I turned toward them, all rhino instinct now. They were possible danger. They were challenging me. That was a mistake.
BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!
Rhinos get shot at all the time. Unfortunately, there are people stupid enough to think rhino horn is a medicine, and people creepy enough to slaughter endangered rhinos to get it.
But they don't go hunting rhinoceros with shotguns. You want to shoot a rhino, you need a high-power, high-caliber rifle. Not a shotgun that fires a bunch of small pellets.
BLAM! BLAM!
I felt something sting my face and shoulders. It made me mad. I charged.
Not a trot, an out-and-out run, with head down and horn out.
"Run!"
They ran. I ran after them. It took about three seconds for me to catch the first one. I plowed right into him, felt the contact with his soft, mushy body, tossed my head, and . . .
. . . Let's just say that particular man won't be sitting down for a long, long time.
I had lost the other guard. But that was okay. They weren't my goal.
"Get me to the door!" I yelled to the others.
"Left. . . okay, now right. . . okay now . . . jeez, what are you, blind? Left, right, okay, CHARGE!"
I charged.
WHAMMMM!
I felt like I'd hit a truck. I backed up and slammed forward again.
WHAMMMM! Crunch.
"Man, that was a tough door!" I said.
"Um, Jake? You missed the door. That was the wall. You okay?" Cassie asked.
"l'm fine. One more push and we'll be in." I reared back and slammed forward. I felt scraping along my back. Then I was in much cooler air.
"We're inside, aren't we?" I asked.
"Yes," Tobias answered, sounding tense. "And we are out of time." I'm sure it was a beautiful house. But I didn't really see it. All I saw with my dim rhino-vision were walls and doorways. But at least we'd been right to guess that there were wide hallways. Wide enough for me to barrel down like a ... well, like a rhinoceros.
And the ceilings were high enough that Tobias, Cassie, and Marco could fly down them, searching madly from room to room. Searching with vision greater than human vision and hearing that could pick up the sound of a gopher belching from a distance the length of a football field.
They used me to open doors.
"Jake, open this door," Marco would say. I'd
turn where he showed me, shove my massive bony face forward, and the door would explode in splinters.
Crrrr-UIMCH-Bang!
"We are trashing this man's home," Cassie said. "l sure hope he is a Controller after all this."
"He can afford to have his doors fixed," Marco said.
"That's not the point," Cassie said. Then, "Jake, open this door, please." Crrrr-UNCH-bang!
"Nothing," Tobias complained. "Nothing, nothing, nothing! Nothing in any of these rooms, and there may be a hundred rooms in this place."
"Tobias is right. We are out of time," Cassie said.
"This isn't the way to do it," I said. "We can't just search room-to-room. It could take hours. We need to figure this out. How do we find Ax and Rachel? Where would they be?"
"ln the last place we look," Marco grumbled. "0r at least . . . wait a minute! Wherever they are, they'll be guarded."
"Yes!" I said. "0f course. We just rampage till we see something well guarded."
"l'll head upstairs," Tobias said.
He zoomed away and up a large staircase. I
lumbered along into a vast open living room area. I stomped on through. I tried not to crush too much furniture, but I was big and half-blind, so I kept hearing the crunch of wood and the shatter of glass and pottery in my wake.
"Up here!" Tobias yelled.
Then, not as loud as before, but still loud enough . . . BLAM! BLAM!
"Tobias!"
"l'm okay! But I found an area with two big guys with big guns. It's upstairs."
I tried to turn around and head back to the stairs, but then Marco yelled.
"Uh-oh! Guys coming up behind us. Man, how many gunmen does this lunatic hire? Jake, we have to go through these guys to get back to the stairs!"
"l got guys on my tail!" Tobias yelled down from upstairs.
I spun around and wiped out a couch in the process. "This way?!"
"No, a little left!"
I turned and annihilated a coffee table. Then I charged. I couldn't tell the difference between the men and various pole lamps and bookcases, except when they moved. The blur drew my eye, and I smelled humans.
I lowered my head and charged.
Shotgun pellets stung but didn't penetrate beneath my outer skin.
POP! POP! POP! POP!
I was hit. I staggered. I felt the bullet from the handgun tear into my right shoulder. A second slug lodged in the bone of my face.
I hit the guy with the gun. I was mad. I lowered my horn and I tossed my head back. He went flying back over my shoulder.
"Ya-ah-AHHHHHH!"
The other man jumped aside. I think he was fumbling to reload his shotgun. I sideswiped him and knocked him into the wall. Then I was out of the room, back into the hallway, tearing along back to the staircase.
I was bleeding. And I was weakening on my right side. My right front leg was moving slower. The bullet in my face must have ricocheted off. I felt pain there, but not the heaviness I felt in my shoulder.
I came to the stairs and tried to charge straight up. But rhinos were never meant for climbing stairs. My legs wouldn't lift high enough. My weight and momentum were too much. The wooden stairs splintered.
BLAM! BLAM!
"Tobias! What's going on up there?"