Free The 13 Secret Cities (Omnibus) by Cesar Torres

dull smear. I was so embarrassed for him that I couldn't even tell him to roll down the sleeves of his hoodie.
    There was no point in taking any action, because suddenly, music was pouring from the speakers that framed the stage, and the blue lights glowed brighter. We had stood in this crowded spot for two hours, enduring a dismal opening act. Now we finally had the payoff.
    Rhinoceros took the stage swiftly, each band member moving with agility despite the fact that all of them were in their mid-fifties by now. The grind of the guitars made my ears ache from the first strum, but the music drenched my bones and my hair with a wave of sound. José María and I shared a love for these shows, and we got lost in the lumbering but sharp sound of the music. The main set lasted seventy minutes, and I don't recall ever lifting my hands off the railing. The air was thick and hard to breathe, but José María and I craned our necks toward the stage, where Cheetah the lead singer crooned their massive hit "Hail to the Chief."
    After the main set, the crowd roared for an encore. We chanted and stomped for twenty minutes, until Rhinoceros came back to the stage. Before they started playing again, Cheetah took to the microphone.
    "Chicago," he said, and the audience shrieked for almost a full minute. He pursed his lips and continued. "We just want to take a moment to acknowledge the tragedy that took place in Millennium Park just a few weeks ago. We have always loved your city."
    The applause and shouting from the crowd went nuclear. It took a full minute for it to get quiet enough for Cheetah to get back to the mic.
    "On this visit, we have noticed that the place looks grayer than usual. We feel the sadness and mourning as if we could almost touch it. Too much blood has been shed in this place, and we hope for peace."
    The audience applauded.
    "Now if only we could bring ourselves together and reject the anarchism that's splitting us apart, man. OLF, and Anonymous, we wouldn't be here today lamenting the graveyard that we created in Pritzker if it wasn't for the bullshit that groups like OLF cause.”
    The noise from the audience became pure thunder.
    “You know who you are, man,” Cheetah said. “If you're caught up in this shit, stop it. You're the very root of the problem, and you can take yourself out of it. You can prevent more bloodshed."
    A series of boos rang throughout the Aragon, but they were few. Other voices cheered.
    "If you're going to push for this kind of anarchy," Cheetah said, "just take yourself out of the equation."
    "Take yourself out," chanted the crowd, an echo of thousands.
    "Yeah, like this fucking traitor up front," shouted someone behind me. I knew the voice. It was the guy with the brown work boots. "We got two little OLFers right here."
    I blushed, and José María turned to me, his face pale with fear. The crowd around us had turned to look at us, and the white lights from the stage burned my skin. Now even the band was looking at us.
    "Leave the kid alone," someone shouted behind me.
    "Traitors," someone else said.
    "Anonymous pieces of shit," rang out.
    "Fuck you and your kind."
    "Terrorists," someone shouted.
    Terrorists.
    José María had nothing to do with this, but now people were shouting names at him, too. The man in the work boots came up close and he tapped my shoulder hard with his index and middle fingers. I turned around and looked into his drunken face. The can of Miller in his hand was too likely to become a weapon if he decided to brandish it or toss it at me.
    Suddenly, I felt sick, and a gray shroud clouded my vision. I was remembering hazy images, where I ran down a grassy field and shots rang out in the distance like thunder, and around me people kept on falling on their knees, their hands and backs. I could suddenly remember clearly the woman in the pile of bodies next to me, and the way her breath was there one moment, hot under the chilly air, then gone forever in the next. Her