"Rollie, please- may I come in and talk to you?" she asked, clearing her throat as she dropped her eyes from his intense stare.
 
 

"Come in, Detective Sanchez…that is, if that is YOUR real name," Rollie replied, his voice laced with sarcasm.
 
 

She didn’t reply but entered, seeing Angie on the floor with Aidan. Angie nodded silently as Mira greeted her and pulled Aidan up in her arms. She sat down on the larger couch as Rollie joined her. Mira took the opposing smaller loveseat and sat down on the edge in the center of the couch. She ran her hand through her thick, shoulder length hair and moistened her lips. Her heart was pounding in her throat and she wondered if they could see how nervous she was.
 
 

"Yes, Rollie- my name is really Mira Sanchez, and I guess, I’ll start by telling you when I was first deceived by Michael Lopez…" she began, as she noted Rollie swallow hard, his face softening some and Angie stroked Aidan’s curly head and looked at Mira with expectation. Mira Sanchez, for the first time, appeared extremely vulnerable.
 
 

"My husband, Michael- he was working vice as you know…it was over five years ago and we were having problems with the marriage, two cops- one in vice, one in I.A.- you know…."
 
 

Angie could see that Mira’s eyes were watering slightly, the throb from the pulse in her neck beginning to be noticeable and Angie smiled slightly, giving Mira some ease as she continued her story.
 
 

"Anyway, he would be gone sometimes weeks at a time on a deep cover case and meanwhile, there I was, wondering if he would pop up or not for a day or two. He was moody, restless, drinking and well, we weren’t speaking much at times. I was waiting for him to come home after a particularly long assignment- it had been a month and I called the precinct to find out where he was because I was getting fed up. He had never been gone so long," Mira’s voice was becoming angered and at the same time, strained.
 
 

"The precinct told me he had been in touch with them and they were being given progress reports as expected and were not concerned. I, however, had not gotten a thing from Michael and it concerned me. When Michael’s partner was killed a week later, I really became frantic and I went down to mid-town south and demanded to find out where Michael was…I just couldn’t believe that everything was going fine on this case. My suspicions were confirmed once I spoke with Leo McCarthy."
 
 

Rollie’s mouth opened slightly, his surprise apparent as Angie frowned and struggled with Aidan who was growing restless just sitting in her lap.
 
 

"That’s right, Rollie- I did know Leo. He was the only cop there that came up to me after I drilled everyone there. I was so angry with their closed lip boy’s club because they kept looking at me as nothing more than I.A. Leo caught up to me as I was getting into my car and we sat in my car and he told me that Michael had stopped meeting his scheduled progress reports and that they had sent out tracers and that’s when Michael’s partner was killed. As you can see, I was beyond angry- I guess I took it out on Leo and told him I was launching a full I.A. investigation….like a threat would move Leo…" Mira said, smiling suddenly in the midst of seriousness and Rollie smiled back genuinely and relaxed as Mira took a deep breath and continued;
 
 

"Leo took my words back to the department and within two days, the door opened to my apartment and in walked Michael! I was so happy to see him and had so many questions and well, my emotions ruled my head. Michael was so apologetic and loving…so concerned for me and well, I guess we rekindled the romance that night after months of nothing but heated words and arguments…"
 
 

"I don’t understand?" Rollie asked, interrupting her, "you didn’t suspect that Michael wasn’t Michael…?"
 
 

"Not until after the sex," Mira said, her voice soft and low and she looked down at her hands then and then looked to Angie, who met her eyes in a kindred bond. Rollie was surprised as Angie handed Aidan to him and went over suddenly, touching Mira’s hand. No wonder Mira had been so supportive and so understanding of the way she had felt when Victor Loubar had fooled her into thinking he was Rollie. Angie hugged her as Rollie struggled for more explanation.
 
 

"Rollie, I knew then, afterwards, that this Michael was not my Michael. Suffice it to say, this man was um, different."
 
 

Rollie looked over to Angie who held onto Mira’s hand, saw the rekindled look of hurt, humiliation in his wife’s eyes that mirrored in Mira’s and he rubbed his fingers over his eyes and sighed, leaning forward then on the edge of his seat; "When did you confront him?"
 
 

"That morning, with my service revolver at his temple when he woke up…" Mira said quickly then and continued her story; "he tried to say he was just preoccupied with other things and I told him, that I didn’t know who the hell he was, but his preoccupation was ten times better than my own husband’s style of lovemaking. I guess that, with my own style of drilling a witness, well- let’s just say that I threatened him with severe malice over a certain part of his anatomy. It was then that he decided to tell me who he really was and what had happened to my husband. I marveled at how much he looked like my husband in face and build and told him so. He then began to tell me the most fantastic story I had ever heard and now, I’m telling it to you."
 
 

"Wait!" Rollie told her, putting his hand out to stop her- "Are you telling me that I have never worked with your real husband, that over these past years, I have been working with this decoy?"
 
 

Mira smiled weakly, almost pathetically; "yes…."

Elena Serrano was looking intently into Michael Sanchez’s eyes with a steely determination. She would not let him see that she felt totally victimized and a fool for all these years. But the tape! It made her question everything she held dear, the reason she had even started working up the ladder in the F.B.I. She had been used just as much as Rollie Tyler or for that matter, Dingo Tyler.
 
 

"My name IS Michael, Michael Lopez…" he told her, his face near hers as she struggled with her bonds.

"What I’m about to tell you is…" Mira began, then hung her head for a moment as if to collect her thoughts, "is…Michael- THIS Michael told me horrible things…that he had killed my husband during debriefing into this operative group he had been with for some time. He told me it had been unexpected, that Michael must have had some sort of heart condition that was unknown to him at the time. But he did die and the story grew into this chaotic world of CIA, splinter groups, world domination- it was all so fantastic and horrible to hear and all I could think about was that my Michael had been killed by this man."
 
 

"Why had they taken him?" Rollie asked, thinking back to his own abduction and debriefing.
 
 

"They were pulling people literally off the streets, law enforcement, government officials, criminals, psychics, and yeah, even con artists…"
 
 

Rollie’s head flew up as he met Mira’s suggesting eyes; Dingo had been pulled in by Michael Lopez during the Heart of God jewelry deal with Skartsounis and his drug cartel.
 
 

"Apparently, Michael was pulled for recruitment for special operations due to his vice undercover work- they were making a move against drug cartels to enlist the kingpins in global control…that is, until Michael died under the debriefing by Michael Lopez."
 
 

"So, Michael Lopez IS this guy’s name, for real?" Angie asked, shaking her head and tightening her grip on Mira’s hand.
 
 

"Yes, and as he told me that he killed my husband, I literally went mad for a few minutes and nearly killed him in our apartment. I came so close to…." And Mira’s voice trailed off as her inner demons surfaced and she looked up at Rollie with souless, enlarged pupils as he recognized the place where she was.
 
 

"He told me that he was affected by his death…that he realized that he had himself, lost his entire mind to this operation and with the help of several others in the organization decided to leave and run counter operations. He went to Germany where his implant was removed by that doctor- Eckmiller. He found out through a network of others that had gone before him that it was controlling a lot of his thoughts, his perceptions. With Eckmiller’s help, he connected with the others that helped him with plans to move against this splinter group. They changed Michael’s appearance to look like my Michael. Being close to Pollepel, positioned internally with the New York police department was a good cover. And I believed him when he said, wearing Michael Sanchez’s face everyday of his life was his own prison."
 
 

Rollie looked at her with silent empathy as Angie wiped away a tear that had rolled down her cheek.
 
 

"I told him I couldn’t deal with what he had done…that he was on his own, that I didn’t understand what or who he was but that I wanted nothing more to do with him! This man that I had made love to, thinking he was my husband! I wanted to hate him. I wanted to shout out his deception to the world but…."
 
 

Mira paused, her eyes searching upward into the ceiling of the loft; "I was looking at my husband’s face and there was this…I don’t know, a bond was forming as we looked at each other that day and I guess, I somewhat believed his story. I had enough wits about me to tell him to get out, that even though he had physically made his reappearance known at the precinct, that I was going through the motions of divorcing him to keep him away from me."
 
 

"And so began this life of hell," Rollie continued as Mira stopped talking and he moved over, handing Aidan back to Angie as he sat to Mira’s other side and put his arm around her shoulder, "I have so many questions about Pollepel, why and who?"
 
 

"And I really don’t have those answers, Rollie. The last time I saw Michael Lopez was when he came to me after I thought he had died in that basement. He showed up at my apartment. I was stunned and well- I’m getting ahead of myself. You know, during those five years after the ‘divorce’, I felt that this Lopez was still watching me, and occasionally, as you know- he was there. At the bank robbery, in Harlem that night, he kept coming in out of my life. You kept pushing him at me and I know this is crazy but physically, he was Michael…but inside, this man was totally different. He had such mystery and an agenda that I didn’t even begin to understand…and I…"
 
 

"You fell in love all over again," Angie commented and looked at Rollie with her eyes meeting his in wonderment.
 
 

"Yes, I let him get past that wall…and then, well- when I got pregnant during the mission he was on to recover Czewt, I had this delusion, I don’t know that we could be a family. After I lost the baby, we both decided that it was no good to both of us to continue this relationship. He was also still pursuing this endgame with his organization. So many people turning against him and people who were not what they seemed to be…"
 
 

"Like Eckmiller…" Rollie said, frowning, "he had killed the wrong man at Langley."
 
 

"Why was Rollie so important to them, Mira?" Angie asked, still wondering why Rollie had been kept for so long, used by Brabon at the hospital and then, by Eckmiller."
 
 

"Michael only told me once, that it was something to do with the fact that Rollie just never took to the implants like the others. There was another like that and they realized that it was something to do with genetics."
 
 

"Dingo!" Rollie said, jumping up from the couch. He started to pace; "the old buzzard wasn’t able to be programmed, just like me."
 
 

"I don’t know Rollie! Michael never explained anything further. I am as surprised as you to find that he and Dingo have been working for sometime together. You will have to talk to Michael to get the whole truth of that out."
 
 

"But Mira, Michael did die in front of us…he was helping us escape in the basement at the hospital- he took Aidan from harm and gave him to me."

"That’s right! I saw Michael die in front of me," Angie said, for she was the only witness, Brabon being dead and Rollie without sight at the time.
 
 

"You saw Brabon’s operative, a double standing in front of you. He was the one sent in to persuade you to get the implants in when you became undecided. Once Brabon realized that he had not really killed Michael Lopez in the harbor the night before, he dispatched the double to take out Michael and assist him with you and Angie. The two Michaels were firing at each other down in that basement as well as Michael Lopez taking out Brabon’s men. It was the double that suddenly stood before Angie and was getting ready to kill her when Michael Lopez shot Brabon and then spun around and shot the double. He then realized that he had given himself the freedom he needed. No one had actually seen him from his position. He had virtually killed himself in front of witnesses."
 
 

Angie stared at Mira flabbergasted, shaking her head as Rollie sat back down and clenched his fists tightly and then released them, placing them on his thighs and sat back on the couch, leaning his head back.
 
 

Mira swallowed, her voice cracking as she slowed down and sighed;
 
 

"Michael Lopez came to me that night, after I thought he had died, saving you in that basement. He told me only that he had used Brabon’s operative as a way out so that he could move freely to work on disorganizing the operations for good. He did say he would have to leave for Germany…that he needed to find out a few things for himself there."
 
 

"Great, I mourned for a bloody stranger at the funeral," Rollie remarked, throwing his hands up in the air.
 
 

"I finally mourned for my husband," Mira said in bitter retort, "my real husband."
 
 

"So, this Michael hasn’t seen you since then?" Angie asked, as she struggled to keep up.
 
 

"That’s right until I got in that van yesterday and there he was!" Mira said, rolling her eyes, "I take it you wanted to surprise me…well, in a way you did but I had a feeling that he would turn up again in my life, like a bad penny."

Elena Serrano felt ill to her stomach and to see Lindquist sitting smugly in a chair watching from a distance only enhanced that feeling.
 
 

"You have an uncanny knack for returning from the dead, Michael- whatever you last name is….!" She told him, relaxing her hands that were bound to her chair arms.
 
 

"I’m like a cat with nine lives…" he almost hissed to her as she tried to erase the mental images that would not stop in her mind after the video.
 
 

"You’re telling me that my whole professional life has been nothing but a joke, that the people I have put away have generally been pulled out of jail by this organization and used to gain power cartels in third world nations?"
 
 

"Something like that…and I used to be right there with them, training these people to achieve their goals. Of course, you were marked for debriefing over two years ago. You were tenacious following Dingo Tyler around. My contacts wanted you to simply be hit but I persuaded them to look at your entire package, Serrano. After all, you’re quite capable of running a good operation. We need more females in this reorganization as well."
 
 

"I see….so I should be thankful for your quick thinking to just assimilate me into the boy’s club here, thanks but no thanks!" she said, and spat at him as he backed away just in time.
 
 

"Okay, manners are something lost in these kinds of situations," Michael told her, smiling and he circled her chair and then put his hand to his chin, studying her, "Dingo- get in here!" he yelled out behind him then and stepped back.
 
 

Elena heard the sound of a chair moving, footsteps coming toward the room and then the door opened and Dingo Tyler walked in nervously.
 
 

"Better get her believing, Tyler. We have to move out in less than two hours. We wasted enough time with your son’s problems yesterday."
 
 

"Yeah, alright mate," Dingo replied as Michael turned and walked out without turning back to look at Elena again. The father of Rollie Tyler came over to where she was bound to the chair and took a deep breath.
 
 

"Elena, best give it up and join in, sweetie- less they off you in under two hours. You’re lucky, they didn’t give me that much time," he told her, seriously as she frowned and stared up at him.
 
 

"Dingo, get me the hell out of here and I will give you immunity from prosecution!" Elena whispered desperately, as Lindquist sat back in his chair and just grinned.
 
 

"You’re a cheeky lady, Elena but business is business. I promised your delivery and a bargain is a bargain," Dingo reminded her as she struggled in her bonds trying to lurch out at him.
 
 

"You son-of-a-bitch! How could you do this? I don’t understand!"
 
 

"Temper, Elena…didn’t that video help you make up your mind at all?" Dingo asked, making a clucking noise in his mouth.
 
 

"For all I know, it was a fake…for dupes like you to swallow!"
 
 

"Hold on now, these guys are bloody angels compared to their counterparts. Rollie got a good lesson from those blokes…take it from him. I would cooperate with Michael. He is the better path in the road, sweetie."
 
 

"But Michael is just like them, taking people against their will, debriefing them into his little company splinter group, what’s the difference?"
 
 

"Well, the one I can think of is that he is getting ready to launch a purge on the stringers out there. He thought he had them all but there is still the biggest one of all, a slippery bastard. He’s been calling the real shots for years."
 
 

"And who is that?" Elena asked, shivering as the images from the video kept running through her mind, almost a kind of brainwashing torture now.
 
 

"Well, that would be telling you more than you need to know right now," Michael Lopez chimed in behind Dingo as he promptly placed a piece of duct tape over her opened mouth.

Angie stood up, taking Aidan upstairs to change him as Rollie sat with Mira alone on the couch. She looked at him out of the edge of her eyes as Rollie sat back with his eyes closed.
 
 

"I feel…." He began…
 
 

"Betrayed…pissed off….angry…" Mira replied, trying to fill in the silence as he paused for words.
 
 

"All of that and yet…" and he opened his eyes, leaning forward on the couch and staring at her with indignation; "hurt- that you couldn’t trust me after all that we’ve been through with the truth! My God, the truth…!"
 
 

"I promised Michael and I guess, I should have realized that by doing that, betraying you would be my life-long punishment. I didn’t come here today for your forgiveness, Rollie. I came here to tell you the truth."
 
 

Angie appeared at the base of the stairs, her face betraying her profound shock and confusion; "I feel like we’ve been nothing more than rats in this big maze, Mira. Was Michael Lopez’s quest for destroying this splinter group THAT important? To risk everything, your friendship with us in serving his ends?"
 
 

"He killed my husband…he saved yours…he’s an enigma to most but I love him…" Mira replied softly, standing up and walked toward the door; "and yes, his ends justify the means but I think he should tell you about that…"
 
 

Mira looked at them both, a small, almost pathetic smile on her face and she pulled the door open and stepped outside, taking a deep breath. Three years of lying to Rollie and Angie was at an end.