Robert Liparulo - The 13 th tribe

He caught movement from the corner of his eye and turned to see Shadow Man hurl himself from the ledge. The man hit the wall, then crashed onto the stairs and began tumbling. The backpack’s strap slipped from his shoulder to the crook of his elbow. The pack bumped down a step, seeming to pull Shadow Man down with it. The pack opened, and a human head rolled out. It picked up speed-hair flying like fire, eyelids open to white orbs, the mouth locked in a curled-lipped grimace-and bounced directly at Tyler.

Tyler screamed, a horrified, sustained release of all the screams he’d been denied: over the invisible man with floating eyes and magically appearing sword; the ear-splitting firefight; the beheading. He whirled away from the head, somersaulted down the steps, found his feet, and ran.

When the shadows retreated, giving Jagger a view of the stars and the buildings crowding around him, he was still trying to fill his burning lungs. He couldn’t have been out long. He rubbed the back of his head, felt a bump, and rolled over to push himself up. While the lights were out, his heart had moved into his head. It pounded in there, making his eyeballs and forehead, jaw and ears as miserable as his heart apparently was about its new accommodations.

For a few moments he forgot what he’d been doing when he fell.. was pushed. He’d been running… gunfire… Tyler!

Someone had been shooting at Tyler! No, that wasn’t right. It came back to him the way reality did after a particularly nasty nightmare. The gunfire was unrelated to Tyler, except that he was outside somewhere, only possibly in the vicinity of it. Jagger had been hoping, praying Tyler was nowhere near it.

He took a step and stumbled, catching himself against a wall. He shook his head, aggravating his misplaced heart, making it pound harder. The gunfire had stopped. He had to find out what had happened, had to get to Tyler, get him home. He looked around and knew where he was, only a couple buildings from the back-corner shootout.

Okay, he thought, move.

He walked, breathed, felt the pounding subside a little. He picked up his pace, began considering what he might find: dead monks… dead bad guys… live monks and bad guys gearing up for another volley. In that instant he didn’t care. His sole desire was to find his son. He couldn’t help believing the monks had brought this on. Taking that man in, being so secretive about it, about a lot of things. So help him, if anything happened to Tyler or Beth, the people who’d blown through the front gate would be the least of Gheronda’s problems.

A shot rang out, and he spun toward it: in the center of the compound, closer to the Burning Bush, closer to Tyler. He wanted to call out him, to let him know he was coming, to hear that he was all right, but if Tyler was safe somewhere, calling to him could draw him out into danger. He ran all out, forgetting about himself, about caution, about anything but getting to his boy.

Less than a minute later he arrived at the Burning Bush. Tyler was gone, the branches that had hidden him fanned out from the corner on the ground. Unthinkingly, disbelieving Tyler’s absence, he lifted them, expecting… what? His son? A clue to his disappearance? Had he left on his own or had someone taken him? Was he home now, curled up on the couch with Beth… safe somewhere else… kidnapped..?

Jagger’s mind slammed the door on other possibilities. He turned in a circle, hoping first to see Tyler-coming to him, cowering in a different corner-then scanning for clues. His boots and Tyler’s sneakers, their socks were on the steps where they’d left them.

Meaning to yell, it came out a whisper: “Tyler?” He raised his face to the sky, drew in a deep breath, but before he could send his son’s name into the compound, Tyler screamed, a long, terrible, little-boy scream. It turned Jagger’s heart to stone.

“Tyler!”

The scream had come from the compound’s most jumbled, stacked section of buildings. Getting to the Burning Bush, Jagger had run through a tunnel under it. He bounded up the steps to the rooftops. “Tyler!” He crossed terraces, bridges, leaped over alleyways, looking, looking and calling. He traversed the roofs, descending a level, then re-ascending, heading toward their apartment. The Basilica’s obsidian-like roof floated across a chasm to his right; the Southwest Range Building ran the length of the rear wall to his left. Beyond that, the black presence of God’s Mountain watched.

He descended into a valley formed by two buildings rising on either side of a walkway, which was itself composed of the rooftops of buildings below it. At the end was an arch, beyond which was a wide terrace running perpendicular to the walkway.

Right or left? he thought as he hurried toward the T. North or south?

The maracas rattle of Tyler’s utility case started as suddenly as a flipped switch. Close, but the walls around him tossed the sound around, and he couldn’t be sure how close or even from which direction it came. He stopped, held his breath.

On the terrace, Tyler flashed past the arched opening.

“Tyler!” Jagger dashed to the terrace and swung right just as his son’s bobbing head disappeared down the stairs at the terrace’s north end. “Ty-”

Footsteps rushed toward him from behind. He spun to see a man dressed from toes to neck in a gray skintight suit. He had short-cropped hair, wild eyes, and the maniacal grin of a butcher who loved his job. Most disturbing was the handgun he clutched in a bloody, gloveless hand. He was pumping his arms in an all-out sprint.

All this Jagger registered in a glance. The guy was nearly on top of him. Jagger’s sudden appearance had not given Tyler’s pursuer time to slow; the man’s eyes were just now growing wide in acknowledgment of his presence.

That this nightmare was chasing his son sent a flood of rage through Jagger’s body. He stiffened his muscles and narrowed his focus on one thought: this guy was going down.

Faced with a charging madman, most people would freeze or jump out of the way. Jagger attacked. He took two quick steps toward the man, crouched, and threw his shoulder into the guy’s midsection. He rose, flipping the attacker over his head, sending a backpack tumbling across the terrace. Before the body landed, Jagger had pulled his baton, snapped it into full extension, and swung it into the hand holding the gun.

The man howled, but kept his grip on the weapon. Jagger raised the baton, taking aim at the man’s head, which lay between Jagger’s feet where it had landed. In a move out of Cirque du Soleil, the attacker executed a backward flip, raising his legs over his head and planting a foot squarely into Jagger’s crotch. Jagger dropped the baton and doubled over… then sprang forward, tackling the man as he tried to stand. There was no time for pain; two seconds of incapacitation meant death.

Jagger fell on top of him. He clambered up his back and pushed down on the man’s head with his prosthetic forearm, grinding his face into the terrace. He gripped the gun hand, lifted it, slammed it down, over and over.

The man drove his head back into Jagger’s chin. He slipped his body out from under Jagger’s and began kneeing him in the hip. He twisted and shoved his foot into Jagger’s ribs, thrusting Jagger off him. The man rose up on one elbow and crossed the gun under his body to fire it.

Jagger completed the roll he’d started when the man shoved him, winding up on his back. This put RoboHand inches from the gun. As the hammer fell, he flicked his hook, knocking the barrel away. The gun roared, and the bullet could have parted Jagger’s hair, it came so close. He pushed RoboHand under the man’s chest and clamped it over the hand and fingers that gripped the gun.