The Solitaire Project

Wed, 13 Dec 2006 20:02:55 GMT

Well, I told you I'd tell what I know, and here it is. The information I got from the dead guy, and here it is. Apparently, they don't work for this "Solitaire Project" they work for the SSI, whatever the hell THAT is. So now there are two agencies, and one is trying to stop the other. The Solitaire Project is made up of people like us. Me and Spider. Some call us mutants, some call us psychics, some call us Talents. I just call us "very unlucky". Anyway, I couldn't get much out of him about that, only that he was very scared of it, what it represented, and what it was trying to do.

Oh, and his boss's sister was a member of it.

Some guy named Maisley. I'll have to remember that. I told Spider and she grunted and went back to cleaning her gun. Anyway, the SSI is either funded by the government, works for the government, works independently of the government, or used to work for the government and then broke free because the government asked too many questions but is still sorta funded by the government because who really expects Congress to be paying themselves a million bucks a year to install $12,000 trees? or something like that. Like I said, the guy was decomposing as I was trying to pull his memories out.

I think...I think they wanted us to work for them. Maybe turn us into hired killers for the government. I ran this theory past Spider, and she got thoughtful. "Maybe." she said. "But they didn't seem very friendly at your parents house. If they were willing to kill Reggie, and he was one of us, then they were willing to kill us." "But Reggie wasn't able to use his powers to kill and Reggie was an Empath." I argued. "Empaths generally aren't that strong." Spider said, scratching her temple with her gun. I hated it when she did that, it always looked like she was going to blow her brains out, but I guess she knew what she was doing because to date she's never done it. Side effect of knowing the future, I guess.

Well, I thought about that for a while, and then sat crosslegged on the bed. Whatever this Solitaire project was, we had to hook up with them, and fast. But then, maybe they were just as bad as the SSI. Which was the lesser of the two evils, the guys we knew were trying to kill us or the guys we didn't know anything about? "Spider, can't you see anything on us in the next few days?" I asked, even though I knew she hated it when I asked those kinds of questions. But obviously she didn't mind my asking or knew I was going to ask because she was already speaking over me. "You know it doesn't work like that, EB. And besides, I've already tried. It just gave me a headache. Try and remember anything else about the SSI that you can, okay?"

And I tried, I really did. But all I was getting was hazy pictures of a building with long corridors and a room marked 331. I didn't know the significance of what was beyond 331 but evidently Mr. Hawkins (that was the dead guy) did, or used to work there. His mind was locked tight against that, though, and he had no memories of being beyond the door. So either he'd never been into room 331 or hadn't been allowed in. Or he'd been trained not to remember. I told Spider all of this, and she just sighed.

Lots of questions now. What in the world IS the Solitaire project, and is it the lesser of two evils? How can we find them, and will they find us? Who's the SSI and why are they trying to kill us? ARE they trying to kill us? What's in room 331?

I miss Reggie.

Engagement

Sun, 26 Nov 2006 19:38:52 GMT

Those guys are back. I don't know who they are or what they want. Sometimes they just sit outside in the car and stare at the house from behind the Payless sign where they think we can't see them and sometimes they walk past on the sidewalk. I know they're all the same organization, they've got the same haircut.

They actually went into the chapel a few times. That made me so mad my vision went spotty, and Spider grabbed me by the back of my neck to keep me from going after them. What right do they have to go in there? Isn't it enough that they killed him? Do they have to parade it right in front of us? Oh yeah, "officially" they're from the Internal Affairs Office, to sort of Reggie's paperwork. There's no such office, according to Spider.

I didn't have a job, so I sat at home all afternoon, thinking about what to do. Spider would kill me, but she was at work, so there wasn't anything she could really do to stop me. Not that that would stop her knowing about it. She'd likely know about it before I did it anyway. She always did. Sure enough, as soon as I fixed the plan firmly in my mind, the phone started ringing. It had a particularly angry tone to it, but I ignored it. It rang pretty much non-stop the entire time I was putting my jacket on.

Well, what did she want me to do, sit around and do nothing? Reggie's killers were walking around free while we sat on our asses. I pulled off my gloves and left them sitting on the counter, petted Charlie a few times, and then did something I'd never done before in my life. I put my loaded service revolver in the back of my jeans as I went out the door. I still don't know, to this day, why I did that. I'm not the one gifted with foresight.

There were three cars in front of the chapel. I slipped inside and there wasn't a single man around in the narthex, but I could hear voices coming from the office. I eased in that direction. "Check those encrypted files. Anything with personal correspondence. I want the son's name and I need it today. We are not leaving here without it." It was a woman speaking and that struck me as odd. So far I'd only heard and seen men wandering around the base. Huh. There was the sound of shuffling. My heart was pounding. Didn't Reggie have a son?

"Tana, I don't think he would have kept anything on (edit name) in his office. We should try the house." said a male voice. The woman called Tana sighed. "We've turned the house upside down and didn't find anything. We've got all the evidence we can already take. I don't care if you tear this church apart. Find the son. This preacher had two other specs under his training and possibly more, and if we don't move--" but I'd heard enough. They'd been in Reggie's house. I cleared my throat and stepped into the doorway.

Four faces looked up at me, shocked. Three men and a woman in business suits. Two were wearing glasses. I almost thought it was worth it for the looks on their faces. "You've been in Reggie's house." I said, shaking. "You've been through his things. Isn't it enough that you killed him in cold blood?" The woman called Tana's eyes flicked down to my ungloved hands for a very quick moment before she looked up at me and smiled. "Now, then, Erin. You're one to talk about killing in cold blood." she said smoothly. So, she did know about Frank. That didn't surprise me. But I didn't care anymore. "Get out." I said. She stared at me coolly, and one of the men behind the desk chuckled. "We're not finished here, Miss Blake." he said, leaning over the desk. I turned my attention to him. "As you doubtless heard, we have not finished our investigation. But if there's anything you'd like to add to it, you'd be more than welcome to add to--" "You think for one minute I'm going to help you?!" I yelled, slamming my fist into the wall and knocking down a picture of Jesus. (Sorry, God, I apologized in my head)

He smiled. "Well, sooner or later, you won't really have a choice." he said apologetically, as if he was a teacher explaining something to a very small child. "You see, we know an awful lot about you, your habits, your schedule..."
"Where I live, where my friends live, where I go to school." I finished for him. "I already know all this. In case you hadn't noticed, I've been watching you follow me around for the past two years, I'm not stupid." Apparently this was news to them, and he and his buddy exchanged uncomfortable looks. "Take some surveillance classes. I'm an Army brat. This may work on civilians, but not on me." I said. "Leave now, you're boring me."

They exchanged uncomfortable laughs. I pulled out the service revolver, and all smiles were wiped off all faces. "I said leave now. Reggie was a friend of mine and I'm not going to let you deface his memory." I said. "You talk big, for a little girl." the man said coldly. "You have no idea how big I can talk." I said. I was scared. I'd never done anything like this before. The woman's eyes got really hard. I don't think they were armed. They must not have been. "So, is this the way you want to play it, Blake?" she said. "I said I want you to leave." I said. "I didn't say I wanted to talk." "Kid's got spunk." one of the other men muttered. "We'll cure that." Tana muttered, and collected her briefcase. She marched out of Reggie's office, and the other three followed her.

..........I think I've crossed a line.

And the world comes crashing down

Sun, 26 Nov 2006 19:32:37 GMT

Yeah I know there's a lot of missing entries. I'll go back and fill them in when I get the time. If I get the time.

Thanksgiving was horrible. Not horrible in that "oh god I have to kiss my aunt Betty and she's got a mustache" way but horrible in that "oh god I think I'm gonna die any minute and I can't call the police because the police would just help the hired killers" kind of way.

Right now Spider and I are holed up in some shitty hotel. I can't say where, in case this gets read by the wrong people. I've got my laptop, and she's pretty good at jacking connections, which she needs to connect to her friends in....well, wherever it is that we're headed next. I slept pretty good, but then again, I was drugged, so that doesn't count.

Right. Story. Those creepy guys were watching the house again on Thanksgiving. They made Bill nervous, so he said I could spend the night with Spider, only to go out after dark and leave the back way and circle around. He also wanted me to take his sidearm of all things. I thought that was overdoing it a bit, but for once Mom agreed with him. So I did. We don't call each other on the phone anymore because we had a nasty feeling they've got the phone tapped, whoever it is that 'they' are.

Spider was waiting for me, in that annoyed way that meant she'd seen something in the very near future that meant trouble for both of us. "Get inside." she said, "And put something darker on." she didn't say anything else, so it must have been really really bad. (Which it was)

We just sat in her house with all the lights off. "Where's RogerRoger?" I asked once, just to break the silence. "I gave him to Dallas." she said. Okay, that was bad. It sounded like we weren't coming back. I didn't say anything after that.

Her alarm clock went off at midnight, and she got up. "Let's go." she said. "You still got that gun?" I nodded, and didn't ask how she knew that. Best not to ask. "You know how to use it?" I nodded again. Bill had taught me how to shoot it when he'd married Mom. He'd made Mom learn too. "Good, you're going to need to. EB, listen." she said, turning to face me. She looked kind of scary, blonde hair half up in a bun and dressed in her fatigues. I was forcibly reminded that she was a lieutenant. "Whatever happens tonight, I want you to do exactly what I tell you, and if you have to shoot anyone, you aim for the center of the body like your step dad taught you, okay?" "You're freaking me out, Spider." I said, trying to keep my voice light. "What do you mean, if I have to shoot anybody?" She just looked at me. "EB. It's important." she said finally. I stared at her, and then nodded.

It was total chaos at my parents house. There were at least nine men in all black swarming all over the place. They looked like ninjas, but I'm sure they weren't. That was my overactive imagination at work. Spider was awesome, she didn't even hesitate. Just waded in and started shooting, took out four men before they even noticed she was there. It made me sick to my stomach, actually. I'd never seen anyone shot before, except on the news. I threw up in a corner, and then someone yelled. "Erin Blake!" and something sharp hit me in the side.

After that everything happened really, really fast. I remember jerking the gun up and squeezing off two shots, which seemed to fly out really slow. I couldn't breathe, and the room seemed to be falling. My head was dizzy, and the floor seemed like a good place to take a nice, long nap. By the time I had fallen to my knees, there was more shooting all over the place, and someone kept yelling "Shoot the goddamn Seer!" until Spider shot him. Then she grabbed me under the arms and dragged me out of the house. I think I blacked out, because the next thing I remember I was laying on the grass outside the house. There were sirens in the distance.

"Shit, shit, shit." Spider was saying. "Get up, come on, we have to go." She had Bill's keys in her hands. "We can't drive his Jeep, he doesn't let anyone drive that car." I said woozily. She was pulling me over to it, pushing me into the passenger side. "Bitch, get in the fucking car, we have to go NOW." she snapped. She'd never sworn at me before, and it kind of woke me up. The first thing I noticed was there was a dead guy in the back seat. "Ohhhh get that guy out of here..." I moaned. "Shut up, we need him." Spider said, jumping in the driver's seat. She peeled out of the garage. "He wouldn't fit in the trunk, all the luggage is in there." she added, "I need you to throw this out the window." she said, handing me a makeshift torch. "Back into the garage. It's cheap glass, it'll break." "Why?"

"We're blowing up your house, that's why."

Told you my Thanksgiving sucked.

Independence Day

Thu, 23 Nov 2006 23:55:10 GMT

Happy Late Fourth to everyone. Hope your explosions were more fun than ours. We had to leave in the middle of the night, Spider was getting edgy. She wouldn't tell me what she'd sensed though. I hate it when she goes all cryptic. I'm not a child anymore.

Anyway, where was I in my story? Oh yeah. After we left the BX, we went back to Spider's house. She had a dog (at that time) named RogerRoger that I wanted to meet. My stepdad was allergic to dogs, but I like animals.

"You know Tank, in the BX?" Spider said, maneuvering her Jeep around a bike someone had left in the middle of the road. "He's going to end up in a divorce. He's cheating on his wife with that checker in lane six. Gonna end up court martialed, dishonorable discharge." she predicted, pulling into her driveway. I was impressed.
"You can see all that?"
"Nah. Checker lives next door. I can hear them at it every night. That's common sense." That's the funny thing about Spider. I didn't understand it then but I guess I do now, that she was trying to teach me about the difference between using your powers as a crutch and just using your brain. There's something to be said for that.
"Gross." I said, getting out. Sex was something they taught in health class, nothing more. Late bloomer, I guess.

"So what do you do?" she asked, throwing herself on the couch. "What are your powers?" "Powers?" I said, still playing dumb. She gave me one of her Looks. "Don't play cute with me, kid. I See all, remember? So how come you're wearing gloves in the middle of July?"
"Oh, that." I said, and then had to explain about the memory thing. Spider seemed very interested, and then wanted me to try it out. "Like, right now?" I wanted to know. "Of course right now." she said, looking as if I'd asked her what cheese tasted like. At that moment a large yellow lab came running into the room, barking his head off. "Down!" she commanded, but the dog jumped up on the couch and started licking me anyway. I squealed and fell over backwards.

Funny, I didn't get a thing from the dog. I learned that day that my powers didn't work on animals. I was sort of relieved. I hugged all over RogerRoger and he loved me back. I took my gloves off and he slobbered all over me. "Yeah, yeah, yeah, enough kissing already." Spider said. "Propose, and let's get on with it." but I could tell she was amused. She was holding out a paperweight. I took it from her and winced. "You stubbed your toe getting out of the shower yesterday morning and said a very bad word." I told her.
"Yeah, so what?" she said, looking mildly impressed. "Is that all?" Challenged, I dug deeper. "You work in Classified, under section 56, for General Park--" "Okay, okay, OKAY!" she snapped, snatching the paperweight back from me. "Jeez, kid."

.......you know, I was kinda pleased with myself. It was the start of our friendship.

First Entry

Wed, 22 Nov 2006 20:08:03 GMT

((Please see my User Info for important information regarding this and all other journal entries.))

Well, I decided to transfer my diary to online. I don't know why. It's gonna take me forever to type out. So, what to say about me? I'm nineteen years old, I have red hair and greenish eyes, freckles, 5'6, and both my parents were in the military. That's how I met my best friend Spider. Weird name, I know. Actually her name's Amelia Roberts, but everyone calls her Spider because she's got spider-sense like Spiderman. And I'm Siphon because....well, I'll get into that later.

I didn't even start calling myself that. Spider did. It was either that or Nightmare and I put my foot down on that one. Besides, I'm a small thing, I don't need a name like that. We're supposed to be superheros, right?

Currently, I can't tell you where I live. Some bad people are looking for us and like Spider says, we have to stay one step ahead of them. Fortunately, with our powers together we can do that. It's kind of nice.

Couple things about Spider. She's ten years older than me and she's really grumpy. I guess it must come from knowing things that are going to happen and sometimes not being able to do anything about it. She smokes, which I don't like, cusses a lot, which I don't like, and has a tattoo of a snake on her arm, which I think is really cool. She used to be an Apache pilot and thought all that stuff with her powers was just really fast reflexes. Then she met Reggie, who told her the reason she freaked out the entire crew was because she put in her landing coordinates for the crash site before they even got blown off course. Reggie is...well, was...one of the most awesome people I've ever known. Losing him hurt more than losing my parents, and that's saying a lot.

Anyway. The whole story is probably going to take quite a long time to tell. I don't know how often I'll get to write on it. Spider and I have to move around a lot. Mostly, it's my fault. I did, after all, kill the guy.

In the Beginning...

Wed, 22 Nov 2006 06:00:44 GMT

I found I had "powers" when I was eleven. I didn't know that's what they were, I thought everybody got odd flashes of memory when they picked up stuff. To me it was completely normal. And then I started going through puberty and everything just started falling apart. Whatever it was (I didn't know the name for it back then) was getting a lot stronger, I guess because of hormones. I'd pick something up with my bare hands and I'd get a massive headache. I didn't tell my parents, because that's not the kind of thing you tell your parents.

Well, and my parents weren't the sort of people you'd want to be open with anyway. Military folks, you know...*rolls eyes*

We moved to a base in southern California (NOT Los Angeles, thank god) when I was fourteen. We were supposed to be there for two years and it ended up being five. I met Spider my very first day there. We lived in base housing and she lived two streets over but she was outside the neighbor's house, flat on her back under the car. I'd never seen a woman under a car before, so I went over to look.

"Unless you're going to stand there staring all day, kid, you can get down under here and help me. You'll ruin your shirt, but it'll be fun." she said from somewhere near the muffler.

"Okay" I said, "but I don't know anything about cars." "That's fine." she grunted. "And hand me that wrench, I'm going to need it." I didn't see any wrench until she took her foot off of it. I picked it up and inched under there with her. Sure enough, the minute I did, oil started dripping on my white shirt. Which was annoying, but not nearly as fascinating as the underside of the car. I'd never seen one before. The girl had her entire torso up in there and was tinkering with some gear. The minute I handed her the wrench, she tightened something, dropped the wrench, swore, and then turned her head to look at me.

"Erin Blake, right?" I was stunned. How had she known. "Don't look so shocked, you were going to introduce yourself anyway. I've got intuition and precognition, they go hand in hand." she grunted, turning back to the car. "Like this piece of junk here. I already know it can't be fixed. But I'm being paid twenty bucks an hour to work on it, so I'm doing it because it's well worth my effort to look like I'm doing something, and if I can make it sound a little better, he can drive it to the garage himself instead of having it towed."

"Oh." was all I could think to say. But my insides were churning. "Then, you know what I'm going to say next?" She shrugged. "I know why you wear gloves, kid. And there's someone you've got to meet. Everything happens for a reason. My name's Spider."

That was how I met Spider. That was pretty much that. She was a foot taller than me, with messy blonde hair that she kept up in a half ponytail or a bun at the back of her head, though it was usually always falling down. She's a lieutenant, and barks at people. She barks at me, and I yell at her, because I'm a civilian, and she can't get away with it. She cusses at me too, but she doesn't get in my face like she gets in the private's faces. She knows better.