The Schism

Disclaimer: I don’t own any of the Where on Earth is Carmen Sandiego characters in this fanfic and no profit is derived from this fanfic…

The young man stood in the corner of the hotel room, what had he done, he wondered, what had happened to make her leave. Waves of frustration, grief, anger, and other emotions came crashing down on him like waves against a beach. He saw his brown; beat up leather flight type jacket hanging from a hook on the door, sticking out of it was piece of white paper, creased neatly. His first instinct was to shred the paper immediately, but some sixth sense told him he’d regret it if he did. There was something else in it, a small pewter medallion of the Blessed Mary, the broken clasp on it’s delicate silver chain fixed, she had helped him get it back.

Part of him was sorry that he had ever met her, but the other half realized that she was the one that helped him face his biggest fear. He turned his attention to the letter. It read

Dearest Victor,

I know you don’t deserve this to happen to you, and all I can say is I’m sorry. I love you but I can’t stay…

The man tucked the letter back into his jacket pocket; he didn’t want to read it. Instead he thought back to the moment where it all began…

~ ~ ~ ~

“Ivy,” said a familiar teenaged voice over the phone, “Hey, I just want to say Boot Camp’s going just fine and…”

The connection suddenly terminated, which was strange. Zack was spending the two months of the summer at the Youth Outreach program, a sort of outdoor boot camp for teens located just south of Orlando, Florida, near the St. John’s River. Normally it was where troubled teens were sent, but Zack went because he wanted to take a challenge this summer, do something different. She hadn’t heard much from Zack in three weeks, aside from a few letters and the occasional phone call. She chalked it off initially to the fact that Zack was probably just having a lot of fun at the camp. That phone call, however, began to worry her. She draped her towel around her shoulder and picked up her gym bag, maybe it was time to go talk to Chief about this. Of course not in the sweaty state she was in now…

“So, just the phone call terminated. Has he tried to call back.” The digitized, but still lovable, Chief said.

“No, he hasn’t. He says that they have phone time every week, but I don’t understand why he just got a sentence in, and not anything else.” Ivy replied.

“Hmm, I’m not convinced this is enough to warrant a C-5 trip, but I can spring the funds for a flight to Orlando so you can check it out. Visitation is permitted, isn’t it?” Chief said.

“It is. Thanks Chief.” Ivy replied.

That night she threw together a travel bag and drove off to the airport. The cross country flight was uneventful, save for Chief making a call, giving her a list of the Acme detectives operating in the Orlando area if she needed help and reminding her she needed to check in with the Acme office in Orlando.

~ ~ ~ ~

Ivy really didn’t have any baggage to pick up, and so she walked straight to the curb, waiting for a taxi. The security guard at Acme, Orlando waved her through after she presented her identification card.

Might as well get something to eat at the café. Ivy thought, realizing belatedly she hadn’t eaten anything since that unappetizing airline lunch on the plane from San Francisco. Ordering a pastry and some coffee, she sat down at a table as Stefan, an old, wiry, but humor-loving Haitian took her order and gave her a receipt.

~ ~ ~ ~

Victor Garibaldi, for the umpteenth time, realized how his wrinkled black Metallica t-shirt, stained jeans, and ancient, beat up leather jacket contrasted with the fashionable and trendy garb of most of the young Acme detectives working out of here. His natural bravado came to the rescue, however, I’m just as good as they are. He thought.

Despite his brave front, however, he was still feeling a little self-conscious. He was on his way to a table when a slender red head sitting at a nearby table motioned him over. “Hey, I’m new here, do you know what time Inspector Lynch’s lunch break is over?”

“Lynch? She usually comes in here.” Garibaldi said, on closer inspection the redhead was pretty cute, an oval, narrow face, green eyes…

“By the way, my name’s Ivy.”

“Victor.” Garibaldi replied.

“Victor Garibaldi?” Ivy asked.

“Yes.” Vic replied.

“Didn’t you crack the VILE theft of the stolen ME 109 last spring?” Ivy asked. “So that’s how you heard of me, eh?” Victor smiled, his best lopsided grin, “Yeah, Lynch is still fuming at me for violating every single regulation in the book. Just because I had to rev the engine and fly the plane out of the place where VILE stashed it, and not to mention I had to pull of an abrupt and rather nasty crash landing in a cow pasture back in California doesn’t mean I’m that bad. I mean I got the plane back to them in more or less flyable conditions, and hey those country boys need a little excitement in their lives, good for the circulation, at least that’s what Chief Inspector Warren had to say.”

“You’ve flown before?” Ivy said.

“A little bit, here and there.” Garibaldi said, casually pulling his pilot’s license out of his jacket pocket.

“How many hours?” Ivy asked.

“Approximately 372 hours, all conditions, all single engine aircraft. I’m working on my multi-engine rating.” Garibaldi said, convinced he had this one talking, expecting her to be amazed.

“You’re really slow, Victor. I have at least 550 or so and my multi-engine rating.” Ivy said, arms folded across her chest, smiling.

She saw Victor Garibaldi’s eyes go wide with surprise, “Man, that’s more than I’ve pulled off in four years of flying. How long have you been flying.”

“Since I was thirteen, five years.” Ivy replied, “How about you?”

“Since I was fifteen, four years. Warren still lets me fly the Cessna we have at the Sanford Executive Airport. Especially if certain Acme detectives here miss their flights and get delayed at airports. I run an aerial taxi service and pick them up or drop them off.” Garibaldi said, taking a seat in front of Ivy.

“Victor, do you know about the Youth Outreach program?” Ivy asked.

“A little, why?” Garibaldi asked.

“My brother’s there. He was making his weekly phone call but then the connection suddenly died.” Ivy replied, “I need to go see if he’s alright.”

“What did he do?” Vic asked.

“Nothing he just wanted to do something different this summer.” Ivy replied.

“I know where that place is. Need a ride.” Garibaldi asked.

“If you don’t mind.” Ivy replied.

“Not at all.” Garibaldi replied. They walked out to the parking lot to a beat up gray 1987 Pontiac Firebird.

“Nice car.” Ivy said, indicating the paint that wasn’t even the same shade of gray all around.

“Thanks.” Victor said, opening the doors, rolling down the window, explaining his AC wasn’t working, and pulled out of the parking lot.

Garibaldi was literally flying down I-4, and as soon as he reached the camp, he parked his car in the parking lot. The camp was a large area, surrounded by a large chain-link perimeter fence topped by coils of razor wire. No cosmetic effect could disguise the height of the fence or the razor wire. There were several cinder block buildings in the compound, the administrative area being in the center.

“Shall we knock?” Garibaldi asked.

The man at the small hut in front of the locked gate let them in after seeing their ID cards and calling up the man in charge. The gate opened and the short, stocky man at the gate led them to the administration building. Ivy noticed Victor hadn’t removed his gold-framed aviator sunglasses even when they were indoors.

The camp’s founder turned out to be a big, broad shouldered Caucasian man named Desmond Fritz. “Mr. Fritz, sir, you have visitors.” Said the stocky little guy from the gate.

“Mr. Fritz, Ivy Darren, I’m here to visit my brother, Zack.” Ivy said.

Desmond Fritz said, “Darren, oh, yes, Zack Darren, let’s check his company’s schedule, shall we.”

They stepped into his office, and behind his desk was a huge flag with the Army seal. The big man looked at his computer, “I’m sorry, Camper Darren isn’t available at the moment. Here’s my card, call if you have any more questions. Les, escort these two out.”

Ivy wasn’t sure what gave her the creeps more, the lanky seventeen year old Les with a shaven head and a sullen expression or Mr. Fritz, not even knowing where his own campers were unless he checked their schedule. This camp wasn’t that big, only fifty people or so, why did it need a database to figure out where they all were.

As they walked down the concrete sidewalk, Ivy saw a group of kids in black uniforms with two more of the camouflage-clad counselors standing over them. The oldest kid looked to be no older than thirteen or fourteen while the counselor looked little more than seventeen or eighteen. They were carrying garden tools and appeared to be emptying a planter. She paused to watch them when Les growled, “It’s just a work detail, nothing interesting. We assign campers who misbehave to them. C’mon keep moving.”

“Hey, don’t manhandle the lady like that.” Garibaldi said.

“You wanna make something of it?” Les replied.

“Just throw the first punch and we’ll see who’s on the deck.” Garibaldi said in a menacing tone.

“Boys, boys. Let’s not resort to violence.” Ivy said, taking Victor by an arm. All the while Ivy didn’t show exactly what she was feeling but when they reached the car she let Victor know.

“Vic, didn’t that counselor seem strange to you?” Ivy asked.

“Who, Mr. Fritz?” Garibaldi replied, “Yeah, kinda, why.”

“I mean, fifty campers isn’t that many to look out for. Yet he needed some kind of database to keep track of them all. And that fence looked like it came from a prison. And the creep, Les, I can’t believe they put him in charge of these kids when he’s not even that much older himself.” Ivy replied.

“I see your point.” Garibaldi said, “There’s more at this camp then meets the eye. The fact that they put that slack jawed yokel in charge of those kids makes my skin crawl.”

“Hey Victor, don’t look now, but that Les guy is still here, mind if we keep talking more when we get on the road.” Ivy replied, indicating the camouflage clad bully with the dark shades.

“Sure.” Garibaldi said, pulling them out of the parking lot. As they drove down I-4, Ivy was still voicing concerns.

“I think this camp is more than meets the eye. They just tell me Zack isn’t available and not where he is. That’s creepy. And did you notice how quick he was to get rid of us, almost like he wasn’t expecting us and he wanted us to leave as soon as he saw we were there and who we were.”

“You’re right, Ivy, you’re right. But for now, let’s see what information we can dig up. Chances are that phone number is either no good, or leads to some kind of answering machine that gives him time to come up with a phony response of some sort.” Victor said.

~ ~ ~ ~

At the office of Mr. Fritz, Les stood before his boss. “Are you sure those two didn’t get too suspicious?” Fritz said.

“Yes sir, I don’t think they did.” Les replied, “One more thing, I the boy outta that pair, I overheard the girl call him Victor. You don’t think he’s the same Victor we had here, do you think?”

“I noticed that too, very daring Mr. Garibaldi, showing up like that. And an Acme detective to boot, who would have thought that Acme would take in a former Sicilian street urchin like him.” Fritz said.

“What about Acme?” Les said.

“Don’t worry about Acme. I’ll make sure that they don’t have a just cause to investigate us. Leave it all to me.” Fritz said.

To be continued…