Grand Theft Auto: Revenge
Chapter Two: Fugitives
Hughes expertly piloted the small speed boat across the open water, heading towards the boathouse Vercetti owned in Viceport. The huge, deafening explosion that had consumed the Mercedes had attracted swarms of VCPD boats and helicopters, searching in vain for survivors. There couldn't be any survivors, not after an explosion that big.
"Papa," Michael whispered brokenly again, tears streaking down his face. "Oh, Papa. . .what am I going to do?" he hid his face in his hands, sobbing. "What am I going to do?"
Hughes stopped driving the boat for a second, turning to face him. "You can start acting like a man, for one," he said coldly. "Your father would beat your ass if he saw you carrying on like that. Sit up straight!"
Immediately, Michael's posture changed. He sat up straighter and his jaw took a determined set. When that combined with the angry, hostile look in his eye, he looked chillingly like Tommy had at his age. He was still pale, but Hughes' words had treated him like a slap to the face.
"That's better," Hughes said grudgingly. "We need to get out of the city, and fast. The Forelli have probably got gunmen all over the place. They've already beheaded the Vercetti Family and now they're going to be shooting the corpse to make sure- that means they'll be taking out all your father's underbosses and even targeting his legitimate businesses."
As if illustrating his point, a report broke in over the soothing music Hughes had turned on to calm Michael down.
"This is News 7, with a special bulletin," the anchor said, his voice tinny over the small radio. "Just minutes ago, powerful real estate magnate and suspected drug baron, Thomas Vercetti, was killed along with some sixty-five other people, including his son, Michael Vercetti, when Vercetti's yacht, the Mercedes, exploded off Ocean Beach. At this time, the cause of the explosion is undetermined, but police experts suspect foul play. Not long after the explosion, fires broke out all over Vice City, appearing to have been set deliberately. All of the fires thus far have damaged or destroyed properties owned by Vercetti, including several apartment buildings, the Cherry Popper Ice Cream Factory, and his exclusive condo Downtown. Police have no leads-"
Hughes turned the report off. "See," he said to Michael. "This isn't any kind of takeover attempt. The Forelli are trying to destroy the entire empire."
"It's the only revenge they can think of," Michael said coldly. "They want to put Vice City back to what it was before my father took over- a confused, corrupted mess. All of the gangs my father kept under control will break out and start wars with each other for the pieces."
Hughes nodded. "I lived here then, right near the border of Little Havana and Little Haiti. Cubans and Haitians fighting every couple days, doing drive-bys, selling drugs. . .it's why I respected your father so much. He always kept the more. . .unpleasant. . .aspects of his business away from children and innocents. These guys, they're animals. . .Cubans, Haitians, Sharks, Columbians, biker gangs, not to mention all the drug dealers, bookies, and scumbags in it for themselves. People won't be able to walk the streets again." Hughes swallowed with difficulty. "The cops are going to be what they used to, too. Beating suspects to death, running them over, extorting bribes."
"Micky! Hughes! You're alive!" a voice called to them from Vercetti's boatyard. It was Jed Paige, the ex-Navy sailor who had been placed in charge of the boatyard and the drug-smuggling business that operated out of it. He ran down the dock to meet them, helping them moor the boat. "Christ, I saw the news, I thought you guys were dead! Come on, get in, quick. The city's gone to shit! It's pandemonium! Some big shot from Liberty's handin' out huge rewards for anyone who trashes stuff the Don owns! I just sent the boys to the front to take care of anyone looking for trouble."
"Good work," Michael said, following Hughes into the boathouse's office. "We need transportation to Escobar," he told Jed. "Bring along a few guns, we might hit some trouble. Me and Hughes need to get the hell out of here."
"You'd do well to leave too, Paige," Hughes added. "The Don's underbosses are being taken out all over the city."
"Take one of my father's boats and all the drugs you have," Michael told him. "Consider it a farewell gift."
Paige looked from the older Hughes to the younger Michael. "What do you mean, 'farewell gift,'" he asked. "I'm not going anywhere."
"Jed, Vice City is going to hell real soon and if you don't get out now, you won't get out at all. Just get one last message to boys for me, ok?" Michael looked at the older man, his eyes pleading.
Jed gave in. "Yeah, sure," he said, suddenly sounding very tired. He sank into his leather desk chair, his eyes downcast. "I can leave everybody a group voice mail on their phones."
Michael looked at him, his eyes harder than they had been that morning. "Tell them I said, 'whether you leave Vice City or try to get a peice of independent action, thanks, and good luck.'" With that, he and Hughes left the temporary safety of the boathouse, climbing into an unmarked cab (provided free of charge by Kaufman Cabs, a company incidentally owned by Vercetti). Inside the cab's glove compartment they would find two well-cared for .45 semiautomatic pistols and under the passengers seat would be secured a twelve-guage, doublebarreled shotgun and a box containing forty-five shells of number 4 buckshot. Vercetti had been big on arming all his cars and hiding caches of money and weapons throughout the city in numerous remote locations. Unfortunately, the two didn't have time to collect any of this, and would have to make do with the weapons on hand.
"You want the pistols or the shotgun?" Hughes asked.
"Shotgun," Michael answered. He had always liked shotguns. They weren't fancy weapons; you pointed them in the general direction or the target and let the spread do the rest. Even a near miss could disable or disarm a target. Plus, they hurt like hell, and Michael was feeling savage enough to want to inflict alot of pain on anyone stupid enough to try to take them.
It was a short drive to Escobar International Airport from Viceport, but the luck Michael had had throughout the day seemed to be prevailing. When Hughes (who was driving) stopped at a red light, a man dressed in the grey coveralls of a freight worker at the docks and wielding a two-by-four saw them and shouted to the crowd of identical men following him. At once, their taxi was surrounded by dock workers who apparently had an idea that the one to bring Don Forelli their heads would receive an extremely large sum of money.
The hammers, crowbars, and baseballs bats wielded by the freightmen banged off the taxi again and again, splintering the windows in no time. Hughes tried to pull away, but the mass of bodies around the car prevented him from getting more than two or three feet from his stopping spot. Michael grabbed the shotgun from under the seat and checked to make sure it was loaded. It was, thankfully. Michael took off the safety and pointed the gun at the windshield. It was already cracked so badly it was near shattering and three or four men had climbed on the hood of the car, banging the windshield with hammers.
"Get ready to run it, Ian," Michael told him, leveling the gun.
"Jesus, Micky, don't-"
"When I say so, gun it!"
"Oh, man, I'm gunna regret-"
Michael pulled the trigger, shattering the windshield and leaving ugly wounds in two of the men on the hood. He pumped the shotgun, readied it again, and fired. The hood was now clear. A third and fourth shot emptied the shotgun, but cleared a path.
"Go!"
Hughes slammed his foot on the gas, breaking free of the swarm of men around them. When he had gotten about twenty feet away, Hughes slammed on the brakes and threw the car into reverse. He ran down nearly the entire mob chasing them and waited until he had backed right back to his original spot. Braking and throwing the taxi into forward, Hughes sped off, hitting the prone mob again while they were still knocked down. Michael climbed into the backseat and used the butt of the shotgun to shatter the back window too. After reloading the shotgun, Michael pointed it out the back, ready to take out any pursuers.
It wasn't long before the first organized attempt on Michael and Hughes' lives was mounted. Fortunately, no one knew Michael was Vercetti's son.
"We've got company!" Michael yelled. From around a corner, six punks on dirtbikes began following them, gaining with every passing foot. The airport wasn't far now, and Hughes was on the phone with the hanger manager there, ordering him to prep the helicopter Vercetti used when he had to travel out of down.
"Take them out, the copter'll be waiting for us at Escobar!" Hughes yelled back.
"All right boys, get 'em! It's gotta be one of Vercetti's underbosses, he's in a Vercetti cab!" the leader of the dirtbike gang yelled, taking one hand off the handlebars to pull an Ingram Mac10 submachine gun from his sleevless denim jacket. He fired at the cab, making Michael duck instinctively. Instead of his head, the bullets splashed off of the bumper of the vehicle. They were trying to shoot out the tires and disable the cab.
Armed with the knowledge that they weren't trying to kill him, Michael popped back up, took aim at the nearest bike, and fired. The buckshot chewed up the bike's front tire like so many angry teeth and sent the punk riding it over the handlebars and into the street, where his fallen bike was struck by another biker who was also thrown from his ride.
"You'll pay for that!" the leader yelled, spraying the back of the taxi with another burst from his Mac10.
"Not on your life, asshole!" Michael called back, shooting at him. The gang leader swerved expertly, dodging the shot. Hughes twisted around for a moment and shot several times out the back. All of the shots hit the same biker directly in the face, practically causing his head to explode. Michael used the time this diversion brought him to fire again, hitting the fourth biker in the arm. While not fatal in an of itself, the wound tore the biker off his bike and into the street. It was just the leader and one more, now. Michael prepared to take another shot, but stopped to look at Hughes when he heard the roar of a bike engines.
"We're dead," Hughes said. "They've got reinforcements and the car can't take much more abuse. I'm gunna turn as sharp as I can and you're gunna jump out. Jack a car and make for the airport."
Michael's reply was cut short but the arrival of the new bikers. They weren't reinforcements at all! Michael recognized the biker in the leader immediately. It was Mitch Baker, leader of the Outcasts, a biker gang that his father had employed as strongmen. He too held a shotgun, a sawed-off, stubby model that looked wildly inaccurate and extremely powerful. Baker fired the hand cannon, taking off one of the two remaining bikers' heads. The leader turned sharply, trying to flee, but a fat biker Michael recognized as Cougar hurled a long metal chain through the air, striking the leader in the back of the head. He fell from his bike and struck the pavement hard. He moaned, tried to get up, then fell into unconsciousness. Baker waved and motioned for his bikers to fall into formation around the battered taxi. Michael waved a grateful "thank you" to the aging Vietnam vet.
When they arrived at the airport several minutes later, Michael and Hughes paused a moment to say thank you to Mitch.
"It's not problem," the tall, muscled Outcast leader said, waving a hand. "Your daddy pulled me outta some tough situations over the years, and I figured it was the least I could do. Where're you boys headed, anyway?"
"I have some contacts in San Andreas," Hughes said. "Some old Army buddies who'll help us get back on our feet."
"Then we'll back here to kill those sons of bitches who got Dad," Michael said forcefully, his jaw set.
Baker nodded. "San Andreas is a rough place," he said. "I spent some time there in the late 70's. Heard it's got even worse- lots of crack dealers and senseless killing."
Hughes nodded. "You're right, but any place is safer than here right now. Every second we stay is a risk."
"In that case, goodbye, amigos," Baker said. "Get on that copter and get out of here."
Without another word, Michael and Hughes boarded the hovering copter, not looking back. Not trusting him, Hughes kicked the pilot out and instructed him to dump the taxi in the ocean. With one more wave to Baker, the two were off, heading North.
"I thought San Andreas was west of here," Michael said to Hughes.
"We're going to Liberty City," Hughes replied. "No sense taking chances. Besides, the Forelli Family is in Liberty City."
Michael clenched his teeth in anger. "I'll kill them all," he snarled.
"Yeah, we will," Hughes said. "We will."
Fin.
