The Lies That Blind III: The First Pull By Donna
She heard the screams first. She looked around and saw Catherine Parker on a table, giving birth. Just as she had seen on the video, Dr. Raines was at the foot of the table, awaiting the child's arrival. She shuddered again at the thought of Dr. Raines delivering her. After he had handed the first baby off to a nurse, he turned back to the woman on the table and told her there was a problem with the second child. She saw the pain in her mother's eyes and heard her anguished cry as she was told that the child had been stillborn.
She called out to her mother.
"He's lying, mom! He's not dead!"
Her words had no affect. She tried to move to her mothers side, but found that her feet would not cooperate. She looked over at the nurses.
"Tell her the truth! Tell her that Raines is lying to her!"
Again, there was no response.
She turned towards the door where Raines and the nurse carrying her brother had disappeared. This time, her feet moved and she followed them.
When the door slammed shut behind her, there were no signs of them. In fact, there was no sign of anyone. The corridor was silent and black, the walls scorched from the heat of a horrific blaze. She turned around, but the room she had just left was in the same condition.
She heard a soft sound and looked down. There, at her feet, was a basket. She knelt down and pulled back the soft pink blanket to find a small baby.
Even though Parker had never seen her child, there was no doubt in her mind about the identity of the baby.
"Catherine?"
The little girl opened startlingly blue eyes and laughed in delight at the woman standing over her.
She chose to interpret that as an affirmative.
Gently, she lifted the small bundle and cradled her close. She was surprised at how natural it felt and how much she enjoyed the soft scent of baby powder.
"This is no place for you, sweetheart. Don't you worry, though; Mama's going to get you out of here someplace safe and sound."
She was delighted by an answering "coo" and a toothless smile.
"Angel?" her father's voice called out, starling her out of the warm moment.
He called again, sounding closer this time.
She couldn't let him see the baby. She looked around frantically for some place to hide her. Over in the corner, she spied a cardboard box, somewhat scorched but still intact and with cover in place. She rushed over and opened it. It contained several files in red jackets. She pushed them aside and carefully laid the precious bundle next to them.
"Please, sweetie, be very quiet. We can't let your grandfather see you."
She replaced the lid, stood and turned just as her father came around the corner.
"Ah! There you are, Angel. Didn't you hear me calling you?"
"I'm sorry, Daddy. I was just looking at all the fire damage. It's amazing that anyone survived."
"That doesn't concern you, Angel. There is something I need your help with."
"Oh?"
"The Centre wants me to provide them with…"
He looked past her and noticed the box sitting in the corner.
"Ah, yes…" He walked over and picked it up. "This will do nicely."
She moved to intercept him, but he sidestepped her and handed the box to a figure standing in the shadows.
"Daddy!"
"You've got to trust me, Angel. I'm only doing what I think is best for you. You take care of me; I take care of you. Remember?"
She strained to look past him, keeping a panicked eye on the box and it's precious cargo.
"It's better this way."
She looked back at the man gripping her arms to discover not her father, but Lyle now standing in front of her.
"I mean, look at how well the Centre did with me, Sis."
From around the corner, she heard a little girl's voice, calling for her mommy.She pushed him away and started running down the corridor after the shadow. She could hear her daughter crying just ahead, but couldn't seem to catch up to them. From an overhead speaker, another voice spoke up.
Jarod's voice.
"Don't bother. You'll never catch her. But that's all right. She's probably better off without you anyway. As slow as you've been to figure it out, you'd make a lousy mother for any child, much less a pretender."
She kept running.
His taunt continued.
"You'd make a lousy mother."
"Mommy, where are you?"
"I'm coming!"
"You'd make a lousy mother."
"Mommy!"
"Catherine!"
She sat up in bed, her heart pounding and her body drenched in sweat. She took a deep breath and threw the covers back.
It was only a dream.
She had several hours before she was due at the Centre, but she knew she would never get back to sleep. Instead, she took a long shower and tried to relax. Today was the day she would put her plan in motion. After weeks of planning and working, today she would start tweaking some of the loose threads from her tangled past. Today, she would start making some people at the Centre very nervous.
She looked at the black computer disk lying in the center of her coffee table. It looked nothing like the bomb that she hoped it would be.
If she had done everything right.
If she had covered her tracks as well as she thought.
When the idea had first occurred to her, she discarded it. She knew that she didn't have the computer expertise to pull it off and she hesitated to ask Broots to share the risk. She did, though, ask him a few "hypothetical" questions. When he offered to help with whatever she was planning, she was strongly tempted to accept. In the end, though, she told him that this was something she had to do for herself. She did accept his offer of some basic tutoring and he seemed amazed at how quickly she picked it up. "You keep that up and I'll be out of a job before too long," he said, the worried expression on his face belying his joking tone.
"Don't worry, Broots. I don't think I could stand living in your cyber geek world any better than you could handle reality. You can stay in your virtual world, I'll stay in the real one."
He seemed to find that reassuring.
Between his tutoring and some private research of her own, she had figured out how to carry out her plan. She had even run a couple of tests and the results had been all that she had hoped for.
She was a little disturbed by how easy it seemed to be. Was it because she was doing something wrong or were her own abilities coming out?
The idea was simple.
Just ask the Centre mainframe for some information. She knew she wouldn't get any answers, but she hoped that the questions themselves would raise some flags. The hard part was doing it without anyone knowing that she was responsible. If she had done everything correctly, the little disc in front of her would download her questions where they would wait until a specified time. When the bomb went off, she would be nowhere near a terminal.
This would work.
It had to.
She took a deep breath. There were other angles to this matter and she was determined to explore as many as she could. One of those angles was the trip to Europe with her father the summer Catherine was borrn. It was distinctly out of character for him. He didn't take vacations. He usually worked weekends and holidays. He constantly reminded her of what a busy man he was and how much responsibility he had.
So how did he rationalize spending months in Europe with her? Had he known the truth about her child and hoped that a little time and attention from him would convince her to turn Catherine over to him and the Centre?
She pulled out a box, filled with souvenirs from the trip. She flipped through the box idly, hoping that something would jump out at her. There were ticket stubs from various museums and theatres, postcards showing some of the historic sites they had visited, photos she had taken, and her journal. She picked up the journal and sighed, remembering the days when she had been naïve enough to write things down, believing in the concept of privacy.
She remembered Sidney, presenting her with her first journal, shortly after her mother's death.
"It often helps to sort out your feelings when you put them in writing."
Many a long night had been spent pouring her innermost thoughts, hopes and fears onto the pages of her journal, until she had gotten too old and wise for such things.
Or maybe she hadn't…not completely.
Only a few short weeks ago, she had presented Debbie Broots with her very own journal and pen.
Even her words had echoed Sydney's.
"I know there's a lot going on in your life and it's not always easy to talk about, especially with your dad. Sometimes writing about them helps."
She opened the book and started to read. She skimmed through it, stopping every few pages to read something. It was her journal, her handwriting, but it felt…wrong. She couldn't explain what…the descriptions were exactly as she remembered events…very factual. That was odd…she remembered putting a whole lot more emotion into her writing at that age. And one would think that the hormones of pregnancy would have made her even more so.
She put the book down and stretched, catching a glimpse of the crystal replica of the Eiffel Tower that Debbie had brought her back from Paris. She smiled, thinking about how excited the girl had been showing off her pictures and talking about the trip.
"This is me and dad standing in front of the Arc d'Triumph. You can't see much of it because it's so tall. This is us on the observation deck at the Eiffel Tower. He was so nervous. He kept telling me not to stand so close to the edge…like I was going to fall or something. This one is of us in front of the hotel we stayed in."
Parker sat up suddenly. She looked through the pictures in her box again.
There were pictures of hotels, museums, theatres, sidewalk cafes, beautiful landscapes, monumental castles…but no people that she knew.
No photos of herself or of her father.
No proof that they had actually been there.
She picked up the passport and looked at it. It had all the appropriate dates and stamps and the photo on it was certainly her. But didn't doctors usually discourage travel, especially foreign travel, when you were pregnant?
And the journal. She realized what bothered her about it. Everything was exactly as she remembered it.
Exactly.
On the rare occasions that she had read through some of her old journals, she had been amazed at how different her thoughts were now about the events she had written about years ago. Time had changed her perspective about so many things. So why was this trip so different?
She felt like screaming. She was searching for answers and all she seemed to find were more questions.
She looked over at the clock.
It was time to finish dressing and head to the Centre.
Time to make someone else feel like screaming.
On her way in, she made a brief detour by the cemetery to visit her mother's grave. She knelt in front of the marble marker, tracing the name with her finger. "Mom? It's me. For the last eighteen years, I've thought of this marker as being for two Catherines. I've pictured the two of you in my mind, laughing and playing together like we used to do, you dancing while you hold her and she laughs. Now, I wonder. They lied about your son; did they lie about my daughter, too? Is she with you or is she locked away like her father was? I have to find the truth, Mom. I have to know what really happened, no matter what. Jarod says your voice is inside of me. I hope that's true. Help me find the truth."
She kissed her fingers, then transferred the kiss to the stone.
"I miss you, Mom."
Miss Parker walked into the Centre that morning, attitude in firmly in place. No one would guess that there were elephants tap dancing in her stomach. Once in her office, it was a simple matter of inserting the little black disk into her computer and filing her usual morning reports. She hesitated a moment before hitting the send key. What she was doing could very well change her life forever. It might not be the greatest life, but it was what she knew.
And it was a lie.
She was so tired of lies.
She took a deep breath and pressed the button. It was almost a let down when nothing happened.
'Nothing's supposed to happen…at least not yet,' she reminded herself.
She removed the disk from its slot. It should be harmless now, wiped clean once it had done its duty. But she wasn't going to take any unnecessary risks. In the drawer of an office cabinet waited a heavy-duty magnet she had brought in the day before. She smiled as she put the disk in the drawer, placing the magnet squarely on top of it.
'Wouldn't want that to blow away now, would we?'
Sidney and Broots looked up as Parker stalked into the tech room. "I suppose it would be too much to hope for that you've got something on Jarod?"
Broots jumped slightly and turned to his computer.
"Well, nothing definite…"
"I need definite."
"But there are a couple of pretty good possibilities…"
"Broots, a kitten stuck up a tree or a little old lady standing on a street corner would be good possibilities. I don't need possibilities, I need good solid leads."
"Um…" He frantically studied the monitor, hoping that he would suddenly notice something that hadn't been there a moment before. Anything…
"Well?" She leaned closer. He tried to ignore the sheer power of her presence, but found himself only growing more nervous. Her perfume was a little overwhelming and made it even harder to think.
"Broots!" She snapped her fingers in front of his face.
"Um…no?"
His response was more of a question itself.
"No?" She turned his chair, forcing him to look her in the eye. "It was 'no' yesterday and 'no' the day before and 'no' the day before that. If that's what I wanted to hear, I could just put it on a tape and save you the trouble of coming in. I want results, Broots, and I want them now."
"Parker," Sidney interrupted gently, just as Broots feared he would melt under her icy blue gaze.
"You can't expect him to turn up information that isn't there."
Broots sighed with relief as she turned her attention to the older man.
"I can expect whatever I please. Apparently it's too much to expect competence!"
"He's doing the best he can, Parker. The longer Jarod is out there, the more careful he's becoming about covering his tracks. It won't be long before we lose him completely…unless he wants us to find him."
"Giving up, old man?" she asked with a raised brow.
He smiled and snorted softly. "Of course not. I was just warning you."
"Good. Once your lab rat is back in his maze, I get my life back and everyone will be just a little bit happier."
"Except Jarod," Sidney added, softly.
She decided to ignore his comment, and the pain in her heart. Does it really matter how Jarod feels?
'Of course not,' her head replied. 'He's not like you. He belongs here.'
Her heart answered, 'He's like you could have been…like your daughter may be…do either of you belong here?'
'That's different.'
'How is it different?'
"It just is!"
"'Just is' what?" Broots asked.
She didn't realize she had spoken aloud. Wasn't that a sign of some sort of mental problem…talking to yourself out loud. Maybe she should ask Syd about it later.
She noticed him looking at her, a questioning look on his face.
Or maybe not.
"It just is very difficult to face my father day after day with no progress to report. Especially when Lyle is standing there with that smug sneer on his face."
She looked at her watch.
"Which is what I have to do in about five minutes. I ought to make you tell him."
A panicked expression suddenly covered Broots' face and Miss Parker had to fight the urge to either laugh out loud or check for a puddle on his chair.
"But…But…But…" He choked and sputtered, trying to find the proper words to express his horror.
"I couldn't…I mean…Mr. Parker…He'd kill me…What about Debbie?…You're his daughter…I think it would be better coming from you…I don't think he even knows who I am…"
She interrupted his nervous chatter. "Don't worry, Broots, I won't send you into the lion's den."
He let out a deep breath and smiled slightly.
"At least, not yet," she couldn't resist adding.
He paled again as she leaned close.
"But if you don't have something solid for me when I get back…"
She let the threat hang for a moment before turning to exit the room.
Sidney followed close on her heels.
"It's not nice, teasing Broots that way."
"Who says I'm teasing?"
"Someone who's known you for a very long time."
She stopped and turned to face him. She looked deep into his eyes, almost afraid to see herself as he saw her. After a moment, she smiled. "Thanks, Syd." Her smile, like her mother's, always brought an answering smile from the doctor.
"You're very welcome, Parker, and please remember…"
"I know," she interrupted. She patted his shoulder and walked away.
She stood outside the door to her father's office gathering her courage about her. She had always hated these meetings, having to admit her failure and seeing the disapproving look on his face. Today, though, there was something more. She realized she was angry. Angry at him for having so much power over her, angry at him for the way he had controlled so much of her life, angry for all the times he hadn't been there for her.
And she was angry with herself for caring so much.
In spite of everything he had done and everything she was beginning to suspect that he had done, she still craved his approval.
She still wanted to see his face light up, hear him say "Well done, Angel. I'm very proud of you."
She took a deep breath, knocked and entered.
After several moments, Mr. Parker looked up from his desk.
"Good morning, Angel."
"Good morning, Dad. Lyle."
"From the look on your face, I'd guess you don't have anything new on Jarod," Lyle ventured with one of his obviously fake sympathetic smiles.
"Hey, maybe there is something to those 'twin telepathy' stories," she retorted sarcastically.
"Careful what you say, Sis, or we could end up one of Sidney's projects," he answered back.
"That's okay. If I were to be anyone's 'project' here at the Centre, I'd want it to be Sidney. He's one of the few people here who have earned my trust."
"I'm not sure that's wise, Angel," her father informed her, concern on his face. "Remember, he was the last person to speak with your mother before her…"
He stopped, searching for the right word.
"Murder?" his daughter supplied.
"Accident," he answered firmly.
"Besides, the two of you are far too valuable to the Centre in other ways to waste you on Sidney's research."
"You don't have any new leads on Jarod?" Lyle interrupted, turning the conversation back to its original topic.
She took a seat and looked over at her father, completely ignoring the man standing next to him.
"We have come up with several likely possibilities. At the moment, Sidney and Broots are researching those to come up with the most likely."
"Good. Let me know when you've got him."
Mr. Parker looked down at his desk, effectively dismissing her.
Lyle flashed her a smile and leaned over his father's papers again.
She spoke again. "Actually, Dad, there was something else I wanted to ask you about."
He looked up curiously.
"Remember the summer we spent vacationing in Europe?"
He looked confused for a moment before his face cleared and he smiled.
"Of course, Angel. How could I forget that?"
There was a guarded expression on his face, as though the topic was not one he was very interested in discussing.
She had to admit she also enjoyed the hurt expression that quickly crossed Lyle's face as he was reminded of something else he had missed out on.
"Well, Broots and his daughter just returned from France and she was showing me all of her pictures, so I thought I'd show her some of the ones from when we were over there. It was a little odd, though. There weren't any pictures of us, just scenery and strangers. I thought you might have some other ones, some of the two of us."
He looked away, refusing to meet her eyes.
"Well, you weren't too big on having your picture taken right then, what with…"
He paused and looked over at Lyle.
"I know." She looked at Lyle also. "I had a bit of a weight problem." She looked back at her father. "But I know there must at least one photo of the two of us over there."
"I don't know, Angel. You were pretty adamant, but I'll look and see what I can find. When I have the time."
"Thanks, Dad." She rose. "I should probably get back now."
At that moment, the phone on Mr. Parker's desk rang. He picked it up. Miss Parker waited to see what was going on.
"What? When was this?"
He paused and reached to open the computer on his desk, carefully positioning it where neither of his children could see the screen.
"Yes, I see it. Where did that come from?" Another pause. "How can you not know? Isn't it you job to catch things like that?"
He listened again.
"Well, find out!"
He hung up the phone and stared angrily at the screen.
"Is something wrong, Daddy?" Miss Parker asked innocently.
She started around the desk as if to see what was on the monitor.
He quickly turned it off.
"Nothing to concern you. Either of you. Someone's gotten into the computers." "That sounds like something Jarod would do."
"No, this isn't Jarod's doing."
"You can't be certain. It wouldn't be the first time he's tapped into the Centre system." She looked pointedly at Lyle's hand. "Maybe you should let Broots take a look at whatever's going on."
"Absolutely not. You and your team need to concentrate your efforts on finding Jarod. We have specialists to fix things like this."
The phone on his desk rang again.
"What?" he barked at his secretary.
"The Tower?"
Everyone froze.
"Yes, of course. Put them through."
He paused and listened.
"Yes, it has been brought to my attention."
He listened again.
"No, we don't know where it came from. Knowledge of that project has been kept to a minimum, and those who do know have been carefully checked out."
Another pause.
"Yes, the matter is being investigated thoroughly. Rest assured, we will find out where that came from."
He hung up the phone and looked up at two curious faces.
"Don't you both have work to do elsewhere?"
"Is there anything I can do to help?" Lyle asked.
"No, this is all being handled by people carefully trained to do so. Now, get back to your own work and let me get back to mine."
His face softened slightly. "I'll see you both for dinner tonight."
As they turned to leave, Lyle thought he detected something on his sister's face. A something that made him think that she knew what was going on. He would have to watch her even closer now.
She knew he suspected something, but she really didn't care. She needed to know the truth, and nothing and no one would stand in her way.
Returning to her office, she noticed more people than usual in the corridors, whispering softly among themselves as they drank coffee and stuffed their faces. In her private sanctuary, Broots and Sidney waited for her.
"What's going on here?" Broots asked, his voice barely a whisper.
"I don't know," she whispered back. "Why don't you tell me? Since you're not in your cage, I assume you have something for me." She settled in her chair.
"They shut me down."
"Shut you down? Who? The Internet decency patrol? I've told you to stay away from those kind of places."
"No…what do you mean 'those kind of places'?"
Sidney interrupted. "About five minutes after you left, a sweeper team came into the tech room and told everyone to leave immediately. They said that the system had been breached and everything was going to be shut down for the rest of the day so that it could be checked for problems."
"They wouldn't even let me back up what I was working on," Broots added.
"Interesting," Miss Parker murmured under her breath.
"Well, since we won't be getting anything more done here today, you two might as well go on home."
"Really?" asked Broots.
"Go," she told him. "Take Debbie out of school and make a day of it. Talk to her and listen to her. Let her know she can trust you."
"Thanks!" He turned to leave. "Are you sure it's okay?"
She waved him off.
"Great! There's this really great exhibit at the museum that she's been wanting to see. I was going to take her this weekend but I'm sure it will be much less crowded today. See you both tomorrow!"
He practically ran out the door.
She smiled and shook her head.
'Broots may be a bit of a geek, but he is certainly a great father. Debbie would never have to wonder about him the way I wonder about mine.'
She noticed Sidney looking at her.
"What? Didn't you hear me? Take the rest of the day off. Go play with your lab rats or something."
"Parker, what are you up to?"
"I don't know what you're talking about, Sid."
"You've never been very good at fooling me, Parker. What are you up to?"
She looked down at her lap.
"Up to? I'm not up to anything, Sid."
She noticed a thread hanging from the bottom of her skirt.
"I'm just pulling on a few loose threads."
That night, Parker's dream came again. She called out in her sleep.
"Catherine?"
In her stark room tucked away deep within the Centre, a young woman slept fitfully, dreaming of things she had never known. She turned her head in her sleep.
"Momma?"
In a hotel room half way across the country, Jarod sat staring at the five lines on his computer monitor. Three little data search queries that had sent up red flags in the Centre database.
The first two frightened him a little.
"PRETENDER PROJECT: GENERATION TWO"
"PRETENDER BREEDING PROGRAM"
The third one confused him.
"CATHERINE FAITH PARKER
BORN AUGUST 21, 1980
BLUE COVE, DELAWARE"
Jarod didn't like being frightened or confused. He needed to find some answers.
The End…?