Page 144 of Antihero

Tension pneumothorax.

When the Goliath had slammed him onto the road, the impact must’ve torn a hole in the lung. The opioid muffled the pain, made it hard to gauge, but the slow onset of pressure meant the tear was tiny. Tiny was still a problem since it created a one-way valve that pumped air into the pleural cavity between his lung and the chest wall. The air was trapped there, expanding with every breath. It would continue to compress the lung until it collapsed and he suffocated.

Fingers to his neck, he gauged his heart rate. Already increased, north of eighty.

“What is it?” Anca asked. “Are you okay?”

His breathing had quickened. His blood vessels would be compressing now under the pressure. Dots of static invaded his visual field. He exited the expressway, coasting through a few green lights. The wheezing intensified, the lung leaking air. It felt like there was a balloon inflating behind his chest plate.

He did not have much time.

Anca was leaning over the console now. “We have to get you to a hospital.”

“… can’t go … hospital…”

“You were just at a hospital.”

“… for … you…”

“This is ridiculous. You can’t—”

“Anca.” He managed to say it hard enough that she stopped. “… no time … discuss.” Screeching off the road, he pulled into the gas station they’d stopped at on their way to the meeting. The Mercedes skidded artfully, missing the pumps and slotting neatly into a parking spot to the side of the convenience store. “… not an option…”

“Okay,” she said. “I get it. What then?”

He unbuckled the seat belt, drew in a shuddering breath. “Help me … inside.”

53Let the Countdown Begin

They were sitting on benches in one of the city’s pocket parks but Taz couldn’t remember where exactly they were. His head itched. Under B-Roll’s supervision, he’d spent the morning setting up their White On Posse vendor account at RedLite so they could run their own show.

Things were fucked up, though. The platform had gone down hard, some kind of massive cyberattack. As a new vendor, Taz had gotten corporate emails saying that a buncha their old content and backups got wiped and folks everywhere were freaking out since the vids were seriously gunked with viruses so if you downloaded or watched anything it’d Swiss-cheese your hard drive. He stared at the latest email, claiming that RedLite was rebuilding from bare metal.

“Dunno,” Taz said. “Mebbe we shouldn’t…”

“Shouldn’t what?” B-Roll said.

“Dunno,” Taz said. “Dunno.” He drew in a breath, added meekly, “Mebbe we should, like, just chill for a while, let all this shit blow over.”

B-Roll grabbed the phone out of his hand, scrolled a bit with his thumb. “No, man. No. The upshot is RedLite needs a ton of new content and fast. Says so right here. And I got that Blanca chick scheduled for Friday so that means cha-ching.”

Mikey said, “Me and Finn-Finn got two more on the hook, lining ’em up for next week.”

Taz held out his hand for his phone and B-Roll pretended to give it to him, pulled it back. Did it again. The third time, Taz managed to snatch it.

B-Roll turned his focus to Mikey. “What’s with Dirty Pete?”

Mikey said, “Can’t reach him.”

“What’s that mean?”

“Dirty Pete runs on Dirty Pete time,” Mikey said, with that evil Big Mikey grin. “He’ll call when it’s done.”

Taz’s phone chimed. Now a text from RedLite. He read it, that sick feeling crawling back into his stomach.

“What’s it say?” B-Roll asked.

Taz shrugged.