THE CHOICES WE MAKE
Continued...
"So" Shalimar chirped "I say we try and get an early night and hit the malls as soon as they open tomorrow, what do you say?"
Emma laughed, "How do you manage to get so excited over new clothes Shal?"
The two of them had been looking around the streets for nearly half an hour. Neither had sensed anything yet and they were beginning to relax, thinking the wild goose chase was probably based on faulty Intel and they might as well enjoy the nice morning. Shal stopped to sniff the air for a minute, but the scent was gone. She had probably just imagined it, she thought, turning back to Emma with a grin on her face.
"It's not just the clothes Em, there's shoes, accessories, and of course the most important thing..."
"Jewellery?"
"No silly, Lingerie!"
"Of course, I forgot your obsession with those scanty bits of material."
"Scanty bits of material that pull and push you into the perfect desired shape, honey! I can't believe we've known each other this long and I've never taken you lingerie shopping! You'd look so good in a wonder bra, the guys would drop their jaws."
"Shal, do you realize your comm is still activated?" An amused voice came in. Brennan was having a hard time getting the image of Emma in a wonder bra out of his head.
Emma looked slightly abashed but Shalimar merely grinned, "So did you guys find anything?"
There was a crackling sound starting to come through Shalimar's ring.
"No and listen, Adam thinks this new mutant isn't what we think... Shal?... Emma?"
"Jesse?" Shalimar shouted into her ring. "Brennan? Emma try yours."
"Brennan?" Emma called, "Brennan... Brennan can you hear me?" Nothing.
"Something must be blocking our signal!" Shalimar reasoned.
"Look!"
The feral didn't need the yell from the young psionic next to her; she could smell the presence of another person. Just then a young man with bright red hair came tearing out of the alley nearest the girls. He took one terrified look around and went sprinting into the boarded up building next to them and disappeared.
"Hey!" Shalimar called after him, "Hey, wait!"
"Shal, I don't think it's us he's running from..."
Two men dressed in black had suddenly appeared. Emma entered their mind quickly, "They're G S Agents!"
"Only two, we can take 'em," Emma could see the feral was spoiling for a fight. The men came running toward them, stunners out.
Shalimar lunged as the first man came within reach, delivering a series of punches and kicks that the Agent dodged. He caught her briefly with his weapon. The shock wasn't enough to knock her out but she reeled back for a second, her eyes glowing yellow as her purely feral instincts took over. Running up the wall she somersaulted easily and came crashing down, right on top of the agent, pinning him to the floor. With one swift kick to the back of his neck, she had rendered him unconscious.
Emma, meanwhile, had exchanged her own series of blows with the second Agent, however, he seemed less well trained than Shalimar's opponent and Emma was able to subdue him with a neatly delivered elbow to his face. The man slumped onto the floor, next to his fallen companion.
"Nicely done!" Shalimar praised and the girls walked together into the building.
"Hallo," Emma called, "Is anyone there?"
They both jumped as the red-haired boy appeared form behind a stack of shelves, he couldn't have been more than 17. "Who are you?" He seemed timid, afraid of them,
"It's all right, we're the good guys, we won't hurt you," Emma tried to reassure him.
"No, but the guys in suits will," said Shalimar, "We should go before more of them show up."
"Go where?"
"Don't worry, we can take you somewhere safe we're Mutant X."
As soon as Shalimar had uttered these words the new Mutant seemed to change. He no longer appeared frightened, on the contrary, the blonde realized, he was smiling. Shalimar didn't like it, something was definitely wrong. As if reading her mind, Emma projected into the new mutant. The anger she saw scared her and retreating quickly she yelled, "Shal it's a trap, run!"
But before either of them could move, Devon had raised his hands and white-hot flames sprang along the walls, cutting off their escape. Shalimar let out a yowl of fright, as she became surround by the fire.
"So you're the feral" Devon's eyes gleamed maliciously. Emma made towards Shalimar to try to calm her but another wall of fire sprang up, preventing her. Shalimar was now effectively cut off from Emma. She screamed in fright, as her heart pounded in panic, preventing her mind from thinking clearly.
The first thing Jesse and Brennan saw smoke rising out of a building.
"There!" Brennan shouted as Jesse manouvered the Double Helix and landed it hurriedly. Both mutants had been in a panic since they had lost contact with the two girls a few minutes ago. Adam had said there was a pulse that was causing a communications black-out in the area and there was nothing he could do. Brennan's heart was pumping with adrenalin, he almost fell out the Helix as the doors opened.
As they ran towards the building they heard a scream that made their blood run cold.
"Shalimar!" shouted Brennan. A moment later another three GS Agents had appeared, barring their entrance to the building. Incensed that his friends were trapped inside, Brennan blasted two of the Agents with an extremely high voltage electric shock. They fell to the ground twitching with pain.
Inside, Shalimar was starting to hyperventilate with fear. Looking up she saw a skylight.Bearly stopping to think, she dived upwards, crashing trough the glass and jumped free of the building. Landing on her feet on the pavement outside, she collapsed to her knees as the shock washed over her.
"Shalimar!" Brennan ran over to her as Jesse massed out in time for the punch being thrown at him from the final agent to connect with his solid body. The agent cried out in pain and Jesse knocked him out with a quick punch.
"Shalimar," Brennan put his hand on her shoulder trying to calm her down, "Shalimar where's Emma?"
But the feral was now shaking so hard she couldn't form an answer. Jesse rushed over to her as well, catching her as she collapsed.
Brennan stood up, the blood rushing to his head. "Emma must be still inside!"
Without pausing to think, the elemental rushed into the building. He saw her, backing away from Rykes. Flames were quickly overtaking the building, Brennan realised too late that even he was already trapped, but he didn't care. All that mattered was getting to Emma. But he couldn't. The fire was surrounding him.
"Emma!" he shouted desperately, coughing from the smoke.
Rykes was distracted for a moment. He looked in the direction Brennan had shouted from. Emma used his distraction to quickly enter his mind. She didn't know what else to do, she only knew that she had to dampen these flames somehow or she and Brennan were going to die, and Devon was controlling the fire so if she could only...
Emma concentrated and projected fiercely into the mutants mind, an image of torrential rain, a tsunami, a huge waterfall, storm clouds breaking... Devon didn't move for a moment, but then he clutched his hands to his head and dropped to his knees. Whatever Emma was doing it seemed to be working, Brennan thought, as he noticed the fire around him had started to die down and Rykes now seemed to have collapsed. As soon as he could he rushed over to Emma and grabbed her, breaking the connection.
"Emma, oh thank God!" He hugged her to him but she seemed numbed from her attack on Devon's mind. Brennan put his hands on Emma face and looked into her eyes. "What did you do to him?" he asked. Emma didn't answer, still too shaken. Just then Jesse ran in.
"Emma are you okay?" Emma nodded shakily. Jesse bent down and felt the side of Devon's neck.
"He's out cold." He informed them, "We better get out of here guys, you might have killed the fire but this building has had it." Jesse threw the unconscious form of Devon over his shoulder and Brennan put his arm firmly around Emma waist. She leant into him and allowed him to guide her out and up onto the Double Helix. Jesse, having made sure Rykes was secure, took up the controls.
Shalimar was lying unconscious on one of the seats, having been deposited there by Jesse a few minutes ago. As they got on board the ship Emma's knees gave way and she sunk down, Brennan carefully guiding her to the floor. There he sat, his arm wrapped around her shoulders for the duration of the journey back. Relief was flooding through him and he kept looking at her as if reassure himself she was realty there.
He glanced over at the still form of Devon Rykes. 'When that bastard wakes up, I'm going to kill him!' Brennan thought furiously. That man nearly killed his two friends, and he would pay...
Continued in Chapter 6...