Undisclosed (30 page)

Travis twisted around, surveying and taking stock of the devastation that not only destroyed all of the equipment but the furniture too. It was as though a Mack truck had plowed through everything.

“What the hell happened?”

No one replied.

There was a moment of uncomfortable silence before Travis began stepping over the smashed equipment and melted devices and walking around broken chairs. He looked down at Lincoln, whose face was a pale color, lips blue and eyes closed.

“Is he …?”

“Yeah,” Ty said, clutching the side of his neck and looking up. His eyes were red, face bruised, and the blood that had smeared across his neck was now dried.

“There were too many. We didn’t stand a chance.”

Travis staggered back, a wave of dizziness washing over him. He wasn’t sure if it was the serum or the sudden realization of the chain of events his actions had set in motion. He glanced around.

“Where is she?”

“Deagan took her,” Ty stuttered.

“Where?”

A voice interrupted from behind them. “Dulce. The same place your father is.”

Travis looked to his side to see Jack navigating his way through the rubble with an open bottle of whiskey clasped in his hand. He sounded as though he had already had one too many and looked exceptionally unhurt despite the state Ty and Lincoln were in.

“Where?” Travis asked, not knowing what he meant.

“Beneath the Archuleta Mesa, Dulce.”

Travis grimaced. “This is my fault.” He ran his hand through his hair.

“Yes,” Mason said, his voice rising to a shout. “Yes, this is all your fault.”

“Leave it, Mason,” Ty said.

“No, if he had given us the phone at the start we wouldn’t have been in this.” Mason was seething now, almost spitting as he spoke. “… And Lincoln wouldn’t be …”

“Mason, Lincoln knew the risks,” Jack interjected.

“No, he’s right,” Travis said, reaffirming what Mason had said. “But this isn’t the time or the place to mourn. Any minute cops could come bursting in. Jayde and my father could be killed if I don’t get to them.” He looked at his watch. “In less than five hours, I’ll be dead too.”

“WHAT?” Mason’s face went scarlet as blood surged up in rage. Travis could hear an edge to Mason’s voice, as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

“Not the time to mourn? I should bust your head open,” Mason growled.

“DO IT,” Travis shouted. “If that’s what it takes, do it. But right now we are all that remains. Do you want to bury Jayde too?”

Mason stared him down, his eyes narrowed, full of so much pent-up rage it made Travis reconsider what he had just suggested.

Mason kicked a smashed piece of computer equipment across the room. “I’m outta here.”

Ty sat up. “Mason?”

Mason paused. “She knew the risks.” He stormed out.

Travis watched him as he disappeared into the hallway, uncertain if he should try to stop him and calm the situation. Truth was, they needed Mason. Yet at that point, he would more than likely put a fist in Travis’s face than take orders from anyone.

Ty started to follow but Jack grabbed his arm.

“Let him go.”

“But—”

Jack shook his head.

“What do we do?”

Travis pulled out the 225 serum from his pocket and held it up in front of him.

“This is what it’s been about all along. This is what he wants—so we give it to him in exchange for my father and Jayde.”

“Just like that?”

“Well, not exactly.”

“And getting in?”

“They’ll be expecting us.”

Jack coughed.

Both of them turned to see Jack holding a gun at them.

“Really, Jack, this isn’t the time for jokes.”

“I can’t let you take that out of here.”

“What are you on about? Put the gun down, Jack.” Ty moved in his direction and Jack turned it on him. Ty stared at him in disbelief.

“Sorry, Ty—I know you’re fast, but do you really want to test it?” he said. Ty backed up. “I’ve seen how Kaine deals and if you think for one moment he’s going to hand over Scott and Jayde and let you walk back out, you’re as dumb as I was.”

Travis brow furrowed. “You gave him the phone?”

“You don’t understand.”

“You led them back here?”

“No, you did that part by yourself,” Jack said. “You weren’t meant to get the serum.”

“Why, Jack?” Ty asked.

“I never meant for any of you to get hurt.”

Travis’s mind raced and then it hit him. “For the woman and baby, wasn’t it? Harlan took them.”

“I thought …” he said in a choked voice, as if he had to force out the words.

“The Guardians didn’t save you.” Travis paused. “Harlan spared you.”

“He said if I kept the Guardians off their backs, no harm would come to them.”

“You made a deal with him?” Travis raised his eyebrows.

“Don’t act so surprised. You were about to do the same,” he said.

“Well, that explains all the wild goose chases. Jobs that led to nowhere, my God.” Travis saw Ty’s hands ball into fists.

“It wasn’t all for him. You’re just kids, you deserve to be doing what any other teen your age should be. Not hunting.”

“Of all people you should understand by now, Jack, this is who we are.”

“So you knew where my father was all along?”

“No.”

“Well then how did you know he was being kept beneath Mount Archuleta?”

“You have your friend to thank for that. Before I took the phone, Ryan had managed to get into the remaining folders. There was a blueprint of the underground base, photos of abductees, and video. A maglev train connects Los Alamos Labs with the Mesa base,” he said. “It’s where he would be.”

“And Dr. Evans?”

His silence answered that.

‘God, Jack.” Ty fell back against a table, running his hand across his face.

Travis raised his arms. “But why him?”

“After all we’d invested, we had nothing, I went to see him before you did that night to ask if he would get on board and do what I thought your father had failed to do. Unlike your father, he was stubborn—threatened to tell Kaine. We struggled and the gun went off.”

“And let me guess, when you handed over the phone, Kaine extended his contract with you?” Travis added.

“They’re dead,” he said sadly.

Like a knife piercing his heart, the thought and images of his father and Jayde thrown to one side like trash while Kaine held the serum flashed across his mind.

Travis sucked in a breath; breathing now felt like the worst kind of heartburn imaginable. He looked at his arm that ached; hideous bright welts and dark sores had begun to form in patches across his skin. Another wave of tiredness hit him and he staggered towards a table to brace himself.

Ty stepped forward to help him “Travis? You’re not looking so good.”

The words sounded garbled; he caught the last part as his hearing corrected itself. As he looked at Ty, his appearance shifted from clear to blurred and then back again.

“We don’t have much time.”

Ty looked back at Jack.

“Jack.” He looked at him for a long moment.

Travis felt another wave of energy. It moved back and forth as if his body was fighting for control—fighting for survival. He began to head towards the door.

“STOP.”

Travis kept moving, Ty closely beside him.

“I SAID STOP.”

Travis turned back. “You’re going to have to kill me, Jack, can you do that?”

Jack’s hand on the gun was trembling; he was visibly sweating and had a wild look in his eyes.

They continued to walk slowly until Travis felt his strength returning, and then they moved a little faster. They exited, and as they climbed the staircase they could hear Jack bellowing.

“It’s suicide,” he said. “You’ll die if you go.”

Travis glanced at his wristwatch; he had only four hours and twenty-four minutes remaining.

“I’m dead if I don’t.”

* * * * *

Light spilled its way out into darkness as they emerged from the store. The night was darker than usual, barely any stars visible. It felt as if they had walked into a cave. The only illumination came from a half moon and a few tiny stars that pinpricked the sky. The rest was covered in dark, oppressive clouds.

“Before we go—better suit up.”

Travis looked perplexed. “Ty, we don’t have time.”

“We’ll be quick.”

Ty took him around back. In the far corner of the hangar he unlocked a door by pressing a few buttons on a keypad to what looked like a U-Haul trailer. Inside it was pitch dark. Travis could hear Ty stumbling around, presumably searching for something. A click and the place lit up. They were surrounded by every weapon imaginable hanging on racks: pistols, submachine guns, shotguns, rifles, flash bangs and some which he couldn’t even tell if they were human technology. There was enough stock to start a gun shop.

“Pretty neat, huh?”

“Yeah, if you want to start World War Three.”

“It’s already started,” Ty mumbled.

He pulled down dark black tactical clothing, belts and a holster and threw it at him. It was the kind you might see Navy SEALs wear, but its material was different, lightweight with areas that appeared to be like thin layers of leather. It felt tough to the touch and yet you could squeeze it in your hand like cloth, let go and it would automatically reshape, as if created to withstand an attack.

“Seriously?”

“Might save your life,” Ty said.

As if that could reassure him with his life quickly ebbing away.

“Specially designed, it can resist an incredible amount of abuse and firepower, and trust me, you’re going to be up against power.”

Travis slipped off his jacket and got into the gear. It felt snug and hugged the shape of his body.

Ty held out in the palm of his hands two Heckler and Koch USP Tacticals. He nodded his head in the direction of the far corner. “Grab as many mags as you can carry,” he said. “You ever fired a weapon?”

“I’ve shot off a few rounds at a range with my brother, nothing serious.”

“Pretty straightforward.” He demonstrated loading and unloading a mag. “Holds sixteen rounds. When it’s empty the slide will lock back. Unload, shove in a new mag and release the slide. Point and shoot.”

“Got it.”

He handed him what looked like two reflective boomerangs.

“And these are?”

“You’ll see— be sure to stay low when you throw them.”

Some devices that he did recognize were the circular explosives he’d originally seen Jayde use at the Lab. He grabbed up a few of those.

“What are these?” Travis ran his fingers over what looked like Shuriken throwing stars. In the center of them was a button. Ty grabbed one.

“ED5s. My newest creation; they create a disturbance in the energy field and for up to thirty seconds place a strain on any energy force within twenty feet, ” he said, handing over a bunch to Travis. “Hit that button, throw and start shooting.”

Ty threw most of the guns into a large duffel bag and then threw them in the back seat of a 4x4 truck. Two dirt bikes were already tied down in the back.

“You ready?” he said.

Glancing back down at his watch, Travis nodded.

“Jump in. It’s a good two-and-a-half-hour drive.”

“I’ll take this.” Travis whipped off the tarp from Jayde’s Ducati motorcycle.

Engines roared to life, and they tore out of there, leaving behind a cloud of dust.

Chapter Thirty-One

Deep below the depths of Mount Archuleta, armed military personnel studied the trio closely as they waited for the maglev to arrive. It would be a moment Deagan would relish. Wesley had failed where he succeeded, and he would be there to watch him beg his father for mercy. To either side of him stood Billy and Seth, both fidgeting. The loss of Marcus and Joe had affected them all and yet they had known all along that it would eventually come to an end—it was unavoidable, Joe used to remind him. They weren’t ordinary teens and it was only a matter of time before they would step into the roles of their fathers and from that point they would become Guardian targets. Growing up in the shadow of his father felt like a heavy burden, a foreseen responsibility that he knew he would one day have to carry. From father to son the mantle had been passed down, his father would say. Their task was not a duty, it was a privilege. Like the kings of old, carrying on the legacy of their fathers and fulfilling the promise was just what they did; it was who they were.

But whose promise was it?

He hadn’t known the original Watchers. It just felt like a stupid mythical story invented to explain why they were different from the rest of humanity. No. No, he would do enough to avoid his father’s anger and then when it came time to carry the torch, he’d toss it to the ground and create his own legacy, his own following. One that ruled here, that ruled openly—not in the shadows.

The end of his cigarette glowed under the flickering overhead fluorescent lights that barely lit up the cavernous underground. Deagan took a few last puffs before flicking it onto the magnetic track below them. The golden embers swept away on the draft of the approaching train. It was ultra-silent and three times faster than any known maglev existing above the surface. Stopping on a dime, the maglev halted. Deagan tapped Billy, who had headphones on and was playing a game on his phone. He looked up and quickly stashed them away.