George (Two)

Sat on the Vanguard's roof, my coat off. Even this early in the morning, it was nice and summery. Moon was a big waxy coin hanging above my head. Since the metro closed a while ago, even the drunks were home, or at least passed out in the gutter. You could hear a few cats once and a while, maybe a car backfiring, but mostly it was real quiet. Kinda like one of em black and white movies when they still cared about story, not special effects.

Thing is, I couldn't just go chasing down a bunch of Diablo slobs, then take em into the precinct. Coulda just been a big joke by another gang, frame the Diablos cause someone went and smacked around someone else's kid brother as a joke. Kids got real smart these days, pulling dame tricks like that.

Every so often, I'd walk around the roof, look over the side. People never look up when they're walking, never look down at your shoes. Never really look left or right either, unless you're a pretty dame. People just walk around without looking, or seeing, or anything.

Didn't notice anything until maybe 3 AM. Heard it first, like a bunch of snakes hissing mad at the snake trainer, and someone playing craps and rolling them over some cardboard. I looked over, and it was a few punks wearing orange sweatshirts, orange sweatpants, spray painted orange shoes. They were giggling, playing around, getting sloppy, slobs in training. If they weren't Diablos, they were doing a great job pretending.

I drew Joan, ran downstairs. Didn't feel quite right, running without my trench coat flapping, but at least I moved faster. You could still hear me, though. Hard for an old slob like me with shot knees and no suttle teas to move quiet [Subtlety. I'm unsurprised he can't spell it, though I am amazed that he would even think to use the word in any fashion. -Dara].

They were still spraying when I came around the corner, pointed my gun in between all of them, told them to stop. One of the punks winged his can at my head. I threw up Joan to block it, and the can bounced off and away. Punks scattered like roaches in the sunlight.

I'd already sank six cups of coffee, and only 2 shots of bourbon a while back. Felt like I was on fire, that it'd be the easiest thing to just chase em. Jackhammer in my chest wanted to crack it's way out of my chest when I started really running.

Went after the punk tried to clock me, his hood flapping behind him like a rabbit's ears. I knew I wanted to grab it, real bad. He was gonna learn what it was like to be the rabbit at the greyhound races.