Five motor cycles rumbled down the four lane highway in the right lane evenly spaced and holding a steady speed driving much more carefully than expected of a small group of motorcyclists in the middle of the night. None of the bikers dared to speed. A simple search after being pulled over would be all it took to find over two pounds of methamphetamines per rider. There would be no escaping those charges or the attention they would get from the police. But that was why the packages were divided between the riders. Each of the riders was, well dressed, clean cut, and sober. The men looked less like bikers than they did middle aged yuppies, and that was the entire point.
All five were riding factory motorcycles, that while the cycles were not the top end, flashy, or obnoxiously loud, they were fast. This was not a job for loud and flashy transportation. In the mind of the group ringleader there was never a job to be overly flashy. If there was to be a conflict with any law enforcement they were to kill the officer and split up and try to either ditch the bike and make delivery in a stolen vehicle or return to their lab and wait to deliver it later. They all knew there was no such thing as a perfect plan but they were betting they had come dangerously close.
All five riders noticed something in their left rearview mirrors that was moving up on them quickly. It slowed when it neared them and cruised up beside of them. The two riders in the front looked over at the older car trying to see the man inside through the open windows. All that was visible was a lit cigar between the man’s teeth; however the car’s music was clearly audible. The song was Blue Oyster Cult’s, Don’t Fear the Reaper. It was not a surprise to hear the old song coming from the old car. The lead motorcycle rider waved the car around as the engine was revved up a few times trying to incite a race. Despite the patience of the cyclist the V-8 was forced to roar a few more times by the rider. The lead biker finally turned and gave the driver the finger and pulled his face mask down and spit at the car.
Suddenly the unmistakable roar of Godzilla escaped the dark green 1966 Ford Fairlane 500 as they passed under a street light. The bikers finally saw the driver of the car. The face was anything but human a dark green face mask with a fanged smile painted across it in which there was a hole drilled for the cigar. The stereo once more issued the king of monsters roar as an over and under double barreled shotgun came out of the passenger side window. All of the bikers had already gagged their motorcycle’s throttles open forgetting their earlier rule of no speeding but they could not pull away fast enough. A thunderous blast from the shotgun knocked the lead biker off of his bike as the buckshot punched in to the back of his neck and head and less than a second later another biker was blown off of his bike. The car roared leaving the scene of carnage as two of the bikers hit the motorcycles of their comrades. The bikers were flung tumbling off of their bikes on to the pavement.
Their bodies bounced and bounded over the pavement as bones shattered and organs ruptured. Limbs bent in unnatural directions as the joints that connected them were rendered useless now little more than fragments of bones and ripped muscles. As the last biker skidded to a stop he tried to pull himself up when he saw the green mask over top of him. Only the razor sharp edge of the machete gleamed in the reflecting street light along with the fanged smile as the machete sliced through the air with the grace of a falling tree and he felt his own blood seeping out of his neck on to the pavement. As his eyes began to shut he saw the tall man move to the next biker who had slammed in to a tree and repeat the process.
***
Detective Burke pulled up to the myriad of flashing lights in his personal car a brand new powder blue Mercury Grand Marquis. Yawning and swearing he started towards the scene. His first night off in a month and a half and it had happened again. As he walked up to the crime scene the detective used his left hand to raise the yellow tape move under it and keep walking; just like he had been doing for over thirty years. As he reached the epicenter of the crime scene Burke turned in a small circle making sure that he saw all of the outlines of four bodies littering the pavement and shoulder of the road.
“Four were dead when we arrived the fifth had been tossed in to a “lighter knot pine tree” as one of the paramedics said and it shattered everything from his hips down. The man was not all that stable when the paramedics arrived.” Officer Porter said. Detective Burke rolled his right hand around in a circle as a gesture to hurry along as he rubbed his temples with the other. Officer Porter stumbled a bit she had only been on the department for a few months and still liked to speak to him far too formally. Porter was not classically attractive but she had a body that made Detective Burke wish he had at one point in his life had been an even nominally handsome man. The younger cops all drooled over her as if they had never been around a woman. Burke laughed as the driver of the flatbed truck that they had called to pick up the motorcycles and transport the motorcycles to the impound lot stole a few glances at her rear.
“Uh uh, well all I could get out of him was …I think he said Godzilla, but he was missing most of his tongue, it still hasn’t been found, and his jaw was beyond shattered, they put some morphine in his system so who knows about any of what he had said. If he lives through the night they say we should be able to talk to him in a few days.”
“So why did it happen this time? Any evidence or is this another one of those times where we dig for five minutes in the crime scene and find that the guy was guilty as sin and no one knew?” Burke said. This case was beyond getting to him anymore. Porter said nothing but motioned to the pile of meth in the center of the crime scene.
“None of the men are carrying legitimate licenses or registration, and the faces that I photographed were not familiar from any outstanding warrants. They were all armed with Smith and Wesson automatic pistols; they look like Police Trade Ins. No serial numbers, this looks like they could have bought them or they could be connected to that break in at the satellite police station last year.” Porter said. Burke shook his head the girl was right but all of this at three in the morning was too much.
“Get to the point Porter.” Burke groaned as he pulled a can of soda from the pocket of the fleece jacket he was wearing. It had been a cold spring. It was late April and there had been two frost watches in the past two weeks. Porter took two exaggerated steps to the right revealing a pile of methamphetamines.
“They are saying it is over ten pounds worth of meth. We haven’t tested it yet but the one narcotics guy who showed up said it looked to be completely pure. He said it was the very finest in old school biker meth he had seen in the last decade.” Porter said. Burke let out a laugh and turned around and walked off.
“Why the hell did I even come out here? This LOW RENT jerk has not left us anything good yet why would today be any different?” Burke laughed as he kicked a random piece of metal in the road. A few steps later Porter saw him stumble and turn around with both of his hands balled in to fists. “Will someone PLEASE police the brain matter all over the road?” he roared. Looking down for a second Burke gave a visible shutter.
“Never mind that was part of the suspect’s tongue that I found.” Burke grumbled as he slipped under the tape. A reporter approached him and Burke stopped to speak to him.
Porter smiled slightly she watched the detective walk away. She wondered when they were going to let the case go public officially. Now there were just rumors you would hear at the local restaurants or stores. But since they had no hard evidence to go on they did not want to make any official statements. Things like this made sure that the case did nothing but grate on Detective Burke’s nerves these days but she was still stuck in a stage of admitted morbid fascination. Whoever this man was, Cameron Porter had just recently ruled out the fact that it could not be a woman. Whoever was committing the murders was a little too good at this. The cases had started two months before and the ones that they had labeled as being his hand work had a body count nearing fifty. The body count while ridiculous was made even more unbelievable when the method and circumstances were considered.
The guns used so far were not assault rifles, submachine guns, or even an automatic pistol. To date there had only been a Smith and Wesson revolver which he had utilized to gut and head shoot a dozen people as a cou-de-gra, a Marlin Model 1894 which was a lever action rifle not a high capacity assault rifle it was at best a “plinker” a gun that you shot tin cans with. That was along with a shotgun that could not be named by forensics since it only shot buck shot. Both guns used the .357 Magnum round so they had figured out his motivations there since he only had to carry one type of ammunition for both guns, but he had left every gun he had encountered lying where it fell never interested in stepping up to anything else. Despite sometimes being outgunned he never seemed intimidated. The Suspect had attacked and killed four men all armed with automatic weapons at close range. That was another aspect that was hurting her reasoning that it still could be a woman. Many of the attacks ended with a stabbing from a garden variety machete and on one occasion a seemingly all out brawl between the perpetrator and three other men. But out of almost fifty criminals killed all of which were found to be guilty without a shadow of a doubt no one had seen the suspect.
There was no account to be taken to get an artist rendering. There were no security cameras to pull footage from for even a simple vehicle description. There had been hope that he was not the perfect criminal as they had found a finger print or two in the beginning. But those turned out to be finger prints from people that he had already killed. He wanted his credit and he wanted them to jump through a hoop for them to realize it as well. Other than quickly becoming a boogey man for the local criminals he was just a dick in general.
As good as he was the vigilante had almost been caught tonight. Burke could not see it through his frustrations but this was the first time that the suspect had left anyone alive. Cameron knew this suspect backwards and forward and she knew that he never bit off more than he could chew that meant that he had known that they were coming and had to let this one live. Although she did know that it was a pretty fair bet that the man would not survive and that “Low Rent” could leave without overly endangering himself. Both of the biker’s legs had multiple breaks, a fractured skull, broken ribs, and ruptured organs did not leave the biker with the best chances for survival.
“Lieutenant Jefferson, could we post an officer with the one that lived? I have a hunch that our suspect will try to finish the job.” Porter asked the lieutenant. He looked at her for a moment his face was almost blank then the look of frustration that he had not thought of it himself shown through.
“Good idea Porter.” Jefferson said as she turned and walked back to her patrol car.
***
The biker lied in the hospital bed unaware that three days had passed since he had been attacked. From the waist down as well as his right arm he was covered in plaster casts. His head had been placed in a brace to keep it stationary due to the fractured vertebrae in his neck. He laid there motionless letting the lack of pain wash over him. Pain was the last thing that he had been able to remember but then it all began to flood back to him. The dark green car and the Godzilla roar, as he remembered the green face that had loomed closer to him looked directly at him and then turned and walked away at the same pace that he had been approaching. He had not been able to keep track of time as he lied wrapped around the pine tree shattered but the police and paramedic had not arrived more than five minutes later.
“Mr. Gregory, are you finally awake?” a doctor asked stepping in to the room; he was odd and instantly stood out as out of place for a doctor in a rural southern hospital. His voice was nervous and had the pitch and rhythm of someone from Canada. Mr. Gregory tried to nod in acknowledgement but there was no movement from his head and then through the chemical haze an all important fact occurred to him. He had been carrying fake identification when he was on the motorcycle. He should have been in the hospital under the name Harrison Pitt. The doctor gave a slight smile as he walked over and checked the IV monitor that with some screaming neck muscles Mr. Gregory was able to see clearly read Pitt.
“Ah, we are still pretty sharp aren’t we?” the man asked pulling a scalpel from his jacket. “Well how about we cut to the chase you tell me anything and everything you can about the man who attacked you. I would like to know anything from what kind of car he drove, to his height, weight, identifying marks anything and everything Mr. Gregory.” The Doctor finally stepped in to sight. He was skinny and nervous constantly moving his hands and fighting the urge to keep from touching his own face.
Mr. Gregory knew that the buyers of the meth had sent this man who he only knew as Sonny. The locals were beginning to show their cards on the matter of how scared they were of this boogey man. That was why his group had been hired. They had no clue at first about the vigilante when they started planning the operation a few weeks earlier. But they did noticed that the people getting hit where the ghetto fabulous hoods that liked to flash every bit of cash they could. That was the only reason that had deiced to do the job for Kenneth Host. He was a non descript middle aged man that ran a biker bar that was filled with yuppies and their training wheel bikes on Saturday evenings.
They had thought that working for someone low key and being low key would have made a difference that was why they had planned so meticulously, but that had been naught. Sonny was infamous in the circle Gregory had been attempting to sell meth. He had already done two stints in prison, the first of which was supposedly spent in a military prison. Sonny, while none too tall or muscular was the definition of cagey. His eyes murky hazel eyes carried the look that conveyed that he was never too far from getting in to or too far out of a drug binge. “Green mask, tall, sturdy…” Mr. Gregory said through a wired jaw and with a tongue that was missing much more than just the tip of thanks to a self inflicted chomp during his tumble.
There was a look of confusion from the Sonny’s face. “Could you write it down?” he asked. Mr. Gregory glanced down at his broken arm which ended in a stump. Sonny turned to look at the left hand which was full of stitches and braced with metal.
“Boss man gives me one job and only one job come do this go home. Go home and get my reward but you messed that up for me” Sonny let out a low groan he pounded his fist to the side of his temple blurring his own vision for a moment. He would not be getting any information out of this man, and the boss had commanded that if he could not talk by now that he had to die because he simply knew too much. Sonny pulled a syringe from the pocket of his white coat and stabbed it in to the IV line and pushed the contents in to the line.
“I was supposed to use morphine but I sort of used it on me so this is just some drano that I took from a janitor’s closet down the hall.” Sonny said. The syringe was more of a cooking tool than a medical instrument. The plunger popped noisily as Sonny removed it and then shoved an entire syringe full of air in to the line. As the monitoring screens began to howl Mr. Gregory felt the burning cold in his veins as his eyes rolled in to the back of his head.
“What a waste of time.” Sonny grumbled as he slipped an earpiece in and walked out of the room and saw Mr. Gregory’s real doctor coming. The doctor looked at him curiously. “Sent me to check him out for a both hips and both knees to be replaced. Make that nickel huh?” the Sonny laughed he felt his hand catch his cheek scratching at a spot he had missed shaving a few hours before. The real doctor looked as if he was running in late from a round of golf or tennis; whatever it was that these yuppies wasted their time with. The doctor simply gave a slight laugh that raised his eye brows above the hideous thick brown framed glasses and caused his moustache to look like an even uglier caterpillar and entered the room himself. Sonny picked up his pace.
“Someone stop him this man is dead!” The doctor yelled as he rushed out of the room pointing at Sonny his voice full of shock. Sonny did not look back as the officer that had been dozing by the door stood up and began to chase after him. It would not do any good. He hit the stairs running at full speed and then stepped to the side he had not heard the cop calling for back up yet. Sonny knew if he could silence the cop and hurry he would be home free. The cop hit the stairwell gasping for breath. As he reached up for his radio Sonny punched him in the throat and then shoved the scalpel in through the man’s eye. The cop dropped to the ground and Sonny stole the radio along with the Glock and the two magazines just in case.
When he hit the third floor another police officer was stepping in to the stair well. Sonny emptied half of the magazine in to the man and the shot a few rounds randomly through the closing door. As he hit the fire exit on the ground floor he saw two more police officers responding. Finishing the rest of the magazine off the officers laid twitching and gagging as he snickered when he passed never breaking his stride as he reloaded.
Kenneth had told Sonny that all he had to do was get the information but if things went south he wanted Sonny to make a statement. Four dead police officers might have made a point, but a statement was more than a point. With a fresh magazine in the pistol he jogged to the car he had waiting for him in the parking lot. It had been there for a day and a half already. Opening his door he saw a police cruiser stop in front of him. Propping himself up on the door and shooting through the passenger side window of the car he killed both officers again sending glass and gore spraying through the lot.
Looking up the aisle he smiled and pulled the barbell and a steering wheel lock from the car. In a matter of seconds the police car was rocketing down the aisle towards the entrance. As the car exited the aisle a powder blue Grand Marquis rammed it halting the car from the deadly course that Sonny had set it on. Taking a breath and lighting a cigarette he noticed that there were no other sirens, he could get away.
Sonny was out of the parking lot and on the road in the old stolen Honda Accord before he heard the next reply. He pulled to the back alley of an old foreclosed super grocery store and pulled the gas can out of the trunk of the car along with a trash bag of clothes which he changed in to and tossed the scrubs in the back seat. Quickly Sonny wiped down the pistol and radio before drenching them in gas along with the rest of the car. He threw a lit box of matches in to the back seat and jumped in to another nondescript car and drove away.
Sonny rode back to the bar bumping and diving with each washed out section in the long dirt road. As he pulled in to the cleared acre of land that the large bar sat on he saw that there were the usual vehicles in the parking lot. A crowd was not to be expected at noon on a weekday. As he pulled to the side parking lot Sonny froze when he saw a cop car parked there. A police officer exited out of the passenger door and motioned for Sonny to stop. Then it hit Sonny the syringe he had left prints on it but there was no way that they could have pulled them already. Or could they? He was in the system it would not take but three or four minutes for them to do it on TV he thought as he scratched his unshaven spot on his cheek raw. He kept his eyes locked on the cop and as the cop stepped a few feet to the side of the car Sonny gunned the accelerator and ran him over. Throwing the car in reverse he backed over the man and then drove over him once more. Sonny would not go back to prison. He could hear the man crying out until he backed over him for the third time and the car dropped midway over the man and the cries ceased.
***
Inside the bar Porter heard the cries and the revving car. Drawing her pistol she went for the door backing towards it slowly. She had been here to investigate if anyone had seen the individuals from the “accident” on the highway earlier that week. The man she had been talking to was Kenneth Host a local known for having a hand in everything but always managing to miraculously keep those very hands impeccably clean. Her partner had stepped outside to check on a situation at the hospital a few minutes back she had been alone for a maximum of ten minutes and was starting to leave when it had happened.
Right as she neared the door it swung open she turned to face the threat but caught the ball of the ASP baton to the top of her forehead. As she hit the floor she heard Kenneth start screaming and she heard him start hitting something or someone. As she blacked out she heard all the people in the place start talking at once.
***
Kenneth called everyone. That was what gangs were good for, manpower. Within fifteen minutes the police cruiser was stripped of the low jack that was attached to it as well as all of the guns, ammo, and bullet proof vests. The cop that Sonny had not turned in to bumper food was stripped down to her under wear and locked in a private room in the back where the hookers typically sold their wares. Kenneth would sell her off in to sex slavery or let her join her former partner and feed her to the hogs he had not decided yet. He sat down drinking a tall glass off Johnny Walker Black. It would not be thirty more minutes before the entire police cruiser was torn apart placed on a flat bed and taken to a scrap yard to be compacted and never heard from again.
The grass outside had already been cut and ammonia had been poured over the blood stains and then as it dried up the area was spray painted so that is was indistinguishable unless someone came looking for it and then that was barely even circumstantial evidence without any DNA. One of the boys had come with a back-hoe and a truck and was installing a drainage pipe in the dirt road at the choke point so there was no way to enter in to the bar for as long as they wished.
A man entered and told him that the hogs had been fed the bones had been ground up and all of the surfaces involved had been cleansed. All of the materials worn by them during the butchering as well as the man’s uniform had been burned. His metals and other paraphernalia had been melted down and placed with the car which was less than ten minutes from leaving.
“Pull everyone in for me when it is all done.” Kenneth said. Soon Nearly thirty men stood in the bar. Each of them took a shot and a beer of their choice. Sonny was the only one to preemptively down his and go outside, no doubt to freebase.
“We have shown that we are a force to be reckoned with we are nature we are the true puppet masters of this county. Low Rent has scarred some of the smaller dogs back on to the porch. I heard from Ike Hanson himself not just yesterday that he was going to stop pushing stolen guns in the next month. That is fine let all of the little lap dogs go back to the porch. That just means there is more yard for us and that is what we have been working towards all along. This is our yard and I’ll be damned if some mangy cur is going to scare US out of the yard WE built! Tonight we will lure this Low Rent Vigilante piece of trash out and we will kill him then string him up for everyone to see. Now, Wayne put the road back together and we can finish this up.” Kenneth said. They were sufficiently motivated now even if he had grown tired of his own speech near the end. Kenneth just needed six more months to get squared away before he sold them all down the creek and skipped off to an island leaving everything in worse condition than it had ever been for Daniel Kerns when he got out of prison. Walking away Kenneth realized he had not seen Wayne who would have been double fisting beers and cheering louder than anyone.
Everyone looked around for Wayne realizing that he wasn’t there. “Where is Wayne?” Kenneth asked his anger beginning to rise again.
Outside they heard loud drum beats pounding in rhythm.
“Can you feel that?” one of the men said to another. Curious several stepped to the window.
“OH SHIT!” several cried out trying to back away from the windows.
The backhoe rolled up the concrete stoop and crashed through the door. The men that were carrying guns began to fire at the front of the back hoe but the scoop on the front caused the bullets to ricochet.
“STOP FIRING YOU FOOLS STOP FIRING!!” Kenneth roared but it was no use in a matter of seconds all of the armed men were starting to reload if they had brought an extra magazine or speed loader for their pistol. That was when they heard another different gun shot. One man fell dead and then the next second another. Kenneth ducked low and started for the back room.
There was only one way out of this.
The men who had managed to reload began to fire again as the dust from the wall settled and they were the first to fall. A few seconds later they all looked at one another seeing fewer faces already they scattered with some leaping or stumbling over their fallen brothers in arms whose condition ranged from stone cold and dead with gaping holes in their chests to squirming as their blood pumped out of their stomachs on to the old wooden floor of the bar. In total four men were already dead and five were screaming with their last gasps of air as they futilely attempted to right themselves.
As they poured out of the side door of the bar they found every car and motorcycle in the lot had their tires slashed. They all stopped and looked around realizing that the firing had stopped. With the din from their once “brothers” lessening logic was beginning to creep slowly back in to their minds.
“There is no way that he’ll Kill US ALL!” one yelled as he flung open the door of his truck. A few of the men near him where frozen in place looking for him to give them some sort of instruction when the windshield on his truck shattered as his head exploded and covering the back glass with blood. The shooting started once more randomly. Between shots many of them could hear laughter that was barely audible.
Jerry saw his closest friend Drew dart behind a truck and followed suit. Jerry took cover behind an engine block and grabbed a shard of a mirror and started looking around. Soon he got a glimpse of a man with a lever action rifle to his shoulder a green mask was held to his head by wide brown straps. Standing on the car he looked like statue. He would fire a few shots then load a few quickly in to the rifle and begin firing again. Then the shooting stopped he looked around to see who else was left. When Jerry looked back to where the man had been there was nothing there. Looking up he saw the man was looking at him. The eyes were smiling to match the sick toothy grin that was painted on the face. A steel toed boot struck the man in the shoulder and knocked him over as he began to cry.
Pulling his machete Low Rent heard the gravel crunch behind him. A lackluster shot rang out and struck Low Rent in the back. The biker stood his faced as focused as a man’s face could manage. He was down to a .22 short mini revolver. Low Rent turned as the man fired again as he advanced. Drew saw the green mask jerk back and heard a metal pang. The resounding gong hit was followed by furious footfalls on the gravel as the vigilante charged. Panicking Drew fired the last three rounds blindly. The man doubted the rules of reality; he had shot this man in the face. He fired twice more at the charging figure but he was only reward with the screams of the man that the vigilante had been standing in front of. Then what felt like a metal plated shoulder was slammed in to the biker’s stomach. The biker slammed his hands on to Low Rent’s back feeling what felt like a sheet of metal in the back of the jacket.
Jerry while huddled in front of the truck held his chest where he was unsure whether one or two shots from his friend had hit as he took a ragged breath and began to feel light head he watched in horror as Low Rent drew his machete and nearly severed the leg of his friend as he attempted to kick Low Rent as a last resort. The chopping started and Drew screamed out over and over.
When the fanged green mask turned back to him and there was a visible horizontal graze across the forehead of the mask. The man tried to scramble away but as Low Rent stood he just stopped moving and started crying again. He turned away expecting the machete instead he only garnered a swift quick to the skull that crushed his skull on the chrome bumper of the pickup.
Sonny snickered to himself as he moved the trellis that separated the attic from the outside. He had stood there injecting the last of his meth feeling the icy liquid fire numb him to his core. He felt like a cartoon super hero crouching in the eve of the bar he only had a few seconds to wait before Low Rent was directly below him. He had scantly framed himself in the eve of the bar when Low Rent’s head snapped around as if he sensed another target.
Low Rent saw he could not block the blow that Sonny delivered with the appropriated baton, instead with practically blunt tip of the ASP struck his hand causing him to drop the machete. As Low Rent attempted to recover Sonny was already upon him again striking wildly. The next blow struck him just below the nose and the thin metal creased under the force of the blow. Sonny was not going to give Low Rent the second he needed to regroup. He tried to chop Low Rent but he was not going to give Sonny the time to get in a solid blow. Instead there were multiple slaps and jabs with the baton. Conversely Low Rent while unable to gain enough room to utilize his strength in a full strike, the best that Low Rent could manage were short kicks to the shins with the steel toed boots and shoves. Normally this would have given a man enough sensory input to slow their attack. But the lanky meth addict could not feel any blow that was dealt to him.
“Scared You Coward?” Sonny cackled as Low Rent blocked a blow from the baton with his forearm. Sonny felt the reverb associated with metal striking metal as the ASP bounced back in his hand. Shoving forward Sonny felt a vice like hand grasp his neck and another hammer like fist hit him in the nose and mouth shattering his nose and teeth. The green face drew nearer to the junkie as it slammed in to his face and then he was pummeled again further disfiguring his face. Sonny managed to bring the end of the handle of the baton down on to the mouth of the mask three times with all of his strength. The grip on his neck constricted once more then slung him away.
Sonny was on his feet a second later charging back before Low Rent could draw a weapon. Sonny focused his strikes on the face mask trying to break it or rip it from Low Rent’s face but he was constantly countered by blows to the side of his neck or face. They were matching each other blow for abusive blow. Sonny saw his moment and drew back only to have a boot planted in his chest. The drugs made all of it seem animalistic to Sonny as Low Rent rolled back and leapt up to his feet. Sonny flexed every muscle in his body as Low Rent stood and holding his machete once more.
“I like you Low Rent you know that how a fight starts is how a fight is supposed to end. Isn’t it?” Sonny laughed. As Sonny tossed the baton from one hand to the other a shot rang out and the addict’s eyes grew wide. His hands started up this face which was missing on the left side of his face from his cheek bone to his left nostril. The body fell to the ground squirming as Low Rent turned and headed for the building.
***
Inside Kenneth had called out once more on his cell phone. The vigilante may kill him but he and the cop would die here today. The cop stood a few feet in front of him he had brought her to the back room of the bar and forced her on to a chair just under a steel beam. She was his bargaining chip he had a rope tied under his armpits that ran to the noose around her neck if he fell her neck would snap. If the vigilante bastard were to kill all of the men that were already here before reinforcements arrived then Kenneth would use her to buy himself some time until reinforcements arrived.
“Sorry about your bad day girl but dying will probably be a good thing for you,” Kenneth said to her “I would have probably sold you off to sex slavery after I had let all of my boys and girls have their way with you for a week or so. It ain’t pretty but it sure works and it would have made you a few dollars as well. Remember that little Venezuelan girl from a couple of months back? Yeah she made me a pretty little penny. From what I hear she is still being worked down in Myrtle Beach.” Kenneth rambled he was obviously nervous. It made Porter somewhat relieved to know that he was afraid as she looked around.
Relief was quickly all consumed with rage. Cameron Porter had never been the damsel in distress. Back in the academy she had ran harder, faster, and farther. She shot more accurately than her instructors. None of it had ever been easy, she had to work harder than all of them and never spoke a word of hesitation. Trying to look around she could see that Kenneth was holding a pump shotgun sawn off to illegal lengths. If she wasn’t gagged she would probably be dead by now. She was insulting him through the gag nonstop, she had no clue as to what all she was saying but she knew if he could understand her he would have shot her by now.
As the shooting and screaming stopped there was an odd few moments of silence and that was worse than the gun shots. Kenneth heard a creak and pointed the shotgun at the door waiting for the next creak. When the next one occurred he realized it was not from the hallway.
Porter stared hard at the door in front of her to keep from looking up to the ceiling where the creaking had come from. Kenneth saw her move her head slightly and he looked up as the man fell down through the ceiling swinging the machete as he fell. The rope twanged as it was sliced in half. Porter felt a tug and then heard the shotgun fire as well as an ear splitting scream.
Cameron turned to see the masked vigilante had Kenneth’s arms up over his head.
The pose was held just long enough for Porter to see Low Rent in full light. He was much taller than Kenneth and most men. He was and thinner than Kenneth as well. The now dented green metal mask was held to his head by thick brown leather straps. His build was gangly at best and his seemingly unnaturally long arms, which paired with his long legs and comedic large feet, did nothing to aid his appearance. His upper body was clad in an old brown leather jacket that had already gone under the needle several times for repair and looked as if it would again if Low Rent walked away from this a living free man. Porter saw that the pistol was held in a well worn cowboy like holster and gun belt. The rifle was slung on his back in a similar leather sling. The ragged dark blue jeans bulged at the knees suggesting some sort of knees pads that would match the one that were either sewn in to the leather jacket or worn under it. Porter could see through the ripped cheap leather jacket that Low Rent was bound with muscles that were more accustomed to strenuous labor than enjoyable exercise.
She watched in shock as Kenneth was kicked in the knees, groin, and stomach in a viscous burst of strikes from the gigantic brown leather steel toed boots. As Kenneth was released the vigilante kicked him square in the chest and sent him crashing in to the wall behind him. Kenneth vomited blood as the green faced vigilante advanced on him reasserting his grip on his machete with the leather gloves giving an audible grinding noise.
“Stupid boy you should know this won’t change anything. It was Daniel Kerns before me and someone before him. It never stops heh heh ehhh…” Kenneth laughed. At the mention of Daniel Kerns Low Rent sprang forward slamming his shoulder in to Kenneth’s solar plexus knocking him to the floor as Low Rent’s steel toed boot met his chin snapping his head in to the wall and then the machete was sunk in to his forehead twice. With his torso heaving Low Rent removed the machete and stood motionless for a moment before he began to savagely hack at Kenneth’s now already mutilated head. Her stomach wretched and she saw the neck disappear and the collar bones and ribs splintered. The machete let out a clang and as the blade struck a stud behind the body for the umpteenth time the blade snapped in half.
She watched in indignation as the green face turned towards her with the giant fanged smile and started walking towards her sheathing the broken machete and he pulled out a pocket knife and
walked towards her. Quickly he cut her bindings and she removed her own gag.
What had been a morbid fascination had quickly turned to disgust for Cameron Porter. She had never killed a man. She had accepted that one day that she likely would in the line of duty but she knew she would do so in an almost humane fashion. The Green Faced Bastard before her was a soulless savage and it was nothing as she had imagined it.
“Thank you” she said with more than a tinge of disgust; he looked at her a moment and turned to walk away from her. Porter stepped off of the chair and reached forwards for him and he quickly stepped out of her reach only turning to look at her and shake his head no and wag his finger at her. They eyes behind the mask showed exhaustion as well as the onset of what she knew would be severe swelling. She reached down and grabbed the shotgun and the extra shells from Kenneth’s pocket and reloaded it quickly.
“Freeze, you Green Faced Bastard!” she yelled catching him in the hall. He turned and looked at her curiously melodramatically cocking his head but never blinking his eyes. They stood there in silence for a moment when they heard something that sound like thunder. “Motorcycles and there are a lot of them.” She said as the sound reverberated in the back hall. The man pointed behind her. Porter refused to take her eyes off of him this would make her career and she was no longer entertaining the notion that these criminals deserved his brand of justice.
He walked towards her slowly with his arms raised and as she was within his reach he pointed once more. Porter turned her head knowing that if he wanted to knock her out he would have already and the simple fact that there were worse thing coming their way ensured her he no longer planned on abandoning her. Porter saw that he was pointing to a locker room. She ran in and dressed herself quickly in whatever would fit. When she walked out she saw that he was at the other end of the hall. He jumped up through a small square opening grabbing the sides of it and continued to push to aid his jump. He seemingly never slowed from his initial leap in to the attic and stuck his arm back out for her. She took his arm and he pulled her up with what seemed like almost no effort.
As they slipped in to the attic she saw him move towards a small window that had been shattered in the first gun fight. She watched as he pulled a small black back pack off of his back and pulled out an ammunition box. Quickly unloading the rifle he turned and looked at her pointing to the other window. She went to it and waited. She only had ten rounds for the small shotgun and she knew that it wasn’t time for her to start shooting yet with the severely limited range of the short barreled shotgun. Porter heard the hammer fall on the rifle and the lever being worked.
“Are you just dry firing?” she asked looking across the half finished attic full of boxes and broken bar stools. The man said nothing but pointed out to the road. Quickly looking back she saw that there was a growing pile of motor cycles. Then it dawned on her; he was firing subsonic ammunition. Thanks to his manual action he could fire these nearly silent rounds and be ready to fire another in less than a second. She looked at the pile. The numerous motorcyclists were nearly clogged in the road as he fired one round after another. She could tell these were not as lethal as factory rounds at the range he was firing but she was willing to bet that with the power they held and his known accuracy there would not be anyone to walk away.
As efficient a killer as Low Rent was he alone was not going to be enough to stem the tide. Porter slipped out of the attic and made her way down stairs. Looking around she saw an errant rifle leaning against the bar. Grabbing the rifle she kneeled beside of the back hoe and took aim and began to fire. On the second trigger pull she realized that the rifle was full auto and the magazine was spent with several of the riders from the new column of bikers missing she was pleased enough with the results. She heard the lever action begin to bark once more, he was out of subsonic ammunition.
Porter looked up as the vigilante crashed through the ceiling again. He slung the rifle on his back, shoved the shotgun she had tossed to the ground in his pack, grabbed her wrist with his leather gloved hand, and started pulling her.
“WE HAVE TO STAY AND FINISH THIS HERE AND NOW!” Porter screamed at him shaking the rifle out of frustration. She had never felt a need to kill anything in her life but these men had to die they had killed a fellow officer and come very close to selling her in to sex slavery. The man slapped the rifle from her hands with enough strength to show her he had much more to use if she continued to fight him. She turned and grabbed up an Uzi Carbine from a dead man and took the duct taped magazines from his hand. Looking back at the road where fifteen more bikers where coming with less than two hundred yards to cover. She looked back at him and he jerked her towards the back of the bar hard enough to pull her off balance. She had been trained to deal with grown men and women trying to fight her but his size and strength made her feel like a child.
They were in the wood line within seconds. He pulled the shotgun from his pack and ejected all of the rounds from the tube shoving three rounds he had pulled from a side pouch on the pack. They were less than twenty five yards from the bikers using a tree as cover. The bikers slowed to a stop and she saw Low Rent dip out from behind the tree holding the shotgun at shoulder level and fire. The round had been a slug and it punched through the top of a man’s leg and punctured the gas tank. She heard the action being worked and then a flare streaked towards the bikers. His aim was not perfect but it did the job and the biker and those near him went up in flames. He fired the shotgun once more and she saw him draw the revolver for the first time. It was an old Smith and Wesson Model 27 just as forensics had said. He fired on several of the other bikers and their motorcycles and the blaze grew.
Porter saw it would not be enough and as the remaining five bikers that had not been caught ablaze turned to them raising their weapons to fire. As Porter raised the Uzi and began to do short bursts on each one their bullets murderously scattered through the pines. Porter never flinched as she managed to drop each of the thugs. After they had fallen off of their motorcycles and she shot those as well. As one of the motorcycles exploded she was rocked by a wave of heat. She saw that the bar was beginning to smolder as Low Rent grabbed her arm again.
She was tired of this son of a bitch trying to constantly man handle her. She was just as dangerous as he was and he needed that to be proven to him. She lashed out with a punch to his neck and he dropped his head. Her fist collided with the metal of the mask and her knuckles lit up with pain.
The Vigilante pulled her once more as she swung the Uzi at the fanged smile. It connected and the metal shoulder stock broke the already damaged and creased metal and as she jerked it away it ripped part of the mouth of the mask away. She saw the hit had drawn blood from his cheek, but that seemed to be the least of his worries. Both of the man’s lips were busted and there were multiple purple and black bruises littering the parts of his face that had been uncovered. Porter saw the other scars and lacerations that were also littering his face, half of which were not even scabbed over. As the blood dripped down to his jaw line she saw him give a giant grin that was more intimidating than the one that had been on the mask. The mask was basically a cartoon but the broken and bloodied lips contorting to show the grin was all too real and disturbing. As she stood momentarily shocked by Low Rent’s face the outside edge of his palm lashed out hitting her wrist and then his vice like grip closed around her hand and forced the Uzi from her hand.
He pulled her close to him behind the tree as the back-hoe exploded and the bar was blown in nothing more than flaming hazards. She looked up at him as saw that the blood had dripped down on to her shirt. There was a quiet moment between the two of them and the murderous grin that framed the slightly yellowed teeth cracked open and he began to laugh. As he laughed the cars, trucks, and motorcycles in the side parking lot could be heard exploding. She looked at him curiously as he reloaded the revolver never dropping a spent round. He dumped them back in to the pack as he pulled out bandage and rag. He wiped the blood from his face and slapped the bandage on. Then came a small bottle and walked over and dumped it on her shirt and on the surrounding area. She stood there in disbelief. Another small metal bottle then came out of the pack and he poured it all over the area they had fought. Then he pulled a cigar which he lit with several matches as he walked towards her and dropped them on the ground. As the trail of accelerant ignited and the samples of his blood were either covered in ammonia or burning and she had done nothing to stop him. Low Rent blew the honey scented smoke in her direction with a flirtatious sneer. She began to laugh quietly at first and then more and more loudly.
She was crying in moments; she had killed more men then she could count. She had aided a psychopathic vigilante; she had reneged on her oath to the people, and worst of all in her mind, she had needed to be rescued. He walked her away from the growing fire in the woods and moved her towards a lawn chair that was scattered about a giant fire pit. Her sobs had forced the vigilante to all but carry her and she struck him every chance she could expressing her hate with forceful blows to his ribs. As he went to sit her down in the chair she squeezed his neck and an arm went around and grabbed his back.
It had been her and she felt like he had known that it was going to be her. She saw the show that he had put on. All this time he had been putting on a show for an audience that never lived to tell anyone and she was the first one to live to see it. She was almost certain that he could have gotten the job done without all of the theatrics but she could tell by seeing the mask and the way that he fought; it was all in the presentation. Looking up at him as she again sent her fist sailing in to his ribs there was a look of pity from him, a look that was so uninvited that she wondered it if made him feel ill. He stood there in front of her for a moment. The giant fire in front of them raging on even after the flashing red, white, and blue lights appeared.
“You better get going.” She said looking behind her to the lights giving him the thirty second needed to disappear in to the woods. There was nothing more than a giant smile carved in to the dirt. Porter staggered away from the fire pit to see Detective Burke stumbling out of a squad car with a bandage covering his forehead.
Burke’s eyes were wide with amazement. There were at least a dozen dead bikers piled in with as many motorcycles up the path. Looking around he could see burning bundles which had once been human beings. Abstractly he wondered if this would put Low Rent’s body count in to the triple digits. It looked like a crime scene than a snow globe of a warzone with the ashes of people and building materials floating down to earth.
“Porter? You’re alive! How did you make it? Are you hurt? Do you need anything? Why are you dressed like a slutty waitress?” He began to ask a dozen questions at once. Porter said nothing but continued forward to the nearest ambulance. “Wait, wait, wait, you’ve met him you met Low Rent? What is he like?” Burke asked showing much more emotion than he was comfortable with.
“He is hilarious.” Porter laughed shaking her head a shedding a few tears.
