Crash
I glanced back over my shoulder to see how far behind me Krit was. I grinned, knowing no one could see it since I was wearing Zack's helmet.
Krit shifted gears and quickly drew even with me. I pushed harder, drawing slightly ahead of him again. I cut him off, hearing him swerve sharply to come up on my other side.
"Dirty trick, Ty!" he yelled at me.
He then proceeded to do the same thing to me. I swerved, just as he had done, switched to top gear and blew past him. I stopped quickly, tires skidding. I had won anyway.
I was still grinning when I pulled off the helmet and looked at Krit with a raised eyebrow as he pulled up. He shook his head, laughing.
"I hate it when you girls gang up on me." he said without any real conviction.
"Sure you do." I said, rolling my eyes.
"Alright, alright. I admit it. That's probably the most fun I've had losing." Krit said, smiling brightly at me.
Just then, Syl came running out into the street. She had been watching from on top of the building we had pulled up next to, the building we had decided would be the finish line.
"Go, Ty!" she called to me, "Krit, you owe me more money."
"Aw, come on, Syl. How about I just buy you a beer?" Krit complained.
"Bet's a bet. All the money you owe me I could buy a bar." Syl replied.
Now Krit rolled his eyes. It suddenly occurred to me that I would be really sad to see them go. Now that I had found Zack and all the problems had been straightened out, my mission was complete. Zack would undoubtedly make Krit, Syl and me relocate to new cities now. He would probably argue with Max about staying in Seattle, too. Who knew what would happen concerning Cade. I frowned thinking about this.
"What's wrong, Ty?" Krit asked, noticing my expression.
I shook my head.
"I was just thinking that this is probably the last time we're all going to be together. It's too dangerous to have six Manticore fugitives in the same place." I said, knowing that's exactly what Zack would say next time we saw him.
Krit and Syl both sobered immediately.
"You're right." Syl said sadly, "Knowing Zack, he won't care if we get a chance to socialize."
"He's trying to protect us." I said, feeling the need to defend my big brother.
"I know. But we haven't seen Max in eleven years." Syl insisted.
"And we just met you." Krit added, "And Cade."
Krit's face lit up suddenly. He looked at Syl and she seemed to know what he was thinking. She smiled and nodded.
"What?" I asked.
"Well, if this is the last time we're going to all be together we should at least have a going away party, shouldn't we?" Krit said, his mischievous smile back in place.
"Zack's not gonna like this." I warned, but couldn't help looking forward to the idea.
I was right. When we returned to base and Syl and Krit proposed a night on the town before we all relocated, Zack was furious.
"Have you lost your minds?!" he demanded, "There's six of us here and Manticore knows that. But instead of splitting up and staying free, you want to party!"
"Come on, Zack. What's one night?" Max insisted, immediately agreeing with us.
"One night is plenty of time for Manticore to come here and drag us all back." Zack growled.
He had to know he couldn't win this. Not with all of us against him.
"Zack," Cade said quietly, "I've never had the chance to have some real fun. And sadly, I don't think you have either."
Even Cade was agreeing with us. There was no way Zack could win this argument.
But he was going to try.
Zack crossed his arms across his chest and gave us all his most disapproving glare.
"I will not allow this."
"What're you gonna do? Take us all on?" Max taunted.
"If I have to." Zack replied firmly.
I'm not sure if he noticed us all slowly moving to circle him. We had decided before even approaching Zack that we would make him come with us even if we had to use force.
Max rolled her eyes at Zack.
"You're not that good, Zack. Come on, I already kicked your ass once." she said, providing our distraction.
"This is different."
Cade held up a pair of handcuffs and looked questioningly at Krit.
"Now you have to come." Syl said smugly.
Zack used some colorful expletives that I don't care to repeat.
"Do we have to gag you?" Cade threatened.
Zack glared at her.
"What about Lydecker? Are we going to leave him here to contact Manticore?" Zack demanded.
That was a good point.
"If he was going to contact Manticore, don't you think he would have done it by now?" Max returned.
"They still want me dead at Manticore, Zack." Lydecker said.
"Was anyone talking to you?" Krit snapped.
"Can't we just lock him in a room or something?" Syl asked, rolling her eyes.
"I think I have a solution." Logan spoke up from behind Max.
We all looked at him questioningly. Logan whipped out a phone and quickly dialed a number.
"Hey, Bling? I have a job for you." he said into the phone.
So we left Lydecker to be guarded by Bling. It was a temporary solution and we all knew it. We would have to come to a permanent one soon, but none of us wanted to think about that now. All we wanted to think about was having fun for one night.
So we dragged Zack outside and pushed him into the van, ignoring his protests and threats.
"You can't keep me in this van." Zack growled.
"Sure we can." Cade said, and promptly sat in his lap.
"Cade, if you do not get off me, I will..." Zack began.
"You will what?" she replied.
"Okay, now I know the boy's wack." Krit joked.
"Yeah, well, another crack like that and you'll be sleeping on the couch." Cade threatened Zack.
Krit turned to Syl in all seriousness.
"Twenty bucks."
Syl grudgingly paid up.
"I should never have left you alone with Krit and Syl." Zack muttered.
"Oh, blame us." Syl retorted.
"We're a bad influence." Max agreed, grinning back at us in the rear-view mirror.
She was driving us to some place called Crash.
"I told you he was a fun guy." Logan said from the passenger's seat.
"And I told you just wait until he gets his drink on, right Zack?" Max said.
Zack grunted and resolved himself to just look at us all with his unhappy, disapproving look. I was beginning to think that Zack must have a patent on all disapproving looks.
Zack whined, threatened, and complained the entire rest of the way there. Probably the best insult surprisingly came from Cade.
"What are you gonna cry, Zack?"
I kind of did feel sorry for Zack, but then quickly got over it. We pulled into The Crash's parking lot, Max shut off the van engine, and we all moved to pile out.
"Has anyone ever told you you make a good chair?" Cade called to Zack as she got out.
He made no response.
"Hey, that's an idea." Krit said as he exited the van, "Zack chair. Hmmm, I see one in every house this side of...of..."
Krit was cut off by Syl's slap to his head.
"Hurry up!"
"Alright," he continued climbing out, "Geez, girl's are so pushy."
"Hey!" every female in or around the van exclaimed.
Zack remained seated in the van.
"Zack, get out right now!" I shouted.
"No." he said firmly.
Cade moved in and whispered something in his ear. He grudgingly removed himself from the vehicle.
"He is whipped!" Krit said to Logan in an amused tone.
"Bad." Logan agreed.
"Logan!" Max called, hands on her hips.
"Coming!" he replied, hurrying after her.
We got a lot of weird looks when people saw the handcuffs on Zack, but none of us cared to explain.
"Zack, would you just stop." Cade sighed, "Promise you'll be a good boy."
"No."
"I'll take your handcuffs off if you promise." she offered.
"Fine." Zack grunted.
"Nope. Not good enough. I want to hear the words." Cade pressed.
Zack gave her a look that could have made a normal person burst into flames.
"I will be a good boy." he said through clenched teeth, each word a new sentence.
"Was that so hard?" Cade asked, as she took the handcuffs off.
Krit made a coughing noise that sounded surprising like the word "whipped" as we made our way into the bar.
Zack didn't reply. He looked around him at the dimly lit club. There was a pool table in one corner, a foosball table in another, a guy was doing bike tricks on the bar, and music was blaring from an unknown source.
"Sketchy!" Max called.
The guy doing bike tricks looked up and promptly fell off the bar. Max grinned.
"Oops." she said.
The woman from Jampony that had given me Logan's address hurried over when she saw Max.
"Guys, this is my home-girl, Original Cindy." Max said, "Original, these are my peeps. Zack, you know. This is Krit, Syl, Ty, and Cade."
Original Cindy smiled.
"Original Cindy pleased to meet you. Well, most of you." she said, shooting a look at Zack.
Max smiled and she, Original Cindy, and Logan walked up to the bar where the guy she had called Sketchy was just now disentangling himself from his bike.
"I'll get us some drinks." Syl offered, walking up to the bar after them, "Grab us a table or something."
Krit nodded and went to find an empty table. I followed. I smiled slightly as I overheard Zack and Cade's conversation.
"Zack, I want to learn things. Things that Manticore would never teach us. And right now, I want to learn how to dance." she said.
"Krit could show you..." Zack began.
"No. I want you to show me." she insisted, pulling him towards the spot that was cleared for dancing.
"But..." Zack protested.
"Don't tell me you don't know how."
Zack didn't answer and I could just picture him looking down at the floor and avoiding her eyes.
"Well, I guess we'll have to learn together." Cade said.
As much fun as I thought it would be to watch Zack try to learn how to dance, I forced myself not to. Zack was already mad enough at us, I didn't need to make him more angry.
Krit slid into a booth along the wall and I sat across from him. Syl came back with a pitcher of beer.
"Hey, you know what? I think I'm gonna go make a few bucks at the pool table." she said and quickly abandoned us.
"You know," Krit said, looking after her, "I think my sister has decided to set us up."
I looked after Syl, too. I was too embarrassed to look at Krit. I found myself not minding being set up.
"So you and her aren't..." I said.
"No way. I still think she has a crush on Zane." he said that last part loud enough for Syl to hear. She glared at him from across the bar, "Ever since she found him when he was relocating from L.A. Yep, she's hopelessly infatuated."
"I think she's going to hurt you."
I could feel Krit looking at me. I didn't know what to say so I poured myself a glass of beer and took a swallow. I don't normally drink beer and the taste made me choke.
"You okay?" Krit asked, leaning closer to me, concern and amusement on his face.
"You're fine. I mean, I'm fine." I stumbled, hoping he hadn't caught my mistake.
The smile didn't leave Krit's face.
I distracted myself by looking over at Zack and Cade. They had left the dance-floor and were now sitting down at the bar, some distance from Max and Logan.
"So...uh...
"What?" I asked, turning to stare at him.
"I was joking."
"Oh." I said, looking down at the table now.
"Is the table interesting?" he asked.
"Yep. Very." I said, "If you look at this little swirl here it looks like a whale."
"That's not a whale, that's a humvee." Krit replied.
"It's not a humvee. It's got a tail. What kind of humvee has a tail?"
"It's a humvee!"
"There is no way it could..."
I couldn't talk any more because Krit placed a quick kiss on my lips.
"That's a cheap way to win an argument." I managed.
"But it worked."
"Uh huh. It's a nice humvee."
***
"So. What's your name?" he asked, leaning across the bar towards me.
"I forgot." I replied stiffly.
He didn't seem to recognize that as a rebuke.
"So, you like my bike tricks?" he asked, leaning even closer to me.
"Sure. I especially liked the one where you fell off the bar in a heap." I said, scooting closer to Zack, hoping he would take the hint.
Sketchy laughed like he thought I was making a joke.
"Actually, I didn't mean to do that." he explained.
I rolled my eyes. How stupid did he think I was? Zack leaned in front of me and grabbed the collar of Sketchy's shirt. He pulled Sketchy onto the bar slightly so that he was right in his face.
"I suggest you back off." he growled.
"Sure, Sam. Whatever you say, man." he agreed quickly and Zack released him.
I heard his feet hit the ground and assumed Zack must have pulled him a good two inches off of it.
"Way to score with the hot chick, man." Sketchy said.
Zack bared his teeth at him and Sketchy moved backwards at a rapid pace. I smiled, amused at the situation, and leaned my head against Zack's shoulder.
"Not overprotective at all, are we?" I said, knowing that Zack and overprotective were almost synonyms.
"Of course." Zack said, cocking his head to rest his cheek on top of my hair.
There was a bit of a high-pitched whine that made us both jump and whirl around.
"Sorry about that." the guy who was obviously in charge of the music said before playing another song.
Zack rolled his eyes and actually laughed when he saw Krit trying to get Ty to dance.
I glanced down the bar and saw Max talking animatedly to Syl, Logan smiling as he listened. I heard something along the lines of "I heard Krit say something about Zane." from Max, but didn't care to listen in any further.
This was freedom. It had to be. I had never been happier before in my life. So what if Manticore found a way to get back together and rebuild? So what if they came after me? I had Zack. So whatever the future had planned for me...bring it on.
***
"Ty, you'll head for Omaha?" he asked, turning to me after glancing suspiciously at Krit and Syl.
"I'll head for Omaha." I nodded.
I thought to myself that I never said I would actually get there. Krit, Syl and I made arrangements to seemingly ride together, dropping off me and Syl and then letting Krit continue to Detroit. Secretly, we planned to head to Montana once we were sure that Zack wouldn't suspect.
Max and Logan started looking at each other with dreamy gazes
I wasn't the only one who was surprised by Logan's actually friendly goodbye to Zack.
Syl was happy about the money she had made hustling people at the pool table. Happy enough to put up with Sketchy hitting on her. But she would end up losing a portion of what she made to Krit the next day when Zack and Cade left together on Zack's motorcycle after seeing us off.
And Krit. Krit enjoyed embarrassing me for a good majority of the night. I don't think I'd ever blushed before, but I seemed to be doing a lot of it then. Before the night was over I managed to find enough courage to wrap my arms around his neck and kiss him. Funny how leading a mission to Manticore seemed like nothing when I was trying to find the courage to kiss Krit.
I trusted Cade now. For the most part, anyway. She had my brother's heart and for that I would always be a little mistrusting. If she ever broke his heart, I would hunt her down and kill her myself. I hoped she knew that. But as long as Zack was happy, then I was happy. She brought out a part of Zack that we had never gotten to know before. The part that didn't mind being at a party and that could smile and laugh without being afraid that he was giving away his emotions which was a weakness. Zack would never be the most forthcoming guy with his feelings, but at least now we could all tell that he was happy.
I could safely tell myself, mission complete.
End
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