Page 65 of Toy

She nodded and lifted the binoculars to her eyes. “There’s a ton of trees directly ahead, so I can’t see much, but there’s definitely a road there, about a hundred yards away,” she muttered. “There’s a whole bunch of guys walking down it. I see flashes of them between the trees every few seconds.”

“Which direction?” I asked, raising the rifle.

“Move the rifle further to the left,” she said, glancing over at me.

“How about now?”

She looked through the binoculars again and nodded slowly. “If you start shooting now, I think you’ll get the main group.”

I smiled. “Good. Now cover your ears.”

I squeezed my finger on the trigger and started firing. There was a series of earsplitting pops and a mass of bright flashes as scores of bullets whizzed through the air in rapid succession. I swept the rifle from the center to the right, firing in short bursts before moving back to the center and toward the left. For good measure, I reloaded and repeated the action.

“What do you see now?” I asked Jolie. My ears were ringing so much I could barely hear her reply.

“Seems like you got most of them,” she said with a fervent nod. “Some are running back toward the mansion, though. Aim further left.”

I fired off the rest of the second magazine into the cool night air. Probably a bit of overkill, but hey… the cultist pricks deserved it.

“How about now?” I asked.

Jolie looked again. “Two guys are still running.”

I waved a hand. “Let them go. They can return to the mansion and let the rest of the bastards know they aren’t gonna make it to the airfield this evening.”

I packed the rifle away and picked up a handgun again. Then I looked at Jolie and motioned toward the tree-lined road I’d just fired upon. “Let’s see how many we got. Stay behind me, okay?”

We trudged over to the road and turned left, heading toward the mansion. The dark path was strewn with bloodied bodies. They lay like broken dolls, limbs at awkward angles, heads twisted around. Some of them had died with their eyes still open, wide with shock at the sudden assault.

“There’s got to be at least forty guys here,” Jolie muttered as she shined a small flashlight from my bag over the carnage. She kicked one of the bodies. “I remember this guy. Elena used to have a crush on him when we were kids,” she added bitterly.

There was a rustling in the bushes on our right. I lifted my gun and called out. “Who’s there?”

A trembling man appeared from behind it a moment later. I could see that his clothing was speckled with blood, but I couldn’t see any visible injuries on him.

As he stepped closer, I recognized him as Dale Sardelic, the man who used to restock the vitamin supplies for the New Eden girls back in the day. “Please don’t… don’t kill me,” he said. “I can get you out of here. I know how to fly the plane. Just come with me.”

“Sure, we’ll get right on that, Dale,” Jolie said, putting her hands on her hips.

I nodded. “Yeah. We’ll be happy to show you the same mercy you’ve shown us,” I added in a breezy tone. I lifted the pistol and put a bullet right between his eyes.

Jolie snickered as he crumpled to the ground with the rest of the dead men. “Nice.”

I paused and did some quick mental calculations. “There must be at least thirty guys still alive,” I said as I added up all the bodies on the road. “Probably closer to forty.”

She grimaced. “What do you think they’ll do now?”

“Well, they know they can’t get out of the valley, so they’re probably going to hide,” I said, nostrils flaring. “I bet we’ll step into that mansion and find a bunch of them cowering under beds or in cupboards.”

Jolie lifted one brow. “You think so?”

I nodded firmly. “They’ve got nowhere else to go, and they know we’re armed. Trust me, they’re gonna hunker down and hope they don’t get found before the police show up. Fucking cowardly pussies, remember?

“Good point. So you think we should search the mansion?”

“Yes. Very carefully. Remember, stay behind me.”

We made it up to the mansion about five minutes later. The side door was wide open and a dim light flickered in the entryway beyond. I stopped and held up a hand, keeping Jolie back. “Let me check it out first.”

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