Never Forsaken (The Kurtherian Gambit Book 5) Read online

  CHAPTER FOUR

  The Queen Bitch’s Ship Ad Aeternitatem

  Bobcat was deep in a conversation with Chief Engineer John Rodriquez who had come over to the Ad Aeternitatem for the meeting. It was being held in one of the closed off rooms inside the super yacht. Bethany Anne had given Bobcat the authority to include whomever he felt was necessary to get the small super craft project running and Rodriquez was known for coaxing miracles out of bailing wire and string. Well, if you didn’t include the alcohol and cussing that he considered necessary ingredients at times.

  The Chief Engineer was talking, “I’m telling you, Bobcat, that the thermal effects of that much speed is going to affect the people inside. You need to get a scientist who understands these metals better than you or I to run some tests. The design will probably work to cut down the wind resistance, but unless it has a way to ignore air,” He paused, “It doesn’t, does it?” Bobcat shook his head. “Ok, then consider a rocket or a missile design. We can’t have it long enough for three people stacked on top of each other, so we need to design it as a rocket fat enough to house three around a central axis. It can land on tripods that fold back into the body. Does it need stabilizing fins?”

  Bobcat considered what he knew, “Doubt it. TOM’s craft doesn’t have much of that right now, so I don’t see why.”

  Chief engineer Rodriguez thought about it for another second, “Are we going to be able to get the same propulsion system that TOM’s craft has now?”

  “Not sure how we can fit that in, although I would sure like it!” Both men smiled at that thought.

  Bobcat sighed, “So you’re telling me I’m going to need a rocket scientist, right?”

  “Yup, I might be able to do a lot of things; however, I am not a rocket scientist.” Both men reached for their beers.

  “Looks like I’m gonna have to call Frank then; I’ll ask Ecaterina for the phone number. Wonder what kind of scientist I’ll have to deal with?”

  John just looked at Bobcat. He had a guess however, he wasn’t about to mess things up for Bobcat by telling him what the guess was. He said his goodbyes to Bobcat, and headed out to hitch a ride back to the Polarus.

  Bobcat took out his cell phone and hit the number for Ecaterina. It didn’t take long for her to answer the phone and after a few seconds she sent him Frank’s number. Bobcat called Frank’s number, and surprisingly the man picked up on the first ring.

  “Frank, this is Bobcat. I was wondering if you had a few minutes?”

  Franks inquisitive voice came back over the line, “Sure Bobcat, what do you need?”

  Bobcat smiled, “Believe it or not, I need a rocket scientist.”

  Frank laughed, “You don’t ask for much, do you? Will any old rocket scientist do, or do you need a particular type of rocket scientist?”

  Bobcat paused, “Well, I didn’t realize that there were actually different types of scientists available. Do you have a catalog perhaps?”

  “Ah, no. I need you to give me an idea of what you need, and I will comb through the databases to find someone who might be available. Can you send me a request via email?”

  “Sure, that would be easy enough to do. However, will the emails be safe?”

  “Just make it look like you’re talking about someone from the show Ancient Aliens, it will be flagged as a false positive if anyone should actually read it.”

  “Ok, I can do that. Any idea how long this might take?” Bobcat was fishing for information. He was concerned he wasn’t going to get the craft done as soon as Bethany Anne might need it.

  “I should have a good idea if anyone is available within twelve hours, I will have more information within twenty-four and at most forty-eight hours. We might have someone in the next few days, if they are available and I can tweak their interest enough.”

  Bobcat felt a little tension leave, “Frank, you are a lifesaver! I will buy you as many beers as you can drink the next time we catch up.”

  They said their goodbyes and hung up. Frank spoke to his now dead connection, “Don’t thank me until after you have worked with him.”

  Bobcat turned around and covered up the designs he had been working on.

  He walked out the door and shut it behind him. He ran into Chris in the hallway. They went upstairs talking the whole time about the differences between the Sikorsky and the Black Hawk helicopter and how each one handled. Bobcat was a little bummed at having to leave Shelly behind; however, he knew these craft were the future and it was what he had signed up for way back in Miami. Not that he would have believed Bethany Anne had she confided in him that he would be working with alien technology.

  The Queen Bitch’s Ship Polarus

  Pete had to get Frank’s help with passports for two of his guys. So that took some extra time.

  Pete had gotten to know each one of the guys on the trip down on the Gulfstream and then on Shelly to get them to the Polarus.

  The lead alpha of this group was Tim Kinley. Pete found him smart, aggressive and holding on to his patience by a thread. It hadn’t helped that everyone was stuck in the plane waiting for Frank to get passports pushed through. Pete had finally just dropped the door and ran everyone around the building a few times to get rid of some energy. Once they had the passports, they buttoned back up and took off.

  After Tim was Joel Holt. Joel was the fourth son of a pack leader in Virginia and he didn’t particularly like the family business. Pete figured that Joel was the opposite of him. Where his dad had given Pete too much, Joel’s dad had given him too little. Too little time and too little attention. Pete wasn’t sure that Joel’s efforts to leave the pack life, and specifically his dad’s pack, wasn’t a way to try and get just a little attention from his dad.

  Rickie Escobar was next. Pete had talked with Rickie for a while. Rickie was funny, loud and a bit of a cut-up. Pete wasn’t sure if Rickie was going to make it past the first week. Not because he was weak but rather because he didn’t seem to take anything seriously. In the guard, serious went to a new level or someone got killed. Not being focused led to deaths, both your own or worse - team mates.

  After Rickie, Pete spent some time with Joseph Greggs. An intense and quiet guy, it was a little difficult for Pete to figure out Joseph’s reasons for leaving the pack. Finally, it all came together when Pete had made a comment about the Pack political system. It took ten minutes for Joseph to finally step down off his soap box once Pete opened up that controversial topic. Pete wasn’t very politically minded himself, so it wasn’t a great stretch to admit he didn’t have much to say about the subject nor could he really judge the merits of Joseph’s points. However, Joseph didn’t seem like a political nutcase, so Pete would give him the benefit of the doubt for now.

  Finally, the best conversation of the trip happened with Matthew Tseng. Matthew was a rarity in America, an Asian Wechselbalg from immigrant parents. Typically, Wechselbalg from Asia, any of the countries in Asia, didn’t come to the US. It had been rare enough that the Pack Council had watched them covertly for years to ascertain if they were a plant in America or not. Strangely enough, the fact that the child of the couple was wanting out of the Pack put to rest the fears of a few council members who still considered his parents suspect after three decades.

  Matthew had an easy demeanor and was fast as hell. They had played slaps for a while and Pete couldn’t win. The rest of the guys got involved and even Tim had to admit Matthew was preternaturally fast. Matthew gave off a completely guileless vibe. If he didn’t agree with something, he just stated the disagreement. He never sought to prove his point unless you chose to discuss the issue further. Pete tried to answer some of Matthews questions related to TQB. The more they talked, the more Matthew seemed to … fit … in Pete’s mind.

  Tim was staring out the window as they approached the ship. He was an adequate swimmer, but all of this water was causing him a little distress, increasing his anxiety. He heard Rickie make a comment about the size of the yacht being a compens
ation mechanism. None of the others laughed at his joke and Tim heard the ‘tough crowd’ comment under his breath.

  That was when Tim noticed the sniper in the well concealed location at the top of the large ship. As he looked around, he noticed others at strategic points around the ship. In his mind, it was a carefully orchestrated effort to look normal that would fool most people not seeing it from above. From above it was obvious every person on deck had every other person within their line of sight. He had heard comments about the spec-ops feel from those who had been at the New York meeting with the vampire, but he hadn’t realized just how organized this team was. Tim wasn’t a professional, but he had studied as much as he could through the Internet and from what he understood, they weren’t in Kansas anymore.

  The Black Hawk touched down and Pete opened the door. There were two humans waiting for them, an older fit man in a suit and one huge man who had to top even Tim’s height by four or more inches.

  He was fighting back the desire to go over and slug the guy. His alpha personality was working overtime on something as simple as his larger body size and height. He had to get a grip or he might end up being thrown overboard. Pete had made sure to remind them Bethany Anne was now the final law and she absolutely could and would slap their heads clean off their body if they fucked up too much.

  There was a saying if you killed someone who needed it on land, they had a backhoe to bury the body. Here, there wasn’t a need as the water would swallow you up and no one would be the wiser. It helped Tim keep a tight leash on his anger.

  Even Rickie was momentarily stunned and silent. Joel was checking everything out, Joseph had his mouth open and Matthew just jumped off and looked around. Pete touched the back of Bobcat’s shoulder as he exited and closed the door to Shelly.

  Dan didn’t try to talk at all this close to Shelly; he just dipped his head in acknowledgement and waved everyone to follow him.

  They noticed that the big man waited and followed them. None of them were going to somehow get ‘lost’ wherever they were going. Not that any had thought there would be a boat big enough to worry about getting lost on. Both Tim and Joel had noticed another yacht with a helicopter not too far away. It was a big one, but not as big as the one they were presently on.

  Everyone on the ship sized them up and then promptly ignored them once they saw either of the guys with them.

  All of the Were creatures were wondering just what they had jumped into, and where was the scary vampire?

  Dan took the new recruits into the large conference room and waved them all to chairs. Two more of the big guys with the same patches as Pete showed up, grabbed their bags and took them away. One was white, one was black. A few seconds later a tanned guy with the patch showed up and took a position in the back corner.

  The middle-aged guy went to the front and got their attention.

  “Good afternoon, gentleman. My name is Dan Bosse and I am the head of the military side of TQB Enterprises. Previous to my present lofty position, I worked for the U.S. Government for three decades. Half of that time was spent on special teams hunting young, vicious, mindless vampires called Nosferatu. Have all of you heard that term?” He received a bunch of blank stares. “Damn, what are your elders teaching you guys about vampires?”

  Matthew raised his hand; Dan called to him, “Yes Mr. Tseng?” Matthew was a shocked that the man knew who he was.

  “Not to mess with them and to run like hell if you knew of one in the area.”

  Dan grunted, “Well, I guess I can’t really argue that strategy, it is a perfect lead in to the first part of my presentation. Eric, would you hit the lights?”

  The lights dimmed and the built in LCD TV came on in the wall. “What I am about to share, outside of TQB Enterprise personnel, is not known. I spent a large part of my life making sure the sacrifice of these men was never attributed to the UnknownWorld.”

  Dan went through a list of men, their ages, their service records ending with when and how they had died. It made an impression on each of the Weres, but their bias couldn’t be broken. These were humans, maybe tough humans, but they didn’t have the stamina, strength, or speed of a Wechselbalg. It made sense that Bethany Anne would want to bring on a team of werewolves to help fight these things.

  In fact, the werewolves reacted pretty much as John had called it a while back. They respected the deaths of the human agents, but felt it wouldn’t have happened to them.

  The lights came up and Dan got their attention. “What you are probably thinking is that if you were the ones fighting, you would not have died like these agents had. No amount of my explaining or additional video will likely persuade you otherwise. So, please raised your hands if you believe that you can’t be beaten by a human?”

  Dan looked around, “Mr. Tseng? You don’t have your hand up.” Everyone looked over at him.

  “I’m just cautious Mr. Bosse. I’m willing to fight anyone you need me to, but I’m not willing to believe no human can beat me yet just because I’ve not met anyone who could.” That got a little chuckle from everyone at the table. John calculated that this one was probably going to be the toughest fight they had.

  “Fair enough. Unfortunately, the only vampires we have with us wouldn’t be a good way to introduce you to a Nosferatu. The vampires who are on these two ships, both females by the way, would have you on the ground so fast you couldn’t learn anything. So, you get the pleasure of going against the Queen’s Guard. There are five of them, and five of you. One of the guard, as you already know, is Pete. So if any of you want to call foul we will place a human, if you leave any of them left, in for a second round.”

  Tim thought this seemed fair enough. Personally, he wanted a shot at the big guy - that one looked like he might last a couple of rounds.

  They all left the meeting room and Dan took them to the workout area. He gave them a change of clothes to get into something better suited and let them have time to warm up and stretch their muscles.

  The Queen’s guard were doing the same thing, but playing AC/DC at the same time… It was weird to hear them screw it up and sing, “But Bethany Anne’s got the biggest … balls of them all!” and then laugh their asses off. Until the Weres knew differently, they weren’t going to get sucked into anything that could get the vampire, wherever she was, pissed off at them.

  Dan called Rickie up, “Mr. Esobar, you have the floor. Eric from the Queens Guard is going to be your Nosferatu for this session.” He looked at all of the new recruites. “Now, please understand that while most Nosferatu are mindless about attacking something to eat it, it doesn’t lack intelligence or at least a cunningness at times. If you permit an advantage, it is likely to use it. Do you understand this rule Mr. Escobar?”

  Rickie mouthed off and made a joke out of understanding the rules, “One Nosferatu coming up and one Nosferatu going to go down!” Rickie put his hands up in the air as if this was a foregone conclusion. Rickie noticed that the Guard Eric seemed to put himself into a strange walking motion that looked both painful to accomplish and reduced his walking speed by at least half. This was going to be too easy.

  Dan spoke up one more time, “Is there anything you want to know about your Nosferatu Mr. Escobar? Anything you want to make sure they can or can’t do?” Dan stood there patiently, waiting for his answer.

  Rickie was feeling pretty cocky this time. “Sorry, just need to know how long you want me to make this fight last? Like, should I allow him to last for a least a couple of rounds before he goes down?” Rickie was smiling.

  “That is your final question, Mr. Escobar? Yes? Ok, then the answer is you may win quickly or take your time, but remember that taking your time will just give the Nosferatu time to keep after you. You may start taking out the Nosferatu, Mr. Escobar.”

  Rickie broke into a smile and looked around, hamming it up for everyone, when he turned to face Eric again, Eric shot him in the stomach.

  Rickie went down yelling in surprise, “Mother fucker!�
� Eric jump-limped over to Rickie and used the 9mm Luger to back-slap Rickie in the head. He was knocked out quickly by Eric’s blow to his temple. Everyone was stunned.

  Eric stood up, jacked the round and went to pick up his shell casing. Pete went over to Rickie and grabbed him by the shoulders; he looked over at Joseph, “A little help here? He will be ok; the shot was lead.” Joseph just came over and helped move Rickie to a pad. Pete heard Joseph mumble under his breath, “Still going to hurt like a mother fucker when he wakes up.”

  Pete spoke under his breath, “That’s the point, isn’t it?” Joseph noticed there were five pads on the floor, and five new Wechselbalg recruits. Oh fuck, he thought.

  Since Tim was the last one, none of the guys got to see him ask for John. It wasn’t even a fair contest. Tim might be big, strong and fast, but unlike John, he hadn’t worked out with vampires nor had he been on operations against the Nosferatu. Fact was, John was stronger, almost as fast due to Bethany Anne and substantially better trained and ready. Tim went down in the first five seconds. John didn’t put his lights out until the third time. When Tim woke up, he would know that he had his ass handed to him.