by Bruno Miller
Joel looked at him with a confused look on his face.
“I don’t want to get stuck down here. This could all be a setup. You never know. At least we know we can get out that way if we need to,” Ben explained.
“Good thinking,” Joel said.
“Smart thinking. Always think a few steps ahead and have an exit strategy.” Ben used Joel’s shoulder for support on his way back down the steep stairway, giving him a little squeeze on the way by and doing his best to project confidence.
Joel nodded as he passed.
“I need you to bring up the rear. You’re my eyes and ears. Stay about 10 feet back at all times unless I call you up to me. Got it?”
“Got it.”
“Flash and dash, only if you need to. Hopefully these lights run the length of this thing and we won’t need our flashlights at all.” Ben glanced at the low ceiling before crouching down and heading into the cramped, dark tunnel.
Chapter Eight
They followed Gunner down the poorly lit passage, guns at the ready. The tunnel couldn’t have been more than five feet high and about the same in width.
To make matters worse, the ceiling had been shored up with wooden planks that were held up with a six-inch timber every 10 feet or so. It was a tight fit and slow going.
Ben didn’t like it one bit. They had no idea what they would find up ahead, and he hated how vulnerable he felt stuffed in this tunnel with nowhere to take cover. Best to get through as quick as possible, he thought.
He checked back on Joel occasionally to make sure he was keeping up and staying at a good distance. If he had to back up quickly, he wouldn’t be able to go far with Joel right behind him. But Joel was doing as Ben had asked, and he was impressed with the fact that Joel was using the methods they had practiced at the range.
Ben snapped his fingers and got Gunner’s attention, who was several feet ahead of him. He held his hand out and pointed down with his index finger, which Gunner knew as the “sit” command. It was one of the few hand gesture commands he and Joel had taught Gunner when he was a puppy. Hand gestures were good for maintaining silence in a duck blind—or, in this case, stalking dirt balls through a secret underground tunnel.
The turn in the tunnel was just a few feet away now. He passed Gunner and slowly peered around the corner, only to see another 20 or 30 yards of tunnel ahead. He motioned for Joel to come up to his position.
“More tunnel ahead, but look.” Ben leaned to the side and made room for Joel to peer around the corner.
“See how it gets brighter at the end? And look, we were headed down for a while but now it’s angling up. I think we’re almost through.”
Joel pulled back. “Where do you think it goes?”
“I’m not a hundred percent on this, but I believe it leads to that old outbuilding on the edge of the pavement. We’re traveling in that direction.”
Joel nodded. “Yeah, I remember that when we drove around the building.”
“That’s the only other building that’s even close to us.” Ben wiped sweat off his lip. “That has to be where this goes.”
“If that’s the end of the tunnel that would be about the right distance between the store and the outbuilding.” Joel looked back from where they had come and then around the corner to the section of tunnel ahead again.
“Stay a little closer to me this time, and let’s get to the end quickly and quietly.” Ben patted his leg with his hand, and Gunner resumed leading the way down the tunnel. They made it to the end pretty quickly, landing at another crude set of steep wooden steps that led up to a large open area above the tunnel exit. Unlike the underground room where they had started, this was more of a hole they were standing in now.
Ben looked straight up. There was a metal roof above them. They were inside the outbuilding. He looked back at Joel and pointed up. Just as he’d suspected.
Suddenly, they heard a noise from the room above. It sounded like Allie’s voice, but it was unintelligible and muffled, like she was far away. Without warning, Gunner clawed his way up the nearly perpendicular stairway before Ben could react.
“Gunner, no!” Joel called after the dog, but it was too late. He was up the steps, out of sight, and in the room above them. Ben quickly scaled the rickety steps and stopped just shy of reaching the floor level. He peered over the edge and held his Glock in front of him.
Allie’s voice again. This time she sounded excited and more energetic but still muffled. He poked his head up, looked around the interior of the building, and just caught sight of Gunner’s tail as it disappeared through a doorway of what looked like a small interior office in the outbuilding.
“Come on, quick!” Ben huffed as he pulled himself out of the stairwell and into the building. Joel was right behind when he rushed into the room after Gunner. The dog was there, and he’d found Allie. The poor kid was tied to a chair, her mouth covered with packing tape.
Ben slowly pulled the tape off of her mouth, not wanting to cause her any more pain, but before he had it halfway off, she took a big breath.
“They’re going for the truck!” Allie gasped for air again.
“Get her untied and meet me at the truck,” Ben shouted and ran out of the little office, looking for an exit from the building. He found a door quickly but fought the urge to bust through and head for the truck immediately.
“Slow down,” he whispered to himself. He steadied his nerves, slowly opened the heavy metal door, and looked out.
Two people were running for the Blazer. It looked like a man and a woman, but he couldn’t be sure. The man carried a shotgun and a small bag. The woman was dragging a large bag behind her and struggling to keep up with him. They had already covered more than half the distance between the outbuilding and the backside of the store, where the Blazer was parked.
Once they got to the store and went around the building, he wouldn’t be able to see what they were doing, but he was sure they were going to try and steal the truck.
They probably wouldn’t be able to get it started, but he didn’t want them messing with their stuff or breaking any windows. He didn’t feel like driving all the way to Maryland with busted windows.
“Hey,” he bellowed. The sound reverberated between the buildings.
The woman glanced back at Ben standing in the doorway, but she quickly turned around and continued on. Now even more frantic, she wrestled with the bag. The man with the shotgun didn’t bother looking back, at least not until Ben fired a round from the Glock into the air.
“Stop,” Ben yelled again. Now he was standing all the way outside of the outbuilding’s doorway, in plain sight of the two runners. The man spun around awkwardly, dropping the bag he was carrying, and brought the shotgun up to his hip. Ben saw it coming and ducked behind the door, using it as a shield.
“BOOM… BOOM!” The shotgun roared to life and echoed off the building.
Ben heard the buckshot more than he felt it as it hit the door he was holding on to. It sounded like heavy rain on an old tin roof as the steel shot ricocheted off the metal-clad building and door.
The first barrage of mini projectiles was followed up immediately by a second round that sprayed the building a little to the right of the door he was behind. Ben was able to get a better look at the shotgun right before he took cover. When the guy spun around to shoot, Ben made out that it was an old double-barrel. At that range, even a 12-gauge shotgun would lack enough power to do any real damage. It would hurt, but it wouldn’t be lethal, not to mention the man had just burned through both rounds and would have to reload. Ben wasn’t sure if the guy was that stupid or just that desperate.
“Amateurs,” he said to himself and shook his head.
Ben had no intention of letting the man reload and capitalize on the moment. He stepped out from behind the door and turned his pistol on the man, who was fumbling around in his pockets for what Ben presumed was more shells.
“I wouldn’t do that,” Ben advised in a stern voice. He walke
d toward the couple cautiously.
The woman stopped running and stood motionless after dropping her bag on the ground. She slowly turned to face her partner a few feet away and appeared to be talking to him. She began to make hand gestures toward the man, but Ben couldn’t make out what she was saying.
He continued to advance at a steady pace toward their position.
“Drop the gun and get your hands out of your pockets, now!” Ben slowed down a little but kept moving toward the two. The man continued to fumble around in his pockets in spite of Ben’s warnings.
The distance between them now was less than 50 yards. The man glanced at Ben once or twice until he eventually pulled two shells out of his coat pocket and frantically tried to load the gun.
Ben was beyond frustrated at this point and losing patience with the situation quickly.
“What’s wrong with these people?” he muttered under his breath.
“Don’t do that! This is your last warning.” Ben repeated his request for compliance as sternly as he could. If the man didn’t respond this time, it would leave him no choice.
Suddenly, the woman, her arms outstretched, screamed at her partner. “Please, stop! Just do what he says,” she pleaded.
The man stopped moving for a second and looked at her. With a groan, he let the shotgun fall to the ground along with the two shells he had dug out of his pockets.
Ben resumed his approach. “Put your hands up, both of you!”
“We’re sorry,” the woman sobbed, tears running down her face.
The closer he got, the more he couldn’t help but feel sorry for them. They were a filthy mess and looked like they had been living underground or in the old building since the attacks, possibly. Both of their outfits were covered in stains and dirt. The more he looked, the more he began to think they had been living this way for much longer.
Still, though, he had to remind himself that was no reason to do what they had done: kidnapping Allie and attempting to steal their truck, not to mention the man had just fired a gun at him and put all of them in danger. And for what? So that they could steal their truck and supplies?
Not really sure what to do with them, Ben stopped when he was about 20 yards away. He wished Allie and Joel would hurry up and join him. He really just wanted to get out of there, but he felt a sense of responsibility. He couldn’t just leave these people here to inflict their brand terrorism on other unsuspecting travelers. That wouldn’t be right, and it would weigh heavily on his conscience. What if someone like Jon and Christine and their little girl Jessie had stopped here? Would these people have had any mercy on them, or would they have killed them for their truck and possessions?
Ben knew the answer to that question. It didn’t help him in deciding what to do.
Chapter Nine
Ben didn’t have long to think about anything, though, as he was interrupted by aggressive barking from inside the building, where he’d left Joel and Allie. He knew that bark. It was Gunner’s I’m-not-messing-around bark that Ben had witnessed only a few times.
“POP, POP!”
“BOOM!”
The sounds took a second to register in Ben’s head. “What the—!?”
He spun around to face the outbuilding, forgetting momentarily about the two would-be thieves in front of him. The sounds of gunfire took precedence, especially as it was coming from the building that the kids were in.
“Joel… Allie,” Ben called out. He began to move backward in the direction of the building, trying to keep the two lowlifes at gunpoint.
The man and woman started to back away slowly with their hands in the air at first. Then the man dropped his arms and turned. The woman followed suit and joined in the retreat. They both broke into a run, leaving everything they were carrying scattered on the ground, including the shotgun. Lucky for them, they ran away from the store and the Blazer and headed off in completely different direction.
Ben hesitated for a second.
“Crap,” he growled as he spun around. That wasn’t how he’d wanted that to go. He sprinted back to the door he’d come out of just minutes ago. Small craters and spots of flaked-off paint, caused by the buckshot, were visible on the steel door and surrounding wall as he approached the entrance.
He glanced back to check on the two runners and make sure they were still headed away and hadn’t had a change of heart. He wasn’t sure what was going on inside, but he didn’t need that clown waiting out here for him with a shotgun. They had made it farther than he’d expected, and he was pleasantly surprised to see them still moving at a good pace away from the building.
Ben opened the door cautiously and made his way into the building, fighting the urge to rush with every move. His heart pounded in his chest. He wasn’t sure if it was from the sprint to the door in the hot sun or because of what he was afraid he might find inside the building.
He didn’t remember it being this dark in here, but he figured it just felt that way compared to the bright sunlight outside. The only light that penetrated the interior of the old metal building was from a rusted-out spot in the roof. One of the roof panels had begun to give way at the seam where it joined another panel, probably from too many heavy snowfalls. This created a three-foot-long crack a couple inches wide that allowed a dust-filled sliver of sunlight down to the concrete floor.
As his eyes adjusted to the lack of light, he noticed Joel and Allie standing over the hole that led down into the tunnel. Gunner was sitting at the edge and looking down as well. The kid’s faces were pale as they stared blankly into the pit.
“Guys, what’s going on?” Ben called across the dimly lit warehouse. He stopped, propping open the door with his foot. If the kids were all right, he wanted to keep an eye on the two outside for as long as he could. Then he’d need to get that shotgun secured.
Allie slowly turned to look at Ben. “He had to do it,” was all she said before glancing back down in the hole.
Ben wasn’t satisfied with that answer at all, and he quickly glanced out the half-open door once more before letting it close behind him.
“What do you mean? Had to do what?” Ben asked as he walked toward them, noticing now that Joel was holding his pistol limply in his hand, both arms hanging motionless at his side.
“He was going to shoot Gunner.” Joel shrugged and shook his head slowly. “I didn’t have a choice, Dad. It just happened.”
“It’s okay, buddy. Are you guys all right? Is anyone hurt?” Ben put his hand on Joel’s shoulder and then looked at Allie. “Are you okay?”
“We’re all fine. Even Gunner.” Allie nodded. “He didn’t get a shot off until after Joel had…well.” Allie paused and shifted her gaze to Joel.
Ben looked over the edge. He saw a body at the bottom of the stairs. It was a younger guy, maybe in his mid-twenties. He was wearing dirty jeans and a blood-stained T-shirt with two bullet holes about a foot apart in his chest. The body was sprawled on the dirt floor. His right hand still clung to a roughly made sawed-off shotgun.
Joel cleared his throat softly. “He came out of the tunnel while I was untying Allie. Gunner started to go crazy, and that’s the only reason he wasn’t able sneak up on us. By the time I turned around, Gunner had him by the arm and was pulling at him. I saw him start to swing the shotgun from us to Gunner and knew I had to do something.” Joel shook as he spoke.
Allie took a ragged breath. “If it wasn’t for Gunner… I think that man would have shot us. I was facing the tunnel and saw him. He was pointing the gun at us, but Gunner caught him off guard.” She rubbed at her wrists.
“You sure you’re okay?” Ben looked at her hands.
“Yeah, just a little rope burn.” Allie tried to act casually, but the look in her eyes told a different story. She was freaked out. And understandably so.
With his hands on their shoulders, Ben guided the two back away from the edge of the tunnel entrance. “You did the right thing, Joel. Don’t ever question that. It’s going to take some time to pro
cess that, but right now we need to keep moving.” He made eye contact with each of them, trying to bring them back to the present. No doubt they were each reliving what had just happened.
Ben didn’t waste any time as he headed down into the hole to retrieve the gun. He wasn’t about to leave the shotgun here. It wasn’t that he wanted it, but rather that he didn’t want the two that had run away to reclaim it when they came back. They might have more guns, but they might not. And if taking this one away prevented them from attacking someone else, he had to do it.
“Keep an eye out at the door for the other two, will you?” Ben asked Joel, hoping that a task would get him firing on all cylinders again.
Joel seemed to come to with a little energy and rushed over to the door. Ben pried the shotgun out of the dead man’s grip and hustled back up the stairs.
Allie was waiting for him at the top and launched herself at him with a big hug. She caught him off guard and almost knocked him over with the impact. “Thank you for coming to get me!”
“Whoa!” Ben staggered around Gunner, who had wandered over to get in on the excitement.
“I knew you guys would find me,” Allie sobbed. “But I was still scared. I… I didn’t know what they were going to do with me.” She released Ben from the bear hug and stepped back, wiping her sleeve across her cheeks.
“We weren’t leaving here without you, sweetie.” Ben gave her a nod and grinned, but he was anxious to keep things moving along and get back to the truck. He headed over to the door that Joel was holding partway open.
“See anything?” Ben looked out over Joel’s shoulder.
“No, nothing,” Joel replied.
Ben put his hand on Joel’s arm. “I’m proud of you,” Ben whispered.
Joel didn’t say anything, but he nodded as he continued looking out the door.
Ben turned to Allie. “Did you leave the stone on purpose?”
