Eve of Man (The Harvest Book 2) (25 page)

Zack stood up. “I’ll catch you later.”

After he left, Austin went into the kitchenette. He
opened cabinet doors, not sure what he was looking for until he came across a
bottle of Southern Comfort. He grabbed the bottle and a small glass before returning
to the couch. With the lights down low, he poured the caramel brown liquid into
the glass and set the bottle on the table. Old Donny Reynolds had started
drinking at the ripe old age of ten and never stopped. At his wise young age of
twenty-seven, Austin Reynolds was about to have his first drink.

Austin took a sip and grimaced. He took a second bigger
swallow and waited as the liquid burned down his throat into his chest. He
finished off what remained in the glass, took a second and a third before setting
the glass next to the bottle. Soon his face felt warm and his eye lids heavy.
He stretched out on the couch allowing the alcohol to do its thing. This wasn’t
so bad he thought and wondered why his father had always been so pissed off
when he drank. Austin didn’t feel angry, he felt sleepy. As he lay there, close
to feeling relaxed, Austin went over his conversation with Zack. If he could tell
Zack everything they might be able to figure out a way to stop the Adita, but
if he told Zack what he knew he would be betraying Eve’s trust, not to mention
putting Zack’s life in peril. Whether Eve was trustworthy didn’t matter to him.
He’d always prided himself on holding true to his values and didn’t think now
was the time to forgo them. Austin knew he’d have to figure this out alone. Going
it alone meant making hard decisions.

‘Do you want to be human?’

He heard Eve’s question again and asked himself the
same thing. Did he want to be human? What would it mean if he wasn’t? Could he then
fight the Adita as one of them or would he end up like them? What about Caleb?
By this time next year he would be a young man. He’d already grown two inches
since arriving and Austin could see his face changing, losing its baby softness,
starting to show the man he would be some day.  

The warmth of the alcohol left him and Austin felt
very much awake, but continued to lie still with his eyes closed. Thinking was
easier in the dark. His teammates had always relied on him to devise the
perfect plan of attack. When they’d rescued that village in Africa so long ago,
Austin had lead the charge. He found the warlord hiding deep in the brush. He rescued
the girls from the underground prison, saving them from a life of rape and
torture. He’d done all these things and many more seemingly with ease. At least
that’s how things appeared to his teammates. But he knew their picture of him wasn’t
complete. None of those things were accomplished without Eve’s help. Eve had guided
his hand, making sure he knew when to attack, where danger awaited, when to get
out. Her motives were pure in her desire to protect him, but went no further.
He was not so blinded as to believe she felt anything for the people he saved. And
to Zack’s point, he wasn’t foolish enough to think she would help him against
her own people and he wouldn’t ask. No, this time he truly was on his own.

“Do you sneak up on your mother like that?” Austin
opened his eyes to see Caleb sitting on the coffee table staring at him.

“Yes.”

“Does she get angry?”

“Sometimes. Sometimes she laughs.”

Austin sat up. “She laughs?”

“She only smiles, but I know she’s laughing.”

“I didn’t think Adita laughed at all.”

“Grandfather doesn’t.”

“Tell me about him.”

“He’s afraid of dying and he’s angry, but I don’t know
why. He’s afraid of mother.”

“Do you know why?”

“She’s more powerful than he is, but she doesn’t know
how to use all of her powers yet and Agra, I mean grandfather, fears she’ll turn
against him when she learns his secret.”

“What is his secret?”

Caleb shrugged. “I don’t know. I can just feel it is
all.” He spotted the bottle. “Can I try some?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

Because I said so, almost slipped past Austin’s lips.
“I don’t think your mother would approve, besides it’s not all that great.”

“You don’t have to tell her.”

Austin laughed. What kind of secrets could he keep
from Eve? “Come on Caleb, you know better than that.”

Caleb smiled, happy to see his father wasn’t easily
swayed. He thought to thank him for making the baby, but knew his mother would
not laugh if he told. He wasn’t even supposed to know, but her thoughts
sometimes entwined themselves with his so that he couldn’t help hearing her. As
was the case with Agra’s thoughts, but lately Caleb had put great effort into
blocking Agra from his mind. He wasn’t always successful and when a random
thought did slip through, it was never pleasant in nature.

“Would you like to talk about it?” Austin asked.

Caleb looked at him, first surprised, then with
understanding. “If you were to change, aren’t you afraid you might become like
grandfather or worse, like Za?”

Eve had warned him about Caleb’s powers and his
tendency to listen when he shouldn’t. “I haven’t decided yet what I’m going to
do, but I think I would still be me. I don’t think it would change who I am as
a person.”

“The Adita’s DNA doesn’t work that way. If mother transforms
you, her DNA will dominate and eventually takeover completely. Only the very
best of your genes will survive.”

“So you’re saying I wouldn’t have a choice in how I
want to act? Kind of like eavesdropping on folks?”

Caleb shook his head. “But it’s not a choice father,
it’s quite the opposite. My mind is much stronger than yours, which is why hearing,
or not hearing, is difficult to control.”

“Explain.”

“It’s like energy. I have more than you and the same
or maybe a little more than mother. I’ll have a lot more than mother and
grandfather by the time I become an adult. Right now the energy flows fast.”

“Like an ocean’s current?”

“Yes. And it brings many thoughts all at once. They
arrive before I know it and then you hear a voice you recognize and your mind
tells you to pay attention, so you do,” Caleb explained. “But you haven’t
answered my question.”

“No I didn’t,” Austin said, “because I don’t know the
answer.”

 Caleb shook his head. “We always know the answer,
it’s choosing to not hear what the mind tells us that keeps us from making
decisions.”

Austin laughed. “And what do you know that you’re not
telling me? Something about your mother?”

Again Caleb was caught off guard. “Yes, but she
doesn’t know I know and I would be in a lot of trouble if I told.”

Austin’s brow creased. He’d never tried to listen to
other’s thoughts, they came without warning, as Caleb described. That his son
could block him from hearing what he himself was thinking was obvious. “You can
tell me,” Austin said. “I’ll deal with your mother.”

Caleb crossed his legs underneath him and folded his
hands, resting his chin in the center over his thumbs. He didn’t speak the
words, but thought them rather loud. If he didn’t say them out loud, he
couldn’t get in trouble.

Austin’s eyes grew wide. “Are you sure?”

Caleb nodded.

“Does Agra know?”

“Not yet, but you don’t have to worry. Mother is very
good at hiding things from him.”

“What will he do if he finds out?”

“I don’t know. He might try to harm her. She’s
stronger than grandfather, but she won’t fight him.”

 “Why not?”

“I don’t know. I guess she hasn’t made up her mind
yet.”

“About what?”

Caleb shrugged. “I can take you to Mr. Edward’s son.” Caleb
changed the subject, a skill, or trick, he was well practiced at and one his
mother wouldn’t have let pass, but his father didn’t know him as well. His
father still perceived him as a child, and assumed all children had short
attention spans.

Austin knelt in front of Caleb. “Do you know where he
is? Where Ed’s boy is?”

“I know the way to him.”

“Is he here on Earth? Is he still alive?”

“He’s not here, but the way to him is here. I’m not
sure what stage he’s in. Would you like to go see him?”

Austin nodded, but his mind was moving at breakneck
speed over the possibilities, the risks involved, and the logic of listening to
a seven-year-old, even if that seven-year-old was an exceptional being. He
didn’t like making decisions on the fly, could be a quick way to the grave.
Special operations took weeks of planning and this was no special op. If they
were going to the camps or warehouses or anywhere the Adita were holding
bodies, then the mission was most likely a death sentence.

Caleb tugged on his arm. “We should go right away
father.”

Austin made up his mind in that instant. “Let me call
Zack first. I want at least one person to know we’re leaving. Then we’ll go.
Five minutes.”

Austin went into the bedroom and dialed Zack’s number,
having no idea what he would say. He had to do this and he had to go alone. He
thought about lying to Zack, but when he answered Austin told him the truth. He
was going to find Ryan and would be back as soon as he could. And they weren’t
to say anything to Ed. Zack argued about the sanity, or lack of Austin going
alone or going at all. In the end Zack’s protests were duly noted and duly
ignored. 

Austin returned to where Caleb waited. “Let’s go.” Caleb
took his father’s hand and they vanished into the air.

Out in the hall Zack was running towards Austin’s suite,
but when he opened the door he was too late. Zack spotted the open bottle of
Southern Comfort and an uneasy feeling settled in the pit of his stomach.  “Damn
it man.” Zack pounded on the door frame.

“What’s wrong?” Luke asked, having walked up on the
scene.

“Austin went somewhere,” Zack answered.

“Whatta ya mean went somewhere? Did the bloodsucker
take him back to Bliss or Paru or whatever the damn place is called?”

“No. No. No. He went somewhere with Caleb,” Zack
replied. “Somewhere in the US. He didn’t say where.”

Luke relaxed some. Caleb was better than the
bloodsucker, although he had his doubts about the boy as well. He wasn’t buying
the reason for the kid’s growth spurt. He wasn’t buying any of the explanations
they’d been pushing.

“Why do you hate her so much?” Zack asked, seeing the
disgusted expression on Luke’s face.

Luke’s lip turned up in a sneer. “Why do you like her
so much?”

Zack blew air through his lips, frustrated. “What are
we, in high school?”

Luke shook his head annoyed with Zack’s inability to
see Eve for what she really was, and that was evil. “The bloodsucker’s going to
get Austin killed or worse. Why don’t you see that?”

“She saved Jenny’s life,” Zack reminded him. “And the
life of my unborn child.”

“She didn’t do it for you. Austin begged her to. She
doesn’t give a damn about you or me or anyone in this bunker. When are you gonna
wake the fuck up.”

“You don’t know that,” Zack argued. “She must care
some or why bother with us at all?”

Luke raised his hand for Zack to stop. He was tired of
their ignorance. He knew Eve would stop at nothing to preserve her way of life.
They would all see, but they would see too late. “Let me know when he comes
back.” Luke walked off before Zack could say more.

Zack let him go. He knew Luke was more upset over Madison’s
death then he let on, but what ate at him went deeper than Madison. Out of
everyone in the bunker, Zack worried about Luke the most. He’d never grown
close to anyone except Austin and this thing with Eve was eating at him. If he
knew the recent development in Austin’s relationship with Eve, he would come
unglued.

Zack returned to Austin’s empty living room. He picked
up the bottle and was relieved to see only a small amount missing. He took a
swig, grimaced as it burned down his throat and then took another. “Hope you
know what you’re doin big man.” Zack took one more swig before twisting the cap
in place and setting the bottle on the table. Knowing he couldn’t do anything
more, Zack closed the door and headed for the command center. He decided Austin
and Caleb had used unconventional travel methods and didn’t hold much hope of
seeing anything on the monitors. The bad feeling from earlier returned,
reminding Zack of an old blues tune by R. L. Burnside.

“
It’s bad you know
,” he sang. “That’s right R.
L. I know it’s bad. All the way bad. Flip it, turn it, spin it around. It’s bad
you know.”

Austin and Caleb stood outside the open gates of the Port
of Los Angeles, once upon a time billed as the busiest in the US, but its glory
days were a thing of the past. Austin gazed out over the vast sea of
containers. Thousands of cargo containers held goods that would never leave the
port, would never reach the intended destination. All those items were slowly
deteriorating. All those things people couldn’t live without.

Caleb took Austin’s hand and led him through the gates.
They walked by an abandoned truck. The driver’s door hung at a forty-five
degree angle, clinging to the truck by one hinge. Inside, the driver lay
slumped over the steering wheel facing the door. The expression on the man’s
face, still apparent after all this time, caused Austin to pause. The man might
have been in his forties. A silver wedding band hung on his finger.

They came across a few more corpses, all in a similar
pose, caught in their last breathing moments. Upon reaching the containers
Austin followed Caleb through the maze of metal boxes. The port was the size of
a small town and they walked near one hundred yards before reaching the end of
a row. Here, where the port met the ocean, sat an industrial size crane.
Dangling from the end of a cable attached to the crane was a blue cargo
container. Each time the breeze stirred, the metal moaned, echoing its lonesome
sound throughout the port. The doors of the container had come open, spilling its
contents on the ground below.

Austin picked up one of the boxes that had tumbled
away from the pile. Inside were several smaller plastic boxes that held self-tapping
metal screws, one hundred per box, good for use in brittle material. Austin
tossed the box back towards the pile. At one time the world needed such things.
He looked around for Caleb and found him a good twenty yards ahead waiting for
him in front of a yellow container.

“This is it.” Caleb said.

“What is? This container? Ryan’s inside this
container?”

“No.”

Caleb didn’t explain with words, but opened the
container doors using his mind. Austin braced, expecting the worst, but the
container was empty. Caleb walked inside to the back where he waited for Austin
to join him. Austin wasn’t surprised his son could see in the dark. There
probably wasn’t much his son wasn’t capable of doing and an odd sense of pride
washed over Austin, which struck him as almost humorous. He imagined comparing
his boy to other children, bragging about him to other dads.

“Ok. So what are we doing in here?” Austin asked.

“When I open the door you will see a portal--.”

“A portal?”

“Yes father. The portal will take us to a where some
of the children are being kept. Once we arrive we must hurry. You can’t talk. And
try to think about something else, other than what you’re looking at. If we are
very careful they won’t hear us.”

“Who is
they
?”

“The Svan.”

Caleb placed his hands on the container wall and
pressed. The wall slid open revealing a portal, different than the one in
Cheyenne in shape, but having the same murky center. Caleb pulled Austin
through the center. On the other side they arrived in a stark white room, so brilliantly
bright Austin had to blink several times before his eyes adjusted. Upon
focusing he was able to take in the magnificent and horrid scene before him. A
scene of make-believe so remarkable it strained acceptance. A marvel of
technology, of human preservation, of something so macabre it fascinated and
repelled the mind. Thousands of coffin sized rectangle boxes stood upright lining
the walls of a cavernous room that went on forever. The pods appeared to be
made of a thick white colored metal. On the front of each, a pane of glass giving
a view to the inside. And what Austin saw behind each pane made his stomach
turn. He stared at the children’s faces, and was captivated by a sick
fascination.

Austin reached out to touch one, but Caleb grabbed his
arm and shook his head, reminding him they needed to be quick about their task.
He followed his son past the silent faces of hundreds of children. Their eyes
were closed and for this Austin was thankful. About halfway down Caleb stopped
in front of a pod and motioned to Austin that this was the one. Caleb tapped a
number sequence into the key pad positioned below the glass and then stepped
back. The case filled with a white vapor. After a couple of minutes the locking
mechanisms engaged, and the door swung open with a pop and a hiss. Austin
stepped forward to catch the occupant from falling out onto the ground. Austin
held the boy his arms and recognized Ed’s son Ryan from the pictures he’d seen.  

“You’ll have to carry him,” Caleb whispered in his
father’s ear. He shut the case and tapped in a different sequence of numbers. Following
this the interior went dark and a solid metal blind covered the window. If they
were lucky, the Svan would not notice one more child had died. But Austin
noticed, and as they rushed back to the portal, he noticed several cases with closed
windows. He didn’t need Caleb to tell him what that meant.

They entered the portal, exiting on the other side
through the container and into the dim light of a fading day. Austin glanced
down at Ryan, but his eyes remained closed. He hoped the boy stayed in his current
state of unconsciousness until they returned safely to the bunker. Caleb closed
the container doors and they continued on down the row back to where they
initially dropped in. If they wanted to stand a chance of moving undetected it
was necessary to start and stop from the same place. This created the least
amount of disturbance in the space continuum and would attract little or no
attention. Having no knowledge of how space or time travel worked, Austin
didn’t over think this, but did as instructed.

“Will he survive the trip?” Austin asked.  

Caleb touched Ryan’s head with his finger tip, holding
it there for a few seconds. “He will live, but we must hurry.”

Austin wrapped his arms around Ryan while Caleb took
hold of his father’s hand. “Ready?”

“Ready.”

Caleb squeezed tight and they vanished into the air,
returning to Austin’s suite in the bunker. Austin laid Ryan down on the couch,
checked that he was still breathing and went to call Zack. He returned seconds
later unable to contact Zack.

“I can’t reach Zack.”

“He’s in the recreation room.”

“How’d...never mind. I’ll be back. Stay here with
Ryan. Ok?”

“Yes father.” Caleb didn’t try to stop his father from
rushing out of the suite. Humans seldom spent the appropriate time thinking
things through, they were always in a hurry. If his father had paused in his
thoughts, he could have found Zack on his own. If he had paused to assess the
situation, he would have considered his own abilities or that of his son’s, but
he hadn’t.

Caleb knelt by Ryan’s side and placed a hand on Ryan’s
head and chest. He’d experimented on the animals on Paru and knew he had the
power to regenerate smaller life forms, but Ryan was not a small animal. It
wasn’t that being human mattered, but Caleb’s strength, his power, mattered. It
mattered a whole lot, but he couldn’t worry about that right now. Time wasn’t
the boy’s friend and he wasn’t sure when his mother would return. With his mind
made up, Caleb closed his eyes and focused. As when Eve applied her energy to
regenerate Jenny’s cells, Caleb performed the same process on Ryan.

A few moments later Austin and Zack were hurrying down
the hallway, stopping when they saw the bright glow of light shooting out from
every crack and crevice around the door.

“Is Eve back?” Zack asked, stopping short from
standing in front of the door.

Austin didn’t sense that Eve was back. “Caleb,” he
said almost too soft for Zack to hear him.

“Your son?”

Austin gave Zack a cautious look. “Yes.”

The emanating light retreated from the door. The men
listened and were shocked to hear voices, children’s voices. Austin grabbed the
knob, which turned under his hand and Caleb opened the door.

“Come in father, Mr. Zack.” Caleb swung the door open.
“Ryan’s doing very well.”

Ryan sat on the couch looking a bit disoriented, but
very much alive. His eyes were human and his cheeks rosy.

Zack walked over to him and knelt down eye level with
the boy.  “Hey Ryan. How ya doin’ buddy?”

Ryan rubbed his eyes, maybe thinking Zack wasn’t real,
that none of this was real. “It feels like ants are crawlin’ on me.” He rubbed
his arms, looking at his skin to confirm he didn’t have ants. “You don’t
suppose cancer termites are eating my bones do you?”

Zack and Austin exchanged a confused glance. “No cancer
termites buddy,” Zack said

“The healing will continue for a couple of hours,”
Caleb informed them. “He will feel various sensations as his body fully
acclimates to the change.”

Zack glanced back at Caleb and then up at Austin. Who
was this kid? What was this kid?

“Eve’s son. Our son,” Austin replied.

Comprehension dawned on Zack’s face. His mind began to
wander down the path of the boy’s mother and vampires. “Do you know your name?”
Zack asked Ryan, cutting off his thoughts before they got him into trouble.

Ryan stared at Zack and then replied, “My name’s Ryan
McGrath. I live in Plainfield, Illinois.”

“How old are you Ryan?”

“I’m eight.”

Ed had told them he was seven when he’d been taken.
That Ryan knew a year had gone by brought more unanswered questions and raised
the moral dilemma bar a bit higher.

“Where’s my mom and dad?” He peeked over Zack’s
shoulder at Austin and Caleb. “Are they ok?”

“They’re fine Ryan and they’re here. Would you like to
see them?” Austin asked.

“Yes. I’m sure they’ve been very worried about me.”

“I’ll go get them,” Zack said.

Austin walked with him to the door.

“What should I tell them?” Zack asked.

“Tell them the truth. Best they know before walking in
here.”

“Right that should be easy. Be back in a few.”

Austin closed the door behind Zack, but held onto the
knob for a long time afterwards, thinking too many things at once to focus on
any one thing.
Ryan had memories
, kept circling around in his mind. The
implications of this fact ran deep and wide.

“May I have something to drink please?” Ryan asked.

Austin snapped out of his trance. “Sure thing.” He
grabbed up the whiskey bottle, noticing for the first time it was still on the
table, and went to the kitchenette. “Water? Juice?”

“Do you have Coke?”

Austin scrounged around in the fridge. “No Coke. How
about Berry-Ade?” He held up a bottle of purplish-blue liquid.

Ryan smiled and nodded his head.

Austin sat next to Ryan and poured the purple-blue
drink into a glass. He set the bottle down. “Is it ok if he drinks this?” He
looked to his son, noticing his skin had become pale and clammy.

“Yes. His body has recovered enough to process the liquid
chemicals,” Caleb answered. 

Austin handed the glass to Ryan. The contents did look
a bit like something you’d find at the local auto supply store. “Are you ok
Caleb?”

Caleb nodded. “A little tired is all.”

“Can I get you anything?” Austin was thinking about
what Eve had needed after saving Madison’s baby. Did his son also require human
blood?

“No. I’m fine father,” Caleb replied.

Ryan drank the contents and asked for more. Austin
poured him another glass which the boy downed in two gulps. He set down the
glass and covered his mouth before letting out a loud belch, followed by
another.

“Sorry,” Ryan said, embarrassed.

Austin laughed. “That’s ok Ryan. Gotta let that air
out.” He patted him on the back, inducing another round of belching.

They were still laughing when Zack opened the door.

Ed and Jenny stood inside the doorway wide eyed,
mouths open, for a moment doubting the image before them.

“Mom! Dad!” Ryan jumped off the couch.

They met in the middle of the room. Ed fell to his
knees before Ryan. He touched his face, his arms, and his hair. He was there in
the flesh, warm and alive. Jenny knelt down with them, tears streaming down her
face.

“Ryan honey.” She hugged him tight, kissing his face,
the top of his head. “Oh sweetie I’ve missed you.”

Ed turned to Austin. “How? How’d you find him?”

“It’s a long story Ed. We’ll talk later. Why don’t you
two take Ryan to the diner? I think he might be hungry.”

“I’m starving,” Ryan confirmed and his parents laughed
through their tears.

“May I go with them?” Caleb asked.

“Sure son,” Austin replied, paying closer attention to
Caleb. “You ok?”

“Just hungry.” He flashed his father a smile.

Austin raised an eyebrow. He knew that charm worked on
the girls, but he wasn’t fooled by it. “You’ll come back as soon as you’re
finished?”