LEGACY OF THE BLAZERS - CHAPTER FOURTEEN (Patreon)

"Don’t ask how we survived,” Bon had yelled. “Just know that, for the time being at least, this hacker gal has control of Blowhole’s entire goddamn ship. Meaning, if there’s ever been a time to board it and kick his fucking ass, it’s now!”

Lux had so many questions. So many things she desperately needed to tell Tegan! But there just wasn’t the time. Sooner, rather than later, Blowhole would solve whatever backdoor they had sneaked through, and when that happened, his ship would start firing again.

We were lucky to survive even the blast Tegan and Bon fired, Lux thought. And that was just one blast that was trying its damnedest NOT to hit us.

So she ran. She let her feet crunch the blackened bits spread across the ground and didn’t think twice about it. Follow Kern, get to Blowhole. Follow Kern, get to Blowhole.

The Panty Mafia’s garage was hidden underneath their monstrosity of a castle, and while the initial attacks had caused a few cave-ins, things were mostly stable. Mostly. A few of the support beams looked like they could come crashing down any second but honestly, that wouldn’t be so bad—everything in there…it was useless junk.

Cars with spiked wheels. Planes that shot gas out of their ass. It was like two children had taken their toys and beaten them into each other and just rolled with whatever the outcome was. Though, with Bon and Kern at the helm of the operation, she guessed that made sense. This is what happens when people have too much money and too much free-time!

They made their way to the back, where the cheapest creations were. The mass-produced pieces of crap that were given to normal soldiers. Kern yanked one of them, a hover-bike with handles like a chopper, out of a rack. When he climbed atop it, he looked ridiculous—the thing dwarfed him!

“Get on,” he said. “We don’t have time to take anything better than this.”

She climbed onto the bike and the entire thing rattled like it was about to collapse.  “Are you sure this will make it?”

“Am I sure my dick’s bigger than yours?”

“Are you?”

This got Kern to smirk. “Clever girl, clever girl.”

He revved the engine and toxic black smoke chuffed out the back of it, filling the air. Before they took flight, Lux raised the earpiece to her mouth. “Tegan, we’re about to take flight.”

Bon spoke up instead. “Why didn’t you address me—”

“Oh shut up.” There was clattering as he was, presumably, knocked across the room. “You be careful, Lux. Once you’re up in the air, I won’t be able to hear a damn thing. So…I guess this could be good.”

“Could be. Won’t be.”

“You don’t know that.”

The harsh truth of the situation stung Lux. She was more likely to die up there than return. Blowhole’s power…

Oh, well, never-mind. Thinking like that was pointless. If these were going to be her last words to Tegan, she didn’t want them to be fearful. Hell, she wanted to thank her for being a great friend. Wanted to tell her about all those nights that would have been miserable if she hadn’t kept her laughing. But Tegan already knew that. Expounding on it was pointless.

In the end, she simply said: “Remember every who died,” she said. “All the Greasers, all the Blazers. Don’t let them be forgotten.”

Then, after a long second:

“Including Derek.”

Not wanting to hear Tegan crying, she crunched the earpiece in her hands and patted the exposed stuffing on Kern’s back. “Let’s get going.”

“No goodbyes,” he said. “That’s tough.”

“No time for them.”

He nodded, revved the hoverbike once again, and then they took off, smashing through the gates of the garage as they cruised upward, toward the big baddy in the sky. Though she knew it would tie her stomach in knots, Lux looked down at the destruction below, the burning hellscape they’d left behind. The bodies were too tiny to pick out, but she knew there were hundreds down there.

So much senseless murder.

So much chaos.

“What’s it all for, Kern?” she asked. “Money? Power? Both?”

“Don’t get all preachy on me,” he said, groaning. “We ain’t that close.”

“Or is it status? Do you just like people being afraid of you?”

“I like people not being able to fuck with me. All the money and power and girls and shit, that’s all secondary. Doing what we do, it keeps me perpetually safe. Life’s a lot better when you don’t have to worry about some asshole stabbing you over a line of blow.”

“You could’ve stopped this, though. When you and Bon took charge, you could carved your own path, and—”

“—Look, girl, don’t bitch at me because of how things are, okay? I didn’t write the rules, and I’m sure as hell not going to re-write them. So what, you’re saying all those assholes before me who got to enjoy the spoils of war are just dandy but we’re the assholes? Fuck off.”

“Just…think about how different my life, and my friend’s lives, would’ve been if you never got involved,” she said. “All those people down there who are dead would still be alive if it wasn’t for you sending Blowhole after us.”

“They would’ve died eventually. Everyone does. You will too, and it might even be today. If anything, shit’s easier now that they’re dead.”

“Do you really believe that?”

Instead of responding, Kern just pressed his head closer to the handles of the hoverbike and cranked the speed up a few notches. Lux opened her mouth to say something else, but their was no point. Their conversation was over.

And though nothing had probably changed, she hoped that, whether she lived or died, her words would mean something to him. Maybe not inspire him to right all of his wrongs, but do something. If he saved even one person, or spared even one life it meant, at the very least, that she had done something with her life.

She shook her head, though. Why was she thinking so glumly? She was going to find Cy. She was going to kill Blowhole. Whether she lived or not didn’t matter. If she saved her love and killed her enemy, then she could die in peace.

As the docking bay of Blowhole’s ship opened, likely another one of Tegan’s tricks, she repeated that promise to herself.

END OF CHAPTER FOURTEEN