ONE BULLET
Chicago, Illinois
Justin spun around to see a man in an overcoat holding a shotgun. Justin pulled his gun and aimed. His armed locked up. Not again! The vibration in his spine took was harsher this time, almost painful, and it lasted much longer. He squeezed his eyes shut, and his back arched as far as it would go. Too far, actually; he fell over on his back. While his spine vibrated painfully, he could hear gunshots.
Then suddenly the vibration released his spine and his back relaxed and his arms loosened. People were running from the gunman in the overcoat. Green lay dead on the stairs, and two more people were dead on the floor. It was chaos. The gunman fired one more shot from the shotgun, hitting a woman in the back. He tossed the shotgun aside and pulled a pistol from his waistband.
Justin struggled to get up. His legs and arms felt like jelly. He glanced at his pistol; when the vibration had seized his spine, his hand had clutched, and it crushed the Glock .45. He drew the Vektor 9mm from his waistband and tried to get a bead on the gunman. Too many people were still running away, and he couldn’t get a clear shot. He pushed through the crowd towards the gunman.
***
Alan Richmond fired and shot a man in the back, and watched him fall. He had already gotten Green, but he’d take as many of this rich scum as he could. He fired three times at one man before he hit him and fell. That was four shots, and his pistol held eleven. Seven left. He fired blindly into the retreating crowd. Boom boom boom! Four bullets left, he told himself. He saw a man in a tuxedo pushing through the crowd holding a gun. He aimed at the man, and shot, instead hitting a woman in the arm.
He fired again, and missed, and hit another one of the frightened partygoers. He aimed straight for the head, bracing his right arm with his left, and fired. The man put his arm over his head, and a rip appeared in his sleeve. Alan thought that that would discourage the stupid wannabe hero and that he could make his escape, but it didn’t. The man kept coming.
Alan’s eyes widened and he raised his gun again, but he didn’t get to shoot. Three shots rang out, and blood spurted from his right arm, and he dropped the gun. He glanced up at the man running toward him, saw the cold determination in his face and started to turn-
BLAM BLAM! He felt the bullets enter his abdomen before he heard the shots. He fell to the ground next to his gun. The face of the man appeared in his vision. “You dirty bastard,” the man said. “I could kill you. I want to kill you. I really do. But I don’t do freebies,” he said. Freebies? What was this man babbling on about? Alan felt his gun against his arm. He started to reach for it.
“See,” the man continued, “you’ll probably survive. Providing you don’t bleed to death before the ambulance gets here.” The man cocked his head as if listening. “In fact,” he said, “I hear them now.”
Alan didn’t hear anything. He got his hand around the pistol grip. “I’ll just be going now,” the man said. The man turned around and walked off.
Alan raised the gun.
***
Justin heard the shot as he walked off. He turned around and grimaced. The gunman had shot himself in the head. In his line of business, he had seen death many times, and it never got any prettier, just uglier.
END ONE BULLET
"All around the world statues crumble for me..."
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