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“Run,” she said.

They got up and bolted. There was an exit to the rear with a piece of paper taped to it that read RESTROOMS LOCATED OUTSIDE. They burst through the door and into the night.

A red Jeep Wrangler with a soft top was parked there. “That must be the clerk’s car,” his girlfriend said. “We’ve got to get the keys.”

“I’ll find them,” he said, diving back into the store.

Keeping low, he took cover behind the back row and cautiously peered around the corner. From this vantage point, he could see Gonzalez standing outside and firing at somebody off to the left. The front door seemed to be stuck open and its glass had been shattered by bullets. Jagged shards jutted around the metal frame.

Lewis didn’t hesitate. He ran behind the counter to where the dead clerk lay and began frisking him as if he were a corpse to loot for supplies in Rogue Horizon. He found the car keys in the left pocket, took them, and ran, briefly catching sight of what blocked the door. Caruso lay on her back, half inside, half out, her white shirt stained dark with bloody bullet holes.

He dashed back through the rear door, climbed into the Jeep, and slid the key into the ignition. “Caruso’s dead,” he said as the engine roared to life. “Blackwell and Gonzalez are having a little shootout in the parking lot.”

“Then let’s get the hell out of here.”

Buckling his seat belt, he floored the accelerator and the Jeep barreled out into the desert. He swung the wheel to the left, aiming them back at the road. As they pulled onto US-93, Lewis glanced in the rear-view mirror to see a black sedan swerving out of the gas station, a pair of headlights racing after them through the dark.

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“Shit!” Jenna swore as she looked back. She turned to him. “Does this thing go any faster?”

“Working on it,” he said, pushing the pedal all the way.

The Jeep revved forward, its speed ticking past 100 miles per hour. Even the slightest twitch of the wheel caused the vehicle to sway wildly in the lane. The car behind them continued to gain ground, closing the gap between them.

Lewis looked ahead. There was nothing but empty road in front of them and bumpy, open desert on either side of the lanes. Nowhere to turn, nowhere to hide. The car went as fast as it could; it felt like he was steering a rocket with wheels. Air violently battered the front window, wind whipping around the sides of the Wrangler.

The black sedan got closer in the mirror every time he glanced at it, gliding forward at a frightening pace like a vehicular angel of death. Soon it was right behind him, and he saw a gun-wielding hand reach out of the front window and begin firing. The rear window cracked. He and Jenna ducked as shots sailed over their heads and made bullet holes through the front windshield.

Lewis felt the vehicle swaying wildly side to side, and looked back up to get it under control. In the side mirror, he saw the driver of the car behind them leaning their full upper torso out the window to get better aim, their other hand remaining on the steering wheel inside. More shots rang out in the night.

Past the glare of the pursuing vehicle’s headlights, Lewis could make out the snarling face of Blackwell. He’d ditched the fedora and exposed his bald head to the roaring air, and in that instant Lewis knew he’d seen him somewhere before. He just couldn’t place–

“Des!”

He whipped around. Jenna stared back at him, looking both sad and dreadfully scared. One of her palms was red with blood. Hers. A stray shot had gone through the back of her seat and come out toward the side of her abdomen.

Lewis opened his mouth but never got the chance to speak.

The rear left tire burst in that second, a well-placed round by Blackwell having found its mark. The Jeep swerved wildly, fishtailing like a beast from the sea. He tried to wrangle it, tried to keep the front aimed straight, slammed on the brakes, but it was little use. He lost all control and the car veered off the road, the wheels useless to direction, and the whole world spun on the other side of the windshield. He closed his eyes, his worst nightmare come true, and felt his entire body restrained against the terrifying force of the crash as the car tumbled and rolled and glass and steel and bones cracked all around him. Something heavy collided against his chest, cracking a rib, as long strands of hair brushed across his face. Finally, the Jeep came to a halt on its roof. He kept his eyes squeezed shut, ignoring the pain all over his body, pushing the dark memories deep back down the well.

And then, in that awful instant, he realized he never saw Jenna put on her seatbelt.

Lewis’s eyes flashed open. Everything was upside-down; all the blood rushed to his head. Dazed, he looked up – down, really – toward the ceiling and at that moment a terror he had not felt in years gripped his body.

Jenna lay face down among the glass shards at an awkward angle, her head turned to the side. Her eyes were open and devoid of life.

“No,” he said, unable to fight back the tears. “No, no, no, no, no, no.”

Lewis desperately fumbled for his seatbelt and finally found the release. With a click, he was free and falling toward her. He just managed to put his hands out to land to reduce the impact, but it still hurt. At that moment, he didn’t even register his broken rib.

“No, no, no…” He turned her over but her dead eyes stared up past him, a saddened but ultimately peaceful expression cemented on her face. He stared at her for several long moments, unable to comprehend the sight before him. But ultimately, deep down, he recognized that she was gone.

Lewis squeezed his eyes shut, tried to hold back the deluge of tears welling up in his eyes. It was no use; the dam burst. Memories flooded his mind. He saw himself on that Friday evening five months ago, when Ricky had introduced him to some of his gamer friends as they went bar hopping through Santa Monica. Jenna had been there, and it wasn’t just how pretty she was that made him fall for her. She had had a certain energy about her, a vivacious spirit in her eyes that complemented her broad smiles and infectious laughter.

He’d been so worried about making a good first impression that he’d accidentally spilled his drink on her while turning around at the bar. A couple months later, Jenna told him that she’d found it endearing. In the moment, she’d laughed it off and they wound up have a long conversation while the others were back at the table. They’d traded numbers before they each departed for the night and made plans to meet again, just the two of them.

And now here she was, lying broken inside an overturned car.

Not again.

The astronaut laughed maniacally somewhere off in the distance. The tears streamed down Lewis’s face now, just as they had that night so long ago. The night his mother held him tightly by the side of a lonely forest road, directing his attention away from the twisted wreck of her car toward the stars above.

The night he caused the death of his baby brother.

PART THREE

GAME OVER

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If he held it up against the window just right, it almost looked like it was flying through the stars. He could imagine himself at the helm of a real space shuttle, the whole three, two, one takeoff, the blue sky fading into blackness, and then the lights of distant galaxies and supernovas all around him.