The Pursuit (The Permutation Archives Book 2) Read online

  Permutation Archives 2:

  The Pursuit

  By

  KINDRA SOWDER

  Published by

  Crushing Hearts and Black Butterfly, LLC.

  Novi, Michigan 48374

  This Book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, duplicated, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior written consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  The Pursuit

  Copyright © 2016 by Kindra Sowder

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Cover Artist: Pretty AF Designs

  Edited by: Elizabeth A. Lance

  EAL Editing Services

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission of the author.

  “Farewell happy fields where joy for ever dwells; hail horrors, hail Infernal world.”

  -Paradise Lost by John Milton

  Chapter

  ONE

  Prosecution wasn’t a word I had heard much of until now, and death was something I had never witnessed first-hand. Now both were a part of my world, death woven to become an integral part of who I was. I couldn’t deny that. Not after everything. Not after Cato. Not after King. I had killed at least three or four people with my power now, and Jones’s dark eyes still penetrated my thoughts every now and then too. His dying blood, spreading like black tar through his veins and the one gunshot that took him down when he had attempted to hurt me.

  Before I let my mother walk me out of the compound, I’d made Ryder lead me to that same room with the metal beds, tubes, and machines keeping bodies alive that no longer had the will to live. As I had stared at those same bodies dressed in white gowns, skin pale and even sickly green in hue, I couldn’t help but think that they didn’t deserve a life like this. And they didn’t deserve to be used. I had asked Ryder how to cut their life support, and he showed me, unwilling to do it himself. With one button and a lever, I ended their lives and left them to the darkness of death.

  And that same darkness crept in around me like a silent predator, threatening to take everything into its embrace. It was beckoning to me, and I had considered giving into it many times before, but knew that if I did just that, what was I truly fighting to keep? I wouldn’t be fighting for my freedom, our freedom, or the right to live. I would be fighting with King. King would win, and that wasn’t a part of what Cato had shown me in the compound before I was forced to take his life with the only gift I possessed that anyone wanted. King, our fearless dictator, wanted to build an invincible army that would cause those below him to bow down in fear instead of reverence like our past leaders for the one hundred years before. To take over the United States and end the reign of peace that had fallen over our country.

  We weren’t taught much about our history before the raising of the wall, but what they did teach us was that war ravaged the world. The wall was the solution to protect the United States from what everyone else had done to each other, and we had lived in peace for those hundred years until King took what he thought belonged to him in a seat of power five years ago. Now there was this. The tyranny and the fear that rained down on us since was deafening, and we were trying to wade through the waters of the aftermath, wandering aimlessly in what little remained of the lives we had known. There were just us and the forest encroaching on our personal bubble, slowly being eaten away by our circumstances.

  My mother trudged through the underbrush in front of me, her long legs moving through it with ease while I struggled with my five foot, four-inch frame to keep up. The reunion with my mother was bittersweet and full of tears, but quickly followed by another explosion that shook from deep inside of the compound. Ryder was at my side, hand in hand. My mother eyed him warily until I gave her a weak smile that she returned with a skeptical eye. Julius, Caius, and Doctor Aserov were at our backs followed by a soldier that had come to meet us at the forest’s edge to take us to our rendezvous point with the rest of the small battalion my mother had brought with her to retrieve us after our failed escape. Then we would be taken to their headquarters. His name was Ajax, and he was strong, capable, and well put together. I wasn’t sure of his rank within my mother’s army, but that didn’t matter anymore. He was one more shining ray of hope in a dark situation, especially with the platinum blond hair that fell over his striking amber eyes. Expecting King to be ready for anything, we were trying to go in search of our freedom and my fate as told by my dear deceased friend Cato was something we should have thought of.

  The only ones that were armed were my mother, Ajax, and Ryder. I was shocked they hadn’t felt the need to take his weapons away from him, but he was on our side, right? He could be trusted. Well, as far as I was concerned. After Cato’s death, I had been on the fence of whether he was truly an ally or foe, but I learned quickly just which side he was truly on. Doctor Aserov and he had seen to that by showing me that room within the compound where those depleted bodies were kept, machines breathing and eating for them. I had nearly become crippled at the sight, but he held me together. He may have been the one to inform my mother of her assignment with the Harvest had come to an end all those years ago, but he wasn’t the one that was the catalyst for all of this. He hadn’t pulled the trigger. He hadn’t drawn the blood that condemned thousands, if not millions. No. That face was much more sinister, and I could still feel those cold eyes on my back.

  Ryder squeezed my hand, pulling me from my dark thoughts. I couldn’t help myself after everything that happened. My mind just seemed to go off on its own little journey while my body made its own through the green.

  “Are you okay?” he asked, his grassy green eyes searching mine as we continued to walk through the underbrush.

  Birds sang their cheery songs around us, knowing nothing of the suffering not too far off in the distance that we had just left behind. Now, we were stalking toward another kind of torture. The fight to survive and the right to thrive.

  I wasn’t exactly sure what it was about him that drew me to him. He was attractive, active, and willing to do anything for me without anything in return. But there was one thing about him I couldn’t quite put my finger on. According to Cato’s vision he had shared with me, we were destined for each other. Did fate have that strong of a pull? I was beginning to believe so. We both seemed to have that in common. There was something that drew us together and led us along the same path toward what would be a new world. Or what I was hoping was one after all this was said and done. For me, there was just no other option.

  “As okay as I can be, I guess,” I replied. “Considering.”

  He nodded and looked at the ground, not sure what else to say. I watched him carefully. He had grown a five o’clock shadow since we had left the compound, which hadn’t even been a full twenty-four hours ago. Where was this rendezvous point? We should’ve made it by now, or at least I had hoped. But we had been walking for what felt like an eternity, and my legs shook with fatigue.

  “Mom?” I hissed, trying to keep as quiet as I could, but loud enough for her to hear my words.

  I’d take no ex
tra chances, and I had a feeling we weren’t as far from the compound as I would’ve liked to be. I dropped Ryder’s hand and started toward my mother, who was still moving at a five-foot distance from me.

  “Hmm?” she answered, watching every step she took and kept her eyes and ears out for any suspicious noises that could be the enemy.

  “How much farther is it?”

  I was hot, sweaty, and still in the scrubs I had been wearing when we left the compound, and a shower would’ve been a welcome surprise. Especially since blood had crusted on them from the bullet graze within the compound as well as any dried sweat and other things I didn’t want to think about. My flimsy shoes were no contest for the forest floor either, pieces of bark pricking painfully through the thin rubber soles.

  “Just a few more miles, darling,” she whispered back in earnest. She turned her head to look back at me and winked. “I promise. We wanted to be as far away as possible from the compound before meeting for transport to headquarters. This was for the safety of us as well as all the others.”

  “Others?” Julius piped up from behind me. “How many others?”

  My interest peaked wondering just how many more there were like me out there. And even wondering how they had managed to escape.

  My mother smiled in response, but said nothing to answer his question. Ajax’s gruff voice sounded even farther behind, almost causing me not to be able to hear his answer. I turned my head back in his direction while still moving.

  “Let’s just say this. There are more than King bargained for. Many more.”

  That statement confirmed what I had thought about the number of people like us that King had condemned, and the thought made me shiver despite the heat.

  “By many more, you mean how many?” Doctor Aserov asked, her white coat billowing around her in the slight forest breeze that had picked up, ruffling the leaves on the forest floor.

  As a scientist, I understood her curiosity, especially since she had helped with the discovery of our kind within the human population. How could she not have known? She worked with King and my mother.

  “More than were in that compound of yours, Doc,” my mom answered.

  She sounded angry, but was trying to hold it back. There was no need to hold anything back anymore, but we were still attempting to remain civil despite everything.

  “Oh, I had no idea. How come I wasn’t notified?” she asked my mother, her brows scrunching together with worry.

  “You were within the compound, and we didn’t want too much information getting back to King. We trust our people, but couldn’t take the chance,” she replied, wiping sweat from her forehead. “I mean, he somehow knew we were coming.”

  “Don’t be mad at her, Mom. She did what she could.” I smiled back at Doctor Aserov, letting her know that I was still on her side too.

  She grinned back lazily and mouthed a thank you.

  I nodded. My eyes turned back to my mother’s sweat drenched back. “Plus, Cato was a clairvoyant. There’s no telling how many of them they had and which they were able to convert.”

  “Oh, I’m not mad at her. Not mad at all.”

  I sighed and kept moving forward. Silence took over. I could tell she was being passive aggressive, but I let it go as I knew the good doctor would. My mother was still bitter that they removed her from the Harvest assignment, and Doctor Aserov was assigned after they had made the initial discovery. My mom thought she could’ve avoided all of this somehow. That I could tell from looking at her interactions with the woman. Doctor Aserov was a woman of science; a product of our society to study and that was what she had done. How could we blame her for that? And she had been working with my mother’s efforts all along so how was she even remotely close to being someone worth my mom’s rage? She hadn’t earned mine. Not in the least. The only person who had warranted my anger was King. Him and the friend that had betrayed us. Nero was still a sore spot that I didn’t want to rub at, but knew I’d have to eventually.

  Ryder took my hand in his again, but I pulled it away and closed the distance between my mother and me, knowing someone had to speak to her about not just her misplaced anger, but our next steps. After getting to their hideaway what would we do? What was the plan? The question of her plan would come first. She was leading this entire thing, after all, and only she would have the answers I was looking for.

  My stride met hers, causing me to jog practically to keep up with her. She was much taller than I was and her legs carried her farther with little effort. I was struggling just to keep up which was why I had been content to walk behind her and follow along with the others. Plus, she knew where we were headed, and I was going in blind which still made me a little antsy.

  “How is all of this going to go?” I asked, stomping through the green foliage as I spoke.

  I was already breathing heavily trying to keep up, but I needed these answers, so I pushed forward no matter how hard it was. She wouldn’t look at me, keeping her eyes pointed in the direction of our rendezvous point.

  “How is all of this going to go?” she mirrored my question. “All of this?”

  Her lips perked up in a smile that didn’t reach her eyes.

  “All of what, Mila? How are we going to solve the King problem? How are we going to save our people? How will we get the rest of humanity to accept what you all are?”

  She was condescending, and I understood why, but knew we couldn’t be vying after each other’s throats. At this point, we were all the victim.

  “You mean what I am?” I asked with sadness in my voice.

  “Yes,” she said, clipped and short and matter-of-factly.

  She didn’t even have to consider it since the proof was there. I was different, and she seemed to be having trouble accepting that fact even though she had come to save me, but did she do it out of duty to her children?

  I cleared my throat uncomfortably, swallowing down the tears threatening to spill over.

  “We’re out of the compound now, so I need to know what’s coming next. I don’t like being in the dark. Not after being in that place.”

  Her blue eyes met mine, and there was something behind them I didn’t recognize. Something that nearly made me stop walking and stand there in the forest, lost and confused, but I kept moving. We had to keep moving if we were going to stay ahead of King’s forces. That was if he had sent anything after us. The compound was obliterated and was still crumbling when we left; being rocked with explosions from deep inside levels I didn’t even know existed.

  “I understand, but there are certain things we don’t want to discuss in the open. Not until we are sure we aren’t being watched and right now I can’t guarantee anything. We’re still wide open for attack and we need to be prepared.” She glanced around at our surroundings. “We hit them hard, and they weren’t prepared for the amount of firepower we brought in, but that doesn’t mean anything. The first step is to get to our headquarters, and we will brief all of you on what the next steps are.”

  “So, there is a plan?”

  I was skeptical, and she knew it. She wasn’t exactly giving me many reasons to trust her at the moment. The secrets and half-truths were enough to make anyone wonder.

  Evidently they had been prepared for the failure of our initial escape from the compound, but I didn’t even know how far their reach was or the availability their resources. My mother and Ajax were packing some firepower for sure, and I had no doubts about what they had brought with them. I was worried about what was left. What we couldn’t see under the surface. We had no idea how much of their resources King wasted on us. Well, I felt like it was a waste. If Ajax was right about how many people they had on their side, then they didn’t need us, but chose to save us regardless.

  She looked at me and reached up to grip my shoulder, “Yes, my dear, we have a plan. And if somet
hing goes wrong we are ready for that. You’ll see.”

  She went quiet long enough to consider something and then opened her mouth to speak.

  “And, since you don’t like being left in the dark, you may want to ask your friend about his past. You know, before you get too involved.”

  I stopped walking, looking at her with an incredulous eye. She had just made a tremendous promise without even saying the two words that constitute one and accused Ryder of being something other than what he had proclaimed. Or more. Basically. She continued walking, not bothering to look back at me or stop to reassure me. She was different now. I could see it in her walk and in the words she chose. I could see it in the way she spoke to me. The confirmation of what I was had changed her, but I was still her daughter, so she still felt the need to protect me. I started walking and caught up with her again, asking the only remaining questions I knew to ask out of the many that flooded my mind.

  “Where’s Gaia?” I probed.

  “At headquarters. I would never bring her out here.” She ran her hand through her blonde hair and cleared her throat. “She’s not cut out for the field. Not by a long shot. She has been doing very well working behind a desk, and she’s going to stay there unless something happens to change that.”

  “And Cecilia?”

  I couldn’t forget about the dear friend we had left behind when we were abducted and taken to the compound. She had been a large part of my life, the only one in our small group who didn’t possess an ability of any kind, and never once thought something was wrong with us.

  “Same. I felt the field wasn’t a place for her either, and I was right. The first time she fired a gun she could barely stop screaming,” she explained as she chuckled at the memory.