Working Stiff

by Kevin J. Anderson

  I could picture her ethereal spectral form as she sat at her desk in Chambeaux & Deyer Investigations. She would hold the phone, smiling, her sparkling blue eyes lighting up. “You always take me to interesting places, Beaux.”

  “Interesting … right. This time a murder’s gotten in the way. Star Wars fan dressed up in a stormtrooper outfit found dead with a stake through his heart. Turns out he was a vampire. We’ve got a Klingon as our main witness.”

  “Oh, another one of those,” Sheyenne said. “Are we on the case?”

  “I’m here helping McGoo. The motel’s on lockdown, but no one seems interested in leaving anyway.”

  “Let me know if you need our help. Robin and I are here for you.”

  “I’ve already picked up an unexpected sidekick,” I said, looking around for Fanble, but I didn’t see him among the crowds. “I’ll explain later.”

  After I said goodbye to Sheyenne, McGoo came up, red-faced and harried. “I tell you, Shamble, this is turning out to be a full-fledged cluster-frack.”

  “Cluster-frack? That’s a new one.”

  “From the new Battlestar Galactica, Shamble. Get with it.” He mopped his forehead. “Ach-gLokh Heqht has gone missing—and the rest of the Klingons aren’t talking. He was our only suspect.”

  “We might have another person of interest.” I explained about the internal dispute between TK-9399 and TK-10625.

  McGoo looked interested. “All right, let’s have a talk with him. Is he with the other stormtroopers?”

  “Unfortunately, no. He’s gone missing as well.”

  “How do you lose a Klingon and a stormtrooper in the same day?” McGoo asked, then looked at the chaos of convention-goers and answered his own question.

  I said, “I’m going to the main ballroom to see Van Helsing’s keynote speech. Since the man’s known for killing vampires, it’s worth a look.”

  McGoo, meanwhile, had to get back to the crime scene. The techs had promised some preliminary results.

  I entered the Crown Ballroom, where hundreds of chairs were spread out—and everyone was occupied. I worked my way through the costumed and uncostumed fans, many of whom were unnaturals: curious zombies and werewolves carrying comic book issues and limited-edition action figures. A burly bent-over hunchback clutched a pack of Magic: The Gathering cards, and a mummy held a first-edition papyrus scroll covered with hieroglyphics that he claimed was the “real” ashcan version of Action Comics Issue 0, available only in Ancient Egypt. He was excited at the prospect of getting it signed by one of the ghost comic creators.

  Vampires comprised the majority of the seated audience, apparently having a love-hate relationship with Van Helsing.

  Over the ballroom PA system, loud music started playing the thunderous notes of the Imperial March. The audience applauded and booed simultaneously as the costumed Darth Vader strode out from backstage, his black cape flowing, boots pounding on the rickety raised platform, respirator chugging. He reached the podium, lifted his black gloves, and waited for the crowd noise to die down. In his best James Earl Jones impersonation, the suited Vader said, “Some consider me a bad guy, a person who took a walk on the dark side of the Force and enjoyed it. But I did get better in the end.”

  Several fans in the audience grumbled. I couldn’t tell if they disliked his original villainy or his epiphany.

  “My exploits are nothing, however, compared to the man I’m about to introduce. The greatest villain known to monsters … the bloodiest serial killer in all of vampire history.”

  The crowd grew more raucous. They screamed, yelled, and hissed. The vampires in the audience rose to their feet, shaking their fists.

  “CosplayCon is proud to present our special guest: For one day only—Honest Abe Van Helsing!”

  Vader turned and extended an arm in a dramatic gesture to the curtains at stage left. The vamps screamed and roared, then werewolves joined in, and finally everyone in the audience shared in the hate.

  With a clatter of plastic armor, the stormtroopers marched in as an honor guard around a man in a trenchcoat and floppy hat. He had a narrow face, long dark hair, stubbly beard. I wasn’t familiar with this incarnation of the character, but he seemed to exude predatory evil and bloodlust. His eyes were close-set and blazing.

  When Vader yielded the podium to the guest of honor, Van Helsing just stood there in silence, spreading his glare across the audience and basking in the anger he provoked. “Thank you for the warm welcome. It makes my blood boil, seeing all of you disgusting creatures out there. You think you’re safe. You think CosplayCon is harmless fun.”

  A ghost in the audience yelled, “Boo!”

  Van Helsing parted his trenchcoat like a lecherous flasher to show dozens of sharp wooden stakes tucked into his belt, as well as long knives and a bandolier of garlic bulbs across his chest. “I’ve only got an hour, so I’ll just hit the highlights of my career. Let me reminisce about some of the scumbag bloodsuckers I’ve slain over the years. Ah, there are so many.… Good times!”

  The vampires howled so loudly they sounded like werewolves.

  “Dracula was the one I killed most often, but that guy’s like a Timex watch—takes a staking and keeps on sucking!” He laughed at his own joke. A few audience members groaned. Van Helsing rattled off his favorite impalements, beheadings, or solar overexposures.

  As the crowd grew angrier, I wondered if they remembered that this was just a guy in costume, a fan playing a character. Van Helsing seemed to be really getting into the spirit of his cosplay. Find your inner YOU!

  Thinking of that, I looked around for Fanble, since he’d been so interested, in the speech, but I couldn’t spot him in the packed ballroom. I did see a couple of other Dan Shambles, though not as well executed as Fanble’s costume.

  Even so, I realized that Fanble’s preoccupation with me as an alter ego was nothing more than innocent fun. Van Helsing’s role-playing seemed deadly serious. If this guy truly believed his mission was to kill vampires, and if he happened to find a vampire stormtrooper alone in an empty panel room, maybe he wouldn’t have been able to resist.

  I needed to find out if one of his wooden stakes was missing.

  After the hour-long panel was over, the crowd filed out of the ballroom, while a few people rushed the stage to mob Van Helsing with questions and curses. Since I had a few questions of my own, I pushed forward, too. “Excuse me, coming through—zombie detective, coming through! Official business—zombie detective.”

  When I finally reached the front, fans were pushing program books at Van Helsing for him to autograph while cylon security guards tried to herd people into an organized signing line. When I was within earshot, I introduced myself, which got Van Helsing’s attention. Although he had a grudge against vampires, other types of undead didn’t knot his undies quite so much. “Are you aware there’s been a murder here at the con, Mr. Van Helsing?”

  “Doctor Van Helsing.”

  “Whatever.” I decided to let him stay in character. “A vampire stormtrooper was murdered with a stake through his heart.”

  “Murdered?” Van Helsing raised his dark eyebrows. “If he was a vampire, wasn’t he already dead? I’d call that house-cleaning, not murder.”

  The gathered vamps spewed more hatred, but Van Helsing ignored them. He looked me in the eye and said, “Vampires everywhere are fair game—even at a cosplay convention. They’d better watch out.”

  His comment was greeted by more venomous ire … yet somehow his autographing line got even longer.

  5

  The initial report from the crime-scene techs did not contain any good news. McGoo let out a sigh. “Whenever I have a case like this, why can’t we just turn up a simple clue and an obvious explanation?”

  “Whenever you have a case like this? When do you ever have a case like this?”

  “When I’m around you, Shamble, more often than not.”

  The crime-scene techs had dusted the wooden stake from TK-9399’s chest, bu
t found no fingerprints. McGoo tried to draw conclusions. “That means it could have been another stormtrooper—they all wear gloves.”

  “So does the Darth Vader guy,” I pointed out, then attempted to remember whether the Klingon Ach-gLokh Heqht had worn gloves as well. “And so do the cylons. And so do half the cosplayers here. And why limit it to that? Many con attendees are unnaturals, and a lot of them don’t have fingerprints at all.”

  “Yeah, I guess the lack of fingerprints doesn’t limit the suspect pool by much.”

  As McGoo and I talked, two full-furred werewolves walked by, laughing and bumping shoulders. Each wore a Jayne hat, an odd-looking orange-and-brown stocking cap that looked as if it had been knitted by a blind but well-meaning grandmother. The two were immediately adopted by a group of similarly-chapeau’ed Browncoat fans of Firefly, the long-ago canceled show from which the style derived. I realized that everyone seemed to be part of one big happy fannish family. All fun and games, until someone gets murdered.

  The Motel Six Feet Under was still on lockdown, with uniformed police officers at all doors, but the attendees didn’t seem distressed, or even interested in leaving. As McGoo and I contemplated our next step, Fanble strutted up, looking as if he had just won some kind of costume contest. “I got a break in the case,” he said.

  McGoo looked at me. “How did he figure it out before you?”

  Fanble adjusted the fedora. “Never underestimate Dan Shamble, Zombie PI. I had a hunch and, getting into character, I convinced the con chairman to let me see the registration records. He thought I was you.” He nodded toward me, then continued his summary. “I discovered that Ach-gLokh Heqht and TK-10625 both registered under the same street name! They’re the same person in real life.”

  McGoo looked at me. “Now that’s unexpected.”

  Fanble nodded again. “Indeed. Crossover fandom doesn’t typically happen.”

  I said, “The Klingon and the stormtrooper were our two most likely suspects. If they’re the same person, then it sounds like a slam-dunk.” I grudgingly added, “Good work, Fanble.”

  Fanble grinned before he remembered to get back into character. “The cases don’t solve themselves.”

  “So what’s his real name?” McGoo asked.

  Fanble showed great pride as he revealed the identity of our likely perpetrator. “John Doe.”

  Just knowing the suspect’s name didn’t help much, though. We had no idea what John Doe really looked like, not that anyone really “looked like” themselves at CosplayCon. Find your Inner YOU!

  If Ach-gLokh Heqht/TK-10625 knew he was wanted for detailed questioning, however, maybe he would hole up where he wouldn’t be seen.

  “Let’s check with the front desk and get his room number,” I suggested. “We might find some clues there.”

  The desk clerk stood behind the front counter, using it as a protective barricade against the costumed fans. McGoo meant business as he strode up and flashed his badge. “UQPD. I need you to let me into a room.”

  To show that I meant business, too, I held out my official private investigator’s ID card. “Zombie detective. I’m with him.”

  Fanble flashed a fake ID, which, I had to admit, looked pretty good. “Zombie Detective II, Cosplay Edition. I’m with them.”

  The motel desk clerk, a rabbity little vampire who looked as if he currently regretted his choice of employment, fluttered his hands, mumbled, and turned the computer screen toward him. “And what name is it under?”

  “John Doe,” McGoo said.

  The desk manager keyed it in. “Yes, we do have a John Doe. He’s in room 1013. May I see your search warrant?”

  McGoo smiled benignly at the officious request. “It’s a … welfare check, not a search. We have information that someone may be injured.”

  “Oh dear, of course! I’ll make you a duplicate key.”

  The three of us waited for an elevator. And waited. And waited. Each elevator stopped at every single floor. The doors finally opened at lobby level to disgorge a throng of cosplayers.

  McGoo waved his badge and said, “Police business, we’re commandeering this elevator.” I pushed the button for 10, and we began to ride upward … but of course we stopped at every floor on the way up. Soon the elevator was jammed with imaginary characters. It was a relief to get off on the tenth floor.

  McGoo pounded on the door of John Doe’s room. “Police! Open up.” When we received no response, he slipped the magnetic card into the key slot and opened the door. “Okay, we’re coming in.” Before entering, McGoo drew his revolver, and I pulled out my .38.

  I was surprised when Fanble also pulled out an identical .38. “Is that real?”

  “Part of the costume, for that added bit of realism.”

  McGoo frowned. “Shouldn’t it be peace-bonded, like they said?”

  He looked too much like me when he responded, “It would be if they knew about it.”

  Together, we entered John Doe’s hotel room. The shades were drawn. A suitcase was open on the luggage rack. Clothes lay strewn around the floor and furniture, but the room was silent.

  “Looks like nobody’s home,” McGoo said.

  “Records showed that only one person checked in here.” I glanced at all the clothes.

  “Fans often share a room at cons to save money,” said Fanble, picking up a long Dr. Who scarf draped over the back of a chair. “Maybe John Doe is more than one person.”

  McGoo bent over to inspect a half-open black suitcase that contained all the components of stormtrooper armor. “There’s not enough normal stuff here, though. Only one suitcase of street clothes.”

  I found a complete Klingon outfit tossed roughly in the corner. Behind the chair, McGoo was startled to come face to face with a polished silvery cylon suit.

  Fanble was amazed. “You know, we never did see any of those characters together at the same time.”

  “How could you tell?”McGoo went into the bathroom and studied the vanity counter—saw only one toothbrush and a set of basic toiletries. “No makeup here, no prosthetics or wigs. How did he manage that whole turtle head for his Klingon outfit, or the mop of hair for Dr. Who?”

  As I went to the closet, I felt a sense of dread. Normally in the Unnatural Quarter you might find skeletons in any random closet, but this time I found something else. When I slid the door aside, I saw the complete Van Helsing outfit hanging there—the trenchcoat, the bandolier of garlic bulbs, the floppy hat, the belt loaded with wooden stakes.

  And yes indeed, one of the stakes was missing.

  6

  TK-9399 had somehow made himself a target for either Ach-gLokh Heqht, or TK-10625, or Van Helsing. An intersection of motives. And if the killer had an entirely flexible murderous intent, then CosplayCon was full of potential victims.

  We had to find John Doe—and soon. And among hundreds of disguises.

  Fanble had had the bright idea to cross-check the registrations, discovering that the various suspect characters were all under the same street name. I had the equally brilliant idea of flipping that around: we could look up any registrations submitted by “John Doe” and find out what other characters he intended to play. Since we’d already found the Klingon, stormtrooper, Dr. Who, and cylon outfits discarded in the hotel room, John Doe had to be wandering around the con dressed as someone or something else.

  As precious seconds ticked away, McGoo, Fanble, and I waited for the interminable elevator. Each time the doors opened, the car was going up, not down. Finally, when another upbound elevator opened on Floor 10, two of the costumed fans motioned us in anyway. “Dude,” said a Star Trek redshirt, “you have to go up to go down.”

  So we rode the elevator up to Floor 14, then back down to the lobby (again, stopping at every floor). When we reached the lobby, McGoo bolted out, and the two of us zombie detectives—both the fake one and the real one—followed him to the con registration desk.

  CosplayCon was in full swing, with attendees preparing for the ev
ening’s big masquerade, though I couldn’t see how an official “masquerade” was any different from the rest of the day here. Natural and unnatural fans were grinning. Werewolves got their pictures taken with Wolverines and a too-scrawny-looking Thor.

  We had a case to solve. I could enjoy the con after we captured the murderer.

  The registration desk wasn’t busy this time of day, since everyone already had their badges and set about to enjoy the convention (at least those who hadn’t been murdered or were considered suspects). No one was going in or out of the Motel Six Feet Under because of the lockdown.

  A woman sat behind the information table, happily knitting, while a forlorn cat sat in a zipped-up pet carrier beside her. The woman looked up. “How may I help you?”

  “We need to cross-reference your database,” McGoo said. “One of the con attendees, Mr. John Doe, registered as several different cosplay characters. We need to know the full list so we can track him down.”

  She frowned and set down her knitting close to the cat carrier; inside, the feline batted at the sidewalls, trying to catch the yarn. “Our computers are down right now, but fortunately, we rely on a more efficient analog system.” She pulled out a large plastic recipe box full of colored index cards. “I have every one of the attendees listed here. I can look up your John Doe and pull out his entries.”

  I let out a sigh of relief. “How long is that going to take?”

  “As long as it takes. I’ll flip through the cards and pull them out.”

  “Aren’t they organized alphabetically?” Fanble asked.

  “No, chronologically. By date of registration.” She began flipping through the cards one at a time, starting at the front. While we waited, I looked at the large banner at the doorway: “We Are All Someone Else Inside!”

  Right, I thought. And one of the people here is a murderer.

  A group of rowdy Klingons stormed through the lobby, chasing after a Captain Jack Sparrow who had insulted them somehow. A Mandalorian Boba Fett bounty hunter sneered at a colorful figure of Kenny from South Park, saying, “He’s no good to me dead.”