Detour to Apocalypse: A Rot Rods Serial, Part One (5 page)

“I’m afraid Dr. Bolton’s staying put,” Roscoe grumbled.

Mars smiled at Roscoe. “You don’t know what we are trying to accomplish. You do not know what we will bring about.”

“I don’t care.”

“No, dead man―you care.” Too late, Roscoe noticed Mars’ hands tighten on the pointed crystal skewer that served as his walking stick. “Because I am going to give you exactly what it is you really want. I am going to give you total and eternal war.”

He swung the spire up and plunged it into Roscoe’s chest with impossible speed. Roscoe didn’t have a chance to fire. He gagged as the staff stabbed through him and exited between his shoulder blades. He stumbled back, breath coming involuntarily into his lungs. They inflated and closed, pushing out dead air that he didn’t need. He stumbled and sank down to his knees. Roscoe glanced up, staring into the cold eyes of Townsend Mars.

The cult leader patted Roscoe’s head. “War, my son. Soon.” He kicked Roscoe and knocked him down.

Roscoe struck the cement. The crystal remained wedged inside him, fused into his skin, pinning him to the ground. Betty and Angel shouted his name, but they sounded far away. He kept breathing and his eyes closed. Everything became fuzzy and indistinct.

Roscoe slipped away.

He fell into the memories of the man he once was. These flashbacks were nothing new, Roscoe had learned sometime last year, after old faces from the past had come back to try and take over La Cruz. But now, he lived them again. He was Carmine Vitale, a Sicilian-born hood with an aptitude for motors and murder. He’d come to America as a kid, grew up a punk, and ran errands for hoodlums in Boyle Heights and Bunker Hill until he got pinched and went to fight the war in Sicily. After killing Nazis and fascist Italians for a year or two, the military let him go and he became a full time button man. Vitale would never have stopped―if he hadn’t fallen in love with the Don’s wife. They made a plan to steal her husband’s money and split. He just had to do one more job.

It was a hit on a small time gambler who owed too much money and needed to be turned into an example. But the gambler’s mother was a fortuneteller, a
strega
from the Old Country. Carmine killed her son in front of her and she cursed him―making his body as dead as his soul. The next day, he got another job in La Cruz. Two of the don’s torpedoes took him there. That’s when he realized that the Don had found out the truth about his wife and his top shooter. He was the target now. He pulled a weapon, but the torpedoes gunned him down and left him in a ditch on the road. Carmine died with their last words ringing in his ears: “He’s got a roscoe!” Hours later, Roscoe found himself awake, and shambled down the road until Angel crashed into him. The Captain had taken him in. He’d worked with them ever since.

Roscoe didn’t like to remember his old life. All of his villainies―his sadism, his rage, his love of carnage―came floating back and infected him once again. Roscoe considered himself his own person, free of Carmine Vitale and the past. He hated being reminded that wasn’t true. But the crystal staff did its job. Roscoe drifted through the memories until he found the pure and endless sleep that had been denied to him earlier.

When consciousness finally came, Roscoe found himself lying on his bed in his room. His strength seeped back, and when he looked to the nightstand, he found a thick submarine sandwich and a bottle of Coke waiting for him. He glanced down at his chest. Someone had removed his shirt and tied a set of clean bandages over the wound. Roscoe gave them a pat. He could feel the gaping hole in his chest, but it wasn’t particularly bad. He grabbed the sandwich and gobbled it down before he stood and got dressed. A quick glance at the window revealed that it was morning, but he didn’t know how long he had been out. Roscoe slid on his leather jacket and licked mustard from his fingers, then hit the stairs and went to check up on his friends.

As he expected, they were in the kitchen, along with Major Raskin and Special Agent Pruitt. The Captain sat at the end of the table with a map of the surrounding area. Felix stood next to him, looking it over. Wooster grilled eggs, while Betty and Angel flipped through a set of thick door-stopper books. They had bandaged their wounds from the battle outside the sheriff’s office. Snowball sat on his cushioned bed in the corner, biting a Milk-Bone nearly in half. All of them looked up when Roscoe walked in.

Angel hurried to Roscoe’s side. “How you doing, man? All recovered?”

“It was nothing,” Roscoe said, maybe a little too quickly. He nodded to Felix. “Doesn’t hurt at all. I’ve had bigger splinters.” He sat and pointed to the counter. “You’re making eggs? I better eat a few. Scramble them and fill them up with whatever you got in this kitchen.”

“You are sure you are well, Mr. Roscoe?” Felix asked.

“Kiddo, I’m fine.” Roscoe turned to the Captain. “What’d you do with that crystal in my gut?”

“Felix analyzed it,” the Captain said. “He came to some troubling conclusions.”

“That is correct, sir,” Felix said. “The crystal is composed of no Earthly minerals. I have examined it at a microscopic level and could find no parallels with any minerals known to science. It must be extraterrestrial or supernatural in nature.”

“Extraterrestrial,” Roscoe muttered. “That doesn’t sound good.”

“There’s more,” Betty said. “I’ve been researching Sir Caleb Craul―the spirit who allegedly contacted Townsend Mars during the Great Depression. He’s a real piece of work, into necromancy, sorcery, and alchemy.” Betty patted one of the thick tomes. “According to this, Sir Caleb contacted beings that he called the offspring of demons and angels, which had been locked away under the earth. They taught him their sacred language, which supposedly gave him power over the world.” She pointed to some yellowing pamphlets sporting pentagrams and curling snake designs. “His descendant, Cassius Craul, had quite a following in London and New York during the 1920s and 30s. I think he and Mars met a few times and Craul’s writings about contacting demons might have influenced him.” She glanced up, her eyes dark behind horn-rimmed spectacles. “They certainly influenced Dr. Bolton. He frequently read Cassius Craul’s texts and might’ve attended meetings of Craul’s followers in LA.”

Angel looked up at Major Raskin. “You knew this Dr. Bolton guy was into the occult and still let him work on your rocket ships and high tech projects?”

Major Raskin shrugged. “He was an extremely gifted engineer.”

“Yes,” the Captain said. “And you’ve allowed worse men to work on your rocket ships.” He pointed to Special Agent Pruitt. “Now, I take it we’re still under contract to locate Dr. Bolton and return him to you?”

Special Agent Pruitt nodded. “Same terms as before, but don’t let him escape.”

“That weren’t our doing, G-man,” Wooster said. “In case you’re sore about it, you can―”

“Wooster.” A word from the Captain was all it took to calm him down. The Captain faced his drivers. “We’re going to find out where Mars took Dr. Bolton, and recapture him. The greater Los Angeles area seems a reasonable place to start.” He pointed to Betty and Felix. “Miss Bright, Felix, I’d like you to continue researching Sir Caleb Craul, the Crystalline Church, and what you can of Dr. Bolton’s beliefs and studies. I’m sure you can turn up more vital facts.”

“Sounds good,” Betty said. “We can go to my father’s house, have a look at his library.”

“And I’ll accompany you, Miss Bright?” Felix asked.

“Of course, honey,” Betty said.

“
Wunderbar!
” Felix clapped his hands and his face reddened when everyone stared at him. “I will prepare my materials.” He skittered away from the table, pausing only to exchange a wave with Roscoe. Snowball bounced up and pattered after him.

The Captain turned to Roscoe and Angel. “I want you two to investigate LA. Look for Dr. Bolton’s known associates and friends. Major Raskin can give you a list. Find all our allies―Morris Schlosser and Walt Weaver―and see what they can turn up. I’ll expect you back in the evening with a full report.”

“Got it,” Roscoe said. “I want Wooster to go with us, though. In a separate car, as backup.”

It wasn’t exactly a counter-order―more of a suggestion. Roscoe had been making more and more suggestions lately, and the Captain always listened to them. He nodded at this. “That’s a good idea. Wooster, procure an appropriate firearm. If they run into trouble, you’ll be the one to help them out.”

“Sounds fine to me,” Wooster said, handing Roscoe the plate of eggs.

“Thanks.” Roscoe grabbed a fork. “I’ll go outside and get the cars ready.” He stepped past the table and walked to the screen door, then headed to the parking lot. Their autos stood in a neat row, dented and bumped from the battle before, but still ready to roll. Roscoe gnawed on the eggs as he walked, munching on cheese, onions, peppers, sausage, and all the other ingredients Wooster had stuffed into the hastily made omelet. Heavy footsteps clicked behind him. Wooster stepped out into the sun to join him. “Good omelet.”

Wooster nodded. “My old man used to cook them on a sheet of steel―something fell off our car―over a big, roaring fire. He’d get these big old eggs he pinched from farmhouses and fry them up nice. Burned them half the time, but we didn’t mind.” Wooster stood next to Roscoe. “What happened when that Mars fellow stabbed you with the crystal?”

“I remembered,” Roscoe said. “Again. It came back to me. Carmine Vitale, my death, everything.”

“Well, Roscoe, that’s a trouble everyone has,” Wooster said. “And most of us don’t got the luxury of being dead and making all our sins part of another life.” He patted Roscoe’s shoulder. “But somehow, we manage.”

Angel exited the garage next, sliding his pistols into his shoulder holsters. He tossed Roscoe the sawed-off. “Should we take my ride, man?”

“Why not?” Roscoe nodded. “Wooster, you follow in the Packard. Don’t stay too close.” He headed for the red Cadillac, Angel at his side.

Once again, they were off on a job. This time, Roscoe didn’t think it was going to be easy.

heir first stop was Griffith Park: the big sprawl of thinning grass and fat, towering trees that formed one of the bigger swaths of municipal greenery in Los Angeles. Griffith Park offered a few amusements, clusters of picnic benches, and plenty of open ground that could be rented at a cheap price for a budget movie set. That was where Morris Schlosser―known as “Doc Schlock” to his friends and fans―went to film the outdoor scenes for his latest turkey. Angel drove his Caddie around a little, with Roscoe in the passenger seat and Wooster hanging behind in his two-tone Packard, before spotting the set. With an oversized, cardboard rocket ship jutting out of the ground like some miniature skyscraper designed by a moron, it wasn’t exactly hard to find. Angel rolled to a halt in a nearby parking lot, and he and Roscoe stepped out. Wooster parked further behind.