Disclaimer: See Chapter 1 for the usual disclaimers and cautionary.
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Epilogue
By Callisto
Ethan was very happy to at last have his sister near him. Her resemblance and connection to Catherine Parker, their mother, along with their shared gift gave him a greater sense of belonging than he had anticipated. He finally had the opportunity to get to know his sister and the siblings spent many hours together talking and forging a lasting bond. Ethan expressed a curiosity about his other half-brother, Miss Parker's twin. She was forthcoming if not a bit hesitant with her answers as she told her youngest brother about her demented twin. When her face darkened and the ever-present sadness in her eyes deepened, Ethan decided that he would wait awhile before sharing with her what the voices told him about her twin. The voices informed Ethan that Lyle too shared their inner sense and explained why he wasn't a threat to any of them.
Jarod was relieved to have her with him and away from the Centre. Just as Norah had predicted, he was determined that she should remain with him and he was willing to do whatever was necessary to convince her that their developing relationship was best for them both. The dreams that had formed in his mind since his escape reasserted themselves in his imagination. He had seen several happy families, had put a few of them back together again after circumstances had driven them apart. Seeing so much devastation followed by the hopeful joy on the faces of the reunited families made him more determined than ever to find his own family, but caused another sensation. He wanted to create a family of his own, however his ties to the Centre, along with the holes his captivity had created in his childhood were difficult to overcome. He was either a source of incredulous pity or the victim of countless misunderstandings regardless of how explicit his explanations—there were always a few things he felt necessary to conceal. This had caused unforeseen friction and frustration in his personal relationships. It was a problem that didn't exist with Parker; he was in love, knew it, faced it and accepted it. He could easily relate to her because of her intelligence and the fact that he knew her from childhood. Their shared hopes, dreams and struggles confronting the pain from many of the same lies, encouraged his deepening interest, strong attraction and ever-growing lust.
Parker finally found the love her mother promised. Jarod was a pretender, no question but in her eyes he was simply the man she loved and she was committed to making their relationship work. Being removed from the Centre for good, released all the pressure, frustrations, expectations and anxiety that had been building up inside of her. She knew it had been prudent to keep the fact she was involved in a healthy relationship to herself while she remained at the Centre. This time she wouldn't be too late in making up her mind to commit only to find the man she decided to make a part of her life, lying in a pool of his own blood on her front porch. Jarod was a keeper, extraordinarily intelligent, interesting, a considerate, passionate lover, and caring companion. She had always been attracted to him, but her love for him came from a deep sense of gratitude. He could have phoned her when Sydney asked him to talk to her or worse yet, he could have ignored Sydney's request dismissing his mentor's worries as nothing more than the long awaited appearance of her comeuppance.
She surprised herself by wanting him and wanting to be with him. It was almost a foregone conclusion that they would want children, but her early childhood training insisted that they would have to marry before having any children. Ian's existence while precious, didn't count since the blood tests Jarod performed confirmed her suspicions; Ian was a product of Raines' tinkering with their genetics.
Jarod and Parker happily continued their relationship and they became more comfortable with their mutual affection and intimacy. Both avoided revealing the fact they had fallen deeply in love with each other. It took Ethan, who was normally patient and indulgent to reach the point of eye rolling disbelief to make them admit to the truth. A few weeks after Parker and Ian came to live with them, Ethan decided he had seen enough. He stood quietly in front of them refusing to utter a word, as they looked up at him in growing puzzlement after his hovering presence interrupted their light bantering over Ian's education. Ethan tossed two small ring boxes in their laps.
"You two are killing me with suspense, so I decided to cut to the chase for you. You're in love with each other, get married and give me another nephew or niece," he announced with a wide grin.
They looked down at the gifts he gave them and opening the boxes they found matching puzzle rings, hers had a diamond affixed in the middle. Shocked into silence, Jarod looked from Ethan to Parker and shrugging said, "we already made up our minds, the only delay was trying to anticipate what your reaction would be."
Ethan threw back his head and raised his hands in frustrated defeat. He was beginning to think that living with them was going to cause his hair to turn gray prematurely.
Outside Cambridge, MA
They had finally arrived at the house. Ethan's skills were remarkable and coupled with some input from Parker they were both able to hone in on the location of Jarod's mother. Jarod had waited for this moment for over 35 years, now he was finally on the brink of meeting his mother.
As he hesitantly exited the car, he looked nervously back at his new family. He was consumed with anxiety; he wanted them to accompany him but both his wife and brother steadfastly refused. This was his moment and no matter how close they had become, they wanted him to embrace and see his mother without any distractions or interruptions. He tentatively climbed the stairs of the fashionably renovated house and rang the bell. Smoothing his hands over the cream-colored silk shirt and expensive black slacks that Parker insisted on buying him, he took a deep breath. A young girl answered the door. He stood on the stoop and talked with her for a few agonizing seconds before the siblings watching from the car saw him enter the residence.
The reunion with his mother was poignant. They cried, hugged and stared at each other. Jarod couldn't recall ever being called 'baby' so much and grinned happily at his mother. They spent the rest of the day talking non-stop. The only pause came when their stomachs started growling and they prepared and ate their first meal in decades together.
The next day Jarod woke up early, he had spent the night at his mother's house. Grabbing his cell phone, he dialed the hotel where his family were staying, it had been settled between mother and son that his family would reside with her for the duration of their stay. Parker was still a bit nervous at meeting Margaret, but after the initial awkwardness was broken with the now hackneyed comment, "you look exactly like your mother." Parker smiled and relaxed. They stayed a month with his mother while making reunion arrangements with his father, Emily and the boy—now referred to as Jason.
The Centre
Blue Cove, DE
Several months after Miss Parker's successful break with the Centre, Raines sat in the Chairman's seat and brooded. He had given everything to the corporation: His life, his marriage and all his goals. He had even swapped sperm and blood samples with his brother in the bodily fluids section. The sample Broots had tested wasn't Mr. Parker's but instead Raines. It was anticipated that Miss Parker would eventually begin to question her origins and measures had to be taken to keep her off balance while plans for her transition as a fully corrupt Triumvirate member were being completed. When his brother, Mr. Parker had been in control, the Centre enjoyed unprecedented success as well as failure when Jarod escaped, with Miss Parker the Centre ran like a well-oiled machine. Raines' tenure was already fraught with dissention, fractiousness and capped off by the escape of Miss Parker. Willie's mysterious death caused a frustrated anger within him more than he could have anticipated; he didn't particularly care about his favorite sweeper's death but it was yet another example of the inconveniences and unnecessary hardships that were plaguing him.
One example of his continued hardships; was the unexpected and destructive incursion into the labs located at the Dover facility. Mr. Parker, with Raines' hearty approval had moved Master Parker to Dover soon after the child's birth. Two weeks ago there had been a break-in to the facility, which resulted in the destruction of all the reproductive, material stored there. Plans were well underway to create another child when this incident occurred. Now the Centre no longer had any raw sperm samples from Jarod or the few reproductive eggs obtained from Miss Parker. The potential 'babies' had all been destroyed as Angelo had hoped. Samples from the currently held pretenders had to be harvested again. Raines had no doubt who the culprits were but his efforts to capture them never fully got off the ground. Curiously, the Triumvirate issued orders to suspend any further searches for the fugitives. All his calls to the separate members went unanswered and his queries were summarily ignored.
The Triumvirate took Miss Parker's rejection better than Raines could have hoped. Her absence left him with the remnants of bitter and sharp disappointment. Briefly Raines toyed with the idea of using Sydney to lure back the wayward Pretender, Miss Parker and their child but he was rudely recalled to reality when Lyle, who was needed to play an important role in Raines' plot, reminded him that there would be no one else as knowledgeable to run and maintain the Pretender program. Sydney was the only psychiatrist in the world with the expertise to effectively handle such mental brilliance in a manner that suited the Centre.
As for himself, Lyle was secretively glad that his twin sister made a successful run for freedom. Without her at the Centre, it was just a matter of time before the Triumvirate would acknowledge his bloodline, potential and importance. With some careful maneuvering he would continue to keep everyone in the dark about the emergence of his mother's gift. Like his half-brother and twin, he too inherited Catherine Parker's inner sense; unfortunately it was as warped as the rest of him. Raines' early machinations on Lyle's mind and emotional make-up twisted and for the most part buried his gift. After he met his twin, Lyle slowly began to realize he had the ability to feel her in his mind without needing to be in her presence. More troubling was the fact that he was certain, with a little concentration; he would be able to locate her.
Lyle was fully aware of the destructive tendencies that swam just beneath the surface of his own iron control. He had no intentions of hunting down his twin and dragging her back in shame to the waiting arms of the Centre and Triumvirate. For his own selfish reasons, he needed and wanted her to stay alive and healthy. He wanted for himself, whatever the Triumvirate wanted from her; he felt it would only take a little convincing to get them to give him another chance. Besides, since his twin's appearance and his understanding of her importance to his psyche, the unholy urges that used to plague him and eventually drive him to torture, murder and worse had been kept at bay. Without her stabilizing presence in his mind he would descend quickly into his hellish urges. He fully intended on keeping the status quo as it had been established and though Raines had trained and honed him to his current state of readiness, there was no need for anyone to become aware that Lyle had found an unexpected, new form of self-control.
Sydney continued the modifications to the Pretender project that Parker started. He had also completed his study of the remaining inmates and with some help from Parker's sweeper Sam; Sydney began contacting the incredulously happy families who had all but given up hope of finding their kidnapped children. He began making surreptitious arrangements for the return of the more neglected, discarded souls. Syd had a plan to continue his efforts and free as many of them as possible and with the help of both Bryan and Norah he found a means to cause confusion and inefficiency whenever Raines made plans on kidnapping any more potential subjects.
For their part, Jarod and Parker became terrorists of a sort. Their main and only target was the very corporation which had conspired, plotted and been used against them most of their lives. Using the access and password codes Angelo obtained for them, Jarod, trusting Parker's uncanny inner sense timing, frequently erased important information, deleted emails and obtained important information on the current status of Centre endeavors. It wasn't too long before the Triumvirate was forced to concede that their most profitable corporation had been irreparably compromised and they could ill-afford to allow it to continue to operate.
As Parker had predicted to Broots, Sydney was still too important for them to threaten and kill. Broots on the other hand was enjoying anonymous success in Houston. He eventually became the chief technical officer at a cutting edge software firm. His love life improved dramatically also and when he was able to have a package secretively delivered to Sydney, it contained a picture of him and a woman whose face showed a gentle kindness. Sydney was truly happy for him and added this picture to the ones that were fast cluttering a shelf in his bookcase devoted to his friends and family. He placed Broots' picture next to one of a happily contented looking Jarod and Parker holding a fuzzy-haired infant between them and leaning on his mother's knee, a precocious looking 4 year old who bore a strong resemblance to Parker and grinned with the same mischievous smile that Jarod frequently sported.
~Fin~
(I hoped this story entertained everyone who read it!! Thank you to everyone who read and reviewed )