“Forgot about the fucking body armour, Ben,” Bill gasped. While he was evidently in a great deal of pain, the bullets bruising his ribcage, Bill was nowhere near as dead as King would have like.
He pushed out from under the other man but Bill smashed his forehead down against his nose. He felt gristle crunch and searing agony as bone was crushed, an explosion of blood erupting out in violent bursts.
Bill raised his gun but arched backwards in sudden pain, forgetting his attack and reaching behind him in a desperate attempt to yank what King suddenly realised was a nail out of his back. Behind him, at the top of the stairs, Adjo stood, nail gun raised.
“Go!” he shouted. “Get your girlfriend!”
Unable to reach the nail, Bill instead twisted and let loose a volley of fire up the stairs. Adjo darted backwards, losing the nail gun which bounced and clattered down the steps.
King heeded the man’s advice but not before, ignoring the searing pain of his pummelled nose, he wrenched Bill’s radio from his ear and smashed it upon the ground. At least now he couldn’t call ahead to order Sid’s execution.
In response, Bill whirled again, aiming at him. King bolted, stupidly leaving his own pistol on the ground. He dashed after the fleeing couple and burst out upon the balcony above the hostel. The couple’s screams echoed through the cavernous space as King dived down the wooden stairs. Instants later, Bill tore out of the corridor, two pistols in hand now and fired indiscriminately in King’s direction. King saw an eruption of blood burst from the chest of one hippy-looking man as others dived out of the way, fleeing in a mad panic.
King tore through them, keeping low, his broad shoulders muscling through the crowd as they stampeded towards the exit. Feet and hands and bodies were everywhere. Another person went down in a cry of agony and then King was outside, the frigid air smacking him in the face, raw against his smashed nose. But Bill wasn’t far behind.
The coughs of the silenced pistol were deadly, propelling bullets after the fleeing archaeologist. He barrelled through the crowd as it began to disperse, and headed for the two bikes left on the pavement. Eruptions of dust as bullets slammed into the ground persuaded him otherwise and he turned, darting away from the bikes.
He needed a vehicle. Quick. He couldn’t spare a second to glance at his watch but he knew the minutes were ticking by. He had to reach Sid before the latest fifteen minute deadline was up.
His eyes fell upon one of the two enormous overland trucks parked on the hostel’s driveway.
“King!” Bill’s voice echoed in the air. “Give me the map!”
But King was already in motion. He literally hurled a hapless runaway traveller out of his path and dived towards the truck. The cab had been lowered and the driver/mechanic had been inside, revving the engine. He was only now clambering down the step to see what all the commotion was when he was suddenly wrestled to the ground by the big black man.
King’s tackle had saved his life, however, as a bullet slammed into the inside of the open door.
“What the hell?” the driver demanded with a New Zealand twang but King ignored him, bounced to his feet and leapt inside the cab.
“No!” Bill roared in desperation as he realised the archaeologist’s plan. He ran forward, both pistols raised and threw himself around the open door of the truck, just as King slammed the vehicle into gear.
Bill fired.
King froze. His time was up.
Nothing happened.
It took both men only an instant to realise that the mercenary’s guns were both out of ammo. But King reacted fractionally faster. Just as Bill was about to scramble into the cab to throttle him, he jerked down hard on the accelerator, the wheels spinning, rubber burning. Then he wrenched off the handbrake and the massive yellow truck lurched forward. Bill lost his balance, perched only on the step leading to the cab. He grabbed hold of the open door to steady himself just as he saw King’s plan.
At the last possible moment, the mercenary jumped from the cab just as the driver’s side slammed into the parked bikes, crunching metal. Sparks spat, igniting the crushed fuel tanks and an eruption of flame lifted the cab into the air.
King cried out as he felt the lorry buck beneath him and for a moment he thought it was going to roll but then it slammed back down. He accelerated through the flames, the explosion ripping the open door off its hinges and whipping inside. He felt his skin blister in the heat but the speed of the vehicle soon took him beyond the explosion.
With a small sense of triumph, King took back control of the overland truck and hurled her forwards, scattering the crowds of bewildered travellers and locals alike.
Bill rolled away from the explosion, shielding his head with his hands. The moment it died down he was on his feet, face twisted into an angry grimace.
King had the map. He couldn’t be allowed to get away with it.
He still held one of the two pistols in his hand, having lost the other during his escape from the explosion. It may have been empty but no one around him knew that. He spun, levelling his weapon at the crowd who had stood motionless, stunned by the destruction. Now, with the crazed gunman back in business, they resumed anew their crazy antics.
He ran across the drive to the second truck, flung open the cab door and clambered inside. The driver of this vehicle, painted blue and white, had fled, leaving the keys in the ignition. He turned them, pumped the gas, slammed it into drive and shot off the mark, spinning the wheel quickly to pull onto the main road after King.
“Damn!” King cursed as he caught sight of the blue and white truck in his passenger side wing mirror, the driver’s having vanished along with the door. The cool Patagonian air whipped inside, ruffling his clothing and the loose crisp packets and sandwich boxes that were strewn in the passenger foot well.
He crunched up through the gears but it quickly became apparent that the lumbering lorry was no racing car. It was slow to respond and, even with his foot to the floor, the pace seemed plodding.
Bill was only a hundred yards behind him but King knew that once he reached the T-junction at the end of the high street he’d have to slow considerably to make the ninety degree turn—
“Unless,” he muttered out loud. The turn was fast approaching, the opposite side of the road blocked by a row of wooden summer-house-like structures. The one directly ahead had a large menu board outside, professing to offer Argentina’s best steak but its lights were out, the building in darkness.
The junction was getting closer. He glanced in the wing mirror. Bill seemed to be advancing. King didn’t slow.
“Hell, I knew I shouldn’t have hung around with Nate,” he grumbled, then, believing Raine would do the exact same thing, he pressed hard on the truck’s horn — a warning to anyone inside the restaurant to get out. As he’d suspected, no one did.
Instead of slowing to make the turn, King ground the accelerator into the floorboard and hurled the truck straight forward.
“Got you,” Bill hissed in triumph as he realised the trap King had led himself into. The T-junction would be impossible for a vehicle of that size to navigate in anything more than first gear. And the moment he slowed, Bill intended to ram into the back of the truck and—
“No way,” he gasped as he saw the yellow truck accelerate towards the row of houses. He wouldn’t have thought the archaeologist would have it in him and expected him to chicken out at any moment. But King proved his determination as he threw the overland vehicle straight into the wooden building at a terrific speed. The truck barrelled through, hurling smashed beams of wood and giant splinters high into the air. They whistled all around Bill’s own truck as he raced on through the wreckage after him.