Beyond our Earth

27: Action

~~~~~~~BRADEN'S POV~~~~~~~

There was an intense throbbing in the back of my head as I came to on the floor of an office. The thick odour that wafted around the room made me retch. I propped myself up and looked around, getting my bearings. At the time I had no recollection of how I'd gotten there or why I had been unconscious. Then I turned around and saw the body laying on the floor behind me. My heart jumped. His head was surrounded by a puddle of thick blood that gleamed in the light.

I quickly checked my body over, panicking that I might have been shot as well and just wasn't alert enough to feel it yet. Thankfully my lower body seemed in tacked. There was a bump on the back of my head though that hurt like hell.

I rose to my feet slowly. The sound of tires screeching directed my attention to a window. Outside, three black vehicles charged down the road. Just ahead of them a woman was running franticly. It was Elizabeth! Holy fuck, it was Elizabeth!

I pressed my face against the window as the cars skidded to a stop at the edge of the road. A swarm of middle aged men in black suits surrounded her, closing in like a pack of hungry wolves. She turned to face them, holding out some sort of weapon - a gun - it looked like a gun.

"Oh, Elizabeth.. What in the hell have you done?" I whispered.

I took it as my cue to get the hell outa wherever I was. I jumped the body and tumbled into a hallway. Things were looking familiar. As I exited the building memories started flooding back.

"Damn aliens," I quipped.

Running was an easy choice. The tough one was whether to run away from or towards Elizabeth.

Running away would be safer. I felt up my pockets, searching for the money.

Nothing.

Which meant she still had it.

Which meant my decision was already made.

I hurdled myself towards the cars, the men, the raving girl with the gun and a couple thousand bucks in her pockets.

As I approached a maniacal grin crept across my face.

My eyes darted between the swarm of men and their cars. If they had been in a rush, could they possibly have succumbed to the same fatal mistake as I had made back on Lexington?

None of them noticed my approach. They were busy shouting orders at Elizabeth, who was meanwhile letting off blood curdling screams like something out of a horror movie for no apparent reason. It was quite an amusing little scene. I hated to disrupt it. I wanted to let it go on and see what would happen. But my curiosity would not be quenched today.

I hopped into one of their SUVs and turned the key. Yes, it was still in the ignition. Brilliant.

I put the car into drive and motored onto the grass beside the road, heading straight for the little cluster of men. I revved the engine a few times before speeding at them and making them scatter. Elizabeth's first reaction was to aim her gun at me. She looked like she was close to firing before she finally realized who sat behind the wheel.

She ran up to the side of the car and I slowed for a second as she jumped in and shut the door with a slam.

"Drive!" She yelled.

I did just that.

We sped off into the horizon, glancing back in the mirrors every few seconds to make sure we weren't being followed.

They could have followed us no problem. In hindsight I should have popped their tires or something.

But they left us alone from then on. Were they scared? Maybe.

"You just stole a car." Elizabeth stated.

"You gonna arrest me?" I joked.

"Holy crap, I- I just killed a man and now I'm driving away in a stolen car." She said in awe.

"Believe me, the irony isn't lost." I said.

She shot me a look, but I wasn't paying enough attention to tell if it was a pissed off look or more of an I can't believe we just got away with that type thing. I like to think it was the latter but that's probably just the way I was feeling because the next thing out of her mouth was: "I can't do this anymore."

And she was dead serious too. She spoke in a tone I'd never heard her use before. I turned my head to look her right in the eyes.

"What do you mean?" I asked under my breath.

A sudden tension filled the car and I swear it was palpable.

"I fucked up. I went out on a whim and let my impulse get the better of me. I just did a lot of bad shit, Braden, in a very short amount of time. And - and one thing led to the next and I think I shut out my conscience for as long as I could hold it. Look, I'm really sorry I dragged you into this mess." She paused, "I'm young. I can't spend the rest of my life in jail."

There was silence. 

"Well.. What are you gonna do?" I asked.

She sighed.

"Drop me off at the nearest town. You can keep the money," She took out the wad of cash and tossed it onto my lap.

"You serious?" I asked, glancing over at her. "Because you might want to think it over a little longer before you decide to get out. You know if the police come looking they'll come looking for you here."

I was giving advice that I wasn't really qualified to give. After all she probably knew far more than I did about this kind of shit. But I felt inclined to advise her against it.

"Actually they'll be looking for this car." She said, completely matter of fact. 

She was right so I took the first opportunity to ditch it.

As we drove through the small town again, I pulled off on the side of the road next to a couple of parked cars.

Before we'd even come to a stop, she clicked the handle, readying the door to open.

"Do you know how to hotwire a car?" I asked before she left.

Stopping to really look at her for the first time, I was struck by how red her face was. She was sweating awfully bad and she looked sick.

"No. No clue." She said, opening the door to get out.

"You okay?" I asked, getting out on my side and following her to the sidewalk.

"Fine," She nodded.

"Sure?" I asked.

"Yeah, yeah. Just get outa here will ya?" She replied.

"I will once I figure out how to steel a car." I muttered, glancing at the selection parked in front of me.

She wasn't listening. She was half way up the street heading towards a bar. I let my eyes fall away from her and back to the task at hand. I could go on without her. It was probably better that way.

I spent the next half hour crouched inside a rusty pick up truck trying to hotwire a car. I was sweating buckets, nervous as hell. I literally looked up every five seconds to see if someone was coming. 

You don't realise how scary it is being the bad guy until you actually try it out for a while. I respect those guys a lot more now.

Anyway, I learned two things trying to hotwire that car.

1. Don't ever try to hotwire a car. Despite what you see in movies it's not something you can do based on feel.

And 2. I'm pretty sure Elizabeth has a mental problem.

It was thirty minutes later. I was still crouched down in the front of the truck messing around with the wires when she showed up out of the blue dressed in men's clothing. Then she hopped in the truck and hotwired it for me in under a minute.

I was happy she'd done it. Quite relieved. But now she was standing next to me, looking like a guy, and I couldn't help wondering if she'd changed her mind about coming.

She had.