Day 8

At some point in the early morning hours, Bill the meteorologist reentered Jarod and Miss Parker's hotel room. Both of them were startled awake by the sudden voice and the glaring light emitted from the television. Jarod's arm reached across Miss Parker to the nightstand where the remote lay and he turned it off.

Miss Parker groaned, "So it's back to reality with us?"

He shook his head and pulled the bed covers closer to them both and returned his head to the pillow, "Not yet it isn't."

*****

They had bid goodbye to Harry and packed the few things they had brought with them before the sun had even been up for an hour.

Miss Parker was currently on the phone with the closest car rental agency and it was a battle. "Aren't you people supposed to be professionals? I would think that if you base your entire career around driving you could possibly do that when a customer asks you to."

Sitting on the edge of the bed, Jarod smiled as she made eye contact with him. She raised her hand in an is-this-guy-really-serious? way, to which he shrugged.

"If you're not offering your pick-up service then why the hell are you even open?" she continued. There was another pause as she listened to the poor man's reply.

Jarod lay back on the bed, staring blankly at the ceiling. He had almost forgotten what they were supposed to be doing. As wonderful as life had been these past couple of days, the plan was never supposed to include freezing in a hotel with Miss Parker. In hindsight though, the whole ordeal could have turned out a lot worse.

"So you're saying you don't have one driver who would be willing to come to this hotel for a hundred dollar tip?"

They could have walked on and on in the snow without stumbling upon this place with a less accommodating owner who wouldn't share his peanut butter and jelly and potato chips, Jarod mused. Miss Parker could have been, well, Miss Parker-like. That didn't mean she'd been a complete ray of sunshine the entire time of course.

"Oh I'm sure that does change things a bit," Miss Parker rolled her eyes. "Right. Mhm."

But they had a mission to complete. The immediate goal was to reach Sydney and hope he would be of some use in figuring out what Catherine Parker had left for them. They would have to make it in and out of Blue Cove undetected. Mr Parker was probably wondering just where his daughter was by now.

"Thank you so much," Miss Parker said, her voice sopping in sarcasm. "We'll be waiting."

With that she hung up the phone.

"I hope you have a hundred dollars on you."

Jarod pulled his body to a halfway sitting up position, "Um no actually I don't."

"Oh," she said, completely unfazed. "That's fine."

"Won't the driver be expecting that money?" Jarod pressed.

"Yeah probably, but not until the end of the ride, at which point we'll already be there so it doesn't really matter either way." Miss Parker sat down in the chair across from the bed and crossed her legs regally.

Sitting straight up now, Jarod smiled a little hesitantly, "Miss Parker, that's horrible."

"Mmm yeah," she said, looking out the window to the snow-covered world. "So you think we'll make it to Blue Cove by nightfall?"

"Um yes, I believe so. So long as you don't get us arrested along the way."

"Please, you act like I'm so bad. You're the one impersonating doctors and astrophysicists every other week. This is totally harmless."

She was a difficult person to argue with, regardless of who was right or wrong. So that ended that. Miss Parker continued staring out the window and Jarod gave up on his morality lesson.

She was tired of searching for answers. It seemed like all her life she was constantly seeking something missing. There was a world of knowledge out there that her mother had kept from her, to protect her. Sometimes Miss Parker couldn't help but wish that her pathetic version of innocence had been fully taken from her early on, so that she wouldn't have to spend the rest of her adult life trying so desperately to discover everything on her own. Well, not exactly on her own.

"Jarod, what are we going to do if Sydney turns out to be completely useless, which has been known to happen in 95% of most cases?"

Jarod didn't want to think about that yet, "Let's not worry about that until we know it's true."

"Right. Good plan, genius."

She tapped her fingernails along the windowsill. A few moments passed in silence. Which was okay.

"I just have this feeling that our answers aren't in Blue Cove," she said.

Jarod spoke softly, "Then where?"

"I don't know," Miss Parker said before turning icy. "Damn it, obviously I wish I did."

"Yeah. I know."

A horn honked outside, and Miss Parker glanced out the window, "He's here."

"You certainly motivated him," Jarod checked his watch. "It's barely been fifteen minutes."

"They were really not that far. I don't know what the big deal was," Miss Parker grabbed her bag and opened the door. "Alright let's roll, wonderboy."

"Parker, wait."

Her hair flipped when she turned around. "What?"

Jarod took a step forward and locked her face between his palms and kissed her before she could even take a breath. It was passionate and desperate and a little bit like choking, yet somehow good. As soon as it came it was gone though, and he stepped back.

"What the hell was that for?"

"I just don't want to lose you," he gestured to the open door. "Out there."

Parker tilted her head to one side. It was almost touching. "Don't worry. After all these years you've never lost me before."

Jarod's face twisted skeptically, an expression which didn't escape her.

"Oh good God, can we just go?"

He nodded and walked out the door.

"You need to shave by the way. Scratchy. On my face." She gestured toward her chin with her hand.

Jarod turned around and looked at her with that glint of amusement in his eyes. She was closing the door. When she noticed his staring, he commenced toward the waiting vehicle, grinning.

*****

"So how did you weasel us out of that one?" Jarod said from the passenger seat of their latest rental car.

Miss Parker shrugged and steered them out of the parking lot, "I just let good buddy Joe have his way with me for five minutes in the coat closet."

Jarod glared at her, "You did not. That's not funny, Miss Parker."

"You believed it for half a second. You're supposed to be smart you know."

"But really."

"I can be very charming and persuasive when I want something."

"Charming," Jarod scoffed, "Sorry I missed that one."

"Well next time you should use the restroom before we leave, like a good boy," she responded in a motherly voice.

He ignored her and turned the radio on and flipped around until he found an oldies station.

Miss Parker arched her eyebrows, "No."

"Yup."

"I can't stand oldies. They're all songs I've heard a hundred times over about how thrilled the hippies are that the sky is blue and birds are still singing."

Jarod laughed, "I haven't heard them before, so you'll have to deal with it. That is, unless you're willing to be charming and persuasive."

"I am not pulling this car over to do whatever kind of persuading you have in mind, Jarod."

"That- That is not what I meant," he paused awkwardly. "At all."

"Right. When you get down to it, men are all the same," Miss Parker added stoically.

"Are they though?"

She glanced at him and returned her gaze to the road. They drove on in silence then, save for the sounds of happy hippies and rebellious rockers on the radio.

*****

"Well here we are," Miss Parker said, shifting the vehicle into park. "Home au Freud."

She got out of the car and began walking up the sidewalk to the front porch.

"Wait," Jarod whispered. "I know a better way."

*****

Sydney calmly stirred a spoonful of milk into his tea and placed the spoon in the sink. Setting the cup on top of its saucer, he walked into the dimly lit living room carrying it in one hand and his latest novel in the other. This was his favorite time of night, when the only interruption he would ever receive might be the occasional phone call from Jarod, and that was an interruption he always welcomed.

"Hey there, Syd."

He nearly dropped the tea he was so startled. There was Miss Parker sitting on his sofa with her legs crossed like she owned the place.

"Miss Parker," he began, setting his things on the coffee table between them. "I wasn't expecting you to return so soon from your hiatus."

"Trust me I'm not here for good, but I do come bearing gifts, well one."

Sydney heard the sound of the chain to his lamp being pulled and there was Jarod, comfortable in Sydney's oversized chair. He must have truly been shocked since he hadn't noticed him there before. He looked between the two of them, trying to put the pieces together.

"Jarod, you're not turning yourself in are you?"

Jarod laughed, "Please, Sydney. Don't you know me at all?"

Sydney stroked his chin thoughtfully, "Well I thought I knew the two of you, but right now I'm not so sure."

"It's not what you think," Jarod stood up. "We're helping each other to find the answers we've always needed. We came here because we figured we could trust you."

"Of course you can trust me," Sydney said, still a little off balance. "But what can I do? I'm afraid I don't know anything the two of you don't."

"Sit down, Syd," Miss Parker said. Sydney took his seat in the chair and Jarod sat down beside Miss Parker. "We think there's a very important memory in Jarod's head and we need you to drill it out in that special way of yours."

"What is the memory?"

Miss Parker sighed in exasperation, "If we knew that, we wouldn't need your help would we?"

"Parker," Jarod reached for her hand, which she automatically snapped away to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. He glanced at her, realization in his eyes, but said what he was going to regardless. "We do know a little, Sydney. There were simulations completed by me for Catherine Parker, helping her plan her escape. I obviously have no recollection of this, but we figured she must have used the same technique she did before when she took me out of the Centre and that maybe you could help me find this memory, too."

Sydney took a deep breath and leaned back against his chair, "When did these simulations take place?"

"About a month before," Jarod drifted off. "It was in March, supposedly in the sim lab just like any other simulation."

The psychiatrist nodded.

"Why?" Miss Parker inquired suspiciously.

"It just isn't surprising that she got away with doing that. Catherine would often arrange with me and some of her friends in the tech room to stop the camera monitoring for a certain amount of time. It was easy enough. Everyone who worked there would have done anything for her."

"Why would she do that?" Jarod asked.

"Usually because you," Sydney turned to Miss Parker. "Asked her to."

She shook her head, "I don't remember ever doing that."

"Oh well of course you didn't ask in so many words. You just wanted to see Jarod. So I'd reserve the sim lab and leave Jarod there and that's when your mother would let you in. Your father never approved of your interaction, but she and I always thought it was good for both of you. We could tell you were fond of each other."

Miss Parker shifted in her seat uncomfortably, "So you probably assumed this was going on while my mother worked with Jarod."

"I suppose so."

"Can we try and see then?" she said impatiently.

Sydney looked at Jarod, who nodded in return.

*****

Sydney, perched close on the coffee table, went through the steps with Jarod, relaxing him until he was in a trance-like state. Eventually, he snapped his fingers and Jarod's chin dropped, nearly to his chest. Miss Parker watched them silently, praying that this would work.

"Jarod, you're in a very safe place right now. Can you hear me? This is Sydney."

"Sydney," Jarod mumbled.

"Very good, Jarod. Miss Parker is with us as well and everything is fine."

"Parker," he breathed the word slowly.

"I'm here," she answered softly, not knowing what else to do. Sydney nodded reassuringly.

"We're going to go back now, Jarod, to a place deep in your mind, to before we lost Catherine Parker," Sydney continued, his voice steady and soothing. "Do you remember that day by the elevator?"

"Yes."

"Good, Jarod. Are you there?"

"Miss Parker, she's crying. She needs our help, Sydney!"

Miss Parker put a finger to her lips, reliving the memory with him.

"We're going to try and help. Now think back to the last time you saw Miss Parker's mother. The sim lab. Are you there, Jarod?"

Jarod was silent for an agonizing moment.

"Jarod, please," Miss Parker coaxed gently.

Sydney reiterated, "Are you in the lab, Jarod?"

"Yes."

"Tell me about it."

Jarod's closed eyelids twitched a little and Miss Parker briefly thought of Angelo, who often made similar facial expressions to the one Jarod wore now.

"Miss Parker's mother is here and she wants me to do something for her. It's a secret though. I'm not supposed to tell."

He said it with childish conviction. It was eerie to Miss Parker, who remembered the tone so well.

"You can tell us. You can trust us. We just want to help."

Jarod remained silent.

Miss Parker touched Jarod's arm briefly, "She's my mother, Jarod. I need to know."

"Has to do what's best for her daughter. Needs to escape."

"Does Catherine want you to help her escape the Centre?"

"No not her, someone else. This is for someone else like her."

Miss Parker looked surprised, but Sydney shook his head, indicating that this was probably not true. She reconsidered and it did make sense that she would tell Jarod that this was a plan for somebody else. Her mother was always trying to protect.

Sydney said, "And you told her that she should fake her death?"

"No. Not yet. She has to complete her plan first."

"Plan. What plan, Jarod?" Miss Parker perked up at the words, knowing this is what her mother had wanted her to do.

"She doesn't say," Jarod murmured to which Miss Parker's shoulders slumped. "But she has to go, go meet someone."

"Who?" Sydney asked.

"Won't say, but one day she says I'll meet her too," Jarod answered slowly. "She's waiting in Maryland. One day I'll go there too."

"Why would she say that?" Miss Parker muttered under her breath, leaning back against the sofa.

Sydney shook his head, "Jarod, come back to us. We're at my house and you're going to return when I snap my fingers and you will remember everything we just talked about. 3... 2..."

He snapped his fingers and Jarod's eyes shot open. He took a deep breath and looked from Sydney to Miss Parker, who looked upset, disappointed, frustrated, and so many other things.

"Sorry," Jarod whispered.

She shook her head. "Maryland, what the hell good is that going to do us?"

"I don't know," Jarod responded, unable to look away from the sadness on her face.

Her eyes widened, "Maryland."

"Yeah, that's all she-"

"No, no. There was a place, oh God. I knew she went there sometimes. I just don't know where in Maryland it was," Miss Parker groaned loudly. "If we could just go to my house."

Sydney interjected, "I wouldn't do that if I were you. I'm certain your father is having your house monitored until you return."

"I can get us in," Jarod said. Miss Parker looked at him uncertainly. "Really. I've been in and out while it's been under surveillance many times."

"When else has my house even been under surveillance?"

"Uh," Jarod shrugged. "Just a few other times."

"And was I in the house during these break-ins?" she crossed her arms and raised her eyebrows accusingly.

Jarod smiled, "I think you know the answer to that question."

"You sicken me," she looked to Sydney and stood up, pulling Jarod with her insistently. "Well we thank you kindly, but it's time to go break into my own home now. And not for the first time either."

"Well, first time for you," Jarod added.

Sydney too stood, "Good luck. If you need anything, I'm here."

"We know," Jarod smiled slightly.

Miss Parker looked at Sydney and grinned, "And you tried to act like you hadn't been helping him all this time. The real truth finally comes out."

"I could say the same for you," Sydney nodded toward her with a smug expression on his face.

She directed her comment to Jarod, "You really are one manipulative son of a bitch."

Jarod acted like he was confused by that. "We're leaving now. Thank you, Sydney."

As they left, Sydney couldn't help but smile. He had incredible faith in the two of them working together toward a common goal for once in their lives. It had been a very long time coming, but he had always known it was indeed coming.

Day 35

The light in Mr Parker's office was ironically bright and cheery, as was status quo. How could the man and his surroundings possibly radiate anything but?

His son was in complete shock though. Instead of being praised for his strategic manipulation, Lyle was being chastised by his own father. That was also status quo; he never received the praise or respect he deserved.

"You are not supposed to be using your sister as incentive for Jarod to do his work. How dare you disrespect your family like that?" Mr Parker roared like the crazy patriarchal ruler he was.

"Coming from the man who has his daughter locked away twenty levels below ground, that's quite the loaded accusation."

Lyle was sitting on the sofa, inspecting his fingernails nonchalantly while his father paced the floor in front of his desk.

"I can't trust her anymore. That's all it comes down to. I have reasons for the things I do, Lyle. You should know this by now."

"I have reasons too, and clearly they're good ones. My plan worked. Jarod is with Sydney simming and being a good little lab rat as we speak. What more could you want?"

"The two of them, they-- you allowed them to be in the same room and, well you saw what happened."

Lyle sighed and attempted to rationalize for his father, "Yes clearly Jarod has the hots for my sister. Weird, yes. Amusing, no doubt. But problematic? Not at all. We can use this to our advantage."

Mr Parker slammed his hand down on his desk, causing an echo to reverberate through the room. "You have no idea what you're talking about, Lyle. There is a reason we've been trying to separate them since they were children."

"And that reason would be?" said Lyle, bored by his father's dramatics.

"Never mind. It's need to know."

Lyle stood, "Of course it is, and of course I don't."

"Not now, Lyle," Mr Parker growled.

"I'm sick of doing all the real work in this place and not getting anything in return. I got your monkey dancing just like I said I would. What the hell else matters?"

Mr Parker sat down at his desk and slid his hands over the wood surface. He looked up at Lyle with a knowing, yet don't-push-it look.

Throwing his hands up in defeat, Lyle stepped backward toward the door. "Fine. Keep your secrets. I'm only your son."

With that, he disappeared before Mr Parker could answer him. Instead he mumbled under his breath, "son" as he shifted some papers around his desk.

*****

How could Jarod have done this all his life? Miss Parker was pacing her tiny room restlessly. She hated being kept in the dark and right now she felt like a million things were happening that she wasn't aware of. Jarod was simming. Sydney was letting him. Everyone else in this hell hole, well only God knew what they were up to.

She walked up to the camera in the corner and tapped on the lens.

"Bring me my father," she said slowly, enunciating every syllable perfectly. "You hear me? Bring him."

Twenty minutes went by.

An hour.

Three.

Miss Parker jumped from the bed she had retired to and yelled into the camera, "Bring him to me now! I need to see my father. Bring him damn it!"

But nothing happened.

*****

Sydney couldn't believe how easily he and Jarod had slipped right back into pretending mode. Jarod gave him answers and Sydney prodded for the whys and hows until there was nothing more to be said. He often stopped the sim to ask Jarod if he was sure he wanted to be doing this and the reply was always the same- "I know what I'm doing, Sydney." And presumably he did. Sydney though, wasn't quite so sure.

"And you're sure that the senator's car could arrive at the predetermined location on time still?"

Jarod closed the folder with all the data and research, and looked up at Sydney with a tiny grin, "Absolutely."

It was eerie. Sydney felt like he was talking with a ghost of Jarod. The real Jarod he knew would never do this so amiably.

"Well I think that's enough for today. Is there anything you would like to talk about, Jarod?"

The pretender smiled briefly, "What's to say?"

"A lot, I think. That really depends on you."

"In that case there's nothing to say," Jarod responded. "Except that I do trust you, Sydney."

This obviously loaded statement was even more disturbing for the psychiatrist. There was clearly something he was supposed to understand, something he was supposed to do and he had no idea what Jarod meant.

Sydney whispered pleadingly, "I don't know what you need, Jarod."

The door to the sim lab slammed against the wall as it was whipped open.

"You'll figure it out," Jarod nodded, and for once Sydney could see his Jarod. Confident and strong.

It was Mr Raines who decided to interrupt their conversation with his squeaking heap of metal and decrepit self. Jarod slumped down in his seat, while Sydney rose from his.

"What is your business down here, Raines?"

"Jarod is my business," wheezed the old man.

Jarod's eyes darkened, but he remained silent, glancing instead at Sydney to defend him.

"You must be confused because Jarod is under my supervision, not yours."

Raines stared at Jarod while he spoke. It took everything the pretender had not to cringe, speak, or worse, attack. "I believe you're the one confused... if you think that one simulation a day is enough... for our most gifted pretender... you're wasting our time."

"I am supposed to also be monitoring Jarod's psychological status as well. Exercising his talents so soon could be detrimental to the projects," Sydney crossed his arms resolutely. "I'm sure the tower wouldn't want that."

Jarod clenched his jaw. He hated when people talked about him like he wasn't sitting right there listening, but he couldn't cause any more trouble, not when he knew who would be paying the price.

"I said gifts, Sydney, not talents," Raines took a deep breath. "There's a difference."

"Now's not the time or place for this."

Raines ignored Sydney and stepped so close to Jarod that the pretender had to crane his neck back to look up at the emphysema-ridden man.

"Get away from him, Raines."

"What did you and Miss Parker find?" he hissed.

Jarod's eyes widened in surprise. Raines couldn't know. No, it was impossible.

Jarod answered in a low tone that Sydney could barely hear, "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Yes you do," Raines continued. "I know you went to... Armenia."

All the blood in Jarod's veins stopped pumping, at least that's what it felt like. Aside from himself, only two more people knew about that and he knew Miss Parker wouldn't tell without extreme persuasion, which he doubted anyone was truly capable of. That must mean...

"I said leave him alone," Sydney protested, attempting to separate the two.

"You just think about... how I might have known that," Raines said, taking a step back at Sydney's insistence. "And then you decide if you want... to tell me what you found... or not... the choice is yours."

Jarod's face contorted slightly and Sydney could see his eyes watering, but still he said nothing and looked away stubbornly.

Raines took a deep breath and plodded out of the lab, lugging his oxygen tank behind him.

"What the hell was that all about?" Sydney said, sitting down in front of Jarod, who looked as though he'd just gotten word from the devil himself.

His voice cracked at first when he spoke, "Can we just-- Can we just call it a day? Please, Sydney."

"Talk to me, Jarod. I'm begging you," he changed his voice to a barely-there whisper. "You can't do this alone."

Jarod frowned and shook his head, "I wish I were doing this alone."