by Ilsa J. Bick
The slam had come from the village hall doors. Two of Finn’s men were bulling their way out with someone else—bloody and battered—who still put up a real fight, kicking and bucking so much that two more men bounded up the steps to help. One jackhammered a very hard, fast, and brutal punch to their prisoner’s gut, bad enough to double him over. Bad enough that Alex, for all the distance between them, heard the gasping cry jump from his mouth as he crumpled and sagged to his knees.
At the sound, she fell to her own. Everything came together, all the pieces: the early warning; why the children were gone; that fleeting scent at the village hall and on this decoy bomb she hadn’t dwelled on, something so minute, barely there at all—and she’d had to hold her grief at bay because there were so many more important things to worry about, like keeping the monster in check and her head from being blown off.
Of course, he’d handled it, fashioned this, labored to make it as flawless and perfect as he could: something that would fool the eye for just long enough. There was no one else capable. She should’ve understood that from the very beginning because of his scent, musk and smoke and spice so rich and sweet and strong, what she’d told herself was only wishful thinking.
But it was real. He’s real. He’s alive, he’s … If she hadn’t clapped both trembling hands to her mouth, she surely would have screamed his name.
Tom.
My God.
They had Tom.
120
He hadn’t lied to Chris. When he cooked up this cockamamy plan, he had one very healthy leg and one that was plenty strong, only slightly gimpy. The timing had worked fine. After the RPGs, that changed. So he miscalculated, didn’t factor in distance, how far and fast he could hobble on a bloody leg with a hunk of metal in it that kept wanting to give out. A lot of time got chewed up while he got the ball rolling, lurched his way to the huge compressor on the roof and then around back, making doubly sure all the outside vents were sealed. The last thing he needed was for the smell of burning thermite and live det cord to leak. He went as fast as he could, but by the time he was gimping back around the building and up the village steps to head for the jail, Finn’s men were halfway across the square—and he just … froze. Like Chris on the plateau: he looked, and the sight of all those Changed stopped him dead a good five seconds. Three seconds too long, as it turned out.
Which was not the plan. First principles, again: hold out bait, entice the enemy, lull them into believing they were safe. The idea was to arm the decoys, set off his incendiary, then hustle back to the real deal—that back room filled with propane tanks, C4, cans of fuel oil, and his homemade ANFO—and keep tabs on Finn while he waited for the thermite three stories above to eat through the floor and into an air conditioning duct where it would set off a long snake of det cord. If something failed along the way—say, the thermite didn’t work or the det cord didn’t ignite—or if it looked like Finn was delayed or ready to leave, all Tom had to do was wait for the right moment and then touch off the explosives himself. So, let Finn discover the fakes. Even if they suspected he’d survived the church, Mellie already thought she had all his bomb-making materials. That was the whole point of putting that small stash under the horse trough back at their old camp to begin with. The decoys here would reassure them they were right. Buy the kids a little more time, and then boom!
Great plan. Sucked about the leg. Anyway, it was bad. Frightened men are brutal. Storming the building, they crowded into the jail where he was desperately monkeying up metal shelves. It took four to pry him off, and they did it with enough violence that the back of his head cracked stone. He still felt the warm wet slither of blood down his neck. The rain of punches and blows was worse. One particularly well-aimed kick nearly buried that metal dagger in his left thigh, and his right flank, the recipient of a steel-toed boot, was screaming. Be lucky not to have busted a kidney. The only consolation? Tom’s eyes brushed Jed’s Timex. Assuming he got the right proportions of ABC to ground aluminum and plaster of Paris, and his math was correct—having experimented with those fire extinguishers enough, he was pretty sure it was—he had about, oh, fourteen minutes left to worry about that.
“Found him in the jail,” the steel-toed kidney kicker was saying, “with the fuel stores. Trying to start these up, but they’re fakes. Just, I don’t know, bread dough or something.”
“There’s nothing?” Finn was much bigger than Tom had guessed from that picture: a wide, imposing giant, all in obsidian-black, with a head that looked chiseled out of stone. On the other hand, Finn might seem huge because Tom was on his knees. Standing slightly off Finn’s right shoulder was that dark-haired boy in white, the one with Finn at the ruined church. Now that he was close, Tom saw how the kid’s savage, red eyes watched Finn with this eerie, quivering attentiveness reminiscent of a really well-trained dog waiting for a command.
“Not a single live bomb?” Finn asked Kidney Kicker.
“What about smoke?” This came from the woman next to Finn. “Cigarettes? Anything burning? It’s how he did it the last time.”
Kidney Kicker pulled a frown. “Nothing like that. We’d have smelled det cord or smokes. No C4 either. Just these fakes. Probably thought he could get us going, running around, looking for the real deal, to buy those kids more time. Even if he tried the cigarette trick, we’ve been here long enough that if there was a bomb, it’d have gone off by now.”
“And we’d all be in hell before we knew we were dead,” Finn said, without a trace of irony. He tossed a look over his shoulder. “Which I’m sure you’d approve of, Yeager.”
“You need my approval?” Yeager’s face was calm, though his hungry eyes raked the face of a boy to Tom’s right. Tom nearly had a heart attack when he first spotted the kid. For a second, he thought, Oh my God, they got him before he could get away. But this boy’s hair was longer, almost to his shoulders. No fresh blood on his face or in his hair, no necklace of blue-black bruises, no cuts or raw flesh. This boy’s eyes were dark brown, almost black, no hemorrhage at all. Chris was lean, but this Changed was gaunt, his sunken cheeks like axheads. Then, of course, there was the very pregnant girl hanging onto the boy’s left arm.
Simon? Which meant the girl was Penny. His eyes ticked to the big blond with the mad red eyes, and he saw the sister’s ghost in the brother’s jaw, the shape of his nose. Has to be Peter.
At the sound of Yeager’s voice, Simon stirred, although without much energy. Tom knew the look. Throw a burlap bag over that kid’s head, slap on plasticuffs, squat him next to a mud-baked wall, and Simon could’ve doubled as a captured Taliban. Finn had broken Simon—and you were talking about breaking a monster.
Yeager saw it, too. To Tom, the old man looked like a weary scarecrow with no straw. “I won’t beg, Finn.” Yeager gestured to the waiting crowd. “We made our choice.”
“In a hurry to die? You’d be amazed how stubborn the body is, Yeager.” Finn turned back to Kidney Kicker. “Anything else?”
“Only his weapons.” The man held up Jed’s Bravo and the Glock 19. “Lucky he was so busy trying to fake us out, he didn’t take a shot. Coupla knives, too.”
“That’s not right.” Mellie gave him a narrow look, her gray eyes careful and suspicious. Other than the blocky square of her head, she didn’t look like her brother. “He had an Uzi.”
“Yeah, and you would know. I saw where you got all my other stuff from under the damn trough,” Tom said, knowing the dismay showed. He tried pulling himself a little straighter, but his stomach grabbed and the words came on a grunt. He braced his middle with one arm. He kept the other hand propped on his right thigh, over that divot of scar from Harlan’s bullet, to keep from falling over. A crazy thought sparrowed: now he had a matched set—scar on the right, scar on the left. “I lost the gun in the explosion at the church.”
“But not your head.” Finn’s right hand rested on the revolver’s pearled handle, his index finger keeping time in a slow, thoughtful tap-tap-tap. Like the tick of a co
untdown. A sheathed parang hung from his left hip. “Mellie said you were smart. I wondered if you’d made it.”
“Yeah, I noticed you wired my tent. What’d you do?” His lips skinned back in a grimace against a jab of pain. “Count left feet?”
“Would’ve, if there’d been any to count.” One of Finn’s bushy white eyebrows arched. “I suppose we have you to thank for all this? No children? Well, but those shots. Does give you the willies, doesn’t it? All those poor kids, so much shish kebab.”
This guy really was an asshole. “No shots now,” he said, and noticed that Simon’s gaze had drifted from his grandfather to the bell tower. The tiniest crinkle had appeared between the boy’s brows, almost as if he’d spotted something. Was one of Finn’s men up there? Well, no big deal. There was only another decoy to find.
“I hope not. But, well, I’ve got your kids.” Finn eyed him. “What tipped it?”
“The trash.” Bracing his side helped as long as he didn’t take too deep a breath. At least he was no longer gasping. The ache in his back was down to a dull roar. Not much longer he’d have to deal with either, though, or Finn. First principles: keep him busy, keep him relaxed, looking at me. All warfare is based on deception. “Cindi always picked up. Not like I’ve never seen IEDs hidden under garbage. I just wish it hadn’t taken me so long.”
“I’m impressed. I mean that, sincerely.” Finn gave him a speculative look with eyes that were colorless and cobra-flat. “That’s twice now you’ve survived. First on the snow, now this. And here I thought you were just another dumb grunt. That’ll teach me. How old are you?”
“Why does that matter?”
“Well.” Finn hooked a thumb at Peter, who only glared mutely. “Let’s just say he’s from the bad section of the Petri dish. If I’m not mistaken, you’re younger.”
“Never.” Tom knew where this was going. The fact that none of them had much longer to argue this didn’t stop the chill from shivering down his spine. “Not in a million years.”
“That’s what I said.” Peter suddenly let go of a broken, brittle laugh. “I fought, I—”
“Peter.” Ernst’s flaccid jowls were streaked with tears. He lumbered a half-step before two of Finn’s men moved in to block him. “Don’t. You’re not to blame.”
“Then who is?” Peter looked at Tom with brimming, vermillion eyes. “You won’t be able to hold out forever. Best thing is to die fast. Cut your throat first chance you—”
“Please be quiet, Peter. We’ve had so many interesting talks, I’d be sorry to lose you now.” Finn’s hand hovered over that Colt, although his eyes never left Tom. “But Peter does have a point. Everyone has a price, an Achilles heel. We just need to find yours.”
“You have my kids. I don’t have anything left for you to take.” He was afraid to glance at Jed’s Timex. Funny how subjective time was, dragging when you most wanted it to fly. He hadn’t lied to Chris. He didn’t want to die. There were the kids and Ellie to live for, and Alex, out there, somewhere. Stay alive, Alex, stay safe. Please understand this was the only way.
“Don’t wish your life away, Tom”—and then there was a rasp of metal against leather, a blur of motion as Finn brought his parang around in a slashing cut that cleaved air with a whistle. A laser burned across Tom’s chest as blood spilled down his front. Crying out, Tom began to fall before Finn got a fist in his hair and that newly blooded blade to Tom’s throat. Tom heard gasps and alarmed cries from the old people. Yeager and Ernst were shouting, trying to work their way up the steps, but it was Peter who broke from his guards and started forward. “Finn, no!”
“Be quiet, Peter,” Finn said. Through a sudden, wavering sheen of tears, Tom saw the big boy’s head snap. A shriek bulleted from Peter’s mouth as he crumpled.
“D-don’t,” Tom managed. His heart hammered. Warm streamers of blood were drizzling to cold stone. A millimeter deeper and Finn would’ve flayed bone. Hold on, Tom, you can stand this. Just a few more minutes. On the other hand, if Finn cut his throat, this would end for him a lot sooner. Six of one, half dozen of the other. “Leave him alone. Your fight’s with me, Finn.”
“We’re fighting? I don’t think so. Look at what you’ve done, the lengths you’ve gone and what you’ve suffered, and then tell me that your fight is with me. Isn’t it with yourself, Tom?”
“Finn!” Yeager strained against men no less old but much stronger. “In the name of God—”
“God left Rule a long time ago. You know the real question, Yeager? How can your god allow for someone like me? Because make no mistake, Tom.” Finn loomed in his sight, huge and terrible. “You may think you’re used up, ready to die. I promise you’re not. The body endures even if the spirit does not. I know where the arteries are, what you really need to survive, how to make you last a very long time. You think you need this?” Finn angled the blade until that keen, silvered edge grazed the underside of Tom’s nose. “Or your eyelids or lips or fingers? Those hands? Believe me, you don’t—”
“Stop!” A sudden, very clear voice, from Tom’s left: “Don’t!”
What? Over the boom in his ears, Tom felt his mind trying to battle its way from this fog of new pain. Above him, he saw Finn’s head snap up, those colorless cobra’s eyes suddenly huge with shock—and was that recognition? Who?
“Wait!” Quick as lightning, Finn let Tom go, whipping around to the sound of weapons being readied. Mellie’s huge Magnum was already in her fist as all of Finn’s men drew down; the guard next to Penny had clambered atop the brownstone balustrade, the better to aim …
“No!” Finn shouted. Half-turning, he spotted the guard on the balustrade and sprang, moving surprisingly fast for an old man, that bloody parang already sweeping up. “Hold your fire, don’t—”
There came a crack, the man jerking off a shot at the precise moment that Finn’s blade caught the barrel of the weapon. Crying out, the man staggered as his shot went wild, and then let out a loud screech as Finn cut the parang in a broad sweep across his middle. A gush of bright red blood spattered stone as the guard clutched at his spurting stomach and crumpled, tumbling from the balustrade.
“No, God!” the guard shrieked. He got a hand up. “Don’t—” Whatever else had been on his tongue died as Finn brought the parang down in a hard chop.
“I said,” Finn roared, as he booted a mighty soccer kick at the guard’s head that sent it rocketing down the village hall steps, “no one fires!”
“Elias?” Still straight-arming her Magnum, Mellie craned a faltering look back, paling at the sight of gouts of thick blood still pumping from the raw stump of the guard’s headless corpse. “What are you—”
“Do what I say!” Finn bellowed, brandishing the dripping parang. “No one fires! Let her through!”
My God, Finn knows her. The realization blazed like a pillar of orange fire from an IED. Still reeling, Tom now saw that Simon—that boy with Chris’s face who had looked so beaten just a few moments ago—was staring with a look of disbelief that was quickly shifting to dismay and dread. On the ground, not far from him, Peter was moaning: “No no no, don’t, this is what he wants, this is what Finn wants.”
They all knew her: Finn and Peter. Simon. But how? No, God. Tom’s heart beat even faster, this time with fresh horror. A terrible cold was creeping through his veins to seep into his brain and bones, and he heard himself moan, felt himself die just a little bit more. No, please, God, don’t do this. Aren’t I enough? What more can I give you? Please, don’t take her, please.
Struggling to his feet, he watched her come: hands up, rifle held high. She was tauter than he remembered. Her expression was tight, steely with resolve. Her eyes were very bright, a brilliant green; her long hair as deeply rich and red as his blood.
She was his breath, and he would give all he had to save her. He could; there was still time to get clear. There was nothing Finn could do about the hidden thermite eating metal, the buckets of homemade ANFO, the redundant coils of det cord that wou
ld, in a very few seconds, spark to life. The bombs would blow. Rule would die, but she didn’t have to. Life with Finn wouldn’t be much of one, but without life, there was no hope—and she was hope, for him, most of all.
But he couldn’t let Finn get away either. There were the kids to think about—and Ellie, only eight, just getting started.
This was Afghanistan again, that day in the blare of sun and on the rocks, with that little boy and girl: an impossible choice.
God, what good is a choice when it isn’t one? When it truly is between two evils, and neither less evil than the other? If I save Alex, Finn gets the kids. If I say nothing and the bombs go …
Choose, Tom. He felt that steady pressure, that hand in his mind, trying to knock him down, make him bend and break. Alex or the children: choose—and do it fast.
Because he and Alex had less than eight minutes left.
121
After they’d taken her weapons, she’d come to stand on his right. As she passed, her hand brushed his, the touch so potent he nearly gasped at the scorch and sudden burn in his heart. When she turned to face Finn, her eyes skimmed his for only a moment, but long enough for Tom to see that minute shake of her head. He wasn’t exactly sure what she was warning him about, but he kept his mouth shut. He wasn’t certain he could trust himself to speak anyway.
“You wanted to find me,” she said to Finn. “Well, here I am.”
“You know this girl?” Mellie asked. Her gray eyes shot to Tom, then to Finn. “How? Where?”
“Oh, here and there.” Wiping his gored parang on the trousers of the headless guard, Finn sheathed the weapon. His cobra-eyes ticked from her to Tom, then back. Finn looked both fascinated—and wary. “You killed one of my best hunters,” he said to her.
“It was an accident.” If there was any fear there, Tom didn’t hear it. But he sensed she was waiting for something, and thought, from the tense line of her jaw, she was working hard, too. But working hard at what? Or is she holding back? “You must not have cared about him too much, or else you wouldn’t have left the body and all his nice gear,” she said. “Thanks for that, by the way.”
