The Last War Series Box Set [Books 1-7]

by Schow, Ryan

The instant these guys saw him (he counted six total), they nodded his way and changed their gait, which became predictably thuggish. Great, he thought. Awesome. One of them pulled out a pistol, walked with it at his side. This must be the leader.

  Rider never once broke stride, nor did he draw a weapon. If he played his cards right, he could get past them without incident. It wasn’t looking likely though.

  Rider slid his hand into his pocket and brought out a fresh stick of gum. He unwrapped the stick, spit the over-chewed nub in his mouth into the foil, then rolled it up and shoved it in his pocket. When he slid the fresh stick in his mouth, it was an amazing burst of fruity flavor, the third best thing that happened to him that day.

  Chewing his gum, getting it soft in his mouth, his eyes worked quickly to assess his surroundings. The six of them were fifty feet away and closing. Each of them wore dark sunglasses and each of them looked like they were strapped, even though the lead was the only one with his gun pulled.

  Yeah, this was going to be a problem.

  He’d just passed the baseball field, which had fifty or sixty foot nets and limited entry points, if any; he was now heading into a full residential block of only decorative trees and a few cars for cover, so this wasn’t looking so promising either.

  Eyes roving, all he saw were alcoves to front doors that weren’t deep, and garage doors that were flush with the house. To make matters worse, each house was like so many other houses here in that they were on zero lot lines with shared walls, which meant no escape alleys or places for cover if a shootout unfolded.

  A Chinese woman with her small son opened her front door, saw him and startled. “Get back inside, lock your doors,” he said.

  She did as instructed.

  The six guys fanned out so he couldn’t pass them on the sidewalk. He thought about stepping off into the street where a Honda Accord had slammed into a lifted Chevy Silverado and was abandoned.

  It wouldn’t work for cover for long, though, so he decided to meet the pack head on.

  “Afternoon fellas,” he said.

  “Whatchu doin’ pops?” the lead clown asked. Black or tan slacks, white button ups, slicked back hair and tattoos—these guys were low-level foot soldiers out on patrol.

  “Just passing through,” he said, ignoring the comment about his age. “You?”

  “Expanding our influence,” the lead said, pushing the words on him like a stiff shove. Then, with a fake smile, he said, “And for that we need weapons and ammo.”

  “I have both,” Rider offered knowing exactly where this was going.

  “No kidding, ese,” one mumbled, causing the others to snicker.

  Subtly, the group pulled in closer to make a smiley-face mouth around him. It wasn’t a huge, sweeping smile, but it was enough to tell him they weren’t your garden variety meat heads.

  Tilting his head, reaching over his shoulder, he lifted the modified AR-15 off his back, set it on the ground between them to the left. He unholstered his two Glocks, laid them down on the sidewalk as well, one on either side of his feet. After that he put two of the three knives on the ground and then, from his pocket, his last foil-wrapped piece of chewing gum.

  When he glanced up, they were all looking at each other like they couldn’t believe how easy it was. But none of this was going to be easy for them. Himself included.

  “That’s it?” one said.

  “That’s it,” he replied with an easy smile.

  “You’ve still got one more knife,” the lead said, using his weapon as a pointer. He was pointing at the eight inch blade on Rider’s hip. “Set it down there with the others.”

  “I have a bullet lodged in my right leg,” Rider lied. “I need the knife to dig it out when I get to where I’m going.”

  “Which is where?”

  “None of your business,” he said, politely.

  “Well I’m sure they have knives where you’re headed, so just put that one down and you can move on.”

  “I’d love to, since you seem like nice kids,” he said, getting frowns and a few disbelieving chortles, “but this knife is staying with me.”

  “Kick the weapons to us,” one of them barked, pointing at his guns. The lead was probably five feet away. He was at least eight feet from the guys flanking him.

  “What’s your name?” Rider asked, looking only at him, not the others.

  “Roberto,” he said.

  “You’re not a very good listener, Bob,” Rider said. “Does your old lady tell you that? If she does, then she’s a keeper because man, it’s true.”

  Now comes the posturing, the mean-mugging, the threatening weapon routine. Roberto pointed his gun right at Rider and said, “Now puta.”

  Taking a deep breath, aware of every single muscle in his body and mentally supercharging them, he calmly said, “My sight’s not so good, cataracts in my left eye, shrapnel in my right, but are you pointing a gun at me? Because I gave you my guns already.”

  “Kick them here!” he barked.

  “Let me say this for the cheap seats,” Rider said, his impatience showing. “I have a bullet lodged in my right leg, so if I try to kick anything, I’m pretty sure the pain will make me pass out. And if I try to kick with my left, I’ll have to stand on my right, which will surely buckle. So let me reiterate this as politely as I can, take my weapons if you want, take my life if you need to, but I can’t have this bullet in my leg much longer without risking infection so stop asking for my knife and just take what I gave you.”

  Roberto pulled back the slide, chambered a round.

  “I ain’t asking no more, pops,” he warned. “Kick the weapons our way, with or without your gimp leg.”

  “No.”

  For what felt like five lifetimes they stood there. Rider didn’t back down; they didn’t back down. No one even blinked. Finally one of the guys from the peanut gallery chimed in.

  “He’s just an old man.”

  “Don’t let the gray hair fool you, ese,” Roberto said. “He’s young. Forty maybe, forty-five.”

  “Fifty-three,” Rider lied. In truth, he was ten years younger than he’d just claimed and in excellent shape.

  One of the guys said, “I can’t tell if he’s ex-military or a male model.”

  The five of them had a laugh, but Roberto failed to see the humor. He was the one Rider worried about most.

  “Male model,” Rider lied. “But don’t go getting your hopes up fellas. I’m a girls-only kind of guy.” Fake-hobbling back a step, Rider motioned to the weapons and said, “Have at them. I even left a piece of gum there for the soft looking kid on the end.”

  “Ain’t no one soft here but you, cabrón,” Roberto said. “Turn around and walk your dumb ass away.”

  “I’m not going that way, Bob,” Rider responded. Giving a forward nod, he said, “I’m headed that way, and right now you’re blocking me. Also, keep in mind I was minding my own business when you came up on me. If you want my weapons, I’ve given them to you. But if you want to sit around in some sort of testosterone-laden circle jerk, honestly, you can do that all by yourselves without me having to watch, so do your thing already then get the hell out of the way.”

  Annoyed, but bested, Roberto stowed his gun in his slacks at the small of his back then stepped forward and grabbed the AR. The minute Roberto bent down, Rider grabbed his knife and in an almost otherworldly display of speed and precision, he blew past Roberto, but not before trenching open the man’s carotid artery with a ferocious sweep of the blade.

  Rider was suddenly in the mix of the other five thugs who were scrambling for position. Time compressed itself and all he saw were targets, moves and the end result: all of them all being dead in a very specific order.

  Gunfire shattered the silence, but not before Rider ducked a punch from the outside man, swung around and grabbed a hold of his Adam’s apple. He used the guy as his shield. To the left of him Roberto was cupping a hand over his wounded neck, but blood was pulsing out from between his
fingers. He staggered backwards and forwards, like a drunk. He tried to speak but nothing came out.

  “Cat got your tongue, Bob?” Rider said.

  In one final attempt to go out like a true gangster, Roberto shot through his own man trying to hit Rider. Two of the three shots punched through Rider’s human shield and struck him in the chest. The lightweight body armor he was wearing absorbed the lead, but not before exacting a small toll.

  What in God’s name is he shooting? Rider wondered, catching his breath.

  His human shield was hobbling on wonky knees and there were still four guys left. All of them were weapons hot and he had a knife, an almost dead guy for protection, and a fresh stick of gum. Not all was lost, but he hadn’t seen it play out like this. Then again, in a fight, sometimes you have to operate on the fly.

  The second he felt the last of his human shield’s strength go, Rider dove in Roberto’s direction, rolling and then launching up on him hard. Gunfire peppered the air. He felt several nips and bites, but this wasn’t the first time he’d been shot under fire. In seconds flat, his knife was up under Roberto’s chin. The man stiffed. Internalizing his own injuries, Rider decided none of the rounds that hit him stuck too hard, but damn, some of that lead hurt pretty good.

  He was still on his feet though, and now he had a new human shield: Roberto. Bob. Blood was pumping from the man’s neck, a veritable fountain of red, albeit not as vigorous as before. It wouldn’t be long before this human shield went the way of the last.

  “Is this a Mexican stand-off we’re in?” Rider quipped, looking at the other guys. “Or do you care as much for him as he did for your compadre, the guy he just shot trying to shoot me?”

  Blood soaked slurs poured from the mouth of the twenty-something Hispanic dying in his arms. Seconds had passed at this point; Roberto had precious few left.

  Already his body was getting heavy.

  Grabbing the weapon tucked in Roberto’s waistband, Rider open fired and hit three of the remaining four thugs. The chamber clicked twice on the fourth man.

  Damn.

  The fourth man open fired, hitting Roberto, and by proxy, hitting Rider. Each round kicked a little harder than the last, but the vest held even if it felt like his bones weren’t holding up the same.

  Finally the fourth man’s chamber ran dry and Rider could no longer manage the dead man. He stepped backwards and shoved Roberto’s corpse aside.

  The last clown standing was frantically reloading his weapon, but Rider grabbed one of his Glocks off the sidewalk and leveled it on the man. “You have three moves here, son.”

  “Yeah?” the kid replied, still loading his weapon.

  “First, keep loading that gun and I’m going to shoot you in the face and be done with it.”

  He stopped.

  “What’s your name?” Rider asked.

  “Why?”

  “I’m curious by nature,” he said.

  “Alejandro.”

  “Like the Lady Gaga song? That Alejandro?” The street soldier rolled his eyes, which caused Rider to smirk. “Well, Ali-Ali-jandro, there are two more options.”

  Still holding the gun, but poised for battle, he said, “Option two?”

  “You walk away and wipe your hands of these flunkies. You lose your friends and this fight, but you keep your life.”

  “And if my pride makes this an impossible choice?” he asked, eyes diamond hard and roasting with hatred.

  “Well then I’ll let you choose one of my two knives and we can go hand-to-hand like civilized gents,” Rider said looking extra dignified.

  “You killed them all,” Alejandro said, still reeling.

  Now Rider’s mouth became a flat, emotionless slash. “All of you were dead the minute you stopped me, you just didn’t know it yet.”

  “So you think I should walk away?”

  “I do.”

  “And you won’t shoot me in the back?”

  “Depends,” he said.

  “On?”

  “On how much longer you want to stand here gossiping like a pair of school girls. Make a decision, Ali-Ali-jandro. Now.”

  “You really got a bullet in your right leg?” he asked, looking down.

  “No.”

  Tucking his gun in the front of his trousers, he burned Rider with his eyes and said, “This isn’t over, pops. We’re building an army, and when—”

  The bullet plowing through the kid’s brain stopped his mouth from working. Wide eyed with death, he fell to the sidewalk in a heap.

  “Your threats are duly noted,” Rider mumbled, sitting down beside the slumped over Roberto and in half the coward’s blood supply.

  Roberto’s expanding red pond was generous, but it failed to reach Rider’s guns, and by proxy, his last stick of gum. Thank God. Despite the wrapper being flecked with blood spatter, he peeled back the foil and stuck his last piece in his mouth, chewing loudly before adding one softened wad to the other.

  Blowing bubbles, he swept up his guns, then got to his feet.

  There was something about the fake watermelon flavor that was downright amazing for the first twenty or so minutes. He was inside that window of happiness with enough time left to get back home.

  Stripping the dead of their weapons, and one man of his long sleeved button up (it was the least blood stained), Rider stacked the bodies in front of a blue and white garage door like the garbage they were. He then began loading the hardware into the stolen shirt.

  Things started to hurt. He was missing bits of flesh here and there. He wasn’t sure what hurt more, being grazed a few times, or taking three rounds in the vest. Either way, by tomorrow morning he was going to be red welts and a patchwork of black and blue bruises that would turn green and yellow in the days to come.

  Tying up the shirt’s arms to contain the cradle of weapons, Rider hoisted them over his shoulder and walked the remaining two blocks where his buddy in an old red and white Chevy stood patrol at the street corner.

  “Rider,” he said.

  “Waylon.”

  “You alright?” he asked.

  “Gonna need a Band-Aid and some whiskey,” Rider replied, limping a bit on his left leg where one of the bullets blazed a burn trail over his thigh.

  “That racket up the street,” he said, “was that you?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Problem solved?”

  “For now,” Rider replied, still walking.

  “There gonna be blowback?”

  “Maybe,” he said, limp-walking up the road, his back to his friend. “Probably.”

  “You shot?” he called up.

  “Couple times, yeah.”

  “Go see Sarah,” Waylon said, to which Rider replied, “Heading there now.”

  Not looking back, Rider made his way up to the back fence where he was let inside the compound by a woman with a gun and no sense of humor on account of her entire family perishing in a car fire.

  He made his way to the makeshift triage center/infirmary to have his wounds looked at. Sure enough, his chest was a smattering of bruises and he was hit in the same leg twice. Nothing serious though, just a couple of red trenches.

  Still, it was troubling that he’d been shot at all. Maybe he really was getting old.

  Old and slow.

  Then again, the way Sarah Richards was looking at him (she was the dewy looking beauty working on him—a twenty-four year old nursing student from Cuba, and the closest thing they had to a doctor), he realized that even slowing down a bit, not all was lost.

  With his injuries cared for and Sarah looking a little flush as he put his shirt back on, he said, “Many thanks, Doc,” which she liked.

  “Are you doing anything later?” she asked, cleaning up the small stack of bloody gauze.

  It wasn’t an invitation, Rider knew—she was simply making conversation. Giving her a long second look, he realized just how attractive she was, and not for the first time.

  Like his second ex-wife said, he wasn’t one fo
r romance. He was just better at killing things. Maybe with Sarah, if he ever had the opportunity, he’d give romance one more try. Or maybe he’d just go out and shoot some more bad guys and not think about this kind of thing ever again.

  “Gonna check in on our mystery guest right now,” he finally said. “She awake yet?”

  “Not yet,” Sarah replied. “Maybe tonight.”

  “Vitals though?” he asked.

  “Steady.”

  “Do I have to keep getting shot to see you, or would you be up for an evening stroll a bit later?”

  Now she turned and looked at him.

  “You don’t think you’re too old for me?” she asked.

  “Of course I do,” he replied.

  “You’ve been shot.”

  “Haven’t forgotten about that,” he said.

  “Yet you’re asking me out on a walk anyway?” she said, looking extra shy and ridiculously cute doing so.

  “I am.”

  Her head started to nod on its own as she tried on the idea, and then she said, “Yeah, I’d like that. We haven’t really gotten to know each other.”

  “Not on a social level, no,” he said. “I’ll swing by your room around eight?”

  “If your leg doesn’t freeze up on you, then yes, eight is good.”

  “Now about our mystery patient…”

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Rider headed into the next room where the woman lay in a bed, her head bandaged, yellow and green circles under her eyes. Her nose was broken, but reset. Her head wounds treated.

  When he found her she was in a seven car pile up with the cars in front of her and behind her in flames. Drone attack. When all this happened, Rider was downtown. He was just walking, which was something he often did to clear his mind.

  If not for the routine, the almost aimlessness of it, he would probably begin to go crazy. He was a former operator, a contract killer for the CIA, and now retired. He left the company gracefully, but the truth was, he both hated and loved the chaos he left behind. The strange dichotomy was the basis of many a conversation with many a post-service shrink.

  In the end, he stopped going to therapy because he realized he was a natural magnet for pandemonium. If not in the battlefield, then in the business world; and if not in the business world, then in the bedroom. In the end, he gave up the women and the work in favor of making ends meet on simpler terms. To do this he bought and sold various items on Craigslist as a means of affording his Spartan lifestyle. There was never any comfort in it. He loved almost nothing about his life. It was almost as if he were waiting for something to come along and take him from all this monotony. That something happened to be a drone strike on the city.