The Prune Pitt Terror

By Sheldon McCormick

An evil rocketeer and his sinister allies, the Satans Guerilla terrorist gang, is battering 1986 Compton and South Los Angeles with an arsenal of deadly Prune Pitt guided missiles. The bloodshed and destruction sends two inept black Compton security guards, Ben and Edwin, through their own trials and tribulations and into battle in a desperate effort to save the black community from the scores of lethal rocket attacks fired by the murderous villains.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jun 29, 2015
• ISBN: 9781503555037

Sheldon McCormick

A Los Angeles, California native, McCormick began his writing career while a student at Foshay Junior High School (now the Foshay Learning Center) in 1971. He was a writer for the Los Angeles Sentinel, the Compton Bulletin and several other publications. He was editor of the now-defunct Los Angeles Balance News newspaper in the late 1980s. McCormick received his Associate of Arts degree in journalism from Los Angeles City College May 22, 1986. He is the author of eleven other novels and has written commentaries for his Facebook page.

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Copyright © 2015 bySheldon McCormick.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 06/27/2015

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Contents

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

Dedicated in loving memory to my dearest parents Ouida McCormick (June 20, 1930-May 25, 1982) and Leon McCormick (August 27, 1924-April 29, 1991); my aunt Blanche Stillwell; Mildred and Edward Miller; Mr. and Mrs. Andy Fields and their lovely daughter; Estelle and Jake Laws; Frank Berring; Love Johnson; Joyce Peyton; Dr. Jewell Boutte; my cousin, Renae Rodgers (1951-1981), Lionel Lindsey and all private security guards, bodyguards, private investigators, armored vehicle guards and others in the private security industry who lost their lives in the line of duty. Special memorium to little Aaron Shannon, Jr., Samantha Runnion, Joyce Ann Huff, Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, James Foley, Terri Lyn Hollis, Steven Sotloff, Eric Garner and all victims of crime, violence and tyranny. A big salute to Sergeant Poretta.

Special tributes to Dr. Stelle Feuers, Shirley Butler, Joan Adrienne, Patricia Moore, Clyde Watson, Erin Runnion, Lee Doyle, Larry Morrison, LAPD Sergeant Larry Tate, Frank Alonzo, Mr. Redwine, Dave Adams, Stephanie Washington, Rodgers Jean Taylor, Rev. Gregory Taylor, Gary Calhoun and all of my cousins, Julia Lockhart, Lorena Gallo, Susan, Rebecca, Stephanie and Christine Almada, Daphne Chatman, Flo Jenkins, Evelena Carmen and Deborah Lacey.

CHAPTER ONE

A SIX-YEAR-OLD AFRICAN-AMERICAN GIRL in a delightful bright orange and snow white dress and six of her friends—white, Latino and Korean-American—played a pleasurable and vigorous game of ball in a section of an elementary schoolyard. Elsewhere there, some boys enjoyed basketball, running around the track, making their ways through the monkey bars. Other children had fun with a game of handball or just sat around their cliques and chatted among each other.

Some teachers and school officials watched, while others in the administration office and in each individual male and female instructors graded test papers, enjoyed a coffee break and planned their scheduled lessons for the next session and the following days in class.

A block or so away from the school, hidden in the basement of a one-story neat, modest residential home, several black men in an assembly line of sorts, measured, processed, then small-bagged portions of high-grade cocaine. A small, well-equipped lab that would be the envy of a similar druggist lab, bubbled with activity as four other earnest men measured and checked every inch of its function and the chemicals that bubbled and flowed through it.

A burly, 5-foot-12 inch dark-complexioned black man with his thinning slickened black hair in a short pony tail placed two kilos of cocaine atop a stack of eighteen others in the a corner of the location. It was guarded by an ornery-looking, bearded thug with an AR-15 assault rifle fixed with a fully-automatic 20-round magazine. A balding, lanky-faced and statured caramel-skinned black man in rimmless eyeglasses worked with every ounce of his attention focused on tabulating the location’s financial take on a calculator.

A loaded semi-automatic blue-steel Ruger P-84 pistol sat right next to him and the machine. Another street tough walked his post in a room stocked with bales of marijuana, four kegs of liquid, processed dope and a box of freshly-rolled joints, each one aligned and arraigned like a carton of cigarettes.

Meanwhile, in the neat, upscale-furnitured living room of the 1940s-era home, a couple in their mid-thirties kept watch at the peaceful nighborhood from their front window. They were pleased and sipped coffee.

A mongrel approached a near by yellow fire hydrant and with a raised left hind leg urinated on it. Suddenly, the dog stopped.

It looked around, its attention gravely diverted to some sound only it could hear. The dog visibly wondered where it was coming from, then looked about skyward. A deep, crazed, roaring sound which rumbled in an obscene rattle filled the air from a long distance away, coming from the northeast, hidden behind high clouds and overcast skies.

A bearded, emaciated transcient in braids rummaged through a local trash can for recyclable goods in the hopes of getting some more money for liquor and cigarettes, which he both reeked from, in an alley one hundred and forty eight feet from the schoolyard. He cared less about his immediate surroundings. A harried mother in her late twenties fussed and cared for her two fidgety children, aged seven and nine as she pushed a stroller which held her twenty-month old daughter. The child enjoyed a half-filled bottle of fresh milk.

The strange, profane sound grew closer and louder, moderate at first then on-coming. The plump, long-haired mom paused and wondered aloud, What in the world is THAT? Sounds worst than my ex-husband after sex!

A group of black men sat around a table in a local neighborhood park engaged in a game of poker. A jovial, sarcastic-faced player grinned, looked at his buddies and lowered all six of his cards, Full house, homie!

Aw, man!

A slim Afro-topped teenager slam-dunked a basketball. Suddenly a huge, fiery explosion erased all of those scenes, sending pieces of concrete, wood splinters, plaster, glass, shreadded clothing, splattered and droplets of blood, human tissue, scorched, rended body parts of people and animals and dense, heat-driven black smoke blew out in every direction. The blast lasted a five full minutes. Hellish flames and rising smoke quickly replaced the explosion, along with a woman’s blood-shattering screams and wails of terror and grief.

His straight-stemmed brown and black pipe fired up, a patrician-affable-featured U.S. Air Force colonel blew smoke from his broken-bridged Ancient Roman emperor nose and lips. He was both disturbed and uncertain as he spoke to two senior federal agents in his Washington, D.C. office.

Just like we thought, the tall, bespectacled, cynical-faced Agent Sergeant Al Drummon told the colonel and his fellow investigator Erin Baker, 37, a light-complexioned, medium-featured and built black woman. We scraped up hundreds of metal pieces and numerous parts of a missile of some type. Along with two blocks worth of blown up bodies.

Yeah, she added with a fractured voice and flair through her street-hardened demeanor. And a lot of children. That drug stash and processing house proved to be the main target. Everything around it was collateral damage.

The Prune Pitt, the colonel said, nodding in affirmation. A series of highly sophisticated, very sophisticated and yet very basic military rockets. Built along the lines of the Cold War-era Intercontinental Ballistic Missile, all six-finned. The target finders on these rockets are so sharply refined. They can zero in on a dust mite’s ass with pin point accuracy. Even in the dark.

Or a major city in the wrong hands, Baker said grimly. Especially in the wrong hands. Like those other two attacks on Compton.

And God knows where else they got those rockets aimed at next. The colonel crossed his arms, shook his head twice then bitterly added, Our Air Police investigators are still searching the mountain secret base for those asshole jerk offs who broke in, made off with whole, parts of and numerous data, plans and equipment for the missiles. Not to mention knocking out several of our guards and disarming them.

Maybe when they recover in the hospital, we can get more information from them.

Hopefully, Drummon. The office telephone rang and the officer answered it.