Ever Onward (39 page)

Traveling itself had also proved to be
a problem. The main highways from Toronto to New York were
hopelessly blocked, forcing them to take lesser roads. One detour
had led them through the Adirondacks. Both Sloan and Tiny were
city-boys. The only trees they’d ever seen were pathetic, half-dead
things anchored in cement. The concept of wilderness for Sloan was
Central Park. The towering High Peaks Region left him feeling small
and lost, emotions he covered up by acting meaner than usual, which
for Sloan was plenty mean. When they’d reached the relatively large
town of Lake Placid, Sloan, feeling like a depraved Moses coming
out of the wastelands, had called a halt.

They’d been in Lake Placid now for
almost two weeks. Though he himself rarely ventured out of town ---
those damned mountains again! --- he sent his scouts out regularly.
‘People Hunting’ he called it, though everyone knew it was really
‘Pussy Hunting’. What with drugs gone and booze fast running out,
females were worth their weight in gold. Twice that if they were
young. Sloan had been the first to appreciate the potential of a
female slave trade. Given enough long, lonely nights, most men
would sell their souls for a piece of ass.

‘He who controls the pussy, has true
power!’

When Gut had mentioned seeing two
healthy, young females in a white van just several miles down the
road, Sloan had decided to investigate himself. Flanked by eight of
his trusted followers, he was now on his way to ‘sample the
wares’.

But now that asshole Gut didn’t answer
his calls. The fat fuck had mentioned the name of the shit-horse
town, but was it Keen or Keen Valley? The torn road-map he had
showed a couple of them! It was beyond Sloan how these
shit-for-brain yokels couldn’t even come up with a new name for
each town! East Keen. South Keene. West Keene. Saint Keene of the
Rotted Twawt! Which fucking one WAS it?!

Suddenly the CB belched out static.
Scrambling for the mike, Sloan heard a distant voice shouting
through the white noise.

“... see them! ...Pick’s down...
shit!”

Gunfire crackled. More static. Sloan
swore.

“... bastard’s got... dead! ... your
way!”

Sloan screamed into the mike, but a
dip in the road brought only more ear-piercing static. He switched
channels and told Hicks up ahead on point to move his ass. The
leading bike leaned into the corners and picked up speed. Sloan
growled at Tiny to do the same.

Seven minutes later Tiny grunted and
pointed up ahead. They’d just come through another stomach-heaving
curve and onto a relatively flat, open stretch. Mountains rose up
all around them like angry giants. Hicks dropped back beside them,
a sly grin on his sallow face.

Half a mile ahead a white
van was coming straight for them.

“Trouble ahead, Lover!”

Josh had already seen them. Two, no,
three trucks and a bike out front. All coming fast! Beside him
Flame clutched her handgun like a rosary. From behind he heard Eddy
swear, Princess growl and Trina working the bolt on Earl’s old
rifle.

Frantically, Josh looked for the
side-road he knew was just up ahead. He’d taken the bloody thing a
dozen times in the past, so where the Hell was it?!

The distance had shrunk to less than a
quarter of a mile when he spotted it. Leading off the #73, a
crumbling blacktop followed a winding river up into the mountains.
After eight or ten miles it ended at Heart Lake, headquarters for
the Adirondack Hiking Club. A two storied lodge was nestled along
its pine-covered banks. From the parking lot, footpaths lead into
the vast wilderness of the High Peaks Region.

Nearly rolling the Westfalia, Josh
dropped into second and floored it. The aging motor wined as the
camper raced up the narrow road. Suddenly the rear window shattered
and a rifle slug buried itself in the back of the driver’s seat.
Another thudded into the side door.

“Bastards!”, Eddy swore, casting the
shotgun aside and reaching for Josh’s Winchester. He fired three
shots out the back window before the van screeched around a curve.
The river raced by them a stone’s throw away. The wheels bounced
over cracked pavement.

Flame looked over at Josh, her green
eyes bright with a mixture of fear and excitement. “Know where
you’re going, Lover?”

Josh kept his eyes on the road. “Ya.
There’s an old fire-road up ahead. I’ll swing in there and hope
they go by.”

“Biker on our tail!”, Eddy
yelled.

Behind them, Hicks had pulled ahead of
the others and was now swiftly closing on the van.

“Can you take him?”, Flame
asked.

Trina looked at Eddy, then nodded. “We
can try!”

Both knelt on the back seat and raised
their rifles. Hicks, two hundred feet away and closing, chose that
moment to fire his own weapon. The 9 mm. machine-pistol let out a
continuous burst, spraying hot led all across the roadway. Several
slugs stitched their way up the rear of the van, one of which
passed through the blown window and out through the front. A web of
tiny cracks worked their way outwards from the hole.

Grinning, Hicks moved in for the kill.
He was about to raise his weapon again when Trina’s .306 slug hit
him in the chest. Punched back off his bike, Hicks rolled like a
rag doll for thirty feet before flopping over the bank. The Harley
continued on its own for another fifty feet or so before hitting a
pot-hole. The heavy machine jackknifed end over end into the
river.

Eddy let out a howl, then hugged
Trina. Princess barked out her approval.

“There’s the road!”, Josh shouted.
“Just past that bridge!”

Flame squinted through the shattered
windshield. “I can’t see shit!”

Five hundred feet in the rear, Sloan’s
Pathfinder came into view.

“Christ!”, Eddy cut in. “The others
are catching up! Two, three trucks just came around the
bend!”

The camper rocked on its aging springs
as it raced across the bridge. The slash in the forest that was the
narrow fire-road sped by. Josh dropped back down into third and
pressed the accelerator to the floor. Now that they had been seen
there was no choice but to keep on. The fire-road was a dead end.
Once in it they’d have been trapped.

“Throw out everything but the packs!”,
Josh yelled.

Trina and Eddy began tossing out boxes
of groceries, seat cushions, even the large cooler. The trucks
behind swerved around the litter and kept on. Bullets whizzed by.
Several thudded into the back of the van. Flame and Trina returned
the fire.

“Watch out!”, Eddy barked, hefting the
spare tire out the rear window. The spare hit, bounced twice, and
went spinning back down the road. Sloan’s Pathfinder swerved around
it, as did the truck behind it. The third truck, however, blocked
by the others, didn’t see the steel missile encased in hard rubber
coming until too late. The heavy wheel struck the third vehicle’s
windshield, shot over the roof and landed square on the biker
directly behind.

Both truck and bike never made the
next curve.

“End of the line coming up!”, Josh
yelled. “Hold on! I’m going right up the trail!”

The battered Westfalia
smashed through the flimsy toll gate and fish-tailed around the
empty booth. Tires screeching, Josh tore across the gravel parking
lot and headed directly for the narrow slit in the wall of green
that marked the beginning of the trail.

“Where the fuck did they go?”, Sloan
demanded, his hard eyes raking over the parking lot. A scattering
of trucks and cars littered the lot. An old Ford pick-up was half
way in a ditch. From the open driver’s side a ragged checkered
shirt lay draped over the wheel. The slight breeze flapped the
empty sleeve.

The remaining truck and biker pulled
up behind Sloan’s Pathfinder, their motors purring like hunting
cats. Sloan got out, an Uzie held tightly in his fist. Tiny killed
the engine, took the long deer-rifle down from the rack behind his
seat and stepped out. The four men from the truck and the biker
joined them. Each one clutched a weapon.

The silence of the virgin forest
seemed to hurt their ears. From high overhead a raven cawed. Hector
Billingsly, a local that had willingly thrown in with Sloan, came
up and stood by his leader’s side. A battered Remington .306
bolt-action cradled in his arm.

“They aint here, Boss. Tracks say they
took to the woods.” Hector pointed with his stubble-covered chin at
the freshly turned ruts leading down to the trailhead.

Sloan’s eyes narrowed. “They DROVE up
the fucking trail?”

Hector hawked up a wad of phlegm
before nodding. “Looks that way. Can’t get far, though. Trail drops
off pretty steep a little ways in. Twenty, maybe thirty foot down
to a stream.”

“Then we’ve got them!”,
Sloan hissed, starting off at a run towards the narrow opening in
the forest. Tiny and the others raced to catch up. Only Hector took
his time. He’d been guiding and hunting these woods all his life.
In that time he’d seen all kinds of city-slickers out for a little
adventure. Hikers, hunters, fishermen, each one a bigger asshole
than the last. This lot in the white camper, however, seemed
different. They’d already gotten by that bag-of-shit Guts and
stamped ‘paid’ to that little asswipe Pick. Now Hicks, another
biker and a truckload of Sloan’s best men. Something told Hector
that these were not your average shit-for-brains Lowlanders.
Smiling through his rotten teeth, Hector spit again and sauntered
after the departing figures.

Josh had known it was there. The
problem was that he didn’t remember it being so steep. He’d thought
the van could take it. In a way it had, only now it lay on its
side, the front end hanging over the little stream.

“Everyone okay?”, Eddy yelled, sliding
open the side door and climbing out on top. Flame, with Princess
scrambling over her, was already forcing open the passenger door.
Josh was helping Trina off her knees. She was cradling her left
arm, a look of pain on her drawn features.

“How is it?”, Josh asked.

“Feels broken.”

“Can you walk?”

“Do I have a choice?”

Josh helped her up to Eddy, then
glanced around. Inside was a shambles. The van had rolled several
times, spilling the contents of the cabinets all over. The smell of
gas was heavy. Josh grabbed his pack and Eddy’s and tossed them
out, picked up Trina’s rifle and climbed out. The others were
waiting, Trina sitting cradling her left arm.

“Any sign of them?”, Josh
asked.

“Not yet,” Flame answered. “But it
won’t be long!”

Josh led them up the steep bank to
some large boulders; Eddy was helping Trina while Flame brought up
the rear. At the top Josh turned to Eddy. “Take Trina up the trail.
There’s a large boulder about a quarter of a mile ahead. Wait for
us there.”

Eddy started to argue, but Josh
silenced him with a look. Eddy handed Josh the 30-30, took his
pack, shotgun and led Trina up the rocky path. Flame and Josh
watched them vanish into the pines, the sound of the gurgling
stream covering their going. Moments later another sound reached
their ears, this one, however, was far more threatening. Sloan and
his men were coming at a run.

“There, on the top of the ravine,”
Flame whispered. Crouching down beside Josh, they waited. The van
lay a little over a hundred feet away. The five men stood on the
edge of the drop.

“Do we take them now?”

Josh shook his head. “Wait till
they’re at the bottom. I’ll call out; tell them to turn around. If
they do, fine. If they don’t, take the ones on the right of the
van.”

Flame looked over at the man she was
coming to love, utter disbelief in her green eyes. “
You'll 'call
out
?!' Christ, Josh, do you think those assholes would ‘call
out’ if they were in our shoes?”

He shrugged. “No, but that’s what
makes us different from them.”

“Shit,” she said, shaking
her flaming hair. But a part of her was happy, warmed by his
humanity. He might be a fool, but what a fool! Still grinning, she
raised Trina’s rifle and sighted on the man on the
right.

Sloan watched as the three men made
their way down the steep bank. Below them, the white van lay on its
side. There was no sign of life around it, but that didn’t mean
shit. They might be all dead inside. Then again, they might not.
Sloan wasn’t taking any chances. He and Tiny would wait up here
while the other assholes took a look. Then he saw the rube, Hec
Billingsly, squatting behind Tiny. Sloan was about to yell at him
to get his ass down there when Hec turned those spooky grey eyes
his way.

“Wouldn’t send them down there if I
was you,” Hec drawled, spitting into the leaves.

Sloan grinned coldly. “Well, you’re
not me, hayseed. Not by a long shot!”

Hec turned away, a wry grin splitting
his weathered features. “You got that right, asshole,” Hec muttered
to himself. “I aint got shit for brains!’

Down below, Donny the Geek, a
buck-toothed, pimple-faced youth who sported a shaven head covered
by a red tam, was the first to reach the van. Tim Shingle and a
mean bugger named Nuts Wilson, hung back, scanning the forest.
Donny peered through the shattered windshield, climbed on top and
stuck his head inside.