by Paul Moxham
“Wave it around!” Kenneth shouted, still trying to find the pistol.
As the mountain lion circled the campsite, a little cautious now but far from defeated, Derek took one side of the camp and waved his glowing stick around while Molly took the other side.
Kenneth finally found the pistol and, gripping it in his hand, glanced around to assess the situation. He didn’t want to waste a bullet if it wasn’t necessary. He snatched a stick from the fire, waved it about, and stomped his feet. The animal continued to circle a little closer, red eyes gleaming as it searched for a shadowy approach.
“We can’t go on like this forever,” Derek muttered.
“What are we going to do?” Molly asked. “Agh!” She cried out as the mountain lion threw caution to the wind and lunged.
As Molly backed up near the fire, she tripped over a log and landed flat on her back. Kenneth leveled the weapon and squeezed the trigger. With his pounding heart bouncing his arms around, the bullet spat up the dirt a good yard in front of the animal.
The mountain lion gave a confused yelp and sprinted faster, right over Molly as she cringed and covered her face. Without so much as a parting growl, the creature kept running and raced back to the treeline. Kenneth kept his weapon pointed after him until his fatigued arms finally gave out. He dropped his knees to catch his breath as Molly slid close to him.
“Thanks, Kenneth.”
“Do you think it will come back?” Derek asked.
“Probably not,” Kenneth replied.
“I don’t think I’ll be able to get back to sleep,” Molly said, sitting down. “And if I do, I’ll probably dream about mountain lions attacking me.”
Kenneth smiled. “If we build up the fire really big, I’m sure that will scare the lion if it does choose to come back.”
“I’ll help get some more branches,” Derek said.
Molly stood up. “I’ll go too. I don’t want to be left by myself.”
“Okay, we’ll all go.” Kenneth took the pistol and flashlight and headed in the opposite direction of the hungry creature.
~*~*~
Logan stared in frustration as the police helicopter continued to ascend. Suddenly, the aircraft started to descend.
“What’s happening?” Jet asked, surprised.
Logan shook his head. “I don’t know, but—”
“Look! The tail rotor stopped,” Xavier yelled.
Muscles barred his teeth. “What a piece of luck for us.” He glanced around, and spotting some tables and chairs, he hurried over to them. The others followed. They hid behind the furniture.
As the helicopter touched down, everyone checked their weapons to make sure they were working properly.
“What’s the plan?” Logan said.
“Take out the pilot. Once he’s out of the way, Sanchez will be stranded on the roof,” Muscles said.
“But he still has Lucy,” Xavier argued.
“You’ll have to rescue her then,” Muscles replied, watching as the pilot climbed out of the machine. He glanced at Logan. “You and Xavier have one minute to get to Lucy. After that, we’ll open fire on the pilot.”
Logan nodded as he and Xavier ducked down and skirted around the tables and chairs, past a number of empty crates, and toward the other side of the roof. He looked at his watch. He had thirty seconds left. He glanced at Xavier. “Cover me.”
Xavier nodded. He watched as Logan waited for the pilot to climb up a small step ladder and examine the tail rotor before he bent down and scurried toward the helicopter.
Chapter 29
Xavier waited for the commotion to start. He didn’t have to wait long. Shots punctured the silence. He watched as Logan threw open the door to the front seat and grabbed Lucy.
Lucy seemed to be struggling with someone. Logan reached into the machine and fired a shot. As more shots erupted at the rear of the helicopter, Xavier spotted the pilot leaning against the side of the machine, one hand clutching his chest. The other held a pistol.
Bullets thwacked against the metal of the machine and pierced it. Xavier watched in horror as drops of liquid dripped out.
A shot to the left of him made Xavier spin toward Logan. Sanchez stood at the front of the helicopter with a pistol in his hand. Not wasting time, Xavier pelted the area with bullets. Sanchez ducked before disappearing into the blackness.
Xavier waited, his heart racing, as Logan and Lucy rushed away from the helicopter. At the same time, the pilot slumped to the ground. A second later, a bullet tore into the machine where the liquid was dripping.
A massive boom ruptured the area. The helicopter exploded in flames. Debris flew everywhere. The force of the blast threw Logan and Lucy to the ground.
“Hold on!” Xavier ran to them and helped Lucy to her feet. “Are you all right?”
Lucy slowly nodded. “I think so.”
Logan looked at his fiancée. Her dress was dirty and blood dripped from a wound on her forehead, but she was alive. He clutched her tightly, not wanting to let her go. “I missed you so much.”
“Watch out!” Xavier yelled. Sanchez, bloody and battered, emerged from the smoke and flames and stalked towards them. Xavier pushed Logan and Lucy to the ground and pulled the trigger.
Nothing happened. It was empty.
Sanchez opened fire. A round tore through Lucy’s arm. She cried out in pain.
“Run!” Xavier shouted out as he tried to get away from the madman.
Sanchez limped after Xavier, only to pause as Muscles, along with the rest of the team, emerged from the darkness and opened fire.
The bullets smacked into Sanchez’s legs and arms and he crumpled to the ground. Muscles strode forward and fired twice more.
Sanchez released his grip on the pistol and his head sunk to the ground. Logan, still holding Lucy, advanced to the fallen body.
Muscles kept his finger on the trigger as he approached. He picked up Sanchez’s gun and put both weapons in his pocket. Everyone stopped a few feet from the body.
“Is he dead?” Xavier asked.
“Looks like it,” Muscles replied as he knelt down. He wasn’t one to gloat, and even though he knew Sanchez had been a cruel man, he felt sorry for the way he had died. It would have been nice to get some closure on why he had done what he had.
He frowned. Sanchez was clutching something in his hands. Muscles reached forward and grabbed them to pull them apart.
Sanchez opened his eyes and grinned. “See you in hell.”
Muscles ground his teeth when he noticed a steel pineapple in Sanchez’s hand. The pin was out, but the spoon hadn’t been released. As Sanchez gave a final sigh and his eyelids closed, he opened his palm completely.
Muscles glanced up at the others, who appeared to be frozen in shock. “Run!”
Jet hesitated for a brief second, but Xavier grabbed him and fled.
“I love you, son!” Muscles cried with an eerie calmness.
A second later, the concussion bowed the rooftop. Everyone got knocked to the ground by the force of the explosion. After a few moments, they stood back up.
Jet, his expression one of shock, stumbled toward the gruesome scene. His body was tense as he saw the bloody remains of his father. “No!” He ran toward Muscles, whose lifeless body was lying next to Sanchez’s.
“Wait!” Xavier tried to grab hold of one of Jet’s arms, but the teen pushed him away.
“Let me go!” Jet screamed as he hurried to his father’s body. He knelt down and took hold of his wrist. As he cried out a few moments later, the others decided to let him have some space.
Logan sighed. “What a horrible way to go.”
“Are you okay?” Xavier asked, glancing at Lucy.
Lucy bobbed her head as she shared a glance with Logan. “I’m all right now.”
In the glow of the subsiding flames, the surviving members of the group walked over to where the tables and chairs were and sat down. All of them were shocked. They were still trying to digest what had happen
ed when a shot rang out.
Logan leaped to his feet and reached for his pistol. “You don’t think he—”
“I hope not,” Xavier interrupted, also leaping to his feet.
The two of them raced past the smoldering wreck of the helicopter and saw Jet standing by the remnants of Sanchez, a shaking pistol in his hand.
Jet tossed it to the ground in anger and turned around to face the others. “What?”
“I’m sorry for your loss,” Xavier said.
“Sorry for my loss? What good is that?” Jet screeched. “Is that going to bring him back?”
“No, but at least you can be grateful to him,” Logan said.
“Grateful for what?” Jet spluttered. “Grateful for divorcing my mother when I was just a kid? Grateful for having to sleep on the streets for more than a year?”
Logan tried putting a hand on Jet’s shoulder, but he threw it off. “I don’t need your sympathy,” the teen said.
“You’re upset. You’re young—” Xavier said.
“I’m not a kid. I’m seventeen,” Jet interrupted.
Logan, who had been studying the dead bodies, looked at Jet. “He means your father saved your life. That’s what you should be grateful about.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Jet roared and cried at the same time, in only the way a teenager could.
“Look!” Logan pointed to how close Muscles shredded torso was lying to Sanchez’s. “If we had time to run away, why didn’t he?”
“I don’t know,” Jet admitted. “But what difference does it matter now?”
“He saved you. He saved all of us.” Logan looked at Jet. “I saw more than my share of grenades and suicide bombs while I was in Iraq and I realized one thing—a M67 grenade, which is the one that Sanchez had, is fatal to anyone within fifteen feet. There is no way that we were more than ten feet away when it went off.”
“What are you saying?” Jet said, his brow furrowing. “That it wasn’t a M67?”
Logan solemnly gazed at Jet. “Muscles jumped on the grenade, putting it between him and Sanchez. He took the blast for us.”
Jet was stunned. He looked at Muscles and then at Sanchez. “He... sacrificed himself?”
Logan carefully squeezed his shoulder. “For better or worse, he was the type of guy who didn’t hesitate when something had to be done. No matter the cost.”
Jet dropped beside his father’s body. Everyone looked away while he wept. “Why did you do it, Dad? Why did you have to be the one to die?” He rested his head upon his father’s chest and cried.
Logan and Xavier gave him some space and leaned over the edge of the roof. All was darkness below. All was silent.
“What do you think is happening down there?” Xavier asked.
“Confusion. Chaos, more likely. Hell, I don’t know,” Logan admitted. “What worries me is how we’re going to get down from here.”
“The stairs are the only way.” Xavier sighed.
“Yeah, but what happens when we reach the lobby? We’re almost out of ammunition and a few of us are wounded. I just don’t see us getting past a group of determined men.”
“So what if we don’t?” Xavier asked.
“What do you mean?” Logan replied, frowning. “As soon as we go down the stairs—”
“We don’t, at least, not yet.” Xavier hesitated. “I’ll have to have a talk with Lucy. She might know how committed Sanchez’s men are.”
Using the light of the moon, the two walked back to the bodies of Sanchez and Muscles. Jet was no longer there. Assuming that he had gone back to the others, they walked toward the chairs and tables. There, in the glow of a flashlight, everyone was talking about the last twenty-four hours.
“We heard about Muscles. Did he really sacrifice himself?” Lucy asked.
Logan sighed as he rushed up to her and put an arm around her. He kissed her on the cheek. “Yes, and all because Sanchez had the grenade.”
“He waited till the last possible moment, until we were right there,” Xavier said. “He was downright evil to the very end.”
“So, what’s the plan now?” Jet asked.
“Well, thanks partly to your father, Carlos Sanchez is dead. The question that remains is how fanatical are his followers?” Logan glanced at Lucy. “Do you think his guards are the sort of people that’ll just cut their losses and run? Or will they fight to the death?”
Lucy looked down at the ground as she thought. “Sanchez was a dictator. You were either with him or against him. And if you were against him, you fled the city.” Tears welled in her eyes. “I remember this one woman. She was caught stealing some food. She said she had a young son who was starving. She pleaded with Sanchez to spare the child but …” Lucy sobbed. “He got the boy and shot him right in front of her.”
As Lucy wept, Logan held her tight. “I didn’t mean to make you cry.”
Lucy shook her head. “I know you didn’t. It was just so awful.”
“Okay, don’t think about it any longer.” Logan turned to the others. “If we head downstairs now, we’ll get slaughtered. It seems clear to me that we need to spend the night here and wait it out. I have a feeling that once they realize that Sanchez is dead, his followers will leave The View.”
“But what if they don’t?” Jet said. “If we wait it out here, come morning, we might find ourselves up against a tougher group of men.”
“Let’s put it to a vote, what do ya’ say?” Logan raised his hand. “Raise your hand if you want to stay here for the night.”
Everyone except Jet raised their hands.
“Okay, we’ll stay.” Logan glanced at his watch. “We should have time to grab some food from the party room. We don’t want to be starving when we wake up in the morning.”
“Where are we going to sleep?” Jet asked.
“I say one of the suites farthest away from the staircase,” Logan said.
“Why there?” Xavier questioned.
“If someone comes searching for Sanchez, they’ll search the party room, the penthouse suite, and maybe one of the rooms next to it,” Logan replied. “But hopefully, not every single room, least not the room farthest away from the penthouse suite.”
“Sounds good,” Xavier said. “I didn’t feel like walking down all those stairs again, especially with this flashlight.” He glanced at the light, which was slowly fading. “Let’s hurry before it decides to die completely.”
Everyone stood up, and after one last glance at the smoldering helicopter, they walked toward the rooftop door.
Chapter 30
Xavier’s eyelids were almost closed as Logan walked over. “I’ll take over now.”
“Thanks.” Xavier stood up and yawned. “I’ve been trying to keep awake, but I’m not the young man I once was. All this climbing, running, it’s getting to me.”
“I thought you did pretty well today. You kept up with the rest of us,” Logan said, sitting down next to the door.
“Barely. Anyway, I haven’t heard anything since I took over, so we should be safe to move in a few hours.” Xavier gave Logan his pistol. “Here, just in case anything happens.”
As Xavier walked over to the bed and lay down, Logan stood up, softly opened the door, and peeked out. He saw no one. He slipped out into the hallway and closed it behind him.
Light was shining in at the far windows, which was a good thing, as their flashlight had finally died in the middle of the night. He reached the staircase and glanced down. It was still silent. He waited for a few minutes to see if someone came up them, but no one did. Not wanting to risk it any further, he strode back to the room and opened the door.
After sliding it closed, he sat down beside it and thought about where they could hide out. He suspected that San Francisco would return to its normal state, at least the normal state it was in before Sanchez took charge, but in the meantime, it’d be best to leave the city.
There was a slim chance that some vigilante would come after them for killing Sanc
hez, and he didn’t want to be part of any more killing. He glanced at his watch and saw that it was now January the twenty-fifth. He’d arranged to meet his brother on the twenty-seventh at Stinson Beach.
They would need to find a working vehicle and see if the Golden Gate Bridge was still standing. If it was, they’d head that way up the coast to Stinson Beach. If it wasn’t, they’d have to go the longer route around San Francisco Bay.
Hearing movement, Logan looked up and saw his fiancée approaching. He smiled and put an arm around her as she sat down beside him. Her long, blonde hair was messy and her dress was smudged with blood, but her smile still looked beautiful. It was what had attracted him to her in the first place, as well as her kind nature.
Lucy rested her head on Logan’s shoulders. “I was tired, but I couldn’t sleep.”
“I know the feeling. And this alien invasion isn’t helping matters.”
Surprised, Lucy poked her head up and looked into his eyes. “I didn’t know you still got those nightmares.”
Logan hesitated. “I was going to tell you on our wedding day, but you know how that turned out.”
Lucy sighed. “Yes, that was a day I’ll never forget.”
“Do you want to talk about what happened?” Logan asked. Lucy didn’t say anything, so he continued talking. “I’m here for you, you do know that, right?”
Lucy smiled and kissed him. “Yes. And I’ll tell you. Just not here. Not now. I fought so hard to get rid of those memories that I don’t want to revisit them just now. I want things to get back to normal.”
Logan squeezed her tight. “Normal. That’s a word I never used to use.”
“You never realize how good something is until you lose it,” Lucy said.
“That’s for sure,” Logan replied, running a hand through Lucy’s blonde hair. “I knew I loved you, but I didn’t know how much.”
“How much?” Lucy asked, grinning.
Logan grinned back. “I’ll show you later when we’re all alone. But here’s a taste of what to expect.” He leaned forward and, holding her head in his hands, kissed her on the lips.
