Dave Butler Writes

Rider cocked his revolved and pointed it at Mike’s head.

And Chuy, in Scarecrow’s body, whacked his spiked club into Rider’s grinning face.  Scarecrow, it turned out, was a muscular man, and had none of the underfeeding-induced weakness Chuy felt, despite his pressups.  So when Chuy swung the club as hard as he could—

the weapon’s nails sank without effort into Rider’s face—

Chuy lost his grip—

and Rider’s head snapped off his shoulders.  The moment of disconnect sounded like a snapping twig, and then the head and attached club winged out over the rusted hood of a blue Buick and disappeared.  Chuy’s momentum carried him forward so far he tripped over Rider and Bull Head and fell to the ground.

“Twitch!” Mike gasped.

Oh yeah.  Chuy climbed to his feet and armed himself: Rider’s pistol in one hand and Bull Head’s curved sword in the other.  He advanced on the cage and two spearmen who stood outside it.  Scarecrow resisted, tried to take control of himself back.

Stop it, Chuy told him.

The Bull will be angry.

The Bull is dead.  I killed him. 

As he stomped in Scarecrow’s body closer to the wheeled cage, Chuy got a good look at the animals pulling it.  The Drays, he thought Bull Head had called them, unless by that he meant the bats.  They looked something like elephants, only smaller, and hairy, and they had huge lower jaws that gaped down, revealing teeth like Bowie knives.

Saber-toothed elephants?

Not that Bull.  The real one.

I’m not afraid of the Bull.  Chuy meant it.  Dead and damned already, what was the Bull going to do to him, even if Eddie and the others were right and the Bull was one of the Fallen, the originals rebels against Heaven?

Who are you?

The spearman stepped hesitantly towards Chuy.  They must not know what to make of the fight they’d witnessed, Chuy knew.  Too bad.  He raised the pistol and fired.  Bang, bang! two shots to the chest dropped the first guard and bang! a third, right in his neck, killed the second.

MRWARUUMPH!

The Drays bellowed and shook their shoulders, but didn’t burst out of the chains that held them yoked to the wagon.  Chuy snatched a ring of keys off the belt of one of the spearman and took advantage of Scarecrow’s strength to pick up the dead man and hurl his corpse in front of the Drays.  He didn’t look at what they did with it, but the bellowing stopped and was replaced by chomping and sucking sounds.

Chuy unlocked the gate.  Twitch hesitated a moment, and behind her the other prisoners hung back and watched with hollow, nervous eyes.

“Mike?” she asked.  She sounded like a nervous innocent girl, but she was poised in a sideways crouch in a way that made Chuy think she was ready to kick him in the teeth if he gave the wrong answer.

“Mike?”  Chuy choked.  “I kill a bunch of worthless sons of bitches and risk my own neck to cut you out of jail and probably save you from instant death and you pay me back by mistaking me for that dumb maricón?”

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“Go to hell,” Chuy said.

“Been there.”  Eddie Marlowe, the wire-thin, jittery rock and roll guitarist, shot his bloodshot eyes left and right around the rubble that had once been a parking lot.  The S on the wall above Eddie had collapsed with the brick under it, but it had left behind EARS, and Chuy found the combination of that work and Eddie’s darting glances creepy.  He felt like he was being spied on.   I think Eddie’s a prophet.  Maybe you ought to show some respect.  No he ain’t, you stupid maricón.  And I wouldn’t care if he was.  Still, he was always looking at unseen things, Eddie.  “Done that.”

“The Mare isn’t tired.”  That came from Jane, who sometimes was Qayna, the stone cold killer with knives strapped to her body and a cowboy hat.  She’s not a Latina.  I didn’t say she was.  Shut your pie hole, idiot.  I mean, shut my pie hole.  And don’t say anything about her boobs.  You ain’t fooling anyone.  Apparently Jane was really old.  She had crazy tattoos, seemed to crawl all over her like bugs.

The Mare was Jane’s horse, a big black snorting monster with fangs.  When Jane let the horse free to graze, it came back with bloody teeth.  Occasionally, it coughed up hairballs.  Just like a cat, only what came up was bits of fur and bone.  Now it just stood glaring at the end of the reins in Jane’s hand, reeking of rotting meat.  Chuy could feel Mike trying not to look at the Mare, or trying to drag Chuy’s hand up to grab the crosses and medals that hung on his chest.  Chuy forced the hand down to his side, fixed his eyes on the big animal and spat his contempt on the shattered asphalt on which he stood.  Living with Mike in the same body was like wearing the same clothes as someone—wherever you went, you went together, and you were constantly wrestling over control.  Fortunately, Mike was a pussy.

“I’m tired of the Mare,” Twitch said.  She looked out of place among the ragged band of weirdos; she looked like a teenaged girl in skinny jeans and a t-shirt spangled with the photos of some boy band that disintegrated along with everything else in the Fall.  Dirty and scraped up, but Twitch could have been just another suburban kid.  She’s no kid, check out her… she’s a fairy.  Be nice to her.  Chuy ignored Mike.  “We can’t all ride the Mare, anyway, we’re tired.”

“And there’s gas in the truck.”  Eddie jerked his head at the vehicle.

“Do you hear something?”  Twitch cocked her head to one side.

“There’s probably cans of refried beans in the truck, too.  ’Cause it’s a taco truck.  So hell no.  Even if I could, which I can’t.”

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