Adapt (I)

Boe

I slam the front door behind me. Alex is sitting in the passenger seat of the black Hummer, scrolling through something on his phone.

I grind my jaw. That dramatic door slam was supposed to mean something. I march over to the car and fling open the driver’s side door.

“Has she calmed down?” He asks without looking up from his phone.

I narrow my eyes. “She is asleep. You need to leave.”

“No. You can’t handle this mission by yourself.” Still not looking at me.

“She can’t handle two having two hunters around her. It overloads her.”

“Well, she will just have to grow up and get over it if she wants to go to be inducted at Head Quarters.”

“She isn’t going to HQ.”

He still hasn’t looked up from his phone. “Don’t be ridiculous. She needs training.”

I grind my teeth. “She doesn’t want your training. She won’t go to HQ. In fact, I don’t think this mission is viable at all. I suggest we abort.

His attention snaps to me. “Not possible.”

“Why not?” I cross my arms. “What is it about her that makes you want her so bad? She is not hurting anyone. She is just tucked into a tiny town, taking down Therians as they come along. She isn’t bothering any hunters. What is so precious about her?” I mean, I know why she is so precious to me…

Alex makes absolutely no attempt to answer me. He just stares me down, as if his glare alone will make me cave. But this entire matter has bugged me since I had read the profile of the mission. I want answers. I raise my eyebrows to show Alex that I am not quitting.

He breaks. “Boe, her blood line is rare and powerful. Her father, his mother and a long string of her ancestry is renowned for their leadership and deft skill.”

I shrug. “That may be true, but you don’t understand her. There is something wrong in her genetics. Something backfired in her DNA-”

Alex cuts me off. “Her mother’s side is also important.”

“I don’t give a fu-”

“Her mother was a Therian.”

I hear the words. They bounce back and forth in brain. My mind attempts to reject the information, but it seems the software is now encrypted. “What…” I breathe.

“That’s right Boe, she is fifty percent Therian.”

“But…” Logan’s words ring in my ears. Turns out that a Therian can also mate with a hunter…

“You mean that you knew and didn’t tell me...?” I ask, still breathless.

“Recruiting only just got wind of this information this morning. Scarlet’s file was dumped on our desk eleven years ago, by Operations. We figured it was just a file mix up and they were returning it. Then the Tracking Division called a meeting with Recruiting and Operations this morning, Ministers only. Even I haven’t been made privy to all of the details. All I know is that whatever she is can create havoc, and she needs to be contained.”

I slowly digest what he is saying, linking it with other pieces of information - her intolerance of hunters; her emotional outburst after our first hunt; her enhanced abilities.

“Wait… contained?” I ask.

“Yes. We don’t know what she is capable of.”

“So, what? Are you going to lock her in a room and study her?”

He shacks his head. “No, we will train her as if she is a normal hunter. If she shows difference, then we will address it accordingly. But she needs to be in a controlled environment. That means out of the human world until we understand what parts of her DNA are prominent and what is not.”

“She has survived in the human world just fine. In fact, that is where she belongs, much more so than at HQ. Do you understand the pain she goes through just being in the same room as other hunters? Because what you just witnessed was not her throwing a fit. That was her senses being overloaded by the presence of hunters and her fighting the urge to destroy us.”

“Destroy us? I doubt one girl could kill two highly trained hunters.” He laughs.

“As the person that has fought her in two serious fights, and only narrowly winning one with a lucky stab to her stomach; and having witnessed her engaged with Therians that even I doubt my ability fight, I can tell you that she could definitely take down both of us.”

“Speak for yourself.”

“Look, I am telling you that there is no way you are going to be able to just pick her up and take her back to HQ. Even if you got a team of thirty together, you would be sacrificing precious hunter lives, and then you can forget training her.”

“Didn’t I make it clear to you that this is a Level One mission? Hunter’s lives are no longer my concern.”

“So, when you send a team and half of them die, but you get her back to HQ. And when she doesn’t cooperate, and you throw her in a deep dark cell, then will your mission be complete? Can you tick that of your list of things to do? Will throwing an innocent girl in indefinite pain make you feel accomplished?”

“No, but I still have a job to do.”

I give him a puzzled look, but I realize that he is dead serious. He couldn’t care if he ruins Scarlet’s life, as long as he completes his mission.

This must have been how I sounded when I first arrived in Green Haven

I swallow, knowing I wont win this battle. Perhaps I can buy time to get Scarlet out of here. “Look. I have her trust. If you just give me some more time, I think I might be able to get her to come quietly. But if you come in and hard ass it, then you have no chance of being able to work with her.”

He takes a deep breath. “Fine.”

“And you have to leave.” I add.

He clenches and unclenches his jaw. “Fine. You have until the end of next week.”

“Thank you.”

“But at the end of the week I am coming in with a squad helicopter. She will be on it willingly or unwillingly.”

I nod and swallow back the lump in my throat.