by Jeff Olah
As Sean twisted away, Mason lost his grip on the boy’s arm and fell backward. Sean slid his feet back under himself and got to one knee. In between explosions to his left and right, he managed to slow his breathing and squeezed off three more rounds.
As Mason recovered, another succession of ten cracks could be heard in the distance. Digging in, he lunged forward and slammed into Sean’s right side with enough force to take both of them to the ground.
Mason pulled himself up onto Sean and drove his hands into the boy’s upper arms and pinned them backward against the warm rooftop. “Enough,” Mason said. “You’re not doing this.”
Sean began spitting the words out, although he’d already decided how this would end. He was lost and the only thing that felt right was pulling the trigger. He’d taken down at least one of the men a half mile away and all he wanted was another sixty seconds alone with his rifle. “Mason, let me go.”
Sliding forward, Mason eased another twenty percent of his weight onto the boy’s upper body and leaned in. With Sean’s face flush and sweat now oozing from his hairline, he struggled to free himself as Mason shook his head. “The only way I’m letting you up is to follow me through that door. You aren’t thinking straight and you’re gonna get all three of us killed.”
Shifting from side to side, although unable to gain any ground, Sean stared back into Mason’s eyes. “Just go, I don’t want you—”
“Sean, we are going back inside. I don’t care what you want at this point. We have other people that we need to worry about. You’re wasting time and with what’s coming next we’ll need you; your sister will need you.”
His face changed, almost as if the gravity of the situation finally revealed itself and he was ready to believe. Sean relaxed his body and smiled at Mason. “You’re right; my dad wouldn’t have wanted this.”
Sliding away, Mason released Sean and moved to his knees. As the barrage of gunfire went quiet, Mason stared into the distance and paused for a moment before turning back to Sean. “I’m not sure how many of them are out there or why they’ve stopped, but we have to go.”
Nodding to Mason, Sean backed into the wall at the edge of the building and took a sprinter’s stance. “I’m ready.”
Holding his hand out, Mason listened for another second. “I’ll get to the door and open it; stay on my heels and stay low. Once inside, start heading down with the others. I’ll catch up.”
Sean gripped his rifle and looked to the door and then back to Mason. “Okay.”
Pushing away, Mason looked back. He was half expecting to hear the familiar cracks of gunfire in the distance, although he was relieved to only find Sean close behind. Reaching the door, Mason pulled it open and was caught off guard as Sean plowed into him from a full sprint.
Sliding on his back and coming to rest up against the railing above the open stairwell, Mason shook his head and swore he could feel the fillings in his teeth coming loose.
Mason looked back as Sean got to his feet, smiled, and took two steps back out onto the roof.
As Mason began to right himself, Sean held his rifle at his side and shook his head. “Those men are going to pay for what happened to my father. I don’t need your help, nor do I want it. Get my sister and the others out of here.”
“Sean, wait.”
“My father is gone. I don’t care about anything else.” Sean stepped aside and closed the door as gunfire once again erupted in the distance.
Pushing forward, Mason instinctively lunged for the door. He wasn’t sure which came first, the shattering of his ear drums as the door exploded or his left hand being blown apart as he reached out for the handle. It didn’t really matter, though; either way, he was in trouble.
215
“I want every single one of them dead… today.”
Tobias hadn’t accounted for the disappointing turn of events the last few minutes would hold. He figured Lockwood might have tried to resist or that the Doctor may even refuse to help altogether. These were complications that he was prepared to deal with and was almost hopeful would occur in some form or another. Roughing up the man who helped placed Goodwin in that wheelchair had its appeal.
He just wasn’t prepared when Dr. Lockwood jumped to his death.
The plan laid out by Marcus Goodwin was changing and it was happening much quicker than Tobias was comfortable with. Fortunately with this change would come the opportunity to get to the man who only moments before threatened to kill him, the same man who forced a Feeder to attack Goodwin and then left him to die. Tobias Cane wanted nothing more than to eliminate every member of that man’s family, although he wanted one thing even more than that. He wanted the chance to kill Mason Thomas with his own two hands.
Glaring over his shoulder, Marcus Goodwin was wheeled quickly out of harm’s way. Tobias continued to bark orders while retrieving a rifle from his fallen comrade and placing the scope to his right eye. “Get him behind the stairwell and bring me the sat phone, I’m going to bring them to me.”
Standing with his left shoulder propped against the cylindrical light post, he was only partially protected, although he didn’t much care. Three rapid explosions peppered the concrete parking block to his right as Tobias spotted his target. “It’s the boy,” he shouted. “Make sure he regrets staying behind.”
The short stocky man who’d already pushed Goodwin behind the stairwell joined the others and raised his weapon. All three men who were crouched behind the concrete retaining wall fired without hesitation. With their mark nearly half a mile away and Tobias having the only weapon with a scope, their targeting was all over the place.
Two of the men, with very little long-range experience, ended up empting their weapons into the rooftop adjacent to the one they were attempting to destroy. The third man, although much closer, only managed to take out the windows along the top few floors of the building.
Pulling his eye away from the scope as he also fired his last shot, Tobias turned to his men. “You three are useless, get to the office and wait for me there.”
In unison, they turned their attention from Tobias to Goodwin without yet moving.
“What are you waiting for? He’s not going to tell you anything different, get moving.”
As the men slowly shifted to a standing position, another two shots rang out in the distance. Without waiting for further direction, they darted from their hidden positions and sprinted toward the stairs. The first two plowed through the doorway, leaving the third to take a round in the back. The wounded man slammed into the door and dropped to the concrete.
Tobias shook his head and watched as the fallen man was dragged into the stairwell and out of sight. Back through the scope, he scanned the roofline and once again located the single remaining member of Mason’s group. Speaking only to himself, Tobias smiled. “Boy, you’ve got some balls; too bad I’m going to rip them off when I finally get my hands on you. I only wish your father hadn’t jumped. I would’ve loved to have seen the look on his face when I end your life.”
Out of the corner of his eye, the flailing of the man in the chair could no longer be avoided. Tobias focused his rifle on the door sitting just beyond the boy’s head and rattled off four quick shots. “That should give me a few seconds.”
Marching the short distance to the man in the chair, Tobias was caught by surprise as a single shot rang out. He didn’t flinch and although he figured the boy for a good shot, he maintained his current pace. Moving in behind the protection of the concrete walled stairwell, he knelt next to Marcus Goodwin and nodded. “Let’s get you downstairs. I’ll take Cory and gather the others. We’ll make sure they’re gone by the time the sun goes down. All of them.”
Goodwin stared back for a moment and then shook his head.
“No?” Tobias said. “Which part are you having trouble with?”
Goodwin motioned for Tobias to move closer and with something resembling a subdued whisper, he said, “Not all of them.”
Slightly more co
nfused and beginning to anger, Tobias said, “What, I don’t—”
Again the volume in his voice fading, Goodwin said, “We have no need for the others, you go out and get him… only him.”
“Who?” Tobias asked.
“Don’t waste your time with the others.” Goodwin fought for each word. “Bring me that arrogant prick. I want to watch him die at my feet.”
“Mason?” Tobias said. “But the others would never let him—”
“Don’t give them an option, just go get him and bring him back.”
Out of the line of fire and down through the parking garage, Tobias quickly moved through the empty space as he wheeled Goodwin along the first level. Silence surrounded them as they approached the rear entrance to the small building and climbed the makeshift ramp.
Two men sat within a few feet of the folding table at the center of the room staring down at the floor. No one spoke or made eye contact as Goodwin rolled in behind the table. He looked back at the door as two more explosions could be heard from the parking garage. Back to Tobias he nodded and then sat motionless as the door slammed shut.
“Obviously the plan has changed.” Tobias slammed his hand down on the plastic table, nearly causing it to fold in on itself. “We had anticipated not being able to get to Lockwood and the real possibility of him being killed before we did. So now that he’s gone, we have no need for those people a half mile away.”
Cory was the first to look away from the badly stained carpet. “Okay, so what? We just pack up and head out, find someone else to fix this?”
Tobias grinned. It was the first time anyone in the room had seen him look like this. It wasn’t pleasure, that much was obvious, although this look appeared to be a departure from his typical aggressive demeanor. Still, the two men were on guard as they sat quietly in their chairs.
“Just pack up and leave?” Tobias asked. “Cory, I hope you haven’t developed a soft spot for those people… because if you have, I’ll kill you right here in this room.”
Cory leaned back in his chair and pushed his hair away from his face. “You know where my loyalty—”
Tobias held out his hand. “No need to plead your case to me, just do what I ask, when I ask. You got any problems with that?”
Momentarily cutting his eyes to Goodwin and then back to Tobias, Cory shook his head. “I’m good.”
“You better be,” Tobias said. “I’ve kept you alive longer than I care to remember. You owe me more than you could ever repay and if I find out you’ve become fond of the people we’re going after, you’ll face their same punishment.”
Cory said nothing.
“Good,” Tobias said. “Get me the sat phone. We’re going to call in a favor from our friends in the Stateside Building. This is gonna be fun.”
216
Five minutes ago, he watched as Sean slammed the door and walked into a hailstorm of bullets, not knowing the boy’s fate. Now, he sat backed into the corner of the stairwell gazing down at his left hand, wondering if he was bleeding to death.
His injury, while more painful than anything he’d yet experienced, didn’t actually appear to be life threatening… for the moment. Mason winced as he leaned forward and slid his jacket and then his sweatshirt off. Laying them both in his lap, he pulled at the hole in his sweatshirt and freed a piece just long enough to wrap his badly damaged left hand.
One end in his right hand and the other anchored in his mouth, Mason pulled the makeshift bandage just tight enough to cut the flow of blood to a slow trickle. The river of sweat running the length of his spine cooled and then evaporated as he stared back at the door. He realized that if he had tried to stand one second earlier, the round that obliterated his fingers would have plowed straight through his forehead instead.
Looking back at what he’d been through over the last year, and what he was sure to face in the next few hours, he wasn’t convinced that this turn of events was any better.
He hadn’t heard a single shot within the last several minutes, and leaning into the railing he was able to see the mangled remnants of his ring and pinky finger one floor below. Clutching his jacket, Mason stood and pushed himself forward. Hunched over and sliding along the wall, he stopped just short of the door and let out a long breath.
Biting into his lower lip, Mason gathered himself and then bent at the waist. Aligning his right eye with the one inch hole nearest the door handle, he blinked through the rounded beam of light forcing its way through. As the world beyond came into view, a lightning bolt of radiating pain shot through his left hand with such ferocity that he dropped his jacket and began to lose consciousness.
As his body careened to the floor, time slowed to a crawl. Mason watched himself slam into the top step and then go head over heels down the long flight of hardened steel steps. Boots, and then ceiling and again the stairs, he thought to himself, “This is nothing like in the movies.”
The initial collision along the top few steps distributed the force of the impact fairly evenly. Although as luck would have it, his left hand was caught behind his hip and took the weight of half his body. Instinctively he pulled away, only to exacerbate the agony. He pulled his left arm into his chest and slowly came to a stop near the last step.
Mason’s vision began to narrow as the taste of bile rose in his throat. Still clutching his left arm, he rolled to his right and onto his jacket. As the stained brown corduroy twisted under his head, a small piece of tattered paper dropped out of the breast pocket and into his line of sight.
He instantly recognized it as the note left for him by Dr. Eugene Lockwood. It was the same night Mason drove Marcus Goodwin to the bottom of the mountain, blew a hole in both of his feet, and then left him to die amongst the beasts he helped create.
Slipping from consciousness, Mason reached for the handwritten message with his right hand as the images from that afternoon came back to him.
A wide U-turn and then back up the two lane road as the man he vowed to kill faded into the late afternoon sunset. Oranges, yellows, and reds bled into the landscape as hundreds of Feeders made their way out of the valley and moved toward Marcus Goodwin.
Mason had allowed a Feeder to attack Goodwin at the center of the courtyard, not fifty feet from where his wife and son were buried. He told the others and himself it was to further the research Lockwood was doing, although he knew better. So did everyone else living behind the walls of Blackmore.
Mason took his time driving back up the mountainside and watched every detail of the densely packed forest as it had begun to shed its fall coat. Pine needles lined the road where it transitioned from paved to dirt and then back to asphalt as he neared Blackmore. Not many had ever traversed this narrow road and even fewer since the infection.
With so many deaths and the losses still too fresh, Mason pulled the truck to the side of the road and parked. He wanted more than anything else to forget. Not completely, but for a few hours. He needed to put everything into its proper place before he could continue up the mountain and be any good to the members of his new family.
As the sun completed its day’s work and drifted into the western horizon, Mason lay back on the hood of the truck and took in what two weeks’ worth of hell had done to the valley below. Spot fires burned out of control, entire cities blacked out, and not a single sound arose other than the pulsing wind that brushed over the tall pines at his back.
Within an hour, Mason had come to a conclusion and with it a choice. He could continue to feel sorry for himself and become a burden to Randy, Savannah, Dr. Lockwood, and the others, or he could use the experiences of the last two weeks to serve them. Not simply as an act of loyalty or even camaraderie. This was for those no longer here.
This was for April. It was also for Justin, and for William, and even for his father-in-law, Major Daniels. He could never bring them back, although their memories would serve to push him forward one day at a time. It had to; nothing else would.
As the storm made its way out of t
he valley and into the foothills, Mason was back in the truck and approaching the entrance to Blackmore. His headlights dimmed and not wanting to announce his arrival, Mason slowed as he rolled up to the gates.
Squinting through the downpour, he was confused to find Dr. Eugene Lockwood standing with an umbrella on the other side of the guard tower. As the gates parted and Mason pulled the truck back into the courtyard, he cut the motor and sat quietly behind the wheel.
Lockwood walked the short distance to the passenger’s side, shook out the umbrella, and joined Mason inside the cab of the truck.
“Doc, what are you doing out here?”
“You’ve been gone quite a while; some of us were beginning to worry.”
“I’m fine; I just… needed some time. Some time to put all this stuff in order, to figure it out.”
“Figure it out?” Lockwood asked. “How’d it go?”
“I don’t know, Doc. I just don’t know. I feel like I’m supposed to be the one to make sense of it all. That I’m the one who everyone is looking to for answers.”
“You’re right, Mason; you’ve become that person for us. Whether by design or by choice, you are that person for this group.”
Mason laughed, but not out of amusement. “I’m not a leader.”
“Call it what you want, son, but you are what holds these people together,”
“What about you? I can’t think of a better person to—”
“I’m a scientist. I play a role in this group, as do the others, but you are what keeps this thing going. I’m sorry, but I don’t think you have a choice, at least not yet.”
“Excuse me?”
“Mason, these people need you, and for all our differences, I need you too. And please don’t make me say it again. I won’t be around forever; this world has already dictated that. I need to be sure my children are with someone I trust to keep them safe, now and when I am gone.”