by J. J. Holden
Without another word, she raised the barrel and aimed at Peter’s chest for as long as she dared—half a second—and knew God would guide her aim. Surely He would.
She squeezed the trigger twice.
* * *
Jaz saw sudden movement among the Clanners—Grandma Mandy raised a pistol toward Peter. She cried out as the older woman fired. Just as suddenly, a riot of noise from multiple gunshots and people screaming reached her ears. Jaz scanned the area through her scope and then froze. A cluster of guards were firing at the Clan, but what shocked her was the sight of a cluster of guards firing at the other guards. It must be Joe Ellings and the sympathizers. Clanners ran in all directions.
Damn, Mandy had forced the resistance’s hand when she’d shot at Peter. Cassy was face down on the ground next to Peter. Mandy may have saved Cassy’s life, but the several bodies that remained when the Clan members had scattered showed that the price was steep indeed.
Then she saw that a half-dozen of the Clan, including Michael, Sturm, and Mueller, were also armed, and firing at the loyalist guards from their position behind and to the south of them. Jaz sighted in on the unfinished house; a guard’s head was visible. Bang! Jaz’s shot took him in the face.
She became aware of a bass-heavy barking noise from all around her. It reminded her of the Hellhounds she’d seen in a horror movie and for half a second she almost panicked, until she realized the noise came from the Marines she was with. They were charging toward the farmhouse, barking, moving in a peculiar leapfrog kind of way; one knelt and fired while another advanced, took a knee, began firing, and the first Marine then advanced. It was brutally effective; the White Stag loyalists outside were mowed down from the onslaught of Marines, Clanners, and Joe and his sympathizers.
Jaz swept her rifle around seeking a target, checking windows for snipers on the earthbag buildings. She moved back to Cassy and Peter, but Cassy was nowhere to be seen, nor was Peter.
* * *
Peter Ixin cursed. His bulletproof vest had stopped the old lady’s bullets, but he’d been out of commission for a bit. When he came to his senses, there were gunshots all around, and everyone was scattering. Some of his guards were firing at other guards, but he had no idea why or who were the loyal ones. There was a chaotic barking sound all around that freaked him out.
He pulled his .45-caliber M1911 and searched for a target, but the Clanners were darting around like rabbits fleeing from a fox. His gaze then settled on Cassy; she lay motionless, face down in the dirt, hands still tied behind her back, but she was alive and breathing.
Cassy had led the invaders to the White Stag farms, killed his people, evaded him, embarrassed him, and refused to say where she’d hidden the food stockpile. The bitch’s mom had shot him, and he was pretty sure he had cracked ribs from that, despite the vest. Enough was enough. Peter staggered to the still-twitching body of the would-be executioner and picked up his axe. He walked over to Cassy as he holstered his pistol and kicked her savagely in the side. She cried out and curled into a ball. So the bitch still lived. Peter smiled and then bent down to grab a handful of her hair. He forced her to her feet, and she hardly resisted. She must have been too worn down from the treatment she’d received during her captivity. Good. He resisted the urge to slit her damn throat with the axe. She might deserve that, but it wouldn’t serve his purposes.
Peter looked around again. A handful of Clanners stood with a few of Peter’s own people and a cluster of soldiers, firing at the unfinished farmhouse. They were prone or in cover, and Peter had only ten rounds in his pistol, so he didn’t bother firing at them. Inside the building, loyal White Stag people popped up into the windows, returned fire, and then ducked down again. Peter wished he could help them, but they’d dug their own grave by getting holed up in a building with one exit. Stupid. There was no room for stupidity in this dark new world. At least they’d distract the attackers long enough for him to escape, so it wasn’t a total loss. Maybe the defenders would even win, but he doubted it.
By the main farmhouse, however, he spotted Jim, who waved at him frantically and held the door open. An ally was just what he needed right now. Peter pressed the axehead to Cassy’s throat with one hand, still gripping her hair with the other, and forced her toward the farmhouse. “Let’s go, bitch. Jimbo and I are gonna hightail it out of here, and you’re our exit visa. Your people might get the farm back, but they’ll be celebrating without you.”
* * *
Cassy struggled against Peter’s iron grip, but not too hard—the sharp axe blade against her throat prevented more than a token resistance. It was maddening—and terrifying. Peter certainly wouldn’t hesitate to cut her throat if it suited his purposes.
She considered drawing the knife a sympathizer had slipped to her, but she didn’t dare to draw a hand away from Peter’s. Not with that axe against her throat. In the back of her head, she was convinced that if she moved one hand away, the sudden slack would make Peter cut her throat. For now, the game was to play along and look for an opportunity to strike.
Adding Jim to the picture was a complication she didn’t need but could do nothing about.
Peter rushed through the doorway, and Jim slammed it shut behind them, then Peter roughly shoved Cassy into a wall. Peter and Jim were now between her and both the front and back doors. The overwhelming sounds of a massive firefight continued unabated.
“Anyone else in here with us?”
“No, boss. Two Clan kids ran out the door before I could nail ’em. How long you think we need to hold out?”
Cassy was struck by the irony of these two pompous asses hiding in her house, still believing they were in control of the situation. Her terror and fatigue slammed up against the hilarity of the situation and shattered. Someone began to laugh, rising louder and louder, and whoever it was sounded completely hysterical. She realized the two men were staring at her. She was the one laughing. She tried to stop, but just couldn’t. Screw it. She was going to die anyway. Might as well have a little fun first. “You two…” she said between torrents of laughter.
Peter’s eyes narrowed, and he strode up to her in two steps to tower over her. His face was flushing, turning red. “Shut up! What the hell are you laughing at, bitch? You’re gonna fuckin’ die here, you know that?”
Oh man, he looked a little like Santa Claus now, with his jolly nose all red. A skinny cowboy Santa with no beard. Hilarious. She struggled to catch her breath, but managed to stammer, “You two! You’re funny. Little Santa Cowboy and his little Helper Elf!” She lost the battle with herself and burst into fresh laughter.
Peter turned to Jim. “Get upstairs. I’ll deal with Crazy Girl. Get on the rifle and start sniping anything not White Stag.”
“What about the traitors? How will I know?”
“Moron. Our people are in cover. Anything moving around is fair game. Kill everything you can.”
Cassy, cackling madly, watched as Jimmy the Elf ran upstairs to help Santa deliver deadly presents to all the good little boys and girls. Then Peter faced her again and raised the axe. He grunted and thrust the axe’s eye—the nub of wood protruding from the top of the axe—straight into her left cheek. Cassy felt the bone crunch beneath the blow, and in only seconds, she could no longer see from her left eye.
As the pain burst throughout her head like fireworks, she gripped her knife tightly to the side of her leg. She had a present for Santa, and it wasn’t milk and cookies. Again she was overtaken with a fit of mad laughter. Some part of her knew she was losing her mind, yet there was a part of her—clinical, detached—that allowed the madness to rise. It was useful. One step closer, Santa…
Peter was screaming at her, she could see his cheeks puff and his face turning a beet red with rage, but she couldn’t make out his words. It just sounded like “womp womp,” like the teacher in a Charlie Brown Christmas Special. The detached part of her understood he was about to kill her, that he somehow thought that if she died, he could regain control of th
e situation. Fool. No matter what happened in the next few seconds, his time on earth was nearly done.
Axe in his right hand, Peter reached down with his left to clench a fistful of hair. He lifted her head up so that she looked directly at him and raised the axe high. And then the look on his face changed. Anger turned to confusion and disbelief. The axe fell from his hand; he reached across his body and then held the now-empty hand in front of his face. It was dripping crimson. His blood, the color of Christmas. Slowly, he tilted his head to look down to the left, and when he saw the knife handle sticking out from his armpit, his gaze snapped to Cassy’s eyes.
“You… bitch…” he managed, before he fell over. Cassy’s hair slipped from his grasp as he fell to his side and lay there moaning in agony. Peter still had that idiot look of disbelief on his stupid asshole Santa face.
The clinical part of her mind decided it was time to get her shit together, and slowly, her laughter subsided. She grinned down at Peter and wiped laughter tears from her eyes to her chin. “Peter the Great, my ass.”
Cassy struggled to her feet. Her body felt suddenly heavy, like her legs were full of lead. Adrenaline crash. Her hand shook uncontrollably when she pulled her knife from under Peter’s arm; he groaned, but didn’t move. Experience told her the shakes would last several minutes, but with Jim on the top floor sniping from the window, lives were in the balance. There was no way she could run out even if she’d wanted to. Jim would see her and shoot her in the back once she got outside.
Instead, she’d have to kill the bastard or die trying. Even if she lost, the time he spent away from the window to deal with her would save lives. Hopefully, she’d have another shot of adrenaline when she confronted Jimbo the Elf. If only she had one grenade, but she’d have to make due with Peter’s own pistol. If there was a God, then He would see to it that she killed the pig upstairs with his master’s gun.
With a sigh, she turned to face the stairwell and steeled herself for what must come next.
* * *
Cassy took a tentative step toward the stairwell, pistol in her good right hand and knife in the left with the point down like an ice pick. She vaguely remembered that Michael once told her not to do that unless she was a master knife fighter, but in her mind’s eye she envisioned Jim leaping at her from the left side of the stairwell when she went up. She’d have no leverage with the standard grip Michael had taught her if that happened.
Or maybe her wits were just addled by fatigue, pain, injury, starvation, and raw seething hatred. Either way, she had no time to over-analyze it. Enough already—it was time to go upstairs. Her people needed her, even if her help came at the expense of her own life.
Creak. Cassy froze and listened. The first stair wasn’t quite right, dammit, and she should have remembered that. Maybe Jim hadn’t heard it over the din of combat and the thick earthbag walls in the house. It only took a couple seconds for her to realize that Jim hadn’t stopped firing, however. He hadn’t heard. She continued to creep upstairs, but she was careful to avoid the loose fifth step. It was the only other creaky stair.
As she continued up the steep, narrow stairwell—almost a ladder—more of the upstairs room came into view. First, the bed in the middle of the room, but Jim wasn’t there of course. Then the north wall with its window—she wasn’t surprised to find Jim wasn’t there, either. Disappointed—she could have caught him unaware and exposed—but not surprised. The sadistic, little weasel was careful of his own welfare—always.
Finally, she was far enough up the stairs that her head was almost visible from anywhere in the room, but not far enough for her to see Jim. The last couple steps would be the biggest risk. She’d be the one exposed and unaware. She paused as a shiver of fear ran through her, but then that sweet, sweet adrenaline kicked in once again. The fear fell away.
She could get up the steep stairs faster and quieter with her hands free. It might cost her a half second to draw her pistol again. But the element of surprise would give her that time, whereas if he realized she was coming up, then he could get the drop on her… Cassy decided to tuck the pistol in her waistband and to clench her knife between her teeth like in the movies. It was a small room, so it was entirely possible she could kill him faster with the knife than by drawing her pistol again. She hoped so—it would be delicious to end Jim with her own knife as she had almost done with a small pocketknife a month ago right after the EMPs hit.
Cassy’s hands reached the top of the stairwell railing, and she grabbed hold tightly. She brought her feet up a few more steps, forcing her to crouch. She was ready—it was showtime. She pushed up with her legs like pistons and pulled hard on the railing, vaulting her over the last few steps. As her head shot up and out of the stairwell, she caught a glimpse of Jim crouched at the south window with his rifle thrust outside; a shot went off, and he smoothly moved to cycle the rifle’s bolt to ready another shot.
As she noted all of that, she landed a foot beyond the stairwell edge and snatched the knife from her mouth. Jim must have heard her despite the battle din, because he began to turn away from the window toward her, swinging his rifle around with him.
Everything seemed to be moving in slow motion, including herself, but Cassy knew that was only a side effect of the adrenaline that again poured through her system. Knife in hand, she pushed off hard with her right foot, propelling herself at the bastard. The surprised and suddenly-fearful look on his face as death came for him was satisfying in a way she hadn’t felt before. Bloodlust… With savage joy, she realized she would reach Jim before he could bring the rifle around to fire.
Pain shot through her left foot when it landed, and the hardwood floor rushed up at her. There was the sound of a rifle going off and an odd metal ting noise. Cassy brought her knife up in a vain, instinctive attempt to put it between her and Jim—but her hand was empty. She stared at it dumbly, uncomprehending. Jim’s hyena laugh echoed through the room.
Cassy looked down. Why was her foot bleeding? Was that a bone sticking up through her shoe? It looked more like a nail…
Jim spoke: “Caltrops, bitch. Pretty great shot though, huh?”
His voice snapped her out of her shock, and time sped up again. So it wasn’t her bone, it was the sharp point of a caltrop. She realized there were several of them scattered at the top of the stairwell, made from filed-off soldered nails. Her knife was broken in half on the other side of the room. He must have hit the blade with his panicked shot.
Cassy looked to Jim again and saw him work the bolt. Reloading. Well, she might be about to die, but at least Jim was no longer at the window killing her friends and allies. They had a good chance now to get into the house before he could get back to the window. As Jim took aim, Cassy smiled—content with her small victory—and waited for him to shoot her.
“What are you smiling at?” Jim asked, voice harsh and demanding. “Sure, you got me once by surprise, but that was the old-world me. I was trying to be merciful with my punishment, and you were just too stupid to take your lesson and move on. But even after you stabbed me by surprise, like a coward, you were too weak to finish it. Weak, Cassy. For all your high-and-mighty bullshit about being some powerful ‘Clan leader,’ in the end you’re just a woman. Did you really think some woman could kill me? I’m all man, babygirl, and you never had a chance.”
As he delivered his monologue, Cassy propped herself up on her elbows—which put her right hand tantalizingly close to the pistol in her waistband—and pretended to listen to his every word. Her smile didn’t fade, though—this blowhard stood there gloating while justice rolled inexorably toward him. Without him sniping in the window, the other loyalists would soon be overrun. Dying wasn’t so bad, knowing that her kids and her people would again be free of people like Peter and Jim.
Cassy said in her sweetest voice, “You know, Peter might still be alive if you weren’t so painfully stupid—”
Jim fired his rifle—the noise and smoke briefly baffled her senses. Pain flooded through
Cassy’s left leg, but not from the nail in her foot. She cried out and glanced down reflexively. The bullet had struck her in the thigh, and a pool of blood was growing rapidly. It didn’t hurt as much as she’d imagined a gunshot would though.
Jim cycled his rifle’s bolt and then stood motionless, staring at her through half-closed eyes with a smile on his face. The same smile he’d had when he first tried to “punish” her outside of Philadelphia.
Cassy knew he’d never let her tie off her leg to stop the bleeding, so what the hell. Now or never. She drew the pistol from behind her hip and shoved it toward Jim. He was so enraptured by the sight of her bleeding leg that he didn’t even seem to notice. This time she didn’t hesitate. She barely heard the pistol fire, but she saw clearly the spurt of blood that erupted from his right shoulder. Jim fired back reflexively, but the shot went wide, and the recoil caused his rifle to fly from his hands. He was already moving toward her when Cassy pulled the trigger again, but she couldn’t tell whether the round struck him.
Screaming in pain and rage, Jim leapt into the air and dove toward her. He landed on top of Cassy, knocking the wind out of her. The pistol skittered away. Cassy struggled to catch a breath as Jim raised himself with his good arm, and then he drove forward so that his forehead smashed into her nose and swollen left eye.
As Jim raised himself up again, Cassy cried out from the pain and frantically struggled to get out from under him, to no avail. He dove forward again, but Cassy held him off with her outstretched arms. She felt her thumb slide into the wound on his shoulder, a sickening warm, wet feeling, and Jim screamed in agony. His left arm gave out, but he used the momentum to roll away—anything to escape that agony.
Cassy rolled onto her stomach and struggled to get away, but her left leg was just dead weight. She clawed at the floor to pull her body along, away from Jim. Away from death. She couldn’t help it; the almost serene acceptance of her fate had vanished amidst the pain and terror of fighting for her life. But then her hand struck something metallic—one of the caltrops. She grabbed at it like a drowning person reaching for a life vest and managed to get ahold of it. It felt like a miracle, a gift from God.
