Blaze of Glory

CHAPTER 22

Great green gobs of greasy, grimy gopher guts,

Mutilated monkey meat, Chopped-up dirty birdies' feet.

Great green gobs of greasy, grimy gopher guts,

And me without a spoon.

Over and over Grandma Riggs sang the grotesque children’s verse as Buckley carried her through the rubble-strewn streets at a dead run. For almost an hour, with Grandma Riggs sitting in her chair facing backwards, she’d alternated between singing, cackling and begging for just a little more crack.

Her arms had been too brittle and weak for her to be able to hold onto him, so they’d duct taped her to a chair which they'd then affixed to his back with lengths of rope. Even now as he ran, however, the rope around his chest and waist sawed back and forth. He was certain that the skin beneath the rope was gone, leaving a set of long bleeding wounds.

They were headed for the ocean. They’d been only a few miles away from the shore and the idea had hit them that if the Maggies had such trouble with salt, the ocean would be like acid. Hope was kindled as they all realized that fully two-thirds of the planet was safe for humanity. Perhaps even islands were habitable. Hurricanes, once seen as the bane of the North Carolina Coast and the Outer Banks, suddenly took on Old Testament connotations promising to cleanse the earth of evil. Had the great flood been for this very purpose? Had the Maggies been here before?

Buckley turned for a second, pausing to catch his breath and work out the knot in his side. He watched as Gert leaned back like a center fielder and hurled a North Carolina Cocktail at the last caddie still on their trail. The glass bottle containing salt and lighter fluid arched high into the air, then fell, striking the Cadillac-sized maggie on its back and exploding as the burning rag ignited the gasoline, immediately causing an eruption of blood and flesh and maggie guts.

Mark another one for the human team.

MacHenry, winded but grinning from ear to ear, ran up, grabbed Buckley’s elbow and helped propel him along. Even overloaded as he was with cloth bags filled with Carolina Cocktails, he was less burdened than Buckley.

“Thanks man,” Buckley wheezed. “She’s heavy and I’m not as young as I used to be.”

“Giddyup! Move it horsy! Giddyup!” came the commands from his back. Grandma's heels dug into his back as she tried to urge him forward with her kicks.

Buckley rolled his eyes.

“None of us are.” Then MacHenry's smile fell. "Fucked up what happened to Samuel."

"I didn't think you cared," Buckley said, not really meaning it. "The way he fucked with you."

"That wasn't a big deal. He was just scared is all. It was his way to bleed off stress. Me, I got to have sex, so who am I to complain."

"It could just have easily have been you," Buckley said.

"Don't I know it." MacHenry shook his head. "I don't know what to say about that."

“Really? I thought you'd be disappointed you aren’t dead yet? I mean this ain’t exactly going out in style. This isn't jumping off the top rope.”

“What the hell are you talking about? This IS going out in style. I’ve always loved those suicide rides like the Charge of the Light Brigade; how against all odds, with death a certainty they rode as a unit into the face of the enemy for God, country and comrades. Into the Valley of death and all that shit.” He turned to glance behind him, ensuring Gert was in stride. “Oh yeah,” he grinned broadly, leaning over to kiss the woman who’d become his truest love. “I definitely feel like Johnny Storm right now. How about you? You feeling heroic? You feeling like Ben Grimm?”

“I don’t think he ever felt heroic, you know?”

“No?”

“I think he was just tired of it all; of all the violence and death.”

“Well, maybe not, but you sure kick ass like he did and are just as strong.”

“Strength is relative.”

As if to prove MacHenry’ point, over the cacophony of crumbling buildings and screaming friends, Buckley heard Grandma Riggs ordering a pizza with pineapple and anchovies on an imaginary cell phone, reminding him that he was an Atlas, doomed to carry the fate of the world upon his shoulders, or at the very least, a crack-addled grandma.

Their portable soundtrack provided the maniacal background music to their flight as Grandma Riggs sang over and over -

Great green gobs of greasy, grimy gopher guts,

Mutilated monkey meat, Chopped-up dirty birdies' feet.

Great green gobs of greasy, grimy gopher guts,

And me without a spoon.

Ten blocks later, it was plain that they wouldn’t be able to run all the way. It was just too far. Twice, Buckley had stumbled struggling to hold both him and his passenger upright. MacHenry and Gert were both limping as legs more used to other, more supine, activities suddenly found themselves pounding vertical.

They had to stop.