Extant

by Mary M Wallace

  Declan felt his curiosity spike. “But you’ve been getting the whole story,” he said. It wasn’t a question, but Stella nodded.

  “Exactly.” Stella looked at him, her gaze direct. “Declan, we know you were meant to be one of his targets. That’s why he made me bring him here. I think I finally have a theory as to why.”

  “I’d love to hear it,” he said.

  “Your ability is different than anything else out there. You can basically do anything, Declan. Do you know how rare that is? The last mimic I know of was born over a century ago. The other abilities out there—they’re far more common. It’s rare for two people to have exactly the same ability, but variations of the same one happen a lot, really. But yours?” She shook her head. “There’s nothing like it.”

  Declan felt oddly embarrassed. He’d been told his ability was rare, but he hadn’t given it much thought. It was just something he could do, like his ability to draw. He’d only known about this part of himself for the last several months, but it had quickly become commonplace. He’d almost begun to take it for granted. Now, he thought about Stella’s words and really considered what she was saying. When things clicked into place, his eyes narrowed.

  “You think Ephraim is collecting Praetorians with rare abilities?” he said. “For what purpose? His mind controller is dead. And Hastings couldn’t manage to control more than one person at a time anyway. What would be the point?”

  Stella chewed her bottom lip in a nervous gesture. “I think he’s experimenting on them.”

  Declan’s brows shot up at that. “I thought that was taboo or something?”

  Stella gave him a look that seemed to question his intelligence. “Since when has Ephraim cared about what’s right or wrong?”

  Declan conceded the point. “That’s true. So, what do you think he’s hoping to accomplish?”

  “Well,” she said. “I can’t really be sure, but I have another theory. When Ephraim disappeared back in 1929, he only had one ability. By all accounts, he’d only ever had one. He wasn’t a mimic, right? So, how can he do all the things they say he can? Never mind the reports that he seemed to have stopped aging. There are reports saying he can walk through walls, read minds. Some say he’s a telekinetic. Some say he can teleport. He’s bulletproof, whatever. Name an ability and there’s probably a report somewhere saying he’s done it.” She leaned forward, her gaze intent. “But he couldn’t do it before. And he’s not a mimic. At least, he wasn’t born one. So, either hundreds of people over the last 80-plus years are lying—or he found a way to acquire more abilities.”

  Declan leaned back in his chair, his thoughts a jumble. He thought about the recurring nightmare that had always seemed to be at the center of things. In it, Ephraim had forced Bree to shoot herself. He’d broken Declan’s bones without touching him. He’d vanished from one place and reappeared in another. Declan had always thought of it as just a dream until he’d met Bree that night in the bar. Once he’d come to terms with the truth of her existence, he’d had to do the same with Ephraim’s. If she was real, Ephraim had to be as well—along with all the things he was able to do. He hadn’t questioned how Ephraim had gained the abilities from the nightmare. He’d been more focused on how to stop it from happening. Now though, he examined the dream from another angle.

  If Stella was right and Ephraim was collecting people with abilities he coveted, it still didn’t explain how he managed to take those abilities for himself.

  “Does anyone really know how the abilities are passed down?” Declan asked. “I mean, genetics plays a small role, right? Because if your parents are Praetorian, you will be too. And your kids and so on. But that doesn’t determine which abilities you end up with. I mean, my mom could start fires with her mind. I can’t do that.”

  Stella shrugged. “You could if there was another pyro around.” She shook her head. “I don’t think you even realize how powerful you could be. But I think Ephraim does. I think he’s known about you for years and has been trying to find you. If he can find a way to harness your ability, he won’t need to keep hunting down others. He’ll have every ability he wants.”

  Declan felt a spike of fear slide down his spine when he thought about someone like Ephraim possessing any ability he wished. He was the type of person who would stop at nothing to achieve his goals. If Stella’s story was any indicator, he clearly didn’t have a problem killing innocent people. He wondered what Ephraim’s end goal was and how many Praetorians he’d already killed to get there. He looked at Stella. She raised her brows at him as though she knew what he was thinking and had been waiting for him to catch up.

  “How did you figure all this out?” he asked.

  “My own experiences plus the info Sawyer found on your parents,” she said. Her face took on a thoughtful expression. “A lot of things have come back to me in the past few weeks. The more I think about it, the more I think Hastings was acting on his own when he ordered me to kill you. Ephraim is more likely to want you alive if he’s experimenting and trying to collect abilities. I wonder if Hastings was trying to eliminate you before Ephraim could take your ability.”

  Declan thought she was probably right. He considered all she’d just told him, feeling a little overwhelmed. He’d spent so much time over the last several months wondering why Ephraim wanted him dead and somehow Stella seemed to have put it all together. He didn’t know what to do with her discovery, but he thought the first step was to talk to Conrad and Rowan. The two of them were experts at planning and strategy. If anyone could come up with a way to stop Ephraim, it was them.

  Declan and Stella went to Rowan first with the theory. When they finished speaking, he stood there for several long seconds. His eyes lost focus for a moment as he used his ability to cycle through the possibilities. When he finished, he stood quickly.

  “Come on,” he said. “We need to talk to Conrad.”

  Declan thought Stella looked nervous, but she didn’t hide herself as they followed Rowan to Conrad’s office. She kept her eyes on Rowan as they walked. After all she’d told him earlier, Declan thought he better understood how difficult this was for her. When they came to the large antechamber leading to Conrad’s office, Rowan stopped and turned to look at Stella.

  “You okay?” he asked, studying her face for a moment.

  She nodded, but Declan thought she still looked nervous. Rowan must have been satisfied with whatever he saw in her face because he turned to enter the large room. Before he could begin walking, Stella reached out and slipped her hand into his. Rowan clearly hadn’t expected this because he looked back at her, his expression questioning. Then he smiled at her and Declan felt like he was intruding on a private moment between the two. He quickly glanced down at his feet. Then the three of them were walking again. They passed between the rows of desks, Rowan and Stella side-by-side and Declan a few steps behind. The people seated at the desks didn’t openly stare, but Declan knew they were stealing glances out of the corners of their eyes as the trio passed. Conrad got plenty of visitors throughout the course of a day, but Stella was still a bit of a celebrity since her return. Word of this visit would spread through the compound like wildfire, everyone speculating as to the reason.

  Conrad opened the door as they reached it, his face carefully blank though Declan thought he detected concern in the man’s eyes.

  “Come in,” he said, looking at each of them in turn. If he thought it odd for the three of them to come to his office in the middle of the afternoon, he didn’t show it.

  Once they’d all filed inside, Conrad closed the door and turned to face them. It wasn’t unusual for Rowan to come to his office with something he deemed important. He didn’t usually bring people with him though. Still, it wouldn’t have worried him if Stella hadn’t been there. She’d been so careful to keep hidden since her return that her arrival here, in full view of everyone, had Conrad more worried than he appeared.

  He walked over to stand in front of the desk, turning to face th
em. “What’s going on?” he asked, letting some of his concern show in his face.

  Rowan was quick to reassure him. “Nothing has happened,” he said. “We think we—well, we think Stella—has figured something out.”

  Conrad glanced from Rowan’s face to Stella who was looking down at the floor. He noticed their joined hands, but he made it a point not to stare. He looked back to Rowan before he made her more uncomfortable.

  “What’s that?” he asked.

  Rowan took a deep breath and looked directly at Conrad. “We think Ephraim is experimenting on Praetorians, trying to gain more abilities. And we think that’s why he wants Declan so badly.”

  Conrad was stunned. Experiments on Praetorians had stopped hundreds of years ago. It was barbaric and inhumane and never led to any new information.

  “Why?” he asked, looking back to Stella. “What makes you think so?” He tried to make his voice calm. For a moment, he thought she wouldn’t answer and he was just about to turn to Rowan or Declan, but then she looked up from the floor.

  “Hastings,” she said, looking at him directly now. “It wasn’t until I heard about the files on Declan’s parents and the place Sawyer said she found with Rafe, that I started putting things together.” She took a breath and let it out. “I did a lot of terrible things because Hastings made me do them. I killed innocent people. I hurt people. But the worst thing I did was take people. I took people with abilities. I delivered them to Hastings and I don’t know what happened to them. For all I knew, they were being treated like me, at best.” She glanced at Declan and then back to Conrad. When she spoke again, her voice was stronger, more certain. “I believe Ephraim has found a way to use the abilities of other Praetorians, like Declan. Only he’s not a true mimic. He had to piece together his ability from the abilities of others.

  “I think he’s after Declan for two reasons. One: because he wants what Declan has. It’s a shortcut. He could stop taking abilities one at a time. If he was a true mimic, he could do anything he wanted.”

  “What’s the second reason?” Declan asked, genuinely curious. She hadn’t mentioned this earlier. Stella turned to look at him.

  “I think Ephraim is afraid of you,” she said. “You’re the only Praetorian with access to more abilities than him. I think, if you really wanted to, you could kill him. And I think he knows that.”

  Stella continued talking, explaining to Conrad what she’d already said to Rowan and Declan. Over the next half hour, Conrad asked questions and Stella answered them as best she could. By the time they’d finished, he was certain that Stella believed her theory. He wasn’t entirely sure she was correct, but he thought there was a strong likelihood. He felt his mind reeling with the new information.

  Looking at Rowan, he said, “We need to look into this. I don’t even know where to start, but I’m sure you have some idea, right?”

  Rowan smiled and shrugged. “You know me,” he said. “I always have ideas. Let me do a little digging and get back to you.”

  Conrad nodded. “Okay,” he said. “For now, I think we need to keep this to ourselves. I don’t want to start rumors and we don’t want people to worry about being kidnapped and experimented on. At least not until we know what’s really going on.”

  They all agreed to wait until they had more to go on before going public. Conrad thanked them all for coming to him, taking care to look at Stella when he did. He didn’t want to put all the focus on her, as he knew that made her uncomfortable. But he wanted to make sure she understood that he was thanking her for having the courage to speak about the things she’d endured. She’d always been so much like her mother. It made him proud to see how much of Gwynn’s strength she possessed. Still, he could see that fragility within her that she hid so well. After the three of them left, Conrad sat staring at his desk for a long moment thinking about all he'd just learned. He worried about Stella. He only hoped her strength would hold out long enough for her to heal from all the wounds she kept hidden.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Declan decided that Conrad’s instructions to keep the information private didn’t include Bree, so he told her everything he’d learned as they ate the pizza Declan had baked. It was one of the few things he was good at and it stemmed from his year of working at a local pizza parlor as a teenager. Bree had been happily surprised to find that he’d cooked for her. When he told her about Stella’s theory, she’d reacted as Declan had known she would. She was worried and afraid for him.

  “What are we going to do next?” she asked. “We need a plan.”

  Declan did his best to reassure her. “Rowan is already working on it,” he said with a smile. “We both know there’s no one better at coming up with plans.” He pulled her into his arms and kissed her. “So, let’s just wait and see what he comes up with.

  He could tell she wasn’t happy with that solution, but she knew there wasn’t anything else they could do without more information.

  “Fine,” she grumbled. She hugged him close, laying her head on his chest. “Thank you for telling me.”

  “Whatever happens,” he said, “we’re in this together.”

  The days passed with no new information. Rowan had the idea of digging into Praetorian history. He wanted to find out more about the experiments that had been conducted over the years. He hoped it would lead him to an answer about what Ephraim was up to. There was a wealth of information in the compound’s library, but Conrad had told him they’d have to petition the council for the older historical archives. Bree was excited about the idea of digging through old books and files. She spent a lot of evenings in the library, trying to find any references to medical history, genetics, or medical testing and experimentation. It was a slow process and after more than a week, she had very little to show for her efforts. Still, it was good to feel like she was doing something.

  It was clear that Ephraim was a step ahead of them and that thought made Bree nervous, especially when it came to Declan. If Stella’s theory was correct, Ephraim wouldn’t stop until he had Declan’s ability. Imagining how he might go about extracting that ability filled Bree with dread. They needed to stop him, but they were no closer now than they’d been when she’d first arrived at the compound. She tried to tell herself that they were making progress, but the sense of dread she felt increased with each day.

  Declan and Rowan had started their training sessions with Rylee sitting in to keep things calm in Declan’s head. Bree had been present for the first session. Afterward, it had been decided that she shouldn’t attend anymore. This was for many reasons, the main one being that she found it nearly impossible to remain silent and still while Declan was in pain. She wanted to call a halt to the whole thing as soon as it started. Declan had also told her that her being there was a distraction that was breaking his concentration. Bree hadn’t argued the point.

  When the three of them had a training session, Bree made herself scarce and spent the evening in the library, researching. It was something she was good at and she enjoyed it. If it could help keep Declan safe and keep her from watching his nightly migraine session, she was all for it. After a week, Declan had told her that he seemed to finally be getting the hang of Rowan’s ability. At least, the nosebleeds had stopped. He hadn’t passed out since that first time. He was still nowhere near Rowan’s capabilities, but he was convinced now that he would eventually be proficient. Bree still didn’t come to the learning sessions.

  One night, Rowan invited the team over for dinner. He said he thought everyone could use a break from the stresses they’d been under and they all agreed. Bree and Declan met Sawyer and Corbin in the hallway outside Rowan’s door. Jon and Rylee were running late and had told them to go ahead. Rowan greeted them all with a smile and gestured them inside his quarters. To everyone’s confusion, his living room was decorated for a party.

  When Sawyer turned to look at him with narrowed eyes, he smiled and said, “Surprise?”

  Sawyer shook her head and gave him an annoy
ed look, but there was a gleam of amusement in her eyes.

  “I thought I got out of it this year,” she said, finally allowing herself a smile.

  “Not a chance,” Rowan said with a grin. “What are big brothers for?”

  “Thanks, Ro,” she said as she looked around at the bright streamers and balloons scattered throughout the room.

  There was a beautifully decorated cake with Sawyer’s name in the center of the dining table. She looked at Rowan with a questioning gaze.

  “Maggie said I couldn’t give you a crappy cake,” he said, sheepishly. “She made it.”

  Sawyer’s smile broadened. “It’s great,” she said. “Is she coming?”

  Rowan nodded. “Yeah, everyone will be here in a bit. I told them all different times.” He and Sawyer both laughed as Corbin shook his head at the two of them, smiling.

  “I’ll never understand this thing you guys do,” he said as he walked over to snag a chip from one of the bowls on the counter.

  Bree looked from Sawyer to Rowan, confused. “Um, happy birthday?” she said to Sawyer.

  Sawyer smiled. “Thanks,” she said, turning to look at the others. “I’ve never really been into birthday parties and I hate surprises. When I was a kid, Rowan and Nick used to try to make my birthday a big deal, thinking they were being nice. I never told them I hated it.” She looked to Rowan who smiled and took over the story.

  “After my dad passed,” he said, “it was just me to throw the party. That first year I wanted everything to be perfect. I wanted to prove that it could be just as good as it was when it was me and him doing it. I cooked the food, baked the cake, decorated everything. I went all out.” His lips curved into a smile. “It was awful. The food was burnt, the cake was dry, the decorations wouldn’t stay up. I got really mad, you know? I’d failed. That’s when Sawyer told me that she didn’t even like the surprise parties. She never had. She just wanted to make us happy, so she’d been pretending for 10 years.” Sawyer leaned over and wrapped her arm around Rowan’s waist, giving him another hug.