World War Forever (Highway To Armageddon Book 2)

by Harold Bloemer

  Probably because she doesn’t know what else to do, Krystal slowly retreats into the cockpit and grabs the controls. She gently turns the plane to the left, causing the wing of Machete’s flying car to slide out of the hatch door. Machete’s car flies away from us. I assume it will continue to fly in a straight line until it finally runs out of power and crashes into the sea.

  Klaxton eventually clambers to her feet, wipes away the blood trickling out of her mouth, and staggers past me without saying a word. She disappears into the cockpit with Krystal. It’s a wise move, as I’m less likely to throttle her if she’s out of sight.

  Everyone leaves me alone for the next twenty minutes or so. The solitude seems to help. Without people constantly pissing me off, my anger starts to fade away. I continue to sit here in the middle of the cabin, with my eyes closed, taking deep, calming breaths, struggling to crawl out of the pit of madness I tumbled into. After a while it seems to work. I’m still upset, of course… still angry… but I no longer feel like a loose cannon on the verge of obliterating anything and everyone around me. I feel like I could return to that unhinged state at a moment’s notice, but at least I was able to craw my way out of the dark void of madness. It means if need be, I will be able to crawl my way out again.

  Once he feels it’s safe enough to approach me without suffering grievous physical or emotional trauma, Lance squats beside me and hands me a bottle of water from the mini-fridge. I shakily accept the bottle and take a sip. I don’t realize how dehydrated I am until the cool liquid gushes down my parched throat.

  “Thank you,” I say in a hoarse voice.

  Lance cups my chin in his rugged hands and says, “Look Boom Boom, I’m sorry. About all of this. You’re right, this is all my fault. I pushed you into doing these things. I made you feel like we had to go ‘over the edge’ in order to accomplish our mission. And I was wrong to do that. We never should have gone after Klaxton. We should have stayed home. You tried to tell me… to warn me this was a horrible idea… but I was too bull-headed to listen. After what went down in Alaska, I felt we were invincible. I thought, how could a trip to the Amazon possibly compare to a shoot-out with Russian terrorists and the American Secret Service? But I was totally wrong. This was ten times worse. I mean, what were we thinking? What was I thinking? It was insane to think we could change the world. I mean, we’re just teenagers! We’re not even old enough to legally drink yet. What are we doing here? It’s crazy!”

  I heave a heavy sigh and reply, “I don’t know, Lance. But it’s too late to turn back now. We’re in too deep. We need to finish what we started and get Klaxton back into the White House. Then we can----”

  KA-BOOM!!!

  A deafening explosion rattles the entire chopper, sending me and Lance careening into the unforgiving steel wall. Thankfully we slammed into the left wall. If we went the other way, there’s a very real possibility we would have tumbled right out of the hatch door and plummeted to our deaths.

  Grenade cries out in agony as his broken body slams into the wall as well. I cringe at the sight of all the blood splattered against the wall. Grenade is still hemorrhaging like crazy. It’s like he has the Ebola virus or something.

  Lance crawls over to check on me. My head is throbbing like crazy (I slammed it against the wall pretty hard), but other than that I’m doing alright. For now, at least.

  “What the hell was that?” Lance grumbles, grabbing my right hand as the lights in the cabin flicker off and on before finally fizzling out and plunging us into darkness. The only light we get is from the glowing control panel in the cockpit and the occasional flash of lightning outside. (We’ve flown past the worst of the thunderstorm, but we’re still skirting the outer edges of it.)

  “I don’t know,” I moan. “It felt like we were--”

  I’m interrupted by another explosion. Lance and I slam into the wall for the second time in less than a minute, smacking our heads against the metallic hull.

  Lance collapses to the floor, gripping his skull. “I think we’re being blasted with concussion grenades. Whoever’s attacking us wants us alive.”

  “I’m betting it’s not us they want.” I point to the cockpit, where Klaxton is prostrate in the doorway, struggling to get to her feet. “They want her.”

  A voice from outside bellows through a megaphone “This is the United States military! Land your plane immediately or face immediate annihilation! This is your only warning!”

  Lance and I stumble into the cockpit with

  Krystal and Klaxton. I glance at the holographic screen hovering over the control panel and groan. It’s broadcasting an image from one of the chopper’s rear-view mirrors. Flying behind us, armed to the teeth with dozens of machine gun turrets and rocket launchers, are three of the United States’ most sophisticated, hi-tech, insanely deadly fighter planes. They almost look like sleek silver spaceships, with giant, bulky, fold-up wings protruding out of the sides and rectangular, bullet-proof windshields in the front. They’re the fastest planes on the planet, capable of zooming along at thousands of miles an hour. There’s no way in hell we’d ever be able to outrun them. It looks like our uncanny streak of evading death and capture is about to come to a screeching halt.

  “The motherfuckers found us!” Krystal blurts out, stating the painfully obvious. “What should we do?!”

  A garbled, tortured cough causes us all to twirl around. Leaning in the doorway of the cockpit, looking closer to death than any person I’ve ever seen, is Grenade. As his lone bionic eyeball flickers, Grenade chokes out in between hacking coughs, “We can’t… kahhh… we can’t surrender! Kakhahh!! They’ll… they’ll kill us all! Kaaahh…. Hehh!! Heehh! Kachhh!! We need… we need to fight… klecch!!!”

  “Are you out of your fucking mind?!” Lance cries hysterically. “We can’t fight back against those space-ship things! Maybe if I had my electric glove, or if Boom Boom had Alex’s laser-firing goggles. But we don’t have any of that shit! All we got are a couple guns and some knives! Face it, Grenade, it’s over. We tried our best, but even we can’t take on the full, unadulterated might of the American Military. I’m not going to let you get us all killed because you have some delusional fantasy to save the world!”

  Grenade doesn’t say a word. Instead, he makes his way over to the hatch door (leaving a trail of blood in his wake), whips out a handgun, leans out of the chopper, and fires at the nearest military plane. The plane jerks sideways to avoid the bombardment of ammunition. The bullets don’t come close to cracking the plane’s windshield, but I’m assuming the pilot would rather be safe than sorry (hence the jerking evasive maneuvers).

  Lance tries to pull Grenade away from the door. “Stop it, Grenade! You’re only making things worse!”

  Grenade punches Lance in the face with his human hand. Lance stumbles backwards, clutching his mouth.

  “Grenade, what are you doing?!” I scream, rushing to Lance’s side. I wipe away the blood trickling out of his mouth. His eyes are glazed over, like he’s stunned. Hell, he might have a concussion for all I know.

  I scowl at Grenade, who is in the process of replacing his spent ammunition cartridge with a fully stocked one. “Stop this madness at once! You’ve already screwed things up enough as it is! Don’t… oh dear God….”

  I watch in horror as another space-plane flies right up beside us. A door on the side of the plane slides open and an armored soldier hoists a bazooka over his shoulder.

  I forget all about telling Grenade to stop and instead holler, “Shoot that soldier, Grenade! Shoot him before he---”

  I don’t get a chance to finish my sentence. A projectile of some sort explodes out of the bazooka’s long barrel and slams into our propellers. The projectile detonates on impact, making some sort of crackling sound. Tendrils of electricity cascade down the side of the chopper as we stall in mid-air. A few seconds later all the lights on the control panel in the cockpit fizzle out and we begin our freefalling descent toward the Caribbean Sea. I scream as Lance
, Grenade and I tumble into the cockpit and slam into the front windshield. I glance out the windshield just long enough to gather my surroundings. The coastline of South America is just barely visible off in the distance. It’s probably a good 30 or 40 miles away. There’s no way we’d be able to swim to shore. If we don’t drown, we will be snatched out of the sea by the American Military. And then we will be ruthlessly executed. Drowning almost sounds peaceful in comparison.

  “Everyone hang on!” Lance screams, wrapping his arms around me so we don’t get separated when we slam into the water. “Take a deep breath and get ready to kick your feet and---”

  SPLASH!!

  The entire chopper vibrates like crazy as we slam into the sea. A giant wave of water splashes over us, completely inundating the cockpit. I manage to take a giant breath just before the water rushes past my head. Still clutching Lance’s hand, I kick my feet and begin to navigate my way out of the cockpit. I crack open my eyes to find Klaxton in front of us, swimming like a dolphin toward the hatch door. The water is dark, but the steady bursts of lightning up in the sky allow just enough illumination that we are able to make our way out of the sinking chopper, albeit just barely.

  Lance and I follow Klaxton to the surface. As soon as we burst forth from the raging sea, we gasp feverishly for air, thrashing our arms and legs like crazy in order to stay afloat. Klaxton is a few feet away from us, treading water as well. Almost immediately upon surfacing, our retinas are blasted with blinding spotlights.

  The same booming, thunderous voice we heard before shouts, “Put your hands in the air NOW!!! Failure to comply will result with your immediate termination!”

  The three of us do as we’re told, raising our weaponless hands high into the air. I continue kicking my feet so I don’t sink beneath the choppy seas. Lightning flashes overhead, interspersed with cracks of thunder. The gusting wind slams into my face, causing my soaked hair to flutter around like tendrils of flame.

  I crack open my eyes and peer up at one of the space-planes hovering only a few feet in front of me. It’s hard to see with the spotlight still blasting my eyeballs, but the plane is so gargantuan that it’s impossible to miss.

  I squint my eyes and notice a soldier standing in the open hatch door, pointing a gun at me. I’m just about to duck underneath the water when the soldier pulls the trigger. Instead of a bullet drilling into my skull, however, a metallic cable explodes out of the barrel of the gun and wraps around my chest. The soldier proceeds to pull me up onto the sliding ramp protruding out of the hatch door. Even though I’m quite aware I face a grisly fate, I’m still relieved to be pulled from the chilly, choppy sea. It’s still humiliating to be pulled from the water in this fashion, though. I feel like a fish being reeled into a boat.

  As soon as I’m yanked onto the ramp, two burly soldiers grab me by the arms and toss me into the cabin of the monstrous space-plane. I slam onto the solid steel floor, smacking my face against it. Even if I wanted to fight back, I’m not given the opportunity. Within seconds of slamming onto the floor, another soldier thrusts a stun gun into the back of my neck. I scream and thrash around like a fish out of water. A tsunami of agonizing torment courses throughout my entire body, engulfing my brain in a suffocating cloud of pain.

  A few seconds later the bombardment of intense agony abruptly comes to a halt. I blink away my tears and try to pull my hands in front of me. But I can’t. My hands are stuck behind my back, ensnarled in excruciatingly tight metal handcuffs that are digging into my skin. The soldiers must have bound my hands while I was being tased. I was in such horrific pain that I didn’t even notice.

  I turn onto my side and watch as Lance and Klaxton are pulled into the plane and tossed down beside me, shivering and soaking wet. They, too, are promptly assaulted with stun guns, allowing the soldiers to easily slap handcuffs around their wrists.

  I glance around the cabin and say, “Wh… where’s Krystal?”

  None of the soldiers answer me. I force myself into a sitting position and shout, “Where’s Krystal?! You can’t just leave her out there!”

  “Shut your trap, girl!”

  A burly, blonde-headed, middle-aged woman storms over and slams the butt of her machine gun into my skull. A sick thud echoes throughout the cabin as bright lights twirl around in front of my eyeballs. It takes everything I have to remain conscious.

  Another soldier shouts, “Hey, someone help me! This bitch is fat as fuck!”

  I repeatedly blink my eyes so the stars go away and peer out the hatch door. I’m almost overcome with giddy happiness at the sight of Krystal’s prone, soaking wet body being reeled into the plane. It takes two soldiers to pull her inside. The soldiers don’t bother tasing Krystal, as she’s already unconscious. They do slap cuffs on her, though, and roll her next to me.

  I stare at Krystal’s ashen face. She doesn’t look good.

  “Krystal,” I whisper, nudging her chest with my knee. “Pssst! Krystal, wake up.”

  “I said shut up, you stupid bitch!”

  The blonde-headed woman hits me with her gun again, this time so hard that I’m knocked flat on my back. That definitely saps the fight out of me.

  The blonde bitch marches over to her buddies and barks, “Where’s the other one? The cyborg freak?”

  “I don’t know, Sergeant,” one of her male subordinates replies. “We’re looking for him.”

  “Well hurry up. We need to get a move on,” she says curtly.

  The soldiers search for Grenade for another ten minutes or so before giving up. The blonde sergeant orders all the planes back up into the air. I fall sideways as the space-plane blasts off at what must be many hundreds of miles an hour.

  After I prop myself back up into a sitting position, I gaze out one of the plane’s many windows. The other two massive planes are flying in front of us. The coastline of South America appears to be getting closer and closer with each passing second. They’re taking us back to the Amazon. Fuck!

  The blonde sergeant storms back into the cabin and kneels down in front of Klaxton, who has been desperately attempting to break free from her cuffs. The sergeant clutches Klaxton’s chin and sneers down at her. “We finally got you, you bitch. You’ve caused us a ton of problems with your little disappearing act. But President LeBeau was confident we would finally find you. It was only a matter of time. Even you can’t run from the mightiest military power on Earth. When we hand your carcass over to the Chinese, the invasion will cease and we can all carry on with our merry little lives.”

  Klaxton chokes out a snort of derision. “You fool. You stupid, wretched fool. How asinine can you be? The Chinese will not stop their inexorable, juggernaut march toward global domination just because you hand me over to them. The only thing that will stop Empress Xing and General Kang’s insatiable thirst for bloodshed is a brutal counterassault! All this time you morons have wasted trying to track me down should have been spent fortifying our Pacific defenses. Your president is weak. That’s why I picked her to be my vice president, because I knew she wouldn’t get in my way. If you continue to follow her nonsensical orders, you will only be expediting the downfall of the American Empire. The Chinese will continue to waltz all over us as long as that pussy president of yours is in charge.”

  The sergeant bares her teeth and smacks Klaxton hard across the face. The slap echoes throughout the plane, prompting several of the other soldiers to cock their eyebrows in surprise and disapproval. I’m sure they’re not particularly fond of Klaxton, but I’m also sure they don’t approve of their former commander-in-chief being treated in such a humiliating, disrespectful manner.

  “Shut your filthy mouth, traitor,” the sergeant growls.

  Klaxton initially appears shell-shocked at being slapped, but her lips soon curl into a demented smile. She then starts cackling… the hysterical, giddy cackle of a psychopath who enjoys people standing up to her… only so that she can subsequently crush them like ants beneath her jackboot.

  Still grinni
ng like a madman (or in this case, a mad woman), Klaxton says, “As God is my eternal witness, when I become president again… and mark my words, I shall once again reign as supreme leader of the world’s mightiest empire… I will not only ensure that you are brutally and sadistically slaughtered, but I shall also oversee the complete and unequivocal obliteration of your entire bloodline. Every last man, woman, and child that shares even the slightest link to your lineage, will be extinguished from this Earth. I just thought you should know that.”

  Klaxton’s psychotic, blood-drenched monologue stuns everyone on the plane, including the battle-hardened soldiers. Even the sergeant grows pale. She actually gulps and steps back. Klaxton has succeeded in freaking her the fuck out.

  In an attempt to save face, the sergeant marches over to me and shouts, “President LeBeau only wants Klaxton brought in alive. The rest are expendable. Commence with their execution.”