Life Restart in Pendusky
Chapter 1 - Be Find
The starlit moon brightens the night in a certain city. The street lights have turned on as the house lights. During our walk on the streets, we see how much this city is calm as there are no cars on the road driving. The only source of presence on these calm streets is a grounded newspaper; now being blown away as it hits on a closed restaurant's door.
Now... You might ask: Where are we? What city is this? Well, my friends... Welcome to the city of Pendusky, Ohio. Population breaking 60K one of the most manageable of the Ohio state. The crime rate is low, the services offered by the city are satisfactory and the local government is trustful.
Is this city the best in the state? No.
Of the county? ..Maybe. Pendusky isn't perfect as we explore further in this story but it's manageable.
We stop the fly-by when we reach to a building. Looking at the nameplate, above the building entrance wall, it says: "Pendusky's Police Station". Yup. We are where the police work. We could get inside, but the characters that we'll get to know the first exit of the building. Both wear police uniforms, displaying their obvious cop status. One has black hair while the other was blonde. And both are male too. I forgot to mention that part.
They reach a police car and the blonde cop took out his car keys. But, before he could use it to open the car, the black-haired one steals it from him.
- "I'm driving!" The black-haired one said.
- "Seriously, John? Why you always drive my car?!" - The blonde cop complained and inquired rhetorically at this action.
- "Because I prefer to drive it, Tommy. And yes: I know that the question was rhetorical. I just answered anyway."
Ladies and gentlemen, I present you one of the best cops in the city, João Braga and Tommy Phillips. (John and João are technically the same in terms of language). Officer Braga was a GNR cop in Portugal that moved to the USA for better stability. As for Tommy, he was from San Francisco as a normal cop and decided to move to this city for some reason...I can't know everything, alright?
Anyways, Officer Braga unlocks the car and gets inside it as Officer Phillips does the same on the other side of it. John flips the car on and they both drive off the building. From here they do the ever-important act of doing car patrol. I mean... it's not to say they don't do more complex crimes like murder but these types of crimes are rare and out of Pendusky. It's to the point that they sometimes are moved temporarily to the border cities for extra help. It's how it goes for a low-crime rate city like was referred earlier.
As they drive, the Officers see the city streets calm and empty. No people around here. All deserted...Yeah, when you're a cop and doing patrols, it can get dull and boring. But you must always keep a watchful eye on car patrols, something could happen at any time.
But there is something that's gonna happen in a few seconds. These officers' chances to argue with each other. And they argue a lot. I mean a lot.
- "It's peaceful out tonight," Thomas said taking in this calm. - "It almost makes you want to forget about thatpersecution in the city of Kertillion."
- "Seriously?" - João complained. - "That was two days ago! And you still want to bring that up?!"
- "Yes, I do!" - John rolls his eyes at this.
After that, Tommy continued: - "We were on persecution. You were driving fast to catch the bad guy that tried to rob the bank of the city. However, as we did it, you drove to the right side of the road."
- "So...?" - Officer Braga asked since he wasn't understanding where this is going.
- "You don't see the mistake?" - Officer Phillips interrogated rhetorically, not believing what his partner said. - "In your country, you didn't learn that people pull over the car on the right side of the road to let police and ambulance?"
- "Oh... I'm sorry for trying to be faster at catching the criminal." - John apologized but it's seen that is sarcasm.
- "I can't believe in this..." - Tommy said to himself. Then, he said to him: - "I understand that you wanted to catch him but that is no excuse to turn into an enemy of the public safety!"
- "Enemy?"
- "Yes! The people in cars could have an accident!"
- "But they didn't have. Or I would be suspended!"
- "And me, even that I didn't do anything!"
- "You care about yourself or the people's safety? Decide!"
- "Don't try to use a scarecrow fallacy on this!"
It's beautiful, isn't it? The way they argue back and forth at each other, they're like a married couple. While Officer Braga is more aggressive and likes to solve crimes the easier way, he's calm and in control. As for Officer Phillips, he's abrasive and sensible but can be affectionate. It's kinda polar personalities, I know. But if this is how they're being friends with each other works, then it works.
Oh, if you're wondering if these arguments trouble on duty. Don't be. Fortunately, these type of arguments never made any trouble during car accidents or in the middle of crime scenes, that is lucky.
They continue to argue as João doesn't look at Thomas since he was driving. Then, he shuts up and raises an eyebrow at something. He suddenly hits the brakes bringing the car into a sudden stop, startling Phillips.
- "What was that for?!" Officer Phillips spouted out peeved and in surprise by the sudden stop. "You can't stop my car like that-"
- "Tom! Look!" - Officer Braga interrupted as he points at something.
- "Oh... Don't try to change the subje-"
- "No. I'm mean look! Over there!"
Tommy rolls his eyes and looks to where his partner is looking. And... He had the same reaction. Why? Because, where John is pointing his finger, at a good distance, they see a bench. The thing about the bench? There's a figure laying there. It's not exactly seen what kind of person it is due to said distance.
- "Uh... John? When was the last time you saw some homeless on the streets since the two Shelter Centers were built in this city?" - Thomas raised a question, receiving a shrug of John. At that, he continues: - "Whatever. Let's park near there to take him or her to one of the shelters."
- "Okay. Time to restart the engine!" - João exclaimed.
- "Don't say that again!" - Thomas said to him with a glare.
And so they restart the car and drive slowly to not wake up the homeless person abruptly or startled the person if said person is somehow still awake. As they near, they can get a better visual look on who's who on that bench. They get near and in reality, there are two people laying on the bench.
- "Two persons? It's not a coincidence anymore." - Officer Braga commented.
The car continues it's slow drive until it stops by the front of the bench. And when they saw the two people, they got shocked. Why? Because these bench sleepers are minors. No, you're not being deceived. There are two MINORS, sleeping on the bench. But who? Well... I won't reveal but to give some help,I'll say that one is a white-haired boy wearing a messy orange polo and blue pants and the other is a brown-haired teen girl wearing messy purple clothes.
The officers' faces were blank. They never saw this in their works or in the news; it was new to them. It was silent for some seconds until Officer Phillips decided to break the silence:
- "We'll argue about what we were talking about at another time. This is more important."
- "Oh... I didn't know that was more important!" - John said with sarcasm.
- "Cut the sarcasm out!" - Tom said after giving a glare again to his partner before they decide to exit the car.
The officers carefully take the sleeping minors in the car by putting them in the back seat. With the kids now seated, they then get back in their car and drive the kids to the police station. The silence is dominant since this was shocking. John found this situation unusual since he never saw or heard about a homeless kid, more or less two! As for Thomas... He is more worried. God, if he found his own kid on the streets, he would take him and treat him like there was no tomorrow. He knew that something happened to them.
But what?
Later, as we get inside Pendusky's police station, it's busy. Conversations and running were heard all around since some of the 911 calls of the city and of the border are called to here. The officers were hard at work! (Ignoring the few officers that are napping and goofing off on social media.)
The two officers from earlier get inside the building with the kids in tow. As they get inside, they carefully bring the kids to the waiting room and set them down on the benches. The officers look at the kids, they haven't stirred or made a peep since they were picked up. It's surprising at how they didn't wake up yet, even with the noises from the police station.
- "Okay... Stay here to wake them up and talk. I'll call the Chief." - Officer Braga told his partner.
- "Wait! Why me?" - Tom asked.
- "You have a son, right?"
- "Yes...?"
- "I have any kids?"
- "No, you don't."
- "Right, so you have experience with kids while I don't. Bye!"
- "But... But..."
These words were useless since João went away to warn the chief, making Officer Phillips sigh. After that, he gets near to the kids and thinks:
- "Soo... Who do I wake up?" - He took some time to think about it for some seconds. Then, he makes the final decision: - "The girl. She's obviously older."
Tommy shook the girl's shoulder and it made her react. She starts to twitch her eyes and, when she hears noises, the eyes turn completely wide and turns scared as she sits upright at the bench.
- "Woah, dude!" - The teen said as she looks in any direction. -"...How I am he-"
-"HEY!Hey! Hey." - Officer Phillips tried to get her attention.
The girl looks to where the voice appeared to see the officer; she sees the police badge on his belt. She suspects that it's one of those fake cops to trick her but glancing around again, she sees that she's in a police station. It made her sigh of relief knowing that the cop is real; she's still safe. However, she needed answers about her next questions.
- "Hi..." The purple shirt girl spoke.
- "Hi, sweetie... My name is Tommy Phillips but you shall call me Officer Phillips." - The blonde cop greeted.
- "Ok, officer..."
- "Soo... Can you tell me why you were outside during these hours? Shouldn't you and the boy be with your families?"
"Families..." That was the word that made the teen hesitate and sadly sigh. She put her knees to her chest and hugged them with a sad face. It made Tom sad too and regrets asking that to her.
- "Okay... I guess that you don't have one." - He let out.
- "True..." - The girl replied. Then, she looks to the boy with a smile and continues: - "I mean... Only my brother..."
The officer looks at the sleeping boy. He felt sympathetic to these kids that stayed together no matter what. However, he had a strange feeling due to them having different hair colors between them. And even stranger that the boy has white hair. He never saw that color in any minor's hair. But he decided to put that aside for the moment.
- "It's better to wake him up, don't you think?" - Thomas asked.
- "Yeah... I agree Officer..." - The teen answered.
She puts a hand on the boy's shoulder to shake him up a little. And... The reaction was similar to her when she noticed the noises.
- "MY GOD!" The boy shouted in a panic. -"WHERE A-"
- "BRO! BRO! Calm down!" - The girl told the boy before he calmed down and looked at her. - "Look. We are in a police station. And the sir here is Officer Phillips. He took us here."
- "Actually, it was with my partner. But he went away to warn the chief." - Thomas clarified.
- "And I'm already with him here." - A voice appeared.
They looked to where the voice appeared and sees Officer Braga and who looks like to be the chief. He has brown hair and dark blue glasses.
- "Hi. As my partner said, I'm his partner. My name is John Braga but you shall call me Officer Braga." - João greeted. Then, he pointed at the other cop that is with him and continued: - "He's Officer Trengove. He is our chief and will help us here in your situation."
- "Thank you, Braga. Now... Before anything, I need you to tell your name and age, please." - Officer Trengove thanked and ordered.
- "Why ask their age?" - John whispered the question to his partner.
- "Don't question that. He's the chief." - Phillips said.
- "Well... My name is Lincoln. I'm 11 years old." - The boy answered.
- "And mine is Luna. I'm 15 years old." - The girl answered next.
- "Surnames?" - Officer Trengove asked too.
- "It's Loud, sir." - Lincoln replied too.
- "Oh... That's a Funny surname." - Officer Braga whispered.
-"Braga! I still can hear you. It's not the time for comments!" - His chief scolded him after turning to him. When João raised his hands of defense to him, he turned back: - "And from what I heard from him, you were sleeping on a street bench. Why? Shouldn't you be with your family?"
Again... The last word, that was "family", was enough to make them hesitate sadly and look to each other. This made Officer Trengove think about the only possible reason for this. He was an expert in many things related to his job and this, even though not common, was one of them.
- "That sad silence tells me that you don't have one?" - The Chief asked, making them nod slowly after some seconds.
- "Sort of..." - Luna added.
The officers decide to sit on the bench between the girl and the boy. Thomas was on Lincoln's side while João and Officer Trengove were on Luna's side.
- "I know this is hard for you to answer this one but... We need you to tell me what happened to you to be in this situation. Is it okay to tell us?" - Trengove interrogated.
The Loud pair looked at each other sadly, thinking about how they will explain what happened to them. Seeing their emotions, Officer Phillips warns them:
- "We can give you some time if you want. We won't force you to tell us right now."
- "No no no... We will tell you now. Better let it out now than later." - Luna replied right away. Then, she inhales and exhales to start the story: - "For starters... We are not from this city. I mean... Not even from this state. We're from Royal Woods, Michigan, born and raised."
- "That far? Sorry for this question, but that is surprising." - Officer Braga asked and apologized.
- "That's okay, officer... Anyways, one thing you will be more surprised is that we were from one big family."
- "How that can be more surpri-" Braga spoke but Lincoln interrupted.
- "With Luna, I have 9 more sisters."
- "Woah." The two officers said completely shocked.
- "A-At the same house?" The chief said wide-eyed.
"Yes, sir," Lincoln responded. - "Yeah, we kinda get that reaction."
The officers were flabbergasted by this.
- "How do these two live in the same house with nine sisters?" - Tommy spoke out.
John responded. - "The same way I'm with you, I tune you out."
- "Braga. Phillips. That's enough." - The chief spoke to the officers.
- "Yes, sir." - The two officers responded by raising their hands in defense.
- "(Ahem.)" - The chief then regains his composure."- Sorry for not letting you explain the rest. Continue."
- "Coming back to the story, we had a good life. Good friends, good relatives, hobbies… That stuff. Our parents were very caring for us and never let anybody hurt us. We were very happy and end up going on many adventures. So it's useless saying that we didn't have a good life…" - Luna explained. After that, she sighs sadly at what will happen next and continues: - "I mean... Until 2 months ago we had a good life..."
- "Our mom had an accident when she was driving with the family's van. The doctors tried to save her but she died from the impact. " - Lincoln says. Then, he sniffles and continues: - "I and the rest of the family were shocked to that news, but my dad was hit the hardest. He's gone from a caring-dad dreaming of owning his own restaurant to an… unfair drunk dad that doesn't show compassion for us."
This is another shock to the officers. I mean... Not that they never heard it before in this city or in nearby ones but what in the world?! Officer Trengove would say something but Luna continued the story:
- "He began to sell some of our stuff like toys, part of the clothes and non-educative books. Fortunately, we still had a bed. Anyways, he alleged that was to pay the bills he had. At the start, we understood since his salary was small little dollars from those bills.But... We ended up finding out 3 days later that he was using that money to actually pay for drinks. And not the good ones, I guarantee."
- "We confronted him about that. However, he denied our 'claims'." - Lincoln proceeded. - "The only positive point about this is that he didn't behave violently against us, but on the other hand… He barely made food to us saying that we should prepare it ourselves. Since Lincoln, I and part of our sisters knew how to cook, it wasn't that bad. After that, he didn't let us hang out with our friends, grounded or not. Finally, like that wasn't enough... He started... To verbally insult us."
Luna continued.-"It was just unjustifiable torture... we had to suffer this for about half of the month. With that, we had to do something. We had a sibling meeting and agreed that fighting off or confronting our dad wouldn't work and make things worse so... We had secretly decided to run away from our home. So that night, our family left the house. We were the first ones."
Lincoln finishes up. - "Staying at Royal Woods was completely out of the question since our ex-dad could find us so we decided that we will also run away from our city. Before going, we put letters at some certain friends' houses to warn them of what happened and guaranteeing, even that is not certain, that in the future, we would contact them in any way: Phone, online, anything. We left the city with nothing except our clothes that we still are dressed and some cash. The rest... It is a big journey of walking from there to here."
Tear flew down the officers' eyes. They never heard anything like that. Runaways never happened in this city. Not a single time. Drunk parents did happen but never on that scale. The fact that it happened to these children was pretty dark, so they have to do something. Sending the kids back home was obviously out of the question. There was only one other option; one that could be the best. The Chief looked to the other two officers to say:
- "I know what you are thinking to do and that is the same thing that I'm thinking." - Then, he looks to the kids as the officers and he gets up to tell them: - "Lincoln. Luna. We can't do something like send you back home since your situation was the worst that we could imagine. So what we're going to do is to call child protection service and they will, without any doubt, put you into a foster home. This case will be put in my control. I will leave to do the call." - He looks back to John and Thomas to tell them: - "You two are free to go home after this. Not that you don't have a patrol to do but I think it's better for you to process this."
Luna and Lincoln sighed at what Officer Trengove said before turning to the other two officers, knowing that was totally true. There isn't an option B to this. Trengove leaves to make the call, not without looking back with worry in his eyes. Braga and Phillips decide to not leave yet and put their knees down to the floor to look to the two minors with concern.
- "Look, we are very sorry for your loss and disgrace that you lived. It's painful to know how much you suffered from your old home. If something happens... Call us, okay?" - Officer Phillips told them, receiving nods at this question. In that, he takes out a card to give to them and says: - "Here is my number so you know who to call."
-"Wait!" - Officer Braga exclaimed before stealing the card. After that, he takes a pen to write his number on it and gives back to his partner to tell him: - "Here, you go give it to them!"
- "Wow... First, you steal the driving seat of my car. Now, you steal my cards." - Officer Phillips said with sarcasm. Then, he turns back to the minors and tells them: - "In any type of way, take this to call us."
- "Thanks for what you are doing." - Luna thanked after taking the card.
- "No need to say thanks. We want the best."
- "We will leave now. Stay here until our chief says something to you. Be safe." - João said.
The officers leave from the common room, waving goodbye to the kids on the bench. Lincoln and Luna look to each other and, create a tiny smile in each face and hug each other of relief.
- "Now we are completely safe. Things will change. You agree, Luna?" - Lincoln whispered to her.
- "Yes, I agree. This will be a new page. But don't worry. I will protect you no matter what and nothing will make it invalid." - Luna agreed and added.
- "You promise?"
A tear starts to form on Luna's left eye and falls by her cheek as she tightens her hug.
- "I promise..."
This will be surely a change in their life. The journey was complete to find a new place to stay safe. Now... A new one begins where they can expect anything.
Hey guys! JMbuilder here!
And yes... I put the rewrite on 1st April. At that, some of you thought this was a prank. But no. I intended to make an April Fools fanfic before but I forgot and ended up being occupied.
Anyways, I hope you liked this first chapter. I think I fixed up the problems New Life In Pendusky had and my beta-tester (Ink-Dub) guaranteed it by a revision.
I won't publish a new chapter sooner because I'm working for a story that I intend to publish on a certain day of April. I already warned on my QA but I decided to announce here too.
The only reference: The personalities of the officers João Braga and Tommy Phillips were based around the ones of, respectively, Steve McGarrett and Danny Williams, from Hawaii Five-0 (2010 Version).
Anyways, repeating, thanks for reading. Favorite and follow me and the story. Also, review the story to give an opinion.
And... That's it. See you another time, my readers!