Freelancers: Falcon & Phoenix

by Thackston, Anthony

  Falcon jerks Phoenix’s arm up and down as he tries to put an elbow in the top of Little Wang’s head. The little brother blocks the strikes and delivers strikes of his own, forcing Falcon to defend himself and Phoenix.

  The car swerves all over the road as Falcon yanks Phoenix around, trying to keep from being hit. He takes a few of the blows just to get in closer to Little Wang. The brother gets hold of Falcon’s head and he pulls him into the back seat, taking Phoenix’s arm with him. The inadvertent move actually benefits them as the sudden pull forces her to cut the car to the right, avoiding another rear end collision from Big Wang’s truck.

  Phoenix tries to maintain control. Out of the corner of her eye she notices the truck pull alongside her. She looks to her left as the passenger side window rolls down. Her eyes go straight to the gun pointing directly at her. She ducks down and the bullet passes through her open window and into the passenger door.

  She sits up and cuts the wheel to the left, slamming into the assailing vehicle and almost sending Big Wang off of the road.

  Falcon does his best, in the back seat, to keep from jerking Phoenix around too much. The task is nearly impossible while he's forced to block the punches aimed at either side of his head. He tries to get in his own punch but Little Wang grabs his free arm and starts to put it in some kind of submission hold. Without a free hand, Falcon has little choice but to use his head. He rears back and drives his head into Little Wang’s. The hit doesn’t knock him out but it does loosen his grip on Falcon’s arm.

  The Freelancer moves to the other side of the back seat to alleviate the strain on Phoenix’s arm. Little Wang shakes off the dizzy feeling just in time to see Falcon wildly kicking at him. The two both kick at each other. The strikes do little in the way of finding a target as their legs flail about, sometimes getting tangled, sometimes just hitting the bottoms of each other’s boots.

  As the vehicles speed down the road, the storm clouds darken the sky. A light drizzle quickly turns into a heavy rain. Whatever lines used to be painted on the road are nearly invisible. Even if the windshield didn’t have bullet holes in it, at this speed, the visibility is almost zero. The heavy pouring rain drumming on the roof of the car makes Falcon and Little Wang stop trading blows with one another. They both sit up to face the front.

  The car skids as the tires lose traction on the wet road. Phoenix tries to keep it under control with one arm.

  “I could really use that other hand,” she says as she gently turns into the skids.

  Falcon scrambles to climb into the passenger seat. He holds his arm near the steering wheel, giving her as much freedom of movement as possible.

  Phoenix winces as over-extended muscles suddenly contract.

  Big Wang stays just in Phoenix’s blind spot with Rosario actually catching up. Her oversized tires leave her with little worry about losing traction on the road. The Dealer is the only one who slows down. Having only his hat as any kind of roof does little to keep the rain out of his eyes.

  All gunfire stops in light of the storm as the vehicles hit the gradual incline of a curving freeway ramp.

  “What is that?” Falcon squints. He points at the top of the ramp. Something large sits in the road.

  “I can’t tell—”

  “Marauders!” Little Wang yells.

  Falcon’s eyes widen. “Is that a bus?”

  Phoenix releases the accelerator. She barely taps the brake for fear of losing control on the wet road but as the car gets closer to the bus, what Phoenix sees makes her change her mind. She slams on the brake pedal as the car comes around the curve. An old yellow school bus blocks the road. Several guns appear through the windows of the bus, aiming right at them.

  10

  Nearly every window of the road blocking bus has a gun sticking out of it. Muzzle flashes light up the scarred faces of the Marauders inside. Phoenix keeps her foot on the brake pedal as the car rounds the curve, getting closer to the weaponized bus. But the slick road keeps the car moving forward. She shifts the vehicle into reverse and switches back to the accelerator. The tires spin backward but the wet road and their initial momentum still keeps them heading toward the new trap.

  Little Wang tries to wave his brother down and warn him but Big Wang’s attention is still on his target as he moves his truck up on the driver’s side of the car. The backwards spinning tires finally slow the car down and Big Wang gradually eases ahead but he still doesn’t notice the bus.

  Rosario catches up just in time for the tires on Phoenix’s car to grab the road and take it backwards. The scarred woman watches as the large off-road tires go right past the backwards-moving car. She turns to face the front, again, and is met with a hail of bullets from the bus.

  Big Wang’s truck slams into the bus first. Rosario’s large tires hit it on the other side. The impact does little more than rock the bus and put them even closer to the gunfire.

  Phoenix turns around to watch the curve of the road as she races backwards.

  “Turn this thing around!” Falcon yells when a bullet hits the car's hood.

  Phoenix turns the wheel, pulling Falcon into her. The spin tosses Little Wang to the other side of the back seat. With the car facing down the ramp, Phoenix throws it into drive and hits the gas. The rear end fishtails a little but the tires return to the road quickly enough.

  Little Wang sits up and looks out the back window. The heavy rain makes it hard to see much more than the vehicle shapes all following them. Including the bus. “Why are Marauders in my country?”

  Falcon turns to face Wang and sees all three vehicles chasing after them. “Worry more about how we’re gonna get away from them.”

  Even with the heavy rain hitting the car, the sheer amount of gunfire blasting from the bus, is nearly deafening. It makes no difference to the Marauders who they get. Rosario and Big Wang try to fire at the engine of the bus to stop it. All any of them knows is that they don’t want to be who the bus catches up to. Fortunately it's taking a long time for it to catch up. Unfortunately, the bus occupants don’t care about what happens to their vehicle. The bus doesn’t slow as it skids against the cement barrier in pursuit of whichever car it can get close enough to.

  Falcon watches the bus come out of the curve and onto the straight away. “At least those two are between us and them.”

  “Not for long.” Little Wang points at the bus.

  The glow of a flame reflects off of the falling water. The bus’s speed rapidly increases as it catches up to Rosario. To Falcon’s dread it gets alongside her. Gun blasts fire off in her direction. Lucky for her, the oversized tires provide adequate protection for the most part. She tries to turn into the bus to knock it off the road but despite her heavy tires, the bus is still heavier.

  The gunfire continues as the Marauder-modified vehicle passes her up and pulls alongside Big Wang.

  “They passed her up.” Falcon’s words are almost inaudible.

  “Passed her up? What?” Phoenix looks in her side mirror. “Marauders don’t pass anyone up. Don’t tell me they're after you, too.” She turns to Falcon. He shakes his head.

  They both look back and see the bus starting to pass Big Wang. Their eyes fall to Little Wang whose expression is one of guilt as he shrugs his shoulders. “I did a bad thing, once.”

  “Once?” Falcon demands.

  He and Phoenix turn to face the front just in time to see the Dealer heading straight for them. Phoenix veers to the left, narrowly missing the dune buggy. Big Wang and Rosario shift out of the oncoming vehicle’s way. Even the bus moves out of the way. Sadly for the Dealer, it’s not far enough. The front of the big yellow vehicle hits the front of the dune buggy on the driver’s side. The impact sends the Dealer’s car spinning off of the road.

  Big Wang watches as the bus speeds toward Falcon’s and Phoenix’s car. If they catch them, they’ll take his brother and put him through a hell worse than any the Emperor would have done to Falcon. The driver’s side of the windshield rolls down an
d Big Wang takes aim at the bus’ tires. His shots hit the bumper of the quickly escaping vehicle. He refocuses his aim to the exhaust pipe connected to the fire-spewing turbine near the roof. Two bullets hit the pipe running along the side of the bus. The flame sputters out and the bus instantly slows.

  Big Wang quickly gains on the bus but the back door of the modified vehicle opens up and two Marauders with sinister grins stand in the doorway. They both hold one military-grade fifty caliber vulcan cannon. The barrel spins seconds before the bullet-spitting machine unleashes its six thousand round a minute ammo.

  Big Wang slams on the brakes but it’s too late as the bullets rip into the front of the truck. If the first bullet didn’t destroy his engine the other two hundred or so did. The large brother jumps out of his vehicle just before it becomes a rolling ball of fire.

  Without the speed boost from the turbine, the bus returns to its normal top speed. It is slow enough for Rosario to catch up to it. She pulls along the bus’s side and fires at one of the windows. The buckshot shatters the glass, taking out the shooter behind it. She pulls the gun back in to chamber another shell. Before she has another chance to re-aim, the bus swerves into her, pinning her against a metal railing. Rosario tries to turn into the bus to get herself unstuck but its weight keeps the pressure on.

  A short chance to escape comes up as the Marauder vehicle steers to the other side of the road. Rosario tries to speed ahead of the bus to avoid being pinned, again. A fatal mistake. She looks to her left to see it coming in for another hit. There’s no time to hit the brakes and the bus slams into her. This time the impact with the side rail causes her vehicle to pop up over it and flip off the road.

  Falcon looks back to see the off-road tires rolling over and over before the illuminated chasers from the vulcan cannon fly toward her car, bursting it into a ball of fire. “I’m sorry,” he mutters as the heavy rains douse the fire, quickly.

  “That’s three out of the way,” Phoenix says.

  Falcon faces the front. “There’s no way they’re catching up with us now.”

  “Really? These damn Marauders.” Little Wang watches as the bus actually does start catching up with them.

  Phoenix turns around. “How much nitro does that thing have?”

  She steers the car to take up one lane while the bus maintains its position. Guns fire out of one side of the window. Phoenix takes her foot off of the gas and lets the bus get closer.

  “What are you doing?” Falcon asks.

  “Trust me.”

  The bus speeds past them. The flame of the second turbine shoots out of the back door. Phoenix watches the bus pull ahead of them. The flame goes out and two Marauders push the turbine toward the front of the bus. Phoenix then floors the accelerator and catches up to the Marauder vehicle.

  “Phoenix?” Falcon asks as he watches the vulcan cannon being set up in the open door.

  “Not yet.” She glances at the guard rail.

  The Marauders plant their feet in the doorway. One holds the fifty cal while the other grips the trigger.

  “Phoenix.” Falcon’s voice gets louder.

  “Not yet.” She glances back toward the guard rail as they get closer to the back of the bus.

  The barrel of the gun starts to spin. Slow at first, then much faster.

  “Phoenix!” Falcon yells as he starts to reach for the wheel.

  “Now!” With the right side guard rail, now gone, she steers the car to the left of the bus just as a hail-storm of bullets fly into the previously occupied section of street. She pulls the car up to the rear wheel and cuts sharply to the right. The impact, coupled with the wet road, makes the bus fishtail violently. It also causes Falcon’s and Phoenix’s car to spin out.

  The drivers of both vehicles try to correct their direction. They both fail. The bus is the first to roll and, without a guard rail to stop or slow it down, the Marauder vehicle rolls over and over off of the road and into a field.

  Phoenix’s car does hit a guard rail but, just like Rosario, it pops up over it and rolls into the open field on the other side.

  11

  The rain turns to a light sprinkle as the sun’s evening rays break through the dark, parting clouds. One of the rays hits Falcon and Phoenix right in their eyes. Phoenix is the first to put her hand in front of her face, blocking out the intense orange glow. She squeezes her eyes tight and starts to sit up.

  Falcon’s head rests on the open window of the door. He tries to bring his left hand up to block the sunlight but the unexpected drag of Phoenix’s arm stops him. “Oh yeah,” he says, displeased at the situation.

  “You, too,” she comments as she pulls her arm back towards her, finding some kind of middle ground between the two of them. She looks down at her jacket and her legs. They’re covered in bits of glass from the blown-out windshield. Popping her jacket gets the glass chunks off of it and she carefully brushes away the shards on her legs.

  Little Wang sits up in the back seat and looks around at the car. More glass is in the back and the interior has dents pushed in his direction, making the rear seat feel claustrophobic. His hand goes to his head. “Anyone get the number of that—”

  “Bad joke.” Falcon slowly turns around to shoot Little Wang a scolding look. He looks down in his lap and finds the gun. He ejects the magazine. Empty. He drops the useless weapon to the floorboard.

  Phoenix looks over Falcon then back to Little Wang. “We’re ok.” She opens her car door and it falls off of the hinges, crashing to the ground. She takes a disbelieving glance at Falcon before stepping out of the wreck of a car, dragging her sluggish prisoner behind her. They both look the car over as Little Wang stumbles out of the back seat and falls to the ground.

  “We’re ok. The car, though…” Falcon says, looking at the busted out glass and the bullet holes littering the hood. The roof looks as though it had bowling balls dropped on it.

  “The other car would have taken a better beating.” Falcon admits he may have been wrong about his choice of vehicle.

  “I won’t say I told you so.” Phoenix rubs the back of her neck with her right hand, pulling Falcon’s arm up with it. “At least we landed upright.” She points across the road. The Marauder bus lies on its side.

  “Think any of them survived that?” Little Wang tries to look for any signs of life. The top of the bus faces them, making it impossible to see inside.

  “We did,” Falcon tells him.

  Little Wang watches the Marauder vehicle, knowing that Falcon is right.

  “Still,” Falcon continues. “There were more of them in there than us. That many bodies. That many guns…”

  “They probably all shot themselves during the roll.” Phoenix adds as she walks to the front of the car. She pops the hood and the Freelancers examine the engine. “It looks ok,” she says.

  “Yeah.” Falcon reaches for one of the bullet holes in the hood. “Maybe we got lucky.”

  “You got a funny idea of luck.” She slams the hood shut and pulls him back around to the doorless driver’s side. Phoenix reaches inside for the keys and turns them. A sigh of relief escapes her when the car starts.

  “Like I said.” Falcon looks at her. “Lucky.”

  “Ok. Get in,” she tells him. He climbs back into the car through the driver’s side. Phoenix follows.

  “Wait. You’re not leaving me here,” Little Wang protests.

  “Your brother tried to run us off the road and you climbed in, trying to stop us,” Phoenix tells him.

  “You took me to the Emperor knowing what he would do to me. What makes you think we’d let you back in here?” Falcon asks.

  “I can see why you might—”

  “Good luck in Marauder country.” Falcon says as Phoenix hits the gas. The car lurches forward but doesn’t go anywhere. Phoenix floors it but the car stays in place.

  “Same to you, huh?” Little Wang crouches down and looks at Falcon before shifting his gaze to the rear tire. Phoenix looks back at the object of
his attention.

  The tire is in a small rut. She hits the gas but the wheel just free spins, slinging mud behind it and along the fender. “We’re stuck in the mud,” she says, more for her benefit than Falcon’s. Phoenix steps out, dragging her prisoner with her. The three of them stare at the muddy rut. “Go check if there’s anything in that bus we can use.”

  Little Wang stares at her like she’s joking. “I’m not going over there. You know what they’ll do to me?”

  “I want to know what you did to them,” Falcon says.

  Little Wang smiles. It’s a fake smile, expressing regret over a stupid act. “Marauders have chiefs. Chiefs have daughters. You do the math.”

  Phoenix raises an eyebrow. “You know some of them are cannibals, right? You’re lucky you got away from her.”

  “I hope it was worth it,” Falcon tells him.

  “Well up until now…”

  “It doesn’t matter. We need to get this thing moving again. You.” She points to Little Wang. “Get in.”

  “Are you kidding?” Falcon starts. “You’re gonna let him drive?”

  “Someone needs to push and I'm not letting you go.” She holds up her cuffed hand. “He has to drive it out.”

  “Un-cuff me and the problem is solved.”

  “I’m not risking you running off again.”

  “You’d rather let the guy who helped try to kill us drive off, than just trust that I won’t run.”

  “If there’s more Marauders, I’m not walking. I promise I won’t run,” Little Wang says as he gets in the driver’s seat.

  “I feel a lot better since you promised,” Falcon says as Phoenix jerks him to the rear of the car.

  The two of them put their shoulders into the vehicle. “Start slow,” Phoenix says.

  The back tires slowly turn while Falcon and Phoenix push. Getting traction on their own becomes a problem as their boots slide on the muddy terrain.

  Falcon readjusts his stance so his back is to the car. “Try a little faster,” he says as he digs his heels into the slick ground. The tires kick up globs of mud but don’t seem to do much more than dig a deeper trench.