Winter's Legacy: Future Days (Winter's Saga Book 6)

by Karen Luellen

  “Um, yeah. Inspiring speech. So why do I still feel like I’m going to hurl on my boots?” Cole moaned.

  “You’d be crazy not to be scared.” Creed offered a tight-lipped smile.

  “Evan, you’re up.” Meg’s words had everybody turn to look at Evan with curiosity.

  “Right, okay. Well, while we were in Cairo, I spent a lot of time at the University’s Student Lab secretly working on two projects. With Kylie’s help, I finished them hours before the attack on the yellow house.”

  “What projects?” Alik asked, his blue eyes searching.

  “Remember when Arkdone planted nanoweapons into our bodies designed as triggers and explosives to keep us from being in close proximity to one another?”

  “I’m sure everybody remembers that,” Meg’s voice took on a hateful edge as she recalled clearly the day she was subjected to the device that gave her “The Perfect Concussion.”

  “Right,” Evan continued. “Well, that gave me the idea. I created my own nanoweapons.”

  “You did what?” Margo squeaked.

  “Well, to be fair, I didn’t start from scratch. To construct a nanoid from the start would have been exceedingly tedious requiring access to high-tech materials, laboratory equipment and time I just didn’t have. So I extracted the deactivated nanoparticles that had been implanted into my chest by Arkdone.” Evan ran his hands through his hair, deep in thought before continuing. Had he taken a moment to look up, he would have seen the entire family staring at him, bug-eyed and jaws agape.

  “I only needed one, you see. After some trial and error, I finally succeeded in reanimating and reprogramming one. The trials I conducted on Moe and Curly confirmed my work.”

  “Moe and Curly?” Cole interrupted.

  “His lab rats,” Kylie offered with a smile. She had known Evan was working on something complex and suspected it had something to do with the creation of an offensive strategy, but this—nanoweaponry—blew her mind.

  Evan looked up and blinked as though waking from a foggy nap.

  “Evan, keep talking,” Meg’s tone was both encouraging and anxious.

  “Right,” Evan nodded, as though his sister were there to see him. “So, once I had the first nanoid functioning properly, I set it to self-replicate using the other hundred nanoparticles I harvested from myself as spare parts. Seventy-two hours later, I had amassed a microscopic army. I designed them to target the Circle of Willis where they remain in a sleeper-state until activated.”

  Cole raised his hand. “I am so lost. Who the heck is Willis?”

  Those with medical backgrounds found it hard not to smile at Cole’s perplexed expression. “The Circle of Willis is a ring of arteries found at the base of the brain that provides all the blood that comes and goes to the brain. It is essential for life,” Theo explained.

  Cole reached up and rubbed the back of his neck. “Got it. Sorry, keep going Ev.”

  Evan pulled the black, hard-shelled sunglasses case from his pocket and waited impatiently to continue. Cole was like a brother to him, but it was difficult to discuss his research and developments in a way that everybody could understand. “No worries, Cole.” He forced himself to smile, though inside he was chomping at the bit to finally explain what had been a guarded secret for months.

  “The nanoids will remain in their sleeper-state indefinitely, unless triggered.” He opened the black case and held it out for everyone to see. “Meg, I have in my hand two vials and six keychain-sized cylinders.” He explained aloud so she could visualize what he was holding. “In the vials are the nanoweapons—one for Arkdone, the other for Williams. The Chapstick-sized devices are remote detonators. When any one of the detonators is triggered, the nanoids in both Arkdone’s and Williams’ brains will cause a rapid annihilation of those vital arteries. Death will be painful but complete in fifteen minutes.”

  “So,” Theo’s eyes were alight with excitement. “Why would we bother with the remote detonators? I mean, if we’ve managed to inject them with the nanoids, why not kill them right then?”

  Meg’s voice sounded distant, as though she’d pulled the phone away from her mouth. “We don’t want to kill them unless we have to. They’re powerful men who could be forced to use their positions for good.”

  “My thoughts exactly, Meg,” Evan was grinning as he stared at the cell phone still in his mother’s hand.

  “That’s why you made so many detonators?” Theo asked.

  “So the ability to activate the nanoweapons was spread out. If either of them tries to kill any one or more of us, the survivors would still be able to retaliate.”

  “But what if one acts out and the other doesn’t?” Farrow had been concentrating hard on the conversation, doing her best to keep up. She got lost in the medical and technical jargon that may as well have been a different language to her.

  “That’s just another safeguard,” Alik explained. “Right Evan?”

  “Precisely. I propose we explain the intricacies of our ‘checkmate’ like this: We allow them to live if Arkdone steps down from his political posts and closes his asylum completely—including the release of all metamonarchs currently ‘in training’. Williams must forfeit all associations with metahumans as well, disband the Facility and relocate to Arkdone’s asylum. Neither will be allowed to further experiment with human subjects of any age: zygote to cadaver. We tell them they can live out their days in this peaceful but forced exile, if they adhere to these rules. If one or both are ever discovered to have broken any part of these imposed rules of peace, they die.”

  The plane was silent for a moment before Cole spoke up. “Or we just kill ’em. I vote for kill ’em.”

  49 Winter’s Revenge

  “Wait, you said ‘projects’—as in more than one,” Sloan pushed. She’d had no problem keeping up with the conversation and was anxious to hear the whole story.

  “Yeah, I did.” Evan began with a deep breath. “The nanoweapon is in the blue vial. The other project is the golden one.”

  “What is it?” Margo asked her son.

  “Payback.” Evan’s face hardened. Evan stared at the gold liquid before continuing. “I used my blood as the base.”

  “You recreated the original serum? But I thought you already did that?” Theo asked.

  “I did. This time, I didn’t want to replicate the Infinite Serum. I wanted to dismantle it.”

  “You created a neutralizer.” Alik’s face paled.

  “Oh, it doesn’t just neutralize. It leaves the subject in a weakened, susceptible state.” Evan nodded solemnly, “In my mind, I’ve called it Winter’s Revenge. Creating it was far easier than the nanoweapons and was actually done as an afterthought. I really didn’t have time to thoroughly test it, but preliminary tests on Groucho and Harpo—more lab rats—proved promising.

  “I just knew the nanoweapons weren’t going to be enough. I wanted a way to strike fear in them—in a demoralizing and life-threatening way. They have more than earned this.” He glanced at his mother’s facial expression. She looked deep in thought, an internal struggle clear on her face.

  “Mom, any one of the things these devils have done, not just to us, but to other innocent souls, warrants this. This is poetic justice.” Evan nodded at the gold vial in his hand.

  “How likely is death?” Margo asked, her voice level.

  “Groucho and Harpo both lived, but they were on death’s door for five days. To be honest, I don’t know how miraculous their survival was. But during those five days, the exaggerated strength and intelligence they had gained from becoming meta-rats three weeks before, was stripped away.”

  The family exchanged glances.

  “Can both the nanoweapon and Winter’s Revenge be used simultaneously?” Theo asked.

  “In theory, yes. Each will target different parts of the body. The nanoids simply travel to their predetermined location and lie in wait. The Revenge attacks on a cellular level—stripping the DNA strand of its metahuman mutation. Again,
I didn’t have enough time to test as thoroughly as I would have liked, but the science is solid. I poured all my knowledge into these projects. It’s all I did the entire time we lived in Cairo.”

  “How would they be administered?”

  “I fill one syringe with half of each. We inject Arkdone and Williams. The hard part is going to be getting near enough to them to dose them.”

  “Well, I like this idea!” Cole blurted. “Winter’s Revenge sounds wicked cool!”

  “We need to make sure it never falls into the wrong hands,” Meg’s voice sounded haunted through the cellphone speaker.

  “Agreed,” Evan carefully placed the vial full of golden liquid back into its case and closed the lid carefully. “You can imagine how careful I’ve had to be during its creation.”

  Everybody stayed quiet, waiting for Margo to weigh in. She held still as stone for a moment then began slowly shaking her head.

  Evan’s heart sunk. He had spent so much effort trying to find a way to control and punish the men who hurt his family—hurt thousands for that matter—that he hadn’t given much thought beyond creating the weapons. His mother’s disapproval smacked bitterly.

  “Mom, c’mon. Be reas—” Alik started in his brother’s defense.

  Margo held up her hand, silencing him. “Alik, please,” she gently chided her oldest son.

  “Evan, these ‘projects’ of yours. They’re brilliant—absolutely brilliant.” She reached out to hold Evan’s clammy hand.

  “While I was wheelchair-bound, I had a lot of time to think. I saw you all struggle and fight. Sometimes your struggles were against the enemy but more times than I’d like to remember, it was with one another or even yourselves. I felt helpless. I couldn’t help you the way I knew how. I couldn’t take-up weapons and command a strike against those who dared harm my babies and it infuriated me! I am as much a fighter as I am a woman of faith. Having a huge part of what makes me feel like a good mother taken away from me, left me more than just physically crippled. I was emotionally crippled, too.

  “Your work in the lab, that’s your way of fighting, Evan. Using your brilliant mind, solving problems with complex science, that’s how you show your love. It’s the most powerful ‘gift’ you have. If this is what you designed to help your family overcome these monsters, who am I to deny you? I will not cripple you the way I was crippled,” Margo shook her head emphatically.

  “I think your forethought and planning was genius. We have tried to handle matters peaceably and neither Arkdone nor Williams will allow it. Evan, you were right to see the need for weapons.”

  As Margo spoke, Evan’s smile grew until it was wide enough for his honey eyes to crinkle adorably at the corners.

  50 This Is It

  “Brilliant ingenuity, Evan. How did you know we’d need this?” Theo asked.

  “Yeah, it was part of my original vision. The one I shared only with Meg all those months ago.”

  “Did your vision happen to show you how we were going to manage to inject the weapons into W-Arkdone?” Cole pressed.

  “W-Arkdone? Really?” Sloan muttered.

  “It’s faster,” Cole shrugged and offered her a crooked grin.

  “No, I was hoping you could help me figure that part out,” Evan admitted.

  “We’ll come up with something,” Margo waved dismissively though her thoughts were already racing with possible scenarios. “What Evan has given us is a means to cut off the heads of the snakes. We take out the leaders and their groups—controlled by fear and force—will disintegrate. Absolutely—‘checkmate’.”

  “I’m going to have to go soon. I’m not done fortifying the house and I’m running out of time,” Meg explained as a shuffling sound could be heard on her end.

  “Of course Meg,” Margo’s brow furrowed with deep lines.

  “What’s your ETA?” Meg asked. Inwardly, cringing at what she knew she was about to hear.

  “Jacobi and Trainer are burning fuel getting us there as fast as possible, but we’re still two hours, fifty minutes away from the jump zone,” Creed checked the countdown he’d programmed into his watch.

  Meg chewed on her lip. “Yeah, I’m not sure what will be happening by then, but I know I’ll do everything I can to hold down the fort.”

  Everybody sat in worried silence for a moment, mulling over her implications.

  “I have faith in you, Meg.” The confidence in Creed’s voice was powerful enough to break the foreboding temperature drop they felt for Meg.

  “Listen to me, Meg,” Creed continued. “You just stay alive. That’s your one objective. Use any means necessary. Hideout in the topography of the land. Build a fortress around yourself in the laboratory. Heck, dig a hole in the ground and breathe through a straw if you have to. But stay alive.” Creed’s love for Meg and his desperation for her safety was clear to everybody. “Will you do that for me, Meggie?” his voice softened, defining him as even more courageous in its vulnerability.

  “I love you, Creed.” The emotion in Meg’s voice exposed her fears of letting her family down—of letting Creed down. “I love you all so much my heart swells with happiness, then crashes down with terror that I could lose you in an instant.”

  “Meg, don’t talk like that.” Alik pinched the bridge of his nose, refusing to let his tears slip through. “We’ll be together soon and we’ll all be there to fight at your side.”

  “I know you want to protect me little brother, but everyone has done the math. I’ll have at least ninety minutes of flying solo down here.” Meg looked around the lab, somehow seeing every detail of every piece of furniture, equipment, vial, flask and instrument as clearly as if she’d just donned a pair of three dimensional glasses. She swallowed hard at the taste of adrenaline, coppery sweet, rising in her throat. “A lot could happen in 90 minutes,” she added with a haunted whisper.

  “Meggie,” Evan’s voice pleaded.

  “Evan, you listen to me, baby brother. You too Alik. This is bigger than any one of us. Williams and Arkdone have to be handled, if not neatly by Evan’s weapons, then messy with multiple bullets in their heads. No matter what happens to me, Evan’s plan will still work. You have to make it happen. Promise me, promise each other, whoever is left standing will take up the cross and finish what we started—or die trying.”

  Everybody’s eyes were red with emotion as they murmured their promises aloud.

  “If we get separated we need a meeting point,” Farrow offered, discreetly wiping her runny nose, forcing herself to think like a soldier—a soldier who needed to force everyone to think of contingency plans.

  “Give it two weeks from today. In two weeks time, if anyone was separated from the group, we will plan to meet at whatever remains of Paulie’s house on the west side of the Big Island.”

  “Who’s Paulie?” Sloan leaned in to whisper to Cole.

  “I’ll tell you later.” He reached for her hand and held it affectionately.

  “Hawaii?” Farrow was asking the group.

  “Yeah, Hawaii,” Theo breathed deeply before continuing. “I’ll have to dig deep, but I’ll make sure you have access to enough cash for plane tickets.”

  “That won’t be necessary Dr. Andrews.” Vince Trainer, the straight-laced copilot who had been with them from the start, stepped through the cockpit door. “I’m sorry, Jacobi and I were listening through the intercom,” he blushed deeply. “You just get in contact with either of us, anytime, day or night, and we’ll pull the strings to make sure you get back to the Big Island on time.”

  Theo stood and shook the pilot’s hand before pulling him in for a guy hug.

  “Did you tell them, Vince?” Bob Jacobi’s voice boomed over the intercom.

  “Yeah, I told them, Bob!”

  “It’s been an honor working with you. Vince and I are determined to finish this with you.”

  Margo laughed through her tears at the gruff affection clear in the senior pilot’s voice. “Thank you, Bob. And you, Vince. It means so
much to me to know you’ll help my family reunite.”

  “Mom,” Meg’s hushed voice interrupted the minute of hopefulness and brought everyone to immediate silence. “I’ve got to go. I love you.”

  “We love you too, Meg. We’ll see you soon. Do you hear me?”

  “Yes, ma’am. Goodbye, for now.”

  “Just for now,” Creed added before the phone went dead in Margo’s trembling hand.

  The bulkhead slowly emptied as everybody shuffled to their seats further back in the plane.

  Margo and Theo sat side-by-side, deep in thought.

  “Mom,” Evan smiled sadly as she blinked away her shadows of doubt and looked up at her son.

  “Hm?”

  “This is exactly what I saw one hour ago.” He sighed deeply, his shoulders hunched. “I’m not sure how helpful that part of my gift really is.”

  Margo reached up and squeezed his hand gently. “‘Your talent is God's gift to you. What you do with it is your gift back to God. Just think about it, son. And please remember, I love you no matter what.”

  51 The Originals 101

  “I believe we’re all present now,” Donovan Arkdone began. “We’ll start with introductions. I have thirty-five metamonarchs on my team.” The camera panned slowly giving each face a second to be spotlighted.

  “For those of you unaware, metamonarchs are both metahuman and Monarch slave—a powerful and exceedingly lethal hybrid. They will do exactly as I order, as any Monarch slave would, but the metahuman element enhances their advantage. They will fight with strength, intelligence and absolute obedience—to the death. Their pursuit of the objective will be single-minded.” He paused for dramatic effect.

  “They are led by my most skilled and seasoned agent, Michelle Andrews.” A drop-dead, beautiful dark-haired woman with obsidian, starless eyes stepped into the camera’s sight.

  “Dr. Williams, please introduce your teams,” Arkdone, ever the showman for the camera bowed slightly.