Fanfiction : Music : Mos Eisley : 3

3: Drive-Thru
8:15 AM, Thursday

John leaned against Chad. Gazing up at his friend, John met with caring eyes.

"You all right?" Chad murmured.

Mud caked the navy cushions surrounding and beneath John.

"Yeah." John gave Chad a crooked smile. "More appreciative of breath now."

Chad grinned. He slipped an arm over his friend’s shoulder and gave him a squeeze.

Hazy rays played across the faces of the three in the back seat of the car. Flea stared out the window, watching as the sun ascended into the sky. Guard rails and the occasional car raced across his field of vision. He turned to the others. "Maybe," he whispered to Chad, "we could make a sign. Put it in the window. To say we need help."

Leaning toward the bass player, Chad breathed, "We don’t have anything to write with."

"I’ll write in blood."

"On what though?"

Flea sighed and returned to monitoring outside activity.

"Do you think Anthony’s okay back there?" John hissed.

"I don’t like all that whispering back there!" their bulky kidnapper announced from the driver’s seat. "Now dry up!"

"Just wondering if Anthony’s okay in the trunk," John replied evenly, wiping dried clay from his fuzzy chin. "Like is there enough air? And what about carbon monoxide poisoning? I read that..."

"I don’t give a sh** what you’ve read!" the driver snapped. John shuddered.

"Um... he, he might have a point there, Lloyd," Josh stammered from in front of John. He leaned forward and adjusted his glasses. "Should we take any chances?"

"He’s not going to die!"

Lloyd’s flabby arm lay across the side of the door, auburn hairs across it dancing in the breeze. He leaned over it and spat out the window. "D’we have any coffee left? I’ve got this sh*tty taste in my mouth."

A dark green thermos glinted in the newly risen sun as Josh held it in the air. "No, you drank the last of it about an hour ago."

Lloyd smacked the thermos out of Josh’s hand. It flew into the back seat and landed at Chad’s feet. The three Chili Peppers looked down at it before returning their attention to Lloyd’s foul expression.

"We could stop at a Waffle House!" Josh’s arm extended out the window, pointing to a blue highway sign. "There’s one at the next exit."

Rubbing the sweat off his upper lip, Lloyd shook his head. "Drive-thru is better. Takes too long at Waffle House. Besides," he thrust a thumb into the back seat, "I’m not sure you can handle these guys on your own."

"They’re locked in!"

"If it were just you," Lloyd sighed, reaching for the glove compartment, "they could overpower you, with or without a gun."

Josh glanced into the back seat and shrugged. Turning back to Lloyd, he said, "I could get the food then."

"Probably screw up the order."

Flea leaned toward Chad. "Got anything sharp?" he breathed.

The sedan glided down the exit ramp, and Chad turned to Flea.

"What the hell are you planning?"

"If we do drive-thru," Flea whispered, raising his eyebrows, "the cashier girl’ll see us." He stared at Chad, who shook his head. "Ask John if he does."

"Flea," Chad hissed, then closed his eyes. "You’re not writing in blood. There has to be another way."

Chad scanned his surroundings. The floor of the sedan was amazingly clean, no lint even. His eyes traveled across it to a mud patch, in which John’s sneaker-clad feet rested. All over John’s side of the car, mud painted everything. John sat amidst it, his head propped on his hand as he gazed out the window. His eyelids drooping, his head sagging. Mud all over his face...

Mud...

Chad’s sights whirled to Flea, who was gnawing on a cut near his thumbnail. "Write in mud!" he breathed. Flea looked up and was greeted with a huge smile.

"Mud?"

Chad turned to John. He elbowed his friend in the ribs. John jumped in his seat and glared at Chad. "What?"

"Take off your flannel."

John raised an eyebrow. Shrugging, he undid the buttons of his shirt. He slid it off his torso, revealing a T-shirt beneath. The T-shirt, once completely white, now sported a dark brown ring around the collar.

As John handed the muddied flannel shirt to Chad, the sedan pulled into the parking lot of a McDonald’s. A six foot statue of Ronald McDonald beamed at them by the side of the building, standing in a permanent wave. Besides Ronald, the parking lot was deserted.

The sedan pulled up to the ordering booth.

"Welcome to McDonald’s!" a tinny female voice crackled through the speaker. "May I take your order?"

"Just a minute!" Lloyd hollered. He turned to Josh and murmured, "I’m getting them all hash browns and water. What do you want?"

"Coffee and an egg mc’muffin."

"Okay," Lloyd turned back to the speaker. "I’d like..."

As Lloyd ordered, Flea spat. A trail of saliva dropped from his lips and sunk into the sleeve of John’s flannel. He rubbed it with the shirt tail and held the sleeve to the window.

"Would you like an apple pie with that?" the crinkly voice asked.

Lloyd leaned out the window. "Does apple pie really go with breakfast, darling?"

"Um, well...," the voice replied. "Um, no, sir."

Flea pressed the sleeve to the left side of his window.

"Don’t forget to write mirror image," Chad hissed.

Shifting the sleeve to the right, Flea wrote his message backwards:

KIDNAPPED
CALL 911

The sedan drove around the corner of the building, to the drive-thru window. Flea lowered the flannel and handed it back to John. He gazed upon the face of the cashier. Her red McDonald’s cap was tilted to the left. Blond wisps of hair hung over her face, the rest pulled back in a long ponytail. Her stormy eyes darted about, glancing from the bags of food, to the cash Lloyd held out the window, to the drink dispenser beside her, to her cash register. Without looking, she accepted the money from Lloyd. Coins slipped from her fingers, clinking to the pavement. Lloyd swore and unlocked his door. He bent over to retrieve the change. The girl leaned out the window, holding out her palm. She caught sight of the mud message, at the desperate eyes watching her, wide and scared, and she accepted the change from Lloyd. Furrowing her eyebrows, she threw the change into the cash drawer. She scratched her head as she grabbed the bags. She handed them to Lloyd. As she grabbed the drinks, she looked into the back seat. She smiled when she saw John.

"Have a nice day!" she handed the drinks to Lloyd, then waved to the three staring at her from the back seat.

Flea sighed.

Lloyd pulled into a parking space. He dug in the bag, his eyes watching Josh. "Go throw this in the trunk, will ya?" He tossed the hash brown to his partner. Handing over a water, he added, "And let him have a few sips of this before we get going again."

Josh hopped out of the car. His door swung shut behind him.

A bag flew into the back seat, plopping into Chad’s lap. "Eat up!" Lloyd thrust three McDonald’s cups at them, and they each accepted one.

Flea was gulping down his water when Chad elbowed him. Lowering the cup, he asked, "What?"

"Wash the mud off your window!" Chad hissed. His hand was in the McDonald’s bag. Flea dumped water into his hand and rubbed fiercely at the window. The mud spread further, covering the entire surface.

The front passenger’s door opened, and Josh sunk into his seat. The sedan backed out of its parking spot and slid onto the road.

Chad took John’s flannel and exchanged it for a hash brown. John squeezed his breakfast, watching oil bubble out of the rough potato exteriour and drip down his fingers. He scrunched up his nose and tore off a dime-sized piece.

The sedan got back onto the highway.

John gulped down his first piece of hash brown and immediately went for his water. He glanced at Flea, vigorously working at wiping away the mud, then at the seat in front of him.

"Is he all right back there?" John called to the front seat. "Is he okay in the trunk?"

"He’s fine," Josh replied, drumming his fingers on the dashboard.

"Did you ask him?"

Swiveling in his seat, Josh glared at John through thick lenses. "What, did you expect me to ask?" Out of the corner of his eye, Josh caught movement. He turned toward it. "’The hell are you doing? Why’s there mud on your window?"

Flea froze, holding his breath.

"What’s going on back there?" Lloyd exclaimed, glancing over his left shoulder, glaring at Flea. "’The hell... what are you doing?"

Flea stared back.

"Damn you! Were you ..."

"Lloyd! Watch out!" Josh exclaimed. Whirling around, Lloyd saw the bumper of the Jeep coming up fast. He slammed on the brakes. The sedan squealed to a halt in the middle of the highway, hurling its occupants forward. The sedan grinded to a halt mere inches from the Jeep. They barely had time to sigh when an SUV rammed into them from behind.

"F***!" Lloyd cursed. Yanking the steering wheel, he flew into and soared down the brake-down lane.

Josh held his hands to his temples and shook his head. He readjusted his glasses. Then glanced to the rear of the car. "Oh sh**! Pull over!"

"Can’t yet!"

Flea swiveled in his seat. His stomach dropped. Jagged-edged blue metal, crumpled like discarded paper, stuck out by the rear window. "Anthony."
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