Chapter 21
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Everything had been so perfect.
Cody had joined Dave in the small office where they’d dressed in their tuxes. They’d joked with each other about weight gain, though Dave told Cody he was showing good muscle definition in his arms and shoulders from his new workout routine.
Cody had left the room first, and before he’d followed, Dave had paused to look back at his jeans and t-shirt neatly folded on the desk. When he came back to get them later, he’d be a married man.
The music had been perfectly timed. When Cody heard the instrumental version of “Holding Out for a Hero,” he’d turned, smile big and bright, tears glittering in his eyes, and grabbed him in a hug.
Once Cody walked out to meet Demetrius, Dave stood alone within the greenery, closing and opening his fists, more excited than nervous as he waited.
Those first notes of their song brought fresh tears to his eyes. He wiped them away and shook out his hands, blowing out a breath before stepping from behind the leaves.
He saw his mom at the family table and shared a smile with her, but a shout from Oliver made him snap his head around.
Oliver backed out of the opposite pathway, stumbling and grasping behind him for something to balance himself.
Was Oliver doing something funky during his walk down the aisle? Why hadn’t he told Dave about it?
A noise followed Oliver. It was terrible, almost heartbreaking. A sound full of yearning and pain. And then the mummy batted the leaves aside and lumbered into view. Someone screamed. Guests fled their seats and the mummy swiped at them, narrowly missing Jugs’s shoulder.
“What…?” Dave wasn’t able to make sense of it for a second or two.
Had it followed them inside?
Where had it been all this time?
Oliver kept backing away, sliding over the stone, running into chairs as he fled.
The mummy flipped a table. Linens, glasses, and chairs went flying.
More panicked cries.
Dave yelled Oliver’s name as he watched him stumble over a fallen chair and go down.
That triggered him to move. He pushed his way through their friends and family fleeing the monster.
The panicked guests were everywhere, blocking him, forcing him to waste precious seconds as he fought his way between them.
The mummy roared and shook its fists at the glass roof, its voice a deep well of rage.
“No!” The word was a scream as Dave struggled to get to him. “Oliver!”
He heard someone else yelling. Cody and Demetrius were both working their way forward, fighting to get to Oliver.
Dave shoved Roman aside, finally in the clear and able to lunge toward it. “Get away from him!”
A side-armed swat knocked him off his feet and sent him flying backwards. For seconds, he felt weightless. He heard his mother cry out his name. Someone else shouted a string of curses.
He landed hard on a table, glasses and flatware spinning aside. The tablecloth was slick and he slid off the opposite side onto the stone patio. His breath left his lungs in a shock and his glasses skittered off somewhere.
The mummy roared, and more people shouted.
Dave heard the thump and crash of tables and bodies tumbling, but it all seemed to be coming from a distant room in another part of his life.
He fought to get free from the tablecloth, struggling to draw a breath, but his lungs seemed oblivious to their purpose.
“David. Oh my God. Are you hurt? What is that thing? Where are you hurt?”
His mother knelt beside him. His father came to his other side. He clutched at them, desperate to make them understand. They needed to move, to act, to save Oliver. But he still couldn’t draw a full breath.
Someone smacked him on the back and shoved his head down between his legs.
Dave’s body shuddered, and he gasped. Air filled his lungs and tears flooded his eyes. He clutched someone’s hand as he took another shuddering breath.
“That did it,” Roman said, crouched beside him. “What the fucking hell is that thing?”
He heard more cries and yelling, but everything around him was a blur.
“Oliver…”
“Oh, shit.” Roman launched himself toward the battle. “Cody, look out!”
“Greg,” his mother said. “Oh, Greg. What…?”
“Glasses.” Dave patted the stone around him. “Where are my glasses?”
His parents helped him search. Seconds ticked past. More crashing, a lot more cursing. Screams from people he loved.
Not hearing Oliver’s voice was agony.
“Here!” His father held up Dave’s glasses. “Oh, they’re filthy, David.”
Dave snatched them from his hand. He scrambled to his feet, fumbling the glasses onto his face. Fists clenched and pulse pounding, he surveyed the scene for where to jump into the fight.
Cody lay very still, sprawled against a fallen table, his jacket and shirt shredded and bloody.
Demetrius knelt beside him, face pale, one sleeve of his jacket torn away, blood staining the exposed shirt.
Roman was picking himself up from a tangled pile of chairs.
Robin lay on their back among a pile of napkins and tablecloths, moving slowly.
Lucia and Gayle were staggering to their feet.
All the other guests and staff huddled by the platform up front, physically unharmed, but eyes wide and faces pale as they clung to one another.
The mummy was nowhere to be seen.
Oliver was gone.
Dave ran to Cody and fell to his knees across from Demetrius. “Is he…?” He couldn’t finish the thought, let alone say it aloud.
“No,” Demetrius glanced up. “Knocked out. It took Oliver.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know. Picked him up like he didn’t weigh a thing, threw him over its shoulder and left down that pathway.”
Zenona dropped to her knees beside Cody, checking his pulse.
“I need clean napkins to soak up this blood.” She looked around.
A young woman, one of the event staff, was standing and staring at the ruins of the event.
“Hey!” The woman jumped then hurried over.
“People are injured. Gather clean napkins and tablecloths. And bring me a few buckets of ice.”
The woman hurried off. Zenona snatched up a handful of napkins and pressed them against gashes across Cody’s chest. He groaned and rolled his head from side to side. At seeing Cody stirring, Dave stood and ran for the doors.
“Where are you going?” Demetrius shouted after him.
“After it,” Dave said over his shoulder.
“Take someone with you.”
“There’s no time!”
At the doors between the greenhouse and the interior of the Earth Sciences building, he nearly bowled over Detective Carter. They both shouted and the detective lifted his weapon to point at the ceiling.
“What the hell is going on?” Carter demanded. “We heard screaming.”
“It took Oliver. There are people hurt inside that need medical attention.”
Dave tried to shove past, but the detective grabbed his arm. To the police officers and campus security behind him, Carter said, “See to the injured and call for ambulances and backup. Montroig and Keaton, you’re with me.”
“One of our friends is a doctor,” Dave said. “Dr. Zenona Baldwin. She’s already examining some of the guests.”
While the other officers and security personnel disappeared into the gardens, Lucia and Gayle approached. Lucia’s left eye was beginning to swell, and Gayle had a split lip, but otherwise they seemed okay. Roman, Grant, and Brady came up behind them.
“You should go back and help Zenona,” Dave said. “I don’t want it to hurt anyone else.”
Everyone remained where they were, arms crossed.
Carter pulled Dave in a little closer. “What do you mean by ‘it?’”
“We don’t have time, Oliver—”
“I need to know what we’re going after. Now.”
Dave cursed. “It’s the mummy.”
“The fuck?” Keaton said, her voice a whisper.
“The mummy.” Carter repeated.
“Listen to him,” Lucia snapped. “That fucking mummy is up and walking around, and it’s taken Oliver. Everyone in there saw it. Several of us tried to stop it, and it threw us around like we were nothing. We need to go after it right now.”
Robin, Demetrius, and Clarabell rushed up.
“For the love of…” Carter snarled. “Get back inside.”
“I might know where it’s going,” Robin said quickly. Blood ran down the side of their face from a cut near their scalp.
“Where?” Dave said.
“The coffin.”
Dave started to move, but Carter held him back.
“The what?” Montroig said.
“Its coffin,” Demetrius repeated. “We don’t have much time.”
“You should stay with Cody,” Dave said.
“Zenona’s working on him.” Demetrius held his gaze, jaw set. “You need our kind of help.”
“Your kind of help?” Montroig said.
“It’s not far.” Robin interrupted, pointing. “Just down that hallway.”
Carter tightened his grip on his weapon as he stared at the intersection. Cloud cover outside diffused the daylight coming in from the far exit doors. Only every other set of fluorescent lights were on, allowing more shadows to spread.
“Montroig and Keaton, up front with me. Everyone else, stay behind us.” Carter glared at Lucia and Gayle. “That includes the two of you.” He licked his lips then nodded to himself. “All right. Let’s go.”