by I. T. Lucas
“Not yet.” Amanda crossed her arms over her chest. “Besides, this is only a small part of my research. There is still so much left to discover about how brains work. The neuroscience field is still in its infancy.”
63
Jin
“I’m not in the mood for cooking.” Jin stretched her arms and yawned.
“We can grab something at the café.” Arwel turned on his side and pulled her against his chest. “But we should hurry. It’s closing soon.”
“I’ll just hop into the shower.”
He kissed her hard before letting go. “Get out of here before I change my mind. I’ll shower in the other bathroom.”
“You can join me.” She jumped out of bed and wiggled her bare bottom at him.
“Then we will never get to the café on time.”
“Fine. I’ll be out in five minutes.”
Life was good.
They had both fallen asleep after their afternoon sex, and the nap had been delicious.
There were no exams to study for, no spying missions to prepare for, and no job Jin had to return to. Jin’s only mission was to enter transition, and since sex was necessary for that, she and Arwel could spend their days in bed guilt-free.
She wasn’t even worried about it not happening yet. As Mey’s sister, Jin was a Dormant for sure, and there was no doubt that she was going to transition. It would happen when it happened, and getting there involved lots of sex with the man she loved, so she wasn’t complaining.
When she was done, she pulled on a pair of stretchy yoga pants, paired them with a cropped T-shirt, and pushed her feet into a pair of sneakers.
On second thought, she reached for a hoodie. It was a little cold outside, and after her bout with strep throat, she didn’t want to catch something again. Immortals didn’t get sick, but viruses could hitch a ride on them and jump on the only human host available for them in the village.
“Ready?” Arwel opened the door.
“Let’s go.”
“It’s fifteen minutes to closing.” He wrapped his arm around her waist.
“Do you want to jog?”
“Not really. A fast walk will do.”
“Did I tell you already that Vanessa got Vlad’s mom to agree to go with them to the mountains?”
“You mentioned something about that before pushing me on the bed and having your way with me.”
“Right. I did. What do you think? Do you know Vlad’s mom?”
“Stella is a bit odd, but who knows? Maybe she and Richard will hit it off. Opposites attract and all that.”
“I wish we could go to the cabin as well. It’s going to be really awkward for all of them, and we could help by providing a buffer. Vlad and Wendy are both in a bad place, Stella and Richard don’t know each other, and the only other people going with them are a couple of Guardians. I’m not a therapist, but I don’t know what Vanessa was thinking sending them out there alone.”
He shrugged. “It’s like teaching a kid to swim by throwing him into the pool. He either floats or drowns.”
Jin stopped in her tracks. “That’s awful. Promise me that you will never do it to our kids.”
Grinning, Arwel pulled her into his arms. “Is that your way of proposing to me? Because if it is, the answer is yes.”
She rolled her eyes. “Don’t change the subject. I want you to promise.”
“I promise to never throw any of our kids into the pool.”
She rewarded him with a quick peck on his lips. “Now, was that so hard?”
He chuckled. “I would have never done it. I’m an empath, remember? I could never be so callous.”
“True.” She smiled up at him. “We really should go with Wendy and Vlad to the mountains, not only for them, but also for us. It would be fun to sleep in a motor home.”
“I have no problem with that. But Kian still didn’t get back to me about it. He's either forgotten or decided that he didn’t want us there for whatever reason.”
“You should remind him. And if you don’t want to, I can.”
“I’ll do that right now.” Arwel pulled his phone out of his pocket but then paused and lifted his head. “He is in the café. We can ask him in person.”
“How do you know that he is there?”
“I can hear him. Syssi and Amanda are there as well, and so is Callie.”
“Wonderful. I love that café. It makes meeting friends a breeze.”
In fact, Jin loved everything about the village and about her new family. The only thing she regretted was not having her parents there. That would have made her life perfect as well as Mey's.
“Is there any chance Kian would ever allow humans in the village?”
“You are here.”
“I mean humans that are not about to transition. I’m talking about my mother and father.”
“I don’t know.” Arwel cast her a sad look. “But after your transition, we can go visit them in Israel. We could get you a fake passport.”
“Are we also going to get married there? And what about Mey and Yamanu? Neither of us would agree to a wedding without our parents.”
“That’s not going to be a problem. They can come to the wedding, and after that their memories can be altered, so if they noticed anything peculiar, like a glowing goddess, they would not remember those oddities.”
Jin sighed. “I would be honored to have the goddess marry us, but my parents are a different story. Whoever thralls them should implant in their heads a memory of a rabbi presiding over the ceremony. They really hoped for Mey and me to marry Jewish boys.”
64
Kian
“Your phone is buzzing.” Syssi pointed at the device.
Uncharacteristically, Kian had left it on the table when he’d gotten them coffees.
Putting the cardboard tray down, he glanced at the display and picked it up. “Did you get the guy?”
“We did,” Anandur said. “He’s a private eye, and the truck belongs to his brother-in-law. Anyway, he was hired to snoop around the set of coordinates he’d been given, and report what he’d seen. The troubling part is that the coordinates are right smack over the village. The good part is that the guy reported back that it must have been a mistake because he found nothing there. Naturally, I reinforced the conviction and sent him on his way. But the bottom line is that I think you were right about the undetected trackers.”
“Fuck. We need to get Jin out of here until William modifies the cuff for her.”
“The locator cuff?”
“He is going to make it so it will interfere with the broadcasting. It’s like the one we had Dalhu wear before I trusted him enough to remove it.”
“When will William have it ready?”
“I hope he will be done with at least one by tomorrow morning. I’ll talk to you later. I have to call Magnus and tell him to find the guy snooping around Kalugal’s place.”
“What happened?” Syssi asked when he ended the call.
“Kalugal’s men spotted a truck making several trips by his house, and our guys reported the same from the road leading to the tunnel. It’s good that we have the cars programmed not to enter the tunnel if the sensors pick up any vehicles or people in the vicinity, otherwise the snoop would have discovered the entrance.”
“Good thinking with that one,” Amanda said.
“I need to make the call.”
“Of course.”
After he’d given Magnus instructions, Kian called Kalugal and told him what Anandur and Brundar had reported.
“What am I supposed to do, evacuate?” The computer transmitted Kalugal’s speech in its monotone voice.
“My tech guy is working on a cuff that will interfere with any transmission Jacki might be emitting. As soon as it’s ready, I’ll get it to you. My men are going to find the guy snooping around your place and thrall him to forget what he saw and send him home, but your location is already compromised.”
“Until you get the cuff to me, I’l
l move Jacki to the bunker. Whatever they put in her must be tiny and can’t have a strong signal. The bunker will shield her.”
“Sounds good. But I wonder if that’s enough. Our location is secure because the guy couldn’t even find the entrance, but your place is a different story. You might have to relocate.”
“Are you offering me sanctuary in your village?”
“I can’t do that, but I can find you a safe place to move into until you build your next fortress, and I can give you excellent advice on how to hide your new place better. I have a lot of experience in that.”
“I appreciate the offer, and I will gladly accept your advice. But I’m not in a rush to move. I have nothing to fear from the government. They can try to come in to investigate me and my property, but they won’t get past the gate.”
“Right. I forgot about your special abilities.”
“Nevertheless, when we meet, I would love to hear your advice on how to build a well-hidden and impenetrable fortress.”
Kian chuckled. “I didn’t say it’s impenetrable, although it is. I only said that it is well-hidden. And if you think that my advice will help you locate my base, you are wrong.”
“Oh, Kian, you are such a suspicious guy. Exploiting your show of goodwill to find your village hasn’t even crossed my mind. Frankly, I don’t care about your base and where your people are hiding. If we end up with a working partnership of some sort, that would be great, but if not, that’s okay too. We can still be friends.”
“I hope so. I don’t consider you an enemy, Kalugal, and my suspiciousness is not personal in nature. I’m just very diligent when it comes to protecting my people. I can’t afford to be any other way.”
“I understand. I just wish I could prove to you that I’m not a threat to you or your people.”
65
Jin
As Jin and Arwel reached the café, they found the group looking somber.
“What happened?” Jin asked.
“Take a seat.” Kian motioned to the one next to him.
Arwel pulled it out for her and then grabbed another chair from the next table over for himself.
“You and your friends from the program might have trackers inside you that we have missed,” Kian delivered his disturbing news. “Bridget is going over the test results to see if she missed something, but even if she finds nothing, that doesn’t mean they don’t exist. The circumstantial evidence says that they do. Suspicious activity was spotted on the road leading to the village and also next to Kalugal’s place. I could’ve dismissed it if it happened only in one location, but the same thing happening simultaneously at both can’t be a coincidence.”
For a long moment, Jin processed the information. During her month-long stay in the program, there hadn’t been any invasive procedures. There had been a thorough medical exam at the start of the training that included blood tests and immunizations, and later Doctor Roberts had injected them with various drugs to see if that enhanced their performance.
“Could I have been injected with a tracker? Because I didn’t undergo anything other than blood tests, immunizations, and drug injections. And if Marisol compelled me to forget a procedure, I would have remembered it after Lokan removed the compulsion.”
“Frankly, I don’t know, and neither does William, who is on top of all the latest technological developments. It’s possible that the military has come up with something new, and they are keeping it a secret from the public. It could be made from materials that don’t show on scans, or it might be so tiny that it’s not noticeable.”
Jin glanced at Arwel. “I should leave the village. I’m endangering all of you.”
“There is no need. William is working on a cuff that will interfere with any transmission you might be emitting, and until it is ready, you can stay in the underground facility. That was actually Kalugal’s idea. He’s moving Jacki into the bunker until we get a cuff to him.”
“But what about the watchers? They must have reported to whoever sent them. Both locations are already compromised.” As Jin’s panic flared, her eyes started tearing. “I can’t believe it. After all that we’ve gone through to prevent just that.”
Kian put a hand on her arm. “Relax. We can handle this. I sent out Guardians to deal with them and find out what they know. Turns out that they were given the location and were instructed to snoop around. The one circling the road leading to the village thought that he’d been given the wrong coordinates because he couldn’t find anything. My Guardians thralled him to stay away and go snooping somewhere else. He is going to provide the director or whoever else has sent him with bullshit information.”
That was encouraging, but Jin couldn’t help the tears prickling at her eyes. She loved the village, and she’d been having such a good time there, and now she was forced to live underground again.
“Should I go to the underground now?”
“William said that he will have the cuff ready by tomorrow, but knowing him, he will have it ready for you in a few hours. You can spend the time watching a movie in the theater or swimming in the pool. If he’s not done today, Arwel will have to pack an overnight bag for you both and haul a bed down there.”
Syssi waved a hand. “I wanted to prepare living quarters in the underground, but Ingrid didn’t have time because of the new hotel you have her working on.”
“We can do that,” Amanda offered. “It doesn’t need to be anything fancy. We can have Murphy beds installed in the classrooms. That would solve the space problem. It won't be private, and people would have to share rooms, but then most of the clan members don’t have mates, so that’s not a problem. The mated couples can use the smaller classrooms and the offices.”
“That’s a good idea, and it’s not going to cost a fortune,” Kian said. “Can I put you in charge of that?”
Amanda nodded. “Consider it done.”
With the initial panic receding, Jin remembered what she’d wanted to ask Kian for.
“Are you making cuffs for Richard and Wendy too? They can’t go to the mountains without them.”
“Of course.”
“Awesome. Can Arwel and I join them in the cabin? I know there aren’t enough rooms, but as I suggested before, we can rent a motorhome. I think that us being there will make things easier for the others.”
“I have no problem with that.” Kian looked at Arwel. “Do you want to continue your vacation, or do you want to go as a Guardian?”
“I can be backup, but until Jin transitions, I’d rather not come back full time.”
“Understood.”
“What if Jin enters transition while you are there?” Syssi asked. “Is it wise for you to be far away from medical attention?”
Jin waved a dismissive hand. “It’s only a couple of hours away. If I get a fever or any of the other signs, Arwel will drive me back.”
“Then it’s agreed.” Kian tapped the table. “If the cuffs are ready in time, you and your friends can leave for the cabin tomorrow.”
“I need to rent a motorhome first,” Arwel said. “There might be none available on such short notice.”
“Then buy one,” Kian said. “We might have use for it in the future.”
66
Jacki
As a knock on the door woke Jacki up, she opened her eyes and for a brief moment felt disoriented.
This wasn’t her cozy little room adjacent to Kalugal’s master suite. She was back in the bunker because she and the other escapees had trackers in them that had somehow been missed by Bridget’s scans. Kalugal had confirmed the suspicion by checking her with a device that was designed to pick up transmissions, so there was no doubt that it was there, but she couldn’t figure out how they’d gotten it inside her.
The others might have been compelled to forget a procedure, but that didn’t apply to her. She also couldn’t think of any timeline holes. Could they have used drugs?
She wasn’t immune to those.
A second knock reminded her
that there was someone outside her door waiting for her to acknowledge him. Pushing up on the pillows, Jacki pulled the blanket up to her chin. “Come in.”
“Good morning,” Kalugal said as he opened the door and peeked in. “Good. You are decent.” He motioned for Shamash to enter ahead of him with a breakfast tray.
“Good morning.” Jacki pulled the blanket even higher, covering her mouth.
She hadn’t brushed her teeth yet, and with the immortals’ sensitive noses, they could probably smell her breath from across the room.
After Shamash put the tray down on the coffee table, he smiled at her and hurried out.
Kalugal closed the door behind him. “Did you sleep well?”
“Not really. I kept thinking about the tracker, and how the heck did they manage to put it in me without me noticing or remembering a thing.”
“Why are you covering your mouth?”
“Morning breath. I need to use the bathroom. Would you mind turning around?”
The nightgown he’d gotten for her wasn’t sheer, but the silk outlined every curve, and flaunting that in front of Kalugal would be like waving a red flag in front of a bull.
“Of course.” He sat on the couch and turned sideways, so he was facing the door.
Ducking into the bathroom, Jacki was glad that she had left a change of clothes in there. Once she was done, she came out fully dressed.
Kalugal gave her an appreciative once-over. “You look very nice. I’m still waiting for those photos you promised me, though. Is there one of you wearing that beautiful blue nightgown?”
She sat down next to him. “I only modeled a few of the outfits. You gave me so many.”
He pursed his lips. “That’s a shame. Can I pour you coffee?”
“Yes, please. Did the cuff arrive?”
“It did. I have it in my pocket.”
‘Is it that small?”