Cannibal Corpse, M/C

He smiled at the Ratbags and they were too stunned by what he was saying to do anything but stare. That’s because they didn’t who they were dealing with. They didn’t know how badly he was itching for a fight, how badly he needed some action, and how badly he wanted to lay down some hurt. Above all, they didn’t know that Slaughter was a hardcore 1%er who rode fast and punched hard, always leaving a trail of broken hearts and bodies in his wake.

But they were about to find out.

He looked at the gun in his hand. “This bothering you boys?” He almost handed it to Dirty Mary, but he thought better of it and slid it back in the canvas holster. “Now we’re even. Now we can talk business. We can discuss this like civilized men, citizens, or we can drop the gloves and let the blood flow. Your choice. Entirely your choice.”

Now that the gun was out of sight and out of mind, the Ratbags were feeling better about themselves. Their old arrogance returned and they felt like men again—all except Snake. They had knives and they were going to use them. First on the biker. And then on his woman. Slaughter let them come in. Like Dirty Mary, he had baited them and now he was going to spring the trap. The Ratbags didn’t know all the gang wars and prison fights he’d been in, how he liked to reel his enemies in like this before he beat ‘em down.

He waited.

They waited.

He was waiting for the big guy to pull his knife because he would. It was only a matter of time. He was the biggest and he looked to be second-in-command so he would have to make a move or he would lose face with the others. Slaughter was looking forward to it. All he needed was to get that big piece of shit in close and then he’d break his arms, smash his nose to pulp, thumb out his eyes, and puncture his solar plexus, leave him rolling in the dirt.

“Well?” he said. “Like Dirty Mary said, either show your dicks or put them away.”

Mary hissed at him.

And then it started.

* * *

The biggest one came first, as expected.

He wasn’t an experienced knife fighter. Instead of slashing out with circular thrusts and timed straight jabs, he lunged forward, bringing his blade—a Marine K-bar—down in an overhead arc. Slaughter pivoted at the last second, snatched the guy’s wrist and twisted it fast and fierce, breaking it, and when the guy pitched forward he kneed him in the face and dropped him.

Things happened fast then.

As he put down the big guy, one of them got up behind him and slipped an arm around his throat and another charged in with a hunting knife. Slaughter jumped up as the Ratbag clutched him and kicked the one with the knife in the stomach. The guy let out a whoosh of air and went down at Dirty Mary’s feet and then she had the knife. He looked up at her, wide-eyed and dazed, the wind knocked out of him, and she started stabbing him, going at it in a real kinetic, kill-happy frenzy. She slashed him across the face and jabbed him in the throat, the arm, then sank the blade between his shoulder blades, riding it down and twisting it while the guy screamed out in pain.

Then the little Hispanic guy came up and kicked her in the head and she lost the knife, a couple of teeth, and started wailing out her death song.

Slaughter fell back into the clutches of the Ratbag who had him in a chokehold and brought his head back with everything he had into the guy’s nose, which dislocated with a popping sound. Then he had his Gurkha knife out, the Kukri, and as the guy pressed his hands to his shattered nose, blood running between his fingers, Slaughter slashed him across the ribs and took his left arm off at the elbow.

There was one of them left by then, the little Hispanic dude, except he was the smart one and he ran outside. Just as Slaughter was going to go after him, finish him out there and make it slow, another truck came roaring down the drive, skidding to a halt before the farmhouse.

He sneaked a peek out the window and saw two guys in camos jump out of the cab. One of them was carrying a .30-30 Winchester and he brought it up quick and fired at Slaughter’s silhouette behind the curtains. Slaughter jumped away just as the bullet punched through the glass. But even so, he felt the hot trail of that round pass just by his head.

More rounds came in, shattering windows in their frames and punching into the walls.

It was about this time that he saw that Dirty Mary was down.

“Shit,” he said.

He crawled over to her and she was gone. She’d taken a slug in the side of the head that nearly split her skull in half. It was his fault and he knew it. If he hadn’t been playing silly fucking games, if he’d just charged in with his Mag and drilled them all, she’d still be alive.

A few more rounds came chewing into the room.

He slid over by the front door and kicked it closed with his boot. More rounds punched through it. He sidled along the wall and threw the lock so it wouldn’t be easy for them.