Car Chase (2)
BANG! BANG!
I felt the sharp kick of the recoil through my hands.
The Glock’s distinctive, blunt cracks echoed through the night, stripped of its suppressor and all the quieter mercy that came with one.
The moving car ruined my aim. My first shot buried itself somewhere in their vehicle, and the second round sailed clean past empty air.
Fffft!
Almost at the same time, their return fire came ripping back.
Something slammed into the car door with a hard, ugly thunk that went straight through my ear.
Damn it.
Every time the speeding car skidded around a corner, my body lurched with it and the muzzle shook in my grip.
I didn’t have even a second to line up a proper shot. The only reason I could stay in control at all was because I was holding myself together with inner energy; beneath me, Kuchera was barely keeping his own body from falling apart.
BANG!
I fired a few more times, but all I managed to do was punch more holes into their car. No meaningful damage.
They weren’t doing much better either. Their bullets kept tearing into the back and side of our vehicle, but they still hadn’t landed a decisive hit.
Then it happened. The rear passenger window on their car rolled down, and a new man appeared.
RATATATATAT!
The sound was entirely different from before.
Not a pistol. A submachine gun. Sharp, rapid, merciless fire filled the night.
A chill ran down my spine, and I dropped my head fast.
What the hell is wrong with these lunatics?
Even for a quiet highway in the middle of the night, a submachine gun was crossing a line and then some.
These bastards were even more unhinged than I’d thought.
RATATATAT! RAT!
Bullets hammered the body of the car in a deafening streak.
At the same time, the rear windshield exploded, and glass rained into the cabin. I could feel shards pattering across my hair and back.
"What the fuck!"
From the front seat, MacKinnon hunched lower over the wheel and cursed.
Crash!
Just barely, the passenger-side headrest was shredded, bits of foam bursting into the air.
If I hadn’t ducked, that would have been the exact spot where my head had been.
"Mmph! Mmph-mmph!"
Kuchera, sprawled on the floor, let out something that was halfway between a scream and a gagging noise.
I could feel his whole body shaking like mad under the hood. He had his face buried and was curling in on himself as hard as he could.
"Shut up!"
MacKinnon shouted and wrenched the wheel. He was trying to open distance between us and them.
The car lurched hard to the side, and my shoulder slammed into the door.
Thud!
For a moment, the gap widened between the vehicles, and their fire thinned out.
I lifted my head and checked the road ahead. Just then, another set of headlights flashed into view from the right-hand on-ramp.
It was accelerating like a madman, merging in and trying to close the distance on us from the front.
"MacKinnon! There’s another one ahead!"
"Fuck, I see it!"
MacKinnon spat the words out through clenched teeth, still gripping the wheel.
"I’ll handle that bastard. You deal with the one beside us. At this rate, we’re going to get turned into Swiss cheese!"
At that, I let out a long breath.
I pushed my inner energy to its limit, locked my legs against the seat, and forced myself upright.
The moment my pistol came up on them, my senses sharpened to a razor’s edge, and for a split second time seemed to slow.
Now!
The distance between our car and theirs was about two meters.
I aimed for the driver’s side of the vehicle that had fallen slightly behind us.
BANG! BANG! BANG!
I fired three times in a row.
I could feel two of those rounds punch through the driver’s-side glass and land exactly where I wanted them.
SCREEECH!
Their car suddenly jerked sideways.
Sparks flashed in the dark as it scraped the guardrail, then the whole thing shot off the road.
BOOM!
I checked the rearview mirror just in time to see the headlights tilt and vanish into the darkness.
"Hang on tight!"
MacKinnon shouted that much and stomped the accelerator.
Then he slammed the right rear of the car ahead of us, the one that had been slowing to block our path.
CRASH!
The impact threw my body forward.
Pain shot up my shoulder where it hit the passenger seat.
Ghk...
The car that had taken the hit from behind lost its balance on the frozen road and began to wobble wildly.
Its headlights spun crazily, then the whole vehicle skidded off the pavement and into the brush.
SKRREEEECH!
Our own car lurched violently as well. I heard something rip loose from the front end.
MacKinnon clamped down on the wheel with his teeth bared and barely managed to wrestle the car back under control.
······
For a moment, everything went quiet.
I looked around. No more headlights were chasing us.
Clack.
First things first, I pulled the magazine from my pistol.
Then I swapped in a fresh one and let out a short breath.
Something felt off.
I’d started hearing a nasty sound from the engine bay, like water coming to a boil. Worse, the body of the car felt like it was leaning to one side. Had one of the tires taken a hit?
"Fuck."
MacKinnon, checking the dashboard, muttered under his breath.
"Feels like every warning light in the damn car has turned on. See? Movies and reality are two very different things."
He said it like a joke, but his grip on the steering wheel had tightened hard.
Our speed was dropping fast, and there was no mistaking it.
Yeah. This was a truly miserable situation.
***
Anyone could tell the car was in terrible shape.
The front windshield was webbed with cracks, and the rear and side windows were all gone completely, shattered beyond repair.
Thanks to that, the cold air was pouring straight into the cabin, numbing my face.
"Ha. What a mess."
There were bullet holes everywhere inside the car, and a faint burning smell was rising from the hood.
The only good news was that the car, while slowing down, still hadn’t stopped.
"I’ve already passed the situation along to HQ. They say a pickup team is waiting on the German side. Once we get there, we’re done."
MacKinnon finished his report over the satellite phone and said that much.
Then he tapped the wheel with his knuckles and added,
"Though before that, we’re going to have to get ourselves another damn car. This one’s likely to conk out any minute."
At those words, Kuchera, who had been crouched low beside us, started thrashing.
He was moving his face under the hood as if he wanted to say something.
"Mmph! Mmph!"
I had no choice but to pull off the hood and remove the towel gagging his mouth.
The words burst out of him at once.
"You fucking Russians! You didn’t come to save me, you came to kill me!"
Kuchera was screaming himself hoarse.
MacKinnon heard him and, looking at him through the rearview mirror, sneered.
"Oh, so you just figured that out now? You’re quicker than I gave you credit for."
"You bastards, do I look like I’m going to roll over and die?"
He spat out the words and ground his teeth.
Then, glancing around, he caught sight of a sign passing by outside the window.
"Hey, you said you needed a car, right? There’s a place I know nearby. A transport company on the outskirts of a small town. You should be able to borrow one there."
At that, MacKinnon looked at him again.
Then he asked flatly, with a cynical edge to his voice,
"You expect us to believe you?"
Kuchera cursed again.
"Fuck, I don’t want to die either! I’ll tell you everything I know, so just get me somewhere safe. You guys are clearly Americans, aren’t you? I’ve got enough sense to figure that much out!"
MacKinnon met Kuchera’s eyes in the mirror.
The man didn’t look away.
"What’s the chance that garage is known to the Russians?"
"None. It’s just a normal commercial client, and they only handle legal goods. It’s safe."
I glanced at MacKinnon.
Honestly, Kuchera’s words didn’t sound especially trustworthy.
This was a man whose people had assembled a mercenary team to track him down in less than a day after he disappeared.
It was entirely possible they’d anticipated the route we’d take and already planted mercenaries along it.
“...Fine.”
After a brief look ahead, MacKinnon nodded.
"What if there are enemies there too?"
At my question, he drummed his fingers on the wheel and answered,
"They don’t have enough people to cover every possible place. In the end, it’s a numbers game. Better than the car dying in the middle of the road, isn’t it? This is as close to a hundred percent as we’re going to get."
He wasn’t wrong.
I nodded, and MacKinnon lit a cigarette before adding,
"And anyway, how unlucky could we possibly be?"
As always, MacKinnon was planting the flag for disaster.
Was he doing this on purpose? I looked at him with an incredulous stare.
As if on cue, he avoided my eyes again.
***
With a rattling groan, the car finally rolled to a stop on the outskirts of the small town.
The engine gave one last violent shudder, then died completely.
MacKinnon pulled over into an alley that wasn’t easy to spot from the road.
“Hoo...”
He let out a long breath and opened the door.
Stepping outside, the cold air stabbed straight into the back of my neck.
The cabin had been cold enough with the rear window gone, but outside was on another level entirely.
MacKinnon got out too and quickly scanned the area.
I dragged Kuchera out of the car, cut the cable ties, and retied his hands in front of him.
He was wearing nothing but socks, and his feet slipped and stumbled on the frozen ground.
"Damn it..."
The small provincial town was utterly silent this far into the night, already well past four in the morning.
Only a few streetlights were on, and there wasn’t a soul in sight along the road.
The sound of footsteps in the snow rang out especially clearly.
Our breath steamed white in the air.
With my pistol hidden inside my coat, I walked with the muzzle pressed into Kuchera’s side.
From a distance, it would just look like the three of us were walking together.
Kuchera trembled and pointed the way.
"A little farther from here. About fifteen minutes."
But once we started walking, he was too slow.
He was exhausted from the interrogation, and he was doing it all in socks on frozen ground.
Every time he took a step, his wet socks stuck to the ice with a nasty little sound.
"Walk faster."
"I’m moving as fast as I can. I can’t feel my feet anymore."
I supported Kuchera as best I could, while MacKinnon walked ahead and kept an eye on the surroundings.
Every time we turned a corner, he checked it first and then signaled for us to follow.
Shuttered shops, cars parked along both sides of the street... in the distance, the clock on a church bell tower came into faint view, and the hands were already creeping past four.
Too quiet.
As we moved through the dark buildings, I kept checking for any signs of movement.
That was how we walked for quite a while, until the old buildings Kuchera had mentioned finally came into view.
Then I felt it: a car following us slowly from far behind.
I glanced back and saw its headlights were off.
"...MacKinnon."
I called to him in a low voice.
"There’s a car behind us. Been following since a while ago, lights off."
MacKinnon turned his head slightly to check, then faced forward again.
He didn’t stop walking, but his expression hardened.
A car tailing us in the middle of the night with no headlights on.
Had they found the car we’d abandoned?
Or had they been waiting here for us all along?
Either way, it was far too convenient.
At this point, I was starting to wonder if MacKinnon’s mouth was some kind of cursed object.
A mouth that dragged bad luck along with it every time it opened.
"That’s a car. We’re not escaping now."
After a brief thought, MacKinnon spoke.
"We’d be better off going inside a building and dealing with them there."
I nodded too.
We had no idea how many were following us or how heavily they were armed.
A narrow building with cover was far better than an open street.
"Damn it."
Even Kuchera had figured it out, and his pace slowed further.
I could hear his teeth chattering.
I asked him quietly,
"Where’s that garage you mentioned?"
Kuchera answered in a trembling voice.
"Two blocks from here."
MacKinnon and I met eyes. He gave a small jerk of his chin.
I grabbed Kuchera by the arm and said briefly,
"Then run."
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