XIII. Streetsweep
When The Fuzz Cracks Down, The Punks Rise Up...
It felt like cheating on the poor guy, but all this test driving was strictly business for Lita. In her growing web of connections throughout Haven’s underworld, one thing she found scarce were dependable security staff. While the gray biker Mack Malten and his gang were good fighters, they were off having to wrangle and wrestle the hoods who weren’t down with the whole idea. The dashing Professor Smith and his lot had brains aplenty, but precious little muscle. And as much as she loved them, her street-fighting friends were getting it in the neck with crackdowns, Ash and Chuck Damier warning her to keep clear until the heat died down.
That left the spunky hippie-punk to plunder her favorite street-racing crews for her security team. She hadn’t found too many to fold into her resistance group, The Avenger’s Creed, but she was well-known to these souped-up gangs. Lita’s prized red Beetle mopped the floor with several top-performance rides, meaning only the best could become part of the dark gray vigilante’s pack.
And if you want a job done right, you have to do it yourself.
From a casting call of hundreds, conducted over several nights of carefully coordinated time trials in the city’s darkest parts, Lita found her five mains from a group called “The Dead Rockets.”
Four vintage mid-century muscle-cars, and a hopped-up hatchback from what they used to call Japan. Leading the gang was Rick Laitham, her choice for security chief as well. He was a tan hound about Lita’s height, his snout sharp as a switchblade, rocking loose-fitting leather suit and a bright white T-shirt underneath. His was the dark blue ‘67 Camaro, a real she-beast Lita was savoring like a fine steak. She could see Rick’s half-gloved mitts on the grab handle as she took each corner like it owed her money.
“Ain’t scared are ya?” Lita teased, “You got worse than me to fight if you’re down.”
“Nah, this shit’s just habit.” came the reply. “Good to see you’re hot on left-foot braking too.”
Lita chuckled. “She just feels good to the touch, that’s all. Just like my Little Man.” She rammed the throttle down as the slender blue beauty tore up the street one last time. After a clean handbrake turn over the starting line, she shook hands with her newfound head of security.
“You guys oughta be able to get ahead of anything we put you through.” she grinned. “Especially the way you work her.”
“Whaddya mean by that?” the street-racer chuckled.
“My left paw stays on the clutch. I saw how you were taking her on your own lap and wanted to try your style. Keep it up, she hangs good with it.”
She tapped her Birks on the brake and clutch before stepping out.
“Let’s get ya back to headquarters and briefed.”
Rick gave a sharp whistle through his fingers, and his posse got into their rides once more. Two white Mustangs, a dark red AMC Javelin, and for the hot-hatch, a silver and black Honda City Turbo. Lita gave each muscle car a quick good luck kiss on the hood, but the Turbo she gave a nuzzle. Her driver, the black-furred Shane Romero, got a kick out of it.
“Whatcha dig so bad ‘bout her?” he quizzed with his gruff Bronx swagger.
“I’m a sucker for them big ol’ eyes.”
When she cocked her head to the Red Devil, his dinner-plate headlights staring back, Shane cackled like mad.
“Aight, I get it. Your prized pony ain’t a half-bad looker either.”
“Don’t forget though,” the dark punk cautioned. “It’s what’s under the hood that counts.”
“And how ya use it.” He popped off some more furious revs to Lita’s delight.
“God you’re gonna be fun to play with.”
She dove back behind the wheel of her Bug and led the quintet back to their top-secret offices the long way round.
“It’ll fuck with their projections for the places they’re scanning.” she explained over the radio. “We zig and zag while they zag and zig.”
Rick came in next. “It’ll also give y’all a chance to really stretch your legs when we break the formation. Didn’t just give ya nitro for Christmas in July. If we got anything on our little chopped-up doppler radars, I want to hear ‘em scream good and loud.”
The tan racer pulled his Camaro up alongside the Bug. The two shared an okay sign between each other as they brought the pace up.
Dear old A.C.E.S. had finally changed her evening color protocol, painting this most special night alliance-forging an eye-popping green.
“Shit,” Rick scoffed, “even the dark’s glowing in the dark.”
“I miss when she painted it magenta.” Lita sighed. “Always looked so purty, especially how Little Man looked in it.”
Her newly minted security chief got a kick out of the whole display. “You can bite my head off later, but you look too damn cute with that Bug you keep babying.”
“Ain’t no more than you do polishing that big hunka muscle.” the hippie-punk shot back. “Besides, ain’t nothing too good for my Little Man. Why you think he’s got a big ol’ V8 right up front?”
“Cuz the old ones chug like a freight train.” came Laitham’s reply. “He’s probably the most reliable Bug on the continent.”
Lita’s heavy sigh was all she could say on the subject; she didn’t like to think of the Dark Ages her Red Devil endured.
She also couldn’t afford to ignore the ones he was about to face.
Barreling towards the entourage was Mack Malten, the one-eyed mountain of a biker, rocking a chopped hog at full tilt. Behind him was his usual gaggle of miscreants, their own bikes all the colors of the rainbow. And following behind them was the last thing anyone wanted to see.
“Autocops?” Lita growled. “A-fucking-gain!? Same skunk stripes and everything? Can’t they just, I dunno, MAKE A NEW MODEL ALREADY!? You bitches have been on the fucking 5K for a goddamn decade now.”
“If she can’t fix the fro-yo machine,” Rick replied candidly, “she ain’t about to re-engineer her jackboots.”
To both hounds’ surprise, Lita would get her wish.
Rounding the corner were hovercars the width of the street, all black, with chain guns locked, loaded, and targeting everyone in sight. Lita met the sight with a deferential nod before taking to her radio.
“Y’know what? I’ll take it. Security Team: get to skedaddling! We got new toys on the block.”
The sounds of two dozen screaming tires cleared the way for the bikers as Lita ducked down the left-hand street with the Javelin and the Honda while Rick took his two Mustangs down the right. In the heat of the moment, she also noticed her sandaled left paw flat on the brake.
“Huh. Guess it is rubbing off on me.”
She was quick to pound the gas and gain distance from what was sure to be another melee of the standard divide-and-conquer strategy the autocops were built for. Only problem: neither team was being tailed by their customary clay pigeons.
“What the hell’s taking ‘em?” Lita grumbled.
Her answer came in the form of two quick bursts of red laser fire. The only things that made their way down the alleyway were huge beams that clipped the rides’ roofs and sent bikers flying through the air. Malten came barreling up behind Lita.
“AYOOO URBIE!” the gray biker hollered. “WHATCHA MAKE OF THIS SHIT?”
“NEXT TIME I’LL WISH FOR SOMETHING A LITTLE MORE RULY.” she bellowed back. “GIMME THE BRIEF AND MAKE IT SNAPPY!”
“NEW DEPLOYS FROM THE SOUTH DISTRICT. THEY BEEN STREETSWEEPIN ALL THE WAY UP. KILLING ANYTHING THAT MOVES.”
Lita paused. “Anything? Like ANYTHING anything?”
Malten racked his brain to be sure. “YUP. IF IT BLEEDS, IT LEADS.”
“She’s running a fucking pogrom, that BITCH!”
In a flash, she grabbed the radio and rang up Rick for an update. On his side of the street, him and his ‘Stangs were making the most of the streets ahead. When the precision laser fire ripped over their heads again, Rick swung a hard right down the next side street. The black autocop’s round made a perfect 90-degree angle over head.
“Lita!” the tan racer hollered. “They’re heat-seekers running on the grid. Ain’t no round gonna naturally hit at a right angle.”
“Good to know, but I don’t know what to do about it yet!” Lita answered back. “Keep bobbing and weaving, B Team.”
“Why are we B–”
“CUZ I’M THE A#1 BITCH OF THIS OPERATION.”
Rick shrugged and hung up the radio between shifts. “Fair enough.”
“Shit it’s good to be a boss sometimes.” she chuckled. It was the levity that was going to keep her sane given how advanced these gargantuan machines were. They didn’t even seem like city-ready craft.
They seemed like war machines.
The red-eyed hippie held onto that thought as she led her troop as far from the midnight parade rolling through the town. She took every corner like the hell on wheels she knew her Little Man could be, the red Bug drifting through with the rest in tow. But just as she thought they were safe, a bolt of laser fire ripped along those bloodlines buried deep in the A.C.E.S. network. They were perfect in every single way, except for something.
“How the hell is an energy weapon heat-seeking?” Lita thought aloud. “There’s nothing on-board to guide it. And if it’s following the streets, then what’s it latching onto to try and tan our hides?”
She kept running the questions through her mind until the black wolf Shane came up with something that made too much damn sense.
“Ayo, Avery, did you remember to kill your chip?”
Avery was the white wolf in the AMC. And when he answered in the negative, the first thing out of Lita’s lips was “HOLLUP, EVERYONE PULL OVER.”
A few weeks back, Professor Smith and Lita were able to create a mini-EMP device to knock out the microchip in the back of everyone’s neck. No tethering to the A.C.E.S. network, no jacking into modules. No remote kill-switches that could drop a hound on a dime. She was going to do the background checks when they got back to base, but time was of the essence.
All three cars and all dozen or so of her bikers screeched into an alleyway. Lita leapt out with a flip-phone and bolted for the Javelin.
“You trust me, right?”
The wild-eyed, spiky haired bitch didn’t exactly inspire courage, but Avery dabbed her up the second he saw the phone.
“You guys got a way to EMP these without, y’know?” The stout white driver made a slashing motion across his throat.
“We done our tests,” she panted furiously, “but I got to get the combo right. Gimme your ID number, to the letter.”
Avery rattled off each number and letter, 20 all-told, just as the whine of the black autocop’s cannons revved up. Feverishly, Lita pulled the cord from the device and without a second thought plunged it into the back of Avery’s neck. The driver winced, but nodded.
When she finally hit dial, Avery’s grip on the wheel tightened, then released.
“You still wit me bud?” Lita asked.
He stood statuesque for a time too long to be good, but with a twitch of his head and a heavy sigh of relief, the procedure worked.
“Thank fuck you did that, all that adware in the background finally cleared up.”
She kissed the driver dead on the cheek and dove head-first back into her Bug. The laser fire shot straight down the street, past the group, and into nothingness.
“YEEEHAAAAA!” she whooped. “FUCK YOU PIGS!”
Her victory was short-lived when the second realization dawned on her.
“How the fuck am I gonna get back to Rick and the crew?”
She looked to the pack behind her and then to the road ahead.
“Who’s got the biggest guns and the biggest balls?” she hollered.
Mack gave her a smoldering look with his lone-eye.
“NOT LIKE THAT. Though you can come too.”
She wound up with five volunteers, Shane and his spry Honda included.
“I want a good clean distraction so I can bolt over and make it to Rick.”
Mack and his quartet gave a nod and sped off, guns snapped into their handlebar holsters and ready to fire on the autocops. Shane revved up his engine and peeled away towards the automated entourage. Together, with squealing rubber and a hailstorm of Technicolor lead, Lita revved up her Bug and bolted down after them.
It took five lefts and five rights before she was back at the intersection, the city a blur of green, red and blue. The blue came not from the night, but from the electric bonfire built up as autocop after autocop crashed into one another. Malten and his boys bobbed and weaved while the black wolf in the hot-hatch two sizes too small for him drew the laser fire he knew would never hit him, shot after shot flying into the ether overhead.
Unfortunately, the black autocop doing the firing barreled through its dead pawns and lumbered towards Shane and boxy Honda.
Right into Lita’s path.
“Oh you sonofabitch, making me do this after I done fixed the chassis!”
She slammed the clutch and flipped a switch beneath the radio. In seconds, the Red Devil dropped to the asphalt, wheels buried in his fenders. In a shrieking, sparking fury, Lita furiously screaming “I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry” over and over to her Little Man, the Bug cleared the bottom of the black autocop by an inch.
One flipped switch and a clutch pop later, he was back to his normal height.
“Oh honey you getting the GOOD THC in that engine oil tonight.”
Without a second to lose, she hopped on the radio.
“Rick, it’s Lita, where you at?”
“I can hear that peach of a V8.” came his sharp, snappy tenor. “You two rights and two lefts away.”
“Do any of ya not have your mainframe chips already fried?”
“Manny didn’t,” he sighed. “but he’s dead. One of the shots finally hit us. Took Mustang #1 out in a single blow.”
“FUCK!” Lita bellowed. “Anyone else?”
“Yeah. Me.”
A chill ran down the punk’s spine. “Then you better keep working them boots like a bastard, cuz I’m coming to fix that real quick.”
True to his word, when she took her second left, there was that beautiful blue Camaro, and with another rebel yell, she hustled everyone into the alleyway and leapt out for Rick.
“You trust me?” she asked, flip-phone in hand.
“You the A#1 Bitch.” he smirked. “What you need?”
“ID number and stat. They’re winding up for another round.”
He rattled off the numbers as quickly as he could, Lita dialing them one by one. She could hear the whining pitch reach its crest as she finished the last digit. Out came the chord, and with one last nod, she shoved it into his neck one more time.
The chain-gun fired. And Lita made her call.
“Don’t you fucking–”
BOOOOOOOM!
You could’ve heard a pin drop in that alleyway. Followed by the heaviest sigh of relief Lita ever let out in her life. Rick was still together, all in one piece. The laser blew the back of the alleyway wall out.
“You lucky sumbitch.” she beamed, hugging the driver tight.
“Bit much for the first date.” he teased. “ANYONE ELSE NEED THIS?”
The bikers shook their head and the driver of Mustang #2, a rather reserved red wolf with piercing jade eyes, shook his the same.
“I’m sorry ‘bout Manny though.”
Rick nodded solemnly. “Let’s do him a solid and blow those fuckers apart.”
They shook on it and rejoined the team. At least they would have, had the autocop pileup not reached biblical proportions. Carnage that matched the Goliaths incinerating them beneath their hover-engines. On the other side of the intersection stood Avery and the rest of Malten’s gang, waiting for their prime opportunity to nail these guys on Lita’s orders.
“BOYS.” she bellowed over the radio. “THEY MIGHT BE NICE AND PLUMP, BUT THEY SHO’ COOK GOOD LIKE ANY OTHER BACON. GET ‘IM IN THE ENGINES!”
A volcanic eruption of red lead and electricity pummeled the massive array of six engines on the leviathan hovercraft. It was damn-near deafening, but once Lita’s silver Wildey came out to play, she couldn’t care less. With the whole team laying into it, it was only a matter of time. A fate sealed by two massive shots to the chain-guns from dead-ahead.
It was Shane, standing twice as tall as the hatchback he drove, wielding an ungodly rocket-launcher. The black autocop came crashing down into the streets in a mighty cloud of concrete dust, and the black smoke of the silver autocops beneath it.
When Lita peered out from behind her corner, she couldn’t believe it.
“Where the FUCK do you keep that in there? It’s the length of the damn car!?”
“One,” the darksome driver began. “It’s collapsible. Two: Avery keeps it in his trunk for me so I don’t gotta put it back together.”
With two big thumbs up from the head honcho, Lita gave everyone their routes to the Creed’s HQ and rendezvoused back there. First order of business was whipping up a report to send General Knox, telling all about this advancement in automated weaponry. She put one of the more literate bikers and the assignment before holding council with her new security team. After giving the brief to the four remaining members, she spared a few words for one who didn’t make it.
“I ain’t gonna soapbox on him.” the hippie-punk sighed. “I just want y’all to know that every win we make is gonna be a win for that fella out there. Everything we take back is a win for every last fucking soul they done sucked out this city. Y’all got it?”
“Got it,” came the team’s reply in unison.
“Good, ‘cuz fuck me, I need a smoke. Anyone else want a toke?”
For one night only, the meeting room with its tremendous round table became the largest smoking lounge on the east side of Haven. A pleasant cocktail of tobacco and hash that smoothed everyone over, and got them ready for their next round in the ring against their digital bitch.