"Certainly, travel is more than the seeing of sights; it is a change that goes on, deep and permanent, in the ideas of living." - Miriam Beard

Chapter 18

The Bullet That Traveled Across Two States

It was an hour riding through the desert from Alamogordo to the Texas border, most of it surrounded by the White Sands Missile Range with nothing else in view for miles. Sam almost forgot how massive the military land was, covering 3,200 square miles. In their early days of working at Stallion's Gate, he had once joked with Al that the missile range was bigger than some European countries. In fact, it was bigger than Luxembourg, Liechtenstein, Malta, Monaco, San Marino, and Vatican City combined. After spending the past few days just driving around it, it certainly felt like traveling through an entire country … a very familiar country.

As Sam began to feel dizzy again, he leaned against Araceli's back. She was warm and smelled good despite the sweat from the noon sun. With her there, he felt safe, and at the same time he felt a need to protect her.

What would happen after everything was over? Could Araceli stay off the radar of those Mafia goons? Would she be hunted even after he was gone? He wanted to ask Al, but he could not start talking with Araceli right there.

"You're starting to look adorable, Sam. Quit it!" teased Al.

Sam rolled his eyes. Adorable? Well, why not! She was a lovely lady, and she was nice enough to help him escape from the Mafia. If not for her … he did not want to think about what tortures may have awaited him. She was his savior.

"Mi salvadora," he whispered with a gentle smile, hugging her a little closer.

Al pouted at this affection. He knew full well who was waiting back home for him. Granted, if he was in Sam's place, Al would be all over this bonita dama. He could hardly blame Sam for going a little gaga over those gazongas.

"I'll leave you two alone. Lunch time for me. Try to remember why you're here, Sam. Keep her safe, get her home."

Sam only glanced over as the white door slid open and Al disappeared behind it. That was home, just beyond that white door. How many times had he wished that he could step through that mysterious door and back into his real life?

But this time, he liked being right where he was.

It was just the two of them now, but Sam had no idea what to talk about. Feeling so dizzy, he did not really want to shout over the engine. An hour passed in silence. He was content holding onto her. His ear pressed against her back heard that she was humming some song he did not know. He wished she would sing aloud so he could know the words. Even if they were in Spanish, he would understand. He just wanted to hear her voice.

He looked aside and chided himself. Here she was, risking her life to help out a total stranger, and he was getting weird thoughts about her perfume and soft skin. Perhaps traveling alone for so long was getting to him. Maybe all this Leaping, always helping others, only to land in a situation where someone had to help him, put him off-guard. It felt odd, being the one some stranger helped out of their own good nature.

Odd … and enjoyable.

Finally, they began to see signs for the State border.

"Almost to Texas," Sam sighed in relief. Just another hour and Araceli would be safe. Then he had only himself to worry about and his task of crossing the perilous Mexican border.

It was sad to think about leaving her behind, but he wanted her to be safe. He wanted the Leap to be over and prayed that, once he was out of Theodore Nyt's life, he would not have to worry about this lingering pain again. He could move on to the next task, always hoping to Leap home.

This Leap got him so close … so very close!

Maybe … just maybe … the next Leap would be…

That feeling of hope was shattered by a gunshot. The bike swerved as Araceli flinched hard, but she managed to regain control.

"Are you hit?" Sam shouted in dread.

"No … I don't think so. Just scared me. Ai pendejo, is that them?"

Sam looked behind him. With the highway so empty, it was easy to see the black sedan racing up on their tail.

"Faster!" he shouted.

There was a white flash of a sliding door, and Al appeared looking like he had been running. "Sam!"

"I'm okay," he said as another gunshot fired at them.

"Sam, you have a gun in your saddlebags. You need to get it. You must protect Araceli at all costs."

"Keep driving," he ordered her. Then, with one hand holding her waist, he twisted around to the bags bulging on the sides of the motorcycle. The broken rib cracked and shot pain all through his torso. Sam cried out in agony he thought he had forgotten, but he managed to turn all the way around.

"What the hell are you doing?" Araceli yelled at his pained cry.

He could hardly breathe in this position. There was no way he could grit through the pain and answer her. He pulled out a Colt .45 and aimed behind him.

"Al," he panted, already beginning to sweat with agony. "I can't turn around to shoot."

"Okay, I'll aim for you. A little down. No, too far. Okay, to the right … more … more … down … there. Fire!"

Sam pulled the trigger. The recoil threw his badly-angled hand forward, and his elbow slammed into Araceli's back. She yelled, and the bike went out of control.

"¡Hijo de perra!" she screamed in profanity. "Warn me!"

"Sorry," Sam cringed. Now it felt like his shoulder was out of socket, and he could not hear out of his left ear. "I'm gonna shoot again. I can't stop the recoil, though."

"Just warn me," she said with a stern face, crouched down and racing the bike as fast as she could push it.

The men behind them fired three shots. One hit the bike, but it only did superficial damage. Still, the sound of those shots drove fear into Araceli. Sam felt her breathing growing erratic.

"¿Qué estoy haciendo? ¿En qué me conseguí? Tan solo quiero ir a casa." What am I doing? What did I get myself into? I only want to go home.

"Lo siento mucho. Perdóname." I'm very sorry. Forgive me. Sam said this apology with a sense of grief. It was all he could say for getting her involved in this, and yet it was not enough for endangering her life.

Al talked Sam through aiming again. Because Sam could not even twist to get a straight-on, single-handed aim, he was attempting to shoot over his left shoulder. Al knew that had got to hurt. To feel that recoil at such an odd angle…

"Firing," Sam warned Araceli. Again the recoil thrust his elbow into Araceli's back. She cussed in Spanish but kept going.

"You hit them that time," Al congratulated. It was not a good hit, nothing to slow them down, but to hit anything at all was a miracle, especially on a moving bike, shooting blindly over his shoulder like that.

Sam's left ear was deaf. Turning his head to hear out of the other ear, he listened to Al, who stared down Sam's twisted arm and kept telling him "down" and "to the right." Finally, he was lined up as well as could be hoped.

"Firing!" Sam warned, and pulled the trigger. This time, he hit Araceli in the back of the neck, and she growled Spanish profanities.

Sam heard three more return shots and felt a sting to his shoulder. He was hit! At the same time, the bike swerved out of control, slid to the side, and wiped out into the orange dust on the side of the highway.

Sam went rolling, thrown off the bike immediately, and just barely missed getting caught in the back wheel. Rocks and bramble jabbed and slashed him. Only the leather jacket kept him from getting torn up. He did not see where Araceli landed, but they were right in front of a restaurant, just over the Texas border.

Sam got up to one knee, the best he could manage. He gripped his handgun and steadied his aching wrist. He felt dizzy and shook out his head. His vision swam in bubbles of darkness. Many of his injuries had reopened in the crash, and bleeding even more was not helping his anemic numbness.

He saw the black sedan pull over and two men jump out. He fired three shots. One hit, but the man only paused to hold the wound, then kept walking forward calmly, not even rushing. They had caught their prey.

Sam fired again, but he was out of bullets. He pulled the trigger three more times before he felt panicked. He thought for sure the Colt had seven rounds. Had Theodore Nyt fired it once already? No, he remembered now … Araceli had fired on that man named Tony the Chopper. He hated to realize he had not checked the gun beforehand and reloaded.

He looked around, praying Araceli was far enough away not to be noticed. He would go with these thugs, so long as they did not touch her.

Tony, however, had not forgotten the wound. "There's the bitch who shot me."

"Leave her alone!" shouted Sam.

Then he heard another gunshot, something different, more explosive. He looked to the left. A biker gang had rushed out of the restaurant. With them was what Sam would call a cowboy, and he had a shotgun raised and ready to fire again.

"You botherin' these two?" he shouted.

The men in suits made the mistake of turning their guns on the interlopers, and in a flash the seven bikers and cowboy all opened fire. Through his dreamlike numbness, Sam saw a spray of red mist, and the two Mafia men dropped to the dry ground, riddled with bullets.

Was it over?

Sam slumped. The back of his shoulder burned, and he saw he was bleeding out the front too. Had the bullet passed straight through? He worried if it had hit Araceli.

"Araceli!" he shouted, and clambered in the direction of the skid marks over the dusty desert sand. He found the bike, and a few feet away he found Araceli twisted in a bad position. Her black tights were torn, and her leg had a badly bleeding gash. "Oh God, no!"

A man came up behind him. "We'll see to your lady friend," the old cowboy told him.

"And we'll see about your bike," one of the biker men said, already pulling the Harley upright.

"Don't worry about those two," another man told him. "I know the sheriff. Self-defense, and we got plenty of witnesses. We'll keep you two out of the story, if you want."

"Out of…? Y-Yeah," Sam realized, shaking the black spots out of his head. "Yeah, I … I don't want her to be involved in this. She has nothing to do with this. She was just helping me when I got hurt." He tried to look over to where these Good Samaritans had clustered around Araceli. "How … How is she?"

"I'm fine," Araceli said, sounding like she was just waking up. "Just hurts a bit. What happened? Are those bad men gone?"

"Bad men?" someone around them laughed. "Does that make us heroes?"

"Whelp," another person chuckled just as Sam began to black out, "you two look like you have a helluva story to tell."

"Story?" Sam mumbled.

"Sam. Sam!" Al shouted, walking through the crowd to be by his side. "Don't pass out right now, Sam. It's not safe yet. Don't you dare…"

"Lo siento … mucho…" Sam muttered as his cheek hit the gritty sand.

A/N:

Originally, Sam and Araceli ended up at the Edge of Texas Steakhouse and Saloon. I wrote the final crash scene using that restaurant, and the "cowboy" was supposed to be Mr. Bowen himself, a rancher and owner of the steakhouse. Then, while researching visual clues, I discovered that the restaurant did not open until 1997.

... damn ...

I tried to look up what was in that location, Hwy 54 on the New Mexico/Texas border, in 1995. Unfortunately, hours of researching maps and Yellow Pages from 1995 turned up nothing. The internet apparently doesn't "know all and see all." Instead of freaking out over it, I'm letting it go. It's "a restaurant" on the border. I don't even know if anything existed there in 1995, but for now, this serves my purpose. If anyone happens to know what was located on that site before the Edge of Texas Steakhouse and Saloon opened its doors, if you tell me I will praise you with songs of glory. Knowing my luck, it was all dirt and rocks.

ADDED: Since I was asked, the Spanish phrases Araceli shouts that I don't translate are various profanities.