The Pack (26 page)

“Shamira, I've finished the new designs. We have to get everyone fitted. Mitch is preparing the vehicles some of the others
confiscated in the name of freedom from various Security Force impound lots with the help of your parents' loyal networks,” he said steadily.

Shamira lifted an eyebrow at the mention of her parents helping with the confiscation of vehicles. She wondered what Valens had said to her parents when she wasn't present.
No point in pondering on that further,
she scolded herself. She knew Valens' purpose was to move forward in the attack.

“Good. I want everyone to meet in the front room after we have all prepared the vehicles and have on full gear,” Shamira added and glanced at Hedi, who was already organizing the kids in lines leading to the lab.

“I have something special I made for you. I don't want you to get hurt if we get separated. I left it in Mina's room. I'll see you in an hour in the front room,” Valens said flatly. He dropped his eyes and turned then walked away.
Great. Now I may have scared him off for good
. She figured she'd think about how to fix that later. Now was definitely the time to focus on preparing for their attack, and anything else would have to be dealt with later.

She followed the others out of the training room and headed straight to Mina's room. When she entered the room, she noticed it smelled like roses, sweet and seductive. Valens must have set the scent settings for the room. She surmised from this that he must not be too angry with her. Her eyes traveled around and landed on the white box on the bed with a handwritten note on top.

She walked over to the box, smiled to herself, and picked up the note.

I designed this while thinking of you. I've been working on it since the day I came to your house when you returned from Earth. I knew we would do this together
.

PS. I wasn't angry with you… just at myself
.

Valens

Her eyes watered at his words and the knowledge that he'd believed in her when most people would have taken a look at her and counted her out. She thought back to their first meeting and realized that even without seeing him, she knew they were connected somehow. Now, the thought of him not being part of her life was unimaginable. She trusted him more than she did anyone other than her family, and after this was all over, she promised herself she would let him know it.

She reached for the box slowly and opened it. Another note was inside that pointed to the bathroom she could use to change. A smile slipped to her face, and she removed the tissue that covered the suit he had created for her. She gasped upon seeing it. It appeared to be black, but when she shifted it, the color changed, as though tiny crystallized glass was within the fabric. Her thumb rubbed against it, and it felt like the softest leather.

“Wow! This is beautiful. Oh, Valens,” she said in a whisper with a tear dropping from her eye. This was so special. No one had ever given her something this beautiful. She pulled the fabric, and it
stretched just a bit then retracted.
Leave it to Valens to put something extra into the design,
she thought with a smile. She couldn't wait a moment longer to put it on.

After a quick shower, she rushed out and put on the suit. She walked over to the full-length mirror and was impressed. It even had a belt that held all of her weapons, which Valens had carefully arranged on the floor by the bed. The matching gloves were also an upgrade from the previous gloves he'd given her. She pulled her hair back in a firm bun and sucked her lips as she placed on her gloves. Taking one last glance at her image, she headed out the door and to the front room to leave for the attack.

Kids were piled everywhere. There was very little room for Shamira to get by. As she walked through the masses, the kids chanted while they reached out and touched her. A pat, a finger, and an arm squeeze all came when she walked through the crowd of kids leading up to the front room and the main entrance to Valens' hideout. She forced a shiver of discomfort down deep. These kids loved her and didn't shun her like so many others did. She had something within her grasp they wanted—freedom and justice with
just a taste of revenge, something she desired to give them all. She relaxed and enjoyed it all. Allowing herself for once to relish in the comfort of friends, she smiled as she stood before them with Valens and Anthony on either side of her.

“Everyone, are we ready?” she asked, her voice rising above the chants.

“Hell, yeah!” Anthony said, and all the kids repeated and applauded.

She looked around and cleared her voice in awe at the mass of kids before her that wanted this as much as she did. Her eyes landed on a tall, broad boy just in front of her who looked eager to speak. “Hey, you, what's your name?” She looked over the kid with chestnut brown hair and brown eyes who stood about Valens' height at six feet.

“Dion, and I want to offer my experience in any way. Kurt and I were trained together. He can vouch for me. I'll do anything you need,” he said steadily.

“Dion, I have the perfect job for you. I need someone to lead up the rescue and attack crew that will make sure all of the kids we free from the Mons get out safely. You'll also have to take on any guards that try to kill or retrieve the captives. Can I count on you?” she asked, and after sizing him up, she knew he was her guy for the job.

“Consider it done,” Dion replied. Shamira detected his elation at her trust.

“He's good for it,” Kurt concurred to affirm to Shamira that he trusted Dion also.

“Uh, I offer my services also. I have a skill you will need,” a petite kid that looked like he had missed more than a few meals stated as he stepped in front of Dion.

“What's your name, and what can you do?” Shamira asked, not able to stop the smile that formed on her face.

He grinned widely. “You'll need someone small and wily like me to climb up the tunnels in the Mons to recover any of the kids in the dream mines.” His eyes got wide as though he dared her to tell him no.

“What's your name? How old are you?” she asked, thinking of David and the other kids in the Mons. She didn't want to risk this kid's life.

“Manny, and I'm ten, but I'm a bit small for my age. A side effect of a few missed meals and small parents, I guess,” he said and puffed out his chest to look intimidating.

“I don't know. We're going into dangerous territory, and we may not come back alive. I can't risk your life, Manny,” she said.

“What? I risked my life every day I hid out and ran from Monev. I've been on my own since I can remember. I'm tough. lean do it. Give me a chance. It's all I have to live for—the chance to get back at them. I know the mines. I've escaped them – and Monev,” he said loudly. Gasps and whispers went around the room.

Anthony squinted his eyes in disbelief. “You what? You've
escaped? When? How the hell was that possible?”

“To be honest, it was an accident. I didn't get inside, um, actually, but they were taking me there. While we kids were being transported and moved from the vehicles to the door, a few of the guards started to argue while the door to the back of the truck was open. Since we were being transported, they took off the handcuffs they used to keep us immobile. I slipped out of the truck unnoticed, then took off before they knew it. Lucky for me, they had another truck taking off that was transporting waste to the Outlands. That's where I got off and moved through the night back to Sector Five,” he said and pushed his chest out in pride.

Mitch crossed his arms and looked over Manny with scrutiny. “I'll be damned! I think the little runt is telling the truth, or should I say, he'd better be.”

“You lucky bastard! I think we should bring him with us. He will be small enough to get through the tunnels, and he's mature enough to help the other young kids get out alive,” Anthony said with his hands on his hips while examining Manny with a look of respect.

Valens moved hand off his earlink. “We have the team set to release the beetles. They're on the street and ready to go when we give the word. We have Rob on the inside of the Mons, a runner who was sent there an hour ago. He said he'd make sure he shuts down the surveillance, lights, and security system. We have limited time for him to help, though, because runners are only allowed in the Mons for several hours before they are forced to leave. In most cases, they
can't wait to get out.”

Shamira zipped her outfit up to her neck. “Okay. We need to get moving to the strike location near the Mons. Valens, Anthony, Kurt, Hedi, and Manny, we are going into the Mons first. We'll send the signal to Dion and the others to start the complete attack. Let's go”

Valens opened the door, and Shamira walked to her bike, then watched as the others got comfortable on their vehicles. She gave a nod and followed Kurt to the location within a safe distance of the Mons that would shelter them from discovery.

The Mons stood like a giant before them. They were about a mile outside the security perimeter, and night had begun to fall. They came to a silent stop, and Shamira nodded at Dion while he voiced the command to the mini-computer on his wrist to send the vehicles from the Mars World Construction distribution warehouse to the site. The vehicles were computer operated and would drive on autopilot to the specified location.

She took a moment to scan the area, and on a need to be
cautious, pushed her sight beyond the hard packed ground surrounding their pathway to the manmade entrance to the Mars core heating piping.

“Crud. I knew they wouldn't make this easy. We have a problem,” she said loud enough for her team to hear.

“What is it?” Valens asked.

“There are heat sensor laser landmines that separate us from the entrance to the core heating piping tunnels. If we attempt to walk, drive, or run in that direction, we'll be burned to a crisp,” she said and frowned.

Hedi smiled at the challenge. She worked on her minicomputer on her wrist. “No problem. I can fix it. Just give me about five minutes.” They all looked at her in shock and with a bit of doubt.

“Uh, what the hell you going to do? Lastly, who is going to test it? It won't be me,” Anthony said and shook his head from side to side.

Shamira bit her lip in thought. “We don't need someone to test it. I can tell when they're deactivated. You just follow me.” She looked out to the vast landmine farm ahead of them.

“Uh, how in snot is she gonna do that?” Manny asked in a whisper to Kurt.

“She has gifts, so leave it at that, little man,” Kurt said and smacked the back of Manny's head.

“I hope so, ‘cause she said she was the one going first,” Manny replied and ducked out of the way of Kurt's hand as Kurt prepared to
smack his head again.

“Hey, while she's working on the landmine issue, let's put these vehicles in stealth mode and scramble this area from any surveillance,” Valens added.

Mitch looked up and said, “I got that covered.”

“I'm going to try to get Rob on to see if he's in the security center yet and can deactivate this,” Valens said, then tapped on his ear to connect to Rob.

Shamira's frustration started to rise at this unanticipated delay to their attack. Everything hedged on them getting inside.

“Okay! Rob gave us some good and bad news. Good news is -he's deactivated the landmines. Bad news is, it's rumored that if there is a breach, the whole place is rigged to blow up. That could be a major problem,” Valens said.

Shamira replied, “Oh, it won't be a problem because we'll get them all out alive. David is in there, and I'm getting him no matter what. Returning without him is not an option.”

Hedi sighed. “Okay, then I'm in. I can only deactivate a few so that it goes undetected by the main security system. That means we have to stay really close to one another until we get to the tunnels. I can deactivate them in a stair step mode when we clear a few, then they'll reactivate. The system does a random pass, so the security system expects a few to deactivate throughout the area. I'm tricking it into deactivating them in our path. It's slick, but not tricky enough to stop me from using it to our advantage. We only have five minutes
before our path starts, five minutes and counting.”

Shamira watched the illuminated underground laser mine deactivation pattern move in the direction of the path ahead of them. “First team, come close. I'll lead the way. Get your weapons ready. We may need them.” The deactivation pattern was just large enough for them to follow with less than a foot between them. “Manny, you get behind me. Anthony, pull up the rear. Let's move,” she said and started the mile trek ahead.

She crouched down and moved slowly across the terrain while she watched a few of the mines ahead of her dim as they deactivated. Manny moved anxiously from side to side behind her, and she had to whisper the command for him to be still time and time again. She wondered why she risked bringing such a young kid with them. He would either get them caught or endanger himself. She felt his movement yet again, and this time she reached back to squeeze his arm in a silent reminder to be still. He calmed down again, but she wondered for how long. The trek was slow, and sweat built on her forehead from the realization that with one slip, someone could get burned alive. The activated mines lit up the ground like blue radiant discs under a brown mass.

“This sucks. I can't take it. I don't want to fry,” Manny whined.

“Shush up!” Shamira said.

Mitch forced out in an angry whisper, “If you don't, I'm going to throw you on the mines, so walk and keep your whining to yourself.”

Hedi warned, “We've got to move faster, people. I think the system is on to us. The mines behind us are reactivating faster than I can deactivate the ones in front.”

Manny cried out, “You have got to be friggin' kidding! This cannot be happening.”