This I did in about two hours out of boredom. The characters involve tend to be in many of my fictional ideas. I guess, that could be a problem, eventually I need to branch out to make more characters. Until then, I am just fooling around with these guys.

I am not sure if this will lead into a full-on story. Consider it a short, standalone prompt.


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BANG!

The retort of a rifle sounded from an unknown direction. The bullet sent down range blasted apart a flower pot staged by a brunette man's head. His suave, spike-tipped hair caught a handful of flying dirt raining from its dispersal, covering his face and smothering the air he breathed with rapid gasps. He choked on the few particles of dirt inhaled and coughed into his free hand. His other hand held fast to a Match .45 USP handgun, his finger shaking close to the trigger. His green eyes chanced another look over the rim of his cover, a poorly erected brick wall supporting plants of different sizes and characteristics. The entirety of the roof was a staging ground of brick walls, some standalone, others stacked together filled with dirt for growing plants. The shatter remnants of a greenhouse surrounded them, stifling its interior with as whole panels absorbed the rays of sunlight that beamed upon them, reflecting them inside indirectly. Where rays could beam through unblocked, a sniper's sights were locked and had his or her trained eye on the area.

On the rooftop of a condemned, rundown, desecrated building in the middle of the Bronx, New York, Tyrone Ty Tyson of Brooklyn felt disturbed. His face was pale and sweat streamed profusely from either the heat or constant hovering threat.

“Tyrone! Tyrone!” A dark skinned man to his right barked his name repeatedly. Lying low, on the ground, with another wall of brick safeguarding him from open fire, Frankie Jack Washington thumbed fresh cartridges into a Franchi Spas-12 shotgun's chamber, racked the slide and shifted onto his back with his knees up. Unlike Tyrone of Brooklyn, Frankie heralded from the other side of the United States, L.A., California. Many miles away from home turf, Frankie was sweating like his partner in the Webster Projects on the corner of Washington Ave. Their greenhouse hot box of hell was a shooting gallery as their would-be assassin shattered pottery for sporting fun around their heads. Dirt and clay rained like firework sparks on a Fourth of July.

“What Frank?” Tyrone asked. He looked over the edge where the pot was obliterated by the sniper round. He could not tell what weapon their opportunistic foe was using but the gunman's aim was scary close. Tyrone ducked down when another bullet cracked just inches above his head. Seized by instinct, he threw himself down on his belly, twisted around, and assumed a prone position like his friend.

“Did you see where he's shooting?” Frankie asked. His question was matched with a hard, impatient glare from Tyrone. The black man stared back just as harshly, or even more. Unlike Tyrone's boyish, girl-winning charm and prince-like face, Frankie was a tad temperamental in attitude and crude in charm and he looked like any young buck who glared his way through the streets, which worked out well with bull-loving women up to this point. Now his fiery green eyes were targets ready to be filled with lead.

“b***h! This isn't a staring contest,” Frank growled.

“Why don't you go lock eyes with head hunter over there, buddy. I've been trying for the last three minutes!” Tyrone hammered his fist into the roof floor. Somehow, his rage and frustration punched a hole through the tile and even splintered a rotten wooden beam. He wretched back his left hand and nurtured it with his gun-holding other, feeling the throb intensify.

Frank eyed the small hole then his companion. “Cover me!”

“How the ******** am I supposed to cover you!”

BANG! BANG! BANG!

Repeated rifle shots snapped in the distance and pieces of Tyrone's protection were blasted away like cheap Lego blocks. Pieces of brick and red dust showered over him as he yelled all the profanity he knew.

“Good job, keep it up man!” Frankie sat up against the wall, aimed his shotgun between his legs and fired the weapon empty. Bright red shells flew from the ejection port and clattered over the floor. The booming retort, exploding closer to his family jewels than he would have preferred, shook Frank to the core. Seven noticeable holes, forming a circle, stared back at Frankie in response to his questionable action.

He made sense of it all once he flipped his shotgun around, aimed the butt for the section within the ring of gun holes and bashed it continuously until a man-size hole was formed. “Jump over here man,” Frankie instructed.

Between him and Tyrone was six feet of space, just enough to catch somebody running for their life. Tyrone, on all fours, stared at their chance for freedom. “I swear if I die, this is your fault. I told you those ******** were no ******** do I know, we needed money and we're still going to get paid,” Frankie said.

“How ******** we are, now jump over here b***h or I am leaving your a**.”

Tyrone gulped, breathed, and lunged for safety. His red Converse sneakers kicked off the tile floor as his blue jeans stretched taut from every stride. His buttoned up short-sleeved black shirt, decorated with a red dragon twisting around the black, rippled from his movement. Tyrone thought the insignia on his shirt must have offered itself as the perfect bulls-eye. He dove into the hole as a number of bullets snapped and popped behind him, chasing after him but never quite hitting him.

He hit the floor below with a whump, knocking the wind out of him. Rolling to his right, he avoided getting crushed underneath Frankie's heavier body as the dark skinned thug dropped feet first.

“You're still alive and kicking,” Frankie asked. Tyrone kicked him in the shin before he climbed back to his feet. Frankie, cursing and hopping on one foot, threw a punch which socked his partner in the shoulder.

“I swear man, on my mom's grave, this isn't my fault this time. It's yours,” Tyrone said, rubbing his shoulder until it felt better.

Frankie shrugged and slipped in new shells from the pockets of his brown slacks, he was left with three in in his pants pocket and two in his coat. Covered in dirt, dust, and bits of clay, he wasted a perfect outfit for an occasion he thought would have sealed their way to better living. “Sure, fine, I'll take the hit. I didn't think Chinese mafia were this bad. I took the precautions not to step on anyone's toes, I swear.”

“Who were you paying a visit to?”

“The big man's daughter, she was the only person there to represent. So, y'know, I kept respectful and tried to put in a word for our business,” Frankie said as he paced from one wall to the other. His crocodile shoes crushed the small parts of the ceiling they came through.

“A business of verbal abuse and violence, breaking and entering, thievery, arson, drug trafficking,” Tyrone said, counting the amount of charges and time they could spend in the slammer. “What haven't we done?”

“Killed somebody,” Frankie said grimly.

“Did you tell her that?”

“Yes.”

“The ********, man, you were suppose to sell us not ******** make us look like pansies. That's probably why we got a ******** gunmen shooting at our asses.”

“That's not why,” Frankie stopped and observed the room they entered. Plastic sealed the doorways and the windows were boarded up with planks of wood. Roaches and spiders and other pests crawled along the floors. Rats as large as a small dog scurried about, some bold enough to near them and take a whiff until they were kicked away. Looking around, Frankie pushed aside a veil of plastic and into the hallway inhabiting a staircase leading downward. Tyrone followed after him as they rushed the stairs toward the ground floor.

He brushed by Frankie's shoulder and took the lead. His gun trained for anything below them, ears attuned to the slightest of sounds. At the same time, he had half a mind focused on Frankie. "What did you do?"

And Frankie answered in his assertive, angry and cocky fashion:

“I slapped the b***h.”