Chereads / The Wailing Piano / Chapter 64 - 64

Chapter 64 - 64

By the time the pursuing truck catches up, you are on rising ground, cruising up a slope while the desert floor to your left drops away into a narrow, deep wadi that gets more and more canyon-like the farther you drive. Bullets from the soldiers' rifles ping off the armored plating that clads the rear of your Kübelwagen, whistling past your ears.

But you do not allow yourself to be distracted. Stilling your breathing and focusing fully on aiming your revolver, you line up the driver's head in your sights and squeeze the trigger.

Despite the bullets whistling past you, and despite the wild bumping of the truck, your aim is true. The bullet hits right in the driver's forehead and propels him backward; then he slumps forward onto the wheel, dragging it to the left.

The pursuing truck starts to veer left toward the edge of the plunging canyon. The two soldiers in the back realize their danger and lean forward, desperately trying to rectify the truck's course. The passenger seat is empty: if you hadn't already killed that soldier back at the Bull's Horns, there might have been another person in the truck who could have gotten it under control. But as it is, the soldiers in the back can do nothing to avert their fate.

To the accompaniment of the soldier's screams, the truck careens at high speed off the lip of the canyon, plunging into the abyss. You sneak a look behind you to see it crash, upside down, into the valley floor. Its wheels are still spinning futilely amid the kicked-up dust. That takes care of that!

Your truck speeds on, away from the Bull's Horns, clear of any pursuit.

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