Jake ‘Edge’ Walker
Jake was just sopping up the last of his eggs with a piece of toast when a big man swung around the corner of the booth and dropped heavily into seat across the table. Jake eyed him with a practiced glance and saw danger but no immediate threat. He was as wide as Jake was thin, long grey hair and beard was permanently fixed in a 60 mph blow-back. He studied Jake with quick beetle-black eyes while he finished his breakfast.
The old biker wore oil-slicked jeans, a battered pair of large engineer boots and his old dirty denim riding vest was covered with pins and run-patches. The patch over his left chest pocket named him ‘Road Man’ but Jake didn’t recall where he had seen him before, so he swallowed the last of his coffee and chewed the grounds while he studied Road Man’s face. Hard black eyes above a mangled nose, a thin-lipped mouth that had a scar from the right corner that swooped up in a pale jagged line towards his ear before it disappeared into his wind-swept beard.
Jake leaned back in his seat pulled out a pack of smokes and offered him one. They both lit up and continued to stare at each other through the smoke, the younger man sizing up the older. One corner of Road Man’s mouth quirked up in a parody of a smile, he crushed out his smoke, nodded slightly and muttered “Yeah, you’ll do fine.”
When a prickle ran up the back of Jake’s neck, he casually dropped his hand into his lap. His Colt 45 was nestled in the waistband of his Levis and his thumb raised his shirt so the butt was almost in his hand. His eyes never left the old biker’s face and the smile there had now expanded into a twisted and terrible semblance of a grin. His missing teeth and scarred mouth gave him the semblance of a manic Jack-o-lantern with unholy eyes and Jake took a firm grip on the butt of his 45.
“Take yer hand off that hog-leg, ya can’t kill me that way… It’s been tried before, kid. I been watchin you for a few days now and I think I’ve found the right man for the job.” Road Man’s quiet voice was the sound of shifting gravel in a deep metal bucket; his words were slurred slightly from the scar and lack of teeth. His strange black eyes bored into Jake and he slowly reached into his leather jacket and carefully pulled out a knife and laid it on the table.
It was a dagger about a foot long, red-black non-reflective metal and the handle was wrapped with an old battered red leather thong. There were faint carvings on the blade and tang and Jake could swear he heard whispering coming from it. He sat, staring at the blade and images rolled across his mind like a movie screen. Horror movie was closer; the images were vivid and drenched in gore. Screams echoed in his mind and were getting louder and he could smell blood. His heart was beating faster and he was starting to gasp out loud like he had been running.
The old scarred biker laughed suddenly, picked up the knife and returned it to his jacket. “Ya think Red is bad, Blue is even worse and Black? Well, let’s just say they never see it coming. How could they? Can’t see nothing when you’re knocked out eh?” He laughed again and stood up. “Come with me kid, we got a lot to talk about.” He flipped a $20 on the table and walked out of the diner without a glance backward.
He was sitting on an old ratted-out Panhead dresser and he kicked it to life when Jake climbed on his bike. Jake followed Road Man out of town; they were headed to the lake and it was late afternoon on a sultry hot Southeastern summer day. Most folks were starting to pack up and leave, they didn’t even glance at the two bikers as they rode to a deserted camp spot. The old biker climbed off his Pan and walked slowly to the edge of the water, where he just stood and stared at the horizon.
“I’m gonna tell ya a story and I don’t give a rat’s ass if ya believe it or not. Everything I’m gonna tell ya is the God’s-Honest truth… well, don’t know ‘bout the God part cause sometimes it feels like it’s Good… other times, well you’ll just have to figure it out for yourself.” He turned and stared hard at Jake.
“When I was 59 years old, I ran into an old banged-up, broke down biker that told me a story. A tale that I couldn’t believe, I thought that old bastard had banged his head too many times. Well, they say ‘Seein is believing’ and what that old rat-bastard showed me… well, I guess started believing. Ya know, there’s a lotta weird shit out there kid and THIS is one of ‘em.”