#and i mean. whole entire hands. my hips can dislocate (see wheelchair) and with a good amount of lube and stretch i can be a butch's glove

[thatboomerkid]

PORTALS

We open weird portals to the Underworld and pull the Damned out for cash [part 1]

Hellcrashers Fiction by Nonbinary Bones

I broke open the factory door with a crowbar and entered a decrepit manufacturing plant. The soot-covered facility went bankrupt years ago and still leaked chemical waste into the “Mighty Missisip’” several decades later.

For a brief moment, the only noises were the icy wind racing over the waterfront and the soft ticking sound of the van’s engine behind me. The side panel of the van slid open.

“Sweet baby Jesus, it’s colder than a witches’ tit in a brass bra out here!” Felix exclaimed.

I nodded my agreement as a mechanized lift lowered my co-worker’s wheelchair to the ground.

Jackie hopped from the passenger seat, her military boots crunching on the wooden timbers of the boardwalk.

Sections of the greasy promenade had rotted away, revealing the polluted harbor below. The rancid waters stank of dead fish and petroleum. A huge rickety crane loomed overhead, its base squatting in the water, rusting its way towards oblivion.

Jackie opened the back of the van, rooted around, then pulled a bulletproof vest on over her tank top. She held another vest out in her grimy hand. I took it with a grateful nod.

Vasquez put The Club on the steering wheel, a sunshield on the dash, and began inspecting his gear. He may have been an OCD prick, but he knew how to plan a job.

New Kid hovered nearby, hands in his pockets.

“Hey Bitchnugget, try doing something useful for a change!” Felix jibed.

We grabbed our camping gear and entered the factory. Light filtered in through broken windows from sodium streetlamps outside. The center of the room was illuminated, but darkness clung to the corners. Conveyor belts and walkways filled the cavernous space like a real-life version of Chutes and Ladders. The air reeked of grease and metal. Rusted machinery spoke of long years of disuse.

Felix accidentally rolled right through a pile of animal droppings and cried out in disgust at getting shit in the tire treads. His shouts echoed in the gloom.

I dropped a duffel to the floor and opened it up, revealing a cache of weapons. We divvied up the contents so each of us had gas masks and guns.

“Alright everyone, huddle up.” I said. Everyone gathered in a semi-circle. “Vasquez, give us the rundown.”

“Today is a standard snatch-and-grab. Our target is named Aurora Laura.” He held up a centerfold spread ripped from an adult magazine. The lewd pose didn’t leave much to the imagination. “Real name Laura Brown. Originally from Omaha.” He squinted at the glossy pages. “Measures 34B, Waist 25, Hips 26. Likes puppies and men who aren’t afraid to show their vulnerable side.”

The New Kid blushed, Jackie snorted, and Felix grinned.

“We have reliable intel that the client’s Dearly Departed is being held in a Domain known as Hotel California. Basically, it’s worse than the worst ‘No-Tell Motel’ you’ve ever imagined; word on the street says each Dweller gets their own room, so we’re searching door to door.” He sighed.

The rest of us groaned out loud. “The floor-plan tends to change on its own, so watch out for that. This isn’t Scooby-Doo: we do not split up under any circumstances.”

“If you see something valuable on the way out, grab it. And I’m talking something portable. Smaller than a breadbox. We don’t want another incident like last time.”

Vasquez looked pointedly at Felix before continuing.

“Garrett, you’ll pop the Cherry for us.”

I nodded in response.

“We go in, acquire the target, and get the fuck out of Dodge. Any questions?” Vasquez looked at each of us with an upraised eyebrow.

New Kid raised his hand like a schoolboy.

“Why am I not surprised?” Felix asked the ceiling.

“What’s a Cherry?”

“It’s a door, Kid. A gateway Down Below Where The Bad Men Go.”

“Oh, right.” he said, blushing.

“Okay then, let’s get to it.” I said.

Past wasp’s nests and sticky linoleum floors I found a door with an “Employees Only” sign on it. The door-frame sagged, dislocated from rotted walls heavy with mildew. The door had warped over time so even though it was unlocked I almost couldn’t get it to budge. The factory door bore battle scars and boot prints from a hard fight with someone who lacked a crowbar. Someone like me. Busting open the door revealed a tiny office containing a desk, chairs, and an empty safe. Nothing worthwhile. I closed the door again.

From my backpack I took a jar of a milky yellow fluid and a barbecue basting brush. When I unscrewed the lid, a nasty rotting smell wafted out. My nose wrinkled in distaste as I began painting the door hinges in slime.

“What the Hell is that?” inquired the New Kid over my shoulder.

“Kid, Crashers never say the H-Word. Never. Not even Topside if we can avoid it. I told you this before we started.” I said.

“Aw, come on! That’s some superstitious bullshit!”

“I mean it.” I glared at him. “Watch your fucking mouth or you’ll jinx the whole Crash. Do not say the H-Word.”

“Sorry. What the heck is that?”

“Ever hear of ‘bukkake’?” I replied.

“No?”

“Then don’t worry about it.”

“Okay, but why are you doing that?”

“This particular Cherry won’t pop until the hinges have been lubed with actual body secretions. And before you ask: no, spit won’t cut it. Just be grateful the gateway doesn’t need it fresh.”

“Are they all like that?”

“No, some of them only open at midnight or you have to make a cat cry in pain. It depends on the Cherry.”

“Can I ask you a question?” the Kid asked, shuffling his feet uncertainly.

“Another one? Sure, Kid. Ask away.” I replied patiently.

“What makes a Cherry open where it does? I mean, if they can open anywhere how come a gateway doesn’t open up in the middle of Times Square? Or in a daycare?”

I paused for a long moment, considering.

“Rust and despair. Plants need water and sunshine. Mushrooms need shade and shit. Cherries need rust and despair. Simple as that.”

When I finished painting the hinges the door creaked open on its own, this time revealing a rickety wooden staircase down into darkness. Felix cracked a couple chemical glow sticks and shook them. They began glowing with a golden-green light and he tossed them through the doorway.

I grabbed the handles behind Felix’s wheelchair and edged it closer to the Cherry.

“Hey careful with the merchandise, peasant!”

“I ain’t afraid to kick a cripple downstairs.”

Felix stood up on the other side of the portal.

“What the fuck? You’re just faking?” Kid asked in an angry, disbelieving tone with eyes wide as dinner plates.

“No, Cuntpuddle.” Felix said, rolling his eyes. “My legs don’t work Topside, but they work just fine in the Nether.”

“Topside?”

“That’s just a slang term for the world we live in. Topside is the place that the Damned covet beyond all else and the rest of us take pretty much entirely for granted. Don’t know what you got ‘till it’s gone, as they say. It’s the world you see out your window, where we get born, fuck around, and die. It is what it is and for the most part it’s a pretty okay place to be. For the most part.”

“But how can he walk on the other side of the gate?”

“I don’t know Kid, but as soon as you figure it out let me know.” I said.

We turned on our lights and the five of us moved slowly downwards, footsteps echoing in the gloom.

The staircase was built out of salvaged boards, no two of which were the same; different lengths, different colors. There were fourteen steps exactly, but the topmost step was smaller than all the others and bright red. A last minute addition to avoid Unlucky 13 perhaps.

My nerves were on edge as we descended. Every little creaking step telegraphed our movements to anything lurking nearby.

At the bottom of the stairs we found a diseased and barren wasteland. The ground was black and filthy like the Athabasca oil sands of Canada. My throat and lungs ached. Noxious smoke filled the air and made breathing a chore.

I saw a hundred burning fires lighting up the distant mountains. That made me real tense. I’d watched “The Hills Have Eyes” once and the things down here would have put cannibal mutant rapists to shame.

Glancing backwards, I saw the staircase slowly disappearing like it’d never existed.

----------

In front of us, our destination was uncomfortably close. Squatting less than two hundred yards away was a dilapidated motel modeled after every circa-1940s cheaper-than-shit roadside inn on “the wrong side of the tracks” but worse. The walls had been marred by fire. A flickering red neon sign stuttered “VACANCY” into the night. On the porch was a screen door creaking back and forth on its hinges as if begging for relief. Acid rain tinkled weakly against the corrugated tin roof.

“Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the Hotel California.” I said.

Inside, we found rusted pipes leaking raw sewage and rotting the stucco. Fungal blooms spread over paper-thin plywood with the texture of rotten leaves splintering at the softest touch. Nearly every window was boarded up over the remnants of razor-sharp glass.

We searched room to room, seeing some of the sickest things you’ve never imagined. Things that can’t be unseen. It took us almost three days to find our target. I think the New Kid must have puked twenty times during that stretch.

Sleep was damn-near impossible for a variety of reasons. The moth-eaten sheets were stained yellow, constantly and consistently damp with every body fluid imaginable.

Thanks to the AC units mounted in the walls, most of the rooms were freezing cold and when I say freezing cold I mean actual people covered in actual ice. Never thought I’d see someone with their own urine frozen in an icicle hanging from their crotch.

Some of the rooms were blazing hot, literally cooking the inhabitants alive.

“Mmm! Smells like down-home cooking!” Felix quipped as he caught a whiff of scorched human flesh.

The ice machine down the hall never actually worked until you were attempting to sleep at which point it spontaneously turned on. It wouldn’t do a damn thing when you wanted it to but it would happily and loudly make the sound of a thousand blenders grinding away at a fistful of pebbles as soon as you laid down.

The first night we were camping in one of the motel rooms when the old TV in the corner suddenly turned itself on, self-tuned those old rabbit ear antennas covered in foil, and scared the ever-loving crap out of us by blasting some repugnant program at maximum volume.

The New Kid unplugged the television from the wall, but it stayed on anyway, causing him to start pounding on it angrily.

“Kid, quit making such a damn racket.” Vasquez said.

“Okay, fine.” the New Kid huffed, throwing himself down on the bed. “So here’s a question.”

“Jerkstain, your entire life is one big fucking question.” Felix quipped.

“Where do those shows come from? Is it something the Hotel made to screw with us?”

“Actually, that is a good question.” I said, busily stripping, cleaning, and reassembling my rifle. “I’m fairly certain those shows are piped in from CRT.”

“CRT?”

“It’s another Domain in the Big Bad. Except instead of a motel imagine a sewer filled with television sets and bad wiring. All the TV channels are fucked-up versions of the worst shows ever made.”

“Yeah Dickcheese, if you survive this job maybe someday you’ll get to go there!” Felix said, holding out a flask.

The Kid ignored the jibe but accepted the flask and took a swig of whiskey.

“For example?”

“Okay, you’ve seen the show ‘Survivor?’ Now imagine it’s more like the Hunger Games except the contestants hunt and eat each other to survive.”

“Jesus…”

“Trust me Kid; you really don’t want to watch anything on that boob tube. Here’s a question for you, Kid. How’d you get into this line of work?”

“Well… I dropped out of high school and started getting into trouble, hanging out with a bad crowd. One night my gang broke into a moving van and the cops spotted us. So I ran and made it into the basement of an abandoned meat packing plant. Found a door leading to a hallway made of baby teeth. The cops following me got eaten by a monster made out of tumors and barbed wire. Bought me time to get back Topside. After that, it was only a matter of time before I found more Crashers. What about you guys?”

“Back in the day I was a long-haul trucker until I went into the wrong goddamn gas station. My partner never really came out again. I found that I’d lost the use of my legs when I dragged myself out of the Pit. I figure if I keep Crashing I’ll find a way to make them work permanently.”

“How about you?”

“Me? I’m in it for the money. Cold, hard cash. This ain’t no charity; I got bills to pay. When I do a job, I expect to get paid.” I said.

“Amen to that, brother.” Jackie said, tilting a bottle in my direction with a nod. “The bigger the paycheck the better.”

“How about you Vasquez? How’d you get into this line of work?”

“I’ve been doing this my whole life, man.” Vasquez replied.

“Say what now?”

“When I was a kid, I was a refugee. My dad brought me to the U.S. from Cuba on a raft made out of old plastic barrels he lashed together. I think I was about nine, maybe ten years old at the time.”

“You’re a Cuban?”

“Cuban-American to you, gringo. I’m a Hialeah boy, born and raised. Before ‘95, if a Cubano set foot on American soil they got the chance to apply for residency status a year later. Lucky for us, we made it ashore before we got picked up on Miami Beach. Dry-Feet, they called us.”

“Dad got a job working graveyard shift at a gas station and I started going to school. I always walked down there by myself to bring Dad a soda and we’d sit and chat for a while. One night I’m going down there right before bedtime and there’s all these police out front with that yellow crime scene tape strung up across the door. The cops say that the robbers put lit matches all over him before they killed him.” He takes a long swig from the bottle.

“So Mom couldn’t afford the rent without Dad, and after that we were sleeping rough. Couch-surfing, church pews, shelters, and sidewalks.”

“My God…” Kid said.

“God? God can’t help us, man. See, Satan led his army to storm the Gates of Heaven and drove God and the angels out. The demons smashed his palace of blue-moon marble into dust and Satan sits on the Throne of Heaven. That’s why our world is so fucked up.”

“So Dad’s spirit came to me. He was bloody and there were these tiny flames burning all over his body. He told me that demons found doors to our world. That’s why the gates keep opening, man.”

“Dad told me that he was joining God’s secret army of angels to take back Heaven. He told me that I needed to learn to fight. To stay strong and smart, so I could count on myself, no one else. To fight back against evil. So I went looking for the gates. You look hard enough and long enough, eventually you find something. And I did.”

“Man… is it worth it?” the Kid asked.

“That’s not the right question.” I said.

“Huh?”

“The real question is do you censor yourself or not?”

“What do you mean?”

“Option A: you say the things you ought to, and shut your mouth on what you actually think. You wear the clothes you’re told to wear, go where they say to go when you’re told to go there, do the things they tell you to do. In return, you get the job, the girl, the two-point-five kids, a white picket fence, and a dog. You get to eat three square meals a day, get laid occasionally, and probably enough money to get you everything you need, some of what you want, and a bed to sleep in with a roof over your head. You’re a slave but you’re comfortable.”

“Option B: you get nothing. You get fuck-all and you’ll like it because you’re free. Go where you want when you want and do what you want to do when you want to do it. Comfort means fuck-all because you’ll probably get arrested, get your head kicked in, or both.”

“So my point is do whatever you want to do because I really don’t give a shit, Kid.”

We sat there silently for the rest of the night. There was really nothing more to say.

It was the second night when the New Kid decided that he actually did want to watch something on TV. Scrambled Porn Sally was pole dancing and the fuzzy static bar was right where you didn’t want it to be.

We found the Kid staring and slack-jawed, his nose touching the flickering television screen. His eyes were watering and blood trickled from one nostril.

I shook him out of it and he mumbled a quiet “thank you.” Every so often I’d catch him stealing glances at the television when he thought I wasn’t looking.

If you were still so exhausted that none of that kept you awake, the phone rang and room service cheerfully provided a complimentary wake-up call just as you were nodding off.

Then there were the cock-roaches. Behind one door we found one of the Lost covered in chittering insects. Carnivorous, angry little bastards about three inches long and sporting chitinous dicks.

The moment it was dark the cock-roaches came scuttling out to bite a hole in your skin, pump their nasty bug-dongs in the bleeding orifice, and lay eggs in your flesh. After a few minutes, the cock-roaches deposited a load of eggs and goop into the poor bastard which then burst open and made a new swarm.

Hiding in every nook and cranny, they skittered into hiding beneath the bed and in the closet when illuminated by a flashlight mounted on the barrel of an AR-15.

The New Kid squashed a couple roaches beneath his boot and the rubber sole began to sizzle. “Damn it! That burns like battery acid!” he shouted.

“Then don’t do that.” I calmly said.

On Day Three we found a Damned that swore up and down he’d seen our target. We’d bribed him with a little baggie of black tar heroin that offered a brief respite from his torment, so we felt confident the intel was solid.

We were moving through the darkened hotel hallways, guns at the ready. The Kid was on point with Vasquez watching his back. Felix and Jackie were in the middle while I was behind the squad.

“This scary-ass motel reminds me of that movie ‘Identity’ with John Cusack. You ever see that shit?”

“Is that the one where Cusack delivers a bag to a creepy motel out in the middle of nowhere?”

“Nah, man. That’s ‘The Bagman’ but it did have a creepy motel.” he said.

“Okay, so is Identity the one where Cusack has to stay in a haunted hotel room?” Jackie asked.

“No goddammit, that’s ‘1408.’ Identity is the one where there’s like a dozen people stranded at this motel in the middle of nowhere and they start getting killed one by one.”

“Okay, first of all: why does John Cusack stay in so many scary motels?”

“Typecasting?”

“And secondly, why are we talking about this while we’re standing in the scariest motel ever?”

“Third question.” I interrupted. “Do you two ever shut up?”

We entered Room 303 and finding it completely thrashed, lingered in the doorway. Mattress slashed, threadbare blankets ripped, and every stick of furniture broken. The stench in the room was overpowering. The source was easy to spot; a cadaver lay rotting amid scattered toys on the floor.

“Rock and roll.” Felix said glibly.

We slowly searched the room.

“Dude check this out!” Felix excitedly waved his latest find: a teddy bear stitched together with human skin, complete with male genitals and real eyeballs too. Just looking at it gave me the creeps.

Giggling, Felix waved the bear inches from the Kid’s face. “Come here and let me give you a big old kiss!”

“Ugh, it’s blinking at me.” Jackie said.

“You’re coming home with me little buddy!” He stuffed the doll into his backpack.

We heard a scraping sound inside a large armoire in the corner with the doors shut. Everyone went silent immediately. Vasquez pointed his gun at it.

“Come on out of there slowly, and you won’t get shot.”

There was no noise or movement of any kind in response. Felix sighed before moving very slowly towards the armoire. He pulled the door open quickly, surprising the woman crouched inside. She was covered head-to-toe with bleeding holes from the cock-roaches.

“Climb out of there slowly, with your hands up.” Vasquez said. The woman seemed to comply with Vasquez’s order, her palms open and weaponless.

The Kid hesitated for just an instant when she sprang at him. The woman grabbed his hand, pointing the gun away from herself and he fired out of reflex, the blast ringing in our ears. He tripped over the corpse on the floor, falling backwards. His head hit the floorboards, dazing him momentarily.

She straddled him, clawing his face and howling like a banshee until Jackie stepped forward and bashed the other woman upside the head with the butt of her rifle. The woman collapsed to the floor, clutching her bleeding skull.

“Oh God, don’t kill me, don’t kill me!” she sobbed as she cowered and covered her head with both arms.

“Quiet!”

The woman shut her mouth instantly, but her body visibly trembled and her eyes welled up. Occasionally, tears ran down her face, leaving twin trails on her filthy cheeks.

“Damn guys, isn’t that a little harsh? I mean, look at her. She’s scared and she’s hurt!” said the New Kid.

“Look Kid, I explained this before but let me make it perfectly clear. She isn’t a person deserving of respect and dignity. She’s a very bad person who did very bad things and ended up in a very bad place.” I said.

“Yeah, but-“

“Everyone, and I mean everyone, in the Down Below deserves to be here. No one wakes up down here for being an atheist, or being gay, or for smoking weed when you were sixteen.” I continued.

“Every single person in the Bad Place committed at least one genuine act of pure, unmitigated evil.” I counted off a list on each finger. “Rape, murder, torture. Shoot, I’ve even been on a job to collect a Wall Street banker who stole people’s retirement accounts then blew it on hookers and cocaine.”

“The point is that they did something that caused pain and suffering to others and whatever they did was enough to earn a ticket Way Down to Hadestown.” I pointed to the woman crouched and shaking on the floor. “That includes Little Miss Sunshine here.”

“You try anything like that again, and I’ll shoot your hands off. You run, I shoot your feet. Am I making myself clear?” Jackie said to our target.

“Yes.”

“Is your name Laura?”

“Yes… how…?”

Felix gripped the woman roughly by her chin and held her face up. Vasquez pulled out the centerfold and looked back and forth from one to the other.

“That’s a positive ID on the primary target.” Vasquez said.

“Great, can we get the Hell out of here now?” said the New Kid.

“Goddammit Fucktard, we told you not to say the H-Word!” Felix yelled angrily. He grabbed the Kid by the straps of his flak jacket and shoved him back against the wall.

The New Kid stammered out an apology, but we all knew the damage had already been done. By all rights, we could have abandoned him right then and there. We could have left him to die, but for the time being, we still needed another pair of hands to finish the job.

“We need to get out. Now. We have definitely overstayed our welcome. Bag her up.” I said.

Felix and Jackie grabbed the target by the arms, holding them together and Vasquez locked handcuffs to her wrists. The Kid shoved a black bag over the target’s head despite her protests.

Prize in hand, we made our way out of the motel room just as fast as we could.

----------

At long last we made it to a stretch of blacktop. Abandoned vehicles filled the road and we cautiously threaded our way around them. Each vehicle was rusted or gutted, and most of them had corpses for passengers. The Damned turned their rotting heads to watch us pass, reaching weakly out to grab us.

Dead weeds stuck up wherever they could find purchase in the cracks. We found that the road had been melted, cooled, and reformed. Several Damned had been submerged in the asphalt, arms outstretched as if surfacing from beneath a pool of black oil. Their cries were muffled but still audible. There were impressions left behind in the asphalt after it had released its prizes to the scavengers who came later.

“Hey, do you hear that?” Jackie asked.

“Hear what?” said the New Kid.

“Sounds like something scraping on metal. Listen. It’s coming from over there.”

Obscured by the tinted windows of a camper shell, something moved in the back of a rusted pickup sitting up on cinder blocks. The New Kid crept slowly up to the back of the truck and dropped the tailgate.

A sleek, obsidian hound with a human head launched itself out of the back of the truck. Its fur was black and glistening, with a body built for speed like a greyhound but with the face of a man. It opened its disjointed jaw and roared like a mountain lion, revealing rows of serrated shark teeth.

Like a heat-seeking missile, it hurtled itself at the Kid with every intention of clamping its jaws around his throat. He brought his arm up to block the hound’s attack and the beast locked its fang-filled maw around his limb.

The creature snarled, shaking the Kid like a rag doll, intent on tearing his arm off in a gout of blood. Claws tore his clothing, and the Kid screamed in pain as triangular teeth began to puncture holes in the flesh of his arm.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw a short length of wood. He scrambled for it in the dust with his left hand while the dog savaged his right arm. The New Kid finally managed to wrap his hand around the sturdy board and brought it down on the canine’s square-shaped head in a sweeping arc. There was a loud crack as the board connected, but he could’ve been smacking it with a flyswatter for all the good it did. He struck the sharkdog in its human-shaped face with the board over and over again. The New Kid tried shoving the end into the monster’s mouth to pry it open, but the beast refused to release his bleeding arm.

The moment I saw an opening I shoved my old Ka-Bar knife right into the side of its head. The beast shuddered and died, collapsing in a heap on top of the Kid. He wiped blood and gore off his face and looked up with bleary eyes.

“Told you not to use the H-Word.” I said.

We stopped beside a rusting Quonset hut for a quick break. Jackie dug around in her backpack for a pack of smokes and her lighter. Felix went to take a leak on the other side of the building.

I took a swig from my canteen. The water in the canteen had a sharp taste of iodine from the purification pills I’d dropped in: not unexpected from reclaimed water, but always tough to stomach.

Vasquez sat the package down beside the Quonset and removed her hood long enough for me to give Laura a drink of water. She gulped it down gratefully before we replaced the hood on her head.

I mentally inventoried the remaining water. We all had plastic bottles in our packs plus had the canteen on my hip. I’d read somewhere that the best place to store water was inside ourselves. While I understood that intellectually, I couldn’t help but be daunted at the prospect of making our way across the desert without any water tucked away for later.

Rations were running low too.

We were still many miles away from an exit Topside, and the Bad Place was always full of surprises.

“Hey Garrett. Got a minute?” Vasquez beckoned me over to the side of the building. “You know what I just realized?” he asked.

“That simultaneous revelations aren’t a thing?”

Vasquez leaned in to whisper in my ear. “We are now standing in the Tollway.”

“Route 666?” I asked.

He nodded. “I didn’t recognize it before because there’s no tollbooth and no signs. But one of us is going to pay the toll. You know who I mean.”

I looked over at the New Kid. He was nursing a knot on the back of his head and his face was still all scratched up from Laura’s fingernails. The New Kid removed the sopping bandage wrapped around his arm. The wound where the sharkdog had bit him was black with infected tissue.

Together, we coldly calculated his chances of survival and came up short.

The New Kid was taking a leak on the side of a rusted Quonset hut while Vasquez and I decided his fate.

Rumbling engine noises heralded the arrival of a flat-black sedan on the horizon. A vehicle of generic make and model, the police cruiser had clearly driven through “You-Know-Where” and come out on the other side.

Jackie and Felix grabbed our target and the five of us hustled behind the Quonset, hiding as quick as we could and praying we weren’t seen. The New Kid wasn’t so lucky. The dumb fuck stood there with his dick in his hands and didn’t notice the police cruiser until it was too late.

The battle-scarred vehicle came to a stop, engine idling. The dented drivers’ side door opened and a bipedal male wearing a khaki uniform emerged from the dark interior of the cab. At first glance he may even have passed for human except that every inch of skin was horribly burnt and mutilated. Steel-toed boots crunched on the gravel as he approached.

The Trooper peered at the Kid through his mirrored aviator sunglasses. One hand rested on the nightstick tucked into his belt.

Unsure what to expect, I kept my hand near my pistol just in case.

“You live around here, boy?”

“No sir. Just passing through and found the place like this.”

“I find out you’re lying to me, we’re going to have a problem, boy.”

“Understood.” Every now and then, I caught a glimpse of scarred flesh beneath his shirt.

“Alright then. Just so long as we have an understanding between us.” The Trooper looked around at the horizon almost as if he’d forgotten he was in the middle of a conversation. His gaze settled back on the Kid. “What’s your name, son?”

“My name?”

“Don’t play dumb now.”

Without warning the Trooper pulled a baton from his belt and smashed the Kid with a merciless blow. He doubled over in pain, clutching his belly.

The Trooper loomed over the Kid, lightly smacking the baton in the palm of his palm.

“Looks like you in a heap of trouble here, boy.” the Trooper said with a pronounced Southern accent. He pronounced “here” like “he-ah.”

“You look healthy, don’t have the shakes. No sir, I can tell just from lookin’ at you. You a young man, your back is strong, and you got all your parts in working order, yes sir. You got your whole life in front of you. Seems to me you’ll make a fine slave.”

“You’re gonna dig for us with your bare hands, until your skin is gone, and you dig until your finger bones are worn down to lil’ nubbins. Yessuh, and I’m gonna beat you so bad you’re gonna thank me for the privilege of diggin’.”

The Trooper raised the baton to smash the Kid over the head.

Shots rang out as I unloaded my Glock 9mm into the Trooper’s head, blasting him over and over again. Bullets shattered his aviator shades and tore holes in his khaki uniform before the Trooper fell to the ground. We ran up and Jackie fired her shotgun point-blank into the Trooper’s face before checking on the Kid.

“That seems like overkill, Jackie.” I said with a smirk.

“Overkill is nothing but a word.”

“That stick looks like lacquered hickory but felt like rebar covered in nettles.” The Kid hissed.

“Let’s get the fuck out of here. If one Trooper found us, more are on the way.” I said.

The crew hurried into the Cruiser while the target went into the trunk like a piece of luggage.

“Buckle up.”

“I don’t want to.” the New Kid pouted.

That nasally whine was the last straw. Ice water flowed through my veins. It must have showed on my face because when he saw my expression he recoiled.

“I don’t give a fuck what you want. I ain’t your brother, I ain’t your dad. Lately I ain’t even a nice person. If you don’t do what I say when I say I will knock you the fuck out and make it happen. Now buckle the fuck up.”

He buckled up.

I shifted the police cruiser into drive and stomped on the gas. Nothing happened. “No.” I stomped on it again, shouting louder each time. “No, no, no! I do not believe this horseshit!”

“Is it a Ford?” Felix joked.

Aggravated, my forehead hit the steering wheel. The Troopers were bearing down on us fast. I stomped down on the gas out of frustration and the Cruiser lurched forward. Surprised, I looked up and the vehicle died again, whiplashing our necks. “What the-?”

I closed my eyes, gripped the wheel, and stepped on the gas. The Cruiser moved forward slowly.

“Guys, you’re not going to like this.”

An hour later and my heart was still hammering in my chest and I was white-knuckling the wheel. Vasquez sat right beside me, giving me directions as I drove pedal-to-the-metal with my eyes shut tight.

Bullets pinged off our vehicle and I ducked out of reflex. I could barely hear the gunshots over the roaring engines and police sirens.

“Can’t this piece of shit go any faster?!” Jackie screamed inches from my ear. Jackie turned in her seat, firing a few potshots at the other cruiser.

Felix rooted around in the Army surplus duffel bag and pulled a homemade pipe bomb from the bottom. He lit the fuse with a cheap gas station lighter, let it cook for a moment, then lobbed it out the window at our pursuers.

His throw fell short, and the pipe bomb landed in the middle of the road.

Whether it was Luck or Fate or God deciding to finally give us a break, the second cop car drove over top of the pipe bomb, straddling it with all four tires before it went off.

The police cruiser lifted off the ground, bursting into flame and sending two Troopers screaming into oblivion.

“Keep driving, let’s get as many miles away from here as we can before this thing runs out of gas.” Vasquez instructed.

The sun was setting, and already a cold wind was sweeping down from the hills. Within an hour the temperature would drop by fifty degrees. Sleeping in the exposed cab of the police cruiser would prove to be a very uncomfortable option that night.

And the next night.

And the next.

Four of us left the New Kid hogtied and blubbering in the middle of the road. None of us said a word about it, but we all knew our offering was accepted because we found an exit Topside within an hour.

To this day, I don’t know what dragged him screaming into the desert. But the toll had to be paid.

----------

We delivered the package to a seedy film studio on the outskirts of Las Vegas, Nevada. On the soundstage was a set built out of plywood and made to look like a teen girl’s bedroom: painted pink and full of stuffed dolls. Stage lights hung from metal bars where the room’s ceiling should be, and several cameras were aimed at the bed from different angles.

We were escorted by a couple of hired goons. Low-rent thugs with chrome-played Glocks tucked in the waistband of their jeans.

Vasquez led the way past the stage lights and cameras. Jackie and I flanked the package, while Felix rolled behind with a sawed-off shotgun cradled in his lap.

“You know what the worst job here would be?” Felix asked.

“What?” I sighed.

“Janitor. Can you imagine cleaning this place every night? ‘Excuse me sir, can you lift your feet? I’m trying to mop here’.”

“Jesus, Felix.” I laughed. I couldn’t help it.

“Every night you have to clean it! You can’t imagine the smell!”

“Sure I can.” Jackie retorted. “Like a warm turtle tank probably.”

Felix chortled loudly.

Our customer was a loathsome weasel named Bob Gunkel. He was fat, slowly sliding his way to four hundred pounds. He came out of his office wearing a Hawaiian shirt with huge sweat stains under his pits. He wiped cheese puff dust off his hands, leaving long orange fingerprints on his khakis. The very sight of him made my skin crawl.

“Well? Did you bring her back to me?”

Vasquez pulled the black bag off the package’s head.

“You did it! I have to admit, I had my doubts when I heard you could bring her back but you actually did it!” Gunkel caressed her with his meaty fingers and the expression on his face looked like he was already creaming his pants. She flinched away, but we’d kept the ankle chains and handcuffs on for a reason.

“Laura, sweet Laura, I know I got carried away the last time we were together, but I promise you this time is going to be different!”

Vasquez gripped my arm before I even realized my fist was clenched.

“Sir, not to interrupt, but if you’ll just pay us our fee we’ll be on our way and leave you two alone together.”

“Of course!” He snapped his fingers and one of the goons retrieved a couple of greasy fast food sacks, handing them to Vasquez.

Vasquez checked the paper bags and the wads of cash inside. Jackie and I watched the goon squad to see if their hands moved towards their pistols.

“Are we good?” Gunkel asked.

Everyone held their breath for a moment.

“Yeah, we’re good.” Vasquez said. “Let’s move out, team.”

“You lovebirds have a real nice time now, y’hear!” Felix called on the way out.

Later that night we were sitting in a strip club called Sin Bragas working our way through our second bottle of Don Julio Blanco.

On the asphalt, neon-drenched streets of Topside, we're nothings and nobodies. Between the fast food and taxes, the bad gas station coffee and the past-due child support payments, we’re just pieces of soiled human garbage. In a world of drugs, traffic, radio, politics, smoke and mirrors, we’re little more than dirty, disposable pawns.

Yet amongst the freak show outlaws and leather-clad outcasts, the occult cabals and deranged sickos, the demon summoners, the adrenaline junkies, and conspiracy nuts who make up the heart of the Hades-diving fringe, we’re death-defying, bigger-than-life rock stars.

Every form of fame has its own form of groupies. There are women who sent marriage proposals to Ted Bundy when he was on Death Row, for God’s sake.

Most of us had a scantily-clad woman hanging on an arm or crawling in our lap. Jackie was busy showing off her new tattoo, flexing biceps as big as my head. Her upper arm shined with fresh ink depicting a sexy Devil Girl straddling a black spade with the number “13” in racecar red.

“Well, I gotta go drop the kids off at the pool. Felix said.

Vasquez rolled his eyes and jerked a thumb towards the hallway behind him. Felix rolled his wheelchair to the men’s room. I followed.

When I stepped into the men’s room Felix was pounding on the handicap stall door. “As if my life wasn’t hard enough!” Felix shouted.

I was standing at the urinal when one of the local yokels came in. I recognized him as the hillbilly at the bar telling racist jokes to the stone-faced bartender.

Now, every man knows that there are unspoken rules of men’s room etiquette. When you’re first and there are multiple urinals on the wall, you’re supposed to take the spot furthest from the door. When you come in second, you take the spot furthest from the first guy. What you don’t do, what you never, ever, ever do is stand at the urinal directly adjacent to the first man. That’s a surefire path to an ass-kicking in my book. Of course, this mullet-wearing motherfucker decided to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with me.

“You guys are Hellcrashers, aren’t you?” he asked.

I didn’t respond.

“Dude, you guys just go down to Hell, kick Satan in the balls, and rescue the souls of big-tittied single moms. Man, that’s fucking awesome. “What’s it like being a Hellcrasher, bro?”

“Ever hear the one about the guy who wouldn’t shut the fuck up with his dick in his hand?” I curtly replied without looking at him.

“Um, no?”

I reached up and grabbed the hair on the back of his head then slammed him face-first into the tile. His nose broke and he crumpled like a wet paper sack, hitting his chin on the urinal on the way down to the floor. I hosed him down with the contents of my bladder for good measure.

“That’s what it’s like.”

I was washing my hands when I heard Felix shouting.

“Hey! Can somebody toss me some toilet paper? I’m all out of shit tickets over here!”

I left the club without a word.

[minotaurman-ayjay]

Do not drink and drive

This post details the car accident that I survived.

It will be about how the accident occurred.

What happened to me (Injuries, Court).

What happened to the drunk driver (Prosecution)

and where I am, now.

TW: graphic details of car accident trauma, pictures of x-rays (when I get them). Details of out-of-body experience, and potential glimpse on the afterlife.

In 2015, I had just bought a brand new car, a black and gunmetal grey Volkswagen CC. I loved that car, and I was going to treat it like it was my baby. I bought the big, thick manual that details every part of the car so I can fix it myself if I ever need to.

I didn’t even have the car for more than 3 months.

I was at an intersection, about to go north (one way) on an entrance ramp to the highway. I saw these headlights coming toward me. I didn’t think anything of it at first until I remembered “Wait a minute, this is one way.” Before I could finish that thought, he had collided head-on with me. “Why didn’t you react earlier? You knew you were on a one-way street.” Let me tell you, even though you *know* you’re on a one-way street, to see headlights coming at you is confusing. It’s disorienting, and usually it’s way too late when you remember that YOU’RE the one going the right way, and this motherfucker is about to hit you.

He was in a huge pickup truck called a “dually”, it’s a pickup truck that has a set of two wheels in the back and has a hell of a lot of horsepower.

When he collided with me, his truck went over my car, nearly crushing me in the process. One of his tires was about 3 inches away from my face.

I was pinned under the dashboard, I had lost consciousness. I vaguely remember someone holding my hand and saying “It’s going to be okay. Just stay with me.“  I had an out-of-body experience, I saw myself getting extracted out of the car. I was pretty beat up, my face was scuffed up and bloody from the scrapes of the airbag hitting me. When I was pulled out of the car, my limbs were listless like noodles. I remember seeing my legs… My feet, in particular. Both of my ankles were dislocated, and my hip was dislocated and it looked like it was nearly coming out of my skin.

This is where my out-of-body experience ends. I briefly regained consciousness in the ambulance, I don’t remember if I had an exchange with the EMTs or anything like that, because soon I had fallen asleep again.

Then I remember waking up at this house that I had never seen before. There were people everywhere, music being blared, it looked like a party. I approached the door and my friend Evan, who had died several years before in an accident where he was killed by drunk driving, was at the door with is arms crossed.

I’ll never forget this shocked expression on his face as he asked me "What the hell are you doing here?” and I was like “What are you talking about? You invited me.” He scoffed “Like hell I did, man. Go back home. You’re not supposed to be here.” I thought he was just being an asshole, and we were always confrontational with each other… But it’s all in jest. I posted up to him and said “Fuckin make me, man.”, and then he shoved me.

The shove was so realistic, so jarring, so violent that I had fallen backwards— and then I woke up in the hospital, and according to my mother I was on my way to Radiology to get xrays when I came to. I don’t know if I caught a glimpse of some afterlife, or if I was dreaming, but it was very real. My mom knows that I almost died, and watched me fight for my life.

Anyway, they had to restrain me because the drugs that they had given me made me combative. I was taken to the hospital where my mom works, as it was the closest hospital to the accident scene. She was also on duty that day, and for her to see me like that *had* to have been traumatizing to her.

Apparently I continued to go in and out of consciousness, and when I finally came to for good, I was in the ICU.

The moment I woke up, I felt this whole body pain, like an elephant was sitting on me. Not just my chest, but my whole body felt crushed under this gigantic weight. It was so much pain that it literally felt like weight, like I had woken up on a different planet and the gravity was crushing me. I begged and begged and begged for pain relief, I couldn’t breathe. My mom put the morphine control in my hand and told me to press it. I clicked that thing probably 4 or 5 times. It probably only worked once, but by then I didn’t care. I was so divided from the pain that it didn’t matter anymore.

My mom told me what happened, and what my damage was.

1) I had brain damage and a severe concussion. I was monitored in the ICU for 3 days to make sure I didn’t have a brain bleed they couldn’t detect.  (I can’t remember the details of the brain damage). I had to relearn words, I had to relearn how to talk without stuttering or forgetting what I was saying mid-sentence, or having a word just disappear on me. This still happens from time to time.

2) My sternum had been displaced. Meaning it was fractured and pushed inward. Had my sternum been pushed in any further, I would have died. To this day, I still live with this. Because of this I cannot bind. I still cannot afford the surgery necessary to reposition my sternum.

3) My hip was so severely dislocated that it broke the acetabulum. This is the socket that cradles the ball joint in your hip. I still live with hip complications to this day. Because of this dislocation and the missing piece of acetabulum, I have degenerative osteoarthritis in my hip. I am a fall risk without a cane. I need a hip replacement, but surprise, I cannot afford the surgery.

4) Both of my ankles were dislocated and had bilatural fractures… Which means I had fractures on both sides of both ankles. One of the ankle bones was crushed beyond repair. I needed rods, plates, screws, and a bone graph. I still live with ankle complications to this day. Because of the surgeries and extensive injuries, I have degenerative osteoarthritis in my ankles. If I am to be on my feet or walking for more than an hour, I need to wear boots that are high topped to support my ankles. The drunk driver’s insurance was able to cover these surgery… However, as it became apparent over the years that I needed more surgeries and had more complications because of the MVA, it turned out that the drunk driver had changed auto insurance companies. Since America is the Greatest Country In The World™, health insurance providers DO NOT COVER INJURIES THAT ARE A RESULT FROM CAR ACCIDENTS. You have to go through the at-fault party’s Auto Insurance to get your bills paid. However, SOME health insurance companies WILL temporarily cover what is needed and will go after the at-fault party’s health insurance on your behalf.

But since this fucking shit smear changed insurance companies, I am absolutely fucked, and I can’t track him down to sue him.

5) I have damage to my eardrum. Luckily, it was not punctured by the force of the airbag hitting the right side of my face.

6) I have nerve damage in my knee (somehow? I don’t understand it, either) I can’t kneel on it. I either feel nothing (like the body part isn’t mine or something?) or excruciating pain when I try. There is no in between. Sometimes the nerve damage *itches like fuck*, but I cannot scratch it, as I will either feel nothing, or it will hurt.

7) I have nerve damage on the tops of my feet. I do not like it when my feet are touched. It causes electric shock feelings that travel to my ankle. It’s not pretty.

8) I have nerve damage in my face. I have Trigeminal Neuralgia that is secondary to trauma. Look at my “bloggy” tag to learn more about this.

9) I now have fibromyalgia. When it’s cold, or rainy, or if I’ve pushed myself too much, I will wake up the next morning feeling like I just came to in the ICU. Where I feel this full body pain that’s like an excruciating weight. Luckily, marijuana helps me with fibromyalgia and trigeminal neuralgia flare ups. I take a 2,000mg of gabapentin (spaced throughout the day) and 200mg of seroquil to manage them.

10) I have PTSD that is triggered by the smell of hot metal, the sound of circular saws, and by car accident scenes in movies. It took me forever to get over being gunshy in an intersection, and to even drive at all.

I was bedbound for 2 months, and wheelchair bound for 8 months. I was taking physical therapy and speech therapy for a year before my restitution to cover it had run out.

Needless to say, my quality of life had taken a drastic decline, compared to me pre-accident. Before the accident, I was in shape again. I was gaining muscle and I was close to meeting what I call my “healthy dad-bod” goals. I was going to go to police academy that year, but that was because I wanted to be an investigator for the Crimes Against Children Unit. I’ve had to reshape my future entirely. At the end of it all, my bills were $110,000. Luckily, I only had to pay $10,000 out of pocket, and that’s *LUCKILY*

So, what happened to the drunk driver?

The trial did not last long, he has been given 10 years probation (and straight to prison if he violates), mandatory rehabilitation, and to pay me restitution. Which had recently run out. I don’t know what has become of him, because as I said, I cannot track him down to sue him for my ongoing injuries.

If you are EVER considering driving while drunk, don’t fucking do it. Do not think you are invincible. Do not think it’s not going to happen to you. Do not think you’re not going to hurt someone. I don’t care if you are a “functioning alcoholic” or a “seasoned drinking veteran”, you WILL fuck up. This man that had hit me was 63 years old, and has probably been driving drunk for who knows how long. And once you DO fuck up, you are going to kill somebody. IF they DO manage to live through YOUR mistake, their life is changed *forever* and their quality of life will NEVER be the same again.

You are garbage the moment you sit in the driver’s side with booze in your blood.