Quaranteam - Book Two (Ch. 11)

Virginia smiled softly, nodding. "That certainly sounds like my son. Well, let's get to know one another then as best we can in our short time together, shall we?"

For the next few hours, Andy's mom grilled all the girls, sometimes one at a time, sometimes in pairs or even as a whole, and while they tried to get to ask some questions about Andy growing up, or about Virginia herself, Andy's mom, much like her son, had an uncanny ability to deflect questions around herself and back towards the people asking.

There was even a point in the conversation where Virginia asked about if Ash had felt bad, considering she'd shown up first and yet Andy seemed insistent on keeping all his fiancées on even ground, to which Ash said she'd always thought Andy seemed larger than life, and having extra sets of hands around to keep him from getting idle was for the best. But Ash also pointed out that even in the house, she was sort of First Among Equals, although she rarely went out of her way to use that power. And the fact that all the other women laughed implied tacit agreement on their parts.

Andy excused himself from the conversation for a while to check in on Conner and Samantha. It was true, Sam had been assigned a new partner, a man named Steve who had politely asked not to intrude on the family moment, something Andy found himself a little thankful for, as it let Conner sort of come out of his shell more.

It turned out part of the reason Conner had been so shy was because he'd recognized Emily from the Dagger Academy movies, and while he knew she was an actress playing that part, he also knew that meeting her was a little bit special, and he'd been at a loss for words. Andy hadn't realized that Conner was a fan of the books, otherwise he might have seen that coming, especially since he found out that Matty had read Conner the Dagger Academy books before bedtime for the last few years, which meant his brother's ghost was all over the boy's feelings.

Andy did his best to try and keep Conner's spirits up, and told him that any time he wanted to, he could always reach out to Andy, and that Andy would do his best to help Conner feel connected to his late father. "I miss him too, buddy," Andy said, giving Conner a hug as the boy cried for a little bit. "Each and every single day."

When Andy, Conner and Samantha came back to the living room, he found that his mother had, as he expected, busted out the photo album, and was showing off pictures of Andy as a child, usually in the most embarrassing attire or poses she could. They'd already taken a quick tour of the house, but the room that had been Andy's growing up had been converted into a guest bedroom and there were very few signs of him from his youth, which was why she'd reverted to the photo album.

Because he knew it would make his day, Andy situated Conner in a photo with Emily, Sarah and Piper, the three women surrounding him, each of them with an arm around him, as Conner had the biggest smile possible on his face when Andy snapped the picture. Conner shyly asked if he could get one of just him and Emily together, and Em had happily obliged, all of which brightened Conner's mood considerably. Andy was sure that his nephew would be showing that photo to all of his friends for months to come, telling them how his uncle was marrying Dahlia Hairtrigger (or the actress who'd played her, anyway).

"We've got to get going, Mom, but I hope you'll come out to California a few days early for the wedding," Andy told her. "If you can't, I understand, but it would be nice to give you a bit of uninterrupted time seeing the new place and getting to know all my partners as much as you wanted to. Like I said, if you can."

Virginia nodded, a bittersweet smile on her lips. "I'll make the time, honey. Niko, I hope you, Lexi and Melody will do whatever you can to keep him alive, okay? Losing Matty... it nearly broke me. I don't know what I'd do if I lost Andrew as well."

Niko smiled a little bit sadly herself, moving to give Virginia a big hug. "Well, we're going to do everything we can to keep him safe, especially since he's going to be a father next year." His mom gasped a little at that, as Andy smiled. He was fine with them telling his mother whenever they wanted to, and while they were still in the early days where risk was high, they'd clearly wanted to reinforce her spirits a bit. "It's still early and we're not really telling anyone yet, but both Ash and I are pregnant, so you're going to be Grandma to a lot more kids in the next few years, so you hang on as well, okay? We think we're due sometime early June, but we'll know more for sure next year."

Andy's mom started to tear up, motioning for Ash and Andy to join her, as the four of them had a big hug, Virginia moving to kiss Andy's cheek. "You're going to be a good father, Andy," she told him. "I've always said that. I'm glad you'll have a chance to prove me right. Your late father, God bless his soul, thought so, too, and he'd have been proud of all you've done this year."

Everyone was a little teary-eyed as they climbed back into the SUVs and headed back towards downtown, driving the seven or so miles to get to the Ohio Book Store. A four-story building that had been in use since 1961, the Ohio Book Store was something of a Cincinnati institution, one that Andy had spent countless hours in his youth walking the various stacks, in search for the next great story that would lead him down a rabbit hole in the way only truly fantastic fiction could.

What nobody in Andy's crew had expected was the sizable number of protesters outside of the building, somewhere between forty and eighty people. The protesters were divided into two camps, one who seemed to be "anti-new government" and one side that seemed to be just generally "anti-men." The signs each side carried made it pretty clear who was on which side.

'Why did you live and my husband die?'

'The matriarchy oppresses us!'

'Not my government!'

'DuoHalo is hoax!'

And on the other side...

'Men deserved to die!'

'God hates men!'

'Burn in hell, sinner!'

'Men, stay at home and let women handle things!'

It was enough to make Andy more than a little bit nervous, especially since the two sides, which had been yelling at each other long before Andy showed up, turned all their attention to him when he did, as if both sides hated the other, but they hated Andy more.

Lexi had been in contact with the members of the local police who'd been stationed outside to keep the peace, and so she knew what they were rolling into. There were a few officers stationed inside the bookstore as well. They made it a point to bring Andy in through a back entrance, but once he was inside and they started letting people who'd shown up for the signing (and had passed through a metal detector/quick search) into the building, and that was when tempers flared up out front.

Andy did his best to get through the reading portion of the signing even while there was conflicting chanting outside. He was aided by the fact that the bookstore had set up a microphone and speaker to amplify his voice a bit indoors. And he was pleased to see that the fans he had who'd come out for his book were all eager to hear a bit from the next one.

After that, he'd agreed to do a short bit of Q&A, against the advice of Lexi and Niko, because it had been tradition. He'd made it through four questions before the audience had asked anything about something other than what was in his books. The fifth question was from a young man in his early thirties who looked exactly like Andy envisioned a lot of his readers looked like - a bit overweight, a bit shy but well-educated if a touch socially stunted. "Mr. Conrad," the young man said, "what are your thoughts about the Male Protection Act it sounds like Congress is trying to push through into law?"

Andy sighed, closing his iPad cover over the tablet. "I don't want to get into a deep dive about politics, especially on such a complex issue, but I also feel like you've asked a genuine question and it deserves a genuine answer. In principle, I understand the desire and design to try and keep men safe, especially since there are so few of us left in the world right now, but I also think it's very dangerous for anyone to start dictating how people are allowed to live their lives. Maybe there are some things we men are used to that we should put on hold for a while - smoking, extreme sports, extraplanetary travel - but I also don't want them to think they can tell me I need to never leave my house again until I've fathered a few dozen children, because I've still got to live my life, you know? Human nature is often to overreact when course correcting, but we've still got plenty of time to make sure we can achieve their stated goal of protecting men without telling those men they aren't allowed to enjoy a whiskey sour and a good bacon cheeseburger every now and then."

The answer seemed to go over better than Andy had expected it to, with strong applause from both the few men and the many women in attendance for the signing. After that question, though, Andy was pretty sure it was going to devolve into more things along that way, so he told the audience it was time to get signing, as he cut the Q&A portion off.

The autograph line was long, and Andy did his best to keep it moving along, although, as expected, a number of people Andy had gone to grade school and/or high school had shown up, and many of them wanted to chat for at least a minute or two, which slowed the line down considerably. Andy could've brushed them along, but never wanted to come across as rude, and so did his best to straddle the line between friendly and professional and was willing to give everyone a few minutes of time before pointing out the line behind them.

Two thirds of the way through the line, though, came a rather drastic surprise, as a woman about Andy's age strolled up with a copy of his first book, a giant smile on her face, her top featuring as daringly plunging a neckline as she could get away with without being booked for indecent exposure. "Hey there stranger," she said as she walked up for her turn at signing.

"Marie?" Andy laughed. "Holy shit, I haven't seen you since college. How've you been?"

Marie Anderson had been the girl Andy had been dating right before Fiona, and it was him and Marie's breakup that had led to Andy and Fi exploring their feelings for each other in college. She looked good for her age, certainly very busty, and dressed like she was auditioning for a Bon Jovi video in the 1980s, with leather pants, her blonde hair hairsprayed up into a lion's mane. "Hey Andy," she purred at him. "How've you been? Miss me?"

Andy felt Fiona's hand squeezing his left leg beneath the table and he smiled a little bit, knowing this wasn't going to go at all how Marie had envisioned it to. "Haven't really thought about you much, Marie," Andy told her. "Not with how we left it at the time."

"Oh, come on, Andy," Marie said, trying to give him a gaze down her top. "We were just kids back then, and neither of us really knew what we were doing. But you've grown up into a hell of a man, one hell of a man, and it just so happens my husband died in August. I'm not paired up with anyone, so I was think—"

Fiona took that as her cue to jump in, cutting the woman off suddenly. "You were thinking you could go back to the guy you dated in college until you two split up because you were constantly making fun of his lack of sexual experience?" Fi said, not raising her voice at all. Fi was a professional at being cutting without being loud, a highly refined skill from her journalist days. "Why on earth would you think that, Marie? Because you saw him on television, saw he'd made a little money and you're still playing receptionist at your daddy's feed business?"

"I think Andy's capable of deciding these things for himself, don't you, Fiona?" Marie practically growled.

"He is," Andy said, shaking his head. "And his family is more than completely full, Marie. And even if it wasn't full up, when we split up, or, to be more accurate, when you dumped me, you made it clear that you didn't ever look back with regrets, so I couldn't bear it if I was the one responsible for you breaking your oath to yourself." He signed the book 'Good luck with the new direction, Blake Conrad,' then slid it back across the table to her. "I'm sure you'll find someone else sooner or later."

Marie picked up the copy of the book with a deeply offended look on her face before stomping away, moving to head out of the front door of the bookstore, as Andy felt Ash's hand on the back of his shoulder, reassuringly, as Fi merely quietly laughed. "I am so much better than that girl could ever dream of being," Fi said. "Aren't I?"

"Was the engagement ring not enough, Fi?" Andy teased.

"A girl likes to be reminded every now and then."

"Yes, Fi, I was always happier with you than I was with Marie. Then and now. With her, back when she and I were dating in college, it felt like I was trapped in the same argument for a decision I made years and years ago that never got let go of, and no matter how many times she claimed to forgive me, it always came back to 'You went to Todd and Jenny's party without me, even though I told you to go, because I wanted you to decide not to go without me on your own' since she was explicitly not invited to the party. Her and Todd had been arguing about something, and somehow, I got caught in the middle of it. No matter what I said, whenever I disagreed with her on something, it always came back to that, or back to her usual defense mechanism of complaining that I'm always telling her she's wrong. Seriously, there's only so much drama a guy needs in his daily life."

"And we comprise the entirety of that, Sarah and I," Em said, reaching over to rub her smooth fingertips against the back of his neck. "But I think we offer equal recompense."

"Oh, you most certainly do," Andy chuckled.

That was the moment when everything changed in Andy's life.

The moment he heard a gunshot outside of the building, and everything went mad.

Niko pulled him down to the ground as Alexis and Melody closed ranks around him, forming a triangular human shield around him, pinning him in a small ball before they started to pull Andy to his feet and evac him out the back way that they'd come in, Lexi taking point, Melody watching the rear and Niko practically glued to Andy. The rest of Andy's team were pulled in close, somewhere between Lexi and Niko or Melody and Niko, but it was clear everyone was basically bundled around Andy as the primary point of protection as they all began moving quickly and efficiently towards the back door.

Within moments, all ten of them were inside of the two SUVs, Lexi, Niko, Andy, Ash and Em in the front car with Melody, Sarah, Piper, Fiona and Moira in the rear car. The two vehicles pulled out hard and fast from behind the bookstore just in time to see tear gas cannisters being launched into the protesters out front. Niko was on her phone immediately, trying to get answers. "What the hell happened out there?" she said, talking to someone with the local police or someone in the Air Force reserves who'd also been covertly keeping tabs on the gathered crowd outside. "Right. Okay. Just the one then? Any idea what started it? It related to us or just people being stupid? Sure, I get that. Alright, keep me posted. No, I don't care how unreliable the early information you're getting is - I want it as soon as you fucking have it. Am I making myself clear, or do I need to head down there and put a boot up your ass personally? Sorry. No, I get you're just trying to do your job. You're right, it was uncalled for. I'm still just amped up in combat mode with the adrenaline spike. I apologize. I just... let me know when you know more, yeah? Thanks."

"The fuck happened out there?" Lexi asked.

Ash was practically shivering, clinging to him, and Emily had reached back one of her hands, which Andy was holding, and he could feel her trembling a bit as well. While everyone else felt on edge and wound up, Andy felt the complete opposite, almost cold and dead inside, and he started to wonder if maybe he was in shock at what had just happened.

"Someone in the crowd shot someone else in the crowd," Niko said. "They were only screening for weapons for people going into the building, not standing outside. I told them they should've had the two factions further apart, but Cincinnati PD assured us they had everything under control."

"That was very much not under fucking control!" Lexi shouted before catching herself. "Sorry. Sorry, Niko. You know I'm not mad at you. You handled this like a pro."

"Hell of a fucking test run to see if the three of us can handle something like this, huh?" Niko said, trying to force a laugh that everyone inside the SUV could tell was unnatural.

"You holding it together, Andy?" Lexi asked.

"I'm kind of numb, Lexi, if I'm honest."

"You checked him for wounds when we got him into the SUV, right, Niko?"

"Complete sweep. Not a scratch on him," Niko said. "Always secure and verify the health of the asset first thing."

"You're probably just a bit shellshocked for the moment, Andy," Lexi said. "It's not uncommon for someone to be that way their first time in a firefight. We're going to double back to the hotel for a bit, you all are going to hang out in the lobby while I go and do a quick security sweep of the jet before you all join us, and then we can get the hell out of this town."

"I'm going to call Mama Rook and let her know that we're all fine," Ash said. "It okay if she meets us at the hotel?"

"That's a good idea, Ash. Have her head over, and you all can spend a bit more time talking with her while I'm doing a sweep of the airport," Lexi said. "It'll give you all a chance to cool down, take a moment, clear your heads a bit and start to feel normal."

"I don't know that I'm ever going to feel normal again," Andy said.