Pantheon 3 – Return of Apollo
Chapter 1
Here is the first look at the third novel in the Limitless Logistics series, was released on December 15, 2024. Just like The Memo and Make It Three while there are no spoilers, I highly recommend you finish reading “Pantheon” and “Pantheon 2: Ares & Athena” prior to reading as the characters and their roles will make much more sense that way.
Haven’t bought it yet? You can find Pantheon in both paperback and e-book on Amazon as well as “Pantheon 2: Ares & Athena.”
Already read it? I’d love you to write a recommendation on GoodReads or on Amazon!
Valerie “Athena” Hall – 0854L/1254Z, 17 OCT
From her office in the depths of the downtown Limitless Logistics office, Val’s eyes occasionally flicked to the CCTV video at the edge of her monitor. She was grinding through the day’s paperwork, a military construction project known as a MILCON effort, for the 467th Logistical Group’s new headquarters at Fort Belvoir, Virginia. The proposal was months late and already over budget. Val ground her teeth, anticipating the fight she would have with Missouri’s senior Senator Maureen Mitchell and the Pantheon’s grudging ally. Val sighed and irritably pushed her red-gold hair behind her shoulder again. Reading the report was far less stimulating than watching potential Pantheon candidates arrive for screening.
Just two months ago, when the Pantheon’s extraordinary and highly secret gifts had been exposed on the greens of the National Mall, they had taken an aggressive and controversial step of opening the front doors to the public. In Mandy’s first national address as “Hestia,” she had welcomed anyone and everyone who thought they belonged in Limitless Logistics to show up to see if they possessed teleportation skills, called “Jumping” by the Pantheon. A week later, the first flock of candidates arrived and quick thinking on Val’s part had weeded out the group of hopefuls, revealing Jafar and Rachel as having their vaunted power.
They had since adopted her method as their standard method of screening. A member of the so-called Pantheon, usually Damarcus, would greet the candidates with a firm handshake, telepathically impress Point Zero’s image into their minds, then teleport to the location with an expectation those with the ability would follow. Like Jafar and Rachel, those who truly possessed the skill would know how to follow him. Those who didn’t were gently but firmly escorted out by security.
Two months, Val thought.
They had a flood of people try to join them and had been forced to formalize the meeting and time. Today was the advertised in-processing day and Val hoped to find just one real candidate in the usual flock of wannabes.
Her eyes flicked to the monitor again.
In two months, only one other person had been able to follow Damarcus to the Jump room. Val wanted to groan just thinking of Braxton Chadwick Nelson’s dubious tenure at Limitless Logistics. Chadwick, who hated his first name, was already twenty-nine, far older than even Val when she appeared. He admitted to being able to Jump for the past handful of years and to using his ability, plus his family’s considerable wealth, to wander the world partying. He also admitted that his decade-long cocaine habit had impeded his ability to Jump on more than one occasion.
Val’s jaw clenched. The little shit had been nothing but trouble since arriving, taking a stance of entitlement at every opportunity, even sneering at their considerable pay, which far exceeded anything Val had ever thought achievable in her life. To Chadwick and his family, it was a small addition to the interest from their considerable holdings.
The Limitless Logistics team had been working on getting him ready to be on missions, but so far, none of the Pantheon or their partner agencies had been willing to accept him for a full mission.
Val had nine active Pantheon members to cover two companies with distinctly different missions and she desperately needed more. Unfortunately, that meant she kept Chadwick on her books, despite his obvious flaws. Even if he was never truly useful, she wanted to keep the little party animal in check and keep him from making a bad name for them.
The newly reformed and rebranded Limitless Logistics held true to its roots and was the premier “just in time” logistics company, hauling humanitarian aid, organ transplants, or critical commercial and non-military cargo for those who could pay. The former Limitless Logistics had been split, chipping off the military personnel and cargo movements into Spartan Tactical. And overseeing it all was Valerie “Athena” Hall, CEO of Athena Strategic Enterprises, or the 467th Logistical Group, and her stalwart deputy, Damarcus Washington. She hated splitting apart Marco Martinez’s hard work, but after being exposed in what had been dubbed the “Battle for D.C.” the rebranding had been necessary.
Val’s desperation for new members to fill two companies was enough to allow Chadwick to remain on the Limitless Logistics roster but it wasn’t great enough to let him work alone yet. Jafar and Rachel, though slightly less new than Chadwick, had issues that limited the missions to which they could be assigned. She sighed, absent-mindedly running a hand through her red-gold hair, and let her gaze wander.
The monitor streamed the feeds from security cameras at the building’s front door, lobby, and a small conference room that doubled as an in-processing or briefing room. She watched a few people loitering within camera range of the front door and checked her clock. They had six minutes until the designated screening time and Val didn’t anticipate many of them heading inside for at least three more minutes.
Despite a media blitz designed to show Limitless Logistics and its personnel in a positive light, not everyone in America had bought their message. Many people were scared of their capabilities, even as they sought to join them. Val sighed and twirled her pen around her thumb.
From opposite sides of the screen, two men turned and started toward the door. Val watched as one opened the door and held it for the other, a charming smile on his face. She squinted. It was difficult to see from the CCTV cameras, but the man looked familiar and she squinted harder, trying to overcome the low resolution of the camera. As the front doors closed behind them, she saw others start walking toward the entryway.
Val clicked on the audio for the conference room, intending to listen to the welcoming brief. It didn’t change much from week to week, but she did occasionally enjoy the startled exclamations as the week’s briefer seemed to appear from thin air or Jumped abruptly away. Val checked the roster and saw that Damarcus was doing this week’s briefing. She smiled. Her Deputy had an easy manner and calm smile that set even the most skittish applicants at ease.
Setting her paperwork aside, Val abandoned any pretense and focused on her screen. She counted five people in the room now and scrutinized their faces, looking for any sign that they might possess the natural ability to teleport from one location to another and weren’t just there to sneak a peek inside the building.
One woman’s face showed a slight smirk and Val dismissed her as a looky-loo, possibly a reporter from an obscure tabloid or social media “influencer” looking for the real inside scoop. It had happened at least twice so far and Val shook her head over the lengths folks would go to for their own fame.
Two men sat easily in the plush leather chairs at the conference table and Val mentally dismissed them as well; if they had the skill, they would look more nervous. Val searched the screen for the two she’d seen first enter the building. One, a dour-looking man, stood tensely near the door. Val squinted again and tried to find the one who had looked familiar as Damarcus Jumped into the room, but she could only see his shoulder, just out of the frame.
She chuckled as half the people reacted to his arrival. The woman’s smirk wiped from her face as she stood from her chair, the dour man’s frown deepened, and the two lounging at the conference table pushed back. The man who had been out of the frame stepped close and Val could see his face clearly for the first time.
Shock hit her like a frigid wave and she went rigid in her chair.
“Anna!” Val shouted to her secretary. “Anna, get the conference room on the line right now! Don’t let Dee pass the Jump room location!”
Val watched in horror, strangely transfixed and unable to move, as Damarcus started his welcome speech, unaware of who sat in the room.
“Good morning and welcome to Limitless Logistics. I understand you are presenting yourself as candidate logistics officers?” He scanned their faces as they nodded. Just like shy middle schoolers on the first day of class, no one volunteered to speak.
Val could hear the phone on the conference room table ring as he spoke.
“Very well, then. I am Damarcus Washington. It’s a pleasure to meet you all.”
He walked from behind the lectern. “Now, if you are the kind of candidate we’re seeking, you will be able to follow me.”
Something in Val unfroze as he moved. She Jumped to the conference room, determined to intercept Damarcus before he could pass Point Zero’s location, deep inside their facility. Despite her new resolve, she was too late to stop Damarcus from shaking hands with Apollo, an agent of Svoboda, the Russian terrorist version of their organization.
“Dee, that’s Apollo!” Val shouted.
Apollo whipped around to regard her. His face was unreadable and in the moment, the only thing Val took in was his presence.
“They are coming. You have to evacuate your headquarters,” Apollo said in barely accented but stilted English. “They are coming for you.” He gave a slight bow of his head to her and Jumped away.
Damarcus looked at her questioningly, his warm brown eyes meeting her wide-open hazel. “Who?”
“One of Miller’s Svoboda teammates from this spring,” she told him. Val snatched the ringing phone. “Anna, flush the building,” she said quickly and hung up.
“Oh, fuck. Val, oh God, Val. I didn’t even realize!” Damarcus told her as his light brown face went pale.
Val shook her head and turned to the candidates. “Get out!” She turned back to Damarcus, “Dee, I’m arming up. Meet me in the Jump room.”
Val Jumped to her office and grabbed the small handgun holstered under her desk. “Anna, flush everyone!” She yelled out into the outer office as she snapped the magazine into a Sig Sauer P380.
“Already on it, General Hall,” Anna called back.
“Everyone, Anna,” she said, thumbing the safety off. “Call Hank to warn him. We’ve been breached.”
A breach by those who shared her ability to teleport was her nightmare. Once someone had the visual impression of a space, any space, they could teleport in and out at their will. The handshake Damarcus shared with Apollo had deliberately impressed the image of Point Zero, deeply embedded behind their security lines in his mind. The image was now available to anyone Apollo cared to share it with, including his Svoboda teammates.
Anna nodded once, head already pressing the little used red phone to her shoulder as Val Jumped into their Point Zero, the room specifically set aside for barrier-free teleportation departures and arrivals and unoriginally named the “Jump room.” The tall, blond-haired, and blue-eyed man stood calmly in the middle of the room, clearly waiting for her. Val snapped her weapon up and pointed it at his chest.
“Why?” was all she could grind out. An alarm started blaring and Val heard Anna’s calm voice call across the interphone system. Her finger twitched on the trigger and Val could feel the spring tension start to ride the hammer.
“All personnel, all personnel. Breach, breach, breach. Proceed to your stations, fallback Alpha.”
“Do I scare you that much?” Apollo’s voice was smooth with a hint of a guttural Russian accent.
Damarcus appeared beside Val. “The candidates are running scared. Alpha?”
Val nodded, her eyes still on Apollo. “Seems safest.”
“He won’t be pleased,” Damarcus told her. “You know, Hank—”
“Don’t!” Val cut him off sharply, seeing the look in Apollo’s eyes.
Running footsteps sounded in the hall and Val flinched, strongly reminded of another occasion where she held a Svoboda member at gunpoint on Point Zero.
Val sneered at Apollo. “I killed him right here. You know that, right?”
Apollo flinched back. His eyes went hard and narrow. “We knew he was dead. I assumed it was at your hand. Now I know.”
Val watched his jaw tighten and brought the tip of her gun up as he swallowed hard. Her pulse was hammering in her ears, but she mastered her breathing.
Breathe in for a four count, hold for a four count, exhale for a four count, she told herself.
“Why are you here, Apollo?” She closed one eye and centered the gun steadily between his eyes.
“Would you believe me if I told you it was because it was the only place I could be safe?” Apollo’s posture was shockingly loose for someone who had a gun pointed at his chest.
“Nope,” Val told him harshly. “Try again.”
“They are coming for you. You are in danger and I do not want you to be harmed.”
“Liar,” Val snarled, finger slowly applying pressure to the trigger.
“No lie. They are coming.”
“Who? Vmeste? The oligarchy’s pets?” Damarcus asked.
“Worse, Svoboda and they want you dead.” Apollo nodded to her once again, smiling sadly, and Jumped.
I hope you enjoy this first chapter! The e-book is available for pre-order now and both will publish on December 15, 2024. In the mean time, I would love to hear from you on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and TikTok or by email! Stay up to date on the latest KR Paul news by joining our mailing list. Or find my wild stories of cave diving, ultramarathons, blacksmithing, or powerlifting. As always, thank you dear fans!
Cheers,
Kay
