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JULIUS ALLCOTT
“You haven’t released enough replicates,”the voices of his loves hissed from the darkness in the rear of his car.
“I know,” Julius replied and checked the rearview mirror. The ghostly visage of his wife stared back at him. It flickered. He thought he saw her scream. Then it was gone again. He returned his gaze to the road, to the journey home.
“But we need more to open the gate.”
“Shut up. I must do this slowly. If they’re all out now before the Deadly Seven turn, they’ll be destroyed, and then, my loves, who will bring you back?”
Julius tugged at his mangey hair. His mind raced as fast as the car he drove. He had this all planned. He had it sorted. But if his loves kept hounding him to go faster, he’d never bring them back to this world.
“We have to time this properly. Patience,” he said, realizing he’d let go of the steering wheel. He quickly gripped it again and brought the car back into his lane.
When he’d started the Syndicate decades ago, and helped create the Deadly Seven, his original plan had been to turn them dark so they would ruthlessly hunt down every sinner in the world and bring about utopia for his replicated family to enjoy, sin free. But then the Hildegard Sisterhood happened. Then he found out Gloria, the Seven’s creator, had built in a failsafe into their DNA to stop them from going dark.
For years he’d stewed over the betrayal, only to have a solution drop into his lap. Kidnap the mates. Even after he lost the ability to replicate his wife and daughter, he never gave up. He didn’t see Despair’s betrayal as the gift it was. He never wanted clones of his family. He wanted them—the originals—back. The ones that mattered.
To do that, he had to complete the rituals needed to open the twin gates to the afterlife. One went to the dark place, one went to the light. But with the Deadly Seven and the Hildegard Sisterhood protecting this magical spot where he’d glimpsed his loves for the first time, he needed a distraction to gain access.
And Julius had backup plans for his backup plans. There would be no failing him this time. He could taste victory on his tongue. He could smell the scent of his wife’s perfume.
He’d blown up the bridges leading into the city, trapping the sinners of Cardinal City inside like pigs waiting for slaughter. Without their mates, the Seven were dancing with darkness. It won’t be long before the rest would follow. He had half a mind to tease them with a video recording of their mates in captivity.
Let them watch their loved ones from afar, just like he was separated from his.
No.
He shook his head.
Focus. He would get to the mates in good time. Destroying them at the optimal time would drive the nail in their coffin. He wanted to crush their hope when it was highest.
First, he needed to collect the items for the ritual, and then he would release more weapons on the city to grow the chaos. Sinners would destroy each other, and the Deadly Seven would destroy them, and then he would destroy the Deadly Seven by destroying their mates.
A hysterical laugh bubbled up inside of him at his own genius and he accidentally planted his foot on the gas. The burst in speed only made him laugh harder. His wife and daughter behind him also laughed.
With the city in chaos, and those ungrateful menaces undone, there would be nothing standing in his way to access the gates. He could complete the ritual his loves had whispered to him overnight.
They said if he opened one gate, then their gate would also open. The afterlife was two sides to the same coin. A yin and a yang. Once open, he could pull them through, and the dark Deadly Seven would systematically take care of any sinning souls hitching a ride at the same time. Then he would close the gates. His wife and daughter would be by his side, and the sinners in the city would be gone. It would finally be safe for his wife and daughter to come back.
“What’s taking so long to open the gates?”
Julius tugged his hair again as he met the black eyes of his wife in the rearview. They looked disturbed. Hollow. “Soon, my loves, soon,” he placated. “I haven’t got all the tools. I need your personal items.”
“And then?”
“And then all hell breaks loose.”
His cackling laughter echoed against the windows.
