Free The Vets (Stephen Leather Thrillers) by Stephen Leather Page B

bucks.”
    “But this isn’t fair,” said Pimlott.
    The man peered at Pimlott through the dark lenses. “You implying something by that, College Boy? Are you implying that maybe I’m not up to it? That the fact I’m short a hand makes me less of a man than you? Is that what you’re saying, College Boy?”
    Pimlott felt his cheeks go even redder and he shook his head. “No, it’s cool. You wanna play, I’ll play.”
    The man smiled and clicked his claw again. It sounded like some huge insect. “Good,” he said. “That’s real good.” He used the claw to put a “Closed” sign over the hole in the window and locked the door behind him. Pimlott followed him to the video machine where Suzanne was waiting anxiously. He badly wanted to check to see how much cash he had in his wallet but didn’t dare risk it.
    On the screen in front of them pictures of enemy soldiers flashed up, followed by brief descriptions of their weapons and the terrain that lay ahead. Then the screen cleared and a series of initials and numbers flashed up and began scrolling. The numbers on the left represented the ranking of the players who’d been on the machine that day, the score was in the middle, and to the right were the initials of the players. The results scrolled up to the top to show the top ten players since the video game had been switched off. Pimlott’s initials, JRP, were in third place, alongside his all-time record score. Suzanne’s were in eighth place. First and second place were taken by someone with the initials LC and both scores were about 100,000 ahead of Pimlott’s. Pimlott had never seen LC in action, but the initials regularly headed the rankings and the guy was obviously an expert. He placed his pile of quarters next to his gun and began feeding them into the machine.
    The vet tapped the glass screen with his claw and Pimlott looked up, startled.
    “Maybe I should introduce myself,” he said, grinning evilly. “The name’s Carmody. Larry Carmody.”
    Pimlott looked at the man’s leering face and at the initials on the screen. “Oh fuck,” he said. His stomach churned as he realised that there was no way he could even hope to match the man’s score.
    “Are you ready, College Boy?” goaded Carmody, holding the barrel of the machine-gun with his claw and caressing the trigger with his other hand.
    “Ready when you are,” replied Pimlott, trying to sound confident as he put the remainder of his quarters in a pile on top of the machine. Then he had second thoughts and handed them to Suzanne and asked her to feed them into the slot when necessary.
    “How about you pressing the start button, little lady?” said Carmody, hunching over the gun.
    Pimlott nodded at her and she hit the button. A swarthy colonel appeared on screen to deliver his briefing and Suzanne stabbed at the “two-player” button to go straight to the game. Pimlott began spraying the screen with bullets and letting fly with grenades, his eyes wide as he breathed heavily through his nose. Suzanne put her hand on his shoulder but he shrugged it away.
    Carmody’s technique was more measured and economical. He fired in short bursts of three or four bullets, used his grenades only when faced with a group of enemy soldiers or heavy armour, and when he wasn’t firing he centred his sights on the middle of the screen. His score quickly moved ahead of Pimlott’s.
    “Come on, College Boy, you’re not trying,” Carmody hissed.
    Pimlott ignored him and lobbed a grenade at a lone sniper. He had the satisfaction of seeing the soldier explode in a cloud of blood but then four heavily armed men leapt out of a tree and when he tried to throw another grenade he discovered he was out, he’d used them all up. He tried frantically to swing around the machine-gun but he wasn’t fast enough and took several hits before he mowed them down.
    “Bad move, College Boy,” sniggered Carmody, taking out a large snake curled around the lower branch of a tree