CHAPTER THIRTY

Attack

It turned out that there would be no need to talk to Taryn the next day, for when Sylvie walked out of her house (she’d decided she’d had more than enough of hiding) she found Taryn and Josh walking to her.

“Hi there!” she shouted cheerfully to the couple. “I was just heading over to your place!”

“Well, we’re here now.” Taryn said cheerfully.

Sylvie grinned when she noticed her hand in Josh’s. Perhaps last night hadn’t been so bad after all.

“So, what are you guys up to today?” she asked.

“We thought we’d come over and play some games, or something.” Josh said.

A flash of mischief struck her and Sylvie pretended to look thoughtful.

“Actually, that sounds a little boring.’ She said disinterestedly. “How about we do some skydiving instead?”

The horrified looks of the other two centaurs sent her into a fit of giggles.

“I was only joking.” She grinned. “I mean, come on! It’s not like we can exactly fit into parachutes anymore.”

Josh breathed a sigh of relief but Taryn looked at her anxiously.

“Sylvie, are you sure you’re alright?” she asked. “I mean, you’re acting all…different.”

Sylvie didn’t know exactly what to say to that.

“If you mean that I’m different in that I’m not moping about the house feeling in perpetual lockdown, then I guess you could say that.’ She said. “But I wouldn’t. I’d just say I finally got myself back onto an even keel again.’ She patted her rifle. “And to prove it, I’m headed to the range with dad.”

She waved back at the house where her father was just stepping out, talking rapidly on his cellphone. He was probably talking about the unexpected outing with the Chief and Bengal, but Sylvie didn’t bother listening in; she was going whether they liked it or not!

“And I wanted to see if you wanted to come Taryn, perhaps throw that spear again?”

“Maybe,” Taryn said unsurely.

“Aw, it would be fun.” Sylvie said. “But if you’re busy…” she glanced at Josh, who blushed and shifted his hindquarters away from Sylvie so they couldn’t be seen. Unfortunately for him, that action caused him to bump Taryn’s and she had to step slightly from the hit and both of them blushed fiercely.

“Ah, no, not busy!” Taryn said in a definitely girlish squeal. “But wasn’t sure…I mean…the agents after all.”

“Oh come on.” Sylvie laughed. “With all my friends there and the crowd basically armed to the teeth, Tenebrae Cultor would have to be nuts to attack us there.”

She gestured to where nearly two dozen agents sat on horseback, heavily armed.

“And with that escort we’ll have plenty of protection against anybody that thinks they can hurt us. Not that I couldn’t help of course.” She modestly patted her rifle on her back. She’d spent the morning polishing and cleaning it again, and the rifle gleamed brilliantly in the light.

“Of course.” Taryn said dryly and Josh shook his head.

“They’d be crazy just to take you on with that rifle.” He muttered.

“Damn straight!” Sylvie laughed.

The walk up to the range was short and uneventful. When they got there Sylvie looked around in surprise; Alfred’s had been one of the busiest places in town for over a year, with thousands of people passing through the range daily. This strange…emptiness was simply bizarre.

Sylvie walked up to the ticket counter; a young teen that Sylvie recognized stood there leaning on the counter and looking nearly asleep.

“Hi Maddie.” Sylvie said kindly as she walked up.

“Zzz…huck, um, oh! Hi Sylvie.” Maddie blushed fiercely, her short, black hair bobbed as she bent her head rapidly down to the counter as if she’d been pretending to have been busy and not dozing.

“I take it the range is pretty quiet today?” she said sympathetically.

The freshman (no, she’d be older than that now, wouldn’t she? After all, she’d been a freshman just before Sylvie had gone for the costume) grimaced.

“Yeah, they are.” She confirmed. “Mostly locals these days, and the recruits of course. I wanted to join them.” She said bitterly. “But they wouldn’t let me. Hey, you hear that Beth’s out of the hospital?”

“Really?” Sylvie blinked, surprised. She knew Beth’s back had been broken and she was supposed to be undergoing corrective surgeries to try and repair it and hopefully remove the paralysis.

“Yeah, but she’s not doing so good.” Maddie said a little sadly. “She’s not been able to take the surgeries that they’d wanted; the insurance companies (she spat the word) are saying that under the latest administration, her policy doesn’t cover elective surgeries! Elective! Can you freakin’ believe that horseshit? Uh, sorry.” She blushed.

“No, no, you’re all right. And you’re right. Haven’t they tried to take the companies to court?” Sylvie asked, the first stirrings of impotent anger in her heart.

“With what? They lost their house and all their stuff in the Riots, and most of it turned out to be uninsured! At least the companies paid for their house.” She admitted grudgingly. “And most of the appliances, so that’s something.”

“Hmm. Maybe we could hold a fundraiser.” Sylvie suggested. “Like we did back at Halloween, at that photo stand. Maybe we could have a trick shot competition or something. I could talk with Barnaby and see if any professional would be interested in coming.”

“To face you? I suspect that they would be lining up at the gate.” Taryn said dryly. “I suppose I could speak with Running Cloud about bringing some of the tribal people up, maybe they’d be interested in teaching some of their culture to the crowd.”

“Maybe.” Sylvie nodded. “Then the proceeds would go to getting Beth those surgeries she needs.”

Maddie had been staring pop-eyed at them the whole time they were speaking. Now she spoke.

“You really think it will work?” she asked.

“Trust me.” Sylvie laughed. “If there’s one thing Taryn and I know, it’s how to put on a show for the crowd.” She said it without rancor, but both of them shared a look before turning back to Maddie.

“Anyway, we’ll have to work on setting something like that up.” Sylvie continued. “For now, let’s have (she did a quick count) twenty-eight tickets for the range, please.”

“We aren’t there to shoot.” One of the agents suddenly spoke up, his voice sounding suspiciously high.

“Well, I didn’t think you were.” Sylvie told him dryly. “But Alfred requires everyone to have a ticket to get in, so if you want to still play bodyguard, then you’ll need to have one.”

The agents grunted, but one of them pulled out a black credit card with no name on it.

“Twenty tickets please.” He said, passing the credit card over to Maddie. One of the agents took the reins of the horses while another slouched casually near the entrance, surveying the parking lot. The other two quickly walked in different directions, one taking up a post near the road where he could see anyone coming or going, while the last agent disappeared into the woods heading for the other corner post.

Maddie stared at her computer screen in shock after she ran the card, then came to herself and grabbed her stamp pad and stamp. She proceeded to stamp all the agent’s hands, then Sylvie, Taryn, Josh and her father as soon as they paid.

Both groups filed in and Sylvie saw the entire range appeared to be empty. Natalie was cleaning glasses at the bar, she waved when she saw them come in and hurried off to get Alfred. The armorer looked eager when he found there were actually customers to work with, as Sylvie purchased her ammunition and her dad’s. She added it to the box of the ammunition she’d labored long to make, and she wondered how it would turn out.

Walking down to the range they saw Alfred striding towards them. They waved but didn’t stop as they went to the stalls and he came up behind.

Sylvie put in her ear plugs and loaded her rifle, noting her dad loading his pistol. Grinning at him, she stepped up to the bench and, sighting down range, fired five rounds in quick succession.

Sylvie felt like a different person! The gun was achingly familiar in her hands, and the splintering of the wooden target down range was audible even at this distance. Her father and her spent several minutes simply shooting at the target in every conceivable way, as fast as they could, just for the sheer joy of it.

When she’d gotten down about four of the ammo boxes, she pulled out the box containing the rounds she’d loaded.

“Let’s see how these ones work.” She said, loading ten of them into the rifle.

She took careful aim at the furthest target she could see, about two hundred yards away.

“Sylvie, why don’t you use my long range?” Alfred suggested, breaking into her thoughts before she could pull the trigger.

“Long range?” her father asked, saving her the trouble.

“Yeah, I added it especially for Sylvie.” He snorted. “It’s ridiculously long, I’ll grant you, but I figure the SWAT guys might get some use out of it, if she can’t.”

“How long is it?” Sylvie asked, interestedly.

“Oh, about a mile and a quarter.” Alfred said with a smile.

“A mile and a quarter!” her father gasped. “Alfred, the only rifles that could shoot on that range are sniper rifles, fifty cals!”

“I said it was a bit long.” He shrugged. “Actually, I’d wanted to have it about a mile long and

then put a bullet catch behind the targets, but the land dipped there and it turned out to be cheaper simply to move it to the next hilltop and build the catch there, so that’s what I did, and the shot was a mile and a quarter.”

“Wow.” Sylvie said in awe. “Let’s try it!”

They went to the far west of the range where a long strip of grass cut through the forest and away to a point where Sylvie could clearly see the wall, and the tiny targets lined in front of it (three in all) that looked no bigger than a fly.

The armorer brought out a a rifle scope for Sylvie (an odd one she'd never seen before that had long clamps to go around the barrel and stock) and a spotting scope and gave that one to Alfred who set it up to look down range.

“Now, I know the effective distance of your rifle is pretty good,” Alfred told her, “but I know that it shouldn’t reach out this far.”

“I don’t know.” Sylvie said. “These rounds are hot-loaded, I made them myself.”

“Oh, you’re making your own rounds?” Alfred asked curiously.

“Yeah, it was surprisingly easy, and I didn’t have much else to do for the past six weeks.” Sylvie ground her teeth a little at the memory of being trapped like a rat.

“I see. Well, let’s see what those babies will do.” He said, peering through the scope at the targets, looking down at the ground for the expected geyser of dirt that would herald a bullet strike.

Sylvie took careful aim at the far distant targets, swinging the barrel up as high as she dared. Would it be enough, she wondered as she exhaled and slowly squeezed the trigger.

Bang!

The bullet issued from the gun in a cloud of purplish smoke and zipped downrange. Sylvie stared hard through the scope to see where the bullet would hit.

A flying splinter in her sight jerked her eye to the target, and she saw a neat hole appear in the five spot, directly beneath the ten spot.

“Huh, don’t see the dirt puff.” Alfred grunted. “Must have been looking to far forward. Go ahead and shoot again.”

“Alfred, I think I got the target.” Sylvie said in a quiet voice.

Alfred jerked back from the eyepiece to look incredulously at her, then peered through it again, studying the target.

“Not possible.” He grunted softly as he stared. “Just not possible.”

Sylvie flushed angrily and took aim, going a little higher above the lowest crosshair to take into account the low hit the first time.

Bang! The gun barked and the bullet zipped and struck the target in the lower part of the ten spot, and not quite in the X.

“Holy cow!” Alfred breathed. “I didn’t believe it! That’s something else.” He said, looking proudly at her again.

“Man Sylvie, just as soon as I think I’ve seen you do it all, you pull something else out of that gun of yours that completely rewrites the book! A hell of a gun!” he pumped his fist in the air.

“Thanks Alfred.” Sylvie said lazily as she racked another round into the chamber. “Would you mind if you keep spotting me though?”

By the time she’d finished with half her personally loaded ammo, with their greater grain size, she’d managed to zero in her sight issues and consistently struck the ten spot, though not exactly dead center as she would have liked. Alfred assured her that even professional snipers almost never put a round exactly in the target at that distance, even if they were computer assisted.

Feeling somewhat cheered, Sylvie went back to the main range and shot her pistols for a bit and then policed her brass and joined Josh at the sidelines as Taryn worked on her spear.

It wasn’t sloppy, but her lack of practice had made her aim suffer a little bit, with the tip often hitting in the nine or eight zone on the most distant targets she could reach.

Taryn said nothing about it, but continued to work on it like she was back at the circus, until it improved back to where it had been.

“Getting sloppy.” She sighed.

“Eh, it wasn’t bad.” Sylvie encouraged. “Just needed a couple of throws to dial yourself back in.”

“Well, now that I’ve got the throwing down,” Taryn said with a grin. “How about we work with the melee stuff?”

“Melee?” Sylvie asked, her hearts suddenly hammering faster.

“Sure!” Taryn said cheerfully. “I’ve got a couple of training staffs Running Cloud gave me. We could have some fun with those.”

“Ah, sure.” Sylvie said, not at all sure about this, but not going to wimp out on it.

Taryn pulled from her spear holder two plain staffs, looking like the quarterstaves from Robin Hood.

Tossing one to Sylvie, she took her place in the field in front of the empty range while Alfred and the other drifted to the benches to watch, even some of the agents came to stare.

Sylvie met Taryn and held her staff in guard position, mimicking the other centaur as they sized one another up.

Suddenly Taryn lunged forward, striking the ground with her hooves with a deep thump like the striking of a war drum. Her “spear” lanced towards Sylvie who barely managed to parry the blow and tried to attack. Taryn almost lazily let it get close before batting the attack aside.
For a very short time they fought, and Sylvie got the impression that Taryn was drawing the match out as long as she could, but even she couldn’t help but stop when Sylvie, not paying attention to her hooves, stepped wrong and fell to the ground with a flail of hooves and a startled shriek.

“Sylvie! Are you all right?” Taryn asked concernedly.

“Fine, just tripped.” Sylvie grunted, feeling her bruised ribs as she rolled back onto her belly.

“Yeah, but a trip for us can be really bad.” Taryn pointed out as she offered her hand.
Sylvie took it and the other centaur helped her gain her feet.

“Yeah, but in this case I think I’m all right.” She said. “Just bruised and winded a little. I’ll walk it off. Now, what about you and Josh? I’m not really cut out for sparring, I prefer to work with my pistols and rifle. But Josh loves swinging that iron crowbar of his, and that’s something like a spear. Maybe he’d be good at it?”

Taryn glanced appraisingly at Josh who grinned.

“I doubt I’m as good as Taryn.” He said, “But I could give it a shot.”

“Okay.” Taryn said. “But don’t moan if I kick your butt at it.”

“I won’t!” he laughed.

Sylvie took her place off to the side, next to her father while the two squared off. Josh was much bigger than Taryn, probably had greater upper body strength too, and swung the staff in his hands confidently, and Sylvie wondered for a moment how he had acquired his confidence.
Taryn, however, had great skill, courage, and a quick mind. Sylvie suspected it would be a hard contest, but she suffered no doubts as to who would win.

Sylvie watched quietly as the two began to spar, the staffs whirling in blurred patterns as both sought to get past the others defense. There came a clack of wood, rapid and fast like a woodpecker hammering on a tree, and then both stepped back. They circled one another and Sylvie became struck by the differences between their fighting and another humans: having a horse for your locomotion presented some serious disadvantages in a fight, not the least of which was a larger area to defend. Sometimes one or the other would try to strike at the hindquarters, and the defender would have to lean amazingly far back, practically lying back to back on their horse half, to block the blow.

“Never have I seen such a thing.” Alfred said in awe, watching the display like all the rest.

“It is something.” Sylvie nodded, “I know I haven’t seen such fighting before, but Taryn is just playing with him.”

“I think you are mistaken.” Her father said with a smile.

“One root beer says I’m not.” Sylvie challenged.

“Ha! You’re on!” her father said gleefully, rubbing his hands together.

They watched for a few minutes before:

Whack! Taryn jumped into Josh’s space, causing him to step backwards which left Taryn an opening to strike his left flank twice.

He grunted, surprised for the moment, and grinned.

“All right, you got me.” He said with a smile.

“Thanks for the spar.” Tarym said loftily. She reached out and grabbed his shoulder and pulled him down for a kiss.

“And that’s for not moaning about it.” She said huskily.

“If that’s my reward for sucking it up, I’ll be the next Chuck Norris.” He said happily.

Sylvie bid good-bye to everyone at the front walk to their house. It was quiet and seemingly deserted, though she could see the cop cars still parked at the end of the street. The sun had gone down a while ago, before they left Harry’s and Sylvie wished she’d been able to get a second root beer to go.

“Well, you have a good night, Sylvie.” Taryn said quietly, glancing up at the black hole where the new moon glowered. “Be careful, something about tonight gives me the willies.” Her hand strayed to her spear.

“Don’t worry,” Sylvie assured her. “I’ll be fine. You staying at Missus Grogan’s house tonight Josh?”

He glanced warily at the sky and nodded. “If she’ll let me.” He said. “I’m with Taryn; for whatever reason as soon as we got onto this block, I got antsy, and I don’t know if its the lack of moon tonight or what, but I’m nervous.” He confessed.

Her father glanced at the agents that had followed them home, they were already dismounting and talking wearily amongst themselves, eying the trailer where their barracks stood and the trailers where they put the horses up for the night.

“I think I’ll pop over to the command trailer and check in with the night crew.” He said quietly. “Just in case. All you’re talk is making me jumpy. You gonna be all right getting to bed?”

“Yeah, I should.” Sylvie said dryly. “I mean the house is right there.”

“Yeah, Anne must have gone to bed already.” He frowned at the dark house.

“Well, mom has been working awfully hard lately.” Sylvie reminded him. “She probably fell asleep after we told her we were stopping at Harry’s for that root beer.”

“Probably.” He nodded. “Well, try not to disturb her.”

“I’ll do my best.” Sylvie nodded seriously; she knew how little her parents had been sleeping lately.

“All right. I’ll be in to say good night in a couple of minutes.” He said, striding towards the command trailer.

Taryn and Josh walked up the lane towards their house and Sylvie did her best to walk quietly, but horse hooves were not built for stealth, and she winced at every deep crunch in the gravel or clop!, on the paving stones.

Opening the door quietly, she eased in carefully, hoping not to disturb her mother who was probably sleeping right now. As she started towards her room, she saw a small lamp lit next to the chair and on the reading stand she found a small note:

Hey Guys,

I’ve gone to the office to sign some papers and get them filed. I’ll also stop at the grocery store on my way back for ice cream to go with that root beer. I hope to be back before you, but if I’m not then I’ll be home soon.

Love,
Mom

Sylvie sighed, all her sneaking skills had been wasted, but at least there would be ice cream to celebrate!

In a much better mood she flipped the switch for the lights and felt, rather than saw, the blow aimed at her head from above.

The truncheon struck her near her temple, but did not render her unconscious.

Woozy, she focused on her attacker and saw a tattooed man fall to the floor, having hid on one of the library shelves to get the needed height to strike her on the head. Immediately she noticed a few details; one, his skin seemed to have been painted to look exactly like her library shelves, and she wondered how anyone had managed to render It so accurately on his skin (it even had the little golden globe and eagle decoration her mom had put there years ago!) and two, she thought that under the paint he looked remarkably like the man from the truck!

She had no further time for study; the door to the garage burst open and more men rushed in, holding aloft clubs and nets, but no knives or guns; they evidently wanted to take her alive.

Sylvie may have been hurting, but she whipped the pistols out of their holster and pulled the triggers before the first man had completely cleared the doorway. She fired one shot at each person, and killed or maimed a dozen before they could clear the door, building a stack of bodies that entangled the remaining men and gave her the desperate few seconds she needed to turn and run for the front door.

She burst out the front door as the garage door was hauled up by two large men in black ski masks (they must have deactivated the automatic door opener) while eight figures slipped past them and gave chase.

Sylvie whipped out her rifle and fired, pitching five of them to the ground where they did not get up again. The rest were nearly upon her and she swung her rifle like a maniac, the hardwood stock crushing skulls or breaking bones as the remaining five circled her. When another three had fallen the remaining two tried to rush her; one leapt on her back and grabbed her neck while the other tried to tackle her belly.

Sylvie reared and struck the first in the gut while the one on her back tried to squeeze her neck, hoping to choke her out perhaps.

He hadn’t counted on her rolling quick as a cat, however, and when she regained her feet he remained pressed into the earth looking slightly flattened, though she could hear his pained breathing.

A sharp prick hit her hock and she squealed in pain and fright, whipping around to see what had happened.

A red-feathered dart stuck out of her painted hide, and she stared at it in shock as she realized the light-headed feeling she hadd wasn’t just the result of the blow to the head now, but the drugs working on her system.

She frantically sought the source of the shot and saw a blurred figure walking towards her with an air rifle tucked casually under one arm as if he’d been hunting a deer and now walked towards the carcass.

He was dressed in dark clothes, with a metal badge pinned to the front of them…a police badge she realized. She staggered with the effect of the drug, trying to stand upright. She gave that up and tried to draw bead on him with her rifle, but a swift kick (how had he gotten that close so fast, she wondered) knocked her beloved rifle from her hands.

A smooth-shaven, broadly grinning face leaned into her field of vision and she realized she was laying down on the grass. She futilely tried to kick him with her leg, but only succeeded only in throwing clumps of dirt on his shoes.

He was saying something to her, but Sylvie couldn’t hear it anymore as her vision swam and night closed in around her.

Her final thought was: But what happened to all the guards?