Out of the Black - Lee Doty [101]
Starbursts. Pretty. Ouch.
She was still holding the fletcher. Now that's determination, she thought somewhat blearily. The screeching of tires filled the air, but around that sound, a million imaginary insects seemed to be chattering, harmonizing with the pretty light show in her head.
Her eyes snapped open when the car's screeching terminated in a jarring crash. She was up far faster than she could have been a year ago- thanks Alex. ...Alex! Fletcher in hand, aching body protesting, she sprinted toward the three cars from behind.
Their car had passed her and swerved onto the sidewalk on the other side of the road. The SUV had crashed into the passenger side. The microvan was about five meters behind their car. The driver covered the wrecked car with an automatic weapon braced against her open door.
She could make out the sound of someone yelling angrily from the direction of Ping's wrecked car, then two shots rang out in rapid succession. A shock wave of panic crashed through her. She poured on the speed. Twenty meters to go.
Ping's head slammed into the window's safety glass. The glass turned partially opaque as micro-fractures spread away from thewas hart. He felt like his head had just struck the biggest gong at the Shaolin Temple, its reverberant ring lingered in his ears.
Turgid cloth filled his vision, fouled his every movement- trapped! He had a claustrophobic moment, already the sole inhabitant of the toe-tagged Ping Bannon memorial body bag. He struggled against the restraining cloth, and choked on some kind of burning chemical that filled the air. Coughing hurt his head, which had taken entirely too much damage in the past few days.
Suddenly there was a diffuse hiss and the restraining cloth relented. With tingling arms, he fought to clear it from his face. He was free! Then he understood: though the impact with the SUV wasn't Blood on the Highway bad, it did manage to slam him into the side window and deploy the car's airbags.
Then another realization hit him... he'd just been T-boned by a team of professional killers. Right! Time to move!
The spider webbed glass of his window exploded inward. He was showered with glass shards the size of pebbles, then with rifle butt. Stars exploded around him while he got cozy with a little more head trauma. The universe compressed for an instant to the few electric centimeters on the side of his head where the pain blossomed like a small mushroom cloud. His vision flashed, then went dim.
...but not dark. He forced himself to stay slumped toward the passenger seat, where the impact had driven him. With all his fluttery, barely conscious will, he forced his hands to remain limp, to not fly to the side of his head to cover or probe his damaged noggin. In his imagination, his brain was leaking from the side of his head, demanding a hand to apply firm pressure to keep things together. Nope... request denied... possum cloak engaged.
The back door opened and the car rocked down slightly as one of the killers leaned in. He prodded Alex's immobile form with the barrel of his weapon, prodded again harder. Alex didn't make a sound. The car rocked up again as the intruder retreated out the door. The handle on Ping's door was jerked, jerked again, but the car's frame had bent enough to jam the door.
There was cursing, then yanking, then more cursing with simultaneous yanking. Ping didn't smile, though it took great effort. So, this poor misguided killer had an extra-homicidal character flaw- foul language. Ping took an odd satisfaction from listening to him fail his verbal IQ test. About four words were used in various permutations to