Legion (Southern Watch Book 5)

by Robert J. Crane

  “I’m sorry, Arch,” Dr. Darlington said, and the quiet emptiness settled into him like Midian had died around him. “She’s … she’s dead.”

  Arch stared down at her, into those eyes. Words bubbled up and out, quiet ones that replaced the desperate feel that was clamoring to get out. “Who … can find a virtuous woman? For her price is far above rubies. The heart of her husband doth safely trust in her, so that he shall have no need of spoil. She will do him good and not evil all the days of her …”

  He choked on the last word, and his shoulders heaved, and everything he’d been holding back came out in a terrible howl that split the quiet around him, and Archibald Stan dissolved into sobs, not giving a damn who saw.

  13.

  Hendricks had followed behind Arch, watching, not wanting to intrude on the man’s grief, or on his words with Alison. He was listening, though, and he caught what she said, his mind leaping around a few places with it. It didn’t take him anywhere he particularly wanted to go.

  “What … the fuck?” Erin’s voice came from behind him. He turned to see her there, holding her head, blood trickling down her sleeve, a little pressed into the part of her palm he could see. Blood seemed to be the theme for today, because goddamn if it wasn’t fucking everywhere in this place.

  “You were possessed,” Hendricks said matter-of-factly, turning his back on her to watch Alison take a last breath before she jerked lightly, once. He didn’t want to believe it, but there it was; she was gone, gone in a second, and Arch hadn’t even said goodbye, really.

  “What … happened?” Erin asked, her soft footsteps clicking against the road as she came up on him, drawing nearer.

  “I fucking told you already,” Hendricks growled, and he stalked away from her toward Arch, who was down on his knees, khakis completely stained through with dark liquid. He wandered closer to the man as Dr. Darlington, dressed in some bloody clothes, pulled back and put an arm around her daughter’s shoulder. She looked like she’d been through it today, too, which didn’t surprise him given what had happened before he’d left for the hospital with the others.

  There were a few people moaning and grasping at themselves in the square, but mostly there was just death. He could see another group working their way around, Father Nguyen and Casey Meacham among them, and Amanda Guthrie snaking the long way around, probably hunting any strays. There were still screams in the distance, but other than that, the town was quiet. The lack of sirens gave the air a colder feel to Hendricks, as he stared out across a bloody spectacle of dead kids and parents so gruesome that it would have looked out of place in the war zone he’d been to.

  “God damn it,” Hendricks said.

  “Don’t you go blaming Him for this,” Arch said, out of nowhere. Hendricks had seen the big man’s shoulders shaking and mentally wrote him off. He sure as shit didn’t remember himself as functional enough to answer anything after Renee died, not for a while, anyway. Arch looked up at him. Tears had streaked their way down from the corners of his eyes, but the black man’s voice was strong as he spoke out in a voice that rang across the square. “It wasn’t His doing.”

  Hendricks was about to let loose with a response that likely would have blistered the air, but one look at Arch’s face shut him down. He remembered that feeling, what he saw there, and he couldn’t find it in him to deny the man even a fool’s ounce of solace. So Hendricks just closed his mouth and he watched as Arch slumped back down to mourn his dead wife.

  *

  Reeve had watched it all go down to hell from a few feet away, watched his deputy lose his wife right in front of his eyes, and it froze his ass so still he didn’t even move for minutes and minutes. He just sat there, on the ground, ass against the cold, blood-stained concrete, and watched the world swirl around him, watch everything happen slowly, painfully slowly.

  It was almost like losing Donna all over again.

  He started to come out of it a little bit after Hendricks said his thing and Arch snapped back at him. Reeve expected more out of them both, was about ready to get up and get in there if they needed separating, but the cowboy just left it off, with a pretty curious look on his face. Hendricks had ghosts of his own, that much Reeve knew, and every single one of them was apparent on his face in that moment.

  Reeve got to his feet real slow, hand and ribs aching like a demon had smashed ’em. He took up his sword in the other hand, mainly afraid if he left it here, it’d be gone for good, swept up for evidence or something by whoever came to clean up this mess.

  And looking over it all … goddamn. Who was going to clean up this mess, anyway?

  There was no sound of sirens, no impending ambulances, no Ed Fries rolling up in his car, not even a hint that the volunteer fire department was on its way.

  Midian had gone to hell, all right. There was no help coming, either.

  “Sheriff?” Duncan’s cool voice broke Reeve out of that toxic prison train, and he realized the OOC had no shirt on, his bare chest so glowing white he might as well have applied fluorescent body spray. “We should see to these people.”

  Reeve blinked at him, and he swept the square once. There were survivors; some wounded, some people clutching at parts of their bodies that might have been hit by holy weapons … others crying and holding onto family members that hadn’t made it. Those who could walk looked like they’d gotten out of Dodge, but there was damned sure no shortage of those left behind.

  “Right,” Reeve said, nodding once, hard. Maybe the law said he wasn’t sheriff anymore, but he didn’t see much evidence of the damned law around here, not right now. “Erin?” He called her over and she came, still holding the back of her head and trotting past Hendricks with a sour look. “Dr. Darlington?” She was holding onto Molly tight, standing right next to Alison and Arch, but she turned around to look at him when he called. “There’s people here that still need our help.” He could see Father Nguyen and some of the others working their way over, stopping and helping where they could. Barney Jones, Casey Meacham, Chauncey Watson, Mike McInness—a few others. Melina Cherry was just down the row from him as well, and she looked like she had a few people she was tending to.

  Donna was dead. And even though Reeve had failed in every way, Alison Stan had risen up from certain death and sent the bastard that did the job right back to hell, like a gift-wrapped package for him and a reminder all in one.

  This town wasn’t dead, not yet.

  “We got a lot to do here,” Reeve said and went to lead the way.

  *

  Braeden Tarley didn’t even realize he was sitting until an older black man came up to him and asked him in a soft voice, “Are you all right?”

  Braeden blinked, like he was waking up from a long-ass sleep, coming out of the worst nightmare he’d ever fucking had, and he looked up at the man who spoke to him. He knew him, vaguely, as the pastor of one of the churches in town. He was looking down at Braeden with warm eyes, rimmed with concern. He’d extended a hand and it came down right on Braeden’s shoulder as the pastor squatted down next to him. “You hear me?”

  “I hear you,” Braeden said, his voice all rough, like he hadn’t used it before. Or maybe he’d used it too much. He looked at the man, the pastor, blinking a few times hard. His throat was raw, Braeden finally realized, like he’d taken a sip of acid. “I hear you all right.”

  “You okay, then?” the pastor asked, trying to look him in the eye.

  Braeden looked back at him, and brought a hand up, itching at his nose with the back of his hand. It was wet, soggy, and snot dripped right out onto his wrist, sticking in the arm hairs poking out of his sleeve. His right hand was just numb, the sleeve shredded. “I … I don’t know,” Braeden said finally.

  “You, uh …” The pastor looked around. “You here with anyone?”

  Braeden just closed his eyes. “I was here with my daughter.” He swallowed hard, not a single tear left to cry. “But she’s gone now.”

  *

  Amanda wa
sn’t really bothered by blood and gore any more than these humans would have been bothered by the sight of an animal being butchered. Okay, so maybe some of them didn’t have the stomach to watch that, but it didn’t bother Amanda much. At least, not like it might have before the fiery crucible she’d passed through recently.

  She surveyed the aftermath of the battle with a trace of disdain. Human suffering was pretty unappealing to her, way more gross than blood and entrails, and there was plenty of all of that on display. The milk of human kindness was tasting a little bitter to her at this point, and so she just stood back and tried not to let either the blood or the humanity get on her.

  “You could be of some use,” Duncan said, finally coming over to her long after night had fallen, and after they’d gotten the few survivors out of the square in the back of cars driven by volunteers mostly. The fire department had shown up to help with that, Amanda noticed, but that was about it. She suspected the funeral directors of Midian would be along shortly to get the majority of the business here today. Some of the people who’d escaped were returning now that things were all clear, and that was a whole ’nother mess of humanity that Amanda wanted to avoid.

  Duncan clearly was having similar thoughts. “No ambulances,” he said simply. When she didn’t respond, he went on. “No news cameras.” Still she said nothing. “Something like a hundred people died here, slaughtered by demons, and there’s not a breath of this anywhere, and emergency services beyond the local fire department aren’t even responding.” He turned his head to look straight at Amanda, like he was accusing her of something.

  “How about that.” Amanda didn’t feel compelled to even pretend to act like it was a question.

  Duncan just stared her down. “We’ve been to hotspots before.”

  “You think I’ve forgotten this?”

  “Emergency services don’t fail to respond,” Duncan went on like she hadn’t spoken. “They may fall apart if the network gets too strained, but the ambulances from Chattanooga? They never even responded to the 911 calls. Tennessee Highway Patrol? Didn’t even show up to help, and they would for this kind of emergency.”

  Amanda kept herself from rolling her eyes, but only just. “Yep, it’s a real head scratcher.”

  “You don’t seem too puzzled.”

  Amanda turned her head slowly. “You’re not puzzled, either. You’re just trying to act outraged to draw me out.”

  “This kind of thing doesn’t happen,” Duncan said, and Amanda caught a hint of danger, “not even in hotspots.”

  Amanda just stared back coolly. “Well … this one’s different, I guess.”

  Duncan’s face quivered, his slight jowls getting more pronounced as anger flashed across his face. “Why?”

  Amanda kept it cool as she answered. It had about come time to have this part of the conversation anyway. “Let’s go back to the hotel. We’ll … talk about it.” When she saw Duncan cast a look around, she headed him off. “There’s nothing else you can do here.” She fixed her eyes on the same point he did, where a white sheet was draped over the place where Alison Stan had died, and where Arch was still sitting on the curb, next to her, sitting his own little vigil. “Hell,” Amanda said, taking it all in again, and not really liking what she was seeing on any level, “there might not be anything else you can do anywhere around here.”

  *

  “Hey, Arch?”

  Arch looked up at the sound of Pastor Jones’s voice to find the man standing there above him, next to another fellow. Arch started to get up but Jones held out a hand to stay his action, saying, soothingly, “Just hang right where you are, Arch. It’s fine.”

  Arch did as he was told, running hands over his stubbly head as he stared up at Pastor Jones. He had his doubts that everything could be classed as “fine” or even within a hundred zip codes of what he would consider “fine,” but he stayed sitting on the curb nonetheless, shaded by the half-darkness of the square. They’d brought in cars and flipped their lights, and that was what was shining in from around him, but it wasn’t exactly like daytime around here.

  Arch looked up at the man next to Pastor Jones, and felt a tingle of familiarity as he stared at him. The guy had a right sleeve that looked like it had been all torn up and he was holding his arm at a funny angle. “This is Braeden Tarley,” Jones said, putting his hands on Tarley’s shoulders and steering him down onto the curb right next to Arch. “You mind keeping him company while I go see if I can get him a ride to the hospital? I think his arm might just be broken.”

  “Sure,” Arch said, nodding, staring at the monument straight ahead. He’d already half forgotten about Braeden Tarley, and the man was less than six inches from his shoulder.

  “Braeden just lost his little girl, Arch,” Jones said softly. When Arch looked over, startled, at the man next to him, Jones went on. “Arch just lost his wife, too. You two hang tight, now.” And then Pastor Jones was gone.

  “I remember you from school,” Braeden Tarley said in a terribly scratchy voice.

  “I recall you as well,” Arch said. “Not terribly well, but … I recall you.”

  “I’m sorry about your wife,” Tarley said in a thick voice. “I … lost mine a couple years back. I know how it feels.”

  Arch just sat there for a second, until the appropriate response floated down to him, and the memory of what he’d just heard settled on him. “I’m sorry about your daughter, that’s …” He shook his head. “That’s just awful.”

  “All of this is,” Tarley agreed in that same hollow voice. “And the worst part is …” his voice crackled a little, “… you warned us what was out there. Reeve … he …” Tarley broke it off, his neck sagging.

  “There was no warning for this,” Arch said, keeping his head down. He hadn’t looked back behind him to the sheet that was covering over his wife, not for a while. It was like an itch he kept denying himself to scratch, because that wasn’t really her, not anymore. “No warning at all.” How long had he been sitting here, now? Arch looked around and saw a few of the others moving around here and there. No Duncan, no Guthrie. He wondered idly if they’d survived. Then another question occurred to him, and this one he gave voice to.

  “Where’s Hendricks?”

  *

  Brian Longholt was sitting in his dad’s hospital room, listening distantly to the sound of the heartbeat monitor beep in a steady rhythm. He was holding his mother’s hand, his pain suppressed by the codeine or whatever that the nurse back on his floor had given him when she’d patched him back up. They were sitting in silence, he and his mom, not wanting to discuss what might be happening in Midian, or … the other thing.

  The smell of the hospital reminded Brian of disinfectant or grain alcohol. Maybe more the former than the latter, but either way that, combined with the soft, overly worn hospital gown he was wearing to keep his ass off the cold wheelchair seat was overwhelming his senses a little. He stared out the dark window beyond his father’s bed and listened to it creak against the wind.

  “Hey,” came the soft voice from the door, causing he and his mother both to turn and look. Whatever Brian had been expecting, it wasn’t Hendricks the cowboy, and that caused him to frown hard, instantly, as his mother came to her feet and ran over to give the man a hug.

  “So good to see you, Hendricks,” she said, like she was greeting an old friend, warm and steady. Brian knew that voice and knew it was basically just her trying to contain herself and be the right southern lady she thought she was supposed to be.

  “Hendricks,” Brian said, watching the cowboy carefully. He hadn’t seen the man since he’d rushed off with Arch and Alison to go stop Halloween, and yet here he was, hours later, apparently by himself. There was fresh bruising along the cowboy’s neck, Brian noticed, looking like a shadow or smudge of dirt just above his t-shirt’s collar.

  His mother noticed it, too. “Good heavens,” she said, and did the mom thing where she touched it, probably trying to assess whether she was going
to need to use mom spit to clean it off or just chide him for being insufficiently careful when fighting for his life with demons. “Are you all right?”

  “Fine,” Hendricks said tersely, and then nodded to the bed. “How’s Bil …”

  He didn’t even get Brian’s father’s name out all the way before he must have pieced together his own answer. Brian watched it come to him, the bad news, the ugly truth, that same sinking, sick feeling Brian and his mom had been dealing with for over an hour now.

  The respirator was gone, and Brian’s dad’s eyes were open again, fluttering, responding to the stimuli of Hendricks speaking. He grunted, looking at the wall, like he had since he’d woken up. It was a guttural noise, and it didn’t seem to make any kind of sense.

  “Is he …?” Hendricks’s voice trailed off, looking at Bill in the bed, whose head was cocked to the side, staring at a blank space of wall and making noise like he was conversing with a monkey.

  Brian’s mother’s hands flitted back to her side and she turned away from the cowboy. “Well, now,” she said, and that was it, like she couldn’t find a polite enough way to say it.

  So Brian did. “He’s brain damaged,” he said simply, just got it out there. I shot my father in the head and now he’s brain damaged, probably a step above a vegetable for the rest of his life, which is likely to be much shorter than the average because he’s probably never going to walk again. He just stared at Hendricks and basked in his own discomfort and guilt, because he didn’t even have the balls to say that out loud, even though he was sure Hendricks was thinking it.

  He knew his mom sure was.

  “So, Hendricks,” Addy said, coming back around, forcing a smile, “what brings you back to us at this hour?”

  Brian was watching the cowboy, still stuck on the simple truth rolling in his head, and he almost missed it.

  Almost.

  Hendricks’s face fell, almost imperceptibly, at the asking of the question. He didn’t want to be here, Brian realized, and his mind made the next leap for him, just as quick, and he said it out loud the way he hadn’t had the guts to say the other: “Alison.”