Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego, Home by the Sea, Ch 10 (Dying Informant, 33)

[rose_of_pollux]

Title: Home by the Sea, chapter 10: Longer Nights of Gloom
Author/Artist: Crystal Rose of Pollux (rose_of_pollux)
Theme(s): 33; The wind beneath my wings.
Character: the Dying Informant
Fandom: Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?
Disclaimer: The characters aren't mine (except for Daniels and Adelo) and the story is!

Cross-posted to 31_days and my journal


The Informant accepted and returned the Techie’s embrace, but continued to look around, terribly confused.

“Infy…?” asked the Messenger, recognizing the confused look on his face. “Do you remember what happened to you?”

“I was trapped in the Home by Sea…” the Informant recalled, shuddering. “The ghosts were there… trapped for years and years… They hadn’t known happiness for so long, they started trying to pull happiness from my memories… I felt so drained… And during the day, RoboCrook would hold me down while Eartha tried to beat information out of me…” He shuddered. “I don’t know for how long…”

“Five weeks…” said the Techie, his voice filled with both sorrow for his brother and fury against Eartha. “I was losing hope… I thought we’d never see you again…”

“I thought I’d never see you guys, either…” the Informant whispered. “That’s why I named the mice after you guys… I wanted so badly to be with you again…”

The Inspector glanced at the Informant, and then at Mr. Schwemphf, who was still staring, horrified, at the young agent. The older agent swallowed hard, placing a hand on the boy’s shoulder.

“Do you remember how you got there…?” he asked, softly. “Do you remember what you were doing before you got captured?”

And the Messenger and the Techie understood. Did the Informant remember floundering in the river.

“I was going to get Techie his birthday card…” the Informant began. He trailed off as the brunet sobbed. The boy held his dear brother close. “Hey… nobody told me to, Techie… It was something I wanted to do.”

But the Techie was not consoled, and the Informant hugged him close.

“Infy…” said the Messenger, not sure he realized the full extent of what had happened to him. “Do you remember anything else?”

“Well…” the boy said. “I was waylaid by some woman… She wasn’t with V.I.L.E., though; I didn’t recognize her… She was chasing after me, and I ran towards the river, trying to throw her off, but…” He trailed off, shaking his head. “Something hit me; I think she had a brick in her purse… And then… And then…” He trailed off, his hand on his throat as the recollections came to him. “I woke up at one point, but I couldn’t see anything… It was so wet, and I could hardly breathe…”

His brothers stared at him in horror; they knew all too well where he must have been during that point. And now Schwemphf couldn’t keep silent.

“What are you doing here alive!?” he demanded. “You fell into the East River and drowned-carried off to sea! ”

“Off to sea…?” the boy asked, paling, as his brothers glared daggers at Schwemphf. And then he remembered what Carmen had said… about his fellow agents abandoning him.

He let go of the Techie, clutching absently at his own chest, as though recalling the horrifying sensation he had felt.

“Little brother…” the Techie whispered, drawing the boy into an embrace that the others also joined in a group embrace. “I’m so sorry… We should’ve been here to help you… And if we had been, we wouldn’t have let this happen. But we weren’t here, and it did, and… It’s my fault…” He sobbed again. “I should’ve been there for you… But I wasn’t…” He glared at Schwemphf. “And that’s your fault!” he screamed at the vice-Chief.

“How dare you take that tone--”

“You were the one who sent us out on those solo assignments!” the Techie screamed, pulling away from the Informant to stand up to the Vice Chief. “You told Search-and-Rescue-net to hurry along, abandoning him when he wasn’t even dead! He was alive in the water-you heard what he said just now! He remembered being there… If V.I.L.E. hadn’t come by, he really would’ve been dead! And instead he was alive and their prisoner for five weeks! You weren’t there when I found him! You don’t know what state he was been! He’s suffered, and it’s your fault!”

“Silence!” Schwemphf ordered. “I can assure you that the Chief will hear of your outburst! And as for you, Informant, you’re going to have to pay the price for being AWOL for the last five weeks--”

“Have you completely CRACKED!?” the Messenger fumed, getting to his feet as the Techie’s anger seemed to be beyond words. “He was kidnapped!”

“Because you left him to the mercy of the East River!” the Inspector roared.

And hearing the older agent’s fury certainly began to intimidate Schwemphf, but before the Vice-Chief could chew them out, a new voice called from the corridor.

“What’s going on in here…?” the Rookie mumbled, coming out of his room and looking inside. “I thought we were having an inspection…” He trailed off upon seeing the Informant sitting dazed and pale on the floor. He practically bowled Schwemphf aside to get to the poor agent’s side.

“How… how did you…?” he stammered. “I was there when they… I mean… They said you were dead! Was that some impostor who was thrown into the river?”

“That was no impostor…” the Techie said, too angry to look at Schwemphf anymore. He sat by his trembling friend’s side, holding him close. “He was alive, and that’s why V.I.L.E. went to such lengths to get him out of there as quickly as they could.”

The young Rookie stared at the Techie in horror, and then turned to the Informant.

“I… I was here when they…” he stared into the Informant’s haunted eyes. “Oh, no… oh, no…”

The Inspector placed a hand on the Rookie’s shoulder as he began to ramble, horrified.

“I just stood there and watched…” he said, staring at the Informant. “I know the Recruiting Officer and I kept saying that they should’ve kept searching… Maybe if they had…”

“There’s no point in what ifs…” said the Inspector, glaring at Schwemphf. “But as for you, Schwemphf… Get out of this room. Now. You aren’t going to interfere with his healing anymore-you’ve already done enough by your less-than-subtle revelations.”

The Rookie all but exploded at Schwemphf.

“You always have to go by the book, don’t you!?” he said. “Think about what the Informant had to go through because of that! And I bet you’re not even relieved that he’s alright-you’re probably just worried about all the paperwork it means for you-isn’t that right!?”

Schwemphf backed away, still unsure of what to say.

“You can bet your sweet life that the Chief is going to hear about this…” the Rookie went on. “I’m going to tell her!”

“You stay right where you are--” Schwemphf began, but was bowled over by the young Rookie.

“The Recruiting Officer wouldn’t have left yet…” the Messenger realized. “When he hears about this…” he trailed off, at a loss for what to do. “Infy, I’ll be right back; someone who knows the whole story has to tell the Chief…”

“And keep the Recruiting Officer from going crazy…” added the Inspector. “We’ll both be right back; will you be okay until then?”

The boy managed a weak nod, and the others left, very reluctantly.

“I’ll look after you…” the Techie promised, helping the Informant back to the bunk. “And like they said, they’ll be back, soon. We’re all going to be right here until you recover from this.”

“I’ll be honest, Techie…” the boy said, shuddering. “I don’t know if I ever will.”

The older agent just drew him close.

“You need to get some sleep-you don’t look like you’ve had much at all…” the older agent said. “And are you hungry? Your stash of junk food is still up here, though I’m not so sure that would be the best meal of choice…”

“I’m not hungry…” said the Informant. “And as for sleep… Well, I’ve probably only had a few hours of it every day these past weeks. The nightmares kept me awake… They probably still will… I don’t know if I’ll ever have a good night’s sleep again…”

“I don’t know if I will, either…” the Techie said, sadly. “Five weeks… And to think… I had been on my way to… find you myself; I got there only to find out that V.I.L.E. had beaten me to it…”

The Informant stared at him with an unreadable glance.

“You’d have done that…?” he asked.

“I’m sorry…” the Techie whispered. “I meant no disrespect… It’s just that I... had to see you one last time before I could believe that you were gone…”

He trailed off as the Informant hugged him.

“Thank you…” he whispered. “For not giving up… I really thought that you guys thought I was dead… There was a part of me that wanted you to know… But I knew that if you did, you’d stay in the house and get cursed, too…”

“Willingly…” the Techie said. “You didn’t deserve to suffer like that all alone…” He was haunted by the stress of the past several weeks… seeing the site where he had vanished… finding out that the Informant had been taken-alive… getting captured by V.I.L.E…. And finally finding him tormented and broken… Then seeing him completely motionless for the next week…

The brunet let out a sob, hugging his younger brother even closer.

“Techie…?” the Informant asked. “Techie, talk to me…”

“I wasn’t there for you when you needed me the most…” the older agent said. “I’m so sorry, little brother… Can you ever forgive me…?”

“There’s nothing to forgive,” the boy insisted, as he pulled away from the embrace. He sighed, noticing his trenchcoat hanging from the bar of the top bunk. “Oh, yeah…” He reached into the pocket of the trenchcoat and pulled out a waterlogged envelope. “This is for you… Sorry it’s so late…”

The Techie tried to swallow the lump in his throat as he pulled the equally waterlogged birthday card from the envelope. The words that the boy had written were still barely visible, in spite of the faded ink.

“‘To my quirky and non-clumsy elder brother…’” he read aloud. “‘I scoured all of the electronic stores for the newest gadgets before realizing that you probably made them all yourself-I never have dared to look inside your cabinet down in the Tech-Net labs. So I tried something that I knew you wouldn’t have seen before. It’s for you-a painting that only slightly depicts our brotherhood. Make a wish, Bro-you deserve to have it come true.’”

The Techie wiped the tears from his eyes, but more came. He glanced back at the Informant, who had a weak smile on his pale face.

“I got what I wished for,” the Techie said, sobbing through his own smile as he hugged his surrogate brother. “I got my brother back.”

*****************************

The Chief, of course, sided with the agents, and the next couple of weeks went by slowly. The Informant was still suffering from nightmares and mental scars from what he had been through, but his recovery was noticeable, albeit slow. But his friends were by his side throughout it all, swapping stories about what had happened to them over the past weeks. The Techie did not, however, confess that he had been a prisoner of V.I.L.E., regardless of how much the others asked him about where he had been.

The Recruiting Officer had been just as horrified as the Rookie had been upon hearing what had happened-the Recruiting Officer was making himself scarce, considering himself unworthy to be in the boy’s presence. The Rookie, however, spent a lot of time with the Informant, apologizing profusely for what happened; the Informant would put on a brave smile and waved it away.

Borealis, the ACME Ruff-Net husky, was insisting on spending all of his time with the Informant, whom he had missed over the time he had been missing, too.

And while the Techie, the Messenger, and he Inspector were all spending most of their time with the Informant, they were all researching all they could about the strange Dr. Mendoza. To their dismay, they couldn’t find out much about him.

“Dr. Bellum said that he was somehow affiliated with EMCA …” said the Messenger, folding his arms as they all stared at the Techie’s laptop. They were in the agents’ lounge, commandeering the armchairs.

“Could Mendoza be a woman?” asked the Informant, recalling the woman who had chased him to the East River.

“No-Vulsor said that he’s a guy…” the Messenger said.

The boy shook his head in amazement.

“I still can’t believe that you went to her for my sake…” he said.

“Hey, I’d have gone to a lot worse if it meant getting you back here…” the Messenger said, drawing him in a one-armed embrace.

“If we can track down Conrad Knuckle, we could get some information from him…” the Inspector said. “Unfortunately, he’s on the run.”

“When did you find that out…?” asked the Rookie.

“Not too long after we compared notes and found out that Mendoza was hired by EMCA,” said the Techie, the anger evident in his voice.

“Techie…” the Informant said, softly. He appreciated the trouble that his friends were going through trying to help him, but he didn’t need vengeance; all he needed was their support. And he certainly didn’t want to lose them to anger. Having his friends again after so long seemed like a dream-one that he did not want to end.

The brunet understood what the younger agent was trying to say, and he forced himself to calm down.

“He’s done a good job of keeping himself hidden…” the Inspector sighed, at last.

He looked up as one of the Chief’s secretaries entered the lounge.

“Excuse me…?” she said, tentatively. “There’s a man in the alley who says he knows the Informant; he wants to speak to him.”

“Someone wants to talk to me?” asked the boy, surprised.

The Techie frowned. His sixth sense was telling him that there was more to it than that.

“He says he knows you from childhood,” the secretary said. “And upon hearing how loud he was, Mrs. Pumpkinclanger is ready to believe it…”

“Huh…” said the boy. “Guess someone on the home front heard about what happened to me and wants to make sure I’m okay…”

“I haven’t met your old friends…” said the Techie. “I’ll go with you…”

“They requested to meet with him alone,” said the secretary. But then she noticed the suspicious look on the Techie face, as well as the ones that the others had. “Oh, but we ran a security check on him-he’s clean.”

“I’ll just go say hi,” said the Informant. “I’ll be right back, guys…”

But the Techie was not satisfied.

“We’ll be right in the Recruiting Office,” he insisted, following him.

“Sure…” said the boy, with a shrug.

They headed out of the lounge and out the alley, Borealis bounding beside them, placing his paws on the Informant’s shoulder.

“Down, boy…” the Informant said, with a smile. “I missed you, too, but you’ve got to keep in mind… you’re not a puppy anymore…”

While the other three were right inside, the young agent stepped out to the alley to see Mrs. Pumpkinclanger watering the plants in her window as she looked disdainfully at the young man staring derisively at the furniture and odds and ends scattered around the alley.

The Informant’s eyes widened slightly upon seeing the arrival.

“Adelo…?” he asked, not sure of what to think about the arrival of his former best friend. “What’re you doing here?”

The older man looked up, just as the boy remembered him-burly and red-haired, albeit older.

“Cant I visit an old friend, Kid?” Adelo asked.

“An old friend…?” asked the Informant, frowning. “You sure didn’t act like a friend when you left me in that abandoned house-and then said that Mr. Daniels was going to blame me for it…”

“I’m surprised you made it out of there…” the older man mused, no remorse in his voice. “And I heard that something happened to you several weeks ago-that’s what brought me here; I wanted to see if the rumors were true…”

The Informant’s eyes narrowed.

“Leave me alone, Adelo,” he said. “You were one lousy best friend. Now I’ve got three.”

“Three?” the older man mused. “Yeah, right; they’re probably waiting for a chance to ditch you the second they get…”

“They had their chance,” the young agent informed him. “And they didn’t abandon me.”

“They’re waiting for a better moment,” the obnoxious man insisted. “But don’t take my word for it.”

“Oh, I won’t…” the Informant promised. “Good evening…” He moved to go back inside, but Adelo clapped a hand on his shoulder. The young agent tensed as Borealis growled angrily, baring his teeth at Adelo.

“Did you really think you’d fit in anywhere, Kid?” Adelo asked. “You think you’ve got it made, but they will kick you out when you need them most.”

“How rude…” Mrs. Pumpkinclanger sniffed, overhearing the conversation. Her Siamese cat, perched on the windowsill, meowed in agreement, sneering at Adelo.

“Did you come all this way to tell me this…?” the Informant asked, more annoyed than anything else.

“Not at all,” said the older man. “You see… I’ve missed my old screaming scapegoat…” He chuckled at the indignant look on the boy’s face and drew an arm around his shoulders. “I’ve decided to let you back in with the old crowd.”

“I must refuse…” the boy replied, aiming to walk back to the door.

“And I must insist…” said Adelo. “You owe me that much… after spending five weeks in my property.”

His arm around the Informant suddenly turned into a chokehold as the boy paled. That was how Carmen knew about Adelo-he had given her usage of the Home by the Sea just to imprison him in it!

Borealis started barking angrily, the Siamese cat started hissing, and Mrs. Pumpkinclanger started screeching, yelling at Adelo, who still held the boy in a chokehold so that he could not call to his brothers.

“Aw, shut up, you old bat!” he snarled at the persnickety woman.

“Old bat…!?” Mrs. Pumpkinclanger fumed. She grabbed her rolling pin and hurled it at the redhead.

Adelo was stunned by the blow, and then cried out as Borealis bit him on the leg. With an enraged yell, he aimed a kick at the husky to get him to retreat, and then retreated from the alley himself, dragging the boy with him.

The Techie and the others were already nervous when the Informant had been asked to go alone, but they had complied. But the distraught Techie panicked when he heard the barking and the screaming coming from outside.

“Little brother!” he cried, dashing from the desk he had been leaning on.

But by the time he had opened the door, they were already gone-disappearing into a van.

The Techie crashed to his knees as the others frantically tried to discern the license plate, all the while yelling at Adelo and trying to follow the best they could on foot.

But the Techie knelt where he was, realizing the horrifying truth-he had just lost his brother for a second time.