Redemption (The Alliance Series Book 1) by Marcus Abshire Page A

my weapon from thirty feet away. The bullets hit home but seemed to have no effect.
    I don’t know exactly why but conventional weapons did not seem to hurt her.
    Ok, fine. She raced at me, floating a few inches off the ground, closing the distance in a few seconds. It was all I needed. I gathered energy, drawing it from the air around us. Quickly raising my other hand I unleashed a powerful bolt of lightning that hit the banshee in her stomach. Burns and massive damage already visible on her body as she flew away from me. The lightning raced around the room, leaping from one piece of sawing equipment to the next.
    I unleashed a lot more lightning than I had needed. I wanted to make sure she didn’t fly through my assault like she did my bullets.
    I walked over to her body. She was clearly not going to put up much of a fight. Her body was covered in burns that in and of themselves would be deadly. Her left leg was blown off at the knee from the blast and her right arm was a ragged stump as the lightning had destroyed them exiting her body. She looked at me for a second then succumbed to her final rest. Her body slowly began to dissolve, returning to the Otherworld. I stood there watching, making sure she left.
    You had to be sure.
                  A soft rustle got my attention. It came from behind the large saw. I walked around it looking for the origin of the sound. What awaited me changed my life.
    There amidst the sawdust and forgotten machines were a man and a child, a baby boy. They were both dead, having been hit by the electricity that had traveled around the room. The dad lay there holding his son, protecting him while his mom went out to plead for her life.
    I stood there in shock. She had been telling the truth, she had a family and I had just killed them all, just following orders. I was devastated as differing emotions fought for dominance, anger warred with regret, sorrow strove against denial. One particularly strong emotion settled over the rest as it slowly burned with more intensity than the others. Resolve, resolve coalesced inside me.
    Not anymore. I made a decision right then and there. I would never allow something like this to happen again. Never again would someone else decide who I went after. I would not allow myself to take a job where I was not sure of the target, where I did not know exactly who I was going up against. I still knew what I did was important. I still understood that there was a need for my particular skills, but from now on I would be the sole arbiter of how those skills were used, to hell with them all if they couldn’t accept that.
                  I just stood there staring at the bodies. They were not going anywhere. They were not creatures of the Otherworld. I let it sink in; making sure this image burned into my brain. The next time I felt pressured to take a job I wasn’t clear about I would think of them, remember what failing to trust my instincts cost. Never forgetting the price for not doing what I knew in my heart was right.
                  Never again.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    Chapter 10
     
     
     
     
     
    I awoke to the sound of the phone ringing. I groggily opened my eyes and picked up the handle.
                  "Hello?" I asked. I heard the crisp British accent of Miss Jones on the other end say.
                  "Sir, Mr. Stragnoff wanted me to call you when he procured the information you were querying about. He asked me to inquire if you would be so kind as to meet him down at the practice grounds in ten minutes." She said precisely.
                  "Yeah, of course I'll be there." I said sleepily.
                  "Excellent, I will tell Mr. Stragnoff immediately." Her British accent as crisp in the morning as it had been last night.              
                  I placed the phone back on the receiver and quickly got dressed, making sure