Part Eight

Broots had stumbled up the stairs, Ben on his heels, and after bumbling his way through his first few sentences, sat at the desk near Parker’s seat on the couch. Jim had gone into the living room and retrieved the laptop, then talked Debbie into joining him in an attempt to make a late lunch for the group.

Parker and Major Charles sat side by side on the couch nearest Broots, with Sydney in an arm chair nearer to the opposite sofa. Ben and Ethan, along with the other men in the room, watched Parker leaf through files and Broots begin typing in a terminal window.

“We need the location of a nearby satellite office – not too close and not too far – and the location of a separate Centre storage facility. We’ll have to access the blue box at night, when there is less chance of a confrontation with Centre employees. Cameras will have to be disabled. And it will need to be done within hours of when the mainframe back up takes place. The longer we have the blue box, the more likely the Centre is to catch us. Once we have it decrypted, we can come back here,” Miss Parker spoke, spreading the files over the table in front of her.

“B… but I thought we wanted copies of the information before it was decrypted?” Broots asked, scrunching his brow as he looked at Parker.

“We do. We’ll just take the laptop with us,” Major Charles answered, eyes focused on Parker’s hands as they swept over the tops of the files.

“We?” Broots asked, a look of dread sliding over his face.

“Yes, Mr. Broots,” Major Charles’ tone was amused. “You, me, Ethan, and Jim. You’re the only one who knows what this blue box looks like and where it will be. Ethan will access the encrypted information, and I’ll be your muscle in case there is trouble. Jim will wait for us at another location in case we get caught before we take the box to the storage facility for final decryption.” Before Parker could interrupt, the older man continued. “Parker will stay here with Sydney, Ben and Debbie. Someone has to ensure the Centre doesn’t catch us and to maintain contact with Jarod in case we need his help. The risk is greatest for you, if you are caught,” his eyes lifted from Parker’s hands to her face.

“This is my fight, Major.” Her voice was firm, mouth set in a stubborn line.

“This is our fight. Every one of us. We have all been used and abused by The Centre, and none of us want to see them get away with it. The only chance we have to break the cycle is this one, Parker. If we can find out why the Centre wants you, Jarod, and Ethan so badly, we may be able to stop them. But if you are caught, you’re damning your child to the same life you and Jarod have lived,” he argued, turning to the left to face her.

Broots concentrated on the monitor in front of him, trying to force himself to be oblivious to the argument going on around him, while Sydney and Ben watched with interest. Ethan closed his eyes, feeling the waves of emotion wafting from his sister. Sadness, frustration, anger, and so much pain.

“My mother’s plan… the one she wanted me to finish… this is it, Major Charles. This was the plan. Save the children, find out why the Centre stole the children. It’s about more than what’s in our blood, it’s about more than our gifts. It’s something so much bigger the Centre wants, and to get it, they need us. My mother died trying to save me – and Jarod and Ethan and Angelo. She died, Major. So many people have lost so much to that place, and you want me to just sit here?” She stood to her feet, fighting the urge to pace up and down the room. “Sydney, a little help?”

“I’m sorry, Parker,” Sydney answered in his trademark slow, deliberate voice. “I’m afraid the Major’s right. You have to do what is best for the child you are carrying, despite your drive for revenge.” Wise eyes followed Parker and the Major as the other man stood to his feet beside her.

“It’s not about revenge –“ she began, only to be cut off by the Major’s gentled tone.

“We know,” he broke in, taking her gesticulating hand in his and tugging her back down to the couch. “What we’re doing here won’t make right the wrongs that place has perpetrated. But we may be able to save others from the same fate, including the child.” For a moment, the Major forgot himself, time and barriers slipping from his mind as he placed his palm flat against the woman’s stomach, the warmth of his hand burning through the t-shirt above her low-cut jeans.

A child, wet and crying placed against a naked breast. Catherine Parker, the force of a bullet throwing her to the floor of the elevator. Angelo, scribbling in chalk on the wall of the SimLab, screeching “Terribilis est locus iste!” Broots, throwing the lights in an elevator as Miss Parker stumbled against him, blood dripping from a wound in her arm. Catherine Parker, standing at a cracked kitchen doorway, black eye standing out stark against her pale face. A young girl taking the seat beside a young Jarod, whispering into his ear, pressing her lips against his. Parker, holding the body of a man against her, blood drenching her white bathrobe as she sobbed against the top of his head. Jarod, falling to his knees on the coast of Carthis. Ethan, his arms wrapped around his sister as a fire smouldered around them. A rain-drenched Parker, falling to her knees in a graveyard of Parkers. Miss Parker, with fuzzy vision, staring up at Raines as he lowered a sheet over her legs. Thomas, wrapping his arms around a flannel-dressed Miss Parker, laughing into her hair as a smile broke across her face. Sydney, clasping a hand over a little girl’s, both dressed in black as people milled around them. Angelo rocking forward, muttering, “Illusions are real!” The images flashed as a black and white montage behind his eyes. Each flash lasted only milliseconds, falling rapidly into the next image. The rapid cycling of emotion and image made the older man gasp for air.

Jerking his hand away from her, he expelled the breath he’d been holding, words echoing through his mind. “My name is Jarod.” For a moment, he wished he had left his hand only a second longer – enough to see his son as a child, to see his Jarod happy with his young friend. He had not recognized all of the people, could not place every situation he had witnessed. More importantly, the Major had no idea what precisely had just happened.

“Sister?” Ethan called, breaking the silence of the room. What for the Major and Parker had lasted several minutes had, in reality, only taken the passage of a few seconds. “What’s wrong? What happened?”

Miss Parker sank into the couch, moaning low in her throat as she took her head in her hands.

“You didn’t see it?” the Major croaked, looking curiously at Ethan. At his confused expression, the Major tried to form the words to explain.

“Ethan?” the brunette interrupted. “My head? Can you…?” she waved toward the kitchen with her free hand, then experimentally lay it over Major Charles’ wrist. His eyes snapped immediately to her fingers. When nothing happened, they each let out a sigh of relief. “Those things you saw,” she spoke lowly, “that has never, I’ve never…” her words trailed off.

“W…what is going on?” Broots stuttered, “You don’t look so good, Major Charles.”

“I think I just saw into her memory,” his voice was quiet, filled with a sense of confusion.

“W…wh…what?” Broots yelped.

“Not my memory,” Parker rasped, letting go of the Major’s arm to accept the water and Tylenol Ethan was offering her, having blown back into the room. “It’s like the dreams, the premonitions. Sometimes they’re mixed in with the past.”

“You saw it?” Ethan frowned, crouching on the floor beside her. “I… I didn’t.”

Leaning her head forward against Ethan’s shoulder, “It wasn’t a premonition, Ethan, just flashes of the past, things I’ve been thinking about in the last few days.”

“Is it possible…” Sydney suggested, “that your gift is becoming stronger, Parker? Perhaps, as your pregnancy progresses? Your mother mentioned a similar progression, though I dare say she never projected her thoughts to others. The strength of your emotions could be causing them to project through physical contact…”

“All the more reason for you to stay here, at least until Sydney can ascertain the strength of it,” the Major interrupted, shaking the moment off for further analysis later. Catching her eyes with his, he softened his expression. “Miss Parker…”

With a short nod against Ethan’s head, Parker sighed. “You’re right. Someone needs to coordinate things from here, and if I’m with you… I’ll stay.” Ethan slid forward with her words, pushing his father toward the end of the couch and taking the seat between them.

“Here, lean on me, sister,” he spoke, voice quiet. Brushing her hair from her face, Parker offered him a smile and leaned her body toward him, understanding his need to be the one to offer comfort in matters concerning their joined gifts.

After a moment of silence, Ben and Sydney exchanged concerned glances, neither able to make eye contact with Major Charles, whose gaze had turned inward.

Clearing his throat for a moment, Broots interrupted the quiet. “I think, uh, I think I have an idea. The Denver satellite office is the closest one, and the next closest storage facility is in Portland. That’s probably not a good idea though, since Jarod’s already been there. So, how about the satellite office in Denver, then we travel to the storage facility that is in Denver? If we grab it right before we need to take it to the storage facility, we should have enough time to copy the drive, and get to the storage facility before the Centre knows what’s going on. We could leave in two days, on Thursday.”

“Maybe Jarod can divert Lyle’s attention, get him away from the Centre for a few days?” Sydney nodded to Broots.

“With any luck,” Parker interjected, “They’ll think it was Lyle… again. It should buy us a few hours, at least. We’ll have to work out some sort of system with Jarod, but as long as he gets in touch in the next few days, it should work.”

Snapping back to the present, Major Charles spoke, “Good work, Mr. Broots.”

“Thank you, Major,” Broots smiled, nodding his head rapidly. “I think with Jim’s help, we can also build a component that can be inserted into the storage facility’s backup server and will download all of the files on all of the Centre mainframes. It will take a little bit of time, but it would be worth having. And, I think we should also work on a chip that will give us remote access,” scratching his head, Broots continued, mumbling mostly to himself.

Utilizing his sense of timing, Jim called from the kitchen, “Lunch!” With the added assurance of

Before Parker could move away from the sofa, Major Charles reached across Ethan and took her hand. “Miss Parker… I apologize if I inadvertently invaded your thoughts in some way, but I must admit some of what I saw… was very confusing.”

Chuckling dryly to herself, Parker patted his hand and stood from the couch. “Tell me about it. I have a feeling this is one even Syd is going to have some trouble figuring out.”

Deep inside her, cells continued to divide.