They were working on terminals across from one another in systems. Curlly had a plate of snacks she was munching on as she shifted threw data on the two men they had observed. Her legs were stretched out, crossed ankles propped up on one of Sinjn’s legs.

"You have 45 minutes to turn in your profile to Birkoff Curlly," said Sinjn absently running a hand along her calf.

"I know. My final numbers are filtering through now. But it really doesn’t matter because I won."

"How do you figure that?"

"You wouldn’t have gotten this far if I hadn’t called in to you."

"But you did. I offered to share information with you; moreover, you decided to share with me."

Her eyes narrowed and chin lowered, "Bite me." A wide smile spread across his features and his hand suddenly tightened on her ankle. "You wouldn’t dare!" exclaimed Curlly trying to tug her foot out of his hand.

"That’s one of the things I so admire about you Curlly, your always so ladylike." There was only one response to such a statement. She threw a carrot stick at him and finally managed to remover her foot from his grasp. "At least I didn’t try to pass along false data!" Then she laughed. He inquired just what was so funny. "Here we are, having a most enjoyable argument and we are still plugging right along on our profiles without missing a beat." Sinjn threw the carrot stick back at her.

*****

Curlly laid several outfits down on her bed in her Section quarters. Twenty minutes ago Raine’s team had picked up Ernesto Lugnez, the man who had met with Sorrano, and the well know hit man know as Tommy. Tommy was the man Lugnez was meeting. Lugnez was picked up along with his mistress. Madeline would interview Tommy, Sinjn would interview Jiliana the mistress, and Curlly would take Lugnez.

Finally she decided on a pinstriped vest and pants, no shirt. She pinned her hair haphazardly on her head, laid on the eyeliner and dark red lipstick. She finished painting her finger and toenails a matching red when her intercom bleeped. "Lugnez is waiting for you."

"Thank you," Curlly said while she looked at her appearance in the mirror. She looked like one slut of a businessperson. Perfect. Popping in some gum, she strolled down to containment. She was just about to key in her code when Madeline came out of her interview.

Curlly smiled at her and got the Madonna smile in return. "You look the part Curlly."

"Thanks, will you be watching my interview?"

"Yes. Are you ready?"

"I better be. But I would appreciate any suggestions you can think of though." Maddy smiled and walked away. Taking a deep breath and blowing a practice bubble, she entered.

"Why hello there Mr. Lugnez. I do hope you’re comfortable. You do look a little tense." She walked around Lugnez and started to massage his shoulder. "You really should relax, we are going to have so much fun together." With that she came to his side and slid a leg over his to settle on his lap. She laid her head on his chest and looked up into his eyes. "You know you’re kinda cute."

"What kind of interrogation is this!" Ernesto’s nerves were shot. Curlly could tell by the tension in his body and the jerky movements of his hand that he was very uncomfortable to have her cuddled up on his lap.

Curlly straightened up on his lap grabbed a fist full of shirt pulling his face closed to hers, "The fun kind. Believe me, we will have much more fun than your girlfriend and my fiancé are having."

"What have you done to her?" he hissed out fiercely.

"Ew! I haven’t touched her! But she’s so frail, and I’m sure you talk to her about just everything! Sinjn and I do." She rolled her eyes and smile, "And oh GLORY, his hands! He’ll have his fun and then he’ll break her, the messy boy." She watched him pale and winced inwardly. "He’s still in the fun stage, so we can surely spend several enjoyable hours together."

Her hand started to fumble with his belt when he practically screamed, "What do you people want?"

"Your not going to break are you?" Curlly asked in a disappointed little girl voice.

"I’ll tell you whatever you want, just get Jiliana in here! And get off my lap!" Curlly jumped off enraged and stormed out of the white room. Sinjn was waiting outside for her.

"I always find it interesting to watch you work."

"Yes, I’m sure Jason would have enjoyed it. Maybe I should practice on him?" commented Curlly.

"Never mind."

"Is Jiliana ready?"

"Yes, she’s been drugged and makeup applied to synthesis cuts and bruising. Evidently I had a very good time."

"I’ll bet. Did she know anything?"

"No, she was just scared."

"What will happen to her?"

"Some memory modification. She’ll think they had a car accident and she wondered off. And what happens to Lugnez depends on what he tells us." Just then two of the big, beefy, burly types that permeates Section arrived with Jiliana.

"Glory," exclaimed Curlly when she saw the other woman. She went to check the woman over to make sure the damage really was false. Once she was satisfied the woman was transferred over to Sinjn. His grip looked careless, but he had her securely around the waist. "Let’s go Curlly."

Curlly inputted her code and the door groaned open. Curlly blew a bubble as she entered and Sinjn let Jiliana’s feet drag on the floor. Sinjn was wearing army fatigues on the bottom and a sleeveless muscle shirt with a fake eyebrow ring. He dropped Jiliana at Lugnez’s feet. Because he let her fall along his body he was able to catch the woman’s head with his foot and rest it gently on the floor while making it appear to Lugnez that her head had been kicked.

"I’ll kill you," threatened Lugnez, straining against his restraints.

Curlly’s hand caught Lugnez’s windpipe pushing him against the back of the chair and she squeezed gently, "He’s such a pretty boy Sinjn. Hey, maybe he’d like to watch the three of us go at it?"

Sinjn growled, "Get away from him," and hauled her up against him and kissed her hard. Once he caught his breath a bit he said, AI think that’s a very good idea, my love."

Lugnez was almost in tears, he was so enraged. "Just tell me what you want to know and leave her alone." That was Madeline’s cue.

"Curlly. Sinjn. What is going here?"

"Just getting the job done, Madeline." She exclamated her point by grabbing her beloved’s butt.

"Thank you, I believe I can take it from here."

"Whatever you say Maddy," drawled out Sinjn. He draped his arm around Curlly’s shoulders and the two strolled out.

*****

Curlly had programs running and nothing more to do with the Sorrano mission until they finalized the mission profile. Lugnez had given them quit a bit on Sorrano, but Madeline said he didn't know her location. But a profile was being finalized at this very moment. So rather than bite her nails, so to speak, Curlly ran a check on the painting.

As data rolled in several open windows on her screen, Avillion came over to her. "So, any idea on who's profile is gonna go into play?"

"No, I have better things so do. I know it's silly, but that's catching terrorists."

Avillion laughed. Her friend wasn't even beginning to fool her. "You know there is a betting pool going."

"Oh yah? What are the odds?"

"3 to 2."

"In who's favor?"

"Sorry love, but Sinjn's the favorite."

"Really?"

"Yuppers. They figure you'll share data with him because you’re too nice."

"Is the person doing all this high level thinking male by chance?"

"Yes."

"And is this male the bookie?"

"Yes."

"And is this brilliant bookie of ours Jason?"

Avillion just laughed. "So Curlly, why don't you give me the inside scoop and I'll give you 10%."

"I did share information," said Curlly sticking her nose back into her laptop.

"That's okay Curlly, I'm sure you'll live this one down."

"Yah, me too." As soon as Curlly was sure Avi was gone, Curlly did a little digging. Well, a lot of digging. It was as she thought. They combined the best of both profiles for the pick up of Sorrano. If the mission were successful, they would share the credit. "Well at least we make a good team," muttered Curlly under her breath. Then she made a call.

"Yes," drawled Jason's irritating voice.

Using a voice scrambler, "I'd like to place a bet on the Sorrano profile."

"Who is this?"

"Someone who doesn't want either Curlly or Sinjn to know I've placed a bet."

"All bets are confidential unless you win."

"Just give me the odds." Grumbling Jason complied. Curlly of course placed a bet on a joined profile, which offered the best return for a small amount of cash. "The fee has been transferred to your Section account," said Curlly then hung up. She was the one of six that split the profile, so she'd probably make enough money to buy herself a new wardrobe for her honeymoon.

She was thinking about that really nice brown sweater she saw when her filtered program finished.

"Well, well, well, what have we here?" What we had was the history of the painting. Sorrano's daughter had been killed helping in the Peace Core. This same daughter was Sorrano's only daughter and the artist of the painting. The painting had been submitted two months before her daughter's death. About five months after her daughter's death was when she started her terrorist group into activity. At the funeral Sorrano was quoted to say that, "She now lived in the perpetual heart of winter with her beloved daughter gone." She sent the information to Madeline and Operations. Curlly thought, "I wonder how Sorrano would react to the painting being stolen?"

*****

"We have a team in play they are going to retrieve the painting and place trackers and surveillance. Intel has been received that Sorrano will hold a meeting two hours from now. We will hit the meeting and her home base, which we have now located. Curlly will run coordinated the strike for both teams. Sinjn will lead the team to retrieve Sorrano and Xavier will head the team to clean out her base. Get with your team leaders, we are all on closed quarters standby, dismissed," said Operations ending the debriefing.

Twenty-two grueling hours later they had Sorrano and her whole organization under wraps. The teams were just coming to the airlock, so Curlly filed her report and headed to sleeping quarters to take a nap until Sinjn was ready to leave. On her way she passed Jason in the hall.

"Oh Jason?"

"Yes darlin'?"

"When can I collected my winnings?"

"Winnings?" Jason asked all innocence.

"On the betting pool on the Sorrano profile." She could just see the gears turning in his head.

"But sweetums, you didn't place a bet."

"Sure I did. Here is my pick up number," she said handing him a piece of paper. "Really Jason, I'm sure you should have guessed. When should I come pick up my money? I've had my eye on this lovely pair of shoes..."

Jason just swallowed and grumped out, "I'll see you have it by the end of the day tomorrow."

"Oh, no need to bother so soon. Tomorrow's Christmas, so no stores will be open or banks. And I'm sure you'll need to hit the bank." Jason's perpetual sunny nature reasserted itself and he just shrugged. Shaking her head Curlly started to walk away when Jason called out, "Have yourself a Merry Christmas Curlly!"

Curlly stopped and walked back to where Jason stood in the hallway. "Why, thank you Jason." And with that she placed a hand on each side of his face and brought down his lips to meet hers. Breaking it off she said, " A Merry Christmas to you too." And walked off. She entered her room, practically jumped into her bed and went to sleep. Maybe half an hour later Sinjn carefully opened the door.

He walked softly over to the bed and gently woke her up. "Are ya ready to go?" Curlly just grumbled at him and rolled over. Smiling, he pulled her up to a sitting position and watched her lean over, bend, and fall onto the bed face first. She again growled at him in her sleep. Then he snickered and decided to stop playing. Turning her over he decided it was time for the prince charming theory. Although he was confident he kissed much better than any prince.

This attempt to wake her didn’t result in any growling or mumbling. "Well hi there Prince Charming," said Curlly softly as she blinked the sleep from her eyes. She looked him over a bit, he looked okay, "You didn’t get hurt or anything?"

"No. I’m ready to go home if you are." Twenty minutes later they were driving down the highway towards Sinjn’s house. "So Sinjn, I think we must have you in tails with a cane..."

"And why do you think I’ll pick a cane and tails?"

"Because you didn’t win."

"Of course I did. You know you wouldn’t have had end game if I hadn’t feed you all that Intel," insisted Curlly.

"That's just information, numbers. I put it all together including key personal to pull it off. Maybe I profiled this little bet to bring you in on it?"

"You wouldn't!" Curlly’s voice created a few interesting notes as it climbed the octaves.

"Only if I had too. And you know you would do the same, if Section told you to."

"Fine. All bets are off. I don't do any cooking or dishes and you can pick your own tux. Guess will still have to figure out where we will hold the wedding."

"Speaking of which, I have a suggestion I'd like to put before you. Do you mind if we take a little drive? It's only an hour away from here?"

"Sinjn, it's almost midnight... sure, just wake me up when we get there. But we better hurry, I haven't put out Santa's cookies yet."

****

When Sinjn woke Curlly up she had no clue where she was because it was so dark outside. There was no moon, no wind, and no clouds in the sky. And because they were out of the mountains where CLHQ resided, there was no snow on the ground. Sinjn came around to open her door for her while she finished buttoning up her coat and said, "Keep your eyes closed. Even if you don't
like the site, you'll ruin your present."

"Okay. Sure. Why not." She closed her eyes, but she could smell salt in the air and fell the shifting ground of what felt like sand and lose gravel. They were walking down hill and she thought she smelled water. Suddenly the texture of the ground changed to something harder and slightly uneven.

"Here we are, open your eyes." It took a minute to adjust to the pale light, but they were at the very end of a dock. For a second Curlly thought she was standing on nothing but water. "Ha ha Sinjn," she said as she grabbed his arm to keep herself from falling. He just smiled, for he had done that on purpose. "You want to be married on a dock?" He just pointed out a bit to their left.

There was a beautiful sailboat. Even in the dim light she could tell it was done all in white, silver, and dark gray. And she was dubbed "Mi Llave", which meant "my bread" in old Greek. Curlly had once, what seemed to be a very long time ago, told him all she wanted out of life was to be able to sail around the world and study all kinds of places. Sinjn also, must have seen a little poem she kept in her office with a quote about friendship. How good friends were the bread of life, it was all in ancient Greek. She could feel her throat filling with tears, "This is for me? You did this for me?" He picked up her left hand and kissed it right above his ring on her finger.

"I won't tell you where we are going, but I thought you might like to arrive at our honeymoon destination this way. But it is your ship, so you can do whatever you want with it."

Curlly picked up his hand and made a show off examining his little finger. Then she wrapped her fingers around it and said softly, "Amazing."

He pointed behind her back on the hill. There was a lovely park with lots of old trees and fountains. "Don't you think it would look beautiful come spring? Then after the celebration we can just come down here and sail away."

Curlly stood up on her tiptoes and gave him a long, melting kiss, then wrapped her arms around him and laid her head against his chest. "It's a bit of heaven to be with some one who knows me so well. I love her, I love this place to be the place we are join one to another, and I love you."

"I'm happy you think so love." He paused for a moment and looked down at her thoughtfully. "So you like my hands do you?"

THE END

This story ©copyright Curlly, January 2001