Lance's heart dropped to his stomach. The only sound in the room was the tinkling of remnant glass hitting the floor. Eric removed the blade from his cane and tossed the body to Lance.
"Flip that switch toward the bottom," Eric whispered.
Lance did so, and a scythe flicked from the bottom of the cane. His throat constricted, Amari's body burning into the back of his mind. The ground swayed beneath him, and he leaned on the cane, his mouth dry.
A voice sounded from behind the shelf. "Hello."
Derek whirled and fired. Chips and snacks flew like shrapnel across the room and scattered on the floor as the bullets penetrated them and the metal shelf.
Silence lasted for only a moment before a laugh rang out. "Poor girl. She was so pretty. Seemed rather sweet too."
Kaela screamed and fired her pistol at the shelves. After the first handful of bullets sparked against the metal, her gun clicked. Empty. Lance's ears rang as the echo of the gunshots reverberated throughout the store. He readied the scythe in his hand. If Caleb rounded the shelf, he would be in for a nasty surprise. Eric stood at the ready at the other end of the aisle.
"Do you want to know the funny part?" Caleb was lighthearted in his tone, completely casual, as if the conversation was no less normal with a dead body just outside. "She wasn't even how I found you."
A crumpled bullet flew over the shelf and landed near Kaela's feet.
"Nice shot, by the way."
The bullet glowed. No, the blood on the bullet glowed.
Kaela's eyes widened. "Get down!"
The bullet exploded, and fragments of shrapnel flew across the room, shattering the glass doors of the freezers. Lance dove, pieces of the bullet grazing his back as his leg groaned in pain.
Lance gritted his teeth, using the scythe to pick himself up. Purple lines snaked around the shelf. The slithering lines grew slowly and steadily, wrapping the shelf in a tight hug.
"Run!" Lance yelled as the lines began to glow. He didn't wait for them to react and limped to the back door, broken off its hinges by Amari's body.
Lance covered his head as the shelf exploded into bits behind him, the shattering metal and glass deafening. The force of the blow shoved him farther out the door and into the alley. Eric, Kaela, and Derek landed near him.
Lance's leg screamed in pain as he tried to stand. "Everyone okay?"
"Yeah," Kaela said.
Derek groaned. "Same here."
Eric was panting as he glanced behind them. "Let's get the hell out of here."
Lance caught a glimpse of Amari's broken body, bent in unnatural ways and splayed over a trash can, her eyes wide in shock.
"Oh God," Kaela said, her face twisting with grief.
"Kaela, we have to go. Now," Derek said, his voice rushed.
"I'm so sorry."
"Kaela, now!" Derek grabbed her by the arm, and she broke out of her trance, running beside him.
There was no time for mourning, no time for a moment of silence, no time for anything. They ran down the alley, lit by one streetlamp.
They didn't get far before soldiers appeared at the end of the alleyway, guns pointed.
Lance froze, as did everyone behind him.
"Drop your weapons now!" one of the soldiers yelled.
Lance looked back at them, and after a few shared glances, they slowly dropped their weapons to the ground.
YOU ARE READING
Arachna
Misterio / SuspensoHe was a monster. The nightmares had tried to tell him for years. They were right. Arachna: A web-shaped city with a dazzling nightlife to distract its residents from that place-the slums. An abandoned section of Arachna where the poor suffer and cr...
