Galerians: Ron
The Hero I Call Dad
A confused Ron was led into the living room by his parents. They sat him down in a chair across from the couch were they sat.
After a moment of uncomfortable silence his father began to speak. "There is no easy way to say this so we'll just say it. We're not your biological parents Ron."
"You have to understand that we love you very much. We couldn't love you more if you were our own flesh and blood. As far as we are concern you are our son and we are your parents." His mother added as she looked at him pleadingly.
So many emotions flooded through Ron in that moment. Anger, resentment, confusion, but most of all hurt. His parents stayed quite as he was absorbing everything. When he finally spoke his voice quivered.
"So I'm adopted?"
"In a matter of speaking." His father told him, not able to meet his gaze.
Confusion became the dominant emotion on Ron's face at his father's comment. "I don't understand. In a matter of speaking?"
His father gripped his mother's hand for support. With a sigh he finally looked up and met Ron's gaze. "I knew I would have to tell you this sooner or later, but it's not something that is difficult to remember.
"Before you came into our lives your mother and I lived in Michelangelo City. Back then my name was Gary Stevens and your mother's was Anna. I was in my mid twenties and worked at Michelangelo Memorial Hospital in genetics.
"Their research department was doing revolutionary things. That was mostly because of Doctor Lem. He would show up every once in awhile with data that would send the senior scientist into a frenzy. No one knew where he got the data. No one cared. I never had access to any of that though.
"I was young and new so I was in a lab researching mostly on cancerous rats, but I still heard the rumours. Rumours that human experimentation was going on. I believed them to be just that, rumours. That was until I accidentally saw a file left on a colleague's desk.
"They had a four year old boy in there and were experimenting on him! They gave him what should have been lethal doses of drugs that stimulate the brain in different ways to various ends! It was sickening! So I decided to do something about it!"
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Gary traveled through the halls trying not to look as nervous as he felt. The upper three floors of Michelangelo Memorial were devoted to genetics research. He only had access to the first of the three where the more publicly acceptable research was done.
Now, however, he was on the third after 'borrowing' Dr. Travers' access card. And by borrowing he means knocking him out, tying him up, gagging him, and locking him in a closet. He still wore his id with his photo on his shirt so he wouldn't look suspicious. It was hospital policy and Travers didn't look anything like him even at a passing glance. He just hoped nobody would look close enough to see the level of clearance he had.
He found the isolation ward quickly, having read over the schematics for the building before even consider what he was now doing. This end of the ward only held one patient so it was easy to find the room he was looking for. As he opened the door he saw a little boy no older than four sleeping on a hard metal bed, a mop of blonde hair fell down his face.
Gary knelt down beside the bed and shook the boy lightly. "Rion. Wake up Rion."
The boy's eyes snapped open and looked at him in fear. He backed as far away from Gary as he could.
"It's alright. I'm not going to hurt you." Gary said as non-threatening and soothing as he could. "I'm going to take you out of here."
Rion stared at Gary's outstretched hand then shifted his gaze to his face. For a moment he just stared and to Gary it seemed like he was staring straight into his soul. Slowly Rion reached out and took the hand.
They didn't make it far before a guard stopped them. It was one thing for a researcher to be walking around here this late at night, someone was burning the midnight oil almost every night, but one going somewhere carrying the subject in his arms was not going to go unnoticed.
"Where are you going with subject G6?"
"I'm taking him to the testing room." Gary told the guard simply. Inwardly he was glad that the boy in his arms was placed in such a way as to hid the clearance portion of his id and leave the photo to be seen. The guard didn't even consider he didn't have the clearance to be here.
"Oh really?" Then again.
"I'm doing these test under the direct orders of Dr. Lem. If you wish you can call him and confirm. I'm sure the director of the facility would be glad to be called in the middle of the night for such a trivial matter."
When in doubt, use what you know people fear. And in this place that was Lem. The people he had fired from this department have been known to disappear. The look on the guard's face showed he had no desire to risk being next.
"That won't be necessary. Everything seems to be in order here. Carry on."
Gary thought he was home free after that. He wasn't stopped once as he made his way to the elevator with Rion. Of course good luck tends to run out. As they reached the elevator the doors opened. Lem's personal SWAT team poured from inside and trained their weapons on him and the boy.
Gently putting Rion down, Gary stepped in front of him and stared down the heavily armed men as the leader stepped forward and spoke.
"I'll admit it Doc. I'm impressed a geek like you was able to get this far, but it's over. Give us the boy"
"Like hell!" Gary exclaimed.
"For the love of… it couldn't be the easy way!" The leader said as he roughly shoved Gary aside and grabbed onto Rion. He didn't think Gary had the balls to come right back at him with all these guns pointing at him. He was wrong.
The leader lost his grip on Rion and was knocked on his ass clutching his broken nose. Gary didn't have anytime to celebrate the small victory as one of the guns went off. He felt the searing pain as the bullet tore through his shoulder and came out the other side, the impact driving him to the ground.
Rion stood there looking down at the man who had tried to rescue him, blood from his wound beginning to puddle on the floor. He looked up at the group of men who had caused it. They were the same group he had seen at his home when his parents were killed.
"No rescue for you kid. You're stuck here for…" He was cut off as the air around Rion began to crackle with energy and he waved both arms sharply to the sides. Flames enveloped all of the soldiers and their screams filled the air. Seconds later they collapsed to the ground dead.
Gary stared up at Rion in amazement and fear. But when Rion looked at him he looked so vulnerable and afraid that any fear he had of the boy was quickly replaced with worry for his safety. Parental instincts he didn't know he even had kicking in.
The adrenaline boost from all that was happening lessened the pain slightly. Very slightly. But that was moot at the moment, they had to get out of here. He gritted his teeth and pulled himself up with his good arm. Taking Rion's hand they entered the elevator. They made it out of the rest of the building without incident.
---------------0010100---------------
"After that your mother and I contacted a man that could make people disappear so they could make a fresh start somewhere else. It wasn't legal, but we weren't exactly in a position to be picky. A friend of ours in the NSA had used him before and we got the name from them. We never told them why we needed to disappear though. Lem was very thorough in covering up the escape. He couldn't have anyone poking around the labs.
"When we came to Middleton we all took on new identities. They were close to our originals in that we kept the same initials to help us memorize them quicker. I became Greg Stoppable, your mother Amy, and you Ron."
Ron looked across at his parents astonished. "You… you gave up everything to save me?"
"Of course we did." His mother told him as she reached over and took his hand. "And we don't regret it for a second!"
"I've been having these really strange nightmares lately." Ron admitted. "But they aren't nightmares are they? I remember seeing Dr. Lem kill my birth parents."
His father looked over at him worriedly. "I had a feeling as much."
"There's more. I had a dream about a girl named Lilia. Is she real too?"
"Lilia?" His father thought for a moment. "The only Lilia you would have known at that point would have been Lilia Pascalle. She'd be your age now. Your fathers were partners and pretty famous in Michelangelo City. Dr. Steiner and Dr. Pascalle created the computer system that runs the whole city. Even after all these years the Dorothy system is still state of the art."
"Is she still alive?" Ron asked, though in his gut he already knew.
"I don't know. Her family disappeared the day before Dr. Lem got to yours."
"Dr. Lem!" Ron spat turning away from his parents. "All of that pain is because of him! All these thing I'm starting to do are because of him!"
After a moment he collected himself and turned back to his parents with a sigh. "Why now? If I've had this power all along, why now?"
It was his mother who answered. She had been a psychologist in her old life and had a pretty good idea as to why. "You don't get embarrassed easily. You never get truly angry. Did you ever wonder why? It was your subconscious's way of keeping your power dormant. It seemed to be caused by emotional outburst. Something must have happened to break through your barriers."
Realization dawn on Ron as a name crossed his lips. "Lilia. She's alive. If it were just a dream I wouldn't have seen her as she is now, my age. I would have seen her as my early memories remember her. Whatever she did to contact me, that could be what did it."
A long silence followed as everyone sat, consumed by their own thoughts. After several minutes Ron suddenly got up and left the room. When he came back down he had a duffle bag with him. Both his parents stood and met him at the door.
"You're going after Dr. Lem." His father stated simply, having already figured something like this would happen.
Ron just nodded. "And Lilia. She asked for my help. She's scared of something. If there is anything I can do I have to help her."
"There's nothing I can do to talk you out of this is there?"
"No."
"Alright." His father said reaching into his pockets. He pulled out a set of keys and tossed them to Ron. "Take the car."
"Be careful." His mother added not bothering to hide the tears in her eyes anymore. "And come back to us."
"I will. I promise."
He headed for the door. As he was about to leave Ron suddenly turned back and enveloped both of his parents in a warm embrace. "I just want you to know I love you and that no matter who I used to be I am still your son."