Gideon Koar had been a great man, in Jimmy's eyes. A revolutionary kind of man-- an icon type. Bodies being found buried on his estate? Tortured, abused, and experimented on?
The kind of news was hard to believe. It didn’t sit right with him. He smelled foul play.
But he had orders, and a request.
“Do your best to minimize my visibility, Jimmy,” his boss had said, “I can’t have the rest of the council thinking I'm interested in gaining a piece of the Koar pie after rejecting their offer.”
Trey Oberon was something of an odd-ball compared to the rest of the Council seats. The kind of oddball that Jimmy would willingly sacrifice his plan A for. And given the faces he was seeing going in and out of the estate as he observed from afar, he would be recognized almost immediately. Most would see him as another constable or detective tasked with combing the estate for useful intel. He fit the stereotype, he could blend in.
But some would recognize him as The Hound. Word would get around, and any of the few who knew that he was primarily contracted to Trey Oberon these days would start asking Trey questions that he probably wouldn’t be too keen to answer. The people at Trey’s level played political games within games within even larger metagames. It always sent Jim’s brain for a loop, and he’d cracked some pretty cerebral cases in his time.
A career of cases-gone-wrong has taught him to never leave the office without a plan, ideally three of them. It had saved his life more times than he had fingers count with. Whether the job was high risk— like tailing a Council Seat to a secret location to gather evidence of illicit dealings— or low risk, like the one he was currently contracted for; having a plan, a backup plan, and a backup-backup plan was his golden rule.
His mission was to escort the orphaned son of Gideon Koar to a new city, with a new identity. He didn’t know why, and he didn’t really care. What he did know was that Trey seemed to value this job very highly.
So he’d do his best to see it done.
Plan A was to skulk around the confiscated Koar estate to see if he could verify any of the evidence that was getting everyone so worked up. To be honest, Plan A was more personal than it was professional.
Back in his heyday, his backup-backup plans usually meant being prepared to extort his safety and payment for his work with blackmail he’d gathered against that particular employer on other cases. Council Seats were typically fair dealers, but once in a while they could be like bloodthirsty sharks. There were a couple of those types with Seats on the Council. Other times, you’d get a peaceful period where all the Seats could cooperate in something less like a cold war split 5 ways, and more like a world government aught to.
All that to say that he’d had his fair dealings with the Council before. He was a known value to them, and his primary loyalty to his boss wasn’t a very well kept secret.
Which meant he had to go with his backup plan. Plan B.
The focus of this job wasn’t the Koar estate, it was who it would have belonged to if the Council hadn’t pounced upon it like a hungry lion. The timing of which, Jimmy thought for the thousandth time, was curious. They had pounced on that estate like they’d been waiting for it. It made him think that Gideon Koar’s explosive death in his secret lab hadn’t been so tragically accidental.
But that was a plan A kind of question, and one he wasn’t being paid to answer. Instead, the focus of his job was the Koar heir. An heir to nothing, now. Nothing but grief.
His boss had told him that the council had claimed a few special priviliges during this case, one of which caused Jimmy to believe that the kid would already be at the local law enforcement branch.
It wasn’t too far of a drive. The Gideon estate was in a well-off neighborhood, one where law enforcement was well funded and always close by to assist. As far as back-up plans went, this one was pretty threadbare. He was winging it, but he was confident he’d be able to pull it off. He probably didn’t even have to go inside.
But that Plan A curiosity was still pulling at him, and he figured he could talk his way into listening in on the kid’s interrogation.
Lucky for him, he knew the kid at the front desk. He was the child of an old acquaintence, who apparently liked to tell his boy that he and Jimmy ‘The Hound’ Jeremiah were quite the team back in the day.
Jimmy scoffed. Yeah, right.
The kid let him behind the desk into the offices, and Jimmy reminded him to tell his dad that he still owed him a drink. The boy nodded enthusiastically, and Jimmy was on his way.
submerged in the sounds of the hectic branch office for him to hear what it was.
He observed the atmosphere of the office as he walked.
Cubicles, loud printing machines, cops and admin staff all exhibiting the symptoms of varying levels of stress. Sweat stains, spilled coffee, furrowed brows, mountains of paperwork. The Council had moved uncharacteristically fast, and this local branch had been on the receiving end of that.
The sudden increase in workload was the least of their problems. Media was going to have a field day with this. Soon, reporters would flock to this building in waves. The news of Gideon Koar's tragic and untimely demise had only recently been made public, this dark twist was probably going to make its rounds in the media for weeks.
It made Jimmy uncomfortable. The man had been hailed as a visionary, a modern-day historical figure. He'd help shape the face of the century, making critical advancements in the field of construct artisanship. He'd turned them into consumer products that everyone could benefit from, instead of being used almost exclusively by high-level bureaucrats and the military.
Academics had been calling this current era the ‘age of information,’ but now they were thinking about calling it ‘the age of ether’.
Jimmy had been around. He knew a thing or two about his species. No matter the age or era, humans were humans. Sometimes the so-called ‘greatest’ of men and women would commit atrocious crimes. Sometimes humble nobodies would commit acts of incredible generosity and nobility.
Years ago, Jimmy had hid bodies for those great men, some of those bodies belonging to the noble nobodies who got in the way. Some of those great men got caught, some were living large. Some, he’d even told Trey about. A small revenge, it offered a sense of closure for the naive child that had died within him back then. He’d given Trey a lot of leverage to use against his rivals, some he was sure that Trey was holding in reserve, some he had probably acted on to raise Oberon Enterprises to a new height.
Jimmy wasn't proud of his past, but that had been another life. Now, he was officially an independent contractor. He called his own shots, he could turn down jobs, and he had no one ordering him to do things he didn’t want to do. Being independent in this world wasn’t easy, but he had lived a very unique life, if he said so himself. Just the type of life that could make him useful to people from all sorts of places.
Jimmy turned a corner and reached the interrogation rooms. He knocked on one of the observation room doors that flanked them. The door opened, a tall mustached man looked at him and squinted his eyes.
“Busy,” the man said. Just before he shut the door, Jimmy caught the edge of the door. Despite the man’s efforts, the door barely budged in Jimmy’s grip.
Perks of having an above-average Affinity Rating for his age, and this man seemed to be over a decade younger.
Jimmy flashed his badge, indicating that he’s a licensed private investigator.
“Private? How’d you pull that off?” the man scoffed, “listen, you’re either crazy or brilliant. I don’t care, because either way you’ve got no business here. We’re in the middle of a very important case, so if you’d kindly see yourself out?”
Jimmy sighed.
“Look, my boss assigned me to oversee how this case is handled. You know how it is, right?” He asked the tall man, sticking out his hand, the one not holding the door in a vice grip.
“Name’s Jimmy, by the way. Jimmy Jeremiah.”
The man was about to say something, but then his eyes widened.
“Jimmy, as in James Jeremiah? The Hound?”
Jimmy sighed.
The Hound was gone. An urban legend, a life that he had left behind him. Heavens willing, it would stay that way.
“Just Jimmy, these days. Keep that name quiet, will you? Thanks, detective...”
“Oh, Greg, sir,” Greg shook Jimmy’s offered hand, “Detective Greg Hemruck.”
That named tickled something in Jimmy’s tired old brain.
“Greg Hemruck. I’ve heard that name before. Was it Smith Transports? No,” Jimmy said, waving as Greg was about to interrupt, “don’t tell me. No, it was the Pacific Shield, right? You cleaned out a whole abolitionist cell. Who tipped you off about that?”
If you come across this story on Amazon, it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.
“If word got out that I was naming names, the best case scenario is that I'd be out of a job,” Greg scoffed.
Jimmy nodded.
“I know how it is. Now, about this Koar case—”
“—Say no more,” Greg said, inviting Jimmy in. Aside from the slight distaste from leveraging his old identity, he was somewhat gratified that the name still carried some weight.
“…I know this is hard to hear, Hunter…” the voice sounded so gravelly over the small speaker they had set in the wall above the two-way mirror. It belonged to a young man with sharp eyes, dare he say hungry eyes, in one of the cleanest looking uniforms Jimmy had ever seen.
This young man was clearly ambitious. He had that energy; competent, and unwilling to settle for anything less than the top of the food chain. Jimmy had been like that once. And from a certain point of view, he’d been successful. That is, if you considered PTSD, an estranged family, three ex-wives, not being able to enter certain parts of the civilized world without having to constantly look over his shoulder, the simultaneous hatred and respect of the most dangerous and powerful people in the world, and spending half of his nights sleepless and anxious, a successful career.
But he also had a lot of money.
Then again, most ambitious young men and women wouldn’t come close to living the kind of life that Jimmy had lived. For most people, ambition would work out just fine. They would work their way up the ladder until they’re trusted to help their corporation compete in a global market, if they were successful enough. But by that point you’re going up against entire families, and business or political alliances who would be willing to do anything it takes to remain at the top.
For instance, they would completely tear the inheritance right out of the hands of a young, clueless child.
Hunter Koar sat across from the young hotshot detective who was looking at the kid like a ravenous wolf looks at a wounded rabbit—having been chased and exhausted and was now resigned to its fate.
Who was bank rolling this whole operation, anyways? The Council Seats had probably all wanted a piece of the Koar estate for a while. If this was a joint operation, then there really wasn’t much anybody could do to help the kid. It would explain why Trey might be interested in helping him out. That was Trey’s usual way of working, he did what he could to minimize the damage that the Council could leave in its wake when it didn’t interfere too much with the combined interest of the rest of the Council.
Even then, sometimes Trey took risks that would piss most of the Council off. Like trying to smuggle away the child of the dead golden goose that the Council could never tie its leash around.
Hunter was hunched over. He had long, curly black hair that seemed to resist the pull of gravity. Poor kid looked like he’d just been through a storm, and had only barely made it out.
“So, what, you guys just pulled him out of his house and stuck him in an interrogation room? How long has this been going on for?” Jimmy asked, afraid he knew the answer.
“Orders. Everyone not cleared by the case’s sponsors to be on the property were told to leave or be promptly escorted off-site. That includes the kid,” Greg said.
“…and you’re sure that you have no recollection of any place your father might have left more of his research?” the young man on the other side of the mirror asked. Hunter shook his head, his reddend eyes remaining glued to the table. He sniffed and clenched his jaws.
“I need you to think really hard, Hunter. These men and women are dead. The evidence is pretty clear. They were buried on your family’s estate as recently as 3 years ago. Anything you can tell us that might help us shed light on why your father would do something like this—”
“He didn’t do it,” Hunter muttered, then wiped at his eyes. Jimmy had to strain to hear him. He wasn’t certain he even heard it right.
Poor kid.
“That’s Esther Visgold,” Greg said, gesturing towards the young man interrogating Hunter, “from the LockeMark capital.”
“The Visgolds, eh?” A small piece of the puzzle revealed itself. The LockeMark Visgolds had been with the LockeMark corporation for years. He’d been hired by them once, a long time ago. Very well off, very secure in their position. That wasn’t easy to do, and usually meant that opposing them was universally considered a bad idea, unless you had greater resources AND a fool-proof plan.
If this was one of their kids, out to prove himself, it would explain the feeling he was giving Jimmy. If Esther could bring that energy to every case he operated for the rest of his life, played his cards right, and was able to properly leverage his family resources, he’d go very far.
And it meant that Jimmy wouldn’t be enacting contingency plan C, which would see him bust into the interrogation as Hunters’ assigned lawyer, and get Hunter out of their before anyone up the chain of command could stop him.
Not that he hadn’t done anything like that before, to people much more potentially dangerous than the Visgolds. But he was much younger in those days, and only the youth can enjoy the illusion of immortality. Also, it would risk exposing Trey’s involvement. That risk would only rise if Esther had reason to look into Jimmy’s presence.
Esther would be too young to know who the Hound, was.
Probably.
Best to keep him ignorant. Jimmy would stick with the first back-up plan. Eventually, these guys would lose interest in Hunter. After that, they’d kick him onto the street. That’s when Jimmy would come in.
“How long you figure you’ll keep this up?” Jimmy asked.
Greg hummed to himself in thought.
“We haven’t been able to get much out of him. He had some construct projects he’d been working on— get this; see how frail he looks?” Greg asked.
Jimmy nodded. Frail was an understatement— he looked severely malnourished.
“His last recorded AR measurement had him at 4. That was years ago, and it hasn’t budged since.”
“How old is he?” Jimmy asked.
“He’s 11 this year,” Greg said. Jimmy whistled.
“Poor kid. And you said he was an artisan?”
“That’s right.”
“But don’t you need a higher AR for those? Certainly more than the average toddler, at least i’d assume.”
Greg laughed.
“Yeah, from what I understand you typically need an AR of 9 to begin to think about learning about constructs. They don’t let you build your own until you have an AR of 12, or so. At least that’s how things are at my kids’ school.”
“So how’s he been doing it?” Jimmy asked.
“Apparently he’s been using ether batts. Figures that Gideon would be able to afford a boat-load of them for the kid. They even had a personal node to charge the batteries on the property.”
It was strange, Jimmy thought. Children typically inherited their affinity potential from their parents. Gideon Koar’s affinity had been known to be very high, much higher than even Jimmy’s, who was considered to be pretty gifted— not that he’d had cause to do anything with it except leverage the increased strength and endurance once in a blue moon.
For Hunter’s AR to be so incredibly low was a bit shocking. Another degree of tragedy to add to this whole drama.
“That’s got to be expensive,” Jimmy said. Using batteries would make sense. If you can’t power the construct by yourself, use an aid. No human he’d ever heard of could directly channel electricity, so they had tools do it for them, and batteries to store that energy for later use. The logic seemed simple enough.
“But it makes sense, given who Gideon was,” Greg said.
Jimmy nodded.
The man had possessed a personal net worth that could rival Council families. Expense wasn’t quite relevant at that level of wealth.
“So the kid is taking after his father? He any good with ether?”
Greg shrugged.
“Not my area of expertise,” he said, “and the kid won’t say anything about anything. I think he’s in shock. Probably still processing his dad’s death. Poor kid,” he said.
Jimmy nodded, content to leave it at that. It wasn’t his business anyways. While he was now officially here to ‘observe’ how the case unfolded, Trey probably had multiple vectors of intelligence focused to and from this building.
Jimmy’s job concerned getting Hunter from point A to point B. That’s it.
Esther looked at the two-way mirror, indicating that he was done. Jimmy was relieved he wouldn’t have to wait and watch Hunter be subjected to this crucible any longer.
“Well, Greg, it was great to meet you,” Jimmy said, shaking Greg’s hand one more time.
“Pleasure. Wanna grab a drink sometime? Some of the guys here would probably love to hear some stories about your old cases. You’re something of a legend,” Greg said.
Jimmy laughed.
“I’m a busy man, Detective, but maybe one day I'll take you up on the offer.”
Greg nodded and opened the door. Jimmy smiled and left. He figured they’d keep Hunter in there for another 20 minutes or so while they discussed whatever they learned, or didn’t learn. Then they’d tell the kid to leave, but to make sure he didn’t go too far so that they could contact him if they needed him.
What a joke. The kid had nothing, anymore. No home, no landline. No future.
At least, not that the kid new about.
His prediction was almost spot on. About 25 minutes later, Hunter moped his way out of the law enforcement branch. The kid sighed, and looked up to the sky. His gaze was fixed up there for a while, before someone exited the building behind him and almost bumped into him. Knocked out of his reverie, he started walking.
Jimmy pulled up beside him, and got out of the car. The kid was tall for his age. Just about as tall as Jimmy himself, and he considered himself about average.
“Hunter.”
Hunter stopped, and looked at him. Jimmy could only imagine what Hunter was thinking. Jimmy was overweight, bald, old, and had a worn grey suit which may or may not have had some darker patches around his armpits. The kid pursed his lips, probably thinking of turning right back around and walking to who-knows-where.
“What?” Hunter asked. His voice was low, and quiet. Jimmy almost didn’t hear it.
“I assume that you’ve just been give the worst news of your life,” Jimmy said, “And that this news was accompanied by the prompt notice that your old house, all of your possessions, all of your inheritance, and your projects, have been confiscated from your family’s possession.”
The nerve was apparently still very, very raw. Hunter squinted and wiped at his eyes. Jimmy came around the car and leaned down slightly to look Hunter in the face.
“I can’t imagine what you’re going through kid. I’m sorry.”
“Was there anything I could do for you, Mr..?” Hunter asked, sniffling as his eyes started to water.
Jimmy sighed.
“Its not often that anyone goes through what you’re going through. And you’re just a kid. I know it’s not fair. But my employer has taken a bit of an interest in this case. He wants to give you something.”
That got the kid’s attention. He stared straight into Jimmy’s eyes, and Jimmy could have sworn it was Gideon Koar himself who was standing before him. The kid might not have inherited any of Gideon’s stuff, but those green eyes peppered with crimson shards, held an intensity that reminded Jimmy of when he’d met Gideon once, long ago.
He’d been a very focused, very driven man. You’d have to be, to accomplish what he had.
“Give me what?” Hunter asked between sniffles.
“A new start,” Jimmy said. Hunter looked at him with distrust, and a bit of confusion.
“What do you mean?” Hunter asked.
“I mean, no one here will be able to bother you,” Jimmy said, gesturing towards the building that the kid had just been held for the last few hours.
Hunter looked down, his eyes shifting as he considered. Then he looked back up at Jimmy, and nodded.
“Okay,” Jimmy said, nodding back, “good.”
He squeezed between Hunter and the front of the car, and opened the passenger-side door.
“Get in, it’ll be a bit of a drive. You hungry? We can pick something along the way.”
Hunter nodded as he got in. Poor kid was probably drained. From what Jimmy understood, a low AR could mean that Hunter just wasn’t built like other people. He wouldn’t just be physically weaker, he’d probably have much less energy as well. And after going what he’d just been through, anyone would feel exhausted.
Several hours of driving and a couple of pit stops to eat, Hunter had been dropped off at the empty home which Trey Oberon had set up for him. He hadn’t been allowed to tell Hunter who was providing the home, and it came with a few conditions.
Hunter was alone in the world and would need to fend for himself- but he wouldn’t have to worry about having a place to stay. Jimmy wasn’t too worried. He was the child of Gideon Koar, and despite his handicap, if he had even a fraction of Gideon’s focus and drive, he’d make something of himself in this world.
It was just a matter of time.
Jimmy sighed as he drove back home. Another day, another job successfully handled.
He was thinking he’d just earned himself an expensive bottle of whiskey, and then forgetting about the Koar kid. Whatever happened next for the boy was none of Jimmy’s business.