Born of Silence (Immortal Guardians) (2 page)

Garrick continued his hazy search, taking in every inch of the space. He reached an invisible wall and, placing his hand against the surface, realized it was a large window. Glass, he could break. When he had enough strength, anyway.

Although he was too weak to stand, he forced himself to crawl the length of the glass pane, feeling as he went. It was one solid wall until it reached the rock on the other side of the room. A few feet over from where he was now, was the door. A few more feet over from the door was a broken toilet with a single roll of toilet paper sitting on the lid. That was where the water sound was coming from as it slowly leaked to the floor. Giving the lever a push, he was surprised that it actually flushed. He crawled away and sat on the twin bed. Half of its springs were sticking out haphazardly, and he gingerly avoided anything that could poke him. He took in his surroundings once more. Solid rock walls made up three sides of his cell,
while
glass made up the rest.

Where the hell was he?

Though he figured he was too weak, he still tried to will himself away from
t
here, planning to trace to the beach paradise he often disappeared to whenever he saw fit. He tried harder when that resulted in nothing. Again, nothing happened other than succeeding in draining himself even mo
re. He closed his eyes tightly,
picturing his condo in
Chicago
. Opening his eyes, he hoped to see the dark wood and red hues that decorated his place, but instead
he got
a whole lot of black rock.

Why couldn’t he trace? With as hard as he’d tried,
something
should have happened.

His anxiousness kicked up a notch. “Hello,” he yelled. “Can anyone hear me?”

The window hissed open as an ugly, burly bastard looked through the opening. “Shut up or we’ll put you back under.”

All Garrick could see of the guy was that he was tall and had a hum
o
ngously wide face for the window that nearly blocked all of the light from filtering through. “Where am I?” he asked quickly.

“You don’t get to
ask questions, boy,”
Burly growled.

Garrick persisted. “Who can I talk to? Why am I here?”

“Last chance, asshole. One more word out of you and you’ll be taking another nap.” The guard turned his head then as someone spoke from behind him. “Do you want m
e to detain him, sir?”
He
nodded then, unlocked the bolts
and pushed the door open.

Garrick tried to stand up as the guy walked toward him, but he was still too weak. As he’d feared, Burly was even bigger than expected. He came toward him, appearing every bit as scary as the monsters children feared resided under their beds. He looked human, only slightly
…
tweaked in some way. Hulked-out, if he had to put a name to it. Gods damn, he was big. He barely fit through the doorway, having to twist slightly as he walked through. He had dark hair that was buzzed closed to his skull and his huge, caveman-like eyebrows were crazy-glued into a scowl over his dark, onyx eyes. He grabbed Garrick’s arms and wrenched him into a standing position just as another man entered the cave.

“Guardian,” the new arrival said in a smooth, silky voice.

Garrick’s head whipped up. The man standing before him now was short and stocky. Not short for a human, of course, but short for a demon, which
he undoubtedly
was. He vaguely remembered seeing the male at Pandora’s when he, Ash, and Nitro had gone out drinking one night. The man wore a black suit that was tailored to fit his round figure, and the bastard wore rings like they were going out of style. Despite his short frame, he stood tall and proud, as if he owned the world. “Who are you?” Garrick asked, trying—and failing—to struggle against Burly’s hold.

“My name is Ekhart. And this man is Boris,” he said, gesturing to Burly.

Garrick looked over his shoulder at the big son of a bitch that held him.
Fitting
, he thought. Turning to face Ekhart again, he asked, “What am I doing here?”

“Quite the curious one, aren’t you? You’ll
learn
rather
quickly that you will
only get information if I feel like it, and in this case I do not. I just wanted to stop by and meet our newest arrival.” He stepped toward Garrick then,
placing their noses only a foot a
part
. “You are powerful, are you not?”

He said nothing, just stared at the demon, trying to get a read on his origin. The same way that Ekhart was evaluating him. Instead of replying, Garrick asked, “What do you want with me?”

Ekhart gave him what he could only assume was a pleased expression. “That, my boy, I haven’t decided yet. I shall have to convene with my partners in your case, but we’ll be sure to keep you informed in some capacity.” With a final glance, Ekhart strode from the room. His bouncer released his hold on Garrick with a quick downward shove and followed tight on Ekhart’s heels.

Afterward, Garrick spent hours
either sleeping or
sitting on the bed in his cell, pissed that he hadn’t been able to break free of Burly’s grip, hadn’t been able to trace from
t
here, and still had
n’t the foggiest
where he was.

He had no sense of time,
and
could only assume he’d been
t
here for hours
…
and that didn’t include however much time he’d been unconscious.

He wasn’t as weak as he had been before, but
he
stil
l wasn’t even close to being up-
to
-
par. Focusing with all his might, he tried to imagine a place,
any
other place. But still, each time he opened his eyes, he found that he was still in the dark, damp cell.

He turned his focus on the large windowpane that made up one of his walls. When mentally breaking the glass didn’t work, he stood up, crossed his cell and walloped it with every ounce of strength in him. Over and over he pounded the glass, and over and over nothing happened. Or at least, not what he’d expected. Burly and another oversized man hauled ass into the room, grabbing
him
by the arms. He fought, much better than he had before, and slipped out of Burly’s hold.

“Fuck, this one’s stronger. Give him extra.” He grabbed Garrick once more and pulled his head to one side.

He felt the prick of a needle as it slid into his neck, and then felt the burn of something liquid as it pumped into his body. He fell limp and collapsed to the ground.

Danielle sat on the ground with her knees against her chest and her legs crossed at the ankles. The guards had dumped her in here a while ago, and she’d gone about her business trying to fight the lethargy she always felt whenever they took her.

If she wasn’t mistaken, she thought she recalled the feeling of being moved in a vehicle, the gentle swaying motion and humming that she remembered from her life before she’d been taken. Though the thoughts
that accompanied
that
were far from
welcome. Visions of fighting filled her mind. Claws and weapons, fires and the retched sounds of screams
made her wince
. She opened her eyes, trying to force the visions from her mind. She stood, pacing the room as she stretched her arms and legs, hoping that the ache that was a near-constant presence in her body would ease.

At first, she hadn’t even noticed the man, lying on the rocky ground, unmoving as he slept. It seemed like forever since anyone had been in the adjoining cell. Now that there was someone, she wasn’t entirely sure how she felt about it.

When he had woken, she’d watched him for hours, remaining hidden behind her bed as he investigated his surroundings. Though he was sluggish, likely fighting the same listlessness she felt
.
E
ventually
,
he fell
back to
sleep. She could understand the sleeping part. The scientists had pumped her full of strange things more times than she could count. Some made her heart race,
while
others knocked her out.

Either way, they caused horrible dreams.

The man
was sleeping now, as far as she could tell. He lay still, unmoving other than the rise and fall of his chest. As long as he was in this state, she felt it was okay to watch him openly, not fearing how he may react when he woke and saw her.

She’d made it a habit to make up things about her cellmates whenever she had some. This one was tall and slender, with nice bulges where his muscles were. He wasn’t overly big in the muscle department, but what she would co
nsider as finely toned.
With l
ight brown hair and
cleanly shaven,
he
wore
a nice suit as though he’d been at some gallant event when he’d been taken. She couldn’t see the color of his eyes, not from that distance, and especially not now that he was asleep.

He woke sometime later, his anger visible as he searched frantically for a means of escape. His fury drew the attention of the guards, and they entered his room, planning to subdue him. The prisoner seemed to pack more of a punch than what Danielle would have thought before, and had even surprised the guards.
Though soundproof glass separated them, she could see their surprised expressions, and could hear sounds reach her
through the window in the metal door.

She wondered idly if
the man would
turn into a monster like many of the others had, or if he’d die like her sister had. In the time since Karena’s death, she had nothing to do between experiments other than grieve for her sister and parents. At times, she felt that maybe she’d be alright. Other times, she just wanted to curl up into a ball and die.

Dying wouldn’t be so bad, would it? She thought not. Not when the other option was staying here, getting poked and prodded at, knocked out constantly, and waking up with bruises and scrapes, and even a serious wound or two. No, death would definitely be preferable to the life she had here.

Looking at the other prisoner again, a shudder ran through her as she remembered how scared she
had been
when he’d gotten pissed off earlier. She’d been watching him as he drew into an almost meditative state.
Had
grown relaxed watching him and had even waved at him tentatively in case he was looking at her. He
’d
stood up suddenly, running headlong toward her, stopping inches from the glass that separated them.
And then he
’d
pounded at the window
, punching it repeatedly.

She still didn’t know if he’d seen her. His doing that had frightened her, and she’d scrambled backward against her wall as far as she could get, fearing that he’d crash through the window and beat her senseless.

She’d been beaten too much as it was. She didn’t want any
more.

Even through the
soundproof
glass there was
a light booming sound under the onslaught of his fists. That little bit of sound that came through to her side of the cave had scared her.

The terror that she’d felt ebbed when the Institute’s minions attacked him and pumped him full of something. At least he’d
tried
to fight them before being knocked unconscious. That bravery meant one of two things: either he was as batshit crazy as she’d thought when he attacked the window, or he had the balls to fight them and could maybe—
maybe
—find a way out.

She hoped for the latter and decided to go with that route when making up his story.

He was finely dressed, obviously strong and knew how to fight
.
H
e was probably in his mid-twenties and he was
hot
.
Not just a little hot either, like
really
hot. It had been a long time since she’d been able to appreciate what a guy looked like, what with the poor options she’d had since she arrived at the Institute—not that dating was an option or a priority. She likely couldn’t even talk to him. In fact there was only one person she dared talk to at all, and she didn’t even enjoy it.

Danielle rubbed at her legs, warming them as she came up with a good story for
the new prisoner
.
Hmm
, she thought.
He’s probably rich. His father runs a large company and he is the Vice President, and is planning to take over the company when his father retires. He knows how to fight because he…
S
he stopped, tapping her finger against her chin.
Because he’s a modern-day superhero, rescuing
women’s
purses from thieves and beating muggers senseless. He’s actually here because he purposely got kidnapped so that he can stop Ekhart’s operation and help break me free.
She grinned, pleased with the story so far.
Yeah,
Mom and Dad hired him to save me, and he somehow found out where I’ve been and has
some kickass plan of escape.