by Kyle West
“If we’re going to L.A, we’ll be passing your home, won’t we?” I asked.
Anna nodded. “Last Town is right on the way, guarding the pass into the city. Last time I saw it was when the Reapers took over for good, and they laid it to dust. I hear they’ve rebuilt it, though. It’s a fort now, and all the trade has to go through there to make inside L.A.” She sighed. “It’ll be hell trying to take it down.”
From the south came the roar of approaching engines. I looked in that direction to see a dark cloud of dust advancing toward us.
“Marcus,” I said.
We both stood, walking toward the approaching bikes. As they drew close, I saw that something was off. More of them had left this morning than four. I could swear it.
“Only four are coming back from that patrol,” Anna said. “At least six or seven left, right?”
I waited a moment, just to be sure there were fewer Exiles returning. Without doubt, there were only four coming back.
“I’ll get the others,” I said.
I ran to Odin. We were in for some bad news.
***
As everyone on Odin ran down the boarding ramp, Marcus and what was left of his patrol walked up to the base of the ramp. Marcus hadn’t been away so long because he had been trying to avoid Char. He had been fighting for his life.
“Crawlers?” Anna asked.
Marcus shook his head. “The Reds. They ambushed us in west Vegas, and we didn’t have time to react. They took out Flex and Wedge. We gunned it back here, and they chased us a good way.”
Makara’s face darkened. “Wait. You were attacked by the Reds?”
“Yeah.”
Marcus’s clothes had somehow become tattered during his escape. His men stood beside him, silent.
“They just shot at us,” one of them said. “No warning or anything. They want a war.”
“They just attacked, for no reason?”
Marcus shook his head. “They might have thought we were attacking. We were just scouting, though. We never wanted this to happen.”
“The Reds have always been more violent than the others,” Michael said. “Why do you think Elijah didn’t invite them to the summit? There’s an agreement where the entire west side is theirs. But the east, that’s for the rest of the gangs. That’s where the water trucks are.”
“They thought you were attacking,” Anna said. “That must be it.”
“We can’t stand for this,” Marcus said. “They killed two of my best men! We’re down to just twenty three now, and...”
“Marcus,” Makara said.
Marcus quieted, and looked at Makara. She stood for a moment in silence, commanding his attention.
“You’re right. I cannot allow this to go unpunished. If the other gangs get wind of this, they’ll think us weak if we just let this happen. We’re going after them. Tonight.”
Everyone turned to look at her, unbelieving at first.
“Are we really going to attack them?” I asked. “Shouldn’t we be focusing on other things?”
“No,” Makara said. “Like I said, word of this will reach the gang lords by tomorrow. I want them to know we don’t take this kind of thing lightly. We attack them, let them know not to mess with us like this. We’ll take Odin, load it up with our best men, and go. Raider style.”
Char smiled, and Marcus made a fist. For a moment, the two brothers’ eyes locked. It was the first time they had looked at each other with anything other than hostility since they had gotten here.
“If you think this is the best move for the group,” Samuel said, “I won’t stop you. You’re the leader of the New Angels. As long as this doesn’t interfere with the main mission, I can get behind it.”
I looked at Samuel, unbelieving. Was I the only one who thought this was a bad idea?
“We can’t be serious about this,” I said. Everyone turned to look at me. “We can’t waste more men and bullets on this. Leave the Reds to the Blighters. We’re getting out of here in a few days, anyway. We need to be preparing to leave this place behind.”
Makara looked at me, weighing my words. Anna was quiet, and I could tell that she wasn’t sure what to think. She was a Raider, at least by association, so she at least knew of their culture for retribution. When a rival gang pushed you, you pushed back twice as hard.
Makara heaved a sigh, then turned to Michael.
“Michael, what can you tell us about the Reds? Numbers? Weaknesses?” She paused. “Where they hell are they, even?”
“Well, they’re a large gang, led by a man named Lucius. They have a lot of territory, and are very possessive of it. They are mainly on the west side of town, in the suburbs. They have their own farms and slaves, separate from the rest of the Vegas Gangs. They are probably as strong as the Kings.”
“If we took them out, would anyone inside miss them?” Makara asked.
Michael shook his head. “Most of them would be glad. Only Jade and the Diamonds have dealings with the Reds. Contracting slaves, that sort of thing.”
“That settles it,” Makara said. “They’re done.”
“Settles what?” I asked. “We can’t just attack them. We’ll lose a lot of men. We can’t get drawn into a war when we’re already in one. This just makes us weaker to the Blighters.”
“Alex, let me explain something to you,” Makara said. “Marcus is one of us. One of us got attacked. If we do nothing, we appear weak. The Reds, right now, are probably preparing a defense. We have to hit them before they’re ready. If we leave them be, they’ll be a thorn in our side. You think they aren’t going to leave Vegas when the rest of us do?”
That gave me pause, because it was something I hadn’t considered. The Reds weren’t to be trusted, and having them picking on us while we were on the run was a very real threat.
“Besides,” Makara said, “making an example out of the Reds will make the other gangs think twice before crossing us. I’m not proposing an all-out attack. Just a fly-by in Odin. Some guys on the ground taking some easy shots. Should take five minutes.”
“Seriously?” I asked. “It’ll take longer than that.”
Everyone watched as Makara and I faced off. She didn’t have me convinced. It just surprised me that I was standing alone. Anna looked at me, wanting to support me, but knowing she couldn’t. She agreed with Makara.
“I’m behind whatever you decide,” I said to Makara. “You are the leader of this gang. I just think this won’t be as quick and easy as you think.”
Makara stared at me. She hadn’t changed her mind, either.
“She’s right,” Char said. “I know how men like Rey and Grudge think. We must go after the Reds. And the sooner, the better.”
Marcus stared up at his brother. Up until now, I had not seen them speak to each other. For a moment, it looked like Marcus was going to say something to Char. If the two brothers would end up on speaking terms again, it would almost be worth going after the Reds. For some reason, though, it just felt like the wrong move.
Marcus turned to Makara. “I will lead the assault. Lucius and the Reds will not live to see the morning.”
“We’re not committing to an all-out war,” Makara said. “Just a fly-by. We’ll need everyone on the attack.”
“An all-out war is what you’ll get if you do this,” I said. “Whether you like it or not.”
Makara clenched a fist. “I need you to follow my orders, Alex. I am not messing with you. I’m in charge here, and this is my decision. Is that clear?”
I was doing all I could not to yell back at her. “Is this how we run things, then? Remember, if it weren’t for me, this wouldn’t exist. It was my idea to put you in charge. You better listen to me, Makara. I know what I’m talking about.”
“You do? I don’t think so. You’re just some sheltered Bunker kid who doesn’t know how the world really works. Leave the war and politics to me, Char, and Marcus.”
“Both of you,” Samuel said. “That’s enough.”
&
nbsp; Makara looked at me, her eyes still angry. Though Makara could be harsh, sometimes it was just too much.
She calmed. “I’m...sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.”
“It’s true, though,” I said, quietly. “Maybe I really don’t know what I’m talking about.”
“Come on,” Marcus said. “We can’t worry about hurt feelings. We need to organize this attack, and do it right now.”
Makara looked my direction. I could tell she felt bad. I could honestly say I preferred her feeling angry.
“Everyone, on the ship,” she said. “And Alex. This won’t be a war. You’ll see. This is just saving face. That’s it.”
Marcus’s expression told me it was more than that, but accepting Makara’s lie was just a way to save her face. It was stupid. She had put me in a position where I had to accept her decision, or be a jerk.
“Whatever,” I said. “If we’re going to do this, we do this. I can point and shoot as well as any man. I just don’t have to like it.”
“That’s fine,” Makara said.
She sighed, clearly not happy. What she had to realize was that we couldn’t get bogged down talking about my emotions. Emotions happened, and they made a mess. We had to ignore it, at least for now. More important things were at stake.
I looked from Makara, to Marcus, to Char, and finally, to Michael. I couldn’t believe how quickly this was all happening.
“They have their HQ in this large office building,” Marcus said. “I saw them park a lot of their bikes out there. If we raid that thing, we can deal a lot of damage.”
Makara was only half-listening to Marcus. She looked to me instead.
“If not attack them, what do you suggest, Alex?” Makara asked.
I could tell it pained her to say that. I just wished she would stop. She wanted an out, wanted to give me a chance to think of something better. I could come up with the perfect solution, right now, and it wouldn’t change a thing. Everyone looked to me, as if my opinion mattered. It didn’t. I’d already heard the truth. Makara was in charge, end of story.
“Honestly, I have no idea if there’s anything we can do,” I said. “I just think it’s a bad idea to make a decision in haste...especially one that will cost lives.”
“We’re already in this, kid!” Marcus shouted, his face red. “I don’t care what anyone here says. I lost two men tonight. The Exiles go, with or without help.”
“Marcus,” Char said, arms crossed, “you need to stand down. You’re not in charge, anymore. This is still an open question. Let the kid have his say.” He looked at me, and nodded. “I’d say he’s well earned it. We need to listen to skeptics.”
Marcus’s face, once crimson, was now pumice-gray. He was so angry he could not find words. His cold blue eyes gazed at Char, murderous.
“I’m not taking a counterattack off the table,” Makara said. “I just want to hear all of our options. We can’t ignore members of this group who disagree. That’s not who we are. What I said earlier...it wasn’t true. I don’t want anyone to think I’m not willing to listen.”
I shook my head. “I’ve already said what I’ve had to say. Do with it what you will.”
No one said anything for a while. During the deliberation, many of Char’s Raiders and Marcus’s Exiles had made their way closer to the ship in order to hear the plans.
“This gang is pathetic,” Marcus said. “You were all ready to avenge one of your own, until this kid whines about not wanting to get his hands dirty. If you’re in a gang, you get your hands good and bloody. There’s no other way to run a gang. Otherwise, you’re just in a club.”
Disgusted, Marcus turned from the ship, leaving us in silence. I had no answer for Marcus. Maybe the New Angels weren’t really a gang, at least not in the traditional sense. All the same, I couldn’t think of any way to solve the problem the Reds had caused without violence. Maybe I was just being petty. Besides, the Reds wouldn’t understand anything but violence. Violence was the language of the streets. If we didn’t learn how to speak it, we weren’t going to make much of an impression.
“I’ve made my decision,” Makara said.
We all looked at her. This time, I said nothing. Looking into her eyes, at that sense of resignation, I knew what she had decided. And I hated the fact that we would have to kill again. I didn’t want to kill, but there was no way to avoid it. It was easy to point my gun at the crawlers and Blighters. Those things had no souls. It was harder to point your guns at living, breathing people, even if they were the ones attacking you first.
Makara turned to face everyone, distant Exiles and Raiders included.
“We will attack tonight.”
The Exiles and the Raiders, who had once been staring each other down, now looked at Makara, their faces blank for a moment. Then the men broke into smiles.
Maybe attacking was bad in my book, but if it got the Exiles and the Raiders to stop hating each other, maybe it was worth it.
“If we’re really doing this, we have a lot to go over,” Michael said.
Marcus nodded, his expression relaxing.
“We can make our plans in the ship,” Makara said. She looked out at the crowd. “As for the rest of you, suit up. We’re leaving in two hours.”
Several of the men whooped and cheered as the rest scattered for their tents. I watched as everyone went to the ship, not quite ready to join them. It still felt wrong. We were focusing on petty vengeance rather than the end goal – and everyone was just falling into line. Maybe, like me, they didn’t agree. Makara had a lot of weight on her shoulders. She had a lot of hard decisions to make. She could be wrong, but she could be right, too. Who was I to say what was right or wrong? The lives of thousands of men, both within the city and without, both inside the New Angels and outside it, depended on a nineteen-year-old girl. It was insane.
I sighed, and walked to the edge of the bridge, staring toward the east. It was the direction of the Great Blight. The sky was dark with night, and I couldn’t see much further than a few blocks of buildings. I almost wished the Great Blight would attack, as crazy as that sounds. It would get us focused on shooting the Blighters and not each other. I shook my head. We were doing this stupid attack because Marcus was dumb enough to ride into the Reds’ territory. Did every life demand more blood to be spilled? Would it really be seen as weakness if we did nothing, and kept doing what we were supposed to be doing? I didn’t understand the gang mentality. This attack made us no better than Rey, Grudge, or any of the lords we had met this afternoon.
I was just one voice, though. Makara wouldn’t listen to me when everyone else was already behind her.
“You coming in, or what?”
Anna joined me at the railing. She looked into my face, but I just kept staring out.
I turned to look at her. “Do we really have to do this?”
“It’s looking that way.”
“I don’t understand why. That’s what makes it so hard.”
“I don’t understand, either.”
I turned to her. “Then why are you just going along with it?”
“I’m not sure how I feel about it. I can see both sides. When you see both sides, you just go where the momentum leads you.”
“I’m fighting the tide, then.”
Anna nodded. “That was brave. It’s hard to stand up for what you believe in, especially to your friends.”
I shook my head. “I was just saying how I felt, because I feel like this is the wrong choice. I know this is going to bite us in the butt.”
“Maybe it will. At this point, though, we all just have to along with it.”
“I don’t want to be any part of it. This isn’t right.”
Anna was quiet for a moment. “You can’t control everything, Alex. Sometimes...sometimes you have to do things you don’t agree with. That’s the way the world is. It’s messy.”
I was beginning to think Anna was right.
“You can’t control everyone,” she went on. “I’
ve made lots of mistakes in my life. Mistakes that have led to men being killed. It’s a lot to put on a seventeen-year-old.”
I laughed bitterly. “Are we really so young?”
Anna said nothing, reaching for my hand. She was smiling.
“It’s not the end of the world,” she said.
I smiled, gesturing out to the Great Blight. “Actually, it kind of is.”
Anna rolled her eyes. “You know what I meant. Come on. Let’s go inside. Makara needs to know that you support her, even if you don’t agree with her.”
I nodded. “Whatever she decides, I’m there, for better or for worse.”
“And Alex...”
I looked at her. She squeezed my hand.
“I’m here for you, too. Alright?”
I smiled. “Alright. I’m not going to let you guys go without helping out. I’m a New Angel, too. Even if we disagree on some things, we always have each other’s backs.”
“Come on, then,” Anna said. “We’re missing out.”
Chapter 13
Over the next hour, we made our plan of attack. We were going to attack by both air and land – Marcus and the Exiles from the south, the Raiders from the north, and Odin from the sky. The ship would fly silently through the night, and drop each group off north and south of the Reds’ HQ under cover of darkness. The HQ, according to Marcus, was a tall office building, maybe fifteen stories high. Once the Exiles and the Raiders were in position, they would open fire, hopefully drawing some Reds into the open. Odin would then fly down from the air and do its work.
It sounded positively bloody.
When the ship was loaded with the attack team, about two dozen Raiders and Exiles, the New Angels’ inner circle were situated in the cockpit, ready to take off. I didn’t feel any better about it, but I was behind my team, even if I felt the team was doing the wrong thing.
I just hoped we wouldn’t lose too many men. Once the attack was over, Odin would rush to the rescue of the Raiders, who would be on the north side of the HQ. They would have a harder time escaping because they would be cut off by the building, meaning that they needed to be picked up first. After the Raiders were extracted, Odin would pick up the Exiles, who would be falling back to the south before the Reds had time to regroup. The Raiders numbered twenty, and the Exiles about ten. Only the best were selected, and the rest were staying behind to hold down the fort.