Mike & Karen Ch. 16

"You're thinking that someone might've created it here on campus, and now all we have to do is find proof. So you're narrowing searches to look for the type of file this pic would've been created with and stored as."

"Yep," he agreed, nodding but keeping his eyes on the screen. He'd express his admiration for her quick understanding later. "If I figure out what type of program was used to create it, I can just start looking for all those sorts of files and the dates they were created."

"Annnnd, that's why we aren't using your dad's computer, because you're hacking the university," Alexa said, smirking now. "You're getting right inside their data banks and looking for files stored among zillions of private files we have no business knowing about."

"Only thing I've been deeper in than these computers is you," he quipped cheerfully, pleased with the progress he was making. Alexa blushed and bit her fingernail while she watched her husband sweep away layers of security or simply avoid them by using back doors into programs and secured files. It was astonishing to see how quickly he was burrowing his way into the system. By this point, he could have been doing real damage if he'd been inclined. Thankfully, Alex was just about the most ethical and good-natured person she knew, a trait passed on to him by his titan father.

"Bingo," he said finally, nodding. "I bet this is the program used. Now people haven't known about us for that long, so I just need to gather and check out all the relevant files from the past few weeks ..."

Alexa moved a chair in beside him and began assisting in checking the files, looking for the picture she had brought to him, or others like it. Mere minutes passed before she pointed at the screen, indicating she'd found it.

"Good eyes," he said, smiling evilly. "Now, time to see who this file was created by, and where it leads back to ..."

"Thank God you only use your powers for good, Alex," she breathed quietly. "Because you'd be really frightening if you were petty, vindictive, or a sociopath."

"And there's our perp," he announced, sitting back in his chair and looking at the screen. "Jerry Leech, third year, poli sci department. Well, at least he's not from the Divinities."

"Oh, I think that's the douche that Fre kicked in the brain when she joined the martial arts club," Alexa said, recognizing the name. "He made disparaging remarks about us, and then called her and Jeanie fags, I think."

"No kidding," Alex mused, grinning evilly. "Well, that'll just make this all the sweeter, then."

"So now what?" Alexa asked, making a wry face as she looked at the picture on the screen. There were several others like it, all making disparaging statements about her and Alex. She kept her temper down and let Alex do his thing. "Report him?"

"Too easy," he replied, shaking his head. "You wanted him destroyed, remember?"

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a flash drive, inserting it into a port in the side of the computer. "Now I'm just gonna leave a little tracer in here so that I can get in whenever I like, and from wherever ..."

"Did you just put a Trojan into the university's system?" Alexa asked, somewhat aghast. "Won't it run up against the firewalls?"

"Only kinda sorta," Alex said, shrugging. "It's not malign, it just gives me access to this fucker's entire existence here at the university, and out into any other accounts he's attached to it. See? He's linked a personal Hotmail account to his university profile, probably his personal email. Now I have access to that as well. As for the firewalls, I'm already behind 'em, so no problem."

He turned and smiled at her. "I promise, I'm just using this in order to fuck this guy over, and anyone helping him. It'll have no effect on anything else in the system."

"Like I said, I'm glad you're on our side," she breathed, watching as Alex returned his attention to the screen. Before long, Alex had access to the man's Facebook page, email accounts, and other social media apps. He wasn't doing anything awful just yet, so much as setting himself up to inflict damage when he saw fit.

He did smirk evilly as he tweaked one tiny detail on the Facebook page.

"Oh, Alex, I wanted to destroy him, not condemn him to Hell," Alexa said, wrinkling her nose in distaste. "Did you really have to alter his profile to say he was Nickelback's number one fan?"

"You destroy our enemies your way, I'll destroy them mine," he said cheerfully as he backed out of all the programs, blanked a bunch of caches and then rebooted the computer. "There we go. Now I can keep track of this guy and his cohorts, and they're none the wiser. We can monitor their activities and take them apart however we like, from whatever computer, when we please."

"What'll we do?" she asked as they left the lab, walking down the hall now. "Leave evidence that he's a member of the alt-right? Link his personal uni page to zoophilia sites?"

"I can have him signed up on the deep web as a drug and gun runner if I like," he said, musing. "Maybe I'll link him to incest fetish websites, just for irony's sake."

"You're awful," she giggled, giving his arm a playful swat before looping hers through it and walking along with him quietly. She had confidence everything was now well in hand. They'd see this nonsense ended once and for all. "So now what?"

"Well, in theory I have Old English with Mister Carsdale, but I think he prefers it when I'm not there, since it forces the other students to actually answer questions," Alex said, taking her hand and squeezing it. "So I was thinkin' that if you're up for it, we might dip and go do something."

"Ooh, truant," she giggled. "What then, husband, didst thou in thy mind have?"

"We could let my mom and dad have the house for the night and you and I could go to the Manor," he suggested. "We haven't done that yet, just the two of us."

"Won't we be living there soon enough?" she asked, intrigued.

"Yeah, but I figure being there with you first seems like a good idea," he reasoned. "It's probably gonna be ours one day, way down the road after mom and dad decide to retire to a quiet life. And I want to be there with you, just the two of us, before things get crazy, y'know?"

Alexa smiled prettily. "As long as there's places to sleep, I'm all for playing hooky and then spending the night in a creepy mansion."

"Don't worry, I'll protect you from all the evil spirits," Alex laughed, looking forward to the coming night with his wife.

***

Mike walked slowly behind his lovely wife as they sauntered around the house together. Karen sighed wistfully as she touched things, her piercing golden-amber eyes rather misty: pictures on the walls, an old vase in a nook in the hallway.

"Remember when the Boyds gave us this vase?" she sighed as she picked it up and examined the cheap plaster thing. It was so very out of place with everything else, but she loved it dearly. "Their little girl Amy, God rest her, picked it out for us. She thought we'd like the pastoral scene painted on it."

Mike nodded and put his huge hand on his wife's shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze. Karen smiled and tilted her head into the touch, nuzzling her cheek against it. A tear touched his skin, but he knew she was fine.

"I love it too," he agreed. "We'll need to find a special place for it when we're getting sorted out. A place of honour, really. Maybe paired with that Tang Dynasty horse your father loved so much."

Karen's sniffle was meant to be a small laugh as she turned the little plaster vase over in her hands lovingly. "Remember how bent out of shape he was when you pointed out that most Tang Dynasty ceramics and earthenware were meant to be burial items?"

Mike smiled at the memory. "I never quite figured out if he was unhappy because I knew something he didn't, or because it was such a glaring faux pas on his part. Thankfully, no one else knew or noticed. That, or maybe we can put it in the memories room, next to a picture of Amy. We have a few somewhere."

"Oh, I love that idea," Karen said, hugging the vase to her chest, bowing her head and closing her eyes. "It's a beautiful memory, Michael."

She put the vase down and they went upstairs, just enjoying looking around at the house they would soon be leaving. They stopped in front of a small hatch on the wall, both of them smirking.

"Remember that time your son hid in the dumbwaiter and got locked in?" she asked. "We'd left the house, not knowing he was home and he was crammed in there for three hours?"

"What I remember is him complaining that it was justification for making sure he had a cellphone," Mike chuckled. "I told him that to protect yourself from your own idiot stunts was not a good argument for owning a cellphone. Getting stuck at least twice more just proved my point."

"I have no idea why he was so obsessed with getting stuck in tight, compact places," she sighed, shaking her head as she lifted the small door and looked inside the old Victorian contraption. It had been moved up and down with pulleys back in its day, and that was how Alex had trapped himself. "Maybe that's why he was a week overdue."

"We're lucky he's not passive-aggressively slow about everything, then," Mike mused as they walked down the hallway, looking at the warm colour of the paint and wallpaper on the walls, the Victorian plaster moulds that bordered the ceiling, and the pictures and photographs that hung along its length. Within the next day or so, they'd all be taken down and carefully packed away for moving. Mike had it all down to an art and a science. Karen had every confidence it would all run with the precision of a Swiss watch.

"I'll never get the image of Alli hanging upside down buck naked on this door," Mike muttered as they passed her little sister's room. "Twenty years of history, and that's while I'll remember about this door."

"To be fair, in twenty years, nothing else ever really happened to this door," she said gently, reaching and out and caressing her fingers down the dark, carved wood. "Such a good door, blocking out the sounds our preteen son was making for those first few curious months..."

They approached their bedroom, Mike gesturing for Karen to go in first. She glided in and sighed, looking around the room. It was so beautiful to her. She was going to miss it. The student housing that would follow would certainly take effort to make happen, but she had faith they'd work it out.

The small lamps around the room gave it a soft orange glow, accented by the warm wallpapers they'd chosen. It was a large room, since it had to accommodate Mike, and any bed he fit in, but they'd found ways to make it seem cozy and feel like a den of comforts. Her boudoir area occupied one wall, just off from the en suite bathroom. A desk, complete with the private desktop computer they shared, occupied another, accompanied by personal mementos and heirlooms. The closets took up another area. Their enormous bed occupied the back wall. A huge bay window faced east, to let in the morning sun.

"We're so lucky we have a well-behaved boy," Karen mused as she walked around the room. "Imagine, all the naughty things we've done in here, over the past twenty years. If he'd been the horny, curious type, he could've been spying on us with those hidden cams."

"True enough," Mike agreed, just enjoying watching her saunter around the room. "Wouldn't be so sure about Alli, though ..."

***

Alexa shut the laptop quickly as she sat on the giant chesterfield in the Manor, blushing furiously. Sitting next to her, Alex just chuckled.

***

"Three days left," she whispered as she looked up into his blue eyes, his giant hands holding hers. "Are you sure you can put up with me being emotional and whimsical for the next half week?"

He smiled down at her, nodding. "I live to see it, and would be disappointed if you weren't, Gordon. I know how much this house means to you, how much it meant to us. Our first and only home together, barring housing on the military base, and the only one Alex has ever known."

"Do you think he's upset about moving?" Karen asked, now hugging herself to him, nuzzling into his broad, powerful chest.

"He doesn't seem to be," Mike mused, stroking her bronze hair. "He's probably eager for a change of scenery, not to mention all the opportunities the Manor will offer. He'll have a suite of rooms to mess around in with Alli, get his nerd on, and spread his wings. Just wait until we refurbish that old recording studio out back. We'll need a crowbar to pry him out of it."

"Or Alli to lift her shirt and wiggle her goodies at him," she quipped, smirking up at him now. "Alli offered to cry with me when I was feeling emotional. She's such a good little sister."

"The best, and I've got Ronnie to compare her to, so that's saying something," Mike agreed before cupping her cheek in his mighty hand. She trembled. Thirty years later, his touch still made her weak in the knees. "My father was right, you Gordon-Blackwell girls are the best thing to ever happen to us. And there isn't a day goes by that I don't thank the Almighty for it."

"And I don't care where we are," she said, gazing up into his vibrant blue eyes. "We could squat in a cave, but as long as you're with me, Michael DeBourne, I am the luckiest woman to ever live."

It was not the final kiss they shared before leaving that home, but one of the most passionate.

***

The Bridle Path, Blackwell Manor, some minutes later ...

"Oh don't you dare look back,

Just keep your eyes on me!

I said you're holding back,

She said shut up and dance with me!

This woman is my destiny,

She said oo-oo-oh!

Shut up and dance with me!"

Alexa laughed in delight as she twirled around her husband in the middle of the huge ballroom, the two of them taking up the center of the floor while music from the powerful speakers built into the walls filled the room with music. The couple danced with abandon, knowing they were the only ones around. It still seemed unreal to Alexa that this sprawling Edwardian mansion, a place she felt she knew intimately and yet seemed so unreal to her, would one day be theirs, if they so desired.

"I can't tell you how many times I've dreamed of dancing in this ballroom," she said almost breathlessly as she danced with Alex, her sapphire eyes sparkling. "With my dad, with my mom, with Kar, I just ... and here I am, dancing in this ballroom with the love of my life. Just the two of us. And it's so perfect, Alex."

"I'm getting that impression," Alex replied, grinning, "and I'm actually enjoying dancing in here for a change. I've had to do it growing up, and it was usually pretty tedious."

"Oh, muffin," she cooed, teasing him. "Forced to dance with relatives in a ballroom bigger than most people's houses ..."

"I know, I know," he chuckled, holding her close now as the song ended. Alexa had agreed, that very much was their dance song. It had to be. "Y'think you'd like if we inherited this place and live here?"

"It's a part of who I am, even if I've only ever been here twice," Alexa said, falling into his arms and letting him hug her. "I feel ... like I belong here, that I should have been here, you know?"

"I get it," he said, stroking her long, golden hair. "I'm lookin' forward to this because there's more room to breathe, I guess. I've lived in that one home my entire life, so a change of scenery can't be bad."

"And I moved every few years with mom in Europe, so a little stability is kinda welcome," she replied, taking his hand and leading him over to the large chesterfield, almost falling into it. They stared off at the giant bay windows on the far side of the ballroom, through which the expansive back lot was visible, moonlight glittering on the frozen pond.

"Kar told me that when they held parties here, sometimes she'd get up on the platform at the back there and sing," Alexa murmured, lost in thought. "Or play one of her instruments ... oh, Alex, I remember my mom telling me about my big sissy doing those things and how she held everyone spellbound when she did. I ... d'you think I can do something like that?"

He smiled and squeezed her hand. He'd seen his mother do that exact thing many times over the years in this room, and he loved it. "Absolutely. You're every bit as talented as she is, Alexa, musically and vocally. Different styles, maybe, but this room's been missing your gifts and style its entire existence. Now's the chance to correct that, eh?"

Alexa blinked away the sting of tears. Alex always knew just what to say to melt her heart, and better yet, she knew he meant everything he said. He turned toward her and cupped her cheek gently. Alexa shivered at his touch, hoping that never changed.

"You're in the big leagues now, Alexa, maybe for the first time, I don't know. But it's where you belong, not something you have to aspire and work toward. We all know that already. Knowing my mom, and my grandfather, you must be bursting with talents. We've all seen you, heard you, and need you. This place needs you. Never doubt that."

She threw herself against him, hugging him tight and trying not to cry. Maybe it was the environs, since this was only her second time ever being in the manor, but her emotions were welling up within, and she didn't know how to contain it all.

Not that she needed to anymore.

She pulled back and wiped at her eye, smiling. "C'mon," she said, taking his hand. "We haven't even picked out our suite of rooms yet. Aside from the master suite, Kar says we can pick any one we want. Do you have a preference?"

"Whatever's farthest away from mom and dad's rooms, to be honest ..." he chuckled as he allowed her to bring him to his feet and lead him out of the ballroom.

***

St. George Campus, January 1987 ...

It was a mild night as the pair hustled across King's College Circle and the broad sward of Front Campus, currently sitting under a thin layer of snow. Lisa seemed breathless, but not so much from her exertions as from the activities they were returning from. Her arm was threaded through Karen's while they walked, their breath steaming in front of them.

"Well, that was ... different ..." the redhead said, still not entirely convinced she'd done that. "So that's really a thing now? Like, so close to campus and more or less condoned?"

"There's not really much the university can do about it one way or the other, unless they intend to try and strong-arm the student houses into a code of moral conduct," Karen answered, squeezing her friend's hand. "And given how badly the fraternities and sororities proper can behave, that's rather damned unlikely."

"But that was ... a lesbian party, in what is apparently a lesbian-majority house," Lisa said, still bewildered. Two years here on campus, and she hadn't truly known that such a thing existed. She wouldn't have thought it legal. "And we went to one of their parties. And it didn't get broken up, by campus security, or the police."

"Well, it's off-campus, so nothing the campus cops can do about it," Karen said, shrugging. "As for the police, even six some years after Operation Soap, they're still wary about making raids like that. That whole fiasco really turned the public against them, and especially the gay community."

Lisa nodded grimly, remembering the incident. She'd only been thirteen at the time, but it had been a big deal right across the country -- in 1981, the Toronto police had carried out punitive raids against several gay bathhouses downtown, arresting dozens of people. Not only were they put up on archaic immorality charges, but the incident 'outed' many prominent men who had not been publicly known to be gay. Suicides followed, even if jail time didn't.