Page 31 of The Tracker's Dawn: Sunderverse

CHAPTER 12

Panic shot throughme. What if the SWAT team made everything worse? What if they didn’t reach my sister in time?

“How many hybrids are in there?” I demanded of Tom.

He shook his head. “We don’t know. Twenty? Thirty?”

Oh, hell!

The SWAT team didn’t stand a chance—not without knowing what they were about to face. Rosalina had emptied full clips of high-caliber bullets into Stephen’s hybrids, and they had kept coming and coming. And not only that, even after she took them down, they healed and quickly got back on their feet. What was worse, shooting them only pissed them off and increased their violence. And if the SWAT team didn’t stand a chance, the students would fare even worse. Soon, the school would be nothing but a stage for carnage.

Shaking my head, I backed away from Tom.

“I’ll talk to the captain,” Tom said. “Try to reach them on the radio. How do you kill those... hybrids?”

Damien stepped forward to answer his question while the others stepped back with me. We mixed with the crowd and came out behind them.

“I gotta go in there,” I said, my skin tingling with restless energy. “I have to find Lucia.”

Jake shook his head but said nothing. He understood well. That was my little sister in there, and I wasn’t about to sit here doing nothing.

“I’ll go with you,” Eric said.

He and I were the only ones who could fleet. We would be able to move fast enough to avoid detection.

“Please be careful.” Jake squeezed my hand.

Rosalina set her jaw. “Kick their ass.”

I nodded, then Eric and I were off, circling the main police barrier from the side. Once we made sure no one had noticed us, we let our fleeting power unfurl. The world around me seemed to come to a complete stop. All the sounds became garbled and the spectators froze. Eric and I ran at full pelt. He was a lot faster than me and quickly got ahead. I was able to perceive his legs and arms moving at an unnatural rate, but only because I was also moving at a crazy speed. If I hadn’t been, he would have practically appeared invisible.

In an instant, he was at the side entrance with the demolished door. He stepped just past the threshold and stopped to wait for me. I skidded to a halt a few paces in front of him. I still had trouble estimating my momentum and stopping in time.

I bent over panting. Fleeting was a bitch. It drained me too quickly.

“Let’s save our energy,” Eric said.

I nodded, itching to shift, but urging Red to stand down. My human shape would serve me better here.

At the end of a long hall, a group of men dressed in black and carrying body shields moved in unison. They faced no opposition as they methodically advanced, but it was clear by the sound of shots elsewhere in the building, that there must be another team that had penetrated the school through a different entrance.

“Do you know where to find her?” Eric asked.

I shook my head. “Not yet, but I’m about to find out.”

I pulled out my phone and quickly fired off a text to my little sister. I had tried earlier, but she hadn’t replied. I figured they’d put a spell around the school to avoid panic.