Marina Dre's Arc

Chapter 10 of 14

The message was moving now, but Marina still had one problem under her own roof. Mia stood by the door with her pack already slung on her shoulder. "I'm coming to the tower," she said. "You are not walking into that alone." Marina blocked the door. "He hired men to kill you. The tower is the one place I need you nowhere near." "So I sit in a box while you die." Mia's tail flicked hard against the floor. "No." Arguing would only harden her. Marina had raised a daughter who did not back down. So she stopped pushing and gave her something to steer instead. She led Mia down a narrow stair into a stone room with no windows and a single bolted door. The reinforced safe house. Thick walls, one way in, one way out. On a crate sat three things. A dark glass tablet. A handheld controller with twin sticks. Beside them, a small boy pressed against the wall, knees drawn up. Timmy Halleway, the postman's grandson, left here when his grandfather went quiet after the delivery. His eyes were huge and wet. "Someone has to mind him," Marina said. "He's eight and alone. He needs you more than I do right now." Mia knelt by the boy. Timmy flinched, then uncurled a little. "You scared?" she asked. He nodded. She touched his shoulder. "Me too. We'll watch together." Marina tapped the tablet awake. Camera feeds filled the glass. The harbor radio tower, four angles, grainy in the gray light. "Eyes for me," she said. "You see a man move wrong, you tell me." Then she lifted the controller. "And this flies a drone. It carries a punch. If I'm cornered, you're my second shooter. From here. Not there." Mia's jaw worked. She wanted the fight, not the screen. But she looked at Timmy, then at the feeds, then at her mother's face. "You check in," she said. "Under a minute. Same as always." "Same as always." Mia took the controller. Her thumbs found the sticks like she'd held one a hundred times. "Go," she said. "Before I change my mind." Marina bolted the door from outside and tested the lock twice. Mia was sealed in, safe, and still in the fight. The obstacle was dead. Her daughter would not walk into the killer's sights. A trained attack animal was posted at the door to protect Mia and Timmy. She was three steps up the stair when the tablet signal pinged her own earpiece. Mia's voice, tight. "Mom. Camera two."