by Jackson Kane
One of our sober “chaperones” in front of me pulled his gun and began to rise from his chair. I kicked his face with the heel of my boot with such force that it sent him reeling over the small table where he had been sitting. Then I drew down on the other fake hang arounds on the far side of the room.
“Loopy set us up! They’re trying to hijack the van!” I yelled to Tex, tossing him and our sergeant-at-arms the two pistols I’d taken off the Wild Boys in the parking lot.
A bullet whizzed by my head, catching one of the girls in the throat. I drew down on the shooter and screamed for him to stop. He did. For an eternity, Tex, the sergeant, and I had a tenuous bead on all the chaperones. It was a standoff with no easy way out without killing a whole lot of people.
Although everyone had heard the gunfire, no one knew for sure if it was actually a gunshot because of the music, the shouting, or the drugs. It wasn’t until the girl dropped to the floor when the place froze. She twisted on the ground, writhing, gurgling up as much blood as air.
It was horrible. I wanted to help her, but I knew the second I put my gun away, we’d be outgunned by the Wild Boys. The wide-eyed girl gasped and pleaded wordlessly as she weakly flailed her arms, slowly dying on a loud yet empty dance floor. Dozens of people stupidly looked on, too paralyzed with fear to move.
When the girl lay motionless, it all became deadly real.
Another armed Wild Boy emerged from the bathroom, and now we had lost the balance. The second he fired, it was like someone pressed the play button. Everyone lost their fucking minds. The place exploded in screaming, running, and, of course, more gunfire.
I threw myself toward Miles, toppling him like an upended bowling pin, then rolled over and put a round in the leg and arm of the guy who shot at me. Miles vomited everywhere when he hit the ground as he was obliterated on all sorts of shit. I grabbed him and started dragging him out the side door because he would have to go in the van as there was no way he could ride.
“Everyone! Side door! Go! Go! Go!” Tex screamed, licking off gunshots almost indiscriminately.
The gunfire filled the air, reminding me of a child stomping on a roll of bubble wrap. What followed was the hideous combination of pops, screams, and the sound of meat slapping against the wooden floor. I realized it would be a twisted medley that would be lodged in the back of my brain for a long while.
Miles and I crashed into the parking lot outside just before the rest of our guys. The music was still so loud inside, effectively masking the gunfire, that the parking lot was starkly serene in comparison. I quickly hauled Miles to the van, which was located all by itself toward the middle of the parking lot. When we drew close enough, I overheard some of Skids’s and Maya’s conversation.
“...my fault. During the year I spent as a prospect, your mom and I got very close. When she was pregnant with your sister, we...” Skids was speaking softly, but I could still hear him through the van’s open windows.
Skids had always been tight-lipped about his past so I never could get a solid read on him about his family. It sounded like he was just starting to open up to Maya about the kind of connection the two of them had shared. I wished I could’ve given them more time to talk, but it was about to get very loud and deadly out here. They would have to catch up when—if—we all got out of this alive.
“Skids! Get Miles in the cab! Shit’s gone sideways!” I interrupted emphatically.
The old man emerged from the van. “What’s going on?” he demanded as he helped me carry Miles to the passenger side door where Maya was sitting.
“Loopy set us up! He was a former Wild Boy. Must’ve given them the heads-up about the coke. Take Miles and Maya and go.” I yanked Maya’s door open, and she hurriedly jumped out, clutching her purse, and gave us some room to work.
“Coke? Is that what’s in this van? What’s happening?” She didn’t look like she had any idea about what was coming. I couldn’t even imagine what that kind of innocence felt like.
A pair of our guys, half holding and half dragging another two wounded, shoved open the side door and yelled out for us to wait.
“The inevitable...,” I exhaled through gritted teeth. I grabbed Maya’s shoulders, captured her complete attention, and warned her, “Keep your head down and trust no one but Skids and Miles.”
Her eyes widened as the gravity of the situation began to set in. She was in real danger here. That first step away from her was the most difficult for me. She so obviously needed protection, but I reminded myself that Skids had her and that he’d keep her safe.
It was the rest of my club who needed me now.
“That motherfucking rat. Fuck! Maya, get down behind the wheel well,” Skids shouted when he saw the Wild Boys kick open the side door of the clubhouse and start stumbling out into the parking lot.
The van was out in the open, so there was nothing for Skids to hide behind. Fortunately, everyone that flooded out of that door was so fucked up that their initial volley of gunfire miraculously missed him. The bullets punched through the side of the van all around Skids so closely that if his breaths were tangible entities, they would have been bleeding.
I was about to have our guys open the back doors and load the wounded in with the coke, but a few of the sober Wild Boys in disguise came around the side of the building and had a clear line of sight on the rear. Out in the open like that, we’d be dead before we had it unlocked. I tucked away my pistol and stacked our wounded into the cab like fucking cordwood.
That left no room for Maya.
Skids climbed into the driver’s seat and stared at me hard once he realized how full the cab was, and now he was faced with the real possibility that he would have to make a fatal decision one way or another. There was no way he wanted to leave her here like this, and he was only a second away from getting out of the van and trying something really stupid like going toe to toe with the entire damn biker army.
We couldn’t survive a gunfight now with our members messed up. It would be a slaughter. If Skids had his bike here, he could have taken her out on that, but he had been driving the van. With more Wild Boys streaming out of the clubhouse by the second and the gate still closed, we didn’t have time to switch my bike for his van. He needed to leave now, so that left me to be the one to get her out as it was the only way any of us could survive tonight. Save the girl to save the club… but so much distance between Maya and me.
“No!” I shouted to Skids after slamming the passenger side door. “Use the van to punch through that gate. I’ll get her out. I promise.” I didn’t yet know exactly how I was going to pull that off, but that was on me. I’d do it somehow as long as he got that fucking gate open.
Skids grimaced harshly but understood.
“Move!” I grabbed Maya’s arm when the van took off, using it as a cover on our way to my bike until it quickly outpaced us and crashed through the gate. Now we were about halfway to our exit to freedom, standing out in the open, surrounded and outnumbered.
Oddly enough, it was the whores who saved us.
What was left of the strippers, mamas, and WB support network—hang arounds, prospects, and the like—ran out into the parking lot, fleeing the firefight inside the clubhouse. We would have been dead if there weren’t dozens of scared and confused distractions now running aimlessly around like a flock of headless chickens in a slaughterhouse yard. With all the hammered, angry men trying to line up shots, it was a hard reprieve to swallow because I knew how this was going to play out. There wasn’t enough time to make it to my bike before everything went tits up. We needed to find cover fast.
It was a Coffin Eater who shot first as he fumbled his way atop his bike. The shot sailed right passed the Wild Boy he was aiming at and caught a fleeing girl between the shoulder blades. The girl’s terrified, continuous scream at what she had seen inside cut off into a deathly quiet when the round caught her as if someone had instantaneously crushed her voice box. She hadn’t even hit the ground before the parking lot erupted
into chaos. Dangerous, armed men from both clubs, half crazed from betrayal and drugs, fired at anything that moved.
That was the second bloodbath tonight.
I dragged Maya away and had to throw us both behind a parked car as a Wild Boy, in pursuit of Skids, sprayed bullets at us on his way by. Maya screamed, but I had her by the shoulders as we both fell onto the pavement on the far side of the bullet-riddled sedan, so we’d be a harder target to hit.
Behind cover of his own, I spied a Wild Boy clip one of our guys who was riding out, drilling a round into his chest and one in the side of his head before blowing out his front tire. Brain matter and bone chips burst out of the back of the man’s skull like pink, jellied chunks of calf sweetbreads. He collapsed over his bike, jackknifing it. The whole gruesome mess flipped headlong into a row of lined-up bikes—both ours and theirs—right by the front gate. Several gas tanks ruptured, dumping glossy fuel all over the blacktop.
“Shit! Nikki!” I recognized my bike’s handlebar bent awkwardly, jutting out of the jagged metal scrap pile that was all that remained of the collision. I was absolutely devastated. I fucking just got her back yesterday. Nikki was a passion project for me, handed down from my old man. She had been in rough shape back when he gave her to me, but after several long months, I had her purring like a sinuous cat.
Now I was really pissed.
Maya had a few superficial cuts from hitting the ground but was otherwise physically fine. Amid all the gunshots, screaming, and crashes, she forced herself to regain control of her frantic breathing. The girl was terrified, but I could tell right then that she was strong enough to do what it took to make it through this. That was admirable.
That was also when I noticed her clutching a nine-millimeter pistol. Reflexively, I almost demanded that she tell me where the hell she’d got that, but this wasn’t the time nor the place. I had to keep my promise to Skids and get Maya out of here safely.
Using this car as a shelter was apparently a popular idea as one of the Wild Boys decided to follow suit. When he rounded the car, I reached for my gun, but it wasn’t there. Perhaps our impact against the ground popped it out of my waistband? The Wild Boy saw my cut and immediately recognized that I was C.E.; then he brought his shotgun around to fire on us.
I rolled over on top of Maya, attempting to shield her, as I waited for the end, praying my body would have enough stopping power to prevent Maya from getting killed too. If the biker was using a double-ought buck or slug ammo in his shotgun, it wouldn’t have mattered as the round would have punched through both of us like paper targets.
Click!
“Goddammit!” I heard the man cry out in frustration. His gun had either jammed or was empty. Our luck was so thick right then, I could carve a piece off and eat it.
Maya’s almond eyes became saucers as she pointed her gun at the man. She was trying to muster the courage to shoot him, but after her initial hesitation, all three of us knew that she couldn’t do it. The biker wasted no time in breaking his shotgun in half to clear the jam and reload.
Maya was on the verge of tears. She closed her eyes, her gun arm still locked and shaking as she realized we were both about to die.
I couldn’t let that happen. It was time to take the kid gloves off, and, if nothing else, this motherfucker would pay for what happened to my bike.
I didn’t have time to wrestle the gun away from her fear-induced, iron grip, being that he’d almost finished reloading. She didn’t cry out or protest when I wrapped my hand around hers and the gun, which I pointed clumsily at the man’s center mass. In the end, we were just a little too quick for him.
Using her finger, I fired several shots.
I cautiously stood up as the biker’s corpse hit the ground and surveyed the carnage. Coffin Eaters escaped in ones and twos or not at all. There were so many bodies on the ground that some of the fleeing men were getting thrown off their bikes as they tried to avoid them or ride over them. I was struck by all the butchery.
How the fuck did Tex not see this coming?
I’d been out of the game for years, and I could smell trouble the second we arrived here. He should’ve known better! It only reinforced what a shitty plan this was from the get-go.
I couldn’t help but be a little frustrated in myself too. I was so caught up in Maya that I was blind to what was all around me. The old me wouldn’t have just noticed that something was off. He would’ve immediately been able to recognize it as a trap. More people died tonight because I wasn’t paying enough attention to what was important, a mistake I could not make again. That was if we made it out alive.
Most of the C.E. who could leave were already gone. Without a ride, we were trapped. Without distractions, we were dead. It was only a matter of time before someone spotted Maya and me. That was when the beam of a downed motorcycle’s headlight skipping off the spreading, shimmery river of gasoline gave me an insane idea.
I thumbed out a shitty, plastic lighter from my pocket, flicked it on, locked it in an open flame position, and hurled it at the glistening gasoline pool that led to the heap of bikes. The lighter hit one of the leaking tanks and broke apart into a glowing ripple of blue flame as the gas vapor went up. The resulting fire rapidly spread across the parking lot in an ever-expanding circle. More screams and curses erupted as people ran, throwing themselves out of the way, as if expecting some massive explosion.
There wouldn’t be one, at least not right away. It gave us some breathing room for me to come up with the next part of the plan. The fire and smoke opened the path for us by creating a lull in the gunfire. Now I had to convince one of our hosts to let me borrow his bike.
I scanned the ground and quickly found my gun by the car’s back tire. The shotgun biker’s corpse had almost landed on it when the bullets and gravity took him. I gazed up and spotted a Wild Boy who had just fired up his bike, obviously heading after Skids and the van full of drugs.
“Stay here and keep your head down,” I ordered Maya.
“Where are you going?” Maya frantically grabbed my arm and pleaded, so terrified of me abandoning her.
“Valet’s here with our ride,” I explained, peeling her hand off me. I snatched my pistol and dove for the passing Wild Boy, spearing him off his bike. The motorcycle tipped over and skidded out with no major damage as it wasn’t going that fast to begin with. We both hit the ground like a sack filled with leather-wrapped rocks. The Wild Boy wheezed as the pavement stole his breath from the impact, making it easy for me to get on top of him. I grabbed his collar and shot point-blank through his forehead.
I had been lying to myself about all the “new leaf” crap and about playing it straight to stay out of jail. There might have been a time and a place for that, but here in this parking lot? Hell, there was no room for the passive, the weak, or the restrained.
It was a place for only the killers and the dead.
And I was a killer.
“Maya!” I straightened his bike up, hopped on, then motioned for her to follow.
Heads started bobbing up, and guns resumed popping off after the explosion looked like it was just going to be an intense motorcycle fire instead. With all our guys dead or gone, we were now the only target.
Once she was close enough, I jerked her over my lap and the gas tank like a naughty girl about to get her ass paddled and took off as there was no time to let her get on the bike properly. Bullets zeroed in on us from every angle, every shot getting that much closer. One of them took my mirror clean off as I weaved the bike around bodies and other downed bikes. The pileup wreckage I’d lit earlier coughed up pillars of black smoke that choked the night air. Orange rivers of flaming gasoline coalesced with the oily runoff from other wrecks to extend out over the blacktop like deadly fingers, the largest of which crossed our only exit, creating a fiery barrier between us and freedom.
If any gasoline had splashed on us, those deadly fingers would crush us in a flaming fist, and we’d have gone up like a roman candle if the ga
s tank had been punctured. The vapor would have caught, and we’d be riding an active Harley-shaped grenade. There was no time to think or pray or even change my mind. There was only out or die.
“Hold your breath and cover your face!” I screamed to Maya just before we plunged through the yellow wall of death.
The heat crashed into us as fire licked up the smooth, metal sides of the bike and across every fold of our clothing. It searched for purchase, for anything flammable that would allow it to consume us like an angry, searing hitchhiker desperately grasping to hang on as we slammed through.
A quick twist of the throttle, and both the fire and the Wild Boys clubhouse were behind us. The only thing brave enough to chase us was the blind, sporadic hail of bullets.
I drove us several hundred yards down nearly deserted streets, looking for a quiet alley so I could make sure neither of us were burned too badly. With all this adrenaline, I could be missing an arm and have no idea what had happened.
Behind us from the clubhouse, there was a rapid series of loud popping noises, possibly the bikes’ metal gas tanks superheating, straining against the fire. I checked my remaining mirror and caught a flash of light followed immediately by the boom. The motorcycle pile finally exploded.
We could see the brilliant plume of flame, the light catching the raining shrapnel as I pulled into a side street. There wasn’t much time to hang out here as we were still way too close. Once the cops arrived, everything within a mile’s radius would be stopped, searched, and questioned.
“Maya?” I dismounted and manipulated her body into a better position to check her over for oozing cuts, gunshots, or burns.
“I’m okay, I think....” She was shaking and hyperventilating as she slid off the bike while reaching out for something to stabilize her. Her soft form would’ve appeared pale had it not been darkened with soot and blood, and her hair singed by the fire. “Oh God... I’m not okay.” Her eyes rolled up at the same rate that the blood drained from her face, and she dropped like a sandbag.
