Silence - eARC (28 page)

Staci bit her lip, and her eyes stung a little. “Wanda…I’m not asking you to help. This isn’t a freakin’ game, where if someone dies they just roll up a new character sheet. This is
serious
, and we could all get hurt or worse—”

“—which isn’t different from any other day,” interrupted Jake. “We could get run over, struck by lightning, fall off the dock and drown, break our necks, our houses could burn down, there could be a tragic weedwhacker accident. We could already have been puppy chow for the Blackthorne hellhounds. You’re our friend, too. We can’t let you do this alone and still call ourselves friends. I’m with Wanda; I’m staying, and I’m going to help,” he finished with a gulp. Riley looked shocked, tugging on his elbow, but it was clear that he was determined.

Riley shook her head. “This is insane…monsters and elves, magic and plagues? There’s got to be somebody else that we can get to help, get to take care of this. The cops—”

Jake interrupted her, “—are in on it! You heard Staci. They’re under the thumb of the Blackthornes. And it makes sense. The curfew, the little-shit gangs, the drugs; they’ve been doing what the Blackthornes wanted for a long time, and have been getting worse. Dark elves feed on…misery, right? Sounds like the police are playing right into that. Besides, who else would believe this stuff? ‘Hello, Mr. President? Yeah, you’re never going to guess what, but I need you to call in the National Guard and the Ghostbusters because…’ You see? We’re alone, here.”

Riley looked deflated by that. Jake put his arm around her shoulder. “If we stick together, we can do this. It’s our only shot, baby. I won’t let anything happen to you, okay?” She seemed to take a little heart in that, but still looked scared to death.

“Seth? Where do you fall on this? You don’t have to feel pressured; whatever you decide, it’ll be okay.” Staci almost wished Seth would refuse; maybe that would get the others to back out, if he did.

“I…um…” He looked at his feet, then stole a glance towards Wanda; only Staci seemed to notice. “I’m staying. I’m going to help. There aren’t any other options that make sense, or at least good sense. Hiding won’t work; plague will get us, or some other horrible monster. Running won’t work--we probably can’t at this point; we’d never get our families to come along--and anyway, if what you overheard is what they’re really planning, this thing will eventually be everywhere. There’s no one else that can save us, so…” He sucked in a long breath, then let it out in a heavy sigh. “So, we have to save ourselves.”

Staci sighed, looking to Dylan. He didn’t look like he was pleased with himself, or triumphant. He actually looked like he sympathized with her, a little sadness in his eyes.
Glad he’s not rubbing my nose in it. Maybe there’s more to him than meets the eye.
“Is there anything at all I can say to get any of you to change your minds about this?”

“You…cooould say that there is a hidden camera crew, and that we’re all on television as part of a practical joke show,” said Seth, looking around the room with an exaggerated mask of suspicion on his face. “But, I don’t think you will. So, I guess we’re still with you on this. Guys?” Everyone nodded at that, with Riley chuckling half-heartedly at Seth’s attempt at a joke. Jake and Wanda looked dead serious. Wanda still had that odd air of vindication. Staci had to wonder, now, just what sorts of conspiracy theories she’d had going in her head until now—what had she
thought
was happening in Silence?
Maybe compared to what she’d been thinking of, elves and black magic are…not as bad as what she’d been afraid of?

“Well, if you’re all set on helping us, it’s best that we give you every advantage that we can,” Dylan said. “We’ve got mail and bucklers for protection; just about any magic that hits you on those ought to dissipate and leave you relatively unharmed.”

“Relatively?” Riley spoke up, looking skeptical.

“Nothing is one hundred percent, but it’s better than going up against dark elves in jeans and a T-shirt.” The gang all traded glances. “Moving on. We’ve also got short swords; you can use them one-handed, but they don’t have much reach. There are also a lot of hand-to-hand and throwing knives; you don’t want to use them as a primary weapon if you can help it, since chucking your main weapon is generally poor form when it comes to fighting. But, any elves you’re fighting won’t pick it up to use against you, so you have that going for you. And lastly are some caltrops; pure iron, a specialty order that a friend of mine fabricated. If you start spreading those around, it’s going to seriously mess up any magic for a good distance. Think of them like signal interference. We probably can’t count on anyone actually stepping on one, but if it happens, it’s going to pretty much take whoever does right out of the picture.”

“Besides iron and steel, what weaknesses do dark elves have?” Wanda was listening very closely to everything that Dylan had to say about the weapons, and was equally intent on hearing his response.

“Other than that, not much, really. We’re susceptible to all the regular stuff that humans are; stab us, shoot us, whatever, and we get hurt and can die just like regular people. Oh, we’re also allergic to caffeine. It’s like a super-potent drug; gets us high, and not in a good way. Enough of it can kill.”

“Caffeine? So, like this cola…” Seth said, holding up his plastic cup.

“There’s enough in there to really mess someone like me up.”

“You know, that gives me an idea.” Everyone turned to look at Seth.

“Well, are you going to share with the class, or do we have to beat it out of you, genius?” Wanda punched him lightly in the thigh, raising her eyebrows expectantly.

“Ow. Well, I was thinking…caffeine in cola and coffee is kind of diluted. At the health and wellness store in town, they sell all sorts of supplements. Like concentrated caffeine powders. Even a little bit of that stuff would dwarf what you find in cola.” He looked at Dylan. “Do elves have to drink or otherwise ingest caffeine for it to affect them?”

“For the most part, yes.” He thought for a moment. “But, if you could get a dose into their bloodstream some other way…say, through their eyes, or having them breathe it in…”

“Got it!” Seth pumped a fist up in the air. “Caffeine powder, maybe in a solution of…I dunno, an energy drink or something. Load it all up into a water gun. I know a mod that can boost the pressure up pretty high. Eh, long story. But anyways, you get that powder into a solution like that, blast someone in the face…no way they can stop some from getting in their eyes, in their nose, in their mouth. Super-concentrated anti-elf juice.”

“Remind me not to give you a reason to be pissed off at me, Seth,” said Dylan. This time everyone did laugh genuinely. It felt good, like they were making progress and could actually
do
this. Staci still had a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach, that they were all in way over their heads…which they were. But, having everyone working together somehow abated that, at least a little bit. “Also, I wish I didn’t have to, but I’ve got to say this; it’d probably be best if all of you didn’t really spread this knowledge around. Any of it, really. Elves don’t like being known about, by and large. They don’t like having their weaknesses known even more. Just a polite thing to keep it under your hat, okay?”

“Like we’d tell anyone about this,” Jake snorted. “The first time we said the word ‘elf,’ our folks would have us committed. They already think we’re borderline for playing games and LARPing, one hint that we thought any of it was real and we’d be looking at the world from inside an institution. In my case,” he added thoughtfully, “probably a military academy for
troubled teens.
”

Dylan blinked a little, as the others nodded. “Brenda would love it if she could send me to a drug rehab place,” Staci said bitterly. “Why do you think I haven’t called my father? Why do you think I keep saying I’ve got nowhere else to go?”

Dylan scratched his head, with a peculiar expression on his face. “Huh,” he said finally. “Keighvin might be—” Then he just shook his head.

“Who’s Kevin?” Jake asked, sharply.

Dylan shrugged. “Ask me when this is over,” he replied cryptically. “So, we’ve got the tools. Seth, do you think you can rig up a couple of water guns the way you were talking about?”

Seth grinned, as if this was some sort of prank they were planning, and not an assault on a den of killers. “Sure. Me and Jake can buy the powdered caffeine—it’ll be less suspicious if we split the purchase between the two of us—and I already have a selection of water guns at my house. Also, enough energy drinks to keep a football team going for a week.” He glanced over at the others, thrusting his chin towards the boxes. “Bet you guys never thought all that LARPing was going to come in handy, didja?”

Wanda just rolled her eyes. Jake grinned back a little. Riley bit her lip. “What’s LARPing?” Staci asked, now thoroughly confused. This was the second time it had been mentioned.

“Live Action Role-Playing,” Seth said, just a little smugly. “We stopped doing it just before you got to town because we lost our ride when Greyhound stopped serving Silence. But you’re looking at the Shattered Shield Survivors. Three-time champions, to boot.”

“Which means what, exactly?” Staci asked, with just a touch of impatience.

“It means,” Jake replied, when Seth looked crestfallen that Staci wasn’t impressed, “that the four of us actually
do
know how to swing a sword.”

* * *

Staci closed the door behind Jake and Riley and put her back against it, staring at Dylan, who was contemplating a slice of reheated pizza in his hand. “This is insane,” she said. “There’s only six of us! How can we even
think
we have a chance?”

“I’ve gone through worse odds, and while alone. You ought to give your friends more credit; they’re a brave bunch, and they all seem to have good heads on their shoulders. None of this is ideal, but we’ve got a damn good bit going for us.” He walked over to her after setting the pizza back on a plate. “For one, the Blackthornes don’t know that we’re onto their plan. They know I’m in town, and they know that I’m snooping around, that’s certain. But what they
don’t
know is that you’re helping me. I’m pretty sure they don’t know that you’ve got magic. And they certainly don’t know that your friends are going to be helping us, with iron and steel. That’s a lot of surprises, and my kind doesn’t always do that well with reacting on the fly. We love human innovation for a reason; it’s something we can’t easily grasp and do ourselves.” He turned to lean his shoulder against the door, right next to her. “We’ve stacked the deck in our hand as much as we can. If it were just you and me…we might have been able to do it. But I would’ve had serious doubts; doesn’t mean we wouldn’t have tried, though. It’s the right thing to do. With your friends, our chances of success have gone up, big time. It still won’t be easy; I’m not
that
much of an optimist. I sure as hell like our chances a lot better now, though.”

She couldn’t help herself. Tears started leaking out of her eyes. “Dylan, I don’t care
what
you thought of that crap that Seth and Jake were telling you, they
don’t
know anything about really fighting. I doubt either of them has ever gotten so much as a broken bone doing that LARP stuff, or had anything worse than a papercut! It’s all just”— she waved her hands helplessly —“video game fights to them! And if the bad guy cuts off your head, you just go back to the last savepoint!” She started to sob, because after having seen those hitchhikers die right in front of her, having seen the hounds with bloody muzzles, she could all too easily imagine what would happen if Seth went charging at one of the Blackthornes.

He stopped leaning on the door, stepping to the side and in front of her. “Hey,” he said, taking her lightly by the shoulders. “It’s okay, Staci. This is too much for just about anyone to have to shoulder. You’ve done better than I could have ever imagined; plenty of people would have cut and run way before now. I’ve seen it more times than I would care to admit. The fact that you care so much for your friends, and that you’re putting their well-being first…that says a hell of a lot about you. Your friends are good people, Staci. I’m going to do my best to make sure they don’t get hurt. I promise that, and that we’ll do what we can and together we
will
save the town. We’re almost there, if you’re willing to go the last mile with me.” He moved his hands from her shoulders to her face, cradling it firmly but softly at the same time. She felt like his hands were the whole world for a moment.

Could she believe him? He might have kept some things from her, but…
He’s never lied to me. And he’s been doing this for a long time.
“If something happens to them, I’ll never forgive myself,” she said, looking up into his eyes. “It’s all my fault they’re involved.”

“It’s your fault that they know what they’re facing now,” he corrected gently. “But they aren’t three-year-olds. You laid it all out for them, how dangerous it is. Despite what Seth said, they
did
have a choice. They could have chosen to ignore it, or to run and hide. Those choices wouldn’t have helped, but that doesn’t mean they couldn’t have gone those routes; most people do, when confronted with something like this. They’re involved out of their own free will, Staci. You can’t control them. You
don’t
control them, and you wouldn’t want to, would you?”

She shook her head. He was right. She was—maybe—giving them the only shot they had at doing something about the steamroller that was
definitely
going to roll over her, them, and everyone in the town. Wasn’t going down fighting better than going down as a victim, if it came to that? But she couldn’t help crying anyway. Because it wasn’t any of it fair. “Okay,” she said, sniffling. “I guess you’re right.”

“We’ll get through this, Staci. Together.” She looked up into his eyes, then. The warmth there, so unlike what was in Sean’s eyes, flooded into her. Dylan cared, had been fighting alone for so long…but now he had her help. With her help, they could survive, they could win.

And now she was sure of it, as she had never entirely been sure of Sean without his magic working on her. Dylan cared about her. For her. Entirely outside of what she could do
for
him, she meant something to him, something important. Maybe she was the first person he had ever been able to care about in a long, long time.