Awakened: Book One of the Mind Agents series, Chapter 34

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Sabine can see the alley entrance. It's just a few yards away. She hears Jack calling for her. She slips from an officer's grasp just as another officer takes hold of her. She hides from one, and then the next. She can hide from three of them, maybe four, but as soon as she evades the closest of them, others move in.

A dragnet has her. The more she struggles to free herself, the more it entangles her.

The police officers and guards are too strong for her. She pushes out hard with her mind. She tries to cloud more of them.

Have to help Jack. Have to join my friends.

Just as she feels she can't stem the onslaught, she notices officers closest to the alley reaching for her, but appear to be frozen in place, struggling to use their motionless arms. She runs to them, hiding from the others as she goes. She weaves past them toward the alley. The others chase after her as soon as they begin to perceive her, when they've fallen out of the range of her ability.

She looks back as she runs and sees officers, one at a time, stop as if hitting an invisible wall as soon as they get close to her.

She gets ahead of them, and runs into the alley. "I'm here! I'm here!"

Maya and Chris take her hands. She sees Jack near the center of the alley with two officers. One of them is holding him. Jack's hands are behind his head.

The other officer raises his gun at Sabine and the others. "Freeze! Stay where you are!"

Sabine gets inside their minds and turns their perception of her and her friends into a disappearing mist. The officers look around, lowering their weapons in confusion.

"What in the–?" One of them says.

"It's some kind of trick," the other shouts. "Fan out,"

Sabine runs to Jack and jumps into his arms. She hugs him like she'll never let go, her face bunched into a squint. Jack holds her tightly.

"Am I ever glad to see you," he says.

Jack reminds her of her father, when he wasn't drinking. He was so full of life, and he liked to carry her. He carried her at the festival, at the market. He was like her horse. When he died, she thought she would never feel that sense of warmth, strength, and security again. But now she has. She would go anywhere with Jack. He, Maya, and Chris are her new family.

"We were getting worried about you, girl," Maya says.

"Did you help me get away?" Sabine asks.

"Just a little bit." Maya smiles. Sabine smiles back, marveling at Maya's magnificent hair. She reaches out to pet it.

"I feel like we're all getting stronger," Maya says.

"It's all this practice, right Sabine?" Chris says.

Sabine nods.

They maneuver past the officers toward the other end of the alley. Chris lightly punches one of the officers in the shoulder as they pass. The man's attention remains focused on the alley in front of him, letting Chris pass as if nothing happened.

"Don't push it!" Maya chides him.

Chris laughs. "This pseudo-invisibility of yours is just about the greatest thing in the world," he says, rubbing Sabine on the head.

She smiles. She likes how playful and good-humored Chris is. And she likes his big dimples.

The hunkered group of four emerges from the alley and Sabine sees the towering, angled walls of a massive building. She understands this is the Pentagon, where they must go. Below, in the space just outside the alley, several black cars, police cars, a big black truck, and sawhorse barricades block their way. Armed officers crouch behind their vehicles, with guns aimed at them.

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