Part 7

Peter surveyed his home for the night, sighing deeply. The apartment complex had not been inhabited by anything human for a long time. Peter had once chased a murder suspect through this very building, catching the man because he fell through a weak spot in the stairs. He had noted the obvious lack of occupants at the time. Unwilling to bring the building up to code when the city had condemned it, the owner had simply abandoned the building. Even the homeless of the area shunned the place, afraid of the rickety stairs and the sagging ceilings. There was safer lodging elsewhere, if only a cardboard box.

The last in the line of Caine thought back a moment on the day. He’d gone to work at the precinct, hoping to be allowed some small glimpse of Mandy’s case. He wasn’t. Frustrated, he’d contacted all of his snitches, leaning on them pretty hard. Donnie Double D had been his last, and best hope. Finding no answers with Donnie, he’d driven for what seemed like hours, trying to cool off and regain perspective. He knew that he was out of control, that he was not acting as a cop, but as Mandy’s shattered lover. Turn after turn, street after street he’d decided to go visit his father. . . or Annie. . . or Kermit, and rejected each idea as it arose. His pain was too great. His soul bled so badly that he wanted no one to see the anguish and rage he felt. . . and the guilt. Finally he had started to his apartment. After parking the Stealth, he made it almost to the elevator before he turned an bolted. Peter walked for nearly two hours before he found himself in the abandoned building. He hadn’t intentionally gone there, and once he arrived he was too tired to go anywhere else.

The young cop brushed aside the dust from a corner and sank to the floor. As dismal as this place was, it was better than his apartment. He couldn’t bear the thought of returning there yet. He hadn’t been conscious when they carried him out on the stretcher, and he hadn’t seen the carnage left behind by the gunmen. He still wasn’t ready to see it. He knew that the place would be torn apart and there would still be the fingerprint dust all over everything. It was strange. He had never really thought about what it must be like to go back to one’s home after the forensics crew were done with it. He did now.

As the daylight faded and the darkness of night descended, Peter dozed, half sitting, leaning against the wall. He was dirty, tired, hungry and sore, but he didn’t care. The dirt was better than the suffocating comfort from Annie, comfort he didn’t deserve. Hunger was easier to handle than his father’s forgiving eyes, offering solace and hope. He didn’t deserve the solace. He had let them kill Mandy, he’d failed to protect and serve. The pain in his ribs and the heat coming from the furrow in his side was more welcome than Kermit’s gentleness. He would have rather the ex-mercenary yelled at him for letting his guard drop. That would have been less painful than the sympathy radiating from behind the green sunglasses. He could feel his father’s chi make gentle contact with his own, and he was powerless to stop it, but he didn’t welcome it. He conjured up feelings of the anger and frustration from his first years at the orphanage. He let rage and rejection sting his father’s tender touch across the miles. He needed time alone, time away from his father, the only mother he’d ever known, and his friends. He needed healing time. He continued to sleep, his slumber rocked by nightmares of shotgun blasts and the almost familiar voice uttering that hateful phrase.

*Kill your enemy and he dies once. Do harm to someone he loves and he dies a thousand deaths.* Peter wished fervently for the last of those thousand deaths, the one that would bring him peace. Some time during the night, during the hundredth sequence of death and failure, he was awakened as tears began to flow. Peter sobbed, allowing the pent up grief that he had not permitted himself for the past two weeks to surface. His ribs were on fire from the gasping breaths, but he continued, not caring if the pain caused tiny dots of light to dance in front of his eyes. He finally shed the last tear as he collapsed to the floor, curled in a ball, and slept dreamlessly.

***

With the morning Peter awoke. He felt the heat of fever radiating out from his side, and the ache of his ribs from sleeping in such an uncomfortable position confirmed that he had survived the night. His left hand was swollen well beyond its normal size, and the broken skin around the knuckles was bright red. Really looking at his surroundings, he struggled to his feet, fighting the nausea from his pounding headache.

"Damn, Peter. You really know how to pick your hideouts, don’t you?" he spoke aloud, slightly nervous at the echo. "Well, I guess it’s time to face reality. I can’t change what happened but I’ll be damned if I’ll let Mandy’s killers get off because I couldn’t get it together. Time to go home."

Peter pulled his cell phone from his jacket, turned the ringer back on and dialed Kermit’s number. His side of the conversation echoed off the vacant walls, giving the call an eerie quality.

"Kermit?. . .Yeah, I know you’ve been looking for me. . .I had some stuff to work out. . . Look, I’m at the Marshall Apartment Complex on Ondida. Come get me, okay?. . . I’ll tell you when you get here. Kermit, I’m really not up for this yet. Later, okay." Peter disconnected, then headed for the front of the building, leaving his haven for the real world.

***

Kermit almost winced when he saw his friend. Peter was covered in dust and grime. His hazel eyes were clearer than he had seen them in two weeks, but dark circles ringed them and his skin was two shades paler than the computer whiz would have liked. He was alive, though, and that was all that mattered.

"I don’t know if I should let you in the Kermitmobile or not. I just had it detailed," Kermit joked, relieved when he saw the corners of Peter’s mouth turn up slightly. "Just don’t touch anything you don’t have to. Where to?"

"My place. I want to go home," Peter said simply. He dusted his clothes off as well as he could before climbing into the passenger’s seat, then turned to his friend. "Before you start, I know it was stupid. I just couldn’t deal with all of the tea and sympathy. Every time I turned around there was Pop, or Annie, or Jody. . . or even you. I could feel everyone’s sympathy and concern. It was like I couldn’t breathe without someone thinking that I was hurting either physically or emotionally. I felt like I was being smothered in it. I tried to work the case, but I just ended up in a blind rage. Then I tried to go home. . . and I just couldn’t. I couldn’t look at the blood, I couldn’t see where she died. I just wasn’t ready yet."

". . . And you’re ready now?" Kermit asked as gently as he could without drifting into sympathy territory.

"I have to be. I can’t run forever."

"Before we get there, I think you should know that your father cleaned the place up. He didn’t think you should see it the way it was." Kermit watched his friend’s reaction. Peter sighed deeply, then turned away to look out at the streets on the other side of the car.

"I’m glad." Peter finally spoke. "Sometimes, though, I wish he’d just let me fight my own battles. I managed to survive before he came back. I made it through the academy, through my rookie years and my time with Eppie. I even managed to be a passable homicide detective before he was here to rescue me from any trouble I ran into. Since he’s been here, I’ve gotten too dependent on him. Now, I don’t know how I would handle it if something happened to him."

Kermit listened to Peter and heard his own voice years ago. He’d been just a young boy then, new to Viet Nam, and he’d lost his first buddy. He’d wanted to pull away from everyone over there, afraid that he wouldn’t survive the hurt of losing someone else. If he didn’t care about them, then it wouldn’t hurt so bad when they were killed.

The ex-mercenary remained silent. In time Peter would let himself to care again. It wasn’t in his nature not to love and be loved. It was a trait that Kermit greatly envied. Only recently had the computer genius allowed himself to care for others and permit them into his life. It had been a long hard road. It would be a shorter path for Peter.

[end part 7]

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Part 8

Kermit kept one eye on his friend as they neared Peter's apartment

building. His face was flushed, and his breath was coming in short

gasps. His left hand was obviously broken, or very badly sprained.

"Peter, I know you want to go back home, but I think we should at least

make a stop at your father's first. You could use some patching up."

Kermit broached the subject quietly, preparing to do battle if

necessary.

"All right. I have some bridges to fix there anyway."

Kermit stared in horror at the filthy man in the passenger seat of his car. No protest over going to get fixed up? Had he picked up the wrong Peter?

"What do you mean you have 'bridges to fix'?" the older man asked.

"My father and I have this 'connection', I guess you could call it."

Kermit nodded, gesturing for Peter to continue. "Well, when I was gone

last night he. . . uhhhh. . . well. . . tried to contact me. I thought

some pretty nasty things, trying to drive him away."

"He can read your mind? Like telepathy?" Kermit asked skeptically.

There was no question that Peter and Kwai Chang Caine were linked

somehow, but he found this a little too "out there."

"No, not really. He can sense feelings from me. He seems to know when

I'm happy or sad, or when I need him. I can feel him in here." Peter

placed his hand on his chest. "I made myself angry and bitter to drive

him out of my mind and out of my soul last night. I concentrated on

rejection. It must have hurt him."

Peter was obviously tired. His voice grew more hoarse by the second,

and he stopped fidgeting. Before they reached the brownstone where Caine lived, Peter lapsed into silence and leaned back on the seat. His

breathing slowed, telling Kermit that his friend had drifted off to

sleep. Detective Griffin hated to rouse him from that healing sleep when they arrived, but he had to get him to Kwai Chang Caine’s apartment, and he didn’t feel like carrying his friend up the flights of stairs.

Peter made it up the stairs to Caine's rooftop apartment under his own

steam. . . barely. Kermit was supporting most of the younger cop's

weight by the time they entered the apartment. Caine was sitting in the

middle of the floor in a full lotus position, his head down when the

pair arrived. He looked up as they approached. Kermit nearly let Peter

drop to the floor when he saw the elder Caine. His eyes were red rimmed

and his face shone with tears. He studiously avoided Kermit's gaze,

though, and did not make eye contact with his son. The pain that the

ex-mercenary had seen on the priest's face a moment before was hidden in

a Shaolin shroud of enigma.

The priest quickly rose and helped Kermit lead Peter to the sleeping

platform for a second time since Mandy's death. Peter didn't lay down,

but rather leaned against the platform to steady himself. He knew that

if he laid down he would sleep, and he wasn't quite ready for that. He

needed to tell his father how sorry he was for his rejection.

"His side is infected, I think, and I would guess that his left hand is

broken. I know the stitches came out almost ten days ago in his side, but I think he tore it open again not long after. He bummed some butterfly bandages from me and wouldn’t tell me what he needed them for." Kermit filled in Peter's father on his son's condition. Caine nodded and reached to examine Peter's hand. His initial touch caused Peter to flinch. Caine drew back quickly as if he had been burned. The look in his eyes was pure fear.

"What is it, Pop?" Peter asked, shook to his soul. He had never seen

his father react so . . . so. . . There was no way to explain his

father's actions. The young cop clutched his hand tightly to his chest,

ignoring the pains lancing up and down his arm. "What's wrong?"

"My son," the priest began hesitantly, acting as if he expected Peter

not to answer. " You are not angry with me?"

"Angry? Why should I be angry?" Peter's confusion filled the room. He

watched his father look down at the floor, refusing to meet his eyes. A

seed of realization planted itself in Peter's fertile mind and grew.

"Last night. . . when I rejected your contact. . . when I pushed you

away. I s this about that?"

Caine looked up, his eyes filled with fresh tears and a quaver appeared

in his voice as he spoke. "I was afraid I'd lost you this time, my

son. There was so much anger and bitterness. I was afraid that I had

driven you away because of your love for Mandy. . . that I had caused

you pain by not accepting her. When she died, I feared you would hate

me."

"Wait a minute," Peter broke in, his confusion returning a thousand

fold. "I know that you didn't welcome her with open arms, but I didn't

see that as complete rejection. What's the deal? I just thought you needed some time to get used to the idea. I figured that even Shaolin priests could

suffer from the "nobody's good enough for my son" syndrome."

"I should have welcomed her. It was obvious that you loved her. That

should have been enough for me. I was afraid that I had driven you away

with my doubts about her." Caine began to gain control once more.

Kermit was amazed that something as simple as parenthood could so easily

bring about the downfall of the great Shaolin priest. He vowed never to

have children. *Damn,* he thought. *I guess I’m too late on that one.* He stared at the wall, lost in reflection about his broken marriages and the children that didn’t know their father.

"My son, we must talk about this later," Caine finally spoke, breaking

the silence that had descended on the room. "You are injured. I must

tend your wounds."

Peter took Kwai Chang Caine in his arms and hugged him long and hard,

burying his face in his father's shoulder. He hadn't realized that his

desire to be alone had hurt his father so deeply and frightened the man

that had saved entire worlds from the evil forces. Caine held his son

more gently, aware of the pain just below the surface. He felt the heat

from his son's wound through his shirt. The priest broke away and

gestured for his weakened son to lay on the sleeping pallet. Peter

gave in without a struggle. There had been enough conflict between the

two of them for a while.

***

Xia, daughter of Tan, listened Peter and Caine's conversation through headphones. It had been a wonderful idea to have the priest's place bugged. It was a pity that she had not decided to do the same for Peter Caine's apartment. This moment was well worth the high-priced electronic surveillance wizard’s services. She would have to thank her electronics man when she reached the next plane of existence. He had already departed this life for that place. Witnesses were such a nuisance.

Xia smiled to herself and traced the outline of Peter Caine's face on

the photo in her hands. The thousand deaths she had planned for Peter

had spilled over onto Caine. How wonderful!

[end part 8]

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