Chapter 10

His truck was old, but not too old.  Its sun faded green paint helped it blend in to nearly every location.  It was nothing that attracted attention.  That was important.  He knew a leader shouldn't be inconspicuous, that he led best from the front.  But his men would have to be able to stand on their own.  And at those times it was best to blend in.

This was one of those times.

So he sat in the shadows, parked under the streetlight that had been broken by his men the night before.

Even his name kept him part of the background, when he wanted it to: Jared Smith.  He used others when necessary, but chose them with care.  John Smith was too conspicuously fake, and while he would have liked Jared White or John White, those would have been far too obvious.  The thought still made him smile, though.

He checked the rearview mirror and smoothed his shirt, a simple button down.  It was plain, devoid of any marks of rank or affiliation.  His body was also free of anything that would identify who he was, what he knew in his heart and soul to be true.  He had never been arrested, but if he was, the police would find no inked clues on his skin.

It was something he encouraged in his men, too.  Strongly.  If they had symbols of groups they had been in before joining Jared, they were covered over.  His own group had no symbols.  Tattoos of affiliation weren't only a source of information to the police; they were a barrier to access.  The armed services would no longer accept recruits who displayed them.  And Jared wanted his men training in the military, living in the military.  He wanted them everywhere.  It would be important after they were done in this city.

He peered out the windshield.  He'd dressed carefully, driven carefully, but he suspected it wasn't necessary.  Tonight was a simple initiation for a group of new men, and they were with David, his best trainer.  Jared would watch and see how they did with their surprise.

They had been told that they would simply be cleaning this neighborhood.  Just a section of one street that held a few shops and businesses.  It was part of the growth of the other races, growth that was forcing his people out of business, out of their homes.  The men thought that their test was simply to help defend their people with a few small fires, to force the coloreds out of the city with fire bombs.

The men thought they would throw a few fire bombs and run, but Jared had watchers everywhere, people who called, left messages about what was going on.  Even in this neighborhood, that was overrun, there were a few left who knew that it could be reclaimed, turned back to what it had been before the blacks and Mexicans had taken it away.  All these watchers had to do was call a number and leave a message about what they had seen, about a place that was vulnerable, or about a change in how the other races were acting.  Word would get to Jared and he made things happen.

One of these watchers had said that some of the locals, and not just the blacks, had started to wander the streets in armed groups, that they were going to try to hold their own, try to protect what they thought was theirs.  Jared had waited for this to happen, for the other races to collect into gangs, to fight back.  This was the next step, a necessary element for the main cleansing sweep that would begin later this week.  The violent confrontations would only make the coloreds look like villains and send more people to his side.  It was all part of his plan.  It was going to be their city, a white city.  It would be the first of many.

Jared's newest men would get a real test tonight.  They would be the first to fight, the first to trigger the next step.

He watched as they walked down the street, first two of them, then the third further behind.  David, the most adept at stepping from shadow to shadow, trailed them all.  They kept an easy pace, nothing hurried or conspicuous in their movements as they approached the shops with their barred windows.

Then, Jared saw the others.  Four men.  Three blacks and a Mexican.  They had spotted his men.  He saw the moment of indecision on both sides.  It was a weakness he exploited in those he targeted and one that he would have to train out of his own men.  They would have to believe more deeply in the rightness of their actions, then there would be no hesitation.

Jared smiled as the indecision passed and his men attacked.

 *

The neighborhood was run down, but had obviously not given up hope.  Even through the fog, William could see that the shops behind the metal bars and gates were clean, well kept.  He stopped at a corner and studied the storm of color and movement in the fog.  Two groups of men were already fighting each other.  He didn't know where they came from or who they were, but it was obvious the voices wanted him to step into the fight.  He wanted no part of it.

As he focused on his desire to leave, the fog lightened and William's emotions intensified.

The voices had made him kill a man last night.  But he knew that might not be the best way to describe it.  He bore some of the responsibility.  His conscious mind had certainly been in the back seat during the act, but he was sure he hadn't fought hard enough against what the voices had been directing him to do.  They had wanted him to kill, and he had gone along with it.  The only reason he’d had for listening to them was that they'd never wanted something like that before.  They'd never told him to hurt anyone.  Before he had gone into the hospital, they had only instructed him to help people.  That was how it was supposed to be, how he’d make it.  He couldn't let them use him to hurt anyone again.

As the fog dissipated, pain added to his reasons to leave.  His legs were exhausted and cramped from running, his elbow was stiff and shot with pain when he straightened it.  He was in no shape for this.  He had no place in any of this.

The voices forced their way through his concentration.  The fog around the fighting men intensified again, showed their movements clearly.

Stop them, The Advisor said.  Stop all of them.

Others will be hurt, will die if you do not, The Caretaker said.

"No."  William stood firm.

The Advisor stared at him.  You need to.

"No, I don't.  I need to leave," William said.

The Caretaker took form beside him, wiped the perception of pain from his body as The Hunter and The Advisor stood in front of him.

To help her, you have to do this, The Advisor said.

William stared between the two.  How could that be?  To help and protect Jess, he needed to be near her, not on the other side of the city.

No.  Here.  Now, The Hunter said.

The Advisor pointed to the seven men fighting in the street.  You need to draw attention.

Whose attention?  Someone here?  Someone at Jessica's place?  The man who had gone into her apartment?  The voices had always been terribly skilled at providing him half answers and no explanations.  Now, after years of telling him to hide the fact that he could see and hear them, they wanted him to draw attention to himself?  How did this help protect Jess?

The Hunter's voice was a growl.  Now.

Others will be hurt.  Stop all of them.  Help her, The Advisor said.

William couldn't argue anymore.  Not about protecting Jess.  He stepped forward and the fog took him, wiped away the pain and the clarity of his thoughts.  It was replaced by a stillness where he seemed to realize his actions almost after they had happened.  It was as if his rational mind had left the loop of action and his body was being directed by the voices more than ever before.

One of the men, a Latino, had pinned a squinty-eyed white man with buzzed hair up against a car.  As the Latino's arm came back for a heavy punch, William followed The Hunter in, grabbed the man's wrist in one hand, and neck with the other.  With a quick stomp to the calf, the Latino began to fall backwards.  As he fell, William jerked the arm downward and pushed the man's head up toward where the arm had been.  Helpless, the man twisted in mid-fall and crashed down to the pavement with a fast nosedive. 

Blood welled out of the man's nose and forehead as he moaned groggily.

The squinty white man smiled quickly at William.  "Thanks, Brother."

His word of thanks was short lived.  As Squinty raised his foot up to stomp onto the back of the Latino's head, William grabbed him.

The Hunter pointed away from the car and drew two matched arcs in the fog, one from the ground up, the other downward.  William pushed Squinty into the middle of the street, both hands tight on the man's shirt at the shoulders.  As his hands shoved forward and down, he swept his leg in the opposite direction, back and up from behind Squinty's legs.

The man was airborne for only a fraction of a second, but it seemed longer to William as the outlined body spun in the fog, flailed its arms and landed hard, flat, on its neck.  Squinty didn't even moan, he just lay there, though William could still see color playing through his body in the fog.  The man wasn't dead.