Chapter 7 - Part 2
As soon as Robin put forth the idea that the epidemic wasn't an accident, the room came alive.
"How is that even possible?"
"Did your father say something when he was here?"
"Has he contacted you again?"
"You mean it was manmade and targeted?"
"Who would do something like that?"
"Why would someone do something like that?"
Robin had simply buried her face in her hands and waited for the noise to die down before speaking again. "It wasn't any one thing," she finally said. "It was a lot of little things, and a good dose of Scorpio paranoia--"
"Always helpful," Luke interrupted.
"--that made me look at the pieces in a different way." Robin inhaled a shaky breath and looked around the room at her family, and Patrick, who still appeared terribly confused by everything. "I mean, think about it: Luke, of all people, brings this thing back. My father, of all people, rises from the dead and comes back to Port Charles. A Spencer is kidnapped and experimented on, a Jones is one of the fatalities--"
"What about Courtney?" Liz asked, trying to stave off her own panic at the thought of someone targeting her family.
Robin frowned. "Nikolas told me she wasn't even supposed to be in town. She might not have been a factor at all."
"Yeah," Lucky conceded, "But that still doesn't mean--"
"My parents are missing."
Everyone turned to look at Bobby Donoley, who had sat off to the side of the group, backwards on a pilfered dining room chair. He had been greeted with so much happiness and attention, before he had shrunk to the background of the discussion. Now he was speaking again, and his announcement was met with shock and outrage.
"What!"
"When?"
"Why didn't you say anything as soon as we got here?"
Bobby ignored them and looked at Robin. "That was what convinced you something was going on, wasn't it?" he asked, frowning thoughtfully. "You had your own suspicions before that, but when I told you my parents were overdue, you were convinced."
Lulu cut into the conversation. "What made you think that something happened to them?"
Bobby turned in surprise; he hadn't spoken to the youngest Spencer yet. "I knew my dad was meeting up with some contacts."
"How?" Lulu asked, frowning.
Bobby narrowed his eyes and glared at Lulu, willing her to shut up. "I'd rather not say how I got that information." He ignored her scoff, as well as the questioning looks of everyone else. Turning his attention back to Robin, Bobby asked the question that had been plaguing his mind since he had come to her. "What else made you suspect something?"
Robin didn't answer him. Instead, she got up and walked over to her day bag, the one she used to carry files, planners, and other large objects to and from the hospital. From it, she removed the book Patrick had given her.
Patrick frowned when he saw her come back with it. What was it about that book that had her so panicked? And why were several other people in the room suddenly looking terrified?
"I...received this yesterday. It was given innocuously, but someone meant for me to get it." Robin handed the book to Mac. "Look inside," she simply said.
Mac opened the book, and his face contorted into an expression of pure rage as he read the note. "'Here's to seeing old friends again, PK Sinclair'!" Mac jumped up from his spot on the couch. "Robin, who the hell would give you this?"
Bobby frowned. "That sounds almost exactly like what--"
"What you told me your father said," Robin finished, looking from him to her uncle Mac. "I know. That was what convinced me."
Luke snorted, but his eyes were darker than any Patrick had ever seen in a man before. "No such things as coincidences in this town," he murmured, unconsciously squeezing Lulu's shoulder.
"So, what do we make of this?" Felicia said nervously, taking Mac's hand. "Someone's trying to revive his glory days?"
Robin shook her head. "No." Turning to Patrick, she spoke to him for the first time since the others had arrived. "Tell them what you told me about the bookshop clerk."
More confused than ever, Patrick frowned at Robin, but did as she asked. "He was older, in his sixties, maybe, and he had longish graying blond hair."
Although Mac, Felicia, Luke, and Lucky all paled at the description, Robin urged him to continue. "And the rest?"
"He had an accent," Patrick said, looking around the room at the faces staring back at him. "European, but I don't know what country."
Patrick could not have prepared himself for the explosion that followed.
"Sonofabitch!" Luke shouted, jumping out of his chair.
"There's no way!" Mac bellowed. "I saw the boat explode!"
"It wouldn't be the first time he survived something like that, Uncle Mac," Robin said wearily.
"But still, Robin, honey," Felicia soothed, although her fearful eyes never left her girls, who were sitting on pillows on the floor and looking only slightly less confused that Patrick. "It's a long way from a description and a book to that."
"A book, a description, and someone handpicking that book for Patrick to give to me," Robin replied. She turned back to Patrick, who looked so completely out of his element that, on any other day, Robin would have laughed at the sight. The ever-confident, always-in-control neurosurgeon Patrick Drake, looked thunderstruck by everything that was happening around him. She had always known that her past would drive him away; she just never thought this would be the part that did it.
Understanding began dawning on Patrick's face. He still didn't know the why, but he was seeing very clearly that he had been set up to give that book to Robin. "I thought he was just being friendly," he muttered, rubbing a hand across his forehead. "He was asking questions, talking about...about his past, actually, but it didn't really make any sense, so I didn't think anything of if."
Mac looked like he was barely controlling his anger. "What, exactly, did you tell him?"
"Her name," Patrick said, speaking low, his eyes locking onto Robin's. "Her name, where we lived, her job, what she was like..." His voice trailed off as he thought back on all the information he had divulged to whoever that man was who made the pillars of Port Charles tremble. Patrick's eyes begged Robin to forgive him. "I didn't know--"
"No, you didn't!" Mac took a step towards Patrick, but Lucky beat him to the punch. Literally.
Grabbing him by the collar of his shirt, Lucky swung a hard left hook into Patrick's jaw. Robin yelped and rushed forward, but Luke was first, pulling his son off the stunned surgeon.
"You don't get what you did!" Lucky shouted, trying to free his arms from his father's grip. "You have no idea what you just brought down on all of us! On Robin!"
"Lucky!" Liz and Lulu both shouted.
"You should have just left her alone!" Lucky hissed, though he had ceased struggling. Wrenching himself free, Lucky walked back towards his wife and sister.
Patrick remained on the couch, shocked and rubbing his sore jaw. He was surprised when Robin sat down next to him and pried his hand away to examine his face.
"Let me take a look," she murmured. Robin prodded gently along Patrick's jaw, ignoring the heated debate going on around her. She kept her eyes focused firmly on Patrick's injury, and Patrick kept his eyes focused firmly on Robin. It didn't really hurt that bad, anyway. "I'm sorry," she said quietly after a moment. "Lucky shouldn't have done that."
"It's fine," Patrick replied, just as quietly. "Just, can you answer one question?"
"What?"
"How does the book fit in? That's the part I can't figure out."
Robin inhaled a shaky breath. "Did you ever read PK Sinclair's novels?"
Patrick frowned at her non-answer, but decided to follow along. "My mom loved them. She wanted to be the heroine, Davnee; told me she was the kind of woman I wanted to find someday." Shrugging, Patrick grinned. "Mom said I was too young to read them, so I snuck the books with me to school. I had a total crush on the girl in Crystalline Conspiracy."
He was surprised when Robin laughed. "God, is that ever another story for another time." Her expression sobered quickly, however, drawing Patrick's attention back to the serious tone all around them. Speaking low, Robin finally told him what he had wanted to know. He wished she hadn't.
"Everything in those books is real. He...he wrote it to recapture everything. Davnee is my mom, Patrick. Anna Devane. PK Sinclair is Cesar Faison, the man who--"
"He's the one who did all this, wasn't he?" Patrick said in growing horror. "He's the man from your childhood. Your nightmare." Everything made sense, now, and Patrick suddenly felt sick with himself. He didn't blame Lucky in the slightest for hitting him. Patrick had led this crazy spy that everyone was so afraid of directly to Robin. Patrick would punch himself if he could.
"It's okay," Robin said softly. "You were just trying to do something nice."
"And look how royally I screwed that up." Patrick thought about it for a moment, then laughed mirthlessly. "I guess this is why I should never try to be nice to women," he said, desperate to bring a light back to Robin's eye. "When I'm nice, apparently it really is a sign that the world is ending."
It worked. Robin smiled, only slightly, but it was enough for Patrick.
Even in the midst of the chaos around them, Patrick was most concerned with making Robin smile. He didn't care to ponder what that actually meant.
"Are all operatives in place?"
"Yes, sir."
"Good. The target?"
"Acquired. The fog is pretty dense, but field ops is reporting a positive ID."
"Excellent. Is she alone?"
"Unfortunately, we can't confirm that with complete certainty. Based on the intel provided regarding her family, ops isn't prepared to affirmatively state that."
"Very well. Proceed, but with caution. She is to be taken with the minimum necessary force. Injury might prevent her from completing her task."
"Understood. Awaiting your command, sir."
"Yes, of course. You have a go."
