The Ride - Chapter 15 (An early gift for potential warriors)

[OMR]

Glen silently spun around facing the door. He pulled Sandy behind him. Her face had gone ashen and he could feel her body slightly trembling against his back. His hand holding the small weapon, now pointed squarely at the door, seemed to steady. The creaking and popping coming from the old wooden stairwell had gone silent. They both held their breaths waiting for the next sound…. and when it came, it came in a rush.

The wooden door splintered inwards, the room seemed to explode in a calipee of sounds. The splintering wood, Sandy screaming in his ear, the unearthly howling… and although he wasn’t aware he was pulling the trigger, Glen’s weapon started to jump in his hand following the dark shape that had suddenly burst into the room. All Glen could see was a large amount of sharp teeth coming towards them. Then he began to see the effects the gun was having as it tore large chunks out of what ever it was continue to crawl towards them. Glen’s gun suddenly stopped firing and he knew that it was empty. The dark shape with the teeth had also stopped and only the eyes watched him as he moved over to it. It lay on the old wooden floor, blood continuing to seep out of it. Its breathing was labored and loud.

It looked as thought it had once been a dog… but this dog must have been raised in Hell. The mouth seemed much bigger and was full of razor sharp teeth. The size of the animal was the thing that surprised glen. It looked like it weighed at least 300 lbs. Glen could now see why the door had splintered so easily. The fur was long, black and coarse and the eyes… the eyes were yellow. There were huge gaping holes where the bullets, or whatever the gun was loaded with, had torn into the flesh. The beast made a long shuddering sigh and Glen watched as the light went out in those yellow eyes. He became aware that he hadn’t taken a breath since the door splintered inward. He let out one long slow breath ending in a low whistle as he stared at the “dog” thing.

Sandy had stopped screaming and was quietly sobbing behind him. He turned and took her into his arms. Pulling her close, he made low soft cooing sounds and stroked hair golden hair and gently rubbed her back and neck. He put his head down and smelled the sweet scent of Sandy’s air. Her sobbing had stopped and she raised her head and looked at him with those bright blue crystal eyes that cut right into him. “What in God’s name was that?” she asked. Glen paused a minute then answered, “I don’t know but I hope there aren’t more of them out there. I have no more bullets…. and I don’t think that rocks are going to work!” His attempt at a little humor seemed to bring a small smile to the corner of her mouth. “Then let’s forget about the rocks for now” she answered and seemed to let out a long breath. It did bring up the point of what were they going to do when and if they ran into that thing’s friends or relatives. “I think it’s safer if we stay in the car tonight” Glen said. “At least it’s made out of metal and should be some protection should his friends show up and want dinner. Let’s look around then get the hell out of here. We’re too exposed here.” “No argument here”, she said.

They quickly went through the upper story, not finding much. They did stumble across an old Southern California Trail Rider’s calendar tacked to one of the walls. Its yellow pages were falling apart…. But Glen could see the faded pictures of riders on bikes, coming down sweet single track, jumping off of rocks, gathering around flags. Although he didn’t recognize anyone, some of the riders looked vaguely familiar. He stood there lost in previous memories of rides that he had taken a long time ago on a trail that seemed to glow. His reverie was suddenly broken when he read the date: 2018. That was only 10 years from his time period. This confirmed what he had been thinking all along, that not only could you move into a parallel time shift, you could also move forwards or backwards in time as well. Evidently that brown plastic Boy Scout flashlight with the compass in the handle was no simple flashlight. His handed flashed down and reassured himself that it was safely in his pants pocket. He would have to take a much closer look at it now. There must be some way to control where and when you went someplace “else”. It was turning out to be the key to all of this…. whatever “this” was!

Sandy was calling him from the other room. Glen hurried over to find her staring into a closet. She stepped out of the way and he saw what she had been staring at. A brand new mountain bike wrapped in a plastic coating hung from a hook in the closet. Except for a strange looking helmet, there was nothing else in the closet. There was also no dust in the closet. Although there was dust everywhere else, some how the bike had been protected. Even the tires looked new. Glen quickly pulled the bike down and unwrapped it. The light frame seemed to be made out of a hard plastic-like material. Even the tires looked new. They were firm and hard. The saddle was also strange looking with a slot down the middle. He wondered how it would ride. Stranger yet, there was no name on the frame, or on the front shock…. or any place at all. Slipping on the helmet, Glen wheeled the bike over to the door and said the Sandy, “I’m taking the bike in case we need another means of transportation. Now, let’s get the hell out of here and back to the car.” She offered no resistance and ran down the stairs in front of him. On the way out of the shop, Glen’s eyes swept back and forth looking for anything else they could use. He found nothing but the old rusted frames they had first seen when he came into the shop.

Outside the sun had completely set and a cool breeze had started to blow. Glen wheeled the bike over to the car, raised the truck lid and tried to slip it in the trunk. With all the other stuff they had taken out of the garage, it wouldn’t fit. He leaned down and removed the front wheel. This time it slipped right into a space… like it had always been there. Sandy had climbed into the passenger seat and sat there waiting for him. He pulled the flashlight out and switched it on. The beam cut through the darkness and illuminated the back of the store. He now saw large scratch marks on the door leading into the shop. He was sure they hadn’t been there when they first went in. A chill went up his back. If that thing had gotten to them … he really didn’t want to pursue that line of thought! A sound behind him caused him to spin around and level the flashlight. But it was only Sandy opening the car door and looking questioningly at him. He could see from here that her crystal blue eyes were filled with fear. He hurried back over to the car, climbed in and started the engine. Pulling out onto what seemed like the road; Glen flipped on the lights, gunned the engine and increased his speed.

Although their trip through the darkened streets of Laguna Beach was basically uneventful, they both breathed a sigh of relief when they were able to pick up the road out of the canyon and back to once what had been Lake Forest. Out of the canyon the road seemed to be in better condition and they made pretty good time until they came to what had once been the 405 freeway. There were rusted heaps of cars all going south stacked end to end… as though a kid had left them there after playing cars. What was stranger was there were no cars going north. It was as though everyone had tried to flee south away from Los Angeles. Glen wanted to get out and walk over and look into one of the cars but reason prevailed. There might be another “dog thing” with a mouth full of sharp teeth waiting for an unsuspecting dinner guest. He would pass on this. Glen finally found an underpass that allowed them to get to the other side and he continued to follow what had been highway 133.

Several times he thought he saw movement out of the corner of his eye, but when he turned to look, everything was still. He did have a vague sense of being watched and turned to tell Sandy about it and noticed that she had fallen asleep with her golden head on his shoulder. Somehow he felt comforted by this… sort of like a hero protecting his lady. Anyway, this would give him time to think… something he hadn’t been doing too much of lately. He seemed to be constantly reacting instead of planning…. and he needed to make plans… such as where were they going. He knew he couldn’t drive around all night. Pulling to the side of the road, Glen switched off the lights and killed the engine. The darkness quickly surrounded them. Although there was no moon, he could just make out the ruins of a large building further down the road. He glanced up and noticed how close the stars seemed. With the lights of the city now gone, the stars looked closer than ever. In fact, it looked as though you could touch them. Tiredness quickly came to stake a claim throughout his body. He had been running on pure adrenaline for the last 24 hours. Glen’s eyes were heavy and he felt as if he could just close them for a minute and rest it would be OK…….. Funny, was that a light in that building???…. No couldn’t be. There was no one else around except those large dog things with teeth. That was the last thought he had.

Glen awoke with a start. His face warm from the sun shinning through the window of the car. He hadn’t even remembered falling asleep. Yet here he was both arms numb from the car seat and drool coming out of the side of his mouth. Some hero he’s make. Sandy had stirred slightly when he had come awake but had not moved since. She must have been extremely tired from their journey. Somehow in the bright sunlight last night’s ordeal didn’t seem so bad. Maybe it was the lack of lighting that made the “dog” seem so large. But Glen knew better. That was not an imaginary mouth of teeth he’d shot all to hell.

His eyes fell on the brown plastic official Boy Scout flashlight with the compass in the handle. His thoughts about it being an important key swam to the surface again. Picking it up, he carefully looked at it again. Although he had examined it before, he began to notice several things that you wouldn’t expect to find on a flashlight. Along side the off/on switch was a small brown button that was the same color as the rest of the plastic… only this button had a symbol at the top of the switch and one at the bottom. They sort of looked like plus and minus symbols. This time he also noticed that the flashlight had symbols around the bezel. In fact it was a double bezel with symbols on both. He theorized that if he turned the bezels in a certain way they would match up to a certain time line. The trick was to decipher which pair of symbols was his particular time line. He counted the symbols on each ring. There was 10 on the inner and 20 on the outer. And what the heck was the compass for…. Or was it a compass? Maybe a closer look would tell…..

Glen was so intent on studying the brown plastic official Boy Scout flashlight with the compass in the handle, that he didn’t see what was silently approaching the car. At first there were only 2, and then came another and another, then 3 more and finally the largest one was last. He silently motioned the others to surround the car which they quickly did, cutting off all possibility of escape. They had been waiting since before dawn when they had first spotted the car to close the trap. There would be great celebrating and feeding tonight.

Glen finally glanced up from his study of the brown plastic official Boy Scout flashlight with the compass in the handle to find the car completely surrounded … surrounded by a pack of..…dirty mountain bikers? . They looked like ancient warriors or something out of a Mad Max movie. Their helmets were covered with feathers and each was fully encased in body armor. Unsmiling faces painted with black, white and red paint, these riders did not look like any mountain bikers he had ever ridden with…. nor wanted to! More importantly, these warrior mountain bikers had ugly long sharp curved knives which were out and pointed at Glen. It was also then that Glen noticed the sculls tied to several of the old bikes.

Sandy, wake up! We have guests….”

[foofighter]

excellent...well worth the wait.

[Red Hot Sloth]

Oh yeah...GLEN: Warrior Prince!!!

[bighit8]

"adrenaline for the last 24 hours". Does he end up in Hurkey Gregg?
Thanks, this is getting good.But its a book I cant finish until the author writes more.