PART II

(Two days earlier)

At the first purple light of dawn, they took off.

They'd been loading the doc's van with loads of his stuff from the diner for hours until every bone in their already sore bodies was aching. He'd insisted that if someone came to attack the diner, at least some of his equipment had to be saved. So now they sat squeezed in between wires and other technical equipment in their Trans Am and drove down Route Guano.

The mood in the car was pretty low. The Trans Am was crammed and for Frank sitting on the back seats, it was even tighter because Ray was lying on his back, occupying way more space than they could afford. They'd placed him there on lots of wires after carrying him from the mattress in the doc's room (which Gerard had insisted Ray should lie on).

Ray still couldn't sit upright because of his injuries, so now he was lying elongated (well, as elongated as possible under these circumstances) with his head on Frank's lap.

Frank was beyond annoyed.

He hadn't nearly fully recovered himself and he continuously le everyone know.

Gerard would have preferred to have him sit in the front seat, but that was Mikey's VIP seat and he'd claimed it, and after quite a lot of bitching, the doc had ordered them to "shut the fuck up" and get going. So now here they were, tired and squeezed in and a tad unnerved.

Gerard hit the gas. It sort of hurt to use his injured leg, but there was no way in hell he'd let anyone else drive his baby.

They were heading for a friend's lair about a hundred miles away. The sooner they got there, the better, because a) they weren't in top shape for a battle in case they'd encounter any road control squads and (more urgently) b) Frank was really getting on their nerves.

"Why does he even have all this shit?" he complained. "It's like totally crowded in here. I feel like a fucking sardine."

Gerard didn't bother to point out to his friend that there'd probably be more space if he hadn't insisted on taking his guitar with him. But Ray did. He snapped something like "Well, and whose fault is that, huh?" to which Frankie answered "If I had it my way, me and my baby would be sitting up front with enough space for both of us. But our little princess here-" he reached out and bashed Mikey's head, "- had to be a little bitch and take that seat. Right, Mikey boy?" "What'd you say?" Now Mikey turned around, obviously pissed off.

The word "fuck" was used some more and it wasn't long until the three of them had a real argument going.

Gerard was slowly approaching the point at which he'd kick all of them out and leave them in the desert when a siren interrupted their bickering. "Oh, great." he thought.

They all knew that sound by heart.

A look in the side mirror confirmed his suspicion. There were four BL/ind zone control dracs on motorbikes approaching with high speed.

Now this was just perfect, exactly what they needed: more possible damage.

At least it had got everyone to shut up.

Frankie pushed Ray's head off his lap a little harder that necessary (which Gerard bet he'd done on purpose) and pulled out his ray gun. Ray cursed loudly and tried to keep his balance as Frankie's moving shoved the stuff stored in the car towards him. With a well-practiced movement, Frank and Mikey got up and leaned out the window.

They fought without a word. Laser rays were flying around the car. The dracs were closing in, firing back. Gerard floored the gas pedal, but they were fast. One of them had caught up to them and was now driving directly behind them. He was shooting at the tires.

"Oh no, you won't!" Gerard slammed his foot into the brake. The car made quite an interesting noise (apparently it didn't like being forced to a full stop after going 200). Tires squealed and the engine roared like crazy, but the car slowed down all of a sudden.

But it was the sound of the exterminator slamming unbraked head-first into the Trans Am that made him smirk. One down, three to go.

He got angry shouts from his companions, who had been jerked forwards at his sudden stop, though. "Fuck!" exclaimed Mikey, a hand on his ribs where he had slammed hard against the dashboard. "Could you perhaps warn us before you do that?" "Sorry," he answered.

"Don't be sorry, that was fucking awesome!" came Frankie's voice from the back. He was laughing, the excitement of the battle all over his face. A low groan was Ray's only comment on the matter as he slowly hefted himself back on the seat from which he'd been launched.

Gerard looked at him in the inside mirror and was slightly startled when he saw the blood leaking through Ray's bandages. Oh, no. he hadn't thought of the possibility of their wounds opening again. The doc was going to kill him.

Right then, one of the rays hit his left side mirror and blew it away. "You fucking little -" he cried out, lost for words. How dared they harm his Trans Am? "Mikey, take the wheel." – "WHAT?" Gerard didn't wait for him to react. He let go of the wheel and joined Frank in his battle.

The wind blew around him, making his hair fly around his head like a red cloud. Frankie laughed at him. "All right!" he shouted. "Let's finish 'em off!" And they both shot like crazy.

It felt good when one drac after the other fell from their bikes.

For one moment, it seemed as if they were going to make it.

Then Mikey swerved the car to avoid a major pothole in the road and everything changed.

In the one second it took them to find their balance, the draculoid aimed at the back tire and shot. And this time, the ray hit his target. The tire blew out and Mikey immediately lost control over the car.

They were jerked forward and then tossed around as the Trans Am- driving at full speed- staggered around. Gerard grabbed the wheel, slamming his elbow into Mikey's shoulder to push him away. He jerked it violently, but the car was out of control. "Come on!" he hissed, teeth clenched together. "Slow down the car! Yelled Mikey, "Gerard! You've gotta hit the brakes!" "No!" he hollered back. "If I brake now, the car will start spinning and go off the road!" "Oh my god OH MY GOD SLOW DOWN THE CAR RIGHT NOW!" exclaimed Frankie from behind, in horror. "LOOK OUT!" cried Mikey at the same time.

Gerard looked up and saw the road was bending in front of them. They'd reached the foot of the mountain range.

And they were racing right towards a massif wall of rock.

For a second, Gerard was frozen. Then a gunshot hit the car in the back, sending a jolt through it, and snapped him out of it.

He clung to the steering wheel and turned it to right with all his strength. The car careened and roared, but he couldn't get it to change directions.

Everybody was shouting now.

Mikey yelled something in his ear while Frankie leaned forward, gesturing wildly. Gerard couldn't understand a word over the noise, and he couldn't think straight, so he started to shout, too, asking them to shut up. But his voice just blended with the others until he couldn't even hear himself anymore.

The Trans Am was now about to race off the road.

Gerard took one hand off the wheel for a second to rub off the sweat.

In that moment, Mikey kicked his leg aside and slammed his foot into the brake pedal. At the same time, Frank leaned into the front area and grabbed the wheel, violently pulling it to the side. Gerard only had the time to yell "NO!" before the car started spinning like crazy.

Colors flashed around them as the world blurred. Cables were flying around them.

The car was filled with screams. And then they were off the road, dashing through the desert, slamming into bushes and rocks. They were tossed around. Something hit Gerard's head hard, probably the neck of Frank's guitar (damn that thing).

For one horrible second, he believed the car was going to turn over.

After a few frightful heartbeats, the car slowed down. It spun around some more before finally coming to a stop.

They all sat there, frozen and unable to make a sound. Their panting and their beating hearts were the only sound. Smoke and dust were rising from the car.

Slowly, the revelation seeped through: They were still alive. It was over.

Gerard gradually turned his head towards Mikey, still unable to speak, and met his eyes. They displayed the shock he felt himself perfectly well.

It seemed like hours before somebody made a sound.

It was Frankie who broke the silence eventually. He started to laugh. Everyone stared at him.

The sound of laughter was so inappropriate that nobody knew how to react. Somehow, Ray started to laugh, too, and Gerard found himself joining them. Soon all four of them were laughing like maniacs.

Gerard leaned back into his seat and let his head rest on the seat. Here they were, sitting in a wrecked car, just having escaped death by an inch, with a killer breathing up their necks, and laughing away. What a messed-up situation.

The barrel of a white ray gun pressed against his temple shut him up real fast. He slightly turned to look at the drac holding it.

"Game over, princess," the man whispered gleefully.


More to come! I'm typing it right now- might even be up today!

Okay, I hope, the whole thing with the times isn't too confusing. This takes place after Chapter 6, the morning after the Killjoys' battle.

This whole chapter just took on a life of its own... it got too long, so I split it in two, as I did with the last Chapters of part I. Enjoy and review! :)