Hannibal: Pardons and Puzzles

After Stockwell left, Murdock brought Amy out of the kitchen. We soon found she was just as inquisitive as ever. "Who was that guy? Why did I have to hide? Will someone please tell me what is going on?"

Knowing she wouldn't stop asking until she had a full explanation, I sat her down on the couch to explain our situation and how we got here. Darkness fell, and when Murdock returned prepared to spend the night thirty minutes later, I had finally brought Miss Allen up to speed.

"Haven't you guys tried to escape?" she said when I was done. "I mean, come on, you got out of Fort Bragg; how much easier could it be here?"

I reached out and turned on the standing lamp we'd planted near the couch so Face could see his Sudoku after it got dark. My objective was more devious: I wanted to keep an eye on Miss Allen's reactions. The reason I had let her come at all and get in on our secret was because Murdock was an excellent judge of character, and her appearance had seemed to bring him out of his anxiety problem, or at least temporarily distract from it. But we still had no idea how far she could be trusted.

"It's not that simple," I said. "Without our pardons, we're wanted as capital offenders. The government has a lot more reason to track us down than before, and if they can't find us, Stockwell will. And even if we managed to evade both of them, nobody would want to hire us. As far as anyone knows, we're criminals."

Amy tilted her head to one side. "Really? Would you believe that I have a whole list of people who would hire you in a second if they needed to?"

"What do you mean?"

She smiled enigmatically. "You don't think I've been sitting idle all this time while my friends were in trouble, do you? Like I said, when I heard you guys were on trial, I came back right away, but by the time I arrived you had already been sentenced to death. They wouldn't let me see you, even with a press pass. It was very strange."

She stared into the distance as if watching the events on a TV screen. "When you were executed, I was devastated. I tried to get in touch with Murdock, but I couldn't track him down. And then they announced your bodies were missing, and you had apparently escaped. I knew you guys would be in hiding, so I did my research and found out the only way to get your charges dropped was a presidential pardon. Then I went back to L.A. and contacted all of your former clients that Tawnia and I could find, asking them to sign a petition for your pardon. So far, I have at least a thousand signatures, and some of them even wrote letters."

My jaw dropped. "A thousand signatures?"

Amy beamed. "You guys have helped a lot of people. Whole neighborhoods, in fact. People were falling over themselves to sign when they heard what we were doing. You should read the letters, too — they're very special."

I studied her, trying to pinpoint what exactly made her appear so different now than when she first walked through the door. The cropped hair and dark skirt suit were the same, but her face had lit up with excitement. All the trouble she had gone to to help us blew my mind.

"Miss Allen, answer me this. Why'd you do it? You wouldn't go out of your way to help us without a compelling reason. A front page headline, maybe?"

Amy blushed. "No. I just wanted to find you guys and make sure you could live again. I've been in D.C. for a month scoping out how to get your pardons." She picked up the water glass Face had left on the coffee table and swirled the water around inside. "And no, this is not some trick to win me a place on the team. You were right three years ago when you told me it would never work. I knew you were right; I was just . . . too stubborn to give up a reporter's dream."

I nodded, remembering the night shortly after the case where Face ran for office against Sheriff Dawson, when Amy had come to me to ask if she could be part of the A-Team for good. Her argument was that Decker already knew she was associated with us when he didn't even know that Murdock was on the team. She had gotten halfway down her list of ways she would advantage us before I stopped her. I told her if she wanted to be of use, it would have to be from the outside.

"There are two simple reasons why what you're asking won't work," I had said. "For one thing, you can't go on the run with us since we can't accommodate you and you have job obligations. For another, you were never in 'Nam with us, so no matter how long you stick around, you can never be a member of the A-Team."

"This is because I'm a woman, isn't it?" said Amy, her disappointment in my answer clear to see.

"It's because you're a reporter, not a soldier," I replied. "You can't live a soldier's life."

"But that's what I've been doing!"

Her inflated view of her qualifications was getting on my nerves. "No, what you've been doing is coming with us a few days at a time for missions and then going back to your newspaper with a story to get your paycheck. You don't have to live covering your tracks at every turn, knowing any day the MPs could knock at your door and haul you off for thirty years in the federal slammer. You've got it easy; enjoy it."

Amy tried to argue, but I laid down the law. "Look, lady, you should be grateful you're not wanted by the military and have normal life, but instead you're whining because you can't have things just the way you want them. Now, you can either keep working with us as an outsider the way you are now, or you can go find excitement somewhere else. Your choice."

"Then I guess this is goodbye," she said, tears in her eyes, and left. Soon we heard that she had been transferred to Jakarta. None of the others knew about the conversation we'd had or why she left. Later, I wondered if I'd been too hard on her; after all, she was just a kid who liked a good adrenaline rush, which was something I could relate to. But I told myself it was better she knew where things stood and stopped looking to us for something we couldn't give her.

"You still haven't answered my question," I said, breaking the silence we'd both fallen into. "Why did you come all the way from Jakarta to help us?"

Amy set the glass down and turned to me with a familiar fire in her eyes. "Because you're my friends, and you don't belong in a prison cell or in front of a firing squad. You don't belong here doing rogue missions for an ex-CIA creep who walks all over you. You belong out there," she demonstrated with a wide sweep of her arm, "helping people who can't defend themselves. That's what all the signatures and letters are about. That's why you guys are so different from the A-Team I used to know. You've lost your spirit; it's all business now, at the beck and call of this Stockwell guy. Who are you really helping now? Hannibal, can't you just get out of here?"

She was right. Ever since we'd started working for Stockwell, I'd sensed a change in my men. BA grumbled and argued more out of habit than anything, and without his work at the youth center he had little to do between missions besides maintain our equipment and the van. Once I'd stopped listening to Face's pleas to escape, Face seemed to grow more distant, keeping his thoughts to himself. Our change of situation had actually brought Murdock comparative freedom, but even though he had his own apartment, job, and girlfriend, he didn't seem to be able to enjoy them while the rest of us were in captivity. We may have traded the federal slammer for an upscale dwelling, but it was still a prison. And our political missions did little to help the everyday citizen with problems the local police would overlook.

I leaned back into the couch and sighed. "I thought Stockwell would keep his word, and we would be free after we finished the missions. Now it doesn't look like that's going to happen."

"No, it doesn't," said Amy.

I started to fish for a cigar, but I wasn't wearing my jacket, and Face wasn't there to hand me one. Besides, BA always complained when I smoked in the house. That at least hadn't changed.

"Well, if anything good came out of what happened to Face," I said slowly, "it's that I realized I don't want us to die here. Whether we die in combat or playing shuffleboard, we have the right to die as free men."

"You're absolutely right. Does that mean you'll let me submit the petition?"

I laughed. Amy still hadn't learned how to beat around the bush. "We'll have to decide as a team. In fact, it's time for a huddle before the playoff game. Could you call BA and Frankie in for a meeting? We'll begin as soon as they get the grease out from under their fingernails."

Amy headed outside while I made my way toward Face's room. I hated to wake him up if he was asleep; it didn't take his complaint this evening to tell me he didn't feel well most of the time since he'd been on painkiller. But he'd be glad to know his little incident at dinner hadn't put a damper on our pardons quite yet.

When I opened the door, the light was on and Murdock was perched on the edge of Face's bed. Both were bending over to examine something. When they saw me, they straightened up and quickly set the book they were holding behind them on the bed.

"We're having a meeting in here as soon as BA and Frankie can join us," I announced.

"That sounds good, Colonel," Murdock said, turning to Face.

"Uh, yeah," said Face helpfully, nodding. Both of them looked like they'd been caught with a hand in the cookie jar. I'd deal with that after the meeting. Soon, Amy, BA, and Frankie arrived and sat down on the other bed, and I couldn't help noticing how close to Amy Frankie sat. I claimed an area in front of the door for pacing, an essential for a good briefing, and began the meeting.

"I've called you all together to discuss a possibility that's just come up. Miss Allen has informed me that she's collected over a thousand signatures on a petition for our presidential pardons."

I paused as the men reacted with astonishment and Amy smiled.

"It doesn't sound like Stockwell's gonna come through with his end of the bargain, so we can't count on him anymore. What I want to know is, would you be interested in trying to escape Stockwell and get the pardons our way?"

Frankie shot BA a look at the same time as Murdock and Face exchanged glances. "Okay, guys, what's going on?" I demanded.

BA spoke first. "I was gonna escape and go see my momma. She's been sick, and I want to make sure she okay."

"I'm sure we can work that out," I said. "Anyone else?"

Murdock stared fixedly at Face. "Is there something I should know about, Lieutenant?" I said.

"I started making plans for how we could escape and where we'd go," said Face, avoiding eye contact.

"Here." Murdock picked up the book they had been looking at. Face put his hands up as if to protest, but Murdock was already holding the book out to me, saying, "It's all in here, past the first few pages."

I was more than a little surprised to find myself holding Face's Sudoku book, but I opened it and started flipping through. I soon came to the conclusion that, despite his decision to stick around, Face fully intended to leave again, for good.

"This is all very interesting, Face," I said. He winced as if waiting for a hammer to drop on his head. "Can you summarize what you're thinking?"

"I was just bored, I wasn't trying to—" he said in a rush, then stopped when he realized what I'd said. He took a deep breath. "The only way we can escape is if we're on a mission. With the high security surrounding the house there's no way we could get far enough before Stockwell's goons caught up with us. That's why we have to go on this mission!"

I nodded. "And why didn't you tell me that this evening? Why did you keep this," I held up the Sudoku book, "such a big secret?"

"Maybe because the last time I told you guys we should escape, nobody took me seriously!" His jaw tightened in sudden anger.

"But you've got to admit, you didn't leave," I said.

"Because I got held up every time I tried, and anyway, we can't go it alone. If we're gonna leave, we have to leave together as a team. You said so yourself today!"

"Which brings up another point." I turned to BA. "Am I to understand you were going to leave for Chicago without any warning, Sergeant?"

"Yeah." BA looked at the floor.

"Do you want to explain why you would do such a thing?"

"I thought you'd try ta stop me."

My gaze fell on each of my men in turn: BA, eyes averted but fists clenched; Frankie, pretending not to watch me anxiously; Face, briefly interrupting his resentful frown to scratch his shoulder; and Murdock, silently taking in the tension. Something had gone wrong here, and it had to do with me.

"If none of you felt free to express your concerns to me, I guess that's my fault," I said. "We've all had to adjust to our new situation, but that doesn't change the fact that we're a team. None of us has to go it alone. If there's something bothering you enough to make you want to leave, I'd like to know about it so I can help you fix the problem."

The wall of tension came partway down as everyone nodded, even Amy.

"Now, we have an important decision to make tonight. What we decide could make the difference between whether we live or die; either way, it'll be permanent. I want each of you to think carefully before answering. Do you think we should try to escape Stockwell and get the pardons ourselves, or keep working for him in the hopes that he keeps his promise?"

"I say we go!" BA declared. "I'm tired of waitin' around for this fool Stockwell an' his empty promises. I wanna go visit my momma."

Face shrugged. "You already know what my answer is. This whole arrangement was built on lies since day one. And I don't like doing someone else's dirty work."

"What I don't like is how he don't seem to care if we're alive or dead," Murdock put in. "When you were lost in that Hong Kong mission, all he wanted was the plutonium. Now he's trying to force us on a mission even if Face ain't ready to go yet."

"Of course I'm ready!" Face protested.

"Okay, guys, we'll get to that later. Frankie?"

He shifted position and threw a sideways glance at Amy. "Well, I'm already outvoted. Besides, I missed spending Christmas with my family, and I don't want to do that again."

"All right." I clapped my hands together. "Looks like we're all agreed. Operation Presidential Pardon, commencing now. We need to come up with a plan to escape, and we need to figure out how to request our pardons. Amy's gonna have to take care of that part since she's the only one who won't get arrested."

"I've researched the procedure for requesting pardons, and I can start whenever you're ready," said Amy.

"Good, there's probably a lot of red tape so you'd better get on that as soon as possible. Face, you said going on a mission is the only way to escape?"

He nodded vigorously. "Yes, and Stockwell won't give us any more missions unless we go on this one, so we have to go now."

"Didn't Stockwell say he'd give us our pardons if we did this mission right?" said Frankie.

"Yeah, and then he did a 180 when we said we weren't going," I said. "The last few times we've disagreed he's been willing to compromise, but this time it's all or nothing. Something's different about this mission. We need a backup plan in case he decides to 'modify' the deal."

"Colonel, would you mind explaining what exactly's gonna happen if our escape plan doesn't work?" said Murdock.

"Well, we'll either be killed, captured by the military and executed, or captured by Stockwell and submitted to whatever tortures he thinks best."

"Thanks, I just wanted to know where we stand." Murdock, Face, and BA didn't seem surprised, but Frankie looked a little pale.

"Everyone still game?" I asked.

"Yeah," said BA.

"Okay. Face," I handed him his book, "can you go through what you've figured out so far in here?" Normally I would have started by coming up with a plan of my own, but I wanted the kid to know his efforts were appreciated. He sometimes got in a rut of thinking his value to the team depended on his ability to get things for us, which he couldn't do much of right now.

My offer got the look of gratification I was hoping for. "Sure thing, Hannibal." He laughed. "I should warn you, I was heavily drugged while working on some of this, so hopefully I can read my own writing."

For the next half hour, we worked through the contents of the Sudoku book. Face would explain what he thought we needed to do for a particular part of the escape, and the rest of us would comment and critique until we came to a conclusion. Even Amy offered her opinion the way she used to do. Gradually, the group felt more and more like a team again.

We worked until we had a solid skeleton of a plan and Face showed signs of struggling to concentrate. I dismissed everyone to meet the next day, then went to the office to put in a call to Stockwell. I told him we'd been thinking about his offer, and since Face had a two week follow-up at the doctor's tomorrow, we'd agree to do the mission if he was cleared to go with us. Stockwell merely said he was glad we'd come to our senses, hiding any relief he might have felt at my answer.

When I opened the office door, I nearly bulldozed into Frankie. "Hey Johnny, can I talk to you for a minute?" he said.

"Sure. What is it?"

Frankie put his hands on his hips. "Don't get me wrong, it's great you guys get your pardons and all, but what about me? Amy's petition don't have my name on it, and I can't go on missions for Stockwell by myself. If you guys escape, what's gonna happen to me?"

This was a problem. A big problem. "I hadn't thought about that. Sorry, Frankie. Tell you what, I'll start coming up with a plan right away."

"Better make it a good one," he said, and headed for the stairs.

I stood in the hallway for a moment and listened to the sounds of the house: shutting doors, running water, BA's heavy footsteps. I needed to find Amy and show her where she'd be sleeping tonight. We'd have a full house.

Laughter floated out from Face and Murdock's room. Good, that's what I'd been hoping for. By asking Murdock to help out Face and the rest of us, I'd asked him to help out himself, knowing Face had the best chance of getting him to work out his anxiety problem. Murdock's helping Face open up about his escape plans was an added bonus. At least part of my team was content. I had a long night ahead trying to find a way not to leave Frankie behind. The A-Team never left anyone behind.