Forsaken World:Coming of Age (20 page)

Knowing help would come, Ian and Lance put the cable across the road and led a few dozen stinkers fifty yards in the woods where they put the cable. They shot them quietly then went and led more, taking them out until they had several piles and it was hard to breathe. Like stinkers do, others came to the smell and just stood around the pile until supper was served.

It wasn’t until the next day that anyone knew what happened. Luckily for the Devil Lords, dump trucks were leading the way and were going slow, but one snapped the cable as it slowed, wondering why all the motorcycles were in the road.

It didn’t stay stopped for long because stinkers started pouring out of the woods. Several of the bikers behind the dump trucks and several cargo trucks were pulled off before the plows cleared a path through the bikes so they could leave. Several stopped at Warlock’s safe house, and the demonic toilet claimed its last victim.

One of the bikers there figured out the last dead man had been shocked and turned off the breaker from the solar panels. Then, he found the heart of the demonic toilet and pulled the wires out.

The rest of the group headed south of Barbourville to a warehouse. It was marked with a red pin. Lance and Ian didn’t know when the Devil Lords would show up, just that they would. Of all the stuff they did, this was the most dangerous.

Rolling into the fenced off warehouse, the cargo trucks backed up to overhead doors as the gates were closed. A few bikers cleared the area inside the fence, and the rest ran inside. When one of them grabbed a pallet jack to load the trucks, he pulled a small string that released a weight, which slid down the wall, opening a door to a refrigerated room in the back corner of the warehouse.

The first group to notice something strange was the men trying to roll up the overhead doors. All of them had four padlocks on each door. When the freezer door opened, it pulled a rope, releasing another weight that shut the pedestrian door by the dock, and a bar slammed over it so it couldn’t open until the bar was lifted.

The bar was wired to an inverter connected to a battery. It would shock the shit out of any that touched it but wouldn’t kill them. As the stinkers poured out of the refrigerated room, a man found out just how bad that bar across the door could shock someone. His friends saw him jerk when he touched the door, and they all ran for other doors, but those were screwed shut. Two men tried to shoot the locks off the overhead doors but only got three of the four locks off before the stinkers took them down.

Outside, the two bikers and the dump truck drivers heard the screaming from over twenty men and the moans of almost a hundred stinkers. The men on bikes didn’t wait; they headed to the gate, pulled it open, and took off. Afraid to go back to Pineville and face Boss, they headed south.

For an entire day, Ian and Lance led stinkers in the warehouse then into the refrigerated room, packing the six-thousand-square-foot room with stinkers. When it was full, they closed the door and led what they could away but did manage to clear the warehouse so they could set up a masterpiece.

In the space of four days, the Devil Lords lost over sixty, and the only ones that looked like attacks were at Warlock’s safe house and the road leading back to Pineville. Boss himself led over a hundred to Warlock’s, and it wasn’t long until they found an observation post that Ian and Lance had made. It looked like someone had stayed there for days, and in the trash of food wrappers and magazines, a brochure for a campground south of Williamsburg was found.

It had some notes about Warlock’s house, but it also had a list of supplies that said “Need” at the top. Boss screamed at everyone to mount up, and they headed to Williamsburg. None realized all those they had lost had been planned by two thirteen-year-old boys who had driven a school board, a home owners’ association, mean neighbors, several bullies, an asshole paper delivery man, a man who stole Ian’s bike, and a police department totally insane for years. Intricate plots soon became their calling card, but not once could the two be tied to any of them.

They had now come of age and were able to royally screw anyone in the head whenever they wanted. Now, their deeds were deadly.

Chapter Fifteen

“You see what you can do when you want to make a statement and don’t have to worry about going to jail,” Ian said with a grin, looking at Jennifer on the other side of the sectional. It was six days after they started jacking the Devil Lords. For two hours, he told them what he and Lance had done—the first time ever the two had let anyone in on their deeds.

In total shock, Jennifer stared at him with her mouth hanging open. Allie and Carrie were sitting on each side of Jennifer and wore similar expressions. The three had sat at the control desk, listening to the chaos and mayhem Ian and Lance were creating over the radio.

“Got it,” Lance said, coming up from the basement with his laptop.

“Got what?” Jennifer asked in a monotone, still in shock. Allie and Carrie just blinked.

Walking over the DVD player, Lance plugged his laptop up to it. “Our proof it was us,” he said, turning around.

Still dumbfounded and staring straight ahead, Jennifer mumbled, “You hid and filmed it?”

Lance laughed, joined by Ian. “No,” Lance scoffed. “We found some cellphones and broke them apart so we could hide them and keep their camera where we wanted them. Then I had them just broadcast out in wide-band. Here, I just recorded it since they just broadcasted it out at eight hundred megahertz.”

When he turned to look at Jennifer, the grin fell off his face. “What happened to her?” Lance asked, seeing the lost, dumbfounded look on all three of their faces.

“They wanted me to tell them what we did,” Ian said, shaking his head.

“What’s wrong; they think we didn’t go far enough?”

Shrugging, Ian studied them. “I don’t know. They started looking like that after I told them about the diarrhea kingdom we sent Bones and his buddies to.”

Lance walked over and snapped his fingers in front of them. Jennifer blinked and looked up at him. Allie and Carrie never blinked and continued looking straight ahead blankly. “You made over a dozen men shit themselves to death,” Jennifer mumbled.

“Yeah, ain’t it cool,” Lance laughed, throwing his head back. “Death by jet-powered diarrhea! One of those guys was holding onto that lawn chair, and I swear it was coming out of him so fast, I thought he was going to take off!”

Holding his side as he laughed, Lance looked back at Jennifer and noticed she looked a little green around the gills. The laugh left him as he reached out and felt her face. It felt cool and a little clammy. “You don’t look so hot.”

Closing her eyes and taking a deep breath, she huffed, “I’m okay.”

“Why don’t you and the ladybugs lie down? It’s Sunday, and we aren’t really doing anything,” Lance said, pulling her up.

“Yeah, that sounds good,” Jennifer said, letting Lance pull her up. It wasn’t that she felt sorry for the bikers; it was that Lance and Ian had killed them with pranks very easily. The ease with how they came up with the plans, knew how to chemically separate what they wanted, wire electricity, set traps, and the speed they could set up their deeds just unnerved her. She could’ve killed the bikers, especially after what the boys and she had found out; that wasn’t a problem for her. Jennifer just knew she couldn’t contribute on that level—ever—and it made her feel worthless. That and the fact she had seen a few of the videos of the men wallowing in their feces and getting ripped apart in the warehouse by stinkers. 

“Ian,” Lance said, guiding her around the sectional. “Lead her. I’ll get the ladybugs.” Ian came over and guided Jennifer to the bedroom as Lance went over, picked up Allie, and carried her to the bedroom. Ian guided Jennifer to her bed as Lance put Allie on the top bunk then ran to get Carrie and put her beside Allie on the top bed.

They walked out, closed the door, and Ian stopped, turning to Lance. “They almost act like we went too far,” Ian said, and Lance shook his head. He walked to the couch.

“Nah, they are just blown away by our awesomeness,” Lance said, grabbing the remote and flipping the screen to the port his laptop was plugged in to. “They are the first ones we’ve ever let know and watch us do the deed,” Lance said as Ian sat down, and they watched what they had done.

It was afternoon when Jennifer came out of the bedroom and smelled food. She saw Ian setting the table as Lance worked at the stove. Jennifer put her hair in a ponytail as she walked over. “Sorry, guys,” she said and started helping Ian set the table.

Looking over his shoulder as he stirred a pot on the stove, Lance furrowed his brow. “Ah, don’t get mad, but what are you sorry for?”

“Wimping out,” Jennifer said, walking to the refrigerator and grabbing the pitcher of tea.

Ian blew a raspberry, waving a hand at her. “Girl, please, it is a bit much to watch us work.”

Setting the pitcher on the table, she looked up at him with a straight face. “How can you two move that fast? You’ve never done anything like that before, I’m sure.”

“About moving that fast, lots of practice, and we learned quickly,” Lance said and paused as he carried a pan to the table from the stove. As he set it down, he looked up at her, grinning. “You must plan it out to a T and go over that plan dozens of times. Then, you do dry runs so you don’t leave behind evidence a deed is in place. And we may not have done stuff like that, but we have done similar stuff.”

Putting her hands on her hips, she said, “Oh yeah, like what?”

They looked at each other then turned to her. “Nothing,” they said together.

“Come on, guys, it’s not like I’m going to tell, and even if I did, who can I tell?” she whined, stomping her foot.

Lance looked at Ian and nodded as he went back to the stove to bring over the rest of the food. Ian took a deep breath. “Okay, we’ve made a shit bomb before, just not on that scale,” he said, pouring tea into glasses. “We’ve done the cable thing across the road before as well, but we used rope. Now granted, we never set a trap with stinkers, but that was just too good to pass up.”

Grabbing the glasses as Ian filled them, Jennifer set them around the table. “Who did you shit bomb?”

“Principle Hugh,” Ian replied, looking up with a grin.

Jennifer sucked in a breath. “That’s why he was sick last year?”

“Yep,” Lance said, putting down two pots. “He put us in detention for no reason. We didn’t roll the school in toilet paper, but he blamed us and put us in detention.”

“Yeah, like we would do something as trivial as roll the school in toilet paper,” Ian chuckled. “I’ll get the ladybugs.”

Ian headed to the bedroom, and Jennifer looked over at Lance as he sat down. “Principle Hugh quit last year; do you think both of you are the reason?” she asked, hoping not to make Lance upset.

“Probably,” Lance nodded as he fixed his plate. “Don’t come down on us because you’re a dweeb.”

Not able to help it, Jennifer grinned as she sat down and glanced at Lance’s laptop still hooked up to the DVD player. “Have you two ever filmed your exploits before?”

“Yeah, we started that two years ago,” Lance said as Ian led the ladybugs to the table. “Remember when Mr. Oliver’s brand new Cadillac got super glued?”

Throwing her head back and laughing hard, she howled, “I knew Randy didn’t do that.”

“Well, the police and Mr. Oliver thought he did, and we couldn’t let Randy take the fall for it,” Lance said, chuckling as he watched Jennifer beat the table.

“Mr. Oliver’s insurance company had to buy him a new car,” she howled louder. “You super glued the windows, doors, hood, trunk, and the locks then super glued it to the driveway. When the tow truck loaded the car up, it pulled up four chunks of concrete from the driveway!”

Ian laughed at her hysterics. “Yeah, that was a masterpiece,” he said, sitting down.

“Well, when the police brought Randy to the police station to question him—” Lance stopped when Jennifer quit laughing and looked at him in shock.

“No, you two did that,” she gasped.

Ian nodded. “Yeah, we had to let them know they had the wrong kid.”

“You two super glued those four patrol cars up like you did Mr. Oliver’s car?”

Ian nodded as Lance grabbed his glass. “We also left a note informing them of their error, and if they made another mistake, more glue would follow,” Lance said, taking a drink.

“My dad never said anything about a note,” Jennifer mumbled then looked up at them. “That’s terrorism.”

“Maybe, but Mr. Oliver had pushed the HOA to ban the riding of all bikes on grass, even if it was yours,” Lance snapped. “Now that’s a dictatorship, and I’m willing to use terrorism to fight a dictatorship.”

Leaning back from the table, Jennifer held up her hands. “Hey, I’m not judging,” she said. “I wanted to roll and egg the Olivers’ house, but he had that video system put in.”

“It’s wireless and very easy to jam,” Lance grinned. They bowed their heads and said grace, then Lance looked over at her. “That’s when we started filming our deeds. Never our face and voice, but the action. We didn’t want someone blamed for what we did.”

Jennifer cut her eyes to Lance’s laptop. “You mean you have all of them?”

“Not on my laptop. Are you insane?” Lance snapped, making her jump back. “My mom and dad always checked my computer and message boards I went on before and after anything happened.”

“Yeah, you know how hard it is to scrub your history so they didn’t see we—” Ian stopped as a blush crept up his face, and Lance gaped at him. “Um, that we didn’t do it,” Ian added quickly.

“So, ah, where are the videos at?” Jennifer asked, looking from one to the other.

“Most are here,” Lance said. “We have a metal can buried in the woods. Each deed is stored on its own zip drive. Our last two deeds are buried in Ian’s backyard. We were going to bring them out when we had a chance, but neither of us thought they were a priority with people trying to eat us.”

Jennifer picked up her fork, nodding. “Very understandable.”

Clearing his throat, Ian grabbed his tea. “So Lance, what’s next?”

“Get the rest of the traps around the fence set up then come up with a way to make that equipment quiet. But first, we finish cutting all those trees we have down into lumber. We do that tomorrow, and when all the logs are done, finish the traps around here.”

“Are we going to make the goats a house?” Allie asked, feeling much better and filling her mouth with food.

“Why, they won’t stay in it,” Ian huffed.

“It would be nice if they had a place to feed,” Lance said with a shrug. “Then if we had to, we could close them up.”

Sighing, Ian lowered his head. “Fine, but it’s at the bottom of the list.”

“What are you two doing for the rest of the day?” Jennifer asked, praying it wasn’t watching the videos they had filmed.

“Going to try and figure out what the blue and silver pins are,” Lance told her then drained his tea.

“You think those mean bikers will stay away?” Carrie asked, looking around the table.

“If they know what’s good for them,” Jennifer mumbled.

“Don’t worry, Carrie. The majority are still miles away looking for us. Seems they ran into a large group of stinkers,” Ian chuckled.

“Are you two going to do another
deed
?” Jennifer said.

“Not soon—unless we have to,” Lance said then looked around the table. “If we wipe them out, then the troops north of us can concentrate on looking hard around here and may get lucky and find us. The Devil Lords and the stinkers around here make good guard dogs, taking pressure off of us if anyone starts looking hard for survivors.”

“I like Dino being our guard dog,” Allie chimed in.

“Not as much as we do,” Ian said, shaking his head and looking over at Lance. “We really need to find more dogs. Dino has saved our asses so many times he has become priceless.”

“I want a puppy,” Allie cheered, throwing up her hands.

“Me too,” Carrie cheered with her.

Lance nodded at them with a grin. “If we come across some, we’ll get them.”

“Your moms won’t like that when they get here,” Jennifer said. “They both sneeze their heads off. When they get here, we are going to have to scrub down the whole cabin because of Dino.”

Ian sighed with wonder at Jennifer’s conviction that their parents would make it to the cabin. “I’m sure they won’t mind,” he said with a wishful grin.

After lunch, Ian and Lance headed down to the basement and brought the map Jennifer had copied with the pins over to the control desk. Pulling up satellite images, they zoomed in, trying to figure out the blue and silver pins.

The girls walked in as Lance pointed at the largest monitor, which showed a satellite image. “There’s nothing there but fields, Ian. They aren’t farmers, so what is so important about fields?”

“Shit if I know,” Ian said, writing in a notebook. “The blue pins are over three houses, a building, a barn, a bridge, and now a field.”

Clicking the screen, Lance shook his head. “Better than the silver ones. They are all on roads, and nothing is even close.”

“Close? Hell, all the spots are away from everything,” Ian said and looked up. “There’s nothing around, and the places marked are too narrow for a large group.”

“Huh,” Lance said, sitting up sharply as Jennifer and the girls joined them. “What did you say?”