The Legacy
Bulgerian Underground
by toni walker

Scene 5 - Day One - The park

Ethan palmed his inside breast pocket making sure the postcard was secure. It was still there. Good. That was easy. For a second he thought about how effortlessly the job had gone. Almost too easy. Maybe all the planning on the Legacy's part was worthwhile. This mission definitely went smoothly enough.

"Godspeed, my friend," Isidor said softly in the fatherly voice he used with the younger agents.

"Same to you, my friend." Ethan took two steps backward and watched Isidor carefully as he walked off past the elderly lady.

Isidor turned back and shouted, "Keep that brother of yours in line."

Ethan laughed, nodded. "I will." He waved to his fellow agent. There weren't many operatives he was close to, but Isidor was one of the few.

The elderly lady stumbled a bit after Isidor exited the park. She grabbed her side, almost as if in severe agony. As fast as the pain marred her face, it was gone. Ethan considered helping her to one of the park benches, but then thought better of it. He had a schedule to keep. As he ventured toward his rented jeep, he heard a recognizable click. A click very much like the cocking of a gun. His senses sprung to alert like any good agent's would.

Scanning the perimeter he searched for trouble in every shadow. The click finally registered as that of an old fashioned rifle. The elderly woman pulled one from beneath her jacket and aimed it carefully at him. That was no old lady. Gone was the limp and the slow careful steps. Now the woman who stood not fifty feet away seemed to exude an uncommon youthful zest. She rose to her full height and discharged the rifle in his direction.

He ran for cover. The first few shots missed.

The woman then aimed at his jeep. Two clicks and a discharge later, his jeep's tires were deflating faster than he could formulate an adequate plan. This definitely blew his easy mission theory. Why was it that every mission followed the same format? Some unforeseen circumstance or another would present itself and screw up an otherwise flawless plan. So much for preparing ahead of time. That was all right though. Ethan worked well under such pressure. Many people commented on how ingenious he was, making things out of nothing. He wondered what he'd pull out of thin air today.

The woman again aimed her rifle at him. This time her aim would be truer. She wouldn't miss the second time around. Assassins rarely did. She fired, and the bullet flew at him in slow motion.. Somehow in that split second between impact and discharge he glanced at the teenagers standing in horror on the other side of the park. He performed a dive roll in the opposite direction from the teens to draw the attention away from them and completely on himself. No need getting innocent bystanders injured.

One bullet bit into the fleshy part of his shoulder. The other impacted his chest. He momentarily winced and gritted his teeth to calm the flood of pain coming into his body. As he reached for his gun, he could see the teenagers running toward him. He tried to scream a warning but no words came. They were the last thing on his mind before everything went black.

Scene 6 - Day One - A few minutes later

Scarlett and Phoenix ran towards the man lying in the middle of the park. He wasn't moving. Which wasn't a very good sign.

"Check to see where that woman went," yelled Scarlett as she knelt down to the stranger's side.

"Right!" Phoenix didn't bother to question his sister. She was right. They needed to get a good description of the shooter.

He ran up the steep incline to the east. It wasn't as easy as it looked. The rain from the night before made the grass slippery, and Phoenix struggled to reach the top. He could hear a car start not far away, but by the time he reached the apex, he caught only a brief glimpse of the car. A dark blue sedan. No rear license plate. He ran after it merely to get a better look at what turned out to be flying dirt kicked up by the car's tires. What a sleuth he was. The only thing he knew for certain was that the car sped away down the dirt road south, toward Greece.

"How is he?" asked Phoenix once he rejoined his sister.

"The shoulder is bleeding pretty bad, but the chest wound is different. It's not bleeding at all." She patted the stranger's chest lightly and felt a small round object. She picked it off his shirt. It took a little effort but she managed to dig it out of the vest underneath his coat.

"What is it?" Phoenix stared at the small object.

"I think it's a bullet." Scarlett threw an uneasy glance at her brother.

The stranger's chest suddenly heaved and he filled his lungs with oxygen. Neither Scarlett nor Phoenix noticed the gun at the stranger's hip. He reached for it as he sat up abruptly waving it in a semi-circular direction.

"She's gone," Phoenix said, to answer the question the stranger didn't ask.

"Where?" Ethan's voice was raspy and horse, and he couldn't get enough air into his lungs. The damn thing had worked. Boswell was a damned genius. He had created the thinnest bullet proof vest in the world.

Phoenix pointed up toward the grassy incline. "That way. Toward Greece."

"You're sure?" They both nodded. "What in the hell are you kids doing here anyway?" Ethan was in no mood to baby-sit two teenagers out for a joy ride. He had to get the microfilm back to the Legacy. Time was running out.

Scarlett started to tell the stranger about overhearing the man in the American Embassy when Phoenix stopped her with a stern look.

"Just out for a drive," she improvised casting him back the same stern glance then smiling wearily at the stranger.

"Well then, drive back to where ever you came from." Ethan waved his arms at them bidding them to go. They complied and started back toward their own car.

"Shit," he yelled. The pain in his shoulder had finally kicked in and it hurt like hell. He was thankful that Gia Doyle, the co-Legacy assistant director, had talked him into wearing one of the new Legacy-issue bullet proof vests. Saved his hide. He'd have a hole in his chest as big as the Copenhagen mermaid if it weren't for that small suggestion. Gia was definitely his guardian angel on this mission. He'd have to remember to thank her.

He had worn the thin device so that Isidor wouldn't worry about the mission being too dangerous. Isidor was an old man who had not seen how ugly the Legacy had become in the past five years. Philip Lancaster, the other Legacy co-assistant director, had filled the previous director's shoes and with him came a new era of trouble. Gia tried to keep him in line but he had his own agenda. And his agenda didn't usually mesh with the agenda of The Legacy.

Ethan was certain that Philip didn't care one way or the other. The parent organization, the Knights Foundation, had separated itself from the Legacy years ago. They were all on their own. And if a mission failed leaving an agent in trouble, that agent was left for dead. He had to his own initiative and successfully flee the country he'd infiltrated. Ethan had a feeling that this was exactly what he would have to do.

Philip had sent him to Bulgaria to retrieve an important nox list of Legacy agents currently in that country. It was a simple mission. It was now a mission that had gone awry. According to his watch he had exactly forty-seven hours and thirty-five minutes to deliver the list. If he failed, many agents would be compromised, even killed.

Ethan glanced back at the two strange kids who had come to his aid. Stupid kids, wandering into an undercover operation. But he had a feeling they knew something more than they were willing to tell him. He had sensed it. A talent gained from four successive missions in three weeks. He hadn't seen the inside of his apartment in three months. After this mission was over, he was definitely going to take that vacation.

The pain in his arm reminded him it was still there as he attempted to get up from his sitting position. On the second try he finally made it. The two teenagers were still standing outside their car staring at him like a man in a peep show. They were waiting for the show to start. There wasn't going to be a show. He had the list. It was safely in his pocket. All he had to do now was drive across the boarder into Greece and hand it off to Philip. Simple, even with a wounded shoulder.

He was halfway between a grove of trees and his rented jeep when he heard a high pitched squeal. A squeal he'd know anywhere.

"Get down!" Ethan tried to warn the teens, but they didn't understand what he was screaming about. They didn't know what the sound meant. He dove behind a nearby tree just as his jeep exploded into a ball of orange flames.

"Shit!"

Scene 7 - Day One - The grassy incline

Octavia replaced her microphone ear piece and stepped out from behind an overgrown weeping willow. A perfectly executed diversionary tactic.

"All right," she muttered in a practiced American/Russian accent. "Diversion successful."

"Proceed after target. Incommunicado until goal is reached," said the technical controller after a short pause.

"Until goal is reached. I understand. Octavia, out." She pulled the ear piece off and stashed it in her back pack.

While the teens had been occupied with saving Ethan's life, Octavia cast off her grandmotherly disguise and replaced the old faded mumu with a leopard skin cat suit. Much more to her own taste in clothing. She messed with the black fur cuffs until they were positioned perfectly. Over the suit she tied a long black sarong around her waist. Even if she was in the back woods of Bulgaria, she didn't have to look the part.

She was lithe, willowy, and could wear such a garment with the praise and ogles of the opposite sex. Attracting the prey was a favorite past time of hers. Tonight, the pray was Ethan Fairchild. No, she didn't think she would kill him, not yet anyway, but she could have a barrel of fun torturing him. She too was on her own. Philip's game had begun. Now who would be the better adversary? She scan checked her supplies and headed off after her target.

Scene 8 - Day One - The park

Ethan sighed then winced as a tree root dug into the small of his back. Professional hit. He should have known. Then it came to him in an instant. He had seen traces of many Legacy tactical maneuvers in the last few minutes. The old lady had a particular technique of cocking a rifle that was only taught by Legacy staff members. Inspiration had struck. This whole damn operation was an operation inside itself. A mission inside a mission. Most likely a test of some sort from the parent organization. But this had Philip Lancaster written all over it. It reeked of his doing. Even down to the small detail of using an old lady as the shooter. Playing the odds, he'd even bet he was a friend or knew the shooter personally.

There were many political groups who would want the Bulgarian underground list. Ethan wouldn't put it past Philip to have sold out to one of them. God, damn waffling bastard! Ethan knew that if *he* brought Philip the list, it would most likely fall into the right hands. Most likely. If the Legacy assassin retrieved it, he knew from experience that Philip would hand the list over to the highest bidder. Sometimes he hated this job. Philip was *not* going to win this one. Ethan was ready to show the waffling bastard exactly what he was made of. When he crossed the border into Greece, Philip Lancaster had better be wary.

"Are you all right?" Phoenix rested a hand on his sister's shoulder. "Maybe this wasn't such a good idea after all."

"No, I'm fine. The shaking is only a side effect of the fear." She hugged her arms around her torso. Maybe Phoenix was right. This hadn't been such a bright idea. It wasn't anywhere near as easy as finding the stolen ruby necklace last year or tracking down the school drug dealer had been. This was involving dead bodies and guns and things way too scary for them to be involved in.

"You're right," she finally admitted. "Let's get out of here." Fear painted her small oval face.

Scarlett and Phoenix piled into the Embassy sedan, but before they could drive away, the stranger laid a hand on the driver's side window. He made a circular motion with his hand and Phoenix rolled down the window.

"Hey, there, kids. You weren't thinking of leaving without me, were you?" Ethan gave them his best "trust me" smile.

Scene 9 - Day One - Legacy Headquarters, Director's Office

The gray walls of the operations center appeared almost olive in the ambient light. Much of it was subdued with shadows filling every corner reaching the apex of the vaulted ceiling. In contrast, the light in tactical was bright and luminous. They were pulling an all niter leading Octavia straight to Ethan Fairchild. The tactical screens flashed the coordinates of operatives in the field. Every blip was a Legacy operative with a working Palm Pilot computer. The specially made computer not only had a cell phone adaptation, it also included a chip disclosing the operatives location.

Gia Doyle fingered the Palm Pilot on her desk carefully. "Electronic toys are broken so easily these days." She chuckled to herself. "Or made to look broken."

She flipped a switch inside the battery pack and the tiny computer roared to life.

"Poor Ethan," admitted Gia. "His Palm Pilot wasn't broken after all. Now he's in the field without a way to contact tactical." Her laugh grew increasingly louder. "Even Jeffrey Sogard doesn't know he's about to issue the order to his hero, the great Ethan Fairchild."

Gia continued to watch on the monitor as Octavia aimed her gun at both Isidor and Ethan. "Right about now, she's realizing exactly who we've sent her to kill."

"Sometimes Gia, you're even colder than I am." said Philip Lancaster as he slipped into the room. "This is a test, nothing more. Octavia has become somewhat of a loose cannon, and we needed to make sure of her loyalties. But why Ethan? His loyalty to the Legacy has never strayed."

"My Philip, have we grown a conscious in the past few hours?" Gia came behind him and swiped her had across his back in a suggestive motion.

"You well know I have no problem playing God and neither do you. Why him?"

"He's part of *her* test. They're lovers. I'm giving her a choice. Her father or her lover. The choice will be clear but will she make the ultimate sacrifice?"

Jeffrey came on the monitor replacing the image of Octavia aiming at Ethan. "Philip, we need you down here. We're about to set up for the diversion."

"Right there, kid." Philip nodded to Gia and walked out of the room down the stairs to tactical.

Jeffrey's image faded and Octavia's once again filled the screen. She leaned in and Gia could see her squint trying to aim.

Gia paced around her office at Legacy Headquarters and observed Jeffrey, the controller, from her window high above the control room. She watched him squirm as he issued the order to kill Ethan. He warily glanced up at her, and she gave him a confident nod. He was her puppet and she was the puppet master pulling the strings. Philip only thought he was in control but *she* possessed ultimate power. And she found power to be intoxicating.

In one swift motion Octavia pressed the trigger and shot Ethan.

"Glorious!" Gia laughed and clapped her hands. "She's turning into a death train. Everywhere she stops, people die." Inwardly, she smiled.

She liked the analogy of a death train. It fit Octavia well. The people who loved her ended up dead. Gia laughed. And they would continue to die one right after the other until her entire family was just a sad memory. The greatest day of her life would be the day she finally wiped Octavia Kassoff and her entire clan from the face of the Earth.

"First Franklin, now Ethan and finally Octavia. Then my mission will be complete. We will have won." She couldn't help but gloat. Assignment one was accomplished. Two was a pleasure and three would be the icing on the cake. Ethan Fairchild deserved everything that was coming to him. The only drawback was, that she didn't get to perform his permanent departure herself.

Scene 10 - Day One - The park

Ethan clinched his teeth to mask the pain in his shoulder, make it lessen. It wouldn't. Not even the ancient breathing technique he had learned quite helped as much as he would have liked. The pain spread like fire throughout his right shoulder, and it was numbing already.

"We need to get you to a hospital," dead panned Phoenix without much sympathy in his voice. He didn't look back at the wounded man. He couldn't. This man was dangerous. People wanted to kill him. Now those same people would want to kill them. They had to get rid of him as soon as possible.

"No! No doctors." Ethan was adamant.

The siblings could tell it was an order.

"Well, at least let me do something for that shoulder." Scarlett started to climb into the back seat but Phoenix grabbed her by her flannel shirt.

"No," he whispered so only she could hear. "We're NOT helping this man."

"Why not?" she whispered back. "He needs us."

"Well, we don't need him. I can tell just by looking at him that all he'll bring us is trouble." Phoenix let go of his sister's shirt and she settled back into the passenger seat.

"I'll just help him with his shoulder, and that's all, okay?" She smiled at her twin sweetly. "Then I'll be right back up here and we can ditch him at the hospital. I couldn't live with myself if he died and I did nothing."

Phoenix exhaled a long drawn out breath. His sigh told of his poor mood.

"All right," he decided. "As long as you promise me that this is the last time we run off on one of your adventures."

She smiled a radiant grin in his direction but didn't answer.

"This Nancy Drew complex of yours is going to be the death of me." Phoenix lead his eyes back to the road and off the stranger in the back seat.

"You're a pushover," he whispered to himself.

Ethan could hear the two speaking in hushed tones in the front seat, probably deciding what to do with him. He voiced protests but they fell on deaf ears. The girl crawled into the back seat. Her long red hair was drawn back in a French braid that descended to the small of her back like a silken cord against her green flannel shirt. It was obvious the two of them were twins. Although fraternal, they looked enough alike to startle the casual observer. The girl, whose named turned out to echo her hair color, reached into a compartment underneath the seat and withdrew a first aid kit. It was small and probably not helpful enough to cover the dent in his shoulder. But for now, it would have to do.

Ethan could see her brown eyes catch her brother's in the rear view mirror.

"What?" she questioned. "It never hurts to be prepared."

Scene 11 - Day One - Tactical Control Room, Legacy Headquarters

For Jeffrey Sogard each new day brought with it the chance that another nameless, faceless person could die. Not at his hands but by his voice. He was the controller. The delicate balance between conflicting forces. He directed the operatives into the fray when the bullets were flying and brought them safely home again. Their hands were his hands. Their eyes his eyes. But if he were to utter the wrong command or misinterpret a slight shadow, another person could drop off the list of the living, forever.

It was that thought that sometimes haunted him at night. It was what made this mission so vitally important. He wasn't only saving a life, one single soul. He was saving an organization. He was saving The Legacy itself.

Octavia's image appeared on the screen. His mind quickly jumped back to attention. Glancing up at Gia's office, he noticed that she was concentrating on her computer not the tatical screen to her left. This was it. He had to time it perfectly. Any minute now Ethan would wake up.

Jeffrey clasped his hand over the ethernet cable linking the feed to the rest of the monitors in the building.

"Now," said the Russian blonde softly into her microphone.

Jeffrey disengaged the transmission. All the tactical monitors turned to static.