"You need to settle down." Sheri frowned, catching the bare end of Dawn's tirade. She took two steps closer to the girl, and while she barely made it up to Dawn's nose, Sheri planted her head on her hips -- unwavering. "That's what we're going to get straight, first of all. You can call him stupid all you like, but the way things look -- we're all we have, for the moment."

Sheri pointed over at Logan, who was still finishing up his conversation with Jordan on the phone.

"That boy could end up saving our lives." There was no fear in Sheri's eyes. Her jaw was set, and it was clear she was talking down to the fiery redhead, no matter the consequences. "The sooner you quit with namecalling -- if that's really your mechanism with coping then I think the better of we'll be." The older woman brushed past Dawn without another word. "Let's move the bike, hide it."

Sheri shifted the kick stand and began to walk the wounded cycle down the curved path to where the ditch opened up, near the forest line. As she did so, there were a few dull thuds as Logan tried once, twice, to unsuccessfully end the call -- jabbing the receiver at the phone booth itself.

"Sheri! Shereeeeeeee! I think I broke the latch thing."

Sheri ignored him. There was a slight bump as the front tire hit the curb. The woman walked it over the woodchips getting closer and closer to the drainage ditch, a black hole for frisbees and kickballs and other things of childhood. This was not a safe place to wade or go fishing, many health notices had been sent out about drinking from the crick, and the CSHS Honors Bio class had even found a strain of E. Coli ..

And closer, closer came the bike.

"It's marshy. It'll sink." Sheri stood with the bike at the edge of a precipice. One good push, and it would rattle down the bluff and into the water. The woman stood, staring levelly at Dawn. "This is your test, dear. Are you going to risk the cycle being found and our trail being followed? It's all cute games when you're slashing necks in high school, but things are getting really real, really fast."

Sirens wailed overhead -- they were just below the underpass. The two ducked instinctively as a few emergency vehicles whizzed past, the doppler effect creating an eerie backdrop as the noise faded ..

.. it was just the gurgling of the crick that could be heard, now.

Sheri tapped her finger on the handle.

"Guys!" Logan came bounding back over -- having swerved low to avoid detection -- "I've got news. Jordan says some dude came to his house, but they've taken care of it. They're attacking all over, their cell phones aren't working either. He's coming to get us, I told him where we are." His story started to jump ahead of itself. "I didn't tell -- I didn't tell him about Nikki. I mean Charmena. I hope that's, you know. I mean -- sounds like something we should say in person .. "

Logan glanced from Dawn, to Sheri, and saw the bike in between.

"What's going on?" The good-natured youth did not wear 'worry' well. It just didn't suit him. He reached up, scratched the back of his head. There was still a wrinkle in his shirt where Dawn had so savagely, frantically stabbed at him not moments before. "Jordan should be about ten minutes way .. were you saying something?"

Dawn scowled. As much as she would die thrice over to admit it, her outburst had not been from anger -- or at least, not malicious anger -- but from concern. She was worried, and she hated it. The redhead was not very good at all at expressing concern, and the only way she could do it without brooding was through a rant. But obviously, she couldn't explain that to Sheri, for the same reason that she couldn't have simply said as much to Logan in the first place. As such, something of a pained expression came upon her face as she attempted to combine anger, brooding and irritation with exasperation, surprise, and even apology.

Even as Sheri did as none would have likely dared prior to the current circumstances, Dawn did not rise to the challenge. She could not communicate to Sheri that the only reason she had let loose was because she cared for Logan -- cared for them both -- and so the only thing that she could do to even come close to it was simply to nod in a manner that almost approached meekness. let Sheri think it was her determined and dismissive manner that had done it, but in truth it was a small whisper of her true feelings. Dawn grimaced just to be thinking anything that soppy...

But then the bike came into question, and Dawn's eyes widened.

She followed after the larger woman hastily, opening her mouth to protest, but not quite getting around to it as she was distracted by Logan's shrill whining. Dawn spared him a glance, blinking at his apparent incompetence, before turning back. And widening her eyes further. Was she... no. Surely not...

Dawn practically ran after Sheri then, drawing alongside her after a few bounds. She opened her mouth for a second time to protest -- this was her beauty, her prized possession, her cherished birthday gift from two years ago, more so than any of her other expensive things; the one possession that she never let out of her sight for more than an hour at a time. She'd always imagined riding it all the way through life, doing everything with it... okay, maybe not quite that dramatic, but the gist was there. She couldn't just let Sheri dump it in a marsh!

Before the redhead could speak, however, Sheri did so herself.

"This is your test, dear. Are you going to risk the cycle being found and our trail being followed? It's all cute games when you're slashing necks in high school, but things are getting really real, really fast."

Dawn blinked, mouth left open as if ready to speak, closing for a moment before opening again. No, this wasn't necessary -- they could hide it! And... come back to it? Yeah. That. The sirens passing overhead granted Dawn another moment to procrastinate with her response, inwardly scowling and outwardly staring.

.. it was just the gurgling of the crick that could be heard, now.

"Guys!"

Logan's approach snapped Dawn out of her thoughts to glance up at him, looking incredibly bemused, entirely unfettered in his naivety and, she had to admit, somewhat sweet in his wide-eyed innocence. Wait... what? That hadn't been her thought, had it? If it had been, it was going to get a beating later.

"What's going on?"

Pushing her stray thoughts away, Dawn frowned. "Nothing." she said simply, walking to the bike and giving it a hefty kick. The bright red, shiny cycle rolled forwards down the small slope, looking its most expensive in the few moments before it landed in the sludge with an unpleasant gluuuummmp. Dawn tossed the helmet in after it, sighing and giving Sheri a pointed glance before brushing past Logan to walk back a few paces and stare upwards at the sky.

"Nothing at all. Just cleaning up.." she murmured, letting out a second sigh. She wasn't entirely sure what she was sighing about, really. Perhaps the end of the world was catching up to her...

The ride over to Wedgewood was, in short, awkward as hell.

"Honestly, Jordan?" Sylvia sneered as they came to a respectable halt at the four-way stop on Bloom and North Clark. "If the Death Eaters come shit-storming after us, are you gonna, say, use your turn signal? Maybe -- I don't know, stop for a yellow? You're acting like you're on your damn learner's permit!"

"Sylvie .. " Jordan glanced both ways before pulling out slowly. "If we floor it to Wedgewood, how many Wizards do you think will be on our tail? Droves. Droves of them. If you haven't noticed, I'm trying to drive like we belong out here -- not like we're fleeing for our lives."

"Who -- who says droves?" Sylvia shook her head. She glanced back at the Wizard, who had mostly kept his comments to himself for the duration of the trip. "Do you say droves, Mr. Chuckles?" She nudged his chest with her foot, the cutting board resting comfortably in her lap. "Do you?"

Mr. Chuckles responded with something vague and dreamy, most of his words lost to severe blunt-force-trauma. Jordan gave a sigh.

" .. For the hundredth time, would you please put your seatbelt on?"

Sylvia responded eloquently with a middle finger.

Jordan's grip tightened on the wheel. A few miles passed. He spared a mournful glance at his Klondike bar wrapper, tossed into the passenger seat.

What would you do for a --

-- "JORDANOMIGAWDLOOKOUT!"

Sylvia's screech came out in one high-pitched, high speed missile. Jordan yanked his gaze back to the road. Nothing -- but then a blur in his rearview --

-- a logging truck from Ramble with a full load barreled past them, cargo leaning treacherously. The backdraft sending even their hefty F-250 wavering. Jordan fought for control -- he swerved, swore, and came to a shuddering halt in the gravel. He smelled smoke. What --

-- Sylvia gave a choked sort of gasp, the sudden stop leaving her tangled up in the backseat. She sat up, pushed her bangs out of her eyes just in time to see the semi rattling along at a terrifying pace.

The truck careened back and forth at eighty-plus miles an hour, uppermost logs not used to this deadly rhythm. There were at least four short-bed pickups dogging each of the trailer's moves -- Jordan didn't have to squint to see what was going on. Clear as day, he saw the figures in the back crouching against highway speeds. He saw pointy blue hats, and he saw fireballs. The Wizards were chasing the logger, and his load had caught fire. That's where the smoke smell had come from. Burning cedar.

Dust mixed with ash still rolled past them, reminding Jordan of the trailer's incredible mass. The driver must have been in some sort of panic, but there was no way he could outrun or outmaneuver those smaller trucks. Loggers often took these back roads to avoid weigh stations, stacking their payloads way over the legal limit. This meant --

"Oh my God." Jordan paled. " Oh my God. They can't -- that's gotta be 90-thousand tons of .. "

Sylvia whimpered as the truck made too sharp a turn. The pickups darted away, already sensing the danger -- the trailer began to jackknife. There was no chance for correction, not at that speed, not with that much weight. In horrifying slow motion, the fetters gave out, and with a heart-stopping crash -- the semi rolled. It rolled, and it rolled, and it rolled.

The logs snapped like toothpicks, tumbling off the carrier in a savage free-for-all. The rig itself buckled and skittered along the cement, sending sparks. Jordan closed his eyes.

"No .. "

When he dared to open them again, the pavement was covered in splintered cedar. He could make out the truck's dark underbelly through the haze; one wheel spun, almost lazily. Death, for the driver, would have been immediate. The pickups veered away. Their job was done. The smoke rose, the fire picked up -- they left the carnage to smolder.

Sylvia fumbled for her seat belt.

Click.

At the sound of latch meeting buckle, Jordan pulled back onto the road. Both lanes were completely blocked, so he turned at the first sidestreet he could find -- about two-hundred yards from the spill. A promotional billboard for Zombpocalypse leered down at them as they passed, demanding in harsh red letters: MAKE PEACE WITH YOUR GOD!

Neither he, nor Sylvia said anything for a while.

"Is this it?"

Nathan squinted into parking garage.

"The Taurus? Is that your car?"

The vampire kept walking in way of response, his footsteps taking him down the alley and away from where Nathan stood. "Yes."

"What -- really?" The mountain of a man scratched the back of his head. "Then why .. aren't we getting into it?"

"Easier to get out on foot, this way." Luke stopped. He didn't like stopping. If he was going to be on the move, then he liked to be on the move. He turned back to the man with a last name but no family -- he turned back to him with a slight frown. "One thing that must be said about vampires is that we are consistent, dangerously so. The Grand Mage keeps dutiful notes; my appreciation of Ford sedans hasn't escaped him over the years."

"The Grand Mage .. you mean .. "

"Thaddeus Farcry. Your constant commentary needs to stop."

"Right-o." Nathan jogged the thirty feet to where the vampire stood patiently. The man doubled over, wheezing. "Hang on, brother. Hang on a second .. you sure we can't take the car?"

Luke took a half-step to the side, and dropped the keys down a storm drain.

"Ahh .. "

Things may have quieted downtown, but this was the South Side. There were still Wizards in the street when the people began to fight back. As the first gunshots cracked, Luke gave a sudden glance to the man with no family.

"Time to go."

"I don't see them."

Though Jordan often struggled with the concept, there were some things about Sylvia that could be considered 'useful.' Her attention to detail rivaled that of any practicing mentalist, and she pulled it off with a damning certainty. No fleck of dust, no crooked hanger, no unsorted drawer was safe with her around. Jordan suspected that the talent had something to do with all the I-Spy books that had systematically vanished from his room during their childhood ..

So if Sylvia didn't see something, then it usually wasn't there to be seen. As Jordan coasted past the gate and into Wedgewood, she unglued herself from the window and tapped her brother on the shoulder.

"Jord, what if they're .. gone?"

"Nah. They're here, they gotta be." Jordan said it more for his benefit than anything.

Fingers crossed even as he nudged the steering wheel, Jordan followed the path west to a thicker alcove of trees, near the under-twelve playground -- the only place he could remember a payphone being. So there they sat, a cherry-red Ford F-250 out in the open -- three humans may not have been visible from the road, but their truck sure was.

Come on guys ..

Mr. Chuckles chose that moment to emit a low moan -- a more coherent-sounding moan than the other ones before. The excitement faded from Sylvia's face, and she turned slowly back to the Wizard, eyes filled with a sudden fire. Mr. Chuckles swallowed.

"Jordan -- "

"No, Sylvie."

" -- can't we just -- "

"I said no."

"But there's so many nice places to bury him around here .. " Sylvia clucked her tongue in disappointment, and Mr. Chuckles decided to go back to not saying or doing anything. "Jordan -- THERE THEY ARE!"

This time, a shriek from Sylvia yielded good tidings. Jordan raked the treeline with his gaze, and there was a flash of cyan -- Logan being the first to step out of the clearing --

"Still in his Smoothie Shack uniform, minus the hat and apron, thank God!" They were alive, they were alive! Jordan was out the door and bounding away, the engine still running before the truck could know what was going on.

Sylvia was just a second behind.

"Up." Lovingly as ever, she shouldered the Wizard, cutting board once again in her fist. "Out."

________________

"Hey."

"Hi."

Jordan and Logan met up, breathless.

"Good to see you."

"Same. Stayin' alive, bro?"

"Workin' on it."

"Where's your sister?"

Instead of answering, Jordan simply jerked his thumb over his shoulder to the truck. As though on cue, there was a ding! ding! as Sylvia opened the door, a sharp crack, a low moan, and then a cheerful -- "Oh hey Logan!"

Judging from Logan's expression, Jordan bet he didn't want to turn around.

"Yeah." The elder Renar scratched the back of his neck. "That's our friend. He made a great first impression, destroying our home and trying to kill us, like"

"Good Lord, I think she knocked him out .. "

"We call him Mr. Chuckles. Real conversationalist, he is -- "

"You brought him with you? You didn't mention that on the phone .. "

"There are a few things I didn't mention on the phone. Anyways, I figured if we're gonna be sharing the world with the Wizards, we might as well get to know them."

"Your sister is a raging psycho."

"I know."

Jordan stepped to the side, finally seeing Sheri and Dawn. They had been hiding near the creek. He lifted a hand to them in greeting, and it turned into a gesture, pointing to the truck. His message was clear -- there would be time for group hugs and singing later.

"Pack it in, Sylvie." Jordan returned to the truck with Logan in tow. Sylvia was trying her hardest to lug a newly-unconscious adult male back up into the back seat. "Logan -- give her a hand or something."

"Why do I have to -- "

"You think Dawn is touching that guy?"

Within about fifteen seconds, Logan was wedged uncomfortably in the backseat between a sleeping Wizard and a smirking Sylvia. Sheri fit herself in there somewhere, too, and Jordan had politely offered Dawn shotgun.

"Why does it smell like smoke in here?" Logan sniffed, and Jordan frowned.

"Never mind that." He threw the truck into gear, and they crawled back out towards the main gate. "Someone figure out where the heck we're going, because I think my house is busy burning to the ground."

Dawn really wasn't sure what it was with boys and monosyllabic greetings, but it seemed that no matter what the situation, that was all they did. Sometimes they didn't even bother with 'Hey', and just exchanged a 'Man Nod' with one another, stoic faced and gruff. Perhaps it was some sort of masculine delusion that caring about seeing your friends alive after the strong possibility of death was a weakness. Good grief, it probably was that, wasn't it? Dawn felt like smacking them, but that wasn't going to help things, really.

The redhead remained remarkably quiet as the group bundled into the truck, still somewhat sore over the loss of her bike, and Sheri's little dressing down. She did, however, glance at 'Mr. Chuckles' over the course of this, note his current state of 'beaten up', and offer Sylvia a respectful grin.

Wizard Count:

• Girls: Two (Mr. Chuckles and not-actually-called-Nikki)
• Boys: Nil

And so it was when Jordan spoke after the truck was full, that Dawn spoke again for the first time since their arrival in the cavalry-truck, turning to face him with a faint frown.

"I want to check on my Dad. Our house isn't far from here, you know where it is, Jordan."

If there was one person who was more successful at intimidating the boys of Cedar Spring High than Dawn Keating, then it was Andrew Keating. Everything about Dawn that was scary, angry and undeniably Scottish, came from him. There might have been one or two boys who dared to approach Dawn with anything other than friendship in mind were it not for his overshadowing presence -- every male visitor to the Keating residence always found themselves getting a 'talk' at some point, where they were (not so) politely informed of exactly which of their orifices Mr. Keating's prominent, wall-mounted shotgun affectionately dubbed Annabel would be shoved into were they to try anything with his precious little flower.

Now anyone in their right mind would know that Dawn was not someone you would describe as a 'precious little flower', unless you counted venus fly traps as flowers, and even then you didn't exactly get 'precious little' venus fly traps. But then again, it was questionable whether Andrew Keating was in his right mind. The same could be said about most angry Scotsmen, but Andy was perhaps a particularly angry man, even for a Scot.

It was easy to imagine then, that Mr. Keating would definitely be very much alive at this point, gunning down wizards in the dozens from his porch, Annabel in hand, bright red hair and beard glinting in the sunlight dramatically while he shouted incomprehensible Scottish swear words at the top of his very, very loud voice. Perhaps he would have scared the wizards away just by shouting at them. Wizards had orifices too, after all.

"We'll probably be able to hear him before we see him." Dawn smirked as this image of her father came into mind; perhaps he'd have put on his ceremonial kilt, just to look particularly movie-like. The redhead sat back and clicked her seatbelt on, having none of the rebellious 'it's the end of the world, screw health and safety' ideas like those of Sylvia.

"Well..." Deciding that this would be a good time to acknowledge everyone's state of breathing-ness, Dawn gazed out of the windscreen up at the sky. "It's good to see you two are alright. Like, not on fire or anything."

As the truck moved, the redhead noticed an awkward silence attempting to blanket the group, the weight of the 'end of the world' rather heavy on conversation.

"Oh!" Dawn sat forwards, an amused grin coming to her face. "You'll never guess who turned out to be a wizard..." she said, leaving a gap for the obligatory 'Who?' "Nikki Trawley. The little beauty-queen. Little bitch tried to spring a trap on us."

It was easy to tell, just from Dawn's expression, that that hadn't ended well for the other girl.

The truck drove on....

"Wait," Sylvia's nose crinkled as she tried to work out what had just been said, "Nikki's a Wizard? So you mean -- she's part of .. of them?"

Despite the age difference, Nicole Trawley and Sylvia Renar had been close friends since both girls went to cheer camp in the summer of 2004. In the six years since then, the two formed one of those devil-may-care bonds complete with sleepovers spent gossiping viciously over anyone slightly overweight or slightly different, lots of re-touched facebook photos edited with things like -- "bffs 4 life!" in curly bright letters, and various failed attempts to snare Boys Of Outrageous Behinds (or BOOBs as they, giggling, liked to call them) into that elusive, desired trap of love.

All of that was gone, now. Nicole was a Wizard, and had betrayed her best friend.

Everyone watched Sylvia, now, with a measured amount of sympathy. Even Jordan, who had been victim to both the girls' late-night sleepover scheming, looked up from his driving and glanced into the rearview. Sylvia was staring down at her lap, twisting her hands around the handle of the cutting board. Logan almost reached out to put an arm around the girl.

"Listen, Sylvia -- "

And then Sylvia's head snapped up. Her curls sparked with electricity, and her teeth were clenched. Logan retracted his hand rather quickly.

"That .. fugly little hugslut!"

"Oh, dear," Jordan returned his eyes to the road.

"I will rip out every single fake-chestnut hair on that skank's head! Do you know what she said to Sally Carman once, in seventh grade?"

"I couldn't even begin to care."

"She said my curls were fake. She said that. About me!" Sylvia seized a handful of her hair, her curly-twirly locks, leaned over in her seat and practically stuffed them up Logan's nose as she screeched -- "DO THESE LOOK FAKE TO YOU?"

"Nohmygodthosearesoreal!"

"Fuck that skank-ass bitch. I am not kidding," Sylvia made claws with her hands, and Logan (who, to his credit, thought he was doing pretty well so far) leaned away and into a sleeping, slightly bleeding Mr. Chuckles, "because you know what she did almost a week after that? She got a fucking perm! Trying to be like me! Not to mention she got all pissed when I didn't say how gorgeous it was."

Sylvia paused. She heaved in a few breaths of air.

"Because it wasn't!"

"-- yeah, I got that Sylvie."

"It wasn't gorgeous."

"Right."

"And then when Lacey Miedema -- "

The rules for dealing with a wound-up Sylvia were keep engagement at a minimum, and just nod along so that she doesn't think you're ignoring her. God and all his Saint's help you if she thought she was ignoring you. For now, however, Sylvia had a Logan and a Sheri trapped with her in the backseat. The burden of pretending to care was on them -- so long as Jordan kept nodding vaguely once in a while, he could tune her out.

And so Jordan glanced to the side and nudged Dawn in the leg with his free hand.

"Hey. You're not a Wizard too, are you?"

He let a few beats pass; sometimes his humor was a hit and miss. Jordan continued.

"Look, we'll find your dad. Don't worry. He's probably beating the crap out of those Wizards with his bagpipes, anyways," Jordan grinned, and when he grinned you believed everything was going to be alright, "and then maybe we'll find mine humming Aerosmith kicking equipment up at the station trying to figure out what went wrong."

What Jordan wouldn't give to hear -- "fly high with double-yewwwwww sky! coming from the truck's radio right now ..

" -- but then even though she made it her facebook status, she said it didn't matter! And I was like -- you're such a poser! Everyone can tell it was you! I mean, who the fuck cares about the photo in the first place, but noooooo! She had to make a huge deal about it, all because she knew that Daniel liked me more than he liked her! And that was always one thing she could never really grasp, never wrap her stupid little mind around. I -- "

Sylvia, apparently, wasn't done. Her voice rose and like a roller-coaster of thrilling scorn, ripping along a track of disgust and pent-up hatred.

"-- and then when Logan asked Kimberly to the Winter Formal, everything was suddenly --"

"Woah, woah, wait, what? Hang on, stop, back up -- red light, hold the phone!" Logan flailed his arms a bit. He leaned up off of Mr. Chuckles and stared, "when did I get involved with this?"

Jordan, despite the seriousness of their current predicament, snorted into a fist.

"Are you kidding me right now?" Sylvia's rant had been knocked off track. She sat hair frizzed and fingers still clawing imaginary throats in the air, and she just gave Logan a look, "are you telling me you had no idea she's been stalking you since middle school, just like every other female specimen in the tri-county area?"

"Wow, really?"

Sylvia made a final, general all-around sound of frustration at the matter, grabbed for her cutting board, and turned away to stare out the window past a rather amused and smiling Sheri.

In a way, Jordan was glad that Sylvia had decided to fly off the handle. It covered anyone asking him questions about why he had chosen all the back roads to get to Dawn's house instead of taking the usual interstate. Logan in particular would have wanted to take that particular route, if only for the Zombpocalypse poster on the 8th street billboards -- but the last thing Jordan wanted to do was go anywhere near the scene of the wreck.

And so when things finally settled down, they were about five minutes from Dawn's house. Jordan turned onto Clark Drive, and couldn't help noticing smoke rising from over the first hill.

This was dark and coiling smoke, the sort of smoke that came from things that weren't supposed to be burning. Jordan knew this from summer weekends full of 'experimental bonfires' and he couldn't shake the grim, nagging feeling that he was going to be learning a lot about fire in the next dew days.

Jordan observed the speed limit of 25 miles-per-hour, and the truck crawled along closer to whatever the hell it was waiting for them over the next rise.

It wasn't pretty.

Dawn's house sat at the end of a cul-de-sac and had always, to Jordan's overactive imagination, seemed alive. Its doors and windows stared smugly -- surrounded by arms of wide brick that wrapped low and laced its iron-work fingers as the gate at the end of the drive. Now as they crested the hill, Jordan hated the fact that he saw the house this way because it made the unfolding scene all the more horrific.

The 'fingers' were broken, half of them cast to the side and mangled. Up the hill, past 'rounded shoulders' the old house no longer had eyes, and the 'mouth' of its door was blown open, lips stained with soot.

But it was still standing, mostly. The fact that the foyer and west wing had held their ground spoke volumes of the skill of the initial builders -- the house had been built back when people actually knew how to lay brick. It was the roof that was causing problems -- even from this distance all they could see were patches, bare bits of latticework here and there; the rest had collapsed in on itself, probably crashing down onto the first floor or even the basement.

Here, too, was where the fire found its hold. There was a sinister glow from the eastern part of the house -- a glow that quickly turned to thick, black, twisting smoke whisked away into cheerful white clouds by a pleasant southwest wind.

Jordan felt his eyes watering and his nose stinging. He didn't glance at Dawn as he brought the truck to a stop not ten feet away from the mangled front gate -- but when his eyes saw that the Keating crest had been tossed away like a used tissue, he knew he had to say something.

"Dawn --"

But the girl had already flown out of the truck, slamming the door with a passion behind her. Jordan saw her red hair flying behind her as she made to sprint past the gate, up the hill and towards what had once been her home.

"No!"

What was she going to do? Jordan had abandoned the truck before he could rationalize what they were attempting. This is idiotic. We're running towards a burning house. The fumes alone could kill us in there. I can feel the heat from here. Oh my God. I can feel the heat.

And indeed he could. Jordan was dimly aware of people scrambling out of the truck behind him, but all he saw was Dawn. All he saw was Dawn, charging up her driveway against the silhouette of --

-- she didn't stop, even when the fire seared his face, made him blink through the smoke and confusion. With abandon he made one final charge and managed to catch Dawn around the middle, swinging her to a stop mere feet before she could reach her front walk.

He could feel her fighting him, but he just held onto her tight. If this were an embrace or just an attempt to stop her from plunging into the house and getting killed, Jordan wasn't sure. The tears were rolling freely down his cheeks by now as he half-carried, half-dragged the girl -- though in retrospect, that might have just been a reaction to the acrid, bitter, biting smoke.

Dawn grinned along with Sylvia's rant all through the drive -- of the people in the car, Dawn was possibly the only one not intimidated by the girl. Perhaps that was something to do with a shared state of 'alpha-female'; clearly the two girls were the bosses in this car. Jordan might be deciding where they drove, but that wasn't much compared to what an idle -- perhaps slightly grating word -- from Sylvia or Dawn could provoke. Sylvia and Dawn could take out wizards, they could certainly take inconvenient complaining or resisting male friends down a peg.

In time, however, Sylvia's ranting faded into the background, and the redheads thoughts returned to her father. He'd be alright, of course. He and Annabel. He'd probably have a nice pile of wizards waiting for them when they got there, and he'd meet them on the drive with that wild smile of his, that made it oh-so-obvious that he'd been up to no good. The smile that made his beard curl just like that, and always made Dawn laugh, no matter the situation.

"Hey. You're not a Wizard too, are you?"

Dawn looked up with a blink at Jordan's touch, glancing over at her friend with a slightly distant expression for a few moments before registering what he'd said. The girl chuckled quietly, a single 'heh' and a smile. Hit and miss indeed. But that was alright, because Jordan kept going, and (probably without knowing it, entirely) said just what Dawn needed to hear. At the bagpipes comment Dawn laughed -- a proper laugh, this time, and punched the grinning idiot on the arm.

"I know, don't worry. I'm fine. He'll be fine. I mean, you're alive, and you're a wuss, right?" she teased, returning the grin.

Dawn settled back into listening to Sylvia's little rant, occasionally snickering - none the more so than at her comments regarding Logan.

"Are you telling me you had no idea she's been stalking you since middle school, just like every other female specimen in the tri-county area?"

"Wow, really?"

"Yes, really." Dawn interjected with a smirk, glancing over her shoulder at the boy. "This morning, at the smoothie shack?" This morning? It felt like last month... "Didn't you notice that crowd of gawking nitwits gathered around you, with Nikki Charmeena-balls-of-fire-whatever at their head?" The redhead turned back around, chuckling. "You really are just a pretty face, aren't you? Nothing beneath those curls but bone and air..."

Thinking back on the happenings at the mall, Dawn didn't notice the smoke that Jordan spotted until they topped the rise.

At first, she didn't quite believe it. Maybe she wouldn't let herself believe it -- but for the first few seconds, as they approached the burning ruin that was her home, it didn't register in Dawn's mind that this was her home at all. She stared all the same; a burning building drew the eye after all, and it was only as the truck pulled up outside the gate that she realised just what she was seeing meant.

Flashbacks went through the girl's head of days spent running through the house's gardens, and hallways, playing games of hide-and-seek with her father. Her mother sitting by the fireplace at christmas, one of the rare occasions when the woman came to visit. Dawn sat under the tree opening presents as a little girl, giggling madly as toys and clothes came out of their wrapping. She remembered sitting on the front porch - the one she now saw splintered, charred, with remnants of the door frame scattered over it - on warm summers days with Jordan and her other friends, exchanging stories and licking ice creams, the warmth of the sun on their faces.

The only warmth on Dawn's face now was from the fire, as it vaguely dawned on her that she was running. Moving up the driveway, vague whispers of "No" and incoherent prayers passing her lips without thought. She remembered when she'd first come outside on her seventeenth birthday to find her bike waiting on the drive, her father standing beside it proudly, that smile of proud mischief on his face.

That smile, the one that made his beard curl just like that.

"Oh God no..." Her own voice, again, cutting through the crackling of the fire and bouncing around her head a dozen times over. Where was he? He'd have escaped the fire, of course -- he probably dodged a fireball, and it hit the house, and he had to get out. But what if he was in there? Dawn didn't even feel the heat any more, not consciously anyway. She had to get inside, to get inside and find him, and save the memories -- the box of memories.

Another flashback, her mother smiling down at a still young Dawn as she slid a shoebox into a cabinet. "There! Now it's all safe, for when you miss something in it, or when we want to remember all the best times..."

A time capsule for themselves, not for the future, with photos and keepsakes stowed away within. They'd been put away to keep them safe. But now what? They were probably ashes...

"No!"

Jordan's cry was distant, another world. She wasn't stopping now. Every semblance of the hardened and fiery Dawn was gone now, tears running freely. Her home was burning. Her father nowhere to be seen -- nowhere with that knowing smile, that mischievous grin. The one that made his beard curl just like that...

Then his arm was around her middle, and she was being pulled back. No! "Let go of me!" she screamed, her voice broken through sobs and coughing from the smoke, her face blackened by smoke and wet with tears "No... I've got to find him!" she cried, punching her hands into her friend, over and over, pounding at his arms and chest even as his arms wrapped fully around her and pulled her back, away from the heat and the smoke. Dawn's protests, kicks and punches became steadily weaker as she was pulled away from the house front, until they stopped entirely, and the redhead collapsed into wracking sobs, leaning into Jordan and burying her face in his shoulder.

It was all gone. Everything -- all the memories, the little corners and nooks that nobody but she knew about, the hidey holes where she stowed herself away as a child during hide and seek. The knowing smile when her father found her, that made his beard curl up just like that...

"Oh God Jordan.. it's... it's gone, he's gone, where is he? He should be here, they can't have..." Dawn's voice was cracked and stammering. It just went to show that no matter how hard your outer shell, no matter the prowling, vengeful person you were when you were in your element, some things were beyond shells. This was a world where confidence and strength of will meant very little to the people about to burn your face off, and all the shouting in the world couldn't save a life.

A few hours earlier.

Just as he was about to deliver the 2:05 WSKY weather report, DJ Dan the Afternoon Man heard a low rumble pass over the station and everything -- even the 'On-Air' light above the door went dark.

"Woah! Hey! Wooooah .. "

Dan Renar reached out with a finger to calm Bobblehead-Betty who had been sent into all kinds of tremors thanks to what had been (Dan imagined) a rather feisty gust of wind. He flicked a switch on the receiver next to him -- nothing came through his headphones. Dan's chair gave a squeak of protest as he leaned back, and waved to Henry Meye in the next room.

"What's going on?"

Henry didn't have an answer quite yet. He spared Dan a look, just one hurried look before going back to the age-old standby of all board operators -- just pushing random buttons. Or, at least, that's what it looked like to Dan from his position in a dark, unlit studio.

"Nothing but dead air, Dan!" Henry called back, brow furrowed, once his odd ritual was complete "it's gotta be a transmitter problem."

"That thing again? You have got to be kidding me .. "

WSKY-FM was in dire need of a new transmitter. It had served well back in the 70's when there had been twenty miles of clean, open air from here in Ramble down to Cedar Springs and even as far south as Hatwick -- but since those years the land had been developed and buildings rose into the valley interfering with signal. As a senior prank in the early 80's, the graduating class of CSHS had wired enough short-wave radios from Skipper Point to temporarily throw the station off its Sunday night 'Back-To-God' program. Dan grinned. They can't prove anything.

The transmitter buckling completely, though? That hadn't happened in about six years. Oh, sometimes the signal weaved in and out if the wind from Torch Lake got too ambitious; this was, of course, a perpetual hazard of their location. Generally the signal came back, as though apologetic for wandering off lost amidst all the towering cedar.

But the power had never gone out before! Dan stroked his chin thoughtfully. He slid off his headset, placed it carefully on its designated stand, got up, and strolled out of the studio.

Henry was already making calls, looking slightly comical with a different receiver for each ear. He juggled both of them, cradling them between his neck and shoulders while he punched through each corporate and commercial number he could remember off the top of his head.

"No one's picking up .. not downtown, and not at the Keeler building," the man scowled.

"Maybe it's the phone. Did you try calling on your cell?"

"Eh. Dead, anyways. Forgot to charge it last night."

Dan pulled out his Blackberry to lend a hand, but wasn't surprised to find that the signal was too weak. Being tucked up in the mountains like this had its pros and cons -- right now, it was looking as though the latter outweighed the former.

"It wasn't supposed to be terribly windy," Dan mentioned helpfully, remembering the weather report that had been printed off for him, lying abandoned on its stand back in the studio.

Just then, a door slammed from somewhere down the hall. Dan heard her heels clicking before he saw her -- there was Monica, their secretary, with a pencil tucked behind one ear and a pen tucked behind another, ends lost in frizzled brown hair. She chewed her lip, and stood there looking from one man to the other.

"Whole station is down. Can't get reception anywhere else either, and no one's picking up."

Henry hung up one phone, and then the other, "how long d'ya think it'd take to get someone to come up and look at the transmitter?"

"Oh, about an hour at least."

"Damn," Henry shook his head, and for the first time Dan Renar felt the slightest prick that something wasn't right.

"Maybe it's magic!" Monica joked, and both men had to laugh.

Suddenly feeling better and slightly silly for his misgivings, Dan (who was also station manager as well as the afternoon DJ) gave a shrug.

"Might as well go home, you guys."

"Go home?"

"The last time the transmitter went out this completely, it took three days before we were back up and running. And if by some miracle we do get back in the next hour or so, we've got enough songs lined up to last until Shawn shows up."

Henry laughed, took off his glasses, and began to clean them, "alright, alright. I can go for that. Maybe I'll surprise the wife and have dinner ready by the time she gets back from Memphis."

"Sweetheart, the world would end before you figured out your way around a stove," Monica snorted, and it was just Dan to chuckle this time.

"Okay, you two take care!"

"Bye, Dan!"

"See you later, now."

Dan never wore a coat and so he just walked a straight line from the back room, down the hall, and then out the front door. The towering cedars of Ramble waited for him, waving in the strong breeze and all was well in the world.

Sure, driving got a little precarious in the winter -- but for the most part, Dan didn't mind his lengthy commute. Days like today made everything feel worth-while. Maybe he'd take a leaf out of Henry's book, and make supper instead of ordering take-out. He and the kids didn't expect Lisa home from work 'till late.

Dan jangled his keys in his pocket while humming a lesser-known Beatles tune. He approached his car, his baby -- a bright yellow 1969 Cougar Eliminator with black racing stripes with an almost audible sound of undiluted joy.

The car had belonged to Dan's father, and was now in his loving possession. He had decided belatedly to make the car a family heirloom. Jordan would receive it when he turned eighteen. Sylvia had never learned to appreciate the thing, even fostering such hurtful nicknames as the 'canary-car' and refusing to be seen in something of such an 'audacious' and 'horrific' shade. At least Jordan understood a rare, classic care when he saw one ..

And so Dan roared from the WSKY parking lot with the open road under him, turning left and finding (as was per usual) no traffic meeting him south.

He opened the throttle carefully -- Dan had recently overhauled the engine and if he pushed too hard, he could hear the engine making a few coughs or sputters. The windows were open and the wind whipped around in the car's cabin; the radio was on, but Dan wouldn't have heard anything anyways.

Things went along beautifully like that for about twenty minutes before the Cougar's engine gave a choking sound, and downshifted suddenly. Dan jerked his hands tighter around the wheel as the powerful engine slowed mournfully -- he pulled over in a spray of gravel.

Not ready to be brought down from his good mood, Dan swore good-naturedly and was out of the car at once, unlatching the hood to take a look at the damage. A cursory glance and a few squints told him all he needed to know -- a vacuum line to the carburetor had blown. The new engine had come with new, fancy plastic heads to cover the intake lines so prevent air being diverted away from the engine needlessly -- but in the heat, the plastic had expanded and it looked like the cover had flown off a few miles back. This was why the engine had been running rough. Dan patted the hood in what he imagined was a consoling fashion.

For about fifteen minutes Dan tried a few variations of switching covers and starting the engine. This only resulted in a weak, rasping rumble to the vehicle. It was still sucking air where it shouldn't have been -- there was no way around it, he'd have to find another way back home.

Though it pained him to leave the car there it had to be done. Now feeling slightly miffed, Dan reached for the phone at his belt. The last thing he needed was for this dumb thing not to --

-- thankfully, his phone had enough signal to make a call. Dan tried ringing Jordan, then Sylvia, then called home. Dan waited four rings before the answering machine clicked in, and Jordan's dry voice could be heard saying -- "here comes the beep! You know what to do."

Dan grinned, "cute, Jord, but we're gonna change that, right? Okay, anyways -- transmitter at the station's gone down and I was on my way home when the Cougar's engine went out. I'm about twenty miles north on the W5; looks like I'll need a ride back in. It'd be great if you guys picked up your phones once in a while, as often as you both seem to .. "

Dan turned when he heard the low growl of engine brakes rolling up from somewhere up the road. Ah! There was a Hoyle Logging truck coming his way from the north. It had just crested the last hill, and was it pulling over? Huh. You'd think those guys wouldn't want to slow their route, but Dan had known the Hoyle brother's since college, and they were good guys. maybe one of their sons had see the instantly-recognizable canary-colored Cougar, and were stopping to see if he were okay.

"Hmm .. "

The truck was definitely pulling over, and it was definitely carrying a hefty load of cedar. Dan lifted his arm in greeting to the driver; he had recognized the face, "Yeah. Actually, funny thing! Sam Hoyle's son just pulled over, looks like he's going to bring me back in, even if he just drops me off at the corner station. Make sure you kids do the dishes, and Sylvia, I know your mother wants that living room vacuumed. I don't want the house a mess. Love both of you kids -- will talk later when I get home. Buh-bye."

Dan Renar ended the call, and re-clipped the phone to his belt. He took a step towards the truck, trudging back to where it had come to a stop.

Maybe that one step was the step he needed, because even though he couldn't see it -- suddenly, red block letters began to scroll across the screen ..

Dawn half-collapsed, and Jordan was quick to bend with her. This left his knees smarting on the pavement while Dawn folded into him. She wasn't making sense anymore. Her words had just turned into a tumbled series of vowels all swelling together from the shock. Jordan wrapped his arms tighter around the girl, feeling the wetness of her tears against his neck and smelling the strawberries and smoke in her hair.

The house still burned as freely as ever, and even though they were a 'safe' distance away from the blaze its heat was unforgiving. Jordan wiped sweat from his forehead before it could drip into his eyes. He knelt there with Dawn for what must have been ten minutes; thankful she wasn't hitting him anymore. From the base of the driveway, Logan looked on.

Not that he really saw them. Logan was the picture of emptiness. He stood eyes hooded, fists jammed in his pockets, jaw set. Something coppery filled his mouth; he spat to the side. Blood, from chewing the inside of his lip too hard and not noticing. His entire body felt numb.

’Make Peace With Your God!’

Strange. Even though he had been in the mall when the crisis broke, even though he had watched Nikki -- sorry, Charmena casting fire with her own hands, even though he had lived out an escape scene straight from the Bourne films .. Logan realized it was only in this moment that everything clicked, that everything felt real. Wizards were taking over the world. Funny, right? No one was laughing now.

In contrast to Logan, Sylvia couldn’t seem to stand still. She tried pacing one way, then another – hands snarled in her curls, eyes red and puffy. The girl’s expression was drawn somewhere between horror and disbelief. She had to move! But where? Back to the truck? Over to where Jordan and Dawn?

Sheri stood even further back behind the kids. Her mind was somewhere else completely – thinking perhaps about a fiancé who was a volunteer firefighter, or a mother who lived on the East Side. Her gaze trailed from the flaming house to the crest of a hill where only blue sky could be seen. Perhaps she was wondering what was beyond that hill.

None of them could have known that the Keating’s backyard (once so richly manicured, full of luscious green) was now crisscrossed with swathes of charred black from low-flying fireballs as though a child had angrily taken up a black crayon on paper.

None of them could have known that there were four bodies of four very dead Wizards crumpled here and there like lawn ornaments -- Wizards who had discovered that fire magic was not very good for deflecting bullets.

None of them could have known that a fifth body was not wearing a robe and a hat.

Mr. Keating had made his final stand in the garden about a stone’s throw from the house itself. Flowers had withered from the heat, stone from marble statues was blasted away. Andrew’s body lay half submerged in the fountain, as though he had crawled there in a panic once being lit up like a stuck pig. None of them could have known this, which was almost for the better. The smell of burning flesh would have made them sick.

They couldn’t have known, but somehow they did. Dawn, Sheri, Jordan, Sylvia – even Logan. They knew, but didn’t see. They didn’t want to see.

“Jordan,” Sheri spoke up, now, loud enough to be heard over the roaring and hissing of the fire. “We have to go.”

At these words, Logan was jerked from his trance, Sylvia turned her head blearily, and Jordan gave a small little frown.

“Not every house on the block got burned like this,” the woman kept talking. “And from what you said happened at your house, I can already paint a picture for you. The Wizards came here looking for Dawn’s mother, like they did looking for your mother. Whoever these people are, they’re tying up loose ends and the last thing we need is to give them a sitting set of hostages. We have to go.”

Jordan breathed in, breathed out. It seemed such a simple thing to do, but nothing was simple anymore.

“She’s right. They – we’re not safe here,” oh, shit. His voice was shaking; he had just realized that his own house was probably now in a similar state of disrepair. “We could head up to Ramble. Maybe bog down at Logan’s house. I doubt the Wizards know where that is.”

Sylvia unstuck her throat.

“Are you stupid? Ramble is made up of solid trees,” she tugged at her hair, harder. “Trees that .. “ her voice cracked at the memory of the logging truck, “ .. that burn.”

"What do you want to do, then?" Jordan yelled, and he immediately regretted it. He still had Dawn in his arms. He quieted. "Dawn. Look. Sheri has a point. I don't know how safe it is being here right now. But .. w-what do you want us to do?"

"Guys!"

It was Logan's voice croaking, now -- his first words in the last half hour. He had wandered back down to the truck (maybe more eager to leave than the others) and seemed to be charging back up the driveway towards them.

"Mr. Chuckles is gone!"

Dawn didn't really hear much of the conversation that was going on between the others. Her sobbing had quieted to heavy breathing, the occasional tear still rolled down her cheek, but something was passing. A second shell; tougher than the last. It was one thing to make a shell to not care about high school, another thing entirely to be able to keep your head in a situation like this. Dawn remained buried in Jordan's arms - thoughts in a tangled mess, not knowing what to do, think or say - until his shout at Sylvie snapped her back to the present.

For the first time, Dawn noticed the heat of the blaze, the sweat and faint charring on her face, the crackling and splintering of the house's wood. She registered what was happening -- the words passing between her friends; Jordan comforting her, holding her. She loved him to pieces in that moment, for not trying to say anything, for not trying to 'make things better', for just... being there. Dawn didn't need to be patronised. It was when she caught her name that she fully tuned into what was being said.

"Dawn. Look. Sheri has a point. I don't know how safe it is being here right now. But .. w-what do you want us to do?"

The redhead lifted her head from Jordan's shoulder, hair dangling limply down over her eyes before she tentatively brushed it aside. Face wet with a mixture of sweat and tears, Dawn inhaled deeply -- a mistake, because that immediately inspired a brief coughing fit from the smoke -- before replying.

"Jordan, I..." she whispered, lifting a hand up to rest on his arm, "I need to... I need to see him."

There was no way that Dawn could walk away from her home without finding her father's body. Only then would the sense of finality fully settle over her. Only then would she be able to accept it, accept that the man with the jolly smile and the air of utter invincibility about him could be dead.

Breathing in again, Dawn closed her eyes for a moment to gather herself fully, drawing in on herself and suppressing the desire to burst out in tears again. "I'm going around the back... there might be another way in from there that's less dangerous." she said quietly, probably audible only to Jordan. He'd have to explain to the others. With a forced, fleeting smile, Dawn pulled away from her friend's embrace and stood, glancing at the others briefly as she walked backwards a few steps. With a sense of determined stubbornness, Dawn turned away and strode around to the side of the house.

Her hands clenched and unclenched as she walked, and her breathing was ragged. She squinted her eyes against the smoke, and raised her hand as if to ward off the heat as she passed close to the side of the house. Her expensive boots crunched in the gravel of the pathway leading to the back yard. Dawn was alone when she first emerged out onto the scene, and her breath caught in her throat.

The wizards were the first thing she saw, crumpled bodies with bloody holes torn in their chests, blue hats comically skewed on the floor. Dawn paced further into the garden, passing close to one of the men's bodies. His eyes stared lifelessly at the sky, but Dawn recognised him as... their dentist. The dentist was a wizard. Jesus...

If Dawn was planning on musing on the oddness of that combination of professions, the sight of her father quickly dismissed them. She froze in mid-step, eyes locking onto the figure in the fountain; his characteristic red hair just visible. Anabelle lay helplessly on the grass a few feet away. Hesitantly, nervously, Dawn moved forwards. Her legs shook, and tears once more found their way to her face. Kneeling by the side of the fountain, Dawn extended a hand to gently lift that of her father's from where it dangled out, clutching it tightly.

"Dad..." she whispered to the air, blinking the wetness in her eyes away. "I'm sorry..." What for? Dawn didn't really know. "Mum would be proud... you took those bastards with you..." a heavy sob cut her words off, but Dawn suppressed it again, suppressed the tears. She couldn't collapse into a teary wreck. Not now. Not in the middle of all this...

Mourn the dead when you know that you won't be one of them soon. But she couldn't leave him like this, either.

Jordan watched on from the entrance to the garden, hesitant about joining Dawn at Andrew's side. There were some moments to be shared, and others that were... well, not.

Carefully, Dawn reached into the fountain to hook her hands under her father's body. She half-lifted, half-dragged him towards her, straining at the man's greater weight as she pulled him from the water and onto the grass. Tears continued to roll down her cheeks, but by this point she seemed unaware of them. They weren't her tears any more. At this point, Jordan stepped forwards and made his presence known.

"Dawn, can I... help?"

Dawn looked up in surprise. She hadn't noticed him follow her. Wordlessly she nodded, and her friend joined her. Dawn hooked her hands under Andrew's arms, and Jordan lifted his legs, and together they carried his body away from the wizards to the top of the picturesque garden, where they lay him gently on his back. Dawn knelt down and rested his arms on his chest, folded.

"Goodbye, dad..." she whispered, kissing her father gently on the forehead before pulling away. Her tears had faded, and her breathing was calmer. She would mourn later. Grieving would not keep her -- and more importantly, in her eyes -- her friends alive through the rest of this shit. The redhead stepped away from Andrew, and with a nod to Jordan they began to make their way back to the side of the house, but something caught her eye, and she paused.

Dawn turned and took a few steps back, reaching down and closing one hand around Anabelle. She lifted the weapon, testing its weight. Half full, she judged. There were more shells in the shed, though.

A few minutes later, Dawn re-emerged from the little wooden shed with her handbag bluging full. She'd discarded most of her things, makeup, and other unnecessary accoutrements. Instead, she now had a nice few boxes of shotgun shells. The redhead looked up to Jordan and cocked Anabelle on her shoulder, taking a deep breath.

"C'mon." she said, smiling faintly. "Mr. Chuckles has a head start on us."

And back around to the front of the house she strode, leaving Jordan somewhat dismayed.

Dawn with a shotgun. Dear god...