Tribe, page 5
“Up to you this time, Sarah,” Helen said. “You want me to drive, or stop?”
Sarah looked back at the side mirror. The truck was gaining on them as Helen slowed for traffic.
“Do you have any weapons?” Sarah asked.
“Just us,” Helen said with a grin.
Henry’s lopsided, ‘Hell yeah’ smile was comical, but did little to put Sarah at ease. She looked back again. A second vehicle swerved out from behind the truck. The bright orange snowplow was familiar, but out of place on a hot summer day. Inside were two more men, but in the back end—where the sand and salt would normally be—stood a half dozen men and women, ski-masked and armed.
What…The…Actual…Fuck?
When the lot of them aimed their array of weapons toward the McLaren, instinct drew a single word from Sarah’s mouth. “Drive!”
G-Forces pinned her back in the seat.
Henry let out a loud whoop. He might be missing the adrenaline rush that comes from fear, but that didn’t mean he didn’t get a rush from the speed. He squished against her as Helen twisted the wheel hard to the left, and then back to the right, fishtailing around a taxi and taking a left turn.
Sarah sat up straight. The road ahead was narrow and framed by parked cars, all of them facing her.
It’s a one-way street…and we’re going the wrong way!
Sarah’s hands gripped the door and Henry’s leg.
“Relax,” Henry said, motioning to their potentially insane driver. “She’s got this.” Then he grimaced. “Also, that hurts.”
Sarah let go of his leg. “Sorry.” And she turned around. The black truck careened into the street behind them, nearly side-swiping the parked cars. Sarah cringed for the people who owned the vehicles, and relaxed a bit when the truck straightened out.
Then she saw the snowplow…turning onto the street.
“Holy shit…”
Henry looked back. “Oh man. This is going to be—”
His voice was cut short by the sound of shattering glass, crunching metal, and car alarm duets singing as—two at a time—cars on either side of the road were picked up and flung into the buildings.
“—awesome,” Henry finished.
People all around screamed and cleared off the sidewalks, running into storefronts and alleyways. And then, the worst possible scenario—a vehicle coming the other way. Sarah stared at it in disbelief.
Could our luck get any worse?
It was a dump truck.
Then she realized it could get worse. “Are they after you, too?”
Helen shrugged, but started honking the horn and flashing her high beams. Sarah was pretty sure the garbage truck driver could see the waves of flying cars racing down the street, but Helen wasn’t trying to get the driver’s attention…the message was: we’re not stopping.
The big truck shuddered and squealed to a stop.
Please back up, Sarah thought. Please back up.
And then, one lumbering foot at a time, coupled with a repeated beeping, the dump truck backtracked.
Sarah glanced back. The pickup was right behind them. Slowing down wasn’t an option. But it didn’t look like they’d make it, either.
She wanted to shout.
Wanted to scream.
Instead, she closed her eyes, covered her face with her hands, and for the first time in a long time, prayed. “Dear God in Heaven, please get us ouuuuuhhhh!” The right turn caught her off guard, throwing her into Henry’s lap. When the car straightened she was flung upright again.
Tires squealed behind them. The truck bounced out of the one way street, clipped a car, and failed to make the turn. It slammed into a store front on the far side of the street.
Sarah wondered how many people were in there. How many of them were hurt? Maybe a car chase through the congested Boston streets wasn’t the best idea. She’d made the decision while thinking about herself, but if other people died… That wasn’t right.
On the bright side, the truck was incapacitated for the moment, and that was exactly how long the McLaren would need to leave them in the dust.
The car slowed.
“What are you stopping for?” Sarah asked. She looked ahead and saw the answer for herself. Bumper-to-bumper traffic.
“On foot,” Helen said, “or sidewalk?”
“Sidewalk!” Henry said, but Helen wasn’t looking at him.
Before Sarah could answer, a boom turned her around. Airborne cars took her breath away. They cartwheeled through the air, some upending in the street, others hitting buildings on the far side. The snowplow emerged from the wreckage like a mythological bull, unstoppable and insatiable. And if they continued running, everyone in front of them—in cars and on the sidewalks—would be at risk.
Sarah answered without saying the word, shoving the McLaren’s door up, sliding out, and breaking into a run.
8
“I don’t understand,” Henry said, as he climbed out of the McLaren behind Sarah. “Why are we running?”
“Because staying in the car and driving on the sidewalk will get people killed,” Sarah said, indignant. “Fearless or not, you have to care about other people… Don’t you?”
Henry paused. He hadn’t really thought about it much, because in his experience, no one cared about him. Thinking about other people, and what would be good for them, was a low priority. Mostly, he considered his own needs. But she was right, not caring about consequences didn’t mean he was incapable of empathy…to a degree. Imagining the snowplow charging through a sidewalk full of people felt no different than seeing it in a movie. Like it wasn’t real. Full detachment. But that didn’t mean he wouldn’t be responsible. That he wouldn’t feel guilt.
Henry grimaced. Sarah had unintentionally found a chink in Henry’s emotional armor. So he brushed it aside and pretended to be indifferent. “Fine. But…” He looked back at the car, and then the snowplow careening toward them. “What about the McLaren?”
“I’ll get another,” Helen said, rounding the vehicle’s front end and shoving him after Sarah.
They ran down the sidewalk, following a crowd of fleeing pedestrians.
“These guys are toast as long as we’re with them,” Henry observed.
“Get off the street,” Helen shouted to Sarah, who was still in the lead.
Sarah turned right, entering an alley that smelled like rotten milk that had been steamed into the air. The buildings on either side were old. Maybe older even than the United States, the red bricks worn smooth by wind and rain, the mortar crumbling.
The alley floor was paved, but scabs of the new had peeled away to reveal old cobblestone. Trash cans and bags of refuse littered the alley beside closed doors belonging to a variety of businesses and apartments on the floors above. Far ahead, another busy street, but there were several conjoining alleys from which to choose. They’d entered a maze between buildings at Boston’s core.
Skyscrapers towered beyond the block of brick buildings. It was the middle of a workday. Millions of people filled the city. It wouldn’t be hard to get lost, especially now that the snowplow couldn’t follow them.
A wave of pressure slapped into Henry’s back, stumbling him. It was followed by a grinding bang and the screams of people. High-speed grit peppered the exposed skin of his lower legs, arms, and neck. What felt like a punch struck his shoulder, and this time he did go down, rolling back to his feet like he’d practiced his whole childhood.
As a fearless child, Henry thought he’d make a good ninja. Spent hours practicing his own brand of martial arts, some of it learned from YouTube videos, and throwing himself to the ground to properly learn how to take a hit. This was the first time in his life he’d actually used it, and he was happy with how his muscle memory performed.
Then he turned around.
The snowplow had slammed into the end of the alley, pounding through ten feet of the buildings framing it, before coming to a stop. A pile of bricks laid in front of the monstrous vehicle. Jutting out from the pile of cubed stone…a hand.
A small hand.
A child…
Shadows moved in the sunlit dust filling the alley. People climbing over the snowplow’s roof. People with guns.
The driver inside the snowplow kicked at the shattered front window, desperate to join the chase.
“Who are these guys?” Henry asked.
“We need to keep moving,” Helen said, by his side. Henry looked for Sarah. Found her half a block ahead, still moving. Then she took a left and disappeared.
He clenched his fists. Turned back to the snowplow and the ski-masked attackers climbing down the front. “They killed a kid.”
“They’ll pay for that,” Helen said. “I promise. But not here. Not now.”
He believed her, so when she turned to run, he followed.
Henry wasn’t an athlete. Didn’t do a lot of running. But he managed to keep up with Helen, whose grace on her feet and fighting ability revealed—at the very least—years of training. He couldn’t tell if she was matching his slower pace, or if he was in better shape than he thought.
Gunshots rang out behind them. Semi-automatic. A pistol or a machine gun set to single fire. He wasn’t an expert in firearms outside of a few video games, but neither was the person firing.
They were running down a four-foot-wide alley, much of it congested with trash. Their path should have been easy to predict, but every bullet missed.
Amateurs, he decided. Dedicated to the point of desperation, and heavily armed, but not trained killers.
Metal trash barrels pinged.
Bricks disintegrated.
And then a voice. Loud and angry. “You can’t hide forever!”
Henry looked back. A man with the build of an actual ninja leaped off the snowplow’s hood, landed with a roll that put Henry’s to shame, and drew a sword before sprinting toward them. The bullets stopped, but the man seemed faster, gaining on them with every step. Blue eyes glared from behind the ski-mask, frenzied.
As they approached the turn Sarah took, Henry pointed to it. “She went that way.” When he looked back again, ninja-man was right behind them, sword raised, ready to hack them both down.
Whoa! That was fast!
“Down!” Sarah shouted.
Henry felt himself tackled to the ground.
Saw Sarah above him, swinging a wooden plank like Mo Vaughn—but harder.
The wood sailed just above Helen’s head, but collided with the man’s. Something cracked. Maybe the wood. Maybe the man’s skull. The top of him flipped back while the bottom of him continued forward. He landed in a pile of black trash bags that smelled of fish.
Sarah stepped toward the man, plank raised, ready to strike again. Henry thought the man was done, but Sarah was lost in rage—until a shotgun blast splintered the wood.
Sarah dropped the plank’s remnants, hissed, and clutched her arm.
“Move!” Helen said, pulling them both along and then shoving them ahead.
This time, Henry led the way.
The new alley was straight, a foot narrower, and clear of debris. They were easier targets than ever.
Think about them, he told himself. He felt excitement. The thrill of the chase. But the bullets and people chasing them were of no concern. But I don’t want them to die. That’s not worry, he told himself. Not fear. He liked the Helen lady and Sarah…she hadn’t abandoned them at all. He felt more connected to her than before.
Confident his motives were selfish, he zeroed in on a door ahead. It was dark blue, and bore Japanese and Chinese writing and the image of a fish on a plate. It was also open a crack.
“Here!” he shouted and shouldered the door open, spilling onto a dirty linoleum floor.
Kitchen staff shouted at him in a mix of Japanese and English. Too many voices to understand what was being said, but the message was clear: he was not welcome. The voices fell silent when Sarah and Helen charged in behind him, chased by gunshots.
“Go!” Helen shouted at the stunned men watching them. “Run!”
They didn’t need to be told twice. As the kitchen evacuated like loose bowels, Henry jumped to his feet. The kitchen was full of potential weapons. Pots and pans, and assorted knives, but the closest thing to him was a big stew pot full of something that smelled great—and was bubbling hot.
As Helen and Sarah headed for the restaurant doorway, he reached for the handles.
“Stop!” Sarah shouted at him. “You’ll get burned.”
He didn’t care.
Took hold of the handles. Felt the scalding pain in his hands, and didn’t stop to think about how prolonged exposure could seriously injure him. Partly because these things never crossed his mind, but mostly because he wasn’t planning on holding on to it for long.
He spun around, counting on centrifugal force to keep the pot’s contents inside, and flung the stew toward the blue door just as it opened. Two men and one woman in masks leveled their weapons at Henry and then seemed to notice the flying pot at the same comical moment.
A dull gong sounded as the pot struck the doorframe, whipped around, and then launched several gallons of boiling stew.
All three fell back, tearing off their masks, screaming in agony.
“Yes!’ Henry shouted, pumping a fist. “Whoa!”
Helen yanked Henry by the arm and shoved him toward the door where Sarah waited.
“C’mon!” Sarah shouted!
Henry headed for the door, but didn’t feel Helen beside him. He looked back to find the older woman drawing two butcher knives from a block. He smiled and started back when Helen pointed one of the blades at him.
“Keep going!” she shouted. “And don’t stop.”
“Like ever?” Sarah said.
“Until I find you.”
“How are you going to—”
Armed men and women rushed past their fallen brethren and charged into the kitchen.
Helen whipped one of the knives at the lead man. He took it, center mass, and dropped to the floor, the impact shoving the blade up and out his back.
“Go!” Helen shouted.
Sarah and Henry lingered for one shocked moment. Then Sarah tugged Henry out of the kitchen and they fled toward the restaurant’s exit, as the report of gunfire sounded from the kitchen, quickly followed by the screams of men and women.
9
Sarah shoved people toward the door. The lunchtime patrons and kitchen staff were running from the sounds of violence back in the kitchen, but they weren’t moving fast enough. Sure, most of them were older. And yes, they all had to move through the bottleneck created by the narrow front door.
But still.
She changed her mind when an old Japanese woman went down and the people around her kept shuffling toward the door, an unstoppable force. When the woman cried out in pain—her hand stepped on—Sarah shouted, “Hey!” and cleared a path.
She crouched down by the woman, who was dressed in a loose fitting, blue-and-white, flower-print dress. Her face looked like it had been wrinkled by an artist, the long crow’s feet and deep frown-lines symmetrical. She startled at Sarah’s arrival. “I got you.” Hands under armpits, she lifted the woman up onto her feet.
Instead of being thankful the woman appeared angry. Maybe embarrassed. It was impossible to tell because the woman’s words, “Watashi ni furenaide kudasai!” were impossible to understand.
“You’re welcome,” Sarah said, oozing sarcasm as she motioned to the door, which was now empty.
A shotgun blast snapped her attention away from the exit, as the woman shuffled out into the day’s light and kept chugging along. Sarah was about to run when she spotted Henry at the back of the empty restaurant, peeking into the kitchen.
A second shotgun blast put a basketball sized hole in the door, a foot above Henry’s head.
He didn’t even flinch.
Amygdala or not, how could he not flinch? She took an involuntary step to the door, but was stopped by shame.
She didn’t know Henry well. Not at all really. If he died, her life wouldn’t change at all… Except that I would feel like shit for abandoning him. But if he lived…well, she didn’t know. Maybe her life would change. Maybe for the better. It couldn’t get much worse.
There was also Helen. She was a woman of extraordinary means, and had shown an interest in both of them. Maybe she was the key to a better life. But that might change if Henry died, or worse, if Sarah let Henry die.
Damnit, she thought, and rushed back for him. He was a little taller than her, but skinny. She’d pick him up and carry him out if she had to.
She wanted to shout at him, but she worried the noise would attract the wrong kind of attention.
Didn’t matter. He sensed her coming. Turned around with a smile on his face. A kid on Christmas morning. “Check it out!”
She took hold of his arm, fully intending on dragging him away, but a quick glance inside the kitchen rooted her in place.
It was like seeing a flash ballet.
If ballet was bloody.
And violent.
And savage.
Helen moved with a kind of frenetic grace. Sarah had seen a glimpse of it back at the bank, but this was next level. This was a fight scene worthy of Chad Stahelski.
A masked man came at her with a pair of small, curved knives. He held them like he knew how to use them, and the crazed look in his eyes—almost like he was present, but also on another world—left no doubt that he would kill her.
Are they all on drugs?
The man stabbed down with both blades. Had they connected, Helen would have been impaled in both shoulders. It might not have killed her, but it would have incapacitated her for sure. But the man didn’t stand a chance.
Helen caught both of his hands, and yanked him closer. At the same time, she kicked out hard, catching the man in the gut…and probably the balls. Physics launched his lower half off the floor, and for a moment, he hung in the air, arms extended like Superman, until Helen flung him downward.
The man’s face struck the linoleum with a crunch.
