Although he wasn’t the oldest of Erik’s children, he definitely wasn’t a forgotten child; if anything, Erik was pretty good at distributing his wealth among all 12 of his kids and giving them an equal amount of attention. However, he also brought them into the fold as Trained Mercenaries.
His sons and daughters were all trained like Navy Seals, from physical combat to shooting and tactics. Each of his 12 kids was a monster in their own right, and while not all of them survived to the Descent of Arkadia, seven did.
Together with their father, the remaining seven members of the Colt Family transformed their Mercenary group into a powerful underground force in the Origin Timeline, burning through their funds to buy up all the resources they could when Arkadia appeared, and soon enough, Stillwater, returned to its former glory as a formidable force to be reckoned with.
Yet this was only possible due to the tight bonds and structure of their chain of command. At the Top, of course, was Erik, who ruled with an iron fist. Under his leadership, recruits, each of whom had prior military service, were molded into perfect warriors.
Roy, the oldest of the children, was in charge of logistics; it was his job to book clients and set up the mission directives for each operation before passing them down to his oldest sister, Olivia.
Olivia’s main job was "Human Relations," a fancy title that boiled down to her being the one who assigned the missions to specific operators or teams of operators.
Olivia would often report to the youngest sister, Charlotte, who was in charge of Stillwater Finances.
Maya, the second oldest sister, was in charge of Intel; gathering, collecting, and researching their targets were all under her banner; basically, she was the one in charge of Stillwater’s spy ring. Her network was so extensive that it rivaled my own, which is saying something because I basically had one or two puppets planted in every large group on Earth, even the ones in the Myriad races.
Jacob and Grant, the 2nd brother and youngest brother, were in charge of training and resource allocation; they worked hand in hand to mold Stillwater’s operators into the monsters of the battlefield they needed to be to keep a perfect completion record.
And last but not least was Fredrick Colt. My File on him was nowhere near as extensive as the other members of the Colt Family, and I couldn’t be blamed for that, as he was basically the one constantly on the battlefield, or so I believe.
I had never met or seen the guy before, but since he was not only a returner but also shared multiple physical traits with his siblings, it wasn’t difficult to place him as the mysterious 7th sibling.
All I knew about the guy was that he was in charge of procuring potential missions and presenting them to his father, which told me he was both well-spoken and charismatic, along with being powerful as he would need to be in dangerous territories and negotiating with Rankers above a certain threshold of power.
For him to be the one moving around and getting cards was both weird and on-brand for him, as I didn’t doubt he was doing it at the behest of a client.
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Still, I didn’t close the door on the potential that he was doing it to lure out other returners.
Sitting in the back seat, I noticed that Deeana hadn’t even started the engine as she was waiting for me to tell her where we were going next.
"Dee, we are going to the fourth shop on the list," I said while falling back into thought and allowing Deeana to get me where we needed to go.
’Odds are, with him being ahead of me by around 30-40 minutes, he should be at the second location, maybe on his way to the third shop, provided he did what I did and went down the list from the phone book in order.’
’Although, unlike me, he didn’t call ahead, so there is a chance he instead is just going around to every cardshop in Orlando…regardless, I’m not worried.’
’In the worst case scenario, things devolve into a shootout between Fredrick and me, along with the two operators Fredrick has with him, followed by a no-holds-barred Returner fight like I had back in Scotland. The only issue is Deeana being present.’ Glancing up at the rearview mirror from the back seat, I caught the young lady’s eye, making her smile sweetly back at me.
’Yeah, she can’t be close, so I will have her drop me off a mile or two away from the shop, then head there on foot.’ And that was what I went with; after a 20-minute drive from O-Town Sports cards, I had Deeana pull into a shopping center on the grounds that I wanted her to get me some snacks for later tonight before telling her to take her time and that I had an errand to complete that would take me a while.
After that, I informed her that if I did not get back to the car in 2 hours, she was free to head home, and I would meet her back there. Mind you, I sent it all through Telepathic transmission combined with a hint of Coersion so that she didn’t think anything was out of the ordinary.
With Deeana disappearing into the store to shop for groceries, I got out of the car and looked at my surroundings before pulling up my hood and disappearing from my spot as if I had never been there in the first place.
Although it was a bit annoying to move through shopping centers and neighborhoods unnoticed, I arrived at the card shop within four minutes.
DING, DONG, DING
Pushing open the door, which chimed to alert the staff of my arrival, I briskly walked up to the counter, where a fat middle-aged nerdy guy covered in acne sat on a wooden stool that, to my surprise, held his immense weight.
"What do you want, kid, where’s your mommy? Don’t you know not to walk into stores unaccompanied?" The guy said, causing my left eye to twitch as I held back from slaughtering him like a pig then and there.
"I’m looking for P*Kemon Cards….I heard they were coming out, so I came." I said, putting on my kid act.
"They come out tomorrow, and while I have plenty in stock, you need your mommy to pay me since I don’t give them out for free." With a scoff, the guy waved me away; however, before I could respond to his arrogant claim, I sensed something in the parking lot….Particles.
’Bingo…’