Canyon: A Post Apocalyptic/Dystopian Adventure (The Traveler Book 2) (23 page)

A grumble rolled through the assembled gladiators. Battle eyed the men he didn’t know. None of them looked capable of surviving the Jones. Granted, Battle didn’t know exactly what lay ahead, but he couldn’t see any of the men faring well in a game designed to kill them.

“There are six from the Cartel that’s gonna fight you,” said the grunt. “They’ll have horses and weapons. You don’t. It ain’t gonna be a fair fight.”

“No weapons?” said one of the gladiators standing behind Battle. “We get nothing?”

“I didn’t say that,” said the grunt. “You don’t walk into the Jones with any weapons. There’s a few out there on the ground if you can get ’em. Like I said, it ain’t fair. That’s not to say we don’t want it to be entertaining.”

“So there are weapons?” asked another gladiator. “We just have to find them?”

“Yup.”

Battle cleared his throat. “What happens when we kill all of the fighters?”

The three grunts laughed. “When?”

“When,” Battle stated.

“That’s funny,” said the leader of the grunts. “You’re funny. I can’t tell you what would happen
if
you killed ’em all ’cause ain’t nobody ever done it.”

The grunts laughed again.

“All right,” said the grunt leader. “We’re gonna open the doors here in a second. Then you run out and you fight. I mean run. Don’t walk. Don’t be lackadaisical. Run.”

The grunt leader planted his hands on his hips. He eyeballed the assembled gladiators and pointed at them. “You can kill each other if you want, but it probably ain’t a good idea if you plan on killing
all
of our fighters.”

Battle looked at Sawyer, Pico, and Baadal the Dweller. They nodded at each other, acknowledging they’d do what they could to keep each other alive.

From beyond the doors there was a loud roar and the rhythmic thump of feet pounding on the aluminum stadium bleachers.

The doors swung open. “Go now!” yelled the grunts. “Go! Go! Go!”

The dozen men pushed against one another out onto the edge of the field. To their right was a large crowd.

Battle’s eyes took a moment to adjust to the light as he ran to the front of the pack. By the time they did, he was a quarter of the way across the field, nearing its center. He scanned the turf, looking for weapons and for his adversaries. He didn’t see either.

Then the crowd roared and Battle heard the thunder of horses behind him. He spun around in time to see the slowest of the gladiators knocked to the ground and trampled.

There were six horses and six men atop them. Battle stood frozen with Sawyer at his side. Three of the men had shotguns. One of them had some sort of flail or mace, which he was swinging in a large circle at the end of its chain. One looked to be unarmed, but Battle couldn’t be certain. The last was carrying a crossbow, a quiver of bolts strapped to his back. He unwound an arrow right into a gladiator’s back and through his chest. The gladiator squeaked, grappled with the arrow as he fell, and collapsed.

The horses were approaching fast and fanning out to attack the gladiators one on one. Battle looked past them toward the doors through which they’d entered. To the left of the doors, pressed against the wall of the stadium, was a small pile of objects. He couldn’t tell what they were, but guessed they were the promised weapons. He’d have to get past the horses and their armed riders to reach them. Battle took a deep breath, trying to slow the chaos around him. He gained focus and ran straight at the horses approaching him.

One of the shotgun-carrying grunts took aim at a short gladiator who seemed dumbstruck. An easy target, the man took two in the chest and fell to the ground in a heap. The grunt who killed him didn’t adjust his path, and his horse tripped over the dying gladiator. It tumbled to the ground, snorting and neighing as it fell, its fragile legs kicking up into the air. It landed on top of its rider, crushing him. Battle was feet from the horse. He bolted toward it with a quick step and pulled the shotgun from underneath the animal. The rider wouldn’t need it anymore.

He knew it was empty from the twin shots that had killed the gladiator. He gripped it like a baseball bat and wrapped both of his hands around the warm barrel. He planted his feet and swung at the next approaching rider. Swinging as hard as he could, he hit the rider across his side, knocking the grunt from his saddle. His shotgun flew to the ground, and Sawyer scrambled to pick it up.

“Run to the doors!” Battle called and moved to the stunned, winded grunt gasping for air on the ground. Battle swung the Browning again, this time like an axe, and drove the butt into the man’s chest. He swung again, connected again, and was rewarded with a shallow crack.

Battle tossed the shotgun to the ground and ran, blinders on, toward the pile of weapons. Sawyer beat him there. He was already picking through the offerings.

“This is all junk!” Sawyer said. “A pocketknife, a two-by-four, a can of ball bearings, and a slingshot.”

Battle smirked. It was
his
slingshot. “The slingshot will do. You good with that shotgun?”

Sawyer shrugged.

“Point it away from me,” Battle said. “You’ll be fine.”

Battle spun back to gauge the fight’s progress. He counted five gladiators on the ground. There were four horsemen still on the attack. Only one of them had a shotgun.

Battle slid the tactical slingshot onto his right wrist and eased the pistol grip into his hand. He uncapped the bottle of ball bearings with his teeth and stood up.

“Let’s get back there,” he said to Sawyer.

***

Salomon Pico was running for his life. The grunt with the flail was behind him and gaining. Pico tried to dodge him by darting back and forth, but it didn’t work. They were at the far end of the field, well past where anyone else had run. Pico turned at the moment the spiked head of the flail swung upward at him. He ducked, lost his balance, and tumbled to the ground. He slid along the stained, aged turf and into the stadium wall.

Pico was done. He backed himself against the wall and tried unsuccessfully to regain his footing. The grunt laughed and pulled his horse to a stop. He dismounted and for effect turned to the crowd a half-stadium away and raised his arms in triumph. The crowd roared its approval.

He swung the flail in circles. Faster and faster it spun, and he walked toward Pico, who cowered against the wall.

Pico buried his head and covered it with his arms. He squeezed his eyes shut, expecting a fatal blow at any second. Worse, he thought, would be a nonfatal blow. Instead he heard a grunt, cursing, and the sound of a scuffle.

He looked up to see Baadal on top of the grunt. He had him pinned to the ground, his legs wrapped around the grunt’s neck. The grunt’s eyes bulged as he reached for Baadal’s thighs, clawing for breath.

Pico saw the flail on the ground a few feet from the struggle. He crawled over to it and picked it up. With one hand he pushed himself to his feet and swung the heavy weapon in a circle, gaining momentum.

He caught Baadal’s eyes and shouted, “Move!”

Baadal released his hold and rolled away from the grunt. The grunt clutched his own neck, his chest heaving as he gasped for air. He likely never saw Pico slam the spinning spiked iron ball into his face. Blood, cartilage, and bone exploded outward. Pico let go of the weapon and left it embedded in the grunt.

“Thank you,” he called to Baadal.

The Dweller yanked the flail from the dead man, eliciting a sucking sound as he removed it. He nodded and waved Pico to follow him back toward the center of the field.

Pico ran behind Baadal as he worked his way toward the action. The Dweller, Pico surmised, was not afraid. He whipped the flail to his side as he ran, spinning it like a wheel propelling him forward, spitting blood and matter onto Pico. He wiped it from his face and joined the fray, choosing to help one of the gladiators who’d already taken an arrow to his leg.

The grunt drew a second bolt from his quiver and set it into the bow. He lowered it at the gladiator who was kneeling on his good leg. His injured one was extended outward as if he were stretching it. He was intermittently squealing in pain and begging for mercy.

The grunt pulled his finger to the trigger, but before he fired, Baadal released the flail. He hurled it, whipping it a short distance through the air until it connected with the bow and knocked it from the grunt’s hands.

Pico ran to the side of the horse and dove to the ground. He gathered the bow into his lap, aimed upward, and tugged on the trigger. The bolt shot forty-five degrees and drilled into the grunt’s side. The short distance meant the projectile was traveling with a lot of force.

The grunt’s mouth dropped open. He blinked rapidly, his nostrils flaring. He reached for the bolt and tried tugging on it as he rode past Pico and Baadal. Baadal ran alongside the horse for a moment and then athletically leapt into the saddle behind the grunt, tossing him from the horse.

Pico held onto the empty crossbow and, crouched low, made his way to the injured grunt as a shotgun blast tore through the man’s torso. The rider galloped past, reloading his Browning for another run.

“Get the quiver!” Baadal yelled to Pico. “Get it now!” Baadal turned his horse and ran it toward the entrance to help surviving gladiators on that side of the field.

Pico scurried to the grunt he’d killed with the bolt. Instead of grabbing the quiver, which was trapped underneath the man’s body, he drew a single bolt and loaded it into the crossbow.

He got to his feet in time to see the shotgun-wielding grunt galloping straight at him. Pico didn’t take the time to aim. He fired. He missed.

***

Battle saw three horses with riders. One of them carried Baadal. The Dweller was driving his horse toward him.

One of the surviving grunts was farther away and was bearing down on Pico. The other, the one who Battle had thought was unarmed, was circling around for another pass; then Battle realized that the grunt
was
armed. He was flinging throwing stars at his prey. He’d punctured and killed two of the three remaining gladiators.

“Throwing stars?” Battle thought aloud. “Are you kidding me? Does he think he’s a ninja?”

The words of the grunt inside the holding area rang in his head.
“Like I said, it ain’t fair. But that’s not to say we don’t want it to be entertaining.”

Battle dumped the ball bearings into a pile on the ground. He knelt, grabbed a pair of them from the turf, fingered them into the leather pouch, and pulled the rubber tubing taut. He aimed at the approaching throwing-star ninja and plucked the fingers of his left hand free, releasing the pouch and firing the ballistic ball bearings with enough force that when they hit the ninja on the bridge of his nose, they shattered it.

The grunt cried out, screaming, “My eyes! I can’t see!” He floundered atop the saddle, squirming in pain as his horse maintained its gallop toward Battle.

Battle drew back the leather again.

Pow!

A deafening shotgun blast stopped Battle’s draw. The shell exploded into the ninja’s chest, making him immediately forget about his nose and eyes. He grunted and moaned, slumping forward.

Battle turned to his left and saw Sawyer with the smoking shotgun pulled to his shoulder. The horse galloped past them and Sawyer anxiously looked at Battle.

“Good job,” Battle said with a hint of surprise.

There was one grunt left. He was halfway across the field between Pico and Baadal.

Battle looked over toward the crowd, an indistinguishable mass of people cheering death. In a place rife with decay and pain, they wanted more. Or maybe they wanted others to suffer a fate worse than their own. Human nature was a bitch.

***

Pico’s errant shot should have been the end of him. For the second time in as many minutes, Baadal was in the right place at the right time.

The grunt pulled the trigger on his Browning the split second after Baadal dove from his horse and tackled the grunt, knocking both of them to the ground.

The shotgun blast sprayed to the left of Pico, grazing his leg but doing little damage. Baadal, though, was knocked unconscious by the leap and fall.

The grunt was dazed but awake. He rolled over onto Baadal and started pounding him with his fists. Unable to fight back, the Dweller absorbed the beating, unaware of what was happening to him.

Pico scrambled to his feet and ran to the grunt. He pulled back his right leg and drove his foot into the side of the grunt’s face. The grunt flew from Baadal’s limp body, hitting his head on the ground.

Pico looked around and found the shotgun still loaded with a single shell. As the grunt tried dragging himself away from Pico, the mustachioed Cartel traitor stuck the barrel against the grunt’s spine and pulled the trigger.

Pico moved back to Baadal and knelt beside him. He shook the Dweller awake.

Baadal was bleeding from his nose and mouth. He was missing teeth. His jaw was the color of rotten banana: brown and black and bruised. His eyes fluttered open and he tried to speak, though a groan was all he could muster.

“You saved me again,” Pico said. “I owe you twice now.”

Pico looked across the field, surveying the aftermath.

All six of the grunts were dead. Five of the gladiators lived. At the middle of the field was a gladiator he didn’t know. The man was on his knees but alive. Across the other side of the field, walking toward him, were Battle and Lola’s boy, Sawyer.

Sawyer carried a shotgun over his shoulder. Battle had something in his left hand. Pico couldn’t tell what it was. Pico smiled. His eyes dampened and welled.

They’d survived. They’d beaten the Cartel again.

Pico looked down again at Baadal. The Dweller’s pupils were dilated. His breathing was normal.

“Seems like you saved me once,” said Baadal, his voice raspier. “So you only owe me once more.”

Pico laughed and reached out to help Baadal sit up. He turned his back to the stadium crowd, his hands tucked under the Dweller’s arms, and lifted him to his feet.