Sprung
So, after pottering about the flat for half an hour I start to wonder how my folks are… which prompts me to question my own moral integrity when I realise that this is the first time since the Big Sleep began that I have thought about my family. “Your own flesh and blood” as my dad would often say.
My parents and younger sister live on the other side of the city; about forty-five minutes drive from here. However, considering just about every road is dotted with stationary traffic, it could be difficult to drive there, if not impossible.
The beautiful thing is I sold my car and bought a scooter when I moved to the funky-groovy inner suburbs.
But I couldn’t just have any scooter. No, I had to have The Coolest scooter, a Gilera Nexus 500 maxi-scooter, a cross between a scooter and a road bike. And then, not being content with that, I had it “enhanced” by my good Italian friend Sergio who, as a teenager back in the ‘70’s, lived in Naples and taught himself the art of transforming everyday scooters into potent beasts of terror.
Living in the shadow of Mount Vesuvius his mantra was, “When the second Pompeii comes I want something small and fast to get me the hell outta there”. But I have my suspicions that the need for a fast vehicle had little to do with volcanoes and more to do with the Mafia. Or maybe Naples just has a large population of men named Don.
I go to the bedroom and give Shelley a kiss on the forehead and slip on my leather jacket, then go down stairs and unlock the super strength cable lock and stow it under the seat. I climb aboard and start up the Nexus, letting it purr while I don my black helmet and gloves - ‘cos when you ride a scoot this cool you’ve got to look the part… even if there isn’t anyone to see you.
This is no grumbling, growling Fatboy crying out for attention like an obese child with A.D.D. No, this is a thing of beauty, elegance and grace. More like a silky black jaguar, stealthily striding through the Amazon jungle. But stir it up and it’ll take your head off with one swipe of its powerful claws.
It is for this reason I have named her Pris, after the Nexus-6 human replicant from Blade Runner. A ‘pleasure model’, with a vicious streak.
Pris and I meld into one gleaming Man-Machine as we glide down the driveway then bank left on to the road and make our way toward the freeway, effortlessly manoeuvring through the frozen traffic.
Soon we’re on the freeway, heading west. For now the traffic is sparsely distributed and the express lane is practically devoid of vehicles altogether so I open up the throttle and let the beast off its chain. At 140km/h we weave our way between a Porsche and a Boy-racer, its overly exuberant fibreglass bumpers smashed to smithereens against the concrete divider wall. All the while Pris screams out in throes of passion.
Out of the corner of my eye I catch a glimpse of something flying in the air to my left. But then it’s gone.
Slipping by a jack-knifed truck I sense something high on my right side this time, but when I check the mirrors I see nothing.
Then all of a sudden the road in front of me begins to erupt as if tiny bombs buried in the asphalt are exploding at random.
I back off the throttle and squeeze the brake lever, just as the rear window of a car in the left lane explodes and small holes open up in its roof.
Then I see a dark object in my mirrors; it looks like a helicopter… and it’s shooting at me.
Back on the throttle again, I duck down behind the windscreen to lower the wind resistance. The road ahead is clear; the opening of the Domain tunnel is about three kays away. That’s where I need to be.
I zip by another car and switch lanes just as the lane in which I was just travelling splinters into showers of bitumen. Phew! That was close. What is the problem with these guys?
The road is starting to descend into the tunnel now, less than a kay to go. But that chopper is right on top of me. I open up the throttle all the way, Pris hits power-band and we surge forward into the tunnel with all 50 horses in full stride - I don’t know how Sergio managed to get another ten Brake-Horse-Power out of a single cylinder engine but at this moment, I’m so glad he did. As I pass under the lip of the tunnel I’m doing 180 kays an hour. Signs everywhere tell me I should be doing 80 but road laws don’t account for much right now.
“Shit it’s dark in here!” Oh, that’d be my tinted visor. I flick it up just in time to see the big lettering on the rear doors of a stationary semi-trailer: FCUK.
Somehow, thanks mostly to Pris’ excellent brakes and agility I manage to avoid becoming at one with the truck, slowing down enough to swerve into the gap between the truck in my immediate path and another in the adjacent lane. But the chopper isn’t so lucky.
It clips the top of the FCUK trailer, bounces into the ceiling of the tunnel, then cartwheels through the air and smashes into the wall. It’s at this moment I realise that my pursuer wasn’t a real helicopter at all, more of a scaled down remote control model.
I cut Pris’ engine and drop the stand. Tentatively I make my way over to the wreckage. The mini chopper is about four metres long and a metre wide… Or, I should say, was. Now it’s a ball of twisted metal and carbon-fibre. I give it a kick but thankfully there’s no reaction.
Two little stubby wings have broken off the sides of the fuselage. On each of these are mounted small calibre machine guns and two small missiles. Fortunately it never got the chance to fire the latter.
Okay. So what is a miniature armed helicopter doing chasing me up the freeway? Someone must be controlling the thing, but why try to take me out?
As I ponder this, my thoughts are interrupted by the sound of engines. Motorcycle engines. I look at Pris, it’s definitely not her, much raspier than her soft purr. Then I look up and see the silhouettes of, what appears to be, two quad-bikes manoeuvring their way down the tunnel towards me. They’re approaching from the far end and are about a hundred metres from me. I’ve still got my helmet on, which must have blocked out their noise as they first entered the tunnel.
The weird thing about these quad bikes is they have no riders. Where the rider would normally sit, there is a small turret kind of thing, housing a machine gun and a periscope arrangement with stereovision cameras.
I don’t like the looks of this. I run over to Pris, climb aboard, fire her up and kick up the stand in one smooth move. In three seconds flat I’m out of there, back in the direction of home.
As I exit the tunnel the quad-bikes are just coming past the truck that was, so nearly, my final resting place.
Pris has plenty of power to get us up the tunnel’s ramp, but those quads aren’t your typical agricultural variety either and now they’re out on clear road they really open up. And so do the machine guns.
Bat Outta Hell
Out on the open freeway again. Pris is screaming along but this time I’m heading the wrong way up the road, which provides for a very weird sensation with the cars and trucks all pointing toward me. At 180Km/h it doesn’t matter that they’re not moving, they still seem to be coming at me and a collision at this speed with a stationary vehicle will have the same result as a collision with a moving vehicle: D-E-A-T-H, DEATH!
I steal a glance at my mirrors; the quads are still in hot pursuit but I have the lead on them. They try to even up the deal by firing a non-stop volley of bullets at me but they’re terribly inaccurate when moving at this speed.
I change lanes constantly, to keep them on their toes… and off my arse, using all four lanes of the freeway, and occasionally the emergency lanes.
The Nexus 500 has big wheels for a scooter. 15-inch diameter on the front, 14-inch on the back, and they’re shod with fat rubber so there’s plenty of them on the road. Your typical scoot, other than being completely incapable of reaching half this speed, has tiny 12-inch wheels with skinny little tyres offering next to no stability over 80km/h.
The quads counter my manic lane changing by splitting up, covering two lanes apiece. I can tell whenever there’s an opening between them and me without even looking in my mirrors, simply by the crackle of gunfire. So far I’ve been incredibly lucky but I need to loose these guys real soon, before that luck runs out.
As I zip under an overpass I see my break. I’m in the left most lane, the quads are a hundred or so metres behind. I move over to the inside emergency lane, the metre high concrete carriageway separator wall flashes by seemingly inches from my kneecap. I pass a truck and immediately slam on the brakes then turn hard right.
The truck hides my course change for enough time that the quad that was on my left flies straight past without noticing me zip straight across the freeway lanes, over toward the exit ramp of the road we had just passed under.
The right side quad sees me but has to slow right down to make the sharp u-turn up the exit ramp, giving me a greater lead.
At the top of the ramp I make a right turn, leaning Pris right over, I stretch out my leg to stabilise, my boot skimming the tarmac.
I cross the freeway on the overpass, and then turn hard left down the outbound exit ramp, heading back toward the city. Halfway down the ramp there’s a break built into the concrete wall that the Water Board trucks use to access the concrete drain-way that runs beside the freeway. It angles back on to the direction of outbound traffic but from this angle I have a clean shot at it.
I’ve known about this for years, it’s clearly visible from the bike path I ride to work. There’s no gate and the concrete ramp, which runs for about fifty metres before becoming a long grassy lane, leads down to the drain-way. I zip through the opening and then apply the brakes so I don’t hit the grass too fast and lose control.
The grass lane is about three hundred metres long and has been recently mown. It’s also dry so it’s easy to ride on. I can safely travel at about 60Km/h without too much trouble. Beside the lane is a steep embankment that drops down to a putrid coloured stream that meanders through clumps of weeds and garbage.
I bump along the lane while keeping an eye out for potholes and rocks. Pris is no dirt bike; a decent jolt could do some serious damage to her suspension, leaving me on foot and out in the open.
At the end of the grass lane is a deteriorating concrete ramp that drops steeply down to the drain itself. There’s a short cobbled bluestone path that, after about ten metres, blends into the wide concrete drain-way. Apart from some debris and the occasional shopping trolley, I have a wide-open space to ride. Luckily there hasn’t been a heavy downpour for a few weeks or so or this would all be under water and I’d be screwed. At the moment the putrid stream just dribbles along the narrow deeper channel that runs down the centre of the drain-way.
After carefully negotiating my way down the last ramp and over the cobbled stone path I open up the throttle and belt along the drain as it banks around to the left and then runs under the freeway, which is where I choose to hide. If I’ve lost the quads, I’ll sneak back on to the road and try to make it home. If not I’ll have to keep going along the drain until I can find some other way of losing them.
I stop under the bridge and remove my helmet to listen out for the quads (I’m not falling for that again). It’s quiet for about thirty seconds but then I hear the unmistakable warble of the quad-bikes just as they both round the bend in the drain.
Shit! How did they find me so quick?
But then my question is answered. I spot a small aeroplane with no cockpit circling at about five hundred metres overhead. It looks like one of those unmanned recon planes the U.S. military use. I bet it saw me take my detour and gave the quads my position.
There’s no hiding from those quads as long as that thing is up there and I’m out in the open.
The quads are approaching fast; one on each side of the one metre deep centre channel.
I can’t stay here so I slap the helmet back on my head - just as bullets rip at the concrete channels running under the freeway. Thankfully though, because of the way the freeway crosses the drain at forty-five degrees, the channels give me protection.
I’m about to take off when I spot a nice length of three-inch diameter steel pipe lying nearby and get the overwhelming urge to take a swing at one the quads. I don’t have the luxury of time to decide if this is bravado or stupidity.
I climb off Pris and pick up the pipe. It’s about one-and-a-half metres long and has a nice thick wall – perfect for busting the head off of a robotic death machine.
Because the quads are on separate sides of the centre channel they’ll be cut-off from each other for a short time as they pass under the freeway bridge, making it an even one-on-one fight (ignoring the simple fact that my contender is armed with a machine gun and my only weapon is a bit of rusty old pipe).
I don’t have to wait terribly long. A shadow approaches the channel opening. I push myself back against the wall as closely as I can. The pipe held in my hands like a baseball bat.
The front of a quad comes into view; I pull the pipe back behind my head and swing like hell at where I expect the periscope to be.
WHACK!!!
Bullseye! I snap the tube of the periscope about two inches below the camera head, which now hangs awkwardly to the side, held on only by a couple of wires.
However, I don’t get a chance to celebrate my moment of bravado because what happens next is not at all how I expected things to go.
Somehow I imagined the quad would quietly say to itself “Oh no. I can’t see so I’ll just stop here”. But of course the quad did the complete opposite. It kept travelling on its current path, all-the-while blindly firing its machine gun in a 360-degree arc, possibly saying, “I don’t know where the bastard is but I’m gonna blow the shit out of this place regardless!”
Naturally, I hit the dirt.
After a few very noisy and frightening seconds the quad exits the channel, still firing, leaving behind a trail of concrete dust and gun smoke… Then another completely unexpected thing happens.
The other quad exits its channel and gets hit by a few rounds from the headless quad’s gun. At first I think, “Cool, I’ve killed two birds with one stone”. But the second quad isn’t having any of this. It turns its gun on the headless quad and opens fire, blowing it to smithereens.
That’s not cool.
Now what do I do?
About a kay up the drain-way is a three-metre wide storm water pipe that is easily big enough for me to ride Pris inside. If I can make it there ahead of the remaining quad I could lose it a lot easier than anywhere else I can think of at the moment.
But the quad is between the bridge and the pipe. I need to fool it into coming back under the bridge. So I pick up my trusty pipe again, then climb back on Pris and start her up and rev loudly. I can’t see the quad so I’m only guessing that it can hear the bike but the fact that I haven’t seen it head down the drain means it’s nearby. I then throw the pipe, javelin style, at a banged up old shopping trolley, making a calamity of noise and sending the trolley rolling into the centre channel.
Sure enough the quad detects the noise or movement of the pipe and trolley collision and I hear it roar back under the bridge.
I wring the life out of the throttle, let go of the brakes and fly out from under the cover of the bridge.
I have about a five second lead before the remaining quad-bike from hell has turned back and bursts from under the bridge, immediately firing at me.
I glimpse the pipes opening. I blast past an old steel car wheel, which showers with sparks as bullets bounce off it.
A few metres before the pipe I slam on the brakes and spin Pris 90 degrees then ride her up the small rise into the pipes mouth and switch on the headlights.
There’s a trickle of water in the bottom, which makes things very slippery so the best speed I can get, is about 40km/h, and even that makes for a hairy ride.
I get maybe twenty metres up and just round a bend as the quad enters the pipe.
I can’t swerve about like I could in the open but I’m hoping I can lose it in the labyrinth of storm water pipes. In my teenage years I used to scurry about in these pipes with my mates, I vaguely recall a branch pipe running at right angles to this pipe. Its diameter is half a metre smaller so I’m hopeful that the quad won’t be able to negotiate the tight turn.
Luckily my memory serves me well and the branch pipe is there. Just as I get Pris’ front wheel up into the branch pipe, the quad rounds the bend and lets loose with its machine gun, blowing apart the fibreglass case at the back of the bike, completely destroying it and the spare helmet that was inside.
That’s it! Now I’m officially pissed off. Whoever is responsible for all this is going to pay dearly.
The good news is I was right about the quad bike being unable to turn into the smaller pipe. It makes an attempt but its wide wheels prevent it from completing the turn. It can’t point its gun directly down the centre of the pipe but it fires off a volley anyway.
Concrete chunks from the pipes wall spray everywhere; Pris’ right mirror disintegrates as I squeeze the throttle to make some distance. The headlight illuminates the pipe ahead; I can see the bottom of this one is dry so I go a fast as all hell. There’s a 15-degree turn in the pipe so as soon as I round that I’m out of sight but I don’t back off. I want as much distance between me and that thing as I can get.
If you're curious as to where I got the inspiration for this scene take a look at the photo here of the Gardiner Creek drain-way. It was whilst sitting on the green banks overlooking the drain that I got the idea of a motorcycle chase.
