Interludes
by Thomas Mc


Interlude 3

(due to some discrepancies found by a reader some minor corrections have been made in this chapter)


Vincent sat at his desk wrestling with his feelings when he finally dozed off from the day's physical and emotional exhaustion

~ o ~

Vincent was suddenly wide awake. He was sitting on a bench in the park in broad daylight. He realized that he was surrounded by a crowd of people, all strangers, and they were not afraid. Vincent could sense no fear or hostility ... only surprise, amusement and ... respect?

"Alright, Alright. What's going on here." A police officer forced his way through the crowd. When he saw Vincent his face registered surprise. "Oh, I see." He turned and faced the crowd. "Move along now give the man some peace."

The policeman continued to urge them to move along as the crowd reluctantly disbursed. While Vincent stared at him in surprise he sat down on the bench next to him. "here to visit the family monument?"

"Pardon?" was all Vincent could get out.

"The family monument." He pointed to a monolith like structure that Vincent had not noticed before. It was about four feet high, three feet wide and made of some type of transparent crystalline material. At the top was the word "Forever" embedded in the transparent substance in flowing sapphire blue script. Directly below that a long stemmed red rose was embedded in it positioned so that it underlined the word Forever. Below that was Catherine and Vincent's names side by side. Under Catherine's name were the words, "Loving Wife – Devoted Mother". Under Vincent's name were the words, "Loving Husband – Devoted Father". Next down was the line, "Once Upon A Time In The City Of New York." Below that was the line "Dedicated to them by their devoted children." And the final line had a list of six names. "Jacob – Jennifer – Naomi – Charles – Nancy – Brigit" inscribed into the monument.

The implications of what he was seeing were staggering. He had married Catherine and they had six children. And, apparently, the world above knew about them?

His eyes went back to the line that had seemed most unusual to him as he read it aloud "Once upon a time in the city of New York?"

"Yea, Greatest love story of all time, and it's all true." Vincent looked over at the officer in surprise. "After all it was written by Brigit O'Donnell, who knew them both personally. They even named their youngest daughter after her. It's one of my wife's favorite books." He shook his head. "It's a shame that the book remained hidden, unknown, for so long after Brigit's death. Of course, once the world became aware of the existence of the Wells-Chandlers there was no longer any reason to keep it hidden away so their grandchildren got together and had it published. It helped explain the origin of the Wells-Chandlers to a world that was hungry to know more about them."

Vincent had noticed that passers-by were usually surprised to see him sitting there and tended to stare in curiosity but that was all the reaction he got. He was curious now and wanted to know more. "Caused quite a stir of course?"

"Are you kidding?" The policeman became very animated. "After such a spectacularly heroic introduction to the world back in 2067. The whole world was stunned when it happened." He was warming up to the subject now. "Alexander pops up in the middle of the United Nations General Assembly during the live televised world leaders conference on the resurgence of international terrorism. He takes out that terrorist and stopped him from setting off the nuclear bomb at the top of the Empire State Building." There was raw admiration in the policeman's eyes. "The way he stubbornly hung on to that dead-man trigger switch, despite being shot so many times by that terrorist's accomplice, he saved the whole city of New York as well as all those world leaders. And to have it all happen on a live worldwide TV broadcast. The President himself came to Alexander's hospital room, and later presented him with the highest medal that the Congress could award, and officially granted all of you Wells-Chandlers full protection of official US citizenship. Within a year the other Wells-Chandlers came forward. It's been two decades since then and the world has really changed a lot, though you still don't get to see a Wells-Chandler in person very often. You guys are still pretty rare. I actually saw Alexander last year when the President was in town."

Vincent listened, in total amazement, as the man's story unfolded. He was also amazed at how much time had apparently passed. He was tempted to ask the officer how many of his decedents there were now and how many of them carried his unique feature. Based on what he had said there were more than just a few.

The officer looked a little closer. "You know you are a dead ringer for Vincent."

"You know what Vincent looks like?" he asked, wondering how he knew. There were no pictures of him, except a couple in Elizabeth's painted tunnels, that he was aware of and by the late 2060's he and Catherine were unlikely to still be alive to have been photographed.

"Of course. I've seen the painting of Catherine and Vincent that's hanging inside the entrance to the Wells-Chandler foundation. My wife works there and I see that painting every time I visit her there for lunch." Then he shook his head. "She once told me that some of the old timers claim that the artist painted it after his death." He chuckled. "Less than a century and there are already some pretty fantastic legends popping up about Catherine and Vincent."

The officer seemed to draw himself back from wherever his mind had wandered. "Are you here for the wedding?"

"What wedding?" Vincent asked.

"My niece is marrying Phillip Chandler-Wells next week. I hope she has lots of boys, world needs more Wells-Chandlers like you." He looked at his watch and jumped up. "Gotta go. Hope to see you at the wedding." With a wave of his hand he continued down the walking path, whistling some tune that Vincent didn't recognize.

As he sat there his gaze was drawn back to the monolith while he contemplated everything that the policeman had said. It seemed that at least some of his and Catherine's offspring carried his unique features and still were able to live openly in this place and time. Based on what the policeman had said, those like him were even admired. He had actually been proud that his niece was about to marry one! As he thought about this, the scene around him slowly began to fade away.

Continued


'Beauty and the Beast' and its characters are owned by Witt-Thomas Productions and Republic Pictures. No infringement on copyrights is intended. This story is presented merely for the enjoyment of fans. Original concepts and story elements may be used by other authors as long as appropriate credit is given.