Bea comes through the door, stumbling as if she has been shoved. She lands awkwardly on the floor, yelping in pain. There she stays for a moment, her hair hiding her face. Then she looks up at you.
You gasp in shock. Her hair is like straw, unkempt and matted to the side of her grime covered face. Her fingers curl like claws as her eyes dart about the room wildly before finally settling on you.
"Bea," you shout. Her head falls and she stares at the floor again. "It's me," you say, flipping your imago back to being Siobhan Connor. The Doctor's clothes hang loosely on your now pixie like frame.
"I thought it might be you," says a voice from the doorway Bea just entered by. The fake Hilda steps through, a compact pistol held level in one hand. "When I saw how you reacted to the memory repression being lifted, I thought there was something off about it. Pendleton didn't spot it, and when that alarm went off I figured it was just my imagination. So what do I call you, Will or Siobhan?" The pistol shifts slightly, till it's pointing at the back of Bea's head.
You look at the impostor with absolute hatred. "I should ask you the same: Terry Kipper or Hilda Gunnarson?"
The impostor grins wildly. She swings the gun to the side and shoots at the floor, right next to Bea. Bea squeals in fear. "I'm asking the questions. So, Will or Siobhan?"
He wants to talk? You'll talk then. That just gives more time for Minnie to get here. "Will," you answer flatly. "I'm not going to be Siobhan much longer." Bea makes a whimpering sound.
"That right," asks the impostor. "You know, you got us all frightened out your wits..."
"I know," you interrupt.
The impostor thinks about it for a moment. "Fuck, you got Stoddard? Damn that's a shame, I liked the guy. I guess you know all about us then." You nod. "Yeah, you got us all scared out our wits. You're like a fucking ghost story. Most of us anyways - The Moustache would just like to take you apart and see what makes you tick - but the rest of us... They say you don't need tatts, that you can read people's minds, fuck wouldn't surprise me if you could be in two places at once. How'd you do it," he asks, waving the gun at Bea again.
Fuck, where is Minnie? And what does he mean be in two places at once? Ah... "It wasn't me that set of the alarms," you explain, glancing hopefully at the door you came in by. Nothing. "It's Minnie Fierro. I don't think you ever met her. She'll be here soon you know."
Another shot into the floor. "Don't try to threaten me! I know I'm fucked. Dead, or as good as. We're just having a friendly chat first." He waves the gun, pointing it first at himself then back at you before resting the barrel on the back of Bea's head. "You and me. We've got a lot in common..."
"I've got nothing in common with you," you growl.
"That right? Tell me, what'd you do with Stoddard and the Doc?" You stare dumbly at him. What can you say? You turned them into golems and shrunk them to the size of a doll. "Thought so," says the impostor with a nod. "Seven years after you people killed my handler. Seven fucking..." Another bullet smashes into the floor next to Bea. "...years you trapped me as this woman. Too scared to contact the rest of my team in case you caught onto me." Bea screams as another bullet embeds itself in the floor just inches away from her. "Just watching, gathering whatever secrets you let slip in the hope I could use them. Well you know what Will Prescott? I beat you. I fucking beat you! You never suspected, not once, that I wasn't your friend. That's got to mean something, right? Doing that with just the tatts."
You listen half heartedly as he babbles on about all the things he learned from you. It's all been passed onto Fane, he gloats. They'll use it against you. You glance at the door again. Where is Minnie?
Another bullet in the floor besides Bea. How many does he have left in the clip? She whimpers pitifully and a damp patch spreads out on the floor beneath her. "Why don't you answer me?"
"What," you say, blinking in confusion.
"I said, I beat you. Tell me I beat you."
Is that all he wants? Some crazy sense of affirmation? If it will keep him talking to Minnie arrives... "You beat me," you admit. But there is still one question you have to have answered. "What I don't understand is why you took Bea. I'd never have guessed, but then you kidnapped her. You forced me to track her down and find you."
The impostor frowns. Her eyes pop. "You don't know. You don't fucking know!" She laughs, but it sounds more like a hacking cough. "Oh god, I really did beat you. You didn't figure it out..."
"Figure what out?"
"Like I'm going to tell you," snorts the impostor.
The sigil glows on your fingertips. "I can take it from you anyway," you say, advancing a step towards the impostor and Bea.
"The hell you will." The impostor grabs Bea by the hair and hauls her screaming to her feet. Bea looks at you with desperate eyes as the impostor presses their gun against the side of her head. "Back off!"
You stop. "You can't get out here..."
"I fucking know that!"
"...the moment you turn your back I'll vanish and then I'll get you. I know how your tattoos work. And Minnie's going to be here any moment."
The impostor sighs and seems to gain a little control over their emotions again. "I know. All that I have left to do is spite you before I die."
It takes a moment for the words to sink in. You feel your jaw drop and your eyes go wide with fear. Time seems to slow to a standstill as you shout in despair. "Bea!"
But the shot never comes.
The impostor shoves Bea forwards roughly. She stumbles across the room, teetering on the edge of falling until she reaches you. You wrap your arms round the frightened young lady and hug her close. Bea breaks into tears, huge wailing sobs that flow copiously from her eyes and dampen your stolen clothes as she buries her head on your shoulder. You look at the impostor in confusion, not quite understanding her actions.
"You'll never know," she says with a smirk. The impostor throws her gun to the side and raises her hand to her throat. She makes all too familiar slicing motion. Violet sparks erupt from her hand, dancing over her body and burning what they touch. The false Hilda stands in place shaking violently for a second as the Fane suicide spell - what Julian Dey called a guillotine - does its job. Then her smouldering corpse falls away, blurring into something else as it does.
You slip away from Bea's grasp, kneeling beside the body. He no longer resembles Hilda Gunnarson, but instead the burly redheaded man on the floor matches the memories of Terry Kipper you took from Peter Stoddard. You touch him with the sigil at your fingertips. Nothing comes. He is dead, and he has taken whatever secret he had with him to the grave.
You stand back up and approach Bea. "Is... Is it over," she stutters. You hug her again, rubbing her hair with your hand. "I want to go home."
"We will," you say. Evacuation point C, the one Pendleton ordered you to go to when you were disguised as the doctor, isn't far from here. It's just through a tunnel and Pendleton will have arranged for transportation that you could easily steal for yourself. "I'm sorry Bea. It's my fault that they took you."
"You came for me Siobhan," she replies.
"I said I would find you."
"Thanks," she replies, resting her head on your shoulder again.
The door out of the hold cells are opens and Minnie finally walks in. She's lost the red wig and all that remains of the prosthetics is a few tattered strips hanging from her face. Bea stiffens a little as she sees Minnie. She's never quite forgotten what happened before at Charles' funeral. Hal Swann follows just behind her. He looks round the room, taking all the details before kneeling beside the dead body of Terry Kipper himself.
"You found her," says Minnie to you. She grins cheerily. "There were a few more guards in the lab, but they weren't a problem. I've wiped out every last trace of the abominations they had here. Once we catch Pendleton that wraps up Project Ishtar. Did you handle those three?"
"The guards," you ask. "No, he killed them," you explain, indicating Kipper's corpse. "Probably to stop me following him. He killed himself when I cornered him in here."
"Good work getting Kipper," says Hal, looking up from the body of the Diana agent.
Your mind is still numb from all that has happened today, but you still catch the slip in an instant. "How do you know his name?"
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