What She Thought She Knew (Rachel Moore Mystery Book 1), стр. 57

All of a sudden, a loud beeping noise arose and one of the armored vans came crashing through the front glass.

The three of us got down as we covered our faces from the flying glass.

The beeping noise turned out to be the van's horn blaring to catch our attention.

We realized that the Phantoms were momentarily stunned, so we ceased that opportunity to run to safety.

The doors automatically opened, and we quickly got inside.

Immediately, the driver put the van to reverse, and as soon as we were outside, the driver hit the gas and the van sped away.

Once I regained my bearings, I crawled towards the front, and finally saw who the driver was. "Pete?" I asked in surprise. "What are you doing here?"

The Head Warrior glanced at me briefly. "I'm here because of the Phantoms." He replied.

He sped through the dark streets, and expertly dodged any obstacles in our way.

I crawled into the front passenger street and put on my seat belt.

"Jesus Christ Pete, what the hell is going on?" I demanded.

The Head Warrior ignored me, too focused on driving us to safety.

Fear and Claire were in the back and kept on bouncing around as neither of them had their seat-belt on.

"The Phantoms attacked Seeker HQ. Seeker agents that were there are either dead or have been taken hostage." Pete finally said as he cursed in his breath.

My eyes widened at his news. "I thought they were after the Shroud?"

The Head Warrior shook his head. "No, it was all just a well-executed plan. Seeker HQ was their main target. They drew all high operative Seeker agents away from it so that they could move in. There's word that the Directors are dead."

I gritted my teeth as the van hit a rather nasty looking hole, but the Head Warrior still kept on driving.

"What does this mean for us?" I asked; my heart was beating like mad.

"It means that we're in a full scale war. The whole world is now involved." The Head Warrior replied as he looked at me dead in the eye.

I felt my blood go cold at the horrifying reality.

This was exactly what Rachel feared for.

"Sir, what happened to Rachel and her team?"

If I hadn't been paying attention, I would have missed the Nano-second time frame in which the Head Warrior's body went rigid.

I immediately knew that something was wrong.

Pete turned his head away. "We lost contact with Agent Moore and her team shortly after they arrived in New York. We suspect that the Phantoms have captured them."

My heart skipped a beat as I took in what Pete said. "What?!" I shouted. "How the hell did that happen? Where is she?!"

The Head Warrior didn't even wince.

Instead, he turned sharply into a dark alley and stopped the van.

He turned to look at me. "I mean that she is MIA. The only bodies we found onboard the plane were those of the pilot and Agent Elvira." The Head Warrior looked away, his grip on the steering wheel increased in pressure.

I narrowed my eyes and snarled. "So what, the others just vanished? For God's sake, we're the Seekers! Are we really that pathetic that we can't properly find people?"

The Head Warrior slapped the steering wheel in frustration, and whipped his head around, his eyes were wild with anger and loss. "Don't start acting like you're the only one who lost someone! Several of my friends and colleagues are dead, and I have no idea what happened to the others."

I was about to retort, but a hand gripped my shoulder.

I turned around and saw Fear looking at me sadly while Claire was at a loss.

"John, not like this." Fear said gently.

I looked at my childhood friend. He too was worried for Rachel and the others, though he was calmer about it than I was. How could I have been calm?

I looked away, and gripped the car seat tightly as I struggled to find my inner balance.

For a moment, there was a tense, awkward silence in the van as neither of us knew what to say or do.

Thankfully, Pete cleared his throat, started the van and drove once more.

The silence continued on for a bit longer, until I got tired of it. "What's our next move?" I asked, wary of not pissing off the Head Warrior any more than I already had.

Luckily, he was a professional and went along with it. "We'll have to regroup at a secure location. Gather as many surviving Seeker agents as we can, and strike back at the Phantoms."

I raised an eyebrow. "And how exactly are we going to do that?" I asked.

The Head Warrior ignored my tone, and took out some sort of scanner.

I looked at him in confusion.

"Do you remember all those medical tests you underwent when you first joined the Seekers?" Pete asked.

All three of us nodded our heads.

"Whether you were aware of this or not, every Seeker agent was implanted with nanobots that could be activated in case of an emergency. Frankly, now seems to be the perfect moment." With that, he pushed the button, and suddenly all of our veins started to glow.

I looked at my arms in awe, completely shocked that something like that was hidden inside of me for all of these years.

I looked back at Fear and Claire, and saw that they too were looking at their bodies in curiosity about this fact.

I turned my attention to the Head Warrior. "So, where to?" I asked.

He turned around, and gave me a slight smirk. "To the place where you least expected."

Chapter 28: New Playing Field

~ Rachel's POV ~

The sound of dripping water woke me up from my slumber.

I carefully opened my