Lone Rock

by Duane Lindsay

  “Or lasers. Or a rocket mechanism or those things that come out from your hubcaps and shred his wheels when he gets too close.”

  “The only thing in my hubcaps is dirt,” Adrian said, catching on at last.

  Silence filled the car. The dashboard lights and the huge moon, just above the horizon, made their journey surrealistic, like they were scampering through a landscape by Dali, pursued by demons in a silver Chevy.

  “We’re in trouble here, aren’t we?” Maggie said.

  “Big time. I’m trying not to panic.” In truth, the drive helped settle his nerves. The ancient fight/flight mechanism was still in force, but Adrian was beginning to be able to think, “As long as we’re driving, he can’t hurt us,”

  “So we just keep driving until we get to a town,” Maggie said.

  Adrian looked at the dashboard. “Can’t. When he hit us we were facing east, away from Wendover. There’s nothing in this direction until Tooele, and that’s still another eighty miles,”

  “So? We go to Tooele.”

  “Not enough gas. We’ll run out before we get there,”

  “When I said you should bring your cell phone? I meant that.”

  “What about yours?”

  “Back at the hotel.” She mulled over the situation. “We can’t keep going and we can’t stop and face him,”

  “He’s got a tire iron,” Adrian said, completing her thought. “He’ll beat us to death,”

  “Swell. So what are we going to do?

  “The better question is what is he going to do?”

  The silver Camaro shot past them on the left, like a guided missile from Hell.

  The idea, as it came to Corley was, I’m faster than he is, I’m braver than he is, I am better than he is.

  He touched the wheel and the Camaro slipped into the left lane. He pushed on the gas and the car rocketed forward, passing the Studebaker at one hundred, one-ten, one-twenty five. He saw a startled face in the window as he went by.

  In less than three minutes the Lark was a speck of light in his mirror. Corley kept going until he found one of the sporadic gentle dips in the road. He saw the headlights disappear and clicked off his own as he hit the brakes. shrieked to a stop and turned around, facing west.

  That was faster. Now for braver. He waited for two minutes, and turned on his headlight. He imagined what it must seem like to Adrian. seeing one light appear in the road, like a cyclops. He revved the engine, dropped it into drive and took off.

  The lights of the old Studebaker grew rapidly as he sped up. He rolled down the window to let in the cold night air and lit a cigarette. This was it, the ultimate game of chicken.

  He blew smoke into the wind and set his left arm on the window, just like James Dean would have. He was better than Adrian Beck, because in another few minutes Beck would be dead.

  The headlight coming at him, at a combined speed of what? Two hundred miles an hour? had to be freaking Beck. Corley imagined, with a glow of pure pleasure, what he must be feeling. Panic; had to be. He laughed and pushed the accelerator down the remaining quarter inch.

  The car shuddered to go faster and Corley screamed out loud.

  “What’s he going?” Adrian asked. but Maggie just shook her head, as confused as he was.

  They drove on for a minute, slowing a bit, trying to understand. If Adrian had been quicker, or Maggie had figured things out a little earlier, they could have turned and made a run for Wendover and the safety of the police there. But the thought didn’t happen and they were caught off guard when, seemingly from nowhere, a single light snapped on and began racing toward them.

  “Jesus,” Maggie whispered. “He’s playing chicken. He’s going to kill us.” Her eyes widened as she saw death coming with one bright eye.

  Adrian was paralyzed, like a deer caught in a single headlight. His foot stayed pressed to the gas because he’d forgotten it. He swallowed by reflex and kept his hands firmly on the wheel. He couldn’t think to move them.

  The light grew like the front of a locomotive bearing down. It was as if a monster had come from the dark— a cyclops, one eyed and bent on destruction. All rational thought fled in the face of this threat, all planning vanished. They were on a collision course and couldn’t escape.

  It only took seconds for the Camaro to reach them. Seconds that Adrian could have used to calculate an escape, or to slow down to minimize the impact, anything. Instead he sat frozen in horror.

  Everything slowed down.

  The thin steel of the dashboard, the plastic of the wheel. He felt the slight bumps of the pavement beneath the tires, heard the wind, felt his hands tighten and his throat close as the car appeared behind the light and the impact...

  Never came. Some tiny nerve impulse, not controlled by the conscious mind, twitched slightly and the Studebaker jumped sideways, over the gravel and into the desert. It bounced over tiny rocks, made ruts in the wet sand and crushed a few mangy looking creosote plants before Adrian managed to get control and guide the car back to the road.

  “I have an idea.” Adrian said through clenched teeth. His heart was pounding and he fought an urge to cry. Maggie was already in tears. Adrian touched her hand and she jumped.

  “He’s afraid,” Adrian said.

  “So am I.” The sound of her voice made Adrian feel a terrible regret.

  “He’s afraid of heights.” Adrian said.

  “So?’

  “So, Lone Rock. It’s not far from here, we can reach it. We’ll climb to the top and he can’t climb up after us.”

  “That’s stupid. We’ll never make it. He’s faster than we are.” And crazier, she thought.

  “No, we can make it. Listen to me. I’ve been there. The road is rutted and this car is higher off the road than his. We’ll be able to go faster on rough ground. Hell, maybe he’ll break an axle or something.”

  Hope filled Maggie’s eyes. “Do you think so?”

  “We don’t have any choice.” Adrian didn’t stop to think that escape to high ground was always a mistake.

  The silver car evaporated into the dark behind them as they recovered the road and fled east. Adrian kept the car pushed to its limit and the miles crept away. After several minutes, the single headlight reappeared in their mirror and the chase resumed.

  How much farther? Adrian couldn’t remember the mile marker, but thought it was around 50. He saw a green rectangle materialize, white letters that glowed eighty-seven. If he was right he had seven miles to go. At a hundred, and he was surprised that the Studebaker had it in her, he’d get there in less than five minutes.

  “He’s coming,” Maggie said, cutting that thought short. Five minutes though, was too close for Corley to try the chicken game again. Adrian clung to the belief that he wasn’t suicidal, there would be no sideswiping. He resolved, in an odd mixture of serenity and panic, to just drive.

  The green markers came and went; eighty -six, eighty -five, eighty -four.

  “Have you thought about what we’re going to do when we get there?”

  “One step at a time, Maggie, I’m doing the best I can.”

  There it was, a battered sign that said Delle, the exit to an abandoned service station and the road south to Lone Rock.

  But Corley was firmly back on his bumper. Adrian wondered how to handle this, when Maggie said, “Just as you get to the exit, hit the brakes, try and jam him up.”

  “Are you crazy?”

  “Just do it.” The strain in her voice was obvious.

  “Fine.” The white line widened for the exit and Adrian drifted slightly away from it, hoping to confuse Corley. At the last possible moment he tapped his brakes, not enough to actually stop, but the lights came on and their pursuer veered away as if scalded.

  Adrian, as if he’d done this all his life, snatched the wheel right and the Lark flew into the exit lane at just below a hundred. He pumped the brakes to slow down and fought the car’s urge to tip over. He knew the low slung Chevy wouldn’t have that problem.
Corley would be on them as soon as he recovered.

  The Lark’s tires squealed around the curve. They straightened out and shot down the tiny county road. Four miles to a rutted dirt road, another couple of minutes.

  “And...” Maggie drew out the word while watching the back window, “Here he comes again. He probably had to overshoot by half a mile, so we’ve gained a bit. Are we going to make it?”

  “I think so.” Who could tell? Adrian dreaded every second the Chevy had to catch them. He tasted bile in his mouth and had nearly thrown up. The idea embarrassed him, made him feel ashamed. He wanted to say more to Maggie but didn’t have any words until, “Here’s the turn.”

  “And here’s Corley, right behind us.”

  “I don’t care, we’ve got him now.” The Lark hit the turn, barely more than a slope at the edge of the road, and plummeted down onto the rutted remains of a wagon trail. Adrian steered around eroded pits and rocks big enough to take out the oil pan. Twice he splashed through puddles and the windshield splattered with dirty water, but he kept his speed up, far faster than was wise.

  The silver pursuer fell behind. Adrian sighed gratefully and swerved around a huge stone. The Lark bounced in a deep rut and he hit his head on the roof.

  Maggie felt around the seat and snarled with disgust. “There’s no seatbelt. Doesn’t this thing have any safely features?” She hit the dash. “Even the damn dashboard’s metal. Christ. Switch off the lights. The moon’s high enough to see by.”

  “You’re right, good idea.” Anything had to help. As Adrian hoped, the Camaro was having problems. He saw the single light bounce and jostle and imagined the nightmare ride, like being in a rock tumbler.

  In the new darkness they bucked and careened like pinballs themselves, finally getting near the towering spire. Maggie looked up and wailed, “We can’t climb that.”

  “It’s easy on the other side. Trust me.” They circled around the rock and Adrian stopped. He turned the key and the silence was deafening. A small cloud of dust, kicked up by their passage, settled slowly to the ground.

  “Get out. Hurry.” Adrian paused to grab the woolen blanket and took Maggie’s hand as the they ran up the slope to the massive rock. There was no sign of Corley.

  The angle was gentle, relatively. For Adrian, who had climbed it, there was no difficulty. Maggie, wearing flat shoes, was able to keep up.

  They ducked around huge boulders and slid on crumbling talus and Maggie cursed when she grabbed a weed with savage thorns that cut her palm. The moon helped light their way and within five minutes Adrian pulled Maggie up over the rim of the tower.

  She rolled over on her back, breathing heavily.

  Adrian said. “There he is.”

  She rolled to her stomach to look down over the edge, surprised at how high they were. The Studebaker glistened in the moonlight while the silver Chevy spilled in and out of shadows, like a shark, hunting.

  They watched the door open, the interior light dim from way up here, and Corley got out. They couldn’t make out his features, but Adrian imagined his confusion. What was he going to do now? What could he do? A sense of elation, like finishing a long and punishing race, filled him. He breathed in the cold night air and relaxed for the first time in hours.

  39 – Do It and Die

  They lay on the edge of the rock, spying down. The stone was cold to the touch, chilled by the breeze that swept across it. The moon had risen over the horizon, bathing the scene in an eerie light. And Corley Sayres paced impotently down below.

  “I’m cold,” said Adrian. Maggie reached over and tugged at the blanket he clutched under one arm, settling it over them. He slid closer to her for warmth. “What do you think he’s going to do?”

  Maggie shivered wearily. “I don’t know. Go home maybe.”

  “You think?”

  “No.”

  “Well, he can’t come up here. Maggie, I saw him. He was terrified up on the catwalks, couldn’t move at all. There’s no way he can get to us.” He turned to watch Corley prowling around his Camaro like an angry lion.

  “So what do we do?” asked Maggie. “Lemme up.” She pushed away and stood, keeping far from the edge so she wouldn’t be seen. “This is so...desolate. Adrian, there aren’t any trees up here or any bushes or...anything. It’s like being on the moon.”

  He joined her and they stood arm in arm in the rough center of the plateau. “It’s grimmer at night,” he admitted. “During the day you can see for miles. It’s like standing on the edge of forever.”

  Maggie inspected their new surrounding critically. The top was flat with only occasional crevasses. The wind had brushed the surface bare of everything. “Adrian, there are no rocks up here,” she said, with the first suggestion that maybe this wasn’t the best idea.

  “So?”

  “So what if he doesn’t leave? What if we’re stuck up here without food or water or a damn cell phone? Can’t he just wait us out?”

  “Um.” Adrian hadn’t thought any farther than “Run like hell.” Perhaps it was time to consider phase two. Which was—he frowned and bit his upper lip—what?

  “Well, Corley can’t come up here, we know that.”

  “Okay,” Maggie agreed, though dubiously. She was feeling an odd sense of claustrophobia, as if the sky itself was closing in on her. The idea grew that they had made a horrible mistake. “And we can’t go down.”

  “Soooo, we wait him out. He has to leave sometime.”

  “That’s your plan?” Maggie said. Her voice only carried a few feet before dissipating in the breeze. “That’s your idea of saving us? To sit here on top of a rock and wait while a homicidal maniac hangs out? Just because he can’t climb up here?” Her shoulders slumped and she whispered, “Jesus, we are so screwed.”

  “Would you rather we were still in the car? With him trying to hit us?”

  “Just...just never mind.” She pulled away. Adrian could see her shoulders shaking with sobs. He felt angry and as afraid as he’d been since the night on the bus. This wasn’t that bad, was it? Of course not. There was only one Corley here, not a whole gang. And he wasn’t armed like they were and he couldn’t climb.

  “Beck.” A ghostly whispered bellow startled him. “Adrian Beck!” The wind barely let the shout rise. Adrian went to the edge and looked down. Corley stood by the beginning of the rocky slope, peering up, trying to see. “Beck,” he shouted again.

  “What?” Adrian exposed himself on the rim of the plateau. “What do you want?”

  “Come down, Beck.” The holler was shaky but the tone of threat was clear.

  “You’ll kill me.”

  “I’ll fucking kill you if you don’t.”

  “Then I’ll stay up here.”

  Corley looked about six inches tall, as if Adrian, like a giant, could just step on him. Reality wasn’t nearly as kind; if he met Corley, he’d die.

  Adrian walked to the other side of the rock. He squinted down the steep side, his climber experience gauging the descent. It would be scary, but he could do it. Maggie though...there was no way. Maybe he could go down and circle around. He could sneak up on Corley and bash him with something? Get away while Corley’s back was turned?

  The sound of breaking glass buoyed up and Adrian ran back. Corley was next to the Studebaker, holding the tire iron. As Adrian watched in horror, he swung it in a wide arc. The rear side passenger window shattered..

  “Beck!” More glass broke. “Come down or I’ll kill your fucking car!”

  “Better the car than me,” Adrian shouted back, but he was shaken inside. Watching the Lark be destroyed, after all his and Toby’s work...? But the car could be rebuilt.

  Maggie had sat down in the middle of the rock and wrapped the blanket around herself. She seemed oblivious to the yelling. Adrian winced as he heard the sound of sheet metal being assaulted, and he walked over to Maggie and sat down beside her. She made no sign that she knew he was there.

  Adrian sighed. He wished he’d done somet
hing else, been someone else. Superman, or Captain America. He remembered Roger saying, “He flew through the air—like Batman.” He could use Batman now, or even Roger or any of the guys. He thought about Pieburn and wondered if he was alive. He pictured a mass of tubes attached to a still figure and felt sad.

  Mostly he felt the wind blowing the heat from his thin shirt. He wanted to get under the blanket but didn’t want to bother Maggie, so he huddled next to her in mute misery. The sounds of destruction stopped without him knowing it. His body ached from cold and stiffness. He wondered if he could climb down if it came to that.

  “I’m coming up.” Three small words from the world below had the power to galvanize both Adrian and Maggie.

  She yelped, “What?” and threw the blanket off her shoulders. Together they hurried to the edge and peered down the side. Corley had left his destruction of the Studebaker and was now at the lowest edge of the rock slope. He looked wide eyed and angry as he began to climb. His movements were stiff and angular, as if he was made of broken glass, but he was coming.

  Adrian could see he had the tire iron with him. He rolled onto his back and groaned. What was he going to do? Corley just kept coming; there seemed to be no stopping him. visions of monsters, nightmares from evil dreams—the Terminator—filled Adrian’s mind with dreadful panic. For a moment he actually considered running. He could go over the other edge, climb down and get away. He could; all it would take was leaving Maggie, and she wasn’t talking to him anyway.

  The reasoning was primitive and seductive: save yourself. But although his shoulders shook with tears of his own, of frustration and mortal terror, he couldn’t do it. Not even to save himself.

  The same impulse that had propelled him forward to such devastating results kept him motionless now. He just couldn’t run.

  But he couldn’t lay here either.

  “I’m going down.” Adrian’s voice was diminished by the wind and extreme fear and regret. When he had stood up to the gang on the bus, he had gone in not knowing what he faced. Terror was a subjective thing, imagined, but not real. The knife that scarred him, the memory of broken bones, had taught him well. The monsters were real. Sometimes there was more to fear than fear itself.