Keeping his hands at his side, President Gregory Gear began his speech, and the motion sensing bomb below him was activated under his weight.
The narrow, spooky hallway Gary ran down showed no other signs of life. He didn’t see any place where anymore gryphons or werewolves could hide, nor spring out into the main room with in a span of a few seconds. It was clear they didn’t come from below. Which begged the question: how did the watches bring them?
With every door he passed he frantically tried the key. The key worked to open every door in the basement, none of them contained anything useful. The most potent weapon Gary had encountered was a broom. Unfortunately he wasn’t trying to swish spiders out of his house, otherwise it would have been perfect. When he got to the last door in the hall, a door that looked rotted from years of neglect and lack of proper maintenance, he opened it, and he could feel his inner sci-fi geek squeal happily.
“Holy crap on a cracker.”
Inside was a wide set up of weapons similar to the small laser gun that caused such a controversy at the bank more than a week before. They ranged from revolver to full blown assault rifle in size. He had no idea how powerful or lethal any of them were or even how to shot them, but he resolved to carry as many as he could back to the battle area.
Edgar, Slate, Lindsey, and Guajardo were starting to struggle with their defense. They were finally almost drained of ammunition, some of their swords were broken, and Edgar could only bite so many enemies at once.
Lindsey could feel the last bit of her clip being emptied. It was the last of the small metal bits, and her aim was beginning to slip as they were all getting tired. “I’m just about running out!”
“There has to be an easier way to do this!” Guajardo demanded as she emptied her 9mm at an oncoming beast. “These watches keep bringing new monsters every time they glow. We need to aim at them.”
“It’s better than nothing.” Lindsey’s magazine was empty, so she dove back to retrieve her blade. “Edgar, get those watches from the gryphon!”
The bat perked up and dug his teeth out from the back of a downed gryphon. His eyes found the Time Keeper, and he dashed through the air. The large gryphon had enough time and reflex to swerve itself out of the way. Edgar simply turned a U and tried a second time, coming much closer to slashing the watches away. The time keeper knew he was getting close, so it countered with a routine of blind slashes and chomps at the faster animal. Edgar had too much agility for it, but the watches were always just barely out of reach.
Everyone else’s attention was stolen by the busting open of the far door, where Patrick had previously been thrown. Elder busted out, looking unamused at the return of his first creation. In his hand he held a small button, the same one he pushed when he decided Jefferson Black should die.
He gritted his teeth angrily as he spoke. “Calm yourself, little pest. You belong to me. Remember?”
Upon flicking the switch Edgar paused his flight and collapsed onto the ground like a poorly made paper airplane. He struggled to get up, but his body was too busy undergoing a biological metamorphosis to be able to get back on his feet. Right before everyone’s eyes he was turning into the beast from the murder tape. His eyes flashed into an evil red, his fur grew and pierced out like daggers, and his fangs more than doubled in size.
“Oh no. Oh no.” Lindsey mumbled softly.
Slate watched the bat’s physical change nearly become final. The last thing any of them wanted to do was have to hurt a friend. Having no better plan, he rushed over to the far side of the wall. On it contained some instructions for an emergency exit and a fire extinguisher, but he didn’t want either of those. Right above both of them was a small red lever that everyone can identify. The center of the switch read FIRE ALARM.
He clamped down on it as quickly as he could and a shock wave of high pitch ringing rippled through the building, causing everyone to cover their ears. Several sprinklers from the roof turned on, soaking everyone in the room drop by drop. But to everyone’s surprise, everything that was happening to Edgar had become reversed, and he was back to his non psychopathic self, barely able to get back up. The device in his head couldn’t work with the high frequency beams.
“I can’t believe that worked.” Slate sighed with relief.
But his relief was short lived as it dawned on him that Elder exited the room alone, and there was no sign of Patrick anywhere around them.
“Guys. Where’s Patrick?”
The area looked remarkably familiar. Where had he seen this before? It didn’t take Patrick long to recall that the pavement-like floor of his current dream was the same one he had the day before the raven gang first became a thing. It was the place in the clouds that appeared to be an airport runway, the place where the mysterious man with the long jet-black hair was standing, with his back turned to him.
He looked over. The man was still there gazing out into what was formerly the coming dawn, though this time there was going to be no dawn at all. No sun, no stars, no moon. Everything was black, and the man was simply a shaded silhouette camouflaging in the night. Patrick slowly rose to his feet, ready to greet the man again.
“What am I doing here again? What happened to me?”
“You’ve been stabbed. Fatally I’m afraid.” the man spoke collectedly.
The memory of the duel with Elder came back in a flash.
“I can’t die.” he could feel himself begin to weep. “At least not yet. There’s so much I don’t know.”
A soft breeze came by. It swung the back of the man’s coat in a ghoulish fashion. “The universe decides when we die. Alhough I didn’t get the same chance you have now, you’re going to live.”
“Tell me who you are.” Patrick quietly commanded. “And how you know that.”
The long-haired man slowly turned around. His face was much younger than Patrick was used to seeing in his memories, and even pictures that his mother kept around the house or in their family albums. It was his father as a younger man.
“Hello, son.” he greeted him with a smile. “I know you’ve heard quite a lot about me, but you don’t know the whole story, and I had to make many hard choices.”
Before him, Patrick could feel his heart, or whatever makes the imaginary blood pulse through your veins in dreams, heave through his chest, but he wasn’t going to let that stop him.
“Why have I been having these dreams? What did Elder mean? Are you actually everything he said you are?”
“All the answers will come to you soon.” his father’s coat continued to blow back as he moved closer. “But time is crucial right now, and you need to wake up.”
His last two words echoed through Patrick’s mind as the scene generated by his subconscious began to fade. It was soon replaced by a bright, merciless glare, and a feminine voice was fighting for his attention.
“Patrick!” the voice boomed. “Patrick! Wake up!”
The real world came back to him in the form of a bright beam that made him feel like he was recovering from a night of too much merrymaking and the repeated slaps from Lindsey’s hands.
Realizing he was still alive, he bolted upright, and gave her a tight hug. “Lindsey I’m so glad to see you!”
“Thank you.” she smiled “But we need to go now. Things are getting tough.”
“Wait!” Patrick grabbed her arm to stop her.
He quickly unbuttoned his white dress shirt to find the wound left there by Elder’s blade. To his horror, there was nothing there but a light scratch, nothing to cause gushing blood.
Lindsey bent over to get a look at the slightly red-splotched area. “Oh don’t worry, that’s nothing, now let’s go!”
He sprang to his feet and followed her to the central room, becoming surer that the jab through the back of his chest was all in his imagination. The first thing Patrick noticed as they entered the hall hand in hand w
as how worn it looked from all the fighting. None of the tables and chairs were left standing, and everything else from the buffet trays and banners commemorating the event were all ripped to shreds, mostly by bullets, not to mention all the downed gryphons and werewolves, which was surprising too. And he saw Slate, Detective Guajardo, Edgar, Patane, and Elder. They were all wet, as was everything else in the room.
The last two were becoming violently displeased. Their plan was failing faster than an elephant trying to fly, and they didn’t have much more options left. Patrick nearly burst out into the middle of the room to give the bat a friendly greeting, but just then, he realized that wouldn’t be good for anyone.
“Where’s Gary?” Patrick asked his partner.
“He rushed down to the basement to try to find weapons, but he hasn’t returned yet.”
If Gary didn’t come back soon, the gang would have to rely on their improvised skills with regards to defense. Slate, Edgar, and Guajardo couldn’t keep it up much longer.
The two villains were aware of this, and saw it as a clear cut to victory for themselves. “Everyone, they’re losing their defense. For hell’s sake get them now!” Elder cried out.
The beasts mindlessly obeyed. The normal gryphons and wolves began to form a flanking position, coving the gang from all sides and blocking any escape route. Patrick and everyone uneasily formed a circle with their backs almost touching.
“Anyone have any ideas?” Guajardo asked dejectedly.
They had a couple swords and a few bullets, but that wouldn’t do anything.
“Hey, ugly!” beamed a voice near the entrance. It was slightly strained from singing.
The unexpected cry completely ruined the monsters’ formation. The lion-bird that was nearest to the door turned around to see a confident Johnny, who was armed with only a guitar and his wits. It was too busy to not have perceived the rocker as a threat that it barely noticed him raising his guitar and clobbering it right over its head with his $2000 Gibson. It fell over, unconscious on the floor.
“That is the most rock n’ roll thing I have ever seen.” Patrick commented, keeping his awe for later.
He found Jane on the other side of the room, with her base guitar extended out in front of her for defense. “Our show ended early unfortunately.” The focus of their enemies had become so scrambled that it gave everyone room to rush back into a safe position and attempt to scrap together some kind of weapon.
The sound of someone struggling grabbed the gang’s attention. Patrick turned around to see a cluster of strange looking weapons stumble over to them all. Gary was behind the cluster. He dropped all the weapons on the ground and bent over, trying to regain his breath.
“I’m back.” he huffed. “Quick, take these and figure out how they work. We’ll win with these.”
The look on Elder and Patane’s face could not be put into words, but it wasn’t hard to guess that they were more aware of their certain doom.
“Stop them!” Patane’s voice lashed out at the beasts. “Kill them now!”
The gryphons and wolves all were aware that the fight was nearly at an end. They didn’t want to let down their masters, considering what would be done to them if they failed. Getting stealthily back into focus, they rushed forward, claws and fangs bared.
A yellow-reddish blast of energy seethed through the air and collided with the nearest gryphon. It immediately plummeted to the floor, smoke burning off its fur, which scorched from the blast. To Patrick’s side Lindsey and Slate had their weapons secure at their shoulders and their fingers happy on the trigger.
“Cock it back and let it fly!” they both commanded everyone else. “And aim for the damn watches if you can!”
Patrick clutched the weapon tight against his breast. Its appearance mirrored an average assault rifle, but had a much larger chamber and magazine size. He slid back a small revolving apparatus and aimed it forward. Several bright beams zoomed forward at the pull of the trigger, sending a few wolves and gryphons down to the ground. The time keeper was the main target everyone was aiming for. Despite its much larger size it was not being hit. It was using the large beam coming out of the center of the pocket watches for protection. Every time a laser was on its collision course it simply was absorbed into the brightness, and the lead gryphon was unaffected.
The colorless beam from the watches grew brighter with every blast. The Time Keeper nearly began to stand bipedal as it gained energy and strength. All around it its companions were getting taken out, and with the rising shines it continuously brought more backup suddenly as if by magical means.
Elder and Patane were alight. The time for victory was just about now. The time keeper just needed a bit more energy to initiate the nationwide invasion, with no computer even necessary. All their weapons and men were going to be nothing compared to that amount of power. “Use all you mind, your intellect! I gave you genius intelligence so you could concentrate when the time was needed! Make death happen now!”
With each of his words the blaze grew brighter. It had grown to cover just about every inch of the hall, forcing everyone to close their eyes to save their ability to see. With no way of seeing any of their enemies the gang had to stop shooting. Patrick raised his arm over his eyes, trying to see what was going on. No amount of squinting or UV resistant sunglasses could have graced him with sight.
That’s why they barely noticed when Edgar flung himself into the air and initiated an aerial assault on the Time Keeper. Patrick and Gary motioned out to stop him, but it was too late. The vague shape of their friend’s wings vanished into the infinite flash, and everything from there was consumed in light.
“Edgar, no!” Patrick and Gary begged.
Everyone huddled up close, in an effort to make sure no one had inadvertently crossed into the enemy territory. A massive crash sounded about the now formless room. Almost as soon as it had started the matterless void had dissolved back into a physical existence. Light, at least artificial light from what was left of the overhead ceiling bulbs, was warily returning to the scene.
When Patrick and the gang were finally able to see clearly again they saw everything looked pretty much the same. No new artificial monsters had manifested and the whole building still looked like a trash bin. The only new development was Edgar who laid on the ground motionlessly with smoke coming out of his ears as if were an angry cartoon character, and the time keeper was standing over him protectively.
The gang rushed over. Patrick was the first to get there. He bent over, and put a finger on his friend’s neck to check for any pulse. There was one.
“He’s alive.” Patrick smiled to everyone. “I think he’s going to be okay.”
On the bat’s other, side Gary released a happy sigh and everyone chorused their joy.
“Whatever he did, I guess it worked.” Jane smiled.
Their high hopes were reaffirmed as Edgar’s ears began to twitch rapidly, and he slowly rose back to an upright position, with the assistance of all his friends.
“That was really stupid what you did.” Gary mocked with a smile. “Don’t try anything like that again.”
Edgar grinned and produced a happy sounding screech, which everyone interpreted to mean “alright”. Elder and Patane stood in their same places, dumbfounded over what had just occurred. The former once again flicked his button in another attempt to take control of Edgar. Absolutely nothing happened.
“What?” the doctor cried out. “I… it’s been broken. I can’t control him anymore.”
The Time Keeper was the first to realize what happened. Before the gryphon could complete its objective of initiating the end of the country, Edgar collided with him, completely making it lose all focus and stop his mission. But that’s not what made the Time Keeper decide to switch sides. The smoke coming out of the bat’s ears was from the device planted on his brain during the genesis of his creation. The
intensity of the unique energy contained in the watches was enough to break it from the inside. For all intents and purposes, the shattering of the device should have killed him. But it didn’t. The monster took it to heart. If the most miserable and broken of all Elder’s drones could finally break free of his chains, then it could too.
As everyone was still trying to fathom what was going on the large gryphon approached them. Patrick and the gang watched it with suspicion. Its heavy footsteps brought back all their fright. They were not expecting such a turn of events, so they were shocked when the beast grabbed both the watches on his neck and ripped them clean off, busting the chains. It dropped them both on the ground at the humans’ feet.
“Th- thank you.” Patrick said softly, looking it straight in the eyes for the first time.
With their leader no longer attacking the humans, all the other remaining beasts joined at its side, watching the raven gang with eyes that were no longer menacing, but carried a sense of longing, for a home they could never go back to. The Time Keeper took a couple steps forward and with its front paw gave both the watches a few gentle taps. The watches reacted, and a soft blaze engulfed all of the beasts, including the fallen ones. In a split second they all vanished, and all that was left were the watches.
Not even Patane noticed when Elder anticlimactically slipped out of the building. Now he was all by himself, in a room filled with enemies.
“Don’t think you’ve won!” he growled through his teeth. His hand swerved to his back pocket, plucking out a loaded revolver. “None of you is leaving here alive.”
A shadowy form burst out of hiding and slammed Patane in the back of the head with an empty bottle of Champaign. It was Dr. Hullway. Even with his leg injury he managed to creep up through the side stairway in preparation to spring out if the moment ever called for him. The villain instantaneously fell to the floor, now suffering from heavy internal bleeding from the bottle.
The Raven Gang (Noble Animals Book 1) Page 26