Almost immediately, a Rottweiler charges at me, but I wrestle the monster into a small bathroom and slam the door shut.
Kai steps around me before rushing into a dark room where one of the men opens fire. Neri’s brother kneels down, finds his target through the inferred scope, and shoots twice. The safe house asshole falls silent. The eerie quiet is only broken up by the barking dog in the bathroom.
I tap Kai’s shoulder, moving past him and finding a second hallway. I’m unsure which direction to take. Kai signals he’ll move left, and I ought to go right. After clearing two rooms, I locate the security setup and use the cameras to search the house for our final target.
“Kai, he’s in the kitchen next door to you,” I say in Spanish over our shared radio link.
The final target must hear Kai approaching. He runs for the back door, finds it locked, and then charges toward the front. I watch Kai take a shot that just misses his fleeing target. The final asshole gets spooked and heads up the stairs rather than through the open front door.
“Fuck,” I growl, knowing he’ll use the women as leverage. Radioing Neri, I warn, “The asshole is coming straight for you.”
With no security cameras in the bedrooms, I can’t see if she reacts, and her comm remains silent. Kai reaches the bottom of the stairs by the time the guy arrives at the bedroom where Neri, Sunny, the kid, and my dog hide.
“Shoot now, Neri,” I demand.
I spot a flash as she fires through the door. The asshole falls to the ground, though I can't tell in the dark if he’s still moving. My mind pictures him managing to shoot through the door and killing Neri. There’s a moment where I can’t breathe. If she dies, am I still willing to see another sunrise?
Kai fires into the man in the hallway and hits the light switch. “The electricity is out,” Kai radios to me.
Once Neri’s shadowed figure appears next to her brother, I regain my bearings and locate the house’s light controls. The woman shut them off to give herself an advantage. Unfortunately, she underestimated her enemy and overestimated the useless twats watching her back.
Once the lights are back on, I search the security cameras for signs of life. The only enemy still breathing is the huge dog trapped in the bathroom. I don’t know what to do with the barking beast, but he’ll be fine in there until we’re ready to leave.
The outer perimeter looks quiet, and I find no recent communication to or from this safe house. They hadn’t heard of the bounty yet, but the phone I find in the woman’s pocket does have an unread message from someone asking if she’s seen two foreigners and the Children of the Black Sun apostates.
Once I’m certain the house is clear, I close and lock the front door. Upstairs, Kai plays softie with his people. Down here, I’m on my own while cleaning up two dead bodies.
I hear Robin growling before I see Neri. Holding her weapon at the ready, she moves through the living room to where I wrap the woman’s body in a blanket I found in a downstairs bedroom.
“Is it clear?” she asks in Spanish.
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you answer when I asked over the radio?”
I don’t respond to her question because I honestly just fucking forget they need to know shit. Even with Neri always in my thoughts, I lose track of how I should communicate with her. Robin knows what I want without me saying a word. Sure, the dog ignores my commands, but that’s not the point. He never expects me to explain shit.
Sliding her weapon in her holster, Neri leans down to help me drag the woman to a back room. While I think to tell her to fuck off and go upstairs, I’m too relieved she’s alive to argue. Besides, she’ll just bitch about wanting to help and ask why I’m so afraid of teamwork. I’ll growl and call her a name. She’ll smile like I’m an idiot. Then we’ll end up doing what we’re doing now anyway.
KAI
My heart remains cold when we hunt down the people in this safe house. Despite being raised with love, I still know the truth of human nature. We’re most willing to kill, die, and sacrifice for our own tribe. That’s why I’ll destroy anyone to allow my sister, Sunny, and Anika another day on this earth.
Once removing the man’s body from the hallway, I wash up and join Sunny in the bedroom. Anika woke from the flash grenades and gunfire, but she doesn’t seem bothered. Loud noises lack meaning. She doesn’t know to fear them and is ready to return to sleep.
Sunny, though, stares at me with wide, fearful eyes. Neri firing through the door scared her. The violence was so close, and she felt powerless. Yet, she relaxes when my arms wrap around her.
“Are we leaving?” she whispers as Anika cuddles under the blankets with Duck and Doll.
“No. We’ll rest up and figure out where to go next.”
“I don’t understand what happened. Why did they attack?”
Rather than explain how we preemptively killed them, I tug the blanket over Anika’s little bare shoulder. Her shirt doesn’t fit well, and I wouldn’t be surprised if she wiggles herself out of it by morning.
“The cult offered a reward to anyone willing to kill Neri and me. They want you and Anika returned to their compound.”
Breathing increasing, Sunny stiffens in my arms. She opens her mouth, but nothing comes out. I nuzzle her forehead with my lips.
“Ending a life is ugly. I don’t relish doing it, but killing runs in my blood. My father hunted foul people since he was your age. It’s all he was any good at until he found Mama. It’s what Neri and I do when there are problems that can’t be solved in other ways. Now we face people who wield death. We will meet their violence with our own. It’s what we do,” I explain and then brush my lips across hers. “You’re like my mother, who has no taste for violence. Mama’s the heart of the family. That’s how you’ll be. Neri and I take after Papa. We’re the fists of the family. As weapons, we’ll kill whoever threatens those we love.”
“I feel like your home gets farther away every day.”
Staring into her fair brown eyes made darker by the dimly lit room, I whisper, “It might be a week or even a month before we reach our destination. I won’t rush and make a mistake.”
“What can I do?” Sunny asks, and I smile at how she wants to do more than be saved.
“Eat, drink, and sleep. You need to stay healthy. Getting run down is common when under stress. You can’t stay focused if you’re running on empty.”
When Sunny nods, her gaze loses its earlier edge. She rests her cheek against my chest and sighs. Sunny’s thinking isn’t so different from my mother’s. Like Mama, she needs the world broken into small, easily understandable parts. Explaining the obstacles between our current location and home will only confuse and agitate her. It’s not as if she can do anything about our problems anyway. No, Sunny’s job is to keep Anika calm. I doubt my sister can tolerate being trapped in a vehicle all day with a screaming child.
With Anika now asleep, I leave Sunny to keep watch while I lock the door behind me. The house might be clear, but I’m on edge here in a way I wasn’t at Cobain’s safe house. Something about this location in the woods unsettles me. The sooner we return to the road, the better.