by Carter Roy
She tucked it into her waistband, pulled her shirt over it, and marched outside.
Dawkins and I stood up at the same time.
“What are you going to do?” I asked him.
“Nothing.” He held me back with a palm against my chest. “Her dad will sort her out soon enough. She’s safer apart from us, anyway. It’s you they’re after, Ronan, and so long as they don’t know about Greta, she’ll be okay— oh, for the love of Pete.”
He grabbed my arm and jerked me right, toward a row of claw machines and pinball games and a photo booth with a little blue curtain.
But we didn’t move so fast that I’d missed what he’d seen: As Greta opened the glass double doors at the front of the building, she was stopped by three people. Two men in natty dark blue suits, and a severe-looking older blonde woman.
“The lady from the station. And the bald guy from the train,” I said, hoping Dawkins hadn’t heard me gulp. The other guy had long black hair that had been greased back against his scalp.
“Right.” Dawkins shoved me inside the photo booth. Then he stepped in after me, yanking the curtain shut. “Well, there goes a good plan.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, we’re not going anywhere now.” He peeked out. “We’ve got to go rescue our mouthy little friend.”
“She’s not my friend,” I protested.
Dawkins gave me a look of such withering contempt that I immediately felt ashamed. “Of course she is. Do you know why those three haven’t come back here yet to nab us? Because even though they’ve grabbed Greta, she hasn’t told them where we are. She probably lied, and that’s why they’re looking for us outside.
“So we’ve got to go rescue her,” Dawkins added, crouching down and sliding through the curtain. “Come on. Stay low.” He led me deeper into the truck stop. Beyond the restaurant area the store extended in every direction, like the biggest convenience store in the world. In the back corner was a dark doorway curtained with long clear strips of heavy plastic. “Storeroom,” he said, pointing. “Should lead outside.”
Four crates of milk were stacked on a handtruck beside the plastic-strip curtain. Dawkins tipped the handtruck back on its wheels and rolled it through the doorway.
A chubby young guy in a blue apron glanced at us as we passed, but the dolly must have convinced him we belonged, because he just turned back to stocking an ice-cream case.
Dawkins pushed the dolly through another strip curtain and into a giant room with ramps and a parked truck—a loading dock. There were slots for trucks to back into, and huge open roll-up doors to the outside. Dawkins left the milk on the nearest ramp and peered around one of the doors. I joined him.
“She’s resisting,” he said. “Scrappy little thing, that girl.”
A red SUV was parked on a raised concrete island between the two gas pump fueling stations, its doors hanging open. The blonde woman, her two minions, and Greta were struggling in front of it. Even from here, I could hear Greta shouting that her dad was a cop, that they were going to be in huge trouble, that if they were smart they’d get him on the phone before it was too late.
All of the people gassing up their cars had stopped what they were doing, but the woman held up a silver badge in a leather wallet and began talking.
“What’s she saying?” I asked.
“Probably identifying herself as police or some other nonsense,” Dawkins muttered in disgust. “People are easily duped by official-looking shiny things.”
The slicked-back hair guy put Greta in handcuffs, then he and Mr. Clean lifted her into the backseat. She kicked and screamed the whole time.
“I wish she hadn’t taken that Tesla gun,” Dawkins said.
“Why?” I asked.
“Because now Blondie and her goons have it,” he replied.
The woman Dawkins called Blondie handed Mr. Clean the weapon, and he leaned back in the open door of the SUV. Then Blondie and Slicked-Back Hair separated. She headed right, toward the garage/auto-shop area, and he came our way, disappearing among the line of semitrailer trucks waiting to fuel up at the diesel pumps.
“Now’s our chance,” Dawkins announced, sidling outside. Crouched low, he ran around the corner. I followed as quickly as I could, wondering why we were going in the opposite direction from Greta and hoping that the blonde lady—wherever she’d gone—wouldn’t see us.
But I didn’t hear any shouts or gunshots, and then it didn’t matter anymore, because we’d turned another corner and were deep in the shadows of the garage.
The place stank of old oil and gasoline, and there was junk all over—teetering stacks of tires and grime-encrusted car parts heaped against the walls. An engine was suspended in a harness of chains, a black puddle of gunk beneath it. An enormous rusty orange Cadillac sat right in the entryway, the rear end propped up on a rickety pair of tire jacks. It didn’t have any back wheels, just rusty metal discs where the tires should have been, lug nut screws sticking out. A panda bear key chain dangled from the ignition.
“Nice ride,” Dawkins commented. “Keep an eye out, Ronan. We need something we can use as a weapon.”
A friendly looking old man in a spectacularly dirty gray jumpsuit walked up, wiping his hands on a greasy rag. “May I help you two young gentlemen?” he asked. Sewn onto his chest was a name patch that read ALBIE.
“Why, hello!” Dawkins said brightly. “We’re here to pick up our 1985 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme. Brought it in to have the head gasket replaced.”
I didn’t even have to look to know that Dawkins had turned on that smile of his: Albie grinned in response. “I don’t recall an Olds with a blown gasket, but let me go find the paperwork in the office. May take me a minute; it’s a mess in there.”
“Sure, go ahead,” Dawkins said. “We’re in no rush.”
But we were—Blondie and her goons would be here any minute. I jiggled my leg and tried not to look anxious.
After Albie disappeared, Dawkins picked up a tire iron and smacked it against his palm, then sighed. “It’s no use. The problem is, they’ve parked out there in the center of that enormous concrete lot, so that guy will see us coming from a mile away.”
“Right,” I said. “My mom—she ran really fast. Can you maybe do the same thing? Magic?”
“Can I do magic?” Dawkins said, disbelieving. “You mean like flap my wings and fly out there? Or turn invisible?”
“That sounds kind of dumb, doesn’t it?”
He replaced the tire iron. “The Guard can’t fly or turn invisible, Ronan. I suppose the speed thing is magic of a sort,” Dawkins said, “but it’s a talent that would be useless here. He’d still see me coming, and even if I dodged the shot from his weapon, he might harm Greta.”
“Oh, right,” I said. “Greta.”
“We need to be sneaky but get to her fast.”
“How about that thing over there?” I pointed to what looked like a short ambulance stretcher on wheels. It had a cushion for someone’s head, and a four-foot-long platform—a creeper that mechanics lie down on to go underneath cars.
He put a foot on the creeper, rolling it back and forth. “Good idea,” he said, clapping me on my shoulder. “This looks like it should work.”
“You’re going to skateboard out there?”
“No, no,” Dawkins said, bending down and picking it up. “I’m going to scoot out there on my belly. He’ll never see me coming.” He walked to the front of the garage, hugging the creeper to his chest. “But just to be sure, we’ll need a distraction so big that Blondie and her goons won’t see me, either.”
We looked out at the SUV. Between it and us were a few hundred yards of pavement, empty save for the occasional car or truck rumbling past.
“Where are you going to find a distraction that big?” I asked, feeling a bit uneasy. I had an idea where this was going.
“It’s going to have to be completely bonkers, Ronan—something loud and maybe a little dangerous and just a whole lot insane.�
� Dawkins smiled at me and threw an arm around my shoulders. “Which is to say, you’re the perfect man for the job.”
CHAPTER 8:
WHEELS OF MISFORTUNE
I’d never driven a car before, but Dawkins assured me it was easy. “A car like this one,” he said, pointing to the orange Cadillac, “practically drives itself!”
“It doesn’t have any back wheels,” I pointed out.
He waved his hands as though this were no big deal and yanked open the Cadillac’s door. “It’s a front-wheel drive.”
I thought of Greta out there, handcuffed and alone. “Okay,” I said, sliding into the driver’s seat and snapping on the seat belt.
“First, you’re going to turn that key there. That starts the engine.”
“I said I haven’t driven before. I didn’t say I was stupid.”
“Then you put your foot on the brake—that’s the wide center pedal—and you’re going to move the gearshift—this knob here—from P to D. The D stands for drive. At that point, you’re good to go.”
The world through the dirty windshield was streaky and faraway. “I can’t really see.”
“What’s to see? It’s a truck-stop parking lot.” Nonetheless, Dawkins spat on the glass and rubbed it with the sleeve of his leather jacket—smearing the dirt but clearing some space on the glass.
“So then I give it a little gas?”
“You’re going to need to give it a lot of gas. Really stomp on the pedal. Just go for broke.”
“Key, brake, D, gas pedal. Got it.” I played through it in my head.
“Just aim straight ahead, past that line of cars at the gas pumps and right to the open road beyond. Trust me, before you even get close, I’ll have reached the SUV, taken out that bald number, and freed Greta. Then she and I will come fetch you.”
I shook my head. “That’s the stupidest—”
He tossed the black leather satchel onto the seat beside me. “Don’t forget to bring that when you ditch the car. It’s got our stuff.” He cradled the mechanic’s creeper in his arms. “Remember, you’re the distraction. So honk the horn the entire time. Yell like a crazy person if you want! We want them looking at you, the idiot driving a car without tires. Not at me, the guy skating in from the loading dock.”
With that, he stooped over and dashed outside, back the way we’d come. From the angle the Cadillac was facing, I couldn’t really see the SUV, but that was probably for the best. I pulled the door shut, locked it, and turned the key in the ignition.
The car engine must have been big—really big. It made a world of noise.
I was so startled that it took me a few seconds to remember what I was doing.
As I shifted into drive, there was a pounding on the window: I screamed and let my foot up. The car rocked forward and the engine died.
Beside the driver’s side window was Albie. “You get out of that vehicle right now, young man—do you hear me?” He jiggled the door handle.
I smiled, shrugged, and turned the ignition key again. This time I knew what to do: I kept my foot on the brake, shifted gears, then noticed Albie picking up the tire iron Dawkins had discarded. He raised it up like he was going to swing it right through the windshield.
I jammed my foot so hard against the gas pedal my leg went numb.
The front tires spun, throwing up a smoky cloud of burning rubber. For a moment, nothing happened. Then something seemed to catch, and the Cadillac leaped forward off the jacks.
I yelled in terrified surprise—and a little bit of excitement, to be honest. I was driving!
Until, that is, the car’s back end crashed down on the pavement.
I hope I never find out what a car wreck sounds like, but I imagine it sounds a lot like the earsplitting screech the Caddy made as it flopped into the parking lot.
Albie slammed his fist against the roof and cried out, “Stop! Please, stop! You’re ruining a classic!”
But there was no going back. I punched the gas again.
The car barely moved.
I stood on the pedal with both feet to push it as hard as I could. The engine revved, whining louder and louder until finally the car began dragging itself forward. It was like a thousand metal fingernails scraping down hundreds of chalkboards.
It moved in jerks and spasms, like a dying animal. The back rims caught on something, the front tires spun and gray clouds of smoke obscured the windshield, then suddenly the car surged forward, fat showers of sparks fanning up behind me. After twenty feet of this, Albie gave up and watched, peeking between his fingers.
Me, I kept my leg stiff against the gas, my shoulders braced against the backrest, and looked right.
There was no sign of Dawkins. Everyone else was motionless, staring at the Cadillac: Truckers at the diesel pumps, parents with their kids, the gas station attendants in their pale-blue work shirts, and Greta and Mr. Clean. The SUV was more than a hundred yards away, parked between the fueling stations, but I could see their faces easily. Which meant, I guess, they could totally make out my face, too.
Mr. Clean recognized me and began walking my way, his arm outstretched, aiming the blunt end of the Tesla gun.
I didn’t hear the first shot because the noise of the metal undercarriage scraping the concrete was so loud.
But I saw it.
A jagged beam of bright-purple electricity stretched through the air from the gun, crackling past the front of the Caddy’s grill like a sideways lightning bolt. It left a bright afterimage in my vision.
I blinked then looked back in time to see Mr. Clean aim again. Right at my face.
I ducked. The inside of the car filled with light and a smell like burnt wiring, and all the hair on my arms and head stood on end. A smoking hole as large as a grapefruit appeared in the passenger side window.
Without lifting my foot from the gas, I slid all the way down in the car seat. Now I couldn’t see where I was going. The car kept up its lurch-and-stop progress across the lot, and I peeked up above the door just as Mr. Clean, still walking my way, lifted the weapon for a third shot.
This time the bolt of electricity came sweeping across the hood, sawing through the space where my head would have been if I’d been sitting up. The windshield shattered, showering me with little cubes of safety glass, and where the bolt hit metal, it threw off white-hot sparks.
I screamed, sure I was going to die.
The Caddy was too slow. There was no way I was going to get away from Mr. Clean and his blonde boss, not without back wheels.
I risked another glimpse over the door and saw a dark blur behind the gunman: Dawkins on the mechanic’s creeper, speeding across the open lot to the SUV.
And then I had to duck again.
Tendrils of lightning crackled around the Cadillac’s passenger side. Thankfully, the massive door held against whatever the Tesla gun threw out.
The next time I looked, I saw Dawkins and Greta pile out of the SUV. Dawkins grabbed the mechanic’s creeper, threw it to the ground, and then leaped atop it like a skateboarder.
He rode it straight into Mr. Clean’s back, and they both went down. Greta ran past them, toward the Cadillac, waving her arms and shouting.
I turned off the ignition in time to hear her say, “—oh my god turn off the car before you set everything on fire!”
I pulled the strap of the satchel over my head and pushed open the door.
The Caddie had left a trail of deep gouges in the pavement, and wide streaks of oil and gasoline. They stretched all the way to the garage, where Albie was still standing, looking dumbstruck, the tire iron dangling from his limp hand. I had driven less than a hundred feet.
“Sorry!” I shouted to him.
Greta ran up, panting. “Are you out of your mind? What kind of fool drives a car with no back tires?”
There was a scorched hole through the door where the bolt of energy from the Tesla gun had struck. Another minute and it would have cut all the way through.
“Let’s grab Daw
kins and get out of here,” I said.
But he and Mr. Clean weren’t done with each other.
Dawkins was sitting on Mr. Clean’s chest and throwing punches, but the guy took them in stride. He curled his legs up, hooked a knee around Dawkins’ shoulder, and with a twist, wrenched him off.
“We’ve got to get that gun,” Greta said, running toward something glimmering on the pavement.
She reached it just as Mr. Clean and Dawkins rolled right up to where the truck-stop entrance met the ramp from the highway.
I took a quick glance around for Blondie and Slicked-Back Hair, and that’s when I saw what was headed our way.
“Hey!” I shouted at Greta as I ran toward her. But she wasn’t listening.
Greta scooped up the Tesla gun and took a stance like a cop in a movie—feet wide, both hands around the weapon, arms locked. “Stop now or I’ll shoot!”
“Greta!” I grabbed her collar in my fist and yanked her toward me, hard.
A wall of wind slammed us backward against the pavement as a blue eighteen-wheeler semitrailer skidded past, its brakes locked. In its wake was a cloud of smoke thrown up by the skid.
We sat on the concrete, coughing.
“What happened?” Greta asked. She tucked the Tesla gun into her jeans, pulled her shirt down, and staggered to her feet. Then she helped me up.
“Dawkins!” I called out. “Jack!” I waved the smoke away, but there was nothing to see: just an enormous trailer truck in the middle of the gas station off-ramp.
The driver had stopped his vehicle, but only after it had skidded over the spot where Dawkins and Mr. Clean had been fighting. Had they escaped? Rolled to the other side, maybe? I jogged alongside the wheels, shouting, “Jack? Jack?”
Greta followed. “They got away, right? Ronan, tell me they weren’t there when—” And then she shrieked and clutched my arm.
I saw what she was looking at.
An arm was sticking out from beneath a set of four giant tires, the leather jacket unmistakable, the fingers of the hand relaxed, and open. The wheels rested nearly flat on the pavement. Anyone underneath them wouldn’t be getting up ever again.