by Gabi Moore
I thought about when I had accidentally shot that man who worked for Maurice.
Could I do it? I wondered, lost in an ethical reverie.
I thought about how they killed my dad, and a surge of rage welled up within me, I actually grew dizzy, and started to cry. Tyler noticed something was wrong, and came over to me to make sure that I didn’t drown. He grabbed me by the armpits and hauled me to the rope we had dangled out of the boat so I could relax on his broad shoulders while the pain of the moment overtook me.
“I miss him so much,” I cried, losing myself in the emotions.
The rage had been too much to handle, and setting the anger next to the feeling of disgust and sadness caused by nearly being responsible for the death of that man had pushed me into a place of despair. There was empathy, sure, but the empathy gave way to hopelessness.
“What do you do,” I asked, “when you know something is wrong, and you have to live with the fact that another person did that wrong thing to you?”
The words were blubbery, and sounded garbled coming out of my mouth, but I knew he understood. In spite of his comprehension, he didn’t respond.
How could he respond, I thought to myself, shaking my head. He’s a soldier, he’s made that choice long ago.
“I guess some people can do it, and some people can’t,” I muttered, letting go of him, and drifting back into the water.
He looked behind me, to make sure I wasn’t trying to off myself, and then climbed up the rope toward the deck of the ship. I admired his strong muscles as they helped navigate his body up the edge of the ship. He was naked, and his whole body seemed to glisten in the sunlight and salt-water; every perfectly sculpted muscle.
“Stop being such a baby,” I scolded myself, deciding to take a dive down deep into the water.
What happened next was astonishing, and uncomfortable.
Just as I went down, a whole school of fish swam by, dizzying my mind in a swirl of colors and emotions. The light from the high noon sun reflected off of their iridescent scales, and for a moment I was free. Feeling the beauty of the moment seemed to relieve the burden of pain from my mind.
These fish have suffered losses, the experience seemed to say, and yet they don’t seem to suffer too much. In spite of everything, they continue forward in life.
The feeling of transcendental elation lasted only a few moments, and then a sinking feeling of dread began to saturate in my body. I felt, somewhat immediately, that I needed to get out of the water, and that we needed to move. There was something behind us, and I felt danger. A vision passed through my head like blood in the water, and anxiety began to overwhelm me. With a firm resolution to get the fuck out of there, I began swimming toward the boat.
Tyler noticed the increase in the pace of my movements and looked over the edge of the small vessel in order to check up on me.
“Piper,” he called, “Are you alright?”
I didn’t respond. Instead of taking the time necessary to evaluate my situation, I continued to operate in a fight or flight mode. Steady, capable arms — arms that had been raised by a fisherman grabbed the rope which lead up the side of the ship’s hull. I planted my feet on the side of the ship and then began to walk myself up the edge of the boat. I hauled myself over the side of the ship and looked behind me.
“Move!” I commanded. “We have to move!”
Chapter 20 - Piper
Black shapes were on the horizon, in the direction which I intuitively believed to be Venice. I felt in my heart that they were coming after us and that if we had any chance of escaping, this time, we needed to vacate our current position and fast. Ideally, by means of another ship, but we didn’t exactly have that luxury.
“We need to get to Rome,” I concluded. “What’s the nearest port city?”
I looked at him, hoping he had been able to piece together more substantial information than I would have been able to guess.
“If we cut due west, we will be able to hit Ancona. Shouldn’t be any more than forty minutes, maybe less if we haul.”
I nodded, doing some quick calculations in my head.
“We’ll chart a course to San Benedetto del Tronto, but we’re going to head in along the coast.”
“All roads lead to Rome, I suppose,” he replied, evidencing his confusion as to why we wouldn’t simply head straight for Ancona. “Is something wrong?”
“You and I are going to jump when we get about a mile and a half outside of Civitanova Marche, unless you think it would be better to jump sooner. I think we’re being followed.”
My intuition ended up being uncomfortably accurate.
Over the next hour, I watched as the object in the distance began to steadily gain on us in speed. It went from a dark object at a great distance, to a series of fast approaching ships, which could have been scouted with binoculars had they been any closer.
There was a part of me that felt I was absolutely crazy, and that I was just being paranoid. I didn’t like the feeling that I was getting inside of me, and I didn’t like the too fresh memory of what they did to my dad. Without knowing how they tracked me to Bastion, I couldn’t afford to take that risk.
“We’re ditching the boat,” I said, “Get ready to dive.”
We had to ditch out early and ended up floating in on the tide into a quaint little beach town named Fontespina. The boat continued past the Civitanova Marche Pier, and headed forward, unmanned toward a town called Pedaso. There was an unpopulated strip of land there along Strada Statale Adriatica — the major thoroughfare which marked that section of the coast. I could only hope that the ship would crash into the shoals and that anybody with good sense would see the ship and stay the hell out of its way.
As Tyler and I bodysurfed the tides in toward Fontespina, I felt a slight bit of relief that my impulsiveness would at least accomplish one thing if nothing else — a small piece of history which tied myself to the tragedy of a time now past would sink into the Adriatic, where it belonged.
Tyler stole a tourist’s car that was parked alongside the boardwalk, and the two of us drove down the highway, through the mountains, toward Rome — a regular couple of troublemakers if ever there was one. I took deep breaths throughout that highway journey, attempting to find my center, but failing. It seemed like the anxiety in my chest was so tight that I might not be able to find a way out from underneath my worries.
Decisive actions like we were taking could only lead to long term problems if there were not some sort of escape plan. I held onto the hope that when we reached my contact in Rome, he would have enough sympathy for my situation to help me out. If he didn’t… well, I didn’t know what we might have to do.
We met Antonio at his office later that evening. I knew that he never went home early, so I thought it might be a good enough time to head in his direction. The thing about Antonio is that you have to let him know you aren’t trying to fuck him over, and you have to let him know that you appreciate what he’s doing for you.
“Just so you know, I think we’re both aware of exactly how dangerous this is,” was about the second thing he said to the two of us, right after “Jesus fuck!”
After his explicative about the fornication of Christ, he proceeded to pull a gun on the two of us.
Tyler had closed the distance between the two of them like a trained dog and had him on the floor with the gun dismantled into separate pieces. After that point, it took a minute to bring him back from the land of fear and silence, at which point he quickly regained both his composure, as well as his business acumen.
“So, we’re going to have to talk about payment,” was the third thing he said. “I know you and I go way back, and I’m sorry to hear about your dad, but I just can’t let something like this go for nothing. This is how I make my living, you understand.”
I nodded and held a restraining hand out toward Tyler’s chest.
That man was so eager to fuck shit up, it seemed as though he had reached his peak of stress operat
ion some time ago, and was now ready to smash or steal anything necessary to get toward whatever his goal was. I also felt a strange sense of protective nature coming from him — which was natural, I think, given h is temperament. There was something magnetic and powerful about that emotional force though. I didn’t doubt that the combination of our stressful experiences and the killer fucking that we had been doing over the last week had something to do with the connection.
Antonio ended up settling for half of the contents of the backpack. He put up a bit of a fuss in the beginning, but I could tell it was a ruse from the outset.
“How the fuck did you get this?” he asked, only to cut himself off, “No, don’t tell me. I don’t want to know. It’s probably better if I don’t know.”
He accepted the goods, without too much more hassle. He actually tried to get more, but we told him that was all we had, and that he could take it or leave it. He tried to argue for something else, but I told him I had nothing, and when he looked into my eyes, he knew that I was correct. I was totally fucked, and this was a final movement.
The passports themselves were not so big of a deal. We could have ripped off the place and gotten the raw materials. It was the passwords to Antonio’s encrypted file system that were the real trouble. Even Angela wouldn’t have been able to manage that kind of security in any reasonable amount of time. The man was a paranoid, who basically thought that he was about to be betrayed by every single person he ran across.
Once the passwords were entered, and the passports were printed, Tyler and I had shiny new identities that would serve well enough to get us wherever we needed to go. Antonio may have been a bit of an irredeemable scumbag, but he was good at what he did; an honest estimation would be that there was no one more suited for the job; which is, unfortunately, the exact reason why it turned out we were unable to trust him.
One thing my father always told me that I’ll have to try not to forget is that people don’t see the world as it is, but as they are. It was an old quote from a mystic, and though I don’t recall whom the original source was, my father was mystical enough in my mind to be able to successfully pull something like that off. In my mind, he was the one who said it, and the next series of events only served as a testament to the fact that I should have paid that man a bit more attention while he was still breathing, and on this earth.
That fucker — Antonio.
The one who thinks that everyone around him is trying to fuck him over. He gave me a fucking awful feeling, right before we left his place. That kind of Judas Iscariot level, impending doom, absence of connectivity. I felt cold around him, like a person who was being sentenced to death. Sure he smiled goodbye, but it rang hollow. I couldn’t tell if I was hollow, or it was just him, but the absence of ease stayed with me as we got back into the car and drove away.
We were only about two miles away when Tyler verified my suspicions.
“We’ve got a tail,” he said, grimly.
“That’s not possible,” I said in disbelief. “ How did they find us so quickly?”
“Don’t be naïve.”
His tone wasn’t accusatory or even upset in any way. He was admonishing me for being too trusting of a pre-existing social network.
Everything that happened came back to me, and I realized my folly in going to Antonio. We didn’t have much of a choice. If we wanted to feel the country we could either do it as illegal aliens, and continuously be under the gun of local law enforcement, or we could go semi-legit and forge the papers necessary to keep our heads above water.
Without Antonio, I had no idea how we would have managed to secure those documents. Initially, I didn’t understand why he would let them go, if he wasn’t planning on having us make it out of the area without being captured or killed. Then I realized that it all probably made perfect sense.
“Antonio was just protecting his own ass,” I muttered, feeling so frustrated that I actually punched the dashboard of the car. My knuckles hurt, and I was far too upset.
“God,” I said, feeling incredibly frustrated, “You’d think that I’d be able to score a break or something.”
“That’s just negative self-talk,” Tyler said, interrupting me.
“Who the fuck are you,” I asked indignantly, and focusing my rage on anyone — the nearest object that could feel the wrath and bitterness that was flowing inside of my body. “Some fucking daytime television host, here to tell me what is and isn’t…”
He slapped me.
It didn’t hurt because he didn’t put his whole weight into it, but it was hard enough to bring me back into the present moment. The sting on my cheek reminded me of the reason that I was here in the first place. I was hurt, and we were trying to get out of this together.
“I resent you for hitting me,” I told him, saying the first thing that came to my mind.
“When we were fucking you wanted me to choke you,” he said, “so I thought maybe a little slap to bring some sense into you might not be such an unwarranted thing. Do you know how to fire a gun?”
“What?” I asked, still stunned.
“The last time you fired a gun, you were aiming at me, and you shot your bosses friend. I just need to know if that was a fluke, or if I really can’t trust you with a gun.”
His voice was frustrated, but earnest.
He was picking up speed and turning corners more sharply than not.
“I can handle a gun. I was just scared.”
“Well, I need you to not be scared right now,” he said, speaking loudly so I could hear his voice over the roar of the engine.
I turned around quickly to take note of what he was already aware of.
Two motorcycles and a car were chasing after us; matching us in speed and agility through the hairpin turns of the southwest quarter. In addition to that, a black and white had picked up on the chase, effectively pushing us past all reasonable chance of escape.
“Maybe we should just pull over,” I said. “The police would probab--”
“Get the gun out of the glove compartment, and when I say, I want you to fire on the windshield of the car behind us.”
He was headed full speed in a wild area known as Riserva Statale Tenuta di Castelporziano. Our car spat up dust on the road and hugged every turn. Gunshots went off behind us, and I saw the police car flip over its hood and end up in a ditch. The motorcyclists were having the easiest time of the chase and came right up alongside our rear tail once.
Tyler slammed on the brakes and skidded into a turn. The way he handled a car was a rush, but things got all too real when I felt a huge object slam into our car and flip over the hood. The gunning sound of the closest motorcycle blasted through my chest as the rider was thrown from the vehicle and into a field of tall grass ten meters away.
The other motorcycle managed to swerve off the trail, while the car was approaching fast for a head on collision. With expert timing, Tyler pulled back and swung the car around to the side of the road and down into a ditch. Instead of fighting the decline, Tyler rode with it, and the car got to the bottom of the dirt siding of the road and was able to gain speed once more.
The ocean was nearing, and there was only one car and a motorbike in pursuit. We blasted out of the natural area and onto the main highway, launching up the berm of the side of the highway as we did. The launch caught the motorcyclist off guard, causing him to abandon his bike and fall into a slide on the hard asphalt.
The car, on the other hand, was not so easy to lose. They kept pace with us the entire way. Each time a new threat arrived, they managed to evade in just the right way; balancing pursuit with negotiation, and safety with aggression. When a speed trap was raised, there was little need for the police to respond in any way because no law enforcement professional was going to get in the way of this car and its prey - us.
“This time, they’re professionals,” Tyler said, gritting his teeth as he fishtailed around the side of a cliff.
The sea was approaching on our right-h
and side, and we were wrapping quickly around the edges of the coastal highway. The two cars cruised down a major hill, and we accelerated all throughout the descent.
“Get ready,” he said, grabbing my shoulder. “When we head up the road on the other side of this hill, I want you to unload that clip at the windshield!”
Simultaneously, Tyler released the convertible top of the car, which immediately popped off from the vehicle and flew behind at the car following. Our car wasn’t exactly free from the direction change either, and Tyler had to do some quick sliding maneuvers to get the car under control. In spite of the difficulties, I managed to sit up and ready myself with the weapon aimed at the car behind us.
“NOW!” he yelled, as the car was accelerating up the hill in front of us.
Chapter 21 - Piper
I could feel the dip in the pit of my stomach as the g-force of the hill, however slight, had its effect on my body.
Not pausing to think, and trusting my aim, I let loose the entire clip of the pistol at the windshield of the car behind us. My attack was signaled by a series of brief, staccato bursts. The gun was much louder than I had initially anticipated. Moving forward at that moment, things start to become unclear.
I remember us accelerating up over the berm of the hill, and I remember Tyler leaning over behind me to grab the door of the car. All at once, when we reached the top of the hill, he swung the car far out in a fishtail that almost brought the car off the edge of the cliff.
“HOLD THIS!” he shouted, as he pushed the bag hard into my chest.
The force of the push, in combination with the location of the car and the open window, was a sequence of events that propelled me backward through the air, and right out of the safety of the car door.
Everything happened in slow motion from that point. The car, as well as Tyler’s face, was clear to me as I fell backward through the air. I felt an incredible sense of confusion and pain, wondering if he had betrayed me, and why.
