Jason Knee's Arc

Chapter 8 of 2

The trucks stopped at the gate. Jason stepped out with three hundred Saints behind him and seventy MopBoyz on his flank. The compound rose over the wall, huge and lit, the gate thick with iron. Bobby Lee cracked his knuckles beside him. Ink loaded a shell and nodded. Jason raised his gun. "Open it or burn it," he said. His men surged forward. The gate split with gunfire. Marcus's men opened up from the wall slits the second Jason's line hit the iron. Bullets tore into the trucks. A Saint dropped near Jason's boot. Ink yanked him down behind a car. "They waited for us," Ink spat. He was skinny but fast, a kid Little Layer had raised, loyal to the Knee brothers to the bone. He fired over the hood without flinching. "Three hundred guns don't mean nothing if we can't get through." "Then we get through," Jason said. He grabbed Bobby by the collar. "You know this place. Where's the weak point?" Bobby wiped blood from his lip. He hated taking orders from Jason. But the compound was the prize, and he wanted it alive. "Side service door," he said. "Kitchen. I ran product through it. They won't cover it heavy." Jason waved Pep up. The skater crawled behind the cars, cigarette dead in his teeth. "Take ten men to the side," Jason told him. "Crack the kitchen door. We'll push the front." Pep grinned and slipped off into the dark. Jason counted to thirty. Then he stood and poured fire at the wall slits. Ink and the Saints followed. The MopBoyz pushed the broken gate. Men screamed on both sides. The iron groaned and gave. A thump sounded from the side. Pep had the kitchen open. Marcus's men turned to face it, and their line cracked. Jason ran through the gap in the smoke. He crossed the yard past fallen bodies and purple weed plants crushed under boots in a side garden. He hit the front door with his shoulder and it burst. Marcus stood in the hall. Big, dreads swinging, a gun already up. He fired. The round grazed Jason's arm. Jason dove behind a pillar and came up shooting. "You killed my brother," he roared. "He stood on the wrong block," Marcus said. Flat. No fear. He backed toward a rear hallway, firing as he went. Jason chased him deep into the house. Marcus hit a locked steel door, punched a code, and slammed it shut between them. Jason emptied his gun into the metal. It held. Ink reached him, panting. "We got the compound, boss. It's ours. But he's gone into a panic room. We can't crack it tonight." Jason pressed his hand flat on the cold steel. Marcus was alive, trapped, breathing on the other side. So close. The compound was his. But the bullet he owed Marcus still waited. "Then we don't leave," Jason said. "We starve him out."