False Prey: A Wildfire Novella (Wildfire Saga)

by Marcus Richardson

  “What?” asked Danny, cupping his ear again against the noise around him. The phone beeped: Signal Lost.

  Danny tried asking others to comment but most didn’t want to talk to him. He got the distinct impression that Brikston was a town that didn’t like outsiders.

  At last, he was left alone in the street in front of the church, pondering his next move. The doors to the church were still open. Maybe the priest saw something and can give me a statement, Danny thought hopefully. As he started toward the church he heard a low moan from the shadow-draped interior of the church.

  “Hello?” Danny called out as he walked through the front doors.

  When his eyes fully adjusted to the cool, dark, interior, he someone sitting slumped over in the last row of pews. It was the priest. He turned his head and Danny saw blood smeared across his face and the carpet.

  “Are you okay?” Danny asked. He took the old man’s outstretched hand and held it tight.

  “Bless you, my son,” mumbled the priest. “I have suffered worse in my life…” the old man said and tried to stand up. He winced, then slumped back onto the pew’s smooth wooden bench. He looked up at Danny. “But not for many, many years.” The loose skin of his jowls wavered as he chuckled. He looked around the empty church. Danny follwed his gaze to the alter where a couple of large candles lay on the floor and two pews were tipped over in disarray.

  “The Lord works in mysterious ways, indeed,” the priest said softly.

  “I’d say that crowd had more to do with this mess and your injuries,” Danny replied. “That cut on your forehead looks pretty bad. Let me get you to the hospital—”

  “Oh no,” said the old man with a wave of dismissal. “I’m not all that bad—there’s plenty more people that need more help than me. The Lord will provide.”

  Danny bit back a sarcastic reply and looked around. “What happened?”

  “Oh, that group of hotheads out there,” the priest said, gesturing towards the doors with his left hand while his right probed his wounded forehead. “Came in here looking for the blood of innocents.” He sighed and tilted his head back toward Heaven. “Before this flu business is over, I imagine they’ll find plenty of innocent blood.”

  “Do you know the man the police arrested?” asked Danny. He pulled out the small notebook and pen he always kept with him. “His name?”

  The priest shook his head slightly and grimaced. “No. Never seen him before in my life, poor soul. I tried to stop them and almost had them calmed down enough to see reason when the police arrived.” He sighed. “I don’t even know why the poor fellow was being chased, other than some nonsense about him being a spy.”

  “So you don’t know him, never saw him before, and didn’t see him do anything…illegal?” asked Danny. The first dead end of a new story.

  “I’m afraid not, Son,” replied the priest in a tired voice. The old man’s face seemed a bit paler than it had been a moment before.

  “Come on, Father,” said Danny, hauling the priest unsteadily to his feet. “You don’t look so good. You need to see a doctor. Now.”

  “But, I’m not even bleeding anymore,” protested the old man. Danny noted he didn’t try to struggle all that much, though.

  “That’s what I’m worried about. You’re turning white, Father. Come on, my car’s out front. I’ll drive.”

  CHAPTER 3

  Danny took a moment to gather his thoughts as he got back into his car in the hospital parking lot.

  The priest had blessed him as the nurses came to usher him into an examination room. One came out a few moments later to finish the paperwork and thanked him for bringing in the stubborn old priest. She apologized she couldn’t tell him more than that the doctor would be seeing him soon. In her opinion, though, the old man didn’t look too bad—nothing a few stitches and some rest couldn’t handle. When Danny had pressed for details, she had apologized again and cited HIPPA regulations that prevented her from discussing the patients condition any further.

  Danny had then explained that he was a reporter and asked the nurse if the police had brought in their suspect for treatment. When the nurse looked confused, Danny gave her a brief run-down of the scene he had observed outside the church and described the suspect and the injuries to his head and face.

  “Nope,” she’d said. “We’re pretty quiet most days—Brikston’s a pretty small town—but the handful of people we’ve seen today are all coming down with the flu—except for Father Martin, of course. If anyone had shown up with the police, I’d know about it.”

  Danny had noticed she wore no mask. He said as much and her response had startled him: “Oh, those things don’t work on the flu.” She had sighed as she clutched a clipboard to her chest. “People have been trying to use those things since 1918. They just don’t work—the virus is too small and can infect you too many different ways. Eyes, fingers, open cuts…it can get on your clothes, door knobs, any hard surface and last for hours and even days. As soon as you let your guard down—and you probably won’t even know you’re doing it—it’ll get you.” She had shrugged and looked down at her clipboard. “We’ve known that for a hundred years now, but the public—and the media—keep thinking it works, so no one in healthcare brings it up anymore. At least it keeps everyone thinking about flu prevention—and that never hurts.” She had skimmed the paperwork on the clipboard and read something to herself before glancing up at him.

  “Hey, how come you don’t have one on?”

  “Well, I can’t stand having something on my face like that,” Danny had replied. “Halloween sucked when I was a kid. Besides, it’s hard to smoke with one on.” He had raised his hands up defensively. “I know, I know, it’ll kill me. I’m going to quit. I swear!”

  After a shared laugh she had excused herself and went back into the exam room. Danny had passed on his hope for the priest’s swift recovery and left.

  Now he sat behind the wheel of his car, drumming his fingers on the dash and chewing over the facts in his mind. Something didn’t add up and the familiar feeling that he wouldn’t be able to let it go until he figured out what the hell was going on settled into his stomach.

  Fact: the crowd had accosted not only the suspect, but a priest that knew nothing about…whatever the hell it was that had worked the locals up so much.

  Fact: the accused had been assaulted by the crowd—and the police, it seemed—and no one had done or said anything about it.

  Fact: the accused hadn’t been seen by a doctor, even though it had been over an hour since he’d been arrested. That was definitely odd.

  Fact: The cops had looked awful smug about the whole affair. That one, the big one, even seemed to be playing to an audience, just doing his job. That warranted more investigation, too.

  Danny rolled down the window of his car and lit a cigarette. He found he always thought better about his story when he was smoking. Something about the automatic movements of his hand as it brought the cigarette to his lips and the calming effect of releasing the smoke. He put the car into gear and decided to head for the police station. The town courthouse, city hall, and police station were all wrapped into one squat, Cold War Era building in the center of town. He’d seen pictures of the original city hall that dated back to the Civil War—it was a real looker of a building, it had exuded class and dignity. The new one looked like it could have been a parking garage instead of the center of civil government—dumpster architecture at its finest.

  Danny shelved his thoughts on local architecture and pulled out of the hospital parking lot. If he couldn’t speak to the accused, maybe he could speak to Judge Klein. The old man was bound to have an opinion.

  CHAPTER 4

  For the tenth time, Danny had to stop his fingers from impatiently drumming on the stone bench just outside Courtroom A. He grunted in amusement. Courtroom A. The whole town only had one judge, one court.

  What idiot decided to label it “A”?

  He glanced at the locals sitting on the ben
ches at the far end of the wide marble-tiled corridor. They looked agitated but confident. They all had flu masks on. Danny checked his watch. He’d been sitting out here for an hour. Earlier, he had checked at the police station and he’d been told the accused had been brought before Judge Klein behind closed doors for a speedy arraignment. The Clerk of the Court had seemed surprised there was a closed-door proceeding taking place, but under the circumstances—he took her hushed tone to mean the worked-up locals—it made sense.

  So Danny had found a spot on the bench and deposited his bulky form there. He had contemplated dozing a bit but knew the moment he closed his eyes the court would empty and he’d be left scrambling. Instead, he decided to review his notes. Besides, he figured, he could use the time to come up with a list of questions for the judge.

  He started to pull out his smokes and saw the sign that warned people not to smoke in public buildings. Danny sighed and put his cigarettes back in his pocket. Sometimes he really missed the good old days.

  A muted shout erupted from the courtroom. Danny sat up. The locals looked at one another and sat up, too. The massive oak doors to the courtroom swung open, propelled by the same cops he had seen haul the accused man into the squad car earlier. They looked positively furious as they stood there holding the doors.

  Danny jumped up as a stream of angry locals came out next, ushered by stone-faced courtroom guards.

  “String him up, that’s what I say!” cried one of the men.

  “This is a travesty of justice! A travesty!” said Greg Moore, the auto parts owner Danny had interviewed at the scene of the arrest. He glanced at Danny and started to say something but the press of people propelled him down the corridor.

  “Judge Klein is a senile old fool—I’ll make sure to vote his ass out of office come November!” said the third man, a tall, scarecrow of a man with a sour expression on his face. He glared over his shoulder at the courtroom as he moved down the corridor.

  The guards pushed and cajoled the last of the locals until they had all dispersed, grousing to each other and gradually making their way to the exit.

  Danny called out, “Officers, what’s happened? Can I get your reactions?”

  “Up yours,” muttered the the one without a flu mask. He shoved Danny roughly aside and stalked off down the corridor after the locals.

  His partner, still in his flu mask, frowned, his eyes looking past Danny. Almost absently, he put a hand on Danny’s shoulder. “Sorry about that.” The mask slightly muffled the man’s voice. “Billy kinda got chewed out by the judge in there.”

  “S’all right—all part of the job. So, can I get a reaction from you, officer…?”

  “McCuller,” the cop in the mask said. “Tom McCuller.”

  “Thanks, Officer McCuller,” said Danny as he scribbled down the name. “M-C-C-U-L-L-E-R, right? I want to make sure I spell it correctly for the story.”

  “You got it.”

  “And what’s your partner’s name? You called him Billy…?”

  “Perkins. Billy Perkins.”

  Danny wrote that down, too. “Okay, Officer McCuller, what’s going on?” asked Danny, stepping aside to let the last few court attendants out. The guards glared at Danny before the courtroom doors slammed shut.

  Officer McCuller sighed, causing the flu mask to move on his face. “Judge Klein listened to witnesses and ultimately decided that the defendant couldn’t be held without bail—in fact, he couldn’t be held at all.”

  Officer Perkins reached the locals at the other end of the corridor and the noise of their complaints ratcheted up a notch. News spread fast in a small town, Danny figured.

  “So what happens now?”

  “The defendant…excuse me, the person of interest, is free to go. For now.”

  “So the police department is still watching him?”

  “We’ll be keeping an eye on him and anyone else that’s acting suspiciously. I personally think the Judge is making a mistake, but it’s not my job to question him. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to get to my partner before he starts a riot. We’re going to have a hell of a time keeping the peace when the good folks of Brikston find out about this ruling.”

  Danny thanked the cop and stood there, alone in the corridor, watching the drama unfold by the exit doors. The two cops were trying to keep the locals they’d herded outside from re-entering the building and storming the courtroom. They were all shouting obscenities and feeding off each other’s anger. Danny scribbled down some descriptions of what he was watching. A slight noise behind him caused him to turn.

  The big doors to the courtroom were opened a crack. “Hello?” Danny asked. The door opened further and he saw the recently exonerated defendant looking out the door into the corridor with a hunted look to his eyes. Danny would have bet a few crisp Benjamins the man was looking for a way out of the building that didn’t involve walking past the locals.

  “They said,” he mumbled, glancing over his shoulder. “That I have to leave…n-now…” The wretch clutched his roughly bandaged arm.

  Righteous indignation welled up inside Danny. Here this guy had been beaten half-to-death and then hauled before a court without so much as a cursory medical exam, finally set free, and now they simply wanted him to go away. Danny turned and glared down the corridor toward the still arguing locals with their police escort.

  The cops sure aren’t moving them out of here very fast. The cop—the one called Billy back at the church—turned and looked down the corridor at the defendant. He smirked. It sent a cold feeling down the reporter’s old bones. That one’s up to no good or I’m the Tooth Fairy, he told himself.

  “Look at the way he’s looking at me,” moaned the defendant. He shrunk back into the courtroom. The man was shorter than average to begin with—maybe 5’6”, Danny guessed—but now he looked positively small. His face was a grisly mess of dried blood and fresh bruises. The left side was so bad, his slightly almond-shaped eye had swollen shut. He had more blood on his torn undershirt and a rough, bloody bandage on his right arm.

  “I can’t leave this way…” he said. His voice sounded more like a sigh. Then he closed his eyes and sank to the floor. “I can’t go anywhere…Mr. Moore still has my car…”

  Danny looked back at the suddenly quiet locals. They were all watching him now. The sight was definitely unnerving. Danny felt the urge to flee somewhere and hide.

  “Look pal, I don’t think we have much time before Brikston’s finest let that group of concerned citizens loose. Come on.” He reached down and gently helped the younger man to his feet. The man tried to smile a little.

  “Thanks—but what good will it do? Without my car, I’m trapped in here…” he looked around, tears filling his one good eye. He spat a bloody glob onto the courtroom floor. “I hate this place. I wish I’d never seen the exit for this one-horse town. Bunch of inbred hicks.”

  “That’s the spirit. Now come on, we gotta get out of here the back way. They look like they’re waiting for you out the front door.”

  “What’s the point?” asked the Asian man as he was dragged along by Danny. He didn’t resist much and for that Danny was grateful.

  He led his new charge out the side door under the watchful, impartial stare of the court guards. One leaned his head over and spoke into a microphone attached to his shoulder epaulet. Danny could only assume he was alerting the local cops. They wouldn’t have much time to escape, now.

  As the door shut behind them, Danny saw another stone bench just outside the courtroom. He pulled as hard as he could and slowly worked the bench over to block the door. It wouldn’t slow down the all-pro linebackers they hire as cops in Brikston, but it would give Danny and the defendant a few more precious seconds. He hoped.

  “This way!” Danny said, urging the younger man forward. “That fire exit—quick, open it!” Danny tore off the top page of his notebook—an old grocery list—and threw it on the floor when the fire door alarm began to shriek.

  “That ou
ght to get their attention,” Danny said with a smile.

  “Why’d you ask me to do that!?” hollered the defendant as he put his left hand up to the right side of his face. “Jesus, that’s loud!”

  “Follow me!” shouted Danny over the noise. He scurried off down the hallway towards another exit and quickly stepped outside into the relative peace and quiet. The defendant quickly followed. Danny took one last look and saw the door from the courtroom shudder against the stone bench. He quietly shut the door and stepped to the side. “Now, we just need to get to the front of the building—that’s where my car is. Follow me and we’ll sneak around this side.”

  “Won’t they follow us?”

  “I’m hoping they’ll go through the fire door you set off—I think that takes them out to the back of the building, where there’s a big overgrown lot, if I remember right. Tall grass. Sort of rubble piles people might hide in. Hopefully they go looking for you there.” He paused at the front corner of the municipal building. A police officer trotted past and entered the building, his radio squawking. Danny looked to the right around the corner and saw four men rush through the front door of the building. One had a baseball bat. Another cop followed them, not even trying to slow them down. Finally the coast was clear.

  “Okay, there’s my car, second row. See that Camry?”

  “That thing actually runs?”

  “You wanna wait for one of them to give you a lift?” Danny asked as he jerked a thumb over his shoulder. “C’mon man, think you can make it?”

  “Just get me the hell out of here.”

  “On three. One, two…three. Let’s go!” hissed Danny. The two jogged across the front two rows of the parking lot—the defendant, despite his wounds, easily kept pace with Danny’s awkward, rumbling gait. They reached the old brown Camry safely and jumped inside.

  Less than a minute later they were safely on the road and three blocks away, taking every turn a different direction. Danny checked his mirror—no one was following them. “Okay, there’s not many people out…but get down in front of the seat so no one sees you…”