Table of Contents [Report This]
Chapter or Story 
Chapter or Story
Part 4 - Allegro
Jarod closed the door to Sydney's room without a sound, having made him comfortable and knowing that he would now probably now sleep through the night. Having given Steven directions for taking care of him, Jarod felt confident about leaving. Not that he had told Sydney he was going. Had he known, the psychiatrist would have done everything he could to prevent him from leaving, even to the extent of calling Miss Parker to back him up. That was something that, right now, Jarod didn’t want to have to deal with. He smiled as he looked up to see his sister in the hallway.
“Going to bed?”
“Yup,” Jarod slipped an arm around her shoulders. “You?”
“Mmm-hmm,” she nodded. “Jarod?”
He smiled at her. “Yeah?”
“Are you in love with her?”
Jarod stopped short at the question, looking down at his sister in astonishment.
“It’s just,” she went on hurriedly, seeing that her brother was speechless, “I thought that, seeing the two of you together, she might mean more to you than just normal…”
There was a pause that was threatening to become painful, and which Jarod was determined not to break.
“And I wanted to know how to treat her,” Emily finished somewhat lamely. “You see if you were going to marry her or something, I’d have to behave a little differently than if she was just going to leave when everything died down.”
Jarod saw an easy way to avoid a difficult question and took it thankfully. “By the time all this dies down, we may all have had to leave,” he opened the door of his bedroom and stepped inside. “Good night, Emily.” Shutting the door in her face, he could hear her giggling as she walked down the hallway. Heaving a sigh of relief, he turned around.
Lying on his bed, clearly having decided to wait for him after visiting Sydney, was Parker. Obviously the stress of the day had finally caught up with her because she was lying, sound asleep and curled up the way he had seen her on the odd occasion that he had felt the need to sneak into her house. She was also moaning quietly in a way that threatened to break his heart. With a faint, sad smile, he pulled out of his pocket two letters that he had earlier written while still downstairs. Glancing across at the recipient of one, he wondered how she would react when she read what he had written, not explaining where he had gone, only his reasons for it. A similar letter had been written to Sydney, both of which the Pretender now left in plain sight on the bedside table, and then Jarod walked around to the side of the bed she had left for him.
Sitting down gingerly on the edge, he felt the mattress bend under him and he scarcely breathed as, looking over his shoulder, she saw him turn slightly towards him before lapsing into deeper sleep with a sigh. He stretched himself out on the mattress, gently reaching down to pull up a blanket that lay, folded, on the end of the bed and allowing it to rest on top of her. His own blanket was folded at his feet and, as he lay back with it in his hand, he stretched out one arm so that it lay on her. Immediately her mutterings stopped and he could see the faint smile that appeared on her lips. The urge was irresistible and he leant forward and brushed her lips with his own. It wasn’t a kiss – nothing so gentle could ever be called that – but it was contact and the action was enough to make her relax against him. He smiled as his eyes fell shut. She wouldn’t remember this the next morning, particularly when she was cursing him for leaving without her, but he would.
He checked through the last few things in his bag before heaving it into the back of the car and closing the trunk. Although he had been quiet, he had obviously wakened somebody because he saw the door open and then the smaller version of himself came outside into the faint sunlight.
“What are you doing up?”
“I want to come with you.”
Jarod shook his head. “No way.”
“Why not?”
Jarod leaned against the rear bumper bar and looked at the boy standing in front of him. It was, he had to admit, exactly the same way he would have reacted in the same circumstances.
“Because,” he explained concisely, “I need somebody here in case something goes wrong. I need you to look after Sydney for me. And, if I do get caught, I need you to help Miss Parker to get me out.”
“Would she?” The boy looked skeptical, but Jarod nodded.
“I’m positive. Will you do that for me? If you don’t hear from me in 36 hours, will you help them to save me?” He placed one hand on each of his clone’s shoulders and looked him firmly in the eye. The boy nodded.
“I promise.”
Jarod pulled the car into a gas station and looked over his shoulder. The large, cream-colored building was clearly visible to him and he gave an inward shudder. He never liked being in the area of the Centre and this time was worse because of the things he had to do. As the light around him began to fade, he got out of the car and filled it up, paying and leaving quickly. Everything had to be done quickly and none of it would be easy. He shook his head and looked at himself in the rear-view mirror. Shutting his eyes briefly, he put the mirror back to its former position and continued to drive.
She had been pacing for most of the last three hours and the psychiatrist was beginning to feel slightly dizzy.
“Parker, he won’t come back any sooner by you making laps around my room.”
She sent a glare in his direction but stopped when she saw him smile at her. “Are you deliberately provoking me, Sydney?”
He nodded. “Anything to make you stop. I’m feeling motion-sick just watching.”
She sighed and dropped into a chair. “I’m just edgy.”
“Why? We don’t even know if he went there.”
Miss Parker raised an eyebrow in his direction. “Of course he went there! Where else would he go?”
Sydney shrugged and then gasped at the pain. Miss Parker leapt to her feet and came over to him.
“I’m sorry, Syd. I forgot that you were still an invalid.” She gently touched his hand. “Is there anything you need?”
“Not right now.” He grasped her hand. “Just some quiet company.”
She smiled slightly. “Can I pace?”
He looked sternly at her. “As long as you do it without talking about it.”
“Agreed.” Miss Parker freed her hand and recommenced her pacing while Sydney shut his eyes and tried to ease the pain in his shoulder.
Jarod eased open the cover and dropped silently through it into the darkness of the air vents. He hadn’t been inside the Centre since Lyle had attempted to brainwash him, thus his feelings of repulsion at this moment were strong. If he didn’t have definite reasons for being where he was, he could thing of a lot of places he would rather be. Glancing to both the left and right, he began to make his way slowly and silently along the dark passageways, climbing down several ladders to come in behind an office of a familiar figure. He glared down at the head as it sat at the desk below him and had a strong urge to pull out his gun and blow out the brains of the man that sat there. Controlling his anger, he made his way along the passageway, finally arriving at his planned destination.
Miss Parker opened her eyes suddenly to see the blank wall in front of her. She had stopped short of walking into it as the image assailed her from some unknown source and she had felt powerless to stop it. As she faced the cream paint, she couldn’t resist the urge to put out a hand and touch it to make sure that it was real.
“Parker?”
She could hear the concern on Sydney's voice and turned.
“What is it?”
“I saw something. I saw…” She struggled to put a name to her vision. “I saw a person – going through darkness.”
“Jarod?”
Miss Parker shut her eyes and leaned against the wall, willing the vision to come back to her. The blackness was all that was visible, but she couldn’t be sure of whether it was due to the fact that she wasn’t seeing anything or that there wasn’t anything to see except the dark. With a deep sigh, she opened her eyes again.
“Relax, Parker. If there’s something you have to see, you will. This doesn’t come to you unless it really means something, we’ve established that.”
“Gee,” she answered sarcastically. “Thanks for the advice, Freud.” Turning, she abruptly left the room.
Jarod opened the vent and let himself down into the room below, gently and silently scooping the baby up out of the cradle and, ignoring a bag that stood nearby, picked up a pile of things from a nearby table and stuffed them into the bag he carried before awkwardly climbing back up into the darkness. It was the work of only twenty minutes before the two of them were out of the Centre. Jarod walked silently through the trees to the grove where the car was parked. He fastened the baby into the capsule in the back seat of the car and then, getting behind the wheel, allowed the back tires to spin slightly in the soft soil as he sped away.
“He’s got him.”
Miss Parker burst into the room where Steven was talking quietly to Sydney while he administered a dose of painkiller.
“Got whom?”
“My brother.”
“Lyle?” Sydney’s expression showed his nervousness.
“No, not him. The baby. He got him out of the Centre.”
Pulling up outside the tumbledown shack on the edge of the town, Jarod glanced over his shoulder at the baby asleep in the capsule. He pulled his gun out of the holster and exited the vehicle. After glancing carefully around, he walked over to the door of the shack and raised a hand to tap. Before he could do so, the door opened and his half-brother stood there holding a bag in one hand.
“She told me you were here.”
“Did she tell you anything else?”
Ethan shook his head and Jarod grinned. “Good. Then let’s get out of here.”
The two climbed into the car and it left the area as rapidly and quietly as it had arrived.
“Are you okay?”
“Fine, Parker. You can stop worrying now.”
“And who says I was worrying?”
Jarod grinned at the tone of her voice. “Okay, so you weren’t worrying.”
“I never said that.”
He shook his head in frustration. “Is my father there?”
“What…oh, yeah, sure.” He heard her handing the phone over and then his father’s voice was audible on the end of the line.
“Son, is everything okay?”
“Yup. We’ll be back as soon as we’ve pick up some more food. Of course, we’ll have to take a bit of a roundabout way back, but we should be there fairly soon.
“Take care of yourselves.”
“We will, Dad. You too.”
Jarod terminated the call and glanced across at Ethan.
“You ready to meet your family?”
“Half of it.”
Jarod laughed softly in order not to wake the baby.
“You’ve met the other half and I know what a fun experience that was for you. Let’s just stick with the nice, sane, normal half.”
Ethan looked at his brother out of the corner of his eye and with the hint of a smile on his face. “You’re sane?”
Jarod picked up the baby capsule and followed Ethan into the dark house. It was already past two a.m. and he had warned his brother when they drove up that the others would probably be in bed. The lack of light within the house told him that his assumption was right but he heard footsteps as he entered the living room and turned on the light to see his sister standing there. She took one look at the baby and took the capsule from her brother immediately.
“Where on earth…?”
“The same place,” Jarod grinned, “that the rest of us came from: the Centre. And now,” he glanced at his half-brother, “my body is beginning to forget what a mattress feels like so, if you don’t mind, I’d like to get us all set up so that I can go to bed.” He lifted the tiny form out and cradled it expertly against his chest as his sister watched, open-mouthed.
“When did you learn…?”
Jarod shook his head. “Bed. Now.” Placing one hand on her shoulder, he steered her in the direction of the stairs.
“Where are we sleeping?” Ethan asked, trailing along behind his brother, yawning tiredly.
“Dad said he’d set up a bed for you. If need be, we can rearrange things in the morning.” He led the way up the stairs and opened doors along the corridor until he found what he was seeking and he pointed out the bathroom before saying a polite goodnight and taking the baby into the room he had glimpsed earlier. Gently putting the infant into the crib and covering it, he lit the lamp in the corner and left again.
When he finally reached his own room, he eased his shoes off with a sigh and allowed his jacket to slip from his shoulders, dropping it in the corner.
“You’ll find it more easily in the morning if you hang it up.”
Jarod visibly jumped and looked over his shoulder to where she was sitting up and watching him.
“Hello.”
His answer was a wide yawn that made him feel as though he’d dislocated his jaw and he stumbled over to sit on the edge of the bed.
“What are you still doing up? It must be…” He trailed off to look at his watch but found that his eyes wouldn’t focus properly on it. He yawned again and felt Miss Parker's hands on his shoulders as she eased him backwards so that he was lying in her legs.
“Very romantic and all,” he joked sleepily. “But not the most convenient position for sleeping.”
She smiled down at him and ran a gentle finger down his cheek. “Then you’ll have to move.”
“Remind me,” he groaned as he swung his legs up onto the bed, “how one goes about that again.”
Sliding off her legs, he let his head fall back onto the pillow and groaned once more, looking up at her.
“Are you going to sleep too or were you planning to spend the night sitting there?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” she laughed. “It could be fun.”
“And dark,” he muttered, turning off the lamp that had been lighting the room during the conversation. “G’night.”
He felt her lower herself onto the mattress and creep closer to him. He put out an arm and she took hold of it and wrapped it around her waist. Whether she moved further or not, he never knew.
The room was fairly bright by the time he blearily opened his eyes later that morning. Yawning and stretching lazily, he sat up and looked around. The room was completely empty and he glanced around once more before contemplating rolling over and going back to sleep. As he was about to do so, however, the door opened and a head poked itself inside.
“Morning Steve,” Jarod muttered as he blearily opened one eye.
“Going to get up?”
“Hmm, not sure.”
“Are you sick, Jarod?” The sight of his father’s head in the doorway made the pretender sit upright in bed.
“No, Dad. Just contemplating sleeping in.”
His father laughed and then looked at his watch. “It’s already ten thirty. How much more sleep does a grown man need? Your sister and Miss Parker have been mothering that child for three hours.”
Jarod swung his legs over the side of the bed and groaned. “Could we please be a little less cheerful right now? It’s painful.”
“Jarod! Get down here!”
The call came from downstairs and was met with an immediate response as the Pretender stood up and, still barefoot, left the room at a rapid pace.
“I guess,” he heard as he began to descend the staircase, “that all he needed was the right incentive.
Jarod was still laughing from his father’s comment as he entered the room to find the two women of the house indulging in baby-worship. He stood in the doorway and watched for several moments before they noticed him.
“Are you awake now?”
“Umm, give me time to think about that.” Jarod grinned as he came over to them and sat down in front of them.
The baby held out his arms and Jarod picked him up and cuddled him. “How’s Sydney?”
“Not bad.” Steven came in and sat down in front of the group. “He had a slight fever last night but is better this morning. He wants to know when he can get up.”
“Soon,” Jarod responded to the look that Miss Parker was giving him with a smile. “Very soon, I promise.”
“Jarod?”
“Yeah?” He looked up to see her looking at her with a worried expression.
“Did everything go okay?”
He nodded as the baby began to squirm on his lap. “Without a hitch.”
“And why didn’t you take the bag?”
He looked up at her and his amazement was obvious. “How did you know?”
She refused to look at him for a moment and, leaning forward, he took her chin in his hand and forced her eyes to meet his. “How did you know, Parker?” Every word was carefully enunciated and he waited for her to continue.
“I saw you.” Her voice was soft and hesitant.
“When?”
”When you were creeping into the Centre. You were…”
Jarod nodded. “You saw it – with your inner sense.”
Miss Parker looked up at him and he could detect the fear in her eyes. “Jarod, I don’t know how to deal with it. What does it mean?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know. I don’t know why you saw us, but you obviously did.” He grinned at her, changing the subject abruptly. “As for why I didn’t want to take the bag, you could have worked that one out for yourself.”
“You were worried,” Miss Parker responded, realization dawning in her eyes, “that they might be able to track you through it.”
He nodded. “That’s also the reason that the few things I brought for the trip from the Centre are sitting in a dumpster outside the shopping mall where we bought replacements.”
She grinned at him as the baby reached up and pulled on Jarod’s hair, giggling with delight. The pretender gently released the tiny hand, passing the baby over to his sister and getting up off the floor.
“Where are you going?”
“To see Sydney.”
