Las Vegas is a mistake.
When Spanish missionaries originally stopped at this lonely watering hole three hundred years ago, they had no idea what a mess they were starting. For most of its existence, Las Vegas was little more than a wide space in the road, a place for people to refresh themselves while travelling from Los Angeles to points north or east. It was - and still is - in the middle of a very forbidding desert and there is very little naturally available water.
In the 1930s, the construction of Hoover Dam and the creation of Lake Mead behind it created a source for water that was close at hand. Unfortunately, the demands of farmers in California ensured that most of the water was not accessible to the nearby Las Vegans. Tantalizingly close, yet impossible to obtain. Drought conditions only exacerbated the pressures on this already-taxed water source. Every last drop was spoken for, and no one was particularly interested in giving up their water.
Because in the desert, water is life.
In the 1950s, Las Vegas began to take off. Its proximity to Los Angeles and its relatively easy laws governing gambling and prostitution made it the getaway of choice for those who could. Casinos were constructed, vast halls of decadence and depravity, and the place became the resort of the rich and famous. Entertainers were brought in, particularly Frank Sinatra and the Rat Pack, and Las Vegas became associated with glitz and glamor.
The reality was different. Throughout the 60s and 70s, the major casinos became dilapidated, while seedy, smaller casinos sprang up, often in roadside strings of joined spaces - later these would be known as strip malls. These smaller establishments attracted a very different kind of patron, and crime, always existent in Las Vegas, became rampant. People hard on their luck would resort to holding up others, feeling that these folks had money to waste to the one-armed bandit.
In the 80s and 90s, Las Vegas began to retool. Looking to appeal to a much larger group of patrons, casino owners began to install and implement family-oriented themes. Castles appeared, pyramids arose from the desert floor, and casinos evoking far-away places like Paris, Venice, and New York were built. And the place began to change. Rather than the seedy underpinnings being exposed, a new layer of Disneyland-like attractions brought people to the Strip. And with the people came the money, the urban sprawl, the overtaxing of the water system that was never designed to handle the population influx.
Unfortunately, there was no addressing the crime that continued to plague the city and its surrounding areas. With the end of the housing bubble in 2008, many people found themselves in desperate circumstances. Desperate times called for desperate measures performed by desperate men.
Six of these men were waiting in the parking garage of the airport. One of them knew a guy who let them in the parking structure each night, where they would accost one or two couples - they always went for couples, knowing that men may try to fight if it's just them, but will be more docile if they feel they're protecting their wife. They were not violent, and none of them carried guns, although a couple of them carried knives. They had never had to resort to anything physical - their numbers and sizes ensured that most people just handed over the cash they had on hand - and were really not anxious to try. Their loosely formed group had no real leader, but the biggest among them, a man named Frank, usually did the talking.
They had seen the black, shiny Tahoe enter the garage. They were not able to see the driver as the vehicle approached - the tinted windows and the dark night made that impossible. They did observe him, however, as he parked and made his way into the concourse. Between the vehicle and the clothing, they knew this guy meant money. The six desperate men took their accustomed positions. Frank remained conspicuously visible as they waited.
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Janice hated airports. Vegas was no exception. The smell of sweat and nervousness and coffee and cigarette smoke (no smoking was allowed in the concourse, but the place still smelled of it even after years of the ban and numerous renovations). She shifted the bag over her shoulder, grateful she hadn't checked any baggage, and made her way to the exit.
Who would be there to pick her up, she wondered. Her mind reviewed the faces of the members of the team that she could recall. It had been twelve years since she'd had any contact with any of them... Twelve years of peace and joy - twelve years to forget the past. Now she felt as though she'd been plunged into an icy cold pond of remembrance. Fortunately, as with all things icy and cold, it brought sharp focus to her thoughts. Her past life, suppressed for so long, was beginning to surface. She was remembering lessons taught in her youth, lessons that were in reality little more than training.
She had been taught since she was very young that she was special. Because she was special, she needed to learn to protect herself against what the world might try to do to her. She needed tools and skills that would enable her to remain unsullied by the unworthy hands of craven men with evil intent. Thus she would retain her purity, her integrity, her unique and special quality.
She applied herself with vigor to these lessons. The most important and valuable lessons she learned were not in hand to hand combat, but in recognizing danger signs and avoiding areas of potential threat or hazard. She learned to look into a person's eyes and determine their intent. Most people walk around with blank looks - those she learned to ignore. She also noted that some looked with interest and pleasure, while others looked with malice and fear and hate. These last were by far the most rare, but they were also the ones that she had been trained to seek out. She observed all, but looked for the hard eyes.
She was surprised how quickly it all came back to her. She walked through the concourse observing these people as they interacted. Couples walked together, some very close and obviously in love, others apart. Some people walked alone, heads buried in books or magazines or newspapers or cell phones or their own thoughts. Some looked bemused, tired, and lost. Some caught her eye, and some men even seemed to enjoy her look. But a look was all it ever was. She averted her eyes, constantly scanning, noticing even the children at play or jogging to keep up with rapidly striding adults or sleeping in their parent's arms.
That made her think of Ellen. Ellen was her joy, the one thing in life that brought her peace and hope when all other sources failed. Michael was a good man and she loved him with all of her heart. But Ellen was special, special in a way that Janice connected with. Special because of her heritage, a heritage Janice had understood since she was small as well. While not striving to indoctrinate Ellen in the same way she had been, Janice still tried to instill in her the sense of pride that comes from knowing who you are and what you have been born to do. They connected in mystical ways that only a mother and a daughter can do.
She loved Adam, as well. Michael was older than Janice, and had had Adam from a previous marriage. Michael's first wife died when Adam was very young, and while they shared no blood bond, there was a real aspect of their relationship that transcended genetics. They respected each other and she sought him out to make him feel loved and appreciated. The day he first called her "mother" was one of the happiest of Janice's life, for she had always felt that she was his mother, always tried to act in that role to the best of her ability.
She finally reached the end of the concourse. She knew immediately two things. First, she knew she hadn't been followed. Even the man in the white socks and shorts who had been following her for a little way eventually peeled off at the men's room. She had been watching her back trail just in case, finding the game - as she remembered from her youth - just as invigorating now as it was then. Her trainers would take her to the mall in Amarillo (which she enjoyed thoroughly) and would frequently stage a "follower" to test her ability to observe and detect such things. She always passed. In fact, she was even able to bring down a real pedophile who had been at the mall and looking for a target. That man was still in jail, Janice knew.
The second thing she knew was who it was that was there to pick her up. It was her brother, John.
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