Chapter 3
Callen headed to a spot he had used as a child, he needed to gather his thoughts and process the information he had learned.
Processed….that word had had a whole other meaning 24 hours ago. He thought grimly.
He needed answers and to get them he needed to find Daniel Hurst.
He could not stay at a motel, they'd be looking for him, shelters weren't safe either, he smiled as he walked up to the small building, it was still empty and boarded up, he pried a sheet of metal away from the rotting wood in the back window and climbed inside.
As expected his walk through the musty and dank building confirmed it was empty, he climbed to the top floor avoiding rotting stairs and floorboards, going to a window at the front of the building. He did not need to open it, the glass in the window had been broken years ago, he smiled at the memory, he had broken it himself when he was thirteen, this was one of his boltholes that no one, not even child services, had found. He ran his hand over the inscription in the rotting wood frame, G. Callen, '82. Remembering when he had hidden here last.
He lay out his bedroll, opened a bottle of water, and took a small drink, already realizing the need to ration the food and water he had managed to take from his house.
He lay back and closed his eyes, his mind rapidly scanning the files in his head; He did not think he was anything different, he knew he was smarter that some people, but then other people were smarter than he was. He had always thought like this, there could not be anything in his head, could there be? In addition…if there was could the CIA use it to track him and kill him?
He didn't know, although he hoped not, he needed to find Daniel Hurst and find out what he had done to him as a child, and why he'd done the same thing to his sister….Did his sister really drown, or had the CIA killed her too? Was his mother killed because of this project and not because of the Comescu's?
He had so many questions; he opened his eyes swiping angrily at the tears that were sneaking their ways out of his eyes.
He had trusted the Hurst's more than Hetty, more than the Rostoffs, more than Sam. They had been the nearest thing he had known in his life as family and they had lied to him, they had known his sister, they had ….he stopped as his mind suddenly flipped correlating all the little bit of information he had on the Hurst's. Small things that at the time, as a child he had not understood, but now it was making more sense.
Callen had woken up in hospital, his head hurt and he could hear voices in the background.
"He'll be awake soon, what's the processing speed?" A man said.
"Over 30 terabytes, this is the most ever recorded, it seems to be interacting with his imagination, I mean, doctor he seems to be synchronizing."
"Good….Good, I told them he'd be good for this, ever since I saw his brain scans after the accident, I realized he had the gene mutation that made him perfect for this, the injury…giving him brain damage in just the right place helped tremendously." A pleased voice said.
"Do you think the lack of brain damage in the first subject was what made her…default?"
"Possibly, that and the attachment to her family, she wanted her mother and baby brother. This subject doesn't have that problem and he is our last chance, the mother died and if it doesn't work with him, then if he survives we would have to hope he grew up and had children with the same genetic mutation, he is the last of his line, there are no more Callen's to work with."
Callen stirred, "Mama?" he said
A woman's hand…Emma's he thought… reached over and stroked his head, "Shh, you're being very brave, sleep now," She said and he closed his eyes and slept again.
He filed that memory and found himself standing in Daniel Hurst's office, Daniel smiled at him, "That's good Callen; I need you to do these puzzles for me."
He handed Callen a book full of code encryptions, "Can you unscramble these for me?"
Callen smiled at Daniel and looked over at the large jar of Tootsie pops on his desk. "Our deal still stands one piece of candy for each puzzle." Daniel said.
Callen grabbed the pencil that Daniel held out and climbed up onto the big chair by his foster father's desk.
Within moments, he was handing over the first encryption. He smiled as he was given the candy, he unwrapped the sucker and then put it in his mouth, it helped him concentrate….Callen smiled in his reverie, and it still did help him concentrate.
Daniel had taken all the puzzles and walked out leaving Callen sat in the oversized chair, eating the candy and reading a comic in his head.
Within minutes Daniel and a smaller woman…Hetty! He realized with a start had come in, she was looking at him strangely, "He did this, the boy…Clara's boy?" Hetty said.
Daniel smiled, "Yes Ma'am, the processor is working perfectly, and by the time he's old enough to work for us he should be fully integrated."
"And he won't suffer the same effect as Amy?" she asked.
"No, the brain damage that happened on his extraction from Romania was in the perfect place, the chip fits in there perfectly." Daniel said watching the child's eyes move as if he was reading.
"Callen? What are you doing?" Daniel asked.
"Nothing…." Callen said guiltily.
Daniel and Hetty stared at him and he started shaking, "I'm sorry!" he exclaimed looking scared. "I was reading a comic."
Hetty smiled and walked over to the child, "Was it a good comic?" she asked.
"Batman…he was fighting the Joker and Robin was helping…I like Batman and Robin, they are like me, they don't have any parents and they fight bad guys." Callen grinned.
Hetty could not help herself and she smiled back, "Would you like to fight bad guys some day?" she asked.
Callen nodded and sucked on the sucker, Hetty looked at him, slightly sadly, "I hope one day Mr. Callen you get your wish."
She turned to Daniel, "How much longer is he with you?" she asked as they headed to the door.
He walked out of the room with her and closed the door, "He has to go this weekend, he's been with us for two months, isn't there anything you can do Hetty? We'd like to keep him, but the CIA want him toughened up, they want to let him loose in the system, please?" Daniel sounded desperate and in truth, he was.
"No…there is nothing I can do, but he will always be monitored and I may be able to have him placed with you for the odd weekend, also I have made a request that you stay as his doctor, if any other doctor saw him or the implant was discovered they would be ramifications." She said.
Hetty looked over at the sweet boy, "Oh Mr. Callen, I am so sorry, your life is about to get much harder."
Six years later Callen was running. He did a lot of that, running, sometimes from bullies at school, sometimes from bullies at home, other kids in homes, foster parents. He found he was good at running.
This time it was his latest foster parent, the foster father had been mean and nasty, his wife was a waitress and she worked at night and slept during the day, so she had no contact with him. However, the father, he was an evil man, and Callen had known that from the first moment he had seen the man.
Sasha Masters his current social worker walked up the path with him, "This is for your own good Callen, Mike Johnson and his wife Stella are good people." She said.
Callen's mind ran rapidly looking for any mention of Mike Johnson or Stella Johnson in his mind. Stella was squeaky clean, but Mike…he had a false file, he quickly dug through the redacted parts of his file and stopped dead.
"I'm not staying here!" he snapped at Sasha.
"They are good people G, they've been thoroughly vetted." She argued, it was late and she couldn't place him anywhere else.
"Do it again, Johnson's been arrested for child abuse, he beat a kid half to death in Florida." He told her.
"Oh come on G, you couldn't possibly know that, stop messing me around," She snapped. "Mike is a good man and this will be a good placement for you, they can only have you for two weeks so just behave yourself."
"No!" G grabbed his bag from her arm and pulled.
"Callen!" She grabbed him by the arm and marched him up the driveway, "God help me boy, you mess up and I'll have you thrown in Juvenile hall for a month!" she threatened him.
Callen had heard stories about that place not only from adults, but also from kids that had actually been there, it was the foster kid version of hell and most social worker knew it and used it to keep the kids in line. So he went quiet, the best thing to do in situations like this were to shut up and bide your time.
And he had…it had taken two whole days until Johnson lost his temper and started hitting him.
He'd gone to school and had a run in with a group of bullies, they had, as most kids in most schools did eventually, found out he was a foster kid. They had pushed him in the hallways and tripped him at dinner, which really annoyed him as he didn't care about having subsidized meals but he did hate the fact that it was the only meal he would eat. Stella was out at work and Mike didn't want the kid eating his food.
He had kept his temper until one of the kids, Stan had pinned him up against a wall in a circle of his friends taunting him.
Stannislav Vocovich was a six-foot tall quarterback, he had the respect of the school and he knew it.
"You're weird!" Stan yelled at Callen, "No one loves you, you're just nothing, ya don't even have a name!" he laughed.
Callen looked at his feet, he knew he was alone but he hated this.
"G, G, G, Got no friend, got no brother, no one loves him not even his mother…." Stan chanted as he friends laughed.
G made a fist and punched him on the nose; he wriggled away from the older boy's grip. "You're just a liar Stannislav!" G yelled his tears of frustration evident.
"You tell everyone your dad is a marine, he isn't he's a crook, he's in prison…you aren't even American, you were born in Russia, your dad's in Black Dolphin Prison, you ain't ever gonna see him again!" he yelled as he threw punches without looking.
Stan stopped, he knew his father was in prison, but he hadn't told a soul, the only other person who knew was his mother.
"FREAK!" he screamed and beat him harder.
Callen protected his head as best he could and fought back. "I'm not a freak!" he groaned as Stan kicked him in the stomach, he groaned and rolled away as a teacher yelled and all the kids scattered.
"I'm not done with you freak!" Stan snarled as he ran off leaving Callen curled up on the ground.
Alone, Callen moved away as the teacher's hand touched him on the shoulder flinching at the contact.
"Callen? It's Mr. Marshall, are you ok?" he asked.
"'m fine…please…" Callen asked sitting up, protecting his ribs and wiping his eyes.
"Let's take you to the nurse hey?" Mr. Marshall said helping Callen up.
Callen shook off the helping hand and followed him to the nurses office, he winced as he saw his reflection in the mirror, Stella had brought him a new shirt today and it was now dirty and torn a large rip in one arm.
The nurse dabbed iodine on the worst of his cuts and wrote him a note to send him home.
He limped away from the school and turned in the direction of the Johnsons.
Arriving home Mike was standing at the door, mad as hell. He'd had a call from Stan's mother telling him that the boy they'd fostered was a freak and that he knew things that no one else knew.
Callen looked up as his foster father glowered at him, "Look at you! Stella spends good money on ya and ya repay her by treating her stuff like shit!" he yelled grabbing Callen by the hair and dragging him inside.
Callen took a calming breath, this was going to hurt.
Two hours later, Mike had thrown what was left of him in his room and started hitting the whisky. An hour later and all sound from downstairs ceased.
Then Callen pulled himself out of the window, feeling his ankle twist as he landed on the ground and he ran, or rather limped away.
As light rose over Los Angeles he came across and empty building, pulling a corner of a large plywood board away from the back window he slowly made his way upstairs.
He watched as the sun rose and scanned the pictures in his head, he hadn't been reported missing yet, so he climbed into his bed roll and got a few hours of safe sleep.
Waking up G checked the reports, there was nothing, this was unexpected until he saw a report pop up and then disappeared again off the grid, 'Eric' he thought to himself with a smile.
Hetty must have told him to wipe everything about the CIA being after him, he tried looking into other reports, anything pertaining to Daniel Hurst, he had to find him, he was the only one who could convince Hetty it wasn't true, he wasn't a freak.
He worried that the lack of flag from Eric or Nell, in his mind meant that Hetty was siding with the CIA. He looked through the files that Hetty had brought up yesterday on Daniel Hurst, there was a small file at the back, he'd nearly missed. Hurst had been followed by the CIA since Callen's last medical visit last month. Callen remembered being asked to go undercover on a case for the CIA, but he'd been working flat out with the team looking for a Dirty Nuclear bomb and he hadn't been able to assist them. Was this the reason that Daniel had been taken?
One thing he did know, Daniel had used him as a child, but Jessie was expecting her first child, Jessie hadn't known about what had happened to him, she hadn't even been born at that point. She was the closest thing Callen could remember to a sister, and she was expecting her baby. Callen made his mind up, although he did have questions for Daniel and Emma when he could get his hands on them, that baby was going to have two parents and two grandparents. He wouldn't be responsible for destroying another child's life.
Sam paced Ops while Eric tried to stare him down.
"I'm sorry Sam, Hetty's orders NOTHING goes on up here, it's her laptop only. something about the office being unsecure." He looked slightly afraid, but Eric was more scared of Hetty than Sam.
"Have you heard anything?" Nell asked. "I heard Callen's gone lone wolf."
"I can't talk about it." Sam snapped, He grabbed Nell's arm and pulled her out of OPS and into the hallway.
"Sam?" she asked.
"I need your help...G needs your help, I need you to open a file inside the Hurst file, make it hard to find."
"What's in it?" Nell asked.
"A note, just say, G, Michelle got the order, wants you alive...Trust Hetty, Trust the team...Meet me at spot number 2." Sam said.
"Where do I send it?" she asked.
"Nowhere, just put it in the file, he'll find it." Sam said with a smile.
"How? he doesn't have his phone, we tracked it he paid a cab driver to take it all the way to Studio City." Nell said confused.
"G will find it, Please he needs to know, right now he knows there's a CIA Kill order out on him, he needs to know we won't kill him."
Nell sighed and walked back into the laptop and typed it in.
"Can you tell when it's been accessed?" Sam asked.
Nell nodded and typed a command into the laptop.
"It's already been looked at, but..." she typed in a command, "How? this can't be right?" she said confused.
"What?" Sam asked.
"It's been accessed but there is no IP address, it's just...blank?"
Sam smiled, "Good Callen's got it."
"How? How can he do that, everyone leaves some sort of trace?"
Sam smiled, "Thanks Nell, If Hetty asked tell her I've gone out for coffee."
He walked out leaving Nell looking confused and Eric still looking slightly scared, hoping against hope that Callen trusted him enough to turn up.