The Academy: Book 1 (26 page)

             
The mountain lion burst upstairs, shoving open the door leading to the second story with its head. It paused, and surveyed the room. Its huge green eyes locked onto Asa and Charlotte. It barred its teeth, and began to move over the ground—its bloodied paws crunching glass as it went.

             
Charlotte squatted down and was trying to gain leverage from her legs to turn the latch.
That won't work,
Asa thought,
the door isn't sitting in its frame right.

             
One two, one two, one two.
The mountain lions steps were making the floor beneath their feet vibrate.

             
Asa shoved Charlotte aside like a basketball post player blocking out for a rebound, with the intention of trying the lock himself. With the sound of the beast's paws coming towards them, things seemed to move slower than they should have. Asa could perceive every bit of his hands, he felt as though he had extraordinary control of every joint of every finger.

             
He looked up and could see the mountain lions hair moving as it ran. Its whiskers were pointed backwards as the animal pulled its lips back to reveal long yellowed canines and incisors. The left canine tooth, Asa could now see, had a chip on the tip of it, which made it dull.
This won't matter.
A mountain lions jaw can exerta thousand pounds of pressure, enough to break through a femur, or crack open a human skull. The jaw was strong enough that the teeth didn't need to be sharp. And even without the teeth, they would have no chance. Asa glanced down at the anima
l’
s paws, bloodied from the shards of glass the animal was sprinting over. The paws were the size of dinner plates. Long, razor sharp claws, probably filed with tree branches, were stretched out from the digits.

             
Asa didn't know it, but he was holding his breath as he prepared to try the deadbolt in the slow, underwater-like state that he was now living life in. He could feel his pulse all over his body. He gripped the doorknob with his left hand, squatting slightly, and pulled up on the metal with all of his might. His thought was that, perhaps, if he was able to alter the positioning of the door, that the deadbolt might then be able to slide into the latch.

             
An awful thought occurred to him:
What if the positioning is not the problem? What if there's debris blocking the hole? Or what if the lock is jammed on the inside, corroded with orange rust of old metal.

             
Asa tried to turn the metal latch with his right hand. He could feel Charlotte's desperate eyes watching behind him. He didn't want to let her down. He had pushed her out of the way because he thought that he had a better idea. He didn't want to die this way. But the latch wasn't moving.

             
The mountain lion was then fifteen feet away from the door. It flexed its back legs and leaped forward, its muscular body flying like super man eight feet in the air. Its bloodied front paws were outstretched, prepared to ram the door open. Its mouth was open, ready to rip open Charlotte and Asa's bodies.

             
Everything around Asa seemed to move slower still. He saw the deadly animal floating through the air towards them. He would have one more, last second shot at locking the door. He brushed all his doubts, all his fears away, and concentrated every ounce of his attention and energy so that he could use it all in one grand, final effort to save his life. With his left hand, he gripped the knob so hard that veins and tendons shot out on his forearm. He flexed every muscle from his toes, all the way to the back of his neck in an enormous effort to lift the door high enough to ram the bolt in. From behind him, Charlotte saw his back flex: there were two small nodules beside his spinal cord that stood out when he flexed like that. He had the strength of a mother lifting a car off her child—a crazed, adrenaline laced strength. He didn't know how he knew it, but he could feel when the door was high enough. The cougar was still sailing towards them, three feet, two feet from the door. Asa saw that the tips of the claws would touch first, followed by the rest of the massive, speeding body. His right hand moved like a bullet up towards the lock. With his middle, index, and ring finger, he pressed violently.

             
Click.

             
The door was shut, and locked. The mountain lion flew into the door, but it did not open. The heavy study door pounded backwards but did not break. Asa took a few steps back and watched the animal through the glass with metal diamonds running through it. He felt Charlotte's hand wrap around his, and he squeezed her hand in return. The mountain lion roared, outraged, and took three steps back. It sprinted forward, headed straight for the door again. Asa saw a lethal determination in the animal's eyes. It was going to pound at the wooden door until it either died of exertion, or got in. This door was stronger than the one downstairs, but so was the mountain lion.

End

Want to read more? The Academy
: Book 2 will be released on April 19, 2013. It will have approximately 200% the word count of Book 1.

A quick word from the author:

Hello reader,
 

I first want to say thank you for picking up my novel: I hope that you have enjoyed Book 1 of The Academy. The second volume of this series will be released in April. I promise a longer, more involved addition to this series, and I hope that you will try it out.

As a reminder, every cent that I receive as an author goes to the support of Doctors Without Borders.

For more information see:

http://chadleito.blogspot.com

Your donation has contributed to the help of individuals in need.

For those of you unaware of how my project works, I will give you a quick summary: Each month I post proof of my earnings as an author, and a receipt from Doctors Without Borders verifying that I paid them that amount. I have pledged to continue this project at least through March 2014, (the project lasts 24 months total), and foresee a commitment beyond that likely.

The reader is offered multiple things by this project: First, they are allowed the great opportunity that all independent books offer customers—the ability to read great novels at a fraction of the price traditional publishers
offer. These novels are free from adherence to publishing guidelines and preferences: In this way, independent publishing offers a bigger creative spectrum than traditional publishing and give. Secondly, the reader is given the opportunity to donate in a meaningful and convenient way: All you have to do is press the “buy” button on your Kindle, and you have contributed to things like latex gloves, antibiotics, soap, scalpels, and suture supplies that will help those in need. By buying this book, you have literally helped to give an ill or injured person much needed medical attention. You have also showed the sick person that people care about him or her. Thirdly, this project offers readers an opportunity to be
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              Thanks for reading and listen to the crows,

             
Chad Leito