Hannibal decided after the game last night to let the others sleep in until close to 9 o' clock, then he and B.A. went to deliver the wakeup call. They found Murdock's room empty and that the bed had been made during the night and hadn't been slept in since. Not ready to get into a panic, they went next door to Face's room and found four people asleep in various positions. Frankie and Murdoch were asleep in Face's bed, while Murdock and Face had fallen asleep on the floor in their clothes. Murdock was sprawled out on his back and had one leg swung over Face's body and his foot very close to the lieutenant's face; except that sometime during the night he'd turned his head to the other side to get away from the smell of Murdock's foot. Hannibal chuckled to himself, he almost hated to wake everybody up, almost, but that didn't stop him from yelling at the top of his lungs, "ALRIGHT EVERYBODY, WAKE UP! THE SUN'S UP!"
Everybody shot up half awake and either scared out of their minds by the sudden bellowing or too tired to even acknowledge what they'd just heard. One by one they all fell back down and tried going back to sleep. Hannibal stepped over to the lieutenant and captain on the floor first to make sure they were paying attention.
"Hey, Colonel," Murdock tiredly saluted.
"What time is it?" Face asked as he squinted his eyes shut against the bright light.
Hannibal went over to the bed and kicked the bedstead to get the attention of the two occupants buried under the covers. Frankie weakly brought her head up long enough to say to him, "Tell the sun to come back tomorrow," and she turned over on her stomach and buried her face under a pillow.
"So who won the game last night?" Hannibal inquired humorously.
"Don't ask," Face grumbled as he slowly got to his feet.
Hannibal laughed again and stopped as his nose picked up a familiar scent of something burning. It wasn't like when he smoked his cigars, something had been burnt in this room recently. He looked around for any sign of smoke or anything that suddenly bore resemblance to a Cajun recipe, blackened to perfection, and didn't see anything. Hell, he didn't even see anything that could've been used to burn something with. For the moment he forgot about it and helped Murdock and Face get up, but decided that Frankie and Mad Dog could stay in bed; he figured if they were asleep then there wasn't any way they could get in trouble. Face grumbled to himself as he grabbed a change of clothes for the day and went into the bathroom, Murdock retreated back to his own room to freshen up, leaving just Hannibal and B.A. to oversee things.
Hannibal looked over to the dresser and saw a couple of fat candles on glass saucers and he saw that one of them had been used recently, the wax hadn't melted enough to show, but he wick was black and shriveled. And on the saucer…Hannibal marched over and snatched up the charred remains of half of a postcard. It had come from the hotel gift shop and the message had been burnt away, but he was still able to read most of the name and address it was to be sent to: Frankie's parents back in California.
What, Hannibal wondered, would someone who resented her parents so much possibly write them for now? And what could have been the message that she obviously ultimately decided served a better purpose as ash? He could think of a few possibilities though none of them were nice, maybe that was why it had been burnt but he really doubted it. Hannibal gazed at the burnt card as if trying to read what had been burnt away, like a carbon copy had remained. The first thought that came to mind had been a typical child's greeting of 'I hate you', another, a more mature approach that cut to both chase and bone, 'Why didn't you listen?', but another thought came to Hannibal, and he didn't know from where, but he could just as easily picture the message being, 'How could you do this to us?' Well, he knew he'd never get an answer out of Frankie, so he pocketed the card and left the room with B.A.
That day, while Murdock had made it his business to check out the hotel's swimming pool and try it out, Face made it his business to get acquainted with some of the bathing beauties tanning nearby since his date the previous night had been a bust. As it turned out, it wasn't just one woman he was a bust with, today he couldn't win for losing; all the women he chatted up either had their boyfriends with them or they were married, or they had an older brother who was twice Face's size and didn't appreciate him putting the moves on their little sisters. After about an hour he gave up and went over to the pool to converse with Murdock, who was splashing around in the water like a toddler learning how to kick.
"Hey Murdock!" he said to be heard over the noise.
Murdock stopped flapping around in the water and turned to him and said, "Hey Face, what's up?"
"Have you seen Mad Dog or Frankie anywhere?"
"Nope," he answered, "I guess they're still in the hotel."
"You know," Face said as he sat down by the edge of the pool and waded in the water, "Hannibal hasn't said one thing today about if Masterson is back in the hotel or not, I wonder what's going on?"
Murdock shrugged and tried mounting a giant green inflatable inner tube, and promptly fell off and made a big splash as he fell under the surface, and totally soaked Face in the process.
"Nice, Murdock, real nice," Face dryly remarked as he wiped the water off of his face with the back of his hand.
Murdock resurfaced gasping for breath and he pointed behind them and said, "Speak of the devil, here they come now."
Face turned and saw Mad Dog and Frankie coming towards the pool but neither looked like they were going swimming; they were dressed in T-shirts and shorts from the hotel's gift shop.
"Hey guys, come to join us?" Face asked.
"Not really," Mad Dog answered, "But Hannibal thought it'd be a good idea if we blended in with the other tourists here."
Murdock spat out a mouthful of water like a fish and said, "Hey Frankie cous, the water's great, why don't you guys come in?"
"Forget it," she said, "I don't swim."
"Oh it's very easy, any idiot can learn," Murdock said, "Even Face knows how to swim."
Face glared at him and said flatly, "Thanks a lot, Murdock."
"Well you know what I mean," Murdock told him.
"No thanks," Frankie insisted, "I intend to stay on dry land."
"Aww," Murdock waved her off, "You' probably the type of person that could get seasick in the bathtub."
"It don't make no sense, Hannibal, what's it mean?" B.A. wanted to know when he found out that their guest of honor still hadn't returned to his hotel room.
"Well," Hannibal said as he pondered the situation over a new cigar, "It's unlikely that Masterson could've found out that anybody was here looking for him, let alone that Mad Dog is busted out of the hospital, or even that Frankie has also gone AWOL. And since it's unlikely he has a partner who can tip him off on anything, it stands to reason that either he's here to see somebody about another matter entirely, or he's here to work his sociopathic charm on another woman."
"Now that's gonna be bad if it turns out he and Face are both seeing the same lady," B.A. said.
"Well you know how it is when Face gets involved with a woman who already has a boyfriend, her boyfriend tends to make himself known very quickly, so if that is the case, we should find out soon enough," Hannibal said as they walked out towards the pool.
"And if it ain't the case?" B.A. asked.
"Well it's a small island, our paths are bound to cross sooner or later," Hannibal answered.
"Yeah, but what happens when they do?" B.A. wanted to know.
"Obviously we're going to have to find some way to get him on that plane and get him back to the United States so he can face prosecution for the murder," Hannibal said.
"Fine, sucker can go in my place," B.A. told him, "I ain't flying back there, Hannibal."
"B.A.," Hannibal said, "Why do you always have to be so stubborn? In all the times that Murdock has flown us on missions has anything ever gone wrong?"
"Yes."
"Have we ever crashed?"
"Yes," B.A. answered.
"Were you ever injured in those crashes?" Hannibal asked.
"No," B.A. said.
"So why are you of all people complaining?" he wanted to know, "You have it easiest, you sleep through the whole flight and if anything goes wrong you're the only one to walk away without anything busted or bruised. Look, if Frankie can take sleeping pills to pass through the flight without anxiety, why can't you? It would certainly save us the trouble of trying to slip something into your sandwich."
B.A. glared at him through the corner of one eye and said, "Hey man, don't even joke about that, one of these days Hannibal, I'm going to get you for all those times."
Hannibal maintained his usual coy smirk and said, "Of course you will, B.A."
They went out to the pool and saw Murdock in the water with his arms folded on the tiling around the pool as he talked to Frankie and M.D.
"How's it going, guys?" he asked.
"Hannibal, will you talk some sense into them?" Murdock asked.
"He's upset because they won't swim with him," Face explained and pointed to Frankie, "But she can't swim."
"Ridiculous," Murdock scoffed, "All us Murdocks are excellent swimmers."
"Then it must've skipped a generation," B.A. told him, "Yours."
"I can too swim!" Murdock insisted, seeming very close to throwing a tantrum.
B.A. hunched over to look down at the pilot and said, "I said you can't swim, sucker."
"I can!"
"No you can't," B.A. said.
"Yes I can!" Murdock insisted.
"No you can't."
"Yes I can!"
"No you – hey!" B.A. lost his balance and fell in when Frankie came up behind him and kicked him, resulting in a particularly killer splash.
"Do you have a death wish or something?" Face asked her.
B.A. rose to the surface and spat out a mouthful of water that hit Murdock and Face in a spray, after he caught his breath he opened his eyes and focused them on the person who sent him into the pool, "Hey! What was that about?"
Frankie looked down at him with an almost blank look on her face and she said with just a hint of satisfaction at her deed, "You looked a little steamed, so I thought I'd help you cool off."
Hannibal just chuckled in response.
"A postcard?" Face asked later when they returned to the hotel and Hannibal was able to speak to him alone, "No, I didn't know anyone had any, and I don't remember anyone burning anything last night either."
"Then it must've happened after you and Murdock fell asleep," Hannibal said, "Since it was addressed to the Murdocks it's a safe bet that Frankie was the one that filled it out. Just to make sure though, I tested Mad Dog, I told him I was going to have Amy back in L.A. run a check on the case and the people involved and had him write a letter for me using the same words that were left on the other half of the card. His handwriting doesn't match, so Frankie has to be the one who wrote her parents."
"The question is why?" Face asked, "If what she says is true…"
"If?" Hannibal asked and turned to him, "You don't think she's telling the truth?"
"I don't know, I'm just saying, if her parents did what she said they did, why would she try making contact with them now?" Face asked.
"She might be looking for closure," Hannibal suggested, "No matter how horrible your parents are, you never just walk away and cut them off."
"I wouldn't know," Face reminded him.
"I know you wouldn't," Hannibal replied, "But I knew a lot of young soldiers in the Army, a lot of them barely even old enough to drive, and a lot of them joined not because of the draft, but because it was their idea and it was a supreme rebellion against their parents who didn't want a dead hero for a son. Some of them came in, coming from a long line of fights with their parents about everything and joining the army was just the last straw, all of them, swearing they'd never speak to their parents again, and the ones who lived to go back home, couldn't wait to see them again once they got back to the States."
"I can understand that but do you think Frankie's feeling the same way?" Face asked.
"Not necessarily," Hannibal said, "But closure doesn't have to mean she's thrilled to see them again either. However I think there's something more important we have to get to the bottom of right now."
"What's that?" Face asked.
"I had M.D. take that note when I was shaving earlier, and when I looked in the mirror," Hannibal tilted his head back to expose his neck and said, "I saw something that sparked my memory."
"What's that?" Face asked.
"See this scar?" Hannibal pointed to his throat.
"What scar?" Face asked.
"Well, they told me it would fade over the years, but I never believed it, that's a scar from a tonsillectomy, I had my tonsils taken out as a kid. And I had to stay in the hospital overnight, and I don't think I ever slept until I got out of there. All I could think about was that crazy woman trying to kill me."
"What?" Face was lost.
"Oh yeah, I keep forgetting that's before your time," Hannibal said, "Well, when I was a kid I overheard my mother talking about this woman who was a nurse and she killed a lot of her patients, she also killed her sister, and an entire family she knew, and all of their landlords, by the time the law caught up with her she had about 30 bodies under her belt. And at that time she said her goal had been to kill more helpless people than anybody before ever had. That crazy bat was still alive when I was a kid, she was found not guilty and put in a mental asylum, she lived to be I think 81 years old. And when I was in that hospital I just kept thinking every time I heard someone walking down the hall, that she was out there coming for me, with a loaded syringe in her hand to poison me."
The look on Templeton's face was nothing short of amusing for any situation, even given the somberness here it was almost hysterical. "Well that's all very interesting, Hannibal, but what does it have to do with us here?"
"My point," Hannibal concluded, "Is Murdock said when you guys found Mad Dog at the V.A., he was murmuring 'can't sleep, they'll kill me, can't sleep, they'll kill me'."
"Probably because of the lobotomy," Face said.
"Maybe, except the nurse told us that he hadn't slept in a week, why? The order for his operation only came in that morning when we found him," Hannibal said.
"Well they said that the orderlies beat him up," Face remembered.
"That's true too, but I want to speak to Mad Dog and I want to do it without Frankie there to speak for him," Hannibal said.
"Good luck with that, how're you going to get the two of them apart?" Face asked.
"I don't want to go swimming!" Frankie protested as she dragged her feet while Murdock tried to pull her towards the hotel's exit.
"Come on, Frankie cous, there ain't been a Murdock in our family who couldn't swim, you're not going to break tradition now, are you?"
"Yes!" Frankie answered firmly as she pulled away from him.
"Come on, Frankie, you gotta know how to swim, what happens if we have to bail out of the plane over the ocean?"
"I intend to be knocked out anyway so it won't make me any difference," she insisted.
"I can see I'm going to have to get forceful with you," Murdock said.
"And how do you intend to HEY!" Frankie exclaimed as she felt something grab her from behind and lift her up. She looked down and saw that it was B.A. carrying her towards the door, Frankie writhed in his grip and kicked her legs and said, "Put me down!"
"Shut up!" Murdock replied with a grunt as if he was the one carrying her as the three of them made their way out the door.
Face watched from the foot of the stairs and when they were gone he raced back up to join Hannibal and Mad Dog on the 4th floor.
"Alright, they're gone," he said.
"Good," Hannibal said, "Now Mad Dog, I want to ask you a question and I wanted to get your answer on this, not Frankie's. When you were locked up in the hospital, did you believe somebody was trying to kill you?"
"I thought everybody was," Mad Dog answered, "The orderlies, the doctors, the nurses, anybody who came in and stuck me with something or shoved their pills down my throat. The orderlies beat me to a pulp, nobody ever asked but if they ever did, they would've just said I fell, apparently you become very accident prone once you enter a hospital."
"I can understand that, but did you actually think someone was trying to murder you?" Hannibal asked.
"I suspected everybody," he answered, "I knew I wasn't insane, but they put me in there anyway, my lawyer said it was to avoid going to prison, but if you ever had to spend a night in that place you'd be begging for jail."
"Was there anybody in particular who stuck out, who you thought might have it in for you?" Hannibal asked.
He thought about it for a minute and shook his head, "I don't think so, why?"
"No reason," Hannibal said, "Just thought I might have hit on something. M.D., last night Frankie wrote out a postcard to her parents, and then she burnt it, do you know anything about that?"
He shook his head again, "I thought I smelled something burning, but I thought it was just a dream."
Hannibal thought of something else and he turned to Face and said, "When we get back to California, remind me to look up Mr. and Mrs. Murdock, I think we need to pay these people a visit."
"What good will that do?" Mad Dog asked, "They never even believed their own daughter, why would they listen to you?"
Hannibal turned back towards him and answered, "Simply because we're not their daughter, they didn't believe Frankie because she was a kid, what reason would we have to lie since we've never met any of you until a few days ago, and therefore have no stake in the matter whatsoever?"
"Well…" Mad Dog thought about it, "I guess it might work, but I still don't know. I guess I'm kind of worried about going back there, if you can't catch him, if you can't prove anything…"
"We'll worry about that bridge when we come to it," Hannibal said.
"And true to our military training, blow it up," Face added.
After they talked to Mad Dog and Hannibal decided they got all the information out of him they were going to for a while, Face decided to head on down to the pool and rescue Frankie from her watery torture. He was surprised to see when he got out to the pool that B.A. wasn't anywhere to be seen, but he did see Frankie and Murdock standing by the pool, both of them still looking as dry as a bone, and they seemed to be arguing about something. Well, Face was glad to know if there was a possibility that Frankie was Murdock's family, it didn't mean she was exactly like him, nice to know somebody else finally didn't see things his way.
As Face got closer to them, realized that the pool area was almost empty; well, he had to admit as he squinted, the sun was in a bad position now, probably everybody got smart and went in where they wouldn't be blinded or have to worry about getting sunburn. Suddenly, something happened and Face thought he was seeing things, he couldn't believe what he saw, but he knew that he hadn't imagined it, Murdock had for no obvious reason, grabbed Frankie, picked her up, her kicking and screaming, and he callously tossed her into the pool and let her sink like a stone.
"Murdock!" Face yelped as he ran over to the pilot, "Murdock, what the hell do you think you're doing?"
"Face look!" Murdock pointed to the pool.
Face looked and saw Frankie emerge and she swam over to the edge and pulled herself out.
"She can swim," Murdock told Face.
Now Face was confused, he turned to Frankie and asked her, "Why'd you lie?"
"I didn't lie," Frankie said as she pushed her wet hair back and rubbed her eyes, "I never said I couldn't swim, I said I don't swim, there's a big difference incase you didn't notice, everybody says they can't swim, nobody admits that they don't."
"So why don't you?" Face asked.
"I have my reasons," she answered.
And Murdock had an idea of what it was, "A cover…you pretend you can't swim, and if somebody tries to take advantage of it and throws you in to drown you…"
"Then you come right back up again and give them the surprise of their life," Face finished, then realizing what he'd done, he came to the conclusion that he was spending too much time with Murdock, all of them.
"I used to be a pretty good swimmer," Frankie told them, "Then when I went through my various personalities, I had to give it up for a while, suddenly I became afraid of the water, I thought that would tell my parents something was wrong as sure as anything, I was practically born in the water." She turned to Murdock and said, "How can two people be so blind and so stupid?"
Murdock shrugged helplessly and said, "Got me."
Before the night was over, Face was floating on a cloud of love, or a reasonable facsimile thereof anyway. He'd finally met an attractive young woman at the hotel who wasn't there with a boyfriend, a husband, or an older brother who could stomp him into the ground. Her name was Chastity, she was a tanned beach blonde, and she liked him. This time their date in the hotel managed to go off without a hitch and had no interruptions from 'the children', for which he was most grateful. He'd had a few too many drinks and so didn't exactly remember how he got upstairs or into bed, or even when he fell asleep, but when he did, he had a very unusual dream.
It started with the sound of drums, and chanting, it sounded like some kind of tribal celebration out in the jungle instead of on a tropical island. It was dark but he could also see some lights, like big torches lit throughout the island. He saw a young woman in a long white dress, a simple cotton dress with no design, just looked like one long undershirt. She walked barefoot through the sand, climbing up dirt and rocky hills towards the sound, and as she neared the source of the music, he could see her better. She had long blonde hair and a giant white flower in her hair that matched the dress perfectly. Down below the islanders were beating on drums and marching around in grass skirts and face paint and bone jewelry, chanting some kind of gibberish that he didn't understand.
The woman was found by two of the natives and led into the center of the celebration, and up there, a big fat native covered in enough paint to cover three other people, stood before the woman and said something that Face took to be a native translation of a wedding speech. The woman was joined by, presumably, the man she was to marry, his back was to Face's view but he was able to see it wasn't a native, and the man appeared to be tall, thin, with short brown hair, dressed like the natives in a grass skirt and bone necklaces. Face thought it was a very nice ceremony, until the bride and groom turned around and he realized it was Murdock with his new girlfriend!
Face shot up in the bed and grabbed the pillow behind his head and instinctively reached over and whapped Murdock in the face with it. Murdock shot up in bed kicking and asked Face, "What is it? What's the matter?"
"That's for stealing my girlfriend," Face told him.
"What?" Murdock looked at Face as if he were the crazy one.
Face ran one hand up over his forehead and all the way to the back of his head and saw they were in his room and it was dark, and realized it had been a dream and said, "Never mind, just a crazy dream."
Murdock grunted and said, "That's the best kind to have."
Face looked around the room and said, a bit panicked, "Murdock, where're Frankie and Mad Dog?"
"Not to worry, Faceman," Murdock said as he pointed to the wall separating the rooms, "They're over in my room and I sent Billy to be a watchdog and watch them all night."
"Are you sure they're in there?" Face asked.
"Yeah I'm sure," Murdock answered.
Face laughed nervously and said, "Oh boy, what a dream I had…I heard these drums and this chanting, all these natives running around the island going 'ooh-da-da-eeh-da-da-do-da-do-da-do'."
Murdock started hitting the bedside table in the same rhythm and Face realized what a bad idea that was and he quickly cut the pilot off. "Anyway, I dreamt that there was a wedding taking place, and I look and it's you and my new girlfriend."
"Are you sure about that?" Murdock asked.
"Yeah, it was you, and it was a blonde woman in a white dress, who else could that be?" Face asked.
"Face," Murdock poked him, "Until the other day, Frankie was a blonde, and for all we know, that dress of hers left at the hospital is a white dress."
"What!?" Face asked, wonder what the hell Murdock was going on about this time.
"Perhaps," Murdock tried his analysis hand on the lieutenant, "Your subconscious is suggesting that when this is over, Frankie and Mad Dog will be married, after all he's a Murdock too, just a different kind of one, and they did think I was him at the V.A."
That was enough to leave Face scratching his head for the rest of the night, or at least until he went back to sleep.
The next morning when Face woke up early, he had forgotten about his strange dream and about Murdock's diagnosis of it. All he remembered was beautiful, sexy, 34-26-36 Chastity, who was currently volunteering her services where needed at the hotel for the time being. He got dressed and went down to the kitchen where she was supposed to be helping cook breakfast for all the hotel guests, but one of the cooks told him that she was out helping unload the new inventory from the ship that had come in that day. Face went down to where the boat was docked for the time being and caught Chastity easing down a crate she'd caught from the crew. Face volunteered his own services and helped her collect several more crates of supplies for the hotel kitchen. They then loaded them into the back of the jeep and drove back to the hotel, where Face helped her unload the crates in the kitchen. The crates had been lined with newspapers from Florida and Face noticed that the shipment had only gone out over the last couple of days. He was just thinking what good timing the ship made, when he saw something on one of the papers that caught his immediate attention.
He unfolded the paper and read the headline story and reread it to make sure he wasn't mistaking, and he tore off for their rooms up on the fourth floor and busted into Hannibal's room, screaming, "HANNIBAL!"
The colonel shot up in the bed with a jerk and a yelp, then he fell back against the pillows and said, a bit more relaxed, "Coming, Ma."
"Hannibal, get up, it's an emergency," Face told him.
Hannibal opened his eyes and got up and asked, "What's the matter, Face?"
"Read the paper," Face said as he shoved it into the colonel's hands.
Hannibal rubbed one eye as he skimmed over the front page of the paper from two days ago, and he felt something inside of him stop as he saw what Face had been referring to.
The headline on the front page read 'U.S. Army Colonel and MP Injured in Pursuit of A-Team in L.A.'. Under the headline it explained that Colonel Francis Lynch of the U.S. Army, and one of the MPs in his command, had both been seriously injured two days ago when they tried to apprehend the A-Team.
Hannibal read aloud an excerpt from the article, "Military Police Officer James Youngman, 27, sustained a concussion after suffering several blows to the head, Colonel Lynch was also hospitalized with deep gashes that have been confirmed as stab wounds. Col. Lynch has made a statement that his attacker was not one of the A-Team but refused to go into further details and has been advised by doctors against adding any further comments at this time." Hannibal tossed the paper down, suddenly he felt sick.
"They played us, Hannibal," Face said, ready to shoot through the roof, "They conned us! They conned us! They feed us a sob story about how they were set up and we believed it! There can't be any other explanation, one of those two is a murderer."
Hannibal grabbed the paper and looked at the article again and agreed, "Yeah…but the question is which one?"
"What?" Face suddenly felt like a balloon with a safety pin's prick coming towards him.
"Which one?" Hannibal asked, "I don't believe that they did this together, there wasn't enough time, only one of them could've pulled it off, but which one? Frankie's made it no secret she'd like to kill somebody, but let us not forget, we know very little about Mad Dog to get a reading off of him, perhaps his passive, doormat act is just an act, his behavior makes him seem the least likely of the two, and that's usually just who the guilty party is. The question is, which one of these two actually did it? Which of them tried to kill Lynch and that MP? …And why?"