Chapter 25
Chapter Twenty-Five
Somewhere over Alberta, Canada
It was way past time for Ramon to check in with Kenna. To update her on what Bear’s team was up to and decide between them whether to thwart their efforts or help. It all depended on how far Bear planned to go.
Turned out it was pretty far.
The problem was, they’d taken his phone when he got on the plane in California, before they’d left to go to Norway.
Ramon scrubbed his hands down his face and looked out the small airplane window over his left shoulder, but all he could see outside was the whiteness of thick clouds.
“You should try and get some sleep.” Bear slid into the seat next to him.
“I need a phone more than I need sleep.”
Opposite them, in a seat that faced them on the other side of a table, Lief Holmberg stared at them. He hadn’t said anything since the post office, but the guys didn’t miss a chance to toss a comment his way about the death of their teammate.
Bear said, “So you can call your friends and tell them what we’re doing?”
Ramon wasn’t going to lie, because he didn’t need to. “Checking in with Maizie for information is a reflex.”
He watched Holmberg to see if there was any reaction to her name but saw nothing. Then again, the guy had been stoic since they found him. The only one in the town—or so it seemed. Waiting for them.
A town with a unique genetic profile, probably the result of a Dominatus experiment undertaken generations ago—the first of its kind.
Ramon didn’t even want to know how all that went down.
It made him want to shudder just thinking about it, which made him wonder if not knowing might actually be worse.
That just allowed his mind to come up with all kinds of terrible ideas.
Ways humans had tortured each other for centuries. Because they could, or just wanted to, or for profit—or in the name of medical research.
Think about something else.
There was only one other thing uppermost in his mind.
The fiery explosions he’d seen around the town as they drove away.
Fireballs in the distance. He’d thought about it in the two or so days it had taken them to covertly traverse the country, cross the national border out of Norway, and get to the airstrip where this plane had been waiting for them.
“When were you going to tell me that destroying Vinterdal on the way out of town was the plan the whole time?” Ramon looked at Bear, thinking about that comms communication right before they left the post office.
“Who says it was?” Bear shrugged, most of his attention on Holmberg. “I could have razed the whole place, but I didn’t. What I did was strategic. Despite the fact that they cost me a brother.” He slapped his chest.
Grief had rung in his tone like a bell, calling those around him to come and participate in his sorrow.
“Americans. So sentimental.”
Ramon looked at Holmberg, their prisoner. He didn’t seem worried about what they might do to him, more than simply binding his wrists on top of each other so he couldn’t do anything with his hands.
He hadn’t said anything else or asked for anything.
Bear looked about to burst out of his chair. Ramon held his hand in front of the guy for a second to keep him where he was, a kind of check that a friend would give. Touching him was probably a bad idea.
“I’m sure you’ve lost people before,” Ramon said. “Or did your time as a soldier make you calloused to the loss of life?”
Lief said, “People come, and people go.”
The question was, did he have no family and care about no one, or did he just want them to believe it? If the goal was to not show any weakness in any way, Ramon would also argue he cared about nothing. That way, it couldn’t be used as leverage in a…negotiation.
Did he think he was going to be tortured?
Ramon looked down at the man’s hands and saw the tips of his fingers resembled those of the janitor.
Fingerprints burned off for security, leaving only scars and one less way for an investigator to discern his identity.
But they’d found him perfectly easily using his DNA.
Not even any other indicator. The people who lived in Vinterdal were just entirely too exposed to the world, given that a simple test told them where the janitor had come from.
A simple trip—simple give or take—yielded them this guy. The accountant.
“It was too easy.”
Bear looked at Ramon, incredulity in his expression. “You wanted us to lose more than just one guy? Maybe get into a deadly firefight? It was a snatch and grab. We got what we came for.” Bear motioned at Holmberg with a flick of his fingers.
“That’s the problem,” Ramon said. “I think Dominatus also got what they wanted.”
The skin around Holmberg’s eyes contracted slightly.
Bear shifted in his chair. “Maybe you’re the kind of guy who’s never satisfied. You’ve been through a lot, and you got your life back. But maybe you don’t think you deserve it.”
Ramon nearly laughed. “You think an overblown sense of guilt is causing me to self-sabotage every mission I go on?”
“You thought you had Schnell,” Bear said.
“Turns out it was one of their clones.” Another flick of the hand toward Holmberg.
As if this guy was the representative for the whole of Dominatus.
And maybe he was, at least right now. “You’re scrambling for a win.
Trying to get on my team because you can’t settle enough to accept that you have good things in your life.
That it’s okay to accept the blessing, even though you don’t deserve it. ”
“Are you going to preach at me? Because I get enough of it from Kenna.” And the truth was that Ramon had been starting to seriously consider spiritual things.
Not just because their enemy seemed so powerful they might need some divine intervention to win against Dominatus.
But also because his life had been blessed.
All of them had shown him what grace meant by bringing him into their family. Accepting him as one of them. A brother. Treating him as if he wasn’t the man he had been for so long.
If that wasn’t an example of redemption, he didn’t know what was.
But Bear shoving it at him this way? No. Ramon wasn’t going to be converted because Bear argued him into believing.
Ramon had to make his own way.
“This is all quite fascinating.”
Ramon looked at Holmberg. “So Dominatus just wanted a closer look at what they’re up against. Is that it? You volunteered to be taken so you could see who we are and learn what you can before they get you back.” Ramon leaned forward in his seat.
“Not happening,” Bear said. “You’re going to tell us everything you know about Dominatus and give us access to all their financials.”
“That will take a while,” Holmberg said, his expression placid. “Telling you everything I know.”
“I have a better idea.” Bear reached across the aisle. One of his guys slapped a phone into his hand, then a newspaper.
Bear set the paper on Holmberg’s lap with the headline—and the date—visible, along with the fact that his hands were tied together. He took a photo of the guy. “Time to see if they care about you at all.”
Their captive snorted under his breath.
While Bear typed on the phone, Ramon said, “You don’t think they care? That’s a shame. Being expendable.” He paused. “I’ve been in a lot of situations where I feared for my life, and knowing someone was coming to rescue me made it a whole lot more manageable.”
“As I said”—Holmberg sneered now, but it looked brittle—“Americans are so sentimental.”
“This isn’t just about you being Norwegian. It’s about right and wrong. Maybe you lived with this your whole life. You grew up knowing Dominatus as your lord and master, and there was nothing you could do to escape. You had to toe the line, do what you were told, or else. Right?”
Ramon tried to gauge Holmberg’s response to that before he continued. “You don’t know any other way.”
He’d suspected for a long time that it functioned like a cult.
The leaders, charismatic and unflinching in requiring loyalty or death.
The subjects, cult members who lived or died by their loyalty to Dominatus.
Some were criminals, who got to indulge their evil appetites.
Guys like Dr. Buzard, who used their research to create monstrous things that Kenna and her team had barely managed to stop—or survive.
Within the group, there were factions, but someone at the top had to know what everyone was doing. Or, as Bear had concluded, the person who controlled the money had access to it all. They knew what each part of the organization was doing.
Did this man have that kind of position?
If he did, it was highly unlikely he’d have allowed himself to be captured. And now that he had, it was equally unlikely he was going to tell them anything. Or offer anything in exchange for better treatment.
“And you’re going to save me?” Holmberg asked.
Ramon stared at him for a long time. “Everyone deserves redemption.” That had to be said, but also “If I thought it might work, that would be my plan. But saving one person in Dominatus at a time, stripping them of every foot soldier they have, and dismantling the entire operation from the bottom up isn’t going to work. ”
The whole thing was too big. The backlash would be swift and decisive; they’d be cut off before they could finish.
Bear leaned toward him a little. “That would be why my plan is better.”
“Care to share?” Ramon asked.
Bear showed him the phone screen, and the photo that had been uploaded to…something. Looked like a message board, probably on the dark web.
Along with the photo of Holmberg with the newspaper was a note:
Open for negotiations. Send your representative.
Ramon said, “You want one of them to meet us?”
“I’m kind of hoping they send the president, but maybe she’s busy.” Bear got up and walked down the aisle to the back of the plane.
Ramon looked back at Holmberg. “I guess you’re not the one they wanted to talk to.”
“We all have our part to play.”
How many times had he heard that recently? Ramon was starting to feel like this was a theme from these guys. It reminded him of that quote that was supposed to have been said by Napoleon Bonaparte, “‘We are all either kings or pawns, emperors or fools.’”
Ramon didn’t like the sound of it. He’d rather be a king or emperor than a pawn or a fool. But how was a guy like him supposed to elevate his own life? Seemed more like you were either born at the top or at the bottom.
Could a guy at the bottom live life as a pawn but wind up on top in the end? Could he come up with a plan that subverted what they all thought was the natural order? That was the question.
Ramon had to figure out the answer.
He stared out the window again, thinking through it all. Wondering what kind of plan would net him that result. And whether he should pray, asking God for one. Seemed like He could drop that info into Ramon’s brain like a download—He was God, after all.
But Ramon was still himself.
A black dot appeared in the distance. He leaned toward the window, and the dot got bigger. “Are we expecting company?” he asked in a loud voice to the plane in general.
Bear raced down the aisle to the cockpit.
A second later, he reappeared. “Everyone, buckle up! Things are about to get hairy.”