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Thaddeus Duke · **01-03-2017, 01:27 PM**

Friday, December 16, 2016 | 9:57 AM Local Time | The Illuminatus Compound | Old Saybrook, Connecticut

The Prince has been trembling since his discovery in Asmodeus laboratory. He’s equally curious, frightened, confused. He was resurrected? What the hell does that mean? To most people, when you talk of resurrection, they immediately think of the story of Jesus Christ. To Thaddeus, who has been raised to ignore such idiocy, it is 1000 times confusing. It places doubt within him. If he could be resurrected, then certainly Jesus could have been. But then, maybe Asmodeus just had a lapse, and chose the word poorly. Maybe, in Thaddeus’ mind, when Asmodeus wrote of the resurrection, he meant waking the Prince from his coma.

Whatever the case, Prince Thaddeus is hellbent on finding answers. Asmodeus has been dead nearly a year so there was no retrieving information from him. That only leaves his father. Prying information from the King that he doesn’t want known, can be impossible. For everything Sebastian Duke is, he’s also stubborn as a mule. And that knife cuts both ways. His stubbornness has proved to be a cause of victory, but also defeat. He’s not easily coaxed, but if anyone or anything can, its the Prince and the King’s desire to better the relationship between the two.

Thaddeus has attempted to reach his father, however a malfunction within the Compound’s complex phone system has stymied that effort. He sits in his fathers office, anxiously spinning the chair back and forth, not really saying much.

”What are you going to tell him?” James asks, for likely the first time, seeing his friend in a light he’d never seen before. Sure, he’s the Prince. His family is well to do. He can have pretty much anything he wants. But still, the human element remains. The boy has feelings. The boy has hopes and dreams like any 17 year old kid.

”I don’t really know,” Thaddeus replies, several seconds after the question was asked.

Suddenly the phone on the desk rings and Thaddeus nearly jumps out of his skin. He quickly presses the speaker button.

”Yes?”

”My Prince, please hold for King Sebastian.”

Thaddeus sighs deeply as he looks at Jim. Jim takes a seat in front of the desk, anticipated an awkward conversation.

”Thaddeus?”

”Dad, I have some questions.”

”Am I on speaker? Take me off speaker.”

”You’re not on speaker. There’s a problem with the phone system.”

”Right.

“What’s up? Have you met with the Catholic yet?”

”No, no.

“Soon though.”

”Alright well what’s on your mind kid?”

”Dad I was down in grandfathers laboratory and was looking at things. Something interesting caught my attention.”

”You shouldn’t have gone down there. How did you even get in?”

”Matty told me the bypass code.”

”He shouldn’t have done that.”

”Never mind that. Something was odd, Dad and I kinda need some answers.”

Silence.

”I found grandfathers white board. He predicted every move we’d make. He predicted the moves others would make. I mean, seriously. He predicted the French would allow us flight over their nation. He predicted the German response to our occupation. The attempted assassination of us that took Jacob...”

The King can be heard clearing his throat. He still misses his friend.

”He predicted the war with Poland, their defeat. He predicted the very day we took the Vatican.”

”Your grandfather was a brilliant man. I’d stop just short of calling him a genius. He had the uncanny ability to envision things and see how they’d turn out. How do you think those wars went so smoothly?

“Thaddeus, you ran the operations, but make no mistake kid, your grandfather was the brains behind everything.”

”There’s something else.”

”What is it?”

”Late January, early February Twenty Fifteen. Sebastian demands that I resurrect Thaddeus.”

Silence from the King.

”Well?”

”Thaddeus, I wouldn’t worry about that. It doesn’t make any difference now. You’re here, you’re with me, you’re the heir to the Illuminatus throne. Beyond that, nothing matters.”

”What matters is you told me I was in a coma.”

James fidgets nervously, listening to the two go back and forth.

”Was I really in a coma?”

”Thaddeus, why does it matter? You’re my son and I love you, what else do you really need?”

”Are you serious about improving our relationship?”

Sebastian scoffs. One could envision him rolling his eyes. ”Of course I do.”

”Honesty would go a long way.”

”Alright, alright! Shut up for a minute and just hear me.

“That time you always refer to as your dream. You call it that because it feels like you’re outside of your body watching you rather than actually being you. Or however you usually explain it. When you went after the tyrant, Thaddeus, and I followed after you...”

”King George.”

”Right.

“Well, when he shot you and you say things went dark for what you call an eternity, you were not in a coma.”

Thaddeus expected that, but James sure didn’t. His eyes grow wide.

”The fact is you died in my arms. It was literally the single worst moment of my entire life. When you passed, I was filled with uncontrollable rage. Psychotic, to be precise. I slowly dismembered King George. When I came back through the wormhole I brought two things with me. One was my dead son…”

Sebastian chokes up a little. Recounting a difficult time can be very traumatic.

”What was the other?” Thaddeus asks. He’s much quieter now. More reserved and withdrawn.

”George’s head.”

Silence.

All three men sit in silence, not uttering a single sound until the King chooses to continue his story.

”After we put you to rest I broke. I spent a lot of time in the basement. I took King George’s head and I removed the skin. I’m not proud of this, but I used George’s face as a mask. I went into town, determined to take from others what was taken from me.”

”The news clippings in the folder down in grandfathers lab?” he forms the statement in question form, but really, he’s drawing a conclusion.

Sebastian doesn’t immediately respond. ”Yeah.

“It’s not something I like to talk about. Those people did nothing to me. In fact a lot of them were XWF fans and saw me on TV.”

”How are you not in prison? Or on death row for that matter?”

”I have a lot of friends. One in particular is now dead and I owe him my life. Without going into much detail since I don’t really know them all, Jake made it happen. He coerced the judge into replacing the real search warrant with one that was faked and missing the judges signature meaning all the evidence they had against me was invalid.”

”None of this explains the resurrection.”

”I know, I know. I’m getting there.

“I saw your grandfather resurrect things, usually animals, from the time I was very young. Much younger than you. So, I pleaded with him to try to resurrect you. He resisted, knowing that nothing was a guarantee. Your grandfather worried about brain defects because he’s witnessed it in many of his test subjects.

“Luckily in your case, that didn’t happen.

“Your demise was the worst day of my life. Your resurrection is undeniably the best, even better than the day you were born.”

”I was legitimately dead,” Thaddeus says as more of an observation or a revelation rather than a question.

Sebastian says nothing immediately. With the camera panning over to James, the mans mouth is figuratively on the floor.

”It’s a shock, I know. I’m sorry that I didn’t tell you sooner, Thaddeus. I just wanted to protect you. Learning something like that can hurt a mans mental status. And there’s something you need to realize, kid. I’m not a veteran father. I went from raising an infant with your mother there at the Compound, to mourning your death, to raising a teenager.

“All those things parents learn and experience while raising their young, I didn’t get. Parents find a lot of joy in first steps and first words, and first days of school, and watching their kin grow to be great people. I was deprived of that, and so were you, over my own foolish mistake.

“I know I’m not a great father to you, but I am trying. You resist me at every turn, Thaddeus and I can’t say I blame you. You’re smart. Very. Way too smart for someone that has been through your very short journey. I could tell you knew something was off. I just hope you can appreciate how difficult it is for me to talk about.

“You need to know that I am so far beyond proud of you that I can not put it into words. You are a good man. One day you’ll be a great man. Where my followers feared me, they love you and respect you. You do great things for desperate communities. With the wrestling, you’ve managed that one loss, but have pretty much set down everyone they’ve put in front of you. And you handled that loss with dignity and class. Which is more than we can say for a lot of people that walk through those doors.

“Again, Thaddeus, I am so proud that you’re my son.

“I promise to do better by you. From now on, whatever you want to talk about, we’ll talk.”

This is quite literally the first time Thaddeus has ever witnessed his father being open and honest. It’s also the first time he’s heard his father say anything with his heart on a sleeve.

”Dad I gotta go. Thank you for your honesty,” Thaddeus ends the call and leans back in the chair with his hands clasped on top of his head.

”That’s… Wow…

“I don’t know what to say.”

”What can you say?”

”You could say you defeated death.”

Thaddeus cracks a smile, ”that’s one way to look at it.”

”So I have a question.

“What exactly do you plan to do about your Dad?”

”Meaning?”

”He says he’s intent on doing better by you. You’ve been hard on him. Excruciatingly hard on him at times, I mean, I’ve seen it myself. And I’ve cringed.

“You gonna give the man a chance to actually do right or are you going to keep needling him?”

”You know what I expected from him today? I expected, ‘Thaddeus I’m sorry but I don’t have time today. We’ll talk about it, I promise.’ But then the time never comes and he breaks his promise.

“He has blessed me with a professional wrestling pedigree and one day the throne of Saint Peter. He’s also cursed me with a lack of patience.”

”That doesn’t really answer my question.”

”He says he loves me all the time, but its just words.

“Today he showed me. I’m going to back off of him. Let him breathe. I’ll stay away from Vatican City for now. Maybe I’ll stay here. Maybe I’ll buy a penthouse in New York. Maybe a ranch down south. I don’t know.”

”You’re good.”

”I know but what are you referring to?”

You don’t realize just how much like him you are.”

Thaddeus drops his hands to the arm rests and looks over at his friend.

”I ask you a simple question, and you beat around the bush so much that I’ve nearly forgotten my original question.

“Thad. Your relationship with your father. It’s an uneasy one at best. Tell me what you’re going to do about it.”

Thaddeus can’t help but smile. ”If he wants an easy relationship, I’ll make it easy. Of course, it’ll be up to him.”

”So now what?”

”Business as usual.”

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