Read The Effacing (Book 1.5): Valley's End for Free Online Page B

it?” Jim asked in a hurry.
       Rebekah grabbed the overturned loveseat, rapidly slid it to the window. “You already know! Just hurry! We’re going to need some light.”
       Jim and Ann both grabbed the plaid sofa, leaving Girder no choice but to stand up. They lifted the couch to the window. Rebekah pushed the refrigerator to the front door.
       Girder struggled his way to the candle, flicked his lighter.
       “We need another way out!” Rebekah said. “Is there anything in here that we can break through the wall with?”
       “What?” Jim frowned. “Fuck all that. Let’s just shoot our way out.”
       “Not if we have a chance.” Rebekah responded.
       Girder would have rather died of intense smoke inhalation than being a victim of carnage. Deep down inside he did not mind going out in a shootout, he just didn’t want the blaze of glory thing if he had another option. He thought for a quickie, wasted no time hopping right over to the corner of the living room removing the curtains from over top the dumbbells. He picked up a fifty pound weight seven inches off the ground and held it. “Here you go.”
       Ann and Jim charged to the back and threw the beds in front of the windows, the dressers behind them – in record time of 15 mere seconds – the room darkened and they could do no more. The tiny apartment was temporarily secured, and when they finally returned to the front room, there was just enough light to see everyone’s silhouette.
       “Perfect. Jim, wrap the weights in a bed sheet and bang out the brick wall in one of the bedrooms as quickly as possible. Girder, you should go with him and watch the windows while we keep watch here. Shoot on sight.”
       Girder attempted to pass Rebekah the candle.
       “You’ll need the candle, we can handle this.”
       “How are you—” Girder began, before being cut off by his buddy.
       “Come on, man.”
       Jim hustled to the back room. Girder limped.
       “How much time we got?” Ann asked Rebekah.
       “When they start banging I’m sure they’ll come flying up to greet us.”
       “You know I can’t see, right?”
       “Hold my sleeve. We’re going straight back and furthest from the outside window.”
       BOCK! BOCK!
       Jim and Girder commenced to knocking down the wall.
       “We’ve been in tougher situations than this.” Rebekah smiled, so bright it cleaved through the black.
       BOCK! BOCK!
       “Yeah, tell me about it… but with more people and ammo.”
       The banging continued. You could hear the plywood and pieces of brick hitting the floors in the bedroom, and the umps made by Jim and Girder on every strike. Then, the howl of a dog arose from the ground level, across the street.
       Girder’s attention was deeply drawn to the howl. He knew it must have been the dog they’d seen earlier, and that beast, indeed was a people chaser who worked for Sworn. Girder thought that damn Akita had been outside all along, and he so wished they’d have killed the animal when they initially set eyes on it.
       Jim broke a sweat, he-hoeing the whole while, breaking through the wall. His only intention was getting out the building, away from whatever was on its way up the fire escape. He didn’t respond to the howl, he knew if they did not break through the wall in time they’d end up with their backs against the wall going out in a true blaze of unwarranted glory without ever being heard of in the history to come.
       “We don’t have much time!” Rebekah called out.
       “We’re moving… as fast… as we can!” Jim hollered back, not wasting a second, taking a deep breath before every swing of the 50 pounds of brick busting steel. “We’re almost… through!”
       Scratches were heard from outside the window of the front room. Whoever was out there toyed with them? Rebekah shushed Ann through the dark. Ann grabbed Rebekah’s sleeve, and together, they backed up, raised