by Chuck Rogers
It was tits.
Until we went behind the barn.
The ground around back was dirt and shaded by oak trees. I held up a fist. "Hold up."
Chop looked around. "What?"
It had rained long and hard within the last forty-eight hours.
There were tracks all over the place. Lots of them. Dozens, maybe more. I took a knee. The tracks trampled all over each other but plenty were clear.
The individual who'd left the track I was looking at wore at least a size sixteen shoe. He was only wearing one. Last I'd heard there were no barefoot kickers in the NFL anymore. The uneven, bigfoot-bigboot-bigfoot-bigboot track in soil made me nervous.
It just wasn't natural.
Chop looked around at the ground and got it. "That's a fuckload of prints."
There was a gate in the horse fencing. The gate hung open. A riding trail lead into the trees behind the house and up into the hills.
The flock, whoever they were, had headed that way.
MMA girl spoke out of turn. "How old are the tracks?"
Chop backhanded her to the ground. "Got anything else to say?"
MMA girl lay on the ground with a bloody nose. She vibrated with the need to take Chop to the dirt and put a submission hold on him. "No, sir."
"Then get the fuck up." Chop spent a moment examining the tracks. "How old are the tracks?"
The math was pretty easy. "This happened after the rain. If they'd come through the next day in the mud it'd be smeared to hell and gone. These are pretty crisp. The ground had some time to dry out. Gotta be within the last 24. Maybe last twelve."
Chop was impressed
Barney Bob Mohawk gripped his crow bar. "Jesus."
Chop looked around nervously. "What do you think, Frame?"
I liked the fact that I was being called by name, trusted with firearms and consulted on my expertise. I didn't care for the circumstances at all. "Boss, I got a bad feeling. I think we should pull back. I think if we go any further into Agoura we need to come in heavy."
"Yeah," Chopped nodded vigorously. That was exactly what he wanted to hear. "Yeah, let's form up, get out of here and report."
My shoulders twitched and twitched again.
MMA girl saw the look on my face. "What?"
Ants crawled across my skin. I pulled back the sleeve of my Barney gear. I had chicken skin and every hair was standing up.
Chop stared. "What the fuck, Frame? You got Spidey-senses?"
I jumped to my feet and leveled Dez's revolver at the trees.
God help me, I was getting a hard on.
The divining rod between my legs was not wrong.
One-shoe Sasquatch came sauntering out of the wood like today was any other day at the ranch. The majority of his body looked like cooked shrimp right down to the colors and texture. He had that 'wearing one-shoe limp' and other than the boot the only other thing he wore were sunglasses.
And an erection.
It was profoundly disturbing.
Up to this point it was the most disturbing thing I'd seen in my life.
And I'd seen a shaved, mutant rape bear.
The fact that a man looking like that was giving me a hard-on took it to the realms Lovecraftian nightmare.
I snapped my head back towards the house. "Run! Get back and tell everyone to form up!"
Chop's shotgun blasted and shook leaves in the trees about a good meter wide and high.
One-shoe didn't give a shit.
Snub-nosed revolvers were short-range propositions. "You! Fuck off!"
One-shoe focused on me. His all-you-can-eat-shrimp lips parted and he made the most horrible noise I'd ever heard.
" . . . hoo."
And I've been in prison.
Chop let fly again and I have no idea where his buckshot went.
I let One-shoe get within ten meters and shot him in the chest. Didn't even register. I shot him in the chest again and that buckled him to one knee. I walked up and shot him in the forehead.
He fell on his face in his own tracks.
Chop's eyes rolled like terrified horse. "Oh, fuck! Oh, fuck me, fuck!"
MMA girl shook. "There's never just one."
I took command.
"I said run!"
We ran.
The burned and turned came out of the trees.
They came over and through the horse fencing from all sides.
I heard guns going off up the street.
The SOG was under attack.
The burned were in various states of dress and undress. They were in various burned states that ranged from lobster red to shrimp pink. There were a couple of the brothers and sisters who seemed to have turned an aubergine color with swathes of fuchsia burn rippling across their bodies. Most of the burned were wearing sunglasses and that implied some kind of thought process going on.
So did an ambush.
Then again none of them had guns or blades or seemed to care about a dress code.
Some of them boiled out of the woods ahead of us.
There was going to be a fight.
I shot the first two in front of me and hucked the spent revolver into the face of a Crayola complexioned postal worker who still had his uniform and bag. I took the Halligan bar in both hands. Nothing seemed to intimidate these fucks. They were coming for our asses and they weren't stopping for shit.
There were men.
There were women.
God help me there were children.
A eggplant colored little ballerina with pink blisters that matched her slippers charged me snapping her teeth.
I took her jaw off with the prying blade.
One more stain on my soul.
A purple guy who might have been her dad came at me screaming with his fingers antlered into claws.
He got the Halligan spike through the face.
We broke through and ran for the driveway.
Nothing better was going on.
Choi brother Peter was eye rolling as he got drilled from behind while he got the worst blowjob of all time that consisted of biting and swallowing. Another burned bit out his throat and there was no saving him.
Young Choi brother Phil was impressively spinning and throwing kicks and strikes but he was being swarmed and about to go down. Me, Chop and MMA girl counter-swarmed. Chop's shotgun was empty and he swung it like a bat. Mohawk Bob was gone and MMA girl lashed out with his crowbar.
We suddenly found ourselves in a very brief pocket of calm.
"Peter!" Phil was screaming and crying for his brother. "Peter!"
"He's gone!" I grabbed his arm and flung him forward. "Move! Move! Move!"
We got to the driveway.
Choi brother Paul had already been torn apart and they were eating him. Marrs was in the back of a pick-up with four guys spraying their rifles into the burned. Marrs roared. "Come on! Come on! Come on!"
Me, Chop, Phil and MMA made it to the truck. We jumped into the bed and Marrs slapped the roof of the cab. "Go! Go! Go!"
"Wait you motherfuckers!" Dez ran out of the house. "Wait!"
The burned boiled around both sides of the house in competing waves.
She wasn't going to make it.
Marrs grimaced and slapped the cab roof again. "Go!"
Dez called desperately. "Wait!"
Marrs wasn't waiting. The truck pealed out.
Dez screamed. "Goddammit!!!"
I snatched the bayonet out of Phil Choi's web gear. "Gimme that."
I'd left lots of people behind in my life.
But never on the field of battle.
I jumped out.
Marrs roared. "Frame!"
I ran forward.
I heard tires scream behind me.
I scooped up Choi brother Paul's fallen rifle.
It was empty.
I was going to have to do this the hard way.
There aren't many of us left. But go ahead. Go ask any soldier who ever got the command to fix bayonets in battle.
>
It focuses your ass.
I clicked the bayonet onto that empty M16A2.
I was focused.
I was the killing machine my Uncle Sam had made me.
I now had a hard-on for the correct reason.
The enemy were un-organized, grabasstic pieces of cooked-shrimp looking shit.
I was a minister of death whose prayer for war had been answered.
Dez got tackled from behind and went down. She went all stabby with that great big knife of hers but two more piled on biting and tearing at her.
I gave the burned the war face and I charged.
"Oo-raaaaaaaaah!"
Not to brag, but my Marine Corps 'Oorah!' has the power to make bloodthirsty mutants stop what they're doing and look up.
That got the one on top the butt-stroke from hell. The second I sliced across the throat with the return stroke. The bubble-faced bitch trying to bite off Dez's nose looked up and snapped her teeth at me.
"Eat this!" I rammed the bayonet through her teeth and stopped her glottis with steel. Dez got a knee underneath her and I hauled her the rest of the way up. "Go!"
The burned came on screaming. I gutted one, crushed the face of another and bayoneted the next in the throat. I gave it to them man, woman and child.
Then they were all over me.
Then Chop was beside me swinging his shotgun like a lumberjack. The burner trying to wrestle my rifle away from me got Dez's knife in the neck. MMA girl had upgraded to my Halligan bar and swung with a will. Choi brother Phil literally flew past in a flying kick that toppled a turned and the two burned behind it.
I was in full berserker mode.
"We can take these assholes! We can take them!"
The burned and turned flew in every ruptured direction as the truck rammed the mob. Marrs bellowed down at me in awe and rage. "Get in the fucking truck, Frame!"
Team Barney exfilled.
My legs were still flailing off the tailgate as pick up tore backwards in reverse. People grabbed me and hauled me in the burned hooted and gave chase. Several of us nearly went flying as the driver pulled a very respectable bootlegger's turn and roared out onto the road. I sat up in the truck bed and tried to get air into my lungs. Choi brother Phil sobbed and pulled at his hair for his lost brothers.
"Sweet fuck, Frame!" Chop grabbed my shoulders and started shaking me. "Sweet fucking fuck!"
I gasped. "Water."
"Oh, fuck yeah. Give the man some fucking water!"
A prospect I didn't know pushed a bottle of water into my hands. I drank half of it without stopping. I handed it to Chop and flopped backwards. I flopped into Dez's lap.
She smiled at me.
I looked up and found Marrs looming. His facial expression could best be described as total disbelief. "Frame?"
"Yeah, boss?"
He finally pointed at the front of my bloodstained purple sweat pants. "You have an erection."
Chop was so happy he didn't know what to do. "And it's a monster!"
Marrs just stared.
I think he was starting to respect me.
I closed my eyes, relaxed into Dez and let the adrenalin reaction pass. Dez touched my face. Her thumb slowly stroked the longest bear scar on my cheek.
Yeah, Dez. How you like me now?
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Ain't talkin bout love.
THE STRIPPING TEAMS PULLED BACK to Saratoga Hills. It was considered pacified territory, but after the shrimper horde attack God only knew what was safe anymore. They re-hooded the provisionals, put them in the Uhauls and sent them back to A-Camp. I was still wearing my Barney regalia but me and the survivors of my unit were taken back to camp in the back of the pick-up and not wearing a hoods.
A-Camp was in some park land in Simi Valley.
Pick-ups and SUVs loaded with heavy weapons and dripping with gunmen rolled the other way. Someone had taken my advice and the Sons of Ged were hitting Agoura heavy. I watched the convoys roll past and if I'd had any doubts before I had none now.
Ged had an army.
I sat against a tree. I'd gotten out of the burned and turned attack mostly unscathed but it had been a long couple of days. I looked up to find MMA girl staring down at me. She shook her head. "Jesus Christ."
"Frame'll do."
She looked both ways and spoke low. "Listen, I don't want to be raped or killed."
"Me neither. That Dickie guy scares me."
MMA wasn't laughing. "Dickie scares the shit out of me and everyone is saying you're already made. Can I stick close to you?"
"I was gonna go down before the burned. Then you were fighting beside me." I shrugged. "Nothing I don't owe you."
MMA snuggled in. She had a strong face but big brown eyes and she was pretty when she smiled.
"I don't know your name."
"Leatha."
Leatha smelled like sweat, blood and death. It did not diminish my hard-on. I knew I'd seen her before.
"Leatha So Many Weapons Steel."
She grinned against me. "That's me!"
"I've seen you fight."
She stared at the front of my pants and got quiet. "I don't want to be raped or killed."
"Me neither."
"Listen, I mostly date black guys."
I nodded. "Me too."
Leatha nearly lost it. "Where have you been all my life?"
I gave her the standard answer. "Lurking."
Leatha flinched as Dez loomed over us. "Getting cozy?"
I grinned up. "Want to join us?"
For a second I thought I had gone too far. Then she looked Leatha up and down from head to toe. "Maybe later. Meantime, no fucking for provos without permission. Speaking of which, stand up."
Leatha and I stood up.
"Take off that Barney shit."
We stripped.
I was really hoping I wasn't going to get kicked in the nuts.
We stood there naked. Well, I had a necklace.
"What the fuck is wrong with you, Frame?" Dez stared at me and my hard-on. "Do you have a condition or something?"
"I don't know, Dez. I'm laying in the shade with a hot blonde MMA bitch and all I can do is think of you."
Leatha gave me a pretty sharp elbow in the ribs.
Dez smiled.
I heard the footsteps. There were way too many of them. I closed my eyes. Leatha heard it a second later and turned around in time to take it in the face.
The NFL-size coolers full of Lake Malibou water hit us in a wave.
Where did they get ice?
Then came the hooting, hollering, back pounding and shoulder shaking. Gedheads I mostly didn't know crowded around me, hugged me and inadvertently touched my rampant penis.
Oh, well.
Camaraderie.
And then?
There was Dickie.
He punched me in one shoulder and then the other. "Fuckin' Frame! I know I gave you shit, but I knew you were the shit! I knew it! I fuckin' knew it."
"Dickie?" I was prepared to be the big man. "I knew I had to impress the shit out of you."
And then there was Marrs. "Dickie, Lemmy is bringing the hounds. Ged wants every last one of this burned herd hunted down. He wants Agoura pacified before we push on Malibu."
And there it was. That almost affected my hard-on.
Marrs stared at it again. "Do you have a medical problem?"
"Naw, I just have a hard-on for what remains."
That got some whoops and cheers and shoulder pounding.
Marrs almost smiled and then didn't.
He was going to be harder to convert to Team Frame than Dickie.
"I know how to track. If Dickie wants me on his team I'll go."
"I've been told you deserve some rest. You and her. You're not prospects yet, but go to the member mess tent. Stockpot is doing his steamed dog meat tonight. You don't want to miss that. Tomorrow you go see the man. Dickie, with me."
Marrs and Dickie jumped up into a truck.
&
nbsp; Dez looked up at me. "I was gonna nominate you and her both prospect, but Marrs beat me to it."
"Really?"
"Yeah, me and Chop both seconded it. It's not official. That shit has to get voted on. But you sort of have special status at the moment. Try not to fuck it up."
"I won't."
Then again, knowing me . . .
Dez jumped into a truck. "Come to my trailer tonight. Bring your girlfriend."
* * *
I didn't see any way I could say no. I needed every last true son and daughter of Ged hero-worshipping the mighty Frame ASAP. The Santa Muerte medal felt uncomfortable against my chest as Leatha and I walked over to the member trailers. The good news was that I was full of steamed dog with leeks. Stockpot was a short, scrawny, potbellied guy of indeterminate Asianess with a horrific comb-over. Oddly enough he was wearing a vest over his wife-beater. It road-named him STOCKPOT and his office said COOK.
He was doing something right.
He was also wearing a ring.
It had a dragon on the top and I knew if he reversed it there was a tiger beneath. There was a martial arts movie where the hero had a ring like that. It was kind of bullshit, except that the founder of American Kenpo, Ed Parker, was said to have a gold ring like it. It wasn't official regalia but a lot of practitioners liked to wear a tiger and dragon ring. I was going to buy myself one when I made black belt but we all know how that ended.
Stockpot was wearing the ring.
I covered my right fist with my left hand and gave Stockpot the Kenpo bow.
His eyes flared and he gave it back.
Rumor was a lot of tonight's steamed dog was coyote.
Stockpot gave me an extra portion that he insisted was Pug.
There wasn't a whole lot of celebration. Members, prospects and provisionals had died, but I got a lot of shoulder slams and affirmations. Leatha drafted on my awesomeness and thanked me for not getting harassed and felt up for the first time in days.
We went to go see Dez.
"Are you down for this?" I asked honestly. "We did good. I think I can refuse and we both make it out okay."
I would have described Leatha's stride as resolute. "I'll fuck you tonight because you're the shit and I kind of want to."
Nice.