Page 56 of Chaos

Someone’s keeping this one road clear.

They stay with me as I move from the shadows of the house into the yard, closer to a tree at the edge of the fence line.

In some places the solar panels sit over torn shingles, or damp clumps of leaves.

Kelly eases the safety off her handgun, with a weightysnickin the night. “What do you see?” Her breath puffs out in a cloud.

I shake my head. “Not sure. You see the panels? They’re new. All of them.”

We hit a crossroad, duck around the corner, find more thick black powerlines stretching toward more houses, and another tree felled across a longer road. No signs anywhere. No road names.

This road feels different. There are no houses off that way, but the power lines are thicker than ever, running from telephone pole to pole, thick shadows against the night sky.

And in the distance, just as Rey ducks out behind me, Kelly moving at the rear covering our backs, a light flicks on maybe a hundred yards away, drawing my focus to a warehouse, windows up top with a tin roof maybe, a loading bay, cars in a lot out front.

The light comes from the right side, nothing more, just a single flare like someone tapped their flashlight on, then immediately off.

“A warehouse?” Rey breathes. “In a neighborhood?”

Kelly is silent behind us.

The light flashes one more time, and this time, I catch a glimpse of a person, the distinct silhouette of a rifle.

Just a split-second flash.

On.

Off.

Shit.

“Duck.” I snag Rey by the arm and miss.

She’s already moving. We’re both throwing ourselves down to a squat and crab walking backward into the cover of the house behind us.

“Move,” Rey says.

We take off running.

A man shouts, gunfire splits the night, dogs bark.

There’s no stopping and standing our ground. We’re three people. We have no clue how many of them there are.

More shots fire behind us, more voices calling out, more dogs barking, the clattering sound of bootsteps on pavement, bodies shoving through brush, dogs now snarling, moving faster than people can.

Red pain seers through my shoulder.

I narrowly avoid losing my balance, trip on a root that runs along the edge of one of the house’s yards, catch myself against a fence.

“What?” Kelly asks, nearly tripping on me.

“Nothing,” I choke out, the wild barking growing closer, maybe only ten or twelve feet back. “Just run.”

We hit the truck, find the doors open and waiting, throw ourselves inside.

Jacquetta peels off before we even have the doors closed.

Bullets crash and squeal off the rear bumper.

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