Promethean

by P. S. Power

  The first time it had happened, Liam didn’t get nearly as much of it. Now, having more context, he could tell that it wasn’t just an attack, but that the people outside who were going after those inside were the same ones that he’d encounter at the other house. Simpson and Ginger House were also there, firing round after round into the dwelling. Including rocket launchers, which caused some rather large explosions.

  Inside, Narran the Vampire Queen, as well as several of her people, including Nicodemus and Sondra, died as they were hit with what were probably rocket propelled grenades. Several people that he recognized as werewolves tried to go out the windows, only to be shot with powerful weapons when they did it. That didn’t kill them, but it did force them to transform, where they were hit again. All of them ended up on the floor writhing in pain, as they tried to transform, only to be hit again and forced to move in the other direction. From wolf back to human, and then in reverse, over and over again.

  There were several elves there as well, and people of several different types that Liam had no way to identify, except that they didn’t seem perfectly human. Most of them wisely tried to hide from the bullets by laying on the floor. As it went on, Liam watched the whole thing unfold, the world finally going silent. Then, even though both seemed to be the worse for wear, Sanchez and Brenner ran from the large, rather fine, dwelling, just before the whole thing blew up.

  Liam took a deep breath then and nodded.

  “Fuck.” The single soft word had the other man staring at him.

  “Hum?”

  Trying to scowl a bit, Liam took a deep breath. When he let it out, his voice was actually louder than it normally was. Nearly growling. Rasping at least. It was a new thing for him. Almost like he had a voice, even if that wasn’t physically possible.

  “I had a vision. Again. I think it was of the same thing I saw the first time, about two months ago. A meeting, with the other communities. There was more this time. An attack again. In the same place, which I’ve never been to. Vampires and wolves were being shot from the outside, others as well. Except… This time I could tell who part of the killers were. It was as if I was outside and inside at the same time. Tiffany and Dan ran out just before the whole thing exploded.” Thinking about it he shrugged. “You were inside, lying on the floor. Next to Robert’s grandmother. Nina.” She was the leader of the local elves. A person that would be at such a meeting, most likely.

  Mitchel blinked, several times and then cleared his throat.

  “I see. How accurate do you think this is?”

  That was a good question, really.

  “The first time I drew pictures of some of the faces, and they were real people, even if I’d never met them before. Other than that, I don’t know at all. Is this a vision of the future? Is it just something that I’m making up, for some reason? I have no context for it. It isn’t normal for me, however. I’m not walking around doing this every ten minutes or anything.”

  That, as bland and useless as it sounded, seemed to be enough for the other man, in the moment.

  “Got it. So, who were the shooters?”

  Liam shrugged again. It was so obvious to him that he had to think Warner already knew. Then, getting confirmation was important, as it turned out.

  “The SAU. Most of them, if I have it right. Rich Simpson was there, along with Ginger House. Dressed like they were today, in the truck.” He looked at the man, then at the wall, even if his gaze never left the other fellow.

  After a moment of silence, he went on.

  “This morning I met with Richard Simpson as planned. He set up the event today, for me to be at the Federal building at four, where I was. So he could hit me with a car and then get out and shoot me, before fleeing. Brenner and Sanchez knew about it. He’s supposed to be trying to infiltrate the bad people. That was what I was told and it fit, at the time. The, what happened today… That was different. In the vision they were both attacking though. With big weapons, not just side arms. Things that were hurting and killing those inside.”

  It was just a vision though. True, it might be of the future, or it could be something very different. A possible future or even a warning from himself about various dangers. It was nearly identical to the one that he’d had before. Only now what he’d seen and heard seemed to make sense. It didn’t mean it wasn’t his imagination. Liam had one of those, after all.

  Mitchel simply sat for a bit, in front of the computer, then, after several minutes, rubbed at his face. Scrubbing it, as if trying to wake up. If it worked to energize him or not, Liam couldn’t tell.

  “Okay. So… the FBI, or part of it, is trying to start a war. Rich Simpson is supposed to be infiltrating the ones doing that, except in your vision he was attacking the meeting we were holding. Which… Well, that could mean anything. That he was in on the attack for real, or even that he had to fake it to protect his cover. You said that Tiff and Dan ran out just before the explosion… Like they knew it was going to happen or were they just trying to rush the attackers?”

  Thinking about what he’d seen, Liam had to simply shake his head.

  “I couldn’t tell. It could be either of those things. They had their side arms in their hands and had been hit several times each, in the vests. Sanchez on the arm, which was bleeding. They moved as one. It was just before the explosion.”

  Rather than get upset with him, Mitchel smiled.

  “So, we might not be dealing with them betraying us. Or we might. Working with humans is always a risk that way. Still, what this means to me is that I need to prevent a meeting from taking place. Just in case you’re correct. On the good side, if you are seeing the future, we can change things. I’ve never heard about that gift not being mutable, thank goodness. That would suck, wouldn’t it? Seeing horrors and being unable to stop them. We just need to not have a meeting like that then. Not until we take down the people behind this. That it’s the Federal government isn’t a great thing. We need to know if this is official or just a rogue group.”

  How they were supposed to do that, Liam wasn’t aware. Just asking probably wouldn’t work, he had to imagine.

  Before he could say that, Mitchel was back on the computer, tapping rapidly. He went on that way, not speaking, for about fifteen minutes, then he spun in his chair.

  “There. I put out a warning, explaining that we need to go carefully, instead of flying off the handle. Now… Really, I need to get with my investigator.” He tightened his jaw and then looked over his shoulder at Liam. “This… We’ve been looking into it for a while now. That the FBI might have been setting us up. We couldn’t work anyone inside directly, so we had to do it from the outside. Carefully.”

  Liam thought for a bit, between breaths, and nodded.

  “Warren Oaks. Who, among other things, had me placed with Brenner. That… Something there is still off, isn’t it? I don’t know what it is.” That sense of confusion came back, not relieved at all by working out that Oaks was working with Mitchel. There had been signs of that. Hints even. It wasn’t enough to give him a sense of relief at all.

  Mitchel nodded though, his face seeming impressed that Liam had worked all of that out for himself.

  “Right. I get that though. It took me a while to work out the connection there. The trick is that Mary Frankenstein never existed. That was a fake name that she used. A joke, really.”

  Liam knew that one, so nodded.

  “I was told that.”

  “Yeah. Except that she had a real name. Leslie Stein. That was a bit on the nose as well, so I had some digging done by a friend of mine. Leslie Stein was what she changed her name to, her family name was Steinbrenner. Which…” He waited then, as if it was going to take Liam a long time to catch up, when fed that much information.

  He simply faced the other man.

  “Did Tiffany Brenner change her name as well?”

  “Yup. Cousins, not sisters, but they grew up together, so they have a real connection. Mary, Leslie, wasn’t from the rich si
de of the family, as it turned out. Tiff is. Oaks found Leslie though and brought her into things, after he started working on the current project, about two years ago. We should probably talk to him about that. Possibly your mom as well. Are you feeling up to a driving lesson?”

  Liam nodded, since he truly was. Even if it wasn’t connected to everything he’d just found out.

  “I am. I should call my mother first. Oaks as well. I don’t know if that’s safe to do from here.” The idea that the NSA would be listening was suddenly compounded by the fact that the FBI might be as well.

  Mitchel simply nodded, without making him explain his thoughts further.

  “Let’s just go? Have you read up on the road rules?”

  Liam actually had, which had only taken him three or four minutes to memorize. Even if he didn’t have a test on it, such data was important to understand.

  “Yes. Shall we?”

  They both got up then, moving to the smaller car that Mitchel drove. The keys were passed over. Then, without saying a word more, Liam climbed in, fastened his seatbelt, adjusted the mirrors so he could see and when the other man nodded, started the vehicle.

  Mitchel spoke gently.

  “Pull around, so that you can move onto the street. This isn’t a busy road, but don’t go until I tell you. We’ll be heading to the right. Warren lives off in that direction.”

  It was also the same direction that Sanchez and Brenner had gone. Not that it would mean anything. Not based on one single point of data. Hundreds of relevant locations were probably off in that direction, if one were to drive long enough.

  Interestingly, Mitchel treated the whole thing as a real lesson, making a point of having Liam park, both at the side of the road and on a hill, so he could practice starting again, as well as backing up, several times, including around corners. This took an extra half hour or so, which added to their time on the road. Then the man just gave directions.

  “Turn right up here, on the long driveway. There will be a gate, about fifty feet in, so we’ll have to stop.” Except that, once they got to the large, black iron thing, it was already open. Left that way it seemed, instead of in preparation for them to arrive.

  Mitchel, his eyes narrowing, waved for Liam to move forward. There were several cars in the paved drive, as the car slowly crawled in that direction. The house itself, a huge thing made of stone and glass, wasn’t close to the gate at all. The drive was a long thing with a circle at the far end of it, with two other cars being there already. One of them was the vehicle that Agent Sanchez was using that day. The blue one from the FBI.

  The other was about the same size, and seemed newer and nicer. It was all in white, and was parked about twenty-five feet away from the other one.

  Warner just waved at them with his right hand. The move was almost negligent seeming, as if the FBI being there already wasn’t a problem for them at all.

  “Parallel parking. On a curve, so this will be a bit of a challenge. Go slowly, and try not to hit anything? I’ll talk you through it.”

  Even having read up on it and watched others drive before, Liam had to go through the whole thing several times before he felt skillful at it. Mitchel got him to stop the car and they both got out, walking to the front door of the majestic place, up the smooth stone steps.

  The door opened, with a rather tall man stepping out, his brown skin shining a bit in the overcast light of the day.

  Oaks smiled at them.

  “Liam! Mitchel! Come in. We have some other people here as well. You can drive now?” The question was toward Liam, though Mitch was the one who answered.

  “He can. We probably need to get him another lesson or two, just to make certain of it, but so far I could only barely tell he hasn’t had a license for years. Now… We need to talk about the mess that’s brewing. Liam had a vision. It wasn’t good.”

  That news simply had Oaks nodding.

  “It never is, when that kind of thing happens. Come, this way.” Then, grandly, the rough looking giant waved them into his rather palatial home.

  Chapter twelve

  Liam glanced at the hallway of the place they walked into, not needing a map of the house to understand he’d seen it before. Recently, if only inside of himself. Oaks lead them through the wooden paneled hallway, a rich seeming entry, to a room that was off to the right. It was larger than any other room Liam had ever been in. The single room was, when he inspected it, larger in footprint that Mitchel’s entire house. The ceiling was at least twenty feet high, as well. There was a crystal light feature in the center of the ceiling that scattered the electric lights woven throughout the display. It was large and reminded Liam of ice, for some reason.

  Mitchel was right behind him and didn’t respond to the interior of the place at all. There were, of course, windows, as well as three other people in the room. Brenner and Sanchez were there, of course, though it was the last person that looked over at him suddenly, her eyes going wide.

  Mary jumped up, running at him, her face seeming shocked. The move ended with her arms wrapped around his back.

  “Liam!” she didn't go on, just holding him for a moment. A long time, really. As if she were afraid he was going to get away from her again, if she relaxed her grip at all.

  For his part, he noded.

  “Mother. We were just about to drive to your house, for a visit. I need the practice.”

  Across the room, sitting on the sofa, Brenner managed to look more than a little nervous, for some reason. One that Liam was, he thought, starting to put together. The picture wasn’t complete at all yet. Liam was thinking about what to ask as Mary held him away from herself, her eyes taking in everything about him.

  “Your skin is darker, using protein for that… Why didn’t your eyes change? They should have, at the same time. The coloration change should have been driven through your entire system. There were some minor changes to the formulae used, but…”

  Oaks coughed then.

  “Later, Mary. I’m certain that we have other issues to handle at the moment. We were just about to go over things as we know them, to this point. Liam, you had a vision? Of an attack or violent event again?”

  He nodded, even if he didn't need to know about that nearly as much as what everyone else had to share, if they would at all.

  “The same one as before. I understood more of it. It took place in this room.” He covered the whole thing, no one interrupting him, letting him finish his explanation. “I managed to work out that things are different than I was thinking. That Leslie Stein and Tiffany Brenner are related. I can see it, now that I have you together again. Sisters.” Mitchel had said they were cousins. Except that they looked too similar for that, really. Tiffany had red hair, and Mary’s was slightly closer to brown. The noses were the same though. So was the facial shape. He’d noticed that the first time they’d all been together, even being distracted by the screaming and death threats.

  Mary was a few years older and a bit less thin. Other than that, they looked very similar.

  Tiffany shook her head.

  “No.”

  Interestingly, Mary nodded, smirking a tiny bit. Everyone looked at her then, so she spoke, her voice a bit playful.

  “Um… Yeah. Half-sisters. I ran some genetic tests a few years back, Tiff. We have the same father. Before you freak out about your cheating dad, it was my father and your mother, in your case. Go figure, right? I didn’t bring it up, since that could end with you being screwed out of your inheritance. There’s no need to mess up what you have going on that way, right?”

  Tiffany gave her sister a hard look, as if she didn't believe it. Then she shook her head.

  “Okay. I… We can talk about this later. It… It isn’t important. Not at the moment. I mean, sure, crashing my world to the ground, but… yeah.” She seemed annoyed, instead of angry, at least.

  Oaks laughed. A deep sound that seemed to boom across the room.

  “So, we don’t hold that meeting here? Th
e plan was to try and drive the attackers to us. We can still use this. Is it possible to falsify that such a meeting will take place? Then, when the attack comes we can lay in wait for these others.” He looked at Mitchel and waved for the man to take a seat.

  Sanchez, who was sitting next to Brenner, with about three feet between them, grunted. It didn't sound exactly happy, though the man didn't seem ready to fight, just then.

  “This whole thing has gone sideways. They were never supposed to get a shot off, much less kill six of our own people. I can’t believe they did that at all, to be honest. I mean, why? Sure, Ridley wouldn’t let anyone get the truth out. That’s the job. Carlisle won’t do that either. There’s no reason to get rid of either of them. They’ll simply be replaced with someone in the same mold. Was it… Some kind of mind control? If the vamps found out about it, they might not wait for us to handle things. They can do that. Some of them could, anyway. They have the powers for it.”

  There were nods, from almost everyone, though Liam let his head tilt to the side.

  “That’s possible. So is the idea that whoever is in control of them ordered it. Who’s in charge, do we know?” Liam thought he had an idea that way, but wanted to know if the others had the same concept. There was one person that could have done it, who would have made it so that Simpson was kept out of things, on purpose. His ex-wife, Kim.

  Which was sad, if true. Liam actually liked her, after all. Not that they were so close he couldn’t admit that it was the truth if it was.

  No one spoke for some time, with Oaks finally spreading his hands.

  “No one has knowledge of that, for certain. It seems that it’s one of the Agents from the office, not one of the SAU. For a time I thought it was Agent Brenner. Do you have anything on that, Liam? You stayed on to watch her, after all.”