Halfblood Legacy

by Rheaume, Laura

  In the few seconds it took the woman to wake up and orient herself, Mercy shot a message to her father, mother and Lena all at once, linking them together. There is a user approaching from outside, maybe more than one...I’m not sure. And, I’m feeling a big burst of energy about to...it’s coming.

  She shut off her connections with everyone and let the vision come. She wasn’t fighting them anymore, so she didn’t feel any of the pain associated with trying to stop them. However, since she embraced it, it packed up her whole mind and took it on its journey. She wasn’t in Harmony’s room anymore. She floated outside, an element of the night. The power that burst against her was like a big package that, when her gift opened it up, revealed the events of what lay ahead of the stranger she had gotten a glimpse of. In that blink, she saw that he was just a short distance from her home, approaching on foot, along with many more people. People with headsets and uniforms. People with guns pointing forward. That was all she was able to see before the vision took her.

  She flew, black wings and body hidden in the black night. Below, their house lay silent and still. Silent were the bodies of the lost. Lost were the bodies of the living. Living were the bodies lying silently. Lying and moving silently away. Locked in unconscious minds locked in bound bodies locked in trucks. Bloated trucks, plodding heavily along roads that stretched away from a silent, still house.

  -----------

  Heron closed the car door and nodded to his twin cousins, who quickly disappeared around the building in their car with three of their friends. He walked straight up to the entrance to one of the family’s newest office buildings and entered without glancing at the woman standing at the door. He similarly ignored the man at the desk on his way to the main hall beyond him.

  “Excuse me, sir, but you need to sign in.”

  “Take care of it,” Heron said dismissively. He knew that his uncle never signed in, so he was sure it wasn’t any kind of life threatening security measure. “And, I need you to get my car washed. You have twenty minutes.”

  He saw the man pick up the phone and start dialing rapidly in his peripheral vision, and then he was in the hallway. The majority of the offices were empty, since the building was still in the final stage of construction, the one where the contractor’s incompetence became too blatant to ignore any further. Here and there, small groups of workers were applying the finishing touches to the areas they had recently torn down and redone because the original work resembled something designed carefully by monkeys and installed by creatures without opposable thumbs.

  At the end of the hall, he stopped at the elevator and waited while the guard pushed the button for him. When the car arrived, he stepped inside and pulled out his keys.

  “Sir. I didn’t know that you had access to the bottom levels…” The woman in the elevator said. “I’ll need to call…”

  Heron held the key up so that she could clearly see it. “He gave it to me this morning. Call if you like. I myself don’t like to put too many demands on him, especially in the morning. And the numbers were down in the paper I noticed, which always gets him in a firing mood.” Heron turned and put the key into the slot and turned it.

  The doors closed and they started moving down. When it stopped, he pulled the key out and left the elevator, briskly walking to the observation room. He opened the door and went in. Tiburon’s project manager turned around and then stood up when he saw who it was.

  “Heron, sir. I didn’t expect you.” Jaden frowned. “Is your uncle with you? I didn’t expect him today.”

  “No. He’s not here.” Heron put his medical bag on the desk and opened it up.

  “Ah. Well, how can I help you? We don’t have any projects scheduled for today…” He was pulling up his calendar on the display, obviously looking for reference to a meeting or something that would explain Heron’s appearance.

  Heron picked up the syringe and pressed it up against the man’s arm.

  “Ouch!” He looked down, blinked and then gave Heron an unfriendly look. “What was that?”

  “Bird flu inoculation,” Heron said smoothly, not caring that the man could tell it was a lie. He put the syringe away in a baggie and turning to the panel of displays in front of him. One showed Scythe sitting on his bed. Two others showed empty, unlit rooms. There was one that accessed the network, and another that was purposely not linked to the network, which was where they recorded all of their findings from the interviews. He frowned when he saw that the slot for the removable hard disk was empty. His uncle must have been keeping it with him at all times. That was going to make things harder.

  Jaden was so flustered he didn’t even pick up on Heron’s give-away heartbeat. “I don’t need that. I already...had...and you...should..n’t..”

  His eyes still on the screens, Heron carefully pushed him up against the wall so that when he fell he didn’t block the door.

  He pulled up and copied the last hour of Scythe’s surveillance video and set it to play. Then he reassigned the video feed from the live view of Scythe’s room to the recorded data for the benefit of the monitors in the main security room upstairs. He repeated the process for the camera that recorded the hallway outside of Scythe’s room, where a guard was always posted when the suit was on. There would have been a noticeable flicker on the screens in the upper room, but it was unlikely that anyone would have been looking at exactly the right moment, particularly since the twins would have drawn their attention by then.

  He took a set of keys from a hook on the wall and left the room, palming another syringe.

  It was not far to Scythe’s room, just around the corner from the observation room. The whole working area of the lower floor was very small, with only a handful of rooms. The rest was dedicated to storage and underground access to the utilities for the building: water, electricity, data cable, heating, sewage, et cetera.

  “I’ll be giving him an exam this morning,” Heron explained. He would certainly be examining him, right before he freed him.

  “I don’t have any orders for that. I’ll need to call,” the man said. He was better trained than most of their people, it seemed.

  He lifted his hand to touch his ear, and was about to speak when Heron said, lifting the keys, “I’ll go ahead and start while you're calling, okay? I have a busy day today.” Heron didn’t wait for him to answer. He thrust the key at the lock.

  “No, wait...I need to call first.” The guard’s hand dropped from his ear and he grabbed at the key, which Heron pulled out of his reach. His second hand came from behind and jabbed the syringe into the man’s neck. He let go of the tube and struck him once on the head hard enough to send him to his knees. He was about to give him one more good hit, when the man shakily leaned into the wall and then rolled onto the ground. Heron reached down and pulled the headset off the guard and put it in his ear.

  He could hear a strained voice saying, “And...they said their uncle lets them have equipment from the family offices all the time.”

  Another voice snapped, “Well, tell them they can come back when he’s here. We don’t have any orders for a removal of five brand new computers…”

  “Okay, one of them is taking the flatscreen…”

  “Absolutely not!”

  Heron put the key in the lock and opened the door. He pulled the guard's heavy body over so it would keep the door from closing behind him and stepped into the room.

  Scythe was already watching from the bed.

  Heron said, “I thought you might like to leave.”

  “I would,” Scythe said and grinned.

  “Alright, let’s get this off you.” He went to the bed and opened up his bag and pulled out a very expensive, portable mini circular saw. The small, round diamond tipped blade made a terrible noise, but cut right through the lock attached to the shackle on Scythe’s ankle. When he was done, he turned it off and stowed it.

  “You’re taking a big risk, Heron,” Scythe commented, standing and immediately pulling the suit's thick
top up over his head. Underneath, he only had a thin T-shirt that smelled disgusting.

  “Yeah, that shirt is really toxic. I should have worn a biohazard suit to rescue you…”

  Scythe grunted and started on the pants.

  Heron was distracted by hearing his name spoken in his ear.

  “Where is Heron? Get him up here…”

  Oops. They were going to have to move faster. “We have to hurry.” He helped Scythe step out of the suit’s equally cumbersome pants. The man was perfectly comfortable in the long underwear that kept the rash from the pants to a minimum, even though they both crinkled their noses at the stench. It was making their eyes water. They left both halves of the suit vibrating lightly with electricity on the floor and left the room.

  “There might be a little bit of a hassle getting out. There is a lot of security, but I know you are resourceful that way, so I’m sure…”

  “This way,” Scythe said, passing the elevator and going to the door marked, “Maintenance.”

  “Should I even ask?” He had no idea how Scythe could possibly know what was back there. Even Heron didn’t know. There were no exits, though, he was sure of that.

  “If you like.”

  Already, things were getting unpredictable. Heron smiled and decided to wait and see.

  They wound through a narrow passageway that was lined with pipes and cable tubing and finally came to a dead end that was used as a small storage area.

  Scythe moved a box over to a wall, stood on it and pulled on a loosened piece of drywall. It broke away, and behind it the insulation had been removed, as well as a sizable portion of the outer wall. In its place, a piece of wood had been propped up; it was covered with stucco to match the outside of the building and came out with a swift hit and a little prying.

  Even Scythe seemed pleasantly surprised to find the escape hatch. “That was nice,” he said, pursing his lips and nodding. Then he boosted himself up and shimmied out into the light. Heron stepped onto the box, took the hand that was offered him, and made his way out after him.

  “Okay. I’m asking.” Heron said when they were both crouched outside the building in a half finished flower bed.

  “Lieren made that for me.”

  Who was Lieren? The agitated calling at his ear made him put the question aside. “Tell me later. Wait here. I’ll bring my car.” He gripped his case, stood up like he meant to leave the building by crawling out of a hole, and walked faster than he should have, but much slower than his frantic mind thought was wise. He hurried to the end of the building, turned and crossed the short distance to his car.

  He pretended not to notice that the guard at the door had left her position and was approaching him.

  “Sir…”

  “That’s good for today. Thanks.” Heron said to the young man who was furiously washing his car. He waved the guard away, “Sorry. I’m late.”

  “Wait, sir, your cousins are...the head of security wants to see you. He’s asking you to wait.”

  “He has my number. He can call my offices.” Heron opened the car and sat down before she got to him. He slammed the door, ignored her beating on the window, and turned on the car. He pulled past her and went around the building, watching to see if she was following. She was.

  Heron pulled up right next to the curb and unlocked the door. Scythe jumped in. Then they pulled away just as the woman reached the back of the car and several more security guards came into sight around the corner.

  When they passed the third side of the building on their way to the exit to the parking lot, they passed Heron’s cousins who had moved their car and were loading it with pieces of equipment they and their friends were bringing out of the building.

  When they saw him, they waved and then started pile into the car, but they were being detained by the five security guards who were yelling at them and gesturing wildly with their arms.

  “Those are your friends?”

  “Cousins. Well, two of them.”

  Scythe craned his head to keep them in sight as they left the parking lot. “I think they’re going to get into a fight soon. Maybe we should help.”

  “No need.”

  “Oh,” Scythe said, raising his eyebrows at something he saw. “You’re right. Ouch.” He turned back around and said, “They remind me of you, doctor.”

  Heron smiled and explained, “My aunt was even harder on her own sons than she was on me.” His aunt had taken it upon herself to make sure the children could handle themselves in a fight and had increased their workout after Heron had been forced to use his skills in self-defense the last time he was out with Scythe. “The only thing we have to worry about is someone calling the police.”

  “That won’t happen for a while.”

  “Why?”

  “I’m pretty sure the phones are out.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Because they’ve been programmed to malfunction when someone calls in this morning.”

  “Who?”

  “Another employee of yours.”

  “Like Lieren?” Pieces of information were linking together in his head...

  Scythe nodded.

  Finally Heron understood and the realization was blinding. He drove in amazement for a while before he spoke. When he did, he didn’t intend for his voice to be as loud as it was, but he was too shocked to care, “You were able to manipulate people during the interviews? Other people?”

  “Yes, within a limited range, and Lieren was within range. So was one of your computer techs, and...well...a lot of people.”

  “People outside of the room?”

  “Yes.”

  “My uncle?”

  “No. I couldn’t get into that room. There was some kind of field I think, like the one in my suit.”

  “So, you…what?...controlled them?” Heron asked uncomfortably.

  “Yeah.” He didn’t elaborate, and he didn’t make excuses, even though it was a morally despicable thing to do. Heron could guess what he had been through, so he didn’t judge. He would have done the same.

  “The vote for Bill 67 must be today.”

  “Yes, it is this afternoon. That’s how I knew Tiburon wouldn’t be at the offices with you today. How did you know?”

  “I thought it would be last week.”

  “It was scheduled for late last week, but it got delayed.”

  “Ah.”

  “Why the interest in the bill?”

  “Because that’s the day you decide to come and let me out.”

  Heron mulled on that.

  Scythe said ruefully, “Yeah. Sorry about that.”

  “No. It’s okay. Wait...what?” Scythe didn’t know when he was going to come and help him escape, because Heron hadn’t decided himself until that morning.

  “You were manipulated, too, Heron.” He said regretfully.

  Heron didn’t have anything intelligent to say to that. Not for a full minute. Then he pulled over and stared at the man next to him. “Today I woke up and I was just fed up with my Uncle. And so I read the paper and had breakfast and then called my cousins. The whole thing was spur of the moment.”

  “Are you sure you were fed up when you first awoke? Or did you get mad after you read in the paper that the vote for Bill 67 was today?”

  “It was…” He wasn’t sure.

  “I am sorry.” Scythe said sincerely. Then he leaned back and waited.

  Heron hadn’t decided on his own to stand up to his uncle. It had never even been his desire. He had been made to think that. He was so...disappointed.

  “I didn’t decide to stand up to him?”

  “No, but that doesn’t mean you didn’t want to.”

  “And all the things I did, drugging people, messing with the computer…?”

  “Most of the how was you. I don’t know what the computers look like in the control room, do I? But I did insert into your mind the strong desire to help me out, and it was activated by seeing that the Bill was going to be voted o
n.”

  “So, if it had come up for the vote last week?”

  “You would have shown up earlier.”

  Heron started driving again. They didn’t talk for a long time.

  Chapter 30

  No. No way. It was too dangerous.

  “...and while I’m there, I could take classes from the most respected researcher in the field. Look.” She handed him a printout of the biography of a woman whose latest papers he had already read. She continued speaking quickly, as if she didn’t want to give him a chance to talk because she knew he would refuse, “Her name is Dr. Everett…”

  So many dangers. So many risks. She’d be too far away, well out of reach if anything happened. It terrified him, even to consider it, but he made himself listen.

  “...field manipulation, whatever that is. I just know it would be fascinating, and something we could all benefit from, don’t you think? But, that’s not all. Dad was saying in the last family meeting that…”

  She was so excited that her cheeks were flushed and her eyes were bursting with life. He couldn’t look away from her face if he wanted to.

  This was something that she wanted for herself. He couldn’t gripe about that, since it was obvious that she had been doing almost everything else for the sake of some mysterious vision she had had over two years ago. But, she’d be gone for months...five to six months at a time…

  He was not feeling good. He felt really terrible, like there was a hole at the bottom of his stomach that was filled with a hundred pound bag of sand.

  “...a viable identity that we can use without worrying about…”

  He closed his eyes. She wanted to do this. She wanted something of her own, something she could achieve by herself.

  Mercy misread his expression and suddenly quieted. “You’re not going to let me, are you?”

  No. Definitely not, his selfish side answered.

  She sighed. When he opened his eyes, her shoulders were slumped down and she stared at her hands. That’s how he knew how much she needed it. If it was just something she wanted, she would have tossed her head and snapped at him and marched off. She would have been mad, and probably extremely difficult for a while, and then she would have accepted it and moved on. But this was different.