by S. A. Beck
“You sure?” Otto asked. He heard his words come out in a harsh whisper.
Grunt chuckled. “Just kidding. The fire would get spotted from the road.” Grunt took the packet from him and used the other hand to playfully slap Otto on the cheek a few times. “You need to get your priorities straight, kid.”
Otto hung his head. That had been a test, and he’d failed. Resentment simmered up in him. Who was that guy to lecture him? He was running around there destroying private property instead of keeping on with the mission, and he had already said he wasn’t going to see it through to the end. Grunt might have been able to snap him in half, but Otto had more guts than he did. Otto thought of a few snappy answers to show the mercenary just where they stood, but he couldn’t bring himself to say them. Maybe he didn’t have the guts after all.
The others began to gather near the fence. Otto went over to them.
“Edward says we got ten minutes to get out of here before a patrol car comes into view,” Jim Running Horse said. Otto could barely make out an earpiece running from the man’s phone to his ear.
The Tohono O’odham began to clear out. Grunt came hurrying up.
“All set,” he said.
“Did he help?” Jim Running Horse asked, pointing his chin in Otto’s direction. It was a strange habit the Tohono O’odham had. They never pointed at anything with their finger.
“It’s illegal,” Grunt said in a little-girl voice.
Jim Running Horse scoffed. “You got to school this youngster, my friend, or he’s going to get you killed one day.”
Early the next morning, Otto drove the Hummer along a lonely stretch of highway as Grunt sat in the passenger’s seat. They had rejoined the trailers but kept their distance so no one would notice they were together. The trailer Vivian was driving was a quarter of a mile ahead of them, and they saw her pull into a convenience store and gas station.
“Let’s get some coffee,” Grunt said.
“Fine by me,” Otto replied, pulling off the highway.
It was early in the morning, and Otto’s eyes were gritty and red from another night of trying to sleep in the backseat of a car. He really wished the Atlantis Allegiance would put up at a motel every once in a while, but that would be too risky. Grunt had been quiet for much of the night, but he had started making casual conversation with Otto as the sun rose. It seemed as though he was trying to make amends for the previous night’s outburst. Otto still didn’t know what it was all about. Perhaps he’d learn in time.
As Vivian filled the gas tank to the trailer, they walked into the store, pretending they didn’t know her. The bright fluorescent lights stung Otto’s eyes. The place had the usual aisles full of junk food plus a little diner attached with a few tables and a row of stools at a counter. The only people inside at that hour were a bored-looking teenager at the register and a businessman sipping a coffee and reading a newspaper at the counter.
“Two jumbo coffees, black,” Grunt told the teenager.
“I take cream and sugar in mine,” Otto said.
“Wimp. There’s no caffeine in cream and sugar,” Grunt said. He turned to the guy at the register. “He’ll have his black.”
Otto shrugged. Looked as though Grunt was back to his old self again. As the attendant poured the coffee into two giant Styrofoam cups, they went over to the refrigerator and grabbed some sodas and energy drinks for later.
“We got a long day ahead.” Otto sighed.
“Don’t worry. We’ll get a good night’s sleep tonight. Best to be fresh before getting down to business.”
Otto tensed. More wasted time. They should save Jaxon as soon as they got to Los Angeles. On second thought, though, it made sense to get rested. When they went in to get her, they’d have to deal with two of General Meade’s best agents and who knew what else. Then they’d probably get chased and be on the run for a while. No telling how long it would be before they could rest easy.
So yeah, Jaxon would have to hold tight for another day. Edward said she was in no immediate danger.
Otto grabbed a few donuts, and he and Grunt went to the counter and paid for the food. They didn’t pay for Vivian’s gas. As she came in, they continued to ignore her, and she ignored them.
“Come on, Pyro. Time to get going,” Grunt said.
As they headed out the door, Vivian ordered two coffees and a pair of Danishes and paid for the gas.
Otto saw the businessman glance over his newspaper at her and then go back to reading. Vivian appeared not to have noticed. Men looked at her all the time.
As Vivian left the store, the businessman lowered his newspaper just enough to see the two men get into the Hummer and the woman get into the trailer home. He noticed a Japanese woman sitting in the passenger’s seat of the trailer. He watched as the Hummer and the trailer home pulled away. Once both vehicles were out of sight, he pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and made a call.
Chapter 17
AUGUST 2, 2016, ALBUQUERQUE, NEW MEXICO
9:00 AM
General Meade walked down the line of his agents as they stood at attention. A dozen of them stood there, dressed in identical black suits with identical black sunglasses tucked in their front pockets because they stood in the Poseidon Project’s indoor training room.
The general noted they all kept perfect attention. All were in excellent shape, all trained to fight, all ex-military.
But he noted something else too. The youngest was in his mid-thirties. Some were in their forties. None of them had seen a combat operation in years. They were all ex-soldiers signed up for Army Intelligence because they couldn’t adjust to civilian life. An agent’s pay was much better than that of some soldier in a war zone, the benefits were excellent, and much of the duty was comparatively light.
That was the problem. Those guys were accustomed to tapping the phones of suspected terrorists or tracking down illegal arms dealers, not fighting Atlanteans with superior abilities and special powers. They couldn’t even handle Dr. Yamazaki. They made a big show of bringing her in at the start of everything, making everyone at her university start whispering rumors and conspiracy theories, and then she got away from the hospital. Those idiots were out of their league.
So it was time to up their game.
“Gentlemen, you have a new unit commander. Orion, come over here.”
Orion stepped up beside his master. General Meade noticed the agents’ eyes go wide as they recognized Orion for what he was.
“That’s right, men. Orion here is an Atlantean. And you’ll soon be joined by more of them. If you’re going to defeat the Atlantean terrorist group that’s threatening national security, you’re going to have to use Atlanteans against them, just like we use patriotic Muslims to infiltrate Islamist groups. You’ll be training with Orion on a specially prepared field we have here on base. And you’ll be getting better weapons, assault rifles and grenades. You’ll get body armor too. You’re going up against the best, so you’ll be given the best gear and the best training. It’s going to be hard. Are you ready for it?”
“Sir, yes, sir!” they shouted in unison.
“You’re going to become the baddest killers in the country, aren’t you?”
“Sir, yes, sir!” they shouted again.
“Now go, go, GO!” General Meade shouted, clapping his hands. Orion ran out of the room and headed for the door. The agents fell in line behind him. Meade followed and watched as Orion led them out onto the training ground.
Suddenly, soldiers in camouflage popped up from half a dozen hiding places and pelted them with paint pellets. Orion ducked and rolled. He was the only one not to get hit. The agents stood there, confused, their suits covered in red paint.
General Meade nodded with approval. Let them train with real soldiers for a change, and let them get those damn suits dirty for once.
The soldiers dropped their weapons and charged. That was another special surprise Meade had planned for the idiots. They leaped onto the agents, t
heir fists flying, their booted feet kicking. The agents rallied and started fighting back. Even though the soldiers were ten, fifteen years younger, they found themselves fighting their match as experience dueled with youth.
Soon the whole thing degenerated into a brawl. The agents, their precious egos hurt, showed the soldiers no mercy. The soldiers, for their part, weren’t about to let a bunch of old farts defeat them. An agent staggered back, blood spurting from his broken nose. A soldier got flipped head over heels and cracked his head on the ground, knocking him unconscious. Orion stood a little apart from the fight, laughing at both sides.
Meade laughed too. That was just what the men needed. The army was stretched too thin overseas to pull anyone out of a combat zone, so he had to create one. The rivalry between the younger troops and the older agents would help beat both sides into shape, and if a few people got hurt, well, that was just how the world was.
His phone rang. When he answered, Isadore Grant’s voice came over the line.
“So how is Jaxon doing?” Meade asked.
“There’s been an unusual development. Jaxon has taken to sneaking out at night. Stephen and I have been taking turns following her. At first we worried that she was sneaking out to see a boy. It wouldn’t do to have your future soldier become pregnant. But it turns out she’s doing something more interesting. She’s become a vigilante.”
“A vigilante?”
“She got the idea from a local vigilante who has been appearing in the LA news. She wrote a school paper about it and started sneaking out soon afterward, looking for trouble. Of course a young girl alone at night in LA will find plenty of it.”
“She hasn’t been hurt, has she?” General Meade asked.
“No, she’s been able to handle everything the city has thrown at her, and she’s hooked up with the other vigilante too, the one who originally inspired her.”
General Meade was about to ask a question when Isadore predicted it.
“No, he’s not an Atlantean, just a normal teenage boy. Turns out he’s from Jaxon’s school. We tried to find out if there was something behind all this, but it looks like it’s just a coincidence. The boy knows a bit of martial arts and has some street smarts. It won’t last, though. The kid is bound to get hurt sooner or later.”
“And Jaxon?”
“She’ll be fine as long as she doesn’t come up against a gang or someone with some decent firepower. I’m thinking this is good field training for her.”
“You’re right, it is, but our schedule has to be sped up. We need to make her training a bit more rigorous.”
“You want us to create an incident?”
“Just steer her in the wrong direction, and she’ll create her own.”
“What if she gets injured? Or killed?”
“She’ll heal from her injuries soon enough,” General Meade said. “And if she gets killed, well, that’s just a risk we’ll have to take.”
“Sounds good to me,” Isadore said. “Stephen had already suggested something along those lines.”
General Meade smiled. Yes, he had been right to entrust the mission to those two. Cold-blooded, the both of them.
“I have an idea that will test her abilities to the utmost,” Isadore said. “It will either make her or break her.”
General Meade watched as the agents and soldiers kept battering at each other, their clothing torn and their features bloody.
“Do whatever you think is best,” he said. “And if she breaks, well, too damn bad.”
In Book 4, The Atlantis Secret, Jaxon is finally settling into LA with Brett by her side. As a vigilante in the night, Jaxon feels she’s finally living with purpose—until tragedy falls. Read an excerpt at the end of this book!
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About the Author
S.A. Beck lives in sunny California. When she’s not surfing, knitting or daydreaming in a hammock, she’s writing novels.
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All Books by S.A. Beck
The Atlantis Saga (7-book series)
Book 1: The Atlantis Girl
Book 2: The Atlantis Allegiance
Book 3: The Atlantis Gene
Book 4: The Atlantis Secret
Book 5: The Atlantis Origins
Book 6: The Atlantis Guard
Book 7: The Atlantis Ascent
* * *
The Mage’s Daughter Trilogy
Book 1: Blood Magic
Book 2: Angel Magic
Book 3: Demon Magic
Excerpt from The Atlantis Secret
JULY 7, 2016, SONORA DESERT, 55 MILES SOUTHWEST OF TUCSON, ARIZONA
12:35 PM
* * *
If there was one thing Otto Heike had learned in his time as part of the Atlantis Allegiance, it was that getting shot at really sucked.
It wasn’t so much the “a high-speed chunk of steel could rip through my body at any moment” part or even the little fact that he could wind up dead in the next few seconds, it was more the nastiness of it all. A group of strangers were doing their best to kill him and his friends for no other reason than wanting to stop Otto from rescuing his girlfriend and making what would be the biggest historical discovery since King Tut’s tomb. Those people figured that since they had larger numbers and more guns, they could tell the Atlantis Allegiance to do whatever they wanted.
Like dying.
It was bullying pure and simple, Otto thought as a burst of semiautomatic rounds chewed up the windowsill through which he was trying to peek outside, spitting bits of concrete into his face. He had never liked bullies.
The only way to deal with bullies was to fight back.
Otto waited until the burst finished, and he popped up from the windowsill just enough to level his grenade launcher, pull the trigger, and lob a round across the overgrown parking lot to hit the cracked pavement right in front of the three black sedans parked nose to nose like a wall a hundred yards away.
Otto ducked just as another bullet whizzed through the window to smack into the back wall of the abandoned gas station where the government agents had him cornered. A moment later, there was a flash and a boom outside.
“Good shot, Pyro!” Grunt said beside him. The hulking mercenary popped up to spray the cars with bullets from his machine gun then ducked down again to avoid any return fire. “Looks like you dazzled a few. Wind’s too strong to keep the smoke blocking their line of fire, though. Launch another, and maybe we’ll get a chance to get out of here.”
“It would help if you gave me real grenades instead of flash-and-smoke bombs!” Otto shouted as he reloaded.
“You want to kill people?”
“No, but it looks like a lot of people want to kill me!”
Otto had been on the run ever since the little band of mercenaries had sprung him from jail. At times, things calmed down, like a week ago when they’d spent a relaxing night in Tucson, eating Mexican food and learning about the Atlanteans from an old professor. But those guys in black suits, the government agents sent by General Meade, had located them again, cornering them in an old, crumbling gas station on a back county road.
The agents had picked their spot well. All around the gas station stretched a vast, flat desert of rock and cacti. There was nobody for miles, not even a ranch house. The Atlantis Allegiance always drove the back roads to avoid getting sighted. That worked most of the time, but whenever they got attacked, they couldn’t hope for any help.
It was just Otto, Grunt, and the half-dozen government agents outside.
“When’s Vivian getting here?” Otto shouted over the sound of gunfire.
“ETA one minute,” Grunt shouted back.
More shots stitched a pattern into the back wall. Otto
crawled to the next window over, kicking some old beer cans out of his path. Keep moving and keep them guessing. Grunt had taught him that. The building looked like it got used frequently as a local party place. Graffiti decorated some of the walls, and empty cans and cigarette stubs littered the floor. At least the partiers had broken all the windows already. If they hadn’t, Grunt and Otto would be getting showers of glass. Those agents’ aim was far too good for Otto’s comfort.
Vivian and Dr. Yamazaki had driven off to open a cache of equipment hidden down the road while he and Grunt stayed at the station to open up a second cache containing some electronic supplies Edward needed. The agents arrived a minute after Vivian had driven out of sight. Otto hoped they hadn’t sent a second group after her. Getting saved by Vivian was Plans A, B, and C.
There was no Plan D.
At least Edward and Dr. Yuhle were a hundred miles away with the trailer. No way they’d get that lumbering vehicle out of the mess Otto was in. It went from zero to sixty in about five hours.
“Outgoing!” Otto shouted, popping up and firing the grenade launcher. He barely made it back out of sight before a bullet cracked off the windowsill.
A moment later, a flash and a thud told him his grenade had gone off. A second after that, a deep boom shook the entire building. The back wall of the gas station was illuminated in garish red.
“Damn, Pyro, you hit one of their gas tanks!” Grunt shouted.
Otto dared a peek outside. A mushroom cloud of flame billowed up from one of the sedans. The haze of smoke from his last bomb shrouded the whole area, weirdly backlit by the burning car. Agents scampered off in all directions to avoid the flames. For a brief second, Otto felt relieved no one had gotten incinerated, but his thoughts were soon swept away by the beautiful sight of the flames.
