Grim Judgment

by Jennifer Reinfried

  “I called you to the bunker to bring me good news, not this shit.”

  “I’m sorry, sir, but I don’t think I can find Emma. Not unless Isaac gets to her first.”

  “And the tracker on my car?”

  “Isaac was going through Colorado earlier this morning.” Grant scratched at his goatee.

  “I cannot believe he disobeyed me.” Vance sighed. “We will see what Isaac leads us to. If he cannot find her as well, call him back to me, and we will get on with cowering from the world until Jaxon and Shawn are brought down.” He looked up, his pale eyes boring into Grant, who forced himself to not look away. “She has valuable information, much of it. She cannot be allowed to just disappear. She needs to be dealt with. Permanently dealt with.”

  “Of course. I get it.” Grant took a small step away from his employer.

  “Sir? You wanted to see me?” Volk poked his head into the common area.

  “Yes, yes, come in. Shut the door.” He put his cup on the table beside him and watched as the other man settled into a chair. Grant nodded at the Head of Finance, but didn’t leave the room.

  “You are doing well, I hope?” Vance continued.

  “I am, for the most part. And you?”

  “Just fine.” Vance tilted his head to the side and folded his hands over his stomach. “Isaac left four days ago.”

  “Oh? I hadn’t noticed.”

  Vance frowned.

  “I mean.” Volk shrugged. “He mostly kept to his room.”

  “I know. He was still healing from his wounds.” Vance looked at him pointedly, and an uncomfortable silence filled the room. He took another sip of his coffee, and Grant felt a pang of craving, wishing he would have poured himself a cup.

  “You know,” Vance said. “If you need to go, you can go.”

  “Why would I leave?”

  “When Isaac left, it was hard for me to accept.” Vance raised an eyebrow.

  “Look, I initially took this job to help me raise my kids. You know damn well I’m not keen on killing, and don’t condone how some complete their jobs, although I do understand they have to be done.” Volk shifted in his seat, and his eyes trailed over to the bottle of alcohol next to the mug on the table. “Would you mind?”

  “Not at all.”

  Vance slid the bottle over to the man, who took a long pull, then breathed out heavily and said, “Not bad.”

  “What is your point?”

  “My point is, I know my kids are out there, but I can’t leave. I would never give your position away, for starters.”

  Vance shrugged. “If you left, we could move. It would be irritating, but I am not holding you here on purpose.”

  “Oh, so the armed guards inside are for decoration? Like the undercover ones surrounding the place?”

  “There you go again, sniffing everything out like a true volk.”

  “Sir, you know I’ve always hated that nickname.”

  “Why? It is fitting. The volk in sheep’s clothing.”

  Volk grimaced. “I’m not a wolf. I prefer to be likened to something less menacing. Like a puppy.”

  With a laugh, the Russian leaned forward. “The guards are for my safety, as well as everyone inside, yes. If you leave, I will know, and we will simply move to a different base. The only one who knew of my safe locations was Alex, so I am in no way worried.” Vance smiled. “That is why I offer. If you want to leave, if you want to find your kids, help them, you can. I will just move. Not a big deal to me, and I like to ensure my employees are happy.”

  Don’t take the bait, Grant thought. Just stay here. Say no. He swallowed and clasped his hands behind his back.

  Volk smiled. “Thank you, but I’m happy here, at least for now. Besides, they can take care of themselves.”

  Vance laughed. “Don’t I know it.”

  “There’s nothing I can do for them right now.” The Head of Finance stood. “I truly appreciate all you’ve done for me, even though we have family on opposite sides.”

  “You have been with me a long time, Bruce. I trust you completely. I just thought that maybe you could try to talk some sense into Jaxon and Shawn. Maybe get this idea of revenge out of their minds.”

  Bruce stared at the floor. “I see.” He nodded slowly. “All right. I’ll consider it.” He turned and shuffled through the door.

  After Bruce had left, Grant cleared his throat. “Sir, I—”

  “Talk to him. Get him to see reason. But if you cannot, take off his head.”

  —-

  Jaxon followed a few paces behind Lucas, his hand gripping Shawn’s elbow, not knowing what they were being led into. He continued to recall his brother’s words. How they had each other’s backs. The knowledge they had powers beyond the capability of most other humans quelled his fear some, settled his rapidly beating heart.

  We don’t fear others. Others fear us. They made their way through a sitting room, foyer, past a large, open kitchen and into a long dining room. The hard, wooden floors thumped with their steps. The air was slightly damp, and Jaxon could smell the barest odor of dust.

  “Yeah, we keep meaning to clean the place, but things keep coming up.” A tall, well-built man with a facial scar grinned at them from the left as they approached a long wooden dining table. Jaxon turned and smiled.

  “Aaron.” He nodded once. “Still intruding on people’s thoughts, I see.”

  “Can’t be helped. Good to see you again. And you,” he addressed Shawn. “Very happy to see you pulled through.”

  “Thanks, person I don’t know,” Shawn replied, a nervous smile on his lips.

  Jaxon snorted. “This is Aaron, one of the people I told you about. He was there in Redborough while Duncan and Sarah saved your life. He...kept me calm.”

  Shawn reached out toward the sound of Aaron’s voice and they shook hands. “Thank you, man.”

  “Don’t mention it. We Synths have to stick together. Although, the real people you should be thanking are—”

  “Shawn.”

  Jaxon looked up with a small smile as Duncan interrupted, striding into the dining room.

  “Uh, yes?” Shawn said, deep confusion on his face. He was standing next to the table, with the fingertips of one hand on its surface.

  Duncan strode forward, a wide smile parting his beard. In a few paces he reached forward and pulled Shawn into a tight hug, whose baffled expression deepened.

  “Sorry,” the older man said, and let go. “Are you still sore? From your wounds?”

  “Nope, not at all,” Shawn replied. “Good as new.”

  “Fascinating.”

  “No different from me or Peter,” Lucas said, speaking for the first time since inviting them into the house.

  A sadness flickered in Duncan’s eyes, but it was quickly replaced by a welcoming grin. “And you’re able to walk now? Just like that?”

  “Pretty lucky, huh?”

  “No kidding. Sit, sit.” Duncan gestured to the thick wooden chairs that surrounded the table.

  Jaxon pulled a chair out for his brother before taking a seat himself. “Where’s Mari? Is it just us?”

  “Mari has guard duty right now, and Naomi is resting.” Duncan waved a dismissive hand at Jaxon’s questioning glance. “We’ll get there, I promise. Right now, you have other inquiries. We have some time to discuss, so,” he shrugged, “what do you want to know first?”

  “How do you know us?” Shawn said quickly before Jaxon could even get a full breath in.

  Another expression trickled over Duncan’s face, and he looked slightly uncomfortable.

  “Well,” he said. “Long story short, I worked at the lab where you were created. I assume Jaxon’s caught you up on what he knows?”

  Shawn nodded. “Yeah, stuff about being bred for war using Evo DNA. A little difficult to believe at first, but kinda makes sense if you take me and Jax into consideration.”

  Chuckles echoed throughout the room.

  “Yes,” Duncan said. “Evos gave
their DNA to help create new, improved humans.”

  “Synths,” Jaxon spoke up.

  “Correct. The experiment was called Project Bluefish, don’t ask me why, and took place at Lab 14. You both were born there, grew up there, until the accident when you were both eleven.”

  “What happened?”

  Duncan eyed Jaxon a moment before he replied. “One of our Synths...surprised us. We had no time to react. Basically, it was a slaughter. Many people died; Synths, Evos, and scientists alike. A friend and I were able to help some of the children escape, including you two. Shortly after, the government officials in charge of the experiments caught wind, but I had taken the kids elsewhere before they could find us.” Duncan looked down at his hands, clasped together lightly on the table before him. “I stayed on the run with the ones I was able to rescue. Lucas, Peter, Mari, Naomi and Aaron.”

  “Not us?” Shawn asked.

  “Not you. Jaxon’s father...he requested that he raise the both of you on his own, and I had no right to deny him that. He took you two and disappeared while the rest of us went into hiding, in Colorado. Been here ever since, training, hiding.”

  Jaxon’s mind pulled up the memory of him and Shawn, huddled together on the floor until his dad burst through the door. “You’re training?” he asked.

  “Making our powers stronger,” Lucas said.

  “Trying to learn how to control them,” Aaron added. “I still can’t drown out multiple people, but thanks to Duncan and the other Synths, I’ve been able to pinpoint certain voices, can find anyone in a large crowd.” He smiled at the older man. “We’re still works in progress, but we’ve had a long time to practice.”

  “So you can help me get stronger?” Jaxon said. Eagerness swelled inside him.

  “We can help you control your powers, yes,” Duncan replied.

  “Wait, so...” Shawn held up a hand. “Can we go back to my twin? That’s still freaking me out.”

  “You say twin,” Lucas said with a laugh. “I say clone. Potato, po-tah-toh. We aren’t technically twins because I’m younger than you.” He grinned.

  A short silence followed before Shawn said, “Clone?”

  “Well,” Duncan said, “the plan was, once a Synth was perfected, they’d be cloned. An entire army could be created, full of people with these elite abilities, in a matter of just a few years, once they were on a roll. Shawn’s powers were perfected before anyone else’s, so they cloned him a few times. While those developed, they tried to take it to the next level and increase Shawn’s sight tenfold.”

  “Clones? Now we’re talking about clones? Of Shawn? This is fucked up.” Jaxon stood, his overwhelmed mind aflutter, and began to pace beside the table.

  “What do you mean, ‘the next level’?” Shawn asked, ignoring his brother.

  “They inserted high-tech implants behind your eyes,” Duncan replied, “thinking they would give you night vision, but all they did was mess up your sight. The accident at the lab occurred before they were scheduled to be taken out, and the lab was destroyed.” His eyes developed a faraway look. “You were left nearly blind.”

  “Whoa, whoa, wait a minute,” Jaxon stopped moving back and forth. “Can we address the biggest issue here?”

  “Which is?” Duncan asked.

  “Why Shawn and I don’t remember any of this? My dad adopted us. Neither of us recall anything about a lab or clones or Synths or any of this shit.”

  Duncan frowned at the curse. “That’s because I wiped your memories. Both of you.”

  “Excuse me?” Shawn’s face looked as incredulous as Jaxon felt. “What the hell?”

  “The flashbacks,” his brother said softly from his chair.

  Jaxon looked at him, recalling the nightmares that plagued his sleep. “Why?” he demanded.

  “What happened to you two in particular that night is something no child should ever have to live through. The memories would have haunted you, and your father and I both agreed—”

  “You keep bringing up my dad,” Jaxon interrupted. “How much of this does he know about?”

  “Plenty. Your mother worked at Lab 14 for a long time.”

  “So he knew about me. He lied to me.” Jaxon felt anger creeping up through his body, flushing his face.

  Duncan stood. His eyes were wary, and he flicked a glance over at Lucas, who in turn looked at Jaxon.

  “Hey,” Aaron said, his voice cutting into Jaxon’s sudden rage. “Think about it. Why would Bruce tell his children about an uncontrollable, dangerous superpower after wiping your memory so you could forget about it? With no lab, no specialists to help you, you could have spazzed out, gone on the fritz trying to use it.” He took a step forward, eyes on Jaxon’s clenched fists.

  Shawn spoke up, realizing the tension in the room. “Jax,” he said. “It makes sense.”

  Duncan nodded, his friendly gaze still hinting of sadness.

  Jaxon forced himself to unclench his fingers, breathing deeply through his nose, holding it, then letting it out in a long stream. He knew his power became unstable when he flew into a rage, and the last thing he wanted to do was hurt the people who were trying to help him, help Shawn.

  “Just...tell me this,” Jaxon said after a moment. “If we were bred for war, given powers that helped in battles, what the hell are my wraiths for? Where do they even come from?”

  “My best guess is that you’re some kind of telekinetic who can not only move objects with your mind, but manipulate energy around you to create a tear from which you call forth your wraiths. I don’t know from where, whether it’s another existence or a part of ours we can’t see, because to tell you the truth, no one truly knows anything about you.” Duncan leaned forward over the table. “Your mother and grandfather worked on you, wouldn’t let anyone else in on their work, not even Bruce. She and your father had one hell of a falling out. He had filed for divorce before she was killed in the lab accident.”

  “She’s not really my mother,” Jaxon said, eyes downcast. “She didn’t give birth to me, some surrogate did, right?”

  “That’s correct.”

  “And...and my dad?” He looked up, unsure of if he wanted the answer.

  “As Aaron said, he’s your biological father.”

  “But that means...” Shawn frowned.

  “Yes.” Aaron piped up.

  “What?” Jaxon looked between the two. “Not everyone can read minds, man, speak up.”

  “Jax, if Synths were created using Evo DNA...” Shawn trailed off.

  “No way. Dad’s an Evo?” Jaxon looked at Duncan, who nodded. He couldn’t tell if he was thrilled at the new connection to his father or angry. He sat back down in his chair.

  “What can he, you know...do?” Shawn asked.

  Duncan looked uncomfortable again. “There’s a lot left to discuss,” he said slowly. “And there are certain things I would prefer you hear directly from Bruce. However, I haven’t heard from him in a bit. We were hoping that you would be able to contact him, have him come out here and join us.”

  Jaxon realized he had let weeks go by without calling his father, had barely turned on his cell phone. A deep remorse weighed over him. Shawn’s phone had been left at his home before the chaos of the night he almost died, and they’d never gotten the chance to go back for anything before fleeing Oregon, which meant that if Bruce had been trying to call them, especially if he’d heard about the events on the roof, he would no doubt be in a panic.

  “We haven’t heard from him lately.” Jaxon forced his concerns back in his mind. We need to help Shawn first, he thought. I can call Dad during the surgery to make sure he’s all right. Once I know he’s safe and Shawn’s recovered, we can take out the people on that list.

  “Well, if you do,” Duncan was saying, “please let me know. Not only can he help you two more than I can in some ways, but he’s an old friend, and I’d love to see him safe.” He stood. “So! Want to get your sight back?”

  Shawn grinned. “In no log
ical scenario would I ever turn that down.”

  “Lucas, can you take him to the surgical room and prep him?”

  “Wait, now?” Shawn looked shocked.

  “Why not?” Duncan chuckled. “It won’t take long, and at the rate you heal, you’ll be completely fine within hours.”

  Shawn stood up so fast he knocked over his chair. “Yes. Yep. Now is good.”

  The small group shared a laugh, including Jaxon.

  “He’ll be fine,” Aaron said once Lucas had left with Shawn.

  Jaxon wasn’t listening. An excitement was beginning to develop within him. “My dad’s an Evo,” he said softly. “That’s actually pretty cool. But you’re not one.”

  Duncan laughed. “No, not me. I’m just a lowly normal human being with no amazing powers to boast of. All I did was surgery and memory wipes, among...other things.” He gestured to the door and began to walk the way Lucas had gone.

  “I have to call him.” Jaxon pulled his cell from his pocket.

  “Whoa, hold on there.”

  “What?” He frowned as Duncan halted in front of him.

  “We need you to use a payphone in town.”

  “Why?”

  “Jaxon, the people you hurt are no doubt looking for you.” Duncan crossed his arms and glanced at Aaron. “Vance is a powerful man. You and Shawn tried to kill him, then attacked his people. One of his own tried to kill you after your friend’s funeral. They’re out there, and you need to be extremely careful right now.”

  “How do you know all this?” Jaxon demanded.

  “Hi, my name’s Aaron,” the blond man said behind him in a sarcastic tone. “I believe we’ve met.”

  “Seriously?”

  Aaron shrugged. “When Lucas greeted you, I’d already been listening to you two. Not trying to be rude, but we kind of needed to make sure you weren’t a danger to us.”

  “Yeah. Whatever.” Jaxon glared at him, then turned back to Duncan.

  “How do you know they’re still looking for us?”

  The older man shifted from one foot to the other. “Because we have one of them in custody. He told us—”