Before the Storm by Sean McMullen Page A

Fox.
    â€˜Fox, threat, remove!’ barked Emily, hardly realising that the words were leaving her lips.
    In a single, fluid movement, Fox turned and draped BC over Daniel, then kept turning and swept his foot up to strike the knife hand of the nearest youth. The knife went spinning out of sight. Meantime Daniel collapsed under BC’s weight, striking his head against a brick wall. Emily turned back to Fox in time to see him cross his arms to ensnare the descending blow from the cane while striking out with a kick that was more like a punch to catch another youth in the face. Having secured the cane, he drove the butt up into the jaw of its owner. Incredibly, BC had somehow summoned the energy to fight too. A delicate flick of his foot sent a push boy’s knife spinning away, then a strange, flat kick to the stomach doubled him over with a thud like a sledgehammer driving fence posts. With a curiously graceful hop-step, he darted forward to take the youth by the hair before driving a knee into the side of his face. The youth collapsed.
    A push boy tried to pin Fox from behind. Fox dropped his weight and ran backwards, slamming the youth against a wall. Fox now twisted free, pinned his attacker’s arm and snapped one of his fingers, so that he shrieked with pain. Emily saw the two other gang members huddling together, wide-eyed with fear. One of them was taking out a little pistol.
    â€˜Fox, gun!’ warned Emily, and Fox somehow flipped the youth he was holding through the air, to bring him crashing down on his friend with the gun. Fox closed with him, and his elbow crashed into the youth’s jaw with a loud snap.
    By now the fifth member of the push was out of the lane and gone. Emily glanced around. BC was leaning against a wall and panting heavily. Daniel shook his head and blinked his eyes. Barry was backed against a wall, clutching his bag, his mouth hanging open. Fox was uncurling from a crouch, still holding the cane and wary of whether or not there was still a threat.
    â€˜Emily, gun, collect,’ panted BC.
    Emily picked up the little pistol – and the fifth member of the gang reappeared, with three policemen.
    â€˜That’s ’im, that’s the cove wot’s murderin’ me mates!’ cried the youth.
    Emily thought very fast. Explaining all of this to the police would involve her parents finding out about their adventure. Worse, Fox would probably have to make statements to magistrates, have to produce papers that he did not have, explain where he came from … and worst of all, have to prove it. As for the problems that accounting for BC would involve, it did not bear thinking about. Emily made her decision, then thought, Am I being a bad girl or a great leader?
    â€˜Fox, attack!’ she barked.
    The cane whirled into Emily’s field of vision to strike the leading policeman on the forehead. Even as Fox charged the man beside him, BC flung something at the third policeman, who dropped his baton and clutched at Mr Lang’s letter opener, which had embedded itself in his shoulder. Fox swept his foot into the back of a knee, collapsing the policeman so that he struck the back of his head against a wall. By now the remaining policeman had pulled the letter opener from his shoulder, and attempted to threaten BC with it. BC brought his hands down on the policeman’s wrist with his fingers splayed wide, spun his entire body around so that the man’s arm was twisted up behind his back, then elbowed him on the side of the head. He collapsed.
    The fifth member of the push had watched all of this with his eyes bulging, and once again he turned to run. He found his escape blocked by Emily. She was holding the push captain’s pistol in both hands.
    â€˜You just put your hands up, you horrid little boy,’ declared Emily in the most menacing voice that she could manage.
    With no visible emotion whatsoever, Fox seized him by the collar and slashed downwards