Chasing the Falconers

“If this isn’t suffering, then what is?”

Again, Aiden demonstrates his privileged background and fundamental misunderstanding of the criminal system in the United States. He laments the suffering he endures as a captive at Sunnydale Farm, believing that his few hours of work caring for the animals is extensive labor and that the unsavory food constitutes torture. Soon, Aiden will come to understand how naive he was in his views.

“Look around you. You see a cage. I see wood, and hay, and papers. One match, and this whole dump burns.”

Miguel’s offhand comment foreshadows the way they will all escape from Sunnydale. A short time later, Aiden will spill the contents of his kerosene lantern and have a few seconds to put out the fire. Instead, he hesitates, recalling Miguel’s comments about escaping in the aftermath of a fire. In those seconds, the fire rages out of control.

“You got this from Dad’s book? Are you crazy? The biggest fire he ever survived was a back-yard barbecue!”

John Falconer, who holds a PhD in criminology, is also the author of detective novels starring Mac Mulvey. Throughout the novel, Aiden channels advice from his father through those novels, relying on the antics of Mulvey to get him out of sticky situations. When Meg first learns of this, she is incredulous, believing that their father’s creativity is not grounded in life experiences.

“This is what we’ve been praying for—a chance to get out of here, to help Mom and Dad!”

After the fire consumes the dormitory, Meg encourages Aiden to use the fire as cover for an escape. In her plea, she claims that she has been praying for a chance to escape and to prove their parents innocent. In contrast, Aiden has not revealed any inclination to either escape or pursue justice for their parents. Meg is street smart, witty, and idealistic, while Aiden is practical, methodical, and realistic. Only Meg is capable of believing in the miracle of an overturned conviction, in escape, or in the possibility that two fugitive kids might make a difference at all.

“It’s no big mystery, bro. There are no stores, and even if there were, we have no money. Whatever we get, we have to steal.”

Meg again demonstrates her inclination toward pragmatism. Unlike her brother, who clings to his moral superiority by refusing to admit that his acts of theft are the same as crimes committed by others, Meg is able to accept that crime is sometimes committed out of necessity. She has no moral qualms about stealing food when she is hungry and has no other means of surviving. In this, Meg acts as a character bridge between Aiden and Miguel. Aiden represents one end of the continuum, and Miguel represents the other, with Meg firmly in the middle and capable of understanding both sides.

“Well, what’s your plan, besides shooting holes in mine? Our parents are in jail because we can’t get our act together to get them out!”

Meg takes responsibility for her parents’ continued incarceration, believing that her inability to prove their innocence is the main reason that they are still behind bars. Unlike her brother, Meg believes that they can make a difference and that they have an obligation to look for the proof that will set her parents free. In contrast, Aiden views himself and his sister as children incapable of changing the system or freeing their parents. He is slowly won over by Meg’s persistent belief in the righteousness of their mission and its relative success.

“It was something from his regular life, not this improbable nightmare that had replaced it.”

Riding bikes through the cornfield, Aiden feels the wind in his hair and imagines himself and his kid sister riding together as part of childhood. He longs for a return to a time that he views, in hindsight, with nostalgia. This is a trait Aiden displays throughout the novel. He looks back on his life before his parents’ arrest with rose-tinted glasses, recalling more joy, affection, and comfort than was present. He has a harder time adapting to his new reality than his sister and is angry and bitter about what has been lost by their drastic change in circumstances.

“Ever since their parents’ arrest, they had been mistreated, lied to, jerked around, ignored and neglected. Worse, they had been treated as if they were guilty of some unspecified vile crime. It had never occurred to them that anyone might try to help them.”

After a graduate of Sunnydale Farm named Jimmy puts himself at risk to help Aiden and Meg, they realize how long they have been living in a state of constant mistrust of others. They have become fugitives from not only justice but also civil society and human decency. This single act of kindness will not be the only time in the novel that someone will put themselves in harm’s way to help the Falconers. Later, Miguel will intervene to help rescue the siblings, and Agent Harris risks his career and reputation to assist the children.

“It’s my job to get us through this. I have to be sharp, on my toes. I can’t let anything get past me.”

Aiden feels responsible for his younger sister, Meg. At the same time, Meg thinks that she is responsible for taking care of her brother, who she sees as stiff, plan oriented, and incapable of making quick decisions. Meg recognizes herself in contrast to her more methodical brother and understands that aspects of their oppositional personalities will be needed in the journey to prove their parents’ innocence.

“They weren’t thieves. Their honesty was what separated them from people like Miguel.”

Aiden and Meg believe that they are morally superior to Miguel, who they view as a criminal. They believe that Miguel’s manslaughter conviction equates to murder, while they view themselves as innocent children plucked from good lives and cast into a den of crooks. They hope to maintain their morality by resisting the temptation to do wrong wherever possible. At the same time, they are hungry and cold, and stealing is the only option.

“Was he crazy to think of himself and Meg as being better than Miguel? The three of them were fugitives, wanted by the law. And they were all guilty of stealing.”

The Falconers have a complicated relationship with the law. On the one hand, Aiden and Meg’s parents are behind bars for crimes they didn’t commit, just as they were in Sunnydale. At the same time, they are beginning to understand that some crimes are committed out of necessity. They have a vested interest in proving themselves and their parents innocent, but the further they travel toward that end goal, the more crimes they commit in the process, and the more they undermine their ultimate objective.

“As she held him, he had a strange feeling that he should be hugging her harder, never letting go.”

Aiden has a dream while riding the boxcar from Nebraska to Illinois in which his mother calls him down to get dinner and he resists. She collects him upstairs and carries the six-year-old Aiden down and outside, hugging him close. The memory is tainted by Aiden’s emotions while dreaming them, infusing a sense of loss and grief into the hug that his mother gives him on the dock. In this and other instances, Aiden struggles to view his memories without infusing them with present-day emotions.

“The Falconers followed like the tail of a comet. They had no loyalty for Miguel Reyes; they didn’t like him, and trusted him zero. But he ran with the kind of cool self-assurance that inspired confidence. Besides, if anybody was an expert at fleeing the police, it had to be this juvenile delinquent. For good or ill, their fates had become intertwined.”

The Falconers still separate their morality and their criminal actions from the likes of Miguel, who they continue to see as a hardened criminal who deserved his confinement at Sunnydale. At the same time, they recognize that they need his help and his street smarts in order to evade police and reach Vermont. Within 24 hours, they will learn that Miguel is not the hardened criminal they imagined him to be, but rather someone who committed crimes out of necessity, just as they have done. After this, Aiden and Meg cannot view the legal system in the same way.

“Amazing, Aiden marveled. The only way to survive as a fugitive was by breaking even more laws.”

Aiden and Meg are beginning to understand that crimes committed out of necessity are often forced on those incapable of finding justice through the legal system. Because they were interned at a juvenile correction center, their freedoms were restricted, and they were unable to seek justice for themselves and their parents through traditional means. Becoming fugitives was their only path to regaining their freedom and seeking justice for their parents. However, in order to survive, they soon learn that they will paradoxically become the criminals they hope to prove they are not.

“Soon Aiden’s curly top had been reduced to a tight crew cut. Meg was amazed at how his entire appearance was transformed. Her brother had always had a serious yet somehow goofy look to him. Now his cheekbones seemed higher, his jaw stronger, his eyes more deep set. His appearance was older, more mature.”

After finding safety in the confines of an empty home, the trio undergoes makeovers to try to disguise themselves from the police. Aiden’s transformation is representative of how his confinement and escape have aged him prematurely. Necessity forces him to grow up too soon and abandon his childhood for a seriousness that is well above that of a typical 15-year-old.

“Please believe me—this is not how we usually are. We’re not bad people but we’re DESPERATE!”

Aiden leaves an apology letter for the McKinnon family, the owners of the home that he, Miguel, and Meg have broken into. Again, Aiden justifies his crimes through the seriousness of his situation. Because he is “desperate,” he is capable of stealing from strangers. While this does not make him feel better about himself, it suggests that Aiden’s logical brain is struggling with his emotional brain, and the ensuing chaos leaves Aiden unsure if he is a criminal or if he is a person with just cause for theft. Further, it suggests that Aiden used to see crime as a black-and-white issue of right or wrong and that his view has changed because of the desperation of his plight.

“If they were to have a prayer of helping their parents, they would have to watch Miguel, to learn from him, almost be him in a sense. To survive as a fugitive, you have to be a little bit crazy.”

After watching Miguel’s actions over the course of the previous hours, Aiden concludes that Miguel is better suited to life as a fugitive than they are precisely because he is unpredictable, risk taking, and bold. While Meg begins to question if associating with Miguel is too much of a risk, Aiden has been converted to his methods. By this point, Miguel has fed, housed, clothed, and transported them all while keeping them from police detection, and Aiden is very much aware that Miguel is responsible for their continued evasion of the police.

“Shaken and terrified, Meg glared right back into the teeth of his rage. ‘I’ll crash the two of us, don’t think I won’t! I’m not leaving my brother!’”

After Miguel abandons Aiden to the two truckers who catch him siphoning gas from their truck, Meg intervenes to save her brother. Loyalty is one of the most valuable traits the Falconers possess. Meg is fiercely loyal to her brother and vice versa, and they are both loyal to their parents. The Falconer family loyalty is contrasted with the Reyes family’s lack of loyalty when Miguel arrives at his brother Freddy’s house only to be banished.

“‘Justice!’ Miguel practically snarled the word. ‘You rich kids are all the same. Why are you entitled to justice? Where’s my justice?’”

Miguel believes that justice is a concept more regularly apparent in the lives of the wealthy, who can afford a good defense lawyer, than in the impoverished, who have no means of defense. This becomes apparent once Miguel reveals that his manslaughter charge was for shoving his abusive stepfather during a confrontation. Miguel knows that justice is out of reach for himself and marvels at the naivety of Aiden and Meg, who believe that justice is a thing that one can prove and earn, regardless of circumstance.

“‘Don’t you get it?’ Miguel asked bitterly. ‘There’s no innocent and guilty, just lucky and unlucky. Think my old lady’s going to blow her savings on a lawyer for the kid who put her husband in the cemetery? Unlucky—same as your folks.’”

Miguel understands that his life trajectory has been driven by a lack of luck as well as his economic situation. His mother is of limited means and could not afford to defend her son. His brother was himself incarcerated and is on parole—unable to associate with a fugitive. Miguel does not blame his mother or brother, just the system and the bad luck that placed him within it.

“‘Because I created them, that’s why!’ Harris snapped. ‘I made them what they are today—motherless, fatherless, homeless fugitives. Can’t you get it through your head? Everything that happens to Aiden and Margaret Falconer—it’s on me!’”

Agent Harris arrested John and Louise Falconer for treason. Later, he believes that the legal system pushed guilty convictions on the Falconers in order to close the case and end the media frenzy. In their haste, Harris believes that things were missed. Few details about the case, the trial, or Harris’s involvement are included in the source text. However, Harris is a permanent secondary figure in the On the Run series and makes repeated interventions in the Falconers’ lives in an attempt to right his mistake.

“Aiden would not have believed he’d ever be capable of such sympathy toward the bully who had once made a career of tormenting him. Yet he recognized Miguel’s despair almost instantly. It was the combination of misery and hopelessness Aiden and Meg had felt during the trial, in the foster homes, and at Sunnydale.”

Miguel is deeply wounded when his dream of reuniting with his brother and watching TV with him on his system is shattered when his brother throws him out and tells him that he is banished from the Reyes family. Miguel has nowhere to go and believes that he will be absorbed back into the system. Aiden and Meg, who once had nowhere to go and were abandoned by family, know how Miguel feels. This life-altering moment for Miguel brings empathy to the complicated relationship between Miguel and the Falconers.

“Both knew what ‘back into the system’ represented for Miguel. Not another place like Sunnydale, but real jail, with bars and armed guards and inmates who could teach Miguel the true meaning of tough.”

As Miguel is loaded into the ambulance, Aiden and Meg escape on a stolen ATV with the photo of Uncle Frank. As soon as they cover enough distance and find shelter, they realize what will become of their friend and accomplice. Miguel will not find justice; he will end up back in the system that has already betrayed him. He has nowhere else to go, his family doesn’t want him, and he has no money for a defense. As an escapee who has broken several laws in his flight from the law, he has only succeeded in adding to his rap sheet.