Last Resort (26 page)

Conner smirks and tosses the axe to the floor. He steps back from the keys and waves for me to come forward. I scoop to pick them up, but we both know the keys are just a pretext for the final battle. Conner springs at me before I reach the keys. I am ready. Skirting to the side, I catch him solidly in the chest with my knee. I try to leap on him from behind, but Conner lands a solid right hook to my eye. I stagger backwards and crash against one of the square, wooden poles that support the roof. As I fall back, Conner grabs his axe, and raises it overhead, swinging with all his strength for my skull.

At the last second, I drop to the floor and his axe lodges in the wooden pole with such force that the timbers vibrate. I charge Conner from below, slamming into his waist, intending to push him back. It is impossible. He outweighs me by too much. I would have better luck pushing a tree. He grabs a fistful of my hair, jerks my head up, and slams his fist into my nose. I have the sensation of stumbling back, and in the next instant, my back hits the thick rope that cordons the deck from the beach below. I somersault over the rope and crash flat on my belly on the sand. Blood pours out of my nose. It must be broken. My face feels as though an elephant stepped on it.

Everything tilts. From my disoriented perspective, I see Conner tromp triumphantly down the steps towards me. I struggle to push up, but my elbows wobble and I sink to the sand. He raises the axe for the final blow.

“No!” Gwen leaps on his back, scratching and clawing. He yanks her off and slaps her hard enough to send her spinning. The sight of Conner striking Gwen sends scalding venom coursing through my veins. My vision clears. I rise to a crouch.

Conner turns to me and gets a handful of sand in his eyes. He cries in frustration, blinking furiously. I regain my feet. Blinded by the sand, Conner swings his axe wildly, missing me by several feet. I look for an opening, but from the corner of my eye, I detect sudden movement. It is Bob, clutching his crowbar, intending to tackle me. I drop to all fours and Bob crashes into me, his momentum sending him hurtling directly into the path of Conner’s axe. The axe hacks deep into the side of Bob’s neck, nearly severing his head. Several women scream at the sight. Not wasting a second, I grab Bob’s crowbar and smash Conner’s right knee, shattering the bone. He howls in pain and swings for my head. I grip the crowbar from both ends and block the axe. The impact on the crowbar sends a numbing jolt down my arms. I stumble back and we square off against each other.

Conner limps towards me and wipes sand from his eyes. His face is a pinched mask of pain, but he manages a wolfish grin. “You should’ve stayed dead.”

Blood trickles into my mouth from my busted nose. My breath is ragged and I circle him warily. As the rising sun illuminates the beach, Conner limps towards me, each step causing him to grit his teeth from the excruciating pain. I back closer to the crashing surf. The foaming seawater hits my feet. I cannot retreat any farther.

We attack simultaneously, neither weapon making contact, but that is not Conner’s plan. He wrestles me to the ground, and uses his size advantage to pin me on my back. I beat at his face, but the blows fail to connect with any impact. An ocean wave surges over my head, and he holds me down. I buck and writhe, desperate to breathe, hearing only the roar of the wave and feeling his thick wrists with his hands pressing down on my head.

The wave pulls back, giving me a precious moment to gasp for breath. His face is near to mine, lips pulled back in a canine snarl and he rasps, “…kill you…fucker.” Another wave rushes over me, cutting off my air. I thrash desperately, but Conner is too big to throw off. The knee! Hit the knee! I kick with more precision, and slam my knee into his broken one. Conner releases my head and I immediately roll away.

I crawl on my belly back towards the wooden deck. Conner seizes my legs, pulling me back to the water. My hands claw at the sand, and touch something hard. The axe. Summoning every ounce of my strength, I swing it and cleave Conner’s head from his ear to his jaw. In death, Conner spasms as if electrocuted. He flops over on his back. A large wave rolls in, scoops up his body like a parent to a dozing child, and carries him away.

Epilogue

A year has gone by—maybe more. It is hard to tell. I sit on the sand near the spot where I fought Conner to the death. We continually tried to reach someone on the ham radio we salvaged from the sinking sailboat, but we never did. Eventually, the battery died, and thus passed into history the last working piece of electronic equipment known to man. As for those who sailed to Barbados—that was the last we ever saw of them. The poisonous, radioactive storms that we feared did not come to Isla Fin de la Tierra. They are out there still, I am sure, just beyond the protective stream of clean air that funnels past our isle.

Our supplies are gone, save for the hard liquor, which we only drink on special occasions. Working with the islanders, we have food for us all. We grow tropical fruit, and hunt the wild goats that roam the hills. Each day, men from the resort and men from the island paddle together out to sea on handmade rafts. They catch fish or dive for conch and spiny lobsters. On the few times that it rains, we catch and conserve as much water as we can. It is a harsh existence, but manageable so long as we work together.

I rise to my feet and walk towards my bungalow. A flock of chickens scampers ahead of me. Pamela, Dellas and Rhodesia wave sticks at them in a comical attempt to shepherd the errant fowl.

“You missed one,” I grin and point to a chicken making a run for freedom.

Pamela, looking tan and bemused, laughs. “I liked them so much better when they came skinned, deboned, and wrapped in plastic.”

I laugh in agreement. Gwen waits for me at the backdoor of our bungalow, and in her arms, our son: Phillip Jr. He has my eyes and my hair, and as he watches my approach, he smiles.

I hold my arms out to take him.

“You want to go to Daddy?” Gwen asks him excitedly, to which he squeals with delight. She gives me a quick kiss and gently places him in my arms. “Don’t shake him, Phillip. I just breast fed him and I don’t want him to spit up.”

I look him square in the eye. “You don’t want me to shake you?” I playfully bark, giving him a teasing jiggle. “Huh, no shaking de baby! Okay, no problem. Come with me,” I tell him, not that he has any choice. “There’s something I want to show you.”

I hold him under a palm tree and point at the sea. “Look at that. Do you see all of them? Aren’t they pretty?”

In front of us, cascading like a shower of white confetti, a stream of butterflies flutter by.