“Oh, my God!” yelled a woman. “That’s Skylar Stover! What are you doing to her?”
“Yeah, man,” said another. “What is this shit? Let the lady go!”
“Why are we even listening to this?” yelled a beautiful mother of three children standing not thirty feet away. “Who the hell are you?”
And that’s when Larry decided Skylar had been right, even if she no longer believed it. There was no way this scene could be real, not when he was forced to listen while a lovely young woman hurled insults at him. Larry wondered how long this temptress had been there, though it seemed as though she had always been there, that he would forever see her face, those big, lovely eyes and that tiny nose and those perfect pink lips. Of course a woman like this loathed him. She had always loathed him. She would always be there with him, waiting to cut him at the knees with her haughty smile and biting wit, her note handwritten in beautiful script, My boyfriend says you are a FUCKFACE, and suddenly the ringing in Larry’s ears rose up and clobbered him in the head. He seemed to fall to his knees, or the world turned sideways, and still the woman was there, hating him, looking at him as if he weren’t human, as if he were a bug she could squash with the step of her foot.
P.S. Don’t write back!
You probably didn’t know human screams sound just like the screeching in my ears. Until then, I didn’t either. It made me wonder if the sound I’d been hearing all this time had been a literary device meant to foreshadow my defining moment.
Dirty humans in the crowd went down by the row. It would have been nice to savor each kill, like the bittersweet flavor of lemonade, but the mass of them lost density as they fled from their fallen comrades. They spread in all directions the way a drop of liquid soap repels a film of greasy water.
The gun was a live thing in my arms, growing warm, punishing me. In moments I was through the first clip and was forced to replace it with another.
My targets were children, mothers, teenagers in football jerseys. A man in a flannel shirt and jeans was pointing a rifle at me when he fell backward, two beautiful maroon blooms spreading into the brown pattern across his chest. No good guy with a gun was going to stop me! And I get it, most of you think I’m a monster, but that’s only because you accept the idea of meaning in the world, that our puny decisions matter. They don’t matter. Nothing does. Whether or not this world is a movie is irrelevant. The important thing is I am not simply allowed to behave in absurd ways. I am obligated to.
Something whisked by me. A whip crack of a sound. A bullet.
As much as I enjoyed the carnage, the last thing I wanted was to be killed by one of my targets. By then the mass of them had pushed down the fence, and they were streaming toward the building, which meant my retreat would have to be careful.
When I reached the ladder, my path to freedom was still clear. But in the distance, running for the trees, I saw a woman and two children. The clip was nearly empty, so I switched the rifle to single-fire and allowed myself three shots. One for each of them.
Remember my dance in the rain, days ago, as I dodged bullets fired by Paige? This was the same scene except I had become the sniper.
I shouldered my weapon and fired. Fired again. And a third time. Finally, the woman went sprawling and dragged the children with her.
I climbed quickly down the ladder. On the ground, I crept toward the employee entrance and listened carefully. I could hear screaming. Gunshots. I darted away from the open door just in time for a bullet to scream past me.
My spare clips and weapons were inside, only yards away, but if it was Paige who’d shot at me, I wouldn’t get another chance. The moment she saw my silhouette in the doorway, I would be dead.
There was no option but abandon the other guns and remaining rounds.
I ran.
When Seth saw Billy and Miguel knocked to the ground by gunshots, a moment passed where his mind went completely blank, like an email someone had been writing but quickly deleted. After walking so far, having overcome so much to get here, he couldn’t believe it would all end like this.
“Put down your weapons!” Aiden yelled at them. “Every one of you, put your guns on the ground or I will open fire.”
The darkness was closer than it had ever been. All his life Seth had known it would come to this. All his life he’d been waiting for the end.
“I’m taking Thomas and Skylar outside,” Larry said inconceivably. “I want to show those people why they’re here. I want Thomas to pay for doing this to us.”
Seth understood how Larry felt. A couple of days ago, while he was drunk on whiskey, Skylar had convinced him to believe all this was Thomas’ fault. But in the sober light of day that reasoning seemed desperate and futile. This was no movie and there would be no happy ending. It was reality, and it was always going to end poorly.
“Seth,” said Aiden, “pick up your gun and throw it out the door. Throw Thomas’ out the door. I don’t want complications. I have work to do.”
Seth could barely make himself move. His family was in danger and these weapons were the only means to protect them. But at the moment his options were limited, so he carried out the orders as instructed.
Soon Aiden was swallowed by shadows, and the sound of his retreat faded in the distance.
“We need our weapons back,” Tim said. “Larry has lost his mind. He’ll drive the crowd inside before we secure supplies.”
“I’ll get the weapons,” Seth heard himself say. “The rest of you grab whatever you can.”
He approached the open door of the warehouse, the place where a truck would back its trailer to be loaded or unloaded. The floor was about four feet above the ground outside. He jumped to the concrete below and retrieved a military rifle and two handguns, including his own. He could hear someone in the crowd yelling. Or maybe Larry yelling.
Anthony took the weapons from Seth and helped him up, back into the warehouse. Outside, the sound of the crowd grew quiet. After so much noise, the silence felt ominous.
“My wife and children are back there somewhere,” Seth said to Anthony, pointing over his shoulder. “I need to find them.”
“We should all go,” said Anthony. “Now.”
Seth nodded. But when he turned around, toward the darkness, he saw Jimmy doubled over on the concrete floor. His face was tinted green and his eyes were closed. Seth approached and knelt next to him.
“Jimmy,” he said. “You want me to drag you out of here? I don’t think I can carry you.”
“Nah. My goose is cooked. Live fast and die young, right?”
“Just so you know,” Seth said. “I was going to pay. If it weren’t for all this, you would have gotten what was coming to you.”
“I had a nice life. I got what I deserved. Now, go get your wife and kids.”
“All right, Jimmy. Take care, man.”
Seth stood. Tim had emerged from warehouse depths carrying a small box labeled PETER PAN CRUNCHY.Anthony held his rifle at waist level.
“We need to—”
The sound of running footsteps interrupted him. It was a teenage girl followed by a woman who might have been her mother. The two of them ran into the darkness, toward the warehouse exit. A few others followed, nodding at Anthony as they ran past. These were other warehouse employees, Seth guessed. Everyone was leaving.
Everyone except an imposing figure that emerged from the darkness, coming quickly this way. Seth raised his weapon, afraid Aiden had returned to kill them.