Resolutions – 23

Changing Gears

by MMB

David Lawler tossed the papers he'd been reading for the past several hours down on the couch next to him and yawned widely. He rubbed his eyes beneath his glasses and then got up to stretch. The clock on his mantle chimed softly, and he counted the chimes and then swore softly when he realized that he'd been reading most of the night and would have to be at work in a little less than three hours.

But the reading he'd been doing had been absorbing. This Pretender Project that the Centre had been involved in years ago was an audacious and outrageous plan to take advantage of the incredibly high-powered minds of a very select group of young people who would be isolated from mainstream life and their every effort controlled from there on in. Included in the packet had been a list of names for eight of the children involved in the testing — given names only, no last names. It seemed the Centre was more than happy to steal these children's very identities in order to make them completely dependent up on the Centre and its operatives for their daily needs.

First among these children had been a boy named Jarod — and as time went on, all mention of any other children than Jarod faded from the records. But of Jarod there was ample mention — the number and variety of projects, studies, SIMs and experiments that he had either carried out or been a part of gave new meaning to the term 'lab rat.' From all indications, the Centre had held Jarod prisoner from 1963 until his escape in 1995 — when he would have been approximately 37 years of age. A retrieval team had been formed immediately to recapture the escapee at the order of the Chairman, Mr. Parker — a team that had been led by a much younger Miss Parker. The search, which from some of the reports had been intense at times, lasted for nearly seven years before it had abruptly been shelved after nearly a year of no contact or information concerning the escaped man's whereabouts. That had been nearly seven years ago.

Miss Parker had become the latest public sweetheart after her heart-wrenching and truly courageous descent into the sublevels of a damaged Centre to rescue workers trapped below ground. That she would have willingly participated in a manhunt to return a certified genius to a status of prisoner and virtual slavery was certain to rock the reading public who now called her a heroine — IF he could get solid substantiation to back up these allegations.

Then there was the question of the kinds of projects that the Centre had been forcing Jarod to be a part of…

He shook his head and stumbled into his messy kitchen to fumble his way through cleaning the coffeemaker of the previous day's brew and getting it perking another pot of liquid ignition. Other than that it was a think tank and that it had been the victim of a bombing, very little was known about the Centre itself. There was the suggestion that the Centre was a research and development firm with whom the Pentagon had several on-going contracts — but again, it was only an allegation with nothing to back it up as yet.

Lawler drooped into one of the kitchen chairs and dragged a small legal pad and a pen over. There were a number of things that HE could do while waiting for his unidentified source to cough up more information on this fascinating story. He started by noting the names of people he needed to check out: William Raines, Lyle Parker, Charles Parker, Sydney Green, Lazlo Broots, Agande M'tumbo, Otamo Ngawe, Major Charles Russell — certainly there would be publicly-available records concerning the Americans at least. M'tumbo and Ngawe had been members of an international organization known as 'the Triumvirate' — apparently almost as shadowy as the Centre itself. Interpol might be a source to check up on THEM. And there was the question of military contracts to follow up with a representative from the Appropriations Committee.

He scratched his head and dropped the pen tiredly onto the pad and turned impatient eyes to the burbling coffeemaker. He knew he had just scratched the surface of something big — the kind of story that could make or break a reporter's career. IF it held up to research, that is.

Deb paused as she passed Kevin's bedroom door, but remembering her promise walked determinedly forward and then down the stairs in search of her grandfather. The subtle horror of her early morning nightmare had caught her by surprise, and she had found herself unprepared to even begin to deal with the idea of Kevin and her father AND her grandfather rejecting her because she was pregnant. She desperately needed reassurance, and she needed it NOW.

She paused at the bottom on of the stairs as she saw the slight Japanese man in the living room raise his head and look in her direction and then nod. For the first time since she'd come home and awakened early enough in the morning to find him still in attendance, she didn't feel nervous beneath his steady gaze. "Mr. Ikeda," she said softly.

"Deborah-san," he returned with a bow. "Is everything all right?"

Deb pulled her bathrobe a little tighter around her body and moved into the archway. "Do you have kids, Mr. Ikeda?"

The ninja shook his head. "Regrettably, my wife and I were unable to have children," he answered easily. "Why?"

"I just…" She shrugged. "Never mind."

"You are troubled about something," he observed in a soft voice. "Is there anything I can do to help you?"

"It was just a nightmare," she explained lamely. "I'm being silly."

"Not necessarily," he responded gently. "A nightmare can often tell you where your mind is troubled. After all, a nightmare without fear is nothing but a dream."

"All my dreams are nightmares lately," Deb told him sourly. "When do they stop?"

"When whatever it is that is troubling you has been settled, one way or the other." He gestured at the couch not far away. "Do you know what troubles you?"

"Yeah," she told him, following his suggestion and finding a seat on the edge of the couch. "Just about everything nowadays."

"Is there nothing in your life that you can trust?"

"I don't know," she said plaintively. "Everything's changing around me so fast."

"Then the only thing you can trust in is the fact that everything is changing," Ikeda told her in a very matter-of-fact tone. "Taking that one step further should tell you that whatever it is that troubles you now will therefore also change in time, becoming less troubling. There is comfort to be found in that, if you are willing to see it."

Deb blinked — it was a very different way of looking at things, but it made a crazy sort of sense. "I suppose," she allowed very slowly, and then shook her head. "But it doesn't help me in the here and now."

Ikeda shook his head with a gentle smile. "But Deborah-san, what problem do you have right now, in this very moment? Are you in danger?"

"No, but…"

"Are you hungry, thirsty, cold?"

"No…"

"Then what problem do you have right now?"

"I'm afraid," she said softly.

"Of what?"

"That I've made a huge mistake and that Kevin and Daddy and Grandpa will…"

"What others will do or think is a future problem, not a problem in the here and now," Ikeda observed firmly. "When you think about what might be, or what might not be, you are sending your mind forward into a time that doesn't exist yet — it is only a dream, an illusion." He watched Green-san's pretty blossom of a granddaughter trying to bend her mind around what was to him such simple wisdom. He spoke again to remake the point. "And this mistake you speak of, it is in the past?"

"Yes, but…"

"Then nothing you do now can change what has happened. If you want to talk about the here and now, do you suffer now because of what you did? Are you in pain NOW?"

"No…"

"How do you know that you have made a mistake then?"

"Because I might be pregnant NOW," Deb burst out. "That's a here and now thing, isn't it?"

Ikeda's eyes widened briefly, and then he nodded. "Yes, it is. Do you know for sure?"

"No…"

"And if you aren't pregnant — is what you did still a mistake?"

Deb stared at the man. He was leading her through a completely different path of thought than her grandfather would have — but she was finding it just as effective. "Yes, because I took a risk unnecessarily."

"Have you learned from this mistake?" he asked gently.

"Yes," she admitted softly.

"Then the mistake served its purpose, whether your problem in the here and now is an illusory one or a real one. You have changed so that it won't happen again. You have already dealt with the past. All you need to do is to quit borrowing from the future."

"What about Kevin and Daddy?"

"What about them?"

"What if they get angry at me — stop caring…"

"Deborah-san," Ikeda said very gently, "Even anger is a temporary emotion — it is born, lives a while, then fades. Worrying about the reaction others might have to your condition isn't going to change what will happen — they will react as they will react. That is not a here and now 'thing', as you put it."

Deb stared at him. "Then how do I prepare myself for possibilities?"

"You don't."

Her mouth dropped open. "What do you mean, I don't?"

"You simply respond to what comes to you in each moment — for no matter how much you might prepare, when reality finally arrives, it will never be as you have foreseen it."

"But… I can't do that…"

"Of course you can — but remember, I didn't say it would be easy," Ikeda told her with a half-smile. "However, I know for a fact that keeping your mind in the here and now will give you a measure of peace between the now in which you're living and the now that is to come. And I'd be willing to bet that much of the fear that haunts your dreams and turns them into nightmares is a fear that comes borrowed from a future that doesn't exist — from illusion. Remember that, even as you begin to fear, and you can begin to turn your nightmares back into dreams again. Observe your fear as you would observe the sun rising — watch it, and you let your sense of the here and now disarm it so that it cannot control you."

Deb folded her legs up onto the couch and sank her chin into her hand as she thought through what this strange and exotic man had told her. She didn't know how, or why, but what he was saying actually made sense to her, and that her need for the reassurance of her grandfather's arms — or even Kevin's — had diminished considerably. "Thank you," she said finally.

Ikeda bowed from the waist as he sat on his heels on the floor near the center of the room. "You are most welcome."

Evidently the girl was contented to remain on the couch, for after a long moment of silence, Ikeda saw out of the corner of his eye as her head slipped to the cushioned arm of the couch with eyes closed in slumber. Silently he rose to his feet, retrieved the throw blanket from the back of the couch and covered her so that she could stay warm. Then, with a deep and silent sigh, he glanced at his watch and reclaimed his spot in the center of the living room from which he could sit in perfect stillness and listen to all that was going on around him.

Always an early riser, thanks to starting out life on a Montana ranch, George Canfield stood next to the patio door that opened onto his balcony, cradled his coffee cup in his hand and wondered for yet another countless time just how he had managed to get mixed up in this cadre of super-patriots. He had come to D.C. with the best of intentions – to make a difference for his constituents and try to serve his country – but somewhere that intent had gotten blurred. He had listened to the snow job that Harry Burns and Tom Jackson had sold him during a long lunch and had bought into the idea that through strength and preparedness, he could accomplish his idealistic agenda all that much more effectively.

Now, with things starting to slowly unravel and the prospect that the only way to defend himself against being held accountable for the things that he had helped foster was to bring another person or organization down, he wasn't so sure what he'd done was the right thing. If being a super-patriot was all that it was cracked up to be, why were so many who had worked so hard to further their agenda now cooling their heels in a military stockade? Why would the FBI be following his every move and probably listening in on his every phone call?

Where had it all gone wrong, Canfield asked himself bitterly, and how could he begin to salvage what little was left of his reputation and honor before he got dragged down into the mire with the others?

He sagged against the wall as it occurred to him that he could begin to cooperate with the investigation into his friends – become an informant. But he wasn't exactly sure how to do it without causing comment or raising the suspicions of the others. A thought struck him, and he slowly straightened and then drained the rest of his cooling coffee with one gulp.

Knowing that there was nobody at his office at this hour on a Saturday morning, he dialed his own office. He waited until the operator at the switchboard had forwarded the call to his office extension and the answering machine there had picked up the call. "Hello," he began quietly, then took a deep breath. "Look, I know you guys are listening in on my phone calls. I want to talk to somebody. I'm in over my head, and I know it."

He waited, but no voice answered his plea. "C'mon, fellas. Burns and Jackson had you all figured out two days ago – I'm sure you've noticed that all our meetings are taking place where you can't hope to listen in. I'm not comfortable with what they're planning to do, and I want out. I need help. Will one of you people PLEASE answer me?"

Again he waited, and again there was no reply. "Damn!" he swore softly and slammed the phone back down onto the cradle. He'd have to get to the office sometime either today or tomorrow to get to the answering machine to erase the suspicious message before it could cause any comment. Burns and Jackson were starting to funnel so much through their secretaries, there was no way to know that his secretary wouldn't mention the message to one of theirs and give him away.

No sooner had he begun to turn away and head back to the kitchen for some more coffee than the telephone began to ring garishly into the early morning. Frowning, he picked it up. "Yes?"

"Senator Canfield, this is Special Agent Jim Gillespie of the FBI."

"Ah," Canfield breathed in relief. "You WERE listening."

Gillespie smiled grimly and knocked back another gulp of cold coffee. "Listening to what, Senator?"

Canfield snorted in frustration. "Did you call me at this hour of the morning to play games, Agent?"

"No, sir," Gillespie admitted. "But I did call to see if you were serious."

"Completely," Canfield stated in a completely convinced tone. "I know you guys have us under surveillance, but that our mobile meetings have probably stymied you. Burns and Jackson are also starting to run a lot of stuff through their secretaries, in order to avert suspicion."

"Really?" Gillespie nodded to his partner, who reached for the outside line in order to inform Berghoff of this latest development. Gillespie returned his attention to the rebellious senator. "And what do you have to offer us?"

Canfield again breathed easier. "I want to talk – and I want to help you nail them."

"Senator, if you are involved in the kinds of things your colleagues are, you realize that you won't be able to get out of this scott-free…"

"I just want out," Canfield said with quiet desperation. "They're talking about raising a scandal that will knock any revelations about us right off the front pages – and one that will pay back the Centre and its new Chairman for lack of cooperation."

Gillespie's eyebrows soared. "What kind of scandal?"

"They're going to drag up some dirty laundry from the Centre's past and make Miss Parker have to try to explain it away," Canfield shrugged as if the agent on the other end of the line could see. "And while she certainly has some explaining to do, this is getting out of hand, as far as I'm concerned. I may have had my lapses as far as judging what was right and wrong lately, but I don't necessarily find the idea of covering one's ass with another person's tattered reputation a very good thing to do."

Gillespie's brows soared even higher. "They're wanting to take a run at the Centre, eh?" He let his voice show his incredulity. "Better people than they have tried – and failed."

"I seriously doubt that would stop them," Canfield snorted bitterly.

"Listen," the FBI agent told the senator suddenly. "Stay where you are. I need to get in touch with my superiors, and I'll be back in touch with you as soon as I know how he wants us to play this. You aren't planning to go anywhere today, are you?"

"Just to the office to get rid of that message on my machine when I spill my guts as far as wanting to betray my associates…"

"The message machine can wait. Give me an hour to get back to you, OK?"

Canfield thought about it for a little while, and then nodded. It was a small enough price to pay for beginning to extricate himself from this hopeless situation. "OK," he agreed sourly.

He heard the phone on the other end disconnect, and he replaced his receiver with a shaking hand. He'd done it now – changed sides in this thing entirely.

He hoped he was doing the right thing at last.

The knock on the door after Margaret had arrived with her suitcase and carry-on bag surprised Jarod, and he opened the door to let Ethan into the house. "I thought that I could give you a lift to the airport," the younger man told his brother. "Besides, you forgot to give me your house keys last night…"

"I'm hoping that I can convince you to hang onto my car too, until I can make arrangements to have it shipped back East," Jarod told him while fishing his key ring from his pocket and quickly removing two keys. "The brass key is to the front door – the nickel one is to the padlock on the storage shed in the back yard where I keep all the outdoor stuff."

"Unka Ee-fan!" Ginger exclaimed as she dragged her suitcase out into the living room to stand next to her father's. "Me thought me not see oo t'day."

"Nah," Ethan grinned and swooped down on his niece and hauled her up into his arms. "I just had to say another goodbye to you." He looked over at Margaret. "Are you all ready to go?"

"I think so," she answered. "Ginger, why don't you go to the bathroom one more time, so you won't have to when we get to the airport?"

"Gamma…"

"Grandma's right, Sprite," Ethan said, depositing the little girl on her feet again. "Go on, and I'll get your suitcase out to the car." He watched Ginger scamper down the hallway and then turned to look at his brother when Jarod didn't have anything to add.

Jarod was looking around his house – a place that had long been a refuge, his first real home – with some regret. "I'm going to miss the place," he said softly, as much to himself as to any of the others in the room with him. "This was the first place where I felt I really belonged, that was really MINE, you know?" He looked from his mother to his younger brother.

"It's not going anywhere, Jarod," Margaret soothed. "And where you're going, you know very well that you belong just as much as you've ever belonged here. The time will come when you come back to visit – and the place will still be here."

"Remember, I helped you decorate the place," Ethan reminded him with a grin. "I'm not about to go out and hire an interior decorator to undo what took us the better part of two years to put together properly!"

"That's a comforting thought, I guess," Jarod sighed and shook himself mentally. He looked down as he felt Ginger insert her hand into his. "Ready to go, Sprite?"

"Uh-huh," she nodded with eyes that sparkled with excitement and anticipation.

Margaret took charge of Ginger and seated her in the back seat of Ethan's car while Ethan deposited suitcases in the trunk. Jarod paused one more time just inside his front door to look around the house he'd called home for the last five years. Then, with another wistful sigh, Jarod turned the deadbolt by hand and pulled the front door shut with a definitive click.

Ethan respected Jarod's obvious wish for quiet between them while he drove the several miles from the house to the airstrip where the sleek, black Centre jet stood waiting. The pilot could be seen signing paperwork with the airport authorities, vouchers that assured payment for jet fuel purchased that morning and flight plans among other things. Seeing the car pull up next to the jet, the pilot finished his business and came over to the car to retrieve the quartet of suitcases from the trunk and pack them into storage compartments in the belly of the jet.

"I'll see you in a couple of weeks," Margaret told her middle son and then hugged him tightly. "Be good."

"Enjoy your trip, Mom," Ethan told her and hugged her back. "And tell that sister of mine I love her."

Then he was bending down to Ginger. "Goodbye, Sprite. You take good care of your Daddy, won't you?"

Ginger had Bear in her arm tightly, but still reached up to pull her uncle's face down so that she could give him a kiss. "Me miss oo, Ee-fan."

"I'll miss you too," he kissed her cheek gently. "Be good."

"Come on," Margaret called to her granddaughter with outstretched hand. "Let's see what kind of seat you can have on the jet, OK?"

Ethan turned then to his older brother. "So," he said with real sadness.

"Yeah," Jarod replied. Now that the moment was here, it was hard to say goodbye to a man with whom he had shared so much of life over the past few years. "God, I didn't realize it would be so hard…"

"This isn't goodbye, Jarod," Ethan told him firmly. "There's a wedding that we'll all be coming back to see in not THAT distant a future, after all…"

"Still…" Jarod moved close all of a sudden and clasped his brother tightly and pounded his back, feeling Ethan return the sentiment. "Take care," he said with an oddly constricted voice.

"You too," Ethan replied and then backed away. "Tell Missy I told her to take good care of you."

Jarod grinned. "I don't think you'll have much to worry about there," he chuckled. "And you tell that girlfriend of yours… what's her name again?"

"Cassandra," Ethan supplied with a shake of the head. "For a genius, you can sure forget names easily."

"It'll be easier to remember when the name doesn't change every year or so," Jarod quipped, taking the last shot in a familiar verbal sparring match. "Anyway, tell her to take good care of you too."

"I will," Ethan promised, then waved. "Go on now – Missy is waiting, and if my memory serves me correctly, she's not the best when it comes to patience…"

Jarod laughed out loud. "Bye, Ethan," he called and then walked up the steps of the jet.

Margaret had Ginger already seated in one of the window seats and had her buckled in securely. Jarod took the seat across the aisle from them and grinned at his daughter. "Ready?"

"Let's go, Daddy!" Ginger called eagerly.

Jarod looked up and nodded at the pilot, who had stood waiting in the cockpit door for his passengers to settle into their seats. Within minutes, the engines of the jet had wound themselves up tightly, and the aircraft began to move slowly and surely to the end of the runway.

Canfield opened the door and let the two FBI agents into his spacious apartment. "Can I offer you gentlemen some coffee?" he asked nervously.

"Thank you, no," Assistant Director Berghoff shook his head and motioned toward the living room and the seating available there. "This isn't a social call."

"I… know…" Canfield responded lamely and then followed the agents into his living room and sat down on the edge of the easy chair. "What now?" he asked anxiously. "What do you want of me?"

"First, you tell us what you know of this group and its activities, past and present. THEN we figure out how best to use your information to put an end to this," Gillespie told him, pulling a small tape recorder from his jacket pocket and pressing the record button before setting it in the middle of the coffee table. "This is Agent Jim Gillespie, and my partner is AD Berghoff. We are interviewing Senator George Canfield at his apartment. Senator?"

"Wait a minute… What will this get for me in the long run?" Canfield looked back and forth between the two FBI agents. "Can I trade my help and eventual testimony for immunity from prosecution?"

"That will be up to the federal prosecutor," Berghoff told him frankly. "And, of course, if the Senate Ethics Committee decides to take up this issue, I don't know how much your cooperation will count in that venue. All I can say is that your cooperation will be noted and passed along as a contributing factor to closing this case." He gazed at the slightly pale and disheveled Senator. "That's the best we can do. And now, if you don't mind…" He pointed to the tape recorder.

Canfield closed his eyes, knowing this was the point of no return. Once he started telling these two everything that he knew, there would be no going back. "I am a member of a group that has existed for over forty years," he began, remembering the way that Harry and Tom had introduced HIM to the group not long after he'd taken office. "We call ourselves 'super-patriots.'"

"So super-patriotic that you think the law doesn't apply to you?" Gillespie asked scornfully, only to earn a glower from his superior.

"Who all is a member of this group?" Berghoff asked, deflecting the Senator's pique and keeping the discussion on track.

"Myself, Senator Harold Burns from Florida, Senator Tom Jackson from Vermont, Brigadier General Douglas Curtis of the Air Force and Colonel Harris. Another member, Phillip Baldwin of the NSA, died a few days ago in an auto accident."

"Are these the members that have always belonged to this group?"

"No, sir," Canfield shook his head. "The civilian side of the group changes according to who is in office — and Harry Burns brought in Phil Baldwin a year or so before I joined to replace a representative of the General Accounting Office who had a stroke and had to retire in to a convalescent home. All of us are under obligation, should we reach our term limits or lose an election or retire, to recommend a likely replacement. For example, I joined the group only last year, recommended by former Senator Reeves of Michigan."

"What about the military men?"

"Curtis and Harris have been members of the group for years – I'm not sure that they were part of the original group. They aren't old enough, frankly."

"And the NSA agent who died recently?"

"He was our accountant, as was his predecessor."

Berghoff was taking notes as well as recording the interview, and he looked up from his notes. "And what was the purpose of this group?"

"To take advantage of any and all opportunities to sponsor the kind of research that would keep the United States' level of preparedness second to none in the world," Canfield responded with a hint of the pride he had once felt in their dealings. "To serve that end, we who are in the civilian end of government see to it that funding we receive from political action committees is funneled into military projects with research and development firms who… aren't really picky as to the KIND of project they'll accept, if you know what I mean…"

"No, Senator," Berghoff responded sternly. "What DO you mean?"

"We promote and fund the kinds of projects that would tend to violate international treaties, were their presence known," Canfield answered nervously. "We deal mostly with technology that would enhance black-ops units and agents imbedded on foreign soil – chemical and pharmaceutical substances and psychological methods that will easily extract important information and/or help prevent detection of our agents. We have, in the past, funded the efforts of a few talented individuals to plug in all the known variables to a situation and run simulations that predict the responses of foreign governments or operatives, the reactions of our military, or whatever we need to know ahead of time."

"You say this group has been in operation for years?"

"Yes, sir."

"Then what has changed to make you have second thoughts about what you're doing?"

"Everything started coming apart after there was a change in the administration of our key R & D firm, known as the Centre. The new Chairman there decided that she wanted no further part in the kind of work we were doing, and summarily shit-canned all the projects they had been working on for us. She boxed up all the data, wrote a ton of checks for unspent funding, and turned everything over to the Pentagon with the understanding, which our military members had fostered, that the Pentagon knew all about these things. Since then, our efforts to get the Centre to reconsider its decision have all failed miserably."

"And now?"

"And now that most of the military men involved with us have been arrested, including the two members of the group, Burns and Jackson have decided that you boys must be onto us, and that the only way to protect ourselves is to take an offensive posture – drag up past projects that the Centre was part of and make them public as well as expose any and all public officials who might have been involved in that project. The group decided that the scandal would knock any reports of OUR wrong-doing right off the front pages of the newspapers, and so cover our asses, as it were."

"Do you have any idea exactly what kind of Centre projects…"

"None at all. Tom Jackson said that he had the ideal project in mind – something to do with a 'Pretender,' whatever the hell that is – and that he'd start leaking information about it to the press." Canfield grimaced. "I think he has visions of himself as a modern-day 'Deep Throat' kind of character."

"You are aware of the assault on one of the Centre scientists?"

The Senator looked down and nodded guiltily. "We had a long discussion when Colonel Stiller was arrested as to what to do next."

"Did the group sanction the attack?"

Canfield looked up sharply. "General Curtis was the committee member in charge of directing the liaisons in their dealings with the Centre. He didn't run all of his tactics past the group — as long as whatever he did was effective, I don't think any of the rest of us wanted to know."

Berghoff leaned forward a little. "Will you be willing to sign a statement to the effect of affirming that everything you just told us was the truth?"

Canfield nodded, sitting back in his easy chair as if all the stuffing had been taken out of him.

"We need you to agree verbally, so that it's on the tape, Senator," Gillespie pointed out.

"Yes, I'll sign," Canfield said tiredly. "Can you help me?" he asked them then, letting his hazel eyes dart from one agent to the next.

"When do you meet next with your group?" Berghoff asked, turning the tape recorder off and stuffing it into his jacket pocket.

"Monday at noon."

The AD looked at his agent and then nodded. "We'll want you to wear a wire, so that we can hear exactly what goes on at this meeting. Will you do that for us?"

"What if they figure out…"

"They won't," Gillespie reassured the Senator quickly. "Contrary to what you see on television, we're more than capable of using the kind of micro-technology that would be very difficult to spot even if you DID know a bug was there."

"OK," Canfield said finally. "What then?"

"That will depend on what is discussed at the meeting," Berghoff said frankly. "If you think you can manipulate the conversation around so that your associates can convict themselves, that would be great – but don't do anything that would jeopardize your safety. We will have a full team of agents ready to move in on your location should anything start looking like you're in trouble." The AD gazed at the Senator evenly. "Do you suspect that either of your associates might be capable of violence?"

Canfield shrugged. "Who knows what any man can do when pushed hard enough," he responded cautiously. "When will I get this bug of yours?"

"Gillespie here will come here to your house early Monday morning before YOU go to work. You can wear the bug all day — we will only have a warrant to tape the meeting with Senators Jackson and Burns."

"And if they figure it out?"

Berghoff was putting his pen away. "I told you, we'll have a unit of agents tailing your vehicle out of sight. Should anything untoward start happening in the car, we'll be able to move in on a moment's notice. But if all goes well, you'll return to your office and your co-conspirators will be none the wiser."

"Then what?"

Berghoff rose to his feet, Gillespie a moment later. "Then you wait. Depending on what is included in the conversation, we may have enough to get a warrant — or we may have to have you attend one more to get as much incriminating evidence as we can before going for the warrant."

"Is that it?" Canfield was amazed. "That's all?"

"For today," Berghoff nodded and gestured to Gillespie to head to the door. "Like I said, Agent Gillespie will be here early Monday morning with the bug you're to wear to your mobile meeting. You'll be contacted that evening with further instructions." He followed his field agent to the door, noticing that Canfield was following behind them like a whipped puppy. "You've done the right thing, Senator," he said, turning to face the man. "Whatever happens from here, you've done the right thing."

Canfield closed the door after the FBI agents had left, and he drooped into the living room and headed straight for the bar to pour himself a very stiff drink. It was going to be a very long weekend of anticipation and dread. And he'd still have to get into the office to take care of that revealing message on the machine too.

Miss Parker's eyebrows raised when it was Sydney that answered her knock at his door. "What's this — didn't Kevin set up your therapy machine?"

"I decided that I was going to have a day's break from that damned thing," Sydney grumbled as he gave her a quick kiss on the cheek when she walked past him. "Between being shot and having knee surgery, I've been tied down to that couch for weeks now – and it's beginning to wear on my nerves. I decided that since today was a special day for the family, I'd make it just that much more special for me and escape from knee-torture."

She looked deeper into the house and found Kevin listening. She blinked surprise at him — he shrugged concession back at her. "It will be interesting to find out just what Kevin decides will be his fee for not ratting you out to your therapist," she said, her hand grasping Sydney's warmly as she passed by him.

"You look ready for the day's game," Sydney commented. Davy was in his favorite sports tee shirt and jeans, with his cap and glove in hand.

"Hi, Grandpa," Davy greeted his grandfather fondly. Strange — he knew his mother had been very worried about Grandpa Sydney for days now, and Grandpa didn't look as if he was ill or anything. "Mommy said you haven't been feeling so good lately. You OK now?"

Sydney's chestnut eyes shot a sharp look at Miss Parker, and then shook his head. "I'm fine, Davy. Thanks for asking."

Davy trotted into the living room and dumped his glove and cap on the back of the couch. "If you're not going to be in the den today, do you think I can try to talk Kevin into video games?"

The psychiatrist's brows raised, and he looked back at his protégé. "What do you say, Kevin — do you want a day off from all this heavy reading? If I'm going to play hooky from the damned gizmo, you might as well get to play hooky from the Centre Archives…"

The young Pretender's face broke into a smile. "I'd like that," he admitted. "We've been at it pretty hard for quite a while."

"You've made good progress, from what I hear," Miss Parker told him with a nod. "Go on then, you two — tear up the electronic racetrack."

"Yeah!" Davy trotted toward the den, with Kevin following close behind.

Miss Parker chuckled at them, then looked around. "Where's Deb?"

Sydney's face crinkled into a combination of admiration and concern. "She decided she wanted to drive into Dover to see her father this morning. I have a feeling she went in to tell him about her relationship with Kevin."

"I was hoping she'd wait on that until after Monday."

He nodded and leaned a little heavier on his crutch. "So was I — but I suppose she just wants it out in the open now, and I can appreciate that too. She's already had me climbing her case a couple of times — she probably just wants to get through her father doing basically the same thing so she doesn't have to dread it anymore."

"True — although all WE have to dread, now, is facing Broots once he knows what's been going on," she mentioned in mild frustration.

"We'd have to face it one time or another, just like she would." He gestured with his head for them to head to the kitchen. "C'mon. I have some coffee made, and I'll bet you could use some."

'I'm not sure about that," she said, following him obediently. "I'm so excited about Jarod finally coming home today that I'm just about ready to jump out of my skin already — I don't know if I need much more of an energy boost." She put her hand on his shoulder and moved past him. "You sit down — which cup is yours? I'll get you some more…"

"The green one," he answered, grateful for her offer and parking himself in the nearest kitchen chair. "Thanks."

"How'd you sleep last night?" Miss Parker asked as she poured two cups of coffee and carried them over to the table.

"Well, actually," he replied, taking up his cup and taking a long and needed sip. "I'm having trouble waking up this morning."

"You could probably use another night or two just like that one," she observed, joining him.

"You're probably right," he answered and ran his finger absently along the handle of his mug. "All I do know for sure is that if I did dream last night, I don't remember."

"I tell you what: let's not dwell on the darker stuff today, Syd," Miss Parker decided suddenly. "We have Jarod and Ginger coming home at last — with his mother tagging along as a visitor. Let's leave the darker topics alone for a day and think about how things seem to be calming down for all of us finally."

Sydney couldn't help smiling at her. "Going to play Pollyanna today, are we?"

"Hey!" she exclaimed, throwing her hands apart, "God knows that we deserve a break from our doom and gloom at least once in a while, don't we?" She reached out and took hold of the empty hand Sydney had resting next to his coffee cup. "And things ARE getting better, Sydney. We have a few areas of concern to work through later yet, but overall…"

"I know, ma petite," he said, letting go of his coffee and patting her hand on his. "I know."

Margaret moved very slowly and quietly to stand from her seat without rousing her granddaughter and moved to sit next to Jarod on the other side of the plane. Jarod glanced past her to Ginger and smiled as he saw how she had fallen asleep watching the clouds and far-away ground go by below her. "She'll have a great case of jet-lag by the time she gets home," he commented quietly.

"It's a combination of excitement and apprehension," Margaret explained in an equally quiet voice. "The flight and the idea of seeing Davy again thrill her, but she's very aware of going to a new place, with people she doesn't know…"

"She'll have you and Davy and me around her to help ease her into her new life," Jarod affirmed, as much to himself as to his mother. "And she'll get to know Deb and Sydney and Kevin and Broots and Sam soon enough." Jarod patted his mother's arm on the armrest between them. "That reminds me. I want to talk to you a little bit about Sydney."

Margaret could see the defensive look on his face and decided to try to disarm some of his fears immediately. "I'm not going to tear him to shreds, Jarod, if that's what you're worried about," she assured him. "I just want to know a few things…"

"I know that, Mom, but you need to realize that he's not in a really good place emotionally right now," he told her softly and firmly. He sighed. "He's finally having to work through some of what he went through as a boy in Dachau — and it's really bad, Mom. He's not going to be able to deal with a lot of recriminations. At least, not until he and I have had a chance to have several very long, involved and intense discussions about things we have yet to settle between us. Frankly, I think he and I deserve the chance to do that before…"

"I don't want to make him feel bad, Jarod — at least, that isn't my intent," Margaret insisted, patting his hand reassuringly. "I just need to know… I need answers that only he can give me."

"Promise me you'll try not to upset him very much," Jarod asked worriedly. "He's been the one whose been holding the family back there together as things have gone so wrong lately — we all need him as stable as possible."

"Missy's worried that I'm going to try to rip him a new…"

"Yeah, she's worried – and wanting to be a little protective. His physical health has taken a couple of hard hits recently too, and now with the nightmares and guilt rising from his time as a Nazi prisoner…"

"I promise I'll try not to upset him too much – but I'm not going to be able to help it if one of my questions triggers things he already feels badly about…"

"No, but you could stop pushing if you see that he's having trouble dealing with it," Jarod insisted firmly, "and wait until he and I have a chance to settle that point before pressing again."

"You can't really blame me," Margaret looked down at her hands. "I want to see what it is about this man that you can still feel pressed to defend him, despite what he did to you for all those years…"

"It wasn't always Sydney, Mom," Jarod exclaimed softly and then glanced around his mother again to make sure their conversation wasn't loud enough to disturb his daughter. "And it wasn't always Sydney's choice in the matter. He was under a lot of pressure to allow me to be used as an experimental subject – and he got a lot of grief thrown at him when he would try to stand up to Mr. Parker and Mr. Raines on my behalf. He lost too, Mom – the Centre stole his son, the woman he loved, put his twin brother into a coma for twenty years, lied to him and made him believe he'd killed an associate in another car accident… When you speak of him, I think you believe that he was wholly knowledgeable and cooperative with everything that went on – and it just isn't so."

Margaret stared at her son for a while. "I suppose I'm still seeing him through your eyes – holding him responsible because I simply don't know enough about what else went on. I don't want to make him simply a convenient target – he's just the one person who had the chance to be closest to you for all those years, and I'm still horribly, madly jealous of that time."

"I think you'll find that he understands that too a whole lot better than you think," he told her with a sigh. "You see, he didn't know he even had a son until Nicholas was grown and in college – and when he found him, he had to recognize that another man had raised his son as his own for all those years. And as I found out later, after I went back, even though he and Nicholas speak from time to time, they aren't very close at all." He patted his mother's hand. "So you see, he knows all about being jealous of the one who was close when it should have been someone else. If anything, you should be prepared for him to be a little jealous of YOU for getting our family put back together after all, when his stayed permanently shattered."

"You never told us that," she told him in a startled tone.

"I never needed to until now," he replied gently.

Margaret shifted her gaze from her son's face to the white, fluffy clouds that seemed to stream slowly by outside the little, round porthole. "I'll keep that in mind," she told him with thoughtful sincerity. "I think that rather than simply be angry at all of these people for all of this time, I should have wanted to hear you tell me about them."

"I wasn't ready to talk about them, Mom," Jarod told her. "I had just found all of us and put us together as a family. Sydney and Missy were the life I'd left behind me – the life I wanted to forget."

"But you didn't forget."

"No," he admitted. "It took a while, but I finally figured out that they were a very important part of who I was — and who I am now. But by then, we all had enough else to think about that you didn't want to hear, and I didn't have the time to tell you properly. I do know though," he added quietly and gently, "that Dad and Sydney had a chance to talk once, before I found you all. Dad told me once, when it was just the two of us, that he thought Sydney was OK."

Margaret blinked. She suddenly missed her husband very much and still gave his opinions a great deal of weight. "Your Dad said that?"

"Mmm-hmmm…" Jarod nodded.

It was enough to give her plenty to think about as the plane continued in its trek across the continent – enough to give her pause when she finally did meet him. If Charles said that he thought this Sydney was OK, maybe she needed to meet him with a mind even more open than she'd originally intended. She leaned toward her son and felt him lift his arm and let her lean closer.

Deb hesitated as she reached for the handle of her father's hospital room. Once more she found herself questioning the wisdom of telling him everything that was going on in her life at this point, when he would obviously be frustrated from being stuck in a hospital where his input into the situation was necessarily so limited. Was she only asking for more grief – and maybe laying the groundwork for the kind of rejection that she'd dreamed about just that morning by telling him something that she KNEW he didn't want to hear?

And yet, would it be any easier on her OR on him to wait until later? Certainly by waiting, she'd at least KNOW if she actually were pregnant or not – but then again, if she told him now, he could prepare himself for the possibility… Oh, the alternatives were enough to give her a headache!

With a deep breath, she pulled open the door and walked in. "Hi, Daddy!"

"Debbie!" Broots smiled and put his container of apple juice back on the bedside table. "I didn't expect to see you today," he exclaimed as he held his hand out to her.

"I decided I hadn't been in to see you for a couple of days, and I didn't want to wait much longer," she answered honestly. She let him pull on her until he could put his arms around her and hug her tightly. She rested against his shoulder for a long moment with eyes closed. "I love you, Daddy."

"I love you too," Broots said slowly and cautiously. He held her close for a while, and then put her away from him just far enough so that he could look into her face. "What's going on, Deb?"

She blushed and then turned slightly pale. "What do you mean?"

"C'mon, Deb, this is me – remember? You tend not to get THIS cuddly and demonstrative unless there's something going on with you. What's up?" There was no way that he was going to let her go, and so he held onto her hands tightly so that she finally sat down on the edge of the hospital bed next to him. "Deb?"

"I'm in love, Daddy," she told him finally.

"In love?!" Broots repeated incredulously. "Isn't this a little sudden? I mean, you're just starting to get over…"

"It's Kevin, Dad," she continued in a soft voice, "and he's helping me get over things too."

"Kevin." Broots repeated again. In his mind's eye, he saw again the young rescued Pretender and his daughter embracing outside the French doors of Ben's inn, and he realized that this probably wasn't half as sudden as it might have seemed. "And what about him – how does he feel about you?"

"We love each other very much," she told him softly. "He sometimes helps me when I have nightmares…"

"You're still having those?" he asked gently. She nodded slowly. "Are you still talking to Sydney?"

"Yeah, but…"

Broots frowned. "But what, Deb?"

"Grandpa's had troubles of his own lately, Dad," she explained quietly. "Something about the Nazis…"

"Oh man…" Broots breathed out in sympathy for his old friend. A long time ago, after Sydney had gone AWOL after seeing an old Nazi nemesis in the Centre, Miss Parker had taken him aside and told him what she knew about what Sydney had gone through – and it was enough to curl his rapidly receding hair even then. Then he narrowed his eyes. "Just how has Kevin been 'helping' you?"

Deb blushed. "Sometimes he holds me for a while when I'm having trouble waking up from a nightmare…"

"In your bedroom?" Broots asked suspiciously.

"Sometimes," she answered honestly.

"Does he ever try to take advantage…"

"Daddy, he never does anything that I tell him not to do," she told him – surprised at the honesty of the answer, and yet how much that would truly anger her father was simply omitted from that simple truth.

Broots' face eased into a gentle smile. "Just making sure, sweetheart," he soothed and chafed her hands between his. "I just worry about you since I'm not there…"

"Grandpa's there…"

"Have you told him about this?"

Deb blushed again as she nodded. "He wasn't too happy about it, but yeah, he knows."

Broots frowned again. "Why wasn't he happy about it?"

"Because he was afraid that we'd do something that would make it harder for me to work through… things…" she answered, again being truthful. "But even he can see that Kevin is just helping now."

"You listen to your Grandpa Sydney," Broots instructed her with a finger shaking in the air in front of her face. "If he thinks that something might be dangerous…"

"He knows that Kevin would never hurt me, Daddy," she complained quickly. "We've talked all about it – all three of us. He's OK with it."

Again Broots' face smoothed. "Well, as long as you don't do anything that could cause you more problems in the long run – and as long as Sydney is comfortable with the situation – I guess I can't complain much." He smiled at her. "I'm glad you have him to watch over you while I'm stuck here."

"I am too, Daddy," she told him as she leaned forward for another quick hug.

"So," he said in a much lighter tone of voice, "tell me all about your job at the library now. How's that working out?"

Miss Parker moved her knight carefully and then looked up. "Check."

Sydney frowned – he hadn't seen that move coming at all. A frosted eyebrow rose halfway up his forehead. "I thought you said you hadn't played in a while," he reminded her accusingly.

"I haven't played a human since last you and I went at it," she admitted, settling back in her chair comfortably. "But Jarod put a version on the computer at the house – and I've had occasion to wile away the time a few times matching wits with Mr. Pentium…"

"Matching wits with Mr. Pentium…" he repeated dryly as he studied the chessboard with renewed concentration to see if there was a loophole through which he could escape the apparently inevitable, and then moved his bishop to protect his king. Then, with interest, he watched her face study his move and the possible responses. "You're very quiet today, Parker…"

Her storm-grey eyes came up to meet his. "I know. I'm just wanting Jarod to get here, and wishing he was already here."

"I'm surprised. You never were very good at practicing patience," Sydney commented in a gentle voice, "not even as a little girl."

"I've gotten a little better," she protested in her own defense.

His lips curled into a fond smile. "True, you're not pacing up and down and snarling at everyone in sight — this is progress…"

Miss Parker's mouth dropped open in surprise at the unexpected ribbing, and then folded into a smirk. "Getting sentimental for the 'good ole days', Syd? Of course, without Broots around to cringe and stammer…"

"No, no," he put up a defensive hand. "I'm quite content with the progress you've made so far." He fell silent and watched her think through her move for a while longer. "Are you going to stare at the board until lunchtime, or are you going to move?"

"NOW who's having trouble practicing patience?" she chuckled at him and reached for the knight and took the bishop. "Check."

Very calmly, Sydney reached for his queen and brought her from the other side of the board, taking the knight. "Check."

Now it was Miss Parker's turn to stare in consternation at the chessboard. "If I didn't know you better, I'd say you distracted me so that you could gain an advantage," she shook her head and buried her chin in her hand.

"I would NEVER do anything like that, Parker…"

"Riiight…" she quipped in a disbelieving tone. "I should have known better than to even think such a thing…"

"That's right," he nodded vigorously. "After all, I've never given you any reason to distrust me."

"I used to watch you play Jarod, remember?" she reminded him sharply. "I may not have been up to your level of mastery at the time, but even I could see that you'd bring out your little comments at JUST the right time to chip away at the concentration."

"And still he beat me regularly," Sydney reminded her back. "Besides, the cliché goes 'everything is fair in love and war,' and chess is nothing but stylized and formal warfare."

"You're picking nits, Syd."

"I love you too, Parker, and it's still your move."

She looked up at him with sudden fondness. "We haven't done this for quite a while," she observed softly. "I've missed our Saturdays — and our chess games."

He smiled. "So have I, ma petite. I'm even just a little jealous of Mr. Pentium — how sad is that?"

Miss Parker chuckled. "Well, maybe life finally can get back to something that approximates normal around here once and for all."

"Give it a few weeks yet at least," Sydney told her as he returned his attention to the chessboard. "You have yet to figure out what would constitute a 'normal' for you that includes Jarod and now another child. Broots needs to be released from the hospital and come home…"

"I get the picture," she waved her hand across the chessboard. "I just mean that I'd like to think that all of the upheaval we've been through this summer is just about at an end, and we can start figuring out what 'normal' means now."

"You think this mess with the discontinued projects has been dealt with?" Sydney asked, curious.

"All the principals that I know of are behind bars now," she said with a shrug. "What else could go wrong?"

"Mmmmm…" Sydney leaned back in his chair and shook both head and forefinger warningly. "Don't tempt fate, Parker. This IS the Centre we're talking about here — even if you are trying to change its spots — and you know how things work around there. Just about the time we think things are taken care of, something new jumps out of the woodwork at you."

"Whatever, it isn't going to happen today," she stated firmly. "Today is going to be a quiet day just like our Saturdays used to be — when you and I play chess and putter in the kitchen, and Davy plays softball with his friends. The only thing new to jump out of the woodwork today will be when some of our family comes home to stay later this afternoon."

"I hate to tell you this, ma petite, but we won't be playing chess at all if you don't finally break down and make a move," he relaxed and grinned at her.

"True," she grinned back, reached for her other knight and gently removed his queen from the board. "Check."

Sydney frowned, cradled his chin into his hand and leaned against the cushioned arm of the easy chair. "Damn."

With a final few keystrokes, David Lawler filed the story he'd been working on for the better part of a week and then leaned back in his chair and sighed. NOW he could get down to the business of checking out some of the information his unnamed informant had given him. He quickly checked to see that the article had uploaded properly for editorial review, and then brought up his Internet browser.

Heading to a search engine, he typed in the name 'William Raines' and hit enter. The icon in the upper corner of his browser waved for a long moment while the powerful program searched through its hundreds of thousands of web pages — only to come up after churning for longer than normal with a 'Not Found' error message. Lawler frowned. According to the information given him, William Raines had been the Chairman of the Centre for over ten years — odd that someone of that stature didn't have at least one biography page listed somewhere.

The second name on his list was 'Lyle Parker' — and that too brought up the 'Not Found' error message. Lawler scratched his head. That was damned strange. Both of the men he'd searched had, according to the information in his hand, extensive reputations. He typed in 'Charles Parker' with no more success.

Finally, with 'Sydney Green,' he hit pay dirt — although minimal at best. It seemed that Sydney Green — DOCTOR Sydney Green — was a psychiatrist who had written several seminal research papers on psychological and emotional bonds between twins, as well as a very old paper on the effects of stress on the adolescent mind. The articles authored by the man were readily available — and copies of the textbook he'd authored on the elements of psychiatry were still available for order from . But information about the man himself was virtually non-existent.

'Lazlo Broots' had a single entry found — evidently the man had written a book on computer security systems — but again, no information on the man himself existed. When Lawler entered 'Major Charles Russell' into the search field, he once more came up with a 'Not Found' error message.

Lawler stretched back in his chair with his hands behind his neck and his eyes narrowed, studying the error message still displaying on his monitor. Just who the hell were these people that seemed to be so powerful and yet virtually unknown and unlisted anywhere? On a whim, he leaned forward again and typed in 'The Centre' in and hit enter. Immediately he was presented a link to the Centre's own public website, touting itself as a premier research and development corporation holding several patents in the fields of pharmacology and chemistry. He clicked on the link to the page listing the corporate officers and found himself staring at the picture of the woman at the top of the page.

So THAT was Miss Parker, he thought to himself approvingly. She certainly was a whole lot more impressive when she wasn't covered with dust and grime, as she had been in the now-familiar video of her finally emerging from the ruin of her corporate offices after leading several hundred employees to safety.

Not far from her picture was one of Lazlo Broots that listed him as the Director of Technology and one of Dr. Sydney Green that listed him as the Director of Psychogenics — whatever the hell THAT was. At least he now had some idea what a few of the people he was investigating looked like.

Following a hunch, he moved back to the home page and entered 'Pretender Project' in the search field found there. Upon hitting enter, he was immediately presented with a 'Enter Password To Continue' page. Lawler began to smile.

Maybe there WAS something to this story after all…

Feedback, please: