Silence and Stilettoes, Pt. 5 (Voting)

(Here it is, Silence and Stilettoes Part 5! Check it out now, vote below, and Daring+ fans pick up the accompanying Wallpaper here too! Be sure to check out the full story so far here at the Master Post!)

“‘Aaauugh…’ I wake with a groan. A grumbling, throaty groan that even as low it is, makes my skull shake inside my head. The room spins slowly and each bump-bump of my heart pounds like a drumbeat in my ears, that tinnitus like ringing the base line tone to its melody. With a sigh I try contemplating my last memories… 

I was… I was deep in the Rat’s Nest… I was… chasing evidence… I was… laid out flat with a blow to the head. That’s right, I let my guard down around Selina, and I paid big for it.

A sudden light shining in my eyes derails my train of thought. A bright penlight darts back and forth in front of face, waving back and forth… it does not help my migraine one bit. I can’t help but follow it with my gaze, and that split-second automatic response is all that is needed before I hear a gasp.

‘Oh dear! He’s actually alive? I mean, you’re alive!’.

The light disappears with a simple click and a soft, small hand is placed on my chest, stopping me from sitting up from the cold, metal slab I find myself laid out on. My vision begins to settle and a second hand floods my sight.

‘How many fingers am I holding up?’
 

I brush her outstretched hand aside with my own, I’ve no patience for this right now. Not only does my head hurt in an ungodly way, but so too does my back, like I’ve been mauled in my sleep. What happened to me? Well, I guess I needn’t ask that… I already know. Her calling card, the claws down the back… Selina thought that was the last time we would ever meet, she left me for dead.

‘Where am I?’ I growl as I scan the room, not waiting for an answer.

‘The morgue.’ Her tender yet lively voice responds, seeming to not realize that statement would normally need some follow up explanations.

It’s true. Even in the darkness I can tell this is the end of the line for most folks. The slabs, the surgical equipment, the blazing furnace across the room. It’d be a safe bet to think that’s the source of this overwhelming heat. Without further ado, I prop myself up against my companions wishes, waving away her concerns as I gather myself.

‘Are you sure you’re alright? You don’t look so good. I honestly thought you were no longer with us. I’ve been down here all evening and you never even moved once.’

‘I’m fine… as well as can be given the situation. It’s night time already, you say? Who… who are you, by the way?’

‘Kelly Walton, at your service. You’re lucky I’m down here too, you were only about an hour away from a night in the metal hot press, if you know what I mean? Mr…?’

‘Roy’ I grunt curtly, not one for talking about myself at a time like this… or any time for that matter. I admit I might be a little shaken by her admission I was nearly set to boil.

‘Roy? As in Royce, Royce O’Donnell? For real? You must be messing with me… you’re wrapped up in this too? Darn… And here we thought you were just another corpse pulled out of the Rat’s Nest… What a night we are having!’

I look the young blonde up and down with a weary, judgemental eye. She’s far too young to be a doctor, and far to innocent looking to be crammed into such a crude nurse’s outfit… or half of one. Going by her assumptions I take it she’s no medical genius either. 

Noticing my looks she takes a half-step backwards, her hands covering what her discarded scrubs top do not. A weak half-chuckle from her tells me she more than a little embarrassed to be seen this way. 

It seems the heat was a little much for her, the sweat rolling down her body a dead giveaway, and so alone as she thought she was a good a time as any to strip down to her undergarments for a while.

Staring at her while she jabbers on, I’m intrigued to meet another seemingly clean soul, and not surprised this city has the likes of her handling it’s grimmest tasks. Her sweet face… there’s something about it…

‘You know who I am?’

‘By reputation mostly, the ‘justice’ man of a time gone by, that’s really all anybody knows. I only knew your whole name because of the letter I have for you. Oh… Sorry… about your friend, I mean.’

Alright, I’ll bite… She has my attention and my curiosity now. ‘My friend?’

She mutters and fumbles with her words a moment, instead falling back on a head nod across the room to answer my question. She’s means the cremation furnace. My ‘friend’ is in there a head of me.

‘Well… I’m sure you heard… see, we’ve been real busy here today because of the murder. I mean, there’s always a murder, maybe two… but you know… *the* murder. Of him. Of Mark Perkins’

‘Wait! Mark? His body is in there? Shit… Shit, shit fucking shit! There goes my evidence!’

She nods, biting her lip so as not to say anymore. This is not good. I didn’t think I’d ever get to examine the body, but to destroy it within half a day? Something is rotten here, and it’s not just the… we’ll call them ‘clientele’.

‘You did know him then? It’s not a coincidence you’re down here, is it? Did the same person get to you too? Oh my… is… is there a serial crazy-man on loose?!’

‘No’, I say to settle her before she flips out, ‘It was a woman who sent me here… though I can’t say for certain she’s not responsible for Mark too. She is ‘the Cat’ after all…’

‘The Cat? Ohhh… She’s sent a few boys down here to keep me company before. She’s a rough one.’

This is getting me nowhere fast. It’s already night, not that I can tell in this dark and dreary sub-basement, and Asana is still waiting on me. I take to my feet, inadvertently holding my head where the wrench struck me as I do. It’s a relief to feel no more than a minor dent and a touch of blood where it landed and little else. I would have settled for my head being still on my shoulders…

Now standing, I tower over the smaller girl, who has to crane her neck to look up passed my broad chest. Glancing around the room I look for my jacket, and my gun, so I can get a move on back to my office-slash-home. Before that though, there is one last matter before I can go.

‘Are you looking for your letter? It’s over there… It was the only personal effect on the body when we got him down here. You… you can take it, I guess… it has your name on it after all.’

It’s laughable how little respect is paid to the rule of law, protecting evidence and proper police work around here, even by those on the right side of the thin blue line. At least this time it actually helps me. Lives are on the line, there’s no time for red tape bullshit. Not with this headache of mine.

Stepping across the room I scoop up the bloodstained paper that lies beside a cadre of used medical supplies and what I assume are the last specks of Mark’s bodily fluids that remain in this world. The flimsy sheet flutters and rustles when I pick it up. She was telling the truth, there’s my name, hand scrawled in black and white…

‘To Royce O’Donnell,

Behind the Beautiful Eyes lies a familiar soul you know too well. But don’t be fooled, there are no Heavily higher causes behind this… my murder will be for very Earthy motives.

- Mark Perkins”

Why does it feel like everyone is playing games with me? What did I ever do to deserve this Hell? What about me screams ‘sacrificial pawn’? It takes all I have to not crumple up the only clue I have into my balled fist and whip it into the dancing fire of the furnace, where it can burn to cinders like everything else in this world should!

It takes me longer than I care to admit for me to calm myself. It helps that I still have a cigar in my trench coat pocket… and that I have the sense to score a chuckle as I light it up on the licking flames of the cremation furnace that currently burns up my only client. Dark humour is the only humour you’ll ever find around here.

‘Uummm… There is no smoking allowed down here…’

‘Kelly… It was Kelly, wasn’t it? You think it can get any worse for the likes of us who find themselves down here, myself included?’ I say with a smirk.

‘N-no? You still don’t look so good… are you sure you don’t want me to check you out? You never did tell me how many fingers I held up…’

‘No thank you… I have a different way you can help me. I’ll be taking every file you have on my friend Mark, autopsy included, and I’ll be on my way. I’ll also be needing anything you have on similar causes of death … There’s a good girl.’

She goes about gathering what I ask for without question, the commanding tone in my voice enough to jolt her into action. Condescension aside, it never fails on the impressionable worker bees of this world. By the time I take my last drag of my cigar, she has manila folder already for me. I thank her with a thin smile and a deep nod. 

I flip the folder open and glance at the front page of the autopsy report. Not a lot I don’t know already, but a proper study session later should turn up someth-… Wait.

‘There are multiple causes of death in these additional files… what gives?’

‘We weren’t able to come to a single cause of death before they ordered us to burn the body. The neck wound was severe but potentially post-mortem while… Oh, shoot, I wasn’t supposed to mention the orders!’

‘It’s alright Kelly, I won’t tell. I think you and I have much more to discuss after all… Come by my offices as soon as you can find the time, and bring everything you have on hand about these listed poisons.’

With a forceful double tap of my index finger on the printed lines of the files I hold, underscoring my request. I lost the better part of a day, but now I’m finally getting somewhere. 

Kelly will need time before she can gather all I have asked of her, I can tell there’s plenty still to pump her for. At the very least getting her to a place I know is secure should loosen her lips on these ‘orders’, hence my open invitation. While I wait, I have time to play another hunch these files have thrown my way…”

What’s my next move?

(The poll will stay open 6 days, until about the same time as this post goes live on Tuesday 7th of May. Be sure to vote by then!)

Be hard boiled and beWilder!