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jaywrites101 · 5 years

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The City In FreeFall; Chapter Three

When I woke up, it was thirty minutes past noon. SmashStone and his thugs were gone. And so was my wallet. Mac left a note on my face that read, be at the east side of Warehouse 15 by eight-thirty or you're a dead man. At least, I assumed it was Terry Mac who wrote it since I didn't think anyone else in the entire gang was capable of writing. Except you, a lingering sense of guilt reminded me.

The cigar hole in my chest still burned. My chest throbbed along dully until I tried to take a breath. It caught halfway and red-hot knives cut into my esophagus. I needed to go to a hospital… But there'd be no way a hospital would let me just walk out in a couple of hours… Besides… I… I wasn't finished being an absolute total dumbass yet…

I still had to talk with the BloodBlades.

This part of the plan was much less thought out than everything that's come before it… Somehow…

I had to make it into BloodBlade territory, find someone who wouldn't just shoot me at the first sign of my new "tattoo," and convince them to get to Warehouse 15 at the same time as the SmashStones…

The walk out of The Rock and back into BloodBlade turf gave me plenty of time to realize just how totally whiffed I was. Could I have still gone to the police? Yes. Did I?

You underestimate just how damned stubborn I can be.

No more kids in caskets, I told myself. No more kids in caskets. Every step felt like my bones were filled with lead. No more kids in caskets. Jerry's face at the visitation, so pale and porcelain. It was profane! No more kids in caskets. Did I have brain trauma? I passed Old Man Yin at his noodle shop. He looked at me like I was a nightmare. Dried blood running down my sides, No doubt he thought I'd been mugged… No more kids in caskets, no more kids in caskets! The BloodBlade hideout was plain as day. An old gym that closed down long ago. Was I really going to just walk in there? The thugs by the door just stood there in shock as I marched past them. NO MORE KIDS IN CASKETS!

"I demand to speak with Cutter!" I roared at the building. There were three fighting mats all lined up with people in and around them. My shout stopped them all in their tracks. I always did have a strong voice. Everybody in the room could see the hole in my chest, and no doubt every single one of them knew what it meant.

"The only way you're getting to see Cutter is an execution," a voiced jeered from the side.

"You're not going to live that long!" another thug exclaimed.

Someone pinned my arms from behind, while a dude with long silver hair came at me with a knife. In case you couldn't tell, BloodBlades love their knives.

“Oh wow!” you might be thinking, “Is this how you died the first time?” Nope! That's still yet to come! No, this time around I jumped back against the guy who had my arms and kicked the guy with the knife with all my might. I immediately dropped to the floor and lay there like a worm, too busy bleeding to death to really take note of the chaos that was exploding around me. Fun Fact: doing just about anything while one of your ribs is broken makes everything 100x's worse! Fighting for your life? Don't try that at home kiddos.

The silver-haired guy pulled me up by what was left of my T-shirt and shouted… something at me. My vision was getting kinda blurry. Whatever he asked, my witty response was to bleed on him.

Oh, yeah. Who's got the makings of a vigilante superhero? This guy.

Another guy dressed in grey sweatpants and a hoodie showed up and garbled something at Silver Hair. Next thing I knew, I was being dragged backwards through the gym while the others gawked at my broken body.

Side note, what is it with bad guys and dark rooms? Seriously! Don't they know torture rooms are completely unreliable? At best they were just putting me in a place where no one would hear my screa--on second thought everything checks out now.

The big guy tied my arms behind a chair and bound my legs for good measure. I tried not to panic.

Unlike the backroom at The Rock, this place had a proper ceiling over my head and charcoal grey drywall all around, so I didn't have to worry about Cutter just dropping in from above. But then again, I didn't get a good look at the room, so the iron door in front of me might not have been the only way in or out… but then again, again, if it wasn't the only way in or out of the room, why make the door out of iron?

I overthink pointless things like that. If I spent half as much effort thinking about my plan as I did about that small room I wouldn't have been in this mess in the first place. Bio101 was looking better and better each second…

After a short spell, the guy who stopped Silver Hair from gutting me returned to the room.

Tying me up so I couldn't move and then putting me alone in a room for a few minutes was, honestly, the best thing they could've done for me. Sure, they could've also left a hot girl in the room to nurse my wounds and make sure I had plenty of water, but this wasn't too bad all things considered.

My head had cleared up a little. The world wasn't black and red anymore, and I was able to hear when the door opened. My body was still screaming pain signals to my brain, yes. But I wasn't about to pass out.

"You've got a lot of guts coming here alone," the man said.

"Unfortunately I seemed to have left half of them back on 21st street," I joked weakly.

A swift smack to the face showed just how much they cared for humor in the BloodBlade gang.

"Do you even know who I am?" he glowered.

Everybody and their cousin knew what Cutter and SmashStone looked like. Those two had been running wild down in the Heap for years. This guy wasn't Cutter. But he clearly had some authority to keep ol’ Silver Hair from giving me a chest piercing. That could only mean the man before me was…

"Friday."

The man shook his head. "No, be thankful I'm not him. You'd already be in the ground if I was."

"Oh."

"I'm Seth Bridgess," he said as if it meant something.

I vaguely remembered a news report about Seth Bridgess, but I couldn't pin it down… until I could.

"Wait, you're just Cutter's drug pusher--" Bridgess stepped forward, his knife appearing in his hand like magic. "I-I mean--you're his drug kingpin. Ha-ha, yeah. Big guy, Seth Bridgess. The biggest drug dealer in the town."

Bridgess looked like I'd kicked him in the groin. Figures…

"Then I'm sure you know why I've left you alive?" he spit. This guy clearly had something going on behind the scenes… … But… I saw an opportunity.

"It's because of the second shipment," I said as casually as I possibly could.

Seth's face was priceless. "What second shipment?" Hook, Line, and Sinker.

I embraced as much of my inner coward as I could. It wasn't that hard, I had a lot of terror built up throughout today. "Oh, uh. O-of course not, you're k-keeping me alive because of… w-why exactly are you keeping me alive?"

"What second shipment?" Bridgess asked again, putting his knife to my throat for dramatic effect. It's a common misbelief that when someone holds a knife to your throat you can feel the knife against your skin. I didn't. What I did feel was a drop of warm itchy wetness that ran down my neck.

"I have conditions."

The knife at my throat twitched. It was a small movement, but enough to draw more blood. I felt pain now. A line of warmth at my Adam's apple that burned more the longer I waited.

"I want to be the one who kills SmashStone," I growled.

As I expected, Seth pulled his knife away. Bad guys are funny like that. Beg for your life and they'll just laugh as they kill you, even if it hurts them too. Tell them you want to kill their greatest rival? They'll give you a frickin weapon and let you walk out the door with it. As far as they're concerned, it's still a death sentence.

Bridgess peered at me suspiciously. What I said wasn't a lie per se. He could see it. But he was sharper than the usual thug. He had to be.

"SmashStone and his damned bricks are destroying this city," I claimed wildly. "I hate them! If they weren't tearing up the city, you lot wouldn't have had to steal from them--Jerry wouldn't be dead!"

"I get it," Bridgess snorted. "You're just a brat out on a revenge scheme. We get boys like you every other weekend."

I let go of another breath I didn't know I was holding. I tried to speak up again but Bridgess cut me off with a furious look.

"But no one. I repeat, no one walks in here with a SmashStone burn on their chest and leaves unscratched."

"But I hav--"

"NO ONE chooses BloodBlades as a second choice! You're playing with fire and now you're going to get burned. Twice."

"I joined the SmashStones to find out where the second shipment was." Seeing as how Bridgess didn't just skewer me on the spot, I took that as permission to continue. "It's high-grade Rock, like the first shipment. SmashStone always keeps half of the drugs that come through."

"Because he's a user," Bridgess interrupted. Everyone knew SmashStone was addicted to Rock; it's what caused his body to mutate so aggressively.

"Right," I said thinking quickly, "But he had some left over from the last shipment." It was a shallow excuse, but it was one Bridgess bought. He twisted the knife in his hand anxiously. Like he wasn't sure if he wanted to stab me with it, use it to cut my bonds, or stab himself. Now that I had a train of thought, the rest of the story came easily. "He has enough left over to feed his habit this month too. But it's bad. SmashStone's pissed! He wants to retaliate for the raid even more than he wants the money from this shipment."

"That's preposterous!" Bridgess spat. I was impressed. I hadn't thought he'd know the meaning of the word, let alone correctly use it in a sentence.

"It's true! He's giving the whole shipment over to his boys tonight at ten. They'll be marching here to pull this building down brick by brick before eleven."

Bridgess punched the drywall. His hand tore right through it. "Over my dead body."

"Probably," I noted. Bridgess glared murderously. "I mean, probably--if I didn't know exactly where the second shipment was and when it was unguarded."

"Unguarded? How? Where?"

Hook, line, and sinker, I thought again.

Out loud I said, "Warehouse 15. You guys have caused more damage to them than you might think. Half their boys are out of commission and they've been forced to only post one guard during daylight hours."

"How--"

I cut him off for once. "I'm the guy assigned from nine to ten. The last chance for you and your crew to really put the hurt on SmashStone."

Seth Bridgess looked like he'd found religion. He made a show of distrust, much like Terry Mac before him, but in Bridgess' case, it was just the motions. He was halfway out the door before he remembered that I was still tied down in the room.

He neatly flicked his wrist and the knife was at my bonds. It was a casual move, one he obviously didn't plan on, because his hand jerked to a stop mere millimeters away from granting me my freedom. It was clear, even in the moment, that some part of him was conflicted.

This was a dangerous moment for me. Technically, Bridgess had everything he needed for the op. I wasn't necessary. But on the other hand, if things went wrong and I wasn't alive to take the blame, Cutter might just shift that blame.

"If I don't show up to my shift--on time--at nine o'clock the SmashStones will know something's up."

Bridgess hesitated. Whatever train of thought he had was shaken. "That's not enough." His breath washed over me, stinking of cigarettes--and something else. At the time I couldn't place that something. But it was a scent I would soon become intimately familiar with. I smelled almonds on his breath.

"If I take this to Cutter he'll cut me. I need something damn good to tell them before they'll trust you."

Just like before, I held the goon's gaze. I thought hard about Jerry. It hurt so much to think about my friend. The only white kid in the Heap. Out of all of us, he alone had a chance to make good on his promise to escape. The rest of us would need a miracle. I was looking right at the guy who probably lead the raid on the SmashStone drug transfer. If hate were a flame, I had enough fire to burn Bridgess alive. No more kids in caskets.

"You have what you need," I told him. "There's only one thing on my mind. I'm going to kill SmashStone."

Bridgess let his knife fly. My bonds came loose and I slumped in the chair. My arms were weak. I'd already lost so much blood. My breath was ragged. My lungs couldn't have hurt more if I'd gotten a faceful of fiberglass dust.

"Thanks," I grunted. "Take this-take this information straight to Cutter. You'll need everyone. Have everyone there on the west side of the warehouse by eight-thirty. When nine o'clock rolls around, it's all yours."

Bridgess bobbed his head several times. "One more thing, kid."

I started to ask what it was, but before I'd even opened my mouth, Seth Bridgess poked his knife into the burn on my chest and twisted. For the second time that day, I screamed bloody murder.

"The pain. You take that, and you walk outta here with it. And just remember, if you back out now, there's much worse we'll do to you before we kill you."

I don't think I answered him. He shoved me through the door where I stumbled and fell. The other members jeered and threw red Solo Orbs at me. The Orbs are just some kind of mouth-sized seaweed compound that replaced plastic cups after the Great Corporate War. The company died along with the rest of them, but their name stuck around for some reason. Anyway, the Orbs didn't hurt too bad when they hit, but they did burst open like water balloons and drench me in various sports drinks.

I made it past the goons. The daylight struck at my eyes like a lance. My eyes burned even as I blinked about a million times to try and get them to adjust.

"Good luck kid," one of the guards murmured as I passed him. I couldn't tell you who it was, I never found out. As out of it as I was, I couldn't even tell you what the guy looked like.

I'd been through hell. There was only one place I wanted to go now. Home. And fortunately for me, the place would be empty.

#The City In FreeFall #new #superheores #fantasy #current wip #StreetTeam

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