Jules Hinton's Strange Trip: Chapter 10 by JCH and Kas

        “If you don’t sit down now, I’m going to go out to the car and get the belt,” the fat woman with the long, stringy blonde hair said for at least the second time in as many minutes.
         “But I’ve got to get away from the dog,” the little boy said, stamping one foot and gesturing toward the few vacant seats nearby.  There was nothing there.  The few people that were in the waiting room were clustered toward the door, half-asleep, chatting idly, or trying to watch the single TV mounted on a shelf against one of the walls.  An older black woman smiled at the mother and the child, nodding her head slowly.
         Jules was trying not to make eye contact with anyone, pretending to be just another patient.  Which is what he was.  He could have laughed.  Or screamed.  It really was funny.  Stopping in another town just to get a few stitches in his arm.  Another hospital.  Trying to watch some show about angels or something.  Trying to pretend that he fit in there, that he was just waiting for someone to come out.  It felt nice.
         He had told the nurse in the outer office that he just wanted to rest a while before trying to drive on.  No one had said anything.  He had told them that it was a nasty cut he’d got trying to help some friends move furniture.  He could tell by their reaction that they didn’t really believe him.  The doctor said that the "cut" had struck an artery, that it had been a good idea to come to the hospital.
 The little boy was galloping around the empty chairs again.  Jules shut his eyes when the kid wandered too closely.  He tried not to shift his arm.  It hurt, but after sixteen stitches and a few shots later he wasn’t feeling it.  He could almost taste a Tom Collins, but as much as he would like to, he couldn’t afford to spend the next day lying in bed and trying to forget everything.
         Nikki.  Thoughts of her drifted through his head, forcing out the fears that he was going mad, that maybe the man who had kidnapped her before had her again.  Or maybe that it was a group of men--somehow connected to the ones that had attacked him.
         Absently he rubbed at the scabs on the back of his hand.  They itched.  His stomach dropped and a bubble of panic and fear rose inside him.  What had happened to him out in those woods?  Dan had told him that he had had a concussion.  Could he have hallucinated again?   Certainly tornadoes ripping through the countryside would have tossed the trees around like...
         He winced, readjusting his arm, feeling the bandage stretch when he moved.  He would have to favor it for a while.  Could he drive?  Could he avoid being attacked by strangers in the middle of broad daylight again?!  He felt as though he would give anything at that moment just to be in control.
         Nikki.  Where was she?  Who was she?  Ferguson had told him that she had been murdered in New York when she was a kid.  But with the kind of money that she was carrying around, and with what she had been doing for a living back then, who knows what her connections had been?  Could she have just decided to disappear back then?  Maybe whatever friends that she had had all those years ago knew how to make kids like her vanish, let them start their lives over?  He had thought about calling his brother again.  Maybe she had tried to contact him again, maybe even left a message.  Maybe she was okay.  Traveling had certainly seemed to have hardened her.  But then, he was the one carrying the gun.
         In a ludicrous way, all of the things that his family and friends had ever said about taking a solitary roadtrip across the country seemed to be coming true.  All at once.  What could he expect next?  Should he just press on and put everything behind him?  He felt a stab of guilt for even considering it.  Where was she?  Driving around looking for her was going to get him killed.  But he had to go back.  Tim had told him that Nikki was okay, that she was going back to where she had last seen him, near wherever it was that Dan and Sara had found him.  That she had gotten away from the man who had undoubtedly been following them.  This comforted him a little, but he knew that she was still in danger.
         Jules heaved himself to his feet and dodged the running child, making his way to the door.  Should he try to disguise himself?  They would be expecting to see his car.  That was it, wasn’t it?  He had seen their faces, knew what they looked like?  A cold chill ran through him.  He remembered the face through the car window...
         He scanned the parking lot before stepping outside into the afternoon sun.  Nothing suspicious.  Keep walking.  He felt the gun through his coat pocket.  Would he be able to use it if he had to?  And what good was it doing telling the police what had happened?  What could they do?  He had to face facts.  Maybe it was just a sudden streak of bad luck.  And it looked as though it was going to follow him for a while.  He hoped that his luck didn’t hurt anyone else.  Or get them killed.
         Back to Smithee.  Back into the frying pan.

         Dan was hunched over a steaming coffee in the corner of the diner.  Through the foggy window, they could see him sitting with Chris, whom Jules had just met, the two of them talking to a pair of paramedics.  The squawk of a radio broke the silence from the lumbering power company truck next to the Jeep.  They’d been riding around like this all afternoon, but now the sun was going down and they had gotten nowhere.  Bile was rising in his throat, but he managed to cut off a grumbling remark, tugging the wide brim of the camouflage hunting cap they had given him down over his face.  He had pulled the ponytail up into the hat, but the green army surplus jacket was just a little to large for him.  He huddled into it in the back seat, waiting.  The CB sputtered.   Someone was making another call asking for help towing a car.  They’d been listening to that too.  Dan had pulled a half dozen of his “friends” to help canvas the town and country-side--looking for Nikki, or for the men that had taken her.  Nothing yet.
         Sara sat in the front seat of the Jeep now, her chin resting on her knees, dark eyes glistening in the neon light from the diner window.  She had her red hair pulled back tight.  Hard to imagine her part of this group, that her father was their leader.  In many ways it seemed like they had just transplanted themselves from Vietnam, that returning to civilian life had not changed anything.  They were still fighting the enemy.  They seemed to move like that.  He had heard Dan and Chris talking about the towns folk, like they were an altogether different breed.  And the government, who they had so diligently obeyed during an unpopular war, had become something far worse for them than an unseen enemy in a field of battle so far away.
         Still, it was none of his business.  It had been a bend to ask them for the help.  But if they hadn’t allowed him to hide the car for the moment, who knows what might have become of him?  But they felt the way he did about those who had taken Nikki.  Whoever had taken her weren’t just breaking a law set down by the courts of the land, they were going against all dignity, oppressing the innocent.  The kind of men Dan and his friends would shoot on sight if they caught them breaking into their homes, or attacking their families.
         Jules resisted an urge to scratch at his arm.  It had been aching fiercely earlier, until he had taken more of the pain medicine the doctor in the latest ER had given him.  Sara had all but ripped the bandage back from his arm when he had arrived Dan’s sister’s home again.  She had seemed pleased with what the emergency room had done.  Something about their “good work.”
         Chris, a thin man in his late thirties with a blonde mustache and a knife on his belt, had come with them while Howard and his friends had split up, taking their Jeeps and pickups in every direction.  Looking for the men who had attacked him.  Looking for the men who had kidnapped an innocent young woman.  But Jules had to wonder just how innocent Nikki really was.  Was she connected to some kind of criminal past, something that she had been a part of in New York City.  Something that she was trying desperately to run from?  And she had run right into him.
         “We’ll find her,” Sara said quietly.  She was looking across the top of the seat at him.  Jules sipped his coffee.  The styrofoam cup was still warm.
         “Unless she’s a hundred miles from here by now.”  He left the bite in his voice.  No control.  He had no control.  She was still staring at him.
 Sara shook her head slowly.
         “As cold-hearted as it sounds, Jules, I don’t think so.  If these guys were waiting for you when you came out of the motel over in Bulroy, they’re not dumb.  They know you know what they look like.  The only thing I don’t understand is why they’re still sticking around.  Why have they been chasing you?  You’d think they’d have disappeared if they knew you’d go to the cops with their descriptions.”
         Jules shook his head, flipping up the brim of the camouflage cap.  That wasn’t what was really bothering him.  Why hadn’t she gone to the police when she escaped from the man that had taken her the second time?  For that matter, why hadn’t she said something about doing that the first time?  There had been no mention on her part about making that first instance a matter for the police to deal with.  They had only become involved in part by his actions--he had gone to report her abduction.  Just what sort of past was she trying to hide from?  And this time--the second time--Tim had told him that she was okay, but that she planned to return to Smithee to look for him, that she had escaped from the man who had attacked them.  No mention of involving the law.
         Chris and Dan were coming out now.  Sara scrambled back between the seats and sat next to Jules while the two men climbed into the Jeep.
         “Too many people worrying about too many problems,” Dan began, shaking his head.  ”Too busy to notice strangers in a little town like this.”
         Jules sat up, gripping the back of the older man’s seat.
         Chris pulled on his seat belt, and started the engine.
         “Another dead end,” Jules said, sitting down again.  Dan half-turned in his seat as Chris backed the Jeep out of its parking space and swung out onto one of the little town’s main streets.
         “Everyone’s looking out for their own.  Trying to get help as best they can.  But they would have noticed a bunch of men like those you described driving around, or looking as though they were up to something.  But it could be that they’re gone.  There’s nothing to say that they’re anywhere near here now.  I hate to say it Jules, but maybe they’ve taken your friend and split.  Either that or she’s hiding out somewhere.”
         “But don’t think we’re giving up yet,” Chris said, looking at him through his rearview mirror.  “If it’s God’s will, we’ll find her for you.  Dan and I both have made calls around the county.  We’ve got friends that will be on the look out.  The best that you can do is stay with us, and as soon as we hear something...”
         Jules alternated between nodding and staring at the passing cars.  Just what he really wanted now, being stuck in one spot with a group of people he wasn’t entirely sure he could trust, as honest as they seemed.  Maybe it was just the way the media always portrayed these people as some kind of fanatics.  Or maybe it was just these sorts of people that had left their old lives behind hundreds of years earlier to come to settle a new country where they could gain some sort of greater control over their own lives.
         They drove through the town again, stopping to talk to one of their friends in a pickup truck and then Chris swung the Jeep back toward Mary's home, where they would be staying.  At least it had power.  Half the town was still without electricity, and repair trucks were scrambling.  He’d seen a weather report from the night before detailing the extensive damage the tornadoes had done earlier that week and was surprised.  He had not realized the extent of the damage.
         Here and there cars still lay on their side or flipped from the terrific winds, along the roads.  Some had driven off the shoulder of the road, getting out of the open spaces during the storm.  They passed another power company repair truck as they turned in the long driveway to the house.
          Chris let them out and waved good-bye, telling Dan that he would keep in touch with them, if not later that night then early the next morning.  Jules swept off the floppy camouflage hat.  He thought it looked silly on him.  But no one had given him a second look driving around with a group of similarly dressed men--and one young girl.  The stars were coming out overhead and he craned his neck to look at the glittering sky.  Sara grinned, sitting down on the broad front porch steps and looking up at the constellations.
         “Well, Mary told me earlier that she was going to have a warm dinner waiting for us, so I think I’ll get a beer and check on it,” Dan said, going inside.  But they weren’t watching.  Jules spotted the brief streak of a shooting star and thoughts of the tiring day fled from his mind.
         Sara laughed, rubbing the back of her neck where it had popped audibly.  Jules felt like lying down on the grassy lawn and staring up at the night sky.  It had been a long day.  Too much of it had been spent alternating between being angry and being frustrated.  And being afraid.  He sat down in the cool grass, looking up.  His arm still ached.  And every time he felt the tug of pain, he could see the image of the knife sticking into his arm.  That made things worse.  He could feel the weight of the gun against his stomach, in the inside pocket of the coat.  How many times that day had he pictured himself having to use it?
         “So this is what you do for fun?” Jules asked, stifling a yawn with the back of his hand.
         “Well, yeah.  But we do a lot of traveling around.  Mostly Dad visiting his friends, but sometimes we all get together and go hiking or camping.  And that’s the best.  At least I’m not wasting my time hanging out in malls and cruising through the little towns around here like most girls my age.”  She did look sort of out of place, with faded blue-jeans and a camouflage t-shirt.
         “But isn’t that... whoops.  Nope, don’t want to say that,” Jules muttered.
         “What?  What!?”
         “Never mind,” he said, craning his neck in another direction to stare up at the stars.
         “Come on, tell me.  What were you going to say.”
         “Hmph!  Well, I was probably going to say something kind of sarcastic--like playing games in the woods with guns and knives being as mindless as driving around little towns in small circles.  But I wouldn’t say anything like that.  But I won’t say that now, not after what’s been happening to me lately.  Maybe the world isn’t the timid veneer that I’ve never really been able to see through until now.  Maybe I should get used to carrying a gun.”
         Sara nodded thoughtfully.
         “But I hate the thought of having to worry about everyone that I meet.  What they might do, what they might want.  It seems like that’s just a paranoid way to live.”
         “Well, as Dad always says, he’s worried about me and our family.  And that he does what he does partly for selfish reasons.  But that’s just part of it.”
         “Yeah, I heard Chris talking too.  Seems like he’s really on the religious kick,” Jules winced.   “Sometimes it seems like there are too many philosophies out there on how to live.  How can you simply choose one?  There’s a philosophy, a religion or some self-help book out there for everyone.  Literally.  And they’re all different.  So how can any of them be better than any other?  Or any closer to the ultimate truth, why we're here, if there is a reason to it at all."
         “Dad says you’ve just got to find something that you’re comfortable with.  Me... I don’t know.  I haven’t figured it all out yet,” Sara said, rubbing her eyes.
         “Well, when you figure it out, please don’t tell me.  I don’t think that I want to know.”
         He stood up and patted her on the head as he walked up onto the porch and headed for the porch swing.
         “I think I’ll sit out here for a while longer and look at the stars.  Let me know when dinner is ready.”
         Jules stopped as his boot crunched on something.  Glass.  He lifted his boot and looked.  Glittering in the half-light of the stars and light streaming out through a window further down the porch, Jules saw several large pieces of glass.  He stood there staring down at it until Sara looked up from where she sat on the front porch steps.
         “What is it?” she said, turning.
         Jules looked up at the nearest window, darkened inside.  Further down the light of the living room shone through onto the porch.  He couldn’t hear anything from inside.  He tried to remember which room this small window let into.  The bottom pane of the window was gone.  Small shards along the rim showed where it had been broken out.
         “Sara,” he said, turning to look back toward her.
         The front door banged open.  Dan was pushed through roughly, blood streaming down his face.  He was coughing.  There was a gun pressed up underneath his chin.  A thick, muscular arm encircled his throat, virtually dangling the older man off the ground.  And behind him a man with shaggy blond hair and a weeks growth of beard.  His eyes glittered as he shoved Dan out onto the porch and smiled at Jules.
         “Daddy!” Sara said, leaping up and running up toward the front porch.
         “You!” the man growled, tightening his grip on Dan, but staring at Jules.  There were sounds out in the yard now too.  He half turned to see someone come clambering up onto the porch behind him, one of the other men from the day before, the ones that had attacked him--Cowboy and Corduroy.  The gun was in Jules’ pocket.  Except that now his hands were nowhere near the inside pocket of his coat.  Any move he made toward it now would be too obvious.
         “Look if it’s money that you want, here, take my wallet.”  Jules reached for the inside pocket quickly, keeping his face blank.  But something heavy hit him from behind, smashing him to the ground.  Just as suddenly arms were grappling him.  He felt stunned.  But now there was some shouting going on.  The man at the door was yelling at Sara, telling her to come back or he’d put a bullet through her dad.  The man behind him was grinding his knee into Jules’ back.  There were more of them inside.  And coming out.  He looked up from where he was pressed down onto the rough wooden porch to see more boots coming out.
         They had followed him here.  Why?  They were going to kill him.  Hope rose in him for a few moments.  Nikki.  Maybe they had Nikki with them.  He could hear shouting out in the yard, scrambling through the bushes.  Had Sara gotten away?
         He was yanked to his feet.
         Cowboy was there.  Only this time not wearing the shirt.  He smelled rum, strong from one of the men holding him.  And then hands yanked the gun from his pocket.  The man with the heavy stubble was still holding Dan, who now hung half-lifeless in his grip.  There must have been six of them altogether.  They looked like some of the roughest bikers that he’d seen on the road, clothes a little ragged, scratches and bruises healing from drunken fights they gotten into over the weekend, healing through the week.
         “Where’s Nikki,” he said, staring at Cowboy with all of the anger that he could muster.  He didn’t see Sara.  But he could hear more crashing through the woods near the house.
         “Shut up,” Cowboy said, staring out at the driveway.  He gestured to the men holding him to come inside.  “Fucking idiots!  They’re gonna chase that girl out onto the street and someone’s going to see it.”
         Jules could feel the pain from the knife wound in his arm as he was shoved roughly toward the door.  Everything in the front hall looked normal.  The kitchen was a mess.  He didn’t see Mary anywhere.
         “Sit him in that chair and hold him,” Cowboy grunted, walking quickly to the window and staring out into the front lawn.  “Goddammit!  Bo, you and Rick get out there and tell those boys to get their asses back in here.  We’ve got to get out of here before something goes wrong.  Fuck, if you wimps weren’t so freaked out last time, we’d have got this done by now.”
         Cowboy shot an angry glance back at the men that were holding Jules as two of the others, a black man with a shaved head and a frowning white man with a thin mustache turned to head outside.
         “One of you gag him.”
         The man with tattoos on his forearms ripped one of the curtains from the window and began tearing strips of it off.  He threw a couple to one of the other men and then came over to tie them around Jules’ mouth.  He tied another tied around his wrists.  Tight.
         “Come on.  Hurry the fuck up!” Cowboy was saying.  And then they had Jules up and were shoving him roughly toward the hallway.  He couldn’t see Dan, or hear what they were doing with him.  Out the back door.  Out past the garage.  Through the woods.  He could tell that Cowboy was nervous.  And so were some of the men.  The ones that did look at him had a strange expression on their face.  A mixture of fear and paranoia, it seemed.  Maybe they were in over their head.  It just kept escalating.  Maybe they had started by kidnapping Nikki, he thought.  And then realized that Jules might have seen them, and they would have to take care of him.  And now that he had been staying under the care of Dan and his friends, it only made it more work for them.  Either they were extremely stupid or extremely stubborn.
         Jules felt detached, being shoved through the underbrush and out onto the road.  His hands were beginning to feel numb, the torn curtain strips cutting off the circulation.  Fifty yards down the road there was power company truck with its lights on.  They would have a phone, or a radio.  If they only looked this way in the gathering darkness...
         He felt a deep coldness well up in his stomach as the back door to the repair truck swung open and another one of the men peered out down the road at them, motioning quickly for them to come.  They were almost dragging him along.  He wished someone would come driving along the country road, someone that might see this and help him.  He couldn’t tell whether or not they had taken Dan along or left him behind in the house and he had no idea where Mary was, but from the looks of the mess in the kitchen, it didn’t look good.  But, he could only imagine what they would do to someone who might come along at the moment they were rushing him toward the back of the van.
         Cowboy directed them into shoving him into the back and then they crowded in alongside him.  In the half-light of flashlights, he could see fresh blood in the back, but no sign of the cause.  Jules briefly wondered what had happened to the men who had been driving the truck but was afraid he already knew.
         Maybe Sara had gotten away.  She would call the police.  Better yet, she would call Chris and Howard.  As long as he didn’t get himself killed in the crossfire.  Or before then.  But it didn’t look as though they were going to do anything drastic yet.  Probably wanted to get away in case Sara did escape and contact the authorities.
         The truck lurched out onto the road, haphazardly swerving to avoid the fallen trees and debris that still had to be cleared off the secondary roads beyond the main part of town.
         “You gonna give it to him now?” one of the men asked in the semi-dark of the back of the truck, the one with the tattoos on his arms.  They were having to sit on several large tool-boxes and rolls of electrical wire.  A man in a wrinkled plaid shirt had a small leather case clutched in one hand.  He shook his head.
         “Right, like he’s going somewhere.”
         “That’s not what he told you.  If you’re not going to give it to him, then hand it here and I’ll do it.”  The second man reached for the case.  The first pulled it back.
         “What do you want to do?  Kill him?  Shit this is getting thick enough without throwing it all away.  He told Batts, not us.  And I don’t know how much is enough, how much would put him out for good.  So let’s just ride it out until we dump him off.”  The one with the tattoos didn’t seem convinced.  Surely they didn’t think that he was that dangerous.  Except for couple of lucky kicks that he had gotten in before managing to get away the other day.
         “Shit,” the tattooed one grunted, “Batts had better know what he’s doing.”  Jules could see the man fingering the gun they had taken from him.  Almost as an afterthought the man added, ”Good thing he didn’t pull this the other day.”  They looked back at where Jules had been thrown.  Without anger.  Something different.  Frustration?  Fear?  Not of him.  Not exactly.  He met their stares until the man in plaid turned to look back out the little window.  He wondered why they had tied him up, but had not bothered to blindfold him.  He was afraid of what the answer may be.  The others were silent, holding on carefully as the truck lurched.
         Jules stared.  They weren’t heading out of town.  He could see the silhouette of a neon sign through the window.  Some kind of fast-food sign.  He had seen it in Smithee, he was sure of it.  He carefully tried the ties on his wrists, they gave a little.  The men were too nervous to see.  Somewhere in the front he could hear the muffled sound of Cowboy’s voice, but couldn’t make it out.  He wondered if they knew what they were doing.  He could feel the truck lurch several times as they took sharp curves.  Driving fast.  His heart jumped as he heard the sound of an ambulance spring up in the distance and then grow clearer.  Nearer.  And then it died off abruptly before cutting back on moments later somewhere that sounded to be many blocks away.  He could see the tension in the men drain visibly.  But one huddled near the back was still staring out of the little window.
         And then the lurching ceased and the truck stopped.  Now it was backing up.  Doors opened.  Movement ceased.  Whispered voices outside.  The men with him in the back of the truck glared at him.  The tattooed man took the safety off of Jules’ gun and laid it with a menacing casualness next to his cheek.  He didn’t breath.
         The door opened at the back and Cowboy was there wearing an orange helmet and jacket with orange stripes.  It looked a little small on him.  Jules winced at the thought of what must have happened to its owner.  He whispered them to silence, passing out instructions.
         They were in town.  Somewhere.  He mentally tried to form a map of Smithee in his mind, tried to picture the direction and the distance they must have traveled.  Surely the man or men with the truck would have to check in with the power company.  They would go missing.  Unfortunately, anything could happen to him between now and then.  He could be long gone, or dead.  And the police would think nothing of seeing just another power company truck parked around town.  His only hope was that one of Dan’s friends would see or recognize one of the men from his description.  Or that Dan was all right and had gotten to a radio or phone.  And Sara... he didn’t want to think about that.  He had too many visions of what might have happened to her and Mary.
         Something cold took hold of him.  Rage.  He felt it pouring through every inch of his body.  It lent strength to his limbs.  He forced his wrists against the cloth binding them, gritting his teeth.  There was no question in his mind now what he might and might not do if he had a gun in his hand at that moment.  They weren’t watching him.
         Useless.  All the rage in the world and he couldn’t budge the bindings.  They had knotted them well.  But he kept trying.  He had to, he kept telling himself.  Why was emotion such a powerful force, but limited to one’s own body.  He could imagine his anger tearing into them, as a tidal wave, tossing them about.
         The door at the back opened again, and Cowboy was motioning for them to grab him quickly.  He was yanked roughly toward the back by his legs.  They were pulling him out, carrying him across a short space and into a suddenly opening door.  Looked like a small motel on the more rundown section of the town.  He was roughly flung onto the bed, and left there.  He struggled to sit up, and was thumped squarely across the shoulders with what felt like a length of pipe.  His pained grunts were all that got through the gag.  But his legs were free.  He had a sudden image of himself, leaping from the bed and crashing through the motel window.  But this was reality, not the movies.  They’d probably shoot him before he made it.  Or he’d end up bleeding to death from the cuts the glass would probably give him.
         Someone grabbed his bad arm in a viselike grip until the pain made his head swim and tears stream down his eyes.  They had him sitting on the floor.  The grip eased but the pain throbbed horribly.  It had been awhile since he had taken the pills for it.  And now the stitches had probably been pulled open by the rough treatment.  He wasn’t sure.  He almost laughed to himself at the thought of yet another hospital visit.  If he made it out of this alive.
         All he could see now was Cowboy over on the other bed zipping open the little leather case and looking at a hypodermic needle.  He looked like he was fumbling with it.  Obviously not his, or he knew nothing about how they worked.  Jules wondered if they were going to try to drug him or if they would end up actually killing him by shoot air into his veins by accident, not knowing how to use the thing.  He almost wished that they would just take him out somewhere and shoot him.  But they obviously wanted him alive.  Why?
         He was shivering.  Shaking.  Cowboy had the needle and was sticking it into a vial of fluid, drawing out some of the stuff.  And he was sweating while he was doing it.  What was he afraid of?  He turned to look at Jules, holding the needle as carefully as he could.
         One good kick could knock it out of his hand.  But that would just delay things.  He needed to let the man get close enough, to let him think that Jules was giving in, or that he was too frightened to move.  And then kick it out of his hand, but onto the floor where it could be crushed.  If they were going to drug him, if he smashed the needle, it would delay them all that much longer.  Giving Dan’s friends or the police that much longer to discover what had happened.
 Cowboy shot the men holding Jules a glance and they tightened their grip.  Jules winced.
         “Shit, he’s bleeding,” one of the men said, and Jules felt that man’s grip loosen on his bad arm, over the wound.  The pain was almost intolerable.  He could feel the dampness of the blood on his arm through the sleeve of his shirt.  But that was enough for him.
         He sobbed, pretending to shut his eyes and sink back onto the bed.  His foot shot up, smashing into Cowboy’s arm.  The man jerked back, dropping the hypodermic needle onto the floor.  Jules used the momentum to jerk forward.  Not fast enough.  He stamped the floor wildly with his booted foot, blindly trying to find the needle.  They were already jerking him back, thinking that Cowboy was the object of the attack.
         But Cowboy had stepped back out of the way.
         “Godammit!  Hold him still!  I don’t care if his shirt turns red with blood!”  He crouched down on the floor, bringing the needle from where it had fallen.  Broken.  His boot had connected with it after all.  Relief and hope flooded into him.
         “Damn it to hell!  Hold him down while I get the other needle,” Cowboy said turning back to the leather case.  Jules felt cold shock and fear.  Dizziness.  He had not seen the other needle.  Now what?  He tried to think.  He would kick until he broke the bones of anyone who’d get near him before he would let them drug him!  Let someone hear their yells of pain! he thought.
         He started fighting their grips, the man holding his bloodied arm was trying to get a better hold.  He tried to kick at Cowboy again.  And then a large tattooed arm went down over his neck from behind.  He could feel the man tighten his grip until his skull creaked.  He felt dizzy, his vision starting to blur.  Cowboy and the needle.  He looked to see how far away he was but the big man was just standing there staring, his mouth hanging open.  Staring at Jules.  He had dropped the second needle.  Jules was blacking out.  His vision was blurring.  He could no longer feel the pressure of the tattooed man’s arm around him.  It felt like his scalp was tightening.  Suddenly the lights went out.  He lurched forward.  They must have let him go, but his head was swimming.  He rushed up from a crouch on the floor to try to tackle Cowboy, to catch him off guard, even though he still could not see the man.
         But he toppled over the back of a chair instead and ran headlong into the wall.  Jules let himself slide down to the floor, shifting his legs around to kick at whoever was foolish enough to come close.  He was glad that he had his heavy boots on.
         Nothing.  It looked dimmer as his vision cleared.  Someone must have cut the lights out or knocked over a lamp.  He looked.  He couldn't see anyone in the semi-darkness.  He could not hear them.  His arm still ached terribly.  It didn’t make any sense.  Where were they?  Hiding?  Maybe they had heard someone outside?  The police?  And dowsed the lights?  Jules struggled up, pushing himself along the wall to the door, spinning around and fumbling with the lock with his hands, tied behind his back though they were.  He hoped they didn’t start shooting now.  He all but fell out the door, scrambling to get upright and run out into the parking lot.  The power company truck would provide some cover, only now that he looked it was gone.  Probably dumped somewhere.
         He sprinted out of the door and out toward the street.  He could almost see them tearing out of the door after him.  He looked around, but could see no police.  It was dark.  Too dark.  And where were the cars?  He ran.  No lights on in the parking lot now.  Another power outage.  Enough to catch them off guard and let him escape.  Only now they weren’t chasing after him right away, and they didn’t have the truck to come after him.  Jules jogged out onto the street, looking up and down for a car to flag down.  Nothing.
         He glanced in the direction of the center of town.  Lights out everywhere.  He made once final glance back at the half-open door of the hotel and then started running down the street swiftly, dodging debris that had not been cleared from the storm several days before.  His balance was a little off, but he had a head start on them, cutting through side streets and back yards.  The damage on this end of the town was much worse than he had imagined.  Houses appeared to have been completely demolished.  It looked like one of the twisters had cut right through this area.  Or maybe two.  No wonder they had taken him here.  Probably everyone was staying in a shelter or, like Dan and Sara, had been staying with their relatives.
         He stopped to catch his breath and then leaned against an already leaning telephone pole to pull at the cloth binding his wrists.  Still too tight.  But at least now he could feel his hands.
         Jules jogged on toward the main street.  Wires were still down, so he had to tread carefully, although he was sure there was no power running through any of them.  It looked as though there had been another storm here recently for all of the damage that he had not seen in the last few days.  He took a side street, breathing hard and froze suddenly as a large dog trotted out of a nearby yard to eye him warily.
         Unconsciously he made a tsking sound that dogs and cats seemed to recognize being friendly.  The dog trotted on down the sidewalk, unconcerned, wagging his tail.  Jules cut across to the other side of the road.  He should have seen a car by now, or something, he thought.  All of the lights were out on Main Street in Smithee.  Half the buildings were smashed or splintered.  The twisters had come through here.  Only so had he.  He didn’t remember seeing damage like this.  Could he had been so engrossed in his own problems that he had not noticed?
         Down at the other end of the street he spotted headlights.  A Jeep!  Had Sara managed to reach Chris?  He started to jog in that direction, his eyes fixing on the lights.  But the closer he got, the more unsure he became.  The Jeep had stopped alongside of one of the buildings.  He saw men with flashlights climbing out.  Wearing helmets.  He slowed his pace, ducking for cover behind several cars parked along the side of the road.  Many of their windshields had been shattered.  Broken glass was everywhere.  Glass!
         Jules leaned up against one of the windows.  Carefully.  Carefully, he told himself.  He winced as flesh connected, but then a little work and the cloth at his wrists came free.  He yanked the cloth out of his mouth, then squatted down behind the car, peering down the street at the lights.  He could see the flashlights shining through the glass window of the store the men had gone into.  One of the men with the helmets came out, carrying an arm full of blankets.
         Blankets?  What were they doing?  Jules took a chance and jogged closer, going from car to car until he could see the camouflage paint and insignia on the Jeep.  Army National Guard.  He ran out onto the street toward them, waving his arms to let them know that he was there.  They reacted immediately.  Flashlights soon were blinding him.  He heard one of the them calling for a first aid kit.
         “Are you hurt?”  one of the men said, eyeing him up and down with his light.  Another man was already undoing a first aid kit.  The first man didn’t stop to hear the answer, shooting a glance back, “Arm’s bleeding pretty bad.  Get him a blanket and some water.”
         They had all come out now, four of them.
         “Anyone else with you?  We swept this area twice already today.  Where were you?”
         “See anybody else?  Anyone hurt?” the man with the medical kit cut in, gesturing for Jules to take off his shirt.  Jules found it hard to do anything but stare.  His mind seemed to be doing backflips, trying to catch up with itself.  Something seemed odd about this whole situation.  He thought that Dan would have mentioned the presence of the National Guard in some way.  Or that they would have seen one of their vehicles or heard something around Smithee about them.  Jules shot a glance back down the road from the direction that he had come.
         “I was being held by some men...”
         That brought them awake.  They stared suspiciously at him, but also at the dark streets surrounding them.
         “What are you talking about?” the leader asked, frowning.
         The man with the medical kit was telling him that it might hurt a little as he applied some sort of disinfectant to the knife wound.
         “I was kidnapped, just a few hours ago by some men, and... and I think they hurt some of my friends.  And Nikki, I didn’t see her with them, but they might be holding her around here somewhere else.  I don't know.  Maybe she's safe.  Why are these people doing this to me?  What have I ever done to them?”  He started looking around frantically as the man bandaging his arm returned his shirt to them.  They had side arms.  He felt a little safer.
         “What?  Looters?  We’ll have to call it in.  Be the first we’ve heard of it since we got to Smithee.  Can you give us some descriptions?”  Jules nodded.  Only he doubted they were looting homes and businesses abandoned by the townspeople during the storm.
         “And you’d better tell the local power company.  There were about six of them and they had stolen a repair truck.  I... I don’t know what they did with the repairmen, but it's probably not good.  They attacked us at the home of a friend who lives just outside of town, Dan Jenkins.  Maybe you know him.  I need to get there.”
         The leader was shaking his head while the others were returning to the store, removing more blankets and supplies and loading them onto a small trailer hooked onto the back of the Jeep.  “I don’t think that that’s such a good idea right now.  You’re hurt.”  He gave Jules a blanket to drape over his shoulders.  “And the men that attacked you, there might be more of them.  They could have followed you here.  What we need to do is to get you and these supplies back to one of the shelters on the South side of town.  That’s where most of the townsfolk we’ve found have been taken.  But we’ll relay the information about the looters to our superiors and to the police here in Smithee.  That’s the best that we can do for you.”
         Jules thought from the tone of  his voice that it was less of an offer and more of an order.  Unfortunately it was one that he would probably have to settle for.  He didn’t believe him.  Maybe if he had still been bound and gagged when they saw him.  If he could get to the other side of town, he could find a car, or maybe someone who would be willing to take him out to Dan’s sister’s house.  His car was still parked there with his bags and things.  The police would have to do.  If the phone lines weren’t out in this sudden black-out, he could call some of the numbers that Dan had given him to alert his friends.  Maybe Sara had already done that.  He hoped she had managed to get away.  If she returned to the house when the men came back looking for him...  He didn’t want to think about that.  Jules sipped water from the canteen the men had given him and pulled the blanket around him.  His arm felt a lot better.  Maybe the stitches hadn’t been pulled out after all.
         One of the guardsmen came over with a pad of paper and a flashlight to get a description of the men and the truck they had stolen.  Jules was glad to give them what he could remember of the men.  And then the fellow was on the Jeep radio, calling in the information and telling him they had another survivor to add to the lists--Jules Verne Hinton.
         Then they were all crammed into the Jeep, Jules in the passenger seat up front, weaving through the debris littering the streets of Smithee.  It was a lot worse than he had remembered.  The people on the other side of the town had been acting as though there was really very little damage at all.  How often did this happen here that they could adopt such attitudes?  He couldn’t imagine the cost of the repairs.  Surely in the millions of dollars just in Smithee.
         One of the guardsmen noticed his stares.
         “Yeah, it’s hard to believe that so many people survived this.  But Smithee was hit harder than some of the other smaller towns nearby.”
         They turned onto the west end of the town’s main street.  Still no lights.
         “How long do they think the power will be out this time?” Jules asked.
         “What do you mean this time?  The power’s been out for days since the storm,” one man said.
         “Hey!  Lights,” one of the men in the back of the Jeep said, pointing further down the street.  Jules thought that he had seen something down there in the direction they were headed.  But the street was pitch black.  There it was, a light bobbing near the side of the building.
         “Let’s see if it’s your looters,” their leader said, reaching for the radio and calling in their location, that they were going to check out the possibility of other survivors.
         “Wait.  What do you mean the power’s been off for days?   I’ve been driving around town for the last few days since the storm with friends.  The power was on up until just a little while ago, maybe half an hour or so.”  Jules stared at the leader.  The man stared back at him just as hard, but didn’t say anything.  Jules felt goosebumps rise across his arms as they pulled the Jeep into an open space near a small clothing store.
         “I think,” the man said, “that we need to get you to the shelter.”  They were already climbing out, flashlights in hand and fanning out to check the area.  One of the guardsmen stayed with the Jeep, standing near the front, one hand resting on the hood.  Jules climbed out of the Jeep and looked up and down the road.  The stars were bright.  He could see the lights of a distant plane climbing higher into the sky many miles away to the north, almost like a brilliant, moving star.
         Had he been down this street earlier that day.  Things looked different in the dark.  Surely the buildings here had not been this damaged.  He could see a roof was partially torn away.  Then a pickup had been rolled through the front of a hardware store window.  But how?  Just a little up the road would be Jay’s Restaurant where they had eaten lunch.  Jules strained to see it in the dark.  No good.
         Two gunshots.  One voice yelling in pain made him almost jump out of his skin.  The guardsman with him spun around, bringing his gun and flashlight up together.  He could hear running, and yelling.  One of them was yelling that he’d been shot.  Jules wished he had managed to keep his gun, or had grabbed it from the men.  For all he knew his had just been used on the guardsmen.  Another gunshot.  Breaking glass.  The guardsman with him at the Jeep was yelling out over the radio for his men to tell him what was happening.  He ran to the corner of a nearby side street, peering carefully around the corner of a building and then jogged down it to where the shots had come from.
         Leaving Jules out in the open.  Alone and unarmed.
         A bullet tore into the pavement about twenty feet from him from the direction of the side street.  Someone shooting at the guardsmen.  They had been followed.  And if the men who had kidnapped him still had the repair truck...
         Jules jogged across the street, keeping the Jeep between him and the side street that the shooting was erupting from.  He could still here the one guardsman yelling.  He stopped in mid-stride.  Maybe he should run back and call for help on the radio.  Another bullet struck a shop window on his side of the street, shattering the glass.  Jules ducked around the side of the building...
 And found a motorcycle parked there.
         He stood there staring at it for a moment with gunshots going off behind him.  More shouting.  Jules quickly walked over to the bike.  It was a Honda, an older model than the one he had owned, in good condition despite the rust.  There was a bag strapped down on the back.
         And keys in the ignition.
         Hope welled up within him.  Transportation.  But he couldn’t just leave them behind.
         The gunshots had stopped now.  Jules tore himself away from the bike and eased back to the corner of the building.  He looked out across the street.  There was a man just coming out of the darker side street.  A tall, thin man with a gun in each hand.  He was scanning the street.  Not one of the men that had kidnapped him, Jules felt sure.  Maybe it was the Batts that one of the men had referred to, who seemed to be the one behind Jules’ kidnapping.
         The man was dressed in dark clothing, black pants with a leather vest.  He paused to glance in the Jeep and then surveyed the street east to west.  He turned and started jogging across the street.  Right toward where Jules was hiding.  It struck Jules like an icy hand on his shoulder.  He had killed the guardsmen, or wounded them.  Jules could no longer hear them.  The bike was his.  He had two guns.  Jules turned.  If the bike would start...
         In that instant, the man crossed out of the darker shadows and into the brighter twilight afforded by the moon and stars.  Jules could hear the man’s boots on the street and knew them.  Jules froze in a half-turn.  That face!  The man that had attacked Nikki at the rest-stop!
         He knew the face.  It couldn’t be--but it was--it was the face that he had seen through the glass, one that he knew by heart...  It was his face!  Almost.  But darker, with a white scar on one cheek.  His body.  Leaner.  Arms tattooed.  Eyes darker, lifeless.
         It was too much!  He turned, half scrambling, half falling to get away.  In the last instant he remembered the motorcycle, all but jumping onto the seat.  The key!  The engine came to life!  Pop the clutch, tap the gear!   Right foot kick up the stand...
         Jules cast a furious glance back.  The man had the two guns trained on his back, pausing to stare at Jules.  Jules stared back over his shoulder, feeling like a deer caught in the headlights of a truck.  His skin crawled.  His mind raced. He had to get away.  Now!
         A sadistic sneer crept across the other man’s face.  The guns did not drop.  “Don’t even try it.  Just turn it off and throw the key over here.”  That voice.  His voice.
         Jules sank down in the seat.  After all that had happened, he still was not a free man.  He reached for the key with one hand and held the other up so The Face could see.  He was moving slowly, trying to figure a way out of this, anything to save his life.  He turned around to look at the man as he tossed the keys in his direction.  Behind The Face, Jules saw a car creep around the corner with it’s lights off.  In the dim reflection of the moon, he thought he could make it out as a late model Ford LTD, the kind that half the cops in the country, including James Ferguson, drove.
         “I guess you got me,” he said.  “Now what?”
         The Face moved quickly, ripping Jules off of the bike and forcing him to the ground face-first.  He was holding the gun to his right ear.  For good measure, he kicked Jules in the side twice.  Meanwhile, the car’s headlights had come on and it was racing toward where they were at the end of the alley.  The Face must be expecting back-up, Jules thought, from the way he barely reacted to the car.  Or either somehow was unaware of it.
         He could not see what was going on as he was facing the other way, but he could hear two doors open on the car.  More boots on the ground.  Or dress shoes.
         “Put the gun on the ground and lie down beside your friend.”
         What?  Maybe it was a cop.  But why hadn’t The Face reacted first?
         “Maybe you didn’t hear me,” the voice said.  “So I’ll repeat myself.  Put the gun on the ground and lie down beside your friend.”
         Jules could hear The Face grunt as he reluctantly did what the man told him.  Then footsteps.  One of the men was frisking The Face.  Jules hoped he found the other gun, and started to say it.  He decided to remain silent instead.
         “Which one is it?” the second voice asked.
         “The one with the tattoos, the one that had the guns.”  #1 seemed to have walked to the rear of the car.  Jules heard him fumbling with some keys, then he opened the trunk.  “You know what to do, don’t you?”
         “Of course,” #2 said.  “O.K. fellas, here’s how it’s going to go down.  You’re doing good so far.  If you keep that attitude, I don’t foresee us having any problems at all.  If you get cocky, then we probably will start having some problems.  Put your hands behind your back.”
         Jules did what he was told.  Immediately, someone--Jules guessed it was #1--handcuffed them back there.  Jules caught a fleeting glimpse of the man as he rolled Jules over.  He was wearing a black business suit.  In fact, he was wearing all black--black coat, black shirt, black tie.  His dark hair was cut short and his goatee was trimmed.
         “Close your eyes,” he said.  And immediately Jules saw why.  The man had a roll of electrical tape in his hand.  He tore a strip of it off and put it over Jules eyes, then another strip over his mouth.  In the back of his mind, Jules thought, ‘At least these guys are smarter than the last ones.’
         “Stand up,” #1 said.  He helped Jules stand and led him to the car.  Jules heard a door open.  “Get in,” the man said.  As Jules felt his way down into the car, he was struck by the man’s voice, the way he said it.  There was no threatening tone in it at all.  Jules had heard enough threatening voices lately to tell the difference.
         The man slid in beside him.  “Lie down in the seat.”  Jules did so as #2 got into the front seat and put the car in reverse.  “How did he take it?” #1 asked.
         “Like a real man,” #2 said.  “Go ahead and make the call while I get us out of here.”
         Jules heard some movement in the seat beside him.  “Oh, I’m so glad I got a hold of you.  I was sure the lines would still be down...  Well, that’s good to hear.  Listen, officer, I was riding by the old Hampton’s Furniture Store over on Skipper Street...  Yes, sir, I’m aware of the curfew, but I’m a friend of the family.  I was making sure the looters were staying away.  But I swear I heard some gun fire...  Yes, sir, that’s Hampton’s on Skipper Street...  You’re welcome, sir.”
         “We’ll be out of here before they come, but our friend will be sleeping like a baby,” #2 said.  “Now for the other phone call.”  Jules thought he heard the man fumbling with his cell phone again.  “Yeah, it’s us.  We got him.  He’s safe...  We’re on our way...”  Then to Jules, “I’m going to take the tape off you mouth.  It’ll probably sting a little.”  He ripped it off quickly and Jules let out a yell.  “Sorry about that.  But it’s always best to do it fast.  What happened to your arm there?”
         “I think that happened the first time I was attacked by a group of thugs.”
         “Does it hurt?”
         “Only when I don’t take the pain medicine.  It’s been a couple if hours since I took it.”
         “Well, don’t worry.  You won’t feel anything for a while.”  Jules felt a stinging pain in his right arm, his good one...  as everything began to grow hazy...
 

next index