Battlecry

by Emerald Dodge

  Patrick’s conspiracy theory was easy enough to dismiss as the ravings of a lunatic, but one part caught my attention.

  “They did keep us stupid,” I admitted. “But I don’t think it was to control us. The elders aren’t evil. Whatever they did, they had our best interests at heart.”

  “Excuse me, lady, but my father is an elder. If anyone here is going to make judgments about them, it’s me. You don’t know even half the stuff they get up to.”

  I held up my hands. “Fine, that’s fair.” I needed to calm him down. “When did you start thinking all this?”

  “The moment I saw our house. Do you actually believe that we’re better heroes because we grew up in shacks without indoor plumbing?”

  I opened my mouth to defend Garrett Williamson’s decision, but shut it when I realized something: I agreed with Patrick. Cold slime sloshed in my stomach as I accepted the truth of what he was saying.

  The principles were real, of course, but he’d pointed out the flaws in our education, and now he was highlighting another irrefutable flaw in our upbringing. I liked our house. I hadn’t had chigger bites since I moved to Saint Catherine.

  “You said you wanted to make a deal.” My voice wavered a tiny bit.

  He slouched back. “Yes. Like I said, I don’t hate you. You and I are two pawns in someone else’s game. I’m going to leave, and if you promise not to chase me, I promise I’ll never cross your path again.” He inclined his head towards me, his eyes almost sad. “You’ll never have to see this ‘ugly face’ ever again. I gotta say, that kinda hurt.”

  In all my wildest imaginings of this moment, I never would’ve guessed that he’d offer to leave us alone. The chance at peace—true, honest peace—was tempting.

  If he was gone, I could send my team out on patrols with the likelihood that they’d come back alive. We could live and move in the city without fearing invisible hands would push us in front of a car. We both wanted freedom, a new beginning. I hated to admit it, but Patrick was right: we were like each other in some ways.

  But unlike Patrick, I believed in the principles. Unlike Patrick, I’d raised my right hand and sworn to uphold justice. Unlike Patrick, I cared about my team. And Patrick had hurt my team, my city, and me. I was going to see him in prison, or I was going to die trying.

  Still, I wasn’t going to tell him that while my teammates and hundreds of civilians were inside a gasoline-doused school with only one exit. This man had just declared to a room full of witnesses that he didn’t believe in right and wrong.

  In the distance, I heard Reid’s loud voice direct students out of the school. I needed to stall just a little longer.

  “Before I answer, I need to know something.”

  “Shoot.”

  “If you don’t hate us, why have you been sending us those death threats?” Obviously they were from him.

  He gave me a little confused look. “I haven’t sent you any death threats.” He raised his arms wide. “Death threats are a coward’s way of scaring someone. As you can see, I’m a man of action.”

  Ember slipped into my mind. He’s telling the truth, Jill. And he doesn’t know about Benjamin.

  “What about the gasoline and murders?”

  “Those aren’t threats. I needed to get your attention.” He shrugged.

  “And you don’t care that you’ve killed a few dozen people just to get my attention.”

  “Nope.”

  “Even if I take your deal, how are you going to get out of here?” I kept my voice neutral. “I can hear ten helicopters above us, and you and I both know every cop in the city is on the scene.”

  “I’m perfectly happy to wait here until dark,” he said coolly, putting his feet back on the desk.

  “Or, you let the kids go, make a distraction, and then run,” Ember countered, looking up from the three sniffling girls. “If you want, I’ll contact Reid and tell him to do something flashy to draw everyone’s eye.”

  Patrick’s expression went from calm to leering as he gazed at Ember, his eyes lingering on her low neckline.

  She froze. “Oh, knock it off, sicko.”

  “Or what? You’ll sic a kitty cat on me?”

  I stood up and stepped between them, shielding Ember from Patrick. “I’ll thank you to not harass my teammates.”

  “Oh no,” Ember whispered. “No, no, no.” Why did you have to move between us?

  Patrick’s eyes gained a vicious gleam. “Look at you, defending weak little girls from big, bad men like me. That’s precious.”

  My teeth ground together. “This is what a leader is supposed to do.”

  Patrick’s face lit up with delight, his eyes glinting with excited malice. “Did Ember tell you about our little romantic moment before I found you in the library?”

  I started to shake. “Yes. What about it?”

  Jill, he’s trying to piss you off. Don’t fall for it. This is his idea of fun. Calm down. You have to calm down.

  “That must’ve made you mad.” A wicked grin was plastered to his face. “I bet you were chomping at the bit to come fight me and defend this slut’s honor. But you never came. Maybe you changed your mind and thought she deserved it? Were you angry that she screamed and cried and told me where you were? You wouldn’t have squealed on her. You’re brave. She’s a traitorous coward.”

  I had three knives. If I moved fast enough, one of them could hit a vital organ. Then again, maybe I didn’t have to pierce something important. Even a flesh wound would distract him enough for me to get in close and break his neck, or strangle him. My fingers ached to be used; squeezing the life out of Patrick Campbell would be the most supremely satisfying kill I’d ever make.

  Jill, don’t! He’s trying to rile you up!

  “Get out,” I whispered to Ember. “Help the guys.”

  Patrick chuckled. “Oh, I wouldn’t go inside the school if I were you. I doubt Ember wants to see Reid’s charred corpse.” His eye twitched.

  In the distance, I heard a hideous crackling whoosh from inside the gymnasium, and then the heartrending screams of students.

  “Leave!” I shouted at Patrick, pointing to the door. “I’m letting you go! Just get out of here!” I’d kill him another day.

  He laughed. “No. The deal’s off. I just decided that as much as I want to never see you again, I want to see you try to stop me even more.” He wiped a tear from his eye. “You’re so much fun, Jill. Thank you.” He inclined his head towards me, black humor spreading across his face. “Let’s have a death match.”

  Sebastian lunged at Patrick and tackled him.

  I sprinted the few feet between me and the tussling men. Patrick kicked Sebastian in the stomach, only to have me on top of him in the next second.

  I brought my knife down towards Patrick’s palm, but it flew out of my hand into the wall. Not willing to risk another knife becoming a projectile, I resorted to punches.

  “Get them out!” I yelled to nobody in particular.

  Out of the corner of my eye, Sebastian limped to the trailer door and opened it. Patrick made the door slam shut, knocking Sebastian backwards.

  Patrick pushed me backwards into the desk, my head cracking against the hard wood.

  Shaking it off, I grabbed a fallen paperweight and smashed it onto his thumb. He howled and slammed my head into the wood twice.

  Once again I was struggling to fight him—telekinesis wasn’t easily countered.

  A flash of metal flew through the air, and then Patrick dropped on all fours with an anguished cry. Ember’s blade stuck out of his shoulder.

  “Damn, I was aiming for his heart.” She unsheathed another knife hidden beneath her skirt.

  Patrick’s head jerked up, rage and shock battling for dominance. He looked from the knife to Ember and back again. “You little—”

  “Call me a slut again. I dare you.”

  I kicked Patrick in the stomach.

  Sebastian opened the door.

  “You asked for it,” Pat
rick growled.

  A high mechanical screech combined with the heavy thud-thud-thud of helicopter rotors filled my ears, and the ceiling collapsed under a three-thousand-pound news helicopter falling through the roof.

  Patrick and I were now separated from Ember and the huddled students by a mountainous explosion of metal and wood. The bent rotors were still spinning, slashing at the fuselage and spraying sparks that ignited leaking fuel.

  Everything happened at once. Patrick pulled a twisted rotor blade towards us and telekinetically wrapped it around me, pinning my arms to my sides before I could react. Ember scrambled over the non-burning part of the wreckage, pulling students out. An explosion in the school rocked the trailer, followed by another explosion, and then another. People outside yelled in terror while helicopters crashed to the ground, onto the school, and into nearby buildings.

  Patrick staggered to his feet and disappeared into the choking black smoke. After a minute I was able to escape from the rotor blade, wiggling free. The temperature inside the trailer was already rising.

  “Ember! Where are you?” My eyes burned from the oily black smoke.

  She coughed. “I’m by the door!”

  The burning helicopter lay between the door and me. Could I move it out of the way? As if answering my question, the flames leapt higher, spreading to the ceiling.

  “I’m going to go through the wall!”

  Before she could reply, I pulled back my fist and punched through the thin wall of the trailer, which splintered easily. I grabbed the sides of the hole and started tearing, throwing every ounce of super strength into my escape. The wall fell away, leaving a hole large enough for me to push through. Gulping down cool, clean air, I fell onto the sidewalk outside the trailer.

  A devastating scene lay before me.

  Pillars of black smoke rose from downed helicopters all over the campus. Emergency vehicles had been flipped over with their occupants still inside, crushing civilians. The gym was engulfed in flames, which had spread to the main wing of the school. Dead and dying civilians were everywhere. Patrick was nowhere in sight.

  I sprinted around to the front of the trailer and located Ember just inside the door. She was trying to remove the lone dead student from underneath the helicopter’s fuselage, away from the fire.

  I moved her aside and pulled the body out. It was Sebastian.

  There was no time to mourn. “We have to get inside the school!” I yelled over the fire and screams. As I spoke, there was another explosion, followed by more terrified pleas from students. I didn’t know how much fuel Patrick had dumped in the school, but I had to assume that the entire school was laced with accelerant.

  Ember and I rushed to the nearest entrance, where a compact car was shoved nose-first in front of the double doors. With a loud yell of frustration, I shoved the car aside, the dead teenage driver’s head banging against the window as it crashed to the ground.

  As soon as I’d unblocked the door, a river of students gushed out, stampeding each other in their haste to flee. Ember and I could not get through.

  Frantic, I scanned for another entrance. A large, upended pickup truck blocked a nearby window.

  Steadying my breath, I began to push it over, straining from the effort. Ember rushed to my side with a small rock in her hand. As soon as there was a foot clear in front of the window, she smashed the rock against the glass, shattering it.

  We squeezed through the broken glass into an empty classroom, the shards cutting at our arms and legs. We streaked through the classroom and into the hazy hallway, where terrified students still ran towards the exit, shirts pulled over their faces. The noxious smell of gasoline made my head swim.

  “Where are the guys?” I yelled to Ember.

  Upstairs. Patrick blocked off an entire wing. They’re trying to break through.

  We began the arduous, smoky journey against the mob, pushing and shoving students and teachers aside as we made our way towards a stairwell, any stairwell, to aid the rest of our team. When we neared the center of the school, I heard the monstrous crackling of flames.

  In the main atrium we were forced to detour around a downed helicopter, which had caused another fire, though it burned much smaller because of the tile and stone materials.

  The main stairwell was completely engulfed.

  We ducked down a rear hallway and clambered over tables and chairs in the cafeteria, eventually finding a small side stairwell. We dashed up into the dense cloud of smoke, eyes burning, and skidded to a halt at the top of the stairs.

  The entire second floor hallway was consumed by burning debris, like a hellish obstacle course that stretched the length of the school. Through the dark smoke I could see a pile of locker banks at the far end of the long hallway. They’d been torn from the walls and stacked haphazardly from floor to ceiling.

  Above the muffled screams downstairs, the burning wood and stone, and crackling flames I could hear Reid shout to Marco and Benjamin. They were behind the lockers, trying to make an escape route that would only lead to more fire.

  An almost imperceptible creaking rose up from beneath my feet.

  “Tell them to get out!” I screamed to Ember, who was kneeling on the floor to escape the smoke.

  She nodded and closed her eyes, then jerked them open. “They’re trapped in the hallway!”

  I took my last breath of relatively clean air and began sprinting down the burning hallway, Ember’s cries behind me, swallowed up by the creaking of the soon-to-collapse school. Ember, go back the way we came!

  I’d never felt heat like that. Fingers of white-hot flame licked at my shins and arms, but I kept running. I smelled singed hair, not sure if it was my head, eyebrows, or arm hair that was burning. Maybe it was all three. Maybe my lungs were, too.

  If it wasn’t for my super speed, I would have collapsed in the hallway and died within minutes, but instead I slammed into the lockers. Reid yelled for the others to get back.

  I pulled the lockers down, the scalding metal burning my hands. One by one the banks fell away until I could see the three shocked faces of my teammates. With one last burst of effort, I shoved the final locker banks aside.

  There were no students behind my teammates; Patrick must have trapped them while they were doing a final sweep.

  Before they could speak, I pointed behind me. “Ben, Marco, run. Reid, sorry, but—” I swept him up into my arms. “Go! Now!”

  Wooden beams fell around us as we began our journey down the hallway. Benjamin disappeared in a blur, appearing at the other end a moment later, panting.

  Marco raced down the hallway, not slowed by the heat, though I knew he couldn’t last much longer than me.

  Reid’s extra weight on my top half threw me off balance, but eventually we made it to the other end. Benjamin touched all of us on the foreheads, and pain I wasn’t aware of on my face, arms, and legs evaporated.

  “Downstairs, down the hall, and through the cafeteria,” I gasped, dropping Reid.

  We ran down the steps and turned into the deserted hallway. We hadn’t gone ten steps before a loud rumbling above us told me what I’d feared: we weren’t going to make it out on time.

  Reid shoved us to the ground as stone floor tiles flew up from beneath us.

  The entire second floor collapsed. Thousands of tons of burning rock, steel, wood, wiring, and furniture fell on us at once with a deafening roar. The noise reverberated in my chest while Benjamin, Marco, and I huddled together in the dark around Reid’s legs.

  The roar stopped as quickly as it had started.

  We were untouched, entombed in a small cocoon of stone tiles. The glow from Reid’s eyes filled the space with enough light for me to see him kneeling, trembling from the effort of psychically holding up our protection. Sweat dripped off his chin.

  All was silent for several long seconds. “Is everyone okay?” I whispered.

  “We’re fine,” Benjamin whispered back. “Reid, can you use the tiles to push off the wreckage?”


  “Why are you whispering?” Marco asked in a normal voice, holding up a ball of light. “We want people to hear us.”

  Reid took a deep breath, and the tiles began to push outwards, rays of sunlight breaking through their spaces. Wreckage fell away and within seconds we were standing in a cleared space of the destroyed school. The bones of the second floor were littered around us, smoldering and glowing.

  “Where’s Ember?” Reid asked, tense. He craned his neck and searched around us.

  I’m by the trailers and I’m unharmed.

  I sighed with relief, and we began to work our way through the destruction towards the trailers.

  Parents and students swarmed the campus, calling out to each other and screaming when they stumbled upon the body of a loved one.

  When we met up with Ember, she directed us towards survivors trapped in and under vehicles, but we also helped locate and remove bodies.

  The first corpse I extracted was Captain Drummond’s.

  Over the next six hours, one hundred and seventy-eight bodies were recovered.

  35

  At twenty-one hundred we stumbled into the convent, sweaty and exhausted. I slammed the door behind us and bolted it, then sank to the floor and leaned against the door. My legs were shaking.

  “Everyone, eat something and go to bed.” I was too tired to sound authoritative. “At sunrise we’re starting our search for Patrick. He’s injured, so he can’t have gone far. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s still in the neighborhood.” I punched the floor. “Kill him on sight.”

  I tilted my head back and closed my eyes. Today’s earth-shattering Patrick versus Jillian “death match” would be in every newspaper across the country tomorrow…but a burning school and dead children would be in the picture, and the story would end with the psychopath getting away. This was not how I’d imagined our showdown.

  Benjamin kneeled down and put his arm around my shoulders, lifting me up. His arm had several raw burns. “Let’s all go to the kitchen and have some water first. I guarantee you we’re all dehydrated.”