Early Release

by Jason Michelsen

  Chris listened as Hutchins ran through the litany of victories the justice system had won over the years. His pistol shook in his sweaty hand as he realized that the final solution--mass execution of all criminals--was his to initiate. The presence of the murdered guards was almost tangible now; they seemed to be trying to wrest the gun from his tenuous control.

  "I haven't even touched on the special cases," Prophet continued. "Did you know that in many states, a college student who urinates in public has to register as a sex offender for a decade or more? Or a psychologist who conducts ill-advised research into child pornography to better understand the abused children she works with? She'll lose her license and never be allowed around the kids she dedicated her life to. All so we can say we're 'tough on crime.'"

  The she-demon was trembling now, sensing the power of the beautiful system her master spoke of. Twice, she opened her mouth to speak, but failed to produce a sound. He felt the victims of Tanlau thirsting for revenge and began to question himself. Was not giving them control selfish of him? Surely they had more right to exact vengeance than he did.

  Closing his eyes, Thompson let the rage, the hate, flow through him. He felt sanctified by their spirits; the righteousness of their violence purified him for his cleansing of the earth. With a grin that would not leave his face, he opened his eyes. They were inside him now; he could feel their emotions like they were his own. He felt the admiration each coworker felt for him, and the attraction toward him he had always suspected the females battled. There was even a flash of madness, and he idly wondered which of his friends had suffered from such a delicate grip on reality.

  "Poor guy," he told himself.

  100

  Everything was happening so fast, Adam didn't have time to regret his latest change of heart. The strangely tense peace he felt was familiar though, and he suspected that with a full day to consider his decision, he would still be comfortable with it.

  "Hold," Saul ordered quietly. "Sniper ahead, on the roof."

  Adam scanned the rooftop, but couldn't make out the man he had no doubt was up there. Still, he followed his friend's example and pressed closer to the wall on his left. It had been only a few minutes since he and David had reunited, but that time seemed longer because it had been spent sneaking around the far side of the school in an attempt to aid the prisoners from an unexpected direction. Now, as they approached the northwest corner of the building, the hypnotic drawl of the Prophet's voice reached them through a disturbingly quiet night.

  "...we can say we're 'tough on crime.'"

  He crept away from the wall just enough to join David in peering around the corner at a scene positively pregnant with tension. It was like David and Goliath gone wrong; instead of being slain with a mere stone, the giant held the little fighter in his fearsome grip. Two rifle barrels stuck out of the gym doors, but the reluctant human shield forestalled any shots being fired. Between the rifles and the hostage stood the girl's mother.

  Back straight, hair shining in the firelight, Adam was once again enamored with the unbelievable strength and classical beauty in this woman. She tried to speak, but the stress must have finally reached her; words seemed reluctant to come. After a moment, she gathered herself and responded.

  "You think that a man who holds a ten-year-old hostage is deserving of our mercy? What have you done to show you are capable of rejoining society successfully?"

  A wordless roar stole the stage before the Prophet could reply, and all eyes--and weapons--turned south to watch the lumbering approach of a very loud, very pudgy silhouette. Officer Thompson. It would have been comical, were it not for the sudden outpouring of gunshots that burst forth from the man.

  Adam and his partner dropped immediately. A mixture of voices screamed various curse words as a wave of returned fire issued forth from both the mob and the door guards. It wasn't slow motion, more like a slide show of images, random interesting details that stuck in the young man's mind. Curiously, the Prophet--quite possibly the most evil man he knew--turned his massive body and shielded the girl. The mother raced toward the child. Thompson's body was obscured by a red haze that had sprung from various dots showing up quickly all over his body. Eve's face showed the terror he remembered from his own time aiming a gun at her.

  Just when the correctional officer seemed almost super-human in his resilience, he dropped to his knees under the barrage.

  Then he blew up.

  101

  David was growing strangely used to explosions--again--and this allowed him to track the critical moments immediately after the blast with clarity. Thompson had closed to within twenty feet of Eve and Hutchins when he detonated. The concussion threw the Prophet forward, still shielding the kid, who took the opportunity to crawl away from her stunned captor. Her mother had also been leveled, and the girl quickly scurried to her still form.

  "Eve!" Lisa screamed as she came tearing out of the school, pistol in hand.

  They came together as Eve reached her mother, tears streaming down the child's face. Three men popped out of the gym and scrambled after weapons of Prophet's fallen men. It was only seconds since the bombs went off, and the gunfire returned in full effect.

  As one, David and Adam popped up to a crouched run toward the girls. A similar party raced out from the trailers in the direction of Hutchins, who still lay in the grass. Cover fire came from both sides, but the townsfolk were severely outgunned.

  Lisa was desperately trying to shield her companions while finding a position to defend herself from, but that looked to be impossible in the open as she was. They were in no mans land, and only the gang's distraction with their own leader had saved the nurse and company so far. With Prophet secured, two men dragged him toward the trailer while the third emptied a clip blindly back into the gym, where the return fire abruptly ceased.

  Emboldened by the advantage, one man rushed from his hiding place behind an old pickup truck. Bearing down on Lisa, he looked like a deranged Sunday school teacher in khaki's and a maroon V-neck sweater. Instead of a Bible, he raised a comically large revolver and began firing. Lisa awkwardly lifted her own gun, but before she could fire, David dropped to a knee and opened fire. Two shots, center mass, took the fight and the life out of the lunatic before surprise could even register on his genial face.

  Brittsen rolled over to peer back into the shadows he approached from with a smile that almost looked like she'd been expecting him. Adam reached them first and laid down covering fire while David caught up and scooped the downed woman up into his arms.

  "This way!" he shouted over the noise, moving swiftly away from the makeshift prison and into the trailer park north of the gang. If they could hold down a flanking position, the Prophet's men--without his influence--may retreat. These people had evidently wanted out of their prison, and splitting the enemies’ attention would make that much easier for them.

  Laying the unconscious woman gently in the grass, David directed Lisa and Eve to stay with her, then sent Adam to one corner of the trailer they sheltered behind, while he took the other. It was clear at the moment, so he took the opportunity to pop the magazine out and replace it with a fresh one. As he slapped it home, the pistol slid out of his hands and dropped noiselessly in the dirt. He hadn't even noticed--nor could he figure out why--his hands were slick. Reaching for the pistol, he froze when the moonlight caught his hand, so much darker than it should have been. Oh God, please, no.

  With a crack in his heart, he turned to look where two girls he cared for immensely sat, stroking the hair of a woman he had never met--and never would.

  102

  Adam had been holding down his corner for less than a minute when the shooting resumed from the school. Thankfully, they had paid enough attention to know who the friends were. The three who had taken positions outside now crawled up to form a line between the trailer he sat behind and the entrance to the gym, giving them a solid front of seven well-spaced shooters. The sniper on the roof certainly wasn't hurting the
ir cause, either.

  David was busily pushing back an attempt to circle around them, and Brittsen was rushing to the blond woman with urgency after a hurried conference with Saul. The kid was crying in fits and starts, holding her mom's hand steadfastly; it was the first time he had seen her appear to be the child she was.

  He turned his attention back to his sector, popping off two more rounds at a guy he recognized from the prison kitchen who thought he saw an opportunity to advance. When three positions opened fire on him simultaneously, he reconsidered and dove back to his cover. A rash of bullets peppered the wall of the school, near the roofline. Adam looked over just in time to see a rifle fall from the roof.

  "Saul, we lost our sniper!" he shouted to his partner.

  Glancing across to David, his breath caught. Between the two gunmen worked a blood soaked nurse, while a little girl stared with wide-eyed sobs. The object of their attention was a gaping wound in the upper back of the woman he had killed for.

  Beyond the carnage, his friend looked back at him. His eyes blazed across the distance; it was clear that this was not a man who used the term acceptable loss.

  "Watch for an opening," he ordered coldly, "we're pushing forward at the first opportunity. It's time we put these bastards on the defensive."

  "She's as stable as she can be right now," Brittsen interjected. "I'll get everyone in the gym ready to move."

  "We need you with Rachel and Eve, someone will take charge of that group. They'll probably join us when they see what we're up to."

  "No, David, they won't. This uprising was my idea, my plan. That sniper he lost? He was the closest to a leader they had, until he deferred to me. Now everything that happens to them is on my shoulders." Adam thought he saw her eyes flick back to Rachel, but he couldn't be sure.

  "Lisa--"

  "Enough, we're not discussing this." Brittsen kissed Eve gently on top of her head, in stark contrast to the steel in her voice, then approached Adam's position.

  With a simple directive to cover her, she bolted away from the trailer toward the gym. He emptied the clip in the direction of the gang, pacing the shots to allow the nurse to cross the bloody, burning field.

  When she was safely inside, he reloaded and looked at Saul, who just stared back. Finally the Soldier broke eye contact and turned toward the girl.

  "Eve, take care of your mother. We'll be right back."

  There was no response, just a quiet weeping, and an occasional pained whisper: "Mommy...."

  103

  Lisa stalked into the gym as two men climbed down from the rubble in the corner, John's limp form between them. She ran the last fifty feet to arrive as they set him down carefully against the wall, just a few yards from the corpse of the guard Saul's friend killed at the start of this battle. His blood was still wet.

  She knelt next to the former mayor, examining a wound high in his chest that she didn't need to. Even an untrained eye couldn't mistake it for anything but a mortal gunshot wound. He was gone, Rachel had a fifty-fifty chance at best, and more bodies littered the gym entrance and the lawn outside. All because some psychotic freak wanted revenge on a society that called him a monster and locked him up.

  "There's nothing we can do for him now," she told the small crowd that had gathered, "except get his town back."

  "But they're killing us!" whined a middle aged woman from the back.

  "And we're killing them. And we will keep killing them until the last one stops breathing, or they clear out of here. We have the numbers, the strength of conviction, and our backs against the wall. They only have inertia. After bullying people for so long, they just keep it up because they don't believe anyone will rise up and stop them.

  "They will break. And there's a man out there about to risk his life again to make sure of it. He has no friends or family here, he just believes in doing the right thing. If we don't make one more push, he will probably die for us. In vain. Because we were unwilling to stand up for ourselves, instead wanting someone else to go get what's ours and give it back to us."

  Lisa pulled her pistol from her waistband and started for the door. "I'm done waiting. From now on I do my part and expect no one else to take care of me. I want my life back."

  When she reached the door, most of the crowd had followed. Sporadic shots came from the trailer the guys sheltered behind, they had not moved. Good.

  "Everything you've got into pushing them south."

  The riflemen at the door nodded.

  "More weapons are on the lawn, if you can get one, use it. If not, get into the trailers. Either way, we don't make an easy target sitting quietly together anymore."

  She gave them--or herself--no time to think it over; she flew out the door firing wildly at the gap Hutchins' men had taken position in as she ran back to David and Eve. As she ran, Lisa was vaguely aware that a slew of people followed her out the door.

  "She's back," the tall inmate yelled as she approached, "and looks like she just kicked the hornets' nest!"

  104

  Swelling gunfire preceded Lisa's return by just seconds. "Adam, this way," David called.

  With the people from the gym fired up, they could concentrate their push on the flank. They paused long enough for Brittsen to reload, then all three slipped into the alley next to the trailer.

  Moonlight was the only illumination here; the fires next to the school were mostly blocked off by mobile homes. Saul didn't expect to run into any of the gang until they advanced three or four rows through the park, but they moved slowly just in case. Since the Prophet was dragged off, he had no clue what to expect from whoever was in charge. If anyone was in charge.

  Without warning, a few former neighbors popped into the alley just ahead. David dropped the first before they even knew they weren't alone, the second man had just turned in shock when Adam placed two rounds in his chest.

  "Get some cover," he told them, "we're not a surprise anymore." He and Lisa ducked behind a crumbling toolshed to their left, Adam disappeared behind foundation blocks of a toppled Airstream.

  Almost immediately, a stream of Prophet's men ran by, some firing blindly down the alley, others just fleeing in panic. Content to run them straight out of Webster, David let them pass with no more than a few randomly placed rounds for encouragement. Things were going well, at least until one figure larger than the rest lumbered by.

  “Saul, you see him?" Adam asked.

  Conflicting emotions ran through his head before he answered. "Yeah, let him go."

  "Let who go?" asked Lisa, her view blocked from behind David.

  "Prophet is back on his feet, but he's running away with the rest of them."

  "And you're just letting him go?"

  "Yes, Lisa. As a general rule, when people run away, I don't go after them and make them fight to the death. You don't ever want to see what people are capable of when their backs are to the wall."

  He turned back to the alley, where the gang seemed to have completed their retreat through his firing lane. Ragged cheers sounded from the direction of the school as the citizens celebrated a victory, however incomplete.

  "We should connect with the rest. If we work together we can conduct an orderly sweep of the town. Run any stragglers out and set a guard."

  "No."

  "What do you mean, 'no?' We have to--"

  "No," Lisa broke in again. "Chasing them off means they don't pay for what they did. I won't let them get away with it."

  Saul was stunned by the vehemence in her normally serene voice. He was further startled when she dashed out into the alley and down the street a homicidal gang had traveled less than thirty seconds prior.

  "What did you say to her?" Adam asked incredulously.

  David just shook his head. He didn't like running around with one group who knew they wanted him dead and another who would assume they did, but without Lisa he couldn't get the town's trust.

  "I have to go after her. You get back to Eve, make sure the Prophet doesn't try to c
ircle back for her. Protect that girl, Adam. With your life."

  Adam nodded solemnly, his hand reaching slowly to the cross at his neck. For once, David had no doubt that he would do the right thing.

  105

  Eve had hardly moved since they left. It spoke volumes of her distress that upon his arrival, she barely spared a glance for a man who had shot at her just a few hours ago. Rachel lay pale and still on the dew covered grass. It occurred to Adam that he didn't know how to care for her.

  "How is she?" he asked quietly.

  After a few sniffles, she looked up at him. Tears still flowed; he wondered how she had any left after these last couple days. "Sometimes she tries to talk, but I can't understand her. And she coughs a lot."

  Adam wasn't a doctor, but that didn't sound good to him. The closest thing he knew to a doctor in this town was out on a suicide mission at the moment, which left him in charge--unless he deferred to a grieving child.

  "Where's Lisa? And David?" she asked, blinking back still more tears.

  "Lisa went after the bad man, and David went after Lisa." It felt like such a feeble answer, he wished he knew how to handle kids.

  Unfortunately, he didn't, as evidenced by her fresh tears. Maybe mentioning the danger her guardians were in wasn't the best plan. Still, he had to get her focus off all the tragedy and establish some hope for the girl.

  "They'll be alright, Saul has been through a lot worse than this. But let's not worry about them right now. We need to get a hold of the other group and let them know what's going on. Do you know many people in this place?"