Two small-time crooks think they’ve found a ticket to paradise in a stolen shipping crate, but the docks only trade in blood and betrayal.
Writer’s Prompt
The rain on the windshield tasted like rust and cheap coffee. Inside the beat-up Honda, the heater was dead, and the dark harbor smelled of dead fish and diesel.
Sal jabbed a cold slice of pepperoni toward the docks. “Watch for the orange crate, Tony. It don’t have TVs. It’s filled with cash and smack. That’s the payload.”
Tony chewed his crust, his eyes locked on the freighter’s crane. “We leave the junk,” he mumbled, steam rising from his mouth. “We take the green, we don’t count it, and we scram for Arizona. I can’t take another winter of this cold.”
An hour later, the docks were a graveyard of shadows. They slipped past the sleeping watchman, the tarmac slick beneath their boots. In the belly of Warehouse 4, the orange crate sat waiting—a neon tombstone in the dark.
Sal wedged the crowbar beneath the splintering pine. Crack.
The wood gave way with a sound like a breaking bone. Sal reached inside, his fingers tearing through packing peanuts. He pulled his hand back, but it wasn’t holding bricks of hundreds or bags of powder.
It was a digital timer. 00:04. 00:03.
From the shadows behind them, a heavy bolt-action clicked.
“You boys are late,” a voice rasped.
Sal froze, crowbar raised. Tony’s hand crept toward his jacket pocket, his fingers slick with sweat. The timer blinked down to one.
Over to You…
How does Tony and Sal’s desperate gamble end? Do they dive for cover from the blast, face the gunman in the dark, or does the timer reveal a different trap entirely? Finish the story in the comments below!
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