Chapter 20: Exposure

The next morning we got an early start. Everyone was very concerned about me, and they fixed a large breakfast, but they also didn't want to focus too much attention on what was already obvious. I knew what last night represented as well as anyone, and I think they all knew I'd internalize it, which would only increase the pressures on me and likewise increase my own tensions.

Melissa asked if she could come along and watch what we did, and I didn't feel we could deny her after what we'd gone through the previous night, so we invited her along. We decided to take two cars. I'd take Cate and Kitty with me, while Gail would take Melissa with her.

We arrived at the Alice Lovett Center for Reproductive Medicine just shortly after they opened. There were already people waiting inside. When I entered there was a different girl behind the counter. I wrote down all of my information and told her why I was here. She looked over my notes while I waited for my specimen cup.

"Uh, excuse me a moment," she said, which instantly set me on edge. She picked up the phone.

"Dr. Lovett, he's here," she said simply, looking at me the whole time.

"Is there a problem?" Gail asked walking up to the counter.

"It seems the good doctor wants to speak to us," I told her.

Dr. Lovett came out about three minutes later. She ushered us over to the side so we could talk somewhat privately. The other girls came along as well. She glanced at them before turning to me.

"Yet another new girl?" she asked, arching her eyebrow curiously.

"Actually it's at least six since we were here last week, and that's not counting all those who would like to be included," Cate corrected her.

She looked at me and shook her head.

"Actually I had Linda call me because I didn't want you to have the same trouble you had the last time. Somehow I figured you'd likely have just as unusual a request as you did before. I figured I should take care of you personally."

"Actually, if he needs someone to take care of him, I'd be glad to volunteer, though I was told I wasn't allowed to assist with the 'procedure'," Kitty teased.

"You know, I do have an additional unusual request," I told her. "Let me give you a little background on why we have so many people interested in my genetic material, as it were. These girls and I share a number of unique genetic anomalies which work together in some unusual ways. They each depend on me to find and activate these traits, thus they are anxious to make sure nothing happens to me. While there are many of them, there's only one of me." At this point I stopped to see just how well she was taking this. She nodded, seeming to consider it seriously.

"Now, at some point, it's likely news of our little group might leak out to the general public. As you might imagine, there may be many who wouldn't be very appreciative of us. What's more, there are a good number of people—and corporations—who would be very interested in gaining access to my DNA. I can imagine that, in such a situation, they'd apply pressure on certain government officials to act, and they'd likely find a sympathetic judge who'd give them a court order to do whatever they wanted. Especially if they wrapped it up in a Domestic Security wrapper. What I'd really like to ask you, knowing what I'm asking you is completely out of bounds and could put you in a world of trouble, is if you could, say, accidentally mislabel my samples. Thus, if they were to come here looking for my samples for their own research purposes, they'd only find an unidentified sample from a normal guy."

She cocked her head and regarded me for a moment, which caused her hair, which was in a bunch of loose curls, to jiggle enticingly. Down boy, I told myself, you've got enough. You don't need to be looking for any more. Although I had to admit, for as much as I loved Kitty, Chalise and Cate, I had really developed an appreciation for more mature ladies.

"You know, you just get to be more and more fun each time we talk. You just can't invent stuff this entertaining. While what you are asking is completely unethical, illegal and immoral, I doubt we could be held responsible for an honest administrative mistake. I'd have to think up a good story for who should handle the samples. Not that I'd ever do such a thing you understand. You realize DNA is pretty easy to lift nowadays. They can probably grab it from a comb, dead skin from a bedspread, or they could simply compel a blood sample."

"Yeah, I'm aware of that," I conceded, holding my hands palms up. "I'm not looking to avoid all potential troubles, I'm just trying to reduce the few risks which are within my control. Anyway, I'm sorry I asked you to potentially compromise your ethics. We won't speak of this again. Now can I have my cup please?" I asked her with a smile.

She laughed, pulled one from her lab coat and handed it to me. "Do you want to modify your authorization list?"

"Nah, the same people are in charge. They can look after the rest. Thanks for everything you're doing for us, Doctor Lovett. I really appreciate it."

"Thanks, Alex. I think by now you can call me Alice. I think I'm going to grow quite fond of you. If you need a list of sympathetic clinics in other locations, just ask and I'll get it for you, although you'll probably need to make your own arrangements with each of them yourself. I'll look forward to treating your various 'girlfriends' in the future, hopefully with you in attendance to check over my work."

I managed to do my business quickly and efficiently. Cate and Melissa found another Watcher outside, so we invited her with us when we returned to the downtown area. We decided to vary the location, but only slightly. We figured we'd focus on more than just tourists by situating ourselves at Aloe Plaza, a little park with some nice water fountains and sculptures just outside Union Station, so there should be plenty of people passing nearby while we waited. While we drove there I contacted Clara, figuring it would take her a little while to get organized and meet us there.

We parked at Union Station and got situated at the public park by the fountains. Melissa volunteered to get us some coffee from a shop inside Union Station—they all seemed to think it might be too difficult for me to try to handle anyone inside the crowded terminal—so we set up shop sitting around the fountain, giving Gail a nice overview of the surrounding area. While we waited for both Clara and the coffee to arrive, Cate and I talked to the new Watcher, Kelly. Kitty watched without saying anything. As Cate went over specifics, I glanced around to see if anyone was paying any attention to me. I spotted a couple of people watching me standing outside of Union Station, so I pointed them out to Kitty to try to round up. Just as she set off, a plain white van pulled up in front of Union Station. I wouldn't have paid it any attention, but the door slid open and Clara burst from the open door to come running full tilt towards me.

"Master, Master, please Master!" she cried loudly enough for everyone around to hear. There were a lot of people still coming to and from the terminal, so she attracted a lot of attention. Cate and Kelly both looked up, and I saw Kitty stop as we all watched Clara running towards me. I sent a quick 'Shhh' to her, but it was only partially successful. She ran up and threw herself at my feet again, silent now, eyes averted, awaiting my reaction.

'Red Alert! Red Alert!' I distinctly heard Gail's warning in my head. Sitting up I scanned all around me. Seeing my motion Clara raised herself slightly.

"I brought people," she stated proudly. "Now everyone can see just how mighty you are, and you can strike fear in all your enemies."

"Oh Shit," I groaned to myself. Looking back at the van, I saw two cameramen and a female reporter with a mic in her hand.

"Cate, interference," I hissed as I jumped to my feet. In order to set up a watch over the area, we'd decided to situate me right in the center of the fountain, meaning I'd have to walk half the length of the fountain to get away. Figuring it would be close, I broke into a run trying to get away.

"Master! Master, what's wrong?" I heard Clara calling from behind me.

'You idiot, ' I mentally hissed at her. 'You don't ask Jesus to appear on a Roman Early Morning News program the day before he's to appear in Jerusalem!' I hated to both flat out reject her and call her names, but I couldn't help it. I was seriously pissed. I knew her unstable personality was going to get us into trouble, and now she'd proven me right in the worst manner possible.

Shit, I hadn't expected for Clara to arrive so soon. She must have been waiting nearby for me to contact her. Now all my plans to find new followers here were trashed. I certainly couldn't reach out to anyone when there was a news crew looking to chase me down.

'I'm not a friggin' Avenging Angel, Clara. In case you hadn't noticed, I'm just a kid, ' I insisted, while running full tilt, something I could only do telepathically. 'I'm not here to strike down nonbelievers, I'm not here to become famous, and I don't operate on YOUR schedule, ' I continued angrily as I tried to figure out how to respond.

"Excuse me, Sir, Sir!" A feminine voice called out from the direction of the street. I glanced over and saw the reporter closing in on me. She was a very attractive, well dressed blonde, but I had no intention of spending any time getting to know her any better. I just hoped I could get away before they got a clear picture of my face, so I tried to cover my face with my arm. But then I figured I'd look even guiltier doing that. Seeing her catching up with me, I took a short cut through the fountain, hardly the kind of thing to make me look good on television, and splashed my way to the other side, attracting yet more attention and soaking myself in the process.

Running away, I couldn't see any more behind me, but I could see what was happening through Gail's eyes. Actually it was strange, because instead of the bouncing view you get when running with a video camera, I got the sharp focus on select regions of Gail's vision, so I could easily discern what was happening.

As the news crew ran after me, Cate ran and stopped directly in their path. Kelly, following her lead, threw her purse at the lead videographer. I could see from the images she broadcast to me that Gail was covering a lot of ground as she came up on them from the side, while the two women Kitty had been on the way to speak with followed the news crew. I had no idea what these last two planned, but I hoped it worked.

The newswoman collided head on with Cate, who yelled at her and called her a stupid, clumsy bitch, which I'm sure made for captivating television but didn't make the news crew look very professional. The lead cameraman almost lost his camera due to Kelly's purse, and had to stop to steady it. The other one didn't want to outdistance the star of the show, so he pulled up short as well, filming the newswoman sprawled on the ground. By then Gail had reached them.

"Hold it right there!" she called out to them in her authoritative cop voice, despite being dressed in her civilian attire.

The reporter looked at her as she attempted standing without losing her grip on her microphone. She glanced at my retreating form, and then turned to Gail. She quickly tried to compose herself, giving up on catching me.

"Hmm, a Smith & Wesson concealed pistol, official bearing, you must be a cop," she announced, proving she wasn't as incompetent as she'd initially appeared. Even though I hadn't recognized her, it appeared she'd been dealing with the city's police on a fairly regular basis, and knew when to recognize them. "What does the city have to do with this?" she asked, shoving the microphone at Gail, trying to continue her 'investigative reporter' coverage. This put Gail off a bit, but only a bit.

"I'm off duty, but I'm not going to let you badger an innocent civilian—" Just then they were interrupted by a scream, and they turned to see the cameraman wheeling, covered in dripping coffees thrown by an angry Melissa. The two women from the terminal surrounded the three members of the news crew, as they didn't look any more pleased than Melissa had been. Gail couldn't let this get out of hand.

"Everyone STOP!" she shouted. The various women halted, not sure of her status in this fiasco, but taking her take-charge attitude into account. Kitty looked around, panicky.

"Get the hell out of here," Gail demanded, and both Cate and Kitty took off, running back towards Union Station in different directions. The two cameramen looked around in confusion, one still cursing as he tried to wipe his camera dry. The other cameraman was caught unprepared and with nothing to film but fleeing backs.

"What's going on here?" insisted the reporter, as she closed in on Gail. "What's this all about? Why are you protecting that man and these women?"

"Listen, I'm not involved," Gail insisted, not very convincingly, as her eyes starting darting around, looking for some gracious way out of this predicament. She'd allowed everyone else to escape, but now she was stuck on camera as a representative of the city's finest. "I just—"

"Right, and you just happen to be here, ready to step in at the first sign of trouble, but you don't attempt to stop anyone else but me," the newswoman countered. Gail looked hesitantly at her.

"Look, everyone is already dispersed. I don't know what this was about, but it's over now. If you can identify who attacked you, you can press charges, but you'll have to counter your own attack on the other woman you ran over. Now, since this is over, I'm leaving," Gail said, starting to back up.

"Wait, don't you think we deserve an explanation?" the reporter pressed, doggedly advancing on her.

I sent a quick 'Shut the fuck up and get the hell out of there!' to Clara, along with a follow up 'And don't talk to the press.' But by then I was gone from sight. I'd continued running down the street, blocked by traffic and a line of trees until I rounded the corner where no one could track me. Luckily Kitty and Cate had enough presence of mind to not head for the car, but ran into the terminal building, slowed down, and calmly walked through it at a leisurely pace. I wasn't sure about the others, but since Gail had dismissed them they each started to back away as well. I also had no idea of what Clara was doing, since Gail wasn't facing her, but I could hear the sound of her crying receding, so apparently she was heading away as well.

"You can't impede the free press from filming in a public park and then just disappear," the reporter protested, waving for her two cameramen to capture Gail's shaky stand. Gail finally succumbed to panic, realizing she couldn't gain anything from remaining to argue with the reporter on air, so she beat a hasty retreat.

"Hey, I'm talking to you!" called the reporter, taking off after her leaving her camera crew behind. Realizing she was being chased, Gail weaved through traffic, trying to get away. Soon Aloe Plaza was left with dozens of very confused people, probably all hungry to describe their confusion in full details in follow-up interviews, since the news crew now had nothing else to report on.

I continued heading north, away from the area. I talked with Gail, who told me she was still circling around and was heading for our cars. She told me to head to a diner she knew which wasn't far away, and to wait for her there, making sure I kept a low profile as the reporters might drive around the area looking for me.

'I contacted Shani, ' Gail informed me. 'I had her call Cate. Hopefully the girls are together by now. I don't want to directly contact anyone because if this gets back to me, I don't want anyone to link me back to you. In fact, I can't even call Melissa for fear it will tie her to this.'

'That's OK, ' I told her. 'I'll have Brooke call her and tell her to wait for the girls at her car. They can meet us at your house. I guess we've lost touch with the new Watchers there, but that's a minor concern at this point. Do you think they'll run with this?' I asked.

'I doubt it. They didn't really get any good incriminating footage and it makes them look fairly incompetent, but it depends on what Clara told them beforehand. If they smell a story, they could be all over it. But I think they'd need something specific to interest the public, something more compelling than people interfering with an obnoxious press corp. But I think it best if you got out of Dodge, ' she warned me.

"Yeah, I guessed that much. We'll meet at your place and decide what's next."

When we finally regrouped, everyone had to detail what they knew of events and what had happened to them. Luckily Cate already had Kelly's phone number, though no one knew anything about the two girls who had helped us. Kitty and Cate had gone looking for the coffee shop which Melissa had visited, figuring it to be a decent meeting point, and that's where Melissa had found them. So they didn't arrive too late.

Everyone finally agreed that I'd been correct in my evaluation of Clara, that she was in fact dangerous to us.

"I guess she thought everyone in America wants to be on television," Kitty said.

"Hell, if I wanted media attention, I could have gotten it myself. What I'm looking for is the freedom to move around. Being hounded by the press isn't going to help with that," I complained.

"Man, what's wrong with that woman?" Cate asked, lacking her usual regard for others. "Here I was, starting to feel sorry for her, and then she goes and exposes us, thinking she's doing us all this great favor."

"Guess she thought the second coming needed a little media help to get started," Gail unhelpfully offered.

"We will not do that again," I insisted. "That woman is officially off limits."

"You don't have to tell us twice," Cate answered.

"And I'm sorry for pushing you to give her a second chance," Gail said, looking like she blamed herself for what happened.

"No, you said what you felt. It was me who decided to give her a second chance. I hadn't spoken to her long enough to realize how deep seated her pathology was. I was hoping we could bring her around, but just as I'd feared, she was acting on her preconceived notions of how I should act, rather than trying to understand what I was trying to tell her. We just don't need anyone that reckless. I need support and good advice, not someone who decides how I should be leading my own movement."

"Well, Gail's not the only one who's sorry," Melissa added, looking down at her feet. "I'm sorry for getting you into trouble as well. I really shouldn't have damaged their equipment," she said, glancing up as the words began to pour out as she attempted to explain herself. "It was stupid, but it was all I could think of at the moment. I realize it could involve criminal charges, but I was just so angry at them for being so aggressive I couldn't help myself."

"I wouldn't worry about it," Gail reassured her. "That gear is built to withstand wind, sun and the occasional rain. Hopefully it just annoyed the cameraman," Gail responded. "Still, you don't want to destroy several thousand dollars' worth of equipment, you simply want to get away from a situation like that. That would be considered willful property damage, as well as personal assault, and it would have had multiple witnesses and possibly additional camera footage."

"Yeah, I'll remember that for next time," Melissa responded, looking a little dour. "Sometimes you just react in situations like that."

"Hey, I'm not pointing blame. What you did was natural. I'm just letting you know the possible repercussions," Gail said as she gave Melissa a hug. That eased Melissa's mind quite a bit. I would have done it myself, but both Cate and Kitty were busy hugging me at the moment. Seems everyone was much more concerned about me than about anything else.

Kitty turned on Gail's TV, scanning the news channels for any mention of us.

"It wouldn't be on now, since it's not breaking news," Gail suggested. "If anything it would be a little piece on either the six o'clock or the late news."

"Just sit down and take it easy," Cate told me, pushing me into a chair. "You tend to burn up even more energy when you're stressed. Just sit and relax and I'll fix you something to eat. The last thing we need is you having another reaction because of this."

"Don't worry, I'm fine," I assured her, although I wasn't sure anyone believed me.

"We're all sorry we pressured you to try again," Cate called out from Gail's small kitchen as she fixed me a snack. "You told us she was unstable, but we just couldn't imagine how unstable she was."

"There was no avoiding it. I didn't think to ask what stupid things she may have pulled since we'd last spoken. She planned this all ahead of time."

"Actually, Cate, I was the one who pushed him into it," Gail confessed to my sister. "I gave him a hard time about how I could see her falling apart over his response to her. If anyone is responsible for this fiasco, it'd be me."

"No, that isn't true," I told them both. "I got it from a few people, but principally it was Nikki who told me how she'd have felt if she'd been in Clara's place. She struggled without me for months, which was hard enough. But to be rejected by such a significant figure in your life would have been too much for her. However the fault is mine. I didn't anticipate how she'd react. As I said, I should have asked her what she'd been doing and if she had any more surprises for me. When I spoke to her the last time, I didn't want to have a long conversation since she was so busy pleading for forgiveness."