Blackjack Wayward (The Blackjack Series) (28 page)

Not like she wouldn’t be surrounded by, like, 300 heroes, each one ready to impress her with Zundergrub’s head.

Then again, Z had his little army.

What if he had found her already?

She wasn’t with him at Utopia.

But what if that was his backup plan?

He didn’t just want me dead.

They had plenty of chances for that when they broke into Utopia.

No, he wanted me humiliated, shattered, my body a riddled, bloody mess. My spirit broken from knowing that he had tortured and killed her.

Only then would he kill me.

Anything less wouldn’t be worthy of effort.

What had he said at Utopia?

“Now we will play.”

It was a game to him. He had also mentioned a master plan. The man was certifiable.

Night fell and I walked.

He was playing a game.

Could he have her already?

Maybe he found out where she was from. Maybe she told him her name.

Hell, he had mind-controlled her. Maybe her whole existence was known to him, including her every potential hiding place and safe house.

He had her, then.

That’s what he meant, right?

I fell for the first time, sliding down the backside of a dune I had almost fully climbed.

Crashing through the sand was like a cold bath of refreshing water at night, chilling me to the bone.

I stood and trekked up the dune again.

This dune didn’t matter.

It wasn’t going to beat me.

Yeah, my stubbornness was going to get me through, get me across this desert.

If the next day’s sun didn’t kill me.

No, he didn’t have her yet.

He couldn’t.

Zundergrub would have brought her with him, had her lovely face be the first thing my unfocused eyes would have seen.

Yeah, show her to me, then gut her alive.

Then kill me.

That’s what he would have done.

Apogee was safe.

“You hear that, Haha? She’s safe.”

But he didn’t say anything.

The next day went fast, but I slept some of it.

I couldn’t stay up.

I tried. I really, really did.

Even “Big Bad Blackjack” needs his rest.

I should trademark that.

So I slept.

But time was funny. I went to sleep just before midday, and I woke up at early morning.

Time was going backward.

“If I’m still in the fucking mind-prison, I’m going to crack someone’s skull, Haha. You hear me?”

A bird squawked nearby, drawing my attention.

It was a weird thing. Its head was too big.

“Haha?”

It squawked again.

“Haha! I missed you man!”

The bird flew off, faster than the speed of light it seemed, and I rose to chase after it.

I was faster than the bird; it looked back at me, scared, and went up in the sky.

Then it became the sun.

“Come back, Haha! I have a good joke!”

Something was wrong with my mouth.

And while I thought about it, I fell asleep.

I woke up and thought I was back in the dream world of Utopia again.

I had to be.

But I wasn’t, it was just dark. Nighttime made walking easy and comfortable.

Something was following me.

Maybe it was something hungry, thinking I was dead.

The shadows surrounded me, dancing in and out, trying to kill me.

I tried to run but fell, got up and ran, and fell again.

“Haha, help me!”

But the shadows were there, all over me.

I closed my eyes, resigned to my death at the hands of the shadow people.

I didn’t die, I slept.

I dreamed of Apogee.

Her skin, so soft, bronzed and breathtaking.

My eyes opened and I was on her belly, walking down her navel toward her belly button.

The shadows were gone

It was day.

They’ll be back tonight.

I’ll just sleep and beat them.

Apogee will sleep with me.

I wasn’t on her belly, I noticed, turning back to see where she had gone.

Behind me was more open desert.

And the sun was mad at me again.

Everything lost focus and I fell.

I woke at night, again surrounded by shadows.

I tried to sleep, but this time I was scared.

I’m not sure how I knew it, but I was sure: if I slept again, I wasn’t waking up.

My last sleep was like the snapping of an on/off switch.

I tried snapping my fingers, but I was so dusty and dirty.

My fingers were wobbly.

“Haha, you see this?”

Growling shadows surrounded me.

Then I saw eyes.

They were demons, not shadows.

“Haha! Help me, man!”

I ran

They were with me.

Closing in around me.

Like when my dad used to run with me.

He was so much faster.

“Come on, kiddo,” he’d say, slowing down just enough to give me hope.

And I’d try harder. Always harder.

Sometimes he’d let me win.

And mess up my hair.

“Good job, kiddo.”

He loved me.

Not like these demons,

If they catch me, it’s over.

One jumped in front of me, jaws snapping.

I screamed.

The fangs tore into my face, ripping at my nose.

I fell, kicking at it, and scrambled away, back the way I came.

“Dad?”

But he was gone.

I kick and punch.

It’s like Shard World.

When they had Apogee, when I thought she was dead.

When everything died.

I love her.

I’ve never loved anything in my life.

The demons only hate. They show no mercy.

If Apogee were here, we could fight them, back to back,

Like....

The other time.

But the demons were too many.

When I tried to punch one in the face, they recoil and laugh.

They were laughing at me.

And I was dying.

Chapter Twenty-One

A gunshot rang in the distance.

“Dad?” I said, but I was becoming more and more lucid.

Around me was a scrambling mass of flesh. It was hard to see.

My face and head were covered with slime.

I was awaking at Utopia all over again, except now in the middle of the desert. My body was sore, aching, my hunger and thirst long beyond being noticeable.

Another gunshot rang out.

The mass rolled and moved like a sea around me and I was a leaf on a wave.

“Oh, fuck it,” someone yelled from nearby with the distinct sing-song Australian accent. “Shoot one, Wally, that’ll scare them”

The undulating sea of flesh and dust danced in front of me, limiting my visibility to just a few feet, and the sun was mad at me again.

“Haha!” I yelled, but it was just a hoarse cough, struggling through what seemed like a bag of wadded cotton stuck in my throat.

Sure, why not? Once I had started doubting the dream world of Utopia, they brought me out, threatened me by my worst nemesis, then sent me to Australia for....

That was the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard, and I had just thought it.

A third gunshot cracked, followed by a squealing croak. Something ran into my face and by the time I beat it off, it was already long gone.

“Holy snapping duckshit, he’s alive,” a second voice said, another Aussie-accented man.

“What?” came from still another voice. “I shot that bugger in the head, mate.”

“The dead guy,” someone said. “He’s alive.” It sounded a lot like the second guy, Wally, though I had no way to tell. My vision was a blur, and everything around me was spinning.

I made an effort to stand, but my mind was fooling me into thinking I had control of my body. I didn’t, and instead flailed in the ruthless sand.

“You all right, mister?” asked the first guy.

I clenched, catching a figure at the shadowy edges of my visions, ready to pounce. If it was the real awakening from Utopia, I was going out swinging. If I couldn’t save Apogee, and couldn’t beat Zundergrub, at least I was going to drop the first bastard I saw, and the bastard next to him.

“Gonna fuck you up,” I tried to say, but it came out as something else, just meandering growl. My mouth had a mind of its own, like my legs. Unable to fully communicate, I let out a roar and the nearest guy recoiled from me. If I could only get my hands on him, I could use his body as a weapon against his friends.

“They’re coming back, Nate!”

More gunshots. Sounded like they all had high-powered rifles.

“This guy’s alive!”

“I’ll fucking eat your hearts!” I roared but it was more like five “Th’s” and four “R’s” with a hard “K” thrown in there. It wasn’t a language, but it was coming from me.

“Easy, mate,” guy number one was saying, coming so close to me that I got a good look at him. These people weren’t wearing spandex, nor uniforms. Number One was a middle-aged guy with a camouflage pattern beaner cap and thick glasses. Of the names they were bouncing around, I think his was Nate.

Something was next to me, heaving and bleeding. Nate saw it as well and stood, aiming his rifle and putting it out of its misery.

It was a dingo.

I blinked hard several times, trying hard to focus my sun-scarred eyes, but everything was clouded with a clay-addled, murky fog.

“Who are you?” I said, and it was my first real word.

“Holy crap, he’s alive,” said the second guy. Think his name was Wally.

“He’s a big’un. Think he’ll fit on the plane?”

“I dunno, Wally,” Nate said.

“Call Bess and get her to drive out here,” a third one, who wasn’t in my field of vision, said.

“Might have to,” Nate said.

“Pack of dingos might have something to say about that,” Wally said.

They talked really fast and that’s all I could get from the heavy Aussie accents. I had too much trouble following who was saying what.

It was a bunch of guys. Real guys. Not villains.

I wasn’t in Utopia.

I was alive.

“Think he’s crying,” the third one said.

“You’re gonna be all right, mate,” Nate soothed, placing his hand on my shoulder.

“Hell of a thing,” another one muttered. I was surrounded by bewildered hunters.

“Must’ve been over a hundred dingoes trying to eat this guy.”

Wally knelt next to me, pouring water from his canteen in my mouth.

But I couldn’t drink. The lukewarm fluid both soothed and burned my lips.

I shook him off.

“Easy, mate,” Wally said. “You gotta drink some.”

He forced the issue and I was too weak to fight.

I’m Blackjack and he was stronger than me.

I drank, a tsunami raging through the sandy desert that was my mouth and throat. Gagging and coughing, I doubled over, retching out a brownish fluid next to the dead dingo.

“Who are you?” I tried to say, but my mouth went back on embargo, overwhelmed by a slushy silt that felt gritty on my teeth. I spat a few more times and tried another mouthful of water from the guy’s canteen.

“Take it easy, mate. We’ll find a way to get you out of here.”

“We gotta risk the bird, Wally,” Nate said, finally coming to a conclusion on what they were going to do with me. “You and me on the bird, with the big fella. Ricky and the rest’ll follow in the wagon.”

“You think?” Wally said.

“Else those dingoes are gonna kill us.”

“I got only ten shells left,” said a new voice. So at least there were four. “Cripes, look at him.”

He meant me.

I laughed, then I wept.

Because I was alive.

I was alive.

And I knew what I had to do.

“Zundergrub,” I manage to say, but the floor shifted and danced, then flipped over me. I was gone again.

They stuffed me into the dark back corner of a cramped plane, squished among some luggage, the engine so loud I couldn’t hear myself think. I remember it, but my only visual memory is an orange and brown paisley pattern, maybe from the carpeting. Maybe my face was on the floor.

Then I floated through the air, and dropped, only to float again, surrounded by grunting and cursing.

It was them, the guys who found me.

One was called Wally and another Dean. The third and fourth I didn’t know.

The four of them half-carried, half-dragged me to a small house. It was a nice place. In the flashing image in the back of my mind it was somewhat reminiscent of the classic southern U.S. plantation, but this place only had a few bare trees and sat on a high bluff overlooking a large lake.

I could drink all the water in that lake.

I guess I said that aloud, because Dean laughed and Wally said something that sounded like, “You’ll be all right, mate.”

So they do say “mate” with everything.

The inside the plantation was more like a lodge: all wood and leather with the most prominent feature a well-lit bar, and the heads of all kinds of animals decorating the walls. Dogs came from the rear of the plantation, which was open to a wide porch in the rear with mosquito netting all around and large fans swirling lazily overhead. Some of the dogs were like the demons that tried to kill me.

My rescuers noticed my apprehension and shooed off the dogs.

“I’d be scared of dingoes too,” the third guy said. His face was all beard.

“After what he went through?” said Wally, a tall redhead skinnier than Cool Hand Luke, and about twice as old. Like Cool, he was cultivating some facial scruff that didn’t amount to much, despite his efforts.

They heaved me onto a big couch and left me there, went to the bar, and filled tall glasses with beer. I could see them chatting and laughing at the farthest edge of my diminished vision. They were old friends, probably poachers or hunters, since this place had the feel of a hunter’s lodge. From their easy and comfortable nature, I could tell they had no idea who I was. They’d be running, otherwise.

One of the dogs returned and sniffed my legs and crotch. I didn’t have the energy to wave the thing off, but it didn’t seem satisfied with my various odors. It was skittish, its tail high in the air, front legs dug low and a ripple of fur that would dance down its back with my every shift on the couch. I stared at it, letting my eyes adjust their focus, and saw that it was one of the demon dingo things like the ones that tried to eat me.

The dingo sniffed at the air, and I’m sure he was getting a full whiff of what his mates tried to do to me, maybe wondering if they were onto something. His eyes were like slits, trusting the feedback from his nose, and growing more apprehensive with each passing second.

“Come to finish me?” I joked with the little guy, who took my voice as an invitation to flash his incisors at me with a low growl.

“Off with ya!” yelled one of the guys, scaring the beast out through the door. I could see it run to join his friends, tail tucked between his legs in fear.

“Well, fuck you too,” I mumbled, drawing a curious glance from my rescuers as they joked and drank behind the bar. A fifth guy came down the stairs looking fresh from a shower, wiping his chest with a towel. He was a big fellow, maybe bigger than me. From his posture and demeanor, I could tell this place was probably his, the others his guests. The big guy rubbed his wet head with a towel, and he wore only a pair of chestnut pants held up by suspenders and heavy boots on his feet. He was bald as a cue ball, with a bushy mustache that concealed his top lip. He was maybe twice my age, but his upper body was chiseled, like what I could look like if I were to bother working out. His arms were massive, at least 19 inches around the biceps, shoulders wide and striated, and he had the look of a weightlifter at his prime, despite being at least in his early fifties.

One of the other guys pointed at me, settling his severe, weather-beaten mug on me. It was a hard face, lined with years of experience, and he sized me up in just two seconds, chuckling and telling his boys, “You’ve caught yourselves a big one, lads.”

Wally handed me a tall glass of beer, the foamy head drifting without spilling as the glass descended, the big guy approached on his heels. He rubbed his hands with the towel, his muscles bulging and rippling in compliance. His eyes were still on me, like a rattler moments before the strike, a silly little smile on his face.

“Drink up hearty, mate,” Wally said and I obeyed, almost downing the whole beer – what didn’t spill down my cheeks and onto my chest – rewarding him with a loud belch after the fact.

“Wally,” the big guy said. “Why don’t you and the fellas go outside for a bit.”

He knew who I was, and from the way he stood, the way he looked at me, I could tell he was a super. Maybe it was the freakish physique, or the quiet confidence, standing before a guy he could tell was dangerous, without showing a sign of fear. It reminded me of the New York fight against the Superb Seven. After we had beaten them, and Zundergrub had done his mind job on Apogee, we were confronted by a super whose name escaped me. In any case, the super had seen me, recognized me, and backed down, letting Apogee and me escape.

“What’s wrong, Nate?”

“Just do me a favor,” he said, and Wally nodded, taking the empty beer glass from my hand and retreating to his friends. He spoke to them briefly, and Nate’s request appeared enough to get the whole bunch to evacuate the premises.

“Nate, huh?” I said, but my mouth was still a mess.

He nodded and threw the towel across the room.

“If you think you’re gonna hurt these people – my friends,” he started, motioning to the guys outside, “then you’re gonna be in for a big surprise, you hear me?”

I smiled, but something about my cheeks was bothering me. Something told me I didn’t want to look at myself in the mirror.

“What’s so funny?”

“Why would I want to hurt them?”

He cocked his head.

“Well, you’re Blackjack, aint’cha?”

I nodded.

“They say you’re a rightful prick.”

I tried to move, but my body wasn’t up for the task. Now that I had settled on the dusty leather couch, comfortable as it was, every muscle had decided to shut down.

“Maybe,” I said. “But I’m not going to hurt anyone who helped me out.”

He squinted. “You know who I am?”

I shook my head. “No idea, but if you’re going to make this a real interrogation, you mind another brew?”

The big guy pursed his lips a moment, giving it some thought before getting me a fresh glass of beer, making sure to glower over me as he handed it over.

“I’ve gone by a few names, but I reckon you’d know me best as Major Aussie.”

Of course I knew who he was. He was a Class-A guy, with strength, endurance, toughness. He’d stopped Primal on one if his man-child rampages, and he was more than a match for me even at the top of my game. The Major might have been retired over a decade, but he looked even better than he had at his prime. It wasn’t hard to picture him still wearing the outfit, colored in the rich, dark blue layered over with stars of the Aussie flag.