Blood of the Dogs_Book I_Annihilation

by Richard Cosme

  “Let’s talk this…”

  I threw the walkie talkie straight up, watched it climb to its zenith and begin its descent. His voice kept on droning double speak, “…over. No need to meet fa…”

  I snapped the Mossberg up and fired at the little plastic rectanglar box, blowing it into a thousand plastic pieces, cutting off the beast’s options.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  “Will you look at that,” Weasel said.

  We were in the cab of the truck, gazing forward from the viewports. Stevie was still in his sniper post, ready to warn us of any movement from the back or flanks. Nearly ten minutes had gone by since I had blasted the walkie talkie with Sarah’s 12 gage. I asked her if she had any information on what was going on up there. She said she couldn’t tell.

  I put the binocs into the viewing slot and focused on the top of the hill, which was mottled with shadows as the sun dipped toward the horizon. “There’s something you don’t see very often,” I acknowledged.

  “Give me them things,” Weasel said, reaching for the binocs. After a few seconds, he whistled, then added, “We ever set up a basketball league in this town, that’s where I’m starting.”

  “If we don’t shoot them all first,” I said.

  “That could affect my draft.”

  At the top of the hill, nine men in battle gear were beginning the trek down toward the truck. They were the tallest men I had ever seen, each one at least 6’7’’, some of them topping out at seven feet. The men had formed a tight circle, the diameter of which was about seven or eight feet. They were all facing outward, weapons ready, so that as they advanced down the hill, some of them were walking frontward, some backward, some sideways. The overall effect was of one large, awkward, bristling organism, a land anemone, perhaps.

  “It’s the goddam reincarnation of the Chicago Bulls,” I said.

  “Learning a new folk dance,” Weasel continued.

  “Any bets on what’s in the middle of the circle?”

  “The man’s nothing if not cautious.”

  “Stevie, anything moving on the flanks or rear?”

  “All clear.”

  “Let’s go to work,” I said. “Less than an hour before complete darkness. We need to be gone before that.”

  We opened our doors. Weasel climbed back to his turret. I resumed my position behind the fortified door, watching the herky jerky progress of the circle of tall men work its way down the hill. They stopped twenty meters back. The soldiers who faced the truck viewed the vehicle with a mixture of awe and lust, their rifles pointed our way.

  From the center of the circle, The Babe’s bass voice boomed out. “How you want to handle this, McCall? Why don’t I bring the cunt out now. You leave the machine and walk out of here.”

  Nice try, I thought. “We won’t make the exchange on your turf,” I answered.

  “Where then?” he yelled back. He hadn’t expected me to approve the exchange in the middle of his camp. But it had been worth a try.

  “In the city,” I said. “Buckingham Fountain. On the lakefront.” We had chosen that location because he would never accept it. Too far. Too risky. Too many territories for him to cross. Plus it was in the middle of Black Gangster Disciple turf.

  “You and the Disciples got something cooked up, McCall? You’re gonna have to do better than that.”

  I pretended to think it about it for a few seconds. “Neutral territory then,” I responded, preparing to tell him the site we had chosen, our only shot at getting Sarah back and countering what we knew would be his attempt to get it all. “Indie country. No one to help you; no one to back us up. Out near that mall down south, Fox Valley.”

  He was silent for a few minutes, thinking about the territories he would have to cross, the amount of travel time, the complications of moving as many men as he would need. It was a safe trip for him, no Folks’ territories to traverse, no borders to violate. When he accepted, we had our second victory of the day.

  “Couple of precautions first,” I said. “Number one, while we finish talking, you or your men try to take me out, and the truck gets blown just like our compound. Heard you had a few of your men toasted. Teach you to fuck with someone who hasn’t done anything to you.”

  “Noted,” he replied, his voice venomous, tightly controlled. “Anyone of you so much as aims a nasty thought in my direction, and the slit gets handed over to my men. Next?”

  “No one touches the bitch from this point forward. She’s valuable property. Anything happens to her, deal’s off,” I said in response.

  “Mac,” Sarah’s voice whispered in my ear, “shame on you for talking about me that way.” I heard snorts from Stevie and Weasel.

  I turned my head away from the circle of men and whispered, “I’m working here, Sarah. Can’t let ‘em know I love you. Could be an edge for them. I’m trying to guarantee your safety until we can get you back.”

  “You just watch your step, Mister,” she whispered back. “Don’t let all of this macho posturing go to your head. I thought I heard just a tad of enjoyment in your comments.” Then she laughed. “I’m so relieved you’re helping. All of you. Be careful.”

  “If we make a deal,” The Babe hollered from within the confines of the circle, “the cunt will be off limits to everyone.”

  “Including you,” I said.

  He hesitated. “McCall, maybe we can work a deal for a little taste. I won’t mess her up. She’s the finest piece I’ve ever seen. I don’t think you’re up to giving her the proper service.”

  “Right,” I said, “she’s been hanging on waiting for the right fat, slovenly, rotten-toothed, needle-dicked, smelly psychopath to come along and sweep her off her feet. Let me run it by you again, asshole. I paid two years’ supply of ammo and a hundred grams of gold for the woman. The bitch gets touched, and the deal’s off. She’s too valuable to be pawed by your greasy palms. How much rent you think I could get if johns know she’s been had by the Messengers? The market would bottom out.”

  “Fuck you,” he said. “You act like she’s some kind of goddam cherry. I’ll find some better shit. Younger. Tighter. Keep the slit, McCall. It’s a deal.”

  I placed the Mossberg and my assault rifle on the seat, keeping the Glock and a Ruger as sidearms, and jumped down from the running board. I walked away from the truck, five meters. The soldiers in the circle followed me with their weapons.

  “Let’s finish the deal face to face,” I said to the man in the circle.

  He exited from the rear of the circle, and the soldiers broke to form a skirmish line behind him. As he lumbered slowly over to me, he pointedly ignored the HK that was following him from Weasel’s turret. He wore combat dress. No fancy three piece suits or warm up jerseys for the general in wartime. His Nazi helmet was in place. It had a deep, furrowed indentation in the front, compliments of a slug from my .357 Desert Commando in the Amoco Oil Building battle. Covered in the grey-green-browns of the fatigues, the fat man looked more like a walking tent than a leader of men.

  He had a .45 on his hip, a .38 Special in a shoulder rig, couple of knives…and the baseball bat snugly ensconced in the harness across his back. He stopped within arm’s length of me, near enough for a Bowie knife to flick out his eye.

  “Close up, you don’t look like much, McCall,” he said. “If I didn’t need that truck of yours, I’d just as soon play a little ball with your head. Ever see how a man twitches when he gets smacked real good with a baseball bat, McCall? They flop around all over the place like a fish out of water. Like they was doin’ some kind of sod buster indie dance on their back. You gotta hit ‘em just right, though.”

  He reached out and touched my temple with his forefinger. I snapped my arm up, pushing his away. It was as if I had hit a tree trunk. Guns rattled as his soldiers brought their weapons up. He laughed, booming it out through brown and yellow teeth.

  “Just showing you the spot. Right on the temple. Little soft area. Got to hit it just right or they die too
quick. I’ve gotten pretty good at it. Record’s two minutes and seventeen seconds doin’ the dance. Think you could beat it, McCall?”

  His eyes, more like those of a rodent than a man, lost in huge folds of flesh, gleamed with the prospect of bringing about my death. There was no pretense between us. We each had something the other had to have. Each of us would live through this day. Death would wait for the exchange. But we didn’t have to feign civility.

  The hate flowed back and forth in the narrow space between our two bodies. His for me because I had accidentally stumbled upon one of his schemes, the massacre in the parking lot. Not because I had witnessed the depths of his brutality. That was no problem. He wore his viciousness, his brutal nature like a combat medal. It was his badge, a trademark. His hate stemmed from the fact that I became an inconvienience that day at the college and hadn’t possessed the good manners to die quickly, as all of his opponents had done before.

  The animosity I held for him was that of a father or mother toward an abuser of a child. His transgressions were beyond forgiveness, beyond the search for reasons, beyond comprehension of thinking men and women, beyond the mercy of God. He preyed on the weak, which in his case, was a group comprised of everyone except those he could use. He was beneath the norms and values societies established to ensure survival. The Babe was pure predator, unadulterated evil. In the 20th he would have been a serial killer, or maybe a dictator. Gacy or Hitler. Probably the former. He liked hands on.

  It was a game now for him. He had no intention of returning Sarah to her loved ones. Didn’t know what a loved one was. He would try to take it all. Problem was he hadn’t figured out a way to take the truck by force. So he would try subterfuge. He was comfortable in that arena as well. His dealings with the Insane Cobra Nation were 100% smoke and mirrors.

  His only weakness was that of underestimation. He had done it time and time again with us and still hadn’t learned from his mistake. Between the scouts and the Aon Center and his assault on our compound, nearly well over a hundred of his men had perished in his quest for me and Duke. One man, one dog. And he still felt like he was in charge. It was his sense of superiority that we would exploit to gain Sarah’s release. While he was plotting to obtain the truck and still keep Sarah, eliminating the rest of us in the process, we would be finalizing the plans for Sarah’s rescue and his demise. He was expecting us to be reactive, not proactive. How could a rabbit imagine vanquishing the mighty wolf?

  His Nazi helmet cast the top half of his face in shadows, but I could still discern the extent of the damage Duke had inflicted upon him in the Aon Center. The right side of his face and neck bore the marks of Duke’s fangs. His mangy beard had been shaved in strips to allow for treatment of the wounds. Several deep, scabby furrows, pulled together with slipshod stitches that peeked out from the puckered flesh like mutant whiskers, ran in vertical lines from cheek to neck.

  “Jeez,” I said, “nasty looking wounds, fat man. Does it hurt?”

  “Maybe we should talk about including the dog in the deal for the woman,” he said.

  “Dog’s been sick,” I replied. “Could be rabies. Have you had any fevers, sweats, dry mouth lately?”

  “When this is finished, McCall, that mouth of yours ain’t gonna be flappin’ so much. I think maybe you’d make a decent cocksucker, like your little friend, Merlin. He munched real good. Be difficult for you to talk with a cock in your mouth, McCall.” He flashed me a yellow/brown smile. “Let’s get this over with. How we make the exchange?”

  “I’ll leave the truck outside the mall. There’s a store called Lord and Taylor on the east side upper level. It will be there.”

  “And the woman?”

  “The truck won’t operate without a key. She’ll take you to the key, show you its location and start walking away. Simple. You head for the key; she goes in the opposite direction.”

  “How she gonna know where to find the key?”

  “I’m going to tell her. Right now. I’m not leaving until I see what kind of shape she’s in. I don’t want damaged merchandise. If she’s messed up, you’ll have to sweeten the deal. We lost a few weapons in the fire.”

  It was our chance for an quick resolution to the problem. If we had an opportunity, we would get Sarah into the truck and beat a hasty retreat.

  He didn’t care for that stipulation. Groused about it, finally relented. I found out why a few minutes later. He was concerned about the quality of the merchandise.

  She appeared at the top of the hill, between two soldiers who accompanied her down through the shadows cast by the canopy of trees. As she passed in and out of the sunlight, I could make out little more than her bearing. Nothing was broken. She was walking strongly, shoulders back, focused on her objective, ignoring her guards as if they were servants. As she drew nearer, I began to make out details of the damage they had inflicted upon her.

  In the truck Weasel watched through the binocs.

  “You ain’t gonna like this, Mac,” he said.

  “What is it, Weasel?” Stevie said, his voice edged with concern. “She hurt?”

  “Nothing permanent, son,” he said. “She’ll be fine once we remove her from this human septic field.”

  Sarah and her guards halted halfway down the hill. I watched carefully as they brought forth a heavy chain, attaching one end around a tree trunk and the other tightly around her waist. They padlocked the huge links together.

  There was no chance now of our swooping her up, putting her in the truck and trying to blast our way out.

  “Sarah,” I said when she continued her trek, speaking into her earpiece, “no show of affection. Don’t let them see any signs of caring. Maybe a tad of subservience.”

  She didn’t answer. Just kept on walking, throwing off the restraining arms of the guards as they tried to slow her down, marching past The Babe who had returned to his contingent of lanky storm troopers, stopping right in front of me, the chain stretched out behind her. She shot a withering glance at her escort, who in turn looked to The Babe and, receiving a nod from their leader, stepped back out of earshot.

  I don’t know how she did it, considering what she had obviously been through, the pain she was still feeling, but she flashed me a crooked smile, the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.

  “Should I genuflect, make a little show of subservience?” she asked, her eyes, or eye, one of them was blackened and swollen, twinkling.

  Her earpiece was in place, so she had heard my suggestion. But the derm was gone from her throat. When she spoke, it was closed mouth, like a bad ventriloquist. Her jaw injury was causing her immense pain.

  I looked behind her, checking the attitude of the guards and The Babe. I didn’t return her smile. I felt more like crying but showed no emotion at all. They were watching us intently. At least a dozen M 16s were aimed at her back.

  “How can you smile?” I asked.

  “I’m happy right now,” she said through clenched teeth. “You’re here.”

  “I take it they haven’t given you a mirror.”

  “That bad, huh?”

  “Pretty bad. Does it hurt much?”

  “Only when I smile.”

  Much of her face was bruised and swollen. There were a couple of punctures in the center of bruises, either from a knuckle or a ring. Her lips were split in two places. Dried blood flaked on her chin. Her fatigue blouse was ripped and streaked with blood. Her pants were ripped too, held up by a canvass belt. Her nose, the center of huge area of swollen tissue, obviously broken, had a little bend in it now. The bruising from the break had spread to underneath each eye. The left side of her jaw had a lump on it, was swollen from the ear forward to her chin.

  The extent of the mayhem inflicted upon her face was amplified by the fact that she no longer had her beautiful auburn hair to draw the eyes away from her wounds.

  They had shaved her head.

  Seeing my eyes focus on the top of her head, she waved her hand in front of her face dismissively.
“It’ll grow back,” she said. “I let them do it without a fight. Figured if I could get by with only losing some hair, I’d be lucky. But then they tried to, uh, shave another area. Thought it would be a good present for their exalted leader. Make me more like a little girl. He likes the children, the disgusting fuck.”

  She spoke with great intensity. There was no fear in her, just repugnance and outrage.

  “It cost one guy a testicle,” Sarah continued. “Another, one of his eyes. They all went at me then, about five of them. Cholo initiated the whole thing. Would have killed me, but The Babe pulled them off. He was enraged at his men. Seems he had plans for me last night. Now, I was, let’s say, less desireable. Fat man didn’t want to fuck someone who looked as bad as this. I look upon it as the price I paid to avoid being alone with him. A bargain, really—because being alone with him would have cost me my life.”

  I hated to tell her what I had to say. But she already knew it. Even though we were taking the safest course of action and had done everything possible to ensure her safety, I still felt like I was abandoning her. But by buying another twenty hours, we would be ready for them; have an excellent shot at getting her out in one piece.

  The truck made no difference to us. Compared to Sarah, it had no value. We could easily replace it. If we trusted that The Babe would trade her even up for it, we would give up the truck with no qualms. But he had no intentions of playing straight with us. Too much history. He wanted it all. Me, Sarah, Duke, the truck.

  “Listen,” I began, “I’m sorry…”

  “Hush with the apology. You don’t have to apologize for anything. You’re here. Everyone is. I understand you can’t get me out now. Just tell me what you can so that I can help when it goes down.”

  “Did they take your throat mike?” I asked, thinking it would be helpful for her to have it the next day.

  “No,” she said, smiling once again. “I hid it when they come in. Hid it when they captured me.”

  “Where?”

  “Butt crack,” she answered, smiling lopsidedly.