Chapter 53/54
Chapters Fifty-Three & Fifty-Four
Mon/November/2008 07:00 AM
Chapter
53
God this hurt.
Jeff’s wrist was screaming bloody murder.
His arm was howling like a banshee.
His body was flailing wilding in the air, exerting all the more pressure on his totaled arm and wrist.
Plus -- his eyes locked on the twinkling blue lights -- these fucking canisters, whatever the hell they were, were ready to go off any second. The lights racing around the switches were going round and round in faster and faster rotations. He didn’t know much about these things, but his hunch was that that was not good.
Tim gripped the controls, rocking the aircraft from side to side, trying to tip the platter of canisters out of the cabin. He was having no such luck, but he was sure as hell coming close to tearing Jeff’s arm from its socket.
Each time the chopper listed down to the right side, Jeff flailed his arms and legs, trying to get a foot hold on the skid or the side of the cabin. When it went back in the other direction, Jeff slammed into the side, his body hitting the metal shell with a jolt, the momentum spinning him around.
To make things worse, the view below was a helter skelter nightmare -- moving back and forth from rooftop to the freefall possibility of nothing but air. Each time the helicopter, with Jeff dangling from the side, appeared over the edge of the building, he could hear the crowd gasp. He just bet the news crews were having a field day with this. It wasn’t everyday the world’s third richest man, the software guy, got battered around like this on live television.
Oh, and to make matters worse, he’d been shot by his old high school buddy, Brick Ransom. In the instant before the first shot hit him in the shoulder, Jeff had caught a glimpse of his old friend on the rooftop, taking dazed, rather half-assed aim at Simon, and instead hitting him.
Now he was in this predicament.
Christ, if he survived this, the footage of this moment would be in every news bio, video tribute toast, and Saturday Night Live sketch from now until the day he died. Hopefully that would come later than sooner! Christ! Hell, let them air this shit whenever the hell they wanted to! Just let him get two feet back on the fucking ground!
Chapter 54
The copter was banking south of the building towards Lake Union. Jeff’s leg movements had slowed, probably from exhaustion.
Nick held the gun aloft, closed one eye, and took slow, steady aim at the chain above the Pepper’s wrist.
He’d get one shot.
One shot, then the pilot would pull away from that building, away from all the gunfire.
Nick tracked the movement, sweeping his arm to the side, moving the view up and down as the body of the aircraft continued its topsy turvy movements. The aircraft moved over the edge of the building, its engine seeming to sputter and wheeze, then it started back over the rooftop, and Nick pulled the trigger.
Kuh-pshow!
The chain around Jeff’s wrist let go. Completely. One minute he was flying backwards, over the roof. The next he was falling through thin air as the chopper hurtled away, over the edge, over the crowd, to the north of the building. Jeff looked up into the copter’s cabin as he hung in the air, briefly motionless. He locked eyes with Tim as the man struggled at the controls, then held still, his face going slack. Behind Tim, in the middle of the cabin, a flash of explosive went off, and a cloud of mist filled the air around him. Jeff watched in horrific curiosity to see what would happen. For a moment it seemed nothing would, then Tim’s eyes seemed to bug out, the whites swelling out of his eyelids. His face and cheeks puffed out in a ghastly expression of surprise, as Tim’s now swollen hands flew up to his neck in panic. Blood seeped from Tim’s eyes as Jeff regained his sense of gravity and began pinwheeling his arms and legs. Still, he looked inside the cabin, saw the burst of blood from Tim’s nose and ears, saw the mist of pink vapor burst from the man’s eyes and mouth. Then he saw the worst of it, the final hiccup, as the man’s body seemed to twist inside out, erupting in a geyser of blood and tissue as the glass on the front of the helicopter was covered in blood.
Then, Jeff fell towards the rooftop. He twisted his body in the air, trying to direct the impact to his back, turn into it a little. Closer, closer, the rooftop flew up at his face as he hurtled downward.
Bam!
He landed with a thud at the edge of the platform, the force of the impact sending him flying head over heels toward the ledge, before he stopped, his head and shoulders hanging over the side. He reached his arms out to hold himself in place, his broken wrist on one side, his wounded arm on the other. He closed his eyes in pain, and took a deep breath. When he looked up, a young man, twenty-five, twenty-six, was standing over him, reaching out his hand. Jeff took it, and grunted as the guy pulled him forward, up and away from the edge. He struggled to his feet, dazed, as he heard the sound of his helicopter’s wheezing, gasping, sputtering engine. The two of them looked over at the chopper as it whirled about wildly, its dead pilot’s ruptured remains slumped at the controls.
The chopper began making wider and ever wilder movements. Spinning toward the corner of the building with its rotors. Jeff watched, fascinated, until the young man again pulled on his arm, rather viciously, leading him towards the metal stairs and away from the platform.
Then the chopper’s nose tilted down as it hugged the top of the building and rocketed away towards the lake. Only, its flight was cut short as the rotor blades made contact with the roof, clipping their tips on the concrete surface, sending shards of metal blasting outwards like an abstract porcupine. Jeff and Nick dove for the stairs and shrapnel screamed through the air around them. When they looked up, the body of the mortally wounded aircraft was hurtling forward, over the edge of the building, in a listing arc, still headed for the lake. The sound faded away as their eye’s bulged.
The machine seemed to hover in the air. Then it moved farther and farther away, off into the distance, over the crowd below, over the buildings of the south campus, and out towards the water, where it quietly, and gracefully splashed down in a oddly muted crash landing.
The twisted, burning wreckage floated in place for a moment, bobbing on the surface, before slipping beneath the waves and disappearing from sight.
God this hurt.
Jeff’s wrist was screaming bloody murder.
His arm was howling like a banshee.
His body was flailing wilding in the air, exerting all the more pressure on his totaled arm and wrist.
Plus -- his eyes locked on the twinkling blue lights -- these fucking canisters, whatever the hell they were, were ready to go off any second. The lights racing around the switches were going round and round in faster and faster rotations. He didn’t know much about these things, but his hunch was that that was not good.
Tim gripped the controls, rocking the aircraft from side to side, trying to tip the platter of canisters out of the cabin. He was having no such luck, but he was sure as hell coming close to tearing Jeff’s arm from its socket.
Each time the chopper listed down to the right side, Jeff flailed his arms and legs, trying to get a foot hold on the skid or the side of the cabin. When it went back in the other direction, Jeff slammed into the side, his body hitting the metal shell with a jolt, the momentum spinning him around.
To make things worse, the view below was a helter skelter nightmare -- moving back and forth from rooftop to the freefall possibility of nothing but air. Each time the helicopter, with Jeff dangling from the side, appeared over the edge of the building, he could hear the crowd gasp. He just bet the news crews were having a field day with this. It wasn’t everyday the world’s third richest man, the software guy, got battered around like this on live television.
Oh, and to make matters worse, he’d been shot by his old high school buddy, Brick Ransom. In the instant before the first shot hit him in the shoulder, Jeff had caught a glimpse of his old friend on the rooftop, taking dazed, rather half-assed aim at Simon, and instead hitting him.
Now he was in this predicament.
Christ, if he survived this, the footage of this moment would be in every news bio, video tribute toast, and Saturday Night Live sketch from now until the day he died. Hopefully that would come later than sooner! Christ! Hell, let them air this shit whenever the hell they wanted to! Just let him get two feet back on the fucking ground!
Chapter 54
The copter was banking south of the building towards Lake Union. Jeff’s leg movements had slowed, probably from exhaustion.
Nick held the gun aloft, closed one eye, and took slow, steady aim at the chain above the Pepper’s wrist.
He’d get one shot.
One shot, then the pilot would pull away from that building, away from all the gunfire.
Nick tracked the movement, sweeping his arm to the side, moving the view up and down as the body of the aircraft continued its topsy turvy movements. The aircraft moved over the edge of the building, its engine seeming to sputter and wheeze, then it started back over the rooftop, and Nick pulled the trigger.
Kuh-pshow!
The chain around Jeff’s wrist let go. Completely. One minute he was flying backwards, over the roof. The next he was falling through thin air as the chopper hurtled away, over the edge, over the crowd, to the north of the building. Jeff looked up into the copter’s cabin as he hung in the air, briefly motionless. He locked eyes with Tim as the man struggled at the controls, then held still, his face going slack. Behind Tim, in the middle of the cabin, a flash of explosive went off, and a cloud of mist filled the air around him. Jeff watched in horrific curiosity to see what would happen. For a moment it seemed nothing would, then Tim’s eyes seemed to bug out, the whites swelling out of his eyelids. His face and cheeks puffed out in a ghastly expression of surprise, as Tim’s now swollen hands flew up to his neck in panic. Blood seeped from Tim’s eyes as Jeff regained his sense of gravity and began pinwheeling his arms and legs. Still, he looked inside the cabin, saw the burst of blood from Tim’s nose and ears, saw the mist of pink vapor burst from the man’s eyes and mouth. Then he saw the worst of it, the final hiccup, as the man’s body seemed to twist inside out, erupting in a geyser of blood and tissue as the glass on the front of the helicopter was covered in blood.
Then, Jeff fell towards the rooftop. He twisted his body in the air, trying to direct the impact to his back, turn into it a little. Closer, closer, the rooftop flew up at his face as he hurtled downward.
Bam!
He landed with a thud at the edge of the platform, the force of the impact sending him flying head over heels toward the ledge, before he stopped, his head and shoulders hanging over the side. He reached his arms out to hold himself in place, his broken wrist on one side, his wounded arm on the other. He closed his eyes in pain, and took a deep breath. When he looked up, a young man, twenty-five, twenty-six, was standing over him, reaching out his hand. Jeff took it, and grunted as the guy pulled him forward, up and away from the edge. He struggled to his feet, dazed, as he heard the sound of his helicopter’s wheezing, gasping, sputtering engine. The two of them looked over at the chopper as it whirled about wildly, its dead pilot’s ruptured remains slumped at the controls.
The chopper began making wider and ever wilder movements. Spinning toward the corner of the building with its rotors. Jeff watched, fascinated, until the young man again pulled on his arm, rather viciously, leading him towards the metal stairs and away from the platform.
Then the chopper’s nose tilted down as it hugged the top of the building and rocketed away towards the lake. Only, its flight was cut short as the rotor blades made contact with the roof, clipping their tips on the concrete surface, sending shards of metal blasting outwards like an abstract porcupine. Jeff and Nick dove for the stairs and shrapnel screamed through the air around them. When they looked up, the body of the mortally wounded aircraft was hurtling forward, over the edge of the building, in a listing arc, still headed for the lake. The sound faded away as their eye’s bulged.
The machine seemed to hover in the air. Then it moved farther and farther away, off into the distance, over the crowd below, over the buildings of the south campus, and out towards the water, where it quietly, and gracefully splashed down in a oddly muted crash landing.
The twisted, burning wreckage floated in place for a moment, bobbing on the surface, before slipping beneath the waves and disappearing from sight.