The man to whom he spoke was not nearly as bulky. Pale, short, slender, dressed in black clothes with angel wings embroidered in white thread on the front of his dark shirt. His garments were too big for him, and they bloused out around the red tassels tied to his wrists, elbows, ankles, and knees. He had a shaved head, and his scalp was covered in tattoos of bees crawling over a honey-rich hive.
“I’m just a humble traveler doing god’s work,” said the smaller man.
“Not on this road, pally,” said the big man. “This road belongs to Boss Keffler.”
As he spoke, there was an ominous sound. The smaller man turned to see other men step from concealment among the wrecked cars on the cracked highway. Four of them. All armed. One carried a shotgun in his hands.
“Ah,” said the traveler. “Let me guess — there’s a toll, am I right?”
That put a greasy smile on the big man’s face. “Oh yeah, there’s a toll.”
“Does it matter at all that I’m a servant of god? No, don’t look at me like that, I’m being serious here. I’m an actual servant of god. Doing god’s work. That get me any play here?”
The beefy man looked momentarily confused. Then he grinned. “God’s dead, ain’t you heard? And he left this road to Boss Keffler in his will.”
The big man guffawed, and the others joined him. The traveler smiled thinly, and as the laughter tapered off, he held up a hand.
“Yeah, yeah, okay, very hilarious,” said the traveler, his tone calm and reasonable. “You look like you’re the topkick of this crew. Am I right? What’s your name, brother?”
“I ain’t your brother.”
“Figure of speech. What, sir, is your name?”
“Tony Grapes.”
“Tony Grapes? Really? You’re going with that? Yes? Okay, sure, Grapes. Whatever. Look, Mr. Grapes, my name’s Marty Kirk. Brother Marty these days. We both know that you’re a large, scary individual, and your colleagues there are tough as they come. That’s obvious, that’s a given, no need to go further with that discussion. We know that. Just like we know that I’m a hundred and sixty pounds of middle-aged nothing. I’m not armed, and even if I was, we both know you could take away anything I had and make me eat it, raw, with only a little soy sauce. We’re there, am I right? We’re on that page.”
Tony stared at him with open mouth and narrowed eyes. Wary, but fascinated. “Yeah,” he said. “That’s about it.”
“So, let’s look at the last page of this script, ’cause I don’t think we’re reading from the same screenplay. In your version, I get my tuchus kicked and maybe my throat cut and you guys have a funny anecdote to tell the rest of the Neanderthals about how your combined weight of — I’m guessing here — three quarters of a ton of whale lard was able to stomp my skinny self into the dirt without so much as you bruising a hairy knuckle. I mean, let’s face it, you got that script, you’re reading those pages, am I right?”
“You’ve got a smart mouth.”
“I’ve been told. My point is,” continued Brother Marty, “my script has two different endings. One for the theaters, the other for the DVD extras, you follow? No? Forgot about all that already? Life’s sad, so much is lost. Whatever. In one version, the version where we all end the day happy and still sucking air, you and your four chums here drop to your knees, renounce your false god like the carnival phony he is, embrace Thanatos — all praise to his darkness — and one-two-three, you guys are part of my team. This is a nice scenario, am I right? This is a Hallmark moment and a happy ending.”
“This guy’s totally monkey-bat crazy,” said one of the gang.
“No kidding,” said Tony. He swung the sword out and laid the flat of it on Brother Marty’s shoulder. The weight of the blade made Marty’s knees buckle for a moment.
“But,” said Marty hastily, “let me get to the alternate ending. In that version we go for the edgy ending, the dark ending. The one that would play well at Cannes but score low in the word-of-mouth market. You dig where I’m going with this? No? Let me set the scene. In the alternate ending, you five goons don’t forswear your false god, you don’t accept the blessing of Thanatos — all praise to his darkness — and none of you are on call for the sequel to this summer blockbuster. Are you feeling me on this, Tony? You get where my GPS is taking us? That second ending sucks, neither of us like it. It’s a tearjerker, am I right? And, come on, is that really the best ending for the whole family? I don’t think so. I think we need to take a closer look at the first ending, the one the director wants to shoot, because, hey, it sells more popcorn and it’s a crowd pleaser.”
Tony Grapes said nothing. Neither did the others.
“No?” asked Marty. “Nothing? This is like talking to the screenwriter’s union. Suddenly nobody has words.”
One of the gang said, “Hey, Tony, it’s bad luck to kill a crazy person, you know that, right?”
Tony sneered. “He ain’t crazy. He’s trying to tap-dance his way out of it, that’s all.” To Marty, Tony said, “What were you before First Night? Some kind of con man?”
“I was a producer, so… pretty much, yes. But here’s my point, you fellas need to make a real career decision right here, right now. We could use some local talent, you dig? Someone who knows the ropes and knows the roads.”
“How ’bout we just have some fun kicking your ass up and down the road?”
“Feel free to try, and I mean that sincerely, guys,” said Marty. “But this is a one-time offer that expires… well, now, actually.”
Tony abruptly looked up to see another man in black clothes and red tassels climb up on the hood of a wrecked car.
“Oh, please,” he said with a gruff laugh. “It’s gonna take a lot more than…”
His voice trailed off. There was sudden movement all around them. A second figure climbed onto a car, a third stepped out from between two SUVs. A third, a fourth. Ten more. Twenty.
Too many.
In front and behind and on both sides. They weren’t there and then they were, the figures moving as silently as ghosts. They all carried weapons.
The closest ones were bigger, more muscular and more dangerous-looking than the others, and they had red handprint tattoos over their faces. Their eyes burned with bloodlust.
The gang member with the shotgun raised it to point at the nearest figure.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa now,” said Marty quickly. “Think it through. That there is a Remington model 870 pump shotgun, am I right? You probably have a six-shot magazine and maybe one in the pipe. I’m using that word right? Pipe? So you got seven shots. Your friend there has a Glock 23 with a thirteen-shot capacity, and again one in the pipe. At best — at best I’m saying — if you guys are Deadeye Dicks, you can take out twenty, twenty-two of us. The rest of you have knives and swords, and I’m here to tell you that we like our odds in an edged-weapon tussle. Not bragging, just saying. So, you take out a coupla dozen of us, and the rest of us spend the whole afternoon and evening teaching you guys all sorts of songs. Hymns, if you catch where I’m going with this. It’s a religious thing. Hymns to Thanatos — praise be to his darkness.”
All around them dozens upon dozens of voices echoed the chant.
“So,” said Marty, still being reasonable, “the math isn’t good. I like you boys, you have some pluck, and central casting could’ve put you in anything by Tarantino or the Coen brothers. Seriously, you’re great. But there’s so many of us my head hurts to do the tallies.”
Tony licked his lips but said nothing.
“Okay, I have your attention,” said Marty. “Now, the whole reason I’m here and we’re taking this meeting instead of just walking away from your bleeding corpses is that we need what’s in your head more than we need what’s in your veins. Okay, that’s a bad line. I’m a producer, not a scriptwriter. Follow me, though. It was a threat, but it was couched so as to present an offer. You got that, right?”