Mark Lukens: Ancient Enemy

Stella and David were both still asleep.

Cole looked back at the stove. It was a gas stove. He lifted up the top and blew out the pilot light. He lowered the lid carefully, trying not to make a sound. Once the lid was back down, he turned on all of the burners and the oven. He could already smell the rotten egg smell of gas coming out of the burners.

He grabbed the can of soda from the counter and shook it up. Then he opened the microwave oven and set the can inside. He closed the door and set the timer on the microwave for thirty minutes. The digital numbers began counting down from twenty-nine minutes and fifty-nine seconds. Fifty-eight seconds. Fifty-seven seconds. After thirty minutes the microwave oven would start and heat up the can of soda. The numbers counted down like a ticking time bomb in a movie.

Because this was a bomb.

Cole looked into the living room; he watched Stella and David as they slept while he slipped his coat on. He could feel the stacks of money in his coat pockets that he’d stuffed earlier; the metal case of money, now about half full, still sat on the floor in front of his chair. He had also stuffed some packs of money into his socks and a few in his pants pockets. There was no way he could carry all of the money, but he guessed he must’ve had close to a hundred thousand dollars on him.

This was his share of the money, his mind whispered. And Trevor’s. This was his starting over money.

At least he hoped he would have a chance to start over.

But first he needed to get out of this place alive.

Cole slid his hands into his thin leather gloves and he glanced at the clock on the kitchen wall. It was almost six o’clock in the morning.

And Frank and the others haven’t even tried to attack yet, Cole thought. Why? What were they waiting for?

They are waiting for you, his mind whispered to him again. They are waiting to see what you will do, waiting to see if you will follow instructions and kill the boy.

Cole grabbed the flashlight he had set on the counter earlier and he walked as quietly as he could to the front door. He unlocked the deadbolt and the clicking noise sounded loud in the silent night, but he didn’t even bother to turn around and look at Stella and David if they were waking up now. What could he do now? He didn’t have the time to explain his actions or motives now because the clock was already ticking down to zero – down to detonation.

He slid the recliner out of the way and unlocked the door handle. He opened the door up to the freezing air, and then he slipped out into the pre-dawn darkness and closed the door behind him.

Stella opened her eyes and she watched Cole slip outside and close the door. It was a surreal moment for her as her mind drifted back to a similar scenario for her when she had slipped out into the night from the trailer at the dig site in New Mexico and ran outside for David.

She turned and looked at David. She thought about waking him up, but she didn’t. Let him sleep some more; he needed his rest; he needed to be at his strongest in a little while when they made their escape.

She had read Cole wrong, she realized that now. She had believed that he was really going to stick around and help them. But she should’ve known better. He was a criminal and no matter how much he said he was going to change, he couldn’t do it. He was still just a criminal.

She looked into the kitchen at the single dining room chair that was left. Cole had been sitting in it, she guessed, because one of the metal cases of money was on the floor. It was open, and even from here in the living room she could see that some of the stacks of money were gone.

She thought about taking some of that money. A pack or two could help her and David get far away from all of this.

She had decided not to go to her aunt’s house. What would she do if this thing followed them up there? What would she do if it took her aunt and then sent her aunt back as a hollowed-out husk that asked for things in a gravelly voice?

Or maybe this thing would try a different approach next time. Maybe it would tear her aunt apart piece by piece; her aunt would scream and beg Stella to help her, to kill David so this thing would stop hurting her.

Stella closed her eyes for a moment and tried to push the terrible vision out of her mind. No, she couldn’t risk hurting her aunt or anyone else that she knew. She needed some of that stolen money so they could run and find somewhere safe.

Stella got up and she hurried through the murky cabin and crouched down in front of the open case of money. So many stacks of money inside – one hundred dollar bills collected into a brick of money wrapped in plastic. Stacks and stacks of the plastic bricks of money. She was about to grab one of them, and then she thought of the old man who had been killed in the bank robbery. The one Cole said Needles had killed. This was blood money. A man had died for this money.

And many had died since then.

But she couldn’t let that get to her, she needed to protect David, and she needed some of this money to take him somewhere safe, a place where he could grow up and become strong. Maybe she could find someone who could help them, a shaman or Medicine man who could train David to harness his powers.

That might mean going back to the Navajo reservation, back to where they had come from, back to where all of this had started.

But what else could she do?

She rolled up her pants legs and grabbed a few stacks of the money. She stuffed the money down into her socks and then rolled her pants legs back down to her hiking boots. She stuffed more stacks of money into the waistband of her pants. She took a few more stacks so she could stuff them into her coat pockets.

And then she glanced into the kitchen and saw the numbers on the microwave oven that sat on the counter. The numbers were moving; counting down.

And now she could smell the odor of gas coming from the stove.

And that’s when she heard the thump from the freezer.

She jumped up to her feet and stared into the kitchen at the freezer against the far wall. The lid bumped again; it opened just a bit and then thumped back down.

“Oh God,” Stella whispered.

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

Cole stepped off the porch and his boots sank down into the snow. He had his gun in his coat pocket, but he didn’t take it out; he wasn’t even sure it would do any good anymore, yet he still felt better knowing that it was there.

He scanned the snowy field and the dark blob of trees with his eyes, but he couldn’t see much in the darkness. The moon was already setting low in the sky behind the trees, but even with the scattering of clouds across the night sky, he could see a little bit into the darkness. He didn’t turn on the flashlight yet, he would wait until he was inside the garage to use it. He didn’t know if using the flashlight would attract this thing out here, but he had a feeling that it didn’t matter either way – this thing knew he was out here now, he was sure of it; he could practically feel it watching him, waiting to see what he was going to do.

Waiting to see if he would follow instructions.

As long as Cole was following instructions, he felt sure that he was relatively safe for the moment.

Cole trudged through the snow towards the hulking black shape in the darkness that was the garage. He walked past Tom Gordon’s pickup truck and it blocked the freezing wind a little. Already his face felt numb and his fingers were turning into ice blocks underneath his thin leather gloves. He paused for a moment at the end of the pickup and looked around one more time – nobody moving in the darkness. He looked back at Frank’s spot in the snow, but Frank wasn’t there. He looked back at the cabin which was dark except for the yellowish glow of the kitchen light in the windows. He didn’t see any movement inside and the door wasn’t open with Stella watching him from the doorway.