Variant: A Sci-Fi Romance (Variant Trilogy Book 1)

by J. Q. Baldwin

  He huffed in a chuckle as he circled around my large image. The holo-screen centred the room and as he passed Ava paused in her work and walked closer.

  “Hello Sweetheart, did you become their leader yet?”

  “Not yet, though I suppose with the leader’s upcoming resurrection a little late I may be the front runner soon.” She was there, Ava. One person I’d never truly hide from.

  With all seriousness and a quizzical eye Ava said, “I would expect nothing less.”

  Troy’s fingertips brushed Ava’s hand before turning a purposeful eye to me.

  “Carne’s back.” Such an ominous statement.

  “I know.”

  “He found you already?” Ava asked. “I thought it’d take him a little longer.” She beamed with a little pride. She knew I’d tried to cover my trail. Ava alone had been given access to my location. I never forgot who bred my Mate despite that he’d learned so much from Spartan. She loved me. I’d felt it, but the pride glowing from her was hard to swallow even if she’d tried to sever it quickly.

  “But we’re not calling to tell you Carne’s whereabouts. Ven’s team DeltacrowII hemmed in a POI with links to trafficked plasma, blood products and ghost organs, purportedly from Variants, through a link to an auction house.”

  “Do we know the POI’s real name or the pharma’s growing them?” I kept my presence at the shareholder’s meeting to myself. Carne had not divulged it, so I wouldn't. A scary unspoken loyalty I should question.

  I did question however, how quickly I’d glazed over the fact that Variants were being harvested. A gift from Carne. He’d left blocks in my psyche. I remembered why. That, he hadn't taken. His manipulations were very real. He didn’t simply take to save me from hurt. He saved me from it but explicitly warned me he could relent and let it rush back in again.

  Was I giving him too much credit?

  Did I let myself bypass the very real evidence of GMT because of Carne or because it would alter my own life so greatly? Was I so selfish?

  Troy strode to the centre console. He swished data from screen to screen with a palm. “The pharmaceutical company’s name is Cercek. It’s a subsidiary company under the umbrella of Ceretide Biologicals which made a name for itself in the last decade as a reliable bio-engineer manufacturer for cloned and grown organs, using patients own stem cells and tissues. They began with de-celled aortas but now have diversified into all major organs including skin.”

  The files projected names, faces, reports and drone footage that I picked at while Troy reassembled them before him. I recognised many from the meeting.

  He paused and glanced up at me again. He was small as I looked down into the control room from the large centre screen but Troy eclipsed my size with the weight of duty he suddenly burdened on my shoulders.

  “All hands on deck for this Gyps’. Not just our livelihood but our lives are at stake.”

  “But-” I made to rebut automatically but shut down immediately as my arguments and reasons became petty, even to myself. My self-assessment had taken a monumental hit yesterday and I questioned whether I should be here alone anyway.

  “We need all Variants on board. We can’t afford to include outsiders in our intelligence, lest it proliferate. GMT affects the small number of us in the most violating of ways,” Troy raised his hands, asking for patience. “I know you’ve only been independent for two weeks but to be perfectly honest your talents outweigh your need for solace,” he halted for long moments as I recognised a personal communication coming through to him.

  I waited obediently –

  “This changes things Delilah,” he mused seriously, combing a hand through his hair. “Carne just reported you’ve experienced emotionally triggered, late onset Telekinesis?”

  Late? What a joke.

  I wanted to lie through my gritted teeth despite the fact the two people assessing my every biological response right now were better lie detectors than I. My skills in lying suffered because I shoved them into the same box I used to ignore the world’s pain.

  I truly seethed internally then.

  I knew violation.

  How could he break my trust again? How could he spew my secrets out so freely? Carne knew I wouldn’t want everyone to know I was cracking! He really was ruthless.

  “I have control of it.” Was it a lie? If I couldn’t tell, could they?

  Ava’s button nose pinched slightly, she wasn’t fooled. Troy nodded but it was not to me, it was to Ava who had commented to him telepathically. I exhaled long and low when Troy continued.

  “We have discussed it and there is no way getting around the fact that you have the best facial recognition and working memory processing speed which could be the edge we need in a group auction environment where every player can be analysed without an AI limitations.”

  I paced beside my new cloudy lounge with agitation. I could not go back. Not now. Not after I’d finally found the courage I’d been searching for since I was nineteen years old. “That’s weak, Troy and you know it; there’s plenty in the team who compare to me.”

  “Exceptional surpasses simply, reasonable. Do you think I’d take a second choice into one of the most intimate missions we’ve undertaken in the past eighty years? Someone not Family?” Zeal lit his words aflame.

  “We Variants are all family Troy.”

  “We are Delilah,” Ava swept closer, lifting her hand as if to rub my cheek like she had wont to do as I grew. “Never forget what family means sweetheart, and the people who need you just as much as you need them. We can help you with your Telekinesis.”

  “I haven’t forgotten, but assumedly Carne has also told you I have a new member of my family who at this very moment requires help. You’re asking me to choose between yourselves and her.” It tore at my soul to know that no matter what I said, how I felt, I could not get the momentousness of my deep purpose through.

  “We are not asking you to choose anything Delilah,” Troy said bluntly revealing his true strength of character. The one he hid behind a jovial façade.

  “Any family will benefit directly, as soon as our people and their organs are no longer trafficked. If we shut down those operations you will only be one step closer to your twin.”

  I wouldn’t win.

  “You will be retrieved tomorrow. There will be tests to examine your Tk and you will be required to spend one hour a day with Ella for meditation. She has assured Carne they’ll assist in managing the flux of cognitive energy.”

  “I will not move home; I can’t. Surely you can see that?” I whispered desperately.

  “So live where you want. We’re not asking you to move home permanently. We’re asking you to perform a duty we all feel the gravity of. We have raised you to know, any uncontrolled ability is a liability. Like it or not, you are still one of us and we look after our own. Carne will be there today to pick you up. The end Delilah. Be there or we will take extreme measures to reacquire you.”

  I sagged into my lounge and tangled myself in my pretty blanket.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Carne

  “Why do we find ourselves in a shithole parking complex in Burrow 6, instead of with the rest of our team?” Cory wound around, arms raised as if to take in the grandness of the space.

  It was a graffitied shit-stain, in a derelict Burrow and I gave him a wry grin that solidified into something a little more fierce when I invaded his personal space.

  “Is that a question?”

  “No?” Cory asked with cheek.

  “Pull your head in Cor,” Ella shoulder barged him as she passed to hop atop the concrete barrier. She was ethereal before a backdrop of decay. Pensive, she floated along the wall, her bottom lip a soft pink compared to her strong jaw line apparent in the gaudy light. The vantage point from the third storey was strategic and quiet and she made for a beautiful gargoyle.

  “Your ride’s here Carne,” she nodded down at a vehicle sputtering to a hover at the base of the old concrete square.


  “I’ll be gone at least an hour. We’ll be leaving for the auction plus one this morning,’ I warned.

  “What kind of plus one? Hostage kind of plus one or specialist plus one?” Cory quizzed, taking a peak over the barrier, down to the transport.

  “Both,” Ella chuckled sarcastically before skipping off the height, her highlighted hair floating down her back as easily as her feet found the ground between the space of two bollards.

  “Carne’s picking up Delilah, aren’t you Otso?”

  I scowled. Fucking ‘Otso’. I despised that nickname. Ella could be such a dick, but she knew it could definitely go either way. Only twenty-four hours ago I’d warned Delilah she’d be home by the end of the week, instead I’d be dragging her kicking and screaming if necessary from her naïve freedom to a GMT auction. The very thing I’d spent my life training to keep her away from and I’d now buried her in as bait.

  “Aww, Carne, is this the girl you’ve been playing house with?”

  Ella almost guffawed. I slapped her a little too hard on the shoulder blades, causing her to stumble forward too close to the precipice beyond the broken barriers.

  “What? It’s not my fault,” she protested. “Carne ‘aint the play house kind of guy,” she advised Cory.

  The back end of the glossy black hover vehicle bounced as Keota stepped off the bonnet and patrolled closer to us. His stillness fooled the unwary until his weight landed before you. It was either a tool he used or an intrinsic part of his stony personality, possibly both.

  “Delilah. Is that the little waif who broke your jaw eight months ago, on the training mats before we left Onyxeal Compound?” The deep baritone of Keota’s voice was amused and carried a vibration that grumbled like a tremor.

  “Let me get this right,” Cory ticked things off on one hand, that dimple in his chin creasing in delight. “You have a girlfriend. Who broke your jaw. That you sugar daddy and now we’re bringing her crazy with us on the mission to follow the GMT products after the auction tonight?”

  He scratched an imaginary match at unseen fumes hazing the air.

  “Delilah is not crazy. Nor is she my girlfriend,” I said. Then re-iterated very succinctly: “She. Is. Mine. I’ll warn you now our friendship means very little compared to her, if you so much as sniff in her direction I will not be held responsible for my actions.”

  “Why does it look like you’re not jokin’ Carne?” He asked warily, not trusting his current instincts. He’d only known me to be amicable in an aloof way, certainly no-one prone to fits of violence over what he viewed as a trivial matter.

  “He’s not.” Ella agreed.

  I turned and strode purposefully down the waiting vehicle. No more needed be said. If Cory was stupid enough not to heed my first and only warning then he’d soon learn the consequence.

  I had the driver squirrel around two other Burrows before I gave instructions to Delilah’s apartment. It took longer than I would have liked as usual, but complacency was not an option. If, on the very off chance, my team had to follow the footprints of the GMT sales from the auction long term, she’d be returning here. Despite what Cory thought, I’d not be taking her into combat. So, as little as I liked the idea of leaving her, I wouldn’t compromise her apartment by parking a PMC vehicle at the foot of it and drag her, bodily, into it.

  It could be I was just paranoid about allowing my team near her, though.

  Fuck both my fathers, but they knew me well. I’d keep Delilah with me while we attended the auction tonight only because I was selfish enough to want a few more hours with the contrary wench and to keep her relatively safe with me while Keota and Cory set up security and Ella was occupied with telekinetic surveillance.

  Delilah exhibiting her real peak with telekinesis was a terrifying prospect. It was worse than I’d suspected after the first surge. More powerful. Dangerous.

  Her entire life she’d needed anchoring and this was a variable we now had little time to evaluate. Ella’s priority this evening was not the auction, it was Delilah. And despite Ella’s wont to joke, I suspected she was all too aware what I was capable of when it came to Delilah.

  Delilah

  I slipped my last serrated dagger into the inner arm of my long-sleeve thinning jade shirt . Three knives for each arm. Then, bent over the base of my new bed, tightening my boots, I sensed him.

  How long have you been in here watching my arse, Carne?

  Did you bend over on purpose, just to tempt me? He asked instead.

  A warm thick palm slid down the crease of my globes, smoothly continuing under until he cupped my pelvic bone. His other hand curved my spine down as he moved up behind me as seamlessly as he’d done so many times it felt as natural as breathing. Why did he always have to be so fucking warm all the time? It was like he dripped sunshine.

  You’re not here to fuck me remember?

  I could easily forget Delilah, when your needy scent hits me like that.

  I’ll hit you Carne, you needn’t have asked, I spun and aimed the heel of my palm toward his pleasantly smiling face.

  You have betrayed my loyalty again, I will forever remember, I told him scathingly. You have taken everything from me. Stolen parts of me and betrayed every trust I ever bestowed. Pain is not temporary; it is enduring.

  His ire built.

  So what if he didn’t like to be reminded of it. He’d done it again and again and again. There was no way he could deny it.

  His fisted me by the scruff of my neck violently and kissed the corner of my mouth, tugging at my bottom lip. I fought a rising sigh. I shouldn’t have let him so close. His scent jacked up my senses so fast they drugged me.

  I made to knee him.

  He deflected easily as I knew he would, and moved from my personal space. I was breathing harder. He was right, my pheromones practically laced the room and my psychic energy strained to reach in and tap into the strength I hadn’t felt close all day.

  “I’m not leaving voluntarily, you know that right?” I hardened my voice if not my body.

  Voluntarily or not Delilah, you will be leaving with me this morning. The GMT is excessively bad timing for assessing the Tk and I would be locking you down normally, but Troy is right you are an asset and you’re safer with me.”

  “You put that in Troy’s head. And don’t you mean, everybody else is safer if I’m with you,” I fumed quietly.

  Same difference, Honey.

  Honey?

  That connection took so much longer than it should have. But I knew what that ‘Honey’ meant. It meant run!

  I was too late.

  It was ridiculous how easily he commandeered my own body.

  Locked in a small part of my consciousness I watched as he succumbed to the primordial instincts I presumed he held control of, but never should have. Spun around, he ran his nose up against the little hairs on the back of my neck. They lifted to get closer to him.

  Breathing deep, his great chest lifting, his arms folded under mine, lifting both my elbows high, forcing my hands backwards over my shoulders, resting gently upon a savageness barely restrained in that stony chest.

  I’d escape, I promised myself. This was temporary, unlike pain. I’ll want to escape, I added to the vow.

  You will never again get the chance, this is permanent, and will last aeons, he snapped furiously.

  I perceived only the colour of his arms, the muscles as they bunched. The raw anger that nestled against me, asking for a rub. He left me in that position as his heated hands licked like acid down the piano wire straining the backs of my arms, then down my body.

  I thought for a moment he wouldn’t. But I shouldn’t have got my hopes up. His canines were sharpened naturally, to rend me motionless and he used the skill so splendidly I hadn’t even realised he’d released my mind.

  As he entered my throat, he ripped open my soul.

  A feminine curl of heat promised he’d be loyal, protective. I could trust this man - Mate - at my back with every
vulnerability. He’d fold me into his own energy, remade us.

  But a threat lay there in the open.

  Scent meant many things to Variants that humans had no notion of. Primarily: ownership and that brand scorched down into my blood. I wouldn’t easily wash the taint away.

  While living together scent had hardly mattered if we left the Compound. Our scents knotted much like our minds. But with the laceration of our parting and the mutual distrust yawing between us, a sadistic violence roared into his thoughts: marking deep would go a long way to heal the fissure.

  The bond lied to him as much as it did me.

  My shaking hands slipped back down in front of me and I sagged. With hurt, with love, with barely controlled mutilation.

  Now, am I forcing you out the door or are you walking?

  I listed towards the bed again and almost snarled when he reached out as if to catch me. I straightened myself up, swiped the blood from my torn neck and shucked on a black bomber.

  The new threat hardened the planes of his face and any chivalry was gone. He licked the colour from his mouth. Wrath marred his emotions and he didn’t bother to hide it. I hated that he looked at me with the expression I’d seen many times directed at others, so warmed myself on my own fury.

  He may never forgive me for running but I would never forgive him for betraying me.

  Read on for Sneak Peek of Variant Evasion, book 2 in the Variant Trilogy

  BIO

  J.Q. Baldwin is a qualified builder and accomplished author who enjoys physics and science-fiction. She has four children that cropped up rather quickly and a rugged Irishman for a husband.

  Her writing reflects her tangled hypotheses of deep social, geopolitical and environmental futures based on our current choices.

  Visit her at:

  www.jqbaldwin.com

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