by John Shirley
Cholo laughed.
“Our parents weren’t cousins,” Randle said. Seemed like he wasn’t completely sure.
“Couple of you guys need to get that kid that ran off,” Dickie said, as they got to their street. “I figure he’s hiding in one of these empty houses around here.”
They got to the corner, just about thirty yards from the house with the brass Jesus. And there was a little sky-blue pickup truck coming up the street, with some stuff piled in the back, mostly hidden under a tarp which was only tied down close to the cab. The little pickup was coming slowly, and there was an older black man driving it. Nella had seen that man. His name was Dale something. She couldn’t see anyone with him.
“You think that’s the stuff?” Cholo asked. “Shouldn’t they have cars with them, for us too? Those luxury cars?”
“Maybe this is the first delivery,” Dickie said.
He stared at the small blue pickup, which was a battered Nissan Frontier, as it pulled up at the curb a little bit west of the house with the brass Jesus. The chunky middle-aged black driver, wearing a San Francisco Giants jacket, sat there with the engine idling. Looking tense. Scared? She wasn’t sure. Then he nodded at Dickie, and gestured, hooking a thumb over his shoulder at the rear of the truck. So that was the delivery in exchange for the two women.
Dickie started toward the truck . . . then stopped.
“Randle, Steve,” Dickie said. “See what they got in the back of the truck. Better be valuable shit. Go on—I’ll cover you from here.”
Randle looked at him, brow furrowed. Then he shrugged and walked with Steve over to the little blue pickup, around to its tailgate, and lifted off the untied dark blue-plastic tarp to see what loot they’d gotten.
Russ Haver sat up in the back of the truck. He’d been hiding under the tarp, and he shot them both, at close range, with a.45 pistol. One, two. Just like that.
Randle was hit in the stomach, and fell over backwards, writhing; Steve was hit in the left shoulder and staggered back shouting.
Cholo and Dickie started yelling and Nella instinctively threw herself flat on the ground.
TWENTY-TWO
It worked, Brand thought. Russ’s Trojan horse worked.
Brand tasted metal, felt his pulse pounding in his temples as he stepped out from between the houses across the street from the pickup. Rifle in his hands. He was half-hidden by a tall thin Italian cypress as he took up a position at the corner of the dark-brown ranch-style house. Watching Russ and Dale and the men in the unbuttoned orange and black fireman’s coats.
Everyone seemed to be moving in slow motion, as Brand’s adrenaline telescoped time. His hands shook as he clicked off the safety and raised the 30.06 to his shoulder, the barrel projecting between the house and the tree; he set it into a proper mount with his left hand steadying the rifle, his elbow crooked almost ninety degrees the way Dale had showed him.
Thinking, Shoot him, shoot Dickie Rockwell right fucking now!
He settled the sights on Dickie, who was swiveling a shotgun to fire at the driver. But Brand didn’t squeeze the trigger. Shoot him.
His trigger finger didn’t want to work.
Dickie and Cholo were standing in front of the appointed house, focused on the little pickup where Steve, backing up, was trying to set the AR-15 into a shoulder mount, having trouble with the pain. Randle was clutching himself on the ground, dying behind the Nissan pickup.
Brand glanced at Russ, saw him hunkered in the back of the truck between the wooden crates of heavy garden rocks they’d set up around his hiding place. As he watched, Russ dropped the pistol, snatched up the Winchester, popped it to his shoulder. There was a stony, settled rage in Russ’s face. He was having no trouble pulling triggers.
Dale was getting out of the pickup, pushing the driver’s side door wide open, using the door for some protection, propping the 12-gauge through the rolled-down window.
Shoot them in the center of their mass, boy! Dale had said. And Russ had done just that with Randle Grummon, who was contorting on the asphalt like a worm dropped on coals. But Steve, about twenty-five feet from the truck now, was firing the semiautomatic at Russ. The bullets were hitting the wooden, stone-filled crates, and pinging off the steel of the truck bed. A shotgun blast from Dickie took out part of the Nissan’s windshield.
Brand tried to squeeze the trigger—and lost the bead, the sights wavering off his target as Dickie stepped back, pumping the shotgun with one hand, the shotgun propped against his middle, the other hand holding up a little walkie-talkie. Shouting into the walkie-talkie. Calling Sten?
Dale stepped out from the truck, turning toward Steve to take the heat off Russ, exposing himself—Dale fired the shotgun and the blast caught Steve under the ribcage, he spun and went down, caterwauling in pain, the AR-15 clattering away. Cholo fired at Dale, who was still turned toward Steve—and the shot caught Dale in the back of his right shoulder, seemed to fling him against the truck, as if an invisible cop and shoved him into “the position.” Dale grimaced and ducked back behind the faulty protection of the driver’s side door—
Brand made himself take a breath, let it out slow as he tracked Dickie with the rifle sights. Dickie and Cholo hadn’t seen him—they were tunnel-visioned on the threat close by, as he’d hoped they’d be. He almost had a shot . . . but a motion from the back of the truck distracted him, he saw Russ leaning over the back of the rear gate—coldly shooting Randle Grummon in the back of the head with the Winchester. Taking cover again, levering another round into the Winchester.
And Brand thought, Jesus Fucking Christ, Russ.
Brand saw Cholo was backing up, face taut, firing a pistol—the bullet striking sparks off the roof of the pickup by Dale’s head.
Dickie Rockwell was swinging the shotgun, firing sloppily toward Russ. Russ rose up, fired the Winchester, taking only a split second to aim, and seemed to catch Dickie in the right hip. Dickie staggered, dropped the shotgun—as Brand tried to track him with the front sights of his rifle—and pulled a pistol from his waistband, firing it toward Russ and Dale both, several shots. Dale was trying to control his own weapon but was too injured to do much with it, just managed to fire through the pickup’s driver’s side window. The shotgun blast missed Dickie, punching a hole in the wall of the house behind him as he ran for the front door of the closest house—the house they’d arranged to meet at. Now the pickup was between Brand and his target.
They’d assumed the women were in the house because that’s where the delivery was to be, where they were supposed to make the exchange for them. If Dickie got in there with the women, he’d use them for hostages. Unless they were up at Mario’s . . .
A bullet from Dickie’s pistol clanged into the truck’s left rear tire rim and the loud ringing sound seemed to wake Brand up. Dickie was coming out into view beyond the bed of the pickup. Russ was ducking down, under fire from Dickie and Cholo. Dickie ducked toward the front door, Cholo trying to follow.
I have to shoot! Brand thought, tracking Dickie. Before he was spotted and shot down. Before he died here for nothing.
But he’d never killed anyone before. To just end a man’s life . . . to take that responsibility . . .
Lines from the Bhagavad Gita came to him, suddenly, flashing by in a moment: If we kill these evil men, evil will come on us? And Krishna’s answer: Think of your duty and do not waver—there is no greater good for a warrior than to fight in a righteous war.
And Brand fired the rifle at Dickie—who was dodging into the house.
He missed Dickie—the shot knocked away an upper left corner of the door as Dickie ducked indoors. Brand worked the rifle’s bolt, reloaded, swung the muzzle toward Cholo who was running toward Dale, firing. More windshield glass shattered. Brand tracked Cholo who was aiming carefully at Dale. Brand squeezed the trigger—the rifle bucked—
Cholo jerked in mid-step, his body twisted. He fell on his face. Shot through the chest.
The Spirit that is in all bein
gs is immortal in them all . . .
Brand reloaded the rifle.
. . . for the death of what cannot die, cease to sorrow . . .
Russ fired another round from the Winchester toward the front door, suppressive fire. He levered another round into the chamber, hearing the ejected brass ring on the truck bed, then jumped out of the truck near the curb. Aware—exquisitely aware, in this moment of heightened perception, slowed time—of the drizzle from the lowering clouds, the smell of his own sweat, the feel of the asphalt under his sneakers as he struck the ground, rock dust in his mouth from the bullet-smacked stones, the mirroring crimson puddle forming around Cholo’s awkwardly sprawled body close to the house’s front door . . .
Russ hurried to Dale, who was leaning against the side of the truck, breathing hard, the butt of the shotgun against his left hip turned toward the house. His right arm dangling, his left controlling the gun. Keeping an eye on that front door as he leaned there, gasping.
“You hit, Dale?”
“Some. Not too bad. Not going to do any heavy lifting any time soon.”
Russ nodded, feeling his hands quivering against the Winchester. He hadn’t slept much. He had simmered all night, dozing and trembling inside, and waking up and wishing for day. For noon. Wanting at first to get it over. And then, as he drank instant coffee that morning, heated on a camp stove, he wanted something more than that.
He’d remembered what Dale had said about having to get mad. He was already there. He was breathing anger, feeling it hot in his nostrils, seething in his veins. He had lain in the back of the truck thinking: They murdered my father. Right in front of me. They took Pendra . . .
The rage had boiled out of him the instant he’d heard those footsteps approaching the truck . . .
But in the back of his mind, now, he was appalled at how easily it had come to him. Fire. Cock the gun, swing it. Fire. Two men down. Find another target . . .
He turned at a sound behind him—ready to fire again. Almost shot at Brand who was running across the street. Stopping to stare at Cholo’s body.
“That your shot, Brand?” Russ asked, watching the front door. What was Dickie up to in there?
“Yeah,” Brand said. “I . . . ” His voice broke. “Missed Dickie, but . . . ”
“You hadn’t shot him, Brand,” Dale said, reading Brand’s face, “he’d have finished me off.”
Brand swung his rifle toward the house. “Yeah. But Dickie’s in there with the women. He’s going to use them for hostages. Or take them out the back way.”
“We can’t let Dickie get away, no matter what,” Russ said. Wondering how far he’d go with that determination if Pendra was in the way.
“Maybe . . . ” Dale winced at a stab of pain. “Maybe they’re up at the other house—up the hill there. House by the top of the hill is Mario’s.”
“Usually the Grummons are together—only one here. You’d think he’d have taken a shot at us out of this place, if he was in it. Maybe the other’s guarding them some place else.”
“Mario’s supposed to be . . . ” Dale grimaced with pain. “Watching his house, till we get there, but . . . ”
Russ pointed out, “But Mario’s drunk and half crazy.”
A woman’s voice, then: “Dickie can’t get out the back of that house too easy.”
They all turned to look, Russ swinging his rifle that way—he saw it was the woman Nella, at the corner of the house, getting to her feet, hands were raised to show she was unarmed. She wore a ski jacket and jeans. Her head was cocked to one side, making her dirty hair hang lankly; her face was blotchy, and she was unsteady on her feet, incapable of violence. Just a kind of ambulatory despair.
“You can put your hands down,” Brand said.
“They boarded up the windows really strong,” she said, lowering her hands, “because they stay there part of the time to party. The back door was part of the house that collapsed down into the pit there. So he’s still in there. He’s going to wait awhile in the brass Jesus house there and then he’s going to run out and shoot you.”
“How do you know?” Russ asked.
“Because I know him. He won’t hide long.”
“Where are the girls?” Brand asked.
“Not here. Up the street. At Mario’s.”
“Shit,” Dale said, grimacing with pain. “If we’d known . . . ”
I’ve got to go in there, Russ thought, looking at the “brass Jesus house.” He killed my dad. He’s going to come out and kill me if I don’t go in after him.
Then he thought: Don’t be stupid. Watch the door and wait.
“Look!” Brand said, pointing.
Russ saw Mario staggering down the street toward them, a shotgun in his hands, and behind him came Jill and Pendra. They walked steadily, had chains dangling from their wrists. Didn’t seem badly hurt. Jill appeared to be carrying a pistol.
“Thank God,” Dale said, weakly.
Brand said, “Dale—How about if you get in the back of the truck, we’ll have Jill drive you to Lucia.”
“I’m not hurt that bad. Just throbs like a bitch is all . . . Oh fuck!”
They’d all seen it at the same time: a large four-wheel-drive glossy-black extended-cab Ford pickup truck with oversized tires came barreling around the corner about a block up. At the wheel was Mike Sten. In the back were Remo, Lucas, and Chuckles. Russ could see their guns.
Brand shouted, “Jill! You two get down, stay back and flatten down!”
The women ran off the street, at the intersection, as the glossy-black truck roared past them—and past Mario, who was hunkering behind a mailbox. The pickup drove right for the smaller blue Nissan Frontier, half a block away.
“Come on!” Dale hissed, and he lurched toward the house of the “brass Jesus,” Brand helping him. The upper corner of the house had broken off and slid down the slope in the wave, but there was a square-yard of ground behind the corner—like a platform of dirt and foundation—before the ragged edge of the wall ended in the fallen wreckage. The girl Nella had ducked back around the other corner of the house, behind Jill and Pendra—gone from sight.
Russ was just behind Brand, turning. Deciding he didn’t have time to get under cover, he went down on his left knee, setting the Winchester in a good mount, leaning forward, right elbow propped on his right knee, his hands trembling slightly. One of the infantry man’s firing positions Dale had shown him. The big Ford pickup was coming . . .
Russ held his breath, tracked the front of the black truck, fired, and saw sparks from a ricochet off the grill.
Chuckles and Remo, braced against the vehicle’s motion, fired out the back of the truck toward him—Chuckles firing a pistol, Remo a carbine, the bullets going wide as the truck veered across the street—and slammed into the front of the smaller pickup, making it crumple and spin around so that Russ—squeezing off an ineffectual shot—had to jump to the left to avoid the whipping front fenders. The big pickup swerved, jolted to a swerving halt, the smaller pickup skidded sideways and then stopped with its engine smoking, flames crackling up. To Russ’s left, Brand fired at someone Russ couldn’t see from the corner of the house. Probably missed because Brand hissed, “Shit!” to himself. Russ was down in a rifleman’s kneeling position again, getting his rifle up, trying to pick out a target.
Sten was getting out of the crookedly stopped truck, Lucas was aiming a shotgun over the top of the cab—but was distracted as a shot came from somewhere to his right, from down the side street. Jill, probably, firing a pistol. Missing but distracting him so that when he turned back, Russ had already centered front and back sights over Lucas’s chest. He squeezed the trigger and Lucas’s shotgun boomed uselessly into the air as the man went over backwards, falling against Remo whose shot at Dale and Brand went wild. Dale stepped out from the corner of the house, fired the shotgun. Chuckles shouted as the left side of his face vanished, but he fired back, the bullet thunking into the rain pipe following the corner of the house where Brand was
trying to get a bead to return fire.
A boom. Chuckles shouted again and spun, falling, and Russ saw that Mario had run up to the black pickup from behind, fired his shotgun almost point blank into the back of the truck, the lead shot hitting two men, mostly Chuckles. Remo turned, staggering, firing the carbine at Mario who seemed to trip backwards. Wounded.
A bullet cut the air just over Russ’s head and he swung the Winchester toward the gunman: Mike Sten, on the street, grinning at him over the top of the truck’s hood.
Russ fired but his aim was choked by fear and he missed. As he levered another round into the rifle, he could almost feel Sten’s sights centering on his forehead. He figured he was about to die—then Mike Sten jerked around, spat blood, his shot going wild. Sten took two steps and fell, squeezing off another ricocheting round as he went down . . . and Mario stepped up behind him, shotgun smoking. Fired again, finishing Sten off. Blood was streaming from a wound in Mario’s upper left arm.
Remo yelling with pain as he vaulted off the truck into the street, back behind Mario, turning . . . Russ trying to get a bead on Remo. Couldn’t see him well enough.
Russ stood up and tried to track him. The truck was in the way—
“You fucks!” Mario shouted, at what was left of Sten. “You murdering fucks! You killed my boy! You—”
The rest was choked in blood as Remo shot Mario through the side of the neck. Mario sidestepped, twice, like a man doing a dance shuffle . . . and then tipped over.
Remo was in the street, near the corner, trying to use the back of the black Ford truck for cover, swinging his carbine toward Russ. A crack from left of Russ as Brand fired at Remo—and missed.
Dale was shouting something. Russ couldn’t make out what.
Russ made himself stand still, letting out his breath, steadying the Winchester on his right shoulder—firing at almost the same moment as Remo.
Remo’s head snapped back on his neck, a small round red hole appearing in his forehead over his left eye. He fell out of sight behind the Ford pickup, and Russ chambered another round into the Winchester, turned toward the house—saw Brand and Dale to his left, Dale sitting with his back to the wall, Brand standing nearby, staring in horror over at Mario, who was dying in the street.
