Chapter 14 Part 3 – Call for Obstruction

So far, Barry has signed his soul into servitude to Satan on Earth. He is a courier, transporting some unknown cargo between Denver and Trinidad, Colorado. He desperately wants out of his contract, but his boss Margery, a demon, will do anything to get the drivers to do what she wants. So Barry has decided to be the good employee, hoping to find a way out of his contract. Only there are missing drivers and warehouse workers, and Margery expects Barry and Vern to step in and do all the work and train all the new drivers she just hired, leaving him no time to snoop around the warehouse. During the second run, tornadoes attach all the vans and new drivers, but Barry manages to get out of his van before it’s scooped up in a funnel cloud. After Barry falls down a steep embankment, Vern comes to his rescue. Barry is badly hurt, but as he climbs back up the hill he finds that he’s healing at a miraculous rate, and his eye sight is now perfect. Vern reminds him he’s immortal and should be happy because he would have never lived after the fall.

The Courier Series is about Barry White, a twenty-something computer geek with an overbearing mother, no prospects of finding a girlfriend, and an unemployment record that’s made him pessimistic he’ll ever be happy.

In Call for Obstruction, Barry has just lost his fourth jobs in the past year due to corporate downsizing. Desperate for employment, he jumps at the first position he’s offered over the phone, driver for OTG Courier Services. Shortly after meeting his new boss, a tiny yet fiery old lady named Margery, she coerces him into signing a questionable employment contract he soon regrets.

The Courier was originally written as a twitter novel @TheCourierNovel in 2009, and the same year it won the Annual Textnovel Writing Contest. Later parts of the story are still tweeting.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

W. J. Howard lives near Denver and writes horror, fantasy and sci-fi with a bit of comedy mixed in. Wendy is also the Co-op Manager for Visionary Press Cooperative, leading an innovative way to publish.

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Inside Vern’s van, the stagnant cigar smell makes me choke. He must drive the same van day after day, because fast food bags and cups are scattered everywhere. And why would he have toys from kids’ meals covering the dashboard. The guy sure has a sweet tooth, because there’s a big bag of candy on the console and wrappers thrown everywhere.

“Don’t they clean the vans?” I ask him while wondering if my fingers are sticky to the touch from tree sap or the yellow tar mixed with at least three years of dust that coats the interior.

“I don’t want anyone messing with my stuffs.” Vern pulls back onto the highway.

“Did we lose all the vans again?”

“Yep.” Vern takes his eyes off the road and stares at me. He can’t seem to sit still in his seat. It’s like he’s waiting for me to say something else. “Aren’t you curious how tornados happened to snatch up all the vans but mine?”

I humor him. “Yeah, sure, what happened?” Otherwise he might pester me for the remainder of the drive.

Vern sits up straight and proud, and points his thumb into his chest. “It was me. I gave ‘em up.”

“You gave ‘em up? What’s that supposed to mean.”

“I found the hex Marge puts on the vans and I gave it to the traitors.”

“Those white warrior things? Why?”

“Well, besides Margery pissin’ me off this morning, there’s something else you should know.”

“Wait.” I throw up my hands. “I don’t want to get involved?”

“Too late, kid, but I promise you’ll thank me when I tell you. I’m even bettin’ you’ll want to help me.”

I look at my watch. Three more hours of drive time—or two considering the way Vern drives. I force myself against the seat back and brace myself for whatever Vern has to tell me, figuring I have no other place to go. “Okay, spill it.”

“Remember what I told you about the traitors taking the vans over twenty years ago?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, I gave ‘em up the last time too.” Vern pauses, waiting for me to comment. When I don’t, he adds, “We’re close again. Real close to opening the Gates of Hell.”

“Opening the gates? Of Hell?” I choke out.

Vern nods. He’s got a huge grin on his face. “Yeah, kid, of Hell.”

“Wait a second. Why would you stop the gates from opening?”

“Simple. Drivers get no special treatment when the Gates of Hell open. We’re damned along with every other human on Earth. I, for one, don’t want to have to pay for my sins. Do you have any idea what they do down there to punish guys like me?”

“Like what?”

Vern points at a picture of a young girl, around seven or eight, hanging from the dashboard.

“Your granddaughter?”

“No.” Vern sniggers. “She’s one of my girlfriends.”

There’s an uncomfortable silence in the van while I try not to vomit.

Vern finally asks, “You going to say something?”

“I’d rather just kill you.”

“How about you say you’ll help me?”

“With which one? Finding little girls to traumatize or sabotaging the gates opening?”

“Maybe I’m a pervert, but Margery told me what you’re capable of doing.”

“How is it you and Margery know more about me than me?

Again there was a long silence between us; again Vern breaks it. “Listen, kid, I don’t care what you think of me. All I care about right now is stopping the gates from opening. So either you’re with me or against me.” He takes his eyes off the road and looks at me. “What’s it going to be?”

Talk about being between a rock and a hard place. Either way the world’s screwed, but stopping the Gates of Hell from opening seemed the lesser of two evils. “I guess I’m with you.”

“Good, kid,” Vern punches my arm. “Did you hear that, Marge? The kid’s with us.”

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