The Heritage of Sephtis: The Returning

17: Amber Alert

Marshal walked into his office with a cup of coffee, his third that morning. It had been a long night. He looked down at his desk. The stack had shrunk at least, well that at least the stack of the unexamined files had shrunk. The desk was still covered and surrounded with files, boxes of files, and more files. All these early morning and late night overtime hours were killing him. Especially since they weren’t actually counting for overtime. There was no way he was getting paid extra to look at files of teenage boys in the middle of the night. Marshal sighed and plopped into his chair. He hadn’t even thought about the plates Finn had run earlier. Marshal grabbed a file, opened it and slid it over to another stack. Last night had been a late night because of the files, sure, but he had also been concerned about Finn. So concerned that he could hardly sleep, and had tried calling Finn several times, but he never picked up. He picked up another file, opened it, and slide it over. It wasn’t uncommon for Finn to not answer, and it was probably 2 or 3 am when he called. But still! He hadn’t answered a single call, or called him back, or texted him. Nothing. And he had disappeared. AND he had only called him once in the past 24 hours. Sure one wasn’t uncommon by itself but all of it at once? He grabbed the next file and opened it. He slammed down his coffee.

    “My God…” Marshal whispered. “He’s really done it. He’s gone off the deep end again.” Right in the corner was a picture of Jack. Finn had kidnapped the boy.

    Jaden stood in front of the car, with the hood up, examining the engine. Of course, he didn’t know what he was looking at, but Finn sure did  know what to hit to make the car start smoking. Finn had assured him that the car wasn’t too damaged, and it wouldn’t explode, but you never really knew with Finn. Jack was sitting in the car, with the door open, and a blade of grass in between his fingers. He was doing as all good children do when left with nothing to do outside, he was shredding grass. Finn, on the other hand, was still allowed on his phone because he said so, so he was busying himself with something while leaning against the car. The plan had already been discussed, and the story had been straightened out amongst the three. All that they needed was for some good samaritans to pass by “so they could prey on their charity” as Finn put it. It had only been about half an hour, maybe less, since the wreck had happened. The was that someone would pass through looking for a way around the wreck. And just as luck would have it, a car approached them. Jack looked up, as they rolled down their window.

    “Are you guys ok? Do you need some help?” The driver asked looking at the billowing smoke.

    “Ah, I’m afraid there’s not a whole lot you can do for us. We were just trying to get around the wreck, and the car started smoking. I think it’s ok, but it’s not going anywhere, unless you’re a mechanic.” Jaden said, lowering the hood.

    “Ah no sorry. Have you called a tow service?”

    “No signal.” Finn waved his phone.

    “Ah, sorry to hear that, we can call you a tow-” The man was interrupted as a woman leaned towards the window from the passenger seat.

    “Ah, Bert, why don’t we give ‘em ride instead?”

    “Ah, ok…” The man looked uncomfortable, but obliged. Finn, not wanting to lose the hunt, quickly walked over to the car, and opened the door. Jaden followed suit and quickly slide in. Jack got into the car, and squeezed awkwardly into the middle, with Finn sliding happily in beside him. “So where were you going?”

    “New York, but you can drop us off in the nearest town and we’ll get a rental.” Finn looked down at his phone, they were still making good time.

Marshal had completely and utterly lost it. He was on the phone trying to call in a favor. Usually he would wait patiently and let bureaucracy take its course, as that’s how things worked legally. However, he didn’t really have time for that. It’s not that he didn’t fill out the form or have the information needed, he had all of it. Once he had decided beyond a doubt that Finn had abducted the boy, he had started running around like a mad man collecting information. He had, of course, started by just trying to track down Finn. He had questioned his neighbors and frequent restaurants. However, he had quickly gotten more interesting information. A flashy red car had been seen recently in those places, he’d even remembered seeing the car himself, but even better, he got a license plate number, or at least most of one. He had immediately went back to the station and ran the plate information he had and checked it against the description of the car. And wouldn’t you know it? He was on the run and had dumped the car after driving around a toll booth. Only Finn would do that. It was beyond enough information to confirm to himself that a kidnapping had happened, and enough for an amber alert. He had already filled out and submitted a form, but he couldn’t wait the amount of time it took to get this cleared through normally. He needed that amber alert out now on as much media as he could. Phones, radios, tvs, everything. It would of course take more than a form. Which was why he was calling in a favor. If he could get it out quick enough, maybe whoever was helping him get away would see it and realize at once, or maybe someone wherever they were hiding out would recognize them. He should have never let it go without pushing Finn for more answers.

Finn’s phone started buzzing. He looked down. An amber alert...with his description? What was Marshal doing? Finn slammed his phone down, and the woman’s phone went off in the front, with the usual loud beeping of the notification. He was going to kill Marshal.