Undesirable: Chapter 19
TITLE: Undesirable (A vampire novel)
RATING: NC-17 (This chapter PG)
SUMMARY: As George and Wally continue their hapless journey across the midwest, reality comes to kick them in the shins, repeatedly.
Word Count: 6360
Chapter 19
It was dark when the Limo door opened again. Somehow, the combination of the strange place, the twisted way I'd been lying across the seat, and the plastic and leather smell of the car combined to give me a moment of disoriented panic. For a split second, I could have sworn I was in a coffin, even though it made no rational sense at all. I let out a brief, girlishly shrill scream.
"It's just me," said a dark shape.
"Who?" I asked. Then I woke enough to realize it was Wally. And following that, I remembered that I was in a car and that we were on the run and that the prospects for my future were grim. "Wally," I acknowledged.
"Your turn driving," said Wally. "I can't keep awake anymore. I got a shitty five hours of sleep last night."
"Oy." I sat up and rubbed my face. It felt slightly tacky, the way your skin does when sweat has had a chance to dry on it. Chilly air seemed to go through my clothes, and I grabbed my windbreaker off the floor and started putting it back on. "What time is it?"
"Just before eleven." I'd slept for seven hours, but felt like only three. I had that heavy-sour feeling in my stomach and a kind of rubbery quality to my arms and legs that comes from jet lag. A mild headache had set itself up behind my eyeballs. My circadian rhythms were totally fried.
"What state are we in?" I asked as I climbed out of the car and let the fresh air revive me. We were pulled over on the packed dirt shoulder of the quiet very dark freeway. The only light around came from the limo's headlights and about a bajillion stars. A brisk wind was rustling the long grass around us and what I could see of my surroundings with my dark adjusted eyes was pretty much nothing but endless flatness.
"Still Nebraska," said Wally with just the slightest hesitation.
"Oh you are fucking kidding me!" I felt a surge of frustration. "We haven't even left the state? Were we on a treadmill? What the hell route did you take?"
"Oh, come on… For what it's worth we are about 20 miles from the border with Wyoming." I could see Wally's silhouette reach up a hand to wipe his face. "I'm too tired to argue, especially over some thing this stupid. Can you take over?"
"Yeah."
"Key's in the ignition," mumbled Wally as he climbed in the back and then shut the door.
And that was the end of our conversation. I climbed into the cab of the car, spent a couple minutes figuring out where everything was, then pulled out on the highway. The Town Car was so smooth it made the lumpy earthen shoulder feel like glass, and there was a satisfying surge of power when I touched the gas pedal. The engine barely purred as the speedometer swung up past 90 mph with disarming ease. For a big girl, the Townie was surprisingly agile and responsive. I took my foot off the gas and waited for the needle to point to a more socially acceptable three miles an hour above the speed limit, then set the cruise control and settled back.
The road ahead was absolutely flat, completely straight, and utterly empty. It didn't feel like we were moving. Tread mill indeed.
In fact the only indication that time was passing at all was a soft rise and fall of singing from the radio. Wally had set it to some hick country music station, which, being much more of a classical rock/alternative kind of guy, seemed rather unlike him . The scan button got me a gospel station, and some self-help talk guru explaining to a sobbing woman that her husband was leaving her because she was fat, then finally brought me back to the country channel. I turned off the radio for about a minute, but found the silence too spooky. Giving in, I pressed the on button once more and cruised into Wyoming with the melancholy twanging of an acoustic guitar and some chick claiming her beau had done her wrong. Maybe she was overweight.
The end of the protectorate didn't quite coincide with the state border. I was on the Wyoming side by a good half mile when an oasis of artificial light rose up out of a sea of infinite blackness. Twin sets of stadium lights reached up some twenty-five feet in the air illuminating a sinister archway of dark metal. A separate brown sign told me I was leaving the Cassidy Rural Protectorate. There was no mention of what protectorate I would be entering.
I tapped on the brake and disengaged the cruise control. The Townie drifted down to a crawl and I took in my options. I expected the U of paved road crossing the median strip to allow a traveler to bail out, but to my surprise, on the right side of the lane was a second road, unpaved and carved in criss-crossing ruts, down into the drainage trench and then up around the gate scaffolding.
I wasn't the only one trying to leave a protectorate without permission.
But apparently, we humans weren't the only ones paying attention to it. Before I could consider testing the limo's axels on the rough unofficial road, I saw that someone had crossed this unofficial road with two sections of jersey barrier.
With I sigh, I stepped on the gas and passed under the spidery scaffolding. I could almost hear the click of a camera recording the car. And now Jeffrey knew exactly where we were.
Jeffrey was right. We needed to be smarter than this. Who else was keeping remote track of this vehicle as it made it's predictable way down I80? Should I divert us onto side streets? Serpentine our way though the rectangular states until we arrived at Portland? Or should I take the other tack and count on the 75 mile an hour speed limit getting us to our home protectorate before any individual vampire had the chance to mount a roadblock. Perhaps, if the infighting I saw at Nadette's party were typical, rivalry would keep the vampires from cooperating enough to effectively snare us.
Or perhaps neither, because on the heels of that thought, the low gas light flickered on. Goddamn it. I really didn't need this now. I looked down at the gas gage. It stood just a hair above the E and not getting any higher. And then an even bigger problem reared its head.
Who the hell around here sells gas in the middle of nowhere at quarter to midnight on a Sunday?
The sky was already a dove grey with impending dawn and the birds cawing out their raucous good mornings when a pickup truck pulled into the darkened Arco station. I got out of the Town Car and nodded as a skinny, weather grizzled man in jeans and an oil stained jacket climbed out. He stared at me a moment, then looked at the Townie, then back at me.
"Run out of gas?"
"Yeah," I said, trying desperately to look nonchalant as I leaned against the side of the limo.
The man nodded. He stepped inside the gas booth long enough to flip a mess of switches. The canopy lit up and I noticed that the pumps were on.
"Been here long?"
"Not too long," I lied. I pulled my wallet and handed him a fifty, praying that this wasn't one of those stations that didn't accept them. The man held the bill up to one of the overhead lights.
"Anyone in there?" His voice dropped.
"Just my friend. No vampires," I said, hastily.
He laughed. "Good thing, too," he said. "Can't imagine what kind of trouble you'd be in otherwise. Lady Maeve don't take very well to being made to wait."
I laughed reflexively. "Nah, my friend and I bought the limo second hand," I lied. "We decided to go cross country in style."
He frowned. "Scare a lot of people with one of those," he chided, matter-of-factly. "Especially round here. We don't mess with the vampires, they don't mess with us. If I were to give you a bit of advice, I say you reconsider using a more sensible vehicle for your road trip."
"Ah, yeah," I said. "Little late for that."
The guy nodded, but not with approval. "You can pump your gas now."
I quickly fumbled to get the nozzle into the tank and start it filling. The man just stood there looking at me with a glower. When I finished, he walked back into his booth and got me the change.
"If I were you," he said, "I wouldn't go stopping at any small towns around here. People these parts don't think this kind of thing is funny. Vampires don't, either."
I tried to telegraph an apology with my nod. "Thanks." And I got out of there as quickly as I could. Last thing I needed was to offend the locals with my non-choice of a getaway car.
I was starting to hate the Townie. Yes, she was a smooth ride and the dark cabin had its uses, but in every other way she was the worst vehicle possible for what we were trying to do. Between her insatiable appetite for gas and the way she frightened the locals into thinking they are being cruised by their patron, she wasn't actually helping us. In fact, I'd go so far as to say she was putting up a strong passive resistance. Perhaps I should have called her Christine, but that might have been tempting fate too much.
The smart thing would be to ditch her. Now. Just leave her by the side of the road.
And be stranded in the middle of nowhere to walk back to Portland? We'd starve.
Hitchhike? On the surface it seemed to be a possibility, illegal as hell though it was. But this wasn't like the heavily traveled I5 corridor. As far as I could see up and down the stretch of highway, I was the only person on the road. How long could Wally and I afford to stay in one place hoping for someone willing to face the possibility of stiff penalties just to help out a couple of dudes they didn't know?
So, what were our options? Even if I got us to the nearest city, planes, busses, Amtrak, all were out. Even if we tried to rent a more sensible car, one of us would have to pony up one of our bloodtrust cards complete with the requisite travel permissions - issued by our prospective Patrons. Obviously, that couldn't be me - what with my runaway status and physical lack of a bloodtrust card.
But it couldn't be Wally, either. I felt a momentary wave of nausea.
Oh, God. Wally had no patron. No one to permit him to travel. No one to protect him in another's territory. Much as I hated to believe it, there was some truth to the benign title our vampire overlords insist we use. Jeffrey had certainly gone out of his way to protect me, even if it was because he considered me to be his property. Who would do that for Wally?
He was just as vulnerable right now as me. Collateral reward is how Jeffrey termed it back at that party. It's best they don't have anything more to fight over…. Did that mean that any vampire along our route might just claim him, too? Sure, his blood type is common, but it's common and good. And who is to say that some vampire in say Podunk Wyoming might not already have someone of his flavor type in their harem.
We might be separated. Me going off to some auction to the highest bidder and Wally stuck in corn country far away from all his friends and everything he knew and cared about.
That sure put some perspective on the idea of driving a hearse and shelling out fifty bucks for gas every 300 miles. It was just fucking money. Still - would we be able to manage it? Did we have enough luck and cash to last all he way to Portland?
I could just see the curtain wall around Cheyenne up ahead when I heard a sudden frantic knocking at the window that separate the driver's compartment from the back of the car. I slowed down, then pulled off and came to a stop on the washboard-rippled shoulder of the freeway. I turned the engine off to save gas just as the knocking ceased.
Wally was awake.
The window between the front and back rolled down with an electrical hum. "Geo, stop the car."
As we were already stopped, I simply turned around and smiled. "Good morning? Sleep well?"
Wally's hair was extra tousled, standing up in tufts that would look terrible on a normal person, but endearingly slovenly on him. I could see a bit of dense pale stubble on his cheeks. My own were as smooth as ever thanks to that wax job. Considering how pathetically sparse my beard was in the first place, I was just as glad I didn't have to mess with shaving the dotty little patches off. It was obvious though that Wally could have a full manly beard if he wanted.
He stared past me out the front window, as if that would orient him. "Where are we?"
I flinched at the brusque quality of his voice. "Almost to Cheyenne… Wyoming." After the hard time I'd given Wally last night about our progress, I deserved a good ribbing, but Wally seemed relieved rather than upset.
"Okay," said Wally and he sat back and began messing with his Iphone. "We got to turn around," he said after a moment.
I opened my mouth to ask what was up, but Wally cut me off with a curt "Wait." He then put the phone to his ear. His eyes caught mine and he put a finger to his lips to keep me quiet. "Hey, yeah, this is Walter. I'm in Cheyenne, Wyoming. Uh huh… Yes. Understood." He hung up.
"Who were you just talking to Wally?" I asked. My voice was full of dread.
"We got to get turned around, now," said Wally wiping his hand frantically through his mass of white hair. "Are we still on I80?… then we need to head back that way until we hit Lincoln, then we gotta head South. We need to get to Serenity, Abram protectorate."
"Who was that on the phone," I repeated.
"Geo. You knew this was going to happen."
"Wally," I insisted. "Who was that?"
"Lady Darlene," said Wally. "My patron. She survived. She needs me - us."
My heart beat way too loud. "Wally. I can't." Wally, don't sell me out… Too late, he had. The betrayal stung.
"Why not!" snapped Wally. "Don't you see? This is the solution. The sane solution. This was what I was trying to do before the disaster at the party. We are going to meet up with Darlene and fly back to Portland, and we'll be done. No more worrying about some strange Vampire grabbing you. No more worry about what the hell happens to me when we do get caught." He opened up the door and climbed out onto the road. A moment later he was in the passenger's seat, looking a lot more calm and dangerously determined.
"Wally, she hates me."
"She doesn't hate you."
"Of course, she hates me!" I countered. "She's only met me twice; the first time I threw up on her and the second time I nearly got her killed. I'd hate me after that."
"She may be irritated with you, but she also needs you." Wally considered his words. "You are her way back to redemption. She needs to get your old patron back on her side. Chauncey is…" He paused while I waited expectantly. Finally, he frowned. "Okay, I don't know what he is, but Darlene seems to think he's powerful enough to mend the fences for her."
I hmphed.
"Anyway," Wally shifted the subject. "The important part of this is that she's a vampire. You are under the nine-tenths rule so as long as you are in her presence, no other vampire can lay claim to you."
"I'm sure," I said wryly. That hadn't stopped Jeffrey before. "What's the nine-tenths rule again?"
"Possession is -"
"--Okay I get it." I wiped my face and sat up straight. "That's a formal law with them - or, whatdayacallit, etiquette."
Wally shrugged. "As formal as they get, I suppose."
And there was the problem in a fucking nutshell. Etiquette wasn't remotely law. The best handle I had on it was that it was a form of peer pressure and Darlene was definitely the unpopular kid on the vampire block right now. High school wasn't so long ago that I'd forgot how unequal the application of social law was.
"You know," I said bitterly. "None of this would have happened if she had just tasted my blood when I was a kid."
Wally sighed. "She screwed up big. Even she admitted that."
"I don't even get it," I said clapping my hands down on the steering wheel. "Why the hell did she let me throw up on her, Wally? Why didn't she just voodoo my mind like everyone else has? I'd have run to her arms happily if she'd just put the whammy on me. Then none of this would have happened. I wouldn't have ever tasted freedom in the first place. Everyone would be happy."
"She didn't because she couldn't," said Wally.
"What do you mean?"
Wally looked embarrassed, as if his patron's faults somehow extended to him. "Vampires aren't all equal," he said after a bit. He looked off through the windshield at the sparse Monday morning truck traffic. "When Lord Jeffrey took over my mind… I've never felt anything like that before. Never. It was instant; one minute I was about to scream, next - nothing. He stopped me in my tracks and he didn't break a sweat. And later … when he was…" Wally paused.
"Later, when he was?" I prompted. "What?"
But Wally shook his head and came back to his point. "Darlene has a hard time even reading minds much less changing them. She has to touch and sometimes it takes a while. When I get called up, we usually spend a few minutes holding hands before I get in the… um… mood."
I raised an eyebrow at him. None of the vampires I'd encountered had the least trouble manipulating my mind.
"Anyway, what happened to you was over in seconds, she didn't have time to put the mojo on you. You wouldn't stay still long enough. And you surprised her."
"So you're saying she's mentally handicapped," I said. Great. Just our luck. "So we are relying on the retard vampire to save our asses?"
"She's not retarded!" Wally's face colored a bit and he shifted uncomfortably in his seat. "She's as smart as any of them. But yeah, she's not as powerful as some. She doesn't have the psychic skills, obviously. You know, that kind of endears her to me. I don't like someone being able to toggle me on and off like a switch."
Oh, hooray, finally a point of agreement.
"But you think she can keep us safe?" I asked pointedly.
Wally answered without hesitation. "Yes! Psychic ability or not, she took on twelve normal vampires night before last, and she got away with her life. And I think that makes her kind of awesome. Don't underestimate her." I heard the strident edge of loyalty in his voice.
I had to admit, that was pretty impressive.
"Besides," said Wally. "She's revoked the permits for this car to travel anywhere but back to Serenity. If we keep going, the next gate's going to call the police on us. We have to go back."
I deflated. It seemed like everyone was against this roadtrip. Hell, even I wasn't too thrilled with it. "Plane back to Portland?"
Wally nodded. "There's a small airstrip just outside of Serenity. Darlene will charter us a flight."
"And when I get back to Portland," I murmured. "And she gives me to Chauncey… who is to say he won't sell me off?"
That got Wally. His face suddenly drained of all color.
"Tell me," I insisted. "How do I work this so that you and I don't lose each other?"
Wally frowned. "I don't know. I don't have all the answers. But it doesn't matter because what other choice is there?" He sighed. "I know you have your heart set on this crazy rebellion thing, but we don't even know if it exists. And it seems to me that since it's my ass, too, I should get a say in this. I say I want to go home."
A truck blew past us, the wind in its wake making the Townie rock sideways on its wheels. I closed my eyes, and breathed deep.
You could drop me off here. Go back to your patron. But I didn't want that, either. Better or worse, I wanted to be with Wally, for what little time we may have together. The future was too uncertain to toss away what we had now for it.
"So, Geo, what do you say? Are we going to--?" His eyes were puppy-dog eager.
"Yes."
"--Meet up with Darlene?"
"Fuck it, Yes!" I repeated. Let it go before I change my mind.
"We do owe it to her," ended Wally. Apparently he really needed to get that last bit of guilt trip out. "And she's not a bad person. She made it seem like Chauncey wasn't, either. They won't let us down. They aren't going to separate us. We just have to have a little faith."
I've been a cynical bastard from birth, but even I have my limits. I was too frustrated and tired to fight anymore, so I gave in to hope. What's wrong with taking the easy way, again? I forget.
"I'll take over driving," said Wally. "You look bushed."
I nodded. Probably for the best.
I couldn't shake the ominous sense of doom as Wally undid most of the progress from the night before. The sky was gloomier today, though it didn't rain, we could occasionally hear distant rolls of thunder. The endless rows of crops seemed dreary and colorless. As we passed into Nebraska again I noticed a section of long section of chain link fence topped with razor wire preventing people from going into what seemed to be an endless sea of weeds. Probably somewhere off that way was the remnants of an army base or something. Maybe there would be a hidden stash of old guns and ammunition. The fantasy of shooting a vampire reared it's head for a pleasant moment. Then the last bit of chainlink passed and we were back into the corn, occasionally mixed with other unidentifiable crops.
"I'm sorry," said Wally.
"For what?"
He didn't have an answer for that. This situation wasn't his fault. It wasn't my fault. It wasn't Darlene's or anyone else's either. Or maybe it was all of ours. I don't know.
"Jeffrey's going to be pissed," I muttered.
"Yeah. Probably so."
And that was all either of us had to say on that subject.
We drove mostly in silence for the first few hours, switching off every hundred miles. Wally turned up the radio loud enough to make it unnecessary to add casual chatter on top of it. Instead I grew to be a bit more appreciative of country western. The view was rather monotonous after I became used to seeing crops grown in large circles on square plots. Hunger caught up to us and we ended up stopping for brunch at a diner in Ogallala. The Townie caught a lot of attention and a wide birth. Wally and I fared little better as the locals stared at us while we choked down dry chicken fried steak sandwiches and crinkle cut fries. I hadn't felt so self-conscious since 8th grade.
Back in the car I found myself looking at Wally. Just studying his features, the way the muscles of his jaw lept about as he ground his teeth. Through almost invisible lashes, his pale grey eyes stared at the road. Yesterday's sun had burned his cheek and nose to a one sided rosy blush. I wasn't sure if I should reach out squeeze his hand, the way I would have for any of my girlfriends, or maybe hold his shoulder, or should I just let him macho through it alone. What was the etiquette for a gay affair? Would I lose face to ask?
I don't remember what exactly broke the ice between us again, but somewhere around Potter we were talking again. The subject ranged from high school war stories to upcoming video games and finally to sex which got both of us bothered enough that we had to switch to something else. Even if we wanted to pull over and do something, there was nowhere hidden to do it.
Just before Lincoln we turned South. At first the territory didn't seem particularly strange. It was similar in pretty much every way to what we'd been going through for hours. Same flat. A few less irrigation circles and a few more oddly shaped plots but otherwise about as rural as a place could get. Few houses, every so often we'd hit a clump of six buildings that called itself a town.
Wally and I recognized a song that seemed to be some kind of favorite around here for how many times it turned up in rotation. We banged our heads around and belted out "We'll put a boot in your ass/it's the American waaaay! " more or less in time with the actual lyrics.
"Well, fuck, Geo," said Wally, "There's your rebellion right there. What we need to do is call Toby Keith."
"Notice how he doesn't even mention the vampires," I scoffed. "Poseur. Who are we going to boot in the ass, now? The communists?" The creep of communism had slowed down greatly since the vampires stopped allowing outright war, but every so often a country toyed with turning and stirred up the conservative Americans into an impotent froth.
"Nah," Wally defended. "Shows he's got a couple of brain cells left. If he mentioned the vamps they'd shut him down. That'd be insurrection."
"It's testosterone poisoning."
"It's ballsy," Wally insisted. "Yeah, I'd like to see you to try come up with a pro-war song that can get past the censors. Smart thing, couching it in the past."
I shook my head in wonderment. "Oh my god, you like Toby Keith. This trip is full of surprises."
"I wouldn't laugh, Poison fanboy."
"One album and, besides, with hair like that, who can hate them?"
"God, Geo, the make up - huh." Wally frowned, then turned around in the passenger's seat to look behind us.
I was taking a turn driving so I couldn't do the same. Monday afternoon traffic was denser in this part of Nebraska. The Townie was up to her old tricks again, making life difficult by convincing traffic that the best response to slow the fuck down and treat us like police cruiser. I really couldn't look away for more than a split second.
"What was it?" I asked, toeing the brake pedal and taking furtive glimpses in the rear view mirror for something unusual enough to get that reaction.
"Nothing. A billboard," said Wally. He turned back around and shook his head.
There were a fair amount of billboards around here. Most of them for local big box stores and fast food restaurants, some of those listed directions dozens to even hundreds of miles of driving. This truly was the ass end of nowhere.
"Nothing," he muttered again, as I dared flashed him a questioning gaze. "Just seemed a bit weird."
"We're back in the boonies," I said. "Heard that some of these rural protectorates get a little weird."
Wally turned down the radio to a barely audible rumble. "Weird like Children of the Corn weird?"
Actually, yes, but I wasn't in the mood for starring in a horror flick so I scoffed. "Probably just urban snobs putting down the locals."
"Yeah," Wally said with an uneasy laugh. "We urbanites are jerks."
Then we came up on another billboard. It was plain white with black text:
If they obey and serve him, they shall spend their days in prosperity, and their years in pleasures. - Job 36:11
In smaller print, in one corner, was a cross and then a second, obscure symbol, and the words: Serenity Protectorate Faith Alliance.
"Oookay," I said. "That would be just a bit creepy."
About 500 feet past that was another identical billboard rising up from wild shrubs. It read:
But if they obey not, they shall perish by the sword, and they shall die without knowledge - Job 36:12
Someone had spray painted a separate message in green across a blank white expanse under the quote: WELCOME TO YOUR FINE, SUCKERS!
"I'm getting a bad feeling," said Wally.
"Me, too. Maybe Darlene can meet us out here."
The road curved and the familiar dark metal gate archway appeared. The Gate to Serenity Protectorate had been obscured by a far too convenient copse of aspen. Even half expecting it, the structure came as an unwelcome surprise less than half a mile ahead of us.
"Pull over, pull over," Wally insisted, his voice tight with panic.
I looked around frantically. There was no shoulder! There was no bail out lane! I thought all gates had to have a bail out lane. Not this time. We were stuck on an unseparated, narrow two-lane stretch of rural highway. The ditch to either side of the road was deep and wide enough that even 4x4's couldn't pass it. A U-turn would have been tough with a Honda, but with the Townie it was impossible.
It was almost like Serenity Protectorate wanted to force people into unwittingly crossing into it.
Oh, fuck - that was the scam! The huge fine for traveling into a protectorate without permission!
I pressed down on the brake to slow the inevitable and give myself time to think. Immediately, I heard a long honk behind me. I glanced in the rear view mirror and noticed a massive semi practically sitting on my back bumper. It figures, the one trucker in the whole state brave enough to hang off the Townie's ass would be right behind us now. Shit, shit, shit. Too late. The archway passed over our heads.
We were in Serenity - the worst rural Protectorate on the face of the Earth.
Not two seconds after had we passed under the gate, we heard a siren wailing up behind us. Even though I was expecting it, I jerked so hard safety-belt caught. Glancing in the rear view mirror, I saw the police cruiser pulling out from behind a conveniently placed bush. Just up ahead road widened out considerably. We weren't the first to fall into this trap. So many had that they'd actually paved this section of shoulder.
Angry, I pulled the Townie over. The tailgating truck blazed on past us, speeding up as it went, but the cruiser ignored that obvious bit of lawbreaking and pulled over into the shoulder behind us.
What fucking jerks! How many poor lost souls had gotten themselves turned around in the rural sameness and accidentally blundered down this road? Even if Serenity didn't demand the full $10,000 fine for traveling without proper permission, they had the legal power to hold the poor traveler hostage until he coughed up as much as the locals figured they could squeeze out of him. Assholes!
"But you weren't speeding," said Wally.
"That's not the problem," I growled back, and told him about the scam.
"But we have permission to enter. I was told to come here."
"You sure that was Darlene over the phone?"
"Absolutely."
The police officer tapped on the window. I rolled it down. "Excuse me, officer, is there a problem?" I asked in my least confrontational tone. "We have permission to be here."
"Two of you?" asked the officer. He looked to be high side of forty, but muscular and strong. The grey in his hair spoke more of experience than weakness. He looked at Wally and me, then at his clip board. "Which of you is Walter Aronsen?"
Wally leaned over. "That's me, sir."
I felt a glimmer of hope. These guys were expecting Wally, maybe they didn't think we'd done something wrong. I just wished the cop's expression weren't so guarded.
"And is this a hitchhiker?" He asked Wally, his eyes flickering to me.
"No, sir," I said hastily, a bit of panic in my voice. Even with Darlene's protection, we'd be in big trouble if the cops thought that.
"He's-" Wally began.
Inspiration struck and I cut Wally hastily off "--I'm part of Lady Darlene's entourage."
"-her driver," Wally completed, nodding. Wow, that sounded plausible. I'd have high-fived Wally if that wouldn't have completely blown our story.
The cop looked us both over, then raised skeptical eyebrow. "I was only told about one harem."
"I'm not her harem," I said. "Just her driver."
"Okay, let's see some ID then."
Fuck. My bloodtrust card was gone. Wally reached across my lap and handed the cop his card while I looked through my wallet. I spotted my driver's license. Hell, this is what cops usually are looking for when they pull you over and sometimes it's used as a secondary ID. I handed that to him.
He accepted it and attached it to his clipboard
"Lady Darlene contacted us and asked us to meet her in Serenity, sir," Wally put in. "Would you like us to call her and she can straighten this out with you."
"No need," said the cop, dryly, copying something down on his clipboard. "I've met Lord Abram's visitor. I was sent to escort you to his estate. I wasn't told there would be two of you, though."
"Only Wally is harem," I explained. "I'm not that important. Sometimes she forgets me." It was a good thing this guy wasn't a vampire, because that wouldn't pass any lie detector.
I was blown away by the realization that Wally hadn't sold me out after all. Lady Darlene wasn't expecting me. I really hoped Wally was right and I'd be a pleasant surprise. I wished that he'd actually checked with her before I'd drove myself into her temporary territory.
The cop hesitated and stared at me again. "George Handle," he said. "That name does sound familiar."
"Well, then," I said. "Maybe she did mention me." Yes! I was on a roll. I don't think I've ever lied this smoothly.
"Got a bloodtrust card on you, Mr. Handle?" he asked.
"My Lady has it," I said. "We were unexpectedly separated." There was enough truth to my words that they had a sincere ring to them.
"No bloodtrust card. How do I know you have permission to be traveling? You could be hitching." Oh, God, this guy was a dick.
"I wouldn't let a hitch hiker drive my Lady's car," said Wally with so much horror that the cop looked chagrined that he'd even suggested it.
"Besides, I don't need permission," I said. "If you'll look on my license, you'll see that my restrictions say I'm Black." It did. Not all DMV's bothered to designate a person's blood restrictions, but Oregon, in a fit of thoroughness, did.
Unfortunately, rather than allaying Officer Douche's misgivings, this seemed to make them stronger. "Why would Lady Darlene have a black in her entourage."
"Well, I don't have to taste good to drive a car," I said, then winced at the undiplomatic tone I'd taken. "I just need a clean driving record." Which I had, thank God.
"I got him the job," Wally pitched in. "We are roommates. I put in a good word."
The cop looked from Wally's blood trust card to my driver's license. "You are roommates," he repeated, then snorted softly, his desire to pin the hitchhiker label on me completely stymied.
Officer Douche sighed and shrugged his burly shoulders. "All right, boys, I've been asked to escort you to my Lord's estate. If you'll exit your vehicle, I'll drive you to where your Lady is. I'll have one of my guys take the vehicle back to the rental agency." He then smirked at us, as if he knew how far we'd run off with it.
Wally and I shared a look, then with a great amount of trepidation we climbed out of the car. "I've got a bag in the trunk," Wally said, but the cop just escorted us to the cruiser, opened up the back door, and ordered us in. Wally got in first and slid over to let me sit down.
"Keys," the cop asked, and I handed over the Townie's keys. He closed the cruiser's door on us. I watched through the window as he went up to the Townie and unlocked the trunk, pulling out a couple of bags. He put them into the front passenger seat of his own car, then walked around and got into the drivers seat.
Turning around he asked us through the bars and the bulletproof glass, "You boys comfy back there?"
The seat was comfortable enough, though strange. There were deep indents in the cushions where a cuffed person could fit his arms. I was just as happy this guy hadn't cuffed us, but it still worried me that he'd put us back here. There was no way to open the doors from back here. No lock, no handle.
"It's okay," said Wally, patting my hand. "Lady Darlene will take care of everything. This is what we want."
Funny, it felt a whole lot like getting caught.
Forward to Chapter 20
Back to chapter 18
RATING: NC-17 (This chapter PG)
SUMMARY: As George and Wally continue their hapless journey across the midwest, reality comes to kick them in the shins, repeatedly.
Word Count: 6360
Chapter 19
It was dark when the Limo door opened again. Somehow, the combination of the strange place, the twisted way I'd been lying across the seat, and the plastic and leather smell of the car combined to give me a moment of disoriented panic. For a split second, I could have sworn I was in a coffin, even though it made no rational sense at all. I let out a brief, girlishly shrill scream.
"It's just me," said a dark shape.
"Who?" I asked. Then I woke enough to realize it was Wally. And following that, I remembered that I was in a car and that we were on the run and that the prospects for my future were grim. "Wally," I acknowledged.
"Your turn driving," said Wally. "I can't keep awake anymore. I got a shitty five hours of sleep last night."
"Oy." I sat up and rubbed my face. It felt slightly tacky, the way your skin does when sweat has had a chance to dry on it. Chilly air seemed to go through my clothes, and I grabbed my windbreaker off the floor and started putting it back on. "What time is it?"
"Just before eleven." I'd slept for seven hours, but felt like only three. I had that heavy-sour feeling in my stomach and a kind of rubbery quality to my arms and legs that comes from jet lag. A mild headache had set itself up behind my eyeballs. My circadian rhythms were totally fried.
"What state are we in?" I asked as I climbed out of the car and let the fresh air revive me. We were pulled over on the packed dirt shoulder of the quiet very dark freeway. The only light around came from the limo's headlights and about a bajillion stars. A brisk wind was rustling the long grass around us and what I could see of my surroundings with my dark adjusted eyes was pretty much nothing but endless flatness.
"Still Nebraska," said Wally with just the slightest hesitation.
"Oh you are fucking kidding me!" I felt a surge of frustration. "We haven't even left the state? Were we on a treadmill? What the hell route did you take?"
"Oh, come on… For what it's worth we are about 20 miles from the border with Wyoming." I could see Wally's silhouette reach up a hand to wipe his face. "I'm too tired to argue, especially over some thing this stupid. Can you take over?"
"Yeah."
"Key's in the ignition," mumbled Wally as he climbed in the back and then shut the door.
And that was the end of our conversation. I climbed into the cab of the car, spent a couple minutes figuring out where everything was, then pulled out on the highway. The Town Car was so smooth it made the lumpy earthen shoulder feel like glass, and there was a satisfying surge of power when I touched the gas pedal. The engine barely purred as the speedometer swung up past 90 mph with disarming ease. For a big girl, the Townie was surprisingly agile and responsive. I took my foot off the gas and waited for the needle to point to a more socially acceptable three miles an hour above the speed limit, then set the cruise control and settled back.
The road ahead was absolutely flat, completely straight, and utterly empty. It didn't feel like we were moving. Tread mill indeed.
In fact the only indication that time was passing at all was a soft rise and fall of singing from the radio. Wally had set it to some hick country music station, which, being much more of a classical rock/alternative kind of guy, seemed rather unlike him . The scan button got me a gospel station, and some self-help talk guru explaining to a sobbing woman that her husband was leaving her because she was fat, then finally brought me back to the country channel. I turned off the radio for about a minute, but found the silence too spooky. Giving in, I pressed the on button once more and cruised into Wyoming with the melancholy twanging of an acoustic guitar and some chick claiming her beau had done her wrong. Maybe she was overweight.
The end of the protectorate didn't quite coincide with the state border. I was on the Wyoming side by a good half mile when an oasis of artificial light rose up out of a sea of infinite blackness. Twin sets of stadium lights reached up some twenty-five feet in the air illuminating a sinister archway of dark metal. A separate brown sign told me I was leaving the Cassidy Rural Protectorate. There was no mention of what protectorate I would be entering.
I tapped on the brake and disengaged the cruise control. The Townie drifted down to a crawl and I took in my options. I expected the U of paved road crossing the median strip to allow a traveler to bail out, but to my surprise, on the right side of the lane was a second road, unpaved and carved in criss-crossing ruts, down into the drainage trench and then up around the gate scaffolding.
I wasn't the only one trying to leave a protectorate without permission.
But apparently, we humans weren't the only ones paying attention to it. Before I could consider testing the limo's axels on the rough unofficial road, I saw that someone had crossed this unofficial road with two sections of jersey barrier.
With I sigh, I stepped on the gas and passed under the spidery scaffolding. I could almost hear the click of a camera recording the car. And now Jeffrey knew exactly where we were.
Jeffrey was right. We needed to be smarter than this. Who else was keeping remote track of this vehicle as it made it's predictable way down I80? Should I divert us onto side streets? Serpentine our way though the rectangular states until we arrived at Portland? Or should I take the other tack and count on the 75 mile an hour speed limit getting us to our home protectorate before any individual vampire had the chance to mount a roadblock. Perhaps, if the infighting I saw at Nadette's party were typical, rivalry would keep the vampires from cooperating enough to effectively snare us.
Or perhaps neither, because on the heels of that thought, the low gas light flickered on. Goddamn it. I really didn't need this now. I looked down at the gas gage. It stood just a hair above the E and not getting any higher. And then an even bigger problem reared its head.
Who the hell around here sells gas in the middle of nowhere at quarter to midnight on a Sunday?
The sky was already a dove grey with impending dawn and the birds cawing out their raucous good mornings when a pickup truck pulled into the darkened Arco station. I got out of the Town Car and nodded as a skinny, weather grizzled man in jeans and an oil stained jacket climbed out. He stared at me a moment, then looked at the Townie, then back at me.
"Run out of gas?"
"Yeah," I said, trying desperately to look nonchalant as I leaned against the side of the limo.
The man nodded. He stepped inside the gas booth long enough to flip a mess of switches. The canopy lit up and I noticed that the pumps were on.
"Been here long?"
"Not too long," I lied. I pulled my wallet and handed him a fifty, praying that this wasn't one of those stations that didn't accept them. The man held the bill up to one of the overhead lights.
"Anyone in there?" His voice dropped.
"Just my friend. No vampires," I said, hastily.
He laughed. "Good thing, too," he said. "Can't imagine what kind of trouble you'd be in otherwise. Lady Maeve don't take very well to being made to wait."
I laughed reflexively. "Nah, my friend and I bought the limo second hand," I lied. "We decided to go cross country in style."
He frowned. "Scare a lot of people with one of those," he chided, matter-of-factly. "Especially round here. We don't mess with the vampires, they don't mess with us. If I were to give you a bit of advice, I say you reconsider using a more sensible vehicle for your road trip."
"Ah, yeah," I said. "Little late for that."
The guy nodded, but not with approval. "You can pump your gas now."
I quickly fumbled to get the nozzle into the tank and start it filling. The man just stood there looking at me with a glower. When I finished, he walked back into his booth and got me the change.
"If I were you," he said, "I wouldn't go stopping at any small towns around here. People these parts don't think this kind of thing is funny. Vampires don't, either."
I tried to telegraph an apology with my nod. "Thanks." And I got out of there as quickly as I could. Last thing I needed was to offend the locals with my non-choice of a getaway car.
I was starting to hate the Townie. Yes, she was a smooth ride and the dark cabin had its uses, but in every other way she was the worst vehicle possible for what we were trying to do. Between her insatiable appetite for gas and the way she frightened the locals into thinking they are being cruised by their patron, she wasn't actually helping us. In fact, I'd go so far as to say she was putting up a strong passive resistance. Perhaps I should have called her Christine, but that might have been tempting fate too much.
The smart thing would be to ditch her. Now. Just leave her by the side of the road.
And be stranded in the middle of nowhere to walk back to Portland? We'd starve.
Hitchhike? On the surface it seemed to be a possibility, illegal as hell though it was. But this wasn't like the heavily traveled I5 corridor. As far as I could see up and down the stretch of highway, I was the only person on the road. How long could Wally and I afford to stay in one place hoping for someone willing to face the possibility of stiff penalties just to help out a couple of dudes they didn't know?
So, what were our options? Even if I got us to the nearest city, planes, busses, Amtrak, all were out. Even if we tried to rent a more sensible car, one of us would have to pony up one of our bloodtrust cards complete with the requisite travel permissions - issued by our prospective Patrons. Obviously, that couldn't be me - what with my runaway status and physical lack of a bloodtrust card.
But it couldn't be Wally, either. I felt a momentary wave of nausea.
Oh, God. Wally had no patron. No one to permit him to travel. No one to protect him in another's territory. Much as I hated to believe it, there was some truth to the benign title our vampire overlords insist we use. Jeffrey had certainly gone out of his way to protect me, even if it was because he considered me to be his property. Who would do that for Wally?
He was just as vulnerable right now as me. Collateral reward is how Jeffrey termed it back at that party. It's best they don't have anything more to fight over…. Did that mean that any vampire along our route might just claim him, too? Sure, his blood type is common, but it's common and good. And who is to say that some vampire in say Podunk Wyoming might not already have someone of his flavor type in their harem.
We might be separated. Me going off to some auction to the highest bidder and Wally stuck in corn country far away from all his friends and everything he knew and cared about.
That sure put some perspective on the idea of driving a hearse and shelling out fifty bucks for gas every 300 miles. It was just fucking money. Still - would we be able to manage it? Did we have enough luck and cash to last all he way to Portland?
I could just see the curtain wall around Cheyenne up ahead when I heard a sudden frantic knocking at the window that separate the driver's compartment from the back of the car. I slowed down, then pulled off and came to a stop on the washboard-rippled shoulder of the freeway. I turned the engine off to save gas just as the knocking ceased.
Wally was awake.
The window between the front and back rolled down with an electrical hum. "Geo, stop the car."
As we were already stopped, I simply turned around and smiled. "Good morning? Sleep well?"
Wally's hair was extra tousled, standing up in tufts that would look terrible on a normal person, but endearingly slovenly on him. I could see a bit of dense pale stubble on his cheeks. My own were as smooth as ever thanks to that wax job. Considering how pathetically sparse my beard was in the first place, I was just as glad I didn't have to mess with shaving the dotty little patches off. It was obvious though that Wally could have a full manly beard if he wanted.
He stared past me out the front window, as if that would orient him. "Where are we?"
I flinched at the brusque quality of his voice. "Almost to Cheyenne… Wyoming." After the hard time I'd given Wally last night about our progress, I deserved a good ribbing, but Wally seemed relieved rather than upset.
"Okay," said Wally and he sat back and began messing with his Iphone. "We got to turn around," he said after a moment.
I opened my mouth to ask what was up, but Wally cut me off with a curt "Wait." He then put the phone to his ear. His eyes caught mine and he put a finger to his lips to keep me quiet. "Hey, yeah, this is Walter. I'm in Cheyenne, Wyoming. Uh huh… Yes. Understood." He hung up.
"Who were you just talking to Wally?" I asked. My voice was full of dread.
"We got to get turned around, now," said Wally wiping his hand frantically through his mass of white hair. "Are we still on I80?… then we need to head back that way until we hit Lincoln, then we gotta head South. We need to get to Serenity, Abram protectorate."
"Who was that on the phone," I repeated.
"Geo. You knew this was going to happen."
"Wally," I insisted. "Who was that?"
"Lady Darlene," said Wally. "My patron. She survived. She needs me - us."
My heart beat way too loud. "Wally. I can't." Wally, don't sell me out… Too late, he had. The betrayal stung.
"Why not!" snapped Wally. "Don't you see? This is the solution. The sane solution. This was what I was trying to do before the disaster at the party. We are going to meet up with Darlene and fly back to Portland, and we'll be done. No more worrying about some strange Vampire grabbing you. No more worry about what the hell happens to me when we do get caught." He opened up the door and climbed out onto the road. A moment later he was in the passenger's seat, looking a lot more calm and dangerously determined.
"Wally, she hates me."
"She doesn't hate you."
"Of course, she hates me!" I countered. "She's only met me twice; the first time I threw up on her and the second time I nearly got her killed. I'd hate me after that."
"She may be irritated with you, but she also needs you." Wally considered his words. "You are her way back to redemption. She needs to get your old patron back on her side. Chauncey is…" He paused while I waited expectantly. Finally, he frowned. "Okay, I don't know what he is, but Darlene seems to think he's powerful enough to mend the fences for her."
I hmphed.
"Anyway," Wally shifted the subject. "The important part of this is that she's a vampire. You are under the nine-tenths rule so as long as you are in her presence, no other vampire can lay claim to you."
"I'm sure," I said wryly. That hadn't stopped Jeffrey before. "What's the nine-tenths rule again?"
"Possession is -"
"--Okay I get it." I wiped my face and sat up straight. "That's a formal law with them - or, whatdayacallit, etiquette."
Wally shrugged. "As formal as they get, I suppose."
And there was the problem in a fucking nutshell. Etiquette wasn't remotely law. The best handle I had on it was that it was a form of peer pressure and Darlene was definitely the unpopular kid on the vampire block right now. High school wasn't so long ago that I'd forgot how unequal the application of social law was.
"You know," I said bitterly. "None of this would have happened if she had just tasted my blood when I was a kid."
Wally sighed. "She screwed up big. Even she admitted that."
"I don't even get it," I said clapping my hands down on the steering wheel. "Why the hell did she let me throw up on her, Wally? Why didn't she just voodoo my mind like everyone else has? I'd have run to her arms happily if she'd just put the whammy on me. Then none of this would have happened. I wouldn't have ever tasted freedom in the first place. Everyone would be happy."
"She didn't because she couldn't," said Wally.
"What do you mean?"
Wally looked embarrassed, as if his patron's faults somehow extended to him. "Vampires aren't all equal," he said after a bit. He looked off through the windshield at the sparse Monday morning truck traffic. "When Lord Jeffrey took over my mind… I've never felt anything like that before. Never. It was instant; one minute I was about to scream, next - nothing. He stopped me in my tracks and he didn't break a sweat. And later … when he was…" Wally paused.
"Later, when he was?" I prompted. "What?"
But Wally shook his head and came back to his point. "Darlene has a hard time even reading minds much less changing them. She has to touch and sometimes it takes a while. When I get called up, we usually spend a few minutes holding hands before I get in the… um… mood."
I raised an eyebrow at him. None of the vampires I'd encountered had the least trouble manipulating my mind.
"Anyway, what happened to you was over in seconds, she didn't have time to put the mojo on you. You wouldn't stay still long enough. And you surprised her."
"So you're saying she's mentally handicapped," I said. Great. Just our luck. "So we are relying on the retard vampire to save our asses?"
"She's not retarded!" Wally's face colored a bit and he shifted uncomfortably in his seat. "She's as smart as any of them. But yeah, she's not as powerful as some. She doesn't have the psychic skills, obviously. You know, that kind of endears her to me. I don't like someone being able to toggle me on and off like a switch."
Oh, hooray, finally a point of agreement.
"But you think she can keep us safe?" I asked pointedly.
Wally answered without hesitation. "Yes! Psychic ability or not, she took on twelve normal vampires night before last, and she got away with her life. And I think that makes her kind of awesome. Don't underestimate her." I heard the strident edge of loyalty in his voice.
I had to admit, that was pretty impressive.
"Besides," said Wally. "She's revoked the permits for this car to travel anywhere but back to Serenity. If we keep going, the next gate's going to call the police on us. We have to go back."
I deflated. It seemed like everyone was against this roadtrip. Hell, even I wasn't too thrilled with it. "Plane back to Portland?"
Wally nodded. "There's a small airstrip just outside of Serenity. Darlene will charter us a flight."
"And when I get back to Portland," I murmured. "And she gives me to Chauncey… who is to say he won't sell me off?"
That got Wally. His face suddenly drained of all color.
"Tell me," I insisted. "How do I work this so that you and I don't lose each other?"
Wally frowned. "I don't know. I don't have all the answers. But it doesn't matter because what other choice is there?" He sighed. "I know you have your heart set on this crazy rebellion thing, but we don't even know if it exists. And it seems to me that since it's my ass, too, I should get a say in this. I say I want to go home."
A truck blew past us, the wind in its wake making the Townie rock sideways on its wheels. I closed my eyes, and breathed deep.
You could drop me off here. Go back to your patron. But I didn't want that, either. Better or worse, I wanted to be with Wally, for what little time we may have together. The future was too uncertain to toss away what we had now for it.
"So, Geo, what do you say? Are we going to--?" His eyes were puppy-dog eager.
"Yes."
"--Meet up with Darlene?"
"Fuck it, Yes!" I repeated. Let it go before I change my mind.
"We do owe it to her," ended Wally. Apparently he really needed to get that last bit of guilt trip out. "And she's not a bad person. She made it seem like Chauncey wasn't, either. They won't let us down. They aren't going to separate us. We just have to have a little faith."
I've been a cynical bastard from birth, but even I have my limits. I was too frustrated and tired to fight anymore, so I gave in to hope. What's wrong with taking the easy way, again? I forget.
"I'll take over driving," said Wally. "You look bushed."
I nodded. Probably for the best.
I couldn't shake the ominous sense of doom as Wally undid most of the progress from the night before. The sky was gloomier today, though it didn't rain, we could occasionally hear distant rolls of thunder. The endless rows of crops seemed dreary and colorless. As we passed into Nebraska again I noticed a section of long section of chain link fence topped with razor wire preventing people from going into what seemed to be an endless sea of weeds. Probably somewhere off that way was the remnants of an army base or something. Maybe there would be a hidden stash of old guns and ammunition. The fantasy of shooting a vampire reared it's head for a pleasant moment. Then the last bit of chainlink passed and we were back into the corn, occasionally mixed with other unidentifiable crops.
"I'm sorry," said Wally.
"For what?"
He didn't have an answer for that. This situation wasn't his fault. It wasn't my fault. It wasn't Darlene's or anyone else's either. Or maybe it was all of ours. I don't know.
"Jeffrey's going to be pissed," I muttered.
"Yeah. Probably so."
And that was all either of us had to say on that subject.
We drove mostly in silence for the first few hours, switching off every hundred miles. Wally turned up the radio loud enough to make it unnecessary to add casual chatter on top of it. Instead I grew to be a bit more appreciative of country western. The view was rather monotonous after I became used to seeing crops grown in large circles on square plots. Hunger caught up to us and we ended up stopping for brunch at a diner in Ogallala. The Townie caught a lot of attention and a wide birth. Wally and I fared little better as the locals stared at us while we choked down dry chicken fried steak sandwiches and crinkle cut fries. I hadn't felt so self-conscious since 8th grade.
Back in the car I found myself looking at Wally. Just studying his features, the way the muscles of his jaw lept about as he ground his teeth. Through almost invisible lashes, his pale grey eyes stared at the road. Yesterday's sun had burned his cheek and nose to a one sided rosy blush. I wasn't sure if I should reach out squeeze his hand, the way I would have for any of my girlfriends, or maybe hold his shoulder, or should I just let him macho through it alone. What was the etiquette for a gay affair? Would I lose face to ask?
I don't remember what exactly broke the ice between us again, but somewhere around Potter we were talking again. The subject ranged from high school war stories to upcoming video games and finally to sex which got both of us bothered enough that we had to switch to something else. Even if we wanted to pull over and do something, there was nowhere hidden to do it.
Just before Lincoln we turned South. At first the territory didn't seem particularly strange. It was similar in pretty much every way to what we'd been going through for hours. Same flat. A few less irrigation circles and a few more oddly shaped plots but otherwise about as rural as a place could get. Few houses, every so often we'd hit a clump of six buildings that called itself a town.
Wally and I recognized a song that seemed to be some kind of favorite around here for how many times it turned up in rotation. We banged our heads around and belted out "We'll put a boot in your ass/it's the American waaaay! " more or less in time with the actual lyrics.
"Well, fuck, Geo," said Wally, "There's your rebellion right there. What we need to do is call Toby Keith."
"Notice how he doesn't even mention the vampires," I scoffed. "Poseur. Who are we going to boot in the ass, now? The communists?" The creep of communism had slowed down greatly since the vampires stopped allowing outright war, but every so often a country toyed with turning and stirred up the conservative Americans into an impotent froth.
"Nah," Wally defended. "Shows he's got a couple of brain cells left. If he mentioned the vamps they'd shut him down. That'd be insurrection."
"It's testosterone poisoning."
"It's ballsy," Wally insisted. "Yeah, I'd like to see you to try come up with a pro-war song that can get past the censors. Smart thing, couching it in the past."
I shook my head in wonderment. "Oh my god, you like Toby Keith. This trip is full of surprises."
"I wouldn't laugh, Poison fanboy."
"One album and, besides, with hair like that, who can hate them?"
"God, Geo, the make up - huh." Wally frowned, then turned around in the passenger's seat to look behind us.
I was taking a turn driving so I couldn't do the same. Monday afternoon traffic was denser in this part of Nebraska. The Townie was up to her old tricks again, making life difficult by convincing traffic that the best response to slow the fuck down and treat us like police cruiser. I really couldn't look away for more than a split second.
"What was it?" I asked, toeing the brake pedal and taking furtive glimpses in the rear view mirror for something unusual enough to get that reaction.
"Nothing. A billboard," said Wally. He turned back around and shook his head.
There were a fair amount of billboards around here. Most of them for local big box stores and fast food restaurants, some of those listed directions dozens to even hundreds of miles of driving. This truly was the ass end of nowhere.
"Nothing," he muttered again, as I dared flashed him a questioning gaze. "Just seemed a bit weird."
"We're back in the boonies," I said. "Heard that some of these rural protectorates get a little weird."
Wally turned down the radio to a barely audible rumble. "Weird like Children of the Corn weird?"
Actually, yes, but I wasn't in the mood for starring in a horror flick so I scoffed. "Probably just urban snobs putting down the locals."
"Yeah," Wally said with an uneasy laugh. "We urbanites are jerks."
Then we came up on another billboard. It was plain white with black text:
If they obey and serve him, they shall spend their days in prosperity, and their years in pleasures. - Job 36:11
In smaller print, in one corner, was a cross and then a second, obscure symbol, and the words: Serenity Protectorate Faith Alliance.
"Oookay," I said. "That would be just a bit creepy."
About 500 feet past that was another identical billboard rising up from wild shrubs. It read:
But if they obey not, they shall perish by the sword, and they shall die without knowledge - Job 36:12
Someone had spray painted a separate message in green across a blank white expanse under the quote: WELCOME TO YOUR FINE, SUCKERS!
"I'm getting a bad feeling," said Wally.
"Me, too. Maybe Darlene can meet us out here."
The road curved and the familiar dark metal gate archway appeared. The Gate to Serenity Protectorate had been obscured by a far too convenient copse of aspen. Even half expecting it, the structure came as an unwelcome surprise less than half a mile ahead of us.
"Pull over, pull over," Wally insisted, his voice tight with panic.
I looked around frantically. There was no shoulder! There was no bail out lane! I thought all gates had to have a bail out lane. Not this time. We were stuck on an unseparated, narrow two-lane stretch of rural highway. The ditch to either side of the road was deep and wide enough that even 4x4's couldn't pass it. A U-turn would have been tough with a Honda, but with the Townie it was impossible.
It was almost like Serenity Protectorate wanted to force people into unwittingly crossing into it.
Oh, fuck - that was the scam! The huge fine for traveling into a protectorate without permission!
I pressed down on the brake to slow the inevitable and give myself time to think. Immediately, I heard a long honk behind me. I glanced in the rear view mirror and noticed a massive semi practically sitting on my back bumper. It figures, the one trucker in the whole state brave enough to hang off the Townie's ass would be right behind us now. Shit, shit, shit. Too late. The archway passed over our heads.
We were in Serenity - the worst rural Protectorate on the face of the Earth.
Not two seconds after had we passed under the gate, we heard a siren wailing up behind us. Even though I was expecting it, I jerked so hard safety-belt caught. Glancing in the rear view mirror, I saw the police cruiser pulling out from behind a conveniently placed bush. Just up ahead road widened out considerably. We weren't the first to fall into this trap. So many had that they'd actually paved this section of shoulder.
Angry, I pulled the Townie over. The tailgating truck blazed on past us, speeding up as it went, but the cruiser ignored that obvious bit of lawbreaking and pulled over into the shoulder behind us.
What fucking jerks! How many poor lost souls had gotten themselves turned around in the rural sameness and accidentally blundered down this road? Even if Serenity didn't demand the full $10,000 fine for traveling without proper permission, they had the legal power to hold the poor traveler hostage until he coughed up as much as the locals figured they could squeeze out of him. Assholes!
"But you weren't speeding," said Wally.
"That's not the problem," I growled back, and told him about the scam.
"But we have permission to enter. I was told to come here."
"You sure that was Darlene over the phone?"
"Absolutely."
The police officer tapped on the window. I rolled it down. "Excuse me, officer, is there a problem?" I asked in my least confrontational tone. "We have permission to be here."
"Two of you?" asked the officer. He looked to be high side of forty, but muscular and strong. The grey in his hair spoke more of experience than weakness. He looked at Wally and me, then at his clip board. "Which of you is Walter Aronsen?"
Wally leaned over. "That's me, sir."
I felt a glimmer of hope. These guys were expecting Wally, maybe they didn't think we'd done something wrong. I just wished the cop's expression weren't so guarded.
"And is this a hitchhiker?" He asked Wally, his eyes flickering to me.
"No, sir," I said hastily, a bit of panic in my voice. Even with Darlene's protection, we'd be in big trouble if the cops thought that.
"He's-" Wally began.
Inspiration struck and I cut Wally hastily off "--I'm part of Lady Darlene's entourage."
"-her driver," Wally completed, nodding. Wow, that sounded plausible. I'd have high-fived Wally if that wouldn't have completely blown our story.
The cop looked us both over, then raised skeptical eyebrow. "I was only told about one harem."
"I'm not her harem," I said. "Just her driver."
"Okay, let's see some ID then."
Fuck. My bloodtrust card was gone. Wally reached across my lap and handed the cop his card while I looked through my wallet. I spotted my driver's license. Hell, this is what cops usually are looking for when they pull you over and sometimes it's used as a secondary ID. I handed that to him.
He accepted it and attached it to his clipboard
"Lady Darlene contacted us and asked us to meet her in Serenity, sir," Wally put in. "Would you like us to call her and she can straighten this out with you."
"No need," said the cop, dryly, copying something down on his clipboard. "I've met Lord Abram's visitor. I was sent to escort you to his estate. I wasn't told there would be two of you, though."
"Only Wally is harem," I explained. "I'm not that important. Sometimes she forgets me." It was a good thing this guy wasn't a vampire, because that wouldn't pass any lie detector.
I was blown away by the realization that Wally hadn't sold me out after all. Lady Darlene wasn't expecting me. I really hoped Wally was right and I'd be a pleasant surprise. I wished that he'd actually checked with her before I'd drove myself into her temporary territory.
The cop hesitated and stared at me again. "George Handle," he said. "That name does sound familiar."
"Well, then," I said. "Maybe she did mention me." Yes! I was on a roll. I don't think I've ever lied this smoothly.
"Got a bloodtrust card on you, Mr. Handle?" he asked.
"My Lady has it," I said. "We were unexpectedly separated." There was enough truth to my words that they had a sincere ring to them.
"No bloodtrust card. How do I know you have permission to be traveling? You could be hitching." Oh, God, this guy was a dick.
"I wouldn't let a hitch hiker drive my Lady's car," said Wally with so much horror that the cop looked chagrined that he'd even suggested it.
"Besides, I don't need permission," I said. "If you'll look on my license, you'll see that my restrictions say I'm Black." It did. Not all DMV's bothered to designate a person's blood restrictions, but Oregon, in a fit of thoroughness, did.
Unfortunately, rather than allaying Officer Douche's misgivings, this seemed to make them stronger. "Why would Lady Darlene have a black in her entourage."
"Well, I don't have to taste good to drive a car," I said, then winced at the undiplomatic tone I'd taken. "I just need a clean driving record." Which I had, thank God.
"I got him the job," Wally pitched in. "We are roommates. I put in a good word."
The cop looked from Wally's blood trust card to my driver's license. "You are roommates," he repeated, then snorted softly, his desire to pin the hitchhiker label on me completely stymied.
Officer Douche sighed and shrugged his burly shoulders. "All right, boys, I've been asked to escort you to my Lord's estate. If you'll exit your vehicle, I'll drive you to where your Lady is. I'll have one of my guys take the vehicle back to the rental agency." He then smirked at us, as if he knew how far we'd run off with it.
Wally and I shared a look, then with a great amount of trepidation we climbed out of the car. "I've got a bag in the trunk," Wally said, but the cop just escorted us to the cruiser, opened up the back door, and ordered us in. Wally got in first and slid over to let me sit down.
"Keys," the cop asked, and I handed over the Townie's keys. He closed the cruiser's door on us. I watched through the window as he went up to the Townie and unlocked the trunk, pulling out a couple of bags. He put them into the front passenger seat of his own car, then walked around and got into the drivers seat.
Turning around he asked us through the bars and the bulletproof glass, "You boys comfy back there?"
The seat was comfortable enough, though strange. There were deep indents in the cushions where a cuffed person could fit his arms. I was just as happy this guy hadn't cuffed us, but it still worried me that he'd put us back here. There was no way to open the doors from back here. No lock, no handle.
"It's okay," said Wally, patting my hand. "Lady Darlene will take care of everything. This is what we want."
Funny, it felt a whole lot like getting caught.
Forward to Chapter 20
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