Black Equation - The Gifted Ones

Number Thirty-One

“Must be in the unused escape tunnels.” Arashi murmured. “The exact coordinates?”

“Wait. How deep are they?” Atom asked as he opened his eyes. It was so dark, the moon only offering a sliver of light in the night sky. There were flashes of light from the roaming guards, but aside from that, the place was plunged into total darkness.

And Atom hated the darkness, as much as he hated spinach and celery.

He was cold and hungry and afraid, but he was brave. He had to be. He merely tightened his grip on Arashi instead of whining.

Arashi noticed this, but again, kept to himself. “I don’t know. Four meters?”

“5.34 meters on the roads and 4.78 meters under the buildings,” Ivan answered automatically. He raised a brow at his companions’ bewildered expressions. “What? My mentor used to make me memorize these things for my Trigo class.”

Only you could pull that off, Arashi thought, and Atom couldn’t help but agree.

“She’s about two or three blocks from where we are.”

“I think we better travel underground from now on,” Arashi supplied as he put the young mind reader down. “Less eyes.”

“There are no entrances around this area. It’s all metal and concrete down there,” Ivan reasoned with a grunt. “We could go over to the left side and enter through the canal under the Thierry Bridge.”

He wasn’t saying it, but he had busted his right knee in an earlier fight, and it was too damn painful Atom took immediate pity on him. Running with that knee had to be difficult, and to add Rael’s weight on it. . .

Arashi noticed the limp that his partner was trying to hide. He merely shook his head, but deep inside, Atom knew he was worried. His voice, however, was indifferent. "I have an idea."

These two men were amazing like his brother. Atom was glad that he chose them for this mission.

Arashi took off the heavy bulletproof vest from under his shirt. “You might want to take cover and protect your ears.”

Atom read his thought and immediately yanked Ivan and Rael away. Ivan saw the vest and had deduced his partner’s plan in a blink of an eye. He nodded and picked up Atom on his other arm. As they scrambled to distance themselves, Arashi took three quick backward steps, pivoted on a heel, and then threw his vest right into the middle of the street.

And then he ran for his dear life as well.

It was dark, it was dank, and it was suffocating. Arashi held his flaming fist in front of him, his eyes carefully scanning every nook and cranny for any signs of her.

“There she is!” Ivan exclaimed, a few meters ahead of him.

What he saw made his sight darken considerably.

He couldn’t move.

“Is she – is she . . .”

“She’s alive,” Atom assured softly, trying and failing to keep the fear in his voice. Arashi was scaring him, but he couldn’t spare him shit. He was trembling in anger. No, he was overflowing with a cauldron of emotions: fury, sadness, bitterness, hatred, and most of all, pity.

To be alive, yet looking like that. He closed his eyes. I can’t watch.

He wanted to rip someone’s throat off, namely a villain called Falcon. If not for him, she wouldn’t have a reason to experience this. That man just had to die.