Doria Falls

by Michael Pierce

  “Knock ’em off the mountain!” Jeremy yelled.

  Our pursuers were sandwiched between us and a guardrail protecting them from a drop that extended far beyond what I could see.

  Before the two cars could touch again, Mr. Gordon slammed on the brakes, letting the other car pass. Once they were ahead, the car air skidded to a diagonal stop, blocking both lanes of the narrow road. Our car slowed to a stop a few yards away.

  The four men in black exited the car from all doors in a flash, each with a gun raised and pointed directly at our car. The guy who’d lost his pistol in the earlier collision must have had a spare.

  “Get out of the car,” the driver commanded, with his raised arm over the roof of the car.

  3

  Stalemate

  “This is insane,” Richard said, turning to Mr. Gordon. “What are we going to do? We don’t have any weapons. Do we?”

  “I’ll handle this,” Mr. Gordon said and opened his driver-side door. “Stay here.”

  “Yeah, Mr. G!” Jeremy exclaimed. “That’s what I’m talking about.”

  But I wasn’t so thrilled. I’ve seen Mr. Gordon do some amazing things, but jumping into a fight hasn’t been one of them.

  “What was that about making bullies disappear?” I asked.

  “Some bullies are more persistent than others,” was all he said before closing the door.

  “If you hadn’t left, then you wouldn’t be in this mess,” Desiree said softly, but when I turned to look at her, I noticed she wasn’t talking. “If you hadn’t let that boy take you from me, you’d still be safe.”

  “Reid?” I asked.

  She nodded and laid her head back on my shoulder.

  I watched as Mr. Gordon sauntered to the front of the car. He stood stoically with his back to us and four guns pointed at him.

  Inside the car, it was deathly silent. Everyone seemed to be holding their breath while waiting for something to happen outside. At the moment, looking through the windshield was like gazing upon a still life painting—a moment frozen in time. And I couldn’t help being afraid for Mr. Gordon, for us…for myself.

  Then the first shot was fired, igniting a full on firefight. The barrage of bullets bounced off the windshield and riddled the hood with small holes. But Mr. Gordon stood through the assault. He barely seemed to move a muscle, and when the gunfire stopped, he raised his hands out in a gesture of peace.

  The men in black were noticeably dumbfounded. One more random shot was fired by the driver—a doubting Thomas who obviously couldn’t believe what he was seeing. He’d obviously seen the Lornes do unbelievable things, but the man standing before them was no Lorne, and what he’d done should not have been possible.

  I knew better. Impossible was just a block in your mind needing to be chiseled into dust.

  The guns were suddenly ripped out of each man’s hand and soared through the air away from the cars, over the guardrail framing the far lane, and disappeared over the side of the mountain. The men did not seem to be shocked any longer. They had no distinctive expressions on their faces at all. They were back to looking frozen at their posts.

  “What’s happening?” Desiree whispered.

  “I dunno,” I said.

  Richard’s door creaked as he slowly opened it.

  “Don’t,” Jeremy said.

  “I should do something,” he said.

  “No, you shouldn’t,” I said. “Mr. Gordon doesn’t need our help. We need his.”

  “Cias!” Mr. Gordon yelled from where he stood, making no move toward the other car or the human statues. “We need to talk. Come out and face me man to man.”

  The man in black standing by the far back door suddenly fell out of view, and the bald man with milky white skin and large facial features stood up, placing his hands on the roof of the car. If the huge gash on his head was still there, I couldn’t see it.

  “Let me out,” I demanded to Jeremy.

  “No, we shouldn’t—”

  “Let me out!”

  Jeremy shrank toward the door, opened it and stood back as I slid out of the backseat. Desiree opened her door as well and stood up, but stayed behind, using it like a shield. Richard was the last of us to exit the car. He too found safety behind his door.

  “Let them go, Daniel,” Cias said in his soft, raspy voice. “Unless you want me to grab them. Even you can’t hold onto everyone.”

  As soon as Cias finished his sentence, the three remaining men in black collapsed to the ground.

  “This is unfortunate,” Cias said. “I’m not exactly in the best condition to challenge you one-on-one.”

  “When did you turn?” Mr. Gordon asked.

  “I didn’t.” Cias produced a still painful smile.

  I walked up behind Mr. Gordon and he threw his right hand out from his side, palm back, gesturing for me to stop.

  “Stay back,” he said without diverting his gaze from Cias.

  I halted in my tracks, but did not back up. Richard put an unsteady hand on my shoulder, and I was tempted to shake it off, but remained still.

  “I didn’t turn—I remained faithful throughout my service.”

  “Serving the wrong team,” Mr. Gordon said.

  “That’s a pretty biased opinion. Not serving your little band of misfits, that’s true. I’d say you’re the one on the wrong team—the losing one.”

  “So when you came to me after Kafka was slain?”

  “I had a reputation to maintain, appearances to uphold. You would have done the same.”

  Mr. Gordon lowered and shook his head.

  “You’ve been away from the family for so long, you have no idea what’s going on anymore,” Cias said. “Kafka is back with a vengeance and soon there will be nowhere left to hide.”

  He looked past Mr. Gordon and straight at me—but I soon realized his focus was not on me at all, but on Jeremy. “He’d given you everything and you repaid him with a screwdriver to the throat. You made a terrible mistake, one you’ll pay for soon enough. One day you’ll have to come out from behind Daniel’s shadow, and when you do, we’ll be waiting—waiting to snatch you up like a puppy and repay the favor.” Cias flashed white teeth in the moonlight. “Don’t look so surprised.”

  “You will get no such chance,” Mr. Gordon said sternly.

  “Kafka has taught me to be a patient man.”

  “Kafka’s taught you to be an asshole!” Jeremy shouted at his previous mentor.

  “Son, you know what I can do and still you provoke me?”

  “Don’t call me that—don’t ever! I should have killed you, too.”

  “Well, here’s your chance, son.” Cias enunciated his final word, giving Jeremy a sadistic grin. “Tell your teacher to step aside for a moment and we can finish this like men.”

  Fuming, Jeremy took a step forward.

  “Jeremy,” Mr. Gordon said. “Don’t even think about it. Everyone stay where you are or get back in the car. He’s provoking you to distract me. Just stay back and shut up.”

  “Come on, Daniel,” Cias said with a sigh. “What are we doing here? I know you’re not going to kill me. Presently, we’re at a stalemate, but you can’t keep this up forever.”

  I was only able to see one of the fallen men in black, lying lifeless on the ground, but that one was enough. Mr. Gordon had thrown all the unholstered guns off the cliff, but I saw a bulge in his side and knew he had another firearm.

  “We were just about to leave, and you’re going to let us leave—peacefully this time. I can keep this up for as long as I need to.”

  “You’re fatiguing. I can feel it. I can feel your grip loosening.”

  I wrapped my mind around the pistol under the fallen man’s black shirt and willed it to me like Frolics from the dresser, like the blood from Nero, and the glass from Jeremy’s body. The gun was heavy, but not too heavy. I could flex some unseen muscles and pry the pistol from the holster and will it to me. The holster unsnapped, which sounded like a crack in the nigh
ttime air. The handgun tore from beneath the man’s shirt and sailed through the air and I threw up a hand to catch it. If Mr. Gordon wasn’t willing to finish this right now, then I was.

  “Oliver!” Jeremy yelled from behind me.

  Mr. Gordon snatched the gun in midair, removing his eyes from Cias.

  Desiree screamed as she was suddenly dragged toward the guardrail by some invisible hand.

  “Desiree!” I cried and ran after her, completely forgetting about Cias and Mr. Gordon’s confrontation. I willed her body back to me, but the force pulling her away was too strong, her body too heavy, or some combination of the two.

  Jeremy and Richard were right behind me. I could hear their frantic footfalls as they chased me across the street.

  Her legs hit the guardrail and she tumbled over it, causing her to somersault in midair and land sprawled in the dirt. A steep cliff was just inches from where she landed. Her feet found the edge where the dirt was loose. As she kicked to find purchase, the ground beneath her feet gave way and broke off in chunks that tumbled into the dark crevasse.

  “Take my hand!” I yelled to her as I leapt over the guardrail, landing inches away from her slipping body. I grabbed hold of the guardrail with my left hand and stretched for her with my right.

  She was obviously petrified to lift either hand from the ground, they being the only two things holding her in place at all. Her feet kicked wildly, compromising her position more, but she wouldn’t stop, her body reduced to manic mode.

  “I will catch your hand if you just reach for me,” I pleaded with her. “If you don’t, you’ll fall. You have to trust me.”

  “I can’t,” she cried. “I’ll fall.”

  “You can. I’ll catch you.”

  Jeremy and Richard reached the guardrail, and Jeremy leapt over to join me on the edge of the world.

  “We got you, Desiree,” he said in a soothing tone, the kind you’d use to lure in a scared animal.

  “I can’t!” Her lips quivered as she looked up at us with wide, wet eyes.

  Each second she slid a little farther backwards, closer to where the ground gave way, closer to being swept away in the current completely. I stretched as far as I could, but her hand was now out of reach.

  “Jeremy,” I said and gave him my hand. With Jeremy holding onto the guardrail, and my arms as an extension of his, I scooted closer to Desiree. The ground slipped under me as well. I gripped tight to Jeremy’s wrist, and he to mine, and I reached as far as I could.

  I remembered what Nero had said to me at the river, when he needed me to meet him in the asymmetric plane to escape Alexandria Lorne and her terrible asylum. “When you can’t, you must.”

  Desiree whimpered as if trying to say something, but escaping her lips in a string of unrelated syllables.

  “When you can’t, you must!” I yelled at her and nearly popped my shoulder as I reached an inch or two farther.

  Despite the panic I saw in her beautiful emerald eyes, she clawed violently into the flowing dirt with her left hand and let her right hand go free, reaching out for me. I caught her outstretched hand in that instant and pulled with all of my external and internal strength. Jeremy pulled, too, and we all inched closer to the guardrail and solid ground.

  I guided Desiree’s trembling body over the guardrail and let Jeremy climb over before doing so myself. My adrenaline pumped like a steam engine, with all my fury aimed at Cias for what he’d done—and almost done—to Desiree.

  When I looked to the cars and what was left of the confrontation, I saw Mr. Gordon with the pistol down at his side and the car the other men had been driving flipped over with half of the roof caved in. The car was lying at a crunched angle, not quite on its side and not quite upside down.

  “What happened?” I yelled to Mr. Gordon.

  He walked toward us and threw the remaining pistol into the ravine. “We need to keep going,” he said and headed back to the car.

  “Where’s Cias?”

  “Gone.”

  “What about the other guys?”

  “Gone.” Mr. Gordon stepped into the driver’s seat and started the engine.

  “What the hell happened?” Jeremy asked, but there were no more replies.

  With the realization that Cias was gone, I turned to Desiree and wrapped my arms around her and kissed her on the forehead. “Are you all right?”

  “I will be—thanks to you,” she said and pushed up on her toes to reach my lips. She was still shaking, probably more due to the events and less with the cold at this point. I was so tired of almost losing her that I never wanted to let her go again. But I knew that was stupid. We were far from safe, caught up in this crazy adventure with no clear end in sight. She was only entangled in this because of me and I wouldn’t be able to forgive myself if something happened—something more permanent than what already had. Thanks to me. Thanks to me she was nearly dragged off the edge of a mountain cliff. Thanks to me she was in danger. Thanks to me she was on Kafka’s radar. Thanks to me…

  “Com’on, you two,” Jeremy called, already back at the car, as was Richard. Desiree and I now stood alone by the guardrail.

  We left the wreckage on the side of the road, Mr. Gordon using his abilities to move the mutilated car so it no longer blocked the lanes. As soon as the road was clear, headlights appeared in front of us, crawling up the mountain and passing us without incident. The rest of the drive down the mountain was quiet, but I saw Mr. Gordon periodically glance back at me in the rearview mirror.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, finally breaking the silence.

  “I know,” he answered, but didn’t say anything more.

  By the time we reached the bottom of the mountain and back on level ground, Desiree and Jeremy were out cold—spent from the confrontation with Cias. Desiree was the first, leaning her head on my shoulder, hugging my arm like a body pillow. Jeremy rested the side of his head against the window. In the middle, I was looking at the road ahead of us, suspicious of every car that passed. There were still no orange lines stretching out in front of the car, only the beams of our headlights.

  It had been one hell of a long day. It was hard to believe it was only sometime yesterday morning that I’d killed Nero. From there I’d rescued Desiree from Reid, discovered I couldn’t go home, was left in a safe house that wasn’t so safe, survived an earthquake, and escaped from members of the Lorne Royal Guard—again. And now Mr. Gordon was driving me to meet my father—Nicholae, whom I’d thought was dead up until a mere month or so ago. I couldn’t even keep track of the days of the week since emerging from the fog that had been my captivity—from the asylum and Nero. I didn’t know what day of the week it was or how long I’d been out of school. My every day, normal kid routine was gone—maybe forever.

  Nero was with me somehow. I could feel him, but I couldn’t hear him anymore. And then there was Logan: how he fit into all of this madness, and how he passed on the torch of Commodore Chaos to me. What would I even write? What do I have to say?

  I felt my eyelids growing heavy, too. I needed to sleep for awhile to cut the day off, so when the sun came up it would officially be a new day and not a surreal extension of yesterday.

  I kissed Desiree on the top of her head, leaned back with the tablet once again in my lap, and closed my eyes.

  Oliver Remembers (i)

  I hid within a crawl-sized tunnel that connected the fireplaces of two adjacent rooms in the castle—Lorne Castle. It felt like home. I lived here—in the inner castle Kafka called The Den—with my father, mother, and older half-brother, Jeremy. I was five years old and had been playing hide-and-seek with my mother, though she wasn’t really in on the game. The room ahead of me was bright and the sound of voices lured me into the fireplace. Kafka, with his long black hair and red-flecked eyes, was engaged in a heated discussion with another old member of the family, Cornelius.

  “Zachariah’s death was not an accident, was it?” Cornelius asked. He looked portly next to Kafka’s muscular fr
ame and had a gray receding hairline.

  “Zachariah’s death—though tragic—was necessary. As will be yours.” Kafka inched forward, forcing Cornelius back against the wall. Cornelius looked scared and his eyes darted desperately around the room. “I give you the opportunity to rejoin your son.”

  “No…no! This is madness! You can’t just kill me!”

  Kafka lifted his right arm, and Cornelius’ body seemed to stiffen and lift off the ground so only the toes of his boots still touched.

  “You can’t win! The family is divided, and you’re losing favor!” Cornelius’ voice was hoarse and strained like he had a rope around his neck being pulled tighter and tighter.

  “Favor means nothing. We have lived many lifetimes together. I’m sorry we must part this way.”

  “I’ll see you in the next life. This isn’t over!” Cornelius coughed and gagged, but his hands never rose to Kafka or his throat. It was like his body was frozen.

  “Not this time.” Kafka arched his outstretched arm and Cornelius’ body inched along the floor like a specter, toward the fireplace.

  He let out a guttural groan and his body then collapsed in front of me, in front of the large fireplace. I gave out a soft gasp and quickly covered my mouth.

  “Logan…” he whispered right before his head fell to the stone floor. Blood oozed from a gash in his chest.

  I scurried deeper into the shadows in horror.

  Kafka walked up behind him and kicked the limp body farther into the fireplace. With a loud pop flames burst into existence all around him. I frantically backed out of reach of the orange licking fingers. Cornelius was quickly consumed in flames. He screamed for a moment, thrashed a moment longer, and then he was done. I heard footsteps walking away and a door creak open and close. I was far enough back to not get burned, but the heat and stench of cooking human flesh overwhelmed me. And for some reason I couldn’t move. The dead man before me was a horrific, yet mesmerizing sight. I didn’t understand what had happened or what I would tell Mom later that day.