Mission 5: Payback part 6

Continued from last week...

Cathy walked towards Ryan, and then suddenly, she started to take her face off as if it were a mask. It was a mask of course, but the person behind the mask shocked Tim.
“Ryan?” Tim gasped, he looked to Ryan who was standing right next to him and shook his head as if to clear it. “But, what’s going on?”
Ryan, the one who had just taken off the mask, drew his Glock and leveled it with the other Ryan’s head. “We have an imposter,” he said.
“Wait,” the other Ryan cried, holding up his hand. “It’s me, Zach.”
Ryan faltered for a second. “Show me,” he said, never dropping his gun.
The other Ryan started to pull a mask from his face, to reveal Zach. Zach took off the voice strip from his throat. “See?”
Laz gasped. “How’s that possible? We buried you.”
Zach shrugged. “How should I know, ask Cruise,” he pointed to Ryan.
Ryan laughed. “Well I have news for you,” he said.
“What?” they asked.
“I’m not really Ryan,” slowly, he removed his mask to reveal… Michelle. Now everyone was confused.
“What in the world is going on here?” Tim cried out. “Where’s the real Ryan?”
“He’s been dead ever since the beginning of Mission 4,” Michelle replied. “I killed him.”
“But you’re dead!” Laz exclaimed.
“That’s what you think,” Michelle laughed and shot Zach in the head. Zach fell over silently into Laz’s arms. Tim yelled and rushed towards Michelle, but Michelle shot him as well and he fell to the ground in front of her.
Suddenl{, Katie jumped up and started prying at her face. “This is gonna stop now, Michelle!” she cried. Then she removed her face and a voice strip, to reveal none other than… Ryan Cruise.
Even Michelle seemed shocked. “What? How?”
“I have just one thing to say,” Ryan declared.
“What?” Michelle asked, training her Glock on him.
“April Fool’s!” Ryan shouted.
(Note: the section above was purely an April Fool’s joke, thus the reason for its utter absurdity. Nothing in the previous section is to be taken seriously as it has no effect on the story whatsoever.)

Back to the Real Story…

“What?” the emperor screamed, causing Chuck Morris to flinch ever so slightly. “You let them escape, again?”
“Sir, I apologize for the incompetence of my agents, they will be dealt with--”
“No, no apologies,” the emperor got out of his chair, then remembered how much taller Chuck Morris was and thought better of it. He climbed back in his chair where he made a much more imposing figure. “I want Ryan Cruise, and Timothius, and their annoying little sidekick in body bags on my desk, now; no, I want them yesterday. Do you understand?”
“On your desk, that would stain the wood, don’t you think?” Chuck replied in a monotone voice that made it hard to determine whether he was being sarcastic or not. Only a small twitch on the side of his face gave any indication he wasn’t totally serious.
“Figure of speech, Morris, don’t play around with me!” the emperor was getting more and more distressed by the minute. “I need a massage,” he moaned.
“Good idea, sir,” Chuck Morris started to remove his black gloves and cracked his fingers.
“No, no,” the emperor held up his hand. “I’ll find someone else to do it, that’s okay.”
“As you wish,” Chuck bowed and walked out.
“Oh, and Morris?”
Chuck Morris stopped and turned back to the emperor.
“If you find that Jason Scorn fellow, or Matt Damon or whatever he calls himself, kill him too.”
Chuck Morris flipped a chopstick in the air and caught it easily. “Of course.”

“You thought I was dead, didn’t you?” Cathy said, circling around Ryan, as if she were examining him.
“Well yeah, your head blew up like a watermelon,” Tim exclaimed. Ryan and Laz had told him all about it in the car; he’d seen headshots like that before, but he’d never seen anyone come back alive from them.
“Usually, that’s fatal,” Ryan pointed out.
“Oh yeah, well usually radiation’s a killer, too,” Cathy shot back. “And so is a knife to the heart, and getting blown to pieces, and car crashes, but hey, we’re all invincible, right?”
“I didn’t think you were,” Ryan muttered.
“Well, I’m not,” Cathy said. “It was my bodyguard that was shot, her name was Attalie.” She slapped Ryan in the face.
“Ouch,” Ryan held his cheek with his hand. “What was that for?”
“For letting Attalie get shot, she was my friend. I’d slap you to, Laz, but I guess I can’t expect much more out of you.”
“Ouch,” Laz winced. “I think that was worse than the slap.”
“I don’t know,” Ryan shook his head, still touching his cheek. “She slaps pretty hard.”
“I would give my life for her,” Cathy said more to herself than anyone else.
“Well its kind of to late for that now,” Tim blurted out, earning him an elbow from Katie and a glare from Cathy.
“Well, I love the little reunion we’re having here,” Jordan spoke up. “But we really need to be going. So, everybody, get in the van,” he pointed to an unmarked van sitting in the bushes off in the distance.
“No,” Ryan said.
Jordan looked at him. “Why not?”
“You guys go ahead, Tim, Laz, and I have some unfinished business to settle with the emperor.”
“That can wait,” Jordan said. “There’s a rebellion we can go to; we can regroup there.”
“No, it cant’ wait,” Ryan disagreed. Tim and Laz hopped into Katie’s car and Ryan climbed into the driver seat.
“Hey,” Katie called out. “You can’t take my car.” She reached into her purse to check and see if her keys were still there, they weren’t.
Ryan held up her keys and let them dangle in his hands. “You shouldn’t keep your keys in the outside pocket of your purse, you know.” He put them in ignition and set the car into drive and took off.
“That, that little--”
“Rascal? Imbecile? Rat? Jerk? Idiot? Thief?” Daniel offered.
“All of them,” Katie sputtered.
Jordan just shook his head. “He’s gonna get himself killed one of these days,” he paused and then added, “And not come back to life.”

“Can’t this thing go any faster?” Ryan asked. He was already doing eight-five but the car didn’t want to go any faster.
“Hey,” Tim shrugged. “It is my sister’s car.”
“Maybe the car is made so you can’t speed,” Laz suggested.
“That’s stupid,” Ryan said. They were just coming to the Imperial Bridge, which looked unusually empty.
“Geez, where is everybody?” Tim asked no one in particular. “I’ve seen this place packed full with up to five hundred cars, and now I can’t see a single soul.”
“I don’t know, and I don’t care,” Ryan replied flippantly. “Let’s just get to the emperor; it just means that there’s less traffic, the way I see it.”
“Yeah, but you usually don’t see things very well,” Tim muttered.
“What are you talking about? I have 20/20 vision.”
“That’s not what I meant.” Suddenly, a cell phone started ringing in the car.
“That your cell phone?” Ryan asked.
“No,” Tim shook his head. “Mine was taken from me when I was captured.”
“Well, mine blew up in the car crash, so its not mine,” Ryan said.
“Not mine either,” Laz said.
Tim was digging through the car, trying to find where the ringing was coming from. “It must be Katie’s phone,” he said. “She must have left it in here.”
“Sweet, we can prank call all the people in her contacts list,” Laz shouted.
Ryan and Tim turned towards the back seat and gave him a look.
“Or not.”
Tim answered it. “Hello?”
“Hello Timothius Danaford, prepare to die,” a voice said, and then he hung up.
Tim looked at Ryan. “I really hope that was a prank caller.”
“And I really hope that’s just a normal police helicopter, minding its own businesses, but its not.” Ryan pointed to Black Hawk, flying ahead of them. All of the sudden, fire burst from the helicopter and a rocket flew towards them.
“Not again,” Laz groaned.
There was a huge explosion as the car blew to smithereens and then everything went black…

To be continued...

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