[Note: This is merely the beginning of a story. It's more a concept than anything. I would love opinions, critiques and constructive critism. Thanks! Also this is a futuristic military sci-fi/fantasy so, if it gets confusing, I'm really sorry.]


He never wanted to see his baby sister pull a gun on an intruder. That's why he kept the failsafe codes with her. So that she would be safe from anyone trying to get to him. He was fighting a war, underground, a subtle resistance against the slow takeover of the country he loved. But he couldn't let his sister, one of his hidden allies, his Catrine get into a fight that wasn't hers. But she was so stubborn, Cat wanted to get involved the fight he carried on after their oldest brother died in combat, trying to get medical supplies to them. So, he left her to run the hospital facility that Jayce, his best friend, founded. The medical facility that was the only hope and the secondary base of the resistance movement.

John should've realized that Catrine would eventually make her way to his top operations coordinator, even going so far as to run both of the resistance's security. Catrine was the kind of person that could be the poster girl for G.I. Jane, but she was more actively involved with the digital aspect of security, and frankly, John was happier with that. The less she saw of true combat, the better. He wanted to keep her away from the death, the uncertainty of the time. Catrine, more affectionately known as Cat, ran the engineering aspect of everything too.

If he was the person she reported too, everyone else reported to her. She came up with nearly everything they used. Except battle tactics. Strategy, she was excellent with, but often times could forget that situations could change. John was the best they had with that. He, the ex-Marine turned Jesuit during the second Iraq war, controlled everything. But Catrine made the weapons he used. And now that Jayce, their head of personell, had informed him of Cat's true importance, John didn't even want her near the compounds. Better that she stay under cover of her government protection, as far away from the resistance as she could get.

So, John sent for his baby sister, typing out his last message to her, asking her to come see him as soon as she could. Jayce, who stood beside him, could only cry a split-second warning for John to get down before the world went dark.




Catrine Hope Lawline would not know what happened to the last man in her blood family until she received the report of the security breach of his fortress. As John had been so vital to the resistance, Cat arranged for a seperate bunker for him to use as a command center. The command center ran on completely different lines, and therefore, ran on a different information network. She relied on other human beings to report to her every ten minutes of the status of the command center.

For a half an hour, Catrine received no word. That alone had worried her, but her brother did not pick up his personal line, nor would he answer the emergency line that only she and Jayce had access to. As the third ten minute interval passed, Cat began to mobilize an emergency combat response team, trained to infiltrate or to kill. These men were cold-blooded assassins that she'd use if there'd been a breach of security at her elder brother's heavily camoflauged fortress.

With trembling fingers, she picked up the small land-based phone, and called her head of security, the man who'd saved her from certain death once.

"Oui?", came the answer from a deep baritone voice.

"Kracken",she said instantly as the dark Jesuit man answered his encrypted phone,"We have a problem. Blind Seer's fortress isn't responding, nor is it reporting in. I'd like you to be ready to go and get the fortress out of a pinch in another ten minutes. If I don't hear anything, I'll call you. If you don't get another call, stand down, but stay ready, s'il vous plait." Though it sounded more like a request, Drake, code-named Kracken, would understand the hidden order behind the words.

"Oui, madame. Tout de suite"*,Drake replied to his mistress.

The line clicked dead and silence fell on the line Catrine held. Catrine spun the chair around to face the mirror hanging directly behind her and examined herself. Dark green eyes framed with long dark lashes pierced her own reflection, grazing over high cheekbones and pale olive skin. Short and untidy ebony hair framed her delicately pointed face, giving her the air of a roguish elf. Her full bow-shaped lips, pursed in thought, echoed the lines of worry etched in her forehead. A choker made with thousands of tiny interwoven strands of gunmetal with a dangling black pheonix hung from her throat, rested in the hollow at the base of her throat.

Cat ignored her own reflection in favor of staring at the ancient artifact on her desk, the telephone, silently wondering if she'd have to call Drake again. She already knew she would, but Cat found herself praying that she would not. Those poor people did not deserve the hell she was prepared to unleash upon them.

Every single operative running her brother's fortress knew that if security was breached, or if she went one hour without a report or update, the Hell Hounds would be unleashed. Every single operative knew they would die. The Hell Hounds only orders, if they went into that bunker, to kill any living thing inside, save for the only other people with the same clearance as she-John Lawline, and Jayce Falcier. They were to be extracted alive, and brought to the safehouse where they would rendevouz with the Hermit and then into the ancient subway tunnels, where they could reach HQ.

Ten minutes ticked by slowly, counting down to the execution of the people inside of the Fortress. She stood, stretching, giving herself a cursory glance at her attire. Black military tank top, with a set of dog tags and a black key hanging on a chain around her neck that hung down to nearly her navel. Her lean, lanky muscled body showed no flab, no imperfections. Her legs were long and clad in black jeans, black combat boots laced two inches below her knees, a belt carried extra ammo, and her sidearm, a revolver with the words 'Smith and Wesson' engraved into the grip, was strapped to her thigh. A simple and worn leather harness carried her dual 9 mm pistols, and two silver knife hilts glinted from the top of each boot.

Catrine snorted at her reflection and moved to the space in front of her desk, pacing back and forth in front of it, gently caressing the hilt of a millenias-old sword strapped to her hip. Catrine chewed on her lip, feeling helpless and angry, when the pager attatched to her sidearm's straps began to jerk and buzz, emitting a terrible screech of a sound. She jerked out of her reverie and snatched the pager, pressing a button to silence it, and she answered the page, her husky voice snapping,"This is Dark Queen. Requesting identification. How did you get this line?"

A cold, sweet-sounding voice emerged from the odd grey-green contraption in her hand. "Hello, your Majesty. Guess who?"

Catrine's eyes narrowed, though her voice leveled into something calmer, as she rested her hip on the battered oak desk,"Marina. What is your status?"

The voice chuckled humorlessly and replied flatly,"My status? I'm quite well, other than the bullets in my legs. We have been breached."

Catrine felt a little sick to her stomach as she moved cautiously over to the chair she'd vacated a mere moments before. "How bad?", she asked, her voice as cold as her comrade's.

"Blind Seer is missing and presumed dead-or worse. I'm with Jayce. He doesn't have much time left. He asked me to call you",here Marina paused, gasping for breath as she dragged her body over to Jayce's,"He said...he said he had to talk to you", Marina's clear, sweetly cold voice, went a liitle distant as she spoke to one of her dying leaders,"Jayce. Here. Start talking."

Faintly, Catrine heard Jayce thank Marina, and then his rasping tenor sounded on the emegency line. "I'm...so sorry, Kitty", he began, using his pet name for her, to protect her identity,"I tried...truly...I did. I..nearly managed to warn Blind Seer. I...tried."

Catrine felt tears threaten to take over and spill from her eyes,"Jayce, I know. I know you tried. What did you need? Hurry now. We're running out of time." Her voice strained from her efforts not to let the sobs out.

"I can only say...this...last thing, my love. Votre frère était. ..taken par les lions. ..I telll de volonté vous pourquoi nous utilisons français archaïque. ..to parle."** He faltered, and Catrine spoke.

"I already know why. But I fear they're beginning to understand it. Switch to the eldest",Catrine murmured softly to her dying friend.

Jayce switched to ancient Latin,"Drake...should...polleo ut dico vos...of causa...of quam refragatio...venit super...Jesuits...may videor...unlikeliest...tamen tantum...Jesuits...lucro fidelitas...vobis...quod vobis unus...illic est est a oraculum...peto Crystal Liberi",***Jayce finished. Then he switched to standard English,"...I can only...say...this once. Goodbye, Kitty...I...I love you."

Catrine heard a dying rattle and Marina's soft moan. Marina took the line back,"He's gone", her voice was rough with unshed tears and pain,"Send in the Hell Hounds. Make them demolish the whole damned place. Make it burn to the ground. Dark Queen, Marina Gonzoles, out." The line clicked and went dead.

A sob escaped from Catrine's throat before she could stop it. She put the pager down and reached for the phone and dialed the number for Drake. "Oui?" came Drake's voice.

She only said one thing,"It's time."

Then Cat hung up the phone and slumped back into the chair, covering her face with her hands. She could no longer stop the flow of tears, and for five minutes she sat crumpled in an oversized chair, and wept like a brokenhearted child. The storm of tears passed soon after, and then her mind drifted back to the curiosity that was given to her with Jayce's final breath.

"Drake should be able to tell you of the reason of how the resistance came about. The Jesuits may seem unlikeliest, but only the Jesuits swore loyalty to you, and to you alone. There...is..a prophecy...seek the Crystal Children."


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Translations

*"Yes, ma'am. I'm on it."

**"You're brother was taken by the lions. I have to tell you why we use archaic French to speak."

***"Drake should be able to tell you of the reason of how the resistance came about. The Jesuits may seem unlikeliest, but only the Jesuits swore loyalty to you, and to you alone. There...is..a prophecy...seek the Crystal Children."