Behind them was another yell. “I see her. She’s heading for the elevator with another woman. Archer’s been’s shot.”
Stiles, the cooler head, yelled, “The elevators are dead with the power off. Grayson must have been waiting to ambush us. Kill them.”
Stacy helped her mother run but moved them closer to the line of parked cars for better cover.
“Stacy, you’re blocking my shot.” That was Carl, who was aiming the Marlin over the trunk of the Charger, his left elbow resting on the spoiler.
Barb was surprised to hear Carl’s voice. “Where’s your Dad?”
“On the thirty-eighth floor the last time I talked to him, a half hour ago. He told me not to come. He’s in possession of a mental transmitter that Stiles wants back. I think you were brought here to make a trade.”
Barb noticed something. “Was that the signal I felt? It just quit when the power failed.”
Stacy, shifting their path farther out of Carl’s firing lane, suddenly realized her mother was right. “You could feel that?”
Two shots rang out from well behind them, and a scream of pain sounded from a woman twenty feet ahead. One of the people from the elevator had become collateral damage. A return shot and flash came from over the Charger’s trunk, answered by a man’s grunt back near the van.
“I aimed at the gun flash,” Carl said, the dimness making it hard to see targets deeper into the gloom. With two men down, it had the desired effect. There were no shots for over thirty seconds as the three, with Carl running behind them, passed the last parked car, and moved next to the wall where the elevators were, using the cover of the line of parked cars behind them.
There was a fearful looking man there, just inside the still open elevator, who had pulled the wounded woman in with him. He was frantically pressing the Up button in a panic, oblivious to the power failure. He raised his hands and pleaded as the three came near. “Don’t shoot, I’m not armed.”
The woman had been shot in the back of her left shoulder when she’d started running for the entrance ramp with the others. The other two women were running up the ramp now, and the man, frightened but showing courage, had tried to pull the injured woman to safety.
Stacy said, “We didn’t shoot her mister. There are men from that van that were shooting at us, and they missed. They kidnapped my mother,” she pointed, knowing the flapping hospital gown offered a degree of visual support.
“She escaped from them before they could make an exchange. It’s part of why they killed the power. They want her back.”
Another shot sounded from Carl, as he leaned out of the elevator, and a return wild shot ricocheted from the wall, reminding them that they were still in danger, and outgunned.
Stacy said, “We need to get out of the basement, and the stairs are all we have. Running to the ramp will get us shot in the back like her.” Stacy bent down and checked the woman, who was conscious but bleeding from a wound high on her shoulder.
Carl said, “They’re working their way closer, using cars for cover. We need to go. I’ll cover you when you go.”
Barb asked, “Stacy, why is your father upstairs and not here? I know he’d come armed.”
“I’ll explain as we go. Dad didn’t want me here, and he didn’t know what Stiles would do or how many men he’d bring with him.” She shifted her attention to the man, and the injured woman.
“Those men only want us, but they might not know you aren’t with us. If you help her stand, and run to the stairwell next to us, Carl and I will fire at them to keep their heads down.” She held up her shotgun. “We’ll go up behind you. How many flights to the lobby?”
“Just one,” the man answered, as he helped the groaning woman stand.
“Janice, I’ll help you up the steps,” he assured the woman.
There was a flurry of four shots from the gloom, and Carl fired off a shot and levered another ready. “We need to keep their heads down Stacy, while they run the ten feet to the stairwell door.”
Stacy stood with her shotgun. “Mom, go with them. Carl and I will fire off some shots to keep them ducking.”
As the man stood by the open elevator door, looking into the gloom, he said, “You’re with the man with a gun and badge that told us to get out of the building.”
“That was my father. Start your run as soon as we start shooting.”
She pumped the shotgun and brought it to her shoulder before stepping out of the shelter of the elevator. When she appeared, two shots quickly rang out, marked by their flashes. She picked one, and the shotgun blasted. Carl fired also, and neither knew if they picked the same target. A yell of anger told them they came close.
The man and woman, Barb behind them, rushed from the cover of the elevator and headed for the stairwell door adjacent to the elevator, as another shotgun blast sounded, with two shots from the Marlin as fast as Carl could lever the rounds.
The instant the stairway door opened, Stacy fired at movement and hurried towards the stairwell. Carl fired at another gun flash as he crouched and backed with her. They ducked inside, but Stacy used her foot at the base to hold it partly open.
“Fire off a couple of more rounds, Carl, while I reload. I’ll jam one of my ejected casings under the door bottom to hold it partly open. After you reload, I’ll shoot once before we run up the stairs. With the door half open they can’t tell if we’re waiting for them to expose themselves. That will slow them down.”
Standing in the doorway, she reached into her pocket and loaded four slugs in the shotgun, forced to pump one into the chamber to fit the last shell. Carl popped around the door frame and triggered a shot, and then changed his elevation before the next shot. Stacy picked up her last used shell and shoved it under the door at the middle, then in a crouch, she extended her leg along the floor and used her foot to kick it under tight. A bullet struck the door’s window, showering her with small glass fragments, but when she pulled back, the door stayed half open.
Carl’s rifle was empty, forcing him to reload. From near floor level, Stacy cautiously leaned around the door frame. She saw a man squatting behind a car. He was duck walking closer. She fired just as he saw her barrel appear. He jumped back in desperation, and the slug struck the edge of the rear quarter panel, directly in front of where he’d been. The slug went completely through and sprayed some of the plastic bumper material in his face. He crawled farther back.
“I’ve reloaded, let’s go.” Carl tapped her on the shoulder. They no longer heard footsteps in the stairwell above them so the other three may have reached the lobby level.
“Step lightly,” she cautioned. “They might hear us leaving.”
As they started up, she sensed a group thought from Stiles. It was intended for his four ambulatory men, but she picked it up clearly.
Rush them damn it, don’t let them reach the lobby.
Stacy considered what this might mean. The Immune transmission had ended, but how long ago was that? There was a lag time before a person became a Susceptible again. She felt reassured when Carl said, “I sensed that. But it wasn’t as obvious as it was earlier.”
“Dad told me how to make you immune again if you stay within a hundred feet of me, I did it for my aunt and uncle. I’ll do it for you now, but it only lasts about fifteen or twenty minutes, I think. You need to remind me every ten minutes if I get distracted.” She followed her Dad’s instructions but forgot to make it specific to Carl by name or intent. She used what was effectively a group send.
Ignore external thoughts. No one can control your mind.
Stiles proved he was within a hundred feet of her and he quickly demonstrated that his double Controller genes allowed him to sense what she had sent.
I pay my men well, you little bitch. They aren’t here because I made them come, they already have temporary immunity. Poke your head out that door again to see what I mean.
Two shots struck the door on the heels of his mental transmission. It was so soon that Stacy knew it was Stiles that fired, not
his men, to demonstrate his point. She also realized that she had just reset the Immunity of his men, at least those within a hundred feet, for another fifteen minutes. They would still try to kill her, but Stiles couldn’t force them to sacrifice themselves in the process. They still possessed a sense of self-preservation.
They went up the stairs as silently as they could. At the top landing, Barb was waiting, holding the door open for them. The man and wounded woman were nowhere in sight, but several men stood looking curiously at the attractive woman with an open-backed hospital gown, showing her shapely backside. They instantly seemed to lose interest, at least an obvious interest, when two armed teenagers appeared at the same doorway. Some of them ran into the restaurant, and others, seeing the elevators were still out of service, rushed out the front doors.
Barb explained the absence of the man and wounded woman named Janice. “The man took the woman out the front doors to flag a taxi. There are multiple hospitals downtown.”
Changing mental gears, she asked, “Can you call your Dad? He needs to know he doesn’t need to trade that transmitter for me. I’m afraid he might do that.”
Another shot echoed from below, reminding them their pursuers would soon be emboldened if there was no return fire.
Stacy, aiming her shotgun down the stairs, over the rail to cover the second of two turns, pulled out her phone and activated it with her fingerprint. She passed it to her mother. “Call him. I can’t let them get up here. We need to decide where we go from here. I think we’d be trapped upstairs.”
Accepting the phone, Barb pressed the speed dial for “Dad.”
Answering on the third ring, Dan sounded winded and hurried. “Stacy, I’m busy.”
“Hi, Dan. Did you miss me?”
****
The loss of power, a simple detail he’d overlooked, changed everything Grayson had planned. Stiles and his men were already in the building, and Stiles would be able to control other people in as early as fifteen minutes at the weaker outer range of the just ended transmission, as their Immunity wore off. Fortunately, 39 floors made for a long climb for his thugs.
He knew Stiles had been in Jeffersonville when he sensed his direct message to him, followed by the phone call. He’d felt like he was no more than five miles away, the river was a mile wide, and this building was perhaps a half mile from the river bank on this side. That meant it wasn’t a long drive over the Interstate bridge.
He rushed to collect the laptop, and it’s attached cellphone-like mental signal sensor. He left the transmitter hidden where it was, as too bulky to carry, and the easiest component for Stiles to replace anyway.
He no longer had a reason to wait up here for them, and he didn’t want the police to respond now, although he knew they would inevitably come. He pondered how he would descend. He couldn’t release an elevator to descend without building power, but that would have signaled someone to wait for it to arrive. He selected stairwell 2, which exited the farthest from the entrance to the underground garage, where Stiles men had killed the power. He assumed Stiles and his men would likely use the closest stairwell to the garage entrance to come after him. He didn’t for a moment think there was anyone who could delay them. He quickly tossed away the mops barring the door to stairwell 2 and used the side cutters he’d found earlier to cut the electrical cable that tied the door closed.
He listened briefly before starting down the stairs when he heard distant voices. Then realized it was people descending because of the power failure, and the earlier reports of the elevator malfunctions. It sounded like he’d expect an orderly evacuation to sound. He tucked the laptop under his left arm, stuck the cellphone-like device in a pocket, and commenced his race down the steps, a confiscated gun in each coat pocket flopping at his hips, and his 9 MM in its shoulder holster.
He estimated he was descending a floor every twenty seconds, but he wanted to be certain he didn’t rush into an armed man coming up that was looking for him. He calculated it would take him fifteen minutes to descend to the lobby level without being completely out of breath. By then, the Immunity signal’s effect might have worn off people several miles away. Fortunately, he’d sense when Stiles sent anyone a mental control message and would know what he ordered them to do.
He rushed past a few dozen people that looked at him strangely and called out questions, which he ignored. He slowed passing the fourth floor when his phone started ringing. He paused to look at the caller ID and saw it was from Stacy. He didn’t have time for another debate with her! He tried to catch his breath and answered.
“Stacy, I’m busy.”
“Hi, Dan. Did you miss me?”
He nearly tripped on the next step.
“Barbara?” He abruptly sat down, his tired knees too weak at that moment to support him. The emotions he’d been suppressing shook him to his core. The voice and light-hearted tone were unmistakable. She was alive.
****
Stiles checked his watch. He estimated that he’d soon regain full mental control. Not of his four remaining men, because that little shit, the Grayson girl, had renewed their resistance when they were within a hundred feet of her. However, with his portable transmitter unit working, he wasn’t limited to that hundred foot radius. There were thousands of people outside her range and her father’s that were about to become Susceptible to him again.
He wasn’t sure if he could inculcate enough people with a strong enough preconditioned compulsion to continue to attack the Grayson’s at close range, as they frantically broadcast their Immunity to several thousand attackers. Nevertheless, he could keep those two on the defense, hiding from people who could shoot at them from more than a hundred feet away. The police would become his Tools if needed today.
In the final analysis, he was perfectly willing to keep them both trapped in the building while he had it surrounded, and forced the people to set it ablaze. He’d prevent firefighters from responding.
Thinking of the future, he’d have multiple powerful transmitter systems placed all around the territory he intended to hold next time, so an Immune couldn’t easily reach them all, nor long survive the Hell he’d unleash on them. Ruthless and bloody destruction had been an occasional fantasy of his, but the physical range limits of his power restrained him. Those limits were going to all but vanish, if he had his way.
For now, he had to endure the Immunity that bastard had projected. He needed to do what Grayson had done. Use his wits.
“Jackson, get in the van and drive it up to street level. We don't need to go up those damned stairs. Anson, you ride with him. One of you go in the front door, the other use the side entrance to get behind them. Try to look like you belong there. Don’t flash your guns openly and pretend you’re innocent visitors. Then grab Grayson’s wife and his kid if you can. Kill them if they see you coming.”
When there were no shots out of the stairway door as the van sped past, he told the other two men to get closer to the stairway door. He did the same, demonstrating he was willing to share the risk. He assumed Grayson’s kid and her boyfriend had moved up the steps to an ambush position near the top. There’d be no cover inside the stairwell for anyone chasing after them. But by shooting through the open door a few times, he might hold their attention for the minutes he needed. It wouldn’t take long.
****
Answering Dan’s question of where she was, Barb talked in an excited, breathless rush that gave him no gap to insert a word. “I escaped from a van Stiles brought me over here in because they thought I was still comatose. They administered several strong stimulants I think, which did wake me, but I played unconscious. They all went to watch the power get cut like idiots, and I escaped. One of them realized I was gone and gave the alarm. Suddenly, out of nowhere, Stacy appeared and shot the asshole that was chasing me. Carl shot another one of them, and they both held them off while me and two other people, one of them a wounded woman, got out of the garage. So here I am in the frigging lobby, in a damned hospital gown with
my ass hanging out. Where are you?”
Still emotionally stunned, Dan struggled to absorb the rush of words from his unbelievably resurrected wife. “Wait!” He said. “Stacy’s here with you, and she shot someone?”
“Carl shot one of them too, weren’t you listening? You mean you didn’t bring them with you?”
“God no! I told her to stay away. You said you’re in the lobby? I’ll be right there.”
He rose to his feet and despite tired legs, started taking two and three steps at a time, racing to reach the ground floor to help them against Stiles.
He passed more people on the second floor, one of whom recognized the man with a badge that ordered him to leave the 38th floor. He asked an annoyed sounding question. “Hey, pal! Was the power failure the big damned emergency you meant?”
“No,” he shouted back as he passed. “It’s armed men ready to blow your head off if you get in their way. Get as far from the building as you can.” He pushed through the ground level door into the area adjacent to the central elevators. It took a moment to orient himself after the repeated turnings in the stairwell.
Where’s the entrance to the garage? He muttered to himself.
A man’s shout drew Grayson’s attention in the right direction. “Drop your shotgun, or I’ll shoot her.”
He saw the man who shouted, and he had a burly left arm around his wife’s waist, a gun held to her right side. He was shouting at someone just inside the door leading to the garage stairs.
Whoever was there had a shotgun, and its barrel was protruding from around the door frame, aimed at the man behind Barb. It had to be Stacy because Carl had his arms raised, both hands holding a rifle overhead. A second man had a gun pressed to Carl’s head from behind, and he snatched the rifle away. Somehow these two men had gotten behind the inexperienced youngsters, who probably thought they had Stiles and his crew bottled up at the base of the stairs.
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