As BJ moved quickly down aisle six, he reached under his sweatshirt and let his hand wrap around the butt of his Tec pistol. He snapped off the safety with his thumb. When he arrived at the cross-aisle in the middle of the store, he slowed, stepped laterally, and stopped. Carefully he leaned around a display of Bounty paper towels and glanced down the remainder of aisle seven.
BJ felt his pulse quicken in anticipation. Jack was standing in the same spot, and Slam had moved over next to him. It was perfect.
BJ’s heart skipped a beat when he felt a finger tap his shoulder. He swung around. His hand was still under his sweatshirt, holding on to the bolstered Tec.
“May I help you?” a bald-headed man asked.
Anger seared through BJ at having been interrupted at precisely the wrong moment. He glared at the jowled clerk and felt like busting him in the chops, but instead he decided to ignore him for the moment. He couldn’t pass up the opportunity with Jack and Slam standing nose to nose.
BJ spun back around, and as he did so he drew out the machine pistol. He started forward. He knew a single step would bring the aisle into full view.
The clerk was shocked by BJ’s sudden movement, and he didn’t see the gun. If he had, he never would have shouted “Hey” the way he did.
Jack felt on edge and jittery. He disliked the store, especially after his run-in with the pharmacist. The background elevator music and the smell of cheap cosmetics added to his discomfort. He didn’t want to be there.
As wired as he was, when he heard the clerk yell, his head shot up, and he looked in the direction of the commotion. He was just in time to see a stocky African-American leaping into the center of the aisle brandishing a machine pistol.
Jack’s reaction was pure reflex. He threw himself into the condom display. As his body made contact with the shelving an entire unit tipped over with a clatter. Jack found himself in the center of aisle eight on top of a mountain of disarranged merchandise and collapsed shelves.
While Jack leaped forward, Slam hit the floor, extracting his own machine pistol in the process. It was a skillful maneuver, suggesting the poise and expertise of a Green Beret.
BJ was the first to fire. Since he held his pistol in only one hand, the burst of shots went all over the store, ripping divots in the vinyl flooring and poking holes in the tin ceiling. But most of the shots screamed past the area where Jack and Slam had been standing seconds before, and pounded into the vitamin section below the pharmacy counter.
Slam let out a burst as well. Most of his bullets traveled the length of aisle seven, shattering one of the huge plate-glass windows facing the street.
BJ had pulled himself back the moment he’d seen the element of surprise had been lost. Now he stood, crouched over behind the Bounty paper towels, trying to decide what to do next.
Everyone else in the store was screaming, including the clerk who’d tapped BJ on the shoulder. They began rushing to the exits, fleeing for their lives.
Jack scrambled to his feet. He’d heard Slam’s burst of gunfire, and now he was hearing another burst from BJ. Jack wanted out of the store.
Keeping his head down, he dashed back into the pharmacy area. There was a door that said “Employees Only,” and Jack rushed through. He found himself in a lunchroom. A handful of open soft drinks and half eaten packaged pastries on the table told him that people had just been there.
Convinced that there was a way out through the back, Jack began opening doors. The first was a bathroom, the second a storeroom. He heard more sustained gunfire and more screams out in the main part of the store.
Panicked, Jack tried a third door. To his relief it led out into an alley lined with trash cans. In the distance he could see people running. Among those fleeing, he recognized the pharmacist’s white coat. Jack took off after them.