All four men walked over to the large door. Jack placed his hands on the entrance, noting that it wasn't cold.

Like a vault, whatever handle or doork.n.o.b which had been present before was no longer attached to the front. A large electronic pa.s.scode mechanism glowed menacingly. In the form of a simple keypad, only the numbers zero through nine were present.

They studied the door for several minutes, trying to force it open.

"I was half expecting a retinal scanner and voice-activated pa.s.sword," Agent Wilson offered glaringly. "Guess it doesn't matter, though. We can't get in."

"Well," Jack said, ignoring the DEA agent and addressing the SWAT leader, "I a.s.sume one of your guys can tackle this one?"

"Shouldn't be too much of an issue," he replied confidently. Then, turning back toward the room, he shouted, "Billings, get over here."

Two members of the SWAT team ran over, clearing the distance of the room in mere seconds. The first man, Billings, immediately placed some equipment he'd been carrying at the base of the door and proceeded to attach some wires inside the lock.

The device he used appeared simple enough. It was no more than a customized laptop capable of cracking codes and cyphers. Preston knew he still wouldn't have been able to work the PC on his own and was glad he wouldn't have to fumble with it in front of so many of his peers.

The other team member addressed the a.s.sembled group. "We've almost finished tearing apart the facade that houses the factory equipment." He looked mildly exhausted, and sweat was pouring off of his face. "This was definitely a factory at one time. Based on the number of drums and pipes, this place could produce as much Bloodstrife as the Gluttony facility." He took a few heated breaths before continuing. "Everything is here. There are devices for adding various ingredients as well as a connection to the main water line to dilute the substance."

"So you found some of the drug then?" Jack asked eagerly.

"No, I'm afraid not. I think they knew we were coming. This whole place is empty-not a drop left."

"s.h.i.t," Preston said, kicking the door to the freezer. It echoed across the room which was now more or less silent. The team had finished searching the factory equipment. A few heads turned at his outburst. Noticing the sea of expressionless faces, Preston calmed himself down and addressed Billings. "Well, I suppose you'd better open it while we're here," he said courteously.

"No problem." Billings continued to monitor the decryption progress on the screen. He was running a program that entered hundreds of different numerical combinations, slowly deciphering the code one digit at a time. "Shouldn't be too long now," he offered. The detectives had seen such a program before when Jason McGovern had been explaining the existence of Particle N. Jason's words describing the inept.i.tude of the IT crowd also came to mind. He hoped that this Billings was as competent as Jason had been.

Since the SWAT team had mostly finished tearing apart the insides of the building, they continued the search for additional clues. Only a few seconds earlier they had resumed surveying the area in relative silence. Jack, Preston, and Agent Wilson moved toward the main part of the bas.e.m.e.nt, trying to get a better view of what the place looked like.

Almost everything had been stripped. Pipes and stained black plastic tubing hung down from the ceiling like infected blood vessels. Large blue empty drums dotted the floor. Combined, there appeared to be nine or ten barrels. Preston accepted that the SWAT's estimation had been correct. They would hold liquid equivalent to the vat in Gluttony's factory. He could even see the smaller containers attached to the sides of steel pipes that would have added the various opiates and nicotine to the solution along the way. They were also stained and empty.

The SWAT team continued to walk around the room, tearing down the occasional lingering duct or pushing debris out of the way. Clear paths were still present on the floor, but all told, little had been found.

Still, no one had been hiding among the factory equipment, and no secret rooms filled with the drug were anywhere inside the building. Preston was furious. They had either been tipped off ahead of time, or they knew that Sloth's facility had been compromised. In either case, the investigation may continue indefinitely, especially if they had fled the city. All that he had worked for was gone.

Preston backtracked on the clues that had led them here. Sloth's wind pattern maps would be useful to find out where they may have gone to, but if they were smart enough to move outside of his jurisdiction, then they may well have escaped.

The door leading to the upstairs slammed shut, cutting off his train of thought. Instantly, all members of the team raised their weapons in military fashion. The room grew eerily silent. Preston, Jack, and Agent Wilson began to move cautiously toward the corner of the room, out of any possible line of fire.

Two team members rushed up the stairs immediately and began banging on the steel door at the top, trying to force it open.

"There's no other way out of here," Agent Wilson said to the chagrin of the room. He was clearly losing his resolve.

"Keep it together, man," Jack commanded.

Agent Wilson began taking deep breaths, forcing himself to be calm. He slinked away, choosing to take cover behind a cl.u.s.ter of pipes. The mood of the room had shifted drastically. There was now an imminent threat that had Agent Wilson hiding in the corner. Preston was almost tempted to join him.

The mechanisms in the bas.e.m.e.nt began putting the members of the Chicago PD on edge as the sound reverberating from the industrial pipes increased in a steadily growing howl. Somewhere, out of their line of sight, something had been turned on. There was also a noticeable clanking noise against the metal, but the echo of the tubes made it impossible to discern where the sound was coming from.

Even in the bas.e.m.e.nt's dilapidated state, there was still too much to see in the ceiling.

Each member of the SWAT unit was ready, aiming their weapons in a controlled search pattern as they secured their specific area of responsibility.

Billings, the team member working on the freezer lock, kept one eye on the door as he worked on the code. With the other, he tried to keep watch on the situation unfolding before them.

Two team members had come to his aid, covering him while he attempted to work. Together they formed a small individual offensive unit, focused, but on edge. With the door to the outside locked, gaining access to the freezer appeared to be the only relatively safe haven left, regardless of who might be hiding in there already. The main bas.e.m.e.nt area was far too large and covered in obstacles to mount a proper offensive should an ambush come rushing down the staircase.

With most of the fixtures torn apart, what little cover had been present in the false equipment was now destroyed, composed of nothing more than the skeletal remains of the building.

"Look," Jack whispered to Preston. "I just lost my cell phone signal. I think there's something that's blocking it. I had one when we first came down here. The SWAT team doesn't look like they're able to communicate with the outside either."

Before Preston could respond, the sounds of the team shouting commands to one another drowned out the steady hum of the bas.e.m.e.nt. In moments, after each man had found a strategic place to patrol, the room grew silent. The team was ready with weapons poised.

Most of the guns were pointed with unwavering resolve at the door. From what Preston could see from over the wall of his minute barrier was a few of the men who continued to keep watch on the rest of the bas.e.m.e.nt. The team was well organized and fierce, something he wished that he saw in himself.

The same clanking sound that had been echoing off the pipes when they first arrived began again, filling the bas.e.m.e.nt with an ever increasing sense of unease. At the moment it returned, not one of the SWAT members flinched.

Preston, Jack, and Agent Wilson continued to stay as far back as they could, virtually hugging the wall as they crouched behind a fragile barrier of what appeared to be a mid-size industrial heating unit.

The noise, while hard to follow, sounded as if it were all around, distributed equally like rats running through pipes, sc.r.a.ping the metal with their claws and teeth.

A figure descended from the ceiling at the far edge of the room, too slowly for them to notice. Until now, it had been hiding in the maze of pipes that ran along the top of the room. The labyrinth above them had been too high to reach. At the time, it hadn't seemed a threat. From the team's view on the ground, they hadn't been able to tell just how much s.p.a.ce was up there.

Preston's heart raced as he saw her. The clanking in the pipes stopped at the moment of her arrival. He realized the sound had come from her metal-toed shoes as she'd been walking above them, surveying their fighting strength before making her presence known.

It was a woman, her hair long and blonde. Frazzled, but clean, it hung around her face in disarray. She appeared to be in her early thirties, the same age as Shannon. And, like the departed Sloth, she wore minimal clothing which offered a glimpse of well-toned muscles. Her pants ended at the mid shin with frayed edges, like the remaining fabric had been torn away in a moment of haste. Her shirt, a dirty blue silk blouse, was devoid of sleeves, bordered with the same ragged fabric at the shoulder. Her stomach was totally visible where the shredded silk ended.

Above all, Preston held back the horror when she descended, her full image finally coming into view. It was absolutely clear she was their enemy. Every inch of visible skin was infested with black veins. Her face, her limbs, even the small capillaries in her eyes were covered in them.

In the all-encompa.s.sing patchwork of the spiderlike veins, jagged letters were sewn throughout. She was the dealer whom they had been unsure of. It was Envy. The word was reproduced no less than ten times on the visible parts of her body, interwoven in the claw marks of rigid, dead Bloodstrife vessels all across her skin.

Even her face hadn't been spared. Under her eyes and across her mouth, the letters which composed the word stained her face like trails of dead tears.

Whereas all the others had presented their tattoos in wavy, yet refined letters, each of hers was jagged and uneven. Most of them weren't even identical. It was like she had scratched the words into herself with a dull razorblade and allowed the blood to dry along the surface of her skin.

She appeared distant, but like the addicts on the street, also suffering, trying to contain a near constant bout of rage that dwelled within.

"Oh my G.o.d," Agent Wilson said as she descended fully, hanging from a pipe with one arm. The SWAT members trying to decipher the code hadn't seen her yet, each of them still focused on the door to the upstairs and the surrounding bas.e.m.e.nt.

"Behind you," Agent Wilson yelled.

All the men turned, seeing Envy for the first time as she pounced on one of the men guarding Billings. The leader gave the order to shoot from across the room. A fraction of the team continued to guard the door, ever aware of the conflict surrounding them.

Instantly the room erupted in a hail of gunfire. Envy made her way back into the maze of the ceiling, avoiding the shots. Like the sound of rain striking a tin roof, the din of bullets ricocheting off the pipes enveloped the room.

Easily, she dodged and weaved, her body almost serpent-like as it traversed the tight corridors provided by the industrial ceiling overhead. The SWAT team scattered to different parts of the floor, each aiming their weapons with controlled precision among the hail of gunfire, hoping to catch a glimpse of her before she was able to launch another sneak attack.

For several seconds, the room was quiet again, interrupted only by the dull sounds of the pipes that surrounded them. Even the clank of her metal-toed shoes had been silenced. The team continued to search the ceiling, anxiously awaiting her to reveal herself.

They approached the fallen SWAT member nearest to Billings. From the look of him, he was startled, but uninjured.

"Are you hurt?" the leader asked. It took a few moments for the team member to snap himself out of the stupor. He came to, as if waking from a dream.

"Sir," he said as he regained his composure. "Sir," he repeated as several members of the team continued to cover him. "I can't move."

"What the h.e.l.l do you mean?" the leader responded, eyeing his team member for serious injury. "There's no way-" His voice halted in mid-speech.

Shadows began dancing off the wall all over the bas.e.m.e.nt. Heads turned when they thought they saw movement, skirting about freely in their peripheral vision. Some of the SWAT team noticed what felt like a light tap on the back or head. Instantly they called out to the rest of the team when they felt as if they had been touched. Words came in from almost every member, fear growing more p.r.o.nounced with each report.

Each time, there was nothing to be seen. Cold fear continued to creep through the team.

"Does anybody have her?" a random voice shouted in the bas.e.m.e.nt. When, one by one, each member responded with the word "negative," they grew more on edge.

Preston remained in the presence of Jack and Agent Wilson. The three men had been observing from afar, trying to catch a glimpse of the woman when she came out of hiding to play her inexplicable game of tag with the SWAT team. She was toying with them, no differently than the way l.u.s.t poked and prodded with s.e.xual innuendo or how Greed had decided to feed them small slips of simple information as if he were an adult speaking to a child.

"There!" Preston shouted, seeing Envy exit the ceiling. Before his voice had reached the team, she had tapped one of the men on the back and somehow managed to climb back upward without him noticing. By the time the team turned to see where he was pointing, guns aimed, she had left no evidence of her presence at all.

Preston remained standing for a moment. Seeing that the team hadn't been able to track her down, he slinked into a crouching position beside Jack and Agent Wilson.

Then, it all clicked. He realized what she was doing.

Preston glanced at his partner, seeing if he had somehow connected the dots. Jack continued to stare forward, still focused on the happenings around them. Greed and l.u.s.t had already told them about Envy, the puppet master. At the time, both detectives knew that Argosi wouldn't have let them in on the whole truth. They had been suspicious of the man from the start. Now, it was finally dawning on him what the CEO had decided to skip over, the crucial information which was about to cost them their lives.

The detective realized that, from Argosi's statement, she could only affect those who had black veins. Those two had lied to his face and he believed it. Preston wanted to sink into the floor. With the door sealed, there was no way out. He'd been so close to the end.

At that very moment Preston was about to stand again, intending to warn the a.s.sembled men. He needed to share both the details of his epiphany and the severity of the situation to the team.

It was then that the first affected man screamed as he took his aim away from the ceiling. Preston saw him slowly turning to one of his comrades, struggling as he aimed his weapon. He was no longer moving under his own power.

"What the h.e.l.l are you doing?" the leader asked forcefully, noticing the barrel of the gun rising up to meet him.

"Sir, it's not me!" the team member replied with haste. "I can't stop!" At the last moment, the leader dove out of the way. The gun fired, striking one of the other men. He cried out in agony, slinking to the ground as he died in only a matter of seconds. More of them followed suit soon after.

The two detectives and Agent Wilson continued to duck behind the makeshift barrier with guns drawn while the firefight ensued.

Preston confirmed with each of them that they hadn't felt anyone touch them since arriving in the bas.e.m.e.nt. Seeing a quick nod from each, he turned his attention forward again.

Gunfire erupted from all corners. Team members turned on each other, but retained their personalities and state of mind as they did so. Each time the result was the same. They spoke quickly, with fear and disbelief gripping their voices, twisting the sounds into stuttering excuses and horrifying shrieks. Continually, they said they weren't in control of their actions, and Preston could see it was true. Men who had worked together for years, no different than he and Jack, killed each other swiftly.

He could see it was so much worse than being under the influence of the drug. At least then they may not have realized what they had done, shivering in the moment before someone else put them out of their misery.

Preston's Beretta began to acc.u.mulate a cold sweat as he gripped it too tightly within his hand. It wasn't as if the woman was moving between the men, using them as shields or taking hostages. Instead, she had remained in the maze above, taunting the detectives and those she hadn't been able to touch. Preston felt utterly useless. The men were being picked off one by one, and he couldn't even see the target.

It was in that moment that Preston remembered what had truly transpired in that alley. The woman who had run past him. It was her, the Detective said. She had made physical contact with the addicts before he even arrived. That was how she was able to control her puppets.

But it was too late. Envy already had the entire SWAT team under her control. They danced on her stage, performing exactly how she had intended. Only the two detectives and Agent Wilson had been spared, for the time being.

The sound of gunfire ceased almost as soon as it had begun. Perhaps thirty seconds or a minute had pa.s.sed, the three of them staying as low as possible. Now, the only noise was the sound of a single pair of struggling footsteps approaching from behind the cl.u.s.ter of pipes.

Three guns were aimed at the area where the person would emerge. Even if one of their own had survived, he may prove to be a threat.

Each of them pulled back as they saw the SWAT leader rounding the corner, suffering from two rounds to the arm and chest. He was breathing heavily and painfully, but if he could receive medical attention quickly, Preston believed he may pull through.

"She never touched me," he said painfully, evidently having realized the source of her ability. "But, my own men," he continued. "They shot-"

Agent Wilson fired twice, striking the leader in the head. He fell instantly, the sounds of his gun striking the cement floor and echoing out across the room. Both detectives stared in disbelief, first at the body, then Agent Wilson.

"What the h.e.l.l are you doing?" Jack screamed, aiming at the Agent. "You just killed a cop, you b.a.s.t.a.r.d!"

"He was one of them. Don't you see?" the agent replied. Wilson was clearly in shock and out of his head. He'd been behind a desk far too long. It was all too much for him. Whether in his right mind or not, he'd committed the worst crime imaginable.

"He's lost it," Preston confirmed to his partner, moving in quietly. The detective moved slowly, trying to appear as non-threatening as possible; no sudden movements which may lead to aggressive action.

Carefully, they took the agent's weapon away, struggling to remove the gun from his frozen grip. He continued to stare forward, unblinking, his eyes starting to water. As soon as he was disarmed, the severity of what he'd done seemed to dawn on him. He fell to the floor in anguish, still on the verge of tears. He folded his arms against his stomach tightly as he knelt on the ground, leaning forward until his forehead touched the cement floor. It was as if he'd been kicked in the gut and was bending over in pain.

"G.o.d d.a.m.n DEA," Jack said, shaking his head in disgust.

"Stay focused," Preston said, now only talking to his partner. "We still have bigger things to worry about." He forced himself to ignore the agent as he began to let out thin wails, m.u.f.fled by his emotion.

Their heads jerked to the side, hearing the door at the top of the stairs open. Footsteps began to descend downward toward the bas.e.m.e.nt. Preston recalled the initial raid, remembering that no one had been left upstairs to open the door. It had to be a second wave of the ambush, in case the dealers had believed it was possible for them to somehow take down Envy.

Distracted by the door, Preston hadn't noticed Envy once again descending silently from the ceiling. Immediately, she landed behind them, disarming both detectives. From Preston she had grabbed both his and Agent Wilson's side arms. From Jack, she had taken his Ruger.

She held onto Preston's weapon, throwing the other two behind her forcefully, far enough away to be of no use to them.

They turned to face her, viewing her up close for the first time as she aimed the gun at Jack.

She smiled like a predator would, taking pleasure in the culmination of the hunt. She moved quickly and without a moment's hesitation.

Envy shot Jack in the left arm with Preston's own Beretta. He wailed in pain as he fell beside Agent Wilson, who was still in shambles on the floor.

The DEA agent now had tears running down his face. Envy smiled as she leveled the gun at him, continuing to fire without mercy. The bullet struck him on the left side of his chest. The man's body barely moved from the blast. Absorbing the shock, he somehow managed to remain resting on his folded legs as if under his own power.

In his final moments, the DEA agent seemed to regain most of himself as he stared directly at his killer. Wilson's eyes were forceful and unrelenting, mustering a rage which the man hadn't been capable of producing while he lived. It only lasted a few moments as Preston stared at him, almost studying the enormity of his response. Quietly, the agent lay backward, succ.u.mbing to his injury. His eyes remained open, continuing to shine with the same hatred of Envy, now carved permanently in his face like stone.

Barely taking notice, Envy smiled wider as she turned the Beretta toward Preston.

"I-" he said, having no idea how he could finish such a sentence. Knowing it would be his last, it all seemed so trivial. Unlike Agent Wilson, Preston closed his eyes.

In the darkness of his mind, there was more gunfire. Handguns discharged from one person, then another. He recognized the sound of his Beretta. Preston flinched, realizing that he hadn't been the one who was. .h.i.t. Quickly he opened his eyes, hoping that Envy hadn't decided to kill his partner first as an added insult.

Envy continued to stand before him, but her vein-filled face no longer held the mischievous and predatory exterior she presented while she had murdered Agent Wilson. Now, it was vacant and lacking, like all the blood had been sucked out of her in an instant.

Two more shots rang out, causing Preston to take a step back in surprise. He quickly brought his hands to his chest, confirming again that he hadn't been hit. There was another round fired. This time, the detective saw that the gunfire was coming from behind Envy. Still, he wasn't able to see who was shooting. From his position behind the makeshift blockade, the cl.u.s.ters of pipes around them blocked too much of his view.

Envy fell forward, landing a few feet away from Preston, dead. Preston had closed his eyes after she began falling, imagining that some SWAT member had survived to rescue them from her a.s.sault.

He opened them not long after hearing the thud as she struck the cement, seeing the most unlikely of allies in her shadow. Argosi and Alexandra, or rather, Greed and l.u.s.t, stood there. The CEO held Preston's Beretta which Envy had dropped after the final shot. In his other hand was a standard issue sidearm taken from a fallen Swat team member.

The pair had kicked Jack's Ruger and Agent Wilson's weapon back with them as they had approached from behind. The guns remained on the floor, the two detectives unwilling to risk diving for them, not sure if the CEO had saved them only so he could deliver the final blow himself.