Page 25 of Spyder
Spyder
The one time I could have used an overcast night, it is, of course, clear as a bell. And to top it off, the moon is a big, fat half-wedge shape hanging in the sky, casting the world all around us in a bright as hell, silvery light. Might as well have fluorescent lights hanging over our damn heads.
It took us a while to find the place since Tarantula’s instructions weren’t overly specific, but I suppose I can’t fault him for it. Much. And moving around in the dark scrubland out here, in this place that time and progress both seemed to have forgotten isn’t very easy. But after we got out here, Domino and I both agreed that we needed to lie low and wait until nightfall to move. The last thing we want is to attract any unwanted attention since this is a recon mission.
“They sure picked a good spot. It’s out in the middle of fucking nowhere,” Domino mutters.
“Tell me about it. But it’s smart. No cops out here and it’s pretty simple to spot anybody rollin’ up on you.”
“Yeah, Zavala’s a MENSA guy, for sure.”
I chuckle. “He didn’t get to where he is by being a dumbass.”
“That’s true. I kinda wish he was a moron, though. It’d make this shit a lot easier for us.”
“You ain’t lyin’.”
We’re lying on a rise, looking through our night-vision goggles into a small but wide depression in the land, and in the center of it is a large warehouse. It looks like some sort of prefab construction, and there are some cargo containers stacked up on one side of it. A fence was built around the warehouse, extending the perimeter of the place a good fifty or sixty feet on all sides.
This place is well off the grid, and you’d need to be looking for it specifically to know it’s here. The powerful hum of generators drifts up to us from below, and through the green-tinted light in my goggles, I can see groups of armed men milling around, talking to each other, their laughter even louder than the generators. The flare of the end of their cigarettes as they take a drag is a beacon in the darkness.
“Man, back in the shit, if I saw the cherry on a smoke light up like that, I’d be able to blow a man’s head off even without the scope,” Domino says.
“You ever do it? Blow a dude’s head off in the dark?”
His chuckle is low and malevolent. “A few times.”
Domino was a sniper back in the service and a damn good one, apparently. I know it was he who took the first shot who ignited this current war we’re embroiled in. But he did it to help save Monk’s girl. If Zavala hadn’t taken Kasey, none of this would be happening right now. But he did, so now we’re all dealing with the fallout of the shitstorm that’s been unleashed.
“How are things going with Bellamy?” he asks, totally out of the blue.
“What? What makes you think anything’s going on?”
He chuckles. “Blue Rock ain’t that big of a place, man. Word gets around the grapevine pretty quick.”
“I’m serious, there’s nothing going on at the moment.”
He arches an eyebrow at me. “As they say, don’t bullshit a bullshitter.”
I laugh. “I ran into her on the street. Totally random. We talked. And that was pretty much it.”
“You talked. And that was it?”
“Yeah. Pretty much,” I reply.
He looks over at me, a skeptical expression on his face. But then a grin slowly stretches across his lips.
“Pretty much, huh?” he asks.
“I asked her out. No big deal.”
“You asked her out? I didn’t know you grew a pair of balls. I’d say that’s a pretty big deal,” he says.
I laugh. “Fuck you.”
“I’m serious. How many years did you spend mooning over this girl? The fact that you nutted up and asked her out… I’m impressed.”
“It’s just getting reacquainted over a drink. It’s not a big deal,” I say.
