Steve looked up and saw that he was about to come out of the alley back onto the street. Wilber was off his bike, pointed his gun one way down the street and then the other, and then mounted his bike again.
“Come on, we’re clear, for now.”
They raced to the highway.
12.
The Great Escape
All the men were passed out from a full day of murder, rape, theft, booze, and drugs. Max too was exhausted, not from consumption of these evils, but from bearing witness to them every day, and doing almost nothing to stop them. When he could, he would carefully intervene to save one person at a time, never too much to cause the ire of El Gordo’s men. However, today’s activities had been too much: he couldn’t acquiesce any longer. All day long he repeated the same thing in his mind: time to get living or time to get dying.
All these days, he had acted beaten down and compliant to their demands; after a while, it was no longer an act. Worse, witnessing so much depravity infected his soul, like a virus that was consuming every bit of goodness that remained in him. If he stayed even a day longer, he feared he would pass the point of no return, literally becoming one of them. It had to be tonight.
“Time to get living or time to get dying,” he said as he grabbed his bag and left his room.
At this point, due to his submissiveness, he was largely ignored by the men. After grabbing his keys he walked silently to his Jeep. He had already fastened extra gas cans to the back, behind the spare tire. That would be enough gas to get back to Rocky Point. He added a few days’ worth of food, a five-gallon bottle of water, and an extra AK-47 with lots of ammo. Each had a folding stock and was loaded with one full magazine that had another taped to it in reverse, for easy loading during a firefight. Everything was tightly stowed in the back in anticipation of a hasty, bumpy getaway.
Satisfied with his cache of supplies and silent efficiency, he focused on setting up his diversion. After permanently disabling the other two vehicles, he wanted to ensure his exit wasn’t noticed. His goal was to put as much mileage between himself and El Gordo’s men as possible, as quickly as possible, and not get shot in the process. Engaging them in any sort of firefight would be suicide because of their sheer numbers. Yet, he also wanted to hurt them all for the evil they had inflicted on others.
This evening’s auroral lights were brighter, making it more difficult for him to remain covert. He had to hurry or risk being seen. Gas can in hand; he sneaked up to a shed on the far side of El Gordo’s developed property. The auroras turned the large shed into the head of a green giant with a bad complexion; an earthen roof was its hair, the two windows on each side were its ears, and the locked door its nose. The giant appeared asleep.
He stopped beside the giant’s right ear, looking and listening for anyone who may have seen him and might now be wondering why he was slinking around in the green darkness. Loneliness was his friend. The shed was one of many sprinkled around El Gordo’s vast grounds to hold various tools, supplies, guns, drugs, or simply as shelter from the endless sun. He wasn’t sure of this shed’s purpose, but he knew about the pile of flammable materials on the far side. It was a conglomeration of wood and other building supplies, all haphazardly tossed there, castoffs of endless projects. It was perfect, not only for its incendiary nature, but because the distance from all the occupied buildings and El Gordo’s house meant it would take them longer to investigate. All eyes would be trained in that direction while he left in the other. He sprinkled a little petrol from the one-gallon can onto some of the wood in the pile and parked the open can, still nearly full, underneath. The air around him was heavy with the gasoline’s acrid vapors. Striking a match, he tossed it into the pile and ran to his Jeep. The fire spread quickly.
Jose was fast asleep, dreaming of the woman they had played with on the last run today. She was pretty and plump, but all he wanted was sex. His compañeros had had much more in mind. Her blood and her screams still rattled around in his head, like a bad movie. He tried to push these visions away and hide them in the deep recesses of his mind, sure the evil things he had done would earn him a place in hell.
Then, he was suddenly awake, the sweat-soaked hairs on the back of his neck abruptly alerted. He sat up without a sound and listened for what had woken him, kneading his aching neck. The case of dynamite had been a piss-poor pillow. He was surprised he had slept at all, since this place always scared him; it held much of El Gordo’s excess ammo and explosives, all kept at a distance from El Gordo’s home and the other buildings, just in case they blew: it was that just in case that scared him.
Crack followed by flomp-flomp-flomp-flomp-flomp told him someone was just outside the windows. Jose climbed onto several other cases of dynamite to gain height and saw a man running away. Though he could only see the man’s back, he knew instantly it was Señor Max.
Crack-crack followed by a whoosh from the other window filled Jose with fear. Then, the smell of—fire! He beat a panicked path to the other window, on the other side of the shed, and saw his worst nightmare. He heard a full-throated roar of air as the pile of wood and debris ignited and angry flames viciously gobbled up every molecule of oxygen. The mouth of the fire intended to snack on Jose, its tongue working its way to the window where he stood. The glass shattered and a solid wall of heat like hot bricks knocked him over, then hungrily gnawed at him and the shed’s supply of explosives.
Max was halfway to his Jeep when he heard the gas igniting. He’d hoped that he’d reach the Jeep before the explosion, and that it would’ve been quite a bit louder. At this point, he wasn’t sure it would provide enough diversion for him to get into the Jeep and take off, let alone get away unnoticed. Now he was alarmed that someone would see him even before he had a chance to get into the Jeep, much less drive away unnoticed. He ran faster, unslinging his AK while he ran, just in case he needed it.
Dazed from the blast, Jose could feel fire biting into his skin all over his body. He swatted at the few flames dancing on his chest and hair. It felt like he had been covered by a warm winter blanket. Yet, he was still alive. He jumped up and stumbled a little, his right leg not working right. One look confirmed it was broken, a good chunk of his tibia protruding from his skin halfway between knee and ankle. He hobbled to the door and tried to open it, but it was locked. Next he tried the window he had seen Señor Max running from, but it too was stuck. If he didn’t do something, this place would be his coffin. The other was a wall of flames. Jose reached for the nearest crate, intending to toss it at the stuck window. It was open, full of dynamite sticks. A rolled up coil of fuse lay on top; it was alive and hissing at him like a long, thin snake. He stared, mesmerized by its red-blue slithering movement around, and around, and around, until it disappeared in a blinding, deafening—and lethal—flash.
Max could see the Jeep’s outline only a few more strides away. The sound hit him first. A thundering roar, as if from some gigantic pissed-off lion, crashed his eardrums. It was unlike anything he had heard, even in war. The lion’s breath, a wave of heat and debris, hit him next. It lifted him up, his legs momentarily running in the air, and pushed him toward his destination. He watched in awe as he flew several feet before coming back down to the ground, faltering as his feet struck mid-stride. He was about to turn and look when something hard hit his shoulder, knocking him to the ground, spinning him around to show him the bright ball of fire rising to the heavens.