Brose at The Center

by Jennifer Sue

Part 1

As things returned to normal at The Center after their horrific unscheduled trip to the mall in New Jersey, Brose withdraw from casual social contact with her fellow students. In every math, science and biology class and during lunch, she could feel their apprehension at being close to her... the human killing machine. It felt as if the other students were looking at her as if they were afraid of what she had done. Truth be told, quite a few were doing that. All were glad she was on their team and all those who had been on the expedition understood they wanted Brose with them on future missions, yet many were also afraid she could slip into her mechanical executioner mode. The tension she felt between herself and the other students coupled with the guilt she felt for killing so many people on the mission to make her wonder if she could ever have any type of normal life. In many ways, what she was experiencing now was almost identical to the way her classmates had always treated Dave, only then it was because of the ever present hog stench. The isolation then had been tolerable because that was all Dave had ever known. Now that same isolation felt like a knife to her heart. Having known friendship, even if only briefly, made the withdrawal of companionship emotionally devastating.

Logically she knew what she had done on the mission was for the best as it was through her actions the quads had been rescued. If it hadn't been for her they would be in enemy hands by now. Still she felt guilty for killing all those people. Sure, they were the so called bad guys, but could she have done things differently? She 'what if'd herself into a remorseful funk. The only time she felt a bit of relief was during her afternoon training sessions. She honed her knife fighting skills to perfection and she excelled in hand-to-hand combat. The firing range was her playground.

On the firing range, since it was virtually impossible to improve her accuracy, she expanded the range of weapons. Just as she preferred her Desert Eagle, she fell in love with the .50 caliber M107, a semi-automatic long range sniper/anti-material rifle that used .50 Browning machine gun bullets. The unloaded weight of the gun and scope was twenty eight and a half pounds. The assembled length was fifty seven inches, in takedown mode 38 inches. The safety was an easily reached manual thumb-lever. The magazine capacity was ten rounds although most people preferred a load of 8 to 9 rounds. Once the target was in the sights of an expert marksman, they could aim and fire on target at the rate of 1 round per second. The weight of the magazine with ten rounds was four and one eighth pounds, the muzzle velocity 2,800 fps, the muzzle energy 11,500 foot-pounds, and the maximum effective range was 7,450 yards [2.6 miles] while the absolute maximum range was 7,450 yd [9.8 miles].

Brose astounded everyone with her expert marksmanship. At two and a half miles she was able fire the ten round clip in ten seconds clustering all the shoots in a three inch circle on a moving target. Other skills she honed were stealth, camouflage and concealment, easily exceeding the requirements the US Navy demands of Seals.

While she still supplied scents for the cafeteria and lounge areas, she unconsciously began to exude the cloying smell of hog manure in her perspiration. While not strong enough to contaminate a room, it did annoy anyone near her, sort of like a permanent fart. This resulted in no one wanting to sit near her so in every class there were empty seats about her and she always made sure to get to the cafeteria early or late so she could sit alone to eat.

Brose spent most of her free time working out, adding to her already formidable strength and endurance. As she exercised and perspired, the hog manure smell intensified and made the gym rather unpleasant. When the talent coach finally questioned Brose about her manure scented perspiration, she was clearly stunned. As she sniffed herself she realized he was right. When she failed to shut it off, she began to panic which only intensified the odor. Realizing it was out of her control, she fled outside to avoid contaminating the building, collapsing in tears as she remembered ‘Stinky Finky”.

In the following investigation, it became clear Brose was suffering from PTSD. While she could still control her odorkinesis as she had in the past, she could do nothing about her hog manure scented BO. Even without talking to the shrink she understood it was an unconscious defense mechanism to keep people away from her just as the hog manure smell had done all her life. Daily counseling sessions in a well ventilated room revealed the issues causing her PTSD, but did little to help. To go to her classes and other activities, Brose had to wear a self-contained haz-mat suit to keep her BO from disturbing others.

During an afternoon training session with Mr. Lions she had her ah-ha moment. They were trying to find out how she had been able to block the damper in the mall. They reviewed her initial exposure to a dominator back on her aunt and uncle’s farm. Brose had said it felt like the dominator had raped her mind during the first intrusion. At the dominator’s second attempt, Brose reported she felt the powerful mental probe ‘ping’ her mind and angrily fought back, pushing her back out. This had obviously shocked the dominator and Brose had felt her sudden fear. Anger at the rude mental intrusion had flooded her (Dave) and time seemed to slow. It had been at that point the odorkinesis had kicked in.

“That wasn’t the first time I felt someone trying to mentally communicate with me,” Brose gasped to Mr. Lions. “When I was heading in to the farm and passed Lise, even though I didn’t understand I sensed her empathy powers, I immediately understood what she was trying to tell me just by ‘feeling’ her empathy. Then when she came to comfort me after everything went down, I ‘felt’ she wanted to help me. It wasn’t like I was reading her mind, but I was sensing her empathy.”

“Now that I think about it, at the mall I somehow sensed there was a damper in the food court,” Brose continued. “Even before he tried to blast us! I must have unconsciously put up a mental shield that deflected his mental assault while at the same time tracing it directly back to him. When I charged in, I was already squeezing the trigger and aiming before I actually saw him. He saw Luce and I had blown through his attack but the bullet I fired blew his head apart before he could react. Before he hit the floor I sensed the fear of the mercenaries and fired at them without seeing them. I knew where the were by their emotions! The fear they radiated pinpointed them for me. I took each out with one shot even though two of them were hiding behind counters. The .50 caliber slugs penetrated what they were hiding behind to take them out, but I never saw them! I thought I was just smelling their fear, which I did, but I also felt it with my mind!”

“That’s what has me freaked out now,” Brose continued. “I’m picking up the unease the other kids have about me. I’m sweating the hog smell as a defense mechanism against their emotions! Dr. Tipps said I was doing it to keep others away from me and was due to PTSD. It’s my ability to sense their feelings! I guess I’ve got some sort of unconscious empathetic talent.”

Mr Lions summoned Dr. Tipps and they reviewed what Brose had concluded. It was Dr. Tipps who noticed the pig manure perspiration had disappeared.

That evening Brose joined the others in the cafeteria without her haz-mat suit. As soon as they saw her she sensed their apprehension. “You can relax,” Brose smiled. “We figured out what was making me literally sweat like a pig and I’ve been able to control it.”

Nearly everyone breathed a sigh of relief and several applauded. Brose joined the quads, all four dressed in the girls uniform looking for all the world like two sets of identical twin sister sisters. The five chatted up a storm as Brose caught up on all the quads were doing. Brose was relieved they enjoyed being together at The Center.

*****

During the ensuing talent sessions, it became evident that Brose had been under-evaluated at her initial screening. The scientists sent a team of inspectors out to the farm she had grown up on under the guise of an EPA inspection. Since Brose really felt no emotional connection to her aunt and uncle, she went with them posing as an intern. While one team kept her aunt and uncle busy, Brose led the others to the hog barns where she showed them the drain pipes she had crawled through to exterminate rats.

Using remote controlled rovers, they set up the ventilation fan and sent the rovers inside. What they found confounded the scientists. The concentrations of poisonous gases should have proved at best debilitating to Dave if not fatal. There was no way the boy should have been able to endure the rat hunts. The films the rovers made of the trip proved claustrophobic to all who saw them. The staff developed a new appreciation of Brose’s stamina.

This led to Brose becoming a lab rat herself. For several days the doctors and scientists tested her. After donning a sophisticated breathing apparatus that measured the gases she exhaled and regulated the air she inhaled, they had her run on a treadmill. At first they measured her output on standard room air. Even after two hours of full out running, her CO2 levels were no higher than someone taking a casual stroll. Her blood pressure rose to 200 over 130 and pulse rose 210BPM to hover in the danger zone, but she showed none of the ill effects such readings should have engendered. They took blood samples every fifteen minutes from a trap as she ran to get blood gas readings. They also sampled her perspiration. Upon analyzing her sweat, they discovered why her exhaled CO2 levels barely rose. Somehow she was exuding the excess CO2 through her sweat!

Once they had mined all the data they could from repeated trials, the scientists and doctors began to add the noxious gases they’d found in the sewers under the pig barns to the mix. At first there seemed to be having no effect on Brose. It wasn't until they upped the levels to what should have been incapacitating or fatal concentrations they noticed changes. Her CO2 levels rose slightly but were still no where near what was expected from her exertions. While her pulse reached 300 bpm, her blood pressure soared until it pegged the 300 limit of the equipment. She should have dropped dead but instead just kept running.

Again it was the combination of blood gas readings and perspiration that revealed what was happening. As expected, the poisons showed up in Brose’s blood samples. But somehow Brose cleansed the poison from her blood before it harmed her body by sweating it out! Her perspiration while she was exposed to the poisonous gases was toxic. Somehow her body had adapted, using what should have been fatally high blood pressure and pulse rate to extrude the poisons from her blood into perspiration. They assumed that ability was somehow related to the contamination in the bottled water her mother had consumed.

Deciding to see how powerful her ability was to sweat out poisons, they placed her and the equipment in a sealed room. Once she was hooked up to the monitoring devices and began to run on the treadmill, they pumped in knock-out gases. As she breathed in the various gases, her body filtered them from her blood and extruded it in her sweat. While tear gas made her eyes water, it didn't slow her down or cause her to cough. What amazed those examining her was that it took absolutely no conscious effort, her body automatically filtered out poisons.

As further proof of her ability, they had her lie on a bed while one at a time they injected high doses of various sedatives directly into her body. Brose reported she could feel a brief bit of drowsiness immediately after the injection but that it quickly faded. Monitoring her perspiration they discovered the sedatives being extruded through her skin.

As a further test, the scientists obtained a king cobra and anti-venom. With Brose's permission she allowed it to bite her while they monitored her. Normally fatal to a human in thirty to forty five minutes, other than a slight burning sensation at the site of the bite, she suffered no ill effects. Once more the poison was extruded as perspiration through her skin.

The scientists tried to pull Brose's medical file from before her transition and were quite shocked to discover there was only the hospital record of his birth and the normal childhood immunizations. Dave had never seen a doctor. A bit of investigation revealed that he never missed a day of school. When questioned, Brose could never recall ever feeling ill or even had the sniffles. Her aunt and uncle had colds and flu nearly every winter, but Dave had never caught any bug.

One thing that had been previously overlooked in the medical record Brose had compiled at The Center but now took on importance was that she healed rapidly. The injuries she suffered when she exploded the training building included concussive injuries, severe bruises, minor cuts, and scrapes as well as hearing loss. The bruises never reached the severity they would on normal people. The scrapes healed overnight and the minor cuts in about thirty hours. The concussive force had caused everyone to bleed from their ears and the damage took between a week to ten days to heal and most had some scarring inside the ear canal. The hearing loss Brose suffered dissipated in twenty four hours leaving no damage. As for the shock wave itself, the damage passed in hours.

The scientists concluded her exposure to the contaminated water somehow enabled her body to make these unique adaptations. It was the only logical conclusion they could reach. Growing up in a highly odiferous environment, her metabolism had adjusted itself to compensate for poisons in a similar manner to how people born and raised at high altitudes are much more efficient at breathing in the thinner air than those born and raised at sea level. This probably also explained her tremendous physical strength, stamina and rapid healing. They also theorized it had a great deal to do with her tremendous accuracy due to phenomenal eye-hand coordination and body control. The transition had not only incorporated her pre-existing ability to sweat out poisons but had enhanced it to enable her to create odors and gases at will. What this meant was that while Brose was an odorkinetic, it was NOT her main transition generated talent.

The odorkinesis, while powerful, was a variation of her pre-existing ability to sweat out poisons that was greatly enhanced by the change. Her true talent was her ability to ‘feel’ others without seeing them and to pinpoint their position. She was a powerful receiving empath. That’s how she had ‘felt’ the mercenaries watching her back on the farm that day so long ago. When questioned, the other empaths revealed they knew Brose was always aware of when they read her. In fact, under intense questioning, the empaths realized Brose had ‘allowed’ them to read her. They were all disconcerted to realize Brose could have easily blocked them. By the same token, they all realized Brose had in turn brushed their minds but had never probed other than to locate them.

The question now was could Brose probe into other people’s minds? If so, could she control them? Was she a dominator? Was she a kything? Brose felt the concerns of the staff as they worked with her. She could once more feel the wariness of the empaths as they purposely avoided probing her emotions.

Mr. Lions and Brose put a lot of work into figuring out exactly what Brose could do. At a hundred meters she could detect how many people were in a room by segregating their emotions and if she knew them, she was able to identify them. The accuracy diminished after that, but she was able to detect strong emotions out to three thousand meters and lock in on their location. What was truly amazing was that obstacles such as walls, steel armor, or earth seemed not to interfere with her abilities. She was able to literally 'look' through buildings or even hills to locate not only people, but any animal that could exhibit anxiety or fear.

As a live action test, they set up a series of skirmishes using paint ball weapons. Brose took on ten of The Center's top soldiers. First in a forested venue, then a farm venue, and finally an urban venue. In each case, Brose was to assault the hidden troops who knew she was coming.

Brose was able to sense her opponent’s excitement and apprehension to easily pinpoint each soldier. Then she was able to infiltrate their positions while avoiding detection due to her 'sensing' when someone's gaze was heading towards her position. Guys peeking out got nailed as soon as their heads appeared as Brose was able to pinpoint the exact spot their head would appear. The monitors showed she fired milliseconds before the person peeked so they were hit the instant they came into view. As she had done in the mall, she was able to 'shoot' the soldiers through cover. Remote monitors notified the soldiers they had been taken out by such a shot. To a man, the soldiers were shaken by her uncanny ability to take out their team unscathed.

If someone was concentrating on an objective, their emotions signaled their intent. While not able to 'read' the thoughts of others, she was able to pick-up their intent. They practiced in the school, Brose stayed out of sight in the hall by the cafeteria. She was able to identify everyone and not only pinpoint which table they were at but also which seat they occupied. While sitting in a room she was able to identify students and staff walking in the halls on various floors within one hundred meters of her location and could sense where they were heading.

Next they had Brose try to send emotions to others. Lise worked with her on volunteers but there was no success. Brose could exert no influence upon empaths, telepaths, or any other mind sensing/control ability. The most she could do was piggy-back their probing efforts to pinpoint their location. While she was not able to read or influence their thoughts, they could sense her presence which most certainly scrambled their emotions thus disconcerting them and breaking their concentration. Since the testing was done with her fellow students, Brose toned down the emotional scrambling, but realized she could easily cause a person to go into a panic. The mere presence of her tag-along could induce fear, uncertainty, depression or practically anything emotionally disturbing.

The volunteers were all shaken by what Brose could do. Only those who faced dominators had experienced similar fears. The thing they realized was that Brose could only touch another person’s mind if they were actively using their sensing/probing talents, even if their focus was on another person. Brose could piggyback on their output and follow back to the originator. With further testing, they discovered Brose could also piggyback someone else's probe into the receiver's mind.

Through these tests they proved Brose was a powerful empathy receiver, who was able to trace emotions back to the emitter and often sense their intent. She was not able to influence them in any way. If she encountered someone who was sending out mental probes she was able to piggyback herself on their probes. With that she could read the intent of the sender and receiver. Her ability to piggyback was also how she blocked mind probes.

*****

The quads were in reality twin twins. They eagerly trained with their talents and grew quite accurate and skillful in their uses. The quads knew whenever one quad was using their talent. When together they quickly learned how to avoid canceling each other out. Sunny and Shadow were able to unite their photo/umbra kinetics to create a spiraling cyclone of intense blinding bright light and absolute darkness. They could vary the size and spin of the vortex. They also were able to set their opposing powers so it would pulse out like water from a hose but rapidly switching from light to dark without a pause in a strobe like effect. Both methods were highly disorienting.

In addition they discovered that by using their innate twin link, one could pump up the power of the other. With the talent of one quad linked, Sunny was able to project an almost laser like tight intense beam. The beam would not burn through material or flesh like a laser, but if pinpointed into a surveillance camera lens it would overload and fry the light sensor thus rendering the camera dead. They assumed the same would happen if the beam went into someone's eye but they didn't want to try that.

Blaze and Snow soon discovered they too could link their talents. They were able to unite their pyro/cryo kinetics to create a spiraling cyclone of intense heat that ignited combustibles and ice inducing cold. They could vary the size and spin of the vortex. They also were able to set their opposing powers so it would pulse out like water from a hose but rapidly switching from heat to cold without a pause in a strobe like effect. Either method proved extremely devastating.

Like their twins, they discovered they too could link their talents to pump up the power of the other. Linked, Blaze could melt steel or Snow could freeze an object down to near absolute zero which made it super brittle. Both methods left a long term 'burn' effect because the object didn't instantly cool down or warm up and anyone touching it could suffer.

The quads could also combine cross twin, Blaze could send out a fireball cloaked in a ball of darkness or a cone of bright light. Snow could send out an ice attack similarly cloaked.

On top of that, the quads could link and the power of the other three would boost the talent of the primary user. The power of the links squared. Two together boosted one to twice the power. Three together boosted one to four times the power. Four linked together boosted one to eight times the power. The boosted quad could increase the intensity or the range of their talent or a combination of both. The same held true for their blended talents. One quad could boost two or three of the others.

Although they tried, only the quad who had a particular talent could use that talent. They could share talent energy but not talent. In experiments, they found that through their link they could cause a sedated quad to issue a blast of their talent but had no control. Since each user is immune to the effects of their talent, they could use it in an emergency.

Even before their transition, the quads had a unique mental link, thus their quad speak. For them, taking tests was always a communal effort. The transition improved their capabilities, doubling the range they had previously enjoyed. Now when within one hundred meters, they had virtual telepathic links that were always 'on'. They had learned how to mute the links but even then were able to snap it open if an energetic thought knocked or one of the other's knocked. At distances up to five hundred meters they were empathetic. So far they found no range limit on pain, sorrow, horror, anger or fear. Their ability to link talent powers was limited to their telepathic range. The ability of one quad to initiate a talent blast was their empathetic range.

The main concern was that their innate telepathy might leave them vulnerable to psychic attacks. They practiced their muting capability and succeeded in making it more powerful to the point they were able to prevent intrusion while still feeling someone knocking. Then they brought Brose into the testing. She was able to piggyback on the quad's telepathy. That really shook the quads as no one had ever intruded into their telepathic space. While not being able to read their thoughts or them hers, they were able to communicate empathically and with practice even crude images. Brose was able to show them how she blocked intrusions and they were able to duplicate her methods. They were able to block out Brose while she piggybacked. This didn't prevent Brose from locating them or sensing their emotion, but did prevent any intrusion. Blocking Brose did not interfere with their ability to communicate. Whether that would be enough to keep others out remained to be seen.

The quads also eagerly engaged in the military training available. Having experienced being the victims of armed assault, they wanted to be able to defend themselves without using their talents. Their grandfather had taught them how to shoot .22 pistols and rifles so they quickly picked up the weapon training, easily qualifying on numerous weapons. Since they had taken ballet and acrobatic lessons from age three to ten they had excellent coordination, reflexes, and agility. With those as abilities as a starting point they did well in hand to hand combat training. While not experts, they were so motivated they easily achieved the combat proficiency level of US Marines just out of boot camp in two weeks. In addition they ran and did weight training every day to build their stamina and endurance.

The quads, emboldened by their success in training, decided to ask if training in Parkour could be made available to the students. The adults didn’t have a clue but videos of MTV's Ultimate Parkour Challenge soon educated them. They also presented evidence the Royal Marines were taking Parkour training to aid their urban warfare abilities. No one could argue parkour skills would not prove handy to the students. Inquiries were made and initial contacts were made with American Parkour, the leading parkour and freerunning community in the world. Established in 2005, APK has grown to be home for over 90,000 registered users.

*****

Representatives from the Department of Homeland Security investigated several possible instructor candidates. After doing background checks on those deemed possible instructors,, interviews were held. Everything was done under the guise of selecting qualified, trustworthy parkour instructors for two full time positions at a unique elite private high school that wanted to avoid public exposure for the safety and well-being of it’s students. Once the field was narrowed, sit down discussions were held with Ms Fine and Lili who were identified as the Dean of the school and a student counsel representative respectively. Lili used her telepathy to vet the candidates. The first item was that non disclosure statements would be signed with the assurance they would be enforced. Several candidates refused to sign and the interviews were promptly ended. Those that signed were then informed the school was sponsored by the US government. Any betrayal of confidentiality would be construed as a violation of national security and would be treated accordingly. This removed more candidates. Generalities were discussed as Lili monitored the candidates. If she detected hesitancy or anything that might lead to an eventual issue she would take the pen she was using to make notes and click the retractor mechanism three times. Ms Fine knew that meant the person was no longer a candidate and the interview was cut short. Five year contracts were offered to the instructors. They would have to move to the school where housing, clothing and meals would be provided as would free top of the line unrestricted medical care. All mail outside the facility would be done via an APO address. All electronic communication would be routed through a hub in the Department of Homeland Security. The salary started at seventy thousand dollars and would increase ten percent a year. A retirement program of ten percent of their salary would be set up with them able to contribute ten percent of their salary.

The two candidates Lili deemed most likely to accept the reality of The Center were offered the positions. They were given a week to wrap up any personal affairs and were given their APO and DHS phone number. Any communications that might be needed to make with their new employer would be done through their new DHS phone number.

Dave Ringler was a twenty five year old army vet who became a parkour enthusiast during his tour in Iraq. Since his discharge, he’d discovered he simply couldn’t go back to his pre army civilian life and had found solace in parkour and free running and soon became an instructor.

Harry Hatz was a twenty two year old who dropped out of college after one year to chase a dream of becoming a top parkour athlete. Unfortunately, there was little demand for parkour athletes so he migrated to instructing.

The two knew each other and were on good terms. They would share an apartment in the staff facilities of The Center. The ride to The Center in a blacked out SUV was a bit disconcerting but they were told the location of the school simply called The Center needed to remain a secret.

After settling in, they were given a tour of the facility. There were stunned by the size and sophistication of the building. As they toured the student cafeteria they were surprised. While the students all wore the same uniform, the variety of hairstyles and colors seemed out of place. When they were introduced to Kristyn and Max, they were more than surprised. These kids were their bosses? The story about transitioning seemed fanciful until Kris demonstrated her sparking fingers. Then Max lifted the water out of the glass beside him and floated it over to water the plant on the window sill.

The guys quickly settled in and adapted to life at The Center. Their classes were stuffed with enthusiasts. Most were in it just for the rush, but several were in it to enhance their martial arts skills. Brose and the Quads fell into that group.

*****

Kristyn was pleased Brose recovered from her PSTD but wondered if she was still qualified to be a leader. Was she the best choice to be placed as second in command under Luce? It was Brose who stepped forward asking to sit down with Kris and Luce.

“I’m not sure I’m ready to take on the responsibilities of being second in command for the Gamma site,” Brose began. “I’m a hands on type person. I feel I can do a good job as a squad leader, but my people skills are not up to being a unit leader. I’m not sure I’ll ever reach that point. Give me a task and a small team and I’ll get the job done. I’ll work with and coordinate with other squads like I did on the Quad mission. I feel I’ll be more valuable as leader of a squad.”

“You’ve surprised me again,” Kris replied. “Your honest self evaluation tells me I made the right decision in promoting you. I will admit your PTSD issues have given me concerns about your capabilities as a site second in command. I’d like to discuss this with my staff so if you’d wait outside for a few moments, we’ll make a decision.”

“Thank you,” Brose acknowledged and left the office to wait in the outer office.

After discussing the matter with the staff and Luce, it was decided to keep Brose as a team leader but remove her from being second in command to Luce.

“Thank you,” Brose declared as she accepted the decision with more than a bit of relief. “I’ll make sure you never have reason to regret your decision.”

“I have no doubts of that,” Kristyn smiled. “Now, because of all the publicity about the New Jersey affair, we’ve had to stretch the truth a bit and that concerns you. It seems it has become unofficial public knowledge that there was one soldier who shot down a jet and helicopter with a Desert Eagle.”

Brose blushed and fidgeted.

“To make that rumor seem more true than the reality of you, we’ve pre-dated your military enlistment to a week before the terrorist attack,” Kristyn explained. “Officially, that mystery marksman was a private in the army when the action took place. I wanted to let you know.”

“Thank you, Ma’am,” Brose replied as she saluted Kristyn.

“As for your current status, we’ve decided to have you lead a special squad,” Kris stated. “We feel the talents of the quads and their unique ability to boost places them amongst the most formidable in The Center arsenal. We’ve decided to assign them to you with the intent to make a strike force that can be used for rescue operations or outright assaults. Three soldiers will also be added to the unit. We’d like you to begin training as a unit.”

“Yes ma’am,” Brose smiled glad she was given the quads. “We won’t let you down.”

*****

Brose took her task to heart. With a weird sense of humor, Brose called her squad the Special Operations Squad, SOS for short, confident that anyone her unit faced would be sending out an SOS. The quads were delighted to be assigned to the unit under Brose’s command. The soldiers were crack battle hardened decorated troops who had served in Iraq. Sgt. Glenn McNeil was a decorated veteran of Iraq. His skills as a Special Forces Engineer were impeccable. Pfc. Karen Loose was a motor transport operator. She could not only drive nearly anything, she could repair them too. Sgt. Jerry High was a Special Forces Communications technogeek. Computers and communications were his forte.

Together they conducted training exercises. With a boost, Snow could form an ice bridge across a twenty meter wide running stream that was strong enough for the unit to move across. Blaze then easily melted it removing all trace of the temporary bridge. With full packs they could move fast and stealthily for hours day or night. Shadow could create a moveable shadow shield around the unit while Sunny illuminated their path inside the shield.

In addition to regular combat training, Brose requested the SOS squad get airborne training. If they were needed for a rapid deployment, the ability to parachute into a location might make a huge difference in the mission’s outcome. Luce had already led a skydiving assault when they took out Section Three of the Syndicate.

Kris agreed to a trial that was safe. Just as Luce had done, Brose and the quads got to experience the HALO (High Altitude Low Opening) jump simulation. All screamed but asked for more. Within a week, the entire SOS Squad was jumping out of a plane. A week later they were actually doing HALO jumps.

Brose suggested they mount a mock ground assault on The Center when it was on full alert. At first the military staff refused, but Kristyn felt it would be a valuable experience for the team and The Center so authorized it. As a precaution, an army regiment was sent out to establish an armed perimeter two thousand meters outside The Center perimeter to provide security while the exercise was taking place.

The scenario was set up to begin at dawn with the assault after dark while The Center was on full alert and all the on-site students participating. Weapons were replaced with paint ball guns. The assault could occur at any time between dusk and dawn and come from any direction.

At sunrise Brose and the soldiers scouted the perimeter. One of the quads was with each of them so they were able to maintain radio silence and used each other as relays to communicate. By noon they settled on an infiltration along the main entrance rightly figuring this would be the approach least expected.

Just before sunset, Brose set out with a paint ball sniper rifle to the low point of the perimeter about five hundred meters from the entrance where drains and swales created a lot of cover. Using the paint ball rifle she popped each of the surveillance cameras covering the area. As the base went on high alert Brose scrambled back to the entrance. Lining up in a drainage ditch beside the main road, Snow erected a bubble of ambient temp air around the group to mask them from infrared sensors. They moved up the ditch in the bubble until they reached the gate. Brose then projected a bubble of powerful knock-out gas at each guard rendering them senseless. With Blaze and Shadow combining their powers, Blaze made a torch that sliced through the fence like butter while Shadow blocked out the area immediately in front of the cut. Snow snuffed out the tell-tale lingering heat as soon as they were done.

The squad then moved forward with Shadow masking them from the cameras with darkness while Snow continued to block the infrared sensors. When they reached the building, they moved along the side towards the drains. As they expected, the unconscious guards are the gate were detected within three minutes and security teams rushed to the area, including most of those who had been deployed to the drainage area by the snuffing out of the cameras. Shadow hid them from view as the stayed against the building while the troops redeployed to the gates. By the time they guards reached the gates, Brose had reached the manholes above the sewer drain pit just outside the building. All sewage from inside the base flowed by gravity to this pit to be pumped to the treatment plant. Troops could still be seen watching the perimeter.

Inside, the base commander was scrambling. He'd assumed the attack would come well after dark when the troops had grown antsy and careless. He was almost certain taking out the cameras in the drainage area had been a decoy but erred on the side of caution and dispatched three squads, two to take defensive positions and one to check the perimeter. Assaulting the main gate seemed ludicrous but with the guards knocked out and the fence cut, it appeared Brose's team had gained entry to the base. But after scouring the area, they could find no evidence of intrusion.

Meanwhile Brose easily lifted the manhole cover and the team went down after which Brose replaced the cover. The sewer pit was sixteen feet square and twenty five feet high located twenty feet underground. The manhole opened onto a laddered shaft that descended into the pit onto an open steel catwalk that lined the pit eighteen feet above the bottom. This allowed workers access to work in the pit without having to step into the slop. Normally the workers had respirators and fans blowing fresh air to prevent lethal concentrations of CO2 and sewer gases. Brose used her odorkinesis to convert the air to a safe breathable atmosphere. The main sewer from under The Center was a forty eight inch pipe and a small steady stream of sewerage flowed into the pit. Brose had Snow freeze the sewerage into a dome that allowed the flow to continue under the dome while giving the team a solid curved base to walk on. By keeping their feet at the ice/pipe interface, they had solid footing that wouldn't be slippery.

The team was able to simply walk hunched over through the pipe. When they reached an access pit, Brose scanned for people. There were two guards in the room above. Brose pumped the room full of knock-out gas. As soon as both men were down, she flushed the room with fresh air. Shadow created a black cloud high enough off the floor to allow the team to enter. Spotting a surveillance camera she created a shield of darkness to keep between the camera and the team while not blacking out the entire room as the squad quickly moved inside. The guards were moved into a comfortable position and loosely tied and gagged and moved out of sight of the camera. Shadow shifted the blackness to reveal as much of the room as possible as they worked. As this was only a war game, notes were attached to guards indicating they had been killed. This would allow them to free themselves and await completion of the drill.

From the room, they made their way into a deserted corridor. Scanning ahead Brose located everyone on the floor. They were in the sub-basement where all the utilities and physical infrastructure of The Center were located. Quickly they made their way to the ventilation room. Brose scanned the room and detected one guard and three employees. Again she flooded the room with knockout gas. Blaze cut the center out of the locked steel door while Snow promptly cooled the cut. They stepped into the room and smiled when they saw the wires on the door frame. If they had opened the door an alarm would have sounded. The team quickly disabled the electronic controls that could shut the system down or block off sections or open vents or flush areas. The system was locked in the open position and unable to be shut down. Next they moved to the communications hub where they disabled the emergency power source. They did the same to every back-up power source in the basement except for the ventilation system, knocking out the guards and workers and tagging them as dead. Returning to the alarm control room they disconnected the alarms, stationing a soldier and quad there. The rest headed to the main power room. When they were ready, Brose flooded the entire ventilation system with knock out gas. Within thirty seconds someone tried to activate the alarm. The quad there immediately signaled the others and they shut down the main and back-up power. Since they had disabled the back-up systems, the entire alarm and communications system crashed as did the ability to electronically lock down the building.

Brose then filled the ventilation system with the rotten egg smell of natural gas. The team rapidly moved to the motor pool with Brose creating a bubble of fresh air for them. The guards were down so they pushed a Hummer to the door, manually opened the overhead, then started the Hummer and drove off as Blaze ripped a weak fireball into the motor pool.

With guns at the ready, the squad tore off through the grounds to the perimeter fence where Blaze hit the fence with another weak fireball. At that point they stopped, not having damaged the fence.

There had been a few minor injuries when people passed out, but no one suffered disabling injuries. The team was delighted with their success. Ms. Fine was embarrassed.

It took two hours to get the systems up and running. If it had been a real attack, Brose's squad would have wiped out The Center. If they had flooded the building with natural gas instead of just the rotten egg odor, the fireball into the motor pool would have blown the building to pieces.

The amazing thing was from the time the Brose popped the surveillance cameras at the drain until they stopped the Hummer at the fence, only an hour had passed. The assault team had never been spotted or detected. They successfully took out all the people they encountered. Basically, they simply blew through what had been thought to be a top of the line security system.

In the after action interviews, the team detailed all they had done. That they had been able to mask themselves from the infrared cameras stunned the base security officer. Reviewing the surveillance tapes they were able to see the shadow of darkness in the room in the sub-basement where they emerged from sewer. But at no time had it fully blocked the view so the picture never went blank. Alarms were added to all the controls they had disabled so when someone turned them off, an alarm sounded. Each manhole cover was alarmed with the sensor hidden in the ring that held the lid. Contact alarm tape was affixed to the inside of all doors so if someone cut through a door it would trigger an alarm. Similar precautions were taken at the Beta and Gamma sites.

Brose and the Quads were overwhelmed by the praise of their fellow students. Like all somewhat rebellious teens, they had given ‘the man’ a black eye and gotten away with it.

*****

The SOS unit trained incessantly. Brose demanded perfection, and drove herself harder than those under her command. While the soldiers had not been on the quad rescue mission, those who had recounted the role Brose played. They saw first hand her accuracy with the Desert Eagle. During their training, Brose made it clear she personally didn’t care for automatic weapons as she couldn’t adequately aim each bullet. Semi-automatics were ideal as she could fire off individual rounds as fast as she could aim and pull the trigger. The quads ability with weapons reached expert status in weeks.

*****

It made world wide news. Yet again the US Government was in another standoff with a militant family, this time in the mountains Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania near the tragic borough of Centralia. In 1962 a trash hauler dumped hot ash and/or coal discarded from coal burners into an open trash pit in an abandoned strip mine the town was using as a dump. The borough, by law, was responsible for installing a fire-resistant clay barrier between each layer, but fell behind schedule, leaving the barrier partly incomplete. This allowed the hot coals to penetrate into the vein of coal underneath the pit and light a subterranean fire.

The fire remained burning underground and spread through a hole in the rock pit into the abandoned coal mines beneath Centralia. All attempts to extinguish the fire were unsuccessful, and it continued to burn throughout the 1960s and 1970s. Adverse health effects were reported by several people due to the byproducts of the fire, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide and a lack of healthy oxygen levels.

In 1979, locals became aware of the scale of the problem when a gas-station owner and then mayor, John Coddington, inserted a stick into one of his underground tanks to check the fuel level. When he withdrew it, it seemed hot, so he lowered a thermometer down on a string and was shocked to discover that the temperature of the gasoline in the tank was 172 ÌŠF (77.8 ÌŠC). Statewide attention to the fire began to increase, culminating in 1981 when twelve year-old resident Todd Domboski fell into a sinkhole four feet wide by one hundred fifty feet deep that suddenly opened beneath his feet in a backyard. Only the quick work of his cousin Eric Wolfgang in pulling Todd out of the hole saved Todd's life, as the plume of hot steam billowing from the hole was measured as containing a lethal level of carbon monoxide.

In 1984, the U.S. Congress allocated more than $42 million for relocation efforts. Most of the residents accepted buyout offers and moved to the nearby communities of Mount Carmel and Ashland. A few families opted to stay despite warnings from Pennsylvania officials. In 1992, Pennsylvania governor Bob Casey claimed eminent domain on all properties in the borough, condemning all the buildings within. A subsequent legal effort by residents to have the decision reversed failed. In 2002, the U.S. Postal Service revoked Centralia's ZIP code, 17927.

Several current and former Centralia residents believe the state's eminent domain claim is a plot to gain the mineral rights to the anthracite coal beneath the borough. Residents estimate its value to be in the billions of dollars, although the exact amount of coal is not known. In a nearby municipality, the government was successful in extinguishing a similar mine fire using methods like those proposed for and used in Centralia. The opinion of these former and current residents, concerning the Commonwealth's desire to obtain mineral rights to the coal, stems from the municipality laws of the state. According to state law, when the municipality can no longer form a functioning municipal government, when there are no longer any residents, the borough legally ceases to exist. Thus, the mineral rights, and all other rights, possessed by the Borough of Centralia (since the mineral rights are owned by the borough and not a private company) would revert to the ownership of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania until the legal status of the land (ceding it to an adjacent municipality) occurs. Residents theorize the state legislature would keep the land in political limbo, so they can extinguish the blaze and mine the anthracite.

In 2009, Governor Ed Rendell began the formal eviction of Centralia residents. He faced criticism from some for this move and the current confrontation has arisen due to his efforts. The Quinn family farm was on the edge of the Centralia mine fire about a half mile northwest of the town and had been condemned along with the entire town. Feeling they were being victimized by a government that betrayed it’s citizens to appease big business, they resisted. To defend their home and property, the family accrued a small arsenal of weapons and ammunition.

In many ways, the farm was quite self-sufficient. Like many family farms in the area, they had their own private coal mine. The production was low and the mine only worked occasionally. To them, mining was a like any other crop they raised from the land. They consumed about half of what they dug and sold the rest to neighbors and friends as an unregulated cash crop. The trouble began when an inspector from the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement, Department of Interior tried to inspect the mine. The family thought this was just another ploy to get them off their land. The inspector was curtly rebuffed and was forced off the farm at gunpoint. This brought in the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms who were also met with armed though peaceful resistance. This then brought in the US Marshals who were also met with unyielding but so far peaceful armed resistance. News of the latest armed confrontation quickly went worldwide.

Maive was the matriarch of the Quinn family. A feisty woman, the granddaughter of Irish immigrant miners whose husband had been the grandson of Irish immigrant miners, all of whom were members of the Molly Maguires in the 1870s. James Quin had been killed in 1953 during the Korean War, one of thousands of soldiers who died while the negotiators played politics with their lives. Their sons Sean and Patrick, both green beret soldiers who had served in Vietnam, felt that they and other soldiers serving in Vietnam had been betrayed by the political intrigues of the government. They’d been sent to fight a war but were constrained by politics from doing the job that needed to be done. Their return was made even more bitter by the public reaction to the war. The brothers married and settled in Centralia. As the State tried to enforce the evictions, the brothers with their families were pushed out of their homes and moved back in with their mother. There they prepared themselves to defend their land.

The standoff was in it’s third week when an alert came down the chain of command to The Center. Brose was called in for a briefing. At first she didn't have a clue why The Center would be involved in such a case. It seemed the Quinn brothers had several children, two of whom went to Bloomsburg State University. Linda was Sean’s daughter and Rory was Patrick’s son. The cousins found college life challenging. Raised in the tough self-sufficient coal regions of Schuylkill County they ran into the intellectual liberal slant of those who never came face to face with life in the real world. The professors and most of their fellow students never worked a hands on job. Most felt those who worked with their hands were not civilized enough to comprehend the complexity of academia and needed to be guided by the intellectual elite. Naturally the cousins found themselves in the minority. As often happens to those who didn’t agree with their professors, even though they passed the tests the teachers let it be known they were uncouth slugs. Quite naturally, the cousins never fit in with elitist college life instead making friends amongst the other students with common sense. This isn't to say they didn't party, but did so in a traditional Irish manner. Drink heavily but be able to function the next day. There were few who could out drink the young cousins. This is how they met their future spouses, Darby Doyle and Colleen O’Reilly, also the descendants of Irish immigrant coalminers who could handle their liquor. With so much in common, they meshed quickly and well. At the end of the first semester of their sophomore year, they had a night of hard end of semester Christmas break partying. It wasn’t until February the girls admitted to each other they might be pregnant. Tests in March confirmed they were indeed pregnant. In solid Irish tradition they finished the semester since they had already paid for it. As good Irish Catholics they held a double wedding with a raucous reception as soon as the semester ended. The four moved in together as the guys began working. Both landed full time third shift jobs with morning part time jobs as well as weekend jobs.

As the due date approached, Maive finally convinced them to move back to the family farm where the family could help. A week later both went into labor the same day and it quickly became clear neither was going to have an easy time of it. The young couples crammed into a beat up but good running Bronco and with Sean driving rushed them to the hospital. Then began a series of events that turned the family firmly against all forms of governmental authority. A Pennsylvania State Trooper gave pursuit to the speeding Bronco. When Sean pulled over, he was hot as both expectant mothers were moaning in agony comforted by their frantic husbands. The state trooper could clearly hear and see the situation but demanded Sean's licence and registration of the Bronco. When Sean tried to argue they needed to get to the hospital as soon as possible, the trooper ignored him. Even the desperate pleas of the girls were ignored. When the trooper finally returned he said the licence of the vehicle and the inspection had expired and he was going to have the vehicle towed. That was more than Sean could take, after shouting at the trooper to go to hell, he tore off. Ignoring the pursuit of three state troopers, he headed for Geisinger Hospital in Danville. Once in Danville, with the assistance of the local police, they set up a road block and boxed the Bronco in three blocks from the hospital. The girls were crying in agony as the officers approached the vehicle with guns drawn. They ordered Sean out, as soon as he was out, he was thrown to the ground and brutally subdued. Darby and Rory refused to exit as their wives were clinging to them. Sean was outside yelling the girls needed to get to the hospital. Chaos reigned for the next fifteen minutes. Finally a sergeant from the State Police arrived on the scene. It only took him a few moments to figure out what was going on. Needless to say he was quite upset no one had summoned an ambulance for the pregnant women. In the five minutes it took the ambulance to arrive, both women started to give birth. Rory and Darby rightly refused to allow the police to assist. By the time the ambulance arrived on the scene, the babies were well on their way. The ambulance crew delivered the babies alive and healthy but both women were bleeding profusely. Both bled out before they could even be loaded into the ambulance.

Needless to say there were recriminations. The public outcry over the episode humiliated the police as public opinion held them responsible for the death of the women. No one listened to the doctors who said the women would have died even if they'd been in the hospital. A stunned Rory and Darby took their new born babies home as soon as they could. The lawyer who was representing the Centralia victims took on the case and easily won a large settlement. The money was used by the Quinn family to fortify and arm their homestead. Their dislike of authority now festered and a confrontation became inevitable.

What caused the alert for The Center was the death of the mothers. It was highly improbable that both would die of the same cause at the same time. A bit of sleuthing discovered that while the women were in college, neither liked the chlorinated city water so like many students at the time consumed bottled water. Further investigation showed the contaminated bottled water had been available in Bloomsburg at the time the women became pregnant. While there was no firm evidence to show they had consumed the water, the circumstances of the death at childbirth demanded further investigation. So far, all attempts to speak to the family had been rebuffed. The government had them sealed off in their farm but were afraid to push the issue as they wanted to avoid another martyr for the cause of right wing militancy. The family clung to their Molly Maguire Irish heritage as an anchor in the wild world of excessive liberalism.

*****