The street! Also, two or three more days and I’ll be at 75K words. Then I can get started with re-breaking some of the text so that it’ll heal cleanly this time.
So there was a lot of ugly out there tonight. It wasn’t on the streets, though. If it was on the streets the cops and the Flatfoots would be breathing easier. They had procedures for that. Look for the hotheads, get ‘em by themselves before they set somebody else’s head on fire, too. Keep the fights local, and fists only. And when it came to anybody wanting to agitate: well, a sap in time saves nine. That’s what they did, the last time the Syndicate and the ATSE wanted to rumble, and it worked.
Would it work now? Maybe, maybe not. Thing about the cleaning ladies and the artisans is, they’re smart. They gotta be, to do what they do. And when smart people get dumb enough to wanna throw down, they just lose their judgment, not their cunning. This wouldn’t be two sets of pandilleros slamming into each other for an excuse for a fistfight, and maybe a dance number or two. These were boys and girls with a serious skill set, and who were ready to do unto others before the others did unto them.
Yeah. The ugly wasn’t on the streets. It was in nice meeting rooms that hadn’t been cleaned or aired out in a couple of days, where the same arguments and mutterings had been said over and over again, until they were as stale as the cigarette smoke. Or it was on rooftops, nice and away from any voices of reason that might feel like stopping by. Hell, by now it might even be visiting the richest offices in either group, and if happened Cin City was screwed.
“if happened” = “if it happened”?
possibly “if that happened”
Yeah, ‘that.’