––––––––
“Dude,” said Larry. “I think Jeff must have roofied my Budweiser again.”
“Sorry to harsh your realm, or whatever you grungies say, but this is really happening,” I said.
What was happening was that a 30 foot long allosaurus wearing a monocle was eyeing Hastings the way a fat kid eyes a French fry. The allosaur had just explained to Hastings that death was most definitely on the evening’s agenda. To the credit of his sky-blue uniform, Hastings didn’t miss a beat in chiming in with his own agenda.
“Who are you?” said Hastings. “What are you doing here, and what did you put in those tacos?”
The allosaur let loose one of those maniacal laughs villains stay up late at night practicing. At least, judging from its body language, that’s what I assume the allosaur’s unholy vocalization was. It actually sounded more like a forklift dropping a stack of drywall in the middle of the aisle at Home Depot, but the effect was chilling.
Larry and I began a slow creep along the side of the taco stand, trying to keep as much of it between us and the dinosaur as possible.
“What makes you think I will tell you anything, little man,” said the allosaur.
“It’s not necessary, I’ll admit,” said Hastings. “I’d at least like to have a name to put on the report I’ll have to file when I vaporize you.”
As the giant, impossible dinosaur laughed again, I felt a new found appreciation for Hastings’ giant, impossible cojones. How he was able to talk procedure while he was in the very real position of potentially being bitten in half I’ll never know. Somewhere beyond the fight or flight instinct is the place where Hastings lives.
Larry and I, on the other hand, were decidedly on the same track of the instinct. We had almost backed our way around to the other side of the taco cart when I felt a hand on my shoulder.
“Where do you pendejos think you’re going?”
It was the cook. He was pointing something toward us, perhaps a weapon. In the dark it was hard to see what, but given the situation, everything seemed menacing.
“Just looking for a cash machine,” I stalled.
The cook laughed. A human laugh. The kind of laugh that comes from an uncle who has once again successfully executed the pull my finger gag.
“Homeboy already paid,” he said, gesturing toward Larry. “Just didn’t want you taking off without su comida.”
“Right,” said Larry. My tacos.”
The object in the cook’s hands turned out to be a paper bag soaked with the tell-tale grease spots of a legitimate taco joint.
“Just a minute,” I said, snatching the bag from the cook. “What do you see going on over there with my friend in blue?”
“The health inspector?” said the cook. “He’s talking with my boss, Jorge-George.”
“And Jorge-George is...” I lead.
“A pinche güero who never comes to this part of town at night.”
“Are you telling me you don’t see the freaking dinosaur?” said Larry.
“Which party did you just come from?” he said. “All I see’s a couple cabrónes fighting over how hot I keep my grill.”
There was obviously some sort of perception filter at work. But which way was it filtering? I took out my watch, flipped up the crystal, and viewed the dinosaur through it. It was a mother verbing dinosaur, all right.
The allosaur was making even more thunderous laughing sounds as Hastings pulled out his citation book. It occurred to me that, like the cook, Hastings couldn’t see through the filter either. And I was hit by the sudden ethical dilemma of whether I should help out an unwitting timecop. Nine times out of ten I’d be totally willing to let Hastings twist, but this time he was at a mortal disadvantage. I had a clean shot at running hell for leather to the nearest steel reinforced doorway, but I just couldn’t do it. The opportunity to set Hastings up to owe me big time was just too great.
“All right, Larry,” I said. “We need to come up with a distraction.”
“Look,” he said, “I don’t even know that guy, but I did see Jurassic Park. If there’s one thing I learned, it’s that those things travel in packs.”
“You’re one thousand percent wrong,” I said, easing my way toward a likely looking Suzuki Samurai on the street at the edge of the lot. “This is an allosaurus. The pack hunters in JP were velociraptors.”
Somewhere in the night rang the sound of boxcars coupling, or was it other allosaurs laughing? I hated to admit that Larry could be right.
I pulled a screwdriver, a hammer, and vice grips from the inner pocket of my coat. Yes, a trench coat. I like to carry a lot of tools.
“Here,” I said to Larry, handing him the vice grips. “Let’s do this.”
“Do what?” said Larry.
“We’re stealing a car,” I said as I picked up the pace and headed toward the Suzuki.
“Okay,” he said, matching my pace, and hopping into the ridiculously tiny sport vehicle alongside me. “But if we get pulled over, I’m just a hitchhiker. You don’t know me.”
“I don’t know you,” I said as I popped the screwdriver into the ignition and grabbed the vice grips from Larry. A little artfully applied leverage on the steering column, and the engine turned over on the first try.
Some more applied leverage, and the stolen micro-truck tore up over the curb and into the parking lot. I gunned it toward Hastings and the dinosaur.
“Wrong way, dude!” said Larry.
“We’re going for broke,” I said. “If things get bad, just eat one of your tacos.”
“I lost my appetite.”
We were heading straight for Jorge-George, the allosaurus, or whoever he really was. I wasn’t entirely sure the Suzuki would even put a dent in him. After a moment’s reflection on the vehicle’s super light build, I was absolutely sure I wouldn’t put a dent in Jorge-George. I cut the wheel and remembered why you don’t cut the wheel on a Suzuki Samurai.
We must have rolled about five times before our little steel death crate skidded to an upside-down stop in front of Hastings.
“Holy spit!” he ejaculated. “Where did that dinosaur come from?”
Hastings is the kind of guy who, when he shouts something, it really is best described by the old-fashioned sense of the word ‘ejaculate.’ Also, he’s pretty much a prick. Apparently our improvised car wreck had done the trick of shaking him out of the effects of the perception filter.
The dinosaur kicked the hood of the Suzuki and sent us for another quarter turn.
“I hope you can appreciate the seriousness of your position now, Hastings,” said the allosaur.
“My position is always serious, Mr. Jorge-George, if that’s even your real name,” said Hastings. “You are in major violation of all regulations pertaining to cross-time transit of animal protein for comestible purposes. I would like to see your permits.”
“And I,” said Jorge-George, “would like to bite your head off.”
The allosaur now had one foot on the front bumper of the Suzuki and was rocking it ever so slightly.
Larry and I swayed, still belted into the little death trap. As my senses came to me, I could hear a quick drip, drip, drip and smell the sickly sweet odor of spilled gasoline.
“This really, really, sucks a big one,” whispered Larry.
“You still got those tacos?” I asked.
“How can you think of eating at a time like this?”
The allosaur took a step toward Hastings. The creature was dragging his left foot and limping tenderly. The Suzuki must have done some damage after all.
“This is bigger than you, Hastings,” said the allosaur. “It’s bigger than the Cross-Time Coordinating Agency, and it’s bigger than your arbitrary, human Laws of Time.”
“Not all of them are arbitrary,” said Hastings. I could see him patting his unitard looking for something. He was probably searching for his method trigger. He was out of his depth and needed to flash back to CTCAHQ. Losing track of his time travel device was very un-Hastings-like.
“We’ve got to get out of this micro-truck,” I said to Larry. “It’s leaking gas like a busted-up micro-truck.”
“Right,” said Larry, popping the seatbelt latch, tumbling onto his head and into the parking lot.
I braced myself with my arm, and I still had a hell of a time getting out without pressing my face directly into the asphalt. It was not a glorious evening. I grabbed the bag of tacos and slithered out of the wreckage in the growing pool of gasoline.
The allosaur, Jorge-George, was backing Hastings up against the wall.
Hastings was sweating through his unitard.
I wished I’d had a camera. What I did have was a hammer. At twenty yards it’s not too hard to huck a hammer at a dinosaur and hit him. With a little bit of finesse you can huck it right at his injured left leg. With a lot of finesse, I discovered, you can piss the dinosaur off enough that it starts chasing you instead of the guy he’s got backed up against a taco cart.
“That’s right, you anachronistic son of a bitch! Come and get me!”
What was I saying? In retrospect, I chalk it up to the gas fumes. I was running again, and Larry was running with me. I suppose Larry wasn’t as dumb as I’d given him credit for. Of course, how smart do you need to be to run away from a dinosaur?
We’d gotten halfway to the edge of the parking lot when Jorge-George stopped chasing us, and turned back to Hastings. Hastings was still frantically searching for his method.
“Do you think he’s looking for this?” Larry asked. He held up a metal cylinder about the size of a small flashlight. It was lined with several rows of tiny buttons and flashing LEDs.
“That’s totally what he’s looking for,” I said.
“I boosted it from him on the walk over,” said Larry. “It looked like something that would be cool to take to Laser Floyd.”
“Larry,” I said, “on any other day I’d buy you a drink for pulling a stunt like that. But, today, Hastings is totally screwed.”
Jorge-George was now positioned directly over the desperate Hastings, looking very much like he was intending to literally screw the timecop before eating him.
“I’m not sure I can watch this.”
The dinosaur’s jaw hinged open and moved in towards Hastings. Hastings didn’t scream or flinch, but turned to look directly into the gaping maw of the carnivore.
Just then, the Suzuki’s gas tank finally exploded. The concussion from the blast was enough to send the dinosaur jerking out of his crouch. Larry saw the opportunity and took it.
“Hastings!” he shouted as he threw the metal cylinder, the trigger to Hastings’ method, his time machine, if you will. We all watched as the cylinder followed Newton’s laws along a very hopeful looking arc. However, just as it’s easy to throw a hammer at a dinosaur and hit your target, it proved very difficult to do the same with Hastings’ trigger. It fell five feet short, and on the wrong side of Jorge-George.
Another horrific dinosaur laugh, like stacks of metal filing cabinets tumbling down the Pyramids of Giza, sounded as Jorge-George moved in for the kill.