. . . 35 Hours and Counting . . .

Spurlock awakened earlier than usual. He found himself sprawled across the front seats of the van. His back ached and he groaned when he tried to get up.

The Colt 45 malt liquor bottle slid from his grasp and rattled on the floor of the van. The sound shattered his glassed-over mind. He moaned and lay back, hurting in a hundred places. The big forty-ounce bottles had done their job well, all three of them. At two bucks each on special, they had to be one of the cheapest drunks in town. He was sick. Like the guns they were named after, the Colts had blown fist-sized chunks out of his brain. Last night, this had been a pleasant thing, the first real relief from the withdrawal symptoms that had begun ravaging his body in earnest.

Now, however, he regretted everything. He thought to himself that, ironically, he would have rather worked an honest month at an honest job for the money that he had yet to squeeze out of this mess. He chuckled and groaned again. He farted wetly, then heard the kid stir in his cage.

“You’ve got a surprise ride waiting for you today, punk,” he told the kid. “Just as soon as I’m able to move, that is.”

After dozing for perhaps another ten minutes, Spurlock managed to rouse himself again. He had to either get up or piss his pants. There had been mornings past when he had taken the latter option, but not today. Today, he needed to do slightly better than that. Resolved to facing the sun that he knew blazed just outside, he kicked open the van door and staggered out into the orchard.

He pissed on a black-trunked almond tree and then doubled over. His belly felt tight and sick. His gut gave him a wrenching pain that couldn’t be relieved by urination alone. Without hesitating, he shoved a filthy finger down his throat and gagged. The foamy contents of his stomach splattered the dirt.

“Oh shit,” he slurred and fell back against the van. He panted for a time, then felt better. It was time to get moving.

He struggled back into the driver’s seat and fired up the engine. At least the bitch still started properly. In fact, if it wasn’t for the billowing white smoke he might have tried to beat it to death all the way to San Francisco. But he knew a cop would have gotten him before he made it as far as Fairfield. So, the van had to go.

Seen from the edge the hole was incredibly deep. He had tried to dig a ramp down into it, but that had taken more time, and in the heat of the night and he had skimped. All he had wanted last night was to get to those three bottles of amber bliss. Now, as he drove the shaking machine to the brink, he was daunted.

“Holy shit, we’re in for a ride, kid,” he said aloud. On impulse, he threw open the curtains that divided the front seats from the cargo section. He looked over his shoulder and leered at the kid in the cage. He noted the kid’s big, hungry eyes and the fingers which gripped the bars. Those fingers should not be loose. The kid had untied himself.

“So, you little fuck, you got loose last night, eh?” shouted Spurlock. “Well, you won’t find it so easy to slip out of this one!”

With that, he eased the van into drive and they rumbled, shook and dipped over the edge.

“Next stop, Hell’s Kitchen!” roared Spurlock.

The black earth of the orchard swallowed the van whole. Only a foul cloud of exhaust was left behind. It lay in a spreading mass on the floor of the orchard like the devil’s own stinking breath.

Inside his tiny cage, Justin began to scream.