Bones by the Wood (23 page)

“I’ll warn you now. It’s hot in the tunnel.  If you should black out we will all struggle.  Try not to.”

“We’ll do our best.”  Samuel said dryly.

“How’s it lookin’, boss?”  Chiz shouted from the hallway.

“Tighter than a nun’s pussy.  You boys’ll need to breathe in.”  Samuel called back.

Carlos swung down onto the ladder.  Samuel and Dizzy looked at each other, shrugged, and then followed him down.  He hadn’t been lying, the heat enveloped them before they’d even hit the bottom.  The tunnel that rolled out in front of them was barely high enough for them to walk through in a crouch and only wide enough to admit them in single file. For a moment, Dizzy had serious concerns that Shaggy, Scooby and Shark would fit, but he didn’t particularly want to leave them behind.  In order to make way for the men above, there was no other option; they had to set out after Carlos.

The tunnel was wired with electricity, and every thirty yards or so, a bare bulb provided an anemic circle of light.  It was almost completely airless.  The aroma of the earthen walls was saturated with the lingering smell of the sweat from all the unwashed bodies that had trod this sweltering path.   As he trudged along, Dizzy heard the muffled curses of his brothers as they encountered the tight passageway.

The tunnel seemed to go on forever.  Dizzy’s back was cramping from being stooped, and his knees were aching from the half-crouch.  He was glad he’d left his Stetson back at the clubhouse.  His hair was wringing wet and perspiration was soaking his clothes and dripping into his eyes.  He’d heard plenty of epithets from the three biggest men as they’d repeatedly knocked into the walls and ceiling of the tunnel.  A long time after he was ready for the torture to end, the light got a little brighter.  Dizzy realized it was because another bulb was close by.  He couldn’t see past Samuel and Carlos, but he did feel a whispering tickle of a cool draft of air that brushed against his face, signifying the end of the ordeal. 

The Mexican end of the tunnel was broadly similar to the Texan end.  Carlos scrambled up the ladder first, followed by Samuel and a very relieved and now somewhat claustrophobic Dizzy.  He emerged right up through a hole cut out in the bottom of a ratty trailer.  Carlos had gone directly to open the door of the trailer, and Dizzy followed him and Samuel out into the welcoming freshness of the night air.  He looked around.  The trailer appeared to be smack in the middle of a regular trailer park.  Strings of colored cheap plastic lanterns looped from trailer to trailer in a cursory effort at jolly decoration.  Skinny, mangy dogs scampered across the pathways into the shadows.

As the rest of his brothers emerged into the night, taking audibly deep breaths of the clean night air, doors to the trailers surrounding them opened and men stepped out to join them.

Carlos had obviously seen Samuel and Dizzy’s shared looks of concern.  “Don’t worry
amigos
.  These men will be fighting with us this night.”

As the last of the Priests stepped out of the trailer, several white vans, mottled with cancerous patches of rust, rumbled along the dirt road that split the rows of trailers.  As each set of doors was opened, Dizzy noted that they all had a long, low packing crate in the center of the van bed.  The members of the Priests and their new associates piled into the transports.  Once he was seated, Dizzy took a good long look at the crate in is truck, but other than a series of  numbers and letters spray painted on it in black paint, it was entirely unremarkable.

It was a mercifully short journey in the van, which seemed to have had all its suspension coils removed.  Dizzy sighed with relief when it eventually stopped, and heard several accompanying exhales from his brothers.  The doors opened, revealing that they were on a rough track at the top of a hill that was part of a range of slopes.  Set into the scrub-covered incline below them was a house that seemed to glow in its perfect whiteness.  There was a swimming pool to one side.  The water and the terraces and gardens around the villa were lit with small lights.  From this elevation, Dizzy could see the guards patrolling the property.

“This is as close as we can get,” Carlos said once they had all stepped out into the night.

“Hello, Sam.”  Dizzy spun at the sound of the new voice. Eduardo was making his way through the stunted bushes. 

Samuel and Eduardo greeted each other with their customary firm handshake.  “Eduardo, it’s good to see you.  I’m glad you’re with us.  I know you want an end to these bastards as badly as we do.”

“Indeed.  I told you I didn’t want to miss this.”

The sound of creaking and cracking wood distracted Dizzy momentarily.  Several of Carlos’ men had not yet left the vans.  They began to prize the lids off the mysterious packing crates.  Dizzy was amazed, and pleased, to see that each one contained a rocket launcher and several coordinating missiles.

Scooby was positively giddy.  “Fuckin’ hell, this is some Call of Duty shit right here!”

Dizzy watched the men assemble the weapons for some moments.  Carlos moved between the vans, checking that his men were happy with the hardware. Dizzy turned his attention back to Samuel and Eduardo as Eduardo spoke.

“The Los Perdidos are a swarm, a blight.  Tonight we cut the head off the snake.  Below us is the home of their leader, Juan Alberto.  He is at home with many of his lieutenants tonight.  We will destroy the head of their power structure in one swoop.  It will take some time to mop up the dregs, but we are prepared to handle that.  We do not have long before his patrols come looking for us, we must move quickly.”

And with that they left the relative safety of the summit for an uncharted circle of hell.

~o0o~

Several chaotic hours later, Dizzy, covered in blood that wasn’t his own
, and half deaf from the resounding rattle of automatic gunfire and the whoosh and boom of the rocket launchers, dragged his sorry carcass back into the van.  He wasn’t sure how they were going to make it back through the tunnel, let alone how they were going to ride their bikes back to Ravensbridge.  They’d have to dig deep into reserves that had been emptied by intense, close combat fighting.

Fitz’s sword had been put to good use.  The scarred man had cut an impressive figure, firing his AK with one hand and swinging the massive knife at anyone lucky, or stupid, enough to get within his reach.

Scooby and Shaggy had been the very visions of violence.  As they had waded into the firefight after the initial assault from the slope, their stature, coupled with their battle roars and their enthusiasm for the fight, had made them appear to be the stuff of legends.  Sinatra had proven himself to be an intelligent and capable combatant.  Chiz had shown his usual enthusiasm for aggression.  Cage, Ferret and Easy had all upheld the pride of the Texan charter, and Dizzy was more proud than ever before, and more confident, in the attitudes and abilities of the men that sat at his table.

Dizzy, Samuel, Fitz, Terry and Eduardo had been witness when Shark had gotten his hands on the cornered leader of the Los Perdidos.  For threatening their family, for killing his old friend and mentor, for his role in the death of Samuel’s son, Shark had perpetrated agonizing horrors upon Juan Alberto’s screaming form, and then on his mangled corpse.

On their way back up to the vans, Dizzy had asked Carlos about Juan Alberto’s family.  If this was his home, it had been inhabited tonight only by himself and members of his organization.  Dizzy had been beyond relieved that they hadn’t had to make a decision about what to do with a wife and children, but he was no less curious for that relief.  Carlos had replied that the dead man’s family was vacationing in another family home, further south.  Dizzy considered that it might well have been a lie, but chose to believe it anyway.  If the Rojas had ordered and perpetrated the death of women and children, he preferred to live in blissful ignorance of the fact.

The night had not been without its casualties for the Priests.  Tag had failed to take effective cover during a particularly intense exchange of bullets and had been killed by a shot to the thigh.  He’d bled out before anyone could reach him to drag him to safety.

Crash was injured.  The boy’s head seemed to have a magnetic pull to shit that could kill him.  Now he had a mild concussion and a scalp wound that wouldn’t stop bleeding into his eyes and which would leave another impressive scar.  The rest of their band had a catalogue of cuts, bruises and scrapes, but nothing that would tax Alex’s nursing skills too severely.

Eduardo traveled back with them, but took his leave when they reached the trailer park.  He was limping a little and favoring his left arm, having caught some of the flying debris from an explosion.  He and Samuel embraced, and Eduardo voiced his thanks to the rest of the Priests before he melted into the shadows between the trailers.  The colored lanterns had been switched off and were no longer providing their gaudy glow.

The slog through the tunnel was even more arduous than before.  They were exhausted and had had to improvise a rough sled from materials they had scavenged from the trailer park to enable them to drag Tag’s body along with them.  Dizzy and Samuel had taken the ropes, made from torn strips of sheeting, to haul their fallen brother back to his native soil.  More than once in his life in the MC, Dizzy had been exasperated with Tag’s naiveté or carelessness, but when all was said and done, they were brothers, and Dizzy mourned the loss.

There was no cursing on the return through the tunnel.  Dizzy heard the bumps and scuffs as Shark, Shaggy, Scooby and Crash cannoned off the dirt walls, but everyone was too tired to vent their frustration vocally.

Before the last man had pulled himself up into the farmhouse that hid the entrance to the tunnel in Texas, Samuel was making a call to Little Mark at the Green Pastures Funeral Home in Absolution to ask him to bring the refrigerated van to Texas to collect Tag’s body.  He called Fletch next to instruct him to follow Little Mark with transport for Tag’s and Crash’s bikes.  Carlos himself had volunteered to follow them back to Ravensbridge in one of the vans.

When they reached the diner, Dizzy was struck by the feeling of the distortion of time.  The night had been so long that it seemed as though a week had passed since they’d left their bikes in the care of the diner’s owner.  But now he was back, standing next to his Softail Fat Boy, it felt as though only minutes had passed.

It took the efforts of nearly every man still standing to haul the two heavy bikes into the van.  It was awful in its unceremonious necessity that they had to wedge Tag’s stiffening body to one side between his bike and the van wall.  Crash took the passenger seat, and Carlos waited until Samuel and Dizzy had led the convoy of bikes out onto the road before pulling out after them.

Dawn had finished breaking by the time they pulled up in front of the clubhouse.  Dizzy barely wanted to park his bike, he was happy to let it drop. The adrenaline had long since faded, leaving only a bone deep weariness.  Little Mark was still several hours away, so they pulled Tag’s now fully stiff and horribly mottled body out of the van and carried it into the clubhouse and into the Chapel where they could lay it out on the table. 

The girls were all in the main room, but only Thea and Lyla were standing as they passed with their morbid cargo.  They had to negotiate a path through the mattresses that had been inflated and made up into beds.   All the tables and chairs had been moved to the sides of the room and stacked out of the way.  No one spoke as they laid Tag reverently down.  The brothers from both charters ringed the table with heads bowed as they said their own silent prayers for the soul of their fallen brother.

Still no words were spoken as they went back out to the van to unload the bikes.  On their way back through the clubhouse, Dizzy barely noted that the other girls were all asleep.  He caught Thea’s eyes, but didn’t have the energy to make his lips twist into a smile or to even force his neck to bend his head in a nod.  All he could do was keep her concerned gaze as he passed. 

Before he left, Carlos sought out Samuel.  Dizzy was standing with him, looking without seeing as the blue of the sky increased in its vibrancy, coming fully into the day.

“Sorry for your loss,
amigos
.”

Samuel’s voice was hoarse with the dust of the road when he replied.  “Thank you.  And thank you for your help.”

“The least we could do,
ese
.  You have my condolences.”