27 by TLM

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Day 3

"Listen to me; I will not tolerate this kind of inefficiency. This is the Centre. We have higher standards than this. Update the security programs. Make them work. Put Bruce on the team," Mr Parker paused, allowing the person on the other end of the phone to speak. "Broots, yeah, whatever. Just do it."

Mr Parker looked up as he set the phone back into its receiver to see his daughter standing before him, her hands clasped neatly in front of her, "Ah, Angel."

"What's going on?" she asked innocently.

Her father groaned, "Jarod again. He's been liquidating Centre funds, stealing what's ours to rub our noses in his freedom once again. Just another reason I need you to bring him in and end this mess once and for all."

"I know, Daddy."

Standing, Mr Parker approached his daughter and put both hands on her shoulders. Miss Parker looked up at him cautiously with little girl eyes, "I'm not sure you do. It's been far too long since he's been back here and believe me, I know what you're capable of. If you just understood how essential-"

"I understand perfectly well!" she struggled to maintain control of her emotions, the ones that he could always toil with so easily. "Jarod's the key. To everything. I get it."

"Good. I'm glad to hear that. Now what are you here to see me about? Something new concerning Jarod?"

"Not exactly," Miss Parker began, knowing that Jarod was precisely the reason she was here. "Actually I was letting you know that I'm taking some time off, for my birthday you know. I'd like to relax so I can get back into the Jarod pursuit with a clear head."

"Ah that's right, my little girl's birthday is coming up. But, Angel, I need you here. I've just temporarily reassigned Broots to tech security. The team needs you."

Miss Parker exhaled, letting the words come out casually, "My birthday was two days ago."

"I-" Mr Parker paused, "Oh I'm sorry. Things have just been a little hectic lately. You know how it is."

"I do. Which is why I need this. In all my years of working here, I've hardly taken a sick day. Lyle's in Denver which is currently our best shot to catch Jarod. Sydney's holding down the fort here and Broots can be transferred on a dime if they need him."

There was a moment of silence as Mr Parker considered her plea, furrowing his brow and licking his lips slightly.

"Daddy, I wasn't really asking."

Double take. After another few seconds of contemplation, he said "What my angel wants, my angel gets. I expect you back refreshed and ready to work."

Miss Parker shook her head, but replied, "Of course. I'll see you later, Daddy."

She turned around and her feet followed the heels that were leading her out the door with powerfully delicate taps against the floor.

"You mean you're leaving right now?"

She continued to walk.

"When will you be back?" He stared curiously at his daughter who was throwing his office door open.

"When I get back," she raised a hand.

"Angel," he called.

"It's more notice than you ever bothered with," Parker mumbled as she let the door fall shut behind her.

*****

"I'm really glad we're doing this, Miss Parker."

Jarod peered at her from the passenger seat of her town car. It hadn't even been questioned who would drive to Maine.

She sighed, clutching the steering wheel with one hand as she merged onto the highway, "I should have asked my father for the jet."

"Strangely I don't think he'd be keen on me joining you."

"He wouldn't have to know. I could distract the sweepers-"

"And I'm sure the jet is bugged with all sorts of recording and tracking devices. You would probably kill the pilot in your haste and even if you didn't, he obviously wouldn't be able to come and your father and the execs would wonder when you learned to fly a plane yourself and then once we set off-"

"Jarod! Shut up. Just shut up. I am not going to be able to handle seven hours of this if you don't. Shut. Up."

He did.

"And stop all the grinning. It's starting to creep me out."

He did not. She was obviously nervous and he found it endearing to watch her tap the steering wheel with her fingernails.

Jarod cleared his throat, "So tell me, which is more nerve-wracking: pretending to be on a vacation from the nefarious organization you put under the 'Employed By' section of your tax forms so that you can discover the truth about your life without your father finding out and ordering a hit on you, or spending seven hours in a car alone with me."

She glared at him for an agonizingly long moment before returning her attention to the road. Then, Parker emitted an unnaturally sardonic laugh that worried him a little bit.

*****

"Approximately 35 minutes to go, Miss Parker."

The sun had set about an hour ago and since then, they'd remained mostly silent with one exception.

"Could I get you to promise no more singing for this last hour then?"

Jarod grinned, "That was not singing; it was humming. Besides, that song is a really good time passer."

"Right, well I'm pretty sure I could use ninety nine bottles of beer right about now."

"Now don't be ridiculous. This is the smartest thing you've ever done."

"What? Let you drag me around the country and lie to the Centre, my family?" Miss Parker snipped.

"Well something like that," Jarod mumbled, crossing his arms and turning his gaze out toward the window. "You know I didn't force you into this. You came on your own."

"Please, Jarod. You've been manipulating me since I was ten years old. How is this any different?"

"Because you're not ten years old. You're," he stopped, noticing the deadly expression on her face. "Older than that. Plus I really don't think I manipulated you then. Maybe recently, but only because you've been chasing me."

"Yeah I was doing my job. Sorry about that."

"Not your everyday kind of job."

"Yeah well I was damn good at it," Miss Parker grumbled.

Jarod laughed, "Oh really? Then why am I not at the Centre?"

"Because I'm smart enough to know that having the genius on my side could be a very useful thing."

"So this is all about exploiting my talents?" he nodded.

"Exactly," Parker grinned, throwing a glance his way. She was satisfied to see he was grinning too, though shaking his head at the same time.

*****

Parker climbed the last step to Ben's stoop in slow motion. Jarod followed behind her with two bags hung over his shoulder, noticing for the first time that she wasn't wearing heels. She seemed much smaller than normal. Coupled with the anxiety he could see in her bright blue eyes, Miss Parker actually seemed vulnerable.

"Ring the bell," she ordered, tucking her hair behind her ears. The way she stood under the porch light, her face was only half illuminated, the rest of her still in the shadow. She was beautiful.

Jarod asked her hesitantly, "Are you sure you want to do this?"

"Just ring the bell, Jarod. Ring the bell."

Crickets chirped while he pondered her request, ultimately obeying like the good labrat he was. Parker was staring at the door expectantly, but he remained focused on her, wondering why she was so scared.

The door creaked open and through the screened door, they could identify Ben in khaki pants and a flannel shirt.

"My God, Miss Parker," Ben smiled, opening the screen door to beckon her inside. "And Jarod, too? What's going on?"

Parker smiled back and her voice was so kind that Jarod had to remind himself who he was with, "We need your help."


Day 30

Sydney was persistent; anyone could certainly give him that. The poor doctor had been attempting to coax Jarod into pretending his way through one menial warm-up Sim for almost two hours. There were times when he was so convincing that Jarod had to consider why he couldn't just go ahead and do it.

"Jarod, please. This could never be skewed in a harmful way. You know this."

He did know it, "Doesn't matter, Sydney. One slip is enough to topple the whole house of cards. You know that."

Sydney pulled the other chair out from beneath the metal table Jarod was sitting at calmly, the file contents scattered on the table before him as if Sydney were hoping some sort of photo or text would jump out at the pretender and lure him in, "I understand your reluctance. You have a good heart, which is precisely the reason that Jessica Saunders needs you to identify the cause of her father's accident. Who knows how many lives you could save?"

"Or destroy."

"That's not what this is about."

Jarod smiled a little, speaking playfully, "Never is, is it? Not officially anyway."

The psychiatrist sat and leaned across the table, "I can't bare the thought of what they'll do to you if you continue to refuse cooperating."

"Let Lyle have his fun. He'll get bored before I give in," Jarod answered confidently. "I already told you where your focus should be."

"Jarod, you don't understand the predicament I'm in. They won't allow me to see you if we produce no results."

"Just who do they think will do a better job?"

"My methods of reasoning are dated. Younger doctors with new, more persuasive techniques will be brought in."

"Sounds compelling."

Before Sydney could reply, Broots entered the room looking around nervously.

"Uh, Sydney," Broots glanced at Jarod who was staring at him openly. The direct eye contact threw his thought process off track and Broots stumbled on his syllables before speaking humanly. "I just wanted to update you about that thing you told me to check out and Robby told me you were down here, he saw you on the security monitors and told me since well I'm working in security this week and I was there-"

"What did you find, Broots?" Sydney intervened smartly.

Broots hesitated, clearly worried about Jarod's presence, and spoke softly "Well, honestly, I haven't found anything. It's like that thing just vanished. Not a trace anywhere. The only unusual thing." He glanced at the cameras. "Is that all the higher ups like Lyle and Raines and Mr Parker are nowhere to be found."

Jarod was listening intently and he knew that Broots' last revelation meant that they were working on something more important than their golden pretender project, and there weren't many things that ranked higher on their list. Sydney jotted something on a piece of paper, ripped it from its pad and handed it to Broots. Jarod's eyes narrowed at the passing of the secret message.

Broots scanned the paper quickly and then looked back to Sydney, "Give me ten minutes."

With that he left.

"Let's try something else, Jarod," Sydney went on as if Broots had never been there at all. "Why don't you tell me about your time out of the Centre?"

"What do you want to know?" Jarod countered suspiciously.

"What gave you the most satisfaction? Was it your own personal freedom or helping the people you met along the way?"

"Helping them I guess. It's difficult to measure."

Sydney nodded, "Of course. Can I ask why you helped so many people instead of focusing on finding your own family?"

"I wanted to focus on them. Certain obstacles made that difficult."

"Yes, but you clearly devoted a significant portion of your time to others when you didn't have to. Why?"

Jarod sighed and scratched behind his ear, "I know what you're doing, Sydney."

"Nonsense I-" Sydney's eyes darted elsewhere.

"I did work as a psychiatrist for a while and I applied this same technique to plenty of my patients," Jarod rolled his eyes. "You would love for me to say that I helped those other people because I wanted to do right in the world and make up for all of the catastrophes I unwillingly helped design. Right?"

"Is that not true?" Sydney propped his chin in his hand, hanging on Jarod's every word.

Jarod shook his head, "Of course it's true."

"Then why don't you just-"

"No, Sydney. No. Nothing I do here will ever make up for what has already happened. Don't you get that? This place is the root of that evil," he paused, lowering his voice. "I won't be a part of it, no matter what the consequences for me are."

Sydney stared at his pupil for a long while, then stared away again. After a moment he spoke, "Ah there it is."

"What?" Jarod asked, uninterestedly.

"Our cue." Sydney smiled.

 

*****

There were no lights in her room and with every meaning of the phrase, she was sick of being left in the dark. There was no question who was behind this, and she would be sure to make the bastards pay. All the solitude, it was meant to throw her off balance. It was pathetic how they would apply the same techniques that she'd seen used on others her entire life. It was about as constructive as putting her through a T-board.

Her mind shifted and three day old memories surfaced. She had never acted so stupidly in all her life. And for a genius no less.

*****

"Broots and I are getting nowhere, so her only hope is you," Sydney ended his speech. "Broots can only keep the cameras looping for so long before someone gets suspicious. You must make a decision and make it fast."

Jarod was not reacting the way Sydney had expected. Instead of hopeful, the pretender seemed forlorn, agonized.

"You want me to pretend to be Miss Parker and find out where she is?" he repeated slowly.

"Yes!" Sydney answered proudly.

Jarod scoffed and placed his hands on either side of his head, "What the hell makes you think I haven't already tried that on my own?"

"You have?"

"Yes of course I have!" Jarod stood abruptly, letting the chair fall over backwards. "Not a free moment goes by where I don't try to think her free from wherever she is, Sydney. I'm not just sitting in my cell counting the cracks in the ceiling all night! And you can sure bet I'm not sleeping." He paused, letting Sydney stand and approach him like a lion tamer. "If I could just sim out where she is or create a prognosis in my mind of her physical condition right now, I would have done it already. I don't know where she is and only God knows what they've done to her. Will do to her, I don't know. I don't know anything."

"Jarod," Sydney grabbed his pretender's bicep. "Please tell me what happened."

Jarod couldn't make eye contact with his mentor. He was somewhere else when he spoke, "I let her down. I failed. You told me I can't save everyone and you were right."

Sydney could only tighten the lines on his face, ushering the younger man on with silence. He could hardly hear him when he did speak.

"Now look what's happened. Where's all the hope now?" Jarod changed his tone. "Please find her, Sydney. She's experienced enough disappointment."










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