CHANE
Chane crouched on the rooftop looking down at the building Nik had been escorted into. Externally, it appeared nondescript and a bit run down. But, the stream of people drifting in, dressed up for some clubbing, suggested that looks were deceiving in this case. Something fishy was going on.
She looked at the building on the far side where Jem perched, then down into the alley where Shen and Drea waited with Aunt Karai's bike. Everyone was tense.
She needed to give him enough time to look around without letting it go so long that he was in jeopardy. Hard to figure without knowing what was going on. In retrospect, she wished she'd thought to bug Nik the way they had Luke, but rushing had made her sloppy. If only she knew whether or not he'd found Scout, she'd be able to make the call on when to bring her dad and the others in.
"Well?" Shen's voice sounded edgy over her ear piece.
"If we haven't gotten some kind of sign from him in another ten minutes, we'll move in and investigate. I don't want to blow his cover too soon." Unless... "Drea, I know you're a little underdressed for it, but do you think you could get into the club as a patron and be our eyes and ears?"
"Piece of cake." Drea responded with confidence.
Chane kicked herself for not thinking of it before. "Good. Do it."
NIK
The moment they were back stage, two men, bleeding sinister intent into cloudy miasma around their auras, grabbed Scout and dragged her away. The other band members, still shimmery high, were buoyant, their energy drifting well above their physical shells and intermingling in a shared experience of success. They didn't even notice what happened to Scout. Or him, slipping off to discretely follow.
Stepping behind a stack of crates, he looked through them, mentally filtering out the energy signatures of wood, plastic and liquid that risked obstructing his view.
It was hard to stand back and wait, knowing he could take her guards down before they knew what happened. But, per her wishes, he did nothing as they shot darts into her leg, pumping something into her. Under his unmoving gaze, her energy fizzled into a soupy lethargy, barely a buzz above the ambient surroundings.
Then she was in the cage and gone.
Stepping out from hiding, he scanned the room for emanations of the unique combination of materials from which her weapons were constructed.
There. They'd carelessly tossed her stuff under a table.
He grabbed the bag and started for the same exit they'd taken Scout out of, when the door behind him opened. He spun around, pulling some shuriken from Scout's bag.
Shit! It was Drea.
Too late. The shuriken were already thrown.
"Duck!"
With her mother's rapid reflexes, she arched back, letting the projectiles fly passed above her to embed in the far wall.
"What the shell, Nik!" She yelled, pulsing brightly with anger and frustration. "What are you even doing here? They're supposed to be moving you."
He blinked. "What am I doing here? What are you doing here?"
The angry pulsing got faster, like an explosive becoming unstable. "I paid to get in and see what's going on. I'd barely had a chance to sneak backstage, looking for you, when Chane said you were on the move again. So, I was looking for a fast exit. Everyone else is already following the tracker. You owe me thirty bucks for the entrance fee, by the way."
Well, communicating through Drea would have been more useful several minutes ago. But beggars can't be choosers. "They need to keep following. I transferred the tracker to Scout."
Drea strobed with surprise. "She was here? Couldn't you get to her? Between the two of you, I would've thought..."
He didn't wait for her to finish. "Change of plans. Scout wants to save the others this place is trafficking."
"Trafficking?" Drea's aura curdled thick in shock and revulsion.
He nodded. "She's using herself to find where they're being kept. We can jump into action, call our parents for help, whatever, after we've found it and confirmed it's the place."
Drea groaned, rough and abrasive with irritation, but golden threads of conscience wound around the dark substance of her annoyance. "Great. We're already behind and now we're on foot."
He did another sweep of the room, rifling through drawers and tossing aside all manner of small, metal objects until he found them in a desk drawer by the back.
"Care to borrow a ride?" He held up a jangling set of keys, eyeing the pair of parked vans through the back wall.
Drea snatched the keys out of his hand. "I'm driving."
ALLI
The back of the van was windowless. The driver's part closed off by black slatted elevator doors and beyond them illegally tinted windows. She was fortunate enough to be given a bench seat, despite the ridiculous zip ties they'd bound her hands with. But there was no way of knowing where they were taking her.
That wasn't overly surprising. What she hadn't expected was that Spot wasn't going with her. He'd loaded her up, closed the doors and was gone. Gone. Passed her off like a parcel.
She flinched at sight of the dog crate near her feet, the wide empty space beside it big enough for another just like it. What was she doing? How did she know that what Spot said was true? Not that they'd trade her. She wasn't dumb enough to believe that. But that she'd see her sister at all?
The van bounced and shook as it turned, rolling to a hard stop that rocked her back and forth. White-blue fluorescent light spilled into the unlit cab and two mutants hauled a crate out the back door of a building she'd not seen before. Alli's heart jerked at sight of its contents.
Barely stopping herself from shouting Scouts name, Alli had the sense to wait until they'd slammed the doors shut and took off again before kneeling next to the locked crate containing her sister. Shit. Shit. Shit. What did they do to her?
Alli's teeth ground together. That was about enough of this. She was getting them both out of there. Bringing the zip ties up to her mouth, she worked the joining part between her wrists, then tightened it as much as she could with her teeth. She inhaled deep. She hated doing this in training, but she sure as hell was glad she'd suffered through it now. Lifting her arms high over her head, she exhaled. Inhaling again, she brought them down hard in front of her, slamming her forearms against her hipbones. Pressing her lips together she barely kept herself from crying out. Ow! Ow! Shit! So much ow! Damn.
Her hands were free, but her wrists were cut. Side effects of anorexia, she bruised and injured easily. But again, free hands, so - worth it.
Now, for the dog crate. She eyed the construction of it, a simple four pin drop. With an absurd padlock. Scout could've kicked the door off easy. So, why hadn't she?
As Alli reached for one of the pins, Scout let out a moan. Slightly frustrated that her sister wouldn't be able to hear her if she spoke, Alli worked a hand inside to touch her shoulder, then Scout's eyes flickered open.
Her brow furrowed and she winced, lifting a hand to her head. "Alli?"
Alli almost fell over at sound of Scout's voice. Clear. Sweet. Like some blend of both her parents. Scout may have only spoke her name, but it was enough that Alli suddenly had a new understanding of what it was her sister longed for... that she'd taken for granted every day of her life.
Alli's blood chilled. The only way that was possible was if- "Y-you you're on drugs again?"
Scout exhaled a raspy breath. "They keep dosing me, with a tranq gun. I beat up some of their guys earlier-" She paused, flinched and put her hands to her ears. Her voice coming out a whisper as she continued. "They killed my friend. I- they saw how I fight so they've been keeping me drugged and crated."
"Well let's get you out of here." Alli reached for one of the pins but Scout held up a hand to stop her.
"No. They killed my friend. They're killing people like me and Nik- mutants and hybrids- they're using us and trafficking us and I need to know where the distribution center is. We have to stop them." She pushed herself upright, leaning heavily on the side of the crate. "Nik found me. Gave me a tracker. We're not alone, Alli." She blinked, her eyes a sad glazed blue.
Alli's heart was a clenched mess, her stomach churning. "Scout, who was with Nik? Our parents wouldn't use one of us for bait. How much do you think our cousins are capable of? Huh? Taking down a big operation like this, we need our parents help!"
"Hey!" The driver shouted, banging in the partition. "What's going on back there?"
"Nothing. I was just trying to calm this girl down," Alli said sweetly.
The driver scoffed. "Good luck with that. That one killed a guy."
Alli's eyes widened, fixing on Scout who looked away. "Truth?"
Scout swallowed hard, nodded. "Truth."
"O-okay. We'll talk about that later. With Mom and Dad. For now, we just focus on getting out- "
Scout shook her head. "I'm seeing this through. Go, if you want."
One thing Alli knew of her baby sister was grim determination. Scout was doing this if it killed her, and as blood trickled from one of her ears, Alli worried that it might.
MIKEY/ANTON/YUUTA
Mikey swerved carelessly in and out of the ever-thick New York traffic, while Mom sat in the passenger seat, reading him directions. Despite the panicky rush of a second missing daughter in the space of a few hours, during which the day had gone from awesome-sauce to sucktastic, one thought would not stop poking him in the brain.
"Hey, anyone know why Alli thinks she's got an in at Marco's? Cuz, it doesn't really seem like her scene, ya know?"
In the back seat, Yuuta held his piece, but Anton answered sullenly. "She said it was cuz of Spot."
"Spot?" Did she save somebody's pet in that neighborhood?
"Her ex." Anton clarified grumpily.
Wait, what now? "Ex? Since when has Alli been dating? I mean, besides you."
"Uh," Anton hesitated, sensing he may have mis-stepped, filling his uncle in on Alli's business. "It was short and not serious, so..."
Then Yuuta squeaked excitedly. Normally, Mikey was pretty good at catching what he pitched, but he wasn't being clear. "Whoa, Buddy. Slow down and..."
Yuuta, with the lightning-quick speed of his father, reached into the front and plucked Scout's warrior bracelet from his fingers as he tried to keep a hold of the wheel.
"Hey! Not cool."
In the rearview mirror, he could see Yuuta holding the bracelet out to Anton, signing 'read' one-handed.
"It don't always work that way!" Anton barked, irritated because everyone thought he could just touch something and all the desired answers would come to him. Still, he accepted the broken weapon, begrudgingly. You'd think Yuuta would understand with his intuition being just as finicky. But no, everyone thought Antonello was an on-demand mediu-
Anton sucked in air as the familiar sinking sensation took over. He always hated it, grasping at air as he fell into a virtual rabbit hole, landing hard on the pavement. Wherever it put him he was just an observer, and rarely did he ever see anything good.
He scanned the alley, quickly recognizing his cousin's school. His heart jerked as he recognized Scout, trying to communicate with a visibly injured and upon closer look, high raccoon mutant. He held out two pink pills to her. She refused.
Good girl, Scout.
But, she didn't seem mad at the guy. In fact, pulled him to her as he slumped over. Oh, no. Oh, Scout, damn. Shit. Anton struggled with his inability to talk to her, help her as her friend died in her arms.
Then a familiar van pulled up, ten thugs jumping out. Anton confirmed his suspicion seeing the doors close, the name Marcos painted clearly on the side. He glanced back at the fight Scout had well-in-hand behind him. Saw the change in her eyes, a door unlocked as the knife left her fingers.
"Scout, no!" The ceiling of the car came rushing back, with him still screaming for her. His stomach churned as his spirit slammed back into his body. "Okay, that- seriously sucked."
Yuuta wasn't surprised when Anton's eyes rolled back in his head, slumping against the headrest. He had a knack for finding things and guessing what was important. Every instinct had called out to the bracelet when he'd caught sight of it in his brother's hand.
Anton tensed, jerking forward, screaming at Scout.
Mikey almost swerved into oncoming traffic. "What's wrong? What's wrong?" He cried out, trying to look back while driving. "What happened to her?"
Phoenix calmly reached across and grabbed the wheel, steering them back into their lane.
Anton slumped forward. "Okay, that seriously sucked."
Yuuta patted his shell supportively and Anton glared at him.
"Any clue on where Scout might be?" He signed, hopeful. There had to be a reason that bracelet stood out to him so much.
"Marco's. A van of guys jumped her. It said Marco's on the side." Anton pushed Yuuta away, rolling down the car window to suck in air, hoping it would ease his stomach.
After a few breaths, he sank back into his seat. "There was a raccoon mutant in the alley before they got there. Seemed like she knew him. Guy was messed up, high and stabbed when she found him. He offered her that stuff, but she turned him down. Then she stayed to hold him as he bled out on her. He died in her arms."
Anton turned his head toward the window again. "That ain't even all of it. When those guys attacked-" He swallowed hard. "She uh- took a knife to one of the baddies. Don't think he made it."
Mikey let out a quiet breath of relief. At least she hadn't killed both of them.
Then the rest caught up. Her friend had died. In her arms. That wasn't supposed to happen.
They'd fought really, really hard so that the kids wouldn't have to live through any of the bad stuff. And that was the bad stuff that hurt. He'd felt it enough during the war. Enough to know he didn't ever want to watch a friend die again.
Shini.
Razz.
They were supposed to be done with the hurt.
His vision grew blurry with welling tears, making it difficult to see the road. Wiping his eyes with one hand, he tried to keep his voice from cracking as he spoke. "At least it sounds like we've got the right place for both Alli and Scout. Can someone let Leo know?"
"Yeah." Anton nodded, pulling his phone out. He speed-dialed his uncle, who of course answered on the first ring.
"Antonello? What's going on?"
"I Uh-" Anton's head was still kind of swimmy and he rubbed it, trying to clear the fog. "I got a reading off Scout's warrior bracelet." He handed the broken weapon back to his uncle, who seemed to be holding it like it was going to bring Scout back. "Some guys in a Marco's van jumped her. So, we think we've got the right place."
"Good." Leo replied. "You guys close?"
"Yeah, pulling up now." Anton looked ahead to where Aunt Denim was standing in line to get in the strip joint, wearing a coral-colored, stringy-strapped tank dress thing he could've sworn he'd seen on Alli before. He shouldn't be looking at his aunt's thighs, but he was pretty sure he could see the outline of a gun holster on each leg. The bouncer eyed her, stepped back and opened the tape. "Uh-oh. I could be wrong- but uh- Uncle Mikey, isn't Aunt Denim more the uh, back-up, cover type rather than the undercover?"
Before his uncle could answer, Leo was yelling at him. "Antonello, did you hear me? I said wait until we get there!" Before Anton could hang up, he heard his uncle direct his attention to his dad. "Raph, what is going on back there?" A second later Leo spoke to Anton again. "Ask Mikey if he or Denim have talked to Jem since school let out."