What used to be a middle school at one point in time, for nearly ten years now had sat as an abandoned husk, forgotten by society except as an eyesore, slowly rotting away in a field overgrown by the forces of nature. The exterior of the building was crumbling, many of the windows had long since been broken by neighborhood children and the crumbling brick walls were covered with gang and satanic graffiti. It had served over the last decade as a make out destination for local teens, then as a drug den and crack house before it finally changed ownership to its current residents.
As the group approached, signs of activity became apparent everywhere. There were several cars parked on one side of the building, though the parking lot had largely been overtaken with grass and was now just patches of seemingly disjointed concrete, it appeared as though the section had once been where the teachers of the school had parked. Though the yellow lines had long since eroded away that would have divided such things, a few leaning signs remained in the ground in front of long narrow concrete parking stops. There were also lights shining out from inside some of the windows on one side, like a beacon to anyone paying attention that someone was indeed here.
The group of friends was well versed in dealing with the various Chicago gangs, having spent their entire lives in the Southside of the city. The Vicelords, Gangster Disciples, Almighty Black P Stone Nation, Latin Kings, Spanish Cobras and even the Mexican Mafia, which Mario and Carlos always claimed their older brother was a member of, but they all started to become acutely aware as they approached the building that none of them had any experience with Jamaican Posses.
As they hit the side of the building and went flat, they all smelled the bitter twang of marijuana drifting out from inside the building. Nate smiled.
“Dude, these are my kind of assholes.” He whispered. The rest of them shushed him quickly.
Carlos was the first to reach a window, which was positioned higher up, so that he had to stand on his toes to peek in. He saw an empty classroom, being lit by a few battery powered lights and a few candles. The inside of the room had been stripped of any furniture that it had once held, and there were now only strange symmetrical patterns and geometric graffiti symbols on the walls. Most of them seemed to be patterns of circles connected by lines and triangles.
“Empty.” Carlos whispered to the others.
The rest quickly moved on, passing two dark windows before finding another lighted room. Jermaul, with his basketball player height and composition, was the first to reach this higher window. More strange graffiti patterns were scattered across the room. Circles and crosses and many hearts, though none of them made any sense as far as gang signs or anything of that nature that he could tell. This classroom was also devoid of furniture besides a few dirty mattresses and candles on the ground.
“Empty.” He announced.
“Psst.” Mario nodded his head to gain their attention.
Inside the blackened room next to the one Jermaul was looking in, he had found a few people sleeping on mattresses and a threadbare old couch. No signs of captives or women, so the group eventually moved on.
They could see through the rooms in several cases where the hallways looked empty enough. There were no patrols or a large amount of activity going on, so it looked safe enough to go in for a closer look. And that’s exactly what their brave leader Nate eventually did when he crawled inside a busted-out window into a dark classroom.
“I’m thinkin’ they’re huddled inside the gym or music room or something big like that.” Carlos whispered to the others.
Jermaul went next, and the others waited for the first two to creep around a little, make their way to the door and listen for any trouble. After a few minutes, they gave a sign to the others and the rest climbed through the window also.
“I still bet these fuckers got guns. I wish you weren’t such a fuckin’ pussy about changing into your rat monster.” Mario whispered back to Deacon, who was taking up the rear with him.
“Shut up. Zoe said it was a Tasmanian Devil. If I could figure out how I did it the first time I’d change back and bite you.”
Carlos laughed. “Haha, that’s what I was going to say, bite me.”
They moved inside the hallway and began traveling down the darkened corridors single file. At one point they reached a four-way intersection. One of the paths ahead they could see the roof had collapsed, and most of the hall was barred with debris, the other two ways seemed clear.
Though the group had been friends and together since elementary school, there were three main cliques within the group that followed racial makeup, and they naturally paired up accordingly. Carlos and Mario were the first group, Jermaul and Ian were group two, while Nate and Deacon represented the poor white boys. In this case however, to make things even, Nate threw up a few hand signals and split the blacks up. Jermaul went with them while Ian went with the Mexicans. These also were natural divisions that occurred sometimes while hanging out naturally for the group, as Jermaul was one to sometimes go against his social norms and culture, especially musically. While it took nothing away from his love of rap music, he, unlike Carlos, Mario and Ian, sometimes liked to enjoy heavy metal music, and was especially fond of Guns N’ Roses and Metallica on occasion.
Jermaul naturally took the lead, being the fastest and most athletic of the group, and they went left while the others took the right-hand hallway. As they moved closer to the center of the crumbling building, they eventually found some administration rooms.
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“That’s where yo white ass belongs right there.” Jermaul turned back to the two white boys following him, his wide charming smile overtaking his face as they passed a room that still had a rusted plaque hanging next to the door that read “Principal.”
“He was always in more trouble than me.” Nate responded. “Deacon was in the office so much they had a doormat that said home sweet home rolled out for him.”
“I just got caught more than you. Hey, what about the time you called the gym teacher a ‘faggot’?” Deacon countered.
“Yeah, I did get in some trouble for that. But Coach Wisnewski was a little suspicious, you have to admit.”
“Muthafucka was always tryin’ to get a peek at someone changin’.” Jermaul agreed.
They continued past the principal’s office and came to the cafeteria. It was so dark at this point that they could barely stumble through the hallway. But once they got to the cafeteria, they noticed some bright lights coming from within. Jermaul peeked inside one of the open archways that led inside, and he came back with widened eyes.
“They growin’ weed in there!” He blinked a few times and whispered excitedly.
Nate peeked through the open doorway and saw this for himself. There were rows of cheap card tables set up with the plants growing underneath powerful UV lights. Moving between the tables, there were several men that seemed to be overseeing the operation, or guarding it, or perhaps both. They stumbled about in a drunken manner that seemed off-putting to the others, and Jermaul finally pointed out something that Nate had entirely missed. They were chained by their ankles.
“Who dat den come to my chambahs?” Came a deep voice from inside the darkness. “Come dem closah.”
The friends froze on the other side of the doorway. There was no way that they could have been spotted just from a brief peek inside. They exchanged a glance between them to make sure that none of them had simply imagined the voice that seemed to be speaking directly to them.
“You dere. You ‘ear me now. I see the tree of ya over dere. Come into da light me bruddas.”
Deacon stood up and walked into the doorway. There was no use hiding now.
“Are you the new gang in town that everyone’s talking about?” Deacon asked bluntly.
A dark black man was seated on a ratty old armchair on one side of the room. There were a few dim lights shining behind him which cloaked his face in shadows. Deacon could only see the outline of a thick tangle of dreadlocks, a torn overcoat and a line of thick smoke drifting up from where his face should be. The smoke in fact hung heavily in the room, like a thin smokescreen, further obscuring the view.
“Wah gwaan little duppy conqueror. Ya got a lot of bravery ‘n ‘eart come in ‘ere yuh know. Look at ‘cha now, all tough like a proper ragamuffin not skeered of nuthin’.” He shifted in his chair to get a better look at the young man before him. “Dem nots no gang white boi. We call dem Posses were we from. Gangs are fur dem low-life unorganized street trash. We da One Order Posse, and we gone take ovah dese ‘ere streets ya ‘eard?”
“Yeah, I hear you just fine.” Deacon shifted uncomfortably. He could clearly make out several dark shapes behind the seated speaker and could see the outline of AK-47s that at least three of them were gripping tightly.
“Now tell me den, what bring you ‘ere to da shadows of my domain white boi? You foolin’ wit’ powers ya don’t understand.” The man had a powerful charismatic voice with a certain compelling factor to it that was hard to place.
“I’m here on behalf of a friend. Not looking for trouble. We’re looking for her friend. A young girl named Ava.”
The seated speaker took a drag from a thick cigar that did not smell like tobacco. As the end of the stogie fired bright red, he then broke out into laughter that the men standing behind him quickly joined into. When he stopped laughing abruptly, so did the others.
“An’ who tol’ ya now dat ya might be findin’ ‘er ‘ere wit’ da likes o’ us?”
The man stood up from his chair. He was immediately tall. The young cabbie had to blink twice just to make sure his eyes were not playing tricks on him, because it looked like the shadowy figure grew as he stood with some supernatural force.
Deacon had not realized until the man stood up, but he was unbelievably tall and thin, like something out of a horror movie. Standing this far across the room, anything he might have thought would have only been a guess and could have been influenced by the creepy lighting and smoke in the room, but judging by the other men behind him, Deacon had to guess the man was seven foot tall, maybe more. He began walking casually towards Deacon while the others stayed still like eerie human statues.
“Some people told me that you guys might be able to help find her.” Deacon replied coyly.
“And who dis be dat tell ya dese tings? Dese people dat you speak about? Tell me boi.”
“Some gangsters from a club.” Deacon replied sheepishly. “Italian.”
The man slowly creeped ever closer, something about his smooth, fluid movements reminded Deacon of a long snake. Finally, he stepped inside the light from a dozen or more candles flickering on the edge of a table. Deacon fought the urge to back away as he approached and when his face was revealed by the shimmering light, he fought the urge to gasp.
The man was charismatic for sure, but his eyes were missing the colored irises, and were instead milky white with a single black dot for pupils. They looked like a dead man’s eyes and had no business on something upright and speaking. The main portion of his face was covered in grey ash while dark rings remained around his eyes and cheekbones, and a dark black scar shaped an “X” on his forehead. There were a few patterns of white dots on his face that reminded Deacon of some African ritual paint.
“Dem ganstah now, dem be da Italian goombahs? De same ones we been killin’ all over de city fer weeks?”
“One of them mentioned that there might be some issue between the two of you, but that doesn’t matter to me. I’m just looking for the girl.”
“Well now little boi, ya tink these ‘ere gangstah men might be pullin’ a leg now? Ya tink dey maybe want ya to come aftah dey enemies?” The man before him closed his fingertips together, like some shady old James Bond villain. He was in a state of motion, and even after coming to a stop, looming over the much smaller cab driver, he continued swaying back and forth, again the image of a snake came to mind. “But de real question ‘ere is, why dey send you mon? Just a little man barely able ta see ovah da countah now?”
The tall man puffed more on his cigar, and blew the smoke all around Deacon, who stood unmoving. He leaned into Deacon’s bubble and sniffed him. Deacon caught the whiff of his musty dreads and weeks old smoke coming from his clothing.
“Ah but I see now dat something is different about ya mon! I sense a special powah from in ya. Maybe dat’s why de udders sent ya ‘ere.”
The man put his hand up to his mouth and blew dust into Deacon’s face, faster than he could react to avoid it. He was at first angry simply because he didn’t want dust on him, but as the man stepped back and began laughing, Deacon realized that there was something far worse about this than getting dirty. He felt light-headed and woozy, and his body suddenly became nonresponsive. His legs turned to jelly and suddenly, they could not hold his weight. Deacon fell to the ground, looking up at the strange Jamaican and as the edges of his vision began to go black, he knew that it was probably a worse decision to come here than he had previously predicted.