Reveille (The Hybrid Disasters, Book One)

Chapter 16: I Won't Back Down

The next two weeks passed by in a monotonous, sluggish routine. Monday through Friday mornings involved two hours of extensive training in offensive and defensive sparring with hand-to-hand, weapon, and ability combat. This physical training breaked briefly for showers and breakfast then resumed with six hours of classroom time, with a short lunch break in between. Most evenings typically ended with some kind of group scenario training that involved several mental stressors. These group-sessions, or "what-if" situations as Lolly and I called them, were meant to logically test our tactical expertise. Interestingly, the scenarios were based on actual DPO missions that had occurred over the past twenty years.

Since I was now labeled 'high-risk' thanks to my episode that ended in nearly killing Trixie, Lolly and Mr. Wilkes were the only two willing to train with me in the mornings. The afternoon group sessions, however, were much less physical as they were simply strategy games that only simulated missions realistically. These sessions became my only social interactions with the other trainees. Albeit, much of the group's interaction with me was forced by Mr. Wilkes. On top of all that, every Tuesday and Thursday from eight to ten at night I prepped with Hagan, Adam, and Lyric on what types of information the DPO needed on my father.

It turned out my father was on the DPO's Top Ten Most Wanted list for illegally running a criminal organization and for supplying and aiding and abetting other known supernatural criminal organizations and persons. He was also believed to be heavily involved in trafficking, to include narcotics and actual supes themselves. DPO currently had no legitimate evidence of his misconduct. However, they had previously arrested a number of his proclaimed clients doing his dirty work, but those individuals feared my father so much they refused to become informants. To make matters worse, since my identity was exposed, my father was now known around the DPO Agent circles as 'The Mad Scientist.' Many believed he was secretly and illegally experimenting on trafficked supes to create powerful mutant supes to do his bidding. Agents and trainees were now referring to me as 'Sub-Zero,' a moniker that meant Subject Zero. I was annoyed to say the least.

Despite heavy surveillance, DPO hadn't successfully been able to tie my father to anything. The only evidence they currently had was me, but they also had no real evidence that he was the one that actually created me either.

My job was to help DPO protect the Supernatural Community by gathering hard evidence on my father, so they could arrest him. They wanted me to go undercover and infiltrate his criminal organization. They were currently vetting various scenarios that reintegrated me with Charles while casting a believable mistrust between myself and DPO. They needed Charles to believe I was on his side, not theirs. Hagan believed the most viable plan involved staging an 'escape' for me from DPO's custody and having me go home and cry to my father about how they held me captive and ran tests on me the entire time. My father and I were never emotional with one another, so I had serious doubts about that scenario. Plus, I wasn't a very good liar, and didn't think my acting skills were on par enough to cry on command.

Friday marked the end of week three of the course, which also meant only two true weeks for Lolly and I since we joined a week late. The day was almost over. All eighteen trainees were divided into two groups, offense and defense, for a what-if scenario. The offense, or DPO Agents, were to lead an ambush operation on a group of Witches that were performing a summoning for a Demon. The particular Demon being summoned had a fondness for necromancy.

The defense, or the Witches themselves, had to deflect the ambush to continue carrying out their nefarious plans to summon the Demon and lead an army of the undead. Lolly was on the defense with Trixie as the lead. I was on the offensive team whose lead was Ember Summers, the guy whose caste I was still unsure of. I could tell from watching him spar that he was fast and strong, but he had yet to display any telltale traits.