"Where is he Riley?" Mr. Raines circled around the girl standing before him. Pictures lined the walls of the SIM lab and DSA's were being projected on various screens around them, chronicling the work of the best pretender this establishment had seen for the better part of thirty years. Riley stared at the media around her, using her empathic abilities to feel the emotions emitted from each piece of history, trying to find the logic in them, trying to unravel Jarod's psyche. But there was too much of it, it was assaulting her.
"Become Jarod Riley... Where is he...? Where is he going...? Find him Riley." He continued to circle, like a shark.
"I-I can't sir." She hung her head. Empathing with Mr. Raines was easier than pretending with him, but she still could never shake the suffocating feeling that something was very wrong.
Raines hit her, "Yes you can... you have the ability... use it..."
"I-I'm trying." Riley stammered out, trying to ignore the stinging from her split lip.
"If you were really trying Riley, you would have already found him." He wheezed, then trying another tack, "Riley, Jarod killed Mr. Lyle."
"I know sir." She struggled to keep the emotion from her voice.
"Do you even want Jarod brought back?" he asked with disgust.
"Of course I do!" her head snapped up, eyes indignant, lip curled in a stubborn line.
"Then find him."
She dropped back down into the small plastic chair behind her, resting her elbows on her knees and steepling her fingers in front of her, resting her chin on her thumbs. She scrutinized the projector screen in front of her keenly. After a few more minutes of this, of reading a strange blend of either no feelings or too many feelings, as though someone were fiddling with the dials on a radio, going from fuzzy to blaring every half-second, she gave up. She ran her hands threw her hair frustratedly and rubbed at her stinging eyes. "I'm trying sir. I swear-" she answered miserably.
"Trying isn't good enough Riley... Become him and find a way to bring him back where he belongs... If you had found him sooner Mr. Lyle would still be here..."
Hurt washed through her at that thought and she looked up at him wretchedly. "It's my fault... isn't it...?" Guilt and shame burned through her.
"Yes Riley." Raines paused, allowing the negative emotions to thoroughly consume her. "But you can redeem yourself... " he dangled out the promise of hope, redemption. "Bring Jarod back...make him feel pain Riley... he deserves pain... bring him back home."
Riley nodded, her attention fully focused on the information in front of her. She was picking up thousands of feelings at once; sounds and images flashed in her head, memories, dreams, alien experiences that had happened to Jarod. They were suddenly happening to her, but she was detached, so they weren't happening to her at the same time- a myriad of blurry and detailed encounters. Jarod's world went by in flashes of color and sound. She had finally found her center of balance, the key that would allow her to become Jarod. She had found her way in.
A boy was playing with a toy airplane, running past his parents; circling a block building in an office- where are my parents? "Hello my name is Sydney."; refuge Jarod; Cree Craw Toads Foot Geese Walk Barefoot; fear...a dark room, oppressively so... shadows moved in unreachable corners; sweepers standing outside a doorway; I want my mommy and daddy!; can I go outside?; I don't want to pretend anymore!; Where's Kyle?... What happened to him? dark suited men carrying away a scared young boy- "Jarod help me!"; Apollo mission... the door was jammed... "I'm burning! I'm burning!"; "You're a girl!" soft skin... warm smile... "Miss Parker"; i ma ybodon ; Cree Craw Toads Foot Geese Walk Barefoot...; kiss... mint taste... Miss Parker; Miss Parker...Miss Parker...Miss Parker
"Miss Parker..." Riley breathed out, taken aback by the experiences and feelings associated with merely the name.
Mr. Raines stopped his pacing, "What?"
"Miss Parker!" Riley ran to the DSA projector at the back of the lab, rewinding the viewer to the first image of the girl on screen that Jarod was so fascinated with... soft skin... a girl... surprise... kiss... adventure... the frame was frozen on the wall... Miss Parker, Jarod...
"What is it Riley?"
"I-I... I don't know!" Riley said, running her hands through her hair in frustration. "I don't know what it is, but it's something... something important to him... it's something that we can use... at least, I think it is!" She was excited, energized, but was having trouble with the unfamiliar emotions.
"What can we use Riley?"
"It's an emotion, but I don't think that I've ever felt it before... I-I don't know what it is Sir..." More anger and frustration impaled her; What was it! Why didn't she know what it was!
"Describe it Riley." Raines said, though he was already very sure about what the young empath was trying to say. Raines was not all that surprised at Riley's revelation, but he had always imagined that it would have been Sydney. Sydney had always been the weak link in the pursuit of Jarod. But the irony of it was delicious. He would use the hunteress to ensnare the hunted.
"I don't know sir... it's... it's... complex... he would... do... anything... He would do anything for her." Riley said, gaining confidence in her understanding. "I think that if we were to make him believe that Miss Parker were in trouble, he would probably come back to the Centre in exchange for her safety... But I'm not certain... There are other things that he could do if he were given the time to think up a plan of action... The Centre would need to create a situation where Jarod was powerless... like an ultimatum... he'd need to believe that coming back to the Centre was his only choice."
"Well done... The Triumvirate will be pleased that you have reached such a solution Riley...Good job." Raines said, smiling evilly as left the room, giving some instructions to the sweeper outside the doorway as he passed.
All Riley had ever needed was the right motivation.
After Raines had left, Riley slumped with relief. She was still terribly confused by the emotions that she had experienced. She wanted to know what they meant. They had been so different from her experiences. But she pushed the thought away. She had pleased Mr. Raines today, no small accomplishment, and if it meant that Jarod would be brought back to pay, perhaps she could avenge Mr. Lyle.
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Jarod rounded the bend in the road and a smile broke out on his face at the farmhouse that greeted him. A large, southern sun hung low in the sky and lit up the creamy white paint on the home from behind. A gravel drive diverted from the main road and led up to the house and a small barn stood off to one side. The entire scene looked picturesque; it was quaint and had the distinct feel of a home. Jarod had lived hundreds, perhaps thousands of places over the years, but none of them had quite given him the same feeling as when he came here. Jarod exited the vehicle, purposely slamming the door loudly to alert the occupants of this house to his presence. Moments later and Jarod was being enveloped in a vice-gripped hug, the smell of his father's cologne imprinting itself in the back of his mind. The boy, Jarod had yet to find out what to call him, stood on the porch, slightly off to the side, and gave Jarod an odd look. It almost looked like... fear... Jarod knew what that fear was for. He had sensed it in the boy every time he had come to visit his father; the boy was scared Jarod would steal his father, steal away the only stability he had managed to attain. Jarod knew that feeling; he had felt it himself for a short time when he had first found out about the clone. Jarod was still a little ashamed of such feelings, and his logic had been warped while he had them, he knew. His only thought had been, 'why would they ever want me when they can have him; a younger, less damaged copy?' Jarod understood now that there was never any reason to fear. The boy would come around in time. He really couldn't blame him; it was a purely natural reaction for a child who had never had to share anything before in his life, specifically a single person's attention. It was so simple an equation that most people would overlook it; divide one part father, between two parts son, equals half the attention for either.
Jarod smiled at him disarmingly as he headed into the house to outline the situation to his father.
-
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"They did it again!" Major Charles slammed his fist angrily down on the coffee table and stood up to pace the room. "Why can't they just leave you alone!"
Will scoffed inwardly from where he was eavesdropping; the Major didn't understand. To men like Raines, they hadn't taken anything from Jarod; if anything he owed them something. To men like Raines, Jarod was property that had no right to simply up and run away. The Major would never understand that, Will thought, quietly picking himself up from the floor where he had stationed himself and unobtrusively making his way down the hall. He slowly closed the door of his bedroom behind him, holding the knob so as not to attract attention, and flopped down onhis bed. The Centre certainly had done it again, they created another child, not a clone like himself, but a pretender nonetheless. She was a genius, a pretender, an empath, and if his own experiences with Mr. Raines were any indication to go by, a complete whack-job.
And she's coming here.
Upon hearing that Jarod would be stopping by to visit, Will had been elated, but his joy had quickly vanished when he learned why. It only figured that Jarod would need a reason such as this one to check in, it simply never occurred to him that he could actually visit the father that he had searched so desperately for. Jarod was odd like that, he spent all of his time looking for family, and when he finally had it, he dumped them.
You know it's safer this way some inner voice chided him, but he wanted to ignore it, wanted to be angry with Jarod; it was easier than trying to like him, easier than trying to ignore the fact that he didn't particularly like the man he might become. Will shook himself from that train of thought, he didn't want to try to psycho-analyze himself, looking for the reason for his negative emotions towards Jarod; they didn't make sense, and would probably only reveal some weakness within himself which he wouldn't want to face. He turned his thoughts instead to the girl who would be coming, what would she be like? He himself had arrived at the farm with enough problems to keep psychiatrists busy until rapture.
I might want to suggest to Dad that we stock up on some more sleeping pills. He smiled grimly as he thought of his own frequent nightmares. Tylenol P.M.; America's favorite babysitter.