by Kirk Allmond
Markus, however, was another matter. He had a very high fever, and even after his ribs had been tightly wrapped, he was still bleeding. Kris helped Liam change the bandages three times. After an hour, it looked as though the bleeding had slowed, but his fever was still perilously high. If Kris had learned anything from Tookes, it was that the immunity to the parasites was genetic. Kris quickly explained to Liam about the Tookes family and how they were all immune, so instead of turning into one of the undead, they gained “superpowers.” Therefore, unless Alicia’s mother had a dark secret she never shared, Markus was immune as well.
They changed Markus’s bandages one more time, and Jackson offered to sit with him for the rest of the night so Kris could get some sleep. Uncle Riley had one bed to spare in the main house; he gestured to the room that was across the hall from Alicia. It was a small room with a twin-sized bed, a dresser with a petite kerosene lamp on it, a quilt rack, and a full-length mirror. Kris smiled lightly. This was the most normal place she had been in months and couldn’t have imagined anything more perfect. Her time on the plantation in Virginia was brief, but that world was not something she had ever understood. These were simple folks just trying to get by, and that was an idea that Kris fully supported. She stripped herself of all of her clothes and tossed them into the corner of the room. With a sigh, she slid into the bed, and within moments, Kris was asleep.
It was around 7 am when there was a soft knock on her new bedroom door. With a groan, Kris rolled over and opened one eye. There was a soft, pastel blue light trickling through the window and across the hardwood floor.
“Sec,” Kris said as she pushed herself out of bed. She pulled her pants and tank top on and slowly opened the door. It was Liam. His bright orange, curly hair was an even bigger mess than it was last night, and he had deep bags under his eyes. It was clear that he hadn’t slept at all last night. He reached a hand up and absent-mindedly scratched his head.
“Markus’s fever is down, and his wounds are a lot smaller than they were last night,” he said. “Alicia’s too. I’d imagine she won’t be unconscious for much longer, but we’re not in the clear for Markus just yet.”
Kris nodded. “But it’s an improvement though.”
“Thankfully. I was worried.”
“Me too,” she said, putting her hand on his shoulder and smiling gently at him. “Can I see Alicia?”
“Oh, sure.” Liam turned around, and they both walked across the hall and into Alicia’s room. The doctor slowly peeled off the cloth that was wrapped around her shoulder to check on how it was healing. Her shoulder wound looked like a deep scuffmark, very different from the gaping hole that it was five hours ago. To the side of the bed, Liam had a small table of bandages, wraps, and ointments. He gestured to the table and said, “It’s a far cry from the hospital, but it does the job.”
Kris watched Alicia’s face as Liam worked. She was completely at peace, and Kris smiled gently as she ran her fingertips across Alicia’s chin. It was remarkable how beautiful Alicia was both inside and out. Kris counted herself lucky to have found her.
Liam worked quickly, and in a few minutes, he had changed her wraps. He gestured to Kris to follow him out of the room. The two of them walked down the hall and into the kitchen, where Riley had coffee brewing and eggs for all of them. Jackson was already sitting at the table, his elbows propped against the table; he was clearly deep in thought. Kris, Liam, and Riley joined him at the table, and they all ate in relative silence.
Once their plates were empty, Jackson left the table without saying a word, and Riley only shrugged as he cleared the table. The room was suddenly very stuffy, and Kris excused herself and walked out into the early morning sunlight with Liam close behind her.
“They’ll come around,” he called. Kris stopped and looked over her shoulder. “Jackson doesn’t trust most folks. Especially when he owes someone a life debt.”
“A life debt? Please...”
“I’m serious, Kris.” Liam placed his hand on her arm. “You have no idea what saving Markus means. To all of us.” The intensity in his eyes was almost startling, but it only lasted a moment before he smiled. “Let’s find you something to do around here. You good at anything?”
“Uh. Not particularly, but I learn fast.”
Liam chuckled. “How about weeding a garden?”
“I think I can handle that,” she said with a smile.
The rest of the day was spent doing just that. A few hours later, Liam came by to tell her that the community was getting together for a bonfire and asked if she wanted to join him. Shaking her head, Kris declined. She wanted to check on Alicia and Markus, and quite frankly, she was still feeling rather overwhelmed with how easily the community had embraced her. In just a few short hours, Kris had met the entire group of farmers that Gander Acres had on its premises and knew most of their life stories. She felt closer to these simple folks than she had ever recalled feeling since she was a child.
----
Victor Tookes ran along the bench in the grandstands towards his brother and John. Just a minute before, he couldn't wait to get out from under a shield; now he couldn't get them all under one fast enough. John fell over as a slice opened up his face and then another across his chest, tearing through his shirt and the flesh underneath. Victor dove for Marshall and John, surrounding them with his aura, protecting them from further injury. Victor quickly assessed the situation; it was not going well.
John was bleeding profusely. He healed quickly compared to a normal human but not as quickly as Victor did. There were still an unknown number of invisible assailants out there and the rest of the supers Lightfoot had gathered, in addition to all the normal soldiers.
"Marshall, get John. We're getting out of here in just a second. I'll be right back."
Victor's eyes glassed over, and his head slumped. He looked for Renee's aura, looked towards where they'd left the train, but saw nothing. “Ren, where are you?”
“I'm coming. I have a couple more things to do. I need five more minutes,” Renee said in his mind.
“I'm not sure we have five more minutes. It got ugly here very quickly. The kids are safe, but John is hurt. I'm not sure how long he's going to stay conscious.”
“Shit, I'll be there in three minutes,” answered Renee.
Victor's eyes cleared and he raised his head. “Three minutes to reinforcements. Grab John; I can't take this pounding forever,” Victor thought to John and Marshall as bullets bounced off his aura.
"Hang on," said Marshall. "You get John. I'll be right back." Marshall stepped outside of the shield. The shooters immediately started targeting him. Marshall turned his back; he wasn't sure his eyelids were bulletproof, and with his luck, one of the shooters would figure out how to shoot up his nose or something.
He grabbed the largest of the men by the ankle and heaved him. Marshall threw the man into the crowd and leaped up into the air, bending the bench they'd been standing on flying at least thirty feet in the air. His arc brought him right to the end of the top bleacher. When he landed, he launched dozens of men up into the air, over the edge of the grandstand, and onto the ground below. Most of them did not get up.
Victor didn't wait to see what was happening next; he grabbed John, heaved him up on his shoulder, and took off for the field towards where Reggie had gone. Victor didn't blame the old man for running; he didn't look like much of a fighter.
Marshall grabbed another pair of men by the ankles and flopped them over his shoulder, then slammed their heads into the grandstand. He threw the first lifeless corpse into a group and used the second one as a club, sending men flying in every direction. Marshall was bleeding from dozens of places on his chest, but if it hurt, he didn't let on. He felt his feet being pulled out from under him and swung the dead body around behind him as he fell. A man appeared at his feet. Marshall lifted up one of his size seventeen boots and brought it down on the invisible man's skull.
When Tookes got to the tree line, Reggie
stood up from some bushes and waved him over. He already had his undershirt in his hand. He jumped to John the second Victor put him down. "Oh, Mister Hazard, what have you done to yourself?" Reggie asked, pressing the shirt to the wound across John's chest. "He's going to need a lot of stitches, Mister Tookes. We need to get him to an infirmary or a doctor.”
"Renee's going to be here in a couple of minutes. I have to go help Marshall. Try to slow the bleeding as best you can. He heals quickly but not as quickly as Leo or me," Victor called over his shoulder as he sprinted back across the field to help his brother.
As he ran, Victor yelled in his head as loud as he could for anyone could hear it, “If anyone can hear this, my name is Victor Tookes. My children are being held captive by a rogue military unit. My brother and I are fighting to get them back, but we're outnumbered and wounded. We could use some help. If you can get here in the next couple of minutes, we're at the parade grounds of Fort Hood.” Victor pictured the parade grounds in as much detail as he could and tried to send the image along with the message. He pictured the huge metal bleachers full of soldiers, the raised wooden stage in front and slightly to the side of it. And the gigantic, freshly-mowed parade grounds and the trees all around. It only took a fraction of a second, and he wasn't counting on anyone coming to help, but it couldn't hurt.
----
Kris was jogging up the hill that lead to the main house when a familiar voice tore into her mind. With a deep groan, she grabbed her ears in pain as she fell to the ground. “If anyone can hear this, my name is Victor Tookes. My children are being held captive by a rogue military unit. My brother and I are fighting to get them back, but we're outnumbered and wounded. We could use some help. If you can get here in the next couple of minutes, we're at the parade grounds of Fort Hood.” It was Victor. Kris felt her mind meet his, and she could see everything that he could see. She could see large, metal bleachers packed full of soldiers. Next, she saw a raised wooden stage to the front of the bleachers and beyond that was a grassy field. A grove of trees surrounded them. Kris saw the scene perfectly as if she was standing right there with him. She felt his anxiety and immediately knew that he was in trouble.
“Shit,” she whispered and jumped to her feet.
She ran inside the house, up the stairs, and down the hall to Alicia’s room. As Kris rounded the corner, Alicia was sitting up straight in bed, her hand over her ears with a wince on her face. She looked over to Kris.
“Tookes?” she asked.
Kris nodded. “Yeah. They’re fucked.”
“Figured. And you plan to help them?”
“If I could. But there’s no way to get there from here.”
Alicia pursed her lips together. “Could you see what he saw if you tried?”
Kris raised her eyebrow. “Yeah. I just did, actually.”
“Good.” Alicia tossed the covers off her, flinching slightly as she did so. She rotated her left shoulder “I need my knives and guns. We’re going to Fort Hood.”
“How?”
“Trust me, Kris. That’s what relationships are built on,” she said with a wink.
A few minutes later, after seeing that Markus was in safe hands, Alicia and Kris were standing in the front yard of the main house, holding hands.
“Remember what you did when we first met? How you were in my head?”
Kris nodded.
“I need you to do that again. And if you can, do that to Tookes too. If I’m right, I can take us there.”
“And if you’re wrong?”
“Let’s not think about that,” she said with a smirk.
The laugh that came out of Kris’ mouth was nervous and unsure. “Okay. Let’s do this.” Kris closed her eyes and found the familiar, warm trail of Victor’s aura. She followed the trail back to the source, and as she opened her eyes, she was looking through Tookes’ eyes. Alicia squeezed Kris’ hands, and the world they were standing in dissolved away into nothing. Then, a moment later, they were standing in the middle of a war zone.
----
The younger of the Tookes men leaped up into the grandstand in one single step, clearing several dead bodies and swiping the rifle of a fallen soldier. He fired two shots into the chest of a man who lunged at him and stepped up to the next row. Standing on the top bench were two men firing at Marshall. They reloaded with the same speed and efficiency John did, and they seemed to have magazines tucked in every pocket and pouch they had. Tookes knew there was no way he'd be able to shoot them; instead, he started working his way up the stands.
The number of men was staggering. Vic flipped the selector to fully automatic and sprayed the path in front of him. Humans were much easier to kill than zombies were, and most of the men went down with holes in their chest. He was shooting into a crowd, knocking men back into their comrades, trying to clear a path up towards the shooters that were starting to wear Marshall down. Victor saw his brother drop to a knee as one of the shooters emptied an entire magazine at him. Marshall couldn't take much more.
Victor felt something tug his attention and turned slightly behind him. Black puffs appeared just between the grandstand and the stage. First two men appeared, briefly checked out the situation, and disappeared. Victor couldn't blame them; this wasn't their fight, and the odds were very poor that anyone was going to escape alive. He looked just to their left and figured out what had drawn his attention. There, surrounded in a beautiful purple aura, was Leo, kukris in hand, looking ready to commit violence. From the look on her face, Victor briefly wondered if she was there to help him or Lightfoot.
Chapter 23
Explosion
Leo looked at the crowd and then blinked into the middle of a group of soldiers. She was all over the place, as was her style. She flowed through the crowd, killing anything between her and Victor. She quickly closed the gap as Victor pushed through the crowd much more slowly, waiting for openings, saving what remained of his strength.
“Got yourself in a mess this time, Tookes,” she practically spat. “I guess I’ll clean up after you one last time. Where’s John?” she asked.
“He’s over in the woods with Reggie Walton. He’s pretty beat up.”
“I’m only here because this time you’ve managed to get the kids in trouble,” she said, and then she was off, down the bleachers like liquid death. She disappeared and then reappeared in the middle of a group.
By the platform, Kris was astounded by the number of people attacking her. During the fight in Atlanta, she had a bird’s eye view of what was happening. Being on the ground was an entirely different game with new rules that kept changing. “Permanent Rule: You may not play the Calvinball the same way twice. Primary Rule: All rules are subject to be changed, amended, or deleted by any player(s) involved. These rules are not required, nor necessary, to play Calvinball,” The Voice told her.
“The score is still Q to 12!” Kris replied. She leaned against the wall that faced the bleachers and peered around the corner. More men were running towards the field. This was going to keep getting worse, and they needed to get the hell out of there.
Her ears found Alicia’s heart, still beating steady and true. ”Are you doing okay?” Kris asked.
“Never better, baby!” Alicia’s reply was chipper. Kris heard her knife tear across the neck of a soldier and then felt her presence vanish for a moment, and then she reappeared elsewhere on the field. Kris lifted herself up into a crouching position on the top of the platform; she had to have a higher view of what was happening. She kept her body as low as possible to not attract any additional attention.
Tookes took advantage of a half-second of breathing time to watch Leo. Just as he was turning back to the fight, a tractor-trailer appeared at least fifty feet above the grandstand, its momentum carrying it through the air at a high rate of speed. The doors opened, and the two teleporters Victor had seen earlier jumped out and then disappeared in swirls of black. The truck slammed into the grandstand exactly where Leo had appeared, sending Victor and
everything in the top several rows of bleachers flying to the ground below.
On the platform below, Kris watched the truck fly over her head. “Fuck me!” Kris shouted as the truck slammed into the center of the bleachers. Acting on pure instinct, Kris brought her shield tightly around herself. Moments later, the truck exploded, taking out what remained of the bleachers. Kris was thrown from the platform and back twenty feet. As she was mid-air, she felt her body running on autopilot as she tucked her knees into her chest, landed on the ground in a tucked position, and rolled. She hit the ground hard, and it took her a moment to register what had just happened.
Kris’ ears were so overpowered by the explosion that she didn’t hear the man behind her cock his gun and fire. The bullet passed through her upper leg, and Kris swore loudly. There was pure rage in her eyes as she rounded on her heel and came face-to-face with her opponent. He was preparing to fire again, and after “The Voice” ran some calculations on probability, she was able to dodge the shot. She ran over to the man and knocked his feet out from under him. Kris felt her vision fade away, and she was completely detached from herself as she grabbed the man by the scruff of his shirt. Using the heel of her hand, Kris caught the man’s nose and drove the bone upwards until she felt it shatter. Without another thought, she moved behind him and grabbed him by his mouth and the back of the head. Overcome with adrenaline-driven strength, Kris jerked his head to one side and felt his vertebrae snap, and he fell over to one side, lifeless.
Near what was left of the tractor-trailer, Victor struggled to his feet, only to be knocked back to the ground by the explosion. The two men from the truck appeared just a couple of feet away from Vic.
