Home  Table of Contents  Next

Virtual Reality

Chapter Nine

A garbage can crashed to the pavement. Mort Braggs whirled about, aiming the gun at the can rolling from an alley. A cat flew along the ground in pursuit of scattering rats. Grinning, Mort resisted the temptation to open fire on the little scavengers.

Nervous tension gathered inside him like storm clouds. He walked in a large circle in the middle of the street, wondering how to get back to the safety of the jungle. The closest city park was a mile away. Baker Street Park. It had two dying trees, knee high weeds, and a rusting swing set without any seats. It was a place for drug dealers, not kids. Jungle animals, but not house cats.

Mort chalked the jungle down to a dream. He had dreamed the cat just before his father had awakened him and kicked him out. Why shouldn't he be confused? His head still spun with fatigue. He'd go to school in the morning and get cut down for dirty clothes and blood-shot eyes. Hungry, he'd not be able to study.

At least there would be Marla van Kirk. The Ice Queen. Marla was always the bright spot of his day, even if she would have nothing to do with him. They were both messed over in the head. They shared that in common. Otherwise, they were from different worlds entirely.

Rick Kaiser was from a good background. Marla van Kirk would never lower herself beneath her station in life, but he knew what she thought of Rick aside from all that. Rick was a wimp. Marla van Kirk had yet to learn that he had more in common with her than Rick. Her parents had taught her that she was special, just as his parents had taught him that he was special, too, a thorn in the side of the world.

"Hey, punk."

Mort froze in place. The voice had sounded from directly behind him. Mort turned slowly. The mugger searched his eyes for fear. He found none. Mort brought the shiny forty-five pistol up to bear.

With a cry of surprise, the mugger turned and fled.

Mort followed him with the barrel of the gun. Slowly, his anger grew. His finger squeezed the trigger relentlessly.

The gun boomed. The kick sent him staggering back. The bullet sparked off the side of a building an inch above the running man's head. The man spun around with a look of mortal terror in his eyes.

A car stopped at the intersection a quarter block away. The overhead street light highlighted the dent in the hood. His buddies were back looking for the gun they had lost. One man got out of the car. Fire spat like firecrackers sparkling in the night. Bullets zipped and sank like angry bees around Mort's head.

In a raging anger that would not be denied, Mort raised his gun and fired. The boom was like thunder. Again, the recoil pushed him back a step.

The front tire of the car blew. The car sank to one side like an injured animal. Fire flashed from beneath the engine, glowing on the pavement below. Four doors flew open, and its passengers scattered.

An explosion blew the hood off a moment later. As the sheet metal spun end for end and landed with a loud bang on the street, electrical sparks flickered blue against the sides of buildings.

Fire lit with a whumping sound in the engine compartment and ran beneath the car. The fuel tank of the car exploded, rolling a fireball into the night sky. The rear of the car rose into the air with it. The car balanced itself on its nose, then went over onto its back, rocking to and fro, and burning fiercely.

"Wow."

Dazed, Mort backed into the shadows. He turned and walked away on wobbling knees. Within seconds, sirens echoed in the distance, responding to dozens of emergency calls phoned in by the people in the surrounding tenement buildings.

"Hey, kid! Hold it right there!"

The echo between the buildings made it hard to pinpoint the source of the voice. Mort finally spotted a figure in the window of a second floor apartment. He man stood against a table lamp inside, pointing a rifle down at him.

The man fired first. The bullet struck between Mort's legs and buzzed away. Mort fired back, and somehow the boom was even louder this time. The entire face of the building twice the size of the window blew inward. Dust billowed out above the street. Within the depths of the wound, a ruddy fire began to glow.

Mort backed away in disbelieving surprise as the building began to burn. Flames rose inside, appearing in windows adjacent to his target, then overhead. Inside, people were screaming. They came pouring from the building at ground level like cockroaches swarming into the night, and out onto the roof overhead. By the time Mort had run the length of the block, flames speared the night sky. Fire trucks and ambulances converged from all sides, filling the dark streets with flashing red, blue and white lights.

A police car pulled alongside him. "Hey kid, what's with the gun?"

The officer climbed from the car, pulling his own revolver and bracing it against the top of the car. "Drop it kid! Turn and spread 'em!"

Mort ducked off to one side. A bullet fired at him smacked a brownstone wall at his side, stinging his face with cement dust. Mort dodged into an alley and ran the length of it. He stopped at the dead-end wall blocking his way. Behind him, the cruiser with flashing blue lights barricaded his only way out.

"Hold it right there, kid!" The cop's angry voice echoed. "You might as well give it up!"

Mort tried a door set in a wall of brick off to one side. He blew the lock away with one shot. The inside of the building was an empty factory of some kind. A few bare bulbs dimly illuminated the interior.

Flashing red and blue lights filled every window. Cops moved in from every direction.

"Hey, kid. What do you say? Let's you and me talk."

Mort ducked into the shadows.

"Kid, it's a lost cause. Give it up before somebody gets hurt. Let's at least talk about it."

Mort dodged from cover to cover within the machinery-filled building. Behind him, the officer followed with his hands in the air.

But others stirred in the shadows, waiting for a clear shot. Mort knew how they operated. His father had described the procedure a thousand times.

There was something familiar about this particular cop. Mort knew the face from somewhere. One of Gunther's friends? Gunther's friends were ancient. Most of them had already retired. Some had died. This man was younger.

"Put down the gun. You're not in any serious trouble yet. Let's keep it that way."

"It was self-defense!" Mort called out. He sounded shrill and unsure of himself. He had set half the city afire and he was yelling self-defense. The cops would never buy his story. Gunther would never make bail for him. He'd rot away beneath city hall for six months before they shoved him through some overcrowded court and sent him away for good.

"I'll give you the gun," Mort said, hoping to sound reasonable. "You let me go."

"Set the gun down, and we'll talk about it."

"Back off, mister!" Mort raised his gun. "Don't come any closer!"

They were pushing, forcing him to either give in or get shot. One stupid mistake would nail him. Even now, one of them could be sneaking up from..."

From less that twenty feet behind him, a careless footstep kicked an empty can. Mort swung around. He saw only a dark shape. And a raised handgun.

"Kid, don't!"

Mort fired. He had to shoot or be shot.

The gunshot was like thunder. The dark shape staggered back into the light. Light fell across the officer's face. Mort saw an expression of horror.

On her face.

On a face he did recognize from a hundred pictures around the apartment. Gunther had accused him a thousand times in his drunken rages.  

"You killed her! The last thing she needed was the distraction of a kid! I told her and I told her you'd be a mistake. You as good as killed her yourself, you worthless piece of crap!"

And he had. The face of the dying officer was the face of his mother. Mort turned back to his father, recognizing him, too, from old photographs. He hadn't as yet been born when his father was this young.

Gunther Braggs leveled his handgun, his face contorted with panic and rage. Mort had time to raise his hand. "No, wait..."

In a split second, the young cop became the defeated old man that Mort knew. Anguish took form on Gunther Braggs' face. Grief without measure. Rage beyond boundaries.

Mort never heard the first shot. He never felt it, or the others that followed in close succession.

Home  Table of Contents  Next