Body Count

by mike Evans

  Gabriel casually rose from the seat saying, “I’m going to have a conversation with Patrick. I’ll be back, don’t go anywhere, ok?”

  Shaun thought that he had already been suitably terrified, but seeing a glimmer of joy on Gabriel’s face made it even worse. Shaun barely choked out a few words, “What is wrong with you?”

  Gabriel spun around and looked at the man, seeing the blood trickling off of the table and dripping to the plush tan carpet below and retorted, “I’d say a lot.”

  Gabriel pulled on the handle to the cockpit door, but it did not budge. Gabriel tapped lightly on the door not trying to scare the man….yet. Gabriel calmly called out and asked, “Patrick, how about that tour of the cockpit?”

  Patrick said, “Screw you, I've got a fucking camera here that shows me everything you crazy bastards are doing. It’s for the safety of the staff and you sir are not safe. There’s something wrong with you. I’m landing and you can deal with whatever authorities wherever they’ll let us land.”

  Gabriel said, “Your buddy back there confessed to killing his wife and kids. He said that you had a pretty big hand in it. He said you flew the plane out over the ocean and dumped an entire innocent family.”

  “Well good luck getting either of us to ever say that aloud again in front of the police or whomever you think will care. You best just sit down because I'm going to find a place to land this plane and report your ass for torture as well as being fucking insane. Plus, it probably won't hurt that the two of you are on the run from the CIA. You think they will take that into account?”

  “Patrick, you know it would seem that you have this all figured out huh? You give me a minute and the two of us can have a further conversation.”

  Gabriel pulled his pistol, aiming for the secure lock and unloaded a magazine into it. The rounds left a hole a few inches wide in the door by the time that he was done. Gabriel slid the door to the side and found Patrick holding a fire extinguisher. Gabriel did not see his hand on the handle and when he got close, Patrick shot a puff of the extinguishing chemical into Gabriel’s face. Gabriel had the forethought to close his eyes when he heard it about to unload.

  Patrick took this moment, which he desperately needed, to rush him with the extinguisher, wanting nothing more than the pistols in Gabriel’s hands. He brought the tank down hard on Gabriel’s left forearm; hitting his elbow and making him drop the gun. Gabriel cursed as it fell to the ground. Patrick shoved him back out of the way as he was trying to wipe the dusty material from his face.

  Gabriel reached around, trying to feel for the man, and through tear filled eyes found him. Patrick was bent down scouring the floor for the gun, but just as he felt a hand on his shoulder was when Gabriel brought a knee up, catching the man square in the face. When he no longer felt the man’s shoulder, he knew the pilot was on the ground and brought back his wing tipped shoe and kicked him as hard as he could, five times with each one of them bringing a scream from Patrick, which only made him kick harder. Gabriel screamed, “Our conversation is going to be cut short Patrick, because frankly I just want to fucking kill you now after that!”

  Patrick breathlessly mumbled, “I'm sorry, what would you have done?”

  Gabriel looked at him with disgust and replied, “I never would have killed the man’s wife and kids, but as far as this encounter, I would have used the tank to break my head open and then beaten myself to a pulp with it, so that it would only be recognizable by dental records, which don’t exist.”

  Patrick asked, “Who are you?”

  “The man that makes sure you two don’t do anything else wrong in life.”

  “And when you die, you are telling me that you think you are going to Heaven?”

  Gabriel laughed and said, “I gave up thinking that when everyone I ever loved was ripped from me in one single day. I plan on going to Hell. But I'm going to right as much wrong as I can before I go there. You’ll just get there before me.”

  Gabriel leveled the pistol point blank and fired off two shots from a foot away, Patrick’s brain and skull was literally everywhere in the cockpit and seeing out the window was now impossible. Gabriel heard Shaun screaming from the cabin. Gabriel walked back there, slowly holding his pistol by his side, his face a mess from the spray of the extinguisher, mixed with bits of brain and skull fragments. He walked past his captive and headed to the kitchen where he grabbed fresh towels to clean his face, eyes, and neck until only the puffing bruises remained to stare back at him. Shaun was screaming belligerently and once finished, Gabriel walked back to him where Shaun then asked, “What did you do to Patrick? What did you do to him?”

  Gabriel could have been reading off a grocery list for as much concern as he had in his voice. “I shot him twice in the head Shaun. He deserved it after all.”

  Shaun looked nervously at the pistols and asked with a slight stutter of fear, “What….what are you going to do with those?

  Gabriel looked down at his pistol and uncocked the hammer. He put one, then the other, back away clipping them into the holster. “I'm going to put them away. I hope that I'm done using these for a while, I could definitely use a bit of a break. Besides it isn’t good on your ears this high up, with all the pressure, to be firing these things off.”

  Shaun rested his head back on the seat, forcing a smile that he didn’t think would be possible having a knife stuck through each hand and said, “Oh thank God, for a minute I thought that you were going to kill me too. So you can fly this thing, you can get us the rest of the way to Brazil then, Gabriel?”

  Gabriel said, “No, actually that’s one of the things I always wished I’d have had time for but I just never got around to learning. My handler back when I was a killer for hire was the one who used to get me from point A to B, but he’s already predisposed so we can’t really call on him for any favors. Patrick seemed like he was a hell of a pilot though, up until he made the mistake of agreeing to do what you wanted him to. Well that, and striking me with that extinguisher and spraying me in the face with it. That was just fucking stupid.”

  “Wait, please wait, I’m confused. So if you aren’t going to try and shoot me then what are we doing? Are you going to let me go once we get there and again, please tell me who is going to land the plane?”

  “You really must be a book smart son of a bitch because it’s easy to tell that you sure as hell don’t have any street smarts to save your life. But if I had to guess if you did, you still would have thought that you’d never be found out for killing your family. I’m probably doing the world a favor or at the least insuring that no other woman has to deal with you.”

  “I thought you said that you weren’t going to shoot me, you said you were done with your guns for a while.”

  Gabriel didn’t say anything, he walked to the front of the plane, finding one of the parachute rigs he’d discovered earlier. He strapped it on, making sure that he was good to go and once he read the directions on one of the many other chutes, he cut through their pull cords for good measure. He didn’t have many questions as the differences were slim to the ones that he’d used on the job occasionally, and it’s not like he had another option.

  Gabriel looked at the flight instruments and buttons and to him it seemed to be a million different colors worth. He scanned carefully and when he saw the one mentioning that it would release the fuel aboard, he pulled it back all the way. He looked outside seeing gallons upon gallons of fuel disappear into the sky. Gabriel could hear Shaun screaming from the front and knew he had to exit out the rear of the plane anyway.

  Gabriel walked down the aisle and at first it was the sight of him with the chute on before the realization came across that he really was going to leave Shaun. Shaun yelled, “What were your doing up there? What was all that fluid, and why in the hell are you wearing that thing. You aren’t going to leave me up here are you? You aren’t that twisted are you?”

  “For the sake of time and my energy, I'm letting you off easy Shaun.”

&
nbsp; “There’s no way that I’ll survive. It doesn’t matter if an ambulance finds us out in the middle of nowhere, we will still die.”

  “Think about the good news, you’ll be the first one to the scene of the plane wreck.”

  Shaun tilted his head a bit and Gabriel said, “Just remember you have a handful of minutes left to make peace with God and to either beg or lie your ass off. There isn’t anything else you can do but wait for it to happen.”

  Shaun said, “I wish you would have just left me in that room, I wish you wouldn’t have ever taken me with you, this is such bullshit.”

  Gabriel pulled the hatch to the door, letting it rise up from the outside in. He said, “This is what I do to make myself feel better about what used to be my regular job. Don’t think of this as goodbye though Shaun. I’m sure we are going to see each other in Hell.”

  Shaun started to say something but Gabriel leapt from the door, spreading his arms out and trying to slow down his return trip to earth

  Gabriel wished that he had a pair of goggles to keep the wind out of his eyes, but had no such supplies on him. Gabriel waited a few seconds then looked up and saw the plane begin to veer another direction and slowly started to head down, straight down until it was flipping in the air and spinning wildly. Gabriel tucked, making himself as skinny and aerodynamic as he could, and shot off a mile the opposite way, making sure that he didn’t have to worry about being hit by the descending plane that was bound to crash and go up in a blazing inferno of hell. When he made it far enough to have no worries, he opened his arms, slowing down and giving the chance to be able to enjoy watching Shaun plummet to his death as the plane disappeared into a forest. Gabriel watched as a fireball erupted back up into the cold air.

  Gabriel felt a sense of pleasure and checked his altitude reader, when he hit the correct height, he pulled the ripcord. He felt every ounce of pressure from the parachute as it pulled him back and caught the air beneath the chute. He winced when he floated down. Something that he used to enjoy doing, currently was one of the more painful things in his life. Gabriel attempted to steer but when he saw what was beneath him knew that he had very little opportunity to do anything about it.

  Gabriel closed his eyes, covering and protecting them with his arms as the branches from the trees that had been around for centuries slowed down his fall to earth until he ended up stuck one of them. His arms did little to protect him as the first hit on a large branch ripped them away from his face. The next branch directly connected with his skull and was the final blow that his head could handle for the day. Gabriel felt at his head as he hung there, pulling away his left hand and seeing blood covering it. He started puking and knew that he wasn't going to leave this tree tonight, but that if God or the Devil allowed him to wake up the next day, he’d surely try and find a doctor’s office. Gabriel watched the ground as it became blurry until the numbness in his body moved up through his head.

  Chapter

  Ten

  The trucks drove up to the hunting lodge slowly. When the men opened the truck doors, beer cans rolled out of them and the eight hour trip felt more like a drunken stupor than anything else. Bobby grabbed his coat out of the truck, zipping it up and rubbing his hands in the cool morning air. He kicked at the frost on the ground and already made a decision that getting the hunting lodge heated and running was more important than anything.

  He yelled across to Matt who was doing the golden arch into a meadow and said, “Hey Matt, I'm gonna go get the fire started, can you get some extra firewood rounded up extra when you are done? The guy we rent this place from said that there was some room to put it inside and that there should be some there, but I'm not going to hold my breath that there is enough to handle all of us for a week. Last thing we want to do is end up freezing our balls off while we are out here.”

  Matt leaned back further letting a burp rip and said, “I’m gonna keep pissing until this lovely piece is done emptying itself. I’ll be happy to try and find some wood once I get done.”

  Bobby gave him a thumbs up, shaking his head, knowing he’d just wasted all of his breath. Steven and Tommy pulled in a minute later, rolling to a stop and had the same clatter falling out of their truck when they both stepped out of it. Steven stretched his back out and to no one in particular said, “Is there a reason that we go through all of that bull shit driving this fucking far man? I mean for God sakes there has to be somewhere closer to home than this place in the middle of nowhere?”

  Bobby answered back, “Yeah, there are, and for what they want to hunt in Virginia where all those rich fuckers live, there’s not a damn spot worth of land that we can go to and afford to step on unless you guys want to do squirrel hunting out there.”

  Steven said, “You know, squirrel soup is underrated. You all remember that show Duck Dynasty, man that soup his momma used to cook up? Man oh man did that look good, she was a good woman, there aren’t too many that know how to cook a good batch worth of soup up if you know what I mean?”

  “I think it takes an even more special woman to find one for you that one day will be able to have the patience to keep you around for the rest of your life. I think the best chance you got is your girlfriend Christy, she seems like she’s full of patience, bless her heart,” Bobby informed him.

  Steven said, “Just waiting for the right time, just waiting for the right time, probably will be here before you know it.”

  “Christ, if you need the money to buy her the ring, you just need to ask, hell we’d all kick in some money to help you get a ring, wouldn’t we guys?” Bobby asked his friends.

  Tommy snickered and replied, “Hell no I’m not lending him a dime, that’s a dime I ain’t never gonna see again.”

  Bobby leaned in close and said, “You don’t think lending him some cash, and yes, call it a gift, is going to put you ahead with him? Imagine a week where he doesn’t stop by for free beer and food. You can worry that the only thing you are going to come home to is your lady and not having to worry about him on the couch in his dirty underwear when you wake in the morning. You telling me that isn’t a fair deal trade?”

  Tommy closed his mouth, looked at Steven getting guns out of all the trucks and carrying them to the cabin and said, “You know, there is a good chance that I can talk Lisa into lending me the money. Hell the idea that she doesn’t have to wake up to Steven out on the couch and half naked in the morning once a week would probably be enough to get an extra amount of cash to make sure he gets the nicest ring that he is going to be able to find at the mall.”

  Bobby laughed and said, “Are you kidding me? He’s going to be going to Wal-Mart at best. But there isn’t anything that is going to keep him from getting the best one if we all kick in then. Let’s go get that fire started and we can get some coffee brewed and sober up, then I want to get out and see what kind of deer we can bag today. I’d love to be able to throw in some venison into our stew instead of whatever meat ya’ll brought with.”

  Tommy nodded and the two men disappeared into the cabin and within the hour they were sitting around drinking criminally strong coffee and sobering up for the long day they had ahead of them. They got a stew meal going before they left and added enough wood that the fire would burn strong for the rest of the day if they wanted it to and did not leave the door open. They had learned their lessons about wasting heat and had found that coming back to a roasting cabin was much better than coming back to one that was ice cold. It was much easier to open the doors or windows and let cold air in than trying to get hot air to fill the place.

  Tommy said, “You guys think we got enough beer?”

  “If not we’ll go to town and get more, it isn’t that far. Besides, they got that bar in town that we can hang out in for a few hours and get something halfway decent to eat,” Matt said.

  Tommy replied, “Yeah if we don’t get kicked out for fighting with the locals this time, that would be great.”

  Matt retorted, “Those son of a bitches had it coming
to them, and they deserved it.”

  Steven rose before sliding on his heavy jacket and grabbing his gun. He said, “Probably ain’t much point driving up here for half a day's drive to just sit here and shoot the shit, hell we can do that on our walk out to hunt.”

  The rest of the men moaned, getting up from their chairs and thinking of the cold and bundling up as well before they headed out leaving the cabin to take care of itself. Matt said, “Can you believe that shit about the plane going down? If that’d had been a couple miles closer the son of a bitch might have landed on us. Can you imagine looking up and seeing a goddamn plane coming straight towards you? I mean that’s kind of like God saying, uh hey I made a mistake, going to take care of it tenfold right now though.”

  Tommy agreed, “Yep that’s pretty much just a good factor to know that He really doesn’t like you.”

  They walked another half mile and stopped, looked around and then just stared at each other. In the tree in front of them hung the Devil, only they didn’t know that yet. Tommy found him first, walking up and looking, but not touching. He sat a minute longer, examining the man and trying to see if he was breathing. He could not determine it as the man was swaying gently in the breeze that was dancing through the trees. He looked at his face, seeing the blood soaked across, a multitude of scrapes and bruises, and his jacket had been all but shredded. Tommy thought of his heavy jacket and realized if the man wasn’t dead there was a good chance that he was near frozen. He knew that the plane had gone down late yesterday afternoon and it didn’t take a genius to decide that this man had been one of the plane’s occupants.