Road to Babylon (Book 9): The Ranch

by Sisavath, Sam

  Keo preferred not to think about that possibility, mostly because it was unacceptable. He had to get home. He had to get back to Lara. Coming here, leaving here alone (Okay, not really alone, but close enough) had been a mistake.

  So how many more mistakes are you going to make this week? a voice from the back of his mind asked.

  Hopefully this is the last one.

  The voice laughed. Hopefully, huh?

  Yeah. Hopefully.

  He stared at Bunker, willing the rancher to meet his gaze. Bunker must have sensed him, because he glanced over. Keo held up a hand for him to stay there. Bunker nodded, understanding. From the look on his face, Keo didn’t think the other man was going anywhere anytime soon anyway. Bunker wasn’t on the bumper car platform bleeding out, but he wasn’t exactly his full annoying jackass self, either.

  Keo got up, turned around, and jogged down the hallway. There was no way out of Crystal Lil’s through the front door, but there had to be another way in and out. A back door. There couldn’t possibly just be one entryway/exit.

  There was rustling in the darkness in front of him as Keo approached. The irony that he was moving voluntarily toward signs, smells, and feels of a ghoul instead of going the other way wasn’t lost on him. Right now, he didn’t have any choice; and besides, if the creature had wanted him dead…

  Then I’d be dead right now.

  Bright blue eyes reappeared in the shadows, watching him back. Keo couldn’t see the face underneath the hooded form, but if he could, he imagined it was probably a little—if not a lot—surprised to see where he was headed.

  “Is there another way out of here?” Keo asked.

  “Yes,” it hissed.

  Keo slowed down until he was walking toward the ghoul. It continued to watch him, and he saw just enough of its face—the smooth, black skin seeming to gleam in the pitch blackness—to feel the slight shiver race up and down his spine.

  “Someone’s out there, a sniper,” Keo said. “You have any ideas who that might be?”

  “No,” it said.

  “Are you sure about that?”

  “Yes.”

  “You told me the other Blue Eyes doesn’t know you’re here. Are you sure about that, too?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you sure?”

  This time the creature didn’t answer quite as quickly. It seemed to almost think about it as its eyes moved slightly downcast.

  Keo stopped in front of it, fighting the urge to pull back, to recoil from the intense warm and cold that snaked out of the shadows and embraced him like physical tentacles. The air this close to the ghoul was thicker, the smell more intense. It took all of Keo’s willpower not to react, and he thought he succeeded.

  He thought he did, anyway.

  “I don’t know,” the creature finally said. “He could have sent them.”

  “Your Father,” Keo said.

  “Yes.”

  “If it did, then it knows you’re here.”

  “Yes,” the creature said.

  Its hiss, when it had responded with that single word, hadn’t been nearly as pronounced for some reason. Maybe it was because it, like Keo, had just realized the full consequences of that possibility being true.

  And more importantly, what it meant for their nascent partnership.

  In a word: Not good.

  Not fucking good at all.

  There were a lot of topics for them to talk about, all of them important, but Keo couldn’t afford to waste time right now. He had way more important things to take care of.

  “Stay put,” Keo said.

  The ghoul didn’t answer as Keo walked past it and deeper into the shadows.

  Soon, he was swallowed up by the darkness, but not for long. He took out the small portable ProTac flashlight and flicked it on. It was a tiny thing—five inches long and barely an inch round—but yielded a plentiful 500 lumens and ran on two small batteries that could be recharged back at the ranch using the solar power banks. Keo had resisted the urge to use it earlier because he didn’t think Jackson would have appreciated having a bright beam of light shining on her face.

  He used the beam to guide his way through the corridor now. There was a turn up ahead and Keo took it, running the light near the top, looking for the familiar—

  There. A red EXIT sign hanging off the ceiling with an arrow pointing down another corridor.

  Keo went back to jogging, the time ticking away inside his head. He had to finish this, and finish it fast. He didn’t like Lara being at the ranch alone, and he liked the idea of her being under siege by herself even less. He had to remind himself that she wouldn’t really be alone. Thuy would be there, along with her sister, Abby. Then there were the two sisters, Wilson and Gummy.

  Five women…

  For some reason, it’d never occurred to him that he was leaving Lara at the ranch with four other women. Three of them were kids, and the only other adult had a broken arm.

  Shit.

  Shit, shit.

  Shit, shit, shit.

  He went faster, reaching the rear exit door a few seconds later. The lever moved with some difficulty, the gears grinding a bit from disuse, but it moved nevertheless, and the door squeaked open—Keo stopped, took a breath, then slowly pushed the door wider so it didn’t make nearly as much noise. It still produced some, but not nearly as much as it would have if he’d just plowed into it.

  Streams of sunlight struck him in the eyes, some bouncing off corrugated metal on buildings around him. Direct slivers of light came through three rows of brightly painted horses circling a carousel about ten meters away. He put the flashlight back into his pocket, slid outside, and moved along the building’s rear.

  Keo kept the MP5 in front of him the entire time, ready to shoot anything that moved. Fortunately, nothing did. The horses remained frozen in front, then to the left of him. The same was true for four giant dragons of different colors, part of something called Dizzy Dragon. Most of the colors on the dragons, like those on the carousel’s rides, had peeled away over the years. Or maybe they’d always looked that shabby even back in their heyday. Who knows.

  He reached the side of Crystal Lil’s and pressed against the wooden boards, splinters pricking at his skin through his clothes. Keo ignored it and leaned out to get a better look at the rest of the carnival—and specifically the 100-foot tall steel tower in the center, not more than fifty meters away from his position.

  Fifty meters. Damn. That might as well be a whole universe to traverse when a sniper was up there, waiting to shoot you dead. And whoever was up there, they’d managed to sneak into the place, then up the steel construction without being seen.

  Sneaky bastard.

  Keo focused on the very top, where the shooter would have put himself for a prime shooting spot. At night, and functioning properly, there would have been lights all along the steel girdles leading up to the top. Keo could make out a row of nonfunctioning spotlights up there, but the seats that passengers were supposed to sit in as they were lifted up and then dropped back down at dizzying speeds were resting on the ground. He could see plenty of hand and footholds for someone who was in decent shape to climb up the tower.

  And there he was.

  Gotcha.

  Keo couldn’t see the man—or woman—all the way at the top of the Super Shot, but there was no mistaking a figure up there, crouched on a platform flanked by the four spotlights. The shooter, clad in all-black from head to toe, his face obscured by distance and the lights around him, had been lying down when Keo first glanced up there, so he hadn’t seen the sniper until the man or woman raised himself into a crouching position.

  Sunlight glinted off the big scope on top of the shooter’s rifle. Keo was too far away to tell what kind of weapon, but from the cracks he’d heard earlier, it was some kind of high-powered bolt action rifle, the kind that fired one bullet at a time. If it’d been capable of a higher rate of fire, then Bunker would probably be dead. Keo, too, now that he thought
about it.

  If not for the ghoul that saved my life.

  Jesus Christ. I can’t believe I just thought those words.

  He pushed all of it away and concentrated on the moment at hand. First things first, he needed to get out of here alive, save Bunker’s life, and get back to the ranch.

  Oh, that’s it?

  Easy peasy. Right, Bunker?

  Seventeen

  There was no way Keo was going to drop the sniper from over fifty meters away with just a submachine gun. The Heckler & Koch was a damn fine weapon, but it was designed mainly for close-quarter combat and didn’t have much of a barrel to speak of. Keo hadn’t bothered to put a scope on top of it because of that; it would have just been overkill for a weapon that wasn’t meant to be used at long range.

  Bunker’s weapon, on the other hand, was capable of long-distance shooting. But Bunker was trying not to bleed to death across the street from Crystal Lil’s right now.

  What to do, what to do?

  He took a mental picture of the sniper’s perch—100 feet of prime shooting real estate—before turning and running back to the rear exit of the funhouse. He jogged through the dark corridors, taking the turns, not even bothering to take out the flashlight.

  And besides, he could smell Jackson somewhere up ahead.

  The ghoul turned to look back at him, blue eyes glowing in the shadows, as he ran back toward it. He couldn’t quite see its hooded face, but from the parts that he could glimpse, he thought it looked surprised and maybe a little confused to see him back so soon.

  “Don’t go anywhere,” Keo said as he slid past the creature. He brushed against the filthy cloth it was wearing, generating an icy shiver that raced up and down his spine as a result. If he had to put a phrase to it, it would probably feel like someone stepping on his grave.

  Yeah, let’s not do that again. Ever.

  He hurried up the corridor, back toward the still-open door. Bunker must have seen movement out of the corner of his eye, because he glanced over and gave Keo a Now what? look with both eyebrows.

  Keo crouched in the middle of the hallway so Bunker could see easier. He mimed “shooting” with an invisible rifle, then pointed in the direction of the sniper. Bunker gave him a confused look. Keo pointed at himself, then back down the hallway, before holding up his right hand and “walked” his fore and middle fingers in the air.

  The rancher grinned, amused, but he also nodded. Hopefully he’d understood everything—

  Bunker mouthed the words “Your funeral, hombre,” and started checking his rifle before scooting around his limited cover to get into a better shooting position.

  I guess he understood everything.

  Keo got up and headed back into the shadows for the second time.

  “What are you doing?” the ghoul hissed as he approached it.

  “Trying to save our lives,” Keo said.

  “How?”

  “Don’t you worry your little hairless head over it. Just stay put. Unless, of course, you’d like to run out there and lend a hand.”

  The ghoul that used to be Jackson didn’t reply.

  “I guess not,” Keo said as he moved past it for a third time.

  Goose bumps as the creature’s undulating wave of heat and cold (How is that even possible?), not to mention its smell, overwhelmed him as he neared—then passed—its dark presence.

  He gladly sucked in a lungful of fresh Texas air as he exited the fun house again and hurried along the length of the building until he was at the same spot as before. He leaned out slowly, not willing to get his head shot off in case the sniper was up there waiting for him to show himself a second time.

  There, the shooter, lying down on the platform now.

  Keo could barely make him out, but there was only one black shape moving around up there. Now that he knew exactly where to look, it wasn’t hard to pick the figure up. The shiny sunlight blinking off the large scope mounted on top of the man’s bolt-action rifle didn’t hurt, either.

  All right, Bunker. Don’t miss!

  There were three ticket booths about five meters away from where he crouched, and Keo dashed toward them, even as he kept one eye up and toward the Super Shot—

  Even more sunlight glinting off the sniper’s scope as he swiveled it around in Keo’s direction.

  Fuck!

  He hadn’t expected the man to pick him up so fast. Keo had been hoping to make up at least half the distance between him and the 100-foot tower. That would have been just enough space for him to move around, to force the shooter to stand up to get a better shot at him. In turn, that would have given Bunker a better look at his target.

  Instead the guy saw him almost right away, even while Keo was still halfway to the booths—

  The first and ridiculously loud crack! made Keo jump slightly even while he was in midstride. He also ducked his head even though it was a useless move, because if the shot was true, he would have been dead long before he even heard the gunshot ring out.

  Instead there was an emphatic pek! as the round slammed into the hard ground somewhere behind him.

  Keo all but lunged the rest of the way, landing on his stomach and eating just enough sun-scorched earth to know that he didn’t ever want to pull that stunt ever again. He rolled over onto his back as—

  Crack! as a second shot slammed into one of the booths. The high-caliber bullet easily pierced through the structure like it was made of cardboard and sent a flurry of splinters into the air above Keo’s head before pekking! into the rough terrain five feet from where he lay.

  Keo scrambled to his feet and scooted forward, toward the middle booth, just in case the sniper decided to try hitting him again. The man likely couldn’t see him with the trio of rectangular boxes in front of him, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t pelt the immediate area with bullets in an attempt to get lucky.

  Except the sniper didn’t do that, which either meant he was too smart to shoot at something he couldn’t see or he was conserving ammo. Or both. Yeah, there was a very good possibility it was both. What were the chances the guy might run out of bullets soon?

  Keo moved toward the third and last booth and remained there to catch his breath. Now that the shooter knew he was back here, he probably wasn’t going to make it to his goal—halfway to the Super Shot—without being fired upon again.

  That was…not good.

  Nope. It wasn’t very good at all.

  He’d been hoping…

  Let’s give Captain Optimism a cape, folks! he imagined Danny’s voice chiding him.

  Oh, shut up, Danny.

  Keo rested and tried to figure out another approach.

  The answer didn’t come after a minute.

  …or two minutes…

  Bunker hadn’t fired yet, probably because he’d been caught off guard when the sniper began shooting at Keo. So that meant the rancher was still in position to fire, and all Keo had to do was give him his opportunity.

  Gee, that’s it?

  Fuck my life.

  “Keo!” Bunker’s voice, coming from across the street and slightly behind him. “You still alive over there? Did the bad man get you?”

  Keo grinned, before shouting back, “Not yet!”

  “Good to hear!” Then, “We still on for that date?”

  Date? Keo thought.

  Then: He’s talking about the plan. Right.

  “Hell yes!” Keo shouted.

  “You sure?” Bunker shouted back.

  “Why? You got another date already?”

  “Nah. Just wanted to make sure!”

  “Sure as sure!” Keo said just as he jumped up to his feet and ran out from behind the booth and toward something called a Starship 3000 about ten meters away.

  He’d made the move without thinking about it, knowing that he might change his mind if he did spend more than a few seconds considering just how dumb this was.

  Crack! as the sniper fired again.

  Keo didn’t stop, didn’t slow
down, and didn’t turn left or right to see where the bullet had struck. He just knew—and cared—that it wasn’t him. He kept going forward at full speed until he’d gotten behind the carnival ride, which looked like a giant round saucer in the shape of a UFO. There was probably supposed to be a rainbow of lights arching over the ride, but the bulbs had all shattered years ago.

  He stopped behind a flimsy-looking wooden ramp up to an entranceway ringed with Christmas lights and moved alongside the round object, waiting for the sniper to take another shot. Keo hadn’t heard Bunker fire yet, so the rancher didn’t have a good enough bead. It was very likely Bunker was waiting for his one and only chance to take out the shooter. Which was fine for Bunker, but not so much for Keo, who had to be the guinea pig.

  The ride at his side was big enough—its length easily doubled his 6’1” frame—but he didn’t feel the least bit safe given how high the shooter was perched. You could see a hell of a lot and pretty damn far from 100 feet in the air, which was why the man had chosen the spot in the first place, no doubt.

  So Keo stuck to the Starship 3000’s smooth curving outer wall, keeping his profile as low as possible. He wasn’t delusional enough to think that any part of the ride could stop a high-caliber bullet if the sniper knew exactly where he was. No. It was likely the round would punch right through the faux UFO and take his head off at the shoulders.

  Of course, the man didn’t know where he was, exactly.

  Keo hoped, anyway.

  Because if he was wrong…

  Yeah, better not be wrong, pal.

  Better not be wrong…

  Keo stopped when he reached the end of the ride. There was a series of concession stands in front of him. Two that he could see from his angle, though he distinctively remembered there being more when he’d walked Annabelle through the grounds earlier today. Two was good enough, though. All he’d have to do was make it behind one of them. That should be easy enough. The elongated booth was only about ten meters from where he stood.