Why did she have the compound built in the same state as Lexia lived? Why did she watch her on every birthday?”
“Are you really trying to say Lucy loves Lexia?”
“No, I don’t think Lucy is capable of love anymore, but maybe a very long time ago when she carried Lexia inside of her she did. Everyone has a weakness; even the most cruel and sadistic of us, and I’m telling you Lucy didn’t order for Lexia to be poisoned. Oh, she’d poison her; she’s done it before. After all, why would someone create a poison designed specifically for one person if you never intended to use it? But she’d have done it with control, she’d have done it to gain something; if Lexia dies, she gains nothing.”
“I hope you’re right.”
Derrick paused at the infirmary door and took a deep breath. So do I. So do I.
The few staff who operated the front jumped up as Derrick entered. They hurried off into the back but Derrick ignored them and headed straight for the medicine storage.
“Y-you, you can’t be in here,” squeaked a man.
“Want to stop us?” Marcus asked, laughing as the human man scurried away.
Derrick started to randomly look through the small vials and packets of tablets, but he really had no idea what to look for. It wasn’t like Lucy would just label a vial ‘Maura’s poison cure.’ Picking up several packets of antibiotics, Derrick thrust them at Marcus. “Here, give her some of this and bind and clean that wound.”
“Will this even work?”
“I’ve no idea. Lucy poisoned her before and she was treated by the shifter doctor she ran with, but it didn’t affect her the same this time. Lucy must have changed it. It works quicker. Go. Take the longest route to avoid the busier areas and I’ll see Lucy.”
“Okay, good luck.”
The first two guards he met went down easily. Being novice soldiers Derrick knocked them unconscious without much effort. He reached Lucy’s door coming face to face with two elite. They didn’t seem in the talking mood.
“Don’t even bother, Derrick. No one goes in except for medical staff and elite.”
“Are you forgetting I am elite, one of the originals in fact?”
“You may be an original, Derrick, but you’re no longer part of the elite. It’s clear where your priorities lie.”
“Very well.”
Derrick didn’t like to take the lives of his fellow hunters. While he knew some of them didn’t deserve to live, he also couldn’t forget that every one of the men and women in the compound had once just started out as a soldier wanting to fight for their country. They’d all once been human like him, but unlike him, some had lost any trace of humanity.
They were good fighters and it wasn’t as simple as knocking them unconscious. The elite were the best and brightest of the hunters. Unless of course, you followed Lexia. No matter how good a fighter or how bright your brain, to follow Lexia was to make yourself elite’s number one enemy.
But as Derrick stared at the dead bodies at his feet he realized something; he might not enjoy killing his fellow hunters, he may wish to free them all from the torment they suffered daily, but the only one who really mattered was Lexia.
He wasn’t sure when this had happened, when he’d made the choice to do anything to keep her safe. It may have been the day he first saw her – when he let her jump from the window – or maybe it was the day he watched her suffer unimaginable pain leaving Lincoln behind. There were so many days he stood by while she suffered, while she’d been tortured, while she slowly died a little each day, living without her love. Maybe it was because Lexia only ever thought of those around her, and how she sacrificed anything for those she loved. Or, how she simply gave up her freedom because to leave would mean abandoning those she’d come to call friends.
Perhaps it was simply because she made him feel. She awakened in him what he thought had died long ago. All Derrick knew was Lexia meant everything to him. He loved her but not in the way most people thought. She was his friend, but what he felt went deeper than that; she was the reason he went on, the reason he kept fighting.
He was going to save her. She was going to recover from this and he was going to make sure she came back from