Dark Lord Rob's DarkForce

All Hell Breaks Loose

     "You stay here." How many horror movies have you heard that line in, usually followed by a surprise decapitation? And anyway, how safe can it be right outside the door to Hell? We paused a second, then followed Woodbine up the stairs, passing the guards who, though they obviously wanted to head upstairs themselves to see what was going down, remained at their post.
     At the top of the stairs everything was in chaos... people were running to and fro, carrying supplies and mean-looking guns, even a bazooka or two! We stayed back out of the way, not really wanting to be on the wrong side of a bayonet, no matter how accidentally. There were sounds of gunfire coming from outside the house, and when we were able to get to a window we saw that the walls at the edge of the compound were sheltering dozens of uniformed Brothers, who were firing at something we couldn't see from inside.
     Woodbine stood at the same window, staring out and shaking his head. "They finally did it," he muttered. "The idiots!" Whirling, he caught sight of us. "I told you to stay downstairs! There's a war on up here!"
     "War?" Nathan sputtered, "What war? Who is out there?"
     There was a sudden lull in the gunfire and suddenly we got our answer, for all the comfort it gave us. A voice from outside was barking into a bullhorn and despite the way the horn butchered his syllables, we got the gist of it all right.
     "Reverend Woodbine," the megaphone voice said, "This is the Colonel Heifer of the National Guard. We have the building surrounded, and are offering you the choice to surrender peaceably. Throw down your guns and come out, hands up!"
     "Fool!" Woodbine spat. "No idea he's the tool of the devil." He turned to an aide. "Respond as planned."
     The aide nodded, and spoke into a cellular phone. There was a low whoosh from a garage near the main house, and two rockets headed off over the wall, where they evidently exploded, judging by the noise and the flames and the smoke.
     Woodbine had produced a pair of binoculars from God-knows-where and was surveying the scene. "Don't worry, boys, that was just a warning. No one was hit, though we did eliminate a car or two." He spoke to the aide again. "Get in touch with the Infidels." The aide nodded and spoke into the cellphone again.
     I looked at Nathan, and he looked back at me, and if I looked half as worried as he did then I looked terrified beyond rational thought. Woodbine seemed to sense this, so he spoke to us. "You're safe enough here, though I wish you had both stayed down in the catacomb. After the fiasco at Waco I doubt that they'll come charging in here full-bore."
     "I heard that Waco was destroyed deliberately," I said, meekly.
     "Yeah," Woodbine said, "I think it probably was. As a message to 'alternative religions'. But there's a difference here... they can't risk destroying what we're guarding."
     Nathan raised his eyebrows. "They know?"
     "Sure. Why do you think they're attacking?"

Next: God's Little Hostages