AllFreeNovel
Share Us
The emotion damper in her neck was getting less effective by the minute. She could feel the fear and anxiety creeping into her mind and she tried desperately to push them back. But the negative emotions just kept coming.
What would she do if she couldn’t find them? What if they wouldn’t come with her? What if another sniffer caught her scent?
The intrusive thoughts just wouldn’t stop. And then she heard something behind her.
“XR-17?” a voice called. “Is that you?”
Lili went faster, the sweat breaking out on her forehead. A glance at the tracker screen showed that the red dots were just up ahead.
She was in a rundown part of the city now—a place with lots of empty streets filled with industrial garbage and trash. Rusted machines sat dormant, some of them blocking her way.
Lili ducked around one of these and saw that the place she was headed seemed to be an old, abandoned warehouse. Good—she was almost there!
“XR-17?” the voice called again and it was closer this time. Not only that, but Lili heard a low, buzzing snarl.
Risking a look over her shoulder, she saw LJ-91 and his sniffer were hot on her trail. The Dark Kindred had a grim look on his face and the sniffer’s eyes were burning red as he growled and snarled.
“Shit!” she gasped and broke into a run. There would be no faking them out this time—-her emotions were breaking free all over the place and now she was in a blind panic! She had to get to Dark and Light and hope the two of them would protect her.
“Come back!” she heard the Dark Kindred guard shouting. “I know you’re committing Feel Crime! Come here!”
“Fat chance, asshole!” Lili panted. She ran as fast as she could for the yawning mouth of the warehouse. If she could just make it there she knew that her guys would save her! They wouldn’t let the horrible metal sniffer dog hurt her!
“Come back! You’re in violation of the law!” LJ-91 shouted.
Lili paid no attention. Finally she was past the mouth of the warehouse and inside. As soon as she got in, she started shouting.
“Dark? Light? Where are you? I need you!”
Her voice rang hollowly in the cavernous space. As her eyes adjusted to the dim interior, Lili saw something that froze her blood—the place was empty—completely deserted.
No, that can’t be! They must be in here somewhere!
She glanced desperately at the tracker screen again, which had narrowed down to just this one big room. The two red dots were right in front of her.
Lili ran forward, looking frantically for the two big warriors.
What she found instead was an industrial-sized dumpster filled to the rim with old prosthetics.
“What…what is this? This can’t be!” Lili went up to the bin. Were the guys hiding in there, under all that junk?
Reaching in, she grabbed a piece of equipment that looked a lot like the smart-metal sheath Dark wore over his arm.
At once, the GPS tracker began to beep and words popped up on the screen.
“Target located,” Lili read numbly.
Slowly the reality of the situation sank in. Dark and Light weren’t here—the only thing in the warehouse was their old enhancements. They must have changed them out when they came back to Zeaga Four. All this time she had been tracking nothing but the empty metal shells they had left behind.
That’s it—I’ve failed. I need to get out of here!
Numbly, Lili reached down to press the hidden button on the side of her leg sheath…only to find that it was gone.
“Hey, what…?” She looked down at herself, peering in the dim light. Where had it gone? It was her silent alarm—her last line of defense to call Brock back down to pick her up. Without it, she was stuck here on Zeaga Four!
Desperately she felt all over—she even felt her other leg sheath, wondering if she might have forgotten what leg the call button was on. But it was gone and there was nothing but twisted metal where it had been.
I must have scraped it off when I was wiggling out of that window! Lili thought. Crap—what am I going to do?
