Chapter 3
Seagulls and Chess
A/N: ASL: American Sign Language.
If anyone is confused about the content, it's about 20 years after the books take place. Frank's resigned from his position in the Network and they want to know why. And Nancy Drew and Joe Hardy want to know how and why Frank's missing...
btw, The Prisoner was a British TV series that aired in 1968 and 1969, involving a man (Secret Agent Man) who resigned from his top-secret government job. Except now he's in a place called the Village where they are trying to find out why he resigned.
A pleasant-sounding klaxon brought the man who called himself Frank Hardy out of a shallow sleep. "Good morning, all!" a woman's cheery voice announced. "It's another beautiful day. A few announcements: Ice cream is now on sale at the Restaurant. The flavor of the day is strawberry. Expect a few showers later on, though warm weather will be in place for the rest of the month."
He remembered the events of the previous day with a jolt: he'd been brought here, to the Village (whatever that was); where he had been told it was a place where people like himself- those who worked for the Network- were sent when they resigned, or retired, or whatever it was they did to quit their job.
He remembered that he now had a number instead of a name; he was Number 12. Number 2 ran the Village. But who was Number 1?
His front door swung open with that electronic hum, admitting a young woman with shoulder-length blonde hair who was dressed in a maid's outfit.
"Good morning, sir," the maid said, her voice as pleasant as the announcer's.
Number 12 pulled a bathrobe on over his pajamas and went over to the closet. "Where are my clothes?" he demanded upon opening the door. There was one suit hanging there, similar in every way to Number 2's, straight down to the broad-brimmed straw hat, rectangular-handled umbrella, and dark tennis shoes trimmed with white.
"They have been burned," the maid replied. He could see that the badge upon her chest had the number 26 printed on it in the same red font as Number 2's.
"I want them back." Childish. Wants are childish.
"I'm sorry," the maid said. She hurried back to the door, but stopped. "I know what you must think of me," she said, turning back to him. Tears were welling up in her eyes. "They've offered my freedom in exchange, if you would just tell me why you resigned!"
Number 12 stared at her. "I have nothing to tell you," he said coldly. "Get out!"
The maid, almost gladly, scurried to obey.
He walked slowly along a path that bordered a beach. Seagulls cawed overhead, their voices pleasant to his distraught nerves. A beached sailboat, well out of the reach of spring tide, was moored on the greenness that was on the edge of the mudflats.
"Do you play?" an elderly voice asked behind him.
Number 12 turned and saw an old man sitting at a white table that was laden with a chessboard. "No," he admitted. His observant eyes saw a sign in the distance near a building; he could just barely make out the lettering upon it: Old People's Home.
"You should learn," the man said, beckoning to him with a kindly gesture and smile.
But Number 12 shook his head. "Sorry, I'm a bit preoccupied. I wouldn't make a good partner."
"Ah, what the younger generation has not yet learned," the elderly man said blissfully. "Be seeing you." And a peculiar hand motion—a salute in the form of the ASL signed "f"—followed.
Number 12 copied the motion awkwardly and muttered "Be seeing you" somewhat uncomfortably.
A/N: sorry if this is flowing a bit awkwardly. I'm trying my best to stay true to both the Hardy Boys and the Prisoner...but you know how it is.