The Brother

Chapter Fifteen

The strength exerted by the bike pushed Jace back. He involuntarily gripped his brother’s shoulder to steady himself.

“Are you scared, sis?” said Jonathan.”I can slow this thing if you want.”

“Shut up.” said Jace.

He could feel the wind push back his hair. He tried to keep his eyes open, but the speed of the wind was giving him a hard time. He reasoned with himself and decided that looking down would be the best thing.

Below them, there were plenty of buildings. He couldn’t spot anyone in this city.

“Where is everyone?” Jace shouted over the sound of the wind.

“There’s no one here. This is the neighbouring city Barlum. The first thing that I did after becoming the Chief was have this place evacuated. People were not happy about it.”

“Why? Why did you have it evacuated?”

“Well, it was too close to Stryke’s territory and we needed a buffer zone.” said Jonathan and pointed in the north- east direction. “That’s where Stryke’s territory begins from.”

Jace’s gaze followed the direction pointed by his brother and all he could see were sand dunes.. He squinted his eyes, out of habit, and found a building in the distance that was half covered with sand.

“Is that skyscraper Stryke’s?”, said Jace.

“Good guess.” said Jonathan. “You have now reached your destination. Please …”

“Save the city bus crap.” said Jace. “How long did the ride last?”

“Grumpy sis.” said Jonathan. “Ten, maybe less.”

Jace chose not to reply. He could feel the speed of the bike reduce gradually. He finally began to relax and he heard his brother say,”Hold on!”

Before Jace could say anything, they were nosediving to the ground. Jace felt his stomach rise up to his chest and began to feel sick. Tears welled up in his eyes. They were just 20 feet from the ground and were still nosediving, “JON!”

Finally his brother steadied the bike and gracefully parked it under a tree. Without uttering a word, Jace got off the bike and threw up at the nearest bush.

There goes the breakfast. - he thought and turned around to find Jonathan smiling at him.

“I’m beginning to hate you.” said Jace and felt the sickening taste at the back of his throat.

“I know.” said Jonathan. “I feel proud. Now hurry up. You’ve got to capture a couple of the undead.”

“You?” said Jace.

 What do you mean you? Aren’t you coming?

“Hurry up.Track them down and bring them to me or you’ll spend the rest of your time in a sim room playing World War Z.”

“How am I supposed to track them down?” asked Jace with the disbelief evident in his voice.

“No. I was just kidding about that. Go fifty meters to the east. You’ll find a few undead. Bring them over to me. I’ll be right behind you.” said Jonathan. “Keeping an eye on them.”

“Alright. But which side is the east?” asked Jace and saw his brother shake his head as he raised his left hand and pointed to his left.

He walked carefully in the direction his brother had pointed at. The forest was perfect to hide. The wide bark of the trees, the large bushes only helped him to move more stealthily. But if I can hide, then so can they - he thought and tuned to look back.

He saw his brother crouching next to a tree giving him a thumbs up. Jace smiled and feeling reassured by his brother’s presence, moved forward. He could hear two female voices. He slowly raised his head and found two people who were deeply involved in a conversation. He hid himself behind the nearest tree and tried to get a good look.

There was a white woman, her hair golden and a long scar running along the length of her face. Her companion seemed to be an Indian who was brown and had black hair. She did not have any scars on her, at least none that were visible to him.

“We have to report to Naomi that this place is perfectly safe. There’s no security here. If we don’t report back in another ten minutes, she will think we’re dead.” said the blond woman.

Jace took out the compressed bow and squeezed the cuboid. The two ends elongated themselves almost instantly and the gold writings of the bow glowed faintly under the blazing sun. He pressed the button which had now appeared and took out the smaller version of the quiver from his pocket. He held the miniature version of quiver and whispered ‘figura’. The quiver enlarged itself. A smile crept up his face as he placed it on his back and took out two arrow from it.

He wore the glasses Sameer had given him and whispered, “Muishiki” and “Ni”. The first of them, would ensure that whoever gets hit by the arrow would fall unconscious. While the second enabled him to fire two of them simultaneously.

“We’ll wait for another five minutes. If there’s no trouble we can report it to Naomi.” said the other woman.

Jace’s intuition told him that this was the right moment and he revealed himself, with a bow in hand, and said,”Both of you, lift your hands up.”

Jace didn’t know why he asked them to lift their hands up. Maybe it was the hundreds of movies that he had watched which prompted him to say it. He watched the two women slowly raise their hands.

A smile crept up on the blond woman’s face. “For a moment, I thought you were Jonathan Cooper.”

“Sorry to disappoint you.” said Jace.

“No. I’m happy it’s not him. We’d have been dead by now, if it were him.” said the brown woman. “You look a lot like him. Who are you?”

“I’m Jace Cooper. Jonathan’s brother.” said Jace. He began to wonder if he did the right thing by introducing himself.

“It’s a shame, you know. What happened with your father.” said the brown woman with a smile on her face.   

“What do you mean? How do you know my father?”

The eyes of the blonde woman widened as she said, “You don’t…” but was interrupted as a couple of arrows flew from behind Jace, one from each side and dug themselves into the two women.

“I guess, we’re gonna have a long talk tonight.” said Jonathan as he appeared from amid the bushes.

“How do they know about Dad?” said Jace. “Did you kill them.”

“No, they’re just unconscious. Should be out for a couple of hours. I didn’t want you to know the truth from them.” said Jonathan. His voice sounded dry.

“What truth?” asked Jace. He did not understand what was going on and he felt helpless.

“I’ll tell you everything when we get back.” said Jonathan. “Egredior”.

The gold colored bike appeared in front of them. “Hop on.” said Jonathan. “I’ve informed the Council about these two with my caller. They’ll send...”

Jace didn’t pay attention to what his brother said. He sat on the pillion seat and wondered how the undead knew his father.