I stood with a blank look.
“Those box-like thingies. They have the ammo in them. Ten rounds each.” She chuckled. “Damn, we have to start in first gear, I guess.”
After I grabbed both of them, we ran to the treeline. Beyond, we could see for a clear mile to the south. The trunk line kept going south, but the police had stopped at the intersection of another dual-lane highway.
Jo set up her toy, and told me what I was looking at.
“That cross road is the southern limit of your precious pastures.”
“I don't see a gate. I thought there'd be a gate.”
With a few grunts and curses she both continued placing her gun and responding to my dumb questions. I sensed that she was prepared for a slew of them.
“Nope, no gate on the high plains. Always a way to go around them out here, huh? It just makes a convenient way to describe this place.”
She settled in and began to look through the huge scope on top of the huge tan gun. Without the scope I could still see both cop cars sitting in the middle of the intersection. They appeared to be waiting. I was looking into the proverbial middle of nowhere. I couldn't see anything of interest in any direction but low, dry grass and the odd clump of trees. Just us, our trees, and those two cars.
Minutes ticked by. I was once again struck by how quiet the world had become. Not just because I'd gotten out of my car, but the world in general. The beeps of technology had gone the way of the Old World. No more television. No internet. No game systems.
I should clarify. They probably have most of that somewhere. Maybe in Hays. They still have electricity. But I avoid all that junk. It rots the brain.
“You did listen, K-Bear.”
“Yeah, dad. Sometimes you're right about something,” I thought.
“Movement. What the hell?” She re-adjusted herself on the ground. Her eye was glued to the end of the scope.
On the road coming up from the south I saw a huge truck. A big rig. Out here, in well, nowhere, it looked out of place. It was running totally alone. Something didn't add up.
“One fuel hauler, way out here? Alone and vulnerable?”
She pulled back to look at me. “How did the monkey's know it would be here?”
I gave her my look of ignorance.
She winked at me, then peered back into the glass.
“The cops have stopped it. Hmm. You better hand me one of those magazines, after all.”
I'd been holding them, so I dropped one down to her. She got to work banging in into the frame of the gun, then she pulled back on a handle, getting it loaded I assumed.
“They're just talking. Our two cruisers, and the fueler. They're all standing around like it's a party, or something.”
She didn't say anything for a long time. I couldn't see much detail from a quarter mile away. I saw two black blobs parked in front of a larger blob. I could barely make out the men in the middle.
“Oh shit!” She tensed up. “Oh shit.”
“What?” I still didn't see anything, but I heard the pop of gunfire.
“They're shooting. What the? The tanker had guys hiding or something. They're all over.”
“Are you going to shoot them?”
It was a strange question, I'd be happy shooting—or at least seriously hurting—the crooked cops, but they were still our cops. Whoever was killing them would likely want to kill me.
“OK. This is it.” Jo spoke, but she wasn't talking to me.
“Rook, I need you to do something for me. Don't ask any questions, got it?”
“Why can't—”
“No questions! That's my rule. Got it?”
“Yes.”
“I need you take this gun and go put it back in my car. Here, take these keys.” She tossed her keys to me.
I wanted to ask the question.
She smiled at me. Then answered what she knew was on the tip of my tongue.
“I'm going to get us a cop car.”
Breathe, K-Bear
I love the police. I always have. My dad instilled the proper respect from a young age. He told me—many times—about getting pulled over in his sports cars growing up and how he was always polite to the man or woman behind the badge. More than a few times his goodwill and charm enabled him to get into discussions with the officers about his cars, their cars, and a shared passion for high performance driving. A few times he got out of the tickets, but most times he took them with good cheer.
If I ever considered being inside a police car, it was because my dad convinced me I would be hauled in for stealing candy at the grocery store, or later, for smoking in the woods with the older girls—and their boyfriends. Never in my dreams or imagination did I consider going voluntarily into a police car in an effort to steal it.
And then, in the nowhere region of Kansas, with no one else to witness it, my new friend ran across an open field toward two police cars in the middle of a gun fight!
I intended to put the gun away, but first I laid down so I could watch to see if her hopeless ploy had any chance of success. The officers were nowhere near their cars. As best I could tell, when the shooting started the cops ran for a big pile of dirt on one side of the street and the foreigners ran back to their big rig for cover.
I reoriented the scope and tried to find Jo. Once I found her I watched her approach the intersection.
“My God, she might do it.”
The police had been sloppy, or overconfident. They left their doors open as if they were coming right back. Did they trust the other men? Were they in cahoots and had a falling out? The scope put me in the action, but I had no context.
Jo never stopped running. She crossed the field in a couple minutes, ran up the small embankment—slipping once—and then in full view of everyone jumped into the open door of the nearest car and slammed it shut.
The gunfight stopped, as if all the men agreed what they'd just witnessed constituted a different, and greater, threat.
“K-Bear, what have you gotten yourself into here?”
I glanced upward to see my father haloed by the afternoon sun, as he stood next to me.
“You think I intended for all this to happen, Dad? One second I'm minding my own business, next I'm hauling some kind of canon while my friend rips off the police.” My hackles were in full fury. “So how's your day going?”
He was gone. I didn't think he was in the mood to argue.
I turned back and Jo's cruiser was reversing on the highway, back toward my position. She turned the wheel, slammed the brakes, then spun the car around so it faced me. She let the tires rip as she sped my way.
To my great shock, she honked as she drove on by.
I nearly wet my pants, I'm not ashamed to admit it. I picked up the big gun and ran. It was about ten times heavier than I expected it to be, so it took me ten minutes to walk the thirty yards back to Jo's car. Seriously, it felt like it.
During my struggle I heard the roar of the other Mustang interceptor. They even threw on the sirens, though surely they knew there was no one to hear them.
I stood frozen in the woods as the sirens got closer. I wasn't exactly waving a flag but it wouldn't take much for them to see a lime green car sitting inside a tiny copse of trees.
Closer. The motor churned as the transmission clicked through the gears. By the time they passed they were flying in hot pursuit. If they saw me standing there holding a huge rifle, they let it go.
I didn't bother putting the gun back into its hidey hole. I made a best effort to push it into the hold, then I shut the lift-gate. I jumped in the driver's seat. I pushed the start button and felt the guttural rumble of the fastest car I'd ever been in. I felt it in my chest. In my thighs. I felt the energy in my feet.
“Breathe, K-Bear.”
“Shut it. I know!”
I belted in, thinking for the first time since I became a driver that I might finally need it. With deliberate care I turned around on the gravel parking area. When the car reached the edge of
the pavement I looked back down toward the fuel truck. They, too, had turned around and headed to the south—away from the action.
I turned right, toward it.
You always did what you wanted
I'd imagined I'd cry if I ever got to drive such a car. I was right: I started to cry. I can't explain the feeling of being behind the wheel of a powerful beast like that Mustang. It had a roar that screamed “freedom!” and I seriously thought about turning down any of the side roads and just forgetting what was up the blacktop in front of me.
I was hesitant on the gears, as if sticking them too hard was going to damage the fragile thing. I knew it was ridiculous, but I couldn't help feel I was riding in the most precious piece of pre-apocalypse technology on the road. A known falsehood, since two newer and faster Mustangs plied the asphalt in front of me.
That got me going. Jo put her trust in me to take her car, her gun, and hold her life in my hands. While part of my brain wanted to feel overwhelmed and go find a rock to crawl under, another part came alive at the understanding someone was counting on me.
Yes, the life of a courier is all about people counting on you to be where you said you were going to be. But delivering hydraulic fittings to a sprinkler system is a far cry from trying to save a friend from power-mad ex-police thugs.
I was in sixth gear and moving along, but I had to slow down for traffic inside Coldwater. Another courier—I recognized his older Mustang GT because he painted the thing sky blue—pulled out in front of me was still taking up both lanes of traffic just outside of town. It wasn't uncommon, especially with newer drivers, to be more or less oblivious of what's behind them while driving; at 90 he probably figured no one was going to pass him.
I downshifted and the engine howled, then I mashed the gas pedal as I came up behind him. I took the opposite lane and passed him with a foot to spare like he was stopped. His old Mustang was fast, but it had no hope of catching me, even if he wanted to.
I opened it up and threw off all my personal safeties. I kept the pedal on the floor and didn't let up as it the speedometer ran out of numbers.
“K-Bear, what if there's rocks or debris on the road?”
“Then I die.”
“What if there's an animal or person in the road?”
“Then we both die.”
Dad was back in the passenger seat. He wore one of his goofy racing t-shirts. I leaned over because of my terminal curiosity. As I suspected, his shirt showed a pickup truck with a donkey or something in the back and a long-legged woman standing next to it with the saying “Haul Ass” plastered on it.
“You could have just asked.”
“No, Dad, some things you just have to see for yourself.” I laughed despite myself.
The speedometer was hovering just off the numbers. They stopped at 160. I literally had no idea how fast I was going. The engine screamed at me with high RPM's but it was less stressed than I was.
I saw the cars ahead of me. Jo had slowed down, or the other Mustang was faster. Either way, the pair were very close to each other. I remembered my own run-in this morning—and guessed they'd be less hesitant to use their nudge maneuver on a vehicle from their own stable.
She wasn't able to bob and weave, not at such speeds, but she was tapping her brakes to get the other car to back off. I was less than a quarter mile behind.
And closing.
I felt the pull of the front end. The weight of the car itself. I felt that dangerous flutter in my tummy as I careened toward the trailing police car. I could just run into it and end the whole pursuit. End it all.
“Koala? You in there?”
I ignored him.
I had closed half the distance. Still I was overtaking them at speed.
“I'm so proud of you. What you've become out here. After all that we've been through.”
With a glance—it was all I could spare—I replied in haste. “That's it? You aren't going to try to stop me?”
He laughed. “You always did what you wanted. I loved that about you as much as your mom hated it.”
That did it. I downshifted and stood on the brakes. I bled off enough kinetic energy that when I hit the back of their car it was only a love tap. Enough to get their attention—and mine—but not enough to send us both to our deaths.
Now, with enemies in front and behind, they had to know they were in trouble.
At least, that was my hope. The police driver moved all the way over into the left lane, giving me a clear look at the man in the passenger seat. He had spun around so he was leaning up against the dashboard. He was hunched down in the tight space. His window came down and papers flew wildly in his cabin. I struck me as funny.
I must have smiled despite myself, because the man smiled, too. Then he pulled out his pistol and aimed.
I jerked the steering wheel. I intended to jump behind the police car so the bastard couldn't shoot me without blowing out his rear window, but—and here's something that I hate to admit—my inexperience behind the wheel of the powerful Mustang caught up with me.
I managed to not get shot, but I was less adept at making high speed lane changes. Instead of smartly moving from the right lane to the left, my rear end broke loose and soon it was in front of me. My car entered a flat spin.
My world became a blur as I lost all my speed doing sideways loop-the-loops, all the while hoping I stayed on the pavement. I kept on the brakes, mindful that a better driver could possibly know how to fix this. When I stopped, I burst into tears.
I was also facing the wrong way.
Jake's friend
I'd let myself get distracted.
The one time someone counted on me to be there for them, I spun out in defeat.
I raged. I banged the steering wheel like a teen girl with a father who turned my date away at the door—true story. A dozen stories like that one surged through my veins as the anger surged, then broke. I'd give anything to experience just one of them again.
I gave myself sixty seconds, then I forced myself to pull it together.
The car had died, but that was about it. Through the tears, I pushed the button and got things going again. I spun him around—I was going to re-name him Penn until told not to; I listened for my father.
Nothing.
“Well then, we have an understanding about a boy.” I said out loud.
Nothing.
I rolled with it.
With both my arm wraps—I covered my arms no matter what season, don't ask—I wiped my eyes before starting into the gears again.
At top speed I knew I could catch them, but it took me much longer this time. When I finally caught up I knew why. Jo had opened her Mustang up, too. She had reached the magical speed where it became too dangerous for either car to maneuver to run the other off the road. I stayed safely behind, looking at my options.
Jo's CB radio sat snug against the center console. I could see she used hers about as much as I did. But maybe the police radio would pick up if I called for her.
I turned it to channel 9, not know if it mattered. “Jo. You up there?”
A man's voice jumped on. “Who is this? You are in serious trouble for interfering with law enforcement officers and being an accomplice to theft of police property.”
I so badly wanted to jump on and point out he wasn't really “the police,” but was instead a usurper wearing the costume of a bygone organization of honorable men and women.
“Probably not a good idea.”
“No, Dad, even I knew that.” I couldn't help but laugh at the audacity.
“I hear ya, Perth. Remember how many rounds were in each of my mags? Subtract seven and go to that channel now.”
“How many rounds?” How the hell should I know. She showed me the box-things and had me carry them. But how many bullets were in each one. I knew she said it, there were two boxes, she called them magazines, but—
Ten! She said they were ten-round magazines.
I skipped down six channels and waited to
see if I heard anything. I finally called out.
“Jo?”
She shot back. “Yes! They scan all the frequencies, but we don't have to make it easy. I have an idea. In sixty seconds go to the channel with double the number of letters as the person you described riding in your car with you this morning. And we can't wreck these cars!”
“She remembered me, how sweet.”
I looked at my dad. “Dad, this is serious. Can't you help me with this?”
“Well I could help you, but what fun would that be?”
He smiled, though his eyes conveyed sadness. I wasn't able to really study them as I could do if he was across the table from me. Back in the day I could read him like a book. Now, I had to watch the road.
What would she do?
I remained far enough away they couldn't easily shoot at me again, but there were no margins of error at those speeds. Whatever she was going to do, the potential was there for all of us to end up in fiery wrecks.
As if to test this theory, the road gently curved to the left. It was a ninety-degree turn, but was designed to be taken at 65 miles per hour, not 165. I watched as Jo entered the turn first, slowing but not by much. The other car backed off just a little bit more, then entered the turn behind her. Jo was being reckless, or desperate.
I switched to channel 6, then waited a suitable time.
“I'm here Jo.”
“Go to the weather station lady. Set up Jake's friend.”
She said no more.
“Roger.” I'd said it almost as a question.
I decelerated. We'd already passed the professor's turnoff miles behind us. If she wanted me to go there, I could only assume she'd go there, too. I watched with sadness as the pair of cars sped off into the distance. In moments, they were gone.
I had many minutes of windshield time to think on her statement. She'd called her car Jake, naming it after a boy—I wanted to ask her about that sometime.
“But then who is Jake's friend,” my dad wondered.
I'd already figured it out.
And then you pull
I arrived at Professor Skellert's house and parked my car so it was hidden behind her home. As I got out, she came wandering out onto the back deck. She seemed...odd.
Post Apocalyptic Ponies: Revolutions Per Mile, Book 1 Page 5