Sins of the Past

"Light things it travels faster than anything, but it is wrong. No matter how fast light travels, it finds the darkness has always got there first, and is waiting for it." -Terry Pratchett

Chapter Three – Worst News Travels Faster

Location: Peruvian Amazonia.

Date: May 2nd.

Time: Late Evening.

Something was wrong. She could feel it in her bones.

From the moment she stepped off the charter plane with nothing but a backpack, a wave of foreboding anxiety ripped through her, leaving her wanting to head back to Rockport and into the strange sense of normal her life had become. This wasn't like her, if anything she ran away from any sense of normalcy as if she was allergic and that scared her more than anything she had faced in her almost seventeen years. Besides, after a rather grueling month of grinding for her AP Finals, these two weeks spent on location with her mother were just what she needed before she completed her junior year.

Surd is locked up. Zin is probably dead. Enjoy yourself.

Jessie let out a long sigh as she pinned the locks of her thick hair back into the mess that passed as a ponytail in the tropical locale. Just another week and she would be home, another week and she'd feel like a terrible daughter for allowing her own insecurities get in the way with time with her mother. It wasn't often she was given the opportunity to come down and help uncover Incan works of art, left abandoned for roughly five hundred years.

"Professor Velasquez!" A voice cut through the thick vines surrounding their site. "Phone!"

Estella's face scrunched up in confusion when her assistant barreled down from their campsite to their worksite, waving a mobile phone above his head. Jessie couldn't help but chuckle at the sight of him, reminding her of the mock "reporters" on that old mXc show her father had her watch when she was younger. He handed the phone over to his boss, before plopping down on the had jungle floor.

"Thank you, Dario," she smiled, before putting the phone to her cheek. "Professor Velasquez speaking."

The campsite continued on as before as Jessie watched the color drain from her mother's usually olive complexion, looking as if she might just join Dario on the hard ground. Whatever was wrong, it probably had little to do with the dig itself, as that was coming along quicker than expected.

"I'll see you here in you tomorrow."

Fifteen years.

Estella's world spiraled around her. She thought she had put it all behind her, gave him the space he needed after everything that case took from him. He lost friends, a mentor, and that damned Charlie McCall, but most of all, he lost what little remained of their marriage up to that point. It was easy to blame him and his job for what had happened; easier to leave him behind if she was honest with herself, but that was neither true, nor fair. The cracks were already former and the foundation was crumbling. She had an eye that wandered and mouth that spat venom when she felt threatened. Worse still, she didn't want to have their daughter, their beautiful, perfect daughter, see her dad walk out of her life time and time again. The ultimatum was given and the fate of Europe won, it seemed.

If she was even more honest with herself, Jessie had won in all of this.

Race left I-1, took the bodyguard job with the Quests and gave their daughter the kind of stability that dig sites cannot give. She missed her daughter in their months apart, but she knew it was in Jessie's best interests...even with the dangerous situations they've gotten tangled up in. After all, she was a daddy's girl.

"That was dad, wasn't it?"

Her daughter's voice brought her back to reality. "Yes...he's coming to get you a bit early."

"How early?"

"Tonight, if possible."

She looked as if she wanted to argue, to fight about staying just a bit longer. She wouldn't have blamed her at all, as this past year had been rough on all of them, but she doesn't. For her father to have interrupted the small bits of time she gets to spend with her mother meant that something was up, something big. Things were going just a little too good…

"Mom-"

"No," she says in a hushed, but agitated tone. "It is his story to tell."

"Are you coming too?" Jessie grabbed her mother's hand, almost as if she was five years old again. "If this is serious enough for him to fly right down here to grab me, then you might be in trouble too."

"No, my darling," she kisses her hand before letting it go. "I worked too hard to get the grants necessary to make this dig a possibility. Besides, no one is going to come all the way to these jungles just to grab some old professor."

She hushes her daughter before leading her back towards came. "Come, I'll help you get ready to go."

Location: Rockport, Maine

Date: May 2nd.

Time: Just Before Midnight.

He wanted so badly to go with his father and Race, to make sure Jessie wasn't in any danger. From the way this Neit guy was described, it seemed like anyone Race ever really cared about could be used as collateral damage and Jessie was the easiest way to get to him. Hell, even Estella could be counted in that regard, despite being separated all these years.

Estella Velasquez still had his heart after all this time.

A year or two ago, he would have laughed at such a thing. It wasn't as if he didn't know about the concept of love, he had seen the love between his mother and father for the brief time she was in his life, but to actually feel it was a whole other story. That was something too grown up for him, something to push away until he was older and more wise. Plus, feelings like that get in the way of just playing the field at school, hooking up with a girl here and there, but never fully committing to any one person in particular. But then, Mornay Island happened and things began to slowly change.

It was a joke at first, that the only way they could ever see each other as being more than each other's best friend is for someone else to have control of their bodies. They were raised basically as siblings, seeing each other through so much. Jess had been a strong shoulder to cry on when the anniversary of losing his mother came around and he didn't want to bother his father when he knew the old man was feeling just as he was. And of course, he was always there for her, like during her anxiety attack in the Verne Research Center hundreds of miles under the Pacific and when Surd tried to use her against her own father. She had felt so guilty and weak, so unlike the tough as nails girl that had come to live with them all those years ago, and he was there to remind her that she was so much more than that.

Things moved quickly from that. They lost almost everything when Dr. Zin's robot spies attacked the compound and after coming back from Egypt, they had to move back down to the Palm Key compound until their new home could be completed. Florida had been good to them, at least at first. Days were spent in the sands, their skin kissed by the tropical Floridian sun, their nights racing around Quest World without a care in the world. They figured they had all the time in the world to come to grips with what exactly they were to each other, until they didn't.

The new manor was completed and life was back to normal...or, at least, the Quest version of normal. Most of their classmates never had to worry about losing everything because their father's enemy blew their home to smithereens, never had to go into the mind of the best friend to save her from a maniac they gave that kind of power to. Few people their age could even being to understand the way their lives worked, which made their friendship even more important to him. But no matter how hard he tried, he knew he had to be honest with himself.

He loved Jessica Estella Bannon.

From the moment she hugged him goodbye and boarded the Quest Jet two weeks ago, a dull ache sat like a ten pound weight on his chest, throbbing every hour she wasn't with him. Sixteen was a little young to feel that way, he wasn't brainless like some people thought, but he barely remembers a time in his life with her in it and he never wants to ever know a pain like that. Having her on a different continent was bad enough.

"UNINVITED GUEST APPROACHING THE FRONT GATE! UNINVITED GUEST APPROACHING THE FRONT GATE!"

No matter how many times a day IRIS's voice echoed around the manor, it always manged to snap him out of even his deepest thoughts and toss him head-first back into reality. This time, however, he was a little more on his toes with all that was going on. That same sentiment, however, wasn't shared by his faithful guard dog, who snored away at his feet, not even budging in the slightest as he leapt to his feet to check the closest monitor to check the cameras.

"IRIS, closer inspection."

Through the downpour of the rain that battered their coastal home, he made out a small figure attempting to figure out the intercom system. He looked to be a few years younger than himself, decked out in an oversized, and now drenched, dark colored hoodie, pulled up and over his head, blocking his face. On his back was a bulging backpack and at his feet looked to be a skateboard. How this kid managed to skateboard out here in this weather was beyond him, but he figured that would be a question for a later date. For now, he wanted to know why some random kid was at his door this late at night and in this weather.

"State your business!" He almost laughed as the kid was caught off guard, a fine bit of petty revenge for taking him away from his thoughts about Jessie. "The button in the middle...hold it and speak."

He could almost feel the burning in the kid's eyes as he glared at the camera before jamming the button. "I need to see a guy named Bannon."


A/N: I just want to give a huge thank you to the guest that keeps reviewing this little story. It really helped motivate me to get this next chapter up and out the door. I would also like to thank the soundtrack to the musical, Six. My kid got me into it and now I'm hooked and it helps me keep focus...even if I'm singing along. While my kids believes in Anne Boleyn supremacy, I'm a Jane Seymour kinda gal. ;)