Disclaimer: The characters Miss Parker, Sydney, Jarod, Broots etc. and the fictional Centre, are all property of MTM and NBC Productions and used without permission. I'm not making any money out of this and no infringement is intended.



CURE-ALL
Part 1
by StarsingerSaathi





Miss Parker strode into the shabby motel room, a scowl of frustration already set on her lips. "Gone. As usual." She stated this flatly, to the peeling paint and the roaches that (she was sure) were scuttling underneath the bed. She had made it quite clear that no one was to come into the room with her, and the sweepers were wary enough of the looks she'd shot at them earlier to obey. She took a long moment to take in the less-than-hospitable conditions that probably reminded Jarod of his childhood at the Centre. No wonder he'd left so quickly. Then again, he always left quickly.

A glint caught her gaze, reflecting from something metallic sitting beside the sink in the even more revolting bathroom. She moved closer to get a look at it, knowing full well that anything Jarod left behind was never meant to go unnoticed. It was one of those metal briefcases - and it was very old, considering that it was about as corroded and banged-up as the bare pipes it was leaning against. Miss Parker reached the doorway and flicked the light switch.

Bad idea. The thought flashed through her mind a moment before the briefcase burst open harmlessly, letting loose a shower of confetti and colorful streamers. She stood perfectly still, her expression dangerously close to rage, as Broots rushed past her to check the device. She tested herself, making sure nothing had been hurt. But, then again, that wasn't Jarod's style.

"Um, Miss Parker." Broots turned to her with a poorly hidden smile, handing her an open envelope. She reached inside, and withdrew a small slip of paper. She read it, then smiled in a venomous form of humor and crumpled up the message. A long, purplish streamer drifted from her shoulders as she strode out to find a sweeper to harass.

"What does it say?" Sydney asked, entering soon enough to see her discard the paper. He picked it up and glanced at it quickly. Soon after, he began laughing quietly.

It read, "Happy Birthday, Miss Parker

--- J"

* * * * *

"I suppose that I should give Lyle the next chance we get, angel." Mr. Parker stated, giving his young wife a thoughtful look. "I love my little girl, but she hasn't been working well since that boy's death."

"Oh, yes," Brigitte answered, smiling in sympathy at him. "She just isn't doing the family name justice."

"How would you know anything about my family name?" Miss Parker snapped, having caught enough of the conversation to rekindle her fury. She'd also heard her father's comment about her not working well, and she needed to bury her hurt in some searing, cleansing anger. "You've only just acquired it."

"Now, sweetheart." Mr. Parker said, coming forward to kiss his daughter on the cheek. He really didn't know what she'd heard, but he did know that he'd better tread lightly. His daughter held up a hand, and he stopped in his tracks, realizing that Brigitte was wrong. Miss Parker really did live up to his name, with an iron will and temper to match his own.

But she still needed to shape up.

"Now, sweetheart," he repeated, this time in a gentler tone, "Are you sure you don't want to take some time off?"

"Daddy," she said, imbuing that normally sweet endearment with as much venom as she could muster, "I don't need to recover from Thomas' death." God, it hurt to say that name. She ignored the fresh ache tearing at her insides. "I do need to get back to work. I and no one else will catch Jarod. Send Lyle back to his Asian Brides catalogs." She left, leaving that sentence hanging in the air behind her.

* * * * *

"No, I don't have a confirmation. They just said that they needed all help they could find, and that I needed to get my ass down here as soon as possible!" Jarod was shouting to be heard over the sound of the engine, hoping the helicopter pilot would fall for the few ID's he'd had time to forge.

"All right!" The pilot gestured for Jarod to climb in the nearly full compartment. "You do know what a risk you're taking, going to southern Mexico during the outbreak?"

"Why do you think I'm going?"

* * * * *

"Well, you're cranky tonight. And I thought you'd like my little impromptu surprise party. Too bad I couldn't be there to see your expression." Miss Parker sat up straight in her bed, her fingers gripping the phone in silent anger. Jarod. How dare he. "I'll bet it was priceless," he continued.

"You son of a bitch." she managed to whisper. She was sick of these little games, of feeling continually humiliated in front of family and colleagues.

"Well." Jarod said, after a longish pause. "I wouldn't know about that, would I?" He hung up, while a million other curses for him built up in her throat. They faded only after she realized her retort had stung him.

Almost as badly as her father's statement had hurt her this morning. {{"I love my little girl, but she's just not working well since that boy's death."}} She turned over on her side, letting the receiver drop to the floor. She really didn't want any more calls tonight.

"God damn it." She swore into the darkness, realizing that she wasn't going to get any more sleep tonight. Brigitte's words had cut into her, too, much as Miss Parker had tried to ignore the comment about "living up to the family name". Well, if Brigitte wasn't careful, she might just have to leave in order to escape the full significance of that name: loss.

Miss Parker raked her fingers through her tousled hair, cursing again. Loss. Complete and total loss of everything with any meaning, until everything meant nothing at all. She herself had nearly escaped her family's shadow, finding love, life.

She shook herself. No. She would not allow her mind to go there again. Ever. Thomas' death - his murder, she corrected - was in the past, and she was a Parker.

She would go on with her life, damn it. No matter how much it hurt.

But in the depths of the inky black night, she could allow the barriers, the walls, to ease a bit. She could cry now, if not for her fate, then for Thomas'.

***

Three Weeks Later

"Where the hell is Jarod?" Miss Parker spat into the usually quiet office.

"I believe you, dear sister, were hired to figure that out for us," Lyle replied smoothly. He smiled sweetly over the table at her. She sent him a vicious look.

"No funny gifts, no mysterious e-mails, no trinkets to remind us of his presence - or lack thereof." She listed, holding her brother's gaze. "He's gone. Completely."

"Well, maybe he's finally letting go of us. his surrogate family," Lyle suggested. Noting the look in Sydney's eyes, he added, "It's unfortunate, but a likely possibility."

"Or he's bored with our little melodramas and wants to go meddle in someone else's life for a change," Miss Parker shot back.

"No," Sydney broke into the tension. "He's up to something, and doesn't want us to try anything yet. He'll contact us when he wants to."

"Um." a tentative voice said from the door.

"Yes, Broots?" Miss Parker didn't even have to turn to identify the source.

"I just got an e-mail."

"From Jarod?" Sydney was on his feet, reaching for the printout.

"No. From a girl named. Nova."

"Nova?" Lyle asked, peering over the older man's shoulder as he skimmed the message. "What kind of a name is that?"

"A screen name, you fool," Miss Parker muttered around a cigarette as she lit up. That done, she reached up behind her and snatched the printout from Sydney.

"Jarod needs our help?" She smiled in a way that made even Lyle's insides twist in apprehension. "Oh, this is going to be good." She flipped through the two additional pages. "What the hell.?"

"As far as I can tell it's a list of supplies-"

"No shit," Miss Parker interrupted.

"Um. Medical supplies for a highly contagious disease..."

"A disease, which, 'when left untreated, causes brain damage, blindness, memory loss, and, in most cases, death'," Lyle read from the printout. "So, that's why Jarod is asking us for help. It's in the Centre's best interests to."

Broots nodded. "On the, uh, last page, there's the names of some contacts in the CDC who, apparently, owe Jarod a favor. Nova said that they can get someone out to the site - Jarod's hospital in Mexico - without any questions asked."

"And does she give the coordinates of Jarod's little hell-hole?" Miss Parker rose from her chair and paced, suddenly full of energy. Broots coughed as her path brought her - and her cigarette smoke - past him. He waited until the table separated her and himself, knowing Miss Parker wouldn't like his answer.

"No."

"What?" She stubbed her cigarette out violently on the arm of Lyle's chair. "How in the hell are we going to help out, let alone capture, genius boy?"

"Nova says he'll contact someone he trusts with the information." All eyes turned to Sydney.

"Have you checked your e-mail recently, Syd?" Miss Parker asked in a dangerously sweet tone.

"Yes," he replied, a bit upset at their automatic assumption. "I have."

"And.?" Lyle prodded in an equally pleasant manner. Sydney met the younger man's eyes squarely.

"Nothing from Jarod." Sydney stated firmly, his voice allowing for no argument.

"All right, Sydney. Tell me when you get the coordinates." Lyle said, leaving quickly. Probably to tell Daddy, Miss Parker thought irritably. Always was the company man.

"Broots," she said as soon as her brother was out of earshot, "You get those supplies. I don't care how, just so long as they're ready by the end of the day tomorrow."

"Tomorrow?" Broots choked. "Miss Parker, that's not enough time."

"Yes, it is." He noted her steely gaze, and decided he'd better get his rear in gear. Miss Parker turned to Sydney, handing him the last page of the printout. "You contact these people. Tell them that I'm going to need to leave within the next forty-eight hours."

"You can't be serious," Sydney protested, realizing that she meant to go by herself.

"Oh, please, Sydney. Of course I'm serious. Even my jokes are deadpan." She strode off to go arrange for that leave of absence her father had offered her. Sydney smiled at her parting words, and then went to make some phone calls.

* * * * *

"Oh, honey, don't think for an instant that I'm going to allow you to go chasing Jarod into a hot zone."

"That's your answer, Daddy?" Miss Parker shot a dagger like glare at Lyle and Brigitte, who obviously had gotten to her father first. They, however, were completely oblivious, he engrossed in smoothing a leather glove over his four-fingered hand, and she busy filing her nails. Miss Parker turned back to her father.

"Fine. Don't give me my time off. But don't think that you, the bottle-blonde on your desk, or that thumbless bastard over there can stop me from going anyway."

Before her father could react, she was out the door.

* * * * *

Jarod sat, hunched over his computer screen, watching a computer program run. He waited, patiently, praying that he had found and sent enough information for the doctors in the states to find a cure for the deadly illness. Not only would many villages die without treatment, but so would Jarod.

He was infected. The thin sheen of sweat and ruddy pallor he had developed after the first week he originally attributed to the heat. Going from January in Chicago (definitely not the best place to be in the dead of winter, he'd decided) to the tropics was bound to have affected his metabolism somehow. Then, he found that wiping the supposed sweat away actually wiped a pinkish - which meant bloody - moisture away. On further examination, the flush that had crept across his face was actually tiny, broken capillaries. The telltale coloration darkened to a purplish, mottled bruising at his temples.

The day he finally figured it out, he'd buried the last of his colleagues, and a small child he'd attempted to save using a serum of his own making. The child had died, the intended cure actually a catalyst for the brain fever. Jarod had nearly gone mad, knowing that his genius had been the death of an innocent - someone that he was supposed to protect.

After staring around at the one-room hospital that had been overfull a week before, and was now hauntingly empty, he finally resorted to asking for help. "Nova" - actually a sixty-some-odd hacker in Missouri - had obliged by sending the Centre an e-mail for him, so they wouldn't have an immediate fix on his location. Now all he had to do was find an actual cure for the Centre to send down for him and the rest of the CDC-affiliated volunteers. If the other volunteers hadn't already died.

Jarod began to sway slightly on his stool, watching with dulling eyes as the computer screen seemed to grow dimmer, save for the little red 'low battery' warning in the lower right corner. The file took ten more minutes to finish, but by that time, he had fallen to the floor, unconscious.

Per his previous instructions, however, his e-mail activated, sending details of the cure and his precise location to a far-off recipient. The person receiving this, however, was not Sydney, but someone he probably wouldn't have contacted at any other time. In fact, they were the last person he would ask for help in any other situation. But this time, they were the only one determined, fearless, and healthy enough for him to trust.

* * * * *

Two minutes later, in Blue Cove, Delaware, Miss Parker stared at her computer screen, for once in a very good mood. The e-mail was short and to the point:

"See attached file for cure. Bring 2000+ doses with you. Please.

16? 33' N

95?35' W

AgonEDa, Mexico.

--- J."

It was an obvious decision whether or not to go down and get Jarod, but as to that massive quantity of medicine. She picked up her phone and dialed Sydney's office. "Syd. When's my flight? And where can we pick up 2000 or so doses of a serum by then?"

She was on her way via helicopter by the next evening.

Disclaimer: The characters Miss Parker, Sydney, Jarod, Broots etc. and the fictional Centre, are all property of MTM and NBC Productions and used without permission. I'm not making any money out of this and no infringement is intended.



CURE-ALL
Part 2
by StarsingerSaathi



"No, I do not want to be dropped off midair," Miss Parker was explaining patiently. "Nor do I want to be dropped off alone." Her voice echoed weirdly in the biosuit that the CDC people had insisted she wear. The man she was speaking to, a native Mexican who was the only pilot within a thousand miles who spoke English, was willing to fly her into a hot zone, who accepted the scant amount of money she had on her- plus her cigarettes, butane lighter, and her 'medicinal' booze - shook his head in fear. She doubted that the unwieldy green suit and helmet she was wearing (and he wasn't) helped his paranoia any, either.

"I may be cheap, lady, but I'm not crazy. Look, I just drop you off twenty feet from the ground into that big hay pile over there. That's soft, yes?" She looked over to where he was gesturing. The 'hay pile' was actually a large compost heap-like mound, covered in cut grass to keep it from drying out. It was forty feet from where they had dropped the supplies - all safely in durable, foam-lined containers, thank God - but it was still unappealing. She realized that he was maneuvering the small helicopter over to the mound and faced him with her fiercest look, and shouted back.

"NO!" But he was undeterred. He hovered the beat-up aircraft about twenty-five feet from the heap's highest, and hopefully softest, point, pulled the release for her door, and said:

"Yes! Goodbye, miss!" And pushed her out. She fell, screaming obscenities in every language (including a few in Spanish that made him glad he'd gotten rid of her) as she landed. She continued shouting at him until his plane had disappeared into the clouds.

Finally, she sat up, counting the bruises she'd pay him back for if and when she found his sorry hide again. Fortunately, he'd guessed right that it was soft - the actual grass part, at least. There were also massive branches, logs, and a pervasive odor of decomposition and. Oh, damn. For the pilot's sake, she hoped that she didn't smell what she thought she smelled..

Wait a second. She could smell? Through the suit? She twisted, examining the suit closely, and found a large rip in its sleeve. She didn't remember how it happened, but she was sure it was the pilot's fault. Or Jarod's. Either way, the suit was useless now.

She stripped the fabric away, ripping the tape from her wrists and ankles, and tied her long-sleeved shirt around her waist. God, it was hot out. She began trudging to the edge of the heap, and towards the large trunks of supplies and medicine Jarod had requested.

By the way, where was Jarod? He may have been sick, but the least he could do was send someone to meet her and help carry this junk to the hospital. She scanned the clearing's edge, and noted a long, low building just hidden by foliage at the tree line. From what she could make out, it had a large red cross on a white field painted on the doorway.

"At least I don't have to drag these things too far," she muttered, beginning to curse once more as she lifted two of the smaller containers. One in each hand, she waded through the uncut grass and scrub towards the tiny hospital. She made two more trips, depositing her burdens just outside the plank door, before ever looking in. She had a bad feeling about the building. It reeked of illness, and of death, the way the Centre reeked of confinement and solitude.

* * * * *

"So?" Sydney replied calmly to Lyle.

"So?!" The younger man shot back, "You just let her - no, you helped her leave?"

"I saw no reason not to. If I hadn't, I would have been hindered her job performance. Which, I remember you saying, was not up to par." Sydney repressed a smile at this warped sense of sibling rivalry that the Centre had brought about.

"Let me tell you something, Sydney: if something happens to her, and Jarod is still at large-or if he dies, god forbid. then you'll have the Triumvirate to face. They would not like to lose either, as much as a pain in the ass those two are." Lyle strode out, still fuming.

Sydney allowed himself to smile then, but more bleakly. He realized that Lyle was omitting one thing: it wouldn't be just Sydney being reprimanded, but everyone who'd known about Jarod's plight. Including Lyle.

He just hoped Parker had gotten to her destination in time to save the Pretender.

* * * * *

"Oh my dear god." Miss Parker said this in a monotone, staring around at the hospital's interior, or what she could make of it. The electricity had apparently gone out, and the only light illuminating the one-room clinic was filtered through the forest canopy and about forty layers of grime on the windowpanes (the ones not completely broken). Cracks and holes in the glass were plugged with rags, dimming the sunlight even further.

What she could see, however, was completely repulsive - by far the most squalid hellhole to which she had ever chased Jarod. The hard-packed dirt floor was littered with refuse, the three rows of cots crammed so closely together that she barely realized that the three foot open area along the left wall was actually an aisle. Mosquito netting, so torn and grimy it almost looked like spider webs hanging from the ceiling, covered the threadbare and stained cots by the windows and the door. The entire room was empty of people, but it still smelled of diseased human flesh. Miss Parker decided to breathe through her mouth.

As her eyes adjusted, she realized that the far wall was actually a makeshift curtain that had acquired the same beige tint that the once white walls had. She made her way towards this rudimentary partition, for once hoping not to find Jarod behind it. He wouldn't have stayed if it was possible for him to leave before she arrived with the serum.

She pulled back the curtain gingerly, seeing a desk covered with papers, medical supplies, a laptop, and. the DSA's. She caught her breath as her gaze found Jarod's still body.

"No," was all she could whisper.

* * * * *

"Jarod. Jarod, wake up, damn you!" He roused himself from his delirium long enough to peer weakly at the all-too-familiar apparition above him.

"Well, Miss Parker." he rasped, attempting to smile. He found it hurt the muscles in his face too much, and grimaced. That hurt, too. "I guess you've got me. That is, if you can save me." And he felt the darkness close around him once more as she laid a cool hand on his forehead.

*****

One Day Later

"So, Sydney, any luck derailing the higher-ups?" He quickly shielded the mouthpiece of the pay phone Broots had rewired.

"Actually, no. Your father's quite determined to get you back, even with Brigitte on his arm, telling him to just disown you and get it over with." On the other end of the line, Miss Parker smiled in grim humor.

"Well, I'm not having much fun here, either. I just hope that the helicopter pilot delivered the cure to the CDC headquarters in Mexico City like he was supposed to." God, she was dying for a cigarette. She should have kept some from that coward Mexican.

"He must have. News of a 'miracle cure' are making headlines even in the U.S." Sydney paused. "What about Jarod?"

"What about him?" she replied, looking over at Jarod's nearby prone form. "He's alive, if that's what you mean. But still out like a light, thank God." She smiled again, this time with definite overtones of triumph. "Don't worry, Syd, I'll deliver him to daddy dearest within the next two weeks."

"Two weeks? That's too long! The Centre will find you by then!" Sydney protested. But she had already cut the connection, leaving him to wonder whether the phrase 'daddy dearest' referred to her own father, or to his own connection to Jarod. He gave Broots back the cannibalized receiver.

"All done?" The computer expert asked. Sydney merely nodded.

"I believe so, yes."

***

Two Days Later20

"God, how I loathe you," Miss Parker murmured to Jarod's sleeping figure behind her, wiping the sweat from her forehead with her sleeve. She continued rinsing out the washbowl she'd been using for cool water. It had acquired an odd, repulsive, pinkish slime from his forehead. Thank heaven for rubber gloves.

She glanced at her sleeve, noticing a pinkish discoloration on the cuff. Great. She'd smeared some of his goo on her clothes. Wonderful. Too bad she hadn't been wearing the gloves while actually cleaning the stuff from his face. At least she hadn't cared to clean any other part of him. a thought she didn't even want to allow to cross her mind. She was not going to play Florence Nightingale to this bastard.

God, she felt like shit. She pressed her palm to her face, feeling a little flushed. "God damn it, god damn it," she spat out from beneath clenched teeth. The heat was starting to get to her.

Jarod stirred a little, making a noise of discomfort, and she whirled. His eyes were open again, but fortunately, not with the glassy look they'd had before. She noticed that his breathing was much better, too.

"Good morning, Jarod," she said bitterly. "Have a nice nap?" He sat up a little, and groaned again, clutching his temple and wincing as if something had struck him.

"So I wasn't in hell after all." He asked weakly.

"No, but you will be, as soon as I get you back to the Centre."

"Don't make me want to get better or anything." He smiled this time, without the searing pain in his nerve endings.

"You don't have a choice, now that you have the serum in you."

"So it works?" he seemed intensely focused on that subject. Mister guardian angel at it again, she thought. "Did you get it to the CDC?"

"It should be there by now."

"Oh thank." he sighed, sinking back onto the cot. He seemed drained of energy now, that small effort to carry on a conversation apparently too much for him. She watched him drift into the oblivion of sleep once more.

* * * * *

"All I know is that Miss Parker left for Mexico. I don't know how, I don't know when, and I don't know where!" Mr. Raines was nearly purple with rage.

"Neither do we, sir," Broots said quietly. It was the truth. Miss Parker had purposely left everyone out of the loop on the particulars of her departure, just in case.

"Why do I doubt you?"

"I really." Broots began. Sydney came to his rescue.

"Sir, I think you're pursuing a useless trail of investigation." Raines began to cough, he was so furious. "Why don't you follow up on this Nova person?"

"Because," Raines hissed, "That's what you two are going to do."

****

Three Days Later

Miss Parker rose from her light doze at a small sound. She looked around in the predawn darkness to find Jarod's bed empty. "Fuck!" she cried, immediately awake.

"Don't worry," a low voice said from the other side of the partition. She squinted, just able to make out Jarod's shadow thrown onto the vertical divider. "I just needed to go. I thought I'd spare you that from now on." She clenched her teeth, thankful for small mercies.

He walked in then, leaning heavily on the wall for support. Chips of the whitewash flaked off from his passage, exposing the bricks beneath. She held out a hand, offering some support in case he needed it. It would help her standing in the Centre if she didn't allow Jarod any more health mishaps. He shook his head, and she withdrew the offer. He was getting much better, but still had a couple of days before long-range travel was possible.

Jarod sat carefully on the edge of the cot, grimacing as his unusually slender frame was jarred by even that action. Miss Parker looked at him critically. He'd lost weight - not a lot, but just enough to prove his illness had indeed been serious. She sat too, feeling a bit weary. Her temples throbbed something awful.

As he turned to lie down, she noticed the faint yellowish bruising at his temples and froze, making the connection.

"Jarod." she began, suddenly chill with fear. He glanced over at her. "I think I'm sick." That got his attention. He was on his feet again in a moment, discarding the pain as unimportant sensory input, and knelt beside her.

"Are you feverish?" He asked quietly, just as if he were a real doctor. She nodded.

"Have you been flushed continually?" In the low light, he couldn't see the fine spiderwebbing of reddish capillaries just under her fair skin. Another nod.

"Headaches, dizziness, nausea, blurring eyesight?"

"Yes..." she whispered, brokenly, attempting to disguise the despair that threatened to overwhelm her. "But I gave myself the serum."

"You might have another strain," he suggested gently. That did it. She stood and strode away from him, through the back doorway and onto the path that, she'd discovered earlier, led to the hollow buildings of the village AgonEDa.

"AgonEDa," she whispered aloud. Agony. That sounded about right. She leaned against the hospital's outer wall, finally aware of the heated disease coursing through her body, infecting and crippling her nervous system. Her sight faded for a moment, and she pressed the base of her palms to her eyes, fighting the pain and the tears that threatened to appear.

"Miss Parker," Jarod said gently. "Can I get a blood sample?" She shook her head. No way was he going to come near her with a needle. He could inject something into her, and make a clean getaway.

Oh, hell, she told herself, you have nothing to lose. Besides, Saint Jarod would never pull a bait-and-switch on you. "Fine," she said aloud. She felt the sharp prick of the needle as a distant pain that grew sharper as her protesting nerves relayed the information.

The next thing she knew, she was feeling drowsy. So sleepy.

Jarod caught her as the sedative took hold and she crumpled towards the floor. He knew she'd resent him for tricking her, but her well-being was more important.

He did not think, even once, of using the opportunity to escape.

* * * * *


Sydney was worried, and had been since Miss Parker's last call. She'd sounded tired, and unwell. He made a decision, and picked up his home telephone, dialing her cell number. To hell if my line's tapped, he thought. Someone picked up the other end, but didn't answer.

"Hello?" Sydney asked into the receiver. "Miss Parker, is that you?"

"No, Sydney." From the tone in Jarod's voice, Sydney knew something was wrong. "Miss Parker didn't get all the information I sent you, did she?"

"No." The older man confessed to Jarod. "Broots got the follow-up communication from Nova just after she left to find you. She doesn't know the nature of the virus." Sydney felt a depression beginning to seep into the pit of his stomach.

"Well, she's well acquainted with it now." Jarod stayed silent so long after this bleak statement that Sydney worried that the Pretender had left Miss Parker's cell phone.

"Jarod, I have to tell you something. I was sent to your friend Nova's house to make some inquiries, but Lyle had already gotten to her first." Jarod closed his eyes, not even wanting to think what Lyle had done to the peasant, aging computer enthusiast. "He knows where you are, Jarod. He'll be there within the next ten hours."

"I can't let the Centre get Miss Parker in this condition. They can get the new strain that's infected her."

"New strain?" Sydney repeated, hollowly. If the Centre found Miss Parker now, in her current condition, they could use the new strain - one that was most likely resistant to the serum - for any of their immoral operations.

"Yes. I can't let them get to her now. Sydney, I have to go. I'll keep her safe. I promise." Sydney covered his face, in complete shock. This situation was getting worse and worse.

Disclaimer: The characters Miss Parker, Sydney, Jarod, Broots etc. and the fictional Centre, are all property of MTM and NBC Productions and used without permission. I'm not making any money out of this and no infringement is intended.



CURE-ALL
Part 3
by StarsingerSaathi




"Miss Parker, we have to go." The sedative was taking too long to wear off. "Miss Parker, now!" Her eyelids lifted, with great effort on her part.

"Jarod, you bastard son of a." He covered her mouth for a brief moment.

"Lyle is on his way!" She smiled, then.

"Good. I got to you first; I can shove it in his face when he shows up."

"You're in no condition for any games, Parker. He'll take me in as his achievement, and will take you in as a prisoner, someone who they can use for lab experiments. After all, once I'm caught, that's all you're good for with this virus in your system." She glared at him with glittering, hate-filled eyes.

"I hate it when you're right," she said, surrendering to logic. "Bastard," she added under her breath, getting up slowly. Suddenly, he scooped her up and carried her out the door on his shoulder. She would have hurt him if the swift motion hadn't increased the pain in her skull so much. She passed out again, dimly hearing the sound of an engine (Where had he hidden the car? she thought abstractedly) as the pain faded away into nothingness.

* * * * *

"So. Jarod's gone. Miss Parker is gone." Lyle summed up the situation succinctly to his father on the cell-phone. "And we're in the middle of a hot zone in southern Mexico." He ground his teeth behind the smile he assumed for the equally annoyed sweepers.

"Well, I must say that you're following in your sister's footsteps rather well," Mr. Raines hissed at the speakerphone in Mr. Parker's office.

"Find them, Lyle," Mr. Parker said after a moment, cutting the connection immediately thereafter.

* * * * *

"Jarod, where are we?" Miss Parker groaned. The engine had turned into an all-encompassing roar that rattled her teeth. "I need an aspirin."

"Aspirin isn't exactly going to help, Miss Parker." She opened her eyes, waiting for the blurriness to clear before she tried to identify her surroundings. She blinked after a moment, not accepting what she saw.

"We're.on a cargo plane." He grinned, boyishly.

"Actually, this is one of the Centre's planes. I'm not going to tell you the particulars, but let's just say that we share a very efficient travel agent. Who, by the way, does not know the destination of the plane, just its origin and takeoff time."

"Good old Sydney," she said, attempting to sit up. That was a bad idea. Her eyeballs seemed to come disjointed, and the suddenly distorted
world began bobbing eerily around, like a balloon tossed by the sea. "I feel like shit." He handed her a paper bag, and she took it gratefully. When she was done, he took it back and tossed it in a nearby plastic crate. "Four-star flight attendant service," she commented weakly. "By the way, ever been one of those?"

"Not yet." He answered distractedly. The virus must be taking over her inner ear, he thought. That didn't happen to me. It is a new strain.

"Will you please stop looking at me like that?" she snapped, fed up with his little looks. "God, it's as if I were made of porcelain." He noticed that she had just turned slightly greenish again, and wordlessly handed her another paper bag. "Thanks."

"It's not as if you're sick or anything." He answered, smiling at her. She shot him an indecipherable look.

"Sarcasm, Jarod? I guess you've picked up on something while running from me."

"That's not all. I've just recently discovered something called 'Dramamine'. Need any?" She glared at him, and passed back the bag.

"Ha ha. I just hope you'll keep that killer humor once the Centre has you again."

"Ah, yes, my newest escape method." He wondered how she expected to take him back to Delaware while she was infected. Was she hoping for some sort of reimbursement? A 'you brought back Jarod and now you can go'? He snorted under his breath. That wasn't likely.

"Where are we going, by the way?" She asked into the silence.

He didn't answer. Nor did he speak for the rest of the flight.

* * * * *

"Well, I must say that your efficiency hasn't diminished since your new.connection to the Centre," Raines commented, his voice coming out even more mechanical-sounding from the surveillance monitor. He was addressing someone just off screen, below the camera's field of view.

"So Project Remote Control worked as I predicted?" His companion - female - answered. He smiled, slightly, from behind his oxygen tubing.

"To an extent. Jarod, though not under our direct control, still helped us evaluate the virus' effectiveness. You have the copy of his information, of course."

"Of course," she said, handing him a disk. "I have the original hidden."

"However, our planned outbreak was contained by Jarod's cure before an accurate appraisal of the virus' impact on a first-world country could be determined. As a whole, the Hoffman virus served only one of its two intended purposes."

"I can rectify that. There is a new strain of the virus."

"A new strain?" The woman laughed, pleased that he hadn't heard yet.

"Yes. When Miss Parker went down to southern Mexico, she contracted the disease - just as the cure was spreading through her system. The virus had time to adjust itself, to mutate and to continue multiplying in her body, unaffected by the serum."

"So. She's just become more valuable than she has been in a long time, has she?" He mused to himself. "Recover her yourself."

"I'll have a hard time getting around my husband."

"Recover her yourself," Raines repeated, and the woman nodded, her face finally visible.

It was Brigitte.

* * * * *

"Zymogene Incorporated," a pleasant voice answered on the first ring.

"Hi, this is Dr. Aimes calling. I'm the new guy in the Biolevel 4 division of ." The secretary punched him through to Vaccine Research and Development, apparently expecting his call.

"Hello, Doctor McFarland speaking." a weary voice answered.

"This is Doctor Aimes."

"Oh, hello," the voice seemed to perk up a little. "When did you say you were starting? I need all the help down here that I can get, and with your credentials, you're even more necessary right now."

"Is this about the Hoffman virus?" Jarod already knew the answer to his question, of course, but he'd found that being over-confident of one's situation threw others off and aroused suspicions.

"Yeah. Despite that cure that came out of nowhere a few days ago, we're still worried about mutations."

"I'll come in tomorrow, if you'd like."

"Please. I know you've just arrived, but I'm desperate for more hands around here. A lot of my colleagues went down to Mexico." Jarod tuned out for a moment, having heard Miss Parker stirring in the next room. He stood up and looked around the corner into the bedroom. She was tossing in her sleep, the fever probably giving her some horrible nightmares. He remembered some of those that he'd had and shuddered in sympathy.

". so you'll be here at about sixish?" He heard Doctor McFarland ask.

"Yes, sir."

"Don't 'sir' me. With your credentials, I should call you 'sir'." Doctor McFarland hung up abruptly. Jarod was left to shake his head at the eccentrices of the scientific community.


* * * * *

Miss Parker woke, lying in an unfamiliar, but wonderfully soft bed. She was extremely comfortable, except for that tugging on her wrist. She opened her eyes then, and saw a shiny ring around her wrist. connected by a chain to another ring around the bedpost... Handcuffs.

"Jarod, damn you!" She tried to shout, but found her voice was just a painful, cracking whisper. She looked around, registering the details of the room. Looking for a key, or her gun. The small nightstand and the table by the door were empty, save for a lamp and a small stack of
paperback novels: The Andromeda Strain, Outbreak, Hot Zone. Apparently Jarod was doing some research. She continued to scan the room. The walls were natural, honey-stained wood, and from what she could see, there were only two rooms adjacent to hers. There was a window just near her bed, showing her a low patio, a dock leading out to a calm, mist-shrouded, icy lake. Jarod was nowhere in sight. Surprise surprise.

She began to realize that her eyesight wasn't as erratic as it had been a few hours ago. Maybe, she thought, being abnormally optimistic, you're actually fighting this thing.

Right, another part of her mind responded cynically. This might just be a hallucination. But even her most unusual hallucinations didn't include a being chained to a bedpost in a lakefront cabin in the middle of nowhere. Those, she thought with amused recollection, had been an ex-boyfriend's fantasies, though. She sat up, feeling her brain begin to swim violently within her skull again, and closed her eyes. Nope. Still sick. She bent over to the edge of the bed, noticing a pail strategically placed on the floor, and allowed herself to be violently ill.

"Good morning, sunshine," Jarod's voice said from the other side of the room. She looked up (her mind reeling at that too-quick motion) at him, feeling like she wanted to die. Or kill him for giving this to her. Or both.

A murder-suicide was sounding pretty good right now.

"I'm pleased to announce that you're not infected with the Hoffman virus," Jarod began.

"What?"

"Instead, you're infected with its parent virus- the one Hoffman was bioengineered from. It's highly contagious - don't mind if I don't come over there - but it should only last about a week."

"Good. Enjoy your week of freedom."

"By the way, don't you want to know who bioengineered the disease?"

"Is this a trick question?" In her state, she could barely think, let alone deduct the source of her current pain.

"No, but I'll give you a hint."

"No hints, damn you!"

"Okay, a small research company called Zymogene Incorporated developed a variant of a relatively unknown disease that they'd encountered on an expedition to Zaire. It - the one you have now - is relatively harmless. Then, their parent company, PolyPharmecuticals, took some samples and the samples disappeared. I found them mentioned in a memo from Mr. Raines to your father. Apparently, Raines wanted to go beyond sims, and wanted to test it in the field. Your father said no."

"But Raines always has his own agenda," Miss Parker finished. "Have you told Sydney?"

"No."

"Will you let me go?"

"No." He grinned, and left the room, leaving her to her renewed nausea.

* * * * *

"Hello?" Brigitte answered the phone sleepily. It's one in the morning, she noted. Who the hell can be calling this late? Mr. Parker stirred beside her.

"Who is it, sweetie?" he murmured. After her long, incredulous pause, he sat up beside her. "Sweetums?"

"It's Jarod!" At that, he took the phone from her hand and covered the mouthpiece.

"Press the green button on the phone. It runs a trace program I had wired for just this occasion." He held the phone to his ear as she did as he'd told her. "Hello, Jarod. I haven't heard from you in a while. Glad to know you're doing well."

"Yes, I'm sure you are," Jarod answered wryly. "But I'm not calling about my health. It's your daughter. I've got her stuck in a cabin in Georgia." And he proceeded to tell her father exactly where, then hung up.

"Trace?" Mr. Parker asked Brigitte. She shook her head. "Of course not. He's too smart for that. Ah, well. At least we know where my daughter is."

"Where?" Brigitte asked.

"About forty miles northwest of Atlanta, just on the shores of Lake." Here, Mr. Parker smiled, chuckling in amusement at Jarod's sense of humor, "Lake Sidney."

She smiled, too, but for a far different reason.

Disclaimer: The characters Miss Parker, Sydney, Jarod, Broots etc. and the fictional Centre, are all property of MTM and NBC Productions and used without permission. I'm not making any money out of this and no infringement is intended.



CURE-ALL
Part 4
by StarsingerSaathi




"Hello?" Brigitte called into the cabin. She'd found the front door unlocked and open, and knew the chances of finding Jarod here were slim to none. However, that was not why she had come.

She had come alone, knowing that using Miss Parker as a lab rat would be extremely unappealing to the girl's father. Mr. Parker was still in Blue Cove, busy with his job, while assuming that he could trust his young wife to bring back his daughter. Brigitte intended to bring Miss Parker back to Delaware, but not back to her father - to a lab Mr. Raines had set up expressly for Brigitte's use. Mr. Parker would simply receive an easily accepted story about another one of Jarod's wild goose chases.

Brigitte smiled, hearing her daughter-in-law's muffled voice from one of the rear rooms. This was going to be perfect.


* * * * *

"Lyle, did you find Miss Parker?" Sydney asked the younger man. Lyle shook his head.

"No. Brigitte's probably been and gone. You know, Sydney, if your lackey Broots had found that trace request a few hours sooner, we'd probably have my dear sister back." They were standing in a short hallway of the cabin they'd just searched extensively. It was completely empty. Most of the furniture was gone, and the air had a disinfected smell about it. Whoever was here last, they had certainly cleaned up the place admirably.

"I'm not so sure that an extra hour or so would have made that much of a difference. Remember, that call arrived at one in the morning. Brigitte may have left as soon as she could."

"Fine. I still don't like chasing around Miss Parker, though."

"It's not necessary for you to enjoy your assignment, Lyle, just to complete it." Lyle shot an indecipherable look at Sydney, and walked away, out the cabin door.

"Uh, Sydney?" Broots called, from the kitchen.

"Yes.?" He answered, hurrying to the other room. He found Broots, peering into the tiny fridge. "What is it, Broots?"

In response, the other man lifted out a small, heavily multiply-sealed vial, labeled "Zymogene, Inc. Biohazard."

"What do you think is in it?" Broots asked, his forehead furrowed in concern. Sydney rummaged in a drawer, hoping to find a plastic bag. Instead, he found a computer disk, neatly labeled 'Sydney' in Jarod's handwriting.

"I'm not sure, but I have a feeling this will provide some answers."

* * * * *

"Hello, Miss Parker," Brigitte said pleasantly, watching the other woman awaken painfully. "Comfy?" Miss Parker simply appraised her new surroundings: she was lying in a small concrete cell, with a large, bulletproof glass window set into the front wall. The door had no handle on the inside, and there were several cameras overtly positioned on the room. Miss Parker suspected several hidden ones, as well.

"Of course not." She watched Brigitte closely through the window.

"Good." Brigitte's voice came tinnily through a small speaker set in the wall by the door. "I wouldn't want you to get rid of the virus in your system too soon."

"Is that why I'm here?" Miss Parker laughed bitterly. So, Jarod had been right about her being used as a lab rat. "You know I'm not infected with Hoffman."

"Yes. It's a new strain, I hear. Maybe I'll name it Parker." Miss Parker shook her head.

"No, no, you dumb bitch. It's the parent virus. The one that's not fatal." The blonde's expression turned from triumph to disbelief.

"Let's just wait until the lab tests come back before we decide that, shall we?" Brigitte replied, regaining her composure.

Miss Parker watched Brigitte walk away, out a lighted doorway, and got up slowly, making her way towards the cot in the corner of her new cell. She could wait until Brigitte returned.

* * * * *

"Hi, I'm Jarod. I work for Zymogene, Incorporated. I was sent here to help with your R & D division." The secretary, a thin, hatchet-faced woman in her fifties, pointed down the hall, giving him directions and an unexpectedly pleasant smile.

"Thank you, ma'am," he replied, and set off in the direction indicated. To the end, take a right, down the stairs, through the door, and then it's fifth office on the left, he recited mentally.

"Hello?" He called, opening the door to his newest temporary office. It was empty, and so he set to work at the system console, typing madly. He was looking for something that connected this corporation to the Centre, and with any luck, he'd find it before the end of the day. Small, relatively unknown facilities like this weren't too secretive about connections to a far more powerful organization like the Centre and any of its affiliates.

And they don't take too many security precautions, either, he noticed, easily hacking into the President's files.

* * * * *

"Good morning, Miss Parker," Brigitte's voice is not the greatest sound to wake up to, Miss Parker decided, getting up stiffly from her cot. "I have good news and bad news for you." A doctor walked in behind Brigitte, carrying what looked suspiciously like a small vial and a syringe.

"For you or for me?" Miss Parker said, fully awake once she watched Brigitte gesture to the two guards. One unlocked the cell door and both walked in, walking with menacing intent towards their captive. Miss Parker, feigning weakness, allowed them to restrain her by holding her upper arms tightly. Brigitte walked in after them, taking the now filled syringe from the doctor.

"The bad news is that you're not infected with the Hoffman virus, or a more deadly strain of it." She smiled, advancing on Miss Parker. "The good news is that we can fix that quite easily." She positioned the needle above the skin of Miss Parker's forearm.

Miss Parker sprung, then, knocking one guard into the wall and the other into Brigitte. The blonde cried out as she fell, the glass vial in her hands cracking and the few drops left of the virulent fluid began mingling with the blood streaming from the gashes the broken glass had made. The doctor fled as Brigitte fell against the door, knocking herself out quite handily.

Miss Parker faced the second guard, who'd recovered and had drawn his gun. "Don't move a muscle." He said.

"I don't have to," Miss Parker said. "In just a few moments, that airborne virus will infect you. I'm immune, thanks to a serum I picked up while in Mexico, but you, my friend, are going to get very sick." She was bluffing, of course: the virus wasn't airborne, nor did a momentary exposure to it infect someone quite so quickly as she'd implied. His expression turned to extreme dismay, anyway, and she smiled maliciously at him. He fled. Miss Parker took the motionless guard's gun. On her way out, she nudged Brigitte with her foot.

"Pleasant dreams, bitch."

****

"Sydney, can we talk for a moment?" Mr. Parker's voice said from the door to Sydney's office. Jarod's mentor looked up, surprise flickering across his face. Mr. Parker was the last person from whom he expected to hear that query.

"Yes, sir." He motioned the standing man in, who closed the door behind
him.

"I'll get right to the point: I'm worried about my little girl." He leaned on the edge of Sydney's desk, looking at him with an open expression.

"I'm working on that, sir." Sydney really didn't know what to say.

"Do you know anything, anything at all?"

"I haven't heard anything that you don't already know about," Sydney replied, not exactly lying. The vial Jarod had left behind had been empty except for a picture of Brigitte (that had amused Sydney no end, but he decided that that was not the best information to give the woman's husband)), so Broots was off working on digging up info on Zymogene, Inc. The disk was sitting in Sydney's coat pocket; he hadn't had time to access any of its contents yet.

Mr. Parker must have suspected Sydney's near-deceit, but said nothing about it. "Inform me as soon as you can. I want my little girl back."

"No offense, sir, but your 'little girl' can take care of herself." And then some, Sydney added mentally.

The other man merely nodded, and left.

****

Miss Parker slipped out of a side door, squinting at the sudden darkness. Dusk had fallen since her initial break from that awful cell. In the meantime, she'd snuck past several of the guards, shot another, and had hidden herself in the ventilation ducts for four hours while the rest of security responded to the alarm that inevitably came. She grinned, recalling the time she'd spent watching them running around, frantically searching for her.

Then again, even Jarod's escapes hadn't taught the Centre anything about the weakness in security that air vents provided. She almost laughed aloud as she skirted the building's wall, making her way to its rear fence. But she remained quiet, meaning to rub Brigitte's failure in her face later, when it was safe again. The chill of the night air began eating its way through the parka she'd stolen from a storage locker on her way out. She shivered, noticing a gate up ahead in the fence. She trudged towards it, her feet beginning to get bogged down in the snowdrifts.

Miss Parker shouldered her way through the frozen gate; realizing that they'd never meant her to get this far. It was a thrilling feeling, to be a step ahead of those who'd kept her a prisoner. She stopped, leaning against a tree's trunk. So this is what Jarod feels like, she thought with a sudden flash of insight. She shook off the empathy. He was still going back to the Centre, and so was she. As soon as it was safe for her to, of course.

She plodded through the woods, noting that the fauna looked familiar, as if she was still in New England. Goddammit, she thought, where the hell am I? Her legs began to grow heavy, weak from her illness and recent exertions.

She found a road (two wide ruts in the snow, really) after what seemed an eternity. A sudden brightness ahead blinded her, and she stopped, collapsing by the roadside into the soft snow. Oh, God, please, she tried to say, help me.

****

Jarod drove through the Maine woods, hoping to see some sort of sign of the closed-down compound he'd found on a PolyPharmecuticals district map. Earlier, he thought he'd glimpsed some sort of light through the trees, but he'd lost sight of the glimmer as soon as he turned off the main road, an hour ago. It was hard enough to stay on the barely discernible road ahead of him in the snow without having to pay close attention to much else. A flash of movement caught his attention just ahead. He glanced quickly at the side of the road; probably another deer, he thought. He saw it again, and slowed to a near stop.

It had been a person. There it was again. This time, whoever it was, they didn't move anymore. He got out, grabbing the blanket from the seat behind him. Anyone out after dark in February in Maine was in trouble.

Jarod rushed to the person's side, noting dark hair, a female form almost obscured by the bulkiness of the oversized parka she wore. He wrapped the blanket around her, turning her so that he could pick her up more easily. As he turned back towards his truck, the headlights illuminated her face.

He almost dropped Miss Parker in his surprise. She woke at that small jolt, and looked up at him without recognition. "Help." she said in a dry, cracking whisper. "Get me away from here."

He nodded. Of course he would help her.

****

"I'm starting to think," Raines began in a dangerously low tone of voice, "that there's something in the water your family drinks." He was speaking to Brigitte again. She looked away, irritated. "You all seem to have trouble keeping your prisoners secure."

"She was no use to us," Brigitte said, defensively. "There was no new strain."

"It doesn't matter. She knows about our lab in Maine, about our operations that her father strictly forbade. She's a weakness." He stopped, fixing the blonde with an angry glare. "Find her."


TBC