Stone Soldiers 1: Mythical (3 page)

CHAPTER FOUR

After shooting the water-guzzling stranger in their camp, Carlos had decided on a different course of action. Running away.

              It wasn’t that Carlos was a chicken. He didn’t consider himself afraid of most anything. But this wasn’t most anything. This was a bullet-proof man that had come back from the dead.

That was definitely something to be scared of.

Carlos felt better about his decision to run away when he looked out from behind the rock he had chosen as his hiding place and saw his friends all doing the same thing. Everybody had run away.                                                                                   

Except Josie. And Logan.
                           

Carlos wasn’t surprised. Josie never really seemed to be afraid of anything.
And Logan had been thrown through the air like a rag doll. He probably was in no condition to run.

Now Carlos felt bad. Not bad enough to come out from behind his rock, but bad.

***

Josie was amazed.

Not because the stranger was still standing after being shot six times, but because of what was happening to him now. His wounds were healing.

The head wound- which wasn’t very deep at all- had closed up. Josie had watched the blood on the wound soak back into the stranger’s head. Like he was a sponge. What she had first thought was a bruise she now realized was something else. A splotch of gray that faded back to flesh color.

The chest wounds were different. Josie watched in fascination as the wounds swelled up from inside the stranger. Bullet fragments were slowly pushed out. What little blood had trickled down from the wounds soaked back into the stranger’s skin. Again, the wounds healed and turned stone-colored then back to flesh-colored.

The stranger seemed surprised too. He had been staring at bullet fragments from his chest, held in the palm of his hand. Then he looked down and watched his chest wounds silently heal.

He looked confused.

“What are you?” Josie finally asked, breaking the silence.

The stranger looked up at the sky, at the stars, for several seconds. Then he turned his strange black-green eyes to Josie.

“An American,” he said. “And judging from these stars, you are too?”

Josie’s throat felt dry. “Yes, Yes... No- I mean, how-?”

The stranger dropped the metal bullet fragments from his hand and pointed to his chest. “How’d I do this? No idea.”

“Who are you?” Josie asked, taking a slow step forward. It all seemed so surreal.

The stranger watched her closely. “I’m Mark. Mark Kenslir,” he finally said, extending his right hand.

Josie looked at the large hand for a second then reluctantly shook it. Despite his freakish strength and bulging muscles, the stranger’s grip was gentle. Firm, but not vice-like as she had worried it might be. The stranger’s hand was dry and smooth- and warm. At least he wasn’t a zombie.

“Are you sure?” Josie asked as she slid her hand away.

“To be honest,” the stranger, Mark, smiled, “I had to think about that.”

The stranger looked around the camp as he continued to speak. “When I first walked in here, I wasn’t sure who I was, or where I was.”

“You’re in Arizona,” Josie said. This was getting stranger and stranger.

Mark looked at Josie again with his strange green-black eyes. “What’s your name, kid?”

Josie had never seen eyes like the stranger’s. Hazel eyes were green and brown. The stranger’s were green and black, with the green being a deep, emerald hue.

“Josephine Winters- Josie. My friends call me Josie.”

The stranger smiled warmly. “Pleased to meet you, Josie.”

Josie couldn’t help but smile back. Even though she knew she should be afraid, that she shouldn’t be talking to this odd man, she felt perfectly safe.

“Speaking of your friends- you think they’re coming back?” Mark asked, looking around.

Josie looked around. She hadn’t realized all the guys had fled the area. Well, almost all of them. Logan was laying on a collapsed tent, where Mark had thrown him.

“I don’t-” she started to say.

The stone man, Mark, pointed a thumb over his shoulder, at Logan. “Let’s check on that one.”

Mark turned and walked to the flattened tent Logan was laying in. He knelt carefully beside Logan.

Logan was lying in the tent, trying not to make noise, but holding his side. He had come down hard, and he was sure his ribs were broken. When he saw the stone man approaching, he panicked. His eyes went wide and he held his hands up defensively.

Mark smiled genuinely. “Relax sport, I’m not going to hurt you.”

Despite the fact this was the guy that had just thrown him through the air with no apparent effort, Logan relaxed and lowered his hands. He noticed Josie was standing next to the stranger, and didn’t appear frightened at all.

Mark gently probed Logan’s side, expertly feeling the ribs and not applying too much pressure. Logan winced but didn’t cry out in pain.

Mark stood up and faced Josie. “I don’t think anything’s broken- maybe just bruised. We ought to wrap the ribs... you have any first aid kits?”

Josie was relieved. She turned and cupped her hands to her mouth and began to call out for her friends. “Guys! Guys- we need your help! Logan’s hurt!”

After several seconds, nothing happened. Josie was about to try again when the guys started to come back, tip-toeing around the tents cautiously.

Jimmy was first to walk over. He eyed the stranger, Mark, with great suspicion.

“Is he okay?” Jimmy asked, trying to see around Mark.

Mark nodded an affirmative. “He will be.”

Carlos and Kendall walked over, standing close to Josie. Kendall too was suspicious. Carlos was intrigued.

“Are you a super hero?” Carlos asked, excitedly.

Oh, great,
Kendall thought to himself.
Here we go.

“A what?” the stranger asked.

Carlos was confused. “A superhero... You know, cape, tights, super-powers.”

“I don’t do tights. Or capes,” Mark responded. “What do you mean by
super-powers
?”

Kendall couldn’t believe he was going to join this conversation. “Oh, I don’t know- like throwing people twenty feet through the air.”

“Or being bullet-proof,” Jimmy added.

“Do you even realize you have a knife sticking out of your back?” Carlos asked.

Mark twisted his head around and tried to look behind him. Sure enough, Kendall’s knife was still lodged firmly in his back, above his shoulder blade, the point maybe two inches deep. He reached back and was just able to pull the knife free.

Mark wiped the blade on his pants, cleaning off his blood. He folded the knife and then offered it back to Kendall. “Good throw.”

Kendall gulped and sheepishly accepted the knife. “Sorry.”

He shoved the knife into his pants pocket.

“Don’t worry, we’re jake,” Mark said calmly.

“Jake? I thought you said your name was Mark?” Josie asked, confused.

Mark frowned. “Jake. Okay... groovy?”

Mark eyed the kids carefully, for the first time really taking in their off-road motocross clothes. Their haircuts. Even their pop up tents.

“So you aren’t a superhero,” Carlos said, disappointedly.

Mark shook his head from side to side. “I’m still not clear on what a
superhero
is. Have you seen super-powers before?”

“Yeah,” Josie said. “All the time. On TV.”

Mark was shocked. “On TV?” The last show he could remember watching was about cowboys.

“Seriously, man,” Carlos asked, not ready to give up, “What’s your stage name?”

Dawn was just starting to break. Mark could see a lot better now. He scrutinized the two kingcab pickups in the camp. They were strangely shaped, with off-road tires. Nothing like the trucks he remembered.

Josie leaned back a bit, looking at the cut on Mark’s back. She noticed it wasn’t bleeding.

Mark pointed to the one of the trucks. “What year is that truck?”

Kendall looked around at his dark blue, dusty, Dodge 4x4 kingcab his dad had bought him. “It’s a 2005.”

Mark was surprised but kept his face straight. “Did you buy it new?”

“You’re trying to figure out what year this is,” Jimmy said in surprise.

Josie stepped behind Mark and grabbed a bottle of water from the cooler- one of only a few left. She uncapped it and started pouring water on the wound as the conversation continued.

“Jimmy, that is ridiculous,” Josie declared.

Mark sighed.
Smart kid,
he thought.

“You got me, kid,” Mark finally said. “So what year is it?”

Josie almost dropped the water bottle. Carlos and Kendall stepped around Mark, watching Josie pouring water on the cut.

“Uh, it’s 2013,” Jimmy said. He suddenly didn’t think he was so clever anymore.

“Really?” Mark was surprised.

Carlos leaned close to Josie and whispered. “What are you doing?”

Carlos’ eyes widened as the wound Josie was pouring water over turned gray and began to close itself. Once closed the wound turned back to the same tanned flesh tone as the rest of Mark’s skin.

Mark turned around to face Josie. She stopped pouring the water, nearly dropping the bottle again.

Kendall was helping Logan up- he held as much of Logan’s weight as he could while Logan held his left arm in close to his bruised ribs.

“I need to get to a phone,” Mark said.

Carlos shrugged and reached into a pocket and pulled out a slim flip phone and offered it to Mark. “Here, use mine.”

Mark looked at the small device, cocking his left eyebrow.

“I was thinking more of a payphone,” Mark said, wondering what the thing in Carlos’ hand was.

Josie pushed Carlos’ hand away. “I don’t think we’d get a signal out here anyway, Mist- Mark.”

Carlos shrugged and put his phone away.

“I think you need to get more help than a payphone has to offer,” Josie added.

“What do you mean?” Mark asked.

Josie swallowed nervously. “When we found you... You had a... head wound...”

“Found me?” Mark asked.

“She means in the desert,” Carlos said. “By that burnt-up boat.”
             

Mark looked from Carlos to Josie. “You were there?”

Josie looked down for a moment, embarrassed. “Yeah, we came across the boat and saw you th-“

“And you just left me there?” Mark asked, incredulously.

“You weren't exactly moving, dude,” Carlos remarked.

Confusion showed on Mark’s face. He looked from teen to teen.
What kind of people are these?
he wondered.
Who would leave an injured man in the desert to die?

“You were stone,” Josie tried to explain. She had to admit, leaving someone stranded in the desert was pretty bad. Even if they did look like they were dead.

“Stoned?” Mark laughed at the absurdity of that. “I don't think so.”

“Not
stoned
,” Josie corrected. “Stone. Rock.”

Kendall frowned. He didn’t like where this really weird conversation was going. “Like a statue.”

Mark crossed his arms over his chest. “That doesn't make any sense at all. Are you sure you kids aren't
stoned
?”

Josie stepped close and put her fingertips gently on Mark’s bare chest, just below his sternum. His flesh was warm, but hard. Harder than any muscles she’d ever touched. Unnaturally hard.

“Mist- Mark, you had a big hole in your chest. And half your head was missing,” Josie said.

Jimmy did not like Josie touching all over the shirtless man with the bulging muscles.

“And he was all burnt up,” Jimmy added. “Covered in ash.” Josie was taking this way too calmly.

“Yeah, man, why weren't your pants burnt up too?” Carlos asked.

Mark stepped away from Josie, looking down at his black, cargo-pocket pants. He ran a hand over the fire-retardant material.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I don't remember ever seeing this kind of material before.”

Josie was alarmed. First the stranger had problems with his name. Then he didn’t know what year it was. Now he didn’t even recognize his own clothing. Super-powers or not, coming back from the dead didn’t seem to be going so well for the shirtless man.

“Okay, so your name is Mark,” Josie said, calmly. “What else do you remember?”

Mark looked up at the girl. She could tell by the look in his eyes there was a problem.

“Not much,” Mark finally said, evasively.