Page 104 of Secret Gifts
She shakes her head and then motions for me to join her in the lab. I almost stick my tongue out at the hulk, but I refrain and head on in while letting the massive steel door shut and seal behind me.
“What’s with all the secrecy and security?” I mumble while following her through the quiet hallway.
Her prissy little walk suits her short, petite frame. Her skin is paler than most hybrids, but her eyes are almost bluer. She reminds me so much of Aunt Symphony.
“Your blood is the reason for the security measure. I’m working on the samples you gave me, and I have been for the past week. I’m not getting anywhere though. My dad never explained how the gifts could be found in the strands of blood. Are you sure that’s what your masked knight told you?”
“Positive. Uncle Grayson and the others have talked about Uncle Clay and Mom unlocking her gifts in here before. The guy in the mask said the ability to block wasn’t in my mother’s blood. He told me he had been friends with your father, and he said Uncle Clay showed him Mom’s blood. He told me it was I who blocked mine and Rex’s gifts. We need our gifts, especially right now.”
She sighs out while nodding her head, and she pulls down her odd spectacles while picking up a drop of blood pressed between two small, thin sheets of glass. I prop up on the sterile steel table in front of her while gauging the dreadfully boring and clinical room around us.
“I can’t understand how you hang out in here for so long at a time. It seems so depressing,” I murmur while my eyes fall on the several posters showing our bodies in dissected, scientific layouts.
“I grew up in the lab. It was mine and Dad’s thing,” she says with a casual shrug.
I huff while flopping my head down, and I feel her hand taking mine, prompting me to look back up.
“It’ll be okay. We’ll figure this out. Aunt Araya is really fucking happy about you being stuck here, by the way,” she murmurs, her tone becoming more playful toward the end.
“Yeah,” I growl. “I swear I think she called in a favor to the commander. He doesn’t know who the hell I am, so why else would he do this to me?”
“I think you could be right. Aunt Araya has always been very, very overprotective.”
“Do you know who he is?” I muse, my eyes gauging hers for a lie.
“I’m not high up enough on the chain to be privy to such information. Only a handful of generals, captains, admirals and a few others know his true identity. I get why he’s doing it though.”
“Really?” I ask in complete astonishment.
She shrugs, and then looks back down to the blood between the glass while shifting to make notes of her findings.
“He’s trying to make a difference, and he's working the lines. This war started the second Uncle Hale... well, when he was gone. They didn’t think anyone else could stop them, and the Unaligned want to rule all the lands. They didn’t like offering the humans the same rights as the rest of us. They wanted them farmed out and turned into packaged blood. They have a tyrant for a leader, and if he ever takes over the United, hybrids will become workhorses… especially gifted hybrids.”
“I don’t understand why any hybrid would serve the Unaligned in this war,” I exasperate.
“They grew up differently than we did. Most don’t know any better, and their values and loyalties side with the only home they’ve ever known. They fight for the Unaligned because they think that’s what they’re supposed to do. Call it Stockholm's syndrome if you want.”
I just sigh. I don’t understand it, but I had an incredible family inside the United. Mom once fought to keep everyone safe despite the fact they abused her, treated her like a pariah, and hated her - hated all hybrids. I suppose Simone is right in saying they don't know any better.
“So... the mystery knight told me something else,” I murmur awkwardly.
“Hmm?” she asks distractedly, her attention clearly focused on my blood and not my words.
“He told me my gifts won’t ever work as long as my hybrid is forced to lie dormant. Do you think he’s right?”
That grabs her attention. She looks up, her eyes seeming huge, considering the magnifying specks. She lowers her glasses, and then she pushes them aside while swirling my blood free from a vial and into the air, using her gift as the catalyst.
“It’s very likely he’s right,” she murmurs softly while separating the strands of weightless blood.
It’s almost beautiful to see the swirls of red splitting, bubbling, and then pulling tightly back into a thread.
“Well, what do I do? When I share blood with Jase, I feel so strong, but it wears off the second the blood high leaves me. I can’t exactly walk around drinking his undiluted blood. It wouldn’t do me any good to spend all day in the bedroom.”
She snickers lightly while shaking her head, finally distracted enough from her task to offer me more than an obligatory glance.
“Blood fucks are just part of a hybrid’s needs. I have an idea. How about you and I go to the Catagar tonight?”
“The Catagar?” I gasp, keeping my voice in a whisper for fear of someone overhearing. My whole body flushes at the mere mention of that word. “You mean the hybrid sex club? You go there?”
