“I want updates on these individuals every three days,” he ordered.
“About the chinks?”
Dana looked at Mark and Rin, a smile breaking out over his lips.
“Mark already has his assignment,” Dana said. “He’s looking out for the Markus boy. I will put him on security detail for Little Lily Sandover. After all, she has already been attacked.”
Sean glanced over at Mark, seeing that the experiment looked confused, but not worried, unable to understand what Dana was saying.
“And Rin is going to be the one you call if you feel that you need assistance catching or detaining any of the Commission children who are out of line. She should understand most of what you say, so you’ll be able to order her to capture someone if you were worried about your ability to do so.”
“We can catch some kids if we need to,” a third man sneered.
“We have the chinks for a reason,” Dana said seriously. “Use them.”
Everyone fell silent for a few long moments before Dana motioned them out. “Go away,” he said. “You’re free to go.”
Everyone filed out of the room slowly except for Rin and Mark, who remain standing obediently to one side of the room.
Sean took a step forward.
“They’re not feeling good about this,” he said. “They’re going to start questioning you.”
“Let them,” Dana said, shrugging. “It really doesn’t matter what everyone else in the Commission is doing. And I expect them to not do their jobs very thoroughly.”
Sean’s brow creased in confusion. “Then why did you bother to assign them those people to watch?”
“It’s all a part of the game,” Dana said, a small smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.
“Game? What game?”
“The game I am playing with Little Lily Sandover,” Dana answered. “Those names I gave them are all those who I know are loyal.”
“I swear, I will never understand you,” Sean said seriously, shaking his head. “If you know they’re loyal, then why are you investigating them and not the ones that you think might not be?”
“Because corruption has already sent in, and people already think that they can oppose me. The only way to fix that is to eliminate all of them.”
“And that has to do with Lily how?”
“Oh, oh, I can’t give away everything,” Dennis said with a devilish wink. “Besides, it will be much more fun if Little Lily has some illusion that she can actually win against me.”
Sean stood straight, closing his eyes and shaking his head.
“I won’t be party to any of this,” he said.
“That’s fine,” Dana said. “You don’t need to be. You’re already on the winning side. This is just a little bit of fun…”
Sean turned to Mark and Rin, nodding for them to follow him.
“Where are you going?” Dana asked.
“Somewhere away from you for a while,” Sean murmured. “Besides, Mark needs to get back to the Markus family.”
“Oh, if you see them, tell Danielle that she has no reason to worry. I’m not going to be investigating her family.”
Sean hesitated, turning to look at Danna as Mark also turned his head, though his eyes were turned down—he was trying not to show interest.
“But you are investigating them, right?”
“I just said I wasn’t.”
Sean turned back around completely to face Dana.
“But you just said that you were not investigating those that you were not sure of their loyalty,” Sean said. “The Markus family is loyal. So didn’t you put some of your men on them so that you could play this little game of yours?”
Dana’s smile became cold, dropping the temperature in the room a few degrees.
“But are they loyal?”
There was a silence that gripped the room as Sean stared at Dana, worried about the knowing look in the eyes of the leader of the Commission of the People.
“Just tell Danielle that she has no reason to worry, because she’s not being investigated.”
Sean remain still a few moments longer before hesitantly leaving the room, becoming more and more worried about the game Dana was trying to play. Mark and Rin trailed behind him. When she was sure no one was looking, Rin glanced at Mark, trying to silently communicate her profound worry. However, when she saw Mark’s face, her heart fell a little in her chest.
Mark’s eyes were cold and determined. Whatever he thought about the exchange in Dana’s office, it obviously forced him to make up his mind about his own course of action. Run wondered what Mark would do, worried about him getting hurt during a second attempt to remove Dana Christenson from power.
Blindsided
“Dana, just answer the fucking phone…” Sean groaned, pushing on the Commission leader’s shoulders. Dana smiled mischievously and leaned back, still straddling the legs of his head of security.
“I was enjoying the vibration,” Dana pouted playfully, digging into his pocket and pulling out his incessantly buzzing phone. “I thought you were, too.”
“Will you get off of me?” Sean groaned, rolling his eyes.
“Trust me, you’re going to enjoy what I’m about to do,” Dana promised thickly, looking at the screen of his phone, his face tightening in confusion.
“What is it?”
“One of the drones…” Dana murmured. He answered the call. “What?”
“Sir! We have a problem! Goliath made it all the way to Ward Six! He’s killed a ton of people!”
“Get the Mark and the others on him,” Dana sighed, leaning against the back of the driver’s seat, pouting at having been interrupted from playing with Sean. The head of security was uncomfortable with Dana still astride him. He would play with Dana’s flirting up to a point, but he had never mastered figuring out the exact moment that the flirting turned from playful to sincere. He had found himself in all kinds of awkward situations with the leader of the Commission of the People.
“No! Sir! I mean, yeah, they’re doing that! We have a bigger problem!”
“What do you mean a bigger problem?” Dana groaned, rolling his eyes. “I’m busy. Make it quick.”
“Sir, there are cells that are empty!”
Dana’s eyes stopped mid-roll and fell on Sean, who was blinking in shock, having heard the message.
“What do you mean there are cells that are empty?” Dana pressed, his voice lined with barely-controlled anger.
“In Ward Six. We were going after Goliath and Lewis fell back into an empty experiment cell. There’s another one right next to it. There are other experiments loose but we didn’t see—fuck!”
There were muffled sounds of gunfire and groaning as the fight with Goliath moved to where the guard had been standing. Dana and Sean listened to the man for a few seconds before Sean forcefully removed Dana from his lap, getting out of the back seat and walking to the driver’s door, climbing into the car.
Dana sighed and crawled forward, leaning on the center console as Sean began driving back to the Commission of the People. Both of them were listening to the pained and hurried sounds on the other end of the phone as the car rumbled forward.
* *** *
Dana sighed and leaned back against his desk, shaking his head and looking over the conscious security detail that stood before him. It had taken hours to reorganize after Dana had shown up. He had seen the Eight Group struggle with Goliath for four minutes before Mark finally put Goliath on the ground and managed to get the thick needle into his armored skin to tranquilize him.
Dana watched as the Eight Group carefully picked up the unconscious experiment and took him back to his cell. He followed them, taking note of the bodies that lined the hall. The conscious guards were going to each body, feeling for a pulse and quickly yelling at the doctors to take the ones that were still alive.
The leader of the Commission had watched everything proceed quietly, observing the way his men dealt with the disaster. But he had qu
ickly caught sight of the empty cells of the experiments and called for a small group to go through the holding cells and be sure that the humans were locked up. The results he got from the search had not been pleasing.
He stood, with all the information, before the remaining conscious members of the security team. The Eight Group stood off to the side of the room, their heads down and their hands folded in front of them, still bleeding from their fight with Goliath. Sean stood in the far corner, looking over the numbers with wide eyes.
“So…can anyone tell me exactly how we managed to fuck up so magnificently?” Dana asked, his tone sharp and cold as ice.
“Three Ward Tens escaped…” one of the men murmured.
“And Goliath got all the way to Ward fucking Six!!” Dana bellowed, standing straight and glaring at all of them. “I know he’s a tough fucker but I have told you time and time again that when that happens to leave it to them and contain the area!” Dana pointed his finger angrily at the beaten former experiments who were standing with their heads down, listening quietly. “Instead, you got in their way and made this a massive cluster fuck! Now, we’ve been breached. We have twenty-eight experiments unaccounted for, and even the holding cells were hit. I’m also out forty-eight men, thirty-nine of which are dead.”
The humans flinched away at the numbers.
“I cannot believe you would all be stupid enough to think that you could stand up against Goliath!” Dana growled, pinching the bridge of his nose. “There is a reason we have the chinks, okay?” He sighed and shook his head. “Alright. Get the hell out of my sight. Got the hospital, get treated.”
“Yes, sir,” they all murmured, turning and leaving the room.
“I guess we’re going to have to treat you here,” Dana muttered, turning to the Eight Group. When his attention focused on them, they all flinched away. Dana smiled at the display, knowing that his previous actions with Mark had made the rest of the Eight Group fear him.
“Dana, they should be treated soon,” Sean sighed, stepping closer and looking over them. “And they probably need rest. From what the men told me, the fight went on for about an hour. I’m sure they’re exhausted.”
“Yes, yes, of course,” Dana nodded, waving at Sean distractedly as he looked among the Asian experiments.
His eyes settled on Mark and he sighed, recalling how Mark had gotten Goliath to the ground and forced the needle under his skin, even as he was being crushed by the larger experiment.
Dana moved over to Mark, looking over the smaller man quietly.
“Oh, Mark…” he murmured. He reached out and ran his fingers along the former experiment’s jaw, pushing lightly to make the experiment lift his head. Mark moved his head, but did not look into Dana’s eyes. Dana looked over the scratches and bruises on the other man. “You did a good job.”
He took Mark’s face gently and tipped his head closer. Mark flinched, but Dana still leaned forward and kissed Mark’s forehead tenderly, which made the leader of the Eight Group shiver in fear.
The Other Car
Dana looked up quickly from his half-kneeling position on the ground and ground his teeth together, watching Lily and Mark run through the people in the park. Sean quickly holstered his gun and reached down, wrapping his hand around Dana’s bicep and helping to haul him to his feet. Dana sighed and pushed Sean away from him.
“I’m fine,” he growled. “Let’s go.”
“Go?” Sean blinked. “You’ve been shot.” Sean did not have time to complete the sentence before Dana was walking quickly toward the parking lot, only limping slightly from the bullet hole in his leg. “Dana!”
“Shut up!” Dana snapped. “Come on, we’re following them.”
Sean wanted to protest, but he knew better than to go against Dana when the leader of the Commission was hell bent on something. He ran forward and quickly unlocked the car using the remote, climbing into the driver’s seat as Dana closed the door to the passenger’s seat.
“Dana, you really should go to the—”
“Drive, damnit!” Dana growled.
Grinding his teeth in frustration, Sean quickly turned the car on and peeled out of the driveway, quickly following the black car that was just about to disappear from sight.
“That chinky motherfucker…” Dana murmured, pressing his fingers to the bullet wound before groaning in annoyance, reached into the back and grabbing the small medical kit that was standard in all the Commission cars.
“How bad is it?”
“I’m fine,” Dana assured. “It doesn’t even hurt. But since I can’t feel it, I know I’m going to have to watch out for infection. Thank you, nervous system…” Dana opened the medical kit and pressed some gauze to the top of the wound in order to clog the bleeding temporarily while he looked for a needle to sew up the wound.
“You’re going to do that now? Here?” Sean blinked.
“Just follow them,” Dana said simply.
“What about the bullet?” Sean asked.
Dana shrugged. “I don’t know, it went through.”
“Fuck, Dana…” Sean rolled his eyes.
“What?”
“You need to be treated properly,” Sean said. “Let them go for now.”
“Hell no, I’m not going to miss the opportunity,” Dana laughed as though Sean had suggested a truly foolish idea. “Besides, there is no needle in the kit. Do you have a sewing kit on you?”
“No, Dana, I do not have a sewing kit on me,” Sean ground out behind his teeth, annoyed.
Dana looked around at the road in front of them.
“Oh, Mark…” Dana sighed, shaking his head as Mark started weaving around the semi-trucks in the industrial part of town. “Just keep up with him, Sean. Make him feel some heat.”
“Mark is not the type you want to pressure…” Sean hissed under his breath. However, he following his boss’ orders and began weaving in and out of traffic, following the car, trying to focus as much as possible. “You’re fortunate we were in the park with a lot of people and Mark couldn’t aim properly,” Sean shook his head. “He would have hit you in the head, otherwise.”
“Now that you mention it,” Dana said off handedly, “for someone with such impressive aim, you would think he would have found a place more vital to hit.”
“He was trying to be discreet,” Sean said sharply, jumping back in his lane of traffic when the opening that Mark had taken closed and he was forced back until the car in the opposing lane of traffic passed. When the car was gone, he quickly leapt into the other lane and began speeding up the sloping curve, catching up with the black car easily, since they were slowing down with the traffic trying to get on the freeway. “He was the best in the Eight Group for marksmanship. Actually, he was the best among everyone in security.”
“Really?” Dana asked, turning to Sean as the head of security for the Commission began switching lanes to take advantage of the opening next to Mark’s car. “In all the security?”
“Fuck!” Sean snapped, quickly turning his wheel to jump over the median after Mark’s car, his eyes sharp, seeing the small opening that Mark was about to exploit. Seeing the other cars begin to panic and swerve, Sean cursed once again and slammed on the brake, throwing the car in reverse and abruptly spinning them around, slamming the car back into gear and speeding angrily the other direction, taking the first turn to take another onramp to the freeway. “Goddamnit…” he huffed.
“Sean, really? In all security?”
“Jesus fuck, Dana!” Sean snapped. “How could you not know that?! That’s how you named him!” Sean glanced at Dana briefly as he sped well over speed limit toward the next freeway onramp. “Remember? ‘Oh, he never missed the mark. That’s what we’ll call him.’”
Dana was silent for a few moments before he nodded slowly.
“Oh, yeah…”
The leader of the Commission reached into his pocket and pulled out his cell phone, dialing a number before lifting the device to his ear.
&nb
sp; “It’s Dana,” he said simply. “I have some members of the little terrorists on the freeway heading west. Black Commission car, number eighty-eight on the bumper. Get anyone you can who is nearby on this. They should be one or two exits east of the interchange by now. Block all the exits around the interchange for now.”
He hung up the phone and sighed, watching with little interest as Sean turned sharply to get on the freeway at the interchange. As they started to see the other cars on the freeway, Dana turned in his seat to look behind him to see where the car was, spotting it easily as it sped in the far left lane.
“There they are,” Dana said with a light smile.
Sean slowed and looked in the rear-view mirror just in time to see the nose of the other Commission car dip as Mark slammed on the breaks and sharply swerved to the onramp he almost passed.
With a frustrated growl, Sean pulled over and threw the car into reverse, driving backward on the shoulder, trying to ignore the pileup of cars that was blocking traffic.
“How did that just happen?” Dana asked, sitting back down in his seat, looking genuinely perplexed.
“Because, Dana, Mark was also the best at defensive driving,” Sean said with an exasperated tone, turning the car and lining it up with the off ramp before slamming the accelerator and pushing the car forward with a roar of the engine.
“Well, what wasn’t he best at?” Dana challenged.
“Communication!” Sean bellowed. “Since you went in and fucked up his voice and pissed him the fuck off!”
“I can do without the sass, Sean,” Dana said as though there was not a potentially dangerous situation at hand. Sean saw Mark speed up the off-ramp and slam into the two cars at the top of the ramp.
“Shit…” he murmured, slowing down slightly as he started up the ramp. “Yeah, well, you know what? We could all do without a very powerful and extremely smart member of the Eight Group loose in the city with all the inside information on us who sympathizes with your experiment of a domestic terrorist group.”
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