Virus

Chapter Nine: Police Station

“Well, Kinsley, it's your lucky day,” she said, twirling the phone wire around her finger. “Unfortunately, your father isn't here. Boohoo.”

“Oi, get off the phone!”

“Oh, damn, I'm caught. Shame that,” she looked up and made a face at Michael Tate, the Deputy Sheriff. His arms were crossed over his chest and his expression was sour. “Give me a minute, I'm talking to a cute guy.”

“I couldn't care less if you were talking to the Queen of England, give me that damn phone,” Michael growled, snatching the phone from her hand when she refused.

“Now, that's just rude,” she pouted, hopping off the desk she was perched on. “You could have asked nicely and I would have considered giving you it.”

“Just go over there,” he said, raising the phone to his ear as he pointed to a seated area that a blonde woman was currently sitting in. “Hello? Who is this?”

“My name is Alexander-”

“As in Kinsley, Arthur Kinsley's son?” there was a pause and Michael sighed. “I'm sorry, Alexander but your father isn't here. He left a few hours ago, there was a disturbance at Vance's and he's not returned since.”

She rolled her eyes and crossed the room, throwing herself down in the seat beside the woman. “Is he always so... moody?”

“He's not moody, he's stressed and you're not helping the situation one bit,” she replied. “Cut him some slack and do as your told.”

“Haven't you heard? I'm a delinquent, I rarely do as I'm told,” she said, rolling her eyes.

Claire rolled her eyes at the teenager, she wasn't in the mood to deal with immaturity as her husband paced the room, he was talking quietly into the phone and his jaw was clenched underneath his thin layer of stubble. That was never a good sign. She turned her eyes on the brown haired teenager and sighed. “Look, I don't know who you are and as of this moment, we have bigger things to deal with than your attitude so shut up, sit still and do as your told. Got it?”

Claire didn't mean to snap, she was just scared. Just that morning, she had arrived at the police station to give her husband his lunch which he had forgotten to lift to take to work and now, now she was trapped in a locked building as the town went insane. There was no rational explanation, it just happened.

It's hard to not to be scared when her sweet, elderly next door neighbour tried to put a thick knife through her heart.

The teenager sulked and folded her arms over her chest. She hated being scolded. “I shouldn't even be here. I'm supposed to be starting college tomorrow, so I'd appreciate it if you just let me go and forget I was even here.”

“You tried to steal a car,” Claire pointed out.

“Borrow,” she sighed and inspected her nails. “I tried to borrow a car. Like I said, I was late and you don't know my father, if I was late then he would have killed me... literally, I'm not joking. Seriously.”

“And if you go by state law, that is classed as stealing,” Claire turned in her seat, tearing her eyes from her husband, who was still talking quietly and quickly. “At least tell me your name.”

“Name's-”

“Claire, Jackson,” Michael cut in, hanging up the phone. “There's at least three kids, if not more, trapped in the school. I need to go get them.”

“Well, Jackson is my surname but whatever floats your boat is cool by me,” the girl Michael addressed as Jackson sat up and looked at him. “Oo, an adventure, can we come?”

Michael grumbled, not looking at her but at his wife. “The kid who phoned was Alex, Arthur's eldest. He said he was in the main office. From what I heard, he has one female with him and he mentioned a friend that's missing. I need to go and rescue them, they said the school was surrounded. You two will be staying here.”

“Mike! I'm not letting you go by yourself. I'm coming, too,” Michael was about to protest when Claire shook her head. “There's nothing you can say that will make me stay here.”

He looked at her and weighed a few options in his head. “What if I said that Jackson has to come as well?”

“I'd suffer it,” she replied.

“Gee, thanks, feeling the love here, folks,” Jackson muttered.

“What about the towns people, Mike? There's something wrong and we can't go out there unprotected.”

“Which is why,” he said, walking over to a locked wooden cabinet, “we go prepared.” He pulled a key from his front shirt pocket and slotted it into the keyhole, pulling the door open.

Inside, there were guns of every size and shape. Jackson rose to her feet and whistled. “Some nice hardware. I want one,” she said, crossing the room to the cabinet. She was impeded by Michael's arm. “What now?”

“This isn't some computer game where if you die you get another chance, a restart. You die out there, you die for real and there's no retries.”

“Wow, you're a great motivational speaker. Have you tried taking your act on the road, you could earn like, I dunno, a dollar, maybe, from it.”

He raised an eyebrow at her and she folded her arms over her chest. “What? Have you never heard of humour? Why don't you laugh for once?”

“I'll laugh when something is funny,” he growled, slapping an unloaded handgun into her hand. “Take care with this, I'm only giving you it because despite how annoying you are, I'm not letting you go out there without a weapon.” Jackson raised the gun in her right hand and used her left hand to support. She aimed it at his chest and pretended to squeeze the trigger, keeping her right arm extended and straight. “Impressive,” he said, handing his wife a shotgun. “Where did you learn to hold a gun?”

“When your dad is an abusive asshole, the only thing you can do is pretend to shoot his head off at the shooting range,” she shrugged and held her hand out for a clip. “My aunt taught me.”

Michael distributed ammunition, reluctantly handing Jackson hers when he slotted a revolver in his gun holder. He was watching her curiously as she took one of the gun belts, sliding it around her waist. “Look, right now our main priority is the kids in that school. We can deal with your rule breaking when we're back, OK?”

Jackson slid her gun into the belt and looked up at him. “Are we going or are you just going to stand there and talk my ear off?”

Claire looked pointedly at her husband and rolled her eyes. “Or we could simply lock you in a cell and leave you there.”

“You wouldn't dare,” Jackson glared at her.

“Trust me,” Claire loaded her gun. “Push me far enough and I'll do more than just that.”

Michael smirked a little at his wife's attitude. It was years since he had seen her feisty side. “As much as I'm enjoying this,” he readied his handgun after slinging a rifle over his back by it's strap, “we should go now.”