AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Tech Bro: There are three men and a ten-year-old boy inside. His name is Antari. Be careful.
I take my duffel and exit the car. I walk toward the side of the house. Light filters through the film on the windows. Despite the obstruction, I peek inside. Two men converse inside, a brown-haired man on the sofa and a blond at the top of a doorway leading to what I suspect is the basement. The third man and the child are not in sight. The man at the door holds an AR-15, ready to use deadly force. Both men have builds that can easily subdue me, but the longer the boy doesn’t appear, the more a sense of urgency rides my ass.
My options aren’t pretty, and I risk harming the child. But he’s better off alive and injured than dead.
I don my gas mask and lob a smoke grenade inside the building and wait for the knockout gas to take effect. Once I hear two thumps, I’m on the move.
Inside the house, I make quick work of tying the men up and stripping them of their weapons before exploring the basement the man with the assault rifle guarded earlier. As I cautiously make my way downstairs, I pull a syringe from my pocket.
“I don’t like it here,” the fearful voice of a child says. “Where’s Pikachu? You said he was coming but it’s been so long and he’s not here.”
“He must be running late. Why don’t we have a drink while we wait?” The last man’s offer to the child propels me forward.
I turn the corner at the bottom of the stairs. His back faces me. I pull the protective plastic covering off the needle end of the syringe with my mouth and rush him. A small leap and I’m on his back jamming the needle into his neck and depressing the plunger, emptying it of the sedative. But then I catch the boy’s frightened gaze.
I’m probably more terrifying than the man about to dose him and do all manner of things to him. I’m the only one wearing a mask, and the first time he sees me I’m taking down the friendly man offering to introduce him to Pikachu and give him a drink.
The man takes advantage of my brief hesitation and throws me over his shoulder. I land with a crack to my skull, making my vision blur. I don’t have time for it to clear because I forgot to check the man for a weapon and I’m the defenseless one until the drug kicks in.
I roll over and stumble to my feet while trying to shake the double vision into one image. After a quick check of the sensitive area on my head, my fingers come away dry. I don’t have time to process my relief because the man charges me. Luck is on my side when I narrowly avoid colliding with him and he runs into the wall, finishing the job the sedative started.
I rip off my mask and turn to the little boy, so glad I got to him before it was too late. Too many times than I’d like to remember, I got there too late to save a child from the kind of nightmares these men inflict on their innocent minds. But the ones that haunt me the most are the ones that disappear. As good as Omari is, there were two instances where we never found the child when I arrived too late to foil the exchange.
Through my heavy panting, I say, “Antari, I’m here to take you home. These men are bad men who want to hurt you, but I won’t let them.”
“But you’re a girl.”
I’m so used to boys responding this way, I grin. “Yes, I am.”
Antari stands beside me while I tie the man up. “Are you going to call the police?”
“Not this time. I’m taking them somewhere special. Want to help me get him upstairs?”
“Then what happens?”
“I put him and his buddies in my van. After everyone’s settled, I’ll take you home where I’ll have a word with your parents.”
He glances at me, then at the comatose man on the floor. “What happens to him?”
“I take him somewhere to be punished for the bad things he’s done.” I begin the onerous task of dragging the dead weight to the stairs while Antari mulls over my request.
“What do I do?” he asks as I reach the bottom of the stairs.
I show him how to hold the man up by his hips while I bear the heavier weight of his torso as we tow the body up the stairs. We’re both panting and sweating by the time we get him on the main floor. Loading the van takes more time since there are three men instead of one. I secure them to each other and the van using more handcuffs than most police officers use in their time on the force.
I text Omari, confirming I have the boy.
“Alright Antari, what’s your mom and dad’s phone number? Let’s call them to let them know you’re alright.”
“I don’t remember.” He pouts but almost immediately bounces back with an excited, “It’s in my phone.”
“Great. Where’s your phone?”
Antari’s shoulders slump. “I don’t have it. And I don’t have a mom either. I have Papa Chul and Papa Kareem.”
“Okay, I’ll still make sure you reunite with your dads. Give me your address and I’ll get you home ASAP.” I jump behind the wheel and put his information in my GPS.
“How do you know these men are bad?”
