Sunfall (Book 3): Impact

by Gideon, D.

  “Only for twenty minutes or so, and that’s if we’re lucky,” the Warden said. “Let’s move.”

  “You kids make sure you come back with the same amount of holes you got now,” Fish said, following them across the bay with a big squeegee propped on his shoulder. “I don’t want blood on my floor.”

  “That’s the goal,” the Warden said, and then they were out in the darkness.

  Preacher glanced up at the sky as they hurried across the parking lot and out into the grass. The sky was completely clear, and moonlight poured down, painting everything in a silvery light. If it weren’t for the slap of their steps in the standing water and the big branches strewn across the lot, you’d never have known there was a hurricane going on just minutes ago.

  Or that it was coming back.

  The corner of the prison’s land butted up against the back corner of the Rec Center’s land. Preacher thought it was a strange setup, given the law’s insistence that no criminals be anywhere close to where children would be learning or at play. Most felons wouldn’t be able to live in a house this close, and here was an entire prison full of them. Then again, the rules never seemed to apply to the government; they did what they wanted.

  Not this time.

  The prison’s drive ran along the Rec Center’s property, but since the Guard had been kind enough to take their quick-deploy fence with them, the group was sticking to the grass. A group of men jogging across the asphalt would be too noisy. As they crept across the slim field between the buildings, the gym doors banged open and a few people stepped outside.

  In the front, Marco gave an arm signal for everyone to get down, and the group crouched in the tall grass.

  More people stepped outside. A couple lit cigarettes. A few jogged for the porta-potties, yelling back about the smell from those that had been knocked over in the storm. One man walked about ten feet away from the door, faced the prison, and started urinating. He whistled a tune and flipped a finger over his shoulder to someone complaining about how close he was. More men joined the first, as if at a line-up of invisible urinals.

  Preacher held his breath. If anyone moved and caught one of these men’s eyes, they’d lose the element of surprise.

  A woman’s voice rang out, calling the urinating men pigs, and the first guy finished up with a happy sigh. Preacher could hear his zipper from here.

  “Be glad I only had to piss!” The man called back as he turned and walked back into the gym.

  They crouched there, for excruciatingly long minutes, as each of the men finished up, chatted a bit, and made their way back inside.

  Preacher heard a low murmur ahead of him and waited for it to be passed back.

  Father Bill turned and repeated the message. “Now, to the corner,” he said in a soft voice. “Low and slow, like we practiced.”

  Preacher turned and repeated it to Trench, and so it went down the line.

  That was something Marco had pounded into their heads earlier: No whispering. All communications while they were outside were to be done man-to-man, in low conversational tones. A whisper, he explained, turned every word into a hissing sound, and that attracted as much attention as shouting.

  Preacher did his best to keep up with the little man in front of him, but waddling was slow going. A man his size wasn’t meant to crouch and walk at the same time. He kept his head down and his eyes on Bill’s heels. The big pair of bolt cutters he was carrying kept tipping him off-balance. His knees were screaming. This was part of why he’d run so much while he was incarcerated--to keep his muscles flexible. Nearly a decade of only riding motorcycles had done a number on his legs.

  One foot in front of the other. Just keep going.

  A hand squeezed his shoulder. “We’re here,” Marco’s quiet voice said. “Stand up.”

  Preacher looked up and found that he’d followed Bill past the Center’s solar panel array and right up to the backside of the building. Here, on the opposite side of the gym’s exit, there were no doors.

  “So much for everyone being asleep,” Trench murmured as he stood and stretched.

  “It doesn’t change anything,” the Warden said, looking at the sky. “We still have to go in. Sure would be nice if Teddy showed up to save the day with that APC right about now.”

  “A Hail Mary like that only happen in the movies,” Father Bill murmured.

  The moonlight was bright enough that Preacher could see lines at the edges of the Warden’s eyes and his mouth set tight with worry. They’d only gone about a football field’s distance and had planned on it taking about five minutes, but that was walking at normal speed across the uneven ground. The waiting, and the sneaky crouching thing had eaten time. To Preacher it felt like an hour, but he knew his knees were lying to him.

  “Front corner, go,” Marco said, and the group set off. They jogged to the corner of the building and crouched down again. Marco peeked his head around the front of the building and back, then looked again. After a few heartbeats, he held up his hand and slipped around the corner.

  “We’re coming, Dotty,” Father Bill murmured. “Lord willing, we’re coming.”

  A whisper started through the trees near the highway. The wind was picking back up.

  “I think we’re running out of time,” the Warden said.

  “We just have to get inside. We can make it back through the storm,” Bill said.

  “It’ll just be a lot harder if we can’t see,” Trench said.

  “We’ll make it,” Bill insisted.

  Marco appeared beside them, low and silent. “There’s two guards in the lobby, on the couches. They’re both asleep.”

  “Not for long,” Preacher said.

  “We know others are awake now. We should use the pipe bombs,” Marco said.

  The Warden shook his head. “We stick with the plan. Hurt no one that isn’t trying to hurt us.” He looked at each man, and they nodded. “Alright then. Weapons ready. Preacher, you’re in front.”

  They’d agreed on this beforehand. Preacher’s job was to get through the doors while the others covered him. They’d head for the restroom and he’d cut the lock, if necessary. Bill insisted that it was just an old-fashioned pin lock, but the Warden didn’t put it past Frank to slap a padlock on it at night. They’d hoped they could get in without waking anyone. Looked like that wasn’t going to happen.

  Preacher swung around the corner and sprinted to the portico. He saw the sleeping figures inside, shotguns draped loosely across their chests. Footsteps pounded past him. The Warden took position behind a column and aimed his rifle at the sleeping men.

  “Ready,” the Sheriff said. Five more voices echoed him.

  The trees answered back with a sound like a distant waterfall and Preacher felt a gust of wind push at his legs.

  “Wakey wakey,” he muttered, and swung those bolt cutters for all he was worth.

  Dotty

  Voices calling for people to get back inside came faintly through the walls. Dotty heard the heavy gym door swing shut, and tugged harder on the zip-tie connecting her ankle to the baseboard heater. It creaked, but didn’t budge.

  The door swung open and Cathy came in, muttering something about men being pigs. Her flashlight beam hit Dotty square in the face.

  “Wind’s picking back up,” she said. “Looks like Frank was wrong. He needs to come get you the hell out of my room. You stink.”

  Crashing glass made them both jump. Cathy dropped the flashlight. Shouts to stay down boomed through the hall.

  “They’re here!” A man yelled. “They’re he-”

  He abruptly fell silent.

  They’re here! They came!

  Cathy cursed and scrabbled for her flashlight, kicking it across the floor in her hurry. Dotty yanked her leg frantically.

  “Quit that!” Cathy yelled. “Frank! Frank! She’s tryin’ to get free!”

  The gym doors slammed open against the wall of Cathy’s room and heavy footsteps pounded by. Someone was beating on somet
hing. Gunshots fired. A man roared. More gunshots.

  “She’s not in here!” Dotty heard Preacher shout.

  The door crashed open and Wilhelm aimed a pistol at her. “Get up!” he screamed.

  “I can’t!” she yelled back, holding her hands up. She yanked her leg to show him.

  “Get her out of my room!” Cathy yelled. “Get her out before they come in here and shoot me!”

  More gunshots. Men were screaming orders. Someone howled in pain.

  Wilhelm spat a curse and holstered his pistol. He pulled a small folding knife from his pocket and started for her.

  Dotty screamed as loud as she could. “Bill! Back here! I’m back here!”

  Cathy slapped her across the face so hard it knocked Dotty’s head into the wall. “Shut the hell up! You’re not getting me killed!”

  “Pin her,” Wilhelm said. “Pin her down.”

  Cathy stepped on Dotty’s wrists and shoved down on her shoulders. Dotty screamed in pain. Cathy hit her again, three times. “Shut up, shut up, shut up!”

  Dotty wished, for probably the fiftieth time since Frank had dragged her in here, that she had her makeshift club. He’d come into her restroom cell before it was even dark, almost panic-like in his insistence that she had to be moved immediately. It had just occurred to him that her family might use the storm as cover for an attempt a break-out. Neither she nor Cathy had been happy about his decision of where to hide her.

  Wilhelm levered his bulk down and sawed at the zip-tie. His knife slipped off and he cut her getting it back into place.

  “Tell me again why we needed to have the lights off?” he muttered. The zip-tie popped free and she kicked. She struck something, and he yelped and fell over.

  “God damnit!” he barked. “I’ll shoot you myself!”

  “Simon,” Frank’s voice boomed from just outside the open door. “You don’t want to do this. You’re already getting people hurt.”

  “I do want to do this,” Bill called back. “Where’s Dotty?”

  Dotty tried to scramble to her feet, but Wilhelm’s bulk pinned her legs. “Bill!” she screamed. Cathy clubbed her in the back of the head with the flashlight. Dotty’s vision flashed white.

  “This is suicide, Father. You’re out-planned and out-gunned,” Frank yelled. “And doesn’t your God say something about not killing?”

  Dotty felt a meaty hand wrap around her bicep and Wilhelm yanked at her arm. “Get up! Now!”

  She got her feet under her and stood, pushing against the wall. The room swam. A cold, hard barrel pressed into her spine and Wilhelm hissed in her ear. “Walk. Walk out there.”

  She stumbled forward, her legs threatening to buckle.

  “You guys okay?” Simon called.

  “I’ll live,” Preacher called back.

  “Just surface wounds,” Dotty heard Marco call out.

  The kids are here? They brought the kids? No. No!

  She grabbed hold of the doorframe and leaned her head on her bound wrists. She just needed a second for the dizziness to fade.

  “Further!” Wilhelm hissed. “Out in the hall. I want them to see this.”

  “Kenny what the hell are you doing?” Frank said, and Dotty looked up to see him in a doorway directly across the hall, pistol at the ready.

  How can I see him?

  “Ending this,” Wilhelm said. He shoved her and she stumbled out into the hall. She blinked hard against a bright light aimed directly at her. That’s how she could see him. Someone at the other end of the hall had some type of flood light. She held up her hands to shield her eyes.

  “Dotty? Honey, walk to my voice,” Bill said.

  A thick arm wrapped around her throat. “She’s not walking anywhere,” Wilhelm said next to her ear. She could smell his fetid breath, feel his sweaty face against her temple. The barrel of his gun pressed into her cheek.

  She froze.

  I will not die like this in front of William, she thought. I won’t.

  She moved her fingers quickly, walking the front of her shirt up free from her jeans. Her knees were trembling.

  “Let her go, Kenny,” Simon called. “Let her go, and this all ends. You go back to doing your thing, and we go back to doing ours.”

  “Get the hell out of my way you fat bas-” Cathy hissed, and she must have shoved Wilhelm forward. Dotty dangled for a moment, held up only by his big arm around her throat, and then got her feet back under her.

  The gym doors banged open behind them and Dotty heard the sound of running footsteps.

  “Your loyal friend Cathy just took off,” Frank said over his shoulder, and from deeper in the room, Cindy spat a string of curses back at him.

  “This is how it’s going to go,” Wilhelm called out. Thunder boomed overhead as if to stress his words. “You’re going to put down your guns and surrender, or I’m going to execute her, right here, right now.”

  “And then what?” Simon called back from the darkness behind the spotlight. “You put us all in front of the firing squad tomorrow?”

  “An armed attack on government officials and law enforcement officers? A firing squad is better than you deserve,” Wilhelm spat.

  Shadows streaked across the light, and Frank’s gun jerked in that direction but didn’t fire. “Joe? Was that you?” he called.

  “I’m in the map room,” a man called back. “Someone just ran by the door.”

  Frank cursed.

  “I think the story is more like Crazed madman attempts dictatorship, citizens correct the problem,” Simon called. “Let her go.”

  Dotty pulled the tactical pen down from the elastic band of Ripley’s sports bra, felt for the tip, and gripped it upright in her fists.

  “How many men did you bring with you, Simon?” Frank called. “The minute you came through that door I had men going out the back to circle behind you. You’re surrounded.”

  “Yeah, shame about that,” Simon said. “We were hoping not to hurt anyone. But when they came around the corner shooting, my deputies outside had no choice. You sent those men to their deaths.”

  “He’s lying,” Frank whispered to Wilhelm. “The last of his deputies took off last week.”

  “Oh for God’s sake!” Cindy yelled. “Just shoot! Shoot the light! Shoot her!”

  “You’ve got until the count of three-” Wilhelm started.

  “Don’t do it,” Simon interrupted. “You kill her, and we’ve got no reason to keep from filling you full of lead.”

  Wilhelm growled. “Put your guns down!” he screamed.

  “No,” Simon said.

  The gym door creaked open and Dotty felt Wilhelm’s arm tighten as he turned his head to look.

  “What-” Frank started, and then went silent. There was a strange sound, like someone stepping on Rice Krispies. Wilhelm let out a high-pitched screech.

  Dotty dropped all of her weight and jabbed the tactical pen as hard as she could into that fat arm squeezing her throat. Wilhelm screeched again. The arm disappeared and she fell to the floor.

  A gunshot rang out and a heavy weight landed on her, pinning her down. More gunshots fired as she scrabbled to crawl out from under whatever was on top of her. Her ears were ringing. Shadows raced in front of her and she blinked hard to clear her vision.

  The weight rolled off and hands grabbed her shoulders. Someone lifted her up, and she struck out blindly with the pen. She felt it hit something and shoved hard against it, trying to drive it in.

  “That really hurts, Miss Dotty,” Marco’s voice said, but the sound was compressed and far away. “Could you please stop?”

  She opened her eyes to find the young man holding her up, her pen sticking into his arm.

  “Give her to me,” Bill said, suddenly beside her. “Give her to me.”

  Marco let go and then Bill’s arms were wrapped around her, and he squeezed her so tight she couldn’t breathe.

  “I didn’t see Cathy,” Preacher said from her other side.

  “Cathy ran,”
Dotty said. She turned her head to look, and gasped. Blood ran down his arm in a sheet, coming from a multitude of shallow wounds in his big bicep. His other hand held a gun.

  “Preacher, you’re hurt,” she said, pushing away from Bill. Even her own voice sounded funny and muffled.

  “I’ve had worse,” Preacher said. He turned slightly to move his arm out of her sight.

  “Hazards of breaching double doors,” Marco said. “By the time you’re through the second set, the guys inside are awake and shooting. I wanted to use the pipe bombs, but the Sheriff wouldn’t allow it.”

  “We had to give them a chance,” Bill said. “There was a possibility they wouldn’t follow orders.”

  “Never count on that,” Marco said.

  Dotty frowned at the distracting chatter. “Preacher, you’ve been shot. Let me look,” she said. She tried to step around the big man to grab his hand, only to have Bill grab hers.

  “No, Dotty you don’t need to see-” Bill said, but it was too late. Her foot hit something and drew her attention down. She pulled in a sharp breath.

  Frank lay crumpled in the doorway, like a rag doll that had been dropped by a careless owner. His head was turned and drooping at an unnatural angle. His mouth hung slack, and vacant eyes stared past her. A large, bloody handprint wrapped around the bottom of his face.

  Dotty looked at Preacher’s bloody hand, then met his eyes, hard and glinting over his still-bruised cheekbone.

  He gave a little nod to her unasked question. “I warned him. He didn’t listen.”

  “And Cindy?” she asked.

  Preacher gestured into the room past Frank with the end of his pistol. “Had to,” he said, his voice laced with disgust. “She was firing at us.”

  Wilhelm lay across the hall, a large hole in his forehead barely trickling blood. His face was frozen in an expression of shock.

  She swallowed down bile and took a deep breath.

  Bill turned her around. “What you did was perfect, Dotty. It was so brave. You gave me the opening I needed.”

  “Opening? What opening?”

  “I couldn’t get a clear shot until you made him let go of you,” Bill said. “Right up to that second I thought we weren’t going to be able to save you.”