What goes around...

(Continued from PART ONE of What goes around...)

Separated from the herd

I moved my unfinished eats from the center console over to the passenger seat, tucked my shake cup between my legs, then made my way out of the parking lot.

Now I was actively watching for new ambush vehicles as I drove.

Fortunately the lay of the road here enabled me to hurriedly return to the interstate again, before the first three cars could get positioned to interfere with my plans.

They clearly saw me go by though. And in my rear view, I watched them prepare for coming after me again.

Holy crap.

There was only the normal chatter on the police scanner; I wished I had my CB antenna mounted. I'd do that the very next chance I got.

Now all I could do with my meal was fetch a few fries at a time, and take a slurp of shake on occasion. It'd be messy eating the rest of the burger now, one-handed, and with the burger itself all fallen apart in the hubbub. Damn!

One problem here was that I wasn't very familiar with the country-side off the interstate in these parts. Sure, I'd lived not far away for a couple decades, but I'd only been driving a few years. And I simply hadn't had much reason for tooling around out here, off the interstate. So I felt more comfortable staying on the main drag. Plus, if things got hairy, it might actually be handy to get a trooper or two involved: surely they'd side with me, over strangers shooting at me!

But there were civilians here too. Agh!

My simple head start over the original trio in getting back onto the highway was helping me some. But what did I do next? Crank back up to high speed to keep my buffer zone? And stay at that velocity until I got to my planned destination? Whoo! That'd be one long run at such a speed. And pretty risky for both me and innocent passersby (at this time of day, and density of traffic), even if those trailing me caused no more trouble at all.

There had to be at least one more vehicle involved: somebody who saw me make the exit and stop for food. Somebody who hadn't been with the original trio, but instead, either far enough ahead on the interstate for me to catch up to and maybe pass them; or waiting around the exit somewhere, just watching for me to pass or get off there.

And there might be still more of these jokers around than that! For it would have to have been an awfully big coincidence for me to take the only exit where an extra member of the gang just happened to be. Much more likely was the possibility of there being two or more unknown gang cars out there: each stationed at a different exit along the highway.

And I had no way to identify any but the first three vehicles so far.

Shadow and I were currently maintaining an average speed of about seventy-five miles per hour, leisurely weaving in and out of traffic as needed, but not using the emergency lane for the moment. With my present head start, the trio would have to do 100+ all the way to catch up any time soon. And I'd see them in my rear view in plenty of time to crank up still more speed, to defeat them that way. So far I didn't see them coming.

But what of the others? The ones I couldn't recognize?

I was really paranoid now, closely examining every car I passed (or who passed me), and every vehicle I saw in my mirrors. But heck if there wasn't all sorts of cover here for unmarked ambushers: they could be anywhere in traffic; or waiting and getting on from various ramps, as I passed by; or waiting on the roadside ahead for me, in the emergency lane, or off the shoulder; maybe even using a trooper's hidey-hole.

It was much the same exercise as watching for unmarked police cars-- except in those days the unmarked law cars were usually laughably obvious in their dull appearances, and typically were all of the same one or two makes and models in a given region. Pretty easy for the trained eye to pick out in daylight, once they got close enough for you to discern such details.

I wished it was dark; for when I was in Shadow, the night was my ally. But it was around 1:30 PM, and not a cloud in the sky.

A 1970 Z-28 Camaro driver didn't like it when I passed him, and began trying to race with me.

This was a pretty common occurrence for me, and so I didn't take it as a sign he was part of the gang currently after me. I usually ignored such challenges these days (just as I'd tried to do with Roddy in his Trans Am, before). A year or more earlier I might have been interested; but after seeing more than one challenger get into serious trouble trying to beat me, I'd (mostly) stopped all that.

It'd turned out some fellas would sooner die in a fiery crash, than see their car get beat in an impromptu street race. Seriously!

You could nip many such things in the bud (if they challenged you face-to-face, and out-of-vehicle) by telling them sure, you'd race them: but only at the drag strip; next Sunday; be there. But very few would actually show.

This tactic also offered them a face-saving way to get out of the contest, as they could easily come up with some excuse for why that wasn't a good time for them. Or, alternatively, any witnesses to their challenge (and my acceptance) would have a while to forget about the whole thing, by the time the appointed day arrived.

I clearly shook my head no at the Camaro driver; but he persisted.

By this point, I was fairly knowledgeable and experienced with regards to fast street cars, and was pretty sure of the Camaro's capabilities (if it was largely factory-standard in specs, like most cars were; and of the few which were significantly altered drive-train-wise, many of those jobs were botched, leaving the vehicles significantly weaker in some respects, than they'd been to start with).

On this nice, neat, little girl of a straight road, with its very few curves (and nicely banked where they did exist), the Z-28 could easily match the Shadowfast of only weeks before in pure speed and acceleration, and even handling. Especially if it carried a big block. For this simply wasn't a very demanding course. If not for traffic clumps, that previous Shadow and the Z could race pretty much side by side on the interstate for hours, before some other factor came into play to stop it, like empty fuel tanks, or a tire blowing at sustained speeds of 120+ mph. Or one driver making a mistake. Etc.

The Camaro driver kept nagging at me. But at least he was doing it somewhat good-naturedly. Usually such challengers quickly began acting like jerks, trying to antagonize you into responding the way they wanted. Like Roddy before.

At that moment we crested a small rise, and beheld a very long, straight stretch ahead, completely clear of other traffic. You could literally see at least a mile or so into the distance.

So I figured why not give the fellow a little taste of what he wanted, just to get him to move on?

After all-- I justified it to myself-- if he kept hanging around, he might get caught up in my gang trouble, putting him into worse danger.

So I finally nodded my head, and waved my left hand in the air where he could see it, in a motion to go for it.

I made sure to let the Camaro get a good head start, as I wanted its driver to be certain of what transpired next.

Then I cheated: floored Shadow; then flipped on my really neat and (relatively) new nitrous oxide system.

That giant kick in the ass felt really good in that moment. I wanted to wave at the Camaro driver and smile at him as I whizzed by, but that would have been horribly dangerous. Shadow on nitrous was a wild beast, which required every iota of your attention. Even when you were going in a straight line like a bullet, as now.

I flipped the nitrous off, with the Z-28 now almost a quarter-mile behind me, despite its own impressive acceleration curve. I then braked heavily too, mainly to quickly get my speed back down to normal-- but at the same time making it easier for him to catch up again.

In a moment he'd eased back up to beside me once more. He had a look of stunned surprise and disappointment on his face. But he also gave me the hand gesture of a military salute as he looked my way: straight hand to the temple.

Heck if this wasn't one decent guy! Possibly a service-man back from a Vietnam tour. A jerk could never have acted that way after losing.

I felt bad about using the nitro on him, but he had asked for a race. And I needed him to be satisfied enough to leave, so he wouldn't get caught up in my own problems.

Plus, I wasn't above having a little fun too, now and then.

I saluted him back, trying not to be too enthusiastic in my smile.

The poor guy would probably think I had a 429 Boss motor in Shadow, after such a display. But even a 429 would have had trouble in a showdown with a nitrous-equipped Shadow, I was sure. At least in some niches of the speed and acceleration chart, if not all.

The Camaro guy eased on by, as I slowed back down to around 75 mph again.

Now it was time once more for my serious concerns; like what to do about my dangerous groupies.

Hmm. As I now had quite a gap between me and any other interstate traffic coming from behind, I decided to 'put my ears on' (to use the CB parlance of the time).

I made a quick stop in the right hand emergency lane, dug out my antenna from storage, and screwed it onto its roof mount. I then resumed my trek, and switched on the radio.

An apparently normal traffic clump was approaching, with the fastest elements leading the way of course, running up to eighty or so mph.

I got back up to 75 and stayed there, maintaining a close watch on the traffic closing from behind via my 180 mirror.

I passed a ramp where several more cars got on. I shifted over to the passing lane to give them space, then returned to the slow lane again (most of the interstates in this region were only two lanes going one way, and two the other, during this time).

Maintaining 75 mph while regularly passing entrance ramps adding more cars to the flow, and the typical traffic speedsters gaining from behind, left me soon in the thick of things again. But I didn't want to drive at 100+ mph for hours to come. Or get off another exit any time soon. Plus, it'd been a while since I'd seen any of my previous attackers. Surely I'd soon get far enough away from my hometown, for the harassment to end (It was relatively rare for hometown civilians to chase me very far out of county; and I'd never had three plus cars of them do it before(!). But there's a first time for everything (is what I should have been thinking)).

Shadow was nearing the half a tank mark on fuel. I had a habit of always keeping at least half a tank of gas onboard for emergencies. I cursed myself for not filling up before leaving town.

With the exit situation being what it was at the moment, it looked like I might have to draw down Shadow's fuel supply a bit more, before replenishing it. I didn't like it, but as Shadow got great gas mileage in normal cruise (24 mpg), a mere quarter tank worth of gas would still let me cover around a hundred miles at average speed or better. And Knoxville was only some 30 miles or so away. There'd be far too many exits there for any penny ante gang to cover, many of them way too public for the gang to try anything big, even if they did happen to catch me there.

Hmm. The CB was awful quiet. Heck fire, I'd forgotten I had it set to my job convoy channel! I switched to the normal trucker traffic channel, and got much better results.

The conversations there were typical for a day like today; nothing out of the ordinary. I was disappointed to hear no one commenting on me and the Z though. Of course, there'd been no one close enough to really witness the non-race. It just tickled me sometimes to hear chatter about Shadow.

I carefully watched the traffic flowing behind and around me, looking for signs of malevolent intent. I also tried to maintain an even more generous space between me and any vehicle ahead, than I usually did. That extra maneuvering space may have saved my life in the near-miss incident before.

Of course, as I was heading back to my convoy job, I did have part of Shadow's armor installed: the frame with unfolding metal panels for the rear of the passenger compartment. Unfortunately, I didn't have the most important parts in place: the seat silhouette panels that hung behind the seat backs. They were currently laying pretty uselessly on my rear shelf, underneath a couple of traveling bags. And it'd take a few minutes to mount even just the driver's side; more time than I'd had at the last stop for mounting the antenna, or when my groupies interrupted my lunch.

Wait a minute: something on the radio caught my attention. It seemed a yellow and black 1969 Dodge Charger was moving at scary speed through traffic somewhere ahead or behind-- I made it a point to check the next mile marker when it came by for reference.

Turned out it was behind. Could it be a groupie?

I maintained current speed. Nothing unusual could be seen in the rear view yet.

A yellow and black 1969 Dodge Charger. Something about that rang a bell. But I couldn't quite place it.

Besides, even if I had raced such a car in the past, it was highly unlikely to be the same one coming now.

But I was sure I'd see at least one more attempt on me by the baddies, before this trip was over.

Hey! What was that? Something was raising the short hairs on the back of my neck, but I wasn't sure what. I scanned my surroundings both directly and via mirrors again: something had changed. Something about the traffic. But not a one of the original three groupie cars was visible. It just seemed like the normal traffic had congealed around me like a blood clot. The clump of traffic in which I was now embedded was very slowly and gradually slowing down all at once, making me slow down too in response. But it'd been subtle! We were now down to sixty. The whole thing seemed a little too orchestrated for my tastes, and I decided I'd better disrupt the status quo, just in case. I wasn't quite as boxed in yet as before, but things were moving in that direction. Everybody in the cars around me looked normal, though. Or did they?

Just like the radio chatter about the Dodge Charger before, one face in one of the cars now surrounding me struck a chord of familiarity. But I couldn't pinpoint why.

Maybe I was jumping at shadows, I thought. But just in case, I decided to change my situation.

As there was a chance I was reading too much into things, I gave the normal blinking signal light for moving over into the left lane for passing, and began visually checking the traffic flow in preparation for same.

Then all hell broke loose.

Suddenly the big family station wagon ahead of me slammed on its brakes in an all out panic stop, even as the older model luxury car behind me and to my left in the passing lane abruptly accelerated to cut me off.

At the same moment, the car immediately behind me floored it, and swerved over into the emergency lane to my right to block me there, even as the car previously behind it moved up rapidly to complete the trap.

Holy crap!

Having my wonderful 180 degree rear view mirror immediately above the windshield helped a lot in providing me with all this intelligence instantly.

I slammed on my own brakes too, as I literally had nowhere else to go as the trap closed on me. But there was one weak spot in the set up. Even as I stomped my brakes and held the steering wheel steady with my left hand, I yanked my crash bar release handle with my right. The activation handles for both my crash bars and tire poppers were situated near the front of my floor console.

The crash bars helped the car blocking me from behind to come to a stop even faster than all the rest of us, opening a small gap behind in the metal walls trying to envelope me.

Me and the rest of the gang were slowing down in an awful hurry, the posse trying to keep everything synchronized while forcing me to do the same, and me desperately seeking a way to upset their designs.

As Shadow and my would-be captors dropped below 30 mph, I grabbed my shifter handle and took it from drive to neutral; a fraction of a second later, as we neared zero mph, I thrust it into reverse. About half a second after that my FMX transmission engaged, and I began spinning my rear tires to take us out of there, through the break in attacker formation caused by my crash bars behind us.

I had to weave backwards and around the still settling attack vehicle there, using the emergency lane and part of the gravel shoulder as well, since the car was coming to rest somewhat sideways, with its front suspension ruined and all.

I couldn't use the emergency lane for long, as my ambush was wreaking havoc with the oncoming civilian traffic, and some moms and dads back there were needing the lane themselves.

So I did my best to get out of the emergency lane and across the others in-between swerving cars, without causing further problems for everybody.

Then I backed into the median and across it; paused only long enough to shift back into drive; and then got back on the interstate-- only this time into the lanes heading back the way from which I'd come.

Needless to say, I was accelerating as much as I could there to both enter the traffic on that side, and get away from my groupies A.S.A.P.(non-nitro assisted acceleration, I mean).

I was too busy for a minute or two there to pay much attention to what my trap setters were doing with themselves. But I knew at least one of their vehicles had been disabled by my crash bars, and the rest now had a pretty good gauntlet of backed up traffic blocking their way.

The CB chatter definitely picked up after that, though it mainly reflected several drivers' consternation at the sudden jam.

One trucker had apparently witnessed the unusual events, and noted a weird, blacked out car seemed to have caused it all, but somehow extricated itself to head back the other way on the interstate now.

Rats! If my groupies were monitoring the channel, they now knew my current position and direction of travel. As did any listening troopers who might not take kindly to someone leaving the scene of an accident, and illegally crossing the median.

Of course, had I been too law-abiding a citizen back there, I might be dead from gunshot wounds now.

So I got off on the first exit I could, trying not to attract any further attention to myself.

It was now about 2 PM. And this was turning into a really long day.

A visit to Booneyville

The exit dumped me out on a road with nothing but trees in sight as far as the eye could see. There were few signs, too. I decided to turn right. Drove several miles, saw nothing; and then more nothing. A few abandoned houses for the most part. Yikes! So I found a suitable spot and turned around. I needed to find a gas station, and figured since there were none out this way, they must all be on the other side of the interstate from here.

I passed the spot I'd exited the interstate, and continued on. Found lots more nothing. For several miles. Then finally came in sight of the most dilapidated gas station I'd ever seen in my life. At first I thought it'd been abandoned long ago, but as I passed by, I saw signs of life: the place was actually open, and apparently selling gas!

Yuck! No way I was going to put gas from that place into Shadow! I'd find a better spot.

And I continued on into a vast wilderness, that I'd had no idea existed in this region.

Oh, the road was nice enough. And there were houses where people apparently lived, here and there. But this route was almost utterly devoid of commercial traffic. After a while, I realized I'd not seen a single semi-truck since getting off the interstate, and got really worried.

On the bright side, I was out of hot water on the interstate at the moment, and hopefully the baddies didn't know where I was either.

Heck: I didn't know where I was myself! I decided to take note of whatever turns I made, as well as conspicuous landmarks, in case I had to turn back and retrace my steps.

I did have road maps among Shadow's equipment and supplies, but those things helped most for interstate travel, and least for little byways like this.

Damn those hooligans for making me use my crash bars! I currently had two spares, but they were back at my parents' place. As were the best facilities and supplies for making more at the lowest possible cost. If I didn't retrieve the spares, I'd need to have some made by a local shop in my convoy employer's town. It'd probably be a week before I could pick them up. Damn!

That was the worst thing about crash bars and tire poppers: you had to treat them as disposables. Although pretty expensive disposables! The tire poppers were actually the worst time and money-wise, because you had to have a lot of them, and each individual popper required a surprising amount of effort to craft.

You even had to be careful how you packed them onboard, else they'd clump together when deployed, thereby being much less effective.

Whenever I made poppers, I usually made as many as I could possibly stand; for I never had enough of them. One dump usually threw away several dozens of the things at once. Yikes!

Why so many? Each popper was fairly small in itself. And to reliably sideline a pursuer, you needed to coat a good sized area of pavement with poppers. That translated to a big number in each drop.

By comparison, the crash bars were simple to fabricate. But having someone else make them was highly annoying.

By now it seemed some troopers had shown up to fix the mess caused by the groupies, according to the radio. Good! I hoped the 'bears' (one trucker term for troopers and sometimes other law officers) would give me some relief by maybe toting a few of my attackers to jail. Or at least scare them enough to make them give up the chase.

Crap! I couldn't believe this road! There was absolutely nothing out here! And it was getting fairly winding and roundabout now, with some nice curves for road handling tests. But I needed other things at the moment.

I continued on for maybe another twenty-five miles or so without finding any significant commercial facilities along the way: just one or two tiny greasy spoon diners, and a genuine old country store, which looked like it was originally a one room schoolhouse. A small junkyard. An old barn coated in shiny chrome hubcaps. Lots and lots of trees and bushes and grass. A few cows. And not a single other gas station. Oh sure: the country store had pumps. But their pumps had obviously not been in working order since maybe the Truman administration. Yikes!

There just had to be more stuff out here somewhere! There were other significant looking roads which branched off or intersected this one, but I preferred to explore this one thoroughfare, before getting into more complex navigation-back-to-the-interstate scenarios.

Unfortunately, one or more of those branch roads must have been where the locals went to refuel and take care of virtually all other matters. For the road I was on just went nowhere, and took its own sweet time doing it. Another 30 miles revealed not much more than I'd already seen.

Crap! By golly, this was one place I knew I'd never be visiting again!

I finally gave up and turned around. Backtracked to the nearest significant looking turn off, then took it.

Lo and behold if I didn't find just more of the same. I went about ten miles, and turned around again. Returned to the main drag, turned right, found another decent looking candidate, and tried it.

This time I found a saw mill at the end: that was it. Turned around, tried the whole thing again, with a different route.

This time I discovered a trailer park, surrounded by regular homes. A sort of little suburb, out here in the middle of nowhere. Where'd these people work? I wondered. So I went back to the drawing board once more.

By now it was getting close to 3:30 PM. I was on the main highway again, looking to try maybe one more turn off, before giving up and heading back to the interstate.

Then I met one of my wondering groupie vehicles on the road: one of the first three cars which had tried to pin me earlier that day. I came around a curve on a hill, and there they were. I think both they and I did a double-take as we passed by one another; the passage really happened too fast for them to take any substantial action in the moment.

Holy smokes! They'd found me!

I high-tailed it back towards the interstate ramp, but it was a long ways off now. And it turned out a second vehicle of the original trio was a couple miles behind the first. Only they were warned I was coming, by radio.

I came around another bend to find them somewhat crossways in the road, with an angry or confused local idling behind them, wondering what was going on.

Two men were standing behind the car, both with long guns. Rifles or shotguns? I wasn't sure.

I knew that an ambush out here in these boonies could get away with just about anything.

I pulled a 180 degree turn on-the-fly with my emergency brake, never getting any nearer to their blockade than maybe an eighth of a mile, and then briefly cut in the nitro for a fast getaway: I was too damn close for comfort for long guns here. This was one of the briefest nitro punches I ever used, due to the near proximity of a curve in my route. Curves, nitro, and Shadow's own innate power simply did not make a good mix.

This was probably one of the top times I ever smoked Shadow's rear wheels too; even including burnouts and warm-ups at drag strips. For using nitro from a near standing start, atop Shadow's own native torque-- well, I'm sure glad I wasn't one of those tires!

We generated so much smoke, it was like I had a James Bond smoke-screen in that moment. They literally couldn't see us, within a second of me flipping on the nitro.

I managed to affect my turnaround so quickly, that it spoiled their immediate plans to hem me in with the blockade, and the return of the first car I'd passed.

Once again they and I met on the highway (the first gang car I'd spied only minutes past). They on their way to close the trap I'd already escaped, and me getting the heck outta there.

Man! This was getting serious!

I was noticing the radio antennas on all these vehicles now. Were they using CB channels for coordination, rather than some other type of transceiver bands? If so, there were only a couple dozen of those (CB channels); and I might be able to listen in! I began manually trying different channels, to see what I could find.

Bingo! I'd found them! And they weren't even using much in the way of code to hide their intent!

Of course, why would they be? I'd been dumb enough to ignore the non-trucker CB channels so far, right? And as long as they stayed off common channels like those (and the emergency channel), the normal limited range of CB transmissions in general meant it'd be unlikely anyone of any import would take note of their communications-- or take them seriously if they did notice them. For lots of goofing around went on over the less popular CB bands.

Although only a few of the groupies were in range of my own radio (so I only heard one side of some conversations), I did manage to learn a few things right off the bat.

Like the fact they were trying to keep me off the interstate indefinitely, until Caleb could get there. Or Gannon. Or Roddy.

Aha! Roddy!

I'm not saying that revelation made the present scenario suddenly make sense to me. After all, what little direct interaction I'd had with Roddy hadn't been all that different from what I'd had with dozens of fellow hometown guys, the past few years.

But some folks hold a grudge; sometimes for things you wouldn't expect. And leaders of gangs sometimes feel they have to make an example of anyone who seems to flout their rules, or succeed in challenging them somehow.

So in a way I did see some possible real world justification for Roddy's shenanigans here; that was just how some people acted in my hometown.

But who were Caleb and Gannon? One of the radio voices more than once referred to them as the "big guns". Which sounded somewhat ominous.

Well crap: I seemed to be cut off from the interstate now. Unless I could find an alternate route.

I could also try hiding. But it sounded like lots of other folks would soon be joining in the chase, combing through this area. So running sounded much more logical.

On the brighter side, I wasn't due for convoy work for another day; not until Monday. So I had some time.

I fantasized about driving to Roddy's house, and beating the holy crap out of him for all this. But that was fanciful on many levels. For first, I'd have to fight my way through all of his henchmen here.

Huh? Suddenly I remembered who that familiar face among the second group of attack cars reminded me of: Cal Birkin. That guy hadn't been Cal, but had looked eerily like him.

I'd worked with Cal on a job of very shaky legal standing once. We'd gotten along pretty well then. Despite just about everyone telling me over and over again how dangerous he was. Not when he was in earshot, of course. For it seemed almost everyone was afraid of him and his brothers. His brother. In the attack car. "Caleb".

So it was Cal who was coming. Cal, who was one of the two "big guns" my ambushers were trying to arrange for me to meet.

Hmm. I figured someone must have offered Cal a sizable bounty to come hurt me. For Cal would do just about anything for a good sum of money. And in my case, he'd get the added enjoyment of some payback. For I'd sort of screwed up one of Cal's little projects a couple years back. Mostly by accident. After that, he'd always behaved sullenly around me. But we'd never fought it out. Of course, we hadn't spent much time around each other either, after that.

I never really learned why so many people were scared of Cal; maybe because I never asked. Cal wasn't a big guy; he was basically my size. And if he often carried a gun (or a knife bigger than the standard local pocket knife), I never saw it.

He did engage in lots of unlawful activities. But not any I was aware of as being especially injurious to anyone.

Cal used to drive a Dodge Charger until...hmm!

I figured it must be "Caleb" the "big gun", who was coming in a Dodge Charger. Could Cal have gotten his old Charger back on the road? Or maybe replaced it with another?

Oh man: this Roddy character was dredging up some mighty turbulent stuff from my driving past, with which to smite me.

But who was "Gannon"? I couldn't place that name anywhere. Maybe he was an out-of-towner called in for the operation.

Well, as I'd been headed for my deadly serious (but also deadly boring so far) convoy job, I did have my 38 Special and 12 gauge pump with me. But of course if it came down to using those, I was probably dead meat for sure.

I was definitely going to have to install my seat back armor when I got the chance!

I wondered if I'd get myself trapped if I took a side road to hide for a moment, and consult my maps? And install my armor too? Maybe.

Damn! At the moment it looked like I had little choice but to head out along the highway to nowhere I'd already investigated for roughly 50 miles! But if Roddy's posse knew an alternative way in, they could still get ahead of me, and maybe stage a trap from which I couldn't escape.

I needed to consult my maps!

It turned out they were too distant and involved with other junk, to get at while I was driving down the road. Grr.

So I figured I'd build me a buffer of time and distance which might afford me a reasonably safe opportunity to stop and check them. Shadow and I tooled on down the route we'd charted before on nowhere avenue, only this time at considerably higher speed, to create our temporary safe harbor.

As they couldn't know if we'd turn off at any of the many intersections along the way, they'd have to check those too, as they came to them.

Although I hated spending all that time to retrace the entire route, I kept going until we'd reached roughly the furthest point of my original exploration. Then I slowed down and began looking for a hidey hole in which to browse through my maps, and build a strategy.

I soon found an old, half-collapsed barn, which offered a decent hiding place, with sufficient gaps in its construction to allow me a spy hole view of the road's traffic, while well shielding Shadow from same.

The grass and weeds around the place were pretty high and thick, and I suspected the spot might be infested with snake dens; but still, it seemed a decent location for what I had in mind. It was now around 4 PM.

First things first: I shifted myself and some junk around inside the car, and hoisted both seat back armor shields into place. It was a bit tougher than usual (doing it without getting out of the car), but as I said before, I was in a snake den place if ever I saw one, and didn't want to step outside.

I worked up a bit of a sweat doing this, since I'd left my windows rolled up-- maybe out of an unreasonable fear that any snakes around might be able to slither up the sides of the car, and get in that way.

I dug out the maps, cleared out my passenger seat for some working space (swept my empty shake and fries containers and various wrappings into the floorboards, and pitched the remaining debris of my now hours old hamburger out a partially opened window), and tried to determine my present location by my day's activities, and various known landmarks like the interstate, intersections, etc.

Whoa! According to the map, we really were in Booneyville! Miles and miles away from just about everything!

It appeared I'd accidentally picked almost the only interstate exit for a hundred miles or more which would leave me in such desolation as this.

Furthermore, my road maps were almost blank regarding the little offshoot roads I'd been in process of investigating, when I'd encountered the posse again.

Well, time to break out the USGS maps, I supposed.

The very best high resolution/local scale/close up USGS maps in my collection mainly covered the mountains on the other side of my hometown from here, plus a few other select locales. But I had something more like satellite scale or road map scale versions available too, for much larger regions-- including this one.

These maps had proven so valuable to me in the past, that I'd quickly replaced any lost or destroyed along the way, such as the time I'd left behind a map in the mountains of North Carolina, in Shadowfast's only major off-road run to date. USGS maps were remarkable bargains for outlaw entrepreneurs like me.

Whew! I sure hoped I wouldn't have to do a repeat of that off-road challenge in this case!

But of course there was nothing like my home mountains anywhere around here: just some small lines of rolling hills maybe; that was it.

Hmm. It appeared this main road didn't continue on into perpetuity after all. According to the maps, it stopped dead only another ten miles or so on, in the vicinity of a lake. There were a few other minor roads branching off it before then; but basically the next ten miles looked like a one-way route to a last stand scenario. Yuck!

A habitual glance at my gas gauge reminded me that I didn't have my usual fuel buffer for much road excitement. Absolutely the only working gas station I'd seen since exiting the interstate was now behind my trackers. If I couldn't find another way out, and had to blow through the posse back to the interstate, I'd almost definitely have to stop for gas there. Which meant I needed to keep enough gas in reserve to make it that far, no matter what.

Of course there was also the siphoning option: stealing gas from some parked car along the way. I even had a hand pump siphon device so I could avoid tasting the gasoline in such a caper.

I hated stealing gas. Shadow possessed his own anti-siphon spring in his filler tube, so it would be difficult for anyone to do it to us. But you do what you got to...

The road options outlined by the USGS maps weren't any better than those offered by the others: I'd really chosen a poor spot for a road war showdown.

It could be that a viable off-road escape route existed somewhere between here and the lake ten miles distant. But my low res maps of this area didn't inspire confidence in finding and navigating such a thing, for too much detail was lacking. And in the information that was present, there appeared to be numerous streams and other hazards I'd have to deal with. Previously, in the higher altitudes of the mountains, streams had thankfully been virtually absent from my path. I really couldn't cross any stream of significant size with my car. Sure, I was willing to ford such things where I could; but suitable circumstances for fording were rare.

So just a single stream could stop me in my tracks out there; at least in regards to taking Shadow with me. And leaving him behind would make me a lot more vulnerable to the gang, if they found me. Naturally, all this brought up the possibility of simply getting as far out as I could, then camping out in a hidden spot somewhere, to wait out the bastards. I mean, surely they'd all be gone again within only a matter of days, if not hours. Right?

But that seemed like a dangerous gamble to me. The farther away from civilization I was if and when they caught me, the fewer restrictions there'd be on what they could do to me.

Plus, although I could maybe hold out for a week or so before venturing back to this main drag area, my foes could wait indefinitely. For they had sufficient numbers to work in shifts and on varying days, and could resupply themselves much easier than I could-- for months on end. If they wanted to. And it seemed that they might.

And all that was assuming that they wouldn't fan out across the countryside themselves, looking for me. What if they did? I figured they could easily rustle up some four wheel drives and motorcycles by which to traverse the terrain lots easier than I could in Shadow. Once they went off-road themselves too-- and got sufficiently close to me-- it was unlikely that I'd ever be able to get back to the highway again myself. And I'd probably be far too short on gas to do much, either. Agh!

To make things worse, once they successfully flushed me out of my hiding place, I'd likely be out in the open, visible from miles away at times, making it laughably easy for them to take me. For there were vast tracts of open fields and cleared land here, in-between small, randomly located patches of woods, and rows of gently rolling hills.

Besides all that, it also hadn't been very long since my previous off-road venture, and I badly wanted to avoid a repeat of the experience. Plus, I seemed to have quite a few more people and vehicles after me now, than I had then. I suspected the greater numbers and radio coordination would serve to accelerate both their progress and adaptability to whatever strategy I enlisted, as well as allow them lots more endurance for the trek than me.

So it appeared my best option was to make a break for it now: before they had the time to amass all their members and mount a more organized search and destroy campaign against me.

I had to try to bust through the posse's line (if I couldn't sneak through it). And do it soon. Very, very soon.

Yeah, right: there was only the one road out of here. And there were apparently at least six carloads of bad guys in the near vicinity gunning for me (not counting the car my crash bars had decommissioned for at least a day or two). And at least three more vehicles and dudes still to come (Roddy, Caleb, and Gannon).

And the way my luck was going, there were still others I just didn't know about yet. Damn!

Then a new player entered the picture. Over the radio.

Mystery man

"Breaker, breaker, I'm looking for the guy who blew my doors off a couple hours ago. You got your ears on?"

What the hell? Could it be? The Z-28 driver?

"Ten-four, if this is who I think it is," I responded.

"That's great! But if you don't mind, could you give me a clue you're who you say you are?"

Hmm. I had to be careful here; we were talking on the posse channel, to which I'd left my radio tuned. They had to be listening in-- if this wasn't one of them just trying to con me, that is.

"Ten-four! If you'll give me one first!"

There was a moment of silence. Then, "Well, I was minding my own business when I seen this mean looking thing I think was a customized Mustang, go by a bit back. I figured I'd jerk his doors, and he jerked mine instead. Then we traded a particular hand signal with each other. Do you know what that signal was?"

"A military salute," I answered. It was him! Had to be! Nobody else had been around to see all that!

Of course, it was always possible he was still a posse member...but heck, not everybody around could be in on it! Could they?

Then I remembered I'd noticed his license plate as he left the scene afterwards...it'd been from Alabama. Which made it very unlikely he was affiliated with the local outlaws. Unless he was Gannon. Grr.

The new player responded to my last transmission.

"Ten-four good buddy! Say, I noticed on the radio that you seemed to get into a little scrap after I left, so I turned around to find out more about it. It took me a while, but I finally found some strange happenings in these parts, that I suspect has something to do with you. How's things going on your end?"

I couldn't believe he'd gone to all this trouble just out of curiosity: was he Gannon?

"Hey buddy, don't take this the wrong way, but I'm just wondering why you'd be so nice as to go to all this trouble, to find out what sort of problems a Ford driver might be having here?"

Again there was a hesitation.

"Well, I got some time on my hands due to my wife leaving me while I was on tour, and basically I'm out looking for trouble, I guess. That's why I pulled your chain back there for a race. So when I heard the commotion on the radio, I figured I'd have a look-see. Maybe help if I could. You know: find some trouble, and dive in."

"Ten-four. I know the feeling," I momentarily thought of Bridget, and then shook my head to stop it.

I was leaving dead air there for a moment, so the Z-man chimed in again.

"My handle's Headhunter. What's yours?"

"Don't laugh: it's King of the Road," I answered somewhat sheepishly. For I definitely wasn't such now. And it'd been a poor choice when I'd originally made it, in a moment of bravado. But as I mostly just monitored the CB channels rather than spoke myself, I rarely used it.

I did have another radio call sign now, but it was only for official convoy duty, and I wasn't supposed to share it with anyone else.

"Ha, ha. Well, with that car of yours, you definitely have a good claim on it," Headhunter replied.

"Thanks. But I've always regretted choosing that name. I just don't use the CB enough to have ever gotten around to changing it."

"I recommend Bat Out of Hell if you ever do," Headhunter responded.

"Ha, ha, thanks. But I did cheat in our little race: I'll tell you how, if we get the chance for an eyeball." ('eyeball' referred to a face-to-face meeting; basically contact not involving the radio medium).

"Well, that's good to know. Now maybe I'll have an excuse to give my buddies for how a piss-ant Ford stain whupped my pride and joy."

Headhunter seemed to use an insulting variation of 'stang (short for Mustang) that I'd never heard before. And no, I didn't care one bit; let him blow off some steam if he wanted. Plus, such bluster was common among men. The worst verbal blistering you could get at college was usually from your pals, rather than your enemies.

I had a feeling Headhunter wasn't Gannon; but there was no way I could be certain.

"Hey Headhunter, I guess I should tell you there's people listening in, here." The previous posse chatter on the channel had fallen silent, once they realized their prey was broadcasting; they were all likely hoping to gather intel on my location, and other status particulars.

"Yeah, I know. I heard them when I found the channel looking for you. They seem to be some ex-friends of yours?"

"Yeah, that's about right, I guess."

"So you want to find another place to park it?"

"Ten-four!"

"Well, I'll tell you what King-- subtract twenty from my ride's number, and meet me there."

"Ten-four!"

Headhunter and I switched to channel eight. We both knew we could be quickly found and monitored again, but at least we were off the bad guys' primary channel now.

"Headhunter, I should tell you you might want to find a different sort of trouble to get into than this."

"Why's that, King?"

"Well, it could get pretty bad; I've dealt with some of these guys before, and can usually handle myself. They just sort of ganged up on me unexpectedly here. I mean, I appreciate you offering to help. But I'd hate for you to get hurt doing it."

There was another delay in response.

"Don't sweat it. I've dealt with some folks like this before too. If you give them enough trouble, they'll retreat. And if not...well, sooner or later the supply runs out on one side or the other," Headhunter mused, fatalistically.

"Ha, ha. I know what you mean," I told him, as I watched a number of vehicles of past foes flash by my mind's eye (all headed towards their respective ends). Some of the most recent had been during my mountain adventure.

"So anything you can think of, I might be able to help you with? Keeping in mind the Cong might be listening in here too, of course."

My certainty that Headhunter was a Vietnam veteran was ratcheting up, with his reference to the Viet Cong.

"Well...there's a good chance we have a lot of these folks in-between us now. If we bugged them enough, it might sort of put a kink in what they've got planned. And let me get out of these boonies."

"Yeah. I got a good idea what they're up to, from monitoring their channel. Apparently they got reinforcements in the queue, so it'd be good to bust things up yesterday."

He meant A.S.A.P. of course, and I heartily concurred, after my ruminations just past.

"Ten-four. Keep in mind they could always get us both."

"Ten-four."

"Headhunter, I feel I should tell you they've got guns. Shot at me at least once, before our race."

"No shit?"

"No shit."

"Well now, that makes it even more interesting!"

"How so?"

"Just does."

It seemed Headhunter felt we were nearing a topic which should be kept mum over the radio, so I didn't press it.

"Headhunter, should we somehow try to coordinate things between us here? I mean, I'm not sure how we'd get around the eavesdroppers, but it might not hurt if we could somehow give each other a clue what to expect."

"I know where you're coming from King, but on this open channel and us with not much common background, I think it best we act as independent agents here. I mean, you and I will recognize each other, but your buddies don't know me. So they'll have to watch all the civilian traffic."

"Ten-four."

"So let's go with what we already discussed. You remember it?"

"Yeah."

"Then let's put things into motion. Just keep in mind you're responsible for your end."

"Ten-four."

"I'll be on the side for a while, King. I'll try to give you an update in an hour or so." 'On the side' meant he'd be listening, but not talking.

"Ten-four. I'll try to do the same."

Headhunter didn't respond again.

Well, now I possibly had help on the far end: maybe even a soldier! Maybe even armed, too. Of course I was armed as well, and didn't consider that too big an advantage in the current situation. But Headhunter surely had more training and experience than I did with firearms (not to mention armed combat).

So now I was to try to make my way towards him; try a break out through the posse lines, before more reinforcements showed up, and the whole gang was fully deployed and ready for me. Headhunter was right about time being of the essence.

Of course if Headhunter was actually Gannon...Grr!

But I knew from my maps, radio, and the experiences of the day, that I very likely did have a substantial number of men already combing the vicinity for me, with more on the way. And although the main road here was pretty lengthy, the bottom line was it was a dead end. With Custer's last stand ready to be reprised, at the lake end of things.

So even if Headhunter truly was Gannon, I didn't have much choice but to try busting out of here anyway.

There were quite a few people living along this road, so the posse couldn't maintain a robust road block anywhere for very long, without somebody calling in the cops; that was in my favor.

A more or less steady (if weak) stream of civilian traffic was coursing back and forth on the road. If it had been dark, I might have slipped past in that traffic before they recognized me, by changing the look of my forward lights-- and maybe rear ones too. Shadow's flat black paint could handle much of the rest, except for any close-up observers.

Unfortunately it was still daylight, and waiting for dark would also allow the posse to further build up their numbers, thereby making a break out even more difficult.

I tried to think of anything I had available onboard to change Shadow's looks from a distance, without detracting too much from his drivability.

If I could just get close enough without alerting them, the nitro might get me the rest of the way.

But again, it was broad daylight. And everything that sprang to mind about changing Shadow's look fell far short of what was required to work. I could remove his lower air dam: big deal. I could maybe use the plywood panels of my rear shelf to drastically change my front end look. But that seemed a lot of work for little chance of success.

I did have some items in my hometown which might have helped-- but fat lot of good they'd do me here in Nowhere USA!

Hmm. My shelf's removable armor frame and related plates could in theory change Shadow's profile dramatically from a long range view. Used on the rear, it could make him more resemble something like a short station wagon in shape, if not color.

I needed much more than that under the circumstances I expected ahead, though.

Plus, whatever I came up with couldn't look too unusual, or else it might attract attention even faster than Shadow's normal aspect. Agh!

After a few minutes I realized there was no practical way for me to disguise us in full daylight, to fool folks who'd likely be only a few car lengths distant, and exercising unusually close scrutiny of our appearance in any road passage.

All that seemed left was distracting them somehow, so that we might blast through their ranks by surprise and raw speed.

Although I felt leveraging civilian traffic for help in all this could be crucial to a successful getaway, I also knew doing it would definitely endanger innocents-- maybe even children. So I had to try to minimize any such involvement by civilians.

Of course Headhunter was a grown man and volunteer-- and military besides, if he'd been honest with me over the air. So I figured he might actually be more qualified for his end of the project, than I was for mine.

I did worry about him not being nitro-equipped though. Oh well: a standard Z-28 should help him quite a bit on the maneuverability scale. Give him basically the same stuff to work with as a non-nitro Shadow (except for the superb curve handling and roll cage protection, and interior armor).

I sincerely hoped Headhunter wasn't Gannon.

I couldn't think of many distractions to try against the posse; I needed more intel for that. I'd switched back to the bad guy channel for some, after signing off with Headhunter. The gentle terrain seemed to help increase my reception range, compared to the more mountainous region of home, but still maybe a third to a half of the gang's radio communications were illegible to me.

Caleb had apparently arrived, and Roddy too. There was no mention of Gannon.

Roddy was ordering people around in the clear on the radio. I couldn't determine exactly everything about my enemies' numbers and movements, but my previous forays along the main road here did help me figure out some of their actions, from the radio conversations.

They'd begun a massive search of every side road, just as I'd hoped. Planning to gradually eliminate my every possible hiding place, until finally getting me pinned down somewhere. Roddy wanted to make sure I didn't escape this time. It sounded like there were at least a dozen vehicles in the posse now.

A blast from the past

I got the impression Caleb had been sent ahead along the main road-- all the way to its end-- to see if maybe I'd made things easy for them, and parked myself real nice and pretty at the lake: perhaps the most convenient spot in the vicinity to finish me off with minimal outside interference and possibility of escape. They must have figured Caleb was the nearest single man and machine combination they currently had available which might prove to be a match for me and Shadow.

The only Dodge Charger I'd ever known to be in Caleb's possession had been one of a color scheme similar to that earlier reported on the radio. And that original car had been impressive in many ways: I'd rode in it a time or two.

Caleb though was no expert driver. He was fearless, which made him willing to try stuff others wouldn't. That fearlessness had contributed to the crack up of his original Charger, putting it out of commission indefinitely, last I'd heard.

And yes: Shadowfast and I had been kind of partly to blame for his Charger's possible end.

If Caleb was leaving all the side roads to Roddy's flunkies to scout the full main drag himself, he could be coming past my barn hideout any minute now.

Hmm. That meant I didn't have time to devise some complicated distraction scheme. But it also meant if he didn't see me I could pull back onto the road after he passed by, and try my luck with the main posse now spread out over miles, with Caleb maybe out of my hair entirely for at least a little while.

That might not offer me much of an advantage; but combined with Headhunter on the other end, I'd enjoy at least a couple of surprises to throw the posse's way.

Or a single one anyway, if Headhunter was Gannon.

Sure enough, it wasn't long before I spied the yellow and black streak of Caleb's Charger pass by, as I watched for it through the narrow cracks of the partially collapsed barn hiding us from the road. He seemed to just cruise on by, maybe figuring to let the flunkies even check out such potential hiding places like this one as well.

Then I realized that he could have simply been going too fast to stop in a practical manner here, and could be back any second for a closer look. After all, I would if I was him. As this spot was much different from the side roads being examined by others. Yikes!

So just as soon as the Charger had passed from sight around a nearby curve, Shadow and I stormed out from hiding and headed back towards Roddy's posse.

I had to think up some good distraction plan in whatever time I'd have before meeting the first of my foes.

I couldn't yet detect any sign over the radio that Headhunter was attracting anyone's attention. But that was okay; the closer his fireworks were to my own timing-wise, the better.

But I kept hoping for signs of posse disruption as one way to prove Headhunter's true identity, and therefore find out for certain if I had a real ally in this fight or not.

Holy cow! In the distance behind me I witnessed Caleb's Charger rounding a curve in a power slide taking up both lanes. Something seemed a little odd about the car's handling. But then again, lots of things had always seemed odd with Caleb's driving. Like I said, he was fearless behind the wheel.

There was apparently someone with him: somebody who'd likely spotted me hiding behind the barn due to not having been burdened by driving itself, and being on the sharp lookout for a car of Shadow's description using the type of tactics I was prone to. Rats!

Well, so much for having some leisurely time to dream up a distraction for those ahead of me; now I needed something for Caleb behind.

I'd already used my crash bars. I hated using up all my tire poppers too this early in the game. But forcing Caleb to stop here might give me an hour or so delay before I had to deal with him more directly-- and by that time I might be long gone!

I'd have to wait though, as it was taking a minute or two for him to catch up. If I dropped them too far ahead of him he might avoid my little gifts entirely.

One reason for Caleb's tardiness seemed to be his rear tires spinning on him more than usual. Had he maybe equipped this Charger with an even stronger motor than he'd had before? That seemed unlikely-- but it was possible.

Something just wasn't right about how his Charger was behaving. But I couldn't quite figure out what it was.

As he drew closer, I could see Caleb was wearing sunglasses.

Hmm. To guard against my strobes, no doubt. But my strobes weren't much use in daylight anyway. And he'd have to remove the glasses after dark or accept entirely different risks.

One of these days I was going to have to make my tire poppers and crash bars be more than single shot affairs, I thought. But I also knew Shadow didn't have any spare room for such additional gear. Unless I did something radically different regarding his gas tank, anyway. Or rear bumper maybe...

Caleb finally got close enough and I yanked the popper release. They struck him, and he slowed down-- but not nearly as much as expected.

I was stunned to see my poppers had failed! For the first time ever! For Caleb was still coming after me at speed, his tires apparently little affected by my spiky assault.

Still, the poppers had slowed him down some; you could see a bit of vibration in the Charger now, that hadn't been there before.

Then I figured it out: Caleb not only was wearing sunglasses to protect against my strobe lights; he had also filled his tires with something fairly solid so they wouldn't fully deflate when punctured.

Son of a bitch! That was the first time that had ever happened!

And so he'd made me waste my poppers too-- which darn well would have likely worked better on any other car in the posse but Caleb's!

Man! I was out of crash bars and tire poppers here-- and the main action was just getting started!

Hmm. It seemed Caleb's Charger had been a bit sluggish in cornering before-- and had been slowed up even more by my poppers. I guess besides deflating his tires a little, the poppers had also reduced his handling quality and practical speed, by some of them staying put in his tires. It must be pretty annoying to be Caleb right about now, I figured. Well, there were more curves coming up. I knew Caleb was a bit lacking in the self-control department. So if I could piss him off enough through a decent set of curves-- with the handling impaired state his Charger was currently in-- he just might take care of himself.

I had only barely enough straight remaining before the oncoming curves to do this, but I figured I'd let off the throttle again so quickly as to minimize the risk, and then let Shadow's handling deal with the rest.

So I held my left hand out the window, waving it to make sure Caleb saw it, and flipped him the bird. I then pulled it back inside, flipped on my strobe lights for a second, then cut them off again, and next hit the nitro switch and throttle.

I barely let the nitro even enter the motor before I flipped it back off again. For that was all the straight I had. Immediately after offing the nitro and letting up on the gas pedal, we hit the curve. Yow!

I still had Shadow's normal power curve to help, but I'd really pushed it with the nitro boost, even brief as it was.

We came a lot closer to going off the road than I expected there, with all four of Shadow's tires squealing protest at some of the highest decibels I'd ever heard them. The nitro boost had really been too much; now I was forced to actually floor Shadow's regular thrust for a split second to push us through. That was a rare mistake on my part! And scary!

But we made it-- or that's what I was thinking as we rounded the final few degrees of the curve, taking up way too much of both lanes in an involuntary power slide, every tire scrambling to maintain their grip on the asphalt. Then I got another surprise.

Holy crap! We were meeting a dump truck coming the other way! Thankfully it was only entering the curve as we were exiting, so I managed to give back just enough of his lane that we didn't collide. But I bet I sure scared the shit out of him!

Then I remembered I'd set Caleb up to be coming around that bend like hell on wheels. Well, the plan had been for him to run off the road, wrecking his Charger and taking him out of the action. So maybe he'd do that first and miss the huge truck.

Then I heard a sickening crash behind me; it had to be Caleb hitting the dump truck head-on.

Well, I was somewhat responsible for it. But to my way of thinking it was self-defense. I was pretty sure the dump trunk driver himself wouldn't be hurt bad. But that Charger (and its occupants) probably got smacked good.

That made two cars down, counting the crash bar target on the interstate.

Unknown number to go.

I'd known Caleb well enough to be sure he'd be incensed by my gesture, and think my token strobe flash was serious. So he would have been motivated by both fury, and the desire to show my strobes had no effect on him wearing his shades.

But then I'd added my astonishing movie-like special effect of zooming out of sight at supernatural speed around the bend. I was certain that one would put Caleb over the top if nothing else did, compelling him to floor his machine.

Of course his virtually solid tires-- now embedded with my tire poppers too-- pretty well ruined his handling. And I'd chosen a pretty good curve in which to pull all this on him. So a crash had been nearly inevitable.

I truly hadn't meant for him to get flattened by a dump truck though.

I was sure Caleb and passenger had radioed the posse about their pursuit before their end; so now they all knew I was coming.

Damn it!

Well, they already didn't like me. But they were far too calm about it. Maybe if I could incense them like I had Caleb, it'd help me again.

And at the same time I might be able to give a message to Headhunter, who was likely listening to the bad guy channel just like me at the moment.

I keyed the mike.

CLICK HERE to see what happened next.

<