Always open with a joke. Chase, the comedian.
The bald guy coughs and rubs his sweaty throat with coarse hands. It sounds like sandpaper skinning a trout.
“Do you always greet people this way? You point a gun at them?” he says, his rich baritone smothered in a Russian accent.
“If I don’t know them, yes. So why don’t you tell me your name and I’ll see what I can do about this gun?” I say.
“My name is Doctor X,” the man says.
Hillary paces nearby, burning off the excess adrenaline in her system. She keeps muttering something. I assume correctly that it’s profanity and continue with the interrogation.
“Doctor X, huh? Must make you the only doctor with a signature anyone can actually read on those prescription slips,” I say.
“I don’t write prescriptions, idiot,” Doctor X says.
“No shit. This isn’t exactly a Walgreens,” I say, nodding to the wreckage. “What brings you to the Museum of the Bizarre, Doctor X, other than finally finding a place where your look fits in?”
Doctor X doesn’t appreciate my sense of humor. Good. I use humor like a weapon, even if I’m the only one laughing. It keeps me focused and in control.
“Let me up and I’ll tell you,” Doctor X says.
I look over to Hillary, still wearing a hole in the moonlight on the ground. “You good with that?”
“Yeah. Let him up,” she says, taking the reins back from the adrenaline.
Doctor X shuffles to his feet a little too quickly for my liking.
“Easy pal,” I say and take a step back. “Up against the Jeep. Hands on the hood.”
Doctor X complies, although not without a string of what I assume is an insult about my mother directed at me in Russian. I keep the laser sight on him as Hillary pats him down. She finds a quartermaster’s bounty of daggers, ammo and gadgets, all of which she sets on the ground. It’s the wallet or ID I’m most interested in, but those are missing.
“Doctor X” it is then.
“OK, Doctor X, let ‘er rip. Who are you?” I say once Hillary is finished.
“I’m someone who can offer you a lot of money to stop what you’re doing and forget this ever happened,” Doctor X says, his hands still resting on the hood.
“Oh, yeah? How much?” I say.
Hillary shoots me a dirty look.
Then again, too much humor can be a bad thing.
“I mean, what makes you such a hotshot?” I say.
“Because I possess something far more important than money. It’s why I came here. I needed to make sure the museum was properly handled,” Doctor X says.
I watch Hillary pick up a dagger and squeeze it tight in her hand. She’s thinking what I’m thinking.
“What are you in possession of that’s so important?” I say.
Doctor X pauses and cranks his head around to look at Hillary. “I’m the one who has your Iceman.”
13.
The revelation about Doctor X’s connection to the Iceman comes as little surprise, but Hillary still looks shocked. It’s as if the revelation confirms this isn’t a dream.
Doctor X takes a step back from the Jeep and turns to face us. The laser sight from my .45 continues to plant a red dot in his vitals, but he knows I may as well be holding a foot-long sub. I’m not going to shoot him, not even if it would do his ugly mug some good. The moonlight accentuates the crooked peaks and hollow valleys of his face.
“Me. I took the Iceman,” Doctor X says. He raises his hands to mock the .45 in mine.
Hillary corrects him. “Stole. You stole my Iceman.”
“No. I’m returning it to its rightful owner. It was never yours to begin with. Not you, not the wretched capitalists who whored out its body almost 50 years ago and absolutely not the so-called collector you purchased it from,” Doctor X says to Hillary.
“With the check I wrote to buy it, you better believe I own the Iceman,” Hillary says.
Doctor X erratically rubs the eye not covered by the patch like he’s shining an apple. He blinks and says, “You’re wrong twice. First, the Iceman is the property of the Russian government. Second, your laws forbid you from owning a human being.”
The plot thickens, but so does my bullshit detector. He’s an opportunist trying to con us out of something. The Russian accent is probably a fake.
“Nice try, buddy, but even if you’re telling the truth, you’re the one who is mistaken,” I say. “The Iceman hit the scene in the 1960s, which means it would technically fall to the Soviet Union, a country that no longer exists. Second, it’s not a human being. It’s a…a…”
I want to say, “fake,” but I lose my appetite to kick the Museum of the Bizarre while it’s down. Instead, I turn to Hillary and ask, “What is it exactly?” because I can’t imagine she’d put a human corpse on display for profit.
“It makes me a lot of money. That’s what it is,” Hillary says without a hint of remorse.
“You never confirmed what it actually is?” I say. I’m unpleasantly surprised by her lack of empathy. What if the Iceman is just some guy who found himself locked inside a freezer back in the ‘60s?
Doctor X chuckles and mutters something in Russian before switching back to English to say, “All you need to know is it’s human and it belongs to the Russian government. The fall of the CCCP doesn’t change either of those things. Indeed, it is you who is the criminal. I merely reclaimed stolen property and pulled over on the side of the road, where I was attacked by a woman in a vehicle and a man with a gun.”
He’s got a point, even if it’s only logical in the vortex of conversations like this one. I lower the .45 while Hillary looks on incredulously like I pulled a severed head out of my pocket.
What the hell am I doing here? Is Hillary who she says she is? Should I really be helping her reclaim a human body so she can turn a buck? And what’s the true story behind the Iceman?
I need answers before I can even think about using that .45 again.
“Good to see you’re a reasonable man, Mr. Baker. I wish I could say the same for Ms. Carter,” Doctor X says. “We tried the easy way, but she refused. We had no choice. Our agent gave his life to cover our tracks, to make this look like a random act or an accident. The Iceman is that important to my country.”
“And why is that?” I say.
“That’s not for you to know,” Doctor X says. He nods to the Jeep. “Now move that vehicle so I can be on my way, and so you two can live to see tomorrow.”
Hillary holds the keys, and she isn’t in a hurry to move the Jeep away from its position blocking in Doctor X’s car.
“Not until you tell me where you’re keeping it and when you’re bringing it back,” she says to Doctor X.
“Fine. Have it your way,” Doctor X says and whistles.
Whistles?
Suddenly, I’m not the only one with a laser sight out here. A spider web of lasers stretches out across the night, ensnaring Hillary and I like two trapped flies.
“Did you think I travel alone?” Doctor X says. “This is your last chance. Move your vehicle and let me leave, or die.”
The laser sights trained on our bodies make a convincing argument. Hillary stomps to the Jeep, fires it up and eases it back just enough for Doctor X to leave in his car, which he does after gathering his belongings from the ground. The lasers disappear as he drives away, taking any chance of finding the Iceman with him. That is, unless we follow him in the Jeep.
“You thinking what I’m thinking?” I say into the open driver’s seat window of the Jeep.
“Get in,” Hillary says. “There’s no way this ends here.”
I ride shotgun in the passenger seat with the pistol while Hillary does her best NASCAR driver imitation. The laser sights from outside streak through windows as we haul ass down the road in pursuit of Doctor X.
Things are going to get interesting.
14.
Doctor X’s head start evaporates within the first minute of
the Jeep peeling away at the museum. Whoever is on the other end of those laser sights fires off a few shots for good measure, but nothing connects. Or so it seems at first.
I can’t tell if it’s Hillary’s driving, with her foot pounding on the accelerator like it’s stomping an ember that floated into a gas station, or a lucky shot at the sidewalls, but it’s obvious the rear passenger side tire is flat. We should be OK since I specifically asked for run-flat tires at the rental agency, but the Jeep still shudders and pulls toward the ditch. Hillary overcorrects, sending us briefly into a 70 MPH fishtail before things settle down again.
Damn. I’m not getting my deposit back for this rental.
The taillights on Doctor X’s car come into view a moment later. We could follow him back to wherever he came from, but I doubt he’ll do us that favor now that the Jeep’s headlights offer a clear outline of the wrinkles on the back of his head. The other option, now that we’ve put some road between the shooters back at the museum and us, is obvious. Doctor X’s car isn’t cut out for these country roads outside Austin, a point I’m sure he’s realizing after turning onto a washboard gravel lane. Even in a Jeep with a flat tire, we’re riding his ass like a skid mark in a pair of old underwear. It won’t take much to run him off the road, but it’ll need to be done correctly to avoid killing everyone.
“Pull up to his left side parallel to his left rear tire, then turn to the right like you’re changing lanes,” I say to Hillary over the thwump of the flat tire’s complaining.
I just described the PIT maneuver, something law enforcement agencies use during high-speed chases to force a vehicle to stop quickly. This can mean forcing the fleeing vehicle into a roll, a spin out or a fishtail, sometimes with devastating results. I don’t want Doctor X dead, though. The PIT maneuver is designed to stop, not kill, and the odds of survival are better than bumper-to-bumper ramming.
That’s the theory, anyway. I’ve never pulled the PIT off myself, and I’ve certainly not tried it by talking it through with someone else at the wheel and a flat tire on a washboard road. This is something for armchair Rambo types to debate while watching breaking news delivered by Chopper 5 Eye in the Sky.
“You sure?” Hillary says.
“If I’m wrong and we wind up dead, I owe you a Coke in heaven,” I say, shouting above the cacophony.
“Or hell,” Hillary says.
She waits to make her move until we reach a straightaway that I wish was another mile longer. Besides nudging a vehicle piloted by an irate driver, the trick with the PIT is in the recovery. We very well could flip in the ditch or find our faces compressed into the bark of one of the bigtooth maples flanking the road.
With translucent knuckles, Hillary guides the Jeep into position next to Doctor X’s car. He doesn’t seem to realize what’s happening, because if he did he’d swerve a bit to throw the physics off. Gravel churns in rocky pops in the foot-long margin between our two vehicles, adding to the deafening racket filling the cab. I glance at the curve coming up in the road. We’re in perfect position, and we can’t wait a second more. It’s do or die. It could also be die or die, depending on how this turns out.
“Now, Hillary,” I say.
Hillary’s gusto evaporates. She hesitates at the wheel.
“I know this seems crazy, but do it. When he spins out, hit the brakes,” I say, begging her to take action before it’s too late.
Hillary adds another millisecond too many to her hesitation. I reach over and yank the steering wheel to the right. The front bumper of the Jeep connects with Doctor X’s car. I don’t hear the sound of the two vehicles colliding. Thinking back to the rule about hearing explosions, I know this isn’t a good thing.
For a moment I feel weightless. My guts lose their gravity and nearly careen out my mouth. That feeling quickly gives way to a violent correction. It’s like the entire universe collapsed into a single point, followed by darkness and silence.
This did not go well.
15.
“Chase? Are you OK?” comes a voice that gradually comes into clarity. It could only be Hillary’s, and it must mean the PIT maneuver didn’t go as planned. I’m on my back, there’s blood in my mouth for the third time in the past 24 hours and all I can see are stars above me in the clear Texas night.
I slowly get to my feet, anticipating that some part of my body will suddenly give way. I’m pleasantly surprised to find that not only does that not happen, but also that I’m in decent shape, or at least no worse than I was before. Even the .45 and ESEE knife remain securely stored in their holsters beneath my bush jacket. Of course, the risk of concussion is still present, but I swear my brain is used to this kind of abuse or I’d already be dead. It’s a gray callous at this point.
My eyes scan the night for signs of an overturned Jeep and scattered wreckage, but I find the vehicle idling on the road 50 feet away, albeit with a flat rear tire on the passenger side. My bags inside are still in place, too. Apparently, I was the only thing to be tossed out of the vehicle following the PIT maneuver. I don’t remember how it happened. Did I accidentally open the door as the Jeep swerved? Did I forget to close the door in the rush to follow Doctor X? Either way, I’m both the luckiest and unluckiest bastard on Earth to be scratching my ass in this ditch and asking these questions.
Just another day in paradise, minus the paradise.
“I’m here, and mostly fine,” I say and walk to the Jeep. Hillary stands next to the hood steaming in the cool breeze. It’s so hot I can practically smell the heat. “Where did our friend, Doctor X, go?”
Hillary points to an overturned car in the opposite ditch. I’ll be damned. The PIT maneuver worked after all. Doctor X’s car must’ve spun out and rolled into the ditch. The car looks like something one of those Transformers from the movies would shit out. He’s no use to us dead, but I’m impressed nonetheless. It’s not every day you get to pull something like that off.
“I’m fine, no thanks to you two,” comes Doctor X’s unmistakable voice from somewhere beneath the car.
His voice doesn’t demonstrate the kind of stress I’d expect to hear after living through the four-wheeled meat grinder that was the rollover.
I draw the .45, and we head over to the car. We find Doctor X beneath a pile of twisted metal away from the cab. He didn’t wear his seatbelt.
Typical.
Only Doctor X’s head is visible from within the wreckage, but I’m struck by how little it appears he’s injured. No lacerations. No bruising. No bloodshot eyes. Nothing. It’s like he walked in off the street and crawled under a blanket of contorted car parts. Hillary notices it, too. She’s stunned.
“What are you looking at?” Doctor X says to us, his voice even and unbroken. “Get me out from under here.”
His clarity is so unusual that I’m not sure we should. Hillary is thinking the same thing. She looks at me and shakes her head.
“I’m in no hurry,” I say, although I catch a waft from leaking gasoline suggests otherwise.
“I think you should be,” Doctor X says.
“And why is that?” I say.
“Because my helpers are already here,” he says.
“Helpers?”
I catch a glimpse of something out of the corner of my eye. There’s movement from somewhere in the night, a flittering break in the moonlight.
“I can call them off,” Doctor X says. “But you have to help me get out from under here.”
Hillary notices the movement, too. They’re hard to make out.
Are these the same helpers with the laser sights from before?
I don’t want to risk finding out the hard way. Those “helpers” are too close for comfort. Hillary and I lift the wreckage up enough for Doctor X to scoot out. His body is remarkably free from injury. He stands up without issue, although his shredded clothes hang from his frame like laundry on a clothesline.
“That’s better,” Doctor X says and brushes himself off.
The movements in the moonli
ght get closer. They’re just beyond eyesight, but I can make out their general form now. They look like people hunched over while rushing back and forth.
A red dot on my chest provides some clarity about their activities. They’re definitely carrying guns.
“I thought you were going to call them off,” I say.
“They don’t take direction easily. It’s part of the reason that Iceman is so important,” Doctor X says.
“And what, exactly, does that mean?” Hillary says. I notice she sports a matching red dot over her heart, too.
Doctor X grabs ahold of his chin and the back of his head. With a quick twist, he cracks his neck. His one good eye looks both of us up and down.
“On my command, my helpers will kill you. Or, should I not issue that command, they will eventually disperse. I hold your lives in my hands. I stand to offer you the greatest act of mercy or of brutality possible,” Doctor X says.
“Thanks for the reminder, Captain Obvious,” I say and turn on the .45’s laser sight. I aim it back at the source of the laser sight trained on me. I might be dead in a moment, but I’m going out the only way I know how: by fucking with the people trying to do me in.
Doctor X grimaces and says, “It seems to me that such an act of mercy would put you two in debt to me, wouldn’t you agree?”
Where’s he going with this?
“No, I wouldn’t agree with that at all,” Hillary says. “You’re the asshole who took my Iceman. You owe me, not the other way around.
“Then let me put it this way,” Doctor X says and runs a hand over his hairless head. “In exchange for saving your lives, you may repay me with a ride in your vehicle, since mine is out of commission. Then you may work on paying off your debt in another way. Deal?”
Chase Baker & the Humanzees from Hell (A Chase Baker Thriller Book 8) Page 5
