My mother is Russian, my father, American. How they met and fell in love is kind of a mystery everyone in my family has always wondered, until they retired from their jobs and changed their names so they wouldn't be killed by Russian special forces. My mother was a Russian spy, my father was an American spy. They met in an operation where they were supposed to kill each other, kind of like Mr. and Mrs. Smith, only they fell in love while they were trying to kill each other, not before. Russia doesn't take lightly to marrying a foreign man, especially when he was part of a network that Russia was trying to disable. America didn't like it either, even tried blacklisting my father, but they couldn't put enough bad things on him. He was honorable, every mission he lead or was part of usually never ended in bloodshed of civilians or people that didn't need to die, it was always the bad guy. Sure many people knew his name, and wanted him dead, and in fact are still looking for him now, but since he changed his everything, there's no chance of them finding him, or Russian special forces finding my mom. At least, that's what we thought. My brothers and I were all out on a Saturday night with friends. Ryan, my oldest brother, who is 22, was out drinking at a club with his friends. My other brother, James, who is 20, was out with his friends, probably drinking as well, but he never tells me anything so I wouldn't know. He's a real Army freak. Wants to join the military but my mother won't let him. She's afraid he'll be TOO good, and the CIA will end up wanting him with them, and my family was highly against the CIA. After my father heard of what the CIA did to Michael Westen, he wanted out. Burning Westen and not even looking to see if there was an explanation or even questioning the person who authorized the burn notice. When my mother heard about Westen, she didn't really care. In Russia, Michael Westen is like a myth, no one believes he's real, but my father swears by it. It often comes in on arguments. Then there's me, Elianna, 18 years old and in my senior year of high school. I was out with friends that night, sleeping over a friend's house and watching TV all night, like usual.
"So then Michael told his on and off again girlfriend, Fiona, to wire a car to turn off by calling a cell phone, a trick that comes in handy a lot of the time" my father was explaining, "Then his best friend and ex-Navy SEAL, Sam to sit in the car with a phone jammer, then Michael went to the electrical box, where all the street lamps are so he would be able to call that, and all the lights would go out. When the guy finally came out, he almost made the guy shit his pants. Michael turned out the lights, then he called and made the car not start, then they turned on the jammer, so he felt completely alone. If that's not enough to scare the shit out of you, they turned on the high beams of the truck and started shooting at him! Well, not really at him, just at his feet so he would think they were shooting at him, they didn't want to kill the guy. All for a 14 year old boy who got beaten around by his step father, he's a legend!"
"He's also not real" my mother cut I, making me roll my eyes.
My father often told these stories, swears he met Michael Westen, even though we all know he didn't. Personally, I believe in my dad's stories, Ryan and I both do. We soak them up, loving to hear all the clever ways Michael helped people. James always waved it away, saying there was never any proof of him.
"You can't even prove he exists, the cover story is that he got burned, meaning all his files are gone, so I don't think he actually did exist, just the CIA's way of scaring Russians." James chuckled.
"Nah, I think he did, if you go back and read the Miami's papers you see all these things about explosions matching to the Westen stories" Ryan retorted.
"Kids, quit fighting, I'm Russian, if he were to exist I would have met him, he was in Russia the same time I was working an OP there." My mother clarified.
"Not necessarily" I started, and from there on was the usual debate as to if Westen ever did exist.
I came home the next morning looking for my parents, their cars were still in the drive ways and it didn't look like there was a break in, I just assumed they went out with friends and their friends picked them up, or maybe they went out on a jog later than usual. Ryan got home around 4, still not hearing from my parents, which was slightly freaking me out, then James came home, with his usual bad mood.
"Where's mom?" James asked, peeking his head in my room.
"I don't know, I got home at 12 and there weren't here" I replied.
"Hmm" he sounded before walking out.
It was starting to freak me out, where were my parents? I usually never called my mom or dad when they weren't home, I was taught to only call in case of emergencies, but something felt off. I called my mom, and heard her ringtone coming from downstairs.
"Mom?" I called, but no one answered. When I walked downstairs, both my mom and dad's phones were on the coffee table in the living room, showing missed calls from their kids.
"Ryan, do you know where mom and dad are?" I asked quietly and nervously to my brother who was watching TV in the living room.
"No idea" he said simply.
"You're not the least bit worried?" I asked
"Nope, they're spies, El, they can get out of anything" He shrugged.
I made a frustrated noise and started pacing, thinking where they could be until 7:48 at night.
At exactly 8 o'clock, my father's phone started ringing, a strange number appearing on it, meaning no one us were calling it. I reached to pick it up when my brother slapped my hand away.
"Ow" I said.
"We don't pick their phones up" Ryan said seriously.
"It could be someone telling us where they are" I said, reaching for it again.
"OR, it could be someone trying to trace it" he said, throwing my hand away from it.
The ringing stopped, then started again, then five more times after that.
"I think they want you to pick it up" James joined it, his arms folded as he leaned against the archway separating our living room from our kitchen.
"Ryan said no" I answered.
"Well I'm saying yes" he shot back, grabbing the phone before Ryan can do anything about it.
"Hello?" he asked into the receiver, both Ryan and I watching his eyes grow wide as he fumbled to put it to speaker.
"Hello Kane residence, I bet you were wondering where your parents went this morning when Elianna walked into the house at 12:13 PM followed by Ryan at 1:25 PM and James at 1:56 PM, I'm here to answer that question" a robotic voice was saying, "We took them, they are being held ransom with electrical wires attached to their bodies" you could hear screams in the background, "They're very loud, I hope you heard that, anyway, we want 2 million dollars, clean cash in 72 hours or you will become orphans, we expect to hear from you shortly, good day" then the phone clicked silent.
