37.
Show time. The small looking warehouse. Dark bricks, one bay door. A chain-linked fence boxing the grounds. A Phoenix armored van pulled up to the gate. The van idled as the gate slowly rolled open.
Bones, Whitey, Rocky, and Shorty. All hunched in the darkness. A shallow ravine, like a fox hole. Black jump suits, black ski masks. Cradling the weapons from Nelson’s cache. They could see the belly of the van. Drive shaft churning with the wheels, as it rolled slowly through the gate. The van headed for the grounds.
So did team Bones, hopping from the hole, maneuvering the darkness. They blended. They made it. Fingering out, like a military team. Steps, stop, steps. Keeping pace with the van.
Closing in.
The armored van reached the warehouse. All four frogged in, creeping the dark, right behind the van. Close enough to see the gold flakes in the Phoenix motif.
The van stopped, feet from the bay door. The team lurched forward, ready to spring. Pause. The bay door started to rise. The draped chains, clanking the rollers, mixed in with a compressor pumping air. The door stopped. Chains rattled more softly, quieting, as the compressor made a giant hiss. Another pause.
An office guard emerged. Bones signaled Whitey. Whitey motioned Shorty, both hanging back. The guard continued the quiz. He stepped closer. Just short of circling the van. Bones pivoted his upper body, feet planted. If he popped the guy, or had Rocky bear hug him, the doors might roll, banging the van's roof.
The guard stopped, shot back into the depot, waving them in.
The van rolled. Team Bones readied. The van entered. Bones and Rocky huddled right up to the van's rear, inches from the doors. Whitey and Shorty raced. Once the van hit a spot in the depot, Bones and Rocky would splash the monitors in the hawk station. Whitey knew this, rehearsing the blitz with Shorty days before the raid, around the clock.
The van closed in. Bones and Rocky, right up the Econoline's ass, inches off the rear bumper. Once they stepped forward, Whitey and Shorty busted behind them, blitzing the hawk station.
The van guards spilled. Bones and Rocky leaped from behind, raised titanium, pointed in a rush. Bones on the driver, Rocky on the front passenger. The van guards froze. Too startled, at first to raise their arms.
The hawk guards sensed something, looking up at two barrels, and a pair of ski masks, like nobody's biz. It happened so quick. In moments, they were floored, and hog-tied. So were the van guards.
Whitey and Shorty ordered the hawk guards back up, and shoved them into the depot. Four on the floor. Shorty hovered, Rocky watched the door. Whitey informed Bones, before the break. They change access codes after all dismissals.
"Which one of you's has the back code?" asked Bones. No one answered. Out came the barrels, cocked, aimed. One of the hawks spoke up. Rocky lifted him off the floor.
Whitey, Bones, and guard went deeper inside the depot.
They reached the counting room. Through the chicken-wire glass, Bones beamed. Piles of loot. Cash bricks, dwarfed a counting table. Stacked high and wide. The catch looked bigger than Hackensack. In the water, anyway. The hawk raised his fingers to tap the pad.
"Hold it up." Said Bones. The hawk stopped. "We know it's a four-digit code. You punch anything more, I'll put you down right here." The hawk continued with four pad taps. The deadbolt shot back, in they went. Bones and Whitey stormed the cash, pushing the piles into large laundry bags. There was more than they planned. Whitey expected three bags. They already had four, when they called for Rocky. They untied the hawk, and had him hump a bag. They returned to the depot, dumping five bags.
Rocky hauled two. They re-tied the help, and ordered him back to the floor.
"Let's go", commanded Bones. Eddie two-wayed Tony.
Scram pulled to another secluded spot, hot wheels pointed to escape. Awesome foursome emerged from the pitch-black, each lugging a large bag. Rocky, two. Scram hopped from the wheel, stepping through the shell. Tony popped the rear doors.
They packed the SUV. Tony launched. Bones rode shotgun.
Shorty, Whitey, and Rocky sat on the loot. Once Tony scrammed a corner, the gang started to howl.
"Shit", said Tony.
"What's up?" asked Bones.
"The cops", shot Tony. A police squad car shuttled up to them, a few lengths behind. The crew, nervous, and quiet.
Another squad car raced up, right behind the one tailing the Suburban. Rocky, Whitey, and Shorty grabbed hardware.
The squad cars prowled. Tony watched his speed. The tail continued, buzzing closer. The racks begin to whirl, as red and blue
lights flash in the night. Weapons cocked.
The squad cars raced up. All three raised their weapons. A hand on the rear window, ready to hatch. Ready to fire. The squad cars zooming up. Tony kept his speed, hand on the wheel, ready to cut.
The squad cars fanned out, and broke. The lead to the right, the tail to the left. The third followed the lead. They each ripped a U-turn, speeding off in the opposite direction.
The crew watched the rack lights dissolve down the roadway.
Tony punched the gas. The crew escaped into the night.