Repaying the Favor

Pierre brought a woman in from France to help Horatio with his studies. As far as he knew, she knew nothing of what was going on with the new resistance or the sickness. She had been told her most details of her job and agreed to it before she even came from France.

Horatio had been reading up on Alyssa’s research since the woman came from France and spent most of her pregnancy, along with Elizabeth’s, working with Alyssa to get a better understanding of it.

Over the nine months, he put away some time to help Ines with her recovery, which turned out to be easier than the group initially believed. She had lost the ability to speak but the chip and the contents were completely gone, which the group believed to be a fair trade so Ines could keep her life.

Horatio had only told Alyssa bits and pieces of his research regarding the woman from France and her baby, knowing it was best to keep the information on the down low and that so long as Pierre knew what was going on, he’d be okay.

While the woman was there, she stayed with Grady. They had told Grady that she was hiding out from her partner until she delivered her baby because she couldn’t handle terminating her pregnancy but she couldn’t have her baby in France. Grady didn’t ask many questions, so it was pretty easy to keep the research hidden.

Chelsea had spent ten months working to keep the new resistance at bay, eventually she had talked Danny into a peace treaty that he had been fighting for months.

Elizabeth had her daughter two months before the French woman had her own daughter, the former being named Juliet and the latter taking on the name Cecily. Elizabeth resumed her normal routine of surveillance and scouting a few weeks after having Juliet, despite knowing the risk against her.

It was abundantly clear to the group after Juliet’s birth that Elizabeth was going to be targeted by the new resistance once again and that it was unlikely that they were going to ease up on the group until they got hold of her.

After the French woman delivered Cecily, Pierre sent her back to France once she agreed to leave her daughter in South Dakota. Cecily was left in Horatio’s care and once she had arrived, he told Chelsea all about where Cecily came from and what he intended to do.

Gus, Devin, and Greg stayed with the new resistance until a morning in January.

Gwen was the first person to spot Devin laying still on the ground in the early morning hours, only being able to see him because she saw the person who had left him there running away from the town.

She ran across the street, waking Marshal and Elizabeth. Gwen and Marshal went to Devin while Elizabeth went to get help, returning with Alyssa, Amanda, and Horatio pretty quickly.

The doctors got to work trying to ensure his safety before moving him. Elizabeth went back home and encouraged Gwen to do the same.

Gwen stayed put, keeping an eye on the way the person had run away from. Marshal kept a watch on her, immediately knowing by her body language that she was hiding something. “Gwen, whatever you’re thinking of doing, I would rethink it.”

She turned to him, briefly catching Amanda looking up at her before she returned her attention to Devin. “What do you mean?”

Marshal looked back at Devin and the doctors before pulling Gwen farther away from them and lowering his voice. “I know you’re hiding a gun somewhere on you. You’re not going to use it, do you understand?”

Gwen scrunched her nose, her face turning slightly red. “The new resistance is a threat again, so you expect me to just leave it alone?”

“I expect you to leave it alone because they’re not a threat. They’re not going to back out of the treaty and you firing a shot would be an automatic fold on us. If you were to fire a shot, you would essentially be getting six people, yourself included, hurt and probably killed. Those people are big on retaliation and wouldn’t hesitate to kill a single person out here right now. They would be thrilled at the opportunity to take out any one of those doctors because it’s a set back for us.”

Marshal turned back to see that the doctors had gotten to moving Devin to the medical center, leaving him with Gwen.

She watched him for a moment. “How did you know that I had a gun?” He shrugged in response. “How did you know I was going to use it?”

“Because anyone who had been upset by these people would have done it and you have a reason to be upset with them.” Marshal held out his hand. “You should probably hand over the gun, though. I don’t think it would sit well with your parents if they found out you had it.” Gwen hesitantly pulled the gun from behind her back and set it in his hand. “Where did you get it from?”

“Lecia, she said it belonged to her daughter and she didn’t want to see someone her daughter’s age get hurt when she had another one just lying around.”

---

Before Horatio left to help Devin, he had woken Chelsea up to watch after Cecily, who had gotten woken up by Elizabeth as well. It was a frequent occurrence, as he didn’t trust most people in the town with her and kept her contact with other people limited.

Chelsea got up and made a bottle for the baby, only going to get her once the bottle started to heat up.

Cecily had been an easy baby from the start, rarely ever making a peep, but Chelsea believed that that had to do with Horatio constantly doing what he could to keep her happy.

Chelsea went to the back bedroom and picked the baby up, cradling her in her arms and taking her back into the kitchen.

Knowing that Cecily was Zachary’s daughter made it pretty difficult for Chelsea to accept her for the first month or so. Chelsea thought she was lucky to get put undercover after his death because she didn’t have to think about it, that thought process was completely uprooted whenever Cecily arrived.

---

FLASHBACK

About a week after Cecily was born, Horatio had gone to the medical center for her. Pierre influenced Chelsea to go talk with him, saying that he had some important news to tell her.

Chelsea met up with Horatio in the medical center, she found him cradling the baby in his arms. The woman from France was nowhere to be found, which didn’t surprise Chelsea as Pierre told them that she would be returning home as soon as she had her baby. “Did she leave already?”

Horatio nodded. “I need to talk to you about a few things.” The two went on a walk around the town, Horatio kept hold of Cecily the entire time. “I haven’t been truthful with you about her at all and it’s been upsetting me for months. I can’t bring her home in good conscience knowing that you don’t know the full truth.”

“What would the full truth be?” Chelsea could recall a few conversations Danny had tried to bring up regarding Cecily’s mother, but Pierre told her that she wasn’t allowed to discuss her, no matter what Danny said.

He carefully passed Cecily to Chelsea, allowing her to look over the baby. “Look into her eyes.” Chelsea did what he said, the baby’s bright blue eyes bringing on a sinking feeling in her chest. “Zachary is her father and given how she was more of a creation than she was a conception, his genes hold more of an influence on her. She’s going to have the pale complexion, the black hair and light blue eyes, probably even the dimples. I need you to know this now so you can work through whatever you have to.”

Chelsea’s eyes stayed locked onto Cecily’s eyes before she shook herself free from the grasp, then passed the baby back to Horatio and crossed her arms. “Why did you lie to me? Why are you only choosing to tell me the truth now?”

“Because I don’t want you to be caught off guard by anything that happens with her. She’s probably going to develop the same disease Zachary and Eris did, she’s going to be sick and I need to know that it’s not going to hurt you to see it happen all over again.” Horatio held onto Cecily, wrapping her in her blanket. “I lied to you because I can’t have anyone else in the town knowing what’s really going on with her.”

“You can’t have them knowing because you know you’re in the wrong, you know they aren’t going to agree with what you’re doing.” Chelsea caught herself by surprise, snapping at him. “You brought her to life with the knowledge that she is going to be sick, she is going to suffer, and you’re choosing to make her a science project. I don’t agree with that, Horatio.”

---

After feeding Cecily, Chelsea stayed up to play with her until Horatio got back since Cecily typically couldn’t fall asleep without him being around. After the first month, Chelsea had started finding Cecily’s light blue eyes to be comforting, she started to find joy in seeing them every time the baby cracked a smile, knowing that her grin would light up her own eyes.

Horatio came back about two hours after he left and quickly took to trying to get Cecily back to sleep. “Devin was just dropped by the new resistance. No chip, nothing out of the ordinary in his system, you know anything about it?”

Chelsea shook her head, watching Horatio pace as he cradled Cecily. “Danny hasn’t mentioned anything about Devin, he said he believed that Greg would be the next one to get out but he didn’t know when.”

“So one of them probably acted out.” Horatio shook his head, gently tapping the baby’s back. “Devin wasn’t responding when we got to him, Alyssa said she expects him to be responsive pretty soon but she isn’t sure if he’s going to remember what all happened since something had to have happened for him to be unconscious.”

A knock at the door interrupted their conversation, the two of them stopping in place and looking towards it. Horatio passed Cecily back to Chelsea and went to the door, opening it just enough to see who it was.

He looked confused but opened the door, allowing Marshal to come inside. “Marshal, the sun isn’t even out, what’s up?” Horatio shut the door but stayed in place.

“You always end up knowing about things that most people here don’t, did Morgan ever have a gun?” Marshal seemed a bit stressed, his hands stayed in his pockets.

Horatio thought over the question before he shook his head. “She didn’t, that’s why she was hiding when Jean Luc was at her house the night she died. She knew how to use a gun, yeah, but she wasn’t allowed to have one.”

Marshal took his hands out of his pockets and pulled a gun out from behind his back, setting it on the table. “Gwen had that on her, she said that Lecia gave it to her and told her that it belonged to Morgan.”

Horatio took the gun in his hands, looking over it. “It’s not from our town, nobody has a gun like this. Did she say when she got it?”

“No.”

Horatio cleared his throat and set the gun back down. “I heard what you were saying to her when we were out there, how did you know she had it? I didn’t even see it on her.”

Marshal looked at Chelsea, then back to Horatio. “I didn’t, Whitlock did. Back in March, he told me about some events that he had been seeing and Gwen having a gun while a new resistance member was around was one of them. She was going to shoot someone, she even told me that tonight.”

“Did he tell you anything else?”

“He’s told me plenty, he hasn’t stopped seeing these things.” Marshal crossed his arms, looking briefly at Cecily. “Horatio, I know who Cecily’s dad is, I know that the only reason you’re doing what you’re doing with her is because you feel guilty and worthless. You may have saved your mom’s life but you see her losing her voice as a complete failure on your part. You talked Pierre into letting you have Cecily so you can cure her because you couldn’t cure Zachary or Eris, you’re holding all these deaths against yourself.”

Horatio stayed silent for a moment, nodding slightly. “That’s… an interesting assessment.”

Marshal stayed focused on Cecily before he turned back to Horatio, his entire attitude being completely out of the ordinary. “I also know that Cecily saved your life just by being born. You and Milo were going to attack Daniel and he was going to kill you both, that changed when she was born.”

“To what?” Horatio seemed nervous.

Marshal looked between Horatio and Cecily before shaking his head. “Don’t waste your time when it comes to returning the favor, yeah?” He started for the door, patting Horatio on the shoulder as he left the house.

Horatio stayed frozen until Chelsea got up and gave Cecily back to him. She rested a hand on his back. “Are you okay?”

“Do you know if what he just told us is legitimate? About the things Whitlock is seeing?” He pulled Cecily closer to his chest as if he were blocking her off from the rest of the world.

“I don’t know anything about that. March is about the same time Elizabeth had started hearing other people’s thoughts and I started seeing dead people, but Elizabeth and I aren’t seeing or hearing those things anymore so I’m not sure how he would still be getting visions.” Chelsea rested her head on his shoulder a moment, her vision landing on Cecily. “You should probably pass on the information about Lecia to Jean Luc when you see him next so he can look into it.”

Chelsea knew that once she got his mind off of what Marshal had said about Cecily, Horatio would be alright.

They laid back down after Cecily had gone back to sleep, neither of them able to find sleep for themselves. Chelsea broke the silence in the room. “With the Wanderers, is your dad still in charge of them even though you’ve basically had a kid?”

He nodded, his eyes staying fixed on the ceiling. “I can call her my daughter all I want to but because she’s not biologically mine, I didn’t have a kid. He’s still in charge of the Wanderers.”

“I’m sorry, I know that having him step down was important to you.”

Horatio turned over to face Chelsea with a smile on his face. “It’s fine, I don’t want to be put in charge of them until I’m ready to be there for them.” Chelsea turned to face him, allowing him to brush a hand through her hair. “I’m not done here yet so I’m not going anywhere.”

She got closer to him, letting out a small sigh as he wrapped an arm around her and held her close, the two of them eventually falling asleep.

---

It wasn’t long after Jean Luc and Amanda had officially started dating that his role in the group started to change. He knew the change was a result of Morgan’s death, but he didn’t want to mull over the thought.

He and Noelle had started focusing on the security of the community, which put him in the middle of a lot of things that went on.

Horatio told him about Marshal’s suspicions about Lecia and what happened with Devin, knowing that Jean Luc would follow up on it himself.

Jean Luc went to Lecia’s house the same day to ask her a few questions. “I have some questions about Morgan for you and the day she died.”

Lecia didn’t seem thrilled to discuss the topics, her face turning sour. “You were the one who was there, not me. I also don’t know how you expect me to remember the finer details after ten months.”

He had gotten used to certain people avoiding questions, it was practically a second nature for him to lead an interrogation now. “Did Morgan have a gun?”

He saw her brows furrow. “Yes, she did. Do you honestly believe that I would let my daughter run around with nothing to protect herself? I told her not to tell anybody about it.”

“Where was the gun on the night she died? When I was talking to her just before she was killed, she was absolutely horrified because she had no way of defending herself.”

Her face fell in an instant as she hesitated on a response. “I don’t know, she was a kid and Jean Luc, I’ll tell you this because you have no kids of your own, kids lose things pretty easily.”

“A gun isn’t an easy thing to lose, though.” Jean Luc crossed his arms. “Where is the gun now?”

“I gave it to Gwen. I didn’t want her to feel afraid and I wanted her to be able to defend herself.”

“Did David or Sarah know about this?”

Lecia shrugged. “What they have going on isn’t really any of my business.”

“Where did you get the gun?”

“I’ve had it for years, I don’t remember where I got it from.” Lecia let out a frustrated sigh. “Why are you asking all these questions? Did something happen?”

“No, someone out there stopped it from happening. Gwen was going to murder a new resistance member.”

She shook her head and scoffed. “You say it like it’s a bad thing. After all they’ve done to us, they can stand to lose a person or two.”

Jean Luc excused himself, knowing he wasn’t going to get anymore answers from her. He relayed the results to Pierre and delivered his verdict. “I can’t really get a reading off of her, she’s complicated. I can’t tell if she genuinely feels negatively about the new resistance or if she’s just playing into it.”

Pierre nodded slightly. “Talk to Marshal and figure out how he knew about Gwen and the gun, talk to Gwen and her parents to get a better understanding of their home life, and talk to Horatio to see if he can tell you where the gun came from and if the bullets match any of our dead.” He paused. “Try talking to Jack alone, see if maybe he knew anything. Younger siblings are notorious for being nosy and I’ve heard he’s no exception to that rule.”

[Talk to Marshal first.]
[Talk to David, Sarah, and Gwen first.]
[Talk to Jack alone first.]
[Talk to Horatio first.]

Jean Luc managed to catch Horatio spending time with his dad and brothers, Cecily and Ines being notable exceptions from the group. The men immediately noticed Jean Luc’s presence, their English conversation turning into Italian as they expected him to pass by them.

Jean Luc managed to pull Horatio to the side alone. “Where’s Cecily?”

“My mom wanted to spend some time with her.” Horatio seemed to be studying over Jean Luc, eventually putting his hands on his hips. “I don’t think you pulled me alone just to ask me about her, though. What’s up?”

“I need your help regarding the gun that Gwen had and a few of the dead.” Jean Luc paused, knowing he had to explain himself better if he wanted Horatio to help. “I want to know if the bullets in the gun match wounds that our dead had and have all my facts sorted out before I go to Gwen.”

Horatio nodded and started to head to the medical center with Jean Luc following after him. “What have you got so far?”

“You know I can’t share details with you, I just need you to tell me what I ask you.” Jean Luc looked at Horatio to see him smiling. “What?”

“It’s just a nice change of pace to see someone who cares enough about their job and the group to stay quiet about things they shouldn’t put out there.”

The two went to the medical center, Horatio grabbing a pair of gloves and handing a pair to Jean Luc and leading him to a back room.

He went to a cabinet and held out his hand. “I need the gun for reference, I don’t know what I’m looking for right now.”

Jean Luc carefully unloaded the gun, giving him a single bullet from the gun and then the gun itself. “Do you think you could tell me where the gun came from?”

“I can make a guess, I can tell you the model and where it was manufactured but if you want to know where this exact gun came from, you’d have a better chance asking Marshal since he knows more about this stuff.” Horatio held the gun in his hands and then put it on top of the cabinet, then set the bullet Jean Luc gave him next to it. He started going through the cabinet, drawer by drawer until he pulled out three bullets.

He set them on the table in front of Jean Luc then moved the gun and bullet to lie in front of them.

“I’m already seeing a match.” Horatio pointed at two bullets. “The one on the left was the one that killed Zachary, the one on the right killed Leona. From first glance, they’re exact matches.”

“What about the third one? Where is it from?”

Horatio picked up the third bullet and looked over it, hesitating on his answer for a minute. “It’s from Elizabeth’s gun, when she shot Gabbie.” He put the bullet next to the one Jean Luc had taken out from the gun. “The third is smaller than the reference, which would mean it’s been taken from a smaller gun. Elizabeth has a smaller gun because she has fewer options on concealing a gun because she’s a smaller person. You and I could hide a gun just about anywhere on us with no issue, she can’t without it restricting her movement.” He moved the third bullet back and put the second next to the reference bullet. “The second and first are nearly an exact match to the reference bullet in general size and weight, the only difference is the two that were used to kill people had something engraved on them, your reference doesn’t. I can’t say for sure if it’s new resistance, but it’s looking like it.”

---

Chelsea had gone to the new resistance’s base to find Elliot and Danny waiting for her in the main room. They took her upstairs to where they normally held their questioning sessions, which she knew was a bad sign for her.

“Why did you guys let Devin go instead of Greg?” Chelsea attempted to lead the conversation to avoid getting questioned.

Danny let out a huff, seeming pretty stressed. “Cecily Lucille Villa. Her surname would suggest that her paternity is one of Cristiano's sons if not Cristiano himself and her residence would narrow it down to Horatio. Juliet Kimberly Kennedy, her surname would be either Marshal or Kyle and her residence would point to Marshal, am I wrong?”

“No but I’m confused, what are you looking into the babies for?”

“Juliet is Marshal’s daughter, but Cecily isn’t Horatio’s daughter. You’re the only one he’s been with and I know for a fact that you haven’t been pregnant, his brothers haven’t been with anyone and Ines surely hasn’t been pregnant. Who are Cecily’s parents?” Danny avoided the question, only seeming to grow more upset as he questioned Chelsea.

“A couple from France, her mother came here to have her baby because she was in a bad relationship and Pierre suggested it to her.”

Danny rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Wrong, she wasn’t pregnant when she came here and she most definitely wasn’t in a relationship with the man who got her pregnant because he’s been dead for nearly a year. Do you want to explain to me how a man who has been dead for nearly a year has fathered a child in your group?”

“I don’t know, I don’t even know who you’re talking about. I didn’t know Horatio was going to be taking care of Cecily until he brought her home, I’m pretty uninvolved with her and your cameras can tell you that.” Chelsea quickly went to defending herself instead of addressing the question. Horatio had told her countless times that nobody was to know who Cecily’s father really was and that he would make the decision whenever he was ready to tell.

Elliot finally broke his silence. “We know that Zachary is her father, we know that Horatio was the one who basically crafted her, what we don’t know is why he did this or how. If I’m not mistaken, you don’t have the technology to do this but somehow you have and there’s living proof that you did. Why did he do this?”

“I don’t know, he doesn’t tell me why he does the things that he does, he just does them and only tells me about them if they mess up. I have no idea what he does all day and he normally doesn’t tell me.”

Elliot looked to Danny expectantly, who shook his head with a sigh. “I believe her; I feel she would have said something had she known beforehand. One thing we know about Horatio is he’s a weird guy who does weird things with little to no explanation, I guess we shouldn’t be too surprised that he’s done this.” Danny then looked to Chelsea. “If you hear anything about why he’s done this or how, please let me know.”

Chelsea nodded. “Did you intend to let Devin go or was that just a mistake in communication?”

“It was intentional. Gregory wouldn’t go easily and Devin was already in the condition he’s in now, so I made the decision to send him back instead.”

Elliot got up and left the room in a hurry, Chelsea noticing that his face was red as he left. Danny got up and left not long after him, allowing Chelsea to go back home.

She didn’t get far before Savannah caught up to her, looking a bit panicked. “You need to look out for Cecily. Daniel wasn’t satisfied with the results he got and he doesn’t expect to get more answers, he wants her dead.”

“What? Why?” Chelsea stopped to talk to Savannah. “What exactly is going on with him and Cecily?”

“It’s not Cecily, it’s Horatio. He doesn’t trust him but he knows that it’s a lost cause to go after him. He thinks that by targeting Cecily, he’ll be sending a message to Horatio to stay in his place.”

Chelsea shook her head. “That’s not how it’ll turn out, the chances of actually getting to her are slim but getting to her and actually killing her are close to nothing.”

“I know this, most of us do but Daniel is insistent that we try.”

Chelsea stayed quiet. “Then let them try, we’ll find out how well that works for him.”

---

Jean Luc went to Marshal after leaving Horatio, the gun and the bullet still in his possession. He now had Noelle in the surveillance room looking over the tapes on the night of Zachary’s death to try to compare the guns.

Elizabeth and the kids were around, but Marshal didn’t seem to have an issue talking around them.

Jean Luc started by asking about the gun, which Marshal answered with ease. “It’s Onyx issued, the engraved bullets are a personal touch but the gun itself is Onyx. The only person I can think that would have engraved bullets would be Luke Lowell.”

“How would Lecia end up with any gun from Onyx, more specifically Luke Lowell’s gun?”

Marshal shook his head. “It was a guess, I can’t tell you that this is one hundred percent Luke Lowell’s gun, I just know it’s Onyx and it has engraved bullets. This could have easily come before Luke’s time at Onyx or from someone entirely different.”

“How did you know that Gwen had it?”

Marshal gave a soft smile. “Horatio already told you.”

“How do you know what Horatio told me?”

“The same way I knew Gwen had the gun.”

Jean Luc let out a huff, briefly looking towards the bedrooms to see Whitlock staring at him.

Whitlock approached the two when he realized he’d been caught. He kept his head down and his voice very hushed. “I told him. I knew Gwen had the gun because I saw it in a vision. I told him what Horatio told you because I saw that in a vision too.”

“Why haven’t you told anyone else about your visions?”

“The five people who would believe me already know about them. My mom and dad, Chelsea, Jude, and Jack.”

Jean Luc paused, thinking over how he could get a head start if he just asked Whitlock the right questions. “What else have you seen? I want to hear what you have to say.”

Whitlock looked to Marshal, getting a nod of approval before he said anything. “Today I saw Juliet getting taken away by a woman in camouflage. It changed something I saw in the past because I saw it play out again.”

“What did it replace?”

“The day Cecily was born, I saw her getting taken away. That played again and this time I saw Juliet.”

Jean Luc looked to Marshal, to see that he looked to already know what Whitlock was saying. “When did that change? Where is Juliet?”

“Juliet is with my mom and Victor, they’re in my room. It changed when I woke up today.”

Jean Luc nodded and went for the door, excusing himself from the house.

---

Noelle had spent most of her day looking through the security footage at her cousin’s request. She had a picture of the weapon she was looking for and she started her search about a week before Morgan died.

In that one week, she saw Horatio get attacked by Gabbie two different times, three different new resistance members just walking along the edge of the town, and one of them confronting Kyle.

She did a bit of research to find that Kyle never filed a formal complaint about being confronted. She watched him for a little longer and found that he never even spoke to anyone in charge.

The night Morgan died came around and she briefly spotted a man in camouflage around Lecia’s house.

A day later watched Filip simply walking down the street and a bullet pass him by, the only person in the area being Filip himself. He stopped and ran back into town, came back later with Grady and Leona. They stayed in the area for a bit before the three split off, Filip went the way he was going, Grady went back into town and Leona stayed in place, Daniel joining her after a few minutes of her being alone.

The night Elizabeth shot Gabbie, the same man in camouflage stayed around Amanda’s house, likely being the one to light it up. He watched Gabbie draw her gun on Horatio. What stuck out to Noelle was that he saw Elizabeth approaching Gabbie, he watched her take aim at Gabbie and hesitate for a solid forty five seconds before she pulled the trigger. He had every opportunity to stop her.

Noelle started skipping around in the footage, her typing eventually landing her on a day that occurred a week before Kimber’s murder. Noelle spotted Kimber and Jude outside on their own, which was already an unusual sight. Daniel was the one who approached them, he crouched in front of Kimber and started a conversation with her. Whatever Daniel was talking to her about, Jude grew upset hearing it and tried to reach out to his sister. Daniel grabbed his wrist and pulled him close, pulling a knife out of his pocket and putting the tip of it to Jude’s neck, his body language changing in an instant as he spoke to Jude. He continued to pull Jude closer to the knife until he got startled by someone leaving their home and took off.

Noelle stopped there, unable to stomach what she was seeing. Her hands started shaking as she made notes of everything she saw and left the surveillance room.

She stayed out of the surveillance room until after lunch as she knew Horatio would be going back to the medical center after lunch as well. The two had a discussion over a few of the things she saw, which helped Noelle keep a cool head about it all as she resumed her search for the gun that allegedly belonged to Morgan.

She watched all the way from Kimber’s murder to Zachary’s murder, not once did she see the gun that Jean Luc asked her to find.

---

The night’s dinner came around and the people in the community seemed rather tense, likely due to the ongoing investigation.

Noelle had told Pierre all of her investigations findings from the people involved all the way down to the duration of the occurrences. She knew he planned to speak with everyone involved and that he didn’t want them to know.

Ines was the last person to arrive at the dinner, she carried Cecily in her arms and seemed a bit happier than she normally did.

After she was seated Pierre stood at the front of the room with Noelle’s notes in hand, he didn’t say a word just yet as he knew that his silence was what would grab the group’s attention. He read the notes in his hands and then looked up at the group.

“I understand that a lot of you are nervous right now, maybe a bit scared and I want to say that most of you have no reason to be nervous as you haven’t done anything. For some of you, that’s exactly why you should be nervous. Some of you are on thin ice with me already, some of you have only just slipped into that territory.” Pierre surveyed the faces of the people in front of him. “Most of you have known me for years and you all know that I hold every single man, woman, child, adult to the same standards and one of my biggest requirements from my people is open and honest communication.”

He read the notes in his hands, his eyes landing on Kyle as he looked up. “Kyle, I know for a fact that if you were in my position and it were Whitlock or Victor that were in yours from the footage that I saw, you would have been absolutely livid to see one of them confronted by a new resistance member and for them to not say a word about it. You did exactly that a week before Morgan’s death, you didn’t say a word about it to anyone. I’ve checked multiple times with multiple people to confirm my statement before presenting it to you, you never said a thing. Why? I want to remind everyone here that Kimber died before Morgan, we already knew the new resistance was a problem at that point, why would you not say anything?”

Kyle shook his head, unable to find words for a moment before he caught Marshal’s eyes. The look shared between the two told Pierre that Marshal had no idea about it until now. “I’ll admit, I didn’t tell anyone because I believed it was common knowledge that these people were in our community at that point. I want to raise this question to you before you go on, though. How can you be so certain that these are things that Zachary didn’t know about before he died?”

“Because Horatio has every single document that Zachary penned in his entire life, I’ve cross referenced the things that I saw with these records.” Pierre’s gaze then landed on Horatio, who already seemed to know that he was going to get in trouble for something. “Speaking of you, you got attacked twice by the same new resistance member in that same week, once with Chelsea and once on your own. I know that the instance with Chelsea was reported but I truly can’t but feel that you only reported that because you knew she would have if you didn’t. You already know you’re one of the ones who’s on thin ice with me, this is the last chance you’re going to get because I've already given you too many.”

Horatio cleared his throat, prompting Pierre to stay quiet for a moment and let him speak. “I know what you’re talking about and I didn’t report it because that was before the entire group knew about the Wanderers and the Italian mafia, Gabbie already knew at that point and the time she attacked me on my own was her way of warning me of what she knew. I couldn’t say anything without exposing myself and at the time, I had no plans to come forward with my connections.”

“And you already knew that Gabbie was Gabriella, the same woman that Samantha was seeing for years now, right?” Carlos chimed in, Pierre immediately knowing the point he was trying to make.

“If you’re insinuating that it’s common place for me to keep secrets, you’re right but I’m going to advise you to watch your tongue. The things I’ve kept from the group have kept me alive and have yet to end up resulting in someone else’s death, so I think I’m doing just fine.” Horatio paused, seeming to think of what Carlos had said. “But no, at that point I don’t think I was fully aware that Gabbie was Gabriella. I only knew about it for about three days before she told the group who I was and in those three days, I was trying to find out as much about her as I could without involving anyone else.”

Pierre looked straight to Horatio’s right where Filip was seated. “Filip, do you want to tell me how you just narrowly avoided getting shot in the head and decide to just not tell anyone in charge? You did a lot better than what your brother did and got Grady, but that doesn’t help the group. It lets one other person know that there’s a threat, so what if something happened on the other end of town with Elizabeth? There’s no way to tie the two incidents to each other because we didn’t even know what happened with you.”

Elizabeth looked at her hands, which were cupped at the table. She spoke up instead of Filip. “You used me as an example because I’m the next one on your list. I’m there because I hesitated on shooting Gabbie, I know this. I hesitated because I was hearing everything that was happening in Horatio’s head at the time, it was overwhelming me and for a moment, I couldn’t remember who I was because there was so much that was going on.”

Pierre looked at the list, finding Elizabeth was right. “You couldn’t have deduced that you would be next. How did you really know?”

She looked at Whitlock, then at Chelsea and gave a shrug. “I’m in their head; the person who really witnessed all of these events on the cameras today, they’re replaying it all in their head right now and it won’t leave me alone. The gene has been malfunctioning for almost a year now and I know for a fact that I’m not the only one who’s experiencing it, I’m just the one who doesn’t catch a break from it.”

Chelsea stayed silent as the group looked at her to speak up next. She felt the eyes of everyone in the room on her as she let out a sigh. “I’ve been seeing the dead people of our group, Whitlock has been seeing flashes of the future. I see someone maybe once a week, his flashes happen about every other day, and Elizabeth’s thought intrusions just about never end.”

Elizabeth nodded, her vision landing on Pierre. “Don’t confront the last person on your list. He already blames himself and hearing it come from you will make him leave. If you want someone to confess to something then that’s fine, but leave him alone.”

Jean Luc and Noelle had been having their own conversation the entire time, keeping their voices hushed as they shared the notes they had taken. Pierre looked at Jude and let out a sigh, shaking his head. “I won’t but I need all of you still all need to become more honest, come forward when things like this stuff happens.”

Pierre looked over the group, immediately noticing Whitlock seemed petrified as he looked forward, past the entire group. His breathing growing rapid as his gaze remained fixed on something Pierre couldn’t see.

---

Whitlock saw Daniel in a room with an auburn haired man, the both of them watching two toddler girls sitting on the ground who were playing with each other. The two girls both had black hair, one had green eyes and the other had blue.

He knew as soon as he saw the girls that one was his own sister and the other was Cecily.

He couldn’t tell where they were but they seemed comfortable and happy there, which told him that they had been there for a while and likely grew to recognize that place as their home.

Whitlock only had enough time to recognize the girls before he was back in the dining hall, sitting by his mother’s side. He looked up at her, seeing her gaze fixed on Pierre.

He knew Juliet was safe in the moment as she was with his dad, but he knew that Cecily would be easiest to get when she was with Ines because she couldn’t speak.

Whitlock got out of his seat, approaching Ines and Cristiano very cautiously. He felt the room around him slow down as his family’s eyes followed his movements, he knew Horatio and his brothers had already spotted him approaching their parents and were likely watching him as well.

Ines gave a kind smile to Whitlock and a small wave as Cristiano seemed suspicious of him already.

Cristiano didn’t say anything until Whitlock started to look genuinely sad. “What do you want?”

Whitlock turned back to the group to see most of them were now watching him, his father passing Juliet to his mother and getting out of his seat. Horatio and Jean Luc quickly followed suit, the three men approaching Whitlock without a word to say.

Whitlock then turned back to Ines, pointing at Cecily. “She’s next, but so is Juliet. It’s happening sometime soon, I don’t know when and I don’t know how, but it’s going to be Danny.”

Jean Luc looked between Horatio and Marshal, neither of them saying a word. Jean Luc reached out to Ines, taking Cecily from her. “Then we’ll do what we can to avoid it. Camillo offered to take over patrolling when Grady can’t do it, I’ll have him patrolling during the day and Grady at night. I’m not too worried about Juliet because there’s four other people in the house and if something were to happen, Milo is literally right next door. Cecily is a different situation and I’m going to have to work through that part myself. There’s a motive for taking those two and I have a feeling someone here knows what it is, they’re just not saying anything.”

Jean Luc finally handed Cecily over to Horatio, then spun around and went to Pierre to update him on the situation.

Marshal briefly turned to Horatio, taking hold of Whitlock’s hand. “They already know the same thing we do, how secure is your research? Where is it kept?”

He sighed, passing Cecily to Marshal, who had let go of Whitlock’s hand to take her. “Not very, I’m going to go check up on that. Watch after her for me?”

Marshal nodded, taking Cecily and Whitlock back to his family as Horatio left the dining hall.