The Sinister Seven

Bernard Roe awoke slowly. The darkness engulfed him, and even as his eyes adjusted there was very little he could see clearly. His head throbbed, and as he ran his hand over the spot that seemed to be the cause of the headache, he winced in pain. The warmth spreading over his hand, combined with the nature of the pain, led him to conclude he'd been struck with great force on the back of his skull and he was now losing a small amount of blood. Judging from his current surroundings, he had likely been dragged to a new location after losing consciousness. He didn't have long to wonder about this new turn of events before all his questions were answered for him.

“Get up,” commanded a stern voice, followed immediately thereafter by a blinding flash of light being shone in his eyes.

“Good morning to you too,” he muttered as he swung his legs over, trying to work out where the floor was. Eventually they landed, and he pieced together he must be on a small surgical table about a few feet off the floor.

“You're a medic, right?” the voice asked with some veiled desperation.

“From the way you ask, I'm assuming you'll be in a very awkward situation if I say no.”

The voice replied in a mumbled insult and shone the light over to a second surgical table. A woman was spread out on it, bleeding profusely, with two more men standing above her trying to stave off the flow as much as possible.

“Help her or else,” the voice commanded.

“I'm a doctor, pal,” he retorted, already rolling up his sleeves and taking a closer look at the wound. “We take oaths to do this sort of thing, without the need of being threatened or intimidated. So either back off or shine that light where I tell you so I can work properly.”

The voice mumbled something again, then reluctantly shone the light directly over the spot that Bernard was indicating to him.

“You there,” the doctor said, gesturing towards one of the men pressing down on the wound, “you seem to have the calmest demeanor here. Tell me in the plainest and most direct way what happened.”

“She was shot in the back while running. We dragged her here to avoid more shots, and we've been pressing down ever since to slow the bleeding. She's been unconscious since right after the shots.”

“You have medical supplies?”

“This is an abandoned medical bay. There must be.”

“You, frightened looking guy,” Bernard commanded to the second one pressing down on the wound, “go find lights and turn them on.”

“I can't. I mean, if we do that ...”

“We're on the run,” interrupted the calmer one. “We don't want to attract attention.”

“Whatever. Find me better illumination. Just the one guy is needed to compress the wound.”

The second man left, face shrouded in visible relief to be getting away from the blood. Bernard set about doing what he could for the wound with the little he had at hand. There was almost definitely more equipment available, but with the room plunged into almost complete darkness he couldn't afford to waste time searching.

“On the run, eh?” he asked without taking his eyes off the young woman stretched out on the table. “You the team that busted out of the Asturia Prison the other day?”

He was met with silence. He looked up and saw both remaining men avoiding his gaze.

“Oh don't be shy now. It was big news. You're what, the Sinister Seven? I think that's the name you've given by the media outlets. Arrested in Rumania after hiding out for a few weeks there, shipped to Asturia, escaped with all the other inmates during that huge riot, and been missing ever since, right?”

“You keep pretty well informed,” replied the calmer man.

“You choose your kidnapping victims ironically. I'm the prison doctor.”

The two men in the room with him got slightly more nervous.

“I was at the epicenter of the mass prison break,” he continued. “Bernard Roe, happy to be of assistance, though I would've preferred to have been recruited less aggressively. That makes you...” he said, squinting as he looked up at the calm man, “John Smith? The ringleader I think. Your parents were very imaginative in the naming department.”

“Not the name they gave me.”

“Then you're the one who isn't imaginative. This girl must be Justine Abrams then. And the big ugly fella holding the flashlight has to be Geddy McBurger.”

Geddy growled in response to being called ugly, but John cast him a glance that made it clear he was to cooperate. Bernard could almost feel the tension in the room rising, but at this point he was too focused on the patient to care.

“Everybody flees to Rumania when they think there's nowhere else to go,” he rambled to himself. The head trauma was causing him to feel extraordinarily light headed, so he aimed to keep talking so he could keep himself awake. “Were you all really that desperate for refuge you had to take the last ditch escape route?”

“It's a convenient place to lay low,” John Smith finally said. “Nine whole planets plus an abundance of moons, each terraformed into a tropical paradise. No paperwork, no security cameras, no idea. Just because it's obvious and cliched doesn't mean it's a poor move.”

“But I imagine a clique of seven seedy looking strangers wandering about attracts attention.”

“It does, but for the most part no Rumanian cares. As long as you don't cause trouble for them, they won't raise a fuss even if they know you've committed genocide.”

Now Bernard was interested. “So how did you manage to get caught then?”

“The Dude.” John Smith sighed heavily. “Kiara Lehiwa. When she found out we were around, she decided to err on the side of caution and have a Shandüchan officer vacationing there keep tabs on us. Finally one of us caused a commotion,” he said, casting a nasty glance at Geddy, “and instead of letting it slide, Kiara contacted some of her old friends to come drag us in. Ty-Ren and Vanessa Cuarón. They assembled a team of about two dozen and hunted us down.”

Bernard listened in silence. As he worked on the gunshot wound in Justine's back, he began to realize more and more the severity of the situation.

“Gonna be honest with you guys,” he said, “I'm not sure about her chances of getting through this.”

“You better hope she does,” came John's reply. “If not, you're never leaving this building.”

“And if she pulls through?”

“I'm a reasonable man. We would happily show our appreciation.”

“Great,” Bernard thought to himself. “Just great. Retirement will never get here.”

Time seemed to crawl as he worked at saving Justine. The poor working conditions mixed with his light headedness made most of what was happening something of a blur for him. Finally, the procedure was interrupted as the most manic looking clown he had ever seen entered the room. This must be Giggles, he reasoned.

“Cops,” announced Giggles in a subdued voice. “We gotta cheese it guys. I gathered the rest already.”

John Smith stared at Bernard with murder in his eyes. “So how's Justine doing?”

Bernard sighed but kept working. “I'll level with you. I think she's had it. And if you move her she's guaranteed to die.”

John Smith raised a gun and pointed it directly at Bernard's forehead. The doctor didn't react, rather chose to continue working on Justine. A long moment passed, and John's eyes softened. He lowered his weapon.

“Thanks for trying,” he muttered, and the six fugitives fled with haste.

Seconds after they left, Bernard stitched up Justine. He was grateful the bluff worked. Justine was fine and would make a complete recovery. Two years of drama in school was finally paying off. Once his stitching up was done, he washed his hands thoroughly and laid back down on the first surgical table. He heard police footsteps approaching in the distance. Time to take a break.

###

Justine awoke with a start. Her last memory was fleeing down a nasty backstreet in Asturia, followed by sudden piercing pain in her back. Now here she was in a hospital bed. Her mind raced furiously as she tried piecing together what happened. She immediately presumed she had been captured, but when she looked down there was a suspicious lack of handcuffs keeping her restrained to the cot.

“Ah good, you're awake,” a nurse said as she entered the room. “I'll let your father know.”

“My wh-” she began, only to be interrupted by the nurse shouting down the hallway.

“Sir! Your daughter is conscious!”

Justine stared at the nurse silhouetted in the doorway with confusion. What in the world was going on here? Her father had been dead for thirteen years. A grizzled looking man about late middle age came in, his face beaming with joy.

“Samantha! We were so worried about you!” he said as he gave her a gentle hug.

“I'm alright Dad,” she responded, accepting the hug. “Thanks for waiting.”

“I'll leave you two alone,” the nurse chimed in, and exited the scene.

Justine and the older man watched until the nurse was gone. “Alright,” she said, her tone of voice becoming stern. “Who are you and just what is going on?”

“You were shot,” he answered. “Your team dragged me into fixing you up. I was almost done when the police arrived, so they bailed.”

Justine suppressed fury. Typical of them. Three years she had spent with the Sinister Seven, and they just dropped her as soon as things went south. She should've known.

“So why all this?” she asked. “What's this charade all about?”

He went silent as he thought. Even he wasn't entirely sure why he was doing this. “I guess,” he finally offered, “it's because I've seen prison hospitals. I'm the staff doctor in Asturia prison, and I've treated a lot of people who immediately returned to the prison blocks. A lot of times my work was undone pretty quickly. You were so close to dying that it seemed you'd have a better shot at recovery in a real hospital, without police and all manner of inmates around.”

She was quizzical at this reasoning, but accepted it. “What's your name?”

“Bernard Roe.”

“You mean I'm supposed to play now that I'm … what did you call me when you walked in?”

“Samantha.”

“Ugh. Sam Roe? Terrible name.”

###

She spent two weeks in the hospital before recuperating enough that the on-staff doctors felt comfortable letting her go. Having no other place to turn, she moved in with her “father”. The timing was extremely convenient, as Bernard's contracted stint at Asturia was finishing and he was finally returning home to Alssyria. Justine had never visited the Voh Terra system, so she was hesitant about what it would be like.

When they arrived, all her fears subsided. Bernard's home was one of the most beautiful she had ever seen. Two stories high, with the most expansive library and wine cellar she had ever seen.

“Pick a room,” he offered as he knelt before the large fireplace in the main room. It was freezing inside. “Any one. You can have it.”

“Which one is yours? I don't want to take it.”

“None of them,” he said shrugging. “I've spent the last few years out and about. All the bedrooms are empty. There's a little stuff in a storage closet, but otherwise I don't really have personal items. I mean, there's a ton of stuff in the house, but that's more general equipment, not necessarily my personal effects.”

Her eyes boggled as she looked around. “How is it so clean after being empty for years?”

“Hired some cleaners to come in and dust everything off and whatnot. It was probably a disaster in here last week.”

She hobbled upstairs as quickly as she could with a partial cast around her torso. Five bedrooms in all. She chose the one with the best view of the snowy mountainous horizon outside the home. Without bothering to unpack, she fell on the bed and settled in. A real bed. She hadn't experienced one of these since … well, since her parents died and she ran away from the child protection agency that was trying to shuttle her off to a for-profit orphanage, the only kind Niiz K had. Thirteen years on the run. Finally a real bed. Real comfort. She imagined how it would feel even better when she got the fireplace roaring. The thought dominated her mind as she slowly drifted off and fell asleep.

Downstairs Bernard sat by the ancient grand piano that rested in the center of the drawing room. His parents claimed it was an antique from Old Earth and that it had even survived the Great Accident. It certainly had enough scratches to back up the claim, though no one had ever given it a proper test to determine how old it really was. He struck four keys and ascertained it was very much in need of tuning. He got up and walked around the place. He should feel comfortable here. This was his childhood home. He'd inherited from his parents two decades prior. But the sheer amount of chaos he'd endured of late left him jumpy. He felt something was sure to go wrong.

When the feeling became too much, he walked around the perimeter of the house. An unshakeable feeling that there were things he had to do followed him. No matter how often he reminded himself that his job was finished, the feeling clung to him.

In the nearby bushes, a twig snapped and it briefly frightened him. Typical, he thought as he laughed to himself. Gunshots, explosions, mutating green goo … none of it was a problem. He could handle that. Peace and quiet was now what really got to him.

He gave up on the walking plan and went inside. He found what he remembered as being the nanny's room from childhood and placed his one suitcase in there. He lay on the bed and stared at the ceiling, hoping to fall asleep, but couldn't. So he stared in the darkness until the sun rose.

###

As the days and weeks passed, Justine's cast was finally able to come off and she regained the ability to walk at a regular pace. Bernard was able to take up work at the nearest hospital, and it was the easiest job he had ever gotten. His decades of experience in all manner of environments almost automatically earned him the position of chief physician, along with the best paycheck he had ever managed.

They settled into a comfortable routine. As he worked, Justine would practice physical therapy at home, based off what Bernard had recommended on a daily basis. When the exertion became too much, she would switch over to piano which she was now trying to teach herself, along with trying to blitz through as much of the library as she could. On occasion she would venture out of the house and into the surrounding neighborhood and town, making a few friends among the locals. Most of them were acquainted with the Roe family, though not necessarily being personally familiar with Bernard considering he spent so much of his life out of town. Except for a few particular neighbors.

“Are you new in town?” asked one of the especially friendly ones.

“Yeah,” replied Justine. “Myself and my father just moved back into the old family home.”

“Oh? And you are?”

“Samantha Roe,” she answered. She'd gotten so accustomed to the lie she almost forgot sometimes that it wasn't true. “The house on the edge of town is my father's.”

“Roe? Which Roe is your father?”

“Bernard.”

The neighbor woman's eyes lit up. “So *you're* the little Samantha! My, I haven't seen you since you were … well you must've been so small you don't even remember it!”

“Oh! I, um … yeah, I guess so. I don't really have memories of this place.”

“I remember how happy Bernard was when you were born. He took you around the entire village showing you off. Of course, you were always gone so much we never really got to know you.”

“I,” she stammered, feeling for the first time she was losing her grip on the story, “I guess not. We, uh, we did travel quite a lot.”

“And how is your beautiful mother doing? I haven't seen any of you in so long.”

“I'm sorry, I really need to go,” she said as she turned to leave as quickly as she could. “I'll come back later on, ok?”

“Tell your mom and dad that their old friend Charlotte Arreo says hi, ok?”

She smiled weakly. “Sure I will.”

###

Bernard came home that evening, absolutely joyous. He personally did not have to see a single patient. All administrative work. Best day he'd had in a long while.

As he entered the front door he heard the piano being softly played. A classic piece. Justine was improving. He walked in and commended her for how well she was doing with it. To his surprise, the usually chipper girl was very quiet and had no response. He chose to simply sit in a nearby chair and read for a while.

“You don't have any pictures,” she finally said.

“I beg your pardon?”

“Pictures. Like on the walls and stuff. You know, family. Friends. Things like that.”

Bernard stirred in his seat. “Why bother?”

“For the memories. It can be nice to preserve those somehow.”

“For me this house is already full of memories. Every item in here has a story behind it. Behind the story are the people who made it happen. That piano for example,” he said, his voice briefly straining, “has more memories packed into it than a single image could ever contain.”

Justine played on for a few minutes. Bernard resumed his reading. To her, the silence felt more tense now than it had before. She had one more, related, question. Finally she spoke up.

“Where did the name Samantha come from?”

He didn't react at first. Then he put down his book and stood up. “Good night,” he said, and then walked off to his room.

###

The next day at work was one of the longest he had ever experienced. When his shift was finally up, he walked back home as slowly as he could. For the first time in weeks he felt hesitant about going back. But as he passed through the gate and looked upon the house, he was struck with a sense that something was wrong. Something new.

As the front door opened, his eyes widened slowly. The front room was torn apart, and many things were broken or missing. He dropped everything he had and ran towards the stairs, quickly glancing into every room he passed. In each it was the same scene. He burst into Justine's room and saw it had been emptied. Lying on her bed was a note.

“*You lied to us.*

* *SS”*

Bernard sank to the floor. He should have known. He should have had better security. Of course they would find her. And now what could he do? Nothing. If he called the authorities to investigate, the whole façade of his “daughter” would be revealed. Instead of solving anything it would just make it worse. John Smith probably knew that too. Once he had their location, he had the absolute upper hand and could do practically anything he wanted.

###

For a few days Bernard couldn't bring himself to go to work, but he also hated being in the house. All he knew was he didn't like where he was anymore. Why couldn't things ever go the way he wanted? As soon as he established some sort of routine that was making him happy, it seemed as though the universe itself tried taking it away. He had to leave. Again.

As he sat on his porch thinking through his future, a postman arrived bearing an envelope. It had no return address. He reluctantly opened it and saw inside a hastily written card.

“*I'm sorry. Please don't try to find me. For your own safety.*

* *Sam”*

He read it a dozen times over before getting up, going over to the piano, and striking a chord. It sounded beautiful and perfectly in tune. So many memories to add.