Through the Hatch
Jeremiah stared from the back seat of the car. The old gas station did not look like a place to find a drug dealer. The young man gripped the gun tighter. His hand slipped, but he caught himself. He looked at the large man again. The man looked forward as if he did not even realize Jeremiah sat next to him.
“Jer,” Jeremiah looked over to the sound of his own name. “Jeremiah,” Hosea’s voice was serious, though Jeremiah could still hear the weakness in that voice.
Hosea made a weak gesture with his head. “I need you out of the car. Out of the car and give the gun to Ezekiel.”
Jeremiah popped the door open. He still kept the gun trained on the large man until he was able to walk over to Ezekiel and hand it to him.
Hosea gestured over to him again. Hosea made a hiss, jerked his head, and Jeremiah walked over.
“I need you to do something,” Hosea said to Jeremiah under his breath. He gestured to his brother as he spoke.
Jeremiah only nodded.
Hosea’s hand reached out. That weak hand grabbed him and pulled him until he was only a few inches away.
“Go around back,” Hosea whispered. “See if you can find another way in, whether that is a back door or the roof.
Jeremiah nodded. A nervous knot formed in his throat. Intellectually, he had known confronting the drug dealer was dangerous, but he had not felt it. His brothers were at his side. They were facing this danger together.
Jeremiah did not protest Hosea’s order. Though that lump of fear in his throat seemed to grow to the size of a baseball, he forced himself to walk away from the building. The last thing he heard from his brothers was Hosea telling the other two that he had sent Jeremiah home, but, of course, Jeremiah did not go home. When he was far enough away, he began to circle around the back of the building. And when he to within ten feet of it, he realized why he was filled with fear. He was alone. If anything went wrong, there was no one to back him up. He had no margin for failure.
Jeremiah stopped when he reached the back door. His hand went to the doorknob, but he was not surprised to find it locked. If it were open, he would have been surprised. He had expected a climb, and the fact that he had expected a locked door put him more at ease.
“Daniel,” he told himself. That was his job. Hosea, Ezekiel, and Isaiah were only a diversion. Ezekiel and Isaiah did not know they were a diversion, and that was part of the plan. They were to draw the gunmen out. Jeremiah was the person who was going to save Daniel. He only hoped he would not run into trouble from the back.
Jeremiah pulled himself up onto the dumpster. The metal lid flexed under his feet, but he did not have time to worry whether it would hold his weight. He was already jumping up onto the drain and scrambling up the side of the building.
Jeremiah only saw one way in as he surveyed the roof. It was a hatch. It was not locked, but it looked like it had not been opened for years, if ever. Jeremiah walked over. As he started to yank on the lever that held the hatch closed he was unable to move it at first. Then it moved a little, and the boy heard a yell from the front of the building.
“Ansel,” It sounded like Hosea’s voice. Jeremiah was unsure, but he did not know who else it would be. “Lyle Ansel,” Hosea yelled again. Jeremiah heard a thud. It must have been rocks or something heavy thrown at the side of the building.
Jeremiah turned his attention back to the lever. He gave it a few more yanks. The rusted lever did not budge. Another yell filled the air. This one was not from his brother. Jeremiah gave another pull on the lever. When it did not budge, he did not let go. He leaned back. He pulled harder, and the lever squealed with a metallic sound as he lifted it up.
“Fleet,” a voice yelled from the front of the store. Jeremiah heard a muffled answer from his oldest brother. Jeremiah grabbed the handle of the hatch. He pulled up. He winced as the hatch gave out an even louder squeal, but when he looked at the drop below him, none of those who stood below him looked up.
Jeremiah could only see one way down, and not even that way down seemed possible. A shelf sat below him. Before he could stop himself, he flung himself down and hung by his fingertips with his arms stretched down as far as he could. He knew as soon as he saw the bookshelf below him that it would be unreachable, but he pointed his toes and only felt air below anyway.
Jeremiah cursed himself. He cursed his own stupidity, but he would not allow himself to linger on that thought for too long. He looked below. He saw the shelf two and a half feet below his feet. He tried to stretch him out even farther. He failed, but he forced his hands to slip. He fell through the air. His feet did meet the top of the bookshelf. In some way, he had succeeded, but that success was short lived. In less than a moment, the bookshelf was tilting and he could do little else but fling himself from it.
The shelf crashed behind him. Jeremiah was just able to get his hands in front of him as he fell, but his face still smashed against the ground. Jeremiah did not have time to groan in pain. He rolled to the right. He jumped to his feet. He glanced back to the front of the store. Only a couple thugs were still in the store. One of them was looking out of a front window. The other was glancing back.
“Hosea!” the name came out of Jeremiah’s mouth in a yell as he met the eyes of the thug looking back. The young man heard a yell from the thug. The boy’s ears filled up with noise, gunfire, but he did not know where that gunfire was coming from. He barely had time to think before he started running and running without knowing where he was going.
Jeremiah fell forward. He caught himself with his hands this time. He heard a shout from the man again. He did not look over, but he thought he saw that man lift the gun up and point it at him.
Jeremiah scrambled to his feet again. His feet stuttered underneath him. His body flung forward, and he was just able to keep himself on his feet. Jeremiah moved in only reaction next. He saw a door. He barrelled toward that door without thought, and as soon as he got his hand on the door, he flung it open and tumbled inside. As he slammed the door shut, the gunfire filled his ears and ripped through the wall. Jeremiah pressed himself to the floor, but when the gunfire stopped, he jumped up to his feet. He was in a hallway. And he knew he needed to get to the end of that hallway as fast as possible.
Even as more gunfire burst behind him and through the door, he refused to drop to the ground. He had at least one person and maybe more chasing behind him, and if he stopped, they would catch up. And if they caught up, the worst possibility was inevitable.
What did stop Jeremiah from running, even though he was at a full sprint was when he threw open the door and saw Daniel gagged and tied to a chair.
Daniel looked up at Jeremiah with wide eyes. A muffled, angry noise came from Daniel. Jeremiah ran over to his brother and pulled the gag from his mouth.
“Jeremiah, what the Hell are you—” Gunfire rattled from behind the door. Daniel shook his head. “The ropes! Get these damn ropes off me! Quick! Quick!”
Jeremiah jumped to the back of the chair. His hands went down to the ropes, but he could not find the end of the knot. And he worried that even if he were able to find the end of the knot, he would not be able to undo it because his hands were shaking too much.
Jeremiah took in a deep breath. He forced himself to slow his breathing. His hands stopped shaking. he followed the rope until he found the end. He tugged at the knot. Even as he heard the gunfire and fear moved through him, he forced himself to hold his hands still and tug the knot loose. A bullet zoomed through the room over their heads. When he looked to the door, he saw that the bullet had torn a hole through it near the top.
Jeremiah tried to hold himself together as more gunfire ripped through the door, but he could not control the fear. It was too much. The last thing he thought to do before dropping to the floor was to tip Daniel onto his side. He had started to loosen the knot, but it only gave Daniel a few extra inches of movement.
As more bullets went through the door, Jeremiah scrambled from the center of the room to behind the door.
The door slammed open. It hit Jeremiah in the face as it did so, but he again refused to cry out. He knew his life and maybe Daniel’s, depended on his silence as well.
“What the?” the man stomped into the room. Jeremiah pulled his breath in slowly. He held it. He watched as the man stepped into the room. The man walked over to Daniel. He brought his weapon up, turned it around, and slammed the butt of the weapon onto Daniel’s face.
Daniel cried out. His face filled with pain. When his head came back up, he started to gag and then he vomited all over his own lap. When Daniel finished vomiting and lifted his head up, he let out a loud, strained groan. His face was red with stress and sweat beaded on his forehead..
Jeremiah took a step forward. He was going to run out and jump on the man’s back, but another gunman walked in behind the first. Jeremiah was just able to slip behind the door as this second gunman started to turn around.
“Did you see him run in here?” the second gun man asked. His voice was filled with annoyance.
“I thought I did,” the first man spoke slowly.
The second gunman grunted. He let out a long sigh through his nose.
“You idiot,” this second gunman took another long glance around the room. His hand came up and cuffed the first man on the back of his head. “You lost him.” This second man than shook his haead and Jeremiah heard his footsteps disappear back into the hallway.
The first man swore to himself. He brought the gun up again. Jeremiah heard a gross thud as the butt of the gun hit Daniel on the crown again. Daniel let out another pain-filled groan as this first gunman turned and walked out of the room as well.
The man slammed the door, and Jeremiah saw Daniel. Daniel’s head was down. Jeremiah heard more gagging, and blood poured from the top of Daniel’s forehead and dripped into his lap.
Jeremiah let the footsteps of the second gun man fade into the hallway before he stepped to the middle of the room and spoke to his brother.
“Daniel, are you okay?” Jeremiah’s voice came out in a husky whisper.
Daniel continued to groan and did not answer. Another sound of a gag filled his throat.
Jeremiah bit his lip. He felt a lump fill his throat. He wanted to reach out to Daniel, but he felt frozen. Or, as he thought about it, he did not think he felt frozen. He felt stuck in the mud. He felt made of drying mud himself.
Jeremiah heard the booming of gunfire behind him, and he finally did reach out to Daniel to wipe the blood from his forehead. More blood replaced it right away, but Daniel looked up. His eyes were filled with pain. His eyes crossed as he tried to focus on his brother.
“Untie me,” Daniel said. It appeard as if he continued to try to focus on Jeremiah, and he continued to fail.
When Jeremiah did not move, Daniel spoke again. “Untie me,” he barked out.
Jeremiah jumped forward when Daniel yelled. He moved behind his brother. His fingers fumbled with the knots. Daniel barked at Jeremiah again when Jeremiah failed to untie him fast enough, and Jeremiah tried to make his fingers move faster. Though moving faster, it took Jeremiah even longer to untie the knot, but when he did, he only heard another impatient but weak bark from Daniel. “Help me up.”
Jeremiah moved to the side of his brother. He put his arm under Daniel’s shoulder and pushed up. Daniel stood with a squeak of pain. Jeremiah could hear with every breath from his brother that the man was holding back pain. Every time the man breathed out, Jeremiah was surprised he did not hear a cry of pain.
Jeremiah was surprised to see that Daniel smiled when he looked over. The boy was going to ask why he was so happy, but gunfire erupted from the front of the store. The clatter continued as Jeremiah tried his best to keep Daniel up and moving. The boy assumed the worst. His brothers had a collection of rifles and shotguns. His brothers’ weapons did not do a good job of standing up to the gang members’ machine guns.
The gunfire stopped. Jeremiah pulled the door open. He heard no voices from the front of the store. When he was finally able to pull Daniel down the hallway, he peeked through the crack in the door. He still did not hear voices of the thugs, but dust filled the air so thick that he could barely see the front windows of the store.
Jeremiah expected to see a gang member jump up and shoot at them at any time, but the first thing he heard was a yell of pain. The second thing he heard was the sound of his own name.
“Jeremiah,” Hosea yelled in his weak voice.
Jeremiah heard smashing glass. Isaiah jumped through the front window. Ezekiel followed nursing his left arm.
Finally, Hosea climbed through the window. When he saw Jeremiah, he smiled.
“Who survived?” It was Isaiah who asked the question. And, almost in response, a moan of pain filled Jeremiah’s ears.
And the boy wondered who was alive. And he wondered how his brothers had managed to avoid dying themselves.