Deadly Genesis (Boomers Book 2) (6 page)

A collapsed lung would be preferable to a punctured one. Ilsa forgot about the others, only asking for help when she needed it. A fast x-ray revealed the airless lung and she made the incision to get a tube in there and re-inflate it. Cleaning and packing the chest wound, she moved to check his skull. A contusion on the back of his head included a minor laceration, but a head injury for a telepath couldn’t be a good thing.

When he was stable, she turned to head back in and check on Amanda, but Garrett blocked her path. “Yeah, no.” He shook his head. “You tell Rory what needs doing and let her do it.”

“She’s a patient. Simon was a little more critical than she is, which is why I triaged him first, but I am going to take care of my other patient now. Get out of the way, Garrett.” She didn’t raise her voice or rail at him. His concern for her lifted her soul, but at the end of the day she was a doctor. She needed to see her patient.

“Ilsa—”

“Stop.” She’d swapped out her sterile gloves for a fresh set, and would have to change them again, but still she pressed her hand to his chest. “You’re with me, and I’m completely safe. She needs our help, not our judgment or censure.”

He bowed his head, a graceful giant acceding to her wishes. She stripped her gloves off and grabbed a fresh pair inside the room. Rory sat at the head of the bed, brushing Amanda’s hair back from her forehead. She looked at Ilsa, her eyes dark with concern. “She hasn’t woken up.”

“It’s okay. Unconscious is probably better for her.” Ilsa dodged more wreckage to work her way up to the head of the bed. Like Simon, Amanda’s pulse was thready. She located the missing I.V. tubing and sighed. The end was completely melted. “We’re going to need another banana bag and I.V. kit.”

Garrett glanced at Rex. The shapeshifter nodded. “I have the ladies’ backs. Go ahead.” The Cajun spared a small smile and remained on sentry staring at the energy blaster. Ilsa ignored them both, as she understood why they were so vigilant, but that wasn’t her concern right then.

Amanda’s right pupil responded to light, her left was blown. “Rory, help me get the EEG wires in place.”

Her former roommate moved quickly and efficiently. Bruises on Amanda’s jaw and throat already showed as a faint red against her pale skin. They would darken. Rory must have hit her really hard. The readouts came out slowly, and Ilsa shook her head. “This isn’t good.”

“Did I hurt her?” Rory stared at her intently.

“I don’t think it’s you, I think it’s more of the issue we’re having with the chip. I told you there might be brain damage. The aphasia is a clear indicator of that, and this is just more of the same. Unfortunately, she doesn’t have the most stable gift…” She studied the readouts. A mild tranquilizer might have enough of a sedative effect to keep her calm, but after the number of meds she poured into her system, and who knew what they gave her during her incarceration, Ilsa was reluctant to subject Amanda to anything stronger than aspirin while they got the metal out of her.

“What about something to lock down her energy builds, doc?” Rex nodded to the woman on the bed. “We could shackle her hands then the energy could be shunted away. At least then she wouldn’t be able to hurt anyone while she recovered.”

“No.” Simon’s raspy voice carried over from the other room. Ilsa wheeled around and walked back to the man on the table. He should still be out, but his blue eyes were open and mostly focused. The Boomers healed incredibly fast, but still... his injuries had been severe. Michael shifted to allow her next to the bed.

“What is it, Simon?”

“Don’t bind her. That’s what her captors did.” Simon exhaled and pushed himself up onto his elbows. “It was my fault. I didn’t realize how much she picked up from me while I was in her mind. When I told her we would never hurt her, I thought back to how we met Rory—it’s what set her off.”

Michael nodded once and put a hand on Simon’s shoulder. Garrett sighed. “Nice cluster fuck.”

“Yes, that’s an apt word for it.” The telepath lay back down. “Is she all right?”

“She’s unconscious. One of her pupil’s has blown. I’ve got some unsteady EEG readings, and I want to monitor her for a while. It’s possible she had a mild stroke, but I won’t know for a while, though.” Ilsa didn’t bother to soften the information. If anything, these soldiers preferred the base truth—the harsher the better. “Rory and Rex are with her. You can rejoin her in a few hours…”

“I need to—”

She folded her arms and stared at him. “Lie right there and recover. Fast healing or not, you had a collapsed lung and bad burns. I cannot even begin to comprehend what happened in your mind when she went off like that, but you need to rest or you won’t be good for anyone.”

His jaw flexed and Ilsa didn’t need Simon’s ability to read his mind.

“Cooperate, please, or I’ll tranquilize you.” She smiled and patted his arm. “Now excuse me. I need to get back to Amanda.”

Behind her, Simon muttered. “She wouldn’t.”

“Maybe not,” Garrett agreed. “But I would.”

“Me, too.” Michael concurred and Ilsa smiled. Yes, it was a bit of a mess, but they could sort it out.

Now, to fix Amanda before she blew them all up. Toxicology and another MRI. Maybe if she did it in stages she could get a more accurate reading.

Garrett pulled a beer out of the cooler and looked at the doctor expectantly. She tapped her water bottle and shook her head. Following the poisoner in the room came the Cajun with shapeshifting abilities and a very large dark-skinned man Amanda hadn’t met yet.
Drake.
That was the name Rory gave him. Simon, sitting in the chair to her left, nodded once, and Amanda folded her arms. With all five Boomers in the room, the space seemed to shrink infinitely. Josh and Curtis straddled chairs behind her and Rory sat next to Michael on her right.

“Everyone’s here.” Michael began without preamble. In the two days since her explosive confrontation with Simon, she hadn’t been left alone for five minutes. Fortunately, the telepath possessed some kind of swift healing factor, because his injuries weren’t even noticeable. She wished she could say the same for hers.

Literally. But at least she was finally out of bed, even if she still felt a bit shaky about it.

“Rory is going to explain to us what ‘The Program’ is and how it affects us. Drake, we need a report on the movement at the docks in the city, and Doc, you wanted to go over more chip data.” For some reason, the assassin’s calm recitation of an agenda struck Amanda as funny.

She dared a look at Rory and swallowed her mirth. Her best friend didn’t look happy. If anything, she looked like she waited for her execution. The tension between Rory and Michael had thickened in the intervening days. Would it have killed the Boomers to let Amanda talk to her team without them?

No. But you’re still struggling, and we’re trying to eliminate secrets.

The voice of patience and reason speaks.
Wrinkling her nose, Amanda forced calm. They weren’t supposed to talk about “The Program” to outsiders, but she would follow Rory’s lead.

She always had.

Rolling her head from side to side, the audible cracking of Rory’s neck split the silence. Tapping her fingers against the kitchen table, she swept her gaze across each person involved in the confab—which was everyone in the house, save for Ilsa’s five other patients whom Amanda hadn’t yet met. “This really isn’t that big of a deal. The Program was developed by the Infinity Corporation to meet the needs of ‘special’ children.”

“Freaks,” Josh piped in, leaning forward. “Call a spade a spade, Roar. We’re freaks. Our time bending hosts have to know what a freak is, after all. Considering we get wiped out.”

Amanda twisted in the chair and stared at him. His tempestuous ability to control wind aside, Josh didn’t usually possess a mean temper. “Wiped out?”

“Hey!” Rory beamed.

Being wiped out wasn’t funny. Amanda transferred her gaze to Rory. “It’s not funny, Roar.” Everyone stared at her now, and Amanda swung her gaze from her teammates to Simon and back. “What?”

“You hearing yourself?” Rory’s smile grew wider.

“Of course I—” And then it hit her. The words coming out of her mouth matched the ones in her head. “Oh, good. Cause that shit got old. So, what the hell are you talking about? Wiped out?”

Conversation broke out from several different directions, and Michael silenced them all with one pound of his fist to the tabletop. “We’ll fill you in afterward. Rory, continue.”

Amanda regarded Rory’s boyfriend warily. He just didn’t sound friendly at all.

He’s worried,
Simon’s mental voice soothed.

He’s rude. And a little monosyllabic. I think she can do better.

Simon coughed.

“Anyway, as I was saying, the Infinity Corporation identified those with powers in the population and offered them full scholarships to attend The Program. We never gave it another name because it was a trial run, a test group to see if those with unstable or dangerous abilities could learn to control them in an accepting atmosphere, surrounded by others who, if not like them, were at least more inclined to understand.” Rory stared at Michael now. “My parents started it because of me.”

“And you never told us about it because…?”

“Because it didn’t come up, tough guy. Between you trying to save the future, identifying what’s in the microchips, and freeing Amanda—it didn’t come up. Would you like to know who my babysitter was, too? Or maybe when I cut my first tooth?”

Michael didn’t miss a beat. “Yes.”

“Oh, for the love…”

“Moving on,” Simon suggested. “The Program did what precisely, Rory?”

“It was a school. We had academic teachers for most of the mornings, and afternoons were spent honing our abilities or identifying them if students didn’t know.” She blew out a breath and avoided looking at Michael. Amanda shook her head. What did she see in him?

“How did they identify you as freaks, then?” Garrett—the poisoner—asked. She’d been warned repeatedly to not touch him for any reason. Even the most casual of contact could have a devastating effect. Fortunately, his girlfriend could…
Is the doctor his wife?

Simon shook his head slightly.

“Blood tests. Apparently we have a mutation in a genome that is detectable. They identified it during The Genome Project a few years ago but, with the number of people who might be weaponized, Infinity buried it.”

“Your parents must have had you tested young.” Ilsa sat forward. “Why did they suspect you might be one?”

“I walked and talked pretty early. I also saw probabilities and could work out complex scenarios by the time I was five. They couldn’t really seem to find a limit to it, and it made my father curious.”

“So, he arranged for you to be a laboratory experiment.” Michael’s gruff voice darkened.

They really do fight a lot.
Amanda chewed the corner of one nail.

It is hard to explain, just know that he loves her. Stop chewing your nails.

Hard to explain because it’s hard or hard because you don’t get it?
Pulling her hand away from her mouth, she drummed her fingers against the table. Restlessness crawled through her.

None of us really understand them. Now, shush. I’m trying to listen.

She turned in the seat to stare at him, but his placid gaze remained focused on Rory. Did he really just shush her?

“We were not laboratory experiments. We were simply testing our abilities. Yes, they tested me first and often because mine were hard to quantify. Josh can create a tornado, so they could ‘see’ his ability. Curtis can make the earth bend to his will. Amanda can shoot tremendous amounts of energy out of her hands. They have tangible gifts. Mine? Not so much. And more to the point, it was a good thing. We all learned control. We learned confidence. It’s how we met—”

“—and how we became costumed heroes.” Amanda sat forward, done with her silence. If they wanted to keep ganging up on Rory, they would have to go through her. “We found that we were good at helping people, and we liked doing it.”

“Yeah, that’s Rory’s fault, too.” Curtis tossed the live grenade into the conversation and Michael quelled the next outburst with a glare.

“Hey, I saw a problem. I fixed it. I can’t turn my mind off. I can’t turn off what I see or how I react to it.” Rory looked at her man steadily. “Don’t ever ask me to try. I am exactly who I am, and I’m not changing for anyone.”

“Perhaps we should move on. If this wasn’t military or government sanctioned…” Rex suggested. Amanda bit her lip and raised her brows at Rory.

It was government sanctioned.
Simon’s mental sigh echoed through her, and she started mentally chanting the last hip hop song she could remember until she felt his retreat.

“Never said it wasn’t.” Rory rubbed the back of her neck. “We had to train against someone and special ops paramilitary are really good opponents. But we’re not drafted and our names were never released. It’s why we use codenames. People don’t know who we ‘really’ are.”

“On that note.” Simon stood. “We’re going to table the rest of our discussions. We have a lot to consider here and—”

Michael strode out of the room, and the door slammed behind him. Rory sighed, but made no move to follow. “Actually, Simon, that’s a great idea. We—” She motioned to herself, Amanda, Josh and Curtis. “—need to talk, too. In private. Without mental eavesdropping.”

“Agreed.”

“Yep.”

Curtis and Josh backed her up, and Amanda nodded slowly.

“Okay, then I guess I’m elected to defuse the Captain.” Garrett brushed a gloved hand to Ilsa’s cheek and left. The others followed one at a time until only Simon remained. He studied all of them.

“I can’t leave her mind unguarded, not while she remains fragile, but I will do my best to stay out of the conversation.”

And if you hear something you don’t like?
Amanda challenged him.

He rose slowly, studying her.
Trust, Amanda. If you mean us no harm, then there is nothing I need to reveal. You have my word.