The Savage(61)
Before Cotto realized what had transpired, the Sheldon girl had foot-stomped one of Cotto’s men, pulled his pistol free, shot him in the gut, his tone belled as he dropped to his knees. Turning, another man took a bullet to the leg from the first man’s pistol, compliments of the Sheldon girl as she’d seen her window of opportunity to escape. Seized it. A third man pressed the butt of his AK-47 to his shoulder. Cotto shouted, “Do not shoot!” And he forearmed the man’s rifle to the ground, watched the Sheldon girl take to the thigh-high weeds and foliage of field until her frame disappeared into the camouflage of barked ash and pollen, the opposite direction of Dorn. Turning to Sergio, he told him, “You and the others, search the area for provisions. Radio Ernesto, tell him to keep up the search-and-destroy, keep the heat in the bush till he finds the man known as Chainsaw Angus.”
“And you?”
“As I do every day, I’m putting what my father taught me to use. I’ve my radio, will check back with details. This Dorn will be of great use and the girl will find him much easier, as she knows the land and its ways.” Then Cotto took to the field to track the female known as Sheldon.
ANGUS
Muscles burned and tendons ached to reach that place so few ever arrived and even fewer held on to. Fists tanned ribs like mortar fire, fingers dug into the soft spots of tissue like carbine piercing wood, sounding off as if a hollow tanker being filled with ball bearings. Fu had conditioned Angus, over and over. Callousing his frame.
Sleep for Angus was blades threading lines across foreheads. Scalps ripped away. The sloth of men yelling, being christened for their wrongs of sin. Nightmares, they churned in his mind similar to the earth that became clumped and heated with decay ladling in brain grease.
For the most part Fu became like a father to Angus. Even with the rigors of training that delivered heated hands and feet, pulsing and swelled. The meanings of his conditioning unknown to him over those first passing months until all the bad occurred.
Fu would repeat how he was preparing Angus. Who questioned in return, Prepare me for what? But when the world swam in a sea of debt that could no longer be paid by the print of bills and the aid once offered no longer came to the foreign, well, by then it was too late for most. And Angus would soon understand what he was being prepared for.
Leaving Fu behind, in search of medicine, passing dwellings of the struggle, curves of smoke whisking from the surrounding wilderness, vehicles muddied by corrosion and on blocks, furniture in yards or on wilted porch stoops, Fu’s words rattling his brain, After light is banished, nourishment shall follow. Fuel will cease. Value will be something of weight. There’ll be those who rape, kill, and steal, but their ways are temporary. They’ll eventually extinct themselves as all men of the savage do when they do not make investments to the continuance of race or people.
The power had absolved and the world had tilted into an unknown mode, Angus told himself as he hung a left onto north Gethsemane Road, drove beneath the overpass of the interstate, then hung another left onto Green Valley Road. He followed the long stretch of crumbling pavement, farm pasture to the right with dead stalks, rusted fence to the left where the interstate ran west and east, but no vehicles were visible except the ones that had been abandoned, all was of the quiet.
Angus wanted rest, drove to the road’s end. Hugged the right curve that morphed to gravel; countryside sprouted up with several shack-like barns and an old house where a ’72 Chevy truck sat in what passed for a drive with ruts of earth, vegetation, and tree limbs decorating it. Pulling up behind the truck, he looked to the female. Eyes clasped. Anger ridged his mind as though just a separate passenger, a manic pugilist without boundaries.
Opening his eyes, Angus studied the house that sat off to the right, paint chipped from the wooden planks of siding; a rock walkway ran along the dead flowers where ceramic figures of dwarfs and Snow White ornamented the area, their colors just as shambled and faded as the house’s siding.
Shifting to park, Angus sat. Tired and worn.
As he pulled the rickety driver’s-side latch of the truck, the door hinge bartered for a greasing, and Angus stepped onto the property. The smell of burnt plastic heated the air. He looked at the sky above, the trees off in the distance; there were no plumes of smoke, only the scent. As he started to approach the screen door, tension replaced the blood that creaked through his body, feeling stronger than what he’d dealt with before a bare-knuckle fight. Unknown was if anyone resided, if he could find rest, recoup, and make plans for where and what to do. Then came the noise. The words of Hank Williams III blared from a distance behind the home. Punch. Fight. Fuck. Muffled almost, but recognized, the sound harnessed his attention.
Walking around the truck to the passenger’s side, Angus unlatched the truck’s door, reached in, and unbuckled the female, fearing to leave her unattended, fearing for her safety. Breaking her down at the waist and over his shoulder, he took her weight, walked across the yard, his pistol in one hand, his other across her ass, mashing through knee-high grass laced with twigs and leaves. Nerves panged in his belly and he’d come to a large rusted tin-sided structure, palmed open the side door. Without thinking, he entered, instead of investigating the interior for squatters, thieves, or worse. He just entered.
Inside, insects trespassed. About the floor were bones, mangled hides, the smear of fluid and animal entrails turned green and black as drained engine oil, hardened like straws amongst crushed beer cans. Flies weed-eated the air with infinity. At the far left wall, several worn leather heavy bags lined and were suspended from an overhead rafter. Squares of foam with knuckled centers hung from walls, used for punching. The back wall was adorned with an aged Nazi flag. Below it were crates upon crates honed of wood. In the area’s center, spent brass lay scattered amongst grease that spotted the dirt floor. And from behind the back wall came that tune from a radio or CD player with Hank III still jamming. Angus clasped his left hand into a fist. Over and over to lax the anxious rattle that plagued the inner workings of his frame. Held tight to the pistol in his right. Looking at the construction of the building, he studied the old six-by-six rafters, which were rough-cut, the type that was hard to sink a nail into. Counters ran along the right wall where any and all manner of tool hung, wrenches, sockets, hammers, and a jack. Tubs for cleaning with small cans of gun oil above them. And what looked to be a rusted fridge. Walking toward it, he could make out framed photos that were freezer-taped to it, they were of bruised limbs and facades of bodies that’d been beat. Teeth broken and busted within gums. Faces of men with eight-ball eyes of bruise, a scalp with locks removed, appeared like a sauced pizza dough before being cheesed and baked.