The ceiling, walls and floor of the BlueGene lab were a bland white. Grids of fluorescent lights stung Sophia’s eyes. A Blue Beret lay sprawled before her, unmoving. She sniffed the air, then stepped over him. With Nasira covering everything outside her field of vision, she continued further into the lab, to find more than two dozen Blue Berets lying around in calm, relaxed positions. She counted them. Thirty to be exact. Benito had used the correct amount of nitrous oxide. As instructed. It was better than she’d hoped for. They were completely sedated.
She checked on her team: Nasira, Lucia, and her more recent additions, Cassandra and Renée. Everyone was accounted for. Like her, they were wearing matching lab coats with chemical splash goggles and half-face respirators that, until now,
