He dreamed...

He dreamed that he stood before a metal door, looking into a room, seeing Simone on the other side of the door, steam rising around her. Shouting her name and pounding his fists against the door, trying to batter his way through and reach her before she took that final step and overloaded the generator, hearing her parting words--I love you, Michael--before she was shrouded in smoke. There was someone behind him, reaching out to shake his shoulder, saying his name, but he could never see who it was, all his attention was focused on the door that barred him from the woman he had loved and married...

"Simone..." he whispered and came awake as a hand prodded bare shoulder, sliding up to brush brown hair from his eyes, blinking, he looked up into the smiling face of Simone and felt a sudden inexplicable chill, same as he always experienced upon waking from the dream to find that Simone was curled up in bed beside him. And in those first few moments of disorientation he found himself wondering which was the dream, Simone beside him or Simone dying...

"C'mon, time to get up. We've got a busy day ahead of us." She was already dressed, wearing jeans and a T-shirt, short black hair still a little damp from the shower, leaning over to give him a quick kiss on the cheek and grasping his hand to pull him up to a sitting position. "Get dressed, I'll make breakfast. Don't forget--we need to talk to Pietro before we head out." A pat on his cheek and she left the bedroom.

Running hands through his hair, Michael pushed the covers aside and swung his legs over the side of the bed, rubbing at his temples to dispel the dull ache these dreams seemed to bring. Three times so far this week, and in almost as many nights--he talked to Simone about them a little and she had just smiled, giving him a kiss and telling him there was no need to be worried about her, she wasn't about to leave him, asking as well if he was taking his pills. At the bedside table was the small bottle of pills to be taken when the headaches came but he had stopped taking them over the last week, bit by bit, flushing them down the toilet if Simone was insistent that he take them.

He didn't like the way the pills muddled his head, making it difficult to concentrate, even if the headaches and the odd visions seemed to be coming on more and more...

Pushing himself up from the bed he picked up the pants lying on the dresser and pulled them on, walked to the closet to pull a white dress shirt off a hanger and put that on as well. Smothering a yawn he left the bedroom and headed for the small kitchen, going behind Simone to slip his arms around her waist. She leaned back into him and said, "What do you want for breakfast? Eggs?"

"You." With her warmth against him he could forget all the doubts and uncertainities he had, ever since he had woken two months ago with little memory of anything but Simone. She was all that was familiar to him in this strange place, with the people that called themselves the Legion, his only link to a past that was gone. She had been the one to guide him through it, telling him how they had joined the Legion years ago, and it fit with what scant memories he still had, explained how he knew the things he did and how easy it was to kill. And when somewhere in the back of his mind a faint voice said what he was doing was wrong he was able to ignore it...

"Silly." She pushed down the hands that slid under her shirt and shivered when he kissed her throat, turning in his arms to twine her own around his neck, drawing his head down to hers for a kiss that left them both breathless. Simone broke it first, pushing at his chest with a laugh, and said chidingly, "We have a time table to stick to, you know that. There will be plenty of time for that later."

He gave a heavy sigh and let her go, leaving the kitchen to sit at the table, elbows propping up his chin, watching Simone as she made breakfast, trying to understand why he still felt this knot in his stomach at seeing her. Sitting back in the chair, he looked up at the ceiling and experienced yet another one of those strange flashbacks...

...Slumped back against the chair, hands cuffed behind him, sweat dampened hair clinging to his face, bright light overhead, and figures circling endlessly around him, speaking to him, words hard to understand but sinking into a befuddled mind. So tired, so hard to concentrate, to deny what they were telling him, because he wanted to believe at least part of it and they knew that, used that small hold on his mind to pull him in deeper. And coming into the light was Simone and he was shaking his head in denial, no longer sure of what was real or a lie...

"Michael?" Dazed he lifted his head to look at Simone as she set a plate before him, sitting on the edge of the table, expression sympathetic as she extended a hand to stroke hair back from his face.

"You've been having the headaches again, haven't you?" She let out a sigh as he gave a reluctant nod and stroked his cheek. "I know you don't like taking the pills but it's for your own good. Promise me that when we get back you'll take a pill and lie down for a while."

"I will." It might make things a little better, ease this nagging doubt.

"Hurry up and eat, we have to go soon." Touching him on the shoulder she went back into the bedroom and he looked down at the plate of scrambled eggs, pushing them around on the plate, the strange memory destroying his appetite.

************

From the outside the building appeared to be a run-down warehouse but the interior had been converted to provide lodgings for the members of the Legion and the two of them shared a loft on the second floor. All in all, there were maybe thirty members that lived in the building, the numbers varying from twenty to nearly fifty if there was a mission going on in the area, and for the most part Michael's contribution had been to plan missions. He had taken part in perhaps two or three missions, Pietro saying that it was better for him to remain behind, that they could afford to lose a few members but not him, and for this latest one he would be the one to actually go in and take out the target, a man named Elliot Warfield that was selling arms to rebel forces in a former Soviet state.

Warfield was to be attending a luncheon at the Westchester Hotel, according to the local paper, and it gave them the best possible opportunity to take him down. There would be a lot of people moving through the hotel and with the invitations Pietro obtained, there would be six of them attending: Michael, Simone, and four other members of the Legion. Scattered around the banquet room, they would provide him with the cover he needed until Warfield was dead and they would be able to escape in the confusion that followed...

On the ground floor they met Pietro in his office, the other members of the team already present, and Simone excused herself to change while Pietro and Michael looked over the floor plans of the hotel for the last time; Pietro was a man of average height, dark hair going gray, wearing dark pants and a black turtleneck, jovial of manner but utterly serious when it came to a mission. He had been as much help settling Michael here as Simone had, easing him into the workings of the Legion and allowing him to take the time to get back into the loop.

"You'll be three tables back from the podium, doing the hit won't take that long. Three fire doors, two on either side of the podium, hit Warfield and go out the nearest fire door. By the time they know what's going on you'll be out of there, the others can go out with the other patrons. If there's any trouble they'll back you up, just give the word."

"Warfield's speech starts at 1:15." Examining the floor plans and fixing in his mind the locations of exits, Michael nodded and straightened. "Just have a car ready."

"Of course." Pietro clapped him on the back. "You're doing a great thing for the cause."

Michael reached out to take the shoulder holster lying on the table and slipped his arms into it, sliding the gun that lay beside it into the holster, pulled on the black suit coat over it and adjusted the holster so that it wouldn't be noticeable. In the lapel of the coat was a microphone to link him to the others and a receiver tucked into one ear, he would hear what they hear and stay apprised of what was going on around him. All his attention would be focused on the task at hand, he had to rely on them to let him know of any possible dangers.

"Ready?" asked Simone as she came into the room, fastening pearl studs on her ears, having forsaken the jeans and T-shirt for an ivory sheath trimmed in white beads along the hem and bodice. She leaned in close to him, slipping an arm around his waist, and for a moment he experienced another weird flash of deja vu--Simone with her back against a wall, looking up at him with wild eyes, he moving to her slowly, with the caution used to approach a wild thing--but then it was gone, evaporating as quickly as it had come.

Shaking himself mentally Michael said, "Let's go."

Leaving the building they split into teams and by 12:30 Michael and Simone were at the Westchester Hotel, walking through the lobby. The doorman had held the door open for them and smiled as they entered but Michael could feel eyes on his back and found himself stiffening, not relaxing even when Simone slipped her arm through his. As they headed for the banquet room, he found himself watching the other people in the lobby, trying to determine who looked out of place, and his eyes fell on a young blond woman sitting on a sofa, wearing a navy suit, lifting her head from the magazine she was reading to meet his eyes, a studied casualness in the gaze before she returned her attention to the magazine.

He came to an abrupt halt, eyes flicking around the room, seeing others around the room that appeared to be watching him as well, just a glance in his direction and then away. Simone tugged on his arm and leaned in to ask quietly, "What's wrong?"

"Something's...not right." It was sheer paranoia, to think that they were watching him, and yet he couldn't shake it, the absolute feeling that they were walking into a trap. Instinct told him to get the hell out of there, warring with intellect that said he was overreacting, and he slowly slipped Simone's arm out from his, knowing he needed that hand to draw his gun. "I think we should break off--"

"When we're so close?" she asked in disbelief, resisting when he tried to draw her back. "Do you know how long it's taken us to get this far?"

The doorman was heading in their general direction and he could see a small group emerging from the banquet room, four men chatting with each other as they walked towards them, a glance over his shoulder showed others approaching. Even the blond woman had gotten up from the couch and was walking towards him, all at a slow deliberate pace, closing him in...he gave Simone a shove and said, "Go!" Dragging the gun free, he fired at the four approaching, the shot deliberately over their heads, and as they dropped to the floor Simone fled for the nearest exit.

"Gun! Everyone down!" shouted a woman's voice just behind him and he swung around, the gun up and finger tightening on the trigger as he aimed it at the blond young woman that stood there. She had no weapon in her hand, just stared back at him, light blue eyes calm, chin up in a gesture that was achingly familiar, and the gun wavered in his hand. He couldn't shoot her, he knew her, even if he couldn't recall her name...

************

And with his attention distracted he was open to attack, a blur of movement to the right and a hand grasping his wrist to wrench the gun free even as he was borne to the ground. The gun was gone and the man over him sat on his legs even as two others came to hold him to the carpeted floor, one ripping the microphone free from his lapel and tossing it aside.

"Don't hurt him." Over him the blond woman, her glance apologetic and determined at the same time, eyes lifting to look as someone else approached. Struggling vainly in his captors' hold, he went still as he saw the woman approaching, holding in one hand a syringe, brown eyes studying him as she said, "Hold him still."

At seeing the needle, he heaved upwards in a desperate attempt to get free but another one came to hold him down while the woman caught a handful of hair and turned his head to expose his throat, bringing the needle in to inject him. A sharp pain and a nearly immeadite lassitude, the hands loosened on him as he lay gasping, fighting against the effects of the drug, and the blond woman's face swam into view, concerned, touching him briefly on the cheek.

"It's going to be all right, Michael. Don't fight it."

How does she know my name? was his last coherent thought before the darkness pulled him in.

Watching Michael as he lay on the floor, struggling to get free, a fear she had never seen him display in his gray eyes, had been painful even though Nikita knew it was the only way. They had been very lucky, the Legion had actually fallen for the ruse of the luncheon and elected to deploy their newest weapon, leaving Michael exposed for the first time since they had first taken him seven months ago. Seven months in which they had assumed he was dead--tortured and then exectued--all until reports from various contacts identified him as the guiding hand behind several Legion sorties; whatever discussion had been done about Michael and his fate had gone on behind closed doors and in the end Madeline had come out with the plan.

Elliot Warfield was involved in humanitarian efforts in a former Soviet state, efforts that discredited the local rebels, and as such was considered a target by the Legion, who had ties to that same group. A few articles here and there, a mention of a luncheon that didn't exist, and the Legion had snatched at it greedily, so eager to do the hit that they had brought out Michael to perform for the first time in public. All part of Madeline's plan to capture Michael and bring him back to the Section, repair the damage that the Legion had done to him.

And Nikita had an idea of how deeply that damage had gone, she had seen the woman with Michael and had been stunned by the resemblance to Simone. Stunned and furious as well, that they would use such a weapon against Michael, knowing how vulnerable he would be to Simone, and wanting nothing more than to go and knock the woman down onto her ass, restraining herself with an effort. It had all gone well, even if Michael had seemed to sense that something was wrong at the end, they would catch a few of the Legion but that wasn't important, retrieving Michael was.

She folded her arms over her chest and shifted her attention to Madeline as the woman replaced the syringe in its case. "What did you give him?"

"A sedative. He'll be out for a few hours, long enough to transport him. Let's get him out of here." She gestured and two operatives came to lift him, Nikita following behind them as they made their way out of the hotel, ignoring the babble of the hotel guests as they passed them.

************

The van took them not back to the Section but to a house on the outskirts of town, passing through a security gate and down a long driveway to a stately Victorian, painted in a subdued yellow with white trim, and parking in the driveway. As they had loaded Michael into the van, Bishop had cuffed his wrists and bound his ankles together as a precaution and when they arrived, he and Carter carried him out of the van and into the house, Madeline going ahead of them to lead the way and Nikita trailing behind them. Up the staircase and to the right, Madeline opened a door and gestured for them to enter, watching as Bishop and Carter placed Michael on the hospital bed, Nikita standing just inside the doorway and moving a little aside to let out Carter out.

Bishop unlocked the handcuffs and stuck them in a pocket of his coat, untying Michael's feet as well; once that was done, he pulled up the restraints that had dangled off the side of the bed and strapped down wrists and ankles, giving the cuffs an experimental tug before straightening. "He's secure." he said to Madeline.

"Good. You and Carter keep an eye on the front, I'll call you if I need your assistance."

Bishop nodded and as he left the room, Nikita moved inside and let the door shut behind her, walking up to the bed as Madeline leaned over to examine Michael, peeling an eyelid back and nodding in satisfaction.

"Why bring him here?" asked Nikita.

"Because if we took him back to the Section like he is, Operations would order him canceled."

A chill traced down Nikita's spine at the matter-of-fact tone, at odds with the gentle touch to Michael's cheek.

"Are the restraints necessary?"

Madeline turned to face her, expression grave. "He sees us as the enemy. When he wakes up, he is going to be...agitated. If things progress it will only be a temporary measure."

"Hard to get him to trust us if we're holding him prisoner." said Nikita flatly.

Madeline let out a small sigh. "Nikita, we have seven days to repair the damage that it took the Legion months to inflict--that was all the time I could secure from Operations. If at the end of that time we don't succeed, we have to cancel him. I know that you care about Michael--"

Nikita looked away, arms folded over her chest, and Madeline hid a smile, "--and that you will do what you can to see to it that he survives this. What I need from you is to do exactly what I tell you, without question. Can you do that?"

Hugging herself, Nikita gazed down at Michael, wary of making the promise, and Madeline gave a shrug, slipping a hand into the pocket of her coat to withdraw a gun. "If you can't, then we might as well cancel him now." With a single smooth motion she drew the slide back on the gun and aimed it at Michael's head, finger tightening on the trigger.

"No!" Nikita lunged for her arm, pushing it up and away and putting herself between Madeline and Michael. "God, yes, I'll do it!"

Madeline stepped back from the bed, a small smile of satisfaction curving her lips. "Good. Before we start I have to show you something. I want you to know what we're up against." She walked out of the room, not turning her head to see if Nikita was following, and Nikita took one last glance at Michael's still form before leaving the room as well.

Madeline led her down stairs and to the right, through the living room and to a closed door, beside the door was a keypad and she typed numbers into it, the door buzzing as she turned the knob. She gestured for Nikita to proceed her in and Nikita walked inside, doing a slow circle to take in the room; it was the only part of the house that could identify it as belonging to the Section, walls painted white, a bank of computer monitors on one wall and a radio receiver set up next to them, in one corner a TV/VCR combo. It was to the TV that Madeline went, picking up the remote control to turn on the power, and Nikita moved closer, watching the TV as Madeline activated the VCR.

Looking over her shoulder at Nikita Madeline said, "You need to see this before we continue." Squaring her shoulders Nikita watched the TV as Madeline pressed the "play" button for the VCR, the screen changing abruptly from black to the black-and-white of a surveillance camera. Nothing in the field for a moment and then two men dragging a third between him, pushing him down onto his knees, the camera zooming in to provide a better picture, good enough that Nikita could recognize the man on his knees as Dylan. "What--?" She half turned to look at Madeline but Madeline gave her a nudge, saying simply, "Watch."

Swallowing, Nikita did as she was told, knowing now what was going to happen. Dylan had been dead for three weeks now, shot in the head and dumped into the river, and now she was seeing it live, watching transfixed as three others came into the picture, the woman that so resembled the dead Simone and a man of average height with graying dark hair. The woman moved a little aside, beckoning to someone that stood behind her, and even though she'd been expecting it, Nikita gave a little start of surprise to see it was Michael, gun in hand.No sound for the tape, just the video, and so she didn't know what the woman said to Michael, saw only that she touched him on the arm and Michael stepped forward to lift his gun and shoot Dylan in the head. Shocked Nikita could only stare at the screen as Dylan's body slumped to the floor, behind her, Madeline said in a calm voice, "Michael and Dylan both came into the Section at the same time, they trained together, did missions together. Dylan was Michael's best man at his wedding."

************

"Why are you showing me this?" asked Nikita huskily, eyes still fixed to the screen as it rewound to show the shooting again.

"You need to see what the Legion has made him into--they have convinced him he is one of them and that Section One is the enemy. He is no longer the Michael you knew, Nikita, and you have to know that he can be very dangerous."

"He could have shot me in the hotel but he didn't." She swung around to face Madeline, hiding the horror and unease she felt under defiance. No expression at all on Michael as he had shot Dylan, executed him, and while she knew he could be utterly ruthless in his dedication to the Section's goals, she had never considered him to be a cold-blooded killer... "What are you doing, Madeline? Trying to convince me to not go through with this?"

Madeline's brown eyes were very calm as she met Nikita's. "I want you to see what he is capable of. Despite what you might think, he has his own strict code of ethics and once he has been convinced that what he is doing is right, he will do whatever he must to achieve a goal. Only four people have seen this tape, only four people know what he did to Dylan--and it goes no farther than this room."

Nikita drew in a deep breath and squared her chin. "I haven't changed my mind."

Madeline smiled. "I didn't think you would." Clicking off the TV, she went to the desk to pick up a briefcase and said over her shoulder, "Let's get started."

He lay on a bed in a white featureless room, muscles still aching from the aftereffects of the injection he'd been given, remembering being taken from his cell to the death chamber and being strapped into the chair, the prick of the needle and the pain as the poison spread through his system. And then awaking here, to this room, and the auburn haired woman standing over him, smiling warmly down at him.

"Hello."

Michael came awake with a jerk, heart racing as he looked wildly around him, seeing the same woman standing over him, a little older but with that same smile, a smile that invited confidences and offered consolation. Reflexively he tried to sit up but the restraints on wrists and ankles pulled him back down to the bed, only tightening when he tugged on them and he gave up the struggle, sinking back on to the bed.

The woman came to stand at the side of the bed and he twisted his head to watch her, fighting down the panic. She's not going to hurt you, said a small voice in his head, the same voice he had worked so hard to ignore over the last few months and now he let himself hear it. "How are you feeling?" she asked, seemingly concerned.

"How do you think?" he countered, lifting one wrist as far as it would go.

"I think--" Slowly she walked down to the foot of the bed and around to the other side and he turned his head on the pillow to track her, momentarily distracted by seeing the blond woman standing at the back of the room, just watching. "I think that you're feeling confused and maybe a little frightened. And that you're not very comfortable like that." She touched one cuff with a finger and he jerked away. "If you promise to behave yourself, we can have our talk in a more comfortable setting." Silence met the invitation and the woman shrugged. "Why don't we start with your name? Who are you?"

Who are you? echoed through his mind and with it another flash of memory, sitting in a chair, arms drawn painfully back behind him, electrodes against the bare flesh of his chest, mouth shut tight against any sound, a hum and a surge of electricity, setting him afire. Pain that spiraled up and up, a voice whispering in his ear, telling him he had the power to stop it, but he wouldn't give them his name, even though he was certain they knew, that small surrender would just open the gates...

Michael shook his head, as much to banish the memory as to deny the woman, and she smiled indulgently. "Such a simple thing, just your name, and you get a reward. I can move the bed to a more comfortable position. All you have to do is tell me your name."

Another voice saying that same thing, over and over, promising him an end to the pain if he just told them who he was, slipping into unconsciousness only to be brought back again and again, no escape...

"Madeline--" The blond woman took a step forward and the woman she'd called Madeline raised a hand to stop her, not even glancing in her direction, brown eyes focused on Michael, hard now.

"Your name." she said in a steely tone.

Now and then blurred, blended, the memory of pain and exhaustion suddenly sharp and fresh, and he swallowed hard, turning his head away and saying in a monotone, "Michael."

************

"That wasn't so hard, was it?" A brush of fingers across his cheek and he jerked back, hissing between clenched teeth, "Don't touch me!" Heart hammering in his chest, remembering another woman touching him like that in the midst of the torture, remembering the hatred he had felt to that woman, to pretend to be someone else...

Madeline drew her hand back, her eyes compassionate as she said softly, "I'm sorry."

Reaching down she picked up the control for the bed and raised it to so that he was sitting upright. "Better?" He turned his head away, hating himself for the weakness, for giving in. It wouldn't stop here, he knew that, this was only the beginning and when he no longer cooperated they would take him from this room and to another room, where the methods they applied would be less cordial...

Stop it, said that small voice sharply. They're not going to hurt you, they're trying to help you. But as much as he might want to believe that, he couldn't, he knew what the Section did to the members of the Legion they managed to capture.

"I want to show you some pictures. Just pictures, Michael." Madeline reached down to pick up a briefcase and set it down on the bed, opening it to remove a manilla folder. From the folder she extracted a photo and turned it so that he could see it, watching him over the photo as he focused on it. "Do you know who these people with you are?"

Himself in a dark suit and beside him Simone, wearing an ivory dress, his arm around her waist and his other arm around the shoulders of a blond-haired man, all three smiling into the camera. Frowning he studied the picture, trying to determine why it was familiar, and flashed to a warehouse three weeks ago, this man on his knees before him, Simone telling him that he was a Section assassin, responsible for killing several Legion members. The gun in his hand and Simone telling him to shoot the man, the man looking up at him with shock and disbelief, saying his name even as he raised the gun to shoot him in the head.

Seemingly unaware of his confusion, Madeline turned the picture and put her finger on the photo. "This is Simone, your late wife, and this is Dylan. He was your best man at your wedding."

"That's not real--" he started to say, shaking his head.

Madeline overrode him. "You and Dylan were recruited into the Section about the same time, you trained together, you went on missions together. You were friends. You married Simone five years ago and she died last year."

"No, she's not dead, she's alive--" The blond woman had moved closer to the bed and Michael glanced at her involuntarily, the dream coming back to him in terrible clarity--someone shaking his shoulder, turning to see this woman behind him, urging him to come with her, physically pulling him away from the door and Simone on the other side... "It's a lie."

"What they've told you is a lie, Michael. They took everything from you--your past, who you are--and made you into one of them."

Lying here in the bed he could remember waking up to see Simone over him, the confusion of those first few days, no memory of what had happened or who he was. All he had was what they had told him and it was all he had to hold to now. "I don't believe you." he said flatly. "Pictures can be faked."

For a long moment Madeline looked down at him and he held her gaze, finding at last that core of ice that had gotten him through the missions, enabled him to do what he had to do. Madeline smiled slightly and said, "We'll talk again, when you're feeling more...cooperative." Turning to the bedside table she picked up a black case and unzipped it, withdrawing a syringe and holding it between two fingers as she bent over his arm.

"No--" He jerked at the cuff, lunging forward, and Madeline stepped smoothly back, eyes flicking to the other woman.

"Nikita."

With obvious reluctance Nikita came forward and brought out a gun, leaning over the bed to press the muzzle under his chin and forcing his head back. "Hold still." she said harshly. He closed his eyes against the sting of the needle and once it was done, the gun was removed, voices faint in the background, fading out as he lost consciousness.

"What are you doing, Madeline?" It took an effort for Nikita to rein in her temper but the anger was evident in her stance and the set of her chin.

"Trying to shock him out of this identity they've built for him. This is going to be an ugly process, Nikita, you know that. And your part in this is next." Madeline turned her attention from Michael to Nikita, replacing the syringe. "As harsh as this might seem to you, believe me when I tell you that what he endured at the hands of the Legion was even more harsh." She had become an expert at gauging reactions and determining how far someone could be pushed before they broke, knew when to push past that point and when to stop. And as strong as Michael was, even he hadn't been able to withstand the torture. She could almost admire whoever it had been that had done this, they had taken him past the breaking point and then rebuilt him.

"Then I want him out of the restraints." Madeline looked at her with lifted eyebrows and Nikita folded her arms over her chest. "He's not going to trust me if I have him tied to the bed."

"Very well. Bishop will take him to another room for you." Nikita blinked, a little surprised that she acquiesced so easily, and Madeline gave her a cool smile. "Just remember our time table. We have six days left." She walked to the door and Nikita looked down at Michael, a hand going to his forehead to push hair out of his eyes. "And, Nikita--" Lifting her head she saw Madeline still standing in the doorway, one hand on the edge of the door, all softness gone. "I was able to convince Operations to give us the time to turn Michael on one condition--that you will be the one to cancel him if he can't be brought back."

And then she was gone, leaving Nikita to stare after her in complete disbelief.

************

That Michael's life rested in her hands was a bitter thing for Nikita to take and ensured her of a restless night spent tossing and turning, running over and over in her mind how exactly she was going to be able to convince Michael that everything the Legion had told him was a lie.

Lying on the bed and staring up at the ceiling, an arm draped across her forehead, she tried to banish the image replaying through her mind, that of herself with a gun shooting Michael, and think of a way out of this. The hell of it was that there was only a thin line seperating the Section from the Legion for the Section could be just as ruthless in its pursuit of its goals, the Legion following its own code as well, opposite sides of the same coin, the Legion a shadow of the Section. And for someone that had been trained to do what had to be done to achieve a goal it wasn't that hard to accept that the Legion's cause was just...

Groaning she rolled over on the bed to bury her head in the pillow and closed her eyes, only to see in her mind the face of the woman she'd thought of as Julie, a long-lost childhood friend, mocking her for her lack of dedication to the Section, the hard light of fanaticism in her eyes as she spoke of the Legion. She had truly believed that the woman was Julie, had taken her into her home and found herself remembering that long ago friendship, but she had never been Julie, had all along been a Legion member trying to find a way to get to Mijovitch and assasinate him before he could take part in his country's peace negotiations. And apparently the best way had been through Nikita, still new to the Section and without that shell of paranoia so many of the older operatives wore like a shield.

And when she did fall asleep it was to uneasy dreams, dreams in which she held a gun to Michael's head, Madeline behind her and telling her that it was the best thing to do, but when she was about to pull the trigger she had seen that it was not Michael but herself sitting in the chair. Sleep came in spurts after that and by 7:00 AM she was up and out of bed, forcing herself into the shower, turning it on cold to clear her head and wake herself up. Once out of the shower she went downstairs to the kitchen to find a manilla folder lying on the table and a ring of keys beside it, taped to the folder was a note in Madeline's elegant handwriting. Rubbing at her eyes, Nikita set the note aside and searched the cupboards for a coffee cup, seeing that someone had been kind enough to have already made a pot of coffee.

Pouring a cup of coffee and adding milk and sugar, she sat down at the table to sip her coffee and reluctantly unfolded the note, spreading it out on the table before her. Not much in there, just telling her that Michael had been moved to a room downstairs--hence the ring of keys--and that Madeline would be in later to lend assistance. The contents of the folder consisted of a series of 8X10 photographs, a pictorial history of the missions she had taken part in with Michael, from her very first mission to the last one before he had disappeared, and among them was the photograph Madeline had shown him the night before, presumably taken at his and Simone's wedding.

Nikita extracted that photograph from the pile and raised her coffee cup to her lips to take a sip as she studied it. A picture of happier times and a window into the past, a life he had shared with Simone--not for the first time she wondered what he had been like before he had lost Simone, before he had shut himself off from everyone else in the Section. Her own relationship with him had always been horribly complicated, every time she thought she had him figured out he did something to throw all her perceptions askew, from unexpected kindness to cold manipulation, sometimes making it very difficult to like him. Made all the more harder by the fact that she felt a connection to him, more than that of pupil to teacher.

A grumbling stomach demanded more than coffee and she had two pieces of toast to go with a second cup of coffee, thumbing through the rest of the photographs; by the time she was done her stomach had given up its complaints and settled into a nervous knot. Six days left, seemingly a long time, but then it had taken the Legion months to accomplish what they had done and they had applied measures that Nikita would not even consider. Rising from her chair, she put the coffee cup in the sink and ran water in it, going to the table to pick up folder and keys, squaring her shoulders as she went to find the room Michael had been placed in, preparing herself to do battle.

Even with years of training and experience, it wasn't possible to remain vigilant every single minute of the day, at some point one had to relax, and it was in one of those moments that Michael had been taken: standing at his mail box in the lobby of his apartment building, sorting through mail when he should of just taken it all upstairs to look through it, aware of someone behind him but not turning until it was too late. The hard muzzle of a gun jammed into his ribs, someone else moving around him to pull open his coat and removing the gun he always kept in a shoulder holster, turned his head to look at the blond man that held the gun, grinning at him as he grabbed an arm and pushed him forward. --Lloyd, said a voice in his slumbering mind-- Out through the front doors and to a van waiting in the front, the man Lloyd pushing him inside, forcing him down onto his stomach on the floor of the van, one knee in his back while Lloyd pulled his arms back and handcuffed him.

Movement off to one side and he twisted his head around to see the man that came out from the front of the van, not recognizing him then, seeing him only as an enemy.

"Hello, Michael." said Pietro with a dark grin...

That brought him up out of sleep, the sight of Pietro's face leering over him, mouth dry and heart hammering. A dull ache in his shoulders and the cold metal of cuffs on his wrists, sitting in a hard chair, and for a moment he thought he was experiencing another flashback but this wasn't the same place as before, the room was smaller and painted sterile white, not the dim expanse of the warehouse he had been taken to before.

************

When? he thought in confusion, shaking his head a little to clear it. Nothing more than flashes, vague memories of pain, but who had inflicted it, the Section or the Legion? The Section was the enemy, they were capable of anything, even of trying to convert him.

Then why had it been Pietro leaning over him? asked the little voice in his head.

But before he could explore that thought any further there was the sound of the door unlocking and he straightened in the chair, ignoring the protest of sore muscles, focusing on the door. It swung open and the blond young woman--Nikita, the other woman had called her--stepped inside, tucking a ring of keys into a pocket of her jeans as she let the door close behind her. A folder under one arm and something slim and black held in her hand, smiling at him as she stepped closer.

"Good morning. Are you hungry? Thirsty?" She gave a shrug as he remained silent and walked over to a table against the wall, laying the folder down on it, returned to stand before him, flipping open the small black billfold she held. "Do you recognize this?"

A local driver's license inside and his picture, the name listed as Michael Renault, credit cards tucked into the other side of the billfold. He frowned as he studied the picture, thinking of the same ID he had back at the Legion's base, same name but different address.

"The Legion sent it us by FedEx, to prove to us that they had you." Nikita managed to keep her tone even as she spoke, not betraying the emotions that memory had raised. Called to Madeline's office to find her and Operations standing behind the desk, Madeline watching her gravely as Operations tossed the billfold on the desk before her. Reaching out, puzzled, taking the billfold and opening it to see it was Michael's, it was like a blow to the stomach, feeling sick and dizzy and out of breath all at the same time. And through the fog of horror and shock, Operations saying that the Legion had taken him and that by now he had most likely been executed.

"Seven months ago they took you--we assumed that they tortured you and then killed you."

And in retrospect she should of known better, if the Legion had been blatant enough to send his wallet to the Section then they would of made a point of leaving his body where they could of found it. Perhaps Operations and Madeline had suspected that as well, letting him remain where he was, knowing that eventually the Legion would bring him out into the open so that he could be retrieved. And bring back with him information on the Legion...

If so, they had played the game a little too close, relying too heavily on the Section's resources and Michael's ability to resist.

"One of our informants told us you were still alive, that they were using you for their own purposes."

The Section took you from us, Simone had told him, explaining away the lack of memory. Held you and tortured you and then let you go once they had gotten what they wanted. "Not the Legion, the Section--you were the ones that took me..." He trailed off, no longer sure of what was the truth and what was the lie. The Section would never let anyone simply walk away free, no matter how cooperative they were, it wouldn't be practical to turn someone loose that could cause future trouble.

"Who told you that, Michael? Simone?" asked Nikita gently and he turned his head away, mouth set in a hard line. She moved with him, kneeling so that she was in his line of sight, and said softly, "Simone is dead, Michael. She's been dead for a year." A flicker of pain in his eyes and she straightened, going to the table to take the folder of pictures, extracting one and thrusting it into his face, forcing him to look at it.

"This is Sparks." Unwillingly his eyes went to the photograph, seeing a tall thin man dressed all in black, long black overcoat and black top hat, the sunken cheeks giving a cadaverous look.

"He led a group called Glass Curtain, they specialized in downing aircraft. You and Simone went on a mission to get information on Glass Curtain but theywere ready for you, ambushed you. Simone was killed...or so you thought."

A brief flash of memory--gunfire around him and over him, shouting at Simone to fall back, trying to provide her with the cover fire to let her reach him but being driven back, Simone falling under the impact of bullets--and he closed his eyes against it, clenching his fists, driving nails hard into the palms of his hands. "That's not true...she's alive." The woman had to be Simone, she looked like her, talked like her...surely he wouldn't care about her so deeply if she wasn't Simone.

************

"She didn't die then, no." agreed Nikita. "She was held prisoner for three years, tortured, waiting for you to come, to rescue her. You never came--not until it was too late." She walked a slow circle around him and he kept his eyes straight forward, refusing to look at her, but she had seen the hit score, a part of her hating herself for using this against him, not wanting to continue with the attack but seeing no other choice. "Do you remember what you told me, Michael? That Simone asked for a backup team and you said it wasn't necessary?"

It wasn't necessary...the words echoed through his mind, an image of Simone and himself, standing in a hallway, her request for the backup team and his dismissal of that request. A memory that could just as easily apply to the Legion as well as the Section. Nikita came to a stop before him, continuing in that same calm voice, "I went in to infiltrate them and I found her, alive after all that time. She died there, Michael, in that base with Sparks--"

"No--" The dream again, this woman the one that had pulled him physically away from the door, the door behind which Simone stood, and Simone saying it was just a bad dream--which to believe? Both so sincere and firm in their convictions, which to trust, this woman he didn't remember or the woman he loved? To accept what this Nikita told him would mean that everything he knew was a lie, Simone was a lie and the life they had together was a lie...

The uncertainity in his eyes was the first sign that she might actually be reaching him and Nikita pressed the advantage. "The Legion went to a great deal of trouble to research you, to know what buttons to push. They knew that to establish this identity they'd created for you, they would need something to keep you in line. They bring in this woman that looks like Simone and they tell you that she's your wife, that you belong with them. And because you loved Simone so much you wanted to believe it, believe that she was still alive and you were together again."

Her words sent a chill through him and he tried hard to remember what had gone before, could only bring to mind the image of Simone at his bedside when he had awoken. Looking up at her, eyes focusing on the familiar face, he had felt an intense sense of dread and shock, had not been able to keep himself from flinching when she reached out to touch him. A voice yammering in his head, telling him that this was all a lie, but there was no memory to refute the prescence of Simone here, nothing at all to hold to.

"But you can't be with Simone again, Michael, because she's dead. That woman is not Simone and you do not belong to the Legion. The Legion is the enemy, Michael, not the Section." And what a bitter taste those words left in her mouth, words she did not believe herself, but she put all the conviction she could muster into her words. "The Legion are terrorists, assasins, they kill innocent people, and the Section exists to protect the innocent."

"Why should I believe you?" It came out more as a plea than defiance.

She came in close, seemingly oblivious to the fact that if he wanted, he could use his feet to strike out at her, and put her hands on the arms of the chair, leaning in. "Because I wouldn't lie to you, Michael, not about something as important as this. You know that."

He could only shake his head, not meeting her eyes. "I don't know anything anymore..."

"You can believe me, Michael." said Nikita softly and he lifted his head reluctantly to search her eyes, looking for the least reason to doubt her but there was nothing there save her own conviction and sincerity. And he found himself wavering, wanting to believe her almost as much as he wanted to believe Simone...

The sound of the door opening broke the spell and Nikita turned, biting back the words of irritation that came to her lips upon seeing Madeline standing there, shifted her attention back to Michael to see him stiffen in the chair, the momentary vulnerability gone, leaving in its place a calm now a little ragged.

"I need to speak with you, Nikita."

Straightening, Nikita nodded and said softly to Michael, "I'll be back." Following Madeline out of the room, she faced her, letting a little of her irritation show. "I was getting close, Madeline, what's so important?"

"Our time table has shrunk." replied Madeline evenly. "In three days Elliot Warfield will be hosting a benefit dinner for the relief fund and giving an impromptu press conference on the recent bombings by rebel forces. We need to have Michael ready and willing to identify potential Legion asassins. You've established a connection with him, he's on the verge of trusting you, and you need to take it a step further."

"How?" asked Nikita suspiciously.

Madeline smiled. "I think you know how."

She felt her cheeks heat, as much as she tried not to flush, and folded her arms over her chest.

"I am not going to seduce him, Madeline." Even if he had once been willing to do that to save her, she didn't think she could do the same, she didn't have the same ability to distance herself as he did. And it would be especially difficult considering her attraction to him, difficult to keep control of the situation...

"Then you will have to cancel him, Nikita. Which would be more difficult for you to do?"

Nikita looked away, wrapping her arms around herself and suppressing a shiver, and Madeline laid a hand on her arm. "Your decision, Nikita. I'll do what I can but you are going to be the one that will shift the balance. Whether we succeed or not may be entirely up to you."

Nikita glanced back at the door, thinking of Michael on the other side, hating the fact that this was on her head, whether he lived or died. It's not as if it would be that distasteful...she tried to squash that thought, finding herself flushing again, and slowly she nodded. "All right, if that's what it takes..."

"Good." She looked at Madeline to see her smile in satisfaction, as if she had already known Nikita's answer. "After I speak with him, we'll give him tonight to mull over what we've told him. Be ready tomorrow to do what you have to."

"You don't need me in there with you?" Part of her was relieved at the thought--she didn't like watching Madeline work on him, didn't like seeing her take him apart--but another part wanted to be there, to protect him.

"No." The smile was still there but it had lost its softness, achieving a hard edge. "There are things I have to say that you don't need to hear. Take the time to decide how you're going to approach him." And she unlocked the door and went back into the room, leaving Nikita alone out in the hall.

************

Once the door had shut, Michael let himself slump back in the chair and shut his eyes, trying in vain to focus his scattered thoughts, to find some sense in all of this. Too much of what the woman Nikita said made sense, giving weight to the lingering doubts over the last few months, and there was also that feeling of recognition when he had seen her in the hotel. If it was all a lie, if Simone wasn't who he thought she was, then who was he? Agent of the Legion or agent of the Section? And was there really any difference between the two?

The door opened again, not Nikita returning but the other woman--Madeline--coming inside, shutting the door behind her, and he straightened in the chair, twisting his wrists hard in the cuffs and the pain clearing his head a little, driving away the weariness and confusion. He would need all his wits to deal with this one, she would be far more subtle in her approach than Nikita, and if there was a "bad cop" here it was Madeline.

Madeline smiled a little, as if she could read his thoughts, and walked behind him; as much as he wanted to turn his head and watch her, keep her in his line of sight, he held himself still, knowing that would concede a point in this game. An opening of a drawer and a rustle of paper, the click on her heels on the floor as she made her way leisurely around the chair to stand before him, holding a folder in one hand, and he lifted his head to look at her warily.

"How far back do you remember, Michael?"

"Why?" he asked, eyebrows knitting, trying to see the purpose of this approach.

Madeline gave a shrug of slim shoulders. "It's a simple question. How far?"

Despite himself he considered that question, sifting through memories to find something past the last two months, but there was only bits and pieces, nothing concrete, no more than fleeting impressions. "Two months." he said flatly.

"How long have you been with the Legion?" she asked crisply.

"I...don't know." He knew that he had married Simone five years ago but beyond that he was sure of little, when he had asked her about it she had always shifted the subject and after a time he had stopped asking.

"And who were you before you were Michael?"

That question brought his attention to her, eyes narrowing as he lifted his head to stare at her, Madeline's brown eyes imperturbable as she returned his gaze. "Try to remember, Michael. What was your name before you joined the Legion? Surely you changed your name."

Vaguely he could remember a voice calling his name, his old name, and remember as well the querulous note in that voice he had hated so much...when he had been younger the sound of that voice woke fear, fear of a beating if he didn't respond quickly enough, but when he was older and less inclined to simply accept the beating, the voice prompted only disgust. Memories forgotten or so long set aside that it was as if it had happened to someone else entirely...

"I don't remember--" As much a lie to himself as to this woman, a denial of who he had been so long ago.

"Your name was Louis Millot. You were born in Montreal, Quebec, on July 14, 1967. Your mother died when you were six and your father--Jacques Millot--took you back to Paris with him. Your father was a drunk and he used to beat you--do you remember that?"

He remembered...he remembered mornings he had walked quietly around the tiny flat, trying to make as little noise as possible, knowing that if his father woke up from last night's binge he would be angry and abusive. Fetching bottles for him, buying food because his father couldn't be bothered to, burying his head in the pillow and crying at night after a beating, trying to smother the sound of his sobs because he knew it only angered his father more. His father's slow decline over the years, eventually giving up the pretense of working, and living most of his childhood out on the streets...

"He died when you were fifteen. You were out on your own, no family, no place to live."

And he did remember that as well, coming home one afternoon to find his father dead, having choked to death on his own vomit, no money to bury him and no money to pay two months' rent. Nothing more than what clothes and possessions he could fit in a bag before he was out on the streets, nowhere to go... He shook his head to clear it, trying to push back the memories, deny them, because in their wake came another memory, this one even more painful to bear.

"Then you fell in with this...group that called themselves Liberte." she continued, voice dispassionate, inexorable. "You learned a great deal from them--how to fight, how to kill, how to make bombs. You placed a bomb in a department store that killed 27 people, three of which were children, and you were injured when it went off prematurely, arrested by the French police. You were tried and convicted and sentenced to death--until the Section intervened. The Section, Michael, not the Legion. We gave you a second chance at life, a chance to atone for the things that you did as Louis Millot. I was the one that came to you--you remember that, don't you?"

When he had first woken here and seen her, it had come to him, the memory of being in that white room, Madeline standing in a corner watching him, coming to him when she had seen he was awake. Work for us and we will give you a new life, she had said, and for the boy he had been, scared and wanting very much to live, there had been no other answer. Eleven years ago Louis Millot had died and Michael had been born--it whirled through his confused mind, images of that long ago past, Bernard telling him and Yves to set the bomb, saying that it would not go off until after closing. Yves had died in that blast and he had suffered minor injuries, requiring treatment at a local hospital, but there had been witnesses to place him at the scene, in possession of the package that had concealed the bomb, and an anonymous phone call by Liberte to claim responsibility. More damning evidence since he was a known member of that group and enough to ensure a speedy trial and conviction.

************

And it all felt true, meshed with everything that he knew and had been told, explained how he knew to do the things he did. A killer then and a killer now--how had he been able to do it?

How to reconcile what he did? The image of the man Dylan's face swam before him and he closed his eyes against it, swallowing hard, thinking, My God, what have I done? If this was all true, if Simone was indeed dead and he had been taken by the enemy, converted by them, then he had killed a friend in cold blood, just because they had asked him to--and what did that say about the man he had become? Bile rose in his throat at the thought and he swallowed again, struggling to banish the treacherous doubts and the weakness they brought. Don't question, just do, said the ghost voice of a long-ago trainer, and he had taken that advice to heart, that and everything else they had told him.

"You remember, don't you?" asked Madeline softly and not without a little pity. He had changed so much over the years, from that angry, defiant boy to the calm, controlled man, far surpassing their expectations, and even she--seeing potential in those beginning years of training--would not of guessed that he would come so far. Watching him grow and learn, guiding him along the way, he had been more like her own child than other of the other operatives she had seen through training. She had seen him through the worst and the best, watched the relationship between himself and Simone grow from that first meeting to their marriage, seen the devastation of her loss and his slow return with the appearance of Nikita.

Michael simply shook his head, letting his shoulders slump, not knowing what he was denying, himself or her. He could remember now those things long ago but nothing more recent--perhaps he had once belonged to the Section, had left them for the Legion...his mind tried to grasp eagerly at that thought, to explain away everything he had done, but he couldn't accept that. Too easy, too much of an escape, and he had enough sense left to know that wasn't the answer.

"Think about it, Michael. Take what you remember and put that against what you know now. You'll see the truth--you belong to the Section, not the Legion." Nikita had started on the groundwork and now the foundations of his identity were slowly eroding, eaten away by doubt and the resurface of memories he couldn't deny or explain away. It hadn't taken much to get Operations to agree to this, despite what she had told Nikita, because the two of them knew that Michael was the best possible candidate of the Section operatives to eventually succeed Operations and cancelling him without making an attempt to bring him back was not an option. Not only a personal loss but years of training and grooming gone, wasted--still, if it was necessary, to have Nikita be the one to do it would strengthen their control of her.

His head was averted from her and she wanted very much to go to him, to touch him and tell him it would be all right, but it was too soon for that, at this point he would rebuff her and it might affect what she had been able to accomplish here. Instead she said, "I'll leave you now to consider what you've learned." Removing the keys from the pocket of her blazer she unlocked the door and left the room.

Another restless night and early morning, sitting at the kitchen table and listlessly sipping at her coffee, Nikita contemplated what she was about to do. From the beginning she had felt attracted to Michael on several different levels--he had been her trainer and mentor, seemingly her only ally in the hostile world of Section One, and on a purely physical level he was a very attractive man, add to that his quiet reserve and the mystery that shrouded him and his past and it was difficult to resist. And she knew that there was some attraction on his part as well, more than just a game he was playing, made it all the more confusing by his actions, pulling her close and then pushing her away, a foot lost for every inch of ground won. All of it going back to Simone, always Simone, a ghost that seemed to be forever between them...

And while she could recognize his actions as a defense mechanism against exposing himself to the pain of loving and losing another person to the Section, it still hurt, all the lies and manipulations and games. Somewhere beneath that cool exterior was a Michael only Simone had known, lover and friend, and the romantic in Nikita believed that someday she would reach that part of him while the realist wanted her to keep her distance, to keep from being hurt again.

So what are you doing here, thinking about how to seduce him? she asked herself ruefully and gave a shake of her head, rising from the chair. Winding a strand of hair around her finger as she walked to the room, she tugged nervously at her hair as she stood outside the door and then took a deep breath, squaring her shoulders, feeling like she was seven years old and going to the doctor for a shot. Dreading it and wanting to get it over with at the same time, knowing it's going to hurt and also that once it was done, it was done, it would only hurt a little while and then it would go away.

************

She unlocked the door and stood there with her hand on the knob for a few moments, taking several deep breaths to steady herself, her heart going a little fast in anticipation. Turning the knob she opened the door and stepped inside, seeing Michael slumped in the chair, head down and chin nearly touching his chest, let the door shut quietly behind her and went to squat before him, putting out a hand to lift his chin. He came awake at the touch, head jerking, blinking at her, gray eyes soft and dark, still blurry from sleep, circles under his eyes and lines of exhaustion marking his features, so vulnerable and open and she wanted to just take him in her arms, hold him and protect him against the Section and all of the world.

Dipping a hand into her pocket, Nikita removed the key to his handcuffs and moved around to the back of the chair, Michael turned his head to follow her, still dazed from sleep, a twist of the key and the first cuff sprang open, the second one going as well. She let them fall to the floor with a clatter of metal and he slowly drew his hands in front of him, rubbing absently at his wrists, head lifting to look at her in puzzlement as she came back around the chair.

"Why?" he asked simply.

"Because I want you to trust me." She took one of his hands in her own and with her thumb rubbed at the mark left in his flesh by the handcuffs, feeling him stiffen for a moment, as if he would draw away, and then accepting the carress, brows knitting. Nikita smiled, feeling a sense of power and triumph at the thought that for once he was left trying to figure out what she was doing, and drew his wrist up to her lips to place a small kiss there, his flesh warm and soft, a jerk at the touch of her lips but nothing more. In her mind's eye she could see herself and Michael, a gun in her hand pointed at him, asking him why she shouldn't kill him, Michael moving forward making no attempt to shield or protect himself, answering in that soft voice of his that he couldn't think of a single reason, kissing her on the hand and walking away.

"Do you remember what you told me once? That you thought you couldn't care for anyone in the Section again?" She moved a step closer, still holding his hand, and caught his other hand, bringing it up to rub it against her cheek, letting her eyes close briefly at the feel of his knuckles against her cheek. "And that you were wrong. You said that we fight all the time to stay alive, why fight what's between us? Do you remember that, Michael?"

He drew back a little from her, looking more than a little flustered, and she released a hand to touch him on the cheek, letting her hand slide back and into his hair, as soft and silky as she had thought it would be in her wilder imagings, combing her fingers gently through tangled hair, pulling it back from his face. Let his other hand go and traced the line of his cheekbone with her fingertip, she felt him shiver under the touch and his eyes closed, throat working as he swallowed hard.

"I don't want to fight anymore, Michael." she said huskily, stroking his cheek gently and letting her palm rest on his cheek, a moment's hesitation and then she felt him leaning into her hand. "I'm not Simone but I can care for you as much as she did." The mention of Simone's name brought a momentary stiffness, melting away when she leaned forward to kiss him on the lips, winding fingers in his hair to pull his head closer as she kissed him hungrily, drawing back to look into his eyes, seeking a response.

Michael returned her gaze, gray eyes clouded with confusion and desire, and then he leaned forward to kiss her with as much passion as she had, his hands coming up to hold her head between them, his mouth seeking to devour hers. A little startled she had put her hands up between them and her fingers caught at the front of his dress shirt, tugging at it seemingly of their own volition, pulling it open so that she could slide her hands inside, feel the muscles of his chest, returning his kiss. In turn his hands went up her blouse and around to her back, supporting her as he sank to his knees and tipped her back, laying her out on the floor.

This is going too fast, she thought breathlessly, and made an aborted attempt to sit up, to regain control of the situation but Michael was atop and disinclined to move, one hand cradling her head while the other slid up her blouse. Gray eyes staring into hers, letting her make the choice, and without thought she reached up to pull him down, making a little sound deep in her throat as his hand came in contact with her breast, rubbing gently through the material of her bra, kissed him hard, lips parting to let her teeth nip at his lips.

************

And then he pushed himself off of her, throwing himself back and away, arms coming up to fend her off as she struggled up to a sitting position to follow him. "Michael, what--"

Images crashing him into with the force of a tsunami, a whirlwind flurry of his past, and in the midst he saw himself sitting bound to a chair, Simone over him, kissing him and licking blood from the corner of his mouth. Furious and afraid and hating her, cursing her in every language he could think of, the last and most vicious one in his native tongue. "Chien!" Bitch! And she had laughed and laughed, the bell-like peels of his own Simone but with a maniacal edge Simone had never possessed. He lifted his arms to cover his head, feeling hands tugging at them and struggling against their pull, scrambling back to the wall, his back coming hard up against it, burying his head in his arms to ward off the visions but once they had started they wouldn't stop.

"Michael--"

Dragged through the warehouse and thrown down onto the floor, before he could even attempt to defend himself a heavy boot in his ribs, driving the air from his lungs, gasping and retching as it dug into his ribs a second and third time. Sharp hideous pain as a rib cracked under the blows, unable to perform even that simplest of biological functions--breathing--and in some part of his mind hoping that it would end this way, quickly and easily, but then it was over and he was able to draw in breath again, a stabbing pain with every gasp of air.

"Michael!"

A splash of water in his face reviving him, muscles aching from the beatings and electrical shock, wanting nothing more than to just be dead, to have this over with. And knowing that he wouldn't last much longer, he didn't even have the strength or self-control to keep from crying out. No questions asked, no information wanted, just a wearing down of his strength, and if he thought it would stop he would tell them anything they wanted to know about the Section.

"Michael, stop it!"

Exhausted and mind clouded by the drugs they had given him, seeing Pietro once more with the electrodes, shaking his head in denial and whispering, "No more...please..." Hating himself for that weakness but he was so very tired, past the breaking point and willing to do anything to just have it stop. Simone coming to touch him on the cheek, smiling in satisfaction, and he flinched back but she wouldn't let him retreat, grasped a handful of hair as she stroked his cheek, telling him he was a good boy.

"Stop it, Michael!" Nikita tried to catch at his flailing arms but he was past all sense, gray eyes very wide and wild, not seeing her, seeing some distant memory, covering his head with his arms, a keening sound escaping through tightly clenched teeth and frightening her badly.

"Michael, it's all right, you're safe! Listen to me--" She managed to capture one wrist and drag it away, his head came up, gray eyes unseeing, a sound too much like a whimper for her comfort coming from him as he tried to pull his arm free.

"Stop it!" She got a handful of his shirt and shoved him hard against the wall, his head cracking against it hard enough to make her wince, slumping against the wall.

She scrambled forward, cradling his head in her hands, and gave him a light slap on the cheek, once, twice, trying to rouse him.

Through a fog he could see a face before his and he blinked to bring it into focus, seeing at last Nikita's familiar features, worried and frightened, her hands on either side of his head.

Weakly he lifted a hand to wave her off and she let him go, sinking back onto her heels, watching him intently, he touched his head with one trembling hand, rubbing at his aching head. "Nikita--where--?" And it came back to him in a rush, all that had happened in the last seven months, the weeks of torture and drugs, the endless conditioning to turn him into a puppet for the Legion, lurking in the back of his mind was some terrible memory that he could not quite face yet...

"Welcome back." said Nikita with a smile and impulsively threw her arms around him to give him a fierce hug. A momentary hesitation and then his arms went around her as well, his head resting against her shoulder, she held him tighter as she felt him start to shake, something wet soaking into the shoulder of her blouse but it was a distant sensation, lost before the joy of having him back again.

And they sat that way for a long time, holding each other.

************

"What do they want me to do?"

Michael sat with his back against the wall, knees up and arms draped over them, lifting his head from its resting place on his arms, his voice a rough, weary monotone as he spoke.

Nikita shifted position, stretching legs out in front of her, arms behind her to support as she leaned back, watching him, her relief at seeing him once again Michael tinged with unease at the flatness of his tone. He looked...drained, emotionally and physically, no emotion even when he had related to her in a monotone what exactly the Legion had done to him, leaving her feeling sick and furious. And of course there was something he was not telling her, some private part of the nightmare he'd endured, but she was content to let it go for now.

"Who?" she asked with a frown.

He turned his head to look at her, gray eyes weary and with a bitterness she'd never seen in him. "The Section. They wouldn't of gone to all this trouble if they didn't need me to perform a duty for them."

Nikita nodded slowly, lifting a hand to push a long lock of blond hair out of her eyes. "Elliot Warfield is going to be hosting a fund raiser--they want you to identify any Legion members that might be present."

"They would be drawing from this cell." he said in agreement, mouth twisting, and pinched the bridge of his nose between his fingers. "When does this happen?"

"Day after tomorrow." He was making the attempt to be more like his old self but rather than the calm self-possession there was a fatalism she didn't like, as if he were merely going through the motions. She had to remind herself of all he had gone through, that he'd had little sleep over the last few days and had been forced to relive every ugly detail of his experience--she just wasn't used to seeing him like this... "Michael, about what I said--" she began awkwardly.

He waved a hand wearily at her, letting his head fall back against the wall. "Forget it, Nikita. We're even now."

She flushed at the offhand reference to his own attempt at seduction, his play to make her stay with the Section and not go with Eric, but forged on. "What if I don't want to forget it?" It came out as more of a challenge than she'd meant and he merely looked at her, nothing at all in his eyes to reveal his thoughts, but his mouth was set in a hard thin line as his eyes slid away from hers, staring down at his hands.

"I can't do this right now, Nikita." he said tightly. "You don't understand--"

"Then tell me, Michael. Make me understand." He refused to meet her eyes and she made a sound of impatience, reaching out to touch him on the head, drawing her handback when he recoiled, folding her hands in her lap. "Michael, you can trust me, you know that. Nothing you tell me goes beyond this room. Nothing."

"I killed Dylan." The admission hurt, hurt far more than he had thought it would, even f he hadn't known what he was doing, who Dylan was, it didn't change the simple fact that he had executed one of his few friends. "I killed him because they told me to--because she told me to." A kind of horror in his eyes, far more emotion than she had ever seen him show, and an anguish as well as he turned to her. "They didn't make me into anything I wasn't already. I belong as much with them as I do the Section."

"You are different than they are.." said Nikita fiercely, grasping his shoulders hard. "You do...not...belong...with...them." Each word punctuated with a shake of his shoulders and he searched her eyes, seeking any hint of doubt, Nikita putting all the sincerity she could muster into her eyes; at last he gave a nod and she released him, moving back as he rose to his feet, extending a hand to pull her up as well.

"Let's get this over with." he said with a sigh and as she took his hand, letting him pull her up, she gave his hand a squeeze. A flicker of a smile touched his lips and was gone, so quickly that she thought she might of imagined it, leaving behind the blank mask she knew so well. Taking her keys she unlocked the door and let him proceed her, shutting it firmly behind her.

************

Sitting at the table an hour later, watching Michael as he poked listlessly at the plate before him, Nikita managed to hide the growing sense of unease, lifting her coffee mug to her lips to take a sip. Too quiet even for him and as much as she wanted to try to draw him out, she realized that he needed the time to deal with this on his own. For someone as extremely private as he was, it was difficult to share something so very personal and painful and to press him on it would only make him withdraw all that much farther--and added to that was the simple fact that he lived in a world where even the slightest weakness was a weapon to be used against him.

"Not hungry?" she asked quietly.

"No." He pushed the plate away from him, sitting back in the chair, head lifting to look behind her and his whole body going stiff. Setting her mug down Nikita turned in her chair to see Madeline standing behind her, a warm smile curving her lips, swiveled back to see Michael's reaction--anger and repulsion--before his eyes went cold.

"Can we have a few minutes, Nikita?" Not a request but an order and Nikita looked to Michael questioningly, he gave a slight nod and she reluctantly pushed herself up out of her chair.

"I'll be upstairs." Walking around the table and behind him, she touched him on the shoulder before she left the kitchen.

Madeline watched her go, noting how she tried to give Michael reassurance and seeing his eyes close briefly as she touched him, making a visible attempt to not draw away, turned her attention back to Michael as she placed her hands on the back of a chair. "How are you feeling?"

"Fine." he replied flatly, rubbing at his forehead.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Slowly she moved toward him, fingers trailing across the table, wanting to give some kind of comfort, to ease the pain a little, had her hand extended to touch him.

"Madeline." The accent sharply pronounced as he said her name, one hand coming up in warning, and she stopped, letting her hands fall to her side. He lifted his head to meet her eyes, his own hard and cold, and said, voice tightly controlled, "If I'm to do what I have to do, you have to leave me be."

There was a time once when he would of come to her, would of accepted what comfort she could give, but that had been a long time ago, back before he had known Simone. "Very well. I'd suggest you get some rest--there will be a debriefing first thing tomorrow morning. You'll be given your assignment then."

He smiled humorlessly, a mere thinning of the lips. "You trust me to walk into the Section?"

"If I didn't think you could be brought back, you would of been canceled at the hotel." she replied evenly and walked out of the kitchen.

************

Michael slept the deep sleep of utter exhaustion, no dream to plague him, awaking to instinctively reach for the warm form that had laid beside him for so many nights only to find an empty bed, rolled onto his side to look around the room. Not the bedroom he had shared with Simone or the bedroom of his apartment, it took him a moment to remember exactly where he was and what had happened. Sitting up in bed, drawing his knees up, he rested his forehead on one knee briefly, forcing himself to face and accept the truth. She wasn't and had never been Simone, no matter how much she looked like her, somewhere deep in his subconscious he had known that but had chosen to delude himself and live out the fantasy.

And they had used that against him, using that little hold to pull him in, the woman he'd thought of as Simone a more than willing participant, she had even taken part in the torture sessions.

Pushing the covers back he swung his legs over the side of the bed and just sat there, head turning to look at the dresser and seeing the clothes someone had thoughtfully set out for him. Though there was no clock or window by which to judge time he thought that it was early in the morning yet and as he sat there, staring at the clothes on the dresser, the thought came to him that he could get dressed and simply walk out of the house, leave everything here behind.

Even with the return of his memory, he felt...disconnected, both from the Section and the Legion, and direction less, knowing that he wouldn't go back to the Legion but not certain if he could return to the Section either. It was too soon to make that kind of momentous decision, he had to give himself time to consider what he was doing, not just go off on impulse, because once he set himself on that path the Section would have no other option than to cancel him. He had resources of his own and years of experience, places he could go for refuge, conceivably he might be able to evade Section assassins...

But what would be the point? Once he and Simone had discussed this, back before that disasterous mission against Glass Curtain, talked about leaving the Section behind and hiding somewhere--a chill ran down his spine at that memory, coming with it the insidious thought that maybe the Section had known and chosen to send them out, knowing as well that Glass Curtain was ready for them. With Simone Michael might of succumbed to the temptation to flee the Section, try to survive on the outside, but without her he would devote himself to the Section...just as he had. He scrubbed at his forehead with the heel of his hand, attempting to rid himself of that thought as much as to ease the ache in his temples, thinking, that way lies madness.

If Nikita was with you, would you go? asked that little voice and he closed his eyes, letting his breath out in a long sigh. He thought that if he asked, she would come with him, but as much as he couldn't bear the thought of leaving her behind, he also didn't want to see her die. And it would happen, as good she was, she didn't have the level of paranoia needed to survive life on the run. One or the both of them would die and in the end the Section would win.

With another sigh, he pushed himself up to his feet and went to the dresser, setting aside his black leather coat to pull on black T-shirt and jeans, shrugging into the coat before leaving the bedroom.

For the first time in days, Nikita had slept well and later than she'd been planning, dressing hurriedly and going out into the hallway. She stopped before the closed door of Michael's room, one hand lifted to knock, and hesitated, thinking that if he was still sleeping she shouldn't disturb him, after the last few days he needed his rest. Walking quietly down the hallway she went downstairs and to the kitchen, where she discovered that she needn't of bothered being quiet.

Michael sat at the kitchen table, dressed in his customary black along with the black leather coat, a coffee mug at one elbow and a sheet of paper laid out on the table before him, a pen in one hand and the other supporting his chin as he studied the paper. He didn't look up as she entered the kitchen but she knew he had to be aware of her there, moved behind him to look over his shoulder and down at the paper, seeing what looked to be a sketch of a building.

"What's that?" she asked curiously.

"The warehouse that the Legion is using as their base." He had been sitting here for nearly two hours, trying to draw the plans, and while he was able to recall it in detail, memories kept intruding on the process, leaving him angry and impatient with himself at his inability to focus. Here was the offices and past them the main bay of the warehouse, no exits that he remembered but then he hadn't been in the condition to take notes and afterwards he had never gone there, and as he had tried to sketch it out the only thing he could remember was the dark airless closet they had locked him into between sessions and the unaccustomed panic he had felt at being shut in like that. Lying there in the dark, too weak to even move, and struggling to control the fear that tightened his chest and made his breath short...

Raising his head, he finished the ground floor with a few angry strokes of the pen and went on to sketch the top two floors, trying to focus and ignore Nikita's prescence behind him at the same time. She hovered behind him, radiating concern, and, rather than soothing him, it rankled, taking all the self control he could muster to not snap at her; the dispassionate part of his mind knew that she was only trying to be of help but it was salt to the already badly wounded pride, aggravating and inflaming it. From childhood he had learned to be self-reliant and found it difficult after all these years to accept assistance, however well meant--to accept it meant acknowledging weakness and in the Section that could prove lethal.

Standing behind him Nikita could see anger in the stiffness of his shoulders and the sharp movements of his fingers as the pen moved over the paper, knowing it was directed not at her but at himself and wishing there was something she could say--or do--to draw him out of this. And knew as well that she would have to bide her time, now was not the time to attempt to draw him out, not when he needed all his strength and wits to accomplish the task he would be set. Later...later she would force the issue but for now she was content to let it go.

"Are you sure they'll still be there?" she asked, walking around the table to sit down across from him.

"It depends on how much confidence they have in my...ability to resist. And the strength of their programming." His mouth twisted as he said the word "resist", a momentary flicker of bitterness and self-loathing in his eyes, and he gave a little shake of his head, letting the pen fall to the table as he sat back in the chair.

Nikita looked at her watch and heaved a sigh, rising reluctantly from her chair. "The briefing will be in an hour--we'd better get ready to go."

Nodding Michael finished the last of his coffee and rose as well, folding the sketch and stuffing it into his jacket pocket, following her as she left the kitchen.

************

Walking into Section One's headquarters was oddly disquieting, strengthening the feeling of being disconnected, and as he followed Nikita down the hall, Michael was aware of the eyes of other operatives on him, tracking him as he passed. He had known it would be hard, coming back here after all he'd done, but he hadn't expected to feel this, the strong sensation that he was walking into the lion's den and wanting to bolt, every step deeper into the depths of the Section an exercise in self-control. Despite the coolness he was sweating by the time they reached the briefing room and before they went inside Nikita touched his arm, giving him a reassuring smile when he looked at her; he managed to give her a small smile in return, drawing in a deep breath before he entered the room, mask set firmly in place.

Heads lifted as they came inside, seven pairs of eyes watching as they both took a seat, and of them Michael was especially aware of Madeline's eyes on him, appraising him, but once he had sat down some of the sense of dislocation had eased. This room was by far the most familiar to him and if any place in the Section could be considered "neutral" it was this--here he was able to find that focus it had been so hard to attain and he actually found himself relaxing as he leaned back in the chair, folding his hands in his lap. Four of the operatives seated around the table he had a vague acquaintance with and from them were brief, furtive glances of curiosity, but nothing more, no hostility.

Coming through these doors he had wondered how many of them knew he had executed Dylan and how they would react but there had been nothing so far to indicate anyone knew. Until he looked at Birkhoff seated across the table from him and Birkhoff glanced away, looking uncomfortable and wary, that much telling him that Birkhoff knew. Operations passed behind Birkhoff's chair and he didn't have to guess that he--as well as Madeline--knew, from Nikita's lack of reaction at his statement they had told her as well. And to keep the command structure secure they would not allow that information to be spread among the operatives...

"As you well know, Simon Warfield has been targeted by the Legion due to his involvement with a relief fund for a former Soviet satellite country. And because he has been speaking against the rebel forces attempting to overthrow the government. Tomorrow night at 5:00 PM he will be hosting a fund raising dinner at the Marriott and we are expecting the Legion to make an attempt on him there, given that their previous attempt failed." Operations looked directly at Michael as he said the last and Michael returned the look coolly, letting nothing out; after a long moment Operations broke the connection and walked around the table as he continued.

"Given that we have no records of any known Legion members, Michael will be coordinating with us to identify any members present. Nikita will be providing video feed so that we can locate and remove any potential...problems. Michael and Birkhoff will be monitoring from the van, the rest of you will be on the floor. We've already assembled the team that will work as bodyguards for Warfield, everyone else will be providing security for the floor and door. This is going to be the Legion's only chance to hit Warfield before he goes to Washington D.C. to address Congress on behalf of his relief fund and they are going to have to make their move so I want everyone to be prepared. Review the floor plans of the hotel, familiarize yourself with entry and exit points, and no one is above suspicion. Questions?"

Silence around the table and Operations nodded in satisfaction. "We will reconvene here tomorrow at 12:00 to give out assignments and make security preparations. Dismissed." One by one the room emptied, Nikita and Michael the last of the operatives to leave, and once they were gone Operations turned to Madeline.

"Do you think he can do it?"

"He thinks he has to--and that's the important thing." She had been observing him throughout the briefing, watching for the slightest hint of emotion, but Michael had not reacted at the obvious dig Operations had made, seemingly composed. There had been video surveillance through every room of the Section house they'd taken Michael to and both of them had reviewed the tapes this morning prior to the briefing, watching especially the tape of the last session that had broken Michael out of the conditioning. Even if Operations didn't like Nikita he had to admit that she had been the catalyst to bring him out of it--of anyone in the Section he trusted Nikita the most and she would be the one he opened up to, if he was able to let himself.

"And after this is over?" They had both known that the Legion hadn't executed Michael outright but beyond that they had been able to glean little, nothing at all from the Section's vast network of informants. Five months of nothing, long enough that Operations had begun to suspect that he might indeed be dead after all, buried in some unknown grave, and then the reports trickling in, Legion attacks that had the imprint of a familiar guiding hand, finally an actual identification by an informant and then the recovered videotape of Dylan's execution. Madeline's idea to place the blurb in the society section of the local paper regarding Warfield's attendance of a luncheon and it had been simple enough to replace some members of the hotel staff with their own personnel, even going so far as to rent the banquet hall and fill it with their own people.

"It will take him time to recover but he is strong. I'd suggest a little time off and then working him back into the routine. Now that he's seen that even he can be broken, he will be more...cautious. Once he works past it, he will be the stronger for it." She smiled warmly at Operations. "Just as you are."

He smiled faintly in turn. "I hope so. It would be a waste of resources if we had to cancel him."

And a personal waste, thought Madeline, knowing that the same thought was going through Operations' head even if he would never voice or acknowledge it. Rising from her chair, she smoothed her skirt and said, "I have a session with Raine--dinner tonight?"

"Of course. I'll see you at 6:00." Madeline nodded and left the room.

Operations stood alone for a moment, thinking of his own experiences as a P.O.W. and how long it had taken to come back from that, he knew some men who never had. He had to trust Madeline's judgement in this, had to believe that Michael would come through this and be able to function again in his old role. Sighing, he walked out of the briefing room, heading back for his office.

************

On the day of the fund raiser, Nikita was so occupied with the details of the mission that she didn't have time to think about Michael, spending more than an hour trying on wigs and outfits before settling on a simple linen blazer and skirt and a shoulder length black wig. And then there was schematics to be studied and a plan of action to be discussed with the other operatives, who was being placed where and who had responsibility for which part of the floor, a transmitter and receiver to be placed in her blazer and ear, glasses to provide the video link that Michael would use to identify Legion members.

It had seemed to be taken as a given that Michael would not be inside and she understood the wisdom of that. As far as the Legion knew he was dead and to see him wandering the lobby of the Marriott would only drive them off so he was to sit in the van with Birkhoff and monitor the video feed Nikita provided. He had spent an hour or two closeted with Madeline and Operations and when she had finally gotten a glimpse of him in the hallway he had looked tired and tense, just standing there with his back against the wall; she had wanted to go to him but then Walter had distracted her, drawing her attention to the assortment of guns he had laid out on his work table, and when she had glanced back Michael was gone.

4:00 PM and she was walking through the banquet room, just beginning to fill up, winding her way through the tables, a smile that felt brittle even to her stretching her lips, scanning the banquet room, lifted one hand to adjust the glasses and said softly, "Are you receiving?"

"Picture's good." said Birkhoff's voice in her ear. A pause and then Michael's voice, "Head back to the entrance and work your way back."

Letting her eyes roam casually around the room, Nikita nodded to another operative as he passed her and made her way back to the entrance, constantly scanning the room, making the movements deliberately slow so that Michael would be able to see the faces distinctly on the monitor. The conversations around her were just white noise as she walked out into the lobby, taking a quick glance around before going back into the banquet room. For the next half-hour she moved constantly through the crowd, taking a few precious minutes to disentangle herself from an older man that had already drank a few too many glasses of champagne and another held in one shaky hand, and finally came to a halt just beside the entrance.

"Anything?" she asked, idly glancing at the podium and the table set up behind it, where Warfield would be sitting. So far there was only a few people seated at the table, none of which were Warfield, and she shifted her gaze to roam the crowd, looking for any other operatives working the floor. She spotted Nadia standing by one of the tables and once she had got her attention, Nadia gave a shake of her head to indicate nothing suspicious and Nikita sighed, resisting the urge to scratch her scalp under the wig. It had started to itch and it was irritating, she wanted to just take it and toss it a nearby garbage can but she had been seen before by Legion members and her height alone was enough to make her stand out, not to mention the pale blond hair.

"Head back to the podium." said Michael in her ear and with a sigh, she did as he said, taking a different path than before, but the link was silent as she reached the podium and she turned around to walk back, head dipping as she bent over to adjust one high heeled shoe, rubbing a little at her aching heel. She would definitely have to get rid of these shoes, they were rubbing against the back of her heel and the flesh was becoming raw, lifting her head as she straightened she glanced to her left and then to her right, striding forward.

"Wait--" She came to an abrupt halt at the command, scanning those faces immeaditly to her right, seeing an older woman with platinum blond hair and a blue-sequined dress with a man of similar age and wearing a bad brown toupee, past them a couple, she in long white dress cut very low across the bosom and down the back, the man old enough to be her father and heavy set. "No, to your left." said Michael and she turned her head to look again, seeing two men standing together. One was tall and blond, big boned and muscular, the other shorter and older with dark hair, the blond wearing a navy suit and the other a black tuxedo, both with champage glasses and talking in low tones.

She let her eyes skip over them and drew back a step. "Someone you recognize?"

"Hold your position." responded Michael tersely.

In the van, Michael rose from his chair and pulled the headset off to drop it down on the counter in front of Birkhoff; Birkhoff lifted his head from the monitor to look at him, a slight frown on his face. "I don't think you're supposed to go inside." he said cautiously.

"Give me your gun, Birkhoff." He had asked for one and Operations had said simply that since he was going to be monitoring from the van he didn't need one, there had not even been the standby one he had kept in his office and he hadn't bothered trying to go to Walter.

Everyone was being very careful around him and he was becoming heartily sick of it.

"Operations said--" began Birkhoff and trailed off as Michael leaned in close to him.

"Do I have to take it from you?" he asked, voice low and menacing.

Paling a little, Birkhoff reached under the counter for the gun he kept stashed there and handed it over to him, barrel first. Flicking off the safety Michael pulled back the slide and reached behind him to place the gun at the small of his back, muttering, "Thank you." Turning he opened the van door and stepped out onto the pavement.

************

Once he had gone, Birkhoff activated the link with Operations, clearing his throat nervously, knowing that the old man was going to be pissed but he would be even more pissed if Birkhoff didn't tell him. "Uhh--Michael's coming in."

"Damn it, Birkhoff--" A heavy sigh and then Operations snapped, "Patch me through to him."

"I can't, he left his headset behind."

"Then get me Nikita!"

"Right." said Birkhoff hastily and patched him through.

Remaining where she was, as Michael had told her, Nikita was surprised to hear Operations' voice in her ear, low and intense. "Nikita, you are to intercept and contain Michael. Is that clear?"

Swiveling she looked to the door in time to see Michael come inside, moving her way, the line of his path quite clear: the two men she had seen, talking together. In her ear Operations repeated his orders, sounding strident, but she ignored him, moving directly into Michael's path as he came closer. He stared at her coldly and asked, "What are you doing?"

"Keeping you from getting yourself killed." she responded tartly, blocking him.

He let out an aggravated sigh and reached out to take her elbow, turning her so that she stood in front of him, leaning in to say into her ear, "Walk up to them and stay in front of me. That way they won't see me until we reach them."

"And then what? Kill them?" she flung over her shoulder at him.

"I think it would be far more fitting for them to suffer through the same process I did." responded Michael grimly and reached up to casually pluck the receiver from behind her ear, tossing it over his shoulder even as a voice came tinnily from it, cutting Operations off in mid-tirade.

Nikita walked slowly to where the two men still stood, dipping a hand into her purse to withdraw the small gun concealed inside and held it at her side as she came up to the pair. The blond turned to look at her, a slow grin creasing his face, and she smiled back at him, the other man turning as well, freezing as Nikita stepped aside and Michael came out from behind her, smiling coldly at him.

"Hello, Pietro."

The blond man cursed and his hand went inside his coat, presumably for a gun, but Michael had already brought his out and shot him, the bullet passing through his hand and into his shoulder, the man collapsing with a shout of pain. Arm extended Michael moved the barrel of the gun so that the sight was on Pietro, finger tightening on the trigger, ignoring the fact that Pietro had his hands up in the classical stance of surrender; around him there were shouts of panic and the steady sound of Lloyd cursing as he lay on the floor but nothing else existed except Pietro in front of him. Pietro with his smile as he stood before the chair Michael sat in, Pietro just watching as Lloyd kicked him and kicked him until a rib cracked, Pietro's voice whispering in his ear as he slumped in the chair urging him to just give in...

"Michael." Nikita's hand on his arm, just that, no attempt to move between him and Pietro, as she had done for that boy J.P., allowing him to make that choice, and he let his arm slowly fall, seeing behind Pietro an operative come to jerk his arms behind his back and handcuff him.

"Wait." Surprisingly the operative--Joseph, he thought his name was--obeyed his command, stopping just as he would of hauled Pietro away, and Michael shifted his attention to Pietro, hand tightening on his gun as Pietro looked back at him with a self-satisfied smirk and taking a deep breath, resisting the sudden overwhelming urge to smash him in the face with the barrel of his gun. "Where is she?"

"Your lovely Simone?" jeered Pietro with a laugh and Michael took a step toward him, bringing his other hand up to strike him solidly on the chin, lifting the gun to point it at Pietro's forehead.

"Where?" he repeated.

Pietro laughed again but his eyes were a trifle uneasy. "Or you shoot me? In a room full of witnesses?" He swiveled his head to take in the crowd filing out the doors, ushered out by a combination of hotel staff and Section operatives, not even the ones still close to them would look at the spectacle.

Michael showed his teeth in a smile. "As far as the world is concerned, I don't exist. No one will publish a photo or story about this. Now--" He pressed the muzzle of the gun directly against Pietro's forehead. "Where is she?"

"At the warehouse--cleaning up--"

"Take him." said Michael to Joseph and turned away, stepping directly over Lloyd, who still lay on the floor cursing and clutching his shoulder, two more operatives coming to stand over him. Looking back over his shoulder he could see Operations near the podium and he strode for the main entrance, Nikita hurrying to catch up with him, finally reaching out to grab his arm and pull him to a halt.

"Where are you going?"

"To the warehouse--might still be able to catch a few of them there." Nadia and Bishop came up to flank them and Michael slowly stepped back, keeping them in the line of his sight. "Yes?"

"We're coming with." said Nadia firmly and Bishop gave a nod of agreement.

And then Nikita up beside him as well, loyal to a fault as always, her blue eyes determined as they met his. "Come." he said simply and pushed the doors open to leave the room.

************

Birkhoff turned as the door to the van opened and Michael stepped inside, Nikita, Nadia, and Bishop following behind him, reached over to his console to turn down the volume just as Operations' voice started to shout. "What's going on?" Watching the video feed, if he'd had any doubts as to Michael's loyalty, they'd been eased when he'd seen Michael shoot the Legion member.

"We're moving on the warehouse." said Michael shortly, dipping a hand into his pocket to pull out the sketch he'd made. Nikita pulled off the wig and glasses, handing the glasses to Birkhoff and tossed the wig aside, kicking off the high heeled shoes as she moved to the back of the van to find her pack with her street clothes.

"Operations is not going to like this." warned Birkhoff.

"In or out, Birkhoff, your choice." Bishop moved past Michael and to the front of the van, sitting behind the wheel, turning the keys in the ignition.

"I am not going to stay behind and try to explain this to him." Birkhoff muttered, adjusting his glasses, and Michael suppressed a smile, feeling an absurd gratitude for the offhand support.

"Need a backup team?"

Twenty or so Legion members at the warehouse, if they hadn't already packed up and left, and with the element of surprise they could take down maybe a fourth of them, be entrenched on the ground floor--aloud he said, "Call it in--2217 Alexandria, tell them to give us a five minute head start." Enough time to get inside and establish if there was anyone still there.

Pulling on a T-shirt and zipping her jeans, Nikita tossed down the pack and came up behind Michael as he smoothed the paper out on the console, Nadia moving to his other side to look as well. "Three floors, offices are on the main floor, the top two floors are living quarters. Two fire doors, east and west, opened only from the inside, access to the front door is restricted by a keypad. If they've changed the code I'm going to need a way to bypass it."

Birkhoff nodded. "I can rig something up."

"Also a camera at the front entrance, I can take that out once I get inside."

"You're not going in alone." He looked at Nikita as she spoke, arms folded over her chest, no room for compromise in her tone.

"Just long enough to get through the front door, Nikita." he said placatingly and Nikita frowned, eyes narrowing as she stared hard at him, trying to gauge his sincerity. Michael returned her look evenly, letting nothing whatsoever of what he was thinking show in his eyes, his expression; he would go inside and not stop until he found Simone, regardless of how many Legion members were still present. That was the one Legion member he wanted above all others...

"All right." said Nikita reluctantly, still unsure but willing to give him the benefit of a doubt, and Nadia bent over the sketch, asking Michael something in a low tone as Nikita moved back, checking her watch.

Twenty minutes later and Bishop brought the van to a stop two blocks up from the warehouse, as per Michael's instructions; as he'd said the area was mostly abandoned buildings and having the van parked on the street just in front of the warehouse woulddraw too much notice. Michael was the first to leave the van, walking slowly up the sidewalk, gun held down at his side, feeling horribly exposed as he walked up to the front entrance of the warehouse, stood for a long moment in front of the door as he tried to remember the code. It took a few long minutes but it finally came to him and he punched in a series of numbers, holding his breath as he waited for the buzz indicating the door was unlocked, pulled the door open and stepped inside, the gun up to cover himself as his eyes flicked from left to right.

************

He stood still for a long moment, listening to the sounds in the warehouse, hearing off to the left the opening and closing of drawers, coming perhaps from Pietro's office, where the monitor for the front door camera was also conveniently located. Moving as quietly as possible down the hall, he saw that the door was partially ajar and he dropped down to a squat, placing his hand on the door and slowly pushing it open, extending his gun hand to cover the room as the door swung open.

Two people stood in the office, one methodically running documents through a paper shredder and the other packing computer equipment into a box, a woman in her early thirties with short brown hair and a young man barely out of his teens, vaguely familiar to him. The woman lifted her head to look at him and made a belated grab for the gun that lay on a desk and he shot her in the shoulder, turning his gun on the boy as he brought up the rifle slung from his shoulder and putting a bullet in his chest.

Rising to stride inside, he picked up the gun on the desk and went to shut off the monitor, dropping to his knees beside the woman as she lay crying on the floor and pulling a set of handcuffs from his pocket, slapping one cuff on her wrist and the other on the desk leg. He had one more set and he was saving that one for Simone...

Coming out of the office he debated whether or not to go deeper into the warehouse or head for the living quarters but the decision was made for him as shouts came from down the hallway to his right, he headed left and for the stairs, taking them two at a time, gun down at his side. At the first landing and rounding the corner only to throw himself down as a burst of gunfire cut through where he had been standing, rolled and fired up into the stairwell, catching a brief glimpse of a camoflauged leg as his assailant ducked back behind the wall.

A shout from below him and he scrambled up, placing his back against the wall and pointing the gun back down the stairs, eyes flicking back up the stairwell to make sure that his attacker wouldn't catch him off guard. The stairs creaked below him and he sidled towards the second flight of stairs, cursing silently, trying to decide which way to go, from the sound of it the one above him had an automatic weapon and even a poor shot would be able to cut him down before he reached him. Then from below was the rattle of gunfire and a clatter of feet as the one below went off to respond, he let out his breath in a sigh of relief and turned his attention back to the stairs, placing his feet carefully on the steps as he moved up, one, two, three, a pause to listen, four and another pause, heavy breathing above him.

Five, six, and as he put his foot down on the seventh an impression of movement, he dropped immeaditly to his knees, one hand flailing to grasp the railing and keep himself from tumbling back down the stairs while the other instinctively brought up the gun and fired three shots. The man in green camoflauge jerked as the bullets struck chest and abdomen, finger tightening on his automatic weapon and sending a last burst of fire up into the ceiling, the light above exploding in a shower of sparks, the man falling to the floor. Cautiously Michael moved up the stairs, hugging the wall, and stuck his head around the corner, seeing an open door leading to the second floor and no one visible, stepped up onto the landing and kneeled by the man to pull the rifle free of his limp hands, shoving his gun behind his coat and into the small of his back.

Squatting to approach the door in the same fashion as before but pushing it open with the longer barrel of the automatic rifle, supporting the rifle with both hands, but there was no one in the hallway and he took a few precious moments to listen. Gunfire from below, loud enough that it would make it difficult to determine if anyone was on this floor other than by searching room to room and he didn't have the time for that. The apartment he had shared with Simone was on the third floor, he would have to look there first and then come back to the second floor--he let the door ease close and started to turn to go back when there was a gunshot behind and something struck him hard in the back of his right shoulder, spinning him around, the rifle falling from his hands to clatter on the floor.

Gasping he pushed back with his feet, getting his back against the door, his right arm hanging limply at his side, and tried to reach for the rifle but a bullet sent up dust and fragments of wood just inches from his fingers. Coming down the stairs was Simone, gun in her hand, smiling as she walked closer to him.

************

"Dear, sweet Michael--how predictable you are." She shook her head, smile indulgent, dark eyes sparkling with a mad light. How could he ever thought of her as Simone? he wondered despairingly, watching her as she came to a halt. "Pietro said you would never come back here but I knew you would. I think he had far more confidence in your conditioning than I did, he sincerely believed that the Section would give up and kill you. I imagine he's locked away in a little white room right now."

The wound hurt badly but he'd suffered worse, had taken two bullets and still found the strength to walk miles through enemy territory to a hospital in sub zero temperatures, he let his left hand fall down behind him, feeling for the gun in his back, as he asked, "Who are you?" A hundred other things he could ask but that seemed the most important, coming directly from the heart.

Simone shrugged. "Just another lost soul, looking for a family, a place to belong. Just like you...Louis." He went still as she said the name he hadn't used in years, the name that had belonged to someone else in another life, a person so far removed from the one he was now as to be someone else entirely. "There's not a lot of difference between us, you know that? That's why it was so easy for us to make you think you belonged to us. You could be Legion, Michael--Louis--you could fit in as well with us as you do the Section."

She stepped closer, waving the gun, head tilted to one side. "How many people died in that bombing? 27? 30? How many of them were children?" He had his fingers closed around the gun, arm bent in an awkward attempt to draw it out, and Simone moved forward to give his wounded shoulder a kick, the pain surging in a white heat to blur vision, only vaguely aware of her pulling his gun out of his hand.

Struggling to push himself up off his wounded shoulder, he kicked out at her feet and she danced back, finger tightening on the trigger, teeth bared in a vicious smile. "Getting shot in the knee is probably one of the most painful ways to be shot, other than being shot in the stomach, of course. I think I'd like to hear you beg again before I put a bullet in your head."

"Go...to hell." he gasped, pulling himself up with a groan, sweat streaming down his forehead.

"You first, darling." She lowered the gun, aiming first at his knee, lips curving in a smile as she raised the angle of the gun to aim at his groin.

"Drop the gun!"

He turned his head to see Nikita on the stairs, gun aimed at Simone, her beautiful features set in a hard, implacable expression, a glint of fury in light blue eyes. Simone held her gun in both hands, aiming it at Michael's head, and said with a quick sideways glance at Nikita, "I'll kill him!"

"And I'll kill you." responded Nikita flatly. "Drop it."

A click and he closed his eyes against the expected impact of a bullet, when it didn't come, he opened his eyes to see Simone dropping the gun as ordered, letting the one she had taken from him fall as well. Nikita moved up the stairs, gesturing with the gun for Simone to move back, and behind her came Bishop, scooping up the rifle and kicking the two handguns towards the stair, going to grab Simone by the arm and shove her against the wall. A brief search and then he handcuffed her and took her back down the stairs, Simone's curses carrying back up to them.

Kneeling beside Michael, Nikita studied the wound in his shoulder and shook her head at him, arm draped over one knee. "Why do you feel this constant need to take advantage of the Section's medical plan?"

He managed a faint smile. "It's the benefits that make the job."

Taking his good arm and slinging it over her shoulder, she pulled him up to his feet. "Careful, Michael, I might actually think you have a sense of humor." Sliding an arm around his waist, she helped him down the stairs.

************

Dr. Sorenson decreed that it would be at least a week before Michael would be allowed back on light duty and another two weeks before he could return to full duty. Any other time and Michael would have taken a few days rest, gone back to work--there was always something that could be done, even if one had an arm in a sling--but this time he accepted it, knowing he could use the time to recover from his ordeal. Two days spent in the Medical section and as soon as he was given leave to go, Dr. Sorenson's orders still echoing in his mind, he was summoned to Madeline's office.

He had been expecting the summons and was not surprised to see Operations standing back behind Madeline's desk, Madeline sitting in her chair, looking cool and composed as always, giving him a smile that did not quite reach brown eyes. No offer for him to sit down but he would have refused it all the same, just stood before the desk and waited for them to speak. And of course it was Operations who spoke first, stripping off his glasses with an angry gesture to point them at Michael, tone scathing. "I might expect that kind of grandstanding from a raw recruit--but not from someone with your level of experience."

"It got the job done, didn't it?" he responded calmly.

Operations leaned over the desk, hands placed flat on its surface. "You were lucky. The Section does not rely on luck."

"What would you have done, if I'd come back here without establishing my loyalty?" Michael asked softly and Operations merely stared back at him, expression stony, that in itself an answer...as if he needed one. "You got what you wanted--Warfield is safe, you have Legion members in custody, one of which is highly placed." And from what he had heard Pietro--after an initial resistance--had been very forthcoming, providing the first good information they'd ever gotten on the Legion.

"That kind of behavior is not acceptable." snapped Operations. "Is that understood?"

"Yes."

Operations gave him a look of disgust and stalked out of the room, Michael suppressed a sigh and shifted his attention to Madeline. "Is there anything else?"

"Yes, there is." She rose from her chair and came around the desk, leaning back against it. "I think that you should see someone in Psych."

Even though he had been expecting this as well, he stiffened at the suggestion and clamped down hard on the irrational surge of anger, making eyes and tone cool as he lifted his chin a little. "That would be a waste of time, wouldn't it?" he asked, raising his eyebrows. "I've been here long enough, I know exactly what they want to hear."

"Not for the Section but for you, Michael." Brown eyes sad and compassionate and he looked away, jaw tightening. "You've been through a great deal in the last several months and you have a lot of emotions to sort through. You're angry with yourself for giving in, for being weak, when there was nothing else you could do. If you're going to work past that, find a balance again, then you're going to need help."

He smiled thinly. "Thank you but no. I think I've had enough brainwashing."

"Your choice, Michael." said Madeline softly. "I'm here to talk if you need to." Michael gave her a slight, mocking bow and left her office.

************

Back at his apartment building for the first time in what seemed years, taking the elevator up to the third floor and about to head to 308 when he remembered that he was forgetting something, went back down the hall to stop before 301 and knocked on the door. No response and he was about to knock a second time when he finally heard footsteps on the other side and the sound of a padlock being drawn back, stepped back as the door opened to reveal a plump, middle-aged woman with graying brown hair drawn into a bun, wearing a flowered apron over a dress, eyeglasses on a chain and resting on her bosom.

"Hello, Beatrice."

The woman lifted the glasses to set them over her nose, frowning as she looked at him, and then her face broke out into a wide smile, transforming her and showing the beauty she must have been. "Michel! Wherever have you been?"

He leaned in to give her a kiss on each cheek, taking the hands that she extended and allowing her to draw him into her apartment. "Come in, come in--my goodness, I thought you had dropped off the face of the earth. And look at you, so thin--what did you do to your poor arm?" Beatrice clucked her tongue and shook her head at him, he just managed to suppress the grin she always brought him, knowing that when she was in mid-scold she would not be stopped and any sign that she was not being taken seriously only increased the lecture. "Seven months you have been gone, such a long time with no word at all, I thought you might of died!" She crossed herself as she said the last. "So you will tell me where you have been for so long?"

"Family business--I'm sorry I couldn't get in touch with you." He looked around the apartment and asked, "You still have her, don't you?"

Beatrice put on an affronted look. "As if I would throw her out, just because I thought you were never coming back. I said I would watch her for you, did I not?"

Something brushed against his foot and he bent over to stroke the back of the white long-haired cat, she lifted her head to give him a lofty look from blue eyes and rubbed her head against his hand, forgiving him for his transgressions. Michael smiled despite himself and picked her up one handed, Cleo settling against his chest and extending a paw to swat at his face, butting her head against his cheek. "I missed you, too." he said softly and got up from the chair, Cleo held awkwardly in one arm. "Thank you for watching her for me." He leaned over to give Beatrice a kiss on the cheek and she blushed in pleasure, pushing him away.

"You must come over for dinner." she said firmly.

"Tomorrow night." Michael promised with a grin and she swatted at him.

"Go on with you--get some rest, you look terrible." She glowered at him as he left the apartment and watched him go down the hall, shutting the door once he had gone out of sight.

It took a little juggling and complaints from Cleo, accentuated by a digging in of claws, but he got the door for his apartment open and stood for a long moment in the doorway, just looking around, trying to see if anything was different, changed. Cleo wriggled in his arms and he let her go, she walked across the carpet, tail up, and leaped up onto the red plaid chair that had been Simone's, settling down and promptly going to sleep.

"Home sweet home." he murmured with a sigh and went to find an empty box and tools, spending the next two hours methodically removing the two cameras he knew of--one in the bedroom and the other in the kitchen--and finding another in the living room by sheer luck, tossed them in the box and then took the box down to throw it in the dumpster. He had always known the cameras were there but given that he spent so little time here it hadn't bothered him. Now...now he couldn't bear the thought of the Section scrutinizing him, analyzing him.

He sank down onto the black leather couch with a sigh and put his feet up on the coffee table, closing his eyes, feeling himself relaxing, fully relaxing, for the first time in months, and within a few minutes he was asleep on the couch. After a moment, Cleo got up from the chair and leaped onto the couch, laying down beside him and settling once again into sleep.

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