The Gang-Slayer

It was an ordinary Monday afternoon as TJ made his way home from school. His day felt as if it had lasted forever; his 8th period teacher went on and on about limits. What spun him out the worst was that it was only a Monday, and that he would have four more days of torture before he would get a possible break. As he walked, his book bag seemed to slump lower and lower from the weight of his books.

"Let's see," he began out loud "If I get my Calculus out of the way first, then English and History should be a breeze." However, he suddenly remembered that his English teacher expected his first draft for an essay tomorrow. He sighed loudly, stopped to take a deep breath, then continued his expedition.
As he walked through the quiet streets of his suburb, he looked around at the same boring neighborhood in which he had grown up. The same houses with the same people seemed to live there. In fact, he could have sworn that the trees were all exactly the same height as when he was only a child.

"Only three more months," he whispered "and I'll be out of this town for good." TJ began to ponder if he would ever come back to visit his hometown when he saw his friend Felix emerge from his house.

"Hey TJ!" he called "what took you so long to finally get out of school?"

"I had a lot of books to bring home" TJ hollered back. Felix ran down his walkway to meet with TJ and walk with him the rest of the way to his house.
As they approached the next intersection, a crowd of people began to approach them from the left. They seemed to be covered in black and TJ couldnt make out any of their faces. That's pretty wierd, TJ thought, but decided to disregard it. He and Felix began to discuss their baseball card selection and contemplated on several possible trades.

No sooner did they cross the street did the mysterious ensemble of men begin sprinting toward them. Now that they were moving so quickly, TJ could make out at least four or five of them there.

"Run!" TJ yelled and he and Felix began to move faster than they had ever remembered moving before. Regardless, the strangers began closing the distance and eventually caught up with them. Out of breath and sweaty, TJ and Felix stopped and saw exactly six people encircling them, all dressed with black hooded sweaters and black jeans.

"Why did you idiots run?" asked one of them.

"I don't know" Felix gasped "Why did you run after us?"

"Well," the hooded man explained "we figured that a couple of kids like you must have SOMETHING worth stealing, since you're from this neighborhood."

"Sorry," TJ said, "We have nothing, just my books." However, the crowd seemed to doubt this.

"Run your pockets" one of the other black-wearing fiends demanded.

"Run what?" Felix interrogated.

"Ma boy Daril said to run yo pockets, foo'!" another one of the gang members exclaimed. Felix was about to comply with the fellow's request, but TJ halted him.

"And how are we supposed to know that you won't take our stuff and then beat us up?" TJ inquired.

"Well put it dis way" the first one replied "run yo pockets or will blow u fools away n take yo stuff regardless." Unintimidated, TJ refused to move an inch.

"Oh we got a tough guy!" Daril yelled. The rest of the men began to laugh and jeer. The first member of the group pulled out a knife and began advancing towards TJ. In response, TJ grabbed his cellphone in his pocket and pointed it forward through the pocket, making it seem like a gun.

"You guys have exactly five seconds before I kill all of you." he muttered gently. The other men seemed to think it really was a gun and began to run, almost getting hit by a car in their haste. Once he could no longer see them, TJ turned to Felix to see if he was ok. He seemed a little pale and shaken up, but overall he seemed ok. Upon seeing TJ's face, he even bagan to laugh.

"Did you really have a gun?" Felix asked through his laughs.

"Nope," TJ explained, "But those guys were a bunch of punks so they were scared by just the threat of a fake gun." The two boys continued their journey homeward and TJ was glad that his day finally had some meaning to it.