by Steven Ormosi
Kelly waved goodbye to the last of her clientele and poured herself a beer. Her planning board would be here soon and she was none too happy with them about the way that the mayoral race had been panning out so far for Ed Jenkins. With a week left, most of the polls they had been taking were too close to call and she needed her horse to win. Hell, everyone did, most of them just didn't know it.
Ed had almost everyone important on his side. His biggest obstacle was a fairly entrenched loan shark who had a lot of the poor and desperate people of the city in his pocket. He went by Billy the Kid because, well, his name was Billy and he always kept an ancient six shooter on him. Kelly was not fond of him and even less fond of the fact that Donovan had convinced the dirtball that he would be second in command of the city if Ed Jenkins lost this election.
Kelly was refilling her glass as her crew walked in with the usual swagger, grunting, "Evening boss," as they strolled up to the bar.
"Get yourselves a drink and sit down, we have some things to discuss," Kelly nodded at the taps.
Her guys settled in at the long table in the corner as Kelly locked the door. "So, why are we here?" She asked.
Her right hand, Perry, spoke first. "To be honest Kel, I have no idea. I think we've done a great job with your boyscout and--"
"Let me stop you right there, Perry," Kelly interjected, "Ed Jenkins is a good man. I admire that, and just because we don't always do things his way doesn't make him a fucking boyscout. How about you do the job I told you to do and don't give me a million excuses about how a guy who is probably this city's best shot at getting out of the stone ages any time soon is too honorable to win a goddamn election. We need him." She swept her finger around the table. "Each one of you needs him. He can bring us all together. He's our fucking George Washington, ok? Now I don't want to hear any more about how well you've been doing until our poll counts have that scumbag Max Donovan eating dirt. Understand me?"
They nodded and spoke in unison, "Yes, boss."
"Okay, sound off. Who's working the north side of town this week? What's our status there?"
Derek spoke up "I've got the north, we're running into pockets of Billy's guys doing some hard campaigning at the shops along Bristol St."
"Well you make sure that they know they're not on their own turf over there and give them the message tomorrow morning. We've got a damn week left before the election, people, we need to keep Donovan's goons in check. Just because you're not hustling bodegas for protection money anymore doesn't mean you're not allowed to bust some skulls. I need results on this, make it happen."
"You got it Kelly."
"Sunny, Al, how are we looking in the marketplace?"
Sunny spoke up, "We're about 50/50 in there, boss. Donovan keeps walking through, telling people that your boy Jenkins is trying to close down the bazaar. The smarter ones don't believe him, but a lot of people are pretty stupid. I think Jenkins needs to put in some face time there. Talk to the people about how he's gonna help them."
Al added, "Or we could just bust Donovan up real good."
"Shut up, Al," Sunny said.
Kelly sighed, "For the hundredth time Al, we can't just bust Donovan up. A: he's always protected and B: we can't look like we're trying to strong arm this election, we have to seem clean to make Donovan look bad here, so yeah, shut up."
"Sorry, boss."
Kelly reminisced upon how glad she was that she'd made these two work together. Al was the tough guy of the group, great if there was a scrape but not the smartest tool in the shed. Sunny was her thinker, he was invaluable in helping with strategy and he helped make sure she hadn't missed any details in her gambit. Al protected Sunny while he got results in the marketplace for her. "I'm going to have Ed do some walkthoughs over there, see if we can't change some minds."
"Good. Moving on," She turned to Tony, "How's intel going on Billy?"
"The guy is armed to the nines, he's got a ton of supply and about twenty people working security for him at any given time. I can't even get a meeting with him, let alone have a chat in the street. From what I know, he's completely obsessed with getting that second in command job, but from his M.O. I'd say he plans to kill Donovan and take over the first chance he gets."
"Donovan would never make that guy his number two anyway," Kelly said, "he's too unpredictable, Max isn't stupid, even if Billy is. How do you think he'll react when Donovan loses?"
Tony said, "I think it's best that we strip some of his power before we find out about that. We might be looking at a gang war if we don't."
Kelly looked at her last lieutenant, Carl, "You up for some special ops Carl? We need to make sure that Billy doesn't cause a shit storm once he realizes he's not going anywhere."
Carl simply nodded.
"Good, I'm getting some information tomorrow about a pretty large weapons cache that Billy keeps. I'll brief you, then you've got one day to prepare and the day after that you hit him."
Carl smiled.
"Ok, that's about it for tonight. Perry, make sure these jokers do their jobs. Go talk to Jenkins tomorrow morning and let him know about that walkthrough. Try to talk to Donovan, too. Let him know we're watching him and that any dirty tricks he tries to pull will be public knowledge within the day. That should at least give him pause if he thinks he can get away with fixing this thing."
"You got it, boss. We'll talk to you tomorrow."
Kelly walked up the stairs. Jonah's door was open as it always was when he was awake, he was reading by candlelight, "G'night Jonah. See you tomorrow."
"Hey Kel, I was actually waiting up for you, just wanted to wish your camp luck with the big election."
"Thanks Jonah, but we don't need luck, I'm just hoping for a nice turnout."
"Ha, well, good luck anyway," he said.
"I better see you at the polls, buddy."
"Wouldn't miss it for the world."
"You working tomorrow?"
"Bright and early," Jonah sighed, "In fact I'm gonna try to catch some sleep now."
"I'm beat too, gonna hit the hay. See you after your shift tomorrow?" Kelly asked.
"I'm sure I'll need a beer or two."
"I'll have it ready, with a shot to chase it."
"Ugh. I can't wait. When I go blind, I'm suing you for damages."
"I'm sure the courts will be very sympathetic. Good night."
"Night, Kel."
The next day Kelly woke up to the sound of the siren.
"Fuck!," she yelled as she jumped up from bed. Coming out of her door she saw that Jonah had already left for his watch, "Fuck."
She hurriedly got dressed and ran down the stairs and out the door towards the Wall. Upon arrival, she saw the bustle of people. Sirens were still wailing, which meant watchmen were still cranking them, this was a good and bad thing. On the good side, they were still alive. On the bad side, whatever the hell was making them crank their sirens was still going on.
She sprinted towards the siren. She'd always have friends at the wall and they'd know more about the situation than the sheep left at city hall anyway. It took her about 5 minutes to reach the inner wall near the closest tower. By the time she got there, the siren had stopped. She grabbed the first person she recognized, "Ben! What's going on?"
Ben turned, "Hey Kel, well, we have a small breach and we think we can fix it, thank god. But our watchman is stuck up in the tower."
"Who?"
"Sorry Kel, it's Jonah. I was just heading in to help," he said motioning at the protective outfit he was wearing.
"Get me a suit, I'm going in with you."
"Sorry Kel, I can't let you do that, we've got protocol, we can't let anyone but Watchmen in there, it could compromise the city."
"Ben, I don't give a zed's fucking asshole who it compromises, get me a goddamn sui--"
Just then she heard the gunshot.
Everything slowed down. Kelly couldn't move. She could only watch as Ben ripped himself away from her and ran towards the doors pulling on his helmet as he did. The only clear thought in the turmoil of her mind was the phrase Jonah had said over and over, his mantra. "That one bullet is to save my soul."
Kelly hit the ground hard, her legs giving way to fear and pain, her knees skidding against the gravelly rocks below. She didn't care. Jonah was dead.
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