5

Pretending to be asleep while Vernon, and his buddy looked me over slowly. The kid in my grip was covering his mouth in an attempt to reduce the amount of sound his breathing might create. He'd just overheard some really bad sounding conversation. Everything Vernon had just explained to his buddy sounded like bad news. It didn't take a genius to figure that much out.

Vernon slowly seemed to drop his guard.

"Fucking thing..." Vernon trailed off into mumbling to himself, "Once we kill this thing then we'll be hailed as conquering heroes. No one will have the balls to question anything we have to say after that." he moved toward the warehouse door, "Spread the word to the others. I'll get Calen on board. He won't be able to ignore the nest for long so we should have a party together before the end of the week. We might even get to use the vehicles."

The mage guy nodded to Vernon before leaving first in a rush. He didn't like being in here with me. He didn't seem nearly as confident about Vernon's whole plan as Vernon was. He just wasn't strong enough to argue with him. Vernon watched me for nearly a full minute before leaving.

He would have been just as oblivious as usual to me listening it if I'd been able to control myself, but I just had to growl when he called me a flying lizard. I couldn't help myself. I slowly uncoiled out of my sleeping position, and set the kid down next to me gently as I watched Vernon's heat signature continue to move away. I growled to myself mostly as I watched him go. Wishing once again I could just kill the bastard.

"Did I just hear what I thought I heard?" the kid brought me out of my murderous state of mind by speaking.

"No," I ordered, "You didn't hear anything. Not until after this is all over." Focusing on the kid with both eyes, "If Vernon catches wind of you overhearing anything he'll dispose of you in a heartbeat. Do you understand?"

The kid just nodded quickly, and nervously.

"We'll finish our discussion another time," I created a spatial portal that led to where the kid had been hiding before, "Think about my offer, and go home for now."

He stared at me as I appeared to ignore him for a few long seconds before wheeling his way through the portal. I mentally forced all my bonded awake, and asked them to come to me for a bit. Ethan was the only one that was happy to have his sleep interrupted. Rushing into the warehouse while still wearing what he'd been sleeping in. Jax wasn't far behind him, but at least he was dressed, and ready.

Savannah took her sweet time. Making coffee for the other two as well as herself before coming into the warehouse fully dressed like Jax.

"Vernon is making his move," I announced without waiting for Savannah to pass out coffee to the other two, "I want you to find out what this nest of spiders is, and why it's so dangerous. Vernon seems to think it'll be a perfect place to farm cores. I want to know as much as you can find out. I don't care if it's just hearsay, and rumors."

Ethan was the first one to move out. Savannah went back into the office apartment. Jax just shrugged helplessly. He wasn't exactly the studious type. He didn't even know where to start.

"Do you want to spar a bit to get the blood pumping?" I asked since Jax was struggling to figure out where to start.

"Why?" Jax huffed out a laugh, "So I can loose in three seconds flat."

"I'll hold back," I shuffled closer as amusement hung around the fringes of my mind, "I want to see how much you've grown. I'd hate to find that I've been wasting mana on you this whole time."

I knew I was egging him on. He knew I was egging him on. Yet he still took the bait. I took my human form to spar with him since I hadn't fought as a human for a good long while, and those were the skills that needed the rust polished off the most. I was glad to know that my system wasn't letting me forget anything that I'd learned from Goliath.

I held back just enough to be just slightly stronger then Jax. Forcing him to use his full capabilities he entire hour that we sparred back, and forth. Jax looked more like laundry fresh out of the washer when I was done. Every inch of him was thoroughly damp with sweat, and he could barely stand. He stood there gasping like a fish for over a minute.

"I thought you said that you would hold back," he said a word between each gasp.

"I was holding back," I smirked as I watched the heat signatures outside of the wall for any that might be headed this way, "I would have won a long time ago if I'd gone at you full force. Just be glad this wasn't a magic battle. My capacity for mana is so far ahead of yours that its kind of stupid."

"You suck," Jax clearly didn't mean the insult.

I could've been able to tell by his tone even if I didn't have access to his mind. I was debating on switching forms just in case, but I didn't see anyone coming my way. I didn't see any problems with staying in my human form for the time being. I could feel discomfort crawling up my spine. I didn't want anyone seeing Wyatt Nix with my bonded.

Wyatt Nix was a criminal on paper. Dangerous, and unpredictable. Nix my current alter ego was just a pet creature. A creature was easy enough to ignore. They didn't usually have an agenda.

People underestimated my intelligence. Vernon was particularly guilty of that. I'd thought about how stupid Vernon was for discussing his plans in front of me multiple times. I'd openly shown him hostility on multiple occasions, and yet he still preferred to talk in here because people didn't want to come in my warehouse. It was my space.