Denver was one of the few places with a strong presence from more than one or two super corporations. Fenghuang also has several buildings being rented out from Zero Round. Giving them the presence to create jobs and promote their product to more people, bullshit! The gangs of the city all knowing that if they can’t get hold of a black market weapon from a desperate ZR employee they can always go to Fenghuang for some prime chaos creators. This is more than likely the true purpose of Fenghuang’s presence, to create disorder amongst the people and confusion throughout those who would control.
It was no wonder that the low levellers did not rise up when everyone got their GID - they were still trying to figure out where they were going to get food for that week. As you would expect crime has risen in the low-level neighbourhoods, gangs execute their own justice and control on small regions at ground level. Some of them striking “sponsorships” from corporate bigwigs, only so they can get some cheap protection while they organise shady dealings.
Dixon himself holds a fairly average score. While becoming a gang member at a low-level GID might be considered doing well for yourself - getting employed under the LAF was also doing well for himself. Although he only really operated at an officer’s level while part of the force - he attempted to rise to the rank of detective but was denied. Only a small number of mid levellers have made it to detective, they still aren’t assigned high-value cases though. After the accident, Dixon decided that he’d had enough of taking orders from self-centred pricks and young up and comers. His training and experience had led him into “the lows” before, missing person statements, assaults, rapes, everything under the sun. Almost always there was a corpse to deal with, seeing another dead abused woman or child caught in crossfire chipped away at Dixon every time he saw one.
He still returns to the lows these days, but only when his drunken desperation gets the better of him. Ending up in a broken down building paying a stripper for an hour of her time before the emotions hidden inside him break out. Most of his drunk encounters in the low ended being thrown out by a meathead bouncer, tweaking off of some morbidly named drug cocktail.
Although RJ may give him a hard time quite a bit, it is also in her interests to make sure that he stays alive. Without the power of his body, she would die out within a few days. There’s a chance that her AI could be removed from Dixon and brought back to life. The places he ends up passing out or getting in trouble, it would be far more likely that his body would be torn apart or reduced to nothing.
Chapter 3
It was that day of the year again for Dixon. The day that he never wanted to come, but every time it came around his head was numbed from reality with memories that almost made him feel human.
Standing in the cemetery in front of his daughters’ graves the rain beat down on him. He barely felt the cold damp working deeper into his clothes, not because he was drunk but because he could only feel his little girls.
Jenny’s grave had a wreath propped up against it, the flowers bright and fresh, he hadn’t put the wreath there. He’d set the small stuffed snake toy next to it. It wilted a little as the moisture ran through the soft material.
Rose’s grave also had a wreath propped on it. Beautiful roses in a circle highlighting her name on the gravestone. Dixon’s single rose sitting on the ground braced against the wreath.
A funeral party walk by, all dressed in the standard black, a few covering their faces as they wept walking past. Their hats covering them from the rain, their tears visibly glinting in the light. Nobody could tell if Dixon cried from the drops of water running down his face. He shed several tears as he looked at two place markers stuck in the mud to show he’d lost his family.
“Come on, Dixon, you’ll catch a cold standing in this rain” RJ’s voice said, muffled a little from his sleeve.
Turning to walk from the graves, he muddles into the funeral party crowd. Reaching into his coat as he watches his feet carry him forward. Pulling a bottle from his coat - he pops the cork. Forgetting what spirit he’d chosen to drown himself in this time he throws it back. The burning sensation warming his insides, but not numbing the cold hurt in his heart.
Stumbling home, Dixon ignores the prostitute’s offers, the youth’s empty threats. A gang of guys try to approach him but, turn back as he spots them, smashing the bottle on the wall and staring them down.
RJ intervenes before Dixon takes things further. “Dixon, please get us home. You’ll only make yourself dumber mixing in with that crowd.”
“I wasn’t making friends, RJ” Dixon murmurs between hiccups.
“Oh really? You look like you’re a good match for them”, her voice jabbing.
“Fuck you, RJ.”
“Love you too, Dixon.”
Reaching his door he tosses the broken bottle. Tripping in the door he crawls to his feet again and slumps into his bed, passing out.
Waking up with blurred vision and a pulsating echo of pain in his head, Dixon opens his eyes.
“Hey buddy, come on man, wake up!”
Dixon rolled out of his bed, a stale smell in the air, possibly his own vomit or piss on the bed? He couldn’t distinguish the difference.
“Jimmy?” He said to the silhouette figure before him.
“Yeah buddy, it’s me. You trying to fill that head with booze again and pickle your brain?” Jimmy leaned against the doorframe.
“So what’s it to you?” Dixon scratched his head, blinking several times to try and clear his vision.
“Well nobody wants to hold onto your brain” Turning from the doorway, Jimmy walks to the kitchen and pours two mugs of coffee.
“Nobody seems to want your brain either, pretty boy” RJ quips.
“Morning RJ,” Jimmy says sarcastically.
Rising from his bed and seeing the pool of liquid and chunks he was lying, in Dixon then tastes the remains in his mouth. It was indeed vomit he was smelling. Tossing on a shirt, he walks through to the kitchen and takes the coffee from Jimmy.
“Hey, thank you and fuck you” Retorting in disgust - Dixon sips at the coffee. Whipping open the cupboard and rifling through its contents.
“What? Not sweet enough” Jimmy laughs while taking a seat. Dixon pushes his hand deeper into the cupboard and pulls out a bottle of whisky, popping the bottle cap off and pouring it into his mug. Sipping at his drink again he closes his eyes and sighs.
“Better?” Jimmy says, while visibly showing concern.
“Better!” replies Dixon, as he flumps down into the seat opposite Jimmy.
“You are a real fucking mess, Dix” says Jimmy.
“Yeah? And you’re here for some fucking reason, Kersh” staring harshly at Jimmy. He doesn’t hate him but with the level of hangover he has right now, Dixon certainly didn’t feel like having a chat.
“I’m just checking up on you buddy!” The Boston accent creeping through Jimmy’s apprehension made him sound like he was being cheeky sometimes, Dixon couldn’t help but like that.
Jimmy Kershon or “Kersh”, as Dixon nicknamed him, also worked for the LAF. The two were partners for nearly twenty-five years and had ended up in almost a movie like buddy cop friendship. Dixon being the pessimistic hard-edged one of the group, Jimmy was quite the opposite. A happy-faced pleasant person to be around. Two years younger than Dixon although most would assume they were ten years apart. Jimmy was a handsome guy who did his best to keep himself well-groomed, and also keep a masculine but welcoming appearance. “Pretty boys don’t get respect in the force!” he’d say after locking up another young punk who took a swing at him for thinking he was soft.
Dixon used to look like a man not to be messed with, and for the most part, his broad shoulders and large presence still gave off that impression. The dried in vomit in his now scruffy beard, and sweaty unkempt hair, made him look worthless. He stank like he hadn’t washed in a month, not that he could remember the last time he’d cleaned. Jimmy didn’t want to start poking too much fun at his look though. He was hi
s best friend after all, his only friend. After the accident Jimmy took Dixon in. There was no way he was going to let the man who’d saved his life countless times fall into the gutter.
Another reason Jimmy wanted to help his friend was that he considered him almost like family. Dixon had been married to a beautiful woman and they had two daughters, Rose and Jenny. He would regularly look at their photo in Dixon’s apartment when he visited. Two gorgeous young girls who were taken far too young. There were no photos of the ex-wife, Sadie, to be seen in the living room.
Jimmy had helped care for the kids, frequently sitting for them when Dixon and his wife would go off on trips or go out for date night. He loved being called Uncle Jimmy, he always wanted kids of his own when he settled down with a bride. When the crash happened and Dixon was pulled from the wreckage along with his wife, he was screaming in fury. Even when the surgeons were operating on his arm he screamed in anger at the idiot who collided with them.
Both girls died in the car, their bodies broken and burned too badly for an open casket funeral. It was shortly after this that the divorce pushed Dixon over the edge and Jimmy was there to catch him. RJ had almost taken on the role of proxy amalgamation of both Dixon’s daughters. Rose’s kind intention teamed with Jenny’s sharp wit. Jimmy could almost picture a teenage daughter of Dixon’s with her mother’s intelligence and her father’s ferocity.
“Want to grab some breakfast? I’m buying” Jimmy looked at the rose and snake tattoo on Dixon’s arm, intertwined around each other and covering the large scar up his arm. Jimmy knew that the tattoo was for his daughters, the two of them loved going to the zoo, and Jenny would always race to the reptile enclosures to see the snakes. He liked his partner's tattoo but also felt a little bit of pain every time he saw it.
“You’re buying? I guess I have to come now” Dixon threw back the rest of his drink, stood up and marched for the door.
“Dixon?” RJ enquires.
“Uh, hey Dix?” Jimmy called. Dixon turning to see what was holding him up.
“Dixon?” RJ enquires again.
“Might want to put on some clothes. I don’t want to arrest you for indecent exposure” Jimmy cocks his head at Dixon’s lower half. Looking down, Dixon remembers that he’s only wearing his vomit covered boxers and a shirt with a picture of a man lying face surrounded by bottles of beer and the caption “Fit Shaced”.
“Guess you’re right” Dixon replies with a look that could be his bleary-eyed hangover or could be a bit of the irritation he’s feeling.
“This the most action you’ve had in a while, Jimmy?” RJ remarks.
“I’ll meet you at the car,” Jimmy says as he slips out the door.
When Dixon finally appears and collapses into the passenger seat Jimmy rolls his eyes and starts the engine. Pulling away in the LAF issued detectives car, the radio murmurs in the background, all the callouts of crimes in progress. Jimmy was proud of his car, being one of the few mid levellers to make it to detective made him feel distinctive. Regularly washing his car, it was one of the few that didn’t have graffiti along the side of it reading “LAFfing stock”.
Dixon looked out at the streets as they passed by. Prostitutes and drug dealers on most corners talking to anyone walking by. Children playing games using drones as Frisbees or kicking around garbage in slum soccer. It didn’t make him happy to see the kids have to grow up in a place like this. He felt the most pain knowing that their parents were probably the drug dealers or prostitutes standing nearby. Either that or their parents were due money to them.
Jimmy pulled the car into a local diner about ten miles from Dixon’s place, four miles from the LAF headquarters. It was the diner they used to get breakfast most mornings when they worked together. Dixon hadn’t been here for several years.
“Wow, Momma’s Bistro” Dixon stepped out of the car and looks at the large sign blinking on top of the diner. “Does momma still work here?”
“What? Of course not. She died like six years ago” Jimmy remarked as he held the door open for Dixon. Several LAF cops sitting having their own breakfast nod to Jimmy as they take a booth. Dixon catching the eyes of a few younger officers, their curiosity quite evident.
They ordered their standard breakfast, a stack of pancakes each, bacon, eggs, sausages, blood pudding and about enough coffee to put a meth addict at ease. Jimmy didn’t have as much of the coffee, of course, it perked Dixon up though.
Seeing the life beginning to pour back into Dixon, Jimmy leaned over the table and whispers “I got something for you” with a hint of excitement.
“Is it a date?” RJ jokes, Jimmy looks at Dixon’s arm and then back.
“What?” Dixons face pinching in confusion.
“I got something for you. I got a call last night of a disturbance in an apartment. Think you’re going to want to come along with me” Jimmy’s face lighting up as he talked.
“Why? Whose apartment is it? Not like I could do anything anyway, I’m not one of you anymore, Kersh!” Dixon stared back, an eyebrow raised.
“Oh, I think you’ll be interested…” Jimmy looked around the diner to make sure nobody was paying attention.
“It’s Chester Lopez’s place!”
Chapter 4
As they pulled up to the mega high rise building Dixon couldn’t help but look up and try to take in just how tall it was. Blinded by the sun that singes the remains of his hangover, he looked at Jimmy.
“He lives here?” Pointing to the building as Jimmy reached for the door handle.
“Looks expensive, he must be doing well for himself,” says RJ.
“Promoted twice since we last saw him, RJ.” Jimmy looks up to Dixon. “You think I just brought you to a fancy building to show you how nice the shitter was?” Jimmy flashed his cheeky grin, Dixon smirked and followed him inside.
“Be serious, you’ve done that before haven’t you, J-Kersh?” says RJ.
“I told you, stop calling me that RJ.” Jimmy grunts.
“So it’s a domestic disturbance, what? Music too loud?” Dixon asked.
“Apparently there were reports of loud crashes and bangs, shouting and a female screaming” Jimmy said as the two of them walked past the reception desk. Flashing his badge at the pretty girl behind the desk, it illuminates projecting out about an inch. They enter the lift to take them to the eighty-second floor.
“You think it’s really a good idea bringing me here?” Dixon asks - crunching his fists thinking of seeing his enemy.
“Well, I’m here to question him about the disturbance last night. You’re going to wait outside. Maybe I’ll call you in for a chat, maybe I won’t” Jimmy winked at Dixon as the lift picks up speed.
They arrive at the eighty-second floor and walk down the corridor. The hallway is dimly lit like it was a seedy underground club. The décor contrasting with a super professional business feel. They walk around several corners before finally coming to the right door.
“827 D, this is it. Are you going to be ok?” Jimmy asks Dixon with a vague look of concern on his face.
“Me? Peachy!” Dixon knocks on the door hard and steps back, crossing his hands together behind his back.
“If peaches were likely to violently explode, maybe,” RJ says, Dixon taps his arm and mute’s RJ.
The door opens with the sound of pounding music, the smell of something stale and unnatural, and a medium sized man with large hair.
“Uh, yes, can I help you?” the irritated face questions.
“Mr Lopez?” Jimmy crosses his hands and lowers his head, game face on.
“Who the fuck wants to know” Clearly a good foot shorter than the two of them, the man tries to intimidate them by opening the door a little further. His striped suit screaming his GID level, and the Fenghuang logo on the chest confirming just how high levelled he is.
“Detective Kershon, this is Dixon Callaway” Flashing his badge again Jimmy lets the man investigate the holographic projection of his badge. “I’m guessin
g you are Mr Lopez then?”
“Uh yes, sorry detective, what is the issue?” The arrogant grimace on Chester’s face drops.
“There was a disturbance reported in the building last night, just wanted to come in and ask you a few questions if that’s alright, sir?” Jimmy slips the badge back into his jacket pocket. Chester steps back, holding the door open allowing them to enter, locking eyes with Dixon as he passes. Dixon’s rage only just being held at bay as he enters. Chester clearly recognizes him but doesn’t know from where, this only angering Dixon further.
As they look around the apartment Dixon’s hate turns to disgust at the amount of space he sees before him. A large open plan living room, kitchen and games area are framed by giant windows that look out over the city. From up here it almost looks quite nice. A staircase pokes out of the far wall. Dixon’s eyes follow them up as he realises that there is an entire top floor to the apartment comprised of an office and gigantic master bedroom.
“Pretty sweet, huh?” Chester boasts, walking past and sitting down on the sofa, resting his feet on the black coffee table in front of him. Jimmy can’t help but try to figure out what it is holding up his hair while he looks around; product, misshaped skull or some strangely hidden scaffolding?
“Was there anyone here last night with you?” Jimmy brings up his arm, the LAF database springing to life and projecting from the screen grafted to him.
“Oh yes, I had a, um….friend here” Chester removes his feet from the table and sits up as he tries to hide the obvious.
“A friend huh?” A smile creeps across Jimmy’s face. Dixon meanwhile, is slowly wandering around the apartment, Chester occasionally looking at him, curious where he’s wandering.
Looking around the kitchen, there are knocked over glasses and mugs that Dixon notices. Far too many for just two people. He ascends the staircase while Jimmy enquires further.
Neon Haze: Snakes and Roses Page 2