by Jim Heskett
Layne realized that Paul didn’t know both Keegan and George were dead. Maybe now wasn’t the time to have that conversation. But, it would have to come soon.
“A key to something in the shed,” Layne said, musing to himself.
At least now, he knew where to go. He knew what the Disciples were after, and he knew exactly where to find it. If he got there first, would he spoil their plans, or would it be a waste of time?
Paul angled his head toward the valley where the town sat, frowning. “Did you see that?”
“See what?” Molly Waffles asked.
Layne pivoted and pointed his gaze in the same direction. He noted little flashes of light that he knew all too well were from rifle rounds. They had started less than a minute ago, but came on quick. Within fifteen seconds, there were a dozen different sources of weapons fire concentrated in a small radius in town.
“Is that semi-auto?” Molly asked.
Layne squinted, sucking through his teeth. “Probably.”
“Looks like it’s centered around the area between city hall and the VFW,” Molly said. “Getting heavier. I know a few people in town who’ve been stockpiling for something like this, so some of those rounds are probably from townspeople.”
“It’s the convoy. My best guess is that reinforcements for the Disciples of the True America arrived and are cleaning house. Paul: do you have a gun in your truck?”
“Just my hunting rifle, but it’s loaded and ready to go.”
“If you want to join us, Molly can get you something better.”
Paul frowned. “Join you for what?”
“Defending the town,” Layne said as he checked his SIG Sauers’ magazines. “It’s now or never.”
43
Harry Boukadakis transferred the potato chip dust from his palms to his jeans as he leaned forward. He knew better than to sit like this; his back would hate him for it tomorrow. But, as his fingers flew over the keyboard, it didn’t matter at the moment. He had to hurry.
He hit the Enter key, and the text came back:
COMM ACCESS GRANTED. TYPE “1” FOR CONTROLS.
Harry hooted, but only a minor hoot, because they weren’t out of danger yet. He typed 1 to access the controls, then he linked his computer’s microphone to the speaker system at BCS.
Harry slid on his gaming headset and pulled the mic close as he watched Winnie Caldwell weep to herself, sprawled on the floor between the gift shop and the front entrance. She’d been there for several minutes, frozen in her spot.
“Mayor Caldwell,” he said.
Her head snapped up, eyes darting all around. “What?”
“My name is Harry. I’ve patched into the speaker controls there.”
Her head still swiveled, but not as frantic. “Who are you?”
“I work for the government.”
“Local? State? I don’t know who you are.”
“No, ma’am, I expect you don’t. I’m an analyst at the State Department.” Since Harry couldn’t tell most people what he did for a living, Intelligence & Research analyst was one of the cover stories he’d prepared.
“But what matters most is that we need to move fast. I’ve contacted Fish and Wildlife, but we don’t have time to wait around for them.”
“Why?”
“Ma’am, I’m seeing several large cats on the external surveillance monitors. A few are still near the sanctuary, but some have wandered down toward town. At least two of them, but maybe more. With the heavy snowfall, it’s hard to tell.”
“They’re going toward Shotgun?”
“I believe so, ma’am, but I can’t see anything in town. Your downtown CCTV isn’t accessible.”
This seemed to hit her hard, and Harry watched the woman on the black and white surveillance feed sink her head back into her hands. Her shoulders wriggled. She was crying.
Harry stared at her for a few seconds, unsure what to do. When he’d practiced this conversation in his head, Winnie had been a willing participant. But, if she was too distressed to move, then that presented a whole new box of problems for Harry to sort.
“Winnie? Winnie?”
After the second time, she looked up. “What?” she said, slurring and angry. “Someone killed all these people. Every last one of them. There’s blood everywhere.”
Harry bit his lip, thinking how to respond. Working with traumatized people to spur them to action was more of a Layne Parrish skill set.
Harry tapped the Mute button. “Come on, Boukadakis,” he muttered. “Think. What are your options?”
After drumming his fingers on the desk for a few seconds, he jabbed the button to speak.
“Winnie, I’m sorry you have to see that, but we don’t have time to look behind us right now. I need your help. There is a locker, or a caged area outside the gift shop. It’s about a hundred feet due east of your position. In that locker are several drones with sedative darts to track down and knock out the cats until the experts arrive. Every one of those animals has a linked GPS tracker, and the drones will find them in minutes, but not if I can’t activate them. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” she said. “You can’t access the drones. What am I supposed to do?”
“The drone release isn’t working. I think something might be blocking the door-unlock mechanism. I can’t see it from the camera feeds, but there’s got to be some kind of physical obstruction preventing me from releasing them. Everything on my side has green lights, so it’s got to be a problem on site.”
“You want me to go open the drone cage? Out there, where the cats are?”
Harry winced and rubbed his hands together. He sat back in his chair, listening to it squeak, and tented his fingers. How was he supposed to pitch this solution to this woman? Could he say, yes, you might get eaten by a tiger, but if you don’t go out there, then all these cats and probably several people will die.
“Mayor,” he said, keeping his voice soft and comforting. With a breath, he did his best to channel Layne. “I need you to go outside and find out why the drone cage won’t open. You are the only person who can help us out. Help your town, Winnie.”
He saw her eyes flare as she rose to her feet. “Okay. Okay, I can do this. I should warn you, though: I’m still half-drunk and I’ve been off my meds for a few days. It's okay, though. I mean... I’m not sure if I’m seeing things... I mean, seeing things as they really are.”
Harry hit the Mute button on his mic. “Great. That’s just great. Why don’t you also tell me it’s raining frogs outside?” He tapped the button again. “It’s fine, Winnie. That’s fine. What’s important is that we hurry. I’m going to be with you every step of the way. Remember: I can see places you can’t, so if you listen carefully, I can guide you from one end to the other.”
She pulled a revolver out of her purse. “I have this.”
“I see,” he said, clucking his teeth a few times. “Let’s try to keep that as a last resort. And why don’t you keep your finger off the trigger, for now, please? Won’t help us much if you shoot yourself in the foot.”
She nodded, looking at the gun in her hand. She didn’t seem comfortable with firearms. Neither was Harry, but he knew how to show a gun the respect it deserved. At least he had training. This woman had probably never pulled a trigger to shoot anything other than glass bottles out in the woods.
He wanted to tell her to stow the gun, but if a jaguar or lion came straight at her, she might not have another choice. Probably better not to remind her of that fact, though.
“Do you have your phone?” he asked. “There’s no comms outside the building. I’ll be able to see you, but we can’t use the intercom system any more.”
They exchanged phone numbers and Harry called her as he felt sweat collecting on the back of his neck.
“I’m ready,” she said.
“I am too. Don’t you worry, Mayor Caldwell. We’ll take this one move at a time and everything will work out fine. It’s going to be fine.”
“Wh
ere do I go?” she asked.
“Turn to your right and exit out the gift shop.” He switched over to the external feed, the one closest to the drone cage. “The outside looks clear right now. There’s a tiger in the front parking lot, and another one by the west gate, but if you move fast and quiet, they shouldn’t hear you.”
They might smell her, but he couldn’t do anything about that.
“I can do this,” Winnie said, in a low tone that sounded like it wasn’t directed at Harry.
“If it makes you feel better to hold the gun, you can do that. But please, keep the barrel pointed low. We don’t want to shoot anyone or anything we shouldn’t shoot, right?”
She pushed through the gift shop, then out the door. Harry switched feeds to keep up with her. His eyes traveled over six different feeds at once, trying to keep it all together. “Take a left, then the drone cage should be right there.”
“Should be?”
“I can’t see it because there are no outdoor eyes on that part of the grounds. I’m going to lose you on surveillance, so you’ll have to talk me through what you’re seeing.”
“Right,” she said as Harry watched her disappear from view. "That makes sense."
Harry stared for two full seconds of silence. It felt like hours.
“Okay,” her disembodied voice said.
“It should be right in front of you.”
“I don’t see anything.”
He grunted a sigh. “Can we video chat?”
“Oh, yes. I can do that.”
A moment later, Harry accepted the incoming chat, and he saw Winnie’s face up close, in living color. She was an attractive woman, although with the deep bags under her eyes of a person who hadn’t slept well in weeks.
She squinted at her phone and tapped something, then the camera switched to the front. Harry could now see what she saw.
“To your left,” he said. “Looks like a wooden cabinet door? That has to be it.”
“I see it. There’s nothing obstructing it.” She pulled it open and waved the camera around inside it. There were ten or twelve drones, dormant, their blades still. They were all hanging on hooks with charging cables connected. But all the lights were off.
“What does this mean?” she asked. “Are they not working?”
“I don’t know.”
“Wait!” she said, and he could hear the excitement in her voice. “Breaker box!”
“Okay, Winnie, that might be the solution, but let’s think this through.”
“No time! I know where it is.”
Before he could protest, she was off, with the phone swinging wildly in her hand. Harry only saw falling snow and blurry bits of things here and there as she dashed.
“Winnie? Winnie! I need you to stop. Where are you?”
“I found it!” she said, panting.
Harry cycled through the feeds until he spotted her, about fifty feet north of the drone cabinet. He watched her approach the breaker box on the side of the building as a large cat padded toward her from the east.
“Winnie,” he said, trying to sound calm. “There’s a lion to your right.”
She whipped around, and the lion paused. From the phone audio, Harry thought he heard it growl.
“Oh, Lord, help me,” she said, terror in her tone.
“Winnie, listen to me. Do not make any sudden movements. Do not raise the gun yet. I want you to lean forward and flip the breakers, then take two steps to your left. Then turn and run straight forward. There’s a door ten paces in that direction. Do you see it?”
“I see it.”
“I’m accessing building controls to unlock it.”
He typed a few commands into the keyboard and felt a rush of relief as he saw confirmation the door had unlocked. The lion’s head tilted left and right, probably trying to see better through the falling snow.
“I want you to be very careful how you…”
Before he could finish the sentence, Winnie lunged forward and smashed her hand against all the breakers, flipping them off in sections.
And the lion raced toward her. Harry watched clouds of snow burst like drops of rain in water as the lion reached full speed.
“Winnie!”
He watched her flip through another section of breakers and all his surveillance feeds blanked.
“Winnie, are you still there?” he said into the phone as a cold hand gripped his spine. “I’ve lost surveillance. Winnie, can you hear me?”
Harry heard a roar. Then a scream, something tearing, and heavy breathing.
“Winnie! Get inside that building!”
Two seconds later, the surveillance feeds reconnected. He saw a lion standing exactly where Winnie had been, the breaker box open, but no mayor. No blood on the lion’s mouth, no torn hunk of person hanging from his teeth.
“Winnie?” he asked, fearing no reply.
“I’m here,” she said. The camera turned back around, and he saw her face. Not seeming much worse for wear.
“You okay?”
Her eyes were wide, her jaw set, her teeth bared. Harry had seen this look before; adrenaline overload. Couple that with whatever effect her lack of medication had, and Winnie looked near the edge of her sanity.
“I’m fine. It came at me and tore my sleeve. But I kicked it in the head and then ran.”
“You kicked a lion in the head?”
She giggled, a high-pitched sound lacking joy. “Holy shit, I guess I did. It’s outside the door, looking at me. These doors are glass. Can it break through?”
Harry typed into his keyboard to access building controls. And now, he had a new section he hadn’t seen before: remote drone emergency access. She’d done it. Flipping the breakers had worked.
“Doesn’t matter, Winnie, because he’s not going to be a problem any longer.”
Harry activated the drone and sent a command for it to seek out the nearest GPS transponder.
“I see it!” she said. “It’s right out there!”
Harry switched to the external feed. He watched the drone hover above the lion. The animal took one half-hearted swipe at the machine before a projectile zipped out of the bottom. It latched into the lion’s back.
It took a couple of steps, let out a muted roar, and then swayed on its feet. Five paces later, it sunk to the ground, then its eyes closed.
“It worked!” she said.
“Good, good. You’re doing great, Winnie.”
“It’s my fault.”
“What’s your fault?”
“I let the cats out. I was going to shoot one, to get back at the sanctuary for suing us.”
He pursed his lips. “I’m not sure what to tell you. Fish and Wildlife will be there in about thirty minutes, maybe forty-five. Those other drones will hunt down the other cats, so if you stay right there, you should be safe.”
He switched to the internal feed and watched her standing in the gift shop. Her eyes were wide, her jaw set, with veins popping on her forearms. “I’m going to wait for them. I'll tell Fish and Wildlife what I’ve done.”
“I understand,” he said. “Thanks for your help, Mayor Caldwell.”
“Thanks for your help, too, Government Worker Harry.”
He ended the phone call and then unleashed the full fury of his fingers on the keyboard, sending those drones out to hunt down the cats and end all this craziness.
44
Layne and Molly Waffles drove down the pass and into the town of Shotgun, with Paul trailing them in his car. Layne noted little skirmishes breaking out here and there, as evidenced by the flashing pops cutting through the falling darkness. He assumed that the townspeople were fighting the Disciples, but how had it all happened so fast? Did these newcomers roll into town and start shooting?
Layne had assumed they were extra reinforcements to find and fight him, but that was not apparently true. Were they trying to clean house? If so, every man, woman, and child in Shotgun was in danger.
As they drove, Layne noted a co
rridor of violence in the town. At the southern edge of town, Layne saw a firefight happening in the park. A group of combatants had clustered around the plastic jungle gym, while the other group used the brick bathroom building as cover.
From the park was a straight line to city hall, where there was also evidence of weapons fire. And northeast from city hall, Layne could see action at the VFW, too.
At the bottom of the mountain pass road, they were closest to the park, so Layne stopped there first. He pulled the car over at the far end of the park. Paul parked behind them, then hopped out and slid into the backseat of Layne’s car.
“This doesn’t make sense,” Molly said as she fastened velcro on her tac vest.
“What?” Layne asked.
“Those shooters by the playground are Disciples. I can see the tattoos from here. But those guys firing at them over by the bathrooms aren’t townspeople. They look like more of the same.”
Layne squinted and realized she was telling the truth. Could there be a civil war brewing among the Disciples? No, more likely, the caravan of cars had arrived this evening to deliver the real cleanup crew. They’d probably been ordered to kill the old crew, as well as any townspeople who’d gotten in the way.
Layne pulled a Mossberg shotgun from behind the seat and stuffed his pockets with shells.
“Which group do we shoot at?” Molly Waffles asked.
Layne shrugged. “Both of them, I suppose. Until we know what’s going on around here, anyone we don’t recognize is a potential enemy.”
“Wait, guys,” Paul said from the back seat, his finger urgently pointing out the side window.
Layne craned his neck to follow, and he saw a sleek, black creature hustling through town. Like a shadow moving deliberately along the sidewalk.