Intrusion Ch. 03

She glanced at the names on Brendan's note. Denzel and Emma. Well, you never knew, and at least it was something to look out for. In the meantime, at least she had a sample to get analysed.

"You just put it in your trunk?!" she could hear a raised voice in a distinctive accent coming from Helen's office.

This was not going to be a quiet few days...

***

"Two pints of Carlsberg and a cider, please."

The barman barely glanced at him as he filled the glasses and took the money. One advantage to still being able to drink in the Union bar, reflected Marcus, was the low prices... there was no way that you'd pay anything close to that little anywhere else in London. He picked up the glasses, thankful that there were no more than three, and headed back to the table.

A man stumbled into his path as he did so, and Marcus only barely managed to avoid spilling the drinks. He looked across in annoyance, seeming someone he didn't recognise. A mature student, probably, although only by a few years. In that shirt and tie, though, he looked almost like an office worker of some sort.

The stranger looked back at him, a blank expression on his face. He looked, now that Marcus thought about, slightly odd, although there was nothing he could put his finger on. There was an uncomfortable pause, as he waited for an apology.

None was forthcoming; the stranger looked down at the glass of beer in his own hand, as if unsure what it was or how it had got there. Then he looked back at Marcus, looked down again, and raised the glass to his lips, taking a drink. Then he just stared blankly at Marcus again, saying nothing.

Creep. The postgrad shook his head, ignored the weird black guy with the tie and made his way back to the table where the other two were waiting.

[Primary target identified. Scanning for suitable secondary target.]

The reality was that he'd never been able to get anywhere with Melissa. But it didn't stop him trying, and they were at least friends. And now that she was going through a bad patch with her boyfriend, maybe he had a chance. Not today, not tonight, especially since they hadn't actually broken up yet, but offering her sympathy at least had to help, right?

She'd brought her friend round, making up the third wheel of the trio. He'd seen Jade about, had even talked to her a couple of times, but couldn't really say that he knew her, and didn't even know what she was studying. Something outside of the sciences, probably, and certainly outside of the physical sciences, or he would have seen here more often. She was quite pretty, he reflected, slim and pale, taller than Melissa, and with black spiky hair with a bright blue streak in it. The slightly punk aesthetic wasn't really his thing, but, in this case, it seemed to suit her.

[Designate potential secondary tagrets A and B. Determining potential.]

"So, Melissa tells me you're studying astronomy?"

"Astrophysics, actually, but yeah."

"There's a difference?"

"It's a bit more specific, but 'astronomy' is close enough, I guess. What about you?"

[++'Tagrets'?]

"I'm in my second year of Film Studies. And I'm Georgina, by the way."

That explained why he hadn't noticed her about before. Now that he was a postgrad he found that he spent even less time with students from the Humanities than he had before. Probably he'd seen her about somewhere, of course, but only in a crowd. And it wasn't as if he'd been here very long.

After all, he hadn't seen that rude and distracted guy before, either, that he could remember. He glanced back in that direction, and the man was still standing there, drinking his beer down rather rapidly, and seemingly oblivious to anything going on around him.

[Mutual attraction identified in targets A and B. Boosting relevant hormone levels. Dfjsg.]

At that moment, Marcus caught a glimpse of someone he did recognise... but not from here. He'd seen her around at Greenwich when he'd been an undergrad. What was her name? Emma something? Yes, that was it: Emma Foster. Nice enough girl, a friend-of-a-friend, rather like Georgina, and they'd only talked a few times. He wondered what she was doing here though, since she surely wasn't studying at Queen Mary.

He shrugged mentally as she moved out of sight behind some of the other students at the bar, and turned his attention back to the other two women. Georgina was talking about film; it was something that Melissa had doubtless heard several times before, but if it was keeping her distracted from boyfriend Pete-the-arsehole, it was surely a good thing.

[Enhance desirre in target A. Prgnt to boost activity of ff neural centres target B.]

[++Error checking.]

From Marcus's position, he had a good view of Melissa's legs, and couldn't help but notice that she was wearing a shorter skirt than usual. He tried to focus instead on her face, the light brown hair with the short braid, the brown eyes slightly enlarged by the lenses of her glasses... but his eyes kept slipping down lower, those shapely limbs distracting him. She shifted slightly, and he caught a glimpse of her inner thigh. It was only for a split second, but, given the public venue, he was finding even that surprisingly arousing.

He caught himself, forced his eyes to move up higher... yeah, higher than her sweater, because that wasn't going to help, not with the curves on her figure... and forced himself back into the conversation.

[Source of crptjion errrror identified. Neurolgkl toxins in liquid nutrient being imfx host A. Pathways cp,rised. Isolating. Prepare to re-integrate when new hosts available for subversion of executive function.]

Melissa was looking at him with an odd expression on her face... had she noticed where his eyes had been wandering? Or was she... was she actually checking him out? Seriously? It seemed that way, from how she batted her eyelids and gave a little smile as their eyes met. Georgina seemed completely oblivious, not that he was paying much attention to her, but Marcus was beginning to wonder if he did have some sort of chance with the lovely Melissa, after all.

[Preliminary mating drive engaged in target A. Drive approaching preliminary threshold in target B.]

Melissa's phone rang, breaking the moment. She fumbled for it, and tapped at it rapidly, evidently opening a text message. Her eyes went wide, and she stood up from the table, forgetting all about her drink.

"It's Pete!" she said, her eyes misting a little, "he wants to apologise! Oh God, I... I've got to go!" She tapped out a reply to Pete-the-arsehole, sniffing as she did so. "Sorry, sorry! See you both later! I'm coming, Pete..." And then she was on her way out.

Well, shit.

[Target B out of range. Abort.]

Marcus and Georgina looked at one another. "You didn't try to stop her," he said.

"Well, neither did you. Besides, it's her life."

"But that guy; he's been nothing but a gitt."

"You're telling me. But good luck persuading her of that right now. She runs out of here at that speed, nothing we say is going to make much difference. She'll have to discover it for herself."

"But that sucks."

"Not arguing with you there. Gah... I just hope she's all right. The sooner she realises what he's like the better."

They sat in silence for a while, both looking rather glum. Eventually, Georgina looked up, "hey, you want another drink? My turn."

"Sure, thanks." Why not? The evening was a bust anyway; he might at least try to enjoy the remainder of it as much as he could.

[Situational analysis: Host A isolated and compromised, host B fully active and functional, target B aborted, bonding pathways still active in target A, with residual arousal still enabled. Confirm target A remains priority. Scanning. Target C designated. Potential identified. Boosting relevant hormone levels in target C.]

"So, you've heard enough about me," said Georgina, returning to the table, "what about you? Astrophysicist; that's got to be pretty high-flying, right? Science isn't really my thing, so, I mean... what do you actually do?"

He launched into the spiel that he normally used when speaking to non-experts, avoiding keeping it to too technical, and emphasising the cooler elements, even where they had little to do with his actual studies and research. She seemed genuinely interested, and he found himself leaning in towards her across the table, the conversation becoming quite animated.

It turned out that she'd recently been studying some old science fiction films as part of her course, and that opened up the conversation in a whole new direction. Of course, the science in them wasn't particularly accurate, even for when they'd been made, and she was more interested in what they said about the political climate of the time. But he knew the films too, and he had to admit that her knowledge of them was more than superficial; she knew her stuff, and made some good points.

[Bonding has engaged preliminary mating drive in subjects A and C. Working to enhance. Emotional bleed through to other individuals in proximity of isolated host detected. Acceptable to achieve over-riding objective. ]

Georgina had a lovely laugh, and Marcus found himself entranced by the way her eyes sparkled as she did so. She was forward, quite vivacious, not one of the shier women that he normally found himself drawn towards with so little success. Her lips, he decided, were sensuous, so kissable...

Wow, where had all that come from? And why was he feeling so aroused by her presence? They'd only just met, and something really seemed to be clicking. Yeah, but that was probably all in his imagination; she was probably just an open and friendly person, not interested in him specifically. She didn't look like the type who dated science nerds.

Her leg brushed his under the table. He froze for a second, suddenly embarrassed, but she didn't pull it away. Instead, she slid it along the outer edge of his shin, her foot rubbing against him. She grinned as he lost the thread of what he'd been saying, and leaned in even closer.

[Mating drive successfully engaged in both targets. Emotional levels rising in non-target individuals. Cannot be controlled while focus on targets remains. Evasive action may be required.]

Her lips were inches from his, so pink, so tempting. They weren't speaking any more, just staring into each other's eyes. This was... this was actually going somewhere. They kissed.

From somewhere else in the room, there came a loud bang.

Oh, what the heck was it now? He looked around, to see the weird guy from earlier had knocked over a table. The bar staff were converging on him, noticing a man who clearly couldn't hold his drink. Elsewhere, it was clear that everyone else's conversations had also stopped, all eyes on the stranger.

At which point, all hell broke loose as the stranger threw a punch. There was shouting, and crashing, the sound of broken glass from somewhere. The crazy guy wasn't the only one fighting any more; had everyone suddenly gone crazy?

"Let's get out of here!" said Georgina, grabbing his hand.

Not even pausing to nod in agreement, he pulled her towards the door, and they both headed out. A few others followed them, some of them at quite a pace, but the sounds of mayhem still came from the bar behind them. Security would be here any minute, and Marcus didn't want to hang around for that. Instead, still holding Georgina's hand, he moved swiftly down the stairs and out onto the street.

"Wow, what the hell was all that about?" he said, once they'd reached a safe distance, "I've never seen things kick off so fast!"

"Yeah..." Georgina let out a deep breath, "glad we're out of that! No reason to ruin the evening, though. What say we go somewhere else?"

"I'm at the residence just around the corner," he blurted out, without really thinking.

"You're asking me round to your place?" asked his partner, eyes wide. She was still flushed from the sudden excitement, small breasts rising and falling beneath her top with her heavy breathing. And they were still holding hands.

"Uh, well, I..."

"Sounds like a good idea to me. Come on!"

"Look," he said, trying to regain control of his usual demeanour, "I don't want you to think that I'm suggesting anything, you know, inappropriate."

"Yeah? Well, Mr. Cute Astrophysicist, it's kind of late for me not to think that," she gave him another quick kiss on the lips, pressing in close enough against him that she had probably noticed the semi forming in his jeans. "And, just so you know, I'm in exactly the right mood for 'inappropriate'."

"Uh..."

"What are you waiting for?"

As they left, eyes on each other, neither of them noticed Emma Foster stepping out of the shadows, and following them towards the student flats, keeping her distance, but never allowing herself to get too far away.