Part Three

An hour later all the teams had elicited the information they needed and were on their way.

From the clues they got from Davenport, North's group was headed to a large textile factory about 20 minutes away from Section. The disk they were looking for was supposed to be in the accountant's office on the top floor. Sylvia spoke up. "Don't you guys think this is a bit weird. I mean, the scavenger hunts I know about always consisted of a list of things you were to find and see who could bring the most of them back. This having every group finding one specific thing just seems strange to me."

North laughed. "Well, this is Section. You know nothing is normal around here. I do agree with you though, it does seem strange. I also think it's a little strange that so many of us had the day free to participate." Curlly nodded. "Yeah, it was. But I sure did have fun getting that information out of Davenport. Did you see the poor guy. He was so uncomfortable." They all laughed remembering the way Curlly had extracted the info from Davenport. "I do believe he will give you a wide berth from now on Curlly," Sylvia exclaimed.

Rita's group was heading off to a warehouse in the middle of the warehouse district, again about 20 minutes from Section. Kit spoke up first. "So, have either of you ever heard of a ‘Band Aid' file? I certainly never have."

Rita and Nabiki both shook their heads. "Nope, never have," Rita answered. "But I sure did have fun with Walter, didn't I? The old guy was positively red when I got finished with him. I didn't think the he would embarrass like that." Nabiki laughed. "Yeah, I was afraid he was gonna pop a vein he was so red. I just wish we could have interrogated Roy instead of Walter. Now that I would have enjoyed." Rita and Kit both groaned. "Yeah, we know Nabiki. I think Sherry probably took that into account." With that the whole group started laughing.

Trace's group was the last to leave Section. Trace wasn't a happy camper either. "Of course our group would get stuck with Michael as our source. I think Sherry did that on purpose." Aly laughed and Kathy chimed in "I'm sure you're right. She knows how you love working with him." "Yeah," Aly continued, "and I'm sure she wanted to put that new truce to the test." Trace grumbled some more and then stated, "I'm gonna think twice the next time before I do Sherry a favor." That threw Kathy and Aly into another fit of laughter.

After a few moments Trace spoke up again. "This is just too weird. My cat sense is definitely acting up. I think we should be on guard while we are retrieving this map. This is the strangest scavenger hunt I've ever heard of." The others agreed and decided that maybe Trace was right. They figured out from what Michael told them that their location was a library. "We are to find a map in a library. Well, that shouldn't be too hard! There are probably only 20,000 books in the library. I wonder how many of them are Atlases?" Kathy questioned. Trace groaned. "I don't even want to think about it. But I'm certainly gonna have a talk with Sherry when we get back."

Once all the teams were on their way, Sherry met with Walter and Davenport to see how their groups made out. Then she headed for Michael's office. Once she entered, Michael jammed the surveillance. He watched as Sherry came in, wandered back and forth and back and forth. He got up from behind his desk and went to her. He took her arms to stop her pacing. "Don't worry so much, chere. Everything will be fine. Although Trace wasn't very happy."

Sherry groaned. "Yeah, well, I honestly didn't plan that. It just sort of happened that way. I pulled the instructions out of the box blindly. I should have known Trace would end up having to interrogate you. I'm sure you both enjoyed that immensely. Just another thing to hold against me."

Michael shook his head. "Stop it. I don't want you beating yourself up over this any more. It's not your fault. You are under orders. They will understand that. So far no one has gotten into trouble. So relax. You're wired much too tight. You're probably gonna end up with another migraine. You can't get like this every time you create a profile and send a team out."

Sherry groaned. "I know Michael. It would be different if I was simply sending out a team or two from Section. But I've sent all my friends out there blind."

Michael made a decision. "Come on. We are getting out of here for a while."

Sherry shook her head. "I can't Michael. I have to be here in case something happens. And I have to be here when they get back."

Michael nodded. "I know. We're not going anywhere far. We're just going for a walk in the woods behind CLHQ. I know that always relaxes you. You have your comm set and I have mine. If anything happens, we'll hear it and be back in no time. We'll tell Roy to take charge if we aren't back and somebody gets into trouble." Sherry finally agreed and followed Michael out of Section.

North's group made it to the factory and noticed that there were guards surrounding the building. "Great. They didn't tell us this. What do we do now?" Sylvia had an idea. "I know. Curlly's the youngest and fastest one here, so we'll send her after the file. North, you and I will create a disturbance, distract the guards. Give me a second and we'll be ready to go. Sly tampered with the brakes on their vehicle and then she and North got in the car, made sure their seatbelts were secure and then headed toward the building. They crashed through the gate with North laying on the horn. The guards all ran toward the gate and Curlly hurried into the building. North headed for a group of dumpsters and rammed into them, bringing the car to as safe a stop as she could. The guards came running with guns drawn and pulled open both car doors. North and Sylvia got out, acting shaken and scared to death.

"What are you ladies doing? You could have been killed," one of the guards demanded.

North apologized. "I'm sorry. My brakes seemed to go out and I couldn't get stopped. I thought maybe pulling in here was safer than trying to travel on down the road."

The guards exchanged glances and nodded, apparently buying the story. One of them offered to take a look at the brakes and quickly spotted the problem Sly had created and took the time to fix it. "That should do it ladies, but you better get it checked out immediately. You don't want that happening again."

North had noticed Curlly slipping out of the building and into the wooded area across the road. "Thank you so much. We really appreciate it. I'm sorry we bothered you. I'll get the car checked out right away. Thanks again." She and Sly climbed back in the car and headed back the way they had come. A short distance down the road and out of sight they pulled over and Curlly hopped in. "Got it. Let's head back. I'm starving." North and Sly simply shook their heads and laughed.

Rita's group didn't have the trouble of guards. However, they did have another problem. Walter hadn't exactly given them real specific instructions and there were three warehouses that all looked the same. "Well," Nabiki suggested, "we could each take one. That would be faster."

Kit shook her head. "No. That could be dangerous. We don't know what's in these warehouses or how they are guarded. I think we should stick together." Rita sighed. "I guess you're right Kit. So, where do we start?"

Nabiki pointed to the one farthest from them and that's where they headed. Once inside, they immediately realized it was the wrong building and headed into the next one. It was very dark inside and Rita lit their candle. "I think this is the right place. Look up there," Rita pointed to the upper level. There was a desk with a safe sitting behind it, just as Walter had described it. There was a lock on the door leading up to the upper level. Grabbing the nail clippers, Kit pulled out the small nail file and picked the lock. "These things certainly do come in handy, don't they?" They had been told the file wasn't in the safe, so they each took a corner of the office and started digging. Rita took the desk and finally found the disk taped to the bottom of the bottom desk drawer. "Got it. Let's go ladies."

Trace, Aly and Kathy had arrived at the library and walked in. There were books everywhere. Kathy went to the desk and asked where the Atlas' were located. The friendly librarian showed the trio to the Atlas section and they all started looking. It was slow going and no one was making any progress. The trio got together and started whispering back and forth.

"Maybe we're looking in the wrong place. Let's think about what Michael said and see if we come up with something else," Kathy suggested. The girls went over everything they had been told by Michael. Then they considered the fact that they were looking for a map of a terrorist attack by a group called Eternal Night. Trace got up and started pacing.

Aly repeated the facts to herself over and over again. Finally, it hit her. "I think I know where to look." She quickly explained her idea to her friends and they agreed. It didn't take long for them to find the map in a collection of books on world religions. It was a very small map, safely tucked away in the back of a book on the history and architecture of famous churches. Once the map was in their possession, they quickly made their way back to Section.

Sherry had Christopher set up refreshments in the CLHQ conference room. Sherry, Michael, Walter, Davenport, Madeline, Operations and Jurgen were awaiting the arrival of the teams. Sherry paced back and forth. Operations and Madeline kept an eye on her. Michael and Walter tried to distract her, but it wasn't helping much. Jurgen did his best to keep Operations and Madeline's attention off of Sherry as much as possible.

Finally, the teams began arriving. Rita's team made it back first. She triumphantly turned over the BAND AID file to Sherry. She also had a few choice words for Walter about the sketchy information he had given them. Operations and Madeline watched and listened closely.

Next Trace's group returned with the map. Kathy handed it over to Sherry. Trace couldn't pass up the chance to harass Michael just a little. "Hey Michael. Thanks for the great information you gave us. You might as well have simply said ‘Go to the library.' We figured the rest out ourselves."

Michael nodded. "That was the point. I didn't want to make it too easy." Trace grunted and Aly pulled her away.

North's group came in shortly after Trace's. They turned over the umbrella file to Sherry. "Thanks, North. You did great." Curlly then regaled them with the tale of Sly's quick thinking with the brakes. A short time later everyone had returned and was gathered in the conference room. Sherry had disappeared shortly after everyone arrived. Kit noticed and asked North if she knew where Sherry went. North shook her head no. Just then, Madeline and Operations moved to the front of the room.

Operations quieted everyone and took charge. Just as he began to speak, Sherry returned. She walked over to the Section chief and had a brief conversation with him. Operations nodded and then turned back to the group. Michael and Walter made their way over to Sherry to give her moral support. They weren't sure what the outcome of this would be, but they would stand by her and help her whatever happened.

Operations spoke. "I want to thank you all for participating today. I'm sure many of you have questions. Madeline and I will explain what we can."

Everyone was curious now. What was going on? Wasn't this supposed to be fun and games?

Madeline stepped forward. "What you took part in today was a mission. But not only a mission, it was a test."

Immediately angry murmuring was heard throughout the room. Madeline let it go for a few seconds and then continued. "This was a test of all of you, but mostly it was a test of Sherry." All eyes immediately swung in her direction. Sherry had never wanted to melt into the floor as much as she did at that moment. Michael put his arm around her waist as a show of support.

Madeline continued. "We tested all of you on your investigating, interrogating and retrieval skills. I am happy to report you all passed with flying colors. A commendation will be placed in each of your files which will be beneficial in the future when promotion time comes." There was more grumbling and growling after that statement.

"The main purpose of this project, however, was, as I said, to test Sherry. We wanted to assess her ability to profile a mission and get operatives to carry it out without their having knowledge of what was actually going on. We needed to know she could send teams into the field knowing they were inadequately prepared. Of course, there wasn't too much danger involved for all of you, thanks to Sherry's profile."

Sherry still wanted to crawl away and hide. She could feel the eyes of everyone. She felt sure if Michael and Walter weren't flanking her, she would have disappeared as soon as Madeline began talking. She could imagine what was going through their heads. "How could she do that to us? She's supposed to be our friend." "Last time I accept an invitation from her." "With friends like her, who needs enemies?" Walter looked over at Sherry and noticed her strained expression. He leaned down and whispered, "Come on sweetness. It'll be okay. They aren't gonna tar and feather you."

Operations took over the explanation at this point. "The information each team retrieved was of extreme importance. Eternal Night is an actual terrorist group that has been attacking places of worship all over the world. They aren't particular about who they target either. They've hit temples, synagogues, Catholic churches, protestant churches, just about everybody. We knew they were planning another attack soon. We needed the when and the how. We also needed their backup plan so we could stop that as well. Sherry gave all the information you retrieved to Birkoff and Roy and Gray have their teams out right now rounding up the leadership of the group and destroying their headquarters. Sherry did a superb job and so did the rest of you."

Madeline spoke once more. "This test was the final stage in our evaluation of Sherry. She was put on the promotion list by Oversight and it was our job to make sure she was ready. I am happy to report that she is ready and effective immediately she will be given Level 5 status."

Sherry's eyes flew to Madeline, who simply smiled at her. She had known she was being tested, but she hadn't been told why. Operations walked over to her. "Congratulations. You know we will be expecting more of you now, but I'm sure you won't disappoint us."

Sherry, still dumbfounded, simply nodded her head. Madeline had walked over to add her congratulations. "And now that you and Michael are the same Level, we have no problem with the engagement. Just keep it low key."

Michael tightened his arm around her and Sherry nodded. "Thank you," she finally managed to utter. Madeline smiled and nodded. Then she and Operations excused themselves to head back to oversee the mission to take down Eternal Night.

"Congratulations," Michael whispered in her ear and then placed a kiss on her cheek. Walter smiled and gave her a hug. "I knew you could do it. Now what say you lose the man in black and take off with me." Sherry finally laughed, some of the tension leaving her body. Michael, hearing Walter's remark, quipped "Dream on, old man." Sherry laughed and Walter shook his head. "You two have definitely been spending too much time together."

The room was still pretty quiet and Sherry was afraid to face her friends. She took a deep breath and decided it was time to take the bull by the horns and get it over with. If they never spoke to her again, well, she'd have to deal with it. Seeing her move to the front of the group, everyone quieted down.

"I want to apologize to you all. I hated deceiving you all that way, but Madeline didn't give me a choice. I did my best to keep you all out of danger and I had shadow teams follow all of you just in case. I knew I was being tested, but I had no idea why. I want to thank you all for your cooperation and the great work you did. And again, I'm sorry."

The silence in the room seemed to go on forever. Sherry was extremely uncomfortable. Michael was just about to move to her side and get her out of here when a voice shouted out "Well, I suppose we can let it go this time, but don't ever let it happen again." It was Rita.

Sherry exhaled the breath she hadn't even realized she was holding. Then everyone started clapping and cheering and congratulating her all at once. She was overwhelmed and finally broke down. Kit was at her side immediately.

"Hey. You just got promoted, you pulled one over on all of us, Operations and Madeline are pleased with you and you're engaged to that gorgeous guy over there. What's with the tears?"

Sherry laughed. "I was just so afraid you would all resent this. I mean, I knew that you would understand it was something I had to do because I was ordered to, but I still thought you would all resent the heck out me for a long time."

North walked up and heard the last part of her statement. "You sure don't think much of your friends, do you?" and then she laughed. Sherry smiled and said, "I knew you all wouldn't let me down, but I was just so worried that you'd be angry when you found out. You guys are definitely the best friends a girl could ask for."

Just then Christopher walked in with a couple of assistants following pushing carts into the room. Everyone watched as the refreshments were laid out. All of a sudden a voice was heard over the din.

"CHEESECAKE!" and Curlly made a mad dash for the table.

The End