Blindsided by Mirage
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Chapter or Story 
Chapter or Story
"I can't believe this is happening," Jarod murmured despondently, staring at the distant flames beyond the jet's windows.
Parker couldn't believe it either, although she'd never admit it to anyone. Quietly, she unpacked a parchment wrapped sandwich, Kind bar, thermos, and two bottles of water from a paper tote.
"You should eat," she informed Jarod softly. "Green Goddess on sourdough, loaded miso ramen, and something for that sweet-tooth of yours."
"What," Jarod asked, gazing up at Parker's face in disbelief when she unlocked the handcuffs, "starve a fever, feed a griever?"
"Eat," Parker demanded. "And don't try anything."
Jarod removed the cap from a bottle of water, and asked with some cynicism, "Why the urgency?"
"Did you forget how bad Centre food tastes?"
Jarod answered with a head-shake, and incisive one-note laugh, "Some things are too revolting to be forgotten. Are you going to smuggle food into the Centre for me like you did when we were children, or do you intend to finally make your great escape from the Centre?"
"Let's just-- get through this," Parker answered guardedly, and observed as Jarod sheepishly unwrapped the sandwich.
With an appreciative moan Jarod bit greedily into layers of avocado, frisée, watercress, radicchio, and arugula. He ate enthusiastically, licking avocado oil from his fingers, and immediately washed the sandwich down with an entire bottle of water.
"There aren't sedatives in that, I hope," Jarod said when Parker emptied the soup into a large sturdy paper cup. "No chopsticks?" He asked. "No, I suppose there wouldn't be," he murmured bitterly, his words clipped, his voice filled with anger, however, Jarod permitted neither anger nor grief to take precedence over fueling his body.
He tipped the cup carefully, incrementally, slurping soba, vegetables, and tofu, savoring each bite, and washed it all down with broth.
"Afraid I'll attack?" He asked, offering Parker the empty cup. "Using chopsticks?"
"The Centre knows what you're capable of," Parker answered softly, accepting the cup, and discarding it.
"They think I'm guilty, that Sydney's myocardial infarction triggered me, and, as predicted, I snapped, don't they? Was the soup transferred to a paper cup because a thermos, in capable hands, might become a weapon of opportunity? Do you think I'm guilty, dangerous-- after everything, after Carthis, after we-"
"Dessert," Parker reminded brusquely.
Jarod smiled sympathetically, and removed the bar's plastic wrapping. "Now this is interesting," he said. "Dark chocolate, nuts, and cherries. Mmm," he hummed. "Delicious. Would you like some?" He asked Parker, and observed her head-shake. "I'm sorry," he said. "I wasn't aware that the topic was off-"
Jarod's words dissolved to sudden silence when the jet jerked to life. Startled, he inhaled sharply, and rose.
Parker rose as well, and withdrew her gun from its holster, and cautioned in a low, tight voice, "Don't make them sedate you, Jarod."
"Them," Jarod asked darkly, "or you?"
"This is your only opportunity to find out who murdered Miuna, and why," Parker reasoned, relaxing fractionally when Jarod grudgingly sat.
"And then what?" Jarod asked, determined not think of Miuna, resolved only to escape. "I lose my freedom, family? And what about you? Do you think they're going to just let you walk away?"
Parker briefly contemplated the question, as if she truly possessed answers, or something approximating control, as if there were infinite options, or even a single alternative.
"If I recall correctly," Jarod said, "the deal you made to return to corporate was with your father. Do you expect the Centre to honor, or even acknowledge, that arrangement now that he's gone?"
Parker slowly sank into an aisle seat, and cradled her gun in her lap. "You should hydrate."
"Or the Centre will do it for me? Yes," Jarod said, "I'm all too aware. Are you?"
"Am I what," Parker said, irritably, observing him swallow the remaining water.
"Aware," Jarod clarified. "If you aren't aware you will be soon-- if they renege, if you aren't reassigned to corporate. You're going to have to prepare yourself, prepare to witness the barbarity firsthand, and actively participate in it. You can't intervene if they decide to coerce a relapse into my childhood drug addiction, stop my heart, clone me, ship me off to Malabo."
"Intervene," Parker repeated with some incredulity. "I might finally get some peace with you on another continent."
"Perhaps," Jarod said amiably. "Assuming they don't assign you to the Pretender project, and send you to another continent with me. If you think about it, think this all the way through you might find that peace is a lot more difficult to attain than you'd like to believe it is."
"You should worry about yourself," Parker advised tartly, tossing the handcuffs into the seat next to his. "And put these back on."
"Why shouldn't I worry about you?" Jarod asked, cuffing himself. Correctly interpreting Parker's single lifted eyebrow, Jarod demonstrated that the handcuffs were indeed locked. "Aren't you worried about yourself?"
"I'm not worried about anything," Parker answered crisply.
"Not even Sydney? How do you think he's going to react when he discovers what you've done?"
"Better than he'd react if I'd left you here to die," Parker answered confidently, however, the conviction with which she spoke was tenuous and ephemeral—was, in fact, a mere memory when the jet touched down in Blue Cove.
"Imagine you're somewhere nicer," Jarod whispered when he and Parker disembarked.
"What?" Parker asked, appalled that he would utter her name.
"You look like you're the one they're going to strip search, force into a shower, and toss into a cage."
"Yeah," Parker rebutted quickly with cursory glance at the evening sun, "I guess I dread working late as much as everyone does."
"I don't suppose I can change your mind about this. I feel like I should at least try."
"It'd be easier if you didn't."
"Easier for you," Jarod said. "Yes?"
"Don't give anyone here a reason to shoot you," Parker intoned neutrally. "You've lost enough blood already."
"Look at me," Jarod pleaded. "Please, look at me."
"I know this dance already," Parker asserted softly. "I'm sitting this one out."
"You know too much," Jarod warned. "They'll kill you before they let you walk away."
"Yes, that's been established already, thanks," Parker murmured sardonically.
"You don't want to do this," Jarod stammered, hesitating at the double doors that would deliver him to concourse seven. "You never have. You were going to let me go until Lyle arrived, weren't you?"
"You're really going to recite every page in the playbook, aren't you, Sigmund," Parker said. "Mom's next, right? You love getting off rubbing salt into open wounds, using Mom to manipulate me, but I'm not her, so save your breath, and keep walking."
"No, you certainly aren't your mother," Jarod agreed, and explained savagely, "because she would never do this me, and you don't need anyone to tell you how disappointed in you she'd be if she were here right now."
Words were presently the only weapons at Jarod's disposal; his were particularly injurious.
He observed Parker's face lose color, felt her shudder at his side, and he deliberately twisted the blade. "If your mother were still on speaking terms with you," Jarod admonished Parker impassively, "she'd tell you that herself."
Notably stunned by his words, Parker faltered mid-stride, discreetly clutched a handrail for support, and blinked away the tears blurring her eyes. She yearned for a flawless rebuttal to silence him, but none existed, and she was incapable of speaking, and, in fact, Parker was absolutely inclined to agree with Jarod.
"Your mother was murdered because she was trying to save both of us, and instead of fighting for her, for the people she gave her life to protect you are fighting her, so the snub is warranted," Jarod snarled. "But I'll bet she's talking to Ethan."
"Enough," Parker demanded in a strangled voice that appalled her, and her alone, to hear.
I'm not falling apart. A dozen more steps and fake smiles, and the tormenting ends, Parker consoled herself, lied to herself. She believed she'd never escape Jarod, that even death would deny her reprieve, liberation.
"Hardly enough," Jarod sang crossly. "Are you going to let them murder Ethan when he comes for me? Need I remind you that your mother was murdered-"
"Yeah, and I'll be murdered, too, if I try to stop this," Parker argued hotly. "Or is that what you want?" She purred, and observed Jarod's reflexive recoil and gasp.
"No," Jarod answered weakly. "You know it isn't," he whispered, turning his head towards the sound of rapidly advancing footfalls. "Lyle's coming," he cautioned, swinging his anxious gaze at Parker, and addressing her by name. "Shouldn't we be walking? Let's go," Jarod pleaded eagerly. "Now."
Parker tightened her grasp, and struggled to fashion a false smile with which to greet her brother.
"What's the hold-up here, Sis?" Lyle asked, irritably.
"It's me," Jarod remorsefully and hastily stammered. "I'm sorry, Mr. Ly-- uh," he said with a clipped grunt, prompting a frown from Lyle. Slowly dropping to his knees, Jarod noted Parker relinquishing her hold on the handrail, and palm-shaped condensation. He explained in a pained voice, "Eating all of that food on an empty stomach was a mistake."
"It's probably just all the excitement," Lyle assured Jarod with a cheerful smile and a light pat on the back.
"Excitement," Jarod murmured softly, handily concealing his revulsion. "Yes," he agreed demurely. "That must be what it is."
"You'll be good as new once you're in the infirmary. For God's sake, Willie," Lyle exclaimed, "get our Pretender here a wheelchair. I have to make some calls," he said, addressing Parker. "You got this, Sis?" Lyle asked, repeating himself when Parker didn't immediately answer. "Sis? Can you handle intake and processing? Jarod here doesn't look like he's going to give you any trouble."
"No, he doesn't," Parker agreed.
If only looks weren't deceiving.
