by Lee French
“Oh, whatever.” Hannah rolled her eyes. “I’ll go find Alice, then, and Lizzie and Dan. Anyone else?”
“Andrea,” both men said at the same time.
Hannah sighed. “Please don’t kill any more people than you have to. That’s all I’m going to say.” She left the room without waiting for a response.
“People are going to die.” Matthew said it flatly, as a statement of fact.
“Yeah.” Stephen nodded. “We’ll wait here so we don’t have to wait around there too long. Let’s see.” He turned to the map and ran his finger over the basic route despite the lack of roads on the page. “This drive will probably be, what? Eight or nine hours? Be ready to leave at midnight. Let’s push it a little, but not cut it too close.”
“Twelve hours to make a nine hour drive?” Matthew fiddled with his watch. “Sounds reasonable.” The two men shared a look, and Bobby thought something else passed between them. With a curt nod, Matthew left the room.
Bobby stuck with Stephen as he explained what they knew to Lizzie, Dan, Alice, and Andrea. Andrea reminded him of an underwear model, with frothy brown curls and cinnamon skin. It might have had something to do with the tight little shorts she wore. Even so, despite getting an eyeful of three different attractive women at once, Bobby’s thoughts still strayed to Lily. He wanted to curl up with her and never let her go.
Stephen watched the four of them go to prepare and sighed. “I will never get tired of watching that,” he muttered, his eyes firmly on Andrea’s backside.
Bobby had to admit the view could be much worse. The dragon trilled his agreement, provoking a smirk from Stephen.
“Hey, you have a minute?” A girl with a ton of freckles and straight red hair in a bob cut poked her head around the corner. Her ears had five hundred piercings filled with different colored studs. Back home, Bobby called a girl like that ‘freaky’. He’d since developed a whole new definition of that word, and chose instead ‘different’.
Stephen saw her and smiled. “Sure, Kaitlin, what’s up?”
She stepped into the room, showing off an outfit that hurt Bobby’s head: orange and pink striped tights, a black pleated miniskirt, fuzzy purple slippers, an orange tank top, and a gray hoodie with the zipper halfway undone. ‘Different’ definitely covered Kaitlin.
“I heard Hannah saying some of you are going out to rescue Bobby?” As she got closer, Bobby put her height at about five foot nothing.
“Yeah.” He quirked an eyebrow at her. “You want to come?”
“Hell no.” She waved her hand, dismissing the idea as crazy or stupid. “I just thought you might want some guidance. Oh, hey, is that one of his dragons? Can I hold it?”
“That’s kind of up to it, not me.” How true. “And yeah, that would be great. Thanks.”
Bobby urged the dragon over to another girl who wanted to touch the cute dragon. She held him up high enough so the dragon could touch her nose, then shut her eyes. Figuring she might be using a power, he sat patiently, tail wrapped around the dragon’s feet. A minute or so later, her eyes snapped open.
“Don’t speed on 80 in Wyoming. He’s on a military base with planes. Don’t expect him to be able to help. Jayce will be here just after ten tonight and you should bring him. Don’t take Hannah’s van. There are three suits, don’t let any of them get away.” She offered Stephen the dragon back, then paused with her other hand up, finger extended to make him wait. “Don’t go through the front gate, and watch out for the little girl inside the building: pigtails, red shoes, red dress. Protect her at all costs.”
While the dragon hopped back to Stephen’s shoulder, he repeated everything back to her, and she corrected him when he made a mistake. “Will do. I just love saving little girls.” The words came out creepy, leaving Bobby—and Kaitlin, probably—with the impression that he meant to add ‘for snacking’ on the end.
“She’s important.” Kaitlin grabbed his arm and yanked him closer, her whole expression steely and daring him to try something. “Really important. She has to live and see you guys as big damn heroes.”
All traces of humor gone in an instant, he nodded. “I get it.”
“Okay.” She let go and gave him a satisfied smile. “Good luck.”
He tipped an imaginary hat at her and left the room. Bobby watched him stuff a change of clothes in a bag, studiously avoid the kitchen, field a few questions from the others, then return to the work of smashing through that interior wall. Just when he thought he’d have to figure out how to pass the time without his mind buzzing or distracting Lily from her boy too much, the dragon settled on a shelf and shut down. Everything went black.
The dragon came awake again. Surprised to find himself still in the dragon, Bobby accidentally made it yawn and stretch. It tumbled and brushed on something, revealing it had been scooped up by a hand. He found himself eye to eye with Stephen. “Are we ready to go?”
Bobby trilled and stamped, then flared his wings and jumped into the air.
“We didn’t get all dressed up for nothing,” Jayce said with a smirk.
Warm relief flooded through Bobby at his voice. Nothing like hearing the rock-steady sound of someone he knew and trusted. He flitted to Stephen’s shoulder and chirped a greeting for Jayce.
“Is that Bobby in there, or just the dragon?” Jayce flashed him a confident grin and climbed into a van.
Stephen slid into the driver’s seat. “I don’t know, and actually, I’m not sure I want to know. I mean, thinking about that is a little mind-blowing. Sure, we all defy the laws of physics already, but that’s just going way, way past logic and into crazy.”
Jayce chuckled. The rest of the van gave up a few snorts and chortles. “Because getting your nourishment from blood isn’t way past logic and into crazy.”
“It’s only crazy,” Andrea’s light Tennessee drawl said, “when it hasn’t been written about in umpteen books already.”
Bobby checked the rest of the passengers and smiled when he saw Alice. No matter how big a pain she’d been, familiar faces made everything seem better. Noticing him, she gave the dragon a wave and a pleasant smile. He lifted a claw and waved back.
Lizzie sat across Dan’s lap, both of the refusing to use seat belts. Andrea, sitting beside Alice, now wore black leggings and leaned against the window. Matthew lounged across the back, arms crossed and eyes shut. When Stephen started the engine, he faced front again.
Lily ran out the front door in a green flannel robe she clutched shut. Standing on the front stoop, she waved, her hair mussed and eyes drooping. She must have gone to bed already, but made sure to wake up for this. Through Stephen’s open window, he heard her say, “Be careful and bring him back safe! ”
Stephen gave her a thumbs-up out the window, and she smiled. It held enough worry to crush Bobby for doing that to her.
“Awww.” Lizzie’s rough alto voice crooned from the back. “She’s so cute. Probably jump him the second he gets back.”
Bobby ignored her. Sort of. Aside from the guilt, seeing her make a special effort for him… He didn’t get warm or flush or blush or sigh, but he felt like if he had his body, he’d definitely do at least one of those. He’d also follow through on all the other impulses by taking her in his arms and finally kissing her.
Alice sighed. “Doesn’t it bother you the slightest bit that we might all be siblings?”
Dan grinned. It bothered Bobby how much he and Dan looked alike. It crossed his mind that the two of them might have the same real parents, making them full brothers. “Honey, we grew up as brother and sister. Mom had me and adopted Lizzie two years later. She called us a matched pair.” He kissed Lizzie’s neck. “We so totally are.”
“And if we are related by blood, who cares?” Lizzie raked her fingernails across his scalp to brush his hair behind his ear. “It’s not like we’re planning on having kids and a white picket fence.”
“I want a dog, though. I like dogs.” Dan grinned and kissed Lizzie hungrily. The rest of th
e group, aside from Matthew who seemed to be asleep, either rolled their eyes or grimaced.
Leaning forward, Andrea said, “I dunno. I mean, no offense to you two, but I’m just not that interested in any of the guys at the farm. Oh, sure, you’re all pretty. Being at the farm is a lot like living in one of those weird perfume commercials and all. But nobody’s a spark for me. I need a spark, a pop, razzle-dazzle.”
“None taken,” Jayce said with an amiable smile. “I’m not particularly interested, either. Nice to look at, but not interested.”
Stephen, Bobby noticed, kept his mouth shut and his eyes firmly on the road. His knuckles, already normally quite pale, had gone white from his grip on the steering wheel. Odds seemed high he had one of those cute little bunnies and fuzzy duckies moments going on in his head. At least he knew those things were wrong and actively avoided following through with any of them.
With that, and Dan and Lizzie not bothering to stay quiet, the chatter in the car died. Jayce turned the radio on, flipping between stations until he found one that Andrea danced in her seat to. The pop songs blurred into each other, broken up only by commercials.
Bobby couldn’t stop thinking about Lily. If she turned out to be his sister, half or full, nothing would change. Like Lizzie said, he had no plans for kids of his own. Sebastian did make him think he might be a passable daddy. That didn’t mean he felt ready to raise his own from the ground up. Anyway, their problems started and ended with her dead husband.
The dragon found this line of thought annoying and stupid. It hopped down and settled in the ashtray, shut down before Bobby could protest. It opened its eyes twice when they were switching drivers, first to Alice, then to Jayce. The third time, the car stopped because they didn’t know where exactly to go. It was daylight by then. Jayce hopped out, checked with the guy manning the gas station, and came back with some snacks for everyone.
“There are two bases in Utah, Hill and Dugway. Hill is just north of here, Dugway is pretty much the western half of the state.”
Stephen was in back now, sitting with Matthew and huddling under his hoodie. “Kaitlin said it had planes, and the dragon pointed to Salt Lake City.”
“Probably Hill, then.” Jayce looked down at the dragon. “Is it Hill?” Nod. “We should have a plan of some kind. We can try walking in the front door and asking politely, but I’m going to go ahead and guess that won’t work.”
Dan and Lizzie came back, disrupting the discussion. They settled onto the same bench seat again and Bobby wondered how either of them ever managed to accomplish anything. Then again, their house had been in need of enough repair that he would’ve been ashamed to let his Momma see it.
“Kaitlin specifically said not to use the front gate. If I fly in, I can probably find a way to get everyone else in quietly. Biggest problem, though, is the damned sun.” Stephen scowled.
“I can help.” Lizzie held up a black bondage mask for him. Her dress, so far as Bobby could tell, had no pockets, and he hadn’t seen her reach into their bag. With a moment of reflection, he realized he’d be better off not knowing why she had it in hand.
Stephen stared at her for a long moment. His lip twitched, showing one fang. Reaching back, he grabbed it and muttered, “Thanks.”
Lizzie grinned and blew him a kiss. “Can’t we just blast our way in? That would be a good diversion.”
Andrea rolled her eyes and shook her head. “How public do we want to get? That kind of thing is a line. Once we cross it, we can’t really go back.”
Alice shrugged. “It’s a military base, we won’t get a lot of press from it. Mostly what will happen is the suits will know that a bunch of us are working together and get an idea of how well we do that, plus they’ll learn about the powers the rest of you have.”
“And—” Matthew, now sitting in the front passenger seat, had to cough and clear his throat before finishing the thought. “And we’ll be telling them that we’ll go to the mat and pull out the stops for one of our own. They’ll be more ready for us the next time it happens.”
“They might also step up the effort to find us in this region, because they’ll have a time frame to work with.” Jayce checked the roads on the map, following them with his finger. “Since they know how long Bobby has been here, they know how far away we can’t be. Maybe we should wait until the last minute to keep as much area in their search pattern as possible.”
“Why did Kaitlin say not to take Hannah’s van?” Stephen fiddled with the mask, giving it a dirty look. “That’s the one thing she said I didn’t really see the need for.” He finally put it on, getting familiar with the zippers and snaps and figuring out how to make it fit best.
Everyone went quiet and Jayce started the engine. Bobby figured that since the suits knew she’d come with them, Hannah’s plates had some kind of alert on them. Not only that, she had Pennsylvania plates, which would stick out in these parts. The Montana plates this van sported wouldn’t get a second look.
Dan broke the silence. “We should swipe some local plates for this van, just keep ‘em long enough to do this job and toss ‘em on our way outta state.”
Almost three hours later, after another stop and another close look at the map, Jayce parked the van in a residential neighborhood. Everyone piled out to walk the rest of the way. The dragon perched on Stephen’s shoulder and saw him check his watch, noting the time as 11:15. With his dark hoodie, creepy mask, leather gloves, and nondescript jeans and sneakers, he looked like a serial killer. Without them to keep him sane, he could be one.
They moved in a disjointed group, Stephen keeping Jayce and Matthew between him and the few people they passed by. A few blocks later, they reached the last row of houses before the razor-wire topped chain link fence providing a wide buffer for the base. The dragon pointed at the cluster of buildings in the distance, making sure they knew not to go looking in the hangars.
“We’ll see you on the other side.” Stephen tipped an imaginary hat and grabbed Dan under the armpits. They flew up and over the fence, landing on the other side. Lizzie blew Dan a kiss and Stephen flashed a peace sign back at the group, then the two of them dashed across the open space to the nearest hangar. Anyone paying attention to this section of the perimeter would see them, no question. Bobby doubted anyone watched it all the time.
Getting into that building required pushing a button and being buzzed in, which would be harder. Security might be lax around the edges, given this base sat in the middle of the country and had a barrier against casual trespassers and dumbass kids. The actual buildings, so far as he saw before, told a different story.
Knowing what would happen in a minute or so to help defeat that security, the two men put their backs to the building Bobby pointed out for them and waited in the shade. Right on cue, an enormous, billowing bale of fire exploded at the spot where they’d left the others behind. Lizzie certainly did have a flair for the dramatic. He barely knew her, but could easily imagine her dancing around in the flames like a giddy schoolgirl in a shower of confetti.
“That’s my girl,” Dan murmured. He smiled as a second huge plume of fire erupted near the first.
Stephen pulled the mask off while they waited and stuffed it into a pocket. “Damn, that thing is hard to breathe through. You’re sure you can make someone push a button?”
“Yeah, I’m sure.”
“I should mention that I’m hungry.”
“Awesome.” Dan grinned, showing no sign of squeamishness. “You take down whoever gets in the way, I’ll grab Bobby.”
Vehicles raced across the base in time to see a third fireball explode. So far, only a few scraggly shrubs had caught fire, presenting no real threat to the base or the neighborhood around it. Andrea or Jayce would be standing next to Lizzie, reminding her not to kill anyone. Hopefully, she’d listen.
“Lizzie isn’t a patient woman.”
“Yeah, my girl is more of the instant gratification type.”
Stephen checked his watch. “We’ll g
ive them a couple of minutes to muster everything that’s going to get mustered.”
“Burn, baby, burn,” Dan chuckled, his eyes lit up glee. They watched as more and more vehicles streamed off in that direction and more and more fire shot into the sky. Any of those blasts hitting a building could demolish it. They had to be that big to attract enough attention and cause enough chaos.
Stephen tugged his hood up and patted Dan’s shoulder. They rolled around the corner, slipping up to the front door. He pushed through the outer door of an enclosed entry with ease. The inner door, on the other hand, had a place to swipe a key card and a button to press to get someone to open it for them. He tapped the glass to check how solid it was, then pressed the buzzer to get someone to show themselves.
Dan scowled as no one popped into view. “It’s a camera system. Sorry, can’t use that.”
“No problem. We can do it the hard way instead.” Stephen took three steps back, then threw himself at the glass, hitting it with his shoulder. The glass cracked.
“Awesome.” Dan flicked a finger at the MP stepping out into view as he drew his gun. The guy shot the glass four times. He turned the gun on himself and shot his own leg.
Stephen hit the glass with his shoulder again and smashed through it. He stopped a few feet inside the door and shook glass off himself.
Dan followed him through the hole and picked up the dropped weapon. He clucked his tongue at the guard’s whimpers of pain. “Don’t bitch, buddy, I coulda made you point it at your head.”
When a second MP jumped into the hallway, Stephen grabbed him by the neck and threw him at the wall with enough force to leave a dent. “Lead the way, dragon.” He pulled out his nightmare swagger and stalked up the corridor.
The plan Bobby heard discussed outside neglected to mention mayhem inside the building. These two seemed to have intended to do it all along anyway. On the bright side, Dan was right, he could have had the man shoot himself someplace fatal. The dragon flitted forward, trying not to think too hard about the angry path these two men had decided to carve through the staff here. Dan’s gun barked several times along the way. Not one of the shots hit anything vital on anyone, suggesting he was either a lousy shot or a fantastic one, and he only aimed at men.