by Gareth Otton
Trevors nodded, then he blinked out of existence, leaving Stella a space to fill beside his men who were still firing out of the hole in the wall.
Stella dropped to a knee, part to make herself a smaller target and part because her body ached from the punishment it had been put through. She ignored those aches as she pointed her gun at the end of the corridor and watched for movement. Inside her head, she started counting.
Sixty... Fifty-nine... Fifty-eight...
A flicker of movement in the shadows beyond the open doorway at the end of the corridor caught her attention and triggered her truth sense. She knew instantly that it was the shadow of a man leaning forward to look around the door, and she knew where that head would appear. Acting off her eidolon instincts, she lined up her shot and squeezed the trigger as Trevors had shown her in all their training sessions, and the gun coughed in her hand.
Her eidolon strength helped her absorb the recoil of the weapon and her heightened senses helped her aim to be true. Though she had little practice with these weapons, she fired them enough to know that those senses were more than enough to make her deadly to anything larger than a grapefruit at a couple hundred feet. The end of the hallway was closer than that, so the head that was larger than a grapefruit exploded the moment it appeared around the corner as her bullet passed through his skull.
You just killed a man, something inside her screamed. However, her worry for her dog and her instinct to survive forced her to push that thought aside and concentrate.
Forty-three... Forty-two... Forty-one...
She didn’t see any other shadows, but she fired again, a small burst just to deter anyone else from approaching the door. Meanwhile, out of the corner of her eye, she saw Freckles continuing his rampage through the carpark as he attacked another group of three men.
However, rather than ripping these apart as he had with others, someone else appeared behind him, someone large enough to make him look like the large dog he had been ten minutes ago rather than the enormous beast he had become.
Twenty-eight... Twenty-seven... Twenty-six...
Kuruk Campbell had a look of fury on his face as he laid two enormous hands on Freckles’ back and gripped hard enough to pull the dog back from the trio of men he was attacking. Freckles yelped in pain. The door she was supposed to be covering was forgotten and Stella spun to face the car park, her gun trained on the battle between her dog and the giant.
Nineteen... Eighteen... Seventeen...
She knew she was nearly twenty seconds shy of her promise to keep Freckles out there, but even Trevors wouldn’t hold it against her considering the sudden danger Freckles was in. Even though he thrashed and snapped his jaws in the air, trying to get at Kuruk, the giant was always one step behind him. Light flared from beneath his t-shirt in multiple locations and with a roar that Stella could feel as much as hear, Kuruk flexed his giant arms and lifted a flailing Freckles off the floor.
Freckles tried dreamwalking to a new location, but he just took Kuruk with him. However, one thing he had managed was to turn Kuruk a little more so that he was turned toward the hole in the wall. Seeing his expression, Stella didn’t hesitate. She aimed for Kuruk, trusted that she would fire true, and pulled the trigger.
The bullet slammed into the giant’s shoulder, making him grunt and release Freckles with that hand. It was all the room Freckles needed to twist around and clamp on to Kuruk’s forearm, biting hard enough that Stella could hear splintering bone even from inside.
In an incredible display of determination, Kuruk didn’t lose his head as he found himself bleeding from both his shoulder and forearm, he simply released Freckles with his other hand and then backhanded the dog hard enough for Freckles to yelp in pain and fall away.
However, he never went far before turning to face the giant again, growling low and loud as he ignored all the guns trained on him. He was about to go back in for the kill and Stella knew he’d never make it. He had lost his advantage of always being on the move and even though the count in her head was still ten seconds short, she couldn’t hold on any longer.
“Freckles, come here.”
The dog flinched like someone had shot him, his head jerking up and his snarl vanishing in a second as his tail started wagging. With a pop he vanished before anyone could shoot him.
There was another pop, which was all the warning Stella got before the enormous shape of her newly grown dog barrelled into her, forcing her to the ground and licking her face to show his excitement at seeing her alive and well. However, his brief lapse into normal dog behaviour soon faded when he tasted her blood. He couldn’t resist sniffing at her wounds, then he backed off and spun, turning towards the hole and growling at the potential attackers who were taking advantage of his absence.
“Freckles, stay,” Stella ordered, reading her dog’s body language and knowing he wanted to rush back outside and finish what he started. She watched him only long enough to be sure that he listened, then looked back towards the door she was supposed to be guarding.
“Shit,” she swore as two men were in the doorway, both getting a good look inside the hallway. However, before she could raise her gun to correct her mistake, there was a pop from her side followed by the bark of gunfire, and both men dropped into bloody heaps.
“Everyone, dreamwalk back to the garage,” Trevors barked. “We’re getting the hell out of here.”
His men, who were running low on their ammo, shot Trevors a relieved glance before blinking out of existence. The ghosts outside who had been drawing fire looked back with matching relieved expressions before they grew blurry and wraith like, each surrendering to the pull of the next life. Their forms collapsed into small glowing balls of light that zipped off along some invisible path that only Tad could see before they blinked out of existence and moved on to the next life as their jobs were now complete.
Stella took half a second to mourn the loss of those men and women who had died under her charge, and then she too joined the tactical guys and dreamwalked with Freckles one step behind her.
They landed with a splash. Stella looked around to see that the garage had been flooded by the hose that was still running. However, what she didn’t find were people other than those who had been fighting in the hallway. Denise had got them all out.
We got that much right at least, Stella thought, grateful that some of her people could escape this with their lives. When she glanced down to the underwater dreamcatcher that had finally cooled, Stella knew she owed Mitena a great debt for installing that. It was ironic that it was the creation of one Campbell twin that was saving them from the rage of another.
Pushing useless thoughts like that aside, Stella pointed to the three members of the tactical team who weren’t her or Trevors and shouted, “You three, get out of here now. Me, Trevors and Freckles will hold them off.”
She was tempted to force Freckles to go instead of one of those three, but she knew her dog well enough to know he would never leave her.
To the credit of Trevors’ men, they all complained about being the first ones to go, but a glance from Trevors’ and Stella’s stubborn insistence that they were wasting time soon had all three men moving. They knew the drill from here. One of them would think of where they needed to go and then...
Blinding white light flared from the floor at the same time the sound of gunfire erupted from out in the hall. Both Stella and Trevors ducked and moved away from the door as bullet holes appeared in the wood, sending splinters into the room.
Stella reached for Freckles to pull him behind her to safety, but even with all her new strength she couldn’t move the much bigger form of her dog. He even shot her a stare that seemed to say, you’ve got to be kidding me, before Stella finally gave up.
“What did you need that minute for?” she shouted at Trevors over the sound of gunfire.
He grunted and nodded his head towards the corner of the room. Stella followed his gaze and frowned when she noticed a strange substance stuck t
o the wall. She had never seen it in person before, but she had seen enough movies over the years to hazard a guess as to what that strange putty like substance was.
“Explosives?” she asked.
“They’re in as many rooms as I could access in a minute, all of them in structurally important places. When this place falls, it’s going to take a lot of those bastards with it.”
The gunfire continued as they spoke and Trevors was left shouting over the sound of it. His last words, however, sounded unnaturally loud as the gunfire ceased. Stella glanced at the door, her skin tingling and her body shaking as the adrenaline responded to what she imagined might come through that door at any moment. She had been in a lot of fights over the last year, but this was the first one that felt like a battle they could not win.
“Freckles, listen to me,” Trevors shouted, pulling her attention away from the door. “In a minute that door is going to burst open and a whole horde of shit is going to come rushing through. When that happens you only have one job.”
“Trevors,” Stella said, not liking the tone of his voice. Trevors ignored her and kept his attention on the dog, who seemed to understand that whatever Trevors was saying was important and he needed to listen.
“When that happens, even if that dreamcatcher still isn’t cool, your job is to drag her arse onto it and get her out of here. You hear me?”
“Trevors, what are you talking about. We’re sticking to the plan and we’re all getting out of here.”
Trevors finally looked away from the dog and the smile he wore didn’t belong in this situation. It was a gentle smile, the kind that only belongs on the face of a man at peace.
“I am following the plan, just not yours. We were never going to hold this place. This garage is too big. The only way the two of us could hold this room is if we stayed by the door and used it as a choke point to stop them all coming at once... and even then it’s iffy. With us running across the room to that thing, we’d be sitting ducks. The only way this works is if one of us is here holding them off while the other one escapes. We both know the world needs you more than it needs me, so that’s not even a choice right now.”
“Bullshit,” Stella swore, and for the first time in her life she didn’t like how Freckles was crowding her, pressing his body into hers like he was unwilling to let her escape. “We’ve both got dreamcatchers and we can both—”
“It’s too risky,” Trevors interrupted. “Dreamwalking over there even for an instant leaves this door unguarded, and that’s enough time for someone to come in, line up a shot and take us out. On that dreamcatcher is the one place where we can’t hope to dodge bullets because we can’t leave it if we hope to get away.”
“So we go over there now and we shoot at the doorway from here.”
“You can’t shoot out into the hall from over there,” Trevors argued. When Stella opened her mouth to argue again, Trevors smiled even wider and shook his head. “It’s no use, Stella. I’ve made up my mind. I understand now.”
“Understand what?” she asked, her voice shaking as tears filled her eyes.
“Why I survived after Harry and his men were killed. Why it wasn’t me who died outside Lizzie’s barn. Why you were right when you told me I had to push through my guilt over what happened and stay here to help you. It was all for this moment. Now come on, go, they’ve stopped firing long enough and any second now they’re going to finish arguing about who is the first one through this door and they’re going to storm this place.”
“No, Trevors. This is stupid. We can both go. You’re just—”
Stella was interrupted as the door exploded open as a large man with three glowing dreamcatchers burst through it in a shower of splinters.
Trevors was ready and he fired his gun from point blank range into the soldier’s back. All of his bullets failed to penetrate whatever protection one of those dreamcatchers was offering him, but that dreamcatcher couldn’t hold out forever. Light flared ever brighter on the man’s shoulder until it flashed so brightly that Stella had to look away. Then abruptly it was gone as the protective dreamcatcher burned out.
The next bullet from Trevor’s gun tore through the man’s back, the one after that through his neck, and the final one through his head.
Trevors had just enough time to look up and say one word before he turned to the opened doorway and fired on all the soldiers rushing towards him.
“Go!”
“Trevors, no,” Stella screamed, but it was no use. She might not be willing to sacrifice Trevors life, but Freckles knew where his priorities were and before she could stop him he pressed himself hard against her and the world shifted. It was only a short jump to the other side of the room, but she hadn’t been ready for it and she hadn’t triggered it herself, so the nausea hit her hard as always.
Through the dizziness and sickness she was just in time to see Trevors glance her way to make sure that she had got to the dreamcatcher safely. He smiled when he saw her, and that smile didn’t flicker as the first bullet hit his chest, nor as the second pierced his vest and entered his gut.
He was still smiling when he let go of his gun and raised his right hand high to show he was holding a small black device with a single button on it; a trigger. Then, before any more bullets could pierce his body, he pressed that button.
There was a strange moment of frozen time as Stella’s terrified brain absorbed Trevor’s expression, the horrible wounds he had already received, and the inevitability of what happened. She had just enough time to hope that his sacrifice was worth it and that Kuruk was in the building when it came down before she realised something she had overlooked until this point. Trevors had already pressed the trigger, but Stella and Freckles were still in the room.
She glanced down at the floor and saw that in slow motion the dreamcatcher was activating, but it didn’t feel like it was going to be in time.
Freckles shifted beside her, wrapping himself around her body, and then it was too late for anything else.
This explosion made the last explosion that had gone off in her vicinity seem minor in comparison. The wireless remote triggered the explosives that Trevors had placed around the building and they exploded with such force that the shock wave of the explosion destroyed anything they were attached to.
Stone crumbled, steel tore like paper, wood disintegrated and glass shattered as the DTHQ was first blown apart, and then a second later it was consumed in a fireball that could be seen from the other side of the city and heard from miles away.
In a heartbeat the DTHQ was reduced to less than rubble, killing everything inside.
21
Wednesday, 28th December 2016
10:31
Jen was exhausted.
Dr Burman had been added to the Dream Team’s alert system so they would be on standby should the situation be called for. It took a lot of arguing on Jen’s part with both Dr Burman and her father to get them to agree to this, but as usual she managed to out-stubborn them both and was now paying the price for this super power of hers.
Three times since she had healed Lizzie, she had been called into the hospital to help with nightmares or dreamcatcher attacks that had left people moments from death. Each time her presence had been the deciding factor for at least one person and she was making incredible strides in learning to use her power. Therefore, she always felt amazing after healing someone.
However, the amazing feeling was starting to get tempered by not just her lack of rest, but the level of stress that had been introduced to her life. She had only been concentrating on what it would feel like to help people in ways that no one else could, and hadn’t thought about what it would feel like to look at a person and imagine what the consequences of her failure might be. Just a slight mistake or anything short of her best might cost someone their life, and that weight got heavier with every new person she helped.
Now, slumped in a waiting chair in the emergency room, waiting for Dr Burman to finish talking with the nurse
on reception, she felt crushed by that weight. This morning she had been asked to work on Leon who, while not in the worst state of anyone she had ever seen before, had a lot of head trauma after being pounded on by someone really strong. Though she tried not to, she couldn’t help but dwell on what Stella’s reaction might be if she couldn’t help Leon, or what her own reaction might be. If he died because she couldn’t help, then wouldn’t that be the same as her killing him in a way?
She had pushed herself too hard in order to overcompensate for that, not stopping even when Dr Burman told her she had done enough for Leon to naturally heal the rest. She wasn’t satisfied until the Leon that emerged from her healing was the same Leon as the one that woke up that morning.
Dr Burman had been furious with her. He said she had pushed herself too far again despite his repeated warnings for her not to do that. He said that by spending so much effort on Leon, she now had less energy left should she be needed again. She heard him and understood his complaints, but she couldn’t bring herself to regret the decision to help her friend. Her relief didn’t last long as suddenly people started showing up from the DTHQ.
A popping sound brought her out of her thoughts and she looked up, expecting to see one of the Dream Team or maybe, and she was hoping for this option, even her father appearing in the waiting room. However, what she saw instead made her jump and woke her up fully as other people waiting to be seen by doctors screamed in surprise.
It was the pop of someone dreamwalking, but this time rather than just one body there were two, and they were moving fast. An enormous shape that had the same colouring as Hawk but was much bigger was wrapped around another figure that was hard to make out, but looked suspiciously like Stella. The two of them materialised in mid-air and rather than just drop to the floor, they were thrown across the room like a train had hit them, neither stopping until they bounced off the wall on the far end of the room.
