“Stop laughing!” he blurted.
Killherkillherkillherkillherkillherkillherkillherkillherkillherkillherkillher.
Now he was fully choking her. She’d destroyed his crew, one by one, and now she was taunting him. He’d killed plenty of times before, so this was no different, but still it felt like he was losing a part of himself. The bitch had gotten the best of him, something that was traumatic in its own special way. If Dan was still alive, he would have used his favorite phrase, echoing inside of Marcus’ head like the little imp was still alive: she got yer goat, didn’t she Marcus? Got yer goat real good.
As he tightened his knuckles up around the snickering bitch’s throat, Marcus thought of the first time he killed an animal, choking the family Labrador until it sunk its baby teeth into his palm. The mutt resisted, delivering the best fight it could manage, but gave in rather quickly. Humans had a much larger fight in them Marcus found, but this tart didn’t have an iota of that. She seemed to be enjoying her death. Or enjoying something.
He loosened his hands. The grin would not leave her face.
“Gotcha,” she said, gasping for breath, still clutching her ears. “I gotcha. You don’t even know it, but I gotcha.”
“What do you—”
And then an eerie wooziness, and then a sticky red, plopping in the snow, and then the darkness.
Chapter Five
He hadn’t realized that he was already dead by the time he’d reached her. A dead man walking, but consumed by viciousness.
She had taken another shot. She wasn’t sure how, but she’d taken another shot, and it was a perfect hit. For all she could remember between the shock of her ears ringing (ringing, hell, they were screeching) and the moment she struck the ground, she might have dropped the gun and pulled the trigger by accident. Or maybe it was blind luck. Or maybe it was a higher power. It was a stray shot, either way, and it had plugged him right in the chest.
Bang.
Baldy was dead.
It was the cold that had puzzled him so. It was so damn frigid that he hadn’t a clue that there was a bullet lodged in his chest, his body numb and in shock. Psychos like The Shiny Bald One were so out of touch with the real world that they couldn’t grasp simple concepts like “I’m hot” or “I’m cold” or “I’ve got a bullet in my chest.” So filled with rage was he that he couldn’t see anything but Annie’s face, smirking at him from the distance, goading him to finish her off.
His body slumped to the ground as a pulse of blood flowered inside of his jacket, dripping down his front side into the pristine, but well trampled on, snow.
“Good night, asshole,” she whispered, wishing her ears would stop ringing soon.
Annie stepped past The Shiny Bald One’s body. Part of her wanted to spit on his corpse for all he had done, but she retained her civility long enough to get past him, to leave him behind to rot, as he damn well deserved.
A wave of philosophical puttering drifted through her head. What made a person turn to such vulgar actions? What made a person so innately horrible? Were they born that way or did the environment (be it snow, or bad parenting, or economics) trigger it? It was an age-old question and one that Annie hadn’t the heart to consider any deeper. Regardless of how Shiny started out, she knew one thing for certain…
He was dead.
She was free.
Not just escaped, but free. Free of all the lunatics who sought to do her harm.
“I survived,” she whispered to nobody in particular, realizing that she was probably approaching the corner of Crazy and Cuckoo, slowly but surely. “I survived,” she said again, putting one foot in front of the other as she guided herself towards The Yeti and Shiny’s snowmobiles. She could only hope that there was enough gas to stretch the last mile or so to her house.
She thought: I beat those fuckers. This is the part where the cops show up and put one of those warm blankets around me. This is the part where they put me in a helicopter and fly me to safety. This is the part where the credits roll.
Annie couldn’t help the smile that kept surfacing on her face. She couldn’t be sure that Paulie and Christian were okay, but she was almost certain that they were. She’d defeated the evil-doers, and so the reward awaited her.
A gust of wind picked up, driving her backwards with a chilly blast of snow. Just enough to remind her optimism that she wasn’t quite through the ordeal yet. Still one more mile to go and anything could happen in that mile.
She looked to the milky sky, praying for that cinematic helicopter to take her this last stretch.
No luck. The usually helpful cops were in their houses, abandoning the duty to protect and serve. The police department in her town probably had one or two snowmobiles and they were most likely being put to use with selfish purposes. The world’s rescuers had all run away, tucking their tails between their legs and thinking only about number one. They couldn’t be blamed though—this storm spelled out the end of the world, after all. And if the world was ending, then why bother with hired duties or careers? Annie would have done the same thing.
As if on cue, the snow got heavier once again, blasting through the trees as if it was being created by a huge machine. Though the temperatures had warmed a few degrees, the storm itself kept battling.
It’s the damn aliens. They’ve got a huge freakin’ snow machine. They just want to go skiing, she thought. Annie accused extraterrestrials of the storm on more than one occasion. Tony had laughed at the notion, but there was something in his eyes that said he might have believed it, if given some time for it to settle in. There was no other explanation, even still, it was as good as any other.
When would it stop? She was sick of asking herself that.
Never, that’s when. Never. Annie knew that now. It would never stop. Not in her lifetime. Maybe in Paulie’s, but not in hers. She would die in the snow. They’d all die in the snow, every last human being.
The Yeti’s (or maybe it was Shiny’s, she could not recall) snowmobile started right up. It hummed better than the other one, so she took that as a good sign. Perhaps it was more fuel efficient than the first one. The key had a little chain hanging off it, and it said “OUTTA MY WAY, PUSSIES!” Fitting. Very fitting, thought Annie.
“Outta my way,” she said to herself, revving the motor and pushing herself through the steadily accumulating snow, looking in the direction of Main Street, and beyond that, her home, and towards her family.
Part V- HOMECOMING
When Paulie woke up, he found the boots. He put them on immediately, marching around the room in them. He couldn’t resist looking at himself in the mirror to see how much he looked like a cowboy. He was freezing his patootie (as his mother would have said) off, but the boots made him feel warm. Such a nice gift. Eggah was the best! And even better, he didn’t have to pay for them like he thought he’d have to. He could pass them on to his daddy for a gift, to make him more like a scallion. Just like Eggah. He couldn’t wait to see his father’s face. For Christmas, Paulie and his mother had picked out a bright red power saw for a gift, but his father didn’t seem too thrilled about it. He’d seemed mad about the gift, actually. Paulie wasn’t sure why. They were always fighting lately, even about gifts, which seemed just plain crazy.