Chapter 1

He comes for everything
Even love’s gotta die
But make him take it on the wing
Baby let it fly.
Skull shine, skull shine...
Reaper Man (B. Lake) 2012

ZERO HOUR

“No sudden movements and don’t say a fuckin’ word! Gimme the keys and walk away. And don’t look back if you want to keep your face!”

Not the most polite introduction, but I guess carjackers don’t have the opportunity to read Miss Manners too often. Well ... if you think about it, they’re probably driving most of the time.

I’d never been jacked before, and despite the very explicit instructions that had been grunt-hissed at my back while something dug into it very pointedly, I really didn’t know what to do. Should I put my hands up? How did I then give them my car keys? I didn’t want to reach into my pocket for them, in case it sparked off some sort of reaction; maybe they’d think I was going for a weapon of some sort.

If I walked away without giving them the keys, it seemed I was dead. If I went into my pocket for them, it seemed I’d probably be dead. If I tried to explain my dilemma I’d probably be dead as well; the sheer venom in that voice stated loud and clear that its owner was just looking for an excuse.

All in all, it was a very weird situation in which to find myself. I had parked on the side of the road in an ocean of wheat fields, miles from any sign of human habitation, and had been just about to unzip to relieve the strain on my bladder, when the weapon was poked in my back. I mean, how ridiculous was that? When did carjackers start hanging about in fields on the ridiculously faint chance that some traveller might stop right there to take a piss?

The weirdest thing of all – the part I just couldn’t really come to grips with – was that I wasn’t panicked into just throwing a wobbly right there and then. My mind seemed to be clear, and as I was standing next to my car, it directed me to raise my hands and lean slightly to my right to take a glance in the wing mirror.

The part of the weapon I could see in the reflection looked to be camouflaged; shades of green and brown in various splotches. The barrel looked to be slightly bent and I couldn’t really see much of a hammer ... or slide ... or even a grip held in that small hand. What the hell type of gun was that? I didn’t know what to do with the information, until suddenly the whole thing came into focus in my mind.

I twisted suddenly, my right arm flying out backwards in a desperate attempt to throw them off balance for a second or two while I made a jinking run for the dubious safety of the wheat. I felt a pain in the back of my hand, heard the very distinct sound of teeth knocking together, and gathered my feet under me to run.

Unfortunately the jacker was quicker, grabbing me around the waist and then sliding down to clutch my thighs, then knees and finally my feet. What the fuck?

I leapt out of the encircling arms and desperately looked around as I started to run. Then I pulled to a halt. There was only one of them. And he was flat out and face down on the floor.

In the errant hand was ... a stick.

As a weapon, it had a few drawbacks. It had no trigger, no magazine, and no sights. It didn’t even sport a sharp edge. But its main drawback was that it was ... a stick! And not even a very big one, at that!

The attacker had a few drawbacks as well. These were obvious; such as the fact that they were unconscious, or passed out; and that it was actually a girl, or a really underdeveloped boy. No, the ratio of chest to waist to hips pointed to it being a small girl – a small, half-naked girl; dressed only in a man’s shirt, some plain, off-white panties covering a round little butt, and some sort of knitted grey hat, all of which were distinctly grubby. A panel of the cotton panties had pulled away from the waistband at one hip and left a hole. My ex had a pair like that, claiming that they were just too comfortable to throw out. These looked like they were all too ready to give up and throw themselves out, begging for the sweet relief of the rubbish heap.

I gazed down at the prone figure, the chest rising and falling to offer proof of life, while the faint whistling noise from the unseen face offered proof of a tendency to snore, and tried to work out just what the hell was going on. I realised my adrenaline levels were about ten feet higher than I was tall, and I was actually panting with fear. My heart was only then starting to wind down from Defcon 1 status.

I got angry.

Some midget female had tried to carjack me by threatening me with a twig, and I had very seriously considered giving in to that threat. How very fucking dare she‽ Okay, I was no Hulk or even a Thor, but I was pretty sure I didn’t look like some pushover, either. At five foot eleven and seven eighths, I was actually taller than some of the other Avengers ... Black Widow and Scarlet Witch were both shorter than me.

Yes, I do have my Nerdling badge, but that still didn’t explain why a grubby munchkin thought she could rob me at stick-point.

I pissed on the back wheel of my car while I thought about it. I disarmed her by snapping the twig in two. I nudged her none-too-gently with my foot until she grunted and raised her head. Her face was as grubby as the rest of her.

“Get up!”

“Fuck you, asshole!”

My mouth fell open in surprise. I couldn’t believe I was getting cheek from some kid – a kid who’d just failed to rob me, mind you.

“You kiss your mother with that mouth?” I growled

“No. But you can kiss my ass with yours!”

“I wouldn’t kiss your grubby arse with my worst enemy’s mouth!” I retorted.

“Only because your dick would probably be too deep in his mouth,” she came back, and I had to admit, she had some chops when it came to insults. “You faggots are all the same!”

“Well, when faced with you, I reckon being gay would probably be a better choice.”

“You better not touch me, or I’ll rip your dick off through your asshole.” Jeez, just the thought of that made my eyes water.

“Like I said, being gay would be a better choice.” I held my hand up to stop the flow of her vituperation. She cowered for a moment and then came back snarling.

“You tried to carjack me!” I accused before she could get back into full flow.

“So what?”

“So what? What do you mean, so what? You can’t just say so what! It doesn’t work like that. So what? So ... it’s not only illegal on so many levels, it’s fucking rude!” My mind wasn’t running particularly smoothly, what with it being inundated by fear, adrenaline, relief and anger all at the same time, and it was all I could come up with.

“Oh, grow a pair!”

I stared at her. She stared back. She probably won the staring contest as it seemed she had sheer hatred on her side, while I had to make do with plain old common or garden anger. For a moment I wondered if she had been coached by my ex-wife.

“Oh, now I get it. I’ve just realised, you’re an actual, real live goblin sent from hell to torment me.”

“Was it the teeth and claws that gave me away?” she sneered.

“Nope. It was more you being small, dirty and really fugly!”

To my surprise, she burst into tears, her shoulders shaking from her sobbing and her face back in the dirt.

And we were getting along so well. What a shame.

I did what men do so well in situations like this. I looked around at everything except her, while trying not to frown in guilty confusion and not kick at the dirt with the point of my shoe. I also resisted the urge to polish those same shoes on the back of my pants leg. I mean, I’m not even American and I still felt an urgent need to say ‘Aw shucks.’

I took a photo of her with my phone.

“I’m reporting this to the police,” I said.

Her head rose once again. “You hit me!”

“Yes.”

“You shouldn’t hit girls. That’s assault!”

“Not when they are trying to rob you with a deadly weapon, it isn’t.”

“It was a stick, you pussy!”

“You told me you’d blow my face off with it, you miniaturised uber-bitch.”

“Well, between the two of us, which of us has an actual injury, huh? Who do you think the cops are gonna believe? You, a big strong he-man type, or me – a small, frightened crying girl with a bruise on her face?”

“You think I’m a he-man type?” I was still considering her threat, so I think I was a bit nonplussed, and might have come across as a touch needy. She had a point about the credibility of the two claims.

“That’s what you took from that? Of course I don’t think that! You think I need a psychiatrist to comprehend reality? He-man ... hah!”

“Actually, I think you need a shrink to keep you in a strait-jacket.”

“I am not crazy!” Spit actually flew from her mouth and I saw real rage in her eyes.

“Oh, well, that’s all right then. I just needed to hear you say it, and now that you have, well ... you’ve certainly convinced me!” I came back, unable to stop myself, despite starting to seriously worry once more. She really was looking a bit crazy. “I mean, almost all sane people try to shoot people with a stick ... when they’re five fucking years old!”

I shouted that last part, tapping my temple meaningfully. I knew she was just a kid with a foul mouth and I - in my adrenaline rush - had responded very inappropriately, but she’d not only made me think I was going to die, her constant insults were getting to me. She just wouldn’t shut up and let me think. If she would only shut the fuck up! I should make her shut up!

Oh hell, now I sounded loony, as well – even to my own mind. That was exactly what all the crazies said just before they hauled out the butcher’s knife and went all Janet-Leigh-in-the-shower on everyone. I seriously considered for a moment that her lunacy might be infectious.

“Don’t call me crazy!” she reiterated, her scream so loud it broke halfway through, as if something had snapped in her throat. She rose to her feet, panting hard.

“Then don’t act like it!” I shouted back. “And at the same time, stop acting like a fucking toddler! You’re what ... eleven, twelve maybe? A foul mouth doesn’t make you a grown up. Act your age, not your fucking shoe size! Even if you are a psychotic, insane goblin.”

I couldn’t resist throwing that last part in – it seemed to press her buttons, and despite me being the adult, right at that moment I was all for jamming on those buttons like they were the working parts of an orgasmatron.

“I’m twenty, you sizeist, misogynistic pig!” she yelled and darted straight at me. Sizeist! Misogynistic! Me? I marvelled that even dwarf chicks were using those pejoratives now. I didn’t believe for a moment that she was any older than fourteen. Maybe fifteen, tops.

Her claws were aimed at my face and I realised, perhaps for the first time since I’d laid her out, that she could truly be a threat. Despite the fear and the anger within me, I also realised that I had perversely enjoyed our exchange of insults and had thrown myself into it. It had been a chance to vent some of the poison that had built up in my system since...

Her shirt flapped open as she came at me and I realised, as well, that, by the small but significant bulges on her chest, I had indeed been mistaken about her being a child. As her fingers drove towards my eyes, I yelled in fear and grabbed for her wrists, catching them more by luck than judgement. We struggled for control of her hands for a moment, but she was too small and had little chance of getting them free to do me damage.

She tried to knee me in the balls, but I managed to twist and took it on the thigh. While her knee was raised and she was off-balance, I pushed and we both fell to the ground, me on top of her skinny body, holding her arms down alongside her head.

She wriggled and fought viciously, and then suddenly went so limp that I was taken by surprise, almost releasing her. But I wasn’t falling for that! Her lips moved as if she was inviting me to kiss her and I drew my head back sharply, repulsed. Then I understood that she was whispering something. I leaned down close enough to hear, while carefully remaining out of range of her teeth – I wasn’t going to trust this little troll for a moment.

“Please don’t. Please don’t do it to me anymore. I’ll be good.” It was so faint, it was almost inaudible. But it was there.

I felt the hairs on my forearms and the back of my neck all instantly stand to attention as if they were on parade, and I think I somehow managed to levitate to a standing position without actually moving.

Then it got worse as, with my weight gone, she simply drew herself up into a foetal position with her eyes firmly closed, put her thumb into her mouth and began to suck on it.

Christ! This was bad. Very bad.

I stared around, searching the huge horizons of the Mid-West for inspiration as to what to do. My first instinct was to get back in the car and get the fuck out of Dodge, before the Earps herded me into the OK Corral and gunned me down like a dog.

Just leave. Yes, that was the sensible thing to do. Of course it was! She was a carjacker, a criminal, and that was all I needed to know. Anything else was out of my jurisdiction. Just leave her there and drive away. She could hijack the next guy who needed to strangle the weasel within her hunting grounds.

And ... And fuck! I couldn’t do that. I have White Knight Syndrome. It’s real - you can look it up. I’m irresistibly drawn to women who are damaged.

Oh, it sounds great - riding to the rescue of fair maidens and reaping the rewards of fame, fortune and free fucking. Who wouldn’t want that?

Well, I don’t, for one. It causes me to make some really bad life choices. It makes me think I can fix things that can’t be fixed. It makes me want to try and help the helpless, mend the irretrievably broken, heal the mortally wounded. Hold that in your mind and look around you. See the wilfully stupid, the eternal addicts, and the perpetually obstinate who just won’t help themselves? And now watch yourself ride in and try anyway. Fun!

I’ve been told that it’s much more common than most people think, and that it could be a symptom of low self-esteem, hoping that someone with even lower self-esteem would love me. That it might be me trying to create a debt that would bind someone to me. That I am possibly trying to use rescue tactics to dominate a weaker person for my own ends. Or that I could just be a big-headed cunt showing off – although that’s my ex-wife’s diagnosis and she might be biased.

Admittedly, those are the dire characteristics of the syndrome. There are some kinder attributes as well, but they’re all bad in my opinion.

The thing is, of course, I’m not actually a knight! I don’t have the courage, the know-how or the derring-do to swoop in and actually fix anyone. All I have is the stubbornness to stick around and keep using my unerringly wrong self-belief and emotional need to keep trying, until even I can see that there’s no hope – usually just before the going-down-for-the-third-time bit. Try staying through the self-destruction, the insistence on self-medication, the never-ending mourning for a lost love, the complete and utter lack of any self-esteem, or the addiction that will be instantly cured ... starting tomorrow, I promise! All of those things grind people into fine dust, and, inevitably, those around them are pulverised as well.

Not such a wonderful thing to have, then.

A shrink had explained it all to me – the idea being that if I knew I had the problem, I could somehow avoid it. I would like to think it’s all bollocks, and that I just empathise with sad people ... well, sad women. But, unfortunately, there is a truth there. Somewhere within me is a trigger, and if someone pulls that trigger, then the gun goes off. It’s inevitable. Therefore, when faced with a possibly wounded bird, I use the shrink’s advice; I turn around and walk away before they can pull that trigger. With so many women damaged in some way or another, it makes life pretty lonely at times, but it’s better than the alternative.

And here it was again.

Expecting her to suddenly come to life and attack me again at any moment, I gingerly leaned down and gathered her up. Then I put her down again, thought some more and sighed deeply. I fetched a travel blanket from the car, wrapped her in it and picked her up again, sliding her onto the back seat. Sweating now, I fastened a seat belt around her with some difficulty, closed the door and climbed in behind the wheel to have a think.

What the hell was I going to do with her?

Okay, it wouldn’t be right to just leave her out in this enormous, rural farming wilderness where she could be attacked and devoured by a roaming band of voles, or something equally horrific - especially as she was dressed only in a disgustingly filthy woolly hat, a shirt and a pair of tatty knickers. I mean, a passing hedgehog might just get it into his mind to take advantage of her. It could happen! Well ... probably not. I had no idea whether there were hedgehogs and voles in the USA. They’re tiny, probably nasty, British predators – mostly of slugs and worms – and I don’t know what the American equivalents are. Probably politicians of some ilk.

In the rearview mirror, I caught sight of my face and the sardonic grin plastered on it, and relaxed my mouth. I didn’t need my weird sense of humour getting me into trouble. Not now.

I had to go somewhere, so I decided to just go forward. The hire car that I’d picked up at the airport in Kansas City had managed to go into a complete snit and sulk when I pressed a few buttons to see what it could do, so now the GPS system wasn’t working at all, and my phone wasn’t doing a great job of covering the load – or any load at all, in fact. I determinedly didn’t use it much, so it was probably my fault. That morning I’d been heading towards Wichita on something called the 77, and then discovered that somehow I’d apparently meandered off-route and was now on the 56 and had to get back on the 77. According to those numbers, I had apparently wandered across 21 national highways without noticing anything amiss. I think American roads might be numbered by the same people who train British council planners, as there was no apparent logic to them. Whatever the number, when I turned off the highway to seek enlightenment, I was instantly lost.

Being lost in the USA is very different to being lost in Britain. In my homeland, if you are lost you just find a reasonably-sized road and follow it to the next garage – five minutes, at most. If you got lost off the main highways in America, all signs and filling stations immediately seem to take shelter underground and can’t be found for love or money, and you can end up travelling a hundred miles before you find a living being to ask directions. And usually, that being will speak only Spanish.

I continued down the road, surrounded by enough wheat to drown the world in breadcrumbs. My thoughts drifted, imagining soft, white, puffy crumbs of bread drifting down from the sky. They would bounce off the bonnet – no, this was an American Ford, not a German-built one, so it would bounce off the hood and...

“Where are we going?”

I looked in the rearview mirror as a dirty face slowly hove into view as she sat up.

“I’m going to stop at the next police station. I won’t say anything...”

She sniggered. “The next police station. Right. And what ... you’re expecting there’ll be some guy in blue, with a dome head helmet, saying something like, ‘‘Ello, ‘ello, ‘ello! What’s goin’ on ‘ere then?’ Dream on!”

Her Cockney accent was abysmal and it sounded as if she’d been dropped on her head as a baby. Even Dick van Dyke did it better. Her stereotyping riled me.

“No, I’m expecting some fat guy in khakis and a 200 gallon hat, with an M1 strapped on each hip inspecting us to make sure we’re the right colour and saying something like ‘What y’all hidin’ there, boy?’”

“Ouch, that hurt,” she sneered, but I saw a grin flash across her face. “This is not the Deep South, you know.”

“How would I know that? I’m lost, the GPS isn’t working, and I haven’t seen another person in the last half hour apart from you. I can’t ask for directions, and for all I know, we’re about to cross the border into darkest Peru.”

“You talk funny. Even for a gay English guy, you talk funny.”

“No, I talk perfectly normally. You speak funny.” Any moment now, we were going to get into ‘your mother’ insults. I eyed her in the mirror. Her face was really dirty, but her eyes were very green – a dark green, almost emerald. Attractive really. “And I am not gay.”

There was a moment’s silence, then, “So how come you didn’t fuck me when you had the chance then?”

I was gobsmacked, unable even to string a sentence together. The words had been thrown out offhandedly, but listening was a big part of my job and I could hear echo after echo of tension, anguish and fear. I squeezed my eyes shut for a moment in despair at the ridiculous situation I’d got myself into. Then I remembered I was driving and opened them again.

I had two options here. I could tell her the truth; that she looked like she’d been slow-rolled across a heap of coal, smelled like a Gorgonzola-addicted badger and was on a par with a fifty year old heroin addict when it came to being sexually attractive; or I could be polite.

“I was a little tired,” I said. I can’t help it. I’m English. It’s what we do. In Britain, every girl would immediately know what I meant by that was that she was a minger and had more chance of falling pregnant by email than getting fucked by me. I guess we speak in some sort of code of politeness at home. It avoids violence. Underneath that imperturbable exterior, the British are, by and large, a violent race, and even our children – on learning that we as a people have been almost constantly at war with each other and the rest of the world for almost two thousand years – take on that fact with equanimity and an attitude of ‘Legend! Get stuck in there! Lemme at ‘em!’

It was her turn to look nonplussed. I ignored her, too busy trying to ignore the smell, which seemed to be permeating through the car like treacle – an inevitable flow that stuck to everything it touched.

I finally gave up, pulled off the road and turned off the engine. “You look as if you’ve had a long and very exciting day, running from ... whomever or whatever it is that you’re running from – possibly a bar of soap. I have water in the boot. Why don’t we rig up some sort of shower thing so you can at least feel clean again?”

“You think I’m running from something?” she demanded angrily. Her tone pressed a few of my buttons.

“Good Lord, no. I would never think that. No, I knew instantly that you’re obviously doing some kind of super-long marathon dressed as a bag lady in order to entertain the massed spectators watching you every step of the way – probably for some worthwhile charity like Save All Priests From Kids. And when you saw you’d fallen behind, you thought you’d just politely borrow a car to catch up again. Stupid of me really, not to immediately commend you on your efforts. I do beg your pardon!”

Hah! We’re polite, but we do sarcasm to Olympic standards.

“You’re mean,” she declared after a moment. I maintained a dignified silence.

There was a long pause while she considered my earlier offer. “You have water in your boots?”

I sighed. “The trunk. In the trunk.”

I got out and retrieved a plastic gallon jug of water that I had stowed there against breakdowns. I’d been warned when I picked up the rental that, where I was going, mobile phone coverage was patchy, at best, and the heat was ever-present. I opened her door and held up the jug invitingly.

“You’ll feel better.”

“Nuh-uh,” she grumbled into the blanket that she held around her like a shield. “You’ll drive off and leave me here.”

“I wouldn’t. It would be rude. Besides, I didn’t think you wanted to be in the car with me.”

“I wanted your car. You weren’t supposed to be part of the deal.”

I thought about that and took the keys from the ignition, pocketing them. I might have just put an idea into her head and didn’t want to find myself stranded.

“Come on,” I ordered. “Out!”

“Not a chance!”

I lost my temper. “Get out of the car and wash! You stink like a fox in heat, dressed in a heavy fur coat that was used to clean the decks of the ark – after all the animals disembarked! My nose is trying to crawl down the back of my shirt in defence. Now move!”

I grabbed the woolly hat off her head and threw it onto the ground at my feet, half expecting that the bugs I was sure had made their home in there would promptly lift it up over their heads and race off through the grass with it.

I wasn’t expecting the mass of golden-red hair that dropped from beneath it as I dragged it away. Okay, the hair was matted and dull, and probably as filthy as the rest of her, but the colour and volume of it was certainly unexpected, to say the least. I’d never seen hair that colour before. It was a melange of copper, bronze and gold. She had precious metals for hair. No wonder I was stunned.

“That’s my fucking hat!” she yelled, abandoning the blanket and clambering out to grab the filthy scrap. I quickly slammed the door closed behind her and pressed the button on the fob.

She heard the security beep from the car and turned to grab the handle, only to find it locked. Then she looked at me, tears collecting in her eyes.

“Please don’t leave me here,” she begged.

“Oh for Gods’ sakes,” I grumbled. “I won’t leave you here. I wouldn’t do that. But I’m not taking you a single centimetre further until you clean off a little – it doesn’t have to be a lot, just something a little more profound than a cat-lick with a wet wipe.”

“You’re just trying to get me naked!” she accused. She had a hair-trigger temper. Shit! Another one!

“Oh, be still my heart! The prospect of seeing a scarecrow with no clothes on has me all a-shiver, my lady. Us farmyard peasants just can’t control ourselves when faced with temptations like that! It’s just not fair on us, yer worship!” I frowned at her and offered her the jug once more. “Hold that. Don’t let your smell melt the plastic.”

I wasn’t sure whether she was more offended at my crack about her smell, or the scarecrow bit. I wasn’t a woman, so I had no idea of how the ranking of insults worked in the little black book of ‘things men do and say that really piss us off.’

I opened my suitcase, dragged out a pair of shorts and two tee-shirts and tossed them to her. She had been taking a long drink from the bottle, and had to juggle things a little to catch them while not spilling, but it did distract her from trying to kill me with venomous bolts of lightning from her eyes. At least that’s what I imagined she’d been attempting by the way her frown screwed up her face.

“Use one of the shirts to wash yourself clean. You can wear the other. And wear the shorts as well. Those knickers are not coming within twenty feet of this car from now on.”

“Do you have any shampoo?” she asked, as if we were in a hotel bathroom. I started laughing at the incongruity. What else could I do?

“You’ll have to wait until we get to a police station,” I smiled.

She gave me a snarky grin. “I don’t think that the Sheriff normally lets the public use the showers in the Station House.”

I let that one go. Hey this wasn’t Rome, so I didn’t have to do as the Romans do. Or say.

“You’ll have to wait then.”

There was a long, pregnant pause which seemed to get closer to term the longer it went on.

“So ... Turn around!” she said.

I thought about that for all of a split second. “Not a chance. The last time you were behind me you threatened to shoot me in the face. With a stick. A stick! Hah!”

I sniggered and she glared at me, and then flounced around to the other side of the car, dumping the jug and clothes on the boot. When she was as far out of my view as she could get, she peeled off the shirt and bent over, drawing off her panties.

I couldn’t help it.

“The driver of that car’s probably appreciating the view,” I mentioned, nodding my head towards the road.

She gave a little squeak and raced back around to my side of the car, crouching down and bobbing up every now and again to try to see which direction the mythical car was coming from.

Her figure was ... unexpected. She had small, round, slightly freckled breasts, so pale that I could see the minute blue veins beneath the skin. Her areolae were small and coral coloured, with bulls-eyes of petite, slightly darker nipples the hue of demerara sugar, which were as perky as the day is long. Her chest narrowed to a trim waist and then widened to hips that drew the eye around to the back where a bum as pert as her nipples was on display, bringing to mind the apple that Paris gave to Aphrodite, and which promptly kicked off the Trojan War. All things considered; a bit skinny and way too dirty for my tastes, but still superb.

I then caught a glimpse of that magical colour at the junction of her thighs and felt a shiver run through me.

Chapter 2 »