Pusher
Chapter One: Bitter Medicine
1
When the Gunman entered Etty, Etty had a feeling of nausea and being spied on. (Roland didn't realize anything, which Etty told him afterwards.) It seems so, in other words, that he has some vague sense of the appearance of the Gunner. When they got to Deta, Roland was being chased forward, whether he liked it or not. Deta also had a sense of his presence; on some uncanny level she seemed to be waiting for his arrival—waiting for him, or another, a more frequent visitor. From this point of view, he felt that as soon as she first entered her consciousness, she seemed to fully understand his presence.
Jack Mott didn't feel that way.
He was too focused on the boy.
He had been looking at the boy for two weeks.
Today he's going to come and push him.
2
Even from behind (the gunman's eyes), Roland recognized the boy. It was the boy he met at the station in the desert, the boy he had saved according to the oracle in the mountains, and then two choices were before him: to save the boy or to chase after the man in black, and in between he made the decision to sacrifice the boy; the boy had his own words, go ahead—before he fell into the abyss, the boy told him that there were other worlds beyond this world. Obviously the boy was right.
The boy was Jack.
He held a brown paper bag in one hand and a tray of canvas bags in the other. Judging from the appearance of the canvas bag bulging, the gunman thought that it must be a book.
The streets were bustling with traffic, and the boy was waiting to cross the street—the same street as the place where the prisoners and shadow ladies he had brought were, and he understood that in this moment nothing made sense. There's nothing to focus on, except what's going to happen or not happen in the next few seconds.
Jack didn't enter the World of the Gunner through any magic gate, he passed through a more direct and easier to understand portal: he died in his own world, and then reborn in Roland's world.
He was murdered.
It is more accurate to say that he was pushed once.
He was pushed into the street; on his way to school he was run over by a car, with a lunch box in one hand and a book in the other.
He was pushed by a man dressed in black.
That's what he's going to do! He's going to do it! Murdering him in my world is a punishment for me – let me watch him be murdered in this world before I can intervene!
However, the rejection of the fate of the savage has always been the mission of the Gunman's life— it is his fate, if you like it — so he runs straight away without even thinking about it, acting as quickly as a conditioned reflex of the body's instincts.
A terrifying and ironic thought arose in his consciousness: What if the body he entered was the man dressed in black? What should I do when I rushed over so eagerly to save the boy, but saw that it was my own hand that reached out and pushed the boy? What if this controllable feeling is just an illusion? You know, Walter's last hippie-smiley joke is that Roland himself is the murderer of the boy.
3
In that instant, Jack Mott lost his attention, and the string that was taut in his head suddenly disappeared. Just as he was about to jump out to push the boy into the center of the street, he felt his physical response misaligned in his consciousness—as if the pain was on one side and the pain was on the other side.
When the Gunner wedged in, Jack thought there was a bug on the back of his neck. It's not the kind of stinging bee, it doesn't have the slightest biting feeling, just a little itchy like it's been scratched. Mosquitoes, maybe. However, in an instant, a small mistake occurred on this bone eye. He patted it and turned to pay attention to the boy again.
He thought it was all just a blink of an eye, but in fact, seven seconds had passed. The gunman's fast-forward and fast-out didn't even notice the change behind the pair of gold-rimmed glasses on his face (office workers mostly went to the next street through the subway station, they were sleeping, half-dreaming eyes could only see themselves), and Jack's dark blue eyes turned light blue. No one noticed that the eyes had darkened again, back to their usual cobalt blue, and at this moment he had refocused his attention on the boy, but he missed the best time, and he couldn't help but be annoyed. The color of the traffic lights changed.
Looking at the boy's sleepy eyes and crossing the road, Jack turned around and walked backwards on the road from where he had come from, squeezing hard into the crowd of people passing by.
"Hi sir! Pay attention—"
At a glance, it was a girl with a face as white as curd. Jack shoved her aside rudely, and without even looking back at her angry look, she waved the textbook in her hand and threw it over. He walked toward Fifth Avenue and left the corner of forty-three, where the boy had planned to die today. He lowered his head, his lips pressed together, and it looked like he had no mouth but a long scar across his chin. There was obviously a traffic jam around the corner, but instead of slowing down, he quickened his pace and walked past forty-two, forty-one, and forty. Halfway down to the next intersection, he passed a building where the boy was still alive. He just glanced there, and he had been following the boy for three weeks, and he had been following him every morning before school, following him from the building to a corner three and a half blocks away, and then straight to Fifth Avenue. This corner, in his opinion, is the best place to start.
The girl he was pushing and shoved screamed behind him, but Jack Mott didn't pay attention to her. An amateur Lepidoptera insect collector would not pay attention to an ordinary butterfly.
Jack, in a certain way of doing things, resembled an amateur Lepidoptera insect collector.
Professionally, he is a successful chartered patent attorney.
Pushing people is just his hobby.
4
The Gunman almost fainted when he came back from the man's consciousness. If it's some sort of relief, it's just because the guy isn't men in black, and it's not Walter.
It all stunned him... Then he suddenly realized.
After detaching himself from his own body, his consciousness, his destiny, was as strong and sharp as ever, and the sudden realization was like a chisel slammed into the temple.
He had not yet understood this when he left, and he understood when he was sure that the boy was safe and sound and had slipped back again. He found some kind of connection between this man and Odette, a coincidence that was so surprising and frightening, and that he finally understood which of the three cards he had drawn and who they really were.
The third is not this person, not this pusher; the third name, Walter said, is "death."
death...... But not at you. That's what Walter said, the astute guy who was as astute as Satan, he said. A lawyer's reply... So close to the truth that is hidden in the shadows. Death is not directed at him; death becomes him.
The prisoner, the lady.
Death is the third person.
Suddenly, he was completely convinced that he was the third person.
5
Roland wedged in like a no-trailing ejection, and when he caught a glimpse of the man dressed in black, a carefree ejection program was activated.
He thought that if he hadn't intervened to stop the man dressed in black from murdering Jack (which may be a paradox), but had waited until he arrived at the station (he had stopped the man from murdering Jack), perhaps the Dimension of Time would have canceled everything that had happened... If he saves Jack in this world, it means that he will not meet Jack later, and everything that has happened may change later.
What will change? Not even speculative. He never thought it was the end of his quest. And it is safe to say that this after-the-fact reasoning is a kind of virtual reality after all; if he had ever seen the man dressed in black, whatever the consequences, whatever the specious paradoxes, whatever fate was predestined in the darkness, he would certainly have used the head of the body he had entered to go up against Walter's chest. Roland had no choice but to do so, and he could not control it, just as a gun could not refuse to pull the trigger and shoot a bullet.
If everything is solved by hell, then it will have to go with it.
He glanced quickly at the crowd around the corner, looking at every face. (He looks at women's faces as carefully as he looks at men, in case someone pretends to be a woman.) ）
Walter wasn't there.
He slowly relaxed, as if the fingers clasped in the trigger had relaxed at the last moment. No; Walter wasn't around the boy, and the Gunner somehow felt it wasn't that day. It was not that day. It's close to that day — less than two weeks, maybe a week, maybe even just a day off — but not yet.
So he returned.
He saw on the road...
6
...... He was dazed in shock: this was the man he had slipped through the third door into his head, when he was sitting in front of a dilapidated rental window waiting for someone—the house was full of such abandoned rooms—abandoned, and occupied at night by drunks and lunatics. You know what a drunkard is, because you've smelled the strong smell of sweat and the pungent smell of urine on them. You know what a lunatic is, because you may have learned about their deranged weirdness. The only furniture left in this room is two chairs. Jack Mott used them all: one sitting, one against the door that opened to the aisle. He didn't want to be disturbed suddenly, and of course it was better not to give people a chance to disturb him. He approached the window and looked out, while hiding behind the diagonal shadow line to avoid being seen by any passers-by.
He held a rough red brick in his hand.
The brick was pulled out of the window, and there many of the bricks were loose, and these bricks were old, the corners were weathered, but they were heavy in the hand. The large bricks bond to the old mortar like adsorbents stuck to the bottom of a boat.
This man wanted to smash people with bricks.
He didn't care who he hit; as a murderer, he was an equal opportunityist.
After a while, a family of three came down the road from below: a man, a woman, a little girl. The girl walked in the innermost part, apparently trying to get her to avoid the vehicle. It was close to the station, but Jack Mott didn't pay much attention to any traffic. He cared that there were too few buildings like these that could be used by him; the house had been destroyed, and it was littered with rubbish, broken wooden strips, broken bricks, and broken glass.
He only peeked out for a few seconds, wearing sunglasses on his face and an unseasonable knit hat buttoned up in his blond hair. It's also like a chair under the doorknob, a truth. Even if you don't feel any dangers to worry about, it doesn't hurt to reduce those that may be.
He was wearing an oversized undershirt—almost up to the middle of his thigh. This large shirt that could hide his real body (he was very thin) must have been deliberately chosen by him. This undershirt has another function: whenever he performs a "depth bomb attack" on someone (playing the hand of "depth bomb attack" is a thought that often haunts his mind), he always has to wet his pants. This loose, drooping undershirt just covers the wet stains on the cargo pants.
Now they are closer.
Don't shoot, wait, wait, wait...
He trembled by the window, and the hand that took the brick withdrew to his stomach, reached out again, and withdrew again (but this was recovered to a halt on his waist), and then he threw himself out, and now he was fully awake. He always shot at the penultimate shot.
He threw the brick and watched it fall.
Bricks fell, torsoating in the air. In the sunlight Jack could clearly see the mortar hanging from it. At this moment almost everything else is clearly discernible, and everything is interpreted in its material relations with the utmost precision and perfect geometry; it is a kind of substantive advance of his life, like a sculptor changing a stone by striking a chisel with a hammer, and a rough object thus creates something new; it is the greatest thing in the world: rational and full of ecstasy.
Sometimes he will lose his hand, or simply throw it away, just as a sculptor may chisel something wrong, or chisel it, but this time it is a perfect blow. The brick hit the girl in the bright plaid skirt impartially in the head. He saw blood—brighter than bricks. Of course, the blood that splashed out will eventually dry out into the same maroon-purple color. He heard the mother scream. He immediately slipped away.
Jack jumped out of the room and threw the chair that had been under the doorknob into a distant corner. (Running across the room, he kicked off the chair he had been sitting in while he was waiting.) He jerked off his large undershirt and took a tie-dye handkerchief from his bag behind his back. He unscrewed the door handle with a handkerchief.
No fingerprints will be left.
Only rookies leave fingerprints.
The door swung open and he tucked the handkerchief back into his bag. He went down through the hall and became a drunken drunkard. He didn't look around.
Looking around is also a rookie.
The old bird knew that looking at it would make others suspicious. Looking around might be some sort of evidence that might be considered an insider of the event. Some clever stripe may target you as a suspect in the incident, and you may be investigated. Just because you had looked around nervously. Jack felt that no one would associate him with criminal activity, even if someone thought the "incident" was suspicious and would investigate it, but...
Take acceptable risks. Minimize possible hazards. In other words, you should always put the chair under the doorknob.
He walked through dusty corridors, where the paint peeled walls were bare with the slats inside, and he hung his head and muttered to himself, like the tramps you can often see on the street. He faintly heard the scream of the woman—the girl's mother, he reckoned to be—screaming, and the voice came from the front of the building; the whimpering motion was ignored. The act after all these things happened—that yelling, that confusion, the crying of the wounded (if the wounded person could still cry), Jack wouldn't care. All he cared about was this, and this push changed the daily course of things, reshaping the new texture of the life that was never extinguished... And, perhaps, all that is destined is not just this blow, but is pushed in a circle around, like throwing a stone into a calm pond.
Who says he's not shaping a universe today, or at some point in the future?
Oh My God, no wonder he wet his cargo pants!
He walked down two flights of stairs without encountering anyone, but he still performed like this, shaking his body from time to time when he walked, but never making a toddler look. Shaking your body is not remembered. And an exaggerated toe is possible. He muttered, but never said a word that could be understood, and it was better not to act than to act exaggeratedly.
He went out of the dilapidated back door and into an alley full of discarded garbage, broken bottles printed with the sun, moon, and stars.
He had already arranged the escape path in advance, and everything was planned (taking acceptable risks, minimizing the danger, being an old bird in everything); and this planned personality was what impressed his colleagues, and naturally made people think that he was a promising person (needless to say that he also wanted to run ahead, but he did not want to run to prison, nor did he want to run to the electric chair).
A few people came down the street and turned into the alley, and they just ran in to see where it was screaming, not paying attention to Jack Mott, who had taken off his unseason-knit hat and was still wearing sunglasses (not obtrusive in this place on such a clear morning).
He turned into another alley.
Turn to another street when you come out.
Now he walked calmly in an alley cleaner than the two alleys before him—almost all the way he looked. The alley leads to another street, where there is a bus stop in the north block. In less than a minute he saw a bus arriving at the station, which was also part of the pre-planned plan. As soon as the car door opened, Jack went up and threw fifteen cent coins into the coin box. The driver didn't look at him much. It was fine, but even if the driver looked at him a few more times, all he saw was a weird guy in jeans, like the kind of unemployed vagabond whose big sweatshirt was like something he had picked up from a Salvation Army garbage bag.
Be prepared, be prepared, be an old bird.
Jack Mott's secret is to be successful in everything he does, whether it's work or games.
After driving through nine intersections, the car passed a parking lot. Jack got out of the car, walked into the parking lot, opened his car (it was an unremarkable mid-fifties Chevrolet that still looked pretty good) and drove back to New York City.
He was now at ease and unencumbered.
7
In a moment, the Gunner glimpsed all these things. He could have seen more before his shocked consciousness turned off on the other mirrors. This is not complete, but it is enough. Enough is enough.
8
He watched Mott cut a cut from the fourth page of the New York Daily Mirror with an Eckert art knife and went out of his way to confirm the news in that column. "Black girl unconscious after tragic accident," the headline reads. He saw Mott take out glue and smear it on the back of the cut newspaper and paste it into the scrapbook. Mott pasted it in the middle of the blank side of the scrapbook, and there were many newspaper clippings in the first few pages that turned over. He saw the news on the open page that read: "Five-year-old Odette Holmes, who went to Elizabethtown, New Jersey, for a happy celebration, is now the victim of a cruel and bizarre accident." After attending her aunt's wedding two days ago, the girl and her family were walking to the station when a brick fell..."
However, he hadn't done it only once to inflict such harm on her, had he? No, God, no.
From that morning to the night Odette lost her legs, in the years between, how many things Jack Mott threw and how many people pushed.
Then it was Odette who suffered again.
The first time he pushed something toward her.
The second time, he pushed her down in front of something.
Who am I going to use? What kind of person is this —?
Then he thought of Jack, of the shoving that had sent Jack into the world, of the laughter of the Man in Black he heard, and he collapsed.
Roland fainted.
9
When he woke up, he was looking at the neat rows of numbers on the green pieces of paper. Bars were drawn on both sides of the paper, so that every number looked like a prisoner in a cell.
He thought: This thing is not out of bounds.
Not Walter's laughter. Could it be that — the plan?
No, God, no— nothing is more complicated than this, and nothing is more useful than this.
But a thought came up, at least, in my head.
How long have I been out? He was startled. When I came through the door, I felt about nine o'clock, or earlier. How long has it been——?
He came on.
Jack Mott—now he was just a puppet of the Gunman's fiddling—glanced up and saw that the expensive quartz clock on the table showed fifteen o'clock.
God, is it so late? Is it so late? But Etty... He's probably tired and can't hold on any longer, and I have to—
The Gunner turned Jack's head. The door was still there, but from there he could see worse than he had imagined.
On one side of the door there are two dark shadows, one in a wheelchair and next to another... But the man was mutilated and could only support himself with his arm, and his lower leg was taken away by the savage thing that shot very quickly, like Roland's fingers and toes.
The shadow moved.
Roland immediately whipped Jack Mott at the speed of a hungry snake, forcing him to turn his head away.
She couldn't see us, not until I was ready. When I was ready, she couldn't see anything but the man's back.
Deta Walker could not have seen Jack Mott under any circumstances, for through the open door only what the host had seen could be seen. It was only when Mott looked in the mirror that she could possibly see Mott's face ( though this might lead to the terrible consequence of a plausible self-duplication ) but even then it would have meant nothing to either of the two ladies; the point was that the face of the lady meant nothing to Mott. Although they had a secret relationship with each other, they had never seen each other.
The Gunman didn't want this lady to see that lady.
At least, it's not the time yet.
Intuition sparked a spark and got closer to a mature plan.
But it had been too long here—the light reminded him that it was almost three o'clock in the afternoon, maybe it was past four o'clock.
Between now and the appearance of crawfish after sunset, how much time is eledicid etty until the end of his life?
Three hours?
Two hours?
He can also go back and save Etty... But that's exactly what Deta Walker wanted. She set a trap, like a villager who was afraid of tigers who deliberately released a lamb as a sacrifice to lure the tiger into the range of arrows. Maybe he should return to his sick and crooked body... But there is not enough time. He could only see her shadow because she was lying by the door, and his revolver held her tightly in her hand. At this moment, as soon as Roland's body moved, she would shoot him, and it turned out to be him.
Since she was still afraid of him, he might have ended up at least lucky.
Etie may end up dying in fear in a hiss.
He seemed afraid of Deta Walker's rough twittering voice: "Do you want to play with me?" Grey meat sticks? Sure, you want to me! You wouldn't be afraid of an old crippled black woman silver, would you?
"There's only one way," Jack muttered. "That's it."
The office door opened and a bald man with glasses looked in.
"How did you do Doffman's account?" The bald man asked.
"I'm sick. I think I'm going to lunch. I had to leave. ”
The bald man looked at him worriedly. "Maybe it's a virus, I've heard that a terrible virus is spreading everywhere."
"Maybe."
"So... As long as you get Doffman done by five o'clock tomorrow afternoon..."
"All right."
"You know his temper—"
"Yes."
The bald man, who seemed a little cramped and uneasy at this moment, nodded vigorously. "Well, go home. You don't look much like you normally would. ”
"Yes."
The bald man hurried away.
He felt me, Gunman thought. This is only part of it, not all of it. They were all afraid of him. They didn't know why, but they were all afraid of him. They were right to be afraid.
Jack Mott stood up, saw the suitcase he had brought with him (it was brought in when the Gunman entered his consciousness), and tucked the paper on the table together.
He felt an urge to quietly look back at the door, but then restrained the urge. Unless he was prepared for all the adventures, he could not look back until he was back there.
At this time, the time is very tight, and there are still some unfinished things to be done.
Chapter 2: Sweet Bait
Deta hid in the thick shade of a stone cliff, two boulders that were cracked and leaning against each other, like some old man going to the stone to tell his strange secrets. She saw Etty scouring up and down the gravel-strewn hillside, shouting in a hoarse voice. The stubble on his cheeks had finally grown into a beard, and at first glance you might recognize him as a middle-aged man, but three or four times, when he approached her (sometimes so close that she could grab his ankle with a hand), you could tell he was still a child, listless like a kicked dog.
Odette feels guilty, but Deta is overwhelmed and ready to deal with this natural prey.
When she first climbed here, she felt the creak under her palm, like the movement of autumn leaves on the thinning branches of the canopy. When she adjusted her eyes, she saw that it was not a leaf, but the skeleton of some small animal, some kind of prey, and if the yellowed ancient skeleton was not a fake color, it should be a long time ago, this was once a beast's den, the kind of weasel or stoat or something like that, probably sniffing all the way into the low bushes of the forest at night, where the trappers came with their noses to catch the prey. Then it was killed and eaten, and then the hunter dragged the leftovers back here to store and wait for night to come out hunting again.
Now that there was a much bigger prey here, Deta's original thought was to follow the trick of the natives ahead: wait patiently until Etty fell asleep, he was sure to sleep, and when that time he did it, dragged his body here. So both revolvers were in her hands. She could sneak over to the door and hide, waiting for the big bad guy to return. She initially wanted to kill the big bad guy's body like she did with Etie, but why did she think it was bad? If the big bad guy has no body to come back to, Deta will have no way to escape from here and return to her own world.
Is it possible for her to let the big bad bring herself back?
Maybe not.
Maybe it will work.
If he knew Etty was still alive, maybe it would be fine.
So here's a better idea.
Her cunning nature is deeply ingrained. Whoever dared to hint at her to her face might laugh at the crowd; but her inner insecurity was equally ingrained—for the latter, she blamed any opponent she met on a match of her own intelligence. That's how she feels about the Gunman. She heard a gunshot and looked toward where it had been fired, only to see a puff of smoke coming out of the muzzle of his remaining gun, which he had reloaded and dropped to Etie before passing through the door.
She knew what it was alluding to Etty: all the bullets were safe and sound, untouched; the gun could protect herself. She also knew what it was alluding to her (of course the big bad guy knew she was peeping; though she was actually asleep when they started talking, maybe it was the gunshot that woke her up): Stay away from him, he's carrying the real guy.
But the devil is likely to think more carefully.
If this little show was specifically aimed at her, was there no other intention in the big bad guy's consciousness that neither she nor Etty could understand? Maybe the big bad didn't think so—if she saw that the bullet could shoot, so would the bullets she had taken from Etty's hand.
Presumably he guessed that Etty might have slept there, but didn't he understand that she might have stolen the gun at the right time and then quietly moved back to the mountain to hide? Yes, the big bad guy may have foreseen everything. He's a clever white devil. Smart enough to foresee the best time for Deta to catch this little white doll.
Therefore, the big bad guy is probably deliberately putting a bad bullet on the gun. He had lied to her once; why not come a second time? This time she had examined the chamber of the gun, and it was really loaded with bullets instead of empty magazines, and yes, it looked like real bullets, but in fact it might not be. He wouldn't even risk putting a bullet in what might be dry, would he? He had arranged all the bullets. After all, guns are the business of the big bad. Why did he come to this hand? Why, in order to induce her to expose herself, this is obviously the case! At this point, Etty would restrain her with the gun that really worked, and he wouldn't make the same mistake again, whether in a state of extreme exhaustion or not. In fact, the more tired he is, the more he may be careful not to make a second mistake.
Nice temptation, White Devil, Deta thought in her gloomy den. This dark cave, although cramped but comfortable, was covered with a soft carpet on the ground, which was the decaying corpse of the small animals. Nice temptation, but I don't eat this set.
She didn't have to shoot at Etty, she just had to wait.
Her only fear was that the Gunman might return before Etty fell asleep, but fortunately he was still outside. The lifeless body under the door was still lying there motionless. Maybe he was in trouble finding the medicine he needed—she could think of something else. Isn't it as easy for a man like him to find something to do with a fiery provoking a bunch of male dogs in heat?
Etie searched for the woman named "Odette" for two hours, and (oh, she hated the name, she kept shouting up and down the hill until she couldn't make a sound.
At least Eti was doing what Detta had expected: he went down the hill back to the beach, which was just a small triangle, sat down next to his wheelchair, and looked around dejectedly. He climbed one of the wheels of his wheelchair, a gesture that was almost touching. After a while, he let go of his hand and sighed deeply.
This situation brought a sharp pain in Deta's throat, and her head suddenly hurt from one side to the other, like a lightning bolt in the summer, and she seemed to hear a voice calling... Calling or drinking orders.
No, you can't, she thinks, not really knowing what she's thinking or talking to. No, you can't, this time you can't, not now. Not now, or never again. This sudden pain burrowed into her head again, and she clenched her hands into fists. The tense face exuded a firm spirit—the deformed face of the tiger was nothing less than a self-deprecating expression—an expression that mixed with incomparable ugliness and almost holy fortitude.
The lightning pain did not come again. The sound that seemed to be transmitted by pain also didn't reappear.
She waited.
Etty braced her chin with her fist and braced her head. After a while the head began to hang down, and the fist slid down to the cheek. Deta waited, her dark eyes shining.
Etty suddenly looked up, stood up hard, walked to the water's edge, and picked up the water to wash her face.
That's right, white kid. There's no criminal shame in this world, otherwise you wouldn't have brought it here, would you?
Etty was in a wheelchair this time and felt more comfortable. He stared at the open door for a long time, (What do you see there, white child?) Deta was willing to pay twenty dollars for a ticket to listen to you,) and then sat down on the sand.
He held his head with his hand again.
Soon his head was hanging down little by little.
This time there was no delay, his chin was quickly pressed to his chest, and although the waves were loud, she could still hear his purring. Soon, he fell to the side and curled up.
She was surprised, disgusted, and frightened to find that she had a hint of pity in her heart for the little white boy lying below. He looked like a Chinese New Year's Eve little one who had been guarding half the night but had been chased into bed. Then she remembered how he and the big bad guy had teased her with poisonous food to tease her, and how she had moved away in the last moment when she reached for it... At least they were afraid she would be poisoned.
If they were afraid you would die, why would they let you eat that poisonous thing in the first place?
The question frightened her, just as the momentary pity frightened her. She hadn't asked questions of herself before, and in her consciousness, the voice of the question didn't seem to sound like her own at all.
They didn't want to harm me with this poisonous thing, they wanted me to get sick, and they would laugh at me as soon as I vomited and moaned.
She waited twenty minutes, then climbed down toward the beach, twisting forward like a snake with her strong hands, eyes not leaving Etty for a moment. She could have waited another hour, or even half an hour more; it would have made the fucking white devil sink deeper into his sleep. But she couldn't afford to wait. The big bad guys could come back at any time.
When she approached where Etie was lying, (he was still snoring, it was like a sawmill's circular saw was sawing a furuncle), and she picked up a stone, just a bare head and a sharp end.
She grasped the tip of the light slip and continued to walk the snake, crawling to the place where he was lying, with a murderous glint in her eyes.
Deta's plan was cruelly simple: hit Eti with the sharp end of the stone until he was as unconscious as a stone. Then take his gun and wait for Roland to return.
If he suddenly sat up, she might give him a choice: take her back to her own world, and if she refused, she would die. Either you go out with me, and she might say to him, when your boyfriend is dead, you can do whatever you want.
If the gun that the big bad guy had given to Etie couldn't be used—it was possible; she had never met someone like Roland who made her hate and fear, and she couldn't gauge how cunning he was—she was going to do the same thing against him. She would use stones or simply deal with him with her bare hands. He was sick and crooked, and he had lost two more fingers, and she could take him over.
But as she approached Etty, an uneasy thought came up again. This is another question, as if another voice is asking.
What if he knew? What if he knew you were going to murder Etty again the second time?
He wouldn't know anything. He was too busy finding medicine for himself. What I do know is that he himself is about to fall.
The strange voice did not respond, but the seeds of doubt had been sown, and she had heard their conversation, and at the time they thought she was asleep. What the big bad guy wants to do. She didn't know what was going on. Deta only knew what tower it had to do with. Maybe the tower was full of gold and silver jewelry, and the big bad guy wanted to make a full bowl. He said he needed her to go there with Etty and someone else, and Deta guessed maybe he could do that. Why are those other doors here?
If it was a piece of magic and she killed Etty again, he might have known. If she cut off his way to find the tower, she would have cut off the lifeblood of the fucking white devil. If he knew that he had no reason to live, then the fucking white devil could do anything, because the fucking white devil couldn't make a name for himself than shit.
The thought of the big bad guy coming back made Deta shiver.
But what should she do if she doesn't kill Etty? Maybe she should have brought Etty's gun while he was asleep. But if the big bad guy comes back, can she still fiddle with two guys?
She didn't know yet.
Her eyes caught a glimpse of the wheelchair, and she pushed it away, but pulled it back again. There is a deep pocket on the back of the wheelchair leather backrest. She found a screwed rope that they had used to tie her to a wheelchair.
Seeing the rope, she understood what she had to do.
Deta changed her plans and crawled towards the Gunner's silent body. She's going to find what she needs from his backpack (he's called it a "leather bag") and then use the rope, as quickly as possible... However, at this moment, she caught a glimpse of the scene outside the door and froze.
Like Etty then, she thought she was seeing some kind of movie footage... Just look at which TV cop drama this scene is more like. The scene is a pharmacy. She saw the apothecary trembling with fright, and Deta couldn't laugh at him. Because there was a gun pointed at the apothecary's face. The pharmacist seemed to be saying something, but his voice was out of tune too far away, as if it were a sound wave reflected from the speaker. She couldn't tell what was going on, she didn't see who was holding the gun, but she didn't have to see the guy standing there with her own eyes, did she? She knew who the man was, of course she knew.
It's the big bad.
But it wasn't like him standing there, it was like a chubby little, it was like an accomplice of his, or he was possessed, yes. He soon found another gun, didn't he? I bet that's right. You're doing it, Deta Walker.
She opened Roland's leather bag, and there was a faint smell of old tobacco in it, which had long since ceased to smell. In a way, it's a lot like a lady's handbag, and at first glance it's all a bunch of gadgets... If you look closely, it is an item prepared by a wandering man to cope with various unexpected needs.
She was thinking that the big bad guy's trip to find his tower was also a long and good time. If that's the case, then the bunch of stuff left here (though some of them are tattered enough) is astonishing.
You've got to do it, Deta Walker.
She took what she needed and silently snaked toward the wheelchair. Once there, she straightened herself with one arm and pulled the rope out of her pocket like a fisherwoman. She kept an eye on Etty at every turn, wary of him waking up. He remained motionless until Deta wrapped a rope around his neck, tightened it, and dragged him away.
He was dragged backwards, and at first he was asleep, thinking he was doing something about the nightmare of being buried alive or suffocated.
Soon he felt the pain of the rope in his neck, his mouth was stuffed, and the oozing saliva flowed down his chin. This is not a dream. He tugged the rope and tried to stand up.
Her strong arms pulled him tightly. Etty fell to the ground on her back. His face turned purple.
"Be honest!" Deta sneered at him sharply behind him, "I won't kill you if you're honest and obedient, and if you don't obey, I'll strangle you right away." ”
Etty lowered her hand and tried to calm down. The loose knot that Deta had tied around his neck would allow him to take a gossamer breath intermittently, which you could only say was better than holding back.
When the beating heart stabilized a little, he wanted to look around, and the rope immediately tightened.
"Think about it. You can only look at the sea, the gray meat stick. Right now you can only look in this direction. ”
He turned his head to look at the sea, and the rope was immediately loosened, allowing him to breathe pitifully. His left hand sneaked toward the waistband of his left pants. (She saw the action, he didn't know, she was grinning at him.) There was nothing there, and the gun had been taken away by her.
When you're asleep, Etty, she'll crawl up to you. Of course it's the gunner's voice. It doesn't matter what I say to you at this point, but... I told you. That's your romance story – a rope around your neck and a crazy woman with two guns behind your back.
But if she wanted to kill me, I would be able to do it while I was asleep.
So what do you think she wants to do, Etty? Sending you a Disney World luxury tour for two?
"Listen to me." He said, "Odette—"
As soon as the name came out of his mouth, the rope around his neck was immediately tightened.
"You're not allowed to call me that name. Next time, I am not allowed to call me by the name of anyone else. My name is Deta Walker, and if you're still counting on giving you some air in your lungs, you little, better remember! ”
Etty coughed, her nostrils gasping for breath, and she could only squeeze the rope hard. A large black dot burst open in front of his eyes, like a flower of evil blooming.
The tight rope finally loosened him again.
"Do you understand, White Devil?"
"Yes." His answer was just a cry.
"So say it, say my name."
"Deta."
"Call me my full name!" Listening to the voice of this dangerous hysterical woman, Etty was glad he couldn't see her.
"Deta Walker."
"It was good." The rope was loosened again. "Now you have to listen to me, White Bread, and you're doing this with a brain, if you want to live until the sun goes down." You don't want to play any tricks for me, just now I saw that you still want to play the trick of pulling out the gun, you are asleep that time I have already taken the gun from you. Don't try to fool Deta, her eyes are sharp. You didn't think about how she saw it, for sure.
"You don't want to play your wit, don't think I'm legless and easy to deal with." I lost my leg and learned a lot of Western love, and now I have two guns of fucking white devils in my hand, I have to do something with them, you say West is not West? ”
"Yes," Etty said choked. "I'm not playing tricks."
"Well, good, really good." She chuckled, "I'm busy like a dog when you're asleep." Seven seven eight eight things are all done. Now what I want you to do is, white bread: put your hand behind your back and touch the noose—the same one I put around your neck. There are three nooses in total. I've been using my brain while you're sleeping, you lazy bone! She chuckled again. Touching the noose, you yourself string your two wrists together.
"Then as soon as I pull my hand you will feel these knots tighten, and soon you will feel it, and you may say, 'This is my chance, I have to take this rope to put on the black bitch.'" Lo and behold, she can't figure out the drawstring now,' but—" At this point, Deta's voice became more urn-like, more like the tone of the Black Southerners in the hilarious drama. "—Before you're going to take the plunge, it's better to look back."
Etty complied. Deta looked more and more evil at this moment, and her unkempt appearance may be more terrifying than her own ferocity. She had been wearing the same dress that the Gunman had taken her captive from Massey's company, and by this time the skirt was tattered and filthy. She picked up the knife she had found in the gunner's leather bag—the tape with which he and Roland had cut the drugs—and cut her skirt in half, pulling a piece of it to make a makeshift holster, and hanging it bulging on either side of her hips. The worn handle of the gun is cocked on one side.
Her voice was a little muffled as her teeth were biting the rope. A freshly cut rope head was exposed to her grinning mouth; the end of the rope was clutched on the other side of her mouth—the rope was tied to his neck. It was a terrifying image of a savage carnivore—grinning with a rope—and he looked at her in a daze, looking at her with a look of horror, and her mouth widened even wider.
"You want to play tricks while I'm fiddling with your hands." She said angrily, "I'll squeeze you with my teeth, gray meat stick." I won't be relieved this time, see? ”
He couldn't say anything at all, just nodded.
"Okay. Maybe it will make you live a little longer. ”
"If I can't live," said Etty in a choked voice, "you don't want to go to Macy's company again to steal things, and never want to go there for fun again, Deta." He'll know that in the end no one is playing. ”
"Shut up," Deta said... Almost humming. "You just have to shut up. Keep your thoughts and tell that guy. What you can taste is another rope noose. ”
I've been busy with the work you've been asleep, and she said so, and a wave of nausea startled him, and Etty understood what she was busy with. The rope made three knots that could be pulled together, and the first one was put around his neck while he was asleep. The second tied his hands behind his back. At this moment she pushed him viciously from the side and asked him to pull his ankle to his ass. He understood what the gesture meant. She reached out from her skirt and poked one of Roland's revolvers into Etty's temple.
"I'll have to do that if you don't do it, Gray Meat Stick," she said in that humming voice. "If I do it, you're dead." I might as well throw some sand over your head and cover the gun hole in your head with my hair. He thought you were sleeping! She giggled again.
Etty pulled her foot up, and she quickly tied a third noose around his ankle.
"Bundle it up, and try to bundle it like a livestock on the pasture."
That's a pretty good description, Etty thought. If he feels uncomfortable in this position and wants to stretch his foot down, he is bound to pull the rope tied to his ankle more tightly. This tightened the rope between his ankle and wrist, and then tightened the noose around his wrist and neck...
She dragged him along, dragging him stiffly toward the beach.
"Hey, what's going on—"
He just wanted to struggle backwards, and everything in his body tightened—including breathing. He had to try not to struggle, dragged by her (get your feet up, don't forget, asshole, you have to strangle yourself if you want to put your feet down), and she dragged her over the rough ground. A sharp stone cut through his cheek, and a stream of hot blood flowed out. She gasped heavily. Layers of rolling waves washed over the rock cavern, and the sound grew louder.
Want to drown me? Sweet Christ, is this what she wants to do?
No, of course not. He remembered that he had actually understood what she was thinking before dragging the winding tidal line, and that his face had rake like a rake across the seagrass, and he didn't have to wait for him to see that the salt-stained thing was as cold as the fingers of a drowning sailor.
He remembered that Henry had once said that sometimes they would shoot one of our gang, an American, I mean—they knew a Vietnamese soldier was useless, because any Vietnamese trapped in the jungle we wouldn't take care of. Unless it's a recruit egg from home. They would make a hole in his stomach and make him cry and cry, and then they would have to send someone to rescue him. Their rescue operations tossed and turned until the guy was dead. Do you know what they call that guy, Etty?
Etty shook her head, chilled by what he said.
They called him sweet bait, Henry had said. A dessert that can be used to lure flies and even a bear.
This is Deta's calculation: use him as sweet bait.
She dragged him seven feet below the tidal line, and without saying a word, she left him and left him there facing the sea. When the Gunman saw it through the doorway, the tide had not yet risen to drown him—the Gunman might have seen him at low tide, and the tide might have risen six hours later. Long before that...
Etty's eyes rolled upwards to see the sun sprinkling golden light on the sea. What time is this? Four? Almost. The sun sets at about seven o'clock.
He was worried about the long night before the tide rose.
When it gets dark, the crawfish will burrow out of the water; they will crawl to the beach, and he will lie helplessly tied up, and they will tear him to pieces.
It was an endless time for Etty Dean. The concept of time itself became a laughing stock. He couldn't even care about the fear—no matter what would happen after dark, the pain in his legs continued, and in the end the pain made him scream unbearably. If he wanted to relax his muscles, all those knots would be tightened at once, and the noose around his neck would have strangled him to death, and he could only try to pull his ankles up to ease the force that strangled his neck and allow himself to take a little breath. He felt that he might not be able to survive the night. By then he was afraid that he would no longer be able to lift his legs back.