Finishes the knot and slides it tight against his collar. That's all right, then. Brushes down his hair, or tries to, but the spiky, short hair is as undisciplined as its owner and will not lie down. Who needs mousse? This nest would stand up and riot at the drop of a hint. He finishes dressing, all the little details in place, and puts on his jacket, checks the look and fit in the mirror, and gives himself a vicious smile: baring of teeth.
Down the stairs at a crisp jog, soles of his shoes clip a tattoo from the steel plates on the edges of the old, wooden treads. The old woman in the house dress glances at him over her bony shoulder as he passes the kitchen.
"Out late, again?" she calls.
He grins at her and says nothing. She snorts and goes back to her sinkful of dishes.
Pause at the door, check left, right, across the street, then out the door and down the steps with the same, quick movement as before. Strides away down the sidewalk, impatient gait that seems on the verge of breaking into a jog out of sheer drive.
Two observers put down their field glasses inside a cramped and uncomfortable room.
"He's the one. See what I mean?" says one.
"Yeah.... Does that guy ever slow down?"
"That's about as slow as he gets, except for dead asleep. Then, he vacillates between still as a corpse and twitching."
"Bad dreams, eh?"
The first one coughs out a laugh. "I doubt that. To have bad dreams, you have to have a conscience, or something like it."
"Nice guy."
"Can't be all bad: he's got a girlfriend...."
"I know lots of girls with low self-esteem."
Another laugh. "Wait until you see her: smart, beautiful, professional."
"Professional what?"
"Doctor, I think."
"You're pulling my leg...."
"Nope."
"Maybe she's his shrink."
"If so, I'd love to come in for some therapy," the first one says with a leer.
They both laugh, smoke cigarettes and get set to wait....
....
He smacks the old pinball machine and growls at it as it clatters and rings a final score on its lighted board. Ping, clunk... and the ball is swallowed up at last.
"How'd you do today?" the bartender asks.
He shrugs. "Same."
He sits at the end of the bar and finishes his breakfast: a greasy burger and a cup of harsh coffee. The only other customers in the place look like they spent the night on the sidewalk outside and dragged themselves in as soon as the doors reopened.
The bartender twists his towel about in his hand. "Uhhh.... Would you do me a favor?" he asks.
The man in the suit raises an eyebrow.
The bartender pulls a sealed envelope out of a cubbyhole under the bar and offers it. "Take this down to the City Clerk's office?"
"Postal Service not good enough for you?"
"It's my license fee. It's late, but I can't leave here... not with these guys around."
He stares at the bartender, then nods sharply and takes the envelope, stuffs it in his pocket, stands up, throws money on the bar.
The bartender shoves the money back at him. "Nah, nah... can't take that. You're doing me a favor. No problem, right?"
He frowns and narrows his eyes. "All right."
"Just drop it in the box. I don't need no receipt or nothin'."
He shrugs and heads out the door.
He strides a few blocks up and turns the corner, heading for downtown by the most direct route. He waits a few minutes at the corner, then swings aboard a bus as it stops before him. He doesn't take a seat, but stands about midway back, holding on to one of the upright poles in the aisle. Pale eyes note every face; no one of any interest... so far.
Blocks pass and the bus disgorges a tumble of passengers into the downtown core. He steps off at the last and heads uphill to the city offices. He ducks around a corner and stops, takes the envelope from his pocket and rips it open.
A double-thick sheet of blank paper, folded twice, slips out into his hand. He holds it in his fingertips, taps it against his other palm, his eyes narrowing to slits. Lighter from his pocket. Sets the paper on fire and holds it in front of him. Swaps the lighter for a pack of cigarettes. Shakes one up and draws it free with his lips. Lights it from the burning paper and puts the pack away.
He watches the paper burn a while longer, then tosses it away, nearly reduced to ash. He leans against the wall and smokes from a fisted hand, thinking.
....
"Hey, Elise, nice ass."
Leaning over the control console, she grinds her teeth and says nothing. The man enters the control room and leans on the console.
"How's your psycho boyfriend, these days?"
"Go hang yourself," she retorts. She stands straight and sweeps her hair from her face.
"Ooo... not nice, Elise."
"Neither is he. Someday, you're going to go too far Henderson, then you'll find out." She reaches for another set of controls. Behind her, a second man slips into the room and latches the door soundlessly after himself.
"I don't think so, Elise. In fact, I don't think he really gives a rat's fuck about you. Not enough to risk his life or anything. Probably, you're a pretty good screw, that's all. If you dropped off the face of the earth, he wouldn't give a toss."
She whirls toward him, fury creasing her face into an ugly rictus.
"Let's find out...," Henderson laughs.
Steel claws reach from her other side and rake down her face, slicing open pale flesh to the bone.
Shrieks and stumbles backward. Gasps in pain and shock, one hand groping across the console as the other tries to cover her ripped cheek, touches a bleeding eye. A small light blinks far away. The man with the steel claws slashes at her again. Henderson sits on the console and watches. The light goes unnoticed.
Elise screams and stumbles sideways. Falls....
....
He passes the guard in the hall. The guard raises a lazy hand in greeting and walks on. The man in the suit keeps going. The lab halls are shiny white, reflecting a dim image of his striding legs which vanishes into the distance of his height.
He stops outside the console room and blinks at the closed door. He knocks and waits a moment, then opens it and steps warily into the doorway.
"Elise?"
Silence.
He closes the door behind him and flicks on the lights. Blood pools on the floor between him and the console. Splashes of the red fluid deface the machinery. A fan of straight, red lines beside a round smear reminds him of hair blowing in the wind.
"Elise!"
He steps over the blood and begins to search....
.....
The booth in the back has its own inversion layer. Smoke mounds over it like storm clouds gathering over the ocean. The man in the suit hunches in the booth and drags on another cigarette.
"Hey, Jack," another man greets, stopping at the end of the table. "How're they hangin'?"
Jack points at the other seat. "Siddown, Andrus."
Andrus, tall and thin, small beard and mustache, looks like his limbs were put together with nuts and bolts that were never torqued down to spec. Tosses a small computer bag onto the seat and slides in.
Waves a clear space in the smoke. "Jesus Christ, Jack... got a cigarette?"
The man in the suit flicks the pack on the table toward the other man. Andrus picks it up, finds it empty, crushes it and throws it down. Extracts a box of cigarettes from his own jacket pocket and takes one out, tossing the rest onto the table, beside a clutch of beer bottles.
Andrus borrows Jack's lighter and ignites his cigarette.
"So," he says, putting the lighter down between them, "where's Elise? I thought we were going out."
"Elise is dead."
Andrus chokes on a mouthful of smoke. "What?! What the hell happened?"
Jack reaches into his breast pocket and brings out a small data disk. He wings it across the table.
"Got that off the event recorder in her lab."
Frowning with trepidation, Andrus picks up the disk. A bit of mucking about and the computer is ready to go. The disk whines and spews five minutes of ugliness across the screen.
Andrus stares in stupified horror.
"Holy shit, Jack.... Say I'm not seeing what I think I'm seeing."
Jack picks a cigarette out of the box on the table and lights it from the smoldering stub of his old one before grinding that out. The ashtray overflows with similar butts.
"I don't know what you're seeing. What it looks like to me is two guys cut her. Details are hard to make out, but...."
"God...." Andrus slides out of the booth quickly and vanishes into the men's room.
When he comes back, he picks up and shakes each of the beer bottles in turn until he finds one that sloshes. He drains it and signals the waitress for more. The men stare silently at each other until the beer is delivered and paid for. Andrus bolts about half of his, swishing the liquid around his mouth like water.
Swallows hard and croaks, "I know I'm going to regret asking this, but, what are you going to do, Jack?"
Jack sips and grins over the mouth of his beer bottle. The expression brings a shudder up Andrus' spine. "I'm going to find them. I'm going to find out what they did to Elise and I'm going to kill them."
"Wha-- wha-- ? Back up." Chops the air with his hands. "What do you you mean 'what they did to Elise'? If she's dead, then she's dead, Jack. I'd think that would be obvious from the body."
"No body."
Blinks. "No...?"
Shakes his head slowly.
"I think you'd better tell me exactly what you found."
"There was nothing in the room except blood and this recording."
"Holy shit...," Andrus mumbles. "I don't suppose you alerted security or anything like that?"
"No."
"Why the hell not, Jack?! Fuck! Now they're going to think you did it!"
"Why would they?"
Leans forward and glares and Jack. "They know you. They know you were there at about the right time. You came and you left without saying anything to anybody, I'll bet. Now they have a room full of blood and no body. What do you think the cops are going to think?"
"I don't give a shit what they think. They'll figure it out when they find the recording."
"You left a copy?"
"Original is in memory."
Slumps back, relieved. "Thank God. At least you did that much. Not that it's going to help a hell of a lot. They're still going to wonder what you were doing there. I suppose you can account for yourself at the time it must have happened. Or can you?"
"I doubt it. There's something going on. Someone tried to set me up for something earlier today. I was standing in an alley having a smoke about the time this would have gone down."
"Jesus...." Andrus shakes his head and looks down the neck of his beer bottle. "Can't do anything the easy way, can you, Jack?"
"This will be easy: find them, kill them. Simple."
"I had a feeling you were going to say that. Crap, Jack.... Don't you ever leave anything to the cops?"
"Usually, what I leave for cops is bodies."
Shakes his head. "You had better not get caught, Jack. If you stumble, they'll light you up."
"Do I look like I give a shit?"
"Easy to say in the heat of passion, Jack. But, you have to watch out for yourself, too. Plenty of people don't like you. Plenty of people would love to see you go down and they don't give a shit about Elise or whatever's happened to her."
"I know."
"Well, at least that's something. So long as the cops don't decide the recording's a fake that you planted to implicate someone else. And they might. Jesus, it's so sick; who records this sort of thing?"
"Elise. I think she did it."
"How? They didn't let her set the recorder, I'm sure."
"She'd been having some trouble. She wouldn't tell me exactly who or what, but she said some guy in the lab had been pestering her. Hitting on her, I think. Probably, she set the recorder in case he came in and cornered her. Then all she'd have to do was flip the switch and the lab camera would shoot into the control room. Which it did. Her hand's near the switch at the start of the video."
"How do you know?"
"I watched it about a dozen times."
"Oh, Christ...." Shudders. "How can you stand it, Jack?"
"I can't stand it. That's why I'm going to kill them. But I can burn on it until then."
"Don't burn out."
"After this, it won't matter."
Looks green. "Let's get out of here, Jack. I need to get some air."
They rise. Andrus throws some money on the table for the waitress and they go out through the back door into the parking lot.
Outside, the temperature had lowered with the sun. They start across the parking lot. A path of yellow light cuts across theirs.
"Hey! Hey, 'scuse me!"
Both halt and turn back toward the voice.
A woman in a dark suit and a long, cream-colored, cashmere coat trots toward them. Avalanche of dark curls onto her shoulders. The light cuts off behind her. They wait.
She stops and looks them over. Flicks a look over Andrus and his computer bag, dismissing him. Attention to the man in the suit and tie.
"You John Koenig?"
Thinks a moment, silent, then answers.
"Yeah, I'm Jack Koenig. Who wants to know?"
Pulls a slim case from her coat pocket and flips it open. Shield and ID.
"Detective Freeborn. I'm looking into the disappearance of your girlfriend, Dr. Elise Nolan."
"Disappearance?"
Freeborn nods. She's chewing gum.
"Yeah. She vanished from her lab this afternoon and left nothing behind but blood. And don't say you didn't know, Jack, 'cause a security guard told me you were the last person in her lab." Speaks at full-auto. "Considering evidence, that would leave me with three possible conclusions.... So, how long were you in the lab?" Demon's manic grin.
"What's it matter?"
"At least you don't deny she's your girl. Just tell me and I'll let you know."
"About twenty minutes."
Sharp upward nod. "What were you doing in there for so much time?"
"Looking for Elise. She wasn't there."
"Yeah, I know. What did you think of the place?"
"I thought something had gone down."
"But you left without saying anything to anybody, Jack. That's not very upright of you."
Jack looks at Freeborn.
Laugh. "Well that was conclusion number two: you saw the evidence but chose to say nothing." The grin, again.
"And what were one and three?"
"One: you vanished her yourself. Did you do that, Jack?" Eyebrows up.
"No."
"Three: you're blind and stupid. Are you that, Jack?"
Glare.
Chuckles. "I didn't think so. I never was thrilled with number three."
Jack is stone. Andrus shifts his eyes between them, but does no more.
"Look, honesty compels me," Freeborn starts. "You've got a sheet, Jack." Stabs a red-tipped finger at him. "I haven't had a chance to look at it, but I've been made aware; you're not a nice guy. On the other hand, I know when you entered the lab and when you left and the preliminary forensic inspection tells me blood was already coagulating when you must have arrived, so, convenient as it may be to suspect you of the foul deed, it doesn't fit. Or at least not yet. So, I get conclusion number two: you saw the scene and said nothing."
Jack says nothing. Notices that Freeborn never seems to blink.
"Want to tell me why?"
More silence.
"Ok. What about you?" She turns a basilisk stare on Andrus. Ice cold.
Shrugs. "What do you think's become of Elise?" he asks.
"Oh, you know her well enough to call her by her first name? What's yours?"
Jack shoots him a glower.
"Andrus. John Andrus."
Freeborn ticks her head in disgust. "John and John.... What is this, some kind of comedy team? How do you know her and how 'bout Mr. Silent, here?"
"I went to college with Elise. We're friends. Sometimes we do a little something, meet for a drink or something. I came down to meet Elise and Jack this evening, but Elise didn't show up."
"Cosy little threesome. You all go out together a lot?"
Andrus opens his mouth. Jack cuts across him.
"Freeborn, you're startin' to piss me off."
"Really? I have that effect on a lot of people. It's amazing what people will say just to cease being irritated. How pissed are you, Jack?"
"Slow simmer."
"Good." Grins. "Good." Slows down a moment and nods. And right back up to speed. "Look: thing is, I want to find Dr. Nolan. I want to find her quick, 'cause I think she's in bad shape, where ever she is."
"Not dead?" Andrus blurts.
"Dead? Why dead, Mr. Andrus? Hell, no, I don't think she's dead. Or, she wasn't when she left that room. She could be dead by now, though. Why would you think that? Jack, here, say something to you about her being dead?"
"Just--you talked about blood.... That made me think...."
"Of a lot of blood. OK, I see. You know about blood, Mr. Andrus? Jack?" She shoots each of them a look and interprets their blank stares as permission. The grin. She goes on. "See, the human body contains about a gallon of blood. Now, you pour that out on the floor while it's still nice and warm and that's a big pool of liquid. But you don't have to bleed out the entire supply of blood to bleed to death. Depending on how fast you're bleeding, it'll only take half a gallon or so to reduce blood pressure to nothing, induce anoxia and shut down the heart and brain." Snap. "Bang, you're dead.
"But, now here's the thing, you can lose a pint of blood and be OK: you go down and donate blood and you feel a little woozy for a while, maybe a little nauseated, but you're OK. You lose more than a pint and you start to have trouble. Around a quart low, you can't stand up, you can barely move and you may not be able to remain conscious, depending on your pain threshold and why and how fast you're bleeding. Follow me so far?"
Andrus nods. Jack stands stoney.
"So... we had something more than a pint and less than a quart of blood in that room. Assuming that it's all Dr. Nolan's, which I am, and that nothing else may have induced trauma or otherwise complicated her condition, she was probably still alive when she left the lab and she didn't go under her own power, because there were no drag marks or footprints."
"What does that mean to us?" Jack growls.
"To you, Jack? It means that whoever attacked your girlfriend picked her up very carefully and removed her, but left the evidence behind. Now, why would they do that, Jack? Hm?"
Stares back at her.
"Somebody's got a kinky sense of humor," Freeborn goads.
Two blank stares, one appalled, one cold. No movement.
Cell phone.
Freeborn takes the device from her pocket and answers it.
"Oh, really?" Pause. "Really.... Well, well...." Laughs darkly. "Thanks." Puts the phone away.
Grim. No laughter now. Her eyes bore into Jack. He looks back, waiting. Andrus might as well be invisible.
"Found a video, Jack. Nasty." Metered phrases. "You're not on it, you lucky bastard, but two other guys are. Seen it?"
"Don't know what you're talking about, Detective."
"Course not. What did you spend twenty minutes doing in that eight by ten room, Jack?"
"Looking around."
"So you said. I haven't seen this video yet, but I have a good idea of what it's going to be like and I wouldn't be too generous-hearted with the guys on it if I were a close friend of Elise Nolan's. In fact, it would make a person like me--not too tolerant, kind of temperamental, possessive, crazy--just a bit crazier. Know what I mean?"
"No idea."
"Sure." Half a smile. Gone again. "Ok. Bottom line, Jack: I want to find Dr. Nolan and I want to find her fast."
"Why?"
"Besides 'it's my job'? How 'bout: I think she's still alive. I think someone is very sick and I'm not very good with illness, so I want to get to Dr. Nolan before this illness becomes terminal and I'm not going to be too concerned with the disease. At the same time, I'm not going to have a lot of patience with anything that gets in my way."
"And what if... the disease gets cured?"
Shrugs. "Load of paperwork off my desk, so long as there are no complications to that cure. But. Locating Dr. Nolan, alive if possible, is my job. And, if I had my way, I'd like to know why this happened, but, if I never know, I won't lose much sleep, so long as certain things work out the way I want to see them."
Jack grins slowly. "There're a few things I'd like to see, as well, Freeborn."
"So long as one of them isn't my legs, you do what you have to, Jack. But stay clean, OK? 'Cause my case load is heavy enough already."
Chill light flows over two faces of stone and hot coals. Andrus shifts on his feet.
Freeborn pivots on her heel. "Good night, gentlemen. Be seeing you around, I'm sure." Strides into stripes of darkness and light that score the sidewalk beyond the lot.
Andrus shivers. "That is one creepy female."
Next installment.
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