Alan Gray

-1-

“Daddy, this is for you,” Grayson holds up a paper bird made out of surgical paper that wasn’t quite a crane. “See, I’m sorry. You have to talk to me. Daddy, please ?”

Haley doesn’t take the gift. His glazed eyes sweep protectively over his son and then back to the coated two way glass. He’d spent all night walking absently around the lab and had been sitting against the far wall since this morning.  He’d been off since he told Kian where to find El and the others. I’d thought Grayson being here would make Haley even more defiant but it seemed to have broken him.

When Kian and his guards left us yesterday, I saw a side of Haley I'd never seem. He'd shaken and screamed at Grayson for leaving and made a point to make him understand we were bring held hostage here. It seemed harsh but what the fuck do I know ? He’d finally stopped when he saw the bruising on Grayson’s head from where one of Kian’s minions had tried to knock him unconscious.

We both had enough medical knowledge to know that if Grayson didn’t already have a concussion from that he probably had one now from Haley shaking him. I’d taken the pillow from one of the recovery beds and Grayson had slept at his father’s feet all night.

And while Grayson seemed ready for forgiveness after a night’s rest Haley still clearly wasn’t. The only other time he’d talked to Grayson was to tell him to face the wall whenever Kian’s guards came in and never speak around them.

“Alan.” Haley says, getting up suddenly and walking over to me.

He rests his pale arm, palm up against the surgical table I was cleaning.

I wipe the area with disinfectant and give him a small dose of morphine.

“It could be okay. El and them might get out before he finds them,” I tell him. “You misled them. You told him the wrong building didn’t you ?”

“How did you know ?”

“I lived at Arkham briefly,” I remind him.  “I know the freshman dorms are empty during brea--,”

The door opens and one of Rias guards, an thug from what used to be the Armenian cartel, walks in. He’s one of the older ones who looks like he's been through some shit. He walks over to us, surveying my work station and letting his eyes rest on Haley.

I watch in shock as Grayson, who is out of the guard’s eye line, quietly crawls towards the door the guard left open. I try to play it off like I don’t notice because the kid seemed pretty smart and maybe he could get us help. But Haley chooses the same moment to turn and sees his son sneaking out.

“No!” Haley hisses sharply. The guard turns back around and sees Grayson nearly out the door. He charges, his hand on his gun

“GET BACK IN!,” the guard snaps, stomping on Grayson’s  fingers and sweeping him back into the room with his boot.

Grayson wails and Haley grabs the sharp scalpel I have sitting in disinfectant and  charges towards the guard. The man pulls his gun and fires a warning shot into the wall. Pieces of ceiling sprinkle down over them.

That stops Haley in his tracks.

“Drop the scalpel! On your knees or I'll blow your fucking head off!,” the guard orders, pointing his gun at him.

The scalpel clatters to the floor and Haley goes to his knees in front of the guard.  I look down and pretend to be engrossed in my equipment as the guard unzips his pants. I don’t know what is more disgusting; that the guard is doing this with me in the room or me--for not doing anything about it.

“Shut him up,” the guard barks.

Grayson was  now facing the wall like he’d been told but he hadn’t stopped whimpering and had his hand in his mouth.

“I…I don’t know how,” Haley chokes out.

The guard sneers and takes the medical lubricant off my operating table and  gestures Haley towards the bathroom. Haley gives me a look I can’t decipher and follows silently after the guard.

When the door to the bathroom closes I try to approach Grayson as non-threateningly as I can. I bend down to his level because I’d heard kids responded to that.

“You can turn around…I think I should take a look at that,” I tell Grayson, pointing to the hand the guard had stepped on.

He’s crying too loudly to hear me but I can tell nothing is broken by the way he is holding his fingers. I reach around him and spray a numbing spray onto his hand to help with the pain and that puts him in hysterics.

“Sorry,” I say and I am.

He reaches quickly for his stuffed robot and presses himself farther into the corner. I put the pressure blanket I’d found in a drawer over him, hoping it would make him sleep. Blankets like that were usually used to keep patients calm during surgeries when they were awake.

I go back to pretending like I’m working on Kian’s street samurai and try to be loud about it so Grayson doesn’t hear the sounds coming from the bathroom.

After a few minutes there’s a tap on the other side of glass from Minnow and I immediately start processing.

U....O….K

Minnow taps out.

They must have heard the gunshot.

We had to be short with out messages since  neither of us were experts at Morse Code. We’d learned just enough for situations like this. I’d told her Haley and Grayson were here but I wasn’t sure how to explain anything else. I just tell her Grayson tried to leave. I ask her about the girls. She just says they are the same. Scared shitless.

H…A…V…….  F…O…O…D…….2…….D…A…Y

Minnow taps out.

It takes me a minutes to decode it.

They usually always bought us some form of non-perishables for breakfast and dinner but there hadn’t been anything today.

N…O…….U ? I ask.

N…O she responds.

O…D…D she taps out.

She runs her fingernails against the glass and I run mine back over the same spot following her path. It was what she’d been doing to let me know she was still there even if she was too tired to send code. I just needed to know she was still there.

I hear loud, clear moaning followed by a 'shut the fucking door'. I turn just in time to see the bathroom door being slammed shut. I hear a struggle going on behind the door and some cursing. Then it stops and goes back to low grunts.

Grayson is standing in front of the door his hand on the knob.  

“You should get away from there,” I say in the quietest voice I can manage and touch his back.

I shepherd Grayson back to one of the hospital beds and give him some more surgical paper to play with. I find a granola bar Haley had hidden in the air vent. He’d stopped eating and started hiding his food when Grayson showed up.

When Haley and the guard come out of the bathroom an hour later the guard makes us all close our eyes and put our hands up when he opens the door and leaves.

“Daddy, was he hurting you ?” Grayson asks cautiously.

“No,” Haley says quickly. “Go stand in that corner--,”

“Why--,”

“Because I'm upset with you. I told you to face the wall when the guards came in and you didn’t listen, you have to listen--,”

“I wanted to go get help-,”

“You can’t get help," he says through gritted teeth. “Those men with guns are dangerous. They will kill you. They will kill me.I’m trying to protect you. If you disobey me again I will hurt you, do you understand--,”

“Da--,”

“No. You have no say in this. If anyone else comes in this room you face the wall. You make yourself small and invisible. If you don’t they will kill you. Do you understand ?”

“Yes, Daddy-,”

“Go stand there until you can remember that.”

“I’m sorry--,”

“Now.”

Grayson dutifully goes to the corner and Haley walks to the other side of the lab. I follow after him.

“Are you okay ?,” I ask

“I’m fine,” he says as he leans against the table and buries his head in his hand.

“No, you’re not…I think you're freaking him out--,”

“I’m protecting him.” 

“Look, I’ll get us out of this. Kian can’t keep us here forever--”

“Yes, he can,” Haley bites back. “He reminds me of my brother and--and Maxwell.  Men like him are cruel and they never like to lose. And when men like that get bored they just get more worse. Sometimes you can't win...if we're kept locked up here  any more than a year I want you to kill us. Grayson and I."

"You  really don't think Luce is burning down this city to find you---"

"I know he is but, he's also not who he used to be...I always told Luce if I ever ended up in a situation like this again I wouldn't force myself to live through it. Some things aren't worth surviving. He'll understand."

"What about the girls ?"

His face stills.

"I'm terrified for them."

 

---

-2-

I’m woken in the middle of a deep sleep by Minnow tapping frantically on the glass. It’s a long sentence and she keeps doing the whole thing again and again until I finally get it all.

G…I…R…L…S……G…O…N…E…….K……T…O…O…K ….…T…H…E..M

G…I…R…L…S……G…O…N…E…….K……T…O…O…K ……T…H…E..M

G…I…R…L…S……G…O…N…E…….K……T…O…O…K ……T…H…E..M

Her tapping rouses both Haley and Grayson from where they were sleeping together in one of the recovery beds.

“What now ?,” Haley asks.

“Kian took the…them away,” I say cautious of Grayson who was waking too. We hadn't told him Atsumi and Angel where on the other side of the glass.

“Does that mean that he…did what he wanted to El ?,” Haley asks.

I  run the theory that El is dead by Minnow but before I can get the words out the doors to the lab swing open and Kian Donnelly walks in. Grayson quickly pushes his face into his father's body and Haley covers him with the blanket.

Instead of his usual trio of guards Kian’s just got one guard who looks terrified.

That has to mean something.

“Kian,” I say standing. “I’m behind on my work but I’ve been telling your guards I need to go to the med supply so I can mix my own preservation liquid--”

“We can discuss that later. Come with me.”

He steps aside so I can walk out of the room. I exchange a look with Haley who won’t look at me.

I was blindfolded when they brought me here but I suspected we were in some abandoned municipality building because the lab I was using was set up like a morgue. We get into the elevator and exit the building and I see it was the former Catalina City Hall.

The island was technically apart of the Sprawl but it was built like an old time Europe. If it weren’t for the holoscreen ads and skyscrapers in the distance I’d think we’d gone back to the early 20^th century.

We walk down the cobbled street towards an old style house at the end of the block. Kian walks me up two sets of stairs and into an office space. The space is sparse and small.

“Welcome to my office,” he says, sitting behind the desk.

“If you don’t mind me asking,” I say.  “What do you do for a living ?,”

“I run books,” he replies easily. “I inherited the business from my Uncle. Before that I was the man who made sure every one of my uncle's bets was paid in full.”

I don’t have anything to say to this so I let it hang in the air.

 “Alan Gray. I didn’t know much about you when I first started on this journey but my men did some research and I had no idea what a prize you were. I know you’re loyal to Minnow and the way things used to be. But I have a plan for the future and I need you to be apart of it--,”

“I’m not saying no. But I have to know what is going to happen to Minnow and--,”

“Believe me, Alan. I don’t want to kill her--,”

“Your father wouldn’t have,” I say quickly. “Minnow’s forgotten more than we’ll ever know about how the cartel and MBC run.”

“Noted.” he says. “But there are other people who have her knowledge. That said I have a vision for my future and I  see you in it. I want us working side by side. I can be agreeable. Promise me you’ll serve me and she’ll live.”

“What about Haley and Grayson ?,”

He laughs at that.

“I have no use for Alex Haley anymore, although my men may feel differently,” he smiles. “But I don’t mind keeping him alive. The child is part cyborg and I’m willing to keep him alive unless he’s of better service to me for research.”

“Now for my terms,” he continues. “In a few days I’m  gathering representatives from every remnant family on this island and announcing I’m the Shy cartel heir and that I’m taking over. It will be an invitation for them to join my side. I  want a line of street samurai on either side of me during the announcement. And of course, the Sprawl’s most notorious ripper doc at my side.

“....You found El, then ?,” I ask casually.

“I’ve decided to refocus my energy and man power. It has occurred to me that everyone already thinks she is dead, which is good enough for now. Plus I don’t actually need her for my little show.”

“Show ?”

“At The Avalon Hotel,” he says. “My announcement.”

 

***

Kian gives me a small army of medically trained guards from his cohort and we work through the next two days on the last three street samurai. It was never my goal to finish this work but I have no choice. It keeps the guards busy so they leave Haley alone. Kian even makes him help and I want to talk to Haley but I don’t get anytime alone with him. Grayson stays in bed, resting off his concussion and keeping eerily quiet.

On the day of Kian’s  announcement I’m taken to the Avalon Hotel and given a room in an expansive top floor suite. The suite is buzzing with guards and a few people who must be Donnellys. I step away and get my first hot shower in over a week

By some miracle the bathroom has a syn connection near the bathtub.

Fucking rich people.

I have an operator connect me to Arkham Academy and when I reach the administrative office I ask to speak to Hotako. I give one of my aliases that Hotako would recognize as me.

“Alan ?,”  I hear Sara’s voice and I nearly cry.

Hotako must have recognized the code name if he transferred me directly to Sara. I can hear a faint beeping behind her and the familiar sounds of the school's infirmary. But I don’t have time to ask.

“Sara listen, I faked my death. That guy was Rayne’s son Kian not Kenji. You need to get here and save us. I’m at the Avalon H--”

“Alan, we know--”

“You don’t understand. The girls are al-”

“We know--”

“Haley and Gra--”

“We know,” she says. “We know everything. Luce and Jean captured three of Kenji’s  men when they bombed the school and got the answers out of them.”

Jean and Luce had been formidable interrogators on their own, I could only imagine the vicious bloodshed from the two of them working together.

“Okay,” I say, still amazed after all these years she could always still be one step ahead of me. “I think Kian trusts me. He's let me in. Is there anything I should do ?,”

“Yes.” she says flatly. “Stay out of the way”

Then she hangs up.