DAD!
Emily didn’t pause to think. As her dad fell and her mom screamed and pulled Aidan to the floor, she threw herself toward the door, picked up the assault rifle they’d taken from the dead man. She went to the window—she was expecting any moment a bullet would tear through her, but it didn’t happen—and crouched below the sill. Aidan and Bob and her mom were lying on the floor near the stove.
Her dad was levering himself up into a crawling position, and when she saw that, she let out a long breath.
She could feel and hear rounds hitting the outside of the cabin. Her dad was suddenly beside her—jump-cut quick. Leaning against the wall, avoiding the window. She glanced at his side.
“Flesh wound,” he said. “Skimmed me is all.”
She nodded.
Another bullet hit the side of the cabin.
“Whoever built this built it good,” said her dad. His grammar tended to slip in moments of stress. “You gonna give me that rifle?”
She didn’t. She popped her head up and scanned the lakeside, the trees. A flash from the undergrowth fifty yards away, and she ducked as a shot chipped the window frame. Another flash. Thud.
But only from that one location, as far as she could see—only one shooter. She swung up the stock of the gun, got the barrel over the sill, and fired right through the plastic toward where she had seen the fire coming from. The noise was enormous, head-filling.
Dum-dum-dum!
Dum-dum-dum!
Two bursts of semiauto fire—not too much. They only had a finite amount of ammunition. There was a break for ten seconds, maybe, and then another round of bullets slammed into the cabin.
“Who the hell is it?” said her dad in a strained whisper.
“Wish I knew,” Emily whispered back.
“The hunter who shot Bob Simpson with a long-range full-metal-jacket round, maybe,” said her dad. He raised an eyebrow.
“Maybe.”
“Or someone hunting Bob. Or you.” He was looking at her.
She tried not to meet his eyes. He was too good at reading her.
“He shot at us when we were walking in the valley up there.” She gestured toward the mountain. “I don’t know if we strayed into a secret military area or something.” The small kernel of truth in the flesh of the lie.
“So they’re shooting civilians now? No.”
She was still averting her eyes. Her dad would see her lies in an instant, if he looked into them. She gave a noncommittal shrug.
“Some psycho, maybe,” he said, his tone less suspicious, and she realized: Why would he think she knew anything about what was happening? There had been no gunfire for a minute now. Had she hit the guy? Or was he just sneaking up on them?
“I guess,” agreed Emily, muscles physically relaxing. Feeling bad—she wasn’t big on Bible study, but she didn’t like lying, either. Relieved at the same time, though.
“Active shooter, they call them on the news,” said her dad needlessly, and Emily realized something else: This was how he dealt with stress. By trying to understand, to analyze.
Thud. Thud. Swish.
More bullets, the last going through the plastic window. Emily raised the gun above the sill, let off another burst of fire in the direction she thought they’d come from.
“We can’t stay here,” she said.
“Why not? Better than going out there.”
“No. What if it’s not just one guy? What if they bring grenades? Smoke? What if they burn down the cabin?”
He nodded, getting it right away. “OK. So what’s the plan, then?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “You’re the soldier, right?”
He nodded again. “Wait here. Keep laying down covering fire. Small bursts, to preserve ammo.”
She raised her eyebrows.
“Yeah, fine,” he said. “I deserved that.” He crawled across the room and paused by Bob, exchanged a few words with him. Then he went to the cupboards on the other side of the room, started looking through them. He pulled out a jerry can—unscrewed the cap and sniffed. He brought it over to where she still crouched, occasionally putting the barrel of the rifle over the sill and firing in the general direction of the flashes she had seen earlier.
“OK,” he said. “Here it is. The plan. You’re going to give me the gun. Then you get Bob to that shed out back.”
“Cold storage.”
“Right. No way he can run, so we’re gonna hope they assume we’re all gone, don’t bother searching too closely. You, your mom, and Ade”—they even had a pet name for him!—“are gonna go out the door and book it to the canoe. I’ll cover you. Then I’ll follow.”
“But you can’t cover yourself.”
“No. I’ll just have to run fast.”
It was stupid—you couldn’t outrun bullets—but what else were they going to do? She also didn’t want to leave Bob—but again, what else could they do? The man could barely walk. The word again was in her thoughts a lot. Being shot at, again. People coming for them, again.
People getting hurt, again.
Them wanting to take Aidan, again.
But if they did, she would kill them.
Again.
She handed over the rifle and the spare magazine—she’d used up all the bullets in the clip. Then she scooted over to Bob before she could rethink any of this. “You’re going in the cold storage. My dad talked to you, right?”
“Yep,” he said.
“Got the antibiotics?”
“Yep,” he said again.
No need for further discussion. She got him under the arms and half supported, half carried him to the side door. She turned to her dad and gave him a nod, and he went up on one knee, started firing single shots out of the tattered plastic window. Just like that: Special Forces mode. No unnecessary questions.
But there would be lots of questions later. Emily knew that.
She kicked the door open, and she and Bob went out into the half light, the whole lake valley echoing with gunshots. She pulled and pushed and heaved him toward the shed door, then leaned him against the wall while she opened it. He almost fell inside.
“We’ll come back for you,” she said. “Or we’ll send someone.”
“Sure.”
“We will!”
He smiled. “I believe you.”
“Keep taking the amoxicillin. If they come back here, hide behind the meat.”
“Sure.”
She rolled her eyes. “Stop that. I hate…I hate this. Leaving you behind.” Tears, embarrassingly, sprang up in her eyes. Welled up.
“I promise you, it’s OK,” he said. “I’ll get out of here. I have to. I need to see my wife; tell her what Aidan showed me.”
“What did he show you?” She should have been fleeing, but she wanted to know.
He shook his head. “No time. You’ll have to ask him to show you too.”
“OK.” She still hesitated. “Thank you. For everything.”
He smiled. “No. Thank you. I’m an explorer. That’s why I became a pilot. Last frontier, all that shit. Thanks to you, I got to go on the greatest adventure of all. I met an alien. And he gave me the best gift in the world. Now go. Keep him safe.”
She swallowed. “I will.”
Gunfire continued from behind them. No time. No time.
He touched her hand as she turned to go, to hide her tears. “I always wanted to explore,” he said. “What do you want to do with your life?”
She stared at him. “What?”
Gunshots—dum dum dum dum. Her dad was going to run out of ammo, even with the extra magazine.
“I…don’t know.”
“Then decide,” said Bob. “Once this is all over. Survive—and then decide, and then do it.” He pulled her, unexpectedly, into a hug, and she froze and then relaxed, hugging him back. As if he were her dad, or something, though, of course, her dad would never hug her. Then Bob gave her a little push. “Now go.”
He pushed her out of the door and pulled it shut, and she ran back to the cabin, where her mom and Aidan were waiting. She scooped up Aidan in one movement, threw him over her shoulder in a fireman’s carry, and ignored her mom’s astonished expression.
“Move,” she said, and her mom moved.