Child of Recklessness (Trials of Strength Book 2) (19 page)

Alex had returned to his happy
self, and was wide-eyed as he scrutinised his
mother
’
s face. I had no idea what to do. No idea on how
to proceed after what had happened. My son wasn
’
t safe.
Not only were outside forces likely to hurt him, to whisk him away
to be tested and tortured, but an inside one had almost killed him,
and he had only been born.

Chris watched me with a pinched
expression, as if he was reading, or having the same thoughts I
was. I wanted to discuss it with him and the group like I normally
would, but I couldn
’
t formulate the words. I knew what
would happen anyway. I would say something needs to be done, Chris
would argue about plans and smarts; then I
’
d argue
we didn
’
t have the time, and we
didn
’
t. But Anna would follow me into danger, Jessica
would follow her, and Chris, even though he
’
d
fought it, would go too. I couldn
’
t put
them in danger anymore.

My thoughts shifted to my
father, to his hiding place, and anger burned in my stomach. He
hadn
’
t had to do much after Greystone, and the hellish
existence we faced was still happening to us. It was during those
thoughts that a startling clarity passed through my mind. My
father
hadn’t
done anything since we’d left Greystone, but in his lack of
actions, he’d done a lot. The government was after us, not him, and
I knew it had everything to do with the videos we couldn’t access
in his files. Was he using them to protect himself? And by doing
that, forcing his old bosses to go after us, pushing us more and
more into the recklessness I’d committed in my search for
him?

My gaze wandered to Anna and my son. Alex
was calm once again, and he made pleased noises at his mother, who
bounced him on her shoulder. Anna’s face was glazed, and she no
doubt felt the same thing I did, the increased danger in the air.
Things had to change, before we were ripped apart by a plethora of
powerful forces, or even worse, by ourselves.

It was as I watched the two most
important people in my life that everything changed. I flashed back
on what had brought our dysfunctional family together, the
desperate need to survive. I remembered my own fear of dying, of
being but a footnote in the world, and while that emotion was still
present, I knew something else with complete certainty.

I would die to keep my entire family
safe.

I was ready, and as that thought
brought a lump to my throat, not only was I ready, but
willing.

*

The room Brian was in with the corpse
of his father was silent. The former never came out, and none of us
went in. No one wanted to shatter whatever world Brian had erected
around himself to cope. I was still sitting on the couch, a calm I
hadn’t felt before helped keep the jitters everyone else had fell
victim to away. Anna fed an exhausted Alex, and both Chris and
Jessica paced on opposite sides of the room.

I hoped they would tire soon, that
they would turn in for the night. I had made my decision. I knew
where my father was, where I would have to go, and I was going that
night. What I couldn’t do was tell the group. Chris had been right,
I was reckless, deadly by accident, and I would not let my choices
destroy my family. I wouldn’t ask them to join me in what I
planned. It was unfair, and something I had to do alone, that,
along with my newfound willingness to die for them, I was
ready.

I stood and slouched over to the line
of computers, doing my best to exude exhaustion, and hope it rubbed
off on my unknowing captors. I switched on the array of tech and
started to filter through the files Jessica had gifted us with. I
lingered over the missing files of video, the ones that supposedly
held footage of experiments conducted by Richard Bishop when he was
still employed by our loving government.

I then moved onto what Brian, Chris and
Paul had informed Anna and me of. I was struck by a wave of almost
crippling guilt as I perused Greystone 2.0, cursing myself at the
rush I‘d been in. If I‘d waited, I wouldn‘t have walked Anna and I
into another trap. Like Chris had said, Anthony Bishop had been
gone for a while, and his new form had been put to use in a new
experiment conducted for my sister. They’d thrown her into a mimic
of the events I had been through, and it had failed, my father
hypothesising that there was some other, some severely important
factor that he was missing. A note had been put at the end of his
report, a question.

Will to survive not strong
enough? Putting subjects in mental, emotional and physical trials
of survival not enough? Some other factor is missing. Something
Subject 17 (Lucas Bishop) had at the time of change.

I couldn’t think of anything that
could answer his questions, and part of me didn’t particularly want
to.

Another hour passed as I got familiar
with my father’s income. He described that once I’d been conceived,
he’d moved to Greystone to hold the place, waiting for the
inevitability that was the government’s withdrawal because of the
number of mistakes. While there, my Dad had still kept his hold on
Digilock, and kept the income of the companies who used it. A few
months before the apocalypse that had befallen my old town, the
government sacked my father and his group, and he had then enacted
his desperate experiment to succeed.

Anna kissed me on the cheek and turned
in. Chris had given up his room, and left it for Anna and I to use.
Jessica fearlessly braved the room Brian occupied, and a few
seconds later, returned with the crib in her arms. Both she and
Anna went into Chris’s room, and neither of them returned. I heard
Chris flop onto one of the couches and struggle to get
comfortable.

I clicked on more files and refused to
move my eyes from the screen. I focused on Chris’s breathing,
waited for his breaths to slow, and for him to slip into sleep. I
felt the feeling of excitement and panic build in my stomach, like
a mix between butterflies and bats. The hairs on my arms stood on
end.

I almost growled in frustration when
Chris’s snores drifted from behind. I sighed and stood, suddenly
becoming obsessed with how I moved, and the sound I made. I slipped
by the man on the couch, and slid out into the corridor. I tread
carefully as I entered Brian’s room, which held the guns and
equipment, and gained for myself a simple handgun with a full clip
of ammunition.

I had to push the images of Anna and
Alex from my mind. I didn’t want to leave them, I wanted to stay
and be with them, to watch them grow and flourish in a life without
fear. But while the government still posed a threat, and my father
remained alive, that world would never exist. And so if it meant I
had to give up my life to give them back theirs, so be
it.

I wasn’t sure if I could kill the man that
had ruined our lives, and I knew that if I entered that building, I
might not come out alive. There was also my captive sister, who
according to the files had lost the battle against the drug our
father had created. All I knew was that she was still with him, and
that I would no doubt find her in the process of finding him.
Seeing her changed would hopefully give me the strength to do what
I needed to do.

The elevator doors opened, and with one
more look down the gloomy corridor with its dust-ridden red rug and
painting-lined walls, I pressed the ground floor button, and the
doors closed.

The Sister

I passed the bundles of homeless
men and women in the dark spacious room of the ground floor. None
of them took any notice of me as I rushed passed them, the money
Brian had been supplying them with obviously paying off. I
exited
onto
the quiet street with the loaded gun
tucked and hidden under my top and hooded jumper. I noticed vividly
at how broken the area the hotel was situated at was. The
surrounding buildings were covered in spray-painted graffiti, and
windows and doorways were boarded up.

Thankfully because of its
destroyed look, there weren’t many people traversing the streets. I
pulled up my hood anyway, caution was better than ignorance, and I
plunged my fists into my pockets. I remained vigilant, my eyes
scraped the darkness for danger, and my ears kept watch where my
eyes couldn’t. With all my senses primed for action, I pulled up a
mental map I
’
d committed to memory the last time we’d
travelled to Digilock, and did my best to remain
unnoticed.

To blend in with the night.

*

I turned onto the street Chris
had parked on the last time we were there. I
’
d had a
few close calls that night, the presence of authority much more
dense after the explosions at my father
’
s
warehouses. On more than one occasion I
’
d had
to backtrack and make my way through alleys that assaulted my nose,
or down streets that the police weren
’
t
positioned.

I tried to breathe evenly as my
heart rate kicked into full gear. The tall building I headed for
loomed into view, and I took solace in the fact I
wouldn
’
t have to climb it again. I was taking the more
direct route.

I pushed the revolving doors and
entered the brightly lit room I
’
d
charged through with Anna in my arms. The same woman who
I
’
d seen draped over her computer was awake and
wide-eyed as I threw back my hood and approached her
desk.

‘
C-c-can I help
you?
’
she choked as she brushed her hair from her
eyes.

‘
Yes,
’
I
smiled.
‘
Tell Richard Bishop his son is here to see
him.
’

She nodded curtly and snatched the
phone beside her keyboard. Her eyes flashed to my hands, as if she
expected to be put asleep again. A few unbearably long seconds
passed before someone answered the receptionist. I listened
in.

‘
Mr Bishop?
’
the
woman whimpered.
‘
Your son is here to see
you.
’

‘
Good,
’
I
heard the familiar sadistic voice of my father reply. I could feel
the smile on his face, hear it in his voice, and a wave of rage
burned my chest.
‘
It
’
s about
time he showed up. I
’
m on floor ten, Penelope, please
send him up.
’

Of course he
’
s
expecting me. I wouldn
’
t have expected
less.

‘
Right away, Mr
Bishop,
’
Penelope replied.

She gulped as she slammed the phone
down a little too hard, and that made her jump.

‘
F-f-floor
t-ten,
’
she stammered.

I nodded amiably and rounded her desk
for the elevator behind it. I could feel her eyes on my back, and
when I entered the large lift, her head snapped away and she typed
rapidly on her computer. I could see from where I stood that what
she was typing was a random collection of letters to make her look
busy. I smiled.

I pushed the correct button and
the doors closed. The panic that buzzed in my stomach increased,
and I could feel it pass through my entire body in waves. I shook
my arms, my legs, stretched my neck and sighed.
I
’
d been working towards that moment, coming
face-to-face with my father. Getting justice, or revenge, it
didn
’
t matter which, for all he had done to me, and
everyone I cared about.

But part of me was apprehensive.
I
’
d killed before, but those had been creatures
already on death row. My father was flesh and blood completely
human, and even though he was more monstrous than the things he had
created, I was still terrified. I felt at my waist and made sure my
gun was still in place.

I can do this. All I need
to do is do it. Walk in there, ignore him, ignore everything, and
put a bullet between his eyes.

It was simple, but even I
doubted my ability to go through with it. For the sakes of everyone
I loved, I needed to. I also had to factor in that my Dad no doubt
had protection waiting, and if I took too long, I
could be dead, and
the trip would have been for nothing. I assumed that
they
’
d kill me anyway, that if I succeeded in putting
my father down, his mercenaries would return the favour.

The elevator pinged, and the doors
slid open. I stopped breathing. A long corridor ran in front of me.
The tenth floor was a lot like the top one Anna and I had
infiltrated. I stepped out of the elevator and onto the immaculate
white tiles of the floor. To my left was a wall of windows that
continued down the large hallway.