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  He ran fast, but not far. When he was about fifty feet away, that same beep Clint and the others had heard before slashed the night sky. Chong halted so fast Clint could practically hear the big man’s feet bite into the pavement below as the beep came again.

  “What happened? What color? What –” demanded Chong.

  “It’s red!” shouted Elena. She hustled after Chong, the others hesitating only a moment before following.

  Clint wondered why any of them would follow, would get close to Chong when his collar was now flashing red. Then he realized the answer his body had already known, even as Noelle said, “We have to stick together, remember?”

  As they approached Chong, the big man’s collar flashed once more, then went green. He must have seen that fact on the others’ faces, because he heaved a sigh of relief that quickly became a sharp exhale of purest irritation. “Shit. Hitched my wagon to a buncha –” He shook his head. “Come on.”

  He turned and began jogging in the same direction he’d been going. He moved fast enough that everyone had to hustle to keep up, but not so fast that he left them behind.

  The collar on his neck stayed green. Clint cast his eyes over the others’ collars. All green. When he got to Noelle, she nodded and smiled weakly. “Looks like we’ll be having some together time, huh?”

  Clint couldn’t help but chuckle.

  They continued forward, keeping pace with the slowest of the group. Clint would have figured that to be Elena, since she was the shortest and roundest of them. But she turned out to be surprisingly quick, her legs pumping like pistons as she continually outpaced everyone else, moving ahead a dozen paces before seeming to remember the rules of the “game,” allowing herself to fade back and letting everyone catch up.

  No, the slowest person was Solomon. He was tall and rangy, but his long legs moved slowly – torturously so, given what was waiting for them if they didn’t make their journey. Clint gritted his teeth, knowing that saying anything wouldn’t make the big guy move any faster.

  Chong didn’t have the same inhibitions. “Hey, motivational speaker,” he said, turning the title into some kind of slur. “Can’t you motivate yourself?”

  Solomon managed a short glare before turning his attention to putting one foot in front of the other. “Doesn’t… work… like that….” he said in between breaths.

  “You’re a pretty shitty motivator, eh?” said Chong. “Doubt you bring home the bacon.” He paused, and his mouth curled in a sour grin. “Going back to boosting cars, I assume?”

  “Shut up,” shouted Noelle. She looked around, obviously surprised at her own outburst, then her shoulders stiffened as she added, “He’s good,” to Chong.

  Clint blinked in surprise, a motion echoed by Solomon himself. “You… you heard me talk?”

  Noelle nodded. To Chong she said, “He used to be a gang member. The….” She looked at Solomon. “What gang was it?”

  “I’m Five-Deuce,” Solomon said, spitting out the words as a combination curse and challenge and shield. Then he blinked as though surprised. “Used to be Five-Deuce.” He gestured around. “This is actually their territory. It’s how I know it.”

  “Banged a lotta hookers here, huh?” said Chong.

  “Shut up!” Noelle shouted again. “Didn’t you hear him? Used to be a gang member. Now he talks about getting out. He’s got a good message. Better than anything you’ve said.” She turned to Solomon and added, “Your wife must be proud.”

  “She is,” said Solomon.

  Chong laughed. Clint sighed. “What’s so funny now?” he asked.

  “He said that his wife was Mexican,” said Chong. He waggled his eyebrows at Solomon. “She leave you? That what happened?”

  Solomon’s eyes flashed with sudden rage, and he took an angry step toward Chong. Before he could get there, though, Clint surprised himself by launching toward the bigger man. He shoved Chong, feeling the man’s tank top rip under his hands. “Shut up, man! Don’t push him! There’s no reason to –”

  Chong, staggered back by the surprising force of Clint’s push, now surged forward. “What’s your damage, kid? Not like I was making fun of your family – if you even have one left after your little visit to the cemetery.”

  Clint felt his features twist liquidly, washing back and forth between the twin shores of anger and hurt. For a moment he was back in an office – the office. Back in front of the nicked-up desk with the placard on it that said “DAVE HIGGINS, DIR.” over a logo with the name “Eighth Street Children.”

  Dave Higgins was behind the desk. Gray. Always gray, like he had been born in a stormcloud and had carried a bit of that storm with him everywhere he went. He leaned forward over that crappy, tortured desk and Clint heard his own voice – high and tight, the way it always was in this memory – say, “She’s dead, isn’t she? My little sister is dead.”

  The bit of his past inserted itself into Clint’s present, throwing him back and twisting in his guts with a sharpness that hurt. Then that pain became a tightness, and the tightness shifted quickly to anger. Clint shoved Chong again, shoving the memory away at the same time.

  Clint lunged forward, following Chong as he stepped back in surprise. Other than an ability to take a punch, Clint didn’t have any particular skills as a fighter. He doubted he could face down a guy as big as Chong. But he had to do something. Had to make the nightmare memory go away. Pain could do it. He’d fight, he’d maybe lose. But the memory would go, and hopefully would stay gone.

  He took another step, and looked down as he felt something touch his arm. For a moment, he was looking at Claire.

  No. Not her. She’s dead.

  It was Noelle. The young woman squeezed his bicep. “Don’t,” she said. “He’s not worth it.”

  Clint stared at her, seeing his sister’s face superimposed over Noelle’s, existing both in this place, this now, and in the then of memory.

  Claire faded. She always did.

  Clint nodded sharply, then turned away from Chong and resumed walking. The timer was still counting down.

  Seven minutes and change.

  Interlude

  1

  Her name was Hope, and it was more than a name. For Hope Sterling, her name was a beacon that pointed at a brighter tomorrow.

  For a long time it had been nothing but a name. She recognized, even at a young age, that she enjoyed blessings of a type and on a level that most people could only dream about. That was part and parcel of being the only child of one of the richest men in the world. But recognizing one’s elevated station was not the same as truly appreciating it, or of having the hope that tomorrow will be as bright – or brighter – than today.

  Then she fell. She fell into Mommy’s arms, and then she had a moment where she thought she heard Daddy’s voice. Then all went quiet and all went dark but somehow Hope knew she was still falling. Falling and falling forever, until there was nothing but the darkness, pressing her down farther and farther, faster and faster.

  She hit the bottom of the nothing-place with a jarring jolt that she felt from her toes to the top of her head. It hurt. Every cell in her body screamed, and even though she could see nothing of herself, she felt herself turn into a clenched fist. One solid line of muscle, pulling itself tighter and tighter and so tight it felt like she was going to die, and then tighter still.

  Then the fist opened. The darkness fled.

  Hope opened her eyes.

  She was in a room she recognized, though she had no memory of ever visiting such a place before. But she knew what the bright lights and white, naked walls and the beep-beep-beep nearby all meant: she was in a hospital.

  She didn’t understand what was happening. She was seven, and she was a bright seven-year-old – everyone said so, and some said she was something far beyond merely bright – but even the smartest child has her limits. That was something she knew, too, just as she knew that it was no crime or shame to ask for help.

  She tried. She wanted so badl
y to open her mouth, to scream and cry, but when she tried her mouth stayed closed, her words remained locked in her throat, no tears came to her eyes.

  Hope panicked, but only for a moment.

  This will end. I’ll be able to move again in a second.

  She had no idea if that was true or not, but she chose to believe.

  That was the first, smallest hope.

  She stopped struggling, and listened. At first there was only that steady beep of a heart monitor. Then other sounds came to her: the hum of machinery, the different but no less distinct babble of voices – people going about their business in this place.

  She heard Daddy a moment later. He sounded like he was far away. She had to concentrate to hear him, and no matter how hard she tried, she missed every few words. The blackness into which she had fallen kept threatening to come back, and whenever it did it dampened out sound and sight for precious seconds.

  “… -most died,” Daddy said. “How did this happen? I can’t believe –”

  Daddy faded for a moment. Hope didn’t understand the words he had said. What had died? Was she dying?

  Daddy’s voice returned then, and he sounded lost. “I don’t believe it. How can this be possible? I can’t… I can’t believe that….”

  Hope heard something that sounded like a sob, and for the first time she felt afraid. Even in the darkness, she hadn’t really felt fear. The darkness was nasty and thick and felt like it was shoving into every part of her, but she hadn’t really feared. She had known that Mommy and Daddy would find her, and would pull her out of that darkness sooner than later.

  But the sound of Daddy crying… that was something she had never heard, never thought she would hear. And if something had made Daddy, with his money and his thousands of employees and the dozens of people who ran his house and above all with Mommy at his side… if something made Daddy cry, how terrible and frightening a thing it must be.

  She felt a hand on hers. She still couldn’t move, but her soul jumped at the touch. She heard Daddy again, and finally realized that he wasn’t far away at all; he was right here beside her. But he still sounded like he was on the other side of a thick wall when he said, “This can’t happen. I won’t let this happen.”

  She looked for a moment. She saw Daddy. He plastered a smile on his face, so wide and so red and so fake she knew it could not be real. Daddy never smiled like that, and that meant something was wrong. It meant Daddy was afraid.

  “Mommy?” she said. Because shouldn’t Mommy be there, too?

  “She’s not here, honey. But I am. I’ll always be –”

  The darkness reached out. Hope didn’t know if it would keep her this time. Whatever had happened had terrified Daddy, so she no longer knew if he could fix whatever it was.

  She could only hope.

  2

  FBI REPORT FILE FA2017R2

  Appendix B

  Reproduction of YouTube comments on pertinent videos – see Appendix AA for list of videos, both active and since archived, Appendix AB for list of videos no longer available, and report sections 18 through 20 in re actions taken to recover videos that disappeared during hours following incident.

  See also Appendix AC list of known commenters as matched to YouTube designations, and Appendix AD for list of YouTube designations belonging to persons still unknown.

  For list of known homicides attributable to YouTube commenters, please see report for File FA 2018R2.

  See also Appendix AD and files referred therein to list of Portobello Road videos, comments, and homicides. N.B.: Hard copies of the files must be relied upon, as all electronic files are subject to corruption by parties unknown. See Internal Report FA 2019R43.

  ---

  Comments to YouTube video designated A9

  ---

  2 COMMENTS - SORT BY

  Lost1tY3st3rday

  I think… I think that shit was real.

  REPLY

  HansomeMuthah92

  I think it was.

  Can we do that? You think we can?

  REPLY

  TWO

  1

  “Gotta live the dream, boy.”

  Those were the last words Solomon Black heard his old man say. The dude had knocked up Solomon’s mom and then bolted when he found out she was pregnant. He came back when Solomon was five, ambling into the apartment like he owned the place; like he hadn’t even been gone. He pulled a beer from the crappy fridge, tossed his feet on the chair, and said, “Hey, girl,” to Solomon’s mom before turning on a football game.

  After five minutes he turned it off, said, “Cocksuckers couldn’t win a game if the other team didn’t even show up,” then took Solomon’s mom behind the curtain strung up in the middle of the single room that served as living room, dining room, and kitchen on one side of the fabric… and the “bedroom” on the other.

  A couple seconds of murmured conversation. Solomon heard the strange dude say, “Baby, please,” a couple times. Then he heard sounds he never heard before. Sounded like his momma was maybe getting hurt, so he went to the other side of the curtain and then a heavy, man’s boot flew out and hit his head with a dry, painful thud. Both Mom and the stranger screamed for him to get out.

  He did, but not before he saw what was happening beyond the curtain. It scared him. Mom had to be hurt, right?

  But she came out ten minutes later and was all smiles. She got the stranger another beer, then sat on the arm of the chair he’d apparently adopted as his own and whispered to him and giggled and then giggled more every time the dude pinched her bottom or squeezed her boob.

  Solomon did not like the guy.

  “He’s your daddy,” his mom said after the dude left, maybe a half hour later – a half hour during which the stranger had not looked at Solomon even once.

  “Daddy?” Solomon remembered saying.

  “Yes. Your daddy. He’ll be around more now.”

  She said it like that was that, like it was all the explanation anyone could want, need, or hope for. That was how she acted, too, because Solomon certainly never heard nothing more about the stranger who was his daddy.

  “Dad” showed up every week or two. Never sent no money Solomon’s way, or his mom’s – least, not from what Solomon saw when he ate his dinner or went to school with no lunch after a breakfast of water and wishing.

  In fact, near as Solomon could tell, money actually went out the door every time Dad showed up. He drank whatever beer was in the house – and Mom started stocking up, too, so as to have “everything nice and nice” for him when he showed up. And when he left, Dad usually whispered something in her ear and waited ‘til she handed over whatever money was in her purse. If she didn’t hand it over, he just took it. She complained once.

  Black eyes are a good way to stop someone’s complaining. That was the first of two things Solomon learned from his dad. The second was that taking things was easy, and no one said shit to you if you did it with the right attitude. The attitude could get you money from a woman who could barely afford food, and turn that money into new Jordans or a limited edition Lakers hoodie.

  Solomon didn’t have that attitude. Not yet. But he was getting it. He wasn’t as big as the other kids, but he figured that was because he was barely getting started. At five years old he knew he was tiny, but he also knew he was tough. One time Darius – a second-grader whose daddy was a different kind of no-show, ‘cause he was doing a dime in Folsom for armed robbery – cut Solomon with a knife he brought to school. The knife wasn’t too big, thankfully, but it still cut Solomon pretty deep. Even so, when he got home he didn’t say a thing until his mom asked (screamed, actually) what had happened and why blood was running down his arm and staining the carpet.

  “Dad” came home while Mom was sewing him up. Hospitals were too expensive, so when Dad walked in Solomon was sitting quietly as Mom ran black thread in neat crosses along the length of the cut.

  Dad watched for a minute. He stared at Solomon, and Solomon could t
ell that his dad wanted to say something. Didn’t, though. Just shoved a knuckle into Solomon’s head and gave him a noogie that hurt near as much as the knife cut did, and said, “Tough little shit,” before taking Mom into the bedroom and making their noises again.

  It was the only compliment Solomon’s dad ever paid him. He hated his dad, he knew that. But he couldn’t help feeling all glowed up inside, like he had a candle or a fire or something in his chest. Felt good.

  Dad left. But before he did, he took Solomon aside. “We gotta have a man talk,” he told Mommy when she came out of the bedroom. “Go to the store.”

  “But –” she began.

  “Now, woman,” he growled. She went. After she left, Dad pulled Solomon close and said, “Who did that?”

  Solomon was only five. But he knew the rules. “Snitches get stitches” was one of the first things anyone learned – shit, he knew it before he knew how to curse, and that was pretty damn early. So he shook his head.

  Dad nodded. “No snitch, huh? That’s good.” Then he gave Solomon a single shake. Just one, but it snapped his head back so hard he worried it was broken. “But I’m your dad, boy, and I ask you a question, you answer, you hear me?”

  Solomon bit back tears, and tried not to whimper the single word: “Darius.”

  “One-Ton’s kid?” asked Dad. He used the gang name Darius’ dad went by – that was how most of the growed-up dudes Solomon knew of called themselves. They wasn’t Aaron or Joe or Mike or Pete or none of that – they was Killer Bee or Joey Cholo or Thirty Mil or whatever name they got when they joined one of the gangs that ran things in the hood.

  Solomon hesitated another moment – not long, less than a second, but it earned him another quick shake. “Yeah,” he said. “That’s him.”

  “Huh,” was all Dad said. But the next day when Solomon went to school Darius was gone and all the teachers acted weird and the second graders had a special assembly and then got to go home for the day and when they came back the next day Darius still wasn’t there and didn’t come back ever again.