by Matt James
“Art?” Mom asks. “Where’s Tanya?”
It’s the first I’ve heard anyone mention his wife. I forgot to ask, but Mom didn’t.
“She…” Art’s eyes water, answering the question. “She’s out back.” He sets his rifle down. “She panicked and ran for the back door. They overwhelmed her and everyone else inside.”
“You’re the only survivor here?” I ask, inspecting the shattered glass belonging to the rifle and shotgun display behind the counter.
“I am.”
“How?” Dad asks. “How’d you do it.”
Without looking, Art reaches behind him and pats his custom-made weapon. “I made it upstairs before Satan’s kin could and put a bullet in anything that tried to follow me.”
“Hence the bodies at the door.”
He nods.
“Why didn’t you leave?” Jill asks, lifting Hope off the ground and setting her on a clear section of countertop. The rest is covered in glass and other debris.
“I… I couldn’t.” His head dips. “Everything I have is gone.”
He means Tanya, not the business.
I face the man and get down to business. “We need a few things, Art.”
He nods. “Figured as much. Take what you want. I don’t care anymore.”
I elect to give the man some space and have a look around. Unfortunately, there isn’t much left except a handful of bows and their more exciting relatives, crossbows.
“Don’t suppose you have anything heavy hitting in back?”
He shakes his head and sighs.
“Once the front doors were compromised, I barricaded myself in my upstairs office with all the ammo and supplies I could carry. Eventually, it settled down enough out here for me to do a little recon. Luckily, everything that was stolen had trigger locks on them. It’ll take those bastards some time to get them going.”
“Looks like they took everything.”
He looks at me and smiles. “Not everything.”
I watch as Art circles around the counter and plucks one of the crossbows from the wall. “Most people don’t know how to use one of these. Lucky for us that they don’t.” He looks at my mom. “I’ve got plenty of arrows and quivers left.” Mom eagerly heads in that direction, to the left of the counter.
“I don’t know, Art…”
He waves away my words and hands me the crossbow. “Treat it like a rifle, Frank.” I take it. “This is a state-of-the-art Barnett Predator crossbow. It features a precision sniper’s scope and can fire a bolt up to 430 feet-per-second.”
“That it?” I ask, mockingly.
Art rips the crossbow from my grasp. “Listen, smart ass, this thing is as deadly as any hunting rifle—ten-times quieter too. Learn to use it,” he hands it back, “and you’ll wonder why you never had one in the first place.” He continues while I take a closer look at the all-black weapon. “The only downfall is that they can take a little time to reload—so you’ll want to practice yanking that string back quickly, but precisely.”
“Uh, thanks,” I say, soaking up all the information he just bombarded me with.
I think I’ll stick to my pistol until I’m comfortable.
My eyes open wide.
“Have any 9mm rounds laying around—just in case I’m a slow learner?”
Art rolls his eyes and huffs aloud. He doesn’t say no, however. Jill clears her throat and holds up her right hand. It’s empty, except for the finger gun she’s signaling me with.
“And a spare piece for her?” She’s been unarmed since Baldy crushed her gun to a pulp with his bare hands.
Moving behind the counter to the back-left corner of the floor, Art huffs again, dramatically throwing open the door to the back room. He mumbles something about maybe having an extra of both somewhere. I think there his own personal armaments too. Art doesn’t sell handguns or their type of ammo in any of his stores. The only reason I asked was because he literally lives right down the street from here.
Looks like I was correct to ask.
Curious about my new toy, I press the stock firmly into my shoulder and aim down the, uh, barrel. Does it even have a barrel? I have no idea what the parts and mechanisms of this thing are called.
“Here.”
I turn and find Mom standing behind me with a black quiver. It’s packed with carbon arrows—twelve in all. I know they’re made of 100-percent carbon because they say so, right on the shaft. I draw one and inspect it, whistling at its sleek, four-bladed tip. The only word I can think of when describing it is “nasty.”
I smile wide.
“A boy and his toy,” Jill says, reading my mind. And that’s precisely what I am.
“Tell me about it,” Mom says, tilting her head at Dad. “After he bought that thing, I did everything I could to keep him from cleaning it on the dining room table.
Both the women laugh, and my father and I are smart enough to let them have their fun, even if it’s at our expense. Heaven knows we’ve had our moments in the past, and I’m sure we’ll have more of them in the near future.
Mom draws an arrow and nocks it.
“Get yourself something new?” I ask, impressed with how she handles the classic bow.
“Just an upgrade in arrows,” she replies, releasing the tension on the string. Face flushed, she replaces the arrow in the quiver on her hip. It’s buckled to her belt and makes her look like she’s outfitted with a short sword instead.
Unlike hers, I have a classic back quiver. It has a padded, crossbody strap that fits snuggly across my left shoulder. Apparently, I don’t get a sheath like Mom does.
“I have trouble reaching them if they’re on my back,” she says, answering my question without me even asking it. “You should be fine, hun.”
“Put your foot firmly in the stirrup at the end of the crossbow!” Art shouts from the other room.
“What?” I yell back.
“I’m teaching you how to use the damn thing!”
Oh.
I do as he says and point the crossbow at the floor, straight down. Impressively, the toe of my shoe fits inside the opening beneath where the arrowhead sits perfectly.
Cool!
“With a finger on either side of the flight track, firmly pull back on the string while keeping the pressure even until you hear a double click inside the trigger box!”
I do as I’m instructed and smile wide when I hear the sound I’m looking for.
“That’s it?” I ask.
“Yup!” He replies. “Usually you’d want to use a rope cocking device or a hand crank, but I doubt you’ll have time for that shit wherever the hell it is that you’re going!”
Art reappears a couple of minutes later with a black case in hand. He slams it on the counter next to Hope, earning a shriek from her in response. He looks at me, then Jill, and then my parents.
“Oh, sorry.”
Hope hops down and moves to the window behind the counter, giving the older man a venomous stare as she passes by.
Art doesn’t notice the glare and places his thumb on a small screen and then punches in what I know to be a combination. Art seems to have found himself a gun safe. The tiny screen is a fingerprint scanner. The safe clicks and he opens it, revealing the weapon inside.
“Here you go, my lady.”
Jill lifts the pistol out of the case, and I dread the choice.
“Smith & Wesson Governor,” he announces.
“A revolver?” I ask, staring at the compact variant. “You’re giving my wife a six-shooter?”
“What’s wrong with it?” he asks. “Besides, it’s all I have besides my rifle.” He holds up a holster. “Have this too…”
“Why a revolver?” Dad asks, eyeing the pistol.
Art shrugs. “I use it for security when I’m in the store.” He continues like that was the perfect explanation. He hands Jill a box of bullets. “Here’s the ammo.”
“And me?” I ask.
“Sorry, Frank,” he says, shaking his he
ad. “Nothing that’ll work.”
I frown, not happy with only having a half dozen rounds left.
Looking over my crossbow again, I sigh. I better get really good at shooting this thing—and quick!
“Um, what’s that?”
I turn around and find Hope still behind the counter. She’s kneeling on top of a second counter that runs the length of the wall with her face pressed up against the glass. She’s looking south, toward the front parking lot. I can’t see what she sees from where I’m standing, so I speed walk over to her.
“Ho-ly shit…” I mutter, witnessing what she sees. Hope gives me a surprised look when she hears me say “shit.”
A car goes sailing into the air, and I track its trajectory and get sick to my stomach. Thankfully, it doesn’t land on our ride, but it came pretty damn close to doing so. The only thing we’ve come across that can manhandle a 4,000-pound object like that is…
“Babe.” I look at Jill. “He’s back.”
She runs to our side, and her face instantly pales. I see why half a second later when I face forward again. There must be two dozen Unseen following closely behind the giant pig.
There’s a bang somewhere beneath us.
“The back door!” Art shouts, rushing back around to the escalators.
Babe tracked us.
The other Unseen are just here to see if there’ll be any leftovers.
25
I successfully nock my first arrow just as the first wave of Unseen enter the building. Art expertly takes aim with his rifle and blasts a hole in the first one’s chest. It’s sent sprawling backward where it tumbles over its slain brethren. He quickly does the same to another.
No one beside him has a long-range weapon, so we’ll have to wait for them to get closer. We agree to stay upstairs for the time being and bottleneck them on the escalators. Everyone except Hope is standing at attention with their weapons in hand. Doing whatever she can to help, Hope is now standing at the window calling out the movements of the Unseen below us.
She’s even reciting the names I’ve given them.
“Two sirens, eleven goblins, uh, six reapers, Babe, and one big guy.”
“A brute?” I ask. Hope stops and looks at me like I just farted. I explain further. “Sort of like Baldy.”
“Ohhh,” she replies, nodding hard, squeaking her face against the glass as she does. “Yes, like him.”
Well, we’re screwed.
The creatures enter the lower level, but there’s more of them than Art can take out. In a moment, they’ll flood in and see us. The sirens are the ones we’ll have to watch, as well as the brute.
“Art, concentrate your fire on the two women and the big guy.”
“What about the pig?”
I shrug. “Yeah, him too.”
I shoulder my crossbow, eagerly awaiting the release of my first carbon fiber arrow. I have no idea what kind of kick it’ll have, if any at all. I doubt it’s anything I can’t handle, though. While peering through my crossbow’s scope, I go to readjust my stance and catch something in my periphery off to the left.
I grin. It’s a wild idea, but it’ll help with our makeshift bottleneck.
“I’ll be back!” I shout, rushing away.
“Where could you possibly be going?” Art asks, yelling after me.
I don’t explain. I just keep moving and quickly get to my destination. This section of the upstairs houses the water-based sports department. Fishing and snorkeling and whatnot. More importantly, there’s a column of kayaks at the rear of it.
I sling my crossbow over my shoulder and yank one of the ten-foot-tall kayaks free. It’s lighter than I thought it’d be, which is excellent because I’m flying solo right now. Grunting, I drag it out into the main walkway, but the weight suddenly lessens when my father joins me.
“Good…idea,” he says, wincing. This isn’t helping his ankle.
Not that my thigh is doing any better.
“Whatever you guys are doing,” Jill shouts, “hurry up!”
Limping backward while holding a kayak almost twice my height isn’t comfortable and having my back to the action is worse. Art’s rifle barks occasionally, and even Jill’s Governor comes to life. I can’t see her firing the short-barreled six-shooter, but I bet she looks pretty cool doing so.
Dad and I get back to the escalators just in time. A column of goblins are scrambling up the immobile escalator steps, sacrificing themselves in the process. It's an incredible sight to behold. I can just barely make out one the sirens at the back of the group, staying low and out of Art and Jill’s line of sight. I’ve seen this behavior before too. I once witnessed a siren shouting out orders to a pack of goblins back in New York.
Just like the spotted hyena, I think. I scrunch my eyebrows. How do I know that? I chalk it up to the many hours of watching Animal Planet.
Mom looses an arrow from her bow, taking down one of the Unseen. Jill puts a hole in the next. Art has moved off and turned his attention on Babe and the brute below us. Unfortunately, when the two goblins go down, two more arrive to take their places.
“Now!” I shout.
Together, Dad and I hurl the kayak down the left-hand escalator. The goblins there have nowhere to go and are bowled into and knocked back. With that group immobilized for the moment, everyone with a weapon takes aim at the right-hand escalator and opens fire.
Including me.
Here we go.
I shoulder my crossbow, take aim, and fire. The weapon bucks slightly, but not as much as I thought it would. At 430 feet-per-second, the arrow sails through the air and cuts down the siren, just as one of Mom’s arrows does the same. The siren looks stunned that she was taken down so swiftly. It was only a second ago that she was safely crouched behind her lambs. With her goblins gone, the siren was left out in the open.
“Nice shot, Frank!” Mom calls out, drawing another arrow.
Shit, I think, recalling Art’s instructions. Gripping the Predator crossbow by its stock, I place my foot in the stirrup, grab the string with both hands and pull, trying my hardest to keep the pressure even. Three seconds later, I get a double click, reach over my right shoulder and quickly place an arrow on the flight track. Loaded, I raise the weapon.
But I don’t pull the trigger.
“Fraaank!” Hope shouts from across the room.
I look up and find her running for her life into the camping supplies section of the second floor. A goblin has somehow found a way up to us without using the escalators. I subconsciously knew that they’d figure out another way up here. I just wish it hadn’t happened so fast.
I don’t wait, I bolt for the west side of the store. My leg is killing me, but I pay it no attention. Something could be killing Hope. I will myself to move faster after she calls out my name in fear again.
“Frank, help!”
Entering the department near a grid of accessories shelves, I snag a generic hunting knife from a pegboard hook and tear into the semi-hard, clear, plastic wrapping with my teeth. I don’t know what the hell it’s called, and neither does anyone else…probably. But it’s the bullshit everything comes in that’s sealed all the way around the product.
I bite harder and feel the material give—my teeth almost with it. I pull it apart with my hands, just as I find Hope backing into a cutout in the west wall. To her left is a mounted fire extinguisher and to her right is an elevator I didn’t know existed. Then again, for this level to be handicap accessible, it would need one.
I eye the elevator. Let’s hope they don’t figure out how to use it.
The goblin is hunched, stalking toward what he thinks is an easy meal. I don’t plan on making it easy on him, though.
I quickly take aim with my crossbow but stop, not at all confident in my aim. I don’t want to miss and hit Hope instead. Quietly, I kneel and carefully place the loaded crossbow on the ground. Then, I sprint forward and jump on top of the creature and bury the blade into the small of his back. We roll to ou
r right, hacking and slashing at one another, and I do everything I can to hold onto the hilt of the knife while wrapping my left arm around his neck from behind.
We halt our chaotic roll with me atop him. I pull my arm free and, instead of choking him, I dig my forearm into the back of his head, pressing him face first into the floor. Still gripping the slick knife hilt, I yank it free and drive it home again and again. After the third strike, his aggressive flails slow, and after the fourth such impalement, his body goes limp.
I get to my knees and toss the knife aside. Next are my hands, of which, I wipe clean on a random shirt hanging from a clearance rack. I take a moment to catch my breath and find Hope.
“Frank!”
She throws herself into my arms. Her sobs are drowned out by Babe bursting through the front of the building. Until now, he had stayed put in the parking lot. Doing his part, Art puts two rounds into the pig’s flank, enraging him even more.
“Come on,” I say, hefting Hope onto my hip.
I leave the knife and draw my pistol. I carefully hand my crossbow to Hope for the time being—at least until I can find a safe place to hide her. Jill meets us halfway and takes Hope from me.
“Lock yourselves in Art’s office,” I say, getting a nervous look from Jill in return.
“Go,” Mom says, overhearing me. “We’ll be fine.”
She nocks an arrow and lets it fly. I don’t watch what it hits—if anything. Instead, I return my attention to the ladies in front of me.
“You sure?” Jill asks.
I heft the Predator onto my shoulder and wink.
Jill smiles and heads off. As long as nothing follows them over there, Jill and Hope should be fine. It’s not like Jill can’t handle herself. Plus, you don’t want to piss off mama bear!
“Uh,” Dad says, “a little help?”
He’s standing in the middle of the escalators’ exits, rotating between them both with his shotgun. Boom, switch. Boom, switch. Boom, switch. But it's not the enemies below that has his attention, even though he’s staring down the barrel of his 12-gauge.
