Blood Brothers Read online

  Blood Brothers

  Michael Evans

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Newsletter

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  The Story Continues...

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Blood Brothers (Conspiracy Chronicles)

  Copyright © 2019 by Michael Evans

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the expressed written permission of the author except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  For updates from the author on his mission to live boundlessly and a free download of the Deadwave Official Game Guide subscribe to the author’s newsletter at: www.mevansinked.com/team-boundless/

  To Matthew Evans, my one true blood brother, who always makes me smile.

  Chapter 1

  The blackness of the night sky has no answers.

  Nothing does.

  For the first time in my life, I feel like a failure, even though by all objective measures I succeeded. I should be happy. I should feel fulfilled. I should feel like I’m good enough for once in my life. I won the Deadwave World Championship. I achieved my only dream with tens of thousands of people watching me and cheering me on as I sliced apart zombies and eliminated other avatars in the biggest game of my life.

  I gave up everything to be able to do this myself.

  I skipped school, pretty much lost the meaning of sleep in my life, and did not interact with any human beings outside of Deadwave players. That meant I had to miss out on all the normal high school things: prom, homecoming, dating drama, sports games. That also meant I had to miss out on the last few years of my mom’s life before she supposedly killed herself by throwing herself off the sunset cliffs at Point Loma late one night.

  I only say supposedly because I have a sneaking suspicion that she was murdered by the same mysterious group trying to kill me and forcing me to assassinate my father, but I’ll get back to that later. The point is I gave up everything for the chance to win.

  And I told myself once I got to hold that diamond medallion in my hand that it would be worth it. That the unbelievable feeling of victory, of happiness, would outweigh the sorrow and hatred for my own self and allow me to finally feel truly great about something in life.

  I was wrong.

  I got that medal. I felt the feeling of victory, and don’t get me wrong, it was un-freaking-believable—I’m talking like combining all the best highs in the world into one out-of-body, mind-shattering experience.

  But the high faded in less than a minute, and soon reality hit me.

  I stood on that stage tonight and realized the one simple truth: nothing outside of me will make me truly happy. And that realization is one that would normally be empowering, but after learning that you pretty much pointlessly sacrificed five years of your life to ultimately fail in pursuit of your one goal—happiness—is beyond a depressing feeling. In fact, it’s the kind of feeling that makes you want to close your eyes and force your body to sleep.

  But I can’t do that.

  The terrors will come the second my consciousness enters the state of sleep. As I think about sleeping, my mind instantly flashes back to all the kidnappings, all the gruesome killings I had to witness, and a fat man choking me, which, when put together into one nightmarish vision, makes for a truly horrible night’s sleep.

  I have people after me. Actually, to put it more bluntly, I have people who want to kill me. They want to destroy my father’s empire. They want to steal his patents, likely steal his money, and ensure the world-changing technology of the Chimera Life Pods, which will allow anyone to live in a virtual world, is in their own hands.

  And now I have to kill him. I have to murder him, so that those same people don’t murder me.

  And that time could be at any moment. It’s the reason my heart can’t stop pounding against my chest, and my eyes perpetually scan my surroundings for any figures lurking in the darkness. I didn’t feel safe going anywhere after the competition other than to my hotel room. Luckily, it is only a few blocks away from Madison Square Garden, so it was very easy for me to hail one of the yellow taxis in the fleet of city-owned self-driving vehicles that roam the streets.

  I decided to skip the post-game conference, instead escaping out one of the side entrances of the Garden, where a taxi discreetly picked me up and whisked me away from the chaos. With my piercing headache, and the sudden defeated feeling overcoming me after working tirelessly for years, I knew it would be best if I could sit in the darkness of my twentieth-story hotel room.

  So, that’s where I am. In fact, not to get into too much detail, but I’m currently in my boxers and socks, sitting on a leather chair in the corner of the cramped hotel room, letting the soothing energy of the silence and darkness amalgamating into one sound soothe my mind and drain the adrenaline out of me. It will likely be at least another hour before my mind can finally shut itself off and enter a state of sleep, but for now, staring straight forward at the white comforter, the mattress, and the odd patterns in the brown carpet beneath me is all I need to keep me content. I am sitting completely still, except for the odd, yet compulsive desire for me to rub my socks against the floor in tight, continuous circles.

  This trance of sorts, where my thoughts stay locked in trying to bring back the high of that feeling the first few moments after I won and return the tears of joy to my eyes, shatters with a single, loud knock on my door.

  I scramble for my clothes. On the floor I dump out the contents of my suitcase, including my two sets of extra clothes, my toiletries, and my clear glass tablet that I sometimes use to get work done on instead of on my hologlasses. I throw on a pair of cargo shorts and a gray hoodie, the two staples of my wardrobe.

  I step towards the door, then pivot backwards, my nerves getting the best of me. I turn towards the window and try to think about ways I can survive the jump. In my mind I have this crazy fantasy that I can always avoid confronting the issue—avoid killing my father—if I don’t ever give them a chance to give me a sign. I can always lock myself in a single room in my house, and whenever I step out in public, I will make sure I’m around dozens of people, so that they can’t get away with anything without being caught.

  I should have known from the beginning that plan is a pipe dream. I gulp as the loud knock reverberates throughout the room once again, breaking the silence in an instant. It has to be them. My dad would text me if he were coming over. And Riva, well, I highly doubt she will want to talk to me anytime soon. There is only one reason why someone is knocking on my door this late. They want me to kill.

&n
bsp; My options of escaping from this room are infinitely slim. I can maybe reach the air duct at the corner of my room and crawl through the air vents. But at some point, I’m bound to hit a deadly fall twenty stories down, and I don’t know how many people have died from falling in air conditioning vents, but I don’t want to add my name to that list.

  Of course, my second option is to try and bolt out the window, but there’s no way that will work. For one, I’m not a freaking superhero. So, scaling the building is not an option. The only thing my body will know how to do is fall from it. And falling to the cement on a chilly October night is not how I want my story to end.

  I’ll go down fighting.

  I look through the peephole. My only hope is that it’s not that freakish masked lady from before.

  “Open the door, it’s me.” The voice causes me to jump back as my right eye nears the peephole. I bite my tongue to refrain from screaming—to say I’m paranoid nowadays is an understatement.

  The distinctly strong, feminine voice instantly clicks in my memory. I open the door, suddenly feeling more stupid and embarrassed than scared. Well, part of me still feels scared too, but more of a nervous scared instead of a I-might-die fear.

  This is the girl I thought would never give me the time of day. This is the girl that I never thought and still don’t think that I deserve. She’s beautiful. She’s smart. She’s athletic. She’s caring. She’s everything I’m not and more.

  Normally I would be elated to see her. Normally I would open the door and see her huge smile as our eyes connect and soon after our lips too.

  But I know today will be different.

  Her lifelong dream was lost today. She wanted to win the Deadwave World Championship like me. And she sacrificed so much the week before the competition as I battled a drug-induced coma to make sure that I could compete, that I can’t even imagine what she felt when she watched me drop that medallion onto the ground. When she watched me drop her dream onto the floor as if it was nothing.

  To me, it all now feels like nothing. And I wanted the world to know that. I wanted the world to know that none of this matters, that all of this is bullshit and a distraction from the real problems threatening to tear society apart.

  But I don’t know if Riva gets that.

  And the moment I open the door, I want to close my eyes. I can’t bear to see her upset. I can’t witness the fact that I have disappointed someone else who I care about too.

  I barely have any time to register the expression on her face before her body springs forward. She wraps her arms around me. The familiar warmth of her body and comforting aroma of her hair swathe my senses as all my worries wash away.

  She whispers into my ears, her hot breath pressing against my neck. “I’m proud of you.”

  Chapter 2

  I wasn’t kidding when I said I sacrificed most of my life and suffered a metric crap ton of guilt to pursue my Deadwave dream. That’s why as I lay in the hotel room bed with her, I have next to no clue what I’m doing. And mind you, I know this isn’t complicated. I just have to put my arm around her and let our bodies and the moment take care of the rest. But that’s exactly what is nearly impossible for my mind.

  I can’t stop thinking about the best place to put my arm around her, or the right position for my body (there has to be a technique for spooning right?). Stop thinking, just let it happen.

  For once, I let my mind get swept away in the moment, in the beauty of her curvy body and her thick, black hair. I don’t know how these kinds of things are supposed to feel, or even if they are supposed to have a singular feeling, but the voice in my head constantly telling myself that it wants more suddenly silences.

  Seeing the pleasure on her face and feeling the exuberance in her body makes me feel like I’m good enough for as long as the feeling lasts. Her heavy breaths only cause more blood to rush down south. We let our bodies awkwardly dance throughout the night, our lips and bodies doing all the talking instead of our minds, and all the problems in our lives becoming a thing of the past as we both drown in pleasure.

  But the moment ends way before I am ready. The second she pulls away, her body sinking back down into the mattress beneath her, my mind falls back into its familiar pattern—it wants more. But I know well enough by now to hold myself back. Some parts of my mind will never be satisfied, and in life I’m still dealing with the realization that I will never be truly happy. Whatever I have in life, I will always want more of it.

  There is never a limit.

  The moments when my mind seems to forget that thought and is satisfied in a fading feeling are the ones that bring me solemn happiness. And despite everything in life right now, despite the fact that everything is falling apart, and I have no idea how to fix it, I just feel happy.

  And those moments in my life are few and far between.

  I never allow myself to feel that way.

  “Well, wow.” She smiles as she looks up at me. I am still above her, my bare body suddenly feeling chilly as the vent pumps out a round of cold air. I fumble for my shirt, the self-conscious feeling over my large nipples and lack of defined muscles taking hold as the high of the moment fades.

  She pulls the blanket over her chest, an odd glow in her brown eyes. The darkness in the room that made it nearly impossible to discern the color of wallpaper feels alive with her here. Everything feels better with her. Part of me wishes we could somehow run off and have a future together, but I know that is impossible for too many reasons. My future may not exist. And even if it does, everything will be different.

  We only have this moment.

  “Yeah, we sure didn’t waste any time there.” I laugh and kiss her on her cheek.

  “I needed that.” She speaks in a soft, sexy tone that reaches out and touches every part of my body. “I needed you.”

  “I did too. I do.”

  “I’m sorry for stopping by this late, I know you’re probably tired and have a lot going through your mind right now, but I needed to see you. I’m also not some creep who followed you home. I messaged your dad and got the address of your hotel room.”

  “Oh, please, you are welcome to follow me home any day. I’d much rather you than them, and you are the best surprise in the world.” I smile, this time kissing her on her neck. She turns over so that she can look into my eyes, her body still remaining under the covers. “Opening the door to a hug from you is amazing, I didn’t think you would want to see me after everything.”

  “We were competitors when we walked out of that room.” Tears surface in her eyes, but her voice remains calm. “I wanted us both to win. But I know that is impossible. So, since it wasn’t me, I’m glad it was you. I wanted it for you more than anyone else. I’ll be back at it again next year, and it sucks to feel like this whole year was wasted, but I’m happy you got it. This was your only chance and you did it.”

  “I’m still sorry, though.” I embrace her, and the moment my arms wrap around her body, she weeps quietly into my shoulders. “I’m so, so sorry. You sacrificed most of your last week of training before the finals to help me get better and to support my dad. We literally have no family or friends—literally none.” I pause, the thought hitting me about how lonely my past has been. After my mom’s death, what little interaction we had with her family on the East Coast disappeared, and my dad mentioned his parents so little that at times I question if they actually exist and if maybe he is a literal robot (I didn’t actually believe my father was a robot as a kid, but I won’t lie—the thought has crossed my mind). All I had was Jake and my mom, while my dad worked. Now, with Jake siding against me and throwing a party that led to my old house collapsing, all I have is Riva.

  And I’m afraid I’m going to lose her too.

  “Just thank you.” My voice finally breaks through the silence. “Thank you for being there for me and for my dad when no one else could. You sacrificed so much.” I sit up and push the covers off me.

  “What are you doing?” She eyes me sus
piciously as I make my way over to the small dresser. I pick up the glowing diamond medallion draped across it. A sea of event staff flooded me immediately as I walked backstage after dropping it in front of an audience of tens of thousands of people. They handed it to me, most shocked by my action, and I took it, forcing my way out of the Garden as fast as I could. The entire time I kept it in my pocket, my fingers grazing over the smooth crystals every few seconds. Even as I pick it up now, it is so dense yet so beautiful that I can’t help but stop for a second and admire it.

  “Do you know why I dropped this?” I hold it up, its exterior barely shimmering in the blackness. She sits up, the covers falling to her waist to reveal her naked breasts.

  “No.” She shakes her head. She looks frustrated, even maddened. Her eyes can barely even look at the medallion; instead she glances out the window and the faint rays of city lights that peek through the closed shades.

  “This feeling. This goal. This dream that we both sacrificed so much for. I realized how pointless it all was.” I swallow. “This didn’t change anything in my life. This doesn’t make me happy. It’s a reminder that I’m not. A reminder that nothing will magically make my life better. Looking at this diamond medallion and realizing there is no seismic shift in my life makes me want more. It makes me want all the power in the world. But at the same time, I wanna give up. I wanna stop chasing things. Stop chasing happiness, and live in this moment, forever with you.” I pause, carefully examining her expression as I walk over to the bed with the medallion in my hand.

  “That’s why I want to give this to you. You deserve this just as much as I do. And I know better than anyone that this medallion is no substitute for victory, but it’s a symbol. That maybe the diamond is worthless to me, maybe the money is, maybe even victory itself means nothing. I’m still trying to figure it out. But I know this: you mean something to me. You mean a lot to me. And I don’t know what’s gonna happen in the future, but I want you to have this as a reminder that I’m always here for you. And that in the moments we aren’t together, I wish it were different.”