Madman's Monster

by Michael Louis Weinberger

  "What the hell is he waiting for?" Lei hissed, "it's not like he hasn't been invited enough."

  "He's making himself out to be a selective client."

  Lei glared at me, "I know that. I just think he already established that fact ten minutes ago."

  "Maybe he's stalling until Rogers can get a good recon of the interior?"

  Lei was going to say something back, but then hesitated before saying, "that would make sense wouldn't it?"

  "Some," I admitted, "but my concern is for the men that are busy talking amongst themselves on either side of the entrance."

  Lei perked up, "Where?"

  "The three men smoking, but evidently not interested in what the club is selling to the left of the entrance and the two men sitting at the bar in front of the dancing girls but not really watching them."

  There was a crowd in front of the nightclub with pedestrians and potential customers constantly moving back and forth in front of the entrance so it took Lei a second to make out the men I had mentioned.

  Once she had seen them she said, "Good eye babe. Who do you think they are?"

  "Probably local law acting as covert security for the nightclub." "Do you think Larson made them as well?"

  "The man's a pro, so my guess would be 'yes,' but even professionals can slip." I thought about what Larson had said to me back at the apartment, and how he had given me instructions to watch the building from the street "Just in case."

  "What should we do?" Lei asked and the anticipation in her voice was unnerving to me.

  She had taken in the raw blood less than six hours ago and it was undoubtedly still affecting her. She was going to be all adrenaline and no reserve for a while longer, so I thought it best to give her something to do.

  "I'll take the three to the left, draw them into an alley or something, while you distract the two at the bar."

  Lei pouted, "Why do you get the..."

  I cut her off, "the two at the bar are in plain view. You can't just knock them on the head and make a meal of them."

  "I wasn't going to..." as she protested I gave her a look that said, just who do you think you're trying to fool? "...well, okay, the thought had occurred to me, but only if I could reasonably cover my tracks."

  "Lei," I said calmly, "what happened this afternoon was a by product of necessity. Tonight is not. We don't take blood, even of our enemy, unless we absolutely have to."

  She was going to argue when I said, "Or we'd be no better than Dimitri, or the rest of those Russian scumbags."

  Lei's mouth shut and her eyes searched my face until she gave me a slight nod.

  "Damn," she sighed, "Its been so long since I had the real thing that I forgot what it was like."

  "I know, and you are going to feel the effects for a while longer, so..."

  I let her finish the thought, "so, I'll put on a show for the guys at the bar while you get to go and play with the other three."

  At that exact moment she drew her hand back and slapped me hard across the cheek. The sharp sound of the smack was loud enough to be heard over the music thumping all around us, and every head seemed to turn in our direction. Lei started yelling at me in Cantonese and stormed away to an empty seat next to the two men of interest at the bar. Larson watched her as she sat down, but didn't break character, and instead took the moment to approach the girl he had been focusing on. It only took a moment before the dancer entwined her arm in his and led him inside, while pressing herself against him and looking relieved that her "John" hadn't noticed Lei and lost interest.

  I rubbed my cheek and pretended to be embarrassed by the laughs that were garnered by Lei's little scene and then made a show of sulking away until I had moved nearly a block down the road. When I thought I had covered enough distance I stepped into the sparse shadows that the tacky neon signs allowed and made my way back to the spot where my three targets were still standing. It wasn't easy to be stealthy, given all the animated neon that illuminated the majority of the street into a semblance of daylight, still I found myself in striking distance without having drawn the attention of the trio.

  From my position I couldn't see Lei, but she didn't need me to protect her; in fact, it was quite the opposite, because if Lei needed me it would be to stop her from doing too much damage as opposed to someone hurting her.

  I staggered out of the shadows, feigning maximum inebriation and flopped around until I basically fell into the first of my targets. The man who was closest to me jumped as I grabbed his arm in apparent support, and dragged his body down with mine as his two partners exchanged looks of both concern and anger at my spectacle. To them I was just another stupid "Farang," or foreigner, who was both the bane and lifeblood of the city. The Thai people have a strange perception of foreigners, and consider then to be unsophisticated, uncouth, spoiled, stupid, naive, and Godless. Of course, the Farang are also wealthy and, therefore, necessary to the inflow of money for their country. I suppose they all remember what life on the farm was like and don't want to return to that life at any cost, or they probably would have kicked all the Farang out long ago.

  As a result of this double standard they treat tourists pretty well in general, but if one were to get out of line, or get too inebriated to behave properly, it gives their deep seated resentment an opportunity to come to the surface, and a major beat down isn't that unusual. More than one tourist has found themselves waking up in a hellhole of a Thai prison, broken and bloodied, with no sign of the local party that may or may not have been responsible for their situation.

  Unfortunately these guys were keeping their composure, not wanting to give away their "undercover" stake out. I pulled the arm of the man I held and pushed the lit end of his cigarette into the bare arm of his pal, who yelped in pain and slammed his fist down on my back. I barely felt the blow, but I knew I was gaining their attention and intent. I reeled from the blow and stepped on the sandaled toes of a third man before bringing my head up quickly and bashing the back of my skull into the nose of number two who was bent over me, looking for the best angle to punch me again.

  Good, now all three of them were pissed at me and their fists rained down on my back in rapid succession. One guy tried to reach under and pop me in the face but I tucked my chin into my chest and protected myself from his attempts as I tried to stagger away. They followed still uselessly pummeling my back with their fists, I almost laughed at their pathetic attempts to hurt me.

  It wasn't that my back was so strong or anything...its just that, for the most part, the Thai people are small. I could feel the blows falling on me, but either they were too angry to concentrate on where they should be hitting me in order to hurt me or they just didn't have the mass behind them to inflict any kind of incapacitating effect.

  I kept staggering until I found an alleyway and "slipped" into the mouth of it as one of the men threw a kick into my leg. That stung a bit and my apparent response seemed to inspire the trio into launching more kicks that sent me reeling into the back of the alley. I pretended to fall and launched myself to the ground several feet away when we reached the end of the alley. The men surrounded me, trying to stomp on my head or kick my face and I saw no reason to keep the pretense up any longer.

  I grabbed the first outstretched leg I could get a hold of and pulled the man to the ground. I pivoted my weight on top of him and slammed my elbow into his forehead that would have made him see stars if the back of his head hadn't whiplashed into the pavement and knocked him unconscious.

  The other two went into professional mode as their buddy hit the ground and they jumped on me in an attempt to pin me beneath them, but they still weren't treating me like anything more than a drunk who got in a lucky blow. The look on their faces turned to shock as I pushed free of their grasps and wrapped my arms around the neck of the man who had been lying across my chest. I tightened the chokehold as the man croaked out what might have been a scream while the last man desperately pulled on my arm in a vain attempt to free his comrade. When
he realized he couldn't make me let go he stood and reached behind his back for something I couldn't see. I felt the man in my arms go limp and I threw his unconscious body off of me and kicked my booted foot out at the knee of the last man. I felt the crack through the sole as the joint hyper extended and the man's body came crashing to the ground.

  A quick flip of my foot brought a heel down on the man's jaw and sent him mercifully to sleep. I got up and felt a queasy feeling in my gut as I saw that the man had a whistle in his hand and not a gun. It was what the police used out here to alert others that they needed backup; therefore, even though I had needed to end the skirmish immediately, I couldn't help but feel badly about the permanent damage I had done to the guy's knee. I tried to justify my guilt by telling myself that if they hadn't been so keen on beating up a drunk foreigner it never would have happened, but that wasn't completely fair. I had goaded them into it after all. I bent down and checked the knee, it wasn't broken, only dislocated, and with a quick pull I reset the joint while the man remained unconscious. It was the least I could do to spare him the pain of resetting the joint when he went to the hospital later.

  I walked away from the alley feeling a little dirty both inside and out, as I made my way back to the entrance of the nightclub.

  Chapter 24

  Larson walked slowly, as the girl who was escorting him inside fawned over him, guiding him toward the bar. There he would pay her bar fee and take her into one of the "short time" rooms located on the upstairs floor of the nightclub. The small male bartender was alone in his efforts, and completely overwhelmed by the multitude of customers that were screaming out drink orders. The girl's voice joined the cacophony of raised voices, vying to be heard over the blaring stereo system, but failed to get his attention.

  Good, Larson thought as he craned his neck around to take in every detail he could manage to remember. There were doors that seemed to be haphazardly placed about the perimeter of the club. Larson guessed that they were probably quick getaway passages in case of police raids...or they might serve as entryways for any number of the club's security personnel who could then come out of the proverbial woodwork at a moment's notice. Either way, he knew he'd need to keep his eyes on the doors when...

  A fist caught him across the jaw. It wasn't unexpected, actually it had been part of the plan, but Larson hadn't seen it coming and his world spun and he felt his knees buckle underneath his own weight, as Rogers wrestled him to the ground. He heard some of the club girls’ scream, as the crowd that had been literally pressing against him suddenly parted in order to give the brawlers plenty of room. Rogers was in full character and pressed his attack by twisting his body and shifting his weight in order to bring another fist raining down. Larson saw the balled fist coming for his face mere moments before it would have struck, but instinctively he raised a hand and palmed the fist as it fell and then reached up to grab a hold of Rogers' left ear. Rogers yelped in pain as Larson pulled him down against his own body. Rogers responded by cursing loudly in both English and Thai.

  "Take it easy!" Rogers whispered as his eyes squinted in pain at the force Larson was exerting on his ear before he started cursing loudly again.

  "Damn near knocked my head off asshole!" Larson snarled under his breath back at Rogers before he twisted harder on the man's ear. Rogers yelped again and was about to drive a knee into Larson's gut when something heavy fell on top of them. It was the bartender and the little man already had an arm around Rogers throat in the makings of a chokehold. Rogers let go of Larson and quickly grabbed on to the arm at his throat. Now

  it was Larson's turn to shift his position. He maneuvered his feet under Rogers' chest and, with a grunt, pushed both men off his chest, sending them sailing backward into a set of tables, most of which were fully occupied.

  Rogers and the bartender crashed through a table, which shattered under their weight and velocity, sending the occupants scurrying. Larson sat up in time to see working girls and patrons surrounding them in an attempt to watch the action while staying far enough back to not become part of it. He also saw groups of men step over the prone bodies of Rogers and the bartender, who they must have thought to be unconscious, materialize from the crowd, rudely pushing their way forward and carrying short heavy clubs in their hands.

  Damn, he thought, the entire spectacle had grown out of control so quickly that sticking to the plan was going to be difficult. Larson stood alone and held his ground while the oncoming men staggered to a stop in front of him. Apparently they weren't used to anyone facing them down as they ran in. He let his face grow stern, conveying a message that needed no translation: he was no simple civilian, to mess with him was to be in over your head and the result would be deadly. One of the security men seemed to break under the intense glare and took a step back from Larson, while the nearly dozen or so others looked confused and uncertain as how to proceed...that was...until the body of the bartender came flying over the top of their heads and crashed into Larson. In that moment of vulnerability, the security crew found their courage and swarmed in on him raining blows down on his back and legs with the heavy wooden clubs they held.

  ***

  When I finally arrived back at the nightclub's entrance I could see that Lei had the two "undercover" officers, who had displayed so little interest in the club girls, completely mesmerized by her "dance." There was a gathering crowd who had also taken an interest in her, as she gyrated around the makeshift strippers pole that the outdoor bar top sported. By the vacant stares of the pair of men she held in complete control, I could tell that more was going on with them beyond simple gawking. Lei had put them in thrall, a technique some of our kind, Hunters for example, are trained to do involving years of practice. Like hypnosis, it involves a lot of psychologically centered movement, involving the power of suggestion, although it is significantly less formal than clinical hypnosis, in that the goal is just to create passivity, rather than some defined post-session disorder. In the case of what my kind call a thrall, the subject is guided into focusing on a specific object, like a point on the body, followed by that object undergoing a repetitive movement, creating a stimulus causing the brain to slow its own cognitive processes. Eventually the subject is completely drawn in to the moment, and at that point, the subject is simply cognitively "lost" as if in a prolonged daydream or coma, from which they have no interest in waking.

  In the more sordid times of my people's history, the Hunters used this technique to trap potential victims, making them momentarily defenseless against the forthcoming attack. Initially, it was only somewhat of an effective method with one major flaw because, just like in the case of hypnosis, the subject had to be a willing participant or it wouldn't work. This is what eventually led the technique being tightly wrapped around seduction, because after all, what else could hold a person's attention more than sex?

  To say Lei was one of the best was an understatement. She was a master of the highest order when it came to enthralling a subject. It was her upbringing and her life prior to being brought in by Alpha, and despite how hellish it may have been, that kind of background made her a natural at the technique.

  I smiled as one of the men had actually begun to drool slightly as he stared, open mouthed, at Lei while she danced. When the screams began to cut through the music that was blaring over the nightclub's sound system, the entire crowd that had gathered jumped in surprise. My head spun to the entrance and, without thinking I bolted for the opening. The two men Lei had been focusing on shook their heads and came to their senses, but not quickly enough to avoid the heel of Lei's boot as she spun a kick that cracked the first man's jaw before slamming into the second's. Both men fell limply to the ground and the crowd broke as everyone ran in different directions.

  I pushed my way past a number of patrons who were going for the exit, and it was as if I was a salmon, swimming upstream. I could "feel" that Lei was right behind me and using my body to make a path for her as we broke through the crowd and into the open
expanse of the nightclub. We both froze as a smallish man went sailing airborne past our eyes and crashed into someone, maybe Larson, taking both of them to the floor. A dozen men holding small clubs appeared momentarily befuddled by the surreal flight of the little man, but when he collided with Larson, they quickly regained their senses and pounced on the pair, smacking them repeatedly on the back with the clubs.

  I was about to jump in when Lei put a hand on my shoulder as a whistle blew behind me.

  The police were already here... and too quickly to be a coincidence. They weren't worried about breaking up the fight either as the first one through the door raised a gun and aimed it at the pile of men. The club's security men looked up in shock and tried to scramble away, too late, as the shot rang out and the bullet struck one of the security members. Blood flew and people started screaming as panic broke out inside the enclosed space.

  Rogers hit the policeman in a tackle that wrenched the policeman's body hard enough to break bones, and the gun flew from the man's hand. Larson had fought his way to his feet and was calling out a warning that I couldn't make out over the crowd. Another shot rang out and I spun in time to see Rogers body contort as the bullet struck him. These policemen weren't here to control the situation or restore the peace, they were here to kill. Odds were that they had been paid off to take us out; however, as they had no idea what we looked like, they were probably going to shoot any foreigners that started trouble. Lei and I leapt into the fray, forcibly throwing bodies out of the way as we pushed through the remaining crowd. I grabbed the first policeman I reached by his wrist, and tearing the gun from his hand lifted him over my head and slammed him to the ground hard enough to incapacitate him. The next policeman had just registered me as a threat when my knee drove into his abdomen. As his body bent over from that blow, I brought my knee back up into his face and he fell limply to the floor. A third policeman raised his weapon at me and I was about to dive to the side, but Lei landed on his back with a snarl that would have been the envy of any large predator. Lei opened her mouth but instead of ripping out the man's throat as I was afraid she might do, she instead let out a martial art cry and used the momentum her initial hit had given her to drive the policeman down to the floor. I could hear the man's forehead smack the linoleum despite the intense noise of the club and crowd.