Revolution (46 page)

             
"I didn't bring them here," Chesser said
pleadingly
and then winced when one of the Enforcers b
umped
him in the head with the butt of his gun.

             
"Shut it."
             

             
"Well, what have we here?" the Lighter in front spouted and smiled halfway.

             
Sherry's hands on my back tensed. She peeked around my shoulder and before I could say anything she told him, "We were trying to see if you have anything to steal.
You're kinda starving us, you know."

             
I felt my eyes bulge. What was she doing?

             
"Oh, it's obvious you're a bunch of thieves. Hungry thieves at that," he said and chuckled. "All skin and bones covering that pretty body of yours."

             
I tightened in anticipation of slamming my fist into his face. Sherry's arm squeezed mine. She was trying to tell me something, but I wasn't getting the message.

             
"Well, I guess we can leave now. Nothing was stolen, so no harm no foul, right?" she ventured and smiled.

             
"Not exactly, pretty one." He grinned evilly. "You broke our door, public property." I was s
o glad that Ellie was with us.
This whole conversation would be
going
different
ly
if
he knew two Keepers and a…whatever Ellie was
,
was right there.

             
"We don’t have any money," Sherry told him.

             
"Let's go," he ordered and ticked his head to the door. "Breaking and entering gets you a night in our nice county jail, run by Enforcers of course."

             
I kept Sherry right behind me the whole time as they herded us out. It was then that I realized what Sherry had been trying to do. They were taking us outside and completely oblivious to the video tape we had planted. Even if…we didn't make it, at least the tape would play tomorrow morning.

             
We followed them outside to a van they had waiting for us. I wasn't going to any enforcement facility and neither was Sherry. I'd die first. They opened the door and I saw Miguel getting ready to start swinging. But then one of the Lighters to the front of the van jerked and turned to his
co-workers.
Marissa slipped back from the front of the van just as the man
jammed the butt of his rifle into the
other
man's face. Blood gushe
d as the man went down. Then the
Marissa-
compelled
gunman went for another one, but he didn't get him before the Lighter took his head in his hands and broke his neck. He fell to the ground along with his comrade.

             
He turned and Miguel was ready. I pushed Sherry back a little and met Miguel just as he tried to stake him. The Lighte
r was ready for Miguel though, b
ut he wasn't ready for me. He backhanded Miguel, but I got my stake deep in his gut. I flinched back from the lightning and knew we needed to get out of there soon.
Ryan quickly put the other Enforcer in the sleeper hold and threw him to the ground indignantly.

             
All right, we really needed to get out of
t
here. The others would have seen the Lightning and known what it meant. Marissa and Jeff came around the van and he barked basically the same thing. I turned to grab Sherry, but she was gone. I did a quick circle to find her and saw her little head bouncing as she walked between the cars. I blurred to her and started to ask what she was doing, but she picked up a can of black spray paint under the graffiti at the side of the club.

             
She smiled softly at me and t
hen walked down the wall to the street
. I followed closely behind and watched as
she gazed up at the town sign, 'Welcome To Effingham, Illinois'
.

             
I felt the others at my back and turned to Miguel. He had a curious look on his face. Sherry turned to me. "Lift me, babe."

             
I didn't ask why, I just did it.
I hoisted her up easily to sit on my right shoulder and watched as she shook the can and sprayed it, her arm moving and swinging with the motion. I couldn't see what she wrote, but when she stopped, I lowered her back to my side and we all looked at it with a reverence I felt pulsing through us all. She
had
written over some of the words.

             
The sign now read, "Welcome To Our Town".

             
"Looks good," Chesser said and crossed his arms. "Sounds like a country song."
             

             
Everyone laughed behind us. I looked down at her and she looked up at me. We both smiled at the same time. "Let's go home," she said. "Let's go wait and see if all this was worth it."
             

             
So I picked her hand up in mine and we all walked back to the van.

             
"You'll need to come home with us. You know that right?" I looked at each of Chesser's men.
"
You're all welcome."

             
"Well," he said and sucked
air
through his teeth. "I'm not sure we could go home again, so I guess we've got no choice but to take you up on your offer."

             
The others agreed vigorously.

             
As soon as we were pulling out of one side of the parking l
ot, another van was pulling in on
the other. I had no doubts it was the Lighters and Enforcers and we had dodged a major bullet. But the ride home was uneventful and as soon as we pulled in, it was apparent our night of anxiety had been
for a good cause. We did it and now, ju
st needed to wait to see if the
tape played or not.

             
"I just don't get it, I guess," one of Chesser's men said.

             
"Get what?" Chesser asked him and looked around at the dilapidated warehouse.

             
"I just don't get this compulsion thing." We parked the van under the tree and made our way to the ladder.

             
"What don't you get?" Marissa asked and went up the ladder ahead of Jeff.
We all lumbered up to the roof before he spoke again.

             
"How can the Lighter
s compel us? And how come this tape thing is going to work?"
             
"One compulsion overrides the other," she explained and punched the elevator button. "They compelled those people. Sherry's tape, in a sense, will override the compulsion and they can think for themselves again. Sherry can't do compulsion, but…." She shook her head. "For some reason, when someone is told the truth about the Lighters, the compulsion wears off."

             
"I see." He rubbed his chin and looked around the elevator. "Then how come I was never under the compulsion to begin with?"

             
The elevator dinged and the doors opened. Marissa shrugged and sighed as she went through. "Don't know, but it's so
good to be home!" she exclaimed.
That was when I saw Lily bolting through the crowd toward us. I pushed the jabber mouth out of the way and
lifted her sweet smelling self into my arms. Sherry was at my side and hugged her, too.

             
"What have you been eating?" I asked and laughed at the fruit pulp stuck on her lip.

             
"Peaches," she spouted.

             
"That's why you smell so sweet," I told her. "Did you and Lana have fun?"

             
"Not reaww
y," she admitted and whispered the rest. "She wouldn't let me
eat
anything but peaches while you were gone."

             
Sherry chuckled and covered her mouth with her fingers. "What did you expect her to do, bug? Feed you everything there was just because we were gone?"

             
"Um, yeah! Isn't dat what babysitters do!" she crossed her little arms and pouted in the cutest way. I hugged her to me before seeing Chesser over Sherry's shoulder. I hoisted Lily to my chest and turned to him. "As you can see it's not much. We sleep on pallets. It's concrete. It sucks," I admitted, but he laughed.

             
"No worries. I just feel bad that we couldn't bring anything with us," he said and looked around.
"
Things just went from bad to worse tonight. They caught us as we were going in. Sorry."

             
We'd all been so quiet,
reflective, on the way home that
we hadn't talked much.
We had no idea what had happened.

             
"No worries, mate," Miguel grinned his wolfish grin and slapped Chesser on the back. "We got lots of chores for you to do to earn your keep."

             
Chesser grinned back good naturedly. "I bet you do."

             
Miguel laughed and came to me and Lily. "Come on, little love." He winked at me. "Daddy and mommy have lots of…talking to do tonight."

             
Sherry laughed into my arm to hide her blush, but I just couldn't do anything but be grateful to that Aussie. "Thanks, man."

             
"You got it." He held out his free hand to Rylee. "You coming, sheila?

             
She looked at us all in turn and then straightened her back. She took Lily from Miguel and hoisted her to her hip. "Come on, little girl. Let me teach you the importance of pepper spray."

             
Miguel just laughed, turned and gave me a very suggestive thumbs up, and then trotted after the girls. I switched my gaze to Chesser, who seemed pretty amused by things. I pointed at the crate near us. "Sleeping bags are there. Bathroom, and I use that term loosely, is back there." I smiled. "Goodnight."

             
I took S
herr
y straight to Danny. I knew he'd
have some horrible timing later when he realized we were home and I didn't want any interruptions. He, Calvin, Frank and Celeste were playing some gambling game against the wall with dice.
             
"Hey, we're home," I wasted no time. He wrapped Sherry in a hug before doing me the same. "Ok, goodnight."

             
"Whoa, wait," he argued. "What happened? No details?"

             
"No details tonight. We're…tired."

             
"Ah," he said, but then grimaced. "Ew, gross!"