Chapter 11 Zero
ZERO
Rat, or whatever the fuck his name is, bounces back quickly.
I trust Piston and Beast to make sure Sandra stays out of the way, which leaves me free to do what I do best. Target neutralization.
I throw myself at him, hitting him high in the chest and with force.
Maybe he’d put up a better fight if he wasn’t drunk, but we’ll never know.
I nail him in the face with an elbow and he topples backwards.
“What the fuck is your problem, rodent?” I snarl. “We came here for a peaceful fucking beer and now I’ve gotta deal with your blood on my fucking clothes.”
“You motherfuckers killed my cousin!” he yells, cradling his face with blood dripping between his fingers.
I glance back to our booth. Both Piston and Beast are up, forming a wall in front of Sandra. “Rat’s cousin. Does that ring any bells with you guys?”
“Not a fuckin’ thing,” Piston says with a nasty grin.
Beast shakes his head. “Nope.”
“See, I don’t tend to kill people for no reason,” I explain as I close the distance to our new buddy.
“There was a time when that reason was that I was getting paid for it, but I’ve put all that behind me now.
These days it’s mostly because they were trying to put holes in me or mine where holes shouldn’t be. Was your cousin an asshole, rat face?”
We have an audience now, and the atmosphere is shifting.
Rat clearly picked the fight with us, but we aren’t in our home territory.
The people who want nothing to do with this are moving away, and the ones who want a reason to pound someone are drifting in our direction.
Three nasty looking motherfuckers are leading the charge.
"Hey, pretty boy, you should fucking know better than to come around here." The middle of the three, a ruddy guy with a scraggly beard and tattoos on his forehead, slaps a fist into his palm, stupidly choreographing his intentions. The other two spread out, trying to flank me.
Which could almost work if I was alone. Luckily, I’m not.
One gets too close and Beast launches him like a catapult.
The guy lands hard on top of a table, scattering glasses and bottles everywhere.
The guys sitting at that table manage to dodge out of the way, but they’re pissed at being interrupted and take it out on the guy who just landed in front of them.
The mess distracts the guy with the face tattoos. Grabbing the opportunity, I step in, grab his arm in two places and spin him around straight into his other friend. Something makes a shark cracking noise. They collapse in a pile on the floor.
I'm not here for a fucking brawl. I'm here to end it.
“Back off!” Sandra yells.
I turn to find Piston grappling with one guy, while another has his hands over his head, trying to protect himself from Sandra. She has a heavy glass in her hand, and she brings it down hard, knocking him sideways with a dull thunk. Sturdy glass.
“You okay? I call out over the noise.
She nods and gets a better grip on her improvised weapon, looking ready to throw it if anyone comes near. Her eyes are bright, and she almost looks like she’s having fun.
Out of the corner of my eye, I spot suspicious movement near Beast. "Heads up!"
He spins to my voice, just in time to see the fucker behind him with the bar stool.
With a quick snag and pull, he yanks it out of the guy's hands and breaks it over his head.
That guy didn't know the rule of never bringing a weapon to a fight if there's any chance of it being used against you, and now he's reeling and picking splinters outta his hair.
At this point, the whole fucking bar is involved. Most of the fuckers are brawling for pure love of the game. I’m pretty sure Rat was the only one that gave a shit about us being Screaming Eagles.
A guy leers at Sandra, and starts climbing into the booth from behind.
The fuck he is. I lunge for him, but before I reach, she spins and slams her glass in his face, knocking him backwards.
She stares wide-eyed, like she can't believe that worked, but her excited grin is kind of scary. Is it wrong that I find it fucking hot?
And I’m so fucked.
Sandra’s too interesting to let slip by, and there’s no way I’m gonna let that happen. Sorry, Quickshot. She might be stuck with us for a while.
"Good girl!" I yell at her, as I nab the fucker who got a faceful of beer glass and throw him back into the melee.
There's a sound behind me, and I whirl to find the bartender wielding a fucking baseball bat. "Whoa, man! We didn't fucking start—"
He swings and connects with the arm of a guy who's just pulled a fucking knife from his belt.
Even over the fight, I can hear the crunch of bone, followed by a loud scream.
"You don't fucking draw steel in my goddamn bar.
Get the fuck out!" His voice carries over the noise like a drill sergeant in a library.
"And the rest of you, sit your asses down and stop acting like fucking idiots! "
Some of the chaos winds down, but not everyone gives a fuck about his warning. He doesn't look too surprised. This isn’t his first bar fight, and probably not even his tenth or fiftieth either.
I take down a couple of guys and make sure they stay down.
Beast literally carries a guy out the fucking front door and throws him into the lot, and Piston puts his fancy street fighting moves to use, dropping a guy to the floor with a quick one-two-three to the face.
In the end, it's just us, some moaning fuckers at our feet, the bartender and some of the regulars who were wise enough to stay out of the fight, or at least pull out before it got serious.
The bartender turns our way, the baseball bat on his shoulder.
Piston throws his hands out. "We didn't start this. That fucker came at us."
He nods. "I know. Had my eye on you boys. Not your fault the locals got a little uppity."
Sandra appears between me and Piston. "Is it over already?"
"Already?" I give her a look. “Were you hoping for a second round?”
She shrugs.
Beast's laugh echoes off the rafters. "Ease up there, battle maiden. You okay? Guessing so." He gives her a thorough look anyway, all the way down and back up, but pretty sure he's checking her out more than checking for damage. She did a good job holding her own.
"The fuck happened here?" There’s a long-haired guy in the doorway. From what I can see on his cut, I’m pretty sure it’s Hellfire, president of the Outlaw Sons.
With him is a second man with a hint of reddish beard and short blond hair. Ghost, the patch on his cut says. One of their VPs. “Screaming Eagles giving you trouble, Hector?”
This is getting old. "For fuck sake. Is grudge holding a national sport over here or what? "
Hector, the bat wielding bartender, laughs.
"Hate to say it, but it wasn’t their fault.
They showed up with the lady, we gave them a friendly amount of shit, and everything was fine until Rat decided he needed to avenge his cousin.
It went downhill from there when the usual assholes decided it would be a good chance to make history. ”
Ghost snorts derisively. “Don’t start a dick measuring contest if you can’t measure up.”
Hellfire walks over, Ghost right behind. "Everything good? Eagle-eye doing alright?"
"The usual bullshit but Prez has it under control. I’ll let him know you care,” Piston says.
Hellfire barks out a laugh. "You do that. And tell him you degenerates are spreading that sharing an old lady curse. Be good if he kept that shit in his own club."
Ghost's lip twitches ever so slightly before settling right back to humorless stone. Dunno if anyone else noticed, but I'm giving three to one odds that he's one of them.
I put my arm around Sandra’s waist. "Sorry, we haven’t found a cure for it yet."
Hellfire nods. "Gonna grab my beer then. Officially, you’re welcome to stay, but man to man, I recommend you boys don’t linger too much or the rabble will have time to regroup."
"Think we're done here, anyway." I tip an imaginary hat to Hellfire.
A moment later, we're on the road, the air blowing in our hair and the salty breeze coming in off the ocean.
Out on the water, far in the distance, the green and red lights of passing ships tell us which way they're going.
This stretch is open, a slice of open coastline between cities, one of the few places where you don't have to pass through a gate to get to the water.
Sandra pats me on the shoulder and points when a sign says: "Public Beach Next Exit."
I nod and pull ahead of the others, signaling for them to follow.