V (boyxboy short stories)

Verrückte clowns.

     Now, the usual bank-robbing scenes would start with a group of well organized thieves barging in the place, demanding that everyone held their hands up while pointing the guns threateningly.

     That... is not how it went.

     As soon as the four men entered, the shooting began, taking one innocent citizen after the other, the grinning smiles on their personalized clown masks being the last menacing, taunting sight the victims got to see, the faces bound to echo in their minds even after their quick deaths.

     They shot away, watching as body after body fell to the hard floor with thuds, their blood joining the complexity of colours on their masks and staining their suits, the clothing hiding the anti-proof vests and armour underneath.

     The four thieves then ran towards the large, main counter of the bank and slid on it, landing behind in a crouch. Three of them turned around and pointed their weapons towards the big doors, awaiting the cops' arrival, while the fourth one of them searched the pockets of the dead employee, eventually finding a key.

     He hurried towards the door of a room and opened it, continuing down a hallway until reaching the huge safe. The man let a heavy bag slide down his shoulder and to the floor, and he took out a drill, pinning it around the lock of the wide door and pressing activation buttons.

     By the time the machinery started working on its own, the policemen had arrived, opening the doors widely, the countless men casting shadows over the bloody bodies on the floor, the shadows wrapping their horrified and dead expressions in a perfect hug of morbid.

     The thieves fired right ahead, one of them skilfully handling a Glock17 into taking out a handful of men in seconds, the man in the middle using a shotgun, trained hands reloading, aiming and firing in robotic-accurate moves, and the remaining one blindly firing his MP5 with a maniac laughter of joy- his pure rage, ironically enough, more effective than the others' in taking out men.

     Still, they were equally aware of the strategy they had to apply. They would squat down and hear for the cops' shots, only raising after the men fired in order to catch them by surprise. Shards flew everywhere from the shattered glass top placed on the counter, along with wooden dust and splinters, but they revealed no skin to harm.

     Meanwhile, the man working on the safe had managed to penetrate the thick door and pulled it open, entering and fishing 4 crumpled backpacks from his bag. He placed bundles of money inside with a hand, the other one reaching for his handled transceiver and pressing the button to access their driver.

     "Be at the front of the bank in 100 seconds." he demanded in German, the microphone in his mask also allowing his partners to hear the order through their single earphones.

     He hurried to fill the four backpacks and then slid them all on one arm, leaving the bigger bag and the drill behind as he hurried down the quiet soundproof hallway, until he opened the door, a symphony of noises flooding his head. Bullets hitting the floor with bell-like jingles, guns firing frantically, each in their own monotonous but melodic rhythm, the eager laughter of his less than sane friend, angry and alarmed shouts from the cops- that would be a Monday in the guy's life.

     As he got behind his partners, he slid three of the backpacks on their shoulders and looked at his watch, noticing they had exactly 60 seconds to go, so he yelled in his microphone for them to retreat and they all left towards the back.

     They ran through the many corridors, a loud beeping stretching on forever in their ears at the sudden contrast between the noise back there and the dead silence in the hallway, save for the tapping of their leather boots.