by Ryan Schow
When Rider headed out the front door, he bounded down the steps and onto the street where the Jeep was parked. Looking at Hagan, he said, “Keys?”
The boy fished the key from his pocket, tossed it to Rider. They both got in the Jeep. Rider stuck the key in the ignition, gave it a twist. The engine turned slowly, sluggishly, failing to catch. He let off the key, then turned it again, working the gas pedal the right way, tapping it lightly so the engine wouldn’t flood. It finally caught and coughed to life.
“For a second there, I wasn’t sure it would start,” Hagan admitted.
“Old engine, old gas,” Rider explained. “You got a gun?”
Hagan reached behind the seat and pulled out a long rifle, then looked at Rider as if that was all the answer he needed.
“Ever killed anyone with it?”
A wave of sadness moved through his eyes, like a memory bloomed to life. An unwanted, shameful memory. Rider had been wondering about this kid since he first saw him. His response to the question spoke volumes. Rider suspected the kid would do what it took to survive, but he wouldn’t do it willingly, not if it involved more killing. Before he even answered the question, though, he’d accurately predicted what Hagan’s response would be.
“Yes,” he said.
“How many?” Rider asked, suddenly attentive only to the kid.
“Three.”
“They deserve it?”
“I’m not sure anyone deserves it,” he said.
“You always feel like that at first,” Rider replied, “but these are abysmal times and the way we used to think in the past—how we used to live with a clear set of morals and values—we’re going to have to put all that behind us if we want to survive. Do you have something smaller? A handgun perhaps?”
“At the house. My brother Ballard has it.”
Rider unholstered one of his Glock’s and handed it to him. “There’s one in the chamber, and the safety is in the trigger.”
“This is what my dad has.”
“Good,” he said. “If I tell you to shoot, you shoot, got it?”
Hagan looked at him and saw the way the boy must look at his father. It sort of made him sad thinking he never had any kids, that he’d never have any kids.
“Okay,” Hagan replied.
“Unless you want to drive and I can man the guns.”
“I got it,” Hagan said, looking away.
He dropped the Jeep in gear, worked the clutch and the stick shift then said, “Where to, kid?”
Hagan gave him directions.
They navigated slowly and safely through the streets, keeping their eyes peeled for potential obstructions, problems, or signs of trouble. They talked casually, Hagan briefing Rider on what happened to their home, Rider telling him a bit about the college and the people there. Then it happened: they came upon a wall of men blocking the street.
“Dammit,” Rider muttered, readying his other Glock.
He felt Hagan tense up.
“Just relax, kid,” he said too casually.
The barricade of men looked like they were all in their twenties or thirties. Their weapons were out. Each of these guys bore the no-nonsense look of troublemakers. Behind them stood two really old choppers and a line of bicycles both old and new. One of the men put his hand up and signaled toward the Jeep. Rider slowed to meet them.
The line moved forward as one.
When the line stopped moving, one man continued forward. The leader came up alongside the Jeep and said, “You can’t cross through here.”
“No problem. You got a detour?”
“Yeah,” the guy said, eyeing Hagan. “Back the way you came.”
Rider was getting a little tired of this. He studied the line of men quickly but thoroughly. There were nine of them. Four had their weapons drawn, but only two of them concerned him.
To the man beside him he said, “I have to get back to the Presidio, and I don’t mind backtracking. But I’d like to know that when I swing back this way I don’t crash whatever party it is you were having before I arrived.”
The man was tall with a receding hairline. He had bad teeth and clothes that stunk up the air between them. He closed in on Rider, sidling up next to the front door. The guy’s eyes were on the kid. On his lap, Rider fingered the Glock’s trigger from the top, aimed it at the door in the exact place he knew he’d hit body mass.
“Just make a wide berth,” he said, looking at Hagan’s rifle. “You got any ammo in that thing?”
“Of course,” he said.
“Let me have it,” the man said, a pistol coming up and pointing into the Jeep. “And the Glock, too.”
Rider put the Jeep in reverse, not quickly, but like it was no big deal, and the guy said, “Not yet. Guns first.”
“They’re my guns, Cochise,” Rider said. The man moved his weapon around to Rider, pressing the muzzle into his head, which was exactly what Rider wanted.
It all happened in a split second.
Rider jerked his head forward and flung up his left hand at the same time, catching the side of the gun enough to slap it backwards. A gunshot exploded in a deafening roar, rattling Rider’s brain. The bullet missed both Rider and Hagan, as intended, but Rider squeezed the trigger on his Glock, putting a round through the Jeep’s door and into the man’s pelvis.
The scumbag buckled forward, gasping.
Slightly disoriented from the concussion burst in his ear, Rider snatched the guy’s arm, yanked him up against the Jeep and held him there. Rider’s eyes were diamond hard and extra pissed off. The attacker tried but failed to stand. Glock still in his lap, Rider smashed the gas, dumped the clutch and jolted backward in a fit of smoked rubber and gunfire.
“Get down!” he screamed at Hagan, who needed no prompting.
The line of men were firing on them, spider-webbing the entire windshield as they both ducked down. Bullets dug into their seats, slapped the metal frame around and behind them. Rider released the man’s arm seconds before slamming the Jeep into something solid and fixed. Bullets plunk-plunk-plunked into the engine, killing their only mode of transportation instantly.
The gunfire ceased. They didn’t have much time.
“We need to go,” Rider said. “Now!”
Rider popped his head up, saw the men descending on them while at the same time loading their weapons. They were thirty yards out and closing in fast.
“Your side,” he told Hagan.
With the rifle in hand, Hagan kicked the door open and hustled out. Almost as an afterthought, he reached back into the foot well and grabbed the fallen Glock.
Good kid.
Gunfire peppered the Jeep’s engine, hood and already obliterated windshield. They scrambled out of the Jeep and took cover behind a wheel. Rider then realized that what he’d hit. It was the corner of a brick building. He never felt the Jeep jump the curb, but all kinds of weird things happened when you were trying not to panic under fire.
“Keep your body between them and the wheel,” he said. “And give me that rifle.”
Hagan handed it over.
“Is it loaded?”
“Four rounds,” he said.
“That all?” he asked, knowing by the squat look of the magazine the boy was telling the truth. Not that he’d have a reason to lie. Hagan reached into his pocket, fished out four more shells, shoved them his way.
“Hold ‘em ‘til I’m out,” Rider said, moving into a prone position on the ground so he could see his attackers’ feet. “This scope accurate?” he asked as he looked through the scope.
“My father’s a Marine,” he said. That was the answer Rider needed.
Steadying the rifle, he found his target, released his breath and squeezed the trigger. The first round blew out one man’s ankle. He crumpled to the ground, howling in pain, his face pumped full of agony. Rider sent the next round through the tibia of a second man pausing to check on his friend. He went down, too, growling and grimacing, holding his shin in front of him.
The moron with the destroyed ankle, he had his pistol in his hand. He was popping off shots; Rider put a round through his left nostril. Adjusting just a hair, he sent his last round through the throat of the downed man with the destroyed shin.
“That’s four,” Rider said above the ruckus of return gunfire.
Hagan shoved the next four more rounds his way. Rider scooped them out of Hagan’s hand, ejected the magazine, thumbed in four rounds then inserted and slapped the magazine home.
Bullets were plinking off the outer shell and the undercarriage of the Jeep.
“Stay behind that wheel!” he barked at Hagan who was already shifting position.
Rider dropped the rifle, grabbed his Glock, then popped his head up and fired off three fast rounds. Two rounds found one man’s chest; the other went a quarter inch wide. Rider spotted five more and realized he wasn’t good enough to hold the Jeep alone, much less with a kid ready to piss his pants.
Then the kid rolled onto his side, aimed his Glock and fired off two rounds, eliciting a scream. So maybe he wouldn’t be pissing his trousers after all.
Rider’s fourth round silenced the man.
Keeping count in his head, Hagan’s Glock held six more rounds, his had five and there was a full magazine in the rifle. With three men left, they stood a fighting chance. Looking behind them for an exit, or better ground to mount a defensive assault, he saw a street littered with tall buildings and half a dozen firebombed cars.
“We’re heading there,” he said, pointing to the street behind them. “See that first SUV?”
“Yeah,” Hagan asked, wincing each time a round pierced the Jeep’s metal skin.
“We need to make a run for it, but you need to stay as low as humanly possible. If they can see you they can shoot at you. Got it?”
“Got it.”
“Good, go!”
Hagan ran low, moving faster than Rider imagined he could. Rider turned and followed Hagan, and to his relief, no one took a shot at him.
The Jeep continued to take fire, however, telling Rider they didn’t know he and Hagan were after better cover.
When a shaggy haired man peeked his head around the Jeep, Rider put a bullet through his crown. Another appeared almost at the exact same time and ate a bullet for his effort. A few minutes later, the sound of a motorcycle engine cut into the still afternoon air, turning over, then roaring off in a clatter of noise.
“Let’s go,” Rider said, dragging the kid to his feet until he fell into step behind Rider.
When they came upon the dead guys on the other side of the Jeep, Rider said, “Grab their guns, check their pockets for keys.”
“The motorcycle?”
“Yep.”
Hagan found the keys, tossed them to Rider. He looked at them then smiled. Together they gathered up the guns, headed to the old chopper left standing, then saddled up. He handed Hagan the black skullcap Helmet with a Death’s Head sticker on it and they stowed the weapons in a pair of old leather saddle bags.
Rider stuck the key in the ignition, flipped out the kick-start, stood and gave it a hearty push. The engine turned over easy. There was a cotton black half-face skull mask. He slipped it on his face, then over his shoulder he said, “Where are we going kid?”
“You’re going to take a left in two blocks, then go straight for eight or nine blocks.”
When they arrived at Hagan’s home, Rider spotted three eviscerated cars and a dead boy lying in the gutter across the street, his head shot open. He pulled the chopper to a stop in front of the house, drew out the kickstand. He dropped his face mask just as Hagan was handing him his helmet. Rider got off the bike, hung the helmet on the handlebar.
“Your mom do that?” Rider asked, his eyes on the dead boy’s pulped head.
“He destroyed our house.”
Rider glanced over at the house. It looked like it had collapsed in front of what was a pretty explosive mess of cars and what used to be an SUV.
“I’m assuming that’s you?” he asked, nodding toward the house.
“What gave it away?” the kid said, getting off the bike.
Smart ass.
A young boy with a mop of sandy blonde hair peeked his head out of the smashed front door. He saw them, relaxed some and came out.
“Hagan,” he said.
“Ballard,” Hagan replied in a way that let Rider know the boys were close.
The boy was younger looking than Hagan, maybe thirteen or fourteen. He was a few inches shorter than his brother who was a few more inches shorter than Rider. Ballard’s blonde hair was longish, more Justin Bieber than a surfer, but his plain American face was an open book. He was scared for his mother, but more concerned about Rider.
Looking from Rider to his brother, he said, “Who’s he?”
“This is Rider,” Hagan replied.
Rider offered a hand; Ballard shook it. He had a solid grip for a kid that wasn’t skinny but wasn’t built either. His face had multiple nicks on it—cuts that looked a few days old, and his eyes danced, even though the rest of him exuded a sort of calm disinterest.
“Nice to meet you, Rider,” Ballard said.
“How’s Mom?” Hagan asked.
“I think she’s not doing so well. She’s sweating a lot, but she’s talking about how cold she is, too. I think she has a fever.”
“Can you take me to her?” Rider asked.
“You a doctor?”
Looking at the kid, he said, “Do I look like a doctor?”
Rider was in his early forties with straight, sliver hair that he wore long on top and clipped short on the sides and in back. He was tall, but not much over six feet, and strong. Really strong. He lost some of his muscular bulk from his time as a CIA contractor, but he was still a fast fat-free killing machine. He had more ink than he intended when he started tattooing himself, and both arms were sleeved, shoulder to wrist. It gave him an edgy look, but he felt edgy anyway. Like he lived his life trapped in a cage, frantic to escape but not at all comfortable with all that lie on the other side of the bars. Rider knew he looked like a lot of things, but certainly not a doctor.
“So why are you here?” Ballard asked, shading his eyes from the sun.
“I’m here to transport her to a doctor. Plus I know a few things about injuries like your mother might have sustained.”
“What’s your training?” he asked.
“Ballard,” Hagan warned.
“I can ask questions,” Ballard argued, “especially when you show up on a motorcycle talking about taking Mom to a doctor. What are you going to take her in? How are all four of us going to fit on that thing, and where is the Jeep Hagan stole?”
“We were ambushed on the way here,” Rider said, monotone and without expression.
“We took the motorcycle,” Hagan admitted.
“I need to see your mother, and we need to start thinking about what we can use to transport her a couple of miles from here. Whatever we use needs to be sort of like a gurney.”
“Your doctors are a couple miles away?” Ballard asked.
“No, there’s a hospital a couple of miles away. There I think we can find a real gurney, and some medicine, but we need to get her there first. Can she walk at all?”
“Not really,” Ballard answered. “I mean, she’s been laying down so she hasn’t really tried.”
“I’ll follow you,” Rider told the boy.
Ballard gave Hagan one last look. Hagan nodded, causing Ballard to pull his eyebrows together and go against what looked like his better judgement. The boy turned and led the way inside, causing Rider to tell Hagan, “I don’t think he likes me very much.”
“You look like an old gangbanger,” Hagan said.
Rider wasn’t sure if that was an insult, a compliment, or a totally impassive assessment of his look.
It didn’t matter.
They went inside, Rider ducking in through the broken front door and the caved-i
n ceiling. He had to drop to his knees through most of the journey, crawling through rubble, tunneled ruins and standing water from broken pipes. Even though he was lean, twice he was forced to suck in giant breaths of air just to squeeze his body through cracks in the destruction. They moved up the stairs, which were collapsed, with half the second story sagging at a steep angle toward him.
When they finally got to Hagan’s and Ballard’s mother, Rider’s hands and knees were protesting. Sadly, he was far older than his age.
The first thing he noticed was how young Lenna Justus looked. She couldn’t be more than thirty-two or thirty-three. The second thing he noticed was that she was attractive, but not in a gaudy way. She was more of a natural beauty.
Lenna Justus was asleep on the floor, tucked under a slightly lifted mattress that might protect her should the roof collapse. He placed his hand on her forehead, felt the heat pulsing off her. It was just like Macy.
“Lenna,” he said.
She stirred.
“Lenna, wake up.”
The woman cracked her eyes open, found him, tried to focus. He met her with a warm smile and said, “My name is Rider. Your son Hagan asked for my help. How are you feeling right now?”
“Cold,” she said, shivering. “Need to break this fever.”
Rider looked at Ballard and said, “Can you still get to your kitchen?”
The boy nodded.
“Do you have any onions?”
“White or red?” Ballard asked.
“White, if you have it. And a steak knife, too.”
“You making me dinner?” she asked, groggy, half a weak smile finding her face.
“Something even better,” he said with warmth in his voice. “I want to move you, but I need you to tell me if anything hurts.”
“It all hurts.”
Hagan said, “It wasn’t easy getting her in here.”
“Did you check for cuts or abrasions?” he asked. The older boy shook his head. “I need you to help your brother with that onion. And bring some water if you have it.”
When Hagan left, Rider said, “I need to pull you out from under this mattress where I can examine you, is that okay?”
“Yes,” she said.
Hands in her armpits, he gently eased her out from under the mattress, checking her face for signs of pain or discomfort. “I need to look you over before we move you. It’s going to be an interesting ride out of here, and honestly, I’m concerned about transporting you if you have any serious injuries.”