3 – Squalor Victoria

Roan figured that Jordan could be excused for being an asshole due to his dad. But there was absolutely no doubt that he was an asshole.

He was a spoiled trust fund brat, from what he could tell. He went to a very pricey private school where he had been suspended multiple times, for incidents  ranging from bullying to being intoxicated in class (he could understand the impulse, but not a smart move). He probably would have been expelled if his dad wasn’t Robert Hatcher. He must have taken after his mother in looks, because he was lean and very tall, a string bean, with straight black hair and hazel eyes set in a narrow oval of a face. He had a strong chin, and while he was a good looking kid now, he would probably start looking craggy in his early thirties; he had both the type of face and temperament best suited to youth. Once you were twenty five, that behavior and face would get old fast.

The files Robert had included on his son were remarkable and creepy for their thoroughness. His son had run away before, but always come home within forty eight hours, mainly because he ran out of money. (Once, he was in a drunk tank in Enumclaw, and his dad had to go pick him up.) He ran track and was fairly decent at it, but not great; he was an also ran more often than a star. His habit of keg standing on a weekly basis probably had a lot to do with that.

His list of ex-girlfriends was enormous, especially considering he was only seventeen. The most recent one had only a first name listed, Brittney, with question marks afterwards. Robert had attached what appeared to be a grainy security camera photo (grainy enough to be absolutely useless) along with a note he must have typed himself: White trash gold-digging whore. Eighteen, looks twenty five, tits fake. Seeing her to annoy me.

In a strange way, he despaired at this. Fake tits? At eighteen? He sincerely hoped Robert was being a catty bitch, but considering straight men seemed to know all about tits, probably not. Jesus, what kind of dirtbag bought fake tits for a teenager?

The huge problem here was he needed a last name. If he was going to check and see if he’d run off with this girl – a really good likelihood if he’d run away again – he needed a last name. There was no way the school – the Rutherford Academy, which almost sounded like a possible sequel to The Stepford Wives – would turn over any records. To him. He was going to have to call Robert and ask him to get the school to turn over a list of names of all the girls named Brittney who went there. That was a hideous breach of privacy, but money talked, and Hatcher had enough to scream. He would get the list; they probably kissed his ass in every manner possible.

But he didn’t feel like calling him just now. He’d wait until later, when there was a possibility he’d get his voice mail and not him in person. He felt he needed a few pills or a beer before he could deal with the asshat again.

Because of his mystery (at the time) client, he wasn’t able to pick up Holden from the hospital; he’d called Dee and asked him to get him instead. Luckily it was a break day (he didn’t have weekends off; those were boom times for the paramedics), and Holden didn’t mind as long as he got out of there.

But they would be visiting him later, as Dylan insisted it was the polite thing to do. So when he got home, he walked in to the delicious aroma of spicy cooking. “Goddamn, I hope that’s for me.”

“Sorry, but it’s for Holden. It’s a “Welcome home, sorry you got stabbed” tamale pie,” Dylan replied, his voice wafting from the kitchen.

“Wow. Now that’s a specialized cookbook.”

“Very funny. Wanna drink, Krusty?”

“Beer me, bartender, and pour yourself one while we’re at it.”

“You bastard.” Dylan didn’t like being reminded he was a bartender at home. If Dyl could ever talk him into having a house party, he wouldn’t serve drinks.

Roan flopped down on the couch and closed his eyes, feeling both tired and irritated. He had to call the douchebag and get those student records. What was bothering him was the WAV file of Jordan’s last phone call to his dad – it sounded very real. Very confused, distressed, the voice of a teenager who had the sudden, terrible awareness that his best friend has been the psycho killer all along, and yet he knows if he lets on, he’s dead next. There was also that teenage boy need to be macho and cool even though he was shitting himself. You couldn’t fake that, no matter how good an actor you were.

It was very easy to believe Jordan ran away willingly, to escape his buttcrack of a dad, but maybe something went wrong along the way. He hated Hatcher; but Jordan, chip off the old douche that he was, couldn’t help who he was born to.

“Tell me about it,” Dylan said, joining him on the sofa. He pressed a pale ale into his hands, and laid down on the couch, so his head was on Roan’s thigh. Roan took a swig of the cold beer and then looked down at Dyl, who was looking up at him curiously.

“Tell you about what?”

“What’s bothering you. That little vein is standing out on your temple.”

“Is it?” He reached up and touched it, but he didn’t know why – he couldn’t actually feel it. “Ah fuck.”

He had no choice but to tell Dylan about the case, recounting how much he honestly hated Hatcher and how much Jordan was hardly different, but since he was a kid he felt bad for him. He stroked Dylan’s hair this entire time, unconsciously, although he was aware how soft it was. Dylan listened politely, as he always did; Roan sometimes wondered if he went away on a private meditation in his head while he was yammering away about something, but Roan didn’t know a way to ask that wouldn’t sound rude.

Finally, when Dylan spoke, he was still looking up at him curiously. “You dislike this guy enough to  screw up your own investigation?”

Roan stared down at him, beer bottle half way to his lips. “Huh?”

“Someone goes missing. What’s the first thing you do? The first thing you’ve done since I’ve known you.”

He had the sudden, sick feeling he’d stumbled into a trick question. “Um …”

“Search their house, or in this case, room. You look for physical clues to where they’ve went. You haven’t done that yet.”

He could only nod. He was perfectly correct. How many pills had he had today? “I’m afraid I’ll just start beating him as soon as I see his obscene Medina home.”

Dylan shook his head and frowned in disappointment. “Keep your eye on the prize, hon. Missing boy.”

“It’s hard to keep your eyes on the prize when you realize his garage is the size of your house, and he’s one of the least deserving people on the planet.”

He sighed, and patted him on the leg in a sympathetic manner. “Would it help if I came along and distracted him while you searched Jordan’s room?”

“He’s not gay. He may be homophobic.”

“So? I’m a bartender – I’m used to dealing with jerks, idiots, and morons. They’re not always drunk.”

He had a point. He had a couple, actually. Roan hated to think he  could be as much of an idiot as his clients.

So they headed out, after Dylan took the tamale pies out of the oven (he’d cooked one for them too; he figured Roan would want one too), and Roan took an emergency pill, in hopes that it would keep him from losing his temper and smashing in Hatcher’s smug face. Was there a pill in the world capable of that? He supposed they’d find out.

The drive out to Hatcher’s place was actually enjoyable, which was extra surprising considering how long a drive it was. But Dylan distracted him with talk and fed him pieces of an apple, which they split (of course Dylan almost always had an apple with him – Roan had decided he wasn’t going to ask). Dylan actually had some stuff still at D’Andra’s place, and hadn’t gone back to get it yet. Had he thought he made a mistake by leaving? Roan didn’t ask, and he didn’t say, but there seemed to be some sort of implication in the fact that he had yet to leave the house (save to go to the store and get ingredients for tamale pies).

Roan lost all his breath as he saw Hatcher’s home for the first time, like he’d taken a two by four to the gut. A long, winding private road led up to what could have been a modified private castle on Lake Washington, with its own private dock and stretch of beach. But it was all green, relentlessly green, from the sprawling golf course lawn between the house and the dock to the landscaping and well tended “woods” behind the home, acting as a natural fence. It was a temple of wood and glass; the windows were huge, and while mostly coated to keep prying eyes out, it still sparkled like ice between wooden slats. The house was three stories, and Roan had no name for the architectural style – post modern, perhaps modern, who the hell knew? The house lolled in the greenness like a colossal alien church, abrupt angles and steepled roofs giving way to glass window walls as empty as a bureaucrat’s soul. He had been wrong – his house wouldn’t make up Hatcher’s garage, it would make up Hatcher’s closet. Kitchen closet, not even bedroom. Just walking the grounds would be a work out for the dedicated athlete.

“Holy fucking Christ,” Dylan said, upon seeing the glass castle. “Does the Pope live here?” That about said it all.

The private road ended before a broad drive, that was cut off by a metal gate as decorative and high as a medieval portcullis. Roan found himself looking around for the enfilade placement, and when he told Dylan that, Dylan just stared at him until Roan was forced to ask, “What?”

“I’ve never heard anyone use that word in a sentence before. I think I’m stunned.”

“I did try out for Jeopardy, you know.”

He shook his head. “How can you possibly be an action hero and the world’s biggest geek at the same time? It doesn’t make sense.”

“I’m a complicated man.” He just about managed to say that with a straight face.

There was a speaker in the gate, and a voice demanded to know who they were. Roan identified himself – the voice was brusque, not Hatcher’s; it invoked a mental image of a ‘roided out shaved ape, perhaps newly sprung from some kind of zoological prison, where he spent twenty years for killing a tank full of sharks with his bare hands – and said he had been hired by Hatcher and had to speak with him. There was a very long silence, a silence long enough for him and Dylan to battle each other by throwing out medieval terms they knew (Dylan opened with “hornwork”, Roan countered with “ballista”), and finally the guard ape grunted something that couldn’t be discerned, and the gate started automatically opening.

“Oh boy! We get to see the wizard.” Dylan said, with a ton of false cheer.

“Nuh-uh. I don’t care that we’re gay – no Wizard of Oz references, or I’m pulling this car over.”

“Spoilsport. You just don’t want me to make any cowardly lion jokes.”

“Oh my god, I didn’t even think of that.” He hadn’t. He was just in full idiot mode today.

The lake glittered off to the right like a dream forever out of reach, the private dock an elongated L shaped shadow in the water’s glare. Eventually a deliberately planted scrim of tall, willowy trees reduced the view to shards of silver between the branches. The house loomed bigger and bigger, until the horizon was just its icy gleam.

Roan deliberately tried to mentally blank out, go away on a little vacation, so he didn’t notice too many details, so he didn’t get overwhelmed by fury. This was a different world, one that kind of baffled him. When people insisted there was no class system in America, they obviously hadn’t seen the rarefied air of these places, so out of reach for the average person that they never even crossed their radar unless they happened to catch a particularly egregious episode of Cribs. There was the very rich, and everyone else. Although the very rich were a small percentage, they had a disproportionate amount of power, and they must have, otherwise why weren’t the proletariat storming those oh so pretty gates?

This was his own radical tendencies, he was aware of that. He may have once been a cop, but he still felt the urge to throw a garbage can through a Starbucks window at times. He struggled with the duality of keeping the peace and wanting to completely sabotage the system at the same time. No wonder he turned to pills.

They heard the harmonic splash of running water when they got out of the car, and they traced it to a copper sculpture that looked like an ancient cave wall, only with rainbows hidden in its burnish earth tone, and water cascading down its flank. Dylan leaned in and whispered, very softly, “You can fight the man at another time. He’s your client, remember that.”

What gave him away? The tensing along his shoulder blades? His hands clenching into fists? His jaw tightening until he heard his own teeth creak under the strain?

The door opened before they reached it, and they were met by a man who seemed to ooze officiousness from every steam treated pore. He was in his late twenties, five five and maybe a hundred and twenty pounds soaking wet, in a crisp grey suit so pale it was almost silver, a color like ash and regret. His shirt was as white as a new envelope and its folds just as sharp, his tie skinny and conservative navy, a Bluetooth wanker tag affixed to his right ear, his hair the hue of smoker’s teeth and cut super short but in an acceptably mainstream fashion. His eyes were super caffeinated and bright as lasers, blue diluted by clouds, his lips thin and almost bloodless, appropriate for a man who probably avoided smiling in case it cracked his entire facade. “Mr. Hatcher will see you, but next time you should schedule an appointment,” the man said, his voice sharp and brittle, and just hiding the vaguest hint of a lisp. “He’s a very busy man.”

Roan opened his mouth to respond, but the man had already spun on his heel and retreated into the house, not requiring a response. He exchanged a look with Dylan, and whispered, “He has his own Smithers.”

“Don’t all megalomaniacs?”

“He’s gay, he should have better taste.”

Was it a stereotype that the high powered, super efficient aide de camp was a frustrated and vicious queen? Absolutely. But it came about for a good reason, and even Dylan didn’t doubt that this man was one of their tribe as they followed his bubble butt down the hall. That made him want to take him aside and smack the shit out of him for betraying his own people, but how he was betraying them wasn’t clear. He just wanted him to sabotage Hatcher in some way, or in the very least be a bit more out. He probably wasn’t; he probably pretended to be totally asexual for his asshole of a boss.

The house was all pale wood and light spilling in from multiple and sometimes improbable angles, sun painting everything like they were in a forest glade. Expensive furniture and knickknacks surrounded them, but kept to a rather severe aesthetic, so the rooms looked half empty. Again, Roan tried not to focus on any of it.

Smithers led them to a large room that must have been some kind of home office for Hatcher. The floor was hardwood polished to a high gloss, and while there was a desk of black metal and plate glass, it seemed like little more than a way station for computer towers. A widescreen TV was mounted on one cinnamon colored wall, and it seemed to be slightly bigger in length than his Buell. The sound was muted, but some kind of Japanese financial news report was playing out in incongruous silence.  Sunlight spilled in through the far window wall, which was totally surrounded by trees, both blocking the view from prying eyes and filtering the light to a soft glow.

Hatcher was sitting in a black leather armchair across the room, working on his laptop. Barely looking up, he said, “Do you always bring friends with you?”

“This is my assistant and smoking hot boyfriend Dylan Harlow. Dylan, this is the client.” He had to throw the boyfriend thing in, just to see the reaction.

Smithers flinched slightly and looked scandalized – oh, come on queen! – while Hatcher looked up, an unreadable expression on his face. “Dylan Harlow? The artist that makes those morbid pictures?”

This caught them both off guard. Hatcher knew who Dylan was? “Um, well, I wouldn’t call them all morbid. I paint some expressionist -”

“I know, but you do those pictures with bleeding walls and whatnot, right? You don’t sell them.”

Dylan nodded with obvious trepidation. He seemed to know what was coming. “I rarely sell them. They’re personal to me.”

“I want one.” It wasn’t a request; it was a demand.

And it was absolutely the wrong tack to take with Dylan, who may have been a peace loving Buddhist, but was as stubborn as all get out. He crossed his arms over his chest and frowned. “I’m not here about art. I’m here to assist in the investigation of your missing son.”

“And how exactly are you going to help?”

“He’s going to keep me from killing you,” Roan told him, point blank.

Smithers’s jaw dropped and his complexion turned to curdled cream, but Hatcher snickered derisively. “What do you want, Mister McKichan?”

“I need to search Jordan’s room.”

“I’ve already done that.”

“Perhaps, but I still need to do it for myself.”

He considered that, eyes glancing past them and at the Japanese news anchor behind them on the big screen, a rugged man who could have been Dan Rather’s bastard son. “Fine. Andrew, show him to the room. Mister Harlow, I have to ask that you stay here.”

“Why?”

“He’s afraid we’ll start fucking,” Roan said.

Smithers – Andrew – looked like he’d just punched his grandmother, and Dylan didn’t look overly amused either, but Hatcher just smirked. “You don’t know me well enough to have such a low opinion of me,” Hatcher replied.

“I’m an investigator. Gut instinct counts for a lot.” He then looked at Andrew and gestured impatiently, wanting him to lead the way out, and Andrew glanced at Hatcher for confirmation – an ever so obedient dog – before giving him a pissy little scowl and all but swishing out of the room without a word. As Roan followed, Hatcher added, “Don’t take anything.”

Roan’s only response was a flashed middle finger, which made Hatcher snicker again.

Roan noticed tiny little black dots in the corners or walls of every room as lithe little Andrew led him up a sweeping blond wood staircase, and realized they were cameras. Security cameras? Probably, but maybe more. Hatcher seemed like a man who wanted to be in charge of everything. Did that extend to other people’s lives?

Yes, this was a fabulous dream of a place, and any kid would have been thrilled to live in such a luxuriously appointed gilded cage. But maybe Jordan got tired of having a backseat driver in his own life.

Too bad Hatcher would probably never give him access to the camera feeds, because he felt there was a YouTube scandal there just waiting to happen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2 – Satan

Roan led Hatcher into his office, and almost instantly regretted it. His eyes scudded over everything like the place was an open sewer pit, and he was just trying to find the rats before they attacked him. As he took a seat behind his desk, he noticed Hatcher’s eyes seemed to stick on the far corner, where he had his old fashioned file cabinet, as well as his Simpsons animation cel and a sexy photo of Paris. “I knew you kept a low profile, but I hadn’t imagined you sunk this low,” he said acerbically. He had a kind of staccato deadpan that made everything sound bitter or sarcastic.

“It’s an office park, not the gutter,” Roan replied.

Hatcher gave him a look that suggested he saw no difference. “If you say so.”

Hatcher studied the guest chair before sitting down, as if he expected to see a puddle of vomit or semen on it. Roan began wondering if he could afford to just punch this bastard. “Mr. Hatcher, I know you have security staff, so I’m curious why you’re here.”

“Ah, good, you don’t like bullshit either. I need this done in private, as quietly as possible, and I don’t know if I trust my staff not to eventually leak this to the press.” He pulled something out of his pocket and tossed it on his desk. Roan saw it was a flash drive no bigger than a thumbnail, a black, flattened oval, which he pulled the cap off of and plugged into the USB port of his computer. “That will tell you everything you need to know – and many things you don’t – about my son.”

“So this is a family issue?” He hated them, but he wasn’t going to say so now.

He sighed as if he didn’t care much for these kinds of issues either. “My son Jordan, a seventeen year old fuck up who is fucking up at an advanced rate. He’s fucking up enough for two people twice his age.”

Files popped up on his screen, but he was too engrossed in the general contempt coming from his client to look. “What’s he done?”

He rolled his eyes. “Besides spent enough on nose candy to keep the nation of Columbia solvent for the next twenty years? He’s gone missing, and either he’s making a half-assed attempt to extort more money out of me, or he might have finally gotten his stupid ass in trouble. There’s an audio file on the drive, the last phone call I received from him three days ago.”

Roan looked at his computer screen and found the WAV in the files. He didn’t want to smile, but Hatcher’s open contempt for his son was almost amusing, in a sick sort of way.

The WAV was a good recording. He could hear a slightly static-y connection, and then the slightly tremulous voice of a young man, sounding either very high, very scared, or both. “Hi, um, dad? I really fucked up. I think I’m in trouble here, could -” The connection dropped off so abruptly it was incredible. Bad cell phone? Somebody cutting a line? No one hung up.

“Did you try and follow up on this?” Roan asked, although he suspected the answer.

Hatcher dipped his chin towards his chest, a hidden, burning contempt deep within his hooded eyes. Was there anyone he liked? The world must have been one disappointment after another for him. “I did. The number was blocked, so there was no caller ID, no star 69, and talking to the phone company was a total waste of my fucking time.”

“I’d ask why you taped the phone call, but I know better.”

His eyes narrowed, and Roan could almost feel the psychic spike he was trying to mentally shove through his chest. “After some asshole tried to sue me three years ago, I find it’s in my best interest to record incoming calls. You never know when somebody’s going to try and claim you have an oral agreement with them when you don’t.”

“Fair enough. But I still don’t see why you couldn’t trust your staff security to look into this.”

This earned a tsk and a sigh. “Most of my staff hate Jordan, and would happily humiliate him. Some might be tempted by money to leak it to a journalist or slap it on a blog. In case that idiot is just trying to get money out of me, it’ll make us both look bad. I’d rather not have that.”

Roan considered that, sure it was true, but not sure he liked it. “I guess I shouldn’t ask about the police for the same reason. Why me?”

“I like the best, Mr. McKichan. And let’s face it – most people are too stupid to realize what you are.”

Wow – he really didn’t like this guy. He even hated his software, whatever the fuck it was. “Meaning what?”

His eyes were frosty and hard, two pieces of hail nestled into his eye sockets. “Meaning I know your secret, although it’s not a secret, is it? People just don’t want to believe it. After all, you’re diseased, and you’re a butt pirate. You’re not supposed to be super-human.”

Wow. He was so glad he’d mastered the poker face while a cop, otherwise he’d have let on his shock. This guy had big brass balls, and he was as obnoxious as Rush Limbaugh denied both his Oxycontin and his bucket of KFC. He didn’t know if he even wanted a client this much of a prick. “Only my friends can call me a butt pirate. And no one is super human outside of a comic book.”

“Good. I almost believed it. But you seemed faster and stronger than everyone else at Grant Kim’s perp walk because – duh – you are. People are, in general, morons, and they’re willing to ignore what they don’t like or don’t get. I didn’t get where I am denying facts simply because I don’t like them.”

“So, not a Fundamentalist then?”

“I don’t know why you are the way you are; there’s no way the virus could be responsible. But then there’s no way the virus can exist either, so we’re at a logical impasse, a place where what we know breaks down into so much noise. That’s where you are. It must be fascinating.”

“So are you hiring me ’cause you think I’m Batman, or are you hiring me to find your son?”

“Don’t be stupid. Batman isn’t superhuman, he’s just a man with gadgets. You’re more like Mystique.”

“Okay, yeah, this interview is done. No thanks.” He should have guessed a software designer would be a great huge nerd. But he hadn’t really expected this turbo powered arrogant asshole of industry to be a comic geek. He yanked the drive out of the port and tossed it back in Hatcher’s lap.

“You’re offended by the truth?”

“The truth, breeder?” he snapped. “You don’t know me. Don’t pretend you do.”

Anger briefly flashed through Hatcher’s eyes, but it dissipated quickly, and he looked almost remorseful. For a second. He wasn’t used to taking shit from anyone, and probably hadn’t had anyone say no to him in some time. “Fine. Perhaps I presumed too much. I apologize.” He put the drive back on his desk, and pulled out a wad of cash, held together with a rubber band, that he also placed on the desk. “I’ll pay in cash, so no one on the staff notices the payments. I assume that’s enough of a retainer to get you on board.”

“I honestly don’t know if you can pay me enough,” he told him, sitting forward. “I am not one of your staff, and I’m not a peon. You treat me in any way less than respectful, and I’ll throw your money back in your face and walk. Understand?”

He nodded, but didn’t try and look humbled, which was a good thing, as it wouldn’t have worked. “It wasn’t my intention to offend you.”

“No, it was just your intention to try and intimidate me by being King Asshole. I could’ve countered with ‘No wonder your kid’s so fucked up’, but I held back. Doesn’t that make me the bigger man?”

Hatcher winced at the son crack, which was good, as it showed he had some feeling other than contempt. “I’m sure I deserved that.”

“You deserve much worse. And believe me, I can be more of an asshat than you can ever dream. I was a cop, remember? No one’s a bigger asshat than a cop. So get the fuck over yourself.”

From the stiffness of his posture and rigidity of his shoulders and his jaw, he wasn’t used to people talking to him like that. But he wanted something from him, so Hatcher was just going to have to bend over and take it. In a manner of speaking. “Are you taking the case?”

Roan made a show of thinking about it. He really didn’t want this dick of a client, and he had a feeling there was more to his need to go outside his staff than just their hatred of Jordan. But there was no getting around the fact that he needed the money. Gay guys were supposed to be affluent, right? No kids and no wife supposedly meant more disposable income. So how come that wasn’t working for him? Yet another stereotype he couldn’t seem to live up to – that was grossly unfair. (Then again, Dylan was even poorer than he was, being a bartender/artist. He was living up to the starving artist stereotype, though, so he got a pass.) “I suppose. But any more shit and -”

“You walk. I get it.”

“Good.” He should have told Hatcher he was just lucky he needed the money, but he didn’t want to give him the upper hand. Roan reached across his desk and grabbed the flash drive again, but made sure he didn’t even look at the wad of cash. He didn’t want him to even guess he might be in this for the money.

Hatcher stood, unfolding in a manner that might have been considered menacing if Roan didn’t think he could kick his ass without having to stand up (yeah, Hatcher had a ‘tude, but he also obviously had a desk job … and yet, could buy and sell his ass a million times over, so he ultimately won). “My private number is on a text file. I’d appreciate you destroying it once you don’t need it anymore.”

“I’ll wipe the drive.”

“Good.” At the door, Hatcher turned and looked back at him. He had an almost feral grin, all teeth and confidence, and Roan found it deeply unnerving. “You’re exactly the type of man I thought you would be. Good for you.”

Roan wasn’t sure how he was supposed to take that. That almost felt like an insult. So he said nothing, but as it turned out, Hatcher hadn’t expected a response – he’d already swanned off, out of his office.

As soon as the outer door closed, Fiona appeared in the doorway, holding her riding crop. “Wow, what a massive tool. I’m surprised you didn’t kill him.”

“Me too.” He nodded at the riding crop. “Were you gonna be my back up?”

“Nah, I was just hoping to hit him.”

He couldn’t blame her. He told her the next time Hatcher came to the office, she should have a whip standing by, just for fun.

He’d take his goddamn case. But as soon as he was done with it, nobody said he couldn’t deck the bastard.

Bloodbath

1 – Bear Away

Roan wondered why anyone bothered with razor wire.

It was so easy to defeat. If you had a thick enough coat (leather preferred), you just threw it over the stuff and could climb over it quite easily. It might rip the shit out of your jacket, but you were fine if you were careful. That’s what Roan did, even though he had other options. He could have used bolt cutters to cut the chain around the rusty gate, or even just attempted a jump over the chain link fence, as he was hardly a normal Human. But that would have been a bit too Six Million Dollar man for him, and he honestly didn’t know if he could jump that high.

The rest might have ruined any sense of surprise. He didn’t kid himself – there were probably CCTV cameras out here, hidden somewhere in the fourth of a mile of desert scrub up to the house, and the element of surprise was one he couldn’t count on for long – but he wanted to keep it for as long as humanly (or inhumanly) possible. He didn’t know how many people were there (although judging from all the scents he was picking up, many), and he didn’t know how well armed they were, but he knew these weren’t men who cared much for laws. They had killed before, and what was one more body?

But if he could get in close before they knew he was there, if he could get to the main house, he had a better than average shot of taking them down. In close quarters, he had all the advantage.

It was a time of day he usually tried to avoid, the cusp of morning, the sky gently cycling through many shades of indigo and blue as the sun started lighting the edge of the horizon. It was not proper morning, just frighteningly early, the chill bite in the air enough to raise goosebumps on his arms. In a handful of hours, it would be so hot out here it would be a nightmare (especially to one with as much Scottish blood and genetic paleness as him), but right now he was shivering as he walked along the ocher sand, scanning creosote bushes and tenacious Scotch broom for any hiding crepuscular snakes or any signs of cameras or electrical gear. Snakes had no smell, not really, not unless they were poisonous, but electrical equipment often had an ozone scent. He saw faint tire tracks, guessed they were from a Jeep like vehicle, and he was still studying them when he caught the scent of exhaust on the wind and heard the faint hum of a motor.

There wasn’t a lot of cover out here – this location was picked specifically for that reason, for the fact that if anyone came for them, they’d have a good half mile head start – but there was enough scrub brush clumping together and enough lingering darkness that he figured he had some temporary cover as long as he didn’t move. He was wearing all black, his ninja gear as Paris would have called it, but here it had a very specific purpose. In full daylight he’d stand out in a desert, but right now in the asscrack of dawn he was just another shadow. He crouched down behind the sour smelling scrub, in a hybrid kneeling/runner’s crouch, one leather gloved hand flat against the sand. He would probably have surprise on his side here, but he would have to move fast – he didn’t want to risk gunshots until he absolutely had to. His muscles were thrumming like wires, ready to go, as he’d been priming his own adrenaline since before he reached the fence. His rage was a cold, constant variety, murderous and yet strangely clinical, and sometimes that actually made it harder to keep the cat out. It worked best in sudden, emotionally homicidal bursts, but who was the boss here? If it wanted to keep surviving, it would work with him.

The jeep pulled up about twenty feet away from the scrub, the open topped kind with no side windows, Army surplus jeep, the kind that gave you better views and more angles at which to shoot at people out of your vehicle. The man who got out was pudgy, but had a kind of utilitarian heft, part muscle and part fat. He was wearing a t-shirt that advertised a local titty bar and worn jeans that hung in a way that suggested he had French fry legs holding up his potato shaped body. In spite of his leather jacket, he was also visibly wearing a gun, what looked like a .45 S&W in a worn belt holster done up in cowboy drag, and a hunting knife in a camo holder on the opposite hip. He was smoking a cigarette, holding a battered old red plaid thermos, which he poured out onto the sand – smelled like coffee, and since it didn’t steam, he assumed it was cold and disgusting. What Roan initially took for a cell phone on his belt appeared to be a walkie talkie on second glance.

He had a nothing face, the kind you forgot while you were talking to him, soft and doughy, eyes as empty and glassy as potholes filled with rain, a ratty beard and mustache combo that looked from a distance like he painted his face with mud. He looked like he should have been wearing a cowboy hat, if only to cover up the bald spot in the direct center top of his scalp. He smelled like stale smoke, body odor, cordite, and arrogance.

The man glanced at the fence line, a casual look, routine, but he froze when he saw the coat over the top of the razor wire. He was about fifty yards away from the fence, and it could have been a person strung up there from this distance, at least if you didn’t look too hard. He squinted at it, hand reaching blindly for his walkie talkie, and that’s when Roan decided to make his move. He felt the power gathering in his legs, coiling like springs, before he charged out of the brush, sprinting towards him as straight as an arrow.

It was all a blur really, although he saw it in slow motion, as he did often when the lion came out to play. The guy turned instantly towards him, reaching for his gun instead of his walkie talkie, but he didn’t make it. Roan crashed into him like a bullet train, shoulder to the sternum, and the man didn’t fall back so much as get thrown back hard into his jeep, making it rock, his air leaving him in a pained grunt.

He had enough presence of mind to slam a meaty fist into Roan’s back, which hit near the small of his back and hurt like fuck, sending an electric thrill of pain down his spine, but that was his first stupid mistake: pain made the lion come out stronger, faster, harder to control.  He snarled as the man gasped, “Faggot freak -” confirming he recognized him. Roan suspected they knew his face, that the guy in charge of this operation made sure everyone knew it.

Roan jammed a knee hard into the guy’s balls, and as he doubled over in reflex pain, punched him square in the jaw. He felt the bone shatter beneath his fist, too much strength in the punch (the muscles of his forearm and hand were twitching, liquid steel hardening to stone), and the guy hit the edge of the hood of the jeep so hard on his way down he left a dent in the metal. He was out long before he hit the sand.

He checked to make sure he was still breathing – he was, but holy hell, a flap of his scalp was hanging off his head like a poorly glued toupee; there must have been something sharp where he hit the hood – and then took his gun, his knife, and his walkie talkie. He turned him over onto his side so he didn’t choke to death on his own blood, which was now sluicing out of his misaligned mouth at a healthy (but not life threatening) pace, and then threw the knife far away, close to the fence. He wouldn’t need the knife in any scenario – if he got close enough to use a knife, he could use his hands instead, or even the fangs that were aching to spring through the soft meat of his gums. They were far more deadly weapons than that dull edged piece of metal.

He considered taking the jeep, but then decided it wasn’t smart. They could clearly see he wasn’t the man who had left driving it; it would have to be pitch black with zero visibility for him to even momentarily pass as the man he’d just beaten to unconsciousness.  Different complexions, builds, hair color, clothes – nothing fit, and in a jeep with nothing but a windscreen, there was no place to hide. No, it would just draw attention to him. Better to continue on foot.

He did, and ate up about twenty five more yards before he scented the dogs.

They were pit bulls, about eighty pounds of muscle, teeth, and ugly, bred to be vicious and stupid, stupid enough to come after him even though he didn’t smell right. They were all the same dull brown color, probably from the same litter, and all trained to kill and do nothing else. One lunged ahead, and as it jumped he kicked and caught it hard in the stomach, sending it flying backwards. The second had launched itself higher, possibly going for the throat, but he punched it right in the side of its head in mid-air. He felt something burst beneath his knuckles, and the dog was dead before it smashed down to the ground, its head oddly flat on one side, blood and other fluids oozing out its nose and ears, and out the hole where its left eye used to be. The third pit bull had pulled up short, confused by the whimpering of the dog he had kicked (it was trying to get up, but kept falling over – a hip had been dislocated or a leg had been broken, possibly upon landing) and the smell of death coming from its other companion.  Roan snarled at it, and said, in a half roar, “Come on, if you’re hard enough.” He met its growl with a growl of his own, flashing the teeth that now filled his mouth with pain and blood, lips pulled back, and the attack dog faltered, ears swiveling back in obvious confusion. Roan roared, the sound ripping up his throat like aural vomit. It took a couple steps back, still snarling, drool dripping from its mouth, but Roan took a couple of steps closer, growling louder, and that was enough. The dog took off running, sand kicking up like smoke in its wake. It was a shame, because he was salivating at the idea of ripping out its throat with his teeth, finding out what its blood tasted like. The pain radiating throughout his jaw, spreading up his scalp and down his neck, was nuclear, but it was also oddly cleansing. He could focus now; he could see the very lip of the ground almost two hundred yards away, where the desert gave way to an indent too tiny to call a valley – a depression? – where the main house probably was, hidden away from immediate view. Totally privacy, in a stretch of land not too far from the “down-winder” area, where waste from the nuclear plant had tainted the land and most people had cleared off, save for those too poor to move, or too dangerous to be interested in leaving. These were not poor people with no options. They wanted to be here, where no one could see what they were doing.

The wounded dog cowered as he stalked by, but he had no interest in it. “Don’t feel bad. You don’t send a dog to fight a lion.” The dog simply whimpered. Roan thought about putting it down – one punch and it was done – but it could probably survive the injury, and he hated to kill an animal when he didn’t have to. In the aftermath, some animal association could pick it up and nurse it back to health, and see if there was any way to love vicious killer out of a dog. It wasn’t its fault – that’s what it was trained to be.

Not the case with him. He was born this way, caught between Human and virus, lion and man, a hybrid compromise between two incompatible states. The fact that the perimeter guard knew who he was suggested they knew he would probably be paying them a visit, but there was no way they’d expect him to come like this: alone, in the dead of dawn, creeping up like a thief. You’d have to be crazy to attempt such a thing.

Which was exactly the point. He was crazy – he was a thing that shouldn’t have been. And whereas they had made a choice to be the brutal, heartless bastards they were, he never had a choice.

He flexed his hands and felt bones crack in his jaw as his vision shifted, making the landscape appear as if in bas relief, every flaw and contour of the land brightly visible. His blood tasted like pennies in his mouth.

May the best animal win.

*****

Ten Days Earlier

Fiona came to work primed for battle.

She wore her black leather jacket, knee high black leather boots, black leggings with black leather accents on the side, and a black t-shirt with a pile of skulls on the front. That didn’t include the riding crop with the metal tip hidden in her purse, which was also black leather with silver grommets. She wanted to send the subliminal message of dominatrix, but Roan felt she had successfully sent the message “I am a biker and I’ll kill you”, which still worked.

Roan was in average gear for their mystery, phone phobic client, but wore his HK in a holster hidden under his jacket, in case he needed to threaten the guy. He could have just triggered a change, but he wasn’t sure Fiona had seen that (did YouTube count? Not really, not considering the quality of the videos), and didn’t want to freak her out now. There were some things it was best to keep from your employees.

They ended up waiting a couple of hours, and during that time they made a small betting pool on who could be walking into MK Investigations. The odds on favorite was aggrieved husband, as the caller was a man, and men were slightly more likely to react in homicidal violence if you dissolved their marriage by getting glossy photos of them with their mistress or with the girls down at the Happy Dragon massage parlor. Next up was a cat hater, as there were many of those, and the Grant Kim incident – if it taught you nothing else –  taught you these guys weren’t afraid to resort to stupid ass violence in front of armed cops. Third in line was some homophobe who was so threatened by the idea of a gay man with any power he had to kill him before the urge to suck a dick overwhelmed him (also known as the Dan White defense). Fiona insisted it could be an ex of his, but Roan had to admit that, sadly, he didn’t have that many exes. Dee, whom he was still friends with, a couple guys he’d had tricks (one nighters) with who probably didn’t even know his name, one who moved to New York ages ago and didn’t hate him anyways (Evan), and the others were dead (Connor, Paris). So no homicidal exes, although frankly it would have made it easier if that had been the answer.

(Oh, wait – what about Collin? Well, he was theoretically straight, and they’d been teenagers, so it probably didn’t count either way. Wow, he hadn’t thought about Collin in ages.)

After hour two began, the call being a prank had entered the betting pool. Even though the guy sounded serious and kind of dour on the phone, that didn’t mean it wasn’t some asshole making a joke. Maybe the guys who called with their usual threats realized he was paying no mind to them, and decided to get juvenile. Well, more juvenile.

Roan had just decided that if no one showed up by the time the lunch hour rolled around, he was just going to send Fi home, and maybe wander home himself. He could sit on his ass doing nothing just as well there, and there he wouldn’t be taunted by paperwork, the bane of his existence. There he’d only be taunted by bills, the second bane of existence. But most likely he’d just put on a Simpsons DVD and forget about it.

He then heard someone at the door before it opened, and stood up, ready to draw if the guy came in blasting (he had no doubt he could draw faster than the other guy could pull the trigger – his cat reflexes were good for that if nothing else), but the man who appeared was unarmed, unless you counted the Bluetooth phone clipped to his left ear more of a weapon than a wanker tag.

“Hey, you look familiar,” Fiona said, just as Roan was thinking it.

He did look familiar. He was an averaged sized man middle aged man, not overweight but not really slender either, remarkable instantly for his exquisitely tailored designer suit and three hundred dollar sunglasses. His hair, bless it, was still a bit of a mess, wavy, dun brown, and refusing to conform to whatever style seven hundred dollars could buy you. Perhaps in a bid to seem daring, his dark blue tie had a paisley pattern on it.

He took off his sunglasses and looked around his office like it wasn’t quite what he was expecting. He had sharp brown eyes over a hawk’s beak of a nose, and radiated an intensity that Tank would have recognized as a kindred spirit. His eyes seem to devour the room in two sweeps, and stuttered over Fiona, as if she was an anomaly he couldn’t reconcile. Well, yeah – biker babe as receptionist. Bit of a head scratcher to most people. (And the truth was even weirder.)

Finally, Roan placed a name to his face, even though really it was just the intensity of the eyes that gave him away. When you saw a man with eyes like that, he was either a serial killer or a genius. He figured what you considered this man depended on your point of view. “Robert Hatcher?” Roan asked, not sure he was right.

The man’s laser gaze fixed on him, and he gave the tiniest nod in response. “Roan McKichan. I’d heard you did things a bit differently than your average investigator, but I had no idea.”

Was that aimed at Fiona? He wasn’t sure.

But then again, he had no idea what a software billionaire like Hatcher could be doing in his office.