The Pack-Retribution (7 page)

Shamira yanked Hedi’s arm forward to force her into a spin. They flipped together landing on their knees with their hands still tightly clasped together. They looked at one another in silence for a moment. Both Hedi then Shamira burst out in laughter. Behind them several thumps and bumps from Valens, Kurt and Anthony signaled that they landed.

“It’s good to be back. Ye-ah boy!” Kurt exclaimed and slapped hands with Anthony.

Shamira’s chest filled with butterflies of adrenaline. She jumped side to side on each foot ready for the next building.

Valens pulled her in a hug. “Like that, don’t you?” His voice deepened.

“Just what I needed,” Shamira answered then kissed him, butterflies tickling her stomach at his closeness. “Ready for the next one?” She nipped his bottom lip with her teeth.

Valens squeezed her tighter and whispered. “Yeah. Dion’s got Hedi. You want to do it with me or by yourself?”

“I can go it alone this time.”

Valens shook his finger and tsked. “Yeah, but then you’d miss out on this new move I’ve got up my sleeve. I’ll teach it to you and then you can do it yourself on the next building.”

Her curiosity and thirst for a challenge piqued. She grabbed his hand. “Let’s do it.”

Valens let out a chuckle and pulled her forward. “I’ll dive first and pull you over my head. You dive over me and pull me with you.”

“Got it. So you land first and I’ll land over you.”

“Yep.” They started running.

Valens whooped. “Top this, suckers!”

Dion answered. “You are wrong. So wrong—in so many ways. Hedi won’t make it.”

Anthony shouted. “You go boy! But Kurt and I got something for you!”

Shamira sped up.

Valens yelled. “Now!”

They sailed through the air. She felt like she was on fire with tingles of awareness and a pure high. “Yes!”

Valens flipped her. She pointed her toes like a ballerina. Dragging him over her, she sailed through the air. He flipped forward and with a thump then a roll Shamira followed to land in front of him. She stumbled slightly and he hauled her forward into his arms and kissed her. “See, we’re made for this.”

Her hand rested on his rapidly beating heart that matched time with her own. “Yeah. We are.” She closed her eyes when Valens leaned in for a hungry kiss. Melting, she let out a small groan.

“Man, cut that out. Get a room,” Anthony snickered when he landed.

Shamira and Valens broke apart to grin at a grouchy Anthony.

“Stop hatin’.” Mitch hooted then landed out of his flip behind Anthony.

Kurt followed with the grace of a ninja warrior and landed silently behind them. “Ya’ll have to work on the landing.”

Dion and Hedi staggered noisily behind them. Dion slid Hedi into his arms for a quick kiss before turning to Kurt. “No one’s got it down like you, Kurt. You were one of Monev’s best assassins before you went rogue on them to join Valens.”

“Yeah, man, you got style—finesse, but to me, a kill is a kill.” Anthony scratched his wrist.

“What’s wrong with your wrist?” Shamira asked.

“Stupid rash. It’ll be okay though.” Anthony stretched. “You going now or what?”

Chapter 11

They climbed down the last building on the block. Lights framed the structures and traveled alongside the sidewalks. Shamira stuffed one hand in a pocket and closed her eyes. She briefly pummeled herself into the complete darkness that reminded her of the safe place she’d lived within most of her life. Being blind hadn’t been a handicap. It had been a safe haven. It was a familiar place that allowed her to be what she needed to be. A place without the weakness of what was seen, only what she believed.

A faint sound of young voices wafted around her. Her eyes fluttered opened bringing her back to her dim reality. “I hear something. Someone over there in that abandoned building.”

Valens chin dipped. “That should be where Nan lives. Several families share the bottom floor. The top floors are for the Help Center and the homeless.”

“Good. You leading the way?” Shamira asked.

“Yeah, she’ll let me in.” Valens went ahead of the others. His hand fisted up, froze for a moment, then knocked on what appeared to be the back door to the building. The door was a thick, makeshift door of hollowed metal.

They were sandwiched between two empty buildings in an alleyway. The sand-swept corners hadn’t had the luxury of the sand drains that drew loose fragments of sand within it to clean the streets. This part of town was neglected in the Mars cleanup, Shamira guessed.

Valens knocked once more before the door clicked open and a girl’s head appeared.

Shamira closed in behind him to study the girl. Nan stood about Shamira’s height with brown hair and large blue eyes that appeared tired. The girl was extremely thin with a weak malnourished look about her. Shamira couldn’t help being angry at seeing another casualty of what Monev left behind.

Valens reached into his pocket and pulled out some coined credits of money and handed it to the girl. “Nan, thanks for talking to us. Here’s some credits for food since I wasn’t able to get by here this week.”

The girl’s thin face brightened with a large beam of gratitude. “No, thank you. We are so grateful you help us, but now the Security Force Elite Reconstruction Program will start supplying us food and supplies while training some of us to work the underground heating systems and wind towers. If you didn’t get us moved to the top of the list I don’t know how long we would’ve been able to survive.”

“Great, I told them about your mom and what she was trying to do.” His face turned solemn. “But, I’m actually here for information.”

“Anything I know, I’ll tell you. What’s going on?” Nan sent a cautious look toward Shamira.

“Do you know if there’s been any underground illegal action? You know, someone trying to supply dream to some of the recovered addicts? Anyone’s lives being threatened?” Valens asked.

Nan looked confused. Then she turned her head slightly and peeked behind her. She stepped forward and closed the door. Whispering to herself, she wrung her hands. “Well, there’s something going on. One of the recovering addicts who was having a hard time of it, showed up a few weeks ago and said he was quitting the program. He and a few others packed their stuff and left. None of them had kids or family here on Mars to help them.”

Shamira came up next to Nan. “Were they over their addictions? Did they ask for food or anything to help them to survive after they left?”

Nan bit her lip. “No, both were working through the withdrawal pains. It takes almost a year to work through them; the pain hits less often depending on when you last used. A lot of the grownups here had a stash of dream to last them a while after Monev got destroyed and they would use what they had. We still have some people who are just now out of supply and decided not to go with the rehabilitation program offered by Earth.”

Kurt leaned over. “Something is off. You saying that several of the recovering drug addicts packed up and left? How were they acting? Did they seem like they were using again?”

Nan’s face frowned in thought. “Now that you mention it, no. They acted like they were fully recovered. No shivers, scratching, or denial of food. If I wouldn’t have known they were users before I would never had guessed they were addicts. The only other option is that someone gave them a synthetic of the cure Earth sent for users to take for the almost instant relief of the addiction.”

Shamira put a hand on the doorframe. “Why wouldn’t an addict take the Earth cure in the first place?”

“Many of them don’t trust the Earth cure. They think Earth will put something in the drug to control them, or track them like animals.” Nan frowned. “But my mom doesn’t believe that. She believes an addict has the power to overcome their addiction on their own, and by doing so, they understand the pain of the recovery and will choose not to go back to that life again.”

Anthony snorted. “Yeah, right. I doubt that works for most of Monev’s victims. They made sure dream and scream would hook a fool, and good.”

“We’ve seen success in most,” Nan replied. The door opened behind her.

A tall boy with spiked up hair stuck his head out. “Hey, your mom’s askin’ for ya.”

Nan looked over her shoulder at the boy. “Please tell her I’ll be right there.” She waited until the boy left before turning back to Shamira.

“One more thing, do you have any names? Ideas where they would hang out if they aren’t here?” Shamira asked.

Nan bit a fingernail. “I know one of them was called by a nickname. Freaksheep. He used to brag about how he’d been a top dog until everything went to pot. He said he started using dream to pass the time since he didn’t know what else he could do to make a living before he came to us. But now, dreamheads that didn’t want treatment find hideouts in the outlands. I don’t know where, but I overheard a few of those that left say this was better than there.”

Valens patted her on her shoulder. “Thanks Nan. Call if anything else weird comes up?”

“Sure.” She stepped back inside.

Shamira folded her arms. “Sounds like a copycat organization maybe starting up. But Renu just didn’t sound like the type to share his secrets. Especially what kept him in control of all the other turned criminals.”

Kurt teased his chin with his thumb. “No, he wasn’t sharing any information. At least not to anyone who wasn’t close to him or didn’t have a need to know reason for being involved.”

Mitch grunted. “All those guys were supposedly murdered. Even Renu. So who would be left to pull it off?”

Dion leaned on the building and crossed his legs. “What about some of the kids? I mean some who were assassins could be pretty devoted to Monev.”

“Considering that you and Kurt are the only assassins we know, do you have any leads to some of the former kids who were recruited as assassins by Monev?”

Dion spit on the ground. “Naw. Didn’t like any of them when I was with Monev, so I didn’t look for them when most of the kids were recovered by the Security Force. But because we got out of the organization before we turned seventeen, we didn’t have to make a choice to be elevated to permanent members. Those who never got out, either chose to become a Monev assassin for life—or they gave their lives.”

“You had Kurt vouch for you when you came to us. Wasn’t he your friend?” Shamira asked.

Kurt’s gaze locked with Dion’s. “No. I just knew I could trust him. We did some jobs together. He never failed—neither did I. Most of the other kids on my jobs, they just didn’t have it in them to survive. They were decoys we knew weren’t going to survive. Anyway, if you failed on a job and survived the hit, there was a chance you wouldn’t survive Monev’s discipline.” Kurt turned away in disgust.

Shamira tilted her chin towards Dion and watched as he scratched his wrist, then raked his hand through his dark hair. “How many assassins were they training?”

“Thousands, I guess. But those kids melted into the population. I figure they were glad to have a way out.” Dion pushed himself off the wall. “Anyway, looks like the trail’s only lukewarm for now.”

Mitch stuffed his hands in the pocket of his black jacket. “Yeah, I’m out. Who’s coming, maybe we can still make that movie.”

Shamira expelled an angry breath. She closed her eyes briefly and the sound of tapping within the wind teased her ears. Sprouting a frown, she opened her eyes, the feeling of apprehension making the hairs of her neck lift.

A yell vibrated the air strongly from Mitch. He was thrown back into Kurt. And blood dripped from his temple.

Kurt pushed Mitch off of him. He took on a fighting stance and grabbed his gun. “What hit him? Can’t see a thing.”

Shamira heard it. About six sets of feet landing on the ground surrounding them. “There are six or more! Weapons ready.”

The clicks of guns echoed. Shamira searched for their attackers and caught the shimmering of their tight suits. In an instant, they became visible. Men in form-fitting hoods with visors covered their eyes were poised to attack.

Shamira glowered. The burning power within her stomach surged. She charged the slim man in front of her. He pointed his gun at her head. She glided to the ground. Slid on her knee, and kicked upward into his groin. He bent over with pain evident in his eyes. Her fist trembled from the adrenaline, and the numbing peace of combat focused her. A roar erupted from her throat. She punched upward into his chin. He flew through the air. And his head hit the wall with a crack. No time to second-guess herself, she just had to bring him down. She ran to him. Blocking out the mayhem of her friends fighting behind her, she clenched her fist tightly.

Her chest heaved gulps of air as she towered over him. With a press of her knee on his chest, she reached to snatch at his masked covering. The exhilaration of being able to get some answers pulsated through her blood.

His hand dropped and he let out a gurgle. “You’re dead, and so is everyone…you…care…” He tightened his fist.

Shamira lifted up his mask and the veins on his face blackened against his pale skin. He cried. A gasp escaped her lips as her attacker’s body disintegrated into ashes. Her knee hit the pavement amid the putrid dust of burning flesh. A gasp escaped as she swallowed back her vomit.