Just when it seemed like the cop was going to pull thetrigger, the man that had been bashing his head against the bars for the lasttwo hours, reached through his bars of his cell and yanked on the cop's satinpolice jacket. He managed to squeeze off a round that zinged by Ace's head. Hotfire ran down his cheek.
"I got one!" the cop announced to his partneras he slipped out of his jacket and away from the grasp of the man in the cell.
"Well, then take him out," his partner yelled.
Ace was still in shock when the cop pulled the trigger.Despite everything he had seen that night, he still felt fear gurgle in hisbelly as the cop put a round through the head of the man across the hall. Heslumped to the ground, his face still pressed against the bars, and bloodrunning down his face, dripping onto the concrete floor.
The cop continued down the hallway, Ace momentarilyforgotten. Ace flinched every time there was a gunshot. That could have beenme, he thought. He held his hand to his bleeding cheek and hoped hisbandmates were yelling out their names, but he couldn't tell over the din ofnoise coming from the cells.
When the cop had checked every cell, he came walking backthrough the hallway. "Stay in your cells. We have an emergency situation.If you stay in these cells, you will be safe. We will be back in an hour tocheck on you. Especially you, buddy boy," he said as he strode past Ace'scell.
As the cop disappeared from sight, Ace could hear the manrepeating his message, and then they were gone, both of them. Noise stillflooded the cells. People were yelling for help and asking questions."Stay in your cells," the man said again, slamming the door shutbehind him.
Fuck that.
Ace pulled the key ring off the jailor and began pluggingthe keys into the lock on his cell, one by one. The last thing he was going todo was sit in a cell with a rotting corpse, waiting to be executed. He didn'tknow what was going on outside, but this was most definitely not normal... evenfor America.
Chapter 37: Hot Chops
Mort's landing had not been soft, but thankfully, it hadnot done any further damage either. His body had flown over the top of theshopping cart as it collided with the bumper of the red truck. He laid therefor a second, trying to figure out if he had hurt anything in the fall. Hisknee was still on fire and his elbow still ached, but the cuts on his face hadfinally stopped bleeding. He did have a nice case of road rash on his sidewhere he had tumbled across the pavement, leaving some of his skin behind.
He sat up, and managed to stand on his one good leg, hisother dangling gingerly, just barely touching the ground. He looked back up thehill he had come down, and saw shapes moving underneath the streetlights. Theywere coming. He didn't have much time. He hopped over to the truck and saw theman from the grocery store. His forehead was curved the wrong way thanks to thesteering wheel of the truck.
Mort looked at the other car, and didn't imagine thatthings would be much better on the inside of that car, as the entire front ofthe sedan had been ripped off by the diesel beast of a truck. Mort fumbledaround in the man's pockets, searching for his gun. No luck. Then he noticed aglimmer of silver on the floor of the truck. He reached for the shine andpulled out the man's handgun. It was heavy in his hands.
He backed away from the car, holding the gun gingerly andtrying to avoid tripping over the cans of food that littered the street. Hisonly thought was of escape. He looked at the gun in his hand, and for a moment,he was tempted to put the barrel in his mouth and take the simplest way out.But that's not who he was. He wasn't a quitter, and if he had been, he wouldhave been dead a long time ago.
Behind him one of the cars caught fire. That was a goodenough sign for him to move. Mort hobbled down the street, looking for anywhereto hide. There were plenty of ramshackle houses along the street, but the lastthing he wanted to do was break into a house and hold people at gunpoint. Hesettled on a small restaurant named Hot Chops.
It was a two-story house that had been converted into abusiness. Ten wooden steps climbed up to the first floor of the house. Helimped up the steps, each flex of his bruised knee bringing more agony. Helooked over his shoulder and back down the street. They were gaining ground.Soon, the dead would be at the vehicles he had left behind.
As he reached the second floor landing, Mort put his faceto the windows to see if he could see inside. It was pitch black inside. Usingthe butt of the gun, he smashed in one of the windows and then cleared away theglass. He crawled inside, grunting in discomfort as he tried to maneuver hisinjured leg through the window with the least amount of pain. Once he gotinside, he laid there, catching his breath and waiting for the pain to subside.
He listened for footsteps or any other sounds of alarm,but there were none. When he was satisfied that no one was going to come andshoot him in the back, he rose to his feet and looked out the window. He wasjust in time to see the burning car explode. It wasn't a huge explosion, but hefelt the force and heat from it down the block, and the sound was deafening.Car alarms erupted in a cacophony of wailing throughout the neighborhood.
Shadows stumbled in front of the fire, outlined againstits brilliance as they moved down the street and towards his hiding spot.Flame-engulfed figures emerged from the conflagration and stumbled after them.A man with a hunting rifle burst out of the front door of one of the housesnext door. With his back to Mort's
