Roz sat forward. “What agencies?”
“CIA. NSA.” Valor paused. “Occasionally, the FBI and DEA. Jo also has trusted contacts in the DoD.”
Roz let out a disbelieving laugh. “So are y’all like…spies or some shit?”
Valor’s answer was a low rumble. “We prefer harbingers of justice.”
Gage absorbed that word. Justice. He wasn’t sure he knew what it meant anymore.
“So, you save lives?”
Zorion’s voice glided toward him from across the cabin. “We save nations.”
We?
They were speaking as if he belonged in this harbingers gang.
“And I’m expected to…what?” he asked.
“It’s your choice whether you join us. But you already possess the enhancements.”
Gage ground his molars.
“I get it,” Valor lowered his voice. “Zorion and I went through the same horrors as you and Scar. But the program wasn’t always corrupt and cruel. The Blacks and Browns volunteered.”
Gage swallowed thickly.
“Valor and I were Navy warfare captains. During a mission, we got stranded in the Amazon, and that’s where the Ravens got us. They drugged us, erased our existence, and did experiments…”
Gage could hear the pain and anger still lingering under the strength.
“What kind of experiments?” Roz asked.
“They injected animal DNA into us. I have PUMA blood, and Zorion has a hawks’. I have strength and he has incomparable eyesight.”
“Wow.” Roz gasped.
“It may sound cool but trust me, it was excruciating. Many nights, I wished for death, that one of those injections would finally kill me.”
“Jesus.” Gage felt bile rise in his throat.
“But Jo got us out of there and took us someplace safe,” Valor said. “A place that taught us how to master what’d been forced into us. She rebuilt the program into what it should’ve been all along. Honorable, disciplined, and accountable.”
Gage leaned forward. “But…you kill, right?”
Zorion didn’t pause. “We do what must be done.”
“God’s commandment says, ‘thou shalt not kill.’” Gage said, “I won’t take a life.”
“And no one will ever force you to,” Zorion said. “If your faith is your weapon, so be it.”
Gage nodded.
“Each Raven carries a codename. A name earned by their skill, character, ability, or fight style.” He paused. “I look forward to discovering yours.”
Gage leaned back in his seat.
He may be lost between the man he’d been and the one he was becoming. But one thing he knew for certain…he would never lose his Christianity.
