THE PERFECT TEN (Boxed Set)

divide as we approach...”  He must have decided I really was confused, because he kept explaining. “That way, if one team is penned in by a croggle or a different threat, the other team can help the child. We may be too late.”
    “What if—”
    “Shhh,” he snarled. “When a child is delivered, Zilya and Etoi will distract the threat. I’ll hand off the child to you to protect then I’ll draw the croggle away so they can escape. Each team knows their duty. No arguments.”
    That sounded like Callan had to be the last one to escape the croggle. Wouldn’t that be harder to do alone? When the forest started to open up ahead, Callan stopped abruptly and dropped into a crouch behind paper-thin bushes that barely hid anything. I dropped into a crouch beside him.
    I studied the quiet area, thinking this might be the wrong place when I heard his sudden growl of anger.
    Something was up.
    Searching further to my left, I spied Zilya and Etoi hunkered down, too.
    I could feel the double beat of my heart racing as I inhaled the acrid scent of the blood-colored earth . Sweat ran down my face and dripped into my eyes, blinding me.
    I leaned my mouth near Callan’s ear, noting how he forced himself to remain still when he obviously was bothered by me being so close. Could I use that to my advantage at some point?
    I asked, “What’s the problem?”
    “Tek-nah-tee scouts.”
    Lifting up, inch-by-inch, I braced myself on my arms and managed to see through a gap in the intense orange-and-black leaves. An area that looked similar to the same grassy field where I’d fought the croggle monster earlier fanned out before us. The trampled rubbery grass here had gray-blue bloodstains darkening the ground.
    But there was no dead monster carcass. Was this the right field?
    So what happened to the croggle? Or were those bloodstains from something else?
    A sudden movement to the left snagged my attention.
    No monster, but two people. The tek-nah-tee scouts? Both males in their early twenties, each holding the arm of a little boy, a toddler, no older than three or four, with bright red hair and horror etched in his tear-streaked face.
    The two guys wore shiny, metallic gray one-piece clothing that covered them from neck to boots. The way they carried themselves, their demeanor reminded me of the people in uniforms who’d arrested me near the Sandia Mountains this morning. That seemed forever ago and these two scouts were far more lethal looking than the elders who’d carted me to the Institute. Dark, short-cropped hair gave these two young men an aggressive and harsh appearance. Unmerciful.
    And they both had menacing designs painted–inked?–in black on their exposed forearms. Tattoos.
    So those were tek-nah-tees, huh?
    Now I understood why Mathias thought Tony was one since he had that same short hair with an arrogant cut to his chin, a scorpion tattoo and he strutted with attitude the way those two moved. 
    One scout clutched a metal instrument. A flint-gray box that fit in the hand he raised and pointed at the child.
    The other scout, with a wide forehead and dull eyes, shook his head. “You know we can’t kill any of them unless you want to explain a tek death back home.”
    The first male laughed, a cold chilling sound, eyes trained on the small boy stumbling between them. “Don’t be so serious, Phen. I won’t kill the package. But I can play with the furkken brat.”
    I wanted to ask Callan what furkken meant, but from the way a muscle jumped in his jaw I took it as a curse or derogatory term.
    “Not with me here. Do it on your own time so I don’t get charged with misconduct. SEOH could have vids in this area. Let’s get our surveillance done and go home. This is as good a place as any to dump the incomer.”
    “A little further in the middle. That way the croggle has a better chance of catching dinner. Need to keep the livestock fed, and feeding him there means we won’t have to walk through the blood to reach the transender to leave.”
    The child cried out, startling the guy with the gray box.
    His hand twitched, or he must have hit a button and the child screamed in pain. A single burst of terror.
    I launched myself forward.
    Callan shouted something at Zilya, but I’d already exploded from cover, racing toward the little boy.
    The scouts were so surprised by the toddler’s sudden wailing they weren’t looking up as I charged them.
    The guy holding the box lifted his head a second before I reached