Catherine was a rare not to be injured during the mission, but she was sent to the infirmary an hour after returning to the institution, fortunately a short electric shock would bring unimaginable pain to people, but the sequelae were not as serious as other injuries, after a series of timely and effective measures such as cooling, intravenous high-dose injection of rescue drugs, oxygen delivery, and assisted breathing, she opened her eyes at about three o'clock in the afternoon of the next day, and removed the endotracheal intubation on her own. Little Martin's condition was much worse in comparison, Catherine gave him an impressive nightmare, although he was awake now, but the depression, anxiety or nervousness that was as strong as substance still controlled him, everyone who approached him was attacked, and refused to communicate deeply with anyone, and the doctors could only determine that his spirit was extremely stimulated, but could not determine the extent and origin of it, and they had to temporarily inject him with anesthetic drugs to let him sleep peacefully.

"What kind of stimulus did you put on him?" Abel came to pay his condolences to his very good partner in the nest, and the condolences were a smoked chicken breast sandwich with mozzarella cheese, cucumber, tomato and egg white, and a glass of warm milk.

Catherine was already hungry, and although she had a splitting headache and her arms and shoulders were numb, she couldn't wait to take a big bite on the beautifully shaped triangular bread: "Abortion." She replied vaguely.

"Endosperm abortion?" Abel didn't react for a moment, he couldn't understand how anything related to the study of embryo sac development and fertilization properties (in English, the word abortion could also be used to refer to pollination or endosperm reproduction failure) could pose such a threat to little Martin – he was almost insane.

"No," Catherine said with milk, rushing down the choked clump of bread, "a miscarriage, a miscarriage, the loss of a child." She said peacefully.

Abel was dumbfounded: "But he's a man!" ”

"So it works better." Catherine put down her glass and spread her hands with difficulty: "Men are less resistant to physical and mental stress than women, and this is something that has long been scientifically proven," she smiled contemptuously, "to feel what it is like to be forcibly hollowed out—maybe it will teach him how to treat other people's children." ”

The doctor behind Abel looked at the ceiling, he was now a little sympathetic to poor little Martin, from a spiritual point of view, he could go and apply for the 200,000 yuan prize from Guinness, nine years ago there was a man who pioneered a miracle and successfully gave birth to a child himself, and now even the abortion record has been broken.

Abel coughed unnaturally, and he suddenly felt that Catherine was okay with him: "If you feel better," he said, "the boss wants to see you." ”

***

Catherine was still in the head's office for the first time.

Of course, the head is not the real head of the institution, he is only in charge of this place, but it is enough, he has a lot of power in his hands, enough for him to cover and control all the people who work and are working in this "Tower of Babel" that stands alone in the wasteland. He was about thirty-five or forty years old, tall, well-dressed, with blue eyes that were sharp, cold, and even cruel hidden behind rimless glasses, and it was because of these eyes that one could distinguish him from the well-dressed politicians, academics, and Wall Street dwellers — the eyes of creatures at the top of the food chain.

"You may be seated." He said that as Catherine sat down on the leather sofa across from his desk, the sunlight streaming in through the huge floor-to-ceiling windows, wrapping her around her like a warm and soft blanket, which should have been comfortable, but Catherine was not at all at ease.

Perhaps it was the layout of the office that made her feel cramped—the Tower of Babel was an irregular reinforced concrete special-shaped column frame structure, with thousands of concrete columns deep into the rock and beams that combined them to form the skeleton of this behemoth, with the distance between each column ranging from twenty to thirty feet, the office was an elongated square, which took up two columns horizontally and four longitudinally, and the black sofa group that Catherine was waiting for was far away at one end of the office. At the other end, the head's desk was lined with computers, printers, copiers, scanners, a projection screen that took up a quarter of the wall, silver bookcases, marble tables, glass multi-storey cabinets, and so on — the head sat behind his desk, his fingers crossed. The curtains were drawn on his side of the windows, and a small half of the room was shrouded in artificial shadow.

"I want to talk to you, Catherine," said the chief, "I think you want to talk to me too—Catherine, Martin. Shawd complained to the Home Office that you had seriously obstructed his investigation. ”

For a moment, Catherine felt all her blood rush up her face and head, her eyes were hot, her lips trembled with anger, and she took several deep breaths to stop herself from being so excited: "He's not going to be an investigation at all," she said. ”

"It's not something you can define." The leader calmly replied, "He has all the formalities, the reasons are good, and he has been allowed to do so." ”

"Can he do that?"

"As long as I sign for him."

"You promised me," Catherine felt that her anger had exceeded the limit, and her voice was buzzing in her head, "I complete the mission, you guarantee his safety, there will be someone to take care of him, to meet his reasonable requests, and there will be nothing unpleasant about him." ”

"I believe we've done it." "He's been treated—the best, cared for—twenty-four hours a day, his demands met—games, books, and gardens—but Catherine, after all, is not the guardian of the institution, but, dear, I'm sure you can understand the difference between the two words—not just literally." ”

"But what does a six-year-old know about?"

The leader smiled slightly, "This can only be said, Catherine, we know it in our hearts, Sasha. Probably the only thing that Hopkins can call childish is his body, his brain and willpower are far beyond that of children and even adults much older than him, and he probably knows a lot more than we think...... Catherine, Mr. 'Ghoul' has killed and eaten four innocent people and killed nearly a dozen members of the Agency, including Jack, your former partner, and even the catastrophe that nearly wiped out the entire town of Doug...... Or rather, that's what he made—and that's just what he's done in the year he's reappeared—of course, I'm not saying that we want his father to pay his son's debt, which is unconscionable and unlawful, but we need all the clues, even the little dry descriptions...... We don't have much to find Anthony. Hopkins's stuff, his resume, medical records, and files disappeared seven years ago when your sister, FBI agent Catherine, was investigating; And the personal belongings that are of some use have basically gone to the garbage dump, and his portable computer was found in the house of a police officer, and it was filled with color by the bastard who used the private evidence. Romance movies and boring adult games that even the best computer experts struggle to find a trace of what was once relevant to them; The only thing we ended up finding was a copy of the "La Ragainnière" (La Ragainnière, a culinary expert in Paris) sold to a crime collector by his former guard, with his own annotations in the corner, which I had read, very interesting, but the problem was that it was useless to our intelligence and operations team. He paused, made a gesture, and his voice became softer and softer: "We can only look for clues from him, Catherine, I didn't give you a chance," he said, giving himself a thumbs up, "I once asked Abel to remind you to go and talk to Sasha." ”

"But you don't want to, do you?" He quickly continued, "You don't want to, you're afraid that the child will be more alienated from you because of this." Catherine," he chewed on the name of his subordinate gently, as if in the face of a wayward but intelligent, proud child: "We have indulged you—because you are beautiful, young, vibrant, and capable, and special, so we can promise you many things, but Martin. Shawd was just as good, young, strong and powerful, and most importantly, his demands were not contradictory to the hopes of the institution. He crossed his fingers and raised them to his lips, "Look, Catherine, since we can tolerate you doing it...... Something that shouldn't be allowed," he sighed, "how can we reject a legitimate application?" ”

“…… After all," said Catherine with a bitter mouth, "you just want me to get a clue from Sasha...... But it's almost impossible. ”

"Ah, I know," replied the leader nonchalantly, "so we let someone else go." ”

"Don't force Sasha," begged Catherine, who was not accustomed to doing it, and therefore seemed stubborn, "as long as Sasha is here, Anthony will come sooner or later, and then we will easily catch him." ”

The leader shook his head, "Who knows." Maybe he will come, maybe he won't. ”

"He's coming."

"Which day? Which month? What year? We can't wait forever for the 'ghoul' to crawl out of his coffin, searching, catching, and feasting on his prey: innocent civilians and members of the police and agencies trying to stop it. "I'm disappointed, Catherine, you're so selfish, you can only see yourself, go your own way, grab what you need, and even if Jack dies tragically in the fire of Aliaou because of your fault, you still don't change, you don't feel guilty, you don't hesitate - as hard as ever, you act recklessly." He raised his hand again to stop Catherine from interrupting him, "That's it, Catherine, you have not been able to provide a convincing reason for me and others who need to explain, and I can only maintain my original opinion—Catherine, you can arrange the sand as you wish. Hopkins' life is going to be the future, but neither you nor he can refuse a request from a member of the intelligence and operations team, or any member of another agency, if their request to cooperate with the investigation is granted. ”

Catherine got up from the couch, "I'm not going to ask for any more money, treatments, caretakers, or anything the hell. ”

She'll take Sasha away, they'll have a harder, more dangerous life - who knows Anthony. When will Hopkins come to the door, but there won't be a second time, and no one can hurt the child while she can still breathe, even if he is an angel or a devil.

"Don't be stupid, Catherine."

The boss said.

(To be continued)