Bring The Heat

30. Gangs of Jewel Street (GOJS ARC 1)

Robin wiped sweat from her brow. No wonder all the gangs hid away in old buildings all day, her outfit mixed with the blazing sun was like being steam cooked. And she'd only just got here, after traveling for about half the day!

Peeking out over the top of a broken window of the building she was in, she watched as two men talked, and she waited... just waited... now! They both turned their backs, and Robin hopped out of the abandoned shop's window and made a break for the alleyway next to it, slipping down it and behind another building just in time. She wanted to remain unseen until she found AR, or at least a gun... not that she would plan on using it.

Catching her breath for a second in the shade of the buildings, Robin smelt something awful. It was the most putrid smell she had ever smelt... quickly, she made herself a plant-based face mask, but even still... the smell was pretty overpowering.

Turning the corner, Robin saw where the smell was originating from. A dead, decaying body, rotting in the heat of the summer. She gagged at the sight, but managed to keep it down.

Looking again, she could see that it was... a woman's body. She didn't seem to be wearing any gang clothes, and though it was hard to tell precisely because of the decay, she seemed quite old. She was probably just an innocent old lady, victim to a gang's violence and dumped back here out of sight. Strangely, however, the marks on the wall behind her suggested that she was shot by something other than a bullet, like an arrow or crossbow bolt.

Robin held her hand up to the wall of the alley, and thin, flowering vines spread across the wall, covering the woman's body completely. It was the least she could do...

Continuing forward, Robin found that the alleyway ended with a metal staircase. She slowly walked up it, and found herself on the rooftop of a smaller part of the building. At the top of the staircase, she heard some quiet talking coming from behind a big, blocky A/C unit on her right, and peeked around it...

Only to be met with the watchful eyes of six gang members.

"Hey, lady... this is not your place." one of the men said, approaching cautiously.

Shit. No turning back now...

"Sorry. I just need to pass through." Robin returned, trying to fake confidence but unable to make eye contact.

The man looked back at his friends, and they all chuckled. He turned back to her.

"Uh... no. You're gonna leave right now." he instructed ominously.

Quickly, Robin evaluated her surroundings. On her left were two windows into the attached building, that went up another storey. That was it! She had a plan.

Unfortunately, the man noticed Robin's eyes flick around, and reached to draw his gun, but she was already dashing. She threw herself through the brittle, aged glass, shielding her face with thick-vine- covered arms. She reached out and tapped the window edge as she flew through it, then threw herself down to the floor. The whole gang fired into the building, their bullet's barely whizzing past her head. Their assault was quickly shut  down by a thick block of tree bark now filling out the window, garnering a 'what the fuck...' from one of the men.

Robin hopped to her feet quickly, and brushed herself off. Man... her shoulder had really taken the brunt of that fall. This was her first time on field...

"Go around the front!" a voice from the other side yelled. Robin noted two sets of footfall hopping down to the ground floor, and kicking in the front door to the building. Shit!

Thinking on her feet, Robin slammed her palm down onto the ground, shooting out a thin vine across the room and to the top of the stairs that the men were rushing up. The first of the two managed to gingerly hop over it, but the man behind him fell face first to the ground.

As a bullet whizzed past her head, Robin rolled into cover behind a wardrobe. It began to fall apart as two more bullets tore through the frail wood... she started panicking, and knew she needed a plan. Fast.

She took a deep breath. She could... try and reinforce her cover with bark? No, her window cover was already being kicked down and shredded from the other side, it wouldn't be strong enough...

Maybe she could make a break for a window, or the stairs to the roof? No, one attacker was incapacitated but the other was fast approaching...

FUCK! She couldn't think her way out of this one... coming up with a plan was taking too long! And so Robin slowly emptied her lungs of air, letting her body take over and react at last, as she felt her own vines tighten around her body and drag her to the wall.

The gunman turned the corner quickly, gun pointed straight at the corner where Robin was huddling...

The corner was empty. He froze for a second, bamboozled, before a hand slipped down from above and grabbed his gun! Reflexively, he looked up to see Robin attached to the cieling by vines, looking down the barrel of his own gun aiming right at him!

Before the gunman could react, Robin shot him in the foot and dropped on top of him, before knocking him out cold with a mean pistol-whipping. She lurched across the room towards the man who had tripped on the stairs, and was now picking himself up, rubbing a broken nose. He raised his gun at her, but she swiftly smacked it out of his hand with the hilt of her own. Hearing her bark barricade snapping behind her, Robin delivered a powerful kick to the man's chest, sending him falling back down the stairs, before she spun on her heel and dashed up to the roof of the building just as the remaining four men busted in.

As she ascended, Robin sprouted a thick net of brambles shooting across the stairs behind her, blocking the men from getting through. Still, they managed to shoot apart some of the brambles, and proceeded through the web. They didn't seem to realise that Robin still controlled them, though, so were surprised when they were each swiftly disarmed as their guns were ripped from their hands and tangled in the thickest parts of the web.

Standing on the edge of the roof, Robin looked down, scanning the area for an escape. The floors were large, and she was already overexerting herself... jumping down would probably injure her legs, and she wasn't sure she could fix those kinds of injuries before her attackers could reach her.

And so she turned, looking back at the three men who had crawled out of her bramble net, covered in cuts and bruises, and leaving the last man behind to struggle with the guns. They were furious and bloodthirsty. Robin met their evil glares with an ice-cold confidence, adrenaline shooting through her veins. Her coat fell to the ground, and she threw her hat, cracking her knuckles.

'Three against one...' she thought, 'a fair fight.'