Project Blackhawk (or The Blackhawk Experiment)

“Wait, but how--how can he hate Chicago and be with the Avalanche?” Andrew blurted out. “We didn’t do anything!”

“Someone did...someone must have. One of us must have done something!” Dave insisted. “It’s the only logical explanation.”

“Since you bring it up, maybe it was you!” Andrew snarled.

“Yeah!” Brandon agreed.

“Me? Why? I’m not stupid Shawzy and we all knew about the consequences!” Dave retorted, shoving the pest backward.

“Well it wasn’t me,” Andrew snapped. “I’m not stupid either!”

Brandon nodded. “Me neither.”

“I guess we got to figure out who then and right this problem!” Dave said.

“Right!” the other two agreed.

“Maybe we can start by trying to gather clues from Jonathan and Patrick. How were they traded, why and all of that,” Dave suggested, closing down the laptop once more.

“But...Jonathan hates Chicago?” Andrew exclaimed. “One look at me and he’ll land a punch, I know it!”

“That’s true. You’ll have to just try to grin and bare it, we need you with us,” Dave said.

Andrew nodded. “Alright, let’s go see Jonny then…”


In Colorado,

Jonathan Toews skated hard around the ice. He met up with Gabriel Landeskog at center ice and skidded up next to him. “Hey Landy, what’s up?”

“Looking good on that Power Play, eh?”

“Yeah, we were killer on Special Teams last night, knocked those sniveling Hawks down a peg!” Jonathan laughed.

“Right? Why do you hate them?” Gabriel asked, putting his helmet on his head and snapping it into place.

Jonathan spun to him. “Landy, I’ve already told you the reason. The Hawks betrayed me!”

“What about that blond kid you were paired with?”

“Patrick Kane?” Jonathan questioned. “Don’t care. You’re my best friend, Landy!” He slapped the blond forward on the back. “Now, I’m going to focus on shooting and accuracy today. It may be a back-to-back game with those losers, but I know that I hit multiple posts the other day. Can’t have that tonight, right?”

“No.”

Jonathan scooped a puck into his blade and launched off. He pulled a few moves, but nothing showy and then shot at the goal. The puck slid through the five-hole of the goalie and into the back of the net. He rounded the goal and went to the bench.

As he leaned against the railing, a black gloved hand shot from behind him and clamped over his mouth. He was dragged backward into the tunnel and then instantly released into the locker room. The door was slammed shut and locked.

“What the--? What do you all want?” Jonathan snapped, brushing himself off.

“We need to talk to you, Jonny,” Dave stated. “There’s a major problem happening.”

“Yeah, there’s a Blackhawk in my locker room!!” Jonathan roared. He launched forward at Andrew.

Brandon and Dave grabbed him, halting his progress. Andrew spat at him. Jonathan was furious and he fought the hold on him.

“Jonny, calm down!! Please. It’s important and he won’t hurt you!”

Jonathan relaxed and Dave and Brandon let him go, but stood by at the ready. The Avalanche player tugged on his jersey to right it. He glared at Andrew. “What do you want?”

“What happened to you? Just tell us what happened in Chicago,” Andrew begged. “You’re not hostile like this at all.”

Jonathan spun on his skate heels and went to his stall. He put his helmet on the shelf and then sat down to remove his skates. He didn’t say a word to them, until he finally pulled his second skate off and set it down on the stall beside him. He looked up at them, his chocolate brown eyes sparkling in the dim neon light of the room.

“It was Sharpie - Patrick Sharp and his partner-in-crime! Those bastards started this! They took a prank too far, it upset me so much, I lashed out and injured Kaner in the process. Is that what you want to know?”

Andrew looked horrified. “You hurt Kaner?”

“It was an accident!” Jonathan snorted, looking to the side. He lifted his hand up and wiped away a tear from his eye.

“What did Sharpie do exactly?” Andrew pressed.

Jonathan’s head snapped back up and he glared at Andrew. “Ask the asshole for yourself, he’s still a Blackhawk!”

Andrew balled his fist up, but Dave saw him and put his hand in the way, shaking his head.

“Thank you Jonny, you can return to the ice if you wish.”

“Nah, I was pretty much done and if he’s gonna be around here, I don’t really want to continue to play. Blackhawk spy!”

Andrew growled, wrinkling his nose up in distaste. Dave and Brandon grabbed him and they exited the room. Before they did however, Dave halted and turned back to the Av, who had gotten to his feet and was pulling his jersey off of him.

“Sorry about the whole kidnapping thing, but we really needed to talk to you.”

“Get out of here!” Jonathan snarled.

Dave shrugged and closed the door.

“He’s the asshole!! This is not the Jonny I know...or knew! We have to fix him...we have to get him back!” Andrew stated.

“We should try Kaner, before going to talk to Sharpie...it seems that Sharpie might not be the same man we all once knew,” Brandon suggested.

Dave nodded. “Right. Come on, let’s get out of here, before Jonathan explodes and attacks Andrew.”

“I’ll get his skinny Canadian ass!” Andrew grumbled, cracking his neck and knuckles.

“So, where is Kaner?” Brandon asked.

“He’s in Tampa remember,” Dave replied.

“Oh right...so back to the warehouse first?” Brandon sighed.

“Right. You got it!”

“Let’s do this!” Andrew exclaimed.

They all ventured down the tunnel and left the arena and returned to Florida and the warehouse once more.

Dave had once more opened his computer up and was doing some research. They didn’t know about Patrick and they thought a little research on him wouldn’t be a bad thing. They watched many videos of him on a line with Marty St. Louis and Steven Stamkos. They watched him blossom and bloom and have a pretty sick freshman season with the Lightning. But that’s all the video they found of him.

Curious, they googled Patrick Kane and went to figure out what had happened to him. As it turns out, there was a mystery about that too.

“Look, his stats stop after that first year. And, wait, click on the article right there,” Andrew said, indicating the desired article.

Dave clicked on it.

“Patrick Kane, after stunning and wowing millions in Tampa, vanished after his rookie season. His disappearance is suspicious and many believe he was abducted by aliens…” Dave read, trailing off. He turned to Andrew and Brandon, who were sharing a horrified look.

“That seems a bit far-fetched, but still…” Brandon remarked.

“What happened to Kaner?” Andrew inquired out loud, asking the one question that was at the tip of all of their minds.

“I don’t know, but it doesn’t sound good.” Dave went back to the main search results page and clicked on some other articles. It was the same thing. Patrick Kane had just vanished. His goals and all his stats ended during the 2009-2010 season.

The mystery and desire to know grew even more so inside of each of them.

“Who did this? We didn’t do it!” Andrew blurted out.

Dave shook his head. “Well, someone had to have discovered this place and went back in time to create this new reality timeline.”

“But who?” Brandon pressed.

“I don’t know,” Dave took a moment to think, before he continued on with, “Let’s run through what we know, okay? Patrick was a Blackhawk, who got injured in Chicago after his rookie year and then Jonathan is traded to Colorado, while Patrick is sent to Tampa Bay, he recovers from his injury and has a stellar breakout sophomore/first year with the Lightning, playing with Stammer and Marty.”

“And Jonathan Toews hates Chicago and blames Sharpie for the trade,” Brandon added on.

Andrew sighed heavily. “And apparently, Saader’s still gay for me.” He looked down at his feet as the other two men turned to look at him.

“What?”

“I don’t wanna talk about it.” He remained looking down at his feet, uncomfortably shuffling them. There was awkward silence, as Brandon and Dave struggled with what to say and eventually, Brandon broke the short silence.

“So did Sharpie do this?” the Shark asked.

“Nah, but someone else must have and changed Sharpie’s character. He’s still a prankster...but it sounds like he’s not just a prankster, but more like a villain? It seems like Sharpie’s the one to talk to still,” Dave said.

“Or Bur, Jonny said it was them both. It was a prank gone wrong that lit him up and made him lash out,” Andrew stated.

“Right, we’ll just need to be extremely cautious,” Dave nodded. “So we need to find out what that prank was and where Kaner’s gone.”

“This is bad, this is so bad. When we fix everything, we need to destroy that time machine!” Andrew remarked.

“Right.”

There was a moment of silence.

“So, I guess we’re going to Chicago to see Sharpie and Bur...how bad could they be?” Brandon remarked.

Dave and Andrew looked at him and shrugged.

“And nobody say anything about Saader and I or I’ll make you wish you’d never said anything!” Andrew growled. “Saader’s a friend, not a lover…”

Notes

HAHA SAADER AND SHAWZY BROMANCE!!
Holy--JONNY ALMOST ATTACKED SHAWZY!!!! :O AND HE HURT KANER???? WHAT???? Don't worry, I know the suspense kills but you shall soon find out the answers to these questions.



Next up: How Bad Are Sharpie and Bur???? And what exactly happened in 2009...