The author wishes to express thanks to anyone who may read his story and encourages them to leave reviews, comments or even flame it hard. As with any who try their hand at publicly expressing an idea or story concept, all feedback is important and welcome.

Disclaimer: I do not own SeaQuest, Star Wars, nor any other sci-fi or fantasy series, movies, comics, cartoons or news items used in this fiction as they belong to the creators or broadcasters or publishers who put them out for consumption by the public.

SeaQuest

Abstract

Lucas knew full well that being sent out of the country on a military boat would only end up with him injured or dead, no matter what lies Lawrence spread around. So Lucas did the logical thing: he packed up and left in the dead of night, leaving behind in public forums incriminating evidence against his bastard father to keep him too busy to hunt him down.

This story takes place before season 1, in the months before the SeaQuest is commissioned out to sea in the period when Lucas was ordered by his father to join the ship without any care for his opinion or general welfare.

This story is Alternate Universe, most characters are OOC and there are several mini-crossovers in the form of cameos and snapshots with the maritime-inspired series NCIS and JAG who are the most relevant to the situations facing Lucas and the casts of MacGyver (2016), NCIS and Bones will make large appearances. There is a lot of CIA, NSA, Homeland Security, Canadian Mounties and Coast Guard and other multi-varied organizations mentioned along the way. As such, given so many crossovers of equal proportions, I am again placing this in the general SeaQuest section of the fandom since it would not fit in a single sub-genre. My thanks for your tolerance of the situation.

Unlike my other story, "Justice for Lucas", this has absolutely no psionics, magicks or time engines involved even if such things were part & parcel of the SeaQuest canon in all three seasons.

PS; I like flames, they're fun to read so don't hesitate to write them.

WARNING; the language level of this one will be almost mild instead of the usual street-trashy when we consider a story based on boats and sailors. However, as I always warn people who read my work: this language was pretty much normal in the school yard 30 years ago when I was a teenager. So, how can you have such a thin skin and be part of the same culture on the same continent if this is really that offensive to you? Where did you spend the last few decades, if you can't take a few hard words from the mouths of kids when these words have been around since before World War I?

WARNING; the travels described in the fic are not necessarily matched to the buildings or services offered by the companies and localities in reality. This is a FF story, hence I write in such way as to make it coherent and believable. Which means that sometimes I will place trains or buses in localities the real companies don't operate. Contact Amtrak, Greyhound or Via Rail to get the real information.

WHAT IF LUCAS SAID 'NO'?

FIRST CHAPTER; OH HELL NO, I AIN'T GONNA GO!

Paternal enmity Aeternam

(SeaQuest – season 1 – opening theme)

Monday 14th of December, 2020; 13:00pm

Wolenbahn Inc, office of Lucas Wolenczak, president

San-Francisco, California, USA

The video screen was blank. It had been that way for almost a half hour now, closed off and cool, like the forgotten plate of call-in lunch and the mug full of old coffee. The blinds had been closed on the large glass walls that showed either the inside of the office building or the balcony outside, overlooking the four storeys down to the private inner courtyard of the office complex. All calls and emails had been configured to re-route to message boxes with the flick of a single little button on the touchscreen controller inset in the surface of the large, deep solid wood desk that dominated the room.

Huddled in the depths of his massive, cushy executive chair, Lucas heaved and spasmed silently, trying desperately to stanch the flow of tears rolling down his congested face. The silent chocking sobs were so harsh they hurt his chest each time he coughed out and during one fit of anguish he actually bent over so suddenly his forehead banged on the desk's edge hard enough to rattle the picture frames and tableware.

Now disoriented and hurt about the head, with a small rivulet of blood sluicing down between his eyes and along his nose to mix with the salty tears of desolation, the poor 16 year old kid didn't know what to do anymore. Standing unsteadily, he leaned on the furniture around the large room so he could walk from the chair to the private en-suite bathroom for a first aid kit and a warm shower to wash away the pain and sorrow he was drowning in. Once inside, he locked the three mechanical locks and punched in a secret access code into the control panel besides the vanity mirror to lock down his entire office in secure mode for the day. Not even the cops or firefighters could come in unless they tore down the walls when that set of protections was engaged.

Sitting down on the swiveling stool covered in water & tear proof material specifically for such situations, he pulled open the vanity's many drawers to expose the kit assembled inside. It was a testament to how lonely and harsh his young life was that he needed to keep the equivalent of a St-John's Ambulance first responder's kit in his office bathroom. He had learned at a young age what happens when a kid from a rich, important family like his goes to the police or hospital for help even if it is life-threatening. The return home normally became a bigger threat against his welfare and often enough, his autonomy as well, no matter he was innocent and hadn't started anything. His father didn't see it that way and since he had a bigger checkbook and more contacts than Lucas did, then his voice, and his lies, were the ones that ruled the responses of adults around the situation. Not to mention that Lawrence and Cynthia were the ones responsible for most of the abuse he suffered to date, so no help ever came from them, quite the contrary.

The private seven-piece bathroom (sink, vanity, toilet, soaker tub, shower stall, washer & dryer) was both an immense luxury in any office but also a fundamental necessity in his life. Lucas had been officially housed in an old brownstone building owned by Stanford University's real estate division. It was composed of three habitable levels plus the basement for the garages and utilities. The antiquated 5½ room apartments had been refurbished into dormitories with two persons in each of the three bedrooms. The five boys he shared the second storey apartment with were almost the same age as him when he arrived, but not at all the same attitude. The Stanford University's 'Young Prodigies' program had severe deficiencies when it came to placing and monitoring the children in its care. The other boys were passive-aggressive, bullish and more interested in the discoveries of cheap drugs and cheaper sex than studying or starting up a business like Lucas had done with his gaseous display consoles amongst many electronic products he offered.

Not only did the little bastards think it was okay to snoop around his personal things, they tried to steal his money, bank cards, company papers to sell on the black market, anything small and easy to turn over for a bottle of booze or a quick fix in the public toilets on campus. Then two years ago, when he just turned fourteen at the end of 27th December 2018, a thug tried to rape him in his own bed at the dormitory during the New Year House Party.

He had permanently moved into brand new office spaces in a new office complex after that event.

The other teens in the apartment had collaborated with the attacker because they thought Lucas was acting too high and mighty with his little company. Back then, his only publicly known company, Wolenbahn Electronics Inc in Buffalo, already had twenty employees and established orders for about five million dollars worth of consoles and other cybernetics. Nobody except a handful of lawyers and secretive employees knew about his many houses, businesses and warehouses around North America, all courtesy of his ancestors, especially his great-grand father, despite that he had been a cold despicable bastard too. Lucas never gave money or loaned out to the boys as he knew them to be slovenly and lazy, without any revenue other than allowances from their families. Anything he loaned out would be gone and never come back; he had by others who had lived in the building before. None of the other young boys were trustworthy and not a single one would hesitate to steal, defraud or extort from him if they could.

Well, because he didn't accept to be their victim and cash cow over the years, they finally decided that when an older guy in his early twenties showed a depraved interest in him, they would help him to come in and lock them in the room from the outside until the deed was done. Then they would negotiate with Lucas to get 'protection' money by threatening to make it happen until they got paid to keep the building's doors locked. Then, they would force him to do their homework and term projects for them so they would all have better grades while doing jack-shit nothing to earn it all.

The result stunned the kids, their parents and the Stanford administrators all together. Lucas had detected the date-rape drug in his food early in the evening and gone to his room to inject himself with an antidote he kept there, in his office and on his person at all times. What people aren't aware of is that Stanford is an incredible university with top notch science, medicine and law faculties. Unfortunately, it also has a pervasive disease that affects the entire campus; it is one of the worst places in terms of what is called 'rape culture' by the media. The college boys, especially those in the sports programs, just call it 'easy fun for the night'. Spiked drinks, tainted food, handshakes with a contact poison on a small strip of clear cellophane, there are hundreds of ways to catch prey unawares and then bring them to an out-of-the-way place to do your business in peace.

Lucas knew about this as he had heard rumors since his research about the campus services and student life during his 9th year, just before he came to attend. He had then been the victim of that type of attack when two of the dorm-mates had spiked his Pepsi so they could toss his room and steal from him. They had attacked his sleeping defenseless body in anger, thus waking him, when they found everything locked in heavy armored trunks and steel furniture he had moved in with, just in case something of the sort occurred. After that event, he had talked with many other young prodigies, mostly from other buildings and different classes than his own to avoid the angry delinquents and their friends. He especially asked the 'prodigy program' girls and young women at large about the rumors and then asked a few who were pharmacology majors if there were any protections available. There was, but at a steep cost most couldn't afford, at least not all year long, every year.

Lucas could afford it easily. He had two separate trust funds from his grand-parents on both sides of the family, he had already started his small company in Buffalo at age 9 before moving to San-Francisco where he simply opened a small dedicated office with a separate supplemental production facility, both near Stanford campus. He delegated the assembly of the finished products to employees while doing most of the high-price programming contracts by himself under a different hacker's handle: Frankenstein 'The man made of many broken parts' which was a cruelly fitting reality for him. Plus, he had acquired at age 9 the many vast plots of land, houses and companies that came with the Wise Manor Heritage & Trust left behind by his ancestor that was raking in a lot of money. Lucas was far richer than anybody knew but he never bragged or showed off, keeping to modest habits and good quality clothes but in usual cuts and styles that didn't show their worth. He expended a lot on his medical care, surgeries and therapies to heal from the violence of his parents but that was inside his body, or at least under the clothing, and therefore not visible either. Using this phantom wealth for his extended protection and that of a few friends was cheaply paid for the peace of mind he obtained.

Since the teenager had been warned years ago and maintained regular chats with his friends in the pharmacological industry even after their graduations, Lucas was not caught by surprise by the 2018 attempt at drugging him. So, the boy decided to ambush his would-be robbers by taking the antidote and then going to bed to fake being unconscious to catch them in the act. He checked the security cameras he had secretly installed the January before to record pad his reports of theft and vandalism for the campus police or the actual Silicon Valley PD if it came to that again. He set up the cameras to send their recordings to an out-of-country server in the Caiman Islands at his lawyer's second office, just in case the University or the kids' families tried to pressure him into silence again, like the four last times.

(The Rolling Stones – Paint It Black)

No more mister nice Lucas.

Boy was he surprised when the door opened and instead of teenaged thieves it was a twink rapist trying to jump on him in bed to rip off his clothes and molest him. The guy was sure surprised too when his victim wasn't asleep, was in fact fully coherent and aware to identify him, and had the biggest blasted box-cutters he'd ever seen! Lucas had taken the precaution of going to bed with industrial sized box-cutters in both hands and a few more 'defensive' tools secured about his person just in case. He had a bad feeling and the rape statistics for juvenile boys on campus were not in his favor. Large annual parties where there was plenty of booze, pot and young couples going away to dark nooks were a favorite time of predators and Lucas had the bad feeling the stats were catching up to him.

The stats caught up to him indeed; the rapist was even less lucky to get out alive.

The guy's face, hands and chest had been so badly cut he was considered disfigured for life unless he put out over three million dollars worth of plastic and reconstructive surgeries. Just re-attaching his fully severed nose would be about 15 hours of work if it were to happen. Repairing the left eyeball was impossible; he was now blind for life on that side. Both ears were mangled messes that had missing pieces. His throat and vocal chords were badly maimed and would never recover above 40% capacity. One hand was unresponsive for ever and the other was missing the thumb. Then what happened below his beltline, and what he now missed, would haunt him for the rest of his pain-filled life.

The bloodshed had been so bad and noisy that the partiers had to call the police, the ambulances for several cases of shock and two SVPD wagons to haul away the perpetrators and their supporters. It happens the security cameras in the staircase going up to the apartment had captured the scene of the three juvenile thugs getting paid for drugging Lucas and setting him apart so the man could go in to commit the rape undisturbed. The three thugs had essentially pimped out their dorm-mate without telling him and added insult to the injuries by setting it up like Lucas was a drugged-out floozy who got into trouble by his own careless idiocy.

The fallout was too much for Stanford to hide, especially with the SVPD and paramedics involved, on top of the reporters and a horde of kids with camera-enabled smartphones. The families of the thugs being rich and having some influence, they managed to pull their kids out of the school before they were officially expelled and two were shipped out of the USA right away to avoid prosecution. That left Lucas to deal with the legal procedural fallout by himself at the end of the week. And then his father Lawrence had arrived secretly, after receiving an angry call from the parent of the third thug because he was in police cells being interrogated. The moron had been caught at the US / Mexico border crossing, in a stupid Uber car driven by a drunken kid from the same party, of all things, trying to leave the jurisdiction. Apparently that was a big No-No when you are arraigned for 'conspiracy & accessory to rape' amongst others and his parents were even more pissed because now the DA would never accept a deal to let their only child get off easy as he was a proven flight risk.

Lucas' father Lawrence didn't care what the story was because he never did and always looked for the most inane reasons to hurt and beat his son until he was badly injured. And it now had been four long years since the last time he had put his own hands on the boys' filthy pasty skin. He listened to the complete case that was showed extensively to him by the county prosecutor, backed by the videos, vial of drug powder and wads of cash in the three boys' possession at the time. Then the depraved father made false smiles, spoke platitudes to the officials and made it look all right in the best of all worlds. He promptly took Lucas out of the station and to his suite, a 5-star penthouse in the top of the local Hilton Hotel, and immediately beat the life out of the weak, injured, already traumatized 14 year old, victimizing him anew despite the risks Lawrence knew this to involve, as the last time had shown.

The point was simple: the event made Lawrence Wolenczak look bad. It didn't matter that Lucas was innocent or a victim or had been in danger for his life as the rapist could have killed him when he was done with him.

Child + call / visit of cops = bad image for parents, always.

Therefore, call / visit of cops = beating for child, always. Period.

Lawrence had always hated his son without restraint but had also begun to fear him because he had started to fight back against the abuse, going so far as to kill some of the minions Cynthia and himself had hired to help 'docilify' the boy. That's why Lawrence drugged his son surreptitiously in the police station to make him amenable and pliable. With the boy drugged out of his mind, he brought him to the hotel and beat him to the point of bleeding injuries, scarring lesions from whipping him and multiple broken bones in his legs. Except at the end, the teenager had managed to rally himself and use a pressurized capsule of acid to injure Lawrence and make him back off. The teenager then crawled around the hotel's corridor, trying desperately to find help, while Lawrence ran off to find his own medical help as well as dodge the cops.

Later on, when the police were investigating, they took body surface photos, affidavits and initiated an investigation of the police station itself to see where and how the kid had been drugged. The injuries inflicted by Lawrence were so grave that Lucas had to be hospitalized at the Stanford Campus Clinic for almost four months before being let out on 'light duties' with severe restrictions to his walking abilities for another whole year after that. Lucas had needed to move around in a motorized wheelchair for almost ten months and do two months of physiotherapy to relearn to walk after the violent altercation with his father. The only silver lining in the dreary cloud was that daddy dearest had not escaped unscathed from the fight.

On top of that, to the vile, criminally defunct bastard's surprise, Stanford University didn't want to even try to silence the situation, not after the mess with the Brock Turner case of 2016 still quite fresh in the collective memory. The families of the delinquents involved were 'cooing' and 'haaawing' at the name and presence of the great and mighty Lawrence Alexander Wolenczak while sneering in contempt at his back. Even the parents of the kids who doped Lucas and set him up to be raped thought Lawrence was a dip-shit father and his son deserved much better.

And, coming full circle back to the subject, THAT was why Lucas had such a large executive office space with such an extravagant private bathroom reserved just for himself attached to it. He needed it to keep himself alive by having fresh medical supplies available and having enough storage for extra clothing to change out of his damaged or bloodied threads when a patch-up was needed. The shower & steam therapy stall was a necessity to deal with the cramps and bruising in his thorax, just like the tub with its Jacuzzi water jets and automated massage rollers were better for the legs and back. Bolted solidly to the wall above the side-by-side washer & dryer was a pull down single bed so he could sleep off the injuries and self-medication. It was designed for all the comfort he could get to fit into the tight, secure space of the bathroom. It had also become his permanent sleeping arrangement ever since it had been built, right then after the violent altercations with the kids and Lawrence.

NOBODY but him ever took care of him, so he bought and kept what he needed to do it right. He had the money, a massive steady yearly income on top of the two trust funds, and he had done several very lucrative contracts for the World Bank's cyber-security department that he had been paid for in Euros and coins across several accounts with different pseudonyms. Lucas had spent the last four years creating, back-stopping and armor-plating seven different alternate identities in case he needed to run away from his father and his many military contacts. Until then, that money was used to splurge on a few select items like his company's office space in a fully secured complex that not even Lawrence could breach.

His landlord was the World Bank and they liked him better than his dad.

Take that, dad! For once, cronyism, gerrymandering, back-room deals and occult alliances had saved his life and health! The office was the only place in his life Lucas felt safe and physically secure. By March 2019 he had moved out of the Brownstone completely, re-routing all physical mail and parcels to his office. Stanford could do nothing about it anymore, not after Lucas had decided to bypass his father and use his own company's lawyers to strong-arm the situation to his liking. Lawrence had been completely flabbergasted that Lucas had actually filmed the beating his parent gave him. The soundtrack of Lawrence berating Lucas that "He should have let himself be raped in silence rather than make a public mess that embarrassed his father in public" clinched it that the kid would no longer be a victim anymore.

Then Lucas pulled out three dozen recordings of similar events since he was five years old.

Strangely enough, Lawrence signed off on Lucas not needing to live in a Stanford appointed building anymore. He also stayed away from his son for almost two whole years. Until now.

Time had made Lawrence harsher, meaner and also bolder in how he showed his contempt towards his only child. He never sent anymore the mandatory "You did well" greeting email when the school report card came in. He stopped sending the small (10$, what a cheapskate!) monetary reward for doing well in his studies on account that he had his own company and no longer needed such a childish display to know he did well.

The threats of beatings if he did badly or misbehaved had been suddenly removed from the conversation and relationship because Lucas always told Lawrence the comms were recorded and sent to a secure server out-of-country each time they spoke. Thus, his father had become more civil, in a cold detached way, and called far less as well.

Until this noon. What a way to ruin an entire life!

Lawrence had decided to pull a play from the book of the three juvenile thugs that attacked Lucas by pimping him off to some friends. Except instead of cheap sex from a drugged kid, they wanted cheap cyber support that they would be paying Lawrence for, not Lucas himself.

That's right: Lawrence was using the old 'parental authority' card to oblige Lucas to go to some dumb-ass military boat in the ocean depths to serve as their resident 'geek squad' of one. He would be the only teenager aboard and the only person under 21 years of age as that ship had several requirements, like a lot of diplomatic contacts, which needed older, more mature mindsets from the crew and passengers.

SO, Lawrence had decided to illegally write up Lucas as a subordinate inside the World Power Project hierarchy - as a bleepin' Department Director no less! – in order to be the one that bills the UEO Navy and gets the money, not Lucas himself. Also, by using that same law, his dad was absconding his – supposed – salary, bonuses and benefits because Lucas was "Too young to handle them responsibly by himself" or so the blasted crud said to the IRS (USA's Internal Revenue Service; the tax collectors)!

SO now Lucas was supposed to just shut the fuck up and get ready to deploy from the drydock at New Cape Quest in south Florida on the 10th of January 2021. OR ELSE daddy would have to come over and show his little kiddie who it was that had the PATERNAL AUTHORITY in the household.

Lucas had two more years at Stanford planned out.

Lucas had business contracts in progress to fulfill.

Lucas wanted to stay a civilian, not become a slave and certainly not a child-soldier.

Lucas most specifically didn't want to be put under the legal guardianship of some white christian bastard to whom Lawrence would give "The full fatherly rights of corporeal dis'k'iplinings and corrections as needed to make him workable and agreeable to the eyes of the american christian community".(southern USA accent and contemptuous sarcasm very much expressed)

In other words, Lawrence had found a way, a loophole, in the child protection laws to get back at his son's attempt to escape from the violence in his life. He wanted to use the organized religious bastards that poison American society to do the beatings for him and defend him on top of things. They had BILLIONS of dollars and MILLIONS of worshipers that vote to influence politicians and law-enforcement officers all day long. They had even managed to enshrine in the laws the right to beat and harm children as being 'good christian moral upbringing'. All Lawrence had to do was sign over his parental authority to a church, parochial school or some cockamamie private pastoral tutor and Voila! One teenaged boy back in slavery again!

(Two Steps From Hell – Fearless)

Well no! But oh fucking Hell, no! Not in this life or the next!

It was a well played gambit on his father's part, Lucas had to admit. The man was rabidly atheistic and of jewish ancestry, like Cynthia Holtzenstein, his ex-wife and mother of Lucas, had been. Nobody who knew the man would have ever thought he would go down that avenue. Getting in bed with the WASP (white anglo-saxon protestant) movance in order to cozy up to a church group enough to trust them with his secrets and then make a sweet deal in a backroom like that…

Yeah, his dad wanted to hurt him plenty now. That much was obvious.

Well, Lucas was not the defenseless little tool-in-the-shed that Lawrence thought. The teenager had seen the writing on the wall all those years ago and then again with the rape case. He had nothing but pain and misery coming from his father, and had to be ready to cut all bridges as soon as the threat was enacted. Since he lived, studied and worked full-time in the office, things actually got easy from now on to the end. He would need to send out wire-transfers to deposit cash in some Western Union branches to wait for pick-up and then reserve a nice sleeper cabin on an Amtrak train up North to the USA's eternal cousin: Canada. Once across the border, he would make a prolonged stop to treat his legs again, then head for the center of the country's landmass where he would find a nice little out-of-the-way village with few permanent residents and fewer tourists. He would settle there on a farmstead until he turned 21 years old or older, then he would use his well earned funds to travel abroad and see the world in person instead of vicariously through a computer screen.

It was a very basic plan, barely the bones and nerves of one, but he had the time and money to do it as well as almost four solid years of preparatory work already done and rearing to go.

If his father and associated minions thought they could enslave him in an army boat of any sorts and take him out to international waters to beat on him and then say "it's international waters, US laws and children's rights don't apply here', then the collective of bastards was in for a rude awakening.

Lucas would use every contact, cybernetic and human, that he could lay hands on and then go hunting for the personal juicy details of each life. Politicians and soldiers all get promotions and higher, more exalted positions in their organizations by many, many means, not a few of which are underhanded and down right criminal. Not a single religious zealot ever got promoted without destroying his rivals and having several depravities of his own in the closet. Lucas planned on finding all of this, agglomerating everything with his father's own crimes and secret deals then publish everything on several servers, especially in countries the USA and UEO can't intimidate.

Can you say "WikiLeaks"?

Russia is such a nice place in summer; China too, come to think of it. It was just Lawrence's bad luck that he forgot how many tongues his son spoke fluently, and what doors can be opened when you show respect for an official and his cultural traditions by speaking his native tongue instead of shoving english down his throat in his own office, in his own government building.

Lucas finished wiping the blood from his face and sprayed some Bactine mist on the small abrasion to seal it cleanly. He undressed out of his clean but modest jeans, t-shirt and flannel shirt ensemble that he chose specifically to hide how much money he had to his own name and started up the shower. He would cleanse himself in the shower with a good scrub and then steep himself like a teabag in the soaker tub with the Jacuzzi set on its softest, most meditative setting, with some therapeutic bath salts made by his own medication company: Wise Apothecary & Chemists Ltd, est. 1808.

After taking care of his spastic, cramped body and aching head, he would order in a new, better, hot meal and get on the Internex to start playing his pieces on the newly established gameboard.

Check, Lawrence; your move.

Filial enmity resurgent

(Two Steps From Hell – Never Back Down)

Tuesday 15th of December, 2020; 09:30am

Wolenbahn Inc, office of Lucas Wolenczak, president

San-Francisco, California, USA

Lucas sat at his desk, humming along the excellent epic melody of Two Steps From Hell as it played in the background. The theme was quite 'À propos', too. He had spent the evening going through his MP3 music collection to compile everything in proper order, again, and load it into the large, and heavily modified, LG Stylo V smartphone ('Tech Support' edition) that was his Go To device for most of his personal activities online and storing securely a few knickknacks he didn't want on a company machine. His custom-built laptop workstation, a ten pounds, 21 inches wide monster in charcoal gray casing made to look older and more worn out than it actually was, sat in his armored titanium briefcase along with his bank cards, cash in US dollars, Canadian dollars, Euros and physical bronze-colored coins. All the cash was in certified US Postal / Canada Post envelopes with paperwork certifying he needed it to spend on his business trip to set up a new office and production workshop in Vancouver. Since he actually had six consoles and varied cyber equipments sold and working in the area, the story was credible. He might even do it for real as the potential for profit was real too.

A small flat felt pouch would stay in its hiding space in the waistline of his clean-cut dark brown khaki trousers. The pouch was a personal joke and throwback to his family's jewish ancestry back in the old european countries before the 1800's when his forebears had the vision to emigrate to the USA while the European monarchs' incessant wars were on hold for a while. This pouch contained individual, natural raw unmarked gemstones, just like his far away ancestors used to cut and polish in the jewelry stores of Prague. These were universal currency in every culture on Earth and completely untraceable. It would demand a lot of haggling and bartering to use them but the diminutive packet contained twenty assorted gems of 2 full carats each just in case he needed to go off-the-grids in a bad way.

Better to have and not use than to desperately need and not have available. Especially on the run.

(Two Steps From Hell – Victory)

A bleep from his console told him his lawyer had received the messages from last night and was processing them. It could take a few hours but it would get done. Then the fun would begin. Lawrence wasn't the only one who could find large well funded groups to influence lawmakers and police officers across the planet. Children's rights and child protection had two very big allies in the USA and Lucas would use them both to good effect.

Enter the game, the new pieces: The California DCFS and the ACLU.

Each state and the federal government of America had their section of the 'Department of Children and Family Services' whose jobs were about as self-evident as the name of the organization.

The other one, that was a real wild card of its own. The 'American Civil Liberties Union' had long been a thorn in the side of crooked politicians, tyrannical police officers and cult gurus all over the USA. There was nobody that was exempt from their acerbic skeptical perusal or the vitriolic lambasting that would follow if they were indeed trying to abuse trust, hurt people or exploit the poor and defenseless.

Lucas may not be poor and completely defenseless, but he was 1) a child, and 2) a child victimized repeatedly by his mother, father and their assorted cronies. He had the emails, films and telephone conversations recorded accumulated over 13 years to prove it all.

Three guesses which way those organizations would lean, and the first two don't count. Eh, eh, eh!

(Europe – The Final Countdown)

Lucas leaned backwards into the sinfully padded backrest of his chair and contemplated the reply he had just received from Amtrak about his reservation. His booking a 1st class sleeper cabin on a train meant he got a quick response. Having used an international 'Visa Black - Executive VIP' credit card emitted by a Swiss bank in Geneva had opened doors that the average little 15 year old could only dream about but never reach. Lucas wasn't average and his own steady cash flow meant he could indeed reach his goals and his dreams too, if he made an effort.

The train company was 'happy' to receive him and fully aware he was a minor traveling solo abroad for his business needs. The packet of information he had sent Amtrak last evening had been vetted and his identity, the real one at this point of the plan, was accepted without any hiccups. He would have a nice enclosed cabin with en-suite bathroom. According to the reply, he would have a wide double bed, small desk and small table with two chairs for private two-person dining in peace and comfort. The room had its own mini fridge, coffee maker, micro-wave oven and, incredible luxury, a small wood burning stove that lit and heated the room but also had a flat top to heat food for a more romantic experience for those who took their train-borne vacations seriously.

Lucas really wanted to travel more after reading that! It certainly wasn't this morning's cheap frozen flatbread, egg, sausage and cheese sandwich that he heated in the micro-wave and took all of five bites to gobble up that counted as either refined or romantic experience. Humph! He needed to take more care of his body and his mind if he wanted to avoid becoming depressive and self-destructive like Lawrence kept trying to make happen.

The young man stood up and walked over to the tall coat rack next to the bathroom door. He had dressed in matched all-black underwear, and would compliment the brown khakis he wore with a solid brown flannel shirt that matched as well. A pair of brown & beige mid-calf high hiking boots, brown leather belt and a pair of decorative brown leather bracers would accessorize the lot. He would look like a young, cool, well dressed teenage entrepreneur who came to Vancouver both for the business opportunities and the end-of-year celebrations. The good part of using his real identity to cross the border meant he could explain his high-priced train ride and a good hotel as being his 'sweet sixteen' presents to himself before getting serious about searching out office space and setting his company firmly in place.

Lucas smiled a nasty little smirk as he took out his flat wallet that contained his cards and identity papers. Opening it, he read anew the formal licenses and permits he had accumulated over the years, most of which his father had no idea. He had licenses for driving a moped (California, age 14), a car or pickup (New Mexico, age 15), a snowmobile (California, age 14), a 4-wheeler (New Mexico, age 14) and several licenses for small propeller plane (California, age 12) and motorboat (California, age 12).

(Two Steps From Hell – Never Back Down)

The one that would give Lawrence nightmares was the nifty little gun license. He obtained it at the age of 14, right after the attempted rape. It was then that Lucas started reacting seriously to the threats posed by his dorm-mates, even those that just stayed silent and apathetic, and his father. So, he found a family-friendly gun club and asked one of the Silicon Valley PD agents assigned to his rape case to sign him a reference letter to show the club admins' that he had a valid reason to want to use guns for self-defense. He therefore learned to shoot a variety of revolvers, pistols and long rifles. He even got to shoot off a few models of crossbows during an exhibition of novelties by the club's shop. Thanks to the last two years and occasional trips to the shooting range despite all the mobility troubles the wheelchair caused, Lucas could say that he was comfortable with and favored the bolt action rifles and the small but practical Derringer-type pistols like those of North American Arms, American Derringer Company or Cobra Arms. He felt the most comfortable with a small cal.22 holding 4 to 8 shots, be it revolver or semi-auto. His needs were for self-defense, not large game hunting or proving the size of his manhood, unlike other teenaged boys with gun licenses.

Despite the permit, he couldn't legally own a gun unless it was bought for him and given to him by an adult in his direct family. He had asked his lawyer if the man could purchase the weapon then sell it to Lucas but no; that was a big risk in his circumstance. With his companies, 2 trust funds and several million dollars worth of contracts, even the least little bit of an impropriety could tempt somebody at the California District Attorney's office to lay charges, if only to strong-arm Lucas into offering up some cash for his electoral campaign to buy peace with the bastard.

Besides, any weapon bought in the USA would have to go through the Canadian customs and would probably be seized. Better to find a way to buy the needed gear across the line when he got there then getting bounced back at the crossing post. Plus, at this point, there was little proof that Lawrence could bypass the layers of defenses that his son was setting up in such a way as to force the young man to go off-grid and hide in the deep dark segments of society. Not yet, anyways. Although, if pressed, the boy was easily able do so and would not look back when he did.

It all depended on just how pissed off Lawrence would be, and how much money and contacts he would be forced to burn to stay out of jail or even just keep his place as the Chairman and Lead Scientist of WPP. Hopefully, he'd burn through a lot and have nothing left to spend on getting back at Lucas before the kid turned 21 years old in peace. If not, then Lucas would do like the SeaQuest where his dad wanted to send him off to: go dark, deep and silent, and then shove a 10 megaton warhead up his backside from out of nowhere. The boy might be a hard-core civilian and pretty much a pacifist when left unharmed, but he could run a stealth attack on the enemy just as well as anybody whose life, freedom and dignity were threatened by armed criminal forces.

(Two Steps From Hell – Wolf King)

The young man took another look at his clothes, waiting for him on the coat rack, and sat back at his desk. He had a long day ahead of him and many things to clear up before his train left at 22:00pm this evening. Yes, he had opted for the soonest, quickest departure allowed by his choice of cabin and luxury. If they had told him next week, he would have accepted it, but they had the choice as there were three trains every week that left for the Canadian Rockies equipped for luxury vacationers. Why set it back to later when his entire personal life could fit in one large wheeled trunk, a carry-on bag and an aluminum briefcase?

Now, all he had to do was to upload some files and incriminating videos to an out-of-country server and set a timer to download them to the appropriate persons on Monday morning of next week when he would be across the border and out of jurisdiction. Then a series of pre-written letters and forms going to some fourteen agencies and organizations about why he felt it necessary to turn his back on his birth country and seek refuge up north.

After the legal maneuvers were on their merry way, he looked over the itineraries for the many long-haul 18-wheel trucks that left from the Wolenbahn Stanford Manufacturing Plant, the Wolenbahn Buffalo production lines and the Wolenbahn Ramshackle House workshop in New York city. The private train convoy from the Bramble Manor facilities in Cambridge, Massachusetts, near the Mount Auburn Hospital complex right on the side of the Charles River, would take time to be loaded and then reach its destination, even by using older, less traveled railways in the more rural areas of America. The vintage executive floatplane had been ordered from the San Francisco harbor back to the Wise Manor in Buffalo and would stay there until it was called to serve, which could take many months as he didn't want to risk that particular asset during a possible firefight.

The next hour was passed reading and signing off on the remaining reports and orders for the other medication production or shipment facilities owned and operated by Wise Apothecary & Chemists Ltd in Detroit (Michigan), Sarnia (Ontario), Sault Sainte-Marie (Michigan & Ontario), Copper Harbor (Michigan), Clough Island near Duluth (Wisconsin) and Mission Island in Thunder Bay (Ontario). Everything was centered around the Three Great Lakes in the middle of the continent as the company had been built in the early 1800's when only horse carriages and sail boats had been available to move goods and people around. And for large freight, river boats and canal barges were the only logical solution until the advent of steam engines to power larger boats and then trains but the railways took many decades to establish. Far longer than the owners of the company had been willing to wait at the time.

Finally, with all the movements of vehicles and cargo arranged and confirmed, he printed out his last bureaucratic preparations of this morning before he got on the vid-phone with his lawyer: the forms to ask the Canadian government asylum and official refugee status pending the review of his formal emergency immigration request. Just in case it was needed…

Placing pieces on the gameboard

(Frederich Chopin – Funeral March)

Tuesday 15th of December, 2020; 11:22am

Wolenbahn Inc, office of Lucas Wolenczak, president

San-Francisco, California, USA

Well, that was that, done and dealt with.

The lawyer confirmed for him that Lawrence had indeed registered him as an employee of WPP as a full-fledged service director in the IT department and the fool even had the gumption to backdate it to two years ago. His dad was so stupid that he had processed all the back-pay and benefits as well but had made two critical mistakes in his attempt at deception which showed he wasn't receiving any outside help from criminal pros at this point.

ONE; he didn't process all the IRS paperwork and back-taxes for the salary and performance bonuses that he claimed his son had earned in those two years. Now what would that count as? Oh, yes… Tax fraud, logging false contracts with the UEO Government and identity theft just for starters…

TWO; he took the cash into his own personal bank account, not an escrow account or the two trust funds established by the grand-parents or even a new trust fund as would be the normal procedure in such cases. His attorney told him that the laws of several countries, led by the USA actually, had been modified to prevent under-aged professionals from being defrauded or stolen from by the adults in charge of their job performances. The movement had been led by the music and performing arts industry as that was the biggest population of juveniles that earned the most hard money and where the worst parental and agency frauds happened. Then it was the sports leagues that went after the parent-coaches who controlled and defrauded the salaries and pensions of the young athletes in the college leagues and National leagues. There too, a lot of hard cash went around and a lot of adults thought it was theirs to use, not the kids, despite it being the young people who were on the field playing the games or doing the pretty-pony routine in the boardrooms of international companies to earn big-money sponsorship contracts.

According to his lawyer, Lucas had a very good chance at suing Lawrence for identity fraud and attempting to include his son in his conspiracy to defraud the IRS and WPP. If, by some miracle of Darkness, Lawrence managed to find a judge corrupt enough to dismiss those charges, then he was setting himself up instead for a suit for stealing the wages and benefits from his son. On top of which, the lawyer would help Lucas properly register with the tradesmen unions that controlled the workforce on-site at WPP. They would make a deal with the white-collar syndicates and blue-collar labor unions to back them up in their suit against Lawrence on grounds of having broken labor conventions by having tried to hire outside the pool of unionized members as he was bound by law, having attempted to steal the union dues instead of paying them out when he took control of Lucas' financials, etc…

The idiot parent had hung himself from the left, right and center all in one go.

Lucas almost felt sorry for the incompetent adult but, after what he had suffered from him in injuries, demeanment and emotional traumas over the years, pity was in short supply all of a sudden. Let the dumb crud express violently his mid-life crisis and insecurities about his manhood to a judge in open court, in front of jurors and media, and see what that got him for a change!

No, Lucas wasn't going to hold back his retaliations anymore. During the conversation he had told his attorney quite clearly to notify the IRS, the Federal and California DCFS, the bank where the salary's money was transiting in order to recall the funds and put them in judicial escrow, then liaise with all the unions he should be a member of to work at WPP in his multiple capacities. On top of that, Lucas told his lawyer to contact the UEO departments in charge of Justice, Military Security and the World Financial Market Authority that watched over the World Bank, International Monetary Fund and planetary money movements as they were the ones in charge of the WPP's cash reserves and employee benefits management and pension funds.

There would be a lot of dogs-of-war barking rabidly against his dear father's stinking hide come Friday morning, and it would get worse from there on.

After all, the World Power Plant was located on the Western Coast of the African continent, and the countries that compose the Pan-African Confederation would want a piece of the action, just like the members of the European Union which was the second biggest financial backer of WPP at a whooppin 25% of the startup cash after the UEO Alliance (UEO 50%; EU 25%; PAC 15%; AtlC 10%).

Those two confederations stood to lose several tens of billions of Euros if the whole project tanked out because one measly functionary was using his posting to defend his great and mighty image of what he believed was his adult manliness against his poor beleaguered teenaged son. Not to mention the loss of reputation, credibility and capacity to control their own people inside their own organizations when it became public just how big a clusterfuck Lawrence had made of his position at the top.

Chuckling darkly at the gallows humor of the situation, Lucas wondered if his father would ever realize that by trying so desperately to demonstrate his penultimate control over his boy's life, that he had in fact proven the exact opposite. He had proven that he himself was out of control, disconnected with reality and completely incapable of differentiating between his wants, rights and legal limits anymore.

Well, with around thirty foreign governments hunting him down for a piece of his oily hide, maybe he'd wise up at some point, but Lucas wouldn't hold his breath for it. His evaluation of the situation was that Lawrence was a bad job done and he needed to start actively cutting his losses where that bastard was concerned. In the end of things, the broken-souled teenager was just glad his poor grand-parents had reached peace before they could witness the shameful acts of their son and be brought low by his depravities as it would certainly splash around the entire family and spare none.

With a great sigh of resignation, Lucas took the paper printout on his desk; one of two sets of forms his lawyer at sent over as PDF's to read, fill out and file with him before leaving tonight. The thickest and most important was the dual request for the severing of filial ties and parental authority against Lawrence coupled with the request for legal juvenile emancipation. Both would be arbitrated in full family court by his attorney and the DCFS people against Lawrence and his church cronies, if any of them dared to show up to contest the requests, thus exposing them to public scrutiny. The second set of papers was thinner but foresaw the coming of many, many more in the near future. It was the official request to the Canadian government for the obtention of bi-national USA-Canada citizenship followed by the application for status as legal 'investor immigrant' so he could obtain permanent residency rights and protection inside of Canada without the time limits imposed by a foreign worker's visa or other types of transitory passage agreements.

Moving not only his business but his entire life up North was a big step but he had been thinking about it for a long time already. Officially, as the Law stood, he was legally domiciled at his father's house in Buffalo, New York State, even though he had never set foot in the place in his entire life, and simply a boarding student at Stanford, San-Francisco, California. As Lucas had never moved his permanent residence or place of legal housing to Stanford or San Francisco in any ways, it would look in the papers as if he were migrating from Buffalo directly. And that could actually help, when he proved he had never been housed directly in the same building as his felonious father.

This just left the reaction of his mother to worry about.

And there was no way he would expose himself to that train wreck in progress anymore, no sirree! Leaving Cynthia Holtzenstein in the past had been hard but necessary for his survival. The woman was like a bad addiction to opioids; getting weaned off had almost killed him but staying in contact would kill him just as surely, just a lot more slowly, more violently and leave a bigger mess. No; his mother was a bad person in herself, to which was added the fact her choice of men usually turned around the mental profile that Lawrence had. And his father was actually amongst the least violent, least criminalized she had been implicated with in her life to date.

Hint: criminal attorneys should NEVER date their clients; it will never end well for the kids if there are any as a result of the relationship.

(Alice Cooper – Poison)

Cynthia was a criminal law defender that specialized in dealing with white-collar information thieves, extortionists, black-mailers and financial scammers. Rich guys who scam the IRS and have offshore foundations (Daddy dearest) were her daily bread and served as her bed-warmers by default when she didn't get her chosen quarry. When she didn't have a full roster of stand-alone criminals to represent, she dabbled in defending the mafia; organized crime Bosses liked her like moths were attracted to a sugar-scented candle's flame. Cynthia had represented in her twenty year career to date some seven 'Dons' of the New York State, Vermont and Massachusetts area. She had handled the case of a few guys from Maine that had trouble in NYS's capital in Albany when their attempt to corrupt the state's Secretary of Justice had backfired and they were caught in the act by the security cameras the man had placed inside the office itself.

Damn, but the gal was courting trouble! She was attracted to men of power and authority, those who had just the right 'Bad Boy' attitude and scent of seediness to get her desire for danger and adrenaline rush going. Not that she would ever get into the dangerous situation herself; her style was to wait patiently at home, listen to the man's heroic stories of his nefarious deeds and then 'reward' the guy sexually in proportion to how big an effect his retelling had on her hormones.

Some girls just liked ponies, others thought they were little princesses like daddy told them when they were young and some others never really grew up from the fantasy world of their childhood and always pined after the great conquering hero to come sweep them off their feet. His mother's psychological profile was all of these put together, and then some. That explained her ownership of a horse farm in Vermont's forested mountains and her regular attendance at medieval fairs and renaissance parties where she always went costumed as - what else? - The beautiful, delicate, demure princess who needed her big strong warlord to come save her…

Lucas wanted to gag when he thought about some of the stuff he had seen and lived from his mother's few years of actual presence in his life. The time, when he was seven years old, when she had forced him to do like a real little page-boy in a great medieval castle by dressing in costume, then staying stiff and silent with a basket of towels and toiletries in his arms right next to the bed where she was shagging vigorously the winner of the Autumn Fair's jousting tourney was engraved in his mind for the rest of his life.

That this event was actually one of the least dangerous and least damaging situations he had endured because of her princess & hero fetish was a complete nightmare that he needed to find a way past at some point. The therapist he had begun consulting since the attempted rape two years ago had done some headway, but there was a limit to how much manure the poor girl could remove from his mind unless she started living in the same house 24 / 7. And as much as he like her, the 29 year old wasn't his type or in the same league. She was far too much San-Fran harbor hippie for his tastes, thank you very much.

Looking at the clock face built into the desk's surface, Lucas picked up the office's corded telephone set to order himself a very light lunch that he could eat one handed for the most part. Giving the gimlet eye to the piles of paper waiting for his manual TLC, the teen wondered if his lawyer wasn't out to get a piece of his juvenile hide too… Given his luck with the adults in his life, it wouldn't surprise him…

Lawyers are humans too; I have proof, I tell you!

(Twisted Sister – We're not gonna take it anymore!)

Tuesday 15th of December, 2020; 15:07pm

Office of Carmello Giorgio Campanello di Sovorone, esq.; attorney at law

San-Francisco, California, USA

The older Italian gentleman smirked through his thick bushy mustache at the delicate (snobby) mannerisms of his youngest, most prolific corporate client that he still actively represented. Most of those in Lucas' financial and social level were elderly, like the lawyer himself, and already enjoying retirement in the sunnier countries of the planet on long-winded life renewal cruises. Usually without any spouse to hinder them as those had been dropped out of their lives just before pushing their assets out of US jurisdiction and getting a divorce through a friendly, well rewarded judge. And those were easy to find in North America, if you had the connections, money and time to spare to look in the right places.

The 79 year old Sicilian had immigrated to the USA with his parents just at the onset of Mussolinism in Italy's central districts, while the going was possible as the black shirts didn't control the whole country yet. Then, after spending most of his youth in the poorer districts of New York City and the New Jersey Coastal towns, doing small errands for local Famiglia, he had hit it rich by saving the life of a small child from a sexual predator who tried to abduct the small boy from a park. It was the first-born son of a Don, the heir and only child of a Famiglia in Jersey.

The Don was implacable in his cruelty against the pervert but truly generous towards the young 17 year old who saved his son. He paid the boy's education in Law at Harvard, along with a generous living allowance, then Carmello worked for him about 13 years before getting married and moving to San Francisco because his wife wanted to be close to her ailing mother. The Don, still alive and in charge, had approved the desire to take care of family and blessed the move by giving him a set of referrals to local people in need of good reps in court to start up his clientele base. The young man had therefore been involved with the legal aspects of Famiglia and Mafia in the personal, corporate and criminal aspects all of his life. He had set up marriage contracts, testaments, heredity charts, trust funds, family foundations in the USA and offshore, set up corporations both legal and dummies, fought the IRS and Bureau of Incorporations, etc… A few times he had done the basic research and evidentiary vetting for criminal cases but he had never pleaded in criminal courts. He presented himself in a police station only to get the paperwork or post bail for the client when the actual criminal litigator of record wasn't readily available.

With his white but deeply tanned skin tone, ivory white hair, brows and gallic-style handlebar mustache, all mounted on a heavy muscular frame of six feet and three inches of some 240 pounds, the man made an impressive figure anywhere he went, despite being wheelchair bound for years. He had a rolodex of contacts that held so many 'Bad Boys' that Cynthia would wet herself just thinking about it, before she even laid eyes on the cards. His much more secret list of 'Go To' people in the judicial apparatus of the USA, Canada and Mexico was even more carefully guarded and many a person in the american Homeland Security Department dreaded the day it would come to light as their names and the favors they owed him were written in there. Corruption was a science, a craft and an art form; he excelled at it all.

In honesty, Carmello shouldn't have accepted Lucas as a client six years ago when he came to San-Francisco and set up his lodgings and company's secondary office in town. However, he had references from back home. The grandson of his old Don had known Lucas through the interactions of his father and older brothers with Cynthia as their attorney. He had taken pity on the poor kid who was half his age but forced to endure stuff from his parents that even their 'Made Men' didn't deal with in the back alleys at night during their enforcement jobs. The teenager had contacted his grand-father's old friend and ally to ask him if there was anything to be done for Lucas and so, without ever becoming involved or truthfully aware of just who had helped him, the Wolenczak boy had been allowed to move his person, life and company to Stanford where he started a new, much healthier part of his life.

Or so it seemed from the outside.

Carmello's blood boiled when he thought of the hot-wet-cunted bitch in heat that was his mother. And don't get him started on his father! Carmello had been raised in the old days, when a slap in the face or a switching on bare arse was normal. He didn't disavow corporal punishment but he certainly didn't think what Lucas had endured from his mother's bed-pets or his father's angry, out of control rages was anything related to discipline or valid physical intervention. Even in his youth, Cynthia would have been known as an amoral floozy and Lawrence an ill-bred mannerless cad. The fact Cynthia relinquished her parental rights so rapidly 6 years ago had been helped along by a few contacts back in New York State that still owed him a few considerations, even if Lawrence thought it was the secret deal he struck with the woman that had caused this. What the man didn't know would only hurt him that much worse later on and it was a good thing according to the elderly gentleman.

Lucas had never been told the nitty-gritty details but he had diligently repaid the help he got by running the numbers and crunching the data streams to validate the positions a few of Carmello's clients had taken against the IRS or their spouse's divorce attorneys about the assets to be split between the parties. Since the boy had managed to get him four clean unilateral wins and almost two dozen partial but very favorable agreements, he had certainly paid off his lawyer's time and efforts on his behalf quite nicely. The large payments his clients gave him were certainly not for losses or dissatisfaction, that was sure!

The elder gentleman smiled again as his youthful guest sipped delicately, almost demurely, from the small cup of strong espresso while reading over the finalized version of the paperwork to be submitted to the Canadian Border & Customs services for his immigration & citizenship applications. The all brown and beige clothing was a very different look from his usual dark blue denim jeans and checkered shirts. Carmello thought he had chosen a good appearance to pass the train line's people and the border guards would treat him a bit better than if he were dressed in his normal old, rumpled and washed out clothes. The boy's instinct in using his true ID and credentials to pass the lines was spot on and using his company's need to expand to support his clients in Vancouver was a stroke of genius. The authorities could uncover and punish a lie, but against the truth the police and ICE would be powerless to stop his passage.

A small snort of amusement brought the venerable lawyer's attention to his youngest client on retainer and he raised his eyebrows in the universal gesture to indicate a silent interrogation. Lucas peered at him over the top of the sheets and smirked at the older man's gall at submitting this in writing for public records.

"Four years of Trump as president was a catastrophe and the onset of another term is making me move up north to protect what's left of my personal dignity? Are you freaking serious, man?" the teen asked incredulously as the older gentleman's own smile widened enough to show teeth.

"Well, he did spit contemptuously on New York values and San-Fran hippies and such… And you have both in your family and business. On top of that, if you want to burn the bridges with the old WASP neo-cons in DC at the Pentagon to break away from your father's sphere of influence, dissing the Commander-in-Chief and making him publicly spit on your name will do that, and then some." The old litigator pointed at the sheets in the boy's hand and continued "Don't forget that this will blow up in old Lawwy's face too! He'll have a Hellavu time convincing the people in DC and the Capitol that he's not secretly against their pony who won them the race both times around. And these bastards have proven themselves to be even more vengeful and quarrelsome than they are racist, bigoted and close-minded! Nah, your daddy's gonna be in the hot seat for that one for a looong time to come; trust me on this."

Lucas just shook his head in despondent disbelief while also secretly thinking the man was probably more right than he knew. From what transpired in the news networks nationally, even Fox News and the normally 'right-of-center but still mainstream' media had rapidly developed a distaste for the Trump-style of public management where everything was turned into a personal, one-on-one contest of will and machismo with each and every bureaucrat, agent, elected official or ambassador, domestically or abroad. The number of emigrants flowing out of the US in the last year alone was staggering in that fully half had stated that the Trump-team presidency had been the fundamental reason for their decision to move out of America. In that way at least, Lucas wouldn't look too much out of place.

"Is there anything else that I need to secure Wolenbahn Electronics against my parents?" the child asked the older man. His greatest fear was losing his life's work, seeing his patents and intellectual property be sold off to finance Lawrence's vendetta against him at some point.

Carmello shook his head negatively and responded firmly "When you transferred a part of the legal ownership of the company between the two trust funds set up by your grand-parents and kept only 10% of the class-A voting stocks in your own name, you essentially blocked any attempt at taking over the corporation by anybody. Since you are the sole beneficiary of both trusts and they cannot be dissolved for cash-out before you turn 25 years old; any argument made that you put your assets and future in danger by the maneuver are self-evidently false and would bounce off the DCFS and family courts like bugs off the windshield of a car. There is nothing your parents or any church-associated cronies of theirs can do to either seize the assets or obtain any sort of purview over these trusts."

The stately male took a small sip from his minuscule espresso cup and savored the rich, deep flavor before continuing his reply. "The rest of the liquid assets in your own name have been pooled to a bank in Geneva, Switzerland, before splitting them again between Wolenbahn Electronics and the other anonymous Swiss, German, French and British numbered incorporations we have created in the last four years in preparation for this moment. About 40% of your wealth is still in Wolenbahn while the rest was split in 15% blocks and spread in the other shell companies as requested. There is nothing of yours in Canada to physically trace you with, everything will be cash-in-hand or done by wire-transfer as you asked."

Lucas finished signing the sheets in the appropriate places and placed them in their respective envelopes before standing up, hand extended for a last farewell. It would be many years before they saw each other again, even by vid-phone, and given the age and health that Carmello had these days, it could very well be the last time all together.

"I was happy to make your acquaintance, sir, and to work with you on so many projects. You taught me a lot in the six years that we knew each other and I will remember you fondly." Lucas said with a small shy smile as he shook hands with the elder male. Carmello nodded in appreciation of the youth's gratitude, spoken plainly but felt deeply as was the way with the teen. He had a habit of keeping his shields up and tall thick walls around his soul and mind; good habits, given how the world worked for those who saw the deeper, darker truths of life.

The lawyer leaned backwards, making the leather of his wheelchair creak and strain under his girth as he was shaken by a wet, phlegmy cough. It wouldn't be long now, his doctors had confirmed. In a few months, at the end of spring 2021 at the most, he would join his beloved Marianna in the arms of the Lord and be redeemed for his sins. He calmed his breathing and massaged his chest slowly as he watched the carefully neutral, professionally detached expression wash over the face of his youngest client and nodded one last time at him to go. The road was calling to the child and there was nothing to do for Carmello anymore that human medicine wasn't already doing.

Taking his large armored briefcase, Lucas walked out of the luxurious, high-class office for the last time of his life. He knew deep inside that they would never meet again in this life and he could not afford to come back to pay respects at a funeral lest he place himself in Lawrence's grip again. Any gestures of remembrance would have to be done privately or when he had passed 25 years of age and taken hold of his life against all comers.

"Au revoir, mon vieil ami, on se reverra dans un meilleur monde." Lucas thought somberly as he walked out of the building, accompanied by the tapping noise of the can he needed to use on long distances, then into the long black limousine he had rented for the day to ferry him around town in peace and comfort. He had the means, why not use them? Now, all he had to do was some last minute shopping then going to San-Fran's central Amtrak station where the train line had scheduled an executive assistant to meet him. The person would do a final vetting of his identity and baggage then take him to the VIP luxury lounge for a nice, last meal aground before boarding the train for a late evening departure around 22:00pm if all went well with the locomotives and passenger cars.

Last call! All aboard!

(Ludwig Van Beethoven – Symphony #6, sotto voce)

Tuesday 15th of December, 2020; 18:42pm

Amtrak station, central hub, VIP arrival

San-Francisco, California, USA

Lucas watched traffic pass by slowly as the limousine turned leftwards into the reserved driveway of the train station, headed for the discretely located VIP arrivals vestibule. Standing inside the shade of the climate controlled compartment, a young woman was visible, holding a small clipboard and wearing the uniform of the train line's employees.

The driver parked the car just a bit away from the door to let a single lane's width between the car and building before turning off the car and stepping out. The woman came out and greeted the man and exchanged some small talk with him to verify which VIP he was disembarking at the terminal. Once confirmed she had the right car, the driver firmly rapped a knuckle on the window of the passenger door, signaling the boy it was his escort waiting for him. Thus assured, Lucas unlocked the door and slowly, painfully climbed out of the luxury vehicle on unsteady legs, dragging his cane and armored briefcase with him.

The young woman had white skin, brown hair, green eyes and a soft, gentle demeanor common to those who work in hospitality and customer service around the world. She nodded towards Lucas but didn't extend a hand as that was inappropriate given her job and their differing stations in life, with hers being much beneath the paying passenger's position. Lucas didn't agree with the psychology of the situation but understood the protocols and reality of money well enough to not insist or be overly friendly with someone whom he would have beside him for about 15 minutes before they separated and never met again in this life. This type of snobbery bothered the gentle boy but it was pointless for him to fight it when all of society across the planet thought the same way.

Plastering on his face his best, most polite corporate owner's smile and demeanor, he inclined his head minutely and waited until the car's trunk was opened so the exec could take a tally of his heavy baggage and call out a porter with a dolly to lug it all inside to the warehouse to await loading onto the baggage car when it was positioned. Lucas would only have to check his briefcase and carry-on shoulder bag that held his clothes and toiletries for the trip itself. All his other clothes and extended personal belongings, which weren't that numerous in fact, were all stored in the wheeled trunk in the car's back. His more important tools, books, electronics parts and two backup computers had already been shipped out by UPS overland trucking last evening before he went to bed. Those two heavy wheeled trunks would be waiting for him in Vancouver's UPS depot for pickup when he got there.

Smiling emptily at all the right places and times, the teenager kept an attentive but silent attitude with the executive all the way from the car to the VIP embarkation counter where she placed him in the hands of the US Customs agents for processing then disappeared back into the depths of the terminal. Lucas couldn't care less about the unknown woman, despite her friendly nature. The moment he scanned his passport and ID cards into the Immigration & Customs Enforcement system, it would ping around the country and the people who watched his dad, and his supposed 'interests', would be notified. The only good part of this was that he was moving well passed the usual business hours and had reserved the ticket under the name of his company, Wolenbahn Electronics International Inc, thus making certain that even fewer people would make the link with the family's rare eastern european name.

The customs agents were bored out of their minds as most people coming aboard, even the VIP's, were not planning on leaving US soil so they had plenty of time to talk with the little blond guy and process his paperwork at a leisurely pace. A few smiles, platitudes and a wave later, and Lucas was hobbling through the gate and into the waiting area for fine dining, a large TV showing CNN to the room at large and free wi-fi. There were some cushy lazy-boys spread between the large five-seat sofas and coffee tables and a doorway in the far side of the room held a sign that spelled out the name of the restaurant / lounge where the food was. Deciding he did have the time and appetite, the young male aimed his slow moving frame towards the restaurant so he could feed himself something better than his usual fare of neighborhood diner order-in meals.

Lucas appreciated the very plush, velvety five star setting and menus; it was really high-end VIP as promised. He took his time by firstly ordering a chilled pitcher of lemonade and some garlic bread au gratin to nibble on while he perused the menu. He had a good two and a half hour to eat in peace before boarding, he wanted to enjoy this experience fully on the off chance it went pear shaped on him.

Having finally selected something from the Host's Table in the menu, he ordered a decadent meal of surf & turf composed of braised sirloin steak (real beef – what a decadent treat!), grilled turkey breast, three large pan-seared scallops wrapped in bacon and three large scampi shrimp. The plate came with the usual sides of potatoes at choice, steamed vegetables, rice and coleslaw. All the sides were in small quantities, more to give some variety than to create a massive quantity. The adolescent was surprised that a train station, even a VIP one, would have the ability to serve red meat in this epoch of USA politics, given that the industrial production of such had been banned since before he was born in the mid 1990's. The waiter explained that the meat was actually from a local dairy farm that needed to slaughter its animals when they no longer produced milk anymore so the foodstuff was actually seasonal and still in very limited quantity. Also, despite the price on the item, it went off fast as their clientele was the social stratum that did have the finances to afford it easily, especially on vacations or business travels since those were tax deductible corporate expenses.

Taking his own sweet time to eat, he managed to clean out everything thus amazing the waiter who wondered out loud where the thin, lightweight boy had stowed it all. Lucas smirked in return and asked for the dessert menu; he didn't have any space left, not really, but he wanted to goad the waiter a bit and if he did find something he liked, he'd ask if he could have some to go aboard the train. Being in the VIP passengers and having a sleeper cabin with its own fridge surely had some privileges, no?

From the dessert card he chose himself a non-alcoholic irish coffee and decided that he did in fact still have room for a little solid food so he chose a luxurious five layered chocolate and wild berries cake topped with mint ice-cream and french vanilla whipped cream. The waiter's dubious glance was amusing, as was his flabbergasted expression when Lucas methodically ate his way through the sinful baked confection relentlessly.

When the young man brought him the check, the teenager couldn't help the playful chuckle that escaped him. "I have a very quick, very demanding metabolism." He quipped at the male server while sliding his credit card in the wireless machine to pay his meal. The man shook his head and grumped good-naturedly at the bottomless pits inside teenagers and bemoaned that his cute, gentle little girl was gonna be like that in less than four years. He wasn't getting any sympathy on that one from Lucas: "You had a kid cuz you wanted it; live with it. She certainly didn't ask for you either." The teen thought silently as he slowly, painfully, stood from the booth to trudge his way to the boarding area.

Barely two minutes later, the boarding warning light came on and a voice sounded out of the waiting zone speakers, calling to all passengers and train crew to prepare for departure in thirty minutes.

(Scorpions – Wind of Change)

A different executive assistant waved at Lucas to come by her side and she showed him a sheet of paper with his picture and credentials listed on it. Her job was to show him to his cabin aboard the train and introduce him to the stewards so they could know him and his needs. Unspoken went the underlying message that it was to warn them he was a minor traveling unaccompanied and he needed some basic surveillance, from afar and discretely given it was HIS company that paid the tickets and HIS opinion that would be in the customer reviews that the line's client satisfaction department would write in the reports.

The cabin was exactly as luxurious and spacious as advertised. The small appliances were all built into smooth dark wood cabinets with open faces. There were a few open shelves to stow the basics of traveling in a cabin for a prolonged duration like pajamas, towels, toiletries and such. There were small nightstands on each side of the bed for more personal items. The small wood burning stove had two glass sides and was actually set into the wall with the bathroom so you had light, heat and a small cooktop on each side. Ideal for soaking in the tub while keeping hot your chocolate, tea or coffee.

Lucas sat on the wide cedar wood chest/bench at the foot of the king-size bed, keeping a politely neutral face while the stewards explained the basic rules of using the cabin and appliances, especially the fireplace. The fridge had a basic setup of drinks in retail bottles, condiments for hot beverages and a few things to fix up to his taste the snacks he could buy in the dining car and bring back to his cabin if he preferred to eat privately. Also, all sleeper VIP passengers could simply ring the stewards to place an order in person or use the brand new touchscreen tablet that also served as the train's intercom and paying vid-phone for calling people off-train on the move.

Lucas nodded at the right places, smiled and thanked the two stewards for their time before closing the door and sitting on the side of the cushy bed. His armored briefcase and carry-on shoulder bag moved and creaked on the bed as he settled his weight and leaned backwards, setting out his arms and splaying his hands to support his weight from behind. He exhaled a deep sigh of satisfaction and contentment. The first important part of the day was done. He had completed all the paperwork and put it in the mail thus insuring it would take several days to travel to its processing point instead of doing it by email or the electronic filing that could now be done directly on the governmental websites. Lucas was looking for exactitude and clarity in his forms, not speed of execution. The delays were crucial to insure he passed the lines unopposed before the shit hit the fans.

Getting up from the bed while leaning on his cane for support, he undid the top three buttons of his brown flannel shirt, exposing the black t-shirt beneath. Giving himself a mental push, he began to set up his large custom built laptop on the small table and placed the safety locking wires, attaching the machine to the table's leg to prevent theft. Then he placed the armored case in the lowest open shelf and used the extensible straps on its outside to secure it from moving around with the train's vibrations. He opened the carry-on and took out the set of new pajamas, flannel pants with a drawstring and buttoned shirt with long sleeves, along with his new toiletry bag to hold the brand new, better quality items than those he had used over the last six years. Since he was starting a new life, he had decided to splurge a small bit and do for himself some shopping therapy to boost his flagging morale.

It's not like a new toothbrush, comb and hairbrush were that much luxury, but he had walked by an interesting boutique that sold mid-level and high-end utilities for travelers this afternoon, thus the new, sturdy carry-on bag, toiletry kit and some small personal thingies to make himself feel more human, feel more like himself and not just Lawrence's runaway child.

The teenager tinkered around the room, looking at the small details that he hadn't seen when the stewards had been present. There was a pair of tall, narrow windows on the external wall, one over each chair of the small dining table so each person could see outside as the train rolled. On the inside wall, an extra large 60 inch wide view-screen had been mounted above the thin cupboard that held the cleaning supplies, dry condiments, tableware and linens like tablecloths, napkins, hand towels and such accouterments like in a hotel. The bed's headboard was a well made single wall unit with the nightstands, a few thin shelves and some overhead storage split in two compartments, one towards each outer side of the bed. The base of the bed was elevated and held two wide, deep drawers for bedding, sheets, extra pillows and such, again one for each sleeper in the room.

The wall separating from the washroom had the small wood stove right next to the door, and on its left were shelves with closing doors indicating a full height closet for coats, boots, umbrellas and other travelers' items. On the right side of the lavatory door were open shelves separated in three distinct segments: the lowest was the wood-rack for the kindling and logs, the middle was the small set of blue-enameled cast iron stoveware (pot, kettle, pan, spatula, ladle, tongs, meat fork and such) and finally, the upper shelve held a pot of tinder, boxes of wooden matches, two cans of lighter fluid and a modern flint & steel set attached to a metal wire. Everything needed to load, light and utilize the stove was in the same area, neatly stacked or placed to avoid very young children playing with fire.

Lucas hummed a tune from his favorite epic-style music as he finished setting his miserably few personal effects into the drawers and shelves on his side of the bed, the one next to the outer wall, in view of the windows. He was thankful that both frames could be opened the old fashioned way, by sliding upwards and locking with a pair of manual deadbolts, one on each side of each window. There was a fly screen in the window but it could be raised out of the way as well for unimpeded view or grabbing a branch of pine or spruce as the train passed in the more heavily forested areas of the line.

(Europe – The Final Countdown)

The young man sighed in deep relief as the mechanical sounds of the locomotives up front and clanking of the rail cars intensified just before the classic brass bell sounded out the last call to board after which the massive 40-car long vehicle began to pull out of the station, chugging along the northward route that would take Lucas to Canada, freedom and ultimately, safety.

Once the boy was used to the rhythmic swaying of the wagon, he used the rotary switch to dim the lights and then set to treat himself to a live fire in the small stove. He didn't want any beverage or food, just the beautiful lights and liveliness of the dancing flames would be enough for him tonight. That and a nice long soak in the tub before going to sleep. Wearing a small discrete smile that he kept for moments when he was alone and truly safe, he opened the glass panel of the stove to carefully pile a small amount of wood, followed by a bit of tinder from the pot on the high shelf. He took the one box of matches that was already opened and noted it was almost full. Not that he was worried; there were other boxes and the stewards probably had a stash in the cargo cars to restock all the sundries and foodstuffs in all the private cabins. Striking the match, the teen smiled wider at the rejuvenating sight of the light, dancing on the tip of the small, wooden stick. He placed it in the minute heap of tinder and blew lightly on it to give the flame air to grow. Inside of a minute, the tinder and dry kindling were alight, soon followed by the three small logs. Making certain the fire was well taken and safely contained, he closed the glass door and locked it, shaking it a bit to verify it would hold.

Standing up unsteadily from his cramped kneeling position besides the stove with the aide of his cane, the boy went to open the bathroom door to give it a better glance as well. The first thing he noticed was all the plumbing and waterworks were placed towards the far wall of the room; the toilet, vanity console, bathtub & shower combo, all were oriented so their fixtures were into the bulkhead facing towards the front of the train. It was logical, Lucas thought, just like a ship at sea, they needed to limit the number, types and positions of pipes to not take on weight or make the system prone to breaks and jamming. Fewer pipes, clustered together but straight and well angled took care of that.

The toilet was near the outer wall and the tall, narrow window similar to the main room. The vanity with a single sink and three-segment articulated mirror were in the center, with a pull-out swivel stool to sit while washing, shaving or doing anything else that might necessitate the tall, wide mirror and sink at the same time. The tub & shower combo took the entire left wall, the one towards the inside of the wagon. The corner of the bath where the person's head rested when they soaked leisurely was right next to the small stove's glass panel, although this one was not mobile. There was as claimed a flat surface, gently warm and large enough to hold two mugs of drink or two small plates of food. Since the tub was actually an extra-wide affair with Jacuzzi jets, it was obvious the whole cabin and bathroom had been designed in the goal of keeping a couple of lovers satisfied in all aspects of their romantic vacationing on the move.

Lucas snorted at the idea of him getting anywhere close enough to someone to have any form of sexual relations with them. After the things his back-alley slut of a mother had made him endure from her bed-warmers and assorted male-objects, he wasn't in any hurry to jump in the sack with anything for a good long while.

He turned the knobs on the tub's faucets to adjust the temperature of the flowing water and went back to the bed area to undress and stow his clothes for tomorrow. He had washed them in his office bathroom and then dry-cleaned by the cleaner's shop in the ground floor of the office complex last night before going to bed, just after shipping out his two principal trunks of parts. These clothes could be clean and presentable for the next two or three days, until he reached an acceptable hotel or country inn in the Northern part of Vancouver, far from the touristy sectors of town. Then, he'd get changed into his other set of clean clothes to go shopping so he could start accumulating enough personal effects, clothes and a few luxuries to really feel free and safe in his new life.

Now nude, he reached into the overhead storage of the bed and pulled out one of the complementary bathrobes monogrammed with the Amtrak logo and hobbled back into the bathroom to enjoy himself for a long, calm, meditative soak. Making certain he had his cellphone, spiked keyring, and tactical pen with him, he set them on the small service tray beside the tub before fussing around the two cabinets under the vanity's counter. He found the soap, scented oil and washcloth he wanted easily enough. The train line certainly didn't cheap out on him when they said it was top notch luxury throughout the cabin and trip.

(Jon Bon Jovi – It's My Life)

Setting some softly scented lemon oil in the water, he waited until it reached the desired height to shut it off, then closed the electric lights in the bathroom as the stove's glow would be enough and quite appeasing on its own. Then, holding onto the safety & lift assistance chain dangling from the ceiling, the adolescent very slowly and carefully lowered his frail, shaking body into the warm, soothing liquid. He set his head down onto the fluffy, waterproof pillow at the inclined end of the tub and closed his eyes, letting the water's swirling movements and the luminous cleansing heat from the wood fire wash over him, taking away the worries, anxieties and sorrows for the evening. As he seeped in smelly yellow water up to his neck like an overgrown lemongrass tisane, Lucas smiled in relaxed contentment for the first time in over two years. Ever since the attempted rape by that twink bastard, the teen had come to realize that he would never be safe anywhere that was set up for him by either biological parent. The only way for him to be safe was to handle the problems himself while keeping quiet and invisible at all times.

Well, he'd learned the lesson well the last time dad had been in town. He had done everything in the last two years to set up escape plans and contingencies in case of his untimely demise from unnatural causes not linked to illness or willful suicide. He had gone as close to off-the-grids as could be while still operating through the web and postal service to establish his exit strategy out of the USA and Lawrence's legal reach. Now, he would see how far his father was willing to dabble into the deeper darkes to maintain his unholy grip on his only child. Snort! Lawwy wouldn't let go. Lucas knew that already. It was part-and-parcel of the mentality of the 'bad boys' his mother always fell for; they were nasty, possessive and dominating characters who would never accept being bested by anybody, let alone a slight, reedy, sickly little kid like him.

Lucas humphed again, opening his eyes and looking at the nice analog clock mounted above the vanity mirror's central segment. It was a brass frame with glass front and brass needles to show hours, minutes and seconds, a dial indicated the day / night cycle and small rollers spelled out the day, month and year with letters and numbers. A very nice piece of train line mechanics, just like in the old days when things were made to be tough, long lasting and beautiful at the same time. Seeing that he had in fact been seeping for almost an hour and a half, the boy looked at his finger and saw them to be wrinkled like stewed prunes and realized that his time of calm meditation had come to a stop. Sitting up in the tub, he closed the jacuzzi jets and then soaped up more for the symbolic effect of washing off the spiritual dirt and crass of his former life than any real need to clean himself. After rinsing off and pulling the plug of the tub, he very carefully stood up and then stepped out of the tub. Quickly, he then sat on the swivel stool to rub himself dry with the sinfully thick terrycloth towel that had hung on the back hooks of the bathroom's door. Damn, this was luxury for real! Note to self: find decent towels; they make even a tight, diminutive bathroom feel heavenly.

Wrapping the towel around his thin, gangly frame, the boy gazed deeply into the glowing embers of the stove, the few flickering flames spreading out their happy light and healing warmth. Sighing in rare delight, Lucas turned his head towards the outer wall, to see the buildings, road signs and occasional bridge trestles passing by the window as the train had moved out of San-Francisco Bay's urban area and was now rolling in a less populated region of California.

(Soul Asylum – Runaway Train)

Well, that was that. There was no going back at this point or everything would have been useless and Lawrence would certainly not reward him or even just leave him alone if he did get cold feet and abort his exit plan. Getting off the stool, the teen dropped the towel in the hamper and pulled on the bathrobe, clinching it tightly around his waist. Leaning on the walls, furniture and his cane in the right hand for support, he walked to the bed area and pulled on the pajama pants, deciding against wearing the shirt as the small stove made the room quite balmy and the thick comfy sheets would take care of any chill he might feel. Taking off the robe and setting it on the hook next to the bed, he pulled the covers back and then grumped annoyed. He had to walk around the bed, turn off the lights from near the entry door and then trudge back to his side of the bed to get in under the waiting fleece blanket.

Now laid out in his cocoon of warm safety, under enough sheets that even his overly thin, fatless frame would stay warm, the boy took one last deep breath to steady his heart and let the gentle rocking and swaying of the railcar lull him to slumber. He had no desire to be awake for the few towns the train would stop at for 15 to 30 minutes while US Post bags and boxes were exchanged and a few passengers disembarked for layovers scheduled in their prolonged train line cruise from the southernmost tip of California all the way up to the northernmost tip of the Rockies. The coming-and-going of others didn't concern him anymore and he didn't really care to sight-see from a moving platform, so his sleep would be sound and deep. He hoped. Anyways, he had asked the stewards to give him a wake-up call at 10:00am the next morning. He would see then how the night went.

{ SQ } - { PREVIEW ch.2 } - { SQ }

Luxury train ride up to Seattle, enjoying the vacation and taking a breath of fresh air. Some deep web searches, finding very bad information about his enemies behind Lawrence and getting spoofed by an amateur. Then, the transfer over to the Via Rail train, passing the border into Canada.