Hit Squad Read Online Free PDF Page B

I was
guessing she was quite pretty under the dirt.
    ‘I, Tania,’ she said. She gulped.
    I looked around. Ranged in a row as we were we must look really intimidating.
    I stepped forward, smiling to put the girl at her ease.
    ‘We heard you scream,’ I said. ‘Are you okay?’
    Tania nodded.
    ‘What on earth is going on?’ Ed muttered.
    ‘You’ll have to mind-read her, Ed,’ Dylan said, her voice full of suspicion.
    ‘No,’ I said. ‘We can’t just assume everyone we meet is untrustworthy.’
    Dylan snorted.
    ‘Anyway I don’t think mind-reading would work with her, beyond general emotions,’ Ed said. ‘She doesn’t sound like she thinks in English.’
    ‘Mind-read?’ Tania said.
    She said it too casually. I was suddenly certain this was a trap.
    ‘She knows what we can do,’ I said, my anxieties mounting.
    Behind us, the door slammed shut. A key turned in the lock. Nico immediately raised his hand.
    ‘My telekinesis isn’t working,’ he said.
    I looked at Tania. ‘What’s going on?’
    Tania shook her head.
    ‘Look!’ Cal pointed to an air vent in the base of the wall beside the table. A thin tube poked out through its bars. As I saw it, I felt a fine mist clutch at my throat.
    ‘It’s Medutox,’ I said.
    Medutox. The drug we’d encountered for the first time just a couple of weeks ago, which had rendered all our psychic abilities useless.
    Nico was twisting his hand – a classic telekinetic move. Except . . . He turned to meet my eyes. His shocked expression said it all.
    ‘I’ve lost my powers,’ Ed gasped.
    ‘Me too,’ Dylan cried beside him.
    I looked round frantically. There must be some other way out of the storeroom. But it was completely sealed. No doors or windows. I groaned. We couldn’t have picked a worse place to escape
from if we’d been trying.
    The Medutox was still being pumped into the room. Cal tried to leap up, onto the table. But instead he just landed back on the ground with a dull thud.
    ‘It’s reached me too,’ he said. ‘I can’t fly any more.’
    I stared at the metal pipe, knowing that my own flaky ability to see into the future must be gone too. Who was out there? Was it the man experimenting with Medusix? It must be, if he also had
access to the counter-drug, Medutox.
    ‘What do you know about the Medutox?’ Dylan demanded angrily, turning on Tania.
    ‘What about the Medusix?’ Nico added, his fists clenched. ‘Why are you here? Who sent you?’
    Tania backed away.
    ‘I am recruit,’ she said. ‘I join to get special powers.’
    I stared at her. ‘Recruit for what?’ I asked.
    ‘Join what?’ Cal demanded.
    And then the door opened. My hand flew to my mouth as a familiar face peered round the doorway.
    It was Jack Linden – the man who had originally found us and brought us together. Linden had tried to take us and sell us to the highest bidder more than once before. His wolfish face
creased with a smile, his bright blue eyes twinkling as he looked around the room.
    ‘How nice to see you all,’ he said smoothly.
    ‘It’s you ?’ Dylan sounded appalled. ‘ You’re the person who’s been experimenting with Medusix?’
    ‘No, my job was just to find you,’ Jack said, still smiling as if we’d all just met up for a picnic.
    ‘What d’you mean?’ I said. ‘Why?’
    Jack ignored me. He entered the room properly.
    Two men followed him inside. I stared at them. ‘That’s Knife Man and Broken Nose . . .’ I breathed.
    ‘How the hell are they here?’ Nico demanded.
    ‘They were dead ,’ Ed gasped.
    ‘A trick,’ Jack said. ‘For some reason we don’t understand, Medusix just makes adults unconscious for a few minutes – so they look like they’re dead –
then it passes, leaving no trace. The effect on children is different . . .’
    ‘What does it do to kids?’ I asked. ‘Does it give them psychic abilities?’
    ‘Never mind that now.’ Jack clicked his fingers and the two men headed straight for Nico and