Last Chance
Seeds of Destruction


It had been three months since Jarod had become an America’s most wanted star, and in that time they’d received almost 500 calls. Broots was excited by this, and wondered if they could get some sort of record. Miss Parker considered this high on her ‘list of worst things to happen to me’. Calls were coming in from all over the country, people seeing Jarod everywhere, as of such they ended up with having Miss Parker and Sydney in one jet, while Lyle and Willie took the other.

The worst parts, Miss Parker reflected, were the chronic jet lag (which day of the week is it?) and having to talk to the people who rang in. The best one she’d come across swore she saw Jarod at ‘that gas station talkin' to Elvis.’ Miss Parker hadn’t commented, what could you say, really? Though she now had Broots asking the nuts what they saw Jarod doing. Thus far the award winners had been ‘taking a piss,’ ‘sifting through my trash’ and ‘napping on a park bench’. It had saved them about 10 trips, and given Lyle something useful to do.

Sam had to drop her off at her house, he'd sat, watching in amusement while she tried to open the door with her car key. After she reached for her gun, he quickly got out of the car and moved to help her. “Thank-you Sam,” she said, and went inside. Her silver briefcase was dropped on the table she could locate, even in the dark. From in the living room a light switched on. Miss Parker resisted both the urge to roll her eyes and draw her gun.

Entering the illuminated room and ignoring the occupant, she headed for the liquor cabinet to pour herself a nightcap. Without turning around, she knew the armchair was occupied and the prospect of spending a night on the couch was unpleasant so she pulled off her heels and started for her room.

The bet as to whether he'd follow her was answered five minutes later when he sat down on the end of the bed. If he'd been 30 seconds earlier he would have seen her slipping on her nightgown.

“Something you want, Jarod?” she asked, opening one eye.

He cocked his head to one side and raised his eyebrows. She rolled her eyes. “Men,” she muttered.

“No. I am here for a reason, I need to know where the DSA’s are.” His tone was all business.

“I put them in Mama’s studio.” No one ever went in there, the room even had a fine layer of dust. If Mr Parker had ever ordered her house swept he’d no doubt tell them to avoid the room with the locked door.

Jarod nodded his head. “If you could leave it in on the coffee table I’ll pick it up.”

He wouldn’t even think of going in there by himself, he knew what it meant to her she realised.

She nodded and he got up to leave. She thought about asking him to stay for a moment but thought better of it. “Go see Sydney.” It had been extremely difficult to get through to either one of them recently. Cell phones couldn’t be used on the Centre jets and their phone lines had no doubt been tapped.

Jarod nodded and left.

The next morning she felt even worse than when she'd gone to bed, her legs ached, her eyes were tired and she had a splitting headache. Along with various other aches and pains.

Sam arrived at 8:00, though he didn’t beep the horn or go to the door she knew he was there. Sydney would no doubt claim it was her inner sense - she called it being punctual. She hadn’t left the DSA’s on the table like she’d said; instead hanging from a silver chain was a key. Jarod would understand.

Miss Parker got into the back of the car; Sydney had already been picked up. She greeted both men and promptly tried to fall asleep. Wishing idly that Jarod would hurry up and say his ‘final goodbye’.

Pointless, the entire day could be summed up in that single word. Lyle got pissed off at Broots for the sudden lack of Jarod sightings - he seemed to have wizened up about the calls he was getting. So to avoid his wrath all day Miss Parker sat in her office, listening to reports on the various people that Jarod could be taking shelter with and the various places he could be. Her name and Blue Cove weren’t on the list which amused her slightly. That night she left at 5 pm, instead of the normal 7 and 8, with Sydney and Sam, and pondered with them why she’d bothered getting out of bed.

The answer came on the Six o’ clock news.

“--tales of kidnapping, attempted murder, conspiracy, child abuse, murder and crimes against humanity.”

Miss Parker had been ordering take-out when she heard from the other room, the phone lay dangling off the wall as she followed the reporters voice.

“Video evidence has been given to this news station earlier today, now we have to warn you the footage you are about to see may disturb some viewers.”

The announcer disappeared, replaced with footage from DSAs: Jarod when he’d just been brought in, still asking for his mom and dad. The images changed and became Jarod slightly older, his first ever pretend, the Hindenburg. Jarod crying into Sydney’s shoulder became Jarod in the heat case, then Jarod in Apollo 9. The images kept changing and Miss Parker just gaped. He had actually sent it to the media.

The announcer reappeared, “That was just some of the evidence given to us, each one is dated as you may have seen in the bottom left of your screen below the ‘For Centre Use Only’ and next to the subjects name, ‘Jarod’. From what we can tell this child – now a man – Jarod was imprisoned for at least 30 years.”

The other announcer took over. “Just recently, in the last hour, we have received new information on the location of this ‘Centre’ and have handed this over to the proper authorities.”

Miss Parker leaned across the couch, grasping for her cell-phone (her other phone was still off the hook) while trying not to take her eyes off the screen. Speed dial 3 was hit and rang.

“This is Sydney.”

“Syd, channel 9 now!”

She heard his shuffling and then, “Oh my god!”

“I think Jarod’s saying goodbye.”

She clicked off the phone.

“--Some of you may recognise this Jarod from the later footage as he had recently appeared on ‘America’s most wanted’. Now this is not to count against him just yet as the note and testimonial of many others confirms this story.”

The images changed from the newsroom to what looked like some part of Vegas.

“This is Argyle, who says he has had dealings with both The Centre and Jarod.”

“Yeah, that’s Argyle A-r-g-y-l-e, and yes the Centre tried to kill me, Jarod saved my life.”

“Why did they try to kill you?” The reporter asked.

“Well Jarod was helping this little girl and ended up in a tight situation which I tried to help him out of, and they stuffed me in the trunk, they were going to kill me.”

“And Jarod’s helped you since then too?”

“Yeah, he helped me out of my own tight spot a year later, and saved me and my fiancée.”

The report continued, showing various people who told of how wonderful Jarod was, what he’d done for them. Finally, after almost six people (including one red head with a tale of a thumb less man kidnapping her) the ordinary news reports came on.

She grabbed her keys and mobile and was backing out of her drive way in record time. Her phone rang when she was less then 10 minutes away.

“Parker.”

“Have you been watching the news, Miss Parker?” Broots asked.

“Along with the rest of the country. Look Broots, I’m headed to the Centre I have to get to my brother. Now listen carefully, I want you to take Debbie and go, somewhere, anywhere. Just go.”

“Leave the Centre?” His voice squeaked.

“Yes. Do it now,” she ordered and could almost see him debating the idea over in his head.

“I … be careful Miss Parker.”

He hung up.

The car park was in chaos, people arriving and trying to get in, Parker decided that in the middle of the road was a fine place to park and ran the remaining distance to the lobby.

It was havoc in there too. Sweepers running around, secretaries trying to gather as many files as possible, Cleaners trailing after the secretaries and in amongst it all was Lyle. He looked positively ill.

“I want every file, every disk, every scrap of evidence that we can use against them. They may take us down but I’ll be damned if they’re not going down with us.”

At his order, three sweepers ran off and she ran towards him.

“What are you doing!?” she yelled above the dim.

“Protecting The Centre! What are you doing?”

“Protecting myself.”

“Good,” he turned towards the remaining sweepers, “Lock down as many sub-levels as you can.”

They to left; there was only Cox, Lyle and herself remaining.

Lyle glanced around before talking to Cox, he needn’t bother, she could hardly hear herself think, there was no possibility of someone eavesdropping on them.

“Go down to SL-27, I need it destroyed, everything gone.”

Cox nodded his understanding and left, motioning for a couple of men who were standing around to follow.

“If I were you, I’d get myself out of here, the feds’ will be here in less than an hour.”

She searched his face, looking for any sign of deception or trickery. Finding none she wondered, just for a moment what she’d missed in not having him as a brother. She decided it was the adrenaline.

“I just need to get some things,” she didn’t know why she was telling him this.

“I’ve already sent out someone to look for cousin … Angelo.”

“Thank-you.”

The only elevator available just happened to be the elevator she liked least, though she now knew that her mother hadn’t really died here it was still a symbol of lies and deception. But most of all it was a warning, they kept this elevator for her.

Angelo’s space was first, she’d never forgive herself if she didn’t find him, if Lyle was right (which she privately knew he was) then they’d only put Angelo in a cell, not a jail cell but worse, he’d be poked and prodded and then after he died, dissected.

The elevator doors opened and there stood Angelo, holding a box filled to the brim with Cracker Jack’s.

“Daughter free,” he muttered happily, removing one of the boxes and ripping it open.

“Angelo free,” she replied.

He hummed quietly and said “Tasty,” she supposed that it was a thank-you.

Next stop, nursery. Along the way they stopped at various sub-levels, people anxiously waiting to get in, they weren’t so anxious when she showed them her gun.

“Wait here, Angelo, keep these elevator doors open.”

She rushed along, hearing her baby brother’s fitful cries for attention. Baby’s are perceptive to the mood of their caregivers and her brother almost doubly so. Entering the room with her gun drawn she found no one, not even the nurse who was suppose to be looking after him around the clock. She's not going to be getting a reference, Parker thought wildly, but that didn’t matter now. Miss Parker scooped up the crying child, who immediately stopped wailing, grabbed a blanket and a carrier and was back in the elevator.

“Baby,” Angelo cooed, he was eating more cracker jacks and underneath the piles of boxes, she noticed a flash of silver.

“Surprise,” Angelo said, noticing where she was looking.

She smiled. Angelo may not know all the secrets and lies but he knew where to find them.

The elevator arrived at the lobby, the doors slowly opening, Miss Parker was just about to get out when Angelo pulled her back, “No, not that way.” He pushed the door-closing button and pushed down to SL-10. “Secret way.”

“Angelo I can’t crawl through air ducts with a baby.”

Angelo smiled reassuringly.

They arrived on SL-10 and went towards the Sim-lab, Miss Parker clutching the baby and Angelo holding his box. As soon as they got in Angelo dashed off towards Sydney’s office he was back a few minutes later carrying a metal box. “Sydney’s treasures,” he explained. He dropped the box on top of his own possessions and hurried to a darkened corner, what ever he did, a small entrance appeared near the door. “Hurry,” Angelo said going through the passage.

“What is this Angelo?”

“Just in case."

“In case of what?”

Angelo didn’t reply. The three of them continued along the ancient corridor, Angelo in front, as he seemed to know where he was going.

“Is this the way that Jarod escaped?”

Angelo shook his head ahead of her.

Miss Parker shrugged and continued following. Somewhere in the distance she could hear shouts, screams and the occasional shot, probably Lyle going down in a hail of gunfire, she thought.

Eventually they reached the end of the tunnel. Miss Parker looked around in frustration. “There’s nothing here Angelo!”

Angelo pulled her cell phone out of her pocket and started dialling, when he was apparently finished he handed it back to her and starting examining the brick wall they’d run into.

“Hello?” she asked.

“Miss Parker?” Jarod’s voice drifted across.

“Jarod?”

“Where are you? I’m at your house but you’re not here.”

“I’m in the Centre, I had to get Angelo and my little brother.”

Jarod cursed, “I thought that Angelo would get himself out. He did last time.”

“Last time he was on medication,” Miss Parker reminded him.

“Where are you, I’ll come and get you.”

“I’m in a passage way, Angelo led me here, it’s off from the Sim-lab.”

“The Sim-Lab on SL-10,” Jarod asked.

“Yes.”

“At the end of the tunnel there’s what looks like a brick wall?”

“Yes, it most defiantly looks like a wall.”

Jarod ignored her, “There’s nothing holding the bricks together, I removed the masonry when I was young, you can kick or push them through.”

She put down the phone and did as he said, sure enough the brinks toppled loudly on to the floor.

“Now you’re in the Centre’s original air ducts - before they upgraded them to make them nuclear explosion proof. Take the next left, then right, then continue straight on and you should find a ladder, it leads straight up to the roof.”

“And just how are we going to get Angelo, a box full of DSAs and a baby in a carrier up that?”

“Don’t worry, just be at the bottom.”

He hung up which annoyed Miss Parker even more. Nevertheless, she followed his instructions, glad that these air ducts were large enough to walk or at least crouch in.

They arrived at the bottom of the shaft, sure enough it went straight up, Miss Parker had no idea how Jarod was going to manage this one. She kept her brother occupied by playing with a toy from the Cracker Jacks, and kept herself occupied by thinking of names for her brother.

Her phone rang again, echoing all the way up the tunnel.

“Yes.”

“I thought it’d be too much for you to answer with hello twice.”

“How are we getting up Jarod?”

“You’re not,” said a voice from behind her.

“Jarod!”

He put the phone away and stepped out of the shadows. She took notice of the scratches and blood on his face.”

“What happened?”

“A couple of sweepers thought that they would give me one last beating. Willie’s idea most likely.”

“What happened to getting up?”

“There are already three helicopters up there, taking away all the tower members they can.”

“How did you get in?”

“Walked through the front door,” he said nonchalantly.

Miss Parker rolled her eyes. “How are we going to get out?”

“Same way.”

He turned and said hello to Angelo who looked extremely pleased to see him and offered him candy.

“Later,” Jarod promised and picked up Angelo’s box.

Jarod led them back the way he came, eventually stopping at a metal cover. He kicked it open and offered her a hand. “Now,” he said, “you’re a social worker, the baby and Angelo were found in a nursery down in the sub-levels.”

Miss Parker nodded and tightened her grip on the carrier; Jarod hit the call button for a nearby service elevator. It arrived a minute later and they piled in, Angelo at the back holding on to Miss Parkers free arm.

The doors opened to the lobby, it was still full of secretaries, sweepers, operatives and cleaners and now also full of federal agents, CIA and local police. Jarod adjusted the badge he'd got from somewhere so it showed obviously. They exited the elevator, making a straight line for the exit, Jarod blending in completely, looking around, checking on the occasional bond, no one looked twice at them.

The guards at the door did question them. They examined Jarod’s identification for a long while and asked him about the blood as another questioned Miss Parker.

“My papers? Identification?” She hissed at the man who’d been gutsy enough to question her.

“I’m at the police station filling out some forms on the latest neglected kid when suddenly a call comes in about this freaky place on the hill, chief says we need a social worker and lucky me, I’m heading out the door. Thus here I am, with this kid and what I assume is his father because I found him in the nursery. So if you want to take this screaming baby and his father - who has already bitten two other guards - be my guest.”

The agent very wisely backed off.

“Thank you,” Miss Parker said as she strode away.

“My car is over here. Yours is probably still being tracked.” Jarod said, leading them to an expensive convertible.

“Typical,” she muttered and began strapping her brother into the back car seat.

Jarod smiled and did the same with Angelo.

Jarod entered her hotel room looking rather annoyed, Miss Parker was playing with Jeremy on the floor, even though she insisted she wasn’t any good with children the little boy seemed to adore her.

“Tasty?” Jeremy gargled.

“No sweetie, no sweets and Jarod is in lots of trouble for giving it to you.”

Jarod smiled as the small boy screwed up his little face into a sort of pout.

“Jarod?”

The pretender smiled again and came to sit down beside them, tickling Jeremy on the stomach.

“Did you get the results?” she asked.

Jarod nodded.

“And…?”

“He is your brother,” Jarod said.

Miss Parker breathed a sigh of relief.

“And mine,” he continued.

“What!”

“The best I can guess is that Mr Parker didn’t know that Ethan was alive, he needed another project to gain leverage, so he did it again. Your mother's egg, my father's sperm.”

They both sat and looked at their little brother, who was completely unaware of the fact his biological mother had been dead for two decades, and his father was old enough to have grandchildren. “Sick,” she finally said.

Jarod nodded his agreement.

“Oh,” Jarod suddenly said and got up. A second later he was back with the remote and smiling when Miss Parker looked at him quizzically.

The television flickered on, Jarod rapidly changed channels until he had apparently found what he’d been looking for.

“Before we show you tonight’s program we’d like to rectify some points in a bulletin you may have seen a few weeks ago, in light of the recent raid on The Centre, we here at America’s most wanted need to apologise for being mislead and misleading the public on the case of one Jarod Charles.”

Miss Parker tuned out - she knew what the rest would say - and looked at Jarod. The relief on his face was obvious and there was also something else, he was calm, not something he normally was around her.

They watched for a few more minutes, Jeremy had fallen asleep.

“What are we going to do with him,” Miss Parker whispered.

The look of anger and frustration returned to Jarod’s face, “I don’t know, I think my father is a bit old to look after a baby.”

“I’m going to stay with him,” she said determinedly.

Jarod picked up the child, carrying him into the hotel’s second bedroom (Angelo was staying with Sydney down the hall) and placing him in the crib.

He returned to the other room and sat down beside her again, this time looking very nervous, she gave him another quizzical look.

He took a breath and after opening and shutting his mouth soundlessly a few times, managed out: “I’m sorry I wasn’t there, that morning.”

Miss Parker grinned strangely, “I knew you wouldn’t be, it would have been too dangerous, you were afraid I’d shoot you and besides, it’s not like I’m the first you’ve left in the morning.”

“If I could go back-” Jarod started. “But you can’t. Look it doesn’t matter now, we’ve got all the secrets, The Centre has been held accountable, Lyle, Raines and Mr Parker all got what they deserve, it all worked out.”

Jarod nodded, then changed his mind and shook his head, “Not quite everything,” he murmured.

She raised an eyebrow, noticing him moving towards her.

“I didn’t get to wake up with you.”