Reddened Wasteland by Kyle Perkins Page B

thing he needed.
    “The partner is more for us than she is for you. She
will report your progress to us,” Aemon said with a smile.
    “Oh, so keep tabs on me. Am I now under
investigation?”
    “None of us are above investigation, even me,” Aemon
said as he handed Alerik a keycard. “This will be your pass into any part of
the city. You have shown us great promise, so do not let me down. We expect
results,” he locked his eyes on Alerik.
    Alerik bit his tongue. “I’ll do what I can.”
    He got up from his chair and walked out of the office
before Aemon could say anything else to piss him off. He was having a hard time
controlling his temper as it was.
    ***
    On the return trip home, Alerik stared daggers at the
driver. The lousy snitch. He didn’t bother saying a single word outside of
instructing the man where to drive. When they arrived at the apartment, he
hopped out and slammed the door behind him without looking back. He had a lot
on his mind and things were not getting better. Something big was brewing and
in some ways he felt no closer to answers than when he first started.
    He sighed heavily as he opened the door to his place.
The lights were off, and the room was oddly quiet. Maybe she was taking a nap? Too
bad, he thought. He needed someone to talk to, and she had signed up to be
his person to talk to. She didn’t need any beauty sleep, anyway. 
    “Velar! Get your lazy ass up. I’ve got an update,” he
called out.
    No response.
    He frowned and moved towards the light switch,
stumbling when his foot caught something on the floor. He wanted to excuse it
as an unfamiliarity with the apartment, but deep down he knew it wasn’t that.
The hair on the back of his neck stood on end. “Velar!” he called, less teasing
and more firm this time, “This isn’t funny!”
    Finally, he reached the light switch and flipped it
on. He scanned the room with his eyes and shook his head in disbelief. It took
a moment to process what he was looking at. The apartment had been raided. All
the furniture had been overturned, several of the paintings had been torn from
the walls, and various household objects were scattered on the floor. His
adrenaline spiked and fear gripped his chest. He tried to calm himself before
he lost it. There had to be a perfectly reasonable explanation for all of this.
Velar would explain. He just needed to talk to her.
    He stormed towards the bedroom and a soft melody
registered as he neared the doorway. Glancing inside, he realized it was an old
record that was playing on a loop.
    “Velar!” he shouted this time, growing more panicked
by the minute.
    Again, no answer.
    He began racing through the house, thoroughly
searching one room at a time. The bedroom was tossed and the record player was on
the floor. The mirror in front of the bed had been shattered. The other rooms
were ransacked in a similar fashion. It did not look good.
    Alerik started to freak out and he walked back out to
the balcony to get some fresh air before the walls closed in on him. He began
pacing, millions of terrible images flashing through his mind in an instant.
Who did this? Who would take Velar and why? She never hurt anybody. She was
only guilty of being associated with him.
    He stopped pacing when he noticed Velar’s backpack.
She never left anywhere without it. Maybe she dropped it as a way to warn him.
    He furiously marched back inside and started punching
the walls and smashing things as he moved through the apartment. It wasn’t
productive, but he needed to get his anger out somehow.
    He kept asking himself how something like this could
have happened. Only The Union knew that he wasn’t home at the time, but Velar
was working with him and he was working for them. It didn’t make any sense. The
shady driver would have been the last one who saw her. Unless, of course,
Liberty’s Hammer had been watching them all along, waiting for this opportunity
to make a move. Alerik would do anything to get her back. She