Page 62 of Painless
They sprung into action, following their captain’s orders, but looked just as confused as me.
“Gunner, where—”
Something small and metallic whizzed by my head. Another hit me square in the back and clattered down the wall to the ground. A dense, white smoke began pouring out of the canister. By the time I felt the stinging in my eyes and throat, it was too late.
Hundreds more of the tear gas canisters sailed over the walls, seemingly out of nowhere. Coughs and cries of confusion filled the air. Even without the burning in my lungs and eyes, visibility was reduced to nearly nothing as smoke filled the air.
I scrambled off the wall, covering my nose and mouth with my shirt as I headed for the clubhouse. We needed guns. We weren’t getting choked and blinded for no fucking reason. I had to reach the armory.
Half-blinded by tears and stinging pain in my eyes, I spotted my woman running to rush out of the clubhouse while I, and a dozen others, crowded the doorway to rush in.
“Jandro, what’s happening?” Mari moved away from the door, flattening herself against the wall to let the stampede of people through.
“Attack,” I rasped through my body-wracking coughs. “Smoke and tear gas. Keep everyone insi—”
A deafeningBOOMrocked the building, knocking me off my feet and directly into her. Hysterical screams from outside made my blood run cold.
“You okay?” I turned my head to cough into my arm, which I braced against the wall to not crush her.
“Yes, but we need to help those still outside!”
“Follow me,” I coughed. “Armory.”
I grabbed her hand and pulled her down the hallway, my sight and breathing only marginally better away from the smoke. Two more blasts went off, rattling the windowpanes and creating even more chaos outside. I could only hope Gunner and his guys were handling it out there.
Our armory was once the cash vault of this ritzy, gated community. Nothing was left in it when we took over the place, but the impenetrable steel and concrete walls made it a great place to store guns.
“You know how to shoot now, right?” I held a rifle out to Mari.
“Um, kind of.”
“Good enough. We need you.” I showed her how to load the Mini-14, then shoved it into her hands, along with a spare box of ammo.
Next, I pulled out the box of gas masks and dug until I found one of the smaller sizes for her. “Put that on and adjust it as needed. The bottom part needs to seal to your skin.”
I found one for me and put it on, grateful that I shaved that morning, as the mask created a seal. At that point, more of the guys started coming into the armory and taking their own guns and masks, their eyes red and noses runny from the gas.
“Make sure the women and kids are safe,” I instructed, my voice muffled by the mask. “Have them hide under tables, beds, in closets, maybe. We don’t know if they’re bombing houses or what.”
“It looks like grenades, VP,” Slick reported. “Being dropped off by drones.”
“Son of a bitch,” I cursed. “Then we need to shoot down some motherfucking drones, don’t we?”
A chorus of bloodthirsty cheers answered me, their guns raised in the air and red eyes narrowed with vengeance behind their masks. These were the Steel Demons I knew. This attack would not maim us.
I turned to Mari. “Stay by the building to help people find their way in. If you see something flying, shoot it. If you see anyone without a Demons patch, shoot them.”
She nodded, but before I could leave, reached out and clutched the front of my shirt in her small fist. “I love you. Be careful.”
I wrapped a hand around the back of her head, touching our foreheads together as best I could without my mask knocking into hers. “Can’t kiss you now, but I will later,Mariposita. Te amo.”
“You better.” She stepped back, brandished her rifle in front of her, and cocked it. “Now go.”
Damn if I didn’t get just a little bit turned on, seeing my woman dressed up like a post-apocalyptic vigilante. I had to give it to her good, after we were done with all this shit.
Leading my guys, I jogged out of the building into the war zone outside. You’d think there was a forest fire nearby, the smoke hung thicker than coastal fog. The air through my respirator was now just mildly irritating, rather than choking.
“Spread out,” I commanded. “Stick to walls and what you can see. Don’t run out into the smoke unless you see someone who needs help. If you do, send them back to Mariposa.”
