by Travis Borne
“So, we’re just going to follow him?” Jon said.
“We need to find out where he goes, what he does, anything we can use to change his mind, convert him, and, I got this—” Jim pulled an old camera from his super-tight pants pocket. Their eyes responded with wonder and confounded realization; no words needed. “Swap-meet find, piece of shit, but…”
They looked to the bar. The bartender was up and responding to a swirl of Carlos’ finger. He poured a tar-like liquid into a tall glass.
Felix looked apprehensive again, he clearly remembered the situation with Miguel and didn’t want his son to go near. He said, “Rico, I go, you take the truck.”
“Why? But I don’t know how to—”
“Felix, we need you to drive the truck,” Jim said. “No one else knows its quirks. If you want, Jon or I can switch places with Rico. It really doesn’t matter. The only reason I said, and no offense, Jon and I can run faster if he takes off into a full sprint. Rico only needs to get near him, then we’ll take it from there.”
Felix nodded. “Careful, Hijo.” He put a somber hand on Rico’s shoulder and squeezed a squeeze that would equal a hug in anyone’s book.
“What’s to worry, Papa? Let’s just get it over with. I’m curious, we all are.”
“He’s right,” Jim said, “now let’s go, find out what the hell is going on in his brain, then use our new information tomorrow and hope to hell we can convince him. It’ll be our final day here—last chance to save the world.”
41. The Pursuit
Rico edged toward the bar while Felix nervously hesitated at the double-swinging doors. As expected, when Rico got within three feet of his back, Carlos turned around.
“Uh, hey. Carlos, you all right?” Rico asked, approaching his left side.
“I feel like being left alone right now, if you don’t mind.”
Keeping the pressure on, Rico hesitated but retained his forward motion, then took a stool beside him. “Same here, too much alcohol. I don’t usually drink like this, you know. I’m feeling like a coffee, how about—”
“Don’t you listen?” Carlos interrupted sternly. “You’re all alike, humans. Forget this, I’m out.” After downing his drink—gulp, gulp, as if time stopped and a horror movie was shanking Rico’s kidney, gulp, gulp, gulp…
It looked like motor oil but thicker; then Carlos stood up—pale, and a final swallow as if he was downing a horse pill. He headed toward the front doors at a brisk pace. Felix had darted from sight before Carlos spotted him and was currently hustling toward Esperanza with a hunched speed walk; it was parked across the street. He got in, keeping eagle eyes on the saloon doors.
With an austere step and one-hundred-percent sober footfalls, Carlos’ boots tapped the wooden floor like gavels. He went through the swinging doors as if they didn’t exist, descended the steps, and headed for the center of the street, as if to brawl with the invisible man. Then, like a sports car on rails, he veered left. Felix cranked up Esperanza, ren, ren, ren, verrrennn, pushed in the clutch and put it in first.
“What was he drinking?” Rico asked the bartender while eying the glossy sludge as it slid back into the glass like blended leaches.
“His usual when he gets in one of those moods,” said Simon the bartender. “Coffee.”
“Just coffee?”
“With a kick,” Simon admitted.
“Oh yeah?”
“Six scoops of sugar and a whole cup of molasses, plus, well, he told me not to say...” Simon grinned at Rico, a perfect poker face, holding himself still, arms widely propping him up on the counter. His eyes waited through thin spectacles and Rico’s reaction came through with flying colors—colors of the underworld. Rico’s return smile was a grimacing mess.
Jim and Jon burst out of their chairs. They hesitated at the saloon’s outer deck. Carlos—had bolted. On foot and running down the street, east under the moonlight, he was a top-fuel dragster. All-out sprint, and he didn’t appear to be forcing his body to achieve what seemed—superhuman speed!
“Would you look at that,” Jon said.
Jim exploded, “Let’s go, Jon, move!”
Felix managed Esperanza like a wild bull, already on top of it. He gunned the engine and its brand-new first gear sent it spinning into an arc. Tires ate Mexico, desert went into the air as if a meteor had struck, and he slid it to a stop right in front of the saloon. Jim vaulted over the side of the bed and lowered an arm to Jon; with an interlocking forearm grip he heaved him up and over. Rico followed, running faster than Jim had surmised he could, and yanked on the passenger door then hopped in; he had to slam it twice to get it to shut, while Felix had already welded the gas pedal to the bare-metal floor. Confounded, two gawking DCs and Simon watched the action movie from the porch of the saloon.
Like a chariot commandant, Jim commanded, “Felix, follow that dust!” He pounded on the roof. And Jon had a smile—for some reason.
And Jim kept pounding.
And Jon pounded.
The truck was quieter. By some strange and perhaps lucky coincidence Felix had recently completed work on it, hence missing spaghetti dinner—but, since time had been slowed due to the arrival of Greg and Eddie a while back, he’d likely had more than enough time to do the work.
Felix gunned the ol’ gal, released and pressed the clutch, then gunned ’er again. Esperanza roared but not like when they'd used her to cross the desert in search of the bunker. The new sealed muffler seemed to add plenty of torque, that and the working first gear; it sent them back, way back. Felix shifted through the gears as if the gallon of mezcal he’d sucked was some sort of concentration supplement, while Jim reached to help Jon, who’d nearly somersaulted over the tailgate when Felix had ignited second gear; pedal to and probably through, the metal.
Bracing themselves, clinging to the roof with wide arms, Jim pounded some more. “Go, Felix, go! Did you see that, Jon!”
Jon’s eyes said, “Yes, holy shit, yes!”
Rico was watching the road, and the roof, which was almost caving in because of the chariot-driving madmen on roids, pounding on it with all they had.
Carlos was a blurry pinpoint leading a trail of dust with a wake worthy of a tank doing ninety. The plume revealing his direction was like a jet’s contrails and the intensity was as if Carlos was cutting the world’s throat with a wire saw.
“He’s gone!” Felix yelled out the window, gripping the wheel with one hand while torturing the column shifter. All and everything that existed became dust and they were a bullet lost in it. Just in time though, a breeze pushed it to the side and the moon illuminated the road.
“There! Just follow that trail!” Jim roared. He and Jon ate mouthfuls for a good ten minutes. By the looks of Carlos’ plume, they were at least keeping up and only a half mile behind. Their eyebrows and hair became pale as the old pickup bounced across the desert on the same road Jim and Rico had taken with Felix to meet the eccentric, short motherfucker named Q.
Jon hunched and peeked inside. He could see the half-lit instrument panel. “He’s doing eighty, Jim!” And Felix was doing his best to see the road too, headlights off, moonlight on, nothing else. Rico had one hand on the dash, the other pointing; as if coaching a senior on meth, Rico looked like a driver’s-ed instructor swallowing a double dose of Medusa’s glare, and Jon knew why.
Jon yelled, “Felix, slow it down!” He pounded on the back glass this time.
Rico was yelling too, also telling his papa to slow down.
Visibility: zero. Jim could see above, vaguely. It was enough; even if it wasn’t, he didn't care. He searched, then pointed after the wind moved the dust, shoving it right down their throats. Jim roared, “Go, faster—” He gagged, aahk, huaack. “—punch the fuck out of it, Felix!”
But Felix had over done it. Not a damn thing but pale fog now, and no more lucky gusts. He panicked and switched on the headlights. A blank wall of light. Jon kept pounding on the glass, yelling—
Felix responded, bu
t not to him, and did slow down: 70 mph, 60… Then he turned his neck to see Rico, using only three tenths of a second from the steady, but evil, projector of time. Felix had become prey to his own panic; his eyes inflated like wet, white, hot-air balloons and his pupils were black holes absorbing the fatal chain of events. Felix jerked the wheel hard left when he saw it—but it was too late.
The front right tire hit, hard. Jon’s head was forced into the back glass which imploded, taking the shape of his face; body compressing, slow motion, compressing more, his neck crunched folding almost in half. The pop was the only noise owning the hollow second of frozen time that’d hijacked his mind and it sounded just like another fist bump to the glass, save for an added click that bounced between his ears; if he still had some time left for it, he’d cringe.
Minds raced, winning against Chronos who’d taken a punch to the gut—but only in four minds. Jim’s legs were slow-motion burgundy matchsticks in the top corner of Jon’s left eye, extending straight up in pants so tight he looked like a female from upside down. As if being sucked through a straw, Jim disappeared diagonally over the roof. And Jon’s right eye saw Felix incongruously becoming one with the steering wheel, meshing into it like a painting taking a bucket of water. Beside him on the far end of the bench seat, the driver’s-ed instructor went into the dash like a pile of clothes being forced into a hamper; Rico’s Medusa-fucked face was a white flash bulb currently in transition to chili-pepper red.
The boulder that’d launched them grinded along the bottom right side of the truck, delivering jarring tremors as if they’d struck an iceberg. The rock caught the rear wheel, which bounced the truck up and over, sending it into an angle that set it on its side as if sliding for home; same home-plate dust save for a bigger foot, Esperanza’s whole body. Before coming to a stop sideways in the middle of the road, Esperanza bounced back then forth one time, rocking to a halt, barely avoiding a flip onto, possibly, Jim.
A rush of air, diced into silence as Esperanza pift-pift-pifted her final pift. There was no laughing as the dust plume caught up to them this time.
Felix was out cold. His chin had fought the steering wheel and lost. Blood leaked from the side of his mouth and his head was meshed into the warped wheel.
Warped too, Jon’s neck. It’d gotten compressed—and stayed there. He was awake as if he’d taken an injection of adrenaline to the temple but couldn’t force his head straight. Still in the back of the truck, huffing, trying to fathom what’d just happened, and slumped into the sidewall, he again made the attempt—nope. Like a knee on growing pains, locked, his neck was locked, bones paradoxically weaved into each other. Damn, not good. He managed to stand up and stumbled away from the sideways heap. His arms hung loosely at his sides and turning to look into the wreck he could see Rico pop to life with a grand, fast suck of air; Rico’s countenance was a shocked teenager, and holding his head, he reached for his father as if he’d been blinded. He’d fared okay save for a white gash on his forehead; a gash so deep it refused to bleed. He’d impacted the windshield just as Jon had the back glass.
Jon realized, he’ll live, and trudged on. The dust was still a whiteout, but subsiding as if the air was falling asleep. Moving through it like a bent-neck zombie through fog, Jon called out, “Jim!” Ear stuck to his shoulder, he repeated, “Jim! Jim, are you okay?”
But Jim was down. A good thirty feet ahead in the center of the road, now half illuminated by one-eyed Esperanza as her light started to penetrate the subsiding dust; he lay on his side, legs splayed, one arm forward, one under his torso, a hand buried between his crotch. His face was smashed into the road. Jon knelt down and slowly turned him over; Jim’s face, eyebrows, and bald head were as off-white as a garlic-besprinkled egg.
The dust plume had fallen to become a sweet-smelling fog and the moonlight lit up the surrounding area like a swamp-themed horror flick.
“Jim, Jim,” Jon said, maneuvering his stiff body to help his friend. “Jim. Are you—”
Jim popped to life and drew in a breath. Uuuuaah, arrrruuuuaaaahhhh, then, huuh, aahk, huaack. Dust came out of his mouth just like the robot head, Rafael’s. He pulled in his extended left arm and pushed to roll himself the rest of the way over. Jon carefully helped him accommodate. The right side of his face was scraped like a five-year-old’s knee after the first bike ride, as if Dad’s push was a 1970s one. The only good news, Jim’s skintight red pants had finally ripped, allowing blood to flow—and he received a refill of color.
“Shit, Jim, your face.”
“What’s, uh…” He slowly brought a hand up to it. “…uh…what’s wrong with it?” His fingers crawled up to the bottom of his right eye and the arrival felt like numb icicles going into a hot, extra-cheese pizza.
“I think—it’s just a bad scrape. I can’t see…” Jon moved side to side, trying to discern what he was looking at. “…can you open that eye?”
“Yeah, I think it’s okay,” Jim said, using less air than necessary, the words falling out like vomit from a cadaver. He forced himself up, breathing out with a good amount of effort, yet still dully. He looked at his legs then wiggled his toes inside the hand-me-down, too-tight cowboy boots Felix had lent him. His knee; he could feel a sharp pain as if a railroad spike had been driven through it—but he didn’t think it was bad enough to be broken, just hurt like hell. The overall pain was arriving like medics in a civilized world, more with each passing second. Dully he let out even more air, and more, seemingly more than his lungs could hold. Grunting, pushing, he rose to a seated position, then reached and felt himself up and down like a cop patting down a leper: around his sides—no bones sticking out, well, that’s fuckin’ fantastic, said the sarcastic malcontent residing deep within, as if it’d only been kicked into a hole but not secured by a locked grate; and to the road rash from elbow to shoulder on an arm he could no longer feel. The knee and the eye hoarded pain from elsewhere—the eye mostly, as if he’d been skull fucked. With Jon resting a worried hand on his shoulder, Jim finally said, “Uh…I think I’m okay. Help me up, would you, Jon? How’s—Rico?”
“Dang, Jim, maybe this wasn’t such a good idea,” Jon said, helping him up. “Felix was doing damn near 85 miles per hour.” After Jim’s feet replanted, Jon tried once again to straighten his neck, but it was still locked. “I think Rico’s okay. Felix is out cold. The guy is freakin’ nuts.” Jon paused, walking alongside Jim, who was moving slug slow, still assembling his bearings. “Shit, Jim, I saw you fly over the roof—the whole thing was surreal, like everything was in slow motion.”
Jim just nodded a dead-guy’s nod and released another uh, uuaah, then, aahk, huaack. He continued trudging toward the truck.
They checked on Felix and Rico. Rico was wrapping his head which had finally started to bleed. Felix was barely coming to; his mouth was sloppy-lipstick bloody and a few more teeth were knocked loose, but apparently, he’d only taken a sockdolager from the steering wheel.
They all got out, checked each other over, then stared at poor, demolished and disfigured, Esperanza. Moonlight was a black-light bulb’s haunt; the dust had settled and the air was fresh, sweet, and cool, and the old gal was dying, headlight getting dimmer, dimmer, dimmer...
For the first time, Jim attempted to open his right eye; two-dimensional vision was pissing him off. But it was sealed shut, crusty with dirt and juice, and swelling. He reached again to his face and with two fingers gently touched his upper, then lower eyelid. Slowly, he spread the two fingers—juice came out; cherry popped. And the swelling was no more, as was Jim’s three-dimensional vision. He only grunted a low, “Fuck.”
Jon saw and shook his head sadly. Felix obviously felt bad. Rico was grossed out.
“Well, at least the pain went out with it. Kinda like the biggest zit I ever had.” He let out a quick and twisted chuckle, then turned to Felix.
“Señor Jim,” Felix said. “I—”
“Not your fault, Felix. It was my idea. I wanted so fucking bad to catch him.
And actually, unlike Jon, I was telling you to go faster.” They each felt a demented sense of relief and started laughing. Pain came to each with every spasm of laughter—and the distorted cackles and ughs and aahks made their way into the quiescent desert surrounding them; but they couldn’t help it, and the laughing continued for a long good while.
Jim felt his face, while he chuckled, and remembered the first dream he’d had in over twenty years, after spending the first day logged in with Amy. The wall had exploded, taking out the right side of his face, way worse than this. He remembered the eyeball juice soothing his skin. It was just about—the same feeling. He slid his fingers together and said, “Sticky.”
Jon finished off with the final sick chuckle. Shaking his head with a flat smile, then said, “Here, let me wrap up your face, Jim.”
The front tire had exploded, upper and lower A-arms were beer cans after Jerry’s mitts. The boulder only moved one inch but it had sent the heavy drum brakes, front rim and guts, under the truck. Esperanza’s rear leapt over the destroyed gob of detritus before bouncing up and over the massive two-foot-tall boulder. The U-bolts holding the axle to the leaf spring had snapped and the axle was left hanging from the back of the truck like greasy, sand-coated entrails. Esperanza, wasn't going anywhere. Her one eye was a faintly glowing ember, now, and the four of them were at least fifteen miles deep into the middle of nowhere. It was going to be a long trudge back.
“You were right, Felix,” Jim said, “we should’ve let Rico drive.”
42. Rafael
Carlos’ dust plume had settled too. He was gone. The desert was silent, and sweetly fresh as if they’d plowed through a mile of prickly pear cacti, mint, and stinkweed. Only the rarest chance of a nudging breeze soothed their damaged bodies; the time was 2:34 a.m.
