Plague

Chapter 12 Day 2 4:00 AM

Chapter 12
Day 2
4:00 AM

Jim drove slowly, at the lower limits of the speed limit. He didn’t want to get into an accident. He made it down to the San Fernando Valley when the car engine began to stutter and then stop. Jim allowed the car to coast to a stop in the darkness, on one of the center lanes on the 4 lane highway. When the SUV stopped, Jim cut off the lights and both men simultaneously opened their car doors and exited the car, slammed the doors, and walked to the edge of the highway. They began walking toward the next exit, a half mile away.
The two men, walking on the shoulder of the road, had progressed several hundred feet when an explosion was heard. Without stopping, Jim turned his head and saw that another car, traveling at highway speed, had rammed into the SUV which had been left dark and deserted in the middle of the road. The car which struck the SUV seemed to launch itself into the air, then twist and land on the ground, on its roof, sparks lighting the night as it slid across the road, striking the concrete median. Gasoline dripped out of the torn side of the vehicle and was ignited by a spark as the car bounced off of the median and back along the concrete roadway.
The second explosion lit the night. As the car burst into flames, a high pitched scream came from the vehicle. Jim watched for a moment, as the burning car slid toward where he and George were standing. When it was about fifty yards away it exploded. Pieces of metal and flesh rained down over the area. A piece of flaming rubber landed on George’s arm. He looked at it, watching the flame eat through his shirt. Then, without a second thought he brushed it off of his arm, not even looking at the red/black area of third degree burn on his arm.
The two men turned and continued to walk towards the highway exit. They reached it and continued walking, covering almost a mile before they were surrounded by a half-dozen large motorcycles with as many men and half as many women riding around them, in a circle, screaming obscenities and yelling out loud.
Jim and George stopped and looked at each other. George stepped forward and grabbed the front of a large Harley Davidson with one hand and yanked it up in the air, its two passengers spilling into the dirt beneath the back wheel of the hog. George got both of his hands on the motorcycle and threw it several hundred feet across the road.
The other riders stopped screaming obscenities and paused for several seconds. The men and women of the Devil’s Mouth biker gang had never seen anyone lift almost 1000 pounds of hog and throw it ten feet, never mind several hundred feet.
While the police liked the group, made up of Hispanic ex-cons, for robbery and murder, drug smuggling and an all-around bad attitude, they were not known for being cowards.
Gordo, the head of the local chapter of the Devil’s Mouth, watched the large motorcycle fly through the air. He heard two screams when the biker in front of him couldn’t stop in time, as he and his old lady were also watching the motor cycle move though the air in such unnatural way; they weren’t looking in front of them and ran over the man and woman on the ground, late of the flying motorcycle.
The motorcycle that ran over the two more unfortunate gang members also developed trouble when the man it ran over reflexively brought up his arms as the heavy motorcycle ran over his belly, and he stuck one of his arms against the wheel, causing it to be torn off and the rider of that unfortunate motorcycle thrown off as the bones in the disembodied arm caught in the wheel and against the top of the wheel housing, causing the motorcycle to suddenly stop and throwing the driver off his seat and onto the street in front of George.
George picked the man up by his long, greasy hair, and held him high off the ground. George put his other hand over the base of the man’s neck and with seemingly little trouble, George pulled the biker’s scalp off of his head, pulling off a not inconsiderable part of his upper face at the same time. The man screamed and George threw his body back onto the ground, in front of another motorcycle which ran over the body and fell onto its side, its driver yelling as his leg bones underneath the motorcycle were snapped in multiple places.
Gordo was able to stop his cycle just feet away from disaster. He coolly looked at George and Jim and took his .38 from the waistband of his pants and quickly snapped off a shot at George, by far the bigger of the two targets.
The bullet hit George in the shoulder, throwing him backwards onto the ground. Gordo gunned the machine between his legs and drove closer to George, grinning as he stopped his cycle with his gun pointed straight down at George’s head. He was about to fire the gun again and send a bullet into George’s brain when, from the light of a street lamp, he saw the hole in George’s shoulder stop bleeding and cover itself with white flesh. Gordo looked incredulously at George, who calmly stood up and grabbed at the gun in Gordo’s hand, his hand holding Gordo’s arm above the wrist. George pulled the gun away from Gordo, ripping his arm off at the elbow. He threw the flesh and metal down onto the street and turned to look at the last motorcycle, which was accelerating on the road, going back towards the Interstate highway.
Jim looked at George, who dropped Gordo, and the two men continued to walk on the shoulder of the road, unhurried, just strolling down the street.
About a half hour later Jim lightly touched George’s arm. Both men stopped and looked at the sign next to Jim, which said, “Campsite, State Park, Turn Left ¼ mile”.
The two men nodded and began to walk, one turning into the campsite down the road, the other going right on the road.