by Jan Stryvant
"Shadow, this is Robbie the Dialer," Vito said, as the crew started to unload the moving van.
Shadow pulled back the hood and took off the mask he'd been wearing so he wouldn't stand out among the rest of the crew. The guy Vito was introducing him to looked to be about sixty, and as mundane as they came.
"Hi," Shadow said, and pulling off one of the gloves he was wearing he shook hands. "Are you the safe cracker Vito was telling me about?"
"That would be me," the man said and nodded.
"Great," Shadow said and unzipped the jumpsuit, "We got one large safe, three medium ones, and two small ones."
"Move them over by my bench there, and I'll get right on them," Robbie said.
Shadow nodded and called over Jeff, the guy who was the head of the crew and told him where to move all the safes.
"So, how'd it go?" Vito asked Shadow as they both watched the moving van being unloaded. Three households full of stuff was a lot of items.
"It went pretty well," Shadow smiled, "I think I'm going to give all the guys on the team an extra share."
"Really?" Vito looked surprised.
Shadow nodded and thought about all of the gold he had scored on the bank job that no one here knew about but him.
"Yeah, they did a really good job. I want the guy who we had impersonating the security service to get a nice bonus too. He yelled at us a few times and acted like a complete jerk. It was perfect."
Vito laughed, "Yeah, Chad's a ham; he pulls crap like that all the time."
"Well it sure worked, people were going out of their way to ignore us," Shadow grinned and shook his head. One of the guys on the team was carefully pealing the vinyl stickers with the moving company name off the sides of the truck, while the others started sorting all of the goods that they'd taken.
"It's going to be hours going through all of this junk," Shadow sighed.
"Days is more like it," Vito said looking over the haul.
Shadow looked over at the large group of antiques that they'd stolen along with everything else.
"You or Scorecard into antiques at all?" Shadow asked.
Vito shook his head, "I'm not, the boss is though."
"Tell him if he wants any of them, to come on down and help himself, I won't even take it out of his percentage."
"Really?" Vito looked surprised.
"Yeah, those things are too easily tracked; I doubt the fences will give us much for them. Besides, he set me up with a really good crew today. Gotta do something to show my appreciation, right?" Shadow laughed.
Vito smiled and shook his head, "You really are one of kind, you know that?"
"Well yeah, I see it every morning when I look in the mirror!"
Vito laughed and walked off to call Scorecard, and two hours later, Scorecard showed up with a small van and a couple of workers. He picked out six different pieces from the pile, and then as the workers loaded them into the van he came over to Shadow.
"Mister Scorecard," Shadow said and bowed.
"I think you've earned the right to drop the 'mister'," Scorecard chuckled. "Vito tells me you're really happy with the crew I set you up with?"
Shadow nodded, "I'm going to offer each of them an extra share of the loot. Today went incredibly well."
"As I understand it, you spent quite a bit of time and effort arranging for the owners to be occupied, the security company to be unaware, and had copies of all the codes and all the keys, right?"
Shadow gave a small nod. "Prior planning and all of that does pay off."
"Apparently so. Why'd you pick these three, anyway?"
"Because they were engaged in a lot of white collar crime. So they're most likely to have a lot of untraceable securities and other items in the safes that Robbie is working on over there."
"They don't work for one of the other bosses or kingpins, do they?"
Shadow shook his head, "No, Sir. Totally unprotected."
"Good good. I'll send over my main fence with Vito tomorrow."
Scorecard then turned to the crew that had helped Shadow; they were still going through all of the items that had been dumped out of the desks and dressers, as well as the smaller safes that Robbie had already opened.
"Listen up," Scorecard said, "Shadow has told me that you're all to get an extra share of the proceeds for your great work today, and I want to thank you all too. You men did a good job today. Now just don't tell anyone about it for the next few years!"
They all cheered at that and went back to work.
"Thanks, Scorecard," Shadow said and gave another small bow.
"You're a good kid. Come on by Bell's tomorrow when you're done with this, and I'll introduce you around. I'll let everyone know you're okay."
Shadow smiled and nodded again, and shook hands with Scorecard for the first time since he'd met him.
# # # # #
"So, how much did you make?" Liz asked him.
"Three point two million was the final amount that we ended up with, and that was after fencing."
Liz rolled over and looked at him; they were lying in bed together at her place. They'd already spent an hour making love to each other.
"That much?"
"One of the safes had a million dollars in bearer bonds in it. Another one had ten kilograms of gold and a quarter of a million in cash."
"How much did you end up with?"
"One million," Shadow smiled.
"What? Why so little? You set that whole job up!"
"Well, I gave Scorecard the customary twenty percent. Then I took half and split the other half among the crew that helped me rob all the houses."
"You gave one point two million dollars to a bunch of guys who just carried furniture out of a house?"
"Well, they did a bit more than that, and they helped a lot with getting all the stuff sorted. Plus one of them was the guy who cracked all the safes for me."
"Still, that's a lot of money!"
"Yeah, but they know that if they don't keep their mouths shut, I won't hire them again."
Liz nodded, "Okay, but that still leaves two hundred and eight thousand missing, if you only made one million."
"I bribed a couple of people to do some investigative reporting on the folks I ripped off, to get the focus of the public off of my crimes and on to theirs and tipped a few of Scorecard's men who weren't on the crew, but who helped me."
"Wow, they must be loving you," Liz sighed. "And after I get my percentage, you'll be left with just a little over six hundred thou."
"I must say that I'm impressed with your ability to figure numbers so quickly in your head."
"I'm a businesswoman, what did you expect?" Liz laughed. "So I take it that bag you brought has my share in it?"
"More or less," Shadow smiled.
"What do you mean, more or less?" Liz growled, giving him a look.
"Well, I wasn't exactly sure what your share was, so I had to guess."
"My share was three hundred eighty four thousand dollars!"
Shadow smiled, "Actually, it was more than that."
"What? We agreed on twelve percent! How can it be more than that?"
Shadow leaned in close and whispered softly in her ear. "Because I cleaned out the deposit boxes and there was almost two million dollars in gold alone in there. Plus a half million in cash, and I have no idea yet just how much in bonds and securities."
"Does Scorecard know about this?" Liz asked softly.
"No, just you. Apparently that theft hasn't even been discovered yet. When it is, I'll hand him a hundred grand, smile, and walk away. Until then, it's just between you and me."
Liz looked at the bag he'd set by the foot of her bed. "So just how much is in there, anyway?"
"Seven hundred and fifty thousand, half in cash, half in gold," Shadow purred.
Liz smiled and kissed him. "You really do bring a girl the nicest gifts you know!"
Shadow just hugged her back and purred louder.
"You know, when you disappe
ared for a few weeks there, you did have me worried, Hon. Where'd you go anyway?"
Shadow smiled, he'd spent two months and almost his last dollar developing a stealth form. It had other abilities as well, such as tracking and a lot of training in security systems, both electronic and arcane.
The arcane parts, as well as his newly developed stealth abilities that rendered him invisible to both humans and machines had cost him a fair deal of money. He'd had to call his old master for help with that, and then had flown halfway around the world for the requisite training from someone his master knew.
"Like I told you," he purred and started kissing his way down Liz's sweaty body, "learning not to get caught!"
Circe
Gonna Raise Hell
It was a strange call for a domestic disturbance, by any stretch of the definition. There was a party, there was a problem, someone had called the Police, and the Police had quickly realized just what kind of people were at the party and having said disturbance. So Tomas and his nascent super hero team were tapped to give support.
Thadieus and Centurion had joked a little on the way over, making comments about their new ‘legitimate’ status. Chen had been his usual quiet self. They actually got there within minutes of the call because they were fortunate to be in the area at the time.
“Thank God you guys are here,” The Police Lieutenant in charge at the scene said leading them to the doorway of the after hours club. “It’s a powder keg in there, so be careful.”
“What’s the problem?” Centurion asked, following behind Tomas who was right behind the officer.
“That,” The officer said pointing as they walked into the club.
Tomas looked and blinked. The tableau was not a new one: there was a man lying on the floor, bloodied, and possibly dead. No wait, Tomas saw his chest move and could feel the life in him, he wasn’t dead, yet, but he had definitely been the target of some serious violence from the amount of blood on him and the floor.
Everyone else in the room was back up against the walls. Some were playing it cool, watching to see what happened out of the typical morbid curiosity of drunks or the criminal class that frequented this kind of establishment. Most of the rest however were just plain terrified. Tomas had heard those folks referred to as ‘Tourists’, they weren’t really part of the underworld, but they liked to hang out around those that were and sometimes even got caught in the middle of things when something bad happened.
And that brought his eyes to the ‘something bad’ that had happened, which was sitting on the floor in the middle of the bar, and which a good deal of the people here were focused on.
It was a cat, of sorts.
Shadow growled softly in frustration, the Cops had finally put in an appearance and here he was stuck out in plain sight. He’d been avoiding the police and anything that would bring him to their attention as much as possible since he’d moved here, flying under their radar as it were.
He probably shouldn’t have come to this party, up to now he’d been limiting himself to the serious underground raves and outlaw parties, the ones where nobody made too much of a fuss if somebody got into it, and where they definitely did not call the cops, even when people got themselves dead. But they had wanted his wares here and he needed the money, and he needed to start being seen after all, his unique appearance being something he needed people to get used to. So he’d come here, made the deal, passed over the drugs, then hung around for a bit to see what the party had to offer. He still wasn’t fully comfortable hanging out in public, but at least he didn’t have to fight a challenge anymore every time he showed his face. Of course he’d killed twenty of those challengers, and permanently crippled another seven, so they were getting wary of him now and giving him some respect. If only that asshole hadn’t started making a scene, none of this would have happened.
He patted the girl consolingly and purred a little, hoping again that she’d wind down soon. Poor thing was terrified.
“What the fuck ...” Centurion swore softly surprising Tomas.
“He’s a new super or something,” the Lieutenant said. “We’ve got nothing on him, but some rumors we’ve been hearing. Rumor is he’s one nasty son of a bitch, and has killed quite a few people.”
“Who’s that on the floor?” Tomas asked softly, he was looking at the cat man sitting on the floor near the victim, obviously doing something. Someone turned the lighting up just then and Tomas could now see that he was not alone, he was holding a young woman who was crying into his chest, apparently comforting her? She looked disheveled and the side of her face was heavily bruised.
“And who smacked her around?” Tomas added nodding towards the girl.
“The first is Jin-Tao, one of Laughing Boy’s Lieutenants. I don’t know the details but apparently there was a dispute about the girl, and well, here we are. Do you think you guys could do something? Jin-Tao is bleeding pretty badly over there, and that girl looks like she needs some attention as well. But the medics aren’t going to set one foot in here until he’s under control.” The Lieutenant said motioning towards the dark furred figure.
“Chen with me, you two can escort the medics.” Tomas said and slowly walked over towards the figure sitting, no, kneeling, on the floor. Tomas could make out more as he got closer; it was indeed some kind of cat man, an anthropomorphized black cat, definitely. The fur, tail, ears, and partial muzzle that displayed fangs were rather surprising. From the slashes on Jin-Tao’s body he was sure there were some vicious claws involved as well.
Shadow sighed as he heard them walking towards him, he didn’t have to look; his ears could track them just as accurately as his eyesight. There were only two of them and they were walking slowly, but he could hear the confidence in their steps, and one walked lightly, like a master. Shadow glanced out of the side of his eyes at the body on the floor, he should have killed him, would have too if the highly distraught and weeping young woman hadn’t attached herself to him. He’d pay for that later, he was sure, and the next time would be at the other’s choosing, and he was sure it would not be so easy.
He focused on calming the girl down, either she really liked cats, or she didn’t give a damn what her savior looked like, she was just grateful that the beating she was getting had stopped. He almost growled again as he thought about that, beating up a poor defenseless woman! Yeah, Jin would come back looking for a rematch, and Shadow wasn’t going to begrudge him one. In fact he was already looking forward to it.
When Tomas stopped he could hear the cat-man talking softly to the woman, calming her, telling her she was safe, that ‘the bastard’ wasn’t going to hurt her anymore.
Tomas pulled his power around him, motioned to Chen to be on his guard, and then put a hand lightly on the shoulder of the cat-man. He was big, six foot at least Tomas guessed, and appeared to have muscles like Chen did under that fur. Of course he’d laid Jin-Tao out, and Jin-Tao was a minor power, so he obviously couldn’t be a weakling.
“Excuse me,” Tomas said.
The cat-man’s head turned the second the hand touched him, his eyes focusing immediately on Tomas’s.
“Remove it or lose it,” Shadow growled, this was not a time to have complete strangers pawing at him.
Which of course set the girl off crying again, and holding on to the cat-man even tighter Tomas saw.
“Damn it,” He said softly still looking at Tomas, “you’re not helping. Back off.”
Tomas removed his hand but kept the eye contact. “What happened here?”
“Who wants to know?”
Tomas showed the badge he’d been issued by the City just last month when his team had gone official.
Shadow looked curiously at the badge, “Funny, you don’t look like a cop. Nice duds though.”
Tomas smiled, “We’re the new super team, but we have police powers and legal authority. Now, what’s going on here?”
“He thought he could beat her in public and no one would do anything.”
Tomas thought about that. It wasn’t exactly the response he would have expected from someone described to him as a ‘nasty son-of-a-bitch’. Those kinds of bad guys usually didn’t rescue women in distress.
“Is there anyone else in here that will back up your story?”
“Who cares?” was the growled response, followed by some softer reassuring words to the young woman still crying and clinging to him.
Tomas extended his powers a little more and got the distinct impression that the cat-man before him was extremely pissed off, especially the way he kept stealing glances at the medic’s working on Jin-Tao and occasionally glaring at him. The only thing apparently keeping him from wreaking some sort of havoc was the young girl desperately clinging to him in hysterics. Tomas could sense that he was feeling very protective of the woman for some reason.
Tomas decided to change tactics.
“Does she need medical attention?”
It appeared to work as the cat-man focused his attention fully on the woman clinging to him then with what Tomas’s powers then told him was an extreme single mindedness. Tomas also sensed some sort of power flow. This one wasn’t just a fighter, there was more here than met the eye.
“Yeah, she’s got a few broken ribs, a lot of bruises, some cuts, a mild concussion, I guess this wasn’t the first time tonight he’d let her have it.”
Tomas watched as he rubbed his chin over her head in a very cat like gesture and made soothing noises again, including a soft purr surprisingly.
“Maybe I should take her to the hospital then?”
That earned Tomas another sharp stare, “There isn’t a guy in here that’s going to touch her as long as I’m alive, understand?” and Tomas could feel he meant it.
“What if I got a female uniform in here instead?”