Javie found a guitar and he and Jax started singing. That’s what started everything. The rest of us just joined in because it would have been rude to let them tackle the entire song all by themselves.
“What song was it?”
“God’s Gonna Cut You Down” by Johnny Cash. A song like that causes the adrenaline to start pumping. I merely brought out the Jack to calm everybody back down. Obviously it didn’t work. We just got louder and louder, but it was nice. We were finally able to relax a bit. It reminded me of the early days back at the Safe Zone.
The survivors joined us, of course. Even Father Monarez began to unwind just a bit. Before any of us knew it, we had ourselves a pretty decent party going on. A crowd had even gathered around Jax, since he was finally behaving like an approachable human being. He was telling them some pretty humorous stories about his younger days. I swear I almost fell off my chair laughing when someone actually asked him why he was so rude all the time.
“What did Jaxon do?”
He was laughing right along with me. I don’t remember him answering the question. I think he just laughed it off. Then we laughed even harder when Georgie asked Javie to play some Rascal Flatts and Javie stopped strumming his guitar and tried to throw Georgie out of the church.
“What’s wrong with Rascal Flatts?”
Boy bands don’t belong in country music. Georgie was lucky Nick didn’t pelt him with another bottle. Anyway, the party was great. It was unexpected, but it was needed. Father Monarez even led us in some toasts for the lives that we had lost.
Then he had to screw everything up and ask Jax if he’d like to have his last rites. Jaxon of course had a fit. He stormed off, and when the little priest tried to go after him, I stood in his way.
“You need to let him calm down now Father,” I said.
“I’m not sure what I did that was so offensive,” he said.
“You can’t confront a man like Jaxon with the possibility that he might lose,” I answered. “He can’t think along those terms. He needs to believe that he will win. You basically just told him that you expect him to lose.”
“My son,” he said. “Do you expect anything different?”
I didn’t answer the man. I walked away. I didn’t want to think about it either. That’s when I noticed that the party was over. Everyone looked as if they were ashamed to be having a good time after all that had happened. Or maybe they were ashamed to be having a good time when Jaxon was about to have a battle to the death to ensure everyone’s survival.
I didn’t sleep that night. I’m not sure that anyone slept that night. Instead, I parked myself outside the office door in case Jaxon needed anything during the night.
Shortly before sunrise, everyone was up and getting ready for the team’s departure. They gave us a nasty station wagon since we would need something to carry supplies in. I couldn’t believe that there wasn’t a truck around to spare. A truck would have suited us much better than a station wagon.
Jaxon gave us a quick pep talk and went over all the details once more before we left. He was counting on us. If we failed, everyone would die. When he was finished up and everyone was hopping into the car, Jax pulled me aside.
He handed me his tomahawk.
That gesture almost brought me to tears. He had already loaded up his guns and backpack into the station wagon, but he made sure to hand the tomahawk to me. I looked at the weapon and actually saw it for the very first time. It was simplistic in its design, but in the correct hands it was an incredibly dangerous weapon. Jaxon probably bought it, played with it for about a week and just stuck it somewhere in his house when he grew bored. He couldn’t have known at the time that he would someday become famous and that simple tool would become his primary weapon.
The blade was hair-splitting sharp. The black paint over the metal was faded and scratched heavily, but not a ding could be seen on the edge. The once pale wood of the shaft was stained an odd tan color from sweat, blood and hard use. The weapon damn near screamed in my grip when I thought about all the killing it had done in my uncle’s hands.
“Don’t let them die,” Jaxon said. “If I fail, you need to succeed. Don’t let them die.”
It was hard not to get emotional.
“What about Skie?” I asked. “What do I tell her if things go bad?”
My uncle just stared at me. He tried to say something but couldn’t find the right words. Instead he gave me a quick hug and nudged me towards the station wagon. I watched him turn his attention to Merrick for a bit before he also led her to the station wagon. He wanted her well away from his fight so she wouldn’t be hurt.
Nick drove us away.
We had a job to do and failure wasn’t an option. The plan had two parts. For the first part, we had to search the inside of the stadium. It took about three hours before we found the maintenance room we were looking for. It was a relief that the room still existed. Javie studied the controls and figured out what we would need.
It was going to require a lot of work. He wasn’t even sure everything would still function, but we had to try. We had to make it happen. Lives were depending on us. My uncle was depending on us.
We drove to the hardware store.
This took time as well. Before we could gather up any supplies, we had to clear the parking lot and store of all the shamblers. There were a lot of them, let me tell you. After the area was cleared, we backed up the station wagon and loaded up.
When we got back to the stadium, Javie worked his magic with Georgie and Nick and I got started on the second part of Jaxon’s plan.
“I’m a little bit lost.”
You should be, I’m leaving out all the key parts, but I’ll dig in deeper when the time comes, so don’t worry your pretty little head. Just know that we worked the entire day in an effort to set things up. That was the plan. It would have been a lot easier if the stadium still had real grass, but that kind of luck wasn’t on our side.
When all was ready, we crossed our fingers and locked Javie and Merrick in the maintenance room and went outside. It was beginning to snow harder and that was a good thing. It made finding a hiding place just a bit easier though not very comfortable. You see, the snow was blowing down in a certain angle that kept the field from being filled with snow but was still piling up mounds of it about midway up on the bleachers.
Georgie, Nick and I buried ourselves in the mounds. Each of the three of us took a side of the stadium leaving only the entrance we were hoping Jax would walk through free. To say the least, we were freezing our asses off. I think we shivered in our respective mounds for at least two hours before the foot soldiers led the survivors into the stadium. I was glad when they finally showed up for two reasons. One, it wasn’t pleasant listening to Nick bitch and moan through our ear radios while we all turned blue in the cold; the arrival of the survivors finally shut him up. Two, the survivors came through the entrance we were hoping they would be using. They were led to the immediate side of the field and situated behind a couple rows of large PVC piping that marked the out of bounds line. The foot soldiers placed themselves on the opposite side of the field behind another couple of rows of PVC piping as if they were supporting an opposing team.
The waiting game was almost finished.
An hour after sunset, the Master arrived. It wasn’t some type of grand entrance like I had been expecting. He simply walked through the same entrance everybody else had and strolled rather casually to the middle of the field.
My entire body was shivering uncontrollably in the cold while the Master was barefoot and shirtless as he stood in the middle of the field and waited patiently. I was afraid that my shivering would make the mound of snow above me vibrate and give away my position. Fortunately, the Master never even looked my way.
I never saw the other vampires, but I knew they were there. Jaxon warned us about that. He said they were predators and wouldn’t want to be out in the open. He figured that they would stay hidden until the final moments of
the fight. Then, they would appear somewhere high in altitude since they seem to like being above their prey.
Time began to slow down after the Master had taken his position. I felt the adrenaline surge rampaging through my veins as I waited for Jaxon to make his appearance. Or maybe it was fear. In fact, yes, it was fear. I didn’t want to see my uncle walk into the stadium. A part of me was hoping that he suddenly grew a brain and decided to run off and hide. I knew it would never happen, of course.
Jaxon was coming to fight.
When I first saw him walk out of the tunnel and step into the stadium, I almost didn’t recognize him. He was stripped down to his shorts. I’m not sure how he had known that one was coming, but he had. He looked too skinny, almost emaciated, like a fighter during weigh-ins after a huge weight cut. I couldn’t remember the last time I had seen him eat. The scruff on his face also looked a bit longer than usual. I had just seen him that morning and yet he looked so different.
I was worried about him more than ever before. I began to doubt the plan. I began to doubt everything. I wanted to jump out of the mound of snow and join him on the field. I wanted to grab him and drag him away, and if the Master didn’t let us leave, then we’d both fight him.
Almost in unison, every single survivor began to salute him.
It was an almost surreal moment. It was a way for them to show respect to the man that was risking everything for their survival. Jaxon of course, didn’t seem to notice. His eyes were fixed on the Master. His head was slightly lowered and his face was utterly frozen in a grim expression.
He really didn’t look like the Jaxon that I knew.
He began to walk to the Master. I could see his green eyes smoldering in the darkness. It was a scary sight. The stadium was quiet enough to hear a pin drop. That was the kind of tension and fear filling the air. When the voice came, it literally pierced through the nighttime sky. It was a voice of pure innocence, but it was loud and powerful at the same time.
It was a little girl. At first I thought she was shouting something and then I realized she was singing. Her voice was amazing. I can’t even begin to describe it. Her Mother tried to pull her back into the crowd, but she would have none of that. She really got into it. She was even jumping up and down and pounding her fists as she sang. She started things off wonderfully, but imagine my surprise when every single human being, with the exception of the foot soldiers on the opposite side of the field, began to sing along with her on the chorus as Jaxon walked by. It was amazing. It was the most incredible show of support I think I’ve ever seen in my life.
It’s funny: my uncle isn’t always a pleasant person, and he’s normally somewhat awkward around strangers, but man oh man, do people support him. He may not be good at talking, but his actions speak a thousand times more than any words can convey.
I asked Mona what song she was singing when I met with her. It was “ Lose Yourself” by Eminem. Apparently she sang the song almost nightly to all the survivors at the church and that is why they all knew the lyrics.
I was proud of Jaxon. I was terrified for him. Each bit of emotion began to fight and wrestle with the others until I was a wreck.
The snow was still falling. It drifted lazily past the stadium lights as the song ended and Jax moved closer to the Master. The vampire began to blab about something. It was hard to hear him under the snow, but Jax wasn’t about to play the talking game. He hates talking smack. When things are past the point of no return and a fight is inevitable Jax won’t waste any time mixing words, he just starts punching.
Or in this case, he charged and I swear to God I saw him smile when he did it.
The take-down he used on the Master was picture perfect. The vampire never saw it coming, and despite being like a thousand times stronger than Jaxon, he ended up on his back. The punches began to rain down upon the Master.
For a brief and shining second, I thought Jax was going to win right then and there. A normal human being would probably have been ready for a trip to the hospital. The Master, on the other hand, easily backhanded Jaxon away from him. I was devastated to see how easily he stopped Jaxon’s attack. I was horrified to see how easily the vampire got back to his feet and turned the tables on my uncle.
Jaxon was lifted straight into the air and brought close to the vampire’s face. I don’t know what the monster said to him, but I’m sure it was pretty nasty. It just wasn’t nasty enough. Jaxon opened up his neck with a slice the Master never saw coming. The black blood shot straight up in the air and poured all over Jax.
The fight to say the least was extremely brutal. The vampire had strength on his side to be sure. He pummeled Jaxon mercilessly. Every single strike that landed was life threatening. I could hear the sounds of his fists colliding with skin and bone and I could hear the bones breaking.
I thought my uncle was going to die.
I was amazed that he kept getting to his feet. He wouldn’t give up, and the cuts he landed on the vampire were nothing short of lethal. My uncle knew how to fight. He knew the areas to attack. He reasoned that the vampire would become weak if it lost enough blood.
The field had been covered with a light snowfall. The blood of the vampire had painted the field black all around them. Every time he seemed to grab a hold of Jaxon, Jaxon would cut the vampire again. It wasn’t very long before the blood stopped gushing, and the vampire’s wounds were no longer healing so rapidly.
The Master was fighting stupidly. He should have never met my uncle in an open field. He should never have allowed my uncle to bring a knife. The vampire had underestimated him. Jaxon was a Guardian. Guardians were created to kill monsters.
Jaxon had weakened him, but the price for doing so was high. My uncle had lacerations across his face and chest. His face was battered so badly that he was unrecognizable. Each blow the vampire had landed had been effective. When the Master punched his entire hand through Jaxon’s back and lifted him bodily into the air by his spine, I knew that the end was near.
My uncle had lost.
The question now was how badly the vampire would torture him before he put Jaxon out of his misery. I wanted it to be over. I didn’t want to watch anymore. I couldn’t watch anymore. It was too much. To see a family member go through so much pain, I just couldn’t bare it.
“This is your champion!” the vampire shouted. “This is the man chosen to protect…”
He never finished his thought. Jaxon somehow turned and slashed at the arm imbedded into his back. The vampire dropped him instantly, but before Jaxon fell to the ground the knife lashed out again and opened the vampire’s stomach. I saw grey organs begin to slide out through the wound. Jaxon sliced his neck as the vampire bent over to hold himself together. The last of the monster’s blood dumped onto the field.
The Master did the only thing he could do. He kicked the heap that was my uncle away from him. Jaxon’s body rolled across the bloody field. The vampire was no longer healing. With one arm holding his organs inside his body he stumbled towards my uncle, reached out with his free hand and crushed Jaxon’s fingers before throwing his knife aside.
Jaxon was defenseless, worse than that, he was barely even moving.
“I’m shocked that he was even alive after the vampire grabbed a hold of his spine. I can’t imagine what kinds of injuries that must have caused.”
Be assured that the injuries were indeed fatal, but Guardians are built differently. The can withstand a lot of damage and continue to function. However, Jax was indeed dying. He could barely lift his arms in defense as the vampire began to stomp his body.
I was crying and my tears froze to my face as I watched Jaxons body being abused. I was sure that he was dead. He had to be dead. I wanted him to be dead so the suffering would end. The plan had failed. The other vampires never showed themselves, not even towards the end like we assumed they would.
My uncle was no longer moving. He was nothing more than a broken and bloody heap on the ground.
The vampire wasn’
t much better off. His wounds were ghastly. The organs began to slip out of his body and the loss of blood finally caught up to him. He dropped to the ground. It took the Master a long time to find his feet once again. He looked at my uncle, hesitated and then he motioned to his foot soldiers. I saw them ignore his summons. In a rage, the Master turned his back on Jax and took a weakened step or two in the direction of his foot soldiers.
I knew he wanted the blood.
I simply couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw Jaxon reach down to the cuff of his shorts and pull free his backup knife. I was amazed when he reached out and sliced through the tendon above the Master’s heel and dropped the vampire to the ground. I was completely astonished when Jaxon crawled after him and slashed apart the Achilles tendon of the other foot as well.
The vampire began to crawl away, but Jaxon could no longer follow. He was truly dying. What happened next was the moment I had been waiting for. I only hoped that it wasn’t too late. Jaxon raised one hand into the air and pointed his index finger towards the sky.
I radioed to Javie immediately and told him to turn on the water main. You see, The PVC pipes that lined both sides of one half of the field were one of the things we spent most of the day working on. Once upon a time, the Sun Bowl had an actual grass field, but some time ago the real grass was replaced with artificial grass. Yet the maintenance room that controlled the water for the old living grass field was still inside the Sun Bowl. It hadn’t been used in years, but all the right pieces were in place. All we had to do was follow the old pipes they used to water the grass, find where they had been blocked off and add our own pipes. When all was said and done, and trust me it wasn’t easy because the stupid pipes kept breaking apart, we had a working sprinkler system and a lot of water pressure.
Jaxon was right when he guessed that the vampire wouldn’t know the difference. In fact, the vampire never gave our crappy watering system a second glance. He probably just thought it was an outdated and removable sprinkler system if he even thought anything at all.
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