Victor Gischler - Go-Go Girls of the Apocalypse

There she goes, Mortimer thought. The icon for a new age. She could have been on the recruitment poster for the swingingest army in the world.

She met Mortimer’s gaze and winked as Anne shifted the big truck into gear and kept going.

Bill said, “So that wasyour wife, huh?”

“Ex-wife.”

Mortimer considered Anne’s parting words. They were square. He’d found her. Saved her. The slate was clean.

Sheila’s head came up through the moonroof. She held the headset away from her ear. “It’s working, guys. Hey, they’re doing it. They’re running the Red Stripes out of gas.”

They went to the Cooper. Mortimer took the headphones, listened but didn’t hear anything. “What happened?”

Sheila took the headphones back and listened. “It was working a minute ago.” She ducked back into the car, played with the switches. “It’s working fine, we’re just not getting anything.”

“Maybe they’re all out of range now,” Bill said.

“The Czar has a shortwave radio setup in his lab,” Mortimer said. “I want to know what’s going on.”

“Shit,” Bill said. “Don’t go back in there.”

“They’re all dead or ran away.”

“You don’t know that.”

“Stay with Sheila,” Mortimer said. “I won’t be long.”

The copper tang of bloodhit Mortimer as the elevator door slid open on the top floor of the CNN Center. Lars lay dead in front of him, multiple bullet holes in his back. It struck Mortimer that he wore the same black suit working for the Czar as he did working for Armageddon.

Meet the new boss.

Same as the old boss.

Mortimer stepped over the body, crossed through to the “throne room.”

The giant slumped dead in the chair, his chest and face caked with dark blood. He still clutched the caveman club in one hand. Around him lay half a dozen Red Stripes with their heads smashed open. Horace had gotten in his licks before he went down.

Mortimer picked his way around the bodies, trying not to step in too much gore, and entered the laboratory.

Freddy-the Red Czar-sat with his back to Mortimer. He wore a headset plugged into a ham radio. He chuckled to himself, shaking his head and taking gulps from a bottle of his terrible vodka.

He must have sensed Mortimer’s presence, turned abruptly. “Oh, it’s you. Asshole. You started all this.”

“Not me.”

“I attacked before I was ready. You made me think Armageddon was about to attack too, so I attacked first.”

“I need to borrow your radio,” Mortimer said.

This made Freddy laugh harder. “You want to hear what’s on the radio? Here, have a listen.”

He unplugged the headphones, and the speakers buzzed to life.

– “…and I think they’re dead too. I can’t find any of the security people and-oh, hell, they’re everywhere. They killed Nancy and the whole kitchen staff…” Static.

“Who was that?” Mortimer asked.

Freddy laughed again, eyes afire with madness. “That’s your precious paradise. Joey Armageddon’s is in ruins. Lookout Mountain is a slaughterhouse.”

“You’re a liar.”

The static cleared, the voice coming in strong again.-“…if you can hear this, if anyone’s reading me at all. Repeat, the bicycle slaves are in revolt. They’re apparently organized, maybe been planning this…I don’t…they got weapons…so many dead…” It fuzzed to static again and didn’t come back.

Mortimer felt his stomach twist, his fingers and arms and face going cold and numb.

Freddy slurped vodka, much of it spilling on his chest. He coughed, wiped his mouth. “Nobody wins. Only losers. Only more and more of the world dying faster and faster. I couldn’t bring back civilization my way, and Armageddon couldn’t do it his way.”

Mortimer thought about the village around the incline station, all the bustling shops, the happy people singing along to “Walk Like an Egyptian.” It would have worked, thought Mortimer. We were so close.

“So what’s it going to be, Mortimer Tate?” Freddy belched, drank more vodka. “Are you going to shoot me now? Ha. What’s that going to prove? Go ahead. You’d be doing me a favor.”

Bang.

“Always glad to help.”

Downstairs, Mortimer climbed behind thewheel of the MINI Cooper, started the engine. He felt light and insubstantial, like he might float up out of himself, get lost on the breeze. Or maybe he would faint. He wasn’t sure.

“You find out anything?” Bill asked from the backseat.

Mortimer hesitated, took a deep breath. “No. No, I didn’t find out anything.”

“I’m sure it’s all fine,” Sheila said. “Last we heard General Malcolm had won. The Red Stripes ran out of gas.”

“Yeah, that’s right,” Bill said hopefully. “They kicked ass. And we rescued those women. I’d say the good guys won the day.”

“Right,” Sheila said. “Yeah.”

They looked at Mortimer, waited.

“I want to see Florida,” Mortimer said. “You guys ever been to Florida?”

They scrounged a hose tosiphon enough gasoline from the battlefield wrecks to get out of the city, kept heading south and finally slowed nearly to a stop when they spotted an unknown edifice in the center of the interstate ahead.

“Looks like a person,” Sheila said.

Mortimer scratched his chin, blew out a sigh. “Just standing in the middle of the highway?”

“It’s too big to be a person,” Bill said.

Mortimer briefly pictured Horace, the shark-toothed giant. “We’ll go slow. I’ll toss it into reverse if something happens.”

“Or run him over,” Sheila suggested.

They edged closer, and the thing took shape. It was made in the form of a human, arms outstretched, legs bent. It stood atop a length of neon orange fiberglass that might have once been a car door or hood.

They parked the MINI, got out. The wooden plaque at the base of the sculpture read:

INTERSTATE SURFER

– ANONYMOUS

Upon closer examination, Mortimer saw the length of fiberglass had indeed been expertly shaped to resemble a surfboard.

“Huh.” Mortimer sat on the front bumper of the MINI Cooper and looked at the metal surfer. The legs were axles banged and bent into submission, the arms strands of metal Mortimer couldn’t identify, but the stubby fingers were spark plugs. The torso looked like a gas tank. The skull was some engine part Mortimer could only guess at, lightbulbs in the eyes, the wide mouth a car stereo. An orange highway cone for a hat.

Something in the body language kept the sculpture from looking completely comical. It must have weighed a ton but seemed perfectly balanced.

Bill sat on the bumper next to Mortimer. “It looks like the least little thing could knock it over, massive and fragile at the same time. I wonder how long it took him to do it.”

“Beats me.” Mortimer noticed a lack of bird droppings on the sculpture. Nothing rusted. This one was relatively new.

Sheila sat on the other side. “I’d have signed my name. Doesn’t he want credit?”

They sat looking at the surfer a long time, nobody saying a word.

They ran out of fueltwenty miles north of Valdosta. They camped near the car that night, built a small fire and slept the sleep of the dead.

The next morning they sat around the campfire’s cold coals, no gasoline, no food, no ideas and no coffee. If Mortimer had been granted only one wish, it would have been for the coffee.

Sheila spotted it first, a black speck in the blue of the sky. They sat and watched the speck grow bigger all morning until it was close enough to recognize as the Blowfish.