Path of the Hybrids: 444, #2

By Relvin Gonzalez

Thirty children will become Archangel Lucifer's assassins. They were all created to obey blindly—all but one.

 

In an enclosed multilevel complex, they train to fulfill a simple task.

 

Get in. Kill. Get out.

 

From a tower overlooking the school, Lucifer's scientists guide the children to maturity. With the push of a button, bracelets control every minute of every hour. All their activities are a stepping stone to their first kill.

 

But a birthmark on A30's forearm reveals she might be the very thing they trained her to kill…a human. She must now make her way up to the Archive and uncover the truth about her past before someone finds her and takes her away.

 

And those that are taken away never come back the same.

 

The second book in the 444 Series, Path of The Hybrids, is a mythological story that continues the saga from Hefnd.

 

If you like mythology and Science Fantasy, you will love Path of the Hybrids. Join A30 on her quest for the truth.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Relvin Gonzalez
• Release date: Oct 17, 2023
• ISBN: 9781964803036

Book preview

PART 1

CHAPTER 1

Across a lake, tall walls and barbed wire appeared in the gaps of the swaying trees. A flock of bluebirds fit from branch to branch, and sang not only for the perfect, earless nature but also for a row of twenty-nine children standing in front of them. A1, A2, A3… to A29, the children waited in front of the birds. Still, like cold statues, they waited for their signal. They lacked patience, not because they were eager, but because it was unnecessary, for the Archangel Lucifer had engineered it off their DNA a long time ago. The drill was not a new one, and the rifles in their right hands felt as comfortable as a pleasant memory. They killed things; that was their purpose.

The last one in the row of children, A29, used his right hand to hold the rifle and his left hand to keep the right one from trembling. Behind them, a black tower that rose like a spire overlooked everything in the Watcher Development Center and the Fields.

Where is she? A voice said to Lucifer behind the glass walls of the tower.

She will be here, Faith. Lucifer stood like a warrior. When he turned around, his skin sparkled like burnished bronze, and his steps fell hard on the floor. Commanding. Yet his face and body had a soft, human likeness. His voice was calm. The calm that would make a non-deity shiver.

It has been three times this week already. I wonder if we made a mistake, leaving her here for so long.

Lucifer returned to the glass with his hands clasped behind his back.

A30 welcomed the annoying buzz of her alarm clock, which had been buzzing for an hour now, as her own minor rebellion. Harmless with a potential for danger, she thrived in the messy side of the room she shared with A29. An hour late. A record, surely. She opened her eyes and slammed her hand on the alarm clock.

The room had exactly two beds with exactly two nightstands on either side, and a big wooden dresser filled the space in the center. The walls were bare. In a school for assassins, mirrors were redundant, a waste, a distraction. A30 pulled on a loose strand of her hair only to see its blackness, and from that blackness, imagined, inch by inch, the features of her face. She had caught a distorted glimpse once over the Blue Field’s waters, but the liquid had since lost its reflectiveness.

A30 reached for the dresser’s bottom drawers, swirling garments around until she found her uniform. She zipped her black suit over her body. The label A30 stretched over her chest. An assortment of knives, handguns, and rifles hung on the side of the closet wall. She pulled the rifle and swung it over her head and enjoyed the kick of the rifle’s muzzle on her back.

Out of the room, she made a quick descent down the stairs to the main entrance. Children the same age as her, organized in groups of 30, filled the main black hallway, a light sage-colored stretch with a dozen rooms on either side. A30 had no interest in the other children’s faces. She wiggled her way through, nudging them to the side. The exit door waited at the end.

How pathetic, she said before stepping out.

A30 walked toward the arced entrance of the Green Fields. She stopped at the base of the tower and stuck her face over its wall. She put her hands around her eyes, trying to block the light from reflecting over the surface.

I know you’re in there, she said, her voice muffled inside the tower.

Oh, we should take her with us already, Faith said from the other side.

Patience, Faith. We still do not know what this means for her, for us. We must observe her progress.

After a few seconds of silence, A30 unglued her face from the wall and walked over the grass of the Green Fields.

Even though they could hear her approaching, the other 29 children remained still. She stood next to the last child, A29, and, without hesitating, took the first shot.

Always late, yet always early. Now that's balance. Your turn, roommate, she said as soon as she saw the dead bluebird fall to the ground. Come on, 29.

The tremors returned when A29 moved his grip to his rifle. His throat felt like he had swallowed a gallon of powder. He raised his rifle to the sky. With the flapping of the birds’ wings now in the rifle’s sight, he hesitated.

A30 scoffed and snatched the gun from him.

No!

She pushed him aside and shot another bird, almost without taking aim, and threw the gun back into his arms. This is hunting, not bird watching. She faced the rest of the group. Anyone else needs help? Her voice mobilized the others.

Within seconds, all guns pointed up and fired. Like a cloud feeding on vapor, the guns gave fuel to the downpour of birds. It had only been two weeks since the children gazed in awe at the birds hatching from their eggs.

A loud beep announced it was time to lower their guns. The children turned and assembled in the ascending order of their uniforms and started toward the school. Walking in a queue over the brick road, another group approached. They came marching in the opposite direction, undeterred by group A’s presence. The labels on their uniforms went from B1 to B30.

Group A pattered up a flight of stairs into the Game Room, where an array of tables stood arranged in a five-row, two-column grid. Over each table lay a set of chess pieces to one side and a bowl of snacks to the other. From choosing the right table to assembling the pieces to perfection, every little detail was important. A test of their character. Each roommate walked straight to their tables. The males assembled the chess pieces over the walnut and maple boards. The females supervised their every move.

While A29 picked up each piece and remembered where it went, A30 glanced at the other tables, crossed eyes with A15, a boy she remembered only by his Blue Field eyes, and faced her table again.

Whereas human kids hung their jackets over their chairs in a chess tournament, in the Watcher Development Center, the children hung their rifles, their muzzles dangling an inch over the floor.

There was no luck involved in a game of chess. When a game was lost, somewhere along the way, mistakes were made. The lesson was to eliminate such inconvenient mistakes. For each player to forge the perfect game by manipulating every variable.

After scratching his head, A29 moved a piece.

I see you’re as bright as ever, A30 said. She turned her eyes from the table where A15 sat, glanced at the board, and moved a piece.

A29 groaned. He scooped some snacks from the bowl, and left shiny fingerprints over the pieces. After both had made a few moves, A29 disrupted the silence of