9th Dec 2003 to 6th Jan 2004
Bound By Western Blakehawke
Set after Freak Nation. February 2023
Sequel to Unwelcome Ties. Set around fourteen months after the events of the last chapter.
Ames and Will come face to face again just over sixteen months after they first met.
Prologue
In Seattle.
The Transgenics were still living in Terminal City and in safe houses around Seattle.
Logan, Original Cindy and Sketchy were living together in Sandemann's old house, not the most ideal arrangement but necessary for security reasons.
Most Ordinaries still feared the Transgenics, though there were a growing number who were taking their side and fighting for their rights.
Special Agent in Charge Ames White was keeping up the propaganda, on the orders of The Conclave, while still being in secret communication with X0-378, the Transgenic who had adopted his son and allowed Ray to contact him whenever he wanted by phone.
In New Brunswick Canada.
Will had adopted thirty eight more transgenic children. The children she had already adopted, Bret nineteen, Nikita seventeen, Cassidy and Cooper sixteen, Daniel nine, James (Ray) eight and twins Robyn and Ryanne seven, were all ecstatic at having more siblings even though it meant that they had to share their rooms and that there was even less of Will's attention.
Eight of these children had been sent to Will with a two and a half months pregnant Jace, and her fourteen month old daughter Maxie, by Max and Logan eleven weeks after Will and her original adopted children arrived at their new home and twelve days after Ray had phoned his father to wish him a happy birthday. Max and Logan had contacted Will who happily agreed to taking Jace and Maxie and also willingly agreed to adopt eight more kids.
The eight children were, at the time of Will adopting them aged and known as: X6's: Rad seventeen male; Paul and Peter clones sixteen and Frazer fifthteen. X8: Hobo eight male. X9: Nellie three. X10's: Missy and Sissy clones almost two. There were five boys and three girls.
Will changed five of their names: Rad became Nikalye; Hobo became Jarred; Nellie became Xena; clones Missy and Sissy became Coral and Crystal.
Jace had split with Andy's father before she knew she was pregnant, it had not been a healthy relationship, after finding herself with one baby and another on the way, Jace had returned to Seattle and Max and Logan for support, they had decided to send her and Maxie to the safety of Will's Canadian farm.
Just over six and a half months after Will left Seattle she had been called back for her knowledge in reading Minoan script. Logan had managed to locate and acquire a document, which was to fragile to be scanned and although a copy was made and sent to Will she decided that she had better see the original because she knew that no matter how careful the person doing the coping was small errors might have been made which would alter the meaning of the script.
The document turned out to be a lineage for a Familiar family, just as the copy had indicated. The references to The Coming that she had wished to double check were no more than passing references. Will fully translated it into English in case even this seemingly innocuous data might prove helpful.
Will returned with twelve more children, she renamed them were necessary before they left, their ages at adoption were. X6's: Jubilee seventeen female; Griffin fifthteen; Montanna fifthteen and Leia fourteen. X8's: Harrison nine; Hannibal nine; Heather nine; Emma eight and Perry six. X9: Remy three. X10's Darwin and Dashiell one both male. There were seven boys and five girls. Will turned Harrison, Hannibal and Heather into triplets.
The other eighteen had arrived twenty seven days after Will returned to Canada with the newest additions to her family. They had left Manticore together and had stuck together. Krit and Syl ran into them and having known that Will had moved to Canada because they were on their way to visit and to rest up on their journey to a new hiding place they took the eighteen children with them.
The eighteen were, at the time of Will adopting them aged and known as: Male X6's: Ace eighteen; Tex and Lex clones seventeen; Mix fifthteen; Jex fifthteen; Craig fifthteen and Josiah fourteen. Female X6's: Mallie and Marlie twins sixteen. Male X8's: Jacob nine; Mark seven and Eddie seven; Female X8: Erin seven. Male X9's: Jace five; Teby four; Dex and Deak twins three. Female X9: Quinn five. There were fourteen boys and four girls.
Will had automatically made the decision to adopt them too as soon as she saw them, since it was the safest and most practical course of action.
Will changed twelve of their names, two only slightly: Ace became Saxon, clones Tex became Martin and Lex became Michael, Mix and Jex became Todd and Tyler and say they are twins. Twins Mallie and Marlie became Natasha and Natalia. Eddie became Ethaniel and became a twin with Erin. Jace became Jason and Teby became Toby, and twins Dex and Deak became Dean and Devon.
In total Will renamed twenty four of her new children, although with Jace she just lengthened it to Jason and altered Teby to Toby. Most X's appear to be bad at choosing or giving decent names. She also gave all of her new children two middle names to go with their new surname of Wolfe.
Will's new children were Caucasian, Latino, Asian, Native American or Canadian in appearance. There were seventeen X6's; ten X8's; seven X9's and four X10's.
Almost a month after Will adopted the group of eighteen children, Logan and Max sent her another X family.
X5's Zari and Dan had met escaping Manticore they had helped ten boys and six girls to escape as well and had swiftly formed a family. Their children are named and currently aged: X10 Benjy two, X9's Johnny three, Robert four and twins Kara and Carrie five, X8's Tom seven, Oscar eight, Charlie nine, Bella nine, Lucy ten, X6's Jeremiah fifthteen, clones Darcy and Jewel sixteen, Reilly seventeen, Heath eighteen and Colt nineteen. Zari and Dan have decided not to have their own children.
Because of the huge increase in her number of children and family living on the farm. Will decided to allow her older X6's to live in the three two and one bedroom cabins, Zari and Dan followed suit, allowing their X6's to room with Will's. Jace lived in the other two bed cabin.
Zari, Dan and their eleven younger children moved into the four bedroom bunk house.
Will decided that the only thing to do was to extend the two one bedroom cabins and the two, two bed cabins into two, two beds and two three bed cabins as well as extending the bunkhouse so that it would have twelve bedrooms.
Having looked at the costs and planning for the future she also decided that it was worthwhile building a new eight bedroom bunk house and five new cabins; two four bed, two five bed and a six bed, as well. She also decided that teaching the children in house was no longer practical and so added a large two story four room school house to the list of construction projects. Luckily the lumber from their own woods was of building quality and the previous owner had used and sold it as such, bringing down the expense of all the construction work.
The workmen Will had hired cheerfully agreed to teach the X6's their skills and the X6's were happy to become apprentices. Zari discovered a passion for all things building related and joined the apprenticeship scheme. Jace, Dan and Will attended some of the lessons.
In the last three and a half weeks, Logan and Max had sent two other X families to live on the farm.
Nailin a pregnant X5, who had turned up in Terminal city a few days after the Jam Pony siege, she gave birth a few weeks later to a girl whom she named Sapphire, Nailin's breeding partner had died when Manticore was raised.
Then Tay a male X5 turned up with his five week old son Dax, his mate had been seriously wounded in the escape and only sheer will power and determination had kept her alive long enough to give birth.
Tay and Nailin quickly partnered up and had soon adopted six Transgenic children. Their children are now aged: Sapphire seventeen and a half months, Dax nineteen months; Amy a five year old X9, two X8's Jack seven and Chloe ten and three X6's Nick fifthteen, Tara sixteen and Pierce seventeen. Nailin is four and a half months pregnant.
An X5 couple, Zia and Rocky, who had been breeding partners and had fallen for each other also turned up after the Jam Pony siege, with their newborn daughter Tamara now seventeen months old, Zia had given birth a few weeks earlier. They then adopted five Transgenic daughters. Now aged: X8's Abby seven and Callie eight and X6's Brooke fifthteen, Rianne (pronounced Re-Anne.) sixteen and Angel eighteen. Zia is three months pregnant.
Each of Will's siblings, nieces and nephews, who live on her farm, know about who Jay really is, that he is really Ray White, and that Will allows him to speak to his father whenever he wants.
None of them questioned this because they were used to doing as Will ordered because she out ranked them and they also trusted her judgement and besides she was infamous at Manticore for being stubborn so there would be little point in arguing anyway because when she really wanted to she win she would verbally entangle her opponent and they would get so confused that they ended up accidentally agreeing.
Because of this very annoying skill Will had always been accompanied on official meetings so that Deck or whoever wanted to speak with her had some back up, and she was always removed before she could get into full swing. This course of action first became standard practice with Will when she was only nine years old.
An annoying development as far as Will was concerned with her nieces and nephews, was that Jay as well as having got all of his older siblings determined to marry her off to his father, had also managed to enlist his older cousins in the campaign. The biological, X10's and younger X9's children being too young to really help actively pressure yet, though Jay had already begun telling them all about the cool stuff he did with his dad and starting to ready them for the campaign.
Following Will's lead her siblings agreed to the policy of allowing the older X6's, sixteen and over, to live in either of the bunk houses or in the X6 cabins. Part of the deal was that most still had a room mate. The adults had decided to keep three of the cabins free for guests, because the farm was used as a stopping off point, by fleeing Transgenics, and others whom Logan needed to get out of the States.
Living arrangements on the farm, all the homes are inside a two acre compound, the homes are: Main house; one twelve bed bunk house; one eight bed bunk house; two, two bedroom cabins; two three bedroom cabins; three four bedroom cabins, one five bedroom cabin and one six bedroom cabin.
Accommodation assignments are as follows:
Main house.
First Floor:
Will's suite: lounge; large bathroom; two walk in closets and dressing rooms and a very large bedroom.
Alec's bedroom and en-suite bathroom.
Children's bedroom and en-suite bathroom 1: Montanna and Leia both fifthteen.
Children's bedroom and en-suite bathroom 2: Todd and Tyler both fifthteen
Children's bedroom and en-suite bathroom 3: Craig and Josiah both fifthteen.
Loft:
Children's bedroom and en-suite shower room 4: Jacob ten, Harrison and Hannibal nine.
Children's bedroom and en-suite shower room 5: Jarred nine, Daniel nine and James eight.
Children's bedroom and en-suite shower room 6: Heather nine and Emma eight.
Children's bedroom 7: Mark eight, Ethaniel seven and Perry seven.
Children's bedroom 8: Jason five, Toby five and Remy four.
Children's bedroom 9: Quinn five and Xena four.
Children's bedroom 10: Robyn, Ryanne and Erin all seven.
Ground Floor:
Children's bedroom 11 (Formerly the playroom.): Dean, Devon, Coral, Crystal all three and Darwin and Dashiell two.
The two, two bedroom cabins:
First: Male X6 quarters:
Bedroom 1: Bret nineteen.
Bedroom 2: Colt nineteen.
Second Female X6 quarters:
Bedroom 1: Jubilee eighteen.
Bedroom 2: Angel eighteen
The two three bedroom cabins:
First Jace's Home:
Bedroom 1: Jace.
Bedroom 2: Maxie two.
Bedroom 3: Andy six months.
Second: Guest Cabin.
The three four bedroom cabins:
First: Zia and Rocky's Home:
Bedroom 1: Zia and Rocky.
Bedroom 2: Tamara seventeen months.
Bedroom 3: Abby seven and Callie eight.
Bedroom 4: Brooke fifthteen.
Second: Guest Cabin.
Third: Guest Cabin.
The one five bedroom cabin:
Nailin and Tay's Home:
Bedroom 1: Nailin and Tay.
Bedroom 2: Sapphire seventeen and a half months and Dax nineteen months.
Bedroom 3: Amy four.
Bedroom 4: Jack seven and Chloe ten.
Bedroom 5: Nick fifthteen.
The one six bedroom cabin:
Zari and Dan's Home:
Bedroom 1: Zari and Dan.
Bedroom 2: Benjy two, Johnny three and Robert four.
Bedroom 3: Kara and Carrie both five.
Bedroom 4: Tom seven, Oscar eight and Charlie nine.
Bedroom 5: Bella nine and Lucy ten.
Bedroom 6: Jeremiah fifthteen.
Eight bedroom bunk house:
Female X6 quarters:
Bedroom 1: Nikita seventeen.
Bedroom 2: Natasha seventeen.
Bedroom 3: Natalia seventeen.
Bedroom 4: Darcy sixteen.
Bedroom 5: Jewel sixteen.
Bedroom 6: Cassidy sixteen.
Bedroom 7: Rianne sixteen.
Bedroom 8: Tara sixteen
Twelve bedroom bunk house:
Male X6 quarters:
Bedroom 1: Saxon, eighteen.
Bedroom 2: Michael, Martin eighteen (insist on sharing.)
Bedroom 3: Heath eighteen.
Bedroom 4: Nikalye eighteen.
Bedroom 5: SPARE ROOM.
Bedroom 6: Peter seventeen.
Bedroom 7: Paul seventeen.
Bedroom 8: Reilly seventeen.
Bedroom 9: Pierce seventeen.
Bedroom 10: Cooper sixteen.
Bedroom 11: Frazer sixteen.
Bedroom 12: Griffin sixteen.
