Strike Fiss’ Manifesto
January 2005
The Lost Soul Motel
721 1/2 Middle Street
Nowhere, Montana.
“GIVE ME BACK MY FUCKING PANTS YOU ASSHOLES!”
Not the most dignified thing to say, I suppose. But it’s the best thing I can think to say as they peel away in the convertible and I really, really meant it.
They took my fucking pants.
Still, I suppose it could be worse. There’s a small town in the distance on the highway. Just a splatter of buildings in the middle of nowhere, really. But there are lights, and that means food. The other way down the road doesn’t look nearly as hospitable, actually. Hell, I don’t even know where I am.
Montana is my best guess. We’ve been driving North long enough. Haven’t heard the ocean. Chances are they’ll risk the border and try to get into Alberta. I hope those fuckers get caught. I hope they get strip-searched and cavity searched at the damn border. Thank you, Bin-Laden. Increased immigration security just made me smile.
Walking down the highway without pants gives one time to reflect upon the events that led them to this point. Really, what else is there to do? Beyond a tractor in the distance and this town, I’m alone. First thing’s first. Inventory.
The cop’s wallet and badge are still in my coat pocket. I can feel them as the fabric slaps against my thigh from walking. Honestly, I’m surprised the assholes didn’t take it. Must have forgotten about it. Maybe they were just too damn high to care. Whatever. I got a cop’s badge, wallet, and fifty-nine dollars. That’s fifty dollars more than what I started the week with.
Vegas has a strange power to do these things to people. You can walk out of the desert with nine bucks and fuck over a blackjack table just when nobody’s looking and walk away with twenty grand. It’s what brings people to that shithole. But the shithole giveth and the shithole taketh away. I met Jasmine and Doug while I was spending the money. We got a bit crazy, got some coke, had a nice big fucking threesome and then a cop kicks down the door.
Well, if I didn’t just shit myself when Jasmine plugs him full of holes with her revolver.
Stole the car, been running ever since. Nobody’s chasing. Nobody cares. But we ran. Lone wolves like me do that a lot. It wasn’t a big deal until the two decide that it was better with just the two of them. Locked me in the trunk for a day, then dumped me out here.
Well, hello here. Sorry to meet you.
I go through the back yard of a little trailer house near the outskirts of town. Some laundry is hung up and I find some new pants without any
difficulty. This fucking place seems like a ghost town. Only thing that seems to signal life is the motel vacancy sign. It’s old but looks clean. It’s that or hide under a trailer and risk another fucking cop coming by when someone sees me.
What the hell.
Corner store is open so I walk in and grab some instant burritos. “Hey, buddy.” I ask the guy at the counter. He looks at me like he’d rather not have to speak. “Never mind.”
I pay for the burritos, some smokes and a road map. I pocket a lighter and a bunch of papers. Even if he saw me do it, I doubt he cares.
The heat is really depressing as I get into the street again. Everything is dry and hot here. Time to put the old feet up. The motel has an old granny watching movies on a black and white TV and she points politely to the sign with the prices. 20 bucks later and I’m in my room.
It’s dark, cool, and clean. I suddenly realize how tired being a sneaky bastard makes me.
I’m asleep even before my head hits the pillow.
A trucker guns his engine somewhere as he peels out of the parking lot and I wake up, more than a bit surprised to see the sun isn’t up anymore.
I lock up the room and stroll a few dozen feet out into the cool Montana night with a smoke burning slowly in my mouth. I don’t really like smoking, I suppose. Just habit at this point. Whatever. My hand moves to the bulge in my coat pocket and I find myself entertaining the curiosity to find out the dead cop’s name.
The night is dark and I’m alone with my thoughts for the first time in a long time.
I’m suddenly overcome with the feeling of a righteous pissed-off mood. Shouldn’t have shot him, those bastards. Him. The weight of his badge makes me realize I’ll either go mad or I’ll look at the damn thing. I don’t want the fucking thing haunting me like that. Hell, I feel guilty enough and I didn’t even pull the trigger.
Biting the bullet, I slide it out into my hand. “Officer Gus Provo.” I announce out to the cool, still air around me. “Shit.” The name sounds like my grandpa or something. Gus. Why couldn’t it be ‘Murdock’ or something dramatic deserving of a dramatic death? People named Gus are supposed to be old, adorable security guards, fatherly beat cops, and Maytag repairmen.
I only saw his face for a second of panic. I can barely remember it. I think he had a moustache. Gray and black hair.
Shit.
My foot digs up a small chunk of the freshly tilled field across the road. “Well, officer Provo.” I say to the badge. “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry. If I knew what to do I would have stopped the bitch.” I pause, then drop the badge into the ground and cover it with a kick.
I feel cold as I walk back to my room.
It’s sometime just before morning that I realize I’m dreaming.
I’m at the bar I first dove into once I got to Vegas. A little shit-dive with dirty hardwood tables and a bar-tender who’s finest outfit consisted of a wife-beater sleeveless shirt with so many stains it looked like an aerial map of Tibet.
The smoke hangs heavy in the air around me. Oppressive. The beer in front of me…three of the nine bucks I have left…is already half gone. There is someone oddly familiar sitting next to me.
“It’s worth more than you think.” Came a gruff voice from the cop.
“Pardon?” I ask, looking over at him. His face is hidden by the tyrannical smokescreen choking the room, but I get the impression I’m not supposed to see it now anyway.
“Your apology.” Gus says. “It means a lot. And it’s accepted.”
“So you’re not going to haunt me or some shit?” I ask, taking a sip of the beer. It tastes much better in the dream than it did when I actually had it in my hand.
“Course not.” He laughs. It makes me both happy and sad to hear he was once such a jolly fucker. “No. But I figure we are both in the situation to need each-other.”
I raise my eyebrow and look over at him again. The smoke hides most of his face, but I do see his lower jaw as he raises a beer of his own to his lips. “No offence, man. But you’re dead. Not much more you need now beyond some flowers and a pine box.”
He laughs again, then nods. “‘Suppose you’re right.”
We both sip our beers. The bar-tender refills mine. It’s even sweeter than before.
“Here’s the deal.” The cop says. “I want revenge. Nothing fancy. Either kill them or get them locked away.”
“I’m not killing anyone. And if I never see those two fuckers again in my life I’ll be a happy man.” I say quickly. It’s an honest response. I’ll go to death row for nicking a pack of smokes before I’d kill anyone. Only one life I own, and even then, I’m not sure sometimes. “No deal.”
The cop nods. “You may not want to see them again, but they want to see you.” He pauses deliberately to let the words sink in and suddenly my beer doesn’t taste as sweet. “They’re coming back for you. You’re the only witness. You got their names. You have the evidence linking them to my death.”
“Bullshit.” I say. “They’re off to Canada to get ass-raped by the border police.” He’s not fooled for a moment. I’m scared. I put on a good show, though. At least I think.
“You’ll be awake soon.” He says. “I don’t have much time. But here’s the deal.” Gus says. “I have no more body, boy. You can be my eyes and hands. Call my precinct at least. So long as the fuckers pay for what they did.”
I listen.
“But if they see you here, they’ll kill you on sight. Then we’re both fucked. You kill them, though, and you get the fifty grand they didn’t tell you about in the back seat of that shit convertible they’re driving.”
My beer reflects the surprise of my eyes. They were driving an old convertible, after all.
“Stay in the room. This place is special. Watch your back. If you don’t want to help, you should be able to duck out tonight. But if you’re serious about that apology…I’ll owe you big.”
I nod slowly. “Alright. Say, for the moment, that I’m in.” I turn to see his smile. “How do I get them?”
“Check under the bed.”
I wake up.
I’m really not sure if I want to check under the bed. Breakfast first.
The same apathetic kid is at the convenience store. I pay for a coke. I take a few pre-packaged sandwiches and jerky sticks. He doesn’t care. I almost entertain asking him if he wants something, but he probably just takes what he wants and marks it up as shoplifting anyway.
When I walk out of the store there is a brilliant sky.
Somehow while I was in the store, the entire hemisphere transformed into a rather dull blue sky into a masterpiece of cloud, light and shadow. You never see such amazing skies by the coast. Lived there all my life and the most spectacular thing I’ve seen was a hurricane. Even that was only a few minutes I dared stay out in the rain. This place is beautiful. The damn sky is sculpted for me, and here I am, eating stolen sandwiches and about to be killed.
Why the hell am I here?
I almost wonder if I said it out loud. The sandwiches are alright and the pop works wonder on my nerves, throwing a bit of sugar into me again.
I want to run.
Every time I look down that road, I either see myself going down it, or those two cop-killers driving back down it to finish me off. A fifty-fifty chance, really. Can I make it to somewhere big enough that it’s not worth them looking around in? Would I even have a chance in the middle of nowhere without a car? Or maybe the dream was just a dream and I’m freaking out.
Who’s to say they wouldn’t just drive by this place? They may not even remember where they threw me out. It’s too much to hope for, though, and all I can think of is how beautiful the sky is and how much all this shit doesn’t matter.
Maybe I’ll just let them shoot me down. Maybe I’ll fake it and join back up with them. That wouldn’t sit too well with Gus and I both, but I’d be alive another day. Is that really what I want?
Live another day?
I’m not so sure anymore. The sky looks like someone painted it. When was the last time I even bothered to look up?
I decide to look under the bed. More answers instead of questions that way. If the dream was just my brain playing tricks on me, then I’ll probably find some mothballs or some lint. If I find something useful, then I know at least that much more is real.
Just as I cross the road, I think I see headlights off in the distance. I hurry inside before the car gets close enough to spot me.
Munching on my last sandwich and using the empty coke can as a glass, I watch as the convertible pulls down the road. They’re both in it. Both look pissed off and frantic. They’re looking for me. I will them to keep going. I pretend, just for a second, that I’m some powerful mind-fucker fortune teller from Vegas, and I try the old Jedi mind-trick on them.
“This isn’t the place. He’s moved on. Better hurry, he’s going to tell the cops in the next city.” I whisper through the curtains. “You were high. The next city is the right one. It looks familiar.”
Sadly, the Force does not smile upon me and I see them yelling at each other as the car slows down. Jasmine motions to the motel. I nearly spit up my sandwich, but I realize it’s the only one in town and they probably just want to stop for the day so they can search around for me. They pull into the parking lot, still shouting and swearing at each other. I can nearly hear them mentioning how stupid they were not to kill me before. They walk right by my door and don’t seem to notice me, though.
I move away from the window. They’ll be staying the night. I pray they don’t notice the occupied room.
The bed is well kept. Looking under the frame, I’m slightly disappointed to find nothing. It’s completely clean underneath. Then, before I give up hope, I look at the crease between the box-spring and the mattress. It’s a statistical fact that more teenaged boys hide porn from their parents between their mattresses than anywhere else. I slide my fingers into the crease and lift it up.
My heart nearly stops.
There is a dusty, old Ziploc bag laying near the middle. It contains a gun and a scattering of bullets.
“Fuck.”
I try not to want a smoke. I really do. But eventually, I give in and I’m smoking in this non-smoking room. I feel bad. Any other motel in the known universe and I wouldn’t give a shit if I painted the walls with my piss, but here…I don’t know.
I just don’t know.
The gun is very well cared for. It’s oiled and clean. I’ve seen the occasional gun here and there, and I know enough that it’s not going to explode if I shoot it.
It’s a semi-automatic. The clip is full, and there’s a spare ten bullets that seem to have no cracks or dents. It’s all ready to use. I could probably empty the clip before that bitch got two shots off. That comforts me a little.
But only a little.
Before I can think about running again, the night comes. Their car is parked a few doors down. I don’t hear them, so that’s a good sign they’re not just next door.
That bit of comfort grows with the weight of the pistol on my lap as I sit on the edge of the bed. Before I know it, I’m asleep.
“Who’s gun is it?” I ask, looking over to Gus. He’s on his third whiskey and coke and I can smell it on his breath. Don’t blame him, really. If I found out I was dead, I’d drink too.
“A hit-man’s.” Gus said. “He says he doesn’t need it anymore.”
“He says?”
“Yeah. Dead too. Said I could use it.” Gus’ foggy smile said. “Got killed before he could come back for it. Says it’s his favourite, so be nice to it.”
“It’s a very nice gun.” I say.
“He’ll be happy to hear that.” Gus says, burping out another cloud of whiskey.
Curiosity. “What is this place? Hell?”
“Think of it like in-between.”
“Like Purgatory?”
Gus pauses on that and nods, downing the rest of his glass. “More like…a place where souls can wait for their unfinished business to be finished.”
“Sounds nice.” I say.
“Oh?”
“At least you get that chance. I don’t even know what my business is.” I say. “Right now, though, it’s helping you. Not for the cash. And I really don’t feel like killing people, but these two are barely people.I want to make things right.”
Gus nods. “To our destinies combined.” He says, suddenly with his forth glass in hand and raised.
I find my hand around another beer. What the hell. I clink glasses with the dead cop named Gus. “To our destinies.” And drink it down.
It’s very sweet.
Another trucker guns his engine, and it wakes me up in time to see the
shadows under my door.
I wonder if I get bonus karma to my aim when the door flies open. It is, after all, quite similar to the moment Gus busted in, a cop in blue all full of righteous attack, only to be shot down by a bitch on the bed. The fact I’m sitting on the bed makes me smile.
The door reverbs off the wall. Doug steps in with a huge knife. Doug’s angry eyes turn surprised when he sees the gun in my hand. Doug drops dead when I pull the trigger three times and two bright-red flowers bloom on his chest. Doug falls down dead, and Jasmine leaps out of the way as the next three bullets miss her.
“DOUG! DOUG! FUCK! DOUG!??!!” she screams. Doug is dead. He doesn’t respond. I almost feel bad for him. He wasn’t the one who shot the cop. He was, however, the one who gave Jasmine a congratulatory cock in the ass for killing the cop later on that night. I no longer feel bad for him, remembering the grin on his face when he asked if I wanted to help him fuck her.
I slide off the bed, crouching behind it. She’s loading her gun. I can hear her even while she’s panting and frantic. “YOU’RE A DEAD MAN! YOU’RE FUCKING DEAD! YOU KILLED DOUG!”
“You killed Gus.” I say quietly. She probably didn’t hear me anyway. She probably wouldn’t care. “Doug is only half the payback.”
My hand is shaking, but the weight of three bullets comforts me inside. The moon is thin but bright, and I see her shadow easily. She’s shaking too. Dogs are going apeshit, but I hear no cops or sirens over the sound of trucks driving by.
“You killed a good man.” I say loud enough for her to hear. “And it’s either me or you now. You won’t win.” Where this bullshit confidence is coming from, I don’t know, but it feels damn good. So VERY damn good.
“Fuck you, asshole!”
“Sorry, I’m not Doug.”
That gets her.
I stand up as her shadow spins around. I fire too early, though. A bullet slips by her head harmlessly. The one shot is all she needs. I almost say ‘how did you punch me from over there?’ before I realize I can’t breathe. When I do breathe, it feels like my lungs are being crushed by a ton of bricks. Air feels like sand.
Well. Shit. My shirt’s bleeding.
Oh. Wait. Never mind.
She walks over to me and kicks the gun away as I slide down against the wall. I silently apologize to Gus’ hit-man friend who liked his gun so much that he let it kill once more after his own death.
Jasmine looks like the crack ho she is. Dirty red lines crease her face as she yells at me and kicks me and pokes and prods me. For a moment, I wonder what the hell she wants. I’m dying. Why is she bothering to yell at me? Curiosity takes over and I try to focus past the shot ringing in my ears to hear what has got the bitch so upset.
“WH…B…CO…BAD….BADGE!”
I finally realize she is talking about the badge. The last chunk of evidence, I suppose. She was the one that ripped it off the cop’s dead body and threw it to me for a trophy. Prints are all over the thing.
“O…t…si…de…” I point weakly to the door. She realizes I said ‘Outside’ and swears.
“You’ll show me EXACTLY where or I will torture you until your last fucking breath!”
I nod. What. Like I’m going to bother? Why not. At least I got one of them. Maybe Gus can haunt her now. That would be cool. I don’t struggle when she hauls me up and helps me outside.
There are still no cops. No witnesses. Even the other rooms and the motel’s office are strangely dark. Business is being done. Nobody interferes. I find one of my lungs still burns, but the other isn’t breathing sand anymore. A lot of me hurts, but it’s not a really bad hurt. It just kind of sucks.
“There…” I whisper, unable to do much else. Talking still hurts like a bitch. Oh well.
She swears nervously, looking around the empty parking lot. She seems more weirded out by the fact nobody is there than I am. “Hurry up! FUCK! Just hurry up!” she screams, pretty much carrying me at this point. Her gun is on my shoulder. If my head wasn’t swimming and my body not weak, I figure I could take it from her and finish the job. The more I think about it, though, the more I don’t care. I’m sleepy anyway. You know in the movies where they tell the dying guy not to sleep? Well, they don’t know how nice that sleep is looking. It’s looking pretty damn good.
“There.” I croak as we stumble out into the field. She literally just dumps me down right there.
The bitch shoots me again. Just to make sure.
What a bitch.
I watch with detached interest as she digs up the badge, laughing a frazzled, cracked laugh. I wonder if she’s realizing it wasn’t worth the loss of so much. Who cares.
It’s a bit more interesting, however, when I watch my own hand reach for her gun. She had dropped it at her side to dig. She doesn’t notice me still moving.
I should be dead. I really should. But I move. I grab the gun. I’m not breathing, and I can’t feel my hands or the cool metal of the weapon, but I know I’m about to pull the trigger, so it doesn’t surprise me when the side of her head explodes into a red mist.
Sure surprised her, though.
Jasmine falls to the ground, deader than I am. The badge of Gus Provo rolls out of her hand and I watch my hand pick it up.
I’m suddenly back at the bar.
“So? Now what?” I ask. My beer is full.
“You’re dead.” Gus explains, but I know there’s more. “But you did good.”
I smirk. “A lot of good it did me.”
“True. But you helped me. That counts for a lot around here.” Gus said with a smile. His face is clearer now. “Counts for enough that
you have a choice. If you want to go back, you can.”
I look down at my beer. It doesn’t taste as sweet now, but I like it much better. The flavour is real.
Gus turns to me. His head is still haloed in smoke. “If you go back…”
“I’ll have to change some things.” I say before he does. “And I don’t want that.”
He seems a bit surprised at this.
“I can die, I guess. Not really scared of dying now that it’s already happened. But I have no unfinished business, and I just killed a man. Not too proud of myself. I’d rather not go to hell or whatever is in store for me.” I offer. “So, what I’m thinking is another deal. Even if I go back, I’m just going to end up in another situation like that. I’ve been doing this my entire life. It’s not the best, but it’s me.”
Gus nods, smoke still hazing his features.
“So. Let’s do this.” I say, drinking another sip. “I stay here. You go back.” The beer is very real. Very, very good. I’m suddenly sure of myself for the first time in decades.
“We can’t trade back.” Gus says. He is a cop, after all. Even if he just used me for revenge, he’s gotta have something good inside him that makes him warn me. “You’ll be stuck here until you figure out it is what you want done.”
“And I don’t know. So I may be here for a while.” I smile at him. “But, that’s pretty much par for me. Maybe I’ll go down. Maybe up. Maybe I’ll just stick around here. Whatever. I like that better.”
Gus just smiles. Then, he nods, and brings up his glass. “To our destinies.”
We clink glasses once more.
I enjoy the drink for the first time in years.
I walk up to the convenience store while the state troopers clean up the mess. Looks like they’ll just label it as a drug-induced fight between lovers. Two guns, two deaths. Nine pounds of crack in the back of their car. Pretty cut and dry for the middle of nowhere.
The duffle bag of money on my shoulder feels awkward, but it looks old, ratty and dirty enough that the kid at the counter of the corner store doesn’t even give me a second look.
The map shows I have a long way to go no matter where I turn. When I bring up the two dozen sandwiches, bottles of water, juice and first-aid kits, the kid just looks at me with a strange smirk.
“Hey. Buddy. You not stealing anything today, man?” he asks, starting to ring things through the old register.
“Young man…I’m an officer of the law.” I announce with just a bit of pride and resentment. “I would never shoplift. I suggest you check with my chief. Twenty-nine years of unblemished service in the Los Vegas PD.”
The young man blinks, then just laughs and shakes his head. “Yeah, whatever.”
I pay for the food and then leave.
The sky is beautiful. The roads are clear. I almost feel like a new man.
I’ve never been to the coast.
West it is, then.
Strike Fiss, Studio Shinnyo 2004. Khattam-Shud, EOF.
Posted under Manifestoes, Short Stories
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