Rated R (The Postmodern Adventures of Kill Team One Book 1)

by Mike Leon

  She’d done an okay job of avoiding the disgusting mess for the last two days. It was hard, considering most of it had been in the front doorway, but she’d managed all right. The police took the bodies, of course, but the gore all over the front counter and tile walkway was the store owner’s problem. Marty, the owner, paid Xtreme Clean to power wash it all away.

  Amy hears someone tug at the door behind her and the bells chime as it opens. She forgot to lock the door behind the cleaning crew.

  “We’re closed,” she says, before turning to see who walked in.

  The man standing in front of her has dark hair and icy blue eyes. His cheekbones are bruised, his forehead lined with straight line scabs from recent cuts, and his thick green duster is scuffed at one shoulder and elbow. He smiles at her warmly “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know. But I’m not here for a videotape. I’m looking for someone. Maybe you can point me in the right direction?”

  “Maybe.”

  “I’m looking for the other girl who works here,” he says. “The dark-haired one.”

  “Who’s asking?”

  “I’m an old friend. We go way back, she and I.”

  “And do you have a name, old friend that goes way back?”

  He doesn’t answer. He smiles and backs away from the counter. He looks down at the shimmering tile beneath his feet.

  “I heard about what happened,” he says. “It looks like they did a wonderful job cleaning up the mess.”

  “Yeah,” Amy says. “We got some real pros in here.”

  “It would be a shame if they had to come back and clean up another one so soon.”

  EXT. GAS STATION – DAY

  Sid exits through the automatic sliding doors of a gas station food mart carrying three bottles of water, two sandwiches wrapped in clear plastic, and a Styrofoam cup of black coffee. He is greeted by the sight of Lily sitting on the trunk of her battered car, her legs crossed next to a faded Joy Division bumper sticker. Her face is half hidden behind a thick-framed pair of black sunglasses. She releases a stream of grey smoke from her mouth with a dry vacancy of expression that implies to Sid she hates the air itself and wants to fill it all up with her exhaust.

  “Why do you do that?” he says, setting the sandwiches down on the trunk next to her.

  “Do what?” she snarks back.

  “Smoke cigarettes. They’re poison.”

  “They can’t be worse than those gas station sandwiches.”

  “I’m pretty sure they’re worse.”

  Lily extends an open box of cigarettes toward his nose. She presses one of the rolled paper cylinders from the package with her thumb. “Wanna find out?”

  “No.” Sid hands her the coffee and she takes it with an acidic grin.

  “You’re such a tight-ass.”

  “I am not a tight-ass.”

  “Why did you pick this gas station to stop at?”

  “It’s a brick structure with a rear exit to a forested area and a large number of sight blocking stickers in the front window to obscure against sniper fire, as well as a steel dumpster which could provide hard cover against large caliber firearms. The adjacent highway is also heavily trafficked, making it unlikely that anyone trying to be discreet would—”

  “Hang on, I can’t hear you over all the puckering of your tight ass, tight-ass. If you weren’t a total murder machine I think you’d be an English professor or something.”

  “I don’t make tactical errors.”

  “I don’t make tactical errors,” Lily says in a mocking imitation of his gruff voice. “You never just do anything just because? Even if it’s bad for you?”

  “Like what?”

  “Booze? Gambling? MMORPGs? Smokes?” She holds out the cigarettes again. “Come on. You know you want to.” She looks at him seductively over the rims of those shades. Sid studies the white box with its gold trim. Angry and official-looking block letters near the bottom of the package issue a warning to him from the surgeon general.

  Sid considers her proposition. The old man would say no. Hell, the old man would break her hand for annoying him, but listening to the old man is what made Sid into the aberrant super killer he is, with little hope of ever fitting into the normal world. Listening to somebody normal like Lily might help him round things out a bit.

  He takes one of the cigarettes and presses it between his lips. Lily has a lighter out faster than a cobra’s bite and she’s igniting the paper. She tells him to inhale. He does. It reminds him somewhat of the clouded fumes the old man made them breathe in the makeshift gas house he built in the pine barrens where Sid used to live.

  “I’m not getting anything from this,” he says, exhaling a cloud of smoke.

  “You have to give it a minute. Sheesh.”

  Sid drags on the cigarette again and waits for something to happen. “This is stupid.”

  “You’re stupid,” Lily says. She slugs his shoulder. Her wrist is bent and her fist all wrong. All the power comes from the whipping of her forearm instead of her shoulder.

  “You punch like a bitch,” Sid says.

  “I am a bitch. A bad bitch.”

  “That’s not an excuse. Come here.” Sid snatches her wrist and tugs her down from the car despite her protestations. He takes her coffee, setting it on the trunk. He pulls her right hand between them and molds her fingers into an acceptable fist. “Tuck your fingers in. Thumb goes on the outside. No, not pointing out like that. Keep it against your fingers. Wrist straight. Clench tight. Good.” He plants her fist against her cheek bone, then grabs her shoulder and turns her whole body just a few degrees to his left.

  He steps back and reads her body. He nods and holds up his hand. “Now punch,” he says. She swings at his raised palm, snapping her elbow, her arm moving in more of a hammering motion than a rear hand straight punch. It’s pathetic. “Raise your elbow and throw your shoulder forward, rotating your body as you punch. Again.” She does most of what he says. She’s slower now, and awkward. “You’re telegraphing.”

  “What does that even mean?”

  “Don’t wind up. Your fist should move straight from where it starts to where you’re striking.” She lowers her fists and he flicks her face.

  “Ow!”

  “Don’t drop your guard. Again.”

  She does. It’s terrible, but less terrible. He shows her how his fists rotate as he punches. After a few dozen tries, she can finally do something that’s halfway presentable.

  “Is this good?” Lily says, punching his hand again.

  She’s still telegraphing, and her shoulder doesn’t come up high enough to guard her face from the side. The old man would have beaten Sid for such a feeble effort, but this is a crash course and will have to do for now.

  “It’s okay,” he says.

  “How was that cigarette?” she asks, plucking the remaining nub of cigarette filter from his mouth and flicking it to the blacktop.

  Sid shrugs. “Pointless. And poison.”

  “That’s half the fun,” Lily says. “Tight-ass.” She weaves her head around and he can tell she’s rolling her eyes at him behind those black shades. “So what’s the plan for today?”

  “We need weapons.”

  INT. GARY’S GUN SHOW – DAY

  Lily walks into the gun show and flips up her sunglasses. She rests them on top of her head as she scans the crowd for a perfect mark. She’s wearing some jeans Sid stole for her and the spaghetti strap top she’s worn for the last two days. She had to run it through the motel laundry machine three times to feel okay about wearing it again.

  She spots her man after a minute: older, chubby, alone except for a little Pomeranian. He sits on a metal folding chair behind a collapsible Rubbermaid table covered in guns and gun parts. The little dog yaps as she approaches.

  “Hi,” she says.

  The sloppy hick raises his head, surprised.

  “Sparky, shut up,” he yells at the dog. “There something I can help you with, honey?”

  �
�I think so,” Lily says. She brushes back her hair. “I need a really big barrel for my lower receiver.”

  “I think I can help with that,” says the gun trader. “How’s your lower look?”

  “Oh, it’s stripped right now.” She leans over the table so he can see all the way down the front of her shirt. “Wanna see?”

  “Uh,” the gun trader says. She has him hopelessly mesmerized. “Sure.”

  Behind him, Lily sees Sid swipe some parts from a crate on the floor.

  She snatches something from her purse: another five-finger-discount from a big box retailer. She sets the item down on the table. It’s an AR-15 lower receiver.

  EXT. PARKING LOT – DAY

  In the parking lot outside the huge convention center hosting Gary’s Gun Show, Sid stands behind Lily’s car. An assortment of gun parts lays spread across the trunk top.

  “Did I do good?” she says, as she approaches from the convention center.

  “Yeah,” he answers.

  “I told you a man can’t resist looking at a pair of tits.”

  “I need the part you have in your purse.”

  She pulls it out and plops it down on the trunk.

  “So what does that thing do?”

  “It’s like the main part of the gun. All the other parts get connected to it.”

  She watches as Sid snaps tiny metal springs and pins into the receiver. Then he puts a much larger spring into a plastic tube, screwing that into a threaded loop. He keeps attaching parts without taking his eyes off her. It takes him less than thirty seconds to build a whole rifle.

  “You’re really good at that,” she says.

  He smiles.

  “Wanna go back to the motel and I’ll show you what else I’m good at?” He smacks her butt.

  “Look at you. So cocky so fast.” She puts her hands on his belt.

  “I’m a quick learner.” He really is.

  Lily’s iPhone vibrates against her hip. She pulls it from her waistband and glances at the display. Amy, probably calling about the store. Lily rubs the slider to ignore.

  “Do you think they’re looking for us?” she asks.

  “Looking for you?” Sid says. “Probably not. Me? They’re always looking for me.”

  The iPhone buzzes again. Amy calling. What the fuck? Lily slides the phone to answer.

  “Hello?” she says.

  Amy’s quivering voice whimpers through the speaker.

  “Lily. He’s hurt—” she chokes into a scream. “He’s hurting me!”

  “What? Who?”

  No one answers.

  “Amy!” Lily shrieks.

  “Hello, Lily.” The voice coming over the speaker is vicious, nearly inhuman with rage. It reminds her of a lawnmower running. “I’m going to make this very simple. Tell my brother to bring the case to the video store by midnight, or I’ll gut this cunt and strangle her with what I pull out.”

  Lily’s heart races.

  “Lily, please!” Amy cries. “He—” the scream that follows is the unmistakable product of him breaking some part of her.

  The phone cuts out.

  INT. LILY’S CAR – DAY

  The steel case sits on the back seat, silently taunting them. Lily looks at it between the seat backs, her face pressed up against Sid’s shoulder.

  “That thing could be a god damned suitcase nuke for all we know,” Sid says. “We can’t let him have it.”

  “I’m not saying let him have it,” Lily shoots back. “I’m saying we just dangle it at him and then you kill him.”

  “Yeah. No thanks,” Sid scoffs. “That sounds like a real good way to end up dead.”

  “What happened to the guy who ended, like, fifty commandos and blew up a building yesterday? You kill the bad guys and save the girl. That’s what you do.”

  “That’s not what I do at all. I don’t think you’ve been paying attention.”

  “I’ll suck your cock if you do it.”

  “Before or after Victor eviscerates me and incinerates my carcass with grenades?”

  “What’s his deal anyway?”

  “He’s a super soldier like me.”

  “Yeah, I know that, but he’s not like you, really.”

  “He’s stronger, faster, smarter. He’s better in every way. Always was. The scars on my arms? He gave me almost all of them.”

  “But I mean something else. Like, what makes him tick? What does he believe in? What does he want?”

  “I don’t think he believes in anything he can’t hold in his hand. I know exactly what he wants. He wants to murder everyone he can. He has a rage, a bloodlust you can’t possibly understand. In Afghanistan, I watched him rape and dismember a girl because she took some bottled water from a supply depot. She couldn’t have been older than fourteen. You know what that looks like?”

  Lily is silent. She doesn’t know what she could ever say to that.

  “I did nothing,” he says. “There was nothing I could do. I just walked away. I don’t think she even took the water. He just wanted to do his thing.”

  Lily watches quietly as his brow crunches into a look of frustration.

  “You hate him,” Lily says.

  He looks up at her and his face is one of quiet realization, as if it’s something he never considered himself before she told him.

  “You didn’t want to walk away,” she says. “You wanted to stop him. It bothers you.”

  “It doesn’t bother me,” he aggressively denies.

  “Oh no,” Lily sneers. “Nothing ever bothers you.”

  “Nothing.” His insistence is so strong it only serves to disprove him. He protests too much.

  “Yeah? Why didn’t you just leave me behind before? You know, instead of fighting an army of soldier guys and blowing up that building? That would have made more sense.”

  “Because . . .”

  “I’m still weighing you down. You should just put a bullet in my brain and get it over with. Go back off the grid. I mean, if you really don’t care.”

  “I don’t think . . .”

  “You know, I watched you brutally murder a whole squad of guys you apparently used to work with, blow up a building like it was nothing, pimp-slap a dude with his own arm you ripped off, shoot down two helicopters, and through all of that you were ice cold, like Ben Stein—well, bad example maybe—like Walter White.”

  “Who?”

  “But you’re still haunted by this girl from the desert with the bottled water.”

  “It’s really more of a mountain climate.”

  “Whatever. You haven’t forgotten her. You don’t even want to talk about it now. You’re changing the subject.”

  “No I’m not.”

  “And you’ve gone well out of your way to stop those commando guys from shooting me to pieces, when it really wasn’t your problem.”

  “I needed to do all of this. You just came along for the ride.”

  “Bullshit. You have a soft spot for pretty girls.”

  “Fuck you!”

  “You totally do! You have a soft chewy center. You’re a Tootsie Pop!”

  “I will smack the shit out of you if you don’t shut the fuck up right now.”

  “Like you did last night when I told you no means no?” Lily grins. Honestly, she was shocked when he didn’t wrap his killer hands around her neck and have his way with her violently in that motel room. She was half hoping he would.

  “I’m not soft!” he barks.

  “I don’t think I even have to argue with you about this anymore. You’re going to start the car and go back to Morston and look in that video store no matter what I say, because you’re thinking about what he’s doing to Amy and you can’t stand it.”

  “You’re wrong.”

  “Am I? Am I really?” Lily rotates in her seat so her whole body is facing him. She narrows her eyes and glares at him—through him. He glares back with angry intensity, but she doesn’t let up. After only a second of silence she sees the slightest shift
in his gaze away from her. His eyes dart right back to meet hers, but that microsecond lapse is enough to confirm everything she just surmised.

  They continue to glare at each other in silence for another full minute before he rubs the frayed wires together to start the ignition.

  INT. VIDEO TIME – NIGHT

  Sid enters the video store, leading the way with a .45 automatic in each hand and a rifle slung across his back. Lily tags along behind him. This after an hour of scoping the place with binoculars and seeing no signs of life.

  He crouches behind the front counter.

  “Get down,” he says.

  She drops down next to him.

  “You really do the two gun thing?” Lily asks.

  “Everybody does that,” Sid says.

  “Really?”

  “Yeah. They’re called handguns. You have two hands. Two is better than one. It’s not that complicated.”

  He jumps out from behind the counter and sweeps his gun sights across the store. Lily watches as his ice cold face turns to a cringe and he lowers both guns.

  “What is it?” she says.

  “Go back to the car,” he barks.

  “What is it?”

  Lily stands up and marches toward him.

  “You don’t want to see this,” he warns. He’s too late though. She already sees.

  Amy’s half-naked corpse stares up at them with wide vacant eyes from the floor of the family aisle. What he did to her—Lily has to look away.

  She buries her face in Sid’s chest.

  “She was supposed to be a kindergarten teacher!” she cries.

  It doesn’t make any sense, what she said, but it’s somehow okay not to make sense right now.

  Sid stands like a monument with his guns in his hands and, she’s sure, an uncertain grimace looking down on her. She suddenly feels feverishly hot and her stomach churns.

  “I—I think I’m going to—”

  She dashes for the back of the store. Sid yells something after her about not being safe, but she doesn’t care. She bashes open the door to the stockroom as she dry heaves. She runs for the tiny bathroom and practically falls through the door.