Plebs

by Jim Goforth

  As luck would have it, Drake and whatever companions he had with him arrived at Bodyworx in just enough time to spy Corey's car sitting conspicuously out front. Consequently here they were now and seemingly in no rush to keep moving.

  Should he call Lee again and tell him the latest developments, Corey wondered and swiftly elected not to.

  Since he was under the impression that Drake had not followed him from home, but had come here under the guidance of Haskell, Corey decided he wouldn't further worry his friends back home with this news. Instead he only had to worry the friends he currently had with him.

  Outside they were still as jocular as ever, chattering in jovial banter which hardly suggested they were in actuality preparing for a battle in which a body count would not be preventable.

  Most turned their attention to Corey as he stepped back outside and Ryan frowned at Corey's grave demeanour.

  "What's up Summertime? Someone steal your lunch money?"

  "Jackass!" Corey snapped at him. "No. Worse. You were right; the bullies who are likely to steal everybody's lunch money have been duly notified. Wesley Drake is here."

  "What?"

  "Who's Wesley Drake?" Jess asked, a fair question coming from her.

  "Drake is one of Haskell's chums. His Range Rover is parked across the street."

  "He didn't follow us from your place did he?" Enquired Desiree. "I didn't notice anyone tailing us and I'm pretty sure nobody did."

  "No, I didn't see anyone either. My suspicion is Haskell has sent all his friends around to all our known hangouts. I bet Drake has parked hidden somewhere nearby and saw us come in. And now he's parked very conspicuously outside as if he doesn't care if we know that he's here."

  "Is he by himself?"

  "I don't know, I doubt it. I bet King is with him."

  "King's another of this Haskell's friends I assume?" Jess assumed.

  "Yeah. Drake's shadow."

  "Shit, what are we gonna do?" Ryan wondered.

  "Go out blasting?" Peter suggested, waving a snub-nosed police issue service revolver garnered from Corey's gun sack and originally a present to Carson Somerset from a retired police sergeant.

  "Leave this to me," Blaise volunteered. She tapped the pistol holstered on her hip. "Range Rover you said?"

  "Yeah white. Rego 'BIGWES'."

  "Okay. I'll take care of this."

  "Hang on, hang on. No shooting, no dead people. I want them alive."

  "What for?" Blaise didn't see the point.

  "I want to find out what they know. How many other idiot friends of Haskell's are involved, what Haskell and Raven plan to do, you know, any handy information."

  "Alright," Blaise seemed downright disappointed. "Well can I hurt them a little bit?"

  As she asked that a mental picture arose unbidden in Corey's mind, one from many years back. It was one of Wesley Drake standing with one foot on Lee Hunter's throat while Dennis King sat perched upon Lee's chest. Both bullies threatened to urinate in Lee's mouth, an eventuality which luckily for Lee never occurred.

  With this vision uppermost in Corey's mind he had no qualms about granting Blaise's request.

  "Sure," he said with an accompanying nod. "Yeah. Rough those bastards up some."

  "Great." Blaise smiled, a malevolent expression indeed and took her immediate leave of their presence, skirting up the back of the neighbouring warehouse to the right and then vanishing up a side alleyway.

  "Shit, what's she gonna do?" Peter mused.

  "Will she be alright?" Ryan wondered, obviously asking a question deemed stupid by the likes of Desiree and Jess.

  They both looked incredulously at him as if he'd asked them to sing the National Anthem as a duet in Gregorian chant.

  "You may not have noticed," said Desiree. "But Miss Blaise is no cotton wool princess. She doesn't need any man to hold her hand for anything. Have you forgotten that she was Black Widow Justice? She's taken down far tougher men than these amateurs, I almost feel sorry for them."

  "Don't". Peter voiced what Corey was thinking. "These fuckknuckles are meathead animals. They don't deserve sorrow or pity."

  "Let's go up this way," Corey suggested, pointing to the left-hand side of the building through which he and Desiree had come, right hand side from the street. "Just in case she needs back up. There could a truckload of Haskell's mates out there."

  "Everybody armed?"

  "Except me," said Ryan.

  "Christ, pick something!" Corey snapped then shadowed by Desiree he stalked up alongside the shops wall, drawing out his weapon as he did.

  He felt Desiree lightly press a palm of reassurance against the small of his back as he halted at the mouth of the alley.

  Poking his head out and around, ready to lower his pistol and blast he saw the Range Rover still in its parked position. The vehicle had one occupant sitting in the passenger seat, but Corey wasn't quite certain if it was Wesley Drake.

  There was no sign of Blaise as yet and Corey didn't especially want to expose himself any further, suspecting that the cars occupant had a decent view of Bodyworx and its perimeters in his rearview mirror.

  "What's happening?" Ryan called in a stage whisper from somewhere behind him and Jess promptly urged him to be quiet.

  Suddenly Corey saw Blaise appear, stalking rapidly down the street like a panther prowling for prey. She was at the Range Rover in a flash, taking the solitary occupant by complete surprise regardless of his rearview mirror vision. With one hand she reached rapidly inside the open window of the car and snatched something from the passenger. With her other hand full of pistol she jammed the nose of the gun up under the gobsmacked occupant’s ear.

  She flung the item away behind her and as it cartwheeled across the concrete Corey identified it as a mobile telephone.

  "You Big Wes?" Blaise snarled at her bailed up victim. "Come on, get out!"

  Taking the gun away from the unfortunate soul, but never lowering the deadly muzzle of it, Blaise yanked open the door and grabbed a handful of the fellow’s coat, hauling him bodily out into the street.

  As the unlucky wretch was dragged stumbling onto the concrete Corey instantly recognised him as Dennis King, Wesley Drake's habitual companion.

  "No I ain't!" King protested, flinging a pair of hands skywards. "Don't shoot me, I don't know anything! This ain't my car, I was just sleeping in it, I don't even know Wesley Drake!"

  Corey almost laughed out loud and he could see Blaise was trying not to do the same.

  Clearly Dennis King, far from being the sharpest tool in the shed, hadn't particularly thought his response through entirely.

  Blaise definitely hadn't asked if he was Wesley Drake.

  "I can't recall asking anything about Wesley Drake," Blaise said, the unrelenting eye of the pistol locked squarely on King's rat-like face.

  "Yes you did, you asked...oh fuck," King's beady eyes widened as he realised his folly.

  "I don't know anything," he reasserted, keeping his paws high in the sky.

  "What's happening?" Ryan chimed in again, desperate to know the score.

  "She's got Dennis King bailed up," Corey advised, laughter ominously close to bursting out of him. "Don't know where Drake is though."

  Wesley Drake was there, but that fact was acknowledged by Corey just a fraction too late.

  Big Wes came sliding out from underneath Corey's parked car so fast he was just a blur, straightening and charging across the street, swinging a piece of timber paling.

  "Blaise! Look out!" Corey yelled a frantic warning and the redhead swiveled around.

  Drake was already in mid swing and the section of wood aimed for Blaise's back connected hard with her hip, knocking her over backwards. As she slid on her back on the concrete Drake dropped his weapon and leaped atop her, kneeling astride her.

  Without warning he clenched a meaty fist and socked Blaise in the jaw, clobbering her head against the sidewalk.

  By the time he was winding up to deliver another
savage blow Corey was on the scene, swinging his right foot in a great scything arc of a kick. The hard toe of his boot slammed with maximum force into Drake's spine and the aggressor straightened up with a guttural howl of pain, instinctively snatching at the abused area with the hand he'd been about to belt Blaise with.

  Corey wasn't through yet; he brought his left arm swinging around in a mighty roundhouse punch intended to take Drake's head off his body, connecting satisfyingly with Big Wes's jaw.

  As Drake tumbled off Blaise, rolling on the concrete, bellowing like an enraged bull Corey followed him with a vicious onslaught of kicks to the ribs.

  Dennis King swung an inept punch at Corey's moving figure and then Ryan and Peter rushed him, seizing him with an arm each, hurling him back against the Range Rover.

  Desiree and Jess crouched beside Blaise, but she was already sitting up, no pain reflected in her eyes, only a cold hard stare.

  Corey flung Drake over onto his back and stuck the pistol in his face.

  The urge to squeeze the trigger and spray-paint the concrete with Drake's scant brain matter was almost overwhelming, but Corey resisted it.

  "Get up you prick," Corey ordered.

  "I can't, you broke my fucking back, you fucker."

  "Get up or I'll piss in your mouth," Corey threatened.

  It was hardly funny, but Peter couldn't help guffawing.

  "What the fuck?" Drake wasn't amused.

  "Remember the time you threatened to piss in Lee's mouth you degenerate? Well fucking get up or it's happening to you."

  "You wouldn't..."

  "Do it!" Ryan urged, delighted by the possibility.

  "Let me go!" King suddenly wailed.

  "Pipe down Dennis," Peter advised.

  "Get up!" Corey roared and stamped suddenly on Drake's abdomen.

  Wheezing and spluttering Drake struggled to a seated position, a great red welt beginning to appear along his jaw line.

  Slowly Wesley Drake stood up, surveying his enemies with angry wary eyes.

  Dennis King watched the scenario from his position, firmly pinned to the body of the Range Rover by the strong grasp of Pete and Ryan. Now and then he would resume struggling to escape with renewed vigour, but his captors were having none of it. Peter threatened to rearrange his facial features very shortly if he didn't quit his shenanigans so King dutifully ceased struggling, sensing the pair weren't about to relinquish their tight holds.

  Wesley Drake stood in the centre of the gathering, his big ham-like hands clenching furiously in tight fists.

  For the majority of the time he kept his angry eyes on Corey, though really he should have been keeping his utmost attention on the vibrant redhead who was stalking towards him, a steely glare dominating her visage.

  As Drake finally turned his eyes toward her Blaise abruptly smiled, and the apparently cheerful expression she wore was somehow far more creepy and menacing than any cold blackbrowed scowl.

  It all made Corey very very glad that he wasn't Wesley Drake.

  Blaise holstered her pistol -not once had she dropped it during Drake's violent attack- and stopped pacing, halting a couple of feet away from Drake.

  "So, you like to hit girls do you?" Blaise asked of Drake, her smile still firmly affixed to her beautiful countenance. She had a tiny thin trickle of blood curling down her chin from the corner of her lips, but she appeared not to have noticed it.

  "Yeah," Drake grunted bluntly. "I love to punch 'em in the kidneys while I'm fucking 'em."

  There was a collective gasp of shock on behalf of Jess, Pete and Ryan.

  Drake had said the wrong thing.

  Corey knew it, Desiree sure as hell knew it.

  The only people who didn't know it were Wesley Drake and possibly the moronic Dennis King who really didn't know too much of anything.

  Corey had been expecting the happy smile to drop right off of Blaise's face after Drake uttered his horrendous remark, but it didn't

  It remained in place even as Blaise struck like an attacking cobra.

  If Wesley Drake had been a speeding blur coming out from underneath the Beast then he was moving in exaggerated slow motion compared with the pace Blaise moved now.

  Corey barely saw her move as she covered the short distance between herself and Drake in something like a split second.

  Her hands flashed out, seizing Drake by the ears and then she head-butted him square in the face, mashing his nose flat and dropping him to his knees. As he kneeled in a daze, blood gouting from his mangled nose Blaise brought her left knee savagely up under his chin, smacking his teeth together. Before Drake could fall backwards Blaise swung an enormous right hand roundhouse which rocketed off the side of his head. The thumped head tipped to the left, only to be straightened up by a cannoning left hook.

  Blaise finished off the blinding attack with two short wicked right jabs and a left uppercut which sprawled Drake backwards across the pavement.

  Knocked out cold, Drake lay still and didn't move a muscle.

  Riveted by the spectacle that was Blaise in action, Peter and Ryan weren't paying as much close attention as they should have been to their ensnared captive.

  Such an opportunity was exactly what Dennis King was waiting for.

  As Peter loosened his hold on Dennis' bicep ever so slightly King fell limp and then wrenched that arm with all his might, pulling free. With the newly released arm, King bunched up a fist and drove it furiously into the solar plexus of Ryan.

  Doubling up winded, Ryan let go of King altogether and the escapee scampered off like a liberated spider monkey.

  Where he was headed was anybody's guess, but with Blaise's back turned towards him it was safe to say he was aiming to snatch the gun from the holster on her belt.

  Luck wasn't on his side.

  As he flung himself forward, stretching arms with a curl of grasping fingers, Desiree slung her right foot up in a great scissoring kick which thumped into King's ribcage, punting him like a football. He landed hard on the unforgiving concrete with an agonised yowl and flipped on his side, exposing his front for a follow through kick from Desiree.

  This one glanced off his chest, but hurt him all the same.

  His clasping fingers opened and closed on air and he decided to remain where he fell, moaning and babbling incoherent impotent curses.

  Corey strode over to his limp figure and crouched down alongside it, his pistol held purposefully in his right hand. He figured the others would be keeping an eye on the unconscious Drake who currently posed no great threat to anybody.

  "What did Drake do to my car King?" He addressed the prone Dennis.

  "I told ya..." Dennis King wheezed out with much difficulty. "I...don't know. I don't know anything."

  "That much is obvious. Come on Dennis; don't make it hard on yourself. What did he do to it? What was he doing underneath it?"

  "I don't know. Sleeping I guess. Same as I was doing in his car."

  "Sleeping under my car?" Corey snorted in incredulous disbelief while behind him he heard others stifle derisive laughter.

  "Yeah. I guess. I don't know. I was trying to sleep."

  "With a mobile phone in your hand? Doesn't ring true to me," Corey said, inwardly applauding his own unintended witty pun.

  "I swear. I don't know what he was doing. I don't think he did anything."

  "You know what? I don't fucking believe you. And I sure as hell don't trust you either," Corey said. "So I guess we'll just have to take Drakes car. And you and Drake are coming with us."

  "Like hell," King puffed out.

  "What are you going to do about stopping us?" Corey wanted to know, then to his companions. "Grab Drake and toss him in the Rover. This bastard won't tell me what's been done to the Beast then I can't trust it enough to drive it. Probably get blown to pieces trying to start it up though I doubt either of these numbnuts have enough smarts to pull that off, but can't be too careful. We'll take the Rover."

  "Okay, I'll drive," Blaise decided.
/>
  "I'd kinda prefer you to keep watch on these two dimwits," Corey said. "You and Desiree. The rest of you keep your eyes peeled for any cops, or Errol Haskell or a whole bunch of weird looking creatures, it's starting to get dark now. We gotta get back to the house very soon."

  "Don't worry about Dennis King," vowed Ryan, still hunched down alongside the Range Rover sucking in deep breaths to recover from the rapid blow Dennis King instigated his very brief freedom with. "I'll be keeping an extremely watchful eye on him."

  He hauled himself up to a standing position, rubbing his abdomen with a palm, glowering balefully at the sprawled figure that was Dennis King.

  "Yeah, a real watchful eye," Ryan reiterated firmly, almost as if he wished King would actually be affronted enough to come back for another swing at him. "See how many dirty tricks he gets up to then."

  "I got an idea!" Pete exclaimed. "Ry's got plenty of rope and cord and that kind of stuff inside the shop dontcha? That way we can tie these clowns up and gag 'em with electrical tape or something and then nobody hasta worry about either of them pulling any sort of stunts. Not that Drake looks up to giving anybody grief."

  "Hey!" King protested from the ground. "You can't do that!"

  Squatting Corey flicked King's right ear with a nasty snap of his finger.

  "Pipe down cry baby. I'm not hearing anything useful out of you so don't tell us what we can and can't do. You idiots want to follow us around and fuck with my car on Errol Haskell's say-so we'll do what we damn well please to any of you we get our hands on." He stood up and looked at Ryan.

  "Ry, you and Jess want to go in and get some ropes and stuff? Don't be all night, just grab some gear and come back. We'll get these fools in the car."

  "Right," Ryan trotted off with Jess in tow.

  Desiree opened the left hand side of the Range Rovers back.

  "Where we gonna put them?"

  "Drake, we'll fling him on the floor of the back seat," Corey decided. "People can put their feet on him for all I care. He's in lala land anyway."

  That much was true.

  Wesley Drake was virtually snoring, stretched out on the concrete, a tiny bubble of blood sucking in and out of his left nostril with each exhalation and inhalation of breath.