Black Magic - Chapter Nine: To A Safer Place
Chapter 9: To A Safer Place
Somewhere just beyond the maze of parked cars and trucks, sunlight could be seen. The exit sat directly in front of us; mocking us arrogantly as a platoon of black clad Section 2 foot soldiers quickly came into view, pistols and shotguns held tightly in trigger-happy hands. Kris knew that if we stopped, we'd all die in a flurry of Hellfire and bullets, so he put his foot down on the gas and prepared to French-kiss fate. A barrage of gunfire peppered the van as everyone except our driver ducked for cover; our economy escape car rocketing trough the meat barricade of attacking agents. Violent sounds roared and screeched from every direction, but were immediately overshadowed and forgotten about once the blue sky surrounded us and made itself known. With cloudless cerulean covering the endless horizon before us and sprawling concrete cityscape to our left and right, I finally felt a sigh of relief release itself from my lungs... Hell yeah, we were free...
"Ladies and gentlemen, we've made it to the promised land!" Kris shouted at the top of his lungs. "Oh yeah!"
Or at least we thought we'd made it to the promised land...
"Thank the stars in the sky, we're free boys and girls!" I added as I turned around in my seat, checking up on Alan and Zeke. I know now that I shouldn't have looked back.
Alan's eyes were clenched shut as he held down on his shoulder, a thick stream of red covering his entire arm and soaking through his faded jacket. Though it looked painful, he didn't make much of a sound. Instead, he proceeded to tighten his grip and control his breathing, proof that he had suffered similar pain before. As he opened his eyes and traded glances with me, he must have seen the horrified expression stretched across my face. Realizing what I was staring at, he turned his head and muttered Zeke's name.
"Zeke?" I beckoned next, my voice meek and worried. "Zeke, are you okay?"
Zeke was slumped over and laying face down in a small pool of his own blood. He quivered and shook as he attempted to reply, but couldn't find the strength to sit up. Knowing that the child I'd brought along was unharmed, having been in my arms during the hailstorm of lead, I hastily jumped over the seat and hurried to my friend's side. Being careful as to not aggravate his unknown injuries, I slowly lifted him up into a sitting position and inspected his current condition. It wasn't good, it was horrendous.
"...How's... it look... doc...?" He panted and wheezed; blood trickling from his mouth. "...What's... the damage...?"
"Oh God." I whispered under my breathe. "Oh God."
Though the holes in the van's walls were evidence enough, I still didn't want to believe the truth of what was happening. It was just too much for me to take in. Zeke had suffered several gunshot wounds to the chest, all of which were bleeding profusely. One of the wounds centered near the stomach, while the other two were just below the base of the collarbone, probably penetrating various organs. His gasping for air was intense and highly labored, signs that he'd been hit through the lungs at least once, if not twice. I tried to say something, anything, but came up short again; I never seem to be able to hold myself together when the situation goes to shit.
"...Mike...?" Asked Zeke, his voice beginning to fail. "...This is... it..., this is... the last dance at sunrise... isn't it...? This is... the end...?"
"Fuck no it's not!" I shouted in return, probably louder than I needed to be. My voice even overshadowed the police sirens that were steadily growing louder in the distance.
"...Shit..." Zeke snickered between gut wrenchingly bloody coughs. "...I thought... we'd made it... to safety... I thought... we were all... gonna celebrate together... or something... This fucking sucks... I'm so sorry... Balto..., but I think you're going it alone... from here on out..."
And then as his eyes lost focus and his punctured lungs exhaled for their last time, Zeke groggily reached up with one arm to grasp at something in the air. With nothing in his grip, his closed fist fell back to the floor, having failed to catch whatever fleeting dream it was that he thought had been floating there. Amidst involuntary muscle spasms and full body quakes, Zeke spat his final words.
"...Ain't it... a... bitch...?" He muttered angrily; the lights finally shutting off for good.
He didn't talk anymore after that. He just fidgeted a little, bled a little more, then stopped moving entirely. With the sirens in the background still growing louder and our situation still skimming the surface of turbulent waters, I gripped my friends hand and screamed profanities at the top of my lungs. Though his last words were ridiculous and failed to do him justice in the end, they did capture his personality perfectly.
Instantaneously, I went into shock and gripped my face tightly with my right hand. My mind raced in every direction; looking back on all of the events that had lead up to this exact moment. Why did Zeke, one of my closest friends, have to die? What did he do to deserve this? I blamed myself, I blamed Alan, I blamed Kris, I blamed everyone else I could think of as well; but I still couldn't find solace and comfort in the end. No amount of playing the blame game or pointing the finger would ease my pain; nothing would. The only thing I could think of, the one thing that entered my every thought, was the horrifying worry that someone else might die. My father's image flashed quickly before my eyes.
"Kris!" I shouted hysterically. "Kris, you have to take me home! My father's in trouble; he needs me!"
"Are you insane?!" Kris retorted angrily as he spun the steering wheel sharply. "You're the one that Norton's after, remember?! Your house is a death trap by now, 100 percent! There'll be a swarm of guys waiting for you at the front door, all of whom will be ready to turn your scrawny little ass into bloody, lump, soon to be maggot-ridden swiss cheese!"
"I don't care, just take me there!" I trumpeted in reply. "My dad's in danger! He'll die if I don't get there in time, I'm certain!"
Alan turned around, scowled for a brief second, then drove his fist across the left side of my face. Enraged, he yelled, "Dominic! We just broke you out of prison and now you're saying that you want to go back?! Think for a moment, just think, about how hard we all had to work in order to save your ungrateful life! If your emotions get the best of you and you scamper home now, then it would have all been for nothing! Everything, even Zeke's death, would all have been for nothing!"
I just sat there, stunned, as he continued to belt out harsh criticism.
"We've all put too much effort into this, far too much, to see it all fall apart now!" He roared. "I thought you were more rational than that, I thought you were driven more by logic than by heart!"
"Hey, this isn't helping anything either, so back off!" Barked Kris as he made another sharp turn. "I have to concentrate right now, Alan, so leave him alone! Suffice to say, we're not taking him home and driving blindly into a baited trap; that's not gonna happen! But that doesn't mean, in any way, that you need to attack him! He's not like you or me, he hasn't traded in his heart and soul for a fucking rank and uniform; he still has the right, as a human, to have emotions!"
The large, charcoal man stood silent for a moment and then nodded.
"All we have left in us is anger." Kris growled. "Even as young as we are, that's the only emotion we're allowed to feel anymore. Don't push that burden onto him as well."
Alan's eyes narrowed as he glared at the back of Kris's head. He then nodded silently to himself and turned his head towards me.
"He's absolutely right, Dominic." He said; his tone of voice now soft and forgiving. "I crossed the line and I'm sorry. You have every right to worry, you do, but please understand the consequences you'll have to face if you act upon those worries. You lost a close friend and you're afraid that you'll lose family as well; that's understandable, but if you try to race off and play the hero now, you'll die."
"Listen to him." Added Dominique. "You can't pull a stunt like this, not after everything we've been through already. We went through Hell, fire and brimstone, in order to bust you out of that moldy jail cell. If you do this now, we might as well have never tried."
As I took my hand from my face, I locked eyes with Beck. She looked destroyed, but still had enough strength to say, "...They're right and you know it, Mike. If we go and try to rescue Dad, we'll be digging our own graves."
"But..." I tried to protest.
"No, no buts, no second thoughts, no indecision; not this time!" Stated my sister firmly; cutting me off. "Because I know someone else that would agree with the rest of us, someone else that would argue against returning home and inevitably dying! Do you?!"
I stayed silent.
"Dad!" She yelled mournfully. "And he'd be right! We've gotta keep going and keep living; that's what he would want!"
"And besides..." Added Alan stoically. "We had a team investigate your home earlier, before we even set out to have you released from Section 2 custody. You father and the ghost were relocated and taken to an undisclosed location."
A few milliseconds of confused silence preceded both Beck and I before we shouted, "What?!"
"If you'd given me enough time to say that a few minutes ago, we'd all be in better spirits right now." Finished the large young man, confirming what he had just said. "Your father was taken to safety and the ghost is waiting for us at our rendezvous location, Dominique's mansion."
Over the course of this day's events, I had grown quite skeptical towards almost everything and anything that happened around me. I wanted to know if I was being fed the truth or a comforting lie.
"...Are you serious?" I asked; uncertainty filling my voice.
Without hesitation, Alan locked eyes with me and resoundingly replied, "Yes."
"And Forte, Dominique, Kris; the rest of you took part in this mission as well, so you all should be able to answer my question with the same level of certainty and clarity?" I asked; the pitch of my voice gradually growing lower and more stern. "Or is Alan just trying to protect me from the harsh, ugly truth?"
Almost instantly, Dominique replied, "No, it's true, it's true! We had some men scope out your house in advance! We wanted to make sure that our information was correct and that you were in legitimate danger! You know what I mean, right, why try to rescue someone when they're not in jeopardy?!"
I eyed Dominique furiously. Though she was a noblewoman from the distant lands of Jenohva and was accustomed to fabricating fascinating lies, just like every politician is, she wasn't very good at lying to her close friends and family. It just wasn't something she'd had the stomach to become talented at.
"Just ask Forte!" She shouted.
A good idea, so I did.
"Well, Forte; is it true?" I inquired. "Is it?"
Though he hesitated for a moment before answering, Forte broke his meditation, opened his eyes, and replied, "...Indeed, it is. We made certain to safeguard your father before coming to your rescue. Alan speaks the truth."
I held my head in my hands once again, thinking to myself that there was no way in Heaven or Hell that Forte would lie to me. We'd known each other for too long. He wouldn't lie about something so dire, so important, so critical. In thinking that, I felt comforted, knowing that I still had a friend like him to rely on. So I cleared my mind and hardened my resolve, preparing myself for whatever horrendous experiences and nightmarish monstrosities still awaited me just around the bend.
"Alright..., then where are we going?" I inquired. "What's the plan?"
"We're going to my place, my mansion." Answered Dominique with a smirk. "And from there we're going to open a portal to some place far, far away. We're gonna get the Hell out of this mess no matter what!"
I was afraid, scared for my life, more so than ever before. If escape really was just around the corner, then I could only hope that our van had enough gas left in the tank to make it that far. At the very least, I owed it to Zeke to make it out of this horrible place and find freedom. Still, my father's fate lingered heavily in my mind; I wondered silently to myself if they'd truly lied to me. I looked down into the sparkling eyes of the psychic child that rested in my arms and asked her as well. She closed her eyes and shook her head. With my free hand, I reached into my jacket pocket and withdrew one of the items that the armed guards had failed to strip from me, a small glass vial. Scooping up some of my fallen comrade's blood, I held it up to the light, watched as the sun shone through the bubbles, screamed murder in my mind, and corked it shut. Blood is a famously powerful fuel in magic and strong emotions are as well. In the end, I wanted to see to it that Zeke, in some small way, had a hand in finishing this fight; I wanted for him to somehow be there himself so that he could watch as Helios Alberio LaCroix died for the second time in over five hundred years. I wanted... for Zeke to get his own shot at revenge...