"This was one of those neighborhoods, you know?" the cop standing next to James Candy yelled from behind the face shield of his riot helmet.
"I'm sorry?" James asked. He hadn't been able to make out what his fellow police officer had said.
The two of them were standing shoulder to shoulder alongside dozens of other police officers in a long phalanx, blocking a wide downtown boulevard, behind light metal fencing that no cop thought would really offer much protection.
"Back in the '90s?" the other cop went on. He was an older guy, heavy, mustached in the finest City cop tradition. Probably not long for retirement. He looked pretty uncomfortable in his riot gear.
"Yeah?" James yelled back.
"Yeah. This was one of those neighborhoods we thought we could keep good. We were flush with that crime relief bill money, hired a dozen more officers and shit. This neighborhood was starting to show some signs of getting... ugly, and we thought maybe we could weed out the bad elements. You know crack was a real problem then."
"I do. I wasn't around then."
"Yeah. Too young. Anyway, we did a good job! We arrested the shit out of the crackheads, the dealers, all those motherfuckers. We would have meetings, we did it... crime went down, sure as hell."
James looked around. It really didn't look like a bad neighborhood to him, he'd seen worse. A lot of neon signs, though. James reflected that at some point, neon signs probably had to look pretty new and fresh instead of gaudy and obtrusive like it mainly did now.
"So what happened?" James asked.
"Shit, I don't know. We were doing the job we were supposed to do, or so I thought. But you know how it is, a Starbucks leaves, a title loan joint takes its place. That happens a few times, and it's like some kind of signal for all the white people to move somewhere else, I guess."
James didn't really know what to say to that.
"And the next thing you know, all the people that
stayed
behind here, the ones that couldn't move out, well, they fucking hated us. Maybe the dealers and crackheads were family or friends of theirs or something. But all these people, you know what?"
"What's that?"
"I got the same color skin as them. I worked every day to serve them, I'm one of them, I got the same skin tone. But they don't see that. All they see is the color blue."
James just nodded.
"And they fucking
hate
blue," the cop concluded. "I ain't doing
this
shit much longer, I can tell you that. I don't know what any of it was really
for.
"
"Yeah," James said again. He put out his armored hand for a fist bump of sorts. "What's your name?"
"Aaron," the other cop yelled, bumping fists.
"Tell you what, Aaron, let's make these motherfuckers crawl back home? And then we'll go out and get us a drink. On me."
"I'll take that drink! Were you around for the last wave of riots? When that Sanders asshole shot that kid? Shawn? And then lied about it?"
"I was."
"I wonder if this is going to be worse than that. That shit was bad enough. Went on for a week. Two weeks."
James looked down the boulevard. He wondered where the protesters were. He knew they were coming.
He wasn't especially worried. Sure, there were going to be some fires, some rocks thrown. Plenty of running around and screaming. It was going to get chaotic, trying to arrest the most violent and dangerous ones amidst all the screaming and smoke, trying not to arrest the actual protesters. Trying not to hurt anyone too much.
But he wasn't particularly scared for his own safety or anything. Usually, you could just corral the protesters and push them around from street to street. After a while, they would feel they had made their point and start to break off from the pack.
That was a good time to bring a few of them down, when they separated from the herd. Bring in the paddy wagons, break up the main group into smaller ones, cull individuals and let the bulk of them dissipate over the course of the evening.
It certainly wasn't an
easy
thing to do.
But James had his full body armor on, his riot helmet, a clear plastic riot shield--a thick one, too, that would stop anything short of a bullet, and maybe even some of those.
The riot gear that the City issued was a lot better than what the cops were sent out in last time. The police union saw to that.
James didn't feel any particular fear about it all. He looked at Aaron. He wondered if Aaron was scared. The guy was a little older and all. Then again, James knew that Aaron had certainly seen plenty before this.
"I bet it's gonna be pretty bad," James said finally. "I'm gonna need that drink."
"I hear you, brother," Aaron said absentmindedly. "Look."
And there they were.
James surveyed the dozens, maybe hundreds of people that were making their way towards the police phalanx.
Fucking Benetton ad out there, he was thinking. Man. You can't get people in this country to unite in any kind of way unless it's going after the police.
Something was a little different, though. Unusual.
None of these people were saying anything. They weren't yelling the usual fuck the police bullshit.
No signs. No one was carrying a sign.
James tried to remember. He thought there were a lot of signs last time. He seemed to recall some of them being used as weapons after a point.
The mass of protesters approached the police barricade silently.
Frankly, it was fucking creepy, James thought.
Each of the protesters was holding what looked like a small package in their hand.
James relaxed.
Ah, I get it. Probably candles. It'll probably be some kind of candlelight vigil or something. That's not so bad.
Sure, there will be a bunch of assholes running around late at night burning shit, but we'll deal with that.
"You are in violation of curfew," the bullhorn blared behind James, making him jump. "Turn around and return to your homes."
No one turned to go anywhere. They all just stood there, a dozen or so feet behind the waist-high metal fence that the police were holding the line behind.
The cops shuffled in their boots, nightsticks thumping quietly in gloved palms.
The protesters just stood there, saying nothing. No demands. No recriminations. Just what now looked like a couple hundred people, bottlenecked up against a police barricade, not moving.
Just looking and blinking.
What the fuck is this, James was wondering.
And then at once, the protesters raised their hands, and began to throw what they were holding in their hands towards the police.
What are those? Balloons? Are they throwing water balloons at us?
And they
were
balloons, James realized.
But not water.
The first of the balloons smashed into the riot shields, exploding a thick red substance all over them.
James lifted his shield higher, pulled it tighter to him.
Is this fucking
blood?
But no. James realized it was paint. Red paint.
The police heard running feet and gripped their nightsticks tighter. They peered around their shields, expecting to see a wave of protesters running into the metal barricade, twisting it down.
Instead, though, the protesters in the front of the pack had turned and run back the way they came, running through an exit that the other protesters had created with their bodies.
This is organized, James realized.
The bullhorn blared again.
Another wave of balloons was launched, this time not just at the shields, but thrown high into the air, plunging down onto helmets, popping, dripping down necks into Kevlar vests.
