The second turning the f.., p.1
The Second Turning (The Feeds Book 2), page 1
THE SECOND TURNING
NICOLE GROTEPAS
The Second Turning: The Feeds, Book #2
Copyright © 2022 by Nicole Grotepas
Published by Conundrum Publishing
www.conundrumpub.com
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance of fictional characters to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
All right reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, photocopying, mechanical, or otherwise—without prior permission of the publisher and author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.
CONTENTS
Prologue
1. Strangers
2. Light in the Distance
3. Encounter with evil
4. The chase begins
5. Where to run?
6. The Defector
7. Alone
8. The ex-girlfriend
9. Who to trust?
10. I know
11. The shadow of the future
12. The problem
13. Never the one you suspect
14. Burning laurel branches
15. Sad Little Town
16. College
17. Haunting love
18. The requirement of darkness
19. The rest stop
20. Regrets
21. The camp
22. Bethany
23. Interrogation
24. An unusual group
25. Gale
26. Chance meeting
27. Hippies with guns
28. With No Eyes But Our Own
29. A friendship begins
30. The Meadow
31. Showdown
32. The Gathering
Epilogue
Free Thriller Sampler
Acknowledgments
About the Author
PROLOGUE
Elliot didn’t remember falling asleep on a hardwood floor. A fire smoldered in a hearth near him. He stared at it for a few minutes, collecting himself. His head throbbed and his vision was blurry as he sorted through the haze blanketing his mind. He was cold and perhaps wet in places—most noticeably beneath his shoulders and chest, and possibly where his cheek rested on the ground.
Bookshelves surrounded the room. It was lit by the weakened fire and two lamps—one floor lamp and a reading lamp next to an armchair. He held perfectly still as his eyes darted from corner to corner, gathering data about his surroundings.
A pang of fright that he did not like at all whipped through him, scattering his sense of control for a moment. Paralysis gripped him. Should he lie still? Was he in danger? Was someone nearby waiting to inflict pain upon him?
When he finally accepted that he was alone, the fear that had gripped his throat and guts lessened. There were no other presences in the room. They would have moved by now and announced themselves, unless they were like him.
And not very many people were.
He moved to stand. His skull throbbed and that told him what he needed to know: he’d been knocked out. Not asleep.
It all came rushing back to him like glacial run-off pouring down his back.
He remembered everything.
A new fear took hold of him and it was cold and terrifying in a way he hadn’t experienced in a very long time.
The moan that had accompanied the echoing headache turned to a growl as he rose, touching his temple and waiting for the blackness creeping through his vision to dissipate.
His victim was gone, but he’d known he was alone. Still, he’d hoped for that one ray of hope. Just one hopeful thing in the mess that he realized he would have to clean up.
The room came into focus. Elliot’s tools—his various whips, his pliers and tongs, his other devices to break and undo people—were scattered haphazardly on the floor.
Turning, he spotted the item used against him: a tire iron. He hefted it and inspected a still-damp bloodstain smeared along one end before slamming it with a thunderous boom against the wooden floor.
The emotion left him quickly. Outbursts like that clouded his faculties. For his work, Elliot needed to be clear of mind and focused. He was embarrassed that he’d permitted himself to lash out for even a second.
He’d been betrayed. Or the man’s ex-wife came home, unexpectedly . . . but then how had she caught him unaware? How had she known? It was unlikely that it was her.
If not her, then who?
He got to his feet and fumbled through the house, toting his briefcase of tools with him.
Soon he found a bathroom. He located the bloody spot on the back of his scalp using an extendable, magnifying mirror and the mirror that hung over the vanity. With a needle and thread from his tool set, he stitched up the gash. He couldn’t risk losing more blood—in fact, he ran a sort of mental check through his body and knew that he’d lost a lot of blood. His clothes were sodden with it, confirming what he sensed.
The process of doctoring himself up was awkward and difficult. However, he was used to operating in less than ideal circumstances and was finished in thirty minutes. Now he would lose no more blood. Now he could begin to replenish and regain his strength. He would need it for what was to come next.
He stared at himself in the mirror. His face was frightening even to him, caked with dried blood and with his hair sticking up and crusty with blood as well. Elliot didn’t want to look like a monster. He wasn’t one. He knew that much—though there were plenty of people who would disagree with him.
They did not know what was in his heart—a respect for order. For obedience. For laws and submission to them.
If they knew this, they would perhaps understand why the term monster could never apply to him.
Though it infringed on his sense of propriety (he was truly no monster, after all), he removed his suit jacket and inspected the stains. It was now too dirty to wear. His dress shirt was also red with blood. He made his way into the master bedroom, into the closet, and found a shirt that would fit him. It went against everything he stood for, but it was the best solution for him at the moment. His appearance was part of his job and he couldn’t afford to look like he didn’t respect the office of his role.
He finished buttoning up the dark blue dress shirt and tucked it into his trousers. He then retied his bowtie, which still worked with the new color of the button-down. The shirt was a bit too loose in the shoulders, but it was better than trying to make his ruined shirt work. Back in the bathroom, he crumpled up his old shirt and put it in the trash. Then he leaned over the sink, turned on the faucet, and rinsed his hair. He worked the clumps of dried blood out and rinsed the stitched up wound.
Once he’d dried off and cleaned up his mess, he raided the fridge of fruit and juices before leaving out the front door. Taking long, purposeful strides, he hurried up the sidewalk with his shoulders brushing against the blossoms of Japanese laceleaf trees. He paused on the driveway and activated his implanted communication system, intending to inform his superiors of what had happened.
After he talked to Ghosteye, of course.
Why hadn’t Ghosteye warned him of the danger? The Editor had seen that someone was coming for him, hadn’t he?
“Ghosteye, Elliot here. Ghosteye?” He opened the driver’s side door, frowning in dismay at the broken window. “Ghosteye? Are you there?”
No answer.
Inside the compact car, Elliot cleared the broken glass off the seat with a cloth he kept in the door pocket. The scattering hunks of safety glass made a sound like falling rain. When he was finished, he set his briefcase of tools on the passenger seat and tried to start the vehicle. Nothing. It wouldn’t start.
“Ghosteye?”
Still no response. His car wouldn’t start and the Editor who should have had his back was MIA.
He knew who the traitor was now.
Redirecting his call only took a clipped vocal command.
A male voice answered, speaking in an educated British accent. “What is it, Elliot? Make it quick.”
“Sir, the subject has escaped, my vehicle has been neutralized, and the Editor fails to answer his phone,” Elliot said.
“Hmm, I see. Do I understand, then, that you’ve let Samuel Ramone get away?”
“Yes, that’s correct.” Elliot hated to admit defeat, but it would only be a short time before he made this right.
“Terrible news, I’m afraid. At the moment, I can’t help you, Agent. I’m in the middle of an extraction. I have a subject halfway through a procedure.” As though to punctuate his claim, Elliot heard muffled, desperate cries in the background.
An icy fear gripped his throat at the sound—the Director only got involved in “extractions” when the subject was someone high level like an Editor…
…or an Enforcer.
Had Elliot made a terrible miscalculation? Was he stupid to call the Director and draw attention to himself?
He thought fast. He coughed and cleared his throat. “Someone betrayed me. The Editor, I believe.”
There was a pause before the Director finally said, “What gives you that idea?”
Elliot swallowed.
“Someone knocked me out with a tire iron. Meaning, they snuck up on me. Meaning the Editor
“Send a team to the Editor’s studio and call in for a clean-up team. Your subject is married, no?”
“He was. No longer. She doesn’t live with him.”
“She may know something. And if she doesn’t, we can use her.” The Director paused, and when he spoke again, his voice had changed slightly, as though he’d filled it with steel. “And Agent, wait there for the clean-up team.”
“Certainly, sir,” he said, automatically.
Just like that, the Director was gone.
Elliot’s fingers trembled until he gripped the steering wheel. He wasn’t nervous no matter how shaky his hands were. Elliot didn’t get nervous. Fear of pain had been cut out of him almost before he knew how to speak.
Keep telling yourself that. Whatever it takes to endure the gut-chilling fear that’s making your palms sweat.
He pulled a flashlight out of the glove compartment, then got out of his car and looked under the hood. He found the problem and reconnected the cables of his electric vehicle then closed the hood.
Crickets chirped from the nearby foliage. He was in a middle to upper class neighborhood. Dogs barked somewhere in the distance. The sound of disembodied laughter drifted toward him out of the night as though a party was happening in a backyard somewhere. The air was fragrant with decay and the scent of grilling meat.
Standing in the darkness, he hesitated. He knew his orders now: call in for the clean-up team. He needed to do it. He had to do it—he believed in the power of rules, of laws, of order. He was part of that system, though he was also outside it as he worked to keep it organized and functioning.
But he’d heard the threat in the Director’s voice. Elliot’s gut was telling him to disobey.
Something wasn’t right.
He could not wait.
Something was barreling toward him and it wasn’t good. His sense of self-preservation screamed at him to run.
He needed a plan. He needed to find Ramone. And he needed to stave off whatever chaos was coming toward him. He called for the clean up team, and then he got back into his car.
As Elliot pulled out of Ramone’s neighborhood, headlights from an approaching vehicle flashed across him.
He couldn’t say for sure, but he sensed that he’d narrowly missed something dangerous coming for him.
1 STRANGERS
“Let’s just say that the nanocameras can’t be duped. They will find their subject and stick with them almost anywhere. They’re truly a marvel.”
ETHAN KIRKWOOD, INTERVIEW WITH KBC NEWS
He was just lucky the clothes hid the damage from the torture session with that Enforcer.
Those were words Samuel Ramone never thought he’d find himself saying to himself. I’ve been tortured.
He’d had to disconnect from his body to survive it.
He stared into the fridge at the gas station where Blythe Anderson, his once-lawyer, had stopped to allow them to get their bearings. They’d only driven a mile or two away from Ramone’s neighborhood on their way to the interstate before she pulled into the parking lot to take a breather.
Ramone had never run away from anything before. He’d never had occasion to be on the lam, to feel pursued by a malevolent force out to silence or stop him.
It felt like… shit.
He stared at the bottles of Coke. The overhead lights glittered off the black liquid. What a strange color of liquid to consider edible. In an evolutionary sense, it seemed like any other animal would automatically consider it poisonous. The direct opposite of water.
Ramone looked at his hand and noticed it was trembling. If Blythe hadn’t intervened, the Enforcer would have killed him. In case Ramone had doubts about what had happened to his missing coworkers, Byron and Merrill, an Enforcer showing up in his own house confirmed his worst fears—they’d been killed.
His back and his legs still echoed with the things the Enforcer had done. His toe still hummed in fear that it was about to lose its toenail. The Enforcer had wanted Ramone’s plans—they’d figured out that he was going to stop the nanocameras and therefore the feeds. Did they want his plans so that they could destroy them, or so that they could set up their own bad actors with his device so that they never needed to worry about the ever-present nanocameras?
“You coming?” A voice at his side asked.
Ramone jumped. His heart skipped four beats and he barely prevented himself from lashing out.
“Blythe.” He shook his head. “Please don’t sneak up on me like that.”
She patted him on the shoulder and flashed him a sympathetic look. “Sorry. You were staring. We don’t want to stop for too long.”
“I know. Be there in a minute.”
“I’ll wait at the cashier. You didn’t bring any way to pay. Unless it was in your clothes.” She looked him up and down.
He considered. Then felt his pockets. She was right. He shook his head. “No, I’ve got nothing. Not even my phone. I’ll catch up in a minute,” he said. He had a vague memory of slamming it to the floor, shattering it, before the Enforcer showed up. “I still don’t know what I want.”
He wanted to go back ten years in time and change the course of history. Was that so much to ask? Surely the gas stations sold options like that? Maybe Ramone could convince his younger, hopeful self to never let Ethan Kirkwood have access to the nanocamera device and therefore prevent the constant streaming of every life into a reality show on steroids. Maybe Ramone’s marriage wouldn’t have fallen apart. Maybe he’d still be a married man.
He glanced at his watch. His divorce was final… in two hours. Midnight.
No more wallowing, Ramone.
He found a large bottle of water and headed to the checkout counter. A person always needed to hydrate after a torture session. Or so conventional wisdom stated.
Blythe watched him as he put the bottle down for the cashier. Her blue eyes were thoughtful. She looked as tired as he felt.
“I’m fine,” he muttered. He gave her a weak smile, but it was the best he could muster. “Really.”
“I know.” She touched him lightly on the back and paid for their items.
They finished and left the gas station. So far, no one seemed to be aware that they were fugitives from the law. That was a good sign.
“What are we going to do? If it were me alone, I’d just run.” he said, slowing in the parking lot on their way back to the Aston Martin. The strange new girl was in there, waiting for them. “But, we know there’s nowhere to go. At least…” he tapered off. He knew what he would do—he’d run to a secluded area and wait for the Enforcer to find him. And then Ramone would kill him. And then he would wait for the next Enforcer. And kill him too.
Because there was no way to defeat the system, not with the nanocameras always watching.
Blythe, pursed her lips thoughtfully. “I know.”
“And the girl?” Just as they were leaving Ramone’s house where they’d knocked out the Enforcer, a car had pulled up and a college aged chick had hopped out and joined them. She’d been directed there by someone Blythe knew, but who she couldn’t explain yet.
“We’ll have to talk about it later.” Blythe’s gaze shifted around, nervously.
“Or never.”
“We don’t know if we’re still being watched.”
“We are. We always are.” Around them the world hummed, carrying on as though a man, Ramone, hadn’t just been whipped and beaten by an agent of the very overlords who gave them their entertainment, the people who promised them safety from evils of that kind. People walked by talking loudly. Cars pulled in to parking stalls with their stereos blaring. A child shouted off in the distance and a horn honked.
