Chapter 3

My father and his friends are journalists. They investigate government conspiracies and how big corporations try to cheat people. I got to go on a trip with them to investigate some corporate criminals. We went on a stake out. It was scary but also very exciting.

Emma sat watching an old rerun of The Outer Limits. She thought the special effects were pretty bad but the story was scary anyway.

Frohike watched Emma watching TV. He felt guilty that there was so little for her to do. Two weeks earlier he had asked her what she did during the summers before her mom died.

"Sometimes I traveled with my mom. A couple of times I went to summer camp. When I was really little, she would hire someone to stay with me and we would go to all the tourist spots around DC."

"So, she got you a nanny."

"I guess you could say that."

"That's what I should do then. Get you a nanny until you go back to school."

"Very funny. I'd stay in my room all summer if you did."

"I'm just teasing." He knew that was a touchy subject. Anything that implied she was younger than her 12 years was never appreciated. "What about summer camp?"

Emma shook her head. "The best places fill up by April. Besides I would rather stay here with you."

Frohike reached over and affectionately patted her cheek. "I'd rather have you here, too."

He thought about other traditional summer activities.

"How about swimming lessons?"

"No, I've never done that."

"Well, how about it? Do you want to take swimming lessons?"

"I already know how to swim." Well, so much for that.

Emma could tell he was trying to find fun things for her to do during the summer. "I do like swimming though. They have a swim club at the Y."

"Is that like swim team?"

"No, it's just a chance to go and swim with other kids your own age."

Frohike liked that idea. At 12, her friends should be one of the most important things in her life but she didn't really have any. So the swim club would give her something to do and throw her into the path of other preteens.

But this was limited. She only went twice a week and although she enjoyed it and seemed to be making friends, it wasn't filling much of her time. And with the bulk of summer vacation ahead of her, Emma was sitting inside watching reruns of The Outer Limits.

These concerns coupled with the fact that Patty and Paul were away for a couple of weeks weakened Frohike's resolve never to take her on 'business trips' even though she frequently asked to accompany them. Whenever he and the other Gunmen needed to go away on a stakeout or just leave town to investigate a story, Emma stayed with Patty and Paul, the neighbors back at the house.

Once Jimmy had stayed with her but Frohike was never sure if Jimmy had watched out for Emma or if Emma had watched out for Jimmy. He figured that together they equaled one levelheaded adult. But Jimmy was needed for this trip and there was nowhere else for Emma to stay.

With time running out, Frohike made the decision to take Emma with them on the out of state surveillance trip. Emma was ecstatic about going. She kept this to herself as much as possible because she could tell that no one else seemed to think it was a very good idea. Traveling in the VW bus was a little cramped but they were only going into Virginia. They got two adjoining rooms in a rather run down motel just outside Richmond: one for Emma and Frohike, the second for the other three guys.

They headed out very early the next morning to do their stake out. Emma and Langly stayed in the Mobile Command Unit while the other three took video cameras that were linked to the computers in the van and picked strategic locations in the trees surrounding the parking lot of a large office complex.

They didn't fill Emma in on the particulars but she got to help monitor what went on outside. She had never seen the Gunmen use the equipment before so was very impressed by everything they did: how they talked to each other on headsets (they even let her wear one but she wasn't supposed to say anything), how they were able to track certain individuals in the parking lot as they arrived for work, and how Langly was able to identify each of these people by using some really cool software.

Jimmy started having trouble with his camera. Langly tried to talk him through the steps to fix the problem but Jimmy was intent on following his 'suspect' and was just making it worse. Langly shut down the equipment and set the password that would be necessary to turn it back on. This was something he always did when exiting the van. He told Emma to lock the doors and not let anyone in except one of the Gunmen. The last thing Langly did was to make Emma get down out of sight before he left to go help Jimmy. Frohike growled at Langly over the headset. "Do not leave her in the van by herself!"

"She'll be fine. We haven't been spotted and Jimmy's not that far from here."

It took Langly longer to find Jimmy than he thought it would. He finally spotted him crouching in the bushes on the edge of the parking lot.

"Shhh!" Jimmy cautioned.

"Just give me the camera," an irritated Langly whispered. He fixed it quickly, showing Jimmy so that he could do it next time and headed back to the van. He was about half way there when he realized he could hear Emma in his headset. She was whispering but she sounded scared.

"Langly, where are you? There are people outside the van! Langly! Dad!"

Langly started running. "Hang on, Emma, I'm coming." He could hear the others telling her the same thing.

Now Emma was no longer whispering. "They see me and they're trying to get in." Over the headset, he could hear the sound of pounding on the outside of the van and muffled voices. Emma was talking to whoever was trying to get in. "I'm not supposed to open the door."

Langly was close enough now to hear the pounding without the aid of the headset. Suddenly, it stopped. Then he could hear Emma yelling at someone to leave her alone. He ran even faster, crashing through the trees with no concern for his own safety. He must have been making a hell of a racket because all activity by the VW bus stopped as he plowed into the roadside clearing where it was parked.

There were six armed security guards by the open door of the van. One was standing behind Emma, his hands around her upper arms. When she saw Langly she started struggling again. She kept twisting around and doing her best to try to kick backwards at the man who was restraining her but she couldn't aim or put any real force into it.

The other five guards pulled their guns and pointed them at Langly. He stopped and put his hands up. "Let her go!" he yelled at them. He could hear the others coming through the trees.

Byers and Frohike also stopped dead as the guards yelled at them to get down on the ground. Byers and Langly did as they were told but Frohike's only concern was Emma.

One of the guards walked up to Frohike. "I said to get down on the ground."

"Let me talk to my daughter before she hurts herself." The guard merely grunted in response but moved aside and let Frohike go over to where Emma was still struggling, trying to break the grip of the man holding her. "Let her go," Frohike said in a low voice.

The guard did as commanded and Emma flung herself into Frohike's waiting arms. She clung to him silently. He started talking to her in a soft voice. "Listen to me." He put his hand under her chin and turned her face so that she was looking directly at him. "We've gone through this kind of thing before. Just do what they say and they won't hurt you." Now he talked loud enough for everyone to hear. "Because if they do anything, I'll hunt them down and kill them in their sleep."

Emma looked at her father. She had never seen him so angry. She believed him and she hoped the security guards did, too.

One of the guards came and took Emma by the arm. She did not want to let go of her father. Frohike gently released her arms from around his waist. "Emma, go with them. It will be okay. I'll see you in a little bit."

She reluctantly allowed the guard to put her into one of three waiting patrol cars. It drove away as soon as she was in the back seat and the door was closed. When the car was out of sight, one of the guards came up behind Frohike and hit him on the back of the head with the butt of his gun. Frohike crumbled to the ground and lay unmoving.

Jimmy watched all this from the bushes videotaping the whole time. As he was heading back to the van he could tell by what was coming over his headset that the three other Gunmen were already with Emma. He slowed down to approach the situation with caution. He could be more help if he was not taken into custody with the rest.

He arrived in time to see the guards allow Frohike to go to Emma. He didn't know why he started video taping but it seemed like a good idea. He saw Emma get loaded into the car but went back to taping the guys before the guard hit Frohike on the back of the head. This unnecessarily violent action toward his friend was almost enough to make him give away his hiding place.

But he kept his cool and taped Langly and Byers being handcuffed and put into one of the remaining patrol cars and Frohike's limp form being tossed into the backseat of the last car. Three guards remained behind. One started searching the VW bus and the other two began beating the bushes for other suspects. Jimmy backed away from the area as quietly as possible to find a place to hide until it was safe.

Emma sat in the locked room not knowing where she was or where her dad and the other guys were. She was frightened but was trying very hard to maintain her composure. A man would come in now and then and ask her questions. He said his name was Mr. Anderson. He was nice at first and gave her something to eat and drink and let her use the bathroom.

But when she could not answer his questions, he started to get mean. He didn't hurt her or anything but he kept saying that she was going to go to jail and so were her father and the other two men. And that if she'd just tell him the truth they could all go home. She kept telling him that the others never told her anything. At one point she got angry and said, "Now I know why they never tell me anything. So that creeps like you can't force me to rat on them."

Emma was encouraged by the fact that Jimmy had not been picked up with everyone else. That mean man had said her dad and two other men. She'd seen both John and Langly before they took her away. That meant that Jimmy hadn't been caught with the rest of them. If he was still out there, then he could help. She didn't know how but she had faith in him.

She needed to go to the bathroom again. It had been hours since the last time she'd gone. But the door was locked and knocking on it and calling for someone to come let her out hadn't worked. She looked up at the camera that was mounted over the door and talked to it. "Unless you guys want me to pee in the corner, you'd better come and let me out of here so I can use the bathroom."

Mr. Anderson came back. He sat down at the table in the middle of the room.

"May I please use the bathroom?" Emma asked as politely as she knew how.

"Answer my questions and you can do whatever you want."

Emma sighed. She wanted her dad so bad it hurt. Tears bit at the corners of her eyes but she would not give this jerk the chance to see that he was getting to her. She spoke very slowly. "I told you before that I don't know anything. I'm just a kid. They never tell me anything. I could make up something but I don't know what it is you think I know."

"Why were you video taping people in the parking lot?"

"I don't know."

"Who were you looking for?"

"I don't know." Emma was losing the battle with her bladder. "Please, can I go to the bathroom? I don't think I can wait much longer."

"Just tell me what I want to know."

She yelled at him. "I CAN'T TELL YOU SOMETHING I DON'T KNOW!"

"There's no need to shout." The man was smiling though. She was ready to break. "Tell me why you were video taping the people entering this building."

There were voices in the hallway. Emma thought she recognized a couple of them. The door to the room she was in was kicked open. Outside the door were Jimmy, Yves and her mom's lawyer, Clarence Brown. There was also a rather messed up looking security guard.

Jimmy went over to Emma when he saw her. He picked her up and held her. She wrapped her arms and legs around him and held onto him as if her life depended on it.

Yves spoke first. "Apparently they are here. I demand you bring the others to us immediately!" The guard looked at the man who was still seated at the table.

Mr. Brown stepped all the way into the room. "I suggest you instruct this gentleman to do as the lady requested while we discuss how many laws have been broken here starting with kidnapping and interrogating a minor without her lawyer or even her father present. We can then go on to unlawful imprisonment, assault and battery, and a list of civil rights violations that will keep you and your company tied up in the courts for years to come. We could also discuss what the media will do to you. The video tape this young man took," he pointed to Jimmy, "would make interesting viewing on the evening news. Your company logo is clearly visible on the patrol cars as is the assault on this child's father. An associate of mine has been instructed to mail copies of the tape to all the major networks and newsgroups unless there is a satisfactory resolution to this matter within the next," Mr. Brown paused to look at his watch, "hour and twenty-seven minutes."

Anderson nodded at the security guard.

Fortunately, Emma heard none of this. The news that Frohike had been assaulted would have heightened her distress. She had only one thing on her mind and she loosened her grip on Jimmy long enough to tell him what she needed. Jimmy glared at Anderson and asked, "Where's the bathroom?"

"It's down the hall and around the corner."

Jimmy rushed out with Emma still in his arms.

Mr. Brown watched this exchange. "How long did you make her sit here?" When Anderson didn't answer, Mr. Brown told him, "I think we can add torture to that list."

Emma had never been so glad to see a bathroom in her life. Jimmy was waiting for her outside the door. His brow was creased with concern. "Did you make it?"

"Yes, I did. Thank you, Jimmy." He dropped to one knee in front of her and began running his hands up and down her arms and legs. He felt every inch of her head and gently pressed on all her ribs.

Emma asked him in the middle of all this, "What are you doing?"

"I'm checking to make sure you're not hurt."

"You could just ask."

When he was done he looked her right in the eyes. "Emma did they hurt you?"

"No, I'm fine. Did you find my dad and the others?"

Jimmy had other concerns on his mind. "You would tell me if they did anything to you that you didn't like, wouldn't you?"

"Yes, of course, I'd tell you. Can we go find my dad now?"

He didn't give up because she wasn't getting it. He was going to have to be more specific. He swallowed and tried again. "Did they," he nearly choked on the words, "molest you?" He started to say rape but he just couldn't. Not unless it was absolutely necessary.

Now she understood what he was asking, "No! No, Jimmy! He just kept me locked in that room and kept asking me questions. That's all. No one touched me."

He hugged her in relief. She hugged him, too, realizing for the first time that what he'd been worried about could have happened.

Jimmy let her go and stood up. Emma took his hand. They headed back to where they'd left Yves and Mr. Brown.

Jimmy recognized the sound of fighting. He started to run pulling Emma along with him. They burst into the room to find that Frohike had Anderson pinned to the floor. Byers and Langly were trying to pull him off. "Where is my daughter!" Yves was explaining that Jimmy had taken Emma to the bathroom. Nothing anyone was saying or doing got through to Frohike. All he knew was that this man had his daughter and he would do whatever it took to get her back.

"Dad!" The sound of Emma's voice brought him far enough out of his rage to realize that she was in the room.

He stopped throttling the man and turned around to see her standing just inside the doorway. "Emma." She ran to him as he got up off the floor. This time when she got her arms around him she knew that nothing anyone said would convince her to let go of him.

Back at the hotel later that night the whole story was told.

Jimmy had gotten far enough away from the van to blend in with the people heading out for lunch. He walked back to the motel room to see if there was word of the others. When he discovered that they were not there, he made a few phone calls. Yves arrived with Mr. Brown a few hours later. If they had been arrested, Yves knew that a lawyer, especially one familiar with Emma's background, would be very useful.

After some quick hacking into the security system, Yves located their missing friends inside the building. She created passes to get them around the front desk. From there she quickly located the floor where Frohike, Byers, Langly and Emma were being held. A security guard hassled them but a quick head butt from Jimmy dazed him enough to ask him a few questions.

Even with Jimmy holding the guard's arm behind the man's back, he denied knowledge of anyone being held against their will. At this point they heard Emma yell. Jimmy recognized her voice and kicked in the door of the room she was in.

Mr. Brown left after making sure that everyone was safely back at the motel. He assured them that if they needed any more help he was available. He was not happy about this turn of events but after conversing with Yves on the way down he knew that she would say everything that needed to be said.

Emma was reluctant to leave Frohike's side for the rest of the evening. He was glad they had looked for a hotel that had adjoining rooms or he probably would not have gotten her to go to sleep in her own bed. Even with the door open between the two rooms, Frohike still had to sit with her until she finally dropped off.

When he announced that she was asleep, Yves lit into them.

"I know I've asked this before but have you all lost your minds? What were you thinking bringing a child on a stakeout? She may not have gotten physically hurt but you won't know for sometime what emotional damage you've done to her."

Jimmy tried to calm her down. "Yves, we know what we did was stupid but, at the time, we honestly thought it was safe. The van was parked on a public road. There shouldn't have been any security patrols in that area."

"Yeah, lay off. Don't you think we feel bad enough as it is?" Langly was especially guilt ridden. If only he hadn't left her alone in the van. When the first security car had shown up he could have lied about why the van was parked there and gotten away with Emma.

Yves was unconvinced. "I don't know, Langly. Do you feel bad enough to guarantee that you will never do something so idiotic again?"

"And you." She turned her ire on Frohike who was once again holding an ice pack to his sore skull. "I thought you were finally acting like a responsible adult by taking care of your daughter. But then you go and do something so phenomenally irresponsible that it makes me question whether you should be allowed to have a child at all."

"Back off, Yves," Frohike said. "Nothing you say can make me feel worse than I all ready do."

Byers's main regret was that he hadn't pressed his point that it wasn't safe to bring Emma with them. But she was Frohike's daughter and the final say was his. That didn't keep Byers from feeling that Yves had gone too far with her last remark. He felt a need to defend his friend. "Really, Yves, that's not fair. Frohike loves Emma and always wants what's best for her. We all do. We couldn't leave her home alone. There was no one who could take care of her."

"Do you honestly expect me to believe that getting your precious story is more important than Emma's safety and well being?"

No one had an answer for that. "You four need to be more careful. If you had been arrested, she would have ended up in the hands of Child Protective Services. Who knows how long she would have been in foster care before you'd be able to prove that someone could provide a decent home for her." Yves started packing up her things to leave. "Did it ever occur to you that there are such things as professional babysitting services? You did know that didn't you?" From the blank stares she got, she figured the answer to that one was, "No."

"She would have hated that," Frohike noted.

"She might not like it but she would have been safe at home and not locked in a room by a sadistic bastard trying to get information out of her because he was getting no where with the three of you!" She struggled to keep her voice down.

As she was leaving, she turned to tell them one last thing. "By the way, you could have asked me. I would have been more than happy to stay with her."

The four men watched Yves leave in bemused silence. Shocked, guilt ridden, and exhausted they all turned in for the night.

Frohike woke up in the middle of the night and noticed that Emma was not in her bed. He turned on the light, swung his legs around to get out of bed and almost stepped on her. She was lying on the floor next to him wrapped in a blanket.

He carefully stepped over her then bent down (that made his head pound again) and gently shook her. "Emma, did you fall out of bed?"

"Hmm?" She sat up rubbing her eyes. "Um, no, I had a bad dream. I didn't want to wake you up."

He put her back in her own bed. "Tell me about it." He had her scoot over a little so that he could sit next to her.

"I don't remember a lot about it now." She was lying and he knew it.

"Emma, if it scared you enough to get you out of bed…"

She just sighed and took his hand. "I'm okay. You really don't want to hear it." This meant, 'I want to tell you but I don't want you to think I'm silly for letting a dream bug me'.

"Emma, tell me."

She looked at him. She saw the concern in his face. "I was back in that locked room. That mean man wouldn't let me out. He kept asking me questions I couldn't answer. Then he said that if I didn't tell him everything he would kill you. I could kind of see through the wall, well in the dream anyway, and he had already killed John and Langly. That man started telling me about how he was going to kill you and Jimmy, too. And there was nothing I could do. He pointed at the back wall of the room and I could see one of the guards shoot Jimmy and then aim the gun at you. I started screaming. That's what woke me up."

"That sounds like a bad one. Are you okay now?"

"Yes, I'm fine."

"That's good. Now, no more sleeping on the floor. Just wake me up if you need me."

"I just wanted to be closer to you. I'm sorry, I know I'm just being a baby."

Frohike hugged her tight, stroking her hair. "No, honey, I don't think you're being a baby. You were very brave yesterday. I know a lot of adults who would have fallen apart if they had to go through what you did."

Emma let him go so that she could see if he was telling the truth.

"Really?"

"Sure."

"You know, the whole time I kept thinking about that TV show Law and Order and how most people tell the police too much and how you said that they just need to shut up until their lawyers get there."

"Yeah, I remember."

"Well, that's kind of what I tried to do. The only difference was that I really didn't know anything. I did tell him that now I understood why you guys never tell me anything."

"And why is that?"

"So that I couldn't be forced to tell anyone stuff you didn't want them to know."

"Well, that isn't it exactly. The reason we don't tell you everything is to protect you. But I think that backfired on us yesterday."

"Why?"

"Because if you had known what was going on, he may have let you go."

Emma shook her head. "I don't think so."

"You don't?"

"No. I kept telling him I didn't know anything and he wouldn't stop. If I'd known a little bit, he'd think I knew more than I was telling."

He realized she was probably right.

"Hey, you know what?" Emma remembered something about the previous day that she hadn't told him. "When I was so scared, I didn't think of my mom at all. It was you I missed. It was you wanted to be with." This realization brought tears to her eyes, "I love you, Dad."

"I love you too, Emma." He hugged her again. Then he had her lie back down. He pulled the covers up under her chin. "Go back to sleep now. I'll be right here."

Emma had another nightmare.

This time she was standing by herself in front of a set of doors with frosted glass. Both doors had writing on them. The right hand door said, "Employees Only." The left hand door said, "Morgue." A voice was telling her, "Go ahead. You need to identify the bodies."

Now her point of view changed and she was looking at herself standing in front of the doors. She watched herself reach out and push open the door marked 'Morgue'. She stepped through the door and it swung back and forth a couple of times when she let it go. Then she was back in her own body. She was in a white room. She wasn't aware of walls or other objects in the room. The only things she saw were four shroud draped gurneys each supporting an unmoving body.

Someone was behind her but she didn't turn to see who it was. It didn't matter. This person pushed her toward the nearest body. "Go on. You're the only one who can identify them and we don't have all day."

She reached out and slowly pulled the sheet off the corpse's face. It was John. She looked at him for a second. Then reached out and touched his face. Just to be sure. It was cold. He was cold.

She moved to the next gurney. This one was Jimmy. He was cold, too. The third shrouded figure was Langly. She had to touch his face also and got the same results.

She turned to look at the last gurney. She didn't want to pull back the sheet on this one but the voice behind her spoke again, "Do it now! Come on! Everyone's waiting!" An arm reached out from behind her and pulled the sheet away from her father's face. She wanted to turn and run but she had to know. She reached out and touched his face also. Then she moved closer and kissed his cheek. "Goodbye, Papa, I love you."

Emma sat up in bed. Suddenly awake and very thankful to be so. It was still dark. The clock said that it was 4:12 AM. She sighed. This was turning out to be a very long night. She sat on the edge of the bed for a minute. Then she got up and put on her robe.

There was something she had to do to shake the effects of the dream. She went through the open door into the adjoining room. Jimmy was asleep on a roll away bed under the window. She tiptoed over to him and gently touched his cheek. It was warm. Emma hadn't realized that she was holding her breath. She let it out slowly and smiled.

She checked Langly next. He was warm, too. Neither man had even stirred but when she got to John and touched his face, he opened his eyes. Emma jumped back, startled.

Byers had been awake the whole time. He figured she was doing this for her own reasons and he'd let her finish before asking her why she was out of bed.

He propped himself up on one elbow and whispered, "What's up, Doc?" She had looked a great deal like a doctor making the rounds on the ward.

"Just checking." Emma whispered back.

"Checking for what?"

"Just making sure that everyone is okay."

"How come?"

"I had a bad dream." He waited, figuring there was more. "All four of you were at the morgue and I had to identify the bodies." She looked down at the floor. "You were all dead."

"And what is your prognosis of our actual condition."

"Everybody's fine." She sounded relieved.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"No, it's okay."

"You're sure."

"Yeah."

"Then you should go back to bed. It's much too early to be up."

"I know. Good night, John."

"Good night."

She went back to her own room. He waited a few seconds then got up to check on her. When he looked in the other room, she was standing by her father's bed. He watched as she touched Frohike's face with the back of her fingers. Then she turned and saw Byers standing in the doorway.

He came all the way in and helped her straighten out the covers on the bed. They were all twisted. Byers figured it must have been one hell of a nightmare. He was amazed that none of this had woken Frohike. When she was safely in her bed, he returned to his own. He'd tell Frohike about it in the morning.

Emma slept peacefully the rest of the night.