slammed on the gas, and they would be ready to defend against another 180, but he had another idea in mind.
He let go of the steering wheel, checking the alignment of the wheels. The Audi ran true, straight up its lane, with no pull either left or right.
He set the cruise control for ninety, and the car began to slow slightly, and then he grabbed his backpack and put it in his lap. He removed the M320 and loaded it with an HE round one-handed but left the rest of the bandolier of grenades, along with the other gear inside the pack. He unhooked one of the shoulder straps just as a fresh string of gunfire from behind him tore into the front passenger seat.
The men after him were having trouble keeping their aim steady at these high speeds, but they were closing on him faster now, and it would not be long before they couldn’t miss either the tires or, if they chose, the back of his head.
Court wrapped the strap over the steering wheel, then reclasped it to the backpack. He put the pack down between his knees. It hung from the wheel, keeping it extra steady with its weight.
He let go of the wheel now and checked the Audi’s trajectory, adjusting the pack once to realign the vehicle with the center of the lane just after rocketing past a slower-moving Toyota.
More gunfire raced up the road on his left, tearing asphalt, just as an oncoming car flashed by to his right. Court unbuckled his seat belt, lowered his seat back, and pulled himself rearward into the back, careful not to disturb the backpack that had taken the wheel of the speeding sedan.
Still more rounds impacted the rear of the car. Court imagined they were close enough now to where they were trying to shoot out the tires, and he thought it likely the Audi would run off the road if they did so.
He reached into the front passenger seat, pulled the M320 back to him, and then spun around to face his pursuers.
The old silver Mercedes was there, in front of him, just forty or so yards back. Two men hung out of it, both with submachine guns in one hand while they held on to the door frame with the other. Court recognized Kent from the hallway of the hospital, leaning out of the front passenger side.
Both subguns flashed, and bullets slammed into the Audi, forcing Court down to the floorboard, but the second they stopped he rose back up, balanced the M320 on the rear seat back, and pointed the muzzle at the center of the Mercedes. He raised his aim an inch, accounting for the high trajectory of the weapon, and then, with no further hesitation, he pulled the trigger.
The launcher bucked in his hands.
The high-explosive round left the M320, passing through the already shattered rear window, arced back up the highway forty yards, then penetrated the windshield of the oncoming vehicle. It detonated, and the explosion ejected both men hanging out of the windows onto opposite sides of the road.
The silver sedan’s gas tank detonated. It drove on like that for fifty yards before skidding hard to the right, running off the road and rolling end over end for twenty-five yards through an uncultivated field.
Court was thankful, but he held his applause; he was in the backseat of a car with no driver, racing towards traffic at ninety miles per hour and, just as he started to move back to the front seat, he heard the telltale thump thump of a blown tire below him.
He dove forward through the seats and turned off the cruise control, then directed the vehicle out of the oncoming lane.
He climbed back into the driver’s seat and pulled a U-turn, racing on the flat tire back to where Kent lay in the road.
Court skidded to a stop next to the still body, climbed out, and ran up to him. He saw that Kent’s right leg was all but severed at the thigh; blood poured out of his ripped pants leg.
Kneeling down, Court began running his hands through the man’s clothing.
“Hang on. Don’t you fucking die! You better not die, dude.”
Court found what he was looking for. He pulled Kent’s phone out of a front pants pocket and examined it. It was an iPhone 8, which caused him to look back up to Kent’s face. It was white as a sheet and his eyes were slowly rolling back into