“I’m going with you to the Hole,” Cassie stated matter-of-factly.
“So will I,” Nemesis volunteered. “We owe you and yours a debt we can never repay.”
“My love,” Laine said to her husband. “Alexon. Stay with him, please. I’ll be better able to do this knowing he is safe within these walls with you at his side.”
Nemesis opened his mouth to argue.
“She’s right,” I chimed in. “We’ll need her to read this Rival Mercer’s mind, even if he’s uncooperative. A smaller group would be better. This isn’t a mission that will need a lot of muscle. Trust me, I wish it did.”
“Please?” Laine asked her husband.
“I’ll stay and watch over Alexon. Come back soon and safe. We have a family to grow,” Nemesis gave in. He drew closer to his wife. Pressing his body against her own, he took her in his arms. Their lips connected passionately. Laine began to purr.
“All right, all right,” I said, pressing myself against one of the walls and scooting around them to the exit. “I’m not sure how things are done on your planets, but we don’t really do public affection like that around here. If you two need a room, then we can make that happen.”
Wesley and Preacher had already moved away from the door, the former muttering about something he had to do, the latter silent and red-faced.
“I didn’t know you were so bothered by public affection,” Cassie teased me. “I’ll have to remember that.”
“Well, not all public affection,” I said, looking back to the couple making out in the dungeon room with the passed-out Spit at their feet. “Just some kinds.”
A twinkle lit Cassie’s eye that told me she wasn’t going to let me forget about this.
We exited the dungeon together. Preacher was already opening a comm line to the Galactic Government via his earpiece. Borrowing a satellite from the GG wasn’t going to be easy, but after our part in the Battle for Mars, I thought we stood a fifty-fifty chance.
Wesley waited for me at the ground level.
“May I borrow Daniel for a moment?” the older man asked Cassie. “I promise it won’t take long.”
“Of course,” Cassie answered. “I’ll prepare transportation to the Hole in New Vegas. We’ll leave first thing in the morning.”
“Thank you,” I said, stifling a yawn. I wasn’t sure what time it was, but I knew it was past my bedtime. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
Cassie nodded and took off toward the garage.
“Walk with me,” Wesley said with a jerk of his chin as he started toward the main staircase in the lower level. “We’ve been through the ringer, that’s for sure. How are you holding up? I mean, without X?”
“Not good,” I told him. “But we’ll get her back. She’s tough. She’ll hang in there. She’ll buy us the time we need to find her. With any luck, by this time tomorrow, we’ll know where she is and be on the way to get her.”
Wesley nodded as if he approved.
We climbed the staircase from the first to the second floor and then the third and fourth floors in silence. Down a wide hall that connected the two wings of the manor, Wesley stopped at a row of massive glass windows.
The moon was high overhead with silver rays shining down on us. The moon itself looked so different than it had in books from our past. There were cities on it now with massive domes in place to hold in the oxygen and gravity wells.
It still shone bright, but how much brighter might it have been with no man-made structures on the surface?
“So, Rival Mercer?” I asked Wesley as he stared out the window.
“Was I that obvious?” Wesley asked, still not making eye contact. He rocked back and forth from heel to toe as he stared out the window.
“No,” I answered. “You hid it well, but I still caught it.”
“You know I was a part of Immortal Corp for many years,” Wesley started. “I worked my way up the corporation to the position of handler, eventually sending the Pack Protocol on missions. I hand-selected the team myself. I’ve never lied to you, Daniel. I don’t know what this weapon or Relic is that X might have information about, but the name Mercer is one I’ve heard before.”
I remained quiet. The weight in Wesley’s words was unmistakable. The older man had seen so much in his time, and if this gave him pause, then whatever it was that came next, I was sure I didn’t want to know.
“I knew your father, Daniel.” Wesley finally turned to look me full in the face. “A Jace Mercer, Rival’s uncle, was suspected of being involved in your father’s death.”
Memories scratched at the edge of my mind. Something Wesley said before about my father drifted to the surface.
“He was part of the Galactic Government,” Wesley continued. “I only ever met him once. He was a good man. I should have told you sooner. I guess I was waiting for life to stop beating you down with all this insanity, but there was never a good time.”
“How did he die?” I asked, struggling with the revelation that Wesley had known who my father was this entire time. “My mother?”
“Both taken out in the explosion,” Wesley answered. “Jace Mercer was the worst kind and it seems his nephew has followed in his steps. An enemy with a purpose who fights for a cause no matter how wrong that cause might be, I can at least understand. Jace Mercer was insane. He’s dead now, but when he was alive, his goal to create havoc in the streets.”
My sleep-deprived mind ran through thoughts and emotions in slow motion. I wasn’t sure what to do with the information. Should I feel angry that Wesley, like Preacher, kept information from me for what they felt was my own good? Did I try and go and hunt down any living family I still might have?
“I know it’s a lot,” Wesley said. “I wish I would have told you before. You’re a good man, Daniel. Don’t let anyone tell you different.”
“What were their names?” I asked, not that it made any kind of difference now; they were gone. Still, in that moment, I wanted to know my father’s and mother’s names. “As a kid, I remember tracking down all the Hunts registered in the public database. I didn’t find them.”
“Search for a Lieutenant Jason Thomas and his wife Penny Thomas,” Wesley answered in a soft voice full of regret. “He was part of the Galactic Government’s intelligence team. As such, his personal records aren’t extensive, but you’ll find some answers.
“When I recruited you, Samantha, Echo, Jax, Angel and Preacher, you became my family, like my own kids,” Wesley said, chuckling for a moment. “Well, not Preacher; that old man’s more like a brother.”
I remained quiet, numb to the idea that I had the names of my parents now. I needed sleep. I knew that much. I felt like a zombie run over by a truck, then that truck reversed just to make sure I was dead.
“Get some sleep,” Wesley said. “Something tells me tomorrow’s going to be another long day.”
Sixteen
I couldn’t fall asleep without looking at whatever information I could find about my parents. A quick call to Bapz and he brought me a data pad with a holo graphic screen.
I sat down, searching for anything I could find on Lieutenant Jason Thomas and his wife Penny. I found articles, pictures, and essays. Like Wesley said before, there wasn’t much more than a quick overview of their life. Nothing deep I could dig into.
I guess once you signed up for the Galactic Government Intelligence division, they had a look over your public presence, scrubbing whatever they deemed unacceptable.
I fell asleep that night staring at a picture of my mother and father. She was tall with brown hair and green eyes that caught the light and sparked even in the picture.
My father had his arm around my mother, clean shaven, and in his uniform, he looked every part the military officer.
My mind wandered to all the could-have-beens if I had grown up with them, then to the idea that my last name was Thomas and not Hunt at all. I thought about changing it as I drifted to sleep, but Hunt was always who I’d been. I wondered who
had decided to change my last name and when before sleep came for me.
I woke the next morning not realizing I had fallen asleep at all. It was one of those deep slumbers where all of a sudden you wake up. A line of drool fell down the left side of my mouth. The data pad with pictures of my parents lay flat on my stomach.
The sun was just beginning to enter my room through wide windows.
A knock sounded at the door. It was what had woken me before. This second knock came a little louder.
“I have caf. I come in peace,” Bapz said on the other side of the door.
“Come in,” I said, sitting up. I ran a hand over my mouth to clean off the drool.
Bapz opened the door with a tray of food in one hand and what looked like a cage with a sheet covering it in the other.
“Time to eat and shower.” Bapz wrinkled his nose at the smell. “Did you sleep in the same clothes you were wearing yesterday? I’m not trying to pass judgment here, but you don’t exactly smell like sunshine and daises.”
“Yeah, I just passed out hard,” I confirmed. “I’ll jump in the shower now. What’s in the box?”
“Not a box, a cage,” Bapz corrected.
The dark red sheet over the cage rattled and shook. Something inside the cage wanted to get out.
“Bapz,” I warned as I stood up and helped myself to the breakfast provided. “I just can’t handle any more crazy right now.”
“No, no, no, this is a positive thing,” Bapz promised. “I know we could all use some good news and I know how much you like animals, so I caught you this!”
In a flourish any magician would have been proud of, Bapz whisked away the sheet over the cage. I was in the middle of taking a long drought of caf. When I saw what was inside, I coughed the hot liquid all over my room. Some of the stuff even went in my nose.
Inside a golden cage was the most horrifically ugly jackrabbit I had ever seen in my life. What was worse was, like most animals on Earth, the creature was mutated. Patches of fur were missing and horns grew out the top of its head.
“We need to kill this thing,” I said, looking around my room for a weapon. “Hey, you think you can build me a small armory in here. I’m always wishing I had access to a blaster or blade.”
“Yes, but we can’t kill him,” Bapz said, shock written all over his face. “Look how cute he is.”
Bapz leaned in toward the cage, talking some kind of gibberish. “Who’s a good boy? That’s you. You’re a good mutated jackrabbit.”
Bapz put a metallic finger through the slates in the cage. The jackrabbit went wild, gnawing on Bapz’ finger like a maniac. Its horns scraped the front of the cage in the process.
If it wasn’t for whatever kind of metal Bapz was made from, the jackrabbit would have taken off his finger.
I consoled myself with a plate of steaming meat and eggs. I knew the food wasn’t the genuine article, since no real animals lived on Earth anymore, but the food tasted good enough. Or I guess tasted like I expected they would.
“I think I can train him,” Bapz said, pulling his finger free with effort. Saliva from the jackrabbit dripped off his finger. “Kind of how the Cripps family trained Butch and her pack. I think I can do something similar with the jackrabbit.”
“If you want to,” I told him around a mouthful of food. “Just be careful he doesn’t get out of his cage and bite someone. There’s enough madness going on right now.”
“You hear that, Mr. Tuppins?” Bapz leaned in close to the cage and talked to the jackrabbit. “You can stay.”
“You named him already?” I asked with an arched brow.
“Of course,” Bapz straightened. “Hold on, incoming transmission.”
Bapz lifted a finger, his metallic eyes concentrating.
“Cassie asked that you be in the garage in fifteen minutes,” Bapz informed me. “They’re about to go. While you’re gone, I’ll see about the weapons being put in your room.”
“You’re the man—err—robot,” I said, extending a closed fist.
Bapz smiled, looking at me then back to my extending fist, then back to me again. “What am I supposed to do with this? Are you trying to strike me?”
“No, it’s something friends do,” I said, shaking my head. “You hit my fist with your own closed fist. It’s kind of like high-fiving.”
“Oh, interesting,” Bapz said, striking out with his fist so fast, I didn’t have time to move my own. I knew it was going to suck by how fast he reacted.
Bapz’s metallic clenched hand slammed into my own.
Pain exploded in my fist. I jerked my hand back, cradling it against my chest.
“Ugh,” I gasped, flexing the fingers on my hand to see if anything was broken.
“Did I do something wrong?” Bapz looked at me wide-eyed. “You told me to hit you in your closed fist.”
“You’re good,” I reassured him. “Just next time, lighter, like barely tap my hand.”
“Oh right,” Bapz said. “Sorry, that was my first ever fist pound with a friend. I’ll do better next time.”
Bapz took his leave while I hopped into the shower, washing off the dirt and grime from the previous day. I opted to take a cold shower this time. I needed to get in and out and while the hot shower was relaxing, a cold shower encouraged me to speed up the process as well as wake me up.
In minutes, I was towel-drying in my room and dressing with the same thing I always wore these days. Black boots and cargo pants with a black shirt. Wearing the same thing day in and day out took a lot of the guesswork out of my life and even sped up the process.
I had read somewhere that we have a limited supply of decision-making brain space each day. The last thing I wanted to spend it on was deciding what to wear.
I opened the door to my room, about to step out. Butch lay on the ground outside my door. The big wolf jumped on me, nearly knocking me backwards. Her front paws pressed against my chest.
“Hey, you.” I scratched the underside of her neck and jaw. “How’re you feeling?”
Butch licked my nose then fell back down to all fours. I knelt down with her, looking at her bandaged paw injured in the fight with the boar. Another reason I needed to pay back Aleron.
“There she is,” Enoch said, turning a corner and coming down the hall. “It’s time to change her bandage. As soon as she knows I’m looking for her, she’s nowhere to be found. I thought she might head this way.”
Butch huffed and I swore she rolled her eyes.
Enoch came down the hall with a med kit and went to work on Butch’s forearm.
“How’s she healing?” I asked, scratching the animal’s head as Enoch changed her bandage.
“Remarkably well,” Enoch answered. “No infection and the bleeding has stopped. A little time will see it healed now.”
“Good,” I answered. “Thank you for taking such great care of her, of all of us.”
“Nothing to thank me for,” Enoch answered. “It’s not me at work here, but He who lives inside of me.”
“Right,” I answered, remembering Father Enoch’s strong faith to the Lord of the Way. “Well, thank him for me too.”
“I can do that.” Enoch smiled. “And for what it’s worth, I know you’ll find X and bring her back. I know you will.”
I was struck by the sincerity and the definite way he made the statement. I too believed I would find X and bring her back, but more in a way that I had to, to stem off the darkness of doubt and anxiety. When Enoch said the statement, it was as if it was inevitable.
“I wish I had your faith,” I told the man.
Enoch stood up, done with his work. He patted Butch on the head then reached into his pocket and gave her a treat.
Butch accepted the offering hungrily then sniffed his hands for more.
“I think you do have faith, Daniel.” Enoch stared me straight in the eyes. “I think you have more faith than you know. Look what you’ve done already. Look at all the people you’ve helped. Think of all the people you w
ill help.”
“That’s not faith,” I said, shaking my head. “I just did what I had to do.”
“But you did what you had to do each day, one day at a time, one situation to navigate before the next,” Enoch pushed. “Each instance, you had to believe and have faith that you could overcome. Every time you got knocked down, you had to believe you could get back up in order to do so. What is that if not faith?”
I scratched at the back of my head. I had never even been to a church or religious function that I could remember. I wasn’t used to getting talked to like this, but what Enoch said now made a lot of sense.
I think Enoch also sensed my hesitancy.
“I’m not here to talk your ear off.” Enoch shrugged. “I’m just here as a friend telling you to extend yourself some grace. You are doing better than you think.”
“Thank you,” I said. “Maybe we can talk more about this when things settle down.”
“I’d like that very much,” Enoch stepped to the side, extending an open arm down the hall. “Now I think you have a madman to talk to.”
Seventeen
I had to promise Butch she could come next time and bribe her with treats, but in the end Laine, Cassie, and I boarded one of the off-road SUVs and headed for New Vegas.
The trip would take a total of four hours if we didn’t run into trouble. Cassie sat at the wheel with Laine beside her. I sat behind the two women, lost in my own head. Dragon Hold disappeared behind us. The vast wasteland Earth had become opened up like some skeleton welcoming us for an embrace.
The most direct route went through a road so covered by sand, I wasn’t sure if you could cover a road at all. While I was on the lookout for Grimm Reapers, mutated animals, or the Lord of the Way knew what else was out there, my mind kept going back to my parents.
Wesley told me Rival Mercer’s uncle was suspected of killing them in an explosion. He said Rival followed in his uncle’s footsteps. But what was Rival in the Hole for? He was he also responsible for mass murder?
“Earth to Daniel,” Cassie said over her shoulder. “Or whatever’s left of Earth.”
Nemesis: A Near Future Thriller (Forsaken Mercenary Book 6) Page 10
