Escape From Dinosauria (Dinopocalypse Book 1) (33 page)

“Yeah?”

The kid nodded vigorously.

“Did it hurt?”

The boy lowered his leg. “I jumped two whole trashcans, almost three.”

“Playing Evel Knievel, weren’t you?”

“Oh, God,” his mother whispered.

The boy eyed her contemptuously, and then managed a wry grin.

“Did you see his last jump? Over all them Pepsi trucks?”

The boy nodded, grinning a little wider.

“Might not ever jump a bike again after that one. That’s what all the doctors on the news keep saying.”

“Bet he will,” the kid said.

“Think?”

The boy nodded, extending his wounded leg again. He pressed the pad of his thumb against the stitches. The inflamed flesh flashed white, then slowly reignited again. “I know he will.”

“What’s your name?”

“Lonny.”

“Hart Perkins.”

“Well, shake his hand.” The woman leaned back in her seat. “Say, pleased to meet you, Mr. Perkins.”

“Pleased to meet you, Mr. Perkins.”

“Once them stitches come out, you’ll have a good scar, and a good story to go with it.”

The boy looked up, squinting at Hart through one eye. “What happened to your face?”

“Lonny! That was rude.”

“No. I asked him about his scar, so he asked me about mine. That’s what you’re supposed to do.”

“Well, I don’t think that it came out quite right.”

Hart raised his right hand, and he stroked his fingertips down the path of destruction that rumpled the skin beneath his right eye to his crooked jawline. He liked the feel of it. Pebbly, yet softer than all of the other skin around it. Like a newborn baby’s skin. “Got this from being dragged through Rome behind a sixty-five Triumph Bonneville.” His fingertips slid up to a wide gash above his right eyebrow. It felt like a slot for inserting coins. “Switchblade got me here.” Tracing the disjointed bridge of his nose, he dabbed at a cleft in his lip that swept upward to meet the flare of his nostril. “Handlebars of a Ducati Scrambler, and a little bit of sixty-eight Mustang.”  

Hart’s fingertips crept over his battered face, exploring every ridge and valley. He browsed through the volumes of permanent records from a hard and violent life, as if each glyph encoded portents that he alone discerned. Hart could lose himself in his scars sometimes, just as one could become lost in an old photo album. Severed nerve endings left whole patches forever numbed. It was strange. He could feel the contours beneath his fingertips, but never their caress upon his deadened face. “But the worst one of all,” Hart said, lowering his voice to a whisper, “the one that hurt the very most,” he reached down to shuck up a pant leg, revealing a small crescent on his kneecap, “is the one I got trying to jump my bike over a bunch of trashcans when I was nine.”

The kid stared. “Are you like—Evel Knievel?”

“Yeah. Something like that.”

The plane lurched. There was that queasy feeling in the pit of Hart’s stomach caused by motion felt, but not observed. They were moving. His leg began to bounce again.

“I’m a stuntman.”

“Like, in movies?”

“And TV shows.”

“Whoa.” The kids face lit up. “Did you hear that, Mom? This guy’s a movie stuntman.”

“I heard. Wow. You can tell your dad that you met a real stuntman once we get to California. He’ll probably think that’s really neat-o.”

Hart glanced down at the woman’s lap, where her hands were casually folded. He hadn’t noticed any rings on her fingers. There weren’t any.

“I’m Heather.”

Turning back to her, he took her offered fingers into his own. They were soft and warm. When their eyes reconnected, a current of funny energy buzzed right up from their hands, through his chest, and into his brain, switching things on like a bunch of Christmas lights out of season. It was an emotion that he’d never really learned quite how to process, because it made him feel out of control, and losing control made him feel anxious. Releasing her fingers, he gave a sullen nod.

Her smile fell, just a little. She cleared her throat. “Lonny’s dad is something of a screenwriter, aspiring actor … all sorts of those Hollywood kinds of things.” She nodded, biting her lip, and shrugged. “To be honest, I’m not sure what he does, really. Lonny hasn’t seen him in two years. That’s why we’re—”

“Ladies and Gentlemen, this is your captain speaking. We’re next in line for take-off. Please fasten your seatbelts, and please remain seated until you’ve been notified that we’ve reached cruising altitude. Thank you, and enjoy your flight.”

Lonny reared up on his knees to peer over the seat in front of him.

“Weren’t you paying attention?” the woman said. “Sit down, and fasten your seatbelt.”

“Those guys up there aren’t sitting down,” the kid grumbled, dropping back into his chair. His Tarzan comic slid down onto the floor as he groped for an elusive buckle.

The first beads of sweat welled up on Hart’s brow. He was quick to wipe them away. Once a plane reached altitude, he was able to relax a little bit. It was getting up there that bothered him.

His height provided him with an unobstructed view over the tops of twenty-eight rows of oscillating heads crowned with variously styled hair. From this angle, they looked like a bunch of motorized androids programmed to swivel back and forth. Invariably, some kid was bound to peer up over the back of his seat, and try to make a game of staring at him. Hart hated that. He hated being stared at when he was feeling anxious, out of control, and just trying to avoid the spotlight. Mean-mugging a staring kid by making a scary face was a temptation, but it almost always resulted in a backfire. It only increased their fascination with him, or worse, would prompt them to tattle.  

Hart narrowed his eyes at a dark recess near the forward boarding hatch, where three, new men appeared. They turned, and began to walk single-file down the aisle. They had an official look about them. The first and the last wore matching suits, sunglasses, and black hats. The figure shuffling in between was less distinct. Slumped forward at the waist, he tottered side to side with every abbreviated step. As he swayed in and out of visibility, Hart noticed that he had a jacket draped over his clasped hands.

Hart’s brow furrowed. His gaze flicked from the strange trio to the three, empty seats in the half-row across the aisle, and slightly behind him. Row twenty-nine was always kept empty, reserved for use by the stewardesses during times of turbulence. However, there was no question in Hart’s mind where these goons were headed. They’d remained out of sight until just seconds before take-off, when there was no chance of turning the plane around.

“They said something earlier about non-routine procedures, and federal authorities,” Heather muttered, rifling through her purse. “I’ve only flown one other time, and they didn’t check our boarding passes once we’d gotten on the plane. Oh, my gosh. Here they are. I’m so glad I didn’t throw them away.”

“Hello.” A stewardess materialized beside him, causing Hart to jump involuntarily. “Would you care for any refreshments?”

“Coors.” Hart dropped the pad of his index finger to the armrest, as if there was an invisible button there that made cans of Coors appear.

The fixed, professional smile of the airline stewardess wavered, struggling to maintain perfect form as Hart revealed his imperfect face. He doubted that it would’ve much mattered what he ordered, or how politely he ordered it. She was the sort of person who was revolted by his appearance, and was unable to mask it.

Snapping out of her momentary shock, the phony smile was reactivated. “For you, ma’am?”

“Tab, thank you. Lonny?”

“What’s a Coors?”

“He’ll have a Tab, too.”

“Two Tabs and a Coors, right away.”

The turbines began to whine. Jet engines ramped up to a deafening roar. Forces gathered upon his chest, and began to press down. Skeins of Baltimore fog and ghostly airfield imagery rushed past Lonny’s window. Hart gritted his teeth, scowling over the top of the seat at the wooden face with dark glasses that showed every intent to invade Hart’s personal sanctum at the back of the plane. A white cord dangled against the side of the man’s neck. It stretched from beneath his collar to his ear. Above the howling turbines, Hart could hear the ring of what sounded like chains against metal shackles.

“Unbelievable,” he whispered.

They’d pulled a fast one. A real dirty trick. Kept them stowed in the cabin until the point of no return to avoid a big fuss from the passengers. U.S. Marshals, FBI, CIA, or worse, whoever these G-men were, their exact affiliation was of less concern to Hart than whatever atrocities the man in their custody might’ve committed that required him to be transported across the country on a commercial airliner.

Hart glanced over at Heather and Lonny. Both of their smiling faces were pressed to the small window, awing over the terrifying speeds at which ordinary scenery could rocket by. Hart’s gaze fell to the dark crescent on the boy’s knee, and he felt strangely ill. During take-off, the same injury that had intrigued him just minutes ago was now a stark reminder that human beings were fragile creatures. Flesh tore. Blood sprayed. Bodies at high speeds flew right to pieces.

Fear of injury and death was not an unfamiliar sensation. Hart embraced those purest of emotions on a pretty regular basis. Although stunts could sometimes go awry, there was always that illusion of control, because the inherent danger was carefully planned. Control was key. Fear could be just as manageable as a predetermined rate of speed, an angle of approach, the timing of a charge placed in a precise location. He supposed that his obsession to control utter chaos was what compelled him to become an emotional masochist, forever diddling with that entropy he feared. However, on a plane there was no control.

As the trio shuffled by, Hart kept his eyes locked forward. Assuming a sort of trance during take-offs and landings was one of his techniques. He would focus his eyes on the most distant part of the plane until the nauseating hot flashes passed over him. Dozens of heads swiveled around in their seats to stare at the newcomers while the feds secured their prisoner between them in the middle seat. Hart could hear them rustling around, but he didn’t turn his head. He just closed his eyes. It felt like the whole planeload was staring back at him. Beads of sweat cut cold trails down Hart’s ribcage. He just breathed in and out until a familiar numbing sensation displaced the nausea, leaving his skin chilled, and his lips tingling. The airsickness released its terrible hold, for the time being. Sometimes, it was just one wave of nausea, and other times it was two or three, depending on the severity of the turbulence. Alcohol, when available, really helped to take the edge off. Where was that Coors?

With a jolting bump, tires left pavement. The nose of the Boeing 707 lilted skyward, and they were off. The plane wavered in the new stream of air, climbing steadily, as landing gears groaned into retraction. He hated this part so much. Always felt like the slightest puff of air could tip a wing to some disastrous angle, swatting an airliner right out of the sky, and back down to earth like a hawk-struck pigeon.

Another hot flash swept over him, soaking his skin with perspiration. Don’t get sick. Please don’t get sick. Hart squeezed his eyes shut, trying not to dwell on the fact that he was no longer in control of a single thing in his world. He tried to ignore the rasp of chains through steel manacles, the snap of locks, the grumbling of federal goons an arm’s reach back and to his left. Even when everything went smoothly, flying was a horrible experience. The added stress of the unusual situation behind him was about enough to send him over the edge.

“Mom, look how tiny everything is down there.”

“Say, bye-bye, Baltimore.”

“Bye, Baltimore.”

Hart’s eyes flicked open. Both of his hands were clamped like a couple of crocodiles onto the ends of the armrests. He forced himself to relax his grip, to lift one quavering arm to wipe what felt like about a pint of sweat off his face against his denim sleeve. He exhaled through pursed lips, and blinked his eyes.

“Sir?”

Hart cranked his head around in the direction of the female voice emanating from the galley. His hand was already cupped in a receptive gesture, ready to receive his cold beer. The flight attendant stepped forward, pointing her finger in the direction of someone further up the aisle.

“Sir, you need to take your seat,” she said.

No beer.

While his head was turned in that direction, Hart stole a quick peek at the occupants of row twenty-nine. Flanked on either side by his handlers, the shackled man was slumped facedown over his knees. The position was not one he’d assumed by choice. The feds each held fistfuls of his collar. They were stiff-arming his head down into the well. Looked pretty uncomfortable. Hart could hear the man’s labored breaths, the phlegm bubbling inside his lungs. Nylon straps were cinched around the back of the prisoner’s shaved head, securing some strange device to his face. That’s when Hart noticed the worst scar that he’d ever seen.

A deep channel haloed the captive’s crown. Crimped at regular intervals with surgical staples, it looked like a hot zipper of red flesh hewn above his ears and eyebrows, encircling the circumference of his head. The wound burned an indignant shade of crimson, and it glistened with antiseptic ointment. It looked pretty fresh. The rude path of the incision gave the impression that the top of his head had hastily been removed, as one might pop the lid off a cookie jar, and had been stapled back into place.