Chapter 17
Chapter 17
“...ART.”
Leonard’s finger stopped on top of the lighter.
Ash scattered from the end of Big Joe’s cigar.
A look of awe spread across the faces of the Crips standing behind them.
He shut down a Blood OG’s question with a single word.
Ayyyy, Shotgun! You’re the craziest bastard I’ve ever seen. Just plain crazy!
SHEEEESH!
The Bloods standing behind Leonard looked even more stunned than awed.
...What? Instead of bowing his head, he’s proudly calling it art?
What the hell is his heart made of?
Gang or no gang, none of that matters. There’s only music.
Where the hell did the Crips even find someone like that...?
Lil D swallowed hard as he stared at Shotgun’s profile.
Expressionless sunglasses.
Shoulders that did not move an inch.
A jawline set hard.
This bastard...
Why did he play the diss track?
Because it was art.
Why did he write those lyrics?
Because it was art.
Why did he publicly smear the Bloods’ face in front of tens of thousands of people?
Because it was art.
From the very beginning, Shotgun had never needed any answer beyond that.
“...”
What was this feeling?
Admiration? No.
Maybe it was closer to helplessness.
Lil D had gone his entire life without really knowing what tension felt like.
He had never backed down in neighborhood fistfights, had sized Dustin up the first time they met, and had even enjoyed the biggest stage of his life at Soundwave just days earlier.
And yet even he was completely tense right now.
But Shotgun?
In front of a Blood OG, he spoke a single word with a perfectly expressionless face and then closed his mouth.
“Hoo...”
Big Joe drew on his cigar.
The corner of his mouth had curled upward in a faint, dangerous smile.
Looks like I misunderstood him.
At first Big Joe had thought it was nerve.
Then he had thought the kid was crazy.
But it was neither.
That isn’t nerve, and he isn’t just crazy.
The tip of the cigar glowed red.
That bastard really has nothing in him but music.
What gang politics were, what the relationship between the Bloods and Crips meant, what guns meant—none of that existed in that bastard’s world.
He had put his music onstage because it belonged onstage.
I still have a long way to go.
To think he had dismissed an artist’s conviction as nothing more than guts.
Then Leonard picked up the lighter from the table.
Flick—
Click.
Flick—
“Art, art, art...”
He rolled the word around in his mouth several times, as though savoring it.
“Is that all?”
He looked at the Asian man in sunglasses.
No answer came back.
“You really don’t talk much.”
“...”
Again, there was no response.
“...”
“...”
For quite a while, the two of them stared at each other like that.
Shotgun did not avoid Leonard’s gaze in the slightest.
...Because his eyes were squeezed shut right now!
The longer the silence stretched, the heavier the air became, until one Blood gang member standing nearby was crushed by the tension and involuntarily sucked in a loud breath.
“You travel with an interesting one.”
“I’ve always had a good eye.”
“I’d like him to work with us too.”
“That would be difficult.”
“I’m not asking you. Hey, with that kind of artistic spirit, can I take it to mean he’d be willing to work with us too—”
Thud!
Big Joe threw the cigar from his mouth onto the floor.
Sparks jumped all the way onto the table.
“That’s far enough, Leonard.”
The atmosphere turned sharp.
“It’d be a waste to leave talent like that only with you. And it’s true that our rappers are doing better than yours these days.”
“...”
“How long are you planning to live off Snoop Dogg?”
Even Big Joe could not bring himself to argue with that.
Unlike in the height of West Coast dominance, these days the Bloods were producing far more Billboard rappers than the Crips.
“Fine, Lorenzo.”
Leonard rose to his feet, calling Big Joe by his real name.
“If it’s art, then it should have an ending.”
He started to put the lighter back into his pocket, then instead slid it across the table.
Big Joe picked that one up instead of using his own lighter and lit his cigar with it.
After exhaling a long stream of smoke toward the ceiling, he slid the lighter back.
In gang culture, it was an unspoken agreement.
A sign that they would not shoot each other.
The gang members followed Leonard out.
The Bloods left first.
Ring... ring...
Leonard, seated in the back seat, placed a call.
Streetlight after streetlight slid across his face.
The one who answered was Slipknot.
A Billboard rapper from the Blood side, with a house in the Hollywood Hills.
“Aight, OG.”
Slipknot headed to the studio thirty minutes later.
He had already decided who he would target alongside the Crips.
Lil D, who had been getting a little buzz lately?
What a joke.
The kid had only just gotten a single onto Billboard. Dissing him would only lower Slipknot’s own weight class.
If I’m doing this, I might as well bundle in that Crips rapper I’ve never liked.
With that thought, he jerked his chin at the producer.
“Lay down something heavy. This is going to be a Crips funeral.”
The next afternoon, a track went up on Slipknot’s SoundCloud.
From the very first verse, he was stomping all over the Crips as a whole.
“I ain’t gonna lie.”
I’m not even lying.
“I slid through your hood, bought weed.”
I rolled through your neighborhood the other day and bought some weed.
“Crips is down bad.”
Looks like the Crips are having a rough time these days.
Then he zeroed in on Clapton, a Billboard rapper affiliated with the Crips.
“Every beat I tossed, you picked up. Everything I flush, you catch.”
Every beat I threw away, you picked it up. If I flush something down the toilet, you’re right there to catch it.
“You charted once and threw a party, I chart in my sleep.”
You probably threw a party the one time you made Billboard. Me, I chart in my sleep.
“But u know? The features I declined? You hopped on ’em.”
You know the features I turned down this time? They went to you.
“Gotta give you credit though—you never clog. Flush game elite.”
I’ll give you this much—you never clog up. Top-tier toilet performance.
The reaction was immediate.
—Slipknot just dropped a Crips diss in real time.
└ Bloods vs. Crips diss war starts now.
—Get the popcorn!
—B.I.G was rapper vs. rapper, but this is gang vs. gang.
—Completely different scale.
—The toilet line LMAOOO.
└ But if that’s true, that’s brutal. The features Slipknot turned down went to Clapton?
└ Clapton must feel pathetic.
└ So in the end he’s just bitter that Clapton charted on beats he threw away, right?
—Let me summarize the order. B.I.G disses Lil D → Lil D performs the diss track at Soundwave → Bloods get pissed → Slipknot disses the Crips and Clapton together.
└ Got it.
└ This is fucking fascinating.
└ Is this going to turn into another Tupac and Biggie situation with actual shootings?
(Translator’s Note: Tupac Shakur and The Notorious B.I.G. — Two of the most influential American rappers of the 1990s. Tupac was murdered on September 13, 1996, and The Notorious B.I.G. on March 9, 1997.)
—How’s the song itself?
└ Insane. The beat goes hard too.
└ The verse delivery is ridiculously good. Everything sticks in your ears.
└ Slipknot’s delivery is built for diss tracks.
└ I just caught myself unconsciously humming the verse where he clowns the Crips.
└ The Crips are fucked now LMAO.
—Has Clapton reacted yet?
└ Not yet.
└ He posted a laughing emoji on his Insta story and deleted it right away.
└ LMAOOO.
└ Guess someone talked him down.
At that exact moment—
“Fuck!”
Clapton’s fist was trembling.
“This goddamn nigga bastard!”
He went straight into the studio.
For eight hours he wrestled with the lyrics, writing and erasing over and over again.
If he attacked Slipknot’s musical ability, the answer would just be, So whose career is bigger?
If he attacked his background, well, the man really was a genuine gangster.
If he attacked his face, that meant nothing.
The best he could come up with was mocking him for being jealous that Clapton had charted with a beat Slipknot threw away...
—Clapton’s response diss just dropped.
Public opinion was cold.
—I listened to it. It’s not bad.
└ But honestly, isn’t Slipknot just better?
└ The difference starts from the beat itself.
└ You can feel the gap in weight class exactly as it is.
└ Slipknot wins by a landslide.
—This diss battle is showing the current state of the Crips and Bloods music scenes exactly as they are.
└ Bloods complete victory, for real.
└ The Crips are having a talent drought.
Clapton stared at his phone, biting his nails.
Bang!
He slammed the table.
Only one hour had passed since he dropped the response, yet public opinion had already tilted.
Would time turn it around?
Clapton himself knew the answer.
It would not.
Honestly, he had known while recording it.
He had lost this one.
Crips hideout.
A heavy mood hung in the air when Big Joe’s phone vibrated.
“...OG.”
The caller was Clapton.
“...I’m sorry.”
Big Joe flicked ash into the ashtray and let out a long stream of smoke through his nose.
No one spoke until that motion was finished.
“From here on out, just stay quiet.”
“...OG?”
“If a second diss drops, don’t respond to it either.”
“If that happens...”
Big Joe’s voice dropped by a degree.
“If you stop now, it ends with you just getting pushed back. But if this turns into rounds two and three, and the diss battle spreads further, the Crips’ overall standing will hit rock bottom.”
That was why he had not brought Lil D into it, and why he had told the other Crips rappers to stay still too.
Because this diss battle could not be allowed to grow bigger.
Yes, Slipknot had taunted the Crips as a whole, but the way the public saw it was still Slipknot versus Clapton.
So for now, it was bearable.
For now.
“...Understood.”
The call ended.
So this was what you meant, Leonard.
Big Joe put the cigar back into his mouth.
Without lighting it, he simply stared up at the ceiling.
What if his brother had lived?
If Lil K had not died at twenty-two, would the whole landscape of this scene have turned out differently?
Shit.
He cut the thought off.
Dead people did not come back.
Wishing otherwise was not how you survived on the street.
“...Slipknot’s second one is out.”
The hideout grew solemn.
Big Joe jerked his chin.
Play it.
Boom. Boom-boom.
Heavier than the first one.
Slower too.
A beat with the tempo deliberately dragged down so that every syllable landed with extra weight.
“Crip niggas keep sending soldiers—send a general.”
The Crips keep sending foot soldiers—send me a general.
“Oh wait, you don’t got one.”
Oh, right. You don’t have one.
As the diss continued, Slipknot dropped a passing mention.
“And that clean-record kid rappin’ ’bout the trap.”
And that kid with a spotless record out here rapping about the streets.
“Lil Dunk, you a Disney Channel gangster, take a nap.”
Lil D, you’re a Disney Channel gangster. Go take a nap.
The muscles in Lil D’s jaw bulged.
“And Crips producer? Pussy-ass nigga hides behind a helmet.”
And that Crips producer? That pussy-ass nigga is hiding behind a helmet.
“Take that shit off. Or keep it on—fits you better, bitch.”
Take it off and step out like a man. Or just keep wearing it—it suits you better, bitch.
W-why me again?!
While Park Geon panicked internally, Dustin slammed his fist into the wall.
Bang!
A crack split through it.
Hiiiik!
Park Geon’s expressionless face hardened even further.
“Aight. Y’all wanna talk about real? Let me show you real.”
Fine. You want to talk about what’s real? I’ll show you real.
Slipknot’s tone dropped even lower.
As if confessing.
As if reciting.
“Caught my first body at sixteen. Armed robbery gone wrong.”
I caught my first body at sixteen. It all started when an armed robbery went wrong.
“I still report every year. They know where I sleep, where I eat, where I shit.”
I still have to report every year. They know where I sleep, where I eat, where I shit.
A parade of lyrics meant to prove he was the real thing.
“Got more bodies I can’t even speak on.”
I’ve got more bodies I can’t even talk about.
“Remember the difference—I bled for this shit.”
Remember the difference—I bled for this.
The beat faded out.
The hideout fell silent.
Jamal unfolded his arms and clicked his tongue.
“Sounds like he has to report regularly to the state as a parole condition. Shit.”
Even Jamal, with the teardrop tattoo under his eye, was left speechless by those lyrics.
—Slipknot’s second round just dropped in real time!
The internet was losing its mind too.
Public opinion had now overwhelmingly tilted toward Slipknot, and this time both Lil D and Shotgun had been given one verse’s worth of diss each.
Not even enough to deserve more than a passing mention.
Just one line each.
—So how will Shotgun respond?
—Slipknot told him to take the helmet off and come out like a man. Will Shotgun join the diss battle this time?
—But unlike with B.I.G, Slipknot is too much of a whale LMAOOO.
—You can’t even clown him as a fake gangster.
└ Maybe even Shotgun will tuck his tail between his legs here.
—What about Lil D?
—Slipknot called him a little kid LMAOOO.
And over on the darker corners of Reddit, users had already begun digging into Slipknot’s past based on the new lyrics.
They searched Slipknot’s real name.
But his arrest record, criminal record, and inmate records all came up blank.
Juvenile court records were automatically sealed.
No matter what keywords they searched, nothing was going to turn up.
—Looks like it’s all true.
One user tried to confirm whether the records were sealed in the first place, but juvenile court records did not even publicly confirm the existence of a case.
There was no way to verify it.
So everyone converged on a single conclusion.
—A man under government supervision.
—And he says there’s another crime he can’t even talk about. What the hell did he do?
—So this confirms he got paroled in exchange for reporting to the state, right?
—Real gangster, yeah.
But there was one person here.
The top admit to UCLA Law School.
Parole reporting goes to a parole officer. Reporting to the state...
Park Geon tilted his head.
...That’s usually a sex offender registration requirement, isn’t it?
(Translator’s Note: Sex offender registration — In the United States, certain convicted offenders may be required by law to register with government authorities and periodically update information such as residence and employment. Requirements vary by jurisdiction.)
“Got more bodies I can’t even speak on.”
I’ve got more bodies I can’t even talk about.
Could that maybe be...