Flashback

The boys pulled their balaclavas down. Val hated the smell and feel of wet wool against his face. At first it seemed like absolute darkness—Val could see nothing at all and a sudden panic made his bowels go watery—but then the light through the rain slits in the closed metal panels filtered in and their eyes began to adapt, at least to the point where they could see one another’s dark shapes standing there. Val sensed someone next to him—Monk?—and felt the other boy’s arms and body trembling hard with terror or anxiety.

Coyne shoved and pulled until all eight of them were piled in as close to the rebar grating and steel panels as they could get. By straining their heads and necks forward through the grate, they could get a glimpse outside through the six tiny slits. The youngest boys took turns at their two slits.

When Val peeped through he thought his heart was going to race itself to death. There were already people and automobiles out there, although the prime parking spot just ten or twelve feet from the storm sewer was still open and empty. The sound of voices, traffic, shouts from the reporters and photographers, and a general crowd buzz seemed to be all around them despite the barriers of concrete and steel. All the other times they’d been here, all the hours they’d spent cutting away parts of the rebar grating and making sure the key Coyne had would actually unlock the swinging cover panels, 2nd Street had been empty and the bit of late-night traffic on Grand Avenue had sounded far away.

Now it was all here.

What the hell had they been thinking? Val knew that it had been a boy’s fantasy up to this point—playing pirates in a cave with real guns—but this was real.

“Coyne,” Val whispered. “We can’t…”

Coyne hit Val in the face with his closed fist. Val went down heavily, the Beretta still in his belt. He felt the strange, squarish muzzle of the OAO Izhmash flechette-spewer pressing painfully into his cheek. “Shut the fuck UP, asshole,” hissed Coyne. “Or I fucking swear I’ll do you here, now, rather than later.”

Flechette guns, Val knew, made little noise, not much more than a whooshing sound. Coyne might risk the noise to… no, Val realized with a sickening lurch of absolute certainty, Coyne was going to risk being heard by killing Val right here and now. With that flood of certainty came the twin realization that Coyne had always planned to kill Val here, this night. Maybe Coyne planned to kill all of the flashgang members before the shooting was over.

Val’s Beretta was in his waistband, under his hooded sweatshirt and flannel shirt, and before he could fumble it out in the darkness, he heard Coyne ratchet back something on the flechette sprayer—a safety, most probably. The next sound he heard would have to be his last…

“He’s here!” shouted Monk. “The limo’s here.”

“What?” whispered back Coyne. “Too early. Another three minutes…” Their leader had obviously been watching his expensive watch.

“He’s getting out!” shouted Gene D. There was no attempt to stay silent now.

The padlock was unlocked, the chain off, and now six of the boys stumbled over themselves reaching for the four-foot-long pieces of rebar they’d propped against the wall under the sewer opening. These short metal poles were the way they’d practiced swinging the steel panels open in the early hours of the morning, with Monk or Dinjin outside and ready to run forward and push the doors back in place.

“It’s him!” screeched Sully at one of the slits. “Omura!”

“Shut up! Shut up!” whispered Coyne, but it was too late to control things now. Events were creating themselves.

At least the OAO Izhmash wasn’t aimed at his head any longer. Val took a breath and began crawling away, slithering on his back toward the darker areas yards away from the opening.

The boys had practiced pushing the panels open smoothly, working together, but now they were banging and prodding almost at random, rebar against flat steel. The panels screeched, scraped, began to open. Light from streetlamps, car headlights, TV lights, and photography flashes flooded into their tunnel and almost blinded eight pairs of eyes that had adapted themselves to near-total darkness.

“Shoot! Shoot! Shoot!” Cruncher was shouting, fumbling to pull back the hammer on his heavy .357 Magnum.

“No, wait, wait, wait!” shouted Coyne.

What does he have planned? Val wondered dumbly. Whatever it was, he couldn’t wait around to find out. He stumbled to his feet and ran toward the curve in the sewer tunnel.

“Fucker!” screamed Coyne and fired the flechette sweeper at him.