Next to him, Roger looked just as miserable and was actually quiet for once.
Whatever pitiful country road they were traveling on was in a state of extreme disrepair. Every pebble and crack in the sun-beaten asphalt made the bus rock on its axels.
His window still had a small peephole scratched through the black paint coating.
Teddy kept leaning over and peering outside.
Endless dead fields and scattered farmhouses with their shutters drawn stretched out as far as he could see.
They rolled past weathered billboards which he read with bored fascination.
A couple announced the arrival of the Pratt County Harvest Festival, but Teddy figured that the billboard had turned out to be a goddamn liar by the time the plague passed through. A few others proclaimed the salvation and mercy offered by Jesus Christ, but considering everything that Teddy had witnessed he doubted any truth in those advertisements as well.
One billboard in particular caught his attention.
The advertisement had been scraped away. The message painted sloppily across it in red paint said: Join the Kansas Farmers Freedom Militia TODAY—tyrants and traitors not welcome
Teddy wondered if these were the folks responsible for sabotaging the Topeka settlement. It was only a matter of time before like-minded people would gather and impose their own rules in the absence of law, he figured.
After passing the militia’s billboard, he started noticing KFFM painted on the sides of some of the old barns and houses. Drawings of a skull and crossbones along with KFFM were painted across the side of the overturned semi-truck that lay off the road and sat in the ditch.
Teddy knew that there had to be hundreds of similar ragtag militias scattered throughout the United States fighting for dog-eared pieces of territory to call their own. He thought their motives were just like those of the prison gangs—power for the sake of power.
It was pathetic really.
But honestly, was FEMA any better with their twisted ideology of rebuilding the very same structure of government that had failed in the first place?
Perhaps, the good folks over at KFFM could do a better job. Hell, why not give a chance to the Yankee Doodle Dandy Gang or whatever ridiculous names the other countless militias were going by?
Teddy didn’t care who sat at the throne.
All he wanted to do was to get away from them all.
He had never joined a gang back in prison and he sure as hell didn’t plan on joining one now that he was out.
Roger yawned and looked over at him. “You’re quieter than usual today.”
Teddy looked away from the window and gave a shrug. “I could say the same about you.”
“Uff-da!” he groaned as he cupped his forehead. “Hangovers and bumpy rides don’t go together well, dontcha know… I was hoping for some eggs to soak up the sop in my belly, but no luck.”
“I’m hungry too,” Teddy complained. “You wouldn’t happen to be holding onto a candy bar, would you?”
Roger chuckled. “All I brought is a deck of playing cards that we won’t get to use today.”
Vue rapped his fist repeatedly against the iron grille. “Yo! Shut up back there! No talking!"
They fell silent.
Parham’s attention snapped in their direction. He stood up abruptly and leaned his rifle against the bench. “Who was talking?” he asked in a cold, stern voice. A hand slid down and rested on his holstered pistol.
Teddy knew that the sergeant already knew. It was an excuse for the man to posture and bluster, he thought.
Parham’s gaze was fixated on Teddy. “Who was talking?” he repeated—eyes unwavering.
“Some idiots in the back,” Vue responded passively as he gave a dismissive wave towards the grille.
“I wasn’t asking you, officer,” Parham said without looking away from Teddy. “I was asking them—the cowards in the back who refuse to speak up like men!”
Teddy rolled his eyes and went back to peering out of his window’s peephole.
Parham became enraged upon seeing Teddy’s nonchalant reaction. “Open the grille!”
Vue looked up at him, uncomfortable.
“Sir, we’re moving…” Vue reminded. “Rules say—”
“Fuck the rules!” Parham snarled. He turned his rage towards the officer. “If they try rushing the grille, shoot every last one of them!”
Vue’s eyes shifted from the sergeant to the passengers and then back again.
“I gave you a goddamn order, officer!”
“Yes, sir…” Vue apprehensively stood up and unlocked the grille.
Parham marched down the aisle towards Teddy with his hand wrapped around the pistol’s grip. He glowered at Teddy in a dark, hooded gaze. “Who spoke?” he asked again menacingly.
Roger let out a heavy sigh and started to sit up, but Teddy reached an arm out to stop him.
“Why do you ask when you already know?” Teddy asked without looking away from the window.
Parham stopped and stood in front of Teddy’s row. He puffed his chest out and stared down his nose at him.
A total lack of fear, the sergeant noted.
That was unacceptable.
“Didn’t my officer correct you yesterday?” he asked with narrowed eyes.
“I reckon so.”
“Do you have a problem following rules?”
Teddy slowly turned away from the window and looked up at the short man, unimpressed. “Do you?” He nodded towards Vue. “Your man over there told you not to go through the grille, but fuck the rules, right?”
Tiny veins throbbed across the sergeant’s neck and his brown eyes widened. His whole face took on a wild, savage expression. The hand gripping the pistol started shaking.
Teddy noted the change in the man’s face and decided it’d be best to submit and let him have his little five minutes of glory. “I’m sorry that my words offended you, boss-man… I won’t talk anymore.”
Parham thought the words oozed with insincerity. He quickly pulled his pistol from his holster and pointed it at Teddy’s forehead.
The other passengers gasped and cowered lower in their seats.
Roger’s face paled. “Hey…” he interceded. “My friend here has a nasty habit of speaking off the cuff. Why don’t we all just—”
“Shut up!” Parham cut in. “Say another word and I’ll put a bullet in you too.”
Roger went quiet and looked at Teddy.
Teddy looked down the barrel of the pistol without even flinching. He knew it was all bluster on the diminutive sergeant’s end. “You won’t pull the trigger,” he said flatly. “You’re embarrassing yourself.”
Parham’s brow twitched and a humorless grin formed across his lips.
As Teddy stared into the man’s haunted eyes, he started to wonder if he had misjudged the man. There was a hardness present, a hatred, and it made him think that perhaps the sergeant was crazy enough to do it after-all.
Teddy went cold inside as he tried to read the man’s face.
Parham noticed a change in Teddy’s eyes and it emboldened him—he saw the first glint of fear.
The sergeant wanted more than a mere glint though.
“Maybe I won’t kill you,” Parham thoughtfully mused. “But you’d be surprised what the human body can endure.”
Instead of baiting the unstable man, Teddy stayed silent.
“I can make your hard day of work especially taxing,” the sergeant continued. He lowered the gun and pointed it at Teddy’s right foot. “Have you ever stepped on a nail? I imagine that this will feel a lot like that, only a hell of a lot worse.”
Teddy’s heart raced as his wide eyes stared fearfully at the pistol. He felt his body tense as he braced for the piercing hot lead.
The sergeant finally saw what he wanted to see; he saw raw, unbridled fear in his eyes.
“Sad,” Parham said with a humorless smile. He holstered the pistol. “You’re not even worth a bullet, but if you test me ag
ain, I’ll teach you the meaning of real pain.”
As the sergeant turned and walked back down the aisle towards the front of the bus, Teddy felt his body relax and sensed the adrenaline that still coursed through him. His heart was beating like a jackhammer and his hands trembled.
Roger glanced over at him and frowned when he saw his pallid face. He reached a hand out and gave him a quick reassuring pat on the knee.
Teddy couldn’t even look at the man—he was ashamed for trembling like a coward. He balled his fists to make his hands stop shaking and turned his head towards the window.
Suddenly, something struck the side of the bus with tremendous force.
All of the windows shattered along the left side and everyone seated along those rows were flung aside like ragdolls.
Teddy’s body was pressed against the window and in the next instant, Roger lay squashed up against him.
Whatever struck against the bus continued pushing forward and scraped the crumpled vehicle across the asphalt.
RAT-A-TAT-TAT-TAT reverberated from behind the bus as the Humvee’s gunner started firing the .50 CAL, but whatever was shoving the bus continued unabated.
Salguero, blood streaming down his lacerated face, clutched onto the dashboard radio mic with both hands. His entire left leg was crushed and pinned between the mangled driver’s side panel and the dashboard. He keyed the mic and started screaming: “Transport to six-zero-nine to Jayhawk Control! We’re under attack! Officers down! Need immediate—” His words were cut short by a deafening cacophony of breaking glass, twisting metal, and horrified screams as the bus flipped and rolled off of the country road.
Teddy flew out of his seat and was tossed violently in the air as the bus rolled over and over. Flailing limbs and pieces of metal knocked against him mid-air. In a dizzying fit of pain, he struck the roof and his world faded to black.
CHAPTER 11
Teddy floated back to consciousness and heard sporadic pops of small caliber gunfire in the distance, but the noise of the .50 CAL was gone. His ears rang and excruciating pain ran up and down his back. The coppery taste of blood still lingered in his mouth.
Diesel fumes and exhaust hung heavy in the air along with the tangy stench of gunpowder.
He heard a few others around him groaning in agony and calling for help.
When he opened his eyes, he realized that he was lying sprawled on his back with his arms spread overhead. Each labored breath hurt and his head swam.
Directly above him, he could see the warped remains of the bus seats.
Garbled, distant voices came out of the dashboard CB radio: Break, Jayhawk Control to—
Teddy forced himself to sit up and a fresh wave of pain crashed through his body.
At the front of the bus, past what remained of the grille, the radio mic dangled from side-to-side like a pendulum from the dash suspended overhead. The radio warbled with static. The windshield had been shattered and crushed to a narrow slit. The doors had bowed inward. Hydraulic fluid spritzed out of the door mechanism and onto Salguero’s leg which was still pinned against the frame and the dash, sans his body.
The rest of Salguero had been torn away from his leg and was pinned against one side of the security grille by one of the axels that had punched through the floorboard.
Vue lay upside down against the side of the bus with his head snapped behind his shoulders and both arms bent opposite ways—an image of a destructive toddler going to town on his playthings rose in Teddy’s mind.
The business casual man wasn’t thrown too far away from Vue and lay dead with a sliver of glass sticking out of his throat.
Parham wasn’t anywhere in sight.
The jarring scene of horror made Teddy freeze for a moment as he sat on the floor, mouth agape.
A few other passengers around him were forcing the dead off of them and starting to rise to their feet, shrieking and crying out in pain.
Automatic gunfire rang out from the field nearby and bullets peppered the side of the vehicle. The gunner let out a merciless straight line across the length of the bus.
Bullets ricocheted madly and what little glass was left exploded into tiny shards.
The passengers who were caught standing were quickly cut down as the lead tore through their bodies.
Teddy ducked and covered his head, squeezing his eyes shut as bullets whistled overhead.
After a few moments, the gunfire stopped and the bullet-riddled corpses stumbled drunkenly a few places before they each collapsed to the floor.
Roger, Teddy thought with sudden urgency. He crawled over the dead on his hands and knees searching for the only friend he had managed to make in the camp. He stayed low, making sure to stay below the windows and out of sight. “Roger!” he called out, voice harsh and raw.
A gnarled, gory hand reached out from underneath one of the bodies and grabbed his ankle. “Help me…” a woman’s raspy voice begged.
Teddy tore his ankle free from her weak grasp and continued crawling, searching. Liquid dribbled from the ceiling and the vehicle’s engine gave a few final clunks. His body was freezing. His clothes were getting soaked with diesel.
Everything was saturated with it.
He had to get out—the whole bus was a powder keg waiting to blow.
“Roger!” he frantically called out again.
Finally, not too far away from the grille, he spotted him.
Roger lay impaled by one of the frame’s steel support beams.
He crawled towards Roger and tried to pull him off of the piece of gore-slathered steel, but the body wouldn’t give.
Roger’s skin was already cool to the touch and Teddy knew it was too late.
The man was dead.
Teddy reached up to pass a hand over the man’s eyelids to close them, but he couldn’t even manage that correctly.
Roger’s eyeballs looked grotesque—one lid remained open and the other only closed halfway. It left him with an unsavory postmortem wink instead of the look of eternal rest.
Teddy stared at him for a few seconds, struggling to maintain his own composure.
A second burst of automatic gunfire ricocheted off of the back of the bus and struck down another passenger who had managed to get on her feet.
Teddy’s attention snapped back to his current perilous predicament like a whip.
He looked around for some way out.
The frontend of the bus was crumpled in and impassible.
Teddy turned towards the rear and noticed that the welded seals that once held the emergency exit permanently shut had broken off during the accident.
The exit door stood ajar and flapped lazily in the chilly wind.
Teddy turned and started crawling towards the emergency exit door as panic tightened its grip. He knew that whoever had attacked the bus was watching that damn door and would take a shot as soon as anybody stepped out.
Yet, if he stayed behind, he knew that he’d either burn up or get popped off when the attacker came by to pick through the remains.
All he could do was hope that the person watching the door was a bad shot.
Teddy swung the door open and dropped out onto the grass embankment.
The machinegun’s response was immediate, but sloppy—whoever was manning it probably didn’t think anyone was still alive inside the bus and wasn’t prepared.
Bullets thwacked against the swinging door and pitched dirt up into the air as errant rounds struck the ground.
Teddy scrambled up the embankment as bullets whizzed past him. Shards of glass were embedded deep in his palms and the diesel burned as it seeped over his wounds. Despite the pain that seemed to overwhelm his senses, he forced himself to scurry onwards like a madman.
Once on the asphalt, he rolled over to take cover on the opposite side of the overturned bus and pressed his back against it.
The gunfire struck aimlessly against the bus a few more times and then ceased.
As he caught his breath, he looked with wary eye
s expecting to see some masked gunman ready to unload on him, but he saw no one.
He was safe—if only temporarily.
To Teddy’s right, he saw what had pushed the bus off of the road.
A bulldozer with a maligned bucket loader sat idling in the middle of the road amongst a sea of shattered glass and pieces of steel paneling. It had comically sharp teeth spray-painted across the front loader and left muddy tracks across the road from an overturned grain silo where it had been hiding and waiting for its next victim. The corpse of a grizzly-looking white man wearing military fatigues sat slouched in the cab—he had been shot in the head. His uniform bore some homemade insignias and had KFFM in place of where the U.S. Army patch would’ve normally been.
Teddy tried to stand, but his right leg was numb.
Confused, he looked down and noticed a crimson blossom forming in the middle of his thigh. His diesel-soaked denim gave the blood an oily sheen.
I’ve been shot, he realized.
Whatever numbing effects the adrenaline had had was starting to wear off, and now intense pain radiated up his leg all the way to his core.
“Great,” Teddy grumbled between his teeth. He scowled and forced himself up.
Spent brass shell casings lay everywhere at his feet.
Teddy glanced around the rear of the bulldozer and rested an arm against it to catch his breath, and take some weight off of his injured leg.
Across the street, parked about one-hundred yards away in a frozen field of corn, three pick-up trucks with oversized tires sat parked in a line. The truck in the center of the convoy had a machinegun mounted on its bed which was manned by a bald white man with flabby arms. The fat gunner kept his weapon pointed towards the bus, his face contorted in a fanatic wide mouthed grin.
Six others, all men, sat crouched in the dead stalks between the pick-ups and were armed with hunting rifles and a few shotguns. The men were dressed in an odd hodgepodge of army uniforms and woolen winter gear.
Proud members of the farmer’s militia, Teddy thought.
A few yards in front of the bus, Teddy spotted the back of the Humvee that had been escorting them as it sat disabled in the middle of the road. Most of the vehicle’s armored paneling was so badly riddled with bullet holes that the plates barely remained attached to the frame. Thin tendrils of smoke rose from the engine and the remnants of the passenger-side door lay on the asphalt along with numerous glass shards.
Absolution Page 13