Down Deep

Chapter Thirty Three - Grant

Grant spent his days either working with his grandfather at the forge, or on the terminal sitting at Zdana's side. His mate had not yet woken and it had been almost a month. Solivis had refused to fight Grant and he kept his medal. Stine wanted to hold off on the hammering until Zdana woke. He had faith that it would be any day now. His grandfather had told Grant the longest anyone stayed with the Mother was only a week at most. Whatever Zdana was being told or shown must be of great importance.

Grant did not care, he just wanted his mate back safe and sound. He looked her over frowning confused. She had not even twitched the entire month. Amazingly, she was still a healthy weight and had lost no muscle mass. Four days after they rebroke her leg, Panta and Reese had done a new scan to check how the break was healing. Everyone was surprised to see the bone fully mended and straight.

His terminal beeped drawing his attention. With a sigh, he turned it on and checked his messages. He had been in constant contact with the hackers he had turned against the council. With their help, he had been able to keep the councilman's grandson from finding them.

There was a news feed waiting for his attention. Someone had attacked a councilor Missra nearly killing her. A group calling themselves, The Capital City Purveyors of Justice, took full credit for the attack. In addition, they sent out feeds to every citynet terminal exposing the council woman's involvement in sending innocent people to the mines, or forcing them to take the long walk.

This was good news for the people in Gateway. The council would take their attention off the mines and focus on the Purveyors. Grant had no idea why the group was so obsessed with finding the location of the missing miners. They had stopped inputting a lot onto Citynet. By the lack of information recently, he was sure they had made a new server just for themselves. With Zdana's help, they could find it, but he had no luck on his own.

'Oy boy.' He looked up to see Kenya watching him frowning. 'They be find'n something on the east end. You need to be coming.' He set the terminal aside and followed his aunt out of the clinic. 'A group that be explore'n and clean'n out some of the empty houses be find'n something in the house. Needs a password to be gett'n in. We tired, but it not be work'n right.'

'Which house?' Grant asked frowning. He had thought they had completed the map of Gateway. Someone had even hung a huge copy right outside of the library for everyone to see.

'That big one Marcell be want'n to move into for all his kit.' She explained. 'They be the ones who be find'n it. After what we be find'n in that last one, not so sure we should be open'n it.' Grant nodded his agreement. He had not been there himself, but Zava and Logi had told him the whole tale.

A group who was clearing houses had found a hatch in the floor under an old rug. It had led down into a secret basement full of all kinds of nasty looking torture devices. A journal told a twisted tale of kidnappings and murder. The man had almost twenty kills before the journal ended. Looking into Citynet, Grant found the news stories. The man had been caught when his last victim had escaped. The city watch had not found his hidden room, but the man bragged about all the people he had killed and how. There had been no trial at all. They had just sent him to take the long walk and his name had been erased from their history.

Not all of the discoveries had been that bad. Some had even yielded some useful items. A house near the exit doors had belonged to a smuggler and they had found crates full of tools and items that had come up from the mines.

The big house that was on the edge if the city had caught a few people's interest. Constructed completely out of hard stone, it was twice the size of any other house in the city and even had a second floor and a basement. Marcell, whose family had taken up three houses near the edge of the main street had put in a bid for this place months ago. He had not been alone, and there had been big fights over who would get to move in there.