The Acid Vanilla Series

by Matthew Hattersley

  Forty-Six

  Despite the fact it was Sunday and the large office buildings and shopping malls in this part of the city closed for business, the streets were already swarming with people. Locals mainly. Spitfire growled at them as he rushed past. Shouting for them to move, to get out of his damn way. Some did. Most stood their ground. Looked at him like he was crazy. Maybe he was, but those people got an elbow to the ribs or a palm to the face as he shoved past them.

  On the corner by the Vietnam Cuba Hospital, two young women in floaty summer dresses blocked his path. He danced around behind them a moment before barging through the middle, sending them flying off in each direction. Screw it. Spitfire had never had any qualms about hurting people. Men and women alike, he didn’t care. He was what he liked to call an ‘equal opportunities killer’. It didn’t matter who you were, what sex, gender or age, how good-looking you were or how much money you had in the bank. If you had a target on you, he was coming. And he wasn’t going to stop.

  “Move! Move out of the bloody way!”

  He took a left down the side of the hospital and then the next right, which took him past a new hotel complex that had been one of his accommodation choices. The Hotel Melia. It had a pool, he remembered, though he wouldn’t have had much cause to use it. Maybe next time. Because, of course, there would be a next time. Acid Vanilla might be on his tail, but she wasn’t going to take him down. Not a chance. He was the one who’d trained her up, for Christ’s sake. Taught her to shoot. Taught her about the psychology of a killer. He let out a sneer as he left the hotel behind. Taught her to fuck, as well.

  “Get out of my bloody way.”

  These stupid people with their petty little lives. Didn’t they know he had a loaded gun in his jacket and he was so close to using it? He felt the reassuring weight of the SIG Sauer against his chest. A P32 X. Not his usual choice, but the P365 – although lighter and easier to conceal – was becoming so passé these days. And so far so good, it was one of the best striker-fire pistols he’d ever handled, and had made short shrift of those Cai Moi fools. Now he looked forward to getting home and revelling in the applause no doubt coming his way from his colleagues. He couldn’t help but think of Magpie Stiletto. She’d been flirty with him recently, he’d noticed. Maybe he’d have a crack at her when he was settled back in London. She was perhaps older than his recent playthings, but no less attractive. And it paid to be with one’s own now and again. Made life so much easier.

  Though as Spitfire reached the corner of the street and glanced back to see a streak of black appear at the far end, he realised how ridiculous that statement was.

  “Keep up, darling,” he muttered to himself. “Just a few more feet.”

  He crossed over the street and took a right past the supreme court. It was a pointless detour but intentional. He was a fit man, ran 10K every morning, plus at least an hour in the gym, plus meditation, plus breathing exercises. Not to mention a healthy bedroom workout most evenings. Acid, on the other hand, looked tired and wired and like she hadn’t had a decent meal in weeks. He already had the upper hand, but putting the knackered-out bitch through her paces was only going to help his plan.

  He ran to the top of the next street and stopped. There it was, half-way down on the right-hand side and painted yellow to match the morning sun. Hao Lo Prison Monument. Once a notorious prison for POWs during the Vietnam War, it was now a museum. Perfect for Spitfire’s needs. It was dark, confusing, twisted. The same as his and Acid’s relationship.

  Spitfire slowed his pace. A minute more and he’d be outside. But she had to see him enter, that was the point. He marvelled at the oddly painted building – once a place of torture and despair, it now had a large blue ‘Welcome’ sign hanging outside. He walked straight past the main entrance and around the corner to the staff entrance, visible from the road down which Acid would come. Once at the door he paused and closed his eyes. Time to focus. Time to get his head in the game. Acid Vanilla might be a messed-up, washed-up has-been and half the killer she once was, but she was still a killer. She’d taken down half of Annihilation Pest Control single-handedly. He wasn’t taking any chances.

  He slowed his breathing, seeing her in front of him in his mind. Her dark hair hung down over her shoulders, bounced as she walked. And of course she was wearing that bloody black leather jacket, the one she always wore. He couldn’t even shake the dirty old thing from his own damned visualisation. He had tried to get her to chuck it out on many occasions. For starters, it stank. And it certainly wasn’t the sartorial elegance she should be favouring as an elite assassin. He’d even had a word with Caesar about it. But the jacket remained. If anything, she had dug her heels in more, started wearing old band t-shirts and ripped jeans. But that was Acid Vanilla for you. Obstinate. Pig-headed.

  Back in the visualisation, she turned to look at him, her face melting into an expression of pure fear. Those big eyes of hers – one petrol blue, one chocolate brown – startled now as he towered over her. She appeared so vulnerable. Her mouth hung open, expectant. He raised his gun. He’d make it quick, he told himself. None of his usual showboating. He was a gentleman, after all. One in the heart. One in the head. She’d be dead before she hit the ground.

  He paused, checking in with his emotions. It was important to deal with any issues before the event. Hesitation was not an option. Hesitation got you killed.

  But he had nothing to worry about. Any feelings he’d once had for Acid Vanilla were gone. Like dust in the wind. He opened his eyes and took out his lock-kit. An old lock like this took him only seconds to get open. He checked his watch: 7.10 a.m. Being as it was Sunday, the museum didn’t open until the afternoon.

  Spitfire stepped inside and left the door open. Acid was only a few hundred feet behind him. Now the fun began.

  Forty-Seven

  Spitfire was entering the Hao Lo Prison museum as Acid rounded the corner at the top of the street. She slowed to a stop. Best to compose herself. Find her breath. The way he’d shot her a look before he entered the building – he wanted her to follow him. Cautiously she approached, drawing both guns before she got to the door. This was a trap. She was certain of it. But surely Spitfire knew she wouldn’t fall for something so obvious. He was messing with her head, the double-bluffing spiralling in on itself until she couldn’t think straight.

  “Screw it.”

  People got too caught up in ‘whys’ and ‘hows’ and ‘maybes.’ You could overthink everything. Most of the time, Acid knew, instinct ruled.

  Listen to the bats.

  Not that she needed reminding. The needle on her manic energy metre was well into the red as she crept inside the museum. The old prison windows had been covered over but the lights were on, illuminating a long room flanked on both sides by glass display cases of prison memorabilia – earthenware pots and bowls, ragged sandals, rusty old leg shackles. Open doorways faced each other at both ends of the room, but the lights were dim in the other rooms beyond. Acid picked the doorway on the right (if in doubt, pick right), but as she sidled towards it the entire museum was plunged into pitch blackness. She couldn’t see the guns in front of her face.

  Tense but prepared for anything, she continued on her path, putting her back against the glass display case and following it until its end. She side-walked the rest of the way to the open doorway and shuffled through into the next room.

  “Jesus.”

  She flinched as the lights went on to reveal two men a few feet away. She fired a double-tap at each. A chest shot followed by a head shot. She watched as their hard bodies splintered, sending particle clouds of dusty fibreglass into the room. Display models. Prisoners. In what was once a real cell.

  Acid sighed. They weren’t even lifelike. Their plastic hair was blue, and their bright orange skin shone in the stark lighting.

  “Very good,” she called out. “You had me there. Real Man-With-The-Golden-Gun shit.”

  Spitfire would get the reference. Scaramanga’s house of
mirrors. He’d always played down the James Bond connection, brushed it off as something others noticed, not anything he ever refined or involved himself with. But Acid knew. Most English men of a certain age had a Bond fetish. Couldn’t help themselves. It was one reason she suspected Spitfire had joined Caesar’s merry band of hired killers in the first place. With his petty-crime background he would never have made it into MI5. Working for Caesar was the closest he’d ever get to an international man of mystery lifestyle and a licence to kill.

  The thought brought with it a strange wave of emotion. But for once, when considering Spitfire, it wasn’t dread or dismay or sadness. This was pity she was feeling. Scorn too. She’d stepped away from the troubling quagmire of jaded nostalgia. And that was a good thing.

  The realisation spurred her on into the next room, a narrow passageway with black cast-iron doors either side of her – old cell blocks preserved for posterity. The walls were high and made from raw concrete, crumbling now in places and adding to the sinister atmosphere. Further along, the iron doors became iron bars, standing floor to ceiling and exposing the cramped cells beyond. With her breath held in her throat, Acid skulked through the room, desperately trying to hold her nerves together as she encountered more dioramas of despair. Bony plastic hands clasped around cell bars, the prisoners’ faces twisted in anguish, their ribs like plastic xylophones.

  A noise from the next room sent her alert systems into overdrive. She moved quickly and pressed herself against the side of the doorway.

  “Enough games, Spitfire,” she called out. “Why not do this like adults? If you’re so certain you can take me, let’s do it. Face to face.”

  She waited. No response.

  “Coward.”

  The word hadn’t left her lips when the museum was plunged into darkness once more. She dropped to a crouch, her back against the wall. A few seconds and her eyes became accustomed to the gloom. Staying low, moving silently, she crept into the next room where a window covered in thick hessian provided some light. But not much.

  She could make out human shapes on either side of her. More fibreglass inmates. Around twenty of them. They were sitting in two rows, facing each other across the room. Their rigid plastic legs were in real iron shackles, their bodies designed to be thin and bony to best highlight the terrible conditions imposed by the old regime.

  Acid eased off her haunches and got upright, twisting her body from side to side in a wide semi-circle as she went, covering all areas. In the middle of the room she stopped as something caught her attention. One of the inmates had a dark-teal suit jacket draped over his shoulders.

  Spitfire’s jacket.

  As the penny dropped she spun around, in time to duck under the swing of a large knife as it swished through the air.

  “Go to hell,” Acid roared. She kicked out and her boot connected with his thigh. At the same time, she shot wildly in front of her, the muzzle flash of the Berettas illuminating the room like a strobe light. But the angle was too narrow. Spitfire rushed between the blasts and grabbed her around the waist, slamming her whole body into the display. She cried out. Felt something break. Next she was on her back, dazed and winded. The head of one of the prisoners lay on her stomach. She shook it off and got to her feet. But before she could ground herself, Spitfire was on her again. He grabbed her right arm and smashed it against the wall, making her drop one of the Berettas. With his muscular torso pressing against her she was unable to get a clear shot with the other. Struggling to breathe, she leaned forward and clamped her teeth into his shoulder. He cried out and released his hold. Enough for her to reach for the push dagger in her belt. Flipping it into position, she speared him with a flurry of punches, slashing at his side with the short blade.

  That got her a heavy elbow to the face.

  She stumbled and went down but was able to fire off a few shots. She saw blood. Saw Spitfire recoil as his shoulder exploded and he fell backwards into the display. He recovered enough to draw his own piece and fire. The bullet tore through her jacket and grazed her trapezius muscle, but that was all. As the bats screamed across her synapses, she pulled herself together and flew at him. She had the push dagger in one hand, a Beretta in the other, rage in her heart and one simple thought in her head.

  Kill him.

  But he wasn’t going to let it happen so easy. As she closed in, he flipped himself over. From a crouching position he grabbed her leg and swept her feet from under her. She stumbled into the back wall, dropping the gun and twisting her ankle, giving him time to get back on his feet, the tables turned. She scurried backwards on all fours. Nowhere to go. The room was closing in. As was Spitfire.

  He held his side, blood seeping over his fingers. “Here she is, folks,” he sneered, looming over her. “The world’s deadliest assassin. What a fucking mess.”

  Acid licked at her lips. Blood was gushing from her nose. She watched him, her eyes wide, her body tense. As he stepped closer, she raised the push dagger at him in a final display of nerve. But it was an impotent gesture. They both knew it.

  "I did say I didn't want to hurt you, didn't I?" Spitfire knelt beside her and picked up his gun. "Got to say, I'm annoyed at myself now, truth be told. But a gentleman keeps his word. So let's make this quick. You won't feel a thing." He raised the gun to her forehead.

  “Fuck you,” she snarled. “You’re not a gentleman. You’re a nasty little boy who never grew up.”

  It prompted a chuckle from him. “Well you seemed to get off on it.”

  “I was inexperienced. A kid. Not anymore. I see you.” It hurt to talk. The pain was kicking in, a reminder she wasn't invincible. But she kept on all the same. Talk was all she had while staring down the bullet that would end her. “You can pretend you’re James Bond all you like, but deep down you’ll always be that lowlife thug from Tower Hamlets. You can’t escape your past, Stephen.”

  “Don’t you dare.”

  “What’s wrong, Stephen? Don’t you like being reminded of who you are?”

  “Do you, Alice?”

  “Maybe I don’t mind so much these days. Maybe I’m realising who I was isn’t the problem.”

  “Jesus Christ,” he yelled. “Give me a second while I get out my fucking violin.”

  “Just get on with it,” she sneered. “I’m ready.”

  He waved his gun at her. “You know, I do feel kind of cheated,” he said, gesturing around the room. “You haven’t seen the best bit yet. There’s a bloody great big guillotine in the next room. Still works too, so I’m told. We could have had so much fun. But no. You had to spoil it by being so pathetic.” He spat the last word at her, his jovial tone shifting, his true colours showing.

  “What can I say,” she rasped. “I’m a real killjoy.” She still had the dagger raised, but her arm was shaking.

  “That you are,” he replied. “What a shame. I suppose there’s nothing left for us to talk about.”

  There was something in the darkness. She'd seen it as he talked. "Guess not," she told him, buying for time. "I only hope you can live with yourself after this.”

  “Oh, I think I’ll be fine.” All the emotion drained from his face. “Goodbye, my sweet.” He reaffirmed his grip on the gun and closed one eye.

  She braced herself.

  Time stopped.

  His finger trembled on the trigger.

  He couldn’t do it.

  Sheer torment played across his classic features. He was angry at himself. Angry at her. He closed his other eye. Readied himself. But before he could take the shot a hooded figure emerged from behind him and smashed a fire extinguisher around the back of his head. The blow knocked Spitfire to the ground. Knocked all the life out of him. Then the figure stepped forward and held out a hand to her.

  “Quickly,” Huy whispered. “Let’s get out of here.”

  Forty-Eight

  Huy helped Acid up and steadied her as she reached for the gun at her feet. Her head was spinning but remarkably the pain was receding. This despite
her plummeting hormone levels.

  “I thought I was a goner,” she gasped. “Where did you come from?”

  “I followed you from the hotel,” Huy replied. “My mother, she made me see I had to help you. I have to make amends for what I have done.”

  Acid took the hem of her t-shirt and wiped some of the blood from her face. She looked at Huy. “You want my advice, try to swerve that desire in future. Making amends can be a real drag.” She nodded towards the body. "Is he dead?"

  Huy peered over. “I think so.”

  “Yeah.” Acid glanced at Spitfire’s prone form. Blood seeped from a large gash in the back of his head. She closed her eyes. She wanted this over, but at the same time seeing him finished off this way, it felt wrong. Huy stepped over to the fallen assassin and made to lean over to check his pulse. But his hand halted mid-air.

  "Wait. Acid." They both saw it at the same time. A slight twitch of the hand. “I don’t think he’s—”

  “Huy, move,” Acid yelled, raising her gun.

  He did, spinning around just as a loud bang reverberated around the room. Blood splattered up the wall. It hit her in the face as Huy lurched forward, staring wide-eyed at her. He followed her gaze down his torso, to the large exit wound which had blown half his stomach out. He looked back at her, made a strange gurgling sound and fell to the ground.