Mike McQuay - Escape From New York

The others in the car were obviously bodyguards. They were dark, like the Duke, and had droopy moustaches. Brightly colored bandannas wound around their heads, and their earrings were large and gold. They wore dark suits with dark shirts. Their faces were lined with cruelty. Gypsies.

The lead car passed and others went by, filled with Gypsies. Their exhaust smoke stuffed the alley with dirty fog and Plissken, by habit, covered his mouth and nose with his hand.

They grumbled along slowly, like a funeral procession,

“Don’t cross the Duke,” the cabbie kept saying, shaking his head. “Everybody knows that”

“Button it,” Plissken rasped. He grabbed Hellman by the shoulder, forcing the man to get eye to eye with him. “Is the President with them?” he asked.

“No,” the man answered, and the Snake couldn’t read through the granite of his eyes. “He’s stashed away at the Duke’s place.”

The caravan stopped in front of the library, but didn’t shut down their engines, probably with good reason. Plissken watched as a man with a deathshead face and chiseled teeth jumped out of the Duke’s car and took the steps up to the library two at a time.

“He’s looking for you, Brain,” Maggie said, as the man began pounding on the door the same way Cabbie had done.

“What does he want?” Plissken asked,

“My diagram to the bridge,” Hellman answered. “When he finds out I’m with you, he’ll kill me. Shit, Snake, I knew I shouldn’t have.. ”

“We gotta get the President now,” Plissken snapped, “while the Duke’s busy.”

Hellman shook his head with resignation. “Forget it,” he returned. “He’s on the other side of town and we got no wheels.”

“Sure we do,” Maggie said. “Cabbie,”

They turned to the cabbie, but he was gone, his cab, too distant for them to catch, was backing down the alley, its sounds muffled by the incredible timbre of the convoy. The cab reached the other end of the alley and backed quickly onto the main street, a tiny squealing sound drifting back to Plissken’s ears.

“Slime,” the woman muttered, and for the second time that night Plissken got to see the range of extreme emotions that could mold her face.

“That’s it,” Hellman said, and breathed deeply. “Deal’s off. Snake.”

“Just calm down,” Plissken told him, and held up the rifle just to let Hellman know that this wasn’t going to be a replay of Kansas City.

The last car in the caravan stopped right in front of the alley. It was an old station wagon, with bars welded on the window like the cab’s. It sat there, quivering like it had caught a chill. One of its headlights had come out of its socket and was dangling, waving at the ground. The man in the passenger side got out, cursed and moved to the front to fix it.

“Wait here,” Plissken said, and his tone told them that he really meant it.

He walked up the alley, staying in the shadows. Getting close to the car, he casually sauntered up to the driver’s window. The man turned to look at him, but all he really got to see was a close look at the tempered steel, combat-gouged butt of the Snake’s automatic. And he didn’t get to see that except for a second.

The butt of Plissken’s gun connected solidly, cracking, across the man’s nose and cheekbone. He went over on the seat without a sound, as if he had just decided to take a little nap.

Plissken opened the door, shoved the unconscious man over and got behind the wheel. The other Gypsy was squatting down in front of the car, still fiddling with the headlight. Plissken slammed the door and hunched down in the seat.

He heard sounds from the front of the car, heard the other man calling a name. Then he saw the man’s shadow drift lazily across the windshield.

The man was at the door, bending down to look through the bars. The Snake came up sideways with the gun butt, slipping it vertically through the bars. He caught the man’s mouth and chin.

The Gypsy gurgled, hands to face, backpeddling toward the alley. Maggie ran out from the darkness, shoved the man back even more and cracked his head on the side of the building. He fell, splashing into a puddle. Maggie and Brain dragged him into the alley.

Laying his gun on top of the unconscious man, Plissken jammed the car into reverse and backed up enough to nose the thing into the alley.

He jerked to a stop in front of Hellman and Maggie. The Brain opened up the door and pulled the Gypsy onto the ground beside his buddy. Plissken grabbed his gun away just as the man was sliding out. Hellman climbed in front, Maggie in back and Snake Plissken screeched away down the alley.

“Oh shit,” Hellman said.

“What?”

“I just sat in something… wet.” He was raising himself up to look at his pants. The seat was soaked in blood. “Shit,” he said again. And then again, just for effect, “Shit”

“Where’re we going?” Plissken asked, pulling out of the alley and heading down a wide avenue.

“Well, ah… it’s a ways from here,” Hellman stammered.

“You’re in this,” Plissken said through clenched teeth. “All the way, Harold.” He stared intently at the man, reminding him of the fire that burned out of control within. “We’re like Siamese twins.”

“Grand Central Station,” Hellman said quietly. “They’ve got him at the station.”

“Which way?”

Hellman pointed straight on. “This is okay for now… no, wait” He was wiggling his hand. “Turn left here.”

Plissken squealed the brakes and took the quick turn. It was a big street, a huge street.

“Wait a minute, Brain,” Maggie said. “This is Broadway.”

“I know,” Hellman answered grimly. “The Duke’ll take Seventh Avenue. Broadway’s got five minutes on him.”

Plissken turned to the woman. Fear was molded on her face. He had never seen that emotion from her. “Brain, come on,” she said.

Hellman set his face. “Keep driving,” he said. “If we’re going to do this thing, we may as well do it.”

“What’s wrong with Broadway?” Plissken asked.

“Just go.”

He turned to the woman again. “What’s wrong with Broadway?”

“Hoodoo,” she answered, slumping back in her seat. And she wouldn’t say anything more.

Plissken kept moving his eye, watching. It was all right at first, but then they began seeing the fires, small fires, single fires burning here and there. They heard the drums, then the chanting, the deathly moan of the chanting.

“What the hell…”

The fires became more frequent and had been somehow treated with chemicals to make their smoke rise different colors: yellows and pinks and fine powdery blues, filling the street with drifting multicolored clouds. The stench of burning rubber drifted with the clouds.

Figures darted wraithlike through puffs of smoke-flitting, ethereal, always in motion, impossible to discern. The drums were loud, throbbing Plissken’s eye, making him rock physically in the seat. And the chanting was a siren song, indefinable, magnetic. The parking meters lined the smoky streets in long rows, metal display poles topped-with heads. Human heads with open screaming mouths. Then the people were everywhere, smoke people, moaning. They moved slowly toward the car.

Plissken felt his stomach muscles tighten. “Come on, Sweetheart,” he said and gave it as much gas as he possibly could on the smoke-filled street. They picked up speed, moving through the ever-growing street throngs.

Bang!

A rock hit the roof, then another.

“Oh God,” Hellman said softly.

Then a barrage of rocks pelted the car from all sides, like a hailstorm. One made it through the bars on Plissken’s window and hit him on the face. The car swerved as he fought for control. Glass broke out of the back window. Screams came from Maggie. More rocks, bigger. Fire came at the car. A torch flew up to hit the windshield, then rolled onto the hood. Plissken jerked some more, knocking it off.