wickerpark | Come what may....

Come what may....

Hadyn had hardly left his son's side since Oliver had brought him home. He'd not seen the boy's eyes open in the time since, either. Coma, the doctor said, was a mixed blessing- it would allow the boy to heal without him suffering through the worst of the pain. But the longer it went, the doctor also said, the less likely that his eyes would open. Thus far it had been 2 weeks, 2 very long and exhausting weeks. Jordan had of course come, it had been his brother who had first managed to pull him away- partly on Elisha's insistence that he needed to go sleep....that nothing would happen while he slept. Afterward, the brothers had sat and quietly discussed the hunt for the people behind this attack.

Jordan was doing what Hadyn could not, at the moment- hunting down not just those responsible, but everyone who had a hand in this malicious act...and their families. Hell, he thought, would rain down of the Clubs once he found them. Even if Elisha cautioned him, promised he would find the man or woman responsible and deal with it accordingly. Hadyn also suspected that Oliver and Sarah were working to uncover it with Carlos' help as well- given the three of them after seemed to meet up to speak in hushed voices. Gael Shaw, at least, seemed uninvolved and relegated to merely delivering the man food and coffee with a bit of idle conversation to go with it.

Today had been much the same as other days, at least until Oliver showed up and all but pushed Hadyn out of the make shift hospital room to sleep or eat...or do anything that didn't involve staring helplessly at his comatose son and trying to will him to wake. A part of him, even, was a little grateful. He hadn't said as much, but rather put a hand on Ollie's shoulder and nodding slowly before moving out of the room and across the hall to a door that lead out into a small courtyard in the castle. It was there he sat, instead, as the smoke from a cigarette curled up around him...staring at the wall across the way instead of his son.

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For so long, Elisha thought, he'd made sure he'd known everything going around around them, cataloged every threat. For so long that he had been the Deck's spymaster longer now than David had ever been. But apparently, he'd developed a blindspot.

It was Ty who he'd thought would be most likely to take a move towards his position...one day. When it happened, Elisha always had known, Tyler would do nothing less than challenge him right to his face. There'd be no subterfuge, no political games of the sorts he'd played when he was only a few years older than Ty was now.

He hadn't expected that someone else would do it, and that they'd lean on the methods that had taken down Andrew thirty years before. Of course, he hadn't been challenged. Whoever it was - and he had all of the agents in his web seeking that information, and Jordan Novak had all his doing the same - whoever it was had to know that they were on alert now. Whoever it was had forgotten who it was they were dealing with.

He didn't speak only of himself, he thought as he paused by Hadyn in the courtyard. "Someone made you get some air," he said. He suspected he knew who. Carlos was fully occupied with the position he'd had to step into when his best friend had fallen into a coma. Sarah was pursuing leads with a single-minded intensity that reminded him that, as much as she was Hadyn's princess, in some ways she was just like him - like in the way she snapped out of her quiet artistic existence as soon as there was a crisis. That left Oliver, who was hardly slouching when it came to trying to piece together leads, but who was doing it between running his own department and living by Ty's bedside as much as he could. Elisha was fairly sure the boy barely slept.

"An unspoken agreement, I suppose." Hadyn said, turning to look at Elisha for a moment before he sighed and stubbed out the hardly smoked cigarette. "He will wake up, and he will live...." It was the mantra Hadyn had told himself since that day. It kept him from not moving from his bed, and it kept him moving through his day.

But still, his little boy looked so foreign, just lying there on the bed. It were not for the steady rise and fall of his chest, and the warmth in his skin- Tyler would have had the look of the dead. It was not an image he cared to ever see in his son ever again.

"I used to worry that Sarah would be the one we had to be most cautious with. Her adventurous exploration, and wild abandon. She was the eldest twin, and the natural leader of the two when they were small. Ty always followed her, where ever she went. And then one day he had become a man; a strong leader in his own right. I have never told him how proud of him I am, Elisha. How much I love him."

"He will." Elisha believed it, even with the...odds. They hadn't the facilities at their disposal here that he could have commanded if he could have taken Ty to New York or London. The doctor was talented, but his assisting physician was their 22 year old nephew - and Cambridge educated though he was, Bas hadn't finished his own training. Ty had a brain injury and those could be sneaky in the best of conditions.

Still, he had to believe it. Elisha smiled a bit as he rested his hand on Hadyn's shoulder. "Sarah has always had some of our more intense traits," he said. "But Ty's always been ours, too." Which meant he had some of the same. He leaned in and pressed a kiss to Hadyn's temple. "You'll be able to tell him, love. Just know that he loves you too, and he's strong. He'll pull out of this."

"Oh, of that I have never doubted. If nothing else, he is most definitely your son, with your same stubborn bullheadedness." He said, smiling softly as Elisha leaned in and kissed Hadyn's temple. They were not, really, a pair of mean that were prone to acts of overt affection, but Hadyn had never felt any less loved. "Our son has aged me this time, I think." He said, shaking his head a little, as he turned to lean into Elisha as he rested his head against his partner's.

"I will kill them, though." He promised, pulling away from Elisha just a little. "I will rip this infection out, and I will burn it to the ground...." He promised, his brown eyes flashing darkly before he frowned at it. "Jordan has found some leads, and soon enough we should have some names. My love for you? Begs me to tell you. My respect for you suspects that you have your own ideas as well. But swear to me, Elisha....if you will not let me deal with this, those responsible must pay. What they have done...if unforgivable."

"Well, someone had to eventually," Elisha said. He'd always looked - and been - much older, but especially lately the difference between Hadyn and himself seemed vast. His face was increasingly lined, and there was hardly any black left in his hair. The last two weeks in particular...

Well, wasn't just Ty's doctor who was concerned. His own had cautioned him to take care with his heart, and it wasn't meant in the emotional sense.

He glanced down at his hands, at the slight tremor that had been present there as long as Hadyn had been a Club and as long as their twins had lived. He'd expected, when he'd developed that, that would be the impetus for someone trying to wrest power from him. But no. That had been too soon after the events that had brought him to the rank of King in the first place. Now, people had forgotten.

"Whoever did this will die," he said in an even tone that he knew Hadyn would recognize, though it had been years. Victor would know it as well. "And as fond as I am of Jordan, I would prefer that my vengeance not be carried out by the Spades."

"Yes, they could challenge you the way a man should challenge you. Last I checked, that was how the system worked. Tyler could no more stop them than you could. The only thing he could do would be to challenge them in return- if they are worthy, they'd keep their place. If not..." Hadyn said in a grumble before he shrugged.

But Hadyn regarded Elisha quietly for a moment, before looking down at the man's hands as well. They did not discuss the tremor, really. Just as they often did not discuss the heart, or the depression, or the many other things that seemed to plague them more as they grew older. Hadyn, despite the youthfulness in his features, as hardly a spring chicken himself any longer.

"Who said Jordan was going to be the one to do it?" Hadyn asked, raising a brow at Elisha. "Though....perhaps after all of this, you might consider the fact that it is time to step down. Given the.....years you've given the suit." Though what Elisha would do in 'retirement' was a little beyond him.

"We both know that there are always some that would prefer to plot their way to power." Some might say he was one of them, but when push had come to shove, he'd challenged Alexander. "There are few who can defeat Tyler in a fight," he said, though. "Carlos, sometimes. Sarah, maybe." Maybe Oliver, in the right moment. Elisha knew enough of his son's boyfriend to guess that. "But again, it comes down to it being one of those who prefer to use intrigue."

"I've been considering driving you insane in retirement," he said after a moment. But of course, the one he'd step aside for - was unconscious in a hospital bed. He believed Ty would wake and be fine, but if he wasn't? "Then again, maybe it's time you call Catherine's bluff, instead."

"Yes, well. That hardly makes them less or a coward, or an idiot. I could have easily accomplished the same with anyone else and made it appear much less...apparent to my end goal." He said, turning to look at Elisha as he frowned a little more. Intrigue was, he was told, a bit of his bread and butter. Very few others kept up with Hadyn at times, but mostly because he could lean in on his brother and Elisha's people to help when he needed it.

It would...not be the same if he took Jack. But then, he was basically the Jack. Elani hardly had the stomach for the more nitty-gritty things, and after his challenge to the Clubs? Catherine had reluctantly and silently just shifted some things in his direction. She hardly trusted him, and his gentlemanly agreement with Catherine was over two decades old now. "She sees it fit to let me deal with some of the dirtier parts of the job." He pursed his lips, looking back toward the doors leading into the Castle. "If....you don't feel ready to retire, maybe I should. I could no more stand to lose you...to this...insanity than one of my children. Ty, Sarah...Carlos. Heh. If I thought the fool capable of it, I'd blame this all on Felipe Sanchez, but alas- he's too much of a coward and an idiot."

He'd been thinking of retirement. He'd been King a long time and it was, frankly, a position he'd never wanted - just one that was hard to relinquish. He hadn't raised their son with the idea that Ty would replace him, but it was clear by the time the twins were fifteen that that was what he'd wanted. Sarah had been less clear about where she ought to end up in life, really, but Ty? Ty had always been King of Clubs in the making.

One might even say that in the last couple of years, Elisha had been biding his time until he felt Ty was ready to challenge him. The irony was, he felt his son was there - and then this happened, and he couldn't step down, not until he knew more of how Ty would recover.

"You're not going to lose me," he said, though, smiling at Hadyn. "You wouldn't allow it, for one. Neither would Eileen, or Sarah. Or Carlos." Carlos was the only other he'd step aside for, he thought. Though Carlos had never wanted King. Carlos seemed occasionally surprised he was a Nine, still.

"Felipe." He snorted derisively. "No, not likely. He's too scared of you, darling. Seven years later, he still turns pale when he thinks of the night you stalked into his house to fetch Carlos up to the Castle."

Hadyn imagined that Ty didn't know if he was ready or not, hungry for it but cautious at the same time. It was, perhaps, the one trait that neither parent could put a finger on when it came to figuring out 'where' it came from. Though, in a way, Hadyn imagined it was his doing. His behaviors had shaped a lot of things in his life, in the ones he desperately had tried to stop.

"Of course I wouldn't allow it," Hadyn said, slipping an arm around Elisha as he rested his forehead against the side of the other man's head. "But if you desire me as your Jack, my love, I would be that entirely. I am certainly much more of a stable mind than I had been last time I held such a rank." And he'd certainly gotten enough crap over his lack of rank in the years since- Jordan didn't really understand it, for one example. Nor had Zoe, really.

"And I stop see why I can't burn a few families to the ground, my love. It would certainly be a unmistakable warning shot. Then Felipe wouldn't have to be alone in his suffering."

The worst time for them, had been when the twins were young, Elisha thought. When Ty and Sarah had been between nine and eleven and they'd both seen Hadyn do things that he felt probably had driven the people they'd become. Ty had his caution, and Sarah had her determination to not push herself too hard for fear that it would be like when her papa had been manic.

Those times weren't entirely gone, but the medication had stabalized Hadyn enough that Elisha no longer wondered what he might come home to.

"Well, we aren't Spades," Elisha said. "It's not even something David and Athena might have done. Besides, it's more fun to watch them live in terror - which they would," he added. "With you as Jack, me as King, and Eileen still as Ace." He wasn't under any illusions that this would end in something as civilized as imprisonment. If he caught them, he'd see them dead. If Hadyn and Jordan caught them, Hadyn would do the same. If the children caught them? Well, Elisha knew his daughter. Like him, an artist was only one piece of her that she showed the world.

"No, it something my...mother would have done." Hadyn said with a sigh as he pulled away from Elisha and regarded their reflection in the window. Well, they were an interesting picture for the Clubs, weren't they? Sharp and certainly capable of being more than a little brutal when necessary. It was, as well, not all his doing.

"Do you have any idea who it is?" He asked, looking at Elisha. "I promise not to kill the whole family. Just, possible, make it a painful death for the guilty." It was a hard thing to let go of. He needed his aggression be released in some way, and why not on the asshole most deserving of it?

"I'll also be officially making my challenge this week, My King."

Elisha had understood Laureline's methods far too well, because in some ways they had been far too similar. He had not been quite as coldly ruthless as she, though, and neither was Hadyn. They were still sharp and ruthless and had made their Suit any interesting one over the years.

"There are two men who might do this," he said. "Francisco Maradona and Ulrich Ambrose." Both Tens, both not yet thirty - both a bit tricky, really. Francisco worked with him in intelligence, so if it was him, he'd know soon enough. But his money was on Ambrose.

He smiled a bit, though. "Your request to challenge Lady Elani for the position of Jack is accepted," he said with the required formality. He wondered how surprised she'd be over it. More than she should be, certainly.

"Ambrose...." Hadyn repeated, trying to place the man before giving up. He didn't have a reason to know every face, or even every ten. There were just to many, and his job did keep him fairly busy. Still, he'd have to look into the man, as well as Maradona. "Well, either way, they will likely regret doing this."

It would have been better, Hadyn thought, if they'd simply tried to go about it the more direct way. Now all they had done was make it more difficult and inspired Hadyn to move on up. It was the proverbial circling of the wagons.

"Well, then. Now just to tell her....and if she cries, I do apologize. She has long be under the impression that we have been friends since our youth." He said, looking back toward the hallway where he noticed the nurse leaving the room with a smile. Well, that was curious. Though a smile was usually a good sign.

Both men were young, and whichever was the culprit was more foolish than Elisha cared a Ten to be. It was one thing to decide that Elisha being in his sixties now made him someone who could be underestimated. But Hadyn was much younger, and Hadyn had been doing the nasty work of the suit that Elisha couldn't reliably do as he got older. Perhaps that was why he suspected Ambrose over Maradona. Maradona at least would know that.

He sighed a little, though. Elani was...sweet. Eileen was very fond of her, and Elisha liked her well enough, but she'd never been suited as Jack of Clubs. Really, she ought to have stayed at Eight - but his choices at the time, as they often had been, were limited. "Elani is under the impression she's friends with everyone. I think it comforts her to believe the world's a shiny, happy place." Which it was not, he thought, watching the nurse with a narrow eyed expression.

"I feel," he said thoughtfully, "that it might be worth checking on our son."

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