Poncho

Xavier was in a quandary in the restroom. More comfortable in one sense at least, he needed to return to his original position at the rear of the complex, or face the wrath of Euron. At the same time, he was debilitated by a very strange sensation, that of total detachment from the clone network, which he was struggling to process. He had known the others were somewhere close by but now, suddenly, they were nowhere. He was entirely alone, with none of the customary low level background interference from the various communication networks that were installed in his system. It confused him. Never, since becoming sentient, had he been so totally and completely on his own. There was a void where the streaming data ought to be.

He sent out little questing threads, searching covertly for connections but they returned unanswered. When Euron’s stentorian tones crashed into his ear, he almost fell over and had to prop himself against the tiled wall until the reverberations subsided.

‘I had to change position momentarily for operational reasons,’ he said, in answer to the inevitable question about his disobedience. ‘I am inside the complex, on the ground floor, in a restroom.’

Slightly mollified, Euron confirmed that a team was on its way and would be with him in thirty minutes.

‘Stay where you are. They will find you.’ The connection was severed abruptly.

* * *

‘Okay, are you all ready?’ Alain was the designated leader of one team and Emma had volunteered to do the same for the other. 

Everyone was.

‘The only thing we're missing is a blanket or some heavy-duty fabric for the drop cloth.’ Kim rummaged in the car boot amongst the coats and extra things she'd grabbed on her way out of the house, hours earlier. ‘This might do.’ She pulled out a voluminous poncho, waterproof on the outside and lined with heavy plaid material. ‘Gimme a minute...’ 

More scrabbling about in the first aid kit and she held up a handful of large safety pins. It was the work of a moment to close up the central hole.

‘Perfect. Let's go.’