CHAPTER 10

As he made his way back upstairs to inform the new parents that their baby was gone, Ryan immediately got Clarke on the phone, "You better have found something on that footage," he begins, expectant and hopeful. Otherwise, they had quite simply nothing to go on and that was a reality Ryan refused to accept.

"We have footage of a young woman leaving the rear exit, holding a baby. She got into the passenger's side of a car. Moments later the driver showed up - we think it's Mark. We're tracking them now, Ryan." Agent Clarke informs him reassuringly.

Ryan deliberately ignored the fact that they had just let Mark get away with a newborn baby. He couldn't waste time giving Clarke a hard time for something that had already been done. "Have a car ready. Weston and I are gonna follow." Ryan instructs his fellow Agent before ending the call.

Jenny is waiting outside of the room when Ryan returns to the ward, pacing and trying to remain calm so as to not alert the couple. He approaches her and pulls her off to the side. "Jenny, I need you to stay with Max while Mike and I go after Gray."

"He took him, didn't he?" She asks, her dark eyes filled with tears.

Ryan nods. "But we're gonna find them. I need you to keep Max here." Although she had just given birth, both her aunt and uncle knew just how determined their niece could be when she set her mind to something. She'd ignore the pain and break her own stitches if that meant she could save her child.

Jenny could do nothing but nod and agree. "Of course." She breathes before they made their way into the room.

Max was sound asleep, exhausted from the labour and Ryan counted his blessings. Mike seemed to be on his way to joining her when Ryan places a hand on his shoulder. "We gotta go, kid." He announces softly.

Mike cranes his head to look up at him. "What?"

"They got him." The words barely escape his mouth, ashamed that he had somehow let it happen.

Mike slowly rises from his chair, his hand still clutching Max's. "What do you mean they got him?" He glances between the Hardys, "What are you talking about?"

"The nurse who came into to take him to the nursery? She's with Mark." Ryan explains, "But Clarke's team are tracking their car now. There's a car waiting downstairs for us to follow them."

Mike blinked once, twice and again before absorbing the information. "You're saying the FBI watched Mark leave with my child?!" He exclaims, mindful not to wake Max.

Ryan shakes his head. "They won't hurt him. At the very least, they'll lead us to the other kids." One of them had to remain calm and considering the situation, Ryan knew it had be him. "You know it makes sense."

His words earned a scoff in reply. "They used a newborn as bait, Ryan!" Mike countered. "What part of that makes sense?!"

"It doesn't matter. We gotta go." The elder agent reminded.

Mike glanced at Max, frowning and unsure what to do. "Let her sleep - there's no reason she has to worry." Ryan told him.

"Are you kidding me?" His eyes flared. What a ridiculous thing to say.

Ryan braced his hands on Mike's shoulders, his eyes baring through into the younger man's. "We're gonna get him back, Mike." The conviction in his voice served as an unspoken promise, convincing enough to assure them that they would.

Mike inhaled deeply and nodded. He approached Max's sleeping form, kneeling down by the bed. "I love you," he whispered, squeezing her hand before he pressed his lips to her forehead. Had Ryan or Jenny been able to see, they'd have noticed a tear rolling down Mike's face and onto Max's skin. Going into these things, they always had to consider every possibility and one of them was their death. This might very well be the last time he'd get to see his wife and she wouldn't have known.

He knew if he remained a moment longer, he'd not be able to tear himself away from her and right now, their son needed him.

Exhaling, finally, he stood and nodded to Ryan who did the same and left.

And with equally perfect timing, Max began to stir. Her hand reached out instinctively, expecting to feel another there. "Jenny? Where's Mike?" She asked upon waking, her brow furrowed in confusion as she surveyed the room, finding only her Aunt.

Her aunt wavered nervously. "He's uh…" she trailed off, unsure what to say; what could she say?

Suddenly there came a sharp, yet familiar pain in Max's abdomen. "Ah!" she yelped. "What the- OW!" Her hands grasped her belly.

"What's wrong?" Jenny implored.

"I don't know!" Max yelled in agony, confused.

Jenny ran to the door. "Nurse!" She called out desperately into the corridor.

...

Meanwhile, Ryan and Mike were en route to Mark's location, following the GPS tracker.

Ryan was driving while Mike ensured they were going in the right direction in reference to the map on his tablet. Somehow, the scenery seemed familiar and likewise the situation.

"Hey, you alright?" Ryan asked, breaking the silence.

Mike turned to stare at the older man, "I don't know, Ryan. My hour-old son was just taken by a psychotic Mamma's boy who may or may not have the ghost of his dead brother living inside him." Ryan already felt like an idiot for asking. "Not to mention the fact that we have no idea what we're walking into and my wife doesn't know if her uncle, husband or child will come back to her, not that she even knows we left." A lump had formed in his throat and he was having trouble breathing past it. "Would you be alright?"

The older of the two nodded, understanding. "Sorry." He couldn't say much else to quell anything Mike was feeling at this point.

"Let's just get there." Mike suggested, preferring the silence.

He had no energy to talk. He was saving it for whatever lay ahead.

Seven months earlier…

It was 9pm and Max had already come home, made dinner and locked the door. She was never the paranoid type and she could certainly protect herself, but given her current condition, she wasn't going to risk anything, not while Mike was away.

So when an unexpected knock came at the door, she immediately unsheathed her gun from its holster and approached it warily.

"Max, it's me!" She heard someone with a strangely similar voice to Mike. But he was in Europe. He wasn't due home for another couple months.

Oh crap! She glanced down at her middle, eyeing the subtle but noticeable bump there. If he didn't know now, he certainly would the moment she opened the door.

When Mike's eyes fell immediately to her belly, she knew it was the reason he had come home. "I'm going to kill him." Max groaned, turning her back to Mike and dialling the phone to call her Uncle, determined to reprimand him for breaking his promise.

Mike watched her and dropped his bags. Approaching her, he took the phone from her hands and threw it on the counter. "I'm so sorry." He breathed against the skin of her neck once he had her in his arms.

Max closed her eyes, inhaling the scent she had missed so much. "For what?" She asked, tightening her arms around his tough frame, intent on making him stay this time.

He pulled back slightly, searching for her eyes. "For leaving you…" he trailed off, gazing down between them. "Leaving you to deal with this… alone." It had to be his biggest regret. Sure, he hadn't known but certainly should've considered the possibility. They had made an effort to be safe each time they were intimate. That night he left however, they threw caution to the wind and were far too eager to love each other than to heed the consequences. The baby, though welcome and already cherished, was one of them.

"How have you been? Did you see your doctor?" He asked.

Max nodded. "Yeah, but Gwen has been a real help - it's not been easy." She had to be honest with him; he deserved that much, if not anything else.

"Are you okay?" He pressed, overwhelmed with a sense of guilt for not having been with her throughout, what he assumed to be the most troublesome trimester.

She nodded once more, reassuring him with a subtle smile. Her head fell against his shoulder. She wouldn't tell him of those days she'd spend in the bathroom, vomiting three to five times each hour; nor the mornings in which she woke up too exhausted to move. "Some women have it worse than others." Gwen would tell her and she certainly got the worst of it.

And knowing full well how terrible Mike felt about leaving her, she'd keep him in the dark about this. Neither he nor she deserved to suffer anymore than they already had.

Present Day…

Mike supposed they had been wrong in that too.

…

"Give him to me." Luke demanded, his arms outstretched and expectant.

"You did well, Sally." Mark interrupts, patting the young girl's back lightly in a gesture of approval. "Take him into the nursery to meet his brothers and sisters." he instructed.

"No!" Luke took baby Henry from Sally's confused arms. "We'll keep him with us for a while."

Mark huffed, exasperated. "We still have work to do, Luke." He explained, not unreasonably. "We gotta prepare to leave the country with eight babies."

Luke rolled his eyes and kept Mark from handing the baby back to Sally. "Whatever."

"No, it's not whatever." Mark continued, holding the baby but trying to force his arms to let him go. "We have to leave soon or they'll find us and all of this will have been for nothing."

His twin maintained his hold on Henry who started to fuss. "Oh do stop whining for once in your life, Mark." exclaimed the older twin. "Christ! No wonder Mother babied you."

Sally watched as Luke sauntered off down the hall with the baby in his arms, babbling nonsense to him and occasionally arguing with his brother who wasn't there.

...

Eventually, after driving for an hour and a half, Ryan and Mike pulled up on the outskirts of an old plantation. The woodland enclosed the mansion they came to know as Jupiter Place.

"Here? Really?" Mike uttered incredulously.

Ryan shrugged. "They must've thought we wouldn't bother to check here."

"Well, apparently they were right." Mike was quickly losing faith in the federation he had been a loyal agent of for nearly a decade. He was starting to believe Ryan was right to choose the vigilante path rather than that which forced them to follow fruitless rules and protocols.

"We'll go on foot from here. Hopefully they don't have security." Mike recalled the time he and Max had infiltrated the grounds without being caught. It was likely he and Ryan wouldn't either. The twins were intelligent, but not so when it came to the basics - it was a weakness the FBI exploited.

Both men exit the vehicle and make their way through the forest and toward the house.

Their guns are unsheathed and ready to point at whatever and whomever dared to move.

Just then, Ryan clocked movement in the house. "Wait... I see something in the upstairs window, far right."

Mike followed his line of sight and saw the same. He squinted his eyes in an effort see clearly.

"It's a girl." said Ryan.

"She's the nurse who took Henry." Mike noticed, tightening his hold on the gun.

…

Sally spent most of her time in the nursery, feeding the babies and tending to them 24/7. Mark had other things to do and rarely came to see them unless Luke was feeling especially bored.

The youngest of the brood was particularly fussy and constantly wanted to be held. Though, without the soothing touch of her mother, she couldn't be silenced.

Sally held her in her arms now, rocking her gently in an attempt to mimic the motion she'd recognise as being in the shelter of the womb. Unfortunately, just as the infant was settling, Ryan and Mike crept into the room.

She turned and shrieked, hoping to alert Mark who was elsewhere in the mansion.

"Put the baby down." Ryan commanded, his gun pointed straight at her head. She did as she was told and tried to escape from the side of the room. "Stay there!"

Mike moved past the girl who remained at gunpoint by Ryan. "They're all okay." he said, inspecting the babies in their cots.

Suddenly, Sally ran at Ryan with a knife she pulled from her apron. He pressed the trigger and the sound of gunfire signalled her death. She fell limp against the floor as the children started to wail in response to the noise.

"He's not here." said Mike.

"What?"

"Henry. He's missing."

"He's right here," another voice announced from the room opposite the nursery.

Ryan and Mike ran to the other room and discovered Henry. He was unharmed but nestled in a basket strapped with explosives. Their hearts sunk to the base of their stomach at the sight.

"Hello, gentleman." the voice greeted from the shadowed corner.

They pointed their guns at him in a swift flick of their wrists. "Mark." Mike seethed, the fire in his eyes burning hotter than ever.

"No, it's Luke, silly." he twin quipped with a smirk. "You'd think they know the difference by now," he sighed sarcastically.

"Right?" Mark chuckles with no intention to defuse the situation with their light mannerisms.

Mike approached slowly. "Give me my son."

Mark tutted, waving his finger and moved closer to the basket. "Oh Mikey, you know better." He kept his gaze on the two men while his fingers toyed with a black band he wore on his wrist. Once a button was pressed, it beat steadily much like the rhythm a heart would make.

Mike glared at Mark the same way in which he had stared his mother down before executing her. Although Mike wasn't one to pray for tragedy and he certainly wouldn't choose those woman to die again if it meant he had this chance; a chance to finally avenge is father's death. Finally, after years of trying, the last of the Grays was here and he had no weapon to defend himself nor any to keep Mike from killing him. He had a chance now and the opportunity to take it.

All the while, Ryan noticed how the red dot on Mark's wristlet corresponded to a similar red light on the bomb's detonator. His brow furrowed slightly, trying to piece it together and just as Mike pressed the barrel of his gun against Mark's forehead, he realised.

"Mike, wait!"

Mike kept his gun in place but turned to Ryan in query.

"The bomb is connected to his heart monitor." He explains, kneeling down by the basket to take a closer look. "If he dies… the bomb will detonate." He was no expert but the smug expression across Mark's face told them he was correct.

Why else would he have faced them with no weapon. It was exactly his intention to have Mike kill him. He'd be dead, yes, but he'd die knowing that his plan was fulfilled to some extent. The baby would die and both Mike and Max would suffer.

Mike gritted his teeth, readjusting his hold on the grip. "You wouldn't harm an innocent child. Even you're above that." or rather he hoped he was.

"Hmm... Luke might be, since it's Max's baby and you see, he has a thing for her. It's annoying, really." Mark rolls his eyes and Mike fumed at the very mention of his wife's name on such a foul tongue. "But me? I don't think I am." And neither Mike nor Ryan could disagree with his claim.

Mark moved away from Mike, his hand place over the monitor as a threat; a warning that he could take it off at any moment, severing the connection. "It was Luke's idea... to keep the babies - he wanted to have a family again. Like mother made for us - we wanted to make our family too." He explains, staring down at Henry who was still crying.

"What about you, Mark? What do you want?" Ryan asked without a care to just what the answers might be. If he could keep the idiot talking, he might be able to figure out just how to get the baby away from the explosives.

"Honestly? I just want you to pay. You had no right to kill our mother!" It was unclear which twin had bellowed the latter.

The younger agent scoffed, "And you had no right to kill my father!" He treaded closer, trying to keep his anger under control for the sake of his son's life. Though his hands stilled, his tongue wasn't so easily restrained. "She got what she deserved."

"Mike!" Ryan pleaded.

"And you will get what you deserve, Mike." Mark responded, ignoring the venom behind Mike's previous comment in favour of his own."We couldn't get to Max, but we got little Henry here." he patted the brim of the basket then continued, "and as the years go by, Max will resent you just a bit more each time she remembers that you couldn't save her baby."

"Really? That's your plan?" The eldest of the men asked, stalling as much as he could.

Mark turns to face him. "It's not ideal, Ryan but we're working with what we have and if you ask me, I think it's a perfect punishment."

He turned completely then, to the baby and reached for his wrist. "Say bye to Daddy, little one." He starts to unstrap the monitor.

"No!" Mike implored desperately, throwing himself toward them.

Ryan thinks quickly and shoots Mark in the knee. The twin's legs fail beneath him and he falls, the monitor falling off.

Fortunately, the timer on the bomb told them they had a minute to spare and Mike takes the opportunity to grab the band and place it on his own wrist.

The timer slowed again to the rhythm of Mike's heartbeats. He reaches for the newborn and holds him tight against his chest, leaving the room and putting as much space between the bomb and themselves as they could.

"Shh... It's over." He cooed to the infant who continued to wail in his embrace.

Mike only turned back once he was over the threshold of the entrance. That was when he heard a single gunshot from the same room he had just left.

"Ryan!" He called upstairs to his uncle-in-law, hoping he hadn't been on the fatal side of the trigger.

The older agent descended the staircase not a moment later, reassuring him.

He could've spared Mark but the boy had endless resources and there was no telling just how he could evade the authorities. If Joe Carroll could do it twice with only a brood of questionably loyal followers, Mark Gray certainly would with the incentive of legal tender.

Ryan couldn't let him live.

…

Mike rejoined Ryan inside who was checking the seven other infants. They were screaming healthily. Baby Henry however had calmed in the shelter of his father's arms. "I'll call Clarke. I'll stay with them until someone comes to pick up the rest." Ryan told him.

"Get him back to her."

And Mike could do nothing but agree. He got in the car and headed back to his wife.

…

"Max?" Mike announced as he poked his head into the room.

"Shh!" Jenny approached him with a finger to her lips. "She just got him to sleep." She tells him, taking Henry from his arms.

His brows twitched in confused. "Him?" Who was she talking about? He ventured further into the room and saw Max.

Max turned on the bed at the sound of his voice. "Mike?" She reached out for his hand. "Where'd you go?" She asked.

Mike stared wonderingly at her; still glowing and still just as beautiful as always. Then his eyes drifted past her and to the transparent cot beside the hospital bed. There lay a second bundle of blue, squirming slightly. "What…?" He started and moved around the bed to see. "How?"

Both women smile brightly in response to his confusion. "He came while you were gone." Max tells him. "Apparently he was hiding behind his brother for nine months." Jenny laughed lightly, staring down at Henry. "I suppose, it explains why I was bigger than I should've been & why I felt the kicking never stopped." Max continued, "While one was asleep, the other was at it."

"A boy?" Mike breathed, his eyes rounded with shock as he glanced up to stare at his wife. "We have two boys?"

Twins; twin boys. It was either a good omen or a very a bad one. And when Mike picks up the youngest of the two boys for the first time, joining Max who now held the other, he decided on the former. Absolutely the former, he smiled widely.

Max's mind drifted off to her previous question, wondering where he had gone off to and what such palaver caused him to miss the birth of his second son. "Should I be worried?" She asked vaguely, unsure if she wanted to know.

Mike tore his eyes from his babies to their mother's face. He could tell her everything that had transpired that day but this time, there was no need for it; no need to worry. "Not anymore," he assured her.

The nightmare was over.

Finally.

The End