Apocalypsis: Book 4 (Haven) (13 page)

Turning around, I carefully lowered myself over the front edge of the trailer.  It took every abdominal muscle I had to keep steady.

I quickly found that even with my arms extended, I was still too short for my feet to reach the moving platform beneath me.

Dammit!
  I turned to look over my shoulder.  All I could see were wires and a dark spot below my feet that I knew was moving, shifting with the movements of the trailer.

I had one shot to drop and land on that thing with both feet. 
Dad?  God?  Anyone up there listening?  Please help me not die!

I took one last look at my landing spot and let go of the top of the trailer.

Both feet landed on the moving connection between the cab and trailer, but it was greasy and one of my feet slipped off.

I screamed involuntarily as my hands scrabbled around, trying to find something to grab onto.

My eyes flashed on blue color and I reached out without thinking, grabbing the coiled hose that ran between the cab and the trailer.

For a moment I was steady again, the bulk of my weight pulling on the coupled cable first one way, then the next.  But then the truck swerved to the right as it hit another parked car and threw my entire body with it.  I held on to the hose for dear life.

No sooner had I righted myself, balancing on that moving black chassis, when a hissing sound started coming from the bottom of the hose.  I looked down in horror as the thing began coming loose from the truck, near my feet.

My body was slammed against the back of the cab as the truck went into an immediate, tire burning, brake squealing stop.

I wasn’t sure if it was the hose problem or the fact that I’d been discovered by the driver, but I had no time to lose.  I had to get into that cab before the driver shot me.  Surely he owned a gun and wasn’t afraid to use it.

I held onto the hose and stepped as far as I could towards the driver’s side of the cab.  The truck was almost stopped now.  I leaned out away from the back of the driver’s compartment a little and grabbed the handle affixed to the side of the cab, making sure to avoid the exhaust stack.

I let go of the hose and jumped off the chassis, flying around like a circus performer and landing on the step that sits below the driver’s side door.  My free hand gripped the windowsill, and I thanked my lucky stars that the window itself was still rolled down.

“What the hell?!” yelled the guy, his face a mask of shock.

“Surprise, asshole!” I shouted, jumping up and into the window, eye gouging him with the fingers of my left hand.

“Ahhh!  You
lunatic! 
You … ahhh!!”  He threw an arm across his watering eyes and kept the other on the wheel.

I knew I only had a couple seconds before he’d be able to see again.  Grabbing the door handle, I pushed in the button that would open it up and pulled it towards me, swinging off to the side to give it room.

By the time I’d swung back in, the asshole had recovered enough to fight back.  His fist came out and tagged me in the collar bone, just barely missing my jaw.

“Get the hell outta here!” he growled, swinging wildly, trying to punch me again.

“Not gonna happen,” I said calmly, ready to end this stupid game.  I had a steady grip on the outside handle, and the truck was finally stopped.  A hissing sound was still coming from the space behind the driver where I’d loosened that hose thing.

I came in fast, grabbing a clump of hair on the top of his head and hauling back on it as hard as I could.

He screamed in pain and frustration as the top half of his body came out of the truck.  It was just dumb luck that the jerk hadn’t put on his seatbelt.  He’d probably figured there was no point, since he was the only one on the road.  He figured wrong.

“Get off!”  He reached up blindly, trying to grab me.  He grasped my wrist just as he was falling the rest of the way off the seat.

There was no way I could hold him and me up with just one hand on the grab bar; my palms were too sweaty.  I was jerked from my spot on the side of the cab, and we both went down, falling several feet to the hard asphalt below.

***

I landed on top of the driver and wasted no time in putting him out of my misery.  I brought my elbow down to smash into his nose, rolling away as soon as the crunch from his broken bone signaled things were about to get really bloody.

“Bryn!” yelled Winky, her feet slapping on the pavement as she approached in a hurry.

I stumbled trying to get my legs under me, a little unsteady from my fall and overwhelmed by the adrenaline that was flowing through my system in massive quantities.

“Are you okay?!”  She reached my side and put her hands on my cheeks, lifting my head up so she could stare into my eyes.

“Are you?” I asked, pulling my face away so I could search her body quickly to assess her for injuries.  I was relieved to find that she looked okay.

“I had a hell of a ride for a few seconds there, but I didn’t fall.  Paci did, though.”

My heart spasmed.  I jerked my head over in the direction of our path of destruction and saw Rob and Bodo standing over Paci.  My proud Native American friend was sitting up and resting his upper arms on bent knees, his head bowed low.

“Is he okay?” I asked, my voice quavering a little.  It made me sick to think I’d done something to hurt him.  He might send my emotions into a tailspin every time I looked at him and he might complicate the hell out of my relationship with Bodo, but it didn’t mean I didn’t care about him deeply.

“I think so.  But we have bigger problems.”  She nodded her head at the guy on the ground.

He was trying to get up, blood pouring down his face and dripping onto his shirt.

Winky stepped away from me and pulled her gun out of her pants.  “Stop right there, dude, or I’ll put a bullet in your friggin’ head.”

He froze in place for a moment.  “What the …”  After a few seconds of dumb shock, he stood up slowly, stumbling a few steps back before he was able to right himself.  “What the hell is wrong with you two?  Jesus, are you off your rockers or what?  Why’d you pull me out of the truck?  You could have just asked me to stop, you know.”

I walked over to stand by Winky.  “I think the better question is to ask what the hell is wrong with you?”  I jerked my thumb back towards the trailer.  “You have kids in there, don’t you?  You’re hauling humans in a
truck
.”

His nostrils flared, and he gritted his teeth so hard his jaw muscles pulsed.  For a minute I thought he was going to refuse to respond.

“No comment,” he finally said.

Winky laughed bitterly.  “No comment?  What?  You think this is a fucking news interview, dude?  I’m telling you right now … you’re dead if there are slaves or cannibal meals in there.  Dead.  Like as a doornail kind of dead.  I’m not playing.”  She waved her gun at him a little.  Her tone said she was thoroughly disgusted with him, just like I was.

Looking at Winky, I was just a little afraid she was going to go berserker on him.  She seemed a little too excited about shooting him doornail style or whatever.

“It ain’t like that,” he said, wiping the blood from beneath his nose.  “I don’t eat kids.  That shit’s disgusting.”

“Whatever.  We’ll get the story from them,” I said.  I turned to Winky.  “You got this?”  I gestured to our bleeding truck driver.  I wanted Winky to stand guard while I let those kids out.

“Yeah.  I got this,” she said, her tone menacing.  “He makes one move, and he’s dead meat.  Vulture food.  Gator bait.”

“Back up a little, give yourself room to maneuver,” I said, tugging on her sleeve.

I faced him fully.  “You have any weapons on you?”

He shrugged.

“I’m coming over to disarm you.  You do anything stupid and my friend will shoot you.  You understand?”

He didn’t do anything.  He was being stupid and trying to face me down.

“Seriously, man.  She’s little, but she’s vicious.  Don’t think she won’t do it.”

I wasn’t lying.  Winky would probably shoot if she had to, but I was praying she wouldn’t have to.  Chances were I’d get clipped or worse.

He nodded finally.

I walked over cautiously, waiting for him to make a move.  But he just stood there and watched me come, wiping his nose off on his forearm a couple times.  It left bloody smears across his skin that made me sick to my stomach, reminding me too much of the blood I’d seen at the canner house and elsewhere.

“Who are you?” he asked when I got close.

“Nobody you need to worry about.”

“You’re that chick, ain’t ya?  The ball-biter.”

I groaned inwardly.  “Shut up.”

“You took that guy’s nuts off, didn’t you?  You’re the one everyone’s talking about.”  A small smile came to his lips.  He looked happy that I’d chomped on a testicle.  I didn’t know whether that was a good sign or a bad sign.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” 
That’s it.  Play stupid.  Do not think about that guy’s nasty, smelly crotch and his testicle blood filling your mouth
.  My stomach clenched.  My visual memory was way too sharp for my own good.

“There’s a bounty on your head, you know.”

My blood froze.  Now I was sick
and
terrified.  I didn’t want to clue this guy into the truth of his suspicions, but the idea of a bounty or contract on my head had me scared shitless. 
How am I going to live a peaceful life if a bunch of kids will always be out there trying to hunt me down?

“Turn around,” I said, my voice gruff.  I breathed in and out rapidly, trying to dispel the horrible feelings that were welling up inside my head and heart.  I had to stay calm and collected so I could be ready for any sudden moves.

He obeyed without complaint.

I stepped closer and felt around the waistband of his shorts.  He had a knife in a holder attached at his belt and another one in his combat boot.

He turned back to face me as I stepped away.

“I ain’t a bad guy, you know.”  He tried to smile but winced when the pain came from his nose.  He reached up and touched it gingerly, sniffing once and then groaning.

“We’ll see about that.”  I walked backwards until I was even with Winky, never taking my eyes off him.  “He’s clean now.  I’m going to check the truck.”

“Good.  I’ve got this.  You can tell me about the ball-biting later.”

My face went crimson, but I said nothing.  Maybe if I pretended it was no big deal, she’d forget all about it.  I walked backwards all the way to the trailer, only taking my eyes off my friend when I reached the end of it.

Rob and Bodo came walking up at the same time.

I looked back to see where Paci was, noticing immediately that he wasn’t with Rob and Bodo.  I could make out his bent-over form, still sitting on the ground, his head hanging down.  Bodo and Rob were sweating like crazy and both of them had beet-red faces.

“Is Paci okay?” I asked, searching their expressions for clues of his condition.

“He’ll be alright,” said Rob.  “Nothing broken, just bruised.  I think he got a little stunned when he hit the pavement.”

“Yeah.  I’ll have to apologize for that.”

“How the hell’d you get that beast to stop so hard like that?”

“I’m not sure.  I might have messed up the air brakes or whatever.”

“Are we going to be able to use the truck?”

I climbed up onto the back of the trailer.  “I have no idea.”

I lifted up the big latch that held the doors together.  Moving it first up and then one-hundred-and-eighty degrees to the right, I unlocked the mechanism keeping the trailer closed.

Jumping down, I looked at my friends.  “Here goes nothing.”  I pulled the right door open first, shoving it so it would swing open all the way.

The three of us stood in the opening and just stared.

***

There were about ten kids inside, all in various states of disarray, from their clothing to their hair to their expressions.

One of them came forward, a girl.  She was trembling but she held her chin high.

“Hi,” I said, trying to look as non-threatening as possible.

“Friend or foe?” she said simply.

“Friend.”  I smiled.  “We stopped the truck and want to help.”

“That’s what the driver said to us, too.”

I frowned, looking at Bodo and Rob.

“What do you mean?” asked Bodo.  “Why are you in da truck and why wass he driving it?”

She sighed, not so much with fatigue as hopelessness from the sound of it.  My heart went out to all of them, they looked so pitiful.  Their clothes were rags and a few of them were curled up on the floor of the filthy trailer.  I wasn’t even sure they were still alive.

“We were taken prisoner by a few guys, and they were going to trade us.”

“Trade you for what?” asked Rob.

“Food.  Fuel.  Whatever.  But then this other guy, the one who was just driving, jumped them when it was dark and told us he was going to help us get away.”

I was so confused now, I didn’t know what to say.  Thankfully, Rob wasn’t suffering the same problem.

“So you’re saying the driver is a good guy?  That we interfered in his little rescue plan?”

She shrugged.  “At this point, I have no idea who’s good and who’s bad.  All I know is, he’s still driving towards the market, and if we get there, we’ll all be dead soon.  So thank you.”  She moved towards the entrance.  “Thank you for stopping the truck.”  She reached the edge and looked out at the highway for a little while.  Then she turned back to the people behind her.  “You guys ready to get out of here?”

Another girl standing said, “But where are we going to go?”

A guy lying on the ground sat up, rubbing his face with weak motions.  “Where are we?  How far are we from the market?”

“What’s this market you guys keep talking about?” I asked.  I was picturing a big slave auction like they had in Roman times, but that couldn’t possibly be right.

“The market is where stuff is traded or exchanged.  At the old casino property in Hollywood, north of here, I hope.”  The girl leaned out and looked around.  The light glinted off her hair, causing some amber highlights to come out.  In another time, she would have been considered really pretty - like prom queen material.  “Where are we?  Do you know?” she asked Rob.