Rage (25 page)

Starky commanded the lead for himself.

Except—and this made Raine grab his steering wheel even harder—that brutal attack by Starky had eaten up some of that lead.

He was just behind him.

Two parts of the Rabbit ahead.

And Raine knew exactly where he could get neck and neck with Starky.

He thought:
I could just take second. A respectable finish for a newbie.

But that wasn’t the deal he’d made. And if he knew anything about this world, you were only as good as the deals you made and the deals you kept.

•  •  •

Just meters behind, Raine got on Starky’s tale, as if tempting him.

He weaved past the first walls, closing the distance. Starky’s Cuprino was way more powerful. But it was bigger, too, less maneuverable.

Then they hit an open stretch midway in the maze, and they both ran side by side, with the last few metal walls ahead.

When one popped up right in front of Raine.

Guess it paid to be the star of the show.

Whoever the hell worked the panels was trying to make sure that anyone betting on Starky made out fine.

Raine cut left, losing some ground. Now he and Starky both headed to the next opening, into the last mazelike row of walls, Raine trailing.

In minutes it would be over.

Which is when Starky looked over. He probably could have gunned it, beat Raine to that opening. With no more mayhem, no more carnage.

He was that close to winning.

But Raine guessed that wasn’t Starky’s style.

So Starky slid right, trying to hook his buggy and chew it up the way he did the last driver he battled.

But Raine had seen that battle, so at nearly the same time Starky made his attack, he jigged his buggy to the right, barely missing getting nailed by Starky’s spikes.

No time to get cocky, though, because with some distance still left before the last walls, Starky would get another chance. Raine’s side panels, with their jagged razor teeth, looked pretty ineffective.

Unless …

As he imagined Starky getting ready for another attack, Raine raised the lever, seemingly removing his defenses. This prompted Starky to move fast—Raine’s buggy had become even easier pickings.

Raine glanced ahead.

Not much time.

Starky slid right, and as he did, Raine hit the lever again.

A miscalculation by the track’s champ.

Raine’s panels came down, digging into Starky’s vehicle even as his spikes made contact with Raine’s car.

The sheer weight of the panel, not terribly sharp, but cheap, heavy scrap metal, pushed Starky to the side.

An unexpected push.

And yet Starky’s spikes had also nudged Raine. They were both heading into the last metal walls at a bad angle.

It might be the lagging driver’s lucky day.

Starky, with the loss of control, slid to the side of the track, hitting the side of the stadium. Sparks flew up from the grinding as the side of his Cuprino slid along the stadium wall.

Raine—on the other hand—heading too fast at one wall, cut right.

Not quick enough. He smacked the side of the wall, his forward momentum turning into a sideways slide, wheels spinning, shooting up dirt and dust from the track.

He turned left as hard as possible, feeling like he had no control, no chance to avoid the last wall … the finish line just after it. He gave a quick look back, since this wasn’t really racing or battling anymore.

It was down to luck. And momentum …

He saw Starky’s car sparking, and then, though it had no wall in front of it, it turned over, spinning, a cloud of dust and metal, rolling only feet behind him.

Raine still had some traction, as ineffective as it was.

He felt the left front wheel fly off. The rim and axle fell to the ground. Three wheels, but the car kept moving.

Both vehicles slid toward the finish line, Starky’s bigger car rolling
behind
him.

Raine crossed the line first, and only then could he finally take his foot off the accelerator, an effort, since it felt as though it had been madly strapped there.

Starky rolled over the line after him—over and over—until the Cuprino came to rest inches behind him, right side up. The wheels were on the ground, but the engine was on fire and the car looked like a dented can.

A crew raced out and yanked Starky free of his smoking vehicle.

No one came to Raine. He stood up.

Was the crowd in shock? The place had gone quiet.

Then Jackie Weeks got the show back … on track.

“
We have a
winner
of the White Rabbit, ladies and gentlemen! Raaaaaaine!
”

And then, properly cued—some probably still thinking of money wagered and lost, others taking in the incredible finish—they cheered.

He had won.

And from the look of things, it didn’t seem that Starky would be driving anytime soon.

R
aine ached in so many different places from the last insane minutes of the race. His car was totaled, but so was Starky’s. And Starky would need a lot of downtime before the sweetheart of this rodeo was ready to ride again.

Yet, as Raine walked away from what was now a wreck, no one came up to congratulate him. If anything, people turned away from him as though he had a disease you did not want to catch.

There was one exception.

As he made his way back to the driver’s prep room, Sheriff Black was there, standing in the center of the room, leather jacket open, hat tilted forward so that Raine just got the dead-on glare of his eyes.

Clearly waiting for him.

Raine walked up to the sheriff.

“You waiting for me?”

The sheriff nodded. “Let’s take a walk.”

It wasn’t an invitation. Raine followed Black out of the room, down the corridor that led to the back.

Raine half expected to see Jackie Weeks there, basking in the success of what his mechanic Mick did, but Weeks was nowhere in sight.

Instead, when they got down the hallway, Black reached out and stopped Raine with an arm on his shoulder. Not a gesture that Raine particularly welcomed. Not here, not back in Brooklyn, not ever. There were things that you just didn’t let go.

He shrugged the hand off his shoulder.

“You think you did good in there, eh, stranger?”

“I won. Isn’t that what it’s all—”

Black shook his head and interrupted.

“It’s about the
show
, Raine. The good people of Wellspring having their favorites. You were to be
part
of that show. Not wreck it. Who the hell knew you could get that damn buggy … to win.”

“But I did win. What do you care?” He knew he was on dangerous ground. Jackie had all but hinted that Black really ran the show in Wellspring. But the way he felt now, if this guy kept pushing at him, there was a point not too far away where he would push back.

Raine took in the man standing there, confronting him. The sheriff was taller than he was, lean, and had two handguns worn western style.

This guy’s right out of Dodge City.

He took a step closer to Raine, in his face.

Raine took a breath.
Steady
, he told himself.
Nice and easy. He is the goddamned sheriff after all.

“You took out
Starky.
People lost money. Worse, they lost their star. And what’d they get in its stead? You.”

“I
won
the damn race.”

Another shake from Black. “There’s only one thing for you to do now. And I’m going to tell you what that one thing is.”

“Clayton said if I raced—”

Black smiled. “
If
you raced. Right. Let me ask you something: what you gonna race in now? ’Fraid you didn’t win enough to go buy a Cuprino. No fucking way.”

“I’ll do something else.”

Raine didn’t like the feeling that Black had an agenda here, that they were going somewhere in this conversation and he didn’t know where.

“You took something away from the people of Wellspring. Now, you’re gonna give back. The winner of the goddamned White Rabbit is going right onto Mutant Bash TV.”

Raine remembered the ads he saw, thinking more bread and circuses. The porcine face of the host, his head looking like a wad of human-shaped dough. The leering faces of mutants.

“I don’t watch TV.”

“A wiseass?”

Another phrase that survived. A good one, too.

“Well, wiseass, you won’t be
watching.
You will be
on
Mutant Bash. Tomorrow, it’s the big Friday Free-for-All.” His voice got low and conspiratorial, as if he was letting Raine in on a secret. “You see, people like their race night, and then they like heading home with containers of stim and getting drunk the next night watching Bash. They’ll
love
seeing you in there.”

“No thanks. I’ll pass.”

Black raised a finger and jabbed it at Raine.

It was one push too many, and Raine reached up. He twisted Black’s wrist, quickly turning, making Black spin around from the pain as he bent the arm up.

In a moment he could break the guy’s arm.

He saw Black go for his gun with his free hand, and Raine
reached down and grabbed that wrist. Now, right up to Black’s ear, he whispered.

“I wouldn’t do that”—he gave the trapped arm a slight pull up for emphasis—“if you know what I mean.”

“You’re fucked.”

“Could be. I’ve heard that before. Now if you can talk in a civil manner, I will let your arm go. Just keep those hands away from those six-shooters,
pardner.
Deal?”

Black hesitated, perhaps weighing if he had another shot to get Raine off him.

Then: “Deal.”

Raine let Black’s trapped arm slide free. “You’d be a dead man. If Clayton didn’t want something from you.”

“I’ve been a dead man before. There we are. So—we were talking about TV?”

“You—” Black adjusted his tone a bit.

Good. Lesson learned.
Though Raine guessed if Black didn’t need him to do the show, he might indeed be in big trouble.

“You will go on the show tomorrow night. The audience will love it. Win there, and you just might have enough for a new buggy.”

“Sounds like a dangerous show.”

“Oh, it is. You can consider what happened out there”—he gestured at the stadium—“as a warm-up. The Bash Arena is not a happy place.”

“Then why the hell would I do it? I’ll go back to Clayton and—”

“Clayton sent me.”

Raine stopped. He remembered seeing Clayton with the men from the Authority, their black uniforms standing out from the ragtag clothing worn by the people of Wellspring.

“He sent me. With this offer.”

“And if I pass?”

“The mayor gets a lot of pressure. Ark survivors are a highly valued commodity out here.” Black smiled. “Yeah, we know. We’re not fools. You’d be a nice prize to turn over. But the mayor’s a man of his word. He’ll keep quiet. For now.”

“
If
I do Mutant Bash.”
Man of his word? His word seemed to change daily.

Black nodded. “And I’ll be quiet as well. Though the day will come, stranger, when you and I will deal with each other.”

Raine heard a noise from down the hall. One of the other drivers limping his way down. He and Black stood there, quietly, as he passed. The man was not so quiet as he passed Raine.

“Fucker.”

He kept limping down the hallway.

“Another new friend,” Black said.

“I see.”

“You show up at the studio on the east side of the city, near the mutant pens. About seven tomorrow night, an hour before the show. You do that, and the Authority will just see you as some other lucky guy who wandered in from the Wasteland …”

“And about to die in the arena.”

“That,” he said, adjusting his hat, “will be up to you. I know one damn thing, Raine—I’ll sure as hell be watching.”

And with that the sheriff walked away.

Raine went to a table in the back of the bar and sat down. His aches now mixed with a numbing fatigue as his body screamed for rest. Despite that, the race and the move he pulled off to win—and then the threat from Black—had his mind in overdrive.

Sally had a full bar. A skinny guy with a domelike head and jittery moves helped her. When she got a break, she walked back to him, two drinks in hand.

“You won.”

“Isn’t that what I was supposed to do?”

“Not that anyone expected it.”

“Not even you?”

“Can I sit?”

“Your bar, right?”

Sally sat down, the place full enough that she had to lean close to speak to Raine.

“Heard Starky took a nasty spill.”

“About as nasty as they get when the person’s still able to walk away from it. Except he didn’t walk away.” Raine took a sip of the drink Sally had brought over. “He got carried.”

“Thanks.”

“Well, you know, the funny thing is that when I was in there, I kind of forgot what you said he did to your driver. But I could see how he operated. Taking drivers out right and left, even if he didn’t need to in order to win. And suddenly
I
wanted to take him out. I wanted to win.”

“So—more races?”

Raine shook his head. “The buggy’s a wreck. Besides, Clayton has other plans for me.”

“What does he want you to do?”

Raine nodded toward the tube television suspended over the bar. Had to be over a hundred years old and still working. Pretty amazing.

“Going on Mutant Bash TV.”

Without thinking, Sally’s hand covered his as she said, “No. You can’t.”

“Why’s that?”

“You ever see a Bash?”

He shook his head.

“You have to fight and kill mutants, or at least get past them. Each setup is different, like a puzzle, only you have mutants
coming out from all over. If I could, I wouldn’t even let it be shown in the bar. But they’d tear the joint apart. I don’t even look. You
can’t
do it, Raine.”

“I wasn’t given an option. It’s this or the Authority. Guess you figured out that they’re looking for me, hm? And since Wellspring is my only option for now, especially without wheels …”