Day 201 - Repeat Offenders - Chapter 4 - (1416 words)

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Repeat offenders

By Wayne Webb

CHAPTER 4

“Let's do it again” Michael was still coughing but he was ready to go regardless, he could see the window of opportunity closing on a second run at the jewels and the cash that they represented.


“I don't think that's such a good idea.” Came back from Brian, but he coughed a couple of times and snuck a look at the machine, wondering if he truly believed himself.


“Oh come on man, let's just risk it anyway. That's the fucking point of having a time machine. WE CAN RISK IT!” Ivan was hyped up and overexcited, the thrill of the chase, the violence low consequences and the brushes with real danger, the reality of it all. His heart was racing and blood high with adrenalin. It was the rush and the charge that drove him to want to go again, right now and experience the same thing, but with instant knowledge and reactions. The pain in his hands was real and harsh, it throbbed with an insistence that time travellers could get hurt. The same pain though gave another message, that the world of pain and hurt was transient for so many others that they intersected with.


Ivan had a plan for chaos and disorder, but one that reaped the benefit for stealing the gems one more time.


“It's ten thirty in the real world, we still have time to set the clock and go a few more times. Come on we're wasting time. We have all the time but only so many events to take advantage of. Let's go, go, go.” Ivan was at the bank of switches and jittering, ready to throw them into place, to take whatever action was necessary to enact another go.


“We go again.” Michael was looking Brian and not asking.


“We CAN go again, but SHOULD we?”


“YES! YES! YES!”


“Yes we should. We need the investment, the bigger the better. We could use the back up policy.”


Brian looked at the other two men and came to the machine, he reset the clock and adjusted the three devices they all wore on their wrists. He looked unconvinced.


“We have around forty five minutes to get ready. The delivery is at eleven seventeen, and next time let's set the clock immediately gentlemen. We can always can it f we don't need it, but we can avoid the diminishing returns effect but not shaving so much off the window each time. The jewels might be there for longer than we realise, but the upper end for pick up is still unknown, let's not find out the hard way.” Michael was in charge, but they were being pushed along by Ivan's power and boldness.


Monday 011:27 a.m. April 17^th


The three men were in the bank again, but this time around things went very differently from the very first instance. As they walked through the door Ivan, with bandaged hands, fired rounds across the bank at both guards, felling the nearest one in seconds and spraying the second with bullets, hitting him and the people next to him indiscriminately. Screaming happened within seconds of the bodies hitting the floor and the blood beginning to flow from the guards, the manager and Ivan's girlfriend.


“Oh for fuck's sake Ivan!” Michael took the gun from the grinning Ivan who shrugged and pulled a second from his pocket and fired randomly at the line of customers still standing, the sensible ones dropping to the floor and covering their heads with their hands. In the next thirty seconds Ivan had shot seven people, not checking to see if they were alive or dead.


Brian stood near the door, not wanting to walk any further in the carnage and the death that was being dealt inside the bank. He turned and walked out the door, leaving the men to the robbery, he walked calmly to the café where they had earlier, in a different set of instances, watched the delivery before going in and committing the crime. His hands were shaking as he went through his pockets looking for his wallet, ready to pay for a coffee.


“What's that noise Sarah?” The Barista was asking the checkout girl, Sarah by her name tag, as she was leaning over the counter and looking past Brian's shoulder and through the glass doors. She could not directly see the bank from her position, unlike the table that they had sat at before, with a clearer view a little further along the plaza side where the steps lead to the bank.


“I dunno. Is that a backfire?” Sarah shook her head. “It can't be guns? Can it? Did we … was that people yelling? It can't be … screaming? No, right?”


“I … should we call someone? Do you think? I mean it was a lot, yeah?” His brow furrowed, he knew what it sounded like but no one wanted to assume the worst. This was not downtown Baghdad, this was not a war zone, they had no real gang issues and no mass shootings, or not yet anyway.


“It is gun fire. And yes, you should call someone. AFTER my coffee please?” Brian smiled wanly, and got nothing but blank stares, the situation was still too unreal for them to grasp. Brian held up his hands and showed them to the coffee shop staff, shaking feverishly and unable to contain the stress. He wavered on his feet and grabbed the counter for support.


“Are you ok? Are you serious?” The Barista leapt over the counter and shepherded the shaken customer to a seat and looked at him closely, trying to see if he was ok or delusional.


“Fuck!” The coffee man bolted backwards and fell on his ass and he looked up at Brian in horror. There was a spatter of blood on the man's shirt and the ashen look on his face and his words all clicked into place. “Jesus, Sarah! Call the cops! Call the cops, now!. Man, dude, were you in there? Is anyone hurt?” He came back in closer, still staring at the trail of red that had arced across the man's shirt, a red curved, connect the dots of the bullet that taken the closest and slowest guards life.


“Hello? Police! Police! There's guns, shooting at the bank, Aubrey Plaza.” Sarah was wide eyed and yelling into her phone receiver, the handset hanging off the wall behind the cash register. Usually for orders.


Brian followed his gaze to his shirt and saw the same thing. “Look at that. That must be from the guard. They were in front of me, I was behind them.” Brian poked at the stain and it smeared at his touch, leaving a red oval on his fingertip. The blood there was a relief map of his fingerprint, as id the red was a special dye that would identify him in the aftermath, he saw it as a problem.


“I don't know, there's a guy here, he saw it, he's covered in blood. I … I don't know... umm I'll ask him, Sir? Sir?” She was being asked to get information from the known 'witness' but Brian was not listening to her and not looking at the man on his haunches in front of him. Instead he stared, transfixed by the reddened end of his index finger.


“Out damned spot.” He said and then laughed at his own reference. Laughed harder than he should have, laughed like he was going a little crazy.


Gunfire rang out again from across the street. There were a rapid succession of cracks and screams.


“There's more, oh my god they're shooting again hurry! Please hurry!”


Brian wiped the finger on the Barista's apron and looked him straight in the eye. “Trim Latte thanks. No sugar, double large and hot, not tepid thanks.”


“What? I think we should wait for the cops, and you need an ambulance not coffee.” The Barista had made a judgement that the man was somehow impaired and he stood to walk away back to the counter and to get te keys, lock the shop up and send everyone home to somewhere safer.


There was no safety for them though.



“Do I have to repeat my order?” Brian stood as well and pointed a gun, not at the coffee man, but at Sarah who dropped the phone and screamed.