Appendix: Interpersonal Dynamics
Once again, it seemed, I found myself in the middle of somebody else's fight. This is more or less the story of my life.
Well, perhaps not so much this time. I had every reason to believe that Gordon or Gordon's group were behind the abduction of Miss DelToro. Besides that, if I hadn't shot those two thugs, the police wouldn't have gotten involved, and Jill probably wouldn't have been found by the government.
So it was kind of my fault, and that's why I didn't mind helping Lorenzo get her back. It wasn't really through any desire to repay him for saving my life. There had been a lot of times when I'd wished that I'd died with Sarah.
A few hours later, Lorenzo's "associates" arrived. His associates consisted of exactly one skinny Goth kid dressed all in black, carrying a laptop computer. He had a big hockey bag slung over his shoulder.
The kid was a trip. Black fatigue pants, combat boots, black Rob Zombie t-shirt. Black trench coat, and his hair was highlighted. He had piercings in his nose, ears, and eyebrows, and had a number of tattoos on top of it.
He looked suprised when he noticed me sitting against the far wall. I had my Colt disassembled on the table in front of me and was cleaning it.
"Who the **** are you?" he asked.
"Who the **** are you?" I retorted.
"Wait...it's you! You're that guy!"
Raising my eyebrows, I looked over at Lorenzo. "I get this a lot," I said.
"What are you doing here?" the kid asked me.
"I'm going to help you get your little girlfriend back so I can get on with my life," I said, going back to my cleaning.
"Yeah," Lorenzo said, "Reaper, this is..."
"I know who he is," the kid interrupted. "Is he for real?"
"Yeah, he's for real," Lorenzo replied. "Let's get started. How are we gonna do this?"
"I'm still on board with the 'go in and kill everybody' plan," I said.
"Yeah, but we need to find Jill first...****. We need more information. I called somebody earlier who might know. He's working on it now."
"We need to get going," I said. "Look, we don't have a lot of time left. We don't know what we don't know, alright? We'll just have to go in and play it by ear."
"Not really my style," Lorenzo said.
"Mine either," I confessed. "But nobody ever tells me what the **** is going on, so I just roll with it. You guys got weapons?"
"**** yeah we got weapons," the kid, 'Reaper', said. He picked up the hockey bag and dumped it out onto my bed. Lorenzo rolled his eyes slightly as weapons, magazines, radios, body armor, and night vision equipment came clattering out of the bag, landing in a heap on the mattress.
So this was the crack team that had managed to track down Dead 6 and infiltrate our compound, I thought ruefully.
Reaper handed a carbine to Lorenzo, who proceeded to check it. Some kind of short, select-fire AR-15, with a ten inch barrel and a suppressor. It had an EoTech holographic sight mounted on top, and had quad rail handguard. A Surefire vertical foregrip weapon light was mounted on the bottom rail, and an IR/visible laser pointer was mounted on the top. The carbine had folding backup sights and some kind of swoopy collapsing stock, too.
Reaper pulled from the bag a Glock 17. He inserted a magazine, chambered a round, then stuck the pistol in a shoulder holster under his trench coat. On his belt he had six more extended nineteen round magazines. He then picked up what I assumed was his primary weapon.
I didn't recognize it at first. Lorenzo grinned when he saw me puzzling over it. It was short, stubby, and had a big magazine.
"It's a customized Saiga twelve guage shotgun. You know Saigas?"
"Yeah, Russian autoloaders, magzine fed."
"Yeah. This one's got a folding stock and an eight inch barrel. It's mounted with a Russian Kobra sight. Some guys we know up in Utah sell them."
"Cool," I said. I had to admit, I kind of liked it. I wondered how well Reaper could use it, though. He looked like an extra from The Matrix.
I watched the two of them get suited up. I could tell they'd been working together since...well, probably since that kid graduated from high school, which couldn't have been all that long ago.
Still, for old friends, they didn't talk much. It might've been because of my presence, but then, professional thieves probably have some weird interpersonal dynamics going on.
Like I've got any room to talk, right?
Anyway, Reaper handed me a radio headset, so the three of us would be able to communicate. Meanwhile, Lorenzo examined a pair of night vision goggles that he'd pulled from the gear pile on the bed. Myself, I'd already had my Colt put back together. I put on my body armor, and a chest harness over that that held three magazines for my rifle. I had a pistol belt with a drop holster on my left thigh, and a triple pistol magazine pouch on my right hip. The kid snickered when I took off my glasses and replaced them with my prescription Wiley-X goggles. Well, **** him anyway. Losing your glasses in the middle of a gunfight is bad.
That done, Lorenzo made a phone call. Someone named Bob, apparently a friend of his. He asked him if he had found the information; apparently this guy had the scoop. Hanging up the phone, he looked at me.
"What's the word?" I asked, fiddling with my thigh holster like a woman adjusting a stocking.
"Our next stop is a closed rest stop a few miles past the California line. From there we go on a dirt road and follow it south for about ten miles. Out there is an abandoned prison work camp. That's where they're holding her."
"You're sure of this? Can your friend be trusted?"
"I'm sure. He's... like a brother to me."
A couple hours later, as the sun was setting, we were headed back west down Interstate 15. I was driving the Taurus, following Lorenzo in his Explorer and Reaper in the Honda Civic rental car he was driving.
It wasn't a long drive. Within an hour, we were getting off the Interstate. The rest stop was closed, but you could still pull off into the parking lot. Sitting in the parking lot was a nondescript black Suburban. I watched Lorenzo and Reaper get out of their cars, and could tell they were suprised.
Anxious, I got out myself, my hand hovering over my pistol. All three of us had on body armor and other battle rattle. I hoped like hell it wasn't a cop.
From out of the Suburban stepped a big guy, tall, barrel chested, and muscular. He and Lorenzo were exchanging words as I approached. I could tell they knew each other. I wondered if it was the guy Lorenzo had been talking to on the phone? Why would he be here?
That's when I noticed the government plate on the Suburban.
"Well **** me," I said to myself. My stomach lurched at the realization. I'd been set up. I'd been ****ing set up! Lorenzo, the kid, the girl...it was all some ridiculously overcomplicated scheme to turn me over to the Feds! Worse, it had worked! There was undoubtedly an FBI SWAT team hiding in the rest stop, waiting for the signal.
My mind racing, I tried to figure a way out. It was then that Lorenzo noticed me looking at him, at the Suburban, and at his friend. He probably also noticed my hand reaching for my .45.
"No! It's cool! It's cool!" He said excitedly. "This is my brother, Bob. He's..."
"You set me up, you son of a bitch," I said quietly, hand moving away from my gun. There was no point. I'd walked right into it, and they had me.
"It's not like that," Lorenzo insisted. "He's my brother. He wasn't supposed to be here. He's supposed to be getting his family to safety!" Lorenzo glared at the other man.
"So," I said, "you called a Fed. Your brother the Fed. You ****ing *******! Why don't you call the ATF and the Secret ****ing Service while you're at it! Hell, we can get the DEA and the Coast Guard in on it too, and have a giant ****ing Federal law enforcement jamboree! God damn it!" I was fuming mad.
"Look Kid," the big man said, "I don't know who you are and I don't care. I'm here to help my brother get his girlfriend back."
"She's not my girlfriend!" Lorenzo sputtered. The big man grinned. I relaxed slightly. They were certainly acting like brothers. They didn't look anything alike, though.
"This is my brother Bob," Lorenzo said. "Bob, this is..."
"Don't you DARE tell him my ****ing name!" I yelled, wheeling around.
Lorenzo laughed. "I'm just ****ing with you kid, relax." I muttered something to myself. It was going to be a long night...
I'm not one of those sensitive artist types. On anything I write I'm open to criticism. Just keep in mind that NC and I are banging this out as we go, and there wasn't any real planning involved. 