A 101 - d2c

'Oh, my God,' she said.

'Yes. That is Arthur Michaels' wife, Diana,' Anna said, grinning.

'They'll tear each other apart,' Julia said.

'I don't think so,' Anna said. 'They've been pumping Key 509 into the room for a few minutes, now, and both of them have been helping themselves to the coffee in the dispenser - coffee that is also laced with the drug.

'Any minute now, things are going to get very interesting for those two women in A 101 ...'

'I know,' Diana said to Sahirah.

Sahirah looked up at Diana. She had been looking at this thick, glossy magazine. She had no idea what she was doing here. Her last memory was of waiting to be picked up by Arthur to head for their usual weekend away at his place out in the countryside.

And now, here she was, sitting at a table in a windowless room, sipping lousy coffee and reading some sort of magazine with some woman sitting on the couch.

'Sorry?'

'I know who you are,' Diana said, getting up to her feet, a little unsteadily. 'You're sleeping with my husband.'

That caught Sahirah's attention. Her head, which had been slowly sinking, now snapped up. Her eyes were wide. She stared at Diana.

'We've not met in person,' Diana said. 'You are Sahirah. Arthur's mistress.'

'I see no point in prevaricating,' Sahirah replied. 'I am. You must be Diana.' She slowly got up from the chair. 'Hope you don't mind if I don't shake hands.'

'That would be wise,' Diana replied, coldly.

'Well,' Sahirah said, 'what shall we do, now that the formal introductions are out of the way?' Her heart was pounding for some reason.

'I think,' Diana said, 'that I need some coffee first.' She made her way over to the coffee dispenser.

The idea of getting coffee seemed like a brilliant idea to Sahirah. 'Mind if I join you?' she asked.

Diana have her a sidelong look for a moment, then nodded.

In close proximity to Diana, Sahirah could smell Arthur's wife's scent. Mixed with the lingering air of the garden, she was wearing something Sahirah knew, but couldn't quite place.

Then she recognised the aroma. 'Oh,' she whispered.

'What?' Diana's expression was cold. More than that; there was pain in her eyes.

'I ... I had no idea,' Sahirah said. 'That's his aftershave. You're wearing his aftershave as your scent.'

'It reminds me of him,' Diana replied. 'I mean, I've got my own boys for fun, but when it matters ... I still love Arthur, more than he will ever know.' Diana sucked at her lower lip. Sahirah was so close to her that she could feel the woman's body heat.

'And you're afraid that I'm going to take him away from you,' Sahirah said. For some reason, she couldn't stop smiling. Diana looked so beautiful, up close, with that glow that all mature women have.

Diana nodded. 'When we were friends at school, back in the day,' she said, 'we were inseparable. Then we fell in love, and by God we had to fight to stay together. Our parents never fully approved, not even when Arthur made his first millions back in the Eighties selling console games and simple personal computers. We just came from different stock. Breeding, my dear.' Diana briefly wondered what Sahirah would smell like. Momentarily, she thought of burying her face in Sahirah's luxurious hair and getting a good, long inhale of her scent. Her heart leaped at the thought. She frowned. Why was she getting excited like this?

'I know about breeding,' Sahirah said, reaching for Diana's forehead to brush aside a loose lock of the woman's hair which had fallen over her eye.

Shocked, Diana slapped away the hand. 'Presumptuous upstart-'

Sahirah looked stunned for a moment. 'YOU-' she screamed.

The coffees forgotten, they screamed incoherently and moved together, hands reaching for one another, seeking purchase anywhere; hair, arms, face. Fingernails sought to rake facial skin like claws. Faces flushed and contorted, the women screamed like animals as they struggled to keep from killing one another - or at least to keep from clawing out each other's eyeballs or leaving permanent visible claw marks.

Julia watched the fight on the screen, as Anna kept monitoring Arthur.

'I think Arthur's about to release,' Anna said.

'I'm more concerned about the fight,' Julia replied.

'Don't worry about that,' Anna said, smiling. 'In a moment, the Key 509 will kick in fully, and you're going to love what happens.'

Arthur had never known sex like this before. He had gone far beyond his normal pleasure threshold, to another plane of ecstasy entirely. Gasping and moaning, his face and upper body flushed and sweating, he begged Sahirah to let him come.

Sahirah, her breasts moving rhythmically in time with her hip movements, looked down on Arthur and smiled.

'Here we go,' Anna said. She said the trigger word that unleashed Arthur's orgasm.

Arthur shuddered and came. The ecstasy of release burned through his consciousness, tearing down the walls, the little censors in his mind that reminded him that he was awake. The Key 509 in his system gave the waves of pleasure radiating from his groin a force of reality that his mind could not resist.

As Arthur climaxed, he shuddered, his semen spurting over himself, onto the couch and the floor as, with a grunt, his back arched one more time and he fell slowly into a deep, deep trance.

In A101, the screaming and fighting abruptly stopped. Sahirah and Diana separated, glowering at one another, growling. Their hair and clothes were in disarray. Their faces were flushed and contorted. Panting, they were not to know that every deep breath served to draw in a greater concentration of Key 509 gas into their lungs.

'Worthless bitch-' Sahirah screamed.

'Uncouth vulgarian trollop-' Diana hissed.

They looked at one another. They caught one another's eyes.

A moment later, they were back together, their hands roaming over one another bodies, looking for purchase. Lips locking, breath mingling, soft moans coming from the women as another passion emerged, seeking purchase in their minds, demanding its own release.

Diana stopped kissing Sahirah, grabbed a handful of her hair and buried her face in Sahirah's locks, inhaling her scent. Sahirah sighed passionately. Her hips ground against Diana's. With a soft moan, Diana responded in kind.

They kissed again; deeply. Passionately. Hungrily, with wet lips and probing tongues and hot breath and moans drawn from the depth of the body.

Separating for a moment, Sahirah and Diana looked at each other with undisguised lust for a moment, before moving back together again. This time, with feverish hands they began removing one another's clothing, desperately eager to expose the other's skin.

Diana's blouse and Sahirah's top flew through the air, to land on the back of the couch. Their bras followed not long afterwards. Kissing passionately, the now-topless Sahirah and Diana made their way to their couch, Sahirah gently raking Diana's body with light strokes of her fingernails as Diana caressed and kneaded Sahirah's ample breasts with her firm fingers.

Diana's skin tasted of perspiration and some exotic cologne; Sahirah's tongue explored the hot skin of Diana's throat, her shoulders and chest.

Diana moaned as Sahirah began to nibble at her smaller breasts, Sahirah's hands roaming over Diana's hot, soft skin. Diana's hips ground against Sahirah's thigh. They separated again to remove the rest of their clothes. Now naked, they moved back together, falling onto the couch, kissing, their fingers finding each other's waiting vulvas, parting soft flesh, seeking out each other's clitorises.

Presently, Sahirah and Diana began to breathe regularly, heavily, in unison, as both began to approach climax. With a groan and a shudder, Sahirah came first, followed a few seconds later by Diana.

'Oh, my God,' Sahirah said, stroking Diana's hair, 'that was intense.'

Diana murmured sleepily.

'What the Hell did we just do?' Sahirah asked, her words slurring. Drowsiness was stealing upon her, making her limbs heavy and limp. Gradually, she joined Diana in slumber.

'They're all ready,' Anna said to Julia. She tapped instructions on the keyboard in front of her.

Presently, white-coated men and women, dragging hospital trolleys behind them, entered the chambers where Arthur, Diana and Sahirah lay sleeping. The lab technicians were all wearing gas masks. Behind them, Tamsin entered the room containing Diana and Sahirah, and Jenny the room containing Arthur.

As Julia watched, they picked up the three and placed them on the trolleys, before leading them out of the rooms. Just before leaving the room, Tamsin looked directly into the video feed and gave a thumbs up to Julia and Anna in the control room.

'And that's them sent off to Central Processing,' Anna said. She looked up at Julia. 'Job done. Let's go and get something to eat.'

Three weeks later.

The Jaguar approached the yellow Vauxhall Vectra parked in the layby on the road up to the Three Maids Hill roundabout. The bonnet of the Vectra was propped open. The pretty Middle Eastern-looking woman stood over the exposed engine. She was wearing a short-sleeved yellow blouse and an impractically short skirt.

Arthur got out of the car and approached the woman. 'Can I help?' He was carrying a rolled-up newspaper.

'Yeah,' Sahirah said. 'The car won't start or something.'

'Ah,' Arthur said. 'Here. Hold this a minute.' He handed the rolled-up newspaper to Sahirah. Arthur went around the front of the car and peered into the engine compartment as Sahirah leaned against the side of the car and lit up a cigarette.

Briefly, Sahirah caught the eye of Arthur's wife, who sat in the passenger seat of the car, using an electronic cigarette. There was the briefest of nods from Diana. Sahirah smiled slightly.

'I think I have it, Miss,' Arthur said. 'See if you can start her up now.'

Sahirah put out the cigarette and got into the car, dropping the newspaper on the passenger seat. A moment later, and the Vectra's engine caught and began turning over.

'There you go,' Arthur said, closing the bonnet. 'That should do the trick.'

After a few moments listening to the car running smoothly, Sahirah leaned out of the window, smiling.

'Thanks,' she said.

'Any time, Miss,' Arthur replied, getting into the Jaguar and driving off.

Sahirah sat in the car, and turned the engine off again. She sat and listened to the rustling of the wind in the trees and the silence in the road.

Presently, another car approached. An identical yellow Vectra. It parked in the layby just up ahead of hers. A white woman got out, with auburn hair. Her red dress was even more impractical than Sahirah's short skirt.

Sahirah got out of the car, clutching her car keys, and approached the auburn-haired woman. Without a word, they fell into each other's arms, kissing one another passionately, their hands roaming over one another's bodies, caressing each other's breasts and firm skin through the flimsy material of their clothes ...

An articulated lorry approached, beeping its horn. The driver leered at the two lesbians as he drove past. Shocked, the young women abruptly separated; staring at the departing truck, they looked sheepishly at one another.

'Maybe another time,' Sahirah said.

'Yeah,' the auburn-haired woman replied. 'Some other time.'

Sahirah got into a yellow Vectra, and drove off leaving Tamsin behind alone in the layby. She watched as the young woman drove the car out of sight, before getting into the Vectra that was left behind in the layby.

On the passenger seat was the rolled-up newspaper.

'Tamsin here,' said Tamsin into her mobile phone, as she peeled off and turned the car around to go down the lane in the opposite direction to the one Sahirah had taken. 'Switch made.

A few miles away, Julia sat in a people carrier in another layby. Beside her was Jenny. In the back were two members of the Sharpton cleanup crew.

Presently, the Vectra drove up to the layby and parked behind it. The B team got out of the people carrier and passed by Tamsin, who got into the back of the people carrier. The keys of the Vectra were still in the car.

'Did you get it?' Julia asked, as they drove back to the Sharpton Institute.

Tamsin looked at the rolled-up newspaper in her hand. She opened it out. There was a small brown envelope inside; opening it, Tamsin shook two 64-gigabyte flash drives into the palm of her hand.

'Looks like it,' she said. 'Let's get this data home so we can get it analysed.'

'Why all that rigmarole with the cars?' Julia asked Tamsin. 'What was the point of the vulgar display?'

'Misdirection,' Tamsin replied. 'If anyone saw anything, all they'd likely have seen were two lesbians making out in the layby. I don't think they'd have paid attention to the cars at all. Also, there was no way of knowing who had come to the layby in which car.' She chuckled. 'Also, it was an excuse for me to make out with Sahirah for a bit.'

'Do you think up spy stuff like this all the time?'

Tamsin smiled. 'Why do you think I'm designated Handler One?' Her mobile phone vibrated. She picked up the call. 'Tamsin,' she said. A moment later, she smiled. 'That's brilliant. I'll tell them.' She hung up.

'What?' Jenny asked.

'That was Home,' Tamsin said. 'As soon as we get the payload delivered, we're to go straight to the boss's office. Doctor Sharpton is in, and wants to thank us personally.'

Back at the Institute, Tamsin placed the flash drives in Dr Henderson's hands. Dr Henderson smiled.

'Thanks,' he said. 'Go and see Dr Sharpton now.'

The team made their way along the corridor. They bumped into Anna, who was wearing a lab coat and a gas mask, and carrying a clipboard. She waved at the agents as they passed.

The lift at the end of the corridor took them down four floors. This floor was busy; lights shone on the white-coated, masked technicians as they tended to the rows upon rows of flowers. The antiseptic odour competed with the heady floral scent of the orchids.

At the far end of the room, the team approached a door. Tamsin knocked and entered.

The room was occupied. They saw someone sitting behind the desk, turned away from them, staring at the big screen behind the desk.

On the screen was a BBC report announcing that the government had committed a large sum of money towards human response research.

'All is well,' Tamsin said. 'It looks as if one of our obstacles has been removed.'

The figure in the chair turned to face them.

'I believe that we can now proceed with the next phase of our operation without interference,' said Dr Sharpton.

'Doctor,' Julia began, 'I -'

'Please,' Dr Sharpton said. 'Call me Stephanie.'