The Troll (22 page)

But
nothing did. The only movement was the stunt plane in the sky,
whirring by every few moments.

Business
went on as promised and The Coach and Mortician approached the
fountain with sinister smiles on their faces.

“
You
really angered The Moderator with your last broadcast,” The
Coach said.

“
Good,”
The Guide said without hesitation.

“
What
is it that makes you so stubborn? It’s as if you have no
concern at all for your own well being, even when you’re in a
war you can’t win.”

“
That’s
the difference between us,” The Guide said. “I’m a
man of principle. You’re
just a sheep…afraid that if he cares about something, someone
will hurt him. A hundred years from now, we’re both going to be
dead Coach. You’re just going to die a coward.”

“
Everyone
has a weakness though,” The Coach said as
he
circled slowly around the fountain to where Iris was bound.

“
Talk
to
me
,”
The Guide said, trying to carry the conversation. The Coach ignored
him and came face to face with Iris, his eyes full of fire as he
considered the task ahead of him.

“
You’ll
be last,” The Coach said. “I’d like you to hear
this.”

The
Guide tried talking to The Mortician. He screamed. He begged. It all
fell on deaf ears though as he listened to The Coach as he began
taunting Iris, running his hands over her face and down her shoulders
and hips. The Guide was ready to cut his ropes, but held on a little
longer. If he broke out now, he’d still have The Coach,
Mortician, AND Pilot to face. Any anger he felt, he would contain as
long as possible until there was a signal.

A
damn signal. His mind spun as Iris sobbed. He heard the plane circle
in the sky. The sounds all blended together, piercing his ears as he
tore apart inside, completely helpless to circumstance. “You
don’t have to do it this way!” he shouted, but whatever
The Coach was doing, he didn’t stop. “Damn-it Troll!”
The Guide shouted, and finally, The Coach did stop, and circled back
to face him.

“
Troll?”
The Coach asked. “Your Troll was nothing but a gimmick to show
the world that no one cares for your cause Guide. He didn’t
even make it out of state, and where is he now?”

“
Coach…”
The Mortician said, distracted by something in the distance. The
Coach turned and saw The Mortician was looking toward the bridge. He
followed Mortician’s eyes to where the silhouette of a man
stood in the center, looking out toward the plane, as if to face The
Pilot. The Coach squinted his eyes and stepped forward, trying to get
a better view.

As
The Coach and Mortician tried to make sense of what they were seeing,
The Guide readied his shard of glass. He’d know the signal when
it came, but he wondered what The Troll possibly could do alone on a
bridge against The Pilot. Was this the signal? If so, it wasn’t
what The Acrobat was making it out to be. Or maybe The Acrobat really
wasn’t trying to help. Maybe this was more trickery. He started
to slowly cut at his ropes.

The
Troll stood watching the stunt plane as it circled the sky twice, as
if The Pilot was trying to decide if he was really standing there.
What The Pilot was supposed to see was a strong confident Troll
challenging him, but what he couldn’t see was how his hands
were shaking, his knees were weak, and a weight in his chest made it
impossible for him to swallow.

The
timing was key, and for a focused opponent like The Pilot, it would
take a great distraction to cause him to falter, a great distraction
to beat him. What he needed The Pilot to do was something he never
did: Flinch. And if he could pull it off and if The Acrobat came
through on his end, and if The Guide and Iris could free themselves
and get away with Rainbow, they could all recommit to their
journey—if they would have him.

The
stunt plane passed over his head and put some distance between it and
the bridge before making a wide loop and positioning itself in line
with the bridge. From the distance, Iris watched in fascination as
The Troll was seemingly committing suicide in front of her eyes. But
suicide wasn’t in his nature, and unless The Troll believed
this was something he could handle, she couldn’t understand why
he was even here at all. Unless she’d misjudged him and her
initial opinion was right: The Troll refused to lose: Online, in
person, against the odds…The Troll wanted to win. Except there
was no way he could win that she could see. She wondered if he had a
trick up his sleeve, or if this was just a ploy to rally her. She
tugged at her ropes, but she was bound tightly and her wrists burned
from having pulled at her ropes all night long. Without a miracle,
this was the end, even if The Troll volunteered himself to die along
with them. She watched and waited.

The
Troll readied himself as the stunt plane faced his direction, coming
faster at him than he had time to react. He was ready to execute the
plan, but The Pilot was flying too high. The timing was off on this
round. If he was shot, it was all for nothing. He ran to the side as
bullets began hitting the pavement and sending concrete in the air
with poofs of smoke all around him. The engine above him roared and
the plane passed overhead. He surveyed his body and found no blood.

Round
two
, he thought and carried himself a few feet from where a path
of bullets tore at the pavement to give The Pilot a better view. He
wrapped his fingers tightly around the transmitter and touched his
inner pocket to make sure his weapon was intact. He was relieved it
was there and even more relieved as the sun began to rise in the sky.
He had a feeling all eyes were on him and that The Moderator hadn’t
executed anyone yet…as if every plan was in limbo and the
clock stopped all around, waiting for his death before the world
could continue to rotate again.

The
plane made a wide loop, putting more distance between it and the
bridge. The Troll forced himself to breath steadily, reminding
himself he was going to have one chance at this. The Pilot fired from
farther away this time, at a greater speed. He flew lower but by The
Troll’s calculations, it wasn’t low enough. This time, he
wasn’t sure he could outrun the bullets because they constantly
sent sparks and pavement flying up around him. Instead he ducked
behind a metal beam, trying to get a grasp on his weapon but failing
as the plane approached, gunfire spattering faster and harder all
around him, blinding and deafening him as he cradled himself as close
to the beam as possible until the engines passed overhead.

That
was it. He knew he wouldn’t survive a third pass and he wasn’t
sure the bridge would either. His body had loosened and adrenaline
pumped through him as he realized the fear of death was gone and he
was in full mission mode, as focused as The Pilot—maybe more.
Wasn’t that really what this was? A staring contest? A jousting
competition between man and machine, or man and machine within
machine? The Pilot was a more than worthy opponent, but The Troll
thought back to Iris telling him that the world was taken with
brains—not weapons, and it would have to be taken back the same
way.

Round
three.

The
Troll spun toward where The Pilot looped his plane back and
repositioned, flying lower—flying as low as The Troll needed
him to fly. He reached in his inner pocket and flipped the
transmitter on, where all over the world monitors flashed on and
people turned to see what The Moderator was broadcasting this time.
But this time, they instead saw The Troll with a determined look in
his eyes, holding the transmitter at his side, not using it to send a
message but instead using it as a weapon. He looked into the sky
where a hundred screens displayed the ground where the transmitter’s
camera was aimed.

The
plane was flying fast, but it didn’t fire. The Troll saw the
guns slowly turning as if they were zoning in on his body. He was
very likely seconds away from death, but everything looked as it
should and he closed his eyes for a moment and whispered to himself:
You can beat him
.

From
his inner pocket he pulled a mirror. He held it to the camera and
triangulated it with the sun. All at once, the world around him went
white and sunlight bounced off every surface.

The
Pilot never knew what happened, and every instinct inside told him to
keep moving in a straight line, aim the guns, eliminate the
target…but none of those things were possible. He no longer
could see the bridge, or The Troll, and the last thing he knew, he
was flying right at it, avoidable only by pulling away. In the
moments of confusion, his timing was lost and his thoughts were too
prolonged to believe it possible. He jerked the handles to the side,
immediately feeling the shame in losing his focus. The plane started
to arc, but everywhere it turned, the blinding of sunlight bouncing
from screen to screen only caused him to lose his sense of direction.

He
tried to bring the plane below it, but there were monitors everywhere
and it was unavoidable. And then, he didn’t know which
direction he was flying—north, south…he had no idea. He
turned to his instruments as a guide, but all he could realize was
that his altitude was low and whatever direction he was moving didn’t
matter, because eventually…

And
then the wing snapped off and the plane began to spin. The last thing
he saw before impact was the bridge, and the plane around him
shattered.

As
The Troll’s eyes went wide, surprisingly shocked by his
success, he pulled the camera away and focused on the ruined plane
instead. The helicopter crash was clearly covered up, but this was
unavoidable. The world was undoubtedly watching, and now they truly
would see that the men in Circular Prime could be beat—even the
best of them. He walked toward the wreckage with a smile, but it
faded quickly as a foot kicked a piece of shrapnel away and The Pilot
began to roll out.

The
Troll set his weapons on the pavement and considered running, but
waited instead. The Pilot had always been a pain in his ass, even
without having said a word. He decided this was a fight he was going
to stick around for.

The
Guide never knew what happened or why it happened, but he heard the
crash and the blinding light around him was most definitely the
signal The Acrobat had warned him about. He wasted no time severing
the ropes once it happened, and when he fell to the water below, he
looked around and saw no one was coming. No one could make out
anything that was happening, but The Guide could easily find his way
around the statue to where Iris was bound. Within seconds, he cut her
down and found her hand. They made their way out of the fountain and
started running. Their feet were still wet and cold and tingled from
being bound so long. They pushed forward with little feeling and
little vision, but knew they were running in the opposite direction
of where they’d last seen The Coach and Mortician.

As
The Guide began to wonder how long the distraction would last, it
suddenly disappeared and the world around them normalized. He turned
back and saw they’d put a good distance between themselves and
The Coach and Mortician and when the lights turned off, their
enemies' attention was focused toward the bridge, so they ran until
they disappeared behind a building and kept going.

“
We
won’t have much time,” The Guide said. “They’re
going to figure out where we are.”

“
They
still have Rainbow,” Iris said. “We have to get it back
or they’ll destroy it.”

“
Did
you see if either of them had a gun or any kind of weapon?”

“
I
don’t think so. I didn’t see anything. The Coach has a
duffel bag which he calls “his players” but I’m not
sure what that means.”

“
Are
you okay?” The Guide asked, finding her eyes. She shook her
head and fell into his arms as he wrapped around her in a hug. She
clung to his body, digging her fingers into his shoulders from
behind. “I’m going back for Rainbow,” he said over
her
shoulder.

“
I’m
going too.”

“
No,”
he said. “If we all die, there’s nothing left to stop
them. The world needs someone to rally people, and you’re good
at that. So is The Troll. This is what I do.”

“
But…”

“
You
circle back to the bridge and see if he’s okay. If I can get
Rainbow, I’ll join you on the other side. We need to eliminate
some of their guys so the world knows we’re a real army. I can
do that.”

“
Promise
me you’ll meet us down there,” she said, finding his eyes
again.

“
I'll
do everything I can.”

The
Guide wanted to kiss her, but there was no time. It gave him more
incentive to survive, but he wasn’t sure what he was up
against. The bounty hunters supposedly all had skills. Some were
known, such as The Mentalist or Chameleon, but others were tucked
away. The Guide understood who The Mortician and The Coach were, but
he didn’t understand what they could do, though he had the
feeling he’d find out very quickly. He’d have a hard
enough time fighting two against one.