Hybrid (11 page)

Selwyn makes his way through the deserted hallways, his gait a little unsteady as he traverses down eighteen levels and across an arching bridge to the residences on the other side of the street.

Dom grins and is careful not to act rashly, although it’s an afterthought to the need, the want coursing through his system, taking him over little by little.

Selwyn lives down lower than Dom expected, and he wonders if maybe he’s misjudged his status until the man pulls out a gorgeous workstation and Dom realizes where all his money has gone. All the money he earned by screwing up an entire species, by tinkering with what he didn’t understand.

Selwyn.

There’s a flash in Dom’s head, and he’s relegated to the backseat, eagerly looking over the driver’s shoulder. It’s darker there now and he can’t make out his own features, but he knows it’s grinning wide, showing alien teeth that are somehow completely out of place in his face.

“You realize, don’t you?” he whispers to the air, his voice hollow and full of murderous desire. “That you’ve lived a life profiting from the misfortunes of others?”

Selwyn stands up, batting his hands around him frantically as if it could push the voice away. Peering around, he sees nothing, but his face retains its pale shade and he approaches the alarm button at the front door.

Dom kicks out, a vicious impulse driving him to maim. Selwyn’s kneecap shatters in a crackling high note of sound that’s like music to Dom’s ears. He goes down, screaming in agony, cut short as Dom puts pressure on the Selwyn’s windpipe, just enough to shut him up.

Still, he doesn’t reveal himself.

Selwyn’s eyes dart back and forth as he grasps his destroyed knee with one hand and his throat with the other. He rolls a bit, gasping hoarsely as he tries to locate his attacker.

“Do you know what I am?” Dom asks, and the question bounces around in his head.

The man shakes his head, eyes wide with fright.

Dom drops his camouflage to reveal his true self. Not the socially acceptable version he usually wears, but his primal nature. A black so deep it drowns all colors and then reflects them back in a cascading iridescence. His body is fluid, rippling, constantly alive and moving, especially with the darkness devouring his mind. Sometimes he forgets how alien he truly is and how much it defines him.

“Selwyn.”

And this time the word is real, a guttural uttering with a metallic taste on his tongue. He savors it, savors the heightened fear that adds to the energy in the man’s body.

“You hurt my siblings by tinkering with what you could never understand. There’s no way you’re getting your scheming hooks into Bastian.” Dom reaches down, claws digging into the man’s shirt, ripping it. He adjusts his grip, sinking into the flesh and bone around his neck. The hold is much better, despite the blood spurting out.

Selwyn’s mouth opens in a silent scream.

“What was that? I can’t hear you.” Somewhere in the back of his mind, Dom’s not sure if that’s cruel or comical, but it makes him chuckle anyway. “I don’t have the time to waste on you anymore.”

He clenches his fist, solidifying the rest of his fingers into sharper edges. They cut through Selwyn like a knife through butter, partially severing the neck and disguising the claw marks. He frowns at the now lifeless body as the blood continues to spurt for a few seconds. Closing his eyes, he exerts will through his fingers, knife style. He needs to disguise the wounds he already made.

It takes all his control not to rip the body apart, limb from limb.

It drops to the ground, and Dom sighs. Blood is everywhere. He didn’t think that one through. He wraps the body in a blanket and stuffs it in the steam shower. Once done, his mind still distant, he glances over at the workstation. Selwyn was about to answer his correspondence files. With a quick dive through them, Dom is able to ascertain his tone and sends a quick email to Deign, Bastian, and Markus, explaining he is ill and will be resting for a few days.

All he needs is a head start before they scan for him. All he needs is somewhere alone to get his headspace together again.

All he needs is to stop the bloodlust from using him as the weapon he was created to be.

The psionic leaning on his door shouldn’t be capable of sounding so damn loud. Bastian groans and rolls out of bed, quickly pulling on his body armor pants and a button-up shirt. Bare feet will have to do. He knows it’s Deign, and laces take too long for her apparent level of patience.

He releases the binding on the door as he half-stumbles into his office and directs a glare at her as she enters with Nimue in tow. Bastian checks himself, not having noticed the girl. Perhaps he should tone down on the Shine dosage for now. He smoothes the reactions off his face immediately, unsure how much he should say about Nimue’s visit last night.

“Sorry for the early hour.” Deign doesn’t seem sorry at all. In fact she makes it painfully aware as she glances down the sliver of chest not covered by his unbuttoned shirt that she has no regrets in the least.

He fights the blush he can feel begin to color his cheeks. Sometimes her flirting is entirely bad timing, even if she rarely means anything by it. “Yes. Someone interrupted my sleep.” He looks pointedly at Nimue. “I never sleep well as it is.”

Deign sighs and takes a seat. “I apologize. Selwyn apparently thought he could commander my little Nimue. I wouldn’t have sent her, Bastian.”

Selwyn? So when Nimue said it was only sort of spying, she wasn’t kidding. Bastian takes his time buttoning his shirt. It was the first thing he’d grabbed, but it’s good for an excuse to mull things over in his mind. Bastian knows Deign needs him right now. Which means he doesn’t have to worry about her probing deeper, so he looks up and nods curtly.

“Apology accepted. Just know if she accidentally touches me, I’m on a hair trigger. You don’t want your protégé dead.” He doesn’t try to elaborate on the previous night. If Selwyn sent her, then Deign really won’t care.

“Message received.” Deign nods, a smile tugging at her lips. “Sometimes I forget you’re so young.” She says the words in a wistful tone, her gaze raking his body up and down.

Bastian fights the urge to snap at her and instead raises an eyebrow. “Are you quite done?” He’s only a decade her junior, but she’s right about one thing. He shouldn’t be in his current position because his father shouldn’t be dead.

Deign sits up taller. “We’re going to have another round of meetings today and tomorrow. I trust I can count on your support?”

He can hear what she doesn’t say. The silent plea that she can’t bring herself to say out loud:
I need you to back me up.
With difficulty, he coaxes a smile back onto his face. “Of course you can.”

Her answering grin is real, just for a moment. Perhaps that’s the actual reason she came to visit him so early. She continues as if she’d never asked the question. “Selwyn seems to be feeling out of sorts. You’ll have an email to that effect, too. Coward. Probably just doesn’t want to see you while you’re angry. Not that I blame him.” She laughs—a pretty, yet hollow sound. “I’ll see you later.”

“See you in a bit,” he says.

Nimue trails behind her, a quick glance and a grin over her shoulder at Bastian. One thought to trigger the door’s closing mechanism and he walks back into his bedroom, ripping off the buttoned shirt in irritation. “Damn it.”

He’s out of options to stall the launching of the Damascus reboot. Regardless of what he tries, he knows it won’t succeed in the end. He showers, overriding its settings so he can have a long one. It works out the kinks in his neck and soothes the frustration that tenses up his back. He steps out and pulls on a full suit of fresh body armor. No more of these naked chest mistakes.

Lacing and buckling his boots, he glances at his wrist. Has Dom already left for the Exiled? Bastian frowns, something niggling at the back of his mind as he checks his email with the fifteen minutes he has to spare before the meeting.

“Checked your email yet?”

Bastian jumps. “Don’t sneak up on me like that Where have you ...” But then he looks—
really
looks—at Dom.

There’s a brown and flaking coat of something obscuring some of the gentle strobing going on underneath. His face doesn’t have the usual appearance, but instead seems to sort of be leaking into itself around the edge, his control slipping by the second. Bastian’s gut clenches, and he stands up, the sense of foreboding threatening to strangle him. “What have you done?”

Dom grins, and the expression is more alien than ever. His mouth opens to a gaping black maw, like it’s trying to suck all the color and life of the world into it. “I didn’t do much. But you’re safe, for a while.”

Bastian’s spine convulses slightly, sending a shiver throughout his body. The words are so ominous. “What do you mean?”

Dom shrugs, and it’s a liquid movement, rippling through his entire, hard-to-look-at form. “Have you ever found it odd that no one but you can handle my real self?” There’s an echoing, metallic tone to his voice, filled with an odd sort of regret.

“I think people are just scared of what they don’t know. Because you can be what and who you want. Most people don’t have that sort of courage.”

“I see.” Dom’s eyes cascade through a rainbow of colors as red and silver war with each other. “Why would I bother with that when they’ll never see me coming?”

And Dom vanishes.

A resounding bang on the mostly open door startles Bastian from staring the space Dom had filled but moments before.

“What?” he snaps before his eyes rest on the figure standing in the doorway. Suppressing a sigh of irritation, Bastian motions for the man to come in. “What can I do for you, Zacharai?”

Zach tosses his head enough to make the oily mess of dirty-blond hair he has flip over the top. “So formal, Bastian...” He grins, and the hair he flipped slowly begins its descent, like the gooey cheese on a pizza when you lift up a freshly cooked slice.

“Formal?” Bastian shrugs. “More like running late for this meeting, tired, and not up for your usual crap.” He fingers a small pouch of Shine in his coat pocket, wondering if his dosage is okay or if it’s wearing off. Zach can usually detect power at ten paces. Hedging his bets, he dips a finger in and bows his head as he stands, concealing his face for the moment he needs to ingest some of the bitter-tasting disguise. “Sit...”

Zach crosses his arms, mimicking the gesture with his ankles as he stretches out in the chair. Bastian seats himself again and resists the urge to blink rapidly as the small dose of Shine travels down into his system.

“You’re always busy, Basty.”

If Bastian isn’t mistaken, those blue eyes are murkier than usual, clouded and secretive. “Hazard of the job.”

Zach rolls his shoulders, grin still affixed to his face, oily pizza hair hanging limply, like the cheese has already dried. “We need to go over the Damascus activation.”

Bastian raises an eyebrow and keeps his face as still as possible. Just like he taught Sai, never give away your emotions. “I could have been having a nightmare, but I’m quite certain we had that meeting in this very office only a short while ago?”

Zach laughs, and the slight edge of hysteria in it sets Bastian’s teeth on edge. “You’re hilarious. You know what I mean.”

Bastian blinks. “No, sorry, you’ve got me.”

Suddenly, Zach leans forward and reaches for Bastian’s hand. The dean only narrowly pulls it out of the way, reaching up to adjust his collar.

For a second their eyes lock, and Zach leans back, an undecipherable smirk tugging at the edge of his lips. “You’re still as skittish as ever, Bastian. Are you sure you’re okay? You feel different today. Your...” He steeples his fingers beneath his chin. “Your aura is muddled. I’ve never seen you this way before.”

Bastian swallows the sudden lump in his throat—or tries to. He opts for as close to the truth as he can get. “I’m exhausted. Could probably do with some sleep.”

“No,” Zach shakes his head. “I know what exhaustion feels like. It’s more like...you’re drained?” And he leans forward again, so close that Bastian can almost taste his curiosity.

“Drained would work. Do you have any idea how much energy I have to expend to keep my shielding up? There’s a reason you all came here to discuss the Damascus, you know.”

“Mmm.” Muddy blue eyes never stray from Bastian’s face. “You should be careful, or you’ll end up in hospital. Can’t have Deign’s little assassin crippled, now, can we?”

Bastian barks out a laugh he doesn’t feel and forces a smile onto his face, hoping it doesn’t look as fake as it is. “Deign’s? Really, Zach, you know better than that. I’m everyone’s little assassin.”

“I’ll have to remember that.” Zach returns the laugh, but Bastian doesn’t think he wants to know why it sounds so joyous.

By the time he gets back to his quarters, Bastian’s brain is on autopilot. Damascus to be activated within the week. Hounds lined up close to Central in order to assist when they’re reawakened. Blah blah, kill everyone and take back what’s ours.

“If the Damascus don’t kill us all first,” he mutters under his breath as he throws himself into his chair. “No one ever says what we’re all thinking out loud.”

There’s no answer to his musings, and the slight disappointment that winds its way down his esophagus is unexpected. With no Sai to train anymore, the moments of brightness in his day have been severely limited. Add to that the security increases since the infiltration meaning less contact with Mathur, not to mention Dom’s reaction to his last reset... If he really wanted, Bastian could spend hours wallowing in self-pity.

Instead, he allows himself only a moment, staring up at the ceiling. He’s done so much talking these last few days. Most of it has been purely to stall the Damascus reactivation without appearing too obvious. Constantly having to swallow his impatience at the people around him because they fail to realize the GNW is no longer about pushing boundaries and trying to find the commonality between the human brain and psionic abilities. It hasn’t been for decades now.

Thousands of people dying in the name of research, under the guise of caring. There has to be a line, where lives mean more than scientific evidence. He sighs and swivels his chair as he closes his eyes, letting the room swirl around him.

People should mean more to the company who came to power because of them.

She coughs up bloody spittle, which stains her beautiful lips red. Some of it catches on the side of her mouth, marring snow-white skin. She reaches out and Bastian thinks, at first, she’s reaching for him, but all she wants is that vial on the side table, glistening and shiny, a fine glitter dust that she’ll liquefy and shoot into her veins to make herself endure the pain in her body.

He blinks his eyes open. It’s been a long while since he’s remembered his mother on her deathbed. More than a decade ago now, he’d been such a mommy’s boy. She’d never recovered from the wounds she’d received protecting him and his brother from the Damascus.

And his father? Barely there.

She’d still be alive if the GNW had taken the responsibilities they’d inherited seriously. Maybe they’d have realized sooner...

Doubtful. Bastian stops the spinning, his head a little light, and maneuvers himself around to the desk to rest his head on the cool glass of the surface. If only Dom were here. His friend since just before his mother’s death, the domino is more human than most people he knows. But there’s something wrong with him, something not right...