“Of course, I will, Dad. We’ll send that bastard straight to hell!”
“And the girl,” he coughed out, “you and she have to get away from here. After…”
“If we survive, of course.”
“No, you will survive, and then you have to make it out, both of you… together…” More coughing, blood collecting on his chin as his body twitched its last. “I love you, my son, more than anything…”
Tears streamed down Ric’s cheeks, his masculine face bending with the frown of a tortured child. “I love you too, Pop, so much…”
“I was always… so proud…”
Jeanell gasped, struggling to withhold her sobs, lest they inspire poor Ric to greater suffering. The young man cradled his dying father, the two looking at each other for what each knew would be the last time. Jeanell knew that there was nothing she could do, nothing either of them could do, except say goodbye forever.
Graham reached up, his quivering hand finding his son’s cheek. Those trembling fingers caressed his beloved son’s face, and then they came to stillness, falling back to his lifeless side.
Ric pressed his forehead against his father’s lifeless face, fingers raising up to slide those eyes shut forever. “G’bye, Pop,” Ric managed to say, tears streaming down his face and sobs bubbling up from his cramping throat.
Jeanell stood there, uncertain what to say or what to do. But she soon lost the luxury of thinking about it.
The chancellor’s men burst into the room from hiding in the closets. One held a smartphone and was about to swipe the screen, carrying them all back to the chancellor himself. Ric was fast to grab the phone and smash it against the wall before doing the same thing with the officer himself.
Ric grabbed the knife from out of one goon’s sheath and swiped at the nearest adversary.
But they weren’t alone.
Jeanell threw herself into the action. She’d never raised a hand in combat before, but it seemed all too easy, too natural. It was like a lifetime of pent-up frustration and fear just came pouring out of her, with an impassioned growl and clenched fists. She was surprised at how much strength she had, legs throwing kicks into those uniformed goons with amazing grace and power. The chancellor’s officers seemed as surprised as she was, but Jeanell wasn’t about to show it.
One of them grabbed her from behind, pinning her arms to her sides while another approached from the front, a greedy smile on his lips. He pulled out his own smartphone, about to swipe her into inescapable confinement. But a swift arc of her leg sent her foot colliding with his hands, sending the phone flying.
A second kick contacted with his forehead, a frontal assault that sent him reeling back. But he wasn’t alone, and Jeanell was still locked in the grip of the man behind her. She threw her head back, hitting the man in the face. He snapped back with a wet, crunchy thud. Jeanell knew she’d done some damage, at least enough to free her from his grip.
Jeanell turned and planed a kick into his gut, the man cramping forward before she could slam her elbow onto the back of his skull, putting the man on the floor at long last.
Ric took a hard strike from one of the jackbooted thugs, leather gloves smashing into his beautiful face. But Ric could take it, and give it back just as well. With gritted, bloodied teeth, he curled up his fist and smashed it into his adversary’s face. Two more punches made the man’s legs buckle and Ric dropped him where he fell.
Ric grabbed Jeanell and they were off again, running out of the apartment and into the hallway, glancing around to make sure the coast was clear. Jeanell cried out, “Why don’t we just hole it somewhere?”
“They ruined my smartphone. Until we get another, we’re on our own!”
They scurried down the flight of stairs, Jeanell’s feet sliding from under her. Her lungs strained to keep pace with her pounding heart, cold sweat collecting on the back of her neck. She looked up and then down, memories of her recent death charge up a similar staircase bursting in her imagination.
Flight after flight passed by around them, each one bringing them closer to freedom. But Jeanell couldn’t help but think that, at the bottom of the staircase, armed guards would be there to capture them, zapping them straight into the arms of that villainous enemy. Or there may be simply a few quick gunshots, bam, bam, bam! and that would be that.
Jeanell knew she couldn’t hope for such an easy outcome.
They spilled out of the staircase to a merciful ambivalence. The pedestrians walked one way or the other, completely disinterested as Ric and Jeanell ran full bore down the street. They weaved in and out of the bored passersby, turning sharp corners and ignoring the complaints and fist-waving of those perturbed pedestrians behind them.
They ran down the street, another humming drone passing by and instantly stopping to change course and follow them. They ducked into an alley, but the drone followed behind them. There was no place to hide, no building inlet and no trash bins, nothing. Jeanell understood why the walls of every building were clear—so there’d be nowhere to hide.
Ric jumped up and grabbed the drone. With a massive growl, he threw the drone into the wall of the building. The clear polyurethane wall cracked and the drone spun off with a drunken whir. Jeanell grabbed the crippled drone and raised it high above her head. A massive release of power smashed the drone onto the ground. The flying disk popped and bounced, but it couldn’t regain a flight pattern and fell destroyed to the ground. The crack in the clear wall healed itself, as if by some miracle of technology. But there was no time to marvel at it, no time to do anything but run.
Ric said, “Nice job,” before grabbing her hand again. “Let’s go!”
“Where?”
“Out of town, as quick as we can!”
CHAPTER TEN
Jeanell and Ric made it through the suburbs and back into the woods outside of Boulder. Jeanell’s legs ached, her mind spinning as she wound up headed in the precise direction she came out of just a day before.
She could only ask, “Where to now?”
Ric glanced around. “Not sure. They’ll be at the particle collider compound, for sure. But there are a few safe areas scattered through the woods where some of our survivors might be.”
“Then why did we go all the way into the city?”
“Safe areas could have been locked down, still might be. Thing is, right now we don’t have much choice.”
“Why don’t we head toward Denver? That’s where the nearest collider is, right?”
“Yeah, that’s a good point. It’s a long way to go.”
“But if we had a smartphone, we could just… what do you call it, hole there?”
“We call it? You invented it, Miss Glenn.”
“Then why don’t we use it? Go back to town, steal somebody’s smartphone—”
Ric said, “Steal? Is that who you are?”
“We gotta do what we gotta do,” Jeanell said. “What’s worse, stealing a phone or letting ultimate evil overrun the globe?”
Ric gave it some thought, nodding and shrugging. “How many times have you swiped somebody’s phone? They don’t just stand there and let you take it. Then we’ll have the local cops on our asses too. And phones don’t even function without thumbprint ID, which we won’t have.”
“Thumbprints?”
“If it’s protected, yes.”
“Then how are we going to get to this chancellor in New York and black hole him up or whatever if we don’t have any phone or anything at all?”
“Not your snotty attitude, that’s for sure.”
They walked on, the mountain seeming to get steeper beneath her aching legs as if out of sheer spite. Jeanell finally said, “I didn’t mean to be snotty, I’m… I’m sorry about that. You’ve gone out of your way for me, I know that.” Ric smiled, nodded, but said nothing as they trudged up the hill. She went on, “I know I’ve messed up your life. I’m… I’m sorry about that.”
“You didn’t,” R
ic said, giving it some thought. “In a lot of ways, you’re the one to make my life right again, all our lives. I’m glad to have met you, Jeanell, and blessed to know you, whatever happens.”
“I hope that’s not as grave as it sounds,” Jeanell said, knowing that her hopes were in vain.
After a few tense moments and some slight progress, Ric asked, “So, how about you?”
“I’m sorry?”
“Well, you know about me, my past, my family. But I don’t know anything about you.”
Jeanell coughed out an awkward chuckle. “Not much to know. Born and raised in Encino, California, in the San Fernando Valley. Parents are still married… well, they were when I last saw them. I don’t suppose I’ll ever see them again.” Jeanell’s blood ran cold.
“Don’t despair,” Ric said. “Nothing is beyond us, Jeanell, not as long as we have each other.”
The words were soothing, creating a warm pit in Jeanell’s stomach, but it soon turned to stone. “Wait a minute,” Jeanell said, “if I’m so famous, you’d know all that, about where I grew up and so forth.”
But before Ric could answer, a bear roared and barreled out of the woods. It sent a shockwave of terror through Jeanell’s body. Her legs froze, body still and paralyzed as the mammoth beast shook its great head, jaw opened and teeth stabbing out of its drooling, pink gums.
“Run,” Jeanell said. “It can’t catch us both.”
“No,” Ric snapped back, “run and we’re both dead. We have to face it down.”
“Face it down? It’s a damn grizzly bear!”
Ric glanced around as the bear roared, sizing up its best first victim. Ric said, “Pick up that branch there.”
Jeanell looked down to see a felled fir branch near her feet. It was about four feet long and bristling with dying leaves and branches.
“That’ll never kill the bear.”
Ric pulled the stolen chancellery goon’s knife out of his belt. “You only need to distract it.”
Jeanell looked at the knife, then at the bear. “Ric, no!”
“We don’t have any choice! Now stab at the thing!”
“It’ll swat this right out of my hands, tear me to pieces!”
But the bear grew tired of their bickering and chose its target. It charged at Jeanell and she raised the tree branch, jabbing it in the bear’s face. It only slowed the animal’s charge, swatting its huge paws to knock the branch away and take its prize. Jeanell could sense the power of the beast, the strength of its paws as it swatted at the branch. She knew she’d be no match for it, and that it was only a matter of time before it made its way to her.
Ric prowled around the side of the bear, but the creature was hardly distracted. It fended off both Jeanell’s tree branch and Ric’s encroachment without much of a threat. Ric said, “To your right, Jeanell!” Jeanell followed his guidance, shifting her position and jamming that branch into the bear’s face with greater aggression.
“C’mon, you big stupid bear,” Jeanell shouted, securing the beast’s attention. “Look at me, dummy! Wanna eat some more tree bark, you fat dummy? Open wide then, open up!”
The bear roared its frustration, swiping at Jeanell again, finally pulling the tree branch out of her hands and leaving her unarmed and defenseless.
She was as good as dead.
Ric launched his attack, landing on the bear’s back and stabbing the hunting knife deep into the bear’s shoulder. The animal screamed in pain, shaking his head, fat rippling under its neck. The bear reared up on its hind legs, swatting and spinning to attack Ric on his shoulders. Ric pulled the hunting knife and plunged it down again, the bear screaming again, pitched both high and low.
The bear walked backward, pinning Ric against the branch of a pine tree. Jeanell could almost feel his spine cracking as the heaving creature crushed him between its own massive weight and the immovable tree trunk. Ric grunted in pain, the hunting knife falling out of his bloodied fist to the forest floor.
Jeanell knew she only had one chance, and that it was probably fruitless. But she also knew that she had no choice.
Jeanell scrambled on all fours to scoop up the hunting knife, handle greasy and slick with the bear’s blood. She wrapped her fingers around it, gripping tight before pulling her arm back and thrusting the knife into the bear’s belly. It howled and swatted its paw, striking a blow to Jeanell’s head that felt like a freight train. She flew back, legs pedaling in a vain attempt to keep her on her feet. But it was only a matter of time before gravity and momentum got the better of her.
Jeanell hit the forest floor with a hard thump, rolling and tumbling in the rotting debris. She forced herself to her feet even before she could fully stand, her instincts telling her that to be trapped on the ground would result in death.
She refocused on Ric, no longer on the bear’s back. He also climbed to a stance, but the bear had turned on him and Jeanell could see in that split second that the creature would reach him, and that it would kill him with one brutal swipe.
Jeanell grabbed the branch and stabbed at the bear, but it hardly took any notice of her at all. The knife was still sticking in the bear’s gut, and Ric tried to reach for it while Jeanell stabbed at the beast with her tree branch. But neither had much hope of prevailing, and all three seemed to know that it was only a matter of time until the bear got to one of them, and then shortly thereafter, the other.
Bang! Bam, bam! The shots rang out and the bear snapped to the side, turning to find the source of the blasts even as it was too late to save itself. The creature screamed, waving its massive paws fruitlessly while another two gunshots burst two bloody holes in the grizzly’s chest.
The bear collapsed with a death groan, whoever was in it rattling its fatty corpse as it escaped. Jeanell’s heart pounded in her chest, the branch falling out of her hand as Ric also looked on in relieved shock.
Reeves stood nearby, one of the chancellor’s automatic rifles in his hands. He wore a little smile and offered Jeanell a reassuring nod. “Miss Glenn.”
“Reeves!”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Jeanell said, “Reeves, you made it out!”
He nodded, rifle still in his hands. “No thanks to you.”
Jeanell answered, “What was I supposed to do?”
Reeves said, “I wasn’t talking to you.”
Ric answered, “What you did isn’t my fault.”
“But you were going to kill us all.”
“I didn’t have a choice.”
Reeves leveled his rifle at Ric. “And what choice do you think I have?”
Jeanell was quick to say, “Reeves, no, he’s on our side.”
“You don’t know that, Miss Glenn. You don’t know whose side anybody is on.”
Ric said, “Wouldn’t that apply to you as well?”
Reeves broke a little smile. “Just because you’re thinking, doesn’t mean you’re not dangerous. In fact, the more intelligent you are, the greater a danger you are.”
“Reeves, no,” Jeanell said, “he’s saved me from the chancellor’s goons, and paid a dear price for it. His best friend, even his father; we can trust him, I’m sure of it.”
Reeves looked Ric over, then Jeanell. He said, “Nice getups.”
Jeanell looked down to see her chancellor’s populace costume, and to recall the reason for it. “Just trying to be inconspicuous,” she said.
Reeves seemed unconvinced. “Uh-huh. And how do I know you’re not bringing his forces down on us right now?”
Ric said, “That we’re not? You’re the ones who brought him down on us!”
“A lot can change in a short time,” Reeves said.
Jeanell added, “You can say that again.”
Ric said, “All right, all right, well, thanks for the help with the bear.”
Reeves said only, “You too.” Ric and Jeanell waited for an explanation before Reeves pulled out a net from behind his belt and tossed it to Ric. �
�Wrap this around the bear, we’ll take it back to camp.”
Jeanell looked at the dead bear and the measly net. “That bear’s gotta be a thousand pounds!”
Reeves smiled. “Five hundred. I’d help out, but I gotta carry the gun.” After a stunned silence, he added, “Between the two of you, dragging it along, it won’t be that bad.” Raising the automatic rifle, he went on, “Might as well get to it.”
Jeanell and Ric exchanged a worried glance. They’d been rescued from the bear, but each had the feeling that they’d been captured yet again, this time by Jeanell’s former friend and workmate. There was no way of knowing what his position was after that short but drastic time of change.
But they didn’t have much choice. Jeanell said, “Can’t we just leave it?”
Reeves shook his head. “Leave all that meat and hide behind? Get to it.” Jeanell and Ric struggled to wrap the net around the huge, lifeless animal. Then they began dragging its carcass along, muscles straining, feet slipping, spines nearly snapping as Reeves drove them back to his camp. They didn’t know what they’d find there, or who, or even if they’d survive the trip.
Reeves said, “They got Brad, and the kid too.”
“Tony,” Jeanell said, shaking her head.
“Yeah, that weakling’ll sing like a bird.”
Ric said, “But you managed to get away,” in a tone that was ripe with suspicion.
“I did,” Reeves said, “and I’m not the only one.”
Jeanell thought to tell Reeves about their collision with Brad in Prague, but one glance at Ric inspired him to shake his head. She swallowed hard and said nothing. Her muscles strained, shoulders and back near to splitting with the weight of that dead bear.
They finally made it up to a ridge with a large cave. When Reeves approached, several bedraggled figures crept out, first among them, the two mute twins.
Maruvian Bride (Alien SciFi Romance) (Celestial Mates Book 5) Page 31
