by Bobby Adair
Grace passed me in her truck, as did Jazz.
I pulled in behind, accelerating to keep up.
Murphy was already pushing the speed.
“You’re going to let me go after this?” my navigator asked.
“I’ll stop just outside the first gate. You can get out.”
He looked down at the cord wrapped around his wrists.
“There’s a pocket knife in the center console. I saw it there earlier.”
He looked at me for permission.
“Get it, dude. I’m sure we’re almost there.”
He dug into the console. “Thank you for keeping your word.”
“We don’t kill normals.” That sounded wimpy as it hit my ears, so I added, “Unless they deserve it.”
Jazz’s brake lights flashed. I tapped mine. I heard a crash of wrenching metal—Murphy hitting the gate.
I hit the brakes, as the navigator dug frantically. The truck skidded to a stop. “This is your stop, dude.”
He pulled the pocket knife out of the console and showed it to me.
I reached over and unbuckled his belt. “Get out and then cut yourself free. I’m on the clock here, buddy.”
He swung his door open and tumbled out.
I called, “You don’t want to be here when we let these Whites out.”
A crash ahead told me Murphy had just destroyed the second gate.
I looked up the road rising in front of me and gunned the engine to race after the taillights speeding uphill.
Men climbed out of the wreckage of a gatehouse just to the side of the road, as I passed through the remains of the first gate.
The third gate shattered with a familiar screech of bending metal. Brake lights glared red. Muzzles flashed across the crest of the hill as the report of gunfire reached me. I urged my old truck to go faster, though I’d just passed sixty on the dirt road, zipping past the wreckage of the second gate.
That left me with mere seconds to make a choice—stop at the rear of the first trailer and release our secret weapon, or make the brazen move to run those gunners down with the steel bumper of my truck.
Deciding to trust Murphy, Grace, and Jazz to do their part in the plan, I cut my headlights, and tore through the final gate, swerving off the gravel road to avoid hitting Jazz’s trailer. In the chaotic beams from the trucks’ headlights, I raced for the first pair of muzzle flashes I spotted.
Gunfire sparked off my hood and raked across the windshield.
Bodies thumped against my bumper, one flying over the truck and the other going under the wheels as I cut a tight right to steer away from the residence that I was sure had to be—
The collision threw me against the steering wheel as steam and shivers of timber exploded over my hood. But the truck still rolled forward. Roughly, chugging and banging with belts screeching so loudly I couldn’t hear the gunfire anymore.
A little disoriented, I reached down to turn the headlights back on. And failed. My hook slipped off the knob. I fumbled over with my right hand to turn on the surviving single headlight as I struggled with the truck’s splashy steering and hard left pull.
Just down the hill, I spotted a gunman jogging toward the semis, coyote-focused on the prey in his sights. That prey could only be one thing, one of my friends. I leaned hard to pull my steering wheel into a wide, sloppy turn, gunned my smoking engine, and came around behind him. He heard the noise and looked over his shoulder, but way too late to avoid being launched fifty feet before being crushed under my wheels.
More sparks erupted on the truck’s metalwork. Glass shattered, and I heard bullets pinging the cab all around me. I mashed the brakes and tried to duck, sliding the truck sideways in the dirt and back up.
Without wasting a breath, I flung my door open and jumped out. Immediately, I opened the rear cab door, yanking my flamethrower rig out with my good hand, racing behind the truck to use it as cover. It took only seconds for me to get my rig up over my shoulders and the flame gun mounted on my hook, trigger in hand.
A screaming chorus of Whites cut through the night, telling me that one of my friends had succeeded in opening their trailer. For just a second, as that surprise sank in, the gunfire stopped.
I sprinted away from the truck and toward the flat, one-story farmhouse. Spotting a trio of men shooting their rifles at my truck, still fatally focused on the surviving headlight, I pulled my trigger and blasted them into briquets. I shot another torrent of flame down the side of the house. Men screamed as it scorched away their skin and seared into their flesh.
In the moment I’d bought myself, I raced toward the trucks.
Murphy’s truck was turned over, mangled steel ripped off its front and sides. That cab, though, was empty, and the trailer, thankfully, still stood upright. When I reached the back of the truck, Whites were still climbing out and running in the direction of gunfire, which seemed to be multiplying from every direction. Out past the left side of the farmhouse, I spotted Murphy, silhouetted by a wall of fire. He was putting our other flamethrower to work.
Seeing that Grace’s cab was empty, I dashed down the length of her trailer to find her and Jazz opening the livestock hauler to free another mob of Whites. As hoped, they ignored us because of our copious display of skin.
Grace hurried over to me and leaned in close to whisper. “We got this. Go help Murphy. We’ll find you.”
Of course, she was right. Our flames would be hard to miss. I charged off to support Murphy.
107
“We came. We conquered,” joked Murphy. Of course. “What’s next, little Caesar?”
With hundreds of taints scampering around and feeding on the bodies of those they’d killed, Murphy, Grace, Jazz, and me huddled behind Murphy’s overturned eighteen-wheeler. None of Bill’s men outside were still alive, or they’d stopped shooting and were fleeing.
“The way they’re shooting from the gunports,” suggested Grace, talking about those of Bill’s thugs who were trapped inside the house, “there might be a handful in there, or even ten, maybe twenty.”
I pointed at the far corner of the house. “I smashed through the wall down there by the corner. I figure we assault there. I’ll run up and flame the room, and then—”
“No,” Jazz interrupted. “You can’t get in there.”
“The hole isn’t big enough?” I asked, figuring she had to be wrong. I’d splintered a lot of wood in that collision.
“There’s no hole,” she explained. “The wood is a façade. The wall behind it is concrete.”
“No shit?” Murphy laughed as he took a peek toward the house. “Sneaky little bastard.”
“Well,” I paused, while I thought through what to do next, “that explains why we thought Bill made a mistake by living in such a vulnerable place.”
“Because it ain’t,” said Murphy.
“Except,” I disagreed, “it still is.”
“If he’s got thick concrete walls disguised as a rickety old farmhouse,” Grace countered, “it’s not likely we’ll be able to kick the door in.”
“Whatever we do,” Jazz added, “we need to do it quickly. You can bet Bill called in the cavalry.”
“Yeah,” Murphy agreed. “We might have a thousand yellows here in fifteen minutes.”
“Okay.” My half-baked idea gelled. “I’ll run up, shove the nozzle of my flamethrower through a gunport, and roast them.”
Grace shook her head. “If we’re not going to make a run for it right now, then we’re going to need Bill alive. Burning the house out through a gunport, well, you can’t control who inside lives or dies. You know that, Zed. Does your truck still run?”
With no shortage of ideas, I said, “We blow the door, then.” I explained what I intended, got no objections, and then showed Murphy exactly how he needed to help me.
Once he was ready, I bolted into the darkness up near the house and hosed the front of the building, setting the wooden façade alight. Knowing those inside wouldn’t be able to see thr
ough the flames flickering over their gun ports, Murphy made for the front door. He laid his flamethrower’s main fuel canister on its side in front of the threshold and opened the release valve. Wasting no more time up there than necessary, he zipped past me as he headed for the safety of his overturned truck. Following him to the limit of my flamethrower’s range, I stopped, turned, and aimed at his tank on the porch, unleashing a full gush of burning fuel.
“That’s enough,” shouted Murphy.
“One more sec,” I told him.
“C’mon!” called Grace.
I released my trigger and flew for the cover of the truck. Just as I stepped behind, Murphy’s tank detonated in a thunderous explosion, sending an enormous fireball into the sky.
Grace shouted, “In case they didn’t know we were here already.”
Jumping to my feet. I shouted, “We’ve got to go now!” I charged between flaming splashes of flamethrower fuel and leapt over smoldering bodies. Some still suffering.
Murphy passed me, as did Jazz and Grace. They reached the porch ahead of me and tossed tear-gas bombs inside. I stormed in after, leveling my flamethrower, ready to torch any who resisted, but before I could shout my demand, I looked across the hazy room. “What the hell?”
108
Murphy pushed in beside me.
Mangled bodies lay scattered in the area of the doorway. As for the door itself, the explosion blasted a big chunk of it through a smoking hole in the back wall. The rest had turned to shrapnel and shredded those closest to the explosion. All of that was expected, though. At least it was on the list of possible outcomes. What I didn’t expect to see was the interior of the house being a single open space, like a barracks, though all of the bunks had tumbled over.
Murphy realized the same thing. “This place isn’t a house.”
“It’s a bunker,” added Grace.
“Everybody,” I commanded, talking to the thugs and stooges still able to understand me. “If you don’t want to burn to death, get on your knees against that wall.”
Nobody listened, though many of the soldiers were still alive, and coughing. Grace picked up a machine gun, to help me cover our prisoners. Murphy rounded up the compliant detainees and herded them toward where I’d directed. Most knelt, some lay, unable to hold themselves upright.
“Jazz,” I called. “How are things outside?”
She stood just inside the door, keeping watch behind us. “Nothing new, yet.”
Checking the faces of the living and the dead, Murphy called, “I don’t see Bill.”
“Is there a,” I didn’t know, “a trapdoor, or a basement or something?”
“I don’t see anything,” Murphy told me.
“It’s a decoy,” guessed Grace.
I wanted to disagree because I hated what it implied. Unfortunately, the logic of her guess made a whole lot of sense. I pointed out a guy that looked to be in pretty good shape. “Murphy, bring that dude over here.”
“We should go,” Grace told me. “Every yellow in the county is on their way here. Right now.”
“Five minutes,” I told her. “We’ll get what info we can, and then bounce.”
Shaking her head, she hustled over to the wall and grabbed the prisoner I’d picked out. Wasting no time, she hurried back, and knelt him in the center of the room.
“Where’s Bill?” I demanded,
Eyes locked on the pilot light still flaming in front of my weapon’s nozzle, he said, “I don’t know.”
“You’re one of his guards,” I accused.
“We guard this place,” he told me, “not him.”
“What’s this place?” I asked.
“Exactly what it looks like,” he answered. “A trap.”
“Oh, no,” muttered Jazz.
Murphy bounded over to the blasted doorway. “Well, General Custer, here come the Indians.”
In a rare display of anger, Grace rushed over and peeked out. “Twenty vehicles, racing up the drive. They just passed the outer fence.”
That meant we had only moments. We’d never escape in one of the two running tractor-trailers. Outside, three pearly-white SUVs sat, decoys to advertise the presence of a man who clearly slept elsewhere. Did they even run? “We’ll have to fight it out from in here.”
“Yeah.” Graced glanced at the body parts on the floor. “That worked out so well for this crew.”
“I’m sorry,” I told her. “I don’t know what else to do.”
“They’re passing the second fence,” called Murphy.
“Gather up all the guns,” I told them. “And all the ammo.” I turned to the prisoners by the wall. “All of you, I want you kneeling over here, blocking the door.”
“You’re using them for shields?” Grace was horrified.
“I can’t have them behind us when the shooting starts,” I explained. “We can let them go if you want.” The reality of my defeat was sinking in. “You should all surrender. I’ll take full responsibility.”
“Won’t make a difference, Batman,” Murphy laughed, because he had a way of dealing with the inevitable better than any of us.
“He’s right,” added Grace.
“If this whole ‘live forever’ thing is real,” suggested Jazz, “then why not surrender? What’s another year in this place compared to what we have to lose by fighting for no reason at all?”
“We march out with our hands in the air,” announced Grace.
“They’re here,” called Murphy.
I heard the trucks rolling over the gravel outside. Machine gun fire rattled as Whites howled and swarmed.
On a desperate hope, I said, “The taints might—”
“No,” Murphy cut me off, “they won’t. Too many guns. Not enough Whites.”
Jazz peeked through a gun port. “He’s right.”
“Once the shooting stops,” Murphy told us, “I’ll go out first, and make sure everything’s cool.”
“You think they’ll shoot us?” asked Jazz.
“Not if we go out one at a time,” Murphy told her. He looked at me while pointing at our prisoners. “You keep all of them in here, until everybody’s out.” He turned to Grace. “I don’t care if they are hostages, as long as they keep us alive.”
Grace reluctantly nodded.
It took ten or twenty minutes, but the shooting outside petered out.
Murphy laid his weapon on the floor, raised his hands, and gave us all a wink. “Wish me luck.” Without waiting for any last-second protests, he marched outside, calling, “Hey, don’t shoot! I’m giving up. Don’t shoot.”
I peeked out through one of the gun ports. Forty or fifty of Bill’s personal guards were out there, all taking cover behind their vehicles, pointing their guns, mostly at Murphy. It looked like a hostage stand-off between cops and criminals. Bill’s bodyguards rushed up to restrain Murphy. With his hands cuffed behind his back they hauled him to one of the trucks.
“Jazz,” suggested Grace, “you go next.”
“But, I—”
“Just go,” Grace told her.
She laid her gun on the floor, slipped off the harness with her unused Molotovs and tear-gas bottles, and laid it gently on the floor. She turned her big, dark eyes on Grace and me. “I’m sorry. I really hoped this would work.” Her arms raised, she slowly walked through the door.
Outside, I saw Bill get out of a pearly-white SUV with two of his mountainous bodyguards following. He strode forward, in no hurry at all, to watch as a handful of his men converged on Jazz.
“It’s down to you and me, now.” Grace laid her weapon on the floor and sloughed off her harness. “Don’t do anything stupid, Zed.”
“‘Anything Stupid’ is my middle name.”
“Exactly.” Grace didn’t move, though. “Oh, Jesus. You’re not going to come out, are you?”
“You should go.”
“Zed, if they’re right about this immortality stuff—”
“Next,” called someone from outside. “Send out the nex
t one.”
“On the way,” called Grace as she stepped over to me. Tears welled in her eyes. “Don’t do whatever it is you think you’re going to do here. Please.”
“You should go.”
“No.” A few tears rolled down her cheeks and she wiped them away. “I won’t let them kill you. I won’t let you do this.”
“Listen, I have an idea.”
“Zed, just stop with the ideas, okay. It’s over. They beat us. Again. Let’s learn to live with it. Okay?”
Irritated and louder, the voice called again from outside, “Send the next one. Now!”
“Go.” I gently pushed Grace toward the door. “You have to go now, or this won’t work.”
Shaking her head, Grace turned, raised her arms, and sobbed softly as she walked through the door. In moments, they had her restrained and stuffed in the back of a truck.
With my boot, I nudged the guy prisoner I’d threatened. “I want you to follow my instruction exactly. Do you understand?”
Wary, he nodded.
“Good. Go outside, walk with your hands up, and when you’re ten steps outside the door, lay down on your belly and put your arms behind your back. You understand?”
“You know they know what you look like, right?”
I tapped my flamethrower with my hook, just to remind him that pilot was still shooting a blue flame. “Do exactly as I told you, or you’ll spend the last three seconds of your life wishing you had.”
He walked out. As he was following my instructions outside, and somebody out there started complaining, I prepped the next hostage.
Bill’s man hollered, “We know you’re still in there, Zed Zane.”
The next guy I sent out, I told him to lie on his back with his arms and legs straight up. I forced the third guy to do jumping jacks and got the response I hoped for. Bill marched forward, but stopped after one of his bodyguards put a restraining hand on his shoulder. “Enough of these games.” He shrugged off his bodyguard’s hand. “Zed, you had so much potential. You could have helped me build New Tejas into the envy of the new world. Unfortunately, it seems your psych exam told the real truth about you. You’re too twisted in the head to do anything but trip yourself up and complain about the disparities of life. Why don’t you come outside and show me you at least have the character to take your punishment like a man.”