Server Down

by J. M. Hayes

  A figure appeared out of nowhere. Materializing, as if Scotty had just beamed him down from the Starship Enterprise. He was dark and trim with black, braided hair held out of his face by a beaded band just over his eyebrows.

  “Lordy,” Mrs. Kraus said. She punched the keyboard like mad and a little message appeared in a balloon over Madwulf’s head.

  “What do you want with me, Fig Zit?”

  “What do I want with you?” the voice boomed. “I want you dead, Mad Dog. Just like that officer in Pascua Village. Just like this.”

  A lightning bolt pierced the sky and all the little lines for Madwulf’s health and spell casting emptied. He pitched forward onto the grass, exactly as he had been when they found him. The voice laughed maniacally.

  “Damn!” Englishman said. “I think we just found the thing that crazy brother of mine thinks is the killer.”

  ***

  Sergeant Parker’s hand grabbed her SIG-Sauer instead of the phone when it rang. And didn’t let go as her other hand reached for the alarm clock and turned it so she could see the face—1:37. Jesus! She’d been asleep maybe an hour. She finally snatched the phone as it began its third ring, but she kept the SIG in her shooting hand. She felt like blowing away whoever was calling, but bullets didn’t travel down phone lines very well.

  “Parker,” she said, crisp and formal and alert. In every way, contrary to how she felt.

  “Hope I didn’t wake you,” a voice she didn’t quite recognize murmured in her ear.

  “Wake me? Who sleeps at one-thirty in the morning?” The man at the other end of the phone line didn’t laugh, but then she hadn’t meant it as a joke. “What can I do for you?”

  “I’m not sure, Sergeant.”

  She had it now—Deputy Chief Dempsey. She didn’t like him much because he had a thing about working with women who had authority of their own and exercised it.

  “Bomb?” she asked. It was a logical question. She was the top explosives expert in Tucson law enforcement.

  He surprised her. “No. Homicide. Of a Sewa officer at Pasqua Village’s Easter ceremonies about midnight. Suspect got away from tribal police, then gave the slip to one of our patrolmen at a neighborhood sex shop maybe half an hour later.”

  She couldn’t figure out what this had to do with her, but she didn’t give him the satisfaction of asking.

  “We’ve had roundabout contact with the suspect, since. Some people think he might be willing to give himself up to you.”

  Parker tried to think who it could be. The only person who came to mind was a former date she’d never seen again after proving she wasn’t someone you tried to get rough with. But that guy had taken a job with a security firm in Iraq where rough was how everybody played.

  “Why?” She was a woman of few words. Especially at this time of the morning.

  “He knows you. Trusts you. His brother thinks he can persuade the man to surrender to you.”

  “Am I supposed to guess who you’re talking about, Chief, or are you going to tell me?”

  Dempsey chuckled. He’d gotten to her, which was what he’d been trying to do from the beginning of the conversation. In his mind, he’d just bested her and proved women didn’t belong in his department.

  “Remember your retirement after that mishap at Glenn and Wilson?”

  Years ago, a woman had died at the corner of Glenn and Wilson. Parker had made a mistake, and then she’d made another by trying to run away from it. She’d run all the way to a rural Kansas county where she’d never have to deal with bombs and choices that could kill innocent citizens again. Except life didn’t necessarily play out that way. Her second experience with a bomb helped her heal from the first, and eventually brought her back to Tucson. And it made her determined to understand everything there was to know about explosives and how to keep them from going boom. That second chance had been five years ago. But she knew the suspect’s name now. It came to her just as fast as the flood of memories caused by mention of that north-central Tucson intersection.

  “Harvey Edward Mad Dog,” she said.

  “Ah.” She could hear the smile in Dempsey’s voice. “So you do know our killer.”

  “I know Mad Dog. Sheriff English’s brother may be about the oddest man I’ve ever met, but he’s also about the gentlest. If he’s the best suspect you’ve come up with, your case is in a world of hurt.”

  You couldn’t hear jaws drop over the telephone. She just hoped Mad Dog hadn’t changed in the years since she’d seen him last—gone psycho or something. She liked it when the Bomb Broad managed to put Assistant Chief Dempsey back under his rock.

  ***

  It wasn’t the shock of losing his home. It wasn’t even the incineration of his computer—his only link to the killer he’d met in War of Worldcraft—that caused Mad Dog to hang up on his brother. It was a marked TPD car slowly creeping past the front of the apartments.

  He was many blocks from there, now. South, toward downtown, though not for any special reason. Hailey hadn’t put in an appearance and he thought she would if he were going the wrong way.

  He didn’t have much of a plan. Just finding another phone, isolated enough for a Cheyenne shaman in war paint to use without arousing undue interest. Any interest, actually, since his licorice head and hands were going to be a problem for anyone he met.

  The black paint made good camouflage as he followed a succession of back streets and dusty alleys. And more than one patrol car had cruised by, uncomfortably close, but without spotting him. He wasn’t ready to wash the stuff off yet.

  Mad Dog was still at a loss to explain what had happened to him on this strange night. The only thing that made sense to him was that Fig Zit really was a vampire wizard, or some real-world equivalent—a being who could reach into the game, or out of it, and touch him anywhere. That wasn’t comforting, but, since Pascua, Fig Zit hadn’t caused him more problems. Of course, Mad Dog had enough already.

  He was in a confusing area where the streets were all numbered, both north/south and east/west. Avenues went toward Mexico and Canada. Streets toward the coasts. Not that he knew where he was going except in the direction of the three unimpressive skyscrapers that marked what must be downtown. He’d chosen that direction only because he thought he could find another pay phone in the business district.

  This was a mixed residential area. And not a high-dollar one, either. Tired old adobes sat among faded brick and dry-rotted wood homes, with here and there the odd bit of gentrification.

  A few dogs announced his passing, though no one paid enough attention to investigate. He glanced at his watch—3:57 Kansas time, 1:57 here. No great surprise if homeowners ignored their animals’ warnings.

  A pair of huge Rottweilers and a neighboring Pit Bull were making so much noise that he rounded a corner into a little cluster of late-night drinkers without noticing them. When he did, he was practically in the middle of a group of dusky figures sipping from tall cans as they sat under trees, on the fenders of a pair of shiny old Chevys, and on the low wall that separated a grassless front yard from the broken sidewalk. He might not have noticed them at all if one of the men hadn’t flipped a glowing cigarette into the street. The situation was short on suitable options. Turn and run, continue forward and try to bluff his way past, or ask if they could spare him a beer.

  “Hi,” Mad Dog said, nodding toward one side of the sidewalk, then the other. No one responded, though all of them stopped talking and turned to watch him.

  “Nice night,” Mad Dog said, approaching the last of them.

  “Hey, mofo,” a voice said, thick with drink and threat and Black street-drawl. “What minstrel show you escape from?”

  Shit, Mad Dog thought. Maybe Fig Zit had arranged more trouble for him after all.

  ***

  Can we talk to Fig Zit the way he talks to us?” the sheriff asked.

  Fig Zit had blasted Madwulf with lightning and fire three straight times. The last time, he’d gotten creative and added
some flaming snowballs.

  Mrs. Kraus shook her head. “Not without special add-on software. Maybe even hardware, stuff I don’t know about.”

  The sheriff was disappointed. “So the only way we can communicate with him is hope he doesn’t kill us before you finish typing your message.”

  “Well,” Mrs. Kraus admitted, “I didn’t think of it, but we don’t have to resurrect Madwulf right there in plain sight. We can hunt around some and maybe find a hidey hole. Has to be close, though, but I just might get off something before he fries us again.”

  The sheriff rubbed his chin in thought. “So our message has to be short. Something that grabs his attention and makes him want to talk to us.”

  “Interrogating him, that’d be good. But I don’t see how we’re going to learn anything useful. It’s not like you can hustle him back into one of our cells. He can just blast us or disappear anytime he wants.”

  “We’ll never know unless we try. Log in again, Mrs. Kraus.”

  They hunted around the spot where Madwulf’s body lay at the edge of a meadow. One of the great waterfall trees was just behind them and they hid in the mist near its trunk.

  “This might work, “Mrs. Kraus said. “Though it’s awful close to that covey of forest sprites. If we’re too close, they’ll pounce on us as quick as Fig Zit. One, we might fight off. More’n that’ll kill us. Slower, but just as sure.”

  “Try it.”

  Madwulf materialized from the ether, resurrected yet again. A pair of forest sprites turned and began coming his way.

  “What do you want me to say?” Mrs. Kraus asked.

  “Tell him we know who he is.”

  As Mrs. Kraus finished the message the forest sprites were on them. Beautiful, scantily-clad human-like females that attacked with slashing teeth and extended claws. Madwulf began defending himself but his health was fading fast. And then the forest sprites melted into small puddles of glowing viscera and Fig Zit loomed over them.

  “You know who I am? And who would that be?”

  “What do I tell him now?” Mrs. Kraus asked.

  That, the sheriff thought, was an excellent question.

  ***

  The professional knew modern police had access to remarkable computer programs, even in the field. Fortunately, they also employed lots of technophobes. All he needed to keep track of what police forces were doing was a radio that monitored the right frequencies. It was just another tool of his trade.

  That was how the professional learned about the sex shop Mad Dog had visited. Why he knew about the body paint his target had purchased. The professional had all that information well before he arrived at the near west-side address his client had supplied. Long enough in advance to find a Wal-Mart, one that wasn’t open and thus wouldn’t record a sale or remember a purchaser.

  Before starting this job, he’d researched Mad Dog. Mad Dog hadn’t been his target then, but the professional was supposed to make certain Mad Dog appeared to be the killer. That meant knowing enough to understand how the would-be Cheyenne was likely to behave. The professional had heard about Mad Dog’s annual vision quests in the park across from the Benteen County courthouse. He only needed black and white paint to mimic Mad Dog’s preferred design.

  When the professional needed last minute supplies, he liked to shop at Wal-Mart. They carried everything, even body paint, or what could be used for the purpose, if you knew where to look. And it didn’t matter that they weren’t open when he made his shopping runs. Wal-Marts were the same everywhere, including their security arrangements. He went in, fast and quiet and easy, and took what he needed.

  The house he was looking for was in the Menlo Park area. Tucson had big plans for downtown renovation and downtown was just east, across the freeway. The neighborhood seemed to be upgrading. Not that some of the houses hadn’t already been desirable. This target lived in one of those—a single-story brick with an odd configuration that must have seemed ultra-modern when it was built shortly after World War II.

  He began with a drive-by surveillance. The iron fence with its spear-like tips could be a problem. So could the fact that it appeared the homeowner was up and about. A light went on in a window as he cruised past. She was at home, at least. He wouldn’t have to go hunting for her.

  He left his car a couple of blocks away, near the foot of a small volcanic peak on which the mandatory letter “A” was outlined. Tucson was, after all, home to the University of Arizona.

  He stripped down and applied the paint. Black everywhere, but for bright and jagged lightning bolts on his arms and legs and cheeks. Mad Dog wore homemade breechcloths these days, but he’d been known to make do with Speedos when he first got started. The professional thought black briefs would do. And then there was the final touch. The hatchet he’d liberated from Wal-Mart’s hardware department. Eventually, an inventory would show the Tucson store was missing some merchandise. But they’d never know he’d broken in. Shoplifters, or disloyal employees, would get the blame.

  Wal-Mart had shoes for every purpose. Most of his purposes required good traction and low visibility, especially at night. Matching the black body paint wasn’t a problem.

  The light he’d seen was out by the time he got back to the house. Another was on in a different room. He could see a shadow moving around in there. He thought she might be up and getting ready to leave. He used the limb of a shade tree to go over the spiked metal wall and made short work of the locks on the back door. Having no pockets, he put the picks in his mouth and reviewed his preparations.

  He didn’t have a headband or a feather. Too little time to find and redesign a headdress from the toy department, and it wasn’t something his victim was likely to notice.

  He hadn’t shaved his head, either. A black swim cap would do nicely. As he slipped through the back door he had to laugh silently at the idea. Shaving his head—that would be overkill.

  ***

  Minstrel show?” Mad Dog said. “Oh, this isn’t blackface. I’m Cheyenne and I’m painted because it helps me focus when I’m trying to contact the spirit world.”

  One of the men laughed. “We got our own contact with the spirit world right here.” He drained a tall can and crushed it in his hand.

  “Cheyenne, huh?” another said. His voice wasn’t hostile, just curious. “I’m Cherokee.”

  “And I’m fucking Apache,” said the one who’d accused Mad Dog of going to a minstrel show.

  “No, really,” the Cherokee said. “On my momma’s side. She was a half-breed.”

  “Me too,” Mad Dog said. “My mother always claimed to be half Cheyenne and half wildcat. She didn’t live Cheyenne, though. Didn’t know much about their ways. I had to find that out for myself.”

  The little group was silent for a minute, with only the first one muttering comments about wise-ass honkies to himself.

  “I tried that,” the Cherokee said. “Wouldn’t nobody talk to a no account Black man like me. Seems we’re considered inferior by Indians as well as everybody else.”

  “Got that right.” It was one of the guys leaning on a fender.

  “Always the black knight,” somebody else said. A wise and thoughtful comment, and as unlikely in a group of post-midnight street drinkers as a Cheyenne painted for a spirit quest or a sympathetic Cherokee.

  “True,” Mad Dog said. “The Cheyenne, they didn’t want to talk to me at first. Especially after a little research showed mom was equal parts Cheyenne and Buffalo Soldier.”

  “Now you’re shittin’ me,” Cherokee said.

  “No, really,” Mad Dog countered. “A sergeant in the 10th Cavalry was my great-granddaddy.”

  Nobody said anything to that.

  “And,” Mad Dog continued, “I got acquainted with a Choctaw once. Choctaw and Cherokee have a lot in common, since they’re both members of the Five Civilized Tribes.”

  “I’ve heard that,” Cherokee said.

  “That Choctaw, he was dying,” Mad Dog said. “I gave him a tre
e burial so Bonepicker and Buzzardman could clean the flesh off his bones before I put him in a burial mound.”

  “What bullshit.” The first guy, the one who’d been looking for trouble from the start, had had enough.

  “Shut up, man,” Cherokee said. “He’s right. I read up on it. That’s the way it’s got to be done, you want your soul to travel to the Milky Way like it’s supposed to.”

  “The Milky Way,” Mad Dog said, “is where my people go, too.”

  “Well fuck me, then,” the trouble maker said. He tossed Mad Dog a sixteen-ouncer. “Sit down and tell us about your spirit world while you share some of ours.”

  Mad Dog, who limited himself to occasional beers or glasses of wine, popped the top on the malt liquor can. “Thanks,” he said, and went over and sat by the guy who’d thrown him the drink. “That’s real kind of you.”

  “I guess we’re all brothers here,” the man said.

  Cherokee said, “That’s a fact.” After a general rumble of agreement from the rest of the men, he continued. “What else do you know about my people?”

  “Not a lot,” but Mad Dog figured he could always slip over into Cheyenne lore when he ran out of Chocktaw. And maybe these guys would let him use a telephone. Or give him a ride. Or just refrain from pounding the honky in blackface into a bloody pulp.

  ***

  The sheriff hadn’t really thought this would work, so he didn’t have a ready answer for Fig Zit’s question. He had no idea who Fig Zit really was. But this god-like cartoon character didn’t know who Madwulf was, either. And that might keep the conversation going. Maybe even tease some clue out of the monster.

  “Ask him the same thing,” the sheriff said. “Ask him who we are?”

  Mrs. Kraus typed and the character threw his head back and laughed at her message.

  “You’re Harvey Edward Mad Dog,” the voice boomed. “You’re a sad old man from the middle of nowhere and I can kill you in reality as easily as I do here. As easily as I destroyed your home. As easily as I turned you into a murderer. You are nothing and I am all powerful.”