2013-03-03 The Longest Ten Minutes

"Ten minutes," One says. "I just need ten minutes to stretch my legs and make sure everything's still working properly. Anyway, I can't stay cooped up in here any longer. Need fresh air, and I need to be alone with my thoughts somewhere besides that damnable bed." For One, the back-and-forth he and Fern have been having for the last half-hour is coming to a close. She (wisely) thinks he should stay in. He wants to go out for a bit before he loses his mind. He's very determined. The Doc really is getting better. He's removed the bandages from his arm and his legs. As with the rest of his newly healed wounds, the skin is bright pink and very sensitive in these areas, even prone to tearing like wet paper if stretched too far. The fresh flesh is there, though. Healed and mostly whole. His chest is still heavily wrapped, but that's to be expected. Too much movement leads to bone grating against bone in some places. Everything hurts. But, like the rest of him, the damage there is mending. It's time to get out. To that end, he's struggled his way into some pants, disconnected himself from the IV and monitoring equipment, and is presently trying to find a shirt big enough to fit over his bandages.

While One may insist that he's going out, Fern is determinedly undermining him at every chance. "Alright, look," she says, her voice reasonable as she leans against his desk, watching him. "If you need to be alone with your thoughts, then /I/ will go out for a while. Open a window, get some air, but don't go out yet." He still looks... brittle, to her. Strong as he is, even he can't hide every sign of his pain, and she's looking for them. A sudden pause in movement when a rib shifts. A bare wince as he twists. She's not even properly dressed, still in his shirt but having added her plaid flannel pants to the mix. "I'll just put my boots and coat on, and you can have the place to yourself for a while, alright?"

After unsuccessful attempts to button several of his shirts, One gives up and straps his holster right on top of all the gauze. "No, no. It's not like that. I just can't stay still any longer. I can't help it." He sounds apologetic, but that doesn't stop him from sliding his Webley into the shoulder rig and putting on his favorite coat. His slim surgical case is shoved into a pocket and a handful of loose revolver rounds stuffed into another. "Relax," he urges, pausing to give Fern a kiss en route to the door. "I'll be back before you can miss me."

"You can't even find a shirt to wear," Fern protests. She doesn't expect to win this battle, but there's still a hope that if she delays long enough he'll realize that he's still not in the best condition. "What if you run into one of them?" The kiss is brief and she makes one last effort. "What if I miss you already? Will you stay then?"

"Huh? I have my gun. I'll be fine," One insists. "Set the traps behind me and use your transmitter if you need me. Remember, ten minutes. Just a lap around the block! Miss you, too!" He sticks his hand back through from the hall and waves, but like a schoolboy facing a sunny day with no lessons, his mind is already outside and his body just has to catch up. The door slams unceremoniously behind him. Fifteen minutes pass without any sign of him. One is never late. Having an internal chronometer will do that.

Fern sighs as the lock snicks into place, and she moves forward to engage the wire of the customized security system. He'll be fine, he said so. To avoid watching the clock, she goes into the kitchen, washing the few dishes they've used. It's not a very successful tactic. Four minutes. Seven minutes. Nine minutes. She looks next as the tenth minute turns into the eleventh. It's one minute. No big deal. By the time it's been fourteen minutes since One left, Fern is peeling off her flannels and slipping into her jeans. At fifteen she's pulling her socks on. She has no idea what to do, where to begin, and she fishes the transmitter out of her pocket.

That's when the door opens, almost wide enough to set off the dead-drop shotgun. A finger reaches in to unlatch the trap after a few seconds' pause. One slips inside and closes the door, but doesn't rearm the shotgun behind him. "Sorry I'm late," he apologizes as he shrugs out of his coat. "I stopped for a cup of coffee." His cheeks and hands are pink from the cold, but that seems to be the worst of his damage. His bandages aren't even ruffled, though he appears to have stopped to wrap his right shoulder.

Fern's head snaps up as the door opens, and she winces, seeing it swing wider than normal and expecting a shot. But no, it stops and One's finger disarms the trap. She lets out a held breath, sitting up straight, one sock on, one in her hands. "I was starting to get worried," she chides gently, watching him hang his coat. Something seems out of place, a frown coming lightly as Fern tries to place what it is. "Did you have to fix your bandages while you were out?" She stands, letting the sock dangle, her eyes on his body as she steps forward, her empty hand raising to touch his arm lightly. "You sure it was just coffee and you're not keeping something?" 'For her own good', of course.

"Huh?" One turns toward Fern and cocks an eyebrow. "What do you mean? I'm fine." Shaking his head, he curls an arm around her waist and pulls her closer. Cunningly concealed, he has a tiny syringe cupped in his hand. A bead of moisture forms on the tip of the needle and falls toward the floor. He reaches around behind her to transfer the wicked little thing to his free hand. Slowly, his hand travels upward, as if to stroke her hair.

Fern tries to step out of the embrace, a little ruffled at having been made to worry over coffee. She'd have made him coffee here. "C'mon, you're gonna hurt something. You had your time out, now throw me a bone and at least sit down." As she's trying to sidestep she realizes what looks odd. "Did you hurt your shoulder?" she asks, looking at it curiously.

"No." One's voice is no longer warm and friendly. There's a cold, distant quality to it. He steps back and touches his ear. "I'm burned. Meet me at evac Alpha-3 in five minutes." Now he smiles, but there's an unsavory edge to the expression. "I told them you wouldn't believe I was him. I never was very good at this sort of thing, and playing doctor has made him too personable to imitate. So, let's make this easy. If you let me inject you with this sedative--" he produces the syringe. "--I won't hurt you and then inject you anyway."

As the clone steps backwards, so does Fern, but she doesn't stop at just one. "Crap," she whispers, skittering aside as she backs into the table, attempting to put it between herself and this Not-One. "Or you could just go away and we'll forget this happened," she offers as another consideration. She clunks into the kitchen counter, feeling behind her for anything that might be used as a weapon without turning her back to him. Even if she had training in anything, she would be no match for a clone as advanced as One himself. With zero training, she'll be lucky not to hurt herself, and save him the trouble. Her hand wraps around the handle of something and she swings it around. A paring knife. Pointy, sure. Tiny? Way. "Crap!" She immediately attempts a lunge toward the bathroom.

There's a brief blur, then the clone is standing between Fern and the doorway. The paring knife skewers him through the middle of one hand during the hasty transition, but rather than pained, he seems to be amused. He lifts the hand up, turns it so he can peer at both sides, then pulls out the little blade and drops it on the floor. "Once more," he purrs. "With feeling."

Leading with the socked foot, Fern slides when she's surprised by Not-One long before she reaches the bathroom door. She feels a resistance from the blade, then realizes that was the feeling of it sinking into his flesh. She jerks back in horror, releasing the knife and leaving it behind. A stumbled retreat is made to put the table between herself and the clone again. "What have you done with him?" Her fear is tempered with anger, both fighting for supremacy in her tone. She's got that whole 'angry bunny' thing going on. "Where's One? What number are you?" Her hope is that he's done nothing with One, and that door is going to swing open again and she'll see the real him there.

"Nine. I was the only other completely successful unit from the original line," he says, somehow managing to sound scornful and proud simultaneously. "If you're hoping your boyfriend is going to come save you in the nick of time, I wouldn't count on it. Things weren't looking very good for him when I broke off from the others." Nine circles the table just fast enough to herd Fern away from him, unless she wants another face to face confrontation. His mouth stretches back into a wolfish, predatory grin. "C'mon," he croons. "You won't make very good bait if I have to kill you."

Something more up close and personal is exactly what Fern doesn't want, and she scoots away for another lap around the obstacle. Her thoughts are racing, first in panic that One could be in worse trouble than her. But if that were true and they know they have him, why would he be here trying to snatch her? But if he were concerned One would come, then he wouldn't be toying with her. She also realizes that, this not being One, he likely wouldn't know things like the gun over by the sofa. Which she doesn't know how to use properly. Okay, that sucks. She could try and push him into the window to set off the claymore. Oh sure, that sounds easy. Let's just do that then. But, he did pick up on the shotgun. "I'm not gonna be your bait," she vows, with absolutely nothing to back it up. She picks up the nearest thing that her hand falls on and throws it at Nine. A can of diet cola. Unfortunately, she's no more trained at throwing with any great deal of accuracy than she is with guns.

One gets home eighteen minutes after he left, having spent nine of them evading his many pursuers Fearing the dead-drop trap, he doesn't just kick in the door, he boots the entire frame out of the wall. Dust and bits of plaster are still settling to the floor when he steps through the gaping hole. He blinks, sights in on Nine, and then immediately takes action. His surgical case is already open and in hand. He draws scalpel after scalpel from it and hurls them at his clone brother. Each is a deadly projectile with a monomolecular edge fine enough the punch through steel. Nine weaves back and forth almost casually at first, but by the time the dozenth blade is headed his way, he's taken more than one cut. The majority of them are down his right arm, which he's chosen to sacrifice in the act of warding off the barrage. The final blade slashes him in the exact same spot Fern caught him with the paring knife. Where before the two brothers were nothing alike, now they are almost indistinguishable except for their fresh wounds. One appears to have been in a fistfight and come out on the worse end, with an eye swollen almost completely shut, a cut at the corner of his mouth, and another split along his cheekbone. His own hands are bloody, especially around the knuckles. His features are twisted into a snarl and he roars a lion's challenge at Nine, who screams right back.

Fern doesn't wait to see if the can hits anything, using the momentum to turn and run, even though there isn't really anywhere to run. She doesn't get very far, either, as the door explodes inward in a hail of debris. Instinct drops her to the floor, and she reverses to dive for the shelter beneath the table. Crawling on all fours, Fern peeks out the other side, seeing the brothers square off. Trying not to draw attention to herself, Fern scoots out from under the table, making another bid for the bathroom. She makes no attempt to look very closely at One, not needing to see what condition he's in right now. She needs to keep her head more than she suspects that would allow. It's not that far, surely she can make the bathroom while they keep each other busy.

THUMP! One drives the heel of his hand into Nine's sternum, sending him flying through the air and crashing into a wall. Nine lands in a crouch and answers back with two-handed strike that THUDs against One's jaw. One is thrown all the way out into the hall. He groans as he comes to his feet, shaking his head to clear it. His next attack is another body blow, but Nine swerves around it. "You'll come to us willingly... given the right incentive." Nine sounds very certain as he grabs One by the coat and delivers a punishing headbutt. "Ooh. Yeah. Titanium cranium. That's one of the new upgrades. Are you okay? Do you need to sit down?" All of this leaves Fern plenty of time to slip into the bathroom. The monsters seem pretty focused on one another. She can't help herself, and not even halfway to relative safety Fern turns her head to look for One. She's just in time to see him go flying out into the hall, and that's enough to stop her. If she would attempt to aid a total stranger in an alley, she doesn't even think twice about her next move. She veers for the sofa, and the hidden weapon. She's played video games, and she's not an idiot. Although the Russian machine pistol is -nothing- like a video game weapon. No other brilliant ideas come to her head, and she takes what she imagines is a sturdy stance, bringing the weapon up as Nine does that thing where the bad guy talks, and she yells, "Leave him alone!"

Punch-drunk, One is barely on his feet after that last crunching hit. His nose is bleeding freely and he's having trouble remembering things. He's standing up, but he feels like he should lay down. Relax. Sleep. Fern. Another snarl comes from between his clenched teeth as he staggers toward Nine, then vaults through the air. Fast, faster even than One, Nine steps aside at the very last moment. One crashes into a wall, through it, and lands in the vacant apartment on the other side of the hall. He exhales, a great sigh of breath that seems to completely deflate him. Then he closes his eyes. This leaves Fern alone with Nine, who doesn't seem at all intimidated by the automatic weapon. "That's a nice piece," he says, in seemingly genuine admiration. "Do you know how to turn the safety off? Go ahead, look for it. I've got time." And all of her television watching and video game playing experience goes immediately out the window. Fern keeps the gun pointed at Nine even as she glances toward the One shaped hole in the wall and tears well in her eyes. Her eyes snap back, vision blurred, holding her eyes on the clone as her grip on the gun changes so her fingers can feel for the safety. Looking down wouldn't help anyway, she has no idea what she's even feeling for, if she were to hit the safety it would be by pure, dumb luck. In her head, she's screaming at One to get up, as if telepathy was one of his upgrades from simply human. Her eyes dart again. He's just laying there.

"No? No matter." Another flash of motion, then Nine is standing next to Fern. He's already gripping the base of the machine pistol, and presses the small slide that disengages the magazine. It falls to the floor with a heavy CLUNK.

"Shh-shh-shh," he says, holding the weapon in a iron-tight grip. "You did everything you could. He knows that. Now it's time to come with me. We want what's best for him, too. If you help us, you can be a part of that. If not..." he glances over to One's prone form. "Well. There are worse alternatives."

Fern doesn't even have a chance to pull the gun away from Nine before it's rendered even more useless than it already was in her inept hands. She lets it go, terrified of the smooth, cold words coming from a face she's grown to love. But aside from looks, their differences are like night and day. "No," Fern says, shaking her head. It's a denial of everything that's happening right now, including that threat of her demise. "I won't help you." Despite the brave (foolish) words, tears stream down her cheeks.

Surprisingly, Nine gives an approving nod. "Good. You have guts, girl. I'll give you that. You've got shit for brains, but you've got guts." The pistol is cast aside. When he makes his move, it's to strike with the syringe that started this whole mess. He aims for her neck, where any hit will get the job done.

She barely even gets a blink, there's absolutely no chance for Fern to avoid the jab, and she cries out, "NO!" Her hand comes up but there's already nothing for her to grab, the clone's speed getting the job done in a second. Fern knows she's defeated now, there's no avoiding the drug entering her system, already putting a fuzz onto her vision and a weakness in her legs. She drops to her knees, struggling to fight against the grey creeping in at the edges. Her voice is soft and pleading before she crumples to the floor. "One..."

Nine lets her fall and casts aside the spent syringe, then reaches up to key his earpiece. "Change of plans. I have them both. Bring the wagon to me. I'll be waiting at the back door." He doesn't even wait for Fern to fully lose consciousness. He grabs her by the shirt and slings her over his shoulder, then picks up One by the back of his belt and carries him like a suitcase. The three of them are in a van and en route to the belly of the beast within moments.