Crystal Beach (Crow Hill Book 1)

by Tom Larcombe

“She asked me to hold on for a minute. There was an alarm and she had to check it out.”

  “I don't care. I need to check on my wife and kids.”

  Joshua's voice took on an ugly tone.

  “Give me the phone!” he demanded.

  “No. You can call as soon as I'm done talking to Rynn.”

  The line went dead in Michael's ear and he looked over to see that Joshua had used the switch hook to hang up the call.

  Joshua's free hand was clenching and unclenching, making a fist the size of a Christmas ham.

  “I'm not kidding! Give it to me now,” Joshua said.

  Michael dropped the handset and backed away from Joshua.

  Joshua picked up the handset and quickly dialed a number, keeping an eye on Michael as he did so. The wait stretched out and in the silence, Michael could hear the phone on the far end of the connection ringing and ringing. After about twenty rings Joshua hung up and tried again. When he still got no answer he hung up the phone and turned to Michael.

  “If the Board shows up, tell them I quit. I'm outta here. I gotta go find out why they aren't answering, keep them safe.”

  “Are you sure? We're safe here,” Michael said. “Oh, to hell with it. I'd do the same in your shoes. I'm going to try to call my dad next. Luck be with you Joshua.”

  Joshua ran into his room and came out with a bag. He pulled a pistol out of it and strapped the holster on his belt. Then he headed for the door, but stopped and turned to face Michael before leaving.

  “You're a good sort Michael. You've been right all this time. The Board doesn't give a shit about you. One of the more powerful wizards, guy called Merle, told them he was going to hold them accountable if anything happened to you. It was just blind luck that you could handle the crystals easily. Don't trust the Board. They aren't what they claim to be.”

  Joshua turned and headed out the door.

  Michael's face reflected his confusion.

  “Merle? That's Rynn's dad,” Michael said.

  Michael waited to see if the phone would ring again. He sat there clutching the necklace with his mother's ring. After ten minutes he began to lose hope. For a moment, his memory of Rynn was vivid, almost as though she were standing beside him. Then he felt her contact him, shouting a message from her mind to his.

  Michael, we're coming!

  * * *

  Chapter 7

  Rynn took Eugene back to the cafeteria.

  “Get some sleep. I think we'll leave first thing in the morning,” she said.

  Eugene nodded.

  'Were they trying to kill us?' he wrote.

  “Maybe. They tried to rob the school last night. That's where I got the pistol. They left it behind when they ran off. They might have only been trying to scare us off this time, but I don't think so. I'd rather not give them another chance, just in case.”

  He nodded before going over to his blankets and lying down. Rynn returned to patrolling the halls. She checked to make sure the fire was actually out and noticed that the sprinklers had started to come on, but stopped before they put the fire out.

  Aside from checking to make sure the fire was actually out, the rest of the night was peaceful, at least inside the school. From outside Rynn heard gunshots, yells, breaking glass, and the occasional scream of pain.

  This is killing me. I want to go out there and help. I'm sure some of those screams are people being robbed or worse. I've got the kids though, I have to protect them, get them out of here. This is only going to get worse, and who knows what would happen to them on their own.

  Twice over the course of the night Rynn had to return to the cafeteria and look at the students that were her responsibility in order to prevent herself from going outside.

  When the streets first started to lighten, she went and woke up the children.

  “We're leaving today. It isn't safe here anymore and there's a place that will take us in if we can get there. It's a long way though.”

  Thinking back to her conversation with Michael reminded her of his question.

  “Do any of you know how to drive a car?” she asked, looking at the older students.

  Eugene shook his head.

  “Not me,” Cindy said when Rynn looked at her.

  Andi bit her lower lip.

  “Kind of? I mean, I know how and I've done it a couple of times, but I don't have a license or anything.”

  “We'll keep that in mind, just in case. It's a long trip, but it's still in Colorado at least. Maybe things are a little more normal outside of the city. We'll find out soon enough,” Rynn said.

  She made their breakfast using the bulkiest foods of those she'd gotten, thinking that anything they ate now they wouldn't need to carry. When she tried to draw water from the tap, she found out why the sprinklers had failed the night before. There was no water. She only got a few drips when she turned the faucet on.

  A trip to the cellar with a pipe wrench allowed her to open up the pipes and provide enough water to fill several large pans from the kitchen. She used it to finish preparing breakfast and while the children ate, she went back down and refilled the pans she emptied making breakfast. She'd fill water bottles from the pans later on to give them water to start their trip with.

  “When you finish eating I want each of you to check your bag. See how much it can carry and decide if you can take a bigger pack. We'll only have what we can carry with us,” she said.

  All of them claimed they could carry more than they currently were. She wasn't so sure about the youngest two, but she thought the other three probably could. At least when they started. As time went by she knew the packs would lighten more quickly than she'd prefer as they ate through their food.

  “Cindy, you and Andi go and try to find some larger packs. I'll start packing for Sean and Randall using the packs Eugene and Andi had. Eugene and Andi, if there's anything you'd rather I not see, get it out of your pack now.”

  'I have a duffle bag in my room,' Eugene wrote, 'can I go get that? I can't carry it full, maybe half-full or a little more. It'll carry a lot.'

  Rynn nodded and shooed him on his way. She unpacked Andi's and Eugene's bags, placing the items that were in them on the table. Then she had Sean and Randall unload their smaller bags and started re-packing the larger ones. After all the items from their previous bags were in the larger ones, she started setting aside some of the lighter foods.

  They can take energy bars, probably some crackers, the smaller drink mixes...

  As she planned their loads she realized that they both only had clothes in their packs before.

  “Do either of you have things in your room that you really don't want to leave behind? You can take some of those also if you have anything that's lightweight.”

  Somewhat intimidated by both the situation and dealing directly with Rynn, Sean nodded. Randall answered with a crisp:

  “Yes, ma'am.”

  “When the others get back I'll send one of them out with you to go to your rooms and get those things. Think about what you want to take. It needs to be light and easy to carry.”

  Eugene was the first one back. He walked in and tossed his duffle bag on the table. Rynn explained what she'd told the younger boys and asked him to take them to their rooms. She also told him to make sure they had their toothbrushes, toothpaste, and any other hygiene items they might need.

  'Can I grab some things of my own?' he wrote.

  “Yes, but the same rules apply. They have to be lightweight and easy to carry.”

  He nodded and shepherded the younger boys out of the room.

  I suppose I'll need to give Cindy and Andi the same option, she thought.

  Twenty minutes later the two older girls returned. Rynn quickly told them the same thing and sent them off to their rooms. She looked at the packs the girls had found and picked two of them.

  As soon as I know how full these will be, I'll decide what food we can carry. We'll need water also. We can't carry enough, but at least I can purify
any we find easily enough by boiling it.

  Another fifteen minutes passed before everyone returned.

  “Is this okay?” Sean asked.

  He held up some sort of stuffed animal that folded into a pillow. When he popped the Velcro holding it closed, it unfolded into a dolphin.

  “If the Velcro holds it closed, we can attach it to your pack that way. That should be fine,” Rynn said. “What do you have Randall?”

  Randall spilled out a small paper bag. Inside were a variety of plastic dinosaurs.

  “My dad gave them to me, back before...” he said sadly.

  “Those will be fine.”

  Rynn rolled her eyes, while facing away from the students, when she saw Cindy's choice. A small travel make-up kit and several extra bottles of nail polish. As much as she disapproved, they still fit the qualifications she'd given so they were packed in Cindy's bag.

  “Eugene?” she asked.

  The young man blushed and laid a bag on the table. He shook out the contents and revealed a knife that was nearly as long as his forearm and three paperback books.

  “If you can use that at all, wear it. Appearances are important and the better people think we can handle ourselves, the less trouble we're liable to have.”

  She glanced at the books:

  “Niven and Pournelle? Bradbury? McCarthy? We need to have a talk about your reading tastes, young man. I may want to borrow some of your books. Good choices and light enough to carry.”

  “Andi?”

  Andi blushed and clutched the plastic bag she was carrying to her chest. Rynn walked over and spoke softly.

  “Let me see, we don't need to show anyone else if you'd rather not.”

  Andi slowly opened the bag. Rynn peered in and saw a pile of fabric. It took a moment for her eyes to resolve the lace, satin, and mesh into clothing, more specifically, lingerie.

  Rynn quirked an eyebrow at Andi, who blushed harder.

  “Those will be fine. They certainly won't take up much space and don't weigh much.”

  Rynn set the students to packing their bags. When they finished, she started laying out food next to each pack.

  “Add as much of what I put next to your bag as you think you can carry. We'll see what's left after that. You'll each be carrying some water as well.”

  * * *

  By the time they were ready to leave, the sun had been up for more than an hour. They headed for the front door of the school since the other doors all led out into alleyways that Rynn would prefer to avoid.

  She paused the group right inside the front doors.

  “You all know what to do if someone tries to grab you. If you need to defend yourself, don't hesitate. Don't wait for me to give you permission. This isn't class; this is the real deal. Are we ready?”

  A series of nods greeted her question.

  “I'll take the front. Eugene, if you can make a piercing whistle, you're in back.”

  He held his thumb and forefinger in front of his lips and nodded.

  “Let's go,” Rynn said.

  They walked out into the sunlight. The warmth of the sun was the only pleasant thing about the day. Pillars of oily black smoke rose to the sky from several locations nearby. The smell of burnt rubber and other things not meant to burn filled the air.

  Rynn turned east and started walking. The front window of the pawn shop she'd looked through the other day was framed with jagged shards of glass, the store looted and empty-looking. The grocery store was no better. Smoke drifted out of the broken windows in its front.

  Three blocks further down she stopped short. She blinked her eyes, not quite trusting what they told her.

  A city transit bus turned the corner in front of them, heading down the road in the direction they were traveling. She was momentarily stunned into inaction, having already decided that all hell was breaking loose. The normality of the sight kept her immobile until the bus had briefly paused at the stop in the next block, then started forward again.

  “Crap! We could've taken that almost to the city limits. Keep an eye open, if there's another one maybe we can get out of the city the easy way.”

  She started to mumble something about being too pessimistic under her breath. Her mumbling stopped abruptly when a series of gunshots rang out. The bus slowly coasted to a stop as a group of young men ran up to its side. Rynn recognized several of them from the prior night.

  She spun towards the back of the group.

  “Eugene, siren?”

  Confusion and fear marred his face. He looked as though he were about to panic.

  “Can you do a siren? A police siren. Like the fire alarm?”

  The confusion on his face cleared and he nodded.

  “Start as soon as you can and make it sound like it's getting closer. I'll do the visuals,” she said.

  Moments later the sound of a police siren rang through the morning air. Rynn watched the gang attacking the bus and once she determined the direction most of them were looking, she flung a small portion of her consciousness into the air. When she could see the intersection they were looking at she created the illusion of three police cars approaching on a road out of their line of sight. When the first of the illusory cars turned the corner, the gang raised their guns. The second one turned the corner and she saw them hesitate. When the third illusory squad car showed up, they tucked their guns away and ran.

  Her illusory police cars parked near the bus, hidden from the gang by the bus itself.

  “Come on, we need to move fast. I don't know where that gang's territory ends, but I want to find out as quickly as we can,” Rynn said.

  They moved at a fast walk, keeping the bus between them and the street they last saw the gang on. She paused and peered into the bus when they passed to see if anyone needed assistance. The only person on the bus was the driver and he was already beyond help. She kept the pace up for several more blocks until she could hear some of the students breathing heavily. She heard sobs and crying as well and tried to ignore them. They couldn't afford the time to deal with that right now.

  “Slow down for a bit,” Rynn said. “We need to pace ourselves. Plus I can see store windows that aren't broken a few blocks ahead. Maybe we're almost out of the gang's territory.”

  When they reached the unbroken windows, Rynn wondered if she'd been wrong. The windows in these stores had bars on the inside, but the stores still looked as though they'd been looted. She sighed and kept moving.

  “Everybody let me know if you see a gas station within a block of our route. We'll need a road map eventually and might as well get one as soon as we can. If we can plan our route to avoid highways and towns we'll probably be better off.”

  The streets were now deserted except for them. Occasionally Rynn caught a glimpse of movement inside a building, normally on the second or higher floors. Cindy spoke up three blocks later.

  “There's one, over on the right.”

  Rynn led the students to the parking lot of a gas station and convenience store. It was looted, but she was pretty sure that the looters hadn't been looking for maps.

  “Eugene and I are going to stand guard out here. I want the other four of you to go in and look for a Colorado road map. They might be behind the counter or they might be in that mess on the floor,” she said.

  She drew her pistol and Eugene kept his hand on his knife. They split up, Rynn out front and Eugene on the only other side of the station that ran along a street. The other two edges of the gas station were bordered by buildings.

  She could hear the children rummaging through the mess inside and wondered what was going on. There was an occasional excited squeal from inside before Andi finally called out. Searching through the store seemed to finally drive the earlier violence from their minds. The lingering sobs and occasional tears she'd heard since the bus were all gone now.

  “Found one,” Andi said.

  “Come on out then. Let's keep going. I want to be out of the city by mid-afternoon if at all possibl
e.”

  When the kids came out of the store, Rynn noticed that a few packs were lumpier than they had been going in.

  Should I say something? Probably not, she thought. I bet it's candy or something like that. They'll get tired of carrying it soon enough.

  Rynn tucked the map inside her emergency bag and led the children back to the road that she knew led out of town in the direction they wanted. As they walked down the road, Rynn realized that there was something missing, and that it had disappeared recently, probably while they were searching the gas station. When they reached the next intersection and the traffic lights were dark, she realized what it was.

  The hum of the power lines. It's been in the background ever since I first came to the school. It's gone now.

  * * *

  Several hours later they found themselves entering suburbia. The first few blocks still showed some signs of rioting, but after that things seemed almost normal. The illusion was broken when they found a small shopping center. It was once anchored by a grocery store. Like the one downtown, the windows were shattered and it had been looted.

  They continued moving through suburbia on foot and half an hour later Rynn's nose was assaulted by the smell of barbecue.

  “Does anyone else smell that?” she asked.

  The students sniffed the air.

  “Someone's grilling?” Andi asked.

  “I think so, stay sharp. We've seen hardly anyone outside so...”

  A block farther along they heard the noise. Pop music was playing, boomingly loud. Halfway down the block they saw a group of people in someone's front yard. The sound of laughter carried over the manicured lawns in the brief moment of silence between songs. They crossed the street, but kept walking. When they were directly across from the people, they saw three grills set up in the front yard. The man tending them noticed Rynn and the children and waved them over.

  “Rynn, he's making me nervous,” Cindy said.

  “Well, we probably ought to go over there,” Rynn said. “It doesn't look like they're doing anything illegal, except maybe disturbing the peace. It seems just crazy enough that I don't want to give them any offense. There's an awful lot of them.”