Free Blood & Tacos #2 by Josh Stallings, Ray Banks, Andrew Nette, Frank Larnerd, Jimmy Callaway Page A

windows.
    In the distance, sirens cut through the night. I walked past Sello and his
gang and limped down the stairs.
    I kept in the shadows and staggered north. At Victory Boulevard, I climbed
a fire escape of a clothing warehouse and waited for the next train to rumble
past. Twenty minutes later, I was on the other side of the island.
    In the morning, Milo picked me up and brought me back to the arcade. He didn’t
ask any questions, just sewed up my cuts and made me chicken noodle soup.
    I spent a few weeks in bed, until Milo accused me of being a lazy hippy. My
ear is fucked up and I’ve got some nice new scars. But honestly, it only
makes me look more wicked.
    The pigs never came to question me, so I figured Sello and his gang had kept
their mouths shut. Besides, they had enough problems with the cops finding shit
in their apartment.
    I kept expecting to see Hector again. I thought he’d tell me how he had
learned to stand on his own and how life was better, but he never came back
to the arcade. I had almost forgotten about him, until one Sunday a couple months
later, I was on 98th Street grabbing a slice from Rose’s Pizzeria.
    Right down the street was Sello’s friend in the 3-D glasses. He saw me
and crossed the street, but I followed. After a half a block, he wheeled around
and held up his hands.
    "Jesus, man. What do you want?"
    I said, "Where’s that kid Hector?"
    3-D looked down at his shoes, absent-mindedly rubbing at the arm I had broken.
    "He’s in ICU at Saint Vincent’s. Can’t talk or move.
They say he’s got brain damage."
    I grabbed him with both hands and shoved him against the wall.
    "Was it Sello? Was it you?"
    "It wasn’t us, man! We were trying to help him!" 3-D squeaked.
"He fell. Hit his head or something."
    "Fell?"
    "My homeboy said it was Hector’s old man. Said he’s a total
hard ass. My homie told me people heard Hector’s dad screaming at him
for coming home late. I know Hector was afraid of his dad. That’s why
he wanted to join the Threats. Sello said that if he passed initiation, we would
take care of things for him."
    I let 3-D go.
    He shrugged his shoulders. "The pigs don’t give a shit. Why should
they? Just another beaner to them. Hector’s father didn’t even get
questioned."
    I put a hand over my eyes and pushed the darkness deep into my gut.
    "You OK?" 3-D asked.
    I had him follow me back to the arcade and told him to wait outside. I threw
some duct tape and road flares into a backpack. At the bottom of the stairs,
Milo asked where I was going. I told him I was going to do some repairs, fix
something that was broke.
    When I came outside, 3-D was still waiting.
    I asked, "You know where I can find Hector’s dad?"
    "Yeah."
    "Show me."
    THE END
    Frank Larnerd is currently a student at West Virginia
State University, where he has received multiple awards for fiction and non-fiction.
His first anthology as editor,
Hills of Fire: Bare-Knuckle Yarns of Appalachia
will be released in the fall of 2012 from Woodland Press. Frank lives in Putnam
County, West Virginia.

SNIPER! Blast Out in Lebanon
      By Matthew C. Funk

     
    Text taken from an interview with Agent "Sniper" by Matthew
C. Funk, 2012, at Sniper’s home in West Palm Beach, Florida.
    Our decisions can’t change the course of the world.
    I used to believe different. I used to accept, as a part of myself essential
as a heartbeat or a sinew, that we can change the planet.
    Choose door one rather than door two, and kings are torn from the throne. Nations
fall. Freedom rings.
    Or not. You fail and your failure means the turn of the world shifts.
    CIA operatives buy into that faith—that "for want of a nail"
pipe dream.
    That faith made me capable of surviving Beirut in ’87. It’s what
sent me there in the first place.
    A black-budget agent for the CIA has to buy into it. It’s not just why
you do what you do. It’s who you are: More important than