That same day (Thursday, April 28, 2022) Charlie’s flat, TriBeCa, Manhattan, New York, United States

Jade regarded the columns of test strips around the plastic jar. This was the third time she had done a twelve panel drug test on the syringes she had snuck out.

Each time all the panels had come back invalid and she thought maybe something was contaminating the results.

But the glowing of the liquid had faded finally and now she was hoping it might yield something interesting.

Charlie was peering over her shoulder. “So how long do we have to wait?”

“10 minutes,” Jade said, focusing on the bottle.

The first time, it had definitely been magic that had interfered, each test strip had started shimmering in rainbow colors that Jade could not describe after she saw them and then the strips had just turned black like ash.

She had waited an hour to try again. This time the strips just indicated invalid results across the board.

Now as her and Charlie watched, the results started coming back. Positive for opiates, for PCP, for cocaine. Negative for others.

“So it is magic mixed with hard drugs?” Charlie asked.

“Looks like it. But why? Maybe the effect is enhanced? Every so often the dealers would collect a group of people and lead them out the door..”

Jade had wanted to follow them but it was too hard to find an opportunity that night.

“I’m going back tonight to check it out and see where they are taking those people.”

“Hey Jade,” Charlie said diffidently, “I think this may end up being a bit too dangerous to do alone. Why don’t we wait for Ella and her friends? Or call that lady you met?”

Her tone of voice was so uncertain, it felt wrong for Charlie.

“I thought about it, but I am going to bring my brother along and a couple of his friends. And this…”

She pulled out Ella’s handgun, the one Ella had left in the apartment before going wherever she had gone this week.

“Do you even know how to use that?” Charlie asked.

“How hard can it be? Point and shoot right?” Jade did not inspire confidence.

“I think we should wait.”

“We?”

Hunts Point, Bronx, New York, United States

Craig and Jade took the train back up to Hunt’s Point. Jade had said that the place had been operating round the clock, so going in the morning would be safer and less conspicuous.

They got off the train and made the same walk Jade had done previously. They found a place to watch the house near a coffee cart. Jade nervously hugger her bag, the gun in it making her more nervous rather than helping her.

They didn’t wait long until a group of people, shuffling and stumbling, came out of the building. The leader had a steady gait and started walking towards Jade and Craig. Jade made sure her face wasn’t visible under her hoody just in case. Her COVID mask providing additional disguise.

She needn’t have worried as the group passed by without any curiosity. They just had to wait and then follow at a discrete distance.

They didn’t go far, just around the corner to a boarded up bodega. Where the group made their way in and shut the door behind them.

“Well sis. What do we do now?”

Jade looked around and thought.

“Something is going on here that is very not cool. Let’s wait and see.”

They only waited for ten minutes and the leader of the group came out and walked back to the first building.

“So what happened to the others?”

“I don’t know, but I don’t like this.”

Craig looked around and sighted something. “Hold on. I got an idea.”

He walked across and down the street back to where they had started, Jade followed him at a distance. There he went up to some kids that were hanging on a street corner and started talking to them. He pulled out his phone to show them something. Then one of the kids started making some calls.

Craig waited with them and a car drove up and five other kids piled out. Armed.

He spoke to them briefly and then shrugged his shoulders. Jade had no idea what they were saying. Craig shrugged his shoulders again and then left, walking perpendicular to Jade. Jade cut over to walk parallel to him to one street over."

“That was fucking dangerous, ndugu” Jade said. She was under no illusions, Craig had just done something very risky.

“Yeah. But they won’t like others dealing drugs on their turf. I also may owe them some free fighting classes. Let’s go.”

They followed the parallel street to the corner and peered around to watch the bodega. Before long they could hear loud music blasting from a car. distorted bass vibrations loud even where they stood.

Teo cars, the same car they had seen before and another car, pulled up to the bodega. The silence when they turned off was almost shocking. Gang members, mostly teens, started piling out of the cars. They all were armed, and Jade clutched the bag with her gun tightly.

“This was so not a good idea,” she said.

One of the kids started yelling towards the bodega. “Hey. This is Hunterz territory. You don’t sell here!”

Nothing. The road was silent. Jade happened to see someone closing their window at a house across the street.

The gang leader shot his gun into the air. Another pause, the world almost still, before something lanced out, a spear of some sort, and impaled him to the ground behind him.

The other gang members started yelling and shooting at the bodega. The sharp sound of the guns echoed between the buildings, deafening.

“Fuck!” Jade pulled Craig back at the sound of gunfire. Flashes of light began to appear that bounced off the building, bright even in the daylight. Jade and Craig lay on the ground, hiding while the yells and gunfire echoed. The gang members kept firing at the bodega, and even started shooting at it with automatic weapons.

After about eight minutes, sirens were heard. Jade heard the music start up as the engine revved and she peered around the corner as the gang members started piling in the car, leaving their dead.

The sirens of police cars came closer and some of the cars kept going, to chase the fleeing gang members, and others pulling up to the house.

Jade finally took the chance to look at the bodega and recoiled in horror. The bodega was a mess: holes through the boarded up windows and the walls were also torn up. Several gang members were laying dead on the ground and more than one had been speared through. Some of those were still moving and flapping helplessly suspended on the spears that had driven through them and pinned them to the ground at strange angles.

One of them died as she watched, going limp. The blood on the shiny metallic spear as he slid down just froze in her vision for a moment, she could see nothing else. Craig had to shake her shoulder.

The police kept coming, and then ambulances showed up. Officers broke down the boarded up door. There were yells and Jade watched as one of them stumbled out and threw up.

Craig looked at the scene and said faintly, “That did not go as I expected.”

“We should go,” Jade said.

“I know.”

But they stood there, fixed in place. They watched more and more police come. The sun climbed the sky. The police set up barricades. Ambulance after ambulance. It was noon now and Jade felt like she should eat, but instead she just watched. Body after body in zipped up bags on gurneys came out. News reporters appeared at some point and filled much of the interstitial spaces behind the barricades, yelling questions into the void of the grim policemen.

At one point, a reporter came to ask what they had seen. Jade and Craig couldn’t focus on him, couldn’t understand what he was saying. They just watched as more bodies kept being rolled out on gurneys.

It was night. The police had setup a cordon around the building. The horror that had held Jade and Craig started to fade.

Craig said softly, “We should go eat.”

Jade turned to him and suddenly, violently slapped him, “This is our fault. We shouldn’t have involved other people. Those kids…” Jade’s voice was hoarse with suppressed hysteria.

Craig looked at her and she saw the shame in his eyes. “I know. I thought we could just… rattle them a bit. I had no idea it would be a war,” These consequences were so beyond him he had no frame of reference.

“What should we do? Do we tell the police?”

“Two blacks coming up to the police to tell them about magic and drugs?” Craig’s voice was firm. “That is suicide and you know it.”

“I know. But this is our fault.”

“Bullshit,” said a familiar voice. Jade looked to see Charlie there

“We were supposed to come and you left without me! I just had to follow the police.” Charlie explained in a terse, angry voice.

But her voice softened a bit, “I think this is bad, but it is the fault of whoever did the killing. We need to tell that woman, Bahu, what happened here.”

Craig looked at them both, “Who is Bahu?”