by Jon Grahame
He was pointing them at a crowd of women and girls who were huddled in a corner.
‘No. Please!’ one shouted.
They held up their hands.
Victims.
‘Stay here!’ he said. ‘No one will hurt you again. We’re the good guys.’
He turned away and one of the girls screamed, alerting him to turn again, but too late. A man had been hiding in the middle of the crowd, crouched at the back. As he rose, the man fired a handgun. Reaper twitched his head as a bullet grazed his neck. Another hit him in the chest and he went down backwards, already sending a prayer of thanks to St Kevlar. The bullet hurt but didn’t penetrate. The man must have thought he had killed him because he took three steps closer without administering the essential headshot. Reaper shot him in the right wrist, so that he dropped his gun, and again through the genitals with a bullet aimed up into his lower abdomen. A classic gut shot. See how he liked the pain.
The man fell to the ground as Reaper got to his feet and kicked away the handgun. The man crawled in a spiral, screaming and trying to hold himself with his left hand.
‘Please, please,’ he said.
Reaper looked at the crowd of fearful girls. ‘Any more?’
‘No more,’ one said, and he could tell from her demeanour that it was true.
‘Please, please,’ the man whimpered.
Reaper leant over him and said, ‘You should be pleading with God because She’s the next person you’re going to see. Just before She sends you to hell.’
He stepped back into the corridor and listened for the shots from across the road that meant that Sandra was still alive.
Sandra had heard his warning and had time to repress the momentary panic and work out what to do. Simple was best. Complex left too many things to go wrong. She fired across the street, rolled and took up another position. Fired again, grabbed an empty bottle from the gutter and went back into the VW van through the side door. She pulled back the mattress to reveal the metal base of the vehicle, tied a piece of thin rope around the bottle, which she balanced on the wheel arch, paid out the rope and hoped it would be long enough. She left the van by the open back door. Another shot over the double-parked Jag and she was back on the pavement.
Three shadows were moving closer, into and out of doorways and the cover of the vehicles. She laid the carbine on the ground and took out the Glock. Seventeen bullets, she told herself. She only needed three.
From one of the pockets in her vest, she took out a compact, opened it and held it low by the rear tyre of the van. She crouched silently and watched the men in the mirror. They were nervous: they moved slowly, staying foolishly together for the comfort of numbers. As they neared the front of the VW, she pulled the rope and the bottle fell, the noise echoing in the emptiness of the van’s interior, and Sandra stepped sideways onto the pavement in a crouch.
The men had half turned at the noise, a half turn that gave her a second of advantage. She shot the nearest in the right arm and he went down; her second shot hit a small man at the rear who carried a sub-machinegun. He had begun to face forward again and the impact tightened his trigger finger and from close range he blasted a third man, fat and middle aged who was carrying a sawn-off, sending him banging along the side of the van.
Sandra let out the breath she didn’t know she had been holding and straightened up – and the first man she had put down fired a single shot with his left hand that hit her squarely in the chest and knocked her to the ground. She rolled, pointed and fired again. This time a head shot. Chest and head. The man no longer moved. She sat up, flexed her shoulders and wondered how Reaper was doing.
Reaper took a glance from the hotel reception into the well-lit pub. Two men: one over to the right by the jukebox that was now playing Pat Boone singing Love Letters In The Sand; another to the left. Everyone else had to be upstairs.
He stepped through the doorway, both guns raised. He didn’t have a clear shot to the right but opened up with both guns, smashing mirrors, tables, glass panes, until a bullet caught the man in the corner and lifted him upright so that he could provide the coup de grace of chest and head. He bounced sideways into the jukebox. The jukebox hiccuped. Pat Boone was cut off short and Jerry Lee Lewis burst in abruptly and loudly with Great Balls Of Fire.
The bullets he had fired to the left had kept the other occupant of the room behind cover. Reaper fired twice more and a table spun sideways revealing his enemy. The man squealed – he actually squealed, dropped his weapon and raised his hands. Reaper shot him twice, same formula. What would he do with prisoners? What remained of society could do nothing with murderers and rapists except execute them. They could not put them in jail, punish or rehabilitate them and they could not allow them to go elsewhere and pollute another part of what was left of the world. Death was the only clear answer.
A glance behind the bar, to make sure no one was hiding there, and he went up the stairs.
As he neared the top, he heard footsteps running, and when he gained the right hand corridor, saw someone disappearing through a window at the end. He ran past three open doorways without pausing to check if anyone was inside. He leaned out of the window and shot the escapee in the top of the head as he negotiated a metal fire escape. More shots to make sure as the body tumbled. The upper glass in the window shattered and he turned to face a man who had come out of the far bedroom holding a handgun. A burn on his left thigh and another thump in the Kevlar vest. Reaper staggered but kept his footing and fired both guns – never mind chest and head; his adversary was too close for niceties. Reaper sent him tumbling down the stairs.
Four steps to the first open doorway. Inside a man crouched, his back to the wall by the window, his knees drawn up, a gun on the floor by his feet, his hands in the air waving like white flags. Four shots to penetrate the knees and arms to ensure the kill. Two more for good measure to stop him twitching.
Reaper was breathing heavily. His senses were heightened although he was deaf from all the gunfire. Through the vibration of the wall, he had the impression that a scuffle was taking place next door. As he turned, someone took a shot at him through the open doorway, missed and started running. Three steps to the doorway and his attacker paused at the top of the stairs: an ordinary-looking bloke in jeans and a sweatshirt that said New York; copious sweat on his face as if he’d been in a shower; mouth open; breathing laboured; fear in eyes that darted everywhere, still hoping for freedom. Almost as an after-thought, he raised the handgun he carried and pointed it. Reaper already had both Glocks levelled. Two shots from each threw the man backwards into the wall and then he fell down the stairs, free at last.
‘Where are you Tilly?’ he roared, even though the words sounded as if they were coming through soggy cardboard.
From the room next door, the one the last shooter had left, came a reply. ‘Bastard. Who are you?’
‘I’m the Reaper, Tilly. And I’ve come for you.’
The door of the room was partially closed and bullets from a sub-machinegun smashed into it, smacking into the frame, and turning the panels into matchsticks. Reaper waited until the burst had ended, kicked in what remained of the door and stepped forward with both Glocks levelled. Mad Dog Tyldesley was at the other side of the room, changing the magazine of an Uzi.
‘Say hello to the devil,’ Reaper said, and pulled the triggers of both guns. Both clicked on empty.
Fuck. How had he used 34 bullets? Thoughts filled his mind fleetingly. He hoped Sandra was okay, that she would get away, maybe even finish the job. At least he’d done his best. If there was a God and She was in a good mood, he might be reunited with Kate.
Tyldesley smiled and displayed a gap where his two upper front teeth should have been. He was maybe thirty, a sloppy six feet in height with a shaved head, his body already going to seed. His arms were flabby in a black vest. He raised the Uzi, and fell flat on his fac
e in front of Reaper, who heard the sound of the carbine a fraction after the bullet had hit the so-called Mad Dog in the back.
His brain took a second to return to live mode. Tyldesley was still breathing. Sandra had shot him through the window. Reaper kicked away the Uzi and slowly and with deliberation reloaded both Glocks with new magazines. Tyldesley was twitching and breathed heavily at his feet. Both hands were stretched in front of him; on the knuckles of one was spelled the word LUVE, on the other HATE. Even the tattooing had been DIY and poorly done. It seemed to sum up his life. Reaper pointed one of the guns at his head and ended it.
He went to the window but stayed out of the line of fire.
He shouted, ‘Good shooting, Sandra. You got Mad Dog!’
‘You okay Reaper?’ He could barely make out her voice.
‘I’m fine. You?’
‘I’m good.’
‘Stay put. I may flush some out of hiding!’
Downstairs, the jukebox had become silent.
He tried the other bedrooms. The front ones were empty. In one of the rear bedrooms, he found a girl sitting in bed, hysterical and holding the duvet as if it were a steel sheet to divert bullets.
‘Are you alone?’ he said.
‘Yes,’ she whispered. ‘Don’t hurt me.’
He lip-read the words and, when she pointed with a shaking finger to a wardrobe, he fired six shots into it and a man fell out. He put a final bullet in his head.
‘The other girls are downstairs,’ he said, scarcely able to hear his own voice. ‘You’re safe now.’
He walked through the gun smoke and silence of the stairs, stepping over bodies as he reached them, feet crunching on glass and expended shells. The girls were still in the restaurant. Their numbers seemed to have grown. The man he had shot in the gut was dead; a kitchen knife had been stuck in his throat. His memory prompted, he went to the body of the small youth, rolled it over, and retrieved his knife.
He stood in the doorway of the restaurant and one of the girls said, ‘Is it over?’
Again, he had to read her lips.
‘It’s over,’ he said. His voice distant even inside his own head, and yet even now he was working out percentages. ‘I need to know how many of them there were. We visited the flats first. Work out how many there were and we’ll see if the body count matches. If there are any left, we’ll hunt them in the morning.’
The girl was the same one who had spoken to him earlier. She looked to be in her twenties but the room was in shadow.
‘We also need to collect all the guns. The weapons.’ He wondered why he was drifting into details that none of them needed. He waved his right hand in a dismissive gesture to discount the last instruction and realised it still held a Glock. Instead, he shook his head and said, ‘It’s over. You’re safe.’
‘You’re wounded,’ the girl said.
‘I’ll live.’
He walked into the bright lights of the pub.
‘Sandra,’ he shouted. ‘I’m coming out. Cover me.’
He crossed the road in lights still ready for a premier but no one shot him.
Sandra stood up from behind the car where she had been waiting and he finally holstered the guns.
‘You okay?’ he said softly.
‘I got hit in the tits again,’ she said.
He pulled her to him and they embraced and she began to cry.
‘I don’t know if we can do this again,’ he said.
‘Only if we have to.’
‘I love you,’ he said.
‘Mutual, Reaper.’
They broke apart and he walked back into the street.
‘If any of Mad Dog’s people have survived, this is their time to leave!’ he shouted. ‘You have thirty minutes amnesty! After that, you’re dead! Thirty minutes to leave! This town is back in the hands of its citizens! The gangs are finished! Twenty-nine minutes to leave. Your amnesty is running down!’
Still no one shot him.
Chapter 4
REAPER TOOK COLD BOTTLES OF PERRIER FROM THE generator-operated fridges in the pub and then he and Sandra left the women in charge and walked to Bradley’s house. The wound in his thigh was raw; the one on his neck annoying and his ribs ached.
The teacher had packed the car with belongings and was trying to persuade Meg to get in. Andrea, the girl they had rescued from the sea-front apartments, was standing wide-eyed and fearful on the doorstep. At least she was better dressed, wearing a tracksuit provided by Meg.
Bradley’s nerves had not improved when they walked out of the night.
‘I heard the shooting,’ he explained. ‘Lots of shooting. I thought it best to leave while we could. You said …’ Meg pulled free from his grip.‘I wanted to get her somewhere safe.’
‘We can’t leave Andrea,’ Meg said, stepping back to the doorway where the two girls embraced.
Bradley stared down the street past Reaper and Sandra, as if expecting pursuit.
‘There’s no need to leave,’ Reaper said. ‘We killed them.’
There were stares of disbelief.
‘Killed them?’ Bradley said.
‘All the bogeymen have gone,’ Reaper said. ‘Tomorrow is a fresh start. But we’re tired.’
‘We need to sleep,’ said Sandra.
She walked into the house and the two girls followed. Reaper trailed behind, leaving Bradley on the pavement with his half-packed car. He could go where the hell he liked. The girls needed to be able to believe that what Reaper had said was true. Sandra reassured them. Reaper splashed water in his face and handed the girls two spare bottles of still-cold Perrier. He was not at all upset that he didn’t have one left for Bradley, who had followed them reluctantly upstairs.
Sandra said, ‘Do you have a first aid kit?’
Reaper was not surprised when Bradley said he did. It was an item, he said, that he had acquired early in what he described as the ‘interregnum’, the period that had started after the mutant virus had swept the world. Perhaps he thought Reaper was the new Prime Minister who would impose a fresh democracy with the power of the Glock automatic.
‘I’ll need you first thing,’ Reaper told Bradley.
‘What … Why? You said it was over.’
‘It is. I’ll need you to take me to our car. I’m buggered if I’m walking.’
The two girls went up to the attic room, leaving Bradley to go into the back bedroom.
Sandra took Reaper into the bathroom to tend his wounds. The graze in the neck she anointed with some kind of unction. The thigh wound was more severe and might have chipped the bone. As it was, it had removed a chunk of flesh.
‘Trousers,’ she said.
He removed the Kevlar vest and his weapons and dropped the trousers. He winced when she probed the rawness and she said, ‘I thought you were a tough guy?’ After a moment or two, she said, ‘This probably needs stitching or a flesh transplant. I’ll bandage it for now.’ She applied more unction, gauze, bandage and tape. ‘You’ll have to see Greta when we get back.’ Greta Malone was their doctor: as far as they knew, the only doctor in Yorkshire.
Reaper pulled up his pants, picked up his kit and followed Sandra into the front bedroom. She took off the Kevlar vest and the gun belt but nothing else and lay on the far side of the bed, facing the window. Reaper stacked his weapons and the vest and climbed alongside her.
‘Hold me, Reaper,’ she said.
He rolled on his side and he held her as he looked at the night sky through the window over her shoulder.
‘That first night,’ she said, ‘you held me like this. Remember?’
‘I remember.’
She cuddled into him and her breathing eased; tension began to seep away.
‘I miss him, Reaper.’
�
��I know. I miss him, too. And Kate.’
Jamie and Kate had both been killed a few days before. Without being over-dramatic, they had laid down their lives to protect the Haven they had been building together.
He could hear her crying softly. After a while, after the tears had stopped, when he’d thought she was asleep, she said, ‘What we did tonight. It was crazy.’
‘Yes it was.’
‘Were we crazy?’
‘Probably, we were very crazy.’
‘But did we do right?’
‘We killed some bad people. We freed some innocent people who now have the chance to be good.’
‘But that’s not why we did it, is it? We did it for revenge.’
‘Yes, we did it for revenge.’
‘After Jamie, I didn’t want to live, except for revenge.’
‘And now we’ve had it, love. We’ve had more than enough.’
She lay silently in his arms for a while and then said, ‘Will we do it again?’
He kissed the back of her head and said, ‘Only if we have to.’
‘I love you, Reaper. I’m glad I’m your daughter.’
‘Mutual,’ he said. ‘I love you, too. Now, get some sleep, daughter.’
Sandra was still sleeping when Reaper slipped out of the bedroom at six. He kitted up on the landing and tapped on the door of Bradley’s room. While he waited, he drank from a bottle of water. The teacher had also slept fully dressed, if he had slept at all. His hair was tousled, which made him look younger. But still not young enough.
Bradley drove Reaper through empty sunlit streets without speaking. He dropped him by the Astra on the outskirts of the town and drove immediately away. Reaper felt liberated to be in his own car, away from the presence of their reluctant host. He sat for a moment and reflected that he and Sandra had attempted the impossible because of their need for righteous revenge and had, against all odds, succeeded. He didn’t know whether to feel relief that they had survived yet again or dismay at the depth of malevolence they had displayed. Maybe a mixture of both. But it had been cathartic for them and a necessity for the people they had liberated.
