“Somebody shut that bitch up!” Grenade shouts.
Lance glances at me and holds up his hands. “I’m not about to go hit a lady. You take care of her, Firecracker.”
“Always leaving me to do the dirty work,” I mumble as I dash over to the screaming woman.
“Sorry about this, it’s nothing personal,” I say before slugging her square in the jaw. The woman’s head snaps back and bangs against the headboard, knocking her out cold.
I grimace and shake my throbbing hand. I seriously hate punching people.
Lance flaps his hands at me and frantically cries, “Come on, Boom Boom, we’ve gotta move!”
“I’m coming, I’m coming, don’t get your panties in a bunch,” I mutter, rushing out of the room.
Light begins spilling out from underneath all the closed doors lining the hallway. There’s also a bunch of hysterical shouting and the unmistakable sound of firearms being cocked, locked, and loaded.
Grenade curses and flips Blackbird’s unconscious body up onto his shoulder. “The shit just hit the fan, folks. Get back up on deck!”
The three of us start racing down the hallway, with Grenade bringing up the rear. Blackbird’s immense weight is slowing him down somewhat, but he’s still able to keep up with us. The guy may be in his early 60s, but you would never be able to tell from the way he moves.
Doors behind us swing open and armed mobsters rush out into the hall. Someone shouts, “They got Blackbird! They got Blackbird!!”
“Well aren’t they observant,” Lance mutters. I notice his robotic glove beginning to glow blue.
A gunshot rings out through the hallway. The bullet just narrowly whizzes past Grenade’s head and nicks the wall on my left.
Someone else shouts, “Don’t fire so recklessly, Paul! You’re going to hit the boss!”
I don’t need to turn my head to know we’re being chased. I can hear the rapidly approaching footsteps.
Grenade shouts, “Lance, take out our pursuers!”
Lance spins around and unfurls a blinding bolt of electricity. Grenade is already crouched down, Blackbird still slumped over his shoulder like a ginormous bag of flour. Behind Lance are six heavily armed goons, pointing their firearms directly at us. Lance’s electric blast spirals over Grenade’s head and explodes into the chest of the nearest goon. There’s a blinding burst of light, followed by a sick crackling sound. The goon flies backwards and collides into two of his buddies. Lance fires off several more blasts, blowing two more goons off their feet. The last remaining goon fires off a shot, clipping Lance in his shoulder. Lance yelps and falls to his knees. I growl and fire off several shots of my own. One of the bullets careens into the goon’s forehead, spraying the wall behind him with blood and brain fragments.
I kneel down beside Lance and gasp, “Are you… are you…”
Lance looks up at me, his face covered in a sheen of sweat. He cracks a pained smile and says, “My armor deflected the bullet. Still hurts like a mother, though.”
I give a relieved laugh and help him to up.
“I’m fine, too. Thanks for asking,” Grenade snarls, climbing to his feet.
Lance blows on his gloved index finger like it’s a smoking gun and says, “Well that was a piece of cake. I figured Blackbird would have invested in more security.”
I point over Lance’s shoulder and reply, “I think you spoke too soon.”
Six more half-naked, gun-toting gangbangers round the corner and race toward us, followed by a dozen more. And several other gunmen emerge from the doorways in front of us.
Grenade growls, “Clear a path up to the deck! I’ll take care of the jackasses behind us!”
Grenade drops Blackbird’s snoring carcass to the ground and begins mowing down the rapidly approaching phalanx of gangbangers with his monstrosity of a machine gun. Bullet casings fly out of the back of his gun and bounce off my body armor as the army of gangsters drop like flies being blasted with bug spray. The hallway quickly runs red from a gushing river of blood.
Lance and I spin around and start taking out the mobsters in front of us. Lance obliterates most of them with his lightning bolts, but I manage to take out a few of the gangsters with uncannily accurate gunshots to their foreheads and bare chests. The gangsters are firing at us, of course, but most of them are so drunk that they wouldn’t be able to hit a bullseye less than a foot away.
After we take down the last of our targets, I glance behind me to see how Grenade is holding up. Grenade has already taken out a good dozen of the gangbangers, but even more are on the way. In fact, it seems that an unending pipeline of gangsters keep barreling around the corner.
“Fuck this,” Grenade growls, lowering his gun and pulling out another one of his blinking obsidian spheres. As he’s doing this, one of the drunk mobsters manages to fire off an accurate shot. The bullet careens into Grenade’s non-metallic arm. Grenade groans as blood gushes from his ghastly-looking wound.
“Grenade!” I shout, running toward him.
Grenade waves me off and shouts, “Turn around and keep running! I got this!”
Lance clutches my arm and pulls me down the hall. I glance over my shoulder to make sure Grenade is right behind us. I needn’t have worried. Grenade hurls his blinking sphere into the midst of the blood-thirsty, shit-faced gunmen chasing after us. Once Grenade has released his, ahem, grenade, he slings Blackbird’s fat ass back over his shoulder and hauls ass in our direction, sprinting faster than someone a third his age. He dashes so fast, in fact, that he nearly runs us over.
A split-second later a concussive blast sends us all flying forward about ten feet. The walls and ceiling vibrate like crazy and a smothering wall of heat washes over us, drenching our bodies in sweat. Searing black smoke billows into our faces, causing us all to start hacking our lungs out.
It takes a few seconds for me to regain my bearings. My entire body feels like it’s been beat with a metal baseball bat. I do my best to ignore the throbbing pain. I’m slightly unnerved by the fact that the only thing I can hear is an incessant ringing noise. The blast may have done some damage to my eardrums. I just hope the damage isn’t permanent.
I look up to see Grenade mouthing something to me, but I can’t hear him. I’m pretty good at reading lips, however, and it seems like he’s asking me if I’m okay. I nod and turn to check on Lance. I’m relieved to see he is relatively unscathed, save for a nasty bump on his forehead. He pushes himself up and clutches his ribs. It would appear he’s as banged up as I am.
After some serious effort, I manage to push myself to my feet. I slowly turn around and take in the carnage Grenade has perpetrated on Blackbird’s beloved flying vessel. The explosive sphere has incinerated a good chunk of the third floor. The walls are missing on both sides and there’s a gaping hole in the ground and the ceiling, exposing the floors above and below us. Severed body parts litter the scorched hallway. On the other side of the massive chasm created by the grenade are dozens of mutilated bodies, writhing on the ground in agony as they reach for their missing limbs. It takes everything I have not to spew vomit all over the place.
I know this is a matter of life and death. That it’s basically us or them. But I still hate the fact we just slaughtered a couple dozen people in a matter of seconds. So much destruction wrought by our hands. It’s almost like human life has no value anymore. It’s become as expendable as an ant beneath our boots.
Grenade hoists Blackbird back over his shoulder and, in between hacking coughs, growls, “Don’t just stand there with your thumbs up your asses. Get up on deck!”
Lance grabs my arm, snapping me out of my stunned reverie, and the three of us stumble our way down the rest of the hallway. We take out a few gunmen along the way, the ones foolish enough to emerge from their rooms. (I have a feeling there are many more cowering under their beds. They are the smart ones.)
We finally reach the stairs at the end of the hall and dash up them as fast as we can. Halfway up a blaring siren goes off,
followed by flashing red lights emanating from the ceiling and floorboards. Someone suddenly starts shouting through the ship’s intercom system, “THIS IS A CODE RED! WE ARE UNDER ATTACK! I REPEAT, THIS IS A CODE RED! WE ARE UNDER ATTACK! WE ARE UNDER ATTACK!”
We’re almost at the top of the stairs when two more half-naked gangbangers round the corner and start firing at us. Lance points his gloved hand at the nearest gangbanger and blasts him off his feet, bathing his entire body in crackling blue electricity. I whip up my pistol and blast the other dude in the head, blowing out his brains. The gangbanger crumples to the ground as blood pours from his head wound. I race past the dying man without a second glance. I have enough shit weighing on my conscience. The last thing I need is to look into the eyes of a dying man whose demise I helped facilitate.
After what feels like an eternity we reach the top deck and practically gallop over to Grenade’s jet. Krystal is in the cockpit, wildly flailing her arms and shouting for us to hurry the fuck up.
Krystal has good reason to be so concerned. Dozens of gangbangers have started spilling out onto the deck, emerging from every stairwell and elevator on the ship. The gangbangers waste no time trying to take us down in a hail of bullets. The only thing working in our favor is the fact that the overwhelming majority of Blackbird’s hapless crew are drunk out of their minds. This results in roughly 99% of their shots whizzing past our heads and limbs. Still, there is that 1% that manages to connect. Several bullets nick my arms and legs, and one even slams into my back, knocking me to the ground. Thankfully my armor deflects the bullets, but the shots still hurt like hell when they careen into my body.
Lance reaches down and pulls me to my feet. “C’mon, Firecracker, we’re almost there,” he grunts, half-carrying me to the jet.
Despite the chaos unfolding around us, I find myself chuckling.
“My knight in shining armor,” I say, clutching onto the only man who has always been by my side, even when I’ve been on the brink of insanity and despair. Lance may drive me bonkers, but I can always rely on him when it matters most. And in the end that’s all that matters, isn’t it?
Despite the fact that we’re over 40 years his junior, and he’s carrying an unconscious 300-plus pound asshole, Grenade makes it to the plane first. He throws Blackbird’s sorry ass into the back before spinning back around and aiming his gargantuan machine gun at the army of gangbangers rapidly descending upon us, like a pack of ravenous wolves closing in on wounded prey.
“Get in the goddamn jet!” Grenade barks before releasing a steady stream of machine gunfire. Krystal helps him out by firing the machine guns jutting out of the front of our jet. The resulting gunfire is enough to rattle my already battered eardrums. Lance and I jump into the back of the jet and rush into the cockpit. I watch in unadulterated horror as dozens of gangbangers crumble to pieces as hundreds of bullets rip into their half-naked bodies. The deck quickly becomes covered in a thick sea of crimson. I have a tough time swallowing the acidic bile creeping up my throat.
Grenade finally throws down his smoking machine gun and hops into the jet. Marching into the cockpit (and leaving blood-stained footprints in his wake) he barks, “Start the damn jet and get us the fuck out of here!”
“You ain’t gotta tell my black ass twice,” Krystal says, pressing various blinking buttons and yanking on levers. The propellers start to spin and the jet lurches into the sky, causing Lance, Grenade and I to stagger backwards and nearly topple over.
As we rapidly ascend into the heavens, the surviving gangbangers point their guns up at us and fire off a volley of bullets. Several of the bullets bounce off of our bullet-proof windshield.
Grenade cackles. “They can fire all they want. This windshield can withstand a grenade blast.”
The middle of the windshield suddenly cracks.
Lance crosses his arms and arrogantly says, “You were saying?”
Grenade responds with an animalistic growl.
“Oh shit, look!” Krystal exclaims, pointing at the deck below. “They’re coming after us!”
We all look down and groan at the sight of dozens of gangbangers climbing into the helicopters and cars still sitting on deck. One of the cars starts to lift into the sky, followed by another, and another.
“You think we can outfly them?” Krystal says, unable to hide the hysteria in her voice.
“We won’t have to,” Grenade snarls. He lifts his robotic arm (out of the corner of my eye I notice his right arm is still bleeding pretty heavily) and a holographic screen pops up. On the screen are a dozen blinking spheres. Grenade flashes his toothy, yellow grin as the blinking spheres disappear one by one.
“You guys ready for a fireworks show?” he chortles.
The first flying car to levitate into the sky suddenly detonates in a massive, blinding explosion that rattles our entire jet. Flaming pieces of debris slam into our windshield, creating even more cracks. Then another car explodes, followed by another, and another. Then all the helicopters and cars on deck detonate in a colossal, simultaneous explosion that envelopes my field of vision with an ethereal white light. I turn away and close my eyes to prevent any permanent impairment to my retinas.
This time our jet vibrates so violently that I tumble to the ground, banging my forehead against the cockpit’s metallic wall. More fiery pieces of wreckage slam into our plane, undoubtedly causing costly exterior damage.
“Take us higher into the sky, Krystal!” Grenade roars. I crack open my eyes to find him crouching down a few feet away from me, his eyes fully open and glowing brightly. I guess his robotic eyeballs are fully capable of staring into a blinding explosion without any negative side effects.
I stagger to my feet and peer out of the nearly pulverized windshield. We’re now about a mile into the sky, but the inflamed airship is still fully visible. The entire upper deck is engulfed in lapping flames. The heat emanating from those flames is so intense that I can feel it baking my face. I pull my visor down over my eyes and zoom in with the telescopic function. As soon as I do, I immediately regret my morbid curiosity. Dozens of flaming bodies are jumping off the fiery deck and plunging into the South Atlantic Ocean. If the third degree burns plaguing their entire bodies or the smoke inhalation doesn’t kill them, then the freezing sea surely will.
My horror grows ten-fold as the hovering cruise ship begins to break apart in mid-air. Giant pieces of the ship break off and plummet into the ocean, along with lord-knows how many victims. A few seconds later the entire ship disintegrates and collapses into the water. I gasp and stagger back, my quivering hands barely able to conceal my gaping mouth. In the blink of an eye countless hundreds have been sent to their watery deaths, just so we could capture one man. My heart feels like it’s been cleaved in two.
“My God, Grenade, what have you done?” I croak in a barely audible whisper.
Grenade turns to me and quietly says, “I know you didn’t want to turn that ship into a tomb, darlin’, but it was a necessary evil. Those bastards chose their fate the moment they decided to work for Blackbird. They knew the kind of man he was. They knew he was wanted by the United States Government for questioning. And they chose to help hide his sorry ass. They reaped what they sowed.”
I simply glare into Grenade’s demonic-looking eyes. I can’t even begin to muster an appropriate response. How Grenade can so nonchalantly kill hundreds of people and express not even the slightest hint of remorse, I will never know.
Lance slumps against the wall, holding his head in his ungloved hand. His eyes are half-shut and he looks like he’s about to vomit. He’s definitely feeling the effects of all his pre-raid drinking and drug use.
I make my way over to Lance and gently touch his shoulder.
“Lance, are you…?”
Lance shrugs out of my grasp and mutters, “I’m fine. I just… I’m tired, is all.”
Before I can say anything else, a groan from the cabin reminds us that we’re not alone. While Krystal continues manning the control
s, Lance, Grenade and I make our way into the cabin and tower over Blackbird, who is sprawled out on the floor in his Christmas-themed thong, writhing around and moaning like a little bitch.
Grenade looks down at Blackbird in disgust. “He’s starting to wake up. You guys wanna interrogate him now, or…?”
I notice Grenade twirling a blade around in his cyborg hand.
“No!” I blurt out, taking Grenade by surprise. In response to his raised eyebrows, I elaborate, “I mean, we should just leave that for LeBeau’s secret service detail. Those guys are experts at interrogations. They’ve probably got some super-powerful truth serum that’ll get him spilling his guts way better than we ever could.”
Grenade grins and holds up his gleaming blade. “I dunno, kid. I’m a pretty good interrogator myself.”
“I’m sure you are, but I’ve seen enough spilt blood for one day,” I say in a frosty voice.
World War Forever (Highway To Armageddon Book 2) Page 14