uSoak: Water Warfare Tournament

The following takes place between 7pm and 8pm

I grabbed the sharp metal edge of the culvert opening and jumped, pulling myself into drainpipe with some difficulty.  I sprinted the length, and when a person appeared in my field of view, I was so concentrated on running and getting back to the car that raising the Pulse Master and tapping a blast of water into their chest was instinctive.  Then I was past them, and I took the path up the side of the ravine at a sprint, zigzagging back and forth for better traction, practically bouncing off the trees I grabbed on and pushed off so fast.

At the forest’s edge, I sprinted for the car.  Another pulled up just as I got in, and I jammed on all the locks.  For a moment I sat in the driver’s seat, breathing hard, dripping with sweat.  My hands shook as I ripped the mylar off the box.  It tore cardboard shreds from the box.  I took a calming breath and examined the item I’d grabbed.  One of the sides of the box folded away to reveal a phone number.  Oops.  Nobody’d be calling that again.

I called the number as I turned the key in the ignition, and the loud purr of the car almost drowned out the destination.  Bay Beach Wildlife Sanctuary.  The GPS map showed me a dot in the middle of…nothingness.  I didn’t worry, I’d find it when I got there.

According to the GPS, it should’ve taken me fifteen minutes to get from Wequiock Falls to the Wildlife Sanctuary.  I had a racecar.  It took nine.  Van Lanen Road I took at a hundred and fifty, dropped down to ninety for Nicolet, and shifted to seventy-five for East Shore.  The whine of the tires on the road, the healthy loud hum of the engine, and the rush of the wind drowned out the world.  Created a new world.  Just me and the car.  There was nothing else.  Just me and the confines of the car, speeding into the sunset.

The sun was dropping, and it was not taking the heat with it.  The wind that slammed against me through the open windows was still as hot and humid as ever.  With some luck, the inferno would retreat some overnight, but I doubted there’d be much of a change – there was still too much heat baked into the ground to give us a moment’s respite.  Even the trees looked weary, sagging imperceptibly, as if anticipating the coming darkness and the chance to rest their tired branches from the glare of the sun.

The houses along East Shore were either mansions or upscale ranches, and you could tell just by looking at them, they all thought they were better than every other house out there because they had beachfront property.  Had to be a stunning view all year long – an almost California-like vista of sand and surf during the summer, and an almost Alaska-like view of gray skies, desolate coastland, and cold, foamy breakers during the fall and winter.

I could see through the sparse trees and across the manicured lawns the Bay Beach amusement park.  Full of people on a hot Saturday afternoon, swelling and ebbing rivers of them.  Rivers was a good description for the crowds, they all flowed somewhere.  The rides were in constant motion and music and the smell of grilling meat managed to cross the several hundred yards to me.

Then I realized I was past the entrance to the Wildlife Sanctuary, and I swung a hard, unthinkingly instinctual one-eighty.  Two different horns blared, and a car flashed past on the driver’s side, close enough I could reach out and touch it.  My pulse spiked, and I laughed.  I knew I was alive.

A giant wood archway announced the entrance to the Sanctuary, and I slowed way down as I wound my way along the twisting blacktop.  The phone’s GPS put the next target somewhere up ahead, in roughly the same direction I was traveling now.  I supposed it would be too much to ask for the road to go that far.

I got my answer when the road ended in a parking lot.  I pulled into a spot, retrieved my guns, and locked the car door.  The phone’s GPS told me what I was looking for was somewhere to the east.  The clock told me the time was seven-ten.  I’d made great time.  Which is something that’ll happen when you drive between ninety and a hundred and fifty miles an hour for two thirds of the trip.

The forest behind me drowned out the sounds of the carnival on the lake shore, and the air was silent except for the faint honking of geese and the whine of mosquitoes.  The whine got louder, and I ducked as one tried to fly into my ear.  It’d be a good idea to keep moving, I didn’t have that much blood to lose.  I considered filling at one of the three blue barrels, but I’d just filled at Wequiock, and with this much open space, I planned on running rather than gunning.

While the big building off to my right looked interesting, the GPS was pointing elsewhere.  Maybe I’d come here tomorrow.  After I won this thing, of course.  I grinned, a lopsidedly cocky Han Solo grin.  How long ago had I been lamenting my lack of options and decided to step into this embarrassingly childish game?

I sprinted through another massive archway and down a concrete path.  To the right campfire pits and stone seats dotted a small grassy field.  Looked like it was some sort of outdoor theater.

The pathway faded from concrete to gravel to dirt and mulch, and I kept running.  The trees grew thicker together, and around a bend in the path they opened up again.  A building sat in the clearing, a dark green camo color, the majority of the outside walls backing up fenced in animal displays.  Natural looking rock walls and plants and camo netting attempted to set a wildlife atmosphere, but the chain link and wooden guard rails were working against it.  A few people stood by the chain link enclosures, looking at the animals, pointing out this or that factoid on the laminated information cards, or oohing and ahhing over some cute thing a cub or small critter did.  I slowed, swinging the Pulse Master to my right side in an attempt to hide it from the crowd.  Just another teenager, out for a stroll…

Yeah right.  A beam of water zipped past from the left, making serious time for the woods, the tail end sweeping towards me, and I ducked, right hand going into my bag and coming up with the Triple Shot.  I twisted in the crouched I’d dropped into and fired four times quick at the doorway to the animal observatory.  A middle aged woman took two of the blasts in the upper chest, one splattering her as it impacted the doorframe, and the last one flew into the building.  From back on the trail I’d come down, more water reached for her, long thin streams arcing in to splash her and the wall.  I twisted again to aim back down the path, five shots going out as fast as I could get my eyes and soaker on target.

Three hit the guy behind me, and I didn’t bother to count where.  I pushed off and was sprinting down the trail again.  So much for taking it easy, not being noticed…

I returned the pistol to my satchel as I ran, swinging the rifle back around and getting a grip on the handle.  Better to be prepared next time, rather than attempting and failing inconspicuousness.

To my left, wolves paced a grassy field, thankfully fenced in.  Boulders dotted the backdrop of their habitat, and a bloody carcass was draped over one.  I averted my eyes.  I can take insane risks, look death in the eye and flip it the bird, but seeing its effects on other living things…no thanks.

With enough space between myself and other people, I slowed and pulled out my phone again.  The dot on the GPS was blinking incessantly.  I was close.  Around another bend in the path, and I was pretty sure I’d found what I was looking for.  The people who put the tournament together apparently had a thing for out-of-the-ordinary missions and challenges.  The four story wooden tower in front of me certainly qualified.  Constructed out of logs and rough hewn boards, it started out roughly thirty by thirty, tapering to about twenty by twenty at the top.  From the nearby fence, I surmised that it was used to gain a better view of the wolf habitat.

Of course, there had to be people fighting here, at least two teams of three each on the second, third, and fourth levels.  It wouldn’t be a mission without some form of close-quarters, high-risk challenge.

The steps ascending to the hole in the floor of the first platform were nearly steep enough to qualify as a ladder.  I bounded towards them, got under the cover of the first platform, and debated pistol vs. rifle in my head while quickly climbing.  Rifle won out.  More water and a strap.  Mosquitoes buzzed me, and I climbed quicker.  Up on the first platform, and I took cover behind the steps, aiming up at the sliver of the second level I could see.

What exactly was I waiting for?

I rotated around the steps and sidestepped as water rocketed down at me.  I held down the trigger of the Pulse Master as I walked, and tagged a guy out with a looping stripe that started on one side of his face, touched his shoulder, and crossed his chest.  I sped up the stairs, pausing at the halfway point to wedge my feet into place and pan the gun around the opening.

Something felt wrong.  I waited, heart pounding in my ears.  Shooting and shouting and hammering footsteps came from the top levels.  Coming this way?  I couldn’t be sure.

Sweat rolled down my neck, my back, my arms.  Something felt wrong.  A watergun and a face behind it appeared, and I clicked the trigger three times, two shots bursting into mist on the platform above, one showering me with droplets as it splattered off the forehead above.  I raced the rest of the way up the steps and nearly knocked over two people coming down.  They looked lost-a-hundred-dollars dejected.

I pumped back to full power, and moved to the front of the steps.  Again I sprinted up to half way, and waited.  No wrong feelings.  No sounds from above.  I moved further up, and stuck my head and soaker through the hole in the floor.  They were all on the fourth level.

The view from up here was amazing.  No wolves to be seen, but the fenced enclosure was full of deer.  This area was below the level of the street, but even so, though the treetops I could get fragmented glimpses of the park across the street, and the houses I’d passed on my way here.

Inland, the view of the park was beautiful, in an unremarkably green canopy way.  Very peaceful, like all forests are.

Staying clear of the hole in the floor of the next platform and its angles, I moved to the edge of the third floor and leaned out.  The fourth story platform was walled in to waist-height.  No shooting up and over the side.  Going up that ladder with two trapped shooters above would be suicide.  I growled, punching one of the support beams in anger, and turned three hundred and sixty degrees, looking for an idea, inspiration, anything.  What was it Max Tanner – one of Dad’s Internet idols – always said?  “When faced with fatal hallways always go dynamic.  Never do the expected.”  Something like that.  Dad watched the guy’s YouTube educational channel religiously.

Never do the expected…

Another cocky grin.  Yeah, that’d work.  And when it came to risking my life, I trusted my hands and my strength more than I trusted someone else’s car…

At the corner of the platform, I put a hand on the support pole and stepped up on the railing.  Vertigo beckoned.  I ignored it.  Turning my back on the drop, I swung a leg over to the other side of the pole and reached up with both hands, getting a firm grip.  I dug in with the sides of both feet and PUSHED.  Luckily the wood was rough, and I was able to get a firm grip with both hands and shoes.  Inch by muscle-burning inch I dragged myself up the timber.

When the next level was within reach, I reached out and got a good grip on the protruding edge.  That felt much better, much more solid.  I half-hung there for a moment, getting my breath back, preparing mentally for what came next.  Close by I heard someone ask “Do you think she’s still down there?”

That warranted another grin.  Nobody thinks someone’s going to do something THIS patently stupid.

Reaching down with my right hand, I slowly pulled out the Triple Shot, then reached back up, getting the gun up above my head so it’d be one of the first things over the edge.  I heaved myself up with a massive pull, getting the pistol over the retaining wall.  I kicked up and pulled myself up further, shooting as I did.  I fired short little blasts all over the fourth level, drawing myself up to the point where I could actually aim over the railing.

By the time I was out of water, they were out of the game.

“Nicely played,” one of them commented as they descended the stairs.  I pulled myself over the railing and looked around the top of the tower for something resembling a clue.  There.  Inked onto the inside ledge of the railing was one word.  “Tilt-A-Whirl.”

Dammit.  They were sending me to the park.  Not only was it another – I checked my watch – thirty-five minutes of run-and-gun, but the crowd would make the both the “run” and “gun” parts of that equation extremely difficult.

I walked over to the hole in the floor and looked down at it for a moment.  From several levels below came the sounds of feet on wood.  Descending would be equally dangerous as ascending.  I pumped the Triple Shot back to full pressure, stuffed it in my bag, and walked to the back of the tower, the side closest to the fence.  I swung over and gripped the railing, then got my feet around the support timber, and started gradually lowering myself down.

The climbing lessons did NOT hurt here.  I made sure every grip and foothold was secure before slowly but surely lowering myself down.  With methodical precision I worked my way down, taking a second or two to breath when I reached the more secure footholds at each landing.

At the second level, the people who’d been coming up noticed me coming down.  Hugging the backside of the wide log, I couldn’t see them, and then couldn’t very well shoot me.  They sure saw my hands though.  There was burst of surprised profanity and plastic creaked.  “Don’t shoot!  You want to knock her off?”

I smiled, faced pressed to the wood.  Even better.

Feet on wood sounded, and I quickly worked my way down to the first level, where I swung over on the platform.  They were waiting for me on the ground.  Quietly I padded over to the hole in the floor, aimed the Pulse Master through, and drilled a middle-aged man in the chest with a bolt of water.  He sputtered at the splash and looked up, pushing his teenage son out of the way as he did.  I dodged back from the hole as water flew up.

Dynamic.  Never do the expected.

I swung over the railing, turned to face it in a crouch, and gripped the Pulse Master with one hand.  Then I let myself drop.

The roof was pretty standard looking.  Brick retaining walls keeping people from falling, either off the roof entirely, or onto the varied levels between the library towers.  HVAC equipment was scattered about, humming quietly.  I got my next assignment from a chalk scrawl on a brick wall: “44.568N 87.8795W.”

I was plugging it into my phone’s GPS before I was even off the roof.  Wequiock Falls, and not too far from here.  The digital clock said I had twenty minutes to go.  Roughly ten on the road, that gave me way less to get out of here.  I figured I could save some of the travel time; I did have a racecar after all.

I sprinted the narrow cross aisle of the library, checking for opponents.  None were in evidence, so I booked it to the elevator.  It’s hard to really feel like you’re running when your shoes make no noise as they sink into thick beige carpet.

I fidgeted as the elevator descended.  I’d pushed the ground floor button, but that was no guarantee of where I got off.  Where would it let me out?  I felt like I couldn’t stay still – the clock was ticking.

The elevator took me below ground level.  Basement level?  Covered tunnels for moving between buildings during the winter?  I’d heard UWGB was famous for trees, toilets, and tunnels…

The doors opened and I dashed out into a funhouse of reflective glass.  Cubicles.  The student credit union.  I picked my way through the deserted bank, heading for the light shining through the front doors far ahead.  Several times I ran smack into glass cubicle walls.

At the front doors, I peered out at the encircling concrete walls.  I was the fish at the bottom of the proverbial barrel.  I checked the pumps on the Triple Shot and Pulse Master and pushed through the doors.

Someone had clearly been expecting company through those doors, because water splattered off the glass as soon as I exited.  I raised the Pulse Master, angling it and shooting towards the top of the “bowl.”  My car was just a few dozen feet away…

I leapt a bench, vaulted a planter the size of a dumpster, and decided to hell with the shooting back.  I let the soaker swing at my side and flat out ran.  Back in the inferno-ish heat, a full-on sprint was not fun.

Water dropped to the grass and sidewalk around me, and I saw the dark, unpainted metal of the RX-7 up ahead.  I pulled the Pulse Master in close and jumped, sliding across the hood of the car behind mine on the seat of my jeans.  Glad I wasn’t wearing shorts, the heat soaked through the denim in an instant.  Covering behind my idling Mazda, I yanked a set of keys out of my satchel and unlocked the door.  Water sprayed into evaporating mist against the windows and metal, and I ducked into the car, pulling the door shut behind me.

My hands were shaking and my breath came in gasps.  Not fun.  I ripped the shifter back to “D” and cranked the wheel left, exited the parallel park with scant inches to spare, and accelerated.

I took the main drive of the college at forty miles per hour, banged down the hill onto the road, and headed north at a cool seventy five.  Green flew by on the winding drive, rich houses on the driver’s side, and before long I’d left the forest behind for farmland.  Corn and rolling fields of dirt zipped past on the right, and through the backyards of the upscale ranches to my left I could occasionally get glimpses the Bay of Green .  Traffic was nonexistent, and I punched the car even further into traffic ticket territory.  At one twenty five, the front of the Mazda felt like it would lift up, and I dropped it back to an ecstatic eighty five simply because I didn’t feel like pinwheeling around the next turn.

I felt free.  Independent.  Alive in a way I’d not felt alive in 3 months.  The thought that at least I felt alive was sobering, but I pushed it out of my mind.

Right off of Nicolet Drive onto Van Lanen, and I buried the pedal in the floor mat.  The directions I’d been given indicated it was now a straight shot to Wequiock.  Time to see how fast this car would go.

I was glad for the soft seats, because after I got over the “going airborne” feeling at one twenty five, I was pushed firmly back into the driver’s seat.  My stomach flipflopped as the speedometer climbed, and I smiled.  If a cop saw this, they’d dispense with the ticket and just throw me right in jail…

The RX-7 maxed out at one eighty five and I hadn’t even hit the nitrous yet.  While a distinct advantage of not valuing your life very much is a willingness to take risks, the thought of hitting that particular button at top speed nauseated me just a little.

I slowed down to a modest seventy-five again, and nearly cruised right past the park.  I braked as I pulled the car onto Bay Settlement road, and at the end of that short, poorly-maintained street, I pulled a near-one-eighty onto the driveway into the parking lot.  Five cars here already.  That was…not good.

The car stereo gave the time as six fifty one.  Past time to hurry.  The Pulse Master banged against my stomach as I sprinted for the blue barrels next to the little roofed sign in the middle of the freshly mowed field.  I filled both, fidgeting anxiously.  I hadn’t yet learned to take my time in a hurry, as Jeff Cooper had said.  Or was it Clint Smith.  It was one of Dad’s icons.

Wequiock Falls looked like a small limestone quarry or a large ravine, circled by trees and a knee high wire fence.  The edge overhung the sides a little bit, probably weak ground, probably the reason the fence was so far back from the edge.  The falls itself was an anemic curtain of water somewhere between a stream and a trick.  Both of my guns cranked out better velocity than the falls had.

I skirted the pit, angling for the dirt path peeking out of the fringe of forest just before the bridge I’d crossed to get here.  Mosquitoes whined in the humid air, undeterred by the weak warm breeze.  The sun caught the trees at an angle, turning the green to gold and highlighting every blade of grass on the field with bright light and stark shadow.  Faintly the falls rushed over the edge, dropping thirty feet to the rocks below.  Such a beautiful scene, I felt like a trespasser.  An astronaut landing on an alien world.

Then I shot two people and the feeling passed.

They were coming up the trail just as I got there, emerging from the wall of greenery without warning.  They also had powder blue water guns held low and loose, and I clicked through the trigger on the Pulse Master, hitting both of them with a storm of water.  The blasts polka-dotted their shirts with dark wet patches, and the guy in the lead, tall, thin, and bald decades early said ‘We were out already.”

“Now I know that,” I replied equably.

The path was steep.  Really steep.  The smooth, soft dirt was like walking on thick grease.  It didn’t help.  I grabbed at trees to keep from pitching headfirst down the grade.  At the bottom, the creekbed was shallow, only inches deep and scattered with broken concrete and chucks of limestone.  A quick glance around the walls of the ravine yielded no clues.  I couldn’t even be sure if this was the last stop for the hour or if I had to jump through three more hoops.

A massive culvert – probably eight feet across – was set into the side of the hill to drain the creek, and I picked my way across the rocks and water, my boots “donging” on the corrugated metal.  The ravine beyond was steeper and deeper, with tall, almost vertical walls of rough, piled rock.  Further down, tall trees jutted out from the sides, shading the stream which sliced through the ground much deeper than the wide, shallow creek farther back.  The culvert dropped water ten feet to a wide deep pool below.

A young blond woman and a man stood below, apparently not together.  The man was further down the ravine, clicking away with an ancient thirty-five millimeter camera at the treetops.  The woman was climbing the rock to the left, a water gun slung on her back.  I smiled and angled the Pulse Master up to nearly forty-five degrees.  I walked a rain of water down onto her back as she climbed.  She swore and the sudden shower must’ve broken her concentration, because she slid back down the grade on her belly, dust and pebbles trailing her.

Another small smile, and I peered out of the cover of the culvert.  Some type of man-made object rested at the top of the slope she’d been climbing.  That’d be fun.

I didn’t feel like taking a dive into the pool below, so I grabbed the side of the culvert and jumped, swinging out onto the steep grade along side it.  I slid a dozen feet on my butt, and the man shouted “Above you!”

Instinctively I rolled to my right, extending the Pulse Master so it didn’t get trapped under me.  A tall college-aged guy wearing a sports jersey sat on top of the culvert, and the watergun in his hand hit me with a refreshing mist as water landed where I’d fallen.

I held down the trigger, angling the gun up and around to get the full spread from the nozzle.  I striped him across the face and chest and rocked to my feet.  “Damn campers” I muttered as I started climbing the incline towards the package at the top.  I had to go nearly parallel to the ground as I dragged myself up the rocks.  The grade was painfully close to vertical, and none of the stones were anything close to stable.  Twice I slide back five feet or so.  My hands were quickly roughed up and covered in dust from climbing, and I stopped just inside arms reach of the package.  A small box wrapped in orange mylar.

I tucked it into my satchel and contemplated the way down.  I couldn’t very well walk down, but this wasn’t a Slip ‘N Slide where I could push myself down either.  I stood unsteadily, and the incline and gravity beckoned to my torso, nearly tipping me over.  I pinwheeled my arms and started running, high-kicking like a chorus girl all the way down.  It’s a decent, if undignified way of running down a steep hill.

It sucks for stopping though, and the guy who’d warned me of the camper caught my hand as I nearly did a digger into the stream.  “Whoa, steady there.”

I righted myself and stepped back.  “Thanks.”

He was younger than he’d originally looked.  At first I’d put his age at thirties to forties, but that was just the beard.  He looked like a college student – football player probably, judging from the muscles in his forearms – trying to impersonate Obi-Wan Kenobi, Attack of The Clones era.  Thick hiking shoes, tan cargo pants, and a gray t-shirt added to the look of wandering professor.  He had flat gray eyes, long brown hair pushed back, and a thin beard, which was why I’d initially gauged his age at twenty years older.

“Anything I can do to help,” he said mildly.  “You’re from that game, aren’t you?”

I snickered.  “However did you guess?”

“Not that difficult really.  I…took part in a game a while back.  Quite fun.”

“Yeah, it is,” I replied, already anxious to get back.

“You should probably get going,” he told me.  Must’ve been a mind-reader.  “It’s nearly seven I think.”

I took that as an invitation to scram, and sprinted for the culvert, pulling the phone out of my bag as I ran.  The clock flicked to seven as I watched.

The following takes place between 6p and 7pm

I hit the locking bar of the door with my shoulder and sprinted out into the inferno-like parking lot.  Even lacking air-conditioning, the interior of the mall had been a still, low heat.  Out here it was a different animal completely.  Brutal sun, hot wind, and the baking pavement was releasing heat of its own.

I swapped the cellphone to my left hand and pulled the pistol from my bag as I ran.  I wanted to be able to shoot if I had to.

The voice on the other end of the line said “The roof of Cofrin Library” and gave me an address further up University, along with a picture of a conglomeration of tall brick buildings.  I slapped the phone shut and traded it in my pocket for the keys.

The car was burning hot, but I didn’t roll down the windows until I was back on the street.  Didn’t want anyone walking up and shooting me in my seat.

The speed I put on the car whipped my hair around like I was in a wind tunnel.  I’d have to find something to tie it back with at some point.  I can’t pull off that gloriously disheveled look like some can.

The commercial district ended soon, and I sped through clusters of red brick apartments and homes.  A sign at one point announced this was the final resting place of Tillman’s Nursery.  Another casualty of the Great Recession, probably.

I felt like I was leaving the city as the street turned into something approximating a highway.  Lots of wide-open space out here, lots of tall grass and blacktop stretching into the distance.  No shade.

Apartment buildings started cropping up left and right as I drove.  Probably student housing.  I wondered where I’d be living in LA when I started in the fall.  Probably dorms.

I’d visited Brett about a month ago and found he’d gotten an apartment right away with a guy named Austen Vaet.  He and my brother had quickly become fast friends, and were planning on transferring to San Fran right around the time the rest of us Calloways transitioned back to LA.  Probably my brother’s suggestion – he was still pissed at our mom.  Austen was a cute guy, and despite the fact that we’d be attending different colleges in different, distant cities, I resolved to find my way to “hang out with my brother” more.  That’d be a good excuse.

The lack of shade gave way to shade as I entered a forested area.  Tall trees sheltered the road from the acidic sunlight, the canopy layered as the trees grew out of the hill on the right.

I saw the University of Wisconsin Green Bay sign too late, and the little Mazda showed me it could move when I slewed it through a U-turn on nearly two wheels.  Good handling.

Even the shallow grade was enough to make me worry about scraping off the undercarriage, and I used that as an excuse to slow down.  Beautiful entrance to the college.  Buried in the trees, a shady yet sunny median, clean and professional sign.  At the currently unmanned guard shack I saw three of the blue fifty-five gallon drums.

Well, if I’d had any doubts about where I was going before…

I could see the Cofrin Library rise in the distance, just over the crest of the hill.  A massive building of rather odd architecture – it looked like a collection of brick towers of varying heights and angles, all jammed in next to each other.  It didn’t look anything like any of the other buildings out here.

I spied movement to the left.  On a broad green, people ran and dodged around each other, spraying wildly.  I shook my head.  Such fights were great for getting wet, but a tactically poor decision.  Take cover, act decisively, end the fight quickly.  Dancing around like it was West Side Story with water guns was not how you go about winning twenty large.

Cofrin Library had a circle drive in front, and the sides were lined with cars.  Oh yay.  People.

I slotted the car into a parallel park job barely big enough for a Red Ryder Wagon – I’d probably get parked in anyway – and left the car locked and running after making sure my spare keys were in my satchel.  I knew I’d want to leave this scene in a hurry.

The wind blowing through the car had made me temporarily forget the overpowering heat outside.  It baked up off the pavement, almost with the visible heat lines from cartoons.  Even the grass and the scattered birch trees looked wilted.  I ran a hand across the back of my neck and it came away slick.

I avoided the killzone of the sunken amphitheater labeled “UW Credit Union” and walked quickly to the doorway of Cofrin Hall.  It was an ominous building, no doubt.  I pushed through the tinted glass doors and went inside.

Holy tall atrium, Batman!

The atrium was so expansive, the library seemed like a building inside the shell of another building.  The walls stretched up eight stories from the tile floor, and the large tinted windows filtered the sun like through a brown glass beer bottle.  Ahead were more doors and an elevator.  Before I took the elevator, I filled both soakers at the blue barrels just inside the door.  They gave me buttons for each floor.  I was heading for the roof, of course I pushed eight.

I cleared my mind as the elevator rose, put myself in a blank, almost robotic state of mind.  Just like Dad taught, don’t think about racking the pump.  Roll with the kick, its quicker to use a reflex than it is to decide to perform that action.

I was jolted out of my tense but peaceful blankness when the elevator car stopped unexpectedly.  Floor three out of eight.  They’d probably want to funnel me through some sort of battlefield.

The doors clanked open and the blankness returned as I sprinted forward.  The huge room beyond had a white tile drop ceiling and firm, fuzzy off-white carpeting.  Translucent plastic sheeting covered tall bookcases on the right side of the room, and similar sheets covered the chairs, tables, desks, and waist-height bookcases on the left side.

It looked like Dexter had arrived early and decorated a killroom.  The sound of running feet intruded into my evaluation, and I pushed the Pulse Master forward on its sling, brought it up to the semi-aimed position I’d been using.  I moved forward, bent forward slightly, sweeping the nozzle back and forth.  Something different between the plastic covered stacks caught my eye, and I twisted at the waist, and pulsed the trigger four times.  Four shots, two people, one hit to the chest apiece, and one of the misses blew into mist that splattered into their faces off the plastic.

I kept moving, reaming on the pump as I moved.

The elevator dinged, and I twisted my head to catch a glimpse of four people spilling out of it.  Literally spilling – two tripped.  Another twist of the head the other way, and then water reached for me from across the library as three someones shot at me from the other side of one of those low bookcases.  They were two bookcases away from me, the empty space between occupied by plastic-covered tables and chairs.

Elevation.  I wanted elevation.

I smiled, remembering a movie called American Outlaws.  I did kind of identify, personally, with Colin Farrell.

It took very little alteration to my course to angle towards the waist-high bookcases, and I barely broke stride to push up and jump.  I pulled my feet up at the apex and landed on the top of bookcase, the plastic sliding a bit and nearly dumping me off.  Up here, the scene looked different.  An angle: I had one.

I pulsed the trigger quickly, taking out two of the three that had shot at me with a sweeping ark.  The third ducked.

My boots hammered the top of the bookcase, and I threw a glance over my shoulder at the four that had left the elevator.  Clearly trained, two had taken up covering positions and weren’t moving.  The other two were moving from cover to cover, heading for the “alley” between the two low bookcases.  Returning to face-forward, I caught the Elevator sign against the wall in the back.  I’d had enough of this party.

I jumped again, a long leap that ended with my feet squarely hitting the tall back of an upholstered chair.  It tipped over backwards, and I rode it down, landing on both feet and breaking into a run again.

I’d landed a one-in-a-million stunt, and three steps later a rolling office chair took me out at the knees.  I landed with a thud that I unfortunately had to describe as heavy.  I’ve got like two percent body fat, how can that be a heavy thud?  I rolled to my back and laid down a few bursts of suppressing fire at the two moving members of the Elevator Four as they moved into the alley.  They had the good sense to back up as the guy who’d ducked my initial bookcase-borne assault opened fire on them as well.

I rocked to my feet, ducked around the computer table that had decided to send its chair out to trip me, and put my head down to run.  I kept low as I ran, ducking behind desks and chairs.  The sounds of a fight raged behind me, and only a few easily avoided beams flew my way.  As Dad said, it’s not the ones addressed to you.  You need to worry about, it’s the ones postmarked “To Whom It May Concern.”

I punched the elevator button hard, and crouched down next to the wall, waiting for the door to ding open.  The one guy I’d missed behind the bookcase was giving a good account of himself, fortunately for me.  He was holding the Elevator Four off with precision shots.  Pretty soon though, he’d run out of water.  I wanted to be out of here before that happened.

A new problem presented itself when the elevator door opened and water hissed out, the person inside waving the soaker in a fan pattern.  I was very lucky I had chosen not to stand in front of the door, and that they had not waited inside.  I stood, pushed the Pulse Master back on its sling, and drew the Triple Shot from my satchel, switched it to my left hand.

Carefully.  I would do this carefully.

Whoever was inside didn’t see anyone threatening them immediately ahead, and started inching out.  Female hands holding a green soaker with a bottom-mounted tank like an Uzi.

I moved explosively.  My right hand pushed the nozzle way out of line while grabbing on to the thick housing with enough force that I could guarantee it wouldn’t be angled back towards me.  I spun around the woman in the elevator, wrenching her around and firing twice at her, the Triple Shot unloading under my right forearm.  Then I gave the water gun a shove.  The whole move had taken less than two seconds, ended with me standing where she had been a fraction of a moment ago, and probably confused the hell out of her.

She started advancing and I clicked the trigger of the Triple Shot, knocking her glasses askew with the headshot.  Retreating into the elevator, I pressed up against the right side, keeping my backup pointed out the door, and hit the button for the top floor.  The door closed, and I let myself sag against the wall for just a moment, letting my breathing return to normal despite the adrenaline coursing through me.  Then I straightened and pumped the Triple Shot back to full pressure, did the same for the Pulse Master.

The doors swished open, and I rotated around the doorway, checking for hostiles.  Another library floor.  All tall bookshelves this time, a plastic-draped maze of them.  Faint sounds of movement further back through the stacks.  Remembering my own trick, I leaned just my head out of the elevator, looking left and right for shooters.  Nobody, and I left the elevator car, advancing with the Pulse Master held up in the sights-less ready I’d learned to use.

I moved quickly past the ends of every bookcase, checking down the long, long aisles for shooters or for some clue where to go.  The tinted windows at my back cast everything in long sunlight shadows.  Chairs and tables for reading were pulled up against the outside wall.  This was pretty library.  I wondered, not for the first time, what college in LA would look like.

My clue where to go presented itself.  Far down an aisle, deep in the stacks was a metal staircase leading up into the ceiling.  Obviously a pull-down like from an attic.

The fact that it was unguarded made me nervous.

I sprinted for it, ducked over the back of the soaker.  Just contemplating that made me feel foolish.

The ladder wasn’t unguarded.  The players nearest it were hiding, pressed up against the backs of bookcases in the narrow cross-aisles so I wouldn’t see them until I passed.  Luckily as I approached I saw an elbow sticking out from the corner.  Obviously disciplined, they must’ve been curious why the footsteps coming towards them stopped, but they didn’t show it by investigating.  Bad for them.  Their discipline allowed me to creep up silently and shoot each one hiding on each side of the aisle with a soaker in each hand.

Usually dual-wielding is just a good way to waste ammo, but occasionally it works.  I didn’t stick around to register any complaints, I took the stairs of the pull-down ladder two at a time, Triple Shot aimed up into the darkness.

There was a small landing at the top, a firedoor leaking light around the edges.  Halfway up, the door opened, and a person with a massive soaker courteously backlit themselves for my shot.  They swore and moved to the side as I dashed past them.  I heard the click of a trigger and the hiss of water leaving a nozzle, and before I could feel the cold water slapping into me, I threw myself on the hot, white gravel rooftop.

Someone standing by the door.  I’d nearly had my own trick pulled on me.  I rolled, fired three times and tagged out my ambusher with a shot to the thigh and stomach.  He didn’t look happy, but he didn’t look like he was going to do anything about it.  I ignored him as he exited the roof, and I started looking for my next assignment.

I picked out the next battlefield without even seeing the street number.  I could just tell the uSoak guy had picked it for its look: A deserted, empty mall of aquamarine glass and red brick.  When you’ve lived in big cities all your life, something like this doesn’t really look that cool anymore.  But in a place like Green Bay?  It stood out, no questions asked.

The address on the front of the building confirmed my guess, and I pulled the car into the nearly deserted lot.  A few semis on the far right of the lot were using the place as a rest stop.  A knot of cars on the far left were clustered with people using bright blue water guns on each other.

I parked right in front of the cool blue-green glass doors and got out.  There was another one of those fifty-five gallon drums filled with water right in the shade of the tall entryway, and I paused to unscrew the cap on the Pulse Master and dunk it.  Then I walked inside.

Another deserted building.  Did uSoak get a group-rate discount or something?

Fake potted palms about my height dotted the front-facing floor-to-ceiling aquamarine windows every few yards.  Opposite the windows, storefronts were blocked off with sliding chainlink security doors.  It was dim and warm, but without the sun beating down and the hot wind, it wasn’t unpleasant.  It wasn’t enough to keep my shirt from sticking to my back, but it was better than outside.

There was an arched entryway on the inside too, and before I stepped through into the mall, I paused.  Something didn’t feel right.

I strafed at a sprint, facing left, and tagged out the guy who stepped out from beside the archway with a blast of cold water to the face.  I was getting better at this not-aiming thing.

Water landed on the tile floor beside me, and I whipped around, dropping into a crouch and striping another stream of water the guy on the right side from just over his left shoulder to just below his right hip.  His white polo stuck to him along the wet path of the blast.

I rose slowly, keeping the Pulse Master pointed in their general direction and pumping quickly to bring it back to full pressure.

They exited the building, looking mournful and regretful and angry all at the same time, and then I turned and walked down the expanse of hallway.

The whole mall was closed down.  Not a single store remained.  Behind the chain gates, the interiors of the stores were buried in shadow, displays occasionally protruding from the blackness, probably too expensive to throw away.

I spun around a corner to point the Pulse Master down a service hallway and nobody moved.  No sound but my own footsteps.  My instincts are pretty good, but the deserted atmosphere was getting me kind of jumpy.  I tried the door just in case the next clue was “behind the scenes.”  Locked.

Benches and deserted kiosks dotted the wide hallway between the windows and the stores along with tall plexiglass displays showing “You Are Here relative” to Sam Goody and The Gap, and a few dead vending machines remained, plugged into the walls.  I tried to imagine what this place looked like before the recession.  Before near worthless money drove people to spend it on things they actually needed.  It’d probably be crowded on a day like today, people escaping the brutal glare outside by coming into the shade.  I felt like a trespasser in a tomb that time forgot.

I saw feet below the open bottom of one of the floor-to-tall-ceiling plexi map holders, and smiled.  Flat-footed, one in front of the other, I approached from the person’s back.  Shorts, an ugly Hawaiian print shirt, and black hair.  I shot him in the back of the neck, suppressed a giggle at his jump of surprise, and moved on.

The wide hallway took a ninety degree turn to the right, and I ducked behind a nearby sunglasses kiosk when I heard fighting.  Peering out, I watched a rather furious fight, contestants dodging behind sign holders and kiosks and, in one imaginative and stupid person’s case – attempting to hide behind a potted plant.

They seemed unorganized, not sure in the least of what they were doing.  Just shooting and hoping they’d hit somebody.  Which they weren’t doing much of.

The guy behind the potted plant was closest.  I moved fast and low, hoping that the guy parallel with him in the center of the hall, hiding behind a vending machine didn’t look my way.  Potted Plant Man stood to open up on someone taking potshot at him from behind a kiosk farther down the hall, and I pulsed the trigger three times, hitting him in the arm and leg and missing with the last shot.  I turned on my heel and moved towards the vending machine before Potted Plant Man even registered I was there and had shot him.

Around the corner of the Coke machine, Pulse Master held low, and I fired a blast into the next player’s midsection.  “Sarah, watch out!  There’s someone else here!” he shouted as he sprinted away.

The kiosk shooter was male, and Sarah was nowhere to be seen.  That concerned me.  I dropped down to crouch with my back against the back of the machine, and pumped back to full pressure.

Water hissed above my head, three shots and three clacks on a trigger from my left.  The Pulse Master was angled awkwardly away from that direction, and without even thinking about it, my right hand found the grip of the Triple Shot in my satchel.  I one-handed it across my body as a person who was presumably Sarah shifted her aim down.  I pulled the trigger several times, my first shot bursting into rain off the front of the exceptionally futuristic soaker she was adjusting to point at my head.  The mist felt refreshing.  The next shot hit her in the thigh, and finally I got one to splatter center of mass.

I pushed the pistol back in my bag, got the Pulse Master up to something approximating ready, and moved out from behind the soda machine.  Water pelted towards me, splashing off the floor, and I got back behind cover.  Someone was going to run out of ammo soon.

At the first hint of a lull in the shooting, I started moving again, fast.  I fired at the kiosk in a measured cadence, making sure whoever was behind it kept their head down.  Before I reached the structure but inside my range, I quit firing, and waited.  I’d used up a lot of water with the cover fire, and I hoped there was still some in the pressure chamber.  If there wasn’t, I was gonna feel really stupid…

Kiosk Shooter stuck his head up from behind cover, and I walked water off the flat wood display surface and into his forehead.  The gun quit firing, just as another started.  My proximity to the kiosk saved me, as the woman I hadn’t noticed behind the cover of the Payless Shoes doorway opened up on me, only to have the supports holding up the kiosk roof deflect her shots.

I made myself a smaller target my diving to the floor.  It didn’t hurt much as I turned the belly flop into a slide.  I elbow-crawled behind the cover of the kiosk.  Now that hurt.  I arched up off the floor a little and pushed the Pulse Master to my left side on its strap.  Now that I wasn’t laying on top of plastic…  I dug the pistol out of my bag and snaked around the corner of the kiosk.  Laying on my side, I started shooting at the woman by the Payless doorway.  Not only wasn’t she expecting it, but I had cover and was a small target, and at this angle she didn’t and was a big target.  And moving simply exposed her to more fire.  So even though she was just at the edge of my pistol’s range – and I missed a few times – it didn’t take much time or risk to tag her out.

I rolled over, aiming at the other side of the hallway, sweeping my point of aim up and down the hall.  Nobody else was around.  I pumped back to full pressure and rose.  The last combatant was departing.  I set the pistol on the tabletop and pumped the Pulse Master back to full pressure as well and started walking again.

There was one open storefront just before the hallway ended in the now-dead WGNR anchor store.  More shadowy interiors.

I filled the Triple Shot to the recommended eighty percent at the blue barrel just outside the door, and dug the Surefire out of my bag again.  Pistol and light beat rifle and no light at these distances in these conditions.  I held both in a Harries grip and walked into the clothing store.

The mannequins were an extra creepy touch.  They stood on pedestals, asexual, amorphous, melted-looking artificial humans.  None of them were dressed, and the tan plastic seemed to glow in the darkness.  There were lots of them, more than I thought was usual for a clothing store.

I wandered through the circular racks, the Surefire casting a hard cone of light through the shadows and swirls of disturbed dust as it heated up in my hand.  Surefires are indestructible hand-sized spotlights, but they can burn your hand in pretty short order, and they chew through batteries really fast.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw the mannequin move.  Something inside me lurched, and something else clamped down on it.  Get a grip stupid.  This mannequin was wearing clothes.  I acted like I didn’t see anything out of the ordinary and wandered closer.  A second-long flick of the Surefire to the eyes, and the “mannequin” put his arm up to shield his face, and I shot him twice, high in the chest.  He stumbled backwards at the blast, and I moved quickly forwards.

Good thing I did, too.

Water came blasting towards me out of the darkness to my right, and I whipped around, shooting twice as soon as I thought my Surefire was on target.  I moved through the racks quickly, bent over the pistol and light in my hand, all my will focused on the space where a front sight should be.

The light reflected weirdly off the circular metal racks, casting a forest of odd shadows and highlights across the walls and ceiling.  It was like being in a room of mirrors, except the mirrors were shadows.  I couldn’t tell if what I was seeing was shadow or solid.

I bounced off a rack and hit the floor on my butt.  Dammit.  I clicked off the flashlight, killing all the illumination in the store except what little filtered in from the hallway.  I heard crashes and profanity in the darkness, and oriented myself towards the noise.  Another click and someone groaned as the light hit their eyes.  I fired very slowly and deliberately over the tops of the displays as I strafed towards the front of the store.

More water from someone standing over by what looked like a jewelry display, a few feet behind the guy I’d tagged out, and I clicked the light off again.

The person I’d shot said “I’m out” and the person I hadn’t shot said “Leave the freakin’ light on already.”

“Not a chance,” I told the darkness with a chuckle.  I stayed put as blundering and crashing sounds moved from the side of the store towards the center back half.  He was either circling me or thought I was farther back than I was.

Another press on the rubberized button, and I ducked as water sailed towards me.  Not only did the light illuminate my target, but it gave away my position.  I crouched and fired in a measured rhythm through the legs of the racks.  Had there been clothes hanging from them, I would’ve had no shot.  Now though, it was just a thick forest of obstructions.  And I’m a good shot.

I was pretty sure I’d shot him in the legs, but stood anyway, and hitting him in the shoulder and ear with quick bursts.

I waited until he’d left the store to continue.  A glance at my watch put the time at less than a minute to six.  Where was that telephone number?  Shouldn’t it be obvious?

It was.  A giant poster of a couple relaxing on the beach with a dog dominated the back wall of the store, and someone had spraypainted a ten digit onto the ocean in yellow.

I punched it in and was out the door and running down the hall before the phone even started ringing.

The following takes place between 5pm and 6pm

I pressed the send button on my phone and brought it to my ear.  “Hello?”

A recorded voice on the other end said “Clark gas station, twelve hundred eighty block of University.”  My phone beeped, indicating a picture had arrived, and I opened it as I put the car in gear and sped out of the parking lot.

The picture appeared in Silverlight, and showed the location of the gas station relative to my location.  Just a quick left up here, over a bridge, and I’d be on the right road…

Looking in my rear view for the turn, I saw a torrent of cars pouring out of the Sierra parking lot.  They were spreading out, heading for their assigned tasks.  Lots of them were following me.

Damn.  I’d kinda hoped this’d be easy.

I waited through an interminable red light, and punched the accelerator into the floor when I got the green arrow.  The camera store on the left whipped by, and then I was on a short elevated bridge.  On the other side of the water were several massive buildings, a power company maybe.  Huge elevated conduits snaked all over the property, and forklifts moved around on the blacktop between the buildings and the manicured water’s edge.

Then I was past, and since I didn’t see any speed limit signs, I held down the pedal, kept the car at forty.  It was probably thirty or thirty-five.  I didn’t care.

A red brick meat packing plant zipped by in the passenger’s window, and I caught a glimpse of bus station and fire department out the driver’s side before they were behind me as well.

Low income housing, run-down two and three story houses that might once have been nice ran along the left side of the street.  I really, really hoped the games wouldn’t take me into that area.

I saw the blue and red Clark’s sign sticking up through the trees before I saw the station itself, and I whipped the wheel right to slot the car in between two cars in the turn lane, immediately reducing speed down to the standard thirty five so I didn’t plow headfirst into the forward car’s rear bumper.  Almost as quickly I yanked the wheel right again, peeling out of traffic and into Clark’s parking lot.

I was expecting more.  The concrete was cracked, sprouting weeds.  The pumps were covered, and had an air of desertion about them.  The station itself seemed more like a lean-to.  Floor to ceiling glass windows angled outwards at the front of the store, the supporting walls and roof a Hot Wheels blue color.  The glass front door was open.  The interior was shadowy, a few white candy racks visible in the dimness.

Blue fifty-five gallon water drums stood next to each pump.  Someone’s idea of a joke, I assumed.

I had a few seconds before others would start showing up.  I checked that the pistol was jammed in my satchel, and got out of the car, the Pulse Master held by my side, the nozzle nearly dragging on the ground.  It was a BIG gun.

As if on cue, 3 cars pulled into the parking lot, one from behind me, two from the road perpendicular to University.  Here we go.

If I had to guess, most of the contestants hadn’t sprung for bottled water for their initial fill.  They were probably planning on filling at the barrels.  I wasn’t going to give them that chance.

A car door slammed behind me, and feet pounded the pavement, coming up towards me.  I turned, lifting the soaker up to eye level, right elbow bent, left arm out straight, the top of the tank in line with my right eye.  I hit the guy running past me in the side with a hard stream of water.  The mist blowing off the splatter on his garish t-shirt felt good in the hot air.

“Hey, you can’t – “

I cut him off as I stalked towards the other cars.  “Where’s that written?”

Momentarily I felt a twinge of regret.  My first “kill” of the game, and they were unarmed.

Whoa.  I was getting way too into this, and it was way too early.

I pumped as I walked, quitting when the gun squealed at me.  One of the cars had its driver’s side window open, and I shot into the car as I walked past.  Another unarmed combatant.

The two people in the last remaining car bolted as I approached, practically diving out of the doors and running for the sidewalk.  Maybe they thought I’d give chase.  They were wrong.

I walked calmly into the gas station and looked around.  Counter on the left, the glass enclosure spider-webbed with cracks.  A newspaper rack stilled contained one last newspaper.  To my right, empty metal shelves and wire racks would’ve once held food and overpriced necessities.  Now they just held dust.

I walked deeper into the gloom.

Glass display cases made up the back of the store, which was deceptively deep.  I peered into the glass contemplatively.  Walk-in freezer, they wheeled the racks of milk and soda up to the doors.

There was a hallway in one of the corners and I checked out both restrooms.  The glass block window in the men’s room had been kicked, and newspapers were scattered in the corner, along with a surplus army mess kit and a change of clothes.  The women’s room was in better condition, and a third door led to an empty, dusty office, which was connected to the walk-in freezer.

I wished the cooling element were still going.  For a freezer, it had the same ninety five degree heat as the parking lot, and even less airflow.  The wheeled racks made a maze in the dark, light from the outside struggling to find its way in.

Anyone, anything could be in here.

I felt no fear.

I felt my way around the room, gently pushing at the carts to get them out of my way.  Whatever was in here was probably against the back wall, and once I was up against it, I pulled the Surefire flashlight from my satchel, and cradling the rifle in my arms, shown the brilliant light on the wall.  Sure enough, an address was chalked onto the wall.  Further up University.  I turned the light out and slipped out the way I’d come.

I felt a twinge of irritation at my own forgetfulness as I walked into an ambush.  The two I’d chased off earlier had been empty at the time, but I’d neglected to think that they might fill while I was inside.  A man and a woman each pointed some large blue soaker at me from positions thirty degrees on either side of the door, each about twenty feet ahead.  The guy I’d shot first was pacing the back of the parking lot, arguing into his phone.

Probably about me.

I pushed off to the right.  They’d have to track further in that direction.  Two steps, and I pointed the Pulse Master at the woman, just a few feet away and fired.  I missed with the first stream, it went wide past her shoulder.  Stupid pistol grip only weapons.  Only good for saving space, not for actually engaging targets beyond contact range.  I torqued a correction in my grip, and my next brief pull of the trigger splattered liquid against her collarbone.  Those were thick, heavy streams, and they moved with some authority.

Then I was into the cover of a gas pump, and posted up next to it.  A breath to compose myself, and I rotated out of cover and ran at a diagonal that would take me past the man who’s partner I’d just tagged out.  He shot through where I had been, and I shot through where he was, pulling the trigger a bunch of times as I past.  Four shots caught him in the stomach, and I stopped running.

The guy I’d shot first was still pacing with his phone by my Mazda.  I walked around to the side and tossed the Pulse Master in on the passenger seat.  I was about to get in when I felt a hand on my shoulder.  I turned my head slowly to find myself staring into the eyes of Mr. Cell Phone, way closer than those eyes should’ve been.

The last time I stared into eyes this close, they were Tim’s, three months ago.  He was saying “How could you?” right before he slugged me in the jaw.  I had seen it coming, and could’ve blocked it.  I hadn’t.  Instead I worked my aching jaw around “I just couldn’t.”

These eyes were angry but they weren’t betrayed.  And if they communicated anything heinous, I’d put him on the ground.  “You don’t play fair.” He said.

“Take your hand off me, or I’ll break it off,” I stated simply.

I think he saw in the blankness of MY eyes that I wasn’t kidding.

“You don’t play fair,” he repeated.  “I’m on the phone with the uSoak people right now.  Hopefully they’re gonna kick your butt outta here.”

“They know where I’m going,” I told him, and pulled the Mazda out into traffic.

There have been a select few people that have called me an artificial girl before.  I think the description is not completely unwarranted, but it goes a little too far.  I like the color pink – when paired with black.  I took ballet and ice skating for a decade before I recently switched to MMA and Krav Maga and rock climbing.  I think purses are impractically small, but I do carry a messenger bag.  I like pretty jewelry and expensive dresses, and the last three months were the longest span I’ve been without a boyfriend since I was fifteen.  But I’m aggressive.  Forward.  Direct.  I want something; see something I like, it’s mine.  I take it or I find a way to get it.  Life is too damn short for mind games and play acting.  And paired with that attitude, I have little use for emotion.  Lord only knew I’d been keeping mine wired tight for a while, but even before that, I took a ruthlessly cold and logical view of things.  You don’t get anything if all you do dwell on how you feel.  What are you going to do about it?

In other words, Hell yeah I look like a girl, but I’ve got the mind of a guy.

I put the pedal down and the world sped by.  The address was way down on University; I was a couple hundred house-numbers back.  Churches and low income housing and closed down stores blurred together, not due to speed, but because there were so many and they all looked the same.  Tall church, three run down two story homes with a dozen cars in front of each, intersection, boarded up diner or Laundromat or printshop.  Then a church, and the cycle started all over again.

It again confirmed my suspicions that Green Bay was just a hicktown with a football team.  There was nothing here.  No economy, no desire, no drive for anything better.  Just people in a decaying holding pattern.  Of all the places I’ve lived that I can remember, Las Vegas has been my favorite.  There’s always something to do, always something to see, always something going on.  You can just go walk the strip if you want to see a new world.  It’s like Times Square in New York sometimes.  And New Years Eve?  Fuggedaboudit, just like New Yawk.  One big party.

And contrary to The Hangover, little naked guys jumping out of your trunk and hitting you with a tire iron is fortunately not a common occurrence in Sin City.

These days though, Sin City was just a little too crowded.  Like a dusty western town, there wasn’t room in it for my memories and me.  I was looking forward to getting away from them, back to the City Of Angeles, studying, going to college.  Maybe finding my way into the street racing culture.  That was why I’d bought the car after all.  You don’t need a race car to cart your books from the dorm to the classroom.

I patted the dashboard affectionately.  “You and me, we’re going places.”  It was infatuation, I knew.  I was even starting to feel giddy again, after my Dad-induced episode of remorse.  I had a purpose – such as it was, a skillset that would enable me to take a good shot at fulfilling that purpose, and a fast car to get me there.   Today, what more did I need.