The Chase

Kurt's friend threw the car door open, scrambled out, flung the tool aside, and ran like hell while Nicky dragged me out of the car. I glanced back that the slavers; they were only 30 yards away and running right at us as fast as they could. The cabbie jumped out of the car and threw his hands up in the air in surrender.

"I had nothing to do with it," the cabbie cried out.

Nicky grabbed the motorcycle and tore the Lanny's Pizza box on the back off. Obviously just a ruse to camouflage the bike, apparently the phony pizza storage box had been only lightly attached to begin with.

"Get on," Nicky shouted as she kick started the bike. Hiking up my skirt up all the way to my panties, I threw my leg over the seat and hung on to Nicky for dear life. With the back tire squealing and smoking, we took off so fast I nearly lost a shoe. With traffic heavy, Nicky tore off down the sidewalk forcing people to dive out of the way. As I looked back, the slavers had given up the chase and were dashing back to their van.

Wearing running shoes, a t-shirt, and blue jeans, Nicky looked back at me incredulously.

"High heels? Really?"

"They're from McAlister and Lancaster of London," I answered.

Nicky just rolled her eyes, "Lean into it."

Careening back onto the road at the first intersection, Nicky leaned hard to the right and I followed her lead as we cut a sharp right turn and speed through the middle of a double line of cars waiting for a light.

Running the red light, Nicky recklessly darted our motorcycle though the oncoming traffic causing shock and pandemonium as she went. I winced as I heard the metallic crunch of a fender bender behind us and the angry honking of nearly a dozen car horns. As we took another sharp curve, I looked back and couldn't see the gray van anywhere.

"I think we've lost them," I said.

"Look for a drone," Nicky warned.

I scoured the sky but couldn't see anything.

"I don't see it."

"Look again, it's there."

Just as I was about to say we were clear, I saw it; a little white helicopter with a camera mounted on a swivel beneath it. About a couple of feet in length, I saw the drone as it was turning the corner about a 100 yards behind us and started closing on us fast. I screamed and Nicky gunned the engine, covering the next few blocks quickly, but it wasn't fast enough; the drone kept pace.

"It's right behind us," I cried out.

"Shit!"

I had never been the scooter-trash type, motorbikes scared me. But Nicky had a wild side to her and had raced dirt bikes for several years. She was quite comfortable doing things with motorcycles that made me most uncomfortable. Opening up the throttle as far as it would go, Nicky pushed to bike to maximum speed and threaded her way recklessly through the heavy traffic. As I looked back, I saw the drone falling behind, unable to match our speed.

"Where is it?" Nicky asked.

"A block and a half back."

Nicky took a quick right, another right, and then a left.

"Where is it now?" Nicky asked.

"You've lost it," I said.

"Hell, that was easier than I thought I'd be. Now we just need to get off the street."

Looking around, Nicky saw a parking garage, half a block ahead.

"Hold on," Nicky said as she dived into a parking garage at high speed.

A car jerked out in front of us and WHAM. We ricocheted violently off the rear fender, and tumbled onto the concrete. Next thing I knew, Nicky and I were sprawled out on the ground.

"Uh." I groaned as I rolled over and managed to get to my hands and knees. Motionless, Nicky was spread out face down on the concrete.

"Nicky!" I cried out.

"Aughhh," Nicky grunted, still splayed out on the ground.

"Are you OK?"

"Peachy," Nicky said in a voice that sounded anything but peachy.

Slowly we tried to shake it off and struggled to regain our feet.

"Oh my God!" A middle aged man exclaimed as he got out of the car and rushed to us. "Are you girls alright?"

"We're fine," I said even though I was still unsteady on my feet and feeble.

"I think we should call for an ambulance," the driver said taking out his phone. "You girls don't look so good."

Woozy, Nicky steadied herself against the car, winced in pain, glanced at the large dent in the car's fender, and looked around for the little white helicopter. As I heard a faint buzzing sound, Nicky's eyes flew open, she pushed herself off the car and stumbled toward the motorcycle.

"We've got company," Nicky said and I looked back to see the drone peaking in the parking garage looking at us.

"Auhh," I grunted, still too shaken up to manage a more eloquent response.

Somewhat reinvigorated, Nicky pulled up the motorcycle and straightened it up. Although the bike looked like hell and the front wheel was a little warped, it seemed like it might be serviceable so we crawled on; Nicky restarted the motorbike and hit the throttle.

"Wait," the car driver shouted, "there's been an accident. You can't go."

I shrieked and hung on to Nicky as tightly as I could as we hurled out of the parking garage like a bat out of hell. Dense traffic in front of us forced Nicky to turn onto the sidewalk with the drone hot on our tail. Panic stricken pedestrians desperately dove for safety and fled in every direction as we cut through the middle of the throng of people.

Nicky fought to control the bike as we zig-zagged all over the sidewalk. With the front wheel bent and wobbling, the motorcycle shuddered almost uncontrollably, making the bike a bitch to steer as well as greatly reducing our speed.

"Can you drive this?" I yelled.

"Maybe," Nicky yelled back. "There's only one way to find out."

I cringed in fear as Nicky shot back on the road and throttled up. Instantly, the bike shuttered violently, Nicky lost control, we nearly wiped out, sideswiped a parked car, careened back into traffic, narrowly missed being run over by a cab, veered hard to the left, ran up onto the sidewalk, and crashed into a pile of garbage bags.

"Get up," Nicky said as she pulled me out of the heap of trash bags. We looked up at the drone just in time to see it clip a traffic light, spin out of control, and bounce on the sidewalk across the street.

"Do you think it's KO'd?" I asked.

"Probably not," Nicky said as she was frantically throwing trash bags on the motorbike. "Those drones are pretty tough. Quick, bury it and get in."

No sooner than we'd buried the bike and ourselves in trash bags, I heard the drone take back to the air, hover for a moment, and rush past us down the street. Nicky jumped up and tried the door to the apartment building beside us. It was locked. I tried a service door, but it was locked as well.

"We need to get off the street," Nicky said. "Find something, anything that's open."

As I looked for a door that might be unlocked, I saw the slaver's gray van driving speeding toward us and screamed in terror. Both of the slavers were looking right at me.

"Son of a bitch," Nicky said as she grabbed me and pulled me back toward the trash pile. "Get back to the bike."

"Seriously? The bike's fucked."

"It's all we've got?"

As I looked up, the slavers were less than a block away and accelerating. Nicky jerked the motorbike out of the trash pile and we jumped on but the slavers came to a screeching halt in front of us cutting us off. Diving out of the van, Mr. Davis pulled out a yellow and black Taser pistol while an angry and detrmined looking Mr. Rodriguez raced toward me. Nicky reversed the bike and hit the kick start. Only twenty feet away, Mr. Rodriguez was only a couple of seconds from nailing us while Mr. Davis leveled his Taser pistol and took aim right at me.

I screamed, "Now, Nicky, now!"

The engine roared to life. Mr. Davis fired his Taser just as Nicky hit the gas and the Taser prongs whizzed past only inches behind me. Mr. Rodriguez dove for the motorcycle, and grabbed my shoulder with his right hand but struggled to get a grip. I held on to Nicky as hard as I could and tried to shake him loose. The front wheel of the bike left the ground but Nicky and I shifted as far forward as we could and the motorcycle kept moving.

Stumbling, Mr. Rodriguez lost his grip on me, fell, and rolled on the concrete as Nicky and I tore down the sidewalk as fast as we could go and still control the bike. Mr. Davis chased us on foot while he tried to get another shot off with the Taser. Despite our rather slow speed, we were still much too fast for the middle aged slaver to run us down from behind and the distance between us and Mr. Davis quickly widened.

"God dammit," Mr. Davis exclaimed as he gave up the footrace.

As I looked back, the slavers were scrambling back toward the van.

Weaving through the heavy traffic, we quickly left the slaver's van behind. It seemed at relatively slow speeds, a little more than a fast jog, we had enough control over the motorcycle to drive it. Because we could drive between the cars, in heavy or stopped traffic, we could outrun the van but we'd never be able to outrun the drone at this speed. After a couple of blocks and a right turn, Nicky glanced back at me.

"Where's the slavers?" Nicky asked.

I looked back but in the heavy rush hour traffic, the streets were filled with delivery vans, a bus, and several trucks. With all the obstructions, the slavers were nowhere in sight.

"I don't see them."

"Do you see the drone?"

I looked around, "I don't see it either."

We took a left turn only to run into the back of the drone but its camera was pointing in the wrong direction and it didn't appear to see us. Noticing an open door, Nicky drove into a restaurant for cover. The patrons looked astonished but the manager was enraged.

"Hey, what the hell do you think you're doing? Get that damned thing the hell out of here," the manager yelled.

"I'm sorry," Nicky said. "I'm really, really sorry sir but it's an emergency."

"It's going to be an emergency if you don't get that bike out of here," the manager said as he pointed to the door.

"I'll just be a minute, please; it's really important."

"A minute my ass. If you don't get that motorcycle out of my restaurant right now, I'm calling the cops." The manager took out his cell phone.

Having no other choice, Nicky turned the motorcycle, left the restaurant and fell into traffic. Neither the drone nor the slavers were in sight and we took a quick left. But, just as soon as we got a couple of blocks up the road, we hit a red light and became ensnarled in stopped traffic.

"Cops!" I yelled as I saw a police cruiser stop in front of us at the light. Immediately, Nicky hid us behind a beer truck.

"Stay down," Nicky warned.

Although the police didn't go out of their way to look for renegades, they considered looking for fugitive collateral distasteful and the work of slavers, if the cops happened to stop or run into a renegade, they'd make the arrest. Attempted theft of collateral was a crime even if the collateral was yourself. Once collateral was collared, the police were notified and when collateral went renegade, the police were alerted to detain immediately.

For us, even a routine traffic stop would be a disaster. As we weren't wearing our collars, and as the slavers had probably notified the police of our fugitive status, if the constabularies stopped us, they'd know in an instant that we were renegades; we'd be arrested and turned over to the slavers for sure. Worse yet, we were driving recklessly, the bike was obviously not roadworthy, and we weren't wearing helmets. If the cops got so much as a fleeting glance at us, they'd pull us over.

Running from the law would be a far more daunting task than running from the slavers – probably impossible. The police had vastly greater resources, hundreds of cops, numerous hover-cars, helicopters, better drones, and a lot more of them. They also had access to hundreds of street cameras with vehicle recognition and facial/body recognition software. If we ran from the police, all that we would probably achieve is to add another six months onto our commitment for attempting to elude police. They'd probably catch us within a matter of blocks. We needed to get off the road as soon as we could.

Fecklessly, I looked around for a way out. All of the buildings nearby were swank condos with passcode entry locks and nowhere to stash the bike. And, with the cops right there, driving on the sidewalk or darting between the traffic would get us busted. We had nowhere to go.

"Did we get far enough?" I asked.

"I don't know," Nicky said. "If the drone gets some altitude and looks around, probably not."

Looking back, I saw the drone, high in the air a couple of blocks behind, looking for us, the camera mounted on its bottom scanned the back and forth. As the camera swept in our direction and we ducked down in front of a car as far as we could but when I peeked back up, the drone's camera was locked onto us and it was moving in our direction.

"It's found us," I said.

"Shit," Nicky looked for an escape.

I glanced around as well but couldn't see anywhere to hide. Then, I caught sight of the gray van only a block behind us and speeding in our direction.

"Slavers!" I yelled.

Nicky looked back, "Shit!"

Looking up, I could see that the light had changed and the police cruiser had driven past the intersection and was driving down the block.

"We're clear. The cops are gone."

"Hang on."

Nicky hunkered down, hit the accelerator, maneuvered between the stopped cars, and perilously dashed into the four lanes of traffic in front of us. Sensing my imminent death or dismemberment, I closed my eyes and screamed. I could feel the bike shutter and wobble to the point that Nicky nearly lost it. Still alive a moment later, I opened my eyes again only to find us safely on the other side of the intersection and moving fast as we frantically threaded our way through snarled rush hour traffic.

Although there was a lot of squealing of brakes, and honking horns, mercifully, this time I didn't hear any collisions. Nevertheless, we were tempting fate. Sooner or later we'd end up road pizza if we kept this up. Even slavery would be preferable to being crushed under the wheels of a bus. Although Nicky's bravado had saved us this time, the next time she tried something like that she could kill us.

"We can't keep this up," I yelled over the din of the motorcycle engine and wind noise. "We're going to die."

"I know; brace yourself," Nicky said as she took a quick left, crossed oncoming traffic, bounced over the curb onto the sidewalk, and drove down a flight of stairs into the City Park, the vibration all but bumping me off the bike. Nicky wove through a stand of trees in an effort to lose the drone to no avail. Despite the trees, the drone dived down below the branches and continued its pursuit.

"It's still there," I yelled. "The drone's right behind us."

Nicky cut through a soccer field and drove into a walking path leading into the forest. On the uneven ground and loose dirt, the wobbly front wheel caused the bike to be even harder to steer. Momentarily losing control, we nicked a jogger, knocking him to the ground. The collision almost took us out as well.

"Sorry," I yelled back at the flattened young man.

The drone, now only head high off the ground, followed about twenty feet behind us. At our reduced speed, there was no way we could outrun it. Nevertheless, the heavy tree cover slowed the little helicopter as well and prevented it from gaining any altitude.

"Duck and hold on tight," Nicky yelled as she veered off the foot path, plunged the motorcycle into the dense woods, and crashed through the thick foliage.

Battered by the tree limbs, our progress slowed to little more than a fast walk. As I looked back, the drone was now at knee height and was losing ground as it struggled to follow us through the heavy brush. After thrashing through tree limbs and underbrush in the forest for about 50 feet, Nicky slid the motorcycle to a stop, jumped off, grabbed a rock, and sprang after the drone.

Suddenly realizing that it'd been lured into a trap in the heavy growth, the drone operator tried to save the vehicle from certain destruction by fleeing as Nicky chased after it but the drone quickly hit a tree branch, tumbled to the ground, landed upside down, and frantically flopped about like a fish out of water. Savagely, Nicky pounded the drone to pieces.

"We're on foot now," Nicky said as she stood up, dropped the rock, and brushed the dirt from the knees of her jeans. As she took off through the underbrush, I struggled to follow her but, with my heels sinking in the soft ground, I quickly fell behind.