Rescue

Jebediah Houston may not have come from Texas. He was an Oklahoma cowboy who knew right from wrong and how family can use you to your own destruction. He worried about his addict of a sister until she killed herself with an overdose. He worried about his drunk of a mother until she disappeared with her twelfth boyfriend after he joined the Naval Academy. He heard from her every week before that when she would ask for money. He didn't have much after paying the rent and utilities on the three bedroom apartment for his mother and sister. He started working at 12 on a nearby farm to keep the lights on. He has not heard from his mother since his Naval Academy Graduation, when she asked for money and he finally refused. The SEALs became his family. His brothers and their families have given him his self esteem and even introduced him to his wife of 34 years.

That is why he is helping his "brother's" family run single file to the bomb shelter on his uncle's vacation property. He smelled smoke, then saw the chain and lock on the door. It looked unnaturally shiny in the moonlight, almost like it was coated with silver. No normal person would do something as expensive as that. "Stand back, I'm going to shoot off the lock. We need to get inside."

As soon as he spoke, he did. Jeb shot the lock off and pulled the chain. Sure enough, the chain and lock were covered in a layer of silver. No time to ponder the reasoning, the smell of smoke was stronger. Siobhan pulled open one door and Karen rushed in.

"Wait! We haven't cleared the building!" Jeb whispered harshly.

"No, but the smoke has." Siobhan cuts off any further complaint. "Now stay low and breathe shallowly."

Karen was already on her hands and knees, moving as quickly as she could in that position. "Brianna, we're here!" she calls out, hoping for an answer.

"Here." a raspy response. "Third left." Brianna let Karen know that she was in the third room on the left from the narrow corridor. Smoke was coming from the room, but not billowing like it could from a large fire. Luckily, there was no doors.

Karen found bottled water in the second room and grabbed a gallon on her way to the third. Siobhan and Jeb crawled up to her just as she was entering the room where Brianna was. There was a small fire on the wood floor with a foul odor coming from it. Brianna was chained to the wall, but the bolts were halfway out of the wall. An open can lay near the small fire made with leaves and paper. Karen douses the fire with water.

"I tried using pee in the can to douse the fire." Brianna felt better talking now that the fire was out.

"Resourceful." Jeb was impressed. This woman was strong and used her brain.

Brianna felt anything but resourceful, or smart. She missed most of the fire and would have died had her human family not shown up. She was concerned how the wolfsbane in her system affected her new set of twins.

Siobhan saw Brianna's wrists and ankles and knew that the burn marks were from the silver on the cuffs. "We need to get these off her. She's having an allergic reaction." Siobhan winked at Brianna to let her know that Jeb was a non-magic human.

"Chris is the locksmith. We normal folk use keys."

"Says the man that shot the padlock on the chains over the door." Karen pointed out the irony.

"I still smell something burning." Brianna thought it might be the leftover smell of the fire, but now she was sure that it wasn't. "We need to get out of here. All of us. Help me with the chains."

"Hang on." Jeb was back to business. He smelled it, too. He looked around and found some bolt cutters. "Gimme the chain." Jeb cuts the second link on each limb to be sure he doesn't hurt Brianna.

Meanwhile, Karen tried to find another fire, but couldn't find anything. When the chains were cut, Siobhan helped Brianna out, Karen led the way out with Jeb taking up the rear, just in case.

....

Chris told everyone where to be around the house. Shaylan was to take the french doors to the left. Scully and his husband, Will, took the rear of the house. Mike, Sarah's husband, took the right side of the attached garage. Siobhan's husband, Trey, covered the front of the garage. As soon as Sloane gave the hand signal, Chris sent everyone to their positions and he himself watched the front door. Chris knew that the house should be surrounded before Jeb and the girls reach the bomb shelter. That way, the target can't leave.

Chris goes to give the thumbs up to Trey to see if everyone is in position, just as he sees the Cadillac roll into the driveway and block the entire front of the garage. A gentleman in a plaid shirt and jeans gets out the passenger side of the vehicle. Trey follows him and gives Chris a thumbs up. He looks around the corner and gives Chris a second thumbs up.

Chris shakes his head and looks over to the corner of the house on the left. Shay is standing on the front left corner, his body facing Chris, looking to his left. He draws a circle pointing up and gives a thumbs up. The house is surrounded. Still, this family is not as well trained as Navy SEALs, but they should be fine if it's just one centenarian, as expected. Maybe two, if this guy walking up to him is any indication.

"I'm Earl Gilhoughley. These are my boys that you are working with," he indicated Trey and the positions of the family around the house. "My older brother is in there," he pointed at the door. "I can talk him down and punch him without repercussions." Chris stepped aside to let him enter the house.

Chris lights up a cigar. His wife doesn't mind if he smokes occasionally, as long as it is outside the house. He smiles as he thinks about his lovely Susan. Her cooking was worth the extra hour on the Total Gym. Her Italian cookies brought kids from all over town to sing Christmas carols at their door. Their own kids started the tradition over 30 years ago and continued it as teachers.

Halfway through his cigar, he hears a gunshot, coming from the bomb shelter. "REPORT!" Chris bellows.

Sloane and Doug come out the front door with a ziptied, lanky old man cackling between them, held by their dad, Earl. "We're secure. We'll put them in the Escalade."

Without a word, Trey opens the back door and secures Uncle Sloane in a straight jacket. "Go. I got this," plastic seat covers rustle as Trey secures the seat belt.

"Correction. WE got this." Earl climbs into the Escalade beside his brother.

"No! Stay! Wait until the weenie roast is done!" Sloane Michael laughs harder as Doug and Sloane Anthony run toward the bomb shelter. "Get it? Hot Dog?" The car door slams shut, and Earl makes good on his promise to punch his brother, knocking him out.

Smoke wafts from the open bomb shelter door. The yard is mostly open, which is why they used a distraction to cover the bomb shelter team. The family ran across the yard with guns drawn but pointed down. They paused to listen at the door just as the other door opened and Karen came out. Doug holstered his gun and grabbed his wife in an all-encompassing embrace, lifting her off her feet.

Siobhan and Brianna come next. Sloane Anthony picks Brianna up, cradling her like an over-sized baby. "I'm sorry. I'm so very sorry. I will never abandon Family again. This I swear."

"I witness your oath." Comes from Doug, Karen, Shaylan, Siobhan, Scully, Will and Michael in unison.

"I accept your pledge, as an injured party, and forgive you." Brianna surprises everyone by saying.

"So be it." The family responds.

"Uh. Can we get in on the love fest?" Chris breaks the mood, with Jeb by his side.

"You got wolves in this area?" Jeb is looking off into the edge of the woods toward the neighboring cabin they had used to watch the property.