"Aren't you gunna say it?"
Jack's eyes were on his gun as he popped the cylinder revealing the chambers filled with bullets. His eyes came up to look at Howard across from him in the bathysphere without his head moving. He then looked back to the gun and rolled the cylinder over with his thumb and forefinger.
"Say what exactly Mr. Howard?" Jack asked.
"That thing you always say." Howard griped the shotgun to his chest tightly. On both sides of him were officers with Thompson sub machine guns.
Jack pushed the cylinder back into the revolver.
"What's he talking about Jack?" Dean asked. He was next to Jack with a Browning automatic rifle.
"Just a philosophy I believe in." Jack said and leaned his head back closing his eyes. Sucking in air with his chest expanding. Exhaling loudly.
"An even better question, if you ask me." Howard started.
"No one's asking." Jack said without moving.
"Well if you were, I'd say it's pretty shitty bringing us in through the front giving these bastards a big heads up before we get there." Howard rolled his shoulders back and popped his neck. "I'd also say it's pretty damn fucked up that there's only five us in this damn boat."
The two officers next to Howard both nodded their head.
"Well Mr. Howard." Jack still had his eyes closed. Wasn't moving. "Some big wig artist director, guy, he got a very fancy play going on today. That's also why we couldn't move in two days ago like you wanted Mr. Dean."
"Well what's that gotta do with us?" Howard asked.
"Can't go through the back of the theater to sneak in cause this big wig doesn't want us spooking his actors." Jack said. His face came down in a smile and he looked over at Howard. "And when we do move through the lobby we have to have small numbers so as not to excite the audience before they enter the play's artistic sanctum."
"Bullshit."
Jack looked over at Dean who was shaking his head smiling.
"The queer son of a bitch even asked not only to kill all of them but if we could kill the criminals quietly."
Every officer in the bathysphere reacted negatively. Except for Dean and Jack. They continued to smile.
The bathysphere rang out. They had arrived.
"You know how I like it boys." Jack said. He stood at the door of the bathysphere as his men lined up behind him. He took his shield off his chest and held it in his left hand at his side. "Wham bam. Thank you ma'am."
The door opened and Jack moved briskly with both of his arms coming up. His right arm held his pistol at a ninety-degree angle so that the barrel pointed at the ceiling. His left arm held out his shield. Behind him Howard and Dean moved in sync with his pace. The other officers followed with some difficulty.
As they came up the stairs they passed a couple with lips locked in passionate kissing. The woman slightly opened her eyes just as they were about to pass and yelped loud enough to scare the man into turning around. They gripped each other tightly.
"Ma'am." Howard smiled and tipped his hat towards the startled couple.
Jack pushed the door open and made his way to the entrance of Fort Frolic. His shield used as a sign for people to part as he pushed past tuxedos and dresses with feathers and frills.
"Rapture Security." He repeated over and over as he pushed by the pomp and circumstance of rapture society. He knifed through them bumping and pushing and never answering any of them. When the bodies began to get rounder and more expensively clothed in the main lobby some moved to block or question Jack. He mad his way past the ticket booth and into the lobby.
"Good sir what is this about?" A puffy man with an elaborate mustache challenged Jack who just blew by. Dean leaned in to the man.
"If you were important enough you'd already know." Dean moved quickly to catch up again with Jack and Howard. The portly man guffawed and shook his head. He rubbed back of his neck and shivered slightly. He looked up to where Andrew Ryan and the powers that be stood calmly at the top of the stairs. Ryan turned and walked towards the theater entrance. Sander Cohen stood where Ryan had stood. In his hands was a small piece of white cloth. His face was still and emotionless.
In his hands the cloth was ripped into two shredded pieces.
Jack continued to move with speed. He did not run but his pace carried him forward to his destination in a deliberate manner. He ascended the stairs two at a time with his officers behind him. Anyway in his way was pushed to the top and out of the way again. People got the clue. They were running into doors and shops to lock the door. The strip club was in sight.
"Y'all better be damn fine shots with those or I'm fucked." Jack dropped his shield. People scattered both ways. The two bouncers at the front of the club stood quickly on both sides of the double doors and their hands moved to their side. The sign at the top of the adult establishment indicated that it was closed. Jack stopped twenty feet away and stood with his body facing them from the side, the gun still pointed at the ceiling. His officers fanned out by him. The bouncer to his left nervously unbuttoned something on the back of his belt.
"Shit, son." Jack said. "You really don't wanna do that."
…..
It was over in just over twenty five seconds.
"Let's check it out!" Jack yelled he stood on top of the stage and checked each smuggler. No one was left. Howard ran past him to the passage way behind the main stage with another officer. Dean stood at the base of the stage looking around.
The walls to each side of the stage were riddled with machine gun fire. Seven of the eight bodies were grouped around the main stage. The bullet holes were puckered holes of gore at entrance and a mess of flesh at their exit. Some larger entrance holes brought on by close shotgun fire that shredded the body.
"That was easy." Dean said setting the heavy weapon down. "I blew threw five cases real quick."
"Eight on five." Jack said. He pulled a cigarette out and placed it in his mouth. "They had Thompsons and Garands. Did you see the way they shot? A weapon of war in the hand of a buncha fucking poets. These shit heads were smoking dope and writing haiku's while we were getting shot at in dinkville. They never would have thought a machine gun could actually herd people to where it was easier to kill em. Christ I should have remembered something for my ears."
"Loud son of a bitch isn't it?" Dean set the large gun down. "Damn heavy too. Barely had any training with this thing. Had similar guns on the planes though. Bigger bullet, though."
"I seen a man get his whole torso ripped to shit from one a our planes." Jack said. "They give y'all the big boys on those things. Hey Dean."
"Yea Jack?" Dean turned and looked up to the stage.
Jack lifted his bare right hand to his face and held thumbs up under his cigarette. A small flame lifted up and lit the tobacco. Dean's eyes went wide and his fingers extended out from each other at his sides.
"I'm real sorry man." Jack pointed at Dean making a gun with his thumb and index finger. "You're just not on the team."
"Your hand?" Dean said.
Jack's thumb dropped and Dean burst into flame. Screaming he started slapping at his face and head while spinning. Spinning in circles towards the door slapping at his body as he screamed unintelligible words. Three times he spins. Four. Five. Six. Seven. The other officer standing on the stage next to Jack vomited onto the floor.
Eight. Dean fell to the ground and continued to spin as he rolled. Nine. Ten.
Jack lifted his pistol and fired three shots, all-connecting with Deans flaming skull. Dean stopped moving, but his body did not stop burning.
Howard and the other officer came back through the door.
"What's all that damn racket?" Howard asked.
Jack stepped down of the stage and started walking towards the entrance.
"What'll happen to y'all's asses if you fuck the story up and force Mr. Fontaine to send me after you." Jack stood at the front of the door and looked down at the still flaming corpse of Dean. Then he looked back to the officers standing quietly in the destroyed club. "Get fire in here just in case that shit doesn't go out and get some medics or, hell I don't know, somebody to carry the bodies out of here.
"Is Mr. Fontaine going to be okay with you using that already?" Howard blurted. Jack walked out of the entrance to stand between the two dead bouncers. The broken doors closed mostly shut blocking the sights from inside to the outside viewers.
There in tuxes and dresses milled the citizens of rapture. The women cling to the men, some guarding their faces in the men's chest or shoulder, but all gave a fascinated look to the corpses that were beginning to create quite the pair of puddles. The only visible bodies were the two out front. The bouncer to Jack's left was rolled over hiding his wounds, but the one on the right had been struck in the face. The lower right half of his jaw was missing and the remaining contents of his mouth were dripping onto the floor. Everyone whispering and shaking their heads. None of them looked away too long.
Some condemned the smugglers some condemned the police and some condemned man and life in general. Jack simply stood there with his gun still in his hand breathing motionlessly.
Then the lights above flickered on and off three times and the crowd moved. They turned their backs on Jack, the two bouncers, and the carnage within the club and moved to take their seats in the theater.
Jack lifted his hand up and pulled the cigarette out of his mouth. He had not inhaled any of it and half of it was now ash that he flicked off. He stared at the bright red-hot ember for ten seconds then put it in his mouth and inhaled deeply. He was now alone.
He leaned his head back, closed his eyes, and exhaled smoke.
….
"Went about as well as we wanted it to go." Jack stood facing the window out into the ocean with a glass of bourbon held loosely at his side. "I got Sullivan thinking one of the smugglers magically set Dean on fire."
"How'd that go, Jackie boy?" Fontaine was laid out on a couch with a cigarette and a smile.
"He had to go." Jack said. "One of the smugglers is spliced, he just didn't know what to do with it. Tenenbaum made sure of all that. It's a helluva way to get the word out about the product."
"Those damn smugglers snuck in and stole my Fontaine Futuristics products Jackie-boy." Fontaine laughed.
"First you're reluctant to talk about it." Jack turned. "Then I magically convince you to go to Ryan, because I'm so close with the fisheries."
"Oh, and doesn't he and Sullivan just love you for that."
"Getting me higher up the food chain. And all the violence of the strip club and especially the death of an officer whip up a wild bit of press for a people desperate to know all the gory details about the blood bath in titty land."
"The secrets of which build these saps to a boil." Fontaine laughed and flicked his cigarette. "Until we finally show them it all. By the time I actually get to selling this stuff, every chump in rapture is going to be lined out the door to feel like a god."
"And you make a killing off all the little horrors that Brigid has been cooking up for you."
"That's not all she's good for Jackie-boy." Fontaine said. Jack looked out the window motionless. "I used to think French was the best tail, but I'm beginning to get a taste for kraut."
"Always with the head games Frank." Jack shook his head and took a sip of his drink. "You know that shit don't work on me."
They remained that way silently for a few breaths. Fontaine laughed and rubbed his face with both hands. He held them both open in front of his face smiling.
"I just had to see if you had any buttons, Jackie-boy." Fontaine said. "I'm beginning to think you ain't got a soul. I thought you really loved that broad. Guess I'll stop with that little game."
"Shit Frank. I do love her."
"Really Jackie-boy? Then why didn't it work?"
"Cause I ain't gunna let some stupid shit like that get on me."
Fontaine laughed harder wrapping his arms around his stomach and lifting his knees up before settling them back down. He giggled softly for a bit before resting one of his arms loosely down towards the ground and the other forearm resting across his eyes.
"Christ, Jackie-boy. You're a cold one."
"Bottom of the ocean Frank." Jack finished the rest of the glass. He closed his eyes. "Cold's all we got."