Sin City 8: Heroes Of Sin:
A handful of heroes from Sin City's past and present are brought together, by a plot to annihilate Basin City, because these heroes have the potential to bring down the Roark family once and for all and end the corruption once and for all.
Marv, Hartigan, Dwight, Miho, Nancy, Gail and Jackie Boy are the only obstacles in Sin City's destruction.
Will they do it?
Who will survive?
Will Sin City be no more?
Chapter One: Late Night Event:
SIN CITY:
Kadie's was busy tonight. Shellie was unbelievably busy serving beverages all the time, so she little time for chitchat with any of the faithful regulars like Marv.
They were drooling into their ales when Nancy Callahan hopped onto the stage and began dancing, her slender body shimmering the spotlights.
Shellie stopped for a moment to search the shadows of the nightclub to find her ex, Dwight. There he was, munching appreciatively on the huge glass bowl of peanuts that she had put on his table at record speed, before tending to a small group of policemen's orders.
A couple of hours later, as they were closing up, Nancy emerged from the apartment she rented upstairs. She wore a white Irish sweater and black jeans. She came over to where Shellie was having a cigarette and smiled at the waitress.
"Hey, Shellie. Tonight was so busy." The nineteen-year-old whispered as two men, supporting a drunken cop staggered to the door.
Marv was still in his stool by the stage. No one dare move him, for they knew that Marv might break their arm or their leg without a flicker of an eye.
Nancy rubbed Shellie's arm and walked over to the hulk of muscle. Marv looked up at her and smiled.
"Hey, Nancy. What do you want with a loser like me?" His words were slightly slurred, but he still in control of his actions. Nancy wrapped her slender arms around his waist and gave him a big hug.
Marv was like her big brother. He hugged her back and swallowed the bottom of his bottle of beer. He wiped the back of his neck with a rag and his eyes moved to the man approaching the group; Dwight McCarthy. They didn't make him leave either.
Lately, Dwight had been more lively…more energetic. Now, he strutted over to them, a smile plastered onto his face. He came over, hugged Nancy, bear-hugged Marv and gave Shellie a friendly kiss on the cheek.
A flash of lightning illuminated the windows and cast light over the four friends, sitting, smoking and/or having a drink. Dwight was still munching on the peanuts, when the final waitress, Ashley left.
Thirty seconds later, ten men armed with heavy semi-automatic machine guns, walked through the door and began to do a sweeping fire.
The four rebels ducked as the bullets shattered floors and windows, tables and glasses and bottles exploded into shards. Nancy pointed at the stairs to her apartment.
"Get up!" She shouted and a man swung his gun in her direction. Nancy whipped the .45 pistols out of her pocket and fired three shots at the man. One caught him in the temple and he crumpled like a paper boat in a bath.
Dwight took Shellie's and Nancy's hands and ran to the steps, while Marv ran to the side of them, using himself as a human shield. Most of the bullets fired at him missed, but a couple struck him in the chest. No damage, just a sting of pain, he thought as he climbed up the stairs three at a time.
One of the men ran to where they kept the big barrels of alcohol and petrol for truckers and planted a small device. It blinked and began to count down…
05:00, 04:59, 04:58…
Nancy rushed to her bedroom and grabbed a bag, stuffing it with the essentials; some clothes, her textbooks of Law and her three favourite novels – one, her favourite Cordelia The Detective stories from her childhood – and what was in her fridge, mainly beer, Coke and some candy.
She slung on her thick fur coat to find Dwight grabbing anything useful in her living room and Shellie splashing some water on her face.
Marv blocked the door with Nancy's sofa, but the guns blasted a hole through.
"The balcony!" Marv cried as they ran away the approaching assassins.
They emerged onto the rain-drenched balcony with no other ways of escape. Dwight looked nervously around for some possible exit, but…
"Nothing. We're trapped!"
Then a lifeline came in; with the sound of something hitting the balcony floor with a sharp THWACK.
Dwight picked it up; it was one of Miho's swastikas. He looked up and smiled as he saw the dark Japanese pixie perched on the rooftop. She must have been keeping watch all the time…
Another assassin in khaki clothes planted a second bomb that was a few seconds behind the first one in the cellar.
Dwight watched as Miho checked her weapons and he stretched his hand to help her down.
She dropped down and helped them get to the rooftop, but stayed when Dwight offered her his calloused hand.
"Miho! No!" He shouted, but Marv dragged him back as the door to the balcony burst open and the entire company of assassins saw her. She was sacrificing herself to save us, Dwight thought with horror.
Miho closed her eyes in what seemed defeat and then they opened and black fire was visible.
Then, as they prepared to fire, a sudden light illuminated the entire balcony. Miho, for an instant was an angel. Her dark hair was almost white at the roots her black kimono was a purer white than Jesus' robe. Her eyes were gleaming silver and her Samurai sword was a white lance. Her soul was as pure as fresh snow from Heaven.
It was her latest trick. Miho had secretly pressed a button that set a spark off which burnt the small pieces of magnesium in secure cases around her waist. When, they went off, they blinded her enemy, making it easier for her to attack.
Then Miho gave a silent smile and the carnage began. She cut them up with her swords and then she threw a knife straight up and pulled out a miniature axe. She threw the axe perfectly, so that it hit the hilt of the now vertical knife and it planted right in the middle of an assassin's head. He reeled back and tumbled backwards off the balcony, landing with a heavy thump onto the cobbled pavement.
Miho slashed with her Samurai so fast that the body didn't slid apart until a few seconds later.
In a matter of seconds, she had finished and she catapulted herself onto the roof, where Dwight had been watching with the others.
"Thank you, Miho." He whispered and he kissed her gently and very softly on the lips. It lasted for only a second.
"Okay Dwight, I think it's safe to say…" Marv began to say, before Nancy yelled out, when she saw the bomb.
00:22, 00:21, 00:20…
"Shit!" Dwight cursed, before Miho pulled out a metal spider emblem. Dwight gave another smile. It was an invention; when thrown, it lodged into a building and allowed up to five people to swing over in one go, like an Indiana Jones-style way. The wire was hyper strength reinforced steel, which made it tough as spider's silk.
Miho threw it with deadly aim and lodged into the roof of another building. Marv went first, causing stone and masonry to crumble to the ground. Then Nancy and Shellie went together.
That left Dwight and Miho. At that precise moment, the first bomb went off, causing the ground floor of Kadie's to collapse.
"What's going on?" Dwight yelled to Marv.
"Must be a second bomb!" Marv yelled, as the second bomb reached 00:00.
Dwight and Miho clung to each other and swung away as the roof began to dissolve. The two comrades hugged tightly and just reached the roof of the adjacent building.
The five survivors watched as the remains of Kadie's crumbled into the ground and fire brigades came and extinguished the flames.
"Who'd want to kill all of us?" Nancy asked to no one in particular and no one answered.
"Where are we going to now?"
Chapter Two: Good Cop, Bad Cop:
John Hartigan's house wasn't necessarily the best in the world, but it was big and big was good, with four bedrooms and two bathrooms.
He answered the door in a red shirt and black pajama pants. Nancy hugged him and then, as they sat having drinks in his living room, explained to him about the attempted murders.
"Get anything about the assassins?"
"Wore khaki, heavy automatics…nothing in particular."
Hartigan sipped his iced tea, with his heart medication fizzing inside and bit his lower lip gently in concentration.
"You guys can stay here, but if they strike again, we can't call the cops. They won't believe you and they won't care and 98 of the cops are crooked."
They agreed and made arrangements; Shellie and Miho would have a room, Dwight and Marv next door, then Nancy in a room next door and Hartigan in his room.
They spent the evening talking and planning. At seven in the evening, Nancy, Shellie and Hartigan made a dinner of spaghetti with basil and tomato sauce and microwave-ready garlic bread. They ended with strawberry and Neapolitan ice cream and beer.
At around midnight, they dropped off to bed, but at four in the morning, Dwight awoke with a groan. Too much alcohol, he realized. He tiptoed past a snoring naked Marv and found his way to the kitchen for a special glass of his guaranteed hangover cure – orange juice, apple juice, ice, a splash of vodka to help counteract it and plenty of water.
The light was turned down to a gentle golden haze and the black curtains were closed to trap any excess light.
The window was open and he shivered slightly. He wore only a pair of three-quarter black silk pants. His muscled chest was bare.
A throwing star lodged itself into the fridge a couple of feet in front of where he was about to stand a few seconds later.
"Miho, it's me."
Dwight leaned over, pulled out the star and saw Miho sitting quietly at the table, eating a bowl of cereal. Her blood-splattered black kimono was in the washing machine and a spare crimson one that she always carried with her was on her small frame.
He joined her with an identical bowl of cereal and they sat in silence, until Dwight saw the fingers of Miho's pale right hand play with something. Silver. Like a necklace or pendant.
"What is it? Show me, Miho. Please." He asked, softly, tentatively.
Miho hesitated for a second, and then handed it over. A silver locket.
Dwight very gently prized it open and looked at the two pictures inside. They were of a Japanese man and woman. They were smiling in each picture.
He remembered the story of how Miho's parents had been murdered by the Mafia family. It was sick.
Dwight looked up and saw tears streaming down Miho's little face. He gasped. Never had Miho shown any signs of pain, inside or out.
The murderer walked over and comforted her, as her head pressed against his chest, her little arms barely reaching halfway around him. Her short dark hair tickled his chest and as Dwight bent down, he smelt something on her hair. Blood, yes. But something else. Sweet. Not as sweet as jasmine, but…like, sandalwood. Yes, sandalwood is what she smelt of.
Miho looked up after a few minutes and looked into Dwight's chocolate brown eyes. He was the only man left. The only man left in her life that was reliable. Her father was dead. The Girls of Old Town and Gail had raised her. Only Dwight. Strong, safe Dwight.
"Are you okay, now?" He asked her and she gives a weak nod. Then as she attempted to get off her stool, she collapsed against the cool laminate floor. Dwight bent down and realized how weak she was. She wasn't eating again, so when he picked her up ever so simply, it was if she weighed nothing but feathers.
He carried her to her room and attempted to leave her, but a small hand grasped his wrist with the strength of iron. Miho looked up at him, anxious. Dwight gave a wry smile and then grabbed Shellie gently and padded over to his and Marv's room and slid her inside his bed.
Then he came over to Miho, who moved to the left of the bed, and slid inside, wrapping the comforter around them. He faced Miho and wrapped an arm around her slender waist his other hand playing casually with the hair that smelt of sandalwood and the Japanese pixie nervously then more confidently placed hands on his chest.
Soon she was asleep, but Dwight couldn't leave – his heart and conscience had him by the balls with this dark angel. Dwight felt the pillow – it was soaked with the fresh tears from a few hours ago.
Dwight flipped the pillow over expertly and settled to sleep. The tears would dry.
Detective Jack Rafferty was sipping his third "whiskey on the rocks". His cat, Little Bastard, was curled up near the patio door of his house. It had begun to rain, no surprise there, then, he thought, as he emptied the glass tumbler.
His scarred hand shifted to the remote at his side and pressed 'ON'. A classic film noir; a Hitchcock thriller; the news, some disgusting pornography of men licking and sucking and making love to other men – it was a channel that he tried to got rid off countless times, but the bastards at the cable service hadn't done anything (at least he didn't pay for it); then, a Chinese horror film involving screaming, water and a mirror…
Jack flicked the TV off and stumbled to his shaky feet. Then, he heard it. It might have been a clock, a dripping tap…but no, somehow louder. Jack found the cause.
It was a bomb.
Shit.
And it was going to go off in ten seconds.
Jack desperately tried to open the front door, but to no avail. The glass patio one was locked too, but Jack used all his free weight and strength to break the glass and his way to safety was clear. He grabbed his cat and pushed his way through the glass to the rain-drowned garden as the bomb hit zero.
The explosion knocked the wind out of him and threw him and the cat at least three feet forward into the mud below.
Marv and Shellie never mentioned the events of last night again, thank God. So, as they sat having a delicious breakfast, cooked by Nancy and Marv, of pancakes, bacon, scrambled eggs and a special peanut omelet for Dwight. Almost everyone at the table, minus Dwight, Hartigan and Miho, had the hangover cure of Mr. McCarthy.
Then they sat down to business, when a man came knocking at the door. Shellie opened the door to a tall, half-Spanish looking/sounding man with dark hair plastered to his forehead by the soaking rain outside.
"Jack! What are you doing here?" Hartigan asked from behind Shellie, who stepped aside at the sight of yet another ex.
Jack stepped inside, carrying a soaked ginger cat. The cat instantly jumped from his arms and hurried to near the radiator in an attempt to dry its fur.
"Someone planted a bomb at my house. It blew up."
Jack was treated with a hot shower and new clothes and hot chocolate for the cold he endured, while Marv made him a breakfast of fried eggs and chocolate chip pancakes (Marv really knew how to cook). He ate and explained how someone had tried to trap him in his house and blow him straight to St. Peter's pearly gates.
"Actually, ten guys tried to kill us last night. They blew Kadie's and Nancy's apartment up, before Miho made salami out of them." Dwight explained.
Someone was trying to kill them all, but why?
Chapter Three: Old Town Trouble:
They decided to get reinforcements, so as Hartigan, Nancy and Jackie Boy went to the nearby weapons store, Dwight, Miho and Marv drove to Old Town, on a couple of motorcycles they hot-wired. Shellie stayed at Hartigan's house with a shotgun, in case any assassins came-a-knocking.
The girls were just waking up there, but Gail was already patrolling. She whipped the shotgun out of her crotch strap, but then saw that Marv was with Dwight and gave a curious eyebrow raise.
"What's up, Dwight?"
"Me, Nancy, Shellie and Marv almost died last night. Thankfully, Miho saved our lives. And Jackie Boy almost got blown to pieces. Kadie's is gone. Someone's after us and they might come after you."
For once, Gail was silent.
"The pattern's emerging. Who are our enemies?"
"Cops. Except for Hartigan and Jack."
"Not them. Think bigger."
"Um…Mafia?"
"Bigger."
"Bigger?"
"Roark."
The very name sent shivers down her spine like a huge block of ice. Roark, the most powerful family in the United States. Senator Roark. Cardinal Roark. The Roark government of Sin City.
"They're after us. Why? We're the only people in this town who can stop something. Minus Shellie."
"Stop what?"
"I don't know." Dwight finished, as a group of men in dirty jeans and white shirts arrived in a rusty truck. The truck drove into the main bay of Old Town, where the girls slept and the men got out.
Gail stiffened when she saw the men. Guns, hidden in their clothes. Not very well hidden.
The men gave greasy smiles, then quicker than a cheetah they pulled out the guns and fried.
"Shit! Bastards!" Gail screamed. Dwight pushed Gail into a crevice and started to fire. Miho jumped up and flung a star, scalping one man. Marv ran towards them and began to rip them apart, limb from limb.
Gail leapt across the alleyway, firing and then the girls of Old Town awakened.
A Spanish prostitute did a spinning roundhouse kick, whilst using a shotgun. She knocked the guy down and blasted his brains out, before a man with spiked gelled red hair and a lip ring gunned her down.
Miho saw this and flung her ice-pick weapon at the guy, slicing straight though his forehead.
Gail ran, unafraid to die and screamed with fury as the fire in her body rose and she fired round after round at them.
The last guy ripped off a grenade from his belt and flung it at Gail. Miho intercepted the grenade and threw it towards the end of the alleyway. It exploded with a BANG that had everyone reeling. The front of the truck exploded, leaving the big bed of the vehicle and the wheels.
The walls of the building started to crumble under the force of the bomb and the occupants ran out. Essentially, there were thirteen girls and one baby boy. And they were all doomed. Unless…
"I've got an idea!" Gail cried out.
The two motorcycles streaked ahead, each with four people on, not counting the stealers. Two long, super-strength ropes of wire clung to the back of each bike, going 70mph, to keep the bed of the truck moving on its wheels.
The truck bed was just big enough to take the other six people and Marv and Gail. Dwight and Miho rode the bikes.
They arrived to a separate area of Old Town, where the girls and the baby were welcomed and Gail decided to stay with Dwight and the others, including Hartigan, Nancy, Miho, etc…
When they arrived, with a dirty Gail, Hartigan, Jack and Nancy showed their supplies; shotguns, semi-automatics, automatics, machine guns, grenades, bombs, swords, daggers, throwing stars, ice-pick daggers, knives, pistols, crossbows, longbows, handcuffs…
"Oh! Handcuffs!" Gail giggled like a schoolgirl, inspecting them expertly.
Dwight rolled his eyes and looked at Miho, who was ignoring them, sheathing the swords and avoiding Dwight's concerned gaze.
Chapter Four: The Plot Thickens:
The seven of them sat at the dining room table in Hartigan's house. Shellie was at the other girls in Old Town.
"What's going to happen?'
"Did we get anything off the guys who attacked us in Old Town?"
"A scrap of paper with a list of numbers on from the pocket of a dead guy called Robert Whiner. That's it."
Miho remembered Robert Whiner – the guy with the spiky red hair and the lip ring that gunned down the Spanish girl – Rosa.
"Let's see."
Dwight fished the paper from his pocket and gave it to Nancy. She looked at the numbers; 01123581321
"What is it, a foreign number? A code?"
"It's the Fibonacci sequence." Nancy stated.
"Wait…what's that?" They looked at the paper. A tiny-penciled phrase was on the paper.
" 'Water and wind.' What the hell does that mean?"
"Water and wind. A river?"
"A museum?"
"Water and wind! It's an expression for Feng Shui."
"Feng Shui?"
"I've got an idea, re-arrange the letters." Nancy said. Hartigan wrote down the words and soon they had a name: Seni Fugh.
"Seni Fugh's a rich fat-cat accountant downtown. He's got a series of lockers. Maybe the code's the password."
Dwight arranged to take the place of Whiner and they produced a correct ID for him. Miho went with him and waited in the car until Fugh opened up.
"What's up, Miho? Why have you been avoiding me? Is it something I've done?"
A shake of her head. Dwight was upset. He wanted to know. He wanted to help her. Maybe he wanted to be with her…
"Then what-" Dwight began, but Miho pointed and Dwight turned his head to see a short Chinese man with dyed black sideburns and a peach-coloured suit.
Miho felt her soul squeeze. Ever since he had kissed and stayed in the same bed as her, she had become possessive of Dwight. Possession led to lust. Lust led to love. Love was dangerous. Not only was Dwight a ladies' man, but they worked together and…
Dwight gave her hand a gentle tug as they entered the building.
"Fugh? I've come to collect my stuff." Dwight said. Fugh glared, but checked the ID and let him go to the storage area.
It was at least twenty feet long with over a hundred lockers.
Fugh pointed Dwight to the right locker and Dwight swiveled the numbers in.
It didn't budge.
Dwight tried doing it clockwise, anti-clockwise, clockwise, and anti-clockwise…the locker clicked open and Miho and Dwight looked inside.
There was a bunch of papers, which Miho stuffed inside her kimono and an emblem for a shirt to sewn on, which Dwight pocketed. Then, last of all was a riddle, which Dwight decided to read later.
Dwight and Miho got back to Hartigan's where they checked everything.
The papers were blueprints for a missile design system or a bomb system, patented back in 1944. The emblem was of a circle, with what looked like the sun's rays emanating from the center. The circle had eagle-like wings protruding from it.
Finally, they came to the riddle;
'Heaven can wait upon a stair
Justice is honor, true and fair.
When the eagle strikes the bell
All sinners will go straight to Hell.'
"What the hell does that mean?"
"I have no frigging idea."
Hartigan stared around the table at his comrades. Gail, now in a pink tee shirt and tight white jeans looked up from the apple she'd just be munching on and gave a shrug.
"Anyone?"
No one answered.
This was getting really creepy and scary now.
Chapter Five: Kidnapped!
The next day, Nancy, Hartigan and Gail went shopping. The Basin City Mall was very quiet and the three companions were soon finished clothes shopping. They stopped at the food court to grab a couple of smoothies.
That's when it happened.
Out of nowhere, three men and two women turned up and start shooting the hell out of them. Hartigan got hit in the stomach. Not fatal. But Gail and Nancy hid behind some tables, until they found them. Neither had weapons to fight back, so they were defenseless.
"Kill them."
"No! Wait…take them with us…I've got an idea." A man said, as a woman pulled out a miniature rifle and shot a dart into each of them.
Instantly they felt drowsy and were carted off like cattle, over shoulders.
When the three of them didn't return, Marv went to the mall and found Hartigan. They patched him up as best as they could and Jackie Boy managed to remove the bullet.
Dwight wiped his eyes and felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked and saw Miho's black eyes concerned and a bottle of beer in her hand. He gratefully took it and drank it down.
"So, they've got Gail and Nancy? Great." Dwight mumbled at the dining room table, with Jackie Boy, Marv and Miho. Hartigan was in his room recovering with strengthening soups and water aplenty.
"What are we going to do, guys?" Marv asked, cracking his fingers.
"I don't know. Not yet."
Nancy Callahan awoke with a headache as if it were splitting her open. All she saw was silver metal. People in greasy uniforms were welding stuff together.
She turned to her side and saw Gail awake and trying to get out of the ropes that banded them together to a huge steel pipe of some sort.
There was a huge elevator shaft aiming straight up and as a man came over to see the two captives, Nancy smelt that smell. The smell of overcooked garbage on the hottest summer's day that made you want to vomit and gag.
Senator Roark, in a yellow and green pin striped suit and with a Beretta at his left hip. The two women were beautiful. One had blonde hair and a figure like Aphrodite. He recognized her from the club they blew up a few nights ago – Kadie's.
The other was a professional whore with short dark hair and missing her black bikini and dozen belts. Gail, head of Old Town. Excellent.
They had gotten two powerful captives and their plan was coming together.
Chapter Six: Location, Location, and Location:
The house was quiet now, without Nancy, Hartigan realized, as he lay, sipping the jasmine tea. It was meant to help heal, and he was feeling much better. The pain was gone pretty much, but they refused to let him up, until tonight.
Nancy Callahan. He had rescued her from Junior Roark eight years ago. Thankfully, he was caught and Nancy grew up. He became her surrogate father, when her own and her mother abandoned her for daring to defy them and testify against Roark.
He loved Nancy. And she loved him. Maybe more than he reciprocated. He would have to find out if she returned. When she returned, Hartigan corrected himself.
She would return.
As Dwight laid thinking at night, Miho slipped into his room. He sat up and Miho sat at the foot of the bed, legs crossed. She had a white-board with her and a dry-wipe marker.
'Have you got anything?' was on the board.
"No, Miho, baby. I don't understand."
Miho rubbed out the previous message and wrote another:
'The poem talked about Heaven and Hell. Maybe it's symbolic?'
"Maybe. What's Hell, though?"
Miho rubbed out the previous message and wrote…
'Hell. Underground. Earth. Maybe.'
Inspiration struck Dwight.
"Miho! You're a genius. Hell is the earth! '…Sinners go straight to Hell'! Whatever's happening, they're going to cause something that's going to swallow up Basin City and everyone with it!" Dwight cried, sitting up quickly. Then realizing that he was naked.
Miho flushed scarlet for a couple of seconds, before averting her gaze, until Dwight pulled on a pair of crumpled blue boxer shorts and a dark red dressing gown. He grabbed Miho's hand and they ran into the rooms, until they collected inside Hartigan's bedroom.
"Think about it. Hell is symbolic, a separate meaning for the Earth. Something is going to cause an earthquake that is going to bury Sin City beneath the dirt from which it came forth."
Everyone was silent.
"We've got to find wherever the Roark's are planning this."
In the morning, while Miho made a simple breakfast for them all of French toast and coffee, the four men discussed where the source might be, with a colour map that Jackie Boy had provided.
Red pins showed possible sites. Bright blue ones showed unavailable sites. They pulled up information on the sites from the Basin City Tourists Website, via Hartigan's computer.
"There's the old construction works…no, there's too many witnesses…"
"How about inside the old Turquoise Lagoon Casino. No, there's a prohibition, due to the amount of asbestos…"
Jackie Boy leaned back in his chair and sipped the burnt coffee.
"Well, we're boned."
"Yep." Dwight groaned as another red pin became a bright blue one.
There were only two red pins left. A church and a road track.
"The church! Think about it. Where is the place of Heaven and Hell? A church. Religion."
Hartigan clicked on the mouse and the keyboard and Jackie Boy read over his shoulder.
"Los Angelo Church. Opened in 1978, closed a year ago for "developments". Has a foundation deep into the earth containing tombs. Perfect."
The five warriors/cops looked around at each other, until Marv spoke, "We can't go in with just the five of us. We need more weapons, no doubt Roark's got plenty of dirty cops and Mafia helping him as security."
"We need to rescue Nancy and Gail as well. And a good getaway."
Jackie Boy had started to make a list of the stuff they needed.
"Anything else?"
Marv gave a big grin, "There is one thing we might need."
Hartigan shrugged. "What?"
"Body armor. I'm not getting shot in the chest again."
Chapter Seven: Reinforcements and Real Plans:
They divided the jobs between them. They didn't have much time, so they split into three groups; Dwight and Miho, Hartigan and Jackie Boy; and Marv, by himself.
Dwight and his master assassin friend bought more weapons and body armor to add to the huge supply already in Hartigan's house.
Hartigan and Jackie Boy arranged the lease of several cars and three motorbikes as getaway transport.
While Marv, went to Old Town and asked the girls. They heartily agreed on the condition that if they saved Sin City, the Old Town Girls would get something in return.
The five of them met up at the remains of Kadie's and decided to check everything.
Plenty of weapons. Enough vehicles. The support of Old Town. Maybe a few clean cops.
That's all. Against the all-powerful Roark's. And a super-weapon. And hundreds of armed men.
Nancy had tried to wriggle out of the ropes. She could gyrate her hips to flocks of drooling men. But not out of tight ropes.
Gail had tried biting through them, but that only resulted in a slap around the face with the butt of a machine gun of a solider.
Eventually, Cardinal Roark, in a black shirt and white jeans came over to them and ordered the men to release them. Immediately, Gail flew at him, but Cardinal Roark, turned and swept his bony leg along the floor, tripping her up in mid-step.
They were tied to chairs near a plasma computer screen and Cardinal Roark opened up a window simulation.
"Ladies, as you have no doubt found out…we are developing something. Something that will make history.
"We have decided to do something about the rising threat of you people. Senator Roark's son gets blown to hell by John Hartigan. I almost die at the hands of that ugly brute Marv. You prostitutes murder my loyal police officers and men. You must be stopped.
"However, if all seven of you disappeared, someone else would be suspicious. They would find out. But, if all of Sin City were destroyed, everyone would suspect a bomb or a tragic accident. Not a carefully planned incident." Cardinal Roark finished.
"But you'll kill yourself and your family in the process."
"Oh no, no, no. That's where you are wrong. Whilst Sin City is being swept into the ground, we will be above all that, safe."
The news hit Nancy like a ton of bricks.
"A plane."
"Bingo, stripper. There's a plane waiting out back and…well, here's a simulation."
Cardinal Roark pressed a button on the computer and a coloured video showed the missile in the blueprints they had found in the locker. The missile launched at a 33-degree angle northeast and landed on a point marked with a pink cross. Underneath the pink cross was a huge tunnel-device that set off a red ball that imploded and the blue outlines of Sin City fell into a huge crater in the ground caused by the red ball.
"The pink cross means the secondary location, which will set off the bomb, which is the red ball. The blue is Sin City, obviously. The missile will take only three minutes to reach the secondary location."
"You're sick."
"Now now. I'm not sick. I'm a revolutionary. This town is getting deeper and deeper into Satan's sin. This way, they can repent and be with God." The cardinal said, his eyes bulging desperately.
Nancy was terrified.
"When's it going to go off?"
"Oh! Midnight, tonight. So, you're doomed."
Chapter Eight: Bomb Voyage:
Hartigan, Miho, Jackie Boy, Marv and Dwight took a vehicle each to the church and saw five guys in khaki army uniform. Miho sliced their throats and they took their uniforms.
They had had a delicious meal; pepperoni pizza, garlic bread, apple pie, steak, chocolate cake, ice cream and beer and Coke.
The condemned men (and women) gave themselves a hearty meal, someone once quoted.
They hid the cars near the church, hidden away.
They slipped in, hiding the weapons and as they descended the yellow metal elevator shaft, they saw the missile in its silver holding shaft.
"Marv, you try and free the girls. Dwight, get over to the missile and try to stop it. Miho, go with Jack and dismantle anything that helps." Hartigan whispered through his teeth.
Miho casually flicked a button on her walkie-talkie. A blue button. The button was a signal to the deputy leader of the Old Town Girls, Franca.
The war would soon begin.
Marv hunched his shoulders down, attempting not to get notice, as he made his way over to the girls. He held a gun and he slipped a switchblade knife from his wrist sleeve to his big hand. He circled around the Franciscan marble pillar and quickly sawed through the thick ropes.
"Nancy, Gail, don't move. Your ropes are free, but don't move." Marv whispered to the girls. They gave a quick smile.
Miho and Jack found themselves on a large, unoccupied helipad. A small plane was there, with helicopter blades, so that it was easier to ascend and escape.
Miho opened up the white shirt of the stolen uniform and pulled out a small GPS tracker the size of a blob of jelly. She stuck to the underside of the plane.
Jackie Boy checked his watch. It was ten to midnight. The sky was a blue-black blanket above them, stars embroidered into it.
"Miho, we've got to move." Miho nodded then stuck a C4 bomb to the other bottom side of the plane. It began to tick, ten minutes.
Hartigan's nose twitched. His allergies didn't come on much, but something was seriously screwing with them.
He saw Cardinal, Senator and Mayor Roark sitting in chairs by the missile.
Then, Hartigan sneezed loudly and everyone turned their heads.
"That's John Hartigan!" Cardinal Roark cried. "Kill him!"
As Hartigan slipped his gun and his walkie-talkie out, he hit the yellow "transmit-all-stations" button and shouted, "Go, go, go!"
Outside, Franca and the girls of Old Town gave one almighty battle yell and poured into the lower section of the catacomb.
Dwight, Marv, Jackie Boy and Miho started attacking the men, while Cardinal Roark set the ten-second timer for the bomb. Nancy and Gail got up and ducked as bullets rained at their heads. Marv cocked his AR-15 rifle and shot down a group who were firing at him.
Dwight came over and handed them guns. Nancy shot expertly while Gail shot everywhere, avoiding her allies.
Nancy shot her way over to the computer and began typing into the computer. Marv ran over.
"What are you doing Nance?"
"Trying to stop the miss-"
There was a thunderous roar and a huge flame erupted from the base of the missile and it ascended into the sky.
"Let's go!" Marv cried, roughly grabbing Nancy and making his way to the elevator, with the remaining girls and Dwight and Jackie Boy and Gail and Hartigan and Miho.
Miho threw a grenade and it ticked away, until it blew the remainder of the men to hell.
As they ran from the site, the church exploded and the plane started to shoot up. The Roark's were there in the plane. Bastards.
"What are we going to do?" Gail asked, before an idea burst into her mind.
"I've got an idea. Nancy, if we got to the secondary site in time, could we remove the bomb and put it somewhere else before it goes BOOM?"
"It's a good idea. It might just work."
Chapter Nine: Time Ticks:
The girls including Franca took two cars, leaving Dwight and Miho a bike each and the others took the fastest car.
They saw the missile slowly carving a path through the heavens. Dwight and Miho sped ahead and found the site. It was a crypt. They found another catacomb with the bomb inside.
The tunnel-device was long (about fifty feet) and had a curved, curled horn, to do speed-digging through the surface.
At its base was a glowing red bomb. It was painted scarlet and the end of it was almost inside the tunnel machine.
Nancy found a set of instructions hidden under a heavy tombstone; to dismantle the bomb, you had to remove the right coloured wire. The colour of the wire was…
Nancy furiously scrabbled at the paper. Someone had erased the colour.
"Shit! I don't know the colour of the wire…Marv, can you open up the base?"
Marv easily cracked the base open and there was ten wires leading into it. There was a groove at either side, where you slid the bomb out and in. The wires were containing it. Well, one wire. The others connected to the tunnel-device.
Jackie Boy checked his watch.
"One minute."
Okay, Nancy thought. Pick. Pick, pick, pick. Yellow you're mellow. Blue you're cool. Red you're dead. Green you're mean. Purple you're…
"Nancy, what's your favourite colour?" Hartigan asked.
'Blue, why?"
"Pick blue then."
Good argument. Nancy took the wire-cutters and everyone huddled closer. Dwight slipped an arm around Miho's waist and she shifted into it. Marv pulled out a cigar and had a smoke.
Gail took a last drink from the bottle she had swiped. Its taste ran down her throat like liquid heaven.
Nancy gently prayed and snipped the blue wire. Nothing happened. Nancy slid her hands inside and the bomb came out.
Everyone cheered. But then the bomb's timer changed to 05:00.
"We've got five minutes to get rid of this thing, before it goes off."
The seven heroes scrambled out and began to drive away, as they saw the plane carrying the Roark's nearby flying.
"What the hell is in the truck?" Marv asked, pulling it out. It was a snowboard.
Then Miho remembered the bomb she had planted on the plane.
There was a small explosion and the plane visibly dropped down.
Miho put up her hand, with the whiteboard. On it was a message; 'I have a plan…'
Miho sped ahead on the bike with Dwight seated behind her, his hands on her hips. She passed him the spider device they had used earlier to escape Kadie's. He pressed it and it shot up and wrapped itself around a bottom bar of the chopper.
In the distance behind them, the missile shot into the ground and orange fire illuminated the desert background.
Miho placed the string through a loop in her belt, then gave the string to Dwight. The female assassin climbed up the string towards the helicopter.
Dwight turned and signaled to Gail, who was riding a bike directly behind them, with Marv.
Gail leapt over and started driving the bike, as Dwight jumped up and started climbing the string towards where Miho was sitting on the bar. Marv slid along the bike to keep it moving.
The two bikes swerved to the left and the right to let Nancy, Hartigan and Jackie Boy through in the open top Cadillac. Its turquoise colour shone in the moonlight.
Miho held the bomb in her robes and unraveled it.
01:42, 01:41, 01:40…
Miho held her hand up to Dwight as he clambered next to her. He sat straddling the bar, while she was delicately balancing on it with her feet.
Dwight spun into the hangar of the plane/helicopter to find the Roark's sitting, having whiskey.
When they saw Dwight and Miho they panicked and pulled out guns.
Miho leapt, rolled and used the blade to slice off the ends of the guns. They were useless.
Cardinal Roark pulled out a ceremonial dagger, encrusted with rubies and sapphires and emeralds and was steel with gold leaf.
He slashed wildly with it at Dwight who rolled and blocked the blade with another knife.
Miho kicked at Senator Roark, who landed a one-in-a-million punch that had Miho sprawling on the ground. She swung her leg and knocked him off his feet, before stabbing Roark in the chest. He gasped and then his life left him.
Dwight pulled out a gun and tore into Cardinal Roark. The bullets' force caused the holy man's body to fall out of the open hangar door.
It fell in front of the turquoise Cadillac. Hartigan yelped and swerved to avoid the rolling corpse.
Miho saw the bomb.
00:05, 00:04…
Miho grabbed the bomb, chucked it near the cockpit, slid her feet into the snowboard, she had brought out from the crevice in her back , grabbed Dwight and leaped out of the helicopter.
Miho pulled the string and a parachute shot out from her kimono. The parachute was found wrapped around the snowboard.
Dwight held Miho tightly and looked for what might be the last time into those black eyes. He decided to do the unthinkable. He leaned in and kissed her on the lips deeply. She kissed him back, then turned and lifted the board up as she threw the spider device for the third time to the back of the turquoise Cadillac, which was speeding at least 50mph to keep the board up.
The board screeched and almost came apart under their feet, but it stayed intact and above them the bomb clicked zero.
The light above them changed night to day for a second and the helicopter was eaten up and then the Cadillac jolted stop, when the wreckage dropped in front of them. The flames spread across the sky for a few moments before transforming to blackened smoke.
Nancy, Hartigan and Jackie Boy stopped the car and Marv and Gail dismounted the bikes.
"Whoo!" Nancy spontaneously cried.
"Guys, I guess we saved the day…and Sin City." Gail said, before enveloping everyone in a big hug, that everyone enjoyed and participated in.
Chapter Ten: Aftermath:
Over the next few weeks, Sin City began to sort itself out. The girls of Old Town extended to Sacred Oaks and got more business.
Nancy moved in with Hartigan and soon they became "in-lovers". Together they helped re-build a new club in place of Kadie's. It was like Kadie's but did decent music.
Marv helped a lot, his huge muscles proving to be amazingly useful.
Gail was amazed when she heard about Dwight and Miho's relationship, but she was happy about them. Together, the two lovers patrolled together and formed a deeper friendship.
The Roark's were not forgotten, but a new government helped. A better government.
Jackie Boy became the head of Police and started sorting Sin City out.
Other heroes helped. Shellie. The Salesman.
The seven of them eventually met up at the new club, which Marv, Nancy and Hartigan had built; Club Heaven.
They all sat at the end of the club. Miho was visible happier.
"Does anyone know? That we saved so many lives?"
Dwight shook his head. "No. No one knows. We're secret heroes."
"Like Tom in Grapes of Wrath. Doing good deeds and avoiding the law." Nancy said, rubbing into Hartigan, eliciting a coarse and sexy purr from him.
"What do you want to do next time?'
No one answered as jazz played in the background.
"I don't know. Get drunk?"
"That's not the same."
"Still…"
Everyone agreed to get drunk.
Dwight carried a sleeping Miho to his car. They had kept the turquoise Cadillac and as Dwight smoothed back a lock of her jet black hair and kissed her pale forehead tenderly. He got in next to her and began to drive back to their apartment in Sacred Oaks.
Dwight had never felt so happy.
Ever.