Dashing devil 4 shadowed.., p.28
Dashing Devil 4: Shadowed Savior, page 28
“Kuh-he,” Mindy laughed, drawing his eye away from the gorgeous angel beaming up at him to the knowing smirk that quirked his soon-to-be lover’s painted lips.
Boyd could also tell that neither would elaborate if he asked… although that wasn’t clear if it was his own deduction, or a thought Mindy sent him.
“Um,” Tinker’s voice interrupted his thoughts on the matter over their comms, “is it safe to land? I see Hope has her shield up, so I’m hovering.”
Boyd let out a sigh and gave Hope one last squeeze before regretfully letting her go and stepping back. “Please drop the shield,” he requested, “so we can scan the area before Tinker lands. Scans indicated this valley didn’t have a lot of life in it to begin with, and I doubt what little is here will be coming out of hiding anytime soon after the ruckus we caused. But it’s best to be safe.”
Hope’s pout when he pulled away was almost as dangerous as Silvie’s, but she nodded. “Of course.”
The golden bubble that tinted the world outside their team disappeared and Boyd scanned the valley floor and walls. Not spotting any signs of movement or life in general, he rumbled, “It looks clear, anyone else detect any threats?”
“No,” Raev was the first to report, her ears twitching this way and that, “I don’t hear a thing.”
“I think we’re good, Darling,” Silvie added.
“I don’t sense any intelligent life out here,” Mindy reported.
“Everyone’s senses are better than mine, but I think it’s safe,” Hope added when Boyd glanced her way.
Unlike Boyd, who had telescopic vision for high-altitude hunting and slit pupils to assist him with night vision, Hope’s eyes were only at the high end of human standards—good, but not considered Powered.
“Go ahead and set the Osprey down, Tinker,” Boyd said over comms, which were still being recorded for Kayla’s benefit, although that was about to end. “Kitsune and Hopewing will provide security while you set up the portable shield generator. I assume we have press inbound?”
Kayla’s voice replied instead of Tinker’s, “Yes, the press are on their way. Sensors indicate that the first will arrive in four minutes.”
“It’s important to get that up quickly, then,” he instructed. “Silver, Mind Witch, and I will report to Director Davis while you do that.”
“Sounds good,” Tinker reported as the silently floating Astral Osprey shimmered into sight about a hundred feet above them and a few dozen feet off to one side before settling in for a landing.
“Alright, get the area set up and make it known that Ms. Bailey will be leading the conference,” Boyd added once the ship’s four-toed landing gear came to a rest, gripping the stone floor of the valley.
“With that,” he finally said, “the mission is complete. Break out into group comms and prepare for the arrival of the press.”
He was planning to check in with Sinoe at that point but was interrupted. ‘She needs some time. She’ll be okay up there for a while but she is having a moment and that’s the best place for it. We’ll send Raev up to collect her once it is time to go.’
“Silver and Mind Witch, please join me.” Boyd swept an arm towards their ship as the rear bay door, which now faced them, crunched into the gravel of the valley floor.
It was time to deal with his Handler and Director, both of whom he expected to be fairly grumpy. Boyd grinned—he came bearing the political equivalent of an expensive whiskey and fine pen set as gifts for each of them.
He wasn’t too worried about facing the music this time around.
Chapter 29
Boyd, Silvie, and Mindy made their way up the ramp and to the bridge for a remote meeting with Royce and Davis. They had even been considerate and scheduled it in advance. They were due for a general update with their assigned city’s Director, anyway. This update included the team's handlers—now only Royce—as was standard procedure.
But as soon as they stepped off the ramp and into the hold, they were stopped by Kayla who wore an expression that Boyd could only describe as restlessly content. She was a woman who had just been given a delicious sundae with all her favorite flavors and toppings, but the cherry meant to go on top was still in the jar—just out of reach.
Kayla intended to get that cherry.
“You need to let me show that footage,” Kayla reiterated, now that they were in person.
Her dark blonde hair was down, but some thought had clearly been put into its styling. She’d pulled it back over her right ear… likely what she thought of as her good side. A smile quirked her lips, but her jaw and shoulders were set. It seemed she was prepared to make her case.
She wore a rich blue blazer and matching above-the-knee pencil skirt over a white, frilly blouse for the occasion. It was clearly tailored to fit her tall and slightly curvier than normal frame. If Boyd had to guess, it was her favorite outfit and it made the few extra pounds she carried in the chest and hips look even better. She topped it off with a pair of short, sensible heels.
There was no doubt Kayla was an attractive woman.
Boyd reminded both himself and his other self that she was strictly off limits. No touching. He shouldn’t even let himself look… at least not too much. They needed her on their side, but not so much on their side that she appeared to lose her professional lack of biases.
Her light brown eyes met his readily as she continued, “I know you have been on a media blackout, but Archangel has a lot of the public questioning if you should be allowed to be a Hero or not. He hasn’t gotten much traction in Glorith but you didn’t save the rest of The Authority from Omega Ray like you did us.” She somehow spoke almost as quickly as Tinker, but did so clearly.
Boyd had no problem understanding her rapid but precise enunciation.
“Don’t get me wrong, killing the Last Dragon will change a lot of minds, but not like this footage will.” Kayla pressed her argument, “Archangel has been painting himself as a beacon of morality, almost like he is integrity personified—a true altruist. It smelled like the ghost of onions past to me, personally, but a lot of people bought it.”
Boyd chuckled and Kayla smirked. “At the same time, he painted you as some sort of morally bankrupt Machiavellian Ne’er-Do-Well. Which hasn’t been my impression of you, at all, and what makes the whole thing stink so much.”
She crinkled her slightly upturned nose rather cutely before her easy, wide grin split her lips, “But this footage? This footage explains it all. He’s a full-blown narcissist, isn’t he?”
“No comment,” Boyd said, though he nodded once.
“I don’t need confirmation.” Kayla laughed. “it’s as obvious as the moons on a cloudless night to anyone who saw that little display—which is exactly why everyone needs to see it. A man like that shouldn’t be receiving the veneration he has garnered. I don’t know how they have been covering up the messes he must leave behind him, but the people have to know. They have the right to know.”
“But I…” Boyd started to say, but Kayla bulldozed over his words.
“And you just know that he will be trying to paint you as the bad guy—the fiend to his golden knight. He’ll make it about protecting the pure Hopewing from the Corruptor, which is what he calls you, by the way. That footage will show the world that you are trying to save her from a buffoon with an ego as big as New Eden.”
“I agree with you, Miss Bailey,” Boyd rumbled politely. “I have every intention to argue strenuously in the meeting with Director Davis we are about to go into, to have that footage declassified. That way, you can show it at an appropriate point during the press conference. It would make an excellent segue to announce the duel… which we will talk about where to fit in after the meeting with Director Davis. The footage is, unfortunately, currently classified, so I must first obtain permission to release it.”
“Oh…” Kayla had built up quite a head of steam while getting her argument out quickly so Boyd couldn’t shut her down.
She deflated when he didn’t object or put up any sort of fight. “Well… good, I’ll let you get to that.” She stepped off to the side to clear their path with an awkward smile.
“Thank you,” Boyd rumbled back with a chuckle, leading Mindy and Silvie forward.
They sat on one of the couches at the back of the Osprey’s bridge, with the hatch firmly secured. Kayla, and the civilians through her, would not be privy to this conversation. Boyd toggled a switch on the wall behind them that brought one of the displays down on a mechanical arm.
“System, cancel Blackout Protocol,” Boyd rumbled to the rendition of the team's system present on their ship. This turned off the complete communication block they had activated just before flying out of the base. “Message Royce, contents: we are available.”
“Sending messa—Incoming Call from: Royce, Emergency Override activated.” The synthetic voice replied.
“What in the actual fuck, kid?!” Royce sounded about as pissed as Boyd had expected him to be, although the screen showed an ‘audio only’ message. He must be away from his desk. “What part of ‘you're in hiding’ didn’t you get? How the hell am I supposed to cover for your dumb ass if you are going to blatantly disobey direct orders like this?”
“I have disobeyed exactly zero orders,” Boyd defended himself immediately. “I’ve stuck to the rules and guidelines you and the Director provided, and did so within the limits of my standing orders.”
“Bullshit,” Royce spat, “ain’t no way.”
“Royce, when have I lied to you?” Boyd rumbled in reply. “I’ll happily explain how I’ve been a good Hero, but I would rather only do it only once. Mind if we bring Davis in so I can dole out explanations and presents to settle both of your ruffled feathers at once?”
“Presents?” Royce asked skeptically.
“A politically useful gift for him,” Boyd replied. “I’m afraid all I managed for you was some personal payback. I would rather hand them out together, if you don’t mind. We don’t have long before the press arrives and I don’t want to keep them this far out for too long.”
“The press are on their way?” Royce asked. Then he added, “Bringing the Director in.”
There was a beep followed by well-dressed but greying Director Davis appearing on the screen. He immediately said, “Devil, I expect you have a very good explanation as to why you disobeyed my direct orders.”
Much like his efficient and simple but clearly well-tailored dark blue suit, his tone was precise and efficient.
“I will keep it brief,” Boyd responded, “because as I was just telling Royce, the press are on the way to our location. I am not comfortable having civilians exposed out here in the Wilds, and I would like them to return to the safety of New Eden as promptly as possible. As to explaining disobeying your orders, I don’t see why I should—seeing as I was following orders.”
“Explain,” the Director’s ice-blue eyes narrowed.
“The last order I received from you, Sir, was to relocate to our new base and start a training cycle. While on location Royce updated my orders to address the disconnection with my Changed mind and assigned Mind Witch as the psychoanalyst best suited for assisting me in that task.”
Boyd nodded to Mindy. “The last order Mind Witch gave me to that end was to go find something to hunt in the Wild Lands—specifically something challenging enough to be fun. The Last Dragon fit the bill.” Boyd finished his explanation with a shrug.
“That’s a technicality at best,” Davis growled.
“One I will happily hide behind if you make me,” Boyd returned Davis’s glower with his most charming smile.
“If he makes you—the fuck kid?” Royce asked. “This ain’t like you. Nobody has ever had to make you stick to the rules.”
“This is Boyd, compulsion-free, Royce,” Mindy replied before Boyd could respond. “He can now look for wiggle room in his orders, which he previously had an implanted aversion to doing. He simply performed an operation within the bounds of his current orders.”
The look she gave both men was penetrating, as if daring them to contest her assertion. “He stayed within every rule and guideline, he just did so without briefing you so you couldn’t change those orders. He can cite all the regulations that allowed him to do it, if you really want him to.”
“Besides,” Silver added, “we all know that Director Davis will say he authorized the mission—both to protect us and to take credit. Why are we arguing about whether or not we had permission to do something we already did? Especially when that something was killing the Last Dragon?” She gave one of her patented pouts. “Why are you mad at my Darling when you should be thanking him?”
Boyd wondered if that pout was the reason why Royce had stayed audio only as the Director’s glower softened. It seemed that even the seasoned statesman wasn’t immune to her practiced charm.
“I just need to know this isn’t going to be an ongoing issue,” he grumbled.
“I can promise it won’t be an issue as long as you can promise to hear me out and honestly consider any missions I come to you with,” Boyd stepped back in now that he had been softened up by Silvie’s pout. “I feel as though we’ve proven that The Devoted are field capable as we stand and that I have a grasp of just what we can handle. I would rather have been able to bring this to both of you first—and I would have, if I wasn’t certain you would have shut us down without that consideration.”
The Director glared at him for a moment before Royce cut in, “The kid takes promises seriously, Director. If you promise to hear him out, he’ll come to you… but if you don’t actually hear him out he’ll probably stop. Promises only count if both sides keep them. Learned that one the hard way when he was sixteen.”
“Fine,” The Director sat back and twisted his neck until it popped.
He blew out a heavy sigh. “I knew taking you on would lead to additional stress… but I didn’t expect something like today. A lot of hopes are riding on your shoulders, Boyd, not to mention the people who would have certainly killed me—slowly and painfully—if you had died while under my command.”
He pinched the bridge of his nose before squaring his shoulders. “So, if it takes promising to hear you out to stop something like this from being a surprise in the future… then fine. I promise to hear you out. My doctor says I need to watch my blood pressure. I’ll have to schedule an extra massage after the spike you caused today.”
“Well, if it helps with your blood pleasure, during your well-deserved massage you can contemplate the full corruption investigation you get to launch into Director Stafford’s administration.” Boyd rumbled with his most charming smile. “I hope getting to search all his closets for skeletons brings you some comfort and relaxation.”
“As pleasant a daydream as that might be, what justification do I have to do that?” Davis raised one of his greying eyebrows, making the wrinkles in his forehead more pronounced.
“We cut the live feed, but have recordings from dozens of drones that show Archangel attempting to murder me,” Boyd explained. “I was in the process of subduing him when his handler, Victory Seeker, arrived and detained him. I informed Victory Seeker that we would be taking custody of Archangel to transport him to Glorith City to stand trial for his crimes. That’s when Stafford arrived.”
“I assume he insisted that Archangel be released to his duties for the duration of the trial.” Davis sounded bored and looked disappointed.
“That would have been the smart thing to do.” Boyd grinned. “Instead, Stafford granted him a full pardon.”
“But you were way out in the Wild Lands… more than a hundred miles outside of New Eden. His jurisdiction only extends twenty miles past his walls.” Davis’s eyebrows drew together in confusion.
“It would seem he overlooked that fact, which I attribute to his having allowed pardoning this particular Hero to become a habit. And I took the measure of establishing an engagement zone, one I’m sure you could backdate a signature onto, if you were so inclined, which made it an Unauthorized Pardon under clause thirty-two, article seven, section D of The Authority’s Charter. Thus, you get to launch a full investigation into his operations,” Boyd’s charming grin became almost predatory.
Davis’s normally dour face took on an expression that could only be called ecstatic. “Well done, Boyd, well done indeed. The investigative access this will grant us will be priceless. Strafford’s a big player, so I’m sure he’ll have extra securities in place—but I’m sure we’ll still find all sorts of useful information.”
Boyd judged it to be a good time to drop the other boot and then segue into asking for a favor. “Yes, that was something of a lucky break. To be honest, I didn’t expect the Director to make the trip all the way out there. I received another lucky break when Archangel challenged me to a Hero’s Duel, which I accepted.”
“You did what?” The Director’s glower returned. “That’s not the type of PR you need right now. We’ll have to find a way to cancel it.”
“We all know there is no way to cancel it and Boyd would never forgive you if you tried to force him to back out,” Mindy inserted and Boyd nodded his agreement.
“When my Darling beats him, Archangel has to dismiss Hopewing from Eden’s Protectors. Both Darling and his Changed Mind would be very upset if you prevented that,” Silvie explained.
“Plus, this is exactly the PR I need right now,” Boyd added his two credits. “Omega Ray was a desperate struggle and, let’s be honest, I got lucky—it shows in the footage. Which is good and bad on the public opinion front.”
He held up one big, red hand and waggled it side to side. “Romantic, but not great on the reliability side of things. I tried to counter that with how we handled the Last Dragon. We’ll have to see how well it’s received but… you saw all that didn’t you?”
“You looked like a professional badass. Yeah, kid, well done. I’ll give you a treat later,” Royce half laughed half grumped.
