HIGH DRAMA BLOGFEST

With only four hours to go until I have to board an plane and fly DL HAMMOND posted what?! 

Please go and check his Blogfest and giveaway! The drama is high and the stakes are higher. And I am not only talking about how unpopular posting this blog has made me with He-who-must-not-be-named! I'm looking forward to reading more of the drama posting and raising the stakes here too! ;)

STAYING LOST is an MG action/adventure

Jon's father CEO/Owner of the ASHTON & ROYAL GROUP has been contaminated with a heavy metal poison. Nerysa is all that stands between Jon and fate that might be even worse.

The sirens sounded throughout the building. The time had come. “Jon, say Goodbye. We have to go.”

 Smoke from the canisters in Hamish’s case, several floors below, was now billowing from the air vents. Charlie Ashton chuckled weakly.

“Dad! I love you.” Jon clung to the hand lay on the bed nearest him.

“Then – live.” His father croaked even as his free hand moved to claw at his chest over his heart. “Ner-ysa?” His eyes begged her to say the words. The pain in his face was greater than the one that ripped at his heart.

The nurse began to check his pulse of his free hand while the monitor’s erratic bleeping began to stutter.

“I promise, Charlie. I will keep him safe.

“Enough, Jon we have to go.”

Nerysa grabbed Jon by the scruff of the neck and began to pull him towards the door. When he reached the slick, white frame, the monitor beside the bed became, for a moment, silent. The line ran from jagged to flat. The silence didn’t last long as a piercing, high pitched warning sounded. 

With one hand towing Jon backwards, their ability to get through the door was compromised. He bumped a shoulder against the frame. This unleashed an inner daemon no one knew lay dormant there. Jon began kicking and screaming. His booted feet caught Nerysa, the door and the frame.

Nerysa picked him up. She held him under one arm while he flailed his arms and legs and tried to break free. She could hear trouble. The sound of running feet. There was very little time left. Nerysa had to try to fulfil her promise to get Jon out of the building and to safety.

She peered around the door into the corridor beyond. Angry flushed faces, with sharp suits and bodies like Arnie, were storming towards the room, their guns already drawn. 

The first shot sent wood chips flying into Jon’s hair. The second sent a shower of glass over them both. 

The shards and crystal cubes halted Jon’s struggles. He was fascinated by the rainbows split by the flecks of glass. 

Nerysa was able to loose the first few shots with a greater degree of accuracy than she could have hoped for if Jon was still fighting her. She hit the first guard in the chest and the second struck high in the thigh. She pushed Jon beside her through the door and forced his stumbling feet to keep going.

They ran towards the end of the corridor where the sign indicated there was a stairwell. A key pad provided security and Nerysa wasn’t sure how she was going to make it open when she heard a call and footsteps running behind her. The nurse had tears in her eyes as she keyed in the code for the door. She didn’t need to say the words. She settled for passing on hope, “Good Luck.”

Nerysa ducked under her outstretched arm and tugged Jon with her. They had to make it. There was just one flight of stairs to the roof. That still might be too far, she could hear echoes and clattering below them too. At least four people. As they turned the corners in the stairwell, she could hear the tell-tale clinks of metal hitting the handrail. She jammed a small amount of plastic explosives into the lock, and onto the hinges of the door.

Using an automatic timer, she prepared the device. Nerysa hurried Jon back down to the turn in the stairs and triggered the explosion. Plaster fell as dusty snow while they ran back up. The footsteps were closer now, and the voices were no longer difficult to decipher, they were as clear as if they were standing right next to them. Probably because... they very nearly were.

Coughing, eyes streaming, stumbling over the twisted metal that had once been a door, Nerysa and Jon felt, before they heard, the whisper soft arrival of the MD 500. With its new design this two-man helicopter was uniquely manoeuvrable. It descended onto the flat roof a little way from their current position.

 A bullet ricocheted back from the low wall ahead. 

With one hand on Jon's head, Nerysa laid down covering fire into the stairwell. She kept her hand on his collar, as they ran towards the helicopter.

Jon stuttered to a halt at the side of their escape vehicle, “There isn’t another seat, Nerysa.”

His reply was less verbal than he would have preferred, Nerysa picked him up and dropped him behind the seats. There was a luggage space and he, apparently, was the luggage. 

The force generated by the machine was instantly felt. Nerysa was pushed back into her seat and Jon became best friends with a range of safety equipment, a metal box and the remains of several lunches eaten on the move – angular, metal or smelly his choices were limited. 

When the helicopter dropped like a stone at the edge of the building Jon thought his breakfast would be joining the litter on the floor. He couldn’t see anything so his body reacted to the changes at a basic level. They were now hurtling forward at speed and he was pressed up against the chairs in the front with no way to do more than hold on and hope.