Opus Veda

She screamed with such force the warehouse shook with fright. Her knife punctured Tucker's skin and entered him as far as it could go. Violent air blasted from his mouth. He collapsed, convulsing and choking on bile. Fluids pooled from his trousers and slicked the floor.

Kasia fell against the wall, covering her face with shaking hands, kicking herself backwards in a futile attempt to escape.

Everyone stood rigid with confusion and horror. Between all of them, the iron slab of Desert Eagle rested.

A worker leapt for it. Luca was on him too fast, tasering his neck and taking the pistol himself. The room filled with noise, as one by one those inside jumped into the fight. Zenia kicked another man back and covered Kasia. Curtis exchanged fists with a second. Across the room Sermon let off a fierce roar, windmilling into the mob with flying fists.

It took seconds of fumbling for Luca to realise the gun was fake. Severely outnumbered, one trick remained. He yelled at the van, tossing the pistol against its window, summoning those within for backup.

In their weeks together, the recruits had come to forget those ferrying them about. Their recipients saw an ordinary delivery van, fronted with black windows, and mistook it for a driverless autopilot.

It was intentional. If either group required force, the drivers inside were equipped to assist.

Out they came, two stout West Africans with polished bald domes and huge arms. They drew two riot guns and loosed them on every American in sight. Razored rounds beat like a helicopter's rotor, pounding against men and sending them flying.

The workers reeled; the revolutionaries laid on the attack. Zenia turned her mark against the wall, smacking his head against a strut until it glossed with red. Sermon bounced around, isolated and frenzied, swinging at anyone who came near.

The biggest of them made it through his attacks, lifting him off the floor and into a stack of kegs. He struggled for an advantage, and in a pause of eye contact, in a moment of psychological warfare, he spat a slur in Sermon's face.

Luca trained his taser and waited as the drivers charged around him, using their emptied guns as clubs. One of their victims rocketed into the corporal's back, but Luca held steady.

He fired. Sermon saw fizzing blue and ducked. An acute bolt sliced through the man's cheek and into his gums. As he fell Sermon mounted him, and started stamping his face.

The recruits bundled Kasia into the van and called Luca to leave. He assessed the scene, finding his foes fleeing in panic or writhing in agony. All was clear, but for one issue.

He dismissed drivers.

Tucker lay prone, paralysed with pain and fear. Kasia's knife stuck from his perineum. Luca grabbed its hilt and slid it out. Then he craned the man's head backwards and slit his throat. Tucker's neck yawned open. Luca watched life fade from his eyes.

He mounted the van and called the retreat.

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Streets passed in silence. The van rocked its passengers gently. Luca muttered into his phone with dense military jargon beyond the recruits ears. He finished and leant forward to address them.

"My superior is aware and will take over here; we will all be fine. Now you know why we've kept the drivers separate, though the trick will get out now."

"What happened with their boss? I mean... he's dead, right?"

Luca grit his teeth. Curtis had gormlessly asked the one question he didn't need to hear. He caught Kasia's chest rising, her hands squeezing her seat.

The gravity of a first kill. Luca chose to rescue her.

"He would have survived Kasia's attack. I did him myself on the way out. If there were any problems, they would be on me alone."

Kasia's grip loosened. She snivelled. Luca wiped her knife against his jacket, streaking the fabric crimson, and handed it back.

"Tanto, isn't it. Elegant… much nicer than the knife I've been issued with. Have you been carrying this with you since the beginning?"

Her head flicked once, admitting guilt. Luca snorted, too wired with adrenaline to tell her off. Curtis gawped at it, his mouth hanging open.

"You said we wouldn't need proper trainin' or anythin' mate. If this is 'ow things are gonna be, I don't reckon I can carry on, just sayin'."

"We can't just openly train people Curtis, it takes time and money and it exposes us. What if a police drone clocked a group of civvies doing weapon drill?" Luca felt dissent in the air and changed tack, "however... given how the last drop just went, I think I can put a plan together for a lesson."

"And I think we should give her a bit more money," Zenia pointed at Kasia, "for her trouble. And as for us, maybe we don't spend the rest of the night shifting deliveries for your 'non-revolutionary' superiors? Since we are mere couriers…"

Backed into a corner Luca could only agree. He called for a wad of notes from the driver's cabin and shared them out, taking none for himself. Kasia kept distant. Money hung limp in her hand. Luca stuffed them into her hoodie pocket for her, but failed to get any response.

Sermon watched, bleakly imagining what she thought of him, hoping his guilt could in time heal the truth: back at the warehouse, he was going to leave her behind.

There was something else on his mind too.

The van rumbled over gravel. They were at Sermon and Kasia's drop-off point, close to home. Twilight covered them.

Luca hopped outside and waited with Sermon as Kasia shambled off in a daze. The two men found a few seconds together.

"How did you find that?"

"Not good mate to be honest," Sermon tutted, his eyes vacant, "that big lad called me somethin'... somethin' I never thought I'd hear in real life."

"What're you talking about?"

"He called me a nigger, Luca."

Luca made an expression Sermon had seen before: awkward, dumb, glazed over, embarrassed. All in a single face. Luca tried his best.

"You're not though, are you! It's just what they're like. I had to deal with it too that manager would not shut up. 'As an American, here's what I think, from the point of view of an American'," he rubbed Sermon's arm, "that's just them though isn't it? All of the ego with none of the sense."

"Yea it's not just them though is it!? I'm getting pretty sick of everyone sayin' we got rid of race, when every week I'm havin' to laugh off comments about my skin-"

"Sermon! Things were much worse before and they're getting better. We just have to carry on!" he looked around and shrugged, "are you doing anything later?"

Sermon frowned at him, "I'll be clubbin'."

"Oh... I thought... can't we meet up again?"

"You cant give me what I need right now."

"Why not?"

Sermon walked away, "you outrank me."

The van passed Sermon by and drove off. Kasia was far ahead, walking back to the estate and oblivious to all around her.

He couldn't face it. He watched her turn the corner, and took another route.