Pursuit of the Apocalypse (22 page)

“No it’s not.”

“You can’t tell me you don’t hear it going clickity.”

“You’re the one going all clickity.”

“Very funny. Turn it off. It’s going to confuse someone.”

“Who in the bloody hell is it going to confuse, Marilynn?”

“Just turn it off, you grumpy old man.”

Henry smiled and reached for the turn signal. He glanced into the side mirror out of habit. “Now what’s this monkey shit?” He turned the indicator off as the other passengers turned to see what had caught his attention.

Two men on motorcycles were approaching from behind. There weren’t enough of them to be considered a gang, but there were enough to make Lynn tap Erica on the knee. “Maybe you should get down, sweetie.”

Erica unbuckled and dropped down between the captain’s chairs.

Lynn tossed a blanket over her and told her to stay still.

Lynn straightened up in her seat and took a deep breath. “Get your glare ready, Henry.”

The two riders caught up to the minivan quickly. They split and each rode along one side of the van, peering in as they passed. When the riders reached the driver’s side window, Henry furled one half of his brow and raised the other. He stiffened his lower lip and put a look on his face that said he had something to say and it was going to take a while to say it.

The man on the bike saw this look and twisted more gas into the bike’s engine. The two bikes pulled away and sped off down the road.

“They’re gone,” he said as his face returned to normal.

Erica emerged from the blanket. “That’s some glare you’ve got, Henry.”

Lynn smiled, “I told you my man was a mean son of a bitch.”

“You never did like my mother,” Henry said and signaled to move back into the slow lane.

TWENTY-EIGHT

Halfway down the tunnel, Jerry met two guards rushing to investigate the gunfire. Dressed in Freedom Enforcement red, it was clear from their panic that they weren’t expecting anyone to come from that end of the tunnel.

They yelled at him to halt, and Jerry didn’t. He caught the first off guard with the haft of the axe and drove him back into the tunnel.

The second man yelled and went for a gun at his waist.

Jerry slid to the right and jabbed him in the face with the axe head. The guard’s nose broke and made a bloody mess of his uniform.

The first guard recovered and lunged for the Librarian.

Jerry swung the axe around and cracked the guard’s jaw with the blunt end of the head. This sent the man to the ground.

The second guard backed away and grabbed for his face while he continued to raise the gun.

Jerry placed a kick to his chest that sent the guard back against the concrete wall with enough force to shake the gun free. He poked him again with the blunt end of the axe and the guard dropped to the ground. All motion stopped.

The Librarian picked up the gun, turned, and ran to the end of the tunnel. It terminated in a hallway filled with cages.

He could hear a commotion coming, working its way down the tunnel from the arena. He didn’t have much time before any number of lunatics were on him. Jerry looked at the cages once more, tucked the gun into his waist, and took the axe in both hands.

He worked his way down the cages, bashing the latches from the cell doors and pulling the doors open. He set several of the caged animals free before running deeper into the complex.

He rounded a corner before the screaming began. His would-be captors were startled to find the bears roaming the hallways. And it wasn’t wise to startle bears.

There were screams and snarls, gunshots and growls. But the gunshots ended long before the growls, and he figured he had bought himself more than a few minutes while his pursuers dealt with the new threat.

He risked a glance around the corner and was surprised to see the bear charging down the hall. The beast wasn’t as large as the one in the arena, but it was big enough to make Jerry run. He wasn’t convinced the creature was coming for him, but he wasn’t one that believed he had to be sure of everything.

Jerry turned a corner ahead of the bear and pulled open the first door he came across. He pulled the door shut behind him and pulled against the handle even though he knew for a fact that bears didn’t have enough thumbs to work a door.

He heard the creature rush past the door without so much as a sniff. It probably wanted its freedom as much as he did.

A groan alerted him to another presence in the room. He let go of the door and spun around to see another prisoner of Tolerance.

The biker was slumped forward in a chair with his hands tied behind his back. The groan was the first indication he was coming to. The second was the string of threats he muttered as he tried to raise his head. He mumbled through swollen lips making most of the words hard to make out. It sounded like he was trying to say talons, but that couldn’t be right.

Jerry crossed the room and stood before the prisoner. He put a hand on his shoulder and shook him until he looked up.

The man raised his head and smiled through broken teeth. He stared at Jerry for a moment and laughed. “You’re him.”

“I am?” Jerry asked.

“You’re the guy.”

“Which guy is that?”

“The guy that everyone is after.”

“And who are you?”

“The name’s Hawk. I’m one of the guys that’s after you.”

Jerry spotted a leather jacket dropped across a table next to a stuffed bird and put it together. “And how’s that working out for you?”

“Ah, don’t be like that, man. It wasn’t anything personal. I don’t even know who you are.” His mouth was going dry as he spoke.

Jerry found a bottle of water on the table and helped him drink. “That was probably your first mistake.”

Hawk drank until the bottle was empty and nodded his thanks. “Nah, my first mistake was trusting these two morons I met.”

“I think I’ve met those two morons as well.”

“No, these guys are a special kind of stupid.”

“Yep. That’s them.” Jerry tossed the water bottle back on the table.

Hawk laughed again. “So, who the hell are you, anyway?”

Jerry shrugged. “I’m the Librarian.”

Hawk’s jaw dropped. And some blood streamed out. “No shit? You’re him?”

“Yeah.”

“You’re really him?”

“Really yeah.”

“Holy crap, man. Everybody is looking for you!”

“We’ve covered that.”

“No, I mean everybody. What is this all about, anyway?”

“You know those big rigs Alasis uses to raid settlements?” Hawk nodded as Jerry crossed back to the door. He cracked it open and peered into the hallway. There was less screaming and roaring, but a moving shadow caused him to close the door. “I destroyed one.”

“Oh, that is sweet! I hate those things. Nothing runs on my roads unless I let it. Except those. Even the Iron Eagles don’t mess with those. And you took one out. That’s nice work, man.”

“Yeah. Nice work. Ever since, they’ve been after me and the woman I love. So we tried to hide, then she was kidnapped and now she’s escaped, but I don’t know where, and I’ve got Alasis, the lunatics of Tolerance, a motorcycle gang, two idiots, and a bunch of bears after me.”

“Sure you kicked over a hornet’s nest. But you knew that would happen, right? You can’t fuck with Alasis and expect anything different, can you?”

“I guess not.”

“So why’d you do it?” Hawk asked. The question wasn’t sarcastic like it probably should have been.

“They were hurting people. They had to be stopped.”

Hawk smiled. “Just like that?”

Jerry nodded and cracked the door again. The hallway was empty. “Just like that.”

Hawk was silent for a moment. Jerry expected him to laugh or gloat. But the man simply said, “I really admire that. Like you were fighting for justice. Real justice.”

“Yeah, it wasn’t my best idea.”

“Don’t be like that. What you did was important. Just because some powerful people want you dead, doesn’t make them right. You seem like a genuinely good dude, Librarian. I hope you find your girl.”

Jerry sighed. He closed the door and stepped behind Hawk’s chair.

“What are you doing?” Hawk asked.

Jerry untied the rope that bound Hawk’s hands and walked over to the table.

Hawk pulled his hands free and rubbed some feeling back into his wrists. The look on his face was more than surprise. He was looking for an answer. “But, I was trying to kill you, man.”

“Yeah,” Jerry held up the axe and set it down on the table next to Hawk’s jacket. “But it wasn’t anything personal.” Jerry checked the door once more and stepped out into the hallway.

TWENTY-NINE

“You got to do it last time.”

“Right, which means I’ve had more practice.”

“Practice at screwing shit up, you mean. You didn’t need any practice at that.”

“I’m not going to screw it up, Willie. Stop yelling at me.”

“Coy, this is our last stick of dynamite. If we blow this then, well, we can’t blow anything else up. And then the girl gets away. And the guy gets away, and our money gets away.”

“Shut up, Willie. This isn’t like last time. You saw how slow that old guy was driving. There’s no way I can mess it up.”

“Give me the detonator, Coy.”

“No. I’m going to do it.”

“Give me the detonator, Coy!” Willie lunged for the detonator in Coy’s hand and a brief game of keep away ensued.

At first, Coy tried to hold Willie back with one arm while keeping the detonator outstretched in the other. Willie tried to reach across this barrier without looking stupid which was rather difficult to do with his arms flailing the way they were. Before long he gave up and tried to work his way around to Coy’s other side. This also proved difficult since Coy’s other side was always moving.

This went on for a minute or two with Willie trying to run around Coy and Coy turning away from Willie, and it didn’t end until Coy twirled himself up in the detonator cord, fell over, and landed on the plunger.

This, in turn, set off their last stick of dynamite that was planted on a tree trunk at the base of the hill. The trunk disintegrated and the massive pine tree toppled across the highway just as the minivan came into view.

“You moron!” Willie shouted. “You did it too soon!”

Coy rolled onto his back and began untangling the detonator wire from around his ankles. “I’m sorry, Willie. I didn’t mean to blow it up.”

“Didn’t mean to? That doesn’t make it okay! ‘Didn’t mean to’ doesn’t undo what you did. It doesn’t unblow up things. You screwed the trap. Again! Now they’ll just turn around and they’re going to get away. Again!”

Coy threw the wire away from his feet and stood up. “Shut up, Willie. I feel bad enough as it is.”

“Well, you’re about to feel a lot worse,” Willie raised his fists.

Coy laughed for only a second. “Are you serious?”

“Oh, I’m serious.”

Coy put his own fists up. “Fine. If that’s the way you want it, let’s do it.”

“Oh, it’s on, moron.”

“Good. I’m sick of you always calling me stupid. Saying I’m dumb. I’m tired of you making fun of me.”

The two men approached one another with their defenses up and began to circle. Then they each took a deep breath and started swinging.

Willie threw a right cross.

Coy jabbed with his left.

Willie threw two quick jabs with his left and followed through with a right.

Coy ducked low and came up with a right uppercut.

Every single punch missed. Nothing was blocked, nothing was dodged, there was absolutely no parrying, and no one was hurt in the least.

Willie took another swing and said, “I’m going to hit you so hard it’ll make your head spin. And then your head will be on backwards and you can watch me kick your ass.”

“Oh yeah,” Coy said. “I’m going to put my foot so far up your ass that it’ll give your face athlete’s foot. And that will be an improvement.” Coy kicked and missed.

“I’m going to punch you into tomorrow so when I wake up in the morning I can kick your ass back to today and you’ll be caught in a never-ending loop of an ass kickin’ time machine.” Willie swung and missed.

“I’m going to kick your ass so hard you’re goin’ to walk funny, and when people asked what happened, you’re going to have to tell them that you got a Coy-lonoscopy.” Coy swung with his right and connected with Willie’s face. “Oh, shit, Willie, I’m sorry.”

Willie backed away holding his jaw. “Dammit, Coy.”

“I’m sorry, Willie.”

“That does it!” Willie ran at Coy and dove for his midsection. He tackled him to the ground and the two men rolled over the crest of the hill. They tumbled faster the farther they went until they rolled apart.

Coy fell naturally into a horizontal rolling style that made him dizzy but slowed his descent compared to Willie’s diving somersault approach which got him to the ditch faster but with considerably more pain.

The world spun as Coy stood. This was inconvenient, but he kind of enjoyed the lightheadedness. He ran a crooked line to his friend’s side and bent to help him up. “Willie, are you okay?”

Willie groaned and slapped Coy’s hand away as he rolled over onto his back. He got to his feet and found his balance.

“Did you break anything?” Coy asked.

“Shut up, Coy. I can’t believe—” Willie pointed to the road. The van was still approaching. “Holy shit, they’re still coming. Get down.”

“What?”

“I said get down.” Willie grabbed Coy and pulled him back into the ditch with a little more force than was probably necessary.

# # #

“N
ow what the hell is this?” Henry said as he slowed the minivan to a stop in front of the fallen tree. The pine blocked the entire south-bound lane.

“Back up, Henry,” Lynn said. “I don’t like this.”

“You’re the boss,” Henry reached his arm behind her seat and turned to back up. “Now would you take a look at these idiots?”

Erica turned to see two men standing behind the minivan covered in dirt, bruises, and a little blood. They each held a weapon that was aimed through the van’s rear window.

The taller of the two men yelled, “We want the girl. We know you’ve got her.”

“Yeah,” the shorter one yelled. “Bring her out so we can give her to the Skinners.”