Jarod watched as more kids headed in, with some having twins. She was taking care of more than a few kids.

“I betrayed trust, everyone’s trust, even Broots’ trust, only for one thing, and I wouldn’t change it.” She moved forward and picked up about a six year old with red hair. She gave him to Jarod. “Meet Ronald. First Pretender kid. He’s Angelo’s son.”

What? Jarod stared at the little boy. He did have some traits of Angelo’s.

“And Stephanie, who is supposed to stay here but does run off to the other side.” Parker picked her up. “And fibs!”

“No, I don’t,” Stephanie’s twin said from a corner.

Stephanie touched her finger to her lip innocently, and then Jarod realized she’d been playing the cute diction game the whole time. “I wanted him to help,” she said. “He’s supposed to be the best one, and this is substandard care for too long. You are getting some extra weight around you so it worked.”

“Well, I can’t have my usual diet, it’s messing up my weight, but it’s not that bad! Mph.” Parker looked toward Jarod. “Here’s a blast from the past. Look at her eyes. Cute little Steph? Damien’s,” she muttered, setting her down.

Damien? “The ex-pretender?” That he killed to save Broots? Converted Pretender turned Cleaner for The Centre. “ . . . okay.” She better not pull out one for me. If she does, if she doesn’t share it now . . .

“Genes don’t change just because jobs do,” Parker groaned as she bent over for another one. “This is Lucas, he’s Alex’s. Say hello Lucas.”

“I don’t like him,” Lucas said.

“Sure you don’t. Back down you go.” Parker looked around. “And Eddie’s girl.” She picked up about a five year old. “She has no name, she was under a project called Rain and Thunder so she just goes by Rain and the other one goes by Thunder. She’s the last one, so breathe, you don’t have one here.”

Jarod exhaled heavily. “Showing kids of pretenders left and right suddenly, you could have started with that.” He looked out at them. “What about um?” Kyle. “Did he have one?” Did he have a niece or a nephew from his passed on brother?

“No, sorry.” Quick but simple. No relatives. She put Rain back down. “Mom knew I wouldn’t be old enough to do anything for the other files, but she knew I could be around to stop the next set of generational problems.” She motioned to the other kids. “Nobody counts kids on isolated farms. I made a deal with his brother to keep quiet.”

“So Jack’s brother and sister-in-law only had four.” Jack kept quiet about the pretender kids not being part of his family. “The other children’s parents?” Jarod asked. “Denise and Arnold?”

“They were in the wrong place at the wrong time. They aren’t coming back, and it’s not because they didn’t love their children.” Parker looked toward the others. “They’re okay. I’ve been here six months with them to get them through the truth too.”

“Taking care of all these kids and one sick woman?” Jarod couldn’t believe it. That didn’t sound like Parker at all.  “You should’ve told someone.”

“Ah, ah, ah. How to commit the perfect murder is about the same to committing the perfect crime,” she said. “The more that knew, the worse the chances I could steal them away. I involved Sydney for the medication she needed. I involved Broots because I had to get these cats out to better homes. I didn’t want you involved, period. The Centre sniffs your scent like dog to meat.”

“I took a period of rest.” Still. “You betrayed everyone you cared about, to rescue children?” He chuckled. “I approve.”

“Pardon me if I don’t jump up with pride, Jarod.”

“I kept trying to get social services to go to their home and see them alone, but you didn’t keep anyone there.” Jarod smirked. “You kept them here. Tricky, Miss Parker.” Aww. “You saved pretender kids. All of them. I really want to hug you?” He held out his arms. Wishing but knowing.

“No. Down. Away.” She backed away. “I don’t do hugs.”

He looked at the little Pretenders. “They all have the gift?”

“Of course,” she uttered. “Some are obviously genetic offspring, but not all of them.” She gestured to some others that were twins to the the pretender kids she just showed. “Cloning ring a bell?”

Oh geez. They weren’t all twins. “Cloning?”

“These are far from the only ones. You wouldn’t believe what’s been going on,” she admitted. “It’s a start though.”

He wasn’t the only guinea pig now. He gestured to her. “You took my truck out, didn’t you?”

“Your truck was better on the highway. I kept the PK and the others fed on decent food. Mostly. I can’t cook, it was worth the drive.” Her nose wrinkled a second. “Did it twice before too, just didn’t kick up much dust. You, I said no hugs!”

Jarod stole a little hug. He was so proud of her. She did it. She kicked The Centre out of her life! He never thought he’d see this day. “I want to help.”

“Of course you do,” she said. “I’ll get the others to the other home.” She saw their faces. “They are being expected.”

“They need taken care of,” Jarod assured her. “We’ll take care of the PK’s too. All Sydney had to say was children from The Centre were involved, I would have been right here to help.”

“He doesn’t know,” she revealed. “He just knew I was hiding out in a strange area for nothing to be wrong. None of you know anything. Clueless.”

“I know that you’re finally ready to get past The Centre. That’s all I need to know.” He tried to hold her hand but she resisted. “Same Miss Parker.”

“Shut up. I told you, no one knows anything.” She gave him a look of cold, hard steel back. She wasn’t playing. She was serious. “None of you know anything. About anything! I wasn’t kidding. Help me place these kids somehow, but don’t expect any kind of friendship.”

Well, she wasn’t going to change overnight. “I got sandwiches.”

“I don’t want a sandwich.”

“You didn’t sneak away in my truck today. It’s getting later,” Jarod suggested. “You have the plates laid out but no food. Kids will need sandwiches.”

“Don’t you still have a job to perform?” she reminded him.

“Nope, just quit. Just ran away in the middle of the night, couldn’t take it anymore.” There was a husband and two wives watching their own kids. They did it all those years without his help. They could watch them again until they found someone else to fill the position. 

There were a ton of kids there, some that had lost their mom and dad, and more who never even knew them, or never had any. Plus, it was clear there was more to this than Miss Parker knew. “Do you have a spare bedroom?”

 “No,” she said. “N.O. No! You can’t stay here.”

“Why not?” Still a lot of hostility built up inside of her. “It’ll be better if you had someone here to help with the problem.”

“You can help from a distance,” she pointed out. “A distance away.”

Nope, he wasn’t going. “No. Spare bed?”

“No. Are you kidding? Most of the kids sleep on the floor and on the couch in sleeping bags,” she said. “Some sleep near me. They find a place and park it.”

“I can find a place and park it, Parker.” Jarod smirked. He had her thinking about it. 

“Don’t ask me any questions about anything that isn’t about the PK’s. Don’t get too friendly. I’m not your friend.”

It didn’t matter how many times she said it. He’d never believe she was a solid enemy now. She just rescued pretender kids from the clutches of The Centre. “Did you get them all?”

“I got who was there. I found some outside help from the woman they used as the mother,” she said. “Maggie. I don’t know much else, she guided me to the records first before I found the actual kids. These ones all knew each other. Feel better?”

“Actually, yeah, I do.” Very. Except. “You sure about Kyle too? I don’t want to leave a little niece or nephew or clone of his behind. Just because he can’t be there . . .” 

“Yeah, well.” She moved slightly. “I admit it.  I don’t really know, there are so many.” She shrugged. “I do need help, Jarod. I don’t know who to go to for this. I was going to let things cool down and then have Sydney help somehow.”

“There is no cool down for The Centre,” Jarod disagreed. “They pursue no matter what. Sandwich?”

“Oh for the love of!” She crossed her arms. “Fine! Give me one sandwich, then feed the rest of them. You got enough for all of them or do I still have to trudge out of here for some drive in food?”

“Drive in food?” The nearest town was nearly an hour away. “Parker. If there’s food, I will fix some.” He moved past the gawking curious kids and went to the fridge. Nope on food. “We need to go shopping.”

“If you tell anyone about this, Broots or Sydney, I swear I’ll kill you.” She went over to the cupboards and pointed out the mac and cheese’s and ravioli cans.

“Yeah,” Jarod agreed as he grabbed three boxes of macaroni. “We need to go shopping.” He wasn’t surprised she lacked cooking skills. Instant food or fancy restaurant food was all she had ever known. “Relax, Parker. I’ll take care of it. I’ll show you how to cook real food for yourself too.”

“I am fine with a sandwich.”

Nope. “Everybody’s getting full bellies tonight.” 

“No, Jarod, you can’t just walk in here and . . . and just start fixing sandwiches like it’s been a week.”

Yeah. Carthis definitely wasn’t a week ago. It was years ago. “Not much to say. I had to stay farther away or you and your crew would die. Compliments of Raines. I didn’t want anything to happen to Sydney, Broots had a daughter to take care of back then, and you? Well. Things . . . just didn’t end real well I guess.”

Heh. Life. It was never dull outside of The Centre. Who knew he’d be ending the evening cooking at ‘Aunt Bar’s’ with Miss Parker and a ton of interesting kids. “It’s great to be free, isn’t it? Never know what will happen.” He noticed a side step of Miss Parker. Yeah. Well. She better get used to it. He wasn’t leaving her presence until every kid there was safe and sound with a new life. “Did you tell them to frog up my chili?”

“Distraction, I needed real food,” she complained.

Yeah, and the weight gain? It wasn’t pregnancy, that was very certain. It was the rapid change in her diet. Some nights fat enriching cheap foods, others when she couldn’t get away, scraping by on ravioli’s. Without a proper diet, she was changing. She was doing what she could though, with what she had. 

Jarod stole a quick look around. The property was decent, but it would never have lived up to Parker’s standards. None of it, she liked luxury city. Six months out there. Even looking at her? It all took a toll on her. She hid and stayed out of the way, yet played doctor and nanny to the kids?

It wasn’t her element at all. Getting out into the thick of the problem. She did it for the kids though. The PK’s, and the poor kids left behind with Aunt Bar, who couldn’t really even take care of herself well. “How did you survive this? You’ve never been a bright and blooming mother type.”

She almost looked offended. “Oh. Jarod. I’ve survived much worse.”

When? It was clear she believed that. When had she hunkered that far away from The Centre, that isolated? That bare with no makeup? She never seemed like she’d be caught dead without it when he knew her. “You should get some better clothes on. You could have shopped for clothes.” She was wearing virtual rags with a hood. It kept her from being seen clearly, but she shouldn’t be hiding in it all the time. “Do you have better clothes?”

“It’s best to stay out of the way and unseen,” she answered back. “I like watching things from behind the stage. I don’t want to be on it.” Something in her voice again that just didn’t sound like Parker. Her eyes too, they had glazed over when she spoke. She walked away toward the couch. “Regulars, this way. Let the PK’s drive Jarod crazy for a bit.” The regular kids left the room with her.

“Well, food, soon,” Jarod said. He was glad Parker took the others, the issue of parents would be coming up and it wouldn’t be easy to talk about around the ones who just lost theirs.

He’d left his attention strictly on Parker during their conversation but now it was time to open it back up to all of the kids that were and had been making their presences known. Some had been badgering him to cook faster, thanking him for having cooking skills, some still asking to go out and eat somewhere, and some just stating how much he shouldn’t have shown up. All dancing around him like monkeys needing attention.  “Hey, hey?” He spied the girl last time that was around earlier that day. “No frogging the macaroni or nobody eats it tonight.”

“I’d still eat it!” 

“Nobody eats raw frog tonight.” Prepared correctly, fine. Out of the thick of the wilderness? Not fine. “I’d have to fix more food,” Jarod said, spying Alex’s boy who said that. “It would just take longer, Lucas.” He looked at the twin pair but they pointed at each other. Were they each given the same name too?

“Jarod?” He felt Stephanie pulling at the hem of his shirt. “You’re a pretender.”

Not surprising Parker warned them about him. “Yes,” Jarod said as he started to fix the simple macaroni. Parker could have done it, but she’d already done a lot. 

“Are you married?”

Typical kid questions. “No.”

“Do you have kids?”

“No.”

“Do you have grandkids?”

Jarod smirked. “You usually have kids to have grandkids. So, no.”

“Great grandkids?”

Kids were missing the concept. “No great grandkids either.”

“What was your favorite pretend?”

Hm, that was easy. “I liked flying. My dad flew.”

“You knew your dad?”

“I eventually got to know him.”

“Did you know my dad?” Stephanie asked him.

Oh. I killed your dad. He sighed. “Little.”

“What was he like?” the other Stephanie asked.

“What was my dad like?” Eddie’s daughter Rain said, bouncing over toward him. “What was he like?” Thunder asked from beside her.

“What was mine like too?” Ronald asked Jarod.

“Aunt Parker said that our dads were a mix of terrible and awesome,” Stephanie said, still pulling at his shirt’s hem. “She wouldn’t tell us who was who?”

Hm. “That’s . . . .that’s because it doesn’t matter,” Jarod told them. “It doesn’t really matter. You are all different.” Some were natural kids and some were clones. It was better not knowing at that age the differences yet. He doubted Miss Parker even knew who was who either.

Geez. He remembered when he first met Major Charles, it was hard to believe The Centre had actually been experimenting with cloning. Now? It looks like they had refined it into an art. Terrible.

“You express too much emotion for a simple question,” Lucas said, staring at Jarod. 

Ah. He definitely had some of Alex in him. Jarod nodded toward him. “True. Some of your dads I’ve had experiences with. Good and bad, but it doesn’t matter.” He looked at the eight potential Pretenders around the room again. “What made you biologically is not going to make you the same to anyone completely.”

“What about mine?” Ronald still insisted. “Do I look like him at all? Do we look like what our dads looked like?”

“I wouldn’t if I were you,” he heard Miss Parker utter.

Jarod glanced behind him at Parker sitting on the couch. He knew what she meant. He couldn’t lie though to Angelo’s family. It wouldn’t be right. “You do look like your dad does.” Subtle but enough.

“Does?” Ronald asked. “I thought he was dead? All of the dads are dead.”

“Your dad . . . he isn’t dead.” Jarod couldn’t bend the truth as much as it hurt. “Your dad isn’t . . . ready for society,” he settled on.

“He’s crazy?”

“He’s been changed by The Centre in a way that makes him different from whom he should have been,” Jarod said, knowing the truth always hurt. “His name is Angelo, and he’s still at The Centre.”

“Did you know mine too? Do I look like him?” Stephanie kept a hold of the hem on his shirt. “Jarod?”

“Do I look like him too?” the other Stephane asked.

“Do you know anything about our mom?” Lucas, Alex’s boy asked.

“Is it almost ready?” One of the regular kids that actually belonged there interrupted.

Good. Jarod could deal with that kind of disruption. “Food takes time, and I am making more than one box to feed everyone.”

“Aunt Parker makes one box at a time,” Judith said judgingly as she came back into the room. She definitely had a trust issue with losing her parents. “The most hungriest eats faster. She’s better at cooking than you.”

Jarod heard a small chuckle escape Parker in the background. Or she doesn’t know how to cook away from the directions on the box. That was way more likely. “Not everyone does everything the same.” He eyed her extra close too. She was also one of the kids that had been around when the chili got frogged. “Definitely not a good idea to do anything to the food since there’s a large portion of it.” Jarod looked through the cupboards above and beneath him too for stuff to add to it. “Green beans.”

“I hate green beans!” Some of the kids yelled from behind.

“I love green beans!” Some others yelled.

Optional side dish. Check. He looked deeper for things to add that Parker wouldn’t have outright eaten, but since she didn’t cook, wouldn’t be going after. Beans as a side dish? Okay. There wasn’t anything to mix with the mac that well. Most of it was bare except for all the different quick ravioli’s and mac and cheese. Never going to get far in the world if she doesn’t learn how to cook. 

Seattle, Washington. Same Time.

"How does this place even run when food comes out like this?"

Kimberly heard another complaint about her cooking. Complain all they want, they were the ones who came by for the damn food. What did they expect, star quality at two fifty a burger?

"Even the toast is burnt."

So was the tip probably now, but usually she didn't get it. No decent cook was taking the job in that place on the salary it gave out. She flipped a burger. A little burnt. Edible, whatever. A little bit of ketchup would fix it up. She added the cheese. Shit, that was supposed to be added on the grill. She felt distracted today. In fact, she felt like she was getting sick. The flu? Just what she needed.

She plated the cheese, the bun, and the burger. She added extra ketchup and onions and pickles to make up for the mistake. Damn. It didn't look too burnt, but her head. Her head was downright feeling dizzy. This always happens to me when Cuyler finds me. The dread of what he would pull her into.

He didn't find that hole in the wall yet. He wasn't involved yet, he just found the ice cream truck. It'd be fine.

Back to Georgia. Nowhere.

As the kids ate, relaxed, and found their place in the strange house, Jarod came over toward Miss Parker. She was on the couch, currently a willing/unwilling pillow to Alex’s kid. He knew from her words that The Centre was involved in new things he didn’t know about yet.  He did manage to find some tea, and remembering Carthis, decided trying to take her some wouldn’t be a bad way to start this conversation.. “Everyone’s asleep.”

She looked at the tea a moment and took it. “Guess so.”

“A lot of children here. They won’t be able to stay together,” Jarod admitted. “They’ll have better lives though. Thanks to you. Aunt Bar couldn’t watch them in her condition. I never knew where they went to, Jack wouldn’t tell me. I’m glad it was somewhere safe.”

“I am not safe.” She had a distant look in her eye. “I am far from safe? I am . . .” Her voice seemed off, almost like she was uncertain of what she wanted to say. “ . . .  the definition of, um, bitch?”

Jarod shook his head. “No. You helped those kids.”

“I didn’t help you,” she muttered. “You spent your life behind glass. I never lifted a finger.”

“I don’t think I was on your list of things to be worried about.” Jarod grabbed his own cup of tea. “You couldn’t have broken me out.”

“Yes, I could’ve.”

Jarod just lingered on her. The way she said it. It was almost like a fact. “It took a genius, and it took me a very long time. Mister Raines’s daughter or not, I knew that.” He never could have even asked. “You’d just get yourself killed.”

“Yeah. I chose to not free you and live a comfy life.”

Still. There it was again. Did she finally develop a conscience about it? “It’s not your fault, Parker. The chasing me afterwards? That was your fault. You know that all I ever wanted, was you with me.” He’d told her that, ever since the first time she chased him in February. He backed off more when he found Thomas for her. Then with Carthis? “We could have had some great times.”

“Things trigger things. Plans trigger things that can’t be changed.” Her tongue rubbed across her teeth, almost like a regret. “Sometimes, even when you find the good, you can’t escape the bad.”

“I’d never blame you for not getting me out.” It would be too dangerous.

“I paid a very big price for it happening.” Her voice slightly shivered. “Fate won’t let me escape. The fact that I have done everything I could to make you stay away from me and still? I end up stuck with you is proof of that.” She yawned. “You were like my mother, Jarod. I couldn’t save you anymore than I could save her.”

“I know.” Of course he knew that. “Just, forget it. Have some tea. It’s a new beginning, right? No more Centre. After this, do you need help finding a place?” She didn’t answer. There was no reason for her to still be so distant. “Do you need help after this, Parker?”

“You can’t help. No one can help me,” she openly admitted. “I just go round and round and round.”

“Like a record, Baby?” he teased, having had heard the song.

“I owed them, those kids aren’t justification of helping to be a good person. It was dues.” She looked away. “No, I don’t need help. I’ll be going back to The Centre.”

What?! “You’re kidding. You just freed yourself.” Ugh! “Parker, it’s too dangerous. Look what you just did. What if they catch you?”

“Then they kill me, no big deal.” She sipped her tea like he just said it was raining. It completely bypassed her like it was nothing.

“No Centre. Stay.” Jarod had been refused before. It had really hurt the last time, no matter how long ago it had been. With that reaction though, he had to ask again. “I can get you out. I can keep you safe. The Centre will never find you. You can make a new start.”

“This many years later and you still use that same old song and dance. I have to go.” She wasn’t budging. “Once these PK’s are OK.”

“Then why bother being out here?” What was he missing? “Do you feel like your mind is your own?” Maybe they had messed with her brain surgically.

“That’s such a loaded question I really want to laugh,” she answered back. “I know that staying away from The Centre.” She seemed to roll her tongue around in her mouth. “It’s a break, at most. The Centre is my future. The . . .” She was hesitant about something. “I don’t know, but . . .” She bit her lip lightly. “I dream and I feel . . . me in different places. Different pasts and different times. Different memories. I know that doesn’t make sense.”

“Try and explain,” Jarod said. “I can help deduce what’s going on if you trust me?” Then maybe they could get it reversed.

“I see me, in high school. My parents just won a trip to Florida.”

Okay. Interesting.

“I also see me, middle school age. Small town elementary. Struggling with decimals in math.”

She felt like different people, and herself?

“I also see me dealing with an annoying you while I’m trying to serve ice cream from a truck.”

Okay, now he was in it? 

She almost choked. “I’m going insane, Genius Boy.”

“No. The Centre is messing with your mind,” Jarod said. “You’re not insane.” He touched her hand with his. “I don’t know what it’s up to, but that’s just more reason to leave it and not go back. You said yourself, that no one knows what is going on inside there. Let me in, Parker.”

“The life, where I’m going to Florida soon. I’m excited. I’m pretty sure I am going to meet you. We busted out at twelve,” she said. “I guess it’s like a combination of old memories except . . . I know it’s not memories. It’s the here and now. They didn’t have that game on phones. They didn’t even have those graphics, period.”

“It feels like the here and now.” Jarod was trying to understand it. He was silent a few minutes, using his brain to the best capacity he could.

The Centre was trying to make her feel like past memories that didn’t happen, were happening now. Why? Were they testing some kind of re-education mixed with memories? Maybe her inner sense mixed with some kind of re-education was the cause of her feelings. “Have you thought about the possibility that The Centre has tried a new re-education technique, and your inner sense is clashing with it?”

“Re-education? You mean making me believe in what I’m seeing actually happened?”

“Yes, in segments in the past. A phony, made up life,” Jarod said. “Re-education, in their hands, is powerful on the mind. Not every mind is the same though. The parts of yourself that you see, they are just parts of a past they tried to conjure up. Nothing more.”

“It is my imagination. I know it is,” she said, “but my mind still feels it. Like, it’s real, and it’s happening. Now.”

“It’s in your head.” Jarod would have to look into that. With enough time, re-education would weaken against her. “The longer you stay away, the less The Centre’s work can harm you. Time can heal you. But you must stay away from The Centre.”

Miss Parker looked toward the children around her and then back at him. She sighed and then swallowed. “Every instinct in me says it’s wrong, while my mind wants to scream that you are right.”

“Leave the Centre.”

“It can’t be real but you don’t know how real it feels.”

“Leave the Centre.” Jarod would keep repeating himself. She would not heal from The Centre’s treatment of her, until she left it behind. “I will help you set up a new life. I will help you get these kids placed.”

“I hate . . .” She seethed. “Not being able to cook! I’ve tried, I got meat and chicken once. I feel like I could? I can see myself doing that. Fixing pancakes and sausage. I see myself as someone who would be good at taking care of kids too, but I can’t . . . here. I can’t do several things, but I feel like I could.”

Jarod waved his hand in front of her face, bringing her back. “This isn’t a question anymore.” The Centre was messing with her mind. “I’m a very good doctor.”

“Pretend doctor,”she reminded him.

I say she isn’t of sound mind to make the decisions right now. He wasn’t accepting any answer of yes or no from her now. “I’m staying here with you. Get some rest.” Whatever The Centre did to her, it messed her up badly. Would he be able to pull her out of it?