Endless War (Complete)

Chapter 13 "Family"

We continue in silence driving towards more mountainous reasons and finally some tree cover. If we stay on the road much longer we will run out of fuel and even worse water. I look over at Grim and he just keeps his eyes on the road not even acknowledging my movement. In the back of the jeep, James is hunched over sound asleep, I am glad one of us is getting rest. I don't trust the man next to me enough to dose off, I am almost sure he would try to kill me. I am too curious about his family to chance having to kill him, so I force myself to stay awake.

The jeep slowly comes to a stop I look and see we still have a bit of fuel so we must be close to his family. I look up to the sky and shake my head. "Pull further into the woods or you are going to get us caught. You should pull far enough in so that we can't be seen from the road either."

He rolls his eyes and obeys my suggestion. "It may look like I am listening to you, but I was going to do that anyway. I may not have the whole of the system coursing through my brain but I am not stupid."

The jeep comes to a stop again and he jumps out of the drivers seat. He grabs my bag with my weapon strapped to it from the back seat and shoves James. James jumps, and looks around confused. "So did he abandon us?" He looks in my direction.

"No, I am behind you." Grim smiles as he gets another jump from James. "We have a decent walk ahead of us so keep up. Otherwise you will get stuck out here at night and that would not be, good for your health. I am sure you would be a nice appetizer for a bear."

Grim starts walking and I fall in step behind him. James scrambles to get out of the jeep and runs toward us not stopping himself before he runs into my back. I turn and grab his waist before he has a chance to fall on the forrest floor. "Best not to fall, you don't want to bleed, when you are being hunted." I sense a panther off to our right. "Keep up."

Grim looks over his shoulder and gives me a strange look.

"Panther, ten yards out. It will loose interest as long as James here manages not to injure himself." I reply to his sneer.

We continue through the trees and as predicted the panther quickly looses interest. As the rocks get bigger and the climbing becomes more difficult, I notice the strain on James so I make it a point to be more helpful. "They shouldn't send you guys out without any survival training. What are you supposed to do if your guards get killed?"

"I wasn't supposed to be there. Those guys came for me, I mean do you really think they would let the lead scientist on their precious HOST Project leave. I stole the jeep. I just had to get out of there. I actually stopped to fuel up at the station and to my amazement the pumps still worked. The guards parachuted in on the jeeps location. I was wondering how they found me so quick." He confesses.

I look at him again and realize how young his face looks. "Grim, stop." I walk to James and realize that he is not short because he is just a small person but he is no older than fifteen. "You are just a kid. I didn't even pay attention to your age in the file. Holy shit, I didn't look at your parents either. Grim, we have the President's kid here. So much for keeping a low profile. How long will it be before they can track you?"

"What?" Grim finally stops like I asked him to. "Wow, so you are Jackson Cross' kid." Grim refers to the president as if he actually knows the man. He wraps his arm around the boy and pulls him along. "Why don't you stay closer to me and away from the killing machine."

I close my eyes and sigh. That is all that I am to him, a machine. I feel tears tugging at the corner of my eyes as my chest feels like a hundred pound weight had been put there. I take a deep breath and pull the sadness away from the surface.

James pushes away from Grim, "First, they can't track me anymore I disabled the tracker after the guards parachuted in at the gas station. Grim you should know, I am better off with her. She may have killed some people because a chip in her head made her do it, but you are the killer. You said it yourself, you were going to kill her for no good reason. You were going to kill me when she rebooted but she saved me, and kicked your ass in the process. So don't mind me, I would rather be alone in the woods with her any day, than to be alone with you." He takes my hand, and the weight lifts from my chest. "Oh, and I am thirteen. I didn't thank you back there, but thanks for saving me, Phoenix."

Phoenix, thats right I am not Tessa the girl raised by a chip in her head. I am Phoenix Aurora, the girl who's mother risked everything to save her. I feel a little stronger now as we continue to proceed further back into the darkness of the thickened tree canopy.

"Here we are." Grim stops at the edge of a pool of water with a small waterfall flowing down into it.

I walk to the edge of the water and dip my hands into the refreshing water lifting a handful of water to my lips. "We are stopping here for the night." I look up at Grim.

"No we swim." He says as he jumps into the pool of water. "You won't short out if you get wet will you."

I glare at him and jump into the chilly water. I turn and look up at James and motion for him to jump into the water. He sits at the waters edge shaking his head. "I can't swim."

I smile, "Don't worry, I didn't know I could swim before today. Come on, I'll help you." I reassure him.

He slowly lowers himself into the water and into my arms. He looks at Grim and he gives the kid an encouraging smile, not that the kid would know, I am sure it looks more like an angry grimace to him. Then Grim turns toward the water fall. "It is about a meter down then you will see the opening to the cavern. It is a short swim into the interior pool." He submerges into the water and I watch as he descends into the clear water and out of view.

James' eyes get big as he looks down. "I can't do that."

"Yes you can. First we will breath ok." I lead him in breathing exercises breathing in as much as possible then emptying our lungs. We do it several times until he is comfortable with trying to go under and hold his breath. We practice it several times then I take his hands, we both take a deep breath then go under the water. I keep him at my side as we make our way under the falls and see the entrance to the cavern. We swim into the cavern and surface in the the pool.

Suddenly I hear the metallic clink of weapons being aimed at the both of us. A woman voice instructs me to let the boy go and place my hands on my head before slowly ascending from the pool. I obey.