The Pack-Retribution (14 page)

Her nose tickled at the smell. Slight smoky…electrical. She must be dreaming.

Chapter 21

The smell was overpowering. A side effect of being blind for fourteen years of her life sometimes made her smell things in her dreams. She turned over. A pop, then a sizzle tickled her hearing, and she jumped up in bed. Eyes open, she took in another deep breath and choked. Transparent smoke clouded the room. Her throat convulsed at the metallic taste of burning mixed with pure energy. Her blood pumped frantically through her veins; tears welled in her eyes from the smoke as fear laced through her veins.

She checked on a sleeping Taren and scrambled to the foot of the bed to check on Mina. Terror seized her as she’d awakened thoroughly and realized her dream was a living nightmare. Another pop and sizzle, then a boom as an electrical charge like thunder hit the house. Her muscles froze. A brief sharp twinge rose through her body, temporarily immobilizing her. It passed and her brow furrowed at the discomfort, but the need to get them out of there resumed with vigor. She shook Taren. Tingles of deep fear skipped over her skin as she saw a thin line of light snap out on the ceiling. Something was wrong, very wrong.

“Get up! Get—” She coughed more, tears escaped from the intensity of smoke that seemed to instantly fill the room.

Taren groggily rubbed her eyes. Then fits of coughing hit her. “What…how…Mi-na.”

Shamira jumped off the bed, dragging Taren by the hand. She crouched on her knees and shook Mina. “Get up. Mina. Wake up!”

Mina opened her eyes, and then closed them to rub with her fist. “Sleepy. Burning.”

Shamira yanked Mina up to stand. “We have to get out! Get the others…in the back of the house.”

“Daddy will get Mom out.” Taren started another coughing fit.

Shamira hurriedly pulled them toward the doorway. Moving strictly by instinct from finding her way around when she was blind, she pushed them forward.

Mina tugged Shamira’s hand. “I can’t see anything,” she whimpered.

Shamira took several deep breaths while she tried to remain calm. She released Taren’s hand for a moment to touch the doorframe. It was hot. “David! Manny!” Her throat constricted as a flash of them lying unconscious on the floor taunted her brain. She kicked the door opened. Splinters of woods flew into the smoky hall, and the door hung lopsided by the top hinge. Frantically, she groped in the darkened hall that led to the living room. Whatever that electrical shock was that hit the house, caused the electricity to die. Irritated, she hit the flattened manual light switch.

“Shamira! Where are you? Shamira?” Taren nearly screeched.

Although the initial shock of smoke had started to clear, the acrid smell of the chemical expelled in the air remained strong. Shamira heard Taren stumble and scream. Her eyes watered and she reached for Taren’s hand.

“Taren…”
Freak! I can’t fight this…no one.
“David!” she screamed for him. Then the blinding paralysis hit her.

The electrical shock battered the house and pulsed stronger and stronger. Shamira froze in anguish, tears ran from her eyes and she fell to her knees. “Oh…God…no.” She shook her head. Failure. Death. Like the man said, and her family too.

Like an angel in the night to pull her out of the depths of hell, she heard David. Her brother was yelling her name. Pain crippled her and she couldn’t move. It was as if her body was dead, but it wasn’t. The nanonytes within her were attacking her. Causing her muscles to spasm and lose control. Zigzags of fire cut through her bones; she felt as though someone was cutting her with a million knives. Inside and out of her entire body, she felt ravaged. Nowhere was free of the all-consuming torture. She couldn’t even speak.

“Over here!” Taren called. “She can’t move. Her whole body is just shaking.”

Mina was smoothing down her hair and rocking back and forward. “Fire!”

Shamira fought through the haze of pain and looked up at the ceiling, now filled with tendrils of fire within the small cracks.
Go! Leave me!
she screamed, but the words wouldn’t move beyond her frozen lips.

David and Manny rushed to her. David bent and held her trembling face within his hands. “I’m going to save you this time, Shamira. Remember. Like I told you when you saved me from the Mons.” Calmly, he smiled at her.

Her heart filled with butterflies of joy. David looked so sure. Deep down, she felt pride. Yes, she’d saved him and she prayed he could save her now.

“Manny, get the girls out. I’ll take care of Shamira,” David demanded. He sounded much older than his eleven years.

“Uh, you can’t move her by yourself.” Manny shook his head while he pushed Taren and Mina to the door. “Run! Get out. Get help for Mom and Dad.”

David tugged her a few inches. “Guess not. Grab her other arm.” He bent and quickly kissed Shamira’s forehead. “I’m sorry…but got to help us save you. You’re strong, I know it.” He sniffed as a tear streaked down his cheek.

Shamira managed to blink her eyes. All the warnings of not tapping into her hidden powers—a strength she’d been forced to push down in order to let the nanonytes do their job—echoed through her head. She sighed. A lot of good suppressing them did her, because now they could cause her death. Maybe even the death of her parents and her brothers.

Crack.

The ceiling broke. Pieces of it fell around them. Immobilizing pain coursed through her again. She shivered, closed her eyes and tickled it—the forbidden power within her. The energy that interlaced itself with rage and was created from the fight she put up for her life long ago. That rage was born from clawing back from the depths of death to bring her back from the dead. She was a baby when it happened, but it has cursed her for the rest of her life. It bubbled up within her, a heated heaviness that pushed through her blood, awakened and hungry. Power, greater than the nanonytes ever was able to replicate, skipped over her skin.

“Whoa.” Manny dropped her wrist. “What’s wrong with her? She’s hot.” He started to cough.

“Her power. She’s using it. It’s okay; it doesn’t hurt too bad. She can control it.” Manny tugged her again.

Her back bowed and a rush flooded her as the dead nanonytes didn’t awaken to counteract her power. Without thought, only reflex, she jumped up off the floor. The throbbing pain coursing through her veins renewed her fight to get them out of the house alive. She twisted her hand, and then grabbed their wrists.

A roar poured from her. “Run!” Shamira tugged them out of the burning smoked-filled living room. She slid to a stop as a fiery ceiling beam fell in their path, blocking the door.

“We’re dead,” Manny cried. “I don’t want to die by…” Coughing fits hit him and he covered his mouth with his fist.

“Not today,” Shamira replied hoarsely. Anxiously, she looked around the room for a way out and pulled them toward the window.

“No…No… the window’s closed! You are cra-z-y!” Manny yanked his wrist.

“Shut up! She knows what she’s doing.” David punched Manny in the arm.

Shamira released his arm. Her tongue felt a bit like lead in her mouth as she forced out the words, “I. Run. Through. Follow.”

Both boys nodded. She charged the window, through smoke, and the scattered licks of fire. She burst through the glass window with a howl. Her body so charged that she didn’t feel the cut of the glass on her forehead, ears or face. A crash sounded behind her. Her body was pushed forward onto the ground from the force of Manny and David’s fall.

She crawled from under the boys, her aches drowned by her heightened adrenaline and power surge. Her nanonytes slowly revived and the warring pain with her inner power and the protective layer of technoskin burned her body from the neck down. She felt as though she was wrapped in a burning cocoon of fire that was eating deep into her skin. Tears fell uncheck and she pushed herself up. With several deep breaths, a moment of angry meditation, she willed her power to bury itself deep within the depths of her body.

A small group of her neighbors stood in front of the burning house with Taren and Mina. She took a deep breath and faced toward the house hoping her parents would emerge. Dread and sadness so deep hung heavy around her. “I’m going back in.”

David stood next to her, flicking embedded pieces of glass off her face, and arms. “Me too.” He wiped his hands on his pants.

The sound of sirens in the distance drew closer and closer. Shamira took a step toward the house only to be pulled back by several of the neighbors who’d come out to help. Their warnings were drowned out by her growl as she snatched her arm out of their grasp.

“Get off me! My…my, oh God, my parents are in there.” Tears fell unchecked from her eyes. Jerking her arms free, she ran towards the burning house. Before she reached the door, a thundering sound of an explosion riveted through the home, causing it to collapse upon itself. David and Manny were on her. They scratched and pulled on her wrist, pleading with her not to get burned.

She stopped her struggle, her heart breaking with sadness as she fell to her knees and pulled the boys close to her as she sobbed. Her fault, her threats, her mistakes caused the death of her parents. She would end this and she would do it—alone.

Chapter 22

Security Force members, the fire department and rescue crews worked diligently to get her parents out alive. At least they hoped her parents still lived.

Shamira stood there just staring at the house as her heart broke. So many tears—a lifetime of them built up from holding back her emotions—drenched her face. Someone had taken her brothers and sister away to soothe them. But all she could do was hold her powerful beast at bay until she could find and kill those that would destroy her world.

Someone touched her, enveloped her in their arms from behind. She smelled him and her eyes closed—Valens. She couldn’t do this with him, couldn’t bring him and his family into her torture. Could she do this? Push him away forever to save him and her friends? Selfishly, a part of her didn’t want to be alone again. He made her feel whole, less afraid to be vulnerable. Yet there she stood, ripped open and aching from her failure to protect her family.

“Shamira, talk to me, baby. Turn around so I can see you.” Valens spoke softly, his steady voice knowing just how to seep its way into her heart.

Taking a deep breath to ready herself with misplaced anger, she seethed, “Get—off—me!” She whirled around out of his arms. “Don’t you get it? I don’t need your pity, sympathy….not a thing from you.” Her fisted hands rose up to the sides of her face. “I just need to be left alone.”

Confusion marred his face. “You’re just upset. Come here. Let me hold you.” He widened his arms, welcoming her to a safe haven for her tears.

She wiped her face with her arm. “I’m sorry about Mina. That she was here when it happened.” She swallowed and moved back from him.

He studied her, and dropped his outstretched arms. “Officer Thompson said your parents are still alive. Weak, but still alive. They’ll save them. They’ll get them out of the house.”

“Thanks…for letting me know.” She walked away and sought out some answers. Officer Drakun was talking with the clean crew who investigated the crime scenes.

She came up behind him; his tall thick form belied his gentle nature. He turned and his grim expression showed concern. “Hey, it looks like the crew found them.” Relief flooded his features. “I just want you to know, the rest of the force doesn’t give a damn what Internal Affairs is accusing you kids of. We know you all are loyal to the force and we’re behind you all the way.”

Shamira nodded at him. “Thank you.” Emotions, raw and painful, filled her chest at his admission of support. He didn’t know how much she needed to hear those words from an Elite Officer of his standing. She’d always tried hard to gain the respect of her mentors and peers. Taking a deep breath, she plastered a grateful but fractured smile on her face for him. “Who’s leading up the Clean Crew?” The Internal Affairs department had become even more distant once it was confirmed that there were Security Force Officers that were involved with Monev. And she wanted to know exactly who was involved with figuring out who was doing this to her family.

“Officer Lynn. You know she’ll get them out safe if she has to crawl in there herself.” He chuckled.

Shamira cleared her throat. Thankful that it was Officer Lynn, someone she and her parents knew they could trust. “I know.” Also, she didn’t remember seeing Officer’s Lynn’s name on any of the list in her research for suspects. Twisting her stiff shoulder, she decided to get some answers. She headed toward Officer Lynn to check on the progress of her parent’s recovery from the debris of their destroyed home. Shamira slid her chin to the side, feeling Valens’ presence as he stared at her. A glimmer of the sun flashed off the silver on his jacket as he spun away to leave the scene with his sister and her siblings in tow.

Officer Drakun ran up behind her. “Oh, just came to tell you, Cadet Valens took your brothers and sister to his home. The council called in and wants everyone to return to headquarters after your parents are retrieved. There’s a mandatory meeting.”

“All right!” A cheer sounded from behind the house. Shamira ran off in the direction of the chaos. Her heart felt as though it was lodged in her chest. She rounded the corner in time to see them lift her mother out of the rubble.