Louis, being still two weeks shy of his twentieth birthday, had never known what it was to have his blood pressure skyrocket. But later on in life when he did have hypertension issues, he would always refer back to this moment as the first time he felt so much stress that he could hear blood and heartbeats hammering in his ears.

And that, of course, was when the truck pulled upland boxes both of the other cars into the nice, tight space right in front of his guard shack.

#

“Roosevelt, dammit, just give me access to the network! This is me talking, the guy who paid off your mortgage, remember?”

“I do recall that, and I’m quite grateful, sir. However, the terms of my employment are very clear: your peers have voted you out of the level of authority that grants you access to-”

“Shit,” Henry mumbled and switched off the comm. This was going to take a bit of doing…

He turned the comm back on again. “Roosevelt?”

“At your service, sir. I fear we were cut off earlier.”

“Yeah, whatever. Look, can you at least tell the others what the situation is right now? They aren’t answering when I try to raise them.”

“Ferrying messages between the members of the team is most assuredly within the parameters of my employment agreement. What shall I tell them?”

“That I’ve gassed Prime and I’m pinned down by the lady with a couple of six guns.”

“I- yes, sir. Very good sir. Will there be anything else, sir?”

Henry was about to answer when a small chunk of the wall exploded just six inches above his head. “You got five minutes left to get me mah money, boy! Or the price o’my silence goes up by a zero or two!”

Henry had never killed except in self-defence, or perhaps in defence of an innocent life. Or perhaps what he considered justifiable vengeance. Or maybe... well, no. But right now he was coming closer than he’d ever come to thinking that maybe, just maybe there’d be a justification here or there to taking the life of an extortionist like the lady who was barely twenty feet away from him…

“An just in case y’all ‘r gettin’ ideas in that gook head o’ yours, if’n you try to rush me, that space between us is a long, long way when I got a total of twelve barrels I kin empty on yuh. Quite a bit ‘o damage I kin do, if even one bullet slips through the armor you’re wearin’, innat right? Mebbe I might poke inta your guts, and you’ll be walkin’ around with a shitbag stuck on your guts for the rest of your life, like Airman gots. Or maybe I’ll tickle your spine some, and you’ll be pushin’ wheels on a wheelchair like the Silver Skull did after he took that fall. Issat what you want, Darkie?”

Bitchy, old, racist piece of shit, Henry thought. But she was right in that there was no way he’d be able to close that distance before she got off a bunch of shots at him, and one of those just might do the kind of damage she was talking about. How much longer before Prime woke up? Or until Roosevelt found someone who was willing to help bail Henry out of this jam?

His com link lit up, hot pink- Gladiatrix on the line.

“Hello?” he said quickly, after opening the channel with a touch on his belt, “Hello, Neela? This is Dark. I’ve got a situation-”

Stolen novel; please report.

He stopped when he heard the laughter on the other end. “Oh, do you now?” she said on the other end. He heard Streak say something else faintly in the background, and the whole room erupted in guffaws.

#

“Look, everyone, it’s gong to be a couple of minutes before I can-”

“Look, mac, we gotta delivery here and a schedule to keep! Can you let these two goons in so’s I can get drop my load and get tot he rest of my route?”

“Uh-” Louis was trying to remember where the day’s delivery list would have been- difficult at best with the screaming kids and dad from one car on his right and the slightly younger fellow in his late thirties getting out of the car that just smacked the family man’s sedan just getting out of the vehicle.

“Wahhh!” screamed the kids.

“Look, man, my bumper’s been crumpled, on your property! Can’t you just let us in for ten minutes, maybe? Just to the gift shop?”

Another kid screeched.

“C’mon, mac! I gott a schedule to keep and a family to feed anna job to keep! All I gotta do is drop off this exercise equipment for your guys and I’ll be gone. I been here before in the morning when the other guy’s been here, I’ll be in an’out, an’...”

“Louis Enkandu?”

Louis looked at the new voice- it was the driver of the Crown Vic. Glasses, just starting to lose his hair.

“What?” Louis said, the stress coloring his voice.

“You are hereby summoned,” the Crown Vic driver said, slapping a piece of paper against Louis’ chest and walking back to his car.

“WHAT?!?” Louis yelled as he dropped the paper to the ground and picked it up, unfolding it as Miguel and the three younger kids from the gym kept up the lelling on his left side and Jake took the cheap cigar out of mouth and yelled on the right side. “Hey, take it up with the judge,” the summoner said. “I don’t type these things up; I just give ‘em to guys like you. Now, couldja let some of these guys through, so’s I can to my next-”

“You ain’t goin’ nowhere, mon, until I get your insurance for the wreck you put on me and my boys!”

“Aw, you kiddin’ me? That was just a bump! And it was ‘cause of those guys behind-”

“An’ those guys are me, and he wants ta drop off the delivery, and I can’t until you guys move forward!”

Now there were four men arguing with each other and Louis, al shouting.

Louis hadn’t been trained for this eventuality, and no one was answering the phone.

“Look, just let us through; we’ll circle around and get outta your hair,” said the dad, the kids still screaming in the back seat.

Louis saw the sedan, Crown Vic, and the Delivery van bunched up like crap in a blocked toilet, and then looked down at the very real-looking summons in his hand. For the first time since taking this job several months ago, he thought about walking off the site- the cardinal sin for any security guard, and a sure-fire way to get terminated.

No one was answering the phone, still, and there were even more folks bunching up behind the van now- legitimate people whom he recognized and were on his daily list of deliveries and-

What the hell.

“Okay, guys, look, I’m gonna make a judgement call here, alright? Sir, you take your boys to the gift shop, here’s coupons for action figures for all three of them, since your tour was cancelled today. Sir, you just turn in a circle and head out. And you guys, with the delivery? Back around the side and then to the left. The loading docks are there, and you’re going to be their problem at that point. Okay, you guys, everyone understand?”

Louis pushed the button under his desk, and the long arm of the gate rose into the air.

All four men stopped arguing, pausing only to give each other dark looks, and drove onto the site.

Louis breathed easy, and began looking forward at the drivers behind the cluster-fuck of people that now filed out and left his gatehouse quiet again.

He enjoyed that peace for the next fifteen minutes, until the dozen-or-so cop cars, paddy wagon, SWAT team and police chopper descended on him like the embodied minions of the wrath of an angry police-god.

#

TO BE CONTINUED....