6 – Blackest Eyes

Roan woke up with a start, sitting up, ready to pounce. On what he wasn’t sure, but he was sure there was something requiring his attention.

But only when he was crouched on the bed did he realize he was in a hospital room, and he had no less than three IVs in his arm. Also, his brain was fuzzy like he’d had way too much Vicodin, and he was mildly achy.

It all started clicking, especially when he saw Dylan asleep in a cot not too far away. And he was just asleep, he was out but still breathing, which was a relief. He hadn’t hurt him … physically  … yet. God, that was a thought he hadn’t wanted to have. But for some reason he was afraid he had hurt him.

Realizing he looked like an idiot, he sat back down, tucking his bare legs back under the scratchy sheets, and he looked at the various monitors around him. Was he okay? He should be an expert at reading all these machines by now, but half the time he never paid any attention.

Roan ran a hand over his head, and was amazed at how short his hair was. Did they give him a buzz cut? But it felt really soft, new, and with the familiar dead tooth ache in his body and the scratchy five o’clock shadow on his face, he knew he had recently transformed. He should have hurt more, but that explained why his brain felt like it was lost in a pea soup fog – they pumped him so full of drugs William S. Burroughs would have been jealous.  He probably wasn’t meant to be functioning yet, but panic and anger (in lion or human form) could push him past any barrier.

Looking at the books and sketchpads around Dylan’s cot, he got a really bad feeling. How long had he been here? “Dyl,” he said, and realized it was his quiet, middle of the night voice. Was it appropriate? It looked dark out the windows, but the metal mesh could have made a heavily overcast day look like night. “Dylan. Can you hear me?”

He stirred, let out a “don’t bug me” groan (you knew you were in a relationship too long when you could easily interpret each other’s grunts and groans), and then suddenly raised his head. He sat up, clearly shocked, and looked at him. It seemed to take Dylan a second to really see him. “Roan?”

He nodded. “Yeah. What happened? How long have I been out?”

Dylan sprung off his cot and rushed to his beside, crushing him in a violent hug and very nearly entangling himself in his IV lines. “Oh god, I thought I’d lost you for good.”

“I’m sorry,” he said into the side of Dylan’s neck. Roan felt tears slide down his skin as he hugged him back fiercely, Dylan trying to hide a sob in his shoulder. The smell of Dylan, the warmth of his body, was so familiar it was instantly comforting, and they were like that for several minutes, while Dylan tried to stop crying, and Roan tried to keep himself from tearing up. Dylan in tears always got to him. He then pulled away and kissed Roan’s face, his forehead, his cheeks, finally his mouth, like he’d been away forever. It probably felt that way.

Dylan finally told him he’d been out for about a week. Which was bad, but not as bad as it could have been.  Dylan also let him know that, once he recovered from his general happiness of him being conscious again, he was going to beat the shit out of him. That was fair enough.

Roan was starving, his stomach felt like it was trying to digest his internal organs, and he didn’t want food, he needed it, now. After convincing Dylan he was up to the trip down to the cafeteria, he got dressed, and carefully removed two of the IVs from his arm (he had to keep one; Dylan said it was off if he didn’t keep at least one). Dylan then led him down to the cafeteria, where he was the only one trailing an IV behind him, but no one much cared.

Yes, it was hospital cafeteria food, but it struck him as some of the best food he ever had. He wolfed it down like there was no tomorrow. He had two pre-wrapped sandwiches, but only by the time he was eating the third did he bother to look and see what was in the sandwiches. Looked like turkey, sad pieces of lettuce, and some kind of anonymous cheese. He didn’t care. They needed mustard, but he couldn’t care less. Partial transformation just beat the shit out of your metabolism, and he felt like a parakeet, trying to eat twice his weight in food as fast as possible. Dylan watched him with the kind of world weary annoyance and affection that could only be adopted by the long suffering spouse. He reminded him to chew every now and then, as he told him the lion had came out in his skin, not once but twice, Dylan just looked weary. Roan would have called bullshit, except he knew Dylan wasn’t lying to him. He still seemed a little freaked out by it, and Roan couldn’t blame him. That would freak him out too; if he ever found himself conscious in a lion body, his mind would probably snap like a pretzel. According to Dylan, Rosenberg had no idea what it meant.

Roan chugged down his second glass of atrocious iced tea, and started in on a pre-packaged brownie, as he thought he should mix sugar and carbs in with his protein. Actually, what he needed was a pizza, something dripping with cheese, grease, and pepperoni. As soon as he thought of it, he asked, “Do you think we can get a pizza delivered here?”

Dylan just stared at him, his dark chocolate eyes giving nothing away.  “At what point do you barf or do we watch your stomach explode like Mr. Creosote?”

“Never. I seem to have hollow legs.” Actually he kind of wished that was the truth.

Just like he wished he didn’t know what the lion coming out while in his body meant. But he did know, didn’t he? Or at least he suspected its meaning. What he could do the lion could do – he could force a change, and maybe the lion could too. Or, in this case, force it to stop. But only when he wasn’t around to put up a fight. So in a technical since, he had custody of his body, but if he didn’t watch it, he was going to be kidnapped and flown off to a country with no extradition treaty.  Or something like that.

Okay, so he was crazy. Roan could only hope it was the good kind of crazy.

****

Scott had no idea why he was still up, watching a movie he wouldn’t be watching if it wasn’t so late and he wasn’t so bored.

It was probably his laziness ganging up on him again. Hockey season was over, for the moment, and he had time to go off his diet and the training grind and just veg like a normal person. For about a week and a half.

Then he’d have to start training again, and back off on the junk food a bit, as he couldn’t afford to get too out of shape. There was a slim chance he could get picked up by someone during the summer trading season, and did he really want to show up with a newborn beer gut and a bit of a wheeze? He had to be in top form.

Grey had no problem with this. Grey would probably roll in around ten in the morning and kick him out of bed, telling him a jog would  be good for him, and he shouldn’t complain since it was only a mile. Grey seemed to enjoy exercise, he seemed to get something out of it, but then again, Grey was always weird. If he hadn’t been a hockey player, he’d probably be a personal trainer or something, someone who gleefully tormented the out of shape for fun and profit. But since he was built like Frankenstein, exercise probably was fun for him.  Get those dead body parts movin’.

Scott shoved a handful of the caramel popcorn in his mouth, and winced as he chewed. It looked like caramel, it was sticky like caramel, but it tasted like sweet chemicals. Horrible shit. But here he was, still eating the stuff, probably due to boredom and being tired. It wasn’t waking him up, though, nor was this film, which had reached ludicrous new heights every fifteen minutes or so. He still had to see how it ended, even though he knew the white guy hero would probably think of some stupid way to kill the beast, and end up with the woman with the weird hair helmet. But he wanted to see how they killed the thing, and he bet it would be pathetic. Sprinkling it with hot sauce, slamming it in a car door, smooshing it with an oversized tissue? The stupid options were endless.

He yawned and stretched out on the couch, wondering if he should risk one more beer. It didn’t go with the horrible popcorn, but the real issue was it would put him to sleep. He was perilously close to sleep as it was. He should just go to bed. Scott was still trying to decide when there was a knock on the door.

He heaved himself off the couch, and asked, “Tegan kick your ass out?” Tegan wasn’t the brightest woman he’d ever met, but she was smart enough to be unable to stand Grey sometimes. Scott gave it three months, tops.

Although it could have been Grey forgetting his keys again, it turned out to be Holden on the doorstep, leaning against the frame. “Nobody kicks my ass without paying in advance.”

He had a bruise, slowly cycling through shades of mauve and purple, growing beneath his left eye, and it looked like he had blood on his pants. “Holy shit, were you in a fight?”

“Fight makes it sound like the other guy had a chance,” Holden replied, with his usual cool humor. Scott helped him inside, as he was limping a little, and once he got him sat on the couch, he asked, “What happened?”

Scott went back to shut the door, and then detoured into the kitchenette to grab a bag of frozen peas from the freezer,  while Holden once again used a lot of words to say  not much of anything. Holden said it was just part of the case he was working on for Roan, and he wasn’t at liberty to go into details with client confidentiality and all. Except he could say that the  guy who he beat up was a total scumbag who deserved worse. “If you wanna give me his name, Grey and I could pay him a visit.”

“Nah. He’s probably gonna need dental surgery, so he’s out of the game for a while.” Scott came back and handed him the bag of peas, which he looked at with a sarcastic raised eyebrow. “Dare I ask what you expect me to do with this?”

So many things came to mind, but Scott said, “It’s for your eye. It’s more comfortable than an ice pack.” What did he find so attractive about Holden? He wasn’t his usual type at all. Physically Roan wasn’t either, but he could understand that, because the guy was a stud. How many real life superheroes did you meet? He oozed machismo and a kind of exotic appeal that he bet even a few straight guys would go for.

But Holden just oozed sex, a kind of dark charm that suggested he’d fuck your brains out if you were lucky, and kill you if you weren’t. He could also turn it off and on, like a faucet, which added a creep factor to it, and should have been a turn off. How did you know when any of this was real? And while he was attractive, he wasn’t overwhelmingly handsome; he wasn’t the second coming of Brad Pitt. Yet there was something about him that made you take a second look, made you stare. Maybe it was just trying to figure him out, as if the puzzle of him was in his eyes, and if you could just be close enough to him long enough you would figure it out and he would make sense. But maybe that was just him projecting.  He didn’t understand Holden, what motivated him, and he wasn’t sure he ever would.  Maybe that’s why he was so attractive.  He was a continuous, unending mystery.

Holden held the bag of peas up to his bruised eye, and let out a slight hiss of pain through his teeth. “I knew coming here was the right idea. Who better to handle black eyes than a hockey player. Bet your brilliant with dental emergencies too.”

“Wow, I haven’t heard that one before,” he replied, undoing Holden’s jeans.

Holden stared at him with his one visible eye, smirking slightly. “You aren’t even buying me dinner first?”

“I want to take a look at your leg, smart ass. How’d you hurt it?”

“Kneeing the guy in the face.”

Scott clicked his tongue. “If you don’t watch it, that’s a good way to break a bone in your knee.”

“Gee, how would you know that, being such a good boy?” he replied with sarcastic humor.  “It’s not like you’re a hockey player or something.”

Scott gave him the finger before yanking his jeans down with a bit more force than necessary.  Scott couldn’t help but notice he was wearing red boxer briefs which looked so incredibly sexy on him, but he ignored that and looked at his right knee, which was a bit puffy and a bit reddish tinged. He touched it gingerly, trying to avoid the bruise. “If there’s a real sharp pain, let me know.”

“It’s a dull ache,” Holden replied. “It actually feels like a pulled a muscle or something.”

“Hmm.” He was far from a trainer, but he’d become a minor expert on leg injuries just by observation. The fact that Holden wasn’t screaming in pain from him grabbing his knee cap was probably the best sign in this situation. “It’s possible. You definitely bruised it.” He started taking off Holden’s shoes, and expected another comment. He wasn’t disappointed.

“No means no, cowboy.”

“You should get in the tub, soak that knee. It’ll bring the swelling down.” Holden’s telling silence made him look up, to see Holden grinning at him in an offhand, goofy sort of way. “What?” Scott asked defensively.

“Has anyone ever told you you’re fucking adorable?”

“You have. I think this makes it several times now. I’m beginning to think it’s an insult.”

That softened Holden’s expression, and Holden sat forward and touched his face, grazing his cheek lightly with his knuckles. “No, never. I just can’t believe your real sometimes.”

What did you say to that? Scott wanted to say he felt the same way about him, but he didn’t know if the way he meant it was precisely a compliment, so he decided to just say, “I have dirty laundry that attests to my reality.”

“Don’t we all? People could die off tomorrow, and all that would be left to prove we existed would be dirty laundry and Styrofoam coffee cups,” Holden replied, sitting back and letting Scott pull his jeans off. He got a close up look at the blood, and grimaced. His first thought, as callous as it was, was that he’d never get this stain out.

He wadded up the jeans in a ball, so no blood would get on their stuff, as Holden limped to the bathroom, shedding his shirt along the way. At least his shirt hadn’t appeared bloodied, but it was dark, and flecks of blood wouldn’t show up easily. He also knew this from experience.

Scott hung around to see the end of the movie before he turned off the set. In the end, they dropped a “small” nuclear bomb on the creature(!), even though it was only in a desert two miles outside the city. Still, no buildings were destroyed, no one was evaporated by the shockwave, and fallout? What the hell was that? What a magnificent piece of crap. He would have blamed Ed Wood for this, except it apparently wasn’t an Ed Wood film. Who knew it was so easy to make a truly epic disaster of a film?

He heard the water running as he went into his room to find some sweats for Holden to wear, and wondered if his were big enough. He was a jock, sure , but Holden was pretty broad across the shoulders. Not Grey big, but a bit bigger than him. Still his sweats were oversized, so he didn’t worry about it too much.

As Scott walked to the bathroom, he wondered what he knew about male prostitutes, except certain neo-cons and evangelists had an insatiable love for them. That was all he knew about them, come to think of it. You just naturally assumed they were all abused as kids, and were all addicted to drugs. The fact that neither of these things applied to Holden made him a true puzzle. That and he seemed so smart, too smart to be doing this for a living. Was he doing this just to be contrary? It seemed a long way to go just to say “fuck you” to the world. But then you add this whole sidekick to a superhero thing into the mix, and things just got too fucked up for words.

He knocked on the door and waited for the okay before coming in, putting the sweats on the top of the toilet tank. “You’re gonna want to wash your clothes before you go out in daylight. Or maybe burn them. This guy was still alive, right?”

Holden chuckled, but in a dark, almost sinister sort of way. He was laying back in their acrylic plastic bathtub, the water still coming in at full blast even though the tub was half full. Since he was naked, Scott could see he had no other bruises, so the fight probably was as one sided as he said he was. And that was yet another oddity of Holden, that he could fight as well as he apparently did. His size was a help, sure, Grey proved that sometimes size was the only difference between a sissy slap fight and a devastating shot heard ‘round the world, but without some ability size wasn’t enough. Had Roan trained him? (Shades of Batman and Robin – a comparison Holden hated, especially since “Batman is a normal guys with a lot of money and tech. Roan isn’t normal, isn’t rich, and has no tech. The comparison would send a comic nerd into a tizzy.” Scott felt Holden had revealed himself as a comic nerd by that statement, but kept the observation to himself.) “I wouldn’t come here if I’d killed someone. I wouldn’t want you getting nailed as an accomplice after the fact.”

“Thanks.” The fact that he had actually considered this made Scott nervous. How dangerous was this guy? He sat on the closed toilet lid, and noticed the steam coming from the tub. “You know, you should be soaking the knee is cooler water.”

“What, and risk shrinkage? Fuck that. Besides, warm water is nice and relaxing.” He settled back against the back of the tub, putting an arm behind his head, adopting a sexy smile. “My knee feels better already.”

He bet. “So where did you learn to fight?”

“From watching hockey.” At Scott’s scowl, Holden snickered, and admitted,” Various places. When I played baseball, the coach encouraged me to do a little boxing, strengthen my arms, and then when I was on the street, I picked up some other things by watching other guys, and trial and error. Fighting isn’t rocket science, it’s just learning not to hurt yourself while hurting someone else. “ He sat forward and turned off the taps. “Isn’t that how you learned?”

“More or less. I took up sparring during the off season, mainly to get my excess energy out and as exercise I could bother to do, but as I started moving up the amateur hockey ranks, I learned some from the older or more experienced defensemen.  There may have been a couple wingers, but defensemen seem to know the best tricks.”

“Maybe you could teach me some sometime.”

Scott sighed and shook his head at a grinning Holden. “Do you ever say anything that doesn’t sound like a come on?”

“I do, all the time. It’s not my fault if you think it’s a come on.” He gave him an innocent look, but after a moment’s struggle couldn’t keep a straight face and laughed.

“You know, I really thought you weren’t coming by tonight.”

That seemed to sober him up;  Scott watched his mirth die away like a light on a dimmer switch. “I wasn’t. But the thought of going home … I dunno. I didn’t want to. “

Scott’s first thought was teasing him, as surely Holden would have done the same thing to him, but there was an alien vulnerability in his expression that made him look Human for once.  Not the world’s slickest, untouchable bastard. Something happened tonight, and it wasn’t the fight.  Something had gotten under Holden’s skin, although the likelihood he’d ever mention it was near zero. Then again, would he? Talking was for other people; talking was what his girlfriends made him do.  The good thing about having a boyfriend was you didn’t always need to talk. Scott moved to the side of the tub, and knelt down before grabbing the back of his head and kissing him, just to see how he’d react.

Holden kissed him back, a wet hand on the back of his neck, water dripping down his back. Holden had this way of kissing him that felt like he was almost trying to consume him, eat his face off like a zombie, but it wasn’t actually a bad thing. It told Scott that he was done with talking for the night, that he wanted to do something much more interesting. And that suited him just fine.

5 – This Love

“Rico was picked up by a john last time you saw him?” Holden asked, not sure if he should believe him.

Newt nodded, taking a deep drag off his cigarette. “He wanted some rock. I didn’t, I mean, what the fuck would I want rock for? Last time I used it I thought my skin was gonna fall off, you know? Besides, I was fine with coke and X, which pretty much does the same thing when you use ‘em together, ‘cept your skin doesn’t feel like it’s gonna fall off.”

Holden nodded, like that made perfect sense. He actually wanted to get up and punch him, but how would that do any good? Besides, he wasn’t sure why he was losing his temper with him now. Had the pot finally wore off? “Where does the john come into this?”

“Well, we were near the bus station, you know? We were both broke, he’d spent his cash on a bottle of tequila, and we had no way of getting any more right then. I had no interest, I had all the drugs I wanted, but he couldn’t live without some rock. So he figured what the hell, do a trick, get some cash. It wasn’t too long before he got picked up. He was supposed to meet me back here, but he never showed up.”

“Do you know who picked him up?”

He shook his head, exhaling a stream of smoke. “Nope.”

“You see what he was driving, what he looked like?”

Newt gave him a half hearted shrug, paying more attention to the television screen, where someone was wiping down a stove top to the utter amazement of an easily entertained audience. “Just a beaten up white pick up truck.”

“What make?”

“You mean type? I dunno. Probably a Ford.”

Great. This was as good as no information at all. “Never seen him before? Not a regular?”

He shook his head and shrugged, too stoned to give a shit. “Dunno man. I haven’t done a street job in a while. I’ve been working as a mule.”

“Did you recognize anyone working the strip that night?”

Newt finished the cigarette, smoking it down to a nub no bigger than a Tylenol. He stabbed it out violently in the top of the Coke can. “Wasn’t a lot of people out there then.” He paused briefly, considering his surely fragmented memories. “Maybe Jewel was there. Across the street.”

“Maybe?”

“It was dark, I didn’t pay much att -”

Newt’s answer was cut off by a scream from a neighboring room, full of the kind of ragged pain and terror that made them both jump.

Automatically, Holden jumped up to his feet and headed for the door, shoving the spool aside and getting pissed off at Newt’s pointless paranoia.

Out in the parking lot, he found a guy with bad skin and prison tattoos trying to haul a bloody, screaming woman back into his unit. She was wearing the mandatory hooker uniform of a miniskirt and a halter top, and he wondered if this asshole was a pimp. He had the greasy look of one. “Shut up, bitch!” he snapped, like the classy guy he obviously was. “I told you not to fuck around with me -”

Holden stormed across the lot, something ugly welling up in his gut. He hated pimps. “Get your hands off her, motherfucker!”

The guy looked up with a deep, murderous scowl, his eyes like bullet holes in a corpse. He had the woman – a girl really; she probably wasn’t older than seventeen, a junkie newbie recently turned out – by the hair, his fist tangled in it like a net. “Fuck off, faggot.”

Holden was barely aware that Newt, still standing in the doorway of his room, snickered. “Oh man, yer gonna get it now.”

Roan would probably have advised him not to make a move first, as Roan seem to prefer people commit to a plan of action before he showed them how utterly stupid it was, but he was too angry to be logical or even care. As soon as he reached the guy he threw a punch. The guy must have seen it coming, but he was too drunk or stoned to move fast, and Holden clipped him on the jaw. It snapped his head back, but the guy threw the girl into the nearest parked car, which she landed against with a sickening noise, and kicked Holden.

He was going for the groin but came up short and kicked him in the thigh instead. It still hurt, still made him stumble back a step, and the would be pimp stepped up to deliver a punch of his own, which connected squarely with Holden’s left eye.

This wasn’t his first time at the rodeo, though. He already knew the punch was coming, and decided to take it, because it gave him an opening. While he was throwing his punch, Holden decided to kick him. So while he landed the punch, Holden kicked him in the nuts at almost the same exact moment. And he was kicking a fucking field goal.

While the force of the punch made Holden reel back and see stars, followed by amorphous blobs of dark spots dancing in his vision, the pimp let out a short, sharp shriek, almost like a little girl, and grabbed his balls, doubling over and slumping back against another car. Even though his vision was still blurry, Holden forced himself forward and took advantage of the pimp’s doubled over state to grab him by his greasy head and ram his knee straight into his ugly face. Holden did it a couple of times, feeling a pain in his knee as well as a warm rush of blood down his pantleg as he knocked a few of the pimp’s teeth out. Holden then shoved him to the asphalt, ignoring the pain in his leg, and gave the pimp a kick in the ribs. “Beat on someone your own size, you ugly fuckhole.” He spit on him, just for a good measure of contempt.

The pimp was panting hard, but he managed to roll up to all fours, and spit out a mouth full of blood before saying, “You’ve made a big fucking mistake -”

Holden kicked him in the head, sending him collapsing to the parking lot. “No, you have, motherfucker.”

“No fights!” Sivan exclaimed, waving a large handgun as he came charging out of his office. “No fights here! You take it away!” At the sight of Sivan with a gun, Newt disappeared back into his room, and Holden couldn’t blame him.

Holden held up his hands, dipping his head in acknowledgment. “It’s cool, it’s over. I’m gonna go, okay?”

Sivan nodded his head like his neck was a spring. “Fine, you go then. No fights.”

“No fights,” Holden agreed, backing away. He looked at the beaten girl, and said, “I know somebody who could help you escape from this bastard. Wanna come with me?”

She looked at him suspiciously, through bruised eyes. “Who the hell are you?”

“A man whore who hates pimps. You comin’ with me or not?”

She still seemed dubious, but her options were non-existent, so she trailed behind him as he walked back to his car. Well, limped. His knee still hurt, his face hurt, and he thought he might have tasted blood. But other than that, he felt fantastic. Jessie mostly dealt with kids trapped in sex slavery, but he wasn’t one hundred percent sure this girl was legal. Either way, Jessie would help her.

Maybe that was the only good thing he could get out of this whole situation.

****

Although Fiona knew what to expect, she was still kind of surprised.

Rainbow had called her that afternoon. Calls to MK Investigations were being forwarded to her number since Roan was “indisposed” (that was the official line for now, even though Fiona thought it was somehow Edwardian in its vagueness), and a nervous Rainbow asked if she could come by and talk, as she wanted to talk about something she wasn’t comfortable discussing over the phone. She thought that was weird, but since Roan had always said Rainbow couldn’t be more harmless if she was a declawed kitten stuck up a tree, Fiona gave her her address. It might not be her address for very much longer anyways.

Tank had asked her to move to Boston to be with him. It wasn’t that she didn’t like Tank, because she did, more than she thought she would. He was a bit crazy, but in a good way, not in a “I’m gonna kill all of you!” sort of way. He didn’t even mind her being a dominatrix, nor did he expect her to bring her work home with her either. He spoke a lot of French, but you couldn’t have everything.

She just couldn’t picture being a hockey girlfriend, or the girlfriend of any pro athlete really. She wasn’t a blonde supermodel type, she didn’t have fake breasts and she wasn’t skinny, nor was she the type to stay at home while he was away fucking groupies. But to be fair to Tank, that kind of woman didn’t seem to appeal to him. If you couldn’t hold your own in a bar fight, he didn’t want to know you, and that pretty much held for women as well as men. That left him a small pool of women to draw from, and supermodel types just couldn’t make the cut. (Well, maybe Naomi Campbell, but she was probably the only one.)

And it wasn’t like she could just pick up and move to a city where she didn’t know anyone. Okay, she could … and she wasn’t without skills. Beyond her dominatrix gifts, she still had her programming skills, and she could always go back to doing some web designing.

But if she left now, she’d feel like she was abandoning Roan, and she couldn’t do that. She would have liked to talk this over with him, but he actually was “indisposed”. He hadn’t regained consciousness yet, as far as she knew. Which reminded her, she needed to drop by the hospital tonight, maybe drop Dylan off a sandwich. He probably hadn’t eaten since she last saw him.

Nine o’clock sharp, there was a meek knock at her door. Rainbow was essentially the hippie stereotype, in a lilac peasant blouse, a long rainbow colored skirt, and a dark blue knitted shawl. (Hand knitted? Maybe.) Her dark hair was curly like a grown out perm, and she had it gathered behind her in a ponytail as thick as a horse’s tail. There was something homely and fragile about her, and you instinctively wanted to protect her. She could see why Roan always had a soft spot for her, even though she was one of those kitty cult people.

She sat Rainbow down, gave her some chamomile tea, and slowly pulled the story out of her. It had to be pulled, as it was disjointed, and she had a tendency to wander all over the place. But from what she could gather, Rainbow was worried that the Church’s new leader, James Campanelli, was doing something terrible.

Since Eli’s death, it seemed like there had been a revolving door of leaders for Divine Transformation. James had only recently taken over, as the old one had died during his last transformation. Rainbow was not a fan of James’s aggressive style, and there were rumors that he had a cabin up in the woods, and that certain members were invited up there on certain weekends, and he had a side internet business connected to it. Rainbow was nervous and vague, and it was all Fiona could do to get something concrete she could work with.

Apparently the rumors had it as some type of “fight club” for cats. Only these were generally fights to the death. She wouldn’t have believed that was true, except one of James’s assistants showed up at the church one day with a bandage on his ear. Apparently, the earlobe had been ripped off, but he told several different stories about what happened, and none made any sense.

She didn’t want to go to the police for several reasons: she didn’t trust them, what if word got back to James, what if they raided the church and people got hurt? She wanted none of that. She was hoping Roan could check it out, find out if there was any truth to it, because if anyone was going to find out the truth, it was Roan. Fiona had to give her that, because few were better at it.

She didn’t have a web address for her, but that was okay, because as soon as Rainbow was gone she did her own search to see if she could turn up any domain names or sites owned by Campanelli. She found two, one which wasn’t being used yet, and another you needed a credit card number to enter. Which didn’t bode well.

Holden was the assistant investigator, and she could hand it off to him, but she was reluctant to do so. This was cat business, and as tough as Holden was, he would be fucked going up against some angry transformed all by himself. (A gun would help, but he’d still be at something of a disadvantage.) Roan was the king of the jungle, and he should have no problem subduing cats; it was what he did, sometimes without intention.

But he had to regain consciousness to do it, and she didn’t know if he ever would. So what should she do?

She decided to crack Campanelli’s site and find out. She’d let whatever she saw on there guide her to her next move. She just hoped it wasn’t fetish porn … although Holden would probably be good at handling that.

It suddenly occurred to her how weird an agency MK Investigations was – run by a cat guy, who employed a part time dominatrix and a hooker who fancied himself a vigilante. In that case, there was no one better to handle this kind of shit.

Again, as long as it wasn’t fetish porn. That would suck.

4 – Ego Death

Roan found himself standing in a hospital hallway, sure he should be somewhere, but not one hundred percent certain where that place was. He turned to find a lion waiting at one end of the hall, its face framed by a huge fluffy fall of mane. It was growling at him, and he shook his head and gave it the finger while turning away. “Like I’d be scared of you. “

At the other end of the hall, there was a man standing there. It took Roan a minute to recognize him, but he looked like a younger version of himself. He didn’t really look like that, did he? His face was leaner than he thought, although his hair was a slightly lighter shade of red, lighter than it had ever been. But this was a dream, he knew that, and things didn’t always make sense in dreams. “Maybe you should be scared,” his other self said. “You’re losing the fight.”

“What fight?”

“You’re not even trying, are you? Since when did you become such a pussy?”

He sighed, wondering if he could actually punch himself. Would it hurt? Would he care? “Go away. I talk to myself enough.” He turned towards the door he saw in his peripheral vision, only to find it was gone. There was just a smooth, unbroken wall. He touched it, feeling stucco, but there was no seam. He turned, only to find that his second self and the lion exchanged places. “Just fuck off already,” he told the lion, and turned to face himself. He – the other he – was sitting in one of those outdoor patio chairs that cafes sometimes had, something that looked like wrought iron filigree that was either freezing cold or too hot, and invariably one of the most uncomfortable things you could sit on beyond a chair full of spikes. The table he was sitting at was a wooden end table, though. “You do know how stupid this all is, don’t you?”

Roan glared at him. “ Talking to myself? Yeah. What’d you do to your hair, you stupid fuck? You tryin’ to go for a junior Carrot Top look?”

His other self didn’t appear amused. “Aren’t you tired of all this sad sack bullshit? You used to be better than this. What happened?”

Roan turned away, not about to get in an argument with a smart ass like himself, but there was the lion, still growling at him. Huffing a sigh through his nose, he picked up the lion. It felt as light as a paper doll. “I told you to piss off.” He then tossed the lion aside, a piece of garbage. He heard a thud of impact, but didn’t bother to see if it had landed on its feet.

The hallway became a narrow corridor, and as he turned a corner, he almost walked straight into his younger, other self. “If you can repel the lion that easily, why don’t you? Oh, I get it. You’re afraid of yourself, not the lion. How distressingly Freudian.”

“You think I won’t hit you, is that?”

His younger self smirked in a really irritating manner. “Oh, I know you will. You enjoy beating yourself up almost as much as everyone else does. You’re taking all the sport out of it.”

He didn’t think about it, he just threw a punch, and it would have hit his other self square on the jaw if he had been standing there, but he had disappeared in a blink. “You’re so predictable,” his younger self said, shaking his head in exasperation. He was now standing farther away, arms crossed over his chest, somehow outside on a sunny sidewalk now. Damn it, he hated dreams.

He closed his eyes and focused on waking up. He wasn’t sure it would work, especially since this wasn’t technically a nightmare, but it was worth a shot.

“You really think that’s gonna work?”

He sighed heavily, and opened his eyes. “Fine, smart ass, say what you’re gonna say so I can wake up.”

His other self shook his head sadly. “I’ve already said it. You already know it too. You’re being an obtuse idiot because it’s easier. Since when have you taken the path of least resistance?”

“Since the path I took didn’t matter in the least.”

“Is it old age that’s made you such a coward? Don’t blame Paris again. You always knew he was going to die.”

“Yes, that makes the pain less, doesn’t it?” he snapped, tired of this. What, like he didn’t know he’d become pathetic, that he’d given up? He knew all to well he had. He wasn’t even a hundred percent sure why now, except the will had just gotten sucked out of him. Yes, Paris was the main reason, but he wasn’t all of it. It just seemed like he was fighting a battle that was pointless, and all he was doing was wearing himself out. The haters would win, because they always won, and he got tired of beating his head against the same walls.

Roan just scowled at his younger self, and wondered if he killed himself in a dream if he’d actually die. It might be worth the risk to find out.

****

Holden had just reached the Night Owl when he felt his phone start vibrating in his pocket. He wasn’t going to answer it, especially since it was Scott, but by the sixth ring he had a change of heart. “Yeah?”

“Ever heard of a film called “The Beast With A Thousand Eyes”?” Scott asked, without preamble.

“Um, no. Why?”

“It’s on channel 22 right now, I’ve been watching it … it’s kind of mesmerizing in its awfulness. I think the monster is a puppet with papier mache on it. And as far as I can tell, it has three eyes at most, unless the rest are on its butt or something.”

“That’s gonna happen. Is there a reason you’re calling with a movie review?”

“I’m bored. I thought maybe, if you weren’t doing anything, you’d like to come over. We could watch the movie and try this new microwave caramel popcorn that somehow ended up in our kitchen.”

“Ew! That sounds disgusting.”

“I know, right? Grey doesn’t cop to buyin’ it, but he must have. I didn’t.”

“Isn’t Grey there?”

“Naw, he’s at Tegan’s tonight.” Tegan was Grey’s current girlfriend. He knew this because he had been around Scott way too much.

And that was the problem. He’d been around Scott way too much. He didn’t want a relationship, he couldn’t handle one, and this was starting to feel like one. It was both frightening and strangely comforting, which was even more frightening. But he liked listening to his voice, so he settled back against the car seat and closed his eyes. “I’m working on a case right now.”

“Anything exciting?”

“God no. It’s never anything exciting.” He thought he heard screaming in the background. “The monster eat someone?”

“It’s trying to. Mainly it seems to be humping the ground as a means of locomotion.”

“Now that’s a great date.”

Scott snorted humorously. “Not humping the ground, no.”

“Hump whatever you can get, that’s what I always say.”

“Oh really?”

“Well, with some obvious restrictions.”

Scott chuckled, and took a drink of something, probably a beer. Holden could barely recall first meeting Scott. He thought he was cute, but was overwhelmed by Grey’s gentle giant persona and the weird vibe he was picking up from Tank (which turned out to be totally justified, and yet not, as he was simply assuming a defensive posture, it was just that Tank’s idea of a defensive posture was total insanity. And that was brilliant). He just assumed Scott was a typical jock. Even Grey turned out not to be typical in any sense of the word; in fact, he still didn’t get him at all. Except Grey could be fearless, ‘cause who was going to fuck with him, and he could see why he idolized Roan, macho asshole that he often was. After a moment, Scott said, “I should be up for a while. So if you wanna drop by later, feel free.”

“What if Grey comes home?”

“What if he does? He won’t care.”

Normally he would call bullshit, but Grey was so oddly laid back he really did bet he wouldn’t care, as long as they didn’t fuck in front of him. And even then he might not care as long as they didn’t block his view of the television. “I don’t know how late I’m gonna be out tonight.”

“Well, keep it in mind. Maybe we can meet for a drink one of these days, huh?”

“What, like a date?”

“Nah, just a beer.”

“Maybe.” They were talking about a date, it was just that neither of them would admit it. Oh well, why not? It was probably easier to pretend.

Holden hung up and got out of the car, heading towards the night manger’s office. It was funny, but after all these years, Sivan was still the night manager. He was a squat but gaunt man with skin the color of a caramel macchiato and an indefinable accent that was almost as comically thick as his mustache, which was definitely a pornstache to be proud of. He was quick to anger but also quick to calm down, which was a good thing since it wasn’t always clear what he was angry about. He was a fighter, though, or had been at some point; his thick sausage fingers had callused knuckles, the type you could only earn through years of punching heavy bags or people. There were rumors that he used to be a “freedom fighter” back in his original homeland, but no one was sure where that was, as apparently every time he was asked he gave a different answer. That led to rumors he used to work for the mob – someone’s mob – but he was too old to be an enforcer now. He was cheerfully crooked though, happy to take money and look the other way when drug deals and prostitution took place in his parking lot, and being as mysterious and grizzled as he was, no one was brave enough to rob him.

Holden slipped him a twenty, and Sivan told him what room Newt was in, without once looking away from his portable television, which seemed to be showing a Japanese game show involving scantily clad girls and lizards. (Surely that made sense to someone.)

Newt’s room was farthest away from the office, which made sense. The Night Owl was a bunch of single units laid out in an almost perfect U shaped formation, and Newt’s room was basically the bottom of the U, the cornerstone that connected the two arms. He knocked on the door, and wondered what he would say if Newt had a client.

After a moment, he heard stuff shifted away from the door (Newt was paranoid, and often piled stuff up in front of a door, whether he could lock it or not), and Newt flung the door open wide. He stared at him a long moment, his pupils so wide you could have driven a truck through them, and finally said, “You’re not the pizza guy.”

What was Newt on? He was standing there in nothing but blue striped boxer shorts that couldn’t have been his (Newt often liked to freeball it), showing a long, lean torso that was almost concave, a tattoo of a bright green lizard over his left pectoral, and a small reddish-purple bruise visible near his right hip. His chest was naturally hairless, save for a bit of barely visible fuzz in the center of his torso, which Newt always attributed to being half-Filipino. But since Holden had met some hairy Filipinos, he wasn’t sure what to make of that.

Newt’s hair was dark and wavy more than curly, but right now it was a lank rat’s nest of a tangle, and the smell of sweat coming off him seemed to indicate he hadn’t showered in a while. “Dude, it’s me, Fox.”

Newt stared at him once more, clearly tripping balls and barely holding on to the Earth. Holden was about to give up and come back another day, maybe when he was slightly more sober, when he suddenly exclaimed, “Oh. I thought you’d joined the Marines.”

He wasn’t kidding, otherwise he would have laughed. “What?”

Newt scratched his head with dirty fingernails. He not only had a club stamp on the back of his hand, but it looked like he had a tattoo on the underside of his wrist. It just said Fuck in thick black letters. “Oh, wait – I mean an escort agency. I don’t know what I was thinkin’ of. C’mon in, want some acid?”

“You’re doing acid?” That would explain a lot. Since Newt had retreated from the door, scratching his ass and revealing a new tattoo (a small spider on his back, in tramp stamp location at the base of his spine), Holden had come in, and was almost overwhelmed by the funk of the room, which smelled like body odor, burnt wires, and mold. It was dark, the only light a silent television playing flickering pictures of what appeared to be an informercial. The covers had been pulled off the bed and lumped up on the floor, like a nest for a large bird, while empty booze bottles and orange juice cartons were scattered across the stained carpet like land minds. He had to look around carefully for a place to step.

“I think so.” Newt paused. “Or was that yesterday? Fuck if I know. What month is it?”

“June.”

That startled a laugh out of him as he sat on the stripped mattress and picked up a lit cigarette from where it had been balanced on the top of a Coke can. It looked like a regular cigarette, but the exceedingly acrid smell of it told Holden it had been laced with something more potent than tobacco. Holy fuck, he wasn’t dabbling in angel dust now, was he? “I promised my mother I’d start rehab in June. Good thing I didn’t specify the year, huh? Could you put that back up against the door?”

Holden turned, and saw one of those huge wooden spools, the type they rolled up industrial cables on. “Where the hell did you get that?”

“Side of the road. Or somebody’s yard, I dunno. It was here when I woke up.”

Holden shook his head as he shoved the heavy thing back up against the door. He’d accuse anyone else of lying, but not Newt. He’d probably killed more brain cells than he’d ever actually had – the fact that he wasn’t a drooling vegetable just showed you how physically resilient he was.

His real name was Shawn, and he was from somewhere in Texas (location varied, just like it varied for Sivan). He was twenty five going on eight hundred and seven, if you considered how much mileage his fun adventures in drug abuse must have added to his life. That lizard tattoo was supposedly where he got his nickname from, but Holden always figured it was really from the movie Aliens. That little girl the aliens couldn’t manage to kill was called Newt, and drugs hadn’t figured out a way to kill Shawn yet either. One monster was as good as another.

“How you gonna let the pizza man in?” Holden wondered.

Newt looked at him blankly. “Pizza man? You ordered a pizza? Thanks, dude.”

With a heavy sigh, he sat on the end of the mattress, and fixed him with a scornful look. “If I ask you about Rico, will you remember anything that actually happened, or didn’t happen three years ago?”

Newt gazed at him with those blown pupil eyes, his irises a mere suggestion of hazel, and said, “Why, did that john kill him?”

Holden stared back at him, wondering if it could possibly be that simple.