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Chapter or Story
Disclaimer: The Characters Miss Parker, Sydney, Jarod, Broots and The Center are all property of MTM, TNT and NBC Productions and are used without permission. If I owed them we'd still be watching new episodes.
One Good Turn Part 2
A Missing Pretender
By Phenyx
Miss Parker strode down the hallway. Arms crossed and heels clicking a sharp staccato through the corridor, Parker's glare discouraged anyone who might be foolish enough to stop her progress. She'd been back at work for a week now and no one aside from Sydney had been reckless enough to inquire about her health.
To the casual observer, Miss Parker seemed to have no lasting signs of her ordeal in the river. She'd spent a couple of days in a local hospital but had quickly returned to Delaware. Within forty-eight hours she'd been admitted again when fluid had started collecting in her lungs and she had developed a moderate case of pneumonia. Even now her doctor's had told her to take it easy, give herself time to heal. As a result, Parker was working shortened hours and spent all of her spare time sleeping.
But Sydney alone knew of Parker's semi-invalid status. Only someone who knew her very well would recognize the weary lines of fatigue around her eyes. Parker's sharp tongue and vile temper kept others from noticing that anything was amiss.
Parker had few recollections of that day in Ohio. She could remember her sudden fury at knowing Jarod would escape her again. She remembered starting across the ice. The rest was a blur. There were vague feelings of bone chilling cold and a far away sensation of panic. More than a month later, Parker still had a constant sensation of cold. She just could not shake the chill in her bones.
Of Jarod and his current status, Parker knew nothing. She and her team had been searching The Centre mainframe for some sign of him but they had found no trace. Parker was becoming very agitated about it.
She dreamed about him at night. Parker's dreams were disturbing, fractured images of Jarod. In her dream, Jarod's face was as pale as death and his lips were tinged an eerily corpse-like shade of blue. Blood ran down his face in rivulets from a cut on his forehead and his eyes were wild and filled with panic.
For the past month, the dream image of Jarod had been silently yelling at her. Parker could see his lips and mouth moving and she knew he was saying something but she had not been able to understand him. Parker sensed that what Jarod was trying to tell her was incredibly important but she couldn't comprehend his words. Until last night.
In last night's dream, Jarod's pale, blood streaked face had appeared to her again. Only this time, with a rush of sound like waves breaking on the rocks, Jarod's voice had screamed at Parker loud and clear.
"Just once you will do as I tell you!" Jarod yelled at her in the dream.
As Parker gasped and surged toward consciousness, Jarod's voice had followed her into wakefulness, "Please, oh please, oh please."
The murmured chant seemed to hang in the darkness as Parker woke up. The dream had seemed so real that for a moment, Parker had looked around the room, expecting to see the pretender at her bedside.
The nightly visions of Jarod urged Parker to even greater zeal in her search for him during the day. The escalation of the intensity of her nightmare caused Parker an increased sense of urgency. She felt a deep need to find Jarod. And she needed to find him soon.
Broots seemed sure that Jarod had not been transferred. A transfer of such importance would have left a trail in the system somewhere. But they had found nothing.
Lyle was irritatingly tight-lipped and refused to reveal any knowledge of Jarod's whereabouts. Parker knew that Lyle had Jarod well hidden somewhere within The Centre. She suspected that Jarod was being moved regularly to prevent her from locating him.
Raines of course had disregarded Parker's requests to see the pretender. The wheezing ghoul had offered Parker a handful of thinly veiled threats regarding her obedience and had placed her on a new assignment. Parker had blatantly disregarded both the threats and the new project. Eventually she would need to do something. Broots was becoming visibly more anxious with each passing day and even Sydney was beginning to have that hunched, hunted look to him as he hurried through the halls.
Life at The Centre was far more dangerous now than it had been in the past.
With a huff of impatience, Parker burst through the doors of her office to find Broots and Sydney waiting for her. She glanced meaningfully at Broots with an unspoken question in her eyes.
Broots nodded. "I swept the room again. I found another listening device and flushed it down the toilet."
Parker sighed. "We are finding these things too easily. Either they are being sloppy or we aren't finding everything."
"Broots checked the room three times, Miss Parker." Sydney reassured her. "He was very careful."
"Especially since I've found these." Broots whispered as he held up two silver disks.
A wicked grin broke out across Parker's face. "You got them." She declared.
"I've made a habit of stealing DSA's from Mr. Raines." Broots said nervously. "Swiping two from Lyle wasn't too hard."
Parker cocked her head at him. "Why, Broots, you old dog, when did you grow a pair?"
Broots tried to laugh but the nervous hiccup came out sounding more like a cackle. Moving in fits and jerks of anxiety, Broots moved to the desk and placed the first disk into the DSA player.
"I can't vouch for the quality of the image." He said. "I made copies of the original disks so that Lyle wouldn't miss them. I made them pretty quickly so there may be a little degradation in the picture."
"As long as you got some valid information on Jarod," Parker said sharply. "I'm not looking to sell tickets."
"I got something, all right." Broots said. "These disks are the entire visual recording on him since he was brought in a month ago."
"We should be able to figure out where they are holding him." Sydney chipped in.
Parker nodded grimly. "Can we see where he is today?"
Broots activated the disk and punched in the time frame they were looking for, "This was recorded early this morning." The technician said.
An image of a darkened room appeared on screen. Cinder block walls enclosed a barred cell within the tiny space. The room was bare except for a thin mattress tossed on the ground near a cement wall. Huddled in a ball on the mattress lay a wrinkled bundle of rags. With a muffled groan, the mound moved slightly and then rolled over.
Jarod was curled tightly around himself, hugging his knees to his chest while he slept fitfully. His face was dirty and unshaven. Bruises and dried blood mottled his cheeks and his jaw. Dark circles smudged the skin beneath his eyes and he whimpered pitifully for a moment before he sighed heavily and fell back into a deep sleep.
Parker sighed with relief. At least he was alive. Jarod looked like hell but at least Parker could now prove to herself that he was alive.
Pointing at the screen, she looked at Broots and demanded, "I want you to screen this recording every which way you can possibly image. I want to know where he is."
Broots nodded and slid into her chair as Parker vacated it.
The next few hours passed slowly. Broots calculated the dimensions of the room visible on the DSA and painstakingly narrowed down possibilities on a detailed blueprint of the facility. Parker spent most of the time pacing the office in irritation.
Long after the regular workday had ended, Broots abruptly cried out, "Bingo!" He grinned. "I've got him."
"Where?" Parker hissed as she and Sydney both hurried to the technician's side.
"SL-20." Broots said, typing frantically at his keyboard. "I should be able to tap into the surveillance system and pick up a real time image."
With a few expert manipulations at Broots' computer, an image appeared on the monitor. The room itself was the same one from the earlier recording but the setting had changed slightly. In the middle of the area sat a small table and a wooden chair. On the table was a metal tray like the kind you find in a cafeteria or a mess hall. An unidentifiable mottled brown substance could be seen on the tray.
Lounging nonchalantly against one wall, arms crossed lazily, was Lyle with an amused smirk on his face. In the opposite corner, pressed against the wall as though trying to melt into the concrete was Jarod, shivering miserably.
"Damn." Parker whispered. With Lyle in the room, it would be impossible to go to Jarod right now.
Parker frowned. There was something odd about Jarod's behavior. He wasn't acting right.
"He looks ill." Broots said as if he could read Miss Parker's thoughts.
Jarod's arms were wrapped tightly around his body, hugging himself. A thin sheen of perspiration covered his skin. Deep circles under his eyes gave Jarod a gaunt, sunken look. His eyes were wild and angry.
"Give it to me." Jarod growled in a raspy hoarse voice.
Lyle shrugged. "Do as you are told, Jarod. Then you will get your reward."
Jarod sighed in frustration and ran his shaking hands through the sweat damp hair on his head.
"Jarod," Lyle said sweetly. "You haven't eaten in days. I don't understand your hesitation in this. It is perfectly good beef stew. I finally convinced Raines that you didn't need that green slop." A wicked smile spread across Lyle's face. "You should be thanking me, Jarod."
Jarod shot the other man a furious look. "Go to Hell." He growled.
"Jarod, Jarod, Jarod." Lyle sighed. "What have I done to deserve your anger? I get you good food. I bring a table and chair so you can regain a little dignity. Why do you treat me this way?"
"You know why." Jarod responded with a hiss.
Lyle shook his head in a long-suffering gesture of futility. "I'm really trying, Jarod. I'm trying to put my sister's death behind me. You didn't mean to kill her, I know that. But the fact is, you were responsible for the accident. Am I holding that against you? No. Am I punishing you for killing her? No." Lyle shrugged. "I am offering you a truce, Jarod. Just eat the stew."
The trio watching the monitor gasped as they realized what a terrible lie Jarod was being told.
While Lyle spoke, Jarod's shaking became more pronounced and he grimaced in pain. His lower lip trembled when Jarod whispered, "Lyle, I need it." He said miserably.
"Yes." Lyle purred sadly. "I know you do. Do as you are told and I'll give it to you."
Jarod slid miserably down the wall and into a crouch. Clutching his middle, Jarod heaved a broken sigh and groaned.
Lyle grinned, sensing that victory was near. "You need to eat, Jarod." He said.
Glaring up at his tormentor, Jarod shot Lyle a look of pure hatred. Pulling himself up slowly, Jarod staggered across the cell to the table. Without bothering to sit, Jarod grabbed up a spoon and started shoveling the food into his mouth. Swallowing huge mouthfuls, barely stopping to chew anything, Jarod gulped down the contents of the tray.
Finishing minutes later, Jarod stood unsteadily beside the vacant chair and looked at Lyle expectantly.
"Drink your milk." Lyle's voice lilted condescendingly. He smiled evilly as Jarod followed his instructions.
"Now." Jarod hissed through clenched teeth.
Lyle nodded and pushed away from the wall without comment. Jarod sank into the chair, eager anticipation obvious on his face.
Parker watched the monitor in stunned horror as Jarod shoved his shirtsleeve up one arm. Red dots speckled the tender flesh of the pretender's inner arm. Lyle pulled a rubber tourniquet out of one pocket and a syringe from the other. With a smooth skill born of repetition, Lyle quickly wrapped Jarod's arm, found a vein and slid the needle into the soft tissue.
Jarod's shuddering stopped and his eyelids began to flutter almost immediately. His head lolled back and his breathing became deep and regular as the drug took effect.
Lyle patted the top of Jarod's head scornfully. "Good boy, Jarod." He said with a sneer.
As Lyle began to leave the room, Jarod hauled himself out of the chair to weave drunkenly to the edge of his cell. Grasping the bars with one hand, Jarod called to the other man.
"Lyle." Jarod's voice slurred.
When Lyle turned, Jarod flashed him a crooked smile of malicious triumph. A moment later, Jarod leaned over, pushed one finger into the back of his throat and vomited the contents of his stomach into a vile sludge at Lyle's feet.
Jarod's contemptuous act of defiance infuriated Mr. Lyle. His reaction was lightening quick and coldly vicious. The first punch knocked Jarod to his knees. After the second contact, Jarod lay in a motionless pile on the floor. Lyle kicked Jarod furiously again and again, blind rage clearly written across his face.
Minutes passed before Lyle regained control of his temper. Sighing in frustration, Lyle shook his head at the moaning creature on the floor. Straightening his tie, Lyle called to someone outside of the room. Two large men that Parker did not recognize lumbered in.
"Get him out of here," Lyle growled. "And get an orderly to clean up this mess."
With a nod, the sweepers grabbed Jarod beneath the arms and half dragged, half carried the unconscious pretender out the door.
"Where," Parker's voice came out as a whisper. The images she had just witnessed on the monitor had affected her deeply. She was forced to clear her throat before she could continue. "Where are they taking him?" she asked.
Broots, shaken and wide-eyed, shook his head. "I don't know." He said softly.
One Good Turn Part 2
A Missing Pretender
By Phenyx
Miss Parker strode down the hallway. Arms crossed and heels clicking a sharp staccato through the corridor, Parker's glare discouraged anyone who might be foolish enough to stop her progress. She'd been back at work for a week now and no one aside from Sydney had been reckless enough to inquire about her health.
To the casual observer, Miss Parker seemed to have no lasting signs of her ordeal in the river. She'd spent a couple of days in a local hospital but had quickly returned to Delaware. Within forty-eight hours she'd been admitted again when fluid had started collecting in her lungs and she had developed a moderate case of pneumonia. Even now her doctor's had told her to take it easy, give herself time to heal. As a result, Parker was working shortened hours and spent all of her spare time sleeping.
But Sydney alone knew of Parker's semi-invalid status. Only someone who knew her very well would recognize the weary lines of fatigue around her eyes. Parker's sharp tongue and vile temper kept others from noticing that anything was amiss.
Parker had few recollections of that day in Ohio. She could remember her sudden fury at knowing Jarod would escape her again. She remembered starting across the ice. The rest was a blur. There were vague feelings of bone chilling cold and a far away sensation of panic. More than a month later, Parker still had a constant sensation of cold. She just could not shake the chill in her bones.
Of Jarod and his current status, Parker knew nothing. She and her team had been searching The Centre mainframe for some sign of him but they had found no trace. Parker was becoming very agitated about it.
She dreamed about him at night. Parker's dreams were disturbing, fractured images of Jarod. In her dream, Jarod's face was as pale as death and his lips were tinged an eerily corpse-like shade of blue. Blood ran down his face in rivulets from a cut on his forehead and his eyes were wild and filled with panic.
For the past month, the dream image of Jarod had been silently yelling at her. Parker could see his lips and mouth moving and she knew he was saying something but she had not been able to understand him. Parker sensed that what Jarod was trying to tell her was incredibly important but she couldn't comprehend his words. Until last night.
In last night's dream, Jarod's pale, blood streaked face had appeared to her again. Only this time, with a rush of sound like waves breaking on the rocks, Jarod's voice had screamed at Parker loud and clear.
"Just once you will do as I tell you!" Jarod yelled at her in the dream.
As Parker gasped and surged toward consciousness, Jarod's voice had followed her into wakefulness, "Please, oh please, oh please."
The murmured chant seemed to hang in the darkness as Parker woke up. The dream had seemed so real that for a moment, Parker had looked around the room, expecting to see the pretender at her bedside.
The nightly visions of Jarod urged Parker to even greater zeal in her search for him during the day. The escalation of the intensity of her nightmare caused Parker an increased sense of urgency. She felt a deep need to find Jarod. And she needed to find him soon.
Broots seemed sure that Jarod had not been transferred. A transfer of such importance would have left a trail in the system somewhere. But they had found nothing.
Lyle was irritatingly tight-lipped and refused to reveal any knowledge of Jarod's whereabouts. Parker knew that Lyle had Jarod well hidden somewhere within The Centre. She suspected that Jarod was being moved regularly to prevent her from locating him.
Raines of course had disregarded Parker's requests to see the pretender. The wheezing ghoul had offered Parker a handful of thinly veiled threats regarding her obedience and had placed her on a new assignment. Parker had blatantly disregarded both the threats and the new project. Eventually she would need to do something. Broots was becoming visibly more anxious with each passing day and even Sydney was beginning to have that hunched, hunted look to him as he hurried through the halls.
Life at The Centre was far more dangerous now than it had been in the past.
With a huff of impatience, Parker burst through the doors of her office to find Broots and Sydney waiting for her. She glanced meaningfully at Broots with an unspoken question in her eyes.
Broots nodded. "I swept the room again. I found another listening device and flushed it down the toilet."
Parker sighed. "We are finding these things too easily. Either they are being sloppy or we aren't finding everything."
"Broots checked the room three times, Miss Parker." Sydney reassured her. "He was very careful."
"Especially since I've found these." Broots whispered as he held up two silver disks.
A wicked grin broke out across Parker's face. "You got them." She declared.
"I've made a habit of stealing DSA's from Mr. Raines." Broots said nervously. "Swiping two from Lyle wasn't too hard."
Parker cocked her head at him. "Why, Broots, you old dog, when did you grow a pair?"
Broots tried to laugh but the nervous hiccup came out sounding more like a cackle. Moving in fits and jerks of anxiety, Broots moved to the desk and placed the first disk into the DSA player.
"I can't vouch for the quality of the image." He said. "I made copies of the original disks so that Lyle wouldn't miss them. I made them pretty quickly so there may be a little degradation in the picture."
"As long as you got some valid information on Jarod," Parker said sharply. "I'm not looking to sell tickets."
"I got something, all right." Broots said. "These disks are the entire visual recording on him since he was brought in a month ago."
"We should be able to figure out where they are holding him." Sydney chipped in.
Parker nodded grimly. "Can we see where he is today?"
Broots activated the disk and punched in the time frame they were looking for, "This was recorded early this morning." The technician said.
An image of a darkened room appeared on screen. Cinder block walls enclosed a barred cell within the tiny space. The room was bare except for a thin mattress tossed on the ground near a cement wall. Huddled in a ball on the mattress lay a wrinkled bundle of rags. With a muffled groan, the mound moved slightly and then rolled over.
Jarod was curled tightly around himself, hugging his knees to his chest while he slept fitfully. His face was dirty and unshaven. Bruises and dried blood mottled his cheeks and his jaw. Dark circles smudged the skin beneath his eyes and he whimpered pitifully for a moment before he sighed heavily and fell back into a deep sleep.
Parker sighed with relief. At least he was alive. Jarod looked like hell but at least Parker could now prove to herself that he was alive.
Pointing at the screen, she looked at Broots and demanded, "I want you to screen this recording every which way you can possibly image. I want to know where he is."
Broots nodded and slid into her chair as Parker vacated it.
The next few hours passed slowly. Broots calculated the dimensions of the room visible on the DSA and painstakingly narrowed down possibilities on a detailed blueprint of the facility. Parker spent most of the time pacing the office in irritation.
Long after the regular workday had ended, Broots abruptly cried out, "Bingo!" He grinned. "I've got him."
"Where?" Parker hissed as she and Sydney both hurried to the technician's side.
"SL-20." Broots said, typing frantically at his keyboard. "I should be able to tap into the surveillance system and pick up a real time image."
With a few expert manipulations at Broots' computer, an image appeared on the monitor. The room itself was the same one from the earlier recording but the setting had changed slightly. In the middle of the area sat a small table and a wooden chair. On the table was a metal tray like the kind you find in a cafeteria or a mess hall. An unidentifiable mottled brown substance could be seen on the tray.
Lounging nonchalantly against one wall, arms crossed lazily, was Lyle with an amused smirk on his face. In the opposite corner, pressed against the wall as though trying to melt into the concrete was Jarod, shivering miserably.
"Damn." Parker whispered. With Lyle in the room, it would be impossible to go to Jarod right now.
Parker frowned. There was something odd about Jarod's behavior. He wasn't acting right.
"He looks ill." Broots said as if he could read Miss Parker's thoughts.
Jarod's arms were wrapped tightly around his body, hugging himself. A thin sheen of perspiration covered his skin. Deep circles under his eyes gave Jarod a gaunt, sunken look. His eyes were wild and angry.
"Give it to me." Jarod growled in a raspy hoarse voice.
Lyle shrugged. "Do as you are told, Jarod. Then you will get your reward."
Jarod sighed in frustration and ran his shaking hands through the sweat damp hair on his head.
"Jarod," Lyle said sweetly. "You haven't eaten in days. I don't understand your hesitation in this. It is perfectly good beef stew. I finally convinced Raines that you didn't need that green slop." A wicked smile spread across Lyle's face. "You should be thanking me, Jarod."
Jarod shot the other man a furious look. "Go to Hell." He growled.
"Jarod, Jarod, Jarod." Lyle sighed. "What have I done to deserve your anger? I get you good food. I bring a table and chair so you can regain a little dignity. Why do you treat me this way?"
"You know why." Jarod responded with a hiss.
Lyle shook his head in a long-suffering gesture of futility. "I'm really trying, Jarod. I'm trying to put my sister's death behind me. You didn't mean to kill her, I know that. But the fact is, you were responsible for the accident. Am I holding that against you? No. Am I punishing you for killing her? No." Lyle shrugged. "I am offering you a truce, Jarod. Just eat the stew."
The trio watching the monitor gasped as they realized what a terrible lie Jarod was being told.
While Lyle spoke, Jarod's shaking became more pronounced and he grimaced in pain. His lower lip trembled when Jarod whispered, "Lyle, I need it." He said miserably.
"Yes." Lyle purred sadly. "I know you do. Do as you are told and I'll give it to you."
Jarod slid miserably down the wall and into a crouch. Clutching his middle, Jarod heaved a broken sigh and groaned.
Lyle grinned, sensing that victory was near. "You need to eat, Jarod." He said.
Glaring up at his tormentor, Jarod shot Lyle a look of pure hatred. Pulling himself up slowly, Jarod staggered across the cell to the table. Without bothering to sit, Jarod grabbed up a spoon and started shoveling the food into his mouth. Swallowing huge mouthfuls, barely stopping to chew anything, Jarod gulped down the contents of the tray.
Finishing minutes later, Jarod stood unsteadily beside the vacant chair and looked at Lyle expectantly.
"Drink your milk." Lyle's voice lilted condescendingly. He smiled evilly as Jarod followed his instructions.
"Now." Jarod hissed through clenched teeth.
Lyle nodded and pushed away from the wall without comment. Jarod sank into the chair, eager anticipation obvious on his face.
Parker watched the monitor in stunned horror as Jarod shoved his shirtsleeve up one arm. Red dots speckled the tender flesh of the pretender's inner arm. Lyle pulled a rubber tourniquet out of one pocket and a syringe from the other. With a smooth skill born of repetition, Lyle quickly wrapped Jarod's arm, found a vein and slid the needle into the soft tissue.
Jarod's shuddering stopped and his eyelids began to flutter almost immediately. His head lolled back and his breathing became deep and regular as the drug took effect.
Lyle patted the top of Jarod's head scornfully. "Good boy, Jarod." He said with a sneer.
As Lyle began to leave the room, Jarod hauled himself out of the chair to weave drunkenly to the edge of his cell. Grasping the bars with one hand, Jarod called to the other man.
"Lyle." Jarod's voice slurred.
When Lyle turned, Jarod flashed him a crooked smile of malicious triumph. A moment later, Jarod leaned over, pushed one finger into the back of his throat and vomited the contents of his stomach into a vile sludge at Lyle's feet.
Jarod's contemptuous act of defiance infuriated Mr. Lyle. His reaction was lightening quick and coldly vicious. The first punch knocked Jarod to his knees. After the second contact, Jarod lay in a motionless pile on the floor. Lyle kicked Jarod furiously again and again, blind rage clearly written across his face.
Minutes passed before Lyle regained control of his temper. Sighing in frustration, Lyle shook his head at the moaning creature on the floor. Straightening his tie, Lyle called to someone outside of the room. Two large men that Parker did not recognize lumbered in.
"Get him out of here," Lyle growled. "And get an orderly to clean up this mess."
With a nod, the sweepers grabbed Jarod beneath the arms and half dragged, half carried the unconscious pretender out the door.
"Where," Parker's voice came out as a whisper. The images she had just witnessed on the monitor had affected her deeply. She was forced to clear her throat before she could continue. "Where are they taking him?" she asked.
Broots, shaken and wide-eyed, shook his head. "I don't know." He said softly.
