Search For The Truth (On Hold)

The Betrayer

Scott

Thirty minutes later, while Bailey, Mom, and I were relating memories, the doorbell rang.

Mom jumped up. "That must be your father. You two stay there. I'll get him!"

We willingly obeyed, and when Mom was out of our sight, Bailey turned to me, his eyes still misty from crying. "I can't believe we actually found each other, Teddy. The chances of it are nearly impossible."

"I'm sure we would have found each other at some point even without the dream," I assured. "After all, we are brothers."

He smiled at me. "Yeah, I guess you're right."

A masculine voice echoed through the hallway, and Mom appeared leading a tall, broad-shouldered man into the living room.

Bailey glanced up, his gaze meeting that of our father.

Dad saw Bailey first, then me. And when he saw me, relief and comfort flooded through me, and I broke out into a huge grin. "Hi, Dad!"

It seemed that ages passed before Dad's jaw dropped and he swooped down on Bailey and me, grabbing us in his arms and practically squashing us against him.

"I never thought I'd see you again!" His hand stroked through my hair in that familiar way he did when I needed comforting. "They said you wouldn't figure it out! But here you are, in my arms!" He pulled back from us and studied us closely, back and forth. "You've both grown! Teddy, you're almost as tall as me! And Bailey, you already look like a college student! I'm so glad you're back!" He wrapped us in that tight embrace again.

This time I couldn't hold it back. I tried to. But then I realized it was pointless. I sobbed.

"Teddy?" Dad pulled back from me, his brow wrinkled in confusion. "Are you okay?"

I sniffed, wiping the tears from my eyes. "F-fine. I'm just happy to see you!" Then I willingly let the tears come. I clenched on to Dad and refused to let go, but Dad seemed to feel the exact same way. We held each other in our arms.

"Dad, what are we gonna do about the SIA? They did all this to us. Or they at least know about this," I began. "We can't just let them get away with it."

"And we won't." Mom stepped around us and led Bailey to the couch. Dad and I moved to a recliner, where I sat on his lap like I had as a little kid. Oh, all the memories were so wonderful! "We've been planning for some time to talk with the SIA, but we really never got around to doing it."

Bailey narrowed his eyes. "Not like they'd help us anyway."

I don't know where the idea came from. But I randomly blurted, "Maybe we don't have to talk to them."

All three of my family members froze. "What?"

Pulling away from Dad, I stood. "You guys have a laptop, right?"

*

"So if I can get into the SIA's website, I should be able to hack into their infrastructure and find out exactly what's going on in that place." Mom's computer sat on my lap, loading. Dad and Bailey stood behind me, watching intently, while Mom snuggled up behind me.

When the computer was turned on, I opened the internet browser and searched the SIA. Huh. Now that was interesting.

"Wait, I thought they were called the Secret Intelligence Service," Bailey commented. He pointed at the name scrolled across the screen. "This says 'The Supermarket at Indus Avenue. That's not a spy agency."

I grinned. "It's obviously just a cover-up. Didn't you wonder why the letters in their abbreviation didn't match up with what the abbreviation meant? SIA doesn't compensate with Secret Intelligence Service. It should've been SIS if that was the case." I paused. "Anyway, we're getting off track. I'm going to log in to my email on your computer, Mom. I need to be able to access it to do what I'm about to do."

"And what are you about to do?" Mom questioned. Her hand was resting on my leg. She clearly didn't want to stop touching her newly found children. I didn't mind.

Instead of answering her directly, I highlighted the URL of the website to the SIA and copied it, then opened a new window from my email and pasted the URL there.

Then I set to work.

*

"Did I ever tell you you're insane? Because you are," Bailey muttered over my shoulder. It was almost seven in the evening and Mom had decided to cook us dinner while I checked out the SIA's information.

Mrs. Stratford had messaged me earlier that evening asking where I was. I'd told her the truth- I was at my real parents' house. She hadn't texted back yet.

Bailey's comment elicited a laugh from me. "Thank you. But I'm just smart at this. Believe me, if we compared grades from school, you'd have a much higher average than I would."

"Hey, if you weren't good at this we never would have met, probably. And we wouldn't be doing this," Bailey pointed out. "So right now be glad you're so smart at this."

"Yeah," I agreed, "later I'll whack myself over the head for not studying hard enough."

Next to me, Mom let out a sigh. "It's so great to have you two kids back. I've missed this teasing a lot."

I heard Bailey laugh. "Just wait. Soon you'll be drowning in sarcastic hilariousness." He rested his arms on the back of the couch.

The first thing that popped up on the SIA's info was a list of the head people working there. The first was a man named Mike Sullister. His picture revealed an older man with graying hair and dark green eyes. Beneath him was a thirty-year-old, petite woman with large brown eyes and dark brown hair. She seemed familiar... but I couldn't place her as anyone I knew personally. Rachel Wing. Nope. Didn't know her.

"Looks like we should try to find that Sullister guy," Dad commented over my shoulder. "If he's in charge he's going to be the one to make any judgments on what we say."

"Huh." I continued scrolling down. Ten more people, and then...

I gasped, my eyes widening in alarm. The laptop crashed into the ground as I leaped to my feet.

No! It couldn't be!

"Teddy?" Dad's arm gripped me around the waist to steady me. "You okay?"

I was too shocked to answer. I'd only met her once, but now that I thought about it, I'd seen her watching me quite often. She was in the class below me.

So the SIA knew full well what was going on. They weren't trying to get us back together as a family.

They were spying on us.

Rosetti Williams was a spy.

A/N HAHAHAHAHAHAHA.