"That is strange..." said Lykopis.

"What?" asked Adem.

"Drake told me Edmund would keep the two groups connected. So far, no contact." She reached out a hand. "Give me the cell phone. I will give Drake a call."

Lykopis began dialing while everyone else searched the room. "Hello, Drake? I see...you just got off the phone...well I was calling because...yes...yes...yes, we are showing signs of it too...I do not think I need to go into detail..." Here Lykopis brushed back her badger's streak. "Just rest assured all of us have undergone some unpleasent changes. Well call Montag back and have him speak to this...whatever his name is. Just do something about it." Her eyes lit up for a moment. "Although if he cannot find a way to fix Icarus, I will be alright with that...yes, I will keep in touch. Lykopis out."

"Well?"

"Drake has been on the phone with Grissom Montag." Montag seemed to have taken up the leadership role in the original Vanguard group, and he was friends with Drake. "Apparently, that 4th dimensional being that use to be on the team is back. One of his cosmic sneezes has resulted in our current...problem."

"So what's the solution?"

Lykopis shrugged. "Apparently, Grissom is having problems of his own. He will get back to us later." She put the phone away. "So for now, we will just have to learn to be content." Lykopis leaned over the baptismal font and looked at the streaks of white. "Is it wrong of me to be this...vain?"

"I think it's a little to late in the game to change a three-thousand year old habbit," said Adem.

"It is just that I have always enjoyed my young face. It makes people judge me wrong, you see? They always underestimate me. They see big brown eyes and full lips, with no signs of crow's feet or age spots. People always assume I am naive or stupid or weak."

"So you like people to underestimate you?"

Lykopis grinned. "I like the look on people's faces when they find out what I am really like."

Adem could understand this. Anyone who saw Lykopis on the street would just see the designer clothing and the model-like features and dismiss her as just another pretty face. Only at closer inspection of the face did Lykopis reveal her true nature. Her eyes had dimmed over the years to a grayer brown, and her lips were curled a bit, adding a sardonic look to her sculpted features. Adem, being an alien, was not fully aware of those aged eyes and cruel lip, but he was beginning to understand the psychology of the human face. "I think Tommy's found something."

Tommy -- in the form of Henry V -- had pulled something out of a small book out of the tabernacle near the alter. It was a large book, covered in red cloth with beads on it. Lykopis looked at the alter, where the church's Bible was laying. "So it is probably not a copy of the Testaments. That might be the records for baptisms. Hand it over."

Tommy passed the book to Lykopis. She sat on the steps of the alter and flipped through the pages. "Ah ha!"

"What is it?" asked Adem.

"Pass me the papers with the victims names!" Adem did so. Lykopis was grinning. Subconciously she brushed her hair back again, but her mind was racing as she flipped the pages and ran her fingers along the lists of names. "Adem, look at these names..."

"They names in this book are the same as those in the list of victims."

"Exactly! And look at this -- all these people were baptized in this church about a year ago."

It was Adem's turn to make a discovery. "Actually, the dates of the disappearences match up with the dates of the baptisms."

Lykopis grinned. "Yes, but what sort of baptism was it?"

Tommy spoke for himself and Icarus. "What do you mean?"

"Twelve Catholics and one 'The House of Smoke and Mirrors'? Something just does not seem right. How do we know these people are Catholic?"

"The reports say --" began Tommy.

"People lie, Tommy." She turned back to Adem. "There is a dozen senarios running through my head -- a secret cult, a massive kidnapping, group suicides -- we are on the right track, but we need to find out more."

"So what's the next --" began Adem, but then, something bad happened. The two massive doors of the church entrance swayed in the wind, until they swung back and shut themselves. Vanguard Europe was plunged into darkness as the only source of light was taken away from them.

Tommy let out a few curse words. He headed towards the door. "Take a step, Tommy," began Lykopis, "and I will kill you." She spoke slowly, as though annoyed and bitter at something.

"Why can't he move?" asked Adem.

"Because I just felt a snake crawling along my wrist, and I can feel the weight of more snakes at my feet." Indeed, everyone in the room noticed the faint sounds coming from the floor. The sounds of scales scraping against stone. "I think we are surrounded."