Salient Secret 2

11

Kai

"This is it," I say standing in front of a massive gate guarding an even larger grey brick house, with beautiful greenery. 

"How are we going to get in?" Enzo  asks. 

"We can climb," Savannah suggests. I tried to talk her out of coming with us for her own safety but then she pinned me on my ass and argued, with undeniable evidence, that she is the best fighter out of us four. 

"Enzo can't you use your powers to short circuit the gate?" 

"Will that work?" he asks.

"Hey pea brains . You coming or not?" Palmer smugly says while walking through the open gate. Sometimes I forget her powers can do the simplest of tasks. 

"Whoever took Avery is loaded with cash," Enzo says in awe of our surroundings, a beautiful fountain, two cars parked outside and four garage doors, not to mention how well kept and big  everything is. 

We get to the door and Palmer unlocks it slowly. I hate to admit it but this modern design is fascinating. However, as beautiful as it is their security sucks. 

"You two take downstairs, we'll take upstairs," I whisper then start walking with Enzo vigilantly up the stairs, each in possession of a tranquilizer gun. We slowly open the first door we come across and see the blue haired girl asleep on her bed. I signal for Enzo to walk in and tranquilize her while I move on. 

The next door has a cliche black 'KEEP OUT!' sign on it. I slowly open the door and see a young male laid across the bed with his blankets on the floor. That looks like one hell of a good night sleep. Nevertheless, I quietly move closer and tranquilize him, shooting a dart right in his thigh. I leave the room and see Palmer and Savannah making their way up the staircase. 

"Downstairs is all clear," Palmer whispers, I nod and Enzo emerges from the first bedroom... What took him so long? Not important, there are four more bedrooms, so I signal for everyone to take one. We all move quietly, making sure we don't wake them up. I approach another door, this time, the room is empty. The bed is neatly made and everything else is orderly. Based on clothes in the closet and necessities in the bathroom, this is definitely the room of a goth biker.

"All clear," Savannah announces loudly from the hall. 

"No sign of  Avery," Palmer says very disappointed. 

"She has to be here somewhere." I am not leaving until we search every single inch of this place. 

"Kai, we checked there-" Savannah starts but I interrupt her. 

"I am not giving up. She's here, think logically, where would you keep a hostage?" 

"In the basement," Enzo answers. 

"Exactly. Let's go," I say moving down the stairs swiftly. We sweep this entire mansion. The basement had nothing but junk in and there were no signs of a hostage or Avery anywhere else, not even in the pool house outside. 

"Look what I found. They were all wearing one," Palmer holds out a ring in her hands. 

"A ring?" 

"Not just any ring," she slips it on, twists it and disappears. I look around in confusion and she reappears behind me. 

"It's how they teleport," she says smiling. I think back to the girl who teleported me to the gym, twice. She didn't touch her fingers when she teleported, she just did it like it's her second nature. I choose to keep my thoughts to myself because I could easily be mistaken. 

"What about the empty room?" Savannah asks.  

"What about it?" 

"Someone is clearly missing, we have two girls and two guys. Aren't you worried the fifth one will come looking for them?" 

"Come looking for them? Where are they going?" The plan was to find Avery, go back home and then let Salutis capture them. 

"Kai we can't let them go. They're literally hunting Salutis." 

"Savannah that was not the plan."

"Maybe it should've been." 

"I will be reprimanded for going on an unsanctioned mission." 

"I understand but you will have captured four psycho arsonists. The heads of Salutis will look passed your irresponsibility and praise you for leading the mission that brought them home." 

"And if they don't?" 

"Kai, we have to take Savannah's side on this one," Palmer adds on behalf of her and Enzo.

"Yeah and with those rings, we can teleport home with them instead of taking another 15 hour jet ride," Enzo says trying to lighten up the mood. 

"Fine," I'm outnumbered, I have no choice, majority rules. 

"I'll tie them up," Savannah says leaving the room. 

"I'll help," Palmer says following her. 

"This is the right thing to do," Enzo pats my shoulder and follows the girls. 

Why doesn't this feel like the right thing to do? 

Vada

I wake up panting after dreaming about Palmer breaking through the mind inhibitor and finding us, and it's all my fault. I've thought about letting them know I'm alive but I have no idea how they would react, would they be mad? Happy? Relieved? I have no idea. What I do know is that I need to make my bed because god knows I won't be coming back here tonight.

I get dressed and teleport into the training room under the house. I play music through the speakers, thankfully, this room is sound proof, I wouldn't want to wake the others. I train for several hours, eventually my 6 am alarm goes off. Yes, that's right, Avery was not a morning person, but Vada is the first person awake around here...most of the time. Cassian wakes up pretty early too that's how he knew I'm an early bird most mornings. 

I teleport to my room and take a shower. Since I'm in a good mood today I decide to make the team a nice breakfast consisting of bacon, sausages, eggs, croissants, waffles and fruit. 

"That's strange," I say to myself after looking at the time. It's 7 am and not even Cassian has come down yet. I teleport upstairs and knock on his door. 

"Cassian," I say walking in since there's no reply. That's odd, he isn't here. 

"CASSIAN!" I start panicking when there's still no reply. I run and fling open Rik's door. He also isn't there. I run to Tanith and then Imelda's room, no one is here. 

Where the hell are they?