Arkadium Rising (17 page)

"It's not right," Eldon said.

"There's nothing we can do to stop it," RJ said. "It's too big." The smoke was thickening, the flames now visible a quarter mile distant.

"It's from the plane crash, isn't it?" Kylie's voice verged on hysterics. When RJ looked into her eyes, she pressed. "Isn't it?"

"If those fuel tanks were full, that'd be like laying down napalm," Austin replied.

"My dad is out there." She pointed toward the billowing smoke. It gave off a sound that could be animus or rage. Monsters rampaging through the night.

"Stupid man." Monique swayed on her feet. She'd found another bottle of Merlot and held it by its neck, half-empty. When she took a swig from the bottle she lost her balance and fell against Jason. He took her by the shoulders and held her up until the ground steadied beneath her. "Who goes running into a fire? Just a stupid man, that's who."

"Oh, Mitch," Linda Dwyer cried. "My sweet, sweet love."

Kylie stepped away from the group, ready to charge into the woods. RJ grabbed her arm. "You can't go in there, Kylie."

"He's out there, alone. I've got to do something."

"We wouldn't even know where to begin a search. Running into the middle of a forest fire in the middle of the night won't do anyone any good," RJ said.

"He's right, Kylie," Marcus added. Again, Jason saw through his brother's demeanor, could read his intentions. Marcus was an animal guided by his baser instincts, and he would never change.

"Let her go," Delaney said. "Her daddy needs her."

"Deli, show a little compassion for the girl."

"I will when you show a little less." Delaney shifted the strap of her automatic and then pushed past Marcus, heading back to the house. "I need to piss."

Monique laughed heartily and took another swig. A shot rang out and the wine bottle shattered in her grip. Everyone flinched and reached for their weapons. Monique cried out in shock and dropped the fragmented glass neck. She immediately covered her face with her hands, checking for damage.

"What the hell was that?" Austin shouted.

"Get down!" Marcus called out and everyone scattered, getting low to the ground.

Monique fell to her hands and knees. Jason hurried to her side and placed a hand on her lower back. "Are you all right? Are you hurt?" He leaned over to get a better look at her face, but he couldn't tell. Mandy joined him, ready with her med kit.

"Let me have a look, dear," Mandy said.

Finally, Monique sat up and removed her trembling hands and looked at them. "No blood."

"That's great, Monique, just great," Mandy said, but still performed a cursory inspection to make sure. There was a small laceration on her cheek that looked little worse than a paper cut.

"I… I'm okay," Monique said. "Did somebody really shoot at me? Really?"

Someone fired another shot and it buried itself in the ground near Eldon's feet.

"What the fuck?" Delaney was at the doorway. She'd unslung her AR-15 and was sighting the gate at the driveway entrance. "You better move your asses!"

"Everyone, back to the house!" Marcus said.

Most of the group responded by sprinting back toward the house where Delaney sighted her weapon at the property's edge. Hector and Austin didn't need to be told to hang back and cover the retreat. The three men took cover behind bushes and trees, chancing quick glances at the forest and wall at the front of the estate.

"Is it them? The townsfolk?" Austin called out as he stared down the sight of his weapon.

"Someone must've spotted us at the wall," Marcus said.

Hector was low-crawling to the edge of the woods, getting a better angle from which to respond.

Another couple of gunshots rang out, missing everyone. Before he reached the house, Jason looked in the direction of the gunfire and saw a flash followed by a bullet tearing at the turf ten feet away.

"Marcus, the wall!"

"I see it, brother." Marcus fired a burst of gunfire along a wide stretch of the top of the wall.

"Hurry up! Keep low." Jason kept his head down and herded everyone toward Delaney, who was waving everyone inside. "That's it, keep low!" Everyone was in a panic, but at least they were moving in the right direction.

Hector fired off a short burst from his weapon and someone on top of the wall cried out in pain and tumbled to the ground. A number of people fired from the front gate, another couple from the top of the wall.

Everyone filed by the dead man on the front steps without giving him a second glance. As they funneled inside, the wide front windows shattered in a hail of gunfire. Jason hesitated at the doorway and looked out toward his brother. He removed the gun from his waistband and leveled it at him. It would be so easy to end it here, to cut the head from the snake. Would the other members of the Arkadium turn on him if he struck down their leader?

"Marcus!" he called out. His mind flashed to the seeping red dimple in the temple of the man he'd killed. He hesitated, his hand shaking.

His brother had taken cover behind a tree in a garden next to the driveway. He looked back when he heard Jason. He didn't look at all surprised to see a gun pointed at him and responded with a smirk.

Jason saw movement at the foot of the wall as someone jumped down to the cover of some waist-high bushes. The man, who wore a dirty trucker hat and a red sleeveless shirt, was squaring his gun on Marcus. Without thinking, Jason turned his weapon away from Marcus and fired at the man. The bullet went wide and struck the wall, showering the guy in brick shards, but it was all it took to distract him. The recoil jarred Jason's wrist. He supported the gun with both hands and steadied it for another round.

Marcus had flinched when Jason fired, but then his smirk widened to a smile as he peppered trucker hat guy with bullets. His red shirt hid the blood as he fell over into the bushes.

"Thanks, brother!" Marcus said.

Jason seethed with anger and boiling adrenaline. For any number of reasons Jason wanted to kill his brother, but just now, seeing his gratitude and relief might have become his biggest reason.

"Fuck you, Marcus." Jason turned away to head inside.

"Get everyone through the house and out the back door. Use the forest for cover. We'll keep them occupied and catch up when we can!"

Jason threw his hands up in exasperation and hurried into the house through the empty living room. He couldn't break free from his brother, and didn't have the stomach to kill him, either. Something was going to have to give. He caught up to everyone in the kitchen. "Out the back, everyone. We're making a run for it!"

"We have weapons, a whole gun room in the basement." Dawn held up her 12-gauge. "We can hold them off!"

"Hold them off long enough for the fire to overwhelm the house?" Jason said.

"Please protect us, Lord!" Linda prayed. "For we are only here to serve and worship You!"

More windows shattered in the front of the house, and Linda screamed. The bursts of automatic fire became steadier, more organized, overwhelming the single shots fired by the locals.

"I need to… sit down," Monique stumbled a few strides to her side, and then sat heavily on the couch. "Don't feel… so good."

"We don't have time for this!" Delaney said in frustration, inching closer to the door. She looked ready to bolt out the door to help Marcus. "Where are they?"

"Stay put, Delaney," Jason warned. "Marcus's orders."

Delaney removed the magazine from her weapon and reloaded a fresh one, slamming it home in frustration.

Mandy kneeled in front of Monique to give her a quick inspection.

Eldon went out to the front door and looked cautiously out. "The fire is almost to the edge of the woods. It won't take much for it to reach the house, not with how the wind is blowing."

"She's been shot." Mandy split the fabric of Monique's pants to expose a bloody wound just above her right knee. "Must've happened in the chaos getting inside. She's in shock."

"Jesus." Jason paced, not sure what to do. "Can you stop the bleeding?"

"It looks like a small caliber bullet. Maybe a .22?" Mandy dug into her kit and removed a packet of gauze. She tore it open and pressed it into the wound. Monique cried out and her head swayed even more. "I can stop the bleeding, but the slug needs to be removed soon or she'll die of infection."

"So she's mobile?"

"I wouldn't go that far."

RJ watched nervously as Mandy tended to his stepmom. "We're not leaving her behind."

"I guess that settles it," Dawn said. "We're staying."

"No, we're leaving.
All
of us. Mandy, let me know when you've got a handle on that bleeding."

"She can't walk," Dawn said. "She's in no condition—"

"God punishes all fornicators and drunkards!" Linda cut in.

Kylie gasped. "Mother, that's enough!"

Everyone stared at Kylie. The silence and stillness was temporary as a wave of bullets tore into the front of the house.

"She won't have to walk." Jason stowed his .38 in the waistband of his jeans. "I'll carry her."

Within a few minutes Mandy had patched up Monique to the best of her ability in the limited amount of time. Jason now stood impatiently on the patio next to the pool. They were waiting on Kylie and RJ to finish up packing a few supplies inside the pool house. Eldon, Mandy, and Linda alternated looking between Jason for guidance and the door to the house, as if wondering how soon armed locals might storm through. Monique lay sprawled on a lawn chair, her eyes closed. She looked both beautiful and at peace. If it weren't for the blood soaking her pant leg and her ghostly pallor, she could have been waiting to see the sunrise. Dawn fretted next to her, crying silently, as she held her stepmom's hand.

Delaney stood near the sliding door, waiting for any sign of Marcus. She sighed and went over to Jason. She looked at the pool house and said, "Don't tell me they stopped inside to fuck."

"Wow, you're unbelievable," Jason said. "Not everything is about sex."

"Aw, you're so sweet! Yeah, just keep believing that." She walked back toward the sliding door, swaying her hips for his benefit. She glanced over her shoulder and caught him looking. She laughed heartily and stroked her AR-15 as if it were a sleeping cat in her arms.

The air was heavy with smoke and the sounds of sporadic gunfire. The first hint of inky dawn revealed itself above the trees to the east. Jason felt paralyzed. He promised himself he would stay with them until they were safely away from both the fire and the revenge-seeking locals. Just that far and not another step. Once he fulfilled that obligation, he didn't care where he went as long as he was nowhere near Marcus.

Finally, Kylie and RJ hurried out from the pool house, both loaded down with backpacks. RJ held up a one liter bottle of water. "This pretty much seals the deal on this place."

"What do you mean?" Dawn looked at the house as if she missed it already.

"The water cut off when I was refilling this bottle."

Jason hadn't really thought about the water supply. Sure, the electric grid was shot, but he couldn't imagine not being able to just turn on a faucet and fill a glass. "Isn't the water gravity-fed?"

"There are pumping stations all through the system, all computer-based. We had water for a day or so, but that was probably just whatever was left in the system when the EMP hit."

"The good news keeps on coming!" To Mandy, Jason said, "Is she ready?"

Mandy nodded, though she didn't seem convinced. Jason went over to Monique and then looked back at RJ. "Give me a hand?"

"Sure thing."

Jason took a deep breath and squared his feet, readying himself for the added burden. RJ swept Monique into his arms and her head lolled with the movement. He lifted her until he could drape her over Jason's shoulder in a fireman's carry.

"Got her?" RJ asked.

"Yeah." After grabbing her left arm and leg firmly under his arms, he bent his knees and tested her weight. "I think so." She felt like she didn't weigh much more than a hundred pounds, but he knew that it would feel much more than that before long.

"I'll take your pack," RJ said. "When you get tired, we'll switch up."

"You got a deal." Jason took a few strides. "Let's go, everyone!"

The group moved out across the patio and across the lawn, leaving the Thompsons' estate behind.

Delaney pulled up next to Jason. "You're sure about this?"

"Not really," Jason said, already panting from the effort. "But we have no other options."

"Jason, my dear, there are always other options. Always. The sooner you learn that lesson, the better."

The group naturally formed with Jason in the lead. He moved steadily, trying to move as fast as possible without stepping in a hole or tripping on anything. When they had neared a trailhead in the woods at the rear of the property, Jason realized he hadn't heard the automatic gunfire for some time. He didn't know what that meant, and didn't really care. If the people of Concord cut down Marcus and his toadies, then so be it. The world would be a better place just as soon as Marcus Grant left it behind.

"Unless you want to walk us straight into the fire, we shouldn't go that way," RJ said.

Jason stopped and considered the trail. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah. The three of us grew up in these woods. That trail loops all the way around to the front yard, just south of our gate near the road."

"RJ!"

"I'm sorry, Kylie, but I'm not going to let us walk into the fire."

"But my dad…"

"We'll just have to double back at some point and track him down. But for right now, our primary goal is to get away from those people who want us dead."

"Why would they want us dead? They are our people. Our
neighbors
."

"And one of them is dead on my doorstep. Do you think seeing him lying there with his throat cut would make them greet us with open arms?"

"He's right, Kylie," Dawn added. "Once we get clear of here, I'll go with you myself and we'll find your dad right away."

Kylie looked hesitant but nodded grimly. "Promise?"

"We're here for you," RJ said and his sister agreed.