Disclaimer: The Characters Miss Parker, Sydney, Jarod, Broots and The Center are all property 
of MTM, TNT and NBC Productions and are used without permission.
No money has been involved here and no infringement is intended. 
11/07/2002


A Voice Heard in Ramah (part 1 – Grief)
By Phenyx


A beautiful, graceful woman stepped from the jet and onto a paved tarmac. Her auburn hair was 
perfectly styled, despite the last several hours on a plane. She hugged her long coat around her 
and shivered. The temperature in Blue Cove, Delaware had dropped since she and her comrades 
had left this morning. The short burgundy skirt she wore was now ill equipped to protect her from 
the chill in the air. 

She looked around the dark runway. It was late. Or it was early, depending on how you wanted to 
look at things. The Centre's corporate jet and its few disembarking inhabitants were surrounded 
by a blackness that can only be achieved between two and three o'clock in the morning.

This woman didn't mind. The darkness matched her mood. Though her appearance reflected only 
a haughty indifference, she was weary and heartsick. She sighed heavily and stifled a yawn. 
Maybe she would be able to sleep for a few hours tonight. Maybe her exhaustion would ease her 
mind enough to rest for just a couple of hours. Maybe.

"We could have stayed in Denver for the night and come back in the morning, Parker." Lyle 
grumbled with a matching yawn. 

Miss Parker flashed a dirty look at her brother. She and Lyle had never been close. Truth be told, 
they hated each other. The expensively dressed, dark haired man was as handsome as he was 
rotten. Parker knew that her brother's good-looking exterior hid a cold-blooded killer. The tailored 
clothes and darling smile were thin veils camouflaging the monster underneath. 

There were plenty of monsters in Blue Cove, and they all resided in a large stone institution 
known as The Centre. Miss Parker herself had grown up in and around The Centre. She'd come 
to believe in the man who ran the place, the man she would always think of as her father. Even 
now, long after his death, part of her still mourned him. She knew that Mr. Parker had been 
someone dangerous that even Lyle feared yet she mourned him none-the-less.

"I told you, I have an appointment with the funeral director in the morning, Lyle." She snapped 
angrily. She sighed again, trying to control the wave of frustration that washed over her. 

Purposely lowering her voice to a more soothing level she asked her brother, "Do you want to 
come to the funeral home with me?" Parker wanted to give Lyle the benefit of participating in the 
decisions that had to be made. This involved him just as much as it did her.

"It's been a long day Parker." Lyle answered. "I'm going to stay home and sleep." He nodded in 
her direction. "I'm sure that any arrangements you make will be fine." Lyle grinned his most 
dashing smile at her, turned on his heel and walked into the night toward his car.

"Miss Parker?" 

Parker turned to face the two men standing behind her. The dapper, graying psychologist, 
Sydney, and the balding, rumpled computer wizard, Broots, both gazed at her with concern. 

These two peculiar companions had been by her side for years now. Together the three of them 
chased The Centre's most prized creation. A pretender. A man who could become anything he 
wanted to be. Centre operatives kidnapped gifted children and then spent years training the 
youngsters to become pretenders. These pretenders became a great revenue source for The 
Centre as they planned or plotted any scenario that any paying client could desire. 

One day, the best and the brightest of these pretenders, a genius named Jarod, had run off. 
Parker had been chasing him ever since. She sighed and shook her head slightly when Parker 
reflected on how her life had changed during those years since Jarod had escaped from The 
Centre. 

Before Jarod's desertion, Parker had been secure in her place at The Centre. She had never had 
any cause to doubt her father or his motives. But Jarod had changed all that. The two of them 
had been friends when they were young. Despite the passage of time and Parker's consistent 
verbal abuse as adults, Jarod had stubbornly continued to offer support to his old friend. 

In spite of her relentless attempts to capture Jarod and return him to The Centre, Parker regularly 
found herself following his lead as Centre secrets began to unfold. As time went by, Parker 
annoyingly learned to trust his information in a way that she had never been able to trust anyone 
else. Their relationship had become a twisted combination of rivalry and dependence. 

It was the pursuit of Jarod that had taken Parker and her group to Denver earlier. She had known 
from the start that it would be a wasted trip. Parker knew that Jarod hadn't been in Denver at all. 
She was pretty sure that he was actually somewhere in Delaware now but she had followed the 
red herring in order to keep Lyle occupied.

"Parker?" Sydney repeated. 

"I'm okay, Syd." Parker said as she rubbed her aching temples. "It's just… Hell. I don't know why I 
thought Lyle would even care."

"Would you like to talk about it?" Sydney persisted.

Parker shook her head sadly. "Not now, Sydney. It's late, you two should get home."

"M… Miss Parker," Broots stuttered. "Maybe… well, perhaps you shouldn't be alone at a time like 
this. I could … or Sydney could… I mean, one of us could make sure you get home okay… 
G…go with you in the morning…"

Parker patted her nervous friend gently on the arm. "Thank you, Broots. I appreciate your 
concern. But I'll be fine." She shrugged her shoulders. "I've gotten a lot of practice at this type of 
thing."

"Parker," Sydney started.

"No. I mean it." She interrupted. "I'm going to go home and try to get some sleep. I have a lot to 
get accomplished in the morning." Parker turned and headed toward her car.

She was tempted to let Sydney stay with her. But Parker couldn't risk having Sydney at her place 
when Jarod called. She glanced quickly at her watch as she climbed into her car. With a little 
luck, she'd get home just in time to receive his phone call.

She turned up the heater and opened her window slightly. Parker didn't want to fall asleep while 
driving home. Of course, falling asleep was just wishful thinking right now. She hadn't been able 
to sleep for days. Not since she had received the call informing her of her little brother's death.

Two days ago, Parker's baby brother had been playing outside. The weather had been 
unseasonably warm for mid-October so the boy's nanny had taken the four-year-old to the park. 
An hour later, the little boy had been dead.

The nanny, panic-stricken at the possible repercussions for her negligence, had called Miss 
Parker from the emergency room. The nanny had been nearly hysterical as she blathered on. 

"It's not my fault." She had repeated over and over. "Oh, Mr. Raines will ruin me for this. Miss 
Parker you must help me. I did like you asked, I never told Mr. Raines about the times you came 
to play with the boy. You have to tell him that it wasn't my fault!"

Parker had stared at the phone in shock for several moments before smashing the receiver into 
its cradle and dashing for the door. She had reached the emergency room at the same time as 
Mr. Raines. The gaunt, wheezing creature had become the boy's legal guardian after Mr. Parker's 
death but had rarely shown any interest in the child. 

Parker alone had wept beside the small still form in the hospital bed. He'd celebrated his fourth 
birthday just a few weeks ago. Parker had bought him a bike and he had been thrilled. The boy 
had solemnly promised her that he'd learn to ride without the training wheels by the time he 
turned five. But now, there would be no more birthdays for this little one. 

According to the doctors in the emergency room, the little boy had suddenly gone into seizures 
while playing near the playground. By the time an ambulance had arrived, the boy had stopped 
breathing. There was nothing that could be done.

A furious Raines had ordered the boy's body sent to The Centre for an autopsy. However, Parker 
had fought him on that front. She didn't trust anything at The Centre. She wanted post mortem 
results that hadn't been tampered with. She wanted information that she could be sure of.

It had taken a lot of yelling and a small fortune in bribes in order to get the body transferred to the 
county morgue rather than The Centre. Later the same afternoon when Jarod had called, Parker 
had asked for a favor.

Parker didn't care how Jarod had learned of the boy's death so quickly. She had known he would 
hear about it. She had known that he would call. She had also known that he would drop 
everything else when she asked him to make sure the autopsy results were authentic. 

When a tip had come into The Centre the next morning, indicating that Jarod had been located in 
Denver, Parker had known it was a scam to mislead Lyle and the others. Schlepping across the 
country was a small price to pay in return for the assistance Jarod was giving her.

Jarod would find out what had killed her baby brother. The boy had been fine. He'd almost never 
been sick. Parker felt that someone had to be responsible for his death. If the boy's death had 
been anything but accidental, Parker promised that someone would pay. She knew that Jarod 
would find the truth for her.

Parker shook her head sadly as she maneuvered her car through the pre-dawn streets. "Who 
could murder a four-year-old little boy?" she whispered. "The same people who would snatch him 
from his bed at night." she answered herself.

It suddenly occurred to her that Jarod had been the same age when Centre operatives had 
broken into his home. They had taken him from his bed and the only world he had ever known. 
They had stolen his life and ended his childhood. Now she felt that someone had done the same 
thing to her little brother, in a much more permanent fashion.  

Miss Parker carefully pulled her car into the driveway in front of her home. One glance at the 
house told her that something was wrong. Despite the fact that all the curtains were drawn, she 
could tell the lights were on. Bright slivers of light could be seen at the edges of each curtain in 
every room. Parker regularly left one light burning in the hallway whenever she left the house but 
now, it looked as though every bulb in the place was glowing.

Parker killed the engine and pulled her gun from its holster before quietly making her way up the 
steps toward the door. When she found the front door unlocked, her anxiety increased and she 
cocked the pistol before entering.

At first glance, Parker thought that someone must have tossed her place in some kind of search. 
Upon closer inspection, she realized that her own things hadn't been moved. There hadn't been a 
search. The mess in her house consisted of printouts and paperwork scattered everywhere. 

The dining room table was covered with papers. Some were crumpled, others torn. Parker 
cautiously scanned the area and found a laptop computer lying on the floor. She stooped to 
retrieve the processor. Some of the keys had popped off in what must have been a violent impact 
with the hardwood floorboard.

Parker stood and placed the laptop on the table. As she turned to glance at some of the papers, 
something crunched beneath her stiletto heels. An empty bottle of rum lay broken in two at her 
feet.

Cautiously, Parker followed the path of destruction from the dining area into the living room. Here 
she found more papers strewn about. Near the cold fireplace, she found a handful of papers. 
Each crumpled into a ball. They seemed to have been tossed, haphazardly at some non-existent 
flame. 

Smashed against the stones of the hearth, Parker found more broken glass. Poking at the pieces 
with the toe of her shoe, she saw that this had once been a bottle of scotch. The vintage liquor 
had obviously been removed prior to the bottle's demise.

Parker bent down and snatched one piece of crumpled paper from the fireplace and smoothed it 
open. It was a Centre memo written by Mr. Parker more than two years ago. The subject line 
defined the topic of concern, a project called Progeny. 

"The Progeny Alpha project is performing as expected." The note read. "Concerns regarding my 
daughter's interference are unfounded. Her input is a necessary requirement for this aspect of the 
project. Removal of her from the equation at this point would alter the parameters of the 
experiment. I recommend that this operation continue on its existing timeline. Should she become 
cognizant of any aspect of Progeny, the scheduled termination date can be expedited at that 
time."

Parker shivered at the words "scheduled termination". Her father had apparently been pleading to 
the Triumvirate on her behalf. Someone had wanted her removed, but Mr. Parker had convinced 
the powers that be that she was too important for the time being. Part of her felt that her father 
had been trying to protect her. Some other part, the one deep in her soul, knew that her father 
had only been trying to protect the mysterious project. 

Suddenly, a heavy sigh could be heard from the other side of the room. The memo fluttered from 
her hand as Parker whirled around and brought her gun up quickly. Poised and ready to fire, she 
looked around for the source of the sound.

Sitting on the floor with his back against the bar, was Jarod. His brown hair was in disarray, 
standing up in places, as though he had been running both hands through it over and over. His 
long legs were pulled close with his knees bent in the air. His wrists rested on his kneecaps 
nonchalantly. In one hand he gripped the neck of a near empty bottle of vodka, which explained 
the glassy, bloodshot look in his dark coffee colored eyes. 

Parker slowly eased her stance. With a final glance around the room she clicked the safety on her 
weapon and returned it to the holster at her back.

She shook her head at him. "Jarod. You look like hell."

Jarod spoke as though he hadn't even heard her. "I've decided that I don't particularly care for 
vodka. I think rum is better." His voice slurred slightly as he spoke. "Of course, scotch is better 
than either of them. Don't you think?" 

"That was twelve year old scotch you drank, Jarod. Very expensive. I'm glad you liked it." She 
drawled sarcastically. "I surprised you're able to think at all in your condition." 

Jarod shrugged and took a swallow from the bottle in his hand. 

Parker crossed the room and sat down beside him on the floor. Then she asked, "You found 
something, didn't you?" 

Jarod closed his eyes and started to laugh in a strange, sad way. "You could say that." He 
answered. "Something, anything, everything," he chanted in a lilting voice. "Somehow, 
somewhere, some place, some day." 

Miss Parker felt goose bumps rise along her flesh. "Jarod," she quipped sternly. "You're starting 
to scare me. Talk to me." 

Jarod's discovery must have been an important one. There was no other reason why he would 
risk coming here in person rather than just calling her on the phone. The fact that Jarod was now 
completely pickled added to her impression that something big had been revealed.

"Was my baby brother murdered?" She asked.

Jarod sighed heavily. "No." he said simply.

"Are you sure?" she urged.

Jarod's eyes filled with tears and his lower lip started to tremble. "Very sure. I did the post mortem 
myself." He whispered, his voice catching. "I was very thorough." He growled.

He rubbed one hand roughly across his forehead and sighed again. "He was stung by a honey 
bee." Jarod stated flatly. "Apis mellifera. I even pulled the stinger from the palm of his hand. He 
suffered a severe allergic reaction. He went into anaphylactic shock. It killed him rather quickly."

Miss Parker glanced around her in puzzlement. A simple bee sting didn't account for Jarod's 
current state of mind. The death of someone so young was a terrible thing and Jarod would have 
felt sorrow over the loss of such an innocent but Parker didn't think he'd get stone drunk over the 
accidental death of a child he'd never met.

"Damn them." Jarod hissed. "Damn them all." He yelled, causing Parker to flinch. He suddenly 
threw the bottle into the fireplace with such violence that shards of glass flew everywhere.

"Jarod, I don't understand." Parker said.

"I was very thorough." Jarod repeated. He buried his face in his hands. "I ran some tests to make 
sure." He murmured. "Blood tests, chemical analysis, and such." 

"And?" Parker coaxed him to go on.

"I noticed an anomaly in the blood test results." He sighed. "He carried the pretender marker in 
his blood. I didn't think much of it at first. You and Lyle both have it, why wouldn't your little 
brother?"

Parker's concern was steadily increasing. As she watched, Jarod placed his head in his hands 
and started to rock back and forth. Parker had never seen him behave this way. He seemed so 
lost, so miserable.

"I always have to be so damn curious." Jarod moaned. "I just had to keep digging didn't I?" 

"Jarod?" Parker felt panic clawing at her gut.

"I ran some preliminary DNA tests and I recognized the results." Jarod whimpered. "God, help 
me. He was my son."

"What!" Miss Parker felt as though Jarod had just slapped her. She blinked at him for a moment 
then reached out to touch his shoulder. "Oh, Jarod, I am so sorry." 

Jarod flinched away, abruptly turned and hissed at her, "You have no idea…" His breath caught 
sharply in his throat. A moment later an anguished wail rose from him as he cried out, "I 
autopsied my own little boy."

"Oh god." Parker whispered. Tears started to roll down her cheeks. Performing an autopsy on 
such a small body must have been difficult enough, but to learn that the same body had been part 
of your own flesh and blood was more than any one should have to experience. Parker had 
asked Jarod to do this. She was ultimately the cause of his suffering now.

"Oh, Jarod. I am so sorry." She cried.

"He was my son," Jarod repeated. "And all I know about him, I learned from a piece of meat on a 
slab." Jarod squeezed his eyes shut tightly and started to shake violently. "I sliced him up like a 
Thanksgiving turkey."

"Jarod…" Parker was at a loss. She didn't know what to do. When Jarod leaned toward her she 
opened her arms and pulled him close. 

"There's more…" He moaned against her shoulder. "Those bastards." Jarod's words started to 
slur together in an unintelligible string of oaths. He curled into a tight ball of misery on Parker's lap 
and wrapped his arms around her waist. With his cheek against her lap, Jarod buried his face in 
her stomach and began to weep. 

Parker tried unsuccessfully to make sense of the muffled words that he continued to groan into 
her shirt. Jarod was so drunk and so upset that his speech was little more than garbled hiccups. 
All Parker could do for him was to stroke his back and murmur nonsense in some attempt to calm 
him down.

Her own tears ran down her face unchecked to fall onto the back of Jarod's shirt.

Parker wasn't sure how long they sat clinging to one another. Eventually, Jarod's body stopped 
shaking and his breathing became deep and regular as he fell into an alcohol induced sleep. 

Parker squirmed her way out of Jarod's grasp. She managed to shake him into a semi-conscious 
state and maneuver him from the floor onto the nearby couch. He was asleep again only 
moments later. 

"Boy, are you going to be hurting in the morning." Parker whispered as she removed his shoes. 

For a moment, habit forced Parker to toy with the idea of calling for a sweeper team. There was 
no way Jarod could walk right now, let alone escape a team. But as quickly as the idea entered 
her head, Parker dismissed it. In his current state of mind, Jarod could get violent. Someone 
would get hurt. Probably Jarod. 

Besides, Jarod needed someone right now. He had always been there for her at the darkest 
times in her life. Now, Parker could return the favor and be there for him when he needed her. 

Jarod whimpered pitifully for a moment when she covered him with a blanket. "Hush now, Jarod." 
She soothed. "Sleep."

A quick glance at her watch told her that it was nearly four in the morning. Parker started 
gathering up the reams of paper littering the floor. Whatever Jarod had discovered was here in 
these documents. It somehow involved the Progeny project, of that Parker was sure. 

What was the Progeny project? What did it have to do with her? How had her stepmother, 
Brigette, given birth to Jarod's child? And how did all this relate to her little brother's death? 

Parker began reading to find some answers.

END PART 1


(Part 2 – Decisions)


Parker stared at the ceiling above her bed as darkness faded with the dawn. With a sigh she 
looked out the window to contemplate the red and yellow leaves on the trees in the yard. The 
newborn sunshine gave the yard a serene glow that was so beautiful it took Parker's breath 
away. 

Sitting up on the edge of her bed, Parker stared in awe at the multi-colored panorama. How long 
had it been since she had really noticed how wonderful autumn could be? She couldn't 
remember. How many times had she ignored such simple pleasures? For those children like 
Jarod, trapped for years inside The Centre, the changing colors of the autumn leaves must seem 
like magic.

Parker sighed heavily and promised herself that she would try never to take such things for 
granted again. She finished watching the sun come up. After a time, she glanced at the clock 
beside the bed. Despite the fact that she had gone to bed barely 90 minutes ago, Parker stood 
and headed to the bathroom to shower and get dressed. She knew that she wouldn't be able to 
get any sleep so why bother trying? After what she had learned in the wee hours of this morning, 
she felt that sleep would elude her for many more days to come.

A short time later, clad only in black slacks and a simple white blouse, Parker padded barefoot 
toward the kitchen. She stopped at the couch to check on her houseguest. 

Jarod had slept like the dead. It didn't look like he had even moved since Parker had thrown a 
blanket on him several hours ago. Parker leaned over him a bit guiltily as she checked to make 
sure he was still breathing. 

"Have you ever had a hangover, Jarod?" she whispered to his inert form. "You're going to have a 
whopper today." Parker gently brushed a lock of hair away from his forehead as she spoke. She 
would need to wake him soon. She had a couple of hours before she needed to meet with the 
funeral director about arrangements for the burial services.  But there was a great deal that she 
and Jarod needed to discuss before she left. 

'Coffee first' Parker thought to herself as she stood and headed toward the kitchen.

~~~~~~~~

"Jarod," at first the voice sounded very far away. "Jarod?" 

He groaned and threw one arm across his eyes in a feeble attempt to keep the soft but insistent 
voice away. 

"Ah," the voice murmured, "it shows signs of life." 

Jarod groaned again and tried to roll away from his tormentor. The slight movement sent sharp 
spears of pain to his temples causing him to cry out softly.

"Come on, Franken-rat." The voice was now followed by a hand on his shoulder, gently shaking 
Jarod awake. "Rise and shine."

"Go away." Jarod finally managed to growl.

Soft laughter followed. "Now, Jarod. Is that any way to talk to the person who holds your salvation 
in the palm of her hand?"

Jarod's eyelids felt like heavy wool blankets that had been pasted to his eyeballs. After several 
failed attempts, Jarod finally managed to peel his eyes open and look at the woman before him.

Parker was sitting on the coffee table beside him. She was dressed and looking far too amused 
for Jarod's liking. 

"What salvation?" He moaned.

"Which would you like first? Coffee?" she held up a steaming mug in one hand. "Or pain reliever?" 
she asked, showing him three tablets cradled in the opposite palm. "Both are extra strength." She 
added.

Jarod rolled painfully into a sitting position and held out a hand to accept whichever item she 
decided to hand to him first. 

"I gather that this your first experience with the consequences of inebriation?" She asked as she 
handed him the pills.

"First and last." He answered. He tossed the tablets into his mouth and started chewing them. 
"Why would anyone want do this to themselves more than once?"

Parker grimaced as she handed him his coffee. "Why would anyone want to chew on aspirin?"

"Shut up." Jarod moaned. "It will get the medication into my system faster." He gulped at his drink. 
"Can't you leave a dying man alone for a minute?"

"Sorry, my friend." She replied. "I am afraid that you're going to live. You look like death warmed 
over, but you are going to survive." Parker patted him gently on the knee. "Trust me, I have 
experience with this sort of thing."

Jarod stared thoughtfully into his near-empty cup, mulling her words over in his mind. Even in his 
current state, his foggy brain clung to the knowledge that Parker, for the first time in many years, 
had just called him 'friend'.  

"Could I get some more?" Jarod asked, holding the cup toward her.

Parker smiled with understanding. "Sure, I'll be right back." 

Jarod watched as she took the mug from him and sauntered into the kitchen. He noticed absently 
that she was barefoot. 'Naked feet.' The thought whipped through Jarod's mind so fast he 
couldn't stop it. The sudden jolt of arousal that followed startled him badly.

He shook his head to clear it and was rewarded with another stabbing pain that traveled from one 
temple to the other. With a groan, Jarod forced himself to stand and made his way to the 
restroom.

After relieving himself, Jarod turned on the cold water, removed his shirt and bent to put his head 
under the tap. For long minutes, he allowed the icy chill to run through his hair and over his face. 
When he finally stood, with chilly rivers running down his back, Jarod was beginning to feel 
almost life-like. 

Jarod grabbed a fluffy towel from the rack and buried his face in its softness. He glanced at his 
reflection in the mirror as he rubbed at his hair. Parker was right. He did look terrible. He had two 
days worth of stubble on his chin and dark circles underlining puffy, bloodshot eyes.

He closed his eyes and sighed heavily as the events of last night replayed in his mind. His 
memory treated him with a graphically vivid image of a small, dissected body on a metal table 
and he snapped his eyes open quickly. Jarod shook his head and forced the mental photograph 
into one of the darker corners of his psyche.

A moment later, Jarod grabbed his cotton shirt from where he had dropped it and made his way 
to the living room as he slipped the garment over his head. Once there, he found Parker sitting in 
an armchair with her legs curled beneath her. She was sipping at a cup of coffee. A second mug 
sat cooling on the end table beside her. 

"Are you okay?" she asked as Jarod picked up the other mug and plopped down on the couch.

"Yeah." He replied simply.

They sat in an awkward silence for a few moments before Parker finally asked, "Do you 
remember last night?"

He nodded. "I'm sorry Parker." Jarod said with chagrin. "I totally lost control. It was a complete 
emotional breakdown on my part. The situation must have been very, …" he paused with 
embarrassment, "uncomfortable for you."

Parker shrugged. "I figured you were entitled." 

Jarod shook his head in disagreement. "I shouldn't have blown a fuse on you like that. I 
apologize." 

"Apology accepted. But I didn't mind." She continued. "I felt I owed you for putting you through 
this to begin with." Parker leaned forward to place her cup on the coffee table. "I asked you to 
make sure the post mortem was authentic. I knew that you would want to do it yourself."

Jarod nodded. "This will sound horrible, but in a way, I'm glad I did the procedure personally. If I 
hadn't, we never would have known." 

Parker stared down at the diamond ring on her finger as she twisted it nervously. The silence in 
the room stretched ominously between them. Parker took a deep breath and said, "Jarod, we 
need to talk about the others."

Jarod stared miserably into his coffee and nodded in agreement. "I wasn't sure how much of the 
situation I was able to convey to you last night."

"Well," Parker admitted, "you really weren't making any sense after that first bomb shell you 
dropped on me. But these," she said handing him a half dozen sheets of paper that had been 
tucked in the cushion beside her, "these explained the situation to me in more detail."

The first sheet of paper was a copy of a page from Parker's own medical file. Jarod quickly 
recognized it as a list of nursing notes from Parker's hospital stay when her ulcer had ruptured. 
Three quarters of the way down the page was a sentence highlighted in yellow. If not for the 
color, the line would have been lost in the jumble of information scribbled on the page.

It read, "Hrvsd 10 oocytes. Trns Progeny asap" But Jarod knew what it said. He had highlighted it 
himself less than twelve hours ago. His mind automatically translated the abbreviated words into 
their true meaning. The hospital staff had harvested ten eggs from Parker's body. Those cells had 
been immediately transferred to project Progeny, most likely located at The Centre.

The other papers were Centre memos, addressed to or from Mr. Parker and Raines. Jarod had 
seen them all when he had printed the sheets yesterday. The first memo, sent from Raines to Mr. 
Parker, was dated only two days after the note from Parker's medical record. 

"Progeny is currently at a 90% success rate. Surrogates are being carefully screened and the 
project will proceed as each individual is approved. 
With an estimated final success rate of 59.7%, we will need additional material in order to achieve 
the desired Progeny population. The female cellular resources are readily available. However, the 
entire male sample at our disposal has been utilized for this first wave of the project.
As a result, we must increase our efforts to bring Jarod back into our possession. Perhaps 
additional personnel could be assigned to the pursuit."

Jarod felt his skin crawl at the impersonal attitude that Raines had demonstrated in the brief 
letter. The bald cretin had such a cavalier attitude about Miss Parker, calling her ova "readily 
available". Jarod and Miss Parker were being treated like prize cattle, bred in a petri dish like 
some twisted science experiment. Jarod's indignation rose another notch at the injustice of it all.
   
The other memos were dated randomly over the next five years and contained several references 
to Progeny, but little actual information.  

"Progeny Alpha development is measuring at estimated levels" one memo read simply.

Another memo, dated less than a year ago, read, "Progeny Epsilon environment is delaying any 
immediate returns on the investment. However, long-term results seem promising. Delta 
simulations and resulting income can be used to support the project until such findings can be 
produced." 

"Jarod?" Parker interrupted. "Those memos are talking about our children, aren't they?" 

Jarod closed his eyes and nodded miserably. "My guess is that there were at least three 
successful surrogates. In vitro fertilization of donor eggs has an average of 20 to 30 percent live 
birth rate. If they started with ten eggs, that calculates to be about three births."

"Brigette was one of the surrogates." Parker stated knowingly.

Jarod looked at Parker. She was chewing thoughtfully at her lower lip as unshed tears began to 
fill her eyes. Jarod ached to go to her, to wrap her in his arms and somehow get through this 
nightmare. But years of isolation and rejection kept him rooted to his seat. 

"What now?" Parker asked.

Jarod admired her strength. He felt his own determination rising as he saw Parker's eyes flash 
with resolve. Jarod didn't realize that he had made a decision until the words began to tumble 
from his mouth. 

"I'm going to find them." Jarod answered with sudden certainty. "The Centre has stolen one family 
from me. I won't let them take another."

"What should I do?" Parker asked firmly.

Jarod blinked at her for a moment in surprise. It was easy enough to share information with his 
old rival. But she seemed to be proposing a combined effort and Jarod wasn't sure how far she'd 
be willing to take her involvement. Simply knowing about Progeny would put Parker's life in 
jeopardy. This was going to get far more dangerous for them both as events unraveled.

"Don't look so shocked, Jarod." Parker snapped as she stood and began pacing the length of the 
room. "Those children are mine too. They've been stolen from me just as much as they were from 
you. For the past four years, I thought that little boy was my brother and I loved him." Her blue 
eyes shimmered with moisture. "His death affected me deeply, even before I knew that he was 
my son."

Jarod pondered her words for a moment then asked carefully, "How involved do you want to be?"

Parker frowned, "What do you mean?"

With a troubled look on his face, Jarod chose his words very carefully. "You've always said that 
you couldn't leave The Centre." He glanced at Parker cautiously. "I run and you chase. That's our 
fate you said."

He watched her reaction warily. Parker shot him a glare and said, "What's your point?"

"Once I find my children, I am going to get them away from The Centre." Jarod promised. 
"Nothing is more important to me than their safety." He stood and began pacing excitedly himself. 
"I'm going to find them and I am going to run far away. No one in The Centre will ever hear from 
me again."

Jarod abruptly stopped pacing behind the chair Parker had vacated. He gripped the seat back 
tightly and flashed an angry look at Parker who stood across the room. "I'm done playing games." 
Jarod vowed. "No more clues, no more notebooks. No more digging for information about my 
parents. I'm a parent myself now, that has to come first."

Parker folded her arms across her chest in a defensive posture. "I'm a parent too! Of course their 
safety comes first. I can't leave my own children in that hellhole to be raised like … like…"

"Like me?" Jarod hissed caustically.

"I didn't mean it that way." Parker said softly.

Jarod sighed and pressed the heels of both hands against his eyes. "I'm sorry. We shouldn't snarl 
at each other this way." He deliberately moved back onto the couch to take a less threatening 
position. "My point is, that I'm going to take them and run." 

Jarod took a deep breath and plunged on. "Are you going to chase us?" He paused for a moment 
then added, "Or are you going to finally break from The Centre and run away with us?"

Jarod watched a series of emotions run across Parker's face. Irritation melted into sadness, 
which was followed quickly by uncertainty, embarrassment and a touch of fear. She glanced at 
him, seemingly searching for some support. Jarod pasted a blank look on his face. He didn't want 
to influence her decision in any way. Parker needed to choose her own path, no matter how much 
Jarod wanted her to follow his.

Parker hugged her arms around her body. "I'm their mother." She whispered desolately.

"Yes. You are." Jarod agreed simply.

She laughed in a sad way. "I'm not exactly your typical soccer mom. Minivans and bake sales 
aren't really my style." 

Jarod stood and shortened the distance between them. "After four years under the influence of 
The Centre, I doubt that these will be typical kids." He tilted his head at her compassionately. "All 
they'll need from their mother will be a great deal of love. And I happen to know that you have a 
lot of that to share, Parker."

He could see the longing in Parker's eyes. Jarod held his breath as he watched the fear return to 
her face.

"Raines will never stop looking for us, hunting us." She whispered. 

Jarod stood silently, waiting.

Parker looked up at him uncertainly for a moment. Then Jarod saw the decision take shape in her 
blue eyes. "You'll need my help to protect them. I'm coming with you." She stated firmly. "If… if 
that's okay with you." She added with concern.

Jarod exhaled gratefully. He moved toward Parker until they were only separated by a few 
inches. "It's okay with me." He smiled. "To be honest, I'm relieved. Becoming a single parent to 
multiple four-year-olds was a rather daunting prospect."

The smile on Parker's face glowed in her eyes. "Dealing with a bunch of pre-schoolers will be 
simple. Living with me is going to be your real challenge." She teased.

"I think can handle you." Jarod responded. "I've done some lion taming in the past, though none 
of those beasts had claws quite as sharp as yours." 

"Watch it Rat-boy." Parker warned.

Jarod chuckled in response.

Parker looked at the watch on her wrist. "Damn." She swore. "I'll need to hurry or I'll be late for my 
appointment with the funeral director."

Suddenly serious again, Jarod nodded and glared at the floor while Parker rushed to her room to 
grab some shoes. 

A few minutes later, Parker reappeared, looking as though she had just stepped out of a salon. 
Her hair and makeup were flawless. She had donned a pair of her signature stiletto heals and a 
black jacket that flared at the waist, ending just above the knees. 

"Parker?" Jarod stressed as she stopped before him. "You can't let anyone know what we have 
learned about Progeny. No one."

She nodded in agreement. Hesitating for a moment, Parker reached in to her jacket pocket and 
pulled out a photograph. With a sad look in her eyes she held the photo toward Jarod.

"Here." She said. "This is the most recent one I have." 

Jarod looked at the smiling young face that appeared on the print. The little boy was sitting in 
front of a candle lit cake, decorated with balloons and streamers made of icing. Sandy brown hair 
hung down his forehead to hide his eyebrows. Ice blue eyes twinkled with glee toward the camera 
and its unseen operator.

Jarod caressed the image. "He loved you very much." Jarod whispered.

Parker looked over Jarod's shoulder so she could see the photo as well. "The feeling was 
mutual." She nodded.

"He was lucky to have you." Jarod's lip trembled as he spoke. With a sigh, Jarod began to hand 
the picture back.

But Parker waved him away. "That's yours, Jarod. Keep it. I have plenty of others."

Jarod was stunned. To him, the generosity of Parker's gift was boundless. "Thank you, Parker." 
He murmured, his voice catching in his throat. "Thank you so much."

Miss Parker patted his arm in understanding, then turned and headed for the door.

"Parker?" Jarod's soft voice stopped her. "Don't let my son spend eternity alone." He said softly. 

Parker sighed sadly. "There's a plot beside my mother's." She answered gently. "She may not be 
buried there, but I've always felt her presence at that spot. She'll watch over him, don't you 
think?" 

Jarod blinked hard at the tears that stung his eyes. He nodded. "I think she'll like that."

Parker paused for a moment on the threshold, one hand on the doorknob, as though she wanted 
to say more. But with a brief shake of her head she left without another word, pulling the door 
closed behind her.

 ~~~~~~

It was after three in the afternoon by the time Parker returned. She was hungry and tired but 
everything was ready for the services to be held tomorrow. 

She unlocked the front door and stepped into the house. For the second time in as many days, 
Parker was shocked by the appearance of her home. 

The place was immaculate. Papers and bottles that had littered the living room and the dining 
table were gone. Shards of glass that Parker had been forced to tip toe around this morning, had 
disappeared. The cushions on the couch had been fluffed and the hardwood floors had that just 
waxed glow. Shaking her head, Parker noticed that the bar had even been restocked.

The entire house had been meticulously cleaned. Dishes had been washed and towels 
laundered.

"Jarod?" Parker called. But the house had that empty feeling to it and she knew that Jarod wasn't 
there.

Parker wandered from room to room, hoping to find some sign that Jarod had been around. She 
needed reassurance that the last twelve hours hadn't been a strange dream. 

There was no trace of Jarod anywhere. Parker sighed in frustration. If a sweeper team should 
happen to descend on this place now, they wouldn't find a single indication that the pretender had 
ever been here. Jarod had probably even wiped away any fingerprints he may have left.

Parker sighed heavily again. She knew that when Jarod was ready, he would contact her. There 
was a great deal of work to be done. They needed to find out more about the Progeny project. 
Specifically, how many children were involved and where those children were being housed. 

Jarod had specifically told her not to let anyone know that she had even heard of the Progeny 
project. So, Parker couldn't work on that aspect of their problem. But, she and Jarod were about 
to become responsible for several small children. Her little ones would need food and clothing. 
Parker decided that, until she received word from Jarod, she would find a way to begin secretly 
gathering supplies.

With this vague plan forming in her mind, Parker headed toward the kitchen to make herself a 
snack. She felt confident that when Jarod called she'd be ready. 

END PART 2


(Part 3 – Rendezvous)



Miss Parker strode confidently down the corridor. Her heels clicked sharply on the tiled floors as 
she made her way back to her office. Other Centre employees quickly scooted out of her way as 
Parker glared at them. She was fuming and looking for an excuse to bite some heads off.

She had just left Mr. Raines' office. As usual, Raines and Lyle had been an opposing force that 
Parker had to withstand. Lyle's parting shot about her attire had nearly earned him a punch in the 
face.

"Do you really feel the need to wear mourning this long? Or are attempting to find out how many 
black outfits are stuffed in your closet?" Lyle had snickered.

Parker had wanted to scream. Baby Parker had been buried only one week ago. Her grief was 
still a tangible thing, though it no longer kept her from sleeping. There were other concerns 
troubling her at night these days. 

Work at The Centre went on as usual. No one seemed to care about the little boy's death. 
Sydney and Broots had conveyed their sympathies, but neither had seen the child in ages. They 
had no emotional attachment to him. 

Lyle seemed to have forgotten that the boy existed. Parker had watched him carefully during the 
funeral. He had seemed bored. Parker had watched him whispering to Raines during the service 
and she suddenly realized that Lyle knew. Lyle knew all about Progeny. He had known that the 
child they buried that day wasn't his brother. Lyle knew he was burying a nephew, while Parker 
buried her son.

The week that had followed had been a long lonely ordeal for Parker. She desperately wanted to 
talk about the revelation that she had other children. She needed to talk about the child she had 
just lost. But the past seven days had gone by with no word from the only person Parker could 
have talked to about these feelings. Jarod had disappeared and no one had any clue were he'd 
gone.

Parker's feelings had wavered from hurt to anger and back again at Jarod's abandonment. With 
each day that passed, she became more anxious, snapping at Broots constantly. At night, she 
would stare at the ceiling, waiting for the phone to ring. Sleep, when it came, was troubled and 
uneasy. 

So now any small thing would put Miss Parker on edge. The meeting with Raines and Lyle had 
been brief but it had been a grueling exercise in self-control for Parker's pent up rage. 

"I need to start smoking again." She groused as she stormed in to her office and sank sullenly 
into her chair.

A heartbeat later, Parker bolted back up and dashed to the door to lock it. She looked warily 
around the room for signs of her intruder. Glaring like a beacon in the middle of Parker's neat 
desktop were four tiny rectangles of orange candy. The PEZ were laid end to end, forming a 
simple square. Next to the candies was a matchbook imprinted with the words "Blue Swan 
Cocktail Lounge" and an address in Dover. 

Parker snatched the items from her desk and quickly wiped away any additional traces of sugar 
with the palm of her hand. She made a circuit around her office searching for any other items that 
may have been left for her to find.

Her heart was pounding fiercely in her chest. "Jarod?" she whispered. Only silence answered.

Is he mad? Parker asked herself. 

The candy had not been on her desk when she had left for her meeting, of that she was sure. 
She had been gone for no more than twenty minutes. Parker was certain that Jarod had been 
here during her brief absence. He was walking around The Centre in the middle of a busy 
weekday. 

Stunned and a little frightened, Parker looked down at the items Jarod had left for her. The four 
orange PEZ sat in the palm of her hand. Their meaning was blatantly obvious. The four candies 
represented four children. 

The message in the matchbook was even simpler to understand. On the inside of the cover, 
written in Jarod's distinct block letters was simply 8 PM, followed by today's date. 

Parker glanced at the clock and sighed. It was going to be a long afternoon. Perhaps she would 
get a head start on the weekend and leave a few hours early. With the mood she had been in 
lately, no one would suspect anything if she took off for a couple of days.

Tucking Jarod's tiny mementos into one pocket, she turned on her heel and left the room. She 
needed to breeze through Sydney's office to lay the foundations of an alibi regarding the next day 
or two.

~~~~

Parker sighed as another moron slithered onto the bar stool beside her. "I'm not interested." She 
glared icily at him.

Unfortunately, this goof was young and full of bravado. He didn't take the hint.

"Come on, sweetheart." The young man cooed. "Don't know if you'll like it if you ain't willing to 
try." He motioned to the bartender. "Let me buy you a drink, darlin'."

Parker pinched the bridge of her nose and breathed deeply in an attempt to calm her jangled 
nerves. She couldn't afford to make a scene. So providing this idiot with a new hole in his head 
was not such a good idea.

This blond buffoon was the fourth brave soul who had tried to get friendly with Parker since she 
had arrived. The Blue Swan cocktail lounge seemed to be a popular place for the blue-collar 
crowd. At 7:00 on a Friday night, the place was nearly packed. 

Parker had been unable to find a booth to hide in. So for the past 45 minutes she had sat at the 
bar, nursing a single drink, while she defended herself from unwanted advances and waited for 8 
PM.

Staring at the man with her most withering glare Parker hissed, "I don't need to sample a thing to 
know that it's revolting." Her voice was sharp and ice cold. "So, unless you would like me to 
create a new orifice for the insertion of my foot, you will leave." She paused a heartbeat for effect. 
"Now."

The young man swallowed before quickly retreating to a nearby table to join his friends.

Parker had barely returned to her drink before a voice purred, "BRRrr. I almost feel sorry for the 
guy." 

She turned to see Jarod standing beside her, a tired grin on his face. "It's about time you showed 
up." Parker said. 

"I'm five minutes early." He replied.

"I know." Parker sighed. "But I've been here awhile, fending off the masses." She gestured toward 
the group of men gathered around her latest victim. 

Jarod chuckled. "I wish I'd been here sooner. Watching you perform the Ice Queen routine is 
always amusing."

"Keep it up, Buster, " Parker warned, "and you'll be on the receiving end of that routine." 

"Gee, I wonder what that would be like?" Jarod rolled his eyes sarcastically. "Let's go." He said 
abruptly.

"Where to?" Parker asked as Jarod led them to the parking lot.

Jarod didn't answer but instead walked past her car to stroll nonchalantly down the sidewalk. 
Parker hurried to keep up with him as he rounded the corner and crossed the street.

Two blocks later, Jarod took them down an alley that emerged in the back lot of an inexpensive 
motel. As they walked up to one of the rooms, Jarod dug a key from his coat pocket and opened 
the door.

"Are you hungry?" Jarod asked as he escorted Parker into the room.

Parker shook her head as she glanced at her surroundings. It was a small but clean room. There 
was a double bed along one wall and a small dresser against the other. The only other furniture in 
the room was a small round table with two chairs.

On the table there was a white bag from a local fast food joint, two bottles of Dr Pepper and a 
manila file folder. Next to the bed was a pile of Jarod's belongings, consisting of his silver DSA 
case and a black backpack.

Jarod wordlessly went to the table and offered Parker one of the beverages. When she declined, 
Jarod shrugged, opened the bottle and took a long swallow.

"I'm starved." He said as he dug into the bag and pulled out a cheeseburger. He flopped into one 
of the chairs and gestured meaningfully at the folder.

Parker picked it up cautiously. "What is this?" she asked him.

"Progeny." Jarod answered as he inhaled his burger. "Everything you could possibly want to know 
about it and some things that you don't." he warned ominously.

"Were you really in my office today, Jarod?" Parker asked, as she sat in the opposite chair.

Jarod looked at her thoughtfully for a moment. "Yes." He replied. "I've been there at least once 
each day this week."

Parker's jaw dropped in shock. 

"By the way," Jarod said in an exaggerated whisper, "your secretary has been making long 
distance calls from your phone when you're not around." He pulled a second burger from the bag, 
unwrapped it and took a bite. 

"I wouldn't be too harsh with him about it though." Jarod said gesturing with the sandwich. "His 
mom has been having trouble with a violent boyfriend, so he calls her at work to talk with her 
about leaving the creep."

Parker blinked for a moment at the nonsense Jarod was spouting. "Who cares?" she squeaked. 
"What have you been doing, spying on me?" She slammed the folder on the table top in fury. 

Jarod rubbed at his temples and sighed deeply. "What did you expect Parker? I needed 
information about Progeny and I needed it fast." He stood quickly, grabbed the DSA case from 
the floor and slapped it on the table top with enough force to make Parker flinch. "Why dick 
around when everything I wanted was right there in The Centre?"

"But how?" Parker choked. "How did you…"?

"Look," Jarod interrupted her sputtering. "I've spent the last ninety hours playing commando in a 
place that makes my skin crawl. I have discovered things that will haunt my nightmares for years 
to come. I'm tired and I'm hungry and I'm really not in the mood to argue with you."

He glanced at Parker's confused face and sighed again. "Let's just say that Centre security is 
designed to keep some people in and others out. Once you're on the other side of the wall, there 
is little to prevent you from moving around if you know where the cameras are located." 
  
Jarod crouched beside Parker's chair and placed one hand on her arm. "I wasn't spying on you." 
He said gently. "I wanted to check up on you." 

He stood suddenly and turned away. "Hell," he admitted ruefully. "I wanted to hide and there were 
only two places I felt safe. My old quarters, and your office." Jarod shrugged.

Parker shook her head in amazement. "I can't believe that you were sneaking around, right under 
our noses, for days."

"Why not? Angelo has been doing it for decades." Jarod smiled sadly. "It was Angelo that found 
out where the children are being kept."

Parker's eyes grew wide. "Are they in The Centre?" she asked fearfully.

Jarod nodded, his face grim. "If I could have gotten them all out on my own, they'd be here now. 
As it was, I nearly decided to free the ones I could and go back for the others. But I was afraid 
that Raines would move the children I'd left behind and we'd never find them again."

Parker caressed the folder with her fingertips. The stack of paper within contained all the 
information she needed about her children. Centre memos and impersonal reports. Parker 
suddenly pushed the folder away and looked up at Jarod longingly.

"I don't want to read this," she whispered. "I can't bear to look at those cold words written about 
my own kids." Parker's blue eyes pleaded with Jarod's brown ones as she asked, "Please, just 
tell me what you've learned."

Jarod slumped in to the empty chair. He grabbed his drink from the table and took a long swallow 
while he organized his thoughts.

"You already know that the hospital harvested your ova while you were being treated for the 
ruptured ulcer." He began.

Parker nodded.

"As it turns out," Jarod explained, "the medication that you were taking in the weeks prior to 
hospitalization wasn't treating your ulcer at all. They had been giving you fertility drugs to 
increase ovulation. As a result, they were able to harvest an impressive number of eggs. Ten 
oocytes is a very successful number of cells.

Anyway, they were all transferred to The Centre and immediately fertilized with my sperm." Jarod 
winced and began to blush. "Do we need to go into how they got that?"

Parker shook her head quickly. "No, no. Go on." She said.

Jarod rubbed his fingertips across his forehead and continued. "Only nine of the ova actually 
fertilized. The tenth was non-viable. 

Once fertilization was complete and cellular division occurred, they were frozen while Raines 
found surrogates to carry individual embryos. 

Once a surrogate was accepted into the project, a medical team would perform a procedure to 
implant a single egg in her body. The nine procedures took place over a span of about four 
months."

Jarod paused long enough to sip at his soda. 

"The Centre's IVF program is really top rate. Of the nine, only two failed to implant and become 
actual pregnancies. A third surrogate miscarried during the first trimester. 

Six of the surrogates carried a fetus to full term and gave birth. There were two girls and four 
boys. 

An added aspect of the Progeny project was that the children would be raised in different 
environments. It seems that Raines wanted to see which form of child rearing created the most 
effective pretender." 

Jarod glared at the now empty bottle in his hand for a moment then went on. "One of the girls was 
placed in a foster home, much like Ethan had been. There were two parents that would provide 
affection but still allow the Centre influence over her life. She was known as Progeny Gamma. 

It seems that none of them were given real names, just project titles." Jarod shook his head sadly 
and shrugged. "She succumbed to S.I.D. when she was eleven weeks old."

Parker's shot Jarod a suspicious look. "Can we be sure that it was crib death?"

"There's nothing to make me think otherwise." He reassured her. "They needed to resuscitate her 
when she was born and she'd had a lot of trouble breathing at first. Babies like that are always at 
higher risk for sudden infant death syndrome. Besides, the documents I found indicate that 
everyone, including Raines, was very irritated when she died."

Parker nodded, "My brother…" she halted and started again. "The child Brigette carried had 
trouble breathing for a while too. Raines worked hard to keep him healthy."

Jarod agreed. "Baby Parker was actually the youngest in the project. He was born three weeks 
after Gamma died."

"Explains why my father was so worried about Brigette at the time." Parker remarked.

"Brigette gave birth to Progeny Alpha." Jarod continued. "He was being raised in the same 
manner that you were, Parker. He was being brought up in society with a loving motherly 
influence from you and an emotionally stern father figure in either Raines or Lyle.

I believe that they planned to tragically remove you from his life at some point, just like they 
removed your mother." Jarod looked to Parker as if trying to gauge her reaction.

"God." She whispered.

"It gets worse." Jarod promised. "Raines wanted several of the infants raised like I was, for 
obvious monetary reasons. However, they also wanted to prevent any desire in these children to 
leave The Centre. So Raines came up with a brilliant idea.

The Progeny Delta project is actually three boys being raised together in The Centre. The three of 
them are insulated from the world and are cared for by kind, firm mentors like I was. But where I 
had one mentor for my entire stay at The Centre, the Delta project has continuously changing 
personnel filling that role.  

These boys have had a never-ending series of caretakers so that they could never get attached 
to any one of them. Any emotional investment they have is in each other."

Parker smiled hopefully. "So they've always had each other to depend on."

"And," Jarod added, "it's an incredibly effective way to enforce discipline. Should any one of them 
fail to follow instructions or begin showing signs of disobedience, that individual would not be the 
one punished. The other two would get the punishment instead."

Parker closed her eyes as she shook her head in dismay. "Do what you want to me, just please 
don't hurt my brother." She whispered.

"I should think that it is a diabolically effect method of control." Jarod agreed. "I know it would 
work on me." 

"All indications are that the Delta aspect of Progeny is highly successful." Jarod continued. "The 
three boys are educated and well cared for. Their simulations are already starting to generate 
income for the Centre."

"They aren't old enough to understand that they are prisoners. Or that they are being used." 
Parker said.

Jarod reached for the second bottle of Dr Pepper and popped it open. "They're not old enough for 
kindergarten for pity's sake." He said gruffly.

"What about the last child? The other little girl?" Parker asked.

The haunted look that Jarod flashed at Parker caused her to lean forward anxiously. Jarod sighed 
as a frown creased his brow.

"She is the Epsilon project." Jarod capped what was left of his soda and firmly placed the bottle 
on the table. He swallowed hard. When he began speaking again, it was in a sharp clinical tone 
that betrayed the emotions he was trying to control. "The Progeny Epsilon environment has been 
complete isolation. There has been no stimuli, no interaction, no affection, nothing. 

Even as an infant, she was kept in a crib 24 hours a day. Someone would come in and stick a 
bottle in her mouth to feed her. No one ever picked her up." Jarod explained. "When she was old 
enough to hold the bottle on her own, even that contact with other people ended."

He leaned toward Parker to stress his next words. "Until about six months ago, she was locked in 
a room with nothing and no one. She was raised on pure instinct. Aside from grunts and screams, 
she's non-communicative. Parker, no one has taught her to speak." 

"I can't imagine treating anyone like that." Parker whispered, tears misting her vision. "What 
changed six months ago?" she asked.

Jarod placed his elbows on the table and rubbed his fingertips in circles on his forehead in 
despair. "Lyle began educating her." He said haltingly. 

Parker suddenly couldn't stop shivering as her skin broke out in goose bumps. "It's bad isn't it?" 
she asked.

The haunted look in Jarod's eyes answered her question and a single tear slipped down his 
cheek as he nodded.

Jarod closed his eyes and took several deep breaths. A moment later, when he opened his eyes, 
Parker saw no trace of the emotions that were tearing at his soul.

Parker took a few seconds to control her own pain as she followed his lead. They had work to do. 
There was no time for frivolous sorrow over things that couldn't be changed.

"Do you have a plan?" Parker asked him.

Jarod nodded. "We move tomorrow night." He said simply, ignoring her look of surprise at his 
short notice. "I'll explain my plan in the morning." Jarod stretched. "For now, I need to get some 
rest."

Parker watched him as he stood and removed his jacket, tossing it on to the chair. "When was the 
last time you slept, Jarod?" she asked with concern. 

Jarod flashed her a crooked grin. "When did I pass out on your couch?" He asked in response.

Jarod tilted his head at her and sighed. He nudged the DSA case across the table toward Parker. 
"I stole these DSAs from the archives. I made copies, so they won't be missed. This is everything 
The Centre has on the children." He paused. "The Epsilon disks are difficult to watch. But I think it 
will be easier in the long run if you were to understand what we are up against."

Parker nodded fearfully as she pulled the case closer and opened it. There were fewer disks 
inside than she had expected. But then, there were only four years worth of surveillance here. 
Parker was accustomed to the thirty years worth of disks that comprised Jarod's life.

The identifying labels on the DSAs indicated that there were two sets of disks. One set was lined 
up to the left of the viewer the other set was to the right.

Parker glanced expectantly at Jarod, hoping he would give her some direction as to where she 
should start. However, he had already stretched out on the bed and kicked off his shoes. Within 
moments, he had closed his eyes and drifted into an exhausted slumber.  

With a shrug, Parker picked the disk closest to her right hand and slid it into the viewer. She then 
settled in and began to watch the lives of her children unfold before her.


End part3.


(Part 4 – Progeny Delta Progeny Epsilon)


As Jarod slept on the nearby bed, Parker watched the first DSA from the Progeny Delta project.

On the viewer, the black and white image showed a brightly lit room containing three plastic 
cradles lined up like the newborn nursery in any regular hospital. Two of the cradles held sleeping 
infants.

The walls were painted with large shapes, circles, triangles and squares. The monochromatic 
format of the DSAs prevented any determination of color in the room but Parker imagined that the 
shapes must have been bright primary colors.

A single nurse dressed in a white uniform, paced the length of the room. A third infant was 
cradled in the crook of her arm while it suckled at a bottle of formula. 

"That's a good boy." The woman soothed. After the baby had emptied the bottle, the nurse placed 
the tiny body against her shoulder and burped him.

The infant gurgled contentedly as the woman stroked the tuft of dark hair on his head.

Parker felt a deep hatred forming for the unknown woman. Jealousy clawed in the pit of her 
stomach as she realized that this video was over four years old. Parker would never feel her child 
on her shoulder the way the woman in the DSA had.

Parker reached out and flipped the DSA on to a faster playing speed. The first several months of 
recordings were all the same. Women in white uniforms would come in to feed and change a 
child when it cried. There was obviously scheduled playtime when someone would come and 
perform educational exercises with each infant.
 
After a few weeks, Parker noticed a pattern developing in the children. The babies' schedules 
began to coincide with each other. By the time the DSAs had been recording for 2 months, three 
nurses had replaced the one nurse previously in attendance. The three boys cried at the same 
time, slept at the same time and were active at the same time. Whether Raines had designed the 
project that way or the children had fallen into the routine on their own, Parker couldn't tell.

Parker pulled the disk from the machine and replaced it with another.

In this recording, the babies were sitting on the floor, surrounded by blocks and big balls. They 
crawled about the floor, happily gurgling and sticking things in their mouths. Two new women, 
clad in the ever-present white uniform sat cross-legged on the floor helping the children make 
towers with the blocks.

With a sad smile on her face, Parker stroked the image on the viewer. She laughed at the playful 
tumbling of the dark-haired trio.

After several minutes, Parker moved on to another disk.

There was now a small table and three little chairs in the room. Another woman held each child's 
hand as she led the toddler to the chairs. The exercise for this day consisted of learning to stay in 
the chair. The youngsters had recently learned to walk and would stumble away moments after 
being seated. The woman would patiently lead the baby back to the chair and then retrieve the 
next child.

Parker shook her head and forwarded the recording another six months.

What Parker saw on the screen at this point made her frown in concern. Each child sat quietly in 
a chair with his hands folded neatly in his lap. Three pairs of dark round eyes watched silently as 
a white clad instructor held up a placard with a word on it. The instructor would carefully 
enunciate the word and then flip the card down, revealing the next one.

The teacher went through each card multiple times, while the children sat without moving. None 
of the boys could have been more than eighteen months old. 

After nearly an hour of drilling, the instructor returned to the beginning of the stack, turned to the 
boys and simply said, "Begin."

"Future" the first little boy read.

"Monetary" the second read as the instructor flipped the card.

"Interest" read the third.

"Stock"  
"Percent"
"Decline"
"Static"
"Value"

The little boys took turns as each card was displayed. Their baby voices slurred the pronunciation 
of some of the words, particularly those containing the letter R. Parker wondered if the little boys 
were actually reading the cards or if they had simply remembered the order of the words used by 
the teacher. Either way, it was not normal behavior for three children who were still in diapers.

Once the children had successfully cycled through the flash cards, the instructor said, "Well done. 
We are finished for today."

With that, the three boys jumped up from their seats and began chasing each other about the 
room gleefully. The wild abandon with which they jumped about made Parker smile. 

Parker skimmed through the recordings. She watched as the lessons became more complicated. 
A metamorphosis from lessons to basic simulations began to take place when the boys were 
about three-years-old.

Within a year, the Delta program had become adept at simulating resolutions to simple problems 
like traffic flow issues. Toy cars and large crayon-drawn maps of busy intersections were used to 
engineer new routes and lay the foundation for new road construction.

Granted, traffic flow problems weren't difficult for a pretender. Jarod could do this stuff without 
even thinking about it, in the same way that most people could chew gum. But these kids were 
barely four-years-old, and this type of simulation could be sold very profitably.

The Delta aspect of the Progeny project had huge financial potential for The Centre. Raines 
wouldn't let these boys go easily.

As Parker watched the most recent recordings she discovered that she could find no reference to 
any names being used. The boys were known collectively as Delta, none had an individual 
moniker. They referred to each other as you, me and him. 

And yet despite this missing bit of personal identity, the images reflected three enthusiastic and 
adaptive little boys. They were extraordinarily intelligent and unusually disciplined for their ages 
but when they were allowed free time the children squealed and roughhoused like normal 
brothers. 

The Centre had entirely isolated them from popular culture. Their meals all consisted of the 
optimized nutritional substance that Jarod had been raised on. So Parker knew that the world 
outside The Centre would be a huge change for them. But the boys seemed confident enough 
and as long as they had each other for emotional support, Parker felt they would be able to 
adjust. 

Parker pulled the last DSA out of the viewer and returned it to the carefully filed group of Progeny 
Delta disks.

Hesitating for a moment, Parker picked up the first of the Epsilon disks and watched the spectrum 
of colors jump off its surface as she held the circle up to the light. Jarod had told her that these 
disks were difficult to watch. Parker wasn't sure that she wanted to know what The Centre had 
done to her little girl. 

Giving in to her curiosity, Parker pushed the disk into the DSA viewer and watched the dark 
screen blip on.

This room was a small gray space with cinderblock walls. Another hospital-like crib sat in the 
middle of the room. The child lying in the crib wore a diaper and a tiny white cotton shirt. There 
weren't even sheets covering the tiny mattress.

A woman entered the room. She perfunctorily changed the infant's soiled garments then 
wordlessly stuck a bottle in the baby's mouth while it still lay in the crib. When the bottle emptied 
the woman simply turned and left the room. 

Parker sped through the recordings. Day after day unfolded with the same routine. The baby was 
changed and fed on a specifically timed schedule. The infant was handled as little as possible 
during these times and no one ever spoke to the tiny creature. 

Tears misted Parker's eyes as she watched the baby's cries go unanswered for hours. There was 
absolutely no interaction outside of the scheduled time for feedings. There was no one to soothe 
the infant's tears. After several weeks, the baby didn't bother to cry anymore.

Months passed and the plastic isolet was changed to a regular crib with bars, making the little 
girl's prison heart wrenchingly complete. Once she could hold a bottle on her own, interaction with 
any caretakers decreased even further.

It became apparent that some of the formula given to the child was laced with sedatives. Only 
when the little girl was unconscious in this manner would someone bathe her and change soiled 
bed linen. The diaper and white t-shirt were her only clothing.

The child grew but her bland surroundings never changed. Parker found herself zooming through 
the DSAs at maximum speed as weeks melted into months. 

At the point in time where her brothers were sitting around a table learning to read, the little 
epsilon girl sat solemnly in her crib rocking back and forth in a monotonous rhythm. 

One day, shortly before the child turned three, she was drugged and her room radically changed 
while she slept. The crib was removed and replaced by a metal cot and a bare mattress. A toilet 
was introduced in the corner and the child was dressed in a nightshirt and cotton panties. A tray 
of green goop passing as food replaced her bottles. 

The little girl hadn't taken the change well. Upon waking, she had been horribly frightened. The 
security of her crib bars was gone. The child had screamed in fear and had crawled under the cot 
to whimper pitifully.

Parker wept as she watched the child's painful adjustment. The little girl hadn't recognized the 
tray as a source of food. Whimpers of fear had become screams of frustration as she waited for a 
bottle of nourishment that never came. It took her days to understand that the trays materialized, 
shoved through a small aperture in the door, at the same time of day that her bottles used to 
come.

She learned to feed herself and she eventually figured out the purpose of the toilet. Her world had 
now grown from the confines of the crib, to that of the tiny room. The child's existence was little 
more than survival. 

She spent some of her time pacing the length of the room like a caged animal. But most of the 
time she sat curled in a ball, rocking back and forth, while she chewed at the ends of her long, 
wild hair. 

Parker wiped the moisture from her cheeks as she found another disk and inserted it into the 
viewer.

The date in the bottom left hand corner of the screen was nearly six months ago. The girl could 
be seen lying on the floor in front of the tiny space where trays were shoved through the door. 
Her dark tangled hair fanned on the floor around her head as the child screamed in anger and 
pounded her fists against the cement beneath her.

Parker frowned as she tried to determine what had caused this type of behavior.

Suddenly, with a loud clang, the door opened and Lyle entered the room. 
"Now what have we here?" he sneered.

The little girl, having been isolated for so long, bolted in fear to the far corner of the room and 
slithered under the cot. 

"Have you followed my instructions?" Lyle asked some unseen person who stood outside the 
room.

"Yes, Sir." A voice answered. "Haven't fed her for 24 hours."

Parker's hands clenched into fists as she watched the video continue.

Lyle nodded and took another step into the room as the door closed behind him. From his pocket 
he pulled a small covered bowl. He crouched down on the floor and opened the container. 

"Hmmm." He said, inhaling the aroma from the bowl. "Smells good, doesn't it?"

Lyle sat on his haunches, holding the bowl toward the bed and waiting patiently.

Long minutes passed before the frightened child eased from her hiding place. She sniffed at the 
air, obviously confused by the smell of whatever it was that Lyle was offering to her.

"Come on." He said, gently shaking the container at her. "Come and get it."

The little girl warily inched closer until she could snatch the bowl from Lyle's hand. She 
immediately withdrew to the far corner and gulped at the food, scraping at the bowl's meager 
contents with her fingers.

Lyle grinned. "Good isn't it, my dear."

For a moment the two stared silently at each other. Then Lyle reached into another pocket and 
pulled out a foil-covered rectangle. 

"Here's a real treat for you." He said as he began removing the silver wrap. "Its called chocolate." 

Lyle broke a small square off of the candy bar and held it out to the little girl in the same way that 
he had with the bowl of food. This attempt took less time for the girl to approach him and take the 
morsel from his fingertips.

Lyle watched in amusement as the child sniffed at the brown tidbit. A look of delighted wonder 
came over her face as she stuffed the chocolate into her mouth and tasted it.

"Would you like more?" Lyle asked as he broke off a second piece. 

There was no hesitation at all as the child crossed the room this time. However, rather than 
handing the confection over as he had before, Lyle snatched the candy away from her grasp. 

An angry frown creased the little girl's forehead as she lunged at the treat. Lyle then struck her 
with the back of his hand with such force that she fell to the floor.

Parker flinched at the image of the violence in the recording.

Lyle then turned on his heel and walked out of the room. "Continue to follow my previous orders." 
He said to the unseen person as he left the room. "She's is to be given nothing but water. I'll be 
back in 48 hours."

The images recorded two days later had repeated the sick scene. Lyle had tempted the starving 
child with tidbits of food until she had come to him willingly. Then he had punished her trust with a 
crushing blow.

The same painful lesson was repeated again and again over the next several months. Once, 
when the girl had managed to dodge Lyle's fist, she had been rewarded with an extra piece of 
chocolate. But during their next session, she had lunged at him and had bitten Lyle hard enough 
to draw blood.

Lyle had slapped her into the corner then bent over his mangled hand. 

Parker shivered at the image of her child. Curled in the space between the cot and the wall, the 
girl's hair hung across her face in a twisted mess. Blood from Lyle's wound trickled down her chin 
as the girl snarled and hissed at her tormentor like a wild creature. 

Parker cringed with each blow as she watched Lyle beat the child senseless for her insolence.
 
The DSA viewer abruptly went black. Jarod stood behind Parker, glaring at the now dark screen, 
his left hand motionless over the power switch.

Parker's lip trembled. "Why?" she whispered.

Jarod's jaw clenched as he said haltingly, "They are teaching her to hurt. To hate. They will 
reward her for violent behavior and punish her for any sign of disrespect."

Parker gasped. "They're treating her like an animal. What can they possibly gain this way?"

"They'll try to break her spirit, destroy what's left of her humanity. Once they accomplish that, 
Raines will have a sociopath to do whatever he wants." Jarod glanced at Parker, his eyes hard 
with determination. "We will stop him." He vowed.

Parker couldn't prevent the tears that flowed down her cheeks. "Oh Jarod, that poor baby."

Jarod's eyes began to pool as well. He crouched beside Parker's chair and tried to reassure her. 
"Did you notice how she fights him?" He said proudly. "Lyle's been treating her this way for 
months, but she still fights him." 

Jarod's lower lip trembled as he went on, "I saw her yesterday, Parker. She is strong willed and 
stubborn. She fears Lyle yet she continues to defy him."

Parker sighed. "I can't bare the thought of him hurting her again, Jarod."

"I know." Jarod stood and paced excitedly across the room. "Lyle visits her once a week. Each 
week is worse than the last. I was too late to do anything when I found them yesterday but we 
need to get her out before he comes back."

Jarod strode across the room and back, a frown furrowing his brow. 

"The problem is," he said thoughtfully, "she has no memory of anyone but Lyle. She inherently 
mistrusts anything new." Jarod glanced sadly at Parker and shrugged. "She will be afraid of us." 

Parker dragged both hands through her hair and sighed with fatigue.

"You're tired." Jarod said, abruptly dropping the conversation. "Lie down and try to get some 
sleep." He urged. "We'll need to rest if we are going to pull this off. We can talk details in the 
morning."

Parker agreed reluctantly and moved to the bed. She kicked of her shoes and crawled under the 
blankets without removing any other clothing. Jarod crossed the room and turned off the lights. 
Parker watched him settle into one of the hard wooden chairs, his legs stretching out in front of 
him.

"Jarod." Parker called softly as she tossed the pillow toward him.

He snatched it from the air with one hand. "Thanks, Parker."  

Parker cushioned her head on one arm and stared into the darkness around her. A few minutes 
later, she could hear Jarod's deep regular breathing as exhaustion prevailed and he fell asleep. 
Her own breathing slowed to match his rhythm as Parker listened to his gentle exhalations in the 
otherwise silent room.

It wasn't long before Parker drifted into slumber as well.


END PART 4


(Part 5 – The Rescue)


Parker could barely see Jarod in the dark car. The vehicle, one of those all-terrain sports utility 
things with a ski rack, had enough room to easily seat six adults. They had driven to this spot 
several hours ago and had parked in the woods not far from The Centre.

Once Jarod had been sure that they were safely hidden, the two of them had waited for the cover 
of darkness. They had talked little while the time passed. Jarod had checked the contents of his 
backpack repeatedly, until Parker had wanted to slap him.

Parker glanced at the duffel lying on the floor in the back seat. It seemed pitiful somehow. She 
had her entire life stuffed into that bag. To make matters worse, her things hadn't filled the case. 
Some of the items within belonged to Jarod.

Granted, when they had stopped at her home this afternoon, Jarod had told her to pack only 
those things that could not be replaced. "You can fill this duffel." He had told her. "No more. So 
choose what you want to keep very carefully."

It had taken Parker only a few minutes to grab some photos, the music box Jarod had given her 
and several pieces of jewelry that had gained sentimental value over the years. She had wanted 
one of her mother's paintings, but none would fit in the space that Jarod had provided. Parker felt 
that he probably would have allowed her the painting if she had asked but choosing only one 
would have been too difficult.

As they had left, Parker watched the house for as long as she could. She stared out the back 
window long after she lost sight of the building. When she had finally turned toward to front 
windshield, there were unshed tears shimmering in her eyes.

"It was my home." She had whispered.

Jarod had patted her shoulder gently in understanding. "I know." He said gently. "We'll find a new 
one. I promise."

She studied Jarod now. He was dressed like Parker, all in black. Frequent glances at his watch 
and a constant gentle tapping of his fingertips against the steering wheel, gave evidence of 
Jarod's nervousness. 

Parker knew that Jarod was edgy at being so close to The Centre. She could feel the tension 
radiating from him in waves. His posture and attitude seemed laid back but Parker knew him too 
well to be fooled. They were both wired and as time dragged on, the strain increased. 

She reached out and touched Jarod's hand as it lay on the steering wheel, bringing a halt to the 
annoying tap of his drumming fingers. 

He must have seen the anxiety in her eyes because he took her hand in his own and said, "Soon. 
We wait just a few more minutes." 

Parker nodded. She was eager to move into action.

Jarod glanced out the side window, quickly surveying the area. Parker looked down. Her fingers 
entwined with Jarod's comfortably as he gently held on to her hand. He was watching out the 
window intently, as though he didn't realize that their hands were still clasped. Parker tilted her 
head and hid a tiny smile.

Neither of them said anything but the simple act of holding hands spoke volumes. During the past 
24 hours, they had talked at great length about rescue plans and ways to help the children cope 
afterward. However, Parker realized that Jarod had carefully avoided any discussion about how 
this arrangement was going to affect the relationship between the two of them.

Sure, they had managed to coexist and even cooperate for short periods of time in the past. But 
now they were about to start a life long partnership in raising their children. 

Parker squeezed his hand gently to get Jarod's attention. He shot her a questioning look. 

"Do you think we can survive living together?" she asked seriously.

He studied her for a moment. "Maybe." Jarod answered. "After all, it has been more than a week 
since you last threatened to shoot me." He added, his eyes twinkling.

"I think we'll manage." Jarod continued with a tilt of his head. "As long as I don't eat your 
cooking." He teased.

"I happen to be a very good cook." Parker said defensively. "I just don't do it often."

The alarm on Jarod's watch went off. He slung his pack over one shoulder and glanced at Parker. 
"Are you ready for this?"

"Not really, but lets go anyway." She answered truthfully.

They left the car and moved several yards to the edge of a field. At the tree line, Jarod dropped 
into a crouch and scanned the meadow carefully. Parker copied his actions.

Once Jarod seemed ready, he looked to Parker and said softly, "Follow me."

They dashed across the field through the moonless night. Parker barely saw the large cylindrical 
shape sticking out of the ground.

Jarod stopped next to the pipe and pulled a flashlight from his pack. The pack then went on his 
back, strapped tightly to his shoulders to leave his hands free. 

With a single shove, Jarod slid the cover of the pipe over and guided the flashlight beam into the 
void below. The pipe was an exhaust outlet for The Centre's ventilation system. Parker could see 
metal rungs leading down to an abyss.

"The covers on these things are supposed to be welded on." Parker said in surprise. 

Jarod hopped onto the edge of the vent and shot her one of his 'gotcha' grins as he swung his 
legs into the opening and began climbing downward.

Parker shook her head as she followed him. 

With the flashlight attached to Jarod's belt as he descended below, Parker could see little of her 
surroundings. For a moment, she worried about what critters could be hiding in the dark around 
her. But she pushed the concerns aside. Jarod was placing a huge amount of trust in her, just by 
having her with him now. The least Parker could do was trust in him enough to lead her safely 
through the dark.

Parker guessed that they had climbed downward for about fifty feet when her feet finally met the 
ground. They were in some kind of maintenance tunnel. Parker could see pipes and ductwork 
wherever Jarod pointed his beam of light.

"This way." He quipped as he took off down the corridor. 

All Parker could do was follow the bobbing light Jarod held as they ran through the darkness. 
After a time, Jarod stopped abruptly in front of a heating duct. He pulled the grate off of the front 
and crawled in.

"These things are smaller than I remember." Parker groused.

"Shh." Jarod hissed. "We're inside." He whispered.

They traveled the twisted route to SL-22 in silence. Parker didn't bother trying to remember the 
way. They had decided earlier that if anything were to go wrong or if they should get separated, 
Parker would just walk to the nearest hallway and act like she was supposed to be there. 

Once they reached the correct level, Jarod popped a grate off and they hopped down into an 
unobserved hallway.

Using hand gestures, Jarod indicated where they were headed. When they reached a door at the 
far end of the hallway, Jarod slid the pack from his back and crouched on the floor to remove 
several items. Parker watched the corridor for any approaching staff.

Jarod unfolded a small three-step ladder and tucked it under one arm. Into one pocket he shoved 
a zip-lock bag containing a damp cotton cloth. In his right hand he held a digital camera, in his left 
he had a security clearance card. 

"Ready?" he asked.

Parker nodded once. With a quick glance down the hallway in either direction, Jarod swiped the 
card through the access slot to open the door. Jarod slid through as soon as the door had opened 
far enough. 

With his back pressed tightly against the wall, he used the ladder to reach the surveillance 
camera. The digital camera he'd brought with him was used to snap a still frame of the room. 
Within seconds he had attached his camera to the observation device and transmitted the still 
frame to the system.

Parker slid wordlessly into the room behind Jarod and pulled the door nearly closed behind her. 
At first glance, the barren gray room seemed empty.

Without hesitation Jarod crossed the room in two long strides. As he pulled the cloth from the bag 
in his pocket with one hand, he grabbed the metal bed frame with the other and flung the cot 
across the room. 

The small ragged bundle of a child that had been hiding under the bed now screamed at Jarod's 
feet and scurried against the wall. She tried to dash around him to hide beneath the twisted cot 
but Jarod snatched her from the air as she sped past him. With an ear-piercing scream the little 
girl twisted in his grasp, clawing futilely at the arm Jarod had wrapped around her waist.

Pulling her close so that her back pressed against his chest, Jarod closed his eyes and 
whispered into the girl's ear "Forgive me, little one." 

Jarod then quickly placed the damp cotton over the child's face. He hugged her tightly as the 
chloroform took effect and the little girl's struggling stopped.

Less than a minute had lapsed since Parker had entered the room yet she was visibly shaken by 
the emotional scene that had just been played out. Jarod sighed, rocking gently, as he held their 
daughter close and stroked her tangled hair.

A moment later, Jarod's face took on a stony determined look and he stepped toward the door. 
"Check the hall." He commanded. 

Parker grabbed the stepladder and poked her head out the door. Nodding that the coast was 
clear, she crept into the hallway and dashed to the first corner. Jarod, with the little girl cradled in 
one arm, followed Parker closely.

They moved quickly through the hallways and ducked into the stairwell. They ran up the stairs to 
the next level. Parker stopped for a moment at the landing to check on the surveillance camera 
posted in that location. The red indicator on the camera was not lit. As Jarod had promised, this 
camera was not functioning.

Their luck continued to hold as the two moved quickly down the next hall. Parker took the key 
card that Jarod held toward her and used it to open the next door. Jarod pressed himself and his 
little passenger into an alcove across the hall as Parker tip-toed into the room.

Using the ladder and a second digital camera, Parker disabled the security system in the way that 
Jarod had done only minutes before. As Parker completed this task, she noticed a dark haired 
child blinking at her in surprise from one of the three beds in the room.

"Wake up children." Parker said firmly. 

Seconds later, the blinking child was standing beside his bed at attention while the other two 
woke and quickly followed suit.

"I am your new instructor." Parker stated. "Do you understand?"

"Yes ma'am." The three replied in unison.

"Come here." Parker ordered. "I want you to all hold hands, okay?" She waited a moment while 
the boys did as she ordered without question. Parker crouched down in front of them and took the 
hand of the child closest to her.

"We are going on a very special assignment." Parker told them solemnly. "I don't want you to be 
afraid but it is important that you move quickly and be very quiet. Understood?"

Three small heads nodded gravely. Their eyes grew wide as Parker opened the door and led the 
trio into the hallway. She hurried down the hall and into a broom closet located at the end. Jarod 
came up the rear and closed the closet door behind them.

He handed the unconscious little girl to Parker, then Jarod shoved aside a metal shelving unit to 
reveal a grate in the wall located halfway between ceiling and floor. Grabbing the metal screen 
with both hands, he yanked it open and turned to Parker. The little girl was passed back so that 
Parker could take the flashlight from Jarod's pocket and crawl into the duct. 

Holding the girl against his shoulder with one hand, Jarod used the other hand to boost the boys 
into the duct one at a time. 

"Follow the light." He instructed them.

Parker felt her heart pounding as she searched the dark vent in front of her. Just when she was 
sure that she would get them all lost, she saw a glimpse of florescent yellow. As she reached an 
intersection in the ductwork, she found yellow tape forming an arrow. The beam from the 
flashlight made the arrow glow brightly.

One arrow led to another at a second intersection several yards further down. After several 
similar arrows, Parker reached an opening with an X taped above it. The grate had already been 
removed, allowing Parker to wriggle out of the shaft and into a maintenance corridor.

Once everyone had crawled out of the vent, Jarod took the lead and rushed through the dark 
tunnels. The little boys ran to keep up while Parker followed a step behind them so that no one 
would get lost.

Finally, they reached the metal ladder that would take them out of The Centre. 

Jarod gently laid the sleeping girl on the floor and removed the pack from his back. The boys 
watched with huge eyes as Jarod pulled a series of harnesses and straps from the pack. He 
handed one harness to Parker and quickly began buckling another around the unconscious little 
girl.

"Step your foot between those straps, sweetheart." Parker said to a nearby child. 

Parker glanced up the ladder in concern. She and Jarod were only two people. There were four 
children they needed to get up the ladder. The climb was much too far for even the tallest of the 
boys to attempt alone.

Looking like parachute jumpers, all four youngsters were quickly equipped with harnesses. Jarod 
tied the sleeping girl to his body so that her head cradled on his chest. Parker helped him strap 
one of the boys on his back. 

Jarod then hefted a second boy onto Parker's back. The child instinctively wrapped his small 
arms around Parker's neck. Parker felt like she was carrying a heavy backpack on some strange 
hike. 

A shadow in the far corner shifted and Angelo suddenly appeared from the gloom.

"Right on time." Jarod smiled. 

Startled by the strange man's appearance, Parker watched silently as Angelo turned around and 
allowed the last child to be saddled on his own back.

Without another word, Jarod grabbed one of the metal rungs and began climbing. Parker followed 
closely while Angelo brought up the rear. For the next several minutes they climbed, the only 
sound was the labored breathing of the adults. 

By the time Parker had reached the top of the ladder, her arms were starting to feel like jelly. She 
threw one leg over the edge of the ventilation shaft while Jarod helped her down. As Angelo 
scrambled out, he began to unfasten the harness he wore.

"There's no time," Jarod stopped him. "We need to go. Come on." He urged as he began to move 
toward the trees.

"No." Angelo said simply as he slipped the straps from his shoulders and let the little boy drop 
softly onto the grass. Angelo then stepped back to the exhaust pipe and began to climb in.

Jarod grabbed Angelo by the arm. "Angelo," Jarod pleaded. "Come with us."

With a crooked smile on his face, Angelo cupped Jarod's cheek with his palm. "Angelo belong 
here."

"No." Jarod whispered sadly. 

"Yes." Angelo insisted. "Powerful here. Only lost out there."

Jarod sighed heavily and nodded with understanding. He stepped closer to the pipe and threw his 
arms around Angelo's shoulders. "Goodbye, my friend." Jarod choked. The hug was awkward 
with the two children still strapped to Jarod's body, but Parker could see the emotion conveyed 
between the two men.

"Goodbye, friend." Angelo whispered. The contact ended and Angelo turned toward the open vent 
again.

"Angelo, wait." Parker called as she rushed toward him. She put an arm around her strange 
friend's shoulder, pulled him close and kissed his wrinkled cheek. "Goodbye. Take care of 
yourself." She said.

Smiling broadly, Angelo took her face in both of his hands and looked affectionately into Parker's 
eyes. "Goodbye." He said. "Take care of each other." A moment later, he was gone and the cover 
was sliding back onto the exhaust pipe.

Blinking away tears, Parker turned toward Jarod. 

"We need to go." He repeated.

Jarod picked up the fourth child by the harness, carrying him like a piece of luggage, and sprinted 
across the meadow toward the hidden car. Parker's feet flew across the grass as Jarod's obvious 
anxiety created a flower of panic in her own gut.

They reached the safety of the trees and found their vehicle before they quickly slid the children 
out of the harnesses. As they piled everyone into the car, Jarod swiftly closed the doors, slid 
behind the wheel and started the engine. 

The car had already started to move when Jarod ordered, "Get them all buckled up." 

Parker swayed clumsily as she crouched in the back seats, fastening seatbelts. One of the boys, 
slightly taller than the others, frowned at her as Parker pulled the strap across his waist. 

"It's okay." She reassured him. "They are for your safety in case the vehicle should stop 
suddenly." 

The little boy seemed to think that over for a moment before his frown disappeared.

Once she had buckled the children in and propped the sleeping girl up in a seat, Parker 
clambered over the gearshift and into the front passenger seat. The SUV fishtailed slightly and 
the tires squealed as the car left the woods and bounced onto a paved road.

Glancing anxiously out the rear window, Parker watched for signs of pursuit.

With a sigh, Jarod glanced in the rearview mirror at the boys and said, "Well done children." 

The three boys looked at each other nervously.

Parker turned in her seat so that she could see their little faces. "It's alright." She said in a 
soothing voice. "We're going on an adventure." 
 
  
End Part 5.
 


(Part 6 – Flight)


Jarod steered the car off the road and onto the drive leading to a small private airstrip. He 
skillfully parked the vehicle in an open spot near the hangar. Parker unfastened her seatbelt and 
stretched. They had been driving for only half an hour, but Parker had spent most of that time 
twisted in her seat as she talked quietly with the boys riding in the back.

Parker was disappointed that the drive had taken place in the middle of the night. The boys had 
pressed their little noses against the windows to see the world rush by but the darkness had 
prevented them from seeing much. 

Despite a limited view, the trio had asked a steady stream of questions. They had been hesitant 
at first. Initially only one of the boys had been brave enough to speak up. He had asked questions 
about the seatbelts first. After he had figured out how to work the latch, he demonstrated his new 
skill to the other two boys. This had been followed by much clicking and clacking as the three had 
fastened and unfastened their seats belts for several minutes.

Parker could see an amused grin on Jarod's face in the light from the dashboard. 

She raised her eyebrows at him. "You think this is funny?" Parker had asked.

"Don't you?" Jarod had glanced quickly in her direction.

Parker shrugged. "That clicking is getting annoying." She said in a low whisper.

Jarod chuckled. "I suggest you learn to increase your tolerance levels pretty quickly, Miss Parker. 
There are a lot of similarly fascinating and noisy things for them to discover in the next few days."

Parker had smiled. "It's going to be fun isn't it?" 

"To an extent." Jarod answered as the smile slid from his face. "But some of it will be very 
frightening for them." He warned with a glance in the rearview mirror at his passengers.

Jarod opened his door and the overhead light came on, making the boys blink at the sudden 
adjustment to their eyes. Parker got out of the car and moved to the back door where she helped 
the boys hop to the ground.

Jarod rummaged through the duffel bag lying on the floor and pulled out a syringe. 

"Is that necessary?" Parker asked as she watched Jarod lean over the unconscious little girl still 
buckled in her seat.

Jarod perched on the edge of the seat beside the child and brushed the tangled hair away from 
her face with a sigh.

"I don't like it anymore than you do, Parker." He said morosely. "But without it she'll wake up in 
about twenty minutes. Do you want to try controlling her while we're in the air? There is no way to 
prevent her from being afraid when she regains consciousness. I, for one, would rather not be 
35,000 feet up when she starts screaming." 
 
Parker knew that Jarod was right. There was no time to give the little girl the tenderness she 
needed. They had to get the children as far from Delaware as they could before sunrise. 

Jarod waited for Parker's permission to further sedate the girl. Parker nodded reluctantly. Jarod 
quickly checked the child's vital signs. Once he was satisfied, Jarod took the little girl's arm in one 
hand and the syringe in the other. He pulled the cap off of the needle with his teeth and expertly 
slid the point into her vein.

"What is wrong with her?" one of the boys, the seatbelt expert, asked curiously.

"She isn't well." Jarod answered simply as he administered the drug. "She will need all of us to 
help her if she is going to get better." He looked at the boy with a serious look in his eyes. "Do 
you think you can do that? Can you help her?"

Equally serious, the boy answered. "We'll help." 

Jarod unbuckled the sleeping girl and pulled her into his arms. Tossing the duffel bag over his 
shoulder, he kicked the car door closed and jerked his head toward Parker to indicate that she 
should follow him.

The group walked several yards across a paved tarmac and around the corner of the hangar to 
where a private jet was parked. Parker thought the plane looked familiar. She guessed that The 
Centre was probably missing one of their fleet. 

"An airplane." One of the little boys gasped.

"A private jet." Jarod nodded. "Pretty cool, eh?"

The boy began bouncing up and down excitedly. "Do we get to ride in it?"

"We sure do." Jarod grinned in amusement at the child's eagerness. 

As Jarod opened the door and ushered the group into the plane, he asked the other two boys, 
"Do you like the airplane too?"

The quieter boy looked around nervously while the other child shrugged, "It's okay, I guess."

Jarod gently placed the sleeping little girl in one of the leather seats while Miss Parker directed 
the boys into the other chairs.

"I'll get ready for take off while you fasten everyone in." Jarod told Parker.

Jarod entered the cockpit, sat in the pilot's chair and began preflight procedures.

The one little boy, so excited by the airplane, fidgeted and craned his neck to see into the cockpit. 
Jarod had left the door propped open. Instrument panels and lights could be seen by the young 
passengers.

With everyone buckled in and ready to go, Parker settled against the leather back of her chair to 
wait out their flight. In the well-lit cabin, she took the opportunity to study her children more 
closely. 

All three brown haired boys were dressed alike in typical Centre inmate fashion. They wore 
shapeless cotton shirts and pants in a neutral color somewhere between gray and green. Each 
had matching black canvass shoes that seemed to all be the same size.

One of the boys was taller, but not by much. He was the more confident of the three children and 
had been the seatbelt expert while they were in the car. He had high round cheeks and an angled 
chin. Parker tried to decide whether he looked more like her or like Jarod. But his features were 
actually an equal combination of both of his parent's.

He had straight dark brown hair like Parker's. Chocolate-brown eyes watched her with clinical 
curiosity. He realized that Parker was studying him and with a tilt of his head, his eyes narrowed 
suspiciously. 

Parker nearly laughed out loud. She had seen that look before. How many times had Jarod shot 
that same questioning glance at her over the years?

The plane taxied down the runway. As the jet left the ground, the second little boy squeaked 
delightedly, "We're flying!" 

This child's hair was a half shade lighter than his brother's and he had wavy curls around his 
ears. His eyes were the same smooth brown color as the first boy. However, this boy's eyes 
glowed with unrestrained joy. He alternated between looking out the window and studying the 
cockpit with a huge smile on his face.

The third child wasn't as thrilled with the ride. He looked around nervously, as though afraid that 
the plane would prove faulty somehow.
This boy's features, though resembling the others in shape, were much lighter in color. His hair 
was a sandy-brown, almost blonde. His eyes were light brown with golden flecks of color. Several 
freckles dotted his nose and cheeks.

Once the plane reached cruising altitude and leveled off, the third boy seemed to relax a little. 
After a while he yawned and his eyes began to drift closed.

"She's cold." The first boy said suddenly, interrupting Parker's scrutiny. He gestured to the bundle 
sleeping in the chair beside Parker.

"How do know that?" Parker asked as she unfastened her belt and stood up.

The boy shrugged. "I don't know." He thought for a moment then answered. "She looks like she is 
cold."

Parker nodded as she pulled a blanket from an overhead compartment and tucked it around the 
little girl. 

Parker crouched beside the still form and studied her daughter's face. A matted mess of hair 
hung across the child's features. The long tresses were mostly russet brown in color with natural 
copper highlights mixed in. Not simply brown, but not quite red either, the girl's hair would be 
lovely when properly cared for.

With a gentle sweep of her fingertips, Parker brushed the hair aside to look at the child more 
closely. Her eyes were closed but incredibly long lashes lay upon soft cheeks. The left side of the 
girl's face was mottled purple and yellow with an old bruise that made Parker's heart turn 
wretchedly in her chest. 

Just beneath the girl's right eye was a small crescent-shaped scar. Strangely enough, the scar 
was in exactly the same place on her face as the little mole on Jarod's.

Parker stood and retrieved another blanket. As she wrapped the first boy in the covering she 
asked him, "Does she look any warmer?"

Dark eyes considered the little girl intently for a moment before the boy answered. "She is fine 
now." 

Parker smiled as she tucked blankets around the other boys. The lighter-haired boy had already 
drifted to sleep. Within minutes, the first child had drifted off as well.

The second boy, still energized with excitement, strained to see out the window beside Parker.

Parker leaned toward him and said softly, "The view out my window is no different than yours." 

He chewed at his lower lip for a moment and then glanced out his own portal. A moment later, he 
was trying to peek out Parker's side of the plane again.

"Come here, I'll prove it." Parker said with a chuckle.

The little boy quickly unbuckled his seat belt and scrambled on to Parker's lap to see out her 
window. 

"See?" Parker asked. "A lot of black nothing. It's too dark to see the clouds."

The child smiled at her in confusion. "The what?" he asked innocently. "What are clouds?"

Parker felt like she'd just been kicked in the stomach. The boy pointed frantically at the wing of 
the plane and exclaimed, "I saw the flap move!" he giggled. "Are we going up or going down?" 

The youngster's enthusiasm was contagious. Parker forced her uneasiness aside and smiled 
again as she responded, "I'm not sure, kiddo."

Parker was suddenly struck by a lovely idea. Standing up, she swung the child into her seat and 
said, "You wait right there for a minute."

She went to the cockpit and stood in the doorway until Jarod noticed her presence. 

Moving aside one earpiece on his headphones so that he could hear both the radio and Miss 
Parker, Jarod asked her, "How are they doing?"

Parker shrugged. "Three out of four are sleeping soundly." 

Jarod turned and looked at her questioningly. "Three?"

"It would seem," Parker began. "That we have an airplane enthusiast among us." 

Jarod grinned. 

"He's so intrigued by the entire thing. And he's asking questions that I can't answer." Parker 
continued. "If you don't mind the company…" she hedged.

The pretender's grin grew even wider. "Of course I don't mind. Bring him on up."

Parker went back to where the little boy sat, still intently watching the flap outside the window.

"Would you like to see the cockpit?" Parker asked the boy knowingly.

The boy's dark eyes grew big as he asked in an awestruck voice, "Is that allowed?"

Parker nodded seriously. "As long as you don't touch anything and follow instructions very 
carefully."

She took the boy's hand and guided him into the cockpit area.

The little boy looked around, enthralled by the lights, buttons and gauges that surrounded him.

Jarod turned toward the boy and said, "Pretty cool, isn't it?"

The child blinked at him for a minute.

Jarod shrugged his shoulders and added, "That's what I thought, the first time I was in a jet. This 
is so cool."

"Cool?" The boy echoed. Parker and Jarod exchanged a look of understanding over the boy's 
dark head. They both knew that Jarod's term was unfamiliar to the child. 

"What do you think, Parker? Can this young fellow handle the copilot's chair for a while?" Jarod 
asked boisterously.

"Oh, yes Sir." The child said quickly as he scrambled into the seat beside Jarod's.

Parker smiled to herself as she went back to her own seat with the other children. From her 
vantage point, she could see straight into the cockpit. Parker watched Jarod as he talked to the 
excited little boy.

"You'll need to buckle up, Ace." Jarod said. 

He started to reach over to fasten the child in but the boy yelped, "I can do it."

Parker tried to doze while she affectionately watched the two interact. Jarod spent the next 
several hours patiently answering a multitude of questions. The little boy quickly learned the 
names of several of the gauges as well as some of the basics of aerodynamics. The child hung 
on Jarod's every word as the man explained what functions controlled which systems.

As they neared their destination, Jarod turned the radio on in the cockpit so that the boy could 
hear the sounds that had been coming through Jarod's headset. 

"Do you want to stay here while we land?" Jarod asked the little boy. "Or would you rather go 
back to your seat where you can look out the window more easily?"

The child blinked at him in confusion. 

Jarod smiled sadly. With a flash of insight, Parker realized that Jarod had just offered the boy a 
choice. The freedom to choose what he wanted to do was a foreign concept to the child and 
Jarod knew it.

He repeated, "You can stay here. Or, you can go back to your seat. It's up to you."

Parker could see the boy look back toward her, then look forward at the instrument panel. The 
little face creased with a frown as he struggled with his options.

He looked at Jarod longingly and said, "I want to stay here with you."

Jarod nodded reassuringly. A moment later, he was talking on the radio, requesting clearance to 
land.

"Do you want to help me out here, Ace?" Jarod asked the little boy.

"Help you fly the plane?" He gasped.

"Sure," Jarod chuckled. "Watch this gauge right here. Do remember what it's called?"

"Altimeter." The boy said proudly.

"Good. You watch that and call out our altitude every 5000 feet while we descend." Jarod 
instructed. "Can you handle that?"

The boy took his duty very seriously and obediently did exactly what Jarod had asked. 

Several minutes later, the plane came to a stop at the end of a runway, not far from a small 
parking lot.

The little boy came bounding from the cockpit and into the cabin with Jarod closely following him.

"Did you see me?" the boy asked his brothers. The two boys had woken while the plane was 
landing and now stared at their brother dumbfounded. "I helped fly the plane. Didn't I?" The 
enthusiastic little boy pleaded with Jarod for confirmation of his tale.

"You sure did, Ace." Jarod smiled down at the child. "And you were a fine copilot."

"Will you teach me to fly by myself?" the bouncing boy asked eagerly.

Jarod crouched down and said, "As soon as you are tall enough to sit in the chair and still have 
your feet reach the floor, I will teach you. I promise."

The boy hopped up and down like he had springs in his shoes. "This is so cool!" the child 
exclaimed.

Parker and Jarod gathered the children and the few belongings they'd brought with them. They 
left the plane and crossed the pavement to a nearby SUV identical to the one they had 
abandoned in Delaware.

As the two adults loaded everyone into the car and buckled seatbelts, Jarod's little copilot prattled 
on incessantly about his escapade in the cockpit. The boy excitedly demonstrated with huge arm 
waving gestures as he talked. 

As Parker fastened her own belt, she glanced in to the back and looked at the other two boys. 
The taller, dark haired boy was frowning with concern in his eyes. The third boy curled timidly in 
his seat. His golden brown eyes were wide with fear.

Parker shot Jarod a worried look. "I should have given the other boys a chance to sit in the 
cockpit with you." She was distressed to think that she had been unfair to the two little boys 
because they had been asleep. "I should have woken them up for a little while."

Jarod turned and studied the three boys for a moment. He shook his head and said, "No Parker. 
You did the right thing." He turned back to the front of the car and started the engine.

"But they are so upset to have missed it. God only knows when they'll get the chance to be inside 
a plane again." Parker said softly.

As Jarod guided the vehicle out of the lot he said, "It's not the plane the has them upset, Parker." 
He explained. "This is the first time any one of them has ever done anything on his own. They 
didn't share the experience so now the other two have to imagine what our flying ace is trying to 
describe."

Parker stared at Jarod for a moment in wonder. When she looked at the three boys again, she 
could see that Jarod was right. The one boy was trying to convey his excitement to the others. 
But one brother was obviously worried about such outrageous behavior while the other was just 
plain scared.

"It will be okay." Jarod tried to reassure her. "Let him have his moment. The others will find 
moments of their own, in time."

Parker turned to stare at Jarod's profile. "You are so good at this parenting thing." She said with 
awe.

Jarod scoffed. "It has nothing to do with parenting. It's just that I remember what it was like to see 
the world for the first time." He shrugged. "I understand what they are feeling, that's all."

"They're lucky to have you here to help them. It must have been very hard for you." Parker 
whispered softly. "Facing all this alone the way you did."

Jarod shrugged nonchalantly. "It was frightening at times." He shot Parker a strange look. "Do 
you want to know a secret?" He went on. "Once, very early on, going back to The Centre did 
cross my mind."

Parker's rolled her eyes in disbelief. "No way."

He chuckled. "Seriously, Parker." Jarod admitted. "I was around 35-years-old, cold, hungry and in 
desperate need of a bathroom. I was in the train station in Dover. I had never seen a dime in my 
life. All I had was a twenty dollar bill." 

Parker started to laugh. The restroom facilities in the Dover train station were all pay toilets. They 
were the kind where the stall door only opened when you inserted a dime in the slot.

"I admit, I was pretty desperate for a few minutes. For a brief few seconds, I did actually consider 
calling Sydney to come and get me." Jarod confided.

Trying hard to stifle her snickering, Parker asked. "What did you do?"

"A very nice elderly gentleman came out of one of the stalls. As he went out, I grabbed the door 
before it could close behind him." Jarod explained while Parker giggled even harder. "To this day 
whenever I'm in one of those pay toilets, I leave extra dimes beside the sink." He added solemnly.

Parker couldn't take it. She bent over and laughed until tears ran down her cheeks.

"Then I went to a newsstand to break the twenty." Jarod continued. "I bought a newspaper and I 
discovered PEZ. Never considered going back again. That's my secret motivation for staying out 
of The Centre you know." Jarod whispered conspiratorially. 

"What's that?" Parker choked around her giggles.

"Sugar." Jarod answered seriously. "The world offers so many varieties of sugar and packages 
them all so wonderfully, how could I ever want to go back to a place that won't even give me 
flavored koolaid?"

Parker's peals of laughter echoed in the car. She couldn't help herself. The laughter was 
cathartic, releasing the tension that had built up over the last few days. Jarod smiled triumphantly 
while she tried to gain a little control. 

"There's a first for you." Jarod said warmly. "I have never heard you laugh like that, Parker."

Parker held a hand to the stitch that was forming in her side. "I'm sorry." She gasped as her 
chortling began to subside.

"Don't be sorry." Jarod urged. "It's a fantastic sound. You should laugh more often."

With a sigh, Parker looked in the back seat to find the children all fast asleep. Resting her head 
on one hand she gazed at their cherubic little faces. "I'm going to try, Jarod. I am going to try."

END PART 6 



(Part 7 – You can call me Daddy)


Jarod snapped awake at the sound of the alarm on his watch going off. Blinking groggily, he tried 
to focus on his wrist long enough to turn off the annoying beep. With a heavy sigh, he stretched 
and rolled onto his side.

The couch he was lying on was reasonably comfortable, even if it was too short for his long 
frame. He'd only been asleep for a couple of hours and he was tempted to drift off again. But, 
sleeping as late as he liked was a luxury that Jarod had never gotten used to. Besides, he had 
some things he wanted to do before Parker and the children woke up. 

They had arrived at this secluded cabin shortly before dawn. Jarod and Parker had carried the 
sleeping children into the house and tucked them all into bunk beds in the same room. The cabin 
was comfortable but not terribly large. It only had the two bedrooms, so all four children had to 
share the same room.

Miss Parker slept in the master bedroom. All that was left for Jarod was the couch. Jarod felt a 
little annoyed that she hadn't even seemed uncomfortable that there was only the one queen 
sized bed for the two adults. Parker had simply handed Jarod a blanket and pillow and closed the 
bedroom door on him without comment.

Not that Jarod hadn't intended to sleep on the couch all along. But he had hoped to tease Parker 
about the situation a bit before revealing that part of the plan.

Another bedroom would have been nice but otherwise, this cabin suited their purpose just fine. It 
was isolated and very secluded while still being close enough to the nearest town that supplies 
could be easily restocked. There were two bathrooms, one for Parker off the master bedroom and 
one down the hall for the rest of them. The electricity was reliable and the house was stocked 
with every possible modern convenience including a VCR and a microwave.

Jarod knew better than to try Miss Parker's patience by making her live anywhere without hot 
water and a cold refrigerator.

Jarod stood and grabbed a T-shirt from the floor where he had tossed it a few hours ago. He'd 
slept in his jeans.  As he slipped the shirt over his head he heard a single soft thump of sound 
come from the children's room. Jarod hurried across the room and down the hallway. 

When he opened the door, he found the boys all wide awake. His little copilot and the lighter 
haired boy were sitting side by side on one of the lower bunks. The last of the three boys was on 
his hands and knees on the floor. He had one ear pressed to the floorboards as though he was 
listening to something. His gazed was fixed under the bed opposite the one occupied by his 
brothers.

Jarod could see no sign of the little girl. 

"She is under the bed." Jarod's copilot said before Jarod could ask.

"Is she hurt or crying?" Jarod asked.

"No." The boy on the floor answered. "She is just watching me. As long as I do not try to approach 
her, she just stares at me."

Jarod wondered how long the four of them had been in these positions. The three boys were 
sitting quietly, very patiently waiting for the girl to get accustomed to them. 

Jarod shook his head for a moment then asked, "Would anyone like some breakfast?"

"Yes, please." All three boys answered.

Jarod turned and walked several yards down the hallway, leaving the bedroom door wide open. 
Halfway across the living room he stopped, sighed dejectedly and went back to the children's 
room. The youngsters were all in exactly the same places as before, no one had moved.

"I won't bring it to you." Jarod told them. "You'll need to come with me to the kitchen if you want to 
eat."

Three small heads turned to him in astonishment.

When Jarod walked to the kitchen this time, there were three scrambling boys following him. They 
watched him intently as Jarod first started the coffee maker and then began pulling items from the 
cupboards and fridge.

"We are going to have French toast and sausage." Jarod said happily. "How does that sound to 
you guys?"

"Pretty cool." Said the copilot from last night as he hopped onto a nearby chair. Obviously, the 
word cool had been eagerly added to the little boy's permanent vocabulary. Jarod knew that the 
child had no clue what French toast was but he figured that it must be good.

Jarod layered a skillet with sausage links and broke a couple of eggs into a dish. As he deftly 
whisked the eggs with a fork, he noticed that the boys were all looking at him expectantly.

"Right." Jarod said. "How about something to nibble on while I get this ready?" He opened a 
cabinet and found a box of pop tarts, maple frosted of course. Jarod opened one foil package and 
slipped the treats into the toaster. A minute later, the warmed pastries popped up and Jarod gave 
each child half of one. 

The boys were studying the toaster with fascination and sniffing their snack when Jarod stuffed 
the remaining half pop tart into his mouth and turned back to the stove.

Jarod used thick slices of bread in the egg and milk mixture to create fluffy French toast. He was 
helping the boys put plates on the table when Parker walked into the kitchen.

She was wearing green silk pajama separates. The shirt had a light flower design stitched along 
the collar. Her hair was in a jumble and her feet were bare. Jarod noticed that her toenails were 
painted peach. 

'Quit it.' Jarod thought to himself. 'They are just toes. There is nothing sexy about toes.' He tried 
to convince himself. It didn't work. He decided to buy Parker some slippers the next time he had 
the chance.

Parker ran her hand through her tousled hair and inhaled the room's aromas appreciatively. 
"Smells wonderful in here." She sighed. "I do detect the scent of coffee among that bouquet do I 
not?"

"Of course." Jarod smiled as he poured her a cup. "Are you hungry?"

Parker nodded eagerly. "With the delicious aromas coming out of this kitchen? How can I not be 
hungry?"

Jarod shot her a crooked smile. "That is the point after all." He said as he helped each boy into a 
seat. "Did you happen to see anyone else who might have been interested in these smells?"

Parker nodded. "Now that you mention it, I did pass a little bundle of curiosity on my way in. She's 
hiding behind the couch." 

Jarod seemed pleased. "Brave kid. She's already come halfway." Jarod started serving French 
toast and sausage onto each plate. 

"This is syrup." He explained as he slathered the maple on generously. "Some people prefer 
powered sugar on French toast." Jarod went on as the boys began sampling their meals. "I've got 
nothing against powered sugar, mind you. But in this case, I have to go with the syrup."

Parker smiled in amusement at Jarod's ramblings as she dug into her own meal. On the last 
plate, Jarod placed a couple of sausages. He added a piece of French toast sliced into four stick-
like pieces and placed the entire plate, without syrup, on the floor just inside the kitchen door.   

"Do you think this will work?" Parker asked with concern once Jarod had returned to his chair and 
started eating. "Remember that Lyle used food to lure her too."

Jarod nodded while he chewed. "She's hungry." He said. "She won't deny that basic instinct for 
food. Eventually, she'll come to realize that I'm not Lyle. I'm not going to hurt her."

"Eventually." Parker sighed. The little girl could be seen peeking around the corner of the 
doorway. She was eyeing the plate on the floor greedily.

"Was she bad?" The little copilot boy asked fearfully.

Jarod frowned. "No, she wasn't bad. Why?"

The three boys exchanged quick looks before the more serious one answered. "Mr. Lyle only 
comes when you do something bad." He whispered.

Jarod's food suddenly just didn't seem appealing anymore. He glanced across the table at Parker 
and noticed that she had also lost her appetite, abruptly pushing her plate away.

Using his fork to push about the last few bites of sausage on his plate, Jarod asked casually, "Did 
Lyle come to see you boys often?"

"Just once." The boy answered solemnly.

As Jarod sipped at his cup of coffee, he could see the girl at the edges of his vision. She 
suddenly dashed into the room, grabbed the food from the plate with both hands and scrambled 
back to her hiding place on the other side of the doorframe.

"Once would be enough, I guess." Jarod continued talking as though nothing had happened. He 
sliced another piece of toast and took it to the empty plate on the floor along with two more 
sausages.

The little boy spoke up again. "Mr. Raines will be irritated that we haven't done our lessons yet 
this morning." He informed them. "He'll send Mr. Lyle to discuss it with you."

Jarod heaved a sigh as he returned to his chair. He exchanged a knowing glance with Parker.

"He won't like having to come all this way to talk to you." The little boy went on seriously. "We 
should really be at The Centre."

Jarod leaned over and glared seriously at the three boys. "No. You shouldn't." He said. "You don't 
belong at The Centre and you're never going back there."

He paused for a moment while the three boys looked at each other in confusion. Jarod gave 
Parker a questioning glance.

She nodded. "We need to tell them." Parker agreed. 

Jarod sipped deliberately at his coffee for a long moment. "My name is Jarod." He said finally. "I 
am your father. And that," he said, pointing at Parker, "is Miss Parker. She is your mother."

Jarod waited several seconds while that information was processed by the three stunned little 
boys. 

"You can call me Daddy." Jarod raised his eyebrows at Parker with an unspoken question. 

"I'm your Momma." Parker said gently, her voice thick with emotion. 

The room was silent for a moment. The boys were shocked. The little girl, oblivious to their 
conversation, scurried back to her plate and snatched up the food once again before rushing 
back to the haven by the door. Jarod got up and repeated the process of filling the child's dish.

When he returned to his chair and sat down Jarod reiterated, "We are your parents. You are all 
our children. The Centre stole you from us when you were no more than reproductive cells in our 
bodies." 

"We didn't realize that anything had been taken from us." Jarod continued. "We didn't know that 
any of you existed. Just as soon as we learned what The Centre had done, Momma and I came 
and got you."

Jarod looked warily at Parker through lowered lashes. He wasn't sure if she would appreciate him 
calling her 'Momma'. Her teary-eyed smile warmed Jarod's heart and reassured him.

"You don't belong to The Centre. You never did." Jarod told them. "You belong to us, your 
mommy and daddy." Jarod's voice cracked and he took a deep breath to control the emotions 
that bubbled inside. "Lyle is not going to come anymore. He won't hurt you. I promise."

The serious little boy who had spoken stared at Parker with huge disbelieving eyes. As the 
youngster sat there beside his mother, Jarod could see him wavering between hope and 
skepticism.

"I know it's hard to understand, sweetheart." Parker said, running her hand through his hair 
reassuringly. "It will be okay." She added as the boy's lower lip trembled.

The boy's dark eyes stared sightlessly at his empty plate for long minutes while he thought about 
what had been said. The two other boys looked equally stunned and confused. 

The first boy looked quickly from one adult to the other. For a moment he looked like he was 
going speak then he snapped his mouth shut again.

Jarod tilted his head and frowned. "What?" He urged the little boy gently.

Squeezing his little arm in a supportive gesture Parker repeated, "It will be okay." She nodded 
further encouragement.

The boy looked at Jarod with pleading eyes then turned to Parker and stuttered, "What is my 
name?"

Parker looked at Jarod, the simple question causing panic in her face. Jarod realized that they 
hadn't discussed names at all.

Jarod lifted one shoulder in a shrug and asked, "What is his name, Momma?"

'Pick one', Jarod told her with his eyes. He watched her for a moment while she stared at him, her 
mouth agape. Jarod nodded confidently at her, knowing that whatever name Parker picked would 
be perfect. He knew she had made a decision when the fear dropped from her eyes and a smile 
began to spread on her face.

She looked at the little boy beside her and lovingly caressed his cheek. "Your name is Jarod too. 
Jarod junior. But we'll call you JR so it won't be confusing."

Now it was Jarod's turn to gape. As Jarod stared in astonishment at the mother of his children, he 
knew with sudden clarity that he would never love any other woman as much as he loved Parker 
at this moment.

"JR" The little boy tested the sound of his own name. "JR" He whispered again.

"Do you like it?" Parker asked a little fearfully.

The little boy smiled. "Yes. I like it very much." 

"What about me?" the second child asked. "Do I have a name?"

Parker looked pointedly at Jarod. 'Your turn.' her look said.

Jarod smiled joyfully at the animated child. "Of course you do, Ace. Your name is Charles." Jarod 
winked at the boy, "How's that sound Charlie?" 

"Cool." The boy giggled.

The third little boy looked timidly from one adult to the other. He gnawed fretfully at his lower lip 
as his golden brown eyes darted back and forth. 

Jarod raised his eyebrows at Parker expectantly. It was her turn to choose another name. 

Parker looked at the little boy closely, tilting her head to one side as she pondered his little face. 
"Do you want to know your name too?" Parker asked him.

The boy nodded. "Y… yes, please."

"Timothy." She said simply.

"Perfect." Jarod whispered across the table toward Parker. To the boys he said, "JR, Charlie and 
Tim. Well boys, what do you think?" he asked.

The three youngsters seemed pleased. 

With an abrupt frown, JR pointed toward the doorway. "What about her?" he asked.

Cross-legged on the floor beside her plate, sat the ragged little girl. She had quietly moved from 
her hiding place and into the kitchen while the others had been talking. She had a sausage link 
stuck in her mouth and was sucking the juice from it.

The moment she realized that she had become the center of attention, the child scurried out the 
door to hide again.

Jarod looked at Parker as he answered. "Her name is Catherine." 

"Hello, Catherine." JR called softly when he saw the little girl peeking around the corner.

Charlie tilted his head while he played with a puddle of syrup on his plate. "Daddy?" he asked. 
"What is Catherine's short name?"

Jarod blinked in surprise. It was the first time anyone had called him Daddy. "What do you mean, 
Charlie?"

"We all have names and shorter names." He said, gesturing at his brothers. "You know, Timothy 
and Tim, Jarod and JR." 

"Oh." Jarod nodded in understanding. "Nicknames. Those are called nicknames." Jarod frowned 
thoughtfully. "You're right. But there are a lot of possibilities for Catherine. Kate, Katie, Cathy, 
Cat."  Parker snorted as he mentioned the last option. 

Jarod gazed across the table at Parker. "What do you think of Cat, Momma?"

"Oh, God forbid." Parker groaned. She stood and scooped her plate off the table to place it in the 
sink with a huff.

Jarod rolled his eyes comically at the boys, making them giggle. "Okay, Cat is out." Jarod gazed 
at the little girl. She was peeking into the room again. There was one sausage still sitting on her 
plate and she seemed to be giving the link serious consideration. 

"She doesn't look like a Cat anyway." Jarod thought aloud. "A kitten, maybe. But not a cat." A 
smile slowly spread across Jarod's face. "That's what your daddy is going to call you." Jarod said 
affectionately to the little girl. "Kitten."

Parker leaned against the sink and said with in an exasperated voice, "Her name is Catherine. 
We'll call her Catherine." 

Jarod stood and picked up some more plates. "Whatever you say, Angel." He said with a smirk. 
"Whatever you say."


End part 7


(Part 8 – Patience tested)


"JAROD!" Parker screamed. 

Jarod flew off the bed and hit the floor running before his mind even registered that he was 
awake. He was only a step behind her as Momma ran to the bedroom door and threw it open.

It was funny, Jarod thought fleetingly, that even in his own mind he was sometimes referring to 
her as Momma rather than just Parker. 

The week that had passed since they had come to the cabin had been relatively smooth. Jarod's 
new family had fallen into an easy routine. Meals had gotten simpler to organize, playtime more 
relaxed and Parker had become amazingly adept in her maternal role.

The children were adapting to her rapidly. Parker seemed to have a natural sense with how to 
talk with them. Jarod had occasionally felt a bit jealous, as though his lack of parents had put him 
at an unfair advantage when it came to being a parent himself. 

Timmy was especially clingy with his mother. The little boy was a worrisome, timid fellow in 
almost constant need of reassurance. Several times a day, he would rush up to his momma 
without warning and demand attention. Jarod's affection was always accepted when offered, but 
Tim didn't seek out his father the way he did his mother.

Charlie on the other hand, thought that his daddy was the greatest. He was a loving child, who 
willing gave hugs and kisses for any reason at all. The youngster was an outgoing, boisterous kid 
who seemed to be just a bit hyperactive. He thrilled at playing and roughhousing on the floor with 
Jarod. It was Charlie who first learned that beds were good for bouncing. 

Even Catherine had started to open up some. Jarod, being too tall and intimidating for the little 
girl, wasn't allowed within two feet of the child without her screaming. But just last night, the girl 
had sat quietly on her mother's lap for the first time while Parker had read stories to them all.

All four children had crawled into Parker's bed for story time. Her smooth voice had read to them 
about Curious George and The Cat in the Hat. Her voice had risen with gentle inflections as she 
had imitated the different characters. The children had been enthralled. 

Jarod, equally spellbound, had stretched across the foot of the bed. He had watched Momma 
deftly give equal attention to each child. As she had stroked Catherine's tangled hair, Jarod had 
felt the stab of jealousy again and he wasn't sure which of them he envied more. 

Jarod had read Curious George dozens of times. Yet, the story was different somehow when 
Parker read it out loud. The nuances that she placed on different words gave the story new 
meaning to him. Eventually, for the first time that he could ever remember, Jarod had fallen 
asleep to the soothing tone of a bedtime story.

Fully awake now, Jarod dashed into the hallway directly behind Parker. It sounded like the house 
was coming down around his ears. A high-pitched trilling alarm shrieked from somewhere in the 
house. Panic slammed into Jarod's chest as he realized that he could smell smoke. They 
followed the racket down the hallway to the kitchen. 

Jarod, being taller and faster than Parker, reached the kitchen first. 

The room was in pandemonium. The refrigerator door was wide open and every container within 
had been opened and dumped on the floor. Milk ran in pasty rivulets across the shelves into 
puddles on the linoleum. Cereal and other dry goods had been pulled from the cabinet and 
sprayed everywhere. 

Protruding from the slots of the toaster was a variety of items: a wooden spoon, a box of rice-a-
roni and a melting rubber spatula. The spatula had succumbed to the heat, turning into 
smoldering goop. The resulting smoke had been just thick enough to set off the fire alarm. A chair 
pushed against the counter gave evidence of the tiny perpetrators of this crime.

The four vandals stood in the kitchen looking at Jarod with large eyes. Catherine was under the 
table, an open box of pop-tarts clutched to her chest, as she screamed a remarkable imitation of 
the smoke alarm. Her pitch was a perfect match.  

Charlie was hopping up and down with a box of cereal so that toasted oats were flying 
everywhere. Tim, suspiciously clutching a plastic pancake turner, edged quickly away from the 
toaster toward the far wall.

With determined strides, Jarod crossed the room and yanked the toaster's plug from the wall. He 
threw open a nearby window and dropped the mangled, burning appliance outside. Leaving the 
window open so that the smoke could escape, Jarod reached up with one hand, flipped open the 
fire alarm and ripped the battery out. 

When the warning siren stopped, so did Catherine's screaming. The resulting silence was thick 
with tension.

"What the hell is going on?" Jarod growled. The fear pounding in his chest was quickly changing 
to anger. He turned to the children and found JR standing before him.

Jarod frowned at the boy uneasily. JR was difficult to read. Jarod was never quite sure what the 
boy was thinking. Unlike the other children, Jarod couldn't predict how JR would react to new 
things. The little boy was eerily perplexing. 

During the past week JR had been detached and suspicious. He was never difficult. He 
cooperated willingly with anything that either of his parents requested. He allowed both Jarod and 
Parker to hug him and to tuck him into bed at night. But he was so watchful, so deliberate in all of 
his actions. He rarely smiled.

As Jarod looked at JR now, he realized that the boy had placed himself between his father and 
the other children. The youngster's chocolate brown eyes watched Jarod expressionlessly. 

"You're testing us." Jarod calmly said to the boy with a growing sense of understanding. 

JR was the leader. That much had been obvious from day one. But his trust didn't come easily. 
Jarod knew that JR had orchestrated this display of disobedience to see what would happen. 
Now the boy was expecting Jarod to do something, but he wouldn't allow any harm to come to 
the others. 

At that moment, in Jarod's mind JR became the eldest of his children. The boy's eyes reflected a 
wisdom and an intelligence far beyond his years. There was a knowledge there that can only be 
born through hardship. JR was the protector and the provider.

With abrupt clarity, Jarod understood what The Centre had done to this little boy. 

JR was a pretender, a very good one. With continued training JR could have one day become the 
best pretender The Centre had ever seen. Because, JR had something that Jarod didn't. JR had 
two brothers that Raines would have used as motivation. JR would have never run away.

Jarod wanted to cry. He suddenly, desperately wanted to call Sydney. When he looked up, Jarod 
noticed Parker standing just a few feet away. She was looking at him with questions in her eyes.

"Are you okay?" She asked him. Jarod smiled sadly at her. 

Parker understands me so well, he thought. She wasn't worried about the mess or the noise. 
Jarod knew she was concerned, not only about the children, but also for him. 

Jarod nodded. "Why don't you go and get dressed, Momma." He said. "We are going to need to 
go into town to restock these shelves."

He turned and pulled a broom from the closet. Then Jarod pulled a roll of paper towels from the 
rack and wordlessly handed them to JR. The children watched silently for several long minutes 
while their father calmly swept debris into a pile. JR began mopping up puddles with huge 
handfuls of paper towels.

Quite sometime later, as Jarod tipped a final dustpan full of ruined cereal into the trash, he looked 
at JR and said grimly, "Someone could have gotten hurt." He paused then went on. "If Tim had 
stuck a fork in that toaster, or if Catherine had gotten hold of a knife…" 

"I would not have allowed them to injure themselves." JR said bluntly. 

Jarod crouched down in front of his son. "You are just a little boy, JR. You don't have to take care 
of them anymore." Jarod placed a hand on the child's shoulder. "That's my job now. I'll take care 
of them and of you. But," he added firmly glancing at the other children as well. "We need to 
discuss a few rules."

"You frightened us very badly." Parker said as she re-entered the room. She had showered and 
was dressed in black jeans and a pink cotton shirt. "We thought you might be in danger."

"We didn't mean to scare you, Momma." Timmy cried tearfully.

"Well," Parker said gently. "Try to remember the rules so that you don't scare me so badly in the 
future, okay?"

"Rule number one." Jarod said seriously. "There are only three things you put in a toaster: bread, 
bagels and pop-tarts."

Charlie rushed into his father's arms excitedly and asked, "What's a bagel, Daddy?"

Jarod shook his head and laughed. "I'll show you. But let's get you children dressed so we can all 
go to the grocery store."

"Rule number two," Jarod continued. "Children sit quietly in the cart when in the grocery store. 
They ask before touching things and they do not run around." 

"Do you think Catherine is up to this, Jarod?" Parker asked with concern. 

Jarod glanced at the little girl under the table as she munched at the last pop-tart. He nodded. "If 
she gets over stimulated, we'll just tell everyone that she is autistic. Her symptoms mimic that 
kind of behavior anyway."

Jarod continued to list specific safety rules for the children as they prepared for their trip to the 
store. Parker added several of the more basic rules like don't run with scissors and never talk to 
strangers.

By late afternoon, listing the dozens of rules had become a game of memorization. Timmy, 
extremely serious about the safety rules, had even remembered the order in which the rules had 
been listed.

That night, Jarod went to tuck the children into bed. 

"Let me get you tucked in nice and tight, Tim." Jarod said to the boy as he folded the blankets 
around the child's legs. 

"Momma already did that." He replied.

Jarod nodded with understanding. "Does Momma tuck you in better?"

Tim seemed to think about that for a minute. "Not better." He finally answered. "Different." The 
little boy took Jarod's face in his hands. Soft little palms caressed the stubble on his father's 
cheeks. "Your kisses are prickly and they tickle." Tim observed. "But Momma smells nicer." He 
added with a yawn.

Jarod had to agree. "You are right, Timmy. Your Momma definitely smells nice." He said with a 
smile as he kissed the boy's cheek again.

When Jarod moved to the other top bunk bed, he found Charlie already sleeping soundly. 
'Amazing.' Jarod thought. Charlie could be so wound up one minute, practically bouncing off the 
walls. But once he decided that it was time to sleep, the kid would go out like a light and he could 
sleep anywhere. Jarod kissed the curly head anyway before sliding down to the bunk below.

"Goodnight, JR." Jarod said as he sat on the bed beside the boy.

The little boy's smooth brown eyes studied him for a moment before JR said, "I am sorry that we 
made you angry this morning, Daddy."

Jarod raised his eyebrows. "I thought that making me angry was the point of the exercise." He 
stated knowingly.

"Maybe." JR answered cautiously.

Patting one little leg, Jarod asked, "Did I react the way you expected?"

Little shoulders shrugged. "You behaved according to one of the possible scenarios. I wouldn't 
say that it was the possibility that I had expected though."

Jarod stroked the little boy's forehead, brushing the hair from his eyes.

"Daddy?" JR spoke again. 

"Hmm?" 

Solemn little eyes watched Jarod fretfully. "I can't just stop."

Jarod frowned. "Stop what, JR?"

"Stop taking care of them, or her. I don't know how to be any other way." The boy said solemnly.

Jarod laid his head on the boy's chest and hugged him tightly. "I'll tell you what JR. You go on 
doing what you know. Just remember that you aren't alone in this anymore. Momma and I are 
here to help you."

JR's little hands patted Jarod's back as he returned the hug. "I'll remember," He whispered.

When Jarod sat up several minutes later, the little boy's eyes were drifting closed.

With a glace at the last bed, Jarod realized that it was empty. He crouched on the floor and 
looked underneath the bed. There was nothing there.

Leaving a nightlight burning on the dresser, Jarod pulled the door closed and began a casual 
search of the nearby rooms. Catherine wasn't in the kitchen or the living room. After an 
unsuccessful check of the main bath, Jarod stopped in front of the door leading to the master 
bedroom.

The door was slightly ajar. It pushed open a bit further when Jarod knocked softly on the panel.

Parker was sitting in front of a mirrored vanity, brushing her hair with long slow strokes.

"Sh." She hushed.

"Have you seen," Jarod asked quietly.

"She's at the end of the dresser." Parker interrupted with a whisper.

As Parker spoke, Jarod could see a tousled head and two dark eyes peek over the edge of the 
bureau. Jarod smiled tolerantly as he leaned nonchalantly against the doorframe and crossed his 
arms over his chest.
He watched silently as Catherine gazed at her mother in wonder.

Parker's repetitive action of drawing the brush through her hair was nearly hypnotic. Her long 
fingers weaved through her tresses as they followed the same path as the hairbrush. When she 
turned to the little girl and smiled, Jarod could see Parker's smile reflected in the mirror. She was 
dazzling.

Miss Parker held the brush out to the little girl who took it gleefully. The child scrambled onto the 
small bench where Parker sat and tried to mimic her mother's actions. 

The mirror itself had been the object of much study several days ago when the children had first 
discovered their own images, but now it was the brush that held little Catherine enthralled. 

The tangled mess on the girl's head was no match for the poor hairbrush and Catherine quickly 
became frustrated. 

"Let Momma do it." Parker said softly as she took the brush. She tried unsuccessfully for several 
minutes to brush the little girl's hair without pulling it too badly. With a sigh, Parker placed the 
brush on the dresser and said, "I have a better idea."

Parker stood and held her hand out to the little girl who glanced fretfully at the abandoned brush. 
"Come on." Parker reassured her. "Momma will fix it."

Jarod cocked his head in fascination as Catherine took her mother's hand. When Parker led the 
girl into the attached bathroom, Jarod curiously followed at a distance.

On one wall of this bathroom was a large mirror located just above the sink. There was a long 
counter for makeup and such with the attached sink located at the far end. Parker pulled a towel 
from the rack and spread it out on the counter near the sink. She then lifted the girl onto the 
counter and laid her down on the towel so that her hair dangled in the basin.

Jarod was awed by the trust the girl had placed in this woman as Parker ran water into the sink. 
When the running water was warm enough, Parker gently tipped the little girl's head back and 
began cupping warm water over her head.

Catherine's hair was long and thick. It took some time for Parker to get it wet, one handful of 
water at a time. She then took a bottle of shampoo and gently lathered the girl's long locks. 
Parker rinsed the foam away and then generously applied conditioner.

As Parker massaged the formula into her hair, Catherine sighed contentedly and closed her eyes.

"You like that, don't you my love?" Parker whispered to her smiling daughter.

Once the girl's hair had been thoroughly conditioned and rinsed Parker held a dripping hand 
toward Jarod. He quickly pulled another towel from the closet he had been leaning against and 
handed the fluffy cotton to Parker. Catherine sat calmly on the counter while Parker squeezed 
most of the water from her wet hair. 

Parker picked the little girl up and moved her to the bed. While Catherine sat on her lap, Parker 
took a comb and patiently unsnarled the girl's long tresses. 

Jarod wasn't sure how long he watched in silence as Parker tended their daughter. Catherine sat 
there with the patience of a saint while Parker's diligence was equally unusual. Jarod's heart 
swelled as he watched the ragged little creature transform into an angelic-looking beauty.

Without her concealing veil of hair, Jarod was able to study his daughter's features closely for the 
first time.

The bruises they had found on Catherine's face the day they rescued her had disappeared 
entirely. Her skin was creamy and smooth as porcelain. Her large eyes, surrounded by incredibly 
long lashes, were such a deep dark brown that Jarod couldn't tell where her irises ended and the 
pupils began. Her high round cheekbones were accentuated by the small crescent shaped scar 
beneath her right eye.

Once the tangles had been removed, Parker brushed Catherine's waist long hair until it shined. 
The striking black orbs of the girl's eyes were punctuated even further by the astonishing color of 
her hair. Somewhere between red and brown, the coppery locks defied description. 

"You've got split ends." Parker said lovingly to her daughter. "We'll have to cut it."

"Don't you dare," Jarod gasped. "Its beautiful. She's beautiful." 

Parker nodded, closed her eyes and pulled the little girl to her chest. Rocking gently back and 
forth, Parker murmured, "We may be a little prejudiced, but I have to agree. She's lovely."

"She is so much like you, Parker." Jarod whispered.

Parker smiled. "She gets the hair from your side of the family."

"She is so strong, so determined." Jarod added. "Look how quickly she's learning to adjust to 
everything."

Parker glanced at him, happiness shining in her eyes. "She has a terrible temper." Parker 
laughed. 

Catherine had thrown an angry tantrum at dinner earlier. The little girl had wanted something but 
had been unable to communicate her wishes to anyone. Her frustration had grown until she 
collapsed in a screaming fit of rage. 

It had been JR who had figured out that she wanted more milk. While Jarod and Parker had tried 
futilely to calm the disturbed little girl, JR had patiently retrieved different items from the dinner 
table and offered them to her until he happened upon the item she wanted.

"Like I said, she is so much like you." Jarod teased.

Jarod sighed. Catherine was curled in her mother's arms, sleeping peacefully. He crossed the 
room and crouched on the floor in front of Parker.

"We make beautiful babies don't we, Parker?" Jarod sighed as he stroked their daughter's cheek 
with the back of his hand.

With a start, the little girl snapped awake. She shrieked and darted off Parker's lap, scrambling 
across the bed to get away from her father.

Jarod grimaced, backing away with his hands up in what he hoped was a submissive gesture. 
Jarod swallowed hard. He hadn't meant to frighten the child. Her reaction to Jarod's touch broke 
his heart.

Parker looked at Jarod sorrowfully. "She doesn't understand, Jarod. She just needs more time."

"I know." Jarod nodded. He began backing quickly out of the room. "I'm sorry." He said shakily. 
Jarod hastily left the room. Leaning against the wall in the hallway he sucked in deep breaths to 
try to control the desolate feeling in his chest.

Feeling as though he was a hundred years old, Jarod walked dejectedly toward the living room 
and the couch he was using as a bed.


End Part 8 


(Part 9 – Connections)


Once Jarod had left the room, Parker coaxed the little girl back onto the bed with little trouble. 
She brushed Catherine's hair for several more minutes until the child fell back to sleep.

As Parker rocked her sleeping daughter in her arms, she glanced morosely toward the door that 
Jarod had fled through. He had been crushed by the little girl's sudden rejection. Parker had felt 
his pain as though it was a knife in her own heart.

After a time, Parker lifted the little girl in her arms and carried her back to the children's bedroom. 
She felt it was important for the children to have some semblance of routine in their lives. There 
was no way to tell when they would need to abandon this peaceful little cabin to avoid a sweeper 
team. Their lives would have so little stability in the future. Parker felt that Catherine needed to 
wake up in her own bed as often as possible.

In the darkened living room, Parker passed Jarod sprawled on the couch. He had one arm thrown 
across his eyes, making it impossible for Parker to tell if he was asleep.

Once in the bedroom, Parker slid the little girl beneath the blankets and tucked them snugly 
around her little chin. Catherine's silky hair now fanned across the pillow in a shimmering halo. 

Jarod was right, Parker decided as she lovingly studied the four sleeping faces around her. They 
had made some beautiful children together. Parker knew that she would always regret never 
having felt them growing inside her. She would forever wonder what it would have been like to 
nurse them at her breast. But Parker could not have loved these children anymore than she did 
now, even if she had been with them from the day they were born.

With a sigh, Parker leaned over and kissed her daughter's cheek and turned to leave the room. A 
tall dark shadow filled the doorway. Jarod, clad in nothing but a pair of jeans, stood with his 
shoulder against the doorframe. He had his arms crossed over his bare chest and the button on 
his jeans was unfastened. Parker wondered if Jarod had any idea what a masculine figure he 
was. 

"Is she alright?" Jarod whispered.

Parker nodded. Placing one hand on Jarod's arm, she said, "She settled down very quickly. She 
couldn't have been too frightened."

"She's not afraid as long as I'm not around." He whispered dejectedly.

Parker curled her arm around Jarod's and leaned her cheek against his bicep. "She needs more 
time."

She felt Jarod sigh. "I know." He whispered. "But knowing doesn't make the waiting any easier."

After a long moment of silence Jarod said, "Its remarkable, really. They are people. They are 
individuals with distinct personalities. And yet, I can see us in them. I can see myself in Charlie 
when he gets wrapped up in some new discovery. I see you begging for your father's approval 
every time Tim begins crying for attention."

Parker nodded, her cheek smooth against Jarod's arm. "JR is the one who is the most like you."

Jarod scoffed lightly. "No. Charlie is the most like me. JR and I just aren't relating the way Charlie 
and I do."

Parker smiled. "Its exactly because you and JR are so much alike that the two of you are having 
trouble clicking." She chuckled lightly at Jarod's puzzled look. "You both try to analyze each other, 
predict how you'll each react. You attempt to deduce the proper response to one another's 
actions. As a result neither of you is really opening up."

Jarod seemed to think about that for several minutes.

"He's so serious." Jarod whispered finally. "The poor kid carries the responsibilities of the world 
on his shoulders."

Parker raised her eyebrows at Jarod in amusement. "Sounds a lot like his daddy."

Jarod shrugged. The two of them stood in silence, watching the children sleep. Parker could 
sense that there was something else Jarod wanted to say. So she waited, gently hugging his arm, 
offering him emotional support.

"I was about this age when I was taken." He said abruptly. Jarod shifted slightly and tilted his 
head to rest it against Parker's hair. "I don't remember much of my life before that." 

Parker let Jarod speak without interruption. She sensed his need for reassurance.

"I remember a lunchbox." He said slowly. "It had cowboys and horses on it. I remember sitting in 
the grass and watching my mother hang clothes on the line." After a short pause, Jarod went on. 
"Most of what I remember are just feelings. I know I felt safe. I remember feeling safe." 

Parker watched Jarod intently, she could feel that he was headed somewhere with his thoughts.

"I don't remember much of my life before I was four. But I do remember. I remember being taken." 
Jarod said in a strangled voice. "How much will they remember some day?"

Parker felt tears burning in her eyes as she realized how Jarod was torturing himself. 

"I want to erase everything that The Centre ever did to them." He whispered in a hoarse voice. 
"But I know that I can't." Jarod's voice caught. "What vague memories will Catherine have of 
Lyle? Do you think she'll always have some indefinable fear of dark haired men and enclosed 
spaces?"

"Oh, Jarod." Parker murmured. In the darkness, she could see moisture shimmering in his eyes. 

"I want to fix this for her. For all of them." Jarod moaned. "But I can never undo what The Centre 
has done to them. They are irreparably scarred and there's not a damn thing I can do about it."

Parker turned and pulled Jarod into her arms. "You can love them, Jarod." She felt his hands inch 
up her back as he cautiously returned her embrace. "The scars will fade in time if we just love 
them enough."

Jarod buried his face in Parker's hair and submitting to her warmth, he squeezed her tightly in 
return. 

"And the incredible part of it is," Parker whispered against his shoulder. "That our own scars will 
heal too, as they learn to love us."

Jarod sighed at her words and pulled her more closely to his chest. After a moment Jarod eased 
up on the crushing embrace. But he and Parker continued holding each other for a long time. 
Parker allowed herself to enjoy the feel of Jarod's body against hers. She closed her eyes and 
found solace in giving Jarod comfort.

"This is nice." Jarod murmured into her hair some time later. He had one arm wrapped around her 
shoulders, the other hand rested warmly on the small of her back as he held her close.

"Mmm." Parker agreed with a hum. With one hand, she started making little circles on the bare 
skin of his back. Parker could feel the heat of Jarod's palm as his hand slowly began to follow the 
path of her spine upward.

"I want a drink of water." A small voice said.

Jarod jumped and flinched away from Parker as though he'd been burned. She saw him shake 
his head violently and swallow hard several times. Parker crouched down to talk to the little boy 
who had interrupted them.

"You are supposed to be asleep, JR." She said gently. 

"I heard you talking," the child said. "And now I'm thirsty." 

Parker smiled reassuringly. "Okay, JR. Let's get you something to drink." She glanced at Jarod as 
she stood up. Parker could see that he was not the least bit amused. 

The position they had just been in and the steamy course they had been following had left him 
looking stunned. He had retreated to the opposite wall in the hallway and flattened his back 
against the plaster. Jarod was staring at her with wide startled eyes.

Parker sighed as she walked away, leading JR toward the kitchen. She hadn't realized how 
difficult this was all going to be for Jarod. In her heart Parker knew that Jarod adored their 
children. She knew that he would gladly sacrifice anything for them. He had abandoned his 
search for his parents in order to build a new family for his sons and daughter. 

With a growing confidence, Parker realized that Jarod loved her as well. In his own way, he 
always had. As she poured her son a drink of water, Parker contemplated the situation. Her inner 
sense told her that Jarod desperately wanted to be loved. But he was also dreadfully afraid of 
losing that love. Jarod was depending on the children to return his affection with the endless, 
unconditional love that only a child can give.

It suddenly occurred to Parker that, for Jarod, her feelings were more dangerous. Not in the 
physical sense, Jarod knew that she would never turn him over to The Centre. But emotionally, 
Parker's affection was far more frightening for him. Parker knew, without a doubt, that Jarod 
trusted her with his life. Trusting her with his heart was a much more difficult battle. 

Parker had cruelly squashed his attempts to forge a relationship in the past. So now, she would 
need to be very patient if she ever hoped to win that type of trust. But Parker could wait. He was 
worth waiting for she realized. Jarod had always been there for her and she knew that he had 
always loved her with a devotion that no one else could match. Parker wouldn't rush him. Things 
would happen as they should in time.

Parker turned her attention back to JR. "Is that better?" she asked after the little boy had finished 
his glass of water.

"Can I take some back to my room?" He asked.

"Alright." She took the glass, filled it halfway and handed it back. 

Parker directed JR back the way they had come. She glanced at Jarod as they passed him in the 
living room. He was slouched on the couch with a troubled frown on his face. His feet were 
propped on the coffee table. He ignored Parker and the little boy as they went by.

As they reached the hallway, JR stopped. He turned back to toward the couch, leaving Parker to 
watch him from her vantage point in the doorway.

Clutching his water glass to his chest, JR stood at the end of the couch and said bluntly, "You 
were in The Centre." The statement hung in the air like an accusation.

Jarod nodded. 

"They hurt you." JR added intuitively. "Not just once like they did to me. They hurt you lots of 
times, like Catherine."

"Something like that." Jarod admitted in a low voice.

Parker watched cautiously from a distance. Jarod had just been through an emotionally rough 
day. He seemed depressed and isolated. Parker feared that the little boy's questions might 
inadvertently make matters worse. 

When Jarod patted the cushion beside him, JR carefully placed the glass on the table and 
scrambled onto the couch.

JR scrutinized his father. Tilting his head to one side the boy asked, "Did The Centre take you 
from your momma and daddy like they took us?"

Jarod leaned his head back against the cushions to gaze at the ceiling. "Not exactly." Jarod said. 
"When I was very small, I lived with my parents. I was about your age when The Centre stole me. 
I was lost and my parents didn't know how to find me. I was at The Centre for a long time."

"How long?" the boy pried.

"Thirty years or so." 

The little boy gasped. "Thirty years is almost forever."

"Almost." Jarod agreed bleakly.

JR seemed to ponder this information for a while. 

"Were you ever bad?" The child asked carefully. 

Jarod looked at boy sadly. "Occasionally." He answered.

JR fidgeted. "Did Mr. Lyle come?"

The tall head shook back and forth slowly. "No." Jarod said. "Mr. Lyle wasn't at The Centre until I 
got bigger. Mr. Raines came himself."

The boy's eyes grew wide with dread. Evidently Raines had a reputation that transcended 
generational boundaries. 

Parker could see Jarod staring sightlessly into the dark fireplace. His voice sounded hollow and 
far away as he went on. 

"Mr. Raines smoked cigarettes back then. When I was," Jarod paused searching for the proper 
words. "When I was naughty, Mr. Raines would use his cigarette to burn the back of my neck." 
Jarod rubbed lightly at the back of his head with his fingertips as he continued. "He'd place the 
blisters just above my hairline so Sydney wouldn't notice the mark."

Standing across the room, Parker bit back a gasp. She put one hand over her mouth and 
squeezed her eyes shut tight. This was one piece of information that Parker had never known. 
She silently added one more curse to the list of William Raines' sins.

"Who's Sydney?" JR asked.

Jarod blinked for a moment, as though remembering where he was. "You and your brothers had 
a lot of people who took care of you, a lot of different instructors. I only ever had one. His name is 
Sydney."

"Did he hurt you too?" 

Jarod sighed. Parker could see him struggling with the answer to that question. "Sometimes." He 
finally responded with a whisper. "But usually he was very nice."

JR continued his interrogation. "Did he play games with you and hug you and tuck you in at night 
like you and Momma do for us?"

"He never hugged me when I was little." Jarod said. "And I can't ever remember being tucked into 
bed. But, he would play chess with me once in a while."

"I know chess." JR said happily.

Jarod patted the boy's knee and smiled lightly. "Well then, you and I will have to find a board and 
play a few rounds, won't we?"

The little boy stared thoughtfully at the fireplace for a moment. "Did your Momma and Daddy 
come and get you from The Centre?"

Jarod looked at the boy forlornly. "No, JR. No one ever came to get me. I ran away."

"You were all alone." JR observed.

"For a long, long time." Jarod nodded.

"Daddy?" The little boy placed a small hand on Jarod's arm until the man looked down into JR's 
face. "We aren't alone anymore. Momma will take care of us and we'll take care of each other."

Jarod scooped the youngster into his arms and hugged him tightly. Parker could see the little 
boy's arms wrapped around Jarod's neck as the two of them rocked each other.

"The Centre won't hurt us anymore, will they, Daddy?" JR whimpered.

"I won't let them hurt us." Jarod promised.

Parker smiled and wiped a stray tear from her cheek. It was difficult to tell whether Jarod was 
comforting his son, or JR was comforting his father. Either way, it seemed as though the two 
pretenders had found a common ground on which to begin building a real relationship.

Silently, Parker crossed the room to stand in front of the pair. She placed one soft hand against 
Jarod's arms and held the little boy in place on his father's lap. 

"Lie down." She whispered.

Jarod's dark eyes looked up at Parker questioningly.

"Lie down." She repeated firmly.

With JR still snugly wrapped in his arms Jarod laid his head on the pillow and swung his feet onto 
the couch. Parker smiled as she picked up the nearby blanket and spread it out over the two of 
them. Gently slipping the covers around Jarod's body, she wrapped them both in a woolen 
cocoon.

JR's dark eyes peeked out at her just above the blanket. He was comfortably cradled against his 
daddy's chest in a warm embrace. Parker kissed the boy's forehead.

Jarod, with his chin resting against the child's crown, smiled tenderly at her. Parker placed a kiss 
on Jarod's brow as well. "Consider yourself tucked in for the night." She told him with a grin.

With a contented sigh, Jarod snuggled deeper into the cushions and hugged his son closer. 
"Thanks, Parker." He murmured.

Parker sat on the end of the coffee table and watched over her two pretenders as they drifted off 
to sleep. 

----

'Our next place will need a dishwasher.' Parker thought to herself several days later. 'Along with 
three bedrooms and a fenced yard.' 

It was early evening. Parker was up to her elbows in suds as she washed the dinner dishes. 
Jarod had cooked so it was her turn to clean up. Over dinner, the two of them had discussed 
relocating, carefully broaching the subject with the children. Now Parker was considering possible 
locales.

"We need to move so that The Centre doesn't find us." Jarod had explained as they ate lasagna 
and garlic rolls. 

The boys had seemed unperturbed. Parker was so worried about bringing change into their lives 
and the need for stability. But when it came down to it, the children couldn't have cared less 
where they slept or what house they lived it. The youngsters had begun to find emotional stability 
in their lives and that was all that mattered to them. As long as Momma and Daddy were with 
them, they felt fine.

For the most part, Parker's family was adjusting quite well to the world. Another trip into town had 
revealed the delights of Wal-Mart just yesterday. Despite their intense excitement, the children 
had all behaved in a socially acceptable way, including Jarod. 

Each child had even received a small gift chosen by their father. 

JR had gotten a chess set, which he had yet to let go of. The little boy had played the game with 
his father dozens of times in the past 24 hours. Jarod had beaten him every time of course. When 
Parker had voiced concern about discouraging the child, Jarod had replied, "Nonsense. I'll only 
beat him until he gets better than me. Then I'll never win again." 

Charlie's lightweight wooden airplane had already broken a wing. The boy had been distraught 
until Jarod fixed the flyer with some tape and a little glue. The simple repairs had been a heroic 
stoke of genius as far as Charlie was concerned.

Timmy had received a Phillips screwdriver. This gift choice had confused Parker at first. But Tim 
had been fascinated. In no time at all he had removed every switch plate from every light switch 
in the cabin. When Jarod had been forced to reassemble the VCR last night, he admitted to 
Parker that the gift might not have been the best idea the pretender had ever had. Safety rule 
number 32 quickly became, 'Don't take it apart unless you are sure you can fix it. And ask for 
permission first.'

Catherine's gift had been her very own hairbrush and some silk ribbons. She carried them around 
with her like other girls carried dolls. The little girl loved having her hair brushed and Parker was 
cornered often to do it for the child. Catherine had even been so gracious as to allow her brothers 
to each spend some time playing with her hair. 

Jarod, however, was still not permitted to touch the little girl. Catherine would only allow him with 
in a few feet before she would scramble away. If her father wasn't looking, the youngster would 
move toward him cautiously. She'd get within inches of touching him. But the moment Jarod 
turned his attention to the girl, she would skitter away to a safe distance.

The girl was getting better though. She had even begun talking. Catherine's vocabulary consisted 
of only one word for the time being but that was still progress. The dinner table had broken out in 
a pandemonium of celebration when she had spoken for the first time barely an hour ago.

"More." The girl had said, punctuating the demand by smacking her plate on the table.

The boys had enthusiastically mimicked the request by banging plates and pounding their forks 
on the table as well. "More. More. More." They had chanted. Jarod had been forced to whistle 
loudly through his fingers to get them to quiet down. 

Then again, Parker couldn't blame them for being rowdy. Catherine's achievement was a huge 
one. Everyone was so pleased with her quick progress. She was a highly intelligent little girl and 
her social skills, dormant for so long, were advancing rapidly.

'She is doing fine.' Parker thought as she washed off the table. 'If I could just convince her that 
her daddy isn't a serial killer, everything would be great.' Parker took the broom and swept a few 
crumbs across the floor, being careful not to push the debris onto her new slippers. The purple 
slippers had magically been in the shopping cart when they had reached the checkout line at 
Wal-Mart.

"They'll keep your feet covered." Jarod had said simply when she had asked about them. 

Parker couldn't begin to fathom why Jarod would think her feet were cold but she hadn't 
complained. The slippers were warm and soft and incredibly comfortable. She had been flattered 
that he had bought her the gift.

Finally finished with her chore, Parker headed toward the living room. Drying her hands on a 
small towel she stood in the doorway between the two rooms and watched Jarod with the 
children.

The three boys were lined up on the couch, paying very close attention to their father. Jarod was 
fiddling with the stereo system and talking.

"We are going to listen to some music. Music can make you feel certain emotions just by the way 
the notes are put together." Jarod was saying as he popped a CD into the carrousel. 

Soft piano melodies began playing in the room as Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata echoed in the 
room.

"This music was written more than two hundred years ago, by a man who was actually deaf for 
much of his life." Jarod told them. 

The boys looked confused. Catherine was lingering between the living room and the hall leading 
to the bedrooms. She watched her father intently as the notes filled the room.

Crouching down in front of the boys Jarod said, "Close your eyes. Feel the music. All music has a 
story to tell." He closed his eyes to demonstrate.

Parker smiled as she saw the three youngsters close their eyes obediently. 

"What is this story about, Daddy?" Timmy asked.

"That's the beauty of it." Jarod smiled. "Music tells a different story to every person who listens. 
No one's story is the same."

As the tune played on, Jarod, eyes still closed, began to sway with the music.

"What are you doing, Daddy?" JR asked. 

"He's dancing, sweetheart. Sort of." Parker said as she crossed the room to join them.

Jarod stood and tried to explain. "The music can make your body want to move. Sometimes you 
can't help it."

Parker held a hand out to Jarod. "May I?" she asked him.

Jarod pushed the coffee table to one side, creating a makeshift dance floor, then took Parker's 
hand and began to waltz with her around the room.

"You dance well." She told him with a smile. 

Jarod raised his eyebrows at her. "Did you doubt that I would?"

Parker laughed. "No I didn't doubt it, Wonder-boy. I know that you are absolutely fantastic at 
everything you do."

"That's right." He teased in a low voice. "Everything."

"Be careful, Genius." Parker smiled as Jarod twirled her around. "I may decide to test some of 
your," She paused meaningfully. "skills." Parker knew that, for now, she could tease Jarod this 
way. This type of playful banter was safe. They did have an audience after all.

Jarod feigned shock. "Miss Parker, Please! There are children present."

As the song ended, Jarod released his partner and abruptly swung Charlie up in his arms. "Dance 
with me, Charlie." He exclaimed.

By the time 'Ode to Joy' reached its crescendo, Jarod, Parker and all three of the boys were 
hopping around and dancing in mad circles. The boys were taking turns as Jarod swooped each 
one up in his arms and spun them around until they were dizzy. 

When the CD ended, they all collapsed on the floor in an exhausted heap. 

"Mission accomplished, Momma." Jarod panted. "I think its bedtime."

Jarod had made a habit of finding some very energetic activities for the children to try every 
evening. Bedtime was always easier when the subjects were already asleep on their feet. On 
nights when Jarod hadn't run the children ragged, Parker would read to them until they fell 
asleep. 

Parker rounded the boys up and led them off to get ready for bed. When she returned several 
minutes later, Jarod was sitting on the floor leaning against the couch casually. The recording had 
ended leaving a heavy silence in the room. Jarod's eyes were closed as if listening to the stillness 
around him.

Parker could see the surprise on his face when Jarod opened his eyes and he saw Catherine 
sitting on the floor next to the stereo speaker. Standing very still so as not to disturb the scene, 
Parker waited in the hallway while Jarod talked softly to his daughter.

"Hello, Kitten." Jarod whispered to the little girl. Catherine looked at him warily. Only a few yards 
away from where Jarod sat, the child stared up at him with pleading eyes.

She turned and stared into the black speaker, her fingers caressing the mesh on front. The child 
then turned back to Jarod and shot him a deliberate glance. "More." She said.

Slowly, Jarod stood and cautiously made his way to the stereo. Parker held her breath as Jarod 
edged along the far side of the room so he wouldn't startle the little girl. He flipped the stereo from 
CD mode to radio and let the soft refrains of a popular love ballad fill the room.

A delighted smile spread across Catherine's face as she gazed into the blackness of the speaker 
as though she could find the origin of the music inside.

A new song started. Parker had heard it before but couldn't remember the name. A haunting 
refrain with a bouncing harmony, the song was the kind of tune that made you tap your foot. 
Jarod began to sway rhythmically and bounce his head while he watched Catherine's face light 
up even more. 

He smiled kindly at the child. "Do you like that?" he asked gently. 

The little girl stood and moved closer until she was just a few feet away from Jarod. Catherine 
then closed her eyes and, imitating her father, she started to move gracefully with the melody.

When the music became bolder, growing joyfully toward the refrain, Catherine held her arms out 
to Jarod. Parker saw him gasp. She watched as his eyes filled with tears when Jarod leaned 
down and lifted his daughter to dance with her.

As the melody rose toward the finale, Jarod spun Catherine in circles making them both laugh 
joyously. One song melted into another as Jarod continued to twirl the little girl around the room. 
The child's hair fanned around them both as she threw her head back and giggled uncontrollably.

Overwhelmed with emotion, Jarod stopped abruptly and hugged his daughter close. 

With her arms around Jarod's neck, Catherine bounced in his embrace, "More, Daddy. More." 
She pleaded.

Jarod laughed, tears in his eyes. "Whatever you want, Kitten." He promised as he began twirling 
her about again. "I'll dance with you forever if you want."

Moving in time with the music, Jarod snuggled his stubbly cheek against the little girl's soft one 
and stroked the back of her head lovingly with one hand. When he glanced at Parker, they shared 
a weepy smile.

"Daddy loves you, Kitten." Jarod whispered solemnly into his daughter's ear. "Daddy loves you."

The two of them danced until long after Catherine had fallen asleep in her father's arms.

End Part 9



(Part 10 – Reunion)


Sydney delicately made his way across the grassy expanse. Walking with a cane, he limped his 
way toward Broots and Angelo.

"Is this spot okay, Sydney?" Broots asked.

Sydney looked down the hill toward The Centre and nodded. "The view is good from here." He 
said. 

As Sydney caught up to the two men, Angelo spread a blanket on the grass and happily sat 
down. Broots opened a folding lawn chair he'd been carrying and placed it next to the blanket. 

"Thank you, Broots." Sydney sighed as he settled into the chair. 

"Your knee has been acting up pretty badly these past few days, Syd." Broots observed as he sat 
beside Angelo on the ground.

"The arthritis in the joint is bothersome. My physician is talking about knee replacement surgery." 
The two men chatted amiably.

Angelo was plucking fluff from a dandelion when Broots said, "There are a lot of people here 
already."

A crowd of about two hundred people had gathered along the hillside. Many of the people had 
chairs and blankets. Others had set up picnic tables with entire meals laid out. Some folks had 
just pulled pick-up trucks onto the meadow and had settled into the truck beds. 

The scene reminded Sydney of the park when he had taken Angelo to see fireworks on 
Independence Day. 

"A lot of people get excited to see such a large structure toppled." Sydney supposed.

Looking down the incline, The Centre could be easily seen from this distance. The entire facility 
was surrounded by a tall chain link fence and large warning signs. Men in hard hats could be 
seen hurrying about and a large crane, a wrecking ball swaying slightly from its peak, stood 
nearby.

After having been abandoned and empty for the past four years, The Centre was finally being 
demolished. The stone monolith was being razed to make room for a luxury condominium 
community. In just over an hour, there would be a controlled explosion and the Tower, the old 
core of power at The Centre, would crumble into dust.

"Do you think she'll come?" Broots asked seriously.

Sydney knew exactly whom Broots was talking about. Miss Parker had vanished ten years ago. 
She had disappeared without a trace. At first her colleagues had been concerned that she may 
have met with foul play. But Mr. Raines and Mr. Lyle, the only two suspects for such a scenario, 
had been equally frantic to locate her.

When Sydney had been ready to confront Raines concerning Miss Parker's whereabouts, he had 
found himself subjected to interrogation on a T-board. Raines had wanted Sydney to tell THEM 
where Parker had gone. 

Evidently, when Parker had vanished, she had stolen a project called Progeny from The Centre. 
Raines had been livid. The project had been in development for years and the sizable revenue 
lost for The Centre had been an embarrassment for Raines' leadership.

Sydney and Broots had searched the mainframe for information on Progeny for weeks. 
Unfortunately, every electronic trace of the project had been erased. He'd never learned the real 
purpose of Progeny. Sydney only knew that one day the project was gone and Miss Parker had 
disappeared along with it.

It had quickly become apparent to the powers that be, that Sydney and Broots had no idea what 
Progeny was or what had happened to it. Neither had heard from Miss Parker nor did they have 
any clue as to how to locate her. She had simply vanished.

After a time, the commotion caused by the loss of the project had died down. Sydney and Broots 
had continued their work and their pursuit of Jarod without Miss Parker's help. Sydney knew that 
Raines had placed a tap on his phone in the hopes that Parker would contact him. She never did.

Months passed before Sydney realized that Jarod had stopped contacting him by phone. It was 
as though the pretender knew that Sydney's phone calls were now monitored closely. When 
Sydney had received the first postcard from Jarod, a niggling suspicion began to form in Sydney's 
mind.

The postcard had arrived, addressed to Sydney at The Centre, about eight weeks after Parker's 
disappearance. It had a picture of Niagara Falls on the front and a New York postmark. Written 
neatly in Jarod's definitive bold print were two sentences. "MISS YOU SYD. WISH YOU WERE 
HERE."

Jarod had never bothered to show any concern about Parker's vanishing act. And Jarod had 
never, ever called his mentor anything but Sydney. Miss Parker however, did occasionally call 
him Syd. These simple facts had caused the aging psychologist to wonder if the two of them, 
Jarod and Miss Parker, might be traveling together.

Sydney had not voiced this opinion at the time. He and Broots had gone to The Falls, obligingly 
following the postcard as Centre procedure required. They had found nothing at Niagara Falls. No 
trace of Jarod or of Miss Parker.

The postcards had arrived with infrequent regularity for the next several years. Always picturing a 
popular tourist spot, the message written on the back was always the same. Sydney had received 
postcards from Disney World and the Grand Canyon. One summer, he'd even gotten one from 
The Eiffel Tower in Paris.

The little cards had become his only connection to Jarod. There had been no more red notebooks 
to find. Broots had been unable to discover even one of Jarod's lairs. They had nothing to go on 
except the postcards. This change in Jarod's routine had further solidified Sydney's suspicion. 
Miss Parker was safe and traveling the world with Jarod.

Then, four years ago, the postcards stopped coming. Sydney didn't think that Jarod had stopped 
sending them. Circumstances at the time had forced Sydney and Broots to each relocate rather 
abruptly, leaving no forwarding address. A pretender of Jarod's ability could have found Sydney's 
new location if pressed, but it would not have been an easy task.

It had been four years ago that Mr. Lyle had chosen some 'recreation' that had been too much for 
him to handle. As serial killers go, Lyle was successful because he acted on his impulse only 
rarely. Several years would pass between the deaths of his victims. As a result, authorities had 
trouble connecting the murders.

Four years ago, Lyle had begun stalking a lovely young college girl by the name of Xuan Mae 
Tran. The police had no clue that there was a serial killer in the area. Lyle had easily snatched 
the girl from a street corner late one night as she walked to her dorm.

Xuan Mae was a petite slip of a girl with an indomitable spirit. She had fought Lyle tooth and nail. 
When he'd headed to his cabin in the woods several days after the kidnapping, Lyle had 
assumed that her torn and broken body was too weak to strike back. He'd been wrong.

Locked in the truck of Lyle's car, the young woman had managed to pick the lock on the 
handcuffs binding her and she had freed one wrist. When Lyle had reached the burial sight he'd 
prepared in the woods, he opened the trunk. Xuan Mae had promptly buried the pointed end of 
the open handcuff in Lyle's throat.

The wound had not killed him but, bleeding profusely, Lyle had been unable to stop the girl from 
escaping.

Xuan Mae's rescue and Lyle's following arrest had caused a media sensation. Finding the open 
and empty grave in the woods, the authorities had naturally searched the entire area. The four 
bodies they found buried around Lyle's cabin were very incriminating evidence. 

To further enrage the public, the media had aired pictures of the beautiful Xuan Mae before Lyle's 
attack. The scarred, torn flesh of the girl's face after Lyle's torture had been heart wrenching. 

The Centre had been unable to prevent the storm of scandal that resulted. News media had 
literally camped at The Centre's entrance. Sydney and Broots, coworkers of the accused 
monster, had been hounded unmercifully. During Lyle's trial, they had both been forced to change 
their phone numbers and move.

Sydney had known that doing this would sever the last weak ties he had with Jarod, but there had 
been little other choice. Especially after one enterprising young investigative reporter found his 
way into The Centre.

The reporter had been trying to find the scoop on Lyle. He had instead blown The Centre's cover 
and brought the institution's hidden agenda into the public view. There had been much finger 
pointing and accusation. Raines fled the country rather than face the legal charges that were 
brought against him.

Lyle had again been targeted by the media as the criminal master mind of the entire facility. The 
Triumvirate had done nothing to change that impression. Lyle had taken the wrap, receiving 
several life long prison sentences. The Centre, cut loose by the Triumvirate in an act of self-
preservation, had fallen prey to the press.  

Shortly after that, The Centre had simply closed its doors. Employees had been locked out and 
inmates had been hastily relocated to nearby hospitals and mental institutions. Sydney and 
Broots had searched frantically for days before they had found Angelo, weeping uncontrollably in 
a padded cell of the state mental hospital in Dover.

Dazed and a little lost, the three men had taken Debbie and they had all hidden out at Sydney's 
cabin at White Cloud for the rest of the summer.  

In the years since then, they had managed to build a semblance of a life. Debbie had finished 
high school and was now attending a university in California. Broots had a new job and a place of 
his own in Dover. Sydney had retired and now spent his days with Angelo. 

Angelo had never completely adjusted to the world. He needed supervised care that Sydney was 
usually able to provide. For the past year, the empathic man had been spending time, twice a 
week, at an assisted living facility nearby. The facility specialized in caring for autistic and mildly 
retarded adults. Sydney hoped that one day Angelo would, with the help of such specialized care, 
be able to live on his own.

"Sydney," Broots repeated. "Do you think she will come?"

Sydney shrugged. "I don't know. She may not know anything about the demolition." 

"Jarod would know." Broots said. "He would always be keeping tabs on The Centre, don't you 
think?"

"Possibly." Sydney nodded. 

"Do you really think Jarod knows where she is?" Broots asked.

Sydney smiled affectionately at the younger man. "This is an old debate, Broots. If I can't 
convince you after ten years why are we still arguing about it?"

Broots chuckled. "You are probably right. But She and Jarod were always at each other's throats. 
I can't remember how many times Miss Parker said she was going to shoot him." He shook his 
head slightly. 

Laughing Sydney said, "You know as well as I do that Parker was never as vicious as she wanted 
everyone to believe. I imagine she became a very different person once she got away from The 
Centre's influence."

"It will feel good knowing that the place is just a pile of rubble." Broots frowned as he glared down 
at the stone structure.

"I was thinking about buying one of the condo's once they go up." Sydney said. "In a small way, I 
could be close to the life I've always known. I'd feel closer to the people I lost there, somehow."

Broots shook his head violently. "No way. With the stuff that went on in that place, anything built 
over that spot is sure to be haunted. Didn't you ever see Poltergeist?"

The two men fell into a gloomy silence as they contemplated the lives that had been altered by 
The Centre. Today's destruction of the building would bring closure to a difficult time in many 
lives.

Angelo blissfully continued playing with the nearby grass. Broots lay back on the blanket and 
stared up at the clouds. It was a beautiful day. A warm breeze blew from the water so that it 
wasn't too hot. 

Sydney casually watched the people around him, hoping to glimpse a face he recognized. A 
small group of adolescents walking nearby caught the older man's attention. 

A teenaged girl with dark eyes was stomping across the grass in Sydney's direction. She was 
dressed casually, in a pink t-shirt and jeans. Her copper colored hair was plaited into a single 
waist-long French braid that hung down her back. 

Sydney guessed that the youngster must be in her early teens. She had the slim figure of a pretty 
girl just beginning to change into a beautiful woman. 

The girl's arms were folded across her chest and her face was full of anger. Something about the 
girl struck Sydney as familiar. It wasn't that he recognized the girl's features. He knew that he had 
never seen her before. But somehow, the way she carried herself, the arrogant, regal strides she 
made and the fire flashing in her eyes, were very familiar indeed.  

The girl was being followed. At her heels was a much younger girl, about five years old. The child 
wore a similar pink t-shirt and matching pink shorts. She had dark brown hair pulled back into a 
ponytail with a pink ribbon. The little girl was nearly running in her attempts to keep up with what 
was obviously her big sister.

"Kitty!" the little girl whined. "Wait." 

"Yeah Kitty. Wait." Purred another youngster in the girls' wake. This boy looked to be a little older 
than the first girl. A tall lanky teenager with dark hair and eyes, he was easily keeping stride with 
the fleeing girls. With a grin of pure mischief, he hounded the pretty girl by systematically 
reaching out and yanking on her braid.

"Leave me alone." The she growled.

Sydney frowned at the tableau. He was concerned for the girls' safety when he realized that two 
more teenaged boys were also following the group. One boy had dark curly hair poking out from 
under a baseball cap. He had his thumbs hooked through the belt loops on his jeans and a 
crooked grin on his face as he casually followed the troop.

The last youngster in the train was a lighter haired boy with a handful of freckles across his nose. 
About the same age as the other two boys, this youngster wore a small frown on his face. 

"Come on, Kitty." This last boy groused. "He was only teasing."

"It is not funny." The older girl snarled with a stomp of her foot.

The boy with the hat drawled, "Actually, it is kind of amusing."

The girl suddenly turned on the youngster in the hat and started spouting off at him in Spanish. 
The words rolled fluently from her mouth as she hissed at him with menace.

"Hey," the first boy interrupted. "There's no need to swear at Charlie. It's me that your angry at."

"Brilliant deduction, Wonder-boy." She snarled. "Just leave me alone!"

"We can't wander off alone." The freckled boy said. "Dad would throw a fit. You know Delaware 
gives him the creeps."

Sydney's interest was peaked. He glanced meaningfully at Broots who had also become 
engrossed in the show. "Does she remind you of someone, Mr. Broots?" Sydney whispered.

Broots nodded in surprise.

The girl's face suddenly fell. The anger vanished to be replaced by concern. "It gives me the 
creeps too."

"I'm sorry." The first boy apologized, suddenly subdued. "I know that you're a little freaked out. I 
shouldn't be picking on you right now." He yanked gently on her braid once more then said 
affectionately. "Tell you what Kitty. I promise not to tease you anymore today. Alright?"

"All day?" the girl fretted. 

The boy crossed his heart with his finger. "All day. I swear." Then with a crooked grin he pulled 
the girl into his arms and hugged her. 

"I doubt that you can manage to lay off for a whole day." She grumbled. "But it's nice of you to try, 
JR."

"That's what brothers are for isn't it?" He replied.

She pushed away from the boy's embrace. "I have three brothers. But you are the only one who 
torments me like this." She observed laughingly.

"Only because they can't handle your wrath." He grinned. "I'm the only one who can keep you in 
line, Kitty." 

"You are a moron." The girl declared as she crossed her arms over her chest again and glared at 
him.

The boy made a grand display of placing his hand over his heart and stumbling about as if he'd 
been mortally wounded. His brothers chuckled while the long-suffering girl just shook her head 
and sighed.

While the older children had been preoccupied with their argument, the younger girl had 
wandered closer to where Sydney and his companions sat. Crouched in the grass beside Angelo, 
she was showing him how to blow the white seeds from a dandelion rather than plucking them off 
as he had been doing.

"Like this." She said seriously. With a deep breath she propelled the little fluffs into the air. 

Angelo clapped his hands delightedly. He had plucked a flower of his own from nearby and was 
just about to attempt the miracle himself when the older children noticed that the little one had 
strayed.

"SYDNEY!" The older girl screeched.

Broots and Sydney both jumped. It was startling to be yelled at this way by a strange girl. 

The teenager ran up to the little girl, grabbed her hand and started to pull her away. "You don't 
know that man." The older girl scolded.

The first of three boys also berated the little girl with concern. "Sydney, you know better than to 
talk to strangers."

Blinking in surprise at Broots, Sydney realized that the youngsters were talking to the pink clad 
little girl. Evidently, the girl's name was also Sydney.

"He's not a stranger." The child pouted. "He's the angel I saw in my dream."

"Oh, shit." One of the boys swore. For a heartbeat, the four children were frozen in place by this 
revelation.

The psychologist stared at the children in wonder as he watched the teenagers' react. The girl 
scooped her little sister into her arms and started backing away cautiously. With a military like 
precision, the three boys fanned out in a defensive maneuver to cover the girls' escape. Within 
moments, the children were all running back the way they had come, the girls in front, while the 
boys followed protectively.

Angelo scrambled up from his position on the blanket and took off after them.

"Broots," Sydney cried. "Stop him. Don't let him frighten those children away."

Broots dashed across the grass in an attempt to catch Angelo. Sydney grabbed his cane and 
started to follow as well. His knee just wasn't cooperating. He was too slow. Sydney quickly lost 
sight of Broots and Angelo as the children led them on a weaving chase through the crowd.

Sydney diligently continued in the direction he had last seen Broots heading. He prayed silently 
that Angelo would be able to keep the children in sight without scaring them senseless. Sydney 
felt a terrible need to speak to those youngsters. 

Some minutes later, his knee aching painfully, Sydney rounded a stand of trees and saw Angelo. 
He was standing beside a picnic table, surrounded by the teens. The little girl in pink sat on 
Angelo's hip as he held the child in his arms. Angelo was talking animatedly to a tall cowboy. 

Clad in jeans, T-shirt and a cowboy hat, the man had his back to Sydney. But as the older man 
limped toward the group, Sydney quickly recognized the figure, even from the back. 

"Jarod!" he called to the man.

The cowboy turned and grinned. Sydney couldn't stop the bubble of laughter that rose in his 
throat. Aside from the hat, Jarod hadn't changed much in the last ten years. The crinkles at the 
corners of his eyes were deeper as were the creases in his cheeks where he smiled. Visible 
under the brim of his hat, Jarod's hair was sprinkled with gray at the sides. But, for the most part, 
he looked very much like the Jarod that Sydney remembered.

Jarod quickly closed the distance between them and wrapped Sydney in a huge, welcoming hug. 
Sydney realized abruptly how desperately he had been hoping to see the younger man here 
today. 

"Jarod," Sydney laughed. "It is so good to see you."

Jarod squeezed tightly, patting Sydney on the back. "It is good to see you too." Jarod stepped 
back and gazed at Sydney happily. "What's with the cane, Sydney? You aren't that old." He 
teased.

Sydney laughed. "Yes I am that old." He replied. "The knee is badly arthritic I'm afraid."

"Please tell me it's not the knee where you were shot." A soft voice said.

Sydney turned and saw a grinning Broots standing beside a beautiful woman. "Parker?" Sydney 
gasped. "Is that you?" 

"Yes." She laughed merrily as she threw he arms around the old psychologist.

"I'm afraid it is that very same knee." Sydney laughed as he returned her hug.

Sydney was astounded at the change in Miss Parker. Her hair was long and pulled into a simple 
braid down her back like the girl. She wore very little makeup yet her face glowed with a healthy 
radiance. Parker's clothes were simple, jeans and a cotton blouse. On her feet she wore plain 
white canvas sneakers. 

Gone was the fashion model ice queen that Sydney had known. In her place was a lovely woman 
whose eyes and smile glowed with warmth. She wore no jewelry except for a simple gold band 
around her left ring finger. With a surreptitious glance, Sydney found a matching ring on Jarod's 
hand.

"You seem so different." Sydney whispered into her ear as Parker hugged him. 

"I'm happy." She explained. 

"Dad," one of the boys interrupted. "Its nearly time." 

Jarod led Sydney to the picnic table and helped him settle onto a bench. "Okay, We don't want to 
miss this. Once the tower comes down, we'll break out the picnic baskets and have a nice long 
talk. Agreed?" 

Sydney nodded and patted Jarod's cheek affectionately. The tall man then hurried over to where 
the three boys had gathered around a digital recorder perched on a tripod. Sydney was grinning 
uncontrollably when Parker sat down beside him with the little girl on her lap.

"Hello, Sydney." The old man said kindly to the child.

"Hello, Sydney." She chirped back and crumbled into giggles.

"It is nice to meet you, Miss." The older Sydney said seriously shaking the little girl's hand.

The girl giggled again and shyly slid from her mother's lap and ran to where Jarod was checking 
on the camera. 

"She's adorable." Sydney said. "How old is she?" 

Parker smiled. "She'll be five at the end of the month. We think she's pretty cute too. But being 
the youngest of five children, she's spoiled rotten."

As Parker talked, Sydney could see the little girl tug on Jarod's shirt and hold her arms out. Jarod 
obligingly picked the child up and settled her comfortably on one hip. With his other arm, Jarod 
put his hand on the taller girl's shoulders and hugged her close. 

"The two of you are raising all five children?" Sydney asked curiously.

"We are their parents, Syd." Parker said softly. 

Sydney exchanged a quick look with Broots who was sitting across from him at the table. "The 
four older children look like they are in their teens." Sydney said cautiously.

Parker smirked. "They all turned fourteen last spring." She explained. "Jarod and I found out that 
Raines had been running a rather nasty little project."

"Progeny." Broots interrupted.

Parker nodded. "Then you know about the children."

Sydney shook his head and frowned. "No. Raines was very upset when you left. He said that you 
had stolen Progeny from him and he wanted it back. Broots and I could never find out exactly 
what the project was."

"That bastard. How dare he say that I stole them from him." Parker seethed. "Raines and Lyle 
took cells from my ovaries when I was having surgery for my ulcer. Then they used Jarod's sperm 
to fertilize them. With a group of surrogates, Raines was able to breed a half dozen infants with 
pretender potential."

"He was playing God." Sydney groaned in disgust.

Parker nodded sadly. "Two of the children died." She whispered. "One succumbed to a crib 
death, the other died from anaphylactic shock caused by a bee sting."

Sydney gasped and stared at Parker in astonishment. Baby Parker, Miss Parker's little brother, 
had died because he was allergic to a bee sting. Parker had disappeared less than two weeks 
after the boy's death. Sydney realized now that the boy had been one of the children bred from 
Parker and Jarod.

Stunned, Sydney gazed at Jarod, wondering how his protégé had dealt with such a personal 
invasion. He would have been bereft at the loss of a second family. Jarod would have moved 
heaven and earth to help Parker free their children with little regard for his own safety.

While Sydney struggled to come to terms with this new information, there was a sudden rise in 
excitement from the crowd around them. As everyone watched, there was a muffled whump of 
sound. A plume of smoke rose from the stone tower and with a crunch the front portion of The 
Center crumbled into dust.

A moment later, the exterior walls teetered and fell inward, collapsing through several levels. 
When the dust settled, only skeletal remains rose into the air like some long dead creature left out 
in the sun.

The lighter haired boy came galloping up to the group sitting at the table. "That was cool!" he 
exclaimed. "I want to study the recording to see if they placed the explosives like I thought they 
would. Can we eat now?" 

"Mind your manners, young man." Parker scolded softly. "Let me introduce you to some people." 
As the boy approached his mother's side, Parker said, "Gentlemen, this is my son, Timothy. Tim 
this is Sydney and Broots and Angelo." 

"It is nice to meet you, Sirs." The boy said politely. Then looking to his mother he said, "Should I 
go get the cooler?" 

Parker nodded and the young man took off in the direction of a green SUV parked nearby. 

Jarod strolled up with the other children. Parker continued with the introductions. The boy in the 
hat was called Charlie. The taller boy, the one who had teased his sister earlier, was named JR. 
Sydney smiled when introduced to the girl whose name was Catherine.

"It is an honor to meet you, Catherine." Sydney said happily.

The girl returned his handshake gravely. "Momma is the only one who calls me Catherine. Every 
one else calls me Kitty." She grumbled.

"Go help your brothers unload the food, Kitten." Jarod said gently. "You'll have to excuse my 
daughter's attitude. She's a little out of sorts today." He told them.

Sydney looked up at Jarod inquisitively. 

Jarod shrugged. "The Centre makes her nervous." He glanced at Parker with raised eyebrows.

Parker responded. "I haven't told them that much yet. Just that the children were the Progeny 
Project."

Jarod threw one leg over the wooden bench and straddled the seat beside Parker. "Kitty 
remembers The Centre and Mr. Lyle. Just being here frightens her a bit. The boys don't recollect 
much. They weren't treated as badly." He paused for a moment. 

"When we pulled them out of there," Parker explained. "Catherine had been badly abused. She 
was non-verbal and had zero social skills."

Jarod reached an arm around Parker's side and casually grasped her hand, weaving his fingers 
with hers in a familiar way. The gesture was so automatic that Sydney knew it must be 
commonplace.

Jarod sighed and said, "The first several months were hard. There were a lot of nightmares and 
temper tantrums."

"The children had trouble adjusting too." Parker teased Jarod with a squeeze of his hand.  

"They seem to have adapted well." Sydney observed. 

"They have." Jarod beamed with pride. "We have a ranch in New Mexico now and they all attend 
the public high school there. Out of necessity, Parker and I home schooled them for a long time 
but once The Centre closed, we were able to settle down in one place and send them to a normal 
school." 

"They have been placed in higher grade levels than is normal for children their age." Jarod went 
on. "Most fourteen year olds are freshmen. But Charlie and Tim are sophomores and JR and Kitty 
will be juniors."

"JR could be in college now," Parker added. "But to advance that drastically the district requires 
an IQ test and Jarod won't permit it."

"He needs to be allowed time to be a kid." Jarod grumbled at Parker.

"I know, dear." Parker soothed. "But Charlie is not about to let his brother take himself too 
seriously."

Jarod laughed then explained to the others, "Charlie is a very carefree kid. So much so that he 
started having some trouble in school last year. His grades dropped to barely average and he 
started causing minor disruptions." Jarod sighed. "He has decided that he's going to join the Air 
Force just as soon as he can so there's no point in finishing school before his eighteenth 
birthday."

"Now he's lost all interest in school. Unless you can apply the information to piloting an airplane, 
Charlie is not the least bit interested." Parker said. "I blame your father." She added, nudging 
Jarod in the ribs.

"I talked to Dad." Jarod told her as he wrapped his arms around her midsection. "He's going to tell 
Charlie that the flying lessons stop if his grades fall below a B average."

"You found your father." Sydney interrupted. 

"They found us about eighteen months ago." Jarod replied. As the children returned, carting an 
ice cooler and several brown bags, Jarod stood and began helping them set the table. "Ethan 
showed up on our doorstep on Christmas eve with my mother and father in tow. Emily arrived two 
days later with her husband and their little boy, Kyle."

"My folks live on the ranch with us. Em and her family live in Southern California. And Jack," 
Jarod paused as he shrugged. "Well, Jack is off licking his wounds somewhere in Montana. 
Lumberjacking last I heard."

Sydney accepted a plate of fried chicken and fruit salad. "Jack?" Sydney asked.

"Oh you met Jack." Parker chided as she spooned items onto a plate for her little girl. "You met 
him a long time ago, when he was just a boy. He looks very much like Jarod did at his age. 
Remarkably so." She said pointedly.

"Oh yes I do remember Jack." Sydney admitted as he realized that Jack was the boy he'd once 
know as Gemini. "How is Jack?" 

Jarod shrugged sadly as he took a biscuit from a basket on the table. "He just went through a 
nasty divorce. From what my folks tell me, Lisa was his first love. After about two years of 
marriage, she decided that she was in love with someone else and left him. Jack was caught 
totally off guard and he's taking it pretty badly."    

"I'm surprised that he would choose to go through this alone." Sydney said thoughtfully as he 
munched at his food. "He has an extended family to support him."

"That's what I said." Jarod grumbled. "But he and I ended up getting into an argument about it. 
Jack says that I have no idea what he's going through. Maybe he's right." Jarod shrugged. "I'm 
still with my first love." He smiled adoringly at Parker as she sat beside him.

"But it took you thirty years to marry me," she said pointedly.

Jarod shrugged. "Don't you think it was worth the wait?" He asked playfully.

"I suppose so." She agreed. 

Parker leaned toward him so that Jarod could kiss her lovingly. Sydney smiled to himself. The 
children around him were talking amongst themselves, ignoring the display of affection between 
their parents as though it were a common occurrence.

"And Broots thought that Parker would have shot you for sure." Sydney chuckled. 

"I nearly did once or twice." Parker confided. She laughed at the stunned look on the computer 
technician's face. "Once, I had bought this sexy green dress for New Year's Eve and he didn't 
even notice it."

"Oh I noticed it." Jarod moaned. "But at the time, I just couldn't work up the nerve to do anything 
about it."

Sydney looked at Jarod in surprise, his brows riding high on his forehead.

"Come on," Jarod exclaimed defensively. "After so many years of being trod on with those stiletto 
heels, can you blame me for being a little leery? I was afraid she would come after me in a 
leather cat suit, carrying a whip."

Broots started choking on his soda as he gasped. Sydney simply chuckled.

"I had to throw myself at him for nearly two years before genius-boy finally got the right idea." 
Parker giggled.

"So I'm a little slow." Jarod said, rolling his eyes. 

Sydney laughed along with the others. Looking around the table, the psychologist could see that 
this little family was a happy, tightly knit group. Jarod had finally found the life he had been 
searching for. Parker had found the freedom to be the loving, compassionate woman she had 
kept hidden while she was at The Centre.

As the friendly conversation and the playful banter continued, Sydney felt a warm feeling of 
security overwhelm him. Jarod was happy. Sydney's protégé had overcome the tragedy of his 
childhood and had built a good life for himself and his family. 

Sydney gazed into Jarod's eyes and saw warmth and forgiveness shining there. Sydney felt 
accepted. The Centre was gone. Jarod and Parker had returned. Sydney had a whole new family 
to care about. They had survived and now they could be together at last.


THE END
 
 

In case you were wondering, the title of this story comes from the first line of Jeremiah 31 verse 
15 from the Bible's Old Testament. 

I think that this passage is very moving. It starts with such despair but leaves so much hope for a 
happy ending. 

When I saw this passage in relation to the story line I had plotted out, I felt that they went together 
beautifully.

---------------------------------------------- 
 
Jeremiah 31:15-17 
 
A voice is heard in Ramah, 
Lamentation and bitter weeping. 
Rachel is weeping for her children;  
She refuses to be comforted for  
her children, 
Because they are no more. 
... 
Restrain your voice from weeping, 
And your eyes from tears; 
For your work shall be rewarded, ... 
And they shall return from the land of the enemy. 
 
And there is hope for your future ... 
And your children shall return to their own territory. 
 
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    Source: geocities.com/phenyx525@sbcglobal.net