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But she was alive, Ice thought with desperate relief as he scanned her with battle-trained quickness, saw that she was bleeding slightly but only from being scraped as she fell, not from the shrapnel, most of which seemed to be burning holes in the torn flesh of Ice’s back.
He pushed himself off Indy now, leaping to his feet, whipping out his knife, standing over her huddled body, prepared to take a sniper’s bullet, ready to rout an army of oncoming assassins.
But there was no rifle crack, no marauding mercenaries, no more glints of glass on that rooftop, no more explosions in the street.
Ice shook his head to get the ringing out of his ears, saw Jack pulling a groaning gasping bleeding Benson away from the flaming wreck, saw Kaiser crawling on hands and knees in the street, blood dribbling from his ears.
“Fuck!” Ice shouted, about to go help Kaiser but Indy had beaten him to the punch. Ice tried to grab her shoulder, but she was too quick, was already by Kaiser’s side, was getting him to lie on his back a safe distance from the burning shell of the car.
Indy glanced up from Kaiser’s writhing body, her eyes narrowed to slits, the anger of that raging infant coming to the forefront now, sending a clear message to her man, to her protector, to her fucking avenger.
“Go,” she said to him. “Jack and I have got this. Go, Ice. Go now. Do it. Fuckingdoit, you hear me?”
Ice met her gaze for one long dark beautiful moment as their shadows connected in the flaming night. Then he whipped his body around and exploded like he’d been shot from a cannon.
The burning shrapnel in his back was fuel now, urging him on as he saw Rhett get to the Chevy Suburban, whip open the front door, hide behind it and aim a black Glock 17 handgun at Ice.
The gun spat yellow flame as Ice thundered towards Rhett. For the life of him Ice couldn’t tell if he’d been hit or not. All he knew was that he was still running, and that was enough for now.
Rhett fired again as Ice launched himself shoulder-first at the open car door, slamming it against Rhett’s body, cracking the bone in Rhett’s forearm between the door and the frame.
The gun fell to the asphalt near Ice’s feet, but he didn’t bother to pick it up. Instead he smashed his right fist into Rhett’s face, felt his knuckles crack bone and crush cartilage, hot blood from Rhett’s shattered nose and broken teeth spraying Ice’s hand before spilling onto the dark road.
Ice grabbed Rhett by the back of his hair now, pulled him away from the truck, spun him around three times and then let go, sending him spinning onto the sidewalk, stumbling into the grass.
And then Ice was on him, slamming fist after fist into Rhett’s face with wild rage that seemed to come from some beast that had been hiding within him for years, perhaps lifetimes.
Rhett’s face was a bloody bulbous pulp when Ice dragged him to his feet again, hurled him face-first into the side of the truck, then ripped out his knife and stuck the blade into Rhett’s lower back, stabbing viciously three times into his left kidney, twice more into the right, then staggering back as Rhett crumpled to the ground like a sack of empty clothes.
Black blood oozed from the fatal wounds like demonic stigmata, surreal and sickly, slow and sticky.
Time slowed as Ice watched Rhett die.
And then suddenly the fight was over, and the adrenaline began to drain from Ice, the pain of the fire-hot shrapnel burning like acid in his flesh, his vision starting to blur as he staggered back to the scene.
All Ice’s senses went in and out as sirens wailed closer and louder, engines roaring around him, tires squealing as a herd of black Chevy Suburbans thundered onto the scene even as ambulances bounced over the curbs towards the wreck.
In a daze Ice saw paramedics lifting Kaiser and Benson onto stretchers, loading them into separate ambulances as Indy screamed and pointed in Ice’s direction as she ran to him.
Ice could see her lips move, hear the sound of her voice.
But he couldn’t understand what she was saying.
Now he felt a throbbing pain above his right pectoral and he realized that yeah, maybe he’d been shot after all. Imagine that.
“Fuck,” he muttered, stumbling and then going down to his knees as Indy tore down the burning streets towards him, getting there just in time to cushion his head before he fell face-first into the asphalt.
Vision went in and out in splinters as Ice felt himself being lifted by many arms. He grinned dreamily, wondering if it was angels laying hands upon his broken body. The grin widened when he thought he saw his smiling parents directing those angels.
But then he immediately lost the grin as panic ripped through him at the prospect he might be dead.
It vaguely occurred to him that if he were dead and still conscious, then it meant the spirit lived on, the afterlife was real, death was just an illusion.
Fuck that, Ice thought as he clawed his way back to the world of burning flesh and screaming pain. The afterlife could wait. He wantedthisdamn life.
A life with her.
“I’m going with him,” came her voice, alive and loud, furious and forceful. “I’m here, Ice. I’m here with you. Hey, is somebody going to drive this fucking ambulance or do I have to do it myself?”
