Fight to the Finish

by Shannon Greenland

  TL’s jaw hardened and I could tell he was not in the mood to deal with any objections or questions.

  David must have picked up on it, too, because he quickly took over the conversation. “Women aren’t allowed to compete in the fights,” he answered Bruiser. “But we definitely need you there as our fighting consultant. Mystic’s girlfriend is the only cover we can give you that will put you close enough to the fights.”

  Bruiser and Mystic eyed each other across the table. They did not look happy.

  “The fighters are kept separate from each other,” David went on. “Mystic needs to interact with everyone until he sees what he needs to see regarding Zandra. This makes it imperative that Mystic fight as many competitors as possible.”

  I raised my finger. “And me and Chapling?”

  TL nodded to Chapling. “Chapling, of course, will work from home base.”

  Of course. I remembered a time when I was promised I would work from home base. But, truth be told, I’d gotten to the point where I sort of liked the traveling, the missions. Sort of. Of course, I’d never admit that out loud.

  TL looked between me and Chapling. “You two are going to design that state-of-the-art, one-of-a-kind program to identify Harry Noor’s new Warriors. And when David and Mystic show up for Warrior tryouts, you need to figure out how your program will identify them as top notch fighters and get them hired on with the Demise Chain. After that, you’ll be on hand working for Harry Noor, advising his fighters. Obviously, if it’s anybody other than Mystic, you’ll give bad advice. Anything to advance Mystic in the competition.”

  “Um,” Hello? Did they not see the fact that I knew absolutely nothing about fighting? For that matter, I’d never even played a fighting video game. Heck, I couldn’t even remember the last time I’d played a video game, period. Not that we were talking about video games, but it was all I could think of that related.

  Chapling clapped his hands. “No problem. Noprobnoprob. This’ll be fun. A little Physics, electricity, throw in some magnetism—Oooh! And we can get those absorption pads from storage and switch out the acceleration wires for recording force faction. Oooh!” He rapid fire clapped. “We should totally get Dr. Gretchen involved. Have you seen what she’s got in her cabinets?” He scratched his head, making his brillo pad hair poof out. “Yeahyeahyeahyeahyeah.”

  He pushed back from the table and jumped down from his seat. “She’s got that really cool,” he snapped his fingers, “what do you call it . . . oh I can’t remember right now.” Chapling waddled over to the conference door, opened it, and walked right on out.

  Everyone just looked at each other.

  David turned to me. “Back on track. Harry Noor is meeting with prospective computer designers in one week. He’ll pick the person he wants to work with after seeing their presentation. He will pick you.”

  I lifted my brows and asked the obvious. “And if he doesn’t pick me?”

  “That’s not an option,” David responded.

  Great. Talk about pressure.

  “A couple days after that,” David continued, “the Warrior try outs will occur, and the following evening will be the night of fighting that Mystic and I will compete in.”

  TL clicked his pen. “There are a lot of unknown facts here. Who is the person who kidnapped Zandra? What does he or she want? What do the fights have to do with it?” TL clicked his pen again. “We’re working with a lot of indefinite details. And that doesn’t make me comfortable in the least.”

  Not to mention the fact his, their, daughter’s life was at stake. With that thought I glanced at Nalani again and found her sitting there staring blankly at the table in front of her. Slowly, her eyes closed, and although it was slight, her brows drew together with the stress and sadness of the situation.

  “Switching modes.” TL pushed back from the table and stood. “Each of you has a specialty. In order to expand on that talent and further your knowledge, you need materials. You need your own special place to go for privacy, research, and practice.”

  I knew he was talking about our special rooms. Only Mystic and Bruiser had not been introduced to their rooms. TL had introduced the rest of us to our rooms right before we went on our first missions.

  TL looked at Bruiser. “Bruiser, you are the only member of your team who has not seen your training room.” He nodded. “Time to take a look.”

  What? I looked across the table at Mystic. You’ve seen your room? I mouthed.

  He nodded.

  Huh. I’d been there every other time my team members had been shown their special area. Why not Mystic?

  TL opened the conference room door. “David’s going to take over from here. It’s late. Please do eat. Get some rest. Training starts first thing in the morning. Bruiser, I want you and David to meet me in my office in one hour. We need to discuss the MMA training needed for this mission.”

  Bruiser nodded.

  Jonathan and Nalani followed TL out of the conference room, leaving me, Mystic, and Bruiser alone with David.

  “When did you all remove your monitoring patches?” I asked, referring to a device we all had to wear when we first moved in.

  “About a month into living here,” Bruiser answered.

  Mystic shrugged. “About the same time.”

  “Same time as me then,” I realized.

  “Bruiser,” David cut in, “ready to see your room?”

  “Definitely!” She pushed back from the table.

  “Can we come?” I asked. “And what about Mystic’s room? Can we see his?”

  David nodded. “I don’t have a problem with that.”

  He led us from the conference room and down the hall of secret rooms, past all the doors I knew of, and came to a stop at tall, beige, double wide filing cabinet.

  This file cabinet had been here up against the wall from pretty much day one of me arriving to the ranch. I hadn’t given it much attention. I did open it once and found it unlocked, with every drawer empty. I’d figured it was extra storage, and TL would move it somewhere when he was ready.

  Stepping to the side, David motioned Mystic forward, and Bruiser and I exchanged a puzzled glance.

  Mystic slowly ran his fingers along the top of the cabinet, almost as if he was a magician silently telling it abracadabra. The cabinet shifted out from the wall and slid to the side, revealing a tunnel glowing in a soft blue light. My nostrils flared a little as they picked up a waft of incense.

  I stood there for a second, staring at the tunnel, smelling the incense, trying to work through what had just happened.

  “There are identity stamp sensors painted into the perimeter of the cabinet,” David explained. “They are rigged to read mine, Mystic’s, Chapling’s, and TL’s prints.”

  “Oh.” That made sense.

  Mystic stepped into the blue glowing tunnel, and we followed. About six feet in, the tunnel opened into a large circular room I estimated to be fifty feet in diameter.

  The walls had been painted light purple, and on the walls scripted with the color teal were the words love, peace, joy, breathe, and harmony. A wooden table stood in the center of the room with a yellow pottery vase. Smoke trailed up from the vase, and I assumed it contained the incense. Oversized, vibrant pillows and cushions piled the area around that table. I guessed that was where Mystic meditated.

  Soft music trickled through the air, settling the sound of hollow wind chimes through me. Around the circumference of the room, about every few feet, stood wooden tables with bowls of brightly colored stones.

  To our immediate right, there were three glass cabinets with see-through doors. Crystals lined the shelves. Big ones, small ones. Round, jagged, lumpy. Clear, green, red, yellow, and purple. Bowls, too, with various herbs in them. My gaze trailed over the top shelf where a row of pendants lay. I smiled at one shaped like a fairy.

  Across the circular room I saw a bookshelf with about fifty books. I could only assume they dealt with mystical themes.

  Diagonal to
where I stood sat a desk with a computer on top. It seemed so out of place in this gypsy world atmosphere. Surrounding the desk and hanging from the ceiling were long beads that acted as the desk’s walls. Diagonal in the opposite direction sat another desk surrounded by hanging beads as well. Decks of cards sat on top that desk, and I gathered they were Tarot or something of that nature.

  There was so much to look at I couldn’t possibly take it all in. But I did notice a telescope off to my left with an extension leading up and through the ceiling. I didn’t know a lot about telescopes, but from what I did know that one looked top of the line. And keeping in mind we were on Sub Floor Four, that was one high powered star gazer.

  Peaceful. That word definitely described this room.

  “Ya know,” Bruiser whispered. “This room makes me want to take a nap or meditate or something.”

  I smiled. Napping and meditating were two words definitely not in Bruiser’s vocabulary.

  She wandered over to one of the tables with the bowls of stones. “What do these do?” She reached out.

  “Stop.” Mystic commanded. “Don’t. They’re not ready for the human touch yet.”

  Bruiser lifted her hands away and glanced over at me. “Ready for the human touch?”

  I shrugged.

  “Okay,” David said, stepping back into the tunnel. “Let’s go see Bruiser’s room.

  We walked down the blue glowing tunnel that led out from Mystic’s room and stepped back into the hallway. Mystic abracadabra his fingers over the filing cabinet, and it slid back into place.

  Mystic, Bruiser, and I followed David through the underground corridors back to the elevator that we all had used when coming down here. David punched in his personal code, and we stepped inside.

  Bruiser and I exchanged a questioning glance. “But what about her room?”

  “Your room,” David answered, “is on Sub Floor Two.”

  “Sub Floor Two?” I perked up. Cool. I’d wondered what else was on that floor.

  One, of course, was our ranch level. Sub Two contained Parrot’s room. Sub Three, I’d discovered while prepping for my last mission, was the clinic where Dr. Gretchen worked. And we’d all known what was on Sub Four since day one—our conference room and the other secret rooms.

  David pointed to the elevator’s control panel. In the center of it was a small black box which looked like a camera. “This is an exhalation analyzer. It is programmed to read your DNA via your breath. Step forward and breathe into it.”

  An exhalation analyzer? And here I’d always thought it was a camera.

  “Freakin’ A, that’s cool.” Bruiser stepped up to the analyzer and breathed a quick, fast breath.

  The elevator ascended, stopped at Sub Two, the door opened, and Bruiser’s mouth simultaneously dropped.

  I peered over her head—being tall always had its advantages—and into, well, a gymnasium was how I supposed it would be described. Then again, the only physical training room I’d ever been in was our barn where we had daily PT. So I wasn’t exactly an expert when it came to identifying work out rooms.

  “Where’s Parrot’s room in relation to this?” I asked.

  “On the other side of the wall.” David motioned his head across the room. “Separated by five feet of concrete.”

  Mouth still open, Bruiser slowly stepped into the enormous room.

  This place was bigger than all the other secret rooms. An octagon in shape, I estimated it covered over one hundred square feet. A fighting rink sprawled the center of the room, bordered by thick wire mesh. It had a red floor with some sort of Asian symbol painted on it.

  Bruiser wandered off to the left, and I watched her as she found her way around the room in a sort of daze. She passed by a wall with an assortment of weapons: swords, knives, throwing stars, numb chucks.

  She reached up for a sword, and taking it from the wall, turned to David. “Sparring?”

  He nodded. “They’re dull.”

  With a nod, she continued around the room, idly swishing the sword through the air. She passed by punching bags, a collection of body pads, hanging rings, a rack of dumbbells, and came to a stop at the edge of a section of bamboo flooring.

  Kicking her running shoes off, she stepped onto the bamboo and gave a slight bounce. A slow smile curved her face as she turned to all of us. “Oh, yeah.”

  And then she launched into a series of spins that looked like a cross between martial arts and gymnastics. I’d seen her in action many times, but her speed and agility always left me speechless.

  She came to a stop just as quickly as she had begun and wandered off the bamboo and over to a book shelf. She stood for a second perusing, and then reached up and slid one free. She opened it and flipped through. “Sa-weet. The latest meridian book.”

  I turned to David and Mystic. “Meridian?”

  “Pressure points in your body,” Mystic answered. “Used in holistic healing and martial arts among other things.”

  “Hmmm.” It sounded like Mystic and Bruiser’s specialties shared similarities. Of course, I wouldn’t point that out to them. They were the antithesis of each other.

  While Bruiser continued looking through her books, I took in the rest of the room. A shower in the corner, a climbing wall, dangling ropes, thick poles I assumed were for some workout reason, and like Mystic’s place, Bruiser had a desk and computer.

  Like I said, I knew next to nothing about gyms, but this seemed pretty darn cool.

  Bruiser closed the book and with it tucked under her arm, turned to David. “Unbelievable. There’s not one thing I can think of that I don’t have.”

  David smiled a little. “Well, if you do think of something, just let me or TL know, and we’ll get it for you.”

  Bruiser grinned. “Can I have an endless supply of chocolate?”

  David gave her a playfully disciplinary look. “Within reason.”

  She laughed and started bouncing in place. “Can I stay?”

  David nodded. “Not long. Remember we have a meeting with TL. Dinner and rest and we start first thing in the morning.”

  She gave another bounce. “Is this where we’re training for the Demise Chain mission.”

  David nodded again.

  Bruiser headed over to a punching bag. “Oh, goodie,”

  David stepped back into the elevator, and Mystic and I followed.

  Mystic pressed the Sub Four button and the doors closed. “I’m heading to my room.”

  David started to say something and Mystic held up his hand. “I know dinner and rest and we start first thing in the morning.”

  David smiled his acknowledgment. The elevator descended, Mystic got off, and the door closed, shutting David and I alone in the elevator.

  Immediately my stomach kicked in with nervousness.

  Neither one of us moved to punch in our code, and I detected uneasiness in him, too.

  “Do you realize,” I softly said, “this is the first time we’ve been alone in a month?”

  Smiling a little, he turned to me. “And this will probably be the last time we have an alone moment until after this mission.”

  I nodded, understanding if we were going to finally talk about things, now was it. “Can we talk?”

  Folding his gorgeous, muscular arms over his beautiful chest, he leaned back against the wall. “Yes, let’s.”

  “I thought—” he started at the same time I said, “You know—”

  We both laughed a little, and he motioned me to go ahead.

  “You know,” I began again, “the last real conversation we had was over a month ago. And we both know how that played out. I told you about Professor Quirk, and you told me you needed time to think. And then you got sent away on a mission, we exchanged a few text messages, no phone calls, and here we are.”

  David nodded. “Being a Specialist doesn’t give much time for other things, does it?”

  I chuckled a breath. “That’s putting it lightly.”

  He smiled at that
. “And so?” he prompted me.

  I sighed. “David, I guess at this point I just want to know what’s on your mind. I know you’re not happy about Professor Quirk, but let me remind you he kissed me.”

  David nodded. “I know that, GiGi. You’re a beautiful, intelligent woman. Guys are going to hit on you. That’s just a fact of life.”

  I tried not to get flattered at the beautiful part, but I was a girl after all. “Then why do I feel like we’re going to break up over this?”

  He didn’t respond, just kept looking at me.

  “David?” And then it dawned on me, and my heart paused a beat. “Are we breaking up?”

  “GiGi,” he quietly sighed. “It wasn’t the kiss. It was never the kiss.”

  “Then what?” I asked, surprised that I could talk with a huge lump forming in my throat.

  “It was the ‘we clicked on an intellectual level’ part. That really hurt.”

  I swallowed. “Oh, David. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean—”

  With a shake of his head, he held up his hand. “Tell me what you want.”

  For you to touch me, to hug me, to tell me we’re okay. But instead, I shook my head, unable to collect my suddenly spinning thoughts. What can I say to save this? What can I do?

  “That’s just it,” he softly responded. “I don’t think you know what you want.”

  I want you, I wanted to say, but instead responded, “What do you want?”

  He gave me a sad smile. “You shouldn’t have to ask me that.”

  “But . . .” hadn’t he just asked me that exact same question?

  “And now,” David continued, “with Randy temporarily here, I don’t know. I just don’t know.”

  I swallowed.

  “I don’t know what else to do.” He closed his eyes. “I thought we were fine, great in fact. Then this thing with Randy comes up. Now he’s here, and obviously there’s something between you.”

  “What? No,” I denied. “We’re friends, that’s all.”

  David’s expression softened as he gazed at me, not saying anything.

  Finally, he nodded. “Truth be told, GiGi, somewhere deep inside I knew this wouldn’t work. Dating, living under the same roof, working for the same organization. It’s too much. It’s too close.”