Introduction: Welcome Back to Pine Valley

The Hubbard House

Angie Hubbard sat at the kitchen table and reached for the newspaper with a hand that was steady but belied the torment she was feeling inside. On the front page of the Pine Valley Gazette, a single word was scrawled in red - in the color of blood - taunting anyone who dared to pick it up. It read GUILTY. Below the mocking word was a picture of JR Chandler being led away in handcuffs.

Angie's husband Jesse walked into the room, adjusting his watch. He moved over to Angie and kissed her on the forehead. His eyes then zeroed in on what she was holding. "Why are you torturing yourself reading that garbage?" He asked.

She sighed in response. "I honestly don't know. I guess I just can't believe that it took nearly two years to secure a guilty verdict in the case... 'Case' ... That sounds so far removed from what we've dealt with. We were there in that room when he-" she paused for a moment, shuddering a little - "when he opened fire. We saw countless people take a hit and drop to the ground. We saw lives lost that day, Jesse. We lost one of our own."

Jesse nodded. "I know. God, I know. It's the first thing on my mind when I wake up and the last thing on my mind when I try to go to sleep."

"'Try' being the operative word. You don't sleep so good anymore, Jesse."

"Neither do you."

Angie set down the paper and splayed her hands out in front of her. "I know... I just wonder ... Of all the places this could have happened, why Pine Valley? Why us?"

"I don't know. Maybe we never will know. But the fact is, yesterday JR was given a life sentence and we have to find a way somehow to move on."

"That's a lot easier said than done."

Jesse picked an apple out of the fruit basket and juggled it from hand to hand, seemingly absent-mindedly. "Don't I know it, Angela, don't I know it."

Pine Valley Hospital

Dr. Griffin Castillo emerged from the operating room and began to scrub out. He had just performed a long and complicated surgery and he was emotionally and physically exhausted. He washed his hands vigorously, maybe too vigorously. He was soon approached by his sister Cara who came out of the same room.

"That was pretty impressive stuff, Griff. I couldn't have done it any better myself." She winked at him teasingly, but he appeared not to even have heard what she said. "Griffin, hermano?" She reached out and squeezed his arm. "What's wrong? You just saved that woman's life in there."

"Yeah, so what? There were a lot of other lives I didn't save, lives that slipped right through my fingers." He angrily hit the wall as hard as he could. His hand came away bloody and Cara shook her head in quiet exasperation.

"Now you've done it, Big Brother," she said as she reached for a fistful of paper towels from the dispenser and laid them over Griffin's bleeding knuckles. "You are angry right now; I get that, but honestly, you are an amazing doctor. We both know it. You have to focus on the people you have saved and not the ones you couldn't."

Griffin glared at his sister. "Are you kidding me, Cara? She is gone - she's gone because of me. Because I couldn't save her. I will never get over it and I will never forgive myself for not protecting her."

The Chandler Mansion (outside)

Zach Slater walked up the front steps of the mansion. He paused on the landing and immediately his mind was assaulted with images and sounds.

Reminders. Terrible reminders.

Someone yelled, "Everyone, get down!" Gunshots rang out, prayers were hurriedly said, and screams filled the air, along with the sound of shattering glass. He heard himself cry out, "Kendall, Kendall!"

"Kendall," he whispered.

He shook his head to clear his thoughts. All he heard now was the sound of a bird chirping in the high treetops.

He sighed and prepared to knock on the door.

The Chandler Mansion (inside)

Inside the mansion, a mysterious woman named Desiree Forbes slowly descended the grand staircase, running her hand down the banister as she did so. Dressed in an immaculate, white, form-fitting, knee-length dress that molded to her lean body like a second skin, she soon reached the bottom of the staircase and looked around the place. A few boxes sat in the entryway but overall, the room was empty save for the furniture covered in white bed sheets.

She moved into the living room and ripped a sheet off the stately sofa. She then rested her hand on her trim hips. A smile spread across her face. "Out with the old, in with the new," she said.

Author's note: I picture Desiree Forbes being "played by" the lovely Brook Kerr, who currently portrays Portia Robinson on General Hospital. I started writing this series years ago and since I've recently gotten into an AMC mood again, I decided I would like to continue with it. I have a lot of ideas. Let me know what you think of it so far, please. Do you think JR really killed people that night at the mansion? Is Kendall truly gone? Hmmmmm lol