TABLE OF CONTENTS:
☣
PART ONE:
CHAPTER 1 – NO WARRANT NECESSARY
CHAPTER 2 – OFFICE TALK
CHAPTER 3 – BLUE STUFF
CHAPTER 4 – GUNMETAL POSEIDON
CHAPTER 5 – THE CRUTCH
CHAPTER 6 – WASTED FRIENDS
CHAPTER 7 – FLEX DAY
✇
PART TWO:
CHAPTER 8 – GLASS SPIRE
CHAPTER 9 – WRAITHVALE
CHAPTER 10 – AMBASSADOR THING
CHAPTER 11 – LUNCH BREAK
CHAPTER 12 – GAS STATION
CHAPTER 13 – HEADQUARTERS
CHAPTER 14 – DRIVE-THRU
CHAPTER 15 – ROUNDTABLE UNREALITY
CHAPTER 16 – THE KOOL KITTY LOUNGE
CHAPTER 17 – SQUEEZING THE BEANS
CHAPTER 18 – INTERVIEW
CHAPTER 19 – FEAR CORPS
۞
PART THREE:
CHAPTER 20 – WHITE CHERUB
CHAPTER 21 – WAREHOUSE
CHAPTER 22 – DISTRACTION BAIT
CHAPTER 23 – TANGO DOWN
CHAPTER 24 – NEO-GULF STREET BRIDGE
CHAPTER 25 – CRUSHING EQUIPMENT
CHAPTER 26 – PROFESSIONAL COPS
CHAPTER 27 – MOTEL MOTEL
CHAPTER 28 – NEO-VANCOUVER
CHAPTER 29 – THE HONEY BEAR
PART FOUR:
CHAPTER 30 – THE MAYOR’S DAUGHTER
CHAPTER 31 – TOTAL ANARCHY
CHAPTER 32 – DUMPTRUCK DERBY
CHAPTER 33 – BREAKWATER BLUES
CHAPTER 34 – SPINAL CAPACITOR
CHAPTER 35 – POSSESSED FLESH
CHAPTER 36 – LATENT BEES
CHAPTER 37 – FORBIDDEN TERRITORY
CHAPTER 1 – NO WARRANT NECESSARY
Rain drizzled lazily from the sky on a chilly Neo-Vancouver autumn Saturday evening. The stakeout had been going on four hours, camping out in Cop Thing’s black police hummer across the street from some bleak brick apartment complex. Mike Trigger sat next to him, sipping gatorade and munching on a bag of trail mix his wife Pamela had prepared for him earlier that day. She always worried about Mike’s safety, especially since he became partners with a literal monster, and tonight they were spending a whole lot of close quarters time together, waiting and watching. The vehicle wasn’t exactly inconspicuous but Cop Thing didn’t seem to mind. Undercover work was veritably impossible for him, being a towering brown naked beast with an inverted crater for a head with a crown of spikes on it. They were waiting for a guy rumoured to be involved with the recent prevalence of ICE on the streets, a potential agent of the medical syndicate known as Gunmetal Poseidon.
“Ah, to hell with it. This guy ain’t gonna show, Cop Thing. Let’s call it a day, I’m through,” Mike said while obsessively rubbing his trigger finger across his beretta, which was unholstered and sitting in his lap.
“Patience is a virtue, Mike. Think of it like fishing. We’re not gonna bag this guy by tapping out so easily. Look -” Cop Thing said and gestured to the front door. A man in a trenchcoat and a bowler hat and sunglasses appeared in the doorway, then looked both way suspiciously and trotted down the steps and across the street, disappearing into the darkness of the park nearby.
“That’s our man,” Cop Thing said. “Right on time.”
“How can you tell,” Said Mike Trigger.
Because he looks suspicious as hell for one thing. He’s wearing sunglasses at night second of all. Either this guy’s covering something, or he’s got a real desperate fashion sense.”
“Let’s roll,” Mike said, and they got out of the car.
“Just remember, lay low, don’t go shooting him before we get any answers.” Cop Thing warned. Mike had an astronomically high body count recently on record and it wasn’t bringing a lot of friendly press about the VPD to the news recently. As stealthily as possible, which wasn’t actually that stealthy because Cop Thing had a heavy lumpering physique and really kind of stood out a lot compared to virtually everyone else, they clung to the shadows and moved in quiet pursuit of the trenchcoat man into the park. Mike tripped on a duck and tumbled into the mud, grunting in annoyance.
“Fucking ducks!” He complained as Cop Thing leaned down to help him up. Mike swatted his hand away, “I’m fine, I’m fine, thanks. I’m pretty capable man.”
“Pipe down, get up, don’t give away our tail,” Cop Thing said and they scurried along the path beside a wooden shed deeper into the forest and took refuge in some bushes near a pond. The trenchcoat man was on a stone bridge crossing the pond, lighting a cigarette and waiting in the middle, peering out over the scenic dark landscape, possibly scanning the perimeter to see if he had been followed. He had, but he didn’t spot them in their cover spot.
“What’s he doing?” Mike inquired.
“Shhh, shut up, here comes what we’re looking for,” Cop Thing raised his index finger over where his mouth is buried behind the encrusted flaps of skin that made up the face of his mutant carapace. Three mafia looking guys in suits came patrolling out of the darkness on the opposite side of the bridge and walked upto the trencoat man cautiously. They began having a conversation but it wasn’t audible to the cops.
“Oh you know what’s gotta be bad. Let’s bust ’em now!” Mike said and brandished his pistol. Cop Cop Thing motioned with his hand for him to put the gun away.
“Not yet, you’ll ruin it. We don’t know what they’re talking about. Wait til they give us a reason, otherwise we’re gonna have nothing but more dead bodies and bad press, and no answers.”
“Fine,” Mike said, dejected. One of the suits produced a briefcase and opened it, the trenchcoat man inspecting it. They couldn’t see what was in it from their current vantage point.
“Stay here, I want to get a better look at that, ok, cover me,” Cop Thing advised then darted out of the bushes and was engulfed in shadow as he ducked under some branches and approached the bridge from underneath a canopy of trees. The sketchy looking meeting seemed to conclude and the involved parties parted ways, the trenchcoat man now carrying the suitcase. Cop Thing was starting to get excited now, it was almost time. He crept along the bottom side of the entranceway to the bridge and waited until the trenchcoat man stepped off, walking down a path into the forest. Stalking him from behind, Cop Thing’s curiosity was growing to the point of impulse action, and he pounced out of the shadows and tackled the trenchoat man to the ground. The man shrieked and turned and upon seeing Cop Thing’s grotesque lack of a face screamed even louder. That wasn’t part of the plan, the mafioso types must have heard that. Great, now their cover was blown. Well, you did it to yourself Cop Thing. You can’t expect everything to go perfect all the time in this business. Time to improvise. Cop Thing slapped the guy in the face and then backhand slapped him again while gripping his trenchcoat collar with his other fist.
“Cop Thing!” The man shouted while scrambling to cover his face with his hands. The suitcase lay vulnerable in the dirt. Mike Trigger ran up, pistol ready and pointed. This was dubious, the guy was a loose cannon.
“Don’t shoot him! For christ sakes try to have a little restraint, Mike” Cop Thing shouted at his partner. Mike’s hands were trembling holding the pistol, his eyes flares with the gleam of some murderous intent. Did this guy give a shit about justice? Or did he just like to shoot people legally? Cop Thing wondered. He should probably get a different partner. Out of the two of them, him being a freakish monster, Mike Trigger was the scary and really dangerous one.
“I want to ask you a few questions,” Cop Thing declared, and shook the trenchcoat man roughly. He could see the terror in his eyes, the sunglasses having been slapped off and laying idly covered in mud. The rain was coming down more intensely now.
“Yeah, we want to ask you a few questions,” Mike said and put his pistol to the guy’s temple.
“Godammit Mike put that thing away. We’re not going to kill this guy,” Cop Thing said, exasperated.
“Fine,” Mike said, mopey, and tucked the pistol into his jeans, even though he was wearing a holster. Cop Thing knew he couldn’t keep his hands off that thing for long. Despicable, how did they let guy’s like this on the force in the first place? Just because the guy was a war hero or something, they let him literally get away with murder. Cop Thing liked to think he had some principals behind his arbiting of justice. He had a vision. A vision for a better world, one which would be brought into reality, by force, by him. Cop Thing grabbed the suitcase, the other hand still pinning the man to the dirt ground. It had a lock on it that required a code to open it.
“It’s locked.”
“Brilliant deduction,” The Trenchcoat man quipped.
“What’s the code? Open it, let’s see what’s in there,” Cop Thing growled.
“Go to hell copper, you ain’t got nothing on me!” The trencoat man replied and he spat in Cop Thing’s face. Then a gunshot rang out and echoed reverberated throughout the park forest. The trenchcoat man’s kneecap of his right leg exploded in a flurry mist of blood and bone as he screamed and writhed in pain.
“Wrong answer,” Mike Trigger stated proudly, posing with his pistol.
“Godammit, Mike, that’s excessive,” Cop Thing said, turning to his partner. “Put the leash back on that thing.” The trenchcoat man’s horrified screams were bellowing throughout the park. Anyone even romotely close by could hear all of this.
“Open the case,” Mike Trigger repeated the order, but the guy was in shock and rolling around on the ground, leg spurting blood all over Cop Thing, who was still holding him down. Mike brought the case over and handed it to the trenchcoat man. “Open it”.
The man was convulsing now and cursing, eyes closed, really in quite a lot of pain. Mike cocked his pistol again. “I said open it, pussy!”
That’s when the three mysterious suit-clad gentlemen appeared under a lamp in the distance, brandishing uzis and one of them had a scorpion rocket launcher.
“Aren’t you going to invite us to the party?” Said what appeared to be the leader. They had clearly heard the commotion and picked up weapons from some kind of cache nearby, probably a vehicle parked inside the forest. Cop Thing took a mental note. These guy’s were obviously invested enough to try to rescue the trenchcoat man, whatever was in that case must be important enough for them to remain in cahoots after they parted ways. They wouldn’t just save their own skins. Cop Thing was wearing a holster packing a 44. magnum, his custom made weapon of choice, and now he was thinking of using it.
“Let him go, or we blow all three of you away,” Said the one holding the rocket launcher, and it was aimed squarely at the three of them. That’s when another gunshot rang out, and the trenchcoat man’s other kneecap blew up and he lay there pathetically wasted with destroyed legs that no longer would ever walk again. Mike Trigger said “Oh? I don’t think you have the balls.”
“Look at this smart ass cop,” The rocket guy said. “He thinks we’re bluffing. Ok hot shot, let’s see who’s the real tough guy here.” And with that he fired the rocket, it screeched through the air and Cop Thing and Mike Trigger dove separate directions out of the way, the rocket made direct contact with the trenchcoat man who was passed out now from the pain-shock, and his unconscious ruined body exploded in a fiery geyster of blood and guts and smoke. The suitcase was blown clear, but stil in tact. Copt Thing did a duck and roll from behind a tree, snatched it, and ran away. Mike Trigger was unloading his pistol at the three antagonizers and they were returning fire with a steady stream of uzi bullets. In the distance, sirens could be heard approaching.
“Come on, leave ’em, let’s get out of here before the rest of the pigs show up!” The leader said and they scrambled into the dark cover of the forest and vanished. Cop Thing had the suitcase, their prime suspect had been reduced to a smoldering hole in the ground stained with charred blood and meat. Mike Trigger had gone off the deep end again, but in the end, maybe they would find the answers they were looking for after all. They retreated with the suitcase back to police HQ to crack the thing open and see what was inside.
☠
CHAPTER 2 – OFFICE TALK
Cop Thing and Mike Trigger were sitting side by side in Police Chief Brannigan Phillips’ office. The blinds were drawn, and Brannigan was sitting at his desk with his elbows planted on top, and his hands in the praying position. He began rubbing his eyes and his forehead, damp with a thin layer of sweat, then took a bottle of Jim Daniels out of the desk drawer and poured himself a shot of whiskey. He was a portly fellow with a white dress shirt and suspenders, badge pinned to his breast, oval head with a thin five o’ clock shadow of a beard, balding.
“Let me get this straight,” Phillips began. “You followed the suspect, blew his legs off, then he got blown up by a rocket launcher, and you got zero answers?”
“Correct,” Cop Thing said.
“Ok, that’s just trash boys. That’s garbage. That’s not even close to good enough. Trigger, you’ve been warned, you’re a cop, not a human firing squad, OK? We need the suspects for a reason uderstand. You’re on a path to go on leave, pal. Or worse, you’re gonna be the one in jail. Ok, let me spell it out for you so it gets through that thick skull of yours. STOP SHOOTING PEOPLE. It’s bad enough I’ve got you teamed up with this beast on the force, no offense, Cop Thing, but who’s the real monster here? Christ,” Phillips said. After he was done his tirade he took a cigar from the desk drawer, lit it and began puffing.
“We broke open the suitcase in the police lab, just as we suspected. The whole thing was filled with ICE. Lot’s of it. This stuff is wreaking havoc on the downtown eastside, not that I care about a bunch of dumb junkies who want to off themselves anyways, but the damn clean-up crew is costing a fortune with this stuff and the Mayor’s so far up my ass about it he’s tickling my duodenum.”
Cop Thing and Mike Trigger exchanged confused glances at this. Neither of them knew what a duodenum was.
“I’m gonna give you guys one more chance, you mess this one up, I’m sorry, but I’m gonna have to fire you, the press is abysmal with you guys, try doing something good for a change then we’ll see what’s up? OK, do I make myself clear? Now, That guy you massacred likely was an agent of Gunmetal Poseidon, we’ll never know for sure thanks to you, but the proof is in the pudding. And in this case the pudding is a shitload of bags of ICE. Right? This stuff ain’t some regular drugs these guys can slowly waste away on and turn up dead in a nice little fetal position somewhere. This stuff will blow your heart out the first time. The stupid thing is, people like it! They’re chasing the ultimate high. The stupid bastards are so hopeless and bored they’ll literally off themselves in the nastiest way possibe, just for a thrill. Meanwhile, the pharma company is making bank. If this wasn’t the law I’d almost say good, waste the fuckers if you wanna kill yourself do it, be my fucking guest, but the law says no. That’s not ok. That’s where you guys come in. Now, Gunmetal Poseidon has some big friends, ok, big ties to powerful people, you know what I’m saying. We don’t know exactly what we’re dealing with here, all I now if we gotta get a handle on this or the Mayor’s gonna fuck me over six ways from Sunday, ok?”
He took a break a puffed on his cigar. Cop Thing and Mike Trigger sat there, taking it, sort of stunned.
“Can I interject here? just for a second,” Mike Trigger said. He was meticulously caressing the trigger of his beretta in his lap. Why these guys let him bring his gun into the meeting like this was a mystery, but they did, pure megligence perhaps, not a conscious choice. “This guy was being a little prick about it Chief, we told him to talk, he wouldn’t do it, so–
“So you blew he legs off, I know” Police Chief Phillips said.
“Yeah, but he had it coming, I warned the fucker, Cop Thing had him pinned down on the ground, what do you want me to do? Not blow his legs off?”
“I want you to do your damn job properly minus the killing spree you always go on. It’s getting harder and harder for me to cover your ass in the press, Trigger. To be frank, I’m starting to wonder who the real bad guys are. We give you a badge and you take that as license to just go out there and start blowing anyone away who gives you a bad vibe…” He took a pause and puffed on his cigar. It was a cuban. He may be overweight, bald, sweaty and generally failing to keep his employees in order, but he knew how to smoke the finest cigars the world had to offer, and sometimes that was as good as could be hoped for. The smoke plume filled the room now, Mike coughed a bit into his bomber jacket sleeve.
“Do you mind? I’m sensitive to smoke, my wife’s gonna be pissed if I come home reeking like cigars,” Mike said.
Brannigan Phillip’s just stared at him. “You’re not in a position to negotiate on such matters, Trigger, if I were you, I’d keep my mouth shut and just pray I don’t shit-can your trigger happy ass right now,” He said. “Is that clear?” Mike nodded and Chief Brannigan took a long drag off his cigar, then blew it directly in Mike’s face, to which he coughed again, slightly embarrassed at the audacious nature of his request. “Ok, moving on,” Brannigan continued, “I want you two to go down to the lab, they’re running a bunch of tests on the ICE, hopefully we can trace this back to the creation point. Whoever those guy’s were in the park you encountered, they’re probably connected at the high levels. I’m talking like the big boys, like the illuminati level, ok. So don’t go sniffing where you’re gonna get your nose clipped off, but maybe we can bring in some lower level guy’s and make them start singing. Right, spilling all the beans. Just don’t blow them away before we get them talking this time. I want to make some actual arrests here, ok, progress. That’s something you guy’s may not have heard of before. Now get out of my office, get down there, get briefed, then go do some actual police work, or I’m gonna have both your badges restricted by the end of the week. Let’s see some results, boys,” He said and stuffed out his cigar as if to symbolize the dismissal of the meeting. Cop Thing and Mike Trigger understood this, stood up, heads hung in subconscious shame, then turned and left the room. It was time to do some real police work, no more screwing around.
☠
CHAPTER 3 – BLUE STUFF
The elevator descended in the police station with a mild ambient hum. The inside walls were mirrors and Cop Thing and Mike Trigger stood in silence, glaring at their stone-faced reflections. They weren’t exactly happy or proud of themselves at the moment, being scolded like that by Chief Phillip’s, but that’s just the way it was. They were guilty of those accusations, Brannigan Phillip’s wasn’t wrong. It was easy for him to say, to criticize them like that, when they were the guys actually out there in the field, in the dark, getting rockets fired at them. Phillip’s just sat his pudgy ass in his office smoking cigars all day. Mike Trigger was working himself up into a pissed off frenzy in his mind thinking about it. Cop Thing could tell from an outside perspective that Mike was just getting more and more irritated, and that he was doing it to himself, unnecessarily.
The elevator came to a rumbling halt on the basement floor and the chrome doors slid open. The duo stepped out and began walking down the hall, footsteps reverberating out, except for Cop Thing, because he didn’t wear shoes. The sound was just the gentle pitter-patter of his bare feet on the linoleum. It was after noon and a lot of the office workers were on lunchbreak, so the halls were pretty empty. Out the window, snow was dropping from the sky, an oppressive blanket of wet white sticky annoyance. Cop Thing disapproved of the snow. Mike Trigger was ambivalent, such things like the weather didn’t really concern him. His wife and his job, and America, and his seven kids. That’s about all that entered his mind, other than the occasional flashbacks to his army days. He was a simple man. They walked casually down the hall and scanned a keycard at a terminal beside an opaque white door. A little light blinked green with a friendly access confirmation beep and the door opened with a swooshing suction type sound. They entered the lab. A man with a comb-over hairstyle in comedically oversized rimmed white glasses and a white lab coat, small thin moustache and a pocket protector had opened the suitcase they recovered the night before in the park. Sure enough, the thing was packed full of blue crystal shards – ICE. The science geeks had been running tests all morning on the drugs.
“Cop Thing, Officer Trigger, glad to see you,” Said the labcoat man. He had a little nametag that said Halloran on it.
“Hi, Halloran, what’s the scoop on the blue stuff?” Cop Thing said.
“Well, first of all, this is some seriously heavy duty contraband. One sniff of this, and people are gonna be tripping balls pretty heavily for about five minutes. That’s the safe part. The unsafe part is this stuff is so potent it’s liable to blow people’s hearts right out of their chests, pretty much everytime, like we’ve seen. But I guess the kids these days are willing to give it a shot, chasing that ultimate high, or they just don’t know what they’re messing with. It’s pretty sad.”
“It’s been a hell of a mess out there, bodies popping up all over the damn place,” Mike said.
“I’m aware of that, Mike, that’s why we’re doing this. Now, what we need to sort out here is where is this stuff coming from? And shut it down. You said you got this from some suit-type guys in the park right? Can you elaborate on that? We need a lead here. Any clues?” Said Halloran and he pushed his glasses up on his nose and scrunched his face in inquiry.
“Well, we had a, er, a hostage, I guess, until Mike popped his kneecaps off and then he got blown up by a rocket. So – no, not really. There’s not much left of that guy,” Cop Thing said.
“Uh, ok, that sounds pretty irresponsible, but alright.”
“Yeah, it was, you know, it was a learning experience.” Cop Thing said. “Right, Mike?
“Yeah. Right, a learning experience, that’s right. Won’t happen again.” Mike said.
“I certainly hope not, we’re not gonna get any answers on Gunmetal Poseidon if you keep blowing away all our suspects” Cop Thing said.
“Yeah, I know. Sorry,” Mike said, glaring from side to side, shifty-eyed rubbing his pistol trigger nervously.
“Do you mind?” Cop Thing asked and motioned towards Mike’s gun, then he turned to Halloran.
“Ok, so what do we know about Gunmetal Poseidon?” Cop Thing asked.
“Well, they’re pretty mysterious, tend to cover their tracks pretty well. It’s only recently we’ve got any hint that they even exist, recon reports say. Judging by what this stuff is made of they likely have ties to actual corporate medical institutions, you know, the big boys, ’cause this is like weapons grade smack.”
“But why would they want to destroy their own customer base?” Cop Thing said. “Wouldn’t it make more sense to keep people hooked on goofballs so they keep paying?”
“Yeah, unless it’s not about the money. Honestly, who knows, somebody’s evil idea behind this whole thing, they might just wanna wipe people out for the hell of it. Who knows how these nut jobs brains work,” Halloran said.
“That doesn’t make sense,” Cop Thing mused. Mike Trigger was fiddling with his pistol again obsessively, not really paying attention. Zoned out, with a deranged look in his glazed over eyes. Cop Thing glanced at him wondering where his head was at. He found himself thinking how the hell did he get teamed up with this guy and what was the rationale behind it? There were other hot heads on the force but this guy really was getting a bad reputation, Cop Thing was beginning to think he might actually be a full blown psychopath.
“We need to get more organized with this. First of all who were those three mobster looking guys packing heat last night? I couldn’t really get a good look at them in the dark, and I was kind of indisposed at the time,” Cop Thing said.
“Yeah, we’re lucky we got away with that. But I’ve got a bullet with those guy’s names on it ready,”
“You don’t even know what their names are though,” Halloran said.
“It’s a figure of speech. We’ll find them, we’re detectives. That’s what we do,” Mike Trigger said.
Cop Thing supposed he was right. Time to put doubt out of his mind, and act like a man. “So where do we begin?” Mike said.
“For a second there it sounded like you knew what you were talking about, Mike.” Cop Thing started, “Look, why don’t we start at the source, let’s get out on the street and try to score some ICE, you go undercover as some lowlife scum looking to get lit, and I’ll hang back and cover you until we get the proper info we need.”
“Why do I have to be the undercover guy?” Mike shrugged.
“Because I look like this, obviously,” Cop Thing said. “It’s going to be a little tricky for me to pose as anything other than Cop Thing, don’t you think? Right, everyone knows I’m a cop.”
“Ok, I guess that’s a good point,” Mike said.
“Ok guys, if you don’t mind, I’d like to run some further tests on this blue stuff, so if you’re all done here, I’d like to get back to work,” Halloran said and turned his attention away, back to the blue crystals strewn across the desk. He began peering into a microscope and studying the crystals intently. “Good luck out there, I’m sure I’ll be hearing about it soon, you guys aren’t exactly the stealthiest bunch of cops I’ve ever met. You might even say you’re becoming somewhat infamous.”
“I don’t know if that’s a good thing,” Cop Thing said.
“It isn’t,” Halloran chuckled. “Happy hunting.”
☤
CHAPTER 4 – GUNMETAL POSEIDON
The mountain ranges outside of Kelowna, BC, were generally unpopulated by regular folk. Frolicking billy goats and birds of prey frequented the area, animals of the altitude. However, deep in the rocky layers lied a carved out network of tunnels and caves cultivated richly with the metal décor and hi-tech computer gadgetry that could be seen in some kind of TV space show. Men and women in blue one-piece jumpsuits populated the subterranean base inside the mountain, some of them wearing yellow hard hats and doing construction work, constantly building, others running more menial errands and programming computer code in cubicles, the kind of complicated specialist stuff that would be scouted out by big-shot professionals when they were budding talents in the army or university, plucked out and put to work for their own uses.
One of the main offices in the labyrinth was facing outside the mountain wall with tall windows, the inside lined with surveillance screen displays surveying the outside of the base. The only thing that was currently showing on them were rock cliffs and swaying tufts of grass in a cold and breezy wasteland no one in their right mind would ever come exploring. Except the purveyors of Gunmetal Poseidon weren’t in their right minds. Not by a country mile.
A slender man with a black padded tunic laced with many pouches and compartmentalized pockets, shoulder pads, popped collar and ninja-style cargo pants tucked into what was somewhere between a mix of military combat boots and pro-wrestling shoes was pacing back and forth behind the gargantuan gunmetal desk of the office. His oval golden belt buckle had an etching of a pill on it. He had a white wrinkled balaclava with glimmering purple goggles strapped on his head which concealed his eyes fully, no mouth opening to the silky sock mask. There was a tumbler of orange juice with some pulp on the desk and a bowl of noodle scraps, chopsticks and cashews which he had just had his fill of, as well as a small bottle of George’s hot sauce. His secretary entered the room, politely scurried over at a quickened pace, so as not to waste even one second of the man’s precious time, and rapidly retreated back outside with the dirty dishes.
“Oh, Ms. Casey?” The man said, not turning to acknowledge her visually, but staring out the window at the prime vista ahead of him, noticing her in the reflection, with his gloved hands firmly behind his back clasped together.
“Yes, Mr. Poseidon?” She said, her voice meek and almost quivering, as if she feared she had made some terrible mistake she was unaware of in her duties and would be reprimanded.
“Thank you. You do good work,” Mr. Poseidon said, now turning to look at her briefly, a privilege, he thought, to be even acknowledged by a man as powerful and important as himself.
A sigh of relief exerted from out of the terrified woman and she smiled and said “You’re welcome.”
She exited the room and Mr. Poseidon took a seat in a massive black leather swivel chair and began pouring over the several computer screens set up and linked together there with a plethora of cables. There was also a legion of paperwork neatly stacked in separate piles organized in order of priority. After several minutes of this the beeper went off on his intercom and he flicked a little red switch and spoke into it.
“Yes, what is it?”
“A Mr. Antonio Jackson is here to see you, Mr. Poseidon,” Ms. Casey said. She was a nice girl, middle aged, competant, no options, spineless. Perfect for the job, a useful prisoner.
“Send him in,” Poesidon said. He leaned back in his chain with his hands folded together on his desk, waiting for his guest. Antonio Jackson entered a few moments later. A stout man in a striped grey suit with a red tie and slicked back jet-black greasy hair, clean shaven pudgy face with jowels. He carefully closed the door and turned to face Mr. Poseidon from the spacious hollow distance across the room, then trepidatiously waddled over approaching. Mr. Poseidon could tell instantly this man was not going to be bearing good news.
“Ah, Mr. Jackson, to what do I owe the surprise in-person visit. Aren’t you supposed to be in Neo-Vancouver right now overseeing the distribution of my little project? Clearly you have something to communicate to me of the sincerest importance.”
“Yeah, well, uh, you see, Mr. Poseidon,” Jackson began, sweating and dabbing his brow with a white rag he brought out of his breast pocket. “The deal, well, I don’t quite know how to say this…”
“Something went wrong, I know, clearly. Tell me about it.” Poseidon invited, raising his hands in a welcoming gesture as he feigned calmness at this sure-to-be calamity failure of this untrustworthy lackey.
“Cop Thing was there. And his partner too. We got rolled,” He stated bluntly.
“Cop Thing, ah yes, that grotesque muscle-bound freak who’s creating such a buzz in the news these days. That is most unfortunate to have him involved – and the ICE? Did it reach the target? What happened, come on, tell me, don’t be shy,” Poseidon goaded.
“Well, they caught our boy you see, we tried to save him, but they got away with the case.”
“They… Got away… With the case?” Poseidon was rubbing his temples with his index fingers, as if he was unable to process this information. “My case of very expensive merchandise you mean? The case that’s supposed to be being distrubuted in every orifice of human decrepitude in the downtown East Side at this very moment, that case? Is now in the custody of the police… Is that what you’re telling me?”
“Well… Yeah, pretty much.” Jackson admitted.
“What about the arsenal of weaponry we sent you down there with. Was that not good enough for you bumbling twats? What about our East Van contact?” Poseidon was now really noticably irritated, rubbing his white-masked forehead with his white gloved hand.
“Oh, yeah, we used it. We used the rocket launcher and the uzis!” Jackson stated proudly, trying to sound reassuring.
“And…?”
“Well, we missed and, well, yeah, we hit the contact instead.”
“You… Hit the contact?”
“Yeah. Like we blew him up.”
“Is he…?”
“Dead? Oh yeah! I think so. But he was probably going to be dead anyways, Cop Thing’s psycho partner kept shooting him in the legs or something, it was hard to see in the dark we could really just hear the guy screaming.”
“Ok, let me get this straight. I want to make sure I understand the situation here. You let the case get confiscated by the police, and you killed our own guy?” Poseidon was now making a real effort to hold back his frustration.
“Right,” Antonio Jackson said, “That about sums it up.”
“You know, it takes a very sympathetic and understanding type of man to forgive such a collosal failure.” Poseidon said, and he stood up. Jackson flinched at this. Poseidon would have had to be told the bad news, he would find out anyways from any of the other sources spying on the streets of Vancouver, he had informers everywhere. This seemed like the most effective method of informing him in terms of hopefull yielding some mercy, Jackson thought.
“Except I’m not that type of man. This isn’t some circus of idiots where you can just fuck up that badly and laugh it off. This is Gunmetal Poseidon, and we don’t tolerate that kind of failure. You must know that Mr. Jackson. Frankly I’m surprised to see you here, I would have thought you’d be halfway to Costa Rica by now, with some bonehead plan to hide your head in the sand. But you knew I’d find you, didn’t you? You aren’t that stupid.”
“I thought if I told you in person I could appeal to your, uh, sensitive side,” Antonio Jackson said.
At this Poseidon laughed out loud, a righteous, raucous, condescending guffaw that echoed throughout the room. “You’re right, yes, that’s good, appeal to my sensitive side. Alright, my months of meticulous planning and spending on this project, you completely fuck it up, and you want to, sorry, appeal to my sensitive side? Ok, well, that sounds fine. That’s perfect. Your rationization makes total sense Mr. Jackson, you’re free to go. Thank you for the update.” Poseidon said, pacing around.
“I am?” Mr. Jackson said.
“Oh yes, everyone makes mistakes. Just don’t let it happen again.” Poseidon said jovially and waved him away. “Have a nice day Mr. Jackson, say hi to the wife, Mindy? Is that correct? And little Timothy? Say hi to Mindy and Timothy for me. I’ll have to remember to give you a Christmas bonus this year just for the family. A man of your considerate work ethic deserves it. Ok, now be on your way, I’m a very busy man, as you should know. Very busy, indeed, good day to you, Sir.”
“Gee, thanks, Mr. Poseidon. I promise it won’t happen again,” Jackson exited the room, confused but relieved. When he was gone Poseidon stood in silence, staring at the wall, thinking. Then he flicked the little red switch on the desk transmitter and dialed a specific number.
“Hello, yes, yeah, it just occurred to me the elevator is having some technical difficulties, Mr. Jackson has just left my office, could you please see to it that he finds his way down to the ground level properly, yeah, yes that is what I mean, take him down via door 313, please. Thank you.”
Antonio Jackson waved goodbye and exchanged nervous pleasantries with Ms. Casey outside the office then walked down the hall. That went better than he expected, but something wasn’t quite right. When he got to the elevator two large body builder type men in black tank tops and jeans appeared around the corner and approached him.
“Hi, Mr. Jackson, Mr. Poseidon called and said he forgot the elevator was having technical difficulties, he wants us to escort you to the stairs.”
“Technical difficulties? But I just took the elevator on the way up here fifteen minutes ago.”
“Yeah, it just started having technical difficulties, like, five minutes ago.”
“Are you sure? What’s wrong with it?” Jackson was perturbed.
“It don’t work, look come with us and we’ll show you the alternate way down. We insist.”
They walked in single file down the hall, Jackson in the middle, one bodyguard leading the way, the other one blocking the flank, down a suspiciously lonely corridor to a door marked 313.
“Is this it?”
“Yeah, this is it,” The front bodyguard said and he opened the door. A towering vertigo vision of extreme height from way up the outside of the mountain was what was behind it. Jackson gasped in horror and then screamed a blood-curdling high-pitched shriek as both men roughly pushed him from behind outside of the door and he plummeted swirling like a rag-doll through the air and smashed his body to smithereens in the jagged rocky pit below. Vultures landed immediately and started pecking at his corpse, eating his eyeballs out of his shattered goreface first. There were several other skeletons in the pit already. The vultures knew to camp the area.
Mr. Poseidon watched on the security camera in his office the delectable feast of the carrion.
“I guess that’s what my sensitive side looks like,” He said and bellowed out an evil laugh that lasted for several minutes while keeled over, stopping and starting, having several uncontrollable fits of laughter while he grasped at his forehead.
Ok, you had your fun, now back to work, he thought.
☣
CHAPTER 5 – THE CRUTCH
A brown van was parked outside a seedy brick building two-storey bar below the misty light evening rain across the street next to a gross alley littered with a pile of garbage in the entranceway. Like many of the alleys in East Van, significantly large and random piles of garbage were becoming increasingly prevalent. There was just too damn much of it for the clean-up crews to handle adequetely, and people tended to full-on disregard the dumpsters and just dump it on the ground, especially in these parts of town where there was a whole festering sub-society of ghoulish wanderers hopelessly lost in oblivion chasing nothing but their next fix and a bunch of crime. It was a sort of collective subconscious post-apocalyptic mentality.
Inside, the walls of the van were lined with surveillance tech and a single computer screen with a green terminal display grid that looked like a homing radar of a submarine, plus the keyboard. Thanks, taxpayers. There was a little green blip on the screen. Cop Thing, Mike Trigger and Officer Dempsey were in the back of the van. Officer Dempsey, a tall, well-built man with a bushy moustace and sideburns, white plain civilian shirt and a police rain jacket was wearing a headset and pointed to the little blip and said “Ok, Mike. That’s you.”
Dempsey was sort of like the designated driver of the police surveillance van when it was considered necessary to use in whatever situation might occur. In this case, they were hooking up a wire to Mike Trigger’s bare chest so they could hear everything going on in the oncoming operation that was about to play out. Usually he wore a white tank top but now he was wearing a faded black hoodie. It was part of the disguise. The shabby run-down dive bar they were about to investigate secretly was called “The Crutch” on East Hastings street. It had a reputation for being a rough place and never failed to get it’s fair share of 911 calls, so they figured it was a good place to start. It was Sunday and they had a beer special of Monkey Back’s and a cute little children’s sandbox pail of peanuts on sale for $4.75, so business was bumping tonight.
The cops were about to start digging for info, in the most inconspicuous way, of course, and see if they could get some of the local patrons talking about the kind of dope-related activity that’s been going down lately. Or, finding out the “word on the street”, as they say in police talk. Mike had been groaning about having to do this in the first place, he didn’t like having to wear a wire. No one would. It was uncomfortable for one thing, not to mention ridiculously dangerous when dealing with edgy criminals who were probably high and drunk, but it was part of the job and someone had to do it. That’s why he got paid.
“Alright, all systems go, should be secure. Leave your gun, Mike, I know it’s hard for you to part ways with that thing but that’s a little too heat-score, don’t you think? If you go in there packing, and start doing the Rambo stuff, like I think it’s fair to say you usually do, this is going to completely backfire. You might even get shot for a change,” Cop Thing warned. “So do me a favour and just give it a rest this time.”
“But I’ll be completely unprotected. I don’t go anywhere without my gun, not even grocery shopping. It’s like going somewhere without my dick.” Mike groaned again.
“I know, but this is a situation where we’re gonna be dealing with potential bad guys, ok, not some pimply teenage pacifist nerds at the checkout counter at the grocery store. Right, who knows what kind of dope sucking scumbags are in there, but that’s what we’re here to find out,” Cop Thing said. Dempsey was on the audio receiver, tapping it, checking it.
“Test one, two, check, check, Yeah it’s working. Don’t let anyone see this, obviously, be very cognizant of that, Mike, please. I know you kind of space out sometimes and get kind of oblivious to what’s going on around you, no offense, just remember, it’s important, because if people see this wire, this thing basically says “I’m a cop”. And the people in there aren’t gonna like having nosey cops come sniffing around.
“Affirmative. Ok, we ready? I’m getting tired of all this sitting around strategizing like we’re in a fucking football swap meet or something. Let’s do what we do best, cop stuff.”
The back doors of the van swung and Mike hopped out with as much bravado as he could muster, landing in a puddle and splashing water all over his jeans ankles.
“Son of a bitch. That’s not a good start. Ah well, it makes me look shittier, that’ll be good for my disguise.” He muttered to himself and jogged over to the front door of The Crutch, where there was a little campfire outside and a small horde of cloaked junkies smoking some mystery substance in billowing stinking plumes. “Hey boys,” Mike said with a salute, trying to play the part. They just stared at him, toothless grins, eyes bulging out of their heads, faces riddled with open sores. They weren’t really even on the same planet anymore, Mike thought, so he did not take offense to the snub. He was superior.
Inside the bar, there were girls and their menfolk playing pool, sports on TV, women’s tennis and hockey, the Canucks were playing Detroit, home game for the Canucks and it had the Vancouverites sitting at the bar enraptured to some degree. There was a four piece band of long-hairs in cowboy garb in the back corner on the stage playing sad crooning country tunes. The bartender was a balding tall fellow in a leather vest and grey jeans, bare-chested with curly black and grey fuzz. Mike guessed the no-shirt no-service rule didn’t apply to the bartender. A veritable army of the world’s most degenerate booze was sprawled out on the mirrored shelves behind him, and Mike could see himself from the bartender’s point of view in the reflection. So this was what it looked like to be a washed out piece of shit. There were waitresses as well but Mike sat at the bar. He could probably pick up a lot more information there, just from eavesdropping.
“What are you getting’?” The barman said, skipping the pleasantries, and tossed a coaster down nonchalantly.
“Hi, I’m new to this establishment, you guys got a special or anything cheap on tap?” Mike said with a sly grin, trying to be as charismatic as possible.
“Monkey Back’s on special.” The barman answered casually.
“Is it good?” Mike said.
“It tastes like shit, but it’s on special. It’s good enough swill for the people who come here, let’s put it that way,” was the reply.
“Alright I’ll get a pint of Monkey Back. When in Rome, right?” Mike said. The bartender just stared at him. Goddamnit man, don’t give yourself away, talk like that and they’re gonna know you’re a cop in five seconds, he reprimanded himself thoughtfully, shifty-eyed. Stay cool, Trigger, don’t blow your cover. Pamela and the kids are counting on you.
The bartender brought the beer over and placed it on the coaster, foam frothing over the rim. “Anything to eat?” He said.
“Oh, uh, yeah maybe, can I see a menu? I’ll just peruse what this classy joint has to offer and maybe decide on a bite,” Mike said.
The bartender brought a menu over, then started tending to his other patrons who were mostly hooting at the hockey game. One guy had a Chucky doll from the Chucky horror movie series, which Mike construed as a bit odd, that guy must be a bad guy for sure, and that guy was sitting with another man in a black coat and a bowler hat whose face was so outrageously contorted and disproportionate he looked like a Dick Tracy villain. If looks could kill this ugly bastard was on a murder spree, Mike thought, then, wait, does that make sense? Wasn’t HE on a murder spree, Officer Mike Trigger of the VPD? No, it was all in the name of the Law. It’s not murder when you’re a cop. Now’s not the time to get philisophical and conscientious, Trigger, don’t get distracted.
He sipped his beer and observed the area, it was quite busy, for a Sunday. Don’t these people have to work in the morning? Then he remembered the sorry rabble he was dealing with. These peasants didn’t have jobs. Or really unimportant ones. Goddamn this society was going to hell in a handbasket.
A man came and sat next to Mike with what appeared to be either his girlfriend, or a hooker, or both. The man wasn’t exactly the picture of health, quite the opposite, in fact. Scrawny, guant, unshaven, wearing a football jersey, Cleveland, Mike thought, although he wasn’t completely sure as he wasn’t a big sports guy. Unless you counted the gun range. The girl was wearing knee high leather boots, fishnet pantyhose and a pink haltertop, hair all strewn about in a flurry, early 30’s but she looked older because she was all fucked up. They were on a first name basis with the bartender apparently, whose name was Cliff. The guy and his girl were Clint and Marlena. There, Mike was picking up information already. This was real detective work.
“Any food for ya?” Cliff asked Mike.
“No I think I’ll just stick with the beer for now, Cliff,” There, say his name, schmooze a bit, that’ll make him like you better.
Marlena looked kind of dizzy and she kept moaning this squeaky squeal and tugging at Clint’s jersey sleeve. He had baggy jeans on casually hung halfway down his ass displaying his shit-stained Calvin Klein undies to anyone who cared to look. It was disgusting but Mike was trained to notice the small details, it was part of his job.
“Two Monkey Back’s and a shot of jager each, Cliff, my dude,” Clint said, hunched over and gyrating nervously, which seemed very unnatural.
Possibly a clue.
“Oh and a bucket of those peanuts. Gotta have the peanuts, eh, buddy?” He said and turned to Mike Trigger and clapped him on the back in a friendly way. “Love the fucking peanuts. Why doesn’t every bar have peanuts, am I right?”
“Goddamn this guy really like’s his fucking peanuts,” Dempsey said in the van to Cop Thing, able to overhear everything. “Must be some damn good fucking peanuts. Probably a staple of his diet.” He was smoking a cigarette which Cop Thing disapproved of but he kept it to himself out of basic politeness. The folds of his facial carapace filtered out most of the carcinogens anyways, it was just a disgusting self-destructive habit in poor taste.
“I’m Clint, man, nice to meet ya, what’s your name? Clint asked Mike and offered his hand. Mike hid his disgust, swallowed his pride and shook the guy’s hand. Who knows where that hand had been.
“Hi, I’m Jared.” Mike said, giving a firm handshake to Clint’s sweaty palm. Which to him clearly said I’m the alpha. Mike hated this guy instantly just by the sight of him, but he was here for information so he played it cool, he might need him. The ragged couple’s beers and jager shots arrived and Marlena was pawing at Clint’s arm, making mousey noises, to which Clint became snappy and irritated with, though under his breath, having some kind of whispered and quick lovers quarrel, then they picked up the pints, had a cheers and drank. Clint gave Mike a cheers to, slurring a bit. Jesus Christ how intoxicated were these losers?
“You from here, Jared? Where you from?” Clint inquired, clicking his tounge and lolling his head around. He was stoned, drunk, and he smelled bad too.
“Port Alberni, originally, but I’ve lived here for years, so I’m pretty much from here now,” Mike said trying to be open conversationally.
“Aw, man! That’s a hick town! I think, never been there myself. Well nice to have you aboard in Neo-Vancouver motherfucker,” and with that he triumphantly slammed back the rest of his beer. “Come on Marlena, shot time. Love fucking jager. Tastes like black liquorice. For the hard stuff, it’s the best tasting one, that’s my opinion. Marlena was nursing her beer still and they cheersed the shots and gulped them down. “Aw, yeah.” Clint said and wiped his mouth with his bare forearm. The band began a faster number and the music seemed to get louder. Mike was starting to get really annoyed with Clint.
“Be right back, gotta drain the lizard,” Clint said and hopped off to the bathroom. Woozy, Marlena leaned over to Mike.
“You know what he did?” She said, brown dialated pupils rolling back in her head and vaguely waving and pointing in the direction Clint walked off to. Mike did not.
“What did he do?” He said, leaning back a bit to avoid her booze-drenched breath, redlipstick applied way too liberally on her over-powdered face. It kind of reminded Mike of The Joker from Batman.
“He smokes drugs in the same room as my son!” She said.
“That sounds pretty irresponsible,” Mike said.
“Jesus, we should arrest that guy and put his kid in child custody,” Dempsey said in the van listening in.
“Then they’ll know we’re listening in on the wire. Is this even legal?” Cop Thing said.
“I’m not sure actually,” Dempsey said.
“Yeah, he brings a bunch of drugs home from his shitty friends house and smokes it in the same room as my son!” She repeated.
“That’s horrible, you sound like you need help.” Mike consoled. The bartender was faintly overhearing this and sort of pretending to go about his business, as if that was normal talk. It probably was for him. Clint returned from the bathroom and ordered another round of Monkey Back’s. It wouldn’t surprise Mike at all if Clint had just ripped a huge snorter of god-knows what in the bathroom, cause he was noticeably ripped as hell when he came back. Clint started whispering something intensely into Marlena’s ear, shaking her by the arm while she had this horror-striken look on her face, bent over the bar staring into her half drank beer when the two new beers arrived. Cliff the bartender said “That’s it, Clint. You’ve had enough for tonight. I’ve told you before. You said you’d behave, but I don’t see any evidence of it. We both know where this is going. It’s actually illegal for me to serve you.”
“Oh, come on, man. I didn’t do nothing! I’m just sitting here having a nice night out with my gal. You gotta come down on me like that and embarrass me in front of my new friend here.”
“Yeah, well, historically I know what’s gonna happen here. You’re gonna get shit-faced and I’m gonna have to kick your ass out, as usual, and your lady too.”
“No, no, no, It’s ok. I’m good for it,” Clint said, then he brought out his wallet and opened it showing a crumpled up twenty, as if that would solve the issue at hand. He was beginning to convulse now and people were starting to get disturbed and take notice. Marlena was looking sad and scared and Clint was starting to clutch his chest.
“Just get the fuck out of here man, I don’t care. Just go. I’m not gonna stand here and just enable you to kill yourself.” Cliff said. Then Clint started to get a bit pissy with the facial expressions and chugged his second beer. “Come on, Marlena, finish that. Let’s go someplace cool. Where they treat people with some respect. I’ve been a good customer here. A solid customer. And this is how you treat me? Not cool man. I ain’t gonna k– k—k–,” He couldn’t quite get the word out, still clutching his chest. Then he stood up so furiously the stool he was sitting on fell over, fell over on the bar, knocking over the glasses, rolled over, screamed and his chest proceeded to explode where his heart is, blood splattering all over the shocked patrons in a spurting geyser of fleshy chunks of heart and bone and he fell face down hitting his head on the bar then keeling over on the ground beside Mike. The bartender was covered in blood now and so was Marlena, who was screaming and kneeling beside him shaking his bloodied body crying “Why!? Oh, god Clint, why, oh why? You bastard! You ruined my life! And you made me cry like you always do!”
“That didn’t sound good.” Dempsey said. “Not good at all, Cop Thing.”
“Sounded like ICE,” Cop Thing said.
ICE, Mike thought. Picture perfect example. The awkward terrified commotion of the crowd’s confused reaction became very audible when the music stopped and the singer exclaimed “Holy shit, folks,” into the microphone. “Umm…. Yeah.”
Sirens could be heard approaching from outside. The show was over, this time.
CHAPTER 6 – WASTED FRIENDS
There was a shaken crowd gathered outside The Crutch bar as ER workers wheeled Clint’s blown-out blood splattered rigormortis corpse on a stretcher, covered in a bloodied beige tarp, into an ambulance which would be soon en route to the morgue. On the bar floor there was a chalk outline of his collapsed and burst frame marked off-limits with police tape, a CSI photographer busily snapping pictures for later reference. The coroner still needed to provide an autopsy, but they all knew what had happened. Mike Trigger had found an empty little crystal clear baggy in Clint’s jeans pocket, which they confiscated and sent back to the police lab to test the residue. There were plenty of drugs on the street, but ICE was the new hot thing, it had special properties. Most especially it was the only drug that was destined to kill a person in the most savagely explosive way in five minutes. People seemed to be interested just from the sheer mystery of the danger. Whoever the sick puppies were who concocted this stuff and distributed it to the public were doomed to pay dearly for such a pervertedly evil idea.
Mike wondered why a person would ever want to get that fucked up anyways? Pure escapism was the answer he came up with. No aspirations, no dreams, no hope. Just the broken remnants of a forsaken life that would never prosper. Where was the sense of self-respect? Drowned in alcohol or suffocated in drugs long ago, never to return. There was only a desperate sense of self-destruction in it’s place. He supposed that was one of the most common plagues on society. Everyone didn’t work towards a common cause. It was a clusterfuck where some people had a downright disdain for not just the law but for the whole system itself. It made him frustrated as hell, but that was just a basic age-old dilemma of the human condition.
Marlena was outside, sitting on the edge of the back of an ambulance with a blanket draped over her shoulders, quivering, sipping a hot chocolate someone had picked up from Tim Horton’s to calm her down. Officer Dempsey was standing there, smoking a cigarette, talking to her about her son and her situation, hopefully they could arrange some help for this poor unfortunate soul, at least get the kid to safety. It always struck a nerve with Mike Trigger the absolute parental negligence capable of people sometimes. Smoking drugs with your little boy in the room, that was just setting a terrible example, not to mention abysmally physically unhealthy. Talk about bad starts. The poor little twerp wouldn’t stand a chance in life with a start like that and his Mother didn’t look like she was going to win any Mother of the Month awards anytime soon. This was the reality of the dark, piss-soaked hellish world they had signed up to serve and protect when they became cops. Mike’s own father, an IT Technician who was prone to melodramatic temper tantrums and would stomp around in his underpants slamming doors and generally scaring the shit out of everyone in the family, came to mind in a stinger of a memory flash. But the old man had ethics and virtue, and Mike somehow still respected his sense of duty which he always tried to uphold, even when it was obviously just a symptom of mental illness.
Cop Thing approached Marlena and took a knee.
“I’ll take it from here Officer,” he said to Dempsey, relieving him, then turning to Marlena, “Ma’am, I’d like to ask you a few questions,” He said.
“Cop Thing, oh my god, you’re even more handsome than on the news,” She said sarcastically attempting humour. Cop Thing wasn’t the humorous type though. Not the most eloquent lady, Cop Thing thought, and rude.
He knew it was true though, and the truth hurt. It was lonely being a monster, misunderstood, the only one of his kind. This is what Frankenstien’s monster must have felt like, except Cop Thing had been a man once, he knew what he had lost, and gained when he underwent the tragic transformation that brought him into his current physical state, and Frankenstien’s monster was a fictional character. Cop Thing was real. That’s why he devoted himself to police work. To try to do some good in a world so cruel and callous. If he could gather the courage to get up every day and fight the battle of life gallantly, why wouldn’t other people? He reminded himself he had some positive aspects to his condition and tried to have some gratitude. This was his fate and he had no choice but to accept it. He had a built-in force field that was part of the thick skin of his mutant carapace. He was especially well fit and muscular, rivalling champion body builders, even to the point of having a six pack of abs on either bicep, which seemed to be another talent unique to him. An increased ability of strength and endurance allowed him to work out more than the average hulk, and he didn’t require as much sleep either, so he would stay up most of the night doing push-ups and reading world history and literature in his apartment living room. He reassured himself he was special, he was meant to be here, he didn’t let himself get depressed or feel sorry for himself, that was for cowards. That was for normal people.
“You said Clint would visit his friend’s and come home with the drugs, do you know who his friend was?” He began. She nodded solemnly, was Cop Thing gonna make her rat people out now? He was. She just submit right away. She had no stake in protecting the guy, and she had no shame or loss of honour about telling the cops about it either. Why should she protect a guy who was inadvertantly responsible for the destruction of her home life.
“Yeah, I know who he is. His name’s Jaguar Johannson. Sells drugs. Whatever flavour, you name it. Down by the docks usually. Clint and him would meet up, I dunno, drink in a graveyard or something, just party you know, on the streets, like fucking derelicts. I guess Jim had connections, I don’t know who, and he just sort of filtered the shit down into his world of drinking buddies and wasted friends. Used to work at London Drugs, the audio equipment section. I guess he makes electronic trance music or something and would push drugs and get people all high at his raves and shit on molly and ketamine. DJ Jaguar. He’s got like, long hair, wears aviator sunglasses all the time and a leather jacket. Doesn’t really change his clothes. Plays shows every Tuesday at The Kool Kitty Lounge. I think he’s on welfare or something and just sells drugs and plays music. Thinks of himself as some great artist. Delusional god-complex asshole. Jim was always talking about himself and his gifted creative force, really self-centered, you know, a total narcissist for sure. But without the charisma to actually make him a likeable person. That’s really all I know. I don’t like the guy, and I don’t think he likes himself, how could you? I don’t mind saying it.”
“Kool Kitty Lounge on Tuesdays. DJ Jaguar. Thank you ma’am you’ve been very helpful. You take care now we’ll get you set up with some help, it’s gonna be ok. It’s gonna get better, you just hang in there an believe it’s gonna get better, and we’ll see what we can do.”
“Just don’t take my son away please. He’s all I’ve got left.” She pleaded and buried her bands in her palms, sobbing, repeating “He’s all I’ve got left, he’s all I’ve got left.”
“We’re the good guys, ma’am, you can trust us.” Cop Thing said and put one of his veiny hands tentatively on her shoulder in an attempt to console her, but it was awkward. Then he walked over to Mike Trigger, who was hanging out on the perimeter, nursing a coffee he got at the 24/7 Tim Hortons a few blocks down.
“Got the guy who probably supplied the ICE, name’s DJ Jaguar Johannson. We can find him at the Kool Kitty Lounge this Tuesday, he’s playing, she says. I’m one hundred percent gonna go to that DJ show, and by me, I mean us, and by us, I mean you, because as you well know, I won’t be able to go in there looking like… This. I’ll wait in the van with Dempsey, same thing as tonight. We’ve got a lead now, let’s take it. Thing’s are starting to come together,” Cop Thing said. Mike nodded.
“I guess that means I’m wearing the wire again, great. I love that for me. Ok but how are we gonna get to the guy, that’s a pretty public space isn’t it, a lounge? Especially if he’s the DJ. We don’t have a warrant or anything. I’m not just gonna tap him on the shoulder while he’s Djing and arrest the guy, even if we did have a warrant, the damn crowd’s gonna pelt me with rotten fruit or something,” Mike said.
“I don’t know. We’ll figure that out at the time. I’m done with this day.”
“Me too. Wanna donut?” Mike said and produced a fresh boston cream out of a bag and offered Cop Thing a chocolate donut with sprinkles, the last donut left in the bag. Cop Thing took it graciously and the folds in his face morphed monstrously back and apart and opened like gleaming flesh-curtains in the rain and the creepy details of his face presented themselves, those gleaming red slits for eyes. His nose looked like something from a zombie movie and his teeth were all oversized and yellowed, sharp incisors prevalently on display. He devoured the donut in one gulp, not even chewing, thanked Mike and got back in the van to call it a day.
☣
CHAPTER 7 – FLEX DAY
Cop Thing had an apartment with decently priced rent out in Burnaby. The commute was a nice drive for him, because he enjoyed cruising in his hummer and listening to black metal records on the speaker system. Despite being able to afford an extravagant vehicle, he was modest with his spending. He got paid more than the regular cops, because his skills were superhuman, but the vehicle was one of the few luxuries he afforded himself. It wasn’t about the money to him, it was about upholding the law.
His apartment was fairly barren, furnished with a brown leather couch that matched his skin tone, framed posters of Muhammad Ali and Michael Jordan, a laptop on a desk and a flatscreen TV, and several bookshelves packed with books. For extracurricular activities, he mostly read and worked out. He had a bench press and some seventy-five pound dumbells, and he usually spent hours pumping iron everynight.
When he got in the door he locked it, tossed his keys on the kitchen counter and opened the fridge. There was a t-bone steak which he pulled out, squirted some coconut oil in a cast iron pan, turned the burner to max and let it simmer for a few minutes while he was lost in thought contemplating the days events. Then he sliced open the sealed package of beef with a chef’s knife and tossed the generous slab in the sizzling, smoking oil a few minutes later. He liked to get a nice sear on his meat and proper seasoning. He opened the cupboard for some salt and pepper and sprinkled lots of both on top, for a little bit of razzle-dazzle. It was pretty hard to over-season a steak. He went over to the living room and turned the TV on. The channel was set to CNF (Canadian News Foundation) but he changed it to Input 1 right away and popped a VHS into the ancient VCR of “Rio Bravo”. He was kind of a supergeek for old western flicks, and didn’t really care which one it was, as long as there were plenty of guns and cowboy hats involved, which there always were.
He dropped to the hardwood floor and banged out fifty pushups, real ones, not sissy half-push-ups, with the old western dialog as background noise, then got up and flipped the steak over, seasoning the other side. He pulled a loaf of garlic bread out of the fridge and flipped the oven dial to 200 degrees farenheit, then put the whole loaf in, separated down the middle so the delicious buttery garlic and parsley would toast appropriately. A nice steak and a full loaf of garlic bread was a favorite after-shift snack for him, it was necessary to keep his bulging muscles nourished. He slammed a full clear-flavor Gatorade to ensure ample hydration then walked over to the balcony and looked outside. He lived on the thirteenth floor and from this vantage point he had a clear view of distant downtown Neo-Vancouver, his everyday stomping grounds, as well as the sky-train whipping by over the dense suburbs of Burnaby. It should have been called “Suburbany” he thought, not even joking.
☣
He rolled out of bed in the very early morning, after a night of thousands of push-ups, rewinding “Rio Bravo” three times and a half-sleep of two hours between three and five in the morning, tossing back and forth, failing to get comfortable, mostly waiting for his alarm so he could get out there into the world and start getting after it. His discipline routine was dialed down now, back when he had been a real human man, he had struggled with the importance of the discipline routine, like most common men. Now that that life had been tragically stripped away from him, he gained something else in return, he knew the importance of making the most out of what you had, and the hard lesson simply resulted in a rock-hard work ethic, after a lot of gruelling pain and training. It kept his mind occupied and didn’t leave room for things that didn’t matter, or that he couldn’t change. He left his apartment and began running down the street. Every morning he went for a lengthy run to clear his head and put things in perspective for the day. That early in the morning, only the hardcore fitness freaks and the derelicts were out and about anyways, so he had to deal with considerably less shock reactions when people encountered him. He ran all the way into town, down to Stanley Park and along the waterway, nodding “Good morning’s” to the common folks he saw. They generally knew who he was, ever since his chemical accident he had been a hot topic on CNF. It worked because it made him into sort of a revered celebrity where people often gave him special favoritism a lot of the time instead of fearing him.
Except he wasn’t a celebrity, he was a cop.
The best cop, he thought and smiled under his facial mask of folded flappy skin.
He thought often of the absolute anomaly of that legendary accident, the mutating chemical spray that happened to him years ago, transforming him into what he was now, and always tried to put a positive spin on it. How it had changed his life forever, and how it were up to him to decide if that were a good or a bad thing. The choice was easy, the opposite meant death. A slow, sad, pathetic, useless fade-out transition of reality to the grave. He just couldn’t accept that. That’s just not how he was programmed. He prided himself on his tenacity to endure the gruesome fate bestowed on him. Other men might look in the mirror, and think oh my god, I’m a monster, and just blow their brains out, but not Cop Thing. So he embraced it and everyday put in the hurculean effort to grow, and hopefully be the arbiter of some actual justice in the world, whereas justice was never done to him, except by his own volition. But he supposed that’s how it was for everyone in this world, just a lot of people didn’t realize it and wasted crucial time complaining. There was quite a wide spectrum of self-pity he discovered with experience, it was all relative. He had even noted someone complaining about the woes of being left-handed once.
It was later in the morning now, he had been running laps around Stanley Park for a considerable length of time and businesses were starting to open. He stopped at a Jumbo Doggo hot dog vendor, the cashier was flabbergasted to be serving THE Cop Thing, and ordered ten hot dogs, loaded them up with the works – mustard, relish, ketchup, diced onions, bananna peppers, everything the plastic nine pans on the doggo stand had to offer, then sat at a picnic table and gobbled them all down ferociously. The hot dog vender shuddered watching this Thing feed and devour the chef’s product in such bulk and with such enthusiasm, but the employee was enjoying it, like a horror movie. The mystery enthralled him. He was just a regular guy selling hot dogs. Cop Thing was a superhero.
Cop Thing had to urinate so he found the nearest public washroom hut in the park. He would never commit a crime, period, even if it was something as seemingly harmless as littering (it wasn’t), let alone one so ignorantly disgraceful as to urinate in public, not in a designated washroom. First of all, it was against the law. Second of all, the reason it was against the law was it was disgusting, it would stink, it would stink like rotten piss. Other people would have to suffer from the smell and be completely inconvenienced and offended at his ignorant lack of respect for the society they were supposed to all contribute to.
Inside the washroom was surprisingly clean and sterile looking. Good, the city custodians were doing their jobs properly. Another man was there, also pissing, and he attempted to make small talk with Cop Thing while they were both pissing, which Cop Thing found wildly inappropriate, but he was polite to the talkative citizen and wished him a good day before he tucked his junk back into the flesh folds of his crotch, concealing it, then left for work for the day, congratulating himself on being a friendly person. It was time to get down to business.
☣
Cop Thing summoned the necessary willpower and energy to run back to his apartment, take a shower, do fifty pushups, get his car keys and drive his hummer into town. He parked at the police station and went inside to his office, greeting his fellow officers as he passed them on the way. He had a wooden door to the office with an opaque glass pane window which only enabled people to see the blurry silhouettes of what was inside. The window said “Cop Thing” on it. He opened the door, walked inside, and strapped on his .44 magnum in it’s custom made padded black-leather holster across his massively ripped chest, which was stored in his locked desk drawer,. He wouldn’t be so brazenly careless as to leave the coveted gunmetal gear out in the open on his desk. He wasn’t so trustworthy of his co-workers, even if they were cops, and there were spies all over the place – or there could be. You never could be too careful. He took his phone out of his pocket, which was really just a fleshy pouch on the side of his body and called Mike Trigger. After a few rings, Mike picked up.
“Trigger here,” He said.
“Rise and grind, Mike, how’s your morning going?” Cop Thing said. He didn’t really care, he fully expected Mike to be completely prepared, that was his responsibility as a police officer, but it was nice to ask, especially to a guy he had to get along with all day, and Mike had a habit of getting a bit moody.
“Fine. My kids are hassling the shit out of me though. Daddy doesn’t have time to give all seven of them the tender love and care each one needs. But Pamela does a pretty good job.”
“Well why didn’t you think about that before you had seven kids?” Cop Thing asked.
“I did, but Pamela wanted more kids, so that’s what we did. She runs the household, I run the streets – and win the bread,” Mike said, triggering a thought of garlic bread in Cop Thing’s mind, making him hungry all of the sudden.
“Right, well I’m at HQ and I’m ready to run the streets and get the bread with you. Where are you?”
“On my way, stuck in the damn construction traffic, the street’s all torn up and gravelly and fucked up. I’m literally in a cloud of dust right now, bumping along at a snails pace, it’s pretty frustrating to be honest, don’t let the Chief know I’m gonna be late or he’s gonna bust my balls big time. I might even be at risk of getting fired, I’m already on thin ice.”
“True. Speaking of ice, whatever happened to that lady from that grisly ICE escapade last night at The Crutch? Marlena?”
“We put her in a halfway home to get her shit together and took her kid to child custody services. She was deemed an unfit parent, rightly so in my opinion, at least for the time being. She’s lucky she didn’t go to the mental institution the state she was in.”
Cop Thing remembered the woman crying about her son and repeating “He’s all I’ve got, he’s all I’ve got.”
“Christ, why don’t you adopt the kid, Mike, you’ll barely know the difference with one more little rascal to take care of.”
“Is that a joke, Cop Thing? I haven’t known you to be much of a comedian,” Mike was not impressed. Clearly his fatherly troubles were no laughing matter.
“Fine. I’ll have lunch before you get here. Try to be on time next time, please, it’s disrespectful to the force, and to me.”
“Yeah, sorry,” Mike apologized and hung up. Cop Thing doubted if he was really though.
Cop Thing went over to the mini-fridge he had in his office where he had an enormous lumberjack sandwich waiting for him, wrapped in saranwrap, and a bunch of Coca-Colas. Lettuce, mayo, mustard, ham, swiss cheese, tomatoes, sprouts, pepperoni, proscuitto, black olives, santa fe sauce (which was basically just chipotle mayo as far as Cop Thing could ascertain, maybe with some salsa in it) the basic good stuff, this bad boy had it all. His jaws were salivating from underneath his facial folds as he unwrapped it. He had earned this through diligent hard work, and now it was time to pay the piper, in deliciousness. He ate one of these everyday, enough sandwich action to kill a normal man. He was halfway through devouring the beastly sub when a knock came at his office door.
“Enter,” Cop Thing said muffled, crumbs and slobber dripping from his mouth full and still chewing. It was Officer Dempsey.
“I hate to interrupt your sandwich time, but lock and load, Cop Thing, we’ve got a hostage situation on our hands. I’ll brief you in the car,” He said coldly.
“Happy Monday morning, welcome to Neo-Vancouver,” Cop Thing grunted to himself, secretly enjoying the drama. What kind of bizarre adventure would they get into today? And what else did he possibly have better to do? This was what he was made for. He dropped the half-eaten sandwich on the desk, pointed to the sandwich and said “I’ll deal with you later.”
Then they both stormed down the hall vigilantly with a purpose and down the stairs to the parking lot. “God, I love being a cop,” Cop Thing said.
✞
PART 2
✞
CHAPTER 8 – GLASS SPIRE
“I’ll drive,” Cop Thing said, took the car keys out of his kangaroo side-pouch and pressed the unlock button on the remote control. The hummer made the positive unlocked beep alert and he and Officer Dempsey hopped in. They fastened their seatbelts, turned the siren on and put the pedal to the metal. Cop Thing turned the blasting death metal he normally listened to off out of consideration for his passenger, and for the situation. This was serious.
“Where are we going?” He asked.
“The CNF tower, not sure of all the details at the moment, all we know is there’s a rooftop full of hostages, including the newscasters, and a gang of pissed off terrorists who want their weird demands met. The place is already under seige with cops,” Dempsey informed him.
“Christ, who picks monday morning for this kind of stunt, Dempsey?” Cop Thing said.
“We’re about to find out, my guess is it’s some kind of anarchist organization social comment on the state of the media. Or they just want money.”
“I feel like I’m about to have a social comment of my own,” Cop Thing said and took one hand off the wheel and tapped his magnum,“If you know what I mean.”
“Yeah. You’re going to shoot them,” Dempsey said.
“Right,” Cop Thing smiled under his facial folds. You could see a faint upwards wrinkling in the curtain of brown flesh covering his face.
✞
The CNF tower was located in downtown Neo-Vancouver and stood sixty storeys high encased in shining glass and grid-steel with a phallic bullet-top roof. The glass spire walls reflected the late morning misty silver sky and the surrounding jungle of sibling skyscrapers around it. The excited conglomerated crowd gathered below to witness the spectacle from a safe distance was made up of the police, including the SWAT team, competing newscasters, predominantly from CNC (Canada News Chain) and BCNN (British Columbia News Network) and the general peering public, divided into citizens and derelicts.
The building had been emergency evacuated minus the A-team morning news crew who were stormed and captured as the terrorist targets in the midst of the Monday morning show “Morning Wood with Bill Littlewood” during a segment covering the Abbotsford dogshow championship while the shih-tzu “Cupcake” was being awarded the gold medal, and taken hostage on live TV, resulting in a significant ratings boost.
The assailants were dressed in black balaclavas and bulletproof vests, urban army camo pants, general armaments being MP5 sub-machine guns, UZI’s, grenades and combat knives. They had taken the hostages to the rooftop, for dubious reasons, possibly for dramatic effect, as the leader had made a camera crew come up under severe duress and was seemingly prepared to have a show of his own. The rooftop was actually a jutting-out platform expanded from the bishop-hat curved top of the building. There was a KT-5L news Telecopter parked there in the heli-circle, the pilot being among the hostages. The terrorists were clever enough to make a special point of that. They had the whole thing meticulously planned out, which was very daunting to the terrified hostages who were basically normal people coming to work on Monday morning. Many of them were hysterically upset which resulted in some rough slapping around discipline enforced.
Guidance by force was the oldest trick in the book.
Bill Littlewood was a semi-famous newscaster as the host of the popular Monday morning talk show on CNF. A devilishly handsome man with a brickhouse jawline, immaculatly clean shaven and perfectly combed silver-fox hair – He had a punchable face even though he was only pushing forty, which was often powdered for TV and some subtle blush added to his cheeks his make-up assistants would do. Unmarried, Bill who was wealthy and successful, was often suspected to be a homosexual, but he dismissed this as jealous gossip, in reality it was more like he was just so narcissistic he had no intimate interest in anyone other than himself.
The terrorist leader was distinguished from the rest of the gang of miscreants by a red bandana which he wore over his wool balaclava and superior firepower. He was packing an AK-47 with a second magazine taped with duct tape to the magazine already installed in the weapon, as well as a body strap stocked full with a variety of grenades – smoke, frag and flashbangs. He was sleeveless, lanky, boasting taught muscular arms, his right arm bearing a long broadsword tattoo descending from his shoulder down impaling a flaming cartoon heart icon at the bottom of the top of his hand. He was also missing a finger on that hand, the pinky.
He lit a cigarette with a baby blue bic lighter and motioned for one of his cronies to bring Bill Littlewood over.
It wasn’t raining that morning like it had been on and off for the last few days, but the weather was grey, windy and dismal, appropriate for the contentious situation, the air was still fresh and moist, especially at the considerable altitude at the top of the CNF tower.
Face to masked face now, Bill Littlewood and the terrorist alpha stood at the edge of the rooftop platform. There was a clear plexiglass gate there protecting the potential plummet over the edge threat.
“So, it’s come to this, Bill. You think you’re hot shit don’t you? Big star. Yeah. It’s time for me to have my show now. After today the world will know my name,” He said, then took off his mask. His face was handsome but scarred, straight nose, green frightening eyes gleaming with some esoteric spark, medium length dirty blonde hair blowing in the high winds, one savage knick out of his lower lip and another on his forehead, prominently visible.
“Allow me to introduce myself. Dak Longstar. Now, you’ve been exploiting the world’s troubles for your own personal gain and fame, and filling in the blanks with a bunch of other stupid pointless shit. To you it’s a bonus when something bad happens, because you capitalize, do your little dance, talk your little talk, it keeps you in business, makes a good show for you. You might even say you thrive on catastrophe. On other people’s pain. The worse the news, the better the story,” He stopped and took a generous puff of his cigarette, not having the consideration or respect to blow it away from Bill’s current powdered facial expression of pure contempt.
“Well, we’re here to capitalize too. Capitalize on your worth, and transfer it to us, so it can be used properly. You have to ask yourself, Bill, who’re the real bad guys here? We could be making a better world. An inclusive world that doesn’t just sweep it’s problems under the rug, and it’s people, or worse, do what you do, use it to your own advantage. Instead you just show the shit and personally prosper. We’re more of the affirmative action type people. Have you ever fired a gun, Bill?, Have you ever even held a gun? Have you ever had to, because if you didn’t…? Have you ever held your dying child in your arms while the militant horde burned down and bombed everything around you? Burned your life to ashes? Ashes in a shallow grave. No, I didn’t think so. You’d have a bad day if you couldn’t get your latte in the morning because the barista had an epileptic siezure.”
“May I interject at this point, I think that’s a little unfair, and rude,” Bill Littlewood said.
“You may not,” Dak Longstar said as he raised the Ak-47 in his hand and pointed it under Bill’s chin, forcing his head to raise and move a bit. A vulgar display of who the master was in the situation.
“So, I want you to bring your camera boys over here, and I’m going to be the TV star for a little while, and we’ll see who has a better show today. Bring the pilot too,” Longstar waved to his associate and dropped his finished cigarette butt on the ground with the same pinkyless hand.
✶ ✶ ✶
CHAPTER 9 – WRAITHVALE
Wraithvale was formed as an offshoot mercenary organization of defected Canadian Armed Forces soldiers who had been soured at the idea of serving the country and began having their own ideas. These ideas were quickly deemed too dangerous by their former militant masters – which they were. Dak Longstar, a gifted athlete, soldier, and esteemed martial artist, became increasingly frustrated with the lack of upwards mobility he and his comrades experienced in the army. There was a suffocatingly small amount of wiggle-room to climb up the success chain, unless it involved a lot of bootlicking a superior officer. Dak had high aspirations, and high aspirations were dangerous. He soon went AWOL and trained a compact platoon of hand-picked and talented men and women with similar views regarding the state of the world and the governments who allegedly controlled it. Dak suspected most of them were merely just acting out their perceived expected role. He actually could not stand taking orders, it went against his nature, but fully expected other people to take his. One day he sketched a drawing of a broadsword stabbing through a flaming heart and this birthed the insignia of what would later become Wraithvale.
Deep in the northern wilderness of Saskatchewan a large cylindrical cement bunker was secretly built in the side of a hill and people began being recruited to join a mysterious budding faction of so-called rebels. Longstar’s former military ties and his reputation as a natural warrior, as well as some powerfully sympathetic friends helped arm this novel brigade with weapons, transporting the cargo out to the middle-of-nowhere base in jeep convoys loaded with crate rations, filled with machine guns and explosives. This steady sequence repeated for years, and the rebel force started to grow more cultlike as vulnerable people in society would be targeted and informed about a superior group of heroes and the benevolent cause that they stood for. For many, the glorious notion swayed them into abandoning their mediocre lives they had grown increasingly disenfranchised with. Transported by scout drivers to the forest base, the new recruits would then begin boot camp style training, undergo “cerebral coaching”, which was kind of a euphemism for brainwashing, and potentially graduate to become a valued member of Wraithvale – an organization that had a purpose, a vision, and a plan that would actually be put into action, unlike the never ending hamster-wheel of any regular job, which generally indefinitely existed to defend the status-quo.
✶ ✶ ✶
On the CNF sky platform the camera crew was encircling Dak, Bill Littlehood was escorted back to the group of hostages, and spat at in the face by the soldier forcing him, who also called him a “Cuck loser”. The pilot on the scene was a good looking young man with dark short hair wearing a brown bomber jacket with a fur lined collar, grey jeans and white hi-top sneakers.
“What’s your name?” Dak asked the pilot.
“Sergei,” Sergei replied.
“Ok, Sergei, when we get our message out to the world, you’re going to fly us out of here in that helicopter right there, and I don’t think I have to explain what’s going to happen if you refuse.”
“Sorry, but I don’t negotiate with terrorists,” Sergei said, staring directly into Dak’s cold, intense eyes, accepting the challenge. They stared at each other in silence for a few intense moments. Sergei knew he couldn’t show weakness to this bastard.
“Is that so? Oh, I think you will though,” Dak said and turned to the hostage group. “Her, bring her over.” Dak pointed out a pretty blonde woman with his rifle. She was dressed in a fuscia blouse and skirt, black nylons and high heels, shivering in the breeze, scared, amidst the group of hostages. “If you don’t agree to fly us out of here right now, Segei, my man, other people are going to start to fly instead – right off the edge of this building,” Dak said.
The woman was being held by the arms and dragged over with a pistol pointed at her head, she was screaming and fighting.
“Don’t do it, Sergei!” She pleaded with extreme bravery. The thug manhandling her proceeded to pistol whip her in the back of the head and that made her stop screaming, “Was that a bluff?” He scoffed.
“I don’t think you really want to be responsible for all these people’s deaths, do you, Sergei? Let’s not be foolish. You’re not going to be a hero today,” Dak taunted.
“Sergei don’t listen to him!” The woman shouted and the thug punched her in the stomach, she dropped to her knees, panting and clutching her belly.
“Leave her alone! She’s completely innocent! That’s my assistant, she’s only worked here for a month! She’s just an office worker, no offense, Linda. I’m the one you want, with your weird stupid vendetta!” Bill shouted, and one of the thugs pistol whipped him in the back of the head too.
“Shut up! None of you are innocent. You’ll have your moment too, Littlehood, oh yes, don’t you worry,” Dak said and turned back to Sergei, “You fly us out after this or every single one of these people is going splat on the pavement below, including you, but we’ll save that for last.” There were six mmbers of Wraithvale on the platform. Sergei wondered how Dak expected to fit all those people in the helicopter, as it only had room for five. Dak looked over the edge and could see a large crowd below, and all the cops. They were probably already plotting some kind of idiotic SWAT team rescue attempt.
“You,” He said, looking at the cameraman. “Let’s go, turn the camera on.”
The cameraman nodded and said “Ok, ok, just stop hitting people for Christ’s sake, alright, ready? And we’re going live in, five, four, three…” The last two numbers he didn’t say out loud but made the number symbols with his fingers. The channel was viewable from below on TV screens they had in the back of the police vans except with no signal. Then a static glitch faded into the scene on the rooftop and Dak Longstar was on TV as the focal point.
“Give me a fucking microphone,” He said to one of the camera crew lackeys, who promptly obeyed and stepped over and gave him one out of the satchel he was carrying.
“Hello, Neo-Vancouver, welcome back to the Morning Glory show. Your regular host has become indisposed for the moment, and I’ll be substituting from here. My name is Dak Longstar, and I’m the leader of the revolutionary organization Wraithvale. You’ve never heard of us, that was intentional, but after today, everyone will have heard of us. Now, here’s what we want, and also here’s what’s going to happen if we don’t get it right now. Let me be quite clear with everyone.”
He motioned for the cameraman to film the edge of the platform as two thugs wrestled the screaming assistant woman into submission, picked her up by the stockinged, strappy shoes ankles and the wrists, and casually tossed her writhing body over the edge.
This was all shown on TV and from the bottom at street level a horrified gasp in unison arose from the crowd, and seconds later the sprawling body hit the concrete with a loud sickening splatter in the middle of the street and exploded in a wet squirting cloud of blood, leaving the obliterated body in a distorted spider-web cracked crater. An eruption of screams and yelling followed, then the indiscernable ambient commotion of panicked discussion. The cameraman was shaking now and a single tear dripped out of his eye and ran down his rain covered face.
“You son of a bitch, you lowlife son of a bitch! I’ll fucking kill you!” Sergei said and charged at Dak, but Dak countered and kicked him in the solar plexus, then followed up with a roundhouse kick to the neck. Sergei did a half backflip at the sheer power of the blow, landing on his head and crumpling, and lay dazed on the ground coughing and choking, spitting out blood.
“I’m sure you would too, if you could. But you can’t, and you never will be able to. There’s nothing you can do, and there’s plenty more where that came from.” Dak turned back to the camera. “As you can see, I’m not joking. Now that you’ve seen we mean business, let me begin. The meaningless loop of drudgery you call your lives is nothing but an impotent hierarchy of servitude to your invisible masters. Well, here are the masters you can see, and we’re called Wraithvale. Your precious talk show host Bill Littlehood is just a construct, a feeble welp pathetic puppet strung up to sing and dance for your entertainment, distracting you all from the true matter at hand. He’s just a disgusting pimple protruding from the larger sickness in the larger body you call ‘society‘ made up of all of you miserable ladies and gentlemen out there swindled into contributing to the machine…”
✶ ✶ ✶
“Whoa, shit! This guy’s completely fucking batshit!” Dempsey said.
Him and Cop Thing were outside the bottom of the CNF building sitting in the hummer, watching from a small TV screen on the dashboard.
“Same old shit, guy’s pissed about his values or something, has got it rationalized he’s got a righteous cause, you see it all the time, all throughout history, deep down the deranged bastard just wants power and sex. The sicko probably doesn’t even know it himself. Makes me fucking sick people like this exist,” Dempsey went on.
“What a hateful, misplaced blame fucking psycho. Unfortunately this world breeds them like cattle. This guy definitely wins the Biggest Asshole Award though. Fuck what their demands are, I only care how to stop them,” Cop Thing said.
“He does have a point though,” Dempsey said.
“Are you fucked? There’s absolutely nothing about what he just said that’s ok. But Christ, we’ve got a real problem here, I think we can’t just bust in there hero-style and take them out, not this time, not with all the hostages.”
Mike Trigger arrived on the scene, pistol in hand. He had a bandaged trigger finger today like he sometimes did, from obsessively rubbing his beretta trigger all day with it, until it was red-raw and bleeding. What the hell kind of Dad was this guy? Cop Thing sometimes wondered. What kind of message are you sending to your kids? Be obsessed with blasting people, son? Life’s all about blasting people, son. And his daughters are going to have some bad fucking Daddy issues.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” Mike said. “Just let me at these fuckings guys, we gotta get up there and blow these suckers away there before they kill more hostages.”
“Good idea, Mike. Why didn’t I think of that? I’m being sarcastic, we can’t do that, obviously, they’ll one hundred percent kill them all as soon as they even suspect that,” Cop Thing said.
“Yeah, but they’re probably going to kill them all anyways, we don’t have much time, we’ve got to act!” Mike retorted, petting his gun rigorously. “You saw what the fuck he just did.”
“They have no bargaining chip without the hostages, that’s the whole point of taking hostages. I don’t want to deal with a whole civvy bloodbath today, not anymore than it already is, do you? Unless it’s the bad guys,” Cop Thing argued.
✶ ✶ ✶
Dak was still on TV performing his heartfelt philisophical speech, “-Wasting your pathetic lives forced to slave away serving a system that doesn’t give the slightest modicum of a shit about you as an individual person. That’s the very design of the whole thing. You’re a giant pack of mob-mentality sheep. You’re ones and zeroes in the matrix. Let me show you. Here’s how much It doesn’t give a shit. See this guy over here?” Dak pointed to a non-outstanding man in a suit in the group of frightened hostages. “Never seen him in my life, I have no idea who he is. I could not care less. He is Human Male for all I care.” Dak said into the camera, and then, after a pause for suspense, “Nox! Herod! Do it. That guy, give him wings,” Directing with his rifle to the two Wraithvale thugs. Nox and Herod obeyed and grabbed the victim, wrestled him fighting and screaming to the edge of the railing. The man put up a decent fight, thrashing away, yelling horrified obscenities, gripping to the handle of the railing at the edge of the rooftop desperately for his life, but the goons smashed his fingers with the butts of their sub-machine guns and he dropped off the edge screaming while the terrified protests of the other hostages filled the moist foggy air.
“Oh, shit,” Cop Thing said, watching this on TV, and they leaned out of the car and looked up to see the body falling right towards them. “Get out!” Cop Thing shouted and he and Dempsey dove out of the hummer on either side as the man’s body smashed directly into the windshield of the hummer two seconds later, smashing the glass and crushing the hood of the vehicle in a dramatic ejaculated puff of engine smoke, oil and blood. Cop Thing was face to face with the draped and mangled corpse, the man’s upside down face dripping with blood, eyes bulging grotesquely out of his broken skull, teeth all jagged and knocked out, stabbed through his bleeding cheek flesh.
“Alright, you’re right, we’ve gotta do something, this guy ain’t fucking around, boys!” Cop Thing admitted. “And now I’m really pissed. Now it’s personal.”
“Roger fucking that, Cop Thing,” Mike Trigger said and lifted his gun and struck a pose, trying to look heroic. Cop Thing unstrapped his holster and pulled out the .44 magnum.
On the TV, Dak said “So now that I’ve made myself crystal clear. Whoever is in charge down there, you will send one ambassador up to the roof, with all the necessary info to e-transfer us $1,000,000,000, which will be used to fund the foundation of a new world order, one that actually works, my way. Oh yeah, and don’t even think about sending in the pigs, the entire lobby of the building is wired with toxic gas bombs, so unless you want your whole VPD SWAT squad to be vomiting up their guts and shitting their assholes inside out, I’d leave it alone if I were you.”
✶ ✶ ✶
✶ ✶ ✶
CHAPTER 10 – AMBASSADOR THING
Nox carried a phone over to Dax with Police Chief Phillips waiting ready on Faceplace, the most mainstream messenger app in the world.
“This is Chief Phillips of the VPD, we heard your request, we’re working on it, just don’t kill any more hostages, for God’s sake. We’re going to send an ambassador up, like you asked for. Just give us a little bit of time to get organized down here,” He said.
“That’s fine. I see you’re smarter than I expected. I knew you’d break eventually, I just didn’t know how much blood would have to be spilled before that happened. Now, don’t try any fancy stuff and send the ambassador up as soon as possible. My team is getting restless,” Dax smiled.
“Alright. Just stay calm, don’t do anything else rash, we’re willing to cooperate.” Phillips said and got off the line. Then he turned to the SWAT Captain Azrael Phobus, who was standing right beside him, backed up by his fully equipped ready team, wearing combat helmets, transclucent red-visor goggles, thick flak jackets, the finest cargo pants, combat boots and walkie-talkies. Cop Thing, Mike Trigger and Dempsey were there too, as well as a deluge of other street officers hanging out in the background.
“Ok, listen up,” Police Chief Phillips began, “Here’s the plan. Cop Thing’s going to be the ambassador. We send Cop Thing in alone. Now, they’re probably watching the surveillance footage from the roof, so Cop Thing finds the control panel for the security cameras and shuts it down, this is important, and you gotta do that ASAP, Cop Thing, I know you’re not an electricians expert or a CNF surveillance specialist or whatever, but luckily we’ve got one right over here and he’s going to brief you how to do it. Make sense?” They all looked around at each other and nodded. “Once the cameras are down, we send in the bomb squad, Wraithvale won’t be able to see them at that point, they won’t know what we’re up to. Cop Thing takes the elevator to the roof and bides as much time as he can with the terrorist leader, maybe even takes them all down somehow, if he sees the opportunity, that sound about right, Cop Thing?” Phillips raised an open upwards facing palm towards Cop Thing.
“Yeah. That would be the highlight of my day,” Cop Thing agreed.
“Mike Trigger’s going to be covering from across the street in the Colossal Hotel with the sniper rifle in case shit goes haywire. Keep it low-key though, Mike, please, these guys aren’t stupid. They may have snipers of their own up there, or at least guys on the lookout,” Phillip’s continued.
“Affirmative, Mike said as he was packing the sniper rifle into a suitcase in it’s deconstructed form. Even though this was an emergency situation with the whole block shut down, there was no need to go parading around in a hotel flaunting a sniper rifle, that would only instill more fear, panic and confusion. Mike had considerable sniping experience from his Afghanistan days, and this weapon was one of his favorites. The particular gun he was going to use was a Savage Scout APJ (All Purpose Jacket). He could barely contain his excitement as he completed the packing and locked the case, big smile on his face.
“Got that? Any questions so far? Ok, so when Cop Thing’s on the roof with the bad guys and the hostages, and Mike’s covering, and the cameras are down, the toxic bombs have been deactivated, we’re sending up Captain Phobus and the SWAT boys as a special guarantee. Like we’re actually gonna e-transfer these guys $1,000,000,000… This Longstar asshole must be even crazier than he seems if he thinks that. That’s when we kick in the door and give them the fucking bullet enema,” Phillips was dead serious. “Once Cop Thing’s in there he won’t be able to communicate with us, so we’re gonna rely on Mike for the recon updates of what’s going on on the roof. Before that, it’s all up to you Cop Thing. You’re the best we’ve got,” Phillips concluded and gave Cop Thing a hearty pat on the back, which Cop Thing found kind of disingenuous. Wasn’t this guy just reeming him and Mike both out the other day in his office about the whole ICE fiasco? Now he was his favorite cop all of the sudden. But there was no time to overthink the details at the moment, it was irrelevant to the current critical situation. There was pertinent police work that needed to be done right, right now.
✢
Dak walked over to Segei and said “I’m going to ask you again, nicely, would you please get prepared to fly the helicopter out of here. Now I’m going to ask you not nicely, if you don’t get prepared to fly that helicopter and all of my team out of here right now, I’m going to fly it. I know you have the key, I saw you take it earlier and put it in your breast pocket, don’t ask me how,” Dak poked Sergei’s breash pocket with the tip of his AK, pushing him back a bit. “So don’t play smart with me. We’ll take our chances in the air. I’m a competant man, I can figure out how to fly that helicopter, especially under the necessitous circustances of survival which you are forcing me into with your fucking dilly-dallying, and we’re going to go back on TV, just to show the general viewing audience what it looks like when a man gets half an AK-47 clip shot into him at point blank range. Do you understand?”
Segei had never been so furious in his life. Being forced to do things he didn’t want to do pissed him off more than anything else in the world, and he knew he was in checkmate. The feeling of being utterly helpless to stop the coming onslaught was abysmally unplesant, emasculating and embarassing. It filled him with real flaming hatred.
“God will have his vengeance on you, but you leave me no choice. I’ll start the engine,” Segei said and pulled a silver crucifix out of his shirt collar and kissed it, then looked up at the sky as if he were summoning God to aid him in what he must do, then he meandered over to the helicopter, defeated.
“Good,” Dak said, then turned to his comrades and twirled his finger in the air. “Smoke break. Now we play the patience card,” He said. Nox and Herod each pulled out packs of cigarettes and bic lighters and started smoking. The other three Wraithvale mercenaries were Jolon, the tall one, Amelia, a woman with an orange-blonde ponytail protruding out the back of her balaclava, and Todd. They were guarding the hostages who were standing under an alcove at the entranceway to the rooftop platform, blocking the door. They weren’t smokers, but Todd took out a flask and took a swig of the mystery contents and passed it around, even offering some to the hostages.
✢
Down below, Cop Thing entered the lobby front door. The room was exceedingly spacious, a chandelier hanging from the tall ceiling, a circular multi-level fountain was constructed in the middle made out of stone, surrounded by low tables with magazines on them, crossword puzzles and rouge leather armschairs, a huge shining silver CNF logo sculpture backlit by colourfully interchanging neon lights mounted on the wall behind a large mahogany front desk, and big flatscreen TVs decorating the walls all around, they were all showing static though, because they were turned to the CNF channel. Notably, there was one dead security guard lying face down in a puddle of blood. It was liminal to be in this extravagantly expensive room surrounded by no-signal static and the only other person there was already dead. There was even a retro TURBO BARBARIAN arcade game in the corner, which Cop Thing kind of wanted to play, as that was an old favorite, but quickly dismissed the idea when he remembered what he was supposed to be doing. The surveillance cameras were looking at him, and he was looking back at them. Glaring into the ominous glass eye which may or may not be watching his every move. The gas bombs were in plain sight, with obvious stroked bio-hazard symbols on them and yellow and black warning stripes painted over gleaming chrome casings. How the hell did these fuckers pull this off? Cop Thing thought, and tried to picture the takeover scene that would have played out not that long ago in this very room, before what would have been any normal Monday quickly transformed into total mayhem.
✢
Back on the roof, Amelia came over to Dak and said “Um, Dak, you’re not gonna like this.”
“What? What is it? This was all going so smoothly,” he said, irritated.
“Their ambassador is in the lobby,” She said.
“Good, that’s what’s supposed to be happening, what’s the problem?” He said, perturbed.
“Their ambassador is Cop Thing,” Amelia said, looking worried.
“Shit!” Dak exclaimed. He stood for a minute staring into nothingness, lost in thought, then turned to Nox, “Patch me back through to that fucking Police Chief,” He said angrily. Nox nodded and returned the call.
“Phillips here,” Phillips answered.
“You didn’t say anything about the ambassador being Cop Thing!” Dak hissed, eyes slits of hate.
“You didn’t say anything about the ambassador not being Cop Thing,” Phillips replied.
“You think you’re pretty clever, don’t you, Phillips?” Dak snorted.
“Well, I didn’t become Police Chief by being stupid,” Phillips said, pleased with himself. The other officers beside him looked at each other smirking.
“Son of a bitch. Send him back right now and send someone else in,” Dak said.
“I can’t, I can’t communicate with him, it’s too late,” Phillips said. “Unless you want me to send in more cops.”
“You think you’re so fucking smart. You’ll regret this,” Dak said and hung up.
✢
Cop Thing found the security camera switch, which was ironically off-camera, and flicked it off. The surveillance tech was one of the people who had escaped in the evacuation and briefed Cop Thing on where the control panel was and how to turn it off. He saw the display screens of all the security cameras turn blank, then he went back to the front door and gave a thumbs up through the glass at the waiting police outside. The bomb squad, which was actually just one guy, ran in and knelt down at the first gas bomb.
“Ho! Boy, look at this little devil, eh? Haven’t seen one of these nasty little guys in awhile,” he said to Cop Thing. He was a younger guy, new recruit to the VPD force, they shipped him in from the Middle East, due to prodigious talent in his craft. His name was Ahmed, good kid.
“You ever seen one of these things before?” Cop Thing asked, referring to the bomb.”
“Oh, yeah, they used this kind of crap all the time when I was in Egypt. The insurgents, I mean. Really messy. Fuckin’ Monday mornings, eh, Cop Thing? Ah well, it’s good people are tryng to bomb shit still or else I’d be out of a job,” Ahmed said and laughed, then he opened the small red tool kit he was carrying and began tampering with the bomb. “I got this. Good luck up there,” Ahmed said and gave Cop Thing a thumbs up, a smile and a wink. Cop Thing returned the thumbs up and wink, which for him appeared as his face-folds scrunching briefly where his eye was covered behind the curtain of see-through flesh, and said “Thanks, kiddo.”
Cop Thing got in the elevator and hit the button for the top floor. At the top, outside the elevator the entire floor looked like a mix between a boiler room and a janitors closet. Cop Thing stalked the dim-lit hall until he found the door leading to the sky platform. He knew it was the right door, because there was a sign beside it reading “Sky Platform.”
He opened the door, walked out and saw the six Wraithvale mercs, there was a helicopter with the ignition started and the blades were warming up rotating. The party of hostages was right beside him, relief and fear on their faces.
“Sorry, I forgot to knock,” Cop Thing said to everyone and shrugged caustically. He didn’t dare move until he knew the terrorists weren’t going to go ape-shit if he did. Dak walked over to him, stared at him in his no-face, squinted his eyes in disgust, and disgust with himself that he failed to foresee this dubious event occuring.
“So, the legendary Cop Thing, you’re the chosen ambassador,” Dak said.
“Looks like it,” Cop Thing said.
“Don’t try any hero-shit, we’re professionals, every single one of these hostages will be dead before you can throw one punch, and so will you,” Dak said.
“That’s fine, can we cut the chatter and get down to business?” Cop Thing said.
✢
Mike Trigger was in a luxury suite on the top floor of the Colossal Hotel, set up kneeling at the window with the curtains drawn, trigger finger twitching, peering out of his sniper scope spying on the scene. He was cool and collected though. His reticle was squarely on Dak Longstar’s head, and he had a bad urge to just pull the trigger and blow the guy’s psychotic brain out of his skull all over the rooftop pavement, but there was no way they could stop the rest of the Wraithvale lackeys before they started blasting, so he forced some restraint on himself and waited patiently, watched whatever it was Cop Thing and Dak were discussing unfold.
✢
Far beneath in the CNF Tower lobby, Ahmed had dismantled the bombs. He text the Police Chief “CLEAR” and Captain Phobus’ SWAT squad was stampeding through the door seconds later, securing the perimeter, skipping the elevator and taking the stairs up to the top floor as they felt they couldn’t risk their blood-up momentum by physically stopping moving, the adrenaline was so high. They also didn’t want to pack their entire A-squad like sardines, in case something went freakishly wrong with the elevator, that was Phobus’ wise order as Captain.
✢
“Trigger, what’s going on up there?” Phillip’s said through the walkie-talkie to Mike.
“Cop Thing’s on the roof, they’re talking, it’s crunch time. I’ve got Longstar literally in my sights. How’s it going down there?” Mike said.
“All systems go, the bombs are down and the SWAT guys are in.” Phillips said.
“Perfect. These fuckers are going down.” Mike grinned.
✢
“Where’s the phone, you’re supposed to e-transfer us from your phone,” Dak said,
“Relax. It’s right here,” Cop Thing said and produced his smartphone from out of his hidden kangaroo-pocket on the side of his hip. There was a slight amount of goo residue on it. Some inhuman bodily secretion.
“That’s disgusting,” Longstar said. “Ok, hurry up, the chopper is good to go as soon as you get the deal done. You got the fucking bank website loaded up or what? Cameraguy! Get over here, I want people to see this. Get this on TV, just start filming, I don’t need the stupid countdown.” The cameraman sighed and hoisted the camera up again and started filming.
“Hold on, just a second, don’t distract me. Ok, what’s your e-mail?” Cop Thing said.
“It’s Wraithvale.nwo.esq@gmail.com. Now come on, hurry the fuck up. $1,000,000,000 right now, send it!” Dak said, pointing the AK-47 at Cop Thing casually fom the hip.
“Yeah, yeah, hold your horses, I’m working on it.” Cop Thing said, unperturbed.
“Work on it fucking faster,” Dak said. Amelia approached them.
“Um, Dak, you’re not gonna like this,” She said.
“Are you ever going to say anything I do like? What?” Dak snapped. He’s losing it, Cop Thing thought happily. Psycho-fucked him.
“The security camera grid is down. I can’t see what’s going on inside,” Amelia said. Dak was annoyed.
“You’re supposed to be the surveillance lady. That’s your job. You’re telling me you can’t do your job? Maybe it’s just your phone, I dunno, fucking turn it off and turn it back on again,” Dak said.
“I tried that. I’ve got a feeling it isn’t just my phone, Dak” Amelia said. “I think we should bail.”
“I don’t. You’re not the fucking leader of Wraithvale – I am, you don’t get to make that decision, I do, and I think we should get $1,000,000,000 right now. You hear that, Cop Thing? Hurry the fuck up I’m getting real fucking impatient here! Nox! Fuck it, release the fucking gas. Does that make you feel better, Amelia, if I release the fucking gas?” Dax was hysterical now, Cop Thing could see the breakpoint tension on his face, the psychosis had settled in, his ego had broken and now it was time to capitalize, much to the sadistic pleasure of Cop Thing.
“Uhhh… Dak?” Nox said.
“What? What now?” Dak was really mad.
“The gas ain’t releasing,” Nox said.
“What do you mean ‘the gas ain’t releasing?’ Press the fucking button, I set the bombs up properly myself!” Dak was pacing around now, sweating, eyes furious, bulging.
“I mean it ain’t releasing, man, I’m pushing the fucking button and it ain’t releasing!”
“What did you do, Cop Thing? Send the money right now, you sneaky fucking cop! Or we’re going to shoot you and every one of these hostages and then safely fly out of here to fucking Jamaica, or wherever we want!” Dak said, and began laughing maniacally. “Press send! It’s not that hard you stupid fuck!”
That’s when the door burst open and the SWAT team flooded out like the oncoming apocalypse. After about one second of a delay, all the participants ascertaining what the current situation just became, everyone frozen stunned while reality seeped in then released in a flood like a crack in a dam wall crumbling open. Then the guns started shooting.
Cop Thing was getting shot right off the bat and his carapace began instantly pulse-glowing red on the outline of his hulking frame. He hunched over, bracing, taking the damage, then he reached into his gooey kangaroo-pouch and pulled out the .44 Magnum concealed there.
The hostages all dove to the ground with their hands behind their heads, some curled up in the fetal position, screaming and sobbing and plugging their ears with their fingertips against the deafening rapid orgy sounds of the gunfire concerto.
Mike Trigger pulled the sniper trigger on Nox, the bullet roaring from across the street, connecting with the thug’s neck, which actually popped his head clean off, unlike a direct headshot which would simply explode a person’s head, this one just decapitated him with the head still intact. That’s the kind of cool little details Mike Trigger noticed and appreciated. He considered himself a student of the craft.
Cop Thing did a barrel roll on the ground and aimed for Dak, but Dak countered with a backflip handstand cartwheel away from Cop Thing, grabbed a hostage, who was freaking out, and put a gun to her head, which did not help her emotional state at all.
Captain Phobus was busily scalping Todd for some reason, possibly out of pure hubris as the Captain obviously had a full clip of ammo which seemed a lot more convenient, but who was Cop Thing to judge an expert’s methods? It seemed ferociously irresponsible and unecessarily flashy, but he ran out of time to think about it as Herod leaped towards him, firing 9mm UZI bullets into the abdomen of his carapace which it just absorbed, pulsating more aggressively red and actually sprouting spikes out of his back in some kind of built-in primordial defense-mechanism. Then Cop Thing shot him in the middle of the chest with the .44 which sent him flying through the air several feet backwards. Herod hit the railing of the rooftop and did a classic backflip Royal Rumble sprawl over the edge, but he was dead the instant the .44 bullet connected. He was really asking for it though.
One of the stray bullets struck the cameraman and blood splattered and the lens as it dropped to the ground and smashed. The thrilled crowd below in the street watching all of this on TV let out a mass glatiator-audiencesque gasp as the show became instantly completely bloodsoaked from their perspective, then dropped and cut to static.
Dak was backstepping towards the helicopter at a furious pace, holding the white t-shirt and black jeans brunette lady hostage as a human shield with the AK aimed and firing over her shoulder in front of him. Mike Trigger sniped again and killed Jolon with a shot right between the eyes cleaving his head in half and exploding it like a piñata filled with brains and blood instead of candy. The headless ragdoll corpse flew through the air and rain, blood spurting everywhere out the neck-hole where his head used to be, amidst the raging choas.
“Bullseye, bitch,” Mike Trigger said and started laughing. Cop Thing grabbed Amelia by the neck instead of shooting her because she was so close quarters, and she was a girl, so he felt like he’d go easy on her. Then he chokeslammed her onto the pavement, knocking the wind and the consciousness out of her.
Dak was climbing into the helicopter with the hostage, Mike’s scope was right on him but even he had the good sense and restraint not to risk shooting a hostage. He had done a lot of fucked up shit before, but he had never done that. He could never forgive himself if he did that. That was not only killing an innocent person, but doing it because of you’re own inept of ability. He couldn’t risk that. That was his worst nightmare. So he crouched and watched the havoc reel on.
Dak, in the helicopter ,was shouting at Sergei with his AK-47 pointed at him, “Drive! Drive you idiot! You wanna to die! Do you? Fly the fucking chopper!”
“I’m going, I’m going, you shut up!” Sergei said and was in the process of lifting off. Must have been some self-preservation impulse to just obey in the jumbled heat of the moment, he couldn’t really refuse or attempt to escape, and Dak had a hostage.
Sergei would probably get them both killed if he did anything other than fly that helicopter. Dak was right, he didn’t actually want to die today.
The helicopter began lifting off and Cop Thing leapt and grabbed onto the open side doorway, dangling in the air as the helicopter ascended. Dak began pounding his fingers with his rifle, then, when that didn’t work, just aimed his AK at Cop Thing’s face to shoot him with it, but Cop Thing grabbed the rifle barrel and tore the AK out of his hands, tossed it into the abyss, then uppercut Dak hard in the face with the same hand in the returning motion swing, knocking him into the wall on the other side of the inside of the chopper. The woman hostage, who had mascara streaks all down her face from the black-stream stained tears from the morning events, fell back in the corner shielding herself with her arms from the ensuing hand-to-hand battle of the two titans.
Cop Thing was in the helicopter now and repeatedly punching Dak in the stomach, then elbowed him in the face and flipped him over on the ground. He went to stomp on his head but Dak still had some spirit left in him, rolled out of the way, then brought out his combat knife from his thigh-strap and started stabbing and swiping at Cop Thing.
Dak went full-bore on a lunge, but Cop Thing grabbed him by the forearm and forcefully reversed the attack and the knife tip impaled one of the smoke grenades on Dak’s grenade sash he was wearing on his chest. A grey geyser of thick smoke started spewing aggressively out of the pierced canister and filled the whole helicopter.
“I can’t see! I can’t see!” Sergei was shouting, the helicopter was a huge metal flying capsule filled with smoke and pouring with it out the door into the air, completely unhinged, leaving a trail of smoke behind as it flailed helplessly through the clouds.
Dak started flailing wildly and so did Cop Thing, each blindly throwing punches and kicks at the other. Cop Thing took a hit to the abdomen from one of Dak’s ruthless master kicks and was ejected from the helicopter.
His free-fall lasted for what seemed like a long time, maybe his life flashed before his eyes, he wasn’t sure, what did that even feel like anyways? Didn’t that normally happen on a day to day basis?
By some stroke of good fate he missed the rooftops and the trees, and for the first time in his life, was so appreciative of the massive piles of garbage in Neo-Vancouver, because before he hit the ground, he landed in an especially tall one and was cascaded down in descending levels of cushioned trash and took virtually no further damage but a few knicks, bruises and scratches.
☠
CHAPTER 11 – LUNCH BREAK
❖
Cop Thing lay buried in the huge stinking mound of garbage for a minute while reality checked back into him. Spiraling through the sky, plummeting from an out of control smoke laden helicopter and surviving by landing in a pile of trash post-rooftop gunbattle was a serious trip. He rolled out, groaning and covered in disgusting random filth and gross juices, a bananna peel on his head, which he tossed off back into the garbage load from which it came and stumbled down the dank alley he had just crash landed in. There was a gang of about a dozen or so homeless people all tweaking out together, throwing some sort of wild monkey dance, flailing their arms, hunched over and contorting wildly, like some cracked out rave minus the music. He shook his head. What was he going to do? Arrest a bunch of crackheads? Some problems just couldn’t be solved by force, sadly.
Cop Thing was tough, everyone knew that, but he wasn`t invincible, and that last battle was on the brink of the damage limit he was able to endure. How many bullets had his mutant carapace swallowed and spat out again? He had no clue, it was all a bloody blur, but he knew the Wraithvale terrorists were all dead. All dead except Dak Longstar, and that one girl. Cop Thing wondered then if the helicopter got away. Wouldn’t the police be tracking it the whole time? How could it possibly escape? He didn’t know but he would soon find out. He carried on walking down East Hastings street, through the ghoulish mob, who paid little attention to him, lost in their own bleak world of horrifying addiction, back to HQ.
❖
Back at the police station, Amelia was in custody. When Cop Thing chokeslammed her on the rooftop, she didn’t die, she just got badly hurt and slammed unconscious. When the police arrived on the grisly gore-strewn scene soon after, they promptly slapped the handcuffs on her unconscious body and arrested her. She was now in the interrogation room of the headquarters. Mike Trigger and Police Chief Phillips were watching her sitting in a chair, alone in the room from behind the mirrored glass window that they could see in from but she couldn’t see out of.
There was a camera set up on their side, ready to document the conversation they were about to have, and they intended to get every detail about Wraithvale out of her. Unmasked, she was a handsome woman, light frame but muscular, pointed nose and long orange-blonde hair that was now worn down, no longer in a ponytail. She sat haggard and smoking a cigarette in the room until an officer entered and told her there was no smoking allowed, then confiscated her cigarettes. She asked for a glass of orange juice, but he refused, compromising on a glass of water.
Police Chief Phillips and Mike Trigger entered the room. The Chief sat down across from Amelia, and they stared at each other contemptuously. Mike remained standing, pacing around in the background. There were only two chairs and a table in the dull coloured, completely uninspiring room.
“I’d like my one phone call, please,” Amelia said.
“Yeah. Yeah, I bet you would,” Phillips said.
“I’m not saying anything without a lawyer present,” She said.
“Those are the rules. Do you have one?” Phillips asked.
“No. So aren’t you supposed to provide one for me?” She said.
“Look, lady, technically, yeah, but in these circumstances – You just super fucked up, ok, big time. To be quite frank, you’re in a shitload of trouble, So let’s get to the bottom of it, and maybe we can negotiate a deal to lessen the blow,” Phillips continued.
“Fine. Get a lawyer in here then,” Amelia said, unintimidated.
Fucking hell, this bitch knows her rights, Phillips thought, and sighed. Sometimes the law worked against them, but the law was the law, and they had to uphold the law.
“Let’s go on lunch break, Trigger, I think that’s enough for now,” Phillips said.
❖
The news helicopter was parked in the woods in a foggy valley clearing somewhere in the interior of British Columbia. The vehicle was low on gas and Dak had ordered Sergei to land so he could collect himself, regroup, and formulate a new plan. They had witnessed the vast, intimidating wilderness below as they flew out of the city, smoke blowing out of the helicopter until it was all flushed out and their visibility returned, over the suburbs and into the wild, miraculously unfollowed by the pigs. The pigs must have been too distracted with the hostages and the gun-battle aftermath to tail them. Dak was thankful for that. What the hell just happened? How did that possibly go so wrong? Sergei and the woman who was taken along for the ride were in the helicopter, waiting. The post-traumatic stress they had just experienced was beginning to fade off, and they were all beginning to get a grip on what the situation had now become. Dak was outside the helicopter, still with the AK-47 ready in hand, it was the object that dictated who was in control here, like the king’s crown or sceptre, and he had to protect it and hold onto it at all costs. He could sense Sergei’s spirit wasn’t completely broken, and that he was no coward. Dak could see the glimmer of vitality in his eyes, and he was mentally guarded against some foolhardy attempt at heroism at any moment.
Dak didn’t stray far from the helicopter so the other two wouldn’t dare trying to fly away without him. If they tried, they wouldn’t be able to get the thing off the ground fast enough before Dak was already back inside, but it was worth considering the possibility. Getting left out here would mean a long, slow, impending doom. He lit a Smokeyum cigarette, king size, and inhaled deeply, the exhaled puff dissipating like his dreams of grandure. The smoking, grinning, sunglasses-wearing Smokeyums giraffe mascot on the pack of smokes seemed to be laughing at him.
No, it wasn’t over, it was just one battle lost, not the whole war.
His whole field crew was dead now for all he knew. All he remembered was Cop Thing was there, then the SWAT team busted down the door, and then people started dropping. What the fuck happened there? Didn’t he take the precautious maneuvers to prevent that from happening? Did they get at least some of the fuckers? He didn’t recall seeing that happen. He remembered seeing poor Todd get scalped, which was violently excessive, even for someone with Dak’s cultivated combat experience.
He was supposed to be good at this.
In the helicopter Sergei turned to the woman. She looked very frazzled and rightly so. Her name was Delilah Ferguson, she was the CNF control room director for the show Morning Glory, so she was kind of a big shot in the news world. Sergei was just the part time CNF pilot, so he wasn’t that well aquainted with her, but he knew who she was, everyone who worked at CNF did.
They sat in silence, both courageously suppressing the fear of the seemingly hopeless and daunting situation. They had gotten away from the last nightmare, now they were in the next one. They were still being held hostage at gunpoint, except now they were in the middle of nowhere trapped with a murderous psychopath. Sergei didn’t think that was an improvement.
“What do you think’s going to happen to us?” Delilah spoke at last.
“I don’t know. Let’s take him where he wants to go, then maybe he’ll let us go,” Sergei said, “What choice have we got? I don’t feel like getting shot right now, do you?”
“No. Not much choice then, I guess,” she said in good humour.
Dak walked over and stood outside the open side door of the helicopter, peering in at them, still finishing the cigarette.
“We need to refuel somewhere, we have to make it to Saskatchewan,” Dak said to Sergei, who was turned around in the cockpit, sitting in the pilots seat and listening to him.
“And how do you suppose we do that? Anywhere we land the cops are going to be on us right away,” Sergei said, “And I don’t think you want that.” Sergei did, but he feared if that happened they would get shot pretty quickly, either by Dak or the potentially trigger happy and ignorant police.
“We’ll find a way. We have to. Unless you want to walk from here, in which case you probably stand a better chance of getting mauled to death and eaten by a bear than ever making it out of these woods alive. The search and rescue guys won’t even know where to start looking for your curled-up in the fetal position frozen dead bodies a few days from now, or never,” Dak said. He had heard stories of people who got permanently lost in the woods, the body eventually beginning to overheat in some weird survival phenomenon, once it got dark, you were completely fucked, and in the wet and cold, you stood virtually no chance. Every direction was a dense forest, and worse, it was probably populated with bears and mountain lions and other undesireable things to encounter. They could see where they were on the maps on their phones, before Dak confiscated them and threw them out of the helicopter, and it was way off the grid in the north of BC, halfway to Saskatchewan.
“We’re going to have to risk it. That’s my decision. There’s no other choice, we’ll stop at the nearest gas station out in the boonies, and get in the air again before anyone even knows who we are,” Dak said.
“Where are you taking us?” Delilah asked. Dak’s silently contemplative response was influenced by him considering whether he should tell her or not. He didn’t see the harm in saying they were going to Wraithvale headquarters, where his loyal followers were holding down the fort, but he also didn’t count on this whole situation turning out this way. Therefore he learned his lesson about unforseen consequences and kept his mouth shut for the time being.
“You’ll see, soon enough, you’ll see. If you behave yourself,” Dak said.
❖
CHAPTER 12 – GAS STATION
The helicopter was in the air again flying low through the clouds over the misty treetop mountain vista engrossing them. Eventually the landscape turned into an arctic outflow covered in snow and they crossed an icy mountain range. The gas in the tank was dangerously close to gone, and they were in a desperate position, as getting stranded up there in the freezing mountains would mean certain death. Dak would probably be forced to resort to cannibalism first, too. The only thing they could do was stick to the plan and eventually they came out on the other side of the mountains, in a different province now, and were flying overtop of woodlands, flats and prairies. A small town appeared on the horizon, and they prepared to land. Dak was in the passenger seat, Delilah in the back. The helicopter landed in a farm field outside the town with an old derelict barn in it.
“Sergei, give me the key, we’re going into town on foot, finding the gas station and filling up some jerry cans, then come back and get the fuck out of dodge,” Dak said.
“Can we get some snacks too? I’m getting really hungry,” Delilah said. It was true, they didn’t have any food and they’d been traveling for hours. She felt ridiculous asking permission to get snacks under threat of death.
“Yeah, fine, we’ll get some food at the gas station. Or you will, and bring it. I just showed my face on television basically threatening the world with extortion and throwing people off of buildings, so it’s probably not the smartest thing to go shopping in public right at the moment for me. Even if no one saw that whole shitshow, I’m dressed like a SWAT pirate and it’s probably suspicious. We’ll all go together, but I’ll hang back a bit. I’m an expert in stealth,” Dak said.
“I’d like it better if you told us where we’re going,” Deliliah protested.
“Yeah, well, I’d like it better if I got my $1,000,000,000 and my whole teams wasn’t dead, but you know what? Life’s not fair. Sometimes you have to take the L and come back fresh and try again,” Dak said. Sergei gave him the key and they started walking towards town. He left the AK concealed in the chopper, but he had a pistol tucked into his pants waistband as the ace up his sleeve, which he made sure to show Delilah and Sergei. It occurred to him to just pop them both right now in the field execution-style and then he wouldn’t have to deal with them anymore, and there would be no more witnesses, but he decided he might need them for something, and as long as he was in control, they could be put to use as his slaves. He had a good amount of experience with that.
When they approached the town, they could see it was really more of a strip mall inbetween farmland on a highway in the boonies. Good, that’s what Dak wanted. Not quite full civilization yet. The hicks out in these here parts would probably be too inept and dumb to try anything to stop him. He doubted if there were any White Knights patrolling the area out here in the countryside. They hopped a wooden fence, climbed through a large ditch with a sewer drain protruding from the upsloped hillside by the side of the road, and crossed the street into the town. The buildings were the usual suspects, a Jumbo Doggo here, a Burgers Queen there. There was a Turtle gas station up ahead, it’s turtleshell logo a symbol of a beacon of hope in the wispy fog. There weren’t many pedestrians, and the ones that there were didn’t seem to care, or did take notice and simply looked confused and dumbfounded. It was raining harder now too, and the shit weather wasn’t exactly an invitation for going outside. Worst case scenario, someone called the cops, if they happened to be were watching the news this morning, which seemed so childishly tattle-taleish and unlikely, Dak doubted that would happen. People were too distracted and concerned with themselves, and besides, wouldn’t he, Dak Longstar, a fearsome warrior, strike fear into these hick peasants hearts? He liked to think so.
“Ok. Sergei, get in there and get two jerry cans and fill ’em up with gas,” Dak said.
“How do you want me to pay for that?” Sergei said.
“I don’t know, with your wallet? Bank card? Don’t tell me you don’t have any money?” Dak said.
“Well why should I pay for it when this is your fucked up mission in the first place?” Sergei resisted.
“Because I’ve got the gun,” Dak looked at him like he was a complete moron, “What do you want? I’ll fucking pay you back later if that makes you happy. Now get in there,” Dak urged and nudged his head towards the Turtle station. Sergei looked at Delilah, who shrugged.
“Christ, you go with him, Delilah, you pay if you have to, you guys fucking figure it out. I don’t care. And do it fast, I’m timing you, I can see the whole thing from here. Just go in there, buy the cans, come back out and start filling them up at the pump. Then we go back and get out of here,” Dak said, “And don’t even think about saying shit to the cashier about any of this. First of all, they probably won’t know what the fuck you’re even talking about, second of all, they’re probably gonna be too confused and lazy to even understand. And you won’t have enough time to make anything out of it anyways, because I’m waiting right here. So, yeah, if you try that, or the cops show up, there’s gonna be some blood. And I’d fucking do it myself if I had to, but this seems like the easier route.”
“Ok we’re going,” Sergei said and him and Delilah walked together towards the Turtle gas station.
“How about I’ll pay for the Jerry cans and you get some food and drinks and we’ll split it that way, even though the gas is going to be way more expensive, I’ll be a gentleman,” Sergei said.
“Are you serious? You’re actually going to go through with this?” Delilah said, “Now’s our chance to do something!”
“Oh! Ok, and how do you propose we do that? We don’t even know where we are, you heard him, he’s waiting outside timing us with a gun. I don’t wanna get shot, and if the cops show up, I don’t wanna be an innocent bystander involved in two gun fights today. So let’s just do what he says for now, I think he’s lightening up a bit. Otherwise he would have killed us already, right, he needs us for something.”
“Fine. I guess there’s no choice, again,” Delilah said. “Alright deal.”
Sergei went to the cashier who was an East Indian fellow with a black turban, glasses and a bushy beard, wearing an official green Turtle logo shirt. The eye contact between them was bizarre, like Sergei told him the whole story in the flash of an eye and the man realized something was very wrong but had no clue what to do about it or the ability to, so they just made the sad transaction. Delilah bought two big bottles of Gatorade, blue and red, for “Health and Mana,” she said, two big bags of Mr. Chippy’s potato chips, salt and vinegar and ketchup flavour, and a pack of Smokeyums. She already had a lighter. She paid, packed all that up in a bag and went outside to the gas pump where Sergei was already pumping the gas. She looked over to where Dak was pointing his head out, hidden behind a building across the parking lot, spying on them.
They met up and started walking back, Dak suspicious of what transpired when they were out of his sight for a few minutes, but he had to let it happen, it was the safest route.
“So how about since we’re cooperating with you, you agree to let us go after we get to your mystery destination. You said it’s in the province, right?” Sergei said.
“Yeah. It’s in the province.” Dak said.
“Ok, so…. What do you think?” Sergei pushed.
“I haven’t decided yet. If you come with me, you can’t leave. Because you would know the location of my secret base, also, you’re not in really any postion of possible negotiation,” Dak said.
“Isn’t that all the more reason to let us go then? Why don’t I land near the place, whatever it is, then we part ways and I’ll fly this thing back with me and Delilah,” Sergei said. They were in the field getting closer to the helicopter now. Dak was carrying one of the jerry cans and Sergei was carrying the other, Delilah had the bag. Even the minutiae of a hint of outside influence was irritating to him.
“I don’t know yet, I haven’t got that far. I’ve been more concerned with getting there in the first place. Right? We had a more immediate problem on our hands, which we just solved. So why don’t you just keep your mouth shut and fly the helicopter, and I’ll make up my mind what to do with you on the way.” Dak said.
Christ, he was treating him like they were all in this together now. Like they were on the same team. They were, that’s what he didn’t realize before. They needed each other. He needed to show who the alpha was, and re-eastablish dominance.
“Because It’s not very motivating for me to fly myself to my own demise,” Sergei said.
“Is this fucking motivating for you?” Dak said and pulled out the pistol from his pants and pointed it in Sergei’s face, who stood there, staring down the barrel, “Is it?”
“Fine,” Sergei said.
They sauntered on.
When they got to the helicopter, Delilah climbed in while Dak and Sergei stood outside, Sergei filling up the gas tank with the jerry cans, then they tossed the jerry cans inside and hopped in too. It was a full tank now. Dak started to think maybe he could turn this whole disaster around. Maybe he just got a free helicopter. Well, not free, but a bonus. It cost five peoples lives of his own chosen best soldiers, and the utter failure of his well-thought-out plan. The goddamn unforseen circumstances screwed him today. His mind started to leer towards what use he could make of Delilah and Sergei. They needed to get all the way to Wraithvale, it seemd so boring and unimaginative to him just to kill them after all this. Could he not use his cultlike persona to alter them, break them down and mold them, morph them into his minions and put them to some use? He thought he could Their attitudes would have to be adjusted. But he had methods of doing that. He and Delilah were both smoking cigarettes in the helicopter as Sergei took the passed key from Dak and started the ignition.
CHAPTER 13 – HEADQUARTERS
✛
The helicopter was parked in a dead grass meadow.outside a forest boundary of barren trees. The fog interspersed behind the thick line of trees obscured any ability to see the geography behind it. There was a dirt road leading in, and Dak obviously recognized the area. He was also in possession of the ignition key again.
“We’re walking from here,” He said, toting the AK-47.
“We took you where you wanted to go, we’ve cooperated with you up until this point, why don’t you let us go now?” Sergei said. The three of them were standing outside the helicopter in the meadow. Delilah was holding the Turtle bag.
“Because you’ll never find your way back on foot, and I want to keep the helicopter,” Dak said. “It’s a long way to civilization out here. You’re quite unlikely to find someone to hitchhike with. Trust me,” Dak said. Sergei sensed this was true, judging from the landscape he saw flying over. They were way out in the hinderlands, he had no idea where, and there was no way to check. They were still thralls.
“Will you tell us where we’re going now at least?” Delilah said. Dak paused for a moment, he had pretty much gotten away with it, they were going to make it, there was no reason not to tell them, because they were about to see it anyways.
“Wraithvale,” he said.
“I thought Wraithvale was the name of your terrorist group,” Delilah stated.
“We’re not terrorists. We’re revolutionaries. And it is. But it’s also a place,” Dak said.
“All the way out here? Why wouldn’t you have a headquarters in a town?” She said.
“Because towns have people in them. I don’t like that. I don’t like society. That’s the whole point of Wraithvale. I created my own little nest out here. It took a long time, years of building and training,” Dak explained.
Delilah lit a Smokeyum.
“And you’re going to take us prisoner there?” She said, smoking.
“Prisoner’s such a harsh term,” Dak said “More like a forced guest. I was thinking more like I would recruit you. It’s a privilege really.”
“Why would we join you?” Sergei said.
“Because the alternative will be far more unpleasant,” Dak said. He could threaten them all he wanted but he knew deep down their spirits would have to conform. There was no way to force that, they had to be persuaded, and there were methods for that.
They were walking up the dirt road in the forest now, surrounded by cliffs and valleys, some prehistoric gallery of fauna and foliage with streams and a wide array of fungus. Orange jellybean-looking mucous highlighted the trees, many of them fallen, and the moss laden stone. They crossed a battered wooden bridge over the stream that had the wooden railing evidently bashed off and had stuck between rocks below. They were moving steadily uphill now, marching over rock hills and mountainous earth, no longer on the road.
“Shortcut,” Dak said.
“Shouldn’t we stick to the road? What if we get lost?” Sergei asked. It was starting to get dark now, but the rain had stopped. Fog permeated the area, veiling the trees, turning them into phantasmal faded silhouettes in the distance.
“We won’t, I know this area well, I said I’ve spent a lot of time here. You might even say this is my forest,” Dak said, with a hint of pride. Delilah was struck by the sheer audacity of Dak’s narcissism, he didn’t own a forest. Did anyone really own land? Sergei and Delilah exchanged a glance. Weird bird sounds echoed throughout the woods, including bizarre screeches that sounded more like it would come from a pterodactyl than any species she had heard before.
Delilah was sharing the bag of Mr. Chippy’s ketchup chips with Segei. The mascot on the bag was an ecstatic looking loveable chip-lady with a top-hat and a cane, googly eyed with black lines for arms and legs, puffy white-gloved hands and sneakers. It was identifiable as a female because of the pronounced pretty eyelashes on the googly eyes.
When they reached the top of a moss capped mountain peak, Dak pointed down into the valley and said, “There.” It was a liminal-looking cement bunker in the distance built into a hillside with jeeps parked outside.
✛
Back in Neo-Vancouver, at the police station, Cop Thing was sitting in his office and finishing the half-eaten sandwich he had a date with. Police Chief Phillips had informed him that Dak Longstar had indeed escaped with two hostages. This annoyed Cop Thing and put a damper on what would have been his victorious mindset for the afternoon.
He had a chance to save them and he blew it.
Phillips was getting a lawer in to represent Amelia, then they could hopefully squeeze the beans out of her on the whole Wraithvale thing. The detectives were currently digging up all the dirt on Dak Longstar, they had to know every detail in order to nab this fucker. The idiot had gone on live TV, shown the world his face, told them who he was and subsequently murdered people. What was this guy thinking? Are you really that stupid? And he was still out there somewhere. It didn’t sit comfortably with Cop Thing to have this fucking maniac out there in the wild, surely plotting his next attack, and now he would be bloodthirsty for revenge too. That kind of psycopathic hubris was unlikely to back down with its tail between its legs from one defeat, so Dak Longstar was probably insanely pissed off at the moment. Cop Thing had a feeling he hadn’t seen the last of him, but resigned to the fact that there was nothing he could do about it right now.
That had been an unusually eventful Monday morning, but his shift was only half over, and there was still a city full of crime to deal with today. He willed himself to put the case aside until later. Cop Thing’s phone started ringing from the top of his desk. It was Mike Trigger. He swiped up to answer, still chewing his last mouthful of the gigantic sandwich. The morning mayhem had done nothing to stall his appetite.
“Hi. I’m in the parking lot. Got a new vehicle for us, it’s just a police cruiser, not anything as marvelous as your hummer, but since that’s a write-off and on it’s way to the junkyard now, I guess you can collect the insurance and we’ll drive this thing until you get a new one,” Mike said.
“Is it black? Is it incognito?” Cop Thing asked, “The new car.”
“Yeah, it’s black and incognito, it’s an undercover cop car,” Mike said.
“Good, I don’t like driving around with our dicks out plainly advertising what we’re up to out there,” Cop Thing said.
“Me neither. Ok, you gonna come down here or what? We’ve still got that ICE case to work on and there’s a whole town filled with scum out there that still needs cleaning up,” Mike said.
“It does. I’ll be right down,” Cop Thing said.
✛
Outside the Wraithvale headquarters looked like a cement horizontal cylinder protruding from a hill with a bunker wall beneath it, sporting giant double doors with a cyberterminal beside it embedded in the concrete, red light glowing in the mist. Dak had an access card which he held up to the terminal, the light turned green with an entrance beep and the doors opened slowly horizontally, creaking and rumbling. There was a guard there that saluted Dak, eyes tentative because he obviously saw the disaster that had happened on TV, or heard about it. The fact that Dak was with Sergei and Delilah instead of Todd, Amelia, Jolon, Nox and Herod was not a good sign either. The guard didn’t ask any questions as he likely feared Dak’s reprisal, he just stood respectfully silent as Dak, Sergei and Delilah walked inside the building. They moved down a wide corridor, the white floors gleaming and the white walls undecorated with chrome locked doors on either side until they came to a large plain room with a round table in the middle, surrounded by clean black leather chairs. There was a tall, muscular man in the room, long grey hair and a handlebar moustache, dressed in a black t-shirt, bomber jacket and urban camo cargo pants tucked into combat boots.
“Dak, good to see you, we thought you were dead. What the hell happened?” He said.
“The cop’s sent in their… Thing. I don’t know, he’s got fucking magic powers or something, I saw him get shot multiple times, he just started glowing red and sprouting spikes out of his back and arms. Somehow they got past the gas, I had to take some hostages to get away. Speaking of which, Delilah, Sergei, this is Merge. He’s sort of like my right hand man here.”
Merge suspiciously stared at them.
“What are we supposed to do with them?” Merge said.
“Put them in the dungeon, for now, we’ll figure it out later, first thing’s first, I need a bottle of whiskey and a roast beef dinner,” Dak said. A woman with wide-rimmed spectacles entered the room. She was wearing a black tank top and beige shorts, shiny beige nylons terminating into thick brown boots.
“Desdemona, can we get some food served up here for me and our new guests, roast beef and mashed potatoes ok? You’re not vegans are you?” Dak said. Sergei and Delilah both shook their heads no.
“I’m gluten free,” Delilah said.
“Tell the Chef, Delilah is gluten free,” Dak said.
“Dak, is this really the time to be celebrating?” Desdemona said.
“I’m not celebrating, I’m hungry and I’m replenishing my spirit, and theirs, they’re going to need it,” Dak said, “Follow me,” he motioned to Delilah and Sergei. They reluctantly followed him down the hall, down a flight of steps, down another deeper hall, which was lined with doors in a symmetrical fashion. The base was bigger than it looked from the outside. There must have been a lot of digging and excavation at one point to build this thing. It was curiousity inducing to see, how did they get away with building this place way out in the wilderness like this? Sergei and Delilah both became somewhat intrigued. There was a bigger picture here that they did not understand, or have any hints about either. These people all seemed like soldiers, not construction workers. They must have had some serious help at one point. Rich help. The base was clean, not dilapidated at all, like it had been built semi-recently. At the end of the hall, Dak swiped the keycard and the chrome door unlocked and slid open vertically.
“Welcome to your new quarters, don’t worry, it’s only temporary, I just can’t have you wandering around the base unescorted, for now,” Dak said. The room was an actual furnished room with two beds and a couch, a table and a TV, very nice for a jail cell, “I’ll summon you when dinner’s ready, then we’ll have a discussion,” He continued. Sergei and Delilah stepped inside, then the door slid closed and locked again from the outside.
Dak returned to the roundtable room with Merge and Desdemona. There was a bottle of Jim Daniels Fire Tennessee Whiskey on the table with one glass. Dak poured himself a generous amount and chugged it down in two big gulps, then he shook his head as the liquor hit and exclaimed, “Ahh! I needed that. I really fucking needed that.”
“Where are the others?” Merge said, in hopeful denial about the grim fate that he feared for his comrades.
“They’re dead, it turned into a huge big clusterfuck with the cops, I barely escaped,” Dak said, sparing him the barbaric details of each of their demise.
“I know, we saw it on TV,” Merge looked away, pacing, “There’s been calls for you.”
“Is it him?” Dak asked, voice thinner.
“It is,” Merge said.
“Son of a bitch. Ok, I’ll be in my office,” Dak said, and took the whiskey bottle with him, leaving the glass.
In his office he sat in an office chair, turned the display screen on on the wall, and used a remote control to dial a contact. The figure who answered moments later was in a room shrouded in darkness, backlit with a glacial mountain view behind him. Only his lower jaw was visible, the rest of him was just a shadowy silhuoette.
“Longstar, this explanation had better be good,” The Figure said, raspy voice. His chin looked old, worn and withered. He raised a cigar from off-screen and began puffing away. The hand holding the cigar was a white-painted metal-looking medieval gauntlet, fingers armoured in layers.
“Cop Thing was there, we weren’t expecting that. They somehow foiled the plan, cut the security cameras and the gas. How was I supposed to know they’d have an invincible monster on site?”
Dak said.
“No excuses. We didn’t fund your whole operation, build your base, and provide all the training equipment and transportation for you to make a colossal public fuck up like that,” The Figure said.
“I know, I know, but it’s not over. We’ll strike back and hit ’em fucking hard, right in the balls. I got two hostages back to Wraithvale.” Dak said.
“That’s not good enough. I should have you hanged right now, but that would only waste my investment further,” The Figure sighed, “Since I’m such a charitable fellow, I’m going to let you live, for now, but one more stunt like that and I’ll be forced to pull the plug on your whole operation, and your life,” The Figure said.
“Makes sense, I take full responsibility, it won’t happen again,” Dak said.
“It fucking well better not, now you had better get busy on your redemption plan, because I’ve done my end of the bargain, and now I want to see some results,” The Figure said and hung up.
“Christ,” Dak said and took a heavy swig of the whiskey, straight from the bottle, “Bad day at the office.”
✛
The police cruiser was cruising down East Hasting street with Mike Trigger driving. It was afternoon and outside the windows they could see the regular swarm of homelessness and drug addiction personified polluting the streets. How were they ever going to handle this forsaken deluge? It was impossible, all they could do was scramble to cope with it. There was no solution because the situation was so ripe with juxtaposing vested interests, no progress was ever made. The government wanted to clean up the streets, but it also was involved in selling drugs, and the good old fashioned intergenerational cycle of abuse had been there the whole time, and didn’t show any signs of going away any time soon, or even improving at all. The world was so sad and painful, it was simply a horrid symptom of the human condition, like crime itself. That’s why we needed the law.
Peering intently on the streets, Cop Thing was keen on the lookout for the next example of criminal scum that needed a lesson in respect. He thought maybe for his next car he’d just get a dump truck, drive around in it with a megaphone and just throw all the criminals in the back hogtied.
“So, where are we right now?” Mike said.
“East Van,” Cop Thing said.
“No, I mean with the case,” Mike said.
“Oh, the ICE case?” Cop Thing said.
“Yeah, that one.” Mike said.
“Well we can check in on this DJ Jaguar guy tomorrow, I want to get a good glimpse, see what this guy’s all about, you know, see him in action on his own turf, follow up on that situation from the other night, for starters,” Cop Thing said.
“Yeah, but what about today, that was a pretty action-packed morning already, got my blood up, now I feel like we could do some more serious work than just drive around looking to meet the quota,” Mike said.
“True, it’s kind of annoying that I can’t do any undercover stuff because I’m clearly a monster, or we could just use force instead, that I could do, and do it well,” Cop Thing said.
“True, and I’m getting a little sick of having to stick my neck out all the time while you just sit back and listen, waiting to come kick someone’s ass if you have to,” Mike said.
“Yeah, understandable, I wouldn’t like that either, but do you have a better idea?” Cop Thing said.
“Look,” Mike said and pointed to a guy sitting down with his back against a barbed wire chainlink fence. He had a big hole in his chest where his heart should be with blood all over it, blood coming out of his mouth and nose, eyes all rolled into the back of his head. Typical ICE.
“Christ, clean up on aisle 666,” Cop Thing said.
Mike called dispatch and reported the human garbage on the sidewalk, and soon an ambulance was on the way to take the poor bastard to the morgue.
“I’m getting tired of seeing that kind of shit,” Cop Thing said.
“Agreed, we need to cut it off at the source,” Mike said.
“That’s exactly what we’re going to do, Mike, but it’s going to take some time, we need to find out what the source is first,” Cop Thing agreed.
“Why don’t we just hunt this Jaguar bastard down right now,” Mike said.
“Because we don’t have a warrant, and I don’t wanna get our balls busted by Chief Phillips for doing a bunch of loose-cannon shit today. We enforce the law, we’re not above it,” Cop Thing said.
“Well, what’s the difference when we go see him tomorrow then?” Mike said.
“The difference is we’re just gonna talk to the guy, in a non-illegal way, get some answers, we’re not gonna just charge at him and arrest him without any evidence. All we’re going on is here is what one lady said, and she was pretty fucked up at the time with her boyfriend’s heart exploding right in front of her and all. None of that stuff she said could be true for all we know,” Cop Thing said.
He still couldn’t forget the shame and disappointment about letting Dak Longstar get away. He knew he had to supress his emotions about the whole thing and just get on with his life right now, he was still on the clock and on duty, and he had to do his duty, but what about those hostages? Cop Thing couldn’t forgive himself. Sure, he was nearly invincible, but everyone else wasn’t.
“Do you mind if I turn this on?” Mike said and pointed towards the small TV screen mounted on the dashboard.
“No, that’s fine,” Cop Thing said. Mike turned the screen on. The channel was set to BCNN, the show was “Afternoon Delight with Laura Bayley”, a silhuoetted cityscape of Neo-Vancouver was in the background behind her that looked like a prodigal kid’s diorama that won the school fair first prize or something.
“Earlier today a terrorist orgnization calling themselves ‘Wraithvale’ led by the notorious warlord Dak Longstar infiltrated the CNF building during the show ‘Morning Glory with Bill Littlehood’, took the crew hostage and held the city ransom demanding an e-transfer of $1,000,000,000 on the building’s rooftop sky platform. A series of toxic bombs were set up and later dismantled by Cop Thing and the VPD bomb squad, who proceeded to take down the terrorists with the help of the VPD SWAT team. Two hostages were thrown over the edge of the building, resulting in two tragic fatalities. Two more hostages, the show’s director Delilah Ferguson and CNF pilot Sergei Shermanov, are currently missing, as Dak Longstar managed to escape with them in the CNF’s news helicopter, and is now wanted dead or alive,” Laura read from the teleprompter, “A little bit of a warning here, this is graphic footage taken at the scene of the gunbattle, viewer discretion is advised.” Then they re-showed the footage from the CNF cameraman who was up there filming the thing, before he got shot, “The cameraman was severely injured and is now in the hospital in critical condition, we wish him well. Ok! So in other news, the adorable shih-tzu dog, ‘Cupcake’, was the winner of the Abbotsford Dogshow gold medal this mor–.”
Cop Thing turned the TV off, “I do actually mind. I don’t want to hear that shit right now. That’s living in the past.”
“Hey, any publicity is good publicity,” Mike said, “Fuck, maybe we should just call it a day. The vibe’s all fucked up.”
“You can, you have a responsibility to your wife and seven kids. I don’t take days off. I have literally nothing better to do. Being a cop is my life, and I certainly don’t stop working because ‘the vibe’s fucked up’, that’s unprofessional,” Cop Thing said.
“I’m thinking about it,” Mike said, “That was kind of an intense scene, even for me. I already blew two people’s heads off today and it’s not even 2pm. That’s not how I expected to start my week.”
“C’mon Mike, I thought you loved shooting people. You’ll probably get a medal for that, by the way. Good job,” Cop Thing said.
“I do but that’s just kind of an intense start right out the gate there after my family weekend, like the transition I mean. One minute I’m playing Sonic the Hedgehog 2 with my kids and filling up my wife and the next I’m splattering peoples brains all over the pavement, life’s so crazy,” Mike said.
What are your kids names again?” Cop Thing said, slightly diverting the subject.
“Ok, so there’s Walter, that’s my youngest, he’s two, then there’s Mitchell, Mike jr., Daphne, Esmerelda, Gary and Dylan,” Mike said.
“You are a true stud, Sir,” Cop Thing said.
“Thanks, it was Pamela’s idea. Like I said, I just win the bread and do what she says. Sometimes what she says is to have sex with her. I like it when she says that,” Mike said, grinning.
“Good for you,” Cop Thing said.
“How about you, Cop Thing? How’s your love life going?” Mike said.
It was a bad joke.
“That’s not funny,” Cop Thing said.
“Sorry, I couldn’t help myself,” Mike said.
✛
CHAPTER 14 – DRIVE-THRU
The police cruiser was cruising doing laps around the perimeter of East Van, the civilian pedestrians busily going about their business in the streets. On the police radio they could hear the rabble of the other squad cars and dispatch reports. All pretty mundane stuff. People reported here, people’s complaints there. Nothing too serious.
“You hungry?” Mike Trigger said.
“I just had a big sandwich for lunch,” Cop Thing said.
“Yeah, but are you hungry?” Mike jostled.
“Kind of. I can always eat more. I’ve got an almost unlimited appetite, it strengthens my mutant carapace. I burn a lot of energy quickly. I already did 1000 push-ups and ran 25 km this morning before work, so…” Cop Thing said.
“Ok, so you wanna go to Burgers Queen while we wait for someone to break the law?” Mike said.
“I do.” Cop Thing said.
They crossed the bridge, the sun was spawning back through the atmosphere through the clouds now, which was refreshing because it had been raining in varying degrees of intensity for days. They pulled into the nearest Burgers Queen drive-thru. There was a large Burgers Queen mascot figurine on top of the restaurant. The mascot had a burger for a head with a bejeweled crown, googly eyes and was wearing an extravagant Queen’s dress and holding a sceptre.
“What are you getting?” Mike said.
“I’ll order, don’t worry about it,” Cop Thing said. They were in a lengthy line of cars, Burgers Queen was always popular pretty much all day long, and rightly so, because it was delicious and modestly priced. A proper quality restaurant, indeed, Cop Thing thought. They approached the menu display and a girl’s depressed sounding voice said “Hiiii, welcome to Burgers Queen, may I take your order?”
“Hi, ok, I’m going to get a BBQ Texas Roadhouse combo, can you turbo size that please,” Mike said. It was a statement, not a question.
“What would you like to drink with that?” The sad, weak voice responded.
“Uh, coke, please,” Mike said.
“Is that everything?” the intercom said. Cop Thing leaned over to place his order.
“One more order, please. Can I please have a Louie Blue Bacon Chicken Mushroom Melt, a Blackened Schizo Burger, two Crispy Chicken Tenders Burgers, and turbo sized please. Coke to drink.”
There was a pause, then, “So, one Louie Blue Bacon Chicken Mushroom Melt, one Blackened Schizo Burger, two Crispy Chicken Tender burgers, turbo sized. Is that everything?” The girl voice said.
“Yep!” Cop Thing said, then thought, for now, to himself with a smirk beneath his facial folds, patting his abdomen.
“That’ll be $46.95. Drive-thru to the next window please,” The girl-voice said, seemingly cheerier now.
“Thank you!” Cop Thing said.
They accelerated to the next window as she had instructed. The girl was a pale, pimply faced goth teenager with medium length black hair and excessive eyeliner. She was wearing pink contact lenses. Mike paid for the order and the girl was in a better mood now, inspired.
“Hi, you’re Cop Thing, right? Hey Julie-Anne, Cop Thing’s here!” She said, turning to a co-worker who was dropping a basket of fries into the deep fryer. Julie-Anne waved to Cop Thing.
“Can I have your autograph?” The goth girl said.
“Sure. Do you have a pen?” Cop Thing said.
“Sure do!” The girl said and produced one from on the terminal desk behind the wall below the window. She passed him a napkin and the sharpie and Cop Thing signed “COP THING” on it, then, contemplating, said “Who should I make it out to?”
“My name’s Kimmy,” Kimmy said.
“Sure,” Cop Thing said, and continued to write, “To Kimmy, all the best”, then passed back the napkin but kept the pen.
“Thanks! My friends are going to be so impressed. You’re so cool. Hey, we saw you on the news this morning Cop Thing. That was some crazy stuff! What’s this world coming to, eh?” Kimmy said.
“It’s a fucked up world,” Cop Thing agreed.
Kimmy passed Mike the first brown paper bag and he passed it to Cop Thing, then she passed him the second bag and he turned around and placed it on the back seat, drinks in the cup holders.
“Thanks so much guys! Have a great day,” Kimmy said.
“Thanks, you too,” Cop Thing said. Mike said thanks too.
They drove around the curb and parked in the parking lot, unloaded their food and started chowing down.
“That probably made that girl’s day,” Mike said.
“Ha, yeah, I felt good about that. Never hurts to bring a little cheer to people,” Cop Thing chuckled.
“She seemed really sad before she saw you,” Mike said.
“She did,” Cop Thing said. They sat in silence then and devoured their meals entirely, then peeled out back on the road to get back to work, stopping for a person walking a white Bichon-Havanese dog crossing the crosswalk in front of them before they got on the main road.
“That’s a cute dog,” Mike said.
“Yeah,” Cop Thing agreed.
❄
CHAPTER 15 – ROUNDTABLE UNREALITY
In the roundtable room inside the Wraithvale HQ, Dak, Merge, Desdemona, Sergei and Delilah were sitting, eating roast beef dinners, with mashed potatoes, grilled carrots and eggplant and yorkshire pudding with gravy, except no yorkshire pudding for Delilah, because she couldn’t eat gluten.
The Chef had been recruited in the beginning days of Wraithvale, back when it was just a fledgling band of rogues and they were building the base up. Chef Shake was a tall, thin black man with dreadlocks and glasses, hypertrophic scars all over his arms. He cooked in the army where he met Dak Longstar and after he was honourably discharged he worked in a series of restaurants around North America, making a living and gaining critically acclaimed experience. He was a natural person to form an alliance with as an old friend of Dak’s and he was well paid for it for coming on board to Wraithvale. It was mutually beneficial because he needed a job at the time. Thus, he became one of the first Wraithvale staff, although he mostly stuck to cooking as his culinary talent was where he was considered most proficient in the role-chain. Each Wraithvale member had their specific strengths and weaknesses, like all people, except some people only had weaknesses. His banquet was delightful, delicious, and nourishing, with that extra bit of mystical touch razzle-dazzle that really good Chef’s possess. Chef Shake had what they call, It.
Sergei and Delilah were grateful for the prime treatment and hospitality as they did not know what to expect when they were kidnapped and forced to come, and understandably feared the worst, but now they were being treated as part of the family. Dak had not abandoned the Jim Daniels Fire Whiskey, and was busy guzzling a glass of it. Sergei and Delilah each had a glass of red wine, which was extra nice. What was the catch?
After dinner, Dak and Delilah smoked cigarettes at the roundtable. Conversation had been kept to a minimum during dinner, as the situation was tense, and no one really knew what would come next. Before Delilah was finished her smoke, her and Sergei both became rapidly sleepy and their heads dropped down face first on the table, darkness enveloping them unconscious.
✵
When they woke up, they were both strapped down onto something like dentist chairs, with metal cuffs around their wrists. They had some kind of hi-tech helmets on their heads with purple visors and a bunch of wires protruding from the back, hooked up to a large machine that looked like a filing cabinet with a lot of dials and buttons and switches on it, as well as gauges and flickering lights. They were conscious but not sober, having been severly drugged, they had no idea what was going on and no abilty to even speak they were so hopelessly stoned. Dak was in the room and so was another man in a labcoat, balding with puffy Einstien-like wild tufts coming out of his temples, searing eyes.
“How long will this take, Doctor?” Dak said.
“Oh, about half an hour,” The Doctor said, “It varies from person to person. If they don’t respond favorably, typically we just push the therapy longer, they always break in the end,” The Doctor said.
“Outstanding,” Dak said, “Well, fire at will, Doctor. I’ll be in my office. I’ll return in a bit to fetch my guinea pigs.”
Dak left the room. The Doctor checked all the adjustments, made sure everything was organized. Delilah and Sergei were muttering and wiggling in the fastened chairs.
“We’ll see you on the other side,” The Doctor said and turned on the machine. It made a rumbling powering up sound like an elevator ascending and he started rolling the BLAST dial which increased the intensity of the treatment.
They were experiencing some kind of mind probing VR nightmare under the heavy influence of enigmatic drugs. All of the sudden they were transported to some dark foggy abyss world. Vampire fangs the size of a saber-toothed tiger, ghoulish skin and veins and incandescent claws flashed in and out of the void, hissing and scratching and screeching. They were so doped up they were physically unable to scream but they were clearly very uncomfortable, squirming and twitching, sweating and moaning horrified sounds. Sergei was transported through a portal to a huge dark field, grey skyscrapers and crumbling stone castles surrounding him. The ground cracked open and split with a shattering quake and started spurting magma from beneath the earth, burning the dead grass and melting the land. Huge dinosaur-like lizards began storming over the mountain peaks in an advancing army towards him, as he could feel all loss of reality and became one with the fabric of this horrible new unreality. Delilah was on a pirate ship, the crew were ghostly skeletons not walking but levitating around the deck, leaving spectral trails. Cannon-balls were being fired across the sea at crystal towers on the jade shore, blowing gaping wounds in the morphing gunmetal glass of the buildings. They began to crumble and fall, creating huge clouds of dust and smoke which grew and enveloped the land, swallowing everything in sight like the world’s worst sandstorm. She was panting and whining, contorting her body in discomfort as some automatic primal attempt at self-preservation. The Doctor increased the intensity by turning the knob, and their visions became even more vividly harsh and terrifying. It wasn’t a hallucination, it was really being imposed on and programmed into their vulnerable, helpless brains. The Doctor called it the brain-scrambler. Once the victims minds had been smashed to fragments and wiped down, the subject was completely open to suggestion and infuence, unable to think for themselves anymore, the pieces could be rearranged and put back together any way the intellectual architect pleased.
✵
Dak was in his office with Merge, passing the Jim Daniel’s back and forth.
“You know, Dak, you know I trust you, and we’ve been drinking buddies for a long time now, but after that CNF blunder, and getting five of our comrades killed, maybe it’s not the best example to set for the rest of the team if you get shit-faced drunk right now,” Merge said.
“Yeah. Yeah, that’s a good point, I don’t wanna lose face as a leader” Dak said and took one last swig, said, “Ahhh!” then put the cap back on and put the bottle in his desk drawer.
“On the positive side, we gained some test subjects for Dr. Shock’s brain-scrambling machine. Think of the possibilities, if this works this time how it’s supposed to, we could simply kidnap specially targeted prime specimens, wipe their brains, then reprogram them the way we want to during the basic weapons and attitude training. We could build our own army of Wraithvale zealots,” Dak boasted.
“You’re the one with the vision, that’s why you’re the leader. I just follow orders,” Merge said.
“That’s right, that’s why I’m the leader, come with me,” Dak said. He stood up and walked out into the hall, followed by Merge. He used his keycard and entered one of the chrome doors onto a catwalk in a large gymnasium type room with a bunch of Wraithvale soldiers in the middle of it working out with weights, others sparring each each other in a wrestling ring.
“Team captain, time to start picking the B-Team,” Dak said.
✵
By the end of the brain-scrambling therapy, Sergei and Delilah were both dreadfully pale and drooling useless vegetables. They were carried to their quarters and placed in their respective beds to sleep it off. When they were sober and awake again, Dak would begin their training. They had used the brain-scrambler before on prisoners, with undesireable results, giving the subject a similar effect as a full-frontal lobotomy, rendering them completely retarded. They had to be brought outside and shot in the back of the head, then buried in the forest in shallow graves. A supreme waste of potential talent, but if you wanted to make an omlette, you had to break a few eggs, and Dak wasn’t willing to give up on the idea so easily. He knew, as a warrior, that everyone faces adversity in life, and it was necessary to accept defeat gracefully and move on with the necessary lesson learned that the experience had to offer. Hopefully this time, with the right adjustments, they could get some better results.
CHAPTER 16 – THE KOOL KITTY LOUNGE
Mike Trigger took the rest of the day off for a brief family-time hiatus, which was admittedly deserved, and Cop Thing’s day was fairly normal after that, minus the fact that Mike wasn’t there. Cop Thing went through his regular after work diet and workout routine, just like everyday. The next day, with Mike back on duty, they got into the usual array of busting people for petty crime and driving around looking for trouble. Their activities included moving unwanted persons out of public spaces where they were creating a ruckus, and later, hunting down vandals and robbers who had blown up an esteemed local ocean-view patio restaurant’s golf tour vans, climbed through the tall glass windows which were left open overnight, and stolen six-packs of rootbeer and one laptop, but left the extensive variety of expensive alcohol and everything else, including the cash register, untouched. They caught the guys with the help of a vigilant employee who was directed by the owner of the restaurant to where the laptop was taken to, because it had a tracking device embedded in it, which the owner could see from his phone app, and he relayed this information to the employee. The cops were pleasantly surprised when the crooks already had existing criminal records and they could pretty much skip the bureaucracy fluff and stuff and just throw the book at them, pretty much canning their asses straight to jail where they belonged.
Amelia had gotten her lawyer, like she asked for, and after negotiations they ended up striking a deal with Police Chief Phillips. The deal entailed a lightened sentence involving community clean-up work instead of jailtime. This basically meant you went around town picking up garbage with a metal claw on a stick and disposing of it. It was embarrassing and demoralizing for someone of her previous rogueish stature, but it was better than jail. Her part of the deal was she had to tell them everything she knew about Wraithvale. It turns out, it was a decent amount. She left out the details of where it was located, because she wasn’t even exactly sure. Unfortunately, most of the info was stuff they could ascertain for themselves, and there were still a lot of unanswered questions because Amelia didn’t even know who were the upper-eschelon sugardaddies involved funding the whole operation, protecting Dak, enabling him to act like a water-walker.
Marlena was freed from the shelter house and set up with her son again, hopefully she could get it together and steer clear of any more trouble. Clint, Marlena’s dead ex-boyfriend, wasn’t actually the father of the kid, so the sad headache legality regarding that situation was null.
As the day passed on, Cop Thing and Mike got ready to scope out DJ Jaguar at the Kool Kitty Lounge to see what he had to say about the whole ICE thing. It was appearing there were larger ominous forces at work here in both regards, which was sort of creepy, they really had no idea what they were dealing with, or getting themselves into, but those kinds of dubious circumstances sort of thrilled Cop Thing in a weird deviant way.
This was his calling in life, this was what he did, danger was part of his duty, and the bigger and harder the conquest, all the more glory for him.
CNF was back to their regular programming with “Morning Glory with Bill Littlehood” airing as usual, Bill not taking any time off for the PTSD he surely endured. He was a man who stuck to his responsibilities and didn’t tap out, Cop Thing respected that.
Mike and Cop Thing rolled up to the Kool Kitty Lounge that night, in the surveillance van again. Dempsey was with them too. They all knew the whole run-down from the first experiment with the wire-tap, and set it up the same way. This time there would hopefully be no heart explosions but you never knew in this part of town, it was a scourge happening all over the place and no one knew exactly what they were getting with their drugs these days, that’s why they were doing this in the first place.
It seemed as simple as don’t do drugs, to Cop Thing. It was like no one would knowingly off-themselves by snorting a bunch of heart-exploding blue stuff, or would they? And how horrifying must that be to have whatever kind of fucked up roller-coaster to hell psychedelic experience these people were experiencing before the chunky bloodsoaked fireworks went off.
Mike entered the club, wearing a black hoodie with his brown bomber jacket overtop. Loud techno music was playing, the crowd was awkwardly meager in size. Purple and pink lights strobe lights and lasers were flashing, highlighting the smoke wisps from the fog machine as a cloud of smoke cascaded throughout the lounge, turning the people in the distance into spectrelike silhuettes.
DJ Jaguar was on stage playing his set, one hand up against his headphones, rocking out to his own tunes. He was riding the decks and bobbing his head in rhythm to the kick drum and the low groove of the detuned bass riff.
It was more of a pulse than a riff, Mike thought, but he wasn’t a hardcore music connoisseur so it was a random passing observation, not a fact. There were some nice looking ladies in there as well as some sort of gangster looking type guys, and some guys in suits, which sort of reminded Mike of the shadowy figures they saw in the park when this whole investigative mess started a few days ago. Maybe it was the same guys, he really didn’t get that good enough of a look at them to judge properly, and he was being wary not to let his imagination get off the leash on him, overthink it and sort of just make up how someone was guilty of something out of his own mental projection when they really were not. It was one of his personal rules, as it should be, not to shoot innocent people. Not non-innocent people, they could bring it on. He’d shoot them all day, they deserved to get shot.
The suit guys were playing pool with some ladies, greasy looking, creased faces told a vague character backstory likely filled with crime and guilt. The bartender was a thin guy in a toque and a black sleeveless shirt, the logo of which Mike paid no attention to, showing off his tattooes. Everyone in the establishment was nursing beers and seemingly having a good time.
“Get a drink for ya buddy?” The bartender said to Mike. Mike was playing it smart, he strived to fit in, not to give away what he was actually there for. What would that sound like? No thanks, I’m a cop, I’m just here to get your DJ talking about the hardcore drug racket he’s accused of being involved in, I don’t have any evidence though, some dead guy’s hysterical girlfriend told me so. No, that wouldn’t do at all. That would be absurd.
So he sat at the bar and ordered a Monkey Back and started sipping. Christ, if they did this undercover shit enough times like this he was going to inadvertently become an alcoholic. He patiently waited for the DJ set to finish, not really enjoying the music at all, it was kind of abrasive actually, poorly thought out, too repetative, more just withstanding it. This was duty, this was work, he wasn’t supposed to be having fun, he was supposed to be upholding justice. Stay serious, stay focused.
“How’s your day been, brother?” The bartender asked.
“Oh, pretty good, uh, you know, kind of sleepy,” Mike said.
“Oh yeah? You work today?” The bartender said.
“Um… Yeah.” Mike said.
“What kind of work you do?” The friendly bartender said.
Christ, this guy asks a lot of questions, Mike thought. Fucking curveball, eh, ok.
“I’m uhh, a coffee roaster, yeah, I roast coffee. Ten hour days. It’s hard work, but I get four days on and three days off, so I still get 40 hours a week,” Mike said. What the hell, where did that come from? I must be getting better at this.
“Oh yeah, coffee business, eh? That’s cool, any food for you today, boss?” The bartender said.
“No, thanks, I’m good for now, just here to check out the music,” Mike said. Goddamn, this guy wouldn’t shut up.
“Oh yeah, DJ Jaguar’s awesome! He’s sort of the house DJ on Tuesday’s. I really like it, you know, it’s got a good beat to it,” The bartender said.
Not as good of a beat as I’m going to have on DJ Jaguar, Mike thought, insanely. Another guy came and sat down and ordered a shot of tequila and a Peebst tall can. He bought a shot of tequila for Mike too.
“Thanks,” Mike said, playing the part of a common washed-out drunk.
“No problem, man, I’m drinking off a breakup, misery loves company right?” The guy said.
“You guys want limes?” The bartender asked. They did.
Then the guy ordered two more shots of tequila and bought Mike another drink.
“I’m feeling generous man, never hurts to share, y’know?” The guy said, clearly desperate for attention, “I’m Leo by the way, what’s your name?”
“Hi, I’m… Steven,” Mike said, half done his beer and somewhat proud of himself for playing the undercover role so well, right down to the part of drinking alongside this sad pathetic cuck like he wasn’t an actual cop on duty right now.
Don’t forget that, Trigger, you’re on a mission right now. Focus, remind yourself of that.
Dempsey and Cop Thing were listening from the back of the van parked in the alley behind the Kool Kitty Lounge.
“Oh my god, at this rate he’s going to get drunk!” Cop Thing said.
“It does sort of seem that way. At least he’s not packing heat,” Dempsey said. He was referring to Mike’s pistol they made him leave in the back of the van. The metal was so worn on the trigger it had lost a layer of it’s colour and appeared with a blotch of faded white.
A man in a suit with his purple collar undone, signifying he was winding down, was following around one of the waitresses who wore a bare-back tank top with spaghetti strings laced across her back holding it onto her torso. This man did not seem to be able to resist as he kept trying to hug her and put his hands on her, until the other bar staff encircled him and basically forced him to back off by their sheer wordless presence.
There were two bartenders now, and two waitresses, the other waitress was dressed as a white angel in a dress little angel wings and thigh-high white stockings and black boots, like it was Halloween. The neon lights were making her dress glow in the dark.
In addition to the musical DJ, there was also a video DJ, Mike noticed, and several big screen TVs were mounted in the air, showing silent extreme ski videos at an undisclosed location. The athletes were casually doing backflips and skiing down mountain tops in the fresh untouched powder you would need a helicopter to get to.
It was crazy how some people got their kicks, Mike thought. Why would anyone want to do a backflip? Then the video would merge into another sport like hockey or basketball and would revolve between them all with amusing video transitions, fading in or out, shapes warping.
It kind of didn’t make sense, why wouldn’t they just show one thing and stick to it? Maybe it was their schtick here or something, no one seemed to be watching any of the games intently anyways, it was just there for show or something to gap out on while you sank deeper into a hopeless pit of drunkeness, listening to extremely loud mediocre techno, and paid for it. But that was fine, Mike just noticed the ambiance, it didn’t concern him.
His job did. On that note, the booze was starting to take hold.
He was onto his second Monkey Back now and the guy beside him was distracted with his back turned to Mike talking to another fellow who had entered the bar, and they were hitting it off with excitedly yelled conversation into each others faces about something. More people were showing up now all of the sudden and a crowd began to form, the increased ambient murmer of the talking melded with the techno beats to form some amalgamated auditory pool of sound with a hierarchy of levels to it, if anyone was paying that close attention, which they weren’t.
“Alright folks, thanks, I’m going to take a quick break and I’ll be right back with more bad groovy bass and sick funky beats, ya dig?” DJ Jaguar said, finished the last of his pint of beer, then walked off stage and disappeared backstage.
Damn, this is my chance, but I can’t just go backstage and corner this fucker. Or can I? I’m a cop, I can do whatever I want, Mike thought. He couldn’t count on the guy coming right out and sitting next to him and just pouring out all this information Mike wanted to know.
How was he going to pull this off?
They always just improvised this stuff and hoped it would work, and, fair enough, a lot of the time it didn’t. Much to his luck and relief, DJ Jaguar showed up right beside him at the bar. Maybe he just stepped out back for a quick toke of the reefer or something. It didn’t matter, but he did smell. Mike couldn’t quite pinpoint it. It was just this funky odor like he slept in his clothes and he hadn’t showered in days. It didn’t smell like weed, it just stank like shit.
The guy actually was wearing aviator sunglasses, like Marlena said he did, even though he was indoors and it was dark, it was just part of the rockstar cool-guy mythos the guy was obviously going for, Mike supposed. Who knows what kind of fucked up fashion ideas these guys come up with when they’re stuck in that mindstate of being locked in a permanent bender.
The guy probably had about one braincell left, Mike sneered.
DJ Jaguar ordered a tall can of Peebst and took a seat next to Mike. How convenient. Perfect.
“That’s pretty cool music, dude,” Mike said.
“Aw, thanks man, yeah, yeah, it’s fun,” DJ Jaguar said.
“Yeah, I like to have fun. You know what else? I like to party too,” Mike said.
“Aw, shit man, yeah, hell we all like to party. Especially in this joint. That’s why it’s the Kool Kitty Lounge man, fuckin’ bunch of cool cats in here,” DJ Jaguar said.
“Yeah, man. Hey you wouldn’t happen to know where I could get some, you know, party favours or something like that, would you? Big rockstar guy like you, I bet you would,” Mike said. Yes, that’s right, play to his ego. No one can resist that.
“Maybe I do, maybe I don’t. Who want’s to know, man?” DJ Jaguar said.
“My name’s Stephen, pleased to meet you. DJ Jaguar, right? I saw your name on the marquee outside. Real cool music man, real hip, my dude,” Mike said. He thought he was getting better at acting, this was coming more naturally to him now. DJ Jaguar looked skeptical.
“Ok, Ok, what you looking for?” DJ Jaguar said.
Was he going for it?
“The craziest shit man, whatever, The most intense shit,” Mike said.
“Man, there’s something that’s so intense, you’ll be wondering if you’re gonna make it out alive, if you’ve got the balls for it, it’s out there.” DJ Jaguar said.
Come on, a little closer, a little closer you rancid little fuck.
“Works for me man, I, um, I live for the thrill,” Mike said, “Can’t get enough of the shit.”
“Thrillseeker motherfucker, eh? Alright, you got cash?” DJ Jaguar said.
“Oh yeah! It’s burning a hole in my wallet,” Mike said.
Damn he was good.
“Hold on a minute, I gotta start my third set soon but just let me look in my bag in the back for you, OK?” DJ Jaguar said.
Christ, this guy was dumb as a hammer, Mike thought.
Back in the van.
“Fucking guy’s just gonna walk right up and take the bait,” Dempsey said.
“We’ll see,” Cop Thing said, unconvinced.
DJ Jaguar said, “Protect my beer, don’t spike it, I’ll be right back.” He said, only half-joking. Then he got up and disappeared again into the backstage area.
Dj Jaguar entered the backstage room and the fear set in he clearly had a dilemma on his hands. This guy was so obviously a cop trying to bust him right now, but also, he couldn’t abandon his loyal fans and bail on his set. He had new songs he was really counting on playing, and he had worked all month on the perfect sequencing of the tracklist. Yeah, that was a real problem. He soon decided he wasn’t gonna get to play anyways if he got arrested, and left to pull an Irish-goodbye out the emergencey exit back door, beside the washrooms in the hall, outside the backstage area beside the stage. Mike Trigger happened to be going to the washroom at that moment, completely not staying true to his word about watching DJ Jaguar’s beer. DJ Jaguar made momentary eye contact with him, they both paused, then DJ Jaguar bolted out the door and ran like his life depended on it down the alleyway.
“Boys, he’s skipped out the back, he’s running,” Mike said into the wire, and started running after him.
“Shit,” Cop Thing said and opened the back door of the van and hopped out. He could hear DJ Jaguar’s running footsteps reverberated through the alleyway complex coming towards him but Cop Thing was hidden behind the van still as it was parked facing the direction that DJ Jaguar was running in. Cop Thing thought, wait for it, then when the footsteps were steadily getting louder and right about to pass, Cop Thing stepped out, took one split-second glance at the fugitive running towards him, then punched him in the stomach. The force of the blow lifted him off the ground, entirely knocking the window out of him and he coughed in the air. DJ Jaguar dropped to the wet pavement, clutching his stomach and wimpering, then he vomited. Cop Thing picked him up by the collar of his shirt and held him so he was standing again, he smelled even worse now because his puke-breath was added to the potpourri of disgusting smells. He was still clutching his stomach, looking at Cop Thing with terror in his eyes, which were now visible because the punch and the fall knocked DJ Jaguar’s aviators off, puke dribbling from his mouth.
Mike caught up to them while Cop Thing had him in his grasp.
“Got you now, fucker,” Mike said.
CHAPTER 17 – SQUEEZING THE BEANS
The moon was mostly full, grey clouds sailing overtop in the atmosphere between the earth and space, an ever-changing act of rorschach blotting of it’s glowing benevolence in the dark. Far below the unfathomable stretch of space where it hung in orbit, Cop Thing had DJ Jaguar pinned against a brick wall in a dirty back alley, with Mike Trigger and Officer Dempsey on either side, creating an extremely intimidating triangle around him. Mike picked up DJ Jaguar’s backpack and opened it, shuffling through the contents. He dug beneath two tall cans of Peebst, and it was just as he was hoping, his suspicions were correct. He pulled out a ziplock bag full of ICE. The unopened beers weren’t illegal, but the ICE definitely was. The stupid thing was it was such a new drug on the streets it technically wasn’t legally deemed as an illicit substance yet.
“Oh! Look what I found! Why would a big rockstar guy like you be carrying around something so harmful?” Mike said.
“What’s that? I’ve never seen that before in my life! I don’t even know what you’re talking about,” DJ Jaguar said.
“Really? Well how did it get in your backpack then? You know, the backpack you were wearing just now, that’s yours right?” Mike said. Cop Thing was holding DJ Jaguar incapacitated by the shoulder, who wasn’t fighting back because he knew he stood no chance.
“Yeah, it’s my backpack, but someone must have put that there, anyone could have done that! You saw, I was playing music, man! I was playin’ my jams. Anyone could have gone into the back and just put that there, they’re setting me up, man!” DJ Jaguar said. Mike squinted his eyes.
“Who’s setting you up?” Mike said.
“I, uh, don’t remember who they are,” DJ Jaguar said.
“Oh? That’s too bad – For you,” Mike said “Cop Thing, refresh his memory.”
Cop Thing simply squeezed DJ Jaguar’s shoulder and he started screaming in agony. Cop Thing could feel the bones begin to give way and you could even hear the crunch as the bones started to crack beneath the crushing force of his grip.
“Ok, Ok! Jesus, holy shit, you’re crushing my fuckin’ clavical, man! Gunmetal Poseidon! Come on! Gunmetal fuckin’ Poseidon, holy shit,” DJ Jaguar said.
“Uh-huh, uh-huh, and who’s your connection to get this blue trash? We want names, locations, all that shit,” Mike Trigger said.
“I am,” a low voice said.
They turned around and there stood four big men in suits, armed with laser-scoped UZI 9mms.
“Who the hell are you?” Mike Trigger said. His trigger finger was twitching now, he was sorely missing his pistol. A pang of dread stung him because he was unarmed, but played it cool and confident from pure necessity of vitality.
“That doesn’t concern you,” The leader said. He was a pouty faced round-headed man with jowels and tiny, beady eyes, slicked back greasy black hair, shining in the street lights.
“Actually, it does, that’s exactly what concerns us,” Cop Thing said. He had let DJ Jaguar go now and was facing the opposite direction, towards the four gun-toting suit men, but the three cops were still caging Jaguar against the wall with their bodily positions.
“Let the DJ go, then you’re gonna die,” The greasy leader said.
“What an enticing offer for a deal!” Cop Thing said. Dempsey was packing heat, but they were literally outgunned, four UZIs meant these guys probably had one hundred and twenty bullets between them. Cop Thing had six, loaded in his magnum, which was strapped in the holster he was wearing around his chest. DJ Jaguar weaseled his way out the side behind Dempsey and moved over beside a dumpster.
“Yo, can you guys take it from here, I gotta get back in there and finish my set,” DJ Jaguar said.
“Shaddup, you!” The leader said, then, turning back to the cops, “I might as well tell ya ’cause you ain’t gonna be breathin’ much longer to squeal about it. I’m Jack Imhoff, I’m a contracter for Gunmetal Poseidon, you know, in the field, the dirty work. Mostly we get the drugs from the big guy, and we disperse it on the streets, making bank all the while cause the high is crazy so the shit’s expensive, real fucking crazy ’cause no one’s ever survived it, but people want to get the rumoured glorious thing, I guess. The whole point, you see, it ain’t about the money, we got lots of that. It’s about a new world order. It’s like fucking draino for junkies, y’know, gets rid of the clogs. Subtle extinguishing. Then, here’s the genius part, we build a new foundation on top of the graves. Then we build a new world on top of the foundation. Organized, under proper control, you see, not with a bunch of unaccounted for fucking loose ends, that’s the big guy’s vision. Everyone’s on medication, keeping people subdued, useful, happy, indentured. Meanwhile we’re laughing all the way to the bank ’cause it’s gonna be mandatory to buy the Poseidon products. See, it’s not as dark as it seems, if you look at it with the long-term perspective. I just like to explain to people the bigger picture, gets me off, I just wanted to see the look on your fuckin’ faces, but now that I have, we’re gonna gun your asses down,” Jack Imhoff said.
“Well, dang, I guess we’ve got no choice but to surrender then,” Cop Thing said. Then he hopped in front of Mike, pulled out the magnum and started firing.
Dempsey started shooting too with his beretta.
All four suits started firing at the cops against the wall like a firing squad on steroids, one of them immediately getting pelted by one of Cop Thing’s magnum bullets directly in the chest, blowing a baseball sized hole in it and sending him flying backwards through the air, where his ragdoll corpse crashed against a dumpster, knocking it backwards an inch on it’s wheels, then he fell limp to the ground.
The UZIs were blazing, bullet casings flying everywhere, bouncing off the ground with sparkling chimes, shining in the street moonlight. Cop Thing was taking all the bullets, all the damage, his carapace pulsing increasingly brighter red, spikes bursting out of his back and arms. Mike was shielded behind Cop Thing against the wall.
Dempsey got a few missed shots off, it was distracting to aim at four submachine guns firing straight at you, before he was pulverized with 9mm bullets and splattered and torn apart, body hitting the wall with a wet smack and fell with a pathetic splash face first into a puddle, which quickly turned red. Cop Thing couldn’t block them both, his instinct kicked in and he just impulsively protected Mike, because Depsey had a gun and Mike didn’t, and he felt guilty to admit it, and it was a subconcious knee-jerk reaction, but because he liked Mike better and he was his partner.
“Christ, this guy’s fucking invincible!” One of the goons said. He shouldn’t have said that, because it was like a signal for Cop Thing to shoot him next, and he raised the magnum and his next .44 caliber bullet blew the guys head into a gory explosive splatter of brains, skull bone fragments and blood, eyeballs sailing through the air and onto the ground still intact but severed from the guy’s brain. One of the other goons stepped on the guys naked, separated eyeball, squished it and slipped on it like a bananna peel, losing his footing, but it was irrelevant anyways because Cop Thing shot this guy next, still being hit the whole time with 9mm bullets, his carapace absorbing it, swallowing the bullets, munching them, then spitting them back out again. Finally, Cop Thing was at critical damage limit and fell down on one knee, exhausted and in need of revitalization. Luckily the leader’s gun started clicking as he was out of ammo. They stood there in the smoke, blood and bullet filled back alley, four shredded bodies on the ground, four still standing, except DJ Jaguar had split during the gunbattle, and was nowhere to be seen. Jack Imhoff threw the empty UZI at Cop Thing as he was hunched on one knee, which hit him in the head and he grunted and toppled over on the ground, filled with bullet holes in his carapace. It looked like fingertip puncture holes in clay, no blood, and the holes were slowly closing again since they had all regurgitated the bullets previously. Cop Thing couldn’t move, surrounded by mashed bullet shells and empty casings beside Dempsey’s bullet-riddled corpse. Jack turned and fled and Mike took off after him, unharmed physically but reeling emotionally from the fire-storm he was just in the eye of. Also, he was pissed and upset about Dempsey’s death, but he had to be a professional and swallow his grief until later, right now he had to bust this bastard.
Jack turned the corner of the alley running fast, Mike trailing behind sprinting to catch him. It occurred to Mike then that he should have picked up one of the other guys guns off the ground, but it was too late, as he was already in hot pursuit, it was an impulse reaction not to, if he did he could have simply shot this guy in the back though. Jack had taken a turn into another alley, littered with moonlit trash and graffiti, there was a chainlink fence at the dead end, blocking off an area with a ladder to a fire-escape metal staircase leading up to the roof above a dumpster. Jack jumped onto the fence and started climbing, just getting out of reach of Mike’s grab attempt as he reached the top, swung his leg over and hopped down on the other side. Mike started climbing too and Jack was already on top of the dumpster and climbing the ladder to the fire escape. By the time Mike had gotten over the fence Jack was already on the metal steps ascending to the rooftop. Mike got over and followed him up, physically exhausted but forcing himself to continue. He couldn’t let this asshole get away, not after what they did to Dempsey.
When Mike got to the roof, he did a quick scan of the rooftop, Jack was nowhere in sight. Mike paced forwards, cautiously looking for where this guy could have dissapeared to, then Jack pounced on him from behind a wall with presumably a door into the building below and started punching him in the head. Mike threw up his arms to protect himself and they engaged in hand-to-hand combat at that point, like classic warriors. Jack Imhoff was no slouch, he seemed to be in even better physical shape than Mike was. A vision of Mike’s family flashed across his mind, inspiring him, reminding him how important this was not to lose, and he was able to summon the strength to take on the fight. After taking several punches to the head and blocking several others, he managed to get a low kick in on Jack’s shin. Jack grunted in pain and Mike performed a roundhouse sweep move, knocking Jack’s legs out from under him and he hit the ground on his back. Mike dove on top of him and started bashing his head against the cement then put his thumbs over his eyes to push them into his brain but Jack managed a lucky elbow swipe to Mike’s chin, stunning him, freeing himself from his grasp. Both men were up again, panting, worn down, but it wasn’t over. Jack swung some haymakers at Mike. Mike ducked two haymakers and jabbed Jack in the stomach, then he grabbed him and kneed him in the stomach repeatedly. Jack caught Mike’s next punch in the air, twisted his arm, causing him to cry out in pain, then kicked him in the face while still holding onto his arm. He kicked him two more times in the face, still holding onto his arm then went in for a bear-hug type grapple maneuver. Mike counter-attacked by ducking down, dodging the grapple, and lifting Jack up by the legs and tossing him over his head backwards with sheer man-power. It was like a suplex wrestling move and Jack did a front flip through the air off the edge of the building and dropped upside down, screaming in horror, falling like a crash-test dummy until his body hit the top of a barbed wire fence far below, bending and breaking it it half with a sick crack. The tangled, broken body was impaled on the top of the fence, cut, stabbed and bleeding caught up in barbed wire. Jack was still alive, barely, but his spine was broken and he was paralyzed, gurgling cries of pain.
In the distance, approaching sirens could be heard. Cop Thing was recovered now and back on his feet. He jogged down the alley and the back door to the Kool Kitty Lounge was propped open, as one of the cooks was taking out the garbage. Loud techno was playing from inside, it must have been so loud that no one in there could hear the extreme gun-war in the alley that just occurred, or the guy probably wouldn’t be taking out the trash right now, unless he was really dumb or had a death wish. Cop Thing went in the open back door and the cook just stared at him, unbelieving, apparently not daring to tell him that door was for employees only.
Cop Thing walked down the hall and down the steps, into the main lounge. DJ Jaguar was actually on stage with headphones on playing his set. How dumb and high was this guy? He must have really had faith in those gangsters to take care of the cops properly just now outside to just casually return to the stage and keep playing. Hell, the show must go on, Cop Thing thought. Cop Thing walked up on stage behind the oblivious musician and pistol whipped him hard in the back of the head, knocking him unconscious, draped over his decks on the table. Then Cop Thing pulled the plug on the music gear in an indiscriminite fashion, just grabbing a handful of cords and tearing them out of the machine. The music cut to an awkward silence and everyone in the room was just staring at him, shocked and appalled. He picked up a microphone that was just sitting there beside DJ Jaguars unconscious body, tapped it to check if it was on, it was, then said, “Show’s over folks.”
CHAPTER 18 – INTERVIEW
It took some paramedic athletecism and teamwork to get Jack Imhoff’s mangled body down from the top of the fence. By the time he got to the hospital, he was in a coma and on life support. DJ Jaguar was in custody, hopefully going to jail for possession. Cop Thing, Mike Trigger and Police Chief Phillip’s all attended Officer Dempsey’s funeral at Dwade Cemetary. Dempsey’s wife, wearing a black gown and veil, black bonnet with what appeared to be a crows feather sticking out of it, was a quintessential broken widow, crying the whole time, dabbing the tears away with a handkerchief and having to be consoled constantly by everyone around. She was a total mess. Dempsey’s thirteen year old boy, Theo was also there, the mask of manly composure on his face, but he could not hide the look of bland, stunned disbelief and post-traumatic stress. It was a heroes funeral, but in reality, Dempsey just got gunned down by gangsters in a gross back alley in East Van.
Everyone was just playing along.
What a waste, Cop Thing thought.
After the ceremony, Chief Phillip’s came up to Cop Thing, who didn’t normally wear clothes, wearing a custom tailor made black suit, standing with Mike Trigger, also in dapper black funeral attire.
“So, you killed all of the suspects again, except for the guy who you threw off a roof and broke in half on a barbwire fence, he’s just paralyzed and in a coma,” Phillip’s began, turning to Mike, lighting a cigar.
“We had to, we had no choice,” Cop Thing said, “There was no way around it, we’re lucky we got away alive, can’t say the same for poor Dempsey. They ambushed us while we were questioning that DJ.”
“Uh-huh, and what the hell were you guys doing there in the first place? You put the place out of business for the night, not that I care about the places reputation, but the owner’s pissed and it doesn’t look good on the police force when you keep popping up in the news for totally obliterating people in every situation, I’m not mad, I’m just disappointed,” Phillips went on. “Did you make any progress at all with the ICE thing?”
“Well, yeah, we busted the guy red handed, he had a big bag of the blue stuff in his backpack,” Mike said.
“Ok, so you hunted this guy down, while he was performing live in front of a full audience of witnesses, mind you, and just chased him down, assaulted him and searched him under no pretense? Is that right?” Phillips said.
“Pretty much, we were going on what that Marlena lady said, you know, the girl who was the girlfriend of the guy whose heart exploded at The Crutch bar. She tipped us off about DJ Jaguar.” Cop Thing said.
“Right, so now we have three dead guys, one who’s pretty much dead, and some loser electronic musician drug dealer in custody and the guy’s lawyer’s probably gonna get him off the hook and out on the streets again as soon as possible because of your guys’ negligent abuse of power,” Phillips said, “And a bag of drugs with no new information, cause the guy’s who knew that stuff you splattered them all.”
“It was self-defense,” Cop Thing said, “They were shooting me with four UZIs at the same time. They told us Gunmetal Poseidon had some NWO plan to wipe out the undesireables and build fresh new society or something. Sounded pretty wacko, but that’s what Jack Imhoff said. I guess he thought we weren’t gonna live much longer and he felt like bragging, like he was proud.”
“Yeah, but we still don’t know who Gunmetal Poseidon actually is, or where they’re making this blue stuff, or how they’re shipping it into the streets,” Mike said.
“We gotta talk to DJ Jaguar again,” Cop Thing said.
“He’s got some hot-shot lawyer lined up who’s got a hard-on for police brutality cases,” Phillips said.
“That doesn’t intimidate me. It’s worth a shot, isn’t it?” Cop Thing said.
“Just don’t shoot him in the interrogation room,” Phillip’s said, “You hear me? I’m serious, boys, no more wild stunts or I’m gonna have to take your badges, and your guns.”
✛
In the interrogation room, DJ Jaguar sat with his lawyer present, who was a thin, pencil-necked, slicked back dark brown hair, with glasses and a little moustache guy you kind of hated on first sight. His name was Dean Simons, he had his own law firm he ran with his brother called Simons & Simons. They specialized in defense cases that had to do with police brutality and unjust cause, which admittedly, Cop Thing and Mike Trigger were technically guilty of.
They were both in the room, Cop Thing was going to be the good cop, Mike Trigger was going to be the bad cop. Phillip’s was watching from behind the mirror, filming the whole thing. DJ Jaguar lit a cigarette and started puffing. He never recovered his aviators.
“So, what we want to know is, how did you get set up with these gangster guys in the first place, and who are they?” Cop Thing said.
“You don’t have to answer that question,” Dean Simons said.
“Look, we’re going to go easy on you if you help us out with this, we don’t really care about small-fry punks like you, we know you’re just a lackey, you probably didn’t even think it through that far yourself, just tell us what you know,” Mike Trigger said.
“Well, a guy I know, who knows a guy, who’s friends with another guy, we all ended up at the bar one night,-” DJ Jaguar said.
“Which bar?” Mike said.
“You don’t have to answer that,” Dean Simons said.
“It’s fine, it’s chill,” DJ Jaguar assured him, “The Kool Kitty Lounge, I’ve been playin’ there for years, y’know, honing my craft.”
“Uh-huh, and then what happened?” Cop Thing said, leaning over the table opposite DJ Jaguar, listening intently with his hands on the table.
“They told me about this new drug called ICE, y’know, real powerful stuff, like weapons-grade smack created specially in some big-time pharmaceutical secret lab or something. Naturally, I was intrigued,” DJ Jaguar said, “I didn’t know it was going to kill people.”
“You don’t have to tell them any of this stuff,” Dean Simons said.
“Let him talk,” Mike snapped.
“My client is under no oath at the moment and he doesn’t have to answer any of these questions,”
Dean said.
“We’re aware of that, but he is answering them, so let him talk. Look, Jaguar, we’ll lesson your sentence, maybe even let you walk, depending on how valueable the information is that you give us, OK? Do you want more people to die because of you? We know you didn’t know what you were getting into, you’re just a low-level self interested ignoramus trying to make a buck off other peoples weakness,” Mike said. DJ Jaguar didn’t appreciate that comment, but he knew it was sort of true, he could rationalize his reasoning any ways he wanted, but it was basically true. He didn’t feel good about himself about that, but he was used to not feeling good about himself.
“These guys in suits started coming to the Kool Kitty, you know, talking to me, trying to persuade me, they didn’t threaten me or nothing, just were really pretty intent on setting me up with the blue stuff, and they were gonna pay me too. You know, I would be well paid, you see,” DJ Jaguar continued.
“Ok, yeah, I see your rationale, you’re selling drugs anyways, right? Why not get involved in the next big thing? I get it,” Cop Thing said
“Don’t answer that,” Dean Simons said.
“They really put me up to it, just kept coming on Tuesdays, buying me drinks, talking to me about this huge new deal and how we were all gonna prosper, and everyone was gonna be buyin’ the shit and having a great time,” DJ Jaguar said.
“Right, but you never tried it yourself,” Mike Trigger said.
“I’m still here ain’t I? I don’t fuck with the hard stuff like that, and that shit’s about the hardest shit you can get, but yeah, I didn’t know until it was too late, ya dig? So I got this big bag of the shit and over time they started sending people my way, and they had really just sold people on the idea, like it was gonna be the greatest trip ever and you’d be best friends with God or something and it was basically gonna evolve your mental perspective and solve all your problems,” DJ Jaguar said.
“And then what happened?” Cop Thing said.
“They disappeared for awhile, after I got the shipment,” Jaguar shrugged.
“Where did it come from?” Mike Trigger asked.
“Gunmetal Poseidon HQ I guess, straight from the lab, I think, right, they concocted this stuff with like hot-shot scientists, like rich guys who defected from the pharmeceutical industry to start this rogue company. This is all heresay, stuff I picked up from drinking with these guys, y’know people get to talking, get a little boozey loosey goosey, they wanna be buddies and be impressive and shit so, yeah loose lips sink shit, people just start saying some shit they maybe shouldn’t be sayin’, that’s how I know all this stuff. Those guys are just people too, right, just guys that work for Gunmetal Poseidon, they’re not actually part of it, they’re just contract work guys sent to Neo-Van to scout out guy’s like me and just move the stuff. They’re like the middle men” DJ Jaguar said.
“And you ended up selling some to your buddy, Clint, who is now deceased because of it, is that correct?” Mike Trigger said.
“Don’t answer that,” Dean said.
“It’s ok. I use to drink with Clint all the time, he was my buddy. I wouldn’t intentionally murder my buddy, would I?” DJ Jaguar said with a touch or irritation and sadness, like he was offended these cops thought he had no morality.
“I don’t know, would you?” Mike Trigger said.
“No, of course not. Clint was already pretty fucked up, I didn’t take much part in his actual personal life, we just had our own thing going where, I dunno, when he wanted to get away from his girlfriend and her kid, which was all the time, we’d end up drinking down by the shipyard or in an alley or in a graveyard or something, y’know,” DJ Jaguar said.
“And how much would you drink?” Cop Thing said.
“What relevance does that have?” Dean said.
“It’s relevant,” Cop Thing said.
“How?” Dean persisted.
Christ, this guy was annoying, Mike thought.
“I dunno, it would vary, sometimes a few tall cans, sometimes like, a case of beer, you know, we’d get really just shit-faced. Really tear one off sometimes, it wasn’t the best thing to do. I can admit that. That’s just where we were at in our lives at the time,” DJ Jaguar said.
“How long ago was this?” Cop Thing said.
“A few months ago, so yeah, I didn’t sell it to him, I just gave him some, because I had told the story of how I got involved in the whole thing, and he got real curious, I guess he liked to experiment with shit like that, like he thought he was some kind of drugs guru or something, and the new experiences were really cultivating his mind in some god-complex type way.” DJ Jaguar said.
“So how long after that did he die?” Cop Thing said.
“Like I said, this was months ago, probably, I can’t remember exactly. He must have put the blue stuff away, saving it for a special occasion. It didn’t really come up in conversation, right, and I was distracted with my music mostly and other guy’s deals. We just drank a lot and complained about shit and talked about our feelings.” DJ Jaguar said.
“Right, you’re not married? No girlfriend?” Mike Trigger said.
“Nope, don’t got time for one,” DJ Jaguar said.
Yeah, right, more like you’re such a despicable, insufferable washed out piece of shit no one would ever want to date you, Mike thought.
This guy was starting to piss him off. He thought he was some great artist or something but really he was just this delusional wasteoid whose self-serving ignorance and greed ended up killing a bunch of people. Mike didn’t feel bad for the victims, because junkies get what they deserve, they made their choice, it was just the plain human avarice that inadvertantly resulted in people dying that rubbed him the wrong way.
At least when Mike killed someone, he meant to do it, like a real man.
“There’s other guys too, it’s not just me. Guys that got connections with Gunmetal Poseidon. The blue stuff, it’s out there man, it’s all over the place, the trouble is, people don’t know exactly what it is, right, like they think bam! Just doing a ripper of whatever, and it’s mixed with ICE, right, and boom, your heart fucking explodes. Right it’s not so pure and obvious anymore it’s all coagulated with the regular shit now ’cause the shit’s been around for months,” DJ Jaguar said.
“Perfect,” Cop Thing said, sarcastically.
“Who else do you know that’s involved with the whole racket?” Mike Trigger asked.
“Don’t answer that,” Dean said.
“It’s cool, it’s cool, man, I wanna cooperate. I want the least harsh sentence possible. Some people, they got, I guess, honour about being a snitch. Not me, I don’t give a shit about these guys. All I care about is music man, and having a good time. Ain’t gonna be a good time in jail,” DJ Jaguar said, “Ok, so there’s one guy, name’s Osiris Haggard. Now, this guy’s like a short fat guy, face is all puffy and blotchy and red or whatever, wears a yellow plaid suit all the time, real eccentric motherfucker. I dunno if he’s in the illuminati or some shit or whatever but he’s always getting away with everything. House is spotless, teeth are really white, you know what I’m saying? The guy’s organized and he’s been in the game a long time.”
Dean was shaking his head with his hand over his eyes looking down.
Cop Thing’s interest was peaked.
“And where would we find this person?” Cop Thing said.
“He comes to the Kool Kitty sometimes, but mostly I think he hangs out at the White Cherub Pub. He’s a regular there, last I heard. For work, I’m not sure what he does for a living. Damn, what was it again? Can’t remember. That’s all I really know about the guy,” DJ Jaguar said.
“Right, and he’s one of these ICE jockeys, like you?” Cop Thing said.
“Last I heard. I don’t know the guy that well. He’s kind of a prick though. That’s the only other guy I know, but I know there’s more. We’re not all best friends or nothin’” DJ Jaguar said.
“You got anything else to say for yourself?” Mike said.
“Not really, except, y’know, I just told you guys basically everything I know, so I’d appreciate it if you lived up to your end of the deal, and put in a good word for me, you know I ain’t have no ill intention. I’m an artist, not a murderer, I ain’t mean to hurt nobody,” DJ Jaguar said.
“That’s about everything we wanted to hear. We’ll see you in court,” Cop Thing said and they adjourned the discussion.
☣
“Damn, once he got a sniff of a bone there, he really started squirting the info,” Mike Trigger said. He and Cop Thing were in the park at a picnic bench, eating Burgers Queen for lunch again.
“Yeah, I thought that lawyer was going to be a lot more troublesome than he was,” Cop Thing said. Mike laughed.
“He was trying, but DJ Jaguar was so set on getting the lightest punishment possible, he just vetoed everything the guy advised him on,” Mike said, “Hell, works for us.”
“Yeah, we still don’t know who those gangster suit guy’s are working for, reminds me of the guy’s we saw in the park that first night, there might be a connection, but I couldn’t get a really good look at them, we were kind of distracted at the time. It’d be nice if Jack Imhoff would wake up from that coma so we could ask him some questions,” Cop Thing said.
“Agreed, it’s not like he’s gonna run away again,” Mike Trigger said.
“We need to find the location of this drugs lab he was talking about and destroy it,” Cop Thing said, “And find out who those suit mercs are. There’s probably more where those guys came from.”
“Probably,” Mike said, mouth stuffed with the last bite of his Chicken Tenders Burger. The sun was out now, which was nice. It seemed like it had been raining for weeks. With the children playing nearby on the playground, and people out for jogs, flying kites and swimming in the ocean nearby, Cop Thing was reminded the world wasn’t all rain, blood, gangsters and drugs. He had sort of forgotten.
Maybe they were doing something right. Maybe they were getting somewhere after all.
“So are we gonna pay this guy Osiris a visit or what? I feel like we’re just repetatively scraping the bottom of the barrel here with these low-level goons,” Mike said.
“Yeah, but you got to start somewhere. We didn’t have much to go on,” Cop Thing said.
“Let’s just skip the undercover stuff this time and approach him as cops, make a deal with him, and just get him to tell us who his middle-men contacts are,” Mike Trigger said.
“What kind of deal did you have in mind?” Cop Thing inquired, intruiged.
“I dunno, something like, tell us what we want to know or we’re going to harass you and make your life a living hell. What’s he going to do about it? Who’s he going to call? Not the cops! If it were up to me, I’d just beat the answers out of the guy right off the bat, this whole ethics of legality issue is starting to piss me off,” Mike said, “Working on the psychology of the individual with every different person is getting exhausting. One thing they all have is common is they generally dislike having pain inflicted on them, unless they’re some kind of sadomasochistic freak.” Mike said, then dipped the last bite of his Tenders Burger in a plastic ramiken of sriracha mayo and ate it, sucking his fingertips at the end.
“Yeah, well we can’t just go around making up the rules. That’s the whole point of being a cop. Don’t let your personal feelings cloud your judgement,” Cop Thing said.
“My personal feelings are more just about getting the job done here. Let’s get this case closed. I could care less if they have to clean up a bunch of dead drug-addicts all over town, but if it’s part of some larger diabolical scheme, we gotta nip it in the bud before that happens, who knows how late in the game it actually is, or what kind of other plans Gunmetal Poseidon has in the works,” Mike said.
“Yeah, we were assigned this case, and it’s our duty to complete it, I agree, that’s what this is about, not avenging dead junkies, there’s no way to solve that whole bleak addiction epidemic as far as I can see, not while people are still human,” Cop Thing said.
“True. Everyone would have to be robots or androids or something for that to happen, plus as a society we just openly sell intoxicating substances to the public, our whole service industry’s based on it, and I don’t see that ever going away, why would it? How could it?” Mike said.
“Yeah, it’s an impossible problem, we’re just swatting fruit flies and then ten more appear,” Cop Thing agreed.
“Well, at least I’m clean,” Mike said, “I do life right, got a wife, got seven kids, I’m a cop. I did everything right,” Mike said.
“Good for you, I’m glad you’re satisfied,” Cop Thing said.
Cop Thing didn’t want crime to go away, he was a born natural cop, he liked busting people, and he was also a mutant monster with conducive powers. There was nothing else for him to do. It would be like being a war general with no war to fight, what were you going to do with your life? You’d go insane with inactivity. No life purpose, and that could be dangerous. He’d probably spontaneously combust.
Cop Thing finished the last of his seven burgers and they dutifully took their trash to the nearest garbage can and disposed of it, then they got back in the incognito cruiser and started driving to the White Cherub Pub, Cop Thing behind the wheel.
“By the way, Cop Thing, thanks for saving my life the other night,” Mike said in an uncharacteristically tender moment of sentimentality.
“Of course, you’re my partner,” Cop Thing said.
“Since we’re not doing the undercover wire thing this time, why don’t you go talk to this guy Osiris, I feel like you’ll be a lot more immediately persuasive,” Mike said.
“I guess it is sort of my turn,” Cop Thing said, then “Ok. We gotta catch him first, all we know is he hangs out at the White Cherub Pub. We can’t just automatically expect him to be an all day drunk at the bar there. That would be convenient but pretty unrealistic to expect that. Plus it doesn’t match the personality description Jaguar told us, but he obviously dabbles there occasionally. Maybe he never goes there again for all we know. Or maybe DJ Jaguar was lying.”
“We’ll find him eventually either way. We have to. We’re cops, that’s our job. I want to make some progress on this case today, and yeah, you heard the Chief, we’re on our last strike, so let’s not blow this guy away, if possible.”
“Look who’s talking, but yeah,” Cop Thing said.
⊹
⊹
CHAPTER 19 – FEAR CORPS
In the Wraithvale training gymnasium, Dak and Merge stood on the catwalk, watching the platoon of soldiers in the making training below.
“Goddamn newscasters, call me a terrorist, will you? I’ll show you terror, if that’s what you think,” Dak Longstar said, referring to how he thought he was unfairly portrayed on the news after the catastrophic CNF seige, “My new team of super-trained insurgents will now be known as – Terror Squad!”
“That’s a little regular don’t you think?” Merge said, “I mean, it’s kind of obvious.”
“Really? It’s supposed to be obvious, it says exactly what it means, how is that bad?” Dak Longstar said.
“It’s just kind of… It doesn’t have a nice ring to it, can’t you come up with something better than that?” Merge said.
“Ok, fine, how about, uh, the Fear Corps?” Dak said.
“Yeah, that’s better, it’s more original.” Merge said.
“Ok, Fear Corps then, it means the same fucking thing anyways,” Dak said.
“Yeah, but it sounds better,” Merge said.
“Fear Corps then. Wait until they see my Fear Corps!” Dak said.
“Why don’t you name it something really cool and simple and mysterious, like ‘Shuriken’,” Merge said.
“Shuriken? That sounds like an unsuccessful NES ninja spin-off game. Come on, Fear Corps, it’s a twist on the whole terrorism thing, they think we’re terrorists, get it? It’s clever because it’s mocking them. We’re not terrorists, we’re revolutionaries, there’s a difference. Our cause is just, terrorism is bad. That’s the difference,” Dak said.
“Fine, you’re the boss,” Merge said.
“I am,” Dak said, while unscrewing the cap off of a tiny one-shot bottle of Jim Daniel’s Tennessee Fire Whiskey. He drank it, then groaned “Ahhhh!” The bottle had a little red devil cartoon character on it with a pitchfork and black scaled wings.
Delilah and Sergei had been successfully brainwashed, so thankfully, it was unnecessary to murder them. They had begun training in the new squad Dak had created from the stable of Wraithvale members left at the base in the woods. He was prepared to learn from the hard lesson of failure and the death of his original team. This time he would be prepared for Cop Thing. No more toxic bombs, nothing that could be thwarted or deactivated, they needed something even more insidius, sinister and a cunning plan for revenge, to send the Wraithvale message to the world once and for all. Dak was still working it out in his imagination what that plan was, but he knew it had to be extra devious, and involve more strategic planning, organization and expert training for his new deadly Fear Corps. He couldn’t afford to lose twice.
Merge was the designated boot camp instructor, spending all day running troops through the forest paths for excessive cardio exercise, gang-pumping iron with vigorous weight training and directing combat experience.
Merge had personally spent time with Delilah and Sergei post brain-scrambling, and he was pleased to admit, they both showed promise. They were just physically adept husks now, mindless vessels to be programmed for Wraithvale’s nefarious purposes.
Except it wasn’t nefarious to Dak, he was completely convinced of his own benevolence.
Dak and Merge climbed down a ladder connected to the catwalk through a square opening in the gunmetal grate floor. The floor was polished wood like would be in a high-school gym baskeball court, except there were no paint symbols or markings, and certainly no basketball hoops. What there was were weights, lots of weights, bench presses, treadmills – there was a wrestling ring and purple plastic blow-up exercise balls people were doing core and balance excercises on, medicine balls, as well as an array of weapons organized on racks on the far wall such as swords, flails, nun-chucks, shurikens, daggers, axes and bows and arrows. There was also a bunch of guns.
Merge made his way over to the wrestling ring, where two greased up shirtless men were dressed in black speedos and fighting each other. The hand-to-hand combat and grappling submission holds between them evolved into bigger moves like power bombs and suplexes.
Merge stood with his arms crossed, admiring his handywork, he was an ex-pro wrestler from New Jersey and he had done an epic circuit of shows over the years, ranging from smaller auditoriums in small towns to bigger venues in successful mid-range companies like WFA (Wrestling Foundation Alliance) and TIW (Total Impact Wrestling). A veteran, his career never fully took off, maybe he just didn’t find the right character, or never got his lucky break. He had been hit in the head so many times it sculpted his mentality for being adept at fighting like a blacksmiths hammer on a red-hot glowing sword.
One night, on a pay-per-view in Michigan called SLAM JAM, Merge was power slammed out of the ring through a table onto a bed of thumbtacks by Angel “The Brick” Rodriguez. When he got up, all covered in thumbtacks stuck into his body and face and bleeding, crowd roaring for the violence, he took a piledriver gone-wrong and actually broke his neck, ending his career and making the show really sad and awkward, as the paramedics had to come remove him from the outside of the ring where the botched piledriver happened.
They wheeled his limp, unconscious, broken body out of the arena in disgrace, and he never wrestled again. The Brick never forgave himself for this blunder, became an alcoholic, and was found hanged in a Denver hotel room years later, wearing women’s clothing.
Merge did recover and was miraculously rehabilitated, he gave up wrestling and became a lone wanderer, hitchhiking from city to city, just surviving and looking for a new purpose. That was a long time ago, but the primordial urge to battle never left him, it was a natural animal instinct, and he soon returned to the craft of combat in the form of a street fighter. After months of street fighting for a living, eventually his talent was recognized, and his emotional vulnerability, and scooped up by someone during a street fighting tournament in downtown Calgary one day. That someone was Dak Longstar.
Now fundamentally employed by Wraithvale and gifted with new vision, the man went from a tragic accidental disgrace and a fall from mediocre-level fame, to being a cross-country vagabond, to this, a Wraithvale high-ranking officer. That’s why he was grateful to Dak, and didn’t really question his motives too much or criticize, originally, except when he felt like it was in the best interest for all of them as a whole as an advisor, because Dak had given his life a purpose again. He gave him a second chance after he had lost himself.
“This is all going pretty smoothly, these people are some of the best I’ve ever seen,” Merge said.
“Who’s your best fighter, currently?” Dak said. He mostly had stayed out of the training room lately, as he was already an adept warrior. Training these newbies was Merge’s job. The initial team that was mostly now departed, Dak had trained, including Merge, but thankfully they had left him behind on the last mission, otherwise he’d probably be dead too, which Dak didn’t like to think that his guys were so easily defeated, but it was extenuating circumstances, versus regular people, fine, good, these guys are going to dominate, but when you have Cop Thing on your side, it’s not fair. How are you supposed to prepare against a person who isn’t even human, who can absorb bullets? Dak would have to think about that.
“Best hand-to-hand fighter, or best marksman?” Merge said.
“Both,” Dak said.
“Well, best hand-to-hand would have to be Dragon Ali,” Merge said, and pointed to an arabian-asian man in a white karate suit, with a grey digital-urban bandana on and sneakers.
“Best marksman would be Mark Jones, this guy’s got a real talent with his aim, and his speed,” Merge said, “Best sniper I’ve ever seen.”
It occurred to Dak that, being an ex-wrestler and transient, Merge may not have actually seen that many snipers. Dak had been in the army and knew a thing or two about precision with a rifle.
“Well, how many sniper’s have you actually seen?” Dak said.
“Check it out,” Merge said, ignoring the question, “Hey, Mark! Come over here,” Merge yelled at him from across the gym where he was doing push-ups in front of a mirror with a rack of weights beside it. Mark stood up and obediently jogged over. Merge picked up a Savage Scout from the gun-rack and handed it to him.
“Follow me, guys,” Merge said. They went through double doors outside into the forest shooting range. “Patience, just wait for it,” Merge said. Dak did as he was asked, although it was tough to have patience, he was semi-drunk, and he felt uncomfortable being asked to do anything by someone else.
“Ready? Mark, show him what you can do,” Merge said.
Mark just stood there, in some kind of meditative trance, eyes closed like he was summoning something spiritually, then all within the flash of a second, he opened his eyes, raised the rifle, squinted his eye peering through the rifle scope and pulled the trigger. The shot rang out, echoing, the sound ricocheting off the trees in the forest.
“Am I missing something? You just shot the forest,” Dak said.
“Did I, though? Come on, over here, let me show you,” Mark said, and motioned for Merge and Dak to come with him, and they went for a lengthy walk into the woods, stepping through low bush and dangling thorns. Eventually they came to a little rabbit hole underneath a fallen, mossy, fungus-covered tree. Mark squatted on his haunches, reached into the rabbit hole and pulled out a pulverized rabbit carcass, blown to shreds by the savage bullet.
“Amazing shot,” Dak congratulated him.
They returned to the gymnasium and Merge had some murmured discussions with his students, Dak was meandering around the gym, observing each participants impressive work-out routine and physique.
Delilah and Sergei were doing sit-ups in front of a TV screen that was showing bizarre digital waves and glitch effects. Dr. Shock had invented some kind of digital visual language to communicate with and inform their scrambled brains. Dak wasn’t aware what the messaging was actually telling them, and he made a mental note to find out.
Does Shock even know?
Merge was at the wrestling ring, which had now been vacated, with Dragon Ali and Tank Williams. Tank was a giant, hairy man, standing six foot seven, barrel-chested with long hair, wearing jeans and combat boots. Dak walked over and Dragon and Tank got into the ring. They bowed to each other respectfully, then started pacing around in a circle facing each other, ready to do battle. Tank made the first move, he went for a lunging grapple, and Dragon jabbed him in the face, knocking him away. Tank tried this again and the same thing happened, resulting in a bleeding nose.
Tank towered over Dragon as Dragon was not considerably tall, probably about five foot seven, Dak guessed, but his movements were lightning quick.
Noticeably frustrated now, Tank tried a third time and threw a punch, but he was altogether too burly and slow, Dragon deflected the attack with his foot then jump kicked Tank in the chest, sending him stumbling back into the ropes. Dragon roundhouse kicked him in the head, sending the huge man rolling over the ropes and tumbling out of the ring to the mat outside. Tank was on the ground, dazed, face up. Dragon was already crouched on the top turnbuckle and leapt in the air performing a frontwards somersault frogsplash attack, landing directly on Tank’s sprawled out body on the ground. Tank stayed down after that.
Dragon Ali walked over to Merge and Dak. Dak was fascinated. Dragon put his hands together and bowed his head.
“Very impressive, how long have you been fighting?” Dak said.
There was no verbal reply, then Dragon opened his mouth revealing a severed tongue, scarred-over flesh bumps remaining on the stump of the wound. Many of these new warriors had been arranged for recently by The Figure, and Dak hadn’t met them all yet, as he had been busy in his own quarters, more concerned at the time with the now defunct Wraithvale A-team, but these new bloods were excelsior.
“Yeah, you won’t get much conversation out of Dragon. That’s part of the reason he’s so good. He doesn’t do anything else other than martial arts. Tank William’s is good too, just not as good as Dragon,” Merge said and gestured towards Tank, who was slowly getting up now, face and chest covered in the gushing blood from his nose.
Dak felt a pang of insecurity and inadequecy at this whole exhibition, and it occurred to him he should assert his dominance as leader. Then it occurred to him that Dragon Ali could likely defeat him in combat, and if it weren’t for the fact that he didn’t have a tongue, and couldn’t speak, Dragon could usurp the leadership of Wraithvale in a primal, tribal way, if he wanted to, because he was stronger and more lethal.
“Great, looks good to me, how are our new specimens?” Dak said, pointing casually to Delilah and Sergei, who were now doing squats together, still watching the glitch-code screen. The screen changed the color theme every once in a while, Dak guessed it was some sort of emotional thematical thing, like red was for aggression, blue for calmness and solitude, that sort of thing.
He spiralled into a defensive, paranoid mindset, where he wondered how much of this whole setup was actually his own doing, based on his own merit? How much of it was he was just a construct, set up for the situation, thinking he was in control, but really he was just the puppet of The Figure all along.
It was a disturbing, terrorizing thought, but it was far too late to turn back now.
Dr. Shock appeared beside Dak as he was observing Delilah and Sergei watching the glitch-screen.
“Captivating, isn’t it,?” Dr. Shock said.
“What does it do?” Dak asked.
“It lays a foundation in their minds, which can be built upon, it gives them a balance, something to hold onto in this new reality they’ve entered into. Weaving their mindwaves into tight knight chains of sanity, otherwise, the shock of existence and utterly not having any sense of identity could cause them to panic and drive them insane. Think of it like a playpen for a baby,” Dr. Shock said.
“What a compelling prospect,” Dak said, “Did you invent this theory?”
“I worked on it, not completely invented it, no. You see when I worked in Antarctica at the Gideon Facility, we had a whole team of the world’s best scientists working on this project. ‘Brain-scrambler’ is just a nickname my colleagues and I came up with, the device is actually called the YM21ZX.”
Dak didn’t ask what this stood for. Some scientist jargon no doubt. He didn’t have space in his mind for those kinds of details.
“It’s incredible, I’m even amazed myself at the little details. For instance, you said Delilah couldn’t eat gluten before the treatment? Not anymore, she could eat an entire loaf of garlic bread without even the slightest hint of a tummy ache,” Dr. Shock said.
“How do you know that?” Dak said.
“Because I tested it this morning, they both had garlic cheesey bread for lunch with alfredo sauce for dipping, quite delightful,” Dr. Shock said. Dak looked deep in thought, stroking his chin with his thumb and forefinger.
“And Sergei, he was a pilot, correct? He couldn’t fly a helicopter anymore if his life depended on it,” Dr. Shock said. Dak was slightly perturbed at this, he kind f liked having a helicopter pilot on deck.
“You might want to program that back in,” Dak said.
“The code-screen is also implanting memories that will be useful to us in their clean-slate minds, you see. The connection to the brain and the body is far more complicated than even the most knowledgable scientists can quanitify. Now that their minds are clear, the code is sending programming messages to them, forming the basis of basic boot camp training experience,” Dr. Shock said.
“You mean you’re just implanting abilities into their brains?” Dak said.
“Precisely, allow me to demonstrate,” Dr. Shock said, “Sergei, Sir, would you please be so kind as to show Mr. Longstar here an example of your new abilities?”
Sergei stood and faced Dak, saluted him, and performed a standing backflip, landed in a pushup position, and started pumping out push-ups, pushing himself off the ground into the air and clapping between each one.”
“Marvelous, isn’t it. I love technology,” Dr. Shock said. It was pretty marvelous, Dak had to admit. Sergei and Delilah even looked more taught and muscular than even yesterday. Dak didn’t know how that was physically possible, but he was looking at it so it must be true. Both test subjects had a completely different look in their eyes now too, which was creepy, a sort of vacant-personality gaze, whereas before they were people, born and raised and filled with experiences and formulated character like anyone else. Now they were vegetables who were programmed a certain way with a specific intention. It was working.
“Delilah, my dear, would you please show Mr. Longstar what you’re now capable of,” Dr. Shock said.
Delilah lowered herself into the push-up postion, hoisted herself off the ground with her arms into a handstand, and started doing handstand push-ups, then she bent forward and gymnastically flipped forward into a standing position again.
“You see what we’re dealing with here,” Dr. Shock turned to Dak, smiling.
“Let’s take this one step further,” Merge said, “Let’s show Dak what it’s like when they’re really in action.”
“What do you propose?” Dr. Shock said.
“An exhibition match between the two of them,” Merge said.
“I don’t see why not,” Dr. Shock said.
They all gathered around the ring, including Dragon Ali, Mark Jones, and Tank Williams, who had cleaned himself off now from all the nose-blood and had a piece of toilet paper stuffed in his nose to plug the bleeding..
Sergei and Delilah both entered the ring. Their street clothes had been changed now, they were both wearing digital-urban camo pants, combat boots and black tank tops. They stood in separate corners facing each other at either side of the ring, then Merge hit a ring bell with a tiny gong hammer and they started squaring off. They were quite evenly matched as the beatings began, not like the Dragon Ali match, where Dragon just conquered his opponent in a flawless victory right away. Delilah and Sergei were going toe to toe, blow for blow, grappling, punching and slapping each other, knocking each other into the turnbuckles and pummeling the opponent there, grunting and groaning, then reversing it and the other one would get the upper hand. This went on for quite some time, much to the amusement of the audience, with no clear choice for the victor in sight.
“Ok, I think I get the point, they’re completely brainwshed and at our mercy, and they can fight now,” Dak said.
“Yes, I’m even impressed myself, this is new territory. A new frontier of human endeavor, do you have any idea of the span of possibilities here? It finally worked!” Dr. Quake said with a touch of condescension that Dak didn’t necessarily enjoy, even though he was condescending to people all the time. His leadership felt threatened in a subtle way which had him neverous and paranoid, although he would never admit to such a fault of mentality, or even realize it. He must maintain total control, otherwise the inmates would be running the asylum. He wanted another drink.
“That’s enough for now, I think!” Dr. Shock called out as Delilah had Sergei in the sharpshooter submission maneuver. She resentfully released the submission and they both rolled out of the ring.
✛
Back in the roundtable room, Dak sat with Merge and Desdemona. The new recruits all had their living quarters on the lower floor, which was sparsely laid out and more conducive to constant training, but they were well fed and promised a bright future for being a part of Wraithvale’s epic mission, which was constrantly reassured by Dak, although no one really understood fully what it was, and he didn’t even have the idea fully formulated himself, but he was prepared to lead and that counted for a lot, apparently, and he had the connections and the funding from The Figure.
Where did The Figure find all these ace people?
Some of Dak’s crew Dak was personally responsible for, like Merge and Desdemona, but some of them, especially these new guys, had simply show up mysteriously pledging allegiance, and Dr. Shock principally was sent to the base by The Figure. He may have even worked in person at The Figure’s science lab, which appeared to be located in Antarctica, judging by Dr. Shock’s candid comments and the arctic mountain backdrop behind The Figure, which Dak wasn’t sure if it was a video screen or the real thing.
The man was a total mystery.
Dak had never even seen his face before, he had never even met him in person. He was just a shadow who spoke to him, dropped money into his bank account and smoked cigars with a medeival gauntlet on.
“So, that all looks very nice, Merge, thank you,” Dak said. They all had short glasses of straight vodka, and Chef Shake was preparing an exquisite dinner for the three of them. The rest of the crew were getting a giant load of meatball spaghetti, a classic favorite amongst the barracks.
“Thank you, Dak, I’ve been putting a lot of work in with these people,” Merge said.
Dak kept thinking uneasily about Dragon Ali. That guy was dynamite, he could probably kick both Merge and Dak’s asses with jeans on. If it weren’t for the sheer absurd handicap that the guy couldn’t talk, he could take over this whole outfit.
Except Dak had the connections. Part of what he did, actually most of what he did, was communicative. He talked to The Figure, he talked to his staff, what did he actually do other than pass on messages and get other people to do things? He really was beginning to have some self-conscious jabs of insecurity. He felt vulnerable all of the sudden, like he was being led in a blindfold to the chopping block, but there was no way out and no one to lash out at like a cornered animal, because he needed all these people, and it was no one’s fault but his own. It was like he had this grand vision and followed through, now he didn’t even know what it was anymore and time seemed to be running out, and there was no exit strategy.
He knew he was going to die in this one.
“Ok, so, new team, good job Merge,” Dak began, then sipped his vodka, “Dragon Ali, that guy’s incredible, so is Mark Jones, Tank Williams, uh, well he got the shit kicked out of him but I think Dragon’s a special case, so let’s have Tank too, if you say so, you said he’s good too, right? And Sergei and Delilah, gotta use ’em for something, even if it’s just cannon fodder, but they look like they know their shit now, which is bizarre but if it works it works,” Dak said.
“Is that all? Why don’t we use all the people we have?” Merge said.
“We will, we will, we’ll be smart and resourceful with this, I’m still hashing out the new target, you know, the new plan,” Dak said, “But these new guys are making the last guys look like child’s play.”
“Agreed, it’s good we’re getting supplemented with all this talent, I don’t know what you and The Figure are talking about, but it’s working. I kind of like having a bunch of Alpha’s just show up on our doorstep and join our team,” Merge said.
“Yeah…” Dak trailed off. He knew he was one step away from the firing range with The Figure, but he saved face for his underlings sake, the facade of control. Inside he was losing it. He wasn’t so oblivious he didn’t notice Desdemona and Merge’s unease and derision at his drinking. If he wasn’t careful he could have a mutiny on his hands at any moment, but he supposed that was how it was for all leaders, all kings. Everyone around was always vying for the throne. Could he even trust Merge? Desdemona? What about Dr. Shock? He didn’t technically work for Dak, he was placed her by The Figure. Was he hiding something? Where did his loyalties lie? That guy was just happy he got to play in his little playground with his little toys in the middle of nowhere at this secret base in the wilderness. It was weird how genius worked, it was like the hyper-focus enabled the superhuman traits to flourish, like the guy was old, he didn’t have a wife, it’s like his IQ was too high to fuck, like he wasn’t an animal anymore. He was more interested in a glitch screen brainwashing code sequence than a vagina. That was ok but it threatened Dak. Because it was easier and safer to just lump people into a predictable box, the people where you didn’t know what they were going to do became extremely dangerous, if they had the combat and mental capabilities, and even if they weren’t capable, they could still burn the place down.
☣
CHAPTER 20 – WHITE CHERUB
The incognito cruiser was parked in the parking lot of the White Cherub. It was an old style pub that looked like it was a medeival inn or straight out of a fantasy novel. There was a patio with glass walls and tiki torches and a big, classy looking gold cherub logo with big gold letter that read THE WHITE CHERUB. Why didn’t they make the letters and the character white? Cop Thing thought. It was located in an shangri-la village type area with lots of people houses, beside a whole foods market and a drug store, the prescription kind.
Cop Thing entered the establishment and there was a sign in the front that read “Please wait to be seated.” A nice young lady hostess in a long grey cotton skirt and black top came to greet him. She saw all sorts of people all day long everyday, but she had never seen someone as ghastly as Cop Thing. Still, she did her job properly and was polite, and she did admire his big muscles.
“Hiiiii, how’s it going?” She said.
“Good, thank you, how are you today?” Cop Thing said.
“Gooooood, just for yourself today?” She said.
“Yes, just for one please,” Cop Thing said. There were some old folks in the place and some people watching sports, it was quite an eclectic establishment, spacious and nice with a medeival sort of theme going on which tittilated Cop Thing, little candles decorated each table, even though it was broad daylight. The gargantuan size of the TV’s looked pretty expensive but Cop Thing figured this place was sort of the local watering hole for a bunch of everyday regular retired rich folks and the regular blue-collar people who just wanted to get tipsy at their favorite bar after a hard days work, where everybody knows your name and they’re always glad you came.
“Would you like a high table or a low table today?” The sweet young lady asked.
“Uh, low table,” Cop Thing said.
“Ok, right this way,” She said, grabbing a menu and the daily special sheet. Cop Thing followed her over to the corner low table and she said “Just be careful because this cushion is completely wet!” Referring to the side chushion in the corner L shaped booth low table.
“I’ll use that cushion then,” Cop Thing said.
“Perfect!” She said and he sat down and scooched over, his massive physique barely fit in the booth but he got by. The girl put the menus on the table and then walked away. He could overhear someone else tried to order something from her and she said, “I’m not your server, I’m just the hostess” and kept walking.
Cop Thing looked briefly at the menu and then scanned the area, taking in the whole scene of the place. The TVs were playing sports, there were some common drunks loitering at the bar, regulars all around, he could just sense that, even though he had never been here before. This was like where people came to just drink themselves to death and feel socially validated about it.
The waitress came over and Cop Thing was intrigued by her outfit. Maroon leather skirt, colour coordinated with her maroon sweater, pretty blonde hair. He still had the leftover remnants of his manly desires, even though he had been transformed into a hulking beast. Impressed, Cop Thing ordered a water with a lemon wedge and a cheeseburger with fries, which was a very light meal for him but he wasn’t here to eat, he was here to find Osiris Haggard. It was four thirty in the afternoon, so whatever Osiris was up to right now, if he really was a regular here, he’d probably show up around now. Cop Thing had sort of just made that up on a hunch, he didn’t really know, how could he? Sometimes he just flew on intuition and it completely did not work. That happened pretty often actually but what were you going to do? You had to trust yourself. He couldn’t get anywhere by second-guessing his own calls all the time. That was for cowards and wimps. It was better to make a definite wrong call than humming and ha’ing about it and running out of time and make no call at all. A leader would never do that. A leader couldn’t afford to do that. It was like shoot first ask questions later. Or what was the other one? It was better to ask for forgiveness than permission. That one stuck with Cop Thing. He was a mutant of action. He said he was going to do something, and then he did it.
It was getting kind of weird and awkward, him being not only a monster, but a famous monster, sitting in the White Cherub by himself having lunch. It occurred to him that ust look kind outrageously suspicious, but he didn’t care. He wasn’t here to not arouse suspicion, he was here to find out the skinny on Osiris Haggard and choke some answers out of the guy. Like who were all these gangster clone guys wearing suits they kept running into? Where were they getting the ICE, and how do they stop it?
He pondered these questions and reminded himself what he was supposed to be doing, as he got up and went to the washroom. He looked at himself in the mirror, then pulled out his massive elephant-penis out of the folds of his crotch and began to urinate in the urinal. A guy came in and started releiving himself beside him, stole a glance at Cop Thing’s package, gasped and said “Holy shit, buds!”
Cop Thin didn’t reply, shook the excess piss drips off, and tucked his penis back into his crotch-folds, concealing it, then washed his hands and went back out onto the main restaurant floor.
Mike Trigger was waiting in the cruiser outside, listening in on the random happenings on the police radio to entertain himself. It seemed like half of what they did these days was doing stakeouts, sometimes he longed to just blast a motherfucker when most of the time they were just sitting in the car eating doughnuts.
That’s when Osiris Haggard walked in. Mike could see him walking down the street from inside because he really stood out visually.
“Bingo, bitch,” Mike Trigger said, alert now and sitting up, no longer slouched in the passenger seat.
Cop Thing knew it was him because he matched the description exactly like DJ Jaguar told them he would. Stout, bald, he looked like a newborn baby that had somehow made it to adulthood, and he was wearing a yellow plaid suit, just as they were told. It was goldish yellow with brown, black and red stripes. He had sneakers on as well, an odd fashion combination, they were Newb Balance, and a tie with some extravagant design that Cop Thing couldn’t see what it was from where he was, some masonic symbol repeated design. Osiris took note of Cop Thing with a long, suspicious glare. Obviously this was out of the ordinary, Cop Thing wasn’t exactly a regular at the White Cherub, in fact he had never been in there before. He didn’t drink booze and he needed to eat food in bulk, so he generally got as much food for as little cost as possible, not go out for overpriced lunch made by Chef’s and common kitchen lackeys at the local drinking hole. A cheeseburger and fries was like kids stuff to him, that was like an appetizer before breakfast.
Osiris sat and played it cool. Their luck was incredible, every guy they were looking for just seemed to pop up right when they wanted them too. Cop Thing called it fate. He didn’t really believe in luck. He believed in faith, and doing the right thing, and having the proper intention and attitude, and the cards would fall the way they did, and you would reap what you had sewn. It was pretty simple in that regard.
Cop Thing had the impulse reaction to just go grab the guy and start yelling in his face and beating the shit out of him, but his attitude was nerfed by the memory of Police Chief Phillip’s telling them they were on their last strike, and that there might be a more effective way to do this. He heard somewhere that when you are forced to resort to force, you have already lost. In the field he hadn’t actually experienced that as true, but he was willing to play it safe this time, until push came to shove. He really wanted answers, he wanted progress, and he wanted solutions.
Cop Thing sat patiently, Osiris Haggard kind of looked at him with some tentative disdain, suspicious. He didn’t know whether to just cut and run. The guilt showed all over his facial expression and the look in his eyes. Cop Thing sipped his lemon water. Osiris went and sat at the bar, greeting the bartender jovially, they clearly were on well known friendly terms. Maybe he was a big tipper. Maybe he was really funny. His looks weren’t really going to win him many friends, Cop Thing thought, but then neither were Cop Thing’s.
Cop Thing’s burger arrived and his mouth and eyes appeared out of the facial folds of his inverted-crater head, and he devoured it in several bites, more just shoving it down his throat with minimal chewing. Then he guzzled the fries down too, all within a couple minutes.
Cop Thing got up and walked over to the bar. He thought he’d give the guy a little time to get settled, sort of watch what he was up against, also he was hungry and he didn’t want to waste his money and abandon his burger. The timing just worked out that way. Cop Thing walked over to Osiris Haggard just stood right beside him as he was sitting in his chair at the bar.
“Are you Osiris Haggard?” Cop Thing said.
“Uh, yeah, you must be Cop Thing,” Osiris said.
“That’s right, I’d like to ask you a few questions, Osiris,” Cop Thing said, and held up his glimmering badge to show Osiris he wasn’t bluffing. It was a gold three-pointed crown type shield that said “COP THING” on it, and that’s all.
“What’s this about?” Osiris said, and sipped his Black Hole beer. It was a dark beer that won an award by a local craft brewing company, pretty popular, Cop Thing had noticed, although he wasn’t a beer enthusiast he just noticed that kind of stuff in conversation or just watching other people. “Loyne’s Brewery,” it was called.
“”Come on, I’ll tell you, come with me, let’s have a little chat,” Cop Thing said.
“Hey, you’re gonna bring him back right, he’s gotta pay for his beer,” The bartender said. Cop Thing reached into his side-pouch, pulled out a fifty dollar bill, handed it to the bartender and said, “Keep the change.”
When Cop Thing showed up with Osiris Haggard in the back parking lot, the cooks sitting on milke crates having a cigarette break scattered and scrambled back into the back door into the kitchen like rats scurrying into a safe hole when a cat shows up. Mike Trigger saw them walking from the front door down the sidewalk to the back and he got out of the incognito cruiser, stuffed his gun in the waistband of his jeans and joined them.
“Alright, let’s get straight to it. We know you’re involved with Gunmetal Poseidon and the whole ICE thing, so let’s just skip the bullshit, we want to know who you’re working for directly,” Cop Thing said, “We’ll make it easier on you if you tell us the truth fast, otherwise we’re going to bust your balls hard seven ways from Sunday.”
Osiris was not looked confused and not at all very pleased about all of this, he wasn’t even suspecting he was in any trouble as soon as ten minutes ago, let alone getting shaken down by Cop Thing and Mike Trigger as soon as he showed up at the White Cherub like he normally did. He knew he wasn’t going to talk his way out of this one, it was just annoying to get put in checkmate so fast and blindsided like that.
“Fine, it’s these guys, I dunno if they’re like the mafia or the illuminati or what, but they sort of all dress the same and they’ve got this motive to move a bunch of ICE. They’ve got a headquarters where they get the shipments of the stuff then they move it around into the city and have this whole operation of divvying the shit up and sending it down all these separate routes so it’s hard to trace. Right, then the shit gets all split and mixed with other drugs and no one knows where it all started anymore. It’s really pretty devious but a guy’s gotta make a living somehow, you know, and these guys have lots of cash, not sure how. They get funded big-time by Gunmetal Poseidon I guess, that’s what I heard at least. I don’t hang out with the guys, I’m not friends with them or nothing, don’t even really like ’em but they pay well and they show up on time and , yeah, that’s about that,” Osiris Haggard said.
“Ok, where is this headquarters you’re talking about, have you been there?” Cop Thing said.
“Yeah, I been there. It’s an abandoned warehouse down near the shipyard. Looks like hell from the outside. It’s all fenced off and shit, no civvy would ever go there, and you can’t get in the gate. I can ’cause they know who I am, you just tell ’em you’re ID on the intercom. For me anyways, not for you. You go there and be like, ‘Hey, it’s me Cop Thing’, right, they ain’t gonna let you in the gate, and they’re gonna be right fucking pissed about it too. Right, it’s not all bells and whistles in there, these guys are serious guys, fuckin’ real serious guys and they’re packin’ mega heat, know what I’m saying, there’s a whole crew of these guys working at the facility there and around town, they’re like fuckin’ ghosts man, they just appear and disappear and spread around this whole, y’know, layer of filth for people. It’s kind of evil actually but hey guy’s gotta make a living, and I ain’t gonna win no beauty pageants any time soon, you must identify with that shit, eh Cop Thing?”
Cop Thing resented the comment. He wasn’t wrong, Cop Thing knew he was ugly. but it pissed him off and fueled his motivation for the case.
“Alright, you’re coming with us,” Cop Thing said.
“But I ain’t finished my Taco Chicken Wrap yet,” Osiris said.
“I don’t care at all,” Cop Thing said, “You have the right to remain silent.”
“You got a warrant for this shit?” Osiris said.
“No warrant necessary. You like having your legs not broken? Then get in the car, we’re going to that warehouse you just told us about, right now,” Cop Thing said.
“Oh, man, can we at least pick up some Burgers Queen or something on the way, I’m fucking hungry, man,” Osiris said. Cop Thing didn’t answer.
✟
Peeling out of the Burgers Queen drive through, they all had bags of tasty specialty burgers and fries, turbo sized. Cop Thing’s, as usual, was in excessive quantities. They drove across the bridge together and down the side roads near the shipyard. Cop Thing skipped letting Police Chief Phillips know what they were upto and went straight to Captain Phobus for SWAT backup. If this warehouse was as packed full of baddies as Osiris Haggard says it was, they were going to need some serious reinforcements.
“Phobus, hello. It’s Cop Thing. We’re en route to an abandoned warehouse with a bunch of bad guys in it, rumour has it they’re shipping and receiving a bunch of ICE there, at least that’s what I’m told by Osiris Haggard. Yeah, Osiris Haggard, he’s some guy who’s involved with the whole drug-smuggling ICE racket here. Yeah, he’s in my car. Yeah, I’m with Trigger. Yeah. Yeah. It’s the three of us. We’re almost there, ok, I could use some backup here, so rise and shine, please I don’t know how many of these guys there’s going to be, or how well armed they are, you’re a SWAT Captain for a living right, well it’s time to earn that wage, my friend. Yeah, we’re on Wharf street, down by the water, address is 1234, yes I’m serious, come ASAP,” Cop Thing hung up.
They pulled up to the warehouse fence and got Osiris Haggard to do the talking in the intercom. The voice sounded skeptical but they let him get away with it, the chainlink electrified fence gate opened and they drove right in and parked in the large empty parking lot. The only other vehicles in there were black and white vans sparsely separated in the dilapidated parking lot cracked-pavement landscape, like these guys carpooled here to launder all these death-dealing drugs.
✟
CHAPTER 21 – WAREHOUSE
“This seems pretty hairy, Cop Thing,” Mike Trigger said. He was right, they were kind of flying by the seat of their pants on this one. Wasn’t this sort of everything they weren’t supposed to do? All the caution about the negligent police work and loose-cannon stuff, not having a warrant, all of that was just out the window now. It was like as soon as something triggered Cop Thing’s aggression he just forgot everything he wasn’t supposed to do and did it anyways.
“Yeah, it’s hairy, but it’s too late now, we’re in,” Cop Thing said.
They were, the gate had closed behind them and Cop Thing, Mike Trigger and Osiris Haggard were sitting in the incognito cruiser with basically no plan and no escape route. Hopefully the SWAT guys would get here soon. Cop Thing didn’t know how the SWAT team was going to get in, bulldoze the gate down or blow it up or something. The whole point here was Cop Thing was sick of waiting around and getting nowhere on the case, and now he wanted to crack some skulls. They had just better pull this one off properly or Chief Phillip’s was going to be pissed, and probably kick them off the police force.
“Ok, I got you guys in here like you asked for, now what? I don’t wanna just walk in there and be like ‘Yeah, hey, I really got no reason to be here except Cop Thing kidnapped me and made me tell him everything about you guys, then used me to get inside the gate’,” Osiris said.
“Yeah, that makes sense. I wouldn’t want that either,” Mike Trigger said, petting his pistol, “So what’s the plan? We gonna just walk right in the front door? We’re probably severely outnumbered. We don’t know what it’s like in there.”
“True. Is there a back door? A better way in, Osiris?” Cop Thing said. Lucky for them there was no one in the parking lot, everyone who was potentially seemed to be inside. It wasn’t really a hi-tech fortress with security cameras and guards, it was more like a shitty old warehouse with broken windows and cracked paint, standing three storeys tall.
Cop Thing was observing the building from the driver’s seat. There was a ladder up the side to a catwalk and a fire escape, maybe they could even get in from the roof. Cop Thing could take a lot of damage but not an infinite amount. Mike Trigger was a human man, he was the one who was really in the most danger here, and Osiris, but Cop Thing was willing to take that chance. So was Mike. Osiris was nervous as hell, sweating and shaking.
“Ok, well you have to go in there, now that you announced yourself, Osiris, and just distract them. Bide us some time to ambush these guys, they know you’re here so you better come up with a reason,” Cop Thing said.
“Like what?” Osiris said.
“I don’t know, you’re the one who has dealings with these scumbags, make something up and make it believable,” Cop Thing said.
“Oh, man, you guys are gonna get me killed, you know that, right? You’re gonna get me fucking killed. I just wanted a Taco Chicken Wrap at the White Cherub. Now I’m gonna die,” Osiris said.
“Just play your cards right and you’ll be fine, Mike and I will find another way in, you just go in there and make some chit-chat,” Cop Thing said, “Yeah, that sounds right.”
“Fine,” Osiris said, “But I don’t like this.”
“Ok, it doesn’t matter if you don’t like it. I don’t like having peoples hearts explode and having to do all this detective work cleaning up the mess you made, but that’s life, now get in there, put on a stellar perforance and win an oscar, please,” Cop Thing said.
Osiris got out of the car, groaning his discontent, and started walking towards the front door. He let himself in and disappeared inside the walls of the mysterious warehouse.
Cop Thing and Mike waited a moment, then they stealthily crept out of the car and scooted across the parking lot to the side of the building, ducked-running and stepping lightly. They were holding their guns with both hands in the ready position beside their heads in case they unfortunately encountered some opposition, but they didn’t. Beside the building was an alley with a chainlink fence and a ladder scaling the old brick wall all the way up to the roof. Cop Thing and Mike started climbing. There were broken windows to either side of them on the way up and Cop Thing leaned over at one point and peered in one of them. It was just as he suspected, a whole factory floor of men wearing suits, working with wheelbarrows, crates, and forklifts. There was a conveyor belt with a bunch of blue stuff on it and guys in hazmat-style suits packaging the blue stuff up. Cop Thing wondered what the hazmat suits were for. They also had tables with weapons on them, UZI 9mms, AK-47s, MP5s, desert eagles, grenades – the whole works.
“Oh, man, Cop Thing,” Mike Trigger said from the lower position on the ladder, looking in the window as they ascended to the roof, “It’s gonna be World War fucking three in there.”
“Just stay behind me, I’ll tank the damage, you snipe from behind my body shield,” Cop Thing said.
“Ok, but we could have come better prepared than this, they’ve got a whole fucking arsenal in there and there’s a lot of them, we’ve got two pistols,” Mike Trigger said.
“I know, but I acted on impulse and here we are. I didn’t really think it through,” Cop Thing said, “Azrael Phobus and the SWAT guys are on the way with the cavalry, we just have to not get killed until they get here.”
“Why don’t we just wait until they get here?” Mike Trigger said.
“Because that would be dishonourable to Osiris Haggard. Yeah, the guy’s a piece of shit drug dealer, but he’s a piece of shit drug dealer who helped us out, and we sent him in there with nothing like a sacrificial pig. I think the least we could do is try to not get him killed,” Cop Thing said.
“That’s very noble of you,” Mike Trigger said.
“Yeah, well, we’re all just people, we have our own individual backgrounds and stories, we make our choices. I don’t feel right about just using a guy and sending him to his death after, do you? Even if he is a lowlife criminal,” Cop Thing said.
“I guess so,” Mike Trigger said. They were still on the ladder halfway up to the roof when they were having this conversation. Cop Thing felt kind of like Batman and Robin from the 60s TV show, except less ridiculous. That was some comic book stuff, this was real life.
When they got to the roof, there was a good view of the harbour and the surrounding gentrified buildings enclosing on the warehouse from the surrounding neighborhood. Crazy how they had skyscrapers for rich people cloned side by side around some old decrepit warehouse near a shipyard no one cared about, except a bunch of drug dealing gangsters, simply dependant on who owned the property.
That’s just the way it was, seemed like the City could use these kinds of spacious areas to house homeless people, and at least feed them and try to rehabilitate them or something, but instead it all came down to who the landlords were, and where the money was funneling to, therefore the place was deemed derelict and inhabited by drug dealers who were actually killing homeless people instead of helping them.
Life was rough.
Cop Thing didn’t have it all figured out, that wasn’t his job, it was no one’s job was the problem. It was easier just to ignore it and sweep it under the rug than to try to deal with it, even having street people die seemed more logical. Maybe this drug blast was actually a good thing in the first place, but that’s not what they were here for. They weren’t on this warehouse drug-bust rooftop to philosophize about the relevance or the strategy to solve the homelessness and addiction scourge of the world, no, they were here to fill a bunch of gangsters full of bullets.
There was an airvent protruding from the ground in the middle of the roof, and a door leading inside the building. They chose the airvent. Cop Thing pried it off with his superior strength, and then him and Mike Trigger squatted inside the shaft and started shimmying along the inside of the airvent, which had a sour smell to it. Mike hoped they weren’t going to inhale excess ICE fumes and have their hearts blow up and die in an airvent today. Maybe that’s why the guys were wearing hazmat suits inside. His wife would be beside herself with grief. What would become of his family? She didn’t work, how could she when they had seven kids? So he wasn’t allowed to die.
Osiris was in the main area of the building floor, surrounded by conveyor belts moving ICE. There was a lot of the blue stuff and it was sort of intimidating having a whole factory floor full of derisive, suspicious guys in suits wondering what the hell you were doing there in the first place. No one invited him, and he didn’t even have a reason other than Cop Thing put him up to it. So he had to come up with something quick.
The head honcho walked over, Osiris had met him before, but they weren’t really friendly fellows with each other. This guy had a personality problem or something, maybe he was autistic or just had shit skills for socializing, but he stood six foot three and was well built, brick jaw with a clean face, little beauty mark mole on his chin, though it didn’t do much to help the guy because he was actually quite ugly, with a non-symmetrical face, oversized hook-nose with hairs sticking out all over the place, and a fat, bushy blonde unibrow. Even his hair was messy and oddly balding in unordinary places. He didn’t have a receding hairline, he just had splotchy patches of thinning hair all over, it was weird. Osiris was pretty ugly too, so you’d think these guys would sympathize with each other, but not really. It was all business, they had no empathy, they were only concerned with their own methods of operation.
“Osiris Haggard, what a… surprise. What brings you down here to the docks today?” The man said. His name was Mason Grader, he sort of was the foreman of this place. Who told Mason what to do, that was beyond Osiris’ knowledge. Mason wasn’t Osiris’ boss or anything, he just sort of set him up with the ICE from the operation here, and Osiris took it from there, but above Mason, was scary territory, Osiris didn’t even want to know. He didn’t have to know, he wasn’t interested, in fact he was more interested in completely steering clear or that sort of information because he was already in way deeper than he wanted to be, with no clear cut way out. He was almost even relieved when Cop Thing aproached him about the whole thing, because he was already fearing for his life over the whole matter.
“Well, uh, Mason, I thought I would pay you a little visit and uh, you know, I’ve been spreading so much of the blue stuff that I thought you could hook me up with some more, you know, because It’s going so well,” Osiris said. Yes, that’ll work, Osiris thought.
“Really? Is that so? Ok, well we’ve got a lot of it here, a new shipment just arrived on the ship. You know that’s what I like to hear, you know what you’re doing, eh, Osiris?” Mason said. Was he serious? Osiris couldn’t tell. They were both testing each other.
“Oh, yeah, it’s going real splendid, people are buying this blue stuff all over the place,” Osiris said.
Mason looked tentative, rather suspicious, and rightly so because Cop Thing and Mike Trigger were plugging along in the air duct connected to the warehouse roof which dropped down and clung to the ceiling, leading all along from the center to the third floor catwalk office off to the side while this discussion was taking place.
When Cop Thing got to the end of the shaft, there was a metal grate door on the shaft opening, suspended above a computer room of the warehouse top floor office. He crouched there for a moment, inside the shaft, watching what was happening below, and listening intently. He could hear the murmur of the guards in the room, whatever they were doing, watching sports on TV or whatever. Every now and then a guy would walk underneath the grate and be actually in Cop Thing’s visual spectrum area, which was very limited being a vertical square pointed down covered in metal blinds.
“Alright, come this way,” Mason said, and led Osiris down a flight of gunmetal steps towards a conveyor belt full of ICE. He was aware Osiris knew what the shit was capable of, and he liked it in some kind of sadistic satisfaction type way. He wanted to load him up with plenty more to disperse with and congratulate himself on the endeavor. After all, that’s what these guys were supposed to be doing here. That was their job, that’s what they were paid to do. Good or bad, didn’t make no difference to Mason. To him it was, you got a job to do and you do it, doesn’t matter if it’s killing people, he couldn’t care less about that. He even liked it to some degree, it made him feel powerful. All these guys did was come to this warehouse everyday, just like any factory work in the history of factory work, get the product down the line and packaged, call it a day and come back the next day and do it all over again, and geerally if people asked they’d say they were in the “shipping and receiving” business.
“Ok, so what kind of vehicle you got today, Osiris, a spacious one I hope. What I’m getting at, is how much ICE you looking to lug out of here?” Mason said. It was a barbed question because clearly Osiris couldn’t tell him the truth. Christ in hell, was he on the cops side now? He didn’t like to think so but he didn’t like these suit bastards either. Wait a minute, was he the victim here? He put that thought out of his mind.
Don’t stray from the task at hand. Don’t be weak. Don’t show weakness. You bleed at all and these sharks are going to eat you alive in five fucking seconds.
“Ok, so we’ve got a whole nice whack of the blue stuff over here, and this stuff is good to go, like, good to go out the door, it’s actually good you showed up, because I was probably going to call you soon anyways,” Mason said.
Osiris nodded his head like uh-huh, uh-huh, sort of waiting for Cop Thing and Mike Trigger to do whatever it was the fuck they were going to do. How long could he play this charade for? I mean, it kind of worked because this is what he would have been doing anyways, but for now he had that extra sweat factor where when they found out he let the bats in the belfry, they were going to be right pissed off. Also he had to stall because if they all carried the blue stuff packages outside to load it up in Osiris’ vehicle, and then just see that he came in an undercover cop car, it was going to be game over.
It was good he had that snub nosed pistol in his ankle strap. Cop Thing and Mike Trigger never thought to frisk him down.
Cop Thing knew he was running out of time. He waitied for a guard to walk beneath the air vent cover, then knocked the grate out of the panel holder, which landed on then guards head below, then he dropped down out of the newly opened hole in the office ceiling, landed on the guy beneath him and squashed him with the grate over his head.
He did not know who the guard was, he did not care who he was, but he crushed him all the same because in his mind he was on the bad guys team and that was all that mattered.
So Cop Thing was standing on the squashed body of the man and there was another shocked guard in the room too, who upon seeing who he was up against, became extremely frightened, but it was too late, as Cop Thing grabbed the man, and put him in a rear-naked choke hold and then snapped his neck in one fluid motion, dropping the rag-doll corpse to the ground before the guard could make a sound. Mike Trigger dropped out of the hole in the roof after that, and they scooped up both the dead guards superior firepower, being MP5 sub-machine guns, and hid the bodies in a closet which was in the room.
✟
CHAPTER 22 – DISTRACTION BAIT
There were a lot of factory related sounds and background ambient noises creating an auditory void wall, where no one heard the grate get knocked out of the roof, or the guard get stomped under Cop Thing’s jump down from the air shaft, and the evidence of entry was neatly disposed of. Mike Trigger was squatted against the wall below the window of the office room, facing the inside of the warehouse. He raised his head and peered out the glass, so he could see the span of the whole building, surveying it. Cop Thing was hunched down too, hugging the wall.They had MP5 sub-machine guns in one hand and their pistols in the other. Cop Thing had his magnum, Mike Trigger had his well-worn berreta.
They could spy on the ground level Osiris talking to some guy in a suit and a bunch of other guys in suits packing and unpacking the blue stuff. There was a lot of ICE down there, this was more serious than they could have ever imagined, and it was happening right under their noses the whole time. Whoever was behind this was very well funded, this must go right to the top in terms of world power. The money-chain must be a whole creepy labyrinth full of trails. They knew it was connected to Gunmetal Poseidon, they just didn’t know who Gunmetal Poseidon was, exactly. They were just a symbolic entity. It seemed like a fantasy. It was like a corporation made up of ghosts.
What was the end goal with these guys? What were they planning?
It didn’t make sense for money, because whoever was behind this obviously had a lot of money already. Also, it didn’t make sense to waste your customer base with murder drugs if you wanted to keep making money off them. No, this was a far more insidious murder plan than that. Someone in this world was playing 4D Chess in a way in which Cop Thing and Mike Trigger couldn’t even fathom. That was way above their pay grade. It made Cop Thing feel like a pawn in a game he didn’t understand, being an interloper on this extreme realm of evil planning and excecution.
Cop Thing motioned to Mike to follow him, and they snuck along the catwalk crouching undetected, stealthily against the railing, which no one saw because they were all sort of dazed and distracted, lost in their own world of mundane activity. These henchmen weren’t passionate about this stuff, they were just doing it for a paycheque.
How could anyone be?
☣
Outside, the SWAT van rolled up on Wharf street and screeched to a grinding halt. The SWAT team flooded out of the back double-doors followed by Captain Phobus in the flank, like a wolfpack leader. He wasn’t wearing his SWAT helmet yet, like the others, as he stopped and absorbed the visual of the situation. There was a chainlink fence gate blocking the van from getting into the parking lot of the warehouse, but they could easily deal with that. They had a demolitions expert on their team. Captain Phobus didn’t hear any gunfire yet, that was a good sign, they wouldn’t be walking blind right into a free-for-all shitstorm.
The demo man ran over to the fence and placed some charges on either side, then he ran back and used a little tech-box with a handle on it with a bluetooth connection to the charge and pressed the handle down. The charges blew, popping the gate right off the hinges with a fireworks display of sparks, fire and smoke. The gate twirled and cartwheeled in the air, a cloud of thin smoke trailing behind, then it fell onto the pavement with a metallic fence-rattling sound and the SWAT team ran in in an expertly trained group formation, packing MP5s, flashbangs and grenades.
☣
“So, Osiris, let’s get you some bags of this blue stuff and we’ll get some of my boys to help you bring it out to the car,” Mason said.
“Oh, uhhh… Yeeah… You know what? That’s fine, don’t worry about it, you guys are really busy here, I can see that, anyone could see that, I can just do it myself, it’s no big deal,” Osiris said.
“Nonsense! There’s lots of us here, doesn’t hurt to help out,” Mason said.
“Yeah, yeah…” Osiris said, sweating, wiping his brow. He was picturing walking out there in the parking lot with a bunch of suit-clad gangsters with a bunch of bags of drugs to his car, and them all discovering it was a cop car, and how ridiculous that would be. It would almost be funny if they wouldn’t execute him right after that, which they would.
He gazed around, kind of freaking out inside. He thought of the snub-nosed pistol tucked into his pantleg around his ankle, but the little six-shooter wasn’t going to do him much good surrounded by dozens of these fuckers. He looked up to the second floor, searching, then higher to the third floor. He could see Cop Thing and Mike Trigger crouch-sneaking along the catwalk dual-weilding guns. Osiris’ eyes widened as he had a premonition of the gunbattle that was about to unfold. Maybe if he could just bide a little more time, he could live through this. He knew the moment to take a risk was almost upon him, and he prayed for his life to whatever God was listening.
He deserved this, he knew, he had done it to himself.
☣
Cop Thing wished his weapons had a silencer on them, because he was counting on being sneaky, but his magnum was loud as hell and the MP5 wasn’t going to lullaby any kids to sleep either. This whole warehouse was heavily packed with armed guards, mostly on the ground floor. He knew the shit was going to hit the fan eventually, real soon actually, probably, because it always did with Cop Thing and Mike Trigger, but he was trying to stall as long as possible for Osiris’ sake. Not that he had any sympathy for the lowlife bastard, but he cared about his own honour and ethics in the situation of using the guy as distraction bait.
☣
Captain Phobus, now wearing his SWAT gear helmet, pretty much ready to rock n’ roll, was leading the pack of SWAT cops outside the warehouse. Stalking the outside, they were creeping around and spying in the windows, remaining unseen, getting a good handle on where the Tangos were located inside.
Phobus could see Osiris, as he stood out in there compared to the rest of the guys in suits, because he had a yellow plaid suit on and the rest of the guys looked like they all had gift certificates to Moore’s on Boxing Day, except for the ones wearing the hazmat suits, that was just so extra it was so confusing and absurd. Except Phobus wasn’t a detective, he wasn’t here for answers, that was someone else’s job. He was here to fill some people full of lead, then call it a day.
CHAPTER 23 – TANGO DOWN
A couple guys in hazmat suits were loading up a wheelbarrow full of crystal-clear bags of ICE when a flashbang came rolling in the room, hit one of them in the foot and bounced off.
“What the fuck’s that?” He said, looking down, his voice muffled and lo-fi from inside the mask of his hazmat suit. The flashbang exploded, blinding and deafening everyone in the vicinity with a heinous high-pitched tinnitus ringing in the ears, including Osiris.
Everyone on the ground floor, which was most of the horde of gangsters, were momentarily incapacitated, stumbling around with their guns swinging, knowing something had gone horribly wrong, but unable to do anything about it in the confused and shrouding deaf white blindness of the panic-stricken situation.
That’s when Phobus and the SWAT team kicked in the door and started burst-firing MP5 shells
into the men in suits, who were then getting riddled with bullets, blood splattering everywhere in red exploding geysers, not knowing where to return fire.
The hazmat guys weren’t even packing weapons and they were getting shot too, simply for being present. One of them took a bullet through the plastic face-cover of his mask and the mask sprayed wet-red from the inside. The limp, rag-doll body flailed face first onto a moving conveyor belt in front of him and was carried down the line in a pile of ICE soaked in a growing pool of blood.
Osiris pulled out his snub-nosed pistol and dropped to the ground, rolling under a table for cover, which was a smooth move because he couldn’t see, but he had a vague spacial-awareness sense the table was there from prior memory.
Then smoke grenades started going off.
Now the entire factory floor was filled with smoke and a bunch of blind, deaf guys flailing desperately, wild with horror, while the SWAT team stormed further inside the perimeter shooting them.
Cop Thing and Mike Trigger ran down the flight of steps in an alcove on the side of the wall, stopping on the second floor abruptly where Cop Thing encountered a surprised and terrified guard. Cop Thing immediately grabbed the guy by the collar of his suit with both hands and flung him over the railing. Screaming, the man did a somersault tumbling through the air from the force of the throw, disappearing in the cloud of smoke which engulfed the bottom floor, presumably falling to his death.
Cop Thing reached the bottom floor, followed by Mike, witnessing the chaos and mayhem from off to the side, protected by machinery and walls from the random blind fire.
One gangster in a suit stumbled out of the smoke and bullet-fire void, coughing, tears dripping out of his eyes, waving his MP5 around, ignorantly pointed at Cop Thing.
Cop Thing devolved into fight or flight mode, and chose fight.
He grabbed the guy by the back of the head and slammed it face down into a pile of the ICE on a moving conveyor belt, then held it there in a savage and cruel display of power for several seconds.
Also, it was probably the largest rail of drugs ever consumed.
The guy must have inhaled a lot of ICE while he was struggling to breath because, screaming and gasping, he suffered an instant overdose and his heart exploded out of his chest several seconds later while he was flailing his arms around, blood spraying all over Mike Trigger, who tried to shield himself from the gaping chest wound geyser with his arms, but was thoroughly soaked in disgusting blood. The guy collapsed while Cop Thing and Mike were standing over this literally heartless pathetic loser on the ground.
“Whoa…” Mike said, shocked, covered and dripping with another man’s blood.
Cop Thing didn’t respond. The smoke was clearing and the gangsters’ hearing and eyesight were fading back. The only trouble with the smoke grenades was the SWAT team couldn’t see either. So now there was a bunch of gangsters, many of them dead or dying, Osiris Haggard hiding beneath a table, an entire SWAT team, and Cop Thing and Mike Trigger in the same room as the smoke dissipated.
Mason Lewis had managed to squirm his way off to the side and was hobbling up the stairs with a bullet in one shin. He had a Desert Eagle in one hand as he retreated, fretting for shelter. A few more guards were on the second floor who had managed to avoid the maelstrom of the initial attack, armed with AK-47s, they began firing from the high-ground vantage point at the SWAT cops phantasmal silhouettes in the dissipating smoke. The cops took cover behind some machinery and crates and began countering fire by sporadically leaning out from cover and firing bursts, interspersed with plain guess-firing around the corner without popping their heads out.
The bottom floor was littered with corpses, blood splatters and gore, strewn all over the conveyor belts, crates and machinery. One hazmat suit man, who was unarmed, climbed up into the nearby forklift and started the ignition, the key was already in the thing, then he courageously drove the vehicle kamikaze-style straight at a group of the SWAT cops, ducking down behind the hull of the forklift while they pummeled it with gunfire. The driver leaped out of the speeding, charging vehicle and rolled out of the way while the forklift impaled one of the cops in the abdomen with the dual-fork spears and crushed him against the wall, pinning him there standing dead.
The hazmat guy was crawling on the ground, scrambling for safety and came face to face with Osiris Haggard, who prompty shot the guy in the shoulder with his snub-nose pistol, badly wounding him, and then shot him a few more times for good measure when the first blast didn’t kill him.
Mike Trigger was unloading gunfire at the AK-47 sharpshooters on the second floor catwalk, catching one of them in the abdomen. The man stumbled backwards firing wildly into the air with the AK, head pointed to the sky, yelling in pain and aggressive frustrated hatred. Mike managed to shoot him again in the right eyeball and then in the forehead right after that creating a combo-chain of explosive gunshot wounds that blew up the guys head and the decapitated body collapsed in a heap, next to the other gangster with the other AK-47, who was screaming some primal war cry surrounded by sheer bloody horror and intense violence.
Cop Thing was back on the second floor catwalk now, taking cover in the alcove, peeking around the corner at this lone maniac ripping AK-47 fire on the entire squad of SWAT cops, pinning them down with suppressing fire.
Mason Grader used his Desert Eagle to blast out a window and leapt from the second floor of the warehouse outside into a dumpster, crash-landing ungracefully in a pile of garbage, then he climbed out and hobbled across the parking lot towards one of the black vans parked outside, dripping a trail of blood out of his leg as he went.
Cop Thing witnessed this and wasn’t going to let him get away with that, he knew the guy must be the leader because he recognized him as the one talking to Osiris that he saw earlier when him and Mike were in the office. Cop Thing ran across the catwalk towards the sharpshooter who was ducked behind a crate there now and reloading, the SWAT team was having a brief respite and reloading as well.
Cop Thing charged over to the gangster on the catwalk, not even trying to be silent and stealthy anymore, his heavy footsteps were creating a loud metal clang as he approached the antagonizer. The gangster popped up behind the crate and began unloading his fresh clip into Cop Thing’s hulking frame. His carapace burst red, glowing and growing spikes out of his arms and his back and his head as he took the damage, absorbing the bullets, the mutant skin swallowing them, chewing them up and spitting them out again, then sealing the wounds. Cop Thing took all of this, much to the gangster’s surprise and more importantly terror, then Cop Thing clutched the man by the neck, knocked the AK-47 out of his hands with his free hand, and proceeded to chokeslam the guy off the balcony over the railing. The man fell helpless and smashed on a crate below, then a bunch of SWAT guys ran up and shot him repeatedly together with machine guns while he was laying in a pile of splintered wood and ICE bags on the ground.
Cop Thing ran over to the window that Mason Lewis had shot out and escaped out from and saw Mason getting into a black van and peeling out of the parking lot.
Cop Thing could not let that happen.
These other guys could deal with the situation inside, it was pretty well finished anyways, they had won, except this guy was getting away and he was the key to the whole endeavor, he could just sense it. So he jumped out of the window into the dumpster, his heavy weight bumping it against the ground, making a loud reverberating metallic crash, then he launched himself over the edge and began running after the van. He stopped and started unloading the MP5 at the back of the van, polluting it with bullets, sparks flying everywhere. One of the bullets blew up the back left tire and the back corner of the van fell and became handicapped with one tire limp and flapping against the ground as the hubcap fired off sparks from the friction with the concrete.
The van was still rolling out of the front gate and down the street, but slower and louder. Cop Thing ran to the incognito cruiser, got in, jacked the key and revved the engine, then pushed the pedal to the metal, following the black van in hot pursuit out into the street.
Traffic was rough as it was almost rush hour, regular people were starting to leave work and make their commutes home for the day. Cop Thing wasn’t regular people. He chased down the injured black van as it struggled to drive, swerving from side to side on the road. Mason Lewis managed to get enough control to steer the thing onto the Neo-Gulf Street Bridge.
CHAPTER 24 – NEO-GULF STREET BRIDGE
✇
It was easy to catch up to Mason’s black van, because the back wheel was blown out, and the van was skidding all over the road, smoking and swerving in-between traffic, trying unsuccessfully to get ahead and outrun Cop Thing. The opposite was happening, Cop Thing caught up to him quick and they were driving side by side on the Neo-Gulf Street Bridge, Cop Thing used the automatic button on his driver’s door control panel to lower the passenger seat window. Mason was struggling for his Desert Eagle, but it was impossible to drive the out-of-control vehicle and aim properly at the same time. Cop Thing took the initiative and shot out the front left tire of the black van with his Magnum from behind the wheel. He considered just blasting Mason but the little voice of conscience and reason piped up inside his head, reminding him to stop killing all the suspects who might be able to tip them off with the necessary information they were looking for, chiefly the whereabout of the Gunmetal Poseidon headquarters and ICE labs was what Cop Thing really want to know.
Mason’s van completely lost control, and he desperately pulled a u-turn, almost flipping the van, instead driving straight into the side railing of the bridge headfirst, crashing the car, cracking the windshield and destroying the engine, which blew a gasket and started spurting smoke from under the now bent and mangled hood. The engine was exposed and some electrical sparks burst into flames, starting a fire. It’s a good thing Mason was wearing his seatbelt. The airbag popped out of the compartment inside the steering wheel, blew up fast, punching Mason in the face and squishing his head against his seat. He managed to squeeze his way out the door, leaving a blood stain smear on the airbag, face bloodied, leg lame, and he started limping down the sidewalk on the bridge outside of the car. The other drivers on the bridge were honking and shouting obscenities, the classic example of road rage, as there wasn’t much space on the four lane bridge, and the slightest delay tended to really piss people off when they were driving, even if it was special circumstances like a high-speed car chase crash involving a celebrity cop monster, like this was.
A BCNN news helicopter was flying overhead, filming and televising the scene below, warning the public to stay away from the Neo-Gulf Street Bridge for the time being. The helicopter must have been just cruising along for a regular traffic report, then they really got a story when they saw this as it was now hovering around in circles, thirsty for action, capturing it on camera and sharing it on TV.
The spontaneous mayhem was good for the ratings.
Then the broken down van exploded and the flaming wreckage drifted back into the street and was blocking traffic, sending a huge cloud of black smoke into the air. The blastwave knocked Mason forward face down on the ground and bits and pieces of slag and scrap metal flew in random directions, dealing damage to the other cars around on the bridge.
Mason managed to approach a car that was stuck in the newly formed traffic jam caused by the commotion. He pointed his gun at the windshield where what appeared to be a mother and son were in the drivers seat and passenger side respectively.
“Get out of the goddamn car! Right now, lady!” Mason said waving his pistol at them and motioning with it to the side to further explain his point with body language, that he was about to commit an act of grand theft auto and hijack the car. It was a Honda CRV, deep emerald coloured. The little boy looked terrified and did as he was told, so did the woman and they abandoned the vehicle and ran off to the side of the street, taking cover behind some other cars that were struggling to move at a snails pace amidst the wreckage on the road. Cop Thing was almost upon Mason now as he was getting into the CRV. Mason lifted his gun, his arm protruding between the open door and the body of the car, and blasted Cop Thing with the full clip. All six bullets remaining of the large caliber gun connected and the damage was so great it actually knocked Cop Thing back and onto the ground with gaping holes in his chest and abdomen. Mason got in the car, slammed the door and hit the gas, accelerating fiercly, running over Cop Thing while he was on the ground. It didn’t completely squish him, it was more like the car brutally bounced over him like some kind of savage monstrous speed-bump, tearing the fender off the front of the car, damaging the whole underside chassis and knocking the muffler loose which dangled along blowing sparks off the ground behind the car as it sped off. Mason kept driving, weaving in and out of the confused and slow moving cars that were strewn all over the bridge, but he couldn’t fully escape because the road was so blocked off by other people’s cars, and he couldn’t get out and run because his leg was fucked up.
Cop Thing lay on the ground, not moving, tire marks across his chest and head. Concerned onlookers approached him. The little boy whose mother’s car was just stolen came up to Cop Thing. He was wearing a little cap with a propeller on it.
“Hey, are you ok, Cop Thing?” The little boy said.
Cop Thing didn’t answer. He wasn’t moving and barely breathing.
“You can’t die, Cop Thing, you just can’t! You’re my hero,” The little boy said. His mother came over and knelt down, observing the damage done.
“Come on, Billy, it’s not safe,” She said.
Cop Thing’s red slits for eyes appeared out of the folds of his face and peered at Billy. Then his mouth appeared and he gave a sly smile, big yellow teeth showing and lifted a thumbs up to Billy. He slowly got to his feet. Cop Thing took the propellor cap off the little boy, scruffed up his hair affectionately with the palm of his hand, then put the cap back on his head and moved on.
It wasn’t over.
Mason was semi-trapped in the conglomerated maze of cars because traffic was so disrupted no one was really using the basic right and left lane rules properly anymore, it was anarchy, and there was a flaming car wreck in the middle of the road. Sirens from the fire truck could be heard getting closer, but it was all amidst a lot of other honking, screaming, and general havoc and just seemed to fit right in.
The BCNN news helicopter was catching all of this, and the reporter on the scene was probably going to get a promotion for this scoop.
Normally, Teddy Malone was just the regular everyday traffic report guy at BCNN, now he had a bird’s eye view of a whole Cop Thing episode. Calling out the action on live TV into his headset like a wrestling announcer, Teddy was updating the BCNN audience by the second of what was happening to Cop Thing below.
This could be Teddy’s big break.
The helicoper even got closer and hovered above the bridge so they could get a better look, there was a pilot, a cameraman and Teddy inside, and they were all quite excited to be witnessing this exhibit.
Mason managed to force the CRV through a blockade of cars, honking at them at bashing them with the bumper of the vehicle. Cop Thing was back on his feet running now and now it was his turn to commandeer something. Except he was going to be more polite about it. He boldly walked up to a Mazda Prestige and held his badge up to the driver.
“Oh, no, no, no, you don’t, I just worked all day, Cop Thing, I ain’t got time for this, I’ve got a date tonight,” The thin bearded hipster in the car said.
“Take a rain check,” Cop Thing said and physically tossed the guy out of the car with minimal effort then got behind the wheel and screeched out chasing down Mason’s CRV. They both made it past the cars blocking the way on the bridge through the opening Mason had forcefully created, it was like a bumper cars at the small town fair with a bunch of confused, inept and aggressive kids driving, but both Mason and Cop Thing managed to alpha their way through.
There was going to be some serious paperwork going on at the automotive insurance office at the end of this, but that didn’t concern Cop Thing one bit.
Speeding along, he tailed Mason right off the opposite end of the Neo-Gulf Street bridge, traffic was lesser now because there was obviously something no one wanted to be involved in going on, also fire truck sirens were nearing so even the cars that weren’t on the bridge were pulled over, clearing the road. Then the fire truck appeared surprisingly over the hump of a hill that wasn’t immediately visible upon driving up it and Mason was speeding so he was forced to take a desperation swerve to avoid getting obliterated and crashed through a chainlink fence into an industrial area gravel pit. Cop Thing had to swerve out of the way of the fire truck too and pursued Mason into the newly unlocked gravel pit. There were bulldozers and a wide array of heavy crushing equipment, mountains of gravel and larger boulders, s smokestack and a crane skyscraper with a ladder in the middle of the metal-skeleton bars it was build out of, dump trucks, graders and a building under construction that was really just the basic iron framework so far.
There were also mysteriously a bunch of men in suits that happened to look a lot like the guys at the warehouse perched on vantage points around the compound, as well as some construction workers.
Are you fucking kidding me? Is this real? These guys are everywhere, Cop Thing thought. Then he darted out of the car and hid in the building under construction, at least the first floor was semi-built with wooden walls and ceiling so he was able to disappear in there momentarily and take cover. He felt like he had taken enough bullets and physical punishment for the day, so he rescinded to the path of least resistance, the stealth path.
Use the element of surprise.
Then he thought, maybe he was led in here on purpose, maybe it was a trap. Maybe Mason knew there was backup for him him here and he wasn’t just swerving out of the way of that oncoming fire truck. It was a disturbing thought. Cop Thing’s usual overconfidence was waning, he didn’t know how much more more abuse his carapace could take today without a chance to recharge. Oh my god, could he die today? It didn’t seem so impossible anymore. He didn’t feel so invincible anymore.
The BCNN helicopter had followed them from the bridge and was stalking the skies above the gravel pit like a predatory bird hungry for a winning news scoop. They were getting after it.
An alarm went off like an air-raid siren in the dirt and rock laden compound. Some of the suit gangsters unloaded some guns from crates and were carrying M4 carbines now, Cop Thing noticed, spying out of the un-built openings in the under-construction wooden walls.
The civvy construction workers had taken a hiatus because of all of this, scattering and vacating the presmises for whatever new this new battlefield was that was about to unfold. They did not get paid enough for this shit.
Cop Thing slid some new bullets into his Magnum, as it was nearly empty. His will and vitality came back to him, he wasn’t prepared to lose, but that didn’t mean he still couldn’t. It was nice when he had Mike Trigger and an entire SWAT team on his side, now he was alone and worn-down, but his determination remained, and in his experience, often times that was the most important part.
☠
CHAPTER 25 – CRUSHING EQUIPMENT
Mason Grader ran up the wooden steps of a portable foreman’s office off to the side in the rock quarry and into the open door. There was a huge muscular construction worker in there, dressed in blue jeans, a grey tank-top, an XXL Class 2 Hi-Vis safety vest and a hard hat. The guy’s head was basically a flesh rectangle, sharp-angle jawline, clean shaven with little beady eyes and a crooked nose. He looked more like a barbarian gladiator who just busted out of a Siberian gulag than a construction worker.
“Fuckin’ Cop Thing’s here, the pigs fuckin’ stormed the warehouse, killed everyone. I think I’m the only one who got away, holy shit, he’s here, he’s in the fuckin’ compound!” Mason said. The construction leader opened a crate full of grenades and picked up a Savage Scout, which was laying on his desk beside a computer and a bunch of architectural blueprints. It’s a good thing the safety inspector never came around here because there was actually a whole bunch of weapons sitting around in what appeared from outside to be just a plain construction site, but the gate was locked and no one had any reason to search the place, or if they did have a reason, they wouldn’t have the guts or the ill-sense to try, because these people would probably have them pinned at the bottom of the ocean with their feet tied to cement blocks the same night.
Mason had met this big guy before, a few times. They had dual operations going on and were kind of tandem leaders of each one, he didn’t know him that well, but they both got their cheques signed by Gunmetal Poseidon, and he knew the guys name was Ivan Jakov.
“Where is he?” Jakov said, stalwart. This alarming update information didn’t seem to intimidate or scare him one bit.
“I don’t know exactly, he’s out there in the fucking rock quarry, hiding or something, I shot the motherfucker six times and ran him over with a car and he just got up again, commandeered a car and chased me down. He’s like the fucking terminator or something!” Mason said.
“I enjoy a challenge. I used to fight in Serbian hardcore street fights in the backrooms of old underground World War Two bunkers with an audience of bloodthirsty rich men and their wives. I was a champion once, but those days are long since past. It excites me to have the opportunity to test my might once more, and prove to myself, I’m worthy of the title of champion,” Jakov said.
“Ok, good, well fuckin’ better start now, ’cause this guy’s fucking bad as fuck!” Mason said.
Jakov tossed Mason a pump-action shotgun that was also on the desk.
“12-guage shells are in the drawer,” Jakov said.
Cop Thing was lurking in the shadows inside the bare-bones built building, recollecting himself, thinking, but trying to not overthink. He didn’t have time for that. The bottom line was, he could only take so much damage in one day before recharging with food and rest, and he may be dangerously close to depleting his health reserve. Also, he was severly outnumbered and outgunned, but not outclassed, or at least that’s what he liked to think.
Mason and Jakov exited out of the portable, holding the guns and Jakov had a belt strewn acoss his chest decorated with a bunch of frag grenades strapped to it. One of the suit gangsters ran up to them from behind the portable and stopped beside the wooden staircase beneath them, talking up at them, “Cop Thing’s in the building, I saw him go in there, you guys got a good plan for this? I don’t wanna die today, it’s fucking Cop Thing man, we’re gonna get our fucking shit pushed in,” The coward said.
“That’s completely the wrong attitude, you need to rearrange that attitude, also, you ain’t going nowhere or I’ll shoot you myself, you pathetic weakling. So you gotta pick whose team you’re fucking on right now,” Jakov said. These guys were really not very nice, not even to each other.
The BCNN news helicopter started to really annoy Jakov, like having some stern babysitter looming overhead, watching everything you were doing and tattle-taling on you. It occurred to him to shoot the thing down, but that was going to be so unnecessarily heavily heat-score they were going to have the entire NVPD on their asses in no time, if they weren’t already, which they probably were, because obviously this whole thing was getting aired on the news, plus murdering people on TV in Neo-Vancouver was sort of bad canon lately.
This isn’t what Jakov thought the day was going to be like today, not by a country mile, but in some sick twisted lost-glory kind of way, he was sort of thrilled by it. So he let them fly, for now.
“Kyle, Fionn, come over here!” Jakov called out to some of the cronies in suits. Apparently they took orders from him, as they obediently ran over, carrying silenced M4 carbines.
“Cop Thing’s hiding in the building somewhere, I want you to take a squad in there and kill him,” Jakov said.
“Cop who?” Kyle said.
“Cop Thing, you know, that monster Cop who’s on the news all the time,” Jakov said.
“I don’t watch TV,” Kyle said.
“Ok, well he’s famous, he’s on the news all the time and people talk about him all the time, what do you live under a rock or something?” Jakov said.
“Is that some kind of sick metaphor or something, because I work in a rock quarry?” Kyle said. Fionn shook his head, like he couldn’t believe the stupidity of his colleague, even though he wasn’t any nobel prize winner either.
“No, it’s a fucking figure of speech, now get in there and flush this guy out like the dirty rat that he is!” Jakov said.
“Well, what are you going to do?” Kyle said.
“What do you mean, what am I going to do? I’m going to hang back here and wait for you guy to do your job. I’m the general here, you don’t see General Patton walking at the front lines getting gunned down like cannon-fodder by the enemy right away because he’s the fucking general, he’s more important, he needs to survive,” Jakov said.
“You sayin’ we ain’t important?” Fionn said.
“Pretty much! Yes, that’s what I’m fucking saying! Now get in there before I fuckin’ shoot you myself!” Jakov said. They had no reply to this and took their chances with Cop Thing. Without their master, who knew what they were going to do in this world. They certainly did not. Pus they needed those paycheques, that’s why they were here in the first place, so it wouldn’t do at all to go burning bridges with their employer right now, but this wasn’t in their job description. Standing around all day in a perfectly safe rock quarry with a nice safe gun for close encounters nearby and scrolling on their phones was basically what was in their job description, and these guys liked it that way.
Simple, safe, easy, and it pays well.
Actually, they thought they had it all pretty well figured out, it was a pleasure cruise on the gravy train. A nice cash-cow job, hell, you didn’t even have to get up that early. All you gotta do is put on a suit, show up, clock in and put in your eight hours and get paid, you barely even have to do any work, then go home and eat a steak and mashed potatoes, like kings of the modern world.
So, under duress, Kyle and Fionn led a squad of suit-clad gangsters and tentatively moved towards the foundation building frame. They didn’t want to do it, but they had to, which wasn’t the best for their fake warlord motivation, because they were more concerned with saving their own skins than taking down Cop Thing. If it were up to them, they’d just run away, but it wasn’t up to them, it was up to Jakov.
So goes the hierarchy of employment, except with these guys, it was a life and death situation now, but they took it for granted that it wasn’t in the past, wasting away each day getting a smooth and easy paycheque, they couldn’t just quit and walk now, because they’d get shot execution style by Jakov or Mason, or both, not like if you worked at Burgers Queen.
Their worst problem historically was being bored, not really doing anything relevant everyday until duty called when the odd freak occurrence that something obscene might happen, and their bodyguard services were actually needed, which tragically happened to be this God-forsaken day. Boredom wasn’t an issue anymore, now that they were beside themselves with fear, an underrated upside to fear.
It felt like going into a labyrinth knowing damn well the minotaur was in there, and that the minotaur seriously kicked ass and was also borderline invincible.
Fionn was quivering with fear as they approached the dark entrance to the tunel system of the unfinished halls. The building was dug deep into the ground by excavator machines and was surrounded by rubble and boulders. He wanted a beer. He wanted a cigarette. He wanted his mother. He wanted to be anywhere but here. Kyle was holding it together a little better, maybe he just didn’t have the intelligence or sophistication to realize how much danger he was actually in at the moment. Being dumb had it’s advantages.
☠
“Come on out, Cop Thing, you stupid shit! We fuckin’ know you’re in there! Just come out and surrender and make this easy for everyone. Otherwise, we’re gonna have to hunt your ass down and fuck you up!” Kyle yelled into the cavernous, creepy dark halls. It was big-talk that really had no basis in reality, and the tone of his voice didn’t reflect the macho bravado of his words. His voice was squeaking and weak, trembling. Jakov was watching from the steps of the portable. So was Mason. Jakov held the Savage Scout sniper rifle, aiming with the scope. Spying on the windows and openings in the complex. Occasionally he could see a flutter of a shadow of a monstrous silhouette stalking around in there.
Kyle, Fionn, and a squad of five other gangsters who generally felt the same way – scared as hell – entered the building foundation. It was like starting a game of Chess versus a guy who you knew was way better than you, and it was just a matter of tie before you were watching yourself lose.
Except these guys weren’t just going to lose, they were going to die.
Once inside, Fionn sort of assumed the command position out of necessity, someone had to do it. He was scared, but that’s when the courage counts, so he sucked it up and acted like he had some balls, a respectable endeavor. He was directing the squad with his hands, motioning in all directions, pointing where he wanted them to go. They obeyed. The command chain had degenerated from Jakov to Fionn, someone had to lead in this situation, and damned if any of these other guys were going to do it. The trouble was, they weren’t really passionate about their jobs. Now that they actually had to do it when it counted, they were sorely unprepared.
The BCNN helicopter was reporting all of this on TV. Teddy was ecstatic. He was going to rise to fame and maybe even get his own talk show for this awesome scoop. That was his hope, and his dream. Maybe this could be the spark that ignited the fire of the star he wished he was destined to become.
Teddy was rooting for Cop Thing, all the BCNN guys in the helicopter were.
Jakov was getting more and more aggravated with the chopper, like an annoying fly that wouldn’t go away and kept landing on your face while you were trying to concentrate.
There was a Scorpion Rocket Launcher in the portable with seeking missiles that were actually steerable from a little display screen on the side of the weapon. It was a tube shaped weapon with a pistol-grip handle that looked like a fat sniper rifle except instead of a sniper scope it had a little HUD that flipped out the side. You could steer the barbed missle with your finger on the touch screen, which had a video display view from the front of the rocket, directing exactly where it went.
Jakov was seriously considering blowing these guys’ asses out of orbit just for the sheer irritation factor of their presence. Plus, they were obviously televising this whole thing, so now the cops were going to be on their way to the rock quarry to back up Cop Thing.
Was this the end? Were they irrevocably busted now?
Reality started to sink in. The fear started to take hold. None of these guys came to work this morning prepared for battle. Even in the epic famous war battles, you knew what to expect that day when you got up at first light, knowing there was going to be a bloodbath and you were almost certainly going to die. You had some time to mentally prepare, and pray. How many of the sorry sons of bitches on the opposing force could you take down before that happened?
A classic motivation. Plain old human hatred, it never got old, and it never got solved, and it never improved. Not even close.
“That helicopter is pissing me off!” Jakov said.
“I know! It’s like a goddamn buzzard, it’s been following me ever since I was on the bridge, fucking news junkies won’t give up,” Mason said.
“The pigs will be here soon, they’re ruining everything! It’s like an eye in the sky, they can see the whole thing on TV!” Jakov said. Masons shin squirted a shot of blood out and he groaned.
“Should we waste them? Let’s fight fire with fire,” Mason said. Jakov was hesitating on the option for extreme force, but now it was starting to seem like if they didn’t hit and hit hard right now, they were going to get steamrolled by the entire NVPD, and he didn’t like having the whole operation under visual scrutiny for everyone watching on TV. Plans began to change real fast at that point. It was time to send a serious message. Self-preservation and an escape route rapidly became a priority issue. There were cars in the compound other than the CRV and the Prestige that had stormed in the gate. They could high-tail it out of dodge right now, but that was coward stuff. Jakov didn’t win street fighting championships in WWII bunkers in Siberia just to turn tail and run away like a total трусиха now. He walked back inside and got the Scorpion, then came out again, having juxtaposed feelings about the whole thing. It was time to go over the edge, and there would be no coming back.
His whole life had led up to this crucial moment, yet he was completely unaware it would ever come. Jakov lifted the Scorpion and pointed into the air, the BCNN helicopter was circling around sucking up the whole scene on prime-time.
But not for long, Jakov thought.
He flipped the HUD screen out of the Scorpion and pulled the trigger after a few more seconds of careful consideration. He knew after he pressed that button, there was no going back. You wouldn’t be able to say “Sorry, it won’t happen again,” about that one.
The missile burst out of the tube chassis and sailed through the air, screeching like a banshee. Jakov used his pointer finger on the HUD like a mouse-pad on a laptop and guided the missle towards the helicopter, which was hovering idle in the air.
The BCNN guys were totally focused on the story involving Cop Thing and the squad of gangsters who were enclosing in on him at that moment, completely oblivious to the fact that the two headmasters on the ground were actually plotting their deaths during that time. Teddy was busily updating the action into the BCNN microphone while the cameraman filmed the ground level action. As it appeared on TV, the gangster squad was entering the construction building facility from a birds-eye view.
The sound of the screeching banshee blast from the Scorpion was so loud they could actually hear it from inside the helicopter, amidst the ambient traffic sounds and sirens. The air-raid siren from inside the compound had stopped now since Mason had confronted Jakov in the portable.
Teddy was on the mic, overly excited about his big break situation, when he heard the rocket-fire and glanced up momentarily, seeing the missle sailing through the air with a trail of fire and smoke behind it, heading straight for the helicopter.
Teddy’s last words were, “Oh! Fuck!” as the missile scooped upwards through the air and imploded into the bottom of the helicopter, blowing the whole thing up in an extravaganza of billowing fire and carnage debris. The propellor ceased to function as the aerial vehicle was totalled and the flaming black wreckage fell out of the sky. Teddy’s flaming body flew out the window screaming from the force of the shockwave. He wasn’t quite dead yet, just horribly burned and scarred and on fire, then he landed on a bed of vertical rebar and his flaming body was skewered in multiple places and the impaled corpse just lay there, not even touching the groun
It was a shame for BCNN, because that would have been good for the ratings, if anyone of the newscasters was still alive to film it, Mason thought cryptically. The flaming helicopter wreck landed on the top of the first floor of the under-construction building in which Cop Thing and the squad of gangsters hunting him down were currently inhabiting.
The impact of the heap of smoldering, burning scrap metal landing on the roof of the facility shook the whole ground floor, sending a wave of dust trailing down from the roof inside the complex, creating an even more dismal and hard to see atmosphere. Cop Thing used this opportunity to his advantage and emerged from the shadows like a spectre behind Fionn and grabbed him, covering his mouth with his hand and yanking him back into the shadows, where only a sickening crack sound was evidence of Fionn’s fate. Now Cop Thing had an M4 Carbine, which had a silencer on it, and a magnum, which was convenient, because he was planning on dispersing with these low level goons silently anyhow.
“Nice fuckin’ shot,” Mason said, admiring the blazing bonfire sight of the destroyed BCNN helicopter, “Put that on the fuckin’ five o’ clock news!” he said laughing.
It was actually, but it appeared from the grim perspective of the BCNN cameraman as just a horrific last gasp and then a fiery engulfing explosion. Then the camera cut out to glitch, because it was completely destroyed, but the footage went straight to TV, and a lot of people actually saw that mesmerizing example of violence and horror. Neo-Vancouver was getting a reputation for having the most insane reality TV lately. Not reality TV like the competative shows with good looking people where they cooked against each other or ate bugs in a race or something. Actual reality TV horror. The kind of stuff people really wanted to watch, but no one would ever admit, because that would be taboo and evil.
At this rate, Neo-Vancouver was going to become the most popular city in the world, not because it was the most desirable place to live, it was actually not, because it was really actually quite dangerous, unless you got off on that sort of thing, but because it had the most action-packed events on a regular basis for a modern city not at war.
☠
The police sirens could be heard coming towards them now, instead of away from them. Jakov was vaguely aware of this warning soundtrack of impending doom. Since the car chase out of the warehouse parking lot, Cop Thing and Mason had left an absolute trail of veritable mayhem.
“Let’s scram! Before the pigs get here! I got this far, I ain’t going down like this today!” Mason said to Jakov.
“You go, I will stay and fight. A captain does not abandon his ship when it’s sinking,” Jakov said.
“You got a fuckin’ death wish or something, bud? The cops are gonna flood through that gate any fuckin’ minute now and light this place up! Trust me, they ain’t fuckin’ around, I seen it with my own eyes. Plus fuckin’ Cop Thing’s in there too, swallow your pride man, let’s roll!” Mason said.
“You go,” Jakov repeated.
Two times told was good enough for Mason, he didn’t really have any stake in it if Jakov got through this alive or not, he wasn’t friends with the guy, he didn’t even like him, he was just a colleague, someone to take convenient shelter with, who happened to be in the vicinity when Mason was desperately pursued by a monster. Now he didn’t need him anymore.
Mason ran to the CRV, which was still running with the keys in it, then burned rubber out of the driveway and escaped down Neo- Gulf street in the stolen vehicle.
Jakov put down the Scorpion and picked up the Savage Scout, taking careful aim at the outside walls of the construction site building, scanning for Cop Thing. He was hyper-focusing amidst the flames and sirens and all the peripheral distractions in the quarry. He saw a big brown muscular Thing move out of the darkness for a split-second and fired. Inside, the bullet passed through the unfinished window opening and ricocheted off the wall beside Cop Thing, puffing a jet-stream of dust out of the newly formed bullet hole in the concrete. Cop Thing did a spin-move as a knee-jerk reaction to this and came face to face with one of the gangsters horrified faces around the corner. The guy knew who Cop Thing was, he had seen him on TV before and pictures of him on the internet, like most people had with popular celebrities, but he wasn’t prepared for the sheer ugliness of what Cop Thing looked like up close. The hulking monster was completely lacking a face and instead just had fleshy folds like a curtain forming a sort of mountainside for a head with spikes protruding out of the top of it.
Cop Thing almost felt sorry for the guy, he was so pitifully outmatched. Then, about one second later, he remembered what he was doing and snapped back into reality, forfeited his empathy and promptly shot the guy burst-fire with the silenced M4 Carbine, tearing his stomach apart, intestines whipping out of the guys blasted hole where his abdomen used to be, strewn all around the dusty concrete floor as the guy screamed his last gurgling scream.
Another gangster came around the corner as this was happening, witnessed this torment, and started firing at Cop Thing, who flipped behind a concrete pillar for cover with quick agility. While having his back to the wall of the pillar, he lifted the M4 upside down beside his head, pointed it behind his back around the side of the pillar and fired a no-look burst in the opposite direction that he was facing. The bullets managed to snag the gangster in the leg and the crotch and the guy fell to his knees, sobbing and crying out in pain.
“Aw, God, man! You shot my dick off! Oh, fuck, my balls, too! You blew my dick and my balls off, Cop Thing! You stupid motherfucker! Oh, God no, no, no, no, no!” The guy cried out. He was so hopelessly in pain-shock and panicking, bleeding out from a gaping flesh wound in his crotch, he was unable to fire his weapon anymore or do anything else except writhe in anguish. Cop Thing rolled around the corner, aimed and shot the guy in the face, mercifully putting the guy out of his abysmally horrified misery.
Two more gangsters came running around the corner, saw Cop Thing on the far end of the completely undecorated room that was actual just concrete pillars on a rock floor with a wooden roof overhead, dim-lit, the ground covered in blood and a few dead bodies. That got the attention of the gangsters first, then they noticed Cop Thing and both started blasting the silenced M4s. Cop Thing returned fire with his M4, and the difference was, Cop Thing could absorb bullets. A horizontal line of bullet-spray from Cop Thing’s M4 cut both these guys in half leaving a rapidly synchronized trail of dust-smoke from the bullet-riddled, blood splattered concrete wall behind them, while he was getting shot as well. Cop Thing’s spikes were weakening now, not as fierce or large as they had been when he still had an ample amount of damage-reduction power left in his bodyshield. He made a mental note to take the extra effort to try to avoid getting shot anymore.
So now there were five gangsters down, two remaining somewhere in the complex, and the boss was outside armed with a rocket launcher, a sniper rifle and a bunch of grenades.
That’s when the SWAT van showed up and Captain Phobus and his team all jumped out of the back of the van, Mike Trigger too, swarming the compound through the open gate.
Jakov wasn’t going back to jail. He was prepared to die fighting before that ever happened again. So he started pulling the pins and lobbing granades at the SWAT team from the wooden portable steps, before he took cover inside the metal rectangle-shaped building. The cops managed to scramble out of the way, mostly, before the bombs started going off. The SWAT van was the first casualty, blowing off the ground and going up in flames from the rear end of the unit. Other SWAT guys’s were knocked down by the blast-chain but not seriously wounded. Jakov leaned out the door next and fired a Scorpion missile towards the oncoming opposing force which collided with the rocky ground and the explosion sent rubble and rocks flying everywhere like a super-frag grenade which shredded some of the SWAT team members, colliding with their heavy armour, kocking them downtaking them out of the action, which really pissed Captain Phobus off. Mike Trigger was hiding behind a rock mound, crouched, leaning up against it at an uncomfortable, jagged and awkward angle.
Mike peeked over the rocks at the open portable door, through the residual smoke that was smoldering off the blackened craters in the site ground. He looked over across the area and could see Phobus and his teammates crouched and covered behind a bulldozer, creeping forward.
They were closing in.
Jakov was out of missles and low on grenades. He was cornered with no exit and outnumbered. He knew this was his last stand.
If only he had simply not come to work that day. If only he had just done literally anything else, except be here at the moment this all started. Now it was too late and he was unable to escape, or to go back in time and do it differently. He had missed his chance. The pure frustration of being completely impotent in a situation was his sole nagging emotion at the time as he crouched in the portable near the door with the Savage Scout. He could lob a few more grenades out there, but would it really make any difference? Maybe he’d get one or two more of them, maybe he wouldn’t. It didn’t really matter anymore, there was so much carnage, would he even able to tell? This wasn’t really his fight in the first place. He was just disastrously in the wrong place at the wrong time. So he waited, and as the SWAT members closed in on his location, he pulled the pins of two grenades and held them with both hands. A line of SWAT cops moved single file up the wooden steps, took a quick glance around the corner of the door, looking inside, took one step inside and a huge explosion blew out the doorway, sending severed body parts flying off the platform, leaving the top of the doorway flaming, with a cloud of smoke billowing out from inside the portable.
When Phobus got in there, the whole inside of the portable was charred and maimed, burnt blood and toasted flesh lying in clumps all around, even stuck to the roof. There was nothing recognizable left of the bodies except a bunch of fried meat.
Cop Thing appeared out of the under-construction first-floor building, holding the magnum and the M4, walking through the dissipating, drifting smoke clouds towards Phobus and Mike Trigger.
“Nice of you boys to show up,” Cop Thing said.
It was over, for now.
☠
CHAPTER 26 – PROFESSIONAL COPS
Police Chief Phillips was sitting at his desk with his face buried in the palms of his hands. Cop Thing and Mike Trigger were sitting opposite him in his office. After a long time, Phillip’s lifted his head out of his hands and his bloodshot, stressed-out eyes were filled with the utter look of pained disbelief.
“Let me get this straight, you waltzed right up and kidnapped this guy, Osiris, without a warrant, made him bring you to a warehouse full of the blue stuff, then you walked right in there and killed all of the gangsters?”
“Yeah, that’s pretty much correct,” Cop Thing said, “I got impulsive.”
Phillips sighed, “And after that little slaughterhouse incident, you got in a high speed car chase across the Neo-Gulf Street Bridge, blew up a car on the bridge, creating the worst traffic jam, not to mention scaring the shit out of everybody, and the whole thing’s getting filmed and shown on BCNN, and you got the news guys killed too because they got blown out of the sky with a rocket launcher? Is that correct, too?” Phillip’s said.
“Ummm…. Yeah,” Cop Thing said.
“Jesus Christ, Cop Thing, how many times have we been over this?” Phillips said, while lighting a cigar, “The only reason I’m not taking your guys’ badges right now and throwing them in the garbage is that was a seriously important drug bust you managed to muster. There was a hell of a lot of ICE in there you stopped from making it onto the streets. So you got that going for you. You did something right. Other than that, that’s the most reckless and irresponsible police work I’ve ever seen. You’re letting your personal feelings get in the way of your duty. You can’t just go around making up the rules, doing whatever you want all the time. It’s called the law for a reason. You need permission for this kind of stuff, I shouldn’t have to tell you guys this, you’re professional cops,” Phillip’s said, paused, then went on “The other positive side is, that Osiris fellow was actually so useful with the tip-off and the info, I don’t even want to charge him with a felony. That took some big balls what he did. Amongst the cleanup of the warehouse, there happened to be a lot of evidence and paper trails explaining some of this Gunmetal Poseidon crap. I don’t understand it yet but we’ve got our best research guys working on it now. Looks like we might actually be able to nail these bastards. Plus, with that gravel pit catastrophe, it’s all connected. Those guys were working for Gunmetal Poseidon too. The only problem was, we couldn’t find any of the back-log information because the office got torched by that suicidal maniac. The computer and the paperwork all got burned in the fire, there was nothing left. Not to mention a bunch of the bomb took out a bunch of our good old boys in the process too, damn shame, damn fine men, and more of them are on life-support at the hospital. Men with families,” Phillips sighed, puffing on his cigar, then looked remorsefully out the blinds of the window at the grey rain drenched streets outside.
“You gonna blame me for that? They knew what they were getting into when they signed up to be cops,” Cop Thing said.
Mike Trigger kind of nodded his head in agreement.
“That may be so, but why does it it seem like you’re always the one connected to the massacres and the overuse of authority and force, Cop Thing? You too Trigger. Who do you think that comes down on when they’re looking for someone to blame? To complain about? To say you can’t do that and spear them with the responsibility? Me, that’s who. No, they don’t blame you Cop Thing, ’cause I’m your boss. I’m supposed to have the leash on you. You too, Trigger. I’m the Police Chief, and damn it, I’m held responsible for what you guys do out there. I warned you, and you just went ahead and did it anyways. Goddamn, boys, I can’t save face for this kind of stuff much longer, you hear me? Seriously, they’re going to burn me at the stake at City Hall if you keep up with this,” Phillips said.
“Ok, well do you want the case solved or not? This is the kind of opposition we’re up against. You saw it, these guys aren’t joking, they’ve got rocket launchers, bombs, a whole pharmeceutical mafia linked crime syndicate. They’re all over the place. It’s like a monopoly of evil out there. We had to fight back, otherwise we’re just gonna get walked all over like dollar stoor doormats, and I can’t deal with that. That’s not OK.” Cop Thing said.
Mike Trigger considered this and nodded his head in agreement.
Phillips kind of respected what Cop Thing just said too, but he didn’t like it. He was aware how jumbled it was out there in the field, and he wanted to see an end to this thing as much as anybody, but he was torn because he had to be the face of the NVPD, and the pressure, criticism and responsibility were getting soul-crushingly severe. The general public didn’t get to see the seedy underbelly of what the cops were up against, they only complained about the imperfections in the execution of the law enforcement, as if they could do it any better.
◍
CHAPTER 27 – MOTEL MOTEL
Mason Grader was standing in the Motel Motel, a creepy old dilapidated motel in the middle of nowhere on a mountainside road in the rocky mountains. He had stopped in some nothingplace small town and bought a costume, painted big white insect-like eyes onto it with some supplies from the art store, and disappeared from society into the foggy mountains, having ditched the stolen CRV on a dirt road where anyone was unlikely to find it for awhile, or know whose it was.
He hitchhiked into different towns on the way and ended up walking for hours until he came acoss the Motel Motel on a foggy, wind-storm night, where no one was staying except for him and the desk clerk, who seemed to be there 24/7.
The desk clerk was a disturbingly gaunt man with a red vest and a little blonde moustache, neatly combed and slicked back black hair frosted purple at the tips. He looked like a cartoon charicature of a butler with a white dress shirt and striped black and gray slacks. He was surprised to see Mason as they didn’t get many customers these days, in fact the Motel Motel had an eerie quality to it that was quite ominous, and it had a ludicrously redundant name which didn’t seem real, like the place itself.
It was like after Mason had gone through that traumatic experience involving the cops and his life got turned upside down, narrowly escaping, he had passed through some kind of dimensional portal of consciousness into an alternate reality. The bullet in his leg wasn’t helping either and it was extremely painful and excruciating to walk all the way that he had to, but some inner reserve of vitality sprung forth, he mustered the courage, the pain tolerance and patience to move forward. He tried to dig the bullet out with his fingers, but it was too deeply embedded and required some surgical tools. Driven mad with desperation, pain and frustration, something had changed inside of him, evolved even, and he was questioning his sanity.
Was anyone really sane? Who decided that? Was it THEM?
Was going to work everyday, in the way society deems necessary, to earn little pieces of coloured paper with dead people on them, or digits on a computer screen in a bank account sane? It was merely acting out an imposed role. Mason was starting to see things clearly now.
The hypocrisy. The unfairness. The forced willingness. It didn’t have to be this way. Not anymore. Not for him.
So he was in the room, pacing around, having suffered some quantum leap snap of personality, wearing an old brown, wrinkled, one piece pajama onesie, and a leather jacket. He had fashioned his own full-headed mask out of some elastic fabric from the fabric store of the same color, and he drank and read the bible in the Motel room alone for days.
There was a restaurant connected to the Motel Motel, a very small and sad one, with one phantasmal Chef and a Korean boy with one arm dishwasher as it’s lone staff, which was strange because there were virtually no other patrons that Mason ever saw, yet the kitchen was active anyways. Mason fed himself here, getting sustenance mostly from tomato soup and garlic cheesy bread, and moved to and fro from his room accordingly, going for walks down the long foggy road, sometimes losing himself in the mountainous forest landscape, but always making it back in time before the sun went down, so as not to get lost and starve or freeze to death.
There was a liquor store nearby on the road, close to the Motel Motel. Mason would visit here frequently and usually pick up vast quantities of Monkey Back beer cans and Firestorm Whiskey, which burned his throat, thoroughly living up to it’s appropriate name.
But he liked the burn, he enjoyed the pain. He had become a masochist, a self-destructive loner completely abandoning his former mentality. His personality was in tattered rags, with no way to put the tapestry of it all back together again in the same way.
And why would you want to?
He had gotten the bullet out of his leg with a switchblade and doused it in alchohol days after the wound had occurred. The festering, disgusting hole was about to get infected and was already puffy purple and crusty, coagulated blood plugging the hole and the shattered bone splints highlighting the blasted flesh. Miraculously, he managed to take care of it properly, and bandaged the grisly thing up with a first aid kit he borrowed from the front desk.
This was all a very intense experience for him and the post-action loneliness, drunkeness and utter solitude in the mountains had him wondering if he had actually gone completely bat-shit insane. He was pondering this in his room as he drank heavily and read the entire bible over a period of weeks. That was how he spent his time. He was wearing the costume the entire time. He had become the split personality. He had become his vice, and that’s what he call himself. Vice.
He would only wear the costume in the motel room, when he left he would change back into his regular clothes to go to the liquor store or the restaurant. Then he would return with a bunch of booze and change back into his Vice persona, get absolutely licked on alcohol, and read the bible. It was the only thing to do. There was no TV in the room.
There was a bathroom, a bed, a window peering out into the perpetually misty backwoods, and that was it. The carpet floor was crimson and the rest of the room had a beige motif, walls and darkened wooden doors. In fact the entire Motel Motel had a beige motif, and other weird things that seemed wildly suspicious, like a pool that was completely empty, dark, abused and dirty in the main courtyard area of the double-floor Motel.
Ever since Mason had hobbled up that mountain road in an epic effort for survival, the fog had permeated the location unstoppably. It was like a fixture of the area, like they were living in a cloud. But he was so drunk and in his own head all the time, he was sort of living as though the sparse other people around in the Motel didn’t really matter. It didn’t matter if they were real or not. He thought, this is how people act in the real world, a lot of the time, other people are not important, they go unnoticed. They were NPCs, non-playable characters, you were you, they were them, you don’t even know how to fully control yourself properly, let alone someone else. And they said the same thing everytime. Maybe some people knew others better than they knew themselves. With the mystery, the terror of existence, how could you even begin to understand another human animal.
That’s what Vice thought.
The only difference was a universe of microcosm traits that made each person a completely unique entity. Except the system was based on how everyone should be the same. Creating an awful dilemma no one had a solution to, or even proposed any ideas for improvement. They were treating people like cattle, and deservedly so, Vice thought, because they were completely willing to act like cattle. It was a herd-mentality, in a world where no one fully understood the extent of the human ability. So to just lump people together like that and try to force everyone through a meat-grinder and package them neatly to be bought and sold in whatever profession they found to survive in and identify as, seemed like just the easy way out. But it created a lot of problems too. Like the repressive explosion that Vice was going through right now.
Did it matter if it made a difference or not? Did anything?
Mason guzzled so much Firestorm in that period he felt like an actual dragon, because the isolation was driving him insane, the religious literature was influencing within him an altruistic god-complex, he was dressing like a thrift store superhero by himself, and his throat was constantly on fire from the vast quantites of cinnamon flavoured whiskey, cigarettes and Monkey Back beer.
He was suffering from a constant attack of gastroesophageal-reflux disease, so he was in constant discomfort, yet he never took any time off to try to heal the issue. He wasn’t gaining weight because he ate so minimally and managed to somehow find the will to do push-ups and go for extensive treks in the wilderness.
He had made quite a bit of money working for Gunmetal Poseidon, that’s why he was doing this in the first place. His life had completely fallen apart, and he needed some time to reflect, but not only that, he was a wanted man by the Police, and Mr. Poseidon wasn’t exactly known for his merciful reaction to failure. He was able to pay his Motel bills and buy alcohol and food without really any restriction or danger of running out of money, which he no longer gave a hoot about, for a considerable amount of time.
He was literally buying himself time.
Wait a minute, was he one of the bad guys?
So Mason had donned this alternate personality, whether that was a logical choice or just a weird manifestation from the cause and effect of what happened, didn’t really matter anymore. He was Vice now, and no one cared except him.
It was like a study period in his mind, in which he was intoxicated on booze all the time, otherwise he would probably commit suicide simply out of boredom induced mental illness, he thought, but this is what it came down to. He didn’t know what to do. No one would find him here.
He couldn’t re-enter the world as Mason Grader anymore.
Gunmetal Poseidon would find him.
Cop Thing would find him.
He had to become what they were. Larger than life, epic entities. Powerful entities. It didn’t matter if you were an individual like Cop Thing or an omnipotent idea and a nework of beings like Gunetal Poseidon.
So out of the necessity of the stuation, he slowly transformed mentally into this new version of himself he had fantasized about and actually created – Vice.
He felt like he was training for something, like he was destined for greatness, which side of the good or evil scale that would be on didn’t really matter to him. It was the grandure and the glory he wanted. His motive wasn’t based in good or bad, it was based in personal necessity for him to have to change who he was. To evolve.
Mason wasn’t a smoker, but Vice was.
Vice would lift his mask so his mouth was accessible and just chain smoke cigarettes all day long, sometimes not even standing up but laying on the bed with his mask half on smoking and drunk. The room was littered with beer cans and empty bottles, he was actually living in a dumpster of his own discarded vices. It was like a bottle depot in there, but no one ever visited the room to see it, and he just had no will or reason to do anything about it. He cared about some things, but not that. It was someone elses problem. One day he would leave this place and it wouldn’t matter anymore, and he had absolutely no intention of cleaning any of it up.
That fateful day eventually came, and one day, Vice just vacated the premesis, with no warning, no cleanup, he just disappeared. Walking back to town, in his costume, he really could not care less about how suspicious he looked in his costume, or what people would think of him.
He had been in a booze-soaked haze for months now, and had utterly changed himself into a different psychological profile from the self-abuse and damage habits he had inflicted.
The information he had read and the repetative self-medicating of his day to day lifestyle had warped his mind beyond repair into this superhero wanna-be type fiend who was on a mission even he didn’t understand.
So, eventually the fog began to dissipate as he came to the bottom of the mountain. He had tested himself and trained the whole time, so he was physically fit, although what other people would probably consider to be quite a sick person at the same time. He was able to endure the hardship of the endeavor, to take the hunger, the stress and fear, and the athletic expulsion of effort to make that savage descending journey on foot, even though his leg was permanently shattered in the shin bone. Copius amounts of alcohol over a long period of time managed to quell the pain and he got used to it and forgot about it. Pain became normalised for him, until it was just the way that he was and he could deal with it.
He arrived in a town, he didn’t even know what town, he didn’t really have any idea where he was in general, or who he was, except that he was Vice now, but he didn’t know who Vice was, or what he stood for. He was like a completely superficial psychopath with no real substance under the facade of his outer costume.
There were no serious laws against dressing up like that, mostly because no one would be insane and non-conformist enough to ever do that, so it was unnecessary to make a law against it, so Vice just waltzed right into town in broad daylight, dressed like some poor Fisher Price knock-off of Spider-Man, who actually had no powers.
It was worse than that, he was simply severely mentally deranged, delusional and a hardcore alcoholic. One thing he did know is there would be nothing for him in this small-fry town. No, what he desired was much bigger, what he desired was grandeur, to actually be somebody of consequence.
Somebody like Cop Thing.
Someone who made a difference, who was revered and respected, looked up to by the regular folk, because they were unwilling to do what fate had pushed on him, and made it so that’s who he had to be. That’s how Vice felt now.
Circumstances had changed. There wasn’t much time left, and he could hear the metronome ticking in his head, all reverbed out and pitch-shifted straight down to Hell.
It was time now. Time to rise up and become what he was destined to become.
What that was, however, still remained to be seen.
◍
CHAPTER 28 – NEO-VANCOUVER
Months after the initial Neo-Vancouver gunfighting terror-spree, Cop Thing and Mike Trigger had been having a more relaxed time recently. Slowly, evidence was forming against Gunmetal Poseidon, conjugated by the research detectives reading into the paperwork discovered at the warehouse crime scene. Some clues were beginning to formulate, and they were discovering bits and pieces of SCI (significant classified information) that felt like ultimately, they were sniffing down the right path, and eventually, like the ocean wearing down a rock-face, something was going to give, and the whole operation would all come crumbling down. Sooner or later, they were going to be able to locate this mysterious drug lab in which the ICE had been allegedly created, and hold some of the lowlife scum responsible. Justice would be served, hot and spicy.
Since the mega-bust at the warehouse, the ICE related deaths had tapered off, which was nice. It was nice to feel like something they did was actually relevent, like it made any kind of positive difference at all. Sure, they had to use extreme force and violence to get that effect, but this was planet Earth we were talking about here, and hell, that kind of stuff happened all the time.
Osiris Haggard got off the hook, even though he was guilty of moving a bunch of ICE, he was also conducive and integral in the exposure and subsequent downfall of one of the big ICE warehouses. They also didn’t have the proper legal sequence of events to successfully convict him, so Osiris was still a free man.
Cop Thing couldn’t come to terms with letting Mason Grader get away that day. He was just haunted by the fact that a man who was hunted by The Cop Thing actually managed to escape, again. He wasn’t comfortable with that, that didn’t sit right with his ego at all. He was a cop, first and foremost, a big, scary, intimidating cop, and if he wasn’t that, he wasn’t anything, so he troubled himself with coming to terms with that critical slip-up. He didn’t even know who the guy was, at the time, as far as what his name was was concerned, the cops ascertained that later from the recovered paper trail, but Cop Thing knew he had to be the leader, and he remembered the look in the guy’s eyes, the terror mixed with the gumption not to lose, not to give up. The guy wasn’t willing to just go down, and that disturbed Cop Thing. He was supposed to be the intimidating one. Facing off against a real monster wasn’t intimidating enough for Mason Grader, he must be some sort of twisted monster himself, inside, in order to pull that feat off, and had gotten away with it.
He got away with it, the words rang out and echoed in Cop Thing’s mind as he looked at his mountainous spikey head in the mirror of his apartment bathroom, disgusted with himself, not just physically, but for his failure to capitalize on the situation properly at the time. He was supposed to be a professional cop. It was his duty to apprehend all these guys or kill them.
Then Mason had disappeared without a trace, even though he was driving a stolen vehicle. The Cops were getting a bad track record of letting the head bad guys who went right up against Cop Thing get away scot-free instead of even trying to pursue them.
For instance, where was Dak Longstar now? Probably on a beach in Miami sipping lattes and margaritas.
Two criminal bosses had escaped Cop Thing’s clutches several months back, both within the time-span of a few days, and it still wasn’t OK. It seemed like he was doing all the heavy lifting here.
He wasn’t unrealistically hard and guilty on himself in his estimation, he knew how much damage he was tanking on those accounts, and he gave himself some credit for that, and for the fact that no one else could do that, so it became his responsibility, whether he liked it or not, which he did not, but it didn’t matter. He could get shot and live with it, his body ate bullets, whereas that was going to be a big problem for the other men and women on the NVPD, or anyone else in general.
He felt lost inside, sad. At least when there was blistering action going on, he had something to focus on, something to do, a purpose. Now that things had quieted down somewhat, the haunting absensce of the cold case escaped criminals was bearing down on him mentally. The mundane activity of scouring the streets everyday, driving around with Mike Trigger literally looking for trouble was so dull in comparison, he almost longed for the astonishing violence to explode once again.
He knew it would, eventually. Guys like Dak Longstar and Mason Grader couldn’t stay quiet forever. Something inside would compell them to rear their ugly heads, vying for that sick attention they craved, and when they did, Cop Thing would squash them into the ground where they belonged.
🐀
Cop Thing was out for a walk in the moderately tempered rain, it was dusk and the sun was blazing pink through the clouds in some beautiful last gasp of glory before it disappeared to the other side of the planet for the night, and the darkness would ensue, and the creeps would come out from their hiding places, like vampires, and the crimes would begin spiking from the utter latent foundation of seediness that permeated the streets of Neo-Vancouver, at all times, the wave of human suffering in the collective unconscious that could not be cured, only the symptoms could be managed temporarily, until the sickness of society sprouted forth with symbolic disease once more. It never stopped. It was just an indefinite cycle of pain, confusion, fear and desperation. It was like Cop Thing could hear the ghosts of the streets crying out, lashing out at it’s unknown oppressor, the mystery of existence itself.
The best six answers he could come up with for that were loaded into the chamber of his .44 Magnum. Sometimes he wore a custom made holster strapped to the outside of his carapace around his broad chest, but that was obvious. Sometimes being obvious had it’s advantages. Sometimes the brazen display of firepower was enough, so you didn’t have to actually use it. It got the point across with one look. Other times he concealed his weapon in the kangaroo-pocket of his carapace, absorbing the weapon, untraceable from an outside view, it just lived inside, comfortably nestled in one of his side muscle pouches.
The streets were blowing with discarded trash, papers and fog. It was oddly windy that evening, eerily so, like Mother Nature was communicating with the pulse totality of joint human endeavor. The sheer rate at which everyone was merely scrambling to survive, it seemed, was so unnecessary, so forced and pressuring, there was really no reason for it. This all started a long time ago, Cop Thing thought, and as technology evolved to previously unimaginable proportions, life was still mainly a sort of tribal animal hierarchy. It was still a basic caveman tribe dynamic between people, it was just more subtle now, invisibly subtle.
The towering skyscrapers were casting heavy shadows into the streets now as the sun winked it’s way out of orbit, and Cop Thing was lumbering through the streets in an overly philisophical mood tonight. Gazing in the reflections of the shop windows, every building someone’s attempt at building a little fort for themselves in this world, bartering with other people for survival at varying levels of wealth and success, whether it was at the top of the tallest tower, or the bottom of the lowliest street corner, pants down, passed out in a little make-shift cardboard shelter, it was similar in the sense that that was the way a specific person had found that worked personally for them to live in this society, no matter how pitiful or despicable. Some were cunning, others inherited wealth, some were completely lacking in the basic intelligence even needed to exist within society.
It wasn’t built for everyone, it was built for confomity, Cop Thing understood this, it depended and thrived on it, but a lot of people didn’t even have the wherewithal, the necessary tools of mental ability to do that, let alone the professional ones.
Then there was the drug addiction epidemic and that was basically just a harsh desperate plea for some comfort, emotional stability or order. Just to not feel completely lost, afraid and vulnerable. People were willing to pay good money to waste themselves just to ease the nightmare of their existence a little bit longer, until all was lost. Seeing people absolutely tweaking it, struggling to even keep their pants on, thrashing about and screaming inanity on the streets, usually some profanity-laced tirade directed at some invisible antagonist, that was increasingly a perfectly regular thing to see. The normal people would witness these digressions and just sort of look at each other like, “yep.” All you could really do was just shake your head and ignore it, like dust and fluff swept under a rug, it was still there.
There had to be a better way, but Cop Thing feared it was far too late.
He knew it was. He almost thought just to blow it all up and start fresh was the only way to solve it all, but that would take eons.
No, don’t think like that. That’s what the villains would think. You have a responsibility to perform your duty, you’re a cop, and you’re not just a cop, you’re the best cop, and you have to uphold the law in the way we’ve organized for ourselves. This is the best we’ve got, Cop Thing thought.
The surrounding everyday horror was so engulfingly prevalent, it became normalised to see something clearly bad there. Ghouls and goblins lurking the streets, shattered pipes, resin-stained tubes and punctured and fried aluminum foil scattered on the ground. The garbage situation was so wildly out of control, Cop Thing couldn’t imagine an improvement ever. The dumpsters were emptied so infrequently they couldn’t keep up with the overload of trash that would accumulate, and there would be huge piles of people’s garbage all throughout the streets, especially in the alleys and on the downtown East Side. It was only going to get far worse. And they were supposed to be busting people for littering cigarette butts.
Cop Thing didn’t smoke, it was disgusting and probably about the dumbest habit a person could pick up based on the health hazards and the high expense. It was like paying exorbitant amounts of money to slowly kill yourself, but with a widely accepted minor coping mechanism with reality many people made that choice to do just that.
So he could understand the hypocrisy of his position, but what choice did he have?
This train of thought needed to change. He was starting to think like one of them. Lazy, hopeless, defeated. Things weren’t so black and white anymore. It was as grey as this clouded over, raining, fog-filled evening.
CHAPTER 29 – THE HONEY BEAR
Cop Thing’s phone rang. It was Trigger.
“Yeah,” Cop Thing picked up.
“Uhh, Cop Thing, you’re not going to like this,” He said.
🐻
At the scene of the crime in the victims East Van basement suite, two young women roomates had been assaulted and bludgeoned to death in their beds, their faces and skulls beyond recognition. The naked bodies lay on top of the bloodstained sheets in separate rooms. The bodies were covered in honey, and a little clear plastic empty bottle of Honey Bear brand honey, which was shaped like a cute bear, was found at the crime scene. Trigger was there along with the CSI team, who were busily snapping photographic documentation of the grisly setting. The walls had also been splattered with blood and there was this coagulated, disgusting mix of blood, cum and honey all over the room. Their footsteps were making sticky sounds when they moved.
“I’ve seen some sick, degenerate freaks in my time, that’s my job,” began Agent Ric Thompson, the lead CSI investigator, “But this one’s really bizarre. I’m not even sure what the proper nomenclature is for a killer who uses food related methods for sexual gratification in his murders, I’ll have to Google that later. We’re sending the honey bottle to the lab for forensic identification, but if the killer was smart enough to wear gloves, well let me just put it this way, we haven’t found any fingerprints in the room yet. Just because these murder-type psychos are extremely nut-balls in the head, doesn’t necessarily mean they’re stupid.” The sound of the analog cameras snapping poloroid photos was like a fluttering beat in the background, “So, so far we don’t have much to go on, the only piece of evidence is the Honey Bear bottle. That’s why for now, we’re calling this guy The Honey Bear killer. We’re gonna get a sample and run some tests on the cum, but it might not be that simple to identify the perpetrators DNA for the match if we don’t have anything on file to match it up with.”
This wasn’t what Cop Thing wanted to see this evening, or ever. One more total psycho on the loose out there, doing whatever he wanted. This whole town was turning into a psycho factory.
“We don’t know what the murder weapon was, it’s all speculative at this point, but if I had to guess, which I do at the moment, I’d say it looks like a lead pipe, but, as you can see, it’s hard to tell because their heads are mashed in so severely,” Thompson said.
Cop Thing exited the room, the haunting, peripheral stench of pure evil was forever imprinted on the basement suit. It was like he could feel the presence of Satan in the room, and that gave him the creeps.
They didn’t know how the Honey Bear got in, what weapon he used, nothing. Cop Thing lost his appetite.
Another case with little to go on, and the guy was out there still, tonight, possibly having some kind of werewolf-style killer-mania. Thompson informed Cop Thing that a neighbor had heard the screams, saw a dark figure exit the suite and flee the scene through the shadows across the street, disappearing in the park on the other side. That’s how the cops knew to show up here so fast. They had to get out there and start tracking this perverted perpetrator down right now, before he struck again.
🐻
That’s why the cops called Mike Trigger into the crime scene, because the murders were so fresh, the killer was likely still in the area. If it weren’t for the good samaritan neighbor, they might have never known about this until way later. But as it was, Mike and Cop Thing were roaming the streets in the incognito cruiser, hunting a ghost who was likely still at large in the area. Mike’s phone rang.
“Trigger. Yeah, yeah… You’re shitting me, yeah, ok,” Mike hung up and turned to Cop Thing, “They found a naked woman in Unicorn Park, same thing, face bashed in, brains all over the place, covered in honey. Looks like there’s a murder-spree in progress going on out there right now, Cop Thing.”
“Then we have to stop it,” Cop Thing said and swerved the car so aggressively in the direction of Unicorn Park and accelerated, one side of the car lifted momentarily off the ground then bounced down again before peeling out and speeding off towards the new crimescene. It was actually a tremendous stroke of luck in terms of catching the crook, because they were already on the lookout for the guy when he attacked again, and they were close to Unicorn Park. Honey Bear was close, too.
Cop Thing was still wheeling mentally from his night prior to this whole fiasco, and he wanted redemption for himself. He was determined to catch this bastard tonight. He couldn’t let another one get away. Not this time.
They parked the car and got out, clasping their guns, they entered the park. They didn’t even stop at the crime scene, they just split up and started hunting the criminal, someone else could deal with that, that wasn’t their job, leave that to the poindexters in the CSI, their job was to be the heavys. It was fully night now, so visibility was limited, the only thing there was in the archway entrance to the park were dim-lit homeless people, tent colonies, trees, and trash.
Mike was alone now, scanning the area, pistol out and ready, stalking through the grass field, winding through the trees, stopping occasionally for cover, trying to remain unseen. He noticed the occasional potential threat, and it would turn out to be an owl, or a homeless person, there were lots of those, then he saw it.
In the distance by a dumpster, a shadow was moving, rustling in a bush, and he caught a glimpse in the light, a brown, masked figure, with what appeared to be a gleaming white eye shining in the park light, and a dark jacket. But he only caught a glimpse before the figure became a silhuoette in the shadow and disappeared again amongst the fog.
“What the…?,” Mike said to himself.
He had the intuition that it was Him.
He sprinted over to the overflowing dumpster and entered into an alley near a building covered by a canopy of tree branches and foliage. He was in a well-covered area of the park now, sporadic lights illuminating a gazebo, or some city-built fountains. He carefully and stealthily moved forward, on full alert.
He knew it was Him, something about the movement, and the mask seemed like a dead giveaway. He warned himself about jumping to conclusions, and his personal rule about shooting innocent people and how not to do it, because he wouldn’t be able to live with himself. He was conflicted like that, ethically, but it wasn’t Halloween, and unless there was a luchador wrestling event nearby tonight in which one of the participants had defected to the park, alone, it was safe to be suspicious. He had to stay in pursuit of this person and do the guilt-math simultaneously. He would track him down and see what happened. Mike hugged close to the gazebo with his back to the wall, moving around the octagonal shape covered in passing waves of shadow from the roof and the wooden posts holding it up. He trotted down some stone steps and steadily moved across a concrete path there, beside some wooden benches and came out onto a road with a huge gravel field near it, gazing out into the distance searching for movement. Where did this guy get to? He was in here somewhere. He had to be.
Mike stopped and text Cop Thing, “Target spotted near gravel field”. Then he stood and just looked in all directions, waiting, because he didn’t know which way to go now. The trail was getting colder by the second. Maybe Cop Thing would encounter the guy, and Mike was getting distracted because he desperately had to take a leak this whole time but from the intensity and necessity of the situation he was forced to put it off until now.
There was a public washroom right there and, being the law abiding citizen that he was, he chose to go to the dark, designated urinating spot instead of do it in public like a degenerate savage. Plus that was illegal. He walked into the bathroom, took a quick glance in the mirror and said, “Make it quick, Trigger, there’s still a psychopath on the loose out there.” Then he unzipped his jeans and began the gratifying stream of relief.
That’s when the toilet stall door behind him crept open ever-so quietly and a pair of gloved hands reached out and strung a cord of fiberwire around Mike’s neck from behind.
Mike still had not done up his pants, or stopped the flow of urine, so he was quite taken by surprise and frustrated when he was all of the sudden being strangled from behind by someone, but the primordial will to survive kicked in like a nitro-blast and through some hurculean feat of strength, Mike managed to whip the attacker over his shoulders and flung him somersaulting forwards over his back, rendering the man momentarily upside down in the air. His head hit the inside of the urinal as his body fell awkwardly, squashed between the urinal and Mike Trigger. Mike got a quick glance at who it was, a man dressed in a full body brown suit with big gaping eyes painted on and a leather jacket.
Mike’s own eyes had not deceived him earlier, the man was really wearing that.
Mike quickly tucked his junk back in his boxers and zipped up his fly, then he kicked the guy in the solar-plexes like a football field goal while he was hunched on the ground, sending him grunting and rolling across the bathroom floor. Mike reached for his gun which he had previously strapped back into it’s holster so he could urinate properly, but by the time he had the thing out, equipped and ready, the creep had made it out the door and fled. Mike chased him out and when he got outside, the guy had seemingly mystically disappeared, Mike didn’t know which way to follow him. Then he saw him climbing a fence on the other side of the gravel field, he was already at the top popping over, with seemingly inhuman speed. Mike ran after, stopping after a few steps to aim fast and take a single shot with his pistol. At least Cop Thing would hear the shot and know which direction they took off in. Then Mike sprinted after the man across the wide open field, jumped onto the fence and climbed over with aggressive vigour. If they let this guy slip tonight, how many more people were gonna turn up dead and slathered in honey in the future?
Mike powered through some low thorn bushes and sprinted down a road on the other side of the fence, still in the Unicorn Park. He couldn’t risk just blasting off his gun at the first sign of movement, because it was dark and anyone else could be in here too. He stopped the sprint because he was chasing nothing, and paced around in the shadows with his gun ready, listening. There were bird sounds, and rustling in the forest. It could be raccoons or squirrels, or it could be Him. There was some omnipresent background forest noise of swaying trees in the whistling wind, the calm patter of the rain offsetting the chaos of the situation.
Where the hell is Cop Thing? I could use some help, Mike thought. It wasn’t everyday a murderer snuck up on him while he was taking a leak in a public washroom and tried to strangle him to death from behind, that was a very disturbing, violating experience, but he was still alive and mostly unharmed, except for the disgusting feeling of molestation and attempted murder which he managed to escape from. His neck still burned from the wire.
It was pitch black with no leads, and this guy was no moron, he was sick. He was really sick. But he wasn’t dumb and he was extremely dangerous. How was he going to find this son of a bitch now?
Farther into the park, there were construction cones and orange netting barrier cubes set up by the City around some trees in a field for some forest conservation area. The grass was tall here, up to the waist, and Mike could see the surrounding apartment building’s lights highlighting the perimeter of the park. He could see the road on the outside.
That’s when he saw Him again, a shadowy figure sprinting through the grass towards the road at a disturbingly high speed, judging from the swiftness of the movements and the general outline of the figure running. There were other people around too, near where the suspect was headed, Mike only glanced at the pedestrians in the area in a sweeping observation, but he noticed at least one couple walking their dog and a jogger. He wanted to shoot this guy in the back right now but there was too much activity around him, he couldn’t risk a miss and the subsequent collateral damage, so he summoned his backup reserve of energy and started running after the guy, except the guy had a head start, and he was faster than Mike.
Mike reached the wood-chip path near the street and gazed down the road where the man was running in the distance, across a side-street intersection. Mike was running out of steam here, but the idea of being inadvertently responsible for more killings by letting him get away was unacceptable.
That’s when Cop Thing rolled up in the incognito cruiser. Mike didn’t ask any questions, he just got in. They sped down the road in pursuit, but the Honey Bear had disappeared again. There was so much darkness, bushes, back alleys and houses on the street, he could be anywhere in the vicinity, but he must be in the vicinity.
Mike hated to admit it, but this guy was good. Adept at stealth, and fast.
They slowed now to a drifting lookout pace in the car, the fear crept in they might lose him for good this time. Riding up Neo-Vancouver street, past the four-way stop and up the hill, hope was beginning to fade away.
Then they saw a figure hop over a low spiked fence and dart across the road as they turned a corner onto a different street. Maybe he didn’t know they were right there when he made his move. He must not have. The shadowy figure was so identifiable in his body language, they kept knowing it was him just by the sheer supernatural quality of the movements. The silhouette darted into a church courtyard across the street and the cop car pulled up behind him rapidly, chasing him down in the parking lot as he ran, screeching to an abrupt halt, and they both got out and chased after him through an alley behind the huge church, across a side-street and into an adjoining graveyard.
Mike Trigger pulled out his gun as the fugitive was running through the graveyard path, beneath the trees towards the lit street in the distance, but Cop Thing slapped his gun down and said, “Don’t,” then burst into a super-sprint after the Honey Bear, caught up to him in the middle of the graveyard, pounced on him and tackled him to the ground from behind.
The Honey Bear rolled over on the grass and pulled out a lead pipe from inside his leather jacket, attempting to bludgeon Cop Thing with it. Cop Thing dodged the attack swipes, and as lightning struck above him, illuminating the Honey Bear’s creepy features in a flash of blue light, Cop Thing headbutted him promptly in the face, knocking him unconscious. The brown-suited masked body lay there limp, still breathing, in the middle of the graveyard on the rain drenched grass.
Cop Thing pulled his mask off. Surreal to see, it was Mason Grader. It was like everything Cop Thing had felt guilty about and brooding over for the past few months had culminated in some karmic fate of justice. They had him. Cop Thing took some handcuffs out of his kangaroo-pouch and slapped them on the unconscious ex-drug kingpin murderer’s senseless wrists.
🐻
Later, when it all went through the whole gruellingly tedious legal rigamarole, Mason Grader was facing three life sentences in prison and two death sentences, in which the electric chair was legal in the province of British Columbia. He would serve years in prison before finally being executed on public television, but before that, the cops were going to learn everything they could squeeze out of that sick twisted brain of his about Gunmetal Poseidon.
CHAPTER 30 – THE MAYOR’S DAUGHTER
In the Wraithvale headquarters in North Saskatchewan, the members of the Fear Corps were sitting around the roundtable with Dak Longstar as he prepared to brief them on the upcoming mission of their cause. They had spent months now training together and honing their specialized skills. There were some extremely talented individuals on the squad. Dragon Ali, for example, was possibly one of the finest martial artists in the world, by Dak Longstar’s estimation. Mark Jones was an amazing marksman. Delilah and Sergei had made exquisite progress and were now veritable Wraithvale zealots. Merge had officially joined the team, and wouldn’t just serve as the stay-at-home-trainer any longer. Tank Williams was a tall, grisly-thick beast who was an immovable force, the only person who could defeat him in hand-to-hand combat at the base was Dragon Ali. The rest of the people at the Wraithvale HQ were basically new fledgling members who weren’t ready for field work yet, or civilians like Desdemona, who served mostly as the secretary, and Dr. Shock, the base scientist, who shared in direct communications with The Figure. Dak was aware of this, but he didn’t know what they discussed. Dr. Shock never mentioned anything about it.
In the roundtable room, after months of deliberation and heavy-duty physical training, the official Fear Corps team was prepared to make a piercing statement to the world on behalf of Wraithvale once more, except this time, Dak planned to come out on top for sure.
“So, first thing’s first, I want to specifically take Cop Thing down on this mission, and yes, it’s personal. We’re going to lure him out, then waste him, and Dr. Shock has developed a new weapon specifically to do just that. It works like a rifle, it’s called the ‘shockwave capacitor’ and it should disable Cop Thing’s damage-absorbant powers. Then, when his shield’s down, we kill him,” Dak said to the team gathered around.
“How do we know that weapon’s going to work?” Desdemona said, flicking back her chin length black hair and adjusting her glasses.
“We don’t, for sure, but Dr. Shock assures me he’s spent ample time studying Cop Thing’s behavior on the internet, he’s become a kind of stalker-biographer, if you will, and has deciphered scientifically what likely took place during the incident of Cop Thing’s mutation, in his opinion, and the effects it had on his body, which enable Cop Thing to act that way. We have to trust the experts on this one, because I don’t know this kind of stuff, and neither do any of you, but Dr. Shock does, because he’s an expert,” Dak went on, “Basically, in layman’s terms, the blast from the gun will rupture the meld between Cop Thing’s carapace and his former human form, sort of reverting his mutation and leaving him weak and vulnerable to our attack.”
“Ok, that sounds good, but what about the rest of the Neo-Vancouver cops? Isn’t this whole idea like a revenge plan of yours for last times massive fuck up?” Merge said.
“Well, yeah, and I’ve worked out an even more devious, ruthless and cunning operation this time that requires that we all take part and work diligently and vigilantly as a team, that’s why I invented the Fear Corps in the first place. For this mission,” Dak said proudly.
“Ok, so what’s the mission?” Desdemona asked. Her and Merge were getting more irreverent with their choice of words and their tone of voice these days, but Dak didn’t do anything about it because he needed them, and he knew how deep of trouble he was in now in general. It was possibly because he openly drank in front of the troops, acted wild and irrational, and had not delivered on his word fully about the last Wraithvale operation, amongst other things. On the other hand, everyone involved was all in on this whole endeavor. They had all commited to Wraithvale and abandoned their regular lives in the past, no one wanted to admit they had been conned or didn’t believe in the overall mission anymore, but the vibe had been tense the whole time following the failed CNF tower mission.
“Here’s the plan, we go to Neo-Vancouver, right, here’s the catch, we kidnap the Mayor’s daughter, we hold her for ransom for $10,000,000,000 this time, as punishment interest for last time, and until we get it, we force the Mayor to put the entire NVPD on strike. That’s right, no cops, and Cop Thing surrenders,” Dak said.
“That’s your terms? That’s a pretty tall order, Dak, you think they’re actually going to go for that?” Merge said.
“They’ll have to, otherwise we’ll kill the Mayor’s daughter,” Dak said, mildly irritated at the perceived obvious stupidity of the question.
“Checks out, I guess,” Merge said, shrugging.
“Well, where do we find the Mayor’s daughter,” Merge said.
“Simple. She’s a student at NUBC, we’ll just stalk and abduct her. Dr. Shock filled me in on all this stuff when we were working this plan out,” Dak said, “Then we camp out in a secret hideout and wait for them to give in. Every moment that they don’t, total anarchy is going to intensify in the streets of Neo-Vancouver with no police force,” Dak said.
“That’s kind of brilliant actually,” Tank Williams said.
“It’s so ambitious it could actually work,” Desdemona said, “They’ll be so shocked at the audacity they won’t know what to do except submit.”
“Exactly,” Dak said.
Dragon Ali nodded his head.
“Let’s just not broadcast on live TV our exact location this time,” Merge said.
“Yeah, obviously, that plan had a whole different theme to it. This one’s about revenge,” Dak said.
❀
The Mayor’s daughter was named Scarlett Harvey, a twenty-four year old Liberal Studies major at NUBC. She lived in the nearby University Heights area in a top floor duplex suite, alone. It was a Friday night and Scarlett was in the prime of her party girl phase these days, so she left to drive her white Honda Mountaineer downtown for a dance party at the Aces High Club. Her hair was dyed dirty blonde-brunette, make-up done up nicely, with shiny red ribbons in her hair. She wore a short plaid skirt, black tank top, nylon pantyhose, a brown bomber jacket and white Nike sneakers with frilly white socks. Her style said casual-gorgeous, and she was pulling it off in spades, with crimson red lipstick delicately and tasefully applied to her pouty, voluptuous lips. She had the black and red colour coordination thing going pretty effectively. Her esoteric fashion sense and pretty outfit really accentuated the fact that she was actually a marvelously attractive girl with shining, big green eyes.
In the car she was listening to the radio reports describing the recent crimes and capture of the Honey Bear killer by Cop Thing. She knew her Daddy, Mayor Harvey, knew Cop Thing personally, and that he would probably be awarded a medal for his heroics in the recent horror case. Same thing with Mike Trigger. The information was such a bummer on her hopeful, excited-to-see-where-the-night-would-take-her attitude, however, she changed the station to play some oldies favorites and stopped when she got to ABBA. “Gimme Gimme Gimme” (A Man After Midnight). Maybe someone would give her a man after midnight tonight. That was a little lighter material. The world was so shitty, did people really have to rub it in your face all the time even moreso? She thought, but she remembered to check her privelege, being a young, beautiful, white daughter of the Mayor of her mega-city hometown.
Speeding along Shelbourne street, there were dump trucks parked all along the middle of the road in a convoy, which seemed kind of suspicious. It was getting foggier now, too, so she lowered her speed a smidgen to play it on the safe side. Curving around the street after the dump trucks, Scarlett rolled down the window and smoked a cigarette with red painted fingernails, the music had changed to “Lovely Day” by Bill Withers.
Shelbourne turned into Pandora street, and passing the derelict gangs and smoke plumes blending with the fog, it always amazed Scarlett how people always raved about the quality of the Chicken Planet fried chicken restaurant on Pandora, or so she had heard, when the outside always looked like a prison block during a riot, with iron bars on the shattered windows. The delivery drivers had to use the buzzer and a can of pepper spray when they went to pick up the hot bags. She knew this because her friend Zachary had told her so, because he was a Road Hero delivery driver and Chicken Planet was like an inside joke with him. But it really was like that.
Scarlett would never have to deliver any food in her life, nor would she ever choose to. She didn’t have to do anything, and she liked it that way. She was young, she was rich and beautiful, and she could essentially make people do whatever she wanted most of the time. She was used to getting her way.
When she got downtown she parked in a non-pay parking lot on the outskirts of the downtown core that not too many people knew about, in case she got too drunk and had to leave her car overnight. She liked to think of herself as a bit of a wild lady, but not wild enough to drive drunk, that was just stupid and irresponsible. She couldn’t let Daddy down like that, even if she never got caught, she would know she was guilty. Daddy’s brother had been tragically killed in a drunk driving accident, so it was a personally triggering issue for him.
The parking lot was next to a condominium skyscraper called Hefty Towers. There were security guards sometimes roaming the area, keeping people mobile, no loitering allowed in the rich folks front yard, but there were no parking attendants, none that Scarlett had ever seen anyways. So this was a good spot, for now, until the City found out people were parking here for free and put an end to it. The parkades downtown were an annoying hassle to find a space, expensive, and you were liable to get your car broken into, especially with a nice vehicle like Scarlett’s Mountaineer, which was a gift from Daddy on her sixteenth birthday, so she had owned the car for almost ten years and had formed a kind of sentimental symbiotic bond with it.
She was trotting across the street with her leather purse when her phone rang. It was her friend Gill.
“Hello?” Scarlett answered.
“Hey, you. Where are you right now? Me and Stephanie are at the club,” Gill said.
“I’m on Burdett and Blanshard, just heading down now, what club are you at? Aces High?
“Yeah, that one,” Gill said.
“Is it busy in there?” Scarlett said.
“It’s getting there, things are starting to pick up,” Gill said.
“Any cute boys?” Scarlett asked.
“Meh, but that cute bartender from The Barnyard next door is working, we were in there already, he was asking about you,” Gill said.
“Yeah, right, really?” Scarlett said, a flush of excitement flooding into her.
“No, but we were in there, we had, like, five China Whites each. We’re definitely getting white-girl wasted tonight, girl, woooo!” Gill said.
“Ok, well don’t get too white-girl wasted without me, I’m almost there,” Scarlett said.
She stopped to get a pack of Smokeyums from the corner store, stopped again briefly to give one to a polite homeless person covered in dirt and bleeding from the face, then crossed the crosswalk and walked past bars and restaurants which had lineups out the doors, taking long drags of her cigarette.
Outside the Aces High Club, Gill was right, business had picked up, there was a line-up of about twenty people, mostly young boys and girls dressed like juveniles, probably barely over the legal drinking age, but also some older gentlemen and ladies, which was cute, she thought, as well as some lurking dirty looking degenerates and street people just scouring the area like vultures, asking for smokes or change. Scarlett could hear the loud, booming bass of the techno music playing from inside and began to get giddy, but she played it cool. She had been reading and writing Liberal Arts papers all week, and it was going to be refreshing to let loose and have a little fun.
She went into the long, wide alley between the Aces High Club and The Barnyard, produced a tiny bottle of Firestorm whiskey, and chugged it down. A man with long white hair and a beard, dressed in a trenchcoat, approached her and asked her what time it was. She wasn’t so high-and-mighty and snobby not to comply, denying a person something so simple as the time, she was a good person, so she looked at her watch and informed him that it was, in fact, 10:30. The man said thank you and sauntered on, she didn’t think anything of it.
Scarlett returned to the front of the bar on the face of the street and got in line. The bar was at the bottom block of Cloak Street, one of the main downtown streets in Neo-Vancouver, and the ocean was visible from the location, just over the street by the inner harbour and down from a hill blocked off by road barrier blocks and fences. She considered going into The Baryard briefly to make a flirty hint to the cute blonde bartender with the nice, big, chiseled muscular arms, like a quick hard glance and then quickly looking away, or playing wth her hair, but decided against it, as that might come across as too flaunty and obvious, which could be repelling, unromantic and anti-seductive. She was too hot for that.
Gill and Stephanie stumbled out giggling from inside, spotted Scarlett in the line and came over.
“Scarletttttt, oh my god! You’re here!” Gill, screamed in the most nasally high-pitched scream and they embraced in a hug. Gill was a stumpy looking lady with braided black hair, chubby face and double-chin, but she was dressed up in a white, tight dress with white high-heels. Stephanie was wearing a small nylon tank-top with a full black front, and tight blue jeans with no belt and sneakers. It was to be a paint-the-town-red kind of night for the trio of young ladies. They all lit up cigarettes.
“Oh my god, the DJ tonight is so fire, what’s his name?” Gill said, turning to Stephanie.
“DJ Jaguar, I think, I’ve heard of him before,” Stephanie said.
“I like his tunes, you know, it’s kind of… Esoteric, you can tell he really takes a lot of pride and time and effort in his craft,” Gill said.
“Oh, yeah? Cool, Yeah, it sounds good. They got any specials in there?,” Scarlett said.
“Like drink specials? Guava Mojitos are on special tonight,” Gill said.
“Oh my god, I love Guava Mojitos, but you gotta get the jalepenos in it if you like the spicy stuff. Makes it so much better,” Stephanie said.
“That’s girly-girl stuff, I’m just gonna stick with a good old fashioned Peebst,” Scarlett said.
“Monkey Back’s on special,” Gill said.
“Oh, yeah? Ok, whatever, Monkey Back’s good too. It’s all the same shit,” Scarlett said.
“Yeah, pretty much, and after you get a few in ya, who cares anyways?” Gill said.
“Exactly, unless it’s like the nasty stuff a total lush would drink, like Black Stallion IPA or Horsepiss Ale, that stuff’s gross but it packs a wallop, I’m not that much of a fucking alcoholic yet to drink that swill,” Scarlett said, “Besides, I won’t have time for that when I finish my Liberal Studies degree.”
“Oh, yeah? Then what kind of job you gonna get, Liberal Studies teacher?” Gill said, “Oh, I forgot, Daddy’s so rich and important you really don’t need to do anything, except be pretty and be Daddy’s little girl, do you?”
Scarlett was young, but her experience with being put-down by jealous other women was veteran level. Comments like that didn’t really bother her, she didn’t take offense, and it was kind of true, plus Gill was shorter and fatter than her.
Scarlett liked being elite. She liked it a lot. She liked being privileged, too. There was nothing wrong with that. In fact it was a gift, it was a sheer stroke of luck. Of all the sperms in the history of the universe that could have hit all the eggs, this one was hers. She wasn’t going to deny her God given birthright by being some spoiled cunt who rejected her parentage and her wealthy situation.
After they were inside the Aces High, they were standing in line again, waiting at the bar for booze. DJ Jaguar was bobbing his head on stage, having a good time, feeling the music and rocking out. The bartender who served the girls was a skeletally thin lady with jet-black hair, bangs and covered in tattooes, wearing a leopard print thin tank top and black jeans. Her oversized belt buckle was a silver old west pistol. The girls got two Guava Mojitos and a Monkey Back, cheersed, then got on the dance floor and started sexy dancing with each other while drinking. After a while of this, everything was going according to plan, and they got more drinks, and some China White shots, and by then Scarlett had a good buzz on. Gill and Stephanie were already loaded.
That’s when Scarlett noticed the white haired bearded guy from outside in the alley, sitting alone inside reading a book in the corner. She thought it was “The Brothers Karamazov” By Dostoyevskey. This struck her as odd because she assumed the guy was waiting to catch a bus or something and that’s why he was asking her for the time, honestly she didn’t think that much about it past congratulating herself for being the kind of person who would give a stranger the time in a dark alley even though she was a beautiful young woman. Also she assumed he was fucked up and didn’t have any money, so she was surprised he was in here because he would have had to pay cover, and he was sitting by himself reading a book in the corner at a dance club.
Scarlett finished her second Monkey Back and started dancing with some hot boys. She ended up making out with one of them named Chad, the cutest one with the nicest muscles, and afterwards he asked her for her number, but she refused, saying she had a boyfriend.
That was always the best rejection line, because the boys either feared or respected other boys, maybe there was a bigger, stronger monkey than you out there. There definitely was, but were you going to be a target for that person? You might if you started talking to his girl. This didn’t actually exist but still she had no interest in pursuing a relationship with this boy, she just wanted to devour his pathetic soul, quick and easy, like a Burgers Queen meal, then get rid of the wrapper. That would show Daddy. She needed the kind of man who was going to be like a fine full meal with vegetables, mashed potatoes and roast beef, brussel sprouts, steamed carrots and cucumbers, with a nice glass of wine, who had a lot of money and was very clever and dashingly handsome. That would show Daddy, too. That’s the only kind of man Daddy would approve of, but where was this mysterious dashing Knight?
Gill and Stephanie had disappeared to the bathroom together, Scarlett stayed behind at a table beside the bar. She was amassing quite a crowd of admiring men surrounding her, complimenting her, offering to buy her drinks. She was delighting in the attention, and her ego was like a thermometer that was red all the way to the little bobble at the top, about to explode. She was so impressed with herself it was scary. She was drinking the drinks, when Gill and Stephanie returned and rescued Scarlett from the landslide of adulation, and the three of them went back to the dancefloor as DJ Jaguar was leading into one of his slow-jams. Gill and Stephanie seemed quite high now, to an alarmingly innapropriate degree. Scarlett was drunk enough to be amused, at first, then the amusement quickly turned into worry, then downright fear. They were acting like tweakers now, crackheads on the street, flailing around and spasmodically girating. It was a dance club, so people were cheering this on, getting really into it, but Scarlett knew that’s not how her friends danced. Then Gill grabbed onto Scarlett’s shoulder, grasping it harder, desperate, digging her fingernails into the flesh painfully. She looked her in the eyes and murmured, “Scarlett…” eyes dazed and watering, then she screamed and her chest exploded, blood spraying out in a geyser all over the dance floor amidst a chorus of confused or drunken screaming patrons, and she toppled over backwards onto the ground, eyes rolled back into her head like black lights in the neon ambiance. Stephanie screamed and got down on her knees shaking her, confused, she tried giving her CPR, even though she had never been trained in First-Aid, and Gil was already quite clearly dead with a gaping explosion wound in her chest.
But it wasn’t over there.
Stephanie screamed as well, grasping at her chest, screaming, “No! No, NO!” Then her heart burst as well, while she was on her knees and she fell face first onto Gill’s bloody corpse, and other people on the dance floor actually slipped on the blood and fell down as well. The music was still going and the dazzled crowd were sort of thinking, is this part of the show? It wasn’t, actually, and Scarlett vomited at that point all over the bodies of her friends and started crying and hyperventilating and then had to run outside for a cigarette to regain her composure. She stumbled drunkenly and insane with suffering fear and pain into the side alley between the Aces High and The Barnyard, fumbling for a cigarette. As she put it in her mouth, sobbing uncontrollably, the pack of Smokeyums fell on the ground and the remaining cigarettes sprawled out in a puddle, ruining them all. That’s when a hand wrapped around her mouth from behind with a chloroform filled rag, then everything went from apocalypse terror straight to black and she was gone.
❄
CHAPTER 31 – TOTAL ANARCHY
Scarlett was strapped to an office chair on wheels by her wrists and ankles, with a blindfold and a piece of cloth gagging her. Dak Longstar, Merge, Sergei, Delilah, Tank Williams, Dragon Ali and Mark Jones were in a wide, dingy hotel room with her, the view from the widow hinted they were somewhere in downtown Neo-Vancouver. The ever present sound of sirens and street commotion further gave away the setting. Dak took the blindfold off and unfastened the mouth gag. Scarlett’s eyes widened with horror as the effects of the chloroform began to wane and she became aware of the team of kidnappers surrounding her.
“You’re awake, that’s good, did you have a good sleep?” Dak said.
She wanted to scream, but had the intuition not to, and managed to hold it back. She could feel she was strapped down, and didn’t want to start acting difficult, who knew what kind of punishment lay in wait with these people?
“What do you want? What did I do?” Scarlett said, acting tough, holding back the terror. She only vaguely recalled the traumatic experience at the bar she had just undegone, but this new danger was a priority in her clouded current mindset.
“You were born a Harvey, for starters, the only daughter of Mayor Harvey. He must really care about you, and we’ve got some special requests of Mr. Harvey that we think your presence in our captivity will be very persuasive about,” Dak said.
“Oh god, what are you going to do?” Scarlett said.
“You can relax for now, we’re not going to hurt you, unless we don’t get what we want. Then we’re going to hurt you,” Dak said. Merge was playing with a combat knife, whittling away on a wooden desk in the room. A spotlight from outside would ocassionally swing by the window, bathing the inside with white luminescense, turning them all into back-lit shadowy figures, because the window was behind them, and Scarlett was pointed towards it. She could feel intuitively they were still in the City, likely not even far from the Aces High Club, but she was oblivious to how much time had past since she lost consciousness. On the positive side of things, she felt generally unmolested, other than being tied to a chair and knocked out with chloroform and abducted in a seedy back alley,
“So, what we’re going to do, is call your Dad, and make some demands, you’re going to serve as a nice pretty little prop for that conversation, ok,” Dak said.
“Can I have a cigarette?” Scarlett said.
This struck them as odd, and Dak glanced at Merge, dubiously. This girl’s not dumb.
“You want… A cigarette?” Dak said.
“Yeah, it’s the least you could do,” Scarlett said.
“That’s not even close to the least we could do, the least we could do is not kill you, but I’ll consider it. Fine, I guess so,” Dak said and turned to Merge, “Do you have one for our guest?”
“Why does it have to be my cigarette? You smoke too,” Merge said to Dak.
“Fine,” Dak said, and pulled his pack of Smokeyums out of his combat vest pocket. Same brand as me, how convenient, Scarlett thought.
She was manipulating us already, Dak thought, then he put the cigarette in her mouth and lit it. She sat there puffing away on it, possibly as some narcissistic display of her manipulative powers. She didn’t have the use of her hands and just sat there, limbs strapped to a chair, puffing on Dak’s cigarette spitefully. There was something oddly sexual about the exchange, considering she really was quite beautiful. Dak put it out of his mind.
“Ok, let’s do this,” Dak said, and took out his phone and gave it to Merge with the video recorder loaded up.
✢
Mayor Harvey sat in his office at City Hall with the flatscreen TV loaded up on the other side of the room. Police Chief Phillips was in there with him, as well as the Mayor’s assistant, Doug Best. The video on the screen was showing Scarlett Harvey, bound and gagged, strapped to a chair in some seedy apartment, with Dak Longstar standing in front to the side.
“Mr. Mayor, how are you today? Oh, right, heh heh, I think I can take a guess. Feeling a bit of panic today, are we? Possibly a little bit of horror? Yes, it’s true, we’re in possession of Daddy’s little girl, right here, and unless our demands are met ASAP, you’re going to be receiving some packages, one by one, of little miss sweety’s fingers and toes. If you still don’t comply, well, we’re going to start upgrading the body parts. Next you’ll be getting some ears, and then some eyes, maybe a nose. Ok, I think I have your undivided attention now. First of all, I want you to instruct the Chief of Police to disband all police activity in the City until you bring us $10,000,000,000. Yes, this is in direct retaliation to last time’s insubordinance on the cops part. I bet those cops thought they were pretty clever sending Cop Thing in like that, and maybe they were, and it worked, for awhile, but they weren’t expecting me to escape, were they? And now I’m stronger than ever, I’ve got a new team of bad-asses and they’re called Fear Corps,” Dak said.
“Jesus flippin’ Christ, they’ve got my little girl,” Mayor Harvey said, looking very upset.
“This guy’s really a maniac, he disappears for months then turns up again with this sicko twisted new plan, I guess he was off festering in some hole, we didn’t hear peep from these bastards the whole time, and we never found the stolen helicopter,” Chief Phillips said.
“Well, we’d better do what he says before they hurt Scarlett!” Mayor Harvey said.
“You can’t be serious, you want me to call off the cops? That’s insane,” Chief Phillip’s said.
“Until we can come up with a viable solution here, just bide us some time until we figure out how to rescue Scarlett, she’s my only child! She’s my little girl!” Mayor Harvey said. He was really quite distraught, and understandably so. Phillips could see the crazy fear in his eyes. Chief Phillips had a young daughter as well, so he could sympathize, but calling off the entire police force in the City sounded like some award-winning lunacy.
Dak went on, “So, in case you are not catching my drift, allow me to reiterate, we want you to order the entire NVPD to go on strike, until we receive the ten billion dollars. We also want Cop Thing to surrender to us.”
“Oh my god, I mean calling off the cops is one thing, but how do you expect me to get Cop Thing to surrender? I don’t think he’s a very surrendering kind of guy,” Chief Phillips said.
“I don’t care how you do it, just do it, we have to try at least, they’re going to kill my baby!” Mayor Harvey said, “Oh god, not my little angel baby.”
“Christ, this is gonna be a shitstorm day and a half of Hell, do you know what this City’s going to turn into without the cops? It’s gonna be an apocalyse zone in fifteen fucking minutes out there, ok, it’s gonna be total anarchy!” Chief Phillip’s said.
“I’m aware of that, but what do you expect me to do? We have to play along until we have a better idea, I can’t just sit here and wait to receive packages of my little girl’s body parts! Come on, man, you must understand. We’ve got some serious work to do here, right now!” Mayor Harvey said. He was right, they couldn’t just let them kill her slowly, and the fuckers would too, they had seen it before, they knew Dak wasn’t bluffing. This was really a debacle. Chief Phillips sighed.
“Fucking hell, welcome to Saturday morning. I haven’t even had my second coffee yet,” Chief Phillips sighed again, then he made a phone call.
“Yeah, hi, it’s Phillips, yeah, you’re not gonna like this, I need you to call off every officer on the squad. That’s what I said. Yeah, yeah, I know,” the hysterical yelling opposition was audible on the phone from the other side, “Yeah, I know, but we’ve got a serious fucking situation here downtown at City Hall that I’m stuck right in the fucking middle of right now. Well, what do you want me to do about it? Yeah, that’s what I mean, order every officer to go off-duty, and get me fucking Cop Thing on the line.”
✢
“Cop Thing, this is Chief Phillips, we got a big fuckin’ problem. I’m downtown at City Hall,” Phillips started. Cop Thing was driving the incognito cruiser through the streets of East Van, his usual beat, it started as just a normal day, but he knew now that was about to take a serious nose-dive swing for the worse.
“I’m listening,” Cop Thing said. Mike Trigger was attentive as well, munching on some Burgers Queen Turbo Sized fries.
“They’ve got the Mayor’s daughter,” Phillips said.
“Who’s got the Mayor’s daughter?” Cop Thing said.
“Wraithvale, Dak Longstar, remember him? He’s back, he’s pissed and he wants your ass,” Phillips said.
“I thought we killed most of those guys,” Cop Thing said.
“Yeah, well, he’s back with a whole new fucking fleet of guys now. Said it was called the Fear Squad. Two of them were the missing persons from the day of the CNF tower seige. Don’t know how he convinced them to switch sides, they looked all zonked out and brainwashed or something on the video I saw,” Phillips said
“Ok, that’s kind of weird, but at least they’re ok,” Cop Thing said.
“Yeah, I don’t think they are though, but they’re alive, and it gets worse, their demands are that the whole police force goes on strike, they want 10 billion dollars and they want you to surrender, then they’ll let Scarlett Harvey go, she’s in some apartment, could be anywhere in the City, most likely,” Chief Phillips said.
“Are you fucking kidding me? How do you expect me to do that? You can’t call off the cops, this City’s gonna blow up with a crimewave in five fucking seconds,” Cop Thing said.
“I know, but what choice do I have, Cop Thing? Guess what, the Mayor’s my boss, ok, he’s all of our bosses. If he says do it, we gotta do it. I know, it sucks. It sucks ass, but you gotta do it,” Phillips said.
“What about all the other innocent folks in this town who aren’t the Mayor’s daughter? If you call the cops off that puts them all in danger too,” Cop Thing said.
“I know, it’s a real fuck around, but orders are orders, ok,” Phillips said.
“So you’re going to order me to walk right into a trap, is that it?” Cop Thing said.
“Well, you’re Cop Thing, so, yeah, we need you on this one. Dak Longstar mentioned you specifically, ok the guy’s got a vendetta now. What if we get you to talk to him? You could rescue Scarlett Harvey, solve this whole catastrophe, except we don’t know where they are. They’re not so stupid as to just broadcast their whole operation on TV this time. They sent a video directly to the Mayor’s office. It’s got the girl all tied up and gagged and blindfolded. The Mayor was pretty upset, wouldn’t you be?” Phillips said.
Cop Thing knew he would be. Ideas started bouncing around in the inverted-crater-like head of his. How was he gonna rescue this girl and save the City at the same time?
“So I’m gonna order every cop to lay down their arms and clock out, until we can get a handle on this situation somehow, I’ll let you know what’s going on soon, Phillips out,” Phillips hung up.
“What was that about?” Mike Trigger said.
“Mike, I’ve got a feeling we’re in for a real clusterfuck today,” Cop Thing said.
Phillips came on the police radio and ordered everyone on the force to go off-duty until further notice.
“Holy fucking nutsack, you weren’t joking,” Mike Trigger said.
“I know,” Cop Thing said.
“So what are we supposed to do, just sit around sucking our own dicks watching crimes escalate all over the City, not doing anything about it?” Mike said.
“I guess that’s what they kind of had in mind, yeah, until I surrender and they get their ransom cash, at least that’s what they’re asking for,” Cop Thing said, “Except we don’t even know where these guys are located right now. Seems like they want to create havoc with a city-wide rampage to send a message in Neo-Vancouver before they even give any further directions.”
“Definitely seems like that, doesn’t it?” Mike said.
“This is going to drive me apeshit, just sitting around, waiting for the guillotine to fall, that’s not how I roll,” Cop Thing said.
“I’m aware of that, you know that, look, it’s not how I roll either, none of us do,” Mike Trigger said, “Any clues in the video to where their secret hideout might be?”
“Could be anywhere in the City, most likely, Phillips is working on it. Mostly we just need the girl to not get hacked up while we figure out what to do about it,” Cop Thing said. They could already feel the tension rising, not having police cars roaming around.
The sirens had stopped, the eerie and haunting absence of the omnipresent protective force, the people’s protective force, that everyone takes for granted is there and even complains about it sometimes, protecting them against themselves. The dark heart of crime and disorder was about to show itself in broad daylight, big-time, with nothing to stop it, that’s how Cop Thing felt. That was probably the absolute worst feeling for him, total impotence at the most crucial time. He needed an idea right now, a real solution.
Fifteen minutes later there were bonfires in the streets, roving bands of criminal thugs running amok with blunt weapons and openly doing drugs and beating the shit out of each other all over the sidewalk and street. Traffic was a mess and the rules rapidly degenerated level by level until anarchy had completely taken it’s ugly hold on Neo-Vancouver.
There was a nasty desperation in the general attitude of the folks in the streets, something was severely different, but no one knew what it was yet. It was amazing how much sway a single person could hold. Scarlett Harvey was more important to the person calling the shots than virtually any other person in this town.
The law had been cancelled. There was no law anymore.
There was a massive amoeba of dysfunction and disarray, worsening steadily by the minute. No one in the streets had really figured it out what had happened yet, because it was a silent withdrawal, but something had clearly changed and that was becoming alarmingly obvious as the minutes dragged on. Cop Thing simply sat in his car, waiting for orders, which was grating and crushing his soul inside and actually really pissing him off.
He had never been so angry in his life, actually, but it was festering inside, gestating his frustration. He could see the absolute destruction happening right before his eyes of everything he had trained for and fought so hard for everyday, all day long, degenerating into unmitigated madness.
They were parked in the incognito cruiser off to the side of the road on East Hastings street, watching a tidal wave of human delinquency grow larger and more dangerous. Cop Thing didn’t know how much longer he could stand it, he felt like he was going to spontaneously combust.
He really, truly hated Dak Longstar at that moment.
They flipped on CNF and Bill Littlewood was now telling the story of the seemingly mysterious resignation of the police. This was apparent from the display of people literally commiting crimes and looting and burning in front of the cop cars, and officers were present and simply not doing anything about it.
It was a sad state of affairs.
The City had turned into an insane asylum in the span of less than an hour, raging in fires and gunfire, stabbings and beatings and a general basic aura of evil mayhem. What was going to give here? Action needed to be taken. They were completely at the mercy of Dak Longstar’s orders. He wasn’t even giving them a chance to comply, because he hadn’t directed the next phase of instructions yet.
✢
“They’re like chicken’s with ther heads cut off out there,” Dak said, smiling and relishing in the evil unleashed by him and the Fear Corps, watching his plan come to dirty fruition in real time on TV. That CNF little weasel Bill Littlehood was reporting on the chaotic lawlessness raging within the City.
Dak pulled out a tiny bottle of Firestorm and chugged it back.
The had put the gag and the blindfold back on Scarlett, so she wasn’t seeing this or able to interject, but she could hear what was happening from the verbal reports on TV.
They had the Spinal Capacitor in the room waiting on the table for the inevitable encounter with Cop Thing. It looked like a big gunmetal chrome rifle with a wide muzzle, golden-painted inside a gaping rectangle leading in where the shock-blast would emerge from, and a gas-cannister apparatus where the ammo charge was stored.
“So, where do you plan on ambushing Cop Thing? I assume you’ve got that part figured out. We can’t get him to come here,” Merge said.
“I know, I’ll meet him myself. Like I said, this is between him and me, and the Spinal Capacitor.
“Ok, so, are you ready to take that risk? You don’t even know if that thing’s gonna work the way you think it should,” Merge said.
“It’s too late now, isn’t it? The plan’s already been set into motion. There’s nothing we can do but follow through,” Dak said.
“Ok, so are you going to make the call?” Merge asked.
“I have to,” Dak said and picked up the phone.
“Hello?” Chief Phillips answered.
“Phillips, this is Dak Longstar,” Dak said.
“Longstar! How did you get this number?” Phillips said.
“Nevermind that, for now. That’s not important. What’s important is the next phase of the plan,” Dak said.
“Ok, which is? What?” Phillips said, agitated, impatient, stressed, and he hated this guy.
“Get Cop Thing to meet me at the Break Street Seawall in one hour, no weapons, no funny shit, ok, no bullshit, or you know what’s gonna happen. First sign we see of any attempt to thwart us, Scarlett Harvey’s gonna get hurt real bad,” Dak said, “And also, you just e-transfer deposit the money into my bank account this time, no in-person tricky crap. You have one hour, you know the account info. Same as last time, wraithvale.nwo.esq@gmail.com. Except do it right this time, or the girl’s dead. One hour,” Dak said and hung up.
CHAPTER 32 – DUMPTRUCK DERBY
Cop Thing couldn’t stand it any longer. Somebody had to clean up this horrid mess, stand down orders withstanding or not. This was unacceptable, duty was duty, and his duty wasn’t negotiable with his superiors. It was a responsibility to carry out justice, no matter what the cost, and watching the city burn down, not doing anything about it, wasn’t Cop Thing’s idea of justice, it was the exact opposite; In fact, it was everything he loathed in this world.
There was mass looting and scavenging, violence and roving gangs in the streets, homeless people and junkies overflowing into the middle of the road out of the back alleys and doorway alcoves where their cardboard shanty towns were set up, stopping traffic, jubilant it was their day to shine through the darkness. Sadly, all it took for this legendary creepshow to spawn was the removal of the punishing force. It turns out no one cared about what was actually right and wrong, good or bad, except for Cop Thing, and this whole collapse was very wrong and bad, in his estimation.
He stepped out of the incognito crusier with a flare of inspiration and gusto and started walking across the street like the determinator that he was, towards a convoy of dumptrucks that were parked there.
“Cop Thing! What the hell are you doing?” Mike Trigger called out behind him, who had just gotten out of the car too.
“Taking the Law into my own hands, where it belongs,” Cop Thing said.
“You can’t do that!” Mike Trigger yelled after him, tentatively. Could he though?
“Wrong, actually,” Cop Thing said. There was a dumptruck driver in the front dumptruck in the convoy, casually and apathetically amused, watching the CNF updates on his phone. Bill Littlewood was still explaining how all hell had broken loose to the good folks watching comfortably from home on TV. Cop Thing got up beside the driver on the driver’s side door and held up his badge to show the guy, as if it wasn’t obvious who he was.
“Officer Cop Thing, I need to borrow this dumptruck,” He said.
“Oh, hell no, Cop Thing, not today you don’t,” The dumptruck driver said.
“I wasn’t asking,” Cop Thing said, then opened the door and yanked the man out by the collar of his jacket, sending him flying to the pavement. The man grunted with a groan of inconvenience and embarrassed chagrin as he landed face first on the ground.
“Sorry, but it has to be done, Sir” Cop Thing said, and saluted the man while he was crawling out of the way on the road. The keys were still in the vehicle ignition, which Cop Thing turned, starting the engine and revving it for good measure. Then he started driving, being at least careful enough not to run people down in the streets.
Cop Thing made a quick pit-stop at a Backyard Depot hardware store that was being ransacked and looted by criminals, the poor, orange vest-clad staff fleeing helpless in terror. He emerged shortly after with a long bundle of rope, tied a lasso, and started lassoing these poor, misled, criminal delinquents and hog-tying them with the rope, cutting off the necessary separated segments with a knife, which he had also picked up inside the store. He made sure to pay for the items, of course, lest he be as hypocritcally criminal as the people he was taking it upon himself to arrest. Then he casually carried the arrested captives to the back of the empty dumptruck and tossed them in, while they were wriggling and squirming and shouting obscenities and threats at Cop Thing, but it made no difference, none of them could even hurt him at all.
Now, in possession of the necessary tools for the job, Cop Thing pulled out from the store and drove out onto the street. Police Chief Phillips hadn’t said anything about the Fire Department being on strike, too, so the sirens were starting up later in the game now, after the pyromania had burst forth, and the firetrucks were in the streets with firefighters running around, desperately tending to the raging bonfires that were lighting up the area, dousing them in streams of high-pressure water from a hose.
Everytime Cop Thing saw a crime in progress, or some suspicious activity, he would stop the dumptruck, leaving it idle in park, get out and apprehend the suspect, roughing them up to various degrees. He was skipping the use of his .44 Magnum in this particular scenario, so as to sort of fly under-the-radar with this whole operation. He didn’t want to draw unnecessary attention to himself and upset the Fear Corps if they somehow found out there was actual law enforcement happening, but so far he was managing to get away with it, because he was blending in with the general level of chaos that was taking place all over the city, and no one was paying that close of attention to the minutiae of the details like that.
Cop Thing used the lasso repetatively to snag these crooks over a course of a few blocks. He used the leftover, much longer bundle of rope, cut it with the knife, then tied them up while they were quite surprised and unhappy about it, then tossed them in the back of the dumptruck like the sacks of garbage that they were. There was a good pile of low-life scum in the back of the dumptruck now, all mashed together and on top of each other. He had apprehended over a dozen people at this point.
Mike Trigger was following in the incognito cruiser, watching in awe and actually quite impressed with Cop Thing’s performance. There was no gunfire, no blood, just good old fashioned cold, hard and stern justice, carried out the way it should be, with a vengeance. Mike gained a lot of respect for Cop Thing that day. Fucking genius, he thought.
Phillips called Cop Thing.
“Cop Thing, what are you doing right now?” Phillips asked.
Cop Thing turned while driving the dumptruck and looked in the back at the mound of squiggling bodies he had amassed tied up back there, “Just tasking out the trash at the moment, Chief.”
“Ok, well cancel that for now, because Dak Longstar wants to meet you at the Break Street Seawall at 2:00pm,” Phillips said.
“Ok, and then what?” Cop Thing said.
“Well, they’re obviously going to try to kill you, so I figure the ball’s in your court for that one, you’re the big-deal hero guy, you figure it out. All I know is the kidnappers in Fear Squad requested you specifically to show up and surrender to them there. Honestly, they’re probably pissed about last time when you fucked up their whole operation and killed their whole squad,” Phillips said.
“I didn’t kill their whole squad, I only killed a few of them, and badly injured some others, if I remember correctly,” Cop Thing said.
“Whatever, you know what I mean, anyways he wants you there at two, so please be there on time or the Mayor’s gonna have my roasted ass on a silver platter for dinner, not to mention Scarlett Harvey’s going to get killed,” Phillips said.
“Well, we can’t have that, but I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but the whole town’s in a manic apocalypse scenario right now, thanks to your orders,” Cop Thing said.
“I know. Look when you’re the Chief of Police, Cop Thing, decisions aren’t always so simple, ok. Things get jumbled sometimes. That’s the hard part of the job. You may think I’m just sitting there at my desk at HQ all day, smoking cigars, but there’s a lot more to it than that, alright. I have to make the tough calls. I have to take the responsibility. Every time you or Mike Trigger goes out on a limb and starts doing wild and crazy shit, it comes down on my desk, ok, my neck’s on the line everytime. Don’t screw this up, please, this is really important. Phillips out,” He hung up.
Cop Thing made a severe U-turn onto a street heading towards the Seawall. There was a man in a bandana mask with a backpack, a Peebst in one hand and a molotov cocktail in the other, eyeing up a local drug store. Cop Thing could just sense this lush was about to strike, so before he could, while still driving, Cop Thing took the lasso in his left hand, swerved close to the guy as he was driving past and threw the noose around him. The rope circlet fell around the man’s waist and the force from the moving dumptruck pulled him off of his feet. Cop Thing wasn’t driving that fast, so it didn’t hurt him so badly, at first, but what did hurt him badly was he dropped the Peebst, and more dangerously the molotov cocktail, which smashed on the ground while the guy was getting pulled to the pavement by the drive-by vehicle with the rope attached to it and blew up in flames, engulfing his whole body on fire. The dumptruck was dragging along the guy’s flaming body on the pavement while he screamed cries of anguish for a few blocks, before Cop Thing really noticed the extent of the damage there, because he was paying attention mostly to all the other potential threats or crimes around on the street. In his mind, that one was solved as soon as he lasso’d the guy.
“Oops,” Cop Thing said and let go of the lasso. Hopefully no one noticed that one. Last Cop Thing saw of him he was on fire, rolling around trying to put it out, and abominably road rashed in the middle of the street in the rearview mirror.
“That wasn’t exactly by the book, now, was it, Cop Thing?” he warned himself, “Don’t get too carried away here.
The dumptruck plowed on, weaving through the confused, slow moving traffic and the firetrucks and pedestrians, honking all the while. The truck rammed into a Mazda which ran a red light, t-boning the hood on the side, smashing it out of the way. Cop Thing looked in the rearview mirror and saw a man in a suit get out of the totalled vehicle, livid, with his hands in the air shaking his fists behind the dumptruck as it drove away.
“It was my right of way,” Cop Thing said, “Stop at a red light next time.”
He’s lucky I don’t go back there and write him a ticket, Cop Thing thought, and pressed the pedal harder, but he was actually glad the guy was still alive.
He was in the heart of downtown now, smoke clouds had consumed the sky from all the fires, and it began to rain again. Good, he thought, that will help the fire fighters. Mother Nature is on the side of justice. The deeper he got into the heart of the city, the more traffic was clogged, immobile and strewn about, like a messed up jigsaw puzzle. He had to make it to the Break Street Seawall soon, and at this rate, in the eye of the crimestorm, that wasn’t going to happen. So, he got out of the dumptruck, abandoning his initial mission and switching to the new one. He climbed up to the back of the dumptruck, leaning over to look at his handiwork. Dozens of criminals, hog-tied piled on top of each other, the absolute look of fear and frustration in their eyes. It stank back there, like the putrid stench of feces and urine, as some of them had defecated themselves and relieved their bladders.
Well, that was their problem, Cop Thing thought.
“Next time you think about taking advantage of the City in a critical moment of vulnerability, don’t,” Cop Thing said, “Or you wouldn’t be in this situation. You’re lucky I don’t have time to take every single one of you punks to jail. Now you just stay here and think about what you did.”
He jumped down from the back of the truck and began moving on foot, running, which he had ample experience with and endurance for, and was actually far faster to do in the situation than driving, except he didn’t have a portable prison cell anymore, and he was running out of time, so he couldn’t stop to arrest anyone on the way.
The streets in the downtown core were raging with distraught pedestrians, running in all directions, shielding themselves from the generalized calamity. It was normal now to see building’s windows smashed out, merchandise and garbage strewn all along the road, people running around, crazed with the loot. To others the situation seemed to make little difference, like the goons so lost in their own world of drug addiction, the outside world had little influence on their behavior, they just stayed in one spot smoking from a pipe, or doing the tweaking shuffle down the sidewalk, as usual.
Cop Thing passed Chicken Planet and was high-tailing it to Break Street, and he had absolutely no idea what to expect when he got there, except Dak Longstar was going to be there and he expected Cop Thing to surrender. Did they seriously expect him to do that though? Obviously there was going to be some kind of heavy ambush attempt. He got out his phone and called Mike.
“Mike, rendezvous at the Seawall. Yeah, the one on Break Street. Bring the Savage Scout and stay out of sight, find a good vantage point. Dak Longstar is calling me out. Yeah, I don’t know what they’re planning. Yeah, I know it’s a trap,” Cop Thing said and hung up.
He was almost there. As he ran top speed and got closer to the Seawall, the surrounding anarchy had subsided somewhat as most of it was taking place in the core area of human consciousness, which was also reflected in the destruction of the businesses, items, vehicles and merchandise. Out near the water on the peripheral of the city, it was mostly houses, apartment complexes, condominiums, and at most, an elementary school or a corner store, plus the odd small park or two at the intersections.
He could see the ocean now, turbulent, tempestuous waves crashing against the Seawall. The long, curving path out to the ocean with a lighthouse at the end spanned several kilometers in length, surrounded by massive cruise ships and cargo ships. The weather was cloudy and raining, and the state of emergency going on inside the City combination wasn’t exactly a conducive arrangement for people to be going for a joy-walk on Break Street right now. When Cop Thing got the the road, he was the only person in sight, an extremely uncommon, and sort of creepy occurrence in this town. People were hiding by now. Fear Corps was living up to their name. Looking back into town, there was a level of smog and smoke covering the buildings that was ominous evidence of the depravity and destruction that had been wrought inside the concrete metropolis within the last hour.
CHAPTER 33 – BREAK STREET SEAWALL
“Phillips, it’s Dak,” Dak said into the phone.
“I know, I can see the call display,” Phillips said.
“Nevermind that, I’m looking at my bank account info, and there is no deposit of $10,000,000,000 yet. Why is that? Did I not make myself absolutely clear?” Dak said.
“Yeah, we’re working out how to do that, but there’s limits and things on the amount you can e-transfer with the bank, right, they have rules and regulations about this kind of stuff. I know you’re a big anarchist revolutionary type guy, but in the real world, things work in a system. We can’t just change the rules just for you at the drop of a hat,” Chief Phillips said. He was still with Mayor Harvey in the Mayor’s office, which had become kind of a command post for the situation they were all going through.
“Well you better figure out how, and fast, I’m meeting Cop Thing in fifteen minutes and if that cash isn’t in the bank account. There’s going to be hell to pay,” Dak said and hung up.
“Christ, I hate this guy. He thinks he can just do whatever he wants all the time and other people are just his servants. Mayor, what are we going to do about this?” Phillips said, “By the way, can I smoke a cigar in here? I think it’s special circumstances.”
“Good god, man, this is City Hall. There’s no smoking allowed in here, but, yeah, fine I guess as everyone’s breaking the rules today, I might as well too, fine. Smoke. Smoke your lungs out,” Harvey said. Phillips complied and lit up a nice cuban cigar and began to puff away. Phillips turned his head to Doug Best, his right hand man male secretary.
“Doug, let’s get the bank on the phone, tell them it’s the Mayor, explain the extenuating critical circumstances, I don’t know how this Dak bastard expects us to just pull $10,000,000,000 out of thin air and just casually e-transfer it to him. This guy must be really out to lunch. Totally delusional, he has no sense of reality, he thinks he can just order the impossible out of other people and they’re just going to do it for him,” Mayor Harvey was really sweating now.
“Maybe that’s what we should do, Mr. Mayor,” Doug Best said.
“What do you mean?” Harvey queried.
“I mean, maybe if we explain the situation to the head honchos at the bank, we can fake the money transfer, and at least bide us some time while he’s dealing with Cop Thing,” Doug Best said. They were running out of time, they were desperate, Harvey was listening.
“Sure, yeah, ok, do it, you talk to them Doug, you were always the best at that sort of thing. It’s just numbers on a screen right, it’s just symbols in people’s imaginations, just get them to make it up and send it to him, then we’ll take it back later after we’ve fooled the fucker,” Mayor Harvey said.
“Exactly, ok, excuse me gentlemen, I’ve got some persuading to do,” Doug Best said and exited the room.
✢
Dak was beside a building, hidden off to the side of the Seawall, looking at his bank account on his phone, and to his delight, a deposit for $10,000,000,000 appeared there. He started laughing hard Goddamn, I’m good, he thought, I get away with everything, I’m a genius. There was a black van parked on the street, Merge was sitting inside of the passenger seat. Mark Jones was stationed in a seaside motel, called the Shiver My Timbers, which had a big sign out front depicting a pirate with a red parrot on his shoulder and a peg-leg sitting on the beach sand up against a palm tree on a desert island, with a treasure chest beside him and a bottle of “Yo-ho-ho” brand rum, on the top floor balcony overlooking the Seawall, armed with a Savage Scout overseeing the whole area. The weather was steadily turning into a torrential downpour at this point, the ocean was wild and violent, waves crashing against the Seawall, splashing water over the steel cord railing all over the concrete platform path. The Spinal Capacitor was in the van, in the back seat, being held by Dragon Ali. Tank Williams was back there too. The Fear Corps were all dressed in black combat jackets with many pouches and urban camo army pants and combat boots. The group was split up now, the other members of the Fear Corps were back at the dingy anonymous hotel room, guarding Scarlett Harvey.
Cop Thing could hear the showdown music from “The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly” playing in his head while he approached the seawall, his toeless bare feet nonchalantly splashing through the growing puddle pools. It was almost time, but Dak was nowhere in sight. Cop Thing crossed Break Street, past the bike lane, and entered the gate to the Seawall platform, which was a large chainlink fence with an open door the City closed at sundown. The Seawall was studded at the sides and insulated by huge rock bricks, forming levels of building blocks which stopped the sea impact in phases. Cop Thing didn’t know if it was a stylistic choice by specialty aquatic architects, or actually was intended to have that functional purpose, and there was no time to care right now, it was crunch time.
He walked out onto the Seawall, alone, alert and waiting. He had his revolver in his pouch, no one said don’t do that, and the whole theme of the day was based on the rules didn’t matter anymore. You had to fight fire with fire sometimes, otherwise, you were going to get steamrolled.
That’s when Dak Longstar appeared behind him, approaching the Seawall from a side street. He said nothing, at first, as he knew he was expected, so he just walked out in the torrential rain onto the platform carrying the Spinal Capacitor. When he reached Cop Thing on the platform, they both just stood and looked at each other, a glare of mutual contempt between them, although it was hard to tell with Cop Thing, because he had no face, but Dak knew.
“Cop Thing, nice to finally see you again!” He had to yell, because there was still a considerable distance between them and the sound of the wind and the rain and waves was taking up a lot of the auditory space.
“Here I am, you’ve got what you wanted, now let the girl go. Order your team to let the girl go right now,” Cop Thing said.
“Yeah, that’s right, you just said it, I’m the one giving the orders here, not you. Do you know what this is about? You humiliated me, you ruined my plan that took me years to build, and you and your friends killed my squad. People I had trained for years, people I had respected. They were brothers and sisters to me, and you just marched right in and destroyed it all, and that was just all in a days work for you, I bet you never even gave it a second thought,” Dak said.
“Maybe don’t plan some idiotic takeover that is absolutely necessity to stop, you must be really mental to think you can get away with a stunt like that, and you killed innocent people in the process,” Cop Thing said.
“True, but you know what? Innocent people die all the time, everyday all over the world. In fact, we prosper from it. So what’s so different from a few more dead ants in an entire ant colony we call Earth, that’s only spawning more. How many people got born that day, Cop Thing? Did you ever think of that? Where’s the law on people being born? But people being killed is wrong and illegal, yet we profit from it, maybe not you and I, but the colloquial We, the Man, the Government, murder is cash, Cop Thing, did you ever think of that? And how would we deal with the mass overpopulation that would avalanche and overwhelm and bury our society without it. You see it’s good when people die, Cop Thing, it frees up some much needed space in which without it, we’d have a way bigger fucking problem, wouldn’t we? What’s the problem? You’re sad, you miss someone when they’re deceased, it’s tragic. You blame yourself? Guess what, everyone dies Cop Thing. You don’t see us out arresting animals for being predators on the other ones. You don’t hold a lion accountable for killing a baby zebra do you? Do you? And yet you call me the bad guy, don’t you? All I wanted was to hold it in front of your face and show you your own disgusting hypocrisy, but that’s criminal to you. I’m the evil one,” Dak finished his tirade and held up the Spinal Capacitor. Merge, Dragon Ali and Tank Williams had left the black van and stealthily moved up behind Cop Thing now while Cop Thing was listening to Dak’s tangent, and the weather was getting worse.
Dak raised the Spinal Capacitor and aimed it at Cop Thing. Cop Thing didn’t know what to expect, but he certainly was not expecting this. A weapon he’d never seen before, gunmetal chrome gleaming in the rain. The weapon charged, glowing yellow beams out of the wide rectangular vertical barrel, the exhaust slots on the side expunging smoke as the weapon heated up rapidly before the blast. When it came, it was a burst of orange flourescent light from the chamber, connecting with Cop Thing in a direct ray of energy from the core of the rifle. Cop Thing absorbed the blast and his whole form started pulsating, glowing yellow luminescence. He keeled over, sick and daunted, waning, down on one knee, then both knees, then on all fours.
What was happening to him?
No one knew, not even Dr. Shock, who invented the the technology. It felt like his skin was peeling off and his muscles were separating from his bones, like his whole body was coming apart at the seams. All of the sudden he had a splitting headache and he wanted to throw up. His eyes and his mouth appeared, protruding forcefully out of the encrusted folds of his face as he was contorted with pain and sickness.
That’s when Mark Jones sniped Cop Thing in the back with the Savage Scout from the balcony of the Shiver My Timbers seaside motel.
Cop Thing’s shield was down, the bullet actually entered his body, instead of being blocked and absorbed like it normally would, and blew out the other side, ricocheting off the concrete ground. He collapsed face down with a bullet wound in his back, carapace smoking from the Spinal Capacitor ammo roast. Then Dak’s head blew up and split in half out of nowhere, brains and skull fragments flying all over the place in every direction, his headless rag-doll body crumpling to the ground from a sniper shot from Mike Trigger, who was crouched in a nearby park behind a picnic table, having just arrived a moment too late.
The top down orders of operation all over the city, with the police, everything, it was all conglomerated and no one really knew what to do or not do or what the consequences were going to be, the last hour or so was so intense and desperate for everyone.
One thing Mike Trigger wouldn’t stand for though was standingly idley by watching his friend get shot to death, so, inspired by Cop Thing’s earlier heroics and the impulse to take the law into his own hands, Mike decided to blow Dak Longstar away, and fuck the consequences.
Now each sniper knew there was another sniper on the premesis, but they didn’t know where. Both targets were down, except Cop Thing wasn’t dead. Dak was. Mark Jones was cautious now, aware of another invisible opposing force, and he was armed. Mike Trigger could see Dragon Ali, Merge and Tank Williams flee the scene, knowing their leader was dead and the killer was somewhere out there behind them. Mike rolled on the grass, carried the Savage Scout across the small park grounds and ran down the side street into an adjoining alleyway, coming out the other side onto a No Exit street surrounded by houses and apartment buildings. The rain had let up a little now and the sun was peeking out. Cop Thing was still laying motionless facedown on the concrete. Dake’s blood and brains were splattered all around too, both of them laying lifelessly on the Seawall path. The three present members of the Fear Corps had retreated back to the van beside the motel, which Mark Jones was still located in, watching keenly. He was virtually protected because his view was almost completely of the ocean and the Seawall reaching out into it. He could see the road and the bike path beside it beneath him, but he knew Mike Trigger’s shot must have come from a spot parallel or behind him because there was no where else to hide from Mark’s vantage point.
Mike was sneaking through people’s backyards, hopping fences, hiding behind bushes and trees as he stealthily crept towards his moving targets that could be anywhere in the vicinity.
That was the most amount of damage he’d ever seen Cop Thing take, was he dead? The fuckers really pulled out the surprise with the Spinal Capacitor. It’s like they invented new technology just to waste Cop Thing with. Mike didn’t have time to do the math in his head, Cop Thing was either dead or he wasn’t, that was all he needed to know right now. The pertinent situation right in front of him was he was up against the Fear Corps by himself, and all he had was his handgun and his Savage Scout.
He came to the corner of an apartment building, back to the wall, hugging it all along the way, hiding in the cover of leaves inside an alcove under a tree. The tree trunk was thin and winding, the outside of the branches and leaves was providing a shelter for him, he could see out, but it was much tougher to see in, and they didn’t know what they were looking for.
Merge had assumed the leadership automatically now, as he had been unofficially second in command already. Dragon Ali couldn’t talk, and Tank Williams was in no due mental capacity prepared for leadership, as he had quickly become the designated big dummy of the group. They were armed with MP5 sub-machineguns and grenades, except for Dragon Ali, who had a strap of shurikens around his chest. He also had a shortsword katana strung across his back. It was against his ethical code to use firearms, he was classically trained in old-school ninja lore.
Mark Jones was scanning the area through a sniper scope lens, more concerned with the presence of the invisible enemy than with Cop Thing now. Judging by the unknown effect of the Spinal Capacitor energy blast, coupled with the sniper shot through Cop Thing, in his mind he kind of surpassed worrying about Cop Thing and assumed he was dead.
He wasn’t though, and slowly his carapace began to regenerate, muscles wrapping themselves back together, wound fibers of flesh unravelled, now in reverse transformation. The Capacitor had had it’s intended cause and method, but it wasn’t enough to actually kill Cop Thing, the blessing of his curse, he was nearly indestructable, and jacked, but his lonely life was the source of being one of a kind, no one like him in the world. The result of a freak accident chemical spray explosion years ago during a firefight with gangsters, which destroyed the previous version of him, it destroyed the man part of him, transforming him into this vengeance obsessed beast on a warpath with evil, destined to enforce his own brand of what he considered right and good in the world.
Mark was now heavily shocked and distracted by the sudden death of Dak. Not knowing where the enemy assassin out there was, or who the enemy was, was unsettling to say the least. He forgot about Cop Thing, who was a downed opponent in his mind, took his Savage Scout, dismantled it and packed it up in a suitcase, and fled out the motel room door, taking the flight of stairs at the end of the hall all the way down to the lobby, making eye contact with the shocked and frightened desk attendent, who could tell by his own weak admission he had enabled this battle to take place by letting Mark in the building, but what choice did he have? What was that old saying? You had to let a vampire in, otherwise they can’t enter. Here was this tough looking military-type guy, hardened face, killer eyes, whose whole aura just communicated he was a dangerous person, simply asking for a room in a motel, which was the clerks actual job to grant him. That clerk was no hero, why should he feel guilty about doing his job? But he could see the mayhem that had happened outside from inside the lobby, and heard the shots loud and clear. Now he just stood there, with the TV on in the background, still reporting the rioting and looting in the streets of Neo-Vancouver, shaking and confused, paralyzed mentally with fear. Mark just walked out the door and fled to the van, where the other members of the Fear Corps had the sliding door open and waiting for him. When he hopped in the vehicle and they were all accounted for inside, they pulled out with a screech, made a hard U-turn, and started scouring the streets in search of Mike Trigger, who they didn’t even know it was actually him they were looking for.
Unfortunately for them, they had packed up too soon, and the job wasn’t finished. Cop Thing was rising to his knees now, crawling through the blood and squishy brain fragments of Dak’s demolished head. His wound was shrinking, the flesh was visibly contorting and covering itself, and it actually left a scar where the bullet had entered his back and exploded out of his chest, shattered bones regenerating.
♛
♛
CHAPTER 34 – SPINAL CAPACITOR
Cop Thing was up now, standing on his feet, healed. He picked up the mysterious Spinal Capacitor, examined it. The gleaming wet chrome of the weapon was reflecting his monstrous face back at him, grey clouds and sky framing it in the mirror. What was this thing? Some kind of fractal body separator. It wasn’t enough to kill him, this time, but he could feel the potential danger if it wasn’t in his possession, so he kept it and moved back into the street. They could deal with Dak’s body later, right now he knew the rest of Fear Corps were likely hunting Mike, and Mike needed his help. Mike was also hunting Fear Corps, in a good old fashioned deathmatch streetfight.
The black van was ripping wildly around the streets, searching for Mike, Merge driving, Tank Williams in the passenger seat with an MP5, hanging eagerly with half his body out the window. Mike Trigger could see the van come around the corner of Break Street and start coming towards him down whatever road he was on, hiding off to the side behind bushes and under a tree, peering out now through the sniper scope.
It was pretty obvious to identify them as the villains because they had a black van, were dressed in all black, and had a guy with a submachine gun hanging out the window in the street. Mike aimed carefully and fired one shot into the windshield from his hiding spot, clipping Merge in the neck and spraying blood all over the inside windshield from the slashed veins.
The van swerved and crashed headlong into a thick tree, shaking a bunch of leaves, branches and acorns out from the impact. The airbags burst and the windshield was smashed. Tank Williams was hanging out the door, his huge frame body plopped out of the open window onto the grass and lay there. The back door slid open and Dragon Ali hopped out, apparently undamaged, compared to the other two. Merge was unconscious, facefirst suffocating in the bloodsoaked blanket of the airbag squashing his face. The bullet hadn’t killed him and neither had the crash, but he was not in good shape at all.
Cop Thing came around the corner and saw the carnage of the crash, looked over across the street, scanning the periphery. There was Mike Trigger lurking out behind a plethora of foliage in the distance, on the front lawn of an apartment complex. He was aiming the Savage Scout at the totalled van, approaching it slowly. Tank Williams groaned, rolled over and struggled to get to his feet, but he was out of Mike’s sniper scope view. He turned and saw Cop Thing walking towards him with the Spinal Capacitor. Dragon Ali had vanished into the surrounding suburbia.
“Die, Cop Thing!” Tank William’s said and lifted his SMG, aiming it at the approaching beast. A spray of 9mm bullet fire peppered the street, shooting up dust and smoke from the impact holes. Some of the bullets connected with Cop Thing, spikes burst out of his massive shoulders with a pulsating red glow. Tank Williams was on one knee now, forehead bleeding from the crash, unloading his entire clip, but he was so frazzled, most of the bullets missed.
Cop Thing aimed the Spinal Capacitor at Tank Wiliams from the middle of the road, not even trying to take cover or shield himself in any way from the onslaught of gunfire against him, his carapace could tank that, now that he was back to full capacity. The Spinal Capacitor began to rumble and the exhaust slots on the side of the vertically rectangular barrel began to glow yellow-gold, smoke issuing out and dissipating in the moist seaside air. A beam of pure energy blasted out of the rifle and shot directly into Tank Williams from across the road, over the grass of the person’s front yard of the house with the tree in it that the van had crashed into.
As the beam connected, Tank’s whole body began to pulse and glow and his skeleton was actually visible through his skin and muscles in an inverted black-tone. He was yelling in agony, his weapon finished on ammo, he simply was on one knee being pummeled by Cop Thing’s Spinal Capacitor blast as Cop Thing paced closer, holding the trigger down, not letting up on the pressure of the beam. Tank’s muscles began to expand and disconnect from the bones, his blood vessels were visible through the skin as he turned into a translucent man reminiscent of an anatomical diagram of the human body, expanding and pulsing. Cop Thing let go of the trigger and swung the smoking rifle to his side, leaving Tank William’s smouldering frame on the lawn, cringing with sick dysfunction. Cop Thing switched the Spinal Capacitor into his left hand and with his free right hand, he whipped his .44 Magnum out of his carapace kangaroo-pouch and took aim at Tank. He fired one round into Tank’s chest, and in his weakened radioactive physical state his entire body exploded in a disgusting squishy splatter of bodily organs, blood and bones, completely annihilating any resemblance to it’s prior human form, the warm-up weakening from the Spinal Capacitor technology.
“I didn’t expect to see fireworks today,” Cop Thing said. Then Dragon Ali jump kicked him out of nowhere in the side of the head, knocking him back and to the side, then roundhouse kicked the Spinal Capacitor out of his hand, then jump kicked the Magnum out of his other hand, sending it flying down the road and skidding beneath a parked car. Dragon Ali unleashed a flurry of kicks into Cop Thing’s abdomen and head, which was actually hurting as he tried miserably to block the incoming combination of blows. Dragon Ali jump kicked him in the head and knocked him to the ground, even though Cop Thing was almost double his size. Down in the street, Mike Trigger could see this fight taking place and raised his rifle, aiming at Dragon Ali, but Mark Jones appeared around the corner in the distance and they caught sight of each other, both weilding Savage Scout rifles. They both raised their weapons and fired as fast as possible at each other, no time to aim, then when the individual bullets missed, they ducked for cover behind the closest possible shelter, a parked car for Mark Jones, an electrical box in someone’s front yard for Mike Trigger. Now there were two snipers on adjacent sides on a long street leading out from the town and towards the ocean conjoining with Break Street, and in the middle, Cop Thing was engaged in a street fight with Dragon Ali, which he was currently losing.
Merge was regaining consciousness and managed to release himself from the wreckage of the vehicle and the squashed bloody suffocating pressure of the airbag. The good part was the airbag had sort of acted like a freak accident emergency bandage on his neck wound and actually stopped the bleeding to some degree, clotting the blood with the pressure. Merge toppled out of the driver’s door on to the grass, which was covered in shattered windshield glass, which stabbed the palms of his hands and his knees and shins when he landed on it, causing him to shriek in pain and surprise. He rolled over and used a combat knife strapped into his boot to cut a piece of the sleeve of his black t-shirt with, which he wrapped around his neck and tied there as a makeshift bandage, kind of choking him, but it plugged the bleeding. He was lucky he was still alive but he was badly fucked up with his neck torn open, a car crash victim, hands and legs perforated with glass. Dak was dead. Everything had gone to total shit. It was hard to get his head around it, he couldn’t think straight or make any clear decisions because everything was so chaotic all around him. Everything had happened so fast all in the span of a few moments, blasts and crashes and deaths. His whole life had changed just then, but he was still in the situation and all he could do was basic animal self-preservation instinct behavior, but it worked, for now, because he was still alive.
Mark Jones leaned around the corner and sniped Cop Thing fast in the back, who was already getting his ass kicked by Dragon Ali in the middle of the street. Cop Thing had spikes coming out of his back, his shoulders and his arms and head now. The physical hits he was taking from Dragon Ali were rendering him unable to defend himself, he couldn’t get the wherewithal or the time to defend himself, because he kept getting pummeled with karate blows.
Mike and Mark were taking free shots at each other from behind their individual cover posts, not really having time to aim properly, because each one understood the danger, the skill and the competence of the other sniper. Cop Thing couldn’t get a blow in and Dragon Ali was wearing him down hit after hit. For a normal man, Dragon Ali would have destroyed him right off the bat, but this was Cop Thing, who was basically successfully being a monstrous punching bag, but was so stunned on defense he was impotent to do anything else.
Dragon Ali kicked him hard in the chest and Cop Thing sprawled back onto the hood of a car parked in the Residential Parking Only area of the side of the road. While he was struggling to regain his composure, Dragon Ali whipped out several shurikens, hurling them fast directly off of his chest strap. They pierced Cop Thing’s chest and forehead, causing his whole body to sprout into a porcupine-esque blob before he keeled over on the ground, body pulsing like a blowfish.
Dragon Ali capitalized on the situation and jumped on top of Cop Thing while he was on the ground, feet first onto his abdomen, and started jumping up and down on him repeatedly. Mike Trigger witnessed this continuing abuse from his post and took a quick shot at Dragon, trying to save Cop Thing, but he had to do it so fast so as not to be too vulnerable against the opposing sniper, the bullet missed and shatted a parked car window beside the two street warriors battling.
Merge was badly wounded but miraculously still alive, dazed and bleeding, crawling on the grass, the bullet that hit him in the neck didn’t hit for fatal jugular damage, it just tore the flesh, stunned him and hurt a lot.
People were watching this epic commotion from their apartment balconies and from inside their houses, peering out the blinds. It was like a spontaneous battle arena in the street all of the sudden, a two vs. two tag match with either side having one man engaged in hand to hand combat, an his partner covering with a sniper rifle.
Cop Thing finally managed to roll out of the way of the repeated kicks and stumbled to his feet. Dragon Ali went for another jump kick, but Cop Thing finally managed to counter and grab his attacking foot and ankle with both hands in mid air, and using the momentum of the jump kick, swung Dragon around and flung him into the side of a car, the force imploding the car frame and cracking the windows.
Another sniper shot hit that same car a second later, above the back tire near the gas tank. Gasoline started shooting out of the newly opened hole there and pooling on the ground, mixing with the water that had accumulated from the prior raindrops. Cop Thing charged and threw a kick at Dragon, who rolled out of the way, somersaulted on the ground and unsheathed his shortsword from the scabbard on his back, then proceeded to perform a flurry attack of sword slashes at Cop Thing, who was dodging backwards through the liquid gas, avoiding most of the chops. One slash hit him in the chest and tore a large streak across his pectoral muscles horizontally. Then, Dargon lifted the sword high in the air and let out some bizarre tongueless warcry that just sounded like the inane roar of a wounded animal and then the hand holding the sword blew up in a splash of bloody fragments, severed fingers and tiny bone chunks twirling in the air in all directions. The sword flung back and the blade stuck in the ground over the sidewalk into someones front yard garden beside a mischievous looking smirking garden gnome. Mike Trigger had finally managed to connect one of the sniper shots.
Mark Jones was next to fire, for some pissed off revenge against this grotesque assault on his teammate. The bullet went between Cop Thing’s legs and ricocheted off the ground in the gas pool, the spark from the impact of bullet hitting concrete ignited the gas and a trail of flames rose from the street. The flame quickly sailed up the stream of gas spouting from the car’s gas tank, sunk inside, and the car exploded. The resulting wreck went up in flames with a huge cloud of black smoke. Some of the shrapnel from the car explosion had shredded Dragon Ali and put him down in the road, his grey karate suit clad handless body now loaded with bits of super-heated scrap metal.
Cop Thing was blown to the ground from the blast but was ultimately not seriously wounded, as usual, although he had taken a massive amount of damage so far that day, all the training and endurance of his will to survive rendered him able to never give up.
He got to his feet and plucked the skurikens one by one out of his body, then ran and jumped through the flame wall that was still a raging inferno in the middle of the road, rolled on the ground and reached for his magnum under the car it had been knocked under previously. Mark Jones was having trouble seeing the targets now from down the road, the scene of utter carnage, flames crossing and rising from the street, billowing smoke upwards into the atmosphere, was all blocking the view. Merge was on his feet now, picking the bits of mangled windshield glass out of his hands and legs. Mike Trigger began to cautiously approach, advancing up the street taking cover squatting behind one car at a time. He could see that Dragon Ali was down, as he was on that side of the flame wall, blocked off from the other sniper’s view. Mike made it to Cop Thing who was crouched behind a van, his spikes of his carapace were subsiding as his body regenerated, red pulse fading.
“Goddamn, Cop Thing, what a day,” Mike Trigger said, “Some close fucking calls there.”
“Yeah, thanks for showing up in time. I hate to say it, but you probably saved my ass. Whatever that crazy weapon is they had almost took me out, I could feel the vulnerability that isn’t normally there, and I didn’t like it. I did not like it at all. I felt severely weakened, depleted. I haven’t felt like that in a long time. Thank you, pal,” Cop Thing said.
“There’s one more of these fuckers out there. The sniper,” Mike said.
“I know. He’s over there somewhere,” Cop Thing motioned with his head. Mike already knew that of course, but he didn’t mention it because Cop Thing had just been through some extreme confrontations and near death situations, so Mike forgave him if he was a little bit senseless at the moment. Still, he was a damn good cop, thing.
Merge was reaching slowly for his MP5, hand shaking, which was lying on the grass beside him just out of arms reach. Mike Trigger came up behind him, kicked it away from the pitiful, wounded man trying to grasp it, then slapped a handcuff on the wrist of Merge’s hand that was reaching for the gun, bending his arm back and handcuffing both Merge’s slashed up hands behind his back while he was face down on the ground.
“You’re under arrest, bud! You have the right to remain silent,” Mike said. He wanted to say you have the right to remain dead, He didn’t know why, because he wasn’t going to kill this guy, he wanted to, so maybe he was just projecting, but that would have been ridiculously easy, considering the battered, pathetic state Merge was in. It’s a metaphor, cause this guy’s life is pretty much over. Mike just thought it sounded cool.
“I don’t know if that pesky ninja bastard is dead or not, but I don’t wanna risk checking his pulse, guy’s fucking hard as diamonds, I couldn’t get a shot in, so thanks again for that one,” Cop Thing said to Mike.
“Plus that sniper’s probably still watching,” Mike Trigger said. They were safely hidden behind the smashed black van up against the tree. Merge was facedown on the grass, squirming and muttering, helpless.
“Mark’s the best sniper in the world, and he’s still out there, as soon as you guys poke your damn heads out, it’s gonna be over for you,” Merge said.
“You also have the right to shut the fuck up!” Mike snapped and kicked Merge in the back. Merge was right though, the sniper was still the extreme priority threat, considering they had no idea where he was now. Maybe he had just cut and run. Maybe he was lurking in wait right around the corner, ready to blow Mike’s head off.
Some of the neighbors in the neighborhood had probably called the fire department, because the sound of approaching sirens was getting louder in intensity. The inferno in the middle of the road was still raging on, producing thick smoke making a pillar into the sky.
“We got to bag that sniper, but can we can’t really just leave this guy here unattended,” Cop Thing said.
“Why don’t we break his legs? Then he can’t go anywhere,” Mike Trigger said.
“Goddammit Mike, that’s not the solution for everything,” Cop Thing said, “And when we get out of this I want to have as minimal guff from Chief Phillips as possible.”
“Makes sense. So now what?” Mike said.
“Uh, you stay here, and deal with him,” Cop Thing said, pointing to Merge on the ground, “I’ll go find the sniper, and snipe him. Get that secret weapon out of the street. It’s some kind of new technology, we’ll drop that off in the police lab, you know, study the technology. Oh yeah, and give me the Savage Scout. I’m going to need it more than you do now.”
“That’s probably true, ok, roger that,” Mike said. He turned over the sniper rifle to Cop Thing, then turned his attention to Merge. Cop Thing raced across the street behind the flame wall, which was waning now to some degree, past the smouldering wreckage of the blown up car and down the sidewalk, keenly observing the distance, ready to dive behind the line of cars in the residential parking spots, but the antagonizing shot never came, and Cop Thing couldn’t see any potential sniper perches. Maybe the guy had split. Cop Thing got to the end of the street and looked in both directions, he had to rely on his intuition here, put his mind in the place of the villain. If he were versus Cop Thing right now, what would he do? He looked down the road again to the right and there was a forested park area in the distance and the street was lined with houses. He needed a clue or a hint or something. The guy could be hiding in someone’s backyard under the back deck under a piece of cardboard or something for all he knew, but he had a feeling this was the kind of caliber of person who was going to stay and fight it out. Merge said he was the best in the world, hopefully that was a bold-faced lie or just a delusion of grandeur, but Cop Thing couldn’t help but factor that into his estimation of what kind of enemy he was up against.
☯
☯
CHAPTER 35 – POSSESSED FLESH
The street was long and winding, wiggly down the middle, rising, clone apartment complexes lining the sides. There was a park in the distance at the end of the road, mist floating by, saturating the view of the ground level entranceway into the forested abyss. Mark Jones was out there somewhere. How many bullets was it going to take to put Cop Thing down for good? Not even Cop Thing knew, because it had never happened before. Today was probably the most physical abuse he had ever endured. Bullets, explosions, weird technology no one knew how to explain that tore his muscles from his bones from the inside out like a muscle magnet gravity manipulator. Yeah, it was one of those days, but now he was in sniper pursuit of the last standing member of the Fear Corps, Mark Jones, although Cop Thing didn’t know that was his name, hiding in the streets, somewhere, possibly watching him right now. He needed a clue, and in his position, he guessed he could take a few shots more, then it occurred to him, maybe if he baited the guy to fire at him, he could at least find out where he was. So what he did was he walked right down the middle of the road, in obvious broad daylight, holding the Savage Scout by his side, non-hostile fashion. He had resigned his magnum back to his kangaroo-pouch. Now it was time to do some dirty work, the serious hero police kind.
Then the savage shot came, hitting Cop Thing directly in the face, next to the shuriken slash that was still slowly healing. The shock from the blast knocked Cop Thing back catapulting into the air from the force of the sniper bullet. He rolled and spiral backflipped onto his face. It was one thing to take hits in his massive body, his pectorals, his abdomen, his arms and legs, even his buttocks, in all those places, there was a lot of meat in there, but his head, like everyone elses, was his weak point. The only difference was, when a normal person got shot in the head, they usually died. Cop Thing just got knocked to the ground and shaken up a bit, temporarily incapacitated. No one really knew the science behind how his tanking carapace worked, further science studies would be necessary for that kind of knowledge, because he was the only one of his kind in known existence, plus, he was a cop, not some scientist’s guinea pig for testing on, by his own admission. He didn’t have time for that kind of pseudoscience nonsense. He had time for justice. That was all that mattered, but sometimes it seemed like he was the only person trying.
Cop Thing lay on the ground for a few moments, the bullet was being munched and then spat out of his face a few seconds later by the possessed flesh of his carapace. The crunched bullet shell protruded from the hole, which sealed itself up behind it, then the shrapnel rolled off his face and onto the pavement. He slowly rose to his feet, then he got shot again in almost the same exact place, forcing him to topple to the ground, and giving him quite a physical as well as mental shock. With the waning basic cognition that was left at that moment, he was beginning to think that using his own life as bait was a bad idea. He was tough, everyone knew that, he was really damn tough, he was elite-superhero-tough caliber, but he wasn’t completely invincible.
Mark Jones was stationed in a small concrete park with an oversized stone throne statue on a raised pavement platform with steps on all four sides, creating a pyramid-like structure in the middle of a large square steel cage. The square ritual zone was surrounded in tall chainlink fence like a regular park tennis court and served as an homage to the brave warriors of days old in past wars, the classics, like World War I, World War II, Afghanistan and Iraq, and also the recent worldwide Cyberwar, which took place in the VR world, where thousands of VR hackers were killed in VR battle, and their real life bodies died too, or went missing in action, basically amounting to the total vacancy of their minds, which was even sadder for the families to witness the pathetic exemption of the lost soul instead of a brave heroes celebrated death. The bodies were still alive but their cognitive thought had vanished into the cyber ether. It was sort of a hacker guerilla war of thieves and rogues versus the oppressive militant overlords of the VR world. The names of the dead were engraved on the sides of the throne, serving as an epitaph.
Mark fired a third shot at Cop Thing, hiding squatted behind the throne, but the bullet encountered the fence. Clipped it and ricocheted off through the hole between the metal wires, deflected, flying astray into oblivion, possibly falling on someones head way later, far away out of seemingly nowhere, but most likely not, but maybe.
Cop Thing rose to his feet for a third time, dazed and fucked up, yeah, this was definitely a bad idea. Mark Jones fired again and the third time the bullet hit Cop Thing in the face directly where the shuriken slash was not yet completely healed. This was one too many bullets for this beastly monster, and the carapace powers were no longer working at full capacity. He crumpled to the ground, and this time, he stayed down. Mark Jones was watching through the scope, waiting. He thought, why should he take any chances? He decided he should not, then unloaded the rest of the bullet clip into the top of Cop Thing’s head while he was lying on the ground, stood, ran to the chainlink fence door, opened the steel latch and escaped. Cop Thing was down for the count. No thoughts, no spirit, no will. Just down, with a bunch of bullets in his head in the middle of the still temporarily forsaken road.
Mike Trigger called Police Chief Phillips on his smartphone, then went to check on Dragon Ali’s body while the phone rang, picking up the abandoned Spinal Capacitor on the way. Maybe Dragon Ali was lurking right behind him, ready to snap his neck, or worse. He wasn’t though. He was nowhere to be seen, in fact. He had escaped. Mike decided not to inform Phillips of this police curriculum blunder and turned his attention back to Merge so that both these bastards wouldn’t get away. No one had to know about this, except Cop Thing, if he ever came back, which Mike was expecting that he would. Little did he know that this time, for the first time, Cop Thing wasn’t getting up again.
“Let me find out from the apprehended where the Mayor’s daughter is, and I’ll call you back, ok?” Mike said to Chief Phillips on the phone. It was a little too soon and presumptuous to give him the green light to call the police squad back onto duty, who knew what kind of orders whoever was holding onto Scarlett Harvey had in case of the incommunicado situation Fear Squad was in now, but Mike had a feeling without their leader, the remaining Corps, whoever they were, were going to be like a chicken with it’s head cut off, unable to take the initiative. It was just a hunch. Only the kind of spineless marks who could barely think for themselves would get involved with a psychopath like Dak Longstar in the first place, let alone call him their master.
Cop Thing remained on the ground for a long time, until Mike Trigger found him while driving the incognito cruiser with Merge handcuffed in the back seat. He tried to revive him, but it just wasn’t happening. He got on the phone to the paramedics, and soon after, an ambulance arrived on the scene.
“Oh my god! Cop Thing’s dead!” One of the paramedics said.
“He’s not dead, he’s just really badly hurt and he needs urgent medical attention, so please, swallow your shock and do you job, right now!” Mike Trigger said, gravely. They listened and packed Cop Thing up on a stretcher and put him in the back of the ambulance. It took two paramedics and Mike Trigger to lift him, because he weighed probably three hundred pounds, and seeing as none of them were pro wrestlers, it was a team effort.
The ambulance whizzed back through the city towards the hospital, red sirens blaring while the vehicle sped in possibly the most priority life-saving effort in the history of medical attention. Cop Thing was not only the best cop on the force, he was a celebrity. When he got to the hospital, he was rushed to the operating room, ushered by a barrage of nurses. Dr. McGuffie, a thin, short man with a furry grey moustache, and a thinning, receding hairline, entered the room, put antiseptic ointment on the blast wound, and they promptly performed X-ray scans on Cop Thing’s mountainous cranium. It was nothing they’d ever seen before, which was exciting from a scientific perspective, but this was no exercise at school, a man’s, no, a Thing’s life was at stake. On the X-ray they could see four crushed up bullets lodged in Cop Thing’s head. Somewhere along the way the possessed flesh of his carapace had lost the ability to defend itself like it normally would, and it was unable to chew up and spit out the invaded metal alien antagonizers. His brain was intact but the little missiles were dangerously close to puncturing it. His skull was even minorly fractured by the bullets, denting and squishing his brain, but not rupturing it, luckily. This was going to be a career changing operation, but they had the best man on the job – McGuffie. They went in with extreme precision, using the most advanced technological machinery, and used robotic tweezers to excise the bullets from the thick, unresponsive flesh of Cop Thing’s head. When they got the flak metal out of his skin, they glued up his skull with a newly invented gelatinous goo and bandaged up the abused hole in his forehead with a white X-shaped sticky guaze bandage, two strips overlapping each other. He was going to live, but this was the worst damage anyone had ever seen Cop Thing take in his monstrous anomaly existence. The nurses cracked a bottle of champagne and poured it all over Dr. McGuffie, congratulating him for a successful improvised surgery that no one could ever learn in med school, then he went out the double doors exit into the back parking lot and enjoyed a much deserved Smokeyum cigarette, contemplating his greatness.
“Damn, I’m good,” Dr. McGuffie said to himself with a wry smile.
☤
CHAPTER 36 – LATENT BEES
Cop Thing was comatose in a hospital bed in a white, sunglazed room reserved for high-profile post-surgery patients. He was alone, with the x-shaped guaze bandage adorning his face like a grisly badge of heroism. His brown muscular carapace lay eerily still, highlighted by a single beam of post-rain window sunlight, covered from the waist down in no-name brand bedsheets with skinny dual IV tubes dangling from crystal clear plastic bags into his forearms. Outside of the window, there was a rainbow kissing the horizon. It was the most picturesque scene of veritable vulnerability Cop Thing had ever been in.
Merge had eventually divulged crucial information while in custody at Police HQ after some hard-edged tactics employed by Mike Trigger, which were confidential, so will not be mentioned here, carefully honed and crafted with experience during hundreds of interrogations he had conducted over his police years. The priority motive was to find out Scarlett Harvey’s whereabouts, which was accomplished, and the SWAT squad led by Captain Phobus had proceeded to swiftly storm the dilapidated hotel complex in the downtown eastside core. They kicked in the door, gassed the whole room with knockout-bombs, and apprehended Sergei and Delilah while they were passed out. Then they brought the limp, unconconscious bound bodies to the police station and put them in jail there for further questioning later. Scarlett Harvey was rescued and taken to the hospital for revival and was picked up by the Mayor soon after. The fact that the SWAT team had successfully recovered and identified the two missing persons from the glass tower seige months prior was impressive as well as bizarre. It was even weirder, creepier and mysterious, that when they regained consciousness, they seemed to not be the same people anymore, having only a foggy recollection of their lives prior to being in Wraithvale custody. Someone, or something, had seemingly tampered with their minds. The cops had to get a psychologist to come down to the station and start exploring the dark webbed labyrinth that was infecting the inside of their brains, where their personalities and memories used to be. As of now, they were mentally void and brainwashed into sub-menial thugs, loyal to a decrepit cult militia corps.
Police Chief Phillips was on the vid-phone with the CHA (Canadian Hyper Agency) Commissioner in his office. The Commissioner was a tall, clean shaven gaunt man, with a long head vertically, wearing wide rimmed purple tinted sunglasses, which was strange because he was in a dark room, and a tan trenchcoat and fedora. He seemed to always keep his head slightly tilted forward to half-cover his shaded eyes, making very minimal facial expressions, never smiling. It seemed like only his mouth moved when he talked, not any of his face muscles. The background behind the Commissioner was a series of hi-tech looking green screens with grids and geometry and blips on them, shining forth accentuated by the negative space of the otherwise dark room.
Police Chief Phillips understood the pressures of leadership, and the massive responsibility that came with it, better than most people ever could, but this man was even beyond that, upper-echelon, at the pinnacle of international espionage based out of an undisclosed location in British Columbia. The Hyper Agency was like the province’s own miniature central intelligence operation, employing some of the finest agents in human history, and it was revered for doing so, by those who were important and trusted enough to even be aware of its existence. The advanced technology of the modern age facilitated the more renowned action missions of guerrilla units and solo agency, compared to times past in ancient history when the spy activities wouldn’t have the glamour and razzle dazzle that they did in the contemporary era.
“Commissioner, we’ve got work to do,” Phillips said, skipping the formalities, “Obviously you’ve heard of the recent city-wide catastrophe here in Neo-Vancouver, well, yeah, we managed to handle it properly, sort of. Now we’re just cleaning up the mess, but it could have been worse. The cities a disaster zone but that’s not what I’m calling for, but it’s linked so there’s some intro context for you. There’s more now. We’ve apprehended one of the main cronies of the Wraithvale corps, they were calling themselves the Fear Corps, by the way. The guy’s name is Merge, I guess he was in on this whole debacle for a long time. You remember Wraithvale, right? They were the culprits of that glass tower incident at CNF a few months back, yeah, that whole bad scene. Well, the leader managed to get away from that fucking situation, pardon my language, and make it back to their HQ out in the boonies in God-knows-where, evidently assembling a new team of misfits for a follow-up revenge attack, which also didn’t work out for them in the end, I don’t know where they find these fucking people, except for the news director lady and the pilot from the CNF incident, they got involved in the whole thing by force apparently, but that’s a whole different story. What I’m getting at, Commissioner, is we managed to squeeze the beans out of this Merge bastard and we know where their hideout is now. At least we think we do, as long as he’s not lying. Turns out the son of a bitch was in the shit from pretty much the beginning. Long story short, we want to send a squad over there to investigate in case there’s any more bees in the beehive, if you know what I mean, and that’s basically out of my jurisdiction. I take my job seriously, ok. I’m not trying to pass the buck, or certainly not try to delegate to you or anything, that would be disrespectful, and you know you have my utmost admiration and respect with all of your years of loyal service, valiance, patriotism and justice served. So, what I’m saying is, I care about how this thing plays out, and I want to extinguish this whole thing and get to the roots of this whole operation, so, I’m asking for your help to get your Hyper-Agents to infiltrate this place, which is in the middle of nowhere in some forest in North Saskatchewan apparently, again, as long as he’s not lying, and if he is, we’ll have to squeeze him a little tighter until he squeals the truth. The guy was a pro-wrestler and a street fighter in the past, real tough guy, but our boy Mike Trigger got to him somehow when we just left the two of them alone in the interrogation room, I don’t know how Mike did it, he made a special request that the rest of us didn’t watch through the spy-window. Hey, if it works, it works, and it is what it is. So, what do you say? Can you help me out here? I think it’s in the best interest of not only the Country of Canada, but the entire human race and everything that’s good and true in general,” Chief Phillips said.
“Ok, I hear you loud and clear, Chief. I’ve got a bunch of stuff going on right now, all my agents are busy at the moment, but I understand what you’re saying and I also understand the necessity and the importance of dealing with the potential further danger here. Especially if you already wiped these guys once, then they just came back again a second time with renewed forces, who knows what’s going to happen if you leave any seeds sown, or who’s behind the curtains pulling the strings. We’re the CHA, obviously we’ve got our own intelligence about Wraithvale, extensive intelligence, that’s what we do, but what we could never point down, frustratingly, was where they were located, or who they were getting their funds from. They must have help. Unseen, evil, big time help, the likes of which outweighs even the Government of Canada. I know it’s hard to believe and like a bad dream come true, but the bad guy’s are strong too. There was no info trail. It was like if Osama Bin Laden was based in Saskatchewan. They seemed to not exist, but we knew they did. So I’m willing to collaborate on you with this, because I’ve been sniffing these guys butts for awhile now. I think that will be in both of our best interests, in the interest our our strong and free Country, and in the best interest of the entire generalized best interests of the world and all of the people in it. There’s a certain compassion and forgiveness and understanding required in life, at least that’s what some people say, not me though, otherwise you’d never reach my level of office. What I think is, we need to erase the fuckers before they breed further evil,” The Commissioner said.
“Agreed. But you said all your agents were currently busy?” Phillips said.
“They are, but I think one of my men is just finishing up a job in Guatemala as we speak,” Commissioner said.
“Perfect. May I be so bold as to ask which one?” Phillips asked, lighting up a cigar.
CHAPTER 37 – FORBIDDEN TERRITORY
Jack Turbo, Canada’s finest Hyper-Agent, self-appointed in his own mind, crouched in the dense jungle foliage of southern Honduras, outside a complex of ancient Mayan ruins that had been overtaken by a swarm of guerilla drug lords and transformed into a hi-tech criminal hideout. Lurking in the depths of the tropical lowlands, Jack had been making his way from the dropzone through the thick bush and dank, murky swamps, stealthily avoiding whatever dangers of nature there were in the periphery, whether it be the apex predators of the animal kingdom of various species, like gorillas, jungle cats, poisonous insects, etc. or a plethora of poisonous plants, the jungle was an absolute cauldron of hostile energy, and it was hot as hell, too, but Jack got through it. It was hard to call it evil, because it was natural, but Jack supposed evil was natural, it was one of the most basic parts of the human condition,. What was the definition of evil anyways? It was a human construct, because animals didn’t have morals. It was like the utter absence of empathy obliviously doing damage for something’s selfish motive, Jack mused.
He was currently on a cliffside embankment, overlooking the ruins with hyper-goggles, surveying the scene. It was a CHA scouting mission, intel sources had reported the presence of a growing fortress of criminal activity, the veins of which were sprouting out and growing further from the source into the cities and resulting in morbid drug related gang violence. Rival gangs were doing completely obscene things to each other no human being should ever be capable of even thinking of, let alone actually doing, but when you were brought up in a desperate world of pain, addiction and violence, and then you added a bunch of intense psychedelic-uppers to the mix, like most of these people were, things started to get crazy.
Honduras was one of the poorest countries in the world, they had to use what resources they had at their disposal to fight for survival, so goes the animal law, but just growing and selling banannas wasn’t really cutting it anymore, and the criminal scum had moved onto bigger and better things and started cultivating a lot of dope and mixing it with weird chemicals. It was bizarre, the drugs in the world these days, it was like the technology was expanding into that world as well as the realm of technology, as the world moved on, and the classics like cocaine and heroin, ketamine and whatever, were all getting spliced with other weird stuff, sort of like as human history evolved through time, races started conquering and mixing with each other, creating new breeds. That’s what was happening with drugs, and though it was unbelievably dangerous, people didn’t seem to care, because so many people had lost hope in the world, and possibly wanted to subconsciously sabotage their own lives with escapism, even if it meant death. It had always been dark, hard, terrorizing and bleak for people throughout history, but now that people actually had access to that information, and weren’t as simply cajoled into a false belief system, though the system tried, and people were knowledgable about all these atrocities, it just got worse, because we knew we were fucked.
Jack had heard the name Gunmetal Poseidon before. It was one of those things no one wanted to talk about, like the very mention of the name was dangerous to a person’s livelihood, or just plain bad luck. Jack wasn’t superstitious, and that kind of attitude just amounted to the idea of pure cowardice for Jack, as he was a Hyper-Agent, and he did dangerous stuff all the time, but he took a mental note as that was a viable reaction to recognize, if that was the effect Gunmetal Poseidon was having on people. To him it was a challenge, an invite to battle.
He led a life of danger, and he loved it.
Nothing compared to the thrill, the intoxication, of the pure dominating excitement of going toe to toe with the enemy, looking injustice in its evil eye, seeing its ego break and crumble into nothingness, and coming out on top, everytime, or die trying.
Jack wasn’t wearing his mask at the moment. The full-face grey tights suit that was his classic costume, with the padded grey hauberk, black gloves and boots, and utility belt with the oversized gunmetal buckle was still a viable first choice of field attire for him. It had been minorly updated over the years, and he no longer wore a black speedo overtop of his tights, mostly due to his colleagues jokes and criticisms of the pointlessness of it. Unlike his black speedo, his mask had a functional purpose. It was in his tactical backpack, the navy blue shining goggles and air filtration unit were built right into the unique item of clothing. It served a few purposes: One, as a gas mask, two, as protective eyewear, and three, it protected his identity, but it was slightly cumbersome and he preferred not to wear it unless he was in a total crunch, which he often was. He rolled over in the belly-down observation position he had been in, eyeing up the Mayan ruins base below, reached into his backpack and pulled out a curry chicken avacado wrap with chopped carrots and arugula wrapped in saranwrap, unwrapped it, and promptly devoured the tasty snack. Then he drank an Alpha-Aid beverage out of a clear plastic bottle, white flavoured, with bonus electrolytes, to stay hydrated amongst the oppressive heat of the jungle.
He was on a mountainside overlooking a valley with ancient ruins built into it, and there wasn’t much shade from his cliffside perch. There was a small cave there, however, and he was using it for shelter and had a small camp set up inside, with a little fire and cushioned seat he had made for himself out of overgrown jungle mushrooms. It was pretty comfortable, actually, and he thought people must have done this historically in ancient nomadic tribes, but he had never heard of any evidence of it. Perhaps he was breaking new ground, but it didn’t matter, he willed the thought out of his mind. He wasn’t a fungus furniture philosopher, he was a Hyper-Agent, goddammit, and he had serious work to do.
⊕
Carlos Salamendez was a six foot tall, devilishly handsome man with salt and pepper curly hair that swayed back over his head and stuck out behind him like an excited cat’s tail. The rest of his body was quite hairy as well, fully carpeted with curly fur, more than a usual man, giving him a bear-like quality. He wore a red Hawaiian shirt with yellow daffodils on it, faded blue jeans and cowboy boots, an expensive watch and aviator sunglasses. He would have been the absolute picture of Central American prosperity and coolness, except his neck had been so badly burned and scarred by fire as a child, he looked like he was wearing a darkened flesh turtleneck constructed by tragic harsh morbidity, as the puffed out brown-thick tissue framed his head like the disfigured hilt of a sword.
Salamendez was smoking a cigar and walking the halls of his makeshift hacienda, overlooking the ruins grounds from a steep embankment where the hacienda foundation was situated. There were many guards patrolling, protecting the operation. Under the ruins there was a network of tunnels and rooms dug out like a Viet Cong dirt-wall labyrinth, now decorated and furnished with tables, computers and alchemical equipment. They were creating, cooking and packaging drugs to be shipped off into different parts of the world.
Salamendez’s wife, Maria, strolled casually into the large room, which was furnished with a red circular rug and decorated with greek-style pillars on either side of a balcony Carlos was now standing on, watching his minions carry out their duties below, while he puffed on a cigar and sipped on tequila, munching on the worm. It was a blustery, humid day and the palm trees were swaying in unison like some wonderful coreographed ballet, clouds rolling in from the east.
Mrs. Salamendez was a medium height woman with long, dark and shimmering, glossy straight hair. She was wearing a tight black onesie and combat boots, smoking a cigarette with her full red lips, inhaling, nursing the nicotine filled smoke in her lungs and exhaling delicately. She was also wearing aviators over her large oval green eyes, mimicking her husband, or was it the other way around?
“Carlos, my dear, someone’s been calling for you, from the office terminal vid-phone,” Maria said. It was a rhetorical statement, because only one person ever called that vid-phone. That was worrisome news. Anyone Carlos actually wanted to talk to could call him on his personal phone. The base terminal was for special requests. His requests. More like orders. Carlos coughed on his cigar smoke and turned around to face her.
“Who is it?” Salamendez said. A rhetorical question. They were posing the facade of control for each other’s sake.
“I think it’s Him,” Maria said. They both knew damn well that it was.
Carlos stood frozen for a minute, contemplating. Could he face Him right now? It seemed like he was going to have to. He was in denial if he thought he didn’t have to. That was the trouble, no matter how rich you were, without independence, and being victim to other peoples whims, you were still a slave in a way. Frightened of whatever may come, knowing there was nothing you could do about it but scramble to defend yourself in any unsatisfactory way possible, so the least amount of violation would occur, but you could never fully escape the unpleasant randomness of life in any course. Even if you could, life would become a boring drawl without the little random tragedies to throw curveballs and test one’s emotional fortitude and vitality. It was bound to happen, and it was even good when the chaos did happen, because the alternative would be even more painful in the pure unchanging monotony of it. If everthing were going right all the time, life would be so predictably insufferable, there would be no point at all, even less so than there already was. The struggle was necessary, and it was there no matter what. So you might as well embrace it and fight back.
Salamendez had been out here in the harsh jungle in the ruin complex, running this expanding operation from the Captain’s throne for months now. Unlike back in the world, he was the boss out here, the way it should be. Now, he was being pressured to answer to a higher power, at least that’s what it felt like, actually, there was no use denying it, no matter how large Salamendez’s ego was, he may be rich and powerful, but it was mostly because of Him, and he was still sort of His thrall, and he didn’t like that. No, he didn’t like that one bit.
The cartel he operated had lots of money, drug money, of course, and gun running, but when it came time to upgrading the operation, and introducing new chemicals and compounds into the mix, higher defenses and more ambitious international selling possibilities, he owed that influence and opportunity to the person on the phone, and there was a certain amount of impotence inducing shame that came with that trade. Not even Salamendez was sure who he was. His face was always covered in shadow, and he seemed to cast his vid-phone consultations from some icy tundra in the background. Salamendez could only ever see the bottom of his face. Old, withered, raspy voiced. He preferred to be referred to only as “The Figure”, which Salamendez thought was pretentious as hell, but he accepted it because the man had opened the gates for all these new enterprises in the drug smuggling career of Salamendez, who was only a medium-scale player from Honduras in a big scale game of profiteering and contraband, but he still didn’t respect the man, he feared him.
“Fine. I’ll talk to him,” Salamendez said, acting like it was his decision and that he had a choice, and squashed his cigar out into a glass ashtray into an etching of Mary Magdalene’s face, then left the room and walked down the upstairs hardwood hall of the hacienda, which was furnished with long Indian rugs.
Salamendez entered into a wide, darkened room with a flatscreen mounted to the wall and a desk with a bank style accountant light on it, with a green lamp cover and gold furnished body. The light was already on. The chair was old maroon leather, cracked and chipping, as the humid jungle air was slowly beginning to take it’s toll on the furniture in the room, of which there was only the chair and the desk, because this room wasn’t for hosting guests, it was mostly for conversing in private with The Figure.
Salamendez flicked the switch on the black terminal board on the desk that looked like an old cord phone from the 80’s, minus the actual phone part. He had no idea who designed this kind of stuff, especially in the modern age of technological renaissance of smartphones and super computers. Why they set the stuff up with this uncouth technology was a mystery to him, but he didn’t do it himself, his minions did it for him, which made him paranoid sometimes, not being in full control, having things happening around him that affected him and he didn’t ok it, and the drugs weren’t helping either. Who was ordering this stuff if it wasn’t him? He found it hard to believe any of these other lackeys in the compound had the ability or initiative to make those kinds of decisions and act on them alone. No, there was someone else pulling the strings in the midst, but he wasn’t sure who, he didn’t trust any of these people.
The screen flicked on and there He was, in the same position as always. It was like he never left his premises, because everytime Salamendez talked to him, he was in the exact same position, faceless and daunting. Every tone of voice, every nuance of word choices had this faint, slimy layer of condescension on it, like dirty dishes that never got washed with dish soap. Salamendez knew he did leave the premises though, because little differences would occur, subtle, making him question whether this was a dream or actual reality, unless he wasn’t a real person at all, and merely some programmed AI orator. It was always the same but always a little different, like a change of tie, or the weather would be slightly different in the background. Sometimes it would appear as a snowstorm, other times, more often, it was a clear arctic horizon over the white mountains. Salamendex still didn’t know if it was a video backdrop or the guy was actually in some frost-laden mountainous landscape, but that wasn’t a priority thing on his list of things to worry about right at the moment, it just occurred to him and was dismissed immediately. He had the premonition of the way he was about to feel when the meeting was over, dirty, violated and touched in a place he didn’t want to be touched in.
⊕
Jack Turbo was perched in the cliffside alcove, adjacent to and above the ruins, hidden, spying and contemplating. His mission was to gain recon info by witnessing the situation at the ruins base, intel sources alluded to its probable presence, but the CHA needed a scout on the ground to actually find it, as it was hidden deep in a valley beneath a canopy of dense jungle tall tree leaves. He had done his job, he was here, the target was confirmed, the only problem was, he craved more. Now that he had seen that, yes, they were indeed here, and yes, they absolutely were probably cooking up smack in those gross dope tunnels. He didn’t want to just call it a day, trudge back through the jungle to the dropzone and hitch a ride back to Canada. That sounded really boring. He was already here now, it was right in front of him. He didn’t have the green-light from the high command to instigate further action, but he had been in the business long enough to know that the CHA were going to revisit this spot eventually, possibly when it was too late. Another Hyper-Agent, or a kill squad, maybe even Turbo himself, which seemed like the veritable pinnacle of beaurocratic pointlessness, since he was already here. In the time that he was retreating and reporting back to headquarters, how many bags of lethal evil dope were going to be shipped out and hit the streets, wreaking all kinds of havoc, keeping people hooked in oblivion and ruining lives? Jack lived in Neo-North Van, and he was an upper-echelon person of the truest degree. He was yuppie royalty in his regular life, in the highest tax bracket, where you actually got a bunch of tax breaks for making more money, because you were a more important person than the regular everyday cannon fodder schlubs wiping scudge, serving and being served and repeat. No, this was heavy duty stuff, this was the stuff dreams were made of, well, maybe not other people’s dreams. Jack always wanted to be a Hyper-Agent, in fact, he was born to be a Hyper-Agent, and he went for it, he worked hard, it payed off, and his dream came true. Now he felt like he could shed the leash. Could he not deal with this situation by himself right now? He was a hero, he was good at this, and he wanted to. He wanted it bad. He was aware of the delays and the paperwork and the meetings and the phone calls and all the stuff that was going to have to take place to make it look like the CHA was dealing with this horrid situation properly on the paper trail and then virtually just let the bad guys get away with it and stay King of the Hill by appearing to do their jobs properly. That wasn’t good enough for Turbo. He wanted results and he wanted them now, and he was the only person who could deliver. Someone had once told him, a woman, when he was much younger and more naive, it was better to ask forgiveness than permission. That sounded kind of evil to him at the time, but evil was abundant in the world no matter what, so he felt compelled to take the initiative on this one, even though for a regular person it would be a total suicide mission to go down there, except he wasn’t a regular person. He was special. He was talented. He was skilled and stealthy and dangerous as hell, and he just made up his mind.
Jack reached into his backpack and pulled out his mask, stretched it over his head, fastened it into position and cocked his laser sighted, scoped Scorpion pistol. Then he slung the backpack on and crept over to the hillside pinnacle where he had been temporarily camped, watching, and slid down the muddy bank, vulnerably visible to the guards momentarily, except no one was paying attention, then disappearing into the foliage covered depths below.
These guards were bad at their jobs. Jack Turbo wasn’t. That was a good sign, but he generally assumed that on most of his missions, because he knew the training and the time he had put into this kind of thing, and now enjoyed the confidence that came with that. There was an important difference between cockiness, arrogance and healthy self-confidence. Healthy self-confidence was necessary if you wanted to get anything done properly. To be excelsior.
Through the bit of jungle between the ruins and where Jack Turbo was, it was bumpy terrain, with fallen trees, swamps and swarms of insects, a huge snake slithering coiled around one of the treetrunks, red-scaled alternating with off-white, a bizarre reptilian species indeed. The trees and plants blocked the view of the ruins, creating a weird, comic book style multi-frame display of the target location. Jack carefully, yet speedily, balanced on a downed, moss-covered tree crossing the swamp and walked across, holding his arms out to steady himself. If he fell there, the sound of the splashing impact of his body would likely alert the guards, as well as being horribly uncomfortable and wet and slimy. The guards couldn’t be that lazy and stupid not to investigate a commotion like that, could they? Unless they just brushed it off as some clumsy jungle animal. Jack reminded himself these guys were probably all tripping balls the whole time on the job, like any low-life drug dealer patrolman probably would.
Creeping on the peripheral ditch of the compound, Jack moved in a crouch-run maneuver, staying out of sight. He wasn’t wrong, the guards did dabble with the narcotic merchandise they were supposed to be protecting from time to time, resulting in their generally inept and ignorant job performance. It was a separate group of chemists that actually created the drugs, but the residue and little baggy packages were often left strewn about in the tunnels on various tables or computer desks ripe for the picking. So they were slacking and distracted, and there was virtually no history of ever actually needing guards way out here in the middle of the jungle anyways, but the master of the operation was the kind of person who didn’t take any chances.
Jack waited for his opportunity and scurried up to the high end of the ditch ridge, peering forward through the ferns loosely scattered around the base level of the compound dirt ground. He was vigilant not to get spotted, and he wasn’t even sure what his plan was at the moment. All he knew was, there was no turning back, not until this whole operation got what was coming to it, whatever that may be. His scoped Scorpion had a silencer on it in case he did run into any close encounters, but if he alerted a whole bunch of guards or a security alarm got set off, he was going to be in serious trouble. He snuck over to a large cargo crate and hugged the wall, peeking quickly over the side, taking in as much information as possible at a glance. There was a cement bunker with a red glowing light on the terminal beside the door. It must be access to the lower levels, probably where the drug making was taking place. He hadn’t actually seen any of the offending behavior going on yet, but the basic story was there, the trucks coming and going, hauling off some sort of mystery contraband packed in crates and brought up from the bunkers, the whole way the place was set up, guards patrolling some cryptic underground lair, plus the intel sources in the first place informed the CHA that there was likely a big narcotic procedure taking place at this particular longitude and latitude of morass. He could see from his vantage point men coming and going from the bunker doorway, and the red light turning temporarily green with a friendly acceptance beep when it did so. The door was apparently locked and required a keycard. That was ok, that was something Jack could deal with. That was sort of basic training type stuff for this sort of sneaky spy espionage into forbidden territory, but he couldn’t go down there looking like this, all dressed up in tights and masked, he would be needing a disguise. So he waited for the next guard to come out of the bunker doorway, the door sliding swiftly vertical with a gushing air sound, then promptly closing behind him as the man walked out, submachine gun slung over his back with a strap. The guard walked to the perimeter of the jungle and went behind a thick lichen and fungus covered treebase for a bathroom break. As the man was unzipping his fly and beginning to relieve himself of his urine in a satisfying stream, Jack took careful aim from where he had mimicked the man’s path into the jungle, then darted off to the side silently, currently ten feet away from him crouched camoflauged behind some bushes. He pulled the trigger and skillfully dropped the target with a carefully placed silenced shot to the temple, ejaculating a mist of blood out the opposite side of the obliviously urinating guards head. Jack jogged over stealthily and dragged the dead man over the ditch ridge on the perimeter deeper into the jungle, stripped him of his navy blue one-piece workman’s suit and confiscated the submachine gun for himself, then dumped the naked body into the swamp. It floated there for a moment, bobbing in the thin layer of gross murky residue living on top of the liquid, then, as Jack was watching, waiting for the body to sink into submerged oblivion, where no one would ever find it, a crocodile sprang forth from beneath the surface and chomped on the temporarily floating corpse torso head-first with it’s gaping powerful jaws, knocking Jack back onto the ground from the terrifying surprise blinding splash. The reptilian beast violently yanked the dead body under, leaving a pool of blood mixing with the green topping of the swamp, an easy meal for the crocodile, literally fed its prey by an even more deadly predator. Jack regained his composure, stepping back, watching, making sure the gigantic lizard didn’t get greedy and come back for him too. When he was fairly sure it had disappeared beneath, he put the suit on, which unfortunately had some excess urine dribbled down the pantleg, but other than that minor imperfection, it was a nice little assassination, Jack thought. He tucked his hyper uniform neatly beneath a tree root where anyone was unlikely to find it, then put his pistol snugly in his Nike boxer-briefs, the kind only government espionage assassins had access to, zipped up the suit, and now unmasked, casually walked back into the base grounds towards the bunker door. The keycard was conveniently in the breast pocket of the suit. So far so good.
He held the card up to the blank, near-black terminal for a second until the light switched green and the approval sound eminated, granting access. He entered.
Inside it was a short dingy concrete path through the bunker, then a janky staircase with a wooden railing, a few poorly built half-steps and steps that sloped downwards with little rubber mats on them for better footing on a crappy situation, descending underground. At the bottom of the steps there were multiple directions to go in, and right there in the first room adjacent to the crossroads by the stairs was a sink and a dishrack, hinting there was a staff room around here somewhere. A guard walked by and glanced at Jack, apparently unperturbed at the presence of a stranger. These guy’s weren’t all on a friendly basis, evidently, Jack didn’t know that before he entered into the situation, which was actually quite extremely dangerous, being in an underground drug lab amongst a squad of armed guards in the middle of a jungle in Honduras, but he was willing to take the risk. He wondered sometimes if he had some kind of undiagnosed mental condition like a blend between a serial killer and a person who likes high-octane death sports. The higher the stakes, the sweeter the glory.
He ventured further, picking a direction at random, relying on intuition like he usually did, it worked a lot of the time and if it didn’t work, then he was forced to rely on his cunning ability to save a situation by improvising.
There was a long corridor with the dirt walls being held in place by planks of wood creating a wooden grid leading down the hall. At the end was a more spacious than expected storage room which Jack didn’t even look closely enough to see what was actually being stored in it in passing. He had bigger fish to fry. Then he passed a hallway that was a little more cultivated, with planks on the floor and window panes granting a view of what appeared to be a science lab of some sort, with lots of beakers and smoldering chemicals, men in hazmat suits and protective masks. Bingo, Jack thought. Whatever the hell they were doing in here, it was definitely massively illegal. One of the hazmat guys exited the room and passed Jack, stopped, stared at him, then confronted him.
“What are you doing all the way down here? You’ve got no business here, you’re supposed to be protecting the lab, not actually in it. That’s our job,” He said in a lo-fi voice muted by the mask.
“I know, sorry, I’m just a goon. A hired thug, not like you brainiac scientist guys, I’m just looking for the washroom, could you tell me where it is, please?” Jack said.
The hazmat guy groaned with impatience, a groan that expressed his irritation, but also his knowingness that these regular goon-type guys were likely way dumber than he was, and it was his damn curse on this earth to be forced to deal with inferior members of the human race on a constant basis, but that was just the way it was.
“It’s down the hall that way on the left,” He said.
“This way?” Jack said, pointing, feigning stupidity.
“Yeah, that way, are you new or something?” The guy said, for some reason taking a slight interest in Jack as a person, or maybe he was starting to get suspicious.
“Oh, yeah, it’s my first day,” Jack said.
“Hmmm, ok, well, lots of the guys don’t use that washroom because it’s kind of a jailhouse shitter, they just go out in the boonies outside, as long as it’s not number two, then I would recommend you use the jailhouse shitter,” the guy said.
“It is,” Jack said showing his clenched teeth and looking mopey, with a hammed up look of agony on his face. Damn, I’m good, he thought, this guy actually thinks I’m that stupid. Jack you’ve done it again. I’m a master of disguise.
⊕
❅
⊹
Legend has it Mike Trigger came out of his mother’s womb waving the American flag, even though he was born in Canada. The son of a Canadian IT technician and a Filipino mail-order bride, Mike was an unconventional child. When other children his age were watching Sesame Street, Mike was watching documentaries about World War II. Instead of idolizing Batman or Superman, Mike idolized the members of his local police department. By age ten, Mike was well known among law enforcement, having performed nearly two dozen citizen’s arrests. Among the offenses, Mike apprehended a man he caught drinking a beer at a bus stop and a woman who attempted to park her car in Mike’s neighborhood without a permit. Several police officers admired Mike’s initiative and reverence for legality. Several others were annoyed by him and wished he would just go away. At age eleven, Mike was so determined to join the military that he successfully convinced his parents to give their written consent. Recruitment officials of the Canadian Armed Forces were amused when little Mike came marching through their door, but sent him away disappointed with the news that he wasn’t of legal age to enlist. He was encouraged to come back when he turned seventeen, and for the next six years Mike counted down the days, crossing every single one off a calendar on his bedroom wall.
The morning of his seventeenth birthday, Mike drove his American-made truck to the recruitment office. Arriving half an hour early, he waited outside the door for the office to open, then went inside and signed up for military service. On September 10th, 2001, Mike’s status was that of a reserve-duty Soldier. The next day, Mike and his parents were watching “Live with Regis and Kelly” when they witnessed the footage of the September 11th attacks on the World Trade Center. Mike’s blood boiled to such a degree that he almost passed out. With every fiber of his being, he ravenously craved vengeance on the terrorists. Later that day, he began to worry Canada wouldn’t get involved in retaliation efforts. He immediately started researching how to become an American citizen, just so he could get to Afghanistan and start killing. As luck would have it, Canada sent over forty-thousand troops, including Mike Trigger. The soon-to-be eighteen-year-old quickly gained notoriety among his fellow soldiers as a “killing machine,” indiscriminately shooting to pieces anyone who looked like they could be associated with Al-Qaeda or the Taliban. Eventually, Mike was court-martialed for several disturbing acts he committed with the corpses of people he killed. Most infamously, Mike emailed his friends and family a photo of two deceased Afghan men that he posed in the “69” position. The photo was leaked to the media and caused public outrage, which resulted in Mike being permanently banned from the military.
After being sent home to Canada, Mike got a job managing a movie rental store. He met Pamela Pearce when she was hired as an assistant manager. They began dating each other and were married two months later. Mike was discontent during this stage of his life. The taste for blood he acquired overseas became an insatiable thirst back home. He felt an addictive need to shoot people he thought were asking for it, and working the counter at a video store was never going to satisfy his desire. He found an outlet for his frustration by impregnating Pam seven times in five years. With video rental stores quickly becoming an extinct business model, Mike and Pam decided one or both of them would need to change careers in order to more confidently provide for their seven children. As a video store employee, Mike had taken home a VHS copy of “Dirty Harry” so many times that it was never available for customers to rent. It was his favorite movie and it inspired him to become a police officer. He knew he probably wouldn’t get to shoot as many people as he did in the army, but however many he could shoot was better than nothing. So, Mike delivered his two weeks’ notice to the video store owner and sent his application to the Vancouver Police Department. After he passed the written and physical exams, Mike was interviewed by a detective who thought Mike’s surname was some sort of prank. Mike explained how Trigger was his real name and it was no joke. The background investigation revealed Mike’s problematic military history, but the city of Vancouver was becoming a hellscape of crime and violence and, out of desperation, the VPD hired Mike Trigger. If you talk to Mike, he will tell you the Top 3 moments in his life that he treasures as cherished memories. Number One is the first bullet he sent through an enemy’s head. Number Two is the sensation when he lost his virginity to Pam. Number Three is when the VPD handed him a gun. His first day on the job, Mike witnessed a mugger grab a woman’s purse and run away. Mike responded by shooting the mugger in the back. He could have easily chased the mugger down, but he wanted the community to hear the shot or read about it later. It was his way of announcing, “Mike Trigger is on duty.” That day, Mike established his style. He would operate in a similar fashion for over a decade and keep the department busy sweeping his actions under the rug. Not all of his aggressive behavior went unnoticed. The “Defund The Police” movement of 2020 incited a lengthy series of Twitter rants that resulted in Mike being banned from the online platform for “hate speech.” His profile photo showed him wearing a “Make America Great Again” hat, despite not being an American or able to vote in US elections. In 2023, Mike was caught on camera spraying a rally of socialists and critics of Canada with a Super Soaker he filled with his own urine while shouting, “If you don’t like this country, get the fuck out.” Mike’s fierce patriotism and allegiance to the rule of law are qualities shared by another infamous member of the VPD: Cop Thing. Some might say the partnering of Cop Thing and Mike Trigger is a match made in heaven.
SIDENOTE: Mike Trigger’s trigger finger is so worn raw from over usage that he has to wear a bandage on it to keep it from chafing and getting infected. He has a moderate form of obsessive compulsive disorder where he rubs the side of it all day.
☠
New Single “Digital Wizard” separate from the new LP “Inspector Deff”, out now on all Streaming Platforms and bandcamp…