CHAPTER SEVEN
mysterious men
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"AND WE WERE RIGHT OUTSIDE LIKE THIS. and all we hear is just, 'bam! bam! bam!' knocking paint off the wall, g! from the inside." jj recreates everything that happened at ms. lana's house for pope and kiara.

"and i'm just looking at him, like—" he starts, "wait, first off, look at this shit. look at it." he says rushing over near pope to shake his hair out, trying to get rid of the remaining paint chips.

dakota laughs at the boy who looks like he's having a mid life crisis.

"that's dandruff, disgusting." kiara's face twinges in disgust.

dakota rolled her eyes at him, "stop spazzing j."

"okay, thank you." pope pushes on jj's head to get him to stop.

"look at all that. all right?" jj points to the ground at the fallen chips of paint that was residing in his hair. "that's paint. at that point, i was just, like... i'm waiting for death." he over exaggerates.

     "dude." dakota shoots him a look saying you're crazy.

     "oh, okay, so you saw the guys that shot at us, right?" pope asked.

     "yeah."

     "did you get a good description of them? what did they look like?" pope continued to question.

     "anything."

     "anything we can bring to a police report?"

     turning to look at them all, jj voiced his thoughts, "burly." receiving 'wtf' looks from everybody.

     "burly?" pope asked in disbelief.

     "out of all things you can say, you pick burly?" dakota looks up at him in question asking herself if she made the right choice making a dumbass her best friend.

     "that's not very helpful."

"okay, well, no, like the type of guy at my dad's garage." jj tried to help them picture 'burly.' "i mean, you guys know he made cargo hides for drug smugglers."

     "i'll elaborate for you guys since he," she stretches out pointing at jj, "is terrible at explaining. basically imagine damien times two. you're welcome."

     everyone went quiet at the mention of damien. they tried to avoid topics involving him as much as the could seeing as he's an abusive dick of a brother to dakota and spends majority of his time with kooks. someone being bigger than damien was quite unusual seeing as he worked out almost every day. however the description helped them a lot seeing as there's not many 'burly' people on kildare island.

getting the attention off of dakota because he knew that's what she'd want, jj brought the attention back to himself. "i can tell you with full confidence, these boys, these killers..." he puffed out, hitting his juul. "they're square groupers." he concluded.

"they're square groupers, like marco square grouper? like pablo escobar square grouper?"

"yeah man." jj let out a breath.

"you guys," kiara interrupted, "not everything is a kingpin movie."

quickly turning to jj pope asked, "so what does this square grouper look like? specifically?"

"you were there, bro," jj waves his hands around.

"you don't know what to look for." pope let out frustrated.

continuing to wave his hands around, jj was losing his mind. "i wasn't taking like mental polaroids the entire time, man. i was under duress okay?" he screeched out, running out of breath. "but i can tell you. i can tell you by the way that ms. lana was screaming... that these guys are serious, serious hombres, man. it's a heavy vibe right now, okay? i'm not liking this very much." finally he was slowly calming down.

"why do they want the compass." kiara asked confused about the whole situation.

dakota piped up from her spot leaning against the brick wall, "i don't know, but it must be somewhat important because ms. lana almost got beaten to death for it."

"it's a piece of shit." pope shook his head. "you could pawn it off for five bucks if you wanted to. no offense john b. i know it's in your family—."

"the office." john b interrupted pope.

fed up with the amount of times jj blew the nicotine into her face, she grabbed the juul out of his hands and chucked it to the opposite side of the porch. jj shot the girl a death glare, in which she returned with shoving her middle finger in his face.

     "my dad. my dad's office." john b continued after the duos small banter starting to make his way into his house. the four teens all got up from where they were standing/sitting and followed him to his dads office. "he always kept the office locked because he was worried about his competitors stealing his royal merchant research. we used to laugh at him like he was actually gonna find it. but now he's gone, i've just kinda... i just left it as he kept it.

    "yeah, for when he gets back." kiara comforted him with a smile while pope, jj, and dakota shared glances knowing you don't get lost at sea for months and just appear back out of nowhere. kiara sent them a deadly look knowing what they were thinking.

     pulling out his keys, he unlocked the door to his dads room and they entered.

     dakota looked around the room in awe. never once has she seen someone have so much dedication over one thing.

     "i've slept over here like six hundred times, and i've never seen this door opened." pope announced taking in his surroundings.

     "here look," jj brought over a board, "this is the original owner right here. he pointed at one of the pictures at the top of it. "robert q. routledge. 1880 to 1920." kiara read off. "there's the lucky compass, right there. she pointed to it hanging from the guys hand.

     "actually, um... he was shouts after he bought it." john b revealed to them all as the rooster crowed in the distance. "then the compass was shipped back to henry." he pointed at the next picture of a man. "he was killed in a crop-dusting accident when he has the compass. after he died, the compass was given to stephen." he pointed at another picture of a different man. "stephen has the compass with him when he died in vietnam." he continued.

     dakotas eyes widened after hearing that every man that has owned the compass at one point has died.

     "let me guess, he died in action, right?" jj interjected.

     "sort of." john b looked up at his friends. "uh, a-actually, he was killed by a banana truck. in- in country. anyways, after that, stephen passed the compass down to him, my dad." he now pointed at the picture of big john with john b in the background.

     "hm. sounds like there's a reoccurring theme here." jj gulped looking at each of his friends.

     "yeah, you have a death compass." pope concluded.

     "no i do not have a death compass." john b denied.

     "get rid of it." jj advised. "it's cursed, and it made its way back to you."

     "i say we put it in the garbage disposal." dakota looked at them all to see them giving her curious looks. "what?" she defended. "saves you and whoever is next in line for their impending fate involving the death compass."

     "yeah, she's got a point." jj points at her, only for them both to be ignored and pout at each other.

     "look," john b said, "my dad used to talk about this compartment in here. soldiers used to hide secret notes." he explained unscrewing the compass.

     "what's that?" kiara asked about the engraved writing on it.

     "that wasn't there before." john b looked at the writing curiously before recognizing something. "this is my dad's handwriting."

     "how can you know that?" pope questioned in disbelief.

"because he does these weird r's with the-" he held up the compass showing them the writing. "see it?"

jj held his hand out, "can i see it?" he observed it as he held it in his hands trying to make out what it said. "red— rout— no i think that's an a."

"it says redfield." kiara announced after getting a good look at it.

"right."

dakota look at the all confused, "what's redfield?"

"besides the most common name in the county?"

"maybe— maybe it's a clue." john b suggested. "maybe it's a clue to where he's hiding."

"a clue? come on, that's—" pope shook his head before the rooster crowed once again. "but if it is a clue, maybe it's an anagram?"

john b lit up after what pope said. point his finger at pope, "yes. perfect. anagram. you need paper." he rushed around to grab a paper for pope.

"how can you concentrate with that thing crowing at you?" pope groaned out, referring to the rooster.

john b frowned at him, "dakota and jj love the rooster."

"i love the rooster." kiara declared.

"okay let me think, dedfiel. colors— that's stupid."

pope continued to try and figure the 'anagram' before the ya ere interrupted by john b yelling, "guys! somebody's here."

the four others took notice of him looking out the window so they made their way over to look too. they saw two men exiting their truck— two very familiar 'burly' men.

"holy shit." dakota let out, gulping harshly now terrified.

"is that them?" kiara questioned looking at dakota who meekly nodded with a grimace on her face.

jj started pacing, "dakota, john b, i told you. why does it always—" he started freaking out until john b rushed over and grabbed his shoulders and pushed him against the wall. "jj! hey, look at me. where's the gun?"

because he was so freaked out, he couldn't think properly so he started stuttering, "gun? i, uh, i can't-"

"now you don't have the gun," now kiara started freaking out, "the one time we need the gun?"

letting out labored breaths dakota piped in, "i don't think we should involve the gun, we don't need a gun, why not throw," she looked around trying to find an object and all she found was a pen, "a pen at him, yeah." she started freaking out as well because the last thing she wants is to see the gun again.

jj tried to remember where he left the gun, "it was in my backpack, and then i—"

"on the porch."

"it's on the porch." jj confirmed in a low whisper and rushed toward the door.

dakota eyes flew wide and tried to follow him to stop him, "jj, don't you dare." but she was held back by john b as jj rushed out the bedroom.

all four of them flinched as one of the men's voices belted out, "john routledge!"

jj turned around quickly, launching himself back into the bedroom. "come out now!" yelled out the other man.

rushing over to jj she flicked him on his forehead, "don't you ever scare me like that again." she pointed at his face.

"they're on the front porch." he whispered to the girl trying to keep his voice as quiet as possible so the men don't find out where they are.

"get out here! routledge! where you at boy?"

"we gotta leave!" kiara whisper shouted at all of them. "window! window." she directed them.

dakota flinched from all the sounds coming from the house and she tried her hardest to stop shaking. ptsd is a bitch, especially when those exact sound trigger an episode. but with all her willpower, she pushed her thoughts the the back of her head and tried to help jam open the window.

"hurry!"

grunting, she started getting frustrated that the window wouldn't open.

"what— what's happening?" kiara asked looking over their shoulders to see that the window wasn't opening. "why is it taking so long?"

"it's painted shut." jj informed her.

pope gently pushed her away and took her spot to try it with jj, yet it still didn't open.

dakota looked over at john b who had his back to the door, in case the men tried to barge in.

"guys, here i got this." kiara declared holding up a letter opener and ran it along the bottom of the window.

"come on." jj rushed.

"i'm going as fast as i can."

dakota was biting her nails harshly, wanting this to be over already and started freaking out when she heard one of the men trying to open the bedroom door.

"you better not be in there!" yelled the mans voice as he continued to turn the door nob. dakota rushes over to hold her hands onto the door as pope and john b leaned their backs against it. however, they all rushed away once the man started kicking at the door, successfully kicking down some of the wood on the door.

all of a sudden the sound of a gunshot rang through the air and once again, dakota was forced into full on panic mode. hyperventilating she ran over to kiara. "please go faster." she begged wanting to get out of the house.

"i got it, i got it." kiara finally got the window to open. and one by one, they all rushed out the window making their way to the chicken coop.

dakota pushed herself as deep into the walls of it as she could begging in her head that they don't get caught. he eyes widened as the rooster started growing even louder, she feared that it was blowing their cover.

"do something pope shut him up." jj commanded from his spot next to dakota as he pet her hair knowing it calms her down and that she was totally freaking out at the moment. he wanted to make sure that she was one hundred percent comfortable because he couldn't have her getting one of her panic attacks at the moment knowing that it would get them killed. dakota looked through the walls and saw that one of the men now had his full attention on the chicken coup. she saw him reach to the side of his jeans and pull out his gun. she couldn't help but stare at it in fear.

"what do you want me to do?" pope whisper shouted at him.

"pet it, or talk to it. i don't know." kiara advised while crying.

removing her gaze from the gun, dakota pushed her head into her hands trying to control her breaths. she lifted her head when she felt jj's hand leave from its position on her head.

she saw him rush over to the rooster to try and get it to stop crowing and started holding onto its neck until it snapped. dakota's eyes widened at the sight of the dead rooster before once again shutting them tightly not wanting to see the morbid sight.

"it's okay, it's okay." jj rushed over quietly and started repeating it, pulling her body into his pushing her head deep into his chest to muffle her cries knowing that they were very close to being caught.

dakota thanked god when she finally heard one of the men yelling to the other to leave and finally they heard them get back into their truck and drive away and slowly she found herself able to control her breathing.