Guadalajara, Mexico.
Gareth woke Hannah up in the morning, as gently as he could. She wasn’t going to be in a pleasant mood after going as hard as she did on the booze the night before.
“Let’s go,” he said without sympathy.
She groaned and wrinkled her nose at him. “You’re an inhuman, hangover-proof monster and I hate you.”
“Come on, gotta get downstairs so they can put food in you.” She groaned low again but rolled off the bed, and he watched her trudge down the narrow stairway. Reeve and Alex were at the table, eating, and it almost felt normal, except for every single other thing.
“Well you look vaguely like shit,” Alex said with a grin. Hannah flipped him off half-heartedly.
“It’s not fair that the only other person whose knack doesn’t get fucked up from drinking gets to cheat on the hangover part. Water water water.” She chugged one glass from the jug and poured another.
Picking at a sweet pastry, Gareth looked around. “Where’s Alyosha?”
“He’s getting our ride ready.” Reeve’s face was a little ragged from not sleeping. “He should be back any… actually that’s him,” Reeve said, nodding toward the door. A key turned in the lock, making Gareth jump. Alyosha stepped in and shut the door, quickly darting his eyes to the floor. He was still avoiding looking at Hannah whenever she was naked. He could empathize. Instead, Alyosha made careful eye contact with Reeve, probably talking in their heads.
Reeve nodded and stood. “Pack it up,” he said, “we’ll bring the food.”
Gareth was happy to sit in the back of the van with Hannah and let Alyosha manage the busy streets. Hannah sat invisibly beside him, just in case they ran into trouble and needed a surprise edge, but he half thought it was to get out of carrying their bags.
They were waved through at the gate of the airstrip and Alyosha pulled the van to stop beside a fifty foot Cessna.
“Wait, this one?” Gareth’s voice was unstrung and incredulous. “This is a…” he trailed off, staring, a cold dread beginning.
“It’s a plane,” Alex said, leaning forward for a better look. “We knew there was going to be a plane, right?”
“It’s a fucking jet!” Gareth spat turning to look at Reeve, “How the fuck did you afford this?”
“I didn’t buy it,” he said flatly.
“The hell does that mean?”
Alyosha, shifting nervously, broke in with an apologetic smile. “We shouldn’t do this here.”
Reeve nodded. “Let’s get inside.”
Inside, the plane was even more expensive-looking. There were luxurious tan leather first-class chairs on each side of the cabin, the four in the back facing forward and the ones at the front facing the rear. Between them, attached to the wall on both sides, were tables large enough to have a wine and caviar tasting, which he had to assume was what they were built for. Beside him, Alex’s eyes were wide as saucers.
“This is insanely cool and I want one for my birthday.”
Reeve ignored him, standing with Alyosha up by the cockpit. “Settle in,” he said. “We’re not going to be sticking around.”
Something about it all felt familiar. The dread solidified into a lump of cold fear and he was starting to realize what exactly they were doing. It apparently took a twenty-nine hour car ride for it all to really sink in. If he knew anything, Gareth knew how to run. It was coded into his DNA—that need to see the landscape speeding by, to grab onto the sense of freedom of knowing he could turn left or turn right and no one would stop him or even know which he picked. He knew from the start that leaving Entropy was suicide, and only the multinational protection of the Corp had shielded him from the particular type of violence that Entropy could bring down on a man. Without that, he could never stop moving.
Looking down the string of days with no destination, his mouth went sour. And to his frustration, Gareth’s instinctual response to this was to run. Book it. Take his bag and take a day, and then come back and start this bullshit. It was what he was best at. But he couldn’t.
Trapped and waiting to take off in this fancy-ass jet, Gareth did what he was second best at: he got into a fight with Reeve.
“So you stole it?”
Reeve looked at him and then back toward the cockpit. “Technically I had Shvedov steal it. He was already the pilot, I just had him take it with him when he went into hiding.”
He wasn’t getting away with a non-answer. “Who’d he steal it from?”
Reeve sat in one of the front most seats. “Entropy.”
That’s what he’d been afraid of.
“There’s no way Alyosha was an Entropy agent,” Alex said, shaking his head. “He’s so nice!”
“Thanks,” Gareth said snidely.
Alex cocked an eyebrow. “Are you trying to tell me that Alyosha isn’t way nicer than you?”
Gareth was burning through the fuse of his temper at a rapid rate, enough that Hannah must have felt it and touched his arm lightly as he went on.
“Can someone shut him up and tell me why we’re planning to fly around the Americas in an Entropy jet?” He could see Alex’s face flush, but the shaking in his core was too distracting to care in that moment.
“It’s what was available. And he wasn’t really an agent. He’s a pilot they waylaid. You must have known people like that.”
“How did you even keep this thing parked?”
“Bribery. And telepathy.”
Gareth dragged his hands down his face. “You pissed someone off. Bad.” He’d ridden in Entropy jets during his time there. Not often, only when he was traveling with Adler after his promotion.
“It was years ago.”
“Reeve, why didn’t you buy your own private jet?” Gareth asked sarcastically. When he didn’t answer, Gareth did. “Because this plane cost literal millions of dollars, right?”
Across the row, Alex mouthed the word, “Yikes.”
Reeve still didn’t respond. Still invisible, Hannah squeezed his arm. “What’s done is done,” she said. It was something Gareth was telling himself a lot these past couple of days. He could hear Hannah drumming on the armrests with her fingers. “Where are we going?”
“Brazil,” Reeve said with a sigh, thankful to change the subject.
“What’s there?” Alex asked.
“Another friend.”
Gareth cut in, not content to let him off the hook yet. “Where are we ending up?”
Reeve made that snobbish face he got when he seemed annoyed that had to attend to the needs of lesser beings. “I told you. Brazil.” He had the audacity to roll his eyes. “Northeast. You wouldn’t know the name.”
“Not where in Brazil,” Gareth ran over him. His voice was raised and he didn’t care. “Where are we going?”
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Reeve blinked. “I don’t—”
“Where? I assume Brazil’s not an end game. What’s your plan, if you’ve been planning this for how long?” Gareth clenched his fist and just barely held himself back from slamming the side of it into the wall. “Where are we going—not at this minute—but where are we going to go?”
“Gareth.” Reeve said his name lightly as if he were a child asking why, why, why. “I don’t know. I can’t. It depends on a lot of factors.” He counted them out on his fingers, his voice slowly rising at each one. “How many resources they commit to erasing us. How badly they want me dead. What kind of knacks the agents that are looking for us have. How badly they want Alex back.” He glanced at Alex, “You’re of age now but not graduated yet so I don’t even know if they’ll consider you an Icarus or just an abducted foster.” He turned back to Gareth, shoulders sagging, voice quiet again. “I can’t know yet. Just try to trust me that I’ve got options lined up.”
Gareth nodded his head repeatedly, lips tight. “Trust you.” He stood up, launching himself at Reeve, wishing he could shove his body through one of the tiny oval windows like toothpaste through a tube. Reeve stood still, waiting and willing to take it. Which was just fucking like him. So superior, like he was saying, yes, angry child I’ll let you take your little frustrations out on me. It only made it worse.
Hannah was faster, putting herself between them in a flash. She was visible again, hands on Gareth’s chest. He pulled up short. Beside Reeve, Alex was on his feet, looking spitting mad, but at this point, Gareth couldn’t tell at whom.
“Don’t,” Hannah breathed. Reeve was still waiting, stony-faced, behind her. Gareth took her hands. They were clammy.
“Hannah, careful—you opened something!” Alex scolded, shouldering past Reeve. Hannah scanned her body, a little bewildered. Gareth took her boney hips in his hands and turned her to see the wound on her side where they had pulled out that long piece of glass. The reddened scab had torn and blood was running down her side, mixed with yellow-white puss.
“Shit! That is really not good!” Alex’s brow was pinched.
“It’s not that bad,” she said, shaking her head.
Reeve’s voice was cold and exacting. “Get the first aid kit behind you and find something to cover it.” He turned to walk away.
Gareth shifted, shaking now, but unable to get to him without jostling Hannah. “Just fucking cover it! Is that also part of your brilliant plan?”
Reeve reeled on him. “You’re scared, we’re all fucking scared! Take a breath and sit down.” He turned. “I’m getting us in the air.”
Alex, eyes narrowed, grabbed at the back of Reeve’s shirt as he went by. His grip was tight and sharp and it made Gareth feel a fraction of a bit better.
Reeve froze and looked at Alex for a quiet, shocked moment. “We’re going to this city in Brazil to see a doctor. We’re staying with a surgeon. Let me get us in the air.”
Alex dropped his hand and went immediately back to Hannah and put an arm around her shoulders. Gareth was still holding onto her waist. Reeve disappeared into the cockpit.
“Find some gauze or something,” he told Alex.
She put her hands on Gareth’s arms and pushed. “If the two of you don’t let go of me, I will methodically spit on you in your sleep.” He took a step back, raising an eyebrow at Alex. “It’s just infected. I’m not fucking dying,” she snapped, shaking them off gently. “Now, can we just put something on this to keep from getting gross shit on the leather and get wherever the hell we’re going without killing each other? I’d rather not do Neptune’s job for them.”
The engines kicked on with a hum and the plane jerked to a start as they taxied to a runway.
“Sit. I’ll find the gauze,” Gareth told them. He watched Hannah tug at Alex's hair, laughing off his concern. He rummaged in cabinets and through supplies. Of course Reeve would be taking them to a doctor. So of course he had to cut their conversation short. He found a large bandage and covered up the seeping cut just in time to sit himself down as they lifted off. They were really in it now.
---
SolCorp LAHQ. Neptune Department.
From the moment Gerrit popped into the Neptune wing of LAHQ with Fredericka, things kicked into high gear. Freddie choked back a gag from the teleportation, and for all that he wanted to support her through that, he was immediately swarmed by admin staff from the Retrieval offices. They herded him and Freddie into the conference room, filled with what he gathered must have been just about the entire Retrieval division.
Freddie smirked and turned to him. “Must have forgotten to mention to you, we let them know you were coming. Whoops.”
“Is now really the time to be hazing me?” he muttered, dropping his Blacks by the door.
Freddie just waded into the crowd, whispering, “Go get ‘em, Tiger,” as she walked by.
Gerrit took a fortifying breath and scanned the crowd. There were easily three or four dozen people standing and watching him, some shifting from foot to foot, others whispering to each other. They looked spooked, and he couldn’t blame them.
Sage del Sol–Neptune, himself—was standing in the back corner, where Freddie joined him. Penn Harris and Casper del Sol were situated next to each other by the window. This was happening. Now.
He took another breath and stepped to the front of the room, clearing his throat, and dove in. No time like the present. “Hi, everyone. I’m Gerrit del Sol. I know many of you haven’t met me and it’s gotta be a shock to suddenly have some guy from Philly standing up here. You’re wondering why Will resigned and why I’m here.” There were murmurs at that, but Gerrit made sure to make as much eye contact as he could with the people in the crowd (his people, now, somehow) as he spoke. “But for now, I’m asking you to put that shock on a shelf for later. Trust me, I’m feeling it too, but right now we have bigger problems to focus on. Later, we’ll have proper introductions and I promise you’ll get your explanations.” He swallowed, glancing at Neptune. He hoped he wasn’t promising something he wasn’t supposed to. It would have been nice to talk to him first.
“Right now, as I understand it, we have a team of four Icarus in the wind, one of whom is a foster. One of the Venus Twenty-Five, for those of you who’ve been here long enough to remember. Now, this news is as new to me as it is to you, so I’m going to need to catch myself up to speed on this case. I figure that’ll take me about twenty minutes tops, which should give you all plenty of time to organize three teams to take point with me.”
He glanced at Freddie, hoping she’d help him out just a little. Her face was unreadable, but that was standard. “Since I don’t know you all yet, I’m not going to pretend to know who my best picks are for this. I’m trusting you all to know yourselves better than I do. I want trackers–at least a few telepaths, a psychometrist if we have one, an empath. A couple of teleporters. We’ll also need some tanks for bringing these Icarus in when we find them–healers, strongmen, telekinetics.” He looked at Sage, “Can we commandeer a Comet or two, sir?”
Sage nodded, and Gerrit said, “Thank you, sir.” He continued, “Fredericka, can I trust you to finalize these teams while I get up to speed?”
He cringed internally at the look she gave him, but she rattled off a few names with instructions to stay put after the meeting.
“Thank you,” he said, meaning it. “I look forward to getting to know all of you better. For now, who here is on Will’s staff?” A few hands shot up. “Great,” he said. “You’re with me. The rest of you, if you’ve got other Icarus you’re tracking, keep on top of it–we can’t let this derail us from the rest of our job. And if you’re between assignments, sorry to say you’re not anymore. I need your brilliant minds working on this one. Send me any intel you can dig up.” He looked around at the silent crowd. They were alert and already shifting to organize. Good. It might have been a case of officers-in-the-room best behavior, but he could work with this.
“Thanks everyone. I’ll meet my three teams back here in twenty minutes. Be ready to hit the ground running.”
He could hear them kicking into gear as he walked out, grabbing his Blacks, Will’s staff in tow. His staff now. Four of them in total. He’d deal with that adjustment later. He turned to one of them, a short woman with wavy brown hair and a bulk of muscle. “What’s your name?”
“Cindy, sir,” she said.
“Nice to meet you, Cindy. Where’s Will’s office?”
She balked for a second, and then said, “This way, sir.” He appreciated her fortitude in stuffing the discomfort for the moment.
“Thank you—I’m not familiar with LAHQ yet, but I’ll get there.” As they walked, he asked the group of them, “Which one of you is Will’s PA?”
“Actually, I am–er I was, sir,” Cindy said, looking over her shoulder at him as they walked.
He nodded. “For now, let’s not worry about past or present tense. If it helps, just think of me as the substitute teacher filling in for a mission and we’ll save the real get to know you’s for later.”
She didn’t say anything, but he couldn’t blame her. He continued, “So, I need you to contact any of our teams currently stationed in and around–where was this team?”
They turned a corner into Will’s office. He hesitated for only the briefest moment before pushing himself through the door and into the seat at someone else’s desk. His former superior’s desk. He swallowed as he logged into his account on Will’s desktop.
“Nevada,” one of the staffers said. “Neptune has them sweeping north and south.”
“Great. Cindy, I need you to send orders to send the stateside teams south and activate any teams in South America to start–that’s a pretty safe bet for an Icarus’ first move. I want them focusing on any airstrip big enough to fly a kite. We’ve gotta start somewhere.”
She nodded and scurried out of the office. Gerrit opened up the Icarus files in their database and started scanning it. He could feel the other three hovering. “So fill me in. What do I need to know? I can listen and read at the same time.” There was a beat of silence, so he glanced up. They looked unmoored. He took a deep breath and tried to put his best, most welcoming face on. Mission mode from word go isn’t always the most friendly first impression, but Freddie hadn’t been kidding when she said ASAP. He softened his voice and said, “It’ll be okay. We’ll get these guys. And then when this crisis has settled, I’ll take you all out for a well-earned drink. In the meantime,” he glanced at one of them–the youngest, who looked the most nervous, “What’s your name?”
“Scott del Sol, sir. I’m the post-grad intern.” He was young and fit, with light hair.
“Can you please pull together the standard from the armory? Enough for me and three teams. Thank you.”
Scott nodded. There was an earnestness about him. It shone through the fog of just how out of his depth he must have felt.
Gerrit turned back to the others. “I hate to ask this of you, but I need you to start filling me in on the team we lost while I scan these files. I need to know what we’re up against, and part of that is learning who they’re capable of taking down.” He knew it was a hard ask, so he gave them as fortifying a look as he could. “Thanks, guys. We’ve got this, okay?”
He focused in on Scott, who looked wide-eyed and even younger after the mention of the agents they’d lost. “We’ve got this,” he repeated, and then repeated it again silently to himself. He’d make sure of it.
***