7 – Diggers of Ditches Everywhere

Considering the day he was having, the phone call from Holden wasn’t really surprising.

Dylan had already intercepted a phone call from Seb, who said Roan wasn’t answering his cell, and he figured Roan was pissed off at him. He didn’t say what had gone on, but he asked him to pass on a message, that the Chief wanted to see him as soon as humanly possible. As soon as Dylan hung up, he asked the air, “What did you do now, Ro?” He might as well ask the air, as he was just as likely to get an answer.

He’d come home – well, their temporary home – to change and catch a quick shower before reporting early for work. Alex had a sick kid and couldn’t work her shift, so he agreed to cover it. It was to be nice to her; he really wasn’t crazy about Silver or its clientele, but he knew why he was there.

He couldn’t deny that, every now and then, he resented being the partner of such a lightning rod figure, but he resented the people who hated Roan even more. Yes, he was controversial, outspoken, and sometimes he went out of his way to offend and challenge people, but his heart was in a good place. He wasn’t trying to harm anyone; he only wanted to help, or, at his worst, hit back for someone unable or unwilling to do so. Although sometimes he worried that he was becoming a vigilante, especially when teamed up with the morally dubious Holden. Still, that was Roan’s decision to make, if he wanted to go that path, and he had no right to judge him on that. Although he was kind of dying to.

But he couldn’t help but worry more about him than get mad at him, as much as he may have deserved it. Roan just didn’t look well, and he’d been hitting the painkillers pretty hard. He was fairly sure he was taking them because he was in actual pain, not because he was an addict who needed to keep his levels up to keep from getting the shakes. He hated the idea that he was in that much pain constantly, and he hated it even more that he wouldn’t tell him about it. But Roan was one of those macho types, and he seemed to need to get to the breaking point before admitting anything like that. Dylan felt lucky. He had his art, his yoga, his family, his slightly bizarre friends. Roan had his pills, his punching bag, and his extremely bizarre friends, which didn’t seem like a equitable distribution of helpful resources.

He was on his way out the door when he got Holden’s call. Holden told him Roan had come from a pretty bad crime scene with a migraine attack, and had taken some pills and zonked out on his couch. “Gonna let him sleep it off here,” Holden said. “He’s in no shape to drive.”

Dylan almost said, ‘You could drive him home,’ but didn’t. This was probably innocent, and he knew very well Roan’s migraine attacks could be violent, ugly things. But Holden could have brought him home, he just didn’t want to.

Still, nothing was going to happen, not while Roan had a migraine. If Holden wanted to be near him, fine, Dylan knew it wasn’t a contest. (And if it was, he’d won. So, too bad for Holden.) He told him to have Roan call him when he woke up, because he wasn’t going to pass on Seb’s message second hand. Also, he wanted to know exactly what Ro did to get him in shit with the Chief.

Since it wasn’t quite the evening shift, when things swung into high gear, Silver was kind of slow, leaving him lots of time to think. Hadn’t Doctor Rosenberg left a lot of messages? And saying nothing, which was fairly unusual for her. She basically just asked for Roan to call her, and when he picked up the phone, she said the same thing to him. ‘Have that bastard call me’. This wasn’t good. Something was wrong with him, wasn’t it? And Roan wasn’t telling him, probably because he was a macho asshole. Fuck! You know, getting involved with an infected, you should expect health problems above all, but somehow, being with Roan, he’d learn to expect death threats above everything else.

There was a middle aged man, doughy in that typical way (probably thirty pounds overweight), in a fairly cheap looking gray suit and navy tie sitting at the end of the bar, who’d been there since he’d started his shift. At first he’d shot him surreptitious glances, but now he was openly glaring at him from beneath dark eyebrows salted with dandruff, his thin lips curling faintly into a sneer. Angry drunk? Dylan was sure the next time he ordered a drink, he’d cut him off. Angry drunks were worse than sloppy drunks, but frankly all drunks were pretty bad.

When the guy waved him over, he went down to him to quietly and politely tell him there were no more drinks for him here, hoping to avoid a scene. But the man’s pudgy hand whipped out, snake fast, and grabbed his wrist, revealing he wasn’t drunk at all, just seething. “I know you,” he grated, in a voice like his lungs were full of gravel. “You were with that freak, that infected asshole who wants to infect everyone.”

His sausage fingers were digging into his wrist with surprising strength, enough that Dylan couldn’t pull his hand away. He instantly thought about reaching under the bar with his free hand and pulling out the ice pick. “Let go of my arm.”

“Fuck you, you infected piece of shit.” the man snarled, keeping his voice low but full of a surprising amount of hate. “You spittin’ in our drinks, huh? Trying to infect us?”

The worst part was this guy actually believed the shit he was spewing. Dylan could see it, and wasn’t even sure how you responded to this kind of insanity. And he should be an expert, considering his brother.

The man was grabbed by the back of his neck, but instead of it being Julio, the huge busboy who often passed for security, it was a really unexpected figure: Tank. He sat on the stool next to the man, and got uncomfortably close to his ear. “You feel that? You don’t want me to sever your spinal cord and leave you a vegetable, do you?”

The man was now sitting stiffly, his brown eyes bulging out of his head. Tank had something in his hand that he was pressing up against the nape of his neck, but Dylan couldn’t see anything. “N-no.”

“Okay then. Let him go.” The man did, and Dylan yanked his arm away. “Good boy. Now you’re gonna take out your wallet, leave a tip, and get the fuck outta here before my buddies show up and help me rip you to pieces, you pig fucking piece of shit.”

Part of the intimidation had to be Tank’s inappropriate closeness. He was almost sitting in this guy’s lap, and that violation of personal space had to be unnerving. Not for Tank, of course, who had one of his stony game faces on, one that suggested he was more insane than that man could ever hope to be.

He dropped some money on the bar with a shaking hand, and that’s when Tank violently shoved him off his bar stool. He stumbled, tried to keep his balance, but hadn’t been expecting it and fell on his ass.

By this time, Julio had come over, and grabbed the man as he stood up. “Problem?” He asked.

He was asking Dylan, but the man answered, indignant and still scared. “This son of a bitch has a knife! He threatened to kill me!”

Tank held his hands open, showing they were empty, as his expression was his usual deceptively mellow one, no trace of his game face at all, his eyes no longer burning with some insane internal light. “No. English not so good, but he ‘s, uh … grabby.” Tank’s natural French-Canadian accent had suddenly trebled in thickness. Oh, the crafty bastard.

“He threatened me, put his hands on me,” Dylan said, holding up his still reddened wrist.

“He, uh, grabbed my, uh, what you say in English, balls? I’m flattered, but no gay.”

“What?!” The man screeched, literally screeched, like an adolescent whose voice had yet to break. “I didn’t do that! I’m not a fag! He – he threatened me! He’s not even French! He’s making this up!”

“Tell Robin he’s barred,” Dylan said to Julio. “And if he comes back, call the police.”

Julio nodded and started muscling the man towards the door, the few restaurant patrons around staring after him as he continued fruitlessly protesting. Julio’s English was kind of limited, so it was almost all wasted on him anyways.

Tank grinned at him, looking like a goofy but attractive busker, with shaggy hair and a t-shirt that Dylan now realized read “Supervillain Intramural” (another t-shirt his teammates probably bought him, no doubt). “Amazing what you think is a knife if someone implies it is,” he said, his voice back to its lightly accented state. He fiddled with a ring on his right hand, and Dylan realized that’s what he had pressed up against his neck.

He shook his head wonderingly. “You’re just evil. I see why Roan likes you.”

This made him grin wider, even more endearing than before. Still, he had an almost unnerving intensity in his eyes that never quite left, and combined with his neatly trimmed pale brown goatee, it made him look slightly devilish. Who had Roan said he kind of looked like? Oh yeah, that guy who used to sing for Alice In Chains. Dylan was taking his word for it, because he kind of missed the whole grunge thing, even though he was a Seattle boy. It’s just while he was in college, the singer-songwriter stuff was more popular. (He could totally see Roan’s point about that form of music being “bloodless”, but he couldn’t see embracing some of that honestly noisy stuff that Ro seemed to love.) “Hey, he clearly wanted to start some shit. Is it my fault he wasn’t all that serious? I mean, what’s the sports cliché, go hard or go home? If he went hard, maybe he wouldn’t be going home.” He paused briefly. “Who am I kidding? Of course he’d be going home. I wasn’t gonna let some bigoted fat piece of shit get over on me. If he started gettin’ stroppy, I’d have rabbit punched him in the kidneys, thrown him down on the floor, and kicked in his solar plexuses. Hard to make charges when you can’t breathe or stand.”

Dylan continued to shake his head, mainly because he didn’t know of a more appropriate response. Violence was base and wrong. And yet there were some nice unexpected benefits to having your husband be friends with a hockey team. “Well, thank you for the help.”

“What was up that guy’s ass?”

He shrugged. “Just a hater. Saw me with Roan, figured I was an agent for infecteds, out to infect all the fat white rich people in here.”

“Horrors,” Tank said, still grinning, his eyes glittering like diamonds. He lowered his voice to a ghost of a whisper, leaning over the bar conspiratorially. “It’d serve the bourgeoisie bastards right.”

Dylan couldn’t help but smile and chuckle faintly. It was obvious why he and Roan liked each other. Yes, there was a little man crush there, but Roan and Tank seemed to have a certain attitude in common. They were also both a bit smarter than you’d probably give them credit for, and too unpredictable for safety. “What can I get you Tank?”

“Oh, I’m not here to drink. I knew you worked here now ‘cause Fi told me, and since I can’t get a hold of Roan, I thought I’d let you know that you and Roan are working personal security for me tomorrow.”

“Pardon?”

He leaned his elbows on the bar, slumping down and looking comfortable. “It’s my last game with the Falcons; I’m signing an insane contract with the Bruins the day after tomorrow. I convinced the arena staff I needed extra security and were bringing in my own people. That’s you and Roan.”

He stared at him in open disbelief. “You convinced someone you need a bodyguard?”

He continued grinning at him in a way that was equally charming and chilling. “I’m a goalie. We don’t fight.”

“Really?” Dylan busied himself pouring Tank a glass of ice water. He needed to look like a customer, or he might get shit about it. “It’s funny, but the last time we were at a Falcons game, I could have sworn the opening video bit they played of the team included you punching a guy so hard his helmet flew off. Or was that another goalie with your number?”

He chuckled with genuine amusement. “That was justified. Fucking asshead pushed Zack into the boards, and if he hadn’t gotten his shoulder up he’d have gone in head first. That’s fucking dangerous, he coulda hurt him bad, and on top of that, Zack’s small. I mean, he weighs what, as much as Grey’s leg? And this fucker, Perry, he was almost Grey sized. And it wasn’t the first asshat thing he’d done that night either. So I just snapped, called him a motherfucker, and when he turned to give me shit back, I’d already shucked off my catching glove and took him down with a right. “ His grin ramped up a notch. “That got on ESPN. So did my subsequent decking of their second enforcer with my blocker, but by then Scott had grabbed me and pulled me away from the dog pile, and Grey and Richie put themselves in front of me to fend off the angry Tigers. “

Dylan almost asked, but then figured Tigers was the team name. “Roan needs a bodyguard as much as you do.”

“I know. But since it’s my last game with the team – well, if I don’t get busted back to the minors at some point – I thought it might be fun to have you guys right there, behind the bench. Ethan’s all for it, he can’t wait to have Roan nearby, he thinks his good luck will rub off on him.”

“Ethan?”

“Back up goalie, now becoming primary goalie. I told him Roan’s been my good luck charm.”

Dylan almost laughed. He’d been wondering if Roan was a bad luck charm, and here came an alternate view. “Why?”

Tank looked at him as if he couldn’t believe he’d have to ask. “My career’s taken off since I met him. I mean, I’m playing the best I’ve ever played, and now I’m off to the NHL. How is he not a good luck charm?”

“But that was a coincidence. You’re playing so well because you train like bastard, and you’ve been working for this most of your life. Roan was happenstance, coincidental at best.”

He nodded. “Doesn’t change anything. He’s been good luck for me.” He gulped down his ice water, and when he put it down, he asked, “Do you have a specialty?”

It caught him off guard, mainly because he was still pondering Tank’s superstitious but weirdly sweet belief that Roan was a good omen. Wasn‘t he, in an odd way? Yes, things had been kind of rough, but there were undeniable good times. And Roan, as much as he frustrated him, could make him happy in a way that no man had since Jason. Maybe even more than Jason ever had. “Huh?”

“Specialty drink, something you like to make.”

Wow, he hadn’t been asked that since … had he ever been asked? He wasn’t sure, but he said the first thing that popped into his head. “I dunno, a Surf Sider?”

“What’s that?”

“Blue Curacao, Southern Comfort, pineapple juice, lime.”

“Ah. Sounds like a fruity drink that’ll knock you on your ass.”

“That’s exactly what it is.”

“Set me up. Oh, what time do you get off work?”

“Tonight? Midnight. Why?”

“Insurance,” he said cryptically, pulling out his cell.

There was another customer, so Dylan had to get him his glass of wine before he made the Surf Sider and brought it back to Tank, who was now folding his phone and shoving it in his pocket. “So who’s the insurance?” he wondered, putting the blue drink in front of him.

“Grey. I’m worried fat ass is gonna hang around and try for ya after work. So if he does, instead of meeting me, he’s gonna meet Grey.” He picked up his drink with a smile. “If he thought I was bad, he hasn’t met him.”

“Ah yes, the guy who threw the punch heard ‘round the hospital.”

“I’m sorry I missed that. Usually you start a riot with a punch, not stop one by throwing a hit.”

“Well, this one was pretty stunning. I don’t think anyone knew you could actually rearrange someone’s face with one punch. You just assumed it was a figure of speech.”

“Grey’s got fists the size of ham hocks and punches like a jackhammer. He can rearrange, renovate, dislodge, puree, pulp, and blend. That’s why he’s an enforcer. To make sure guys who go after little guys or me don’t do it twice. So I doubt Mr. Fat Ass is gonna bug you twice.” He sipped the blue drink, raised his eyebrows, and then gulped it, putting down the now empty tulip glass with gusto. “Wow, that tastes good enough to get shitfaced on. Can I have another?”

“Don’t you have a game tomorrow?”

“Yep, but I’ll stop at two, or you can call me a cheese eating surrender monkey.”

Dylan grinned, unable to help himself. “You know, I’m going to miss you.”

“I ain’t going anywhere. I mean, sure, I’ll have to relocate to Boston, but I’ll be emailing, phoning, and when it’s the off season, I’ll be back. I love Seattle. It’s like Vancouver, but American.” He then gave him a cheesy but genuine grin, showing that, in spite of stereotypes, he had a full set of teeth.

Yes, there were some odd positive notes to being friends with crazy hockey players. But the thing he really never expected was one of them cheering him up when he was feeling down. Maybe he should encourage Roan to hang around with them more often.

****

Roan was initially disoriented when he woke up on Holden’s couch, although the smell of the place was familiar enough that awareness clicked into place, and helped his memory kick in.

The apartment was low lit, though, and he had no sense anyone was around. He found Holden had left a Post-It note on the bathroom mirror. It read: ‘Gone to store. Keys on counter. Don’t kill yourself.’ It was almost a poem, and if they could work around the syllables, it was a haiku waiting to happen.

He felt infinitely better, mainly because his head didn’t feel like it was splitting open anymore. It was always humbling to be taken down so easily by a migraine, but that opened up a new possibility, now considered – it wasn’t just a migraine. Maybe he had a time bomb in his head, not an aneurysm this time, but a tumor.

He stared at himself in the bathroom mirror, wondering if he could see it on his face, death written in the fine lines of his eyes, in the tense set of his jaw. But no, he looked no different than before, except he had two days’ growth of stubble from his partial change earlier in the evening.

Evening. Holy shit, how late was it? He checked his watch, and realized if he floored it, he just might beat Dylan home. He’d already decided he couldn’t keep this from him any longer, and since there was no good time to tell him, he was just going to have to come out with it. Besides, he’d already told Holden, and that wasn’t fair.

As it turned out, he didn’t beat Dylan home, but arrived soon after he had. He was still making himself tea, his post-work de-stressing ritual, and full of messages for him. Seb called to let him know Matthews wanted to see him ASAP (what a shock); Doctor Rosenberg wanted to see him, but wouldn’t leave a message. That concerned him a lot, and he asked if something was wrong. He couldn’t say there wasn’t a good reason to tell the truth.

So he did. He told him about the tumors, about how most were small and of no consequence, but Rosenberg still wanted a biopsy, and wanted to get a couple removed from him. Also, he’d had a brain scan, and she thought maybe his uncontrollable shifts could be blamed on a tumor. Then Roan admitted something he hadn’t said to Holden: the idea of this scared him shitless. He didn’t want to die like this.

Dylan held him and reassured him he wouldn’t, told him everything would be okay, even though Roan knew he didn’t quite believe that himself. He was hoping, he was trying to will it to be true, and Roan actually found some reassurance in that. Dylan said all the right things, and eventually they started kissing desperately, both realizing they wanted the comfort of each other at the same time. Sex made you feel alive, it made you feel like you weren’t going to die, even though it was inevitable. It was a little death that made you feel, if only for a moment, that you could subvert the big one.

Afterwards, Dylan slept while Roan found himself staring out the window at the unfamiliar landscape of a stranger’s backyard, wishing he was home. But he could still smell Dylan on him, and knew exactly why he wasn’t home. Not everybody wanted to fight him; most wanted easier targets. He couldn’t let that happen.

He was planning out his day tomorrow, where he was going to start his search, when the phone rang. He almost didn’t answer it – at nearly three in the morning, there was no way it could be good news – but that’s precisely why he answered it. Might as well man up, face it head on.

He really hadn’t expected anything, but still the fact that it was Luke on the phone – Dee’s nurse boyfriend (or ex-boyfriend? He wasn’t clear on their relationship status) – was still a surprise. “Hey Roan, didn’t wake you up, did I?”

“No, you got lucky. What can I do for you?”

“You know a guy named Oliver Jephson?”

“Yes, he’s a client. Why?”

“He’s in the ER, someone beat the ever living shit outta him. We found your card in his possession, and it was the closest thing to a next of kin we found. Got some contact info for him?”

“Nothing in state,” he admitted, trying to remember. “How is he?”

“He’ll live, assuming there’s no complications. He’s unconscious, though, and he’s at least got a concussion.”

“Do you know what happened?”

“No, no idea. It looks like someone wanted to make it look like a mugging, and maybe it was, but … it’s too vicious. Either he encountered a psycho mugger, or this was personal.”

Yes, that was what he was afraid of. Nothing was ever as it seemed, and why should he expect anything different from this? Even a sad sack kid who seemed perfectly harmless.

But what if he wasn’t?

This is the Holden mix, which is a bit different from the others. Not just because Holden likes himself a bit of emo, but because many of these songs seem to capture specific attitudes and philosophies  of the character. Trying to figure out what applies and what doesn’t may make your head hurt, but that’s Holden in a nutshell.

6 – Hell’s Bank Notes

Roan knew that the cops would do this differently for murdered cats than murdered people, he knew it.

But he had really underestimated both the bullshit and the contempt.

It started with sniggering references to a cat house, and how many ways you can skin a dead cat, and while Seb didn’t take part and tried to shut everyone up, most ignored him. Roan knew it was macho cop shit as well as graveyard humor, the kind that eased the horror of ugly situations, but it was just too gleeful. He snapped when one obnoxious little rookie shit made a comment about what cat tasted like, and maybe the Greek restaurant down the street was responsible. People had said worse things, but he had had enough.

He grabbed the rookie by the throat and slammed him up against the nearest wall. He held him with one hand, felt his pulse beating in his neck, and knew with a single squeeze he could crush every single fine bone in his neck to powder. It wouldn’t even take much, just a millimeter more pressure; his arm was actually shaking from the restraint that he was using to hold back all the strength that wanted to pour into his hand. “These are people,” Roan growled. And it was a growl; there were actual words in there, but they surfaced and sank like a drowning person. “You fucking sadistic moron, these are Humans beings. Are you that much of a cannibal? You Hannibal Lecter’s boy, huh?”

Seb was right there, and looked like he was about to touch him, maybe grab his arm, but instantly thought better of it. Instead, he said, firmly but not angrily, “Roan, let him go. He’s mine to deal with.”

The rookie had almost reflexively put an arm on Roan’s shoulder, as if to push him away, but just as his confusion turned to rage, his hand slipped away as his rage turned to fear. Roan had no idea what the brush cut little boy saw in his face, but it scared the shit out of him. Almost literally. The growling probably wasn’t helping. While the fear was intoxicating, he knew it was time to step back.

With almost painful reluctance, he let go of the rookie, who sank down to the floor. Only then did he realize he had lifted him up off the floor. Once again, he was surprised at his own strength, and remembered Rosenberg told him that maybe it wasn’t his fault. He certainly hoped it wasn’t.

“Let’s take a walk,” Seb said. It wasn’t a suggestion and they both knew it.

As they both left the noisome hallway of the tenement, he noticed the cops were now shooting him looks of wariness, or looks that could have qualified as first degree felonies. But at least they’d all shut their ugly fucking mouths.

They had to make their way carefully down the broken staircase, but didn’t talk until they were outside. Seb turned on him, and exclaimed, “What the hell, dude? I know they were being assholes, but that doesn’t give you the right to Hulk out.”

“If I Hulked out, they’d be dead,” he snapped. “And they weren’t being assholes; they were a hell of a lot worse than that. Those were bodies in there, and they were making fun of the whole situation, like this was a fucking disturbance at a strip joint.”

Seb gave him his firm but otherwise emotion free Spock look. “Could you please stop growling? It’s distracting.”

He hadn’t realized he was growling – yes, again – and it was a true effort to stop. “They’re treating them like a joke, Seb, like they aren’t people at all.”

“I know, and I’m reporting each one who made a crack. This is not your fight, Roan.”

“Isn’t it? They’re my people.”

That made him raise an eyebrow at him. “You’ve adopted them all? I thought you weren’t -”

“This isn’t the place for semantics. You better go back inside and make sure those fuckholes aren’t wearing the victims as hats.” He then turned and stalked away, before he could take out his rage on Seb, who was possibly the only non-asshole at the scene.

At least the cougar was okay. He drugged her before forensics was able to pick its way up the staircase, and the cat squad took her away, complaining that they never saw any action anymore. Roan wished he could say the same thing.

Once he was back in his car, he felt like punching something, but the last time he did he almost broke his steering wheel, and he couldn’t imagine how much that would cost to replace.

The cops weren’t going to treat this like a murder case, he knew it. It was legal to kill loose cats, wasn’t it? They weren’t going to try very hard to find the killer, or even find out who the victims were. Yes, Seb was a good guy, and Chief Matthews seemed to want his services as the resident cat expert, but he was losing what little faith he had left in humanity.

That actually gave him an idea. He needed the help of another person who had zero faith in humanity.

Holden answered on the second ring. “Well, aren’t I mister popularity today? And what can I do for you, Roan?”

Did he even want to know what that popularity crack meant? “You home? I need to talk to you.”

“Great, yeah, come over, I’ll make you a sandwich.”

Was that sarcasm? Somehow he didn’t think so. “Make me a sandwich?”

“You just changed, didn’t you?”

He wasn’t still growling, was he? If he wasn’t, he could neither hear it or feel it. “How do you know?”

“Your voice. Sounds like you’ve been scraping your throat with a metal rasp.”

“That’s a very specific descriptive.”

“I know. I save this shit for you. I know you’re the only one who’d appreciate it. Chicken or tuna?”

He checked over his shoulder to see if he could tell where the conversational shift went. “Huh?”

“Your sandwich. Which would you prefer?”

“You’re serious about that?” Truth be told, he was hungry, but he usually was after a shift. “Tuna, I guess.”

“Good choice. The chicken’s kinda iffy. And don’t hit the pills, I got something for that too. See you in a few.” With that, Holden hung up.

Roan looked at the cell for a moment, his anger draining away to simple confusion. What the hell was all that about? Then again, it was Holden – he would never understand the man, nor was he going to waste his time trying. He just lived to confound, vex, and thwart, all words he probably would have liked. And that was precisely the reason he called him.

His head started throbbing on the drive over, a seeming after-effect of the sharp pains pulsing in his jaw, bad enough that he wanted to reach up and rip off his lower jaw. (Could he? He had a feeling he could if he really wanted to, so he wasn’t going to push it.) The sun coming out didn’t help, as the light stabbed into his eyes like glass shards. Was he getting a migraine? His reaction to light seemed to indicate that.

By the time he reached Holden’s apartment, he ignored what he’d told him on the phone and went ahead and gulped a Percocet before getting out of the car. He was going to need it.

He was about to knock when the door opened, and Holden said, “Wow, you look like shit. Maybe you should take some pills.”

“Say it louder, I’m pretty sure your upstairs neighbor didn’t hear you,” he replied sourly.

Once they were inside, and Holden had shut the door behind them, he said, “Please, he’s a drug dealer. All he’ll wanna do is sell you some E.” Holden was shirtless, wearing nothing but sweatpants and the dog tags he got from that soldier client, now long dead. His apartment smelled like popcorn and tuna, and the scent of food made his stomach roil. It must have showed on his face, because Holden looked alarmed. “Fuck, you gonna hurl?”

He wasn’t sure, and he took a moment to just stand still and concentrate on swallowing down his gorge. “I dunno. I think I’m having a migraine attack.”

“Fuck. Okay, c’mon, let’s get you settled, I have an ice pack.” Holden helped him needlessly to the sofa, and then picked up a saucer and put it on Roan’s leg. “Have that, it should make you feel better in a few minutes.”

It was a brown lump, which would have been really unappealing, except it smelled like chocolate. A brownie chunk, only … there was something else there too, too strong to ignore. “Are you seriously feeding me a pot brownie?”

“These are better than your average po-bo,” he claimed, retrieving an ice pack from his fridge. “I know Mavis, this charming British lady who works for the Angel Project, you know, that charity that delivers food to seriously ill people? Real sweetie; wish she was my grandmother. Anyways, she makes these special painkiller brownies for some of her people, and by making a generous donation I got some. I keep it on hand for really bad days.”

“Pot brownies are horrible.” He’d had a bite of one once, and almost immediately spit it out. It was dry, with an almost straw like texture, and tasted like chocolate laced shit. He had no idea how anyone ever ate them.

“These are different. Mavis has a way with Hershey’s syrup. Try it, you’ll see.”

He sniffed it warily. “You turnin’ into a pothead on me?”

This made Holden snort derisively. “I oughta. I just have painkillers around in case I ever need ‘em. A lingering remnant of my street corner days, I suppose. You always had to be ready for somebody to try and beat the shit out of you. And trust me, those brownies are a great pain killer.”

Well, he was feeling like shit, so he went ahead and took a nibble. He was right – it really wasn’t bad. It tasted like an actual brownie, just with a thicker texture and a slight aftertaste. It didn’t make him feel like vomiting, which was a minor triumph. “Hmm.”

“See, what did I tell you?” He came back from the kitchen, with a plate containing a sandwich, a blue ice pack, and a bottle of peppermint honey green tea clamped firmly under his arm. As Roan continued to eat the brownie, Holden put the plate, tea, and ice bag on the coffee table in front of him. “Mint’s good for your stomach, so drink up.”

He eyed him warily. “You have mother hen aspects about you, you know.”

“Father hen,” he corrected, flinging himself down on the other end of the couch, and picking up his half empty bag of microwave popcorn. His television was on, the sound down to levels that Roan could hear, but he was pretty sure Holden couldn’t. “It’s a hard habit to break.”

That was what Holden meant when he referred to “his boys” – when he was just your average street whore, he still looked after a bunch of younger, smaller, or greener street kids (they weren’t all hookers, but most). Street kids often glommed together simply due to safety in numbers, but there was always a leader, someone who looked after the others, be they tougher, smarter, or more experienced than the rest. Holden fit all aspects of the bill, and seemed to have taken his job quite seriously. Even now, he was trying to protect kids he didn’t even know.

“You watch The Soup?”

Holden glanced at the set, as if double checking, as he grabbed his remote and hit the pause button. The fucker had a DVR. “Yep. It’s funny, and allows me to keep vaguely up to date on reality shows that some of my clients seem to love, don’t ask me why. But I must admit some do have a horrific train wreck quality about them.”

“I don’t know about other people, but I have enough horrific train wrecks in my life.” He popped the rest of the brownie segment in his mouth before reaching for the ice pack and holding it to his head.

“Oh hon, I know. I’m a spectator. Which leads me to think we have another train wreck to discuss.”

He couldn’t deny that. He explained what he’d discovered in Jefferson Heights, and how he was afraid the cops wouldn’t treat it as much of anything. “Do you have any contacts in that part of the city?”

Holden considered that with the barest hint of a smile on his face. “I have friends all over, especially in low places. What do you want?”

“I want to know who might be bragging about cat killing. He was using an abandoned building as a tannery, which tells me he can’t do it where he lives for some reason.”

“Or he knows better than to shit where he eats.”

“Yeah, could be. But I find it hard to believe a man who appeared to be making them into skins would keep quiet about his hobby.”

“Isn’t that rule number one for a serial killer?”

“Typically. But since he’s not, in his mind or the mind of the legal system, killing people, he may not think of himself in that way. Hell, he may think he’s doing the community a service.”

“Well, according to Pat Robertson, infecteds are destroying America.” He paused briefly. “Or was it gays? Foreigners? Women? Hell if I can remember. What month is it?”

“Let’s just say all of the above and move on. Do you think you can help me?”

He nodded, now all business. “No problem. I’ll get the word out I’m looking for a cat killer, someone good at his job. I assume you want him alive?”

He wasn’t kidding. That was one of the most disturbing things about Holden. No, he didn’t judge, and that was refreshing, but he didn’t judge, and that could also at times be very unsettling. Not that he didn’t have a code, but it was a very limited one: no kids, no innocents, no one who wasn‘t there by choice. Everyone else was fair game. Although, to be honest, that was a pretty good code, especially if you believed in karma. “Yes.” He wanted to make sure they had the right guy, and Roan knew he would know the man if he met him. He would smell him, smell the trace of a scent he left at the murder scene, smell a scent of death on him that no amount of soap or time could wash away. Predators knew other predators.

Holden simply nodded again, looking in his microwave popcorn bag, probably for some remaining popped kernels. “You know, I took today off as a mental health day. I figured I’d just watch TV all day and maybe sleep for twelve hours. Best laid plans, huh?”

“I thought I’d be trolling Capitol Hill, looking for a missing man.” His stomach had settled, the pain in his head fading to a dull roar, so he reached for the sandwich.

“Oh, a case? Can I help?”

“Only if you want to pass a photo around, ask if anyone’s seen him.”

“Goddamn, I hardly have to get off my ass for that. Can do.”

Roan took a bite of the sandwich, and marveled. He was expecting a simple tuna on wheat, even though his nose told him to expect a sharp tang of vinegar, but what Holden had made him was a tuna sandwich with fresh vinaigrette, pickles, lettuce, and pepperoncinis for crunch and zest. “Holy shit,” he said impolitely, through a mouthful of food. “This is the best tuna sandwich I’ve ever had.”

“I don’t do normal,” Holden said, reaching for his can of Coke Zero. “Either I’m spectacular or I’m horrendous, but I never settle for the middle. Anyone can be average.” He said it with a little irony, but very little. And having seen him in action, it was easy to believe.

Since Roan was busy eating, Holden turned The Soup back on, and they both ended up watching it as Roan realized how surreal things had become, and the pot was kicking in, big time.

The funny thing about massive pain was the sudden absence of pain was almost orgasmic. Both the Perocets and the pot finally got together for a conference, and decided to make the hurt go away. Relief prickled along his scalp, giving him goosebumps as the ice pack made him shiver, and he still felt a calming warmth in his arms, hands, and legs. Suddenly Holden’s couch seemed like the most comfortable thing in the world.

Holden caught the shiver, and asked, “You okay?”

“I’m fucking brilliant. How strong was that pot?”

“Mavis only uses the best ingredients. She says that’s the key to a great dish; great ingredients trumps a sloppy execution.” He balled up the empty popcorn bag and tossed it towards his kitchenette. It bounced off the countertop and hit the floor. He shrugged at his failure, although it wasn’t clear where he was aiming.

“You know, I never ask how you are,” Roan said. It finally occurred to him, possibly because a secession of pain always made him chatty. He wasn’t sure why, but he was pretty sure this was how Dylan knew when he’d been hitting the pills.

He looked at him with genuine surprise. It was so rare to see a genuine emotion on Holden’s face he hardly knew how to react to it. “Why would you? If it was worth mentioning, I’d say something.”

“Would you?”

“If it was important.”

He frowned at him. “You’re lying. You don’t give any of yourself away.”

Holden looked at him with what may have been a genuine small smile. “There’s nothing to give away. I get so exhausted being what people want me to be that when I’m on my own, I enjoy being nothing to no one. You have no idea how tiring it is always being someone else.”

“I think I might,” he said. He was thinking mainly of how hard it was to walk the line sometimes, between being a Human and being the expression of a virus that ruled his life. The cop and the lawbreaker, the Human and the animal, the outsider and the … pariah. Okay, no, that last one didn’t work. At least he knew what he meant.

“Yeah, maybe,” he reached over and grabbed the ice pack, leaning in enough that Roan thought he might try and kiss him. But he behaved himself, and didn’t. “You went ahead and took some pills, didn’t you?”

“My skull felt like it was going to split open from the pressure.”

He grimaced as he stood, returning to the kitchen with the ice pack. “Go ahead and stretch out, sleep it off, I’ll call Dylan and let him know you’re here.”

Roan laughed. “Like hell. I feel great now.”

“You’re way too fucked up to drive.”

“No I’m not.”

“This isn’t an argument,” Holden said, and held up some keys. It took him a moment to realize they were his keys.

Roan instantly reached into his coat pockets, only to find that yes, his eyes weren’t playing tricks on him – his keys were gone. And he never felt them being lifted. Hell, when did Holden even have the chance to do that? “Motherfucker! How’d you get my keys?”

“Oh please, hon, I’m a professional hooker. I could take your wallet, fill it full of junk mail, and replace it without you being any wiser.” He palmed the keys and dropped them in the pocket of his sweatpants. “You sleep this off. I don’t know if it was the crime scene or what, but you look like motherfucking hell. Take five before you drop.”

It was the drugs, they made him feel good, and it seemed to switch off his internal filter, because he blurted, “I might have a brain tumor.” He didn’t mean to say it, it just came out.

Holden had been coming back into the living room, but he froze where he was, and the look on his face was once again genuine, one of naked surprise that made him look oddly Human. Not that he wasn’t or never did, but Holden had such a slick awareness that he always seemed better than Human. Now he was just a man, and a startled one at that. Maybe if he wasn’t so wasted, he could appreciate that he was getting a rare glimpse of the real Holden, a person almost no one ever saw. “Are you serious?”

“I hafta tell Dylan, but I don’t know how. All I do is disappoint or scare him, and here I am, doing it again. Why doesn’t he leave me? I’m only gonna kill him, one way or another, and I don’t want to hurt him anymore.”

Holden looked genuinely stunned, and Roan suddenly wished he had a camera. Holden then dry washed his face, giving himself a moment to process what was said and get over his shock, and came at it again. “Okay, first of all, he loves you, and I suspect he’s kind of a low level masochist, ‘cause he hasn’t walked away from your drama. Second, hurt him? Who has the fucking brain tumor? It ain’t him. So stop being a macho asshole and just tell him.”

“Like it’s that easy.”

“Fine. Get wasted and tell him. Everything’s easier when your wasted.”

“Apparently.”

After another moment, where Holden briefly paced in a circle, he said, “Try Valium. I’ve noticed Valium has a tendency to make people say things they normally wouldn’t say.”

Roan was going to ask him how he knew this, but decided not to. Also, was Holden genuinely rattled? He seemed to be, kind of, as much as Holden could get rattled. Had he upset him? Why was he upset? Well, maybe it was kind of a big deal, announcing you might have a brain tumor. To him, it was just one more damned thing in a life full of damned things. “I might not have one,” he offered, aware that seemed like too little too late now.

He gave him a hollow eyed look, like he was staring at Roan from the bottom of a well. Or maybe that was just the drugs kicking in big time. “Maybe, but you know it would explain a lot.”

Roan shrugged, as he could only shrug for the moment. He was so tired. Oh, he felt better than he had in ages, but he was still ludicrously weary, and his arms and legs felt like they’d been replaced with lead replicas. Maybe Holden was right about him needing to sleep this off.

Maybe he could sleep it all off, the day, the week, the year. Rip Van Winkle probably had the right idea.