ReGen is this generation's Manhattan Project, and Sepp is their atomic bomb. On the outside, he’s an average teenager, but underneath, he is anything but. For as long as he can remember, he’s always taken his orders and completed his missions. There’s nothing else for him, and he knows no one outside of the project.
But one thing is for sure, this mission changes everything.
Chapter 1
Sepp sat with his feet propped up on the dashboard of the cargo van as he played on his phone, acting very much like the thirteen-year-old the world saw him as. He half-watched as the trees and mountains passed by the passenger window in a blur.
Slowly, the day slipped by as they crossed the border into Montana.
There was only an hour to go until they reached their destination, and so far the transportation had been pretty quiet. Sepp should have known something was going to happen before the windshield shattered.
The next second, they slammed into the guardrail and skidded out of control. They slid off the road and came to a stop in between the highways. His phone forgotten, Sepp was on high alert and quickly grabbed for the gun on his hip. Instinct from his years of training and from the field instantly kicked in.
“Walter? What happened?” he asked, turning to the side. Sepp silently cursed as he realized the driver was dead. “Never mind,” he grumbled under his breath as he quickly grabbed for the radio between them. He checked the mirrors and spotted three hummers as they moved to surround them, no doubt filled with six men each.
Eighteen men, great. Shaking away that thought, he turned on the radio.
“This is Sepp in caravan five.” He spoke into the radio as he flicked the safety off of his gun and quickly shut the van off, knowing he couldn’t get away in it now. “I need backup, now! We were run off the road by three hostile vehicles, and Walter is dead. But will proceed as planned.”
Without waiting for a response, he flicked off the radio.
He knew he needed to get to the package before the men from the hummers arrived, which would only be a couple of seconds. Grabbing his backpack off the floor, Sepp scrambled over the seat and into the back of the van.
In the center of it was a metal container, which Sepp quickly moved toward and knelt beside. As he placed his hand on top of it, a light flickered across it and he winced when it pricked his hand to check his DNA.
A green light appeared on the side as it started to open, revealing a glass, frosted canister. Moving quickly and carefully, he pulled the canister out and slid it into his backpack before snapping the lock into place, zipping it, and pulling it on.
Outside the van, Sepp could hear the sound of pounding footsteps moving toward him. Glancing around him, he made a split-second decision and moved toward the back corner of the van.
He dropped down, keeping his gun in his hands as he bent forward, tucked it against his chest, and wrapped his other arm around his knees. Sepp had just made himself comfortable when the door was yanked open and light flooded in from the men shining their flashlights inside.
“Please, don’t hurt me,” Sepp whimpered, wrapping himself tighter into a ball as three of them climbed inside. The second he spoke, they whipped around and aimed their flashlights and guns at him.
Letting out a small yelp, he buried his face deeper between his legs. He could still see through them as one of the men moved toward the metal container in the center of the van. “Sir,” the man said, placing his hand against his ear. “The canister is empty. There’s nothing inside the van; there’s just a child.”
Sepp silently snorted at that as he made his body tremble. If only, he thought. If he was ‘just a child’, he wouldn’t be there.
“This delivery really was low profile,” one of the other men said, shaking his head as he scanned the front of the van. “Looks like, other than the child, THEY didn’t send anyone with the driver.”
A second later, Sepp made out the sound of cursing on the other end of the radio. “You idiots!” the man on the other end hissed. “That’s not a child!”
But the warning came too late. Whipping his gun out, Sepp took the three men down within a matter of seconds. He bolted forward, leapt out of the van, and took off running.
He was barely five feet away from the van before the yelling began, followed a second later by gunshots as the men from the other hummers came at him and started to enclose him in a circle.
Obviously, they’d all been warned about him now.
Picking a random direction, Sepp didn’t pause as he ran toward one of the men with a gun. Aiming his own gun, Sepp fired at him. The man cursed as he dropped his gun and cradled his now bleeding hand.
Quickly tucking the gun into his belt, Sepp flicked his left wrist and a knife slid out of his sleeve. As he drew nearer to the man, Sepp leaned back and fell, still sliding forward across the ground and between the man’s legs. Bringing his knife up, Sepp slashed the man across the knee.
“Take him out! Take him out!” the man yelled felling to the ground, clutching both his knee and his hand. “Shoot the stupid kid!”
A thudding sound followed a second later as a bullet pounded the ground near him, missing him by mere feet. Ducking down to make himself a smaller target, Sepp continued to run across the grassy field between the two sides of the highway.
One of the three hummers skidded to a stop five feet in front of him, trying to block his way. But Sepp didn’t slow his pace as he came upon it, he jumped up and onto the hood.
Sliding across the hood of the hummer, Sepp fell to the ground on the other side, rolled back onto his feet, and went at it again. White heat tore through his left leg as a bullet cut through his skin.
With a wince, Sepp shoved down the pain and kept running, keeping his mind focused on staying alive and the consequences if he was caught. He felt the difference in his footfalls the second he hit the pavement, timing his dash so a car barely missed hitting him as it cut in between him and the men after him.
The car gave him a couple of seconds of reprieve from the gunshots as the car blared its horn and he reached the other side of the road. Lunging forward, he rolled down the hill, landing on his feet at the bottom.
Sepp stood there for a second, trying to catch his breath as he glanced around him. He wasn’t too far from the nearest town, but it wouldn’t be easy to get there on foot without the men catching up to him.
That’s when something yellow in the corner of his eye caught his attention. It was a school bus, traveling roughly 25MPH, and it wasn’t far from a stop sign. Sepp just needed to catch up to it before it reached the sign.
With one last gulp of the evening air, he took off running again, this time parallel with the road the bus was taking. His feet pounded across the pine needle-covered ground as he darted between the trees, moving a little bit closer to the road with every step.
Soon, only a creek separated him from the road. Keeping his pace even, he grabbed onto the bottom branch of a tree beside the creek. Then Sepp swung himself forward and let go, flying over the creek and landing on his feet on the other side a second before the bus swept past.
Jumping onto the paved road, Sepp jogged down it toward the stop sign where the bus had just pulled up.
Running at the bus, Sepp leapt forward, catching his right foot on the rear bumper. Pushing himself upward, he placed his left foot on the emergency door’s handle, propelled himself up, and caught the roof of the bus.
He pulled himself up and onto the top just as the bus pulled away from the stop sign to start turning left. Crawling forward, Sepp stuck his head over the side of the bus and glanced through the window.
The bus was pretty full, but luckily for him, the back seat only had one kid sitting in it, and he wasn’t next to the window.
Grabbing onto the edge of the roof, Sepp flipped down and around, sliding through the small opening at the top of the school bus window. The second he was through it, he flopped down onto the bus’s back seat.
“What the…” Before the boy sitting next to him could say anything else, Sepp quickly clasped his hand over his mouth.
“I’ll pay you a hundred bucks to pretend I’ve been sitting here all day, or that I’m not here at all,” he whispered into his ear before he let him go.
The boy looked at him, blinked, then shrugged. “Okay.”
“Great,” Sepp huffed, scooting down in his seat. He slid his backpack off and set it on the floor. “I assume you guys are headed home?”
The boy nodded. “Yeah, we are. How did you get in here anyway?”
“Through the open window, obviously,” Sepp said, glancing out the window behind them and frowning when he spotted the hummer trailing behind them. Slipping his hand into his pocket, Sepp slid his wallet out and opened it, shooting another glance out the window.
“Hey, kid,” he said, sliding two hundred dollar bills out of his wallet. “How would you like to make another hundred dollars?”
“Micheal,” the boy said, grinning as he held out his hand.
“What?” Sepp squinted at the boy.
“My name’s Micheal, but everyone calls me Mickey,” he said. “If you’re going to give me money, we should probably know each others’ names.”
“Ok, right,” Sepp said, shaking himself. For a second there, he’d forgotten he was dealing with a child. Even though most people would think he was a child, Sepp knew that he was far from it. “I’m Sepp, and I need you to switch backpacks with me.”
This is on my list to buy soon. My savings can’t afford it this month after my shopping spree. lol Thankfully I had birthday money so it was no big deal. 🙃
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