Title: Gasoline

Author: Minka

Rating: T

Summary: Cleaning the blood from the unit was out of the question. Besides, what would I do with a corpse in the middle of the city? Dump it in a trash can? That sort of stuff only works in movies.

PoV: Jack Mercer

Status: In progress – approx 3 longish chapters

Author's Notes: Another random idea that I just had to do. Just before the brothers walk into Evelyn's house and find Angel at the beginning, Jack asks Bobby what he has been up to the last few years. The way Jack and Bobby talk, I always suspected that perhaps Jack knew a little more about Bobby's mysterious whereabouts then either let on. This is my explanation for that.

Takes place about four years before the movie. Keeping in mind that there is no set in stone, definite age for any of the brothers during the movie, I have guessed that Jack is around 21. This means he is around 18 in this story.

Chapter one

Clean up crew

I shrugged further into my jacket as I walked up the steps. The place was a hole, even I saw it as that, and let's face it, I haven't exactly the best track record when it comes to accommodation. I almost smiled at the thought of one of my old homes. It was a run down factory of some sort, think it may have been glue, but then again, I wouldn't really know. Was always too high there and anyway and that was in the days when I was nothing more then a street rat.

But this, the building in front of me, it would have been better in a hole. Even my shabby, overpriced, rotting apartment was better then this. I was most disappointed in him and resolved to tell him that as soon as I found his punk ass.

Funny how the sayings of the older reflect upon the younger. Had it been even just two years ago, the roles would have been so severely reversed. Me, holed up in some dump and Bobby banging the door down to find me and drag my sorry ass home.

I guess sometimes things just need to change every once in a while. Keeps life interesting, you know.

I still wasn't quite sure what to make of all this. The last few days had been a blur, nothing more. It was late one night, god, almost midnight, when I got the call. At first I hadn't wanted to answer my ringing phone, 'unknown number' displayed in lights. I hate unknown numbers. They never bode well. But fuck, something about it, something about the hour and I just had to answer.

It had been Green, detective Green now actually. Talk about a blast from the past. I don't want to even know how he got my L.A. number, but nonetheless, it was him greeting my hesitant answer.

He was nervous, I could tell that. It reassured me that he was still edgy around me. He had been there when I was a kid on the streets, before Evelyn had taken me in, and he had witnessed some of things I'd done. It was nothing compared to Bobby, or even Angel, but he hadn't grown up with them as one of his biggest enemies. I like to remember how I used to plague them. If I wasn't causing trouble while being held in the interrogation room, then I was on the streets, off my face and doing something that the fine police department deemed as a danger to society.

Good times.

Regardless, I never forgot who it was who would grab me and drag me kicking and screaming back to whatever foster parents I had run away from. I think that is why he's still nervous; regret, guilt for not realising that something was up before he found me almost bleeding to death that fateful night. Not to mention that I think Bobby paid him a visit and extracted some information. I wasn't overly surprised when Green laid off my back after I joined the Mercer household, or that a lot of my 'foster parents' ended up on the front page of the news, crying about how some punk had broken into their house and beat them to within an inch of their lives.

That was Bobby for ya. Always looking out for his younger brother.

Green went to great pains to remind me of that; as if I needed to be reminded about how I was in Bobby's debt. Kept up a spiel about how now would be a good time to help him out and that he needed me and other shit.

Apparently, from what little I got out of him, there was some shit going down in L.A at the moment that was a little out of the ordinary. One of the cops here had called Detroit, hooking up with Green who automatically linked the M.O to Bobby. Since Bobby wasn't in Detroit, Green had taken it upon himself to try and find out where he was.

He didn't tell me much, just some people getting dead in odd ways and that, as rumour had it, a bunch of hitman had been called in. I got the feeling that he was breaking some cop protocol in telling me anything at all, so I let him keep it short.

I like to think that it was Green being concerned about Bobby, or even the family, but I'm sure he was just watching out for his own neck. He knows, as well as I, that if anything happened to Bobby, then the whole town would go up in flames as the three of us sought retribution.

We always loved doing that gas thing.

He'd hung up then, telling me to keep things quiet and not to involve anyone. And, bizarrely enough, not to get too involved myself. Funny coming from a cop out looking to get a wanted criminal under the radar.

At first I'd been subtle, watching places and bars that I thought Bobby might haunt. I'd called Ma and Jerry, but neither knew anything of Bobby's whereabouts. Angel, I discovered, had shipped out to boot camp. Ma sounded sad; not depressed, but maybe more lonely. With me having been gone for almost a year now, it must have been lonely in that house. Not that I was ever that good company anyway, but still, it makes a difference having someone in there every now and then.

When that hadn't worked, I started asking questions, all the while making sure that no cops were following me. I'd never trust Green, but I believed in him enough to think that he wasn't setting me up or using me as bait. Didn't stop me from looking for some disguised uniform though.

And so here I was. After almost a week of following dead end leads and knocking on far too many wrong doors, I was standing in front of a falling down apart building in the middle of winter and praying that this was the right one. I honestly didn't know how much more of this I could take.

As much as it took, I told myself. And that was the god honest truth. I'd go to the ends of the world for any of my brothers, especially Bobby, and if this wasn't his place, then I would keep looking until I'd knocked on every goddamn door in this cursed city.

That's not to say that the search hadn't taken its toll on me. It had been a hard few days, both mentally and physically. The pure cold of the season made all the tramping around seem insane, even to me; my running nose and tight chest a painful reminder of such stupidity. Not to mention that I'd missed all band practices without as much as a word of explanation. But it was the questions, the searching which wore me down. Dealing with some of the lowest creatures this city had to offer – and believe me, there was a lot of them. I was not like Bobby or Angel, even Jerry, who could walk into a room and command attention. Who could confidently walk up to someone twice as large as them and demand respect.

I was just some punk kid who was too introverted to make much of a splash in the harsh way of the underworld.

Mostly though, it was the fear. What if Bobby had got himself into some serious trouble? Real serious. What if I was too late, or couldn't find him at all? All those questions, all those doubts made the process of asking question after question even harder.

Somewhere, in the back of my mind, the unthinkable kept running around, taunting me with its horrible feeling of reality.

What if I never found him?

I can still remember that night, so many years ago when Bobby had first left. Not a word, not a hint or even a note to say why or where he had gone. I'd woken in the middle of the night, drenched in a cold sweat and just knew that something was wrong in the house. Sure, I'd woken like that before, but that was from the dreams, the memories. That night it had been different, I had been different. I'd walked to his room straight away, not for the comfort I usually sought, but for the fact that, deep down, I already knew he wouldn't be there.

That sinking feeling in my stomach was the worst thing I had ever felt; and that's saying a lot. I thought it was the end of the world. That life as I knew it was dead. In a way it was, at least for me, for a time.

But he had come back, just as Ma said he would. And he had straightened me out again. It was hard for me to tell him what a difference his presence had on me. Fuck, on the whole town. As soon as Bobby Mercer was back, the Bobby Mercer, things settled down. I could walk around without fear, there were less random attacks and muggings and even some of the smaller gangs kept quiet until he left. Damn, I think even the police half appreciated it when he came back. Not that he was trying to do them any favours, it was just that even the mobs were afraid of pissing him off.

That was Bobby's thing, you know. That thing which made him s different, and as ma would have put it, so special.

People saw me as the freak child, especially in school. I think I shocked them all when I actually brought home good grades, especially in literature and history, not to mention music. As much as they loved me, I think even Ma was convinced that I was truly a no hoper, through and through. I'm proud enough to admit that I enjoyed that shock factor. I was no genius, no Einstein, but somehow, those grades proved my worth, even if I never needed to. Bobby was the protector; Jerry the level headed; Angle the smooth talker. And then there was me. The quiet one, the shy and introverted child who never made eye contact. But what outsiders never knew was that I was the brains and the look out. It's amazing how much you can see when you look like you aren't paying attention.

Speaking of, just a single glance at the lift was enough to send me heading for the stairs. There was no way this side of hell that I would get into that run down piece of shit. If it didn't break under my weight, it'd leave me hanging between floors. And given the look of this building, I'd be stuck chilling it within the small cell-like box with a maniac.

Not my idea of fun.

I reached level nine and walked down the hall, idly counting the numbers on the doors as I went.

I almost missed the door. I get like that sometimes. Too involved in something stupid like keeping a running count of brass numbers nailed to doors that I forget what it was that I was actually doing in the first place. But it was all good. Once I hit apartment 9F I realised I'd gone too far and backtracked to 9C. I opened the inside pocket of my jacket while I walked back, pulling out a small leather pouch of thin lock picks.

I loved these things. Other then my guitar, they were one of my favourite items. You know, one of those things you never leave the house without.

Pulling out a particularly long, slender bit of metal, I cast a quick look over my shoulder to make sure I was alone before inserting it into the lock.

They say old habits die hard, but I say they never die. They just roll over and play dead until next time you click your fingers and summon them to attention. I used to break and enter as a kid. Big time shit, too, none of that small stealing wallets or acting the part of the pickpocket. And what's more, I did it with style. Most times I even locked the door behind myself as I was leaving, just to prove my point to god knows who. Earned a great rep as one of the best thieves in Detroit anyway, so I ain't complaining.

That was all before Evelyn, of course.

Well, mostly anyway.

A little jiggling, a push and a series of clicks and the lock slide out of the compartment. I grinned to myself and gave it a small boot with my foot as I tucked my picks away. The door swung open with a creak and I almost thought it would fall off its rusted, shitty hinges.

I walked into the dark, listening for any signs of life. It was only then that I realised that I hadn't even knocked. The notion stuck me pretty hard. If this wasn't Bobby's please, then it was highly likely I really didn't want to be doing this. And if it was my brothers, then I was likely to get shot at before I even made it across the threshold.

Stupid, Jack, very stupid!

Uncertainty set in, tormenting my mind with hypothetical questions and endless what ifs. For the briefest moment, I almost considered turning back. Just walk out the door, close it behind me and put this dump as far out of my mind as possible. Easy as that.

That was until the smell reached me.

The room stank… like something died and my heart automatically leapt into my mouth. I knew the smell of blood when I found it. How could I not with so many years spent smelling my own, or that of some poor other kid locked in the same endless struggle as me. It was something that we rejects knew to recognize on instinct.

The smell, the memories it summoned; it all made me blind to reason and without so much as a second thought, I flipped on the light.

What I saw made my stomach tighten. There was blood everywhere, and I mean everywhere. The walls, the floor, and hell even the ceiling looked like it was supporting a new coat of crimson paint. I carefully picked my way through the room, trying to avoid contact with anything and everything. Wouldn't be smart of me to place myself at such a scene, especially since I'd so successfully managed to slip off the radar.

I saw boots sticking out from behind the couch and suddenly I couldn't move. What if I had been wrong? What if I had just let myself in on someone else's crime? Even worse, what if those boots belonged to Bobby?

"Bobby." My own voice startled me; I hadn't even realised that I'd sighed his name. During the entirety of my search, I had been careful not to use it, not to spread any unwarranted suspicion on my oldest brother. It had been hard; he is not exactly that unique in looks. I mean, how many guys only just reach my shoulder, have dark hair and always wears a brown leather jacket. I tell you, I got acquainted with far too many of them before I finally got this tip. Either I have some crazy animal magnetism or this entire damn town has turned gay.

I could feel my heart racing, feel it pumping the blood through my veins at a dizzying speed. My head grew light, whether from the smell or just the feeling of terror and before I knew what I was doing, I was standing in front of the corpse, looking down at it with a sickening lump in my throat.

The guys head had been beat in something shocking. Wouldn't have known it was a head except for the position of the bloody mess on top of the shoulders. A broken chair leg and a smashed lamp lay closest to the corpse, each covered in layer upon layer of blood and god only knows what else.

It was messy, and that was putting it fucking nicely.

But he was blonde. A natural, redish blond and I couldn't have been happier.

I relaxed a bit and crouched down, looking at the body closer and trying to pick out anything of importance.

Not that I was an expert, but even I could tell that it was a pretty fresh scene. Not to the point of the blood still being slick and warm, but it wasn't exactly dried and caked either. Maybe early morning? Yeah, that would fit the rough time frame I had.

Nothing about the crime gave a clear indication that it was Bobby. But I knew him. I knew who he had killed his last foster parent. A lamp over the head. Sure, it was an easy kill, a quick and effective way to stop someone from coming after you – fuck, even I had used that trick before – but for some reason, I looked at the body and almost knew that Bobby had done it. I could see them, grappling and twisting on the floor, each struggling to get the upper hand, and then Bobby bringing that lamp down like a fist of justice.

I blinked the image away and sighed. It was a strong enough feeling that I knew I couldn't walk away and ignore it.

Fuck.

I reached into my pockets and pulled out a set of latex gloves. I'd known that they would probably come in handy. As I slipped them on, I stood and moved cautiously towards the bathroom, keeping my eyes open for any sign of danger. The place was empty and quiet, just like a grave.

The bathroom seemed older then the unit itself, falling apart with cracked tiles with mould spreading out from all the corners. Careful not to tread on the grimy tiles, I pulled one of the dirty towels from a nail protruding from the wall. As the towel came free, the nail squeaked loudly. I jumped as the tile it was attached to fell from the wall and smashed against the floor, sending greyish particles out in a little cloud around it.

Great, just fucking great. Don't know why it bothered me, not like you could tell my little piece of destruction from the rest of the room. Honestly, a bomb site normally looked better than this dump.

Cleaning the unit of blood was out of the question; traces would still be left and what would I ever do with a corpse in the middle of the city? Throw it out the window and then dump it in a trash can? That sort of shit only works in movies.

I set off to work, spraying anything red with a healthy dose of ammonium, then spraying it some more just for good measure. DNA samples would be collected from the body so the corpse wouldn't remain nameless for long. I don't know who he was or what he did, but no one deserves to be buried in a nameless grave. Besides, it was only Bobby that had to be a ghost. Not a trace of my oldest brother could be left else the game would be ruined.

Besides, if there was one thing I was good at, it was cleaning up other people's messes.

The apartment was officially more of a mess now then when I had entered. At first I had just been looking for any sign of my brother, anything that would assure me that I had just covered up his problem and not someone else's murder. Eventually, my epic and meaningful search turned more into a rock star tantrum as I took my frustrations out on the inanimate objects around the room.

Now, instead of a murder scene, it looked like some fucked up wannabe musician had created a battlefield of smashed furniture and shredded paper.

Oddly enough, I felt better.

Then I had found it. Thrown in the corner, under a shredded adult magazine – don't think I even want to know what that was doing there – was an earring sitting on top of a card of matches. Odd thing to find anywhere, but what was more, it was my earring.

I had recognized it immediately and automatically knew what it meant. Years ago, Angel had fallen in with the wrong crowd – more so then usual, I should probably say. Anyway, they decided to seek retribution by giving me a hard time. Even then, they were too scared to pick on his black ass. Funny how I always seem to draw the shot end of the straw. But anyway, long story short, they decided to take me for a nice little ride, and somehow, the idea of leaving my earring in the parking lot seemed like a good idea. Bobby and Angle came back to find me gone, and thankfully one of them found the little stud which alerted them to something being wrong. Since then, it had been a calling card. It was to the point were we had all gone out and brought matching ones, just so we could leave sneaky little messages for each other.

Sure, it could have been a coincidence, but I highly doubted it. So I picked the earring up and shoved it into my pocket. Then I looked at the card of matches. Bert's Bar, it read, address and all. Funny how only the seedy places advertised their whereabouts on their shitty merchandise.

Figuring it was my best bet, I tucked them in my pocket with the earring and gave the room the once over.

It had taken me almost two hours to clean Bobby's apartment. Or whoever's apartment it was. I'd even gone as far as dragging the corpse into the shower and dowsing it with a lovely mixture of water, ammonium and liquid soap, just for good measure. It was by no means a fool proof clean up, but with any luck it would be enough. The cops here deal with murders and crime on an hourly basis, so hopefully they wouldn't read too deeply into this one. Especially if my suspicions were correct and the guy turned out to be one of the hit men Green talked about. That would make things easier on all of us.

Content I could do no more, I shrugged and let myself out. It was hard to act normal after something like that. Not everyday that I break into someone's home and clean it out. Well, actually, that happens a lot – I know the best pawn broker down by the Latino sector. What I mean is with the dead bodies and blood and shit.

So, I put my head down, shoved my hands into my pockets, all the while fingering the card of matches, and took the steps two at a time. Fuck that lift.

From what I could remember, Bert's was a seedy bar on the outskirts of town, buried in some back alleyway near the industrial sector. Mentally I cursed Bobby. That was not the sort of area I ever wanted to be in. Too many thugs and gangs, warring fractions hell bent on destruction and all fucked so crazy that they can't see straight to save their lives. Not to mention it was one of the prime drug and sex spots within the entire damn city.

Just fucking perfect.

I could already imagine what Bert's would be like. Once I found him, Bobby would be getting a good talking to. Again, with the role reversal; it somehow made this whole situation all the more wrong.

To be continued. Comments greatly appreciated.

Next chapter preview:

As Bobby fired back, I jumped. The sound was so loud, like a wild beast roaring in my ear, that it was all I could do to stop myself from curling into a ball at the base of the wall. More shots rung out and I felt something skimming along the side of my arm and grazing my cheek. I hissed as white hot pain flared along the path of the bullet and released a trail of blood in its wake.

Somehow, whether through some sixth sense or ears trained to hear only me, Bobby knew that I had been hit.