[CT] 19.2 - He'll always have to understand...

Saturday June 21st - 0136 hours - Arezzo Italy

Sitting on the balcony of the hotel room that she was sharing with Vaughn she held her cell phone in her hand. Staring out at the skyline she felt it shake lightly in her hand. The alarm had been set letting her know they were supposed to be leaving for the airport now. Heading back to Los Angeles on a twelve hour flight so she would get home and sleep the rest of the weekend away with Julian curled up at her back. Instead her feet were resting on the iron rail waiting for Vaughn to come back letting her know what she already knew was going to happen. The intel they'd acquired from the securities holding had given them another break, but it was too soon. If they could confirm the transport that meant that by Sunday morning whatever was being manufactured was going to be on its way to the buyers... or to be launched as part of some strike.

That information had been sitting in the pit of her stomach for a while now. Everything took too long though. Relaying the intel to Marshall, having him confirm it. Retasking Echelon, confirming the transport arrangements. They'd been sitting in the hotel for the entire night, and Rachel had only gotten a few hours sleep before her internal body clock woke her up again.

Her knee shook from stress being put on the ball of her foot for a moment before she eased her foot off the rail and back onto the cement of the balcony. She had heard only parts of Vaughn's conversation, and now he was on the phone with someone else. Finally the silence came to an end as Vaughn moved toward the balcony leaning against the doorway.

"We've got confirmation, we're going in. Tactical will meet us in Pieve di Saddi, they were stationed in Naples after the bank set up."

Rachel nodded absentmindedly, knowing that the equipment she'd used in the vault had been placed there by someone, and it never failed to shock her how quickly they could pull these things off. She knew they were going to leave Arezzo and head to Pieve where the facility was located. Glancing over her shoulder she looked at Vaughn, "I just have to call my dad. I usually tell him when I'm supposed to get back, and if I don't check in he worries."

Vaughn nodded, "Yeah I'm going to make sure we've got a car on the way to take us to the airstrip."

"Thanks," Rachel replied as she held onto the phone. It was a risk calling Julian where she was. It was always a risk, but with Vaughn in the other room, and everything starting to move so quickly she knew she couldn't call him. The relays alone from her phone would be tracked, and she didn't want to put him at risk. So she called her dad. It was Friday evening for him anyway he wouldn't be asleep just yet.

Hearing it ring Rachel stood up leaning on the railing for a moment and smiling when he picked up, "Hey Dad."

"Rach, is everything okay?"

"Yeah Dad everything is okay, I just wanted to call. I was supposed to be flying back home in a few hours, but something came up. I just wanted to let you know, so you didn't worry when I didn't call."

"Rach... you haven't called me about missing flight times in almost a year."

"I know Dad... it's just this time? This time it's different."

"Sweetie, you're actually worrying me here, what's going on?"

Rachel laughed, "Don't worry Dad, I'll be fine. I just needed you to know." There was a heavy pause on the line and Rachel chewed on her lip a bit.

"Does he know?"

"No."

"Does he need to know?"

"Kind of? You know I wouldn't ask you..."

"No... it's okay Rach, we know the boy we'd want the same if he knew and we didn't. Just... tell me this isn't going to require a trench coat and placing an ad in the Wall Street Journal."

He was teasing and she needed that. Laughing she shook her head, "Oh come on, you'd have loved to do that. There's a number in your phone, it's under Lydia Brown. Just... just send a text saying my flights been delayed. He'll understand... he always understands." Rachel heard her dad agree and he wished her luck still while managing to tell her to be careful and that he loved her. "Thanks Dad... I'll call you when I get home okay?"

"Now are you really going to call me?"

Laughing again Rachel shook her head as Vaughn moved back to the doorway, "Rachel transport is on it's way."

Rachel turned to face Vaughn for a moment, "Thanks, I'll be right there. Dad I've got to go and I'll be safe and I'll call you when I get back, and don't worry I'll be fine."

[MYL] 27.1 - A List of Warnings

June 21st - 2119 hours - Pieve di Saddi Italy

warning: authorized personal only

She had already gone down four flights, her calves burning a bit from the amount of time she was giving her body to rest between forcing it to run full sprint down another flight of stairs. All she had to do was get to the lab, make sure all their computers with the research were set to blow. Vaughn had the second team working from the top floor down setting the explosives and their Alpha Team leader was in the middle of cutting the hard line to make sure they couldn't just transfer their files if the alarms were tripped. Thankfully it seemed staff was light. She'd already taken out two guards and it seemed neither had enough time to notify anyone else for back up.

The only problem was that the labs seemed to be on every floor, and most of them were inactive and a quick scan of most of the materials in them seemed to show that she didn't have to worry about anything too serious coming from not going the extra mile in those other rooms.

Another two flights down and she heard Vaughn come into her ear, "Oracle I just got confirmation from secondary, try the eight floor down fourth door on the left."

"Confirmed, I'm going for the eight floor." Rachel replied as she pushed out the door to find herself face to face with another guard. Grabbing him by the back of the head she slammed him into the steel door that was still slowly closing knocking him out. Reaching down to his waist she pulled his walkie and continued down the other flights of stairs. Pushing the door open she ran down the hallway until she found the fourth door and pushed that open. Setting the walkie down on the first table she moved toward the back of the room where the refrigeration units were holding the virus. "Shotgun I've got visual on the package. I'm setting the charge now."

warning: danger explosive materials
warning: fatal pathogens enclosed - use PPE level 5 for handling
warning: contents are not to be raised above 20 degrees

Her hands reached into the bag slung over her shoulder pulling out the tightly wound small charges. Pulling the backing off she stuck it to the side of the unit and pressed it to arm it before she moved to the computers. Most of them where still on and there was a coffee cup resting on the counter. "Shotgun, this is Oracle I might have company on eight. Can you check the video?"

"Copy that give me just a... minute here... okay, he's in the hallway headed away from you. Guys gotta pee."

"Yeah well just keep an eye on him, I'm hacking into their network now to see if I can wipe all their servers before we blow them." Rachel took a seat and started to work, every once in awhile glancing up to make sure no one was in the room with her. She was able to find most of the data collected and set up a tracer bug so that if anyone tried to download whatever was there by re-establishing a link to the network it would eat all the data as fast as they could try to access it and establish a retrace back door so that back at APO she could sort out just who was trying to access it if they did. Once that was set up Rachel moved to wire the rest of the servers in the room with the remainder of her explosives.

Hearing footsteps outside Rachel moved quickly pressing herself up against a wall next to one of the server banks, "Shotgun... I have movement."

She had been keeping her voice low, and the door swung open before she could even get confirmation from Vaughn. Just what the hell was he doing? Her hand reached for her weapon at her back pulling it out and slipping her finger over the safety to disengage it.

warning: disengage safety before use

"Oracle it's one of ours, you're still clear."

Breathing a sigh of relief she called out, "Oracle moving out!" She had her finger set to slip against the trigger just in case, but it was fine and she moved back to wiring the servers.

"You got this wired to go?"

"Yeah, I already hacked their network, and I just have three more to arm. Shouldn't take me more than a few minutes. Is the building clear?"

"Confirmed, we've got one stray in the bathrooms and we're collecting him now."

Rachel nodded it was the tech from the lab, "Shotgun I'll be topside in ten." Turning to the guy in black she confirmed to him as well, "Tell your men to pack it up and get the hell out of here."

"That's confirmed, men fall back to position delta, we are clear for evac."

warning: blast radius can reach upwards of ten miles
warning: temperatures up to 1000 degrees can be found within one mile of blast radius

Moving to the servers Rachel finished attaching and arming them, before she headed back to the stairwell and started to head up the eight flights back to the main level. Taking them two at a time she let her arm help pull her up along the railing moving as quickly as she could. Her chest ached with the rapidness of her pulse and her thighs now burned with a bit of those endorphins kicking in. Her hand pushed to the heavy steel door on the main level as she continued her quick sprint out toward the back exits. Vaughn was ten miles away up on a cliff bank to set the explosives to go and Rachel just had to get to the forest line.

"Oracle confirmed out of the building, as soon as you have confirmation from Alpha Leader you are set to detonate," Rachel said as she raced along the rocky soil toward the line of trees up ahead. It was going to be a long walk from the site back to where Vaughn was but she knew that it had been the only way to establish a connection to their server remotely. All the dense forest in the area hadn't exactly been a plus when they had figured out their plan of action.

"Oracle I have confirmation from Alpha Leader, keyed to detonate in ten."

Rachel continued running her feet pounding hard into the ground, that began to shook as she felt the series of explosives detonate from beneath her. The building had been impressive a weapons silo built underground and converted to labs that now housed research for those that could afford the rent and upkeep.

warning: appearances can be deceiving

As she got to the tree line she turned around to see the flames come up from the doorways and windows of that top level. It had seemed so innocuous the one lonely building in the middle of the forest and mountains, and now it was gone. She could feel the wave of heat coming from the blast. "Visual confirmation of detonation Shotgun."

"Copy that Oracle."

Her hand went up to shield her eyes from the light considering how dark it was outside, "I'll meet you at the rendezvo-"

The blow to the back of her head came out of nowhere, and maybe it had been the sound from the explosion or her shouting over the noise to confirm to Vaughn, but she hadn't expected the pressure to come so sharp and so quickly. She hadn't expected to feel anything at all but that was what happened and as the bright light from the explosion faded to darkness she knew she was in trouble.

warning: never leave a man behind

"Oracle? Repeat last transmission. Oracle? Confirm meeting at the rendezvous. Oracle can you confirm?"