Pt. 1: “Nameless”, Pt. 2: “Nightmares”, Pt. 3: “Respite”, Pt. 4: “Illusion”, Pt. 5: “Role”

            It was hot. Hotter than any stage light and with no relief, beyond the occasional shady outcrop or scraggly clump of scrub oak that sprung up here and there across a backdrop paved in powdered dust. Even if the tiny patches of eighty-degree relief had been large enough to fit her sore and sweaty body, she had no time to take advantage of either.

            Her first option after slipping behind the hastily pushed aside window screen had been the truck stop across from the motel. It seemed too risky a move, though, what with Jonny and his driver close by and no telling who might be passing through, or whose side they would take under pressure. Because Jonny would apply as much pressure as it took, outbidding Laine with every available bargaining tool, physical and financial.

            Instead, she planned to retrace their route north, staying a good distance from the highway to prevent Jonny and his associates from spotting her amidst the filmy heat mirage that shimmered several feet high in every direction. That kind of caution would also prevent anyone else from helping her, but she couldn’t play around. Not with her life on the line. While hiking in cocktail dress and heels toward some out-of-the-way residence was hardly a delightful challenge, until a better plan presented itself…

            The harsh desert landscape hindered her progress more than anything, except for the very important fact that she had only a vague clue where she was going. Escaping bleak Jamul to hide behind the lines of jagged boulders that made up SoCal’s rugged border landscape? Child’s play. If, of course, child’s play involved blisters from shoes designed for short-term wear—most definitely not for cross-country endurance rambles.

            Ducking down into a stone strewn ravine, Laine glanced grimly at her dusty, chaffed raw feet. The strappy shoes would have to go. Selecting a sharp slab from the bric-a-brac pile at her feet, she wielded the rock like a knife. Two sharp jabs shredded the material from her dress a few inches above the knee. She tore until the circle of silky material dropped free, then further divided the cloth in two. Next, she twisted blue cloth around each sore foot until it covered them like an ugly pair of too-thin moccasins. Hopefully, the fashion creation would function better than her heels.

            Laine grimaced as she stood. Bits of fractured rock dug through the cloth and after a few experimental steps, she sighed in frustration. Heat and sharp edges dug into her already aching pads as if she had been stomping about barefoot. This wasn’t going to work after all.

            Shielding her face with a hand, she looked up the ravine in a vain search for salvation. Rescue was not in the books; that was for sure. But there, a few feet up the incline, grew a few scraggly Manzanita bushes. An idea formed quickly in her head. Gingerly climbing up the incline, she plucked several large handfuls of the tough, rubbery leaves. Then she unwound the material from her feet and layered the leaves across the length of cloth that served as a sole. This time, after double-square knots once more secured her makeshift shoes in place, the tentative footfalls felt workable, if not comfortable.

            Highway 94 lay somewhere to her right, at least half a mile by her rough estimation. She would stick just this side of the ridgeline, following the twists and turns of the road as best she could until she reached some part of civilization Jonny wasn’t liable to be watching. Admittedly, a whole lot could go wrong along the way. She had no food, no water, no protection from the sun. This set the strict time limit for when her strength would give out at a matter of hours. Longer, if she could add any of the three necessities to her assets.

            Not much of chance of that unless a country club was hiding over the next hill.

            Which left her with no choice but to move on and quickly. This was SoCal, for goodness sake. There had to be a residential area somewhere nearby.

            But if there wasn’t…

            Determined to make it through the nightmare, Laine set out across the rocky hills. She wished she could keep the highway in sight, part of her afraid she would wander too far off course and become completely lost. Then Jonny would win anyway.

            She moved as quickly as she could, feeling like molasses oozing in the hot pre-summer sun. Per usual, not a single cloud drifted across the solid cerulean sky. Sweat dripped from more pores than she felt a person should rightly possess until her clothes were drenched. Not even the tiniest breeze wandered by to create an illusion of coolness, or wick the perspiration away.

            Already, her skin felt oven-baked and her mind drudged along amidst a numbness that matched the paled sensation in her feet. If she had feet, because she wasn’t convinced. Still, she kept on. It was the only thing she had. It was the only thing left to do.

            Dust rose in miniature clouds when her feet struck the ground. She learned to pick her knees up high, or else risk a stubbed toe or damage to her fraying moccasins. The sun pressed down, relentless in its assault until she felt it like a physical pressure. Hunched, dried out, and necessarily mindless, she marched below the ridgeline, a zombie with one purpose: survival.

            After what felt like three times the two hours her crystal-faced watch told her had passed, a sprig of hope dangled tantalizingly in the future. A few miles in the distance, the tail of a gravel road meandered out from behind several tall, lumpy boulders. This was good new on its own. More important was the three-story cabin at its end. That became her destination, regardless of what the highway somewhere on her right-hand side chose to do.

            With luck, the cabin possessed a working phone. She’d settle for water and food. Shoes too.

            Also pants.

            A mirror, on the other hand, she could do without. Mitchell would have a fit if he saw her now. She was the polar opposite of public-ready.

            With a clear destination in sight, the distance felt all the greater. Her brain knew she could make the cabin, but the heat had her body fighting for every inch. Rest sounded like the best idea ever. Except that if she sank to the ground, even for a moment or two, she would not be getting up. Not on her own accord.

            She could no longer remember what had possessed her to hike across civilization-proof desert in the first place. The truck stop had been the smarter choice, the one that fell inside her limits. This? This was something that belonged in movies, where crewmembers waited just out of sight with shade tents and drinks with ice.

            It hurt to think about that. Hurt to think about anything beyond the task at hand. No, hurt to think period.

            She climbed, she slipped. Scrapes covered her legs and the palms of both hands. The ragged bottom of her cocktail dress chaffed at her thighs. Every inch of skin was covered in dull grey dust, accented here and there by rivulets of muddy sweat streaks. Her hair had come loose from its mass of pinned blonde strands, clumps of which dangled across her cheeks and curled down the back of her neck. The sticky smell of hairspray clung to each follicle, its scent sickening in the heat.

            She studied her path in fleeting glances between short, exhausted strides. Light from the afternoon sun glinted harshly off glass as she honed in on the building that could save her. It was larger, grander than expected. Lots of large windows and stained wood planks that labeled it a retreat for someone with dollars to spend. Someone who valued their privacy.

            Good. At the moment, she did too. No one would look for her here.

            At what felt like forever, she stumbled onto the foremost step. It took all her effort to drag herself upward toward the door. She knocked. And then she sank down.

            Resting her cheek on her bloodied knees, Laine waited. Her watch read half past seven.

***

            “Dammit, where is she?”

            Mitchell Jansen was furious. His ire translated easily via the nearest cell tower, blasting Kevin Briggs with each expressive syllable. If Merrimac hadn’t been snoozing against the passenger seat window, Briggs would have made him take the call. Instead, he let his partner rest while he broke California law. Driving under the influence of technology. Too bad the Chief didn’t trust BlueTooth devices, despite advances in encryption security.

            To be fair, Briggs didn’t blame him.

            “Sir, we’re working on it. You’ll know the minute we have a solid lead.”

            “Then why the damned hell are you halfway to San Diego when the evidence is right here?” the manager demanded in a tone of unrelenting iron. “These police people aren’t working near fast enough. I need you boys hitting the grey area they can’t. All angles. I want my singer back seven and a half hours ago. I don’t care the hell what it takes.”

            “Porter and Mercier can handle things fine from your end. We need to be in position to move as soon as we have something to move on.”

            “You’re so sure Jacy’s down south?”

            “We think—”

            “To hell with what you think. They never should have gotten through your people anyhow.” Jansen sighed heavily. “Look, give me results. If you don’t have anything by the morning, you get your butts back to L.A. Damn border’s too big as it is. You’ll do more good here.”

            “But we—”

            “By morning.” The connection cut abruptly, leaving Briggs with a silent phone pressed between his ear and right shoulder and a slightly dazed expression. They couldn’t possibly clear this up in less than twelve hours. Not unless they had a more exact location. And that seemed unlikely at best.

            Even if they knew exactly where to look, Mer’s body wasn’t up to speed, couldn’t react fast enough if the situation turned physical. A bullet had scraped past his chest just hours ago, his brain still swelled from its hard knock against the floor. The ex-cop’s instincts might have come through intact, but that wouldn’t be enough. He belonged in a hospital. Except that would leave Briggs without any backup, and the singer in just as much trouble as before.

            Damned whichever way he looked at it.

            Once more, a tired sense of despairing disbelief curtained his mind. The utter helplessness was overpowering in its intensity. He couldn’t begin to plan their next move. He didn’t even have a damn clue where they were headed. Just south toward Tecate.

            “We don’t have twelve hours.”

            Startled in spite of himself, Briggs glanced to his right. Though Merrimac’s eyes remained shut and he hadn’t shifted positions, there was no mistaking the wry humor in his very much awake voice.

            “Thought you were asleep.”

            “Just thinking.”

            Briggs sighed. “Enlighten me.”

            Material rubbed together with a soft sha sha sound as Merrimac shifted to run his hand along the bulky bandage that wrapped around his chest. “Jensen’s kidding himself. If we don’t have our girl twelve hours from now, we’re not getting her back at all.”

            Not alive, leastwise, but neither of them needed to hear that certainty voiced.

            “She’s smarter than a lot of people give her credit for, and I can’t see her buckling under the pressure. She’ll wait for them to make a mistake. Maybe she draws attention to herself, maybe she leaves some sort of message where someone will find it. So long as she’s conscious, she won’t go without a fight.”

            Briggs shook his head. “This is crazy. We can’t just count on her to do something and hope we get the memo. She isn’t trained for this sort of situation.”

            Merrimac smiled grimly and stared out toward the light beginning to fade from the dusky sky. “Survival’s a funny thing.”

***

            Water. She needed water. And also something else. Something she needed to do. Something important that would help her survive. But at the moment, she couldn’t for the life of her recall what that thing was.

            All she could see was darkness, silent and profound, as if her eyes had quit functioning in protest of bodily abuse. Slow at first, tiny lights appeared at the corners of her vision, softly winking above her head until black faded to indigo and varying shades of deep grey. Darker shapes appeared. Enormous serrated silhouettes that dipped and jutted in every direction. Hills. And at her back the cavernous porch.

            Unable to suppress the groan that pushed free as she carefully raised her torso from smooth planed pine, Laine waited for her brain to resettle. No one had answered the door. She was fairly certain she had knocked.

            Fairly certain. By no means positive.

            Purposely ignoring the distinct possibility that the owner might not be at home, she dragged herself six inches closer to the door and knocked again. Loudly.

            A minute passed, then another and another. The door remained shut. No sounds from within betrayed the presence of another human being.

            Plan B was rapidly becoming a reality. However much she preferred not to undertake Project B & E, there appeared little choice. No one would blame her for breaking into a deserted house when it was a matter of life over death.

            She tried to climb to her feet, but her abused body staunchly rejected the command. That initial attempt left her laid-out in a crumbled heap on the planking. Rough wood pressed against her sun scorched cheek, the grain abrasive and yet soothingly cool. Her chest rose and fell beneath her in shallow pants. Every cell begged for hydration.

            Her gaze snagged on the closest window. What she needed lay beyond it. She could be inside within the minute, honing in on a working faucet.

            That thought was the system override key. Mindless except of her goal, she crawled on bloodied palms and scraped raw knees until she could pull herself half-standing, half-careening onto the windowsill ledge. Then she bent her right elbow and threw it hard against the glass pane.

            The force of the blow surprised her, especially when it pulled her weight along with it, sending her toppling amid shards of shattered glass. Several long seconds later, she landed with a hard thud on smooth granite tile.

            Pain hit next. First from her shoulder’s collision with solid rock, then her right calf from its dragged descent over the jagged sill, before the sharp explosion of her elbow strike finally caught up. Grey settled over her vision as nerve-endings screamed their protest.

            The part of her mind that still functioned didn’t care a whole lot about that. She was in. She was one step closer to making it through.

            Water first. Then whatever.

            She stumbled to her knees. A nearby chair gave her something to cling to as she took a moment to get her bearings. Almost nothing of her surroundings registered. Unimportant. Her mind saw no direct access to water, instead instinctively focusing on a door that led through into a room with just visible counters that belonged in a kitchen setting.

            One foot dragged forward, followed by the other. She was upright now, although her hands grabbed for the back of a couch as she passed, their grip slipping along the distressed leather. She made it through the doorway and straight on toward the large ceramic sink. Shaky with the prospect of relief, she fell forward into it, one hand fumbling along stainless steel for the toggle that would get the plumbing going.

            Moments later, cool liquid poured out the faucet end and onto her gasping face. She let the droplets pull away the first layer of dirt caked sweat before her mouth began sucking down water of its own accord. She felt it slide all the way down her throat. There was a moment of shock when it hit her stomach and she coughed, sputtering on the mouthful she had been about to swallow. Her stomach settled and she guzzled as much as she could before it began showing signs of rebellion.

            The other part of her mind, the one that was better at regulating instinct, resurfaced from behind its self-protective wall. Trembling, she forced her lips away from the fall of water, instead letting it cascade over the back of her neck to dampen the stringy clumps of her hair. For a long time she slumped there, too tired to move and with no perception of time.

            Laine snapped awake when her forehead hit the sink bottom. She couldn’t sleep. Not yet. Her hand found the faucet and switched the water off again. Her next step was to locate a phone and call the police. Their phone number hardly required much in the way of memorization, plus they were the quickest help. They could tell her what to do next. Besides, she had no one else to call.

            A pang hit her hard in the gut, but Laine quickly pushed it away. She only had room for what she could deal with right now. Every other thought would have to wait until she had time to process.

            And if she kept putting it off and putting it off, maybe she would never have to.

            A stainless steel refrigerator fit into the wall next to the pantry, with the gas range stove planted between countertop space and the sink by which she still stood. Further down the long room, four leather backed chairs clustered around a square table, perfect for meals or a game of Pinochle. No phone, though. Not from what she could see.

            Automatically wiping her damp hands on her skirt bottom, she grimaced. Now they were dirty again. But that was the least of her problems. She closed her eyes and exhaled. When she opened them again, her steps were much surer as she moved down the kitchen and through another open doorway.

            Before her a dark hall split off in two directions, straight ahead and right. Her eyes had already adjusted to the dimness as much as they ever would and she couldn’t see much. Still, Laine hesitated before her hand moved to locate a lightswitch. As far as anyone knew, this house was unoccupied. Given a choice, it seemed rather unintelligent to turn on a beacon that would certainly suggest otherwise to anyone looking her way. She hadn’t messed up so far—although the desert-crossing had brought her close—and she didn’t plan to start now.

            By touch, she felt her way straight on along the corridor, past a bathroom and into a musty office. The large balcony windows let in what little light came from outside, illuminating tall bookshelves on two adjacent walls, twin leather armchairs positioned before an empty fireplace, and an expansive desk cleared of everything except a hooded lamp and corded telephone.

            Filled with exhausted relief, Laine dropped into the rolling office chair and picked up the receiver. The dull echo of a dial tone met her ears. She breathed in and out, two deep yoga breaths. Then her pointer finger punched the nine button, followed by two consecutive ones.

            Now there was a number no one could forget. Not unless they’d completely flunked grade school.

            “9-1-1. What’s your emergency?”

            The woman’s voice startled her and for a moment, she forgot why she was calling. Added on to that, she wasn’t entirely sure what to say.

            “9-1-1. Can you hear me?”

            “Uh, yes. Sorry.” Laine shook her head to clear it. “My name is Laine Stuart, although they may have me down as Jacy. I imagine there’s a police report or something circulating by now. I was kidnapped earlier today. I got away.”

            There was a long pause. “Jacy, like the singer?”

            “Right.”

            Another pause. “What’s your location?”

            That was an excellent question. “I’m not sure. Sorry. I’m inside a house somewhere north of Jamul.”

            “I can pull the address from your landline. Is there someone there who can confirm it?”

            “No. I’m alone.”

            “Are you in any immediate danger?”

            Reflexively, Laine shook her head no. “I don’t think so.”

            “Stay on the line please; I’ll be right back with you.”

            Sliding back in the chair, Laine closed her eyes and ran a hand through her tangled hair. Some twisted part of her almost wanted to see the damage. It couldn’t be pretty.

            “Ma’am, are you there?”

            “Yes.”

            “Officers are on their way. They should reach you in less than fifteen minutes. I want you to stay on the line with me, alright?”

            “Alright.”

            “Now are you certain you’re alone?”

            Laine’s insides twisted. Did the dispatcher know something she didn’t? “I don’t know. I—I think so. I hiked here from Jamul. I don’t think anyone followed me.”

            Then again, she hadn’t been in any condition to notice otherwise.

            “You hiked?” Surprise intermingled with the dispatcher’s businesslike voice.

            “Seemed like a good idea at the time. Listen, could someone get a hold of my manager? His name’s Mitchell Jensen. He’s probably listed on that report.”

            “The officers will take care of that after they arrive. Let’s make sure you’re safe first. Are you hurt in any way?”

            Was she ever. But scrapes, bruises, and sunburn were hardly life-threatening. “Not especially. Just a little scuffed from the hike.”

            “Will you need medical treatment?”

            “No.” That would mean even bigger delays, and she just wanted to get someplace same. Someplace far away from Jonny, Joe Krimmer and their financial schemes. Someplace surrounded by people with guns who were on her side. “How much longer?”

            “Soon. They’ll be there real soon.”

            The dispatcher meant to sound calming. More than anything, Laine wanted to believe her. Until she sat secure inside a police building, however, she refused to let her guard down. She was too close to safety.

            Her eyes opened wearily. Outside the light shifted, playing across her desk in a sweeping motion. A muffled scraping sounded from somewhere outside, like tires on gravel. She froze.

            “How soon?” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “This is too soon, right?”

            The dispatcher sounded confused. “Too soon?”

            “For the officers. It’s too soon for them to be here.”

            Fatigue forgotten, Laine unfolded herself from behind the desk and crept into the hallway as far as the phone cord would extend. Soft artificial light poured through the kitchen windows, and there was definitely a car engine humming in the background.

            “Ten minutes still, ma’am. Maybe less.”

            So whatever vehicle approached did not belong to law enforcement. That left either the homeowner, to whom she owed a huge thank you and apology, or someone who didn’t belong here any more than she did.
            She was betting on the latter.

            “Shit,” she breathed softly into the receiver. “Someone’s here. Someone’s parking their car right in front of the house.”

            Swift and silent, Laine backed into the office again.

            “Ma’am? Did you say someone’s there?”

            “I’ve got to go. I can’t wait. I’ll try hiding, but I don’t—”

            Her words turned to raggedy gasps as panic sunk in.

            “Ma’am, stay on the line. Tell me what you—”

            “I can’t,” she almost cried. “Tell the police it was Jonny. He took me and his driver knows too. Krimmer’s in on it. They’re using the charity.”

            “Ma’am—”

            Laine gently replaced the receiver, running through her options. She didn’t have time to plan, let alone pack a few supplies. What she had was all she had.

            The front door was out of the question, neither did she have time to search for a back way. The office balcony, though. That was a possibility. She crossed the room and unlocked the glass door, sliding it open almost noiselessly. The house was built into a hillside, so the drop down from here was not nearly as far as it could have been—maybe eight feet or so.

            A car door slammed, echoing off the rock strewn mountains. Decision made, she slid the glass closed and moved to the sandstone and stained wood railing. Spotting a pair of worn nylon gardening shoes propped beside the deck chair, she snatched them up and pulled them close against her body. There wasn’t time to change now, but they would provide much better protection for her feet than the tattered remains of her makeshift slippers.

            She tried not to think about the next part of her maneuver. Closing her fingers tight around the upper rail, Laine slid her slim body over. Immediately, her weary arms buckled and she fought to hold position. Then she dropped.

            The landing jarred every joint in her body as she skidded backward onto her behind. The last of her adrenaline kicked in. She was up and running toward what she hoped was north before another thought could form.

Pt. 2: “Nightmares”

Pt. 3: “Respite”

Pt. 4: “Illusion”

            Approximately thirty seconds after climbing into the Mercedes, Laine’s brain caught up with her. Jon Gold was not a person she knew in any but the broadest sense of the term. He had no reason she could see for doling out assistance. Especially at his own risk. If not for the initial bewilderment of shots fired in so public a place, she would never have ventured down that corridor with him. Moreover, how and why had he acted with greater speed than her security team? A missing link stood out glaringly among the facts of the action, and she had a strong feeling its name was “Joe.”

            It all came down to money, assuming she had the right of it. What she had overheard hinted strongly at a criminal exchange of dollars for services rendered that resulted in more dollars for both involved parties. It could not have anything to do with standard donations to the charity; otherwise, why would the man have acted so concerned about retaining anonymity? Most of the high-roller brand wanted recognition for contributing serious amounts of cash to worthy causes. And if the charity was so strapped for funds, why hadn’t she heard anything about it before? Most condemning of all, however, was Joe’s mention of “return payments.” That factoid erased all contrived guiltlessness of the conversation’s contents. And one well-framed question could lend confirmation.

            Speaking of which…

            She turned toward the golden-headed singer slouched thoughtfully at the other end of the Mercedes’ leather backseat. “Jonny, have you noticed anything…off…about Joe lately? He seemed…well, I heard him say some things.”

            His attention snapped to her. If she hadn’t been looking for it, she might have missed the look of cold calculation that flashed across hazel before settling into innocent query. “Pardon?”

            So Laine had her answer. Part of her immediately regretted the inquiry. Tipping her hand even a little likely placed her in greater jeopardy, but she needed to know Jonny’s level of involvement. From his initial reaction, she guessed it went deep.

            “Never mind. I’m sure it’s nothing,” she shrugged with forced bemusement. Let him think she had missed the significance of the exchange entirely. “Oh, but I’d better let Mitchell know I’m safe before he starts turning the city inside and out.”

            That last sounded extreme for Mitchell. Still, she imagined the likelihood of his finally taking safety over image seriously had grown quite a bit after witnessing an assault first hand. Maybe this was what it took to rattle him. Then again, maybe not.

            “Do you have a cell phone I could borrow?” She added a soft, helpless laugh. “I didn’t think I’d need mine.”

            Jonny shot her a rueful grin. “Sorry, Jace. Left mine at home too. When we stop, I’ll find you a phone somewhere.”

            Two obvious lies blasted his answer apart. Well, three—Laine doubted he was sorry. The outline of a phone stood out clearly in his jacket pocket. Moreover, she had spotted the driver’s cell sticking out of a cup-holder up front. Jonny didn’t give her powers of observation much credit. She would keep that in mind. As advantages went, it was nothing to sneeze at.

            Perhaps she could have at least indicated her awareness of the driver’s cell phone, but she wanted to keep Jonny in the dark as much as possible. The more he underestimated her, the better her chances of getting away. And she planned to get away. Not only that, but she planned on taking as much evidence with her as she could gather about whatever it was he and Joe were involved in. There was little doubt in her mind now that they were behind the attempts on her life.

            Why, of course, remained the biggest concern. Joe, if not Jonny, knew of the provision in her will that left Yellow Brick Road an exorbitant number of dollar signs. The exchange she had overheard sounded an awfully lot like an investment deal, so they were clearly looking to raise funds. For what, though? Until she found that answer, a gaping hole marred the puzzle of the last few weeks. And the final piece would probably cost her.

            Except that she had nothing to lose. Life as she knew it was finished. The most sensible road left to her stalkers was the one where they made her disappear while hiding their involvement. Either they took her out of the game, or she took them out first.

            She wished help was coming, accepted that it wasn’t. She refused to think further along than that. Unless someone had seen her leave with Jonny, her security people wouldn’t know where to start their search—assuming they were even in a position to come after her. And Kyle—

            Her stomach heaved and for a moment, she thought she might throw up. Doggedly, she pushed all thought aside and concentrated on what she did know: sooner or later, the car would have to stop. She would play dumb until that happened. And she would pray Jonny didn’t have a gun.

***

            Kevin Briggs was at a loss. Despite their best efforts, the situation had spun out of hand with astounding neatness. He still couldn’t pin down how. The venue was secure, all the guests registered, surveillance cameras in place, men present on the floor. None of it had done much good, not where it counted. Worse, with no Merrimac to call the shots, the responsibility now fell heavily on his own stiff shoulders.

            While ordinarily this would not have posed a problem, investigation was not Briggs’s strong suit. He had served a stint with the Marines, could take orders and give them too. That did not make him feel any more comfortable throwing out directions that might get the singer killed. He had watched her long enough to recognize that she knew better than to take off on her own. Whatever had gone down, chances were good she was chin deep in trouble.

            Mitchell Jansen’s snarls hardly helped the situation. The manager was absolutely livid that their team held a grand total of zero clues about Jacy’s whereabouts. The police detectives were no better. Not a single camera covered the section of room in which she had stood previous to the gunfire. Only through conjecture could they piece together what may or may not have happened after that. Because Hancock hadn’t seen a damned thing either.

            In the immediate mayhem, Hancock had inserted himself between the assassins and their target, and then laid down a few well-placed leg shots that toppled the pair in ten seconds flat. The bulky guard could certainly shoot—much more accurately than his beefed up build suggested—and his decision was defensible. Unfortunately, those scant seconds provided all the time necessary for Jacy to vanish.

            Their best chance at recovering her might lie in the hands of Porter, Mercier, and whatever useful information they brought to light. In the interim, Briggs checked and rechecked the video records from his laptop while Hancock and the police canvassed the crowd for a lead. Someone had to have seen something.

            Over and over, he watched the killers enter the ballroom and make their way across the floor. If they had a third party working with them, their accomplice blended too completely for him to detect. Or maybe they were already inside among the guests. In the next series of frames, he could see Merrimac smoothly part the crowd on his way to check out their suspects.

            And then running.

            And then falling.

            Over and over and over again. Until the scene lost its affect.

            Switching cameras, he chose the one closest to the spot where Jacy had disappeared. Nothing about that part of the crowd stood out either. Determined, he scanned the shocked faces. There. He recognized that one. A friend of hers, from what he’d seen. Maybe he had noticed something.

            Glad for a legitimate reason to put some distance between himself and the raging manager, presently giving all hell to the detective in charge, Briggs strode back into the corridor that led to the ballroom. With any luck, Bobashank was still inside.

***

            It took much longer than she anticipated but finally, just when she felt certain cold anxiety had worn chinks in her otherwise blasé expression, the car began to slow. Jostling a little from side to side, the Mercedes pulled into the pitted gravel parking lot of a run-down motel just off Highway 94 on the outskirts of Jamul. Any move she made would have to come quickly. Each mile brought them nearer the Mexican border.

            The proximity did not bode well for her prospects.

            Her only other opportunity for escape had come over an hour ago, when necessity forced a stop for gasoline at a 7-11 near San Diego. During their drive, Jonny had launched into an intricate explanation concerning plans for her continued safety. He suggested she leave the L.A. area prior to contacting her people, and when that vital phone call was placed, he insisted he be the one to do it. Playing along seemed the best course of action until she could signal someone for help. The gas station seemed the likeliest place. Unfortunately, Jonny had locked her inside with the driver while he located a payphone, and not a single patron approached the 7-11 in all that time.

            Frustration had eaten away at her, urging her to take a chance before it was too late. Still, the small part of her brain that controlled her urge to run every time her feet hit center-stage held her back. She was no secret agent, no martial arts specialist. With the limited skill-set at her disposal, her only shot was getting the timing right. Otherwise, she would have no chance at escaping pursuit. And there was no doubt there would be pursuit.

            When Jonny returned, it was to say he had contacted Mitchell after getting the number from his own agent—stupidly, she had Mitchell’s contact information saved in her cell phone and therefore had not bothered to memorize it. Her manager was supposedly relieved and urged her to hole up someplace safe until the proper authorities arrived.

            She knew all of this was another in a long series of lies. Jonny had not contacted Mitchell, nor did he plan to. And even if by some extreme chance he had made contact, then either Mitchell had turned idiot, or he was in on the whole thing. Neither option sat well with her. Her first phone call, after she figured a way out of this mess, would be to the police, and not just because she didn’t require a cell phone to keep track of their number.

            A tap at her shoulder yanked her attention back onto the current bane of her existence. Somewhere along the line, Jonny had taken over the role from Robin Kasey. “Hey, I’m gonna get us a room and give it a quick once over. Stay in the car ’til I give the go ahead.  And hey, cheer up. We’re in the home stretch now. Nothing for you to worry about.”

            Hard to worry when you’re dead, she smirked through a touch of morbid amusement.

            “Thanks, Jonny,” she said aloud. “I really appreciate your help.”

            Like hell she did.

            Another empty parking lot, another chance lost. She was running out of options more quickly than they appeared. For obvious reasons, this was a substantial problem. If she did not develop a new plan and soon, the clock would wipe any last, infinitesimal opportunity off the map.

            Time and distance were the foremost factors in achieving an exit strategy that gave her the best chance at success. The more time she wrangled before someone discovered her missing, the more distance she could put between herself and pursuit. With enough time and distance, she could call up help while giving it a chance to arrive.

            Any ideal scenario, however, now seemed doubtful. She would have to make do with what she had, before she had nothing. If she could just get them to leave her alone, even for a minute…but the likelihood of that happening was slim to none. Now that Jonny had her, he would exercise every caution he could afford. And he could afford quite a lot of caution at this point. He held all the cards. It was her job to make him hand over the trump. Every trick counted.

            She was not without a few assets. Jonny didn’t know she knew anything was amiss. He might guess it though. She was in superb physical condition, could run three miles in under twenty minutes, and her front thrust kick packed a punch. Thanks to the media, this last was virtually common knowledge. She did have a face people recognized. There was little he could do about that. Not in a public environment. She was also wearing an outfit that stood out like a dissonant chord this close to the border. Any onlookers would have to be blind to miss her sleek, steely blue sheath dress and four-inch sandal pumps. They were hardly desert-wear.

            Perhaps she should slip out of the car and make a run for it. Only there was nowhere to go. The truck stop across the street might offer some shelter, but she doubted she could make it there without cuing Jonny to drastic action. The same would come from causing a scene in front of motel management.

            Her gut insisted she play along a while longer, that this was not the right moment to bust a move. Countless hours of dance said that timing was what landed a jump, or instigated injury. Instinct kept the whole routine moving. If she wavered at all, concentrated too closely on what she wanted to accomplish, everything would fall apart.

            Personally, she preferred that not happen.

            The cracked door of the rust-stained adobe building swung open and Jonny made his way back to his very out of place Mercedes. It didn’t belong, she didn’t belong, and frankly even he didn’t belong. Someone was bound to notice. Dark sunglasses obstructed his optical focus, but Laine felt certain it centered on her. She settled for a look of impatience, entangled with irritated reproach at their present locale. Let him misinterpret the reason for her aggravation with his oh-so-grand plan.

            A nod toward the driver sent her window rolling downward and she glared out at him. “What the hell are we doing here? We should have headed straight to a police station. There are army bases that are closer. I understand wanting to keep a low profile, but this is ridiculous.”

            He slipped his shades up to perch atop his head and lifted the corner of his mouth in a cocky little grin. “Jansen wanted you to trust me, remember? He’s sending a car for us. They’ll meet us here within a couple of hours. So relax, Jace. I’ve got this under control.”

            Under cover of a heavy sigh, she pushed at the door. To her surprise, it actually opened. The driver must have unlocked it at Jonny’s reappearance. Pushing to her feet, Laine sighed again and squared her shoulders. “I assume we’re going in?”

            That infuriating grin flashed again and Jonny raised a key that dangled from a neon pink plastic paddle. “Room 122. We’ll head in the back way.”

            Even more annoyed at his ploy to avoid the desk manager, Laine followed a few haughty steps behind. The minor tantrum disguised her own scheme: memorizing the layout of both building and deserted stretch of desolate wild. When the time to run finally came, she wanted to know where she was, and what led where.

            They arrived at the door almost too quickly, though at the least it was positioned down a short hall that led out of the Mercedes’ line of sight. That facet might come in handy.

            Hunching over slightly, Jonny fitted the key to the lock and twisted. The door creaked open. Laine winced. That sound would not be easily disguised. Clearly, she was not going to catch a break here.

            “Fortunately, we won’t be here long,” Jonny shrugged in apology. “Not even a television. Phone doesn’t work either. It’s safe enough, though. No one will ever think of looking for you here.”

            Therein undoubtedly lay the problem.

            “It’s fine,” Laine brushed past him. Unless she completely missed her guess, Jonny had disabled the phone on his initial visit. Since he had thought this detail necessary, she hoped it meant he might be planning on leaving her on her own, long enough for her to contemplate a phone call. The thought almost made her giddy. This room might make all the difference.

            “Can I get you anything?”

            She simply stared at him.

            “Stupid question,” he snorted. “Not much around here worth the getting. I need to run over a couple of things with Phil and see about finding a working phone, so will you be all right if I leave you on your own for a few? Shouldn’t take long.”

            Frowning, Laine nibbled at her lip. “You’re sure no one followed us?”

            “Positive.”

            Slowly, she exhaled. “I’ll be fine. Just, would you mind calling Marshall again? See how long this’ll take?”

            “First call on my list.”

            When the door fell shut behind him and the lock snapped back into place, Laine smiled and dead-bolted the door. Then with two long strides, she crossed toward the window.

***

            He was awake. Awake, and seriously pissed off. The white walls that enclosed this room looked like giant slates that accused failure on top of failure. Until this moment, he had never doubted his team’s ability to complete the job. And yet, here they were.

            If they had anticipated another attack, if they had at all doubted their skills and strategies in the event of trouble, they would never have let her walk through those giant double doors. But the honest truth was that their confidence had cost them. They had misjudged the situation in every way that counted. Whatever happened next depended too much on factors over which they had no control. All because they had lost the focal point of their protective services.

            That was part of the reason for his angry outlook. Mostly, though, he railed at his own stupidity. Despite everything he knew about staying close to the target, he had fallen for the trap. He had walked away. Ultimately, he had no one to blame but himself.

            Outside the industrial steel framed window, traffic buzzed and screeched along the well-trekked boulevard. Life went on as it always did, regardless of what happened in the quiet corners of individual life. The world didn’t hold its breath for anyone these days, or if it did, the moment passed by more quickly than it had come. There were errands to run, phone calls to make, work to get done. The plight of a star singer hardly felt real by contrast.

            He registered the thud of footsteps outside the door just before a tight rap sounded. “Yeah, come in.”

            “Mer?” Briggs poked his head into the room, his face drawn and two shades paler than normal. Relief washed across the ex-soldier’s face when he saw his partner sitting up. Slowly, the corner of his mouth twitched. “You look like hell.”

            “Glad to see you too. What’s our situation?”

            Briggs clomped across the compact space, settling onto the only other piece of furniture, a barely padded bedside chair. “Porter call?”

            A short nod confirmed it.

            “Then you know about Gold. Damn good thing Bobashank saw him leave with Jacy, or we’d never have run his name this fast. The LAPD have eyes out for the vehicle, a 2010 Mercedes E-Class Coupe, but Marshall tells me they’ve got nothing yet. If he was smart, Gold got out of town fast.”

            “No,” Merrimac grunted. “The smart one’s whoever stayed behind. Unless Gold wants to pin the tail on himself, he’ll be back and soon.”

            The other man looked away. “Not good for us.”

            “What about the charity? Anything yet?”

            “According to Bobashank, there’s a rumor going ’round that puts Gold in the middle of something big and illegal. Whatever it is, he’s been asking around for investors. Don’t know for sure about the charity. Porter’s reading through financial records right now. There has to be a connection in there somewhere, something that’ll connect Jacy and whoever else is in on this. Shouldn’t be too hard to see which direction the money’s flowing.”

            Merrimac shook his head. “Not good enough. We don’t have time to waste here. There’s a bullet out there with our girl’s name on it. This isn’t about a ransom. My guess is we’ve got hours at best. Not enough to go around checking names, assuming the charity is even involved in the first place.”

            “Shit.” Briggs rubbed a hand over his eyes. “We’re stuck in a maze, here. What the hell can we do?”

            Merrimac wondered the same thing himself. His left side ached, a generalized throb that covered each of the baker’s dozen stitches clamping across his lower ribcage. He’d gotten very lucky with the bullet, a clean furrow that stung like a sonofa without the added hassle of having punctured something vital. It made him feel like an idiot for passing out. That rarely happened in the movies.

            Shoving the pain to the back of his mind, he mentally reviewed the little information they had. Most importantly, Laine was outside their direct sphere of influence, and she’d last been seen with fellow celebrity Jonagold. No interaction between the two had been caught on camera, but street camera footage did show a silver Mercedes headed on the most direct route for I-5. Most likely the car was southbound for Mexico, although there was plenty of godforsaken desert available between LA and the border. His hunch said Jonny would drop her with an accomplice, sweep the car clean, and return on a roundabout way from the north. The accomplice would take care of the rest, preferably below the border, where any foul play was outside the jurisdiction of American lawyers.

            Unfortunately, this was a best case scenario. And it made him sick to his stomach. Mostly because there was a whole hell of a lot of empty land south of the city and he didn’t even know where to start. No time, a few flimsy clues, and a hankering suspicion that all of this was his fault.

            The nightmare was back, but without the boat and murky river water. Only miles of search grid and the knowledge that someone needed help before time ran out—and they drowned.

            Grimly, he stared at the IV hooked into his arm. “I’m not sure we do anything.”

            “What, so we just wait around for Gold?” Briggs spat his disbelief.

            “I didn’t say that. You’re going to go wrangle me a nurse so I can get the hell out of here, and then you’re going to call Hancock. Have him drop off the truck.”

            “We going somewhere?”

            “South.”

            After a moment, Briggs nodded. “If something changes, we’ll have a shot at being in position.”

            Or way out of position. It was a gamble, for sure. Still, “big and illegal” in this part of the world smacked of a smuggling ring, which meant Jon Gold would know his way around the border. With security on the look out in Tijuana, Tecate became the likeliest border town with plenty of branching rural roads in the vicinity. If it were him making the drop-off, that was the direction he would head.

            He just hoped Porter and Mercier could come up with something more concrete fast. Otherwise, they were flying blind, a dart hurled at the target in a pitch black room. If they believed in luck, they might have half a chance on principle.

            But Merrimac didn’t believe in luck.

            Neither would he bet someone’s life on it.

His leg right twitched and sent a jolt through his upper body that exited out his left shoulder.  Dmitry gasped to life seated against the smooth and solid surface of his wooden office door, his legs outstretched to V below his leaning torso.  Groggy, he flickered and briefly scanned the broken room.  Dima recognized everything enough to know his office, but other than the desk, which was still in it’s proper place, everything else was toppled; including two identical yellow plastic chairs that once lined a side of his black desk.  Now, overturned and sideways, useless and divided by his own 46-year old body, their legs pointed upwards like doomed insects fried by the sun.  Broken glass and paperwork lined the wall near and around Dmitry’s angled frame, but no memory flared.  Dima sat, on the two chair side of three, with the remains of his panoramic view, corner office window, sprayed all over his lethargic legs, and had no idea why.

Dmitry curled one leg and then the other, they cracked to life in response.  He pulled himself together, then extended himself to stand.  He felt the whir of rising too quickly try and overtake him, but the world lit up from behind his dark desk, as if returning from a total eclipse. Dmitry stood in awe of this phenomenon.  His office was missing a wall, not just a window.

Outside, he could hear hysteria setting off into the streets.  The waft of burnt rubber and gas, mixed with the stench of  mechanical fire, set in through the massive, missing wall.  A tower of smoke billowed past the missing fraction of his cube; Dima continued to make his way around his desk.

Paperwork and file folders joined the trash and street litter.  Together they fluttered in the smoke and dust that brewed outside the boundaries of his missing wall.  The floor now ended at least a foot sooner than before, and Dima’s glossy eyes searched the chaos below for an explanation.  Sirens wailed to get closer; their flashing lights reverberated off the glass buildings and struck like endless bolts of red and blue lightning in his eyes.  Dima became dizzy and had to take a step back.  The putrid stench of gas and burning rubber grew thicker and it made Dima want to puke.  He felt around for his black leather chair, rolled it underneath him, then sat down to wait for the room slow its rotation and stop spinning.  He found he couldn’t see straight if he opened his eyes all the way.  So he squinted.  Against the harsh emergency vehicle lights that seemed to pierce the gray smoke, he squinted and he went blank.  He tried to remember anything from before the moment he woke up, but nothing flashed before him to replace an empty stare.  Nothing except the aggravating rhythm of red and blue rotations.

He winced.  Against the flashes of light that meant help was just below, he narrowed his eyes to see beyond the plume of smoke.  There was another building; a familiar neighbor from across the street with it’s tall translucent blue, glass windows.  It towered into the skyline of the city, and in it’s vertical, blue reflection, Dmitry could see the damage that was done.  His building was burning at the base, and as for what he could tell, was also missing around half of its panoramic views.  It looked like someone had ripped a cord and peeled off the bottom half of the building’s face, leaving behind rows of confused, broken cubes, and a cloud of nauseating, black smoke.  Like a cigarette left burning, face down in urban debris, the devastation done to his building was most dramatic at the base, closest to the fire.  Black and charred, still orange and lit; the sixty-two story high rise blew its toxins into the atmosphere, and its once beautiful reflection was replaced by something hideous.

Dima listened for the panic in the streets below, hoping for a clue.  He closed his eyes and concentrated his efforts, but all the panic had emptied out; spread into the surrounding neighborhoods.  Even the bleeps and bloos from car alarms had given up their pleas, replaced by sirens and an official sounding voice on a megaphone.  Evacuation orders for the area.  Dima knew he couldn’t stay in his office and considered his own evacuation, but the room was still in a flat spin which meant he was still firmly in place on his ergonomic chair.  Dima closed his eyes again and felt the hammer deep in his skull keep its repetitious thump on beat.  It seemingly threatened to break through the back of Dima’s head, but still he listened, for any clue whatsoever, from the street below.

He made the discovery when he tried to get up to leave; it was there on the door, three feet up on the right side.  It made Dmitry pat the back of his head with his fingers. He pulled back his hand with blood, and he looked down at the crimson, shocked.  The door handle, a four inch bar connected to a one inch stem, where below, his head rested when he startled himself awake, shared the color of blood with Dima’s hand.

He wanted to call out for help, but he couldn’t do it to save his life.  Dima opened his mouth and expected there to be sound, but nothing happened.  His brain scrambled to find answers, but none were made.  He opened his mouth and formed the four-letter word in his mind, but again, when his mouth opened, nothing came out.  Panic flushed through his body and took up residence inside his brain; he sat in silent contemplation of his malfunction.  As the magnitude of his circumstance began to slowly seep in, for the first time in many years, Dmitry Ledkov became very scared.

Ch. 2 -Growl

Ch. 3 – Pant

Ch. 4 – Hunt

Ch. 5 – Cry

Ch. 6 – Fever

The white halogens that had not been broken or killed were scattered.  As if in hiding, a fear that a mass of their numbers together would bring out the attackers again.  Down the hallway they shone like spotlights, tiny squares of tile lit beneath them, the blackness of the school hallway pressed against them ready to spill over the bright edges.  David moved carefully, his feet brushing against dirt, metal, sliding on almost dried crimson liquid.  Each step gave him away.  They knew he was there.  They’d smelt him, tasted him on the air.  Their eyes saw no darkness, their paws pushed no sound.

David’s hands were moist.  His warmth beat against the metal in his hand, building warmer and warmer.  Ready to shoot.  He turned slowly, peered down side hallways and into open classroom doors, his eyes adjusting to the dark.  He walked in a slow spiral, each end of the hallway taking his focus in turn.  Clear.  Quiet.  Dark.  Clear.  Quiet.  Dark.  Each turn revealing an empty end.

Thu-bump. Thu-Bump. THU-Bump.  THU-BUMP. THU-Bump.  Thu-Bump. Thu-bump.

Something ran through the ceiling above him.  His gun drawn, he followed it from where he stood, pointing the way to the farthest end of the hall.  The end that lead to the gym and locker rooms.

When he lowered his firearm from the ceiling, turning toward where the noise fled, something waited and watched.  All fours slightly hunched, David could see the shadow was ready to charge.  Its eyes glowed, the only distinguishing feature of the dark creature’s head in the unlit end of the hallway.  It stared at him.David stared back, unmoving.

It struck him.  He wasn’t sure how.  It had never moved.  He took a few steps back, staggering.  He was sure it had never moved.  Its eyes, its head.  They hadn’t even shifted.  The glowing yellow had left and was replaced by a vibrant blue.  But the animal had never moved.

David lowered his gun slightly, bringing his fist to his abdomen.  He spat blood and propped a hand against the white painted brick wall.  He panted, fueled by fear.  He turned again to the far end of the hall.  The creature met his gaze with its now yellow eyes, turned and left.  Several others called to it in the distance.

From behind where it had stood, David saw the inside of the men’s locker room, the door no longer on its hinges.  Down the hallway, David stepped through the open door and over some pieces of wall that were scattered across the floor.  A shower was running, stuck by a creature during David’s escape.  The hot water poured undisturbed down the drain, spilling puffs of steam across the floor.  The steam tendrils reached out toward the broken lockers, vanishing against the cool surface of the tile floor.  David rounded on the first row of lockers, pressed a hand to his lip and dabbed an unnoticed spot of blood.

The end of the row closest to him was crumpled.  Like a house of cards blown over by a casual breeze.  A pair of legs stuck out from the crumpled foundation.

“Eric?”  David moved to the stack of metal boxes pining the legs.

“David… David?”  The legs moved slightly, fidgeting in their small metal cave.

“Hold still, I’m gonna get you out…” David grunted, lifting pieces of metal as he unburied Eric.  Piece by piece David slowly, and loudly, freed the man beneath the rubble.  Together they shifted Eric’s body, planting him on the tile floor panting and wincing.

“Are you okay?  Are you– Are… I mean…”  David shook his head.

“I’m alright.  I think my arm’s broken.”  Eric pulled his arm close to his chest.  “What’s wrong with you?  Your lip… David you’re bleeding.”

“I’m– I… My head hurts… I can’t…”

“Bet cha’ can’t!”  Lee Meyer stood like Peter Pan, hands in fists against his waits.  His tousled blonde hair waving in the midnight breeze.  “I bet you’re too scared.”

“Am not!”

“Then do it!  Break it David!”  Lee whispered sharply.

David turned to the car in front of him, the smooth metal baseball bat in his hand.  The night stars reflected off the windshield, little light pollution from their small town to block out the celestial target points.

David leveled the bat with his waist.  “Won’t we get in trouble?”

“Chicken!”

CRASH.

Hundreds of shards of glass spilled onto the previously covered car seats, others spilt onto the pavement and bounced across the black asphalt in rhythm with the startled car alarm.

Dee-voo.  Dee-voo.  Dee-voo.

“David?  David?”  Eric looked worried, his arm clasped to his chest, a dried gash glowing pink on his forehead.  “What do you mean your head hurts?”

David looked around at the dilapidated locker room.  “How long was I out?”

“What do you mean?  David… You didn’t– you weren’t out.  You just said your head hurts.”

“I… I dunno.”  David shook his head and took a deep breath.  “Come on.  We gotta get outta here.  There’s not much time left.”  The clock on the wall still ticked off the seconds.  They had just over an hour.  “Can you walk?”

Eric took a moment, wiggling his toes inside his shoes and turning his ankles.  He nodded and David pulled him gently to his feet.  He staggered and leaned into David for support.  This was going to take time.

Together they hobbled to the door.  David peered down the hallway.  It suddenly looked very long.  “Come on.  It’ll be faster if we cut through the gym.”

One hand around Eric’s shoulders, the other pressed against the gym door and pushed.

David stopped.  Stared in shock.

“Oh my God!  You–you’re early.  I wasn’t expecting you ‘til later…Baby, this isn’t what it looks like.”

Stared.

A hushed tone whispered in the dark, “you have to go.  …Go!”

Stared at the other man, a strange naked form pulling out of the linens and groping across the floor.  A sock.  Printed shorts.  Jeans.

“We were… we were just… Baby, say something.”

A half naked figure brushed past David, moving through the darkness, a whorish grin stuck to his face as he left.

David stared.

“Damn it.  If you’re not even going to talk to me how do you expect to make a relationship work?”  The other dark figure stood from the bed and pulled on a shirt.  “You have the communication skills of gnat.”  It pulled on a pair of shorts from the chair next to the bed.  “I don’t know why I even bother.  You’re such a child… I really don’t think this is going to work anymore.”  It stood.  “Look, this last year has been fun, but I’m looking for something a little more serious.  I don’t think there’s anything else for us to talk about.  You should go.”

It moved to the doorway, directing David’s departure.

David had never felt this way before.  It wasn’t sadness.  It wasn’t anger.

David’s hand connected with a jaw.

Not anger.  Not sadness.  “I hate you.”  It welled inside of David.

“Holy shit!  You little freak!  What’s wrong with you?!”

“David, what’s wrong?  David!”  Eric lay on the floor of the gym next to David.

The hatred welled up inside of David.  He couldn’t see.  His breaths were fast.  Eric’s voice called to him.  Brought him back.  Back to his pounding head.

“Are you okay?”  David rolled to his side, faced Eric on the floor.

“You just collapsed… Are you okay?”  Eric propped himself up with his good arm.

“Yeah… I’m– we need to go.”  David rolled to his feet, wrapped an arm around Eric’s waist and pulled him across the gym.  David felt grateful that schools were designed with so many clocks.  At least one in every room.

“Wait.  David, wait.  Slow down, you need to take it easy.”

“We can’t Eric!  We can’t stop we can’t slow down!  They’re gonna blow up the entire town in forty-five minutes and you can’t be here when that happens!”

Eric’s eyes turned to a deeper concern.  “What do you mean?”

“They’re gonna blow us up.  One last ditch effort to stop these creatures.”

“No, David.  What do you mean?  What do you mean: I can’t be here?  What about you?  You can’t be here either.”  Eric let emotion pour across his face uncharacteristically.

“Look.”  David pulled Eric along again, pressing through the far gym door and clenching his jaw out of pain.  “If something happens you have to go.  You have to get out of here.”

Eric choked, a warmth building behind his eyes and temporarily blocking his throat.

They moved down the hallway, the animals calling in the distance.  Joyously running up and down empty upstairs hallways and letting their claws clank against tile.

David could see the open doorway to the parking lot in the distance.  Flickering lights above them.  They pressed on from shadow to shadow.

A fluorescent went.  It burst, its life of stress ending in one brilliant flash of sparks that rained down from the sky.

Blues.  Reds.  Whites.  Stars and streamers.

“David!  Pie!”  David’s mom called over from the picnic table full of food, the lingering scent of barbecue clinging to the tablecloth.

Reluctantly he pulled himself from the blanket laid across the grassy hill beneath the fireworks.  David had never been a holiday person.  He seldom felt like he had much to celebrate.  This holiday was the worst.

“How big a piece do you want?”  His mom asked cheerfully.

“I don’t care.”

She silently cut an average sized piece and slid it neatly onto a festive paper plate.  “Ice cream?”

David pushed at the plastic forks on the table absently.  “I don’t care.”  He said, quieter this time.

She sat the plate down gently on the picnic table, pulled a paper napkin from the stack beside the pie and wiped her hands of cherry red goop.  She picked up the ice cream scoop and went to work in the bucket of vanilla.  “I miss him too.”

Identical balls of vanilla hugged each other, inching slowly toward the pie sharing their space.  “It’s been three years.  And every year is a different type of difficult.”  She reached for the napkin again.  “But, no one blames you David.”  She said evenly.

“I blame me.”  David picked one fork from amongst the many.

“You know how stubborn your brother was.  If he put his mind to something–”

“I know…”  David took his plate and pushed at the shifting ice cream with his fork.  “Pie looks good.  Thanks mom.”  David turned back toward his blanket, one anniversary weighing more on his mind then the other.  Twins in date but not in meaning.

“David,” his mother called, focusing on her son through the crowd of family ohing and awing under the early evening fireworks.

“I love you.”

Tears dripped down Eric’s cheeks.  The pain.  He pulled David through the doors and onto the parking lot ground.

“AAaaah!”  David moaned, pawing at his temples.

“Hang on.  We’re almost there.”  Eric heaved with both hands, broken or otherwise.  “Stay with me…”  Eric pleaded.

David was dazed.  “How long?  How much time.”  He staggered.

“I’m not sure I want to know.”

“You have to go… it’s–it’s coming.  I don’t want it to hurt you.”  David pressed his hands against his forehead again, a silent scream filling the vastly empty parking lot.

They both dropped to their knees, Eric bringing his hands to David temples.  “Listen to me David, you can fight this.  You’re gonna be ok.  You just have to hang in there.  Stay with me.”  Eric pressed against Davids hand which pushed against his chest, “I’m not leaving.”

“I’m leaving!  I hate you and I don’t want to live here anymore!”  David screamed through the front door of his house, his father sitting within view down the short hallway at the kitchen table.

Hate filled David’s head.  Pounding.

“David!  Listen to me!  Listen to my voice.”  Eric spoke calmly.  “I need you to listen to me.  I need you–need you here.”

“We don’t need you here anymore.”  Suzy Eve’s red pigtails bounced as she cocked her head.  “We’ve discussed it, and we all think you’re doing a terrible job.  Michael will be a better Treasurer.”  She peeked slyly at the dark haired boy in the corner of the classroom.  “Don’t bother coming to club anymore.  We don’t need your negativity.”

Jealousy.  Throbbing.

“Remember… remember when we met?”  Eric shifted to the ground, David shaking against his hands.

“Remember the student loan you have to pay off?”  David’s mom rarely got angry.  She was furious.  “How do you plan on doing that without a job?  Of all the– fired?  You had to go and get fired!  What?  You expect your father and I to be able to bail you out?  On our budget?  We’re barely getting by as it is!”

Shame.  It pulsed with every rapid heartbeat.

“You came in with some–God awful–cookies.  You wanted to say thank you to the officers who found your piece of crap bike after it was stolen?”  Eric laughed sadly.

“Really, I appreciate it, but I really had nothing to do with finding your bike.”  Eric smiled, reluctantly eyeing the plate.

“Oh, that’s okay.  I made plenty.  You don’t understand, I am broke.  That bike is my life.”

David breathed.

“I must have ate…ten of those awful things.  Spent what, half an hour talking?”

The low steady rumble of large plane engines called down from the sky.

“What was it you called those cookies?”  Eric rested, settling onto the pavement peacefully.  “They were chocolate.  With coffee or something…”

“I’m pretty much a cookie master.”  David joked, leaning against the police station counter.

“Cookie master?  Are they the ones with the different colored belts?  Or do you get a badge?”  Eric slyly picked another cookie from the plate.

“What did you call them?”  Eric looked across to the open pickup door.  His arm twinged.  Behind him he could just hear the howls of the animals being overshadowed by the roar of the plane above.  “What did you call them?”  Eric asked himself, accepting the ground below him and gazing absently at the world around him.

“Espresso my Thanks Cookies.”  David muttered weakly.

Eric pulled his gaze down.  David had stopped shaking.  Eric let out a laugh.

“Were they really that bad?”  David asked.

The parking lot blurred in Eric’s vision, moisture building up.  “No.  No, they were great.”

***

“Thank you for coming on such short notice Detective Ford.”  The man bowed politely, taking his seat again across the table as the Detective seated herself quietly.

“As you know, we’re all saddened by the tragic… Earthquake that ravaged several towns in the Midwest earlier this week.”  The man lowered his balding head to examine the stack of papers on the table in front of him.

“We’re very concerned that the few survivors are being–cared for properly?”

Ford glanced down at her tidy, short fingernails.  “They’ve been examined an successfully made it through the quarantine process.  I feel confident that they pose no threat–”

The man interjected, “Detective Ford, all I need is for the record to show that the survivors were not mistreated.  Any speculation on the cause or effects of the natural disaster should remain speculation and are officially of no interest.”

Ford nodded her head.  “Proper care was show to all remaining survivors.”

The man collected his papers, nodding.  He stood, rounded the table, his hand on the door knob.  “Detective Ford.  Off the record: we have intelligence that suggests a small town on the Eastern coast may be in danger of another catastrophic earthquake.  I believe Lewis has the details and travel arrangements for you.”  The man pulled the door open.  “I do hope we’ve seen the last of the earthquakes for a while.”

“Sir?”  Ford turned in her chair.  “Any word on the new team members I put in for approval?”

The man turned in the open doorway, the large high rise widows behind him looked out on clear blue skies.  “A civilian with no military training, and a cop?”

“They’re survivors sir.”  Ford stood from her seat.  “I insist.”

The man eyed her for a moment, glanced at some of the papers in his hands.  Slowly he nodded, and exited down the hallway.

Ford moved into the hallway, her slim figure reflecting off the glass panel in front of her.  She looked down at the city below her.  Thousands of people.  Millions of cars.  Trillions of emotions, thoughts, fears.  All clashing with each other.  The stress, aggression, hatred, shame, sadness.

The different walks of life.  Contrasting beliefs.  Opposing views.  Supposed different sides of the same fence.

The creatures were out there.  They couldn’t ever be truly stopped, and they would destroy more towns.  There was no helping it.

Somewhere in Detective Ford’s reflection was a smile.  Despite the odds, despite the hopelessness, she had at least two men on her side.  Two people who knew the stakes, and knew how to combat the creatures lurking inside any one of the everyday people walking the streets below.  Only three people who really understood.  Not much compared to the city beyond.

There is always power in numbers.

Ch. 2 -Growl

Ch. 3 – Pant

Ch. 4 – Hunt

Ch. 5 – Cry

It had never occurred to David how small his town was.  The school taken over, they needed someplace else to set up.  The police station was out, they hadn’t even gotten a chance to start the clean up.  It just lay there in a shamble of broken class and flickering florescent lights.  Detective Ford and her remaining team all looked to David for an answer.  Never mind that he was seconds into his confused and guilty grief.  He must have stammered out “the fire station,” because that’s where they were.  The two story brink building full of lost looking men in suits and holsters.

Detective Ford had been quick to set up an armada of computer monitors and keyboards, after which she’d been locked to her cell phone for the past twenty-three minutes.  David had nothing better to do than watch them tick away, cheering them on.  It was the only distraction he could find, everyone else distracted with their various important looking tasks.

There were eleven, including David.  Detective Ford, McDowell, and eight of their men.  One lay upstairs on a cot, grasping a battered arm to his chest and muttering through his fever.  Two men with guns stood watch, just in case.
The other five men were busy typing on computers and pouring onto maps.  They tried to plan, to prepare.  It seemed incredibly useless to David.  Eric was dead.  His parents were stuck in their house, terrified  and sequestered like the rest of the town.  He marveled at it all.  These eleven government officials controlled everything, the whole time as panicked and confused as the housewives they protected.

David felt antsy.  He was responsible for Eric’s death.  He was a survivor twice over.  He was a bomb the men around him expected to go off, another monster born from his inevitable destruction.  He was alone, his family huddled in their home on the other side of town from the fire house.  He was tired.  He was full of coffee.  His thoughts raced and he muttered like the wounded man upstairs.

“Stop.”  Detective Ford’s authoritative voice cut through the activity of the room.  She waited for eye contact, her cell phone still held partially to her ear.  Her face looked slightly flushed, the usual calm assertiveness slightly disturbed.  “Everyone pack up.  We’re leaving.”

A few men looked puzzled.  The more seasoned ones began without question.  One man stood and looked out the window to his right, fingering the gun strapped to his hip.  David simply sat, eyes calmly focused on Detective Ford.  She kept his gaze, muttering a few last words into her phone before sliding it closed and latching it to her hip.  She made her way to David, her team busy around her.

“You need a hand?”  Ford asked.

David took a second, watched the men pack their things around him.  Most of it had never been unpacked.  “I don’t have anything.  It’s just me.  No packing necessary.”

“Did you want to–”  Ford paused, her hand unconsciously moving toward the phone on her hip.  “Do you need to get anything from your house?”

Another moment of David weighing the Detective with his eyes.  “We’re not coming back, are we?”

Ford gave a look that implied she was breaking a rule.  Sharing information she shouldn’t share.  “David, we can take you with us… because of what’s happened, what you’ve been through.  We have to take you with us.”

“What about the rest of the town?  My family?  How are you going to stop these creatures?”

“We– we can’t let everyone leave.  There’s too big a risk of infection.  We’re just not set up to quarantine every single person here.  And if someone were to… if the creatures were to get out–well we’re not set up for that either.”

“I don’t understand.  If we leave they’re just gonna get out eventually anyways.  If they haven’t already.  How will us leaving help the town?”

Ford unclipped her phone and glance at the digital numbers on the front.  “In three hours there won’t be a town left to help.”

David let the bomb drop, absorbing the impact of her words.

“I’m sorry David.”

*************************************************************************************************

“Mom?!  Dad?!”  David shouted down the hallway to his parent’s bedroom.  The lights were off.  It was quiet and dark through his house.  His parents had the be there.  He needed them to be there.  He didn’t have time.  “MOM?!  DAD?!”  He moved down the hallway loudly.  He felt like he lumbered through the stillness.  After all he’d been through in the last few days, the loudness scared him.  He was giving himself away.

“David?”  An eye peeked through a crack in his parent’s bedroom door.  “It’s David!”  The door flew open to reveal his mother, 9mm in hand.  David’s father stood in the distance, a shotgun pointed at the far window.  They looked older then David remembered.  Frightened and tired.  Bloodshot eyes, lean and hungry figures, gray brows and frown lines.

“We have to leave.  Fifteen minutes tops.  There’s a truck parked outside.  I’ll meet you out there.”  He gave his mom a firm but quick hug, and made for the stairs to his bedroom.

“What’s going on?  David?”  His mom moved to the bottom of the stairs.

“We have to hurry mom.  They’re gonna blow the entire town up.  You can’t be here when that happens.”

“We can’t be here?  What about you?”  David’s father asked, his wife pale next to him.

“We all need to get out of here.  Fifteen minutes!”  David yelled down the stairs.

He pushed his way through his bedroom door, grabbed an old backpack from the hook on the wall inside and started rummaging through his dresser.  Some clothes.  A wad of cash he kept tucked with his socks.  None of it felt vital to his existence.

Dweedle.  Dweedle.

David peered out of his backpack toward the phone on the table next to his bed.  The small screen lit in green with the phone number incoming.  His throat closed and his eyes moistened.

Dweedle.  Dweedle.

He pulled the phone into his hand and sat on the edge of his bed, pressing the button to connect.  He held it for a minute before placing it next to his ear.

“….Eric?”

*************************************************************************************************

They drove in silence.  David’s mother staring out the truck window from the back seat.  At last look at the town, the life about to vanish before her.  The town already felt dead.  It’s people afraid of each other, boarded up in their houses on guard.

McDowell drove unaware of speed limits and stop signs.  There was no traffic and they had a schedule to keep.  They rounded the corner, the fire station in view, and saw the team of nondescript black vehicles loading up to speed away.

Once parked at the curb, David’s parents were ushered towards a car with the wounded man from the upper level of the fire house.  Straight to sequestering for them all.

“Computer equipment in the SUV.  I want guns and ammunition divided equally between all five cars.”  Ford directed her men, nodding absentmindedly to McDowell.

“We’ve got the boy’s folks.”  McDowell pointed his thumb over his shoulder at the car the two parents were climbing into.  “How we on time?”

Ford glanced at the phone on her belt, angling it up and tapping a button on the side.  “Just over two hours.”

“Here I was worried we’d be rushed.”  McDowell said casually.  The thirty minute drive from town to the safety zone well within reach.

“David with his parents?”  Ford asked looking down the curb to the open door of the SUV.

“He was right behind–”  McDowell shot his gaze from one end of the curbside to the other.  “…My truck’s gone.”

*************************************************************************************************

The school looked like the bomb had a already dropped on it.  Windows and doors missing.  Chunks of brick wall torn through like building blocks pushed over by bored children.  The exposed hallways were dark.

McDowell’s truck stood catawampus on yellow parking lines, the driver’s side door left open and the cab light glowing.  David stood at the tailgate, checking ammo and strapping metal to his back and hips.  He’d never had to use a gun before.  At least not like this.  Part of him still hoped for a clean record.

Some sort of large rifle David couldn’t name strapped to his back, handguns at both hips.  David didn’t feel antsy anymore.  He wasn’t tired.  His mind was calm, the feverish race lifted and left him focused.  Focused on the task ahead, on the ticking clock flipping numbers in his head.  Slowly counting down to zero.

“Okay,” David switched on a flashlight, checking the bulb and battery.  “Third time’s a charm.”

Pt. 2: “Nightmares”

Pt. 3: “Respite”

            The risk of exposure was too great. With the police on high alert, not to mention that confounded security team, they could no longer afford to take her out. Sure, the money would have been nice, helped them grow the operation courtesy of a huge influx of capital to increase their investments. But now, any attempted hit would only draw more attention. Attention meant exposure, and the whole façade would collapse on top of them. His career would be over.

            He refused to let that happen.

            Calling off the hit was the smart decision. Jacy, damn the girl, was safe for the time being. He would find the money elsewhere, maybe even at the charity event in an hour’s time. Surely they could schluff off enough of the raised funds to make a deposit on the enterprise. Their contact in Colombia wanted the money paid out in installments anyway. While he couldn’t chance touching his own account for fear the IRS would track such a large transfer, the estimated take from this afternoon should cover a quarter of what they would need. Add to that the contents of their offshore account—the one he liked to call “petty cash,” not the one labeled “cushy retirement”—and they were halfway there.

            He’d call Krimmer. Get him to make the arrangements. Then they would need investors, or some other plan to help them appropriate the necessary millions. He wasn’t worried. He had a couple of options in mind.

***

            A huge banner spanned the entrance arch of the Marriott’s Kennedy Ballroom: “Follow the Yellow Brick Road! 5^th Annual Charity Auction in Support of Foster Kids!” The silver glittered letters dipped and swirled in an elaborate faux cursive font, surrounded by dual woven arrangements of flowers and balloons. Beneath them, rectangles of golden carpet interlocked like flat bricks in a path that meandered toward the catered buffet luncheon at the room’s center, then swept left past curved rows of white-draped tables that bore carefully coordinated assortments of objects. Small stands along the way held stories and pictures of fosterlings still in the system, and the path ended at an artful photographic display of smiling children, each having finally found their new home.

            In the two years she had been involved in the charity, this event did not look to have changed much. The same ice sculptures of children dribbling basketballs, slumped on a bed reading, racing a small, shaggy dog, had yet to alter. A quick glance at the posted menu showed the same fare as before: brazed beef or vegetable stir-fry, minced potatoes, white rice, steamed carrots and broccoli, cranberry-almond salad with vinaigrette, honey wheat rolls, an assortment of cheesecakes and pastries. And of course, a full-service bar.

            That seemed a good place to start.

            Even the crowd milling around this immense chandeliered room had the same look to it, consisting partly of those that ran the charity event circuit, attending dinners and dances, and writing huge checks, and partly of attendees just happy to brush elbows with the rich and famous in support of a great cause. A very few were directly involved in Yellow Brick Road, and these she easily picked out from the crowd.

            Jonathon Gold, better known in the music circuit as “Jonagold” or “The Apple King,” chatted easily near the bar with a couple of blatantly blonde admirers. Getting a few select celebrities to an event was a great way to draw in supporters that wouldn’t have attended otherwise. Jonny, however, was one of the organization’s founding board members and most vocal activists. He put in a lot of volunteer hours working directly with the kids, and had a real way of setting them at ease.

            Bobs was here too. He had donated a chunk of money and joined the board a year or so before Laine. In fact, Bobs was the one who’d pushed her to get involved in the first place. He and Jonny maintained an inherent dislike for each other, of course, but for the foster kids they managed a thin veneer of tolerance. Right now, he was engaged with charity VP Joseph Krimmer, a glass of his favorite rum-and-Coke in hand.

            Continuing her perusal of the room, Laine’s eyes fell upon Robin Kasey. Unfortunately, Robin smiled straight back at her. Very slowly, Laine acknowledged her with a nod, and then just as deliberately turned toward her entourage. If she left their connection at that, maybe the reporter would leave her alone.

            Wishful thinking at its best.

            Kyle and Hancock were her escorts this afternoon, although she had a feeling Kevin Briggs likely hung around nearby. She had been introduced to a new guy, Derek Porter, the previous evening, but he was searching for leads on her attacker with Rick Mercier. Though she didn’t count Mitchell as an official escort, he was present at her side. That she had deemed it necessary to take the day before off had plainly spooked him. Nevertheless, it wasn’t concern for her state of mind that kept him hovering around the perimeter—it was concern that her state of mind would cause her to do something that might negatively affect her image.

            That very same image had begun to pluck at Laine’s nerves. She was no longer quite sure that she cared. About any of it.

            One day of contemplation had proved enough to alter her game-plan. She still refused to give into the fear—that wasn’t the way she operated—but she would control more of the risk factor. Her life was plenty worth it. If she kept her head firmly atop her shoulders and her mind strong, she had the best chance of staying out of danger instead of gravitating toward it. She was her own first line of defense. Kyle and his team were only backup.

            And the police? They knew their business and would pursue any leads. No need for her to get involved there. Regardless, she couldn’t count on them to stave off harm without more useful information, most notably a motive. As things stood, she was perfectly aware of the rumors circulating around that named the entire incident a simple publicity stunt. She doubted Marshall was capable of anything that devious. She certainly wasn’t and her career hardly needed more help, though none of this would keep people from speculating.

            Even here in the ballroom, she could sense the curious thoughts of every head that turned her way. They wondered about why she was there instead of tucked securely away in the Bahamas, and who (if anyone) would want to come after her, and whether there was any possibility of her presence attracting more trouble that afternoon. The morbid appeal of this last bit lingered on the faces of more than a few. Danger held a sort of fascination, so long as it happened to someone else.

            In her case, however, the best course was to set fear aside and address the problem directly. If she approached the crowd on her own terms, she held court on the perceptions.

            “Don’t think you have to breathe down my neck,” she swept a rueful smile over the watchful threesome. Her manager held her in the grip of his intense scrutiny, while Kyle’s casual gaze lingered on a group of gawkers who had found the bar early. Hancock simply stood there and looked intimidating. “It’s a charity event. No one’s going to try anything here.”

            Marshall’s upper lip tightened in a miniscule frown. “I’m not about to leave you on your own, Jacy. And I don’t want the scavengers pelting you with questions. Not until we’ve had time to develop an official statement.”

            She fought an automatic eye-roll, settling instead on a less-than-polite snort. “I’m her in support of the kids, not to take questions. Go mingle or something; I’ve got this handled.”

            Before he could say another word, she turned and strode into the crowd. Several yards of pressed together bodies later, a quick glance revealed Hancock following half a step back. Kyle had meanwhile dissolved into the crowd, probably in hopes of finding a viable observation point. Thankfully, they all seemed willing to play this her way—mostly because this time, her way wasn’t chock full of opportunities for something to go wrong.

            Free at last, she paused at the bar for a flute of champagne mixed with sparkling green apple cider. Over a series of sips and smiled greetings, she pegged down Joseph Krimmer’s position and plotted a course that would hopefully lead her past a couple of other charity-goers she wanted a word with, while keeping her well beyond reach of Robin Kasey’s investigative claws.

            Jonny stopped her near the auction tables.

            “Hey,” he dipped his head. “Glad you could make it. Bid on anything yet?”

            “No, but I will. Not this hat, though.”

            Sharp black eyes followed her gaze toward the nearest table. His solitary dimple cued a lazy smile. “Yeah, hideous, isn’t it?”

            “Someone will bid on it,” she shrugged. When she had last checked, Joseph was headed the opposite direction and she really wanted to catch him before his speech. There wouldn’t be much opportunity to talk with him after.

            “Probably wear it too,” Jonny’s head swung mockingly sideways. His teeth flashed white. “For a good cause, though.”

            “Of course,” she agreed. Only practiced control kept anxiety from tainting her relaxed tone. “Have you seen Joe around? I’m trying to catch up to him.”

            Eyebrows drawing together, he bent toward her. There was something speculative about his expression. “Around somewhere,” he shrugged vaguely. “He seems pretty busy tonight.”

            Finally spotting Joseph at the room’s far end, she heaved a silent sigh of relief. The VP had paused to chat with a dark-haired man she didn’t know. Based on their position just outside the main flow of traffic, she hoped their conversation might take more than a few cursory sentences. “Never mind, I see him. Would you excuse me?”

            The silent Hancock at her heels, she made her way along the yellow-bricked carpet all the while praying her quarry would stay put. It did. In fact, by the time she came within hearing distance, the conversation was still going strong.

            And what she heard didn’t make any sense.

            “I like the sound of the payoff, sure. But I just don’t know. It still sounds risky,” the man was saying.

            Joe shook his salt-and-pepper head. “It’s not. We pull in a lot of money at these kinds of events, not to mention what we get on paper. Yours will blend right in—one pledge among many.”

            A pledge? Why would that pose risk to anyone? Laine looked around for Hancock to see if he’d heard, but he was several feet away talking into his cell phone.

            “You’re absolutely certain they’ve no means of tracking the deposit.”

            “Donations are entirely anonymous. We’ll need your account number for the return payments, of course, which we can deposit without alerting certain interested parties. One of the advantages of a non-profit organization, you understand.”

            The man considered this for a moment. “Give me two days to think it over.”

            “Right. I’ll be in touch.” Joe nodded and turned away, his demeanor obviously distracted. Then suddenly, his gaze locked with Laine’s. There was no mistaking it: he flinched.

            Immediately, a strong urge to back away permeated her body. Former questions no longer seemed important. If she followed the wise course of action, she would confront him here and find out if the exchange really merited her initial distress. All she had to do was ask.

            “Jacy! I was hoping we’d run into each other. Do you have a minute?” Robin Kasey appeared with predictably awful timing, her habit of crashing in unannounced the moment she sensed her target’s distraction in fine form.

            Frustrated at the interruption, Laine repelled the reporter’s verbal onslaught until Marshall materialized at her side, a step behind Hancock. There were only so many ways to imply “no comment” without speaking the actual words. When she finally had chance to turn around, Joseph Krimmer was gone.

***

            Then take care of the problem.

            Krimmer glanced at his cell phone screen and winced. He wasn’t one-hundred percent certain how much of his conversation the singer had overheard, or more importantly, how much she had understood. Regardless, they had an immediate problem that desperately needed solving. And they could not under any circumstances tolerate another screw-up.

            Means were already in place for a rejected scenario from the initial planning stages. Earlier that morning, the knowledge that a pair of trained killers still planned to circulate through the unsuspecting crowd had given him a smug sense of self-satisfaction, though he had not intended to use them. The killers had never been informed of that detail, nor did they know their original target. Regardless, the flawed plan held some potential. The problem would be taking the girl out without drawing deep inspection into the charity’s financial activities, or scaring away potential investors.

            Never mind. Another text popped up on his screen. I’ll do it myself. You provide the distraction.

            Relieved in spite of himself, Krimmer smiled. Now that he could do.

***

            From his vantage point against a wall a short ways from Laine, Merrimac commanded a solid view of almost everyone in the room. Hotel surveillance cameras tucked strategically beneath the ceiling eaves; Briggs had hacked into these and was presently relaying information. Whatever security arranged for this event wasn’t enough. He preferred to keep his own watch—in his experience, instinct rarely transcended any technological format. He wanted the detail direct observation could give.

            “Small commotion brewing by the bar.” Briggs’s voice buzzed in his ear via the tiny headset hidden beneath his carefully arranged hair.

            Ignoring the more than likely intentional pun, Merrimac focused on the indicated area. A few guests showed off raised voices and a carefree disregard helped along by large amounts of alcohol drunk too quickly, though they didn’t yet appear a serious problem. If that changed before hotel security dissipated the potential situation, or if any similar anxieties arose, he would simply have Laine leave early.

            She had been unusually cooperative since his return. That last attempted hit had shaken her; that much was clear. She hadn’t so much as hinted at her original excuse of keeping up image as a reason for sticking with her prescribed schedule. However much he wished they could fade her into the background like an ordinary Jane, it simply wasn’t possible. Unless she radically altered her appearance, she ran the risk of recognition wherever she went. Nor could she vanish from public radar without causing a stir. Deprived of desirable options, their best bet was to allow her a few public events—strictly supervised of course—and grip the reins of security tight the moment she ducked from camera view.

            A crackle of static burst in his ear. “Mer, get eyes on the main door. Some bozos are making a scene at ticketing, but I can’t get a good angle. My thoughts say trouble.”

            Merrimac hesitated, torn between leaving Hancock to briefly manage on his own and checking out the problem. It seemed unlikely that anyone would stage an assault here, but they didn’t pay him to dismiss potential danger.

            The movement casual, his right hand rose to brush against his ear. “I’ll head over. Hancock, maintain your position. Hustle her out the back route at my signal.”

            “Copy,” the big guard’s scratchy voice grunted in acknowledgment. Over near the auction tables, Merrimac saw him move two steps nearer their charge.

            One last visual sweep of the area later, he was trickling through the crowded ballroom on course for the main entrance. The crush worsened along the themed carpeting, so he stuck near the edges. Colognes and perfumes mixed and clashed against folds of exotically colored fabrics and pressed suits. He caught snatches of conversation, but these he let fade into the background. Unless he heard something out of place, he wanted his audio attention on alert for any updates from Briggs.

            After he cleared the commotion, he would also have Briggs contact Porter. With any luck, he and Mercier would have tracked down some sort of lead. As a licensed P.I., and a damn good one at that, Porter was their best bet at uncovering the information necessary to keep Laine out of harm’s way. Celebrity status may have granted her a significant amount of police resources, but investigative cops weren’t big on sharing. Their policy made sense most of the time; in this case, however, a few detailed updates on what the captured assailants had revealed would have improved their chances in a major way.

            “Mer? Anything? I’m flying blind, here. Can’t see a thing below head level with this many people packed in like sardines.”

            From where he stood, Merrimac was having trouble picking out visual detail himself. This whole affair put more distance between him and Laine than he liked. He should have called Mercier in for back-up instead of pairing him with Porter. Unfortunately, he’d had no choice. Porter didn’t know the case, didn’t know the job. He needed someone who did to help fill in the blanks and mull through theories. They’d even gotten Laine’s accountant and lawyer involved for insight into possible financial and legal entanglements. There had to be a reason someone wanted her dead. Without motive, they had nothing.

            “Give me specifics. Who am I looking for?” he brushed a finger along his jaw while activating his microphone. The thing was so sensitive, leaving it on all the time would only result in migraines for everyone wearing a headset. Plus, the added background noise would increase the likelihood of missing one of their fellows’ communications.

            Another hiss of static. “Woman in a loose navy dress, man also dressed in navy with matching fedora hat. They’ve pushed past the ticketing booth and are on their way in. Not stopping to talk with anyone though. No, they look like they’re trying to blend.”

            The described navy pulled at his eye from maybe fifteen feet away. The swarthy folds on the woman’s dress could easily hide a weapon, and the same could be said about the cut on the man’s sport coat. Briggs was correct. Nothing about the couple drew attention, except that this was a complete one-eighty from how they had acted behind the ballroom doors.

            Briggs cursed over the feed. He must have kept his hand on his headset. “The bar group’s acting up again. And they’re headed her way—a perfect screen if someone’s waiting for opportunity. I don’t like the feel of this.”

            Silently, Merrimac echoed his colleague’s choice phrase. It was time to get Laine out. Even if this was nothing, they couldn’t take the risk. One wrong move would lead to outcomes they couldn’t take back. His hand tapped down on his ear again. “Hancock, get—Shit!”

            The rest of his order disappeared behind the force of his dismay as the woman in navy pulled a gun from the elaborate knot near her waistline. All appearance of casualty cast aside, Merrimac lunged toward the couple in a diagonal move that placed him center-stage in the line of fire. At least, it would if he made it before the woman pulled the trigger.

            He didn’t. The sharp crack of a muted weapon—not near so quiet as the soft tup portrayed in movies—rang in his ears. Several people screamed, and not all of them women. It took every ounce of willpower he possessed to stick to his training and fix his eyes forward. All two-hundred pounds of his body collided with the woman four and a half seconds later. As they tumbled groundward, his ears finally registered the second splintering explosion.

            And then he felt the first ghostly spark of pain.

            He was hit.

            Icy heat peaked across his side. His vision went black.

***

            She was back inside the nightmare. The sound, a brutal burst of death, resounded in her mind, joined with memories of two other bullets pointed her direction. Fear permeated her body so thickly every muscle froze in place. Laine couldn’t think what to do, couldn’t think where to run.

            That first shot—she didn’t see where it went. She was too busy getting shoved toward a back hallway. People scrambled out of the way, most of them separating from her until she stood out among the fleeing crowd. A second shot followed close behind. The screams doubled. Only one thought whirred through her head: she had read the situation wrong. No matter where she was, no matter how many eyes watched her, the danger was not going to go away. Worse, whoever wanted her dead would not balk at hurting anyone who got in the way.

            “Come on.”

            Despite the stark confusion that ruled her reactions, she spared a glance for the man with an iron grip on her elbow. He hauled her along at a good clip, shielding her body with his free arm cast around her waist. Hancock, this certainly was not. So where on earth had he gone? Where was Kyle? And when had Jonny Gold arrived on-scene? He was crazy to be anywhere near her.

            “Wait!” she pulled away, but Jonny merely adjusted his grip and continued their march.

            “You’ve got to get out of here. It’s too dangerous.”

            No one could argue with that logic, but part of her refused to bail without at least knowing that everyone back in that room was alright. If one of those stray bullets had caught a fellow auction-goer, she might never forgive herself.

            Breath escaped her mouth in uneven exhalations as her lips just managed to form the query. “Did you see? Was anyone hurt?”

            Briefly, his gaze darted to meet hers. She saw the hesitation there and knew immediately what it meant.

            “Yeah,” he admitted at last. “I didn’t get a close look, but I think…” He paused so that the sound of their footfalls echoed audibly down the wide corridor, overpowering the muffled chaos of the ballroom at their backs. “It looked like one of the guys you came in with.”

            Laine slammed to a stop, forcing Jonny to do the same. The world seemed to freeze around her, or maybe she had stopped breathing. When she finally remembered to draw in air, her constricted throat choked on nothing.

            “Hancock?” The name barely scraped free.

            He shook his head, obviously wanting to get moving again. “I don’t know. Not the big guy.”

            Laine swayed on her silver-laced heels. Jonny would have recognized her manager. That left only one other option.

            Dimly, she heard Jonny’s voice urging her on, but without comprehension. Maybe he was wrong. Maybe it wasn’t Kyle who had been hit. Without a good view—which she doubted Jonny’d had—any conclusion was prone to error. How would he have recognized Kyle in that brief a moment? He’d only seen him once, maybe twice. In all likelihood, the bullet had hit someone else—which didn’t help her conscience any.

            Still, she had regained a bit of perspective and that helped. Now her priority was to get in touch with Mitchell and the security team, let them know where she was. Her destination was probably an important thing to note too.

            In a moment of less than brilliant deduction, Laine realized that they were no longer in the corridor. The side door of a silver Mercedes propped open in Jonny’s left hand as he ushered her within.

            “Wait,” she said for the second time. “I need to call Marshall.”

            “Call him from the car. It’s too open right here.” Firmly, he placed his free hand on her shoulder and pushed until she slid somewhat reluctantly into the backseat. Safety was the priority here. As soon as they were away, she would make the call. And also share her new concerns about Joseph Krimmer.

Ch. 2 -Growl

Ch. 3 – Pant

Ch. 4 – Hunt

The wooden locker room benches were not built for comfort.  Light wood panels stretched the length of the room, tall metal lockers stood to one side, their horizontal metal slats bent in places where hormonal teens had banged and pounded over the years.  The opposite side of the bench gave way to space.  An open isle ran the direction of the wood grain, providing passage to the cold tile communal shower, athlete’s foot running amuck.

David sat with his back to the locked metal boxes, facing the showers like an audience member.  A waist level tile wall opened in three spots, lending access to the lime stained shower heads.  From where he sat he could make out the corner of the metal cage which stood under the grouping of spouts.  An occasional yip or howl shook the metal frame.

They hadn’t come up with a name for them yet.  As a species, it was hard to name.  Part parasite, part mammal, they weren’t “like” anything science had seen before.  The three young were born five days ago, birthed by science and Dr. Smith’s historic C-Section.  The mother had been too dangerous to not keep under sedation.  Her water broke and Dr. Smith’s scalpel carved three young animals from her womb.  No doctor or scientist had ever seen one of these animals alive, so operating blind had been the only option.  Once the third creature had been freed and caged, Dr. Smith’s scalpel continued to explore.  The mother never woke up.

David, Eric, Detective Ford, Detective Anderson, and the army of government staff had spent the last five days sequestered in the High School.  After the last attack, an entire church wiped out, the government had quarantined the entire town.  No one left and no one came in without government clearance.  David split his free time between the library and the locker room.

They had put the three young in a large metal cage, deciding the men’s locker room would be the safest place for it: no windows at least.  They were like puppies, hairy balls of fur rolling and pulling on each other.  Four legs, the back two bent backwards at the knee joint like a dog’s.  Each foot had three toes, stubby black nails beginning to protrude.  They were covered in thick black fur, it had a matted look but, as David had found out, was relatively soft to the touch.  Only the pads of their feet, insides of their ears, tips of their noses and piercing eyes were free of hair.  Their long muzzles showed stark white teeth which rested against their lips and peeked through fur.  The small ones were almost cute, if you could ignore the larger beast clearly visible in every move and noise, waiting patiently to grow.

“You figured ‘em out yet?”  Eric leant against the lockers to David’s right, peering into the shower at the cages.

Dr. Smith and Detective Ford stood by Eric’s side, a group of uniformed men behind them.

“We need to take one of them.  They’re growing faster then we expected, and we need to run some tests.”  Dr. Smith said.  The three uniformed men followed him onto the dry tile of the soap stained prison.

David almost felt bad for them.  Trapped in a cage, motherless.  But he also knew how dangerous they could be.  He’d become something of a legend among the invading officials.  The only civilian to survive an attack.

Dr. Smith’s lackeys had opened the top of the metal cage, sophisticated looking cattle prods at the ready as Dr. Smith reached his leather gloved hands into the cage, a chain looped and ready for the neck of one of the young.  They became agitated.  Snaps of electricity mixing with yelps and snaps of jaws.

“aaaAAAAAAAlllp!  aaaaAAlp!  aaAlp!”  The animal with a chain now around it’s neck began to call.  It’s cry echoing around the room, bouncing from locker to locker.  The two in the cage began to echo their brother’s cry, static fur clinging to the metal bars of their now emptier cage.

“This… this isn’t a good idea.”  David said standing from his bench and moving toward the exit where Eric stood.

“We have no other choice.  We have to study them if we’re ever going to–”

“We have to?  Or you want to?”  David asked, interrupting Dr. Smith who stuffed the frightened and angry pup into a portable crate.

Eric looked at David confused, but no one replied.

“aaaAAAllp!  aAlp!  aAlp!”

“I want to leave.”  David turned to Eric.  “I want to go home, I don’t want to be here anymore.  Please?  Let’s just go… We can’t be here.”

Dr. Smith and his men carried the crying crate from the room, Detective Ford lingered behind.  “David, we need you here.  We–we can’t let you leave.”

David looked at Eric confused.  He looked at Detective Ford, and then toward the crying tile.  “You think something’s gonna happen to me?  You think something’s wrong?  That I’m… infected.”  David didn’t ask.

“I’m sorry David.”  Detective Ford left, following the echoes of the animal being carried down the empty school hallway.

“aAlp! aAlp! aAlp!”

*************************************************************************************************

The school had several large fields around it.  One for baseball, one for football, a course for track, and a soccer field.  Lengths of grass typically obscured by the morning and evening fogs.  Six dark shapes moved on all fours through the early evening’s thick fog, invisible to the men with guns who patrolled the perimeter of the school.

*************************************************************************************************

“Are you okay?”  Eric walked silently through the empty library toward the table where David sat by the window.  A brilliant orange sunset filling the pane.

“No.”  David said quietly.

Eric took a seat across from him, facing the bright hue across the school athletic fields.  “I’m sorry.  I know this hasn’t been easy for you.”

“Look.  It’s okay.  You got a lot going on right now.  Don’t worry about me.”

“David–”

“You should probably go.  I don’t want to infect you or anything.”

Eric leant across the table, staring at David until David’s focus moved from the window pane.  “I’m not worried.”

Blam!  Blam!  Blam!  Blam!

The men’s attentions turned to the field outside their window.  “Gunshots?”  David asked.  When he turned from the window Eric was on his feet, the holster on his hip empty, gun drawn.

“Come on.”

Eric lead the way to the west library entrance.

“Wait.”  David stopped.  “No.  This way.”

*************************************************************************************************

“Dr. Smith.  I’m sorry to interrupt Sir.”

Dr. Smith glared through his surgical mask at the young man standing in the open doorway, contaminating his surgical field.  They’d dedicated the school cafeteria to Dr. Smith’s projects.  Plenty of steel tables and an industrial freezer for whatever was left over.

“Sir.  We think we have a perimeter breech.”

“You think?  Why don’t you go find out, and don’t bother me until you know for sure.”

The man reluctantly returned through the doorway, leaving Dr. Smith and his staff to the project at hand.

“Doctor.  He’s… he’s not sedated.  The sedatives don’t seem to be working on this one.”  His anesthesiologist said.

Dr. Smith looked down at the creature.  It’s eyes were open, peering panicked around the brightly lit room.  It’s breaths were heavy and strained through the muzzle they’d fit it with.

“Did it’s eyes just change color?”  A scrub nurse asked.

“What?”

“There.  Look.  His eyes.  They were green a second ago.”

The medical team peered down into the creature’s face.  Blue.  Green.  Yellow.  Hazel.  It’s eyes were cycling through colors with each deep breath.

“Fascinating.  We’ll have to remove them.”  Dr. Smith said to himself.

“Sir.”  The anesthesiologist said reluctantly.  “The anesthetic?”

“Scalpel.”  Dr. Smith’s hand called.

*************************************************************************************************

“We shouldn’t be here.”  Eric had enough sense to know that enclosed space and emergencies didn’t go well together.  “We shouldn’t be here.”  He said to the walls of the locker room.

“Shhhh.  Listen.”  David said.  “The gunshots.  They’ve stopped.  That’s good, right?”

“Maybe.  Maybe not.”

“aAlp!  aAlp!  aAlp!”

David moved toward the showers slowly, Eric moved with him, gun drawn as he walked slowly backwards and still facing the door.

Ssssmmp.  Ssssssmp.  Sssmp.  Ssmp!

Heavy breaths pulled through the crack at the bottom of the door.

“aAlp!”

“Get back.”  Eric whispered.  He turned an nodded toward the other door on the far end of the locker room.  It lead to the pool.  “Go.  Now.”

David shook his head.  “No.  Come on.”  David waved his hand over, beckoning Eric to follow him toward the pool door.

BAM!

The front door of the locker room fell from it’s hinges, two creatures stood in the frame, red stains from their claws marking the floor beneath them.

Blam!  Blam!  Blam!  COOSH!

Eric fired three shots before the first creature pounced, pushing Eric into the metal lockers and into silence.  A moment later it pulled itself from the crease they’d created in the stack of metal lockers.  It looked dazed, several of Eric’s bullets disorienting it.

David could make out one of Eric’s legs stiffly protruding from the pile of metal.

“aAlp! aAlp! aAlp!”

The second creature turned to David, who stood just outside the tile shower.  It leapt and so did David.  He landed inside the shower on the far side of the cage.  It landed in the waist high title wall, sending chucks of porcelain and concrete flying across the shower.

David pushed his back against the far wall of the shower, propped his feet against the metal cage and pushed.  As the cage lifted and toppled, he could see the creature with it’s head momentarily stuck in the tile wall clearly.  It’s eyes were a bright red.  For a moment,  David just stared at the creature, and the creature stared back.

The cage spilled it’s contents onto the shower floor, the two pups rolling from the clanging metal.

David ran.  He leaped over the half wall and toward the pool door.  He could hear the scratch of nails against tile behind him.  He flung the door open and pushed it closed behind him as he ran.  A moment later it slammed open again.  They were too close…

He dove.  Water rushed past him.  His head broke the surface, and he began his strokes across the pool.  He dug his arms in and pushed.  With each breath, each time his head broke the surface, he could hear thrashing behind him.  It was an unpracticed trashing.  They weren’t built for water.

At the other end of the pool David pulled himself into a soggy run.  There was a door, and behind it a parking lot.  David pushed through the door, the thrashing slowing, getting closer to the edge of the pool.

“Don’t shoot!”  David recognized Detective Ford’s voice.  He ran toward it, the crash of the door behind him flying off it’s hinges pushed his muscles.

Blam!  Blam!  Blam!  Blam!  Blam!  Blam!  Blam!  Blam!

David lunged into the open door of McDowell’s truck, weaving through the remaining officers and their guns.  The gunshots filled his ears, but not his mind.  He slid onto the floor of the truck, his back against the passenger door and left arm resting on the seat.  In front of him through the open driver’s side door flashes sent out by barrels of guns filled the night.  The firing squad at work.  David didn’t see any of it.  His wet chlorinated clothes, Eric entombed in a high school locker room, David collapsed into a singular soggy heap.

            They weren’t in any of them.

            In my jacket pocket? Wasn’t wearing a jacket. In my pants pocket? A quick check revealed nothing. In my purse, where they belonged? After emptying the thing, still no keys. Every usual place, each possible location that might have made sense—they all left me empty-handed.

            Though agitated, there seemed little I could do. I follow a very precise routine where important belongings, such as keys, are concerned. It seems smart to limit the chance of losing things by careless chance. So how could this have possibly happened? Where the heck were my car keys?

            Fortunately, I knew just where my spare set lay safely tucked away in a drawer. The original must be somewhere within these walls. No sense in feverously worrying about them. That’s what backup plans are for; why bother having them otherwise?

            So reluctantly, I set the incident aside for awhile. I would find my keys eventually. Sometime soon, I’d stumble across them and experience a moment of epiphany, in which I would recall the exact moment of placing them in an atypical location, and my reasoning therein.

            This, however, did not happen.

            One afternoon, two days after the initial disappearance, I reached into my purse for my chapstick. First fingering a tiny vial of perfume, followed by a pen and small stack of post-it notes, I recovered the tube, uncapped its end, and applied the balm to my lips. Next, I picked up an empty bottle of Coppertone Sport Sunscreen, SPF 50 (tribute to my strong belief in taking precautions to avoid unnecessary burns), and went in search of the recycle bin.

            It wasn’t until I reached the kitchen that I made an important discovery: the sunscreen bottle was in my right hand, my missing car keys were in my left.

            I have no explanation.

            Nothing drives me crazier than the inexplicable.

“This is a good vintage.” He scooped a handful of soil and let it run through his fingers. It fell in loose clumps, a dark brown shade, and landed back in the rough burlap bag on the floor. “It looks fantastic. That color is so rich, so deep.” He licked the few remaining moist flecks from his fingers. “Delicious.”

I was standing in a dining room that would not have looked out of place alongside the highest temples of haute cuisine in New York City. Geophagia opened last week alongside the San Francisco waterfront, and the proprietor and head chef, George Godson, was showing me around in the morning, as bags of soil and dirt arrived on trucks from around the world.

“As a culinary people, we’ve collectively lost contact with how our food is grown, where it comes from. You walk down the street and tell people that carrots grow underground, and they look at you like you’ve shit in their coffee.” The new restaurant is Godson’s way of reminding people that food comes from the earth. “Our ancestors were raised on food that had dirt on it. Dirt’s good for you. It’s got vitamins, minerals.”

Good, clean dirt, that is. Godson works with suppliers around the world to have specially-irradiated dirt brought specifically to his restaurant. “All the harmful microbes have been scrubbed out of this soil. It’s fine to eat.” The Food and Drug Administration has issued a tentative statement about the concept of dirt-eating, saying, in part, that “soil is not a proper source of nutritional value, and should not be a replacement for actual food in a normal diet. However, soil that has been properly treated would likely not be harmful in small quantities.”

Godson isn’t waiting for bureaucratic approval to start serving paying customers dirt-covered food. “About three-quarters of the menu is standard fare, with soil provided as a side-dish, as a way to enhance the flavor and texture of the meal itself. It’s like wine in that way, in that pairing it is of extreme importance.” The soil from Napa, for example, is good when paired with braised chicken breasts. A blend of soils from China do well alongside veal. “It’s all about pairing.”

The other quarter of dishes are “made with soil as the main ingredient, or central flavor or texture.” The purest of the dishes in this category that Geophagia serves are the ‘mud cookies’, which are simple patties of dirt with just enough water to make them solid enough to eat. “They’re a last-resort food in disaster-hit places like Haiti after the earthquake, where food is impossible to come by, and people are desperate to fill their stomachs with anything at all,” Godson explains. “By offering them here, in the lap of luxury, I want people to think about what the differences in context that take it from a diversionary meal to a staple of a diet.”

I sample a slightly less outré menu item, the braised duck with sea cucumber, with an extremely fine sand from the beach near where the sea cucumber was fished in Alaska on the side. While the dish itself was executed very well, the sand introduced an extra layer of complexity into the proceedings. I tried it both separately and with the meat, and found that, while alone, the sand was simply too gritty to be at all enjoyable, adding it to the dish as I ate, as if it were just another condiment, changed the texture and made it altogether more interesting, the roughness waking up my tongue to better taste the other ingredients.

Opening night was a big hit, Godson reports, with the line of the adventurous eaters backed up throughout the evening. Time will tell if he can turn this momentary curiosity into a sustainable business venture.

Ch. 2 -Growl

Ch. 3 – Pant

Fog cannot be cut.  It cannot be sliced, parted, or moved.  The solid wall of mist and condensation retreated in front of Frank, always one step ahead, still snaking around to close in from behind.

Branches heavy with condensation sagged and bobbed, the forest around him alive with movement and silent to the life of the early morning hour.  Each footfall carefully placed, as Frank landed and listened, step by slow step.

It was a smell, a feeling, that alerted Frank.  Something was off.  The smell of blood and decay, a tinge of saliva and feces.  The fog shifted forward, revealing bones.  Most were gnawed clean, some broken for the marrow.  There were piles, Frank guessed just under a hundred, mostly animals.  Most, but not all.

Frank moved through them, his feet tracing marks clawed into the soil.  Long lines of three tearing the turf and straining the ground with red.

“REET! REET! REET!” The tree to his right called to him, a shriek Frank had never heard before, from any creature.

“Tttk.  Tkkk. Tkkkkkkk.”  A tree to his left clicked at him from around it’s stump.

He heard the breaking of branches to his right; panting that slowly moved down the tree and toward the sliver of prated fog and bone where Frank stood.  It was rhythmic.  Bark was peeled, ripped, from the base of the massive pine to his left, the dull scratching of claws joining in song with the pants and snapping branches.

The next measure of the song simply held a rest.  Quiet.  Frank felt his heartbeat interject into the symphony.  A metronome.  The crescendos, subitos, and  decrescendos of the song he was now writing with these animals in the forest waiting to be called on by the conductor.

Two sets of eyes leered at Frank from both sides, studying the man through matted brows.  They hunched on all fours, ready, waiting.

*************************************************************************************************

He wasn’t even hungry, so if he ate them it would just be out of boredom.  David was usually a fan of doughnuts, especially the kind with sprinkles that Eric called “little kid doughnuts.”  His appetite had been non existent recently.  Mixed with the fact that he didn’t appreciate being locked in a room by himself, left to wait with his thoughts occupying the empty chairs across the unremarkable wooden table where he sat, and there the doughnuts sat untouched and exposed in their cardboard box.

There was something cliché about it all.  David thought he’d seen a movie, maybe a few movies, where the bad guy sat apprehended in an empty room, a box of doughnuts on the table as the authorities contemplated what to do, how to break him.  Put him in a room and lock the door, the doughnuts will keep him busy enough.

But David wasn’t the bad guy.  Which made him resent the frosted pastries.

David diverted his attention to the room around him.  He hadn’t been in this building for years, and he wasn’t sure he’d even gone in this room.  The police department destroyed, they’d rushed to the high school, set up in the library with David tucked away in and old  microform room, a large wooden table centered on the tile floor.  The room had no windows and one door that locked.  David was asked to stay here while they sorted things out.  He hadn’t bothered to check and see if the door was locked.  He wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

The door handle heard his thoughts and began to turn, dipping toward the floor.  A tall, dark haired woman in a suit lead the way into the room, followed by Eric and a  bald man with a holster.

“David, I’m detective Ford.”  The woman extended her hand to David, who took it politely, standing slightly.  David had seen her briefly when he arrived at the library.  She had been ordering people around authoritatively.  David blamed her for his seclusion.

“You didn’t eat any doughnuts?”  Eric asked, concern on his brow.

“I’m not really hungry.”  David mumbled, crossing his arms and leaning against the back of his chair.  Detective Ford moved to a seat across from David, the man with the holster sitting next to her while Eric moved to the chair beside David.

“This is Detective Anderson,” the woman gestured to the bald gun-toting man, “we’d like to ask you a few questions about what happened last night.”

Last night?  David hadn’t realized it was daytime already.  He’d given statements, written, verbal, and dictated, to three different officers, not including his slightly emotional recount to Eric.  He relived it in the hours tucked inside the microform room, archiving it in his mind.  He was not in the mood to go through it again, especially to the authority figures who had brushed him aside.  “Can you people not read?”

“David…”  Eric sounded concerned in his admonition.

“I’ve given you guys my statement.  I’ve been patient, considering that I just witnessed a monster clawing itself from a man’s scalp, and in return I’m schluffed off to sit alone with some old, forgotten newspapers.  I’m done answering questions right now.”

Detective Ford looked genuinely apologetic, she was either a good faker or a good sympathizer.  “David, I’m sorry.  We’ve had a lot to sort out.  I’ve read your statements and spoke with Lieutenant Mills,” she nodded toward Eric, “there are just specific details that we’re still curious about.”

“Like what?”  David asked in his best cooperative tone.

“How did you escape?  And where did the beast go?”

“I had a bit of a head start.  I didn’t freeze completely anyways… It got my shoe, tore it off my foot and I guess that distracted it long enough for me to get to the bathroom and lock the door.”

“And it didn’t break through the door?”  Detective Anderson asked.

“It sounded like it started in on the lockers.  The noise must have attracted someone.  Probably Jim.  I just heard a lot of gunshots.  I guess that was enough of a distraction.  I just waited.  Until I heard Eric…”

“Then you didn’t see where it went?”  Ford asked.

“No.  I didn’t see much of anything.  At least nothing helpful.”  David sleepily poked at a doughnut, sending sprinkles falling to the bottom of the paper lined box.  He picked it up and began to chew, realizing how hungry he was.  “Why aren’t you asking me about it?  I mean, I saw it.  I saw how it… What it did to Jason…”

“We know.”  Anderson looked at Ford, unsure what to say and how to proceed.

“David, this may be hard to understand, but following these creatures–it’s what we do.”  Detective Ford adjusted her suit jacket needlessly.

“You mean… this, what’s happening to us–our town… it’s happened before?  Other places?”  David asked.

Detective Ford let her silence greet David’s question.  There were certain things she could not disclose, even to and eye witness.

“So, you can stop them?  Whatever they are.  You can right?  I mean if you’ve seen it before…”

“Our success rate is–less then perfect.  We’ve learned a lot about them, but we need to capture one–”

“You mean, you haven’t?  Ever?  And this is ‘what you do’ for a living?”

“David, you have to understand: these creatures are very intelligent.  They’re hard to track, their attacks are difficult to predict.”

“Difficult?  But not impossible?”

“There is a possible demographic associated with the victims, but it’s hard to explain or judge who the targets are or will be.”  Anderson explained.

“Ford, this is McDowell.” The radio clipped to Anderson’s hip cut into the fluorescently lit room.  “I’m coming in… I have something you’re gonna want to see…”

Anderson stood and made his way out of the room, “Copy Frank, we’re set up in the school library–”  the door closed leaving the three remaining.

Eric turned his attention from the door, and back toward David and Detective Ford.  “So it does target people though.  What type of people are we talking about?”

*************************************************************************************************

“SINNERS!  HEATHENS!”  Reverend Michael stood before his congregation, the midday light cutting through the large arched windows behind the stage where he stood.  “We are being judged here my friends.  These demons that have invaded our town are not here to hurt us… They are here for THEM!”  He shouted, finger pointed to the wall outside the walls of his church.

A chorus of applause and shouts of affirmation spattered through the pews.

“The fornicators.  The evolutionists.  The scientists!  The homo-sexuals!  The NON-believers!  ATHIESTS!  MUSLIMS!”

The congregation erupted again.  Their Pastor’s words didn’t apply to any of them.

Mrs. Michael sat in the front row, beaming at her husband through her bursting headache.

“Those of us who have not deviated, have not wavered, we will be rewarded.  We shall inherit the kingdom of the Lord.  The rest shall face the consequences for their actions.  Their CHOICES.  Their DEVIANCE!  The path to salvation has not been an easy one my friends.  But our vigilance, our dedication, our efforts shall be judged as well!”

The congregation exploded.  Mrs. Michael’s head pounded.  Their cheers, their leering, their shouts fed her headache.  It’s appetite would not be quenched.

“Let us pray for the sinners in our community.  Let us pray that they meet the judgment they so deserve.”  Reverend Michael said with an impassioned hush.  “Let us pray that they know of God’s will as they meet the destinies they’ve been working so hard for.  Let these creatures find them as suddenly and mercilessly as the sin they were so quick to invite into their lives.”

The congregation began to clap.  Mrs. Michael shot up from her pew, hands claps against the sides of the head, pushing.  Her fingers white from the pressure exhibited.  Her mouth opened into a scream the rose above all noise, “AAAAAAAHHHHHH–RIT–RIT–RIKK–HHHHHHHHHH!”  Something called through her scream, leaving her voice to gurgle away into quick, panicked breaths.

The light pouring into the building became obscured in five of the massive windows.  Five dark shapes crashed through the glass, glittering splinters flying into the wood pews as five hairy, matted animals clawed their way across the unkempt church floors.

*************************************************************************************************

They made their way through the school hallways, Frank McDowell leading the way back to the parking lot.  Ford and Anderson walked directly behind him, the Lieutenant he’d met the night before, along with the boy walking in the back, listening carefully.  The boy intrigued Frank.  David was the only person Frank knew of that these creatures had let live.  Until today.

“You’re serious?”  Ford asked, they were all practically sprinting.

Frank gave her a look as they walked, of course he was serious.

“No den, nothing.  They were just in the middle of some clearing.  Guess there’s no other predators to worry about…”

“They?”  David asked walking closer to Eric’s side.  “You found more then one.”

“There were two.  I had to kill the one.  But the other,” Frank opened the front door to the school, leading to where his pickup was parked, “I guess I managed to get the right amount of tranq in it.”

The cage in the back of Frank’s truck shook slightly, rocking the entire vehicle with it.  It was starting to wake up.

“This is amazing Frank!  It’s– it’s wonderful!”  Ford smiled.

“That’s not even the best part,” Frank smiled back, “There were two of ‘em, right?  Well, I think they’ve been mating.  Let’s go say hello to Momma, shall we?”