No More Heroes-#1 Dystopian Thriller Heroes Series

by Roo I MacLeod

Blacky exited his shed to talk with Jackie, the two men looking up at my hunched figure. Life in the cemetery had picked up a pace. The press with their cameras and lights reflecting off the snow congregated along the iron fence. Pete lay on the ground, with his hands cuffed and a band of blue standing guard. The ambulance found its way off the overpass and two officers in green climbed into the grave. The white-gowned figure of the vicar talked with a reporter, with a police officer standing in his shadow.

  Marvin’s grave, beneath the crooked yew tree, bore a wee cross marking its plot. A lone figure stood at the foot of the fresh pile of earth leaning on a metal crutch. Across Church Lane Tilly directed a vocal clown to leave the Old Poet Public House. Beyond the church life stirred in the buildings of the derelict estate. The Slotvaks were off to work hoping to lighten tourist pockets of their shekels. Two dead bodies lay buried beneath a load of snow. God knows who the police might mark up for those two murders. A load of bikes crashed through the clowns stuttering body and skidded to a halt outside the Old Poet. Harry appeared at the window and caught the gun thrown by the Punksters. The sound of sirens scattered the children, peddling for the square and a hope of ruining the Slotvaks’ day by out-thieving their nimble fingered daughters.

  I stood and slipped skidding halfway down the mountain, pushing a load of sooty snow before me. I’d have slipped all the way to the bottom if my foot hadn’t caught on an object buried in the side of the slagheap. My body swung around so I faced the sky, my foot caught hard. I eased myself to a sitting position and pulled the object free of the litter and rubble. By the time I’d righted myself and untangled my foot, a long blue bag had slithered to the bottom of the slagheap.

  ‘Hello, Ben,’ Jackie called from the shed.

  He and Blacky laughed at my comedy on the slagheap. Jackie stood about five-nine and stick slim next to the man mountain we called Blacky.

  ‘You pick side yet?’

  I shook my head. ‘I’m still waiting for the ref, Jackie.’

  ‘There is no ref.’

  ‘Then I’m not ready. But I’ll come along for a bit. I’m not committing, don’t get excited, but I’d like to do more training. I’ve got the pole to master and gun stuff, eh?’

  Jackie and Blacky walked over to the bottom of the slagheap. I trod the last twenty yards to the bottom with care, following the black scar the bag’s path had created.

  ‘Kids,’ he said to Blacky. ‘No respect.’

  Blacky grunted and stomped back to his shed. ‘I’ve got other options,’ I said turning to Jackie. ‘Wynona says the police are after a chat, but she’s offered me work.’

  ‘Wynona is police.’

  He kicked at the canvas bag. ‘You find bag?’

  ‘Said I would.’

  He grabbed the handle and dragged it to his car. I ran into Blacky’s shed and returned with a set of bolt cutters and cut the chains and padlocks from the bag. I helped Jackie throw the bag into the boot of his car, before we opened the bag. Jackie pulled the top of the bag apart and nodded. ‘That is good.’ He stepped away, opened the back door to his car for me and smiled.

  ‘We going?’

  Large wads of cash lined the top and side of the bag. Beneath the cash a load of account books sat stacked and wrapped in elastic bands. I grabbed two bundles of cash and dropped them on the workbench attacked to the furnace. Blacky stood at the door to his work shed.

  ‘Can you make sure Wynona gets this?’ I said. ‘She can divide it between the Punksters and Weismann. Tell her I’ll be back to talk in two months, tops, looking for work.’

  I approached the front door of Jackie’s navy blue Jaguar, looking Jackie in the eye. He pushed the back door closed and together we climbed into the warm leather interior. Jackie lit a long cheroot, took a flask from the side pocket and offered me a drink. I refused. It was a bit early for me.

  ‘Ready to work?’ he said.

  I smiled as he put the car into gear and pulled away from Blacky’s work shed. No, I wasn’t ready to work. I was looking for a holiday. Sun, sleep and maybe some me time.

  And a lesson in guns as I needed to learn how to shoot.

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  Acknowledgements

  Thank you for reading my story. If you enjoyed it, won’t you please leave a review.

  About Roo I MacLeod

  Roo I MacLeod was born in Croydon, Australia on an excessively hot, humid night and fought three doctors, two midwives and the utilities type person against his entry into the world. His mother curses the long, drawn out labor, but Roo finds it difficult to believe they'd let a utilities type person loose with a set of birthing forceps.

  Time was served at a variety of schools before it was suggested he give living and working in the real world a go. So began his long sojourn trying to find out the best and cheapest means of living. The Volkswagen beetle proved cheap, but uncomfortable for a man of such tall stature. In Darwin he found solace in a one bedroom house with 18 travelers (more commonly known as a squat) but found cohabiting with his own deranged thoughts hard, but 18 tourists was impossible. A two man tent worked well until it was burnt by angry natives. No one took the blame but Roo suspected the lads living in the dry river bed. They’d thrown rocks at him late one night when he wouldn't share his hooch.

  No More Heroes was conceived in a quaint English church when he took shelter from the rain. He stumbled into a funeral and found he'd doubled the mourners present. The vicar, a friend to this day, invited him to pray and sing a few tunes and he, Roo and the young lady in black chucked dirt on the deceased come the end of the ceremony.

  He now lives in West Sussex UK and has spent the last couple of years volunteering at homeless centers. He is barred from two of the five pubs in town for the same attitude that wreaked havoc in his school days and vows to antagonize the remaining four pub Landlords by the end of the year.

  He is a passionate supporter of the Richmond Tigers, The Arsenal and any sport Australia are participating in. He has a partner, who doesn't read or write or support any of the above teams.

  He has two children from a previous unsuccessful attempt to cohabit.

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  People to thank

  The Editors

  Gaby Wright-Robinson. This girl took a tomb requiring an artic lorry for transport and slashed and pruned the tale so it fit snugly inside a mini minor.

  Anna L Walls started life, for me, as a Beta Reader, but proved invaluable as an editor

  Jessica Parker is the girl who fine-tuned the story into the product you have on your device or in your hands. Harsh, fair and true.

  I thank these three girls for pushing my talents to the limit.

  I’ve got to thank my mum’s mate who was the first to read the story. She didn’t have a lot to say, but Judy McEwan’s words ‘a bit dark, but well written’ made me smile.

  Of course I’ve got to thank my mother, Isla Macleod, because she’s encouraged me from wee to adulthood to put pen to paper. And she paid for the cover and the first edit.

  And a little nod to my teachers. Mr. Griffiths from Grade 4, but probably well dead, who encouraged poetry writing, Mr. Leask, a bully with a penchant for the cane, who pushed us to create and make films in Grade 6and Swinburne Community School where teachers Rob Lewers, Lauren and Gerry Ti
ckell taught me and encouraged me to create fiction.

  Heroes Don’t Travel

  The Second Heroes Story

  Available to buy NOW

  Chapter One

  Cops with noose seek Neck

  The spidery script of his mother’s damning words had long blurred in Ben Jackman’s gaze. Confess, Guilt and Honor conspired behind a curl of cigarette smoke. The letter had fallen on top of a large glass ashtray, the red tip of the cigarette coloring the thin parchment. Ben focused his attention on the two police officers standing at the front door of the Old Poet public house. The first copper’s utility belt sat high and jingled as he approached the bar. His boots reflected the yellow flames crackling in the hearth to his left. A police cap covered a head of ginger hair, buzz cut short. A stale aroma of beer and cigarettes caused his pointed nose to twitch.

  Coincidence or what?

  A note from his mother not seen in two years, and coppers never seen in the Old Poet. A plea from his mother, urging him to do his Christian duty by confessing his sins to the law, and the law stood in his pub, manacles jangling, waiting for his surrender.

  Ben turned to the back door, measuring the distance, accepting he might have to run.

  Again.

  ‘But not yet,’ he muttered.

  Ben’s gaze returned to his mother’s letter, Admit and Duty and Father slapping his face. The signature sat crooked at the bottom, the final flourish slipping off the page. He dropped the letter to the bleached table and pulled his hood over his head, hunkering low in the gloom.

  The blue of the law clashed with the nicotine-stained walls and low, black-beamed ceiling. Remnants from the night before sat draped in corners and hugged flat pints. Drams of whisky nuzzled unsteady hands. Stomachs roiled and hangovers weighed heavy.

  An old bird danced with a mop. She wore an apron over a hooded top and joggers. A dirty cloth hung from her pocket and a cigarette clung to her lip, a croak-like hum accompanying the sad tune playing on the juke box.

  The second officer paced the length of the bar, kicking at the loose muddy slates. The scuffed boots trailed a broken lace through the puddle outside the men’s toilet. Her cap sat askew on a thick head of hair tied back in a ponytail. The cluttered utility belt hung low and the truncheon tangled with the handcuffs. She stopped at the entrance to the Ladies’ Lounge, surveying the dark interior, her attention centered on the hooded figure bunkered in the gloom.

  ‘Ben Jackman,’ the first officer called. His nasal voice rasped and folk roused from their ethereal state. ‘I’m looking for a lad by the name of Ben Jackman.’ He slapped his truncheon against the palm of his hand. ‘Aka Ben the Butcher, aka Street Boy, aka his arse is mine.’

  ‘Time at the bar.’

  The call came from Ivan the Landlord. His head rose from the table situated right of the front door, and focused on the intrusion to his slumber. ‘Let’s be having your mugs.’ And his head rested back on the table, exhausted and in need of rest.

  Ivan called the front table his office. He shared the table with two dear companions: Whisky and Cigar. On a good day he invited Glass Tumbler and Ashtray. Ivan filled the Old Poet with drunks, deadbeats and oafs, and offered an old fashioned attitude in his role as the Publican. ‘Service is for the birds,’ Ivan used to say. He had a big, flat face slapped ugly often, and a massive frame drowning in flabby flesh. Ivan drank a lot and felt no compunction to graft: Not ever.

  His best friend Charlie sat slumped at the bar. A crown of thick black hair rested against the pillar separating the front room from the Ladies’ Lounge. Bloodshot eyes hung half open and stared at the slumbering landlord. ‘I wasn’t there,’ he called out. ‘It wasn’t me.’

  The policeman rapped on the bar with his truncheon. Ivan grunted and turned his head towards the noise. Charlie coughed and spluttered, but settled with his toothless mouth agape. Loubie, the girl tending bar, turned from the copper and found a glass to polish.

  The policeman cleared his throat and leant across the bar, slapping her arse with his truncheon.

  She scowled, snarled and scratched at her dirty blonde dreadlocks. She untied the ribbon, shook the braids before tying them back in a thick tail. Leaning against the back bar Loubie rammed her hands deep in the front pockets of khaki combats and raised an eyebrow.

  ‘What?’ she spat.

  ‘Looking for Ben Jackman,’ the copper said. ‘So can you help, or do I need to arrest you?’

  The copper noted the anime tattoos on the underside of her arms and the mesh of small white scars. She crossed her purple boots and pouted, waiting for him to lift his gaze.

  ‘No. Don’t know him. I’ve got a Charlie.’ She looked at the drunk leaning against the post. ‘You can have him, for sure, but be careful coz I think he’s wet himself.’

  Deep in the gloom Ben took a sip of his whisky, raising the glass to Loubie’s loyalty.

  The copper’s partner entered the Ladies’ Lounge. The scuffed boots kicked at the uneven tiles and patches of earth. Ben watched her approach, puffing a vibrant cloud of smoke into the narrow space above his head. Not so long ago, the copper and Ben had shared a moment. It was a single kiss, a peck on the cheek, but the memory still made him smile. And they’d embraced, holding each other tight, watching flakes of snow flutter on the chill wind. She’d smelt good – a curious mixture of moss and burnt ash – and she’d been hot to hold.

  ‘Hello, PSO Webster,’ he said. He kept his voice low, the deep tone whispered. ‘How’s Wolf?’

  She removed her cap and pointed at the wall between the two frosted windows. ‘Wolf is well, now get up.’

  ‘You going hard cop on me? You getting the beast inside you to growl, eh, Wolf Girl?’

  ‘Ben, please get up.’

  She placed the cap on her head, pulled her ponytail through the back and made sure the peak pointed off-center. Ben stood and faced the wall with his hands flat to the white washed brick. She patted at his clothing, ignoring his suggestions where best she might find contraband.

  ‘Who’s the hero?’ Ben asked.

  ‘That’s Barney,’ she said. ‘He’s the new beat copper. I’m showing him about town. He’s employed to find a sucker to wear the Mayor’s lynching last Christmas. His remit also requires him to fit the murder of the two coppers in your girlfriend’s house to a sucker called Ben Jackman.’

  ‘Ex-girlfriend,’ he said. ‘She don’t think I’m a good role model for her child.’

  He looked over his shoulder, smiling and pushing back as she patted at his legs. ‘You’ve missed me, right?’

  ‘Shut up and listen to me good. He wants your neck in the noose.’

  ‘Jesus, him too? Me bloody mother writes to me suggesting I should give myself up. Like she’s got any clue what’s going on in the real world. So why is everyone putting this shit on my head?’ He pointed at the letter on the table. ‘Read it.’

  PSO Webster, aka Wolf Girl, turned the letter and read the scrawling script. ‘I think she cares,’ she said. ‘And she’s worried because the evidence is strong against you. She doesn’t want to read the bad stuff being reported in the papers and she wants your name cleared.’

  ‘My mother cares. Yeah, right. I was thinking about my caring mother just before you come in. I was struggling to remember the good times.

  ‘For example: Summer. Summer for us kids was hell. We swam on this beach right, owned by the military. Yeah, planes and bombs, minefields and shooting. A regular bloody carnival it was. And no other fucker there except soldiers. Zero.

  ‘There were these humungous waves that beat the crap out of you. The water was cold enough to stop the penguins wanting to fish, and the undertow could suck your toenails off your feet, eh? And it was home to these big arsed flies that stung. I mean they landed with a thud and unleashed a spear-like sting into your skin. These were scary flies, but not as scary as my mother. She’d stake us out in the sand like tethered goats and wait until one landed and then smack, and one dead fly is squash
ed into your skin.’

  ‘So she cared, right. She didn’t want you stung.’

  ‘No, we got a smack.’

  ‘Yeah, right. Don’t see the relevance. Listen, I can’t speak for your mother, but you got other problems. The bullets removed from one of the coppers, killed in your ex-girlfriend’s house, match the gun you fired in the police station.’

  ‘I took that gun off the Black Hat who killed the coppers. Everyone had a gun and I wanted one too.’

  ‘That was your first mistake.’

  ‘Oh yeah, people are shooting at me and I’m supposed to ignore a gun when it’s offered, eh? It made sense at the time.’

  ‘Barney thinks you look good for the crime,’ she said. ‘Once he finds you, you’re going to hang. Just like the Mayor did before Christmas. The Man wants this to happen, so it will. You need to leave Ostere.’

  ‘Why can’t you fit up a couple of Black Hats for the murders?’

  ‘Because they’re all dead.’

  She stepped back, but left Ben with his palms to the wall. ‘The bodies weren’t just shot, but mauled like a pack of wolves had been feeding on them. Some joker then deposited the carcasses outside the morgue in a bloody dumpster.

  ‘And they were missing their hearts. Some arse cut their hearts out of their chests, so someone has to swing for this. The Man can’t let it go. He believes the people want justice. The Man wants to see you swing and he’s convinced Barney that you’re our murderer.’

  ‘So why’s he talking to Loubie?’

  She looked over her shoulder and smiled. ‘Barney doesn’t know what you look like.’

  ‘No pictures.’

  ‘Just that crappy shot the tabloids took at Marvin’s funeral.’

  PSO Webster grabbed Ben’s pouch of tobacco and constructed a cigarette. She puffed at the flame Ben offered over his shoulder. ‘But, he’ll work it out soon enough,’ she said blowing the smoke at Ben. ‘He’ll find you, and he’ll tie the noose and drop the trap. He’ll have you swinging for the coppers, the Black Hats, and for the death of your childhood friend. You’re good’