Three Vlog Night

by Z. A. Maxfield

  Generosity notwithstanding, Dmytro doubted he was going to like Ajax very much.

  He’d lied about his sexuality. Lied about his politics, jumping on a conservative bandwagon that would have pushed him off in a second had they known where his true sympathies lay.

  Dmytro wished he could have seen the face of every girl who thought they were going to become the next Billionaire Mrs. Freedom and every moneyed poser who wanted to be just like him when Ajax’s final tirade robbed them of it all. Apparently he’d read the now off-the-shelves book Plummet to Soar and done a 180, deciding that authenticity, honesty, and decency were more important than celebrity.

  Then he’d vlogged his drunken rage at everyone who had adopted him as a folk hero, which went off like a depth charge when the video hit the web—all hands lost.

  Ajax’s was the classic story of a boy’s meteoric rise and his even quicker plummet into infamy.

  As someone who once found himself in a similar—if more literally explosive—predicament, Dmytro cringed for him. He didn’t sympathize. But he winced a little. People made choices, and they had to live with them. Like it or not, he had to keep Ajax Freedom alive to enjoy the consequences of his actions for a long time to come.

  Chapter 4

  Ajax Freedom. There is no freedom in sin. There is no rest for the wicked. Prepare yourself for the torment of eternal damnation. I am the Bringer of Justice, and I will end you.

  BOOM. DMYTRO thought the sound was part of his regular nightmare—that his apartment building was coming down and he had to find a way to get Yulia, Pen, and Sasha out of the rubble through a thick haze of smoke and choking dust. On waking, he needed several disorienting seconds to figure out where he was, who he was with, and why. As always, the pain of losing Yulia consumed him.

  “What’s this?” He unbuckled his belt and retrieved his weapon in a single practiced motion.

  “Stand down, Mitya.” They’d come to a rolling stop along a road he didn’t recognize. “The engine blew.”

  “Sorry. If we’d been attacked—”

  “I’d have woken you at the slightest sign of trouble. This is California, not Kazakhstan.” Bartosz laid a comforting hand on his arm. Since they’d met as young mercenaries, Bartosz, better than most, understood the shitshow behind Dmytro’s closed eyelids.

  “The engine is dead?” Dmytro asked.

  “Looks like.” Bartosz was older by ten years and each one showed. Worry darkened into smudges under his eyes. Lines had begun to bracket his mouth. On Bartosz these things looked interesting. Provocative. Women loved him. Everyone loved a dangerous man, Dmytro guessed.

  “Where are we?” Dmytro couldn’t tell because a bisque-thick fog obscured everything except the closest sign—a flickering old-fashioned neon job that read SEAVIEW MOTEL, on which the v and the i had burned out. The red Vacancy flashed its welcome.

  Sadly, it was on the other side of the highway and they would have to cross in the void.

  Bartosz held his phone up. “Signal’s too weak.”

  Dmytro checked. “Mine too.”

  One or two cars whizzed by theirs. He didn’t like that at all. Disabled car plus fog plus the possibility of fast traffic was an equation for disaster.

  “I’ll bet you’re rethinking the decision to change plans at the last minute.”

  “Not really.” Dmytro was rethinking the job. Not that he’d been given much of a choice. He was the best, so Zhenya and Peter had decided he’d be the best man for it. Plus, he had children of his own, and they believed he’d be able to make Ajax cooperate. But his kids were girls. They were sweet and only wanted hugs and rainbow ponies and to watch a hundred movies with him whenever they had him to themselves.

  Ajax was… not that.

  Dmytro glanced back. “We’ll have to cross to the motel and call Zhenya about the vehicle from a landline.”

  That got another frown from Bartosz. “This feels all wrong.”

  “I’m not fond of the situation either.” This came from Ajax. “My parents usually get the best security money can buy, but so far you guys aren’t filling me with confidence.”

  “I am the best that money can buy.” Dmytro was confused about many things, but not that. “As for the car….”

  Smoke had started to pour from beneath the hood. Some of it seeped through the dash vents. It didn’t smell like burning insulation or charred plastic—or like C-4 and gunfire—but Dmytro’s mind reeled with shock and panic, and he couldn’t stay inside that vehicle. Not for anything.

  He opened the door and leaped out, and then opened the rear door for Ajax. When Ajax didn’t move fast enough for him, Dmytro caught him by the arm and hauled him out.

  “Hey.” Ajax yanked his arm away. “No touchy.”

  “Take all the time you want inside the burning car, next time.” He waited to see whether Bartosz gave any indication he’d get their bags. “I’ll wait and haul your roasted flesh outside.”

  “Mitya.” Bartosz went to the rear of the car and opened the hatch. “Go. I’ll catch up.”

  This time Dmytro got a solid grip on Ajax’s arm and pulled. “Come. I don’t like being in the open.” It was stop-and-go dodging two cars, but they made it across without accident. “Bartosz will bring in your things.”

  Ajax gasped with pleasure once he saw the motel. “It’s a real-life midcentury motor court!”

  “No choice now.” Dmytro gave him another little tug. “Come.”

  “I’m not your pet.” Ajax fought him. “You get that, right?”

  Dmytro eyed him. “If you were my pet, you would come when I say.”

  “Oh, I’d come when you say.” Ajax smirked before yanking his arm away again. “But only in bed.”

  “That’s harassment,” Dmytro complained. Plus, it was Ajax Freedom talking, not the almost bearable Ajax Fairchild. Dmytro gave him a sour glance before pulling on a door that clearly said PUSH.

  Ajax said, “Um—”

  “I see it.” When the door opened, Dmytro congratulated himself for finally winning a battle, even if it was against a door. “Get inside and wait while I help Bartosz with the—”

  “No need.” Bartosz said from behind them. Somehow he had followed them burdened with every single bag and box. “I’ve got it.”

  “Thank you.” Dmytro turned back to the front desk, where the night manager sat on a barstool behind the counter.

  The place was old, the furnishings dated. The clerk was a senior citizen with a head of grizzled curly hair and half-moon glasses perched on the end of his nose. He was not in any hurry to serve them.

  Dmytro cleared his throat. “A-hem.”

  The man glanced up. “Let me just finish this game.”

  “Take your time.” Bartosz narrowed his eyes and glanced toward Dmytro as if to say Do you see this guy? Bartosz had a quick temper, and none of them were happy to be there. Still, there was no point in harassing someone who might possibly help them. Dmytro put a hand on Bartosz’s shoulder to defuse the situation.

  “Whatcha playing?” Ajax asked.

  “Sea Hero.” The old man didn’t glance up.

  “That’s awesome.” Ajax’s soft brown curls bobbed. “You like it?”

  “So far.”

  “Game on.” Ajax’s happy expression changed his whole face. At Bartosz’s blank look, he said, “Sea Hero is the world’s largest crowdsourced data set with the eventual goal of helping the scientific community understand dementia better.”

  Bartosz still stared at him blankly.

  Ajax glanced up as if there were a better answer written on the ceiling. “People from all over the world play the game and scientists track their progress to learn from it.”

  “That’s the idea,” their host said. “I haven’t played a video game since Pac-Man, but I saw what they were trying to do and why, so I hopped right on board to do my part.”

  Bartosz lifted a brow. “We’ll need two rooms for the night, connecting, second floor, by the back stairs.”


  The man wrapped things up with a sigh and put his tablet aside. “And I’m supposed to just have that setup available without any reservations?”

  “Oh, I have reservations. I simply didn’t book a room ahead.” Bartosz glanced out toward the near-empty parking lot. “Is everyone at the movies?”

  “You got me.” The man grinned. “We don’t get folks stopping like we used to. Not since the chain place opened twenty-five miles up the coast. People will do anything if they perceive they’ll get a waffle out of it.”

  “I like waffles,” said Ajax.

  “Who doesn’t? My point is their room rates are seventy-five dollars more than ours, and I couldn’t look at a seventy-five-dollar waffle, much less eat one.”

  “Are you on duty here all night?” Dmytro wanted to nail down some sort of security plan. He wanted to meet the person who’d be keeping an eye on the front desk and find out whether they had an electronic surveillance system.

  “Nah, I go home from midnight to six, but I have someone who comes in. They’ll be around if you need anything.”

  Dmytro met Bartosz’s gaze. “We need our car fixed.”

  “I think we blew a head gasket,” Bartosz offered. “It’s across the street. Can you give us the address here and the use of a landline so I can call for a tow?”

  “Sure. You should get it off the road.” He handed over a motel postcard. “Pea soup tonight. You’re lucky you didn’t get hit from behind. A stranded car is dangerous as hell in that fog.”

  Dmytro asked, “Is it usual for cell phones to lose signal here?”

  “Usual? No. We have signal boosters, but sometimes when the fog gets this bad, they don’t work.” He glanced out the window.

  “The fog,” said Dmytro, disbelief in his tone.

  Ajax bobbed his head. “Since cell phones use electromagnetic RF, thick fog and bad weather can cause propagation delay. The signal might bounce, get weak, or disappear altogether.”

  Bartosz said, “I thought cell phones used microwaves that give you cancer.”

  “Uh, no. The signals from your calls get sent to the tower where they get routed to a wire or fiber optic line.” Ajax’s long-fingered hands described a shape. They were soft, with bitten-down nails, and flew like birds when he talked. Dmytro found it… disarming. “Occasionally, if that underground system doesn’t exist or it runs like a fat dachshund with a headache, they’ll use a microwave line-of-sight transmitter.”

  “So, microwaves.” Bartosz took the word as a win. “That’s what I said.”

  Ajax grimaced. “Not really.”

  “You’ve got a smart one there.” The old man grinned. “My son’s an EMT, and he’s pretty smart too.”

  “This man is not my son.” Dmytro’s loud, unambiguous statement caused everyone to look at him.

  “Okay, well. I don’t judge.” The desk clerk turned to Ajax. “As long as you’re of age.”

  Ajax put his elbows on the counter and rested his chin on his hands. “Oh I am. I’m old enough for you too, Silver Fox. You got room at the inn for me?”

  The old man giggled liked Poppin’ Fresh being poked by a giant finger. He was obviously as delighted by Ajax’s antics as Ajax himself was. Dmytro covered his shame with a grunt and Bartosz swallowed a laugh while Ajax seemed to enjoy their discomfort. He lapped it up like a Popsicle on a hot summer day, which was not the sort of image Dmytro should picture. Still. Dmytro couldn’t get the idea out of his head.

  You can’t be. No. You can’t be stupid enough to find this awful boy… amusing.

  “Bartosz, you deal with the car.” Dmytro could not afford to let Ajax derail his train of thought.

  “You could have it towed to Colin Cuthbert’s place. He’s the best. Works with all the fancy new computers on wheels. But the soonest he’d get to it is tomorrow.”

  “Newfangled stuff,” Ajax said without mockery. “Unlike your motel. Which is a classic.”

  “Nah.” The old man smiled. “It’s just old.”

  “I like old-time charm.” Ajax was talking about the old man too. Dmytro watched the blush his words drew. “Is the pool heated?”

  “You are not going to swim in the pool.” Dmytro could think of nothing worse than watching an utterly defenseless Ajax lolling half-naked in a pool when anyone could fire a rifle from any window in the motor court. “The position is indefensible.”

  The clerk glanced up at the word. “Literally? Or figuratively?”

  Bartosz asked, “Do you have what we need or not?”

  The old man sighed. “209 and 211 up the stairs on the right-hand side and all the way down. We have cable television and free Wi-Fi. Sign on to SeaViewGuest, password is Nachos. I warn you, the ice machine will drive you crazy.”

  Dmytro let his eyes fall on Ajax. “Among other things.”

  Their host typed as he spoke. “The rooms are all nonsmoking. You want two? Two doubles in each okay?”

  “Yes, please.” Bartosz took his Iphicles American Express card out and signed the paperwork for their stay. “I don’t know how long we’ll need it.”

  “Bartlomiej Kowalczyk.” He read Bartosz’s name off the card before offering his hand. “I’m Carl Lents. The rooms will be here as long as you need them. Like I said, people tend to pass us by on their way to better places. Sometimes you’d think they never even notice we’re here.”

  Ajax’s stomach growled loudly in the silence that followed Carl’s cryptic words. “Where’s a good place to eat around here?”

  “Depends on what you like?”

  “Takeout,” Dmytro insisted. “Or delivery.”

  Carl pulled an orange flyer out of the drawer beneath his computer. “Here’s a list of restaurants that deliver. On the back, you’ll find the places where you can pick up takeout. I suggest, though, that you head to St. Nacho’s Cantina and Grill. The food there is good, and they have live music.”

  “Awesome.” Ajax snatched up the leaflet while Bartosz and Dmytro picked up their bags. “I want to eat there.”

  “We’ll discuss it in the room. Follow me. We need to get settled in before we think about food.”

  Dmytro eased out the door and into the crisp, salty air. He needed a shower. Being carsick made him feel unclean. On top of that, he wanted to gather his thoughts.

  They marched along to the stairway, up the stairs, and down the gallery. If there was anyone else in the motel, they were asleep long since. There was no sign they weren’t utterly alone. He ushered Ajax into a room, and Bartosz left their things.

  “Dmytro, stay with him until I get the car taken care of.”

  “Wait, I need a shower.”

  “And I need to have a look around and call someone to tow the car,” Bartosz reminded him. “Or have you forgotten protocol so soon in the face of—”

  “Fine.” Dmytro flung his bag on the bed closest to the window before handing the orange leaflet over. “You go. At least get food while you’re out.”

  “I will. Be nice to the primary.”

  Ajax winced. “Hello. The primary is me.”

  Dmytro snorted. In their shared language, he said, “Bartosz, you have thirty minutes, because if I don’t get time alone soon, I will kill someone, and there’s a fifty-fifty chance it will be you.”

  “I hear you,” Bartosz replied. “Don’t get bent out of shape. I’ll bring something to eat for now. We can decide how long a leash our boy will get later.”

  Bartosz left to check out the motel’s security and call for a tow. Dmytro slid a look Ajax’s way. Perhaps he should talk? Put the client at ease? There was no reason, after all, that he had to act all tough and terse. That kind of treatment worked for one kind of client—captain-of-industry types who expected security to be invisible and lethal. But for a babysitting job like this one? As Bartosz pointed out, they were in California, not Kazakhstan.

  Perhaps being quiet, polite, and well-meaning would be enough.

  He tried out a smile, and Ajax flinched as if he’d s
lapped him.

  Okay. Maybe his smile wasn’t awesome. His daughters told him their friends found him frightening—something about his light eyes made people uneasy.

  But he wasn’t a troll… come on.

  He had the same looks his brother Anton had. Fifteen years older than him, Anton was considered handsome as a fairy-book prince by most of the women they’d known growing up. But Anton had been raised by their mother, who’d died when Dmytro was only six, and maybe it was her soft side, her sweetness, that tempered the rough discipline their father had forced on them both.

  Maybe she’d imbued Anton with charm that Dmytro didn’t have.

  Given time to grieve and age, their father had only grown ten times meaner. Dmytro had been smart enough to tear any softness out of himself before his father could beat it out of him.

  Now it bothered Dmytro because Ajax was young and probably—rightfully—frightened. Except in certain useful situations, Dmytro didn’t like being thought of as scary.

  “I’m not an ogre.”

  “No, you’re only the guy who’s going to curtail all my fun and freedom for the foreseeable future. I wish you were an ogre.”

  Fair enough. They knew where they stood now. Dmytro didn’t like being thought of as a lead balloon any more than he liked being thought of as an ogre.

  He was never going to get on the right foot with Ajax Freedom. But that wasn’t as important as keeping Ajax alive, so he decided to ignore him. Let’s see how you like that.

  Chapter 5

  Ajax Freedom. I come ever closer. The world suffers from the sins of men like you, depraved and indecent. Indolent and lascivious. Only I can save the world from the peril you place it in. Only I know how to end the evil that you represent. There is no one who can save you now.

  THIS THREAT of the I’m-coming-ever-closer variety said nothing new. None of it bothered Ajax anymore. Threats were a dime a dozen.

  Besides, this motel was exactly the kind of place Ajax liked. From the drab paint, the crusty commercial carpet, and the bullfighter pictures on the walls, it was a classic California motor inn like the ones he’d seen on old Route 66 when he and his hippie-dippy grandfather traveled together.