"What do you think?" Rowena asked, sprawled on the floor of the safe house. She was surrounded by stacks of papers and medical records. Across from her, ‘Tina looked up. Danny and Sidewinder busied themselves at the kitchen table, fixing sandwiches that seemed to be designed to introduce obscene amounts of cholesterol to their system in the most efficient manner possible.

"Kiddo, I don’t know what you are, but you are certainly not a Child of Eve." At Rowena’s puzzled look, ‘Tina added, "There’s a different…smell to Children of Eve. Trust me: I’d know if you were."

"So I’m not Eva’s child…" Rowena began.

"I didn’t say that. Don’t get me wrong: I’m not a genetics expert, but if I’m reading this report correctly, you are undeniably the progeny of one Eva Kraus and Brandon Logan."

Danny was the first to break the silence. "The Ice Queen and the Ice King had a love child?

You’re a love child, Rowena. That’s just too cool."

"I’m not so certain about that. Back during that business with Tenebrae and Hunter, Equinox had this assistant by the name of Clemency. Turns out, she was one of the lost Guardian children who’d been kidnapped and rapid-aged by the Shop’s techniques, which they later refined and used to produce their triplet clones."

"I heard about that," Danny said. "Isn’t that when you got the hammer?"

"It is," ‘Tina said, "That’s beside the point. If you jump back even farther, you’ll find that the Shop learned some of those techniques from the Hand of Glory. See, back when Equinox first met Trinity, he was on a Gemeinschaft/Company task force that was hunting for Glory assets in Europe, and they stumbled upon one of the Glory labs. Chaos ensues…"

"Naturally," Danny interjected through a mouthful of sandwich.

"…and in the aftermath they discover some rather extensive plans for cloning experiments. It’s the first time we really got a picture of the whole Children of Eve thing."

Rowena sighed. "How’s that relate to me and my brother?"

"I’m admittedly guessing now, but here’s what I think happened. When things went down, Equinox’s team was trapped in one of the genetics labs. Trapped and cornered, they didn’t have the firepower to destroy the samples and the Glory scientists had just started a new batch. So, he did the best thing he could think of – he contaminated their batch with his own genetic material, then he and his team made their escape."

Danny snickered. Sidewinder said, "I don’t get it."

"Eva was really pushing the Master Race agenda at the time. With his African parentage, it was the equivalent of spitting in her face."

Rowena’s face fell. "You mean all I am is a joke between two superspies?" She stood up and stormed out of the room.

Danny rose to follow her but ‘Tina waived him down. "Leave her be. She needs time to process this."

"If you say so…"

"I say so."

#

Hours later, ‘Tina appeared at Rowena’s doorway. The young enforcer was reassembling her Five-seveN in the dark. ‘Tina’s head cocked to the side in silent question. "Simmons’ version of Zen exercise. He said if you can put together a gun in the dark while you’re angry, you can do most anything."

"Simmons pretends to be a simpleton thug, but he’s much wiser than most give him credit."

"My dad always said that Simmons was the closest thing he ever had to a real friend. It’s the reason why I tracked him down when I struck out on my own."

"Sweetie, let me tell you something about your dad, and I mean this with all respect. Equinox is a scoundrel, a liar, and a compulsive manipulator. If he told you that, it was probably so you would try to track Simmons down."

"I know. My brother and I always said that he’s the kind of guy who can convince you to cut off your own arm with a rusty sawblade and make you think it was your idea to do it."

‘Tina entered the room and sat down on the bed, her tremendous bulk displacing much of the mattress and scattering a few dirty oilrags onto the floor. "Listen: I’ve been looking over the information you’ve got, and there are answers to your questions, but you’ve got only two places to look. The first is your father, and if you’ve gotten this far, I’m pretty sure you’ve tried that option and failed."

"Option two?"

"This gets tricky. Does the name Olivia Lobo sound familiar to you?"

"It does. Syndicate middle management. Grifter who made it big and now specializes in information. Sometime rival with the Enforcer arm of ***in’s Umbrella."

"Seems she made a move a while back and some of her boys pinched some stuff from the Umbrella. In the process, they stumbled upon an old Gemenschaft Shadownet node. I doubt they’ve cracked it, but given time they’ll find someone who will. If we can get that, it will have the answers you need."

"What’s the problem?"

"It’s being held by one of Fade’s lost boys who delved too deep into mysticism – an Intruder who later trained with the Shinobi. Quite frankly, he’s the type who would be better handled by the likes of Koschei, but you have me at the moment, so that’s that."

"Guess we have work to do, then."

Rowena stood, but ‘Tina caught her by the arm. "You’re more than a joke. Equinox wouldn’t have cared for you, made sure you had the best training, or even thought of you, if you were."

"I know. Thanks." ‘Tina stood, hugged Rowena, then left. Rowena sighed and murmured, "You and I are going to have a little chat after this is over, dad."