Chapter Thirty Four
Chapter Thirty Four
"BLOOD TIES"
Eagan's POV
There’s a time-stretch as I turn, my finger still firm on the trigger. Astrid is in the doorway, face pale, eyes wide with fear. Seeing her hits me like a punch to the gut.
“What the fuck’re you doing here?” I growl, glancing back and forth dangerously.
“Eagan, listen to me,” she says, moving toward him even as the gun still points across half his body. “She’s not who you think she is.”
A blur of movement crosses my peripheral vision. I spin around to see Elara making a beeline for the weapon that fell, her moves exact even with blood saturating her shoulder.
I kick the gun away, my own still trained on her head. "Don't move."
“She’s programmed,” Astrid says, her voice quaking. "Katya told us. They’ve turned her against you.”
Elara's gaze is cold, calculating. Sister that I recall, nothing. None of the little kid who used to shadow me everywhere, pleading for stories.
"Is that true?" I ask, looking for any flicker of recognition. "Do you even know who I am?"
“Target Eagan King,” she answers, the voice mechanical. “Overall goal: elimination.”
The words landed harder than any bullet. Eighteen years of searching and sacrificing everything to find her, and now she’s being used as a weapon against me.”
"How did you get here?" I demand, my voice not leaving Elara as I speak to Astrid.
"Secondary team. Liam arranged it."
“I’m going to fucking kill him.” The anger simmering within me threatens to erupt. “His job was to ensure your safety.”
“And you were walking into a trap,” she retorts as she comes up to my side. "I couldn't let you die."
Elara watches the entire exchange with the detached interest of a predator sizing up its prey. Her fingers stretch over the concrete floor.
“She’s been waiting for you,” Astrid whispers. “It was bait,” as in, “This whole operation — the information leak about this place — it was bait.”
"How long have they had you?" “Does it tell you what to do?” I ask Elara, but the explosions above us don’t stop whoever for answering.
“Subject designation E-37 has been active for sixteen years,” she replies.
My voice wavers as I try to hold it together. "Your name is Elara King."
"Designation rejected. I am E-37."
"You're my sister."
An emotion flickers in her eyes — so quick it may have been a mirage. “Familial bonds eliminated during conditioning period.”
"What did they do to you?" The question emerges raw, raw and exposed.
Astrid leans closer, her shoulder against mine. "We need to get out of here. The building's coming down."
As if to underscore her point, hunks of concrete come raining down from the ceiling as another explosion rocks the foundation.
"Not without her." I lower my weapon slightly. "Elara, we're leaving. You're coming with us."
She tilts her head. “Executing the mission has limitations towards satisfying target demands.”
"I'm not your target. I'm your brother." I holster my gun, extend my empty hand. “We played in the leafy garden behind our house. You had a stuffed rabbit called Mr. Floppy without which you wouldn’t sleep.”
Her expression falters, and confusion briefly takes the place of the cold focus.
“You fell out of the apple tree when you were six,” I continue, and take a careful step closer. "Broke your arm. You didn’t cry until you saw that I was scared.”
“Stop,” she says, but her voice is not confident.
“Our mother sang to you every night. The same lullaby."
“Psychological manipulation ineffective,” she says, though she doesn’t move away, even as I step closer.
"Remember the song, Elara? Remember how it went?”
The ceiling above us groans ominously. Astrid tugs at my arm.
"Eagan, we need to go. Now."
I block her out, concentrating on my sister entirely. “You used to sing it to your dolls. To that stupid rabbit."
Elara's breathing quickens. Her pupils dilate.
"Systems... compromised,” she whispers, clutching her head with her hands. “Mute fragments of memory… Unauthorized.”
"Fight it," I urge. "Remember who you are."
The room is shaken by a violent tremor. Behind us, part of the ceiling collapses, blocking the doorway. Dust and debris fill the air.
"Eagan!" “Let go,” Astrid screams, yanking even harder.
“There’s another way out through there!” She gestures toward a narrow corridor branching off the other side of the lab.
A moment later, she convulses, her back arching at an unnatural angle. “Protocol nine activated,” she gasps.
"System purge initiated."
"What's happening to her?" Horror fills Astrid’s voice as she asks.
“They’re trying to wipe her,” I say, dropping to my knees next to Elara. "Some kind of failsafe."
She twitches on the floor; blood starts to bleed from her nose. Her pupils disappear, followed by the whites of her eyes.
“Help me,” I order Astrid, tearing Elara’s shoulders up. "We're taking her with us."
Astrid pauses just long enough before gripping Elara's legs. We drag her down the narrow hallway, the lab collapsing behind us.
The passageway leads to another stairwell, utilitarian and concrete. We fight to get up, my sister an anchor each time we try to take a step.
"Why... is she so... heavy?" Astrid pants, sweat and dust streaked across her face.
“Probably Augmented,” I grunt. "Enhanced muscle density. Skeletal reinforcement."
“What have they made of her?”
“The ultimate weapon,” I respond darkly. "One I wouldn't see coming."
At the top of the stairs, we come to a heavy steel door. I bear Elara’s weight with one arm, draw my gun with the other, and crack it open.
Cool night air rushes through, laden with the scent of smoke and gunpowder. Through the gap, I see trees, there are no immediate threats.
"Looks clear," I tell Astrid. “The fighting’s moved east side.”
"Where are your men?"
"Scattered or dead by now." I push the door wider. "We're on our own."
We come out onto a narrow service road, winding through dense vegetation. Elara’s body has gone completely slack, but a faint pulse still purrs at her throat.
"Which way?" Astrid asks, her arms quaking with exertion.
Before I can respond, headlights sweep around the next bend in the road. I drag her and Elara behind the shelter of a concrete barrier, gun raised.
The vehicle slows as it nears — one of our unmarked SUVs. The driver’s window rolls down to reveal Liam’s taut face.
"Get in," he calls. "They just landed new galbana at main dock.
I hoist Elara’s unconscious body into the back seat before Astrid crawls in beside her. I only go to the driver’s window when they’re secure.
“You did NOT follow a direct order,” I say, voice deadly quiet.
Liam holds my stare steadfastly. “Someone had to rescue your stubborn ass.”
"By risking her? By risking my child?"
“It was my decision,” Astrid says from the back seat. "He tried to stop me."
"Not hard enough," I snarl.
“We can talk later about how grateful you are,” Liam shoots back. “We need to get off this island before the lockdown comes to it, which is coming.”
Gunfire comes from the direction of the main compound. I make one last glance back at the burning wreck of the Kairos stronghold, and then slide into the passenger seat.
"Is that her?" Liam reaches, glancing up at Elara in the rearview as he guns it down the service road. "Your sister?"
"What's left of her."
“She needs medical attention,” Astrid says, holding Elara’s head in her lap. "She's burning up."
“We’ve got a team on standby,” Liam tells us. “Extraction point’s two minutes out.”
I glance to my sister’s face, so familiar and yet so fundamentally altered. Eighteen years of searching with, in the meantime, countless lives destroyed in the process, and she now lays unconscious, programmed to kill me.
"Was it worth it?" Astrid asks quietly, as if she can read my mind.
I don't answer immediately. The road bends, and suddenly in front of you is a small pier with a sleek boat waiting, engines roaring.
“I don’t know yet,” I say, finally. “Ask me again when she wakes up.”
“If she wakes up,” mutters Liam.
I shoot him a lethal glare. "She will."
The SUV skids to a halt next to the pier. Men scramble up to help with Elara, gently passing her to the waiting boat.
Astrid steps off the dock but hesitates, swaying. I grab her arm to steady her.
“You didn’t need to come,” I say, fatigue as much as anger and worry leeching the heat out of my voice.
She gazes up at me, eyes shining even in the blackness. "You would have died."
“Maybe that was the plan from the very start,” I confess. "Clean ending. Poetic justice.”
“There’s nothing poetic about orphaning your child,” she retorts sharply.
The reminder of her pregnant state stings anew. Death has lingered by my side for so long; I’d almost forgotten I created life.
“Let’s go home,” I say softly, pulling her into the boat.
As we drive away from the island, explosions erupt in the night sky. Another family blotted from the landscape of Love Island City, the Kairos fortress ablaze.
Astrid sags against me, her head heavy on my shoulder. Across from me, medics work on Elara, their hands flying, attaching monitors and IVs with practiced efficiency.
"What happens now?" Astrid asks, her voice almost drowned out by the boat’s engines.
I watch my sister’s chest rise and fall with mechanical precision, her face unblemished by the horror of what she’s become.
“Now we see if any of Elara remains,” I counter. “Or if all I’ve brought back is a weapon.”
Her palm meets my palm in the dark, fingers lace. “And if there is nothing left to save?”
The question hovers between us, fraught with impossible choices to come.
“Then I do what I have always done,” I say, holding her hand tight. "Whatever is necessary."
The dark water flies by as we race toward the mainland, and one battlefield left behind for another that could be far more catastrophic.