by Josh Law
“We’ve got a while before the Feds come to pick you up. I heard you like cowboys. Time for me to finally have some fun.” Snake smiled at Marilyn who swallowed hard realizing what he was suggesting and what he might try to do.
“You touch me and I’ll kill you.”
“Oh, and how do you plan to do that, toots? I don’t care what happened in Mexico, you’re no match to me. Your pretty boy son isn’t here to protect you…” Snake cut the keys and smiled at her, studying her closely.
Marilyn felt her heart skipping several beats. It was probably hopeless. The whole thing was doomed anyway. Just as easily as Snake could have his way with her right here in the jungle with no one to stop him, so too would Guatavita have her way and no one could suppress her despite Nicky’s plan.
Nick.
Somehow just his name inspired courage in her.
“How do you know that?” She smiled. Snake blinked confusedly. She wasn’t afraid and that infuriated him.
“What?”
“My son…How do you know he can’t protect me from you, even right now? If nothing else, his name protects me, Snake. I am the Jaguar’s mother. The only human being on the planet at this time that can boast medical capacity to repeatedly rise from the dead. You might be a master assassin, but my kid is legion. You could never snuff him out. He’d never stop coming for you. In the end, whatever they transform him into, whatever happens to the World, he would come for you. Admit it, you’re afraid of Nicolas Avalon.” Marilyn smiled.
Snake stretched a hand to the side of her face.
“Oh, he can try to hunt me all he wants. He’ll still never be able to undo what I’m going to do to you.” He giggled. For a moment, she thought it was over. He plucked out a knife and started slowly cutting her shirt open.
A shot rang out and went into the back of his head. There was little blood but his eyes crossed. She realized that the bullet had torn into his brain and spread in the shape of a blossom. He fell dead against the wheel. She sat there panting.
Behind the trigger stood Chief of Durango’s Police Parker Riggs.
“You just keep turning up like a bad penny and I love it!” Marilyn sat up, swallowing the vomit that rose to the top of her throat. She kicked Snake’s dead body out of the Jeep.
“Well, I was in Acapulco talking to the newspaper boys, when I get a text from Renee that says I better hop into a guy’s helicopter and get you out of Panama. Apparently your super-scary Zombie street fighter son has come up with a plan to save the world.” Riggs smiled and yanked Snake’s body backward from the truck, throwing him on the ground.
“Okay, so far the rest of these cats think that Snake’s in control. They think I’m one of the Feds. I’m supposed to be dragging you out by your hair in like 10 minutes for lift off back to the Capital where some of the plains clothes mercenaries are waiting to have you wacked. Yeah, see, I’ve been on the scene myself, I’ve got intel on the other half of York’s coin. I’m sure she’s already sold you all a manipulative bill of goods.” Riggs puffed. Marilyn studied him and could tell he’d been through hell himself.
“Sure you’ve got a long story to tell, Chief.” Marilyn smiled. Riggs nodded and slid out of his rain jacket.
“Here pull this on. Guatavita better hope she doesn’t figure out a way to get her Hell/Earth correspondence actually set up. If Nicky ever sees this guy down below, knowing what he thought about doing to you…” The Chief hissed through his teeth, not wanting to think about.
“Looks like Nicky’s terror is becoming a trend.” Marilyn marveled at that. Nick was a smart aleck who took insane risks but his bark was way bigger than his bite. With a shudder at her close call, she shrugged the coat on.
“Alright, Mrs. Avalon. Seeing as we’re out of options, we will be commandeering this U.S/New Mayan property Jeep and heading to Panama City where we will rendezvous with your amigo El Sicario Death Angel and a random boat owner Tito. Nicky’s master plan? Shove off to the Pacific and round up the Lazarus Colony for a good old fashion Durango butt whooping!” He punched the gas. The wheels spun on Snake’s body. Bones crunched audibly and the Jeep thumped up and down. Mud and flesh spun everywhere, alerting the mercenaries that their fearless leader had met his well-deserved end.
“Marilyn, when this is over I sure as hell better be getting a raise!” Riggs shot off into the Jungle.
The Hell-hounds began to bray. Marilyn shouted and reached into the glove box hauling out a wad of napkins.
“Stuff this in your teeth!” Marilyn shouted and reached up pressing a napkin to Rigg’s lips.
“Why?”
Marilyn swallowed.
“The dog’s necks. The Mayans used hallucinogens made out of Amazon plants, yeah? See those censers chained to their necks? There you have it, Guatavita’s secret weapon. Some kind of siren psycho-active. If we can’t think straight, we can’t shoot straight and we’re no match for them.” Marilyn stuffed her nostrils and pulled the rain jacket’s hood over her eyes and zipped it up around her mouth. Riggs reached into his pocket and pulled up a bandana stuffing his nose as well.
“Siren drugs, revived jungle kingdoms, zombie teenagers! What the hell?!” Riggs tossed his head.
Marilyn felt Rigg’s walkie talkie buzz in his coat pocket. She whipped it out and answered it.
“Copy.”
“Riggs, damn it, you’ve got to get back to the beach now! Mexico’s going crazy! The Feds have decided to send like 10 battalions of Marines down here to “clean up the streets”. They’re saying something about Mexico launching a terrorist attack on U.S. soil.”
“Uh, Riggs is busy. This is Marilyn Avalon. I can take a message.”
The voice got quiet.
“Do you have any idea what you’ve done?”
“The Mexican mafia came to Durango, blew my kid’s foster home off the map, abducted him, and tried to rope him into some political human sacrifice. If you were a parent, what would you have done?”
Radio silence. Riggs cut Marilyn a look. They spun in circles through the trees, sliding donuts in the mud on their way up from the Jungle and back to where Cipriano’s friend had landed the chopper.
“I copy, Avalon. Tell Riggs that it’s all going loco State-side. The Feds have invaded Durango and there’s a warrant for his arrest. Also, they’ve dismissed the Drop Science Trial as irrelevant or some crap. There’s mass hysteria in Washington as all these crazy purple tear gas bombs have gone off around the Supreme Court!” Silence. The guy was hoping against the odds that she might know something.
“You’re not going to believe the story I’ve got for you…Can I take your name?”
“Emerson Child, U.S. Marshall.”
“Marshall Child, get ready for World War 3.” Marilyn drew a deep breath. Riggs cut her a globe-eyed look. Here went nothing.
Chapter 12:
“Understand something! If so much as a single hair of his curls in the process, I don’t care how many of your History major frat boys and pagan gods I got to wade through, I’ll bury you sister!” Alex head-butted the guy that was grappling him and cracked his skull. He fell to his knees sobbing. Alex swung his elbow into the next guy’s chest and cracked his sternum. That guy threw up almost instantly from the pain and fell to his knees aspirating until one of the medics tore his way through to him.
Nick stood balancing at the Jaguar’s prow, holding his breath. He was painted blue and seven guys had forced his mouth open and fitted a jade dental plate down on either row of his teeth. He now stood as they dribbled him in gold looking down at a huge, beaver-dam like mosh pit filled to swarming with male jaguars with the same amethyst steam seeping censers as the dogs had chained to their necks.
“It’s cool, Alex!” Nick tried to twist around to see the epic fight his brother was putting up. They both knew that he was talking smack, but it was just his nature to try and reassure him. Alex had seen Hell over the last two years and it was Nick’s fault. He hadn’t meant to hurt him.
C
hance looked on with crossing eyes. He held a fat stapled document in his hands.
“So, what, I have to read this whole thing?” His chin jutted indifferently. Even with the threats Guatavita had made, Chance was looking for his loophole to defiance. His means of escape.
Nick held his breath looking down into the pit. It was crazy. Why did he always have to do everything the hard way? Yet, it was possible. Alex had already put a dent in security.
“Kelly, I’m going to call you Kelly, yeah? Okay, just for the record, this is a sucky excuse for a flagship. How many guys could you possibly have on here? Like 50?” Nick tossed his head and the guys that held him stumbled.
“I have legions of people I can just snap my fingers and call up. You’re not actually thinking of backing out of this are you?” Guatavita raised an eyebrow, searing laughter rocking her entire body.
“Okay, so you say you’ve got legions in the bank, I get that. What about on the boat?” Nick spun on his heel and barred the jade teeth.
Guatavita’s lips narrowed into a thin line.
“57.”
Nick clapped his hands together.
“Wanna see something crazy?” Nick smiled, looking straight in Chance’s face and pointing up, drawing his eyebrows up and down.
“Nicky, don’t make this harder than it has to be. I’m sorry about your mother…” Guatavita rubbed her forehead like she was dealing with an irritable toddler.
“Hey, this is supposed to be kitty bonding time, right? Brb.” To their astonishment, Nick did a backflip off the Jaguar’s prow and dove into the Pit.
“Restrain these two before Nick talks them into doing something idiotic.” Guatavita motioned to her guards to get a move on. Alex and Chance exchanged a glance. This was crazy, but they were way ahead of Nick’s plan. Could they actually pull this off?
“He’ll need help back up!” Alex nodded having understood his brother’s sign language before Chance had. Chance ran for the former fishing rig’s single aluminum/ gold plated mast.
“Lady, if you’re going to host a hostile Planet take-over, didn’t you think about making your Naval One more than a Christmas Parade float?” Chance scoffed as he began to climb the rigging like a monkey and cut it loose, letting slack lines fall down toward the Pit.
Alex ran head first towards Guatavita. Alarmed, she dove from her throne. It was the only part of the ship that was a solid gold cast of a historical throne. 20 guards popped out of the forecastle and dove for him. He drove his shoulder into the throne and let its own weight tip it over. It slammed on several feet accompanied by hysteric screams.
Alex spiraled on his heel as all 37 of the rest encircled him. They’d all but given up on Chance who dangled from the rigging, moving hand over hand as he lowered lines for Nick to grab on to. Guatavita turned her attention to him, plucking up an old Mosin-Nagant she’d had propped against her throne and firing round after round at his hands. He gave a loud yelp as one of the bullets grazed his hand. Even in pain and with threats made to his sister, he had to do this. It was his last chance to stick it to the woman that might become the dictator of the once Free World.
Screams rose from the Jaguar pit like smoke from the gates of Perdition. Alex felt his heart stop. In the confusion, he’d forgotten to worry about his brother faced off against the psycho-active jaguars. Everyone froze at his blood-curdling wailing. The guards turned away from Alex to look.
Suddenly, scaling the slack rigging lines like only cats can master, the whole nest of Jaguars began to ascend to the decks. Nick emerged from the Pit seated on the shoulders of a massive male that screamed in indifference at being hauled on board.
Blood streamed from Nick’s arms and from his shoulders that were shredded like a Roman flogging. He smiled sadistically, tugging at the chains that he’d twisted in the teeth of the tormented cats as he’d hauled them topside.
“You wanted a Jaguar, you sick braud? Here’s a whole passel of ‘em! Happy Hanukkah!” He hurled the chains to the deck. The beasts took off.
Alex smiled, relief washing over him that he’d come out alive. He was critically wounded, though. Nick would never blink an eyelash at it, but he was bleeding out rapidly. He’d be dead in minutes if Alex didn’t do something.
He reached and ripped a shirt off of one of the guards that a jaguar had pounced on, sinking its teeth into his skull. He took a running leap straight to the big male that Nick was riding. His brother saw him coming and held out a hand to him. He hauled himself up on its back and shoved the shirt against Nick’s shoulder wounds.
“You, my brother, are somersaulting pumpkins crazy!” Alex popped the back of Nick’s head with his open palm. Nick leaned back against his brother’s chest and smiled weakly.
“Take it easy, granny. It worked, eh?”
Chance came soaring from the mast, arms spread out like a flying squirrel, screaming mindlessly. He spread his legs into the perfect X and landed smooth on the back of a jaguar that began to buck like a crazed steer bull.
“Nicky! I hate you! I for real hate you!” Chance grappled the cat by the ears and hung on for the ride.
“Mm, kitty bonding time was successful. Okay, so let’s cut our losses. Most of the guards are dead. Where’s her Ladyship?” Nick twisted the chain in the cat’s jaws. It screamed and thrashed its front paws at the air but couldn’t reach backward and tear at him in this position.
“Calling in air support? Think she’s going to make a dramatic escape. This’ll be fun.” Alex leaned exhaustedly against his brother. He pointed a shaking finger to where Guatavita balanced on the guard rail, a walkie pressed to her ear. They heard a chopper’s engine cut through the tree line and felt their spirits sink as machine gun fire picked off a few of the big cats.
They’d shaken off their captors for the most part. Chance directed the cat to where one of the guards had dropped his tactical rifle, scooped it up, held it to its head and blew the trigger. He rolled over its head and landed in front of the forecastle, turning and blasting the tech box to make their location hard to pin-point for all of Guatavita’s other guns spread across the jungle. Casting the rifle aside, he grabbed the wheel and began to manual steer the motor boat down the river, heading back toward Yaviza.
So far they felt their counter measures were working. Yet both of them weren’t naïve enough to think that this was anywhere in the ballpark locale of over.
Chapter 13:
She’d faced the Hounds of Hell before. Renee Vierra was ready.
She leaned against a tree, the rifle pressed against her chest. Her heart was drilling in her head. Away in the brush, she felt Cipriano creep with a cat’s feet ever closer to the fence that surrounded Yaviza. He was coming in under the guise of an illegal sea turtle egg seller. The people of Yaviza would learn too late that the larger than life eggs were really the decorative explosive devices of one talented young Bacardi Tanaka.
She laughed through her nose, hearing the beasts paw the ground. There was no way out of this one. Sooner than later she was going to have to pounce and draw the dogs on here. It was just forcing herself to move. Her soul had wilted like a sun-bleached grapevine when the Jaguar slid over the horizon, her little brother on board.
Renee looked up the tree trunk, watching small blue birds dancing on the limbs. There was a mother bird standing in her nest, dangling a dripping flower over her young’s beak. Renee caught her breath. How had such a beautiful image found its way into her dark world? It gave her hope and her reason.
Alex.
Her hands rattled against the rifle, making the bolt click. She sealed her eyes until they watered. His image wouldn’t leave her. He moved inside her, furious to be free. Wasn’t he the powerful spirit that gave life to her core, filling her with fire, adding his will to her own?
These were the ways she loved that kid. These and so many more! He was the son she’d never had. In this moment, when her life was on the line and ,this time, it was a great possibility that she wouldn’t live to take
the next moment in, she realized she had never had the guts to tell him that. To change his name. He was her son and he should wear her name. Alex Vierra. It had the perfect ring to it as far as she was concerned.
“If you can hear me, kid. If I don’t make it. You need to know that dying for you was easy…I love you, champ!” A dog’s nose peered around the tree and snarled. Purple psychoactive chemicals effused from his nostrils and wafted over her skin, causing it to sizzle and blister.
“That’s right, you pig ugly spud! You walk a lady to a dance!” She rolled around and smashed the dog’s nose with the rifle butt. It whined and rolled on its back.
The woods was swarming with animals hopped on the psycho-actives. Renee’s eyes went wide and she caught her breath. Not only dogs. Pigs, monkeys, ocelots. Even large snapping turtles. Animals native to Panama and some foreign. A whole petting zoo of creatures was transformed to jungle-gladiators by the effects of the smoke.
Some pawed at the earth. Some stood on hind legs and snarled scratching at the air. Still others rolled in bouts of dizzying epilepsy, tearing up the earth as their eyes rolled white with the poison. She flinched as Harpy Eagles came rolling through the sky, wreathed in the smoke like creatures out of Hell. One woman against the grand sweep of mythological nightmares. No pressure.
“You guys looking for a big, golden, Noah’s maybe cat-shaped Ark by any chance? First one to actually hoof it there gets to take a swipe at Guatavita!” She spun the rifle around her wrist. Chance hadn’t become a sharpshooter by himself, now had he? She’d taught him to hunt for squirrels after their parents were murdered over meth and they’d had to care for one another in the abandoned family home. She was the sensei of the sharpshooter extraordinaire and had this one in the bag.
It wouldn’t be long before she’d run out of ammo, though. Her jeans’ pockets were full to bursting with brass but she’d go through that in a matter of minutes. There would have to be a way to kill a possessed Serengeti with one stone.
