He moved through it quickly, passing a man covered in blood and faceup. He had several obvious bullet holes and he wasn’t moving, so Jim didn’t shoot him again and reveal his presence any more than his flashlight already did.
He’d just made it into a room they called the Ballroom because of nothing more than its size when he found Court lying there, half buried under moldy plywood and two-by-fours. Rain from an open hole in theroof the size of a minivan poured in on his son, and the hole gave some light to the scene.
He knelt over Court, then quickly looked up to a west-side exit door to the outside, where a man appeared, silhouetted by the light behind him.
The man raised a pistol, Jim raised his, and they both got off one shot before the man stumbled away, out of view. Jim didn’t think he’d killed the enemy, but he heard footsteps slapping through the mud, and that told him the man was running away.
Below him, Court said, “Was that him?”
“Don’t know. You okay?” Jim asked.
“I’m fine.” He began pushing the wood off himself. “Coyle. Coyle was on the catwalk. Did you see him?”
“I saw one dead guy. I don’t think it was—”
“Was he wearing a hat?”
“No.”
“Fuck!” Court said, still struggling to push himself free and stand up.
Jim said, “The only guy I saw alive is running away.”
“Let him go,” Court said. “We have to find—”
“If that’s him,” Jim told his son, “then this is the best chance to end this shit.”
Jim Gentry rose and moved quickly towards the exit, his Staccato up in front of him.
“Dad! Wait!” Court said, still trying to push free of all the debris.
The elder Gentry broke into a run, got to the doorway at full speed, then caught his foot on a cable that had snapped from above and now hung loose across the doorway. Jim stumbled a little, just enough to lose his balance, and his eyeglasses fell off his face.
He caught them as they tumbled down his body, then he looked up to see two men going over the top of the berm, running away in unison, back in the direction of the SUV they’d parked on the western side.
“Dammit!” Jim said as he fumbled to get his glasses back on, and then when he did, he watched while the SUV drove at high speed around a CONNEX, then through the stormy weather back south towards the tree line and the road beyond it.
He rushed back towards his son, who was now clear of the wreckage but struggling to find the little pistol in all the mess.
When his father got close, Court said, “Give me my piece.”
Jim handed the Staccato over to his son, and while doing so, said, “It’s a full mag. I just saw two of them drive away.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yeah. West side. That means we killed four.”
Court found the 642 revolver, handed it back to his dad. He reached into his pocket and passed over the strip clip. “Reload and wait right here for me.” He moved towards the exit, hobbling a little at first, suffering the effects of the fall and the crash of the old catwalk. As he walked, he called out to his dad. “You’resureyou saw two drive off?”
Jim opened the cylinder of the pistol, began removing spent shells. “Yep. I saw two go over the berm. Then I saw the Suburban take off. I can’t say for sure that…” He paused, looking away from the gun, then said, “I didn’t see how many were in the vehicle. It was too far away.”
As Jim spoke, he reloaded the pistol with his four remaining bullets, his eyes on his son as he ran through the door, leaping over the cable Jim himself had tripped on. Court then ran up onto the berm, his pistol out in front of him as he went.
Jim stood there a moment watching, he closed the cylinder, then looked down at his partially loaded revolver.
He decided he’d go back to the dead man he’d passed in the hall and look for his weapon, but only after putting an insurance round in the poor bastard, just to make sure he was dead.
If those two men in the SUV doubled back, Jim reasoned, then they might need more firepower than his little two-inch Smith could provide.
