Free Kronos by Jeremy Robinson

hoax, you have cured my sad reverie, if only for a few days, something the rest of this motley crew has rarely done without having to spend my money. How is that possible? Hmm?”
    O’Shea smiled and answered the rhetorical question. “God works in mysterious ways.”
    “Ha!” Trevor belched a laugh and slapped O’Shea hard on the back. “Indeed he does!”
     

 
     
     
    11
     
     
    Portsmouth Hospital
     
    With the night came a quiet stillness that made it difficult for Atticus to ignore his surroundings. The slight apple scent in the air assaulted his memory. Maria lying in bed. Her last breath. The feeling of his insides shaking with fear as her body convulsed, then lay still. Her room had been nearby…perhaps on the floor above. He wasn’t sure, but this was where she had died; this was the last place on earth he wanted to be. In fact, there was only one place he wanted to be at all, and that was on the ocean, hunting that thing down.
    He stuck his head out the window and took in the side of the hospital. The brick building rose straight and flat, but around the windows, grooved designs had been created with the brickwork. They’d make nice hand and footholds. Then there was the brick windowsills—only about five inches deep, but wide enough to stand on. Fifteen feet to his left, the hospital wall jutted out to the right for five feet and continued beyond his field of vision. His eyes scanned the outer corner, where a pattern of bricks, protruding two inches each in a staggered formation, ran toward the ground—a sorry excuse for architectural aesthetics but useful for scaling the side of the building. The brick pattern ended five feet above the bushes that rimmed the parking lot.
    Atticus figured the bricks didn’t run all the way to the ground because some kid might get the idea to climb up the side of the building after seeing Spider-Man. But the hospital’s architect hadn’t considered anyone’s climbing out a window.
    After climbing onto the sill, Atticus crouched in the window, judging the distance to the next sill over. There was one window between him and the brick ladder. He’d have to jump. His heart began to beat faster, his muscles burning with adrenaline. He looked down again at the five-story drop then back to the windowsill. It was a two-foot jump, not very far, but the narrow sill didn’t give him a margin for error. If he missed, he’d join his family in death. What that would look or feel like, he had no idea. He’d never considered it, not even after Maria died. But now…where were they? Atticus clenched his jaw, pushing such thoughts out of his mind. He could wrestle with death after he finished with the creature.
    With that, he leapt.
    He crossed the two-foot divide with ease, planting his left foot, then his right, onto the adjacent sill. He flattened his body against the window glass and caught his breath…then saw his reflection in the window and smiled.
    Spider-Man indeed.
    The room on the other side of the window suddenly filled with light. He saw a shadow moving on the other side. He quickly gazed back and judged the distance to the corner. He could make it. His legs tensed for the jump.
    The shades were flung open.
    Atticus found himself staring into the eyes of the last person he expected to be in the next room over—Andrea Vincent. Her eyes were wide. At first she appeared terrified, but after gazing into his eyes for a moment, mouthed, “Atticus?”
    He’d been caught.
    It was during that moment of distraction that Atticus failed to notice the sound of grinding mortar. The brick beneath his right foot gave way and tilted at an angle. The sudden jolt caused Atticus to lose his footing. He fell straight down.
    His hands slapped hard against the sill, tingling with pain, but held firm. Atticus was dangling five stories up from a windowsill with a penchant for falling apart. He heard the window above slide open and the sound of a knife tearing through the metal screen