FIRE [FIRST DRAFT]

Chapter 5: Flames of Yellow

 Abba was a fire; unruly, unpredictable and a force to be reckoned with. Her blood ran through Aimee's veins, maybe she could acquire some of those attributes for strength. She had asked Celeste whether she would be ready if there was no choice but to kill her mother. But was Aimee ready to kill hers? She was cruel; she was the reason for all the pain Aimee had lugged with her through the years. Yet, somehow, that did not make it easier.

Her life still felt like a dream, a seven-month-long dream that she could not wake from until the world was rid of Abba. This world that did not know who she was or what she and her friends were about to do for it. She tried not to think that way. Really, she wished she could have been saving the world from someone she was not related to.

"Is it just me or are we smaller?" uttered Gavin. He stared up that skyscraper and took a painful gulp, one that was not as humorous as he or Aimee had hoped it would be.

"You, too?"

She looked back at the others. Whilst everyone else wore the customary GINM or RDA clothing, Dominick was clad in the AIM uniform Finn had found in the pharmacy – he was plan A. They needed someone to hack into the system and figure out exactly how Domino Doomsday would commence, it was a quick and painless exit from a foreseeable apocalypse. Gavin had the knowledge of what went on in AIM, he knew the building inside and out, and Valerie and Finn were experts when it came to computers. But their best bet was Dominick in the end; he was muscular and serious-looking, like Abba's guards, and Gavin and the twins could still guide him via their earpieces.

Aimee watched him amble inside and he checked his walk, careful not to make his limp visible. Stefan stood beside Aimee, she and Gavin were hiding across from each other behind the two pillars that formed a curved arch over AIM's main door. Dominick was in now. He took a few steps, keeping his eyes open.

"This brings back some memories," whispered Stefan.

Aimee coughed out a nervous laugh, recalling the time he had attempted to climb those walls, and the unpleasant encounters that followed.

The three of them had their eyes on Dominick, peering out from behind their hiding places. Dom took another step, and then he was stopped by a deep, daunting voice and the hand that gripped his shoulder.

"I haven't seen you here before," he said matter-of-factly.

Under Gavin's orders, Dominick pretended to be him. When the guard asked him for his code, Gavin fed it into Dominick's ear, and the man searched his files on the digital logbook he held. He ogled Dominick sceptically.

"Gavin Malec?" he inquired. The man spoke French, but Dominick understood. "Says here that you left."

"Transferred," he corrected. "I'm back now."

He walked past the guard, hoping the interrogation was over, but it was not.

"That's some accent you've got there," he tested.

Dominick halted and barely turned his head when he replied, "Are you paid to make small talk or to watch the door?"

Dominick went straight to the elevator. As its doors closed him in, he noticed the guard looking outside, looking for anything suspicious. There was nothing out there but the few helicopters that were left over – that did not return to GINM after dropping off the field agents – and they were hidden within the forest across the road from the building. You could see glints of silver in between the trees and bushes as the sun slapped the metal surface of each helicopter, but the guard did not recognise it. He returned to his post. In his distraction, he failed to notice Dominick place something on the wall beside the elevator; a miniscule device, a capsule, which released an invisible knockout gas. And the gas dexterously devoured the room and the soldiers within it.

Meanwhile, Gavin led Dom through the building and to its heart, the Motherboard, where all operations were controlled. Valerie and Finn were observing his actions from the screens in the chopper that were linked to the microscopic camera on his collar, but Gavin relied on Dom's description of his surroundings. There were seemingly endless corridors and faces that had Dominick sweating from his brow.

"They won't do anything to you, don't worry," Gavin promised. "Just get into the Motherboard. It should be the door to your right, now. Use the key card I gave you and insert the password: 46e6yug14."

He did as ordered. When the door clicked unlocked, his friends cheered in his ear, careful not to deafen him however. He opened the door and entered into a large room lined with many computers and abnormally burly computer nerds at one long desk that stretched and bent like the walls of a colossal maze, in length and in height. Each computer station had steps from the ground to the top of the platform. Dominick felt so out of place, and the glares from the steroid-nerds were not any comfort, but he remembered to stay calm. He faked a cough and covered his mouth with his hand.

Swiftly, he whispered, "I can use any computer?"

"Yes, as long as no one can see what you're doing," replied Gavin.

Dominick ventured deeper into the maze and looked for a computer private enough to occupy. He found one, far from the others, and ascended the steps to the station. It was up to twins now. With their instructions, Dominick was able to sound a false alarm in another room as well as play old footage of an intruder on the security screens. The soldiers in the Motherboard reacted to the alarm like hounds to a whistle, clearing out hastily and routinely. Then, just as Dominick thought he was alone, one of the soldiers approached him.

"Tu ne viens pas, monsieur?" he asked.

Aimee hurriedly uttered, "He's asking if you're going with them."

"Oui," he coughed out his best French accent.

The man nodded and smiled, pleased. He descended the stairs, assuming without a doubt that Dominick was right behind him – he was, creeping stealthily with his hand poised for attack. Without hesitation, Dominick rendered the soldier unconscious with a sequence of swift staccato strikes.

"Down boy, we're trying not to kill anyone!" Finn reminded him.

"Don't worry; I only knocked him out," he stated. "But if all of Abba's men are that easy, today's events should end very quickly."

He returned to the computer, after checking the man's lame wrist for his pulse – he felt it. Then, with his eyes on the screen and his fingers on the keyboard, awaiting commands from the twins, he gave Gavin and Stefan the signal to enter AIM. At that instant, Gavin held Aimee back and Stefan went in alone. She protested, struggled in his arms, reminded of the mechanical arm that had kidnapped her months ago.

"Let go!" she ordered.

"Don't let her out of your sight," Stefan requested that of Gavin. "You know where to go."

"Stefan, this is not the plan!" she yelled in frustration and watched as he strode into the foyer and then the elevator, without looking back.

When she could not see him anymore, Gavin let her loose, and she glared at him with potent rage.

"He knows what he's doing," he muttered. "Come on."

She had no argument, despite her anger; she was speechless and submitted to that trust of hers, the trust that vivaciously clung to him and Stefan both. The elevator returned to the ground floor, its mouth empty, waiting for them.