I want to thank all of you for your patience and persistence. I can't tell you how many emails I got encouraging me to finish this. My computer non-compatibility with the sight did hold me up, but so did an awful case of repetitive stress injury. I urge all of you to look into RSI and ways to keep from getting it. It is debilitating and the pain is unbelievable.

Anyway, on to the story. There will be one or two more chapters at the very least.

Manipulation part 14

By Ecri

Alan stared at his son's face. Too pale and too bloody, it was the stuff of every parent's nightmares. When he'd heard the shots, realized what was going on, for a moment, Alan had thought that both his sons were dead. Now, riding in the ambulance with his eldest, his thoughts flew back to that moment when his youngest had once again proved able to surprise his father.

"Go with Donny. He needs you, Dad." Charlie's voice had cracked with emotion, but it was stronger than Alan had thought it would be.

He shook his head, recognizing his youngest son's need for his reassuring presence, but, to his amazement, Charlie had shaken his head as if knowing his father's thoughts. "Go with Donny." He said again, sounding stronger and more insistent by the moment.

A look at his eldest at that moment decided it for him, and Alan clambered into the back of the ambulance, assuring the EMTs he'd be no trouble, but still flashing a concerned look at Charlie.

Charlie nodded once as the ambulance pulled away, and Alan watched him, still being treated, until he couldn't even pretend to still see his son.

Don hadn't come around, but Alan didn't want to ask about that. He didn't want to be a distraction. He supplied information when asked, volunteered anything he felt might be useful in treating Don, but otherwise tried to blend with his surroundings.

The ride was shorter than he'd expected and all too soon, he was being swept aside as the hospital's ER staff took control of the situation. He was pointed vaguely in the direction of the usual hard chairs in the waiting room, and he stared at the door as it swung shut cutting him off from his son.

He hoped that Charlie wasn't far behind, and only then thought to wonder if they would bring him here or back to the prison. His heart leaped to his throat sending him into a blind panic for all of a minute and a half until he saw Charlie, escorted by David, and Terry, enter the hospital.

"Charlie!"

Charlie's relief at recognizing his father's voice was apparent. "How's Donny?"

Alan shrugged. "I don't know yet."

Charlie seemed barely to hear it as the ER staff rushed over and began to check his injuries. Charlie struggled briefly, but there wasn't much fight left in him.

Alan watched him being treated and almost leaped out of his skin when a familiar voice spoke.

"They'll get the best of care."

Alan whirled around to face Mason, and when he allowed himself to speak it was with a venom he'd thought he'd put behind him years ago. "They will. And if I lose either of my boys, I know who to blame."

Mason looked away briefly, but seemed to force his gaze back to meet Alan's. "I'm not the enemy here."

Alan risked a glance at Charlie before roughly dragging Mason several feet away where he could be sure his son couldn't here them. "Are you really going to pretend to be blameless here? You? After what you put my family through?"

"That was years ago! You can't connect that with this!"

"You think I can't? I know who Buchmann is...was! I know why he's been tormenting my family! Is your memory so short that you really don't know what's going on, or have you been playing the plausible deniability game for so long that you don't even tell yourself everything you know?" Alan's voice was low, but it was filled with menace...a menace reflected in his eyes. "Buchmann wanted revenge! I told you he would all those years ago. You said it would never happen!" He drew in a long breath, stood straighter, his eyes flashing angrily, yet tempered with the determination only a parent can feel when the safety of a child is in question. "I won't let it happen. I won't let them suffer because you made a mistake all those years ago."

Mason shook his head. "The fact that you turned down a as promising as Don's will forever be unfathomable to me. Of course, though I believed you would have been the best of recruits, you were never as suited to it as I thought you were...as Don is." Alan's hands came up to grasp Mason's collar. Mason hit the wall and hit it hard, his hands automatically reaching out to try to pry Alan's grip from his jacket.

"You don't have him! You don't own him!"

Mason released his ineffectual hold on Alan's fists. "In the aftermath of all of this, I can't help but think that they would both have been safer if I'd had my way all those years ago."

Alan shook his head, and opened his mouth to speak, but his words were lost when an alarming beeping caught his attention. He turned to the spot a short distance away where Don was, but his son was obscured by the sheer number of medical personnel and equipment hovering around him.

He saw Charlie then, wide-eyed and staring, looking as he had when he'd realized his mother was gone forever. Alan was moving toward him before he even realized he'd released Mason. The other man was irrelevant. His children needed him.

Charlie saw his father throw Mason against the wall, but he couldn't quite reconcile the image with the man he'd known all his life.

"Dad," He trailed off as his father broke off whatever he'd been saying with a hate-filled glare at Mason and breezed easily by him. Charlie stared for a moment at Mason, but turned suddenly and followed his father. Being under Mason's scrutiny had been distinctly uncomfortable...and yet...it was somehow familiar.

Charlie shrugged that off, or tried to. His life had often left him under scrutiny. He'd felt at times...at his most resentful, stressful moments...as though he'd been nothing more than a performing monkey. Asked to do difficult and not-so-difficult mathematical equations on demand...being stared at, laughed over as people found delight in seeing an insecure five-year-old rattle off a string of numbers they couldn't hope to understand. It had given him a lifelong sympathy for animals in a cage. He'd never enjoyed a zoo or Seaworld in his life.

He shook his head trying to break his bizarre train of thought, even as he realized it was a reaction to stress, exhaustion, and physical pain. He approached his family, realizing how close he'd come to losing the both of them...to losing himself...he stopped in his tracks. Something was going on that he hadn't yet worked out. He was tired of being a pawn in someone's game, and it was obvious to him that that was what he'd been. Mason knew more than he was letting on. He wasn't merely a benevolent superior at the F.B.I. He has some agenda of his own. Something Charlie's own father understood.

Whirling around, Charlie stormed back out to where he'd last seen Mason. The man was talking on a cell phone, which Charlie easily plucked from his hand. "He'll call you back," he said into the receiver, just before snapping it shut.

Mason just stared at Charlie as though he'd expected this.

Charlie stared back. "I want answers." If he'd been listening objectively, Charlie never would have recognized his own voice. It was calm, yet menacing like Don's was when he interrogated a witness.

Mason nodded. "I imagine you do." He moved as though to get around Charlie, but Charlie moved to block his way.

"That wasn't like my father...what he did just then. What did you do to him?"

Mason actually laughed at that, and Charlie felt his own eyes narrow.

"Like father, like son. What did I do to him? Not a thing. He wouldn't see it that way, of course. He thinks I ruined his life...actually, I'm wrong. He thinks I was trying to ruin yours, and that means a lot more to him than anything I might or might not be able to do to him." He did move away from Charlie then, brushing past the younger man. Just before he rejoined some other law enforcement people nearby, he leaned in close to Charlie, whispering into his ear. "The thing is...I don't think it would have been ruined. I think you could have been something to contend with if left in my care."

"You're care...what the h..."

"Charlie!" Alan Eppes called his younger son with the same level of irritation in his voice that the young man had heard when he was a child and

Charlie turned to see his father was still hovering by Don's side, yet his tone, the look in his eyes, and the tension through his shoulders cowed Charlie as it always had. He suddenly felt as though he were seven years old again and had written equations on the dining room wall. He obeyed the unspoken command, turning once to look at Mason and finding that the man had disappeared.

Kim read the official reports of Charlie's arrest, then she spoke to Pierce, the only agent involved who wasn't hovering in the waiting room with Charlie and Alan. When he finished his tale, she nodded once and fell to thinking. Pierce was silent as she did. After some time, she turned to the man and asked the only question she could. "You don't think this is over, do you?"

Pierce looked surprised by the thought, but then shook his head. "I don't, but I couldn't say that's based on any real evidence."

She nodded thoughtfully. "There are still too many holes. Who took notes from Charlie's office and why?"

Pierce warmed to the subject. "How did the Bookman know that Alan Eppes was really the man who'd noticed the discrepancies in the city records and set the police digging when the only one to testify was Alan's boss?"

"How did Buchmann have access to the prison in order to speak to Charlie to make that deal with him?"

"Who actually planted all the evidence that framed Charlie? Buchmann? Some of his employees? Or someone else entirely?"

Kim cast an appraising glance over Pierce. "Are you up to finding the answers?"

"I have to find the answers. I was as manipulated as anyone else was. I was used to send an innocent man to prison. I need to prove I'm a better agent than that."

Kim's eyebrows went up. "Prove to whom?"

"To me."

It was the longest night of Alan's life. He'd hoped never to see the inside of a hospital again, but he'd feared it. How could he not with his eldest son having such a dangerous job?

He kept seeing Don lying there covered in blood, being hoisted onto a gurney and shoved into an ambulance, Charlie–in an odd dichotomy, appearing both twice his age and half of it–telling him to stay with Don. His need to protect both his boys making it difficult to leave Charlie, he'd had little choice in the end but to go to the son in the most dire need of his attention.

Alan knew he'd be sorting through this nightmare for many years to come, perhaps for the rest of his life. Don shot. Charlie imprisoned.

It was more than he could wrap his mind around.

"Dad?" Charlie's voice penetrated his emotion-fogged brain, and he could tell by the tone that it wasn't the first time his son had called to him.

"Charlie? What is it?" His worried gaze fell on Charlie, taking in the bandages and the worry all at once.

"Nothing...I...nothing."

He started to turn away, but Alan stopped him. "Charlie, son...come here..." He took a step toward Charlie and engulfed him in a desperate embrace. Father and son clung to each other, each on the verge of tears and each holding back out of concern for the other. When they eased apart, Alan led Charlie to some chairs and they sat.

"Dad, he'll be okay."

There was more conviction in that statement than Alan expected. Charlie wasn't one to take things on faith. He liked to prove things. Theorems, proofs, equations...everything had an answer, he'd claim. You just had to look for it long and hard enough.

"I'm sure he will." Alan answered even more surprised to realize he believed that. He smiled at Charlie. "We all will."

Charlie gave him half a smile. "Well, technically, I broke out of jail..."

"Yes, but Buchmann confessed to the murders you'd been arrested for."

"Does that nullify charges on the breaking out, which I actually did?"

Alan thought that over. "Don't confuse me, son. I'll get us the best lawyer on the planet. You'll be fine."

"Dad, you can't afford..."

"You'll be fine," Alan repeated firmly.

Charlie nodded, but Alan could tell it was just because he didn't want to talk about it anymore. He didn't want to talk about it either.

Terry sat at attention. All David could think was that it had to be uncomfortable. He'd gone along because he'd signed the reports as well, but he hadn't had much to offer in the exchange besides moral support. As the ranking agent, Terry presented the evidence concisely and clearly.

Her Honor Superior Court Judge Abigail Samuels listened to the audio recordings as she read along with the transcript. When she finished, she removed her reading glasses and looked first at David, then at Terry.

She cleared her throat and Terry returned her gaze expectantly.

"Bizarre case, to say the least, but it appears we do have an uncoerced confession. There is the matter of his jailbreak..." She paused, but neither Terry, nor David seemed uncomfortable with the silence or the implications of her glare. Yes, they'd been involved, but their report indicated that. They weren't trying to hide anything. "But I can put that aside until a more formal inquiry can be convened." She took a pen and paper from a drawer. "I'll grant the motion to drop the charges temporarily until that happens." She scrawled a signature and handed the paper to Terry. "Just make sure none of the Eppes men leave town."

Terry finally allowed herself a smile, and David couldn't help but follow suit. "That won't be a problem, Your Honor."

The judge rose, and they did the same. "I don't know how things turned out so well, Agents, but tell Agent Eppes for me that I admire his tenacity."

Terry nodded again, and was out the door almost instantly, David trailing along beside her. She broke into a grin as soon as they were in the corridor. "It's about time they got a break on this."

David nodded. "I'm glad you thought of this before anyone realized he was technically an escaped convict." He could just imagine someone coming to arrest Charlie at the hospital. Alan Eppes' reaction wouldn't have made him any friends in law enforcement, but then, most of the local Federal agents had already decided to run interference if anyone local decided to take charge. Several had explained to David that many favors had been called in, contacts in local law enforcement called and filled in on things, and David doubted anyone would have felt inclined to act too quickly on an order to bring Charlie in. Still, taking care of things at the top meant they didn't have to worry about it.

It wasn't until they reached the hospital, that David realized their timing should have been a little better.

Terry walked through the doors to the hospital shocked by the sight before her. Charlie, handcuffed, was being physically dragged down the halls, struggling against two of L.A.'s finest while Alan trailed along behind demanding that they release his son, that it had all been a misunderstanding. His language was just getting colorful, when Terry raced ahead to intervene.

Reaching the group, she stood in front of the pair of officers, her small frame making her no less formidable and her relationship with the Eppes family making her twice as immobile than any other officer.

Smoothly, she flipped her I.D. open, flashing her badge at the officers, and speaking loudly and clearly at the same time. "I'm Special Agent Lake. You need to release your prisoner." They began to object, but she shoved the court order at them. "You'll see the Judge Samuels' signature. She particularly asked me to congratulate this man's brother on his tenacity. You have no grounds to hold him."

Cowed more by the look on Terry's face, and also unwilling to cross a judge famous for disliking those who crossed her, they released Charlie and left, counting themselves lucky.

"Thanks, Terry." Charlie said, echoed by his father. "I never thought..."

Terry interrupted him knowing how emotionally drained he must be. "It's fine, Charlie. I'm just used to thinking like a Federal Agent. The local police were sure to realize at some point that you were here. It was only a matter of time."

"You should have seen how persuasive she was with the Judge." David added.

Alan laughed a quiet laugh as though anything heartier was an affront to the situation. "Yes, I can just imagine."

Charlie grinned. "Me, too!"

"It wasn't anything..."

"Sure it was." Charlie's voice was low, but the sentiment was heartfelt, and Terry saw it and more in his eyes.

She nodded once, took a breath as though she would speak again, but just nodded again.

David filled what might have been an awkward silence. "Have you heard anything about Don?"

Alan shook his head. "He's still in surgery. We can't find out anything at all."

Terry shepherded the group towards the waiting room sofas. "Come on. I'll get us some coffee." So they sat, each lost in thought as they waited for word on Don.

"You're here for Don Eppes?"

Charlie and Alan leaped to their feet. "Yes, doctor." Alan felt the words try to lodge in his throat, blocked by the fear that would not diminish. "I'm his father. What can you tell me?"

"He's resting. He'll be in recovery for some hours before we move him to his own room, but he came through the surgery well. The bullet didn't do as much damage as we'd initially feared." The man smiled. "He's a young, fit man. Barring the development of any unforeseen problems, we think he'll make a full recovery."

Alan's hand grasped Charlie's good wrist, and it wasn't clear to anyone present if he needed Charlie to keep him upright or if he believed Charlie needed him for the same reason. Regardless, Charlie stepped closer to his father. "Can we see him?" Charlie had to know. He wanted nothing more than to see Don, to see his chest rising and falling and know that he would only get stronger. Don had taken that bullet for him. He should be the one lying there.

"You can see him once we've moved him to a room. The nurse will notify you."

Alan shook the man's hand enthusiastically, words of gratitude tumbling from his lips.

Charlie sat. From the way the Doctor had said that, he knew this would be a long wait. Impatience, guilt, fear, and sorrow struggled to control him, and he was just beginning to wonder which would win, when he heard a familiar voice.

"Charlie!"

In seconds, before he could quite understand what was happening, There was a warm, dark head nestled on his chest, and strong arms wrapped around his waist.

"Amita?"

"Charlie! We were so worried! Then when Terry called..."

Charlie blinked and turned to look at Terry, but saw someone else instead. "Larry?"

"Charles, our relief that your incarceration is over doesn't compare to our relief that your injuries aren't serious." His smile faded slightly. "How's Don?"

Charlie reached a hand out to shake Larry's as Amita, suddenly embarrassed, pulled away from him. "He's going to be fine. He's in Recovery. They won't let us see him until he's been put in a room."

Larry nodded. "Well, of course. That's the way hospitals do things. Charles, can you talk about what happened? I mean...what did happen?"

Charlie shook his head. "Truthfully, I can't even be sure. So much makes no sense to me. I need to sort through it all."

Charlie could see Larry wanted to ask more questions, but he really couldn't answer them. A slight shake of his head, and Larry nodded his understanding.

Alan, who'd been giving Charlie a bit of room for this impromptu reunion with Larry and Amita, stepped forward. "I'm sure we'll get everything sorted soon enough. Once Don's well."

Larry smiled at Alan. "I'm sure you're right, Mr. Eppes. If there's anything we can do..."

Alan shook his head. "Thanks Larry, but we'll all be fine, now." His voice cracked then, and he cleared his throat swiping quickly at his eyes.

Two days later, Don had been moved to a private room at the behest of the F.B.I. Alan hadn't left his side, though the doctors insisted he was doing well.

Don looked at his overanxious father. "Really, Dad, I'm fine. You don't have to...hover."

Alan drew himself up slightly, an irritated scowl on his face. "Who's hovering?"

"You are." Don and Charlie said together, but Charlie laughed, much to Don's irritation.

"Of course, I think it's warranted."

"It is not!"

"Don, you were shot."

"You were..."

Alan threw up his hands. "I don't want a litany of you-were-hurt-worse-than-I was, thank you very much!"

Don sighed. "Fine. You can both just hover all you want. I won't say a thing."

"You just did." Charlie laughed.

Don ignored him as was right and proper behavior in such circumstance for an older brother. "Dad, did Terry say anything else about Buchmann?"

"What would she say about him? He's dead. He can't hurt us anymore."

Don shook his head, but didn't contradict his father. He felt like something was incomplete. He was feeling restless and needed to get back to work, but the doctors weren't allowing it. He spent his time reviewing the case in his head, and he had convinced himself that he'd overlooked something. With Alan always by his bedside, however, he hadn't had a chance to speak to Terry about it. If anyone could help him see what he'd missed, it was Terry. Don only hoped he'd get the chance to speak to her soon.

To Be Continued