How many bullets are in your gun?
All published excerpts from Apostate: Life after Death in Exile:
From Part 1 Episode 3: How many bullets are in your gun?
I drew back and hit the man as hard as I could in the side of his head with both fists. At this point, I did not care that he had recently been in an accident, and I did not care that he might be injured or confused or dazed. I only cared that he was biting my wife’s arm. The blow opened a gash under the man’s eye and caused him to loosen his grip on Janice. At that point, she was able to jerk her arm out of his mouth, tearing some of the skin as she pulled it out. I immediately wrapped one arm around her, and half dragged, half carried her across the road and up the driveway toward the farmhouse and away from the maniac driver as quickly as possible.
I assumed that he was following us, but I did not look back or stop until I reached the front porch. I finally turned around when I heard a car approach then slow as it reached our driveway. I could see that the driver of the wrecked sedan had walked about halfway up the driveway behind us, as a sheriff’s car pulled in behind him. The deputy opened the door, stepped out of the car, and adjusted his hat and sunglasses.
“Who was driving that car?” the deputy asked pointing back to the accident scene across the road.
The driver slowed his pace even more and started turning toward the deputy. I helped Janice sit down on the front porch and, for the first time, noticed that she had been crying into my shoulder. She was still rubbing her bleeding arm and sobbing slightly when I kissed her forehead softly and whispered, “I’ll be right back.” I brushed her hair out of her face before I turned away.
By the time I started walking toward the deputy, the driver had reached the front of the patrol car. “He was driving,” I said, “and I think there’s something wrong with him. He bit my wife’s arm.”
The man kept walking toward the officer, without slowing or speaking. “Stop right there,” the deputy warned without effect. He kept shuffling methodically toward the deputy without response. The officer placed his hand on his club and again ordered the driver to stop. When the driver’s arm jerked up suddenly to grab the deputy’s shoulder, the officer jabbed the club into his side. The blow only caused the driver to spin into the deputy. His head flailed forward, and he bit down into the officer’s shoulder through his uniform shirt. I could hear the man gurgling again as the deputy cried out in pain, dropped his club, and reached for his gun.
In one swift movement, the officer unholstered his gun, swung it through the air, and struck the driver in the side of the head with the grip. When the driver released his bite slightly, the deputy pulled away from him and took a few steps up the driveway with his back toward me and his gun aimed at the man. The driver staggered a little, before turning back toward the deputy.
Even from this distance, I could see that the deputy’s wound was much worse than Janice’s. Blood already streamed down his back, forming several long, dark stains on his tan uniform shirt.
“Stop!” the deputy shouted. “I will shoot you.”
It had all happened so fast that I realized I was frozen in my tracks, half way between the commotion in the driveway and Janice crying on the porch behind me. The drawn gun caused me to come back to my sense. I ran back to Janice and covered her body as much as possible with mine, all the while trying to keep an eye on the commotion below.
I heard one shot ring out, and looked back in time to see the driver jerk, then continue his slow walk toward the deputy. Dark blood was oozing out of the man’s three wounds now: the one under his eye where I hit him, the one under his ear where the deputy hit him, and the one in his chest where he had been shot. The officer fired three more times in the driver’s midsection in quick succession, each one causing the man to shudder, but barely slowing his approach. He continued his shuffle, half walking, half falling toward the officer.
Finally, when the driver was almost at point blank range, the deputy shot into the center of his forehead, causing the back of his head to explode covering the driveway and deputy’s car with blood, bone, and brain matter. The driver stood straight up for a moment, then plummeted backwards, landing on the concrete with a thud.
The deputy took two steps back, and sat down hard, his gun still pointing in the direction of the fallen man.
“Are you okay?” I asked the sheriff’s deputy from the porch. He sat there for a moment, then turned toward me, visibly shaking.
He looked back toward us and nodded. His hat and sunglasses were gone, lost in the scuffle with the driver, and his shoulder was still bleeding from the bite. He seemed to stare at the gun in his hand. It was shaking visibly. Slowly, he reached up with his other arm, and with both hands working together he managed to holster his weapon.
Reaching up for the handset of his radio, He called for additional help using codes that I didn’t recognize. The air was still filled with the stench of gunpowder and death. Just then we heard the sirens of an ambulance approaching.
All published excerpts from Apostate: Life after Death in Exile:
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