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  “Success, Success!”

  Chapter 2: Aftermath

  Project Divinity Interview: Subject - Rowen Macdonald (Cont’d.)

  “How your daddy managed to rebuild after losing so many was impressive. Most of us around here have a great deal of respect for what that man went through, myself included. Must have been hell.”

  “He didn’t do it alone,” Rowen muttered under her breath “and it took almost two years, living underground, hiding, healing. We were ordered to lay low after the attack. We became more valuable as an information asset than as a fighting force.”

  “I done warned you about your mouth, girl!” said the captain leaning forward quickly in his chair.

  Rowen gritted her teeth, staring hard. “We didn’t have to do anything. To us the attack was a disaster; we lost so many. But to the people left in the city, it was a symbol of hope, proof that we could fight back and win. It didn’t take long for the story to spread. We couldn’t take everybody in, but we could provide supplies, logistics, and weapons. We ended up with a strong network of fighting militia in a short period of time.”

  “Alright, that makes sense. Tell me about the incident with Ari and Augusta. How the hell did that all start?” said the fat captain, leaning back on his chair, picking an invisible piece of lint off the front of his uniform.

  Rowen looked down at her shoes, the pain still fresh in her mind. “It wasn’t just them, sir. It was Mary Beth too…”

  April 2076

  In the wake of their attack on the park, Mary Beth had been true to her word, training Rowen in earnest. Everyone was on edge and it was a pleasant distraction. The only thing good about being trapped in an abandoned city was that there wasn’t much to do with your downtime, so her father decided that it would be a good idea to put everyone on a training regimen. Exercise not only kept everyone fit but kept most people out of trouble. The one advantage they had was that they could get almost anything they wanted if they were willing to take the risk. That meant avoiding patrols and having the manpower to organize and transport everything they needed to create a state-of-the-art training facility to the lair. To that end, they had turned one of the multitude of subway platforms into a gym, giving them the perfect location for Mary Beth to train her.

  Mary Beth, who was not only amazing with a gun but had a knack for tactics, was eager to teach her everything she could.

  The first morning of her training, Rowen arrived ready to learn the finer points of gunplay and tactics, but to her disappointment, the dark-haired woman insisted that she do all sorts of ridiculous twisting and flexing, lifting weights, running, and jumping rope like an idiot. It didn’t take long before her whole body hurt and her limbs felt like Jell-O. She was so tired after the first session that she wanted to quit, disheartened that she was wasting her time, but the older woman insisted that this was how her father had taught her. Even more frustrating was the dancing. Every morning at an ungodly hour Mary Beth would wake her and drag her out of bed to dance. Not just any dancing, but Irish folk dancing. River dancing, she called it, although Rowen had never heard of it. She painfully spent parts of every morning slip jigging, reeling, and light jigging. It was painfully embarrassing, and while she missed Jonah, she was glad he was not here to see how ridiculous she looked.

  Mary Beth particularly enjoyed this torture. She had the most self-satisfied smirk on her face every morning that Rowen imagined that it was some sort of revenge for something that had been done to her when she was the same age. Thankfully, they were alone most of the time, and no one could see her make a goof of herself.

  They had settled into a routine after a few months, and it had almost become pleasant, the dancing automatic. The weight training and flexing no longer hurt so much, and she began to look forward to it, challenging herself to do better, be stronger.

  Then one morning, everything changed. They were going through the day’s routine when Ariel and Augusta ghosted into their makeshift training area. Rowen, lost in the melody of rich, sharp violins and the deep bass of drums, stepping and jigging in time, didn’t hear them enter the gym. She only felt that something was suddenly wrong, like a missed step to a sour note. Rowen felt the cold grip of fear settle in her stomach as the two men moved toward her. Something primal surged from deep inside her, urging her to run, find safe haven. Rowen ignored it, steeling herself. She waited, chin high. She reached for her SIG only to find her waistband empty, her weapon holstered across the platform a short distance away. It might as well have been across the Grand Canyon. She stood facing the two grown men, hands empty. Mary Beth stood at her shoulder, eyes narrowed.

  “What are you two delinquents doin’ here? Can’t you see we're busy?” said Mary Beth, taking a defensive posture. Rowen felt her stomach settle, her breathing slow. The dark-haired woman was far deadlier than her siblings, an artist with her Berettas. Rowen looked at the two men, trying to divine their purpose. Both had taken a beating during the attack, and neither had ever fully recovered, their faces strangely still an ugly mess of blue-green bruises.

  “We need to tap the girl,” said Ariel, his voice deep, gravel on granite. Rowen could see Augusta look away, licking dry lips with a bloated tongue. “Both her parents carry the gene, and there is a good chance—”

  “Both!” interrupted Mary Beth, her normally strong voice suddenly shrill. Rowen’s chest tightened as she felt the older woman take a step back, her comforting presence drifting away. Crossing her arms across her ample bosom, she stared Rowen up and down. “Shit, how? The girl’s mother is dead. Actually, it don’t matter. I don’t wanna know.”

  The three of them surrounded her like a pack of hounds sniffing at wounded prey. Mary Beth gave her an odd smile as she placed a hand on her shoulder. “Rowen, sweetie, we need to run your DNA. You might be able to do a big favor for the lot of us, ok,” she said, lowering her voice, giving her a nod.

  “Why don’t we get my father?” said Rowen, backing away ever so slowly only to find Augusta, the giant of a man, had gotten behind her somehow, blocking any chance of flight. “C’mon, I think he wanted to talk to you guys anyway.”

  Rowen grimaced when no one moved, heart pounding like a jackhammer. “Sorry, Red,” said Ariel, his eyes drilling into her. “Not until we get what we need, so just hold tight, and this won’t take long.”

  He produced a cotton swab, roughly grabbing her face and forcing her mouth open, rubbing hard on the inside of her cheek. When he was done, he pushed her aside, dabbing the damp piece of cotton on his smart device. She rubbed her face, watching him from the corner of her eye, everyone’s attention locked onto the tiny machine in his hand, the screen displaying only a single word over and over, analyzing. Their breathing was the only sound. The longer it went on, the angrier she got. Rowen could not imagine she had anything they needed or wanted. She stood looking at them, her eyes narrowed and her nostrils flaring, doing her best to control her temper.

  The confirming beep of the instrument was like a cannon sounding off on the quiet platform, its echo deafening. Ariel looked up from the device, his lips twisted in a savage grin. “We got a winner,” he said, nodding to his brother and sister, his eyes wide with hunger as he looked down on her.

  “Fuck, we have to report this,” said Mary Beth, fingering her Beretta.

  Ariel shook his head. “No! Fuck them. They haven’t sent us anything since we got to this shithole. We don’t report, not until we get a taste. Who’s gonna know anyhow? Besides, it’ll give us a few months at least, no?”

  Rowen cringed when Augusta’s heavy hands came to rest on her shoulders. She could feel his warmth pressed against her, his hot breath caressing her cheek as he leaned down to speak directly into her ear. “We’re not going to hurt you. Take off your top, or at least lift it. This will be easier if you lie on your stomach.”

  “Here,” said Mary Beth, shrugging off her leather duster and laying it on the floor like a blanket. Rowen began to twist, trying to escape the big man’s grip
, but Augusta’s hands were like iron as he forced her down onto her belly. The smell of sweat and leather filled her nose as she found herself on the grime-covered floor, the dark coat the only protection from the filth surrounding her.

  “You need to hold still, sweetie,” said Mary Beth, stroking her hair as she squatted beside her, the hunger in her eyes a mirror of her brothers’. Rowen shuddered when Ariel produced a needle longer than anything she had ever seen and handed it to his brother, who sat straddled on her legs. The big man had lifted her shirt, rubbing her lower back with a cool damp cloth that very quickly left her feeling numb.

  Ariel buried his hand in her bird’s nest of hair, his grip like steel, his hands like ice. He forced her neck back so she had to look directly into his dark eyes. “Augusta is about to puncture your spine,” he said, his voice cool and angry, like rapids in deep winter. “You do as we say, worst you get is a little headache later. Wiggle around too much, fuck with this, and you never walk again. You feel me, Red?”

  Rowen could smell the pungent odor of stale tobacco and peppermint on his breath. It was vile, making her want to vomit. She could barely bring herself to nod. She lay stock-still when Ariel let her go, sweat rolling off her forehead, her anger boiling like a cauldron. Watching Ariel and Mary Beth, her thoughts were consumed with violence, the deep crimson of murder. She was capable, she had done it to that man in the park. “I’ll kill you all, I swear, I fucking swear!” she whispered in a tense voice, trying to look at all of them at once as she lay flat on her belly. Ariel and Augusta chuckled, not fearing her threats. Only Mary Beth had the sense to look her in the eye, to understand the danger. Rowen promised herself she would kill her last.

  Before she could speak again, the older woman raised a hand to touch her cheek. “Listen, sweetie, I know you well enough to know you gonna be real pissed when we're done here. You probably want to go tattle on us,” she said, unholstering one of her guns, “but we need your daddy to have his head in the game. He’s a smart man, and he looks to have the support of the people under his command, so if any word of this spills out, no word of a lie, I’m gonna take this here pistol, and I’m gonna shoot your friend Gibbs right in the pecker; we understand each other?”

  She could only look at the other woman with burning hatred, her nostrils flaring. Rowen gasped, her whole body going tense as the long steel needle pierced her skin ever so slowly, the pain like lightning driving into her spine. She howled, every nerve ending exploding as the needle made its way to its prize. When it stopped moving, she swore she felt the fluid draining from her. Rowen lay still as she heard the clinking of glass behind her. She could feel Augusta bouncing behind her like a jovial child given too many sweets. The whole procedure took only moments, the pain subsiding immediately as the needle was extracted. Ariel sighed triumphantly, his eyes bright with tears. Rowen could already feel nausea starting, her stomach threatening to heave violently.

  “How many did we get?” whispered Mary Beth, excitement in her voice, enthralled as Augusta busied himself cleaning up.

  “One for each of us, plus one more,” said Augusta.

  Rowen balled her fists into the leather coat, the smell of burning flesh wafting through the air as the big man behind her cauterized the puncture with a tiny laser. When he was finished, he handed Rowen a bottle of water. “You need to drink lots of fluids, rest for a little, but you’ll be right as rain in no time,” he said into her ear before his weight on her vanished.

  Rowen rolled over and sat up to find the big man towering over her, his eyes downcast. “I’m so sorry. If there was any other way…” he said, running off to join his siblings. Rowen watched in fascination while they each took a turn huddled over the tiny vials, adding a yellow powder to the fluid, changing each tube from clear to dark red, each of them in turn swallowing the potion with haste, sighing in relief. Rowen’s gaze drifted to her SIG, sitting alone and forgotten. She wasn’t sure that she could make it to the weapon before they caught her and thought better of it. She knew how uncanny Mary Beth’s speed was; she had seen the woman catch bullets.

  She didn’t understand what had happened here, but she felt violated, like she was part of something unclean. Struggling to her feet, she stared at the dark-haired woman as the three of them stood like a pack of hyenas over a kill, Ariel’s laughter sending a chill down her spine. She would keep her promise; she would never be a victim like this again. But first she would learn everything she could from Mary Beth—drain them dry. Once she was done, she would put them six feet under. Taking a deep pull of her water bottle, she stood up straight, her blood running hot, her anger giving her focus.

  “Mary Beth,” she shouted, her strength returning with every step, “we’re not done for today.” The dark-haired woman jumped in her skin when she looked back at her, and for a moment Rowen thought she saw fear, the buxom woman’s hand drifting reflexively to the Beretta on her hip.

  They stared at each other for a long moment, Rowen challenging, daring her to say the wrong thing. “Are you sure, sweetie, let’s—”

  “Not sweetie—Rowen,” she said, striding over and strapping the holster to her hip, caressing her SIG. Never again would she be without its familiar weight, its comforting grip. Already her mind was racing. A good soldier was always prepared for the mission, planned out every detail, and she would make it her mission to take these three down: find their weakness and end them for good.

  Chapter 3: A Vulgar Display

  May 2076

  He had been forced to ditch the Peregrine VTOL just south of Long Island, plunging the snub-nosed aircraft into the ocean. He had hoped to make landfall with what little fuel he had, but weapon emplacements along the shore had driven him wide of his destination, far out to sea. Abandoning the sinking ship, he had no choice but to swim for over an hour in the icy water before finally washing up on a rocky beach soaked to the skin, his teeth chattering from the cold. The swim would have killed a normal person, being Ascended was the only reason he was still alive

  Dragging himself out of the water, Arthur rolled onto his back, breathing heavily, frozen strands of his hair clinging to the sides of his face. He lay there for a time staring out at the clear blue sky, shivering in the weak autumn sun that did little to warm him, much less to dry his water-soaked tactical gear and leather coat. With a deep sigh he climbed to his feet, finding himself facing a series of low-rising cliffs, and a series of weathered, gray stairs leading up to a walking path that bordered the shoreline. Dusting the sand from his coat, he shouldered the small pack he’d managed to save before losing the VTOL to the depths.

  Arthur’s short climb was rewarded with a stunning view of white-capped waves rolling in off the windswept vista, the crystal waters reflecting the cobalt blue and amber of the sky and sun. High summer grass that had gone brown lined the path, swaying with the breeze. The path itself was desolate, with not a soul to see for miles in any direction, the only sound coming from the crashing surf and the gulls circling overhead. Arthur headed west to his destination, the gravel crunching underfoot loud in his ears, the path gently rising and falling. He walked for almost an hour before seeing signs of civilization, a sandy beach that had the look of being closed for the season, with shuttered concession stands and an empty parking lot devoid of tracks. He debated continuing along the beach but decided after some thought to move deeper inland, wanting to avoid the constant icy wind screaming in from the ocean. He walked a short distance, finding a small paved road that led to the main thoroughfare carving through the southern part of Long Island. The highway was smooth and wide, with wild, overgrown trees and bushes on either side of the road. It wasn’t long before he began to see long, gated driveways leading to the types of homes he’d only seen on the net: Majestic, in most cases with manicured lawns perfectly green despite the lateness of the season, many larger than many of the city blocks he grew up on. They became more frequent the farther along he went until finally he began to see the occasional car or SUV, most of the
people giving him long curious stares as they drove by him.

  Arthur wasn’t surprised when not long after he heard the short shrill wail of a siren, blue and red lights flashing behind him. A commanding voice on a loudspeaker ordered him to place his hands on his head and turn around slowly.

  He did as he was told, locking his hands behind his head and turning around. The imposing Humvee looked like it would be more at home on a military base than a quiet highway in the Hamptons, with gray-and-white camouflage plating covering every inch of it, a .50 cal machine gun sitting on its roof, glaring red and blue lights running along the inside of the roofline.

  Arthur waited patiently for them to check their computer for facial recognition, secure in the knowledge that they would find nothing.

  Two officers climbed out of the vehicle in full tactical gear and helmets, their eyes concealed by mirrored glasses. Both men immediately drew their sidearms, matte-black Berettas, 9mm, standard police issue for this part of the country, holding them at the ready as they approached him.

  The officer on the right spoke first, hints of annoyance in his voice. “This area is off-limits to illegals. You don’t belong here. You’ll have to come with us.”

  Arthur raised an eyebrow, starting to lower his hands. “I’m not sure I understand.”

  “Keep your fucking hands up!” said the officer, raising his weapon. “Do you understand my commands?”

  “I’m an American citizen, Officer…Rassan,” said Arthur, squinting to see his name tag, raising his hands once again. “I understand your commands but not the reason for them. I haven’t done anything wrong.”

  The other officer holstered his weapon with a snort, immediately pulling out a set of tie wraps. “Why the hell are we wasting our time with this piece of shit fence hopper? We should just pump and dump this trash bag and move on; we're almost done for the day.”