Daughter of Zeus ✔

7.3

Shylar was following orders. The object of his mission was a red dot among the blue intersecting lines. Inevitably, he was getting closer.

He was told to watch, not engage. So far, he had not even reached the "watching" stage as his prey kept moving from place to place. If the old man, Kressick, hadn't linked his wristlet to the one on the woman, Ada, he was following, Shylar would have really been in a pickle.

For two hours he had been following the red beep. It finally stopped in one place for more than ten minutes.

"The user you are trying to locate is now at Zugart's Hair and Clothing Boutique."

The virtual map had been helpful in listing each of Ada's numerous stops. Most of her destinations ended with a derivative of the word "shop" or "boutique". She must have come to Atlanta to shop. He merely wished she would spree a little less sporadically.

The woman he encountered in the motel had seemed very self-involved, and he had only known her for a few minutes. A shopping spree made sense. Beautiful eyes didn't mean a thing; he would remember she was stuck up. Stuck up and part of his mission. He mustn't forget that.

Around the corner, he spied the boutique, a small store wedged in between a sandwich shop, and an interface-upgrade emporium. Shylar skulked back to the alley. He could see the entrance from where he was. All he had to do was wait for Ada to come out.

In five minutes, she emerged from the boutique clutching several packages. He was positive of her identity thanks to the tracking program, but he would have sworn she was a stranger. Ada was wearing sunglasses, new clothes, and her hair was blown out and glossed. She had been pretty before, but now she was at a new level of beautiful, an alien-like status models inhabited.

Yes, he was impressed, but all the fake trappings she wore screamed I am a woman. Look at me! also turned him off. When he first met her wearing a T-shirt and jeans, it had been enough to attract him. The new feminine polish she had on was a separator, a rebuff that taunted a person to see and not to touch. She was now a mannequin.

Focus, a voice in his head reminded him. He closed his mouth and straightened his stance. He had a job to do. For once in his life, he meant to finish something.

She was loading her purchases into the trunk. He jogged back to his car parked one street over, then told the car to turn on and waited.

When the red blip moved on his skin, he directed the car to follow.

He stayed two vehicle lengths behind the woman. With the tech, he didn't have to follow too closely. They passed a rich neighborhood in the northern downtown district. Some of the lawns were bare, but one lawn had LCD lawn signs that blinked with their message:

"VOTE FOR BRONTES MORETZ."

Unexpectedly, his car slowed and stopped. "Emergency stop commenced."

Ahead, the other cars were also stopped. Ada was blocking the street with her blue station wagon, inspecting the signs on the lawn.

Each sign was flashing the words,

"VOTE FOR BRONTES MORETZ" in red, set against a blue background. Next to the words, a picture of the smiling man flashed and was gone, to be replaced with the slogan,

"VOTE MORETZ FOR SENATOR".

She stared at the sign as if it were written in another language. Horns honked. People cursed at her. Frustrated with the wait, the other cars drove around her.

Shylar was forced to follow the line of traffic and go around the blue station wagon, lest he look suspicious. As he passed, he watched her. She seemed to be thinking, or deciding. What her decision turned out to be, it didn't matter to him. He knew what she thought her mission was, and why. If he wanted to find her later, he knew how.

~*~