Chapter Five

Matt heads off to save the kid.

I got to the address the crystal had hit upon as fast as was legally possible, no point being pulled over by a cop. I might have known one, but that didn’t mean I was in good graces with all of them, and come on, let’s admit it, who hasn’t ran into one or two a*****e cops who are in it more for the feeling of power than for any sense of justice.

I pulled in front of an abandoned warehouse, and checked the address one more time. This was the place, and looking at it, it was the perfect place to hold a kid if you didn’t want anyone to find him. The place was dilapidated and falling apart, the surrounding buildings in little better shape. It was like a whole block of the city had been abandoned at some point in time. The kidnapper would have no worry about anyone reporting seeing or hearing the kid, because, aside for the poor b******s in the area who had no other place to go but the streets, there was no one to see or hear him. He could do what he wanted with the kid, and no one would be the wiser.

I got out of the car as quietly as I could, and darted off to the building. Most of the windows were boarded up, so there would be no getting in unnoticed that way. I’d have to pull the boards off before I could even think of fitting through one of them, and I doubted the wood planks would want to work with me, or be the least bit quiet. There are just some things even a wizard can’t do. I snuck about the building until I finally found a door that would open for me. It was hanging on its hinges, and no longer fit in the doorway right, so you couldn’t lock the thing if you wanted to. Guess there were a few flaws in the guy’s hiding place, but then again, he probably didn’t think anyone would consider looking in the place in the first place. The door opened out with very little in the way of noise, which I considered a blessing. It was not leaning in such a manner that any part of it touched the floor, therefore, there was no terrible scraping sound when I opened the thing.

The inside of the place was huge and dusty. The room I was in spanned several hundred feet in all directions it seemed, and the ceiling was literally out of sight. Then again, it was pretty dark in there, so the ceiling could have been a lot closer than I thought it was. Large machines covered in cobwebs were scattered about the place. I had no idea what they had been used for in their glory days, but it was obvious that they hadn’t made enough money to keep their owners from going under a very long time ago, and said owners must have been so fed up with the things, that they had neglected to have them removed when the building had been abandoned.

Now, if I had been a cop, this would have been the time when I would have pulled out my gun, holding it close to make sure I’d be able to get it ready when the time came, but I wasn’t a cop, and I didn’t own a gun. I didn’t believe in anyone using the things, and as a wizard, I didn’t need one. I had a few, other tricks up my sleeve, and felt in my jacket pockets to make sure they were still there and secure.

I looked about, trying to figure out where I would keep a little boy if I didn’t want anyone finding him. The machines were pretty big, but they were also a mess. I didn’t think the guy would risk the kid getting hurt by some bit of loose metal or sprang gear, so I counted out doing a thorough search of the first floor. I felt he would be higher up in the building. Judging by its size on the outside, I figured there were probably three floors to the place, even with the first one being as huge as it was.

I walked about, looking for a way up. There was a service elevator, but I didn’t want to chance it. It had probably made a terrible noise when it was in good condition, and I didn’t even know if it would work right if I had wanted to risk it. I definitely didn’t need to be caught between floors while the guy dashed off with the kid. I needed some stairs, and just had to hope that they would not be too noisy to transverse.

I finally found a set of metal steps off to one side of the room, and barely suppressed a groan. Metal would make noise as I went up, no matter how quiet I tried to be, but what else could I have really expected. One, most warehouses didn’t have wooden stairs, and two, if this one had, it probably would have been so damaged with age that no one could have hoped to climb up them without getting themselves killed.

I started up the steps as quietly as my tennis shoes would allow. Thank goodness I wasn’t wearing boots. Those would have clanged the entire way up. As it was, I was still making some noise, but could only hope that it wasn’t enough to draw anyone’s attention to me.

I got to a landing that was loaded with metal barrels when I heard the shooting. I ducked behind one of the old, rusty barrels, my mind whirling in confusion. Most magic users wouldn’t have thought of using guns to fight anyone who was attacking them, but this guy seemed to not only have a gun, but a whole arsenal of weapons at his disposal. I could hear the rapid rap-rap-rap of a machine gun, the slower, louder banging of a hand gun, and yet another gun I could not identify. Well, what did you expect? I never touch the things myself, and was lucky to know what the other two were.

I stayed coward behind the barrel for several moments, going over all the supplies I had with me. I had not thought I’d be up against this sort of resistance, and therefore, hadn’t brought anything that could deal with guns. Actually, I didn’t have anything that could take out a gun, and was cursing the b*****d for being so underhanded. He could have tried fighting fair instead of taking the devious way out. Should have known anyone who would take a kid would be a dirty player, though.

It was then that I realized I was still alive. I was hiding behind an ancient, rusty barrel while a number of bullets were hitting into it, and none of them had passed through me. I couldn’t believe the barrel was really protecting me from the deadly bits of metal flying at me, so what was really happening?

I stood up, and could hear the sound of bullets hitting into flesh, even though I didn’t feel a thing, and when I looked down, there wasn’t a single sign of a bullet hole. A very convincing trick, but that was all it was. He had set up some sort of spell that made the illusion of gun shots, but didn’t mimic them well enough to actually kill a person. It probably would have convinced another person that they were being shot at, but it hadn’t worked too awfully long on me. I had a good idea of what was going on now, and others might have just run for their lives when the ‘shooting’ started.

Ignoring the noise of the bullets, I continued to creep up the stairs to the second floor. Granted, the guy would now know I was there, a second advantage to his little trick, but I really had no other choice than to continue going up. I wasn’t about to abandon that kid. I sort of hoped the guy would think that I was pinned down on a lower level, and wouldn’t think that I was coming up to get him.

I reached the second floor, and the gun shot noises finally stopped. Thank goodness. They weren’t killing me, but the sounds had given me a terrible headache, considering they had gotten louder and louder as I had gotten closer to the second floor.

There was a large crate near the top of the stairs, and I dashed to hid behind it, hopefully before anyone noticed me. It was sort of dark up there, and I could move decently fast when I wanted to. Not inhumanly fast, mind you, but I was pretty swift for my size. Okay, I’m not that big of a guy, but I’m not the smallest man in the world either.

I peeked around the crate to see a small boy tied to a rickety, old chair. His mouth was gagged by a black cloth, and his eyes were covered by a similar piece of material. Aside from that, he looked to be in fairly good shape, for being one lonely, terrified child.

Off to one side of him, was a man who would have scared the crap out of the devil. He was tall, well muscled, bald and covered in scars and tattoos that looked like ancient symbols that would have been used to raise the demons from hell. Okay, so that was a bit dramatic, there, but he looked pretty scary to me. He was most likely a warlock, and one of the more dangerous ones judging by his appearance. He was dressed all in black, with a long, black duster hanging off his enormous frame. I felt even more sorry for the kid after seeing who had taken him from his family. How he had managed to not die of a heart attack caused by fright was beyond me.

As intimidating as the guy was, I was going to have to do something about him before I could get to the kid. I reached into my pockets to make sure my supplies were still there, and then stepped from around the crate. “Hey, jackass!”

He spun about at the sound of my voice, and I tossed one of the cloth bags I had brought with me onto the floor not to far from him. Inside was a combination of powers that when exposed to the air created a blinding flash and a deafening noise. I knew to shut my eyes tight and press my hands to my ears, but the other two in the room didn’t. I felt sorry for the kid, and wished there had been someway to warn him, but I didn’t have time, nor would I have had the means to do so without letting the spooking looking guy know what was going to happen.

I heard two pain filled cries, and knew the trick had worked. I opened my eyes to see the monstrous guy stumbling about, blinking madly and crying out, “I can’t see! I can’t see! The goddamn b*****d took my eyes!” Judging by how loudly he was screaming this, I guessed he hadn’t realized I had taken his hearing as well with that little trick, at least for the time being. It wouldn’t last long, though.

I dashed over to the kid to set him free, but I guess I must have passed to closely by the guy. He reached out, and took hold of my arm, throwing me back away from the kid.

I looked up into a face twisted with rage and hate. Scarred tissue ran from above his right eye, and ran down to his left cheek. A scar left by a nasty burn was located over his left eye. It looked like he had been in a lot of fights, and I guessed since he was still alive, that he was pretty good at it. I, on the other hand, had very few scars, due to the fact that I had been in very few, physical fights in my life, and I wasn’t all that good at it. I was used to using my head, and it looked like my mental skills were about to be put to the test.

He jabbed forward with one, meaty fist before I could do anything. Damn he was quick. White light exploded before my eyes, and pain enveloped my face, focusing around the area of my nose. I could feel the warm blood dripping over my upper lip, and it really, really ticked me off. I wasn’t sure if he had broken my nose or not, but I didn’t want to have to go to the doctor and try to explain that I had gotten into a fight with Goliath, and I made a piss poor David.

I shoved myself backwards as hard as I could, barely avoiding the next blow that had been aimed at my head.

I reached into my jacket, and pulled out another bag of tricks, tossing it into his face. This wasn’t the same as the first bag, but it still blinded him pretty bad. The nice thing about this trick bag was that it caused not only blindness, but a considerable amount of pain. I’m usually not that vicious with my fighting, but he had busted my nose, and it seemed only right to get him back for that bit of abuse on his part.

He stumbled back away from me before falling onto the floor on his back, rolling back and forth, crying out in pain. Actually, he was howling miserably, and I felt an evil sort of glee at that. So unlike me, but hey, he had kidnapped a kid and had punched me in the nose. He deserved a lot worse than that, but I wasn’t going to be the one to punish him for his evil ways.

I rushed over to the kid, who was sobbing pitifully against the gag in his mouth. I pulled the blindfold and undid the gag. He stared up at me with terrified eyes. “Who-” he sobbed so hard that he couldn’t finish what he was about to say.

“Don’t worry, kid. I’m here to help you. I’m going to take you someplace safe.”

He nodded, but just kept sobbing. I felt pretty sorry for the poor, little guy.

I undid the ropes, grabbed him up in my arms, and dashed out of there. As we started down the stairs, the gun shots started up again, and the kid flinched and pressed himself into my chest.

“Don’t worry about those. It’s just a recording. It’s just to fool anyone who came looking for you. It can’t hurt you.”

I felt his head nodding against my chest. I continued down the steps as fast as I could, trying not to flinch at all the loud bangs and pops around us. It was sort of unnerving, but I just kept telling myself over and over again that it couldn’t hurt either one of us. That helped…a little.

I got to bottom of the steps, and charged toward the door that I had come into.

That was when I heard the growling. I spun around to see the biggest dog I had ever seen in the world stalking towards us. It was midnight black with a large mouth filled with long, ivory fangs that dripped with saliva.

I backed towards the door, wishing I had been closer when we had caught the dog’s attention. There was no way we were going to make it to the door before it was upon us, and I was sure it was planning on ripping out at least one of our throats. I wondered where it had come from, and why it hadn’t tried to get at me the first time I had been on this floor.

The kid screamed, cowering against me, and I couldn’t very well tell him it was going to be okay now. I couldn’t get to my pockets with him in my arms, and I sort of doubted he was going to agree to be put down. Besides, I didn’t really feel safe doing that anyway. At least with him in my arms, I had some sense of being able to protect him, even if it was a false sense of security.

The thing was getting closer to us than I was getting to the door, and it was becoming obvious that I was going to need to get at my stuff.

“I’m going to have to put you down now,” I said to the kid, knowing this was not going to go well.

He clung to me, and cried out, “No, no, don’t put me down! The dog will get me! It’ll kill me!”

I turned him around to look at me. Staring him straight in the eye, I said, “No, it won’t. I’ll protect you, but you have to trust me. You have to let me help both of us. Can you do that for me? Can you be brave, for me? For both of us?”

He was silent for several moments, and the thought of just dropping him crossed my mind. Mean as that would have been, the dog was getting closer, and it just seemed sort of pointless to save the kid from his kidnapper just to have him eaten by a dog. Finally, he nodded his head, and said, “Okay.”

I lowered him down, and pushed him gently behind me. Now it was just me and Rover. The dog growled angrily at me, as if it were pissed because I was between it and its prey. It wanted the kid back, and I was sure it would go through me to get to him.

I pulled out a little, round ball from my pocket. It shined silvery in the dim lighting of the room, catching the dog’s attention. I tossed the ball at it, and it went whizzing around the dog. Around and around it went. The dog tried to keep its eye on the ball, but it was moving so fast that it just kept running around and around in circles, chasing its tail.

“Come on,” I stated, grabbing the kid’s hand and running for it.

“How is that going to stop it?” he cried out, being dragged behind me.

“You’ll see.”

The dog noticed we were leaving, and lost interest in the ball. He tried to run after us, but that was when the ball struck into one of its forelegs. It yelped in pain, but tried to come at us again. Once again, it was socked him, this time in the back leg. It cried out again, and this time cowered in the middle of the circle the ball was making, rolling its eyes, trying to find a way out. I prayed it wouldn‘t be able to do that until we were long, long gone.

We dashed out of the building, and I got the kid in the car before I sped off as fast as was legally possible. Okay, that’s a lie. I was amazed that I didn’t get a speeding ticket as I went back to my shop as quick as the car would go.

Author's Note

First Draft