Transcontinental (30 page)

As he closed the door, Ant heard a man shout. There was a gruff edge to the voice that he vaguely recognized. It sent a chill down his spine. Ant suddenly had a bad feeling he knew exactly where they were.

“Uh, Ant?” Leroy called out with a fearful tremor.

Just then, a small body was lifted and slammed against the wall of the autorack, creating a Leroy-shaped silhouette on the floor.

“You’re in for it, now,” the man growled.

Ant sprinted and leapt out of the autorack, then turned to see Leroy held up against the autorack by a brick wall of a man.
 

In an instant, Ant knew what had to happen. It was his own fault, really; he should’ve stayed up, kept watch. He could’ve seen this coming. But he didn’t. He was too busy pitying himself because Leroy didn’t want to spend time with him. It was only right that he paid the price.

“Ant! Help!” Leroy cried.

“It’s just you and me, boy,” the man Ant knew as Noah bellowed.

Ant had escaped fate once, but there was no way out this time. One can dodge one’s destiny, but never can one outrun it. His was staring him dead in the face. To his surprise, there was no room in his mind for selfish notions of running—he was consumed by a raging need to get the man’s hands off Leroy.

Ant muttered “
Khara
,” then swallowed hard and inhaled a sharp breath. “Noah!” he shouted as he let his bag fall to the ground.

Noah turned to him, teeth bared.

“How about picking on somebody your own size? Although the search would be exhaustive and may ultimately prove futile,” he shrugged.

Noah tossed Leroy to the ground like he weighed nothing.

“Do I know you?” he asked, advancing on Ant.

“Indeed you do.” Ant walked backward to draw Noah away from Leroy.

“How’s that?” Noah’s voice crunched like the ballast underfoot.

“Or at least you
would
know me, if you had been able to catch me.” As Ant retreated, he subtly motioned for Leroy to run, but the boy laid stricken, eyes wide with terror. “I was easily able to outrun you, and that was a mere decade ago.” He stepped backward, but Noah was closing the gap.

“You know, that’s ringin’ a bell. Reckon I do remember you,” he snarled.

“I bet you would,” Ant taunted. “I broke your streak!” He urged Leroy to get away, but when Leroy finally stood up, he ran toward Ant, who waved his arms furiously in objection. “I did it on purpose,” Ant continued, trying to distract Noah. “I heard
all about
Noah the bull,” he exaggerated. “Nobody gets away from Noah, they said. Well, I did.”

Ant saw Leroy grab his rucksack. Smart move. Good boy.

“You sure did,” Noah chuckled, more of a guttural heaving than a laugh. “Which is why I was first in line to apply for this baby, right here.” He drew a gun from his belt, and for a moment Ant was frozen in fear.

A single thought echoed throughout his vacant mind: so this is it.

“My streak’s been unbroken ever since. And here you are, the one that got away.” Noah smiled, each tooth rounded like a tombstone.

Ant looked from the teeth back to the gun pointed at him, and noticed it looked abnormal. It was blocky, and yellow paint banded the barrel.

“Guess I should thank you.”

Snapping out of it, Ant unconsciously pivoted on his heel and ran, trying to zig-zag his way out of getting shot, but within a few strides, he felt it. Two of them. At first they felt like bee-stings. Ant swatted at his back, but within a moment his whole body felt like it was on fire, and he flopped to the ground.

Convulsing, smelling smoke, his body seized in an awkward position, Ant felt as if his head was going to explode. He gritted his jittering teeth until the hot pain overcame him and the lights went out.

Chapter 8

Topeka, KS

The whole scene had been a blur for Leroy since the giant cop picked him up and slammed him into the train. His sight had gone white momentarily, accompanied by a sharp pain at the back of his head. He may or may not have cried out for Ant, he only knew that he’d tried. Then he’d crumpled against the ground with a
thud
.

Leroy’s vision returned as he rubbed the back of his head. In a daze, Leroy watched the cop storm toward Ant, who motioned at Leroy to get up, but his legs lacked feeling, as if there was a disconnect between them and his brain.

Ant gestured wildly at him as the two men drew further away, yet closer together. Leroy wriggled his ankle. The pain ignited anew. He could move.

He got to his feet and hobbled over to Ant’s bag, then looked up at the men, who had stopped just feet apart, facing each other. Leroy’d thought Ant was tall, but the cop was bigger in every dimension. They were talking, but Leroy couldn’t make out what they were saying. From his belt, the cop pulled a gun, and aimed it straight at Ant’s chest.

In that moment, Leroy felt true helplessness. There was absolutely nothing he could do to help this man who had helped him countless times in the past few days. With that realization came another—whether or not he
needed
Ant to make it to Tampa, Leroy
wanted
him to come. For all the stress and danger Ant had caused, he’d also been a teacher, a source of entertainment, a leader—even when Leroy hadn’t wanted it. A guardian. It was only now that Leroy began to acknowledge the bond that’d grown between them. And all it took was the threatening of Ant’s life. Great timing.

Leroy gasped as Ant turned and ran from the cop. It was over. He braced himself for the gunshot that would change everything, but instead heard a strange electrical
tck-tck-tck
, which terrified him for reasons he didn’t understand, and instantly Ant went down, convulsing and grunting and snorting and making faces Leroy hoped he’d never see again. He held his breath, watching with wide eyes, helplessness paralyzing him.

The bull stood hunched over Ant’s body, his chest heaving as he squeezed the trigger, sucking in breath after raspy breath. It looked to Leroy as if he grew with each. Then, he threw the gun to the ground, and Ant’s body went still. He clenched his fists and let out a sound halfway between a growl and a roar that made Leroy’s skin crawl, then ripped the nightstick from his belt, flipped Ant’s unconscious body over, and was upon him in one swift movement.

Leroy couldn’t speak or move, anchored by the bags and his sense of mortality. He was forced to watch the brutality waged on his friend.

The nightstick quivered in the officer’s hand as he raised it in the air, then unleashed a mighty swing upon Ant’s face, splitting the skin below his eye. “THIS is for MARTHA,” he said, the nightstick crashing down with each emphasized word, “you VAGRANT SON of a BITCH!”

The wet, dense crack of bone made Leroy want to vomit, but his stomach was empty. “Help!” he called, finding his voice. “HELP! Somebody please!”

“She was a
child
!” the cop screamed at Ant’s bloodied mess of a face. “She was my baby sister and one of you sick
fucks
took her,” he whimpered. “
Never again
!” Noah swung hard, and Ant’s nose flattened with a nauseating
crunch
.

“STOP IT!” cried Leroy, on the verge of exploding with crystallized anger and fear. The bull turned to look at him, and his heart fluttered. He searched for an escape route. To his left was a twelve foot chain link fence. With two bags and a sprained ankle, Leroy knew deciding to climb the fence would prove easier than doing it, but he had no choice.

He dashed over as ably as possible, his whole leg throbbing with each step, and started to climb, good foot first. He glanced over at the cop in time to see him take one more vicious whack at Ant’s knee with the nightstick before he stood, straightened his uniform, then charged faster than a man that large should ever be able to toward Leroy.

Halfway up the fence, Leroy struggled. Foot over foot, hand over hand, he climbed, but it seemed a hundred feet tall. He found he could shut out the pain in his ankle, but the weight of the bags, specifically Ant’s, was incredibly restrictive. He felt as if he was being pulled from behind, but he was getting there. Just a few more feet.

The bull’s heavy footsteps grew louder until he reached the base of the fence and grasped it, then shook vigorously. “Get down from there, boy!”

Leroy’s balance was thrown off just as he grabbed the top of the fence with both hands, thankful there was no barbed wire. He lifted a leg over, then swung and dropped down the other side, which he regretted as he landed hard after a long fall that jolted his legs top to bottom. He collapsed, favoring his ankle, and saw the bull glaring at him with wild eyes through the fence.

“I see you again,” the officer assured Leroy, “I
will
kill you.” Then, he pulled a walkie-talkie from his belt, put it to his mouth, and as he walked away, said “Dispatch, this is Romeo-five. Suspect apprehended in criminal trespass, resisting arrest, and assaulting an officer. Ten-twenty is Topeka Metropolitan Transport, over.” He glanced back at Leroy. “Gonna need an ambulance.”

* * *

The sun of a brand new day peeked over the skyline as Leroy sat in the dirt, overwhelmed, holding his ankle, and fervently hoping that it was Ant’s merely unconscious body that the bull nudged with his foot beyond the fence.

Emotionally, Leroy was scattered, further disoriented by a steady undercurrent of panic. He couldn’t catch his breath, he didn’t know what to do, and he felt like he was going to cry, vomit, and pass out all at once. His instinct was to find a phone and call the police, but the man who’d just beaten Ant senseless
was
a police officer. How could anybody, cop or not, get away with such a thing? He thought stuff like that only happened on TV, not real life, not like this. This was
insane
. His mind reeled.

He knew it was pathetic, but he longed for his mother. She could’ve at least scolded him till he forced himself into a better mood.
 

A distant siren stripped his self-pity like an old bandaid. Leroy labored to his feet despite the relentless ache in his ankle, then glanced at Ant’s motionless body on the ground. He couldn’t look at Ant’s face, couldn’t let it be more than a blurry red spot in his peripheral vision. It was only his face; he’d be okay, Leroy assured himself. He’d be okay.

Noah kneeled down, rolled Ant onto his side, then handcuffed him. When he let go, Ant’s body flopped over. The cop leaned on the back of the autorack, speaking into his walkie-talkie as if nothing had happened. Leroy shuddered with a burning hatred for him. He’d get what was coming.

If he was in the bull’s line of sight when the other police arrived, he was sure they’d come for him. Still, guilt bored through him at the thought of leaving Ant behind. Leroy was desperate to know if he was okay. Finding Rehema didn’t seem so important all of a sudden.

He looked for a spot far enough that he wouldn’t be seen, but close enough that he could see what happened. He trudged away from the fence, along the shore of a modest lake, which turned into the backyards of a cul-de-sac of cozy suburban homes. Across the way, a wooden picnic table divided a thicket of trees and the water. That seemed like an inconspicuous place to wait; who would question a child sitting at a picnic table? He limped over, momentarily startled by a fish near shore who’d apparently been just as startled by him, then sat down facing the rail yard. He had to peer hard through the trees, but he could see Ant’s body on the ground in the distance—a stomach-churning sight that siphoned his hope.

The ambulance finally appeared down a stretch of concrete in the yard, followed by two police cruisers. At least Ant would finally get some help. It was worrisome that he hadn’t awakened yet.

Two young men exited the ambulance and carried a stretcher as the other officers brought up the rear, each as apathetic as Noah and clearly in no hurry. Leroy could understand that; certainly not sympathize, but understand. He’d seen more than enough police procedurals to know that to them, Ant would just be another face, or lack thereof. His vision shook.

What he couldn’t abide was the casual, almost celebratory way the other officers greeted Noah: a pat on the back from one, and a finger-gun point-and-wink from his partner. It made Leroy sick. What had happened there should’ve been cause for the bull’s arrest, not Ant’s. Resisting arrest
and
assaulting a police officer. His blood boiled as the bull showed off his gun to the other officers. He wished he could run over and tell them exactly what happened, but he knew they wouldn’t listen, and if they found out who he was they’d probably arrest him, too. Ms. Stacey was sure to have reported him by now.

The EMTs removed the top of the stretcher, then edged the board under Ant and maneuvered his body onto it, keeping his head from shifting. Leroy held his face in his hands as he observed the grim process. At no point did Ant show any signs of life, though it was hard to tell from afar. The men lifted him onto the stretcher, then loaded it into the back of the ambulance. The doors shut, the siren resumed, and the vehicle made a U-turn and drove off, leaving Leroy lost and alone in a city he’d only ever known as an option on a geography test.

* * *

Leroy kept coming back to the notion that it was his fault, what’d happened to Ant. It was entirely, inescapably his fault. He was the one who couldn’t just ride with Chad. It was too dangerous, too expensive, he’d claimed. Let’s keep moving, he’d said. Well, look at what it’d gotten him. He felt dizzy.