by Gavin Green
I'd turned and had one foot on the wall again when Olinchenko responded. "They may be Outsiders, but they are not my people, Mr. Beck. I don't even know them."
Only turning my head, I asked, "Are you saying you've made yourself a derelict?"
"No, of course not, although I normally live like one. Those strigoi you mentioned, they're like extended family. We are strangers to each other, but they will be polite to me."
"Polite," I repeated sarcastically while turning back to face him. "I doubt some of them know how."
"Yes, polite," Olinchenko said sternly. "Unlike them - if what you say is true - I have been polite to you, as tradition dictates they will be to me. Your accusations have only one constant, Mr. Beck, and that is you. Why do so many strigoi dislike you? Is it them, or is it you?"
"It's not that easy. I didn't start this."
"All the same, I'd prefer to move on and let you tend to your anger. Unfortunately, you are a direct link to the Veleti. I want to repay my debt. I need to. It sits on me like a yoke on an ox. It is no longer my way to force an outcome, Mr. Beck, so I ask you to tell your commander I am here to serve him." Olinchenko paused, and then added in a milder tone, "For well over a century I have looked for clues of the Veleti, listened for whispers of his passing. I found nothing. Do not deny me this chance." His last words were stated like a command, but there was a hint of desperation in them, too.
Shit. "Alright, I'll tell my commander about you, and that you'll be on this Civil Ground if he wants to meet with you. I doubt that'll happen tonight, so find a place to stay. Will that do?"
"That will do," Olinchenko replied evenly.
I wanted another drink, but I wasn't in the mood to hang out at Keegan's anymore that night. Instead, I went home and thought about why most of the hemos weren't fond of me. Like Olinchenko asked, was it them or was it me? Nah, fuck that. It was them.
COOKOUT
I was on the road early the next morning, out to the college town for target and dojo practice. While I was out there, I got all the crap I promised to bring to the cookout. The weather was cooperating that day, with partly sunny skies and fairly mild temps for late June. It was going to be a good day to enjoy myself and forget all the supernatural bullshit, at least for a while.
One of the things I wanted to forget was Olinchenko, but I couldn't. I wanted to hate him, wanted him to be a prick so I could be further justified in my view of the Outsiders. Well, except for Cordell - I couldn't hate him. Thing was, I ended up respecting Olinchenko. That didn't mean I liked him, but I could sort of understand where he was coming from. I left a note on the hemo-net for Viggo about him, and hadn't heard any more about it.
I didn't have any of my own guests coming to the cookout. Traeg had a valid excuse, Diego already had plans with his family, and Gwen backed out late. I asked if she was having more feinting spells. She promised me a slow death. I gave Phillip and Thunder some food, and then headed out again.
I showed up at my old house before the neighborhood guests came over. There was more than enough time to pull my grill and extra lawn chairs from my garage over to Miss Loretta's front lawn, which was larger than mine and had shade trees. My lawn was fenced and bare, and probably still blood-stained.
Hector, his pregnant wife Anna, and their three little dream-killers were the first to come over. Next to show up was Miss Loretta's older sister Lynette, followed by a handful of other neighbors. Next to last to arrive was Miss Loretta's younger brother and his wife. Their daughter - the one who wanted to rent my house - pulled up a few minutes later. She was worth waiting for.
Introductions were made all around, but I had trouble looking away from my neighbor's gorgeous niece. Miss Loretta's brother Lamar was a healthy guy in his forties, about my size but barrel-chested. I already knew he was a wing nut lifer - specifically, an Air Force Captain - so I snapped him a salute when we met. It wasn't strictly mandatory, but it showed respect. Lamar's wife Denise was an attractive white lady with blonde and gray hair pulled up in a bun. They lived out near Whiteman Air Force base, which was close to the college town I went to on weekends. Huh, small world.
Then I was introduced to Lamar and Denise's daughter, Valerie Foster. She had dark brown hair that hung in loose curls over smooth caramel skin. Her eyes were a bright hazel, and she had the kind of smile that could make men do stupid things. The derelict, Audra, had a similar effect on me, although her appeal was all danger and lust. Valerie was sort of the opposite. Her trim figure was sexy, but she had a simple charm and fresh good looks.
Valerie blushed while Miss Loretta praised her accomplishments. She'd graduated college a couple years back, spoke three other languages, and had just recently landed a job as some sort of copyrighter at some company downtown. All that was great, but it also meant she was smart enough to steer clear of a devil dog like me.
The rest of the day in Miss Loretta's front yard went great. Everyone ate their fill, with enough leftovers for everyone. Valerie (she asked me to call her Val) liked my house; we made an informal agreement and she was free to move in when she wanted. I knew that between her "Auntie Lo" and her father, Val would keep the house in shape. I kind of wished it had issues so that I had an excuse to come over.
As the afternoon turned to evening, neighbors said their goodbyes. I gave Val a set of house keys and my number - of my regular phone, not the one Viggo gave me - and told her to call if she had any other questions about the house. I shook hands and said my farewells, but had to endure a smothering hug from Miss Loretta before I could leave.
Thunder warmly greeted my bag of leftovers when I got home. Feeling lazy, I spent the rest of that evening slumped in front of the TV. Hell, to be honest, I was a lethargic shit for the next two days as well. I did a few necessary chores and got in a couple short workouts, but for the most part I lounged in calm solitude and neglected my hygiene. It was pretty damn awesome.
CRATES
My vacation ended all too soon. There was a long list of tasks waiting for me in the Planner. Most of it was more mundane shit - dropping off supplies here and there, and checking certain sewer tunnels. I didn't mind. Repetition only familiarized me with locations.
On my second day back at work, there was a strange chore. I was to pick up two wooden crates, deliver each one to a different address, open them and leave. The addresses were familiar, so I looked them up. Yep, just as I thought - both were parks that Fletcher controlled. I used to patrol each one. A map in the notes flagged a pick-up point; the crates were behind the dumpster of an abandoned building. Each one was three-foot square, and fairly heavy. First stop: Green Valley Park.
I drove into the big park just as the day began to really heat up. A note in the Planner told me to leave each crate in a clearly visible location, to be discreet, and not to touch the contents within. So, fifty feet away from the first picnic shelter along the paved park road, I unloaded the first one. After prying open the top with a crowbar, I saw that the crate held a large sealed plastic bag full of odd, lumpy items. Curious, I looked closer . . .
Body parts - the crate was full of human body parts.
Heads, feet, forearms, fingers, chunks of flesh - you name it. Random parts of dead people all piled in together. Some pieces were rotting. Some looked chewed on. Almost all appeared to be severed, but not in that surgically-removed way. More like chopped-with-an-ax kinds of cuts. Despite the heat, I got cold chills. I backed away slowly, turned, and hurried to my truck.
The crate I dropped off in Spire Park held more of the same. Fletcher was going to have cops and media all over his havens for a while. I figured he also was going to have to do some explaining to Le Meur and the emissaries. I made a mental note to catch the 6-o'clock news that evening.
Two nights later, I had a box of housewares - mainly light bulbs - that Viggo wanted me to deliver to him. It was humid down below in some unfamiliar tunnels, but at least I didn't have to walk through any streams of shit soup. The cockroaches kept me company.
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br /> Following the directions, I got to the end of an abandoned shaft and had to crawl through a dry tunnel connected to it. The snug tube ended at a small antechamber, with an open iron door to my left. On the other side of the door was a Deviant den, one I hadn't been to before. Except for the rough stone walls and low ceiling, it was set up like a large office. There were even a couple framed paintings hung up.
Viggo sat behind a big oak desk, staring at a computer monitor with an irritated expression. Before I could offer a greeting, he glanced at the box I was carrying and said, "Set that on the table behind me."
After setting the box down where he wanted it, I turned and noticed that he was playing computer solitaire. "Is it not letting you win, sir?"
"An internet cable has been cut once again," he replied, turning the game off. "The continued vandalism has begun to test my patience, Leo."
"Yes sir, I bet it has. Uh, not to change the subject, but about those crates I dropped off . . ."
"Ah, yes. I have not seen any eyewitness reports of your activities. Well done." His simple praise was sincere, but I detected that weariness of spirit in his voice again.
"Uh, yeah, thank you, sir. What I was wondering, though . . . And I hope you don't mind me asking. Uh, it's about a delivery receipt at the bottom of one of the crates. That wasn't on the news; I got a message from your police dispatcher about it today. I'm not sure what that was about. Was it intentional?"
Viggo stared at me until I got uncomfortable, which wasn't long. He eventually said, "Everything I do is intentional, Leo. Mr. O'Shaughnessy retrieved a billing receipt from the garbage bin behind a drinking establishment called the Rattlesnake Saloon. It is owned and operated by the Outsider, Lexian Grimm."
"Oh, right - I remember him from the Gathering."
"Yes; he rarely attends those functions. I warned Mr. Grimm about his dumping of victims into the sewer system, if you recall. He did not heed my warning. On my order, Mr. O'Shaughnessy placed the receipt in one of the crates to implicate Mr. Grimm in the grisly discovery. Another minion collected the human remains; I considered that chore beneath you."
"Well, I would've done it, sir, but I sure as hell don't mind that you passed that one onto someone else."
"The other minion in question was better suited for that task. I try to delegate duties according to skill sets. For example, another task has presented itself - a task well-suited for you." Viggo tapped on the computer monitor. "The vandalism in the utility tunnels has become a nuisance. Find the petty criminals and put an end to their irritating crimes. All other chores will be suspended until this has been seen to, but do not linger with this task to avoid them, Leo."
"No sir, of course not," I replied. "Does it matter how I handle this?"
Viggo gave me another black-eyed stare. "I would place that question in the category of lingering."
Grouchy message received. I left before it got any worse.
PLAN
Later that night, I requested all the underground vandalism reports from Viggo's Public Works minion. Copies of them were emailed to me the next morning. One Irish coffee later, I was ready for work.
First of all, I thought it was just internet wires being fucked with. Cable, landline, and local power lines were being cut as well. Where water and gas valves were available, they were being shut off. Since there wasn't any obvious profit from it, someone was being a real dick for no good reason.
There were more reports of vandalism than I thought. Once I had the incidents listed by time, date and location, a loose pattern was easy to see. Three different areas kept being targeted, most likely because of easy access to them. The dickhead (or heads - there might've been more than one) moved in a loop between locations of A, B, and C. Location A was hit every three or four days; so was B, but always one day after A. Location C was every seven days. I guessed even dickheads needed an occasional day off.
Judging from complaint calls, almost all of the vandalism happened right around sunset or just before. The Public Works guy had put in a requisition for motion sensors, alarms and locks, but it hadn't been approved by his superiors as of yet. Go figure.
Location A was the obvious choice. I knew the area because a number of Viggo's chores (both above and below ground) brought me there. It was the old stockyard district just southwest of downtown; half of the buildings out there were empty. The service tunnels in that area were large to accommodate all the water and steam pipes for all the (former) businesses. Newer companies took advantage of the roomy underground and placed junction units for all of their phone lines and fiber optic cables.
There were other sewer routes into that area, but the easiest access point to get to those junctions was a large grate in a delivery alley between rows of currently empty buildings. I'd taken that route once; I'd take it again. One of the parking lots that Viggo owned was only about half a mile away, so I planned on leaving my truck there and walk. Location A was due to be hit again the following evening, so I had time for a recon trip to be sure of my plan.
With my 'ignore me' trick, there were lots of spots down there to hang out and wait. All I had to do was find a dark corner and hope the dickhead(s) came by the spot I picked.
Later that night, I was still thinking about any variables to my plan when there was a knock at the front door. The thunderdome was in a fairly desolate neighborhood to begin with, and I'd never seen anyone (besides me) walking around at night. Anyone who knew where I lived would've called first. Well, except for Viggo, and he would've just stepped out from the dark stairwell.
Gun in hand and with Thunder following me, I peeked through the plate glass window. I blinked and looked again. Clara Page stood there in the dark on the weedy sidewalk. Still in her purple poncho and stocking cap, she gazed back at me with big, innocent eyes. An awkward second later, she waved at me with one hand and held up a half-full grocery bag with the other.
I opened the door and scanned left and right before looking back down at her. "Uh, hi Clara," I began hesitantly. "What're you doing here?"
"Someone said I should stop by and bring you a present." She held the bag up to me. As I slowly took it from her tiny hand, she looked down. "Oh, a kitty," she said. "Can I come in and play with it?" I didn't have much of a choice; she brushed by me and squatted down to pet Thunder.
She'd apparently gotten over her wariness of me. Hey, great, but that didn't tell me why she showed up out of the blue. I shut the door and asked, "Clara, did Viggo ask you to come here?"
"No, not him . . ." she replied vaguely while picking up my oversized cat. Okay, she wasn't going to mention Vivian. With Thunder in her arms, I could barely see the top half of her. "I went shopping," she said through the fur. "I ain't - haven't - done that for a long time. I got all your favorites, I think."
I stepped closer to the hallway light and looked in the bag. Inside was a can of sweet corn, a bag of steak fries, and a thick rib-eye. Yep, she somehow knew my favorites; it was only a little spooky. "Uh, hey, thanks. I don't know what you got me this food for, but it was very nice of you. I, uh, already ate dinner tonight, so I'll cook this up tomorrow."
"Have it for supper, not lunch," Clara said, while she walked past me with Thunder contently on her shoulder. "Can me and the kitty go watch some TV? I promise to brush him."
She was already heading to the stairs when I answered, "Uh, sure. The big TV is up in the lounge."
"I know," she said airily.
Clara was a few steps up the stairs when I added, "His name is Thunder."
"I know," she replied, still moving.
"Okay, uh, let me know if you need anything," I called up the stairs when she'd gone out of view. "I'll be down here -"
"In your office - I know," she called back from upstairs.
Okay, that was fucking weird. I couldn't get my head around any part of that.
An hour or so later, I looked up from my computer and saw Clara staring at me from the doorway. She was as stealthy as Viggo. "Oh, hey, sorry - I d
idn't see you standing there. Is everything okay?"
She nodded her head and said, "Uh huh. I'm gonna go now. Thanks for letting me play with the kitty. He's nice. Maybe I can come and play with him again sometime?"
"Sure, you're welcome here anytime."
Clara gazed at me for a second, and then said, "Okay, thanks. Bye." She turned to leave, but looked back at me with an odd expression on her cute little face. "You should shave tomorrow, too."
I didn't have a reply on hand for the random comment, and she was gone before I thought of one.
BOOM
The setting sun was still above the horizon when I climbed down through the alley grate. I'd done some basic recon earlier that afternoon and didn't see any potential problems. As the strangest young lady I'd ever met had suggested, I shaved and trimmed my goatee when I got home from the recon drive. The steak dinner I cooked was fucking awesome, if I do say so; I could still taste it as I pulled the grate back into place over my head.
Fifteen minutes later, I stood in the corner of a dark alcove behind some ventilation pipes. The only light in there was dim, cast by the small signal bulbs on the row of control boxes next to me. It wasn't much later that I heard voices out in the main tunnel - two voices, getting closer.
By the time they were close enough that the echo didn't garble their words, one of them said, ". . . told you before, man. We have to turn it up a notch. What we've been doing obviously isn't gettin' the job done, is it? Don't worry, I got this."
"I'm not so sure," a deeper voice replied. "We were told to disrupt -"
"And that's what I'm doin'. I'm just uppin' the ante. Trust me, this'll make 'em notice."
By then, I could see the beams of their flashlights and one of the guy's feet. I didn't have a good angle unless they came into my area. It sounded like the guy who was going to "up the ante" was across the hall, in what the city power and light workers called an electrical vault. It was nothing like a bank vault, though. The room had no door and was filled with bundles of wire and an underground transformer. The way he was talking was getting me nervous, and I wondered who they wanted to notice.