Chapter VIII: Street Riot
Inside the abandoned bakery that had been rebuilt into the central of the Immortal Prevention Squad, a group of six officers were around a table, intent on what late-night television was offering on a calm night. Neither of them was thirty, probably not even twenty-five. They looked fresh and childish as their eyes devoured the scene of the film.
Michael Douglas had just walked into his apartment, following a meeting with the psychologist Sharon Stone played. Jeanne Tripplehorn, his fiancée, appeared. What followed was his approach, his pushing her against the back of the sofa and a posterior round of non-missionary sex.
"I love this part." A dark-curly-haired guy who looked sixteen, if surely older, uttered.
"Films like this make you want to go to the shrink." Another, a bald African-American man added.
"Imagine getting an immie chick like Sharon for an inquiry..." A third one, bearing an evident Latin heritage, suggested.
"Yeah!" they all chanted together.
Then they heard something that killed their mood. Something they had not ever heard, and had never thought they would get to hear. The Latin guy stood up and eerily stared at the red blaze before his eyes as the emergency siren howled its way into their ears.
"Sht." One of them cursed.
"All right, people. Get ready."
Barking orders as he walked in, Eric Garfield put on his teflon coating and loaded a shotgun. He put a box of bullets inside a pocket and loaded his trusty .9 mm to then place it in the holster at his waist. Behind him, John Stern sucked a cigarette as he was through with the preparations. He scowled at the men, who were nervously preparing.
It was the first time the alarm wailed. It had been set up in case a citizen saw, or even worse, had, an incident involving immortals. However, the eternal fellows had been very careful when it came to fighting since the Water Disease. Stern could count with one hand the reports around the country on immortals being spotted while receiving a quickening. He finished his smoke and tossed the cigarette. The men were to a certain extent supposed, though not allowed, to be nervous. Even he was uneasy.
"Come on, people. We're moving!" he barked as he went towards the car he shared with his old friend and colleague Garfield. He sat behind the wheel. Garfield sat next to him and exchanged a suspicious glance with him. When the others were in their cars, he hit the gas and the car left the station.
-----
Garfield found the circumstances strange. In 1985, they had found the corpse of the Kurgan in the place where the IPS central now functioned. And now they left from there to find and behead another immortal. The scene of a crime became the starting point on their way to commit another crime. Legally authorised, but a crime nonetheless.
"What do you say, John?" he asked his friend.
"There were reports for at least 50 immortals seen near the city in the last two months. It could be anyone."
"No, you fool." Garfield chuckled bitterly. "I mean, which are our chances against whoever is there?"
Stern grimaced and shook his head. "They're kids. Mummy and Daddy's little pride out to the world to make their folks proud by getting rid of immortals. I doubt they'd manage to catch a bunch of amateur robbers."
"Sir!" The radio rattled. "The PD is calling for backup."
"Really?" Garfield replied rather pissed-off at the news. "Why do you think the alarm was on, moron?"
The radio died.
"Punks!" they cracked together, and laughed about the coincidence for a few streets. They sobered when they noticed that they were only a street from the report place. They could see some police cars parked across the street.
"Who will it be this time?" Garfield wondered aloud as Stern parked and both got off. He could see a shape in the distance, tall, glaring, sword-armed.
-----
Leaning nonchalantly on a stolen Harley Davidson that roared like a baby and clothed in black leathers, the immortal regarded the law-enforcement officers that were there because of him. Only because of him. There were three police cars and now there were three cars of the IPS, the Inevitable Pack of Shitheads. All that fuss for some mortals that had passed to the afterlife.
He kicked and hit the dead body of a bearded pauper trimmed in worn-out and smelly clothes, who still held a whisky bottle in his hands. It had all started with this one. The beggar had asked for a dime. He had refused and the beggar insisted. He delivered an uppercut on the pauper's stomach and without delay grabbed him by the head and made his neck twist until it broke. Then a pedestrian about the size of an American footballer, who was for some reason infuriated by the murder, would rush at him angrily. He dodged a downward punch and kicked hardly the intruder between the legs, in the crotch, where the man surely felt his expectancy of having children fading into nothing. A second kick, straight into the jaw, killed the man.
The NYPD had arrived by then. Less than two minutes since everything had started. A very good time, he conceded. A fat officer tried to talk him out of it, to calm down. He guffawed so loud that his voice echoed. The officer drew out his authorised gun and neared him. When he was at range, the immortal lunged at the speed of sound and snatched the gun out of the hand. The cop barely realised before being shot.
"Sir!" one that seemed to be the leader of the shitheads spoke through a megaphone, interrupting his thoughts. "Please desist."
He laughed out loud. Sir? Was not he supposed to be an abomination escaped from Hell? Whatever. That grey-haired officer had amused him. That would allow him an extra period of life. He scowled at the others. The IPS men were drawing in, forming a semicircle around him. He scrutinised them and grinned. They were kids, disguised in teflon and helmets, but kids nonetheless. Panicked green chickens that could not even hold their eyes and were easily stared down.
One of the dopes made the mistake of approaching too much and he took the chance. He pulled the lettuce by the gun and elbowed hardly against his face. The others froze in pure fear.
"Imagine all the people..." he began to sing loudly without hitting the right tune.
With those words, he fired at one of them. The bullet was aimed to the head. It crushed the helmet and a mass of red was all that could be seen then. The others retreated and hid behind the cars. He took aim at the vehicles, to shoot like he had done before with the cop's gun. But this was a shotgun. Where holes were made with the gun, it was easy to guess what would happen.
"... Resting all in peace!" he continued his heartless song. "YooOOOUUUUU!"
He fired. A police car exploded, and the debris and fire made the one next to it blow up too. The blast killed the four cops belonging to those vehicles as well as three of the shitheads that had hidden behind them.
"Hold your fire!"
The order came from behind the uprising red-and-yellow mass of fire. Someone who was next to the joker who had called him 'sir' gave it, trying to avoid the coming bloodletting. He smirked. Another one that would not bite the dust. In other times, he would have slain them all, but now, it was something gratifying to leave a couple of pitiful mortals to whine about his might. Ant these two, with few, had earned it. A pity, however. He had not been involved in a gunfight since the Wild West.
He shot and one of the IPS cars exploded. The blast hit three more shitheads hiding behind its doors fatally. Only a cop, the two soon-to-be survivors, and a red-haired dude without any helmet, greener than the grass on the other side remained. He began to tread forward, firmly, his weapon aiming. The cop remained still, though fear exuded through his pores. The lucky ones were cooler. He smirked when he focused on the red kid. His crotch had gone bluer and his legs were shaky. Poor kid, he was surely mistaking him for the fucking Terminator!
He shot at the head and the kid went redder, now looking like tomato sauce as he hit the ground. He felt a sting in his shoulder. A bullet fired by the cop. He extended his arm and fired with one hand. The cop ducked behind the car's door. But the shot was not aimed at him. The car exploded, taking the cop's life with it. As another mass of fire expanded, he approached his two favourites, who had been blown hardly to the floor by the wave of hot air just occasioned. They appeared to be sore. He pointed threateningly.
"Spread the word." He growled preternaturally. "The End of Time has arrived in New York. And no one, not even you, Irrelevant Pieces of Scum, can do anything about it."
Garfield grimaced in pain, spotting his shotgun a few steps ahead, not far, but farther than he was able to do. His arms were stiff and unable to grasp his handgun. Stern was lying with his back to the floor. His left arm, useless for anything except for shielding the light from the wind when the craving for a cigarette attacked, was shattered and it irked him hellishly. God, he indeed badly needed a cigarette now. Would this immortal light one for him? At this point, he was considering asking.
The immortal turned and hoofed past the scattered corpses. All started with a dead beggar. No, hold on a second. It went further back in time. True, that virus he had spread in the waters, which died naturally a week later. It had not worked then but it worked now. The posterior immortal slaughter had sped things and The Gathering was here and now. He would achieve the Prize and mankind would still surrender to him. He turned the bike on and made it roar a bit before riding away, cachinnating evilly as he disappeared in the horizon...
AUTHOR'S NOTE: The film the IPS are watching is, obviously, "Basic Instinct," a film I've liked for more than ten years. Of course, Kronos' song is Lennon's "Imagine," not a song or an artist I like, but the idea came after I learned that Valentine Pelka is playing him in theatre.
