Where are our Children: A Novel: Complete and Uncut
Chapter Twenty Four
Don’t cry Hugh, I’m here. I won’t let anyone hurt you again.
-Louis Monroe’s conversation with Hugh Keaton hours before Louis and his family died in a mysterious house fire, December 24th, 1966
Angel
Stone Mountain, 26th Day
AN HOUR EARLIER:
She found Louis Keaton, Moses Jackson and the other three boys slumped over, tired, weary, cold, hungry, scared and in near panic.
She found them using a precise recovery route from her memories of her time under Serena Tennyson with Pandora, great timing and fucking dumb luck. Going into this simple analytics told Dr. Angel Hicks Dupree that the chances of finding the lot of them alive was so obscenely remote, that the spill that she’d prepared for them seemed like a distant memory from someone else’s life now that she was actually face to face with them.
And yet, she’d found them and for the moment that’s all that mattered.
Louis Keaton’s general—Moses Jackson explained to her what had happened to them since Louis had engineered their escape from the clutches of Pandora and some compound miles from here. It wasn’t all good. They’d lost two boys to the quake when their pickup truck overturned. Louis—that’s what he referred to himself as in the interim—quickly told her that they were being followed by several other parties, not just men loyal to Serena Tennyson.
And then he told her that he’d barely overcome an episode about a half an hour before she’d found them.
And she could see his eyes misting as he told her that Hugh was calling him even now as they stood here talking.
“Hugh,” the doctor said as gently as she could and massaged his neck. How many years has it been since I last saw you, Hugh. She knew that their time was short—they were being chased and probably from many different directions, but she needed to know some things first. “Come over here, Louis. Why don’t you come over here and sit next to me please. You must be so tired. Please come. Sit.”
“Why do you address me by calling me by the terrible name? Do you want to see him surface again? Do you want to have him destroy and chance that we have to survive tonight?”
“Just like I told you then I’m reminding you again now—you should make no mistake Hugh Keaton is your true self.” Angel said. “You’ve used this Louis persona as an escape mechanism all of this time. I can’t blame you for that. It was safe there. It was civilized there. Whoever this Louis person was he was a…he was an angel. And you’ve been slipping back and forth into this alternate persona for years as a means of escape from the realities of the horrible things that you have done.”
If only all of us were blessed to be able to do what you are able to do.
If only I could do the same.
Louis was shaking his head in denial. Moses could see the conflict—the tempest rising within him. Moses backed up to the other boys—the children of the storm—and wrapped his arms around them as if he were a mobile barrier as if he could truly keep them safe.
Angel wasn’t afraid of Louis. She was afraid for him. She scanned their perimeter the way Christopher had taught her. The haze from the smoke made the task all the more difficult. Although the conditions make it just as problematic for those who would wish this man harm in a vail attempt to free the children. If someone chose to take their shot at him, the children standing too far away from here would draw their fire more freely. Of course she didn’t want these boys hurt. They’d been through far too much as it was, they’d have memories that would already haunt them the rest of their lives. Just as it haunts you, Christopher, she thought, just as it haunts you my beloved best friend.
She reminded herself again of her motivations: She did not want those boys hurt, but Louis had risked much on a personal level and his professional relationship with some very dangerous colleagues in Pandora to get them this far. He wasn’t a hero, but he had done something very heroic. He deserved to complete his treatment although imprisonment with other animals like Muhammad Clark downstate was far more likely.
“I need Hugh’s strength with us now if we are going to make it out of here alive.” Angel said to him.
“No,” Louis shook his head. “No. I won’t accept your explanation. You’re trying to manipulate me, Doctor, confuse me. You don’t want to awaken him.”
Angel got close.
“Serena Tennyson tried to manipulate you, confuse you. She wanted to get into your head, but you rose above it all. Just look at you now.”
“Stop it…stop it please…” Louis Keaton said in a weak voice.
“Serena wanted you to believe that Hugh was evil. He was a monster to her. He was a creature of the night that she wanted unleashed only when it served her needs. No wonder you thought that he was corrupted and evil when you slipped back into his persona.”
Louis Keaton fell to his knees and wrapped his head with his arms.
“Serena was right about me, Doctor. You are right about me, Doctor.” He finally said after a time. “Hugh is the personification of evil. Hugh was the personification of evil. Look at the terrible things that I’ve done with my life. Look at all the deaths and suffering that I am responsible for.”
“I don’t know your story. I can guess that you have been tormented. You’ve been used, abused and tortured.”
And so he told her…he told her it all with brevity and clarity and a daunting sense of purpose that nearly brought Angel to tears.
“What happen to this persona of Louis Keaton who is standing before you right now? What about him?”
Angel flashed him a smile that was littered in her own deep empathy she held for him as she crouched in her stance.
“Your friend Louis and his family were brutally murdered by your uncle in a house fire. Louis was your friend. He was likely the only true friend that you’ve ever known. He was tough, loyal and honorable…and all that is good in this world and the next. He was also a kid who was killed that day years ago. You lived. You lived on.”
“And you, Doctor, you…” He said through a fresh round of tears. “You’ve been kind to me before, Doctor.”
“I understand you, Hugh. We all have our means of escape to nurture us when we are hurting. You use Louis. I use…I use sex and alcohol…I use a lot of alcohol to escape, Hugh.”
And I wish that I had a bottle right now? I wish that I do with every fiber of my being.
Instead, she watched Hugh Keaton stand up taller than ever before.
“Somehow I knew that you would come for me, Doctor.” He said with a voice that was confident and strong. “I told Moses and the other boys that you would find us. We just had to stay together and believe in one another. And here you are. You are here just I knew that you would.”
“I believe that you’ve been calling out to me since all of this began, since 411. You’ve been leaving me subtle messages all along the way. You simplified it for me.”
“Messages,” The confident voice was gone again. “What messages are you talking about, Doctor?”
Now it was Angel’s turn to stand at her full height and place a hand on her hip. She felt an ache in her side where a knife had punctured there in her mini scrap with Roxanne Sanchez on the Marta far away from where she was right now. A heavy gust of wind tossed her brown hair here and everywhere. Another storm is coming on the city. It looked as if this city’s torment would never end. She could smell something burning in the distance. Otherwise this isolated area of the city just south of I20 was still.
It was too damned still.
“You staged those murder scenes with the dolls as a clue that you had these children in your possession.” She answered his last question at last. “You were giving my hints that they could be hurt by Serena if Special Agent Christopher Prince and the other FBI Agents didn’t find the compound in time after the Zero Hour passed.”
He shook his head and held himself tightly as if he would melt in the spot where he stood.
“You’re wrong, Doctor. I’m sorry, b
ut you are wrong. I don’t remember designing any scenes or handling any dolls. Serena must have had someone else create these scenes that you are speaking of. I do remember hearing the Regent and Serena mentioning the need to keep your people off balance whenever they could, but I never heard them finalize any plans involving this particular method that you are speaking of right now.”
Angel cocked a brow, considering any and all possibilities that she’d failed to explore before. Are you capable of lying to me about this, Hugh? Who else would Oracle have trusted with those scenes?
And then some alarm bells and whistles went off in her head…damn…this wasn’t all on her head this time. She wanted to follow through this with him, but she knew time wasn’t on her time now. She had missed a step—a very important clue somewhere. But for now, at the least, she needed Hugh Keaton to surface.
And she needed him right now.
“You’ve always underestimated your intellectual abilities, Hugh. Your ability to adapt to any situation or environment is unmatched. Your true enemies concentrate on your weaknesses until it is time to exploit you for their purpose. I want to look long and hard at your strengths.”
“I have let them exploit me,” Hugh found some stability in his stance. “I do have strengths.”
“Yes, you have, Hugh. You knew that it was probable that I would be involved in this investigation since long before Pandora launched the 411 attacks on the city of Atlanta. You knew that I would know that you would have Atlanta’s children in your possession. Your history had told me that you wouldn’t hurt them—at least in any long term way. “
And then Angel cocked a brow.
“You wouldn’t hurt them then,” she said. “And you won’t do anything now that would hinder their chances of reaching their loved ones.”
Moses Jackson walked up to where the two adults were standing.
“Haven’t we stayed here long enough, Miss?” He asked. “Are we going home now? Are you going to help him take us the rest of the way home?”
“Soon, Moses,” Angel said with a tight smile. She quickly turned her concentration, her focus again on Hugh. “It is time to embrace your true self, Hugh Keaton. Come with me now. Let’s all go home.”
“And then?”
“And then we all began to pay the steep price for all of the mistakes we’ve made in our lives so far, Hugh. You will pay. I will pay. Moses and these children will also pay as Christopher Prince has all of these years.”
“Chris…” he said. “My general…is my general coming to see us? Is he coming to save us?”
“He will,” Angel methodically removed Roxanne Sanchez’s cell phone from her pocket. “All that I need you to do is give me the permission to call him. He could help us dodge whoever it is that is in pursuit of us. Your old general could help these boys make it to safety the way that you wanted him to keep those boys safe all of those years ago.”
“Safety,” The word sounded heavenly as it came off of his lips. “I want these boys to feel safe again. I want it for myself so very badly.”
Angel nodded and said: “Moses Jackson and these other boys will suffer nightmare of this ordeal for the rest of their lives, just like your general, Christopher Prince has. But they will live on, just as Christopher Prince has. Life is the key to all of this, Hugh. And perhaps they’ll use this setback as a means to thrive the way that your first general has thrived. Let me call him, Hugh. He can help us.”
Hugh Keaton nods an ok.
Angel reached her childhood friend after a handful of rings. She was thrilled to hear his voice. He had survived the Zero Hour, Scar, the earthquake, and all of the terrors that the Atlanta nights had thrown at them all.
And yet, what was he going through at that particular moment that he hadn’t even realized that he was talking to her and not Roxanne Sanchez on the other woman’s personal line. She gave him a terse update of what had recently happened, their likely position and the terms of Hugh Keaton’s surrender.
The first new round of shots sounded close—and then a second round of shots spit passed where they were all standing.
She and Hugh both drove for the ground, taking Moses and the other boys down with them.
“Angel,” Chris shouted into the receiver. “Angel,”
“Hurry, Christopher,” The fear in Angel’s voice was tangible and real. “I don’t know how long we can make it out here.”
And then the signal between the phones was lost.
A minute after the disconnection Angel wondered to herself: How did she forget to mention to Christopher that Roxanne was still alive, relatively well and at the Marta Station with other victims of the earthquake?
Chris
Stone Mountain, 26th Day
From this distance and elevation, it looked to Special Agent Christopher as if Louis Keaton (or whatever they profile referred to monsters as this morning) had shrouded the four surviving boys and his best friend Dr. Angel Hicks Dupree with his frail frame of a body. All of them looked as if they were nearing a panic even as Keaton slid from one spot to another as if not to give any alleged sniper in this area a less clean spot at the pedophile and raising the risk of hitting one of those children percentage points.
And yet this situation looked even more desperate in the 45 minutes or so that it had taken them to get here from the last time he’d spoken to Angel on the cell. He’d only tried ring her up once more since that conversation. And everything considered, the doctor had done a bang up job of describing their position.
Chris asked, “What in the hell happened here?”
Sheridan was wiping his latest round of perspiration off of his thick brows. He could only shrug an answer while he struggled to catch his breath. Normally a drive from just west of downtown out here to near Stone Mountain in eastern Atlanta would take about 20 minutes if you didn’t run into any traffic snarls.
This murky Atlanta morning, however, didn’t qualify as anything close to normal.
It took them that 20 minute count alone to maneuver through two neighborhoods near the mansion while being shot at street level by of gang of about 10 or 12 citizens who’d claimed the streets as territory of their own. Sheridan had lost a fifth of his convoy in the exchange and looked as if he’d taken a bullet in and out of his left shoulder for his trouble. The rest of the lost minutes were spent maneuvering around debris of cars, buildings and the occasional debris of human bodies that the earthquake had left in its wake.
Serena had hid the children well indeed.
Chris mouth went dry and he could feel a huge gust of wind whipping up dirt near his neck and ears. He felt a devastating shot of pain in his gut—that he wasn’t able to mask from Sheridan’s eye, but shrugged him off before he could ask him questions he didn’t want to answer.
He was spending his last days alive in the generation of well laid planners: Serena Tennyson, Grace Edwards and his father Isaac Prince among others.
“It could be anybody following them,” Sheridan said in a loud voice so he could be heard by Chris and the other half a dozen or so men in close proximity. “It could be the reminisce of a Pandora cell or one of those volunteer search parties that we’d organized a few weeks ago trying to play hero by taking Keaton out.” Sheridan dropped his eyes. Either he was bracing them against the windstorm or trying to focus on a particular that he’d seen south of their position down there. His face reddened either from fatigue or embarrassment. “All of the resources that this department possesses and we have to depend on some weekend warriors to do the discovery for us.”
Chris got close to Sheridan so he wouldn’t have to yell. The man needed to learn the revelation that was told to him by cell on their way up here.
A Sargent Valarie Briscoe of the Atlanta Police Department, a professional ally and a personal friend of Chris for years now tearfully gave him the scoop of what might be going on out here. She said told him that she never believed that bullshit about him and any sexual misconduct with his now dead step daughter Eric
a Lovings. She also told him that she’d heard rumors that his brother Xavier Prince had bought it and from the hand of his own people at that, and that she was sorry for his loss, but her call wasn’t about any of that.
What she told him next astounded him—and Sheridan as well when he passed the information on to the acting Director of the FBI.
“What?” Sheridan said in near exasperation. A pain shot through his shoulder. “You just can’t make this shit up can you?”
Chris shook his head.
Sargent Briscoe told him that her second underneath him and a small group of men had broken off from the ‘protect and serve’ element of the APD into an independent crew of vigilantes who were calling themselves Hell’s Gate. They had gotten valuable intel—she didn’t know from where—of Keaton’s approximate location and they had set out with scoped rifles and tons of ammunition in hopes of putting the man out of everyone’s misery before sunset tonight.
“Of all the dumb luck it looks as if their information was concrete. Their out here…somewhere; look Sheridan, I wouldn’t beat yourself up about it. These smaller cells of the APD have been showing up all over the city from what Briscoe told me. Some are fighting on the side of the light, while others have strayed along a darker path. Anyway, just remember that Pandora had the jump on us—this was their hideaway after all—and apparently they hadn’t had any luck in finding Keaton either.” Chris paused and then finished his thought: “We do have to keep this situation contained and not let those boys get hurt.”
“We’ve got bring our own drinks to the party huh?”
“What?”
Justin Ryan shouted a goodbye into his cell phone, got out of the car he’d shared with Sheridan on the ride out here and angled his slight frame through the wind gust until he found himself standing next to the two FBI Agents. Chris looked behind where the former hostage negotiator had walked from a saw a bustle of activity to the south and east of their position.
Sheridan pointed out to an area 100 yards or so that Chris wouldn’t have noted otherwise before the younger agent could open his mouth in protest. He put a hand on Chris’ shoulder and turned him so he could see more men and equipment setting up points to the southwest and west as well.
Louis Keaton and anyone who sought to do the troubled man any harm were surrounded, but should be well outside of sight of the man just below them.
Sheridan had put a lot on the line and trusted Chris’ judgement back at the mansion and now it was his turn to return that trust to his boss right now to get everyone a few feet below them out of this alive.
“I have my sources as well, Agent Prince,” Sheridan managed a tight smile. “I’ve been told that there could be as many as six different parties out here in close proximity. I agree with you that this---Hell’s Gate is probably our biggest threat though. Listen to this though: I’m convinced that gunshots that you heard over the cell were from another group. I’ve also been told that our good doctor put a round in the leader’s side. Those men called off their pursuit to tend to that man’s wounds.”
“Angel and the others don’t look like they’ve taken any direct fire yet?”
“They’re alright,” Sheridan’s smile was gone as if it never had existed at all. “I would think that they are holding up in a physical sense as best as they can, though they’ve got to be fatigued, hungry and mentally spent by now.”
Chris nodded and took the opportunity to steal another look below. Sheridan was on point. Keaton was not looking well especially. He would unravel the longer it took for this thing to settle. And when he emotionally collapsed people would die.
Ryan took the quick moment of silence to offer his opinion.
“I don’t think that your assessment of this Keaton fellow is entirely accurate, Sheridan.” He said and held up his hand to silence both men while he continued to his point. “Look, that monster squeezed the hell out of every moment he’s been allotted to take these hostages in the first place.”
“Damn you and your theories, Ryan,” Chris spoke up. “He was and is still prepared to surrender to me. Angel—Dr. Hicks Dupree and I have already worked it out. And Sheridan’s people are securing the perimeter against any and all enemies. We don’t need you—“
Ryan chuckled.
“You and your doctor girlfriend have ‘worked it out’ as you say? I surely hope that those boys’ parents have their insurance policies paid up—“
Chris snatched Ryan off of his feet by the collar in a second.
Sheridan wedged himself in between the men for the second time in the past few hours. Chris shoved the slight man away. Sheridan fixed a hardened gaze squarely on his subordinate. “Unfortunately, Agent Prince, I find myself siding with Mr. Ryan on this front. I do not doubt Dr. Hicks-Dupree assessment of the man or his situation. I’ve had my differences with that woman’s approach to her job but not with the professionalism and expertise she exhibits once her head is screwed on correctly. My point is this, Chris, if Keaton were planning a peaceful surrender to you, which probability lessens with each passing second because all of these outside factors.”
“Don’t tell me you’re giving up? I gave her my word that we would bring him in alive.”
“Bring him back alive for what?” Ryan snorted. “Look around you, Agent Prince. Even if you take the earthquake damage out of the scenario the damage is done. Pandora and a House in Chains both got what they wanted: A shooting war.” He put a hand on one of his slender hips and relaxed his stance. “Look, I can respect what you did back at that mansion. I can damn well respect what you saw in there. You were right. But we’re here now. And there has to be a line between optimism and foolery. Respectfully, Agent Prince, I think that you’re crossing that line here.”
Chris exhaled…Ryan’s words and Sheridan’s silence was cutting deep into an area of his psyche that he didn’t want to explore further. It pissed him off something bad that this skeleton of a man could be right in his assessment.
And then another shot rang out.
Chris saw Keaton’s head spin around and back—perhaps in anticipation of taking a killing shot that never came. He screamed and the wind carried the sound far away from here. Angel looked as composed as she could manage under the circumstance. She had a small gun pointed in the direction that she likely thought the shot was fired from. Two of the boys had dropped to their knees and were wailing. In that moment Chris had decided that all three of them—himself, Sheridan and Justin Ryan were all wrong about this situation worsening further…
They were already there.
Sheridan looked as if he’d reached that conclusion as well.
“Look, I want you to talk to me, Agent Prince, give me something plausible to work with here.”
“Dammit, everything that we do here is pure speculation, Sheridan. I know Keaton. Remember that, Sheridan, I know this man better than anybody else here, even Dr. Hicks Dupree. If he wanted those boys dead then he would have stayed behind at the compound where they were safely tucked away and waited on Serena Tennyson to command someone out to clit their throats if she hadn’t planned to do the deed herself.” Just like you had commanded, Dad, he thought. “We don’t know if one or any of those boys have been molested.”
“And?”
“And they are alive, Agent Sheridan.” Chris replied. “They have been Atlanta’s missing children. They have been found alive and that means a lot to the people of the city moving forward. It still means a hell of a lot to millions of people in this country of all races moving forward. Louis Keaton deserves to be arrested, tried, convicted and possibly even given a death center for what he’s done here and what he’s done in the past. He does not deserve to be shot down like some rabid dog. And this comes from a man that deserves to take that shot more than anyone who is here today.”
Sheridan nodded after a time.
“Your point is well taken, Agent Prince. We’ll set up as wide a perimeter as we can manage. I don’t want anything getting through our net. I ju
st don’t know how much longer we’ll be able to contain this situation and all of those scoped rifles out there. We also have no guarantees that we’ll be able to locate and incapacitate those other search parties out there before someone squeezes off a round and takes Keaton out.”
“Understood,” Chris took out his weapon and handed it but first to the man who was making this last ditch effort possible. “I’m going in.”
“You’re doing what, Agent Prince?” Ryan through his skinny arms into the air, “Sheridan, you are going to let this man go through with this.”
Chris spoke first: “Remember what I said before, Sheridan, I know Keaton and more importantly he knows me as well. He may even trust me to an extent. There are two people here who are the most capable of resolving this thing peacefully and that are Dr. Hicks Dupree and I.”
“Then you better hurry,” Ryan said in a grave voice. “I think your window of opportunity just got significantly shorter.”
“How do you mean?” Sheridan asked.
When Special Agent Christopher Prince twisted himself around he immediately saw what the former hostage negotiator had seen. This was of crisis and kings. And the kings had sent the eye of the world to witness for them indeed.
Someone, who knew who, had tipped off the media to this locale and to the latest crisis among all the others that was taking place. At least two dozen reporters drove up to the mountain’s side in pickup trucks and in jeeps and three wheelers. They hopped out of the vehicles as quickly as their legs would carry them and started making their way all around the area like ants on an anthill.
“This shit keeps getting worse and worse,” Chris said to no one in particular.
Hugh
Stone Mountain, 26th Day
He first caught sight of Special Agent Christopher Prince as the man worked his way down to the hill to their position. His first general had gotten over half way down when Louis had taken notice of how fit he’d grown over the years.
Not too bad for a dead man, his other voice said from somewhere just underneath the surface of his conscious.
What are you saying, Hugh. What does that mean?
It means exactly what we said. But we have guessed that we have forgotten. The Dragon lady told us that she knew—that somehow she knew that our poor general was dying. She knew that our general was dead man.
Perhaps she had seen it in her flames.
Well he wasn’t moving to badly for a dead man. Perhaps this is the way a man felt at his height in the weeks and days before his sickness set in, before the worse of his illness began to cripple his body…the way that our mind has been crippled over the years.
Hugh Keaton was only faintly aware that the other man had reached him at last.
He went on the defensive and slid himself behind the doctor. But then he realized he’d exposed himself to any potential shooter from his rear and inched himself up a foot or two. Angel looked ragged, but pleased to be reacquainted with her friend and the two shared a brief but emotional embrace.
“Hello, General,” Keaton knew little else to say. “I mean hello, Christopher.”
Chris caught Angel’s look and stayed silent for the time being. She had that way about her. She knew that he was in the latter more advanced stages of a psychological flux as people in her profession would call it. She knew that it was better not to push him unless the situation offered her no other alternative. She had hoped that he would stay neutral during the first moments of this reunion with his general. She knew that something as a simple perception of disrespect of being addressed incorrectly could set either one of these men with a difficult history off.
“Keaton, I came just like I said that I would.” Chris said but his body language was saying something else entirely. “Unfortunately, I’m not entirely alone. Look up there and over yonder.”
Angel tugged at Keaton’s arm to keep him still as he felt himself moving away.
“I’m sure that your general had little to no say so in the manner,” She offered up the man’s excuse for him. But Keaton noted that her tone was hinting at near contempt levels for the bureau. The disease of distrust was spreading. He had been an agent of Pandora. He knew that disease all too well. “I told you that Christopher would come for you and he has.”
“Yes,” Chris said. “I am here and I’m going to help you as much as I can, Keaton.”
“My name is Hugh,” Keaton said partly in pride partly in terror. Chris looked immediately into his friends big brown eyes for an explanation. The doctor had a measured look of satisfaction on her thick top lip. “My name is Hugh Keaton. Louis…Louis Pope was a boy who died with his family long ago trying to save me from my uncle. Yes, my name is Hugh. I won’t respond to anything else.”
“Alright, fine,” Chris said excising the last of his patients. The other man looked around again, working something important or the other in his mind. Hugh Keaton looked with him. There were both civilians and uniformed people everywhere. Many were armed. “So where do we go from here, Hugh?”
“I’ve embraced my true self—and my destiny. I am sure that I won’t be allowed to live much longer.”
“And I have embraced my destiny as well,” Agent Prince said in a sad voice. Angel, for one of the few times he’d ever known her, looked confused. “So I can appreciate where you are coming from. I’m here to spare you from any more pain.” He made eye contact with the boys and Hugh commended the man for forcing himself to smile when it was the last thing in the world he wanted to do right now. “I want to spare all of you from any more pain.”
“I wish that you could, Christopher.” Hugh said. “I wish that you could keep your promise.” And before the FBI Special Agent could usher any more of his lies the man who now referred to himself as Hugh Keaton said: “Please spare me any long spills about duty. I don’t need to hear any monologues about the changing world we all live in either. You are here—you have risked what little life you have left to save these children only. You are here to save your doctor friend from my vile, evil clutches.”
“I’m here to do that too, Hugh.”
Keaton said nothing else for a time. He braced himself…they all did against another strong gust of wind that were becoming more and more frequent with the storm approaching. He stole a long glance around the mountain. He’d lived his entire youthful life up the road in Tennessee in or around mountain ranges just like this one—but he never really seemed to see them. This was a beautiful part of the world to live in.
This was a beautiful part of the world to die in.
And yet, Hugh seemed to only have eyes for Christopher Prince.
“Just look at you,” He said again. “You are all grown up. You are a man now. You have become the man that your father always knew that you would be.”
Angel flashed her look of confusion again. Chris fought off hurt…he rubbed salvia building at the corners of his mouth but had found his voice again.
“Ever since the day that he let you take me away from my mother and my brother Xavier…I became a man, Hugh. I became a man because I had to.” And then Chris found eyes for young Moses Jackson and somehow he knew he was gazing at the childhood version of himself without having to state it aloud. Both generals knew it. “We wouldn’t have survived any other way would we?”
“Survival,” Keaton shook his head as the sadness of his plight nearly overwhelmed him. “I want to survive this, Christopher.”
“I don’t think it’s too late,” Angel said to him, but looked from Chris to the many faces surrounding their position, but strange and unfamiliar faces to her. “But there is danger all around us. It’s probably worse, Hugh, than both you and I realize right Christopher?”
Agent Prince nodded with some urgency.
“She’s right as usual, Hugh. We have to deal with the hand we’ve been given. You need to surrender to me as we three agreed that you would an hour and half ago. Are you prepared to do that? Are you strong enough to keep your emotions in control so we can all w
alk away from this alive?”
There are so many of them…and so few of us.
“There is a human sense of comfort and relative safety when you are sheltered under the umbrella of company and fellowship…” Hugh heard his voice trail off and he began to cry. “I may deserve so but I don’t want to die. I’m so scared right now, Christopher. I want to live.”
“So do I,” Agent Prince said and it was the doctor who neared tears as her best friend’s words meaning became clearer to her. “Let’s start the ball rolling by releasing Dr. Hicks Dupree into my custody and care. Doctor, you will take these boys one by one to the care of your old comrade Agent Sheridan and his people just over that hill while I stay with Hugh.”
“No,” Hugh said quickly. “The doctor stays behind. She allowed herself to be detained to shield me from being potentially shot down by…by whoever is pursuing me. The boys stay as well. We all walk together or not at all. Otherwise, one of these trigger happy people may get an itchy finger. I’ll be dead if only one of these men makes an error in judgement or conscious.”
“I have to side with Hugh on this one, Christopher.” Angel said. “He has done some horrible things, some unforgivable, and I’m sure that many people behind those guns out there aren’t nearly as forgiving as you.”
“Alright, I don’t have the time to argue this point. As you said, Doctor, we already have impatient people with Hugh in their scopes as we speak. We need to move though before this gets anymore out of hand.”
Hugh Keaton could see that for himself thank you. In the near distance he saw more civilians—probably those employed by the mass media—flooding the area with hopes of spreading their lies and innuendoes. He knew that his first general knew that all too well. For better or worse, the next few moments of his life would play out for the entire world to see.
And then he made an executive decision.
“Alright, Christopher, I’ve changed my mind. I’ll go with your original plan. I’ll release the children into the doctor’s care if you’ll tell these boys one thing for me first?”
Agent Prince squared his shoulders and stood his ground.
“One point, Hugh,” He said. “And then we have to go.”
“When your father let me take you, I promised him and subsequently promised you that I would never touch you no matter the personal or professional cost to me.” Hugh said and then he specifically found the young eyes of Moses Jackson staring back up at him. “All those years ago, I kept my word to you. I didn’t touch you. I want you to tell Moses that at the least a horrible human being like me can keep his word.”
Christopher looked to the horizon—pained. Dr. Angel Hicks Dupree looked as if she wanted to go to her friend to comfort him…but the thought of leaving the children even more vulnerable to an errand or stray sniper’s bullet kept her at bay.
“We need to go, Hugh,” was the only answer that his first general could supply. “I won’t be able to hold Sheridan and his people off for much longer.”
“Tell them, Christopher,” Hugh pleaded. “I need you to tell them that I kept my word.”
“No,” Chris said—and then clarified his lone words meaning so there would be no mistake. He looked at Moses Jackson once again. “This man, Hugh Keaton, gave me his word that he wouldn’t molest me and he never did. But there are many types of hurt, many types of pain that one human being can administer onto another. I had nightmares about my captivity. I still do. You children—especially you, Moses, will suffer as I have suffered. But you will survive. You will all live on…as…as I continue to live on.”
And you are right, Christopher…you are so very right.
We have hurt so many.
I have hurt so many.
And there was nothing that he could say or do that would be able to undo what had already been done.
But he would at least start with…
“I’m sorry. I know that now. I’m so very sorry for what I’ve done to all of you.”
“I don’t accept your apology, Hugh, I just can’t.” Chris said. “But I have a question for you as well.”
Angel took an involuntary step towards her friend.
“Don’t do this now, Christopher.”
“Let him speak, Doctor,” Hugh said. “The floor is his. Ask your question, General. I owe you an answer at the least.”
“How did my father know to choose you? How did he know?”
Keaton looked away. He looked back and found all five sets of eyes burning through him awaiting his answer.
Chris patience was running thin.
“Answer me, damn you. You say that you owe me. Tell me the truth.”
Keaton suddenly heard something…he could feel a new sensation blowing into this area and it wasn’t the storm.
It was faint a first and he couldn’t put a name to it.
And then the doctor and Agent Prince must have heard it as well and they reacted to it, especially Christopher because he began to swear and curse like Hugh Keaton had never heard a man swear and curse before.
The boys joined the grownups in the game of search and find—they looked to the skies for answers—
And then they all found that answer seemingly at once.
“Oh my God, no,” It was Angel who had spoken.
The hornets were buzzing all around him just like his dead Uncle Templeton had long ago said that they would.
There were four helicopters flying towards him.
He must fly away.
He must.
When Keaton first started to run—he felt the doctor dive at his legs. He would remember that much at the least. She clawed at the one that was nearest to him, but failed to wrap her arms around the bone the way she would have preferred. Moses Jackson didn’t quite understand what was going on…but he gave his best effort in helping her but missed as well.
Agent Prince had made a quick decision of his own—the same one that Hugh would have made in his place—and gathered and shielded the other boys as his top priority. He dove on top of them in an attempt to shield them from all seen and unseen dangers as his federal government training had instructed him to.
The FBI was running towards him.
Some of the journalist ran away.
It was ciaos in its most perfect form.
And then Hugh Keaton raised his arms and ran like the fool that his uncle had frightened him to be.
And after four or perhaps five steps Hugh heard the sound of firecrackers.
And he felt a hundred mosquito bites on his arms, torso, neck, legs and on his head.
And then they were standing over the top of him: The doctor; Agent Prince; various FBI personnel; reporters; Moses Jackson; and finally the other three boys he’d held against their will.
He did not know how much time had passed.
He could feel the doctor’s touch…and the wetness of her tears as she kneeled down next to him.
Why would she cry for him after what he’d done? Why would anyone cry for him?
He saw TV cameras a plenty and heard the clicking sound of still ones taking hundreds of pictures of what was a very lonely boy from Memphis, Tennessee.
The doctor was still crying, but Hugh used the last of his strength to reach out for where Christopher Prince had stooped down. To the man’s credit he only pulled back a little.
“Your father…Isaac Prince…the Caretaker sought me out, trusted me because I gave him my word.” Keaton said as his breathing slowed with each passing second. “Sometimes a word is all that a man has…even a creature like me. I kept my word.”
He saw the fading image of Agent Christopher nod at his words and excuse himself from the scene. Was everything fading, or were his own tears clouding his view. The doctor hadn’t stopped crying. And for whatever reason her crying was all that he could hear.
Well, at least most of the physical pain was fading.
He fixed his attention of Moses who was staring back with what exactly…was it hurt, disgust, curiosity or some st
range mix of all of them.
But then the boy surprised him, surprised them all by touching Hugh on his face. He wiped the tears from his eyes and off of his cheeks. Hugh was so thankful for that. He was so thankful that in his dying moments, that he could see Moses and the rest of them all so very clearly now.
And then—
And then, just as quickly, Moses got to his feet again and retreated back to where the other boys and Christopher Prince was standing…and he saw his generals together for the first and last time.
Hugh Keaton knew that there is a human sense of comfort and relative safety when you are sheltered under the umbrella of company and fellowship.
Even Atlanta’s missing children knew this to be true.
Serena
Centennial Park, 26th Day
So poor Louis Keaton was now dead;
Serena Tennyson touched the glass in front of the department store down here in Centennial Olympic Park first with her fingernail and then the skin on the palm side and rubbed it with some affection. She was far from alone. She was parked on the sidewalk in front of nearly 40 or 50 people who’d camped out and were watching a national telecast of the morning news.
This store is relative undamaged considering both the earthquake damage and looting that occurred along this block. The looting and petty theft had been the norm during the late night hours overnight. Perhaps the sunlight and a least a minimum presence of the an APD cell that called themselves Protect and Serve, who were still performing the duties as they were sworn to, had discouraged such reckless behavior.
And perhaps, just perhaps, the people of Atlanta had grown weary of violence all together.
She felt something for Louis. She really had. He had lived as such a misunderstood individual—ultimately even by her. He had grown much since she’d been in charge of his original training…and yet he had ultimately disappointed her at the same time. He could have grown into such more. That disappointment she felt extended to her seeing Dr. Angel Hicks Dupree on the news feed as well. Sure, they’d shared a certain kinship of course. Now she was seeing the other woman balling her eyes out national TV for a known pedophile was proving to be unsettling to say the least. Perhaps the doctor would have felt the same level of discomfort at my own emotional display when a known professional killer Danielle Rohm died when the earth underneath her swallowed her up whole.
She didn’t see Christopher Prince on camera. That fact wasn’t a real surprise, especially if Nicholas Sheridan was running the FBI now that Raymond Rice’s betrayal had been exposed for the entire world to see. She was faintly interested if her old adversary was still alive or had the night claimed him as well. She was betting on his survival. She was counting on it. He had proven a resilient if not stubborn opponent just as his younger brother Xavier had been.
The Caretaker would have been so very proud of his offspring.
She looked on. She used her slim figure and her elbows to carve out just enough room to breathe her own air as the crowd grew expeditiously larger every few minutes. She saw Moses Jackson and three of the other surviving boys being escorted to and lowered into unmarked vehicles. When one of the boys looked back at the camera, his appearance brought out boisterous cheers and applause—and even tears from those people directly behind her. People of color were hugging one another. Others who looked like her were praising their God. Hours ago, you people may have been at each other’s throats. Now they were interacting as if those hours had been years and even decades ago. Suddenly the cheering had become so fierce, so emotional that Serena could barely hear herself think.
And she needed to think.
Oracle had been out of contact with her associates for hours now. She did know that her suicide agents would have all but exhausted their use over the city by now.
There was only one command left for her give:
Whirlwind.
The strongest gust of wind she’d felt this morning whipped past where she and the others were standing. Is this a portent of what is to come? At this moment she was torn to whether or not to unleash the Dragon’s version of Hell on this city. She looked around her and over the horizon. The conditions couldn’t be more perfect—or riper from cataclysmic damage to the city’s already frail infrastructure from the coming firestorm if she’d plotted it herself. The rioting had started the process. The earthquake had certainly hastened the destruction. And it was an act of destruction that if her flames hadn’t anticipated.
And now the storm of the century, as some meteorologist was calling it, this wind maker of epic proportions was descending on the city.
And where are you right now, Thomas?
Parts of her wanted to abandon all that was coming and seek Thomas Pepper out. And yet, she wondered if reappearance in his life would ring destruction down on him as well. She’d been the common thread in the deaths of all the people she’d been associated and even grown to care about.
She’d lost her father and mother.
She’d lost Caretaker and the regent.
Louis Keaton was gone.
Even Danielle Rohm had died.
So what would happen if Serena found Thomas Pepper alive? She’d already introduced mayhem and destruction into his life when she commanded Shooter to kill both his maid and his assistant.
Why would you want me, Thomas?
An older woman brought her back to the moment as Serena felt her squeezing her thin hand with her wrinkled one. Serena looked back at her sharply—she’d never been comfortable with human contact…and yet when looked into the older woman’s eyes and saw the smile lighting up her ancient face—
Suddenly the people on this particular strip of sidewalk in this small corner of Atlanta began to dance in the streets. Someone had turned on boom box. The music wasn’t tuned to any music that remotely fit her taste, but she couldn’t deny the upbeat rhythm that the song was generating through the speakers.
Serena pulled her hand out of the other woman’s grasp—only to have it grabbed again this time by a boy no older than the children that she had kidnapped and locked in a hole with a predator. She felt the slightest shiver of…
Is that regret that you are feeling, Oracle, or is it remorse?
Maybe it was something that she couldn’t put a name to, but she continued to feel something unsettling rattling at the pit of her stomach as if she could possibly throw up. She hoped that wasn’t the case. She couldn’t recall eating her last meal. It must have been days ago. And upchucking right now might be particularly unpleasant as a result.
The music still played. Everyone still danced, some of them freelancing while huge numbers of people looked as if they were performing an almost choreographed number as they stepped and spun around and repeated it nearly as one.
The older woman hadn’t given up on enticing her. She grabbed her free hand and at long last Serena gave up on distancing herself from either of the stranger’s grip. The track changed over to something more to her liking and as fatigued as she had been…she felt her hips and her feet moving to the beat until she discovered her body moving with the beat.
Maybe…just maybe Atlanta hadn’t been a city too busy to hate.
Maybe it had been a city too busy to hate for long.
It is a pause and effect, she thought.
She bit back a smile but she could feel it on her face.
She danced.
She still had resources available to her. Perhaps she would use them to find Thomas Pepper and hope that he wasn’t among the many ruins that the city had to offer.
Perhaps…in time…he would have her. Perhaps Serena Tennyson didn’t have to be alone again. Perhaps she would age like all other human beings aged.
Perhaps she could avoid the prophecy that was witnessed to her when she found herself locked in a holding cell downtown during Deliverance.
Maybe I don’t have to give this city to the flames.
She’d been determined to avoid the version of Whirlwind that forces outside of her command w
ished to unleash on this city and the country at large.
Perhaps it is not too late for me to call back my own flames.
She knew that she would have to spend the rest of her days peering over her shoulder, making sure that the FBI or any reminisce of a House in Chains was not there to subject her to arrest or revenge.
She could survive though. She could flourish.
Serena Tennyson felt her hands being passed around from one person in this large crowd to another and then another and she stopped just long enough to have a private dance with each one. She’d grown dizzy and drunk on the crowd’s energy, its good nature and its love.
And then she felt the cold steel of cuffs biting at the skin around her wrist.
After a moment Serena went to her knees after two attempts at escape failed her. She didn’t look up at first…she could not. She would not. Finally, she did look skyward and saw three—maybe four uniformed officers peering down at the prize that they had so neatly wrapped up. The officer nearest to her had cuffed her to his own wrist while the woman on the left side of her waist did the same action with her other wrist. Just by chance, she glared back at the huge TV screen they’d been watching minutes earlier—and saw her face taking up most of the screen with the words in smaller print below it saying: Serena Tennyson, leader of Pandora, is wanted for crimes against humanity.
After a moment of hesitation she began to scramble. She pulled against the cuffs but that only managed to force the steel to bite into her wrist and arms further. She screamed in both agonizing pain and grief.
That moment passed.
Serena surprised herself how quickly she had regained her self- control, all those years of training her mind and body to be disciplined were paying dividends. She felt her pulse slowing and her heart was no longer pounding mercilessly in her chest.
A hand full of other uniformed officers moved into the scene and used their own bodies to shield her from the possibility of her being hit by projectiles or even someone bold enough to try and physically confront her. The crowd that was in such a jovial celebratory mood minutes ago was now coming into slow but steady recognition of who just who she really was.
Is this how my role in all of this ends? Have the flames been telling me tall tales? Is it written for me to exit the game with a simple whimper and not a bang?
The officers pulled her to her feet. She faintly heard one of the officers read her rights to her. She exhaled deeply and began to march with them towards her unexpected destiny.
It was over.
It was finally all over.
And then she saw it.
An older model car bent the curve without slowing, its wheels straightened with lighting quickness and it began to cut and angel towards where she, the officers and dozens upon dozens were loitering.
Her mind told her to run but her body was slow to react and her cuffed partners were struggling to move themselves away from the car’s deadly path.
And just before the car plowed into them—she was struck first at the terrible irony that she, the Oracle, the leader of Pandora was going to be killed by the selfless act of one of her own suicide agents.
If this was her last moment then Serena Tennyson was surprised by what she saw as she heard the screams of the first pedestrians run into and over—and that horrid sound that metal makes as it eats up human flesh.
She didn’t see her life flash before her.
She failed to see silhouettes of her dead parents…or even the flames that she’d grown to trust and love rise in front of her.
In her final moments Serena Tennyson saw a vision of Thomas Pepper.
And he was dying as well.