Trigger Warning

by William W. Johnstone

  Jake reached down and picked up the pipe and chain. He unwrapped the chain, held it in his left hand, and clutched the pipe in his right. He was sick and tired of this. Maybe it was time he actually fought back, no matter what the consequences.

  “Drop ’em! Drop those weapons, damn it!”

  The shouted command came from behind him. He turned, saw the half-dozen uniformed campus cops converging on him. He said, “Wait! I’m not the one—”

  “Phelps, deploy Taser!”

  He heard a stun gun fire, felt the fierce jab as the first set of needles pierced his shirt and lanced into his flesh to deliver their jolt of electricity. He staggered as the shock coursed through him, but he didn’t go down.

  “Carter! Taser!”

  Another set of probes hit him and seemed to turn the blood in his veins and arteries into streams of fire. Agony wracked him as his muscles clamped hard as stone. He knew that he was falling but didn’t feel it when he crashed to the concrete. Consciousness fled from him.

  But not before he heard the gleeful, jeering cries from the spectators.

  “Down—with—Nazis! Down—with—Nazis!”

  * * *

  “Damn it, Jake, what am I gonna do with you?”

  Frank McRainey leaned back in the chair behind his desk, sighed, and shook his head. He was the chief of the campus police, and clearly he didn’t appreciate being called to his office late in the evening like this, when he should have been home with his family.

  Jake sat in the chair in front of McRainey’s desk. His muscles still ached a little from being hit with the stun guns, but he didn’t show that discomfort in his face or voice as he said, “I don’t know, sir. I’m sure there are plenty of people who think you should turn me over to the police and have me arrested.”

  The balding, baggy-eyed campus cop frowned and said, “Was that riot your fault?”

  “Well . . . there was one of me and how many of them? What conclusion would you draw from that, sir?”

  “Don’t get mouthy, son,” McRainey snapped. Then he couldn’t help but chuckle. “At least you didn’t kill any of them. There’s that to be thankful for.”

  “I tried not to hurt anybody any more than I had to. I was just trying to stop that guy Craig from hurting the girl, at first, and after that I just defended myself.”

  “And quite efficiently, too, from what I hear,” McRainey said, nodding. “I’m not going to charge you with anything. Not yet, anyway. Once the activists and the lawyers and the media start putting pressure on President Pelletier, there’s no telling what he’ll insist on, just to get them all off his back.”

  He took his phone out of his shirt pocket, tapped a few icons on it, and then turned the screen so Jake could read the headline on the news site the older man had called up.

  FAR RIGHT EXTREMIST ATTACKS COLLEGE STUDENTS

  “That’s not even close to correct,” Jake said. “I didn’t attack anybody. I just defended myself, like I told you. And I’m not far right, far left, or far anything else. I just want to go to school and get an education, sir.”

  “You’ve been here two months. I’ll bet you’re getting more of an education than you ever bargained for.” McRainey put away his phone, then leaned forward and clasped his hands together on the desk. “Why are you here, Jake? Is it just because of your grandfather?”

  Jake hesitated. Most people here at Kelton didn’t know who his grandfather was, but McRainey was a family friend and had known Cordell Gardner as a young man. McRainey had known Jake’s father Phillip, too. He just didn’t speak of him. Neither did Jake.

  Jake didn’t even use his father’s name anymore. He had changed his legally to Rivers, his mother Donna’s maiden name. He had worried a little about what Cordell would think about that, but the old man not only hadn’t been offended, he had encouraged Jake to make that move . . . just as he’d encouraged him to join the army and then to come here to Kelton College.

  Problem was, the army wasn’t what it once had been, and Kelton College sure as hell wasn’t.

  “Jake?” McRainey prodded.

  But Jake was lost in the past.

  CHAPTER 3

  Six months earlier

  “Well, what else are you going to do with yourself, boy? Pull!”

  Cordell Gardner tracked the clay pigeon with the shotgun, leading it perfectly as he squeezed the trigger. The pigeon exploded into small fragments as the buckshot hit it.

  “I hadn’t really thought about it,” Jake said.

  He and his grandfather were standing at the edge of a large field that Cordell Gardner used for skeet shooting. The roof of the old man’s house, which was big but somehow not ostentatious, was visible over the trees behind them. Gardner’s estate sprawled over a lot of East Texas acres and included tennis courts, stables, and a nine-hole golf course, even though Gardner didn’t play tennis, ride horses, or have any use for golf. Sometimes his guests did, though, and he’d been raised to be hospitable.

  He broke the shotgun open, took fresh shells from his pocket, and thumbed them into the gun.

  “You’d better start thinking about it,” he told Jake. “You didn’t reenlist, so now you have to do something else with your life.”

  “Why?” Jake asked bluntly. “I could just sit around and wait for you to die so I’ll inherit that fortune of yours.”

  Gardner threw back his head and laughed. He was a big old man, although not as big as Jake’s six-four and two hundred and fifty pounds. The shock of hair on his head was snow-white, which made the deep, permanent tan on his weathered face seem even darker than it really was. He had an air of vitality about him despite his age and seemed to be nowhere near dying.

  “How do you know I haven’t disowned you?”

  “You wouldn’t do that,” Jake said. “I’m too much like you.”

  Gardner grunted.

  “Might be a good reason to, right there. Pull!”

  One of the old man’s groundskeepers, who also served as his assistant when he came out here to shoot, triggered the trap that flung a target into the air. Gardner blew it to pieces, then turned and held out the shotgun to Jake.

  “Want to give it a try? You used to be pretty good at this.”

  Jake took the gun and loaded it with the shells his grandfather handed him. He said, “It’s been a long time.”

  “Like riding a bicycle. It’ll come right back to you.” Gardner turned to look at the groundskeeper. “Send two this time, Benny.”

  “You want to make it tough on me?” Jake asked.

  “Just setting a bar.”

  That wasn’t all of it. Jake knew the old man still had a strong competitive streak. He wasn’t necessarily trying to show Jake up, but if Jake missed one or both of the targets and then his grandfather took the gun back and broke both the next time, he would get a considerable amount of satisfaction out of that.

  Jake was contrary enough that he didn’t want to give the old man that much satisfaction. He set his stance, held the shotgun ready in the gun-down position, and nodded.

  “Pull!” Gardner called.

  The targets flew spinning into the air. Jake brought the shotgun smoothly to his shoulder, tracked the leader, squeezed off one barrel, shifted his aim just slightly, and fired again.

  Tiny fragments of both targets pelted to the ground, all that was left of them.

  Gardner frowned and asked, “How long’s it been since you did any target shooting, boy?”

  “At targets like that? Seven years. Maybe eight.”

  Gardner just shook his head in admiration.

  “You’ve got a knack for it. Always have. Never saw a boy who could handle a gun like you, even when you were a little kid. You could shoot like a grown man when you were twelve years old. Drive like a grown man when you were fourteen. I’d ask some of the mamas of your high school buddies what else you could do like a grown man, but I don’t think I want to know.”

  Jake handed back the shotgun and said, “Driving ju
st got me in trouble.”

  “Street racing, you mean.”

  Jake shrugged.

  “The cops frowned on it. I would’ve wound up in jail more than once if it weren’t for you and your lawyers.”

  Gardner pursed his lips and said, “Yes, and it was a mistake saving you from your own foolishness. I should’ve let you spend some time behind bars. Might’ve taught you a lesson. But at least I realized I was about to make the same mistakes with you that I made with your father and stopped in time to keep from ruining you the same way.”

  Jake didn’t want to talk about his father, but the old man had brought it up.

  “Most people don’t consider it being ruined to be a rich, successful lawyer.”

  His grandfather snorted.

  “Most people never knew what a sorry, no-account scoundrel Phillip Gardner really was. It pains me to say it, but he was my son, so I’ve got the right. Of course, I blame myself—”

  “You didn’t shove that cocaine up his nose.”

  “I might as well have.”

  Jake turned.

  “If all we’re gonna do is blow clay pigeons out of the air and talk about a bunch of old crap I’d just as soon forget, I’m out of here.”

  Gardner went after him, put a hand on his arm.

  “Wait. I just want to know what your plans are, Jake?”

  “Maybe I don’t have any,” Jake said, stopping and turning to look at his grandfather.

  “Then why don’t you go back to school and try to figure out what you want to do with your life? I know you too well, boy. You may joke about sitting around and doing nothing, but that’s not in you. Never has been. Maybe the army didn’t work out, but there’s something else waiting out there for you. I know there is.”

  “Didn’t work out?” Jake repeated. “Two tours in the Middle East and a chestful of medals and ribbons isn’t working out?”

  “You did a good job, sure. A great job, even. But did it satisfy you?”

  Jake scowled. The old man knew good and well that it hadn’t. Something was still missing in his life. It always had been, no matter how many skills he mastered, no matter how much excitement and risk he sought out.

  But college? That was supposed to fulfill him? The idea was plain crazy.

  “Look, I know you’re smart,” Gardner went on. “You already had more than half a college degree in your pocket when you were a senior in high school.”

  “Yeah, and I never finished senior year, did I?”

  “Not because you couldn’t have. Hell, you would’ve been the valedictorian!”

  “Salutatorian,” Jake corrected him. “That math team girl would’ve edged me out by a few percentage points. But it didn’t matter. By graduation I’d already enlisted, to get out of trouble with the law. Your idea, as I recall.”

  “And you got your GED and your bachelor’s degree before you got out. That took a lot of work, as well as playing the system for all it’s worth.”

  “You taught me well,” Jake said with a smile.

  “I’d like to think so. But now it’s time to let somebody else teach you. You know I’ve got ties to Kelton College—”

  “You’ve built how many buildings and endowed how many fellowships and scholarships for them?”

  Gardner made a dismissive gesture.

  “I never had a chance to go to college, but I always wanted to. I’ve done all right for myself—”

  “A few billion dollars’ worth of all right.”

  The old man waved that off, too.

  “But maybe I would have done even better . . . more importantly, maybe I would have been a better person . . . with a real education. You can do that, boy. Go get your master’s degree. Hell, get your doctorate.” He grinned. “You could be Dr. Jacob Rivers.”

  “Doctor of what?”

  “I don’t care. Whatever strikes your fancy. That’s what college is for, to find out what you’re good at, and what you enjoy.”

  “And here I thought it was a place where parents paid thousands of dollars for their kids to get drunk, do drugs, and have sex.”

  “Maybe some of them,” Gardner snapped, “but it’s not that way at Kelton. It’s one of the finest academic institutions in the country. That’s why a smart fella like you will fit right in. You’ll see, Jake. Just give it a try, that’s all I ask.”

  It was hard for Jake to argue with his grandfather. When his parents had split up, Cordell Gardner had been a rock, not only for Jake but for his mother—Cordell was very fond of her, as well. As bad as things had been, they would have been worse if Gardner hadn’t been around. Jake really would have wound up in jail, his life a total waste like his dad’s had turned out to be.

  “Kelton College, eh?”

  “That’s right. It’s in Greenleaf, outside of Austin.”

  “I know where it is.”

  “Beautiful little old town, beautiful campus, pines all around . . . You’ll love it there, son.”

  Jake had his doubts about that, but he heard himself saying, “We’ll see.”

  “You won’t regret it,” Cordell Gardner said with a grin on his rugged old face.

  CHAPTER 4

  But Jake had regretted it, almost immediately. His grandfather had said he would fit right in.

  Nothing could have been further from the truth.

  His bachelor’s degree was in biology. He had thought briefly that he might become a veterinarian, because he’d always liked dogs and had worked some with them overseas. But inevitably, that would have meant dealing with a lot of dying animals that he couldn’t save, and he knew he just didn’t have the heart for that. It would take too great a toll on him.

  Maybe some sort of research, though. The idea of sitting in a lab all day didn’t appeal to him, but there were other kinds of research. Going out into jungles and such, discovering new species, things like that. That didn’t sound so bad.

  And objectively, Jake knew his grandfather was right about one thing: he was smart. If one field of study didn’t pan out the way he wanted, he’d just do something else. With Cordell Gardner’s money behind him, plus the small inheritance he had gotten from his maternal grandfather, who had owned a trucking company in New Orleans, he didn’t really have to worry about making a living.

  Kelton College was a liberal arts school, though. There was a science department, of course, including a program that offered a master’s degree in biology, but it was a small part of the school’s focus, which was heavily geared toward literature, theater, music, philosophy, sociology, and especially political science. But only politics of a certain stripe . . .

  Just looking at the names of some of the courses listed in the catalog had him frowning and figuratively scratching his head.

  Gender, Culture, and U.S. National Identity.

  Feminist Critique of Christianity.

  Social Justice and American Racism.

  The Psychological Impact of Male Microaggression.

  Countering Warmongering and Oppression in American Culture.

  Understanding Multiphasic Gender Constructs.

  Jake had never seen such a load of useless baloney in all his life. Where were the regular courses? He flipped over to the English section.

  Heteropatriarchy in American Literature.

  LGBTQIAPK Tales: A Seminar

  He had to look that one up. The abbreviation—which, evidently, today’s college students instinctively understood—meant Lesbian, Gay, Bi, Trans, Queer, Intersex, Asexual, Pansexual, and Kink. Whatever floated anybody’s boat was okay with Jake, as long as it didn’t involve force, coercion, or kids, but a whole college course devoted to stories about such things?

  One glance into the political science section landed him on a course called The Toxic American Political Axis: Republicans, Nazis, and Fascists.

  Jake closed the catalog. He was grateful that he wouldn’t have to mess with any of that sort of course, since he was going for his master’s degree in biology.

  He
found out different when he met with his faculty advisor.

  “Kelton College requires a diverse course load even for specialized advanced degrees,” the professor said. A brass nameplate on his desk read DR. MTUMBO.

  The guy was as pale as anybody Jake had ever seen. Tall, balding, gawky, with a receding chin, he looked like a big white bird. Jake couldn’t help himself. He said, “Dr. Mtumbo?”

  The man sniffed.

  “I identify as African-American. My ancestors were colonialists named Montambault who lived for a time in French Equatorial Africa before immigrating to this country. I simply adopted a more appropriate spelling to honor the unfortunate people they oppressed and exploited.”

  “Oh,” Jake said. He supposed that made perfect sense . . . to the guy on the other side of the desk. “And you teach . . . ?”

  “Microbiology.”

  “I’ll probably be in some of your classes then.”

  “I look forward to it,” the professor said, not sounding the least bit sincere. He pushed a printed list across the desk to Jake. “At any rate, here is the suggested course of study for the degree you’re pursuing.”

  Jake picked up the list and scanned it, then said, “A lot of these courses don’t appear to have anything to do with biology. I mean, economics, political theory, socialization . . .”

  “A Kelton College graduate is a well-rounded graduate.” It sounded like a slogan and probably was, although Jake wasn’t going to waste time looking for it in the college’s brochure or catalog.

  “So I have to take these to get a master’s in biology?”

  “They’re prerequisites for any advanced degree.”

  “Ooookay.”

  Dr. Montambault—Jake just couldn’t think of him as Mtumbo, although he realized that was “insensitive” of him—clasped his skinny fingers together and said, “You’ve already been admitted to this institution, Mr. Rivers, but if I may speak frankly, I’m can’t really see why. No offense, but you simply don’t strike me as Kelton College material, despite your academic record, which is, for the most part, exemplary.”

  “Except for that part about dropping out of high school as soon as I turned eighteen and joining the army, eh?”