Only One Way This Ends
Wilderstory 21
Quinn laid the handset down and listened.
The radio continued to sputter brief snippits of static, but the back of the patrol car was silent. Her eyes flashed up to the rear-view mirror, which was turned away from her. Quinn reached and adjusted it, looking beyond the back window for the source of the sound.
Nothing.
She turned and looked into the back seat.
Empty.
Quinn grabbed her revolver and pushed six of the blue-marked bullets into the cylinder. Her fingers jittered, which made it more difficult. Annoyed, she swung it shut with a flip of her wrist.
She sat still for another moment, listening. Then she pushed open the door.
Quinn stepped along the side of the car until she rounded the back. The distant drone of traffic from the highway returned, along with the buzzing of flies from the dumpsters.
She scanned the surroundings. Broken cement glared white in the midday sun, with dry clumps of weeds pushing out among the cracks.
A square of red caught her attention, nestled in the shade just beneath the rear bumper. It was a tattered old shop rag. Quinn nudged it with the toe of her boot.
Sunlight reflected hotly from the car’s metallic surface. Quinn squinted through it, examining the lid of the trunk. She tapped the end of her gun against it. Then again, harder.
A sound of movement came from inside, followed by a muffled voice.
“Hello? Is someone …” it rasped, “Can you help me?”
Quinn lowered her ear toward the trunk.
“Who’s there — and how’d you get locked in?” She asked.
The audible movement from inside the trunk stopped.
“It’s Jenkins,” the man’s voice replied. “Arizona Highway Patrol.” He paused. Quinn could hear his labored breathing. “I’m kinda screwed here.”
Quinn holstered her pistol and tugged at the lid of the trunk.
“I see that,” she replied. “Do you have the keys?”
She could hear him feeling around inside the trunk.
“I don’t think so,” Jenkins said. “I was knocked out. I can’t remember.”
He sounded breathless. Confused. “My god it’s hot in here.”
Quinn scanned the patches of sand and broken concrete at her feet. The smell of heat surrounded her; a combination of garbage, grease, dirt and vegetation — all struggling in bland isolation against the sun.
Nobody comes back here, she thought.
She lowered herself on hands and knees to peer under the car.
The heel of her palm rested on the edge of the red shop rag — and she felt something hard beneath it. Familiar.
She snatched up the rumpled cloth, along with a jangle of keys it was covering. They were strung together along a short loop of metal beads. From the end dangled a miniature wooden bowling pin, worn with age.
At tiny logo was emblazoned on one side, along with the words: Starlite Lanes, Flagstaff AZ.
Dropping the rag, she fumbled with the keys to isolate the one for the car. Quinn jammed it into the lock and gave it a turn, as the lid of the trunk popped open.
Jenkins was inside — his limbs cramped and bent against his own body. Loose tools and equipment clanged and scraped along the floor of the trunk as he struggled to pull himself out.
Quinn grabbed him by the arm and pulled, hauling him up and over the ledge of the trunk.
He was covered in sweat, and his tan uniform was almost completely drenched. His dark hair clung in wet bands across his forehead, which gleamed, shiny and white in the hot sun.
Jenkins staggered, tumbling down to his knees. He breathed in short gasps, and pressed his shoulder against the chrome bumper.
Quinn knelt beside him, her hand on his back.
“I think you might have heat stroke,” she said. “How long were you in there?”
Jenkins bent his head toward the ground as he tried to compose himself. “They jumped me,” he mumbled. “Took my sidearm, too.”
Quinn gripped his shoulder tighter. “How long?” She asked.
He shook his head. “I don’t know. I blacked out a few times. A day, maybe?”
He rubbed the back of his neck with his hand. “It was so damn hot. I thought I might die in there.”
Quinn lifted herself beside him. “The radio’s been in and out,” she said, “but I can try it again — to get some help.”
She started to walk back to the driver side door.
Behind her, she could hear Jenkins struggling to stand.
“Let me handle it,” he stammered.
Quinn pulled open the door. “You’re in no condition right now to be … ”
“Please,” Jenkins interrupted, “They took my gun. And my badge. It’s a big frikkin’ deal.”
He followed her around the side of the car, leaning against it for support. “Just — let me call it in.”
Quinn slid into the seat, feeling the loose collection of bullets clatter against her leg. Then she felt Jenkins’ hand on her shoulder.
It felt forceful. Heavy.
“Let me call it in,” he repeated.
His voice sounded different. It was rasping. And wet. Like two voices at the same time.
Quinn turned to look at him. His eyes were wide open; bloodshot, with a darkened tinge around the edges.
Like black ink, she thought, as a sinking feeling pulled at her insides.
Quinn reached around her hip to release the revolver from its holster. But Jenkins’ grip on her shoulder was firm.
In one fierce motion, he yanked her out of the car and flung her down to the ground. Quinn gasped, landing flat on her back in the narrow space between the car and the dumpsters. Pushing her elbows and heels into the dirt, she scrambled, crablike, away from him.
Jenkins’ breath cackled out of his throat as he summoned strength from within. In an instant he was on her, flailing at her face and neck like an animal.
Quinn struggled to hold him back with one arm, while she drew her gun with the other. But Jenkins was quick. His fingers clamped around hers, forcing her hand up against her chest.
His full weight was upon her now, and his breath was hot across her cheek. Quinn still gripped the pistol, but her arm was pinned. She felt the barrel of the gun — pushed upwards by Jenkins’ hand — deep against the flesh beneath her chin. His grip encircled her own, pressing ever tighter against her trigger finger.
A buzzing was coming from Jenkins’ throat. Like a swarm of flies, but different.
Tiny black specks filled the air around Quinn’s face, obscuring her sight. They seemed to come out of nowhere, peeling in sheets from his reddening flesh, and out from his mouth.
She winced, squeezing her eyes shut against them.
Only one way this ends, she thought. Then paused.
Well okay, maybe two.
In one swift motion, she yanked her head to one side. As soon as she felt the barrel of the gun slide off her jaw, she squeezed the trigger.
A single shot rang out, piercing the air and thundering into her eardrums with a force that left her dazed.
Everything went silent, except for the intense ringing in Quinn’s ears. Her vision blurred, and she felt hot liquid streaming down her face and neck. A blaze of pain emanated from the flesh of her cheek and across her temple.
This is it, she thought, as blood spilled into her eye.
Jenkins lowered his face to hers, and the haze of black specks enveloped them both. They peppered her flesh like tiny gnats.
“You missed,” he whispered, forcing the gun out of her weakened grip.
He planted his forearm across her throat and leaned even closer.
“Don’t worry” Jenkins smiled, as Quinn struggled for air. He pressed the end of the barrel flat against her ear. “I’ll call this one in.”
Quinn tasted blood in her mouth as she stiffened, waiting for the second shot.
But Jenkins hesitated.
Tiny bits of gravel scraped against the ground as he shifted his weight. He tilted his head and lifted his gaze past hers, listening for something Quinn could not yet hear.
“Freeze!” yelled a familiar voice, from somewhere behind them. Quinn wrenched her neck against the ground to see.
It was Ricky, standing at the corner of the building with his pistol extended. He had a line on Jenkins, just past the edge of the far dumpster.
Ricky pushed the gun forward in short thrusts, like he was attempting to shoot. He frowned at the gun in his hands.
A grim smile cut across Quinn’s lips.
The safety, she breathed.
Jenkins moved quickly. He slammed the butt of Quinn’s revolver against her wounded temple, stunning her almost out of consciousness. Then he pushed himself up and over her body.
Quinn rolled into a ball, reeling from the blow. Her body quaked from the strain of the fight, and a relentless pulse hammered through her skull like beats on a drum. She closed her eyes against the pain, and felt herself being pulled inward.
Kaleidoscopic patterns danced across the inside of her closed eyelids. Amorphous violet hues blossomed and receded, taking form in one moment, and dissipating the next.
And from them, a single tendril-like object materialized.
It was in the shape of a rope — like the one from the flooded cave. Quinn squeezed her eyes to keep it from dissolving. But it slipped from her sight and receded, bounding loosely into the black beyond.
Quinn focused on her breathing. The intense throbbing in her head slowly diminished to a steady, droning hum. And there was the feeling of water, spilling in courses, invisibly, around her.
Embracing her. As she yearned to embraced it.
Quinn opened her eyes. She felt removed from world around her. Detached. Like she was moving outside herself.
In that instant, the whole scenario unfolded with renewed clarity. Precise and frozen, like game pieces laid out on a board.
Quinn took it all in, bit by bit.
There was Ricky, twenty paces away, fumbling endlessly with the safety latch on his gun.
And there was Jenkins, on one knee just beyond the fender, training the pistol on him. He leaned around the corner of the far dumpster, anchoring himself with his free hand on the car.
Quinn felt herself moving up behind him, pushed forward by some untapped reserve of strength. She glanced sidelong into the gaping trunk as she crept closer. And there she saw it, gleaming darkly.
A tire iron. Laying like a gift, atop the spare.
But she also saw something else: Jenkins’ hand, gripped around the lip of the trunk.
Instead of reaching for the black metal rod, Quinn reached up. And in one swift motion, she swung it down. With a solid clunk, the lid of the trunk slammed shut against Jenkins’ fingers — just as another shot rang out.
He groaned, wheeling around and yanking at his pinned hand. The acrid smell of the gun’s discharge filled Quinn’s nostrils, as her arms closed around Jenkins.
Without thinking, she seized his free arm and hooked it around his back — twisting his wrist until the bones inside cracked.
Jenkins slumped against the side of the car. The revolver dropped out of his hand and skidded across the broken concrete.
Quinn fell toward it, sliding over Jenkins’ shoulders and tumbling onto the ground before him. Grabbing the pistol, she rolled onto her back and faced him — pushing against the gravel with the heels of her boots.
Jenkins was heaving with the full weight of his body against the lid of the closed trunk. His broken wrist was bent at a sickening angle. But he ignored it, training his darkened gaze intently on Quinn as he pulled.
Quinn steadied herself in an attempt to calm her shaking hands. The handle of the gun was slick with sweat, as she leveled the barrel toward Jenkins.
He pulled again, and the back of the squad car creaked as it lifted against its own frame. His hand came free with a rip, spraying dark blood from where his fingers were torn away.
Quinn shook her head at the sight, trying to maintain focus.
Before her, Jenkins lowered himself into a crouch, ready to spring. His muscles rippled beneath the fabric of his sweat-soaked uniform, and his eyes flashed darkly.
Quinn clenched her teeth into a thin, dry smile.
Spelunker, she breathed.
A final blast from her gun echoed out, as she watched a ragged hole appear on the front of Jenkins’ uniform. A spray of noxious fumes filled the air as he doubled over, motionless, onto the ground.
Then, silence.
Quinn’s body finally slackened. She rested her head on the broken concrete and let the pistol slip from her grasp.
A hot breeze whistled through the space beneath the dumpsters, as the thin cloud of black specks above her fell away.
The ringing in her ears returned, mixed with the far away sound of traffic from the highway. And then she heard something new: a clamor of voices from the back of the diner.
Rolling on her side, Quinn saw them gathering at the corner of the building. They stood, aghast at the scene that lay before them. And in the middle of the group — slumped on the ground — was Ricky.
An irregular blob of red filled the front of his crisp white shirt.
And it expanded across the fabric. Unfurling, like some exotic blossoming flower.
