After a maze of concrete tunnels, we exited into a storage garage. There was a single car parked inside and I was ecstatic when I saw the old modified Mustang muscle car. "Runs on diesel?" I asked as she searched through a wall unit for the keys. "Of course,” she said, manually unlocking the doors. She was smart. Ninety nine percent of the cars on the street were electric. It was too expensive to afford a gas or diesel run car and they had been outlawed several years ago. Still they blended in due to the fact that electric cars were now manufactured to mimic the feel of these dinosaurs. The police always caught anyone they were in pursuit of because each of their cars came equipped with a focused EMP burst that shut down your engine and rendered your car useless. Sally and I took the back seat and the woman and Bell climbed in front. The garage door hissed open and we were off into the early morning sunrise.
We drove for a good hour, driving into hill country that I didn't know existed. We came to a stop at a secluded cabin that lay on a hilltop. It was the first time I had been in a non-automated house in a while. All the walls were made from timber and the house was plain and quaint on the inside.
The ladies went and washed up upon arrival while I stocked the fireplace. An hour later we were all resting silently around the warmth of the crackling fire. The woman and Bell looked at Sally and I with strange glances. "How...how old is your daughter?" She broke the silence with a question.
"She just turned ten a week ago."
Sally pulled on my sleeve. "The picture daddy, show them the picture."
I pulled a wrinkled picture from my wallet and showed it to the woman and Bell. It was a picture of her on her fifth birthday with a ribbon in her hair standing next to a little white pony. She was all smiles and I smiled a little bit thinking of the day.
"She's beautiful," the woman said. She then grabbed Bell and squeezed her tightly as if it just registered that they were alive and safe. Then she began to weep letting out short sobs. "He was the only chance we had,” she said, with her head buried in her arms.
"Who?" I knew before she even answered.
"GOTHAMS RECKONING."
There goes my payday. "Who was he?"
“Someone who could have saved us all,” she whispered.
The sunlight gripped my eyelids ripping them open from their sleep state. I tried to focus but the room blurred and twisted. It had been ages since I slept and I couldn’t remember how I got into bed. Red goo coated the roof of my mouth and it felt sticky as I slid my tongue along it. The cheap merlot came crashing back into my memory as well as the prior day’s events. I was out of a job and most likely a fugitive on the run with a useless woman and her daughter.
Sally was still sleeping on the bed curled up next to me. I could hear the front door whisper open and soft footsteps treading somewhere in the living room, or at least where I thought I remembered the living room was. I pulled out my pistol and slipped out of bed. It was too easy to become comfortable in a homey environment such as this. A surreal log cabin with comfy beds in the middle of nowhere felt like a vacation I had dreamt up during my drunken stupor.
I slid out of the door silently, hoping that the wooden flooring wouldn’t deceive my steps. A man around six foot two inches was walking past the living room and down an adjacent hallway. I slipped in behind him tracing his footsteps. He heard me at the last second but it was too late. I had my Glock 17 pressed coldly to the back of his head. “Hello friend,” I said.
He was a little bit larger than I expected but his posture was sluggish. “Please, p-please don’t hu… hurt me. I’m a f-friend,” he stuttered. The man sounded younger than I expected. I loosened my grip on the pistol. He rounded in an instant grabbing my gun, twisting it out of my hand, his shoulders and posture now that of a trained warrior. I was off my feet before I could make a noise and he had my Glock 17 pointed directly between my eyes. “Hello friend indeed,” he said boasting. For a second his gun waivered and his eyes flashed some kind of concern or recognition but only for a second and then he focused again. “Silvia!” he yelled out. Footsteps came running from another hallway and came to a dead stop behind me.
“He’s ok, he’s with us Evo,” Silvia said.
Silvia… it sounded sweet on the tongue. I had never even taken the time to ask for her name. She had saved my life and most importantly my daughter.
“What the hell is he doing here?” Evo said.
“He saved us from the cops in our city bunker,” she said as she pulled the gun down.
He raised it back up defiantly. “Did it ever occur to you that he was the one that called the cops?” he said.
“He wouldn’t have done that, he almost lost his life in the process. We can trust him,” Silvia said.
“That is exactly what the police would want you to think. You know more than anyone that this is the way they infiltrate a tight knit group. They make you think that he was there to save you. For Christ’s sake he could be wearing a wire right now. Check him,” he said motioning the gun at my chest.
I decided this debate had gone on long enough. “I’ll check myself.” I said ripping open my shirt to show my bare chest painted with old war scars. Silvia gasped and Evo lowered the gun a bit. “Listen Evo, whatever kind of name that is. I’m a collections agent and I was tracking Gothamsreckoning when I bumped into your girlfriend here. I work alone or else I don’t get paid and now that Gothamsreckoning is dead and I helped aid some of his crew in escaping, I’m in the same boat as you.” I said standing up pushing the gun aside.
Evo looked hard at Silvia and then turned back toward me. “A fucking collections agent. Great man to have on our side. He would have taken us all to prison for fucking money if given the chance,” he said waving his gun.
“Who said ‘would have?’ I’m rather fond of the idea of taking you in right now, but I doubt you’d be worth much.” I said taunting him. I saw the butt end of the pistol coming as the final word came out of my mouth and I had him just where I wanted him. I slid right and drove my knee straight up into his chest catching the pistol in the air as I reversed his grip and twisted his arm behind his back. A kick to the back sent him crashing into a picture frame, which fell and shattered on the ground. I noticed the painting in the broken frame was of two wolves in the heat of battle over a dead carcass on the ground and it made me smile a bit.
“You mother fucker.” He rose to his feet and charged.
“QUIT IT!” Bell screamed stopping him dead in his tracks. The little girl was quiet when she wanted to be, I didn’t even hear her approach.
“We’ll finish this later,” Evo said before turning and storming out of the cabin.
Silvia had a puzzled look on her face. “You wouldn’t take us in would you?” she asked, her pupils dilated making them appear as innocent as a kittens.
I put my hand on her shoulder and rubbed it down her arm, “Not after what you did for me and my daughter.” I suddenly felt like it was an awkward thing to do and removed my hand coldly. I don’t know why I attempted to comfort her but she smiled at me and made it all worth it. That is when I realized that this woman would be the death of me.