Gerardo wipes his eyes and stands up slowly, using the rifle as a crutch once more. It’s like a weight has been lifted, and he can move through the fatigue again. So he moves and keeps moving, every step taking him closer to the Sleeping Place.
TWENTY-THREE
A group of Red Eyes stands around a bonfire. A couple of them toss branches into it. Most of them lean on their spears with dazed, half-asleep expressions. One of the hunters actually doing some work leaves the group and walks over to a pile of branches in the semi-darkness of the distant tree line. He mumbles curses about the ‘lazy fucks’ around him under his breath. He looks up suddenly to see Gerardo standing over him.
Thunk! Gerardo whacks the butt of Gabo’s rifle into the Red Eye’s nose, stabbing one of the bones inside into something important. The hunter collapses. Gerardo picks up his spear and keeps moving in the dark toward another bonfire.
◆◆◆
A pair of Red Eyes leaning on their spears mutter to each other. “No resting,” one of them says, “Chief’ll dead you if he sees.”
“Dead you if he sees,” the other responds.
Gerardo runs the spear through the first Red Eye. The other starts to lift his own…but he’s much too slow, his brain’s cogs way too clogged by exhaustion to make his arms respond in time. Gerardo grabs the downed Red’s spear. He points it up. Limps forward. “Wa—” the second Red Eye begins, but Gerardo digs the X-ACTO Knife that serves as the spearhead into the Red’s throat. The Red Eye gurgles and crumples to the ground. Gerardo doesn’t stop, just picks up the Red’s spear and limps toward the darkness of the tree line.
◆◆◆
The bonfires just below the mountaintop surround it in a thick haze of smoke. A thicket of trees circles the volcano’s peak, making the tallest point a large clearing. In the center of it is a crater filled in with dirt and grass, packed in so thick it’s as shallow and flat as a field. This is the Sleeping Place.
Outside the clearing, Chief walks past Lorena, Edu, Pilar, and Marco. They’re all bound, wrapped over and over again with rough rope and several kinds of wire, tied to the tree trunks they’re leaning against.
Gloria’s parked in the clearing at the Place’s highest point, next to a large, lone tree. Anita’s pinned to Gloria’s front grill, a chain looping over her waist and holding her in place.
A Red Eye wearing only a torn police vest over his emaciated frame walks toward the bound hostages. He leans over Edu and takes a knife out of one of the vest pockets. One of Edu’s eyelids is already badly cut up, the other is swollen shut under a blackening bruise. The Red peels Edu’s eyelid up to get a better angle, as if he were cutting off a fruit’s tough skin. He brings the knife up to it, lining the razor-sharp edge up with Edu’s eyelashes. “Come on,” Edu says, “do it, you fuck. Do it.”
Chief chuckles at this like it’s the funniest joke he’s ever heard. His naked body is covered in a collage of purple and black hematomas of all shapes and sizes. One of his eyes is a ghoulish mess of burst blood vessels, the blood so dark red it’s almost black. The fall out of the pickup truck has taken its toll, but Chief’s still standing with his head held high, his posture as imposing as always. He either doesn’t feel the pain or doesn’t mind it.
BANG.
The hunter in front of Edu drops his knife. A red fountain bursts from his chest, showering Edu in scarlet gore. Chief turns around. There’s a silhouette in the wall of smoke surrounding the tree line. It’s holding a rifle.
A pack of hunters charges toward the silhouette. They’re decked out in coats of red paint and dead leaves and carrying improvised spears. One of them reaches the human shape in the middle of the smoke and impales it with a spear that’s just a kitchen knife taped to a thick branch. The hunter looks at the figure, confused. It doesn’t fall over, doesn’t make a sound as the hunter pulls the spear out and drives it back in. Then he realizes why. The figure is a naked man caked in red paint...a dead Red Eye propped up by a spear like a cardboard cut-out. The ‘rifle’ in his hand is really just a branch. Suddenly, a bang echoes in the darkness. The top of the living hunter’s head explodes into a pulpy mess.
The pack of hunters turns to see Gerardo lying on the ground behind them. He’s got Gabo’s rifle trained on them.
A sequence of flashes illuminates the swirling smoke like a fatal strobe light. As the echoes from the shots die down, Chief watches Gerardo limp out of the haze. A new pack of Red Eyes runs up to Chief, spears and machetes at the ready. Chief takes a knife out of the rag around his waist and hands it to the one closest to him. “Cut the girl’s lids,” Chief says, “not eyes. Just. Lids. Open, yeah?”
“Open-awake,” the hunter says taking the knife and smiling a toothless, gory smile.
“Fast,” Chief says.
The pack runs away from Chief. Gerardo lines the rifle up with them and fires. One falls, but it’s not the one holding Chief’s knife. Gerardo goes to shoot again, but when he fires, Gabo’s rifle clicks emptily in response.
“Aww. Too bad,” Chief says, practically giggling, “bangs are boring. Cutters better.” He takes another knife out of his rags and begins walking toward Gerardo. This one’s a survival knife, serrated and over-sharpened and polished with the care reserved only for something special.
Gerardo drops Gabo’s rifle and pulls his handgun out of his belt. He raises it and shoots Chief as he nears him in the semi-darkness. Half of Chief’s cheek peels away, revealing a chunky mess of flesh and a grungy set of teeth underneath. Gerardo shoots again. The bullet hits Chief in the stomach, the tiny hole leaking a scarlet trickle that wraps around Chief’s groin. Chief keeps walking, keeps coming, as if Gerardo has just sprayed him with a water gun.
Anita struggles against the rusted chains around her waist. She’s gotten a couple of them down to her knees already and, as they moved down, they’ve stained her shirt and scraped her skin, leaving streaks of brown metal flakes on her skin and clothes. Below her, the pack of Red Eyes runs into the clearing. They’re wild and giddy, like a pack of hungry dogs on the scent of tonight’s dinner. Anita squirms under the chains. She kicks the bumper below her. She rises a bit. More chains fall to her knees. The first hunter is almost upon her. Anita lifts her hands onto Gloria’s hood. She pulls on it, moving up slightly and grunting with the strain.
Chief continues walking toward Gerardo. Gerardo blasts him again. This time the bullet hits Chief in the shoulder, taking a strip of flesh with it and cracking a bit of bone away. Undeterred, Chief grabs Gerardo’s collar and brings the knife down into the soft meat between Gerardo’s neck and shoulder, causing him to drop his handgun along with a torrent of hot blood.
The first hunter reaches Anita, baring the knife in the pale moonlight. There are only two chains around her waist now, loose but still enough to hold her in place. The hunter reaches her and, with a smile, brings the knife up to one of her eyes. She shuts it immediately as if he had poked her with the razor-sharp blade. But he hasn’t. Not yet. “Sleeper’s no good without lids,” the hunter says.
Gerardo wraps his hands around Chief’s head. One of them drops toward Chief’s mouth, its fingers snagging on the hole that used to be his cheek, pulling a flap of skin and several sinewy strips of flesh off. Chief keeps coming, keeps laughing. He rips the knife from Gerardo’s shoulder, then staggers forward and sinks it into Gerardo’s stomach. Gerardo gasps, his hands drop to his sides, too weak and loose now to do anything else. “Sleep now,” Chief whispers.
The hunter steadies Anita’s head with one grimy hand, then lifts his dirty fingers and pinches her eyelid, lifting it and pulling it away from the wet, leaking eye underneath. He brings the knife up. “Don’t. Please,” Anita stammers.
The hunter smiles, cocking his head as if he’s surprised to hear this. “Oh?” he asks, giggling, “little girl scared?” His knife hand drifts away from her eye for a moment, and it’s all Anita needs. She smiles.
“No,” Anita says, and rears her head back. Then she slams i
t forward with all her strength, driving her forehead into the hunter’s nose, headbutting him brutally. The hunter falls back, blood shooting out of his nose like red ribbons.
Chief pulls the knife out of Gerardo in one swift, clean motion. Gerardo staggers back. He’s out of energy. It’s all been used up. Gerardo’s tank is remarkable, filled again and again by adrenaline and rage. But he’s been hovering over empty for hours, the walk up to the volcano’s peak being the last straw.
Now, the tank is finally empty. He’s got nothing left, no hidden reserves of energy that adrenaline might shake loose. He feels his body give, his limbs loosen and go slack as if they’ve planned a mutiny on the tyrannical maniac that has forced them to work harder than ever before in one night. He feels a numb emptiness in his gut, right where Chief’s knife communed with his insides. There’s a feeling there, something beyond cold and beyond numb, something Gerardo can only think about as ‘important.’ ‘He’s hit something important,’ Gerardo thinks.
Anita kicks at the hunter in front of her. The last chains rattle loose, finally dropping below her feet.
‘Fuck it,’ Gerardo thinks, clenching and cocking his leg back, meaning to kick Chief’s knee. It’s a pathetic attempt. His leg flops a few feet toward Chief, then drops to the ground, as lifeless and useless as a pool noodle. Chief walks forward, his legs moving like two strong, perfectly coordinated machines, and grabs Gerardo by his hair, dragging him into the clearing.
Gerardo spits, aiming for Chief’s face. What comes out is red and loose and sprays over Chief’s feet like harmless mist. “So weak,” Chief mumbles, “pills and pills and it’s only brought you this. Shoulda stayed awake. Like us.”
“You can’t have been awake this long,” Gerardo says, his voice hoarse and faded. “It’s fucking impossible.”
“Am awake!” Chief roars, pulling Gerardo’s head sharply. “Still. Always. Now, cut out a Sleeper’s lids, make her like us. Burn this place.” Chief drags Gerardo toward the clearing, and toward Gloria and Anita.
Anita stomps on the bumper. She hops up, sticking one foot over the chains, then another. She’s finally free.
Chief drops Gerardo into the clearing. As soon as his head hits the grass, Gerardo starts laughing. “What?” Chief asks. Gerardo laughs louder, it turns into a cackle, then a coughing mess. “WHAT?” Chief shouts, kicking Gerardo in the ribs until his laughter is reduced to a sputtering wheeze.
“She was right,” Gerardo says. His voice is a phlegmy whisper, his body is broken and bleeding, but even under all that, some of the fatigue is melting away from his face. Something’s changed. A barrier has been crossed. “I can feel it. And I think you can too. That’s what all this bravado is...you’re scared. You’re scared to go to sleep.”
“Liar!” Chief howls, “don’t feel anything!” Chief punches Gerardo. Gerardo laughs through it, not coughing or sputtering anymore, but laughing confidently, triumphantly. Chief steps over him, his bloody hands close around Gerardo’s throat, cutting his laughter off. “LIAR!”
Anita sits on Gloria’s hood. A hunter’s spear cuts into the metal of the hood next to her. She turns, flips, grabs the roof and scurries through the driver’s side hole, moving so fast that the hunter’s broken brain has trouble processing it.
Chief grabs Gerardo’s head and slams it into the ground. Gerardo’s face is a raw, red mess, rapidly turning purple…but he’s still smiling. Chief lifts one of his feet and slams it down on Gerardo’s throat, denting it down and cutting off his air supply.
A hunter’s spear crashes through Gloria’s windshield, its head is a small survival hatchet tied to a broomstick. Shards of glass rain down over both seats as Anita scrambles to start the ignition. She panics for a moment as her fingers hit nothing but the empty rubber of the dashboard…until they wrap around the cold metal of the semi’s key.
Gerardo closes his eyes, his face turning red and swelling, his body going into panic mode. Chief presses his foot down harder. “Now you can sleep. World’s for the awake. You’re too weak to make it.”
A heavenly light burns through the darkness and hits Chief and Gerardo from above. Its brilliance turns black into white, darkness into light. It blinds Chief, who staggers away from Gerardo. Gerardo brings his hands up in front of his eyes. They adjust to see…Gloria's headlights.
Gloria barrels down the hill, her massive grill crunching the hunters that clung to the front bumper. One of them lurches through the driver’s side hole and lunges, grabbing onto the driver’s seat. Anita thrusts her shoulder into his face. The hunter’s grip loosens, making him fall and burst into a pulpy mess under one of Gloria’s monstrous tires.
Chief stares at the headlights. They’re twin white eyes in a black void. He’s transfixed. Gerardo gasps for air, coughing as his lungs drink hungrily from the fresh air all around him. His eyes blink the stars above him back into focus.
BRAAAAHHM. Gloria’s horn blares Gerardo into action. He looks up to see Gloria is still rolling down the hill, her front bumper almost upon him and Chief. Gerardo musters the last bit of strength inside his body, channels it through burning muscles and numb limbs and rolls on his side…out of the way of Gloria’s speeding grill.
Just as he does, Chief walks up to the gleaming headlights, mumbling to himself the whole way. “Been awake too long, nothing can make me sleep. Nothing.” Gloria's massive front bumper smashes Chief into a red mess. Chief’s asleep for good...
TWENTY-FOUR
Smoke floats out from under Gloria’s crunched hood. A tree bisects her front grill. Her windshield’s a shattered spiderweb. Gerardo limps toward the driver’s side. There, inside the ruined cabin, Anita’s lying against the steering wheel. Her body’s slumped like a rag doll.
Gerardo scrambles to get to her. He coughs his voice back into existence. “Anita!” he screams. Gerardo grabs her by the shoulders and carefully, gently, slides her out of the driver’s seat and lays her on the cold, wet grass.
A crisscross pattern of several cuts cover Anita’s forehead, bruises dot her small frame. Gerardo pulls shards of glass out of her hair. A thought strikes him then, something about her looks like one of those statues of saints and martyrs at Father Jaime’s church. No. She’s not some holy girl who died showing sinners like him the way. He won’t let that be true. “Answer me!” he shouts, “Anita! Come on. Don’t do this!”
Anita opens her eyes, smiling weakly. “I’m sorry I crashed Gloria,” she says.
“Oh, thank God!” Gerardo says, chuckling with relief. “No! You did good!” He drops to one knee and hugs her. She gets up and starts to walk away, moving toward the tree line where the others are still tied to tree trunks…but Gerardo’s arms are still wrapped around her, still holding on. She stops and hugs him back harder.
“I didn’t think you were gonna take us. You’re so stubborn…” Anita says.
“I’m sorry I…didn’t believe you,” Gerardo says, practically whispering. After all, he’s still a proud man, and those two phrases, the hardest for someone like him to say, have reared their head again. ‘I’m sorry’ and ‘you were right. “You were right,” Gerardo says, biting the bullet. “Both you and Diana were right all along.”
“Yeah. She did tell you though, remember? Guess since she’s not here, I’ll say it.”
“What?”
“I told you so.” Anita grins at him. Gerardo shakes his head and smiles back.
◆◆◆
Anita runs out of the clearing. Gerardo limps after her. He’s got a hand clasped where Chief stabbed him. A thin trickle of blood snakes out of his clenched fingers. There’s enough pain there to dull his smile, to bring a troubled sharpness to his eyes. He narrows them and follows Anita.
Lorena, Edu, Pilar, and Marco are still tied to their respective trees. Around them the smoke’s starting to clear, but the bonfires are still going, the flames dying down but still very much alive.
Anita loops the ropes out of the way, untying Lorena and making her slide down
the tree she’s leaning on and onto the wet grass. She’s about to move to Edu, but Gerardo places a hand on her shoulder. His eyes boil with rage as they rest on him.
“Gerardo, wait!” Anita screams.
Gerardo lunges at Edu, his hands wrapping around Edu’s throat, choking him. Edu’s eyes bulge, but not just because his airflow’s been cut off. They redden with rage. “You gonna kill me like Diego?” Edu croaks.
“You fucking traitor,” Gerardo growls, “you called the Red Eyes so they’d take Anita.”
“I’m the traitor? Why don't you tell Anita about your plan at the Insomnia Café?” Edu asks, smiling sadistically.
Anita turns to look at Gerardo, searching for an explanation. “There was an offer at a research compound for the cure. It was before we saw—” Gerardo begins.
“It’s okay. I forgive you.” Anita analyzes Gerardo’s pained, sweaty face. He’s troubled. His hands are still around Edu’s neck, still tightening with each passing second. Anita nods toward Edu as if to say, ‘your turn.’
“Do it, then!” Edu shouts. Gerardo mumbles something. It’s unintelligible. “What?” Edu asks, “what the fuck did you say?”
“I forgive you,” Gerardo says, and lets go of Edu’s neck. Edu gasps for breath, sighing in relief.
“But, just know,” Anita begins, walking toward Gerardo, “if you’d sold me off and they ripped my brain out or something, I’d have come back as a ghost and haunted your ass for sure,” Anita says. Gerardo shakes his head, smiling.
◆◆◆
Gerardo flips a sheet of metal over one of the bonfires, spilling a massive clump of dirt on top of the fire, smothering it. Ahead of him, the others sit in front of the clearing. Once the embers die down, Gerardo limps over to them.
“Think this shit will actually work?” Edu asks.
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