If any thought was given to the carnage, it was, "good riddance".

————

          It was a good shot. The head exploded on impact inside the hoodie. Gabe was pleased. Another thug sent to Hell. Another bastard that won't be raising Hell in the Hood no more. Too bad it wasn't safe to take out more than one-per-night. Too bad the stupid Law punishes the executioner instead of paying bounty for every predator removed. 

          It was safe to walk away. Gunfire in the hood is just background noise. Another gangster dead won't even get reported on the news. 

          He was born, Peter Gabriel Slater. No one called him Peter Gabriel Slater. Gabe thought he might get all three names on a police blotter. Gabe wasn't worried though, he'd been careful. He didn't think there'd be any police blotter. The cops didn't know about him, neither did the street-scum Gabe executed. The cops didn't really care who did it. The gangs thought the other gang did it. The street was happy somebody did it. 

          Gabe has been working at his mission for years. He couldn't remember when he'd started. 

          He did remember why. He remembered in flashing images: Guns banging; Little kid spurting blood; Gangster shooter's car squealing away; Silence.

          The silence didn't last much longer than the shooting. There was little sense of tragedy. Collateral damage was part of the normal violence. Senseless death happened. Nothing to be done about it except stay out of the way. Gabe thought the same - until that day

          On that day something clicked in Gabe's head. 

          "They must be somethin' I can do". What and how came to him in sudden internal dialogue. "Can damn sure shoot the bastards? - Couldn't shoot 'em all. - Could shoot 'em one 

at a time. - What good to kill only a few? - Every dead gang-banger better than no dead gang-banger - Might get killed? - You old, you care 'bout getting killed? - Naw, not much".

          "Gotta get a gun"!

          That was the beginning. Gabe reckoned: "I'm po, I'm black, I'm old. That make me near invisible. People, they all used to me shufflin' 'round to get beer or smokes. They don't pay me no mo attention than a Popeyes bag blowin' by. Could hide a gun under my longcoat, same one I wear winter and summer. Vargas could get me a gun". 

          Gabe hadn't talked to Tito since he retired. Gabe took the bus out to the end of the line. The shabby old garage looked the same as ever. Tito looked a little older. Gabe took Tito's hand and looked in his eye. "Por Favor, Senior Vargas, I have a need".

          Tito knew what Gabe needed, he didn’t ask why. 

          The gun was more than Gabe imagined. 

          Tito was selling the garage, "Goin' back where I come from". Tito wanted to live-out

the rest of his years in the peaceful quiet of his jungle-village birthplace. That's why he only had one gun left. Everything else he'd sold-off. The gang-bangers didn't want this kind of gun. they preferred small guns, handguns, small enough to hide in a waistband. 

          None of his buyers wanted a long-gun. Especially not an odd one like this.

          Tito opened the box and explained. The gun was an AR-21 Bullpup equipped with a red-dot scope and an M-16 30-round magazine chambered for NATO 5.56X45 rounds. The buy included three ammo boxes of a couple hundred rounds. 

          Gabe didn't know what any of that meant. It took a while for Gabe to fully understand what he was buying. It took a little longer to understand how perfect the AR-21 Bullpup was for his intended work. It took no time at all to realize he couldn't carry all this stuff on the bus. 

          Gabe shelled-out twenty dollars to rent his landlord's old wreck for two hours. 

          It was lot of money for an old codger living on social security. Gabe wasn't near used to spending that much money. He'd used up every dime he'd saved. He took the next few weeks to let everything settle - and get familiar with the Bullpup. 

          Bullpup design pushes the barrel of the rifle up inside the stock, turning a long-gun into a much shorter gun. If Gabe didn't use the magazine the Bullpup could be easily hidden in his long-coat. Gabe only planned to use one bullet at a time. He didn't need a magazine. 

          He didn't need so much ammunition either but since replacement would be difficult to impossible, he was happy to have the extra rounds.

          Next, strategy.

          Hunting street-thugs didn't require much hunting; they were all over the place. The hunting only required a bullet. Gabe would wander around the streets until he wandered across a good opportunity. Any gang of gangsters with nearby cover for a blind would do.

          The gang heard the shot. The dead one spurting blood didn't. The others couldn't tell where it came from. Gabe made good use of the red-dot scope by focusing on either head or heart. He never missed. He never ran away either. Instead he lit a cigarette and shambled slowly off. No one noticed him. He was invisible.

         Gabe's hunting excursions were deliberately random. Having no pattern was part of his camouflage. He needn't have worried. No one cared about dead thugs. It was part of daily life. 

          If any thought was given to the carnage it was, "good riddance". 

          The years went by. The bloody gang violence continued. Gabe never expected his work to change anything. He did it for his own satisfaction. At least it was something. The Law was useless. So was everyone else.

          Doing something was better than doing nothing. 

          Gabe did what he could. 

          It was getting harder. Each year harder than the year before. He was tired. Very tired. One night he was too tired to go out hunting. He decided to go to bed early. He died that night.

          Likely from a heart attack. 

          The landlord found the body; Gabe's rent was days overdue. Para-medics removed the body and discovered the arsenal. The cops took the arsenal away. 

           Gabe's corpse was identified as one Peter Gabriel Slater, honorably discharged and retired from the United States Marine Corp. The story set off loose speculation on the 5:00 News. The gun and ammunition were traced to Israeli Defense Forces; how did old Gabe get this stuff? What was an elderly man doing with such a gun? What about the ammo boxes? What was he planning with all that ammunition?

           What had he already done with it?

          The cops started wondering. Peter Gabriel Slater might have been a one-man vigilante. Maybe some of those dead-files could be closed. Maybe some of those unsolved deaths were 

the work of one Peter Gabriel Slater. It was a convenient solution. The unknown fact of its truth didn't make it any less convenient. 

          The decent folks in the Hood liked the idea. Gabe became a folk hero.

          The myth became larger than the man. Old Gabe was credited with more righteous terminations than he'd actually carried out. The larger truth was unchanged; one man could make a difference. Gabe hadn't gotten rid of all the predators, but the ones he'd taken out weren't raising Hell any more - it was something. 

          Gabe would have wondered about being called a vigilante.

          He'd never heard that word.

By K. L. Shipley

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