Winter's Legacy: Future Days (Winter's Saga Book 6) (24 page)

50 This Is It

“Brilliant ingenuity, Evan.  How did you know we’d need this?”  Theo asked.

“Yeah, it was part of my original vision.  The one I shared only with Meg all those months ago.”

“Did your vision happen to show you how we were going to manage
to inject the weapons into W-Arkdone?”  Cole pressed.

“W-Arkdone?  Really?” Sloan muttered.

“It’s faster,” Cole shrugged and offered her a crooked grin.

“No, I was hoping you could help me figure that part out,” Evan admitted.

“We’ll come up with something,” Margo waved dismissively though her thoughts were already racing with possible scenarios.  “What Evan has given us is a means to cut off the heads of the snakes.  We take out the leaders and their groups—controlled by fear and force—will disintegrate.  Absolutely—‘checkmate’.”

“I’m going to have to go soon.  I’m not done fortifying the house and I’m running out of time,” Meg explained as a shuffling sound could be heard on her end.

“Of course Meg,” Margo’s brow furrowed with deep lines.

“What’s your ETA?” Meg asked.  Inwardly, cringing at what she knew she was about to hear.

“Jacobi and Trainer are burning fuel getting us there as fast as possible, but we’re still two hours, fifty minutes away from the jump zone,” Creed checked the countdown he’d programmed into his watch.

Meg chewed on her lip.  “Yeah, I’m not sure what will be happening by then, but I know I’ll do everything I can to hold down the fort.” 

Everybody sat in worried silence for a moment, mulling over her implications.

“I have faith in you, Meg.”  The confidence in Creed’s voice was powerful enough to break the foreboding temperature drop they felt for Meg. 

“Listen to me, Meg,” Creed continued.  “You just stay alive.  That’s your one objective.  Use any means necessary.  Hideout in the topography of the land.  Build a fortress around yourself in the laboratory.  Heck, dig a hole in the ground and breathe through a straw if you have to.  But
stay alive
.” Creed’s love for Meg and his desperation for her safety was clear to everybody.  “Will you do that for me, Meggie?” his voice softened, defining him as even more courageous in its vulnerability. 

“I love you, Creed.”  The emotion in Meg’s voice exposed her fears of letting her family down—of letting Creed down.  “I love you all so much my heart swells with happiness, then crashes down with terror that I could lose you in an instant.”

“Meg, don’t talk like that.” Alik pinched the bridge of his nose, refusing to let his tears slip through.  “We’ll be together soon and we’ll all be there to fight at your side.”

“I know you want to protect me little brother, but
everyone has done the math.  I’ll have at least ninety minutes of flying solo down here.”  Meg looked around the lab, somehow seeing every detail of every piece of furniture, equipment, vial, flask and instrument as clearly as if she’d just donned a pair of three dimensional glasses.  She swallowed hard at the taste of adrenaline, coppery sweet, rising in her throat.  “A lot could happen in 90 minutes,” she added with a haunted whisper.

“Meggie,” Evan’s voice pleaded. 

“Evan, you listen to me, baby brother.  You too Alik.  This is bigger than any one of us.   Williams and Arkdone have to be handled, if not neatly by Evan’s weapons, then messy with multiple bullets in their heads.  No matter what happens to me, Evan’s plan will still work.  You have to make it happen.  Promise me, promise each other, whoever is left standing will take up the cross and finish what we started—or die trying.”

Everybody’s eyes were red with emotion as they murmured their promises aloud.

“If we get separated we need a meeting point,” Farrow offered, discreetly wiping her runny nose, forcing herself to think like a soldier—a soldier who needed to force everyone to think of contingency plans.

“Give it two weeks from today.  In two weeks time, if anyone was separated from the group, we will plan to meet at whatever remains of
Paulie’s house on the west side of the Big Island.”

“Who’s
Paulie?” Sloan leaned in to whisper to Cole. 

“I’ll tell you later.”  He reached for her hand and held it affectionately.

“Hawaii?” Farrow was asking the group.

“Yeah, Hawaii,” Theo breathed deeply before continuing.  “I’ll have to dig deep, but I’ll make sure you have access to enough cash for plane ticket
s.”

“That won’t be necessary Dr. Andrews.”  Vince Trainer, the straight-laced copilot who had been with them from the start, stepped through the cockpit door.  “I’m sorry, Jacobi and I were listening through the intercom,” he blushed deeply.  “You just get in contact with either of us, anytime, day or night, and we’ll pull the strings to make sure you get back to the Big Island on time.”

Theo stood and shook the pilot’s hand before pulling him in for a guy hug.

“Did you tell them, Vince?” Bob Jacobi’s voice boomed over the intercom.

“Yeah, I told them, Bob!”

“It’s been an honor working with you.  Vince and I are determined to finish this with you.”

Margo laughed through her tears at the gruff affection clear in the senior pilot’s voice.  “Thank you, Bob.  And you, Vince.  It means so much to me to know you’ll help my family reunite.”

“Mom,” Meg’s hushed voice interrupted the minute of hopefulness and brought everyone to immediate silence.  “I’ve got to go.  I love you.”

“We love you too, Meg.  We’ll see you soon.  Do you hear me?”

“Yes, ma’am.  Goodbye, for now.”

“Just for now,” Creed added before the phone went dead in Margo’s trembling hand. 

The bulkhead slowly emptied as everybody shuffled to their seats further back in the plane.

Margo and Theo sat side-by-side, deep in thought. 

“Mom,” Evan smiled sadly as she blinked away her shadows of doubt and looked up at her son.

“Hm?”

“This is exactly what I saw one hour ago.”  He sighed deeply, his shoulders hunched.  “I’m not sure how helpful that part of my gift really is.”

Margo reached up and squeezed his hand gently.  “‘Your talent is God's gift to you. What you do with it is your gift back to God.  Just think about it, son.  And please remember, I love you no matter what.” 

51
  The Originals 101

“I believe we’re all present now,” Donovan Arkdone began.  “We’ll start with introductions.  I have thirty-five metamonarchs on my team.”  The camera panned slowly giving each face a second to be spotlighted. 

“For those of you unaware,
metamonarchs are both metahuman and Monarch slave—a powerful and exceedingly lethal hybrid.  They will do exactly as I order, as any Monarch slave would, but the metahuman element enhances their advantage.  They will fight with strength, intelligence and absolute obedience—to the death.  Their pursuit of the objective will be single-minded.”  He paused for dramatic effect. 

“They are led by my most skilled and seasoned agent, Michelle Andrews.”  A drop-dead, beautiful dark
-haired woman with obsidian, starless eyes stepped into the camera’s sight.

“Dr. Williams, please introduce your teams,” Arkdone, ever the showman for the camera bowed slightly.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I introduce two teams to you.  First, I fly toward our target with a company of nearly three dozen.”  Williams didn’t bother panning the camera.  He was enjoying the flinches and wide-eyed stares the image of his raw face was eliciting from Arkdone’s people.  “This team is headed-up by Company Leader Kerry Braden.”  Williams motioned for someone off-screen to step up.  A hulking figure of a man with red hair, fully dressed in combat camouflage ducked into the seat beside Dr. Williams.  He offered a sharp up-nod into the camera, eyes narrowed with shrewd aggression.

Williams tipped the camera back toward himself.  “My second team is already at the Winter
Ranch.”  He puffed up his chest with pride.  “Company 17 is made of another three dozen.  Company Leader Rhett Hays has established a working base two miles due north of the target.  A reconnaissance team has confirmed my daugh—” Williams stopped himself, covering his slip with a wet, phlegmy cough.  “Meg Winter is at the ranch by herself.  We know the rest of the clan is en route, though their arrival is still several hours away.”

“Our immediate timeline looks like this,” Williams screen switched to the presentation he’d constructed.

“Company 17 originated in Germany and arrived in Texas at sixteen-forty-five hours, U.S. Central Standard Time.  The metamonarchs, coming from Kentucky, are scheduled to arrive at eighteen-thirty hours with the Senator—”

Arkdone’s cough was dry and deliberate.

Williams clearly rolled his eyes and huffed before correcting himself.  “—with the U.S. Presidential running mate Donovan Arkdone arriving soon after his agents.”  He finished with a disgusted expression on his skinless face before giving way to a series of sickeningly wet coughs he barely contained with a red, monogrammed handkerchief.  Everybody on the call grimaced at the grotesque sounds, thankful the PowerPoint hid what was undoubtedly visually disturbing. 

Williams continued.  “As for myself and my second team of metahumans, we will arrive about forty minutes afterward.  Right behind us, the Winter Clan, who originated in Cairo will land at approximately twenty-hundred hours.”  He paused for effect before adding, “All times have been adjusted to include drive-time to the ranch from the various airports in which we are all scheduled to land.” 

“Excellent, Dr. Williams.  Shall we move on to the profiles?” the Senator prompted.

Ignoring his counterpart, Williams kept talking.  “Group Leaders, I am uploading this data with the rest of the video dossier to your phones for reference.”

Instantly, small chirps and vibrating hums sounded simultaneously in all four frames of the video conference screen. 

Rhett Hays forced himself to maintain a calm look of professional interest as he swiped his phone awake and opened the attachment he was just sent.  On his small screen he saw the same timeline that Williams had just explained.  Rhett quickly flicked his finger across the screen to get to the next page
and saw a photograph of three young, smiling people.  Their arms were casually draped across each other’s shoulders as they smiled for the camera.  The top corner of the photo had been burned. 

“This picture is recent.  Of course
, it is of the Original Three metahumans.  Meg is the oldest—soon to have her seventeenth birthday,” he added—oblivious of his words insinuating that the girl would be alive to have a birthday.  However, no one questioned him.  “Alik is the one on the right.  He’s ten months younger than Meg just having turned sixteen himself.  Evan, age fourteen, is on the left.”

Rhett pinched his fingers over the image and enlarged Meg’s face.  He bit the inside of his cheek to keep from showing any reaction to how different this girl looked from the one he met less than an hour before.  This girl was carefree and innocent.  The girl who bested him on silent wings looked ten years older and hardened by life.  Her rosy cheeks and relaxed demeanor had been replaced by chiseled angles, ripped muscles and an aggressive confidence that seemed to vibrate the air around her.  The contrast was striking.

He forced himself to pay attention as his walking-nightmare of a Director delved further into each of the Originals, detailing their abilities and enhanced gifts. 

Rhett smoothly scanned his soldiers.  To their credit, they were maintaining expressionless cool.  No one uttered a word or shared a look that would give away their unified decision to align themselves against their Director and his allies.  His seconds in command sat on either side of him—models of secrecy. 

Rhett only half listened to the intel on the other members that made up the Winter Clan.  From what he could tell, the Director’s take on “the enemy” was skewed and outdated.

His ears perked up when the video conference was adjourning. 

“We all have work to do,” Senator Arkdone was saying.  “Let’s get to it.”

Rousing speech
, Rhett scowled inwardly.

Instinctively
, Rhett knew Arkdone was as monstrous on the inside as Williams looked on the outside.  He wouldn’t trust the politician to follow through with the destruction he was promising nor would he trust his metamonarch puppets. 

The link to the video conference was shutdown and as a precaution, all the equipment was unplugged and stowed in a black, hard-shelled weapons case
s. 

Rhett glanced at his watch and moved to flip on his earpiece. 

“Meg, from Rhett, over.”

“Meg, go ahead, over.” Her voice was breathy, as though she were running.

He frowned,  “Sitrep, over.”

“Oh, just prepping for uninvited guests,” she said, breaking radio voice procedure. 

He smiled despite himself.  He heard her grunt before her panting picked back up.

“Just sat through the weirdest pre
-battle meeting. About to speak to my Company and I want you to listen, copy?”

“Permission granted to eavesdrop, copy.” Meg replied.