CHAPTER 50: HIGHWAY TO HELL
OMG!
Maria is behind the wheel of the Charger, Jason is in the backseat embracing Iva’s body, and Eric is in the burgundy SUV behind them. Shortly, they arrive onto a highway. Eric’s cell-phone starts ringing in his pocket. He leans over and digs into his pocket to retrieve it. He takes a quick glance at the screen to see who is calling him. It’s his sister.
“Hello,” he answers with one hand on the steering wheel and the other holding the phone to his ear.
“Aero, did you find her?” Jessica asks in another vehicle miles away.
Their mother is behind the wheel of the car and their father is in the front passenger seat. The two of them immediately begin to listen closer to the conversation Jessica is having with Eric.
“Yeah, we found her,” Eric replies into the phone.
“Is she okay?” Jessica asks impatiently.
“No, she’s dying,” Eric says with a burning throat. “She’s barely hanging on right now.”
“Oh shit,” Jessica blurts out.
Concern immediately shrouds Jessica. Margie notices her daughter’s worried expression in the rearview mirror.
“What did he say?” Margie asks Jessica in a frightened tone of voice.
“He said she’s dying,” Jessica says with watery eyes.
“Oh, Christ,” Charles blurts out.
“Rave, listen,” Eric continues his conversation in the SUV. “Meet us at Olivia’s. We may still have a chance.”
“I know. I’m showing them how to get there,” Jessica replies.
Suddenly, something crashes down on top of the SUV. Eric eyes widen with shock by the loud thud.
“Hold on,” Eric says with a cautious voice as he looks upward at the roof.
“What’s going on? Aero?” Jessica speaks into the phone, not knowing that Eric has switched his attention to something else.
The SUV lifts again. Then he sees Hellhound landing on top of the Charger in front of him. It appears he’s jumping from car to car.
“Damn it,” Eric mutters as he watches Hellhound leap onto the roof of the Charger.
“Aero, what’s going on?” Jessica says loudly through the phone.
“Rave, I’ll see you in a couple,” Eric replies and tosses the phone sideways onto the passenger seat.
Meanwhile, as Maria is driving, she looks up at the ceiling. The roof of the car is now low as if something heavy is on top.
“It’s him,” Jason warns Maria from the backseat.
The top of the car receives another blow and then another. The blows are much smaller and concentrated. Hellhound is on his knees punching the roof of the car. Jason watches on as the middle of the roof bents inward.
“Shit. Hold on!” Maria warns urgently.
She swerves the car left and right in attempt to sling Hellhound off the roof. He falls belly-flat on top of the car, latching onto each side so he doesn’t fall off. A moment later, she retains control over the vehicle.
“Is he still up there?” she asks Jason in a worried voice.
They continue to listen closely.
“I don’t know,” Jason replies.
Out of nowhere, a hand carrying five sharp nails comes through the roof. Jason leans away as much as he can to avoid the long nails from digging into his skin.
“Get the knife. Get the knife,” Jason shouts to Maria.
Maria is now concentrating hard to multitask. She’s using one hand to drive and another to open the glove compartment. After a couple of failed attempts, she finally manages to open it. Inside the compartment, she finds what she needs. It’s a small bladed knife. The only problem is her arms are way too short to grab it.
She has to take a moment to give the road her undivided attention as she swerves around a family van. Suddenly, Hellhound’s claws penetrate through Jason’s shirt. Jason uses his left arm to support Iva’s head and the other to push Hellhound’s nails away.
“Hurry Athena,” Jason cries out to Maria in the backseat of the car.
The pressure is on now and Maria can definitely feel it breathing down her neck. She attempts to reach for the knife a second time. Hellhound is now forcing his long nails into Jason’s skin.
“Almost there,” Maria says through her teeth as she stretches her hand as far as she possibly can.
Hellhound’s nails are now breaking the barrier of his skin and seeping into his tense muscle fibers.
“I can’t hold it much longer,” Jason shouts to Maria, using all of his strength to push back Hellhound’s arm.
Maria takes both of her hands off the wheel and grabs the blade, quickly retracts her body, and swerves back into the lane.
“AHHHHHHHHH!” Jason shouts in horrible pain.
Maria reaches back and thrust the blade into Hellhound’s forearm. He snatches his hand back and leaps off onto an eighteen wheeler next to them. He stands on top of the large truck and examines his new wound. Blood begins to leak from the cut. This only makes him angrier than before.
Meanwhile, back in the Charger…
“Courage, are you okay?” Maria asks in a timid voice.
“I’m okay, I’m good. It’s just a flesh wound,” Jason says while catching his breath.
They both look around for Hellhound but they can’t seem to find him anywhere.
“Is he gone?” Maria says with cautious eyes.
They both look around at the cars passing by. He doesn’t show his hideous face.
“I think so,” Jason concludes.
They both take a moment to maintain a steady heartbeat.
“How she’s doing back there?” Maria asks.
Jason examines Iva’s bleeding.
“She’s still bleeding a lot,” he informs Maria.
Maria relieves some stress by taking a couple of deep breaths.
“Well, at least we lost him,” she adds, still sounding a bit fearful.
As they pass the eighteen-wheeler beside them, Maria sees Eric in the far left lane, waving for their attention. He’s saying something but she can’t read his lips. Maria rolls down the driver’s window to hear him clearly.
“What?’ Maria yells out the window at Eric.
“I said, watch out for the pillars,” Eric shouts back at her through the strong wind current.
“What pillars?” Maria shouts back.
“Oh shit,” Jason says behind Maria as he spots what Eric is gesturing to.
Maria turns her head to the road again. As a black truck moves into another lane in front of them, she sees the thing Eric is warning her about. Hellhound is standing on a cargo truck about fifty yards away. This truck is transporting dozens of gigantic concrete pillars. Each of them are weighing over five-hundred pounds. Hellhound is using all the strength he can muster to pull the last chain keeping them intact.
“You have to be fucking kidding me,” Maria says with panic.
Maria watches on defensively as he attempts to free the giant pieces of harden rock. She can’t hit the brakes because there’s a line of cars behind her going at least sixty miles an hour. Her heart stops with her mind. She has no idea how she will escape this if he manages to break the last link of the chain. She can’t seem to create a scenario in her mind that would allow her to avoid the oncoming dilemma.
Hellhound pulls harder, finding the strength he needs to break the bolts that is holding the chain down onto the bed of the truck. There’s four large bolts in all. The first one pops. Maria heart skips a beat. He's actually doing it and it’s nothing anyone can do to stop him. The second bolt pops off. Maria’s heart sinks into her stomach. Then the third one pops off. She tightens her grip on the steering wheel until she can’t feel her hands anymore. The forth bolt breaks off. All of her joints lock in place as her temperature rises. She takes a deep breath and prepares herself for the crisis that’s about to unfold.
HERE THEY COME! The large pieces of concrete starts to move and slide off one another. One by one, the colossal pieces of concrete rolls off the truck and then smash onto the busy highway. Hellhound leaps onto another vehicle just in time to watch his deathly orchestra take place before his very own eyes. The impact of the pillars hitting the concrete ignites fear. The first pillar finds its first victim, a red sedan. Unfortunately, the driver wasn’t wearing a seatbelt. His body explodes through the windshield and smacks the ground with a nasty thud like a tomato being dropped from a building; blood and chunks of flesh splatters on windshields. The sedan’s entire front-end crumbles like aluminum foil, and the car itself somersaults into the air.
“Holy shit!” Eric shouts as the car lands directly in front of him, flipping over and over again.
Eric dodges it with the SUV just in time. Maria also veers left to dodge one of the colossal pieces of concrete.
“Behold, my glorious purpose!” Hellhound shouts to the colliding cars.
Cars of various colors and sizes start to tumble onto the highway. Bodies are flying through the windshields of cars as destruction unfolds. Their body twists into unrecognizable shapes as they flip across the hard pavement over and over again. A body hits Eric’s windshield, leaving blood smeared along the right side. Glass and pieces of bent metal is raining everywhere.
Hellhound sees his opportune moment to attack and quickly advances onto the Charger again. He jumps from one car to another and then lands on top of the Charger.
“Not again,” Jason says with worry.
Hellhound reaches over the side of the car and opens the driver’s door in attempt to grab Maria. Then the driver’s door is impacted by a crumbling pillar, which breaks the door off its hinges. Now, Maria is driving without a driver’s door. This gives Hellhound the advantage he needs. Hellhound leans over and tries to grab her from the driver’s side. Hellhound quickly retracts his arms and notices, yet again, he’s been stabbed by some type of blade. Now, his pissed levels has hit an all-time high.
He then uses both of his hands to dig into the roof of the car. Using his incredible strength, he peels back the roof like a can of tuna. Maria is startled to see Hellhound looking down at her through the roof of the car. She can read his eyes like a book. His intentions are to kill without remorse. He reaches a hand down and rips her seatbelt off her shoulder.
“Stab him,” Jason shouts to her.
The knife is next to her in the passenger seat. Maria sees it. She reaches for it without hesitation and grabs it, ready to slice and dice. She then dodges a flipping car in front of her, nearly veering off onto the grass, and straightens the car again. As she focuses on the road, her weapon slips from her grasp and lands onto the floor of the vehicle.
“Shit, I dropped the knife!” she blurts out.
Hellhound grunts while he pulls the roof back even more.
“Stab me will ya?” he says to Maria as he reaches in and grabs the back of her neck. “Say bye-bye, bitch,” Hellhound tells her.
Hellhound does something completely unexpected. With all of his power, he lifts Maria from the driver’s seat; launching her across the air into on-coming traffic.
“ATHENA!” Jason shouts, defenselessly, from the back passenger seat…