THE CASE OF THE BURNING BONES

"I wish to employ your services," the broken man sitting in front of my desk said. Despite his strange appearance, his voice was filled with calm authority.

Soorya - the Afghani girl who's my secretary - was frightened, but trying not to show it. Marie hovered behind me, ready for anything, but trying not to look threatening. I was sitting at my desk, trying to look professional. All in all, there was more acting going on in the office of Domino Investigations than in your typical movie.

Our guest, on the other hand, was certainly more composed than we were. Otherwise, he looked terrible. He was thin and gaunt and I found myself wondering when he'd last eaten. His clothes were shabby and unkept... although if you looked close you'd notice that both he and they were reasonably clean. That's a tough trick to pull off when you live on the streets. I found myself wondering how he pulled it off.

I suppose it was the mask that bothered people the most. It covered the left side of his face, from forehead to chin. It was made of tin and once it had been painted to resemble human flesh, but now it was battered and worn to the point that nothing but bare metal showed. It was intended to conceal a terrible, disfiguring injury and you could see tendrils of scar-tissue creeping out from under the half-mask's edges. It was the best that the modern world could do for people who had somehow lost their faces. The Great War had produced more than a few such men and the story on the street was that the Tinman was one of them.

Our prospective client was a common sight around the dingier parts of town. He was a kook who rambled about, mouthing nonsense, but generally keeping to himself. Everyone assumed that the war that had destroyed his face had also wrecked his mind. People looked at his mask, called him the Tinman, and tried to pretend that he didn't exist. Mutilated and mad are a bad combination. People don't like being reminded that we're all living on the edge of an abyss, and it's all too easy to fall in.

I'd last seen the Tinman just a month ago, being escorted out of the financial district by a pair of strangely nervous police officers. He was calmly telling the cops that one of the most prominent men in town was actually the leader of a Satanic cult.

Sooraya placed a cup of tea on the table next to the man, bowed silently, and backed away. The Tinman gratefully picked up the cup in a hand that was missing two fingers and spotted with puckered burn scars. Then he pulled a wooden straw out of his pocket and put it in the teacup. He said something to Sooraya just before he took a sip. Sooraya and I both blinked in surprise. I don't speak Pashtun, but I've picked up a few basic phrases from Sooraya. The Tinman had just thanked Sooraya in her own language.

"How can we help you?" I asked. I had a wretched feeling how this was going to go. I don't really have the time for charity work and I doubted that the Tinman either had the money to pay us or had a story that would make any sense. So I'd listen to what he had to say and then try to gently shrug him off.

The Tinman used the hand that wasn't holding his tea to fish a ragged sheet of paper from the interior of his coat. He put it on my desk and I automatically picked it up. It was an envelope that had been split open to expose more surface area. Judging from the smell, it had been fished out of a trash can.

On what had been the exterior of the envelope was a pair of names and addresses that indicated it had been sent from a stationary shop to a law firm. But on what had been the envelope interior was a quite passable sketch of a boy and a woman. They resembled each other and I assumed they were mother and son. She was handsome, but care-worn. The boy looked on the scrawny side.

"The boy will be important someday," the Tinman said intently. "And there are men in town who wish to harm him. I want you to find the boy and keep him safe."

Right. I sighed internally and opened my mouth to tell the Tinman that I couldn't help him.

To my utter amazement, five gold coins clattered onto my desktop. Double eagles. You don't see that sort of thing too often nowadays. And that was obviously a lot of money for a man who was supposedly a homeless derelict to be throwing around.

"What's the boy's name?" I asked.

"I don't know," the Tinman said regretfully.

"Do you know where he lives?"

"No. However, I have seen him and his mother at Union Park. I believe she sometimes works as a charwoman."

"Why is the boy so important?"

"I don't know."

"Who wants to hurt him?"

"Men who are in the service of a tremendous evil. It is important that they be stopped."

Well, that was certainly informative. The Tinman's one remaining eye met my eyes. It was blue and seemed clear and sane. Marie put a hand on my shoulder and squeezed gently.

I slid four of the coins back towards the Tinman, leaving one on my side of the desk. Twenty dollars was about right for a job that I suspected would go nowhere.

"We'll take a look," I said. "But given that we don't have a lot to work with, I can't promise much."

"I'm sure you will do your best," said the Tinman as he scooped up the other four coins. Then he finished his tea and stood up. "I will visit you again tomorrow to see if you've had any luck."

Just before he left, the Tinman paused and said something to Sooraya. Sooraya taken aback.

"What was that?" Marie asked after the door closed behind our new client.

Sooraya was eight months pregnant. She frowned and touched her belly. "He said my baby will be a boy. And someday he will be a mighty warrior."


As we drove to Union Park, Marie asked to see the coin the Tinman had given me. I handed it over and she examined it carefully.

"Minted in 1894, but it looks brand new," she said thoughtfully as she held it up in the light and turned it over and over in her hands.

"You think it's fake?" I asked.

Marie shook her head, "No. It has the feel and heft of real gold. But where does a crazy street bum get five of these?"

I shrugged, "Good question. I wondered the same thing myself."

She handed the coin back to me and I pocketed it awkwardly between shifting gears.

"We better keep quiet about those coins," Marie added.

I nodded. This city was filled with people who wouldn't hesitate to rob or even kill the Tinman if they knew he was carrying around that kind of money. There's something about gold... Money makes people evil, but gold makes people evil and crazy.

"What do you know about the Tinman?" Marie asked.

I shook my head, "Nothing much. According to what I've heard, he was injured in the war and has been wandering the streets for years."

"What was he before the war? What's his real name?"

"No idea," I replied. For some reason, my answer bothered me. It didn't seem right that whoever the Tinman had once been was gone and forgotten.


The Depression was still kicking the country's ass and a lot of people were still in trouble. Union Park had a soup kitchen, but it was also a place where people without jobs gathered to look for work. If you asked around, you could get anything from violin lessons to a blowjob.

Marie and I were quartering the area, trying to spot our boy or his mother. We weren't quite at the stage where we would start showing people the Tinman's sketch. If the kid was really in danger, I wanted to find him before anyone knew we were looking for him.

We weren't having any luck. But then I spotted some guys who just didn't fit in with the rest of the crowd. There were three of them. All tough-looking characters dressed in new, off-the-rack suits. And from the way they were scanning the crowd, they also seemed to be looking for someone.

Marie and I casually drifted back together.

"What do you think?" Marie said. Tension was causing some of her Southern accent to creep into her voice.

"These guys could have nothing to do with our case," I said reasonably. "But if so, it's a hell of a coincidence."

"Want me to tap one?" Marie asked.

I frowned. Marie was offering to "accidentally" bump into one of the new guys. Her power might very well knock the guy flat, but she would get a look into the guy's head. That could provide a lot of useful information, but at the cost of letting them know that someone with powers was also involved in the search. My gut said it was too soon to take it that far.

"Tail them," I told Marie. She doesn't stick out in a crowd as much as I do. And she can more than take care of herself.

"Okay," Marie nodded. "But what are you going to do?"

"Talk to Fred."

"Fred?" Marie said in surprise. Then she looked around.

And there he was. Big as life. Bigger, as a matter of fact. Fred Dukes, doing the work of three men as he unloaded a truck full of donated food for the hungry crowd.

"I'll be damned," Marie said with a small smile.


Fred is a big, round, tough-guy who works for a petty gangster named Pietro, doing jobs that require more muscle than brains. Oddly enough, once upon a time I used to work for Pietro as well, which is how Fred and I met. How I ended up with Pietro is a long story - I once thought there was more to him than there actually was. Fred has a soft spot for me, and I use that ruthlessly. I can't help but feel bad about that, but Fred knows a lot of people and is a great window into the world of small gangs and low-rent crooks.

"Dom!" Fred said with a big, gap-toothed grin. He had four man-sized bags of vegetables - ingredients for the soup kitchen - slung over his huge shoulders.

"Hey, Fred," I replied as I hefted another bag from the truck and followed him into the tent kitchen.

Fred dropped his sacks onto a roughly knocked-together table that groaned under the weight. I decided to put mine on floor next to the table as Fred paused to wipe sweat from his forehead. A trio of older women dressed in aprons - Salvation Army volunteers - began opening the bags and organizing the contents. In the background, huge pots of water were being brought to a boil on a pair of old Army field stoves. Something like a dozen people were tending the pots, chopping vegetables, and counting out freshly washed bowls and spoons.

"I didn't know you were volunteering here!" Fred said delightedly. A malformed turnip had spilled onto the floor. Fred absent-mindedly picked it up and began munching on it like an apple.

"I'm not. But I saw you and thought you might need a hand."

"Great! Hey... are you on a case?"

Fred's smarter than he looks, which is not hard to do, I suppose. I pulled the carefully folded sketch that the Tinman had given me out of my jacket pocket and showed it to him.

"Do you know them?" I asked.

Fred didn't even hesitate, "Yeah, I've seen her around. Nice rack. Friendly, too. I kinda worry about the kid, though. He doesn't seem real healthy. Barely eats."

"Do you know her name?"

Fred shook his head, "Never caught it."

"Any idea where they live?"

"In that Hooverville under the Lincoln bridge."

Bingo.

"Thanks, Fred," I said. Then I stood on my tiptoes and kissed him on the cheek. He actually blushed.

Outside the tent, the crowd was forming up into a line despite the fact the food wouldn't be ready for an hour to two. One thing poor people always have is time.

Marie was waiting for me.

"Got anything?" I asked.

She nodded toward the park entrance. The three guys in suits were standing there, talking to a young, dark-complected woman who had black, unfashionably short hair. She was wearing tight-fitting brown leather pants and a matching jacket and was sitting on a motorcycle as she talked to the men.

"The mooks are Germans," Marie said quietly. "I got close enough to hear them talking to each other, but I don't know the lingo well enough to know what they're saying. Their English, on the other hand, is damn near perfect. You'd swear they all came from the Midwest. They're asking around for the mother, but all they have is a description."

Marie paused to glance at the girl on the motorcycle, "I don't know who she is. She just showed up."

"Her name's Maria Hill," I said. "She's a competitor."

Marie raised an eyebrow, "A private dick?"

"More of a a private dyke," I said with a smile.

Marie gave me a look that was half-disgusted and half-amused. "Some might say that describes us."

I grinned at Marie, "Yep. Hey... speaking of which, when are you going to stop wearing skirts and high-heels and start wearing pants and sensible shoes?"

"Never. I have to keep up appearances. I'm obviously the submissive, feminine half of our unnatural relationship."

I either laughed or snorted at that. It was hard to tell the difference.

"Besides," Marie said softly, her eyes still on the unlikely group at the park entrance, "wouldn't you miss that magical moment where you reach under my skirt and slide off my panties? Remember last month, when we were on that stakeout in your car?"

I winced. The guy we had been watching walked out of his house at exactly the wrong moment. Sex with your stakeout partner is really unprofessional, but whenever Marie and I are alone and don't have much else to keep us occupied... well, they say idle hands are the devil's workshop.

"Maybe we better talk about something else," I said hastily.

"Did Fred have anything?" Marie asked.

"He says he's seen the mother and the boy. He didn't know any names, but he says they live under the Lincoln bridge."

As we watched, Maria and the Germans came to some kind of decision. Maria zoomed off on her motorcyle, headed uptown. The Germans got into a brand-new Ford and headed downtown.

There was a collection box for the soup kitchen on a table near the park's entrance. I dropped the Tinman's gold coin into it as we walked out of the park.


Marie looked around at the shantytown that we were standing in with no particular expression. In her bright dress, she stood out, but her part of the South hasn't seen much in the way of prosperity since General Sherman visited it back in 1864. She once told me that she was a teenager before she owned a pair of shoes. When you got down to it, she was more used to both the sight and the reality of grinding poverty than I was.

The old man squinted at the sketch I was holding in front of him as he meditatively sucked on his teeth.

"Yeah... yeah... I know her," he said. "Mrs. Rogers. She's a widow - and a nice gal. She used to live over there."

The old man punctuated his words by pointing at a hovel made up of fragments of wooden packing crates. It leaned precariously against the corner of a bridge stanchion. I suppose it might help keep off the worst of the rain and cold, but not by much. At the moment, a ragged looking teenager was sitting cross-legged in the irregular entrance-way, moaning softly to himself as he rocked slowly back-and-forth. Opium, if I had to make a guess. and he was in pretty deep. He'd be dead in a few months. Or weeks.

"Used to live there?" I repeated.

The old man nodded vigorously, "She got a job as a cleaning woman at a downtown hotel. It's called the Clarion. Part of the job is that they give her and her boy room and board. It sounded like a good deal."

Marie gave the old man a buck. His eyes just about popped out of his head.


The Clarion Hotel had seen better days, but it was still a respectable place for out-of-towners to spend a night or two. Which meant that the house detective took one look at Marie and I and immediately accosted us before we got halfway into the lobby.

"Ladies," he began carefully. "There is a hotel just down the street called the Grandview that you might find more suitable."

The Grandview was actually a nice place. And it was more willing to tolerate same-sex couples than a lot of other high-end hotels. Marie and I had stayed there once as a treat after we closed a big case. She got a huge kick out of the room service.

Actually, I had to give the house detective credit. It's not like Marie and I were carrying picket signs that said "LESBIAN STRUMPETS!" in big red letters, yet he had picked us out immediately. And he was being polite about it and making a good recommendation.

I reached for the thin leather wallet that held my private eye license - this city doesn't actually have a badge for PIs - and said, "We're here on business."

The guy took a deep breath and said, "Never the less, ladies..."

"Look at me," Marie said very flatly, before I could show the house detective my license.

The house detective blinked and gave Marie a long look. Then a look of startled recognition appeared on his face. And then he turned pale. Marie used to be with a guy called Logan. Logan runs the biggest and baddest gang in town. Marie and Logan weren't an item any longer, but not everyone knew that. And in any case, it really wasn't worth taking the chance that Logan might not feel protective about an old girlfriend. Hell, it was something I thought about every now and then. I knew for a fact that Logan still cared for Marie.

"My friend and I are going to go where we want and do what we want in this place," Marie said quietly. "And if I decide to eat her out on that fine piano sitting over there in the corner, you will do nothing more than politely hand me a napkin when I'm done with her. Understand?"

The detective nodded jerkily.

"Now, go away."

The detective nodded again and vanished.

"I have two things to say," I said after a long and startled pause.

Marie cocked her head at me, but didn't say anything.

"First off - that was maybe too much. The guy was just doing his job. And he was trying to be polite about it. And we might have been able to play the professional courtesy card once we explained that we didn't want a room."

Marie shrugged, "Maybe, but I get sick of the bullshit sometimes. And we do have to find Mrs. Rogers before those other guys do."

"You're right. But let's be a little careful about dropping the Logan bomb. It draws attention."

"Okay, but what's the second thing you have to say?" Marie asked.

"That I'm so turned on right now that the piano thing actually sounds like a good idea."

Marie smiled and ran her fingers through the white streak in her hair. "Later. I'd prefer a little more privacy."


After our little encounter with the house detective, the rest of the Clarion's staff weren't inclined to give us any trouble. We found Mrs. Rogers within a few minutes. She was in the middle of making a bed in a fourth floor room when I politely knocked on the open door.

"Sorry. I'll be done in just a few minutes," Mrs. Rogers told us. She was probably in her late twenties or early thirties, but her blonde hair already had a touch of gray. She wasn't pretty anymore - living in a shack underneath a bridge will do that to you - but her trim body and strong features would still draw a second look from most men. Her voice had the merest trace of an Irish accent. She'd probably been really young when her family came to America from the old country.

Now came the tricky part. I had to convince Mrs. Rogers to cooperate with us when she had no reason in the world to do that.

I had just opened my mouth when we heard a rapid pair of shots. They came from somewhere downstairs.


Despite the fact she was wearing high heels, Marie beat me to the stairwell. But I passed her as we clattered down the steps. Once I broke into the lobby, a continuous, high-pitched scream directed me behind the check-in desk.

I had my .45 automatic out as I entered the hotel's back office. The house detective was on the floor, his blood soaking into the threadbare carpet and a short-barreled .38 revolver loosely gripped in his dead hand.

A back door that obviously led into the alley behind the hotel was open. A desk clerk was screaming at the top of her lungs as she stared at the body of the house detective. A frightened bellhop took one look at me, made the assumption that I was a lady cop, and pointed to the door and yelled, "That way! He went that way! And he's got Steve!"

It was fifty-fifty which way I should be pointing my gun when I ran into the alley. I trusted to my luck - always a good bet for me - and found myself aiming at the mouth of the alleyway. One of the Germans from Union Park had an automatic pistol in one hand and little Steve Rogers firmly grabbed in the other. The kid was fighting, but he was a scrawny little thing and the German was manhandling him without much problem.

Maria Hill was there as well. She looked shocked and pissed-off. I understood. I hate working with violence-prone idiots, too. Hill had a revolver and as I watched she pointed it at the thug's head and snarled in passable German, "Put the weapon down and let the kid go!"

The German hesitated, obviously surprised by what Hill was doing. I added to his woes by pointing my .45 at him and yelling, "Drop it!"

Neither Hill or I wanted to take a shot while there was a kid near our target. That made sense, but maybe we should have done it anyway.

The German looked at Hill. Then he looked at me. Then he smiled and dropped his gun. The smile should have warned us. The German said something. It was a word with a lot more consonants than vowels. I didn't recognize the language.

And then Maria Hill burst into flames.


Hill screamed like a damned soul and collapsed. The German ran, dragging the kid behind him. I took a distracted shot at him, but only managed to clip the alley wall. Otherwise, there wasn't any time to think. I sprinted forward, pulling off my jacket as I went. I was going to try to use it to smother the flames that were engulfing Hill, even though I had a sick feeling in my gut that there wasn't a hospital in the world that could save her. Hill was on fire from head to foot, but maybe all of that leather motorcycle gear she was wearing would protect her enough to...

My footsteps faltered and I ground to an amazed halt as Maria Hill slowly climbed to her feet. Her face was gone and replaced by a burning skull. The brighter flames in the skull's sockets seemed to look right at me from the hottest part of hell.

Impossibly, the jaws of the skull worked as it tried to speak to me.

"Sinner," it finally said. Its voice sounded like hot steam grumbling its way through the boiler of a battleship.

Without thinking, I emptied my .45 into the thing that used to be Maria Hill. All six shots slammed into its chest. The cumulative effect was that it staggered backwards a few steps. And that was all.

It was impossible that the thing before me could smile, but as it looked at me, it seemed to do just that.

I turned and ran back into the hotel.


"Run! RUN!" I yelled as I barreled my way back into the hotel.

Marie had finally caught up to me. She was carrying her shoes in one hand and the handgun she keeps in her purse was in the other. The bellhop was on his knees, trying to do the impossible by pressing a folded up towel against the house detective's wounds. The clerk had stopped screaming and was on the phone, frantically calling for help.

The civilians gaped at me. Marie moved off to the side and leveled her gun at the door. Nobody ran. So much for any leadership abilities I might have thought I possessed.

Than the thing that had been Maria Hill followed me into the room. It's flames cast a strange yellow-orange light and the temperature immediately jumped about ten degrees.

The bellhop didn't make a sound as he finally took my advice and sprinted away. The clerk started screaming again as she dropped the phone, but at least she followed the bellhop out into the lobby.

Marie didn't scream. She just fired her pistol carefully and precisely, emptying the cylinder. I didn't bother to look behind me, but I was willing to bet she scored more hits than not. The problem was, her .38 wasn't going to stop something that had just absorbed a half-dozen .45 slugs. But apparently her gunfire bought us some time.

I grabbed Marie's arm as I ran past her. I could feel my luck flowing into her. Good, she was going to need all she could get.

Together, we scrambled over the desk that separated the office from the lobby. The thing behind us just ploughed through it. There was a tremendous crash and chunks of wood exploded everywhere. A half-dozen guests who were in the lobby, drawn by the noise and excitement, watched us in amazement. But once they saw the thing, they shrieked in unison and scattered in every direction.

Marie and I lunged through the front door and out onto the sidewalk. The thing followed us by jumping through the plate-glass window that was the pride and joy of the Clarion Hotel. It was fast and it didn't seem to have to worry about obstructions. And we didn't have any way to stop it.

We were in trouble. It would take the wildest stroke of luck for us to survive.

The wildest stroke of luck was in the process of getting out of a car in front of the Clarion. It was Kitty Pryde, one of this city's crazier powered hitters. She works for Logan. She and I really don't like each other, but at the moment that wasn't much of an issue. Her eyes were comically wide as she stared at the wild scene unfolding in front of her.

"Hi, Kitty," Marie said almost conversationally. Then she wrapped her arm around Kitty and planted a big kiss on her lips. With her other arm, she hooked me in until we were all three locked into an awkward embrace. Then all three of us went desolid and fell through the sidewalk and several yards of concrete, brick, and earth, before tumbling into a sewer tunnel. Just before we vanished under the earth, I could have sworn I heard the thing pursuing us roar in rage.


"I'm gonna kill you both," Kitty gasped after she spat out a mouthful of unspeakably foul water.

"Looks like you're going to have to wait your turn," I snapped back as Marie helped me to my feet. I was woozy from all of the contact with her.

"What the hell was that thing?" Marie gasped.

"Maria Hill," I answered distractedly.

"What?!" Marie exclaimed.

"I'M GONNA KILL YOU BOTH!" Kitty screeched as she produced a switchblade from somewhere and flicked it open. She has a nasty knife-fighting style that involves sliding in and out of solidity. Yeah, she can do that sort of thing. Kitty's a dangerous piece of work, but at the moment she was trembling and barely keeping on her feet. Marie's power had done a job on her.

"Your powers aren't working right now," Marie told Kitty as she gingerly stepped out of the water and onto a short ledge that was adjacent to the watercourse.

"What?!" Kitty said as she paused in confusion. To be fair, a lot was happening to her at once.

I broke Kitty's nose and took her knife away.


We walked a couple of blocks and then I climbed an access ladder and shouldered open a manhole cover. I imagine we were quite the sight as we crawled out of the sewers. More than a few people stopped to stare at us. Down the street, a crowd was gathering in front of the Clarion Hotel, but I couldn't see any sign of the thing that had been chasing us. And besides, the crowd indicated that it wasn't in the area any longer. I can't imagine anyone who saw it would stick around.

"We should keep moving," I told Marie and Kitty.

Marie helped Kitty out of the manhole.

"I'm gonna kill you both," Kitty wept. Her nose was assuming epic size and color, both eyes were turning black, and blood was dribbling down her chin. I think the tears were more from humiliation than pain. Kitty's crazy and I'm not sure she actually feels pain like normal people.

"Don't pull a weapon on us again," I said shortly.

"Would it do any good if we said we were sorry?" Marie asked.

"No. I'm gonna kill..."

"WE KNOW!" I yelled.

"Come on, Kitty," Marie said softly. "We've got to get out of here. And then we'll get cleaned up and I'll take a look at your nose."

Kitty hesitated. Then she nodded. Damned if I know how Marie does that.


The apartment that Marie and I shared was closer than my office, so we went there. A while back, we decided to move in together. Our new apartment was an okay place - certainly better than the places where we both live before, but I sometimes missed Marie's old apartment. It had been the size of a largish closet and there'd been a huge neon sign that blinked all night long just outside her window. The first time we made love had been there. I remembered the way the alternating red light took turns revealing and concealing her nude body...

I shook my head to clear it. We didn't have time to be either nostalgic or horny.

We took turns in the shower. Kitty ended up in Marie's old robe. Given how small Kitty is, she looked like a kid wearing some of her big sister's clothes.

Marie cleaned up Kitty as best she could, put some cotton in her nostrils to soak up the blood, set her nose, and then put some surgical tape over it to keep it in place until Kitty could see a real doctor. A few years in the PI business - first as a secretary and then as an actual investigator - had given her a fair amount of practical experience with the kinds of injuries that come with the job.

Kitty had finally calmed down. I knew this incident was going to end up high on the list of reasons why Kitty hated me, but at least she wasn't in one of her psycho rages at the moment.

"What were you doing at the hotel?" I asked Kitty as I put a shot of whiskey in front of her.

Kitty drained the glass immediately and then held it out for more.

"I wasn't going into the hotel. I was going into the barbershop next door. It's one of our bookie shops and I was going to walk the receipts home. Just what the hell did I run into?"

I refilled her glass. "We're on a case. The details are messy and it got kind of weird. I don't know for sure where the burning skeleton fits in."

Kitty shook her head, "You know something? I don't really care. I don't want to know. You're a pain in the ass, Domino. Trouble follows you everywhere."

I couldn't argue with that.

Then Kitty looked at Marie, "For God's sake, Rogue. Ditch this crazy bitch. Come back to us. Logan will take you back in a heartbeat - you know that."

Marie just smiled sadly, but didn't say anything. Then she reached over and pushed a stray lock of Kitty's hair away from her eyes. It says something about Kitty that she didn't flinch away from Marie's touch.

Kitty sighed and slugged down her whiskey.


Kitty drank a lot more of my whiskey. Then she put on her still-damp clothes, made a dispirited-sounding threat or two in my direction, and tottered unsteadily out the door.

"What now?" Marie asked me.

I shrugged. "We find the kid and get him back."

"How do we find him? We don't have any leads."

I sighed and stretched. It had been a tough day so far and it wasn't done yet.

"Actually, we do have one lead - Maria Hill. She pulled a gun on the German who grabbed the kid. I think she got hired by the Germans because she was a local who knew the city. Then she found out she was involved in something she didn't like."

"And then she turned into a horrible, burning, skeleton-monster and chased us out of the hotel," Marie pointed out.

"There's that," I conceded.

"How do we find Hill?" Marie asked.

"Let's start with the basics. She's in the phone book."


Actually, nobody was more surprised than me when a tired sounding Maria Hill picked up her office phone.

"Hill here," she said.

I took a deep breath and said, "Hill... this is Domino."

There was a moment of silence, then Hill said, "Dom, what the hell is going on?"

I managed not to laugh, "Actually, I was kind of hoping you could explain it to me. Who are those German guys?"

She did laugh, but it sounded bitter. "They're not who they told me they were, that's for sure. They said they were German private cops, looking for a woman who'd been a maid for a banker. She was supposedly with him while he was on a long business trip here in the states. They told me she'd stolen some jewelry from him - family heirloom stuff. The banker wanted the jewelry back, but couldn't take it to the cops because he's married and was sticking it to the maid."

"Not a bad story. It covers all the bases," I said appreciatively. "Why'd they want you?"

"They needed a local who knew the streets and the people. Look, Dom, business has been tight lately and maybe I didn't ask enough questions, but when I heard those shots and then saw that guy grab the kid... I didn't hire on for that. The job wasn't supposed to be about hurting anyone."

"I know. I saw you pull a gun on the German and tell him to let go of the boy. I had a drop on him, too. But then you changed into... something."

Hill didn't say anything. I gave her some time to respond. The seconds stretched on.

"Hill?" I prompted.

"I don't know what happened to me, Dom," she said distantly. "I changed, but I was sort of still me. I can remember everything, but a lot of it doesn't make sense. I seemed to see... the bad things that people had done. It was like a black shroud around them. And it was my job to send that kind of person on to be punished."

My skin crawled. I didn't like the sound of, '...on to be punished.'

"But I couldn't do what I supposed to do," Hill continued, her voice still shockingly sane. "I should have gone after the German. He's a seriously bad guy. He likes to hurt people - women especially. There was a girl he killed in his home town when he was a kid. And another one when he was in the army. And one more after the war. It's what he does when they figure him out - when they become witnesses. And then he killed the house dick in that hotel when he tried to stop the kidnapping - I could see that, too. But something stopped me from dealing with him. And instead I went after you."

Hill stopped talking. And I could hear was gasping, tearing sound from the other end of the phone line. She was crying.

"Where's the boy?" I asked after giving her some time to get ahold of herself.

"They have rooms at a dockside hotel," Hill said brokenly. "It's called the Gold Rush. Maybe they have him there."

I shook my head, even though it was impossible for Hill to see it, "No way they're still there."

"Maybe they are. They don't know I know where they're staying. I followed them after our first meeting."

God bless the paranoia and curiosity of the typical private eye.


Marie was normally careful about the way she dressed. I think it has something to do with being raised dirt poor. But she made a face when I told her where we were going and changed into an outfit that made her look like the kind of girl you would expect to see on the docks.

"This is a new look for you," I observed.

"I'm just a poor working girl," she said, gazing in a mirror as she applied way too much bright red lipstick. "Down on my luck and forced to perform the vilest sexual acts in order to get by. In fact, I've fallen so low that I'm allowing myself to be used by an older *gasp* woman!"

"'Older woman?'," I quoted. Maybe my voice squeaked a bit in outrage.

Marie put down her lipstick and posed dramatically - eyes closed in anguish and her hand on her brow. "An older woman who will demand that I do things that defy the laws of God and nature! Naked and on my knees I will give the older temptress perverse oral pleasures as I tremble in utter humiliation, sure in the knowledge that the gates of Hell now yawn wide for me!"

"You're three months older than me!" I interrupted indignantly.

By now, Marie's Southern accent was in full bloom. "The last tattered shreds of my innocence stripped from me, I sob in utter degradation. Meanwhile, my cruel seducer contemptously casts a few coins on the floor! Meager payment for the perverse pleasures that were afforded her!"

"Hey, I didn't seduce you! You seduced me! Uh... wait a minute.. are you asking for a raise?"

Marie smiled as she put the cap on her lipstick. "My pay is just fine, thank you. And you're damn right I seduced you. You were such a frightened lamb the first time. Trembling like a virgin. It was adorable."

I rolled my eyes, but I couldn't really think of a response.


The Gold Rush Hotel wasn't exactly in any of the guide books. It was a three story brick building that was visibly falling apart. It was the kind of place that had two kinds of customers: sailors and their very temporary friends, and people who either didn't care or didn't have a choice about where they slept.

But now the hotel could add kidnappers its list of clientele.

Marie and I were in a run-down diner across the street from the hotel. Neither one of us were crazy enough to actually eat the food, but the coffee was passable. A few seconds ago, we'd seen one of the Germans exit the hotel long enough to buy a newspaper.

"You'd think the boy would raise a ruckus," Marie said thoughtfully.

"It's not the kind of place where anyone cares much about a screaming kid," I pointed out. "And besides, all they have to do is tell the boy to play ball or they'll kill his mom. That'll keep him quiet."

"So what's the plan?" Marie asked.

"Call the cops."

Marie raised an eyebrow. In between the corruption and the incompetence, the cops in this town are notably useless. Normally, we try to avoid them.

"If we try to spring the kid, they Germans will have every reason to fight," I explained. "After all, there's just the two of us. And the kid might get caught in the crossfire. But if the cops show up... well, that's a different ball of wax. There's a lot more incentive to be reasonable."

Marie thought about it and then nodded, "It's better than anything I can come up with."

"Right," I said agreeably. "So I'll..."

"Oh, crap," whispered Marie, her eyes suddenly gone wide.

I followed her gaze. Out in front of the Gold Rush Hotel, Maria Hill had just parked her motorcycle. As we watched, she calmly pulled a sawed-off shotgun out of her saddlebag, chambered a shell, and began walking into the hotel. She looked seriously pissed off.

"New plan," I said as I jumped to my feet.

"What?" Marie asked as she checked her purse to make sure her handgun was accessible.

"We make it up as we go along and try not to get killed."

"Sounds about right," Marie said as she followed me out the door.


We were almost to the door of the Gold Rush Hotel when we heard the shattering boom of the shotgun. After a brief pause, a couple of pistol shots responded. Rushing inside, we raced past a bunch of people who were either seeking cover or runing for the exits. The kind of people who work or stay in a place like the Gold Rush have fairly well developed survival instincts.

More shots came from upstairs. Marie and I advanced up the stairs in short rushes, one of us covering the other as they moved.

On the second floor, we found the fire-fight.

On the floor of the hallway, one of the Germans was missing a big chunk of his chest. Blood and fragments of flesh were splattered on the walls and floor. Further down the hall, another German was down and a shockingly huge pool of blood was pouring from his body. Hill was using a doorway for cover as she traded shots with someone else further down the hall. As I watched, she ran out of ammo. Dropping her shotgun, she leaned back and began pulling out a small automatic pistol.

Hill's eyes met mine. There was a nasty gash just above her right eye that was turning her face into a mask of blood. I could see a bullet wound oozing blood from her stomach - and that was bad place to get shot. She'd also been hit in one of her legs, and her left arm had been creased. I suppose Hill had decided that living would be nice, but it wasn't exactly a priority. That explained the suicidally direct assault.

The guy who'd been shooting at Hill realized that her shotgun was out of shells and that she was in middle of trading weapons. That made him brave enough to risk coming further out in the open in an effort to get a clearer shot at her. Apparently he was concentrating so hard on her that he hadn't notice me. I sighted my .45 and double-tapped a pair of slugs into him. He staggered back into the room he'd been shooting from.

I advanced down the hallway slowly, keeping my weapon pointed at the door the wounded German had vanished into. There was a pretty good chance he was out of the fight, but I didn't want to take the chance. And besides, there might be more than three of the guys. Behind me, I could sense Marie covering me. Hill came out of her doorway and began painfully staggering down the hall, leaning against the wall for support. She left a long smear of blood on the wall behind her. I made a mental note to never piss her off.

The possibility that Hill might at any second turn into the burning skeleton monster was something I was definitely thinking about.

I beat Hill to the door - not surprising when you consider how badly shot up she was. I listened for a second and didn't hear anything. Then I took a deep breath and made a diving roll into the room. That's something I really wouldn't recommend anyone else try, but it works for me. I'm lucky that way.

I ended up against a wall, crouched low and with my weapon pointed in front of me. Hill took a position at the doorway, using it for cover while aiming her gun into the room.

We weren't ready for what we saw.

The furniture had all been shoved to the sides of the room and the carpet had been torn up, revealing the wooden floor. Some sort of red symbol had been drawn on the floor. In the center of the symbol was little Steve Rogers, bound hand and foot. He was thrashing against the ropes, but didn't seem to be getting anywhere.

The guy I'd shot had collapsed half onto the symbol painted on the floor. I was pretty sure he was dead. His out-stretched arm was almost touching Steve.

An older man, wearing nothing but his pants, was standing near the back of the room, holding an ancient-looking, iron-bound, book open in his hands. Strange linear symbols were drawn all over his chest, arms, and face in what looked like black ink. His eyes were startlingly blue. They almost seemed to glow.

Looking more irritated than anything else, the old man said a word. And Maria Hill changed once again into a horror made of burning bones.

I put a shot into the old man, hoping that would break the... well... 'spell' or whatever it was that he'd done to Hill. I could have sworn that the bullet hit the old man in the chest, but he didn't react. And then I felt the kind of heat you get when someone opens a furnace door and Hill was on me.

Her first blow knocked the gun out of my hand and damn near broke my wrist. I screamed and tried to draw my backup weapon with my other hand, but by then the thing that used to be Maria Hill had me by the neck and arm. I locked eyes with her... it... and in them I could only see an eternity of flame.

Marie charged into the room, blazing away with her six-gun at the old man with the book. I think she was yelling my name. I tried to scream at Marie to run, this wasn't a thing we could fight, but the grip on my throat was too strong and it was getting worse. It was only a matter of a few seconds until my larynx collapsed.

Then Marie slapped Hill on the back of her flaming head. Through a gray haze as I teetered on the edge of conciousness, I could have sworn that I smelled burning flesh.

What happened next is difficult to describe.

Marie absorbs powers, but she absorbs the powers of folks like me and her and Kitty. The kind of people that some of the scientist types call 'mutants'. But whatever the hell Maria Hill had become, I was pretty sure it didn't have anything to do with science. However, Marie's power did manage to do something.

Hill returned to normal - bullet wounds and all. Her grip relaxed and she collapsed against me. I grabbed her more by reflex than anything else. Meanwhile, Marie was surrounded by a reddish light and her eyes had become yellow slits. And she was screaming in sheer horror.

The old man in the back of the room cursed in German and gestured with his hands. Some unseen force slammed me, Marie, and Hill against the wall so hard that the plaster crunched and I could hear the studs in the wall crack. But the pressure didn't let up on us. It kept increasing and I realized that if it kept up we'd all be crushed like bugs.

Believe it or not, that's when Steve Rogers saved us.

He'd somehow worked his way loose from the ropes holding him. Then he reached over and grabbed one of those huge glass ashtrays. The kind you normally only see in bars. It was sitting on a low table that had been shoved, like the other furniture in the room, against the walls.

In one smooth motion, pivoting with the grace of a pro-baseball player, Steve pitched the ashtray like a discus. It slammed into the old man's temple. Whatever the old man had going for him that shrugged off gunfire didn't seem to work. His eyes lost their focus and he staggered backwards.

The pressure on us vanished and we collapsed to the floor.

Okay... no guns. With my uninjured hand, I pulled out the switchblade I'd taken earlier from Kitty. It flicked open as I scrambled painfully towards the old guy.

He was still dazed from Steve's contribution to the fight. I elbow-punched him in face and then kicked his legs out from under him. He tumbled to the floor and I landed on top of him.

He seemed shocked when three inches of steel suddenly appeared in his heart.


As we staggered to the car - I had Hill over my shoulder and Marie was leading Steve - I heard myself ask the kid, "Hey, how'd you get loose from those ropes?"

"Remember that guy who got shot and fell down right next to me?" Steve replied immediately. "I broke his wristwatch. Then I used the glass to cut my ropes."

Huh. Sharp kid.

"Who are you?" Steve asked us.

"A pair of hard-working and now badly beat-up private eyes," I answered tiredly. "We were hired to take care of you."

"Private eyes?" he said excitedly. "You mean, like in the movies? But that can't be right - you're girls!"

Still blinking back tears of pain from her burned hand, Marie smiled distractedly at Steve and ruffled his hair with her uninjured hand.

"Girls can do anything boys can do," I said stoically.

"Bet you can't pee standing up," Steve replied instantly.

Little wise-ass, I grumped to myself. But we had finally got to the car and I was too distracted to reply.


We barely got Hill to the hospital in time. Sometimes, I stay awake at night, stare at the ceiling and wonder if some higher - or lower - power intervened for Maria Hill. She really should have bled out and died before we got her to the hospital.

I had a badly sprained wrist, some cracked ribs, and a lot of miscellaneous bruises, cuts, and scrapes. Marie had a burned hand, but thankfully it wasn't too severe. She also had a list of minor injuries that more-or-less matched mine. Steve had a black eye and few bruises, but otherwise he'd managed to get through his ordeal pretty much intact.

Somehow or other, the hospital didn't get around to calling the cops - which would have meant a lot of awkward questions and would certainly have resulted in Steve being taken away from us.

"Did you call Logan?" I asked Marie as we painfully left the hospital with Steve in tow. Hill was staying, of course.

She smiled awkwardly at me, "Damn right."

"I don't like getting him involved in our cases," I growled.

"He's useful, Dom." Something about the way Marie was talking bothered me. It was like she was responding distantly and automatically, without precisely thinking about what she was saying.

"I don't want to owe him favors."

Marie smiled momentarily in a way that was oddly halfway between impish and subdued. It moved the bruises on her face around in interesting ways. "So we'll pay him back with a threesome. Problem solved."

"What's a threesome?" Steve asked innocently.

Oops. We'd forgotten the old saying about little pitchers and big ears.

"Forget I said that," Marie told Steve firmly - seeming to come back to herself for just a moment.

Everything Marie was saying and doing seemed forced. Something was bothering her, and it wasn't hard to figure out what it was. When she tried to absorb the powers of the transformed Maria Hill, she'd gotten a good look inside the mind of the creature that Maria had become. That had been bad, but she was trying to pretend that everything was okay. I was getting worried.


The Tinman and Mrs. Rogers showed up at our office almost simultaneously.

Mrs. Rogers was almost hysterical. As soon as she saw Steve, she grabbed him and squeezed so hard that I thought we might have to rescue him again. Once she was done with Steve, Mrs. Rogers hugged me... carefully, thank goodness. And then Marie. And then Sooraya. The Tinman seemed amused at our flustered reactions to her gratitude. We weren't used to gratitude. Most of our customers paid sullenly and then stalked out the door.

I told the Tinman our story. Maybe I expected him to tell us we were crazy, but instead he just listened to what I had to say with a mildly interested expression on what was left of his face. Mrs. Rogers' eyes got wider and wider as I worked my way through our tale.

Then, like a sorcerer out of some fairy tale, the Tinman handed Mrs. Rogers a bag of gold. It was filled with more double eagles. I was thinking that they might have to start calling him the Goldman.

"Hide. There may be more men who want to hurt Steven," he told Mrs. Rogers. His voice was dead serious.

Mrs. Rogers gave me an uncertain look. "Do as he says," I urged. "Get out of town right now - don't bother stopping for your stuff. Change your name. Settle down somewhere quiet and out of the way. Wait for the storm to pass."

She nodded hesitantly and thanked us again. Then Mrs. Rogers grabbed Steve and left.

I haven't seen her since. I hope she and Steve are okay.

The Tinman looked at me and said, "The storm hasn't begun."

It took me a second to realize he was talking about the last thing I'd said to Mrs. Rogers.

"What the hell is going on?" I asked, trying to keep the worst of the exasperation I was feeling out of my voice. "Who were the guys who kidnapped Steve? Why did they kidnap Steve? What happened to Maria Hill? And just what kind of storm are you talking about?"

Sooraya handed the Tinman a cup of tea and then pushed a chair next to him. She was being very deferrential to him. He accepted both with thanks and sat down.

"The man who had Steven kidnapped was a sorcerer," he said conversationally. "He was a member of a German mystical order that has dangerously extreme political leanings. As I understand it, he used divination magics to catch a glimpse of the future and learned that fate has great things in store for Steven Rogers - things that might frustrate the plans of men like him. He was attempting to alter fate by using Steven's life as a source of power. Suffice to say that it is a good thing you stopped him."

I nodded warily.

"Miss Hill is a victim," the Tinman continued. "She was temporarily possessed by a demon of vengeance that the sorcerer was using for his own purposes. That was a powerful and dangerous summoning - most unwise, actually. Zarathos is not an entity that can be safely toyed with."

Then, as calmly as if we were discussing the latest baseball box-scores, the Tinman put his straw into his teacup and took a sip. Marie and I exchanged a long look. Sooraya, acting as if the Tinman had said nothing particularly unusual, calmly inserted some paper into her typewriter and began tapping on the keys. Things are different where she comes from.

"There's a war coming," Marie said suddenly. "That's the storm you're talking about, isn't it?"

A worn expression appeared on what was left of the Tinman's face. "Yes," he said. "A terrible war. Worse than the last one, I fear."

I think my stomach turned over. Worse than the Great War? Dear, God...

Balancing his teacup on his knee, the Tinman put four more double eagles on my desk. "The remainder of your fee," he said.

I chuckled painfully, "I hope it covers our medical bills."

He shrugged, "I think you will be feeling much better tomorrow."

I managed not to laugh.

"That symbol that was painted on the floor of the hotel room," he said. "What did it look like?"

I shook my head, "Not a swastika, if that's what you're thinking."

"It looked like a snake with a lot of heads," said Marie.

Really? I hadn't got a good look at the symbol. All I saw were a bunch of wavy lines...

The Tinman nodded. And there was something in the way he did that that seemed to suggest that the Marie had given him an answer he expected.

"What's your name?" I asked, refusing to let the conversation end. I'm a PI. Curiousity is our curse.

He smiled. Sort of. Whatever was underneath his mask twisted his lower face strangely.

"I understand that people call me the Tinman."

"I mean your real name."

"You wouldn't know it."

"Try me."

"Please," Marie added gently.

The Tinman put his half-finished cup of tea on my desk, right next to the short stack of gold coins. He carefully tapped his wooden straw against the rim of the cup to clear it of fluid and then pocketed it. Then he stood up and limped to the office door. Sooraya stood up and opened the door for him.

Just before he left, he paused, looked back at us, and said, "I am Dr. Stephen Strange. Captain, U. S. Army Medical Corps. However, I am no longer on active duty."

He was right. The name meant nothing to me.

"Have a good day, Doctor Strange," Sooraya said politely as she held the door for him.


That night, just before we went to bed, I hesitantly asked Marie what she saw when she touched the demon.

"Loneliness," Marie said as she checked the bandages on her hand. That made her wince.

I frowned in surprise. "That was all?"

She looked at me. "Oh, there were other things. Things like hate, obsession, callousness, and anger. Lots of anger. But the only thing that really mattered was the loneliness."

Marie's eyes were haggard and frightened. I was pretty sure she wasn't telling me everything. But I decided not to push.


Despite bone-deep weariness, it took a long time for us to fall asleep. We lay together in bed until early in the morning, holding one another and not saying anything. Sometimes, Marie trembled and cried softly. When we finally did drift off, it should have been a terrible and restless sleep, filled with pain and nightmares.

Sunrise woke me. I felt rested and fine.

Wait a minute...

I lifted up my right hand and flexed it. It was okay - not even a bruise. In fact, there wasn't a scratch on me. And Marie, lying next to me, still asleep and breathing softly, also looked okay.

Trying not to wake Marie, I pulled down the covers and carefully unwrapped the bandages to examine her burned hand. It was fine.

I kissed Marie on the forehead. She opened her eyes and smiled at me. Then a surprised expression appeared on her face.

"We apparently have a pretty good doctor." I said.

"Looks like. Do you suppose Hill is better?"

"I'd say that's a good bet," I said as I examined Marie's face. Her eyes were clear and I didn't see any fear in them. She seemed to be back to normal.

A thought occurred to me.

"What do you remember about what you saw in that demon's head?" I asked carefully.

She considered that for a moment, then frowned. "Huh. Actually, I don't remember much about it at all. It all seems... hazy."

Yeah, we had a pretty good doctor, all right.

All Marie was wearing was some pajama tops. I was wearing the bottoms. She says that whenever we're in bed together, she likes to be able to touch and kiss my boobs whenever the urge strikes her. I try to accomodate.

As I pulled off her pajama top, I said, "Let's not get out of bed today."

"Sounds good," she said. Then she kissed me.