Jeremy Robinson - The Didymus Contingency

Daniels started to shake. “Jim, Clark, c’mon guys…do what he says.”

Jim took a step forward and aimed as best he could at David’s head. “Put the gun down, now.”

Daniels’s face twisted as though he was being stabbed in the back. “Jim! What are you doing?”

“My job,” Jim said.

Clark began to lower his weapon. “Jim, man, I don’t know. I think we should do what he says. I don’t want anyone to get killed.”

“Listen to Clark,” David said, as he attempted to keep his head hidden behind Daniels’s. “We can all walk away from this in one piece.”

Clark bent down and placed his weapon on the floor.

“Thank you, Clark,” David said.

“You’re welcome, sir.”

Jim’s hand began to shake and his eyes darted back and forth between David and Lazarus. “NO! Pick your weapon up, Clark, right now!”

David could see Jim’s hand shaking, panic overtaking his senses, tunneling his vision. If he didn’t shoot someone on purpose, he might do so by accident. David slowly moved his gun away from Daniels’s head an aimed it at Jim. He hadn’t ever shot a gun before, but he had played Duck Hunt on the original Nintendo system when it was a novelty so many years ago. David figured it couldn’t be too different.

Jim lowered the gun and then in a split second of indecision he raised it up again, determination reviving in his eyes, a burst of red exploded through his arm and his ears rang with the sound of an explosion. Jim’s gun fell from his limp hand and clacked on to the floor. He held his hand to his arm and then took it away. It was covered in blood. “You shot me!”

David smiled. He’d shot him! David pushed Daniels toward Clark and Jim, and then he raised his gun at all three of them. “Don’t move, not one of you.”

David looked at Lazarus, whose eye were wide and lips were pursed. “Are you all right?”

Lazarus nodded slowly, rubbing his ears.

“I’m sorry about this, guys, I really am. But I wouldn’t do this unless I had to, unless it was important.” David pointed his gun at Clark. “Can I have your radio, please?”

Clark took his radio from his belt. “Of course, sir.” Clark handed the radio to David warily and then retreated back behind Jim and Daniels, eyes blinking rapidly.

David depressed the button on the radio, “Uh, this is Clark, over.”

“Copy that, what’s your situation?” came a voice from the radio.

Lazarus took a step back, eyeing the radio incredulously.

“We have apprehended the suspects…uh, we’re bringing them in now. Feel free to call off the alarm…over.”

“Copy, how many suspects do you have in custody? Over.”

“Four, over.”

“Copy that. Good work. Over.”

“Thanks, we’re bringing them in, over and out.”

David switched off the radio and dropped it on the ground. He looked at the three guards. “Your radios. Put them on the floor.”

Daniels and Jim took their radios from their belts and dropped them on the floor.

David looked around the hallway. Now what? His eyes locked on an emergency fire hose attached to the wall. He looked back at the three petrified guards. “Face each other, get close.”

When David had finished tying the fire hose around the men he realized the hose was too loose to hold the men for more than a few seconds. Even Lazarus had failed to get the thick material to tie tightly.

Clark fidgeted nervously for a moment and then found a smidge of bravery. “Sir, you could just leave us here like this and we won’t move.”

David smiled. These poor kids were having the worst day of their life. “Sorry Clark, I can’t take the chance. There are lives at stake.”

David followed the hose back to its glass case where a red valve was labeled: Turn for water. David walked to the valve and twisted it. Water rushed into the hose, blowing it up like a balloon. The three guards were pulled close together by the expanding hose, which resembled an anaconda constricting its prey. When David was satisfied that the men were secured, he turned the valve off, so as not to crush the men to death. “Can you breathe?”

“Yes sir…barely though,” Clark said.

“Have a knife?”

“My belt, on the right side, sir.”

David pushed his way through the tight fire hose and retrieved Clark’s small jackknife. He opened it up and poked a small hole in the hose, which sprayed a mist of water into the air. “There,” David said, “You should be able to get free in…twenty minutes or so.”

“Thank you, sir,” Clark said.

“You’re most welcome.”

David turned to Lazarus. “Ready?”

Lazarus held up a rag tied in a bundle, full of very heavy items. “Their weapons and talking boxes are in here.”

David took the bundle and placed it on the floor next to the bound guards. “Your guns and radios are in this. Try not to shoot anyone today, guys, okay?”

“Yes, sir,” Clark said.

David opened the door to the stairwell and looked at Lazarus. “Let’s go.”

Lazarus and David disappeared into the stairwell and the door closed behind them with a clunk. David led the way swiftly down the stairs. With the heightened security and the watches not working, they were running out of time and might have to attempt an escape on foot. If that turned out to be true, David knew they would all die.

Tom sailed across the control room and crashed onto a computer console. He had forgotten how strong this Legion, this whatever it was, could make a man. He rolled off the console, onto the hard, cold floor and looked up.

The thick foam dangling from Spencer’s mouth was enough to make Sally back away, but what concerned her most was that he was pursuing her. Sally’s face revealed she had never seen something so horrible, so evil. Her normally controlled expression had vanished, replaced by a furrowed brow, crinkled nose and a bit lip brought on by the freshly experienced terror.

After pushing himself onto his hands and knees, Tom heard the clunk of metal hitting cement. He knew what it was. He knew he had it from the beginning, but he wanted to beat the beast into the ground with his bare fists. He wanted to feel the blood of Megan’s murderer on his tender knuckles. But Tom knew he could never win a fistfight with this supernatural creature.

He wrapped his hand around the gun and placed his finger firmly against the trigger. He stood to his feet. “Legion!”

Spencer stopped, his crushing hand only inches from Sally’s throat. He looked at Tom, holding the gun, and grinned. “Kill us again, Tom. Yes, kill us! Kill like you did the Zambian men who murdered your wife.”

“I’m planning to,” Tom said as he walked forward, gun raised.

Spencer craned his neck like a thinking dog. “Do you remember Samuel, disciple?”

Tom pulled the gun’s hammer back with a click.

“When we first met and Jesus sent us into the herd of swine? The pigs. We don’t like pigs. Do you remember Samuel after we left his body?”

Tom paused, he remembered Samuel. He remembered thinking he was a different man. He remembered Samuel couldn’t recall anything that had happened.

“We took him, Tom. He didn’t willingly accept our presence. Nobody ever says yes if we ask them. Never. He didn’t willingly do the wonderful things we made him do. He was innocent-by earthly standards anyway.” Tom’s eyes widened slightly.

“And you remember the men in Africa. The men you killed. You killed us! We loved it when you did that!”

“Shut up.”

“They were innocent of your wife’s murder, just like Samuel.”

“Shut up!”

“And you killed them! Are you going to kill Spencer too?”

Mounting pressure filled Tom’s skull so that his face felt swollen and red with heat. He hadn’t felt the desire to kill a man since Megan had been murdered, and here was the being responsible for her death, and he could kill it again. Or could he? Tom aimed the gun and fired twice. Spencer’s body spun and fell to the floor in a heap.