Hydra Heart

Chapter Ten

Chapter 10: Tenra Solis, Husband of Mary Solis

Vesta and Molly looked at each other, panicking at the incoming transmission. They shot each other glances that said, What do we do?

"Again this is Head Operative Cavarie. KCD-501 do you read me?"

Molly snatched the receiver, hands shaking, and rubbed it against the rough ground. After what had just happened with the white noise, Vesta trusted there was a reason for it.

"You're coming through grainy, is something wrong with your equipment?" Bruta Cavarie's voice said through the speaker.

Molly scraped the receiver one more time, then covered it up, so she could whisper to Vesta. "Take this and start going that way. Their tracking will make it look like she's fleeing the city. I'm gonna go get Tenra. Stay in touch, and keep static coming through the other end. I'll contact you."

Vesta opened her mouth for protest, but Molly was already in a hurry back over to the hotel, kicking up dust in the dark.

--

Molly arrived at the Tavern, sweaty and winded. She booked it up the staircase to their rooms.

She rapped on Tenra's door, and got no response. She knocked harder and faster, so obnoxiously that Shay, one room over, woke up and came out into the hall.

"Shay, where's Tenra?"

"He's not in his room?" The words drooled out of the groggy girl, who was too tired to give Molly lip about it.

"No, and it's urgent. Some stuff went down, and we need-"

Shay made an aggressive noise, and mumbled, "I know where he is."

Molly sprinted down the stairs after Shay, who was keeping the pace high. They descended in a matter of seconds, and Shay led her to a room in the lobby marked Employees Only.

Shay banged on the door. "POPS! Get your ass out here!" Shay's knuckles went to work, sounding like a woodpecker with an energy drink habit.

Tenra stumbled forth and held the door only slightly ajar, so that neither could see into the room. "What?"

Shay spun around 180, and donkey-kicked the door inwards. Tenra stepped back just barely in time. On the bed behind him, the bartender/ hotel owner was laying in bed. The parts of her that neither Molly nor Shay wanted to see were conveniently covered by a blanket.

Tenra was silent. Shay practically hissed through her clenched jaw. She drilled her brown eyes into her father's avoidant face.

"Let's just go," Shay said. Her father neglected to raise his questions.

--

"She's headed that way now, and still has the tracker. I told her to walk slow, so we should be able to reach her in time to do something with the communicator."

"Copy that, but what do you mean by something?" Tenra asked.

"You should be able to find a way to send text-based messages to them, and maybe get intel, right? We can think about it on the way ov-- nevermind, I see Vesta."

Vesta was leisurely walking around in a wheat field, north of the town. The golden grain came up to her waist, and the moonlight was just barely strong enough for her to be visible to her team. They quietly began wading through the grass, moving towards her. Molly, Tenra, and Shay all rapidly shushed each other until they were in earshot of the receiver.

Tenra reached out and took the device from Vesta's hand. He kept walking, with Shay and Vesta right behind. They stepped carefully, so as to not give away the fact that the audio was still being picked up flawlessly. Tenra silently exhaled and pressed a button on the left ear of the comms device. The headset ejected a keyboard, and he typed a message.

En route to Alogos. I'm low, but I'm holding dollar.

A message responded.

Are we 60? We're not seeing what you're seeing.

Tenra smirked, pleased that his Hirudinea jargon was still workable.

We are 60. Headed back now, send time tables.

Tenra waited for a second, hoping the guy on the other end would be dumb enough to drop the location of KCD's base.

No need for that. Pickup unit en-route to your LO. We're gonna get you back to the Weak Spot.

"Shit!" Tenra shouted out loud.

Bruta's voice instantly came through the other end, "Are you back on audio? Wait, I'd recognize that voice anywhere." They heard a fist slamming on a desk come loud and clear through the transmitter. "I'm coming after you with everything I've got, Tenra. I'm gonna send you where I sent Mary." Her voice became more faint as she turned away to yell at someone else, presumably in another room. "Dispatch to Vulture, be armed and ready for combat, we've got--"

Molly snatched the receiver and smashed it on the ground. "At least now they... she... won't be able to track us."

Tenra's shaky voice sputtered out, "We-we need t-to hide."

"Let's just run," Shay suggested, looking concerned for the first time in a while.

"I don't think you know what a pickup crew looks like," Tenra said. He was starting to calm down, but even Vesta could tell something was wrong.

"Deep breaths. We're gonna be okay." Tenra followed her example of breathing in, holding, then breathing out.

"Are we?" Vesta asked.

The four of them heard the humming of a powerful engine, and saw a flashing light in the distance.