[standard disclaimer]

This story is set between On Borrowed Time and Getting Out of Reverse. It presumes knowledge of La Femme Nikita up to On Borrowed Time, and contains no spoilers for Season 4 episodes.

A special thanks to Tia, Titta, and the other Finnish ops for all their assistance

The characters of Patrice, Ruth, Antony, Gwyn, Ilse, and Pyotr are the inventions of the authors. The characters of Patrice and Antony were introduced in their story Outside Protocol. In brief, Antony is the Oversight director responsible for Section 4 Northern Europe, Gwyn is Section 4 head of operations, and Patrice works directly for Antony, but knew Michael when Simone was alive. It is part of LFN Canon that there is a Section 4 - Northern Europe.

Part 1

"Again, I apologize for getting you out of bed. I only wanted you to have as much notice as possible." Patrice's voice on the phone was kind, for her. But Ilse's left hand was clenched on the edge of the desk as though she would collapse without its support. Then she regained control of herself. They were speaking English, as their best shared language of the eight or ten they spoke between them. But it wasn't one Ilse used every day, and she was reaching for words.

"Thank you, Patrice. I had hoped you would be directing this matter yourself."

In the little pool of light from the desk lamp, the diamond on Ilse's left hand glittered icily. The rest of the room was dark - Ilse caught sight of her reflection in the French doors of the study. It seemed like a ghost, the fairness of her hair and skin blending with her pale-green nightgown.

"So did I." Ilse couldn't miss the knife-edge of anger in Patrice's voice. "But there will be no problems." Her tone made it a promise, not just a reassurance.

"Of course not. Good night, Patrice."

Ilse hung up the phone, and stared at it without seeing it. Three horrible words from the conversation just ended ran over and over through her head - Michael Section One. Unconsciously, she reached up to trace the scars which webbed the left-hand side of her face from eyebrow to jaw. She shivered at her own touch , and realized how cold she was. Helsinki at two a.m. in March was no place to stand around in a silk nightgown. On her way back to bed she looked in on her children. Mariana had kicked off her covers again. Ilse tucked them around the sleeping infant, and kissed the round, warm forehead and the black curls like Pyotr's. Alexei was asleep like a bear in its cave, hidden in a pile of quilts and snoring. Only the top of his head showed, flax-pale against the blue pillowcase. He was past six now, and he had slept like this from infancy.

By the time she slid back into bed, she had goosebumps. She snuggled up to her husband's warm back, and he muttered. He'd wake up at a word from her, but there was no sense them both worrying all night.

Her hand traced down his hip to the old scar on the thigh, from Michael's bullet. Ilse thought back to how Pyotr had acquired that scar, and she felt better able to consider her conversation with Patrice. If they could get away from Michael and Section One holding them at gunpoint, then avoiding Michael's team for one mission should be no problem. Whatever happened, Pyotr and the children would stay in Helsinki, well out of the line of fire this time. They had been outrageously lucky once, and she wasn't about to tempt fate. The degree of risk depended on the route the convoy took tomorrow night. Moscow to Smolensk to Minsk they were sure of, but would they go west to Vilnius or due north into Latvia?

In the London station of Section Four, Patrice was also looking at a silent phone. Andrea Kosssov's cherry-red spikes were long gone. Her hair was back to its natural chestnut, and cut into a flattering bob. But not even the best haircut conceals exhaustion and worry. Alone in her office, Patrice wasn't troubling to hide her feelings. She looked up when the door opened, and steeled her features into their habitual expression of faintly contemptuous calm.

But the Eurasian woman in the doorway knew Patrice too well for there to be any pretense between them. She came in, sat down on the corner of Patrice's desk, and touched the other woman lightly on the shoulder. Patrice never liked sympathy.

"I heard Oversight gave the assignment to Section One. I'm sorry."

"It was too high-profile for George to let slip. We lost, Ruth. Michael's going to take a team into the Baltics. I just got off the phone to Ilse."

"You warned her." Ruth was stating a fact, not a criticism.

"Of course I did. Seven years of work goes down the drain if her operation is blown."

"We can hope the shipment goes through Riga instead of Tallinn. Then they wouldn't come within a hundred miles of her."

"We can hope." Patrice's voice was bitter. "We provided the intel, but Oversight was persuaded the mission was too risky for us."

"Are you going to approach Michael?" There was an edge to Ruth's voice when she said his name, there always was.

"No. He's desperate for something to bargain with right now, he'd use this to try to force them to leave him and Nikita alone. I'm not throwing away our Baltic network so Michael can be with his blonde." Patrice said the last word as French, and scorn dripped from it. Ruth allowed herself a genuine smile, one that brought a gleam to her dark, almond eyes, and ran her hand through Patrice's hair.

"There's nothing else you can do tonight. Come to bed."

"All right." Patrice stretched and stood up. She was at least two inches shorter and twenty pounds lighter than Ruth, who still had the rounded figure and shining black hair of the successful Valentine op she had been five years before, when Patrice had met her in Asian Sector headquarters. Even now, when she was a trainer, she wore an expertly tailored dress, the exact shade of kingfisher blue to flatter her skin, and the precise length to set off her legs. Patrice's trouser suit, on the other hand, was a strictly utilitarian navy, and she never thought about what she looked like unless mission parameters required it. But people remembered Patrice, and Ruth was just that attractive woman who worked for her. The way Ruth liked it - she had always found it much more useful to be written off as the girlfriend. No one ever said an unguarded word to Patrice.

Part 3

Madeline discussed the mission with Operations the following morning, before the briefing itself. He was in his most approachable mood over breakfast.

She leaned back with her second cup of coffee, and kept her voice casual.

"This seems like a fairly routine mission. Why did George insist we take it on?

"The Russians can't afford to look after their own stockpiles properly, but up to now they haven't been willing to let us take over. It's a political coup, if we carry this off."

"What about Section 4? It was their information."

Madeline knew the politics on Oversight, knew that taking this mission away from Four would only heighten the tension between the two Sections, which was also a personal hostility between Operations and Gwyn, the head of Four. If George ever mended fences with Antony, Section Four's director on Oversight, then together they might well be able to overcome Section One's advantage, the key file. It was a perpetual game of cutthroat chess, and Paul didn't play it as well as she did.

"So they trade off their intelligence networks for our greater operational capability. That's how it works."

At least, that was how Operations justified needing intel from other Sections. Section One's brutally high attrition rate was defended by their higher success ratio, at least so far. But the constant turnover of field agents meant that they had trouble maintaining their intel networks, based as these always were as much on personal relationships and an ongoing balance of favours returned and owed as on holding a gun to someone's head. Madeline knew how that could be turned into a weakness. Gwyn never missed a chance to emphasize that Section One's 3-point advantage in success was paid for by double her own rate of operative loss.

"We're sending the minimum team required, according to our own profile."

"Let Michael ask for backup if he needs it. He gets along with Gwyn."

So that was Operations' plan, make Michael look overambitious if he failed, incompetent if he asked for help. At least it made sense. Of course, if Michael succeeded .but Operations would assume all the glory would be attributed to him.

Operations was already in a bad mood when the briefing starting. Davenport could tell, just from the way he stood there, shoulders slightly hunched and weight balanced forward, like a boxer in the ring. Davenport looked around the table and wondered what was going to require so much muscle: Michael, himself, Taylor, Snow, and another couple of heavyweight operatives. But not Nikita. She was over at Birkoff's station, studying a monitor. Davenport risked a glance sideways at Michael. But those cool, pale eyes were focussed unswervingly on Operations, almost visibly intent on not looking over to Nikita. In Michael's place he wouldn't have been able to mask his resentment. But Michael's control was like a suit of armor; there wasn't a single word or gesture escaping that could be used against him.

"We have received information from Section 4's source in Finland that someone has stolen two nuclear warheads from a stockpile in Koursk, Russia, and is transporting them to a buyer. The transfer point is expected to be one of the ports in the Baltic republics, Riga or Tallinn."

Davenport wondered what there could be in that last word to put the savagely ironic tone in Operations's voice and stiffen up Taylor as though he expected to be hit.

"You'll be leaving as soon as your gear is ready. You'll intercept the convoy between Minsk and the Russian border and follow it. We want both the buyers and the sellers alive for interrogation. Of course, it goes without saying that we also want to retrieve the warheads safely. Don't let them fall off the dock."

That last remark penetrated even Michael's armor. Davenport saw the muscles in his jaw twitch as Michael clenched his teeth and then deliberately relaxed.

Davenport went straight to Munitions after the briefing, since he'd had a chance to change into fatigues and Kevlar beforehand, and watched with a certain amazement as crate after crate was packed: soft-nose and armor-piercing bullets, tear gas grenades, gas masks, handguns, small automatic rifles, and even a sharpshooter's rifle.

"What, no rocket launchers?

Walter acknowledged the weak joke with a nod. "Can't risk any damage to the cargo, you know."

Davenport looked around, but neither Michael nor Taylor were within earshot yet.

"Listen, Walter. There's something going on I don't understand. What's so scary about Estonia? It's not exactly hostile territory. Michael and Taylor are acting as though we were parachuting into Iraq."

"Yeah, I guess you weren't around back then. Must be seven years ago. Do you remember a recruit named Peter - Eastern European, good at languages, neo-nazi background? He'd have been the year after you and Taylor."

"Vaguely - that's right, wasn't he the guy who couldn't do anything well enough for Michael?"

Walter shook his head. "I never understood why they gave him to Michael to train, right after Simone was lost, unless they wanted to give Michael a target. Boy, Peter regretted coming in with a white-supremacist label."

"Didn't he end up buddied with Taylor?"

Walter nodded. " Madeline's idea - get rid of all his racist ideas by making a black guy his mentor."

"So how do we get to Estonia? I was posted out to New York after I finished training. By the time I came back, Taylor and Mentz were on team one and Peter was nowhere."

The crates finished, Walter settled himself on his stool, enjoying an opportunity to storytell.

"We lost him on his first deep-cover mission, a valentine. There was a woman in Tallinn, what was her name? Anyway, her father had run a smuggling operation out of Tallinn pretty much since Khrushchev - we used it, MI-5 used it, even the CIA, to move agents in and out of the old Soviet Union. He died around 89. The writing was already on the wall that the Soviets were on the way out. We heard his daughter had some kind of operation going there, even after the Baltic states got independence. Peter was sent in to see what she had, was it worth taking over. Didn't seem like much, so they decided to bring her in, debrief her, use her intel to set up one of our own people. That's where it all went wrong." Walter looked back seven years, rifling through his memory for Peter's face. Dark hair, that was right, curly when he grew it out, looked as though he should have a gold earring and a headscarf and play the violin in a Hungarian restaurant. At least, that was what he'd looked like before valentine training, which turned him into someone lithe and graceful, more like those figure-skaters girls liked to watch on tv.

" Too risky to pull her out of Tallinn itself - she had all the advantage there. Peter got her as far west as Prague. Michael's team was supposed to retrieve. Instead she went headfirst out a window into the river, and Peter went out after her. They didn't find the bodies for weeks. With her gone, whatever network she had just dissolved. One of those people who kept everything in her head, nothing on paper or disk. Ever since we've had to use Section 4's network out of Finland for regional intel. Michael doesn't like being reminded of his failures, neither does Taylor."

"We'd better not screw up this one then."

"If you do, look for a likely window. You won't want to come back in."

"Is that why Nikita's not assigned to this?"

"Don't ask me. She pulled team leader position on the mission to Istanbul. Look bad if Michael took that away from her just to run point for him."

Smart maneuvre on somebody's part, Davenport thought. Keep Nikita a thousand miles away from Michael, and make him look like a jerk who wanted to keep her from being team leader if he asked for reassignment. Not that Michael would ever be stupid enough to fall for it.

"Ready." Michael was fully dressed, just pulling on his gloves. His tone of voice was too flat to make the word a question; it balanced between "are you ready" and "you'd damn well better be." Davenport dragged his jacket on, picked up the last crate from Walter, and answered, "Yes".

The cargo plane landed at a disused military base outside of Minsk. Within ten minutes, it was back in the air and the van was on the road, pulling two motorcycles on a trailer to make them look more civilian. Birkoff, in the midst of a heated exchange with Simon, barely noticed the transition.

"What do you mean, a thirty-minute window? We're trying to pick out two semis on one of the busiest routes in Russia, and they're giving us 30 minutes of satellite time? I know there's only the one satellite in range capable of picking up the radioactive signature. So what's more important? What if we can't get visual confirmation in that time?"

"We'll get it." Michael's confidence was steadying, even though Birkoff knew there was no logical reason for it, just the unacceptability of failure. It took twenty-seven minutes and some cutthroat driving to position the van three vehicles back of their target convoy. Two semis, with an ex-military covered truck in front and another behind. Nothing unusual- looking, but Michael had a shrewd suspicion what was concealed behind the canvas covers.

"Pull out and pass them. Birkoff, scan infra-red."

"Right. Six people in the back of the rear vehicle, three in each semi, another six in the back of the lead truck, plus drivers."

Everyone in the van could do the math. Seven of them, if you counted Birkoff, and twenty-two of the other guys. Michael saw the glances being traded as his team started to wonder whether they were actually supposed to intercept this convoy, or just die trying. It wasn't always too safe being on Michael's team, and so far as they knew, there was no backup.

"Next lay-by. Taylor, with me."

This was the real reason for the motorcycles. He would do the vehicle marking himself - show them he wasn't keeping himself out of the line of fire. He pulled on gloves and helmet, loaded what resembled a flare gun with small glass cartridges. Radioactive iodine in an inert oil base - hard to wash off even in steady rain, and Birkoff would be able to track each vehicle individually. He looked at Taylor, now massive and unrecognizable in a face-plated helmet and head - to -toe black leather, who nodded back. Michael felt the van gear down to pull over.

"Go."

They were off the highway for precisely four minutes, the team working like a pit crew to get the motorcycles out of the trailer and on their way. Michael pulled back into traffic first, and began to weave his way forward to the convoy. One cartridge for each regular vehicle, then the truck cabs and the trailers separately. Michael held the gun in his left hand and steadied it across his right forearm. A single series of shots as he accelerated between the two lines of traffic, and then he pulled in two cars ahead of the convoy.

"Confirm."

Birkoff's voice came through the comlink. "Eight markers confirmed. Coming back in?"

"No." Michael watched the traffic slowing down ahead of him in anticipation of the Latvian border. If they pulled off now, they could lose the target trying to get back on. " Cross first."

He and Taylor started to play surveillance tag - taking turns to pull ahead of the convoy, drop behind it, distract their attention from the van which held its position four vehicles behind. This part should have been purely routine, but Michael never trusted a mission to stay on profile. The road branched just north of the border, west to Riga and north to Tallinn. He wanted to stay loose until he knew which port was the destination. He'd have to alert Section 4 then, even if he didn't need to ask for backup. Michael never made an unnecessary enemy, and he preferred staying on good terms with his old colleagues in Four, however little they might like him. Simone's reproachful ghost stood between him and any friendships there.

The foresight which seemed like clairvoyance to operatives under his command stood him in good stead. At the intersection with the highway to Riga, two target vehicles turned right, the other two continuing north.

"What should we do, Michael?"

"Tracking range?"

"Forty kilometres."

"Turn right, and then pull over." Michael wondered if the original intel had covered the possibility of both ports being used. Operations never let Four tell him his business. He parked his motorcycle on the far side of the van, and motioned Taylor to join him inside.

"Put me through to Four." All the while, he and Taylor were cramming what they could into pockets and backpacks. The rifle had to stay, and the gas masks. Too bulky to conceal, and the Estonian border guards could hardly be expected to wave those through, whatever their briefing had been.

"This is Helsinki Station," a woman's voice came through, but not one Michael recognized.

"The target has divided. Two vehicles moving south, two north. We'll need backup at both locations. I have north, Davenport has south."

"Understood. Contact us when you have rendezvous points. Teams standing by as per our profile." A light went on for Michael. So Section Four was taking the position that providing backup had always been part of the mission profile, as indeed it had in their original briefing to Oversight, and Michael was simply working to plan. A pleasure dealing with someone like Gwyn, although Operations never thought so. Operations would be hard pressed to find a reason to fault Michael in the final report to Oversight.

Michael and Taylor were back on the road north within ten minutes of losing sight of their targets, weaving fearlessly through traffic to catch up before they got out of tracking range.

"I have you within 500 metres,." Birkoff's voice came through Michael's link, probably for the last time before Tallinn.

"Confirm visual Out." Michael rarely wasted breath on things like goodbye or good luck.

Ilse and Pyotr's house in Eira, one of Helsinki's nicest neighbourhoods, wasn't Helsinki Station, but it was large and secure enough to provide a reasonable substitute. The official line within Section 4 was that the director's office was supervising this mission personally because of its high profile. Patrice was keeping her promise to Ilse. Ruth was handling communications - a voice that no one in Section One would recognize. Using this house instead of Helsinki Station had the further advantage of its proximity to West Harbour, where the catamaran service to Tallinn docks.

"Blue team, you're going to Riga. Immediate departure. A safe location and transport in Riga have already been arranged. Be ready to move out as soon as you arrive - your orders will be waiting for you. If Section One forgets, remind them that safe handling of the cargo is the first priority, and then securing prisoners for questioning. Their team leader is Davenport and they will be providing technical support. Red team, you have Tallinn. You will be able to call on local backup."

But Ilse and Pyotr went to Tallinn themselves --

"Don't you trust me?"

"Certainly, Patrice, and we'll need your team to handle transport. But you need our expertise. No one knows the docks as well as my people do - how to get in and out of warehouses, which back alleys connect and which dead-end. But if my people go in, I have to be there too. They work for me, not for Section 4. Besides, who of your people speaks Russian and Estonian and Finn interchangeably?"

Having no answer to Ilse's question, Patrice changed the subject. "Stay out of sight. It's Michael and Taylor. They might not recognize you, but they'd know Pyotr."

"Be nice to see Taylor again - he's done well to be still around, " was Pyotr s only comment. The argument over his accompanying Ilse had been fought behind closed doors, and he had won it only on the condition that he not expose himself to any risk of identification.

*********

The catamaran trip from Helsinki to Tallinn takes about an hour and forty minutes. Ilse used it to catch up on lost sleep, since the trip itself was tediously familiar. Either she or Pyotr or both had been making it not less than twice a week for the last seven years, ever since she had been forced to move her own location to Finland. She could hardly have chosen a more secure location, a corner seat with Pyotr beside her and a full team from Section 4 around her trying desperately to look like tourists with nothing more exciting than Toblerone and decent toilet paper in their duffel bags. Ilse slept easily but lightly, the way operatives learn to, getting the most out of every opportunity. Pyotr, who had had a full nights' sleep, merely settled her more comfortably on his shoulder, made sure his jacket was open enough for a clean draw on the shoulder holster, and kept his gaze moving around the cabin. But that only occupied the surface of his mind. Underneath his automatic alertness, Pyotr's thoughts were full of seven-year-old pictures. Not the actual escape from the hotel in Prague - he didn't remember that clearly enough. The shock of the cold water when he hit the river, that was vivid enough, and his desperate search for Ilse in the blackness, wringing out in the shelter of the bridge, the quick hotwiring of a Volvo with Czech plates and the white-knuckle drive south over the Slav border to Brno - all that had happened in a single flood of adrenaline, instinct and training blending seamlessly for the first time. Section had done a better job on him than his scores would have predicted.

The train trip from Brno to Vienna had been his first chance to stop and think about what he was doing. Lack of initiative, that had been one of his biggest flaws as a recruit. So terrified of failing, of Michael's swift and brutal retribution, that he stuck rigidly to the profile and panicked if anything unexpected happened. Unexpected, he supposed throwing the mark through a plate glass window counted as such. And they'd always tried to get him to show more spontaneity in the field. Well, to judge by the look on Michael's face, he had finally succeeded in impressing the miserable sod. For once, just once, he'd beaten Michael. Provided that he could get Ilse away, it would all be worth while, whatever happened to him. Melodramatic, it sounded now, in the prosaic setting of the Tallinn ferry. But it had been plain truth at the time. His best case scenario had been a bullet in the head.

For the trip to Vienna, a tip to the conductor and a whisper about the Frau's delicate condition had been enough to get them a compartment. Ilse had taught him that a pocket full of cash, and at least one spare identity, were travelling essentials. The conductor had also produced a blanket, pillows, a thermos jug of coffee and the location of the first-aid box.

"If Madame finds the motion of the train distressing."

"You are too kind." German was Pyotr's third language, he'd only been speaking it since he was seven. That was what had made him valuable to Section, what had kept him alive through the horrors of training - eight languages including Hungarian, Polish and Serbo-Croat. He could pass as an educated native anywhere between Bonn and Moscow. "Would we be able to have lunch in our compartment?"

"Certainly. But the selection is not large."

Pyotr at this point would have slain and barbecued the conductor himself for a hot meal. "Soup for the Madame, and tea, and anything hot for myself." He helped himself to bandages and tape out of the first-aid box, and did the best he could on Ilse's face. The bleeding had stopped now; the cuts were many but fine. He pulled her hair forward and wrapped the scarf around. It would have to do. There wasn't much he could do for his own injury. The bullet had torn through muscle rather than bone. He'd taped it up first with a cloth and black electrical tape after he'd stolen the car, just to keep the bleeding down. The holes in his trousers he'd concealed with the car coat. Now he had time to change that bandage, repack the wound, pull together the holes in the fabric with more tape, on the inside. Not much longer now. He could feel his temperature going up already, despite a couple of grams of aspirin. But Ilse looked better, some colour was coming back to her cheeks.

"Try to eat something, darling."

"Where are we?"

"Almost to Vienna."

"Are we alone?"

There was no mistaking her meaning. "So far."

"I know where we can go in Vienna."

Then there was a knock on the compartment door. Ilse ate carefully, wasting nothing.

"How do you feel?" he asked anxiously.

"All right." Her clothes were dry, now. He'd taken off her shoes and her sodden jacket in the car, and driven to Brno with the heater on full blast. She stretched cautiously in the seat, slid one hand over her belly.

"I don't remember any cramps."

"There wasn't any.. bleeding when I took you out of the car." They were both picking their words, avoiding each other's eyes. Pyotr began to realize that if Section didn't kill him Ilse might and probably should. Never mind that now - he'd had more happiness in three months with Ilse than anyone in Section ever got. God, just let her get away, and I'll die easy.

They kept up the charade of the happy married couple until their arrival in Vienna, walking through the train station and hailing a taxi. Ilse told the driver,

"Hotel Strauss, please," and didn't say another word until they got out of the cab. She sat without touching or looking at Pyotr, twisting her big amber ring round and round her left ring finger.

"Ask for room 735," she told him quietly as they went up the steps. As they checked in, she stood just behind him, leaning a litle against the front dest. Pyotr was limping now, a pain like scalding water searing down his leg. But he signed the register to match their current papers, Finnish, took their one piece of luggage (actually a gym bag from the trunk of the original stolen car, containing that car's tool kit and blanket, the remaining contents of his and Ilse's pockets as they dried out, and his gun, carefully stripped and packed among the roll of tools for safekeeping), and kept on his feet for the elevator ride. Inside the room, he asked the least important question first.

"Why 735?"

"It overlooks the street on two sides, harder for people to eavesdrop. Lie down before you fall down. Then we'll talk."

Pyotr was only too happy to. He managed to kick off shoes, shrug off his coat before he dropped. His energy hseemed to have run dry abruptly. If Michael walked in the door this minute, Pyotr knew he'd just lie there and get shot. Ilse appeared to be feeling better. He heard water running and when she came back, she was wrapped in a white toweling robe with HS in ornate script on the pocket. She turned on the radio on beside the bed, loud enough to interfere with a bug, and asked her first question since the train.

"Who were they?"

Straight to the point. Pyotr told her the plain truth. "Section One."

Her response baffled him. She repeated the word "One" is stunned disgust, and then swore with a multilingual ferocity that Pyotr could barely follow.

"I assume you told them everything you know."

"As little as I could," Pyotr was quick to say. "And I don't know much. They want...to take over, put someone of their own in place, make it into something useful."

"Like hell they do." Suddenly Ilse raised her hand, and Pyotr tensed. But she simply laid the back of it against his forehead.

"We haven't much time." She seemed to realize that Pyotr was in no shape now to formulate a lie. "As far as you know, are you wired?"

"No. I couldn't be. You're too careful."

"But you could have a locator implanted, one of those radioactive signature ones."

Pyotr found his attention wandering off to how Ilse knew about the cesium tag implants.

"I've got to get in touch with someone, and I can't do it from here. Do you still have your gun?"

He nodded. "In the bag."

She found it and loaded the clip.

"Do it now, " he told her. "Before you go. Then you don't have to worry. No one will find me before tomorrow. You can get away."

Ilse almost smiled. "You mean that, don't you? Being with me must've been a big change from Section One."

"How do you know ? Never mind. Being with you -- " Pyotr was finding it increasingly difficult to put words together. "Being with you was heaven. Do it now."

"No. You keep the gun. Give me an hour to figure something out. I'll be back."

And that was pretty much all Pyotr remembered of Vienna. In an hour, he'd been delirious, two hours after that, he'd woken up to a Section 4 extraction team loading him onto a helicopter. A nasty forty-eight hours being debriefed, and then Section 4 had agreed to pretend it had never happened. Officially Ilse and Pyotr were dead and buried. An entirely new couple had arrived a month later in Helsinki, with perfictly legitimate business interests in the Baltics, resort and casino development. They bought a big house in the Eira district, hired a nanny and a housekeeper and a driver from Estonia as many Finns did, bought a Volvo station wagon and a Saab sedan. The most marvelous life Pyotr could have imagined, and he would be dead and damned before he let Michael or Section One destroy it.

Michael had never been to Tallinn before. Technically it fell under the jurisdiction of Section 4, Northern Europe: Great Britain, Scandinavia and the Baltics. When Adrian had first proposed the Sections, Britain was still in a position to insist that it operate separately from the US. The Paris headquarters for Section One had been chosen on the principle that since the French covert services co-operate with no-one, a base in Paris would be effectively neutral. But the bad blood between Sections One and Four had started with Adrian's forced retirement and had only got worse over the years since. Michael only knew what the briefing had told him, and what little he remembered of World War II history. Tallinn's long and tumultuous past as a strategic trading port since the 12th century, its famous medieval architecture, weren't part of it. Michael knew Tallinn solely as a focus of anti-Soviet activity from the annexation in 1940 to the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Its closeness to Helsinki had made it an ideal transit point for people and materiel in and out of the former USSR, why Ilse and her father before her had been useful to the West. But Michael wouldn't waste time thinking about Ilse, or Prague.

Tallinn is also the closest year-round harbour to Moscow and St. Petersburg. Once the cargo was off-loaded here, it could be shipped out quickly, anywhere in the world, and those involved would be able to scatter. There were sixteen ferry-trips a day just to Helsinki, and others to Stockholm, besides rail and air connections to all of Europe. Michael could not risk losing sight of the convoy for a moment. If he still had tracking in place, he wouldn't have to risk exposure by staying in sight. But Birkoff and the van were nearly 200 kilometres away now, well out of range without satellite backup. He and Taylor had run the surveillance as carefully as they knew how: switching positions, letting other vehicles come between them and the convoy, overtaking and then letting the target pass them again. The distance involved was relatively short, and traffic considerable. There was a reasonable chance they had not been spotted yet. But that would change now that they were in Tallinn itself, swinging south-west around the old city to approach the docks through the industrial part of town. The motorcycle shimmied a little under Michael as he pointed it across the railway tracks. He had delayed calling on backup as long as possible.

"Helsinki?"

"We were waiting for you." The same woman's voice, with a faint undertone of sarcasm that made him think of Patrice.

"Locate from this transmission."

"Already in progress. You're on Parnu, approximately 2 kilometres south-west of the harbour. Can you keep this line open so we can track you?"

"Agreed."

"Red team is now on route to the harbour. We'll direct them to you, but they'll wait for your direction."

"And Davenport?"

"They've been able to keep a secure channel open." Again that subtle hint of criticism in her voice. "There were construction delays on the Latvian highway. They don't expect to arrive at the transfer point for another hour."

"Good." Michael slid the cell phone into his chest pocket without switching off, and concentrated again on maintaining visual contact with the tanker truck and its escort. He accelerated to come beside Taylor, they made brief eye contact, and then Taylor let Michael re-take the lead position.

Ilse appeared to feel the ship gearing down for arrival in her sleep. She opened her eyes and stretched just as the ferry reached dock. They strolled through customs, calling people by their first names and asking after their families.

"Us? We're taking a weekend off. Tante Ruth is looking after the children." Ilse answered without a flicker of strain in her voice. She really could lie as easily as she breathed, trained to it from infancy.

"Enjoy yourselves - don't lose too much money at the casino!" And everyone laughed at the old joke.

"Just taking money out of my pocket and putting it into hers," Pyotr agreed, smiling.

A man dressed as a Hotel Viru employee gave Pyotr the keys to a Saab convertible.

"Good afternoon, sir."

"Thank you, Priit."

Then the man opened the door to a van labelled Hotel Shuttle in Finnish, Estonian, Russian and Swedish, and motioned the Section 4 team aboard.

"The party from Kobnhavn? Right this way."

Inside the Saab, Ilse established a communications link whil Pyotr drove.

"Red team, go directly to Paljassaarre dock for rendezvous. Target is on Parnu heading north-north-east. On arrival we will patch you through to Michael for tactical." Ruth used Russian rather than English, so that Ilse's people would be certain to follow. Michael's Russian was good enough, and he'd have to translate for Taylor if Taylor couldn't keep up. Riga she would do in English, since neither Davenport nor Birkoff were good linguists.

"Back up and transport standing by, ma'am."

It was Priit's voice, and the ma'am was for Ilse rather than Ruth.

"Avoid direct engagement," was Ilse's only comment, but Pyotr saw her smile. By the time the arrived in their "office" at the hotel, the convoy was in the warehouse. Ilse went to her own monitor to follow the tactical.

"We'll trace the warehouse rental," she told Ruth, and put a tech onto it.

Pyotr flinched the first time he heard Michael's voice - just barely, but Ilse saw it. She made sure his set was on receive-only.

"Secure exits," Michael told Red team, unaware that anyone outside the team could hear him. "We'll reconnoiter. At least eleven hostiles."

Michael expected to find the buyers waiting inside. He eased up an exterior firestair while Taylor stood point below, rung by careful rung. Once he was in, Taylor would follow through a ground-floor window. At the top of the stairs, Michael waited for a moment so that his eyes adjusted to the darkness. There was the guard. He caught the man in his garotte and pulled him out of the way, quick and silent. Picking up the guard's cap and AK-47, Michael took his place at the tope of the metal stairs connecting the main floor to a catwalk. A casual glance from below should show nothing wrong.

But instead of a meeting, Michael saw fewer people than they'd followed. Presumably the rest were guarding entrances out of sight. Two of them were bent over a laptop, and one of them had a hands-free headset on.

"It's a remote buy." Michael told his S4 liaison. "Trace their signal."

Then Michael saw a third man come out from behind the semi, wearing what looked like a night-vision visor and carrying an AK-47..

"They have infra-red--" The rest of Michael's warning was lost in a crackle of gunfire sweeping the lower floor. They seemed to have spotted Taylor. Michael held steady, pointed his AK-47 downwards and shouted "What is it?" in Russian. The visored man looked up, and immediately fired at him. Michael dropped and rolled; the bullet riccocheted off the metal framing. He abandoned the AK-47 for his Para-Ordnance already loaded with trank darts. Dead bodies wouldn't tell who the intended buyers were.

"Secure the area." Michael ordered, and took careful aim on one of the men by the computer. It was closed now, but if they could capture, retrieve the last keystrokes, they could trace the link. Michael was now the focus of firing from below. Even as he took his shot, and saw the man drop, he also saw a smoking canister roll in from behind the semi. Gas grenade, good idea. Then Michael remembered that his mask was in the van, in Riga. He pulled his turtleneck up over his face and nose. It would take a little while for the gas to reach him up here.

Michael waited until there were nine bodies on the floor. His eyes were stinging and his balance was beginning to go - not tear gas, some kind of sedative. He couldn't see where Taylor had fallen, or the man Taylor would have had to take out in order to get inside.

"Ready for transport."

"Acknowledged."

Red Team leader, a bug-headed figure in Kevlar and a gas mask, saluted him from the loading bay, and tossed another mask up to Michael on the stairs.

They loaded the prisoners into their own vehicle. Michael picked up the visor, and took it to the fresher air near the bay doors to take a look. It provided infra-red, blue screen, and night vision, very nice piece of equipment. These people had wanted for nothing, technically speaking - they'd found gas masks in the back of the transport. How had he been spotted? Michael slid on the visor and looked at the prisoners - infra-red tags on clothes, a different code for each person. Extremely sophisticated. Michael began to consider what organization could afford to equip its personnel this way, money no object.

"They'll be out for another hour, at least. We have a helicopter waiting to take them to Helsinki for questioning." Red Team leader joined Michael and pulled off his own mask. Underneath was a typical Finnish face - light brown hair, flat cheekbones, hazel eyes, a long-ago-broken nose. "Tikkannen, sir."

"Take the laptop for analysis. And the merchandise?"

"For now we'll secure the warehouse. Easier to return them both by sea than land."

Michael turned, drawn by the sound of dragging feet. Two members of Red Team were finding Taylor's limp body a considerable burden.

"We'll look after that too." There was a hint of sympathy in Tikkannen's voice.

"Thank you." Michael was sorry about Taylor, a good op and a reliable one. He d be missed on first team, someone Michael could trust to watch his back. Davenport was no replacement., since Operations was determined to use him against Michael at every opportunity.

The supercilious voice from Helsinki came back. "The team in Riga also reports containment. Two injured, eight prisoners. Your results?"

"Nine of eleven captured and en route. One loss. All materiel accounted for."

"See you in Helsinki, then."

Michael swung himself into the front seat of the truck, and Tikkanen waved them off.

Taylor woke up lying on his back, but didn't move or open his eyes. Second nature now, find out where you are before you admit to being conscious. He had a headache and a metallic taste in his mouth like the devil's own hangover, but the worst pain was in his chest. Broken ribs for sure. What had happened? He'd gone in the back window on Michael's signal, he was sure he hadn't made a noise. But the guy in the visor had picked him out almost right away. Infra-red, maybe, so he'd have shown up like a Christmas tree instead of being hidden by the shadows. He remembered the crackle of gunfire, and diving for cover, then nothing. The voices above him were speaking Russian. He concentrated on picking out words. X-rays, concussion, drug reaction. Seemed like he'd been picked up by Section 4 medical. He decided to open his eyes. Sure enough, medical rooms looked the same everywhere. Chrome beds, white linens, cold flat pillows, but no restraints. A doctor came over.

"Good, you are waking." The English was heavily accented, but better than Taylor's Russian. He looked at the monitor above Taylor's head. "Your heart is strong. We will move you soon."

Live to fight another day, oh good. But the light was making the headache even worse. Taylor closed his eyes again, and stretched experimentally. No, the ribs were the worst of it.

A vaguely familiar male voice, with less of an accent, spoke from the end of the bed.

"You always were a lucky bastard, Taylor, but this was your best. Thank God for Kevlar. You won't even have a scar."

Taylor squinted - but the figure was black against the strong light. "Who the hell?"

"Back from the grave. Hope you won't mind the transfer."

Delirious, must be delirious. "Peter?"

"Nobody calls me that anymore. You're going to have to brush up your Russian to work in Helsinki Station. It's a long story, you'll have time to catch up later."

"Transfer, you mean?" Did this mean the whole Prague mission had been faked somehow, that he'd been bucked down to Level One and Michael had been officially reprimanded to cover up Peter getting into Four? Taylor shook his head, and regretted it.

"Okay, I'll keep this simple. Ilse and I work with Four, Ilse always did. Michael believes you were killed. You can read your obit tomorrow if you want to. Pretty flattering, for him. Your file at Section One closes, and you stay here with us. Much less chance of being killed for no good reason, a chance to have a life outside of missions."

Taylor was only getting pieces of what Peter was telling him. "Ilse worked for Four?" Then Operations had been starting to go off the deep end seven years ago, if he'd been taking out another Section's intel supplier.

"The doctor's going to give me hell for working you up. Just relax, enjoy the nice helicopter ride to Finland. We'll talk about it tomorrow."

"Why's Four doing this for me?" It was definitely Peter's voice, Taylor was sure of that at least..

"Because they like me? Seriously, they took the opportunity to get one more person out of Section One who could identify me personally. Ilse and I have been out of the database for more than two years."

"Hillinger?"

"Who? No. Wait till you meet our liaison to Oversight - the crazy red-haired broad who tried to blow up Michael. Wish she had."

"Andrea? So all that was cover for taking out your files?" Well, that made more sense that bringing her in just to screw her over and cancel her.

The shadow against the light shrugged. "One of the things she was doing."

"Don't waste your time wishing Michael dead. They've f*&^d him over the last few years as bad as you could want." Taylor knew Peter had very good reason to hate Michael, but what more could anyone do to him? Losing Simone again after finding out Operations had left her a tortured prisoner for three years, losing his son, losing Nikita and having to watch her unfeeling shell walk around the Section saying "yes sir" to Operations. It was only stubbornness keeping Michael alive, and maybe the idea that he could turn her around again. Taylor had given up trying to understand what was going on in Section One. He kept his head down, tried not to get anyone pissed at him, tried not to get too attached to anything or anyone. Like the sensei used to say, reality itself is illusion. Certainly anything that happened in the Section couldn't be trusted. Maybe all this was some kind of elaborate scam too.

"He's still alive, isn't he?" The bitterness in Pyotr's voice was old, and cold, and unchangeable. His two years at Section had been an unbroken hell of humiliation and pain as Michael had stripped off every bit of ego from Peter as he had been then, every scrap of supposed "white" superiority from what after all had been no more than an unemployed petty criminal with nothing but the colour of his skin to be proud of. The worst had been the Valentine training - every squalid trick for pleasing a man or a woman, regardless of the violence of their tastes. Michael had stood by during these sessions, blank-faced, unmoved, and then written up reports critical of Peter's acting ability. No one had wasted time using drugs or conditioning to make it easier for Peter. But along with the hate ran a concurrent fear - he'd never been able to win against Michael in those two years, never landed a blow or managed a throw in drill. Every mistake had been noticed and punished.

"And I've got to hide from him in my own territory." Hiding himself, that wasn't the point, hiding Ilse and the children, that twisted Pyotr's guts. And now Michael was on his way to Helsinki, where Pyotr had felt relatively safe until now.

Michael arrived at the genuine Helsinki station ahead of Davenport, who had twice the distance to cover. Helsinki Head of Station, a grizzled and solidly built man in his late forties, met them at Access.

"Well done."

"Thank you. The prisoners?"

"We're ready for them. You'll be able to question them in another hour."

"Those two first." Michael indicated the two who had been using the laptop. No sense wasting time on the guards. "Second team?"

"Should be here by then."

Michael considered starting the analysis on the laptop himself, but decided against it. Birkoff would work faster than he could.

"We've already reported your success to Section One. They're waiting for your information on the sellers."

Yeah, well, Operations would have to wait until they had some. "Have you seen this kind of equipment before?" Not the visor, Section One had as good or better, but the tagging.

"Not on people, only in documents. ID papers, cheques, it's not uncommon. Logical next step, though. The Russian gangs can afford to buy the best going, that's all. I don't know it as particular to one group."

"Thorough." Michael, despite feeling tired, a little scratchy-eyed and groggy from the gas, found himself interested in who had put such forethought into this sale.

"Please, be at home here. Food, change of clothes, whatever you need."

The idea of a substation being a "home" in which he was a guest amused Michael. But it was typical of Section 4, less militaristic in its administration than One. Clothes that didn't smell of diesel fumes and sweat and that knockout gas would be welcome. He thought back to the last time he'd eaten, and tried to remember whether the time change from France to Finland was one or two hours.

The operative in wardrobe was a surprise for Helsinki Station - a Eurasian girl, dressed for the climate in a burnt-orange sweater and wool skirt, her thick black hair twisted into a roll at the back of her head. She measured Michael with a glance, provided him with a black knitted-silk turtleneck and a four-button suit, the right sizes, passed him a pair of socks, all without a word. She appeared to be aware he wore nothing else. She stood by while he showered and changed, and collected the mission gear afterwards. Her gaze held no personal interest. No, that wasn't it, no attraction but a kind of cold curiosity. So this is the famous Michael! she seemed to be saying. Michael wondered if he ought to recognize her. But he hadn't worked inside Four in nine years, and she was too young to have been an operative then. Obviously some kind of story about him had circulated. Too many of those for Michael to worry about.

"Michael," It was the Station Head's voice on the intercom. "If you'd like to join me in my office for a meal."

An invitation which could not be refused, however disinclined Michael was to make polite conversation. "Of course."

Michael went upstairs, and through the outer glass-walled area into the private office. The figure beside the desk turned around, and several puzzle pieces fell into place for Michael.

"Hello, Patrice."

He kissed the offered cheek politely.

"Congratulations. An excellent job with inadequate resources."

Now even the girl in Wardrobe fitted in for Michael. She would be the current girlfriend. Patrice did a lot of work for Antony in Asian countries. "Backup was excellent."

"Our report, copied to Oversight, says that you followed the mission profile supplied with the intel. I doubt Operations will be foolhardy enough to admit that he altered that profile to reduce your chances of success."

"Not to Oversight." How neatly Patrice fenced with Operations, and incidentally protected him.

"Too bad about Taylor." There was something that rang false to Michael in Patrice's voice, or perhaps it was just the unlikeliness of Patrice ever being sympathetic to him.

"Yes. Shall we?" Michael was hungry, and not feeling up to verbal chess with Patrice. He held out a chair for her, knowing that traditional politeness irked her, but that she couldn't say anything in front of the Station Head.

"Thank you. Oh, one other thing, Michael."

Michael was already accepting a plate of cold meat and rye bread. "Yes?"

"Further backup from Section One is coming in, to go after the sellers. But you've only got a 24 hour window."

Michael waited for her to finish, but he had suddenly lost his appetite. Why so narrow and rigid a time-limit - Operations pushing him beyond any rational expectation just to see him fail?

"Nikita's team finished early in Turkey, they're en route. Couple of hours."

"We should know something by then." Michael's attention was focussed on his plate, on giving a reasonable impression of hunger. If Patrice thought she was giving him good news, then she didn't know about Nikita. Well, that was hardly likely. Operations and Madeline weren't going to let Oversight know they were doing mind-control experiments.

After eating as little as was polite, Michael excused himself to draft his own report to Operations. But what ran through his mind was 24 more hours, that made a 36 hour cycle between reinforcement treatments. If he could get Nikita out of Section and keep her out for 72 hours or more, he'd have a better chance of cracking the conditioning. His fingers kept on typing.

The sellers must represent a well-established and funded group, from the number of men and the equipment found. Infra-red scanning and tagging made successful infiltration of the site impossible . Taylor's loss is regrettable, as he will be difficult to replace on first team. But total losses were well below projection, and all materiel was secured without incident. The motive for use of both Riga and Tallinn as transfer points is unclear, awaiting analysis. At present there is little information about the identity of the buyer or buyers beyond the fact that the warehouse was rented through a Russian shell company with ties to organized crime. We expect that questioning of the prisoners and/or analysis of the computers retrieved will provide the necessary data.

"Michael? Riga team arriving." Helsinki's com officer spoke from beside Michael, looking more Russian than Scandinavian in his heavy blue turtleneck and brush cut.

Michael closed down his station, and stood up. Yes, there was Davenport, and Birkoff right behind him with another laptop under his arm. His prisoners should be ready to interrogate soon, and if they had nothing useful Davenport had brought in eight more.

"So you ran into the infra-red tagging too. It was only the Kevlar that kept our casualties down."

Michael nodded to Davenport, and asked Birkoff. "Anything useful?" He knew that Birkoff would have started the analysis en route. He could no more ignore a technical puzzle than he could refuse an Oreo.

"Virtually blank - no data at all, just the operating system and the program necessary to do the networking. They were connecting to your people in Tallinn when they noticed us."

Michael handed Birkoff the other laptop. It now seemed more likely that the identity of the buyers would only come from the man who had been working at that computer, so he should get to work questioning him.

"Restore last keystrokes."

"I'll let you know if I find anything helpful."

Michael nodded. "Contact me in Interrogation."

****

Michael was still in Interrogation when Nikita and her team arrived from Istanbul. He said "thank you" when Birkoff told him, but continued with what he was doing. Patrice thought that was odd - Helsinki had several people, herself included, competent to take over such a routine task. She watched the scene in Com on the Station Head's monitor, and found Nikita's behaviour equally puzzling. A flick of a switch and she could hear the conversation too.

No joking between her and Birkoff, just a terse "Any results?" from her and a "Not yet" from Birkoff. "Michael's questioning someone now. We expect something soon.. I've got to get back to this decryption. Um, did you know we lost Taylor?"

"Oh yeah." Nikita stood in the middle of Com as though lost, trying to think of what she should do or say next. "Too bad." she came up with finally. Upstairs, Patrice shook her head - Nikita liked Taylor, and he had been one of the first to side with her when they'd thought Operations was cracking up. The best she could do was "too bad"? She wasn't even curious about how it had happened?

"Time to play host again," the Station Head murmured behind her, and went downstairs. Patrice kept watching.

"If you or your team require food or a change of clothing or medical attention, we would be happy to provide it."

Nikita appeared to bring her attention back from a great distance. "What, oh, yeah. Davis, you take anyone who's hungry."

"And yourself, Nikita?" Head of Station pronounced the name carefully - he was old enough to find it an odd name for a woman, as an American would think Fidel a peculiar choice as a girl's name.

"No, I'm fine. If we're going right back out, I'll just stay here."

"As you like."

Nikita wandered around Com for a few minutes, finally settling on the edge of a desk near a monitor running a surveillance program in Russian. Patrice knew it was analyzing satellite communications between Moscow and Chechnya. Nikita stared at the screen as though she actually understood the scrolling lines of Cyrillic script.

Patrice shook her head. Something felt very wrong here. When Head of Station came back in, she excused herself.

"There's something I need to verify. I'll be back shortly, or you can call me."

"Only if we are going to send out a team tonight."

"Oversight is grateful to you for your assistance. I hope to have Section One out of your hair by tomorrow morning."

"We have the warheads secure. " He shrugged. "That's all that matters to me, not who gets the credit."

"That's why you're only a Head of Station - you don't care enough about the infighting."

"That's your job, thank God."

Patrice smiled back, and buzzed the intercom for wardrobe.

"I'm going to Ilse's. Do you have anything to keep you here?"

"No," and Ruth added in quiet Vietnamese. "I've seen everything he's got."

"And you weren't impressed?" Patrice replied in the same language.

"Not bad, if you like boys."

Patrice had to laugh.

The elderly woman who had been looking after Ilse since her mother's death opened the door to Patrice and Ruth.

"Madam is in the bath, but everyone else is in the family room."

"Thank you, Hanna."

"A bath sounds like a good idea, Patrice. It's getting colder out." Their drive to Eira had been enlivened by slick roads, as rain turned into sleet.

Patrice knew there was an invitation under Ruth's remarks. "Not until every damn one of them is on a plane to Paris, Ruth. I need to see Taylor."

"What's wrong? Should I go back and keep an eye on them for you?"

"No, I m just puzzled by something."

Patrice arrived at the doorway to the family room. A fire crackled merrily on the stone hearth, but the three heads she could see over the back of the sofa were focussed on the television set: one dark, one fair, one shaved bald.

"Hockey, I should have known."

"Shhh." came Alexei's voice. "We've got the power play."

"Well, if Finland is playing,"

"Estonia," Alexei corrected her with the same explaining-to-idiots impatience that she tended to use herself.

Patrice switched to English. "Let me borrow Taylor for a moment. Much as I hate to disturb this domestic bliss."

She had arrived at the back of the sofa and was looking down. Taylor was stretched out with his head on the back cushions and his feet on the coffee table. One hand held a beer bottle, the other was making sure Mariana didn't roll off his chest in her sleep. The combination of beer and ibuprofen had pretty much dealt with the pain in his ribs.

"What!" Taylor nearly dropped his beer. He knew that voice. Who the hell else was coming back from the dead? Helsinki was starting to look like the gate to the Underworld. He tried to get up, but was hampered both by the strapping around his chest and the need not to drop Mariana.

Pyotr was already on his feet. "What do you need him for?"

Alexei wasn't good at English, but he knew that tone of voice. "Papa," he said anxiously and pulled at Pyotr's sweater. "What's wrong, Papa?" he asked in Estonian.

"Just a couple of questions, Pyotr."

"What about?" Taylor had made it to a standing position, and got rid of his beer bottle. But he couldn't exactly put Mariana on the coffee table.

"Alexei, go ask Hanna to come for Mariana, and then you can go back to the game. Uncle Mark and I will be in the study. We'll be back soon."

"Yes, Papa."

Once he had given the still sleeping Mariana (who seemed to have a gift for hibernation) to Hanna, Taylor felt more like an operative, better able to deal with the ruthless profiler Andrea Kossov. He wasn't reassured by her correction.

"My name is Patrice, Taylor. I work for Oversight. Ilse and Pyotr come under my jurisdiction." Patrice leaned against Ilse's desk, half Taylor's size but not at all intimidated by it. Pyotr was behind Taylor, apparently backing him up. Taylor appreciated the gesture, but didn't expect Pyotr to be able to do much against Patrice's authority. This was just fabulous, Oversight wanting to ask him questions. At least he'd had a couple of hours of pretending to be normal.

"This is about Nikita."

"Nikita?" Not at all what Taylor had expected.

"She just arrived with her team, additional firepower if we can go after the buyers tonight. She's acting very strangely."

Taylor didn't see what harm could come from answering questions about Nikita.

"She's been like that for, oh, a couple of months now. Up till then, everybody knew she and Michael were seeing each other on the side, and Operations was fuming about it. You knew that two years ago."

Patrice nodded, and waited for him to go on.

"He and Madeline have tried all kinds of tricks, even demoting Michael. But he s just too successful, too popular with George for them to get rid of. Then she came back from a pretty routine mission all flat like she is now. You can see her trying to remember how to talk to people. Mostly she just sits and stares at computer screens when she's not on missions. She's a way scarier op now that she ever was - you just don't get in her way if you want to come back alive. But I don't know why."

"What's Michael doing about it?"

"Damned if I know. Mostly he just seems to ignore it - doesn't talk to her outside of missions that I can see."

Patrice nodded. That fit with what she'd seen, even if it didn't explain how Nikita had been altered. What unauthorized mischief was Operations up to now - psychoactive drugs, psych programming? Not that George would care as long as the success rates were up. That meant there was nothing she could do, unless Michael asked her personally for help. How likely was that?

"Michael never gets a break from them, does he? Thank you, Taylor. That's all I wanted. Go back to the hockey game. Pyotr, if you would tell Ilse I should be back tonight."

"Of course."

Ruth had her coat back on when Patrice crossed the hall.

"If you're going back, then so should I. Let them enjoy this reunion."

"I think they're both learning from it."

The mood in Helsinki Station had changed dramatically when Patrice and Ruth came in through the Head's office. Below them, Michael and Birkoff were just setting up a video link with Operations. He had his back to Nikita, who was still watching a monitor.

"Bad news?" Patrice inquired.

"You might as well listen. We should have known." Head of Station looked older than when she had left him, and more tired.

"Report - " came Operations' impatient voice.

"We have results from the personnel and data acquired in Tallinn. We've been able to trace the rental of the warehouse and the acquisition of the materiel." All true, although Michael didn't know that Ilse had been the source of most of this information. " We also know the identity of the original seller and the intended buyer." For Michael, this amounted to a filibuster. Patrice wondered why Michael wasn't getting to the point.

As did Operations, apparently. "So why are you standing around? Why isn't Birkoff setting up the mission? Clock's ticking, Michael."

Michael paused, meeting Operations' eyes in the image the way he would in person. "Because I lack adequate authority to give such an order."

Operations snorted. "Since when?"

"The originating seller is the deputy minister of defense in the current Russian government and the intended buyer was the Pakistani minister of the interior, according to the records we've been able to access."

Apparently the Russians wanted to make sure that Pakistan kept up with India. Patrice shook her head. That border dispute was top of her list for potential nuclear incidents.

" We would require the authorization of Oversight in council to move against ministers of elected governments."

Patrice said "checkmate" very softly. Michael knew damned well that Operations was supposed to get Oversight approval for any such "political" missions, although he often didn't bother. But by having this discussion in the middle of another Section's station, in front of witness Operations couldn't silence, Michael had made certain Operations would have to agree to play by the rules. Especially since Operations couldn't be sure that Antony himself wasn't listening in.

"A full report is being sent to you for review."

Graphic resolution was good enough that Patrice could actually see Operations frame a word beginning with f- before thinking better of it.

"Bring the teams back as soon as you can. There's no reason for you to stay on there."

"Of course."

Birkoff tapped Michael on the thigh, and handed him a panel. Michael looked at it, and then back up at Operations.

"Tomorrow morning. Freezing rain here, no flights out."

Operations signed off, presumably so that he could curse in private.

"What am I going to do with them, Patrice?"Head of Station asked, genuinely at a loss. Two teams of Section One operatives loose in his station - frankly he missed the old KGB days. At least you had the same enemies every day.

"Let them entertain themselves. Most of them have never been to Helsinki, and they've earned a night off."

"Michael?"

Patrice smiled. "He loves to dance."

"If you say so." Head of Station looked at her doubtfully.

"Just as you would with team leaders from another station - professional courtesy. But leave me out of it. Nikita doesn't have that much clearance." Easier than explaining why everyone in Section One except Michael thought she had been cancelled two years previously.

Patrice watched him stump down the metal staircase, scepticism in every line of his body.

"I should get back to wardrobe," Ruth said from behind her. Patrice turned away from the darkened window.

"Now I'm worried, if you want to look at what she's got."

Ruth gave her a rare, brilliant smile. "She's too tall for me."

"I'll be interested to hear what you think of her, after what Taylor said. Look for any marks - incisions, injection sites. And she used to be a real fashionista. See if she's lost that interest too."

"Are you going to help Michael dress?" There was no malice behind the words. Ruth was just teasing back.

Patrice shrugged. "He's got a suit on, what else does he need?" Patrice knew from experience that Michael in combat boots could still dance like Armand Assante in the Mambo Kings.

Michael stood with his eyes closed, replaying his conversation with Operations and wondering if he could have done anything differently. These under-the-table transactions between governments were the worst to deal with. It could be about hard cash, it could be about political influence, someone unwilling to accept Russia's current lack thereof on the world scene. If he'd spoken privately with Operations, Michael had no doubt he would have received orders to go after the Russian source at least. This way the problem went where it was supposed to, right into Oversight's lap. But it certainly wouldn't endear him to Operations - not that anything would. Michael turned his attention to other, more pressing, matters. The current bad weather meant that Nikita would be at the end of her 36-hour window by the time they flew back. The conditioning might be weaker. If he could get her outside of the Station during this time, away from surveilance and monitors, he might be able to find a crack in the programming.

Michael actually had to tap Nikita on the shoulder to turn her attention towards the Head of Station.

"Sorry."

"As I was saying, since you will be in Helsinki overnight, and off duty, you might like to take advantage of the opportunity. I would be honoured if the two of you would accompany me for dinner. We can certainly provide a change of clothing."

Nikita looked down, and appeared to notice for the first time that she was still wearing the same dusty, sweaty mission gear she'd arrived in from Istanbul. "Thank you. Where is wardrobe?"

Michael heard the faint spark of interest in her voice. Maybe she was just pretending to behave like herself, maybe it was genuine. What she chose to wear might tell him more, at least about who she was trying to impress. Head of Section gave her directions, after waiting a moment for Michael to offer to show her. But he had turned away from Nikita to the intercom.

"Davenport, stand everyone down."

"Yes, sir."

By the time Nikita came back from Wardrobe, the operatives had divided themselves into two uneven groups. The larger, under Davenport's loose supervision, had found a place called Zetor, the tractor restaurant, which promised them lots of food, beer and rock n roll. They hadn't decided whether they would carry on from there to the casino or to a strip club. Alcohol, noise, adrenaline, sex, all the things people used to distract themselves from unpleasant feelings. The smaller, which Michael noticed Birkoff had joined, was hotly debating Thai vs Nepalese food and seeing who was playing in various jazz clubs. Michael saw Davenport purse his lips in a silent wolf-whistle, and turned around to see Nikita walking up the hallway towards Comm.

High heels narrowed her stride, and the matte silver jersey of the skirt swirled around her ankles, showing the long, taut lines of her thighs under the fabric. There was just enough top to keep her from being arrested, stretched tight over her breasts and held in place by a network of laces around her back and throat. Her hair had been pinned up, her face dusted with silver on cheekbones and eyelids, her mouth painted the colour of pink grapefruit. Just for a moment she looked fully alive, unselfconsciously pleased with herself. Then Michael saw her scan the faces of everyone in Comm, checking reactions. Done for effect, all of it, on him or on Head of Section, it didn't matter. Perhaps Operations had asked her to pursue Davenport, deepen the rift between Michael and the operative who ought to be his backup.

Michael waited in Comm, allowed Head of Section to meet Nikita and compliment her, drape the silver fox-fur shrug around her shoulders. Cool as ice, she looked now, her blue eyes narrowed as she watched Michael turn back to Davenport.

"Curfew one hundred hours. Expected departure at eight hundred."

"Count heads myself." They might not be sober heads, but they'd be inside on time.

Only then did Michael join Nikita and the Section Head waiting for him in Access.

"No, after you." He held the door for them. If she was trying to provoke him, whether to anger or to desire, she wouldn't manage it this way.

Head of Section's choice of restaurant was a surprise to Michael, who had expected more emphasis on food than music in the older man's taste. But Patrice's advice had been taken seriously. La Copacabana was one of the more popular places for dining and dancing in Helsinki, with the currently fashionable Spanish tapas menu and live salsa music. Nikita stood in the foyer looking around with the lack of focus Michael had come to recognize and dread in the last weeks. Perhaps she had expected folkdancing and reindeer roasting over an open fire. But as they moved into the restaurant itself, and the music came up to greet them, she shrugged off the fur and began to walk in rhythm with its beat. She had always loved to dance, from her earliest days in Section, when she seemed to deliberately resist being graceful in any other context. Here, she seemed to find it hard to keep her attention away from the band and the dancers. Michael conferred gravely with the Section Head over the wine list, eventually choosing a Spanish red to go with the assortment of appetizers. Nikita, when asked, answered,

"Oh, anything. I'm not very hungry."

Detachment from the body and all its needs, Michael had known that was part of the conditioning from the moment he'd seen her painting her once-bright apartment in stark white. But the music appeared to reach her. Her shoulders kept moving in time to the quick samba beat.

"May I have this dance, then?" Head of Section asked in his formal English. He took Nikita's hand and bowed over it.

"Certainly." Nikita looked back at Michael with a kind of challenge in her eyes, but he simply nodded at her. As Michael suspected, only the difference in heights worked against them as a couple. Ballroom dancing is surprisingly popular in Finland, and Head of Section was perfectly capable of showing Nikita a good time on the dance floor. Michael poured a little red wine into each glass, and sipped his thoughtfully as he watched them. Nikita was beginning to loosen up, even smile. Michael waved for a waiter, and when the man bent down to take his order gave him a couple of hundred marks and a message for the band leader.

When Nikita came back to the table, she dropped into her chair and took a mouthful of wine gratefully. "I'm out of practice."

"Not at all," her partner replied politely.

Michael stood up as the music began again, and held out his hand to Nikita. "If you would?"

She accepted somewhat reluctantly, and immediately began to tighten up again. The band started a slow tango, Michael's request. He guided Nikita effortless through the crowd of other couples moving towards the dance floor. The tango is so popular in Finland that they have an annual festival and competition. Michael didn't say a word, didn't try to kiss her. The dance was enough. She had the anger, the resistance with which tango always begins - two antagonists rather than two partners, one pulling close and the other pushing away. Michael kept his touch light, but inescapable. Gradually, subtly, he felt her begin to respond, to give him at least the appearance of passion. He felt her breathing quicken, saw the physical response a less-revealing dress would have covered, felt her hands relax in his, her body mould to his in the close embrace. His Nikita, the Nikita who loved him and desired him was still there, just out of reach. If he could get her away from the reinforcement, and then use her kinesthetic memory against the brain conditioning, he could break this shell. Even now... but the music ended, and with it Nikita's softer mood. She let go of his hands, and stepped away from him.

"I'm starving. You've got to let me eat."

Well, at least that meant she was paying more attention to her body.

Ilse and Patrice had decided to play things safe, and celebrated the end of the mission quietly, at home. Hanna laid everything out on a long table in the main living room, and people wandered in and out with plates. Good food, conversation, music, the same things Davenport and his people were looking for, but with less of the "tomorrow we may die" greediness. Vodka and caviar to start with, but Taylor knew better than to put hard liquor on top of beer and Advil The food just kept on coming - smoked fish, herring, salmon, potatoes, blinis. He didn't know who all the people were - Ilse's he assumed. The music kept changing as different people went by the stereo - Sibelius, Tito Puente, tangoes, ABBA. Pyotr, watching him from across the room, saw the moment when appetite lost out to exhaustion.

"I'll get him settled," he murmured to Ilse in Estonian.

"Come back. We want to talk shop tonight."

Pyotr gave Patrice a less-than-friendly look.

"I won't keep you up too late." She promised.

The three women sat together in one corner of the main room, plates on their laps and wineglasses in their hands. An outside observer might have believed they were discussing lipsticks and the latest sale at Stockmann.

"Did you see anything, Ruth?"

"Not a mark, and I made a point of helping her with her hair so I could look closely. But her eyes don't focus or track normally."

"I remember her staring at the computer screen. Some kind of visual stimuli?"

Ruth nodded, and so did Ilse. "That's a standard brainwashing technique. Watch the pretty flashing lights."

"Anything else seem off?"

Ruth frowned, remembering. "The same kind of body carelessness that Michael has, so what if I'm naked. She came out of the shower with a towel around her head and nothing else. I'd laid out three outfits - a red dress, that backless grey one, and a more conservative black one. She didn't ask to see anything else, ignored the red one, and held up the other two in front of the mirror. It came across as calculating. "

"Teasing? Look, don't touch?"

"It's hard to explain. She was going for effect, the way someone chooses wardrobe to suit a mission profile, not how they pick out their own clothes."

"You knew her before, didn't you, Patrice?" Ilse put in.

"And I wish I could be at dinner with her and Michael tonight, and see for myself. This reminds me of something. I'll have to check the database at Oversight."

"Provided they get on the plane tomorrow, we've managed to keep my cover in place." Ilse sipped wine, appearing as casual as she could.

"And hopefully we won't need to jeopardize it again. For once their attrition rate works in our favour. Another year or two, and there won't be a field op left from the Prague mission. I've already faded you out of the data files."

"What about Michael?"

"Yes, what about him?"

Pyotr, having come down the stairs in time to hear Ilse's last remark, echoed it as he sat behind her. She leaned back against him.

"As far as we can tell, Operations is taking every opportunity to put Michael's life in danger on missions. Eventually, the odds have to turn against him. They've also done something to Nikita, who used to be in love with him. Looks like brainwashing."

Pyotr thought back, to the chilled-steel automoton who had trained him. People said at the time it was because of Simone's death. But Pyotr found it hard to put Michael and love in the same sentence. "He stays alive, but he can't protect anyone else." Hard to think of Michael as failing to do anything. But there he was, still working for Section, still alone.

"Truer words were never spoken, Pyotr." Patrice considered all she knew of Michael's emotional history - Simone, Elena, Nikita. "Michael's got no time to worry about old failures. My concern was that he would find out about you on this mission, and use it as leverage against Operations. He needs something to bargain with right now."

"As long as it's not us." Ilse stood up, and drained the last of her wine.

"Funny." Patrice also rose, and stretched her shoulders. "I suppose their justification was that Michael's attentions to Nikita were distracting him from missions. But what they've done now has got to be taking up far more of his time. Normally, Michael would have been asking - where did that intel come from, who's your source, how reliable are they. We might have been in serious difficulties. Now, his mind seems to be on other things. He gets the job done, but nothing more. Lucky for us, unlucky for Operations. It's never wise to stand between Michael and his goal. Even if that is just a woman."

"Just?" Ruth raised her eyebrows at Patrice. Ilse and Pyotr exchanged smiles.

" Just Nikita, then. I don't know her well enough to know if she's worth it, only that Michael believes she is. That's all that matters to him."

The End, until Getting Out of Reverse.

Technical note - This kind of detection technology does exist - see www.impactag.com for a portable scanner that can read infra-red and use blue screens to show forgery and alteration in documents. It is used for all kinds of document verification including implanted infra-red authentication codes.

Geographical note - There is a hotel Viru, 3 stars, in Tallinn near the ferry docks, but it doesn't have a casino. There are however, 3 large casinos in Tallinn. The restaurants and clubs I mention in Helsinki really do exist - including Zetor the tractor restaurant and the range from Thai to Nepalese. The tango is so popular there that Finland has an annual tango festival, and the 1999 European ballroom dancing competitions were held in Helsinki.

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