by Gary Sapp
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 just 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
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