Page 39 of Seer Prophet

Mostly because Jon was briefly shocked wordless.

He couldn’t believe Maygar just called Revik “Dad.”

Not once but twice. The only other time he’d ever heard Maygar use that word, they’d all thought they were about to die.

When his shock faded, Jon exhaled in irritation.

He glanced around at the humans gazing stupidly at nothing, then at the small ring of seers who stood to either side of him and Maygar. He caught Jorag’s eye somewhere in that, and saw the questioning look in the tall, blue-eyed seer’s face. Reading the specific request from his light, Jon gestured an affirmative, scowling.

Immediately, Jorag and four other seers stepped forward.

Within seconds, they were leading the humans towards the exit nearest to the outside pier. Jon noted they’d already assigned one seer to every human, as per protocol, to ensure they made it safely to the dock and the waiting boats.

Jon gritted his teeth as he watched them go.

He knew Maygar was right, but he didn’t have to like it.

“We could treat them likepeople,”he muttered. “Not like assets. Not all the time.”

“Oh, grow up!” Maygar snapped. “This is a military operation!Gaosyou are a youngster.”

Jon stared at him. “I’m like… ayearyounger than you, dickhead. In seer age, that’s like, I don’t know… a week!”

Yumi nudged Maygar, giving him a wry smile.

“He’s got you there, baby Syrimne.”

Maygar scowled at Yumi, then deliberately blew past her actual words. Looking at Jon, he rested his hands on his hips, clicking under his breath.

“How many more are here from thisdugra a’kitreList of yours?” he grumbled. When Jon didn’t answer right away, Maygar gave his shoulder a light shove, motioning the same question with one hand. “Brother? What are we doing here? Are we finished? Or do we go upstairs now?”

“Oh, I’mbrothernow?” Jon grumbled. “Not worm-boy?”

“Just answer the question, dick-brain!”

The truth was, Jon was already trying to answer Maygar’s question.

He looked out over the casino, which was mostly empty from the breach alarms. Blackjack tables stood silent, cards spread messily over the green felt. Slot machines sat in rows, dead-looking without anyone standing in front of them to trigger the holograms, or the sounds when buttons got pressed or virtual levers pulled.

Only a wall-height 3D monitor continued to emit sound in periodic bursts, mostly showing off various tourist attractions in the resort and surrounding city.

Jon wondered where all of them had gone.

He could feel the answer in strange pulses through the mobile construct.

Allie knocking out the mafia’s main construct made it harder to feel what was going on in the rest of the building. From what little he could tell, a lot of humans had retreated to private rooms inside the resort.

Some hopped boats for Hong Kong.

Shadow would feel Revik here before any of those boats reached their destination. Whenever Revik left the tank, they always had a countdown running in the background, waiting for Shadow to find him.

That countdown seemed to limit his outings to roughly two hours.

Well, almost three, if he was really pushing it, but the Adhipan and Wreg’s security forces capped his outings at a hard, two-hour limit, just to be safe.

Which didn’t help Jon at all, in terms of knowing the location of any List humans who might still be somewhere in Macau.

After feeling for Wreg briefly with his light, he gave up, touching his fingers to the comm. He hit through to the correct frequency in rote, then turned his back on Maygar and the others, walking a few feet away from where they stood.

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