A/N Woot! The presentation ended up being not that big of a deal, and my paper is almost finished! I have to touch up a couple of paragraphs and write the introduction and conclusion (gag!), but the worst is over. It's not actually due until Wednesday, but I have an appointment with the Writing Center tomorrow. (And, as a new composition teacher, let me take this moment to urge you that if you attend a school with a Writing Center, take advantage of it! Even if you're a very strong writer, it's always helpful to know how your work sounds to someone else before you submit it. dismounts from soap box) Of course, I was about ready to murder myself when I discovered halfway through the paper that I'd been structuring for a 7-8 page essay, when it was only supposed to be 4 pages. (I actually used the phrase "quintuple crap." It didn't relieve my feelings much, supporting my conclusion that profanity is, in the main, not all it's cracked up to be.) But enough about my academic woes and on to the chapter!
Thank you to IcyWaters, my bat-beta par excellence.
Disclaimer The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy belongs to the late Douglas Noel Adams. May he rest in peace. Or pieces, as the case may be.
(Disclaimer courtesy of The Worst Poems Ever by Anakin McFly)
Chapter 39
The truth was that Jay Gatsby of West Egg, Long Island, sprang from his Platonic conception of himself. He was a son of God – a phrase which, if it means anything, means just that – and he must be about His Father's business…
- The Great Gatsby
Paul Cordelia was a sixteen-year-old junior at Saint Theresa of Avila Gotham High School. He played trumpet in band, occasionally wrote for the school paper, and got steady B's, except in English where he usually managed to scrape up an A. He had even, for the first time in his high school career, convinced a girl to go with him to the Winter Wonderland dance, a triumph he was beginning to regret. Keishe Baker looked good in her spangled blue dress, but that was all she did. She didn't talk, didn't dance, didn't even drink punch. In fact, Paul was beginning to think he would have had more fun if he'd brought his sister's doll to the dance (plus, he wouldn't have had to buy Barbie a ticket).
"Are you sure you don't want anything to eat?" he asked for the fifth time.
Keishe just smiled – she had a great smile – and shook her head.
Paul sighed audibly, remembering that he could be earning extra credit for English at a downtown coffee house that was sponsoring an international poetry night. Mr. Jay had strongly recommended the event, even hinting darkly that students who preferred pointless social activities to artistically stimulating ones had only faint chances of being accepted into a university. Paul wondered whether Keishe would mind looking good while doing nothing at a coffee shop instead of a dance. He was just about to ask her when the clowns showed up.
- - - - - -
Gordon picked up his desk phone. "Hello?"
"Jim, thank heaven! I've been trying to reach you for two hours!" Barbara's agitated voice came over the line. "Have you called Carl yet?"
Gordon winced. He'd been half expecting her to call, since he'd seen the news about Wayne Enterprises. Babsie's college money was sunk in Enterprises stock, and ever since Bruce Wayne had returned and burned down his ancestral home, Barbara had been suggesting that they sell out and invest in something safer. "We're not going to panic," Gordon told his wife.
"James! The company's under federal investigation! Before long they'll freeze everything, and then we'll go down with the ship!"
"The company's going to be fine. Listen, the police are in on this too, and there are a lot of things about this so-called evidence of fraud that are awfully suspicious. We're not selling," he said obstinately. Privately, though, he couldn't suppress a niggle of doubt as to whether his stubbornness really arose from confidence in the company's solidity, or if it was because, in some illogical way, selling out would feel like betraying an orphaned little boy whose tear stained face had haunted him for twenty-odd years.
Officer Fiskers burst through the office door. "Lieutenant," he gasped, "the Joker's resurfaced. And he's got a whole school full of kids hostage."
"Dear God," Gordon prayed, forgetting he still held the phone.
"What?" Barbara asked.
"Emergency, babe, I've gotta go. I'm not sure when I'll be home." He dropped the phone and headed for the door.
- - - - - -
Cecilia forced herself to keep her grip on the wheel relaxed, as she sped through the snowplowed streets in obedience to Judas's directions. In her rearview mirror, she could see Dick, stiff and silent in the backseat with the muzzle of the gun pressed against his ribs.
The route they followed seemed to be straightforward, with no evasive maneuvers – apparently their captor wasn't concerned about being followed. Reasonably so, Cecilia thought grimly, constantly but hopelessly watching the traffic around them for a sign of friendly pursuit. Even if Rachel figured out what had happened, by the time an APB was issued to the city's police, they would probably be at their destination.
Sure enough, fifteen minutes after they had pulled out of the social services building parking lot, Judas ordered her to swing into a low income subdivision, filled with neat rows of cookie cutter housing that looked like it had been built back in the fifties. It had probably been created to house the workers for the factory whose smokeless chimneys overshadowed the tiny houses. The house she was ordered to stop in front of was separated from a vast, deserted parking lot only by a rusting fence.
Judas retransferred the gun from Richard to Cecilia and marched her up the walk to the front door, dragging the boy along by the arm. Cecilia knocked on command, and a moment later the door was opened by a slender young man with dark hair and olive skin. He surveyed them expressionlessly, then stepped back to allow them to enter.
"Will you tell…him we're here?" Judas asked as the door shut behind them.
The stranger nodded and disappeared through a side door, leaving them crowded in the narrow hallway. The house appeared as shabby inside as it was outside. The carpet was worn and stained and the white paint was yellowing. There was a print of "Portrait of a Young Girl Reading" on the wall and, surreally, the smell of baking bread permeated the air.
The young man reappeared in the doorway and nodded at Judas. "He's in the office. Take them through the tunnel."
Judas increased his pressure on the gun against Cecilia's back and she obediently moved forward.
"Through the door at the end of the hall," he muttered tersely.
The door revealed a flight of narrow wooden stairs that led down into a tiny basement half filled with a groaning furnace. Judas corralled his prisoners into a corner nearly blocked off by the furnace and spoke. "It's Henry. I've got the woman and the boy."
The cinderblock wall in front of Cecilia parted soundlessly. A lit tunnel stretched before them, its end hidden by a turn nearly a hundred feet away. The turn proved to be only slight, and the tunnel continued unbroken for the length of a football field before ending in a steel door. They must be under the factory, Cecilia thought.
The fact that Judas had made no effort to conceal their destination or even the entrance to the tunnel was unsettling. It indicated that he didn't expect her to be leaving. And Richard… They can't kill Richard, she assured herself. They need him.
There was a keypad next to the door, but it clicked as they approached and needed only a pull to open. They crossed through into a conspiracy theorist's dream world - banks of monitors, regiments of filing cabinets, yellowed reams of printouts spilling off of dusty desks.
They met another man who reminded her of the one who had opened the house door for them. This one was taller and African, but he had that same controlled expression of emptiness. "Gatsby wants to see you," he said coldly. "Leave the woman and the boy here."
Judas swallowed nervously and at last took the gun away from Cecilia's back. He stalked over to a door in the wall and opened it. A brief beam of a different, softer light flowed out as he slipped into the room beyond.
"Sit down," their new guard said softly. He didn't have a visible weapon, but from the way he held himself in quiet readiness, Cecilia had no illusions about being able to escape. Even if she and the boy could outrun him, she wouldn't know where to go.
Cecilia took Richard's hand, warm in her own, and led him toward two straight chairs that stood beside a desk. For the first time since they had left the car, she was able to really look at him. He sat very still, and there was a small wrinkle of pain between his eyes.
"How's your head?" she asked softly.
He shrugged, a minuscule shift of his shoulders. "Okay."
- - - - - -
"Sir, the car has stopped," Alfred's voice said in his ear. "In a low income subdivision called Rolling Acres."
"I know where it is." He was traveling on the perimeter of the city, sticking to minor highways that were less likely to be backed up with traffic at this time of day. He was still fifteen minutes away when Alfred spoke again.
"He's leaving the subdivision, but on foot. He's crossing the property of a neighboring manufacturing complex."
"What kind?"
"Purisol Bottled Water. But it's been shut down for nearly twenty years – since the height of the recession."
He stowed the Tumbler in the shadow of a freeway overpass within sight of the factory, blessing the murky winter darkness. Alfred's report was that the signal had been stationary for ten minutes now. He moved silently through the night, across the vast and empty parking lot, avoiding the two security lights that were somehow still functional.
On the side of the building that read closest to the coordinates from the satellite signal, there was no ground level entrance. But halfway up the wall, he could just see the gleam of a window pane. Using his grappling gun, he propelled himself thirty feet off the ground until he dangled by the glass. The window was unlocked, and it took less that a minute for him to raise the sash and silently drop into the room. Inside it was pitch black, and he activated his infrared vision enhancer. The room had apparently once been an office, but all that now remained was an ancient filing cabinet and a bulletin board.
He crossed the floor and silently eased open the door. It opened onto a wide walkway that ran around the perimeter of the open factory floor that was still cluttered with machinery. There was no movement anywhere, and no sign of life. He moved swiftly away to the right until the coordinates on his GPS matched to a fraction of a degree the ones Alfred had read off to him. There was nothing there. He had to go down.
- - - - - -
Judas reappeared. "He wants to see them," the old man said, and hurried back the way they had come, toward the tunnel exit.
"Come," the guard ordered. Still holding Richard's hand, Cecilia followed him to the door in the wall and went through it when he opened it.
Her first impression after she stepped over the threshold was that of light. Soft, golden, and warm, it seemed to flow through the room, caressing polished surfaces and nestling down onto plush fabrics. The predominant colors were blue and ivory, the wood was dark mahogany, and the whole effect was one of quiet harmony.
It was only after looking at the room that she transferred her attention to the man behind the desk. He was slender and pale, with thinning mouse brown hair, and he watched her with open curiosity. "We've met before," she realized. "Mr. Jay, wasn't it? Teacher of high school English?" She suddenly remembered the name their taciturn guard outside had used. "Jay…Gatsby?"
"An English teacher sort of thing to do, don't you think?" He stood up from his chair and came around the desk. "Miss Somerville, I can't tell you how delighted I am to welcome you here." He extended his left hand.
"Please," she said with only a hint of dryness, "call me Cecilia."
"And you too, Richard," Gatsby said. "I've heard so much about you. It's a pleasure to finally meet you."
He offered his hand, but the boy just glared up hostilely, his shoulders stiff.
"Richard was in an accident yesterday," Cecilia said, "and he's still under the weather. Do you have something I could give him for his headache?"
"Yes, of course, do sit down." Gatsby walked back behind the desk and picked up the phone. "Atuan? Would you kindly send in some mild painkillers? Thank you." He hung up the receiver.
"That's quite the mausoleum you have outside," Cecilia remarked, settling comfortably into the depths of her chair.
"Yes. The remains of a project that was unsuccessfully terminated some years ago, I'm afraid."
She cocked her head curiously. "What sort of project?"
"Now that would be telling," he said casually, picking up a silver letter opener and gently flexing its slender blade as they spoke.
"What harm could it do to satisfy my curiosity? You said the project was finished some time ago, and since you're going to kill me anyway…"
Gatsby smiled. "A woman after my own heart. The objective pursuit of knowledge before all else. It's a pity, really. If we had met earlier, under different circumstances, I think we would have worked well together. I like competent people."
"Why only in the past?" she asked quietly. "Why not now?"
His smile deepened. "Cecilia, are you actually offering to switch sides?"
She shrugged delicately. "I believe in compromise. And I'm fond of breathing. Almost addicted to it, one might say."
Gatsby shook his head. "Even if you meant that as more than a ploy to gain time, it's not that simple. It's not a matter of switching sides. Cecilia my dear, you and I are already fighting on the same side."
Her eyebrows twitched upward. "You're quite sure of that?"
"It's a matter of switching not allegiances but methodologies. Have you ever noticed that people don't care all that much who they are allied with as long as they can continue doing the same things they've always done?"
"Jay, are you accusing me of being an old dog who can't learn new tricks?"
"I would never call you an old dog. And it's true that even in method we are alike. You are clever, devious, ruthless… But you are not absolutely ruthless. There is a vein of weakness in you, and one day, under the right pressure, you would crack and fall short of doing what is necessary."
There was a soft knock at the door, and the African guard entered, carrying a glass of water and a bottle of Tylenol. He set them on the desk and left again. Cecilia shook out one of the pills and offered it and the glass to Richard. He refused to accept them, but sat motionless, scowling darkly at her. Traitor, his silent glare accused.
"Just take it, Richard," she ordered impatiently. "You'll be able to think more clearly."
Grudgingly, he took the medicine and water, careful not to touch her hands while he did it.
"Why are we here?" Cecilia asked abruptly.
"You set me back quite seriously in Colombia, my dear. And I really couldn't let you get away with that."
"You were Morales's buyer," she said slowly.
"Employer might be a more apt description. I had my own agents down there of course, but by the time they discovered who you were and tipped off Morales, the damage had been done. You're a dangerous woman, Cecilia Somerville, and that's not a compliment I pay lightly."
"I'm flattered."
He ignored her sarcasm and continued, "That's why I had Judas invite you to Gotham. I couldn't afford to let you continue running around uncontained. And you were useful to me here."
"I'm so happy to have been of service."
Her comment won a smile from Gatsby. "I wish I could say it has earned you an easy way out, but someone else has requested otherwise, and I saw no reason to refuse him. In fact…" He glanced at his watch. "I suppose I had better call him. I can't tell you how much I've enjoyed this chance to finally speak with you, but time, I am afraid, is pressing." He set down the letter opener and picked up the phone. "Atuan? Tell Señor Morales he may come and collect his prisoners."
"Richard too?" she asked sharply as he hung up the phone.
"I have no further need for him, and Carlos asked specifically that he be allowed to…wrap things up."
Cecilia straightened up in her chair. "The formula exists, you know. And it will be much harder to obtain without a live boy as a bargaining chip."
Gatsby laughed, a light, breathy sound of amusement. "It's so kind of you to look out for my interests, Cecilia, and I have no doubt you are right. Mr. Earle will be disappointed. It was he, you know, who brought the matter to my attention. But you can't still believe that I have expended so much effort and expense for the sake of a formula no one was certain existed. This isn't about the Graysons. It never was."
Cecilia lunged across the desk, her left hand seizing the letter opener and plunging toward Gatsby's heart. He grabbed her wrist and stood as he jerked her fully across the desk and hurled her to the floor. "That was a foolish…" He broke off as a heavy glass paperweight thrown by Richard smashed against his temple. He faltered, and Cecilia tackled him around the knees. She reached for the paperweight to use as a weapon, but as her fingers closed around it, the all too familiar feel of cold steel pressed against her neck.
"If you move, Richard, I will shoot her," Gatsby said softly.
From the corner of her eye Cecilia could see the boy standing a mere two feet away, the letter opener gripped in his fist.
The door to the office swung open and Carlos Morales, followed by two burly men dressed in black, came into the room.
"Señor Gatsby!" he exclaimed in alarm. "Are you hurt?"
Gatsby reached up and wiped a trickle of blood away from his temple. "My own fault. I underestimated young Mr. Grayson."
One of the thugs moved forward and snatched the letter opener out of Richard's hand, then grabbed him by the upper arm and forced him to stand on tiptoe. The other came around the desk and roughly hauled Cecilia to her feet.
"Querida Señorita Cecilia," Morales murmured. "Que gran placer a verte otra vez."
"Carlos, remember…" Gatsby broke off as the muffled roar of an explosion shook the room, causing everyone to stagger. He glanced at his watch. "I see the games have begun on schedule. Carlos, remember that I want the bodies in one piece, and it would be well if you could finish within the hour."
"Por supuesto, Señor." Morales gestured impatiently to the door. "Let us depart."
The phone on Gatsby's desk rang as they filed out of the room. He picked it up. "Yes, Atuan? The Lieutenant is here? By all means, send him in."
To Be Continued…
A/N I'm afraid review responses for the last chapter will be coming individually by e-mail, throughout the week as I have time. But don't let that stop you from reviewing this one! Thanks so much for the great response to the last chapter. It was very encouraging :D