Liquid Cool

by Austin Dragon

  “That sounds like the plan, Cruz. I told you to trust me. Now you got the tools of the trade, like a real high-class detective. Just because we live in a low-life world, doesn’t mean we can’t be high-class.”

  “You were right. I have to admit it without qualification.” I reached out my hand to him. Phishy almost didn’t know what to do, but he shook my hand. “You came through for me, Phishy. I won’t forget it.”

  Phishy was genuinely moved. “You’re welcome, Cruz. I knew I could do it for you.”

  Chapter 21

  Punch Judy

  SIDEWALK JOHNNIES AND sallies all had a “turf.” For most, it was a street, street corner, or alleyway. Many never ventured beyond it. But in a supercity with mega-streets, that was fine.

  I knew Punch Judy would be where she always was—near the lobby of the Concrete Mama—either in the lobby or on the main steps.

  “Hey!” I yelled as I neared her, marching out like a drill sergeant.

  She was sitting on the steps, smoking, saw me and gave me an eye roll.

  “I got a proposition for you!”

  “Proposition?” That made her stand up, and I could already see the annoyance on her face.

  “I need to hire someone.”

  “Oh, the big detective is hiring.”

  “I need a secretary.”

  “Secretary!” she grabbed the cigarette from her mouth. “You stupid man, and sexist, too! Secretary, because I am a woman?”

  I was in front of her now, and I just pointed at her face. “I’ll remember you said that when I go hire some guy for the job!”

  That shut her the hell up. I spun around and stormed back the way I came like a bull. I was mad, and I’m sure my whole presentation was poor, but I didn’t care. I had to find a secretary for the office, because I was not about to leave the office reception area unattended. I needed someone who looked nice, but was tough and, if need be, could take down the next unlucky monkey who tried to shoot at me in my own office. I’d be ready this time.

  I had arrived at my office and ripped down all that police crime tape in front of the door. Phishy was right; the city police put it up, but never took it down. The community or landlord was supposed to do that. It was a city ordinance of all things.

  My office had the same feel as the entire floor—empty, abandoned, uninviting. I wouldn’t come here. It looked like you’d get mugged. I wouldn’t come to my office. It gave off the same vibe as a morgue. There was a businessman inside of me, after all, because I was thinking the right thoughts if I planned to do this occupation for real. But only if I could address all the security issues.

  I lay on the floor on my emergency work blanket from my vehicle. Again, contrary to my germophobic tendencies, right next to the tape outline of the man who got himself shot to death in my office. I had learned he was a low-level street punk. Nothing surprising about how he died. What was surprising was that it didn’t happen sooner.

  I heard the low knock on the door, followed by two more. Did I forget to lock the door again? Had I been hypnotized against my will not to secure my own office door?

  From where I lay, I didn’t even need to move. It opened, and there was Punch Judy.

  Her demeanor was altogether different. I had never seen Punch Judy look amiable or humble before. She gave me a forced smile and stepped inside and closed the door behind her. She stood there, her eyes darting around, trying to decide what to say,

  “Umm. Do you still have the job?”

  I looked at her from my supine position on the floor, never once answering her.

  “I want the job. I need the job. You caught me off guard. That’s why I was rude. More rude than French people normally are. I talked before I used my brains. I want the job. I can’t live the way I’m living anymore. I can’t get a job at normal places because of my psych profile and criminal record. It’s not fair. My record has trapped me. I don’t want to be trapped anymore. If you give me the job, I’ll do a good job.”

  She paused, wanting me to say something, but I didn’t.

  “So I’ll come back tomorrow and start. My hours will be nine to six. I looked up the hours for other detective offices. That’s the normal hours they have. Okay.”

  She waited again for me to say something, then opened the door. She stopped.

  “What is the name of the detective agency, anyway?”

  “Liquid Cool,” I answered.

  “Oh, good. Very cosmopolitan and hip. I would have hated a stuffy name, or something stupid, like the Cruz Detective Agency. Liquid Cool. Very nice. I start tomorrow at nine AM sharp.”

  She left and closed the door.

  I had a secretary. A secretary with two bionic arms that could punch a three-hundred-pound man through the wall, which she apparently did on more than one occasion, hence her psych record. Hence, her nickname, Punch Judy, rather than just Judy. Unauthorized activities as a cyborg will make you unemployable faster than being outed as a carrier of the Asian flu.

  Let someone try to sucker shoot me in my own office, now. We’d be ready for them.

  Chapter 22

  China Doll

  “I’VE KILLED PEOPLE with these boots!” was what I heard as I came out of the elevator. It’s was Dot’s voice, and I knew it was the tone of a highly pissed off China Doll. I didn’t need to be a detective to figure out why.

  There was Dot, with arms folded, glaring at Punch Judy, with her arms folded. Both in front of my office.

  There were those days when no matter what the city had to throw at you, you could keep your spirits up and go about life with a spring in your step. This was not one of those days. I was in a terrible mood, and the Dot-PJ show only soured my mood further.

  I looked at Dot and said, “She’s my secretary, and that’s all there is to it. Deal with it.” I turned to PJ. “That’s my girlfriend and wife-to-be, so you deal with it. I don’t care how you two do it, but do. The feud is over, starting this second. This is about business now, my business. The next time I see the two of you together, all I want to see is smiles and butterflies in the air with a rainbow above you. Do you two know how important this is to me? Do you know how much pressure I’m under? My great detective agency could easily fail. You know how many businesses start and close in this city? Do you know how many detective agencies are out there, and I’m the new kid starting out? I’m so pissed, right now. Since I’m the boss, I’m going back home.”

  I turned around, walked back down the hall, pushed the button, and got back into the elevator. I never even looked back at them.

  PART SIX

  The Case of the Nighttime Bionic Parts Thieves

  Chapter 23

  Mr. Smalls and His Boss

  IT WASN’T PEACOCK HILLS, where the city’s biggest and best non-tech megacorps were housed (tech corps were all in Silicon Dunes). I was on Fat Street, where the second tier companies were clawing at each other to get into the top echelons of business. It wasn’t the Dumps, and there wasn’t any real street crime, as it was fairly well-patrolled by police, but still, it was grimier than I preferred. Easy’s sister-in-law was probably right—I was a bit booshy.

  Today was my first shoe-leather day after almost a week of biz research. GW was my first real client—start to finish—and I had no one else since then, so I was on a mission, doing what all the business books tell you. Get off your butt and find your next client.

  “I’m here to see, Mr. Smalls,” I said to the lobby receptionist.

  “He’s expecting you?” she asked.

  “Yeah,” I replied with a lie. “Here’s my card.”

  She took the card from my hand, read it, and looked up at me.

  “Detective?”

  “Yes, private detective.”

  The woman almost seemed frightened. “I’ll announce you immediately.”

  People-Droid had been the seventeenth company or so I visited. I started at the first business tower on the corner and would work my way up ea
ch tower, then down the street. This was the first company of the third floor; I had 100 more floors to go, and each had six businesses, on average. I figured my shoe-leather soliciting would take me a few years to complete just this district.

  “Mr. Smalls will see you, Mr. Cruz.”

  I knew I had stumbled into something. Every other business took my card and told me that the person I asked for would call me, meaning they’d throw my card in the garbage the second I left the office. At some point, one of them would undoubtedly call building security on me to have the “solicitor” (me) escorted from the tower.

  I followed the woman down one hallway to the first office on the left, which meant either my research was faulty or they purposely had misleading public information. If Mr. Smalls was the president, as their site said, he wouldn’t be in the first office in the hallway; he’d be at the last office at the end of the hallway.

  She opened the door for me to enter.

  A man stood there with an annoyed look on his face.

  “Cruz,” I said as I extended my arm, and he reluctantly shook my hand.

  “The detective?”

  “Yes,” I answered.

  “That was pretty fast. Are your offices outside our doors?”

  “I would love to play along, especially if it led to a new client, but you must have me confused with someone else.”

  “You’re not the detective we called?”

  “I’m a detective, but no, I’m not the one you called.”

  “Who are you then?”

  “I’ve been checking in with businesses to see if they could use my services.”

  “Soliciting is not allowed in this building or any other, Mr. Cruz.”

  “Talking to a person is allowable on the entire planet, as far as I know. We’re just talking.”

  “We have already called a real detective agency, so we won’t be needing you.”

  “Big firm, are they?”

  “One of the largest.”

  “I can understand that, but I doubt you will be happy with their system.”

  “System? What system?”

  “For the big investigation firms, new clients are considered one-offs, so they will send in their little flunky, entry-level agents who will come in here and do more talking than listening, trying to up-sell you on all kinds of other services you don’t need, rather than being interested in the situation you originally called them for. Sole practitioner agencies, like mine—I’m the guy. President, CEO, COO, and detective on the go. I don’t pass you on to any flunkies. I handle your business directly, because I want your business. Big firms want clients with ongoing, recurring business. That’s what pays for their high overhead and exorbitant salaries. Me, no car payments, legacy office space, one employee—minimal overhead.”

  “Mr. Cruz, that’s all well and good, but I need an established firm to handle this matter.”

  “I understand, but let me ask you this: Do you remember when you started your career and you were hungry?” I waited for his expression. He tried to maintain his poker face. “That’s me now, not some version of myself twenty years later. I do have references, too, if it matters.”

  “I’m sure your references will not be of the caliber…”

  “Let It Ride Enterprises, for instance.”

  “You’ve done work for them?”

  “Run-Time is a personal friend.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “You can check, but I think you really should compare my presentation to the flunkies they’re about to send you. But Mr. Smalls, I understand you need to make the best business decision for your company. Here’s my business card—it has my mobile on it—and if you change your mind, I’ll get myself back to your office. I want to establish a good clientele of corporate businesses, such as yours.”

  The man took my card and glanced at it.

  “I’ll let myself out, but thank you for the opportunity to present.”

  I left the office.

  I didn’t expect to ever hear from the man. I just consigned myself to a very, very long day of shoe-leather soliciting. That’s all I could do. I had to make my own connections. No one would do it for me. Every business guy and gal I ever met said the same thing: Starting a business is brutal, but once you get your first client, number two is easier, then comes number three, four, and five. Then you reach a critical mass where those first ones start sending you business automatically. But be prepared for the initial orgy of unfiltered, soul-crushing rejection. Well this day was already that, except for the brief chat with Smalls.

  I had already done the other offices on the floor, so it was up to the fourth floor. As I exited the elevator, I felt my mobile vibrating.

  “Liquid Cool Detective Agency. This is Cruz speaking.”

  “Mr. Cruz.” It was Smalls’ voice. “You can return to my office. My boss has decided not to go with the other detective firm we called. We’ll give you a chance. When can you get back here?”

  “I’ll be back there in a few minutes.”

  GW’s case was a missing person. Mr. Smalls’ case was corporate espionage. When I returned, I was escorted all the way to the office at the end of the hall. Waiting for me were more people in suits, male and female, than I had ever seen in one room in my entire life. Run-Time had three VPs. This company had like fifty, including Smalls. Probably one of the many reasons they were a second-tier company, rather than a first.

  “I’m going to make this brief, Mr. Cruz,” Smalls’ boss said from his seat at the head of the long conference table. He was a much larger man, in a black pinstripe suit and wearing blue-tinted shades. “I want you to find out who’s stealing from our warehouse.”

  All the VPs were sitting at attention around the long conference table and turned from him to look at me in unison. It was funny to watch.

  “Find them and then do what? Police?”

  “No police. Notify our internal security,” he answered.

  I knew what that meant. It meant the internal security would be judge-jury-executioners. I heard all about the world of corporate espionage. Stealing was rampant between the megacorporations and if they used the phrase “internal security” and “espionage,” as in the case of stealing, it meant the security were on-the-payroll gangsters, who made people disappear permanently. The corporate world, government, the streets—they were all a bunch of criminals. But as long as they paid me; I had bills to pay.

  I nodded. “All I need are the details, and I’ll get on it today. If I can recover any of the products stolen, do you want them recovered for an additional fee?”

  “Do you even know what products we make, Mr. Cruz?”

  “You make cosmetic bionic parts—the best in Metropolis. My fiancée has one of your models—NS model.”

  “The neck and trapezoid replacement model,” one of the female VPs said.

  “Yeah. She was in a terrible accident as a teenager, and it saved her life.”

  It was like a giant arctic cloud had lifted from the room. Suddenly, they were interested in me. Suddenly, they liked me. I realized this is what business was all about. Connections. If you knew someone they knew, went to a school they went to, used their product and had some human interest story to go with it, you were “part of the team.” It was so simple. Smalls was more interested in me, because I knew a fellow businessman. Smalls’ boss and company were more interested that I knew someone who directly used their bionic (and very expensive) product. No one really seemed to care whether I was any good as a detective.

  Smalls said as he glanced at his boss, “I’ll get him fully briefed on the situation.”

  “Mr. Cruz,” his boss interrupted. “You’re not a mindless solicitor then. You seem to know all about my company. Do you also know about our problem?”

  “I do. And who’s stealing from you.”

  Smalls and all the other VPs looked at me with surprised expressions.

  I said, “The only way for so
meone like me, a new detective in the industry, to get new clients, beating out established detective firms, is if I’m willing and able to do a lot of work the established firms won’t. I have to be able to walk into a business, knowing all about their case before they tell me a thing—basically have the case solved. That’s the only way, because the expectation of performance is so much higher for us new guys than the established firms.”

  “You’re a smart man, Mr. Cruz,” Smalls’ boss said. “Who stole my products?”

  “Your neighbor.”

  “My neighbor?” Smalls’ boss looked at the other VPs. They looked at me.

  “The Tech-Human company across the hall?” he asked. “Those motherless sons-of-bitches, I knew it.”

  I leaned forward in my chair and rested my elbows on the table. I looked right into the eyes of Smalls’ boss, all the way across the table. “Your neighbor,” I repeated.

  Now, he knew who I meant, and a look of disgust came over his face. The two of us were the only ones in the room who knew what I meant.

  Smalls’ boss stood from the table. “Cut Mr. Cruz a check for his retainer and have the second one ready for when he concludes the case, and a third for a bonus.”

  “Yes, sir,” Smalls said as he stood too.

  All the VPs around the table stood in unison.

  “Anything else, Mr. Cruz?”

  “If my work is to your satisfaction, I’d like to get a business review, too.”

  “Fine, fine.” He turned to Smalls. “Handle that too.”

  Chapter 24

  Mr. Wan

  MY OFFICE WAS MY DOMAIN. I did all the decorating, had the furniture moved in, had stupid pictures on the wall to cover it, and all the secret stuff, like hiding my big shotgun underneath my main desk where I could get to it easily.

  Punch Judy ruled the reception area. It would be like an ex-posh gang member to have an haute-couture interior design decorating sense. With her punk rock playing in the background on an infinite loop, she had turned the barren space into some hipster, scenester receptionist-waiting room of the stars. Psychedelic posters on the wall, her fancy “modern” glass desk with see-through glass drawers, and a boombox on top along with her own mobile computer. All of her workstation was behind a metal barrier, but it didn’t look like a barrier with the decorations. The waiting area had these geometric, purple couches around a glass table on a shimmering, neon powder blue rug. The reception table had French fashion magazines, which I thought was stupid because how could people read them, but then I realized—fashion magazines—so that meant lots and lots of pictures with few words, so it didn’t matter, and numerical prices were universal.