Avoiding...

[Patrick O'Connor]

Patrick O'Connor awoke with the same start that he always had when falling asleep, jerking up with a start and in a cold sweat. It was the same nightmare as always. Running down that Godforsaken pier, killing, and watching his love being killed. Watching her accusing glare at him. Patrick's head dropped into his hands as he shook trying to hold back the tears. That stare haunted him to this day and he hated himself for it. She helped him in his time of need, and then he had thrown her to the wolves. And failed to save her. It was the same as murder. How could he ever hope for forgiveness?

Jesus, he hated hospitals, though Patrick only had himself to blame for this one. It had been two days since he had forced Nova to shoot him at 259. He was in stable condition now after a bit of a rough ride. When he had made it to the hospital he had lost a lot of blood and needed a blood transplant to survive the surgery to fix the damage. Problem was his blood type was fairly rare. It had taken a bit to find before they could do anything. But now he was in stable condition and was forced to wait out the injuries before he could leave. Normally as he was stable now he would just up and leave before questions could be asked but the bullet had done enough damage that Patrick needed the care as it was a little more complicated then just waiting it out.

Luckily for him they hadn't asked him any real questions yet. They had been content to just let Patrick sit and rest. Thing was though, it was hell for Patrick. Sitting around with nothing to do allowed his memories to consume him and in a hospital, under twenty one his direct link to sanity was cut off. He had been able to convince a few people to get in something but it was difficult to get enough. It wasn't enough to dull the pain to its acceptable limits but it was enough to keep the withdrawals away. Being in a hospital also had its advantages, Daniel Heart had been making friends with some of the workers here that would score him some vicodin from time to time to help out. Officially it was for the "pain" but in reality it was just to keep the memories in check.

Patrick sighed and leaned back in his bed after his moment had passed. He glad that he had thrown out the contacts before his encounter with Nova, revealing his naturally green eyes. It had wound up being a good decision as those things didn't last too long and he would have had no way to clean them. It would not do for his trying to stay under the radar if his eye color just changed.

Patrick ran his hand through his hair as he sat there, just waiting for the doctor to tell him the good news that he was not all better but able to get around. Basically to tell him that he could just leave, disappear and he would be fine, the only pain that would be caused was the headache the hospital would have from his unannounced departure...

[Mr. Kaar]

Three rasps would be heard at the door to the room in which they where keeping Patrick, and a surprisingly well dressed Leon Sudeki would walk in with a pair of sunglasses covering his eyes from view. He would walk over to the bed and wave att he boy before raising his other hand, holding a clip board to look at it.

"So... You dont have to tell me what happened...The school's security camera's caught everything. It hasn't been released to anyone, and it will stay that way."

Leon would flip through the pages of the clipboard and then look back to Patrick.

"The hospital is willing to release you right now into my care. Judging by the skills you have in these files... Infiltration, Information gathering, etc. The bases is you have all the skills at your disposal that no one that works for me has. How would you like a job?"

Leon stood there, waiting on Patrick, it was alot at one time, but Leon wasn't... Delicate with what he wanted, he was too straight forward when speaking to people.

[Patrick O'Connor]

The three knocks at the door were fairly expected. However, who entered was not. Patrick's eyes widened in surprise as he saw Leon Sudeki, the Lightning Dragon enter his room. Why the hell was he here? And then it hit Patrick, he had recently become the school administrator. Fuck, was an understatement for the thoughts running through the teens mind.

"So... You dont have to tell me what happened...The school's security camera's caught everything. It hasn't been released to anyone, and it will stay that way."

It appeared that he had in fact been thinking along the same lines. Patrick was in a world of trouble. Sure Leon had said that no one would see the videos but that didn't unfuck Patrick anymore. All It meant was that Patrick would not have to face any sort of criminal charges, yet. That was assuming that Patrick did whatever it was that Leon wanted him to do. That, was generally how these things worked. Of course, Patrick was still Daniel Heart and what skills did Daniel Heart have that would be useful to a school administrator? All Daniel could do was ride a motorcycle and had a meager fighting ability. Unless,

"The hospital is willing to release you right now into my care. Judging by the skills you have in these files... Infiltration, Information gathering, etc. The bases is you have all the skills at your disposal that no one that works for me has. How would you like a job?"

"I assume that I don't have a choice," Daniel Heart said, in a more natural and un-irish accent. Then Patrick O'Connor would pick up his irish accent asking, "So the real question is, how did ye find me out? And more importantly perhaps, where did ye get those records, Lightning Dragon?"

It was really quite the surprise. Patrick had dropped his disguise because if Leon knew that he knew how to infiltrate and gather information as he put it then Leon would have to know that it was Patrick O'Connor that did that sort of shit. It had been a long time since he had done any of that though. Nearly six years come to think of it. During the Reformist and Defenders war during his freshman year at 552. What a bloody war, many students died, sides changed their goals, modified them and reformed them, the war finally ending under the domination of Stein who had apparently allied with Clarke, the headmaster at the time. Patrick had from his first arrival to the school had been trust into the war. He initially chose the side of the defenders and then decided after watching the deaths of many students that the pillar system needed to be abolished to prevent future school wars. With that decision Patrick went undercover to take down the system by getting dirt on Clarke and his dealings. It was a position that had made Patrick hated in the school for working with Clarke, and especially by the defenders for betraying them and taking out a few of their stronger fighters to gain Clarke's trust. Though there was something missing,

"Though I haven't seen them, none of me records should show anything about infiltration or information gathering," Patrick explained calmly, "I had Clarke's full trust."

Patrick could have asked what Leon wanted him to do but it didn't matter really. Leon would explain anyway...

[Mr. Kaar]

"Actually, you do have a choice. I'm not going to force you into anything, and if you want to continue just being Daniel Heart, an every day student, then you can. I'm offering you a job... Patrick."

Leon looked down at the records on the clip board. Then decided to explain.

"Well, while you where fighting for your life in the reform war, I remained neutral, gathering supporters and information, ever since then I've kept an eye on people like yourself. These aren't official records, these are my information network coming together. Not only that, but I sent Valo after Clarke, he isn't The Sky Dragon for nothing."

Leon would reviel that tid bit of information. Before waiting.

"It was easy enough to place two and two together esspecially after the video. Retribution can only be seeked by the sinner."

Leon decided at that point Patrick would need time to digest the situation. So he would move on in explaining the job.

"Before Clarke appeared at 552, we had our own problems with this city's correctional facility. Expiraments where done to these students by a mad man named Sean Barker. My job offers you help in whatever your indever, and the strength to see it through, while I ask you help me bring an end to this lunatic before my time is up."

Thats right. Leon was still dieing from an unknown heart disease. If he didn't go back into cryo soon, it would reach the point of no return.

[Patrick O'Connor]

So he had a choice? Now wasn't that interesting. It wasn't often that you got one of those, especially when you were caught in some sort of crime. Usually your choice consisted of completing the assigned task or going to face your punishment. It seemed that Leon had another degree of honor to him after all. Another thing that surprised Patrick was the fact that Leon had been so well informed. It seemed that Leon knew the truth behind the logic of knowledge is power. And to be able to connect that he was Patrick from the video and his information? That was fairly impressive. After that Leon would go on to explain the job that he had in mind for Patrick.

"Expiraments where done to these students by a mad man named Sean Barker. My job offers you help in whatever your indever, and the strength to see it through, while I ask you help me bring an end to this lunatic before my time is up."

"Time's up? Ye too huh?" Patrick asked raising an eyebrow. The only reason he mentioned that was because he too was dying, though they knew the cause. His liver was crapping out on him, all that binge drinking over the past few years. That though, was likely something that Leon didn't know about since it didn't appear on any of Patrick's records and didn't happen until about six months ago.

But there was something of interest...

"Sean Barker huh?" Patrick asked, "I met the guy a few days ago. Wasn't impressed, kind of a freak."

So the real question of the day was what did Leon want him to do about it? Patrick could assume that he wanted purely information, infiltrate whatever the hell he was doing. But then again, there were certain skill that Leon would have know about if he listened to the tape...

"So what do ye want me to do about him?" Patrick asked, "Ye want information on him? But It sounds like ye've already decided. So Ye want me to kill him?"

[Mr. Kaar]

"No, that would be too dangerous, even for a group of well trained fighters it would be dangerous. I need you to get into his organization and find out his movements. He's going to try and give you his addictive drugs, they have the ability to make you stronger, but they are dangerous. Thats why I am going to give you a plant before you try to get accepted. If you put the leaf under your tongue, whatever he injects or makes you drink will have all the effects it normally would have except for the draw backs."

Leon would wait a second to let him obsorb the information. Before continueing with his explanation.

"Sean is not as dumb as he acts, he always has a plan, but if you get him talking, he loves the sound of his own voice. I'll give you a suit to wear while on a mission if you need to sneak around and not get seen as yourself. I do have to tell you though, the last guy I had inside made it back, but he wasn't in very good condition."

Leon would turn and pull his pack from his back and unload the ballistics mask and the padded hoodie on the dresser in the room. Looking back to Daniel/Patrick Leon would speak again.

"At any time you can leave this job, You can even still refuse now. But when shit hits the fan, It'd be a great help to have an inside man."

[Patrick O'Connor]

The first thing that Patrick had to wonder was, how hard was it to put a bullet in the man's head? Patrick could do it without ever being found out by anyone, or even being seen by Sean himself. If the man was such a monster that had to be stopped what better, quicker and more efficient way to do it then to take him out of the picture. That was of course, assuming there was no end game to the afterwards of the Sean Barker problem. An end game that required him to be alive. But for the moment Patrick kept his mouth shut and listened to his instructions.

"Sean is not as dumb as he acts, he always has a plan, but if you get him talking, he loves the sound of his own voice. I'll give you a suit to wear while on a mission if you need to sneak around and not get seen as yourself. I do have to tell you though, the last guy I had inside made it back, but he wasn't in very good condition."

This certainly was interesting, and good to know. It meant that Patrick's job would be a lot harder. It would be more difficult to determine if he had Barker's trust or not. Which meant to be sure Patrick would have to focus on his duties with Barker far longer before trying to gather any major information that wasn't limited to observations. It also meant that Patrick would had to wait longer before he gave any information. He couldn't allow questions of a mole surface as soon as he showed up. That would be, problematic. Though Patrick openly admitted, "I'll be careful but I'm not scared. They can't do anything to me that hasn't already been done."

"At any time you can leave this job, You can even still refuse now. But when shit hits the fan, It'd be a great help to have an inside man."

"No," Patrick replied, "I'm in until the end. But one last question, what's yer endgame in all this?"

Patrick was going all the way back to the question he hadn't asked in the beginning, "Why not put a bullet in the man's brain from a few hundred yards out or closer? If he has to be taken out why not simply kill him? Ye gotta have some sort of after game if ye want him alive and his information?"

[Mr. Kaar]

"You know, sometimes people can still surprise me. My end game is bringing him and all his affiliated programs down. Just killing him off wont bring down his underlings who have spread out over the last few years. Its like a safety protocol he has in place just in case. He usually keeps close to mindless underlings near him, but allows a few special people to keep their sanity and work for him."

Leon would walk back over to the bed from the dresser and pull out a pockey stick from his pocket, begining to knaw on it he would look to Patrick.

"With his information we can find their locations, and the kind of things we can expect when we make our move."

Leon had only one more problem to deal wth, but he would have to go back to his office to find it. Either way the main plan was to destroy everything, all at once.

"In the end Barker will die. But right now killing him only makes a martyr for whatever sick purpose he has planned."

[Patrick O'Connor]

"In the end Barker will die. But right now killing him only makes a martyr for whatever sick purpose he has planned."


Patrick got up and moved towards the drawers where his clothes were. First he put on his shorts before taking off the gown that he had been wearing, full aware that he had shown leon his ass. Better that then the sunny side he figured. He pulled off the gown before rummaging around for a shirt. While he did this Patrick unintentionally showed Leon the intricate wings that were carved onto his back. If Leon had followed the news at all in New York Patrick's next statement would make more sense.

"A shame," Patrick sighed, "Would of been easier to put a bullet in his head and everyone of his groupies. Rain blood down from the skies so that everyone will know the cost of siding with him."

Patrick finally found a shirt that would fit. Unfortunately it was one of those "Get well soon!" shirts. Sky blue with the hospital's name on it. Pulling it on Patrick turned to Leon, looking him in the eye with a dead pan look on his face, "I do this though and I'm going to have to do some crazy shit to do the thing right. Ye understand that right?"

Patrick just had to be sure that Leon knew that Patrick would have to blur the line a lot to get results. And by blur the Line Patrick meant, "I mean going in so deep ye wouldn't fuckin believe I was even on yer side."