Outrun Stories #24

“15 seconds and WE. ARE. GO,” Rhamshot shouts holding up a black gloved hand in the air, five fingers spread, until they are pulled in one by one and fuck, that single second before the explosion. That flicker, the kick in the gut, the grind of the teeth, the clench of the jaw and the nerves, the nerves never fade, no matter how many times you do this fucking job.

BOOM.

The armour takes the edge off explosion, the gas mask protects from the soot and smoke and teargas we fire off into the fucking huge hole in the wall, but no matter how much protection you have. Layers of Kevlar and leather and air filtration, it never fucking matters. Your gut kicks and your nerves will fire and shit, you’re in the fucking moment alright.

“Move, move, move!” Rhamshot’s fucking screaming at us and I’m hammering through the hole and my breathing’s heavy through the gasmask and my sight’s blurred by the smoke and debris and bullets fucking zip past me as I switch on my heat-vision to see where they’re coming from through all the fucking chaos.

“Acquisition located,” her voice comes through, calm, a fucking stream on a summer’s day. The specialist. She’s found what we’re after and all I’ve got to do is sit tight and make sure she doesn’t die. I good at that, I can shoot people and blow shit up, no problem.

“240 seconds until continuum-transfunction, parallel shift immanent thereafter. Hold tight.”

Three minutes, don’t die. Don’t let her die. Bullets, lots of fucking bullets. Kill a man, kill a woman, doesn’t matter, just a job, they’re protecting whatever the fuck it is the specialist is here to heist, she’s got her job, I’ve got mine.

“INCOMING!” Rhamshot rattles through the comms-link and I dive and the RPG hammers into the wall next to me, blasting it open and of course fucking of course, it’s an outer wall. 1,000ft or so high in this skyscraper and you blow a hole in a wall like that and all of a sudden there’s a lot less smoke and soot and teargas in the air. Sucked straight out until the air-pressure quickly equalises and I switch my HUD back to normal vision and there’s bodies fucking everywhere and I let out a little smile before taking the pistol from my pocket and making double sure that none of them are going to get back up and try to pop off another RPG.

“Parallel shift in three,” Oh shit. “Two.” Here it comes. “One. Mark.” The specialist says, tranquil as a fucking Hindu cow and rip. Straight through time and space, a blink, a twitch, next thing I’m on my hands and knees back in the hide-out puking and trying to pull off my fucking gas-mask before I choke on my own vomit.

“Pull yourself together,” Rhamshot says as he walks passed.

“Asshole.”

“Just another day in the office, kid.”

I stand and wipe the water from my eyes and the sick from my mouth and sweat and soot from my forehead and she’s there. The Specialist. Black leather, high-heals, not a fucking thing has touched her. Of course fucking of course.

I smile, I wonder what the next job will be…