The Herd

Chapter 6

"Well, looky here." Curt stopped his whistling and pointed us out one by one with his finger. "Dumb and Dumber."
"Yeah, what's up Dumbest?" I nodded my head.
"You thought I wouldn't find out about my own bounty?" The Exterminator said as he lit a cigar. "I had to call in some extra protection. I'm paying them to protect me twice as much the bounty offers to kill me." He sucked at the bud of his light, and let out a puff of smoke from his nose.
Ben handed me the pistol and rose his gun's barrel up. Ready to fire if needed. I cocked the handgun he gave me and held it ready. Curt stood beside the mob boss and crossed his arms.
Yi-Lang was a 5'11 Chinese guy with shaggy black hair. He was thin but muscled non-the-less. He had brown eyes, and a darkened tan. His teeth was cloud white whenever he made his signature smug smile. Cocky, and short-tempered, allied with patience and collectedness. He was like a Ken doll version of Cameron, but was the Jock's equivalent to Noah. He was their leader and their brains. Good under pressure, and a large pain in our asses. He was a force to be reckoned with. I wouldn't even be sure if Ben and I together could take him. This Asian bastard knew how to fight.
He wore a dark gray Faux leather jacket, and orange tee, a pair of black jeans, and converse. He wore a cap clipped to his pants, and a black string bracelet. His red bandanna was on his left bicep, instead of the right like the rest of his crew, and it had a symbol on it. Looked like an "X" with four plain circles below it. That was the Jocks symbolic icon. What it meant, stumped us.
After a quick whistle, Curt sat on the edge of the desk. "So. How are we going to settle this?" He asked. Before I, or Ben, could answer, he rose a finger. "Don't answer that. Because I already have an answer. You two are going to tell us where the other nerds are, and then you're going to let us bring you in."
"Bring us in?" Ben asked. "What would you want us for? Why not kill us?"
Yeah, like he could. I thought.
"Because, you and your Herd, are worth a hell of a lot more alive." Curt smiled. "And I'd like that prize. So, Perfecto," he called me by my gang name. "-and..." he tilted his head at Ben. "Which one's under that mask?"
"Why don't you come a little bit closer and find out?" Ben answered.
"Ah, that voice. You must be Pope." He said Ben's gang name. Curt knows all our real names. He's called us then before, but he liked to use our code names as a way to mock us. Like we were children playing Pretend. He didn't care that our names ran fear through other gangs. "The only other ones of you tall enough to match that uniform is the archer, Falco, and the Kaptain. But, I recognize that voice." Curt says. "So full of determination, and stubbornness. Something those two don't have."
"Don't trash talk our family." Ben says, pointing his gun directly at Curt. "Remember which side of the barrel you're on, Lang."
"And you remember how many guns are in the room. Only two of those guns, aren't pointing at you."
Damn. I thought. How the hell are we going to get out of this one?
There's no way Noah would know what's going on. I threw out my earpiece, and unless Ben found a way to activate his in his helmet, we're stuck here. We have to get downstairs, and back to Kap.
"What's your play?" Curt asked. "How are you going to get out of this? Following my request, or doing something really stupid?"
"I dunno," I admitted. "But doing something stupid is more our style, so..." I shrugged. "Working on it."
"Well, stop working on it. Because you're all out of time." Curt said, more directly this time. "Where's the others?"
"If you think we're going to tell you, you're dumber than the title Dumbest." Ben said.
Curt shook his head and grumbled. "You're wearing out my patience, you two." He growled. "I might just have to take the two of you. The rest will come running."
"Yeah," I said. "Then you'll be pissing in your panties."
"Alright." Curt rubbed his eyes. "I'm done. Take'em." His men followed their orders and rushed in.
"Here we go." Ben wrapped his hand around my face from behind, pushing away the glasses and covering my eyes. After that, I heard the burst of a flash grenade. "Let's go!" Ben shouted.
He threw me out into the hall and I could see again. Before Ben closed the door behind him, I saw The Exterminator and Curt, along with his men, rubbing their eyes and shouting curse words. Didn't take long for Ben and I to take off running.
A guard ran at us from a turn in the hallway, he shouted at us to stop as he rose his gun. Ben slipped off his helmet and beamed it straight into the guy's face. His nose instantly let out a waterfall of blood and he fell over on his back. That guy will wake up with a broken nose, and wishing he was wearing his own helmet.
"Kap!" Ben shouted, pushing his finger to his ear. "We're coming out. Things didn't go as planned, so we're going to need cover fire!" There was a brief moment of silence. "Alright. Serve them something fancy, will ya?" He moved his hand from his head to his gun and fired forwards.
Guards were pouring onto the floor from the stairs. We had to duck against the corner of another hallway. Bullets flew, and voices echoed. I peeked around and fired a few shots, but Ben pulled me back just before I got shot.
"What did Kap say?" I asked him.
"He said he's got it covered, and that he was cooking something up." He peeked around and fired his rifle taking out a few guys.
"Ah." I said. "I get it. Serve them something fancy."
"C'mon. We gotta push before the Jocks catch up."
I ran out in the open and shot with him, quickly eliminating the guts directly in front of us. A guard peeked out from another corner, but I shot him dead before he could make any lasting actions.
"Let's go." Ben led the way down the stairs.
Half way down, a guard came up and tackled Ben against the wall. I jumped towards him and rammed my knee against his chest, knocking him against the side wall. Ben smacked his fist across the guys helmet, and I pulled him closer, then pushed him over the rail, letting him knock himself out against the next flight of stairs. We could hear the rest of the guards downstair shouting orders.
"Nice." Ben said. "There's going to be a lot more, so be prepared."
"Yes, I'm well aware." I said.
I barreled out way down the steps until we made it to the bottom. Ben pushed his ear against the door and took a moment to listen. I stood by and kept my gun at the the corner of the stairs.
"Okay," Ben said. "Here we go." He unsnapped a grenade from the guard uniform's belt and pulled the clip. He positioned himself behind the door and opened it a crack. I could hear the shouts of the guards when Ben tossed the grenade through. He closed the door and stood back. I followed his lead and waited.
After the explosion sounded, Ben threw open the door and went out guns blazing. The ground was crippled and charred black from the explosion, and a few guys were blown to more pieces than one. Ben dropped three guys before I made it out and fired my pistol. It only then occurred to me that I should have grabbed a guards gun. Hmm... I thought. Whatever. Not that I need it.
I ducked just as a bullet flew over head. Okay. Maybe it would have been a good idea. At the very least.
I dropped a few guys, as did Ben, and we made our way through the hall. We had to duck behind a fork lift because of the amount of guns firing at us.
"We're not going to make it through there!" Ben shouted over the sounds of gunfire. "Go that way!" He shoved my shoulder and pointed to a door across the way. "Go now!" He said as he peeked over the lift and fired.
I leaped and rolled across the ground. I dodged a few bullets, but managed to open the door and go through. The door led straight into the garage. Vans, expensive cars, and trucks with mounted .50 CALs were slathered across the vast room. From here I could see our truck. Inside, Kap was waiting for us with his get-away car. A large mound of pallets gave us a good coverage from the guards at the front.
"Come on!!" I shouted at Ben while I gave him cover fire. I got in a few headshots, but a couple of them rebounded off their helmets. I winced as a bullet scratched through my left bicep. "Damn!" I got behind cover as Ben met my side. I kicked the door closed and locked it. Bullet flew over head, and shot through some parts of the pallets making small debris of wood fly.
"You alright?" Ben said looking at my wound.
It was bleeding bad, but not enough to bleed out. At least... not quickly. "I'm fine." I said. "Nothing the girls or Cam can't fix."
"Kaptain!" Ben shouted, his finger to the earpiece. "We're stuck in the garage. Can you give us a hand!?"
It was a few seconds until the back of our struck fell open, and clanged against the asphalt. Loud music, of some dubstep I didn't recognize, blared out from the back. I peeked over and watched as the guards stopped firing at us and turned their attention to the truck.
Kap walked out wearing his signature outfit. A black leather trench coat, a pair of torn black jeans, his black and green shoes, and a dark gray T-shirt. His green and black "safety shades" matched his black and green face mask that covered the whole bottom half of his face. From nose to chin. His black and green gloves were snug on his hands as his fingered gripped the handle and trigger of his weapon.
In his hand was his customized, and upgraded Gatling gun he calls the M1337. Heavier than Ben is, and has a long tail of three inch bullets, this thing could fire up to ten thousand rounds a minute. This was Kap's pride and joy.
"Say hello to my little friend, motherfuckers!!" I could hear Kap shout just before bullets rapidly skattered across the front of the building. Guards dropped like flies.