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Chapter 14

I slipped out before Nudge woke up the next morning. I left her a note apologizing for my early departure and excused my actions under the pretense of setting things straight. She'd automatically assume I was talking about my 'parents'. I really mean with the police.

I caught a bus to the station and arrived by seven. I slipped into the busy lobby unnoticed and waited for the man at the front desk to realize I was actually in need of assistance.

When he did I asked for Officer Sheridan. He may have been the asshole that arrested me but he was also the man who could, hopefully, get me what I wanted. And I could always pull the 'you arrested an innocent girl and put her through hell' card if need be. I wasn't above fighting dirty.

When he emerged from the crowded office room and into the slightly less crowded waiting area he seemed surprised to see me. Either that or he was surprised at the state I was in. The dark circles under my eyes testified to the sporadic two hours of sleep I'd gotten the night before.

I was utterly exhausted but resolute in my decision.

"How can I help you Max?" He asked as he led me to his desk and sat down behind it. I sat in the same spot that I'd been handcuffed in three weeks ago.

"I want to do it." I told him. "I want to draw out my real parents. I'll help Agent Tulsin."

Officer Sheridan winced as he looked at me with a gaze I could only identify as sympathy.

"Max," he sighed. "You can't do that."

"Why not?" I demanded. "It's easy. You guys put it out through your connections that I've showed up and bing, band, boom you've got my parents."

"No Max, legally we can't do anything without your parents consent."

"We're trying to find my parents. How can they consent if they don't even know me?" I bit out.

"Your guardians," he corrected himself. "We can't do anything without the Martinez's consent."

"That's bullshit!" I burst out. "They've kept this from me my entire life, how can you expect them to agree to this?"

"I can't. But I have to respect their wishes."

I decided to change my tactic.

"Please," I broke down. Maximum Martinez never begs, yet there I was begging a police officer to throw me a bone. "I want to meet them. I have questions….I need them answered."

I employed my best interpretation of Angel's Bambi eyes as we stared at each other in silence.

"I-I'll go talk to the Chief." Sheridan said at last. "But I can't promise anything."

"Thanks," I sighed, real gratitude coloring my voice.

He got up, his chair squeaking in protest, and headed off towards the back of the station to the room that I'd been escorted to the night before.

I skimmed my eyes around the room, taking in the pleasant buzz of activity as officers chatted, typed, or answered the phone. New people were constantly entering the room while others were leaving. I took in everything from the navy color of the walls to the several windows that brightened up the room.

There were ten desks in the main room I was in. Five on each side and an aisle created between the two sides. Everyone looked content as they worked.

You know, a part of me said, aside from the fact that they continually ruin people's lives, being a cop wouldn't be a bad thing. I'd get to stand up for the little people...I'd get to wear a gun. That does have some perks. But that was just my rebellious teenage side.

And one stupid misfire of a gun and you've labeled yourself a killer. That's just great. Besides, I'm not that sloppy. My other side begged to differ. If Sheradin's desk has anything to say about it...

That's when I realized that most of the officers kept their desks tidy, a drastic difference to the cluttered desk that I sat in front of. As I cast my eyes over Officer Sheridan's desk my eye caught on one of the folders in particular. My mental rant cut off short.

A fresh coffee ring was printed on its front but I'd recognize the thick file anywhere. It was the file the Chief had been holding the night before. The one that contained my parents picture.

Glancing around to make sure that nobody was paying attention to me I slipped my hand over the desk and slid the file towards me.

After another cursory glance I flipped the file open and scanned its contents. The picture of my parents glared at me from the left side where it was paper clipped over the rest of the papers in the file. I flipped the picture up and scanned the document underneath it.

NAME: JEB BATCHELDER

DOB: MARCH 11, 1967

DESCRIPTION: 6'2", THIN, BLOND, BLUE EYES, GLASSES

MARITAL STATUS: MARRIED TO ANNE BATCHELDER AS OF APRIL 24TH, 1989.

CRIME: ILLEGAL GENETIC TESTING AND EXPERIMENTATION ON UNWITTING SUBJECTS. INHUMANE TREATMENT AND DETAINMENT.

FREQUENTED LOCATIONS: GERMANY (EXACT LOCATION UNKNOWN); FLORIDA EVERGLADES; NEW YORK CITY; CALIFORNIA.

LAST KNOWN LOCATION: THE SCHOOL (DEATH VALLEY, CALIFORNIA. BADWATER BASIN)

The sound of a door slamming broke through my investigative haze. My eyes shot up to where I saw Officer Sheridan taking with the Chief, the light glaring off of his bald head. I quickly shut the folder and slid it back in place.

"I'm sorry Max," he said as he took his seat once more. He put his hand over the file and slid it more towards his side of the desk. "I can't do anything. The rules are the rules. If you feel the same way in two months you'll be eighteen and we can go from there. Until then, I'm sorry."

"Yeah, me too." I said as I shot up from my seat and headed out the door. "But rules are meant to be broken," I whispered to myself as I blew out of there.

….

Sneaking into your own home isn't so easy when you have a twelve year old sister with a big mouth.

"Max!" Ella yelled as she caught sight of me trying to sneak up to my room. I glared at her as thundering footsteps came towards us from the living room.

"Thanks Ells," I hissed as my parents rounded the corner. Ella winced in sympathy. Did she know what was going on? Did she know the truth before I did?

"Honey," Mom—I had nothing else to call her— said as she came to the foot of the stairs. She looked awful. Her expression was haggard, the dark circles under her eyes just adding to the effect. Her hair was pulled up into a ponytail, something she rarely did, and her clothes looked like they'd been picked at random, not the careful scrutinization she gave her wardrobe every morning in an attempt to look her best.

Dad looked more or less the same, without the ponytail.

"We need to talk," she finished. "Ella go to your room."

"Why? What's going on?" She demanded. "You guys have been acting weird ever since you got home last night. And you," she spun around on me. "You didn't even come home last night and now…well now you look like you could kill somebody."

Really? All I wanted to do was get to my computer and research 'The School' from my father's file.

But I was always up for a good argument.

I raised an eyebrow at my parents. "You didn't tell her? I guess I should feel relieved that I'm not the only one being kept in the dark."

"What are you talking about?" Ella demanded, her head swiveling between me and our parents.

"Max, leave her out of this." My father warned at the same time.

As much as I wanted to defy him at the moment I didn't want to get Ella involved in our fight. It wasn't something she needed to worry about.

"Ells, I need to talk to Mom and Dad for a minute. Alone. I'll talk to you later." I assured her before heading back down the stairs and pushing past my parents. They followed me to the living room where I stopped and crossed my arms, waiting for their explanation.

"What more do you want us to say, Max?" Mom asked. "We told you everything last night."

"I don't know what I want to hear!" I yelled. "I want you to say something that will help this all make sense! I want you to say you lied at the station and that I'm really yours. I want this all to be one horrible, stressed induced nightmare and when I wake up my worst problem will be passing physics. I want to go back to before the lies." My voice broke as I blinked to keep my burning eyes from shedding tears.

Mom swallowed hard, tears glistening in her eyes as she shook her head. "I'm sorry baby, but we can't go back. What's done is done, what's said is said. All I can say is that we love you so much and we don't care where you came from, only that you made your way to us."

I fought to speak past the lump in my throat. "That's not enough."

….

In the comfort of my own room I flipped open my laptop and opened up the Google search engine.

It wasn't hard to recall the words from my father's file at the police station, I had been reciting the information mentally since I'd read it.

I searched a variety of words relating to 'The School' and 'Badwater Basin' and 'Death Valley' with few results. After an hour of futile googling I typed a new search into the search box: Jeb Batchelder.

Immediately results flooded the page. Articles from newspapers around the country popped up with titles ranging from 'Prodigal Genius' to 'New Advances in the Science Community'.

I scanned article after article getting to know as much as I could about my real father. He was a graduate of Johns Hopkins, he worked at MIT for a few years, he took the lead of his research team when he was only twenty six, he and his wife, Anne, along with their team of scientists, had made progress in their plight for the cure for cancer.

I also found mention of me.

Well, sort of.

One newspaper article briefly mentioned the heartache that was being felt by the Batchelder's as Anne Batchelder gave birth to a still born baby seventeen years before.

They'd covered all the bases. They didn't want anyone to know that they'd gotten rid of me. I'd been completely erased from their lives from the beginning.

Finally I found something of use.

It was a small article talking about tours being given around one of the labs that my father worked at. It was published two years ago.

Today Crucial Cure Lab—also known as 'The School' by many scientists because of its vast wealth of knowledge and continual opportunities to learn—has opened its doors and allowed tours of the facilities for the first time. Now the public can see just what goes into the fight for cancer and how hard scientists work on a daily basis. Jeb Batchelder, one of the head researchers along with his wife Anne, stated that "By introducing the public to our methods we are paving the way to a more accepting and understanding future." Tours are ten dollar a person and run from ten to three on Wednesdays.

I quickly opened another tab and typed in 'Crucial Cure Lab's, California' into the search bar.

A map popped up with a star right over Death Valley California.

"Gotchea," I murmured.

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Peace!