The Powerful Pride of an Immortal (Immortal Supers Book 4)

by Kurtis Eckstein

  We were still hundreds of feet from the field below by the time I was rapidly slowing us down, having full control of our descent long before we were in any danger of hitting. The moment my feet touched down, I set Lexi on her own feet, and the two of us began running through the unfinished portion of the fence toward the house. It felt like I had tunnel vision, like I couldn’t seem to focus, looking at Winter for some sign the threat was truly dealt with.

  Immediately, she met my gaze past an officer, only to point toward the house.

  And that’s when I noticed exactly what I’d imagined only a handful of minutes ago – Freya, leaning against the house with her knees up, her head in her hands, her expression vacant, like she was shocked and traumatized.

  “Go inside and check on everyone,” I urged Lexi, running straight for Freya now.

  She obeyed without question, running up to the front door and rushing inside while I dropped down in front of Freya, reaching out to cover her hands with my own.

  “Freya,” I tried to say calmly – my worry, concern, and panic still leaking into my tone a little.

  Her crimson gaze looked up at me, her eyes seeming to focus. “Sam,” she replied simply, her voice trembling.

  “What’s wrong? Who are they arresting? What happened?”

  “N-Nancy,” she managed, glancing past me.

  Completely shocked, yet somehow not surprised in a weird way, I strained my second-sight behind me, even while continuing to keep my physical eyes on Freya, looking for the person in question.

  And then I saw her, sitting in a police cruiser with her wrists handcuffed behind her back, leaning forward slightly…as she stared directly in my direction, her expression somber.

  “Freya,” I said more gently, trying to keep the anxiety out of my voice for her sake. “What did she do? Why are they arresting her? Is she dangerous?”

  Freya shook her head. “She doesn’t have a dangerous superpower, but…Oh, Sam…” Her voice trailed off, sounding pained.

  I gently began rubbing her shoulders reassuringly. “Freya, talk to me. What’s going on? Did you see something in her head? Why are you so upset?”

  “Sam,” she repeated, looking up at me with a tormented expression. “Nancy isn’t who you think she is. She’s been stalking you for a long time, watching your every move from a distance…” She paused. “Always with a different face.”

  I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.

  “Sam,” she repeated, sounding just as tormented. “That woman. She’s an essential part of the shadow company that’s harassing you, as well as a core piece of the illegal cloning organization that resulted in the creation of Rose, since they are basically the same criminal group. She’s also at least partially responsible for the deaths of thousands of children, most of them failed experiments. Perfectly healthy children, who simply didn’t measure up to their standards.”

  I felt the blood drain from my face.

  Freya then sucked in a deep breath. “But Sam, it gets worse. That woman. She’s also the woman you thought abandoned you by taking her own life, as well as Eden’s first mother. Sam, she’s your ex-wife.”

  22: Resolution

  Sam Archer

  April 27, 2735 – 4 Hours Later – Late Afternoon

  I sat in the downstairs living room on the couch, feeling numb to the world, while Freya sat in the kitchen with Jackie Hendricks, just now beginning to finish up telling her everything important she could think of about the woman they’d arrested hours ago. Of course, Jackie was recording it all on her phone, so she could have an official report made later, with Lexi having her phone out too just to make sure there was a copy of Freya’s testimony.

  The things Freya was sharing were disturbing on multiple levels, and learning how my ex-wife was alive – through a process of transplanting a person’s brain into a lab-created body, combined with a unique super’s ability, who had the power to make an organ match the health of the body – was all extremely unsettling, to say the least.

  Not to mention, the whole reason behind the operation in the first place – offering high paying customers the opportunity to live forever via this method, with the major drawback being that they couldn’t successfully replicate superpowers, even if they could manage to replicate a person’s old appearance.

  But picky customers meant a lot of failed clones. A lot of dead children, who were their own separate people, just like Rose was her own separate person. And even those who were allowed to live were still killed, once their brain was taken out and the paying customer’s brain was put in.

  And, of course, the ultimate goal for the owners of this criminal organization was to create immortal bodies, but not for their customers. No, they wanted the repeat business.

  Rather, the goal, for my ex-wife and those who were in control, all of them being essential in various ways due to their superpowers, was to create immortal bodies for themselves. My ex-wife in particular seemed to have some kind of enhancing ability that was tied to her brain, which meant she kept the ability even when she switched bodies every few decades.

  And Eden? She was an experiment to create an immortal female super, with the woman sticking around to have a pretend family in order to keep me close for additional experiments. And Eden’s ‘disposal’ was likewise just a result of the woman coming to the conclusion the experiment had been an utter failure, combined with more promising opportunities coming up around that time.

  She still kept an eye on me though. Just in case.

  And also because she had a morbid obsession with me, partly out of jealousy, and partly because she loved me in a sadistic way. True sadism – not the fun bedroom kind, but the true life-destroying, soul-crushing, hateful kind.

  She loathed me to the point that she sincerely viewed it as love.

  As I listened to Freya finally finishing up, tipping Jackie off to a ton of leads that might help them start tracking the organization down, I had Winter leaning against my shoulder on the couch, seeming pretty ‘out of it’ herself. She appeared to be emotionally drained as well, between using her ability to stabilize Freya, and then myself too. Not to mention, she was also probably physically drained from Heidi healing her arm a while ago.

  I couldn’t even begin to express the appreciation I felt toward her, knowing the sense of betrayal and shock that had flipped my world upside down would probably be affecting me a ton more if not for Winter.

  Instead, I just felt numb.

  And, because of that, the best I could offer Winter right now was a place to lean, my hands in my lap with me feeling just as wiped out, as if I needed to sleep, except that I couldn’t sleep. It was literally an impossibility for me.

  I assumed Winter must be hungry, considering Heidi used some of her energy for the healing, but she didn’t budge from her spot, pressing into me like she was cold and using my body to try to warm herself.

  Lily was upstairs with Rose in her bedroom, the young girl having fallen asleep after sobbing so much, with Heidi up there now too with Eden in her arms, the two women talking quietly as Lily gently ran her fingers through Rose’s black hair.

  Again, the issue of safety had come up, Freya emphasizing to Jackie that no one in the organization knew where we lived except for my ex-wife, which meant it was vitally important that the woman who currently went by the name Nancy didn’t have contact with the outside world.

  Given the scope of the situation, Jackie reassured her that such a thing wouldn’t be happening. This was the kind of illegal activity that they would focus all their resources toward investigating, doing everything in their power to ensure the enemy wasn’t tipped off before they hit them from every direction at once.

  Because the only way to truly destroy a hydra, was to crush all the heads at the same time, along with the body too.

  Illegal cloning? Disposing of those clones when they didn’t match the desires of the customer? Experimenting on children like lab rats?

  Yeah, it was a
big deal to them. This kind of underground criminal activity was the sort of thing that would put everything else on hold while they prepared for a massive sweep.

  Part of me felt relieved.

  The other part of me was shocked and devastated by how bad it all really was. Never mind the fact that I’d been betrayed, or that I had an evil woman living with me for a decade, treating me like I was a king and the most important person in the world to her, all while she looked upon our daughter like a test subject.

  Just a body for her to steal if it turned out to be a success.

  Shit.

  Shit.

  Winter reached over and rested her arm on my stomach then, holding my side. I finally moved my own arm, and wrapped it around her shoulders, so she could scoot down a little due to her height and rest her head against my chest.

  It helped. A lot.

  And I knew she probably needed the comfort herself, since she was likely still using her ability to help keep Freya level-headed. Because at this point, I wouldn’t be surprised if what Freya really wanted to do was go ‘Nancy hunting’ and rip her head off, even though they’d likely need her to fully resolve the case.

  Especially when Eden was now Freya’s daughter, and her knowledge of what my ex-wife had intended – at what my ex-wife had done , being indirectly responsible for the fire that killed Eden – was enough to make her want to kill .

  At least, I assumed that was what the random weak surges of aggression indicated – though the sensation was so faint, it didn’t actually affect my overall dazed mood. But since my assumption was that Winter and I were still linked or whatever, I assumed I was indirectly getting a hint of what Freya was dealing with.

  But despite everything, Freya kept her cool, commenting on last-minute details while Winter held onto me tightly, wrapped up in my arms, the two of us feeling numb and distant as we sat silently on the latex couch.

  And then, finally they were done.

  Jackie did give us a strange look when she saw how Winter was holding onto me, but she composed herself quickly enough, giving me a sincere smile and then sharing that she’d let me know once she found anything out about my evaluation.

  I thanked her for that, as well as for the helicopter ride and everything else, and then wished her goodbye for now. Lexi went outside with her, probably to touch base, but I assumed she’d be coming back.

  But, honestly, I didn’t care about the evaluation at the moment.

  I just found out my ex-wife was not only alive, but an abhorrent, backstabbing, child-killing, heinous, sinister, narcissistic, cold-blooded, sadistic bitch.

  Honestly, that description was too nice in my opinion.

  I just found out my ex-wife created my little girl to kill her! To steal her body! And then she killed her anyway when she didn’t measure up to expectations – tried to kill me too – so she could disappear and move on to more promising possibilities, but apparently at the time she didn’t realize I literally couldn’t be killed.

  Like, she knew I was immortal, but being truly unkillable was a different thing altogether. It kind of made me wonder if the few other women who had attempted to break through my depressed shell were actually her in disguise, possibly an attempt to try it over again. But I couldn’t be sure without asking Freya about it, and I didn’t want to know right now.

  Because what I did know was bad enough.

  So yeah, seeing my evaluation was not at the top of my priorities at the moment.

  Shit, maybe I’d kill the fiend myself to ensure she was really done for. To make sure Eden’s nightmare never happened again to anyone else. To guarantee that Rose’s horrible reality, prior to us meeting her, never happened again to another innocent child.

  Winter tightened her embrace on me, prompting me to take a deep breath, realizing my numbness was finally shifting to rage. And I wasn’t even sure if it was really my own anger, or someone else’s at this point, even though I had plenty of reasons to be angry. Could be Freya’s anger, though she seemed just worn out as she walked over to sit down at my other side.

  But wait, did that even make sense?

  Since when did I fall under the impression that I might feel someone else’s emotions just because I was connected to Winter? Because up until this point, it seemed like she could help stabilize me, with my emotions influencing her , but never did she insinuate that her emotions might influence me .

  Yet, I felt like that was what was happening. The anger didn’t feel like it was entirely my own, and Winter was just resting against me, completely relaxed, minus her hold on me, so I wasn’t sure it was directly hers either. Not to mention, she didn’t really have a reason to be personally upset by this situation.

  “How are you holding up?” Freya asked gently as she wrapped her arm around my shoulders, completely unbothered by Winter’s head resting on my chest.

  I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I’ve been better, obviously. But, I guess okay. Considering.” I focused on her crimson gaze. “How about you?”

  “I’m alright at the moment,” she admitted with a grimace. “It helps knowing something is going to be done about this. I was just so shocked at first I could barely handle it.” She leaned more into my shoulder, still looking up at me, her red eyes somber now. “I never imagined it was as bad as it’s turned out to be. Never imagined that…” Her voice trailed off.

  She didn’t need to finish her statement though. I knew what she was implying – never imagined that my ex-wife would be a part of this, or that she originally had such heinous plans for my first daughter.

  We both looked up when Lexi stepped back into the house, closing the door behind her, and then joined us in the living room, her expression sympathetic. She took a seat on the edge of the couch next to Freya, sitting a foot away while angling toward us.

  I cleared my throat, feeling another rush of aggression, still speaking to Freya. “So how do you feel about taking this approach? Like, obviously she’ll get put in prison, but she might get a lax sentence if she helps them take down the rest of the organization.”

  Another rush of aggression.

  Freya sighed, removing her arm from my shoulders and leaning forward to pull my other arm around her so she could lean more heavily into me. “I’m upset, but it feels muted.” She glanced down at Winter. “I suppose I have you to thank for that. For helping me think straight. Because as much as I want to kill her, I know it would do more harm than good right now. We need the entire thing to be dismantled, not just one person.”

  Another rush of aggression.

  Winter met her gaze but didn’t respond.

  I finally looked down at Winter questioningly. “Are you alright?” I wondered, causing Freya to give me a confused look, before focusing on her too.

  Winter looked up at me, but didn’t say anything for a moment. Her pale green eyes were hesitant. She then took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I almost killed her, Sam.”

  Freya and I were both shocked.

  “Wait, really?” I asked in disbelief. “Why? Because Freya was angry?”

  She grimaced, looking down at Freya’s chest, just because it was like right there . “When I saw in Freya’s head who that woman was to you, when I realized she’d betrayed you in the worst way possible…” Her grip tightened around me, becoming uncomfortable. “It’s unforgivable. Betraying my alpha is unforgivable.”

  Holy shit.

  “Oh,” I replied simply, surprised by her intensity. I recalled her mentioning she had an issue with owning stuff, but didn’t think it applied to people . Yet that’s exactly what her tone just implied.

  “Yes,” she said, only to look up at Freya. “Someone bringing harm to my alpha, my pride , is unforgivable.”

  Freya reached out and gently rubbed her shoulder. “Thank you, by the way, for letting me bite you earlier. It scares Lily when it looks like I’m out of control like that, but I had to get blood from somewhere.”

  Winter nodded. “I know. You�
��re welcome.”

  I glanced at Lexi, her giving me a weak sympathetic smile, before speaking to Winter again. “Well, despite everything, at least part of me is glad you didn’t kill her.” Silently I considered that the other part of me wouldn’t have been too upset – not at all – although I knew it was better for her to be alive so they could track down the whole organization and bring the rest of those bastards to justice.

  Winter didn’t respond, another burst of aggression hitting me even though she seemed impassive.

  I cleared my throat again. “So then, is the aggression I’m feeling coming from you?”

  “Yes.” She paused. “Sorry.”

  “No, I’m not upset. It’s just, I mean, is it normal for me to be able to feel that coming from you?”

  She shook her head, nuzzling her face against me for a moment while sucking in a deep breath through her nose, before turning to her original position. “No. That’s not part of my power. Your thought earlier was correct. You are feeling my emotions, but I’m not causing it. I can only assume it’s coming from you. A part of your own ability, possibly interacting uniquely with mine.”

  I leaned my head back against the wall, slightly annoyed now, because it was just another mystery. Although, I had to admit this wasn’t the first time I’d felt little pangs of emotions that didn’t seem to fit with my overall mood.

  Lexi finally spoke up. “Huh, you know Sam, you felt kind of angry for no apparent reason when we were leaving to pick up my sister. I wonder if Heidi was angry then, or if maybe someone in the house was upset around that time.”

  I thought back to then, about being angry when I tried to think about her just as we were pulling out of the garage.

  Unexpectedly, I imagined that guy’s face again, except I saw him pecking Heidi on the cheek. The sudden anger it prompted was so abrupt that Winter jerked up to focus on me in concern, and I could actually feel the sensation become muted as she used her ability on me.