Day 72 of 100

Volume 2, Chapter 36

BREACH EARTH, SLOW QUARTER
(ARGUS designation)

MANY YEARS AGO

HOME OF HENRY HEYWOOD

He would not say their life was an ordinary one in any way that would insinuate he was not satisfied by it. Quite the opposite, Henry Heywood could not imagine his life with his wife and son being any better than the way it was now. His work satisfied him, but not nearly so much as coming home to his family did. He would drive home already thinking about what new story his boy Hank would tell him about that day.

But then there came a day that changed their completely normal lives forever.

One day he came home to find his wife concerned over the fact that Hank had not come home from school yet. He was thirteen by then, and Henry hadn't thought too much of it. He was in all likelihood off somewhere hanging out with his friends. He knew what time to get home for dinner, or to call if there was anything at all holding him back from returning.

Only time passed, and still there was no sign of Hank. Henry tried not to appear concerned, so not to make his wife worry any more than she already did. He went out to look for him. He checked with his friends and none of them had seen him. He checked any place he might have been, but still nothing. Finally, he started for home again, wondering how he would tell his wife…

He stopped his car, as he had just spotted the familiar form of his son walking slowly up the street. He got out, ready to give him the talking to of his life… But then just as he called out to him, Hank turned around. He looked so stunned as he ran into his father's arms, Henry didn't know what to say. There was something about him that looked different, too, but he couldn't put his finger on it.

It wasn't until after they'd returned home, where Hank had been embraced within an inch of his life by his mother, that Henry finally got the story out of him. At first, he didn't believe a word of it. Hank claimed he had been to another world… for weeks.

The way he said it, he'd been coming home from school when he saw something very strange. Somewhere ahead of him, there was something like a hole in the world, and through that hole, he could see people and objects, moving so very fast, so fast that he could barely keep up looking at them. Hank hadn't known what to make of it, so he'd approached, and he'd reached out his hand… and then the next thing he knew, he was on the other side.

He had lost his way before long, and after that he couldn't find his way home again. When he'd gone to their house, other people lived there. He'd ended up getting taken in by child services. No matter how many times he told them his name, date of birth, his parents' name, his address, his school, it was all as though he did not exist. They thought he was lying, that he wouldn't tell them the truth. They had put him in foster care until they could sort him out. All this time, he'd tried to get back here, until finally he had found the place where he had first appeared and finally he'd seen it… a hole in the world, where everything moved very slow. He had walked through again, and now here they were.

"Son, you've only been gone a few hours, you…" But looking at him now, he could just sort of see it. He looked older. Not by years, no, but he was a growing boy, it only took weeks and months for him to look so different and…

In time, Hank had been able to prove even more that what he said was true. And in the months to follow, he would discover other holes like the one he'd first found, leading him to many other places. Some were good, some were terrifying. He had ended up in one place when he was fifteen, coming back with some sickness in him. The way he told it, the air was choking him and he'd turned right back. Henry would keep his son's secret, even from his wife. It didn't have to change their lives, although the existence of other worlds… Maybe someday he could try and follow Hank on one of these adventures.

X

MAIN EARTH, THE CITY BENEATH THE BREACH

PRESENT DAY

ARGUS HEADQUARTERS

His record spoke for itself. He didn't know what these people had expected to happen, or how they would have used this information if he hadn't gotten ahead of it and spoken to his superiors, but it was over. He had told the truth about his family, and his grandson's involvement in the kidnappings. And when all was said and done, he was told to keep doing what he was doing, and to attempt to the best of his abilities to find those people and to apprehend his grandson and his partner. Henry assured them that was precisely what he would do.

Even though he had handled the situation, deep down he still felt well in the thick of it. Nate was out there. He had kidnapped three people, would possibly take more of them before this was over… He didn't know if they were hurt, or even alive… He didn't want to think about his grandson taking anyone's life, but at this point what did he know? The man was a stranger to him, just as he would be to him.

He had to put this out of his mind. From this point on, all he had to think about was that his city was overrun with breachers intent on causing trouble, that several quarters of Breach had been attacked or were under threat of attack, and that several people had been kidnapped, possibly with the intent of causing even more distraction on top of everything else happening all at the same time. That one of these kidnappers was related to him could not and would not matter any more than anything else.

X

BREACH EARTH, HAVEN QUARTER

MANY YEARS AGO

HOME OF HANK HEYWOOD

He had not wanted to let his son go. Especially now, with his wife dead and buried, he couldn't imagine seeing the last of his family leave him behind. But he also knew that Hank needed to follow his heart. He'd met a girl, he was in love… And seeing how theirs was the only one that ran at such a slow pace, how could he keep allowing himself to make leaps back and forth in these different speeds? In the end, Henry could only give him his blessing, and a request that he would visit.

It wasn't long that he realized visits would be made complicated by their circumstances. But it could be dealt with. By now, Henry knew a lot more about this world they lived in. He had a new vocabulary for this thing he had been aware of since his son was thirteen. There were no holes in the world but breaches, and these other worlds were called quarters… and there was another Earth. He had learned all this after he'd found his way to the ARGUS outpost and started working there.

Thanks to this position, he had access to a dedicated crossing point, a breach that would take him to this quarter where his son and his daughter-in-law would make their home. They called it Haven. The first time he had visited, the time before this one, his son's wife was about to give birth to their child, a boy, they'd learned. Henry could not wait to meet this grandchild, as strange as it was to think that it could all be happening so fast. Hank had grown up so fast – literally – and now looked more like his brother than his son. But he was used to this difference in time by now.

Still, it was not as easy when, upon his arrival today, he found that his grandson had not only been born but, in the time since his last visit a few months ago in his time, the boy had aged two years. Little Nathaniel had been shy to approach the stranger who said he was his grandfather. And there was something else, too. As he learned that day, his grandson had to be careful. There was a sickness in his blood. He was a hemophiliac. Hank was certain it could have come from him, from the one time he'd ended up in Mist, but Henry reassured him it likely had nothing to do with this.

"Dad," Hank had told him, as they sat together, shortly before Henry's return to Slow. "We were talking," he started hesitantly, looking back to his wife back inside the house. "We think it might be best… The thing is, Nate might not… He won't understand, the way you're not…" Hank had struggled with the explanation, but Henry stopped him. He knew where he was going.

That was the last time he saw his grandson. He kept in touch with his son, though even this became more and more rare, even after he transferred out of Slow.

X

MAIN EARTH, THE CITY BENEATH THE BREACH

PRESENT DAY

ARGUS HEADQUARTERS

Despite the sacrifices required for it, the entire thing had been much too easy. Two agents cornered, knocked out, and stripped of their uniforms later, and they had been able to sneak their way into the building. The 'sacrifices' involved here were that they'd both had to leave behind their respective weapons – so not to draw much unwanted attention on to themselves – before coming anywhere near the building.

It would have been considered unwise, playing with fire… Nate would have said he happened to like playing fire, that it was kind of 'his thing.' Even then, he had to admit, the reason why he and Raymond both had decided to sneak into the place was a tiny bit stupid and reckless, but then neither of them cared. They were just curious to see what was happening in there. And also, maybe… They'd been told they couldn't go into Haven, and they hadn't… but no one had said anything about not looking in on the place from somewhere outside of Haven. Where else could they do that?

It was chaos. All around them, wounded agents were being tended to, while others continued to monitor various breacher crossings across the city, dispatching their people to deal with it all as soon as possible. Nate looked on to this and thought how, in a different life, he might have been all too glad to jump into the fight, if only to knock some heads around and…

"You two, in here," a man suddenly addressed them. Nate and Raymond turned to see another uniformed man looking at them. By the looks of him, he was ranked higher than the two poor saps whose clothes they'd stolen. There was something strangely familiar about this man, but Nate couldn't explain why. All he knew was that it looked as though they might be very close to being busted, and they had to find a way out of it. With any luck, this man did not know all of his agents by face.

With little else to do, they had gone into the room they'd been pointed toward. Nate had gone in first, followed by Raymond. But then all at once, the high ranked man struck Raymond on the back of the head with his gun, sending him tumbling to the ground even as the gun was now turned to be aimed directly at Nate's face. He didn't move.

"On your knees, hands behind your head," the man said as he shut the door. Nate considered his options. "Now, Nathaniel." He froze. He knew his name. How did he know his name? "Knees." So he did as he was told. Cuffs clicked around his wrists. He was pushed on to a chair. "Of all the times for you to show up like this…" the man was saying as he now moved to cuff the unconscious Raymond. "The agents who belong to these uniforms, alive?"

"Who the hell are you?"

"My name is Henry Heywood. I'm the director of ARGUS and I am also your grandfather."

X

MAIN EARTH, THE CITY BENEATH THE BREACH

A FEW YEARS AGO

ARGUS HEADQUARTERS

In his wildest dreams, all those years ago in Slow, he would never have imagined this. He, Henry Heywood, was just named Director of ARGUS, on a whole other Earth than the one where he had been born, in a place designated Slow Quarter. But here he was. The first time he had stepped into his office and taken a seat at his desk, the first thought he'd had… Hank… Nathaniel… He was now on a different Earth than them, but then for a long time he might as well have been on an entire other planet that wasn't Earth for how much they had to do with one another.

Henry understood the reasons why Hank had made the choice he'd made, but still a part of him couldn't help but feel as though he had been abandoned.

Now he was here, and he wondered… Would there ever be a chance for him to connect with his grandson? He knew at least that Hank and his wife had no other children beyond Nate, but he had last seen the boy as a toddler, and now he had to be a grown man… Before he knew it, and in what might have been considered an abuse of power, he had turned to his computer and done some research. Being Director of ARGUS, he had access to databases across all the quarters of Breach, including Haven, where his son and his family…

He did find out some things about his grandson that day… things he now wished he didn't know. In the years since he'd been that small boy who'd sat happily on his knees, he had grown up into… a criminal. He was in prison.

Henry had closed the search at once, erased any trace of it. He didn't know what to do, he didn't know… Hank had never mentioned any of this, and it was no wonder. Was this why he'd been so distant in recent years? He wanted to reach out to him, he wanted… He didn't know what, but… No. He couldn't. Not now. He hated that it was true, but he was. For everyone's best interest, he just had to stay away… just as he'd always done.

X

PRESENT DAY

For several minutes they sat in silence facing one another. Nate didn't want to believe a word the man said, because it sounded ridiculous. Considering everything he had seen and done in recent days it might have been a strange notion, but there were still limits to what a man could believe, and this… this he could not believe. Except… now that he'd said it, all he could think was he looks like Dad again and again. He was almost sure he'd seen pictures of this man before, too. He wasn't about to show that he believed him though.

They were in trouble. They weren't supposed to come here. Once it got back to Vandal, and he had no doubt it would get back to him, oh they would be in big trouble. Most any other time he wouldn't have worried himself over this all that much, but Vandal Savage was not the kind of guy to take lightly, he'd learned that very quick.

When this man, his 'grandfather,' started to speak, he went about laying out his history, how he'd been from Slow Quarter, how his son, Nate's father, was a breach hopper, who'd fallen in love with a Haven girl, how they had fallen out of touch because of the issue of the 'time difference' and how it would grow confusing… how he was aware of his criminal history. The whole time, Nate just stared at him, channeling as much disbelief as he could, even though everything he said made sense. And then he said how he believed the entire reason Nate had been called on to this job he was caught up in was so that it would make trouble for him at ARGUS.

He hadn't wanted to give any sign of breaking, but hearing this, he paused. In the back of their minds, both he and Raymond had wondered how on Earth Vandal and his people had chosen the two of them out of anyone in any quarter or either Earth to be part of this. As much as they could say their reputation preceded them, when it got down to it… what 'reputation' did they really have? But then if this man was really his grandfather…

"Before you get any ideas, I'll point out that I have already informed the higher ups about our relation, and it's all been cleared. So let's turn to another subject of interest. Zari Tomaz. Ronnie Raymond. Kendra Saunders." Nate sat up, but still he said nothing. "You can deny it all you want, but we have surveillance and witnesses to the fact that you and Sleeping Beauty here, aka Raymond Palmer, are responsible. Tell me where they are, and we might be able to cut you a deal."

Nate stared at him, stared at Raymond unconscious on the ground. He looked back to Director Heywood and he shook his head. The look on the other man's face, the overpowering disappointment… If he didn't already have to believe they were family, that would have done it.

"I'll have security escort you to a couple holding cells, maybe some quiet time will jog your memory." Just like that, the director walked out, leaving the two of them sitting – and lying – there, to contemplate just how royally they'd screwed up… all because they cared about their home, and about their families back in Haven.

TO BE CONTINUED (tomorrow, in volume 1)