They couldn't see where they were going.

No sooner had he realized their situation when the car veered to the right and off the highway. It sailed over a drop. Tony felt weightless for a split "oh f.u.c.k me" second. The car hit the ground hard, and Tony felt his teeth mash together. His head slammed against the ceiling. Bodies crashed into and landed on him. Hands of the headless grabbed and released him. He slapped the hands away. More blood blinded his vision. Death was yelling, "f.u.c.kohf.u.c.kohf.u.c.kohf.u.c.kOHFU--"

And then the car was rolling.

Tony heard an explosion.

And for the second time in as many days, a first for Tony, he was unconscious again.

Chapter 45.

When Tony woke up, the first thing he realized was the amount of blood covering his face and in his eyes. Through his clogged vision, he blinked and squinted and saw the headless bodies of his captors slumped over at interesting angles. He moved an arm and wiped their gore out of his eyes as best as he could. He wanted a rag. He studied himself and groaned. He was covered in blood. He felt dizzy then, and closed his eyes, breathing through his mouth. He tasted more blood, winced, and spat it out. For a moment, Tony simply lay there underneath the bodies and limbs of the two men in the back seat with him. He realized being in the back seat had saved him. He had wound up on the floor, wedged in firmly between the seats. Feeling better, he opened his eyes again and moved his arms. Everything worked for him, and he untangled himself from the limbs and corpses, grunting in loud disgust. f.u.c.k, there was so much blood. How many litres were there in a human body? Eleven? It did not occur to him just how much eleven litres was until it was all over the place. Then multiply it by four. His clothes were saturated with it, dripping and sticky. He wiped his face again, leaving wide raspberry smears across his cheeks. A panic was building up inside of him, and he arched his back. He saw how the roof of the car had been splashed-sprayed with blood. Tony heaved bodies off himself. He reached over one and felt for the door handle. It would not budge. He studied the shattered window, noting the shards of gla.s.s lining the bottom where the pane rose and fell as needed. Tony put his elbow over the thick gla.s.s and wormed his way out of the car. He flopped his upper body onto the snowy ground and pulled his legs out behind him, landing on his chest and rolling over onto his back. The snow was deep and thick, and felt absolutely wonderful. The cold drove the fog of the crash out of Tony's brain He just lay there, gulping in mouthfuls of clean northern air. He drew it down through his nose, becoming instantly high from its purity. Or perhaps it was just the relief of being free of the car and the dead meat within. Whatever it was, Tony did not care. He laid there, closed his eyes and wished that when he died, he could be buried in a snow drift.

The cold began to work into his bones, until the blood coating him became thick. He opened his eyes and got to his elbows. He looked at the wreck of the car. Getting to his feet with loud grunts and curses, he staggered to the window. Tony peered inside and set his jaw against the sight and smells of the corpses inside. The four headless corpses.

Where was Frank?

Tony noticed the windshield. It was shattered, blown outward by something leaving the car. He stood up and took in the huge tree that the car had wrapped its right side around, crunching its front and engine block with quiet indifference.

"Oh, s.h.i.t," Tony murmured to himself. He staggered through the deep snow, pushing through thick spruce boughs covered in white, and headed behind the tree and beyond.

He spotted Death sprawled out and motionless at the base of a tree. Tony went to him, swearing all the way. He could see the man's right leg twisted out at a ninety degree angle and figured it for broken. Frank's face was also cut up and bruised, his flesh whipped by stiff boughs as he had flown through them. Blood seeped from a deep cut in his scalp.

"Holy s.h.i.t," Tony muttered, standing over the still form. Death looked banged up pretty bad but, seeing as he went through a windshield, Tony supposed it could have been a lot worse. Death had flown from the car to come to rest some twenty feet away. Tony dropped to his knees and patted Death's cheek. No response. He felt for a pulse. There was none, but what did that mean? Was Death really alive anyway? He slapped him again, harder this time. No, Death was mortal, Tony thought. He p.i.s.sed out enough beer to prove it.

Then, Death's eyelids fluttered, and black eyes calmly looked up at Tony. The Mundane sighed.

Death screamed.

The sound froze Tony to the spot. Death screamed out again, ending in a deep throat sound of agony. He bared white teeth and hissed out steam on the winter air.

"Jesus Christ!" Death barked and looked down at his leg. What he saw made him roll his head on his shoulders in exasperated agony. "Christ on a monkey stick! My leg! My legs!" He reached for them and stopped just before making contact. Setting his jaw, he grabbed Tony instead and hauled his face in close.

"Knock me out!" Death commanded.

"Wha?" Tony sputtered, confusion slackening his features.

"I said knock me out!! Oh, JESUS H. CHRIST!" Death released him and fell back on the snow. He bared his teeth at the pain he was experiencing. This was not part of his plan.

"Listen to me," Death hissed through a set jaw. "If you don't knock me out right now, the meanest G.o.dd.a.m.nedest b.a.s.t.a.r.d in all of existence is going to" Death winced. The pain he felt took his breath away. He crunched his eyes together and got his breath under control. "he'll come right here."

"Wha?" Tony could only say stupidly.

Death looked him straight in the eye. "Do it."

Not understanding why, Tony made a fist and, shaking his head, sent it across the side of Death's head.

It did not knock him out.

"SWEET f.u.c.k ALMIGHTY!" Death wailed in Tony's face. "I said knock me out!"

Blinking, Tony reared back and struck again, rocking Death's head to the side.

Death's face rolled back to face him.

"You f.u.c.king moron!"

Tony's brow knotted up in annoyance. He hit him again. Harder.

Death only grunted, still conscious, and gave him a gla.s.sy-eyed glare, "Y'punch like a gay leprechaun. No f.u.c.king wonder your Ma is in the hospital! Now hi"

At the mention of his mother Tony fired his fist out, twisting it for extra force, and slammed it square on Death's chin. The sudden force snapped Death's head back, his spinal cord cracking like a whip, and he went limp.

Silence enveloped Tony. He stared down at the unconscious mess that was Death, and gauzy snowflakes began to fall.

Chapter 46.

In another part of the country, on a straight strip of the 401 of the TCH, the force known as Pain tensed up, hunched over and put both of his hands on the dashboard as if bracing for impact. His eyes narrowed to slits as if he had heard something, but wasn't quite sure. He c.o.c.ked his head, straining to get a whiff of the vibe that had totally and unexpectedly caught his attention. It was a very special vibe, one that Pain had not felt in ages. Like an ancient, evil spider hanging in a web that spanned places even it had forgotten about, it waited for that one gossamer strand to vibrate again, to tell it exactly where its stricken prey lay.

But it did not. Pain grunted like a Cro-Magnon brute, his brow furrowing as he willed for that single delicious tingle he felt so abruptly. He bared his teeth, impressive incisors flashing, as hope began to give way to b.e.s.t.i.a.l anger. Fingers began digging into the dashboard of the car, actually cracking it, displaying a strength the Stickman did not want to believe possible.

Instead, seeing an opportunity and recognizing it as such, he decided right then to rid himself of a pa.s.senger he had come to hate and fear.

Swinging with every ounce of might he could muster, Stickman swung his fist right into the exposed nose of Pain.

The nose exploded in a flash of blood and cartilage. Stickman felt the pebble-like grind of shattered bone and gristle under his fist. He could not bring his hand away fast enough as Pain's blood gushed over his fist. Stickman felt a very real chill electrify his spine and senses. Pain's blood was as black and crude as raw viscous oil. The sight of Pain's blood spraying from the wreck of his nose paralyzed the Stickman.

But only for a second.

"Bludovab.i.t.c.h!" Stickman swore and ploughed the edge of his fist into Pain's face, again. And again. He grabbed Pain's head and rammed it forward, bouncing it off the dashboard Stickman pressed his advantage. He kept his left hand on the wheel and reached with his right across Pain's body. He grabbed for the door release. The car swerved, and Stickman had to jerk the wheel to keep himself on his side of the road. His eyes flicked from the road to the door handle to the road, again.

Pain grabbed his wrist.

Screaming, Stickman yanked back. The door popped opened a fraction. Pain was regaining his senses, his eyes focused on Stickman. Pain smiled, showing teeth smeared in foamy black.

Stickman freaked.

His right fist flew into Pain's face again and again. He got his right leg up and drove it into the hip of Pain, shoving the thing, for this was no true man, up against the door and forcing it open. Pain grabbed for the head rest of his seat, eyes glazed from the force of Stickman's attack.

Then, Stick slammed on the breaks.

The result was not as spectacular as hoped. The car was speeding along at roughly ninety kilometres an hour on a deserted highway. When Stickman hit the brakes, the car spun around twice before coming to a halt. Stickman held onto the wheel with both hands, his upper body wedged between the dash and the windshield. Pain crashed up against the door and dash. His shoulder pressed into the hard plastic to a point where any second Stickman expected to hear something crack. But he wasn't going to wait for that. Adrenalin shooting through him and his foot-eye coordination coming together as only months of hard training could develop, Stickman contorted himself in the driver's seat until both feet were aimed at Pain's torso. Then, he pistoned his legs out.

Pain flew from the car like a heavy bag of unwanted pig flesh. He landed hard on his side and rolled onto his stomach, a trail of black blood marking his pa.s.sage. Stickman couldn't give a rat's a.s.s if the dude was dead or alive. He frantically reached across and groped for the door. He slammed it hard enough to make the car shake on its cha.s.sis. He crashed back into the driver's seat, put the car in gear, and stomped on the accelerator. The tires screeched and the car shot forward like an out-of-shape missile. Stickman drove the vehicle at arm's length like a stock-car racer making up for lost time. He grinned wickedly. He had tossed the motherf.u.c.ker out the door! Out on his a.s.s! Stickman howled and glanced into the rear-view mirror as if expecting to see a rising shadow on the receding horizon.

Then, his smile faltered.

Stick realized he was driving in the wrong direction, back towards Nova Scotia.

"Well, f.u.c.k me!" the Stickman swore as he quickly dropped his speed and did a two move turn around, working the gears of the car like a professional about to head into a killer turn. The scene ahead of him was grey and overcast, with snow heaped on the sides of the black strip of road. It looked like a wet spine running up between two huge, white shoulders, towards a place where a head should be, but wasn't.

And on the right side of the road, just getting to his knees, was the Stickman's f.u.c.king bane.

Baring his teeth, Stickman pushed down on the gas. The car sped up, heading straight for the figure now standing up. Stickman hissed an oath. The f.u.c.ker wasn't moving anywhere, wasn't even attempting to get out of the way. The car shot forward, and for the briefest of seconds, the Stickman knew what the b.a.s.t.a.r.d was going to try to do, and could not believe it.

Pain saw the car come straight at him. Fury and agony buzzed through his person, making him feel more alive than any million people escaping certain death. A four-wheeled dumpster of a car rushed at him. Pain could see the Mundane behind the steering wheel of the sunbird, hunched over and bracing for the impact that was to come. Pain hunched over and spread his hands, palms up, his knees bent. He smiled, blackness dripping.

The Stickman saw the man tense up. He could not believe that he was actually going to attempt to jump the car.

Then, Stickman remembered who his former pa.s.senger was.

At the last possible moment, Stickman cut the steering wheel to the left, clipping the killer pedestrian with the side of his car and sending him over the hood. A hand slapped down on the windshield, but the man kept on flying, failing to secure a grip. Stickman's sunbird did a fishtail, and he struggled to contain it. He hit the brakes and spun around, looping again on the highway. He expected any minute for the car to go off the road.

But it didn't.

Instead, he came to a halt, realized he was pointed in the direction he wanted to go, and urgently looked in his rear-view mirror and then over his shoulder.

Pain was down again, a black lump on a shoulder of white.

Even though he wanted nothing better than to turn back and drive over the form to ensure the man was road kill, the Stickman did perhaps one of the smartest things he would ever do in his life.

He drove on, leaving the p.r.o.ne figure behind and watching it wink out of existence. He fought down his fear and began to relax after a few moments, realizing that he was free of the thing, and he had left him in the middle of G.o.d knows where, in the death throes of a contrary winter. The thought put a satisfied smirk on his face. And f.u.c.k Jazz, too, for whatever unknown reasons the oath popped into his head. Now, it was on with his mission.

A kilometre behind the Stickman and still lying on his back, Pain petulantly pursed his lips and gazed up at the overcast sky. The sunbird's receding roar grew distant and disappeared. All was quiet around him except for the dreary wails of a dying winter.

Pain sighed.

That didn't go quite the way he wanted.

Chapter 47.

In another part of the country, a black Toyota Celica hummed along Highway 401, heading west. From the air, it looked like a glistening, hard-sh.e.l.l bug zipping along a frosted strip of grey. It looked peaceful.

It was anything but inside the vehicle.

Sitting like a king in the pa.s.senger seat, Fear stared ahead at the snow covered morning and swore. This was taking forever. He should have called Time a while back, but he was enjoying doing what he did best with the two cattle with him. Idly, he fished out his cell and dialled a number, not paying any heed to the two terrified Mundanes.

It took Danny everything he could to maintain control of the car with both hands on the wheel when Fear reached in his coat and brought out the phone. That simple movement alone almost made the legendary bouncer defecate himself in pure panic. He did not know who this man was, or what he wanted, except that his orders were brief after both Crew and he had been subdued.

"Get in the car," and "Drive."

Those five words had carried such a wave of fear that both the bouncer and the hit man were reduced to almost senselessness. Danny did not look in the rear-view mirror. He did not want to. He focused on the road ahead. He knew Crew was back there, curled up as if someone had smashed his t.e.s.t.i.c.l.es. Helpless and silent, with both eyes closed and hoping beyond hope that the fear within him would soon pa.s.s.

Crew had been like that for nearly three hours.

How much fear could a sane mind take before deep psychological damage was inflicted? Danny did not have the capacity to think about it. He felt his heart banging in his ears. He felt the rush of blood in his temples. The swell of desperate energy in his chest. He fought to contain the adrenalin coursing through his system, surging through his legs and just begging him to bolt. Just drive the car off the road, flip the f.u.c.ker and f.u.c.king jet to higher ground. He breathed in deeply, trying desperately to control his fear and just barely hanging on.

"It's me," the man on his left said into the phone. Those words made Danny flinch as if he were about to be hit. In the back seat, Crew drew himself in even further like a human armadillo.

Fear noticed the jerk of his driver's head and gave him such a look of menace that the Mundane actually whimpered and hunkered down over the steering wheel.

"How are you doing?" Time asked on the other end of the connection.

"We're on our way," Fear informed him with a scowl. He had no patience with Time's pleasantries. The Ent.i.ty acted as if he were in an amus.e.m.e.nt park with free access to all the rides. His brightness made Fear want to tell him off. They were at war here.

"I need a boost," Fear said curtly.

"Now?"

Fear sighed heavily.

Sensing the denseness of his remark, Time quickly sought to correct himself. "Yes, yes, of course. Right now. Get them ready. You know where you're going?"

Fear hung up. Of course, he f.u.c.king knew where he was going. After this was all over, he and Time and the b.i.t.c.h called Lucy were going to have a not too pleasant sit down. He stewed in annoyance at the thought of her letting Tony the Tool actually eject him from what he still considered to be his ride. Although, all things aside and flicking a quick glance at the sleek interior of the Celica, this was much better.

Still, it was the principle of the matter.

She made him lose control of a Mundane. He absolutely hated anyone who did that.

He sat and chewed on thoughts of revenge. Then, he remembered Time's words regarding the zombies in the car with him. To get them ready.

Fear's head tilted to the side. It was bad day to be a Mundane. If these pus-heads were of any worth at all, they would make it. If not, well, Fate would be another b.i.t.c.h Fear was going to have a chat with. All considered, there were going to be a couple of Ent.i.ties walking around with some pretty sore t.i.ts after he was through with them.

Fear stabbed his cell phone back into his coat. He yanked his seatbelt down and over his shoulder, wishing it was someone's tongue.