by Patten, Sean
“And so that was her,” said Ed. “This Brittany psycho. She’s the one you found in the wreckage.”
I nodded. “It was her all right. She must’ve gotten wrangled up with the rest of them when the gang brought everyone to the arena.”
“Are you sad about that?” Ed asked.
“Huh?” I said, confused. “Sad she’s dead?”
“No,” he said. “Sad that you couldn’t be the one to do it.”
I couldn’t help but let out a soft, dry laugh.
“I mean, revenge always sounds sweet, but I’m the kind of girl who captures spiders in my apartment and lets them free outside. I don’t know what I would’ve done with her if I even had the chance.”
I shook my head. “But I feel like…there wasn’t any justice about it, you know? Like, she died, sure. But it was a total accident. She wasn’t punished for what she did. No cops, no judge, no nothing.”
Ed gave a small smile. “Maybe we can go back and find Ramirez,” he said. “Get him to read her her rights.”
The idea was so ridiculous that I couldn’t help but smile a little bit. The smile quickly faded, however.
“I have a feeling there isn’t going to be too much of the kind of justice we’re used to,” Ed said, leaning forward and ripping a piece off his sandwich. “All that went away with the power. Frontier justice is the best we’re going to get for a while, I imagine. And in your case, you might just have to content yourself with the fact of that sick bitch not being around to hurt anyone else.”
“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell myself,” I said. “But it’s hard. Really hard. I feel like I cheated, like I got something I didn’t deserve by continuing to live.”
Ed nodded knowingly. “There’s your good old-fashioned survivor’s guilt,” he said. “A disaster happens and the ones who survive are wondering why the hell they’re so special, why other people who probably ought to be alive aren’t, and they are.”
“That’s it,” I said. “Exactly it.”
“Rough thing about that is it’s all in here,” said Ed, tapping the side of his head with his fingertip. “No pill’s going to cure that. Just accept that you’re still here, still alive and kicking. And I don’t know any of those boys in your band, but I can bet you anything that they wouldn’t want beating yourself up over why things went down the way they did.”
I nodded. He was right. Especially Chris, who I could imagine teasing me good-naturedly, telling me to get off my ass and live instead of crying about it.
“Ty, Elliot and Chris,” I said. “Those were their names.”
“Keep them close,” said Ed. “They’re going to stay alive by you remembering them.”
I nodded slowly. I knew he was right.
“Now,” he said, putting his hand on my sandwich and pushing it close. “Eat up. Because this shit isn’t over yet. Not by a long shot.”
18 Ed
“Come here,” I said.
I didn’t know what else to do, so I gave her a hug. Intimacy like that wasn’t exactly the most natural thing in the world to me, but after what Amy had just told me I could tell she needed something, anything, to feel like she wasn’t alone in this new world.
I held her for a brief moment, her body feeling especially small and fragile in my arms. After a beat, I let her go.
“Thanks,” she said, her voice soft. “This is all just so fucked up, you know?”
She quickly wiped a tear away, one that I could tell she wasn’t prepare to have let out.
“Here’s the thing, though,” I said. “You’ve got a mission.”
“A mission?” she asked.
I nodded. “You got your mom waiting for you, right? And she’s not too far from here.”
“Yeah,” she said. “That’s right.”
“Now, I’m not an especially religious man,” I said. “So I’m not going to pretend I know anything about some big, divine plan. But you’re here, and your mom’s there. As of right now, you’re alive so you can see her again. That’s your mission.”
Amy straightened up where she sat, appearing to be bolstered by these words.
“Yeah,” she said. “You’re right.”
Then she flashed me an expression of curiosity.
“What about you?” she asked. “You got some people waiting for you?”
I sure as hell did—my daughter, Sarah. Too bad she was on the other side of the planet. The odds of me seeing her again were slim to fucking none, and I sure as hell wasn’t in the mood to discuss the matter.
“Right now,” I said. “We need to get you home to your mom. No sense in getting mixed up with other priorities.”
“If you want,” Amy said. “I’m sure you could stay with us for a while. Things with my mom and I are kind of…weird. But I know she’d be willing to let you stay after what you’ve done for me.”
“Haven’t done anything yet,” I said. “Right now, I’m still trying to make good for what you did. Let’s focus on getting the hell out of this shithole before we worry about what’s next.”
Another nod. Then a curious expression formed on her face, one that I couldn’t puzzle out.
“What is it?” I asked.
“Look at that,” she said. “Keyring board.”
She pointed to the other side of the room, to a corner that I hadn’t noticed on account of the vending machines blocking the view. I craned my neck to see where she was pointing and a wooden board about the size of my forearm was hung on the wall, little pegs with keys dangling off going down the length.
“Shit,” I said, getting up. “This must’ve been where some of the guys hung their keys when they started working.”
I rushed over to the board, looking over the keys. Sure enough, they were for cars. I took one after the other, jamming them into my pockets. In total there were about ten, and I was going to try them all.
“What are you going to do?” Amy asked.
“Stay here and finish your food,” I said, pointing to the sandwich in front of her that she’d barely touched. “I’ll be right back.”
She barely had a chance to get out a “but” before I was out the door.
I made my way down the rest of the hallway, making the necessary turns that would bring me to the parking lot. My heart beat hard, though, for the first time in a long while, from excitement rather than fear.
I kicked open one more door, this one leading into large, cool room packed full of a dozen or so cars. I didn’t have the keys to all of them, but one of these vehicles had to work.
Either that, or we were screwed.
I pulled the keys out of my pocket and went through them one by one. Half of them were fobs, with buttons to press to open up cars from a distance. That meant electronics, which meant no-go. I quickly sifted through the keys for which ones had electronics and tossed them aside. That left me with just four keys, slicing my odds in half right there from the get-go.
Nothing to do but try them. I went to the nearest car, some late nineties economy sedan with rust splotches all over its black surface. Once inside, the twist of the key failed to turn the engine over.
One down, three to go.
The next was an early-2000s SUV, dark red and in decent condition. It’d be great for carrying supplies and driving off-road if necessary, but it’d drink down gas like nothing.
Didn’t matter either way, because it didn’t work either.
The third was more my style—a beat-up old jeep. Something like that would be perfect for the desert. I slipped in the key and, once more, the engine failed to turn over.
One last key. This ring had a metal pony hanging off it, saving me the trouble of having to guess for which car it was.
I couldn’t spot it at first, but soon realized that it had to be hidden behind a large equipment van off to the side of the small lot. I headed around the van, and sure enough, there it was.
“Oh, mama,” I said, looking the ride over.
It was beautiful—a late-sixties Mustang, forest green
and in perfect condition. Whoever had owned it had taken some major pride in the thing, and I couldn’t blame them one bit. But my excitement turned to fear when I remembered that it was the last car—my last shot for me and Amy to get out of there.
I opened up the car, slid into the cool leather seat, and slipped the key into the ignition.
“Here goes nothing…” I said, giving the key a twist.
Click.
Nothing.
“Aw, come on,” I said. “Don’t do this to me. Come on, baby.”
One more turn, still nothing. I began to worry that the obvious restoration that the owner had put the car through had involved some electronic additions. It’d be just my fucking luck.
“Please,” I said. “Turn over for me, baby.”
I took one last deep breath as I held the key in place. Then, with one final twist, I turned it.
But this time, there was no click. The engine bumped and sputtered, like an old man in a coughing fit.
Then it turned over. The damn thing turned over. The engine growled to life, the powerful boom of the sport car’s innards filling the parking garage.
“Hell yeah!” I shouted out, bouncing in my seat when I realized that the tank was nearly full.
There was a little more to be done—Amy and I would need to collect some gas cans and fill them up, then finally make sure that the way was clear. But the hard part was over. We had a car, and the break room contained more than enough supplies to keep us fueled through the trip to Sandy Vista.
I killed the engine and jumped out of the seat, bounding back towards the break room. Amy was there, her eyes wide with excitement.
“Was that what I think it was?” she asked.
I held the keys up, still grinning.
“Sure was,” I said. “You ready to get the hell out of here?”
Apparently she was, because she hopped out of her seat before I’d even finished asking the question.
Together, the two of us began collecting everything we would carry from the broken-into vending machines and loading them up into some plastic grocery bags we found wadded up in one of the drawers. We had sandwiches, water and soda and hell, even some cookies and candy bars. It’d almost be like a regular old road trip, albeit one with a murderous motorcycle gang on our tail.
“We have enough gas to get to Sandy Vista?” Amy asked as we headed towards the parking lot, bags in hand.
“Yeah,” I said. “But I’m thinking we ought to play it safe before taking off, get some more gas while we can. You ever siphoned gas before?”
“Believe it or not, I have,” she said. “Back when the band was first starting out we had some rough patches during our tours. We went everywhere in a van and there were more than a few times we didn’t have the cash to fill it up. And I drew the short straw more than once.”
I laughed. “Oh, so you’re the expert, huh?” I asked. “Guess I’ll supervise, then. Maybe have a candy bar or two while you do your thing.”
She flashed me a wry grin, and I had the sense she would’ve given me a friendly jab to the arm had her hands not been full.
Before too long, we arrived at the lot. Once there, Amy stopped and set her bags down. I had a sense she had something on her mind.
“What?” I asked.
“You mind if I drive?”
I raised an eyebrow.
“You serious?”
“Sure am,” she said. “Between the tour buses and the private planes and all that I never really get to drive anymore. Sounds like fun.”
Part of me wanted to say no, to tell her that while we’d gotten over the hard part, this wasn’t going to be a pleasure cruise. We still had to get out of Dead Air, and do so without Dante and his men thwarting us.
But then I considered that after everything Amy had been through, she deserved to be in control for once.
“Sure,” I said. “But just so you know, I’m a total backseat driver.”
“I’ll tell you to shut up if you start annoying me,” she said with a grin.
“Deal,” I said.
I handed the keys over and we made our way to the car, tossing the bags into the back.
“Okay,” I said. “Don’t drive like a lunatic. Keep it nice and steady and—”
The sensation of something pressed against the back of my head stopped me where I stood. The something was cold and metal.
I didn’t need to turn around to know it was a gun.
19 Amy
I stood still as a statue, barely holding back a scream. Behind Ed was a man, hulking and tall, his hand raised. In the low light of the garage I could make out the black sheen of the gun in his hand.
A gun he had pressed against the back of Ed’s head.
“Don’t either of you do anything stupid,” he said. “This gun’s got six bullets left in it, and that’s because I used the rest of them on dumbasses who didn’t do what I said.”
“Hey now. Don’t do anything rash,” said Ed. “No one needs to die.”
“Funny,” said the man. “That’s what pretty much every one of the other shitheads I had to take out said. Always wanting to ‘negotiate,’ telling me that no one had to get hurt. But they always tried some shit, did something stupid that made me need to grease them right then and there.”
“We’re not going to do that,” said Ed. “Just tell us what you want.”
As Ed spoke, my eyes adjusted to the dark of the garage and I was able to get a better sense of what the man looked like. Just as I’d noticed, he was tall and muscular. He had short blond hair and a face that was, surprisingly, clean-shaven.
But there was something else to him. He was tired. The man wavered where he stood, and there was a heaviness and fatigue to his eyes that was impossible not to notice. He looked like he was on his last legs, like he’d been pushing himself to the brink and now he was done.
“I want the car,” he said. “First of all. And—”
He craned his head, noticing that the back was full of food and water.
“—what you got in it.”
Then his eyes flicked over to me, flashing for a brief moment.
“Maybe some company while we’re at it.”
Ed’s expression boiled with anger. I got the sense he was on the verge of doing something rash. But I decided to try something, something I knew could’ve been very, very stupid.
“Are you tired?” I asked.
Both the man and Ed shot me the same perplexed expression.
“What?” asked the man.
Ed gave me a look that wordlessly said “What the fuck are you doing?”
“You look tired,” I said. “Like you haven’t gotten any sleep.”
“What the hell does it matter to you?” he asked “I’m here for the car, not for any bullshit.”
“I get it,” I went on. “This last day has been all sorts of crazy. The power went off and everything went to hell. And now you’ve got some totally insane boss shooting people left and right and demanding that you bring him drugs that probably all went up noses hours ago. It’s a shitty situation, I get it.”
He said nothing, instead staring at me as if he was just trying to figure out what the hell was the angle of this crazy woman in front of him.
“And I can tell that what you’re doing now…let’s just say Dante wouldn’t be too thrilled to see it.”
“What the fuck do you know?” he asked.
“Did he order you to do this?” I asked. “Or did you decide that this was all too much for you to deal with, and now you’re getting the fuck out of here while the getting’s good? Bet you heard the engine in the distance and decided that was your ticket out of here. I mean, don’t get me wrong—I might be doing the same thing if I were you.”
“Amy…” said Ed, his voice low, his hands still raised.
I stepped close to the two of them, the keys in my hand.
“What’s the point of this?” the guy asked. “You trying to psychoanalyze me or some shit?”
The man let out a weary sigh.
“Fine, fine,” he said. “I’ll let him live. But I still need the car.”
His eyes flashed over me one more time.
“And you’re coming with me,” he said. “As…insurance.”
There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that what he had in mind for me went far beyond “insurance.” But I humored him, stepping closer.
“Fine,” I said. “I’ll give you the keys and we can get moving. Okay?”
“Huh?” asked Ed, clearly confused. “Amy, what’re you doing?”
But I kept my eyes on the man, moving closer to him one step at a time.
“Fine,” he said. “Come here and hand them over, cutie.”
I fought the urge to tell him to fuck off.
“Here,” I said, holding up the keys. “Handing them over.”
“Looking forward to getting to know you,” he said. “Might make all this bullshit worth it.”
I moved closer still, and was soon only a foot away from him. So close I could smell the stench of sweat coming off his body.
“You want them?” I asked. “Then here you go!”
As quickly as I could, I flipped the keys around in my palm, slipping one through the crack between my fingers as formed my hand into a fist. Then, standing on my tip-toes and reaching up, I jabbed the pointy end of the key forward, right into his left eye. I could feel the surface of his eye break and give, followed by the soft wetness of the inside of it.
“Ah, fuck!” he shouted, staggering backward, his hands rushing to his face.
The gun fell and hit the ground with a clatter, and Ed didn’t waste a second taking advantage of the situation. He turned around and rushed towards the man, slamming into him hard and driving him back into the white side of the van behind us.
The metal crumpled inwards from the impact of the two men slamming into it, the air blasting out of the thug’s lungs. His hand shot away from his eye and I got a chance to see the results of my handiwork—his eye was winced shut and blood streamed down his cheek.