ECHO [Rewritten - NaNoWriMo '16]

Chapter 6: J Not Jay

With Jay between us, we hauled him into the backseat. The rat squeaked and jumped into the car, curling onto the man's chest. It curled its lips back to expose its ugly teeth and hissed. Echo simply slammed the door in response. She got back into the driver's seat and I hesitantly followed in the passenger's. She glanced sideways at me before shifting the car into drive, and promptly stomped on the gas pedal.

She hit sixty in less than four seconds, sliding through the desert without any issue. In the fifteen minutes that it had taken us to get to the location, she returned to the highway in less than five. She turned sharply onto the road, cutting off a car, switching into another lane. Speeding up again, switching into another lane, and passing between cars before finally slowing down to a decent speed.

I was gripping the door of the car with sweaty palms and looked at her, "What the hell?"

"Your car may be common and ordinary, but if we had stayed any longer they would have gotten the license plate number, along with the make and model, and given it to the police. I drove just fast enough to get out of the way but not so fast that people would report me." Echo shrugged.

"I would have," I muttered. Louder I said, "What are we doing with that kid? Who is he to you?"

"He's a Seducer," Echo said bluntly.

"And what is that?"

"It's a type of agent," Echo gripped the steering wheel so hard her knuckles turned white. "The organization that he is a part of is called ALDAR and in that organization there are levels of agents. He is a Seducer, which means that he pretends to be the likeable guy with a promising future. He becomes a trusted citizen and infiltrates either a government building through profession or slowly takes control of a powerful business. His goal is to live a life of an American...or the citizen of whatever country he is set up in...and seem normal. And when given the order, he will take everyone he knows him down into hell."

"Were you part of this ALDAR?"

"I was."

"What were you?" I asked, almost not wanting to know.

"I was an Interrogator." She cast him a hostile look out of the corner of her eyes that informed him that she would not explain what that was. "There's also the Shadows which are what they sound like. Ghosts who were never there."

"Why did you take him?" I asked.

"He has information. Information about ALDAR and Pria."

"How will you get him to talk?" I asked, "I assume that you assassins have been trained to never tell your secrets."

"Oh, he'll tell me." She grinned broadly. I shivered.

We got back my house late into the night – work was going to be hell in the morning – and dragged Jay to the basement. Echo threw him on the floor, causing the rat to hiss but Paiute simply snapped his teeth at the creature. Echo grabbed a chair and had me help put Jay there. She grabbed chains and tied them around his wrists, chest, and ankles. She then fastened a metal harness around the rat and attached a chain to it that was bound to the leg of the chair.

I stood back as Echo grabbed incense and began to burn it. The smell was soothing, relaxing, but had an odd tint to it. Paiute jumped onto my shoulder and smacked my cheek with a thrashing tail. I glared at him. I swear that cat smiled at me. There was a sudden, violent snarl. I looked over and recoiled. Jay had woken up but his eyes were no longer blue and he was snapping his teeth, growling and spitting. His eyes were red, and his teeth...they had looked strange because he had fangs. He roared in fury and threw his weight against the chains.