The Omega

Chapter 39 - The New York Institute

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Alec stepped out into the night, pulling the OP's center door shut behind him as quietly as he had the bedroom door. The grass was wet with dew, but that was fine. He didn't mind. And despite the hour, there was more than enough light shining down from what was almost a full moon. They'd have good light for the upcoming mission.

Moving silently through the stillness he chose his spot. While he would spend a little time solo training, something that always helped him think and settled him, he wouldn't go too far from the house. He'd left a note for his husband should he wake up and find him gone, but he knew that the man he loved would come looking for him and he didn't want him to have to look far.

Thanks to the rejuvenation potion and the two days of mandatory downtime that Luke had ordered for them all he was fully recovered from both his heat and his last vision. Well, what might have been his last vision. They didn't know yet if what he'd seen during his nap two days ago was just a dream or if it was a vision. It had been as vivid as the dreams he'd had during his heat and like during his heat he'd woken up with no headache and no nosebleed. But it was too vivid, too specific, he thought to have just been a random dream.

If what he'd seen is real, and his gut is telling him that it is, two days before the Clave had formally issued Kill on Sight orders for him and his team. Charges of kidnapping and murder had been made against them. Five counts of kidnapping and two counts of murder with additional murder charges pending.

He couldn't deny that they'd thought it through, and he thought it through again as he started his warmup moves. Their statement alleged that his father had been kidnapped first, presumably as a source of information on the inner workings of the Clave. While he hadn't been a Clave official, he'd been the Head of The New York Institute and had worked closely with them for two decades. His dad had extensive knowledge that he and his team could use to their advantage.

Little did the Clave know, Robert Lightwood hadn't worked so closely with them out of loyalty. Not to them anyway. He'd made the connections he'd had early on so that he could keep a close eye on them. But because he knew so much the Clave was telling the Shadowhunter World that when they hadn't gotten what they wanted out of him, when he hadn't betrayed his people, he'd been murdered and tossed aside. Whether it was before or after they'd ultimately kidnapped another to get what his father hadn't given them, the Clave could only speculate. But the charge of murder had been made despite the lack of proof. As for the rest of the charges, they'd been issued in order.

While there'd been several people in Angel Square when Lydia had presented and had witnessed first-hand Mark Ravenwolf's actions, and that Lydia had left with her rescue party of her own volition, the Clave was still calling it an abduction. Their spin was that they'd ambushed a seriously injured young woman, a woman who'd been disoriented and confused from a severe head injury. Because of that injury, she'd been undergoing extensive and intensive treatment in the Idris Institute's infirmary, the infirmary they'd lured her out of. They'd lured her out of the safety of the infirmary and into the open. Then once she'd been further compromised by the trauma of her omega presentation, they'd taken her.

While the Clave couldn't prove that Lydia had been murdered either, it was being presumed that she had been, and they'd been charged with it. The only truth in any of the Clave's claim's regarding Lydia is that they had in fact lured her from the infirmary and into Angel Square. He supposed that they had Jake Brookwater to thank for that, but they didn't mind. Jake had seen the note they'd sent to Lydia claiming to be an admirer and had simply reported the truth of what he'd seen.

How Jake could be related to Mayrse, he didn't understand. But they weren't going to hold it against him. His measure would be taken by his actions which thus far had always been honorable. He's a skilled and experienced Retrieval Team Medic and had according to Luke already begun the application process for the extended medical education program before he himself had left New York. Jake wanted to be a doctor. And from what Luke had seen in him over the past few years as a medic, he thought he'd make a good one.