Leo and Heidi

Somewhere toward Speyer, Germany

The phone did not connect for a while. It seemed to Leo that Heidi’s uncle was not a social cookie. On the other hand, he was surprised that a man who wanted to disappear from society and did not want to be found even had a phone. It did not make sense. It made even less sense that Heidi had his number.

When it seemed that the call would automatically disconnect, a man picked up and answered in a rough voice, through the speaker Heidi had turned on, “Hallo?”

“Uncle, it is me, Heidi. How are you doing?” she asked, in a cheerful voice, not matching the face she was making.

“Heidi? You, little runt! All is well! We have not seen each other in what? Ten years? How is that useless brother of mine, Viktor?”

“Eleven, uncle, it has been eleven years since we last talked. Things are not good, uncle. We need your help,” she said.

“We? What did Viktor do? I said they would come for you!” he said in a hushed tone.

“Viktor did not do anything, at least not directly,” Heidi explained. “The Church attacked us because of who Viktor found. He is most likely captured by them now.”

“What? What caused them to attack you?” her uncle asked, raising his voice again.

“That is a long story. We found someone in Latvia, a man, he is with me now. From all the signs, he seems to have formed a core, naturally,” Heidi explained.

“WHAT?!” Sebastian shouted. “Who is this man? Where exactly did you find him? What are his core’s color and affinity?” the uncle rapidly shot question after question, afraid to miss something.

“His name is Leo. Leo, say hello to uncle Sebastian,” Heidi answered and turned the phone closer to Leo.

“Hello,” Leo greeted him in a timid voice, surprised at how erratic her uncle sounded.

“Well met, Leo,” Sebastian welcomed him. “So tell me more, where are you? How can I help? I assume you need my help; otherwise, you would not risk calling me. At least, that was our agreement that you do not call me unless something mortifying has happened. Am I right?”

“We are now in a BP gas station near Leipzig,” Heidi began. “As I said, we were attacked by the Church shortly after we found Leo, and I shared the news about his core. Uncle, many things I am saying happened in a few days.”

“Oh,” he said. “Please continue then.”

“Viktor managed to stop the initial attack launched by the Church, no doubt aimed to ambush us and capture Leo. We fled our manor in Berlin by finding a truck that was passing nearby and hiding in it.

“That is how we got out of Berlin. I ditched my phone and paid by cash to buy this burner I am calling from. There were no cameras I could see before we walked in,” Heidi explained in detail what she thought was important information for Sebastian.

“Good, good,” he said. “Seems that you remember my lessons well, girl. Tell me then, what is your plan? I assume you have one and want me to participate?” he asked.

“I think that the clan is compromised. Viktor's wife, Adele, betrayed us and called the Church on us. That is the only logical explanation I have. Hence, I do not know who to trust. I know we can trust you, as you have not been in contact with anyone. So the plan is simple - come to where you are and make one,” Heidi admitted.

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Sebastian paused and said, “So he remarried, eh? Well, that is life, I guess. That is true, girl. I have not talked to any of the Church bastards. It is safe to come to meet me. I will help you sort out this mess.”

“We need a place to lay low. You have such, correct?” she asked.

“You are right. You need to come to Speyer. I will wait and meet you at the old church. Then we will go to a place I have found here,” Sebastian answered.

“Thank you, uncle. I will explain more when we get there. I promise.”

“Do not worry. I will see you there,” Sebastian said and cut the call.

Leo stared at the phone for a second and said, “Well, he seems like a funny man. Exactly like I imagined him. I can almost hear the tinfoil hat.”

“Do not mention it,” Heidi sighed. “When you will meet him, you will love him even more. Or hate him. Depends on how crazy you are willing to get.”

Heidi took the burner and put it in her pocket. Then she got up and waved for Leo to follow her. He gathered the rags they used to sleep in the trailer and took the book they snagged from the study. They walked to the cashier and bought some snacks for the road.

After getting what little they could afford with the cash Heidi had left, they went outside. The rain had calmed down, while the wet chill was still there to greet them. Heidi went to find the following driver willing to take them to where they needed to go.

The search did not go quickly as there were not so many of them in their cabins. Most of the trucks were either from Poland or Romania. Heidi avoided those and looked for German-only trucks, knowing they had less chance of running into problems.

After around half an hour, Heidi convinced another truck driver to allow them in his trailer. This time, go to the small town of Speyer. It was a miniature town next to the relatively sizeable Black Forest. The forest Leo knew was surrounded by myths and legends he had read about in some stories during his childhood.

This time the truck driver was friendly enough to offer them a place in the cabin, which Heidi politely declined. Seeing this, Leo thought, ‘Again in the truck. I could have taken the cabin this time. So damn tired to sleep on the floor in the cold.’

Leo got in the back together with Heidi without saying a word, and both sat down in some space near the stack of large, nondescript boxes of goods. The truck they were in was a lot nicer than the previous one and seemed newer. Leo deduced that because it was new, they were not cold this time, and the floor did not look like someone had killed a pig there. Overall he found it pleasant enough.

After making himself comfortable, Leo had an itch at the back of his head, making him think that he had forgotten something after Heidi went all black-ops with her uncle and explained what she had done to go unnoticed. Thinking about it, Leo remembered that he had people that the Church could hunt down. He sat up in alarm.

“Heidi,” he began.

“What?”

“The Church knows who I am, right?”

“Most likely, sure. By now, Adele has given all the information she knows. Why are you asking?”

“If they know who I am, they can easily find out if I have any people who care about me and vice versa?”

“Well, of course. What are you thinking? You do not have any family left. We checked,” Heidi said and paused. “Sorry,” she continued, softening up, not knowing if it was a painful topic for Leo.

“Yes, you are right. I do not have any immediate family,” Leo continued. “However, I do have a childhood friend, Evan. If they know about me, they know about him and would use him to get to me, as awkward as that sounds, right?”

“From what I know, yes. It is a common tactic used by them,” Heidi confirmed.

Leo paled and thought furiously before saying, “Give me the phone, please. I need to call him and warn him before it is not too late.”

Heidi hesitated, “They will just track the call back to us. I cannot allow you to do that.” She frowned and did not move a muscle.

Leo continued, “No, they won't. Evan has a secret phone line set up at home. His grandfather is a loon, similar to your uncle. After his time in the army as a general, he has a lot of weird stuff going on around Europe that Evan is part of. He knows his stuff. The line will be secure,” he reassured her.

Heidi raised an eyebrow, not expecting Leo to have such associates, and handed the phone over, trusting that he was telling the truth. Without missing a beat, Leo went ahead and entered the phone number from memory, hit the dial button, waited for the line to connect, and put the phone on speaker for Heidi to hear.