Remembered

by Krista Street

  “Where’s the one from your cell?” Mica asked.

  “I…uh…tied her up.”

  Mica pulled the rope from her pack. “Good. Let’s tie him up too.”

  I stepped closer and kneeled down to help. “Will ropes hold him?”

  “Probably not.” Mica began looping coils of rope around the man’s arms. “Let’s do it anyway. At least it’ll slow him down if he wakes up.”

  We set to work as Jasper and Flint approached the third cell. When they opened the door, I didn’t see anyone but I heard his voice.

  “Me finks, you blokes are trouble,” the voice said.

  The accent caught me off guard. British?

  I didn’t have time to ponder it. Jasper and Flint brought a man out, each of them gripping one of his arms. He was of modest height, maybe around five foot ten. Dark, ebony skin, a shaved head and frightened eyes were the only features I noticed in my hurried glance. He thrashed and yelled against Jasper and Flint, his movements panicked.

  “Are we going to knock him out?” I asked.

  Flint held the man’s arms as he struggled. “It would be safer.”

  With bile rising in my throat, I grabbed the chloroform. The man opened his mouth to scream, which in a way worked to our advantage. I covered his mouth and nose with a soaked rag. I had to fight the nausea that rolled in my stomach over what I was doing.

  The Brit fell in seconds.

  Breathing quickly, I dropped the rag and surveyed our work. One woman and two men. All unconscious. Guilt rose in the back of my throat. “That didn’t exactly go to plan.”

  Mica rearranged her mask. “At least they’re safe.”

  I turned to Flint. “Should we plant the explosives and get out of here?”

  “Yeah, you, Mica and Jasper plant the bombs. I’ll carry these three to the elevator.” Flint lifted the Brit as if he weighed ten pounds. He lifted the woman next. “And be careful.”

  In a flash, he was gone.

  Mica, Jasper and I wasted no time. We’d worked out where to plant the explosives from the blueprint and critical research areas that Father knew about. However, racing down the hall, to seal an explosive at the end of the ninety cells ranked as one of the creepiest things I’d ever done. The void of the place made it feel like a tomb. At the end of the hall, it felt like the walls were closing in on me, that I couldn’t breathe. I fought long-buried memories the entire time.

  By the time the three of us joined Flint at the elevator, I was sweating profusely. So were the others.

  “Is everything okay upstairs?” Flint asked.

  Jasper closed his eyes. His face twitched a few times. “So far, so good.”

  “Then we stop at S1 to plant more bombs,” Flint said curtly. “After that, we’re getting out.”

  The two men and woman lay in a heap on the elevator floor. It was awkward standing with them at our feet. The four of us crowded together in a corner as the elevator ascended.

  When we reached S1, Flint did most of the bomb planting. I stayed with the captives on the off chance any of them woke up. When Flint, Jasper and Mica returned, all were wild-eyed and breathing heavily.

  “Let’s get out of here,” Jasper said.

  Mica jumped into the elevator. “I couldn’t agree more.”

  I could only imagine what labs and research areas they’d seen in their hurried dash through the S1 level. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know.

  JET AND AMBER almost hugged us when we finally returned to the main level.

  “Am I glad to see you guys,” Jet muttered.

  Flint glanced around. “Did anything happen up here?”

  Amber shook her head and nodded at the guards. “They’re both still sound asleep. Neither has made a sound.”

  “There has to be more guards coming,” I said. “We need to hurry.”

  “Mica and Amber, carry the woman,” Flint said.

  Amber and Jet’s eyes widened as they peeked into the elevator. “They’re unconscious?”

  “No time to explain now,” I said. “We’ll tell you later.”

  The dark haired woman appeared to be sleeping peacefully. Amber only hesitated a second before she grabbed her arms. Mica picked up her legs. They lifted her easily.

  “Jet and Jasper, you carry him.” Flint pointed to the bald man. “I’ll carry the big one and come back for the guards. Lena, you plant the explosives up here. Do you remember where?”

  “Yeah.” I grabbed the pack Jet had been carrying and got to work. We were fairly certain nobody else was in the facility. We’d never seen evidence of researchers or O’Brien employees working here at night. It was only the guards, and we were getting all of them out.

  Using the security badge, I ducked into the first room with a structural pillar. It was a lab. Rows of equipment lined the walls. A heavy scent of disinfectant hung in the air. I quickly secured the bomb in the corner before going back into the hall and heading toward the building’s other main structural posts.

  Father had told me where to plant the bombs. I struggled to remember. My brain felt fried, and my heart pounded so hard it hurt. Stay focused. We’re almost done!

  Pulling out my map, I surveyed the three other locations I needed to find. My hands shook before I stuffed the map back in the pack. The next two locations I found easily enough. I kept my eyes glued to the posts and the bombs. My head spun. Sweat poured out of me.

  The last room was in the corner of the building. I faintly heard the others hauling the remaining guard out. Silence followed. They must have all gone outside. Swiping the guard’s security badge, I hastily opened the last door. Before I entered the room, I knew something was off.

  It took me a second to understand what was wrong. Moonlight poured into the room from an open door. Fresh cold air swirled inside.

  My insides chilled.

  A door to the outside was on the far wall. It was open. How come that wasn’t on the blueprint? And why is it open?

  Nobody was in the room. My gaze darted around. Maybe a security guard fled from here when he realized what we were doing. I raced to the last pillar and began strapping the bomb to it.

  A shuffle of steps, and another flow of fresh air over the skin not covered by my mask, almost made me scream.

  “What do we have here?”

  The man’s voice was like icy tentacles crawling down my spine. I stood and turned.

  In the dark, I couldn’t make out his face, only his outline in the moonlight. He stood in the doorway, the cold outdoor air swirling his long coat around his legs. I switched my vision. The ominous black cloud that pulsed around him told me exactly who the newcomer was. The child in me remembered.

  Marcus.

  “I couldn’t believe it when my security team told me we’d been breached.” He stepped forward. “Luckily, I was still at the office, otherwise I wouldn’t have arrived in time to see who it was.”

  I hastily took a step back. My leg brushed a bench. I almost fell.

  “Who are you?” he asked. His tone was neither fearful nor worried, merely curious.

  My gaze darted to the door I’d entered.

  Marcus’ did too. “An entire security team is on their way. You won’t get away.”

  Hearing his cold words and absolute conviction that our plan was tumbling down around us did something to me. The little girl inside of me, the five-year-old who cringed and cried anytime this man came near me in the past, began to scream. I muffled the sound that wanted to erupt from my throat.

  Focus, Lena! You’re not a little girl anymore. You’re strong and capable. Draw up your power. Now!

  I pulled at my inner cloud, but I was shaking so badly.

  Nothing happened.

  “When I remove that mask, I have a feeling I’ll know who’s underneath it. I see a few red curls peeking out the sides.” He smiled. In the dim light, his white even teeth appeared. “I couldn’t believe it when an observer told me he thought he’d spotted Conroy’s children in the Chicago area a fe
w days ago – all grown up now I see. How long have I been searching for you? Fifteen years? Sixteen years? And in all that time, there have been no sightings of you. ‘Where could they be,’ I’d often ask myself. I knew you were out there.” He smiled broader. “I knew it was only a matter of time before I’d find you again.”

  “Stay back!” I yelled.

  His eyebrows rose. “Or what?” He chuckled. “From how scared you sound, I see that you’re still a little girl. Aren’t you…Galena?”

  My heart pounded as he advanced on me.

  I closed my eyes and focused on the swirling fear that wanted to consume me. If I didn’t stop him, my family wouldn’t know what was coming.

  They could all die.

  They could all be captured.

  I’d lose Flint.

  You need to stop him, Lena!

  Using my despair, fear and worry, I drew up the energy inside of me and pushed it out. I called on everything in the area: Marcus’ cloud, the stray animals in the parking lot where Marcus had entered from, my family’s clouds as they moved the captives into the van in front of the building. Everything. I needed all of it.

  I drew it together until a powerful ball hovered above me. Opening my eyes, I didn’t flinch when I saw that Marcus stood only two yards away, a gleam in his eyes.

  I leveled him with an icy stare. “I’m not a little girl anymore!”

  When my energy ball hit him, amazement flashed across his face right before he sailed off his feet. My ball blasted him out the door to land on his back fifty feet into the parking lot. I didn’t wait to see if he stood.

  I turned and ran.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  I was shaking so badly when I reached the others I almost collapsed. From the feelings emitting from Flint’s cloud, I knew he spotted me. The fear and worry that strummed through his cloud abated.

  For a moment, I just stood there. I felt positive that at any second, the backup security team would careen through the gates. Jacinda hugged me briefly. I barely felt it. Our van idled ahead, parked just outside the gate. It appeared almost everyone was inside, along with the captives. Only one, unconscious guard still lay on the ground near the warehouse.

  I knew I needed to warn everyone, but my mouth wouldn’t move.

  Jacinda pulled me toward the van. “Come on. We need to get going.”

  I numbly ran with her and almost fell inside the van.

  The twins, Mica and Amber were already seated in the back. The three captives lay unconscious in the middle. Jacinda hunkered down at my side. Everyone’s energy poured off them like water blasting from a fire hydrant. It was high enough to make me nauseous.

  “We’ve been here twenty-six minutes.” Di climbed into the driver’s seat and slammed the door. “That’s too long. We need to get out of here. Now. They’re coming.”

  Jacinda tensed.

  I opened my mouth to tell Di that she was right, that we needed to hurry, that Marcus knew.

  Nothing came out.

  “Did you have a vision?” Flint asked. He still stood outside the van. He was the only one not inside.

  Di nodded. “An O’Brien security team is on its way. One of the guards must have alerted them. It’s going to be close, but I think we can beat them.”

  “I have one more guard to dump by the others. I’ll be right back.” Flint disappeared.

  “NO!” A word finally ripped out of me.

  Flint was back before I could blink. He jumped into the van. When our eyes met, he gazed at me questioningly before he slammed the van’s sliding door.

  With a spin of tires, Di stomped on the gas pedal. Flint moved to my side. I grabbed hold of him and pulled him into a hug.

  He held me tightly. I let his feel and scent wash over me. He rubbed my back. “You’re shaking.”

  The dumped sedated guards were barely visible through the back window as we drove down the street. Flint had left them by a building outside of O’Brien’s perimeter fence. It was far enough away that they should be safe from the explosion.

  My mind shifted to Marcus. Will he survive it?

  Cold air blew in through Di’s cracked window. A slight drizzle fell on the windshield. My ski mask felt hot and itchy. I ripped it off before burrowing again into Flint’s embrace. The worry in his cloud grew.

  “Babe, what happened? You’re really shaking.”

  I tried to tell him. Again, nothing came out. Part of me didn’t feel connected to reality.

  Swirling lights lit up the windows. An SUV raced past us, going toward the warehouse. My eyes widened as the O’Brien Pharmaceuticals logo flashed in a streetlight.

  “You better call that number to detonate the explosions, Jasper.” Flint’s voice rumbled in his chest.

  “Gladly.” Jasper tapped in the numbers on his phone.

  A LOUD EXPLOSION and fiery light filled the sky. The van rumbled and shook. It was that powerful.

  Amber plastered her face to the van’s back window while the twins and Mica watched over her shoulders. The O’Brien SUV careened to a halt a few blocks behind us. Six men jumped out, rifles in their grips, their faces trained on the blast. They disappeared from view when Di swerved around a corner. Only a large billowing black cloud signified the place where our beginnings began.

  I knew within minutes this area would be swarming with more O’Brien employees and first responders. I had no idea if the distance I blasted Marcus into the parking lot would mean he’d survive. While I wanted to be free from him, I didn’t want to murder him. I could only hope he’d live.

  Hopefully, the mess we’d left would keep things complicated. Between O’Brien having to explain the gigantic three-story hole in the earth from a “storage warehouse,” four unconscious security guards piled in an alleyway, and a potential dead body in a parking lot, they’d stay plenty busy.

  I slumped into Flint as Di rocketed onto the interstate. My hands still shook, but at least I seemed to be thinking more clearly.

  “We actually pulled it off!” Mica exclaimed, breaking the silence. “We freakin’ did it!”

  The twins were the next to cheer followed by Amber and Jacinda’s grins. Only Flint seemed unaffected.

  “Something happened. Didn’t it?” His dark eyes appeared solemn while the rest of the van reveled in our victory.

  “Yes,” was all I managed.

  His grip tightened on me.

  I let him support me as some of the shock from encountering Marcus wore off. Our victorious outcome seemed too good to be true. All of us got out alive with the three lost children.

  It was exactly the scenario we’d hoped for.

  However, even though blowing up O’Brien’s warehouse would make continuing Project Renatus nearly impossible, or at least significantly delay it, it didn’t mean we were out of danger. There were now twelve people alive, eleven in this van, that were living proof of what the pharmaceutical company had done. Given what Father told us about Marcus, I’d be surprised if he let this end quietly.

  Flint leaned over and buried his nose in my hair, inhaling deeply. With our ski masks off, we were a sea of white and olive faces sitting atop darkly clad bodies. He clasped my hand into his as the van jostled and dipped on the rough road.

  “Are you ready to tell me what happened?”

  I peered into his dark eyes. “Marcus.”

  He tensed. “Marcus? He was there?”

  I nodded.

  The cheering in the van died. “Wait, what did you say?” Jasper asked, leaning forward. “You saw Marcus?”

  “Yeah.” My voice shook. I cleared my throat. “He was in the last room where I planted the bomb. There was a door to that parking lot on the north side. He came in through there.”

  “What door?” Jet’s energy strummed into me.

  “It wasn’t on the blueprint. They must have added it after the warehouse was constructed.”

  Flint’s arms tightened around mine. Hot energy poured from him.

  “What did he do?
” Jacinda asked hesitantly.

  “Nothing, but he knows who we are. I guess one of his observers, as he called them, spotted us a few days ago. Father was right. All this time, where we didn’t think anybody was actually looking for us, we were wrong. Marcus has been searching for us the entire time.”

  Silence followed.

  Mica leaned forward. “How did you get away?”

  “I blasted him with an energy ball. He shot right out of the door.”

  Flint’s energy kicked up another notch. “I should have been there.”

  “We’re almost to the airport,” Di cut in. “Right now our main concern needs to be getting out of Chicago. We can talk about Marcus later.”

  Police sirens and fire trucks sounded in the distance. The burning warehouse was now miles away, but the flashing lights came from all directions and were heading that way.

  Random security cameras in the general area of O’Brien’s warehouse would inevitably catch glimpses of our van leaving. We knew that. Once the police ran through the tapes, they’d know our van had been in the area for weeks. After that, they’d inevitably trace the van back to the used car dealership. I hoped the disguise Father used meant he’d never be identified.

  I leaned into Flint as Di exited the interstate.

  As for the van, it would need to be destroyed. I had no idea how that would happen, but Father said he’d arrange it. Not for the first time, I wondered how many people around the country were on Father’s payroll. Since one of those contacts had supplied us with explosives, I knew most of the people on Father’s payroll walked on the wrong side of the law.

  A sign for the airport flashed by the front window. Thankfully, the people we’d rescued showed no signs of rousing. I used the moment to study them. It was the first time I’d really looked at them, and it was a much needed distraction.

  They had to be around our age since all of the lost children were collected within a few years of one another, but from the gaunt face and sunken eyes of the small female, she appeared older than early twenties. The men were in better shape, physically at least. The largest male was heavily muscled. I knew his eyes were a strange golden color from that brief moment he’d tried to attack me. His hair drew my attention. It was shaggy and the color of dark caramel. He had beautiful hair. The other male, the smaller one, had a shaved head, dark skin and a musky scent.