The Fifth Agent

Chapter Seventeen

Jake found and caught up to me pretty quickly.

I mean, it's hard to miss a furious, winged agent on the warpath. I had my wings tucked tightly in as I stomped through the desks, heading for the front door since I had already grabbed my things from the room I was placed in. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Mia, who was slowly reaching for her gun. I quickly turned my attention to her, and reached for my own. 

I continued walking, but kept my gaze on her. A hand grasped my elbow, and I swiveled around, aiming my gun at the chest of the person. Who, of course, turned out to be Jake.

His eyes widened, while mine narrowed. "I'm leaving, Jake. I'm afraid I've over-stayed my visit, and I have things to do now." 

Jake warily watched the gun, slowly putting his hand down. "Ben, we read the note." Of course they did. "There's nothing we can do."

"Excuse me?" I slowly walked backwards, trying to avoid the desks while keeping an eye on Jake and the rest of the agents, who now had their guns pointed at me. "Maybe there's nothing you're willing to do, but I am." 

I looked back for a millisecond, but that was all it took. Jake lunged forward, grabbing for the gun, and I was pushed to the ground, drawing the gun away and wrapping my legs around Jake's torso and arms, preventing him from moving. Then, I slung an arm under his neck, holding his head at a fixed position. 

The other agents scrambled forward, but I quickly clicked safety off and held the gun to Jake's head. The agents froze as if the whole world would explode if they shifted one muscle. I saw Mia suck in a breath, watching me with terrified eyes. 

I fixed my hard eyes on hers, trying to calm the pounding of my heart in my chest. I had a gun to the one person who I had told myself I would never hurt. With safety off. 

I took a deep breath. "I am going to walk out those doors, and you are not going to stop me or follow me. Understood?" Jake grunted, and I gritted my teeth. "Understood?"

"Yes." Jake spit out, fuming. I slowly released my grip on him, standing up. I kept my aim trained on him as I walked over to the door. Jake had risen, and was now staring at me as if he had no idea who I was. And the sad thing was, me neither. But I couldn't think about that right now. 

Once I had reached the doors, I quickly opened one and slipped out, jamming the gun into the holster once I had clicked safety back on. Unfurling my wings, I let the light metal feathers catch the wind before springing off the ground and into the air. 

I knew where I had to go.

---

When everything that happened three years ago, well, happened, I had immediately contacted my mom to tell her about Max being dead. By then my dad had been kicked out, so I didn't worry about him as much, but I held a great deal of concern for my mother. 

Knowing that something like this, the scientists coming for her, might happen, I relocated her to a small town in Missouri. I told her to lay low, and that I would be back. That was three years ago, and I haven't seen her since. It would be too dangerous, as the scientists could probably find me, and then I would just have led them straight to her. And if that happened, I would never forgive myself. 

I guess Max never found out where my mom was, because if he had, we would have known that each other had been alive a long time ago. 

Since the sun was dipping towards the horizon, I didn't need to fly as high to avoid detection, but I did it anyway, just to be careful. And, as the flight from where I was to Missouri was a couple of hours, I had time to try to figure out just exactly what the hell had happened with my life in a short space of a couple of days.