The Road Trip At The End Box Set

by J N Wood

‘Espanol?’ the soldier asked him.

  Benoit turned the car so we drove next to the cones, slowly rolling past the soldiers.

  ‘Non, Francais,’ Benoit replied.

  ‘Follow the cones,’ the soldier ordered. ‘Stop on other side of the road.’

  ‘Okay,’ Benoit asked, and put his window back up. ‘Does anybody know what is happening?’

  ‘No idea,’ I replied. ‘Talks to us in Spanish, finds out you’re French, and then talks to us in English. Does that make sense to anybody else?’

  ‘That’s not what I meant Chris.’

  ‘I know.’

  The two soldiers followed us closely as we crossed over to the other side, driving through the gap. There wasn’t anything different on this side of the road. One of the solders jogged past us and stopped. He thrust out his hand, indicating we should stop.

  ‘That was fucking pointless,’ I said. ‘Why didn’t they stop us on the other side?’

  ‘Everyone out,’ the soldier still holding his hand up shouted.

  Roy was out first, saying, ‘Come on. Let’s get this over and done with.’

  Before they opened their doors, Benoit and Aurelie gripped each other’s hands, leaned over the gap separating them and quickly kissed. Then they climbed out, leaving me behind. Benoit left the AR-15 wedged in the foot well. I picked up my baseball bat and opened my door, pausing when I was halfway out.

  They’ve got guns. What’s the point?

  I laid The Smasher down across the back seats.

  ‘Hands above your head and stand in a line here,’ one of the soldiers said, pointing to the road in front of us. Neither of them looked like soldiers, both had straggly beards and their uniforms were a mix of different coloured camouflage.

  We might be fucked here. I think Roy might have been aware of this before me.

  One of them, a big fella, walked up and down our newly formed line, taking his time to scrutinise our faces. The other walked over to the Nissan and started opening doors. A cry of, ‘Baseball,’ made me spin around. The other soldier was stood by my door, holding my bat aloft.

  Something solid hit me just below my ribs. All the oxygen within me was forced out in an instant. I bent over, trying to breathe. All I could do was make a crackled raspy noise.

  ‘Don’t move,’ the soldier in front of us shouted. ‘Look at me.’

  He better not be talking to me. I can’t stand up.

  I tried to suck in some air but it wasn’t working. I knew not to panic, that my lungs would start working again, but it was hard not to worry. My vision was starting to blur slightly. Then my body kicked back into action, just like that. I managed to get a little bit of air inside me, then a little bit more. I slowly stood up straight, only just noticing the intense pain in my stomach. The big bearded twat was right in front of me, smiling.

  ‘Empty your pockets,’ he ordered.

  I could hear our bags being thrown onto the road behind us.

  I took out Jack’s phone, all I had in them.

  He swiped it out of my hand. ‘What is passcode?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I wheezed.

  There was a flash of movement as his fist flicked out and caught me right on the nose. I heard a crack and felt warmth on my upper lip, the blood running through my moustache and beard.

  Stood next to me on my left, Roy quickly said, ‘It’s one, two, three, four. The code is one, two, three, four.’

  ‘Gracias mi amigo,’ the soldier beamed.

  A sharp pain was pulsating through my head, my other pain forgotten about. It was incredibly distracting.

  ‘Everyone else,’ the soldier said. ‘Empty pockets.’

  Aurelie pulled out the pockets of her jeans, showing they were empty. I’m guessing Benoit’s were the same, because the soldier looked disappointed.

  Roy opened his wallet and pulled out a photo. The soldier quick stepped over to him, taking the wallet and gripping Roy’s other hand before he could slip the photo into his pocket. Roy resisted. The two of them started a stare off, the soldier’s smile slowly morphed into a grimace. With a grunt he let go, realising he wouldn’t be able to force Roy’s hand back up. He stepped back and lifted his rifle up, resting the barrel against Roy’s forehead.

  ‘Give me it,’ he growled.

  ‘No,’ Roy insisted. ‘It’s just a photo of my wife. You don’t need it.’

  ‘I will kill you if you do not give it to me.’

  Roy leaned into the barrel, his heels actually leaving the tarmac.

  The soldier’s trigger finger twitched, before slipping into the space in front of the rifle’s trigger.

  ‘I have a very nice watch,’ I blurted out, my broken nose making it difficult to speak. ‘Very nice watch,’ I repeated. I lifted my sleeve, showing him the fitness watch I’d kept all this time. ‘Cost four hundred and fifty pounds.’

  The soldier forced his eyes away from Roy and looked over at my wrist. His rifle left Roy’s forehead and slowly lowered, the soldier not taking his eyes from my watch.

  The other soldier reappeared then, walking around Benoit at the other end of our little line. He stopped in front of Benny Boy.

  ‘We only want Spanish here,’ he said, whipping his rifle up to his shoulder. He stepped forward and shot my very good friend Benoit. He shot him point blank in the face.

  Chapter 21: Not Enough Time

  After the shockingly loud explosion of noise, there was a period of surreal silence. Benoit fell backwards, as straight as a board. I didn’t hear a thing when he hit the road. There was a black hole next to his nose. No blood though.

  For a brief moment, I thought I might be deaf.

  An ear splitting scream made me look up from Benoit’s face. Aurelie’s mouth was wide open, her face covered in blood. It was splattered with it, some of it starting to roll down her cheeks. She stared forwards, frozen to the spot, just screaming.

  The soldier took one step to his right, so he was directly in front of Aurelie.

  ‘No!’ I shouted, and stepped forwards, my hands outstretched to grab his gun.

  I saw it at the last second, something swinging around from my left, where that big bearded twat had been. It hit me full in the face, turning my legs to jelly and knocking me onto my back. Dazed and confused, I lay on the road and lifted my hand to my face.

  Roy shouted something. It was instantly followed by a grunt of pain and scuffling noises. I tried to sit up. Roy was on top of the bearded twat. The other soldier was laughing as he put the barrel of his rifle to Aurelie’s forehead.

  She didn’t move.

  He pulled the trigger.

  Her light brown hair puffed out behind her head, almost in slow motion, and the screaming was cut off. It was like turning a television off. Her legs collapsed beneath her and she slumped to the ground, her head resting on Benoit’s legs.

  ‘Aurelie?’ I muttered.

  What the fuck is happening?

  I tried to stand up, but only got to my knees. Roy was still struggling with the bearded twat, both of them trying to take control of the gun between them.

  The murderer of my dear friends took two steps to stand in front of me, his rifle aimed at the spot between my eyes. He pulled the trigger.

  I didn’t have time to even close my eyes.

  Nothing happened. No noise. No pain. Nothing.

  The soldier was no longer laughing. He just looked annoyed. He pulled something back on the top of the rifle, reminding me of Benoit readying the AR-15 for me on board the Penelope.

  I seized upon the opportunity, pulling my left knee out from under me and planting my foot firmly on the ground. I used that leg to launch myself at his middle, my right shoulder connecting with his groin. We both fell down to the tarmac, the groaning soldier on his back under me.

  I hope I crushed the mother fucker’s bollocks.

  I quickly made my way up so I was straddling his waist. His hands were still positioned protectively over his groin. His face crumpled up with pa
in. My first three punches very satisfyingly connected with his ugly, creased face, the second punch drawing blood from his nose. He got an arm up and deflected my right fist, slamming it painfully into the road.

  I continued punching with my left, until he grabbed my wrist. He was bigger and stronger than me, his grip unrelenting. I slammed my right elbow into his chin. He hit me in the face several times with his left fist, the last punch nearly knocking me unconscious. I briefly lost control of my body, my head falling and smashing into his face. My forehead connected with the bridge of his nose.

  I placed my injured right hand on the tarmac and lifted myself off him.

  He looked more dazed than I felt.

  With my hands out of action, I went with the next best thing. I flexed my neck back and brought my head down into his face again and again, and again. The grip on my wrist slackened, until he eventually let go. I didn’t stop, continuing to smash my head into his face.

  I brought my head up, the soldier’s blood mixing with my own and obscuring my vision. I was about to slam it back down again, but stopped when I saw his face, or what was left of it. There was nothing that anybody would recognise as part of a human face.

  My head was spinning. I stood up, wiping my sleeve across my eyes. The whole world had a red tint to it. I searched for Roy, finding him still rolling around on the ground with the bearded twat. After picking up a rifle, lying on the ground near the faceless guy, I staggered over to help Roy, my only friend in the world right now.

  They both seemed oblivious to anything else going on around them, both intent on claiming the bearded twat’s gun. Roy was underneath by the time I got to them. I spun the gun in my hands around, and thrust the butt into the back of the twat’s head. He continued to struggle, not even turning around to see who was hitting him.

  I gripped the gun by the barrel and swung it over my head. As it was arching through the air, I noticed Roy flinching and turning his head away.

  Shit. I’m pretty disorientated at the moment. Is my aim off?

  Too late.

  The gun slammed into the base of the bearded twat’s skull. His entire body relaxed instantly, collapsing onto Roy.

  Roy heaved and rolled the solider off him, hanging onto his gun. The bearded twat was on his back, moaning and whining. Spit was bubbling out of his mouth.

  Roy stood over him, staring down at his quivering body.

  ‘Let’s get out of here Roy. We don’t know if there’s more of them somewhere.’

  ‘One minute,’ Roy said, stepping forward and aiming his new gun at the unconscious soldier’s face. He pulled the trigger but it just clicked empty. ‘Fuck. They didn’t have any fucking bullets left.’

  He caught me by surprise by stamping his heel down onto the man’s face. He stamped down hard again, over and over until there were no more moans, or ever would be again.

  That was probably one of the most violent things I’ve ever seen, and I just caved in a man’s face with my own head.

  Roy stepped backwards and threw the gun down, still staring at the twat’s now crushed face. ‘Okay. We can go now.’ He turned and walked past me. ‘You’ve got blood on your face Chris.’

  ‘Yeah I know,’ I muttered, watching him walk over to Benoit and Aurelie. He knelt down beside them and laid his hand on Aurelie’s shoulder, then crawled over to Benoit and gently touched his chest. He stood and walked towards the car.

  ‘You can drive Roy. I’m not feeling very well.’

  ‘Okay Chris. Keep the gun you have. Might come in handy.’

  I looked down at my hand, still holding the rifle. I’d forgotten I held onto it.

  I paused for a moment as I passed my friend’s bodies.

  That’s not them anymore. They’ve gone. No point in stopping.

  I walked to the back of the Nissan and threw our stuff back into the boot, Benoit’s and Aurelie’s bags as well. I checked my bat was still on the back seats and opened the passenger door, gently easing my painful head inside. For every second that passed my headache seemed to be getting worse.

  ‘Lean forwards,’ Roy said. ‘Let any excess blood drain out of your nose. You should have given him the code.’

  I leaned forward, blood dripping onto the floor of the car. ‘Yeah I know. He hit me with his gun for no reason though. I was pissed off.’

  The fucking phone.

  ‘I’ll be back in one second Roy.’ I left the car and retrieved Jack’s phone from the twat’s pocket. My red tinted eyes didn’t help, but there was so much blood.

  I must have looked in a right state as I walked back to the car, zigzagging my way across the tarmac.

  Once back inside, we both just sat there, staring at the horrific scene in front of us.

  I can’t get over the amount of blood outside, and in this car, but most of it around the two soldiers. I can’t believe we just did that.

  Tears were streaming down Roy’s face. He didn’t make a sound.

  After a minute or so I had to speak up, worried more people would come. Even if they weren’t with the soldiers, they’d still think we were fucking monsters.

  ‘We need to leave,’ I reminded him.

  He just nodded, turned the key in the ignition and reversed the car back to the other side of the road. We continued on our way.

  ‘Do you know the way?’ I asked.

  ‘We’ll figure it out,’ Roy said resolutely.

  Only five minutes ago it’d been the four of us. Fuck. Just this morning there’d been six of us. Now none of their families would ever know what happened to them. They will never find out they travelled all the way from America to get back to them. Their bodies will just stay on that road and in that cobbled street forever, or until the returning animals eat them.

  We should have made time to bury Benoit and Aurelie.

  No, we needed to leave. They would have understood.

  Tears began to fill my eyes then. I didn’t wipe them away, hoping they’d wash that soldier’s blood out.

  Chapter 22: Graveyard

  ‘We need petrol,’ Roy told me a few hours later.

  Neither of us had said a word for all that time, so he surprised me.

  ‘Okay. Stop next time you see a petrol station.’

  My headache was only just starting to recede.

  ‘What’s that noise?’ Roy asked.

  There was a flapping noise coming from Roy’s side of the car. Just a few seconds later it was much more noticeable, and getting louder and louder.

  ‘Fuck,’ I exclaimed. ‘Sounds like a flat tyre.’

  The same noise was now coming from my side.

  ‘Two fucking flat tyres,’ I said. ‘What have we driven over?’

  The noise was behind us now as well.

  ‘Fucking hell,’ Roy said. ‘There’s no chance that’s an accident.’

  Roy stopped the car in the middle of the road, not bothering to pull over.

  All four tyres were full of little nails and tacks. The front two were completely flat, the back two still deflating.

  ‘Somebody must have put these in the road,’ Roy stated, holding up the nail he’d forcibly removed. ‘Did those two fucking arseholes do this?’

  ‘Why would they? They didn’t need to. And it’s been too long since we left them. There may have been some kind of spillage on the road.’

  ‘Of nails?’ Roy asked. ‘You need to clean your face. It’s still covered in blood.’

  ‘Yeah I will when we find a river or something.’

  ‘What’s that?’ Roy asked, looking down the road behind us.

  I looked back down the empty dual carriageway. ‘What’s what?’

  ‘That noise,’ he said. ‘Like a low humming noise.’

  ‘I can’t hear anything.’ But then I did hear it, getting louder and louder.

  ‘Sounds like motorbikes,’ Roy said. ‘Let’s get our stuff and get off the road.’

  Roy ducked back into the front, coming back out with the bearded twat’s rifle and
Benoit’s AR-15.

  ‘They’re both empty,’ I told him.

  ‘We might find rounds for them.’

  I picked up my bat and walked around to the boot. Roy handed me mine and Benoit’s bags.

  ‘We don’t need their bags,’ I told him.

  ‘I don’t want anyone else to have them. We can leave them somewhere nobody will find them.’

  After attaching my bat to the side of my backpack, I swung it around onto my back, holding Benoit’s bag in my left hand. Roy passed me the AR-15 by the strap, so I slung it over my shoulder.

  ‘Anything else you’d like me to carry?’ I asked him.

  ‘No.’ He spun around and started running down the bank next to the road.

  I was climbing over a fence, close behind Roy, when the low humming became the full throttled roar of four motorbikes. I knew it was four because I could see them in the distance, speeding towards us.

  ‘Move Chris!’ Roy shouted.

  I leapt off the top of the low fence and landed in the field, sprinting to catch Roy up. The field was full of rows and rows of trees. It looked like an olive grove, the trees seeming to go on forever on both sides. There was a low terracotta wall at the end of the row, with a building behind.

  We need to at least get on the other side of that wall.

  Sweat was running into my eyes, mingling with blood, explaining why I was struggling to see. I tried to wipe my eyes with my sleeve but the AR-15 slipped off my shoulder. I lifted my other arm but that meant obstructing my view with Benoit’s bag, very nearly making me run straight into one of the trees.

  This isn’t ideal.

  We were halfway down the row, so not far to go. I glanced behind me. The four bikes hadn’t made it to our car yet, but they were at least still heading that way and not coming for us.

  The distance between Roy and I was getting bigger. He was almost at the wall.

  He doesn’t have a banging headache and can probably still see properly.

  The motorbike’s engines sounded like they were idling, so they must have stopped at the car.

  Roy was over the wall. Only his head was visible, his eyes flicking between me and what was going on behind me.