by Dora Blume
He returned her stare with a fierce look of his own, “Yes, I will be there.”
“Okay good, see you on the other side.” She patted him on the shoulder and smiled.
“Yeah, okay.” He walked to the back entrance where he would wait for Bryant. Him getting Bryant in the car was easy, Bryant already knew what was going on. He was concerned for Jess and Sloane who were bursting through the doors and taking the demons head on. That was where he should be. If it wasn’t for his father, he would be. He got comfortable, leaning against the building to wait for his father to come through the door. Sloane was supposed to let him know when he was close. He had his phone on vibrate in his pocket, ready for her signal. He could feel a lump in his throat, he knew it would be there until everything was over and Jessie was safe.
Sloane met with Mike and Jess. They were waiting outside the south doors. They were talking but stopped as soon as Sloane approached.
“So, is everyone in place?” Sloane asked.
“Yep, I’m ready. We’re just waiting for you.” Jess moved up from the bench.
“You ready?” Mike asked looking at Sloane.
“All set let’s go.” She waited for them to go first since Jess was the one who was going to freeze the room upon entrance. The rest were supposed to enter after she’d frozen everyone. Sloane was to go after Bryant because he wouldn’t freeze when everyone else did. She hoped that everything worked as planned. Jess stopped by the door.
“Okay, I’m going to open the door slightly and try to freeze them from here.” Jess moved to the door, and Mike positioned himself behind her in case anything went wrong. Jess looked into the room full of demons and waved her hand, flinging her fingers out. Only about fifteen people closest to the door actually froze. The others noticed quickly and looked around. Jess closed the door and said, “Shit.”
“I can’t freeze that many, Shaundra’s boost didn’t help.”
Mike looked at her, “Alright we go in guns blazing. We’ll save as many as we can, let the others know.” He looked to Sloane, and she started texting to the others.
Mike and Ashley were positioned behind Jess. Sloane stood to the side. Mike nodded to Sloane then Jessie. Mike grabbed the door handle, “Okay, here goes nothing.’” He flung the door open, and Jess moved her hands to freeze people as soon as he opened it. She started running and freezing. Mike shot anyone that went for them. Sloane ran to the corner and had to shoot three guys on her way. She looked over, and the other groups entered through the other doors. Ashley was hurtling people through the sky when they tried to stop Jess. She was well protected, and she had half the room frozen.
At least twenty people were lying dead on the floor. Others were fighting demons in the corner. Sloane located Bryant and was running toward him. He almost made it to the door. She hit the button on her phone as she ran. She had to warn Erik that Bryant was about to head out the door just as they expected. She was surprised he thought he could just slip out. Yet, considering all the chaos going on he probably figured no one would notice him. Which no one did, so he was right. He went through the door, and Sloane hoped Erik got him.
A demon kicked the gun out of her hand, unexpectedly as she ran. Turning to face him, he lay sprawled on the ground, blood dripping from his temple. Pulling a second gun from her waistband, she turned to run. Another man flew up from behind her and wrenched her arm back. Righting herself, she retaliated with a well-placed kick, but he only flinched. He braced himself and lunged for her. She dodged to the right and spun to hit him from behind. He was skilled but not as skilled as her. She jammed the heel of her hand into his nose, and he dropped to the floor. She kicked him in the head and he was out cold.
Cursing, she ran to the door and flew out. She looked around, but she didn’t see either of them. Shit, maybe he didn’t get him, she thought. She looked around frantically and didn’t see either of them running away. She glanced at the car to see Erik driving away with Bryant in the passenger seat.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” she said as she ran toward the other car. Erik glanced toward her then floored it. She got into the other car, started it, and threw it in gear to follow Erik. She had no idea what he was doing. She didn’t believe Erik’s plan worked. A familiar ache crept through her. She hoped Erik wasn’t betraying them too. She trusted him but knew trusting people was dangerous and usually meant getting hurt in the end. She grabbed her phone out to call Mike. She hit the speaker button to deliver her message. “Hey, Erik’s got Bryant. I’ll let you know what’s going on as soon as I know.”
She hit the button to end the call and continued to follow behind them. Catching up with them, she was keeping a safe distance. She was still hoping he was going with his plan to make him think he was helping. She didn’t want to deal with the other option right now.
***
Jess had run straight to the back and froze as many as she could along the way. Mike shot anyone who even tried to go after her. Once the others joined them, Ashley threw anyone who tried to stop her in the air far away from her. She nodded in her direction as she headed to stop the people in the back from notifying anyone about their current situation. They needed to get rid of the demons before anyone knew their plans in Minneapolis hadn’t worked. She’d frozen most of the room as she ran, but the few that were left were being handled by the others. Needing to stay focused, she looked to her right. Mike was running beside her. He cocked a smile at her as she ran, and she shook her head. He always was light hearted even in the most trying of circumstances.
They made it to the back room, but the three people Sloane described were gone.
“Shit, where the hell are they?” Jess asked.
“Probably trying to get out of dodge, come on they couldn’t have made it that far.” Mike started running toward the other exit. Jess followed opening every door she could find along the way. They made it to the hall and started running, only stopping to open classroom doors.
“We could really use Sloane or Erik right now.” Jess was getting frustrated. She swung open another empty classroom door.
“Where are all the students?” Mike asked as he opened his seventh empty classroom.
“I don’t know but there definitely should be classes going on right now.” Jess opened another door.
“Are you forgetting that I’m a tracker?” Mike asked. He smiled crookedly.
“Oh yeah, What the hell? Start tracking then.” She said exacerbated.
“I’ve been trying, but it’s like I’m being misdirected. I get a read on them then I’m compelled in another direction. Give me a minute to hone in on them.” Mike stopped in the hall and tried to concentrate. It took him a minute then his eyes flashed open.
“Got em,” he said and bolted down the hall to the left. He walked into a room that branched off into a bunch of offices. He walked down to the third one on the left and opened the door. The three that they were looking for were sitting in the room. The girl was clutching an amulet around her neck. Mike understood why he couldn’t get a read on them at first. The amulet stopped his tracking ability. The girl screamed as Jess froze them.
“What the hell is that? She’s clutching it pretty tight.” Jess walked over and pried the amulet out of the girl’s hand.
“It blocks trackers among other things,” Mike said. “The demons shouldn’t have it, that’s for sure.”
Jess looked to him seriously, “Where do you think they got it?”
“Well, the only one who carries stuff like that in this town is Shaundra.” He looked pointedly toward Jess, “Let’s tackle one thing at a time.”
“Okay, we’ll figure out the rest later.” Jess started reciting the chant for expelling demons. When it was done, she unfroze them.
“You kids alright?” Mike asked.
“Yeah, what the hell happened?” The boy in the far corner rubbed his eyes.
“Ah, there will be time to explain everything later. Right now, if you don’t want to die you should stay in this
office okay?”
Jess turned to Mike. “We should go back to the main room.”
“Yeah,” he looked to them. “Stay here.”
Mike and Jess walked out of the room and back to the main entrance. They started running when they could still hear people fighting. “Shit, maybe they unfroze when I left.”
Jess ran as fast as she could toward the sound of fighting. Mike was a few steps ahead of her. They burst through the doors, and Jess started freezing anyone she could within her reach. Ashley had a relieved look on her face when she saw them come through the door. Some students Jess had frozen had come to while they were gone, so the fighting started up again. Jess’ heart sunk as she saw her friend Matt lying dead on the floor with a bullet in his head. Jess started frantically freezing and fighting anything in her path. She didn’t care anymore if she saved these kids, they had killed her friend. Grabbing Jess’ hand, he stopped her from killing a frozen student. Mike whispered in her ear, “Stop Jess you don’t want to kill them.”
Her eyes were filled with tears. “Yes, I do. Let me go.” Mike wrapped her up in his arms.
“Jess, I need you to pull it together, freeze them so no one else gets hurt.” He held her a minute longer and let her go when he felt her body relax.
She shook her head, sighed, and went back to freezing those around her. Mike sighed a breath of relief. They needed to finish this. After a few minutes all the college students were either standing motionless or lying on the floor. Ashley and the others started chanting by the students while a few people wrote the needed markings on the wall to dispel the entire building of demons in case they missed anyone hiding. Jess took a deep breath to steady herself.
Death was a part of what they did, but she hadn’t expected any of them to die today. She thought the plan would go so well, and she would be able to freeze the entire room as soon as she opened the door. She had taken the concoction Shaundra made to strengthen her power, so why hadn’t it worked. She knew it should have worked. She looked over to Shaundra who was chanting by a group of students. She thought about the amulet the girl was holding. Shaundra had been the shop owner for years. Everyone knew her, but you could say the same of Bryant. He was a well-respected member of the Shikari and people trusted him. Just like they all trusted Shaundra. Jess didn’t like her current train of thought. She’d used Shaundra’s power boost before, and it worked better. She glared at her and vowed to find out for sure which side she was on before this was all over.
Chapter 19
Sloane followed behind the racing car. She pushed on the gas as he weaved in and out of lanes heading toward the downtown exit. Her hands gripped the wheel tighter, turning her knuckles white. She began thinking back to how Erik acted before they went to the college. Why did he only tell her about the plan? Why would he insist she have another car if he intended to betray them? She huffed a frustrated breath. “What the hell are you up to Erik?”
Erik took the exit to head into downtown Minneapolis. Sloane was so confused by what was happening right now. He had to be heading to the Speak Easy, but why the hell would he go there. He pulled into the back entrance, and they both ran into the building. Now she knew something was up. She parked and ran in behind them. She cursed when she realized the only weapons she had left was the gun tucked into her ankle holster.
She slowed as she entered the bar, eyes darting around the room. She caught a glimpse of the door closing which lead down into the underground passage. Pulling out her phone, she typed two words, speak easy, and sent it to Mike before she headed for the door. She pulled out the gun she had tucked in under her pant leg. She paused, what the hell was she thinking, was she really about to shoot her father and brother? She didn’t have an immediate answer which scared her. How far was she willing to go? Well, if she had to choose between her life and theirs, she would make sure she got out alive.
Since the day her mother had been killed, she swore that she would never be that close to someone again. She would always put herself first. She moved along the wall trying to stay as silent as possible, listening for their movements. They were running, but Sloane wasn’t sure why.
Turning the corner, she entered the large room where she first saw Bryant a few days ago. She stopped abruptly, looking at the two standing there in the center of the room, as if they were waiting for her. Bryant had a wide smirk on his face. Maybe this was his plan to lure her here, she thought. She started glancing around her, mentally marking her exit points if she needed to escape quickly. She looked at the two standing in front of her, Bryant had his hands clasped in front of him. Erik was on alert but tried to appear relaxed. There was something about his attempt to be casual that was off. The tension reverberated from him. She knew they would draw their hidden weapons in a second if they truly needed to. She held her gun raised moving from one to the other, unsure of what exactly was happening here.
“Sloane my dear, why don’t you put that away. You don’t really intend to kill your family now do you.” Bryant turned the right corner of his mouth up in a faint smile but to Sloane it looked more like a smirk. The light in his eyes was far too dangerous, she knew that look well. He had it every time he meant to train them for battle even though it was more like an abuse session. He enjoyed it. That very glint was in his eye now, and she knew he was enjoying himself. She pointed the gun solely at him.
“Well that depends on you now doesn’t it, father,” she spat the last word. “It seems I’m the patsy who’s been lured into a trap by her own brother.” Her eyes focused their anger on Erik.
Erik spoke up quickly, “Depends on what Sloane? We need to talk.”
“Oh, I see, so you two have been together on this the whole time. That means you lied right to my face. I guess I should have expected as much.” She glared in the direction of her father. “But wow, little brother, I didn’t think you had it in you. Why the hell did you even find me to begin with if this was your plan all along? I was living fine without you, without any of this. You found me and brought me back into this world. Now, I’m standing here with a gun pointed at you for what? So, you could both go rogue on the Shikari order. I couldn't care less about the fucking order. Why did you bring me into this bullshit?”
“You were the one that got all the others to trust us dear. You played an integral role in all of this.” Bryant held the same smile.
“Oh great, glad I was useful to you.” She held the gun steady, level with his heart.
“Will you stop? She needs to know what’s really going on. Why we did all of this, she deserves to know the truth.” Erik’s voice was earnest, sympathetic.
“I suppose she should know what’s going on here. We have led her this far haven’t we. Fine, I will tell you, I do believe you can be trusted but would you please lower your weapon. You always have been an act first, think later kind of girl. I would prefer not to get shot today.”
“Ah… I think no. Why don’t you give me a reason to lower my gun than I might think about it? Right now, you two look like traitors, and I’m thinking about shooting you, just because I can.” The corner of her mouth lifted into a crooked smirk.
“Alright then, I will tell you and hope you don’t shoot me just because you can. The order, the one we all trust, has been corrupt for a long time and after your mother died, I vowed I would avenge her death. I found out she was killed by one of our own, but I couldn’t do anything about it at the time. I learned there were too many variables involved to take immediate action. I decided I needed to get inside the circle and find out how deep this all went before I did anything drastic. I found out about the demon's plan back then and got myself in with the leader through the corrupt members of the order. By that time, I became a trusted member of their group since I was feeding them information. I wasn’t giving them much. But it was enough for them to trust me and let me in. That was how I got to know this group and what they were planning.” He took a breath and looked to Sloane before continuing.
“Many of the de
tails are irrelevant, but I had the murderer who killed your mother taken out by a demon from the group here in Minneapolis. I oversaw her death myself because I couldn’t let that bitch live after she had taken the love of my life. I promise you she paid for your mother’s death. Recently, I found out the plan they concocted to take out our entire Shikari, and I couldn’t let that happen. I’m sorry I made it look like I had betrayed you, but it was necessary to stop the information that they were spreading about how to defeat us. I knew that very few people had that information, so I had to find the member of the order that was sharing our deepest secrets; to do that, I had to be an integral part of their plan.” He paused, Sloane’s eyes were wide as he spoke. Erik paced in the background.
“Your mother was one of few people entrusted with that information, and they killed her for it. They wanted to make sure that once the demons had a way to take us out, we couldn’t stop them from doing so. Erik knew what was going on and wanted to find you because you could see the future and help eliminate the threat without blowing my cover. We need to continue to find out what their plan is because we only stopped a small part of it. They have much bigger things in store for us. You’re very much a part of this, and we need your help to save the collective. I know after your mother died you didn’t want any part of this. Yet, I thought you might be interested to learn the circumstances behind her death, and maybe once you knew the truth you would help us to continue our mission. We don’t want any more Shikari to die by the hands of supposedly, trusted friends. We need to weed out the traitors and bring the order back to its former glory with people who truly believe in our values. I know deep down you want to help people. It’s who we are and who you were born to be.”
Sloane lowered her gun a long time ago and stood looking at her father with her mouth hanging open. She wasn’t expecting any of that. After her mother died, it seemed like her father didn’t care, so she left. She loved her mother, and she couldn’t believe her father wasn’t avenging her death. Now, he tells her this whole thing had to do with her mother’s murder. She had no idea what to say. She wanted to slap him and hug him at the same time. She took a deep breath to steady herself. She looked into her father’s eyes and knew he understood. She wasn’t sure why, but he did. He was her father of course he understood.