PART SIX – THE THIEVES OF LIFE

The next two weeks were a blur for all concerned, and it hardly seemed like it had been two days since her last visit with Loomis when Annie found herself in a hospital gown, laying on a gurney in a private room, where she was being prepped for her surgery. Ian had to admit, Giovanni was taking no chances with this operation. All of his team were Rockets, some being Red Rockets specially trained to assist Loomis with this mission and another Green Branch Rocket named Jason Calhoun who had been trained as a doctor with Ian. At the moment, an operating room was being carefully prepared and guarded by the Reds as Ian and Jason prepared Annie. Ian had introduced Jason as another doctor who would be assisting, and Annie had suspected nothing of the sudden addition of the second doctor.

Before long, Annie was watching the lights in the ceiling roll by as the gurney was wheeled into the operating room. Annie looked around uneasily, and found five other people, all dressed in identical green surgical scrubs, lined around the room. If only Annie had realized that under each scrub was a Red Rocket in uniform…

Jason motioned for one of the people to come over, and sit on a stool by Annie's head. "Ms. Masters, this is Laura Cummings. She'll be your anesthesiologist." Annie nodded.

Behind her mask, Laura smiled coldly. So this was the legendary Masterson. With a nod from Loomis, Laura reached over and placed the mask tightly over Annie's face. "Breathe and count back from ten." Laura said in a strangely familiar commanding tone. Annie barely noticed as she tasted the gas and her eyes slowly closed.

Moments later, another man in surgical scrubs appeared in the OR to supervise. Under their Leader's watchful eye, Jason and Ian set the procedure in motion. The team worked virtually in silence as they went about their task, the heart monitor on Masterson and the baby eerily beeping.

Blackness. Dark, swirling blackness was all Annie could see. She couldn't feel much else. Slowly, so slowly she thought she might go insane, miniscule pinpricks of light began to appear, then grow in their size and intensity. Annie groggily opened her eyes. It had been seven hours since Red Rocket Laura Cummings had placed the mask over her face, and she was laying in the recovery room. Loomis was sitting in a chair by her bedside, staring at her intently. "Ian?" Annie asked, She felt like she was drunk, but the sight of Ian gave her hope. "How did it go? Is everything all right?"

Ian grimaced. "I'm afraid not, Jan. Your baby…" Ian's voice trailed off into silence as Annie dizzily tried to sit up, clutching the side rails of the bed tightly for support.

"What? What's wrong with my baby?!" Annie demanded, her voice rising to a frantic pitch.

Ian lowered his head. "I'm so sorry, Jan. The calcification of the placenta had caused too much nutrient loss and your baby… didn't make it." He said softly.

Annie opened her eyes wide. "My baby's dead?" she whispered.

"Stillborn. I'm so sorry, Jan." Ian said again, playing his part to the hilt.

Tears welled up in Annie's eyes. "Oh, God…. Mama! I lost my baby! I never even saw my baby!" All the wooziness of the anesthetic was gone as her body was wracked by sobs caused by absolute clarity. Annie raised her tear-streaked face to look at Ian. "Was- was it a boy or a girl?" she asked tearfully.

Ian looked at her with a twinge of conscience. Damn Masterson for making this so impossible. "A girl." He replied.

Annie looked at Ian, her chest heaving with her sobs. "Can I see her? I mean- can I at least hold her before she's gone forever?" she asked humbly.

Ian had been prepared for this instance. Giovanni, Jason, and the Reds had whisked Annie's true baby away nearly five hours earlier, but Ian had located the baby girl of another couple that had been stillborn. Sadly, this kind of thing happened everyday, and Ian had known finding a substitute for the baby would not be impossible. "Certainly." Ian said quietly. "I'll get her for you."

Ian Loomis walked out Annie's room and trudged to the pediatric morgue to collect the baby he had selected. Truly, this was a ghastly business, and yet it was one that could not be avoided. Upon entering the morgue, he told the attendant that the parents of the baby wished to hold their stillborn baby once more. The attendant somberly handed the small corpse to Ian, and he carried it back to Annie's room nervously.

Annie's tears fell ever so steadily as she looked at the tiny girl in her arms. "I'm so sorry, little one." She whispered as she stared sadly at another woman's child. "I wanted to give you everything, believe me. Please… please just be at peace wherever you are." Unable to stand it one second longer, Annie passed the baby back to Ian and looked away. "What will happen to her?" she asked shakily, unable to face the corpse Ian was holding.

Again, Ian's response was prepared. "You can arrange for her burial or sign her over to the hospital, and they'll take care of the burial." Ian paused. "Jan…" he began softly, "I would recommend that you sign her over to the hospital. When this kind of thing happens, your dwelling on it can only make it harder."

Numbly, Annie nodded just as Ian had expected her to. He had known that the drugs would muddle her thinking and make her more open to suggestion. "I'll get you the forms, then." He said quietly. Ian exited the room, returned the baby to the morgue before it was missed, and then gathered the forms for Anne to sign to make her think the matter was closed. Of course, they were for her benefit only, of no use to anyone else.

Ten minutes later, the forms were signed and Ian had left Annie with the promise that she would be well enough to be released in three days time. Ian had left the orders with the nurses for her release time, knowing that Annie would return to her home where a pair of Rocket assassins would be awaiting her arrival. They would be arriving there tonight, and would be waiting for their target patiently. They would eliminate her brutally, and this whole rotten deal would be over. Ian climbed into his car downstairs and got ready for the drive to Headquarters, where Giovanni was expecting him to ensure all was well with the baby. Suddenly, he saw his reflection in the rear view mirror, and he broke down.

"You really did it, didn't you?" he asked the image in the mirror. There was no reply. "Smooth and slick as a Green Branch Rocket should be, right?" Again, silence greeted Ian Loomis. Sighing, he started the car and drove away. "Tomorrow it'll all be over, Ian." He told himself, desperate to end his guilt. But not forgotten, Ian's mind shot back. Cutting the wheel sharply, Ian pulled off the road and into the parking lot of a small park. His trembling hand reached for the glove compartment. With a quick motion, the door flipped open and Ian reached for the amber vial of tranquilizers. His hand brushed against something else in the glove compartment, and Ian's mind identified the object immediately. A strange sense of calm and peace swept over Ian as his fingers closed around the object and pulled it out. "No more. They can find another ghoul for hire." Ian Loomis said firmly as he raised his Team Rocket-issued .45 automatic to the underside of his jaw. Those were the last words ever spoken by Dr. Ian Loomis, M.D., Green Branch Rocket.

CHAPTER SEVEN: REVELATION