Summary: Dexter and Heisenberg's game escalates.
Down on the Upside
"Something that made sense."
- Dexter Moser
'Zugzwang'
Porcelain. White porcelain. It reeks of bleach and other harsh cleaning chemicals that my nose cannot quite distinguish from each other. The pure, snow-white porcelain trails down into what was once clear water now stained a deep, murky red. My stomach stops doing gymnastics and the nausea that makes my head feel like an overripe melon recedes as I survey the bloody and chemical contents of my body in somewhat restrained horror and admiration.
But, I am certain that staring at one's own vomit is considered abnormal by humans, so I choose to stand and flush away the contents of my once-hearty body. The blood-red puke swirls around the toilet, looking like an admirable copy of red Kool-Aid before flying down the drain and being replaced by new, fresh water.
Chewing a piece of gum, I exit the stall I've been in and return to the auditorium my little group of cancer buddies have rented out for the night. We graduated from the dilapidated warehouse, but, unfortunately, neither the doughnuts or the coffee received their diplomas, apparently. I take a seat next to Lila and watch two men sitting across from us, seemingly uninterested in the woman speaking about how cancer had taken her right arm, which, I must admit, would have made me cry if I were capable of crying over such things. Instead, these two men play chess on a small, portable board and quietly talk amongst themselves.
"I wonder why they even come," Lila remarks, just as entranced as I am.
I shrug, "Maybe their wives made them."
We both share a laugh at that and try once more to tune into the amputee's story, but the game of kings has always interested me, and I find it infinitely more intriguing to watch than a bitter old woman share stories about how her life was before the bane that is cancer entered into it. So, I eventually find myself watching the chess game once more.
"You know," Lila begins, "You were in there for quite some time."
She must be referring to my extended trip to the bathroom, "I needed some time," I respond whilst shrugging, still watching as one man's queen takes the other's rook.
"Something tells me," the raven-haired Englishwoman says, "time is not something you have very much of. Why waste it in the bathroom?" I don't really understand the purpose of such a question, so I just shrug again and Lila switches the subject yet again, "Your friend has been following you again."
That one stops me cold, "My friend?" A friend? Following me? Dexter does not have friends. And when 'friends' are following him, it almost always means ill tidings.
"Yes," she affirms, patting my shoulder sympathetically, "though I can't be totally sure that he means very well. Whoever it is, is stalking you, so perhaps he's not exactly a friend…"
"But probably deranged," I respond, eliciting a chuckle out of the fair-skinned woman. I turn to her once more, "You're sure that someone's following me?"
"Every day," Lila responds, nodding, "a reddish-brown Taurus. The wanker probably even followed you to this place."
It's always nice to see that Debs isn't the only woman in the world that could make a sailor blush with her colorful language, but I thank Lila and return to staring at the chess game, a action which the Briton copies. Thoughts fly around Castle Dexter; each are half-baked fears brought about paranoid neuroticism, no doubt emanating from weary and weakened me. The guy with the white queen moves it up two spaces. The old Dexter, the old soldier, the old boy you could always count on would never be so jarred by such a revelation, but the Cancer-Man is made of somewhat pudgier stuff than grim, determined, special, wonderful me and I am forced to wonder who the follower is, and just how much he has seen, but the Passenger bids me to be calm. I have not felt the need in three weeks, only nausea. I am fairly sure that this did not start up over a month ago as I surely would have noticed by now. The man with the black bishop moves it diagonally. But if the 'wanker' did, in fact, follow me to this little auditorium, or is waiting outside in his reddish-brown Ford Taurus, I can find out who 'he' is, and perhaps allay any of my fears, and if he is a threat… well, I could think of worse ways to spend a Tuesday night.
"Shit!" One of the chess players exclaims far too loudly, causing a few of the members of the therapy session to look back at him in a severe manner, at which he looks apologetically at the rest of the therapy-goers.
"What happened?" Lila asks; confused.
I smile, "If he goes anywhere, he loses his queen."
Lila was right. There was a maroon Taurus that followed behind me at a distance whoever behind the wheel thought was stealthy. Of course, he wouldn't be far off, considering that I hadn't noticed him, which I find a little bit disappointing. I must be slipping. But I make sure to keep an eye out for the Taurus that will be ghosting me; I'll make sure he won't catch me out of the element again.
And I caught his license plate: 7638226
But, today, I find myself looking over some of our old cases. Seven cleared over the year so far, five pending with Heisenberg. All in all, if I bag Heisenberg, I'll have done by June the amount of cases most Homicide Officers close by December.
But Heisenberg has remained entirely too quiet over the last two weeks. And with Perry in the hole, there's likely no chance that the Slasher will continue to kill unless he absolutely feels it necessary. But, Perry is not in a speaking mood, either, not without having all of Miami's attention. He wants a reporter and a page one story. The idiot. In any case, that returns me to being dull, boring Dexter until one of them might send me another love note, another piece of a killer's mind. But I doubt that will happen, so... Decomp Cases it is!
"Espera!" Batista exclaims as I throw some of the less promising cases on to my desk and head towards the door.
"What?" I question, slightly peeved at being denied my chance to escape.
"You'd better put that tone away," the Cuban man responds, "LT says that Mayor Gibson is coming down to the office."
"Why?" I ask, but the answer is already pretty obvious. Last year was an election year, and the underdog Timothy Gibson, who tended to lean liberal, won out. Yeah. I know. A Democrat winning? In Florida? Must be the turn of a new century, after all. But, all Mayors ride with the Police Department for one day to observe how we're 'protecting the community' when they are elected, and Gibson won...
"Mayor's coming to observe, socio. Apparently he wanted to check out Homicide as well, given that this entire Tamiami Slasher thing blew up in our faces," Batista replies, before giving me a serious look, "Speaking of which, what's with the do?"
"The... do?" I question in a confused manner, punctuating my befuddlement with two light coughs.
"Bald doesn't suit you, Dex," Angel snorts, "and is that the beginning of a goatee? You look more like your dealing meth than investigating crimes."
"Thanks," I reply insincerely.
As if to end our bantering, the elevator dings open and a collective breath goes out the office. Suddenly officers and Detectives, even simple office workers stop and stare at an impressive man who walks out from the elevator. He is a tall man, standing about five inches taller than me, with well-swept brown hair and piercing green eyes, an aquiline nose and surprisingly angular jaw. His stride seems to be one that might push all but the most steadfast of obstacles out of the way, and it even appears some of the normally bold Officers of the Law back away sheepishly from the tall man in the Armani suit. He walks towards the middle of the room, before stopping, and rather comically, he stares around awkwardly, unsure of what to do next. So, he opts to stop the first person he sees, who happens to be Debra, and asks:
"I'm here to see Lieutenant Morgan."
Debra nods, but seems to be slightly peeved that out of all the cops the man could choose, he chose her: "In the office right there." She points to Harry's office and the man smiles, seeing his mistake:
"Oh, my mistake," he says, "I should have seen that. Thank you." He extends his hand out to the Morgan of the fairer sex, "Timothy Gibson."
Debra takes his hand, albeit in a most awkward fashion; she does not like politicians, I remember, just like her father, "Debra Morgan," the brunette replies.
"Morgan?" The Mayor questions, "Are you-"
"Lieutenant Morgan's daughter? Yes."
"Ah, okay," the man responds as Debs shakes his hand off hers, "Thank you again for the information."
And then he swoops away to Harry's office, knocking on the door before he enters. Debs sighs rather audibly and stalks over to where Angel and I watched their whole exchange:
"I fucking hate politicians," she says.
I let out a long-suffering sigh to match Debra's earlier exhalation, "Yes, yes. I get enough of that from Harry, I don't need to hear it from you, too." Debs snorts and sits on the edge of my table, and all three of us stare at the closed door to Harry's office when my phone rings. I pick it up:
"Moser."
"Hey, D, it's Quinn," the man's distinct accent registers across the line, "you should get down to the Port of Miami, we got a helluva a body count tied-up in a Narcotics case. Call should be coming from dispatch any second now."
"How many bodies?" I ask.
"Seven," he replies.
"Seven?" I ask incredulously, "where do you hide seven bodies in the Port of Miami?" Debra looks at me in surprise, even Angel flashes me a raised eyebrow of both interest and concern.
"You tell me," Quinn laughs mirthlessly, "we found 'em stuffed in a fucking shipping container here. Seven Jane-fucking-Doe's, too. Looked a little bit like it might have come from that Slasher guy you picked a few weeks back, so I thought you'd want to take a look." I mouth 'seven Jane Doe's' to Angel, who looks at me in surprise.
"Thanks, Quinn. We'll be down there ASAP," I reply before setting the phone back down, at which point Batista remarks:
"Shit," he remarks, "we gotta tell the LT." Debs nods her agreement, rushing to her smaller cubbyhole with a tiny desk nestled inside it to pick up her gun and badge. I put my badge around my neck and head to Harry's office with Batista. Once there, we knock:
"Come in," comes the gruff voice of Debs' father. I open the door and Harry gives me a rather displeased look: "What?" He asks.
"Got a tip from a friend in Narcotics, he says that we've got a situation out in the Port of Miami."
"Go," he says quickly, knowing that whenever I say 'we've got a situation', it does not mean very well. I nod and hurry towards the lift, Batista and Debs following behind.
It's a strangely cool morning in Miami, unseasonably cool, in fact, considering it's 62 degrees on a late April morning, and the regular temperatures around this time verge into the eighties. And, it's raining. Which is also great. I find myself wearing an olive-green double-breasted military coat and a thin sweatshirt underneath for a hood as we step into the rain:
"Fuck," Debs sighs, "I need to buy an umbrella. Rainy season's coming up."
I nod my agreement and proceed completely warm and completely dry to my car with both Batista and Debra following behind. We all cram ourselves into my tiny automobile and I ask Batista where his Camaro went, at which point he says it's in the shop. I snort in laughter and say something witty about mid-life crises and sputtering cars as we travel to the Port and arrive there fifteen minutes after we leave from the precinct.
The Port of Miami has always been a place that makes me nervous. I don't particularly like the maze that the shipping containers create, and something about shipping containers themselves frighten me. I know, the man with no fear fears a rectangular box. Ridiculous, yes, but it's a little fear that I can't really explain.
We ditch my car in a designated lot nearby where all the Narcotics Officers parked and walk to where it seems everyone, including Homicide first-responders, is congregating. I find Quinn in a high-visibility jacket, one of those high-lighter yellow colored jackets, waiting outside the police tape, presumably for us. Debs and Batista both rush to a Uni who is handing out the jackets whilst I walk over to the other Irishman:
"Looking good, D," he remarks with no small amount of sarcasm, "you keep that jacket for special occasions?"
"Always keep a spare," I state the oft-repeated mantra of any good detective: always keep a spare of everything.
"And I like the drug-dealer goatee, too," he smirks. At least he hasn't called me cue-ball yet, "there's a whole, nice, trampy air about you. Look very Dickensian."
"My, that's a big word," I mock, "Where're the bodies?"
"Where all the people are, genius," Quinn snarks, pointing at a crowd of Narcotics and Homicide Officers milling about a shipping container in the distance. I nod, coming very dangerously close to punching the man right in his muck-mouthed jaw, but Debs and Angel return in those ghastly jackets and I am suddenly blinded in a halo of yellow, so I choose, instead, to thank the man tersely whilst he tries to strike up a conversation with young Morgan:
"Well," he says to Debra in a way that I suppose is supposed to be charming, "fancy seeing you again."
Debs cuts him off before he can continue speaking with a swiftly-placed 'fuck off' before she asks me where the bodies are. Quinn, rather downtrodden at being so thoroughly ignored by the brunette, points us in the direction of the police running about the single shipping container once more and we start moving in said direction.
"Shit," Quinn says whilst wiping his face of some moisture, "it's raining like a motherfucker today."
Angel snorts, "Welcome to Miami."
Quinn just grins in response as the Cuban sidles up next to me and points out two large cranes in the distance, "I've told you I'm from New York, right?" He asks, and I nod:
"It's come up in conversation before," I respond, nodding.
"When I came to Miami," Batista says, "this was the first place I saw: the Port of Miami. It was nighttime, and kind of hard to see outside the plane. Just shipping crates and cranes, and the plane was angled in a way that I couldn't really even see the city. For a second, I thought that the Port was Miami."
I give him a look of incredulity, "You said you were fourteen when you came here. Why would you think that the Port was all there was to the city?"
The elder man shrugs, "Beats the hell out of me. Probably one of those teen fears that you can't really explain. But for a second, I thought that those shipping containers were Miami houses, and I wondered which one was mine-" even Debs and Quinn snort aloud in laughter and the Detective smiles bashfully alongside them, "-I just thought it was a city of boxes, you know? And then I saw the old paper factory on the other side of the port and realized there was a real city there."
"What importance did that story serve?" I question in a deadpan manner, causing Debra to laugh slightly.
"I don't know," Batista replies, "Just felt like telling it."
"I only know one thing: if that was you at fourteen," Quinn begins, "then you must've been one retarded eight year-old."
"That's probably true," the Batista affirms amiably as we reach the Narcotics and Homicide Officers who have a few Port Officers milling about them.
Batista, being the senior officer, takes point on questioning the first-responders quite thoroughly. I meander off to where the actual bodies are and, boy, do I find them. Seven beauties, seven women, who, if Quinn is right about it being the Slasher's, are all working girls, kidnapped and killed on what they thought was a routine call. Coitus interruptus, indeed. As a man who enjoys my work, it is often hard not to admire what some other maestros are capable of. They are all chopped up and laid out in the same ritualistic pattern we have seen at all the crime scenes of the Tamiami Slasher, each occupying their own little space in his Shipping Container from Hell... or, at least, the Red Light District.
Suddenly, a text disturbs my awe at the bodies: They're beautiful, aren't they?
Yes, they are, Heisenberg; yes, they are. But that feeling of being watched suddenly arises and I wonder where Heisenberg could be. He could be in this crowd, dressed as any other officer, or hiding somewhere in the Port, but somehow, he can see me.
I notice out of the corner of my eye a Port Officer who seems unconcerned with the entire crime scene and seems to go on about his beat. Normally, in another city, I suppose, this would be normal, but Miami isn't just any other city: Alongside the delicious Cuban food and mostly rude residents of Miami Beach, we all seem to be fetishists of the supremely weird. I'm no exception, certainly, and it is much more common to see people staring at the scene of multiple homicide with morbid curiosity than complete and total disinterest. And, naturally, that interests me. So, I find myself stalking up to the Port Officer, who is a tall African-American man who appears to be in his late forties to his early fifties:
"The show must go on?" I say, half-questioning, half-remarking. The Officer throws me a disinterested stare for a moment, as if I had disturbed him into coming out from his moment of zen, before he turns back to another shipping container, examining it and saying:
"Oh, indeed, son, indeed. The show must always go on," he replies. "We're all just playing our parts after all."
I stare at the shipping container he is inspecting for a long while, before the port authority officer turns back with a question on his lips:
"You homicide?" He asks, to which I nod my affirmation, "I used to be Narcotics; I always wanted to get into Homicide. As you can see that never happened, even with the friends in high places."
"Friends?" I question.
He shrugs, "Yeah, your Lieutenant and me did a few cases back in the day. He was always talking about his kid. Said everything he did was for her."
"I'm sure Officer Morgan will be delighted to hear that," I reply, pointing discreetly to the brunette who looks over the bodies with an air of consternation before she says something to Batista. The Port Officer raises an eyebrow:
"Really? Damn. Has it really been that long?" He asks, "She looks all grown-up. You her partner?"
"Unofficially her partner," I reply; the interested look on the man's face begs me to explain, "Harry's got me working with Debra to show her the ropes."
He nods, "Really? I'd have thought Harry would've wanted to do that himself. If you don't mind me saying, how's handling the rookie?"
"Can't complain. She's actually a lot brighter than most of the people who come cycling through here," I reply, "But, I've been friends with her since we were kids, probably just know how to teach her right."
The man turns around with a significantly brighter look than his normally disinterested countenance, "Anthony Moss," he says, extending his hand. I take it, and reply:
"Dexter Moser." Officer Moss's face seems to light up with recognition as he looks over me:
"Yeah, Harry talked about you a lot, too. Said you were natural police." I send a raised eyebrow his way:
"He did?" I question, "I was dead-set on being a doctor until well into my twenties."
"He said you'd come around; apparently you were built for it," he replies, "Me, on the other hand, nearly got it, but I pissed off the wrong guy. Thomas Matthews, that slick sonuvabitch, had me sent down to these docks sixteen years ago. Been working as Port and Nautical Inspection since. The bastard asked me where I wanted to go when he said Homicide wouldn't take me, so I said anywhere on land as a joke, you know? And what does he do? Has me looking into shipping containers and fishing up the bodies of jumpers from the Causeways."
"Why'd they send you down here?"
"I did too much, asked too many questions, apparently wasn't a team player, is what they said. I guess this is where they send down all the ballhogs: a unit of gloryhounds."
I smile wryly and am about to respond when a fed-up Debra calls me back to the crime scene. I stop by her and she asks me if I just get friendly with the first person I see at the crime scene, but I am too bored to dignify that question with a response, and instead, poke fun at her highlighter jacket and move over to one of the bodies to inspect the cuts with Batista, who breaks out the photos from some of the earlier crime scenes. The cuts on the legs match, the torso, arms... Batista gives me a very excited look:
"You thinking what I'm thinking, bro?" He asks.
I shrug, "If what you're thinking is that this is the Tamiami Slasher's handiwork, then yes, I am thinking what you're thinking."
"Strange," Debra begins, inspecting one of the bodies in a very deep and thoughtful manner. Naturally, I don't like it when Debs finds out something before I do, considering that I'm supposed to be the smart one, but there she is, ready to spit out something important:
"What is it?" I ask.
And, wonder of wonders, her little nugget of wisdom is: "Motherfuck!"
Now, I'll admit that 'Motherfuck' wasn't the bit of advice or the thunderstruck revelation I had half-expected the younger woman to be having, but somehow, I find it more bizarre that I didn't expect a chorus of cringe-worthy morphemes from the Morgan, as these are seven dead hookers, who Debra considers to be 'her people' despite that she claims to have not had sex more than twice since college (barring our few experiences). I'm straying, however; Debra moves swiftly to the open shipping container and steps inside. Batista and I follow her inside to a severely cool pitch blackness. I can see my breath in the bleak air from what little light comes from the overcast skies outside the container, and while the always-prepared Dashing Dexter is quite toasty in his military jacket, Angel and Debra are both in those pitiful highlighter ponchos, and I can practically hear their teeth chattering as the brunette turns to me with a shiver:
"Goddamn, it's cold," she says, smiling, as if to ask whether I get the meaning of a half-spoken riddle of hers. And suddenly-it dawns on me: Debs thinks this could be our killer's workplace. I mean, it's a sound idea. It's cold, narrow... We find who owns a refrigerated shipping container with prime access from the parking lot of the Port, and if it connects in any way to the Tamiami Slasher-
Debs seems to understand that I have been enlightened and chooses to speak instead of giving me time to collect my thoughts: "We can trace this container number back to the owner and if it belongs to Perry, then we know for sure that we've got him."
My, my, Debra seems very excited for a person who is looking in the wrong direction. Apparently I am the only one to see that Darryl Perry has had little to no training with knives or how to dismember people, he has no priors, barely finished high school, and lives in a beaten-up trailer up in North Miami. Perry is a grade-A hick, not a mass-murdering genius. Of course, that might be my indignation speaking, but the Passenger and I have a hunch about this guy-and our hunches are very rarely wrong.
"We ought to get this back to Harry, then" I say, wiping off some of the rain from my jacket as Debs nods and follows me out to my car; Angel says he'll stay behind and wait for Forensics to show up because the Port is nearby one of his favorite restaurants and he can grab lunch there once he's done.
I drive Deb back to the precinct and let her take point on telling Harry about the girls in the shipping container because she seems so very excited to tell him, and this, technically, is still part of her investigation, so I'm, technically, not supposed to be there.
But I stand by Debra, the stoic soldier of the Light Brigade charging into the valley of death, as she speaks to her father, who calls Matthews down to hear this. Of course, the Captain is not terribly impressed by his Lieutenant's daughter's discovery, choosing to turn back to said Lieutenant and growl out: "There are seven more bodies?" in a rather threatening manner.
To which Harry responds, "Yes."
I would chuckle, but, fortunately, better judgment wins out in realizing that, while Debra may be the lowest in rank out of us four, she has more pull with both the Lieutenant and the Captain than I could ever hope for. That, and the story Officer Moss entertained me with down on the docks; asking too many questions or laughing out of turn might be enough to peeve the esteemed senior member of the Homicide Department, an just enough to turn big-bad Homicide Detective Moser to Sailorboy Moser.
Matthews, once again, growls out something about how Perry's bail hearing is today, and someone had better get on helping present these facts to the court. He also makes quite a jab at Harry's previously stellar compstat rate, which hovered at a tri-county-high 59.3 percent prior to the Tamiami Slasher and the lesser known, but equally important Heisenberg, is now about to fall into the upper-twenties with seven new deaths, and Harry levels one of those glares at the Captain, who makes quite light of the glare that could crumble lesser men.
It is with some discomfort in the suddenly still room that I notice I have been sent a text; Harry has me leave the office while he attempts to talk down the Captain, so I check the message I have just received. With a building sense of excitement, I see that the number it was sent from is listed as unknown. I open the text to read:
You've got the wrong man, you know?
So, I type back a Yes, I know to my friend and continue on towards the Forensics office that I have come to occupy. In a moment, I receive another text that says: I can tell you how to figure out he's a fraud if you do something for me. But you have to promise.
You wouldn't hold it against me for being skeptical about making deals with criminals, so I send a What kind of something?
And seconds later, the return reply, That codex you found at that nudist's house. Follow the crumbs.
I must say, that is a bizarre, and altogether too-innocent-sounding sort of offer. And what will you give me in return?
Tell your Lieutenant to have the firewalls checked.
Interesting. I won't promise anything.
But there is no return text and I stride into my office long enough to grab my jacket and the old codex that I tried to return to Mrs. Watts, but she said she didn't want it if it had anything to do with her husband's death. So, that left me the sole carrier and I found the need for a code too interesting to have dropped it off in evidence, considering Doakes had gotten a confession out of Reiker without it. I leave the message with LaGuerta saying I'm headed out to lunch and the elder woman gives me a sullen, aristocratic nod:
"What's with the long face?" I don't really care what's with her face, whether short or long, but it is polite to ask so, and I live and die on the notion of politeness for obvious reasons.
She rubs her forehead, thumb resting on her temple as her index and middle fingers run long strokes across her frontal bone as she speaks, "This Perry hijo de puta. He knows things, things he shouldn't."
"Things he shouldn't?"
"About Department Records," she says, but will go no further. Apparently Mr. Perry somehow got to the normally unshakable woman, and I find that somewhat interesting.
"He's just a pretender," I reply, "Ask him about the bodies we found in the Port of Miami, if he seems to be surprised by it, then we'll know we've got a psycho looking for his fifteen minutes of fame inside and a monster waiting to kill again outside."
LaGuerta nods and smiles, putting a hand on my arm as I try to pull away unsuccessfully, "That's a good idea, Dexter. Thank you."
"Always happy to help," I reply, before stalking off to the elevators.
Once outside, in the bone-chilling rain, I notice another wonder of wonders. An unattended car. An unattended Ford Taurus. An unattended maroon Ford Taurus. Parked in the Miami Metro Police Department Parking Lot. With the license plate 7638226.
I'm starting to believe in miracles.
So, instead of going out to lunch, I head back into the building and to the car pool and ask to check out a car from the cop at the desk, a spry young Nicaraguan lad named, yet another wonder, Dexter da Silva.
"Hey, other-Dex!" He calls out jovially, "that piece of crap Toyota finally break on you?"
"Hmm... something like that, other-Dex," I reply, looking at the sign-out sheets, "any cars worth taking?"
"We caught a Trans-Am in a drug raid, and took a Merc off a guy who's been defrauding the state for years, but I don't think either is quite your style." He smirks, "No, the Pontiac's too much bullshark testosterone and the Merc is too much a tiny prick."
"Thanks for the visual," I say distractedly, looking for the Maroon Ford Taurus with the license number 7638226.
"Well, what're you in for? Here, you know what? You need to live a little. Take the Trans-Am out for now."
I don't really pay attention because I found out who the man in the Ford Taurus is. The car has been loaned to one very mean, very hungry Detective James Doakes.
Doakes.
Yes, the man has always had it out for me, and he's always said that he's watching me. Oh, correction, he's watching me, motherfucker. But he's never actually tried to do any of that, and all of the sudden he's following me?
What does he know?
And how do I lose him?
"Sign right there," da Silva says.
"Huh?" I ask, looking up from him, completely snapped away from my thoughts.
The younger man grins, "Must've lost you there for a moment," he says, "sign here for the Trans-Am."
I sign. Well, that will get me free from Doakes for at least today, but I'll need a more permanent way to keep him off me should he decide to keep being a nuisance. In a moment, I am given the keys to a black Trans-Am that nearly flies out of the parking garage. I had nearly forgotten that most cars have more power than my half-dead Celica. I smile to myself slightly, a small pleasure in being able to drive a car that sticks out so much that it hides me. No one world ever expect Dexter Moser to drive something so gaudy, so... testosterone-laden. I am a man of simple, yet refined tastes. A man who enjoys simple wines, rather than hard liquor, and yet here I am in the dream-car of a man having a midlife crisis.
It's the perfect disguise to get out the precinct without Doakes taking notice. I even find the man standing by his car looking rather lost, trying to search me out among the crowd, but I am long gone in search of the Miami Beach pier where Mr. Watts kept his old boat before he even enters his car.
Fortunately, there is a working radio in my specific car, which is so very rare in automobiles that are more than ten years old, so I get to hear some music on the way down to the pier. I don't know about you, but something seems right about listening to a Joy Division song whilst its storming fiercely outside.
Before long, I find myself exiting the car and I wrap my jacket tightly around me, raising up the hood to shield myself from the thin, spear-like droplets of rain. I walk along the boardwalk onto the dock where Watts' boat is situated, but the tensing of black, leathery wings tells me to be cautious, and I am forced to wonder what it could be that the Passenger is so worried about. I ditched Doakes, Heisenberg wants me here... of course, never trust a serial killer. I let the Passenger's wave icy awareness wash over me and stop cold for a moment, before I notice a black BMW M3 sitting idly in the lot nearby the water's edge.
This is who the passenger bids me be wary of, and so I certainly shall be wary of them. I maneuver away from them and take the roundabout way towards the yacht in question, which would elude me from any onlookers in the lot. I would have preferred having one of my other guns on me, but my service 92FS will have to do if I find myself in a jam. A flash of lightning is seen and a sound of thunder is heard as I stalk quietly over to the Piano Man, Watts' boat.
I come aboard after checking for any signs of life on the boat. It is a nice boat, I must admit. Much better than my Whaler, which looks like a little dinghy in comparison to the behemoth I now stand aboard. The locks, however, are not quite as state-of-the-art as one might expect on something of this value-a simple key-in-hole lock. With my lockpicks and a little bit of elbow grease, the lock twists and the glass sliding door is opened into a very chic, modern living space that is much warmer than the freezing rain and the bleak temperature outside.
Now. To set out to find... something. Something that Heisenberg wants me to find.
But it's hard to tell what it actually is that he wants me to find. Something that must have to do with him. But, why? I look around, but I know that no one ever keeps anything of importance on the entrance level of a , as this is just inside the entrance, I realize I must travel to the bowels of the boat to find anything of use, so I waste no time locating the stairs that lead down to the second level.
It's dark on the second level, so I blindly grope to the side, my gloved hand hitting bare wall until I manage to find a light switch on my eighth tap of the wall. The world illuminates around me and I find myself in a not-too-long corridor. Still stylishly decorated with mahogany wood paneling on the sides and flooring that looks quite a bit like granite-tiling reflecting my image back at me from below.
Stalking past the first room, I find a neat little entertainment room set with one of those fancy new flat-screen televisions that everyone wants to get, a pool table, and what appears to be a minibar against the far wall of the room.
The second room is laden with gym equipment, which was more likely intended for Mrs., rather than Mr., Watts. Finally, I turn towards the room at the end of the hallway, with its sliding door closed, but given the knowledge I have about yachts, that is likely a bedroom.
And I give myself a congratulatory pat on the back when I discover that it is a bedroom.
Bedrooms are nice. They give people a false sense of security. It's as if they think that just because it is where you lay your head at night, it can house all your very deepest secrets. But there are no secrets in life; you just have to find the fine film they've covered it with, and it's just as transparent as any commonly known truth.
So, I scour through the bedroom. This must be where he wanted me to come search. I search through his desk, which houses a very new computer; scour through his various other tables and drawers; finally, I come to the bed. Looking underneath, I find various books that he Watts must have been reading, the largest of which being 'Wealth of the Nations' by Adam Smith. Still nothing. I stand up, looking at the bed, before I pull the mattress up off the bedpost, and underneath, I strike gold.
Pictures. Strewn all over the underside of the mattress as if someone had scattered them there in a rush. Pictures of men and boys, pictures of Reiker, Watts... who knew? Upstanding businessman and a babyrapist. Maybe I should have saved Reiker for myself, rather than let Doakes chomp him up. But, then, I find something that interests me greatly, simply because there is a third man in these photos. One that looks a lot like a man whose blood I smeared on a slide.
One that looks very much like Father Michael Donovan.
Now, I'm a firm believer in coincidence, in fact, the world only makes sense to me when all the things in it are coincidental, but this is just a little too eerie. Even for me. There is a nervous flapping of wings and that feeling of being watched returns.
Mike Donovan disappears, Watts is killed, Reiker awaiting trial. What was the reason behind that? How did they meet? Questions fly through my head, but I receive no answers from the pictures, just more curious positions and a fourth person that I can't recognize. A fourth? What is this, a rape-crew?
This one is wearing a fairly expensive watch and a well-made suit, but I cannot quite make out the face. I think this one will be next, so long as no one finds the pictures. I don't have anything to carry them in today, so I will have to make a return trip sometime to collect them, but this man, whoever he is, is next.
I rummage around the pictures once more and find something that chills my bones. There is one picture among the tens of child pornography that is simultaneously the most scary of all of them and the most innocent. This not a picture of a boy being raped. This is a picture of a fully-clothed, very happy girl sitting atop a man's shoulders. The man is above-average in height, with reddish-brown hair, a few days worth of beard on his face, wearing an black military jacket and carrying an AK over his shoulder. They stand in the middle of a poorly built village, but the man and the girl beam as if they live in mansions.
The girl, with her beautiful head of black hair and her Roman nose, who would have no doubt grown to be a beautiful young woman, is Liza. The man in the black jacket is a younger me. The dating of the photograph says this was taken October twelfth, 1994. I was nineteen then, just a boy.
How could anyone have gotten this photograph?
I turn it over and see a large smiley face drawn over the 'Kodak' stylizing on the back of the picture. This is what he wanted me to find. This is what Heisenberg wanted. But, why? How does he know about this?
I suddenly feel very nauseated and hurry to put the mattress back atop the bed.
It doesn't take me long to put everything back in its right place, take the photo of Liza and myself, and exit the yacht while the nausea builds up and I feel myself quite likely to vomit. Fortunately, I am able to purge myself in the ocean water off the side of the docks. It's raining even harder now than it did when I entered the boat, and I let the water wash over me and just rest by the water's edge for a moment, until the Passenger warns me that someone is coming up behind me:
"It is a tragic disease," a familiar, cultured, Cuban voice registers in my ears, I turn to find Carlos Guerrero limping towards me with a cane, "No, please, you should be resting. Cancer is no easy illness to get over."
"How did you-" but then I realize how stupid it is to ask a drug lord how he gets information. The elder man just smiles as two guards walk behind Guerrero, sheltering him with an umbrella. Both of them are armed.
"They call you a genius," The cripple says.
I shrug. "They are not reliable people," I reply.
The elder man chuckles and stares at my prone form for a moment with something akin to pity: "We're both prisoners of circumstance, aren't we?" He asks. I chuckle myself and nod slightly. "But you can get things done; I've heard about the Homicide genius hiding within Miami Metro. Willing to use anyone, do anything, so long as he gets the job done."
"Bad habit, I know," I say in charming manner.
Guerrero blinks. He apparently had not expected me to have a sense of humor. "No," he replies, "not a bad habit. It's completely understandable, actually. You are a genius, normal people are not held to the standards you are. In the same way, this Heisenberg character of yours is a genius as well. And do you want to know something about them?" He waits expectantly, as if waiting for me to answer. When I nod, he continues: "There is no sense in feeling bad about using others; in a game between geniuses, the mediocre are merely playthings."
"The mediocre?"
He nods to me, extending out his hand and a piece of paper. "You and I may not have been on the same side before, but the attack has... put things into perspective," Guerrero says, "Contact me if you ever need any help tracking down this hijo de puta."
I nod dumbly and take the business card as Guerrero speaks again:
"I do hope you feel better," he says in a sincere, fatherly way before he turns around and hobbles away back towards the BMW M3 I saw parked in the lot earlier. It isn't long before I've decided that I've been rained on enough and head back to the borrowed Trans-Am.
When I return to the precinct and give the rental back to da Silva, I find that Debra and Harry have been searching for me from Batista and they want me in his office. Naturally, that fills me with some trepidation. Both Morgans wanting to talk to me never means anything good. Fortunately, by assuming the worst, I never find myself disappointed. Harry reveals that he wants me to watch LaGuerta interrogate Perry because she claims that I knew that Perry was a faker.
On the other hand, however, Debs is not quite as overjoyed as her father is, and that is saying a lot, considering that Harry looks about ready to commit ritual suicide over not being able to catch the Slasher. Debra's betrayed look is quite obvious as I realize that by telling LaGuerta that Perry's a fake, I have chosen her arch-nemesis over her. I send an apologetic look her way and whisper that 'can we talk?' whilst Harry is on the phone, and my new 'girlfriend' sends me a raised eyebrow, as if her interest is piqued. Apparently she must like being the center of my attention.
Which is how I find myself pressed up against her in the men's bathroom, idly wondering if Harry might walk in while his daughter is practically raping me in the stall. Somehow I predict his reaction wouldn't be pleasant. Debra's emotions are easy to read, and sex happens to be one of the many ways she vents frustration and anger. If she were to combine that with her penchant for vicious arm-punches, and I could sue if I really wanted to.
Luckily for me and stall number three on the third floor men's bathroom, it doesn't come to that. Debs simply mutters that she's still angry at me when we're half-way into pulling her shirt off and says that we'll finish this later.
Later. That is a word that is starting to strike me as being overused over the past few months.
We'll catch the Tamiami Slasher... later.
We'll catch Heisenberg... later.
I'll find whomever it was in that photo... later.
I'm starting to get rather sick of that word.
And suddenly, Debs is gone, and I am alone in the lonely bathroom, before I feel another wave of nausea hit me. I turn around and practically run to the toilet and purge what appears to only be blood at this point, but I know there are chemicals in there somewhere.
The rest of the day was not good, and now that I head to bed, I am forced to dwell on that not good rest of the day: I got to see LaGuerta intimidate Perry with a with a head that apparently belonged to his mother, which Debra had said they recovered in a cooler at his apartment a few days ago. Debs also recounts a story of how she has been visitingI tuned it all out and played the part of the man in the box, completely disinterested at that point.
My mind was much more preoccupied with Heisenberg.
How could he have that picture of Liza? The little girl with the beautiful black hair, who could play soccer like Pele; Dexter's surrogate little child... how? No one knew about her. No one at all. Back to the present, I stare at the picture of her and I for a long while before turning off the lights and pulling the covers over, still as befuddled as before:
Coming into work the next day is no better. Having been unceremoniously awoken by Debra, who had jogged all the way to my home at 6:15, I rushed into the shower and was forced to get ready to get to work at seven for some ungodly reason unbeknownst to me. By breaking every speed limit known to man, we arrived at 6:50. Now, at 7:01, I find Detective Coulter, the Sergeant of the second Homicide Unit that is working a slew of cases alongside Narcotics that seem to tie in a new drug gang in the game. Coulter is a fat, sweaty man with beady eyes and a sunny disposition that fiercely contrasts with his drab and dreary outward appearance.
"Shit, Moser," he says, eyes appraising the line of red names on the board, taking a particularly long, astounded look as Gwen, Homicide's personal undersecretary, pens in Jane Doe #7, "You guys really got shit on, didn't you."
"My guy's taken down five," I reply, "Harry's put practically everyone else in LaGuerta's Unit on the Slasher. I wouldn't be surprised if he lifted off some of your guys as well."
That seems to deflate the fat man, which is an incredibly funny notion to think of, but I refrain from laughing aloud and simply continue on my merry way to my little desk when a little buzzing noise comes from my pocket.
I have come to notice I am very rarely texted, so it is with a sense of exultant joy mingled with trepidation that I open my phone to see Heisenberg's message:
The game is afoot.
I admit to being slightly confused, but there is another text that must be forthcoming. My concentration is broken as LaGuerta addresses me:
"Have you seen James around anywhere?" She asks. At first, I give her a questioning look, wondering who this 'James' character is, until I realize that she means Doakes. I shrug, "It's just that-" she starts, "-he seems to be disappearing a lot lately."
To follow dashing Dexter, no doubt.
"He's got his own life," I respond primly, to which the Sergeant gives me an incredulous grin:
"James? James Doakes? A life?" She full-blown laughs at that, snorting a little bit, "You're funny, Dexter; you know that? Really funny!"
And with that, she walks away, leaving me alone to judge for myself whether she is, in fact, certifiably insane.
The next thirty minutes runs with some semblance of normalcy, even as I expect another text from Heisenberg, but I do not get one. But things do flow smoothly, and it is a Miami rule that when things flow smoothly for fifteen minutes, you should expect three hours of disasters afterward.
And, of course, that is exactly what I get.
Like clockwork, after the my thirty minutes of grace, LaGuerta re-enters my office. This time, however, she has worry lines etched into her forehead rather than a grin, as if some terrible fate is to overtake her soon, and she is dreading its coming. Somehow, it enhances her aristocratic features and she barely speaks above a whisper:
"Lieutenant Morgan would like to see you, Dexter."
Of course, being a creature of tradition and habit, the change in LaGuerta's voice does not go unnoticed. "What's wrong?" I ask her.
"Just... come on," she replies. I comply, feeling slightly uneasy. Could this have something to do with Heisenberg's message?
And, naturally, it does.
I walk into Harry's office and find it occupied by the Captain, LaGuerta, and Coulter, all of whom look very troubled. I do not like being the one man left in the dark when everybody else knows the truth, even if it is a disturbing truth, which it no doubt is:
"Lieutenant?" I ask, choosing to use Harry's title respectfully, considering the company I am in. "What's going on?"
"Yesterday, you saw that Mayor Gibson visited us," Harry replies after a lengthy pause.
I nod.
"He went on a routine patrol check with two officers from Coulter's crew last night, Daniels and Frings," the elder man continues, "along with two of his own personal guards."
There's a catch, there must be.
"Both Officers and the Mayor's bodyguards were found dead this morning in the Design District," Harry continues. I suppose I should show some emotion, considering that Daniels and Frings were two Officers who spoke to me quite frequently, but I think I could be excused for not shedding my tears at the sheer shock of the statement.
"And the mayor?" I ask.
Harry sighs. "In the wind," he replies.
"So, how many perps are we looking at," I ask after a long time of pretending to look pained; Harry doesn't seem to fall for it, but the rest of the group take the bait like it's candy, "two? Three?"
"One," Harry replies, and that boggles the mind. One man took out four armed men, two officers and two personal bodyguards, and then afterwards managed to take the Mayor hostage, despite that the man did not look like a slouch from what I saw of him yesterday?
"Same 12-Gauge from the same shotgun. We haven't been able to match it to any sort of shotgun, yet."
And then, something occurs to me that I hadn't asked before:
"Wait," I begin, "Why are you calling me onto this? I can understand the Captain and the Sergeants, and maybe we'd even get the Major down here, but why me? I'm just a Detective. And, not to sound disrespectful to Daniels or Frings, but I've got enough cases of my own to work."
"But that's the thing," Matthews says before Harry can speak, "your guy, this Heisenberg, took credit for it."
"How?" I question.
Harry points down to what looks like a newspaper clipping on his desk, and I come over to read it. The date reads April 26th, which is tomorrow's date. The headline is no less frightening:
MAYOR GIBSON ASSASSINATED
And as a sort of playful postscript, he added:
Miami Metro Duped Again
By: Heisenberg
I am sure the article underneath is riveting, and I almost want to see my new friend's ability with grammar, but Harry snatches the clipping away and looks at me expectantly: "Can you see now why I need you?"
"Well, in a way, yes."
"Read the last two lines," Harry says, holding the article under my nose. I skim the entire article and finally settle my eyes on the last two lines to read: Dexter. You left me alone. I will eat you alive.
I snort, "Maybe I should've called him 'Hannibal' instead," I reply. LaGuerta and Coulter share soft chuckles, but neither Harry nor Matthews seem too amused.
"This is dangerous, Dex," Harry replies.
"Well then," I say, feeling inappropriately giddy that the hunt is once again, on, "we'll have to stop it before it gets deadly."
Harry sighs and does something that seems very close to rolling his eyes at me, which seems so very un-Harry-like. But, he allows me to take point on this little case from hell, and asks me what it is we should do next, to which I reply that all I need is to get down to the crime scene, but LaGuerta and Coulter insist on telling their subordinates about the new turn the Heisenberg case has taken, and I begrudgingly let them waste my time if nothing else but to appear normal.
Harry and Matthews decide they should come outside: Harry, likely to be with his subordinates, and the Captain, no doubt to rally the troops with some rousing speech that could cause children to crusade.
And a rousing speech he gives. I am nearly moved to tears, considering that Matthews probably didn't know who Daniels or Frings half-an-hour ago. Afterwards, Debra sidles up to me and releases her pent-up frustration and hurt for the families of the deceased with a volley of "fuck"s, "asshole"s, and a rather interesting analogy involving a brown paper bag of dog semen. The nighttime practices of dog breeders aside, however, Debs' full-frontal assault of expletives is quietly endearing in a way that only the brunette could muster. But, I must refrain from thinking about that warm and fuzzy feeling the swears give me and focus on what Heisenberg might want.
Yes; there was sarcasm in that last sentence.
And, soon, with most of Coulter's remnants alongside myself and Batista, who is still technically my partner, Harry, and Debs, we find ourselves in the Design District, on Northeast 41st Street, in a vacant lot where the car rests. Immediately, I am struck with a question:
"Why were they stopped?" I ask, "In an empty lot in the middle of the night? They definitely would've known better."
Harry, however, doesn't come pre-equipped with answers, "I couldn't tell you, Dex," the elder man responds, "we ourselves won't know until we find Mayor Gibson."
If we find Mayor Gibson. Something tells me Heisenberg won't make this incredibly easy. I will have to be particularly ingenious this time around. The bodies don't tell us much other than that Heisenberg didn't waste too much time with them. It is hard to identify Daniels or Frings by anything other than their badges, considering their heads are in chunks of dried, bloody pulp, strewn out across the ground. However, we can tell that they had been caught up in something they considered important, because both men left the car and were apparently gunned-down in the lost. Perhaps to help someone who appeared injured? Or to break up a fight? Either way, they definitely got all they could handle.
I didn't really like them much anyway, despite that they thought it was nice to talk to me. I do not want to be talked to unless someone has something more important than troubles with the wife to say. So, police brethren or not, I will not shed too many tears over the two, though I doubt it would be politic to say so to anyone.
It's likely Frings, in the passenger's seat, was the first to go down. When Daniels saw what was going on, he probably tried to apprehend the suspect himself, but was shot from a further distance, which explains why Daniels body was found closer to the car. The question, however, is how did Heisenberg manage to get past the two bodyguards in the back seat, who were armed as well?
All the deductive skill in the world couldn't tell me that, so I simply ignore it and take it for granted that the guards were killed by shotgun wounds.
"Looks like Frings was shot nearly at point blank range, and Daniels got it second whilst trying to apprehend him," I say, "I haven't got a clue how he could have killed both guards in the car with a shotgun."
Debra puts her head in her hands and growls: "That asshole!"
Yes. That asshole indeed. And now I have to find him because Matthews has seen my clearance rate and thinks I'm some sort of new-age Sherlock and if I don't catch Heisenberg, no one will, and the sky will collapse and the Mayan gods will return to judge the New World of both the living and dead.
I might have gotten a few factoids of that wrong, but you get the point.
Basically, if I don't personally bring Heisenberg into Department HQ by punch-out time today, Matthews will be forced to put something on the table in response to the death of two officers, and it will likely be my career on it.
And that is something that Dex does not like. I mean, I couldn't really care less about money, but I keep this job for a very specific reason, and not being able to work inside the Department would really hinder my ability to do damage control should another Jamie Jaworski fiasco occur. But, you'd have to admit, if Matthews did take my badge for not being able to solve this one and the mayor did die on my watch, he might be doing his Department a service: who wants the wolf at the door to come into their house? Especially when the wolf dreams of eating you every hour of every day?
I turn back to Debs, and her appearance has changed. She looks at the bodies with rising horror, and gives me a far-off stare that sees through me. It's the bleakest I've ever seen the pretty woman look, mirroring only that of how her father looked when it came to his close-call with death years ago. I don't know why she looks that way, but I do not pursue a conversation, as the day is already looking rather cloudy, and my sudden bouts of feeling for Debs included, whatever she says will only hinder me at the moment.
And, to make matters worse, I get a call from Brian whilst on scene. I excuse myself and move off to the side to answer:
"Not a good time, brother," I speak into the receiver.
"So I've heard," he replies, completely without pity, "look, Cody has something called 'Dad Day' at school today. Rita won't let Paul take Cody to school and I doubt the officials would let him in anyway, so that would leave me to go with him, right?"
I say "Mmhmm," wondering where this conversation is going.
"Well, I've got a really big day today. It's a big day in the fellowship, and you're my brother..." he trails off.
Now I know which way this is going, and I do not like it. "Brian," I say, before he can even get his hopes up, "Think of how big your day is, and then multiply that by twenty. That's how big my day is."
"Why?" He asks, "What's going on?"
"Read the newspaper tomorrow," I say cryptically, before feeling my loyalty to my brother override my need to get Heisenberg, so I neither give him a promise nor a negative, "I'll see what I can do, but I can't make any promises, Brian."
"Great!" He responds happily, "If you do come, Rita'll be there, too. It's at twelve, so you can do it while on your lunch break."
I grunt something and end the conversation, grumbling slightly to myself. Why is Dexter suddenly the most dependable man in the world? I abandoned my family for six years; I would've thought that would make them a little less trusting of me. Debs asks what the call was about, and I tell her about Cody's 'Dad Day'. The brunette grins a crooked grin and mumbles something about absentee fathers that I'm sure I'd much rather not hear.
Masuka comes up to us and, for once, appears to be respectful towards the dead, expressing his deepest condolences to the families of the deceased, at which point I wonder why he's talking to us instead of the families then.
My interest fades, however, because Heisenberg left me no clues here, and in a fit of purely faked anger, I storm off to my car, which, of course, after years of misuse, refuses to turn over. I try to start it to no avail for fifteen more minutes. Meekly, I walk back to Harry, who lets me take his cruiser back to the Office, where I collapse into my chair and stare at the pictures of blood spatter on the walls behind me. I need to find Heisenberg somehow, but the great supercomputer that is Dexter's mind is drawing blank.
And, as if to punctuate my idiocy, LaGuerta asks me why I'm just staring at a wall, to which I respond with "I zoned out". Thankfully, LaGuerta sees me as a potential lay rather than a subordinate, so she is much more lenient than, say, Harry would be in the same situation, and she tells me that it must be hard, but we have to find the mayor.
Believe me, I am trying as best I can.
And, suddenly, as if being reminded of how utterly idiotic I sometimes can be suddenly brought my head out of the gutter, an idea sneaks into my head. He saw me at the Port of Miami. Now, either he's been stalking me, or he had already been there. For what, reason, I don't know... I know it sounds like I'm grasping at straws, but I've got no other option here, so I have to grasp at every straw I can until I find something valuable.
So, then, it's settled. I'll have to go to the Port of Miami, see if I can grab anything at all, maybe talk to that C.I. of Quinn's-
"Have you found anything yet, Detective?" Matthews asks as I scour my brain for ideas.
I pretend to look a bit frazzled, "Nothing yet, sir. He must have left some clue as to what he's doing, whether deliberate or not, I just can't find it. I need to see if I can get in contact with some old C.I.s that were in and around the mob game. They might know something about Heisenberg's current whereabouts."
"Alright. Hurry, though, all we know is that if we don't get the Mayor in the next few hours, he's as good as dead."
"I'll be out for a couple of hours, don't expect me back unless I find him or get a call that..." I trail off in an 'uncertain' manner and Matthews falls for the bait, patting my shoulder:
"You're a good kid, Dexter," he says, "A born Detective. Don't get too worried, you saved Mr. Lebedev and his family, if you can get the Mayor out of this is well, bright things will be coming at you."
I nod and smile. I certainly hope they don't. I'm happy right where I am.
But I manage to slip away with that simpering smile on my face and pass by Doakes, who has finally decided to show up, and sends me an accusatory glare:
"Where were you yesterday, Moser?" He asks, still trying to burn me with his eyes.
"What?" I ask, pretending to be confused, but Doakes just stares at me and puts on a menacing sort of smile, so I just walk away after ten seconds of waiting for an answer. I head out to the car pool to find da Silva sitting behind the desk:
"You want me to give you a car for a couple of days?" He asks.
I nod. "Until I can find out if my car can be fixed or not," I reply. The young man has me sign a form and lets me take a Black Mercedes-Benz SL-65, stating that it was some nice version of the car that came from Mercedes high-end tuning company that they picked up in a chop-shop. No tags, no owner, nothing. It's practically a free car, so long as I could drive manual transmission (a skill I picked up in Russia), and I could buy it off auction in a few weeks for a fraction of the original price.
It's all stuff I don't listen to; I'm much more of a boat man anyways.
But, it doesn't change the fact that all the power is nice to have, even for a 'boat man'. And once again, no one notices me leaving, except, of course, for Debs, whom I nearly run over whilst getting used to the shininess of the new car I am in. She apparently just returned from the Daniels/Frings crime scene and seems peeved, going so far as to fling a very unsavory finger in my direction until she realizes that it is Darling Dexter behind the wheel of the behemoth that nearly flattened her:
"Jesus, Dex!" She exclaims, stomping over to the driver's window, "Would you fucking watch where you're going?"
"Sorry, Debs," I reply, "Just not used to driving manual again."
The brunette snorts, looking at the car, "Yeah, nice ride. How did you manage to get this?"
"Car Pool picked it up during a chop-shop raid," I reply.
"Where are you heading?" Debs asks, her hands discreetly resting on my left forearm.
"To Cody's school up in Golden Lakes," I say, "Brian can't be there so it looks like I have to go. Then I'm probably gonna go see if I can fish out any contacts I have that are in the game for any news on where Heisenberg might have been over the past few days."
"You want some company?" The brunette asks, "Two heads are better than one?"
"I don't know, Debs," I reply, "My C.I.s barely like me, let alone another cop."
That, and I don't need more questions on why I would choose the Port of Miami to check, but Debs will have none of that:
"Fine, I'll come with you to Cody's school, and we can grab some lunch," she says, and upon seeing my apprehensive face, she gives me a desperate, pleading look, "look, Dex. I need someone to talk to. You can drop me back off here before you go talk to your contacts."
Fine. Since Dexter has to be in such a giving mood today: For the Mayor, For Brian and Cody... why not add Debra as well?
"Okay," I relent, smiling at her in what I hope is a reassuring way, "Get in."
The Officer positively beams at that and practically skips to the other side of the car and seats herself in the passenger's seat and we drive off. A few minutes later and Debs and I are staring at Biscayne Bay as we pass it by, and finally, the brunette speaks:
"You know," she says, staring out the window, "When you went out for lunch yesterday, Matthews wanted to put me on the crew that was supposed to shuttle the Mayor around. But Dad wouldn't let me. He said I was too green for that."
I sense she's not done, despite that she trails off. But, I am proven right when Debs picks right back up where she left off:
"I was so angry at him. So angry at him. I mean, I hate politicians, but this was a good thing for my career," she turns around and looks me in the eye, "You're nothing like him, you know that?" I'm not entirely sure what Debs means by that, but I nod and let her continue, "You're always there to help me when I need it. And when I heard you were talking to LaGuerta, I don't know if it was because I was already pissed off at my dad, but then I just wanted to let you know..."
Her thoughts are starting to get jumbled, so I pace her with a: "Breathe, Debs."
"And when I saw the bodies this morning. I thought... 'what if that was me'? And I wondered if Dad made the right choice, that maybe I'm not ready."
"Calm down," I tell her whilst upshifting, "You're a good cop. And you'll know when you're ready. Harry made a choice, but that doesn't make it right or wrong, and he still loves you. Just remember, Debs: Your father is a natural cop; you're natural police, too."
The brunette looks at me for a long moment as we come to a red light, before placing her left hand over my right, she leans over and kisses my cheek, "Thank you, Dexter," she breathes into my ear and then leans back into her seat.
There is a stillness in the car that results afterwards. I can feel her eyes on me as well as her hot breath from mere moments ago. It makes me feel like a little child, but Debra's gaze is one of wonderment, or something in between that and contentedness:
"I'm glad you came back," she says, moving her hand up my arm to my shoulder, deliberately referencing a time right after I had returned four years ago, when Debs said she was sorry I came back from wherever it is I went.
I smile hollowly, "I'm glad, too."
"My name is Dexter Moser," I start, "I'm Cody's unc-"
"Do you have a badge?" One of the kids asks excitedly. "What about a gun?"
The teacher gives the loud child a severe look: "Joey!" She exclaims. The kid shuts up. "Continue, Mr. Moser," the elder woman says.
I nod; I'm sure this will be great fun.
Thankfully, I got out of that with little trouble. A ten minute presentation of what Cody's Uncle Dexter does as a Detective (I neglected to mention that I am a Homicide Detective; I don't know if that would be appropriate to tell four year-olds), a conversation with Rita and Debs, where the former gushed about how nice it was for me to come down to Golden Lakes Elementary School to speak to her son's class. She proceeded, then, to apologize for Brian and start fumbling over her own words until I stopped her from inserting her foot into her mouth.
Debs and I left, and apparently, she got a call from Harry saying that the FBI was getting involved now that Matthews had reported this all the way up the chain of command, which means I have two hours before I'm sidelined from this case, which is when the FBI reaches Miami.
I am not doing this as Police, however. Heisenberg may prove to be too dangerous if he has evidence of my time in Bosnia, so if worse comes to worse, I will kill him and let the FBI waste time trying to find him. At that point, it's not the Police Department's problem anymore.
I returned home, gathered my USP and Ruger 22/45, hid them in holsters within my jacket. Fortunately, the cold spell hasn't quite passed, so the jacket can still be used without drawing suspicion. I find myself back at the Port of Miami, back at Angel's city of boxes.
I spent precious minutes figuring out how to get into the port without drawing suspicion. No doubt I have no reason to return to the Port because the bodies were all removed from the shipping container they were in, and the Port guys don't even like us horning in on their business to begin with.
So, that brings trouble. How do I manage to get around the guys watching the port? I have to come up with an answer quickly, before a worker sees an open-mouthed man with a Mercedes staring at the stacks of shipping containers and decides to ask why the man looks so fascinated by a couple of boxes.
But, this has to be the place, right? I could either try to find a way into a Port that advocated bodily harm followed by fines for trespassers, or admit that a series of texts is not enough even for the Passenger to be satisfied with this little children's crusade into one of Miami's few well-kept places.
So I move to the fence with a sort of idiot's determination to just pole vault over the barbed wire, but there is no chance of that happening, so what do I do? What do I do indeed? As if I weren't already thrice-cursed, it begins raining again.
"Sir, what are you doing over here?" A voice comes from behind, and I turn to see a union worker staring at me expectantly.
"I... uh..." is all my normally sharp brain can think of at the moment. The man in his bright orange jacket gives me quite the look of disdain once he realizes I am not here to simply enjoy the scenery.
But, cue the hallelujah chorus as a Port Police Miami Metro Cruiser pulls up to reveal the Port Police Officer I had met yesterday, Officer Anthony Moss:
"Detective?" He asks whilst rolling down the window, "Hey, Michael, back off him, would you?" since my name clearly isn't Michael, he must be talking to the Union Guy in his high-visibility jacket, "He's with me."
"Oh, is he?" Michael questions, "Alright, in you go."
He lets me through and Moss opens the Passenger door for me, letting me in, and drives almost immediately after I shut the door. "And what the hell are you doing here again, Detective Moser?"
"A hunch on a case," I reply, "I need to get to the shipping container where we found the bodies."
"That's been moved," The Officer replies.
Shit. "Do you know where it was?"
"Sure do. Been roaming around these parts over a decade. Why do you need to go there?"
"Sorry," I reply, "Need-to-know basis."
Moss gives me a narrow look, but complies nonetheless and drives me to the area where the shipping container was:
"Are there any high places nearby here where someone could have seen all the bodies yesterday?" I question the Port Officer who nods:
"Sure," he replies, you'd be hard-pressed to find one outside the Port, though. The only way to even get a good look at the place is from either the MacArthur Causeway or the old Printworks back on the mainland."
"The Printworks?" I ask, suddenly very interested.
"Yeah, but you'd need goddamn binoculars to see this part of the Port from there."
Or a sniper rifle. Which Heisenberg has shown he can use. Dexter believes in coincidences, but for a Printworks to be so close to the Port, and with him having sent a manufactured newspaper article to Miami Metro? That is a coincidence even Dex refuses to believe.
And so, I step out of the car into the pouring rain, asking Moss where the Printworks would be from here; the elder man points to a big building in the distance, nearly a mile away. I take out my service pistol and start aiming:
"What are you doing, fool?" The man asks, completely shocked by my behavior.
"Shush," I try to quiet him with as stern a voice as I can, "You're talking. I don't like you talking. I need it to be quiet."
The man, whose interest has obviously been piqued, decides to give me that quiet and look back and forth for any Port Workers in silent dread, head bobbing and waving forwards and backwards at a frenetic pace whilst I take aim at the distant building and try to make an estimate.
I have a good eye for long-distance shots, but even in the rain it is a difficult tell. I can see a fire escape; there may or may not be a window to look out of, but I'll need to check it myself. I head back to the Passenger's seat of the car.
"Nothing," I sigh.
"What were you looking for?" He asks.
"Something that made sense."
And that's all Moss needs before he drives me back to the lot outside the port.
That is how I ended up here, in front of the Printworks, crumbling bricks and broken windows all over the dilapidated building. Hardly the hiding place of a super-criminal, but I've certainly seen stranger. I parked the Mercedes two blocks away to keep Heisenberg from getting too suspicious, and thankfully, the rain provides low visibility and ability to stalk during the day, and I am a prepared monster, the heaviness of the two guns within coat, a third at the hip, and the lock picks in my hands, brings a familiar sort of feeling, like I am on the battlefield again. And that's what makes it all so terribly exciting; I match up against Heisenberg and suddenly I am back fighting in Bosnia, in Russia, all over the world, and that fills me with a euphoric feeling that is very hard to fight down.
But, I am nothing if not patient and willing to endure, so I fight the urge to go in with guns a-blazing and insert the lock pick into the key hole. After a moment, the lock gives way and a soft 'click' lets me know the door has been unlocked.
I walk into a cramped and darkened lobby with a peeling wallpaper with 'The Miami Herald' emblazoned on it. This was a little Branch of the Herald back before I was even born, probably, and was closed down around the time I was making my first babbling noises to my mother.
The equipment is mostly old typewriters that likely broke down during the last frantic days of this particular building of the Herald, strewn across the floor alongside old newspapers and years worth of accumulated dust.
I immediately unholster the Ruger 22/45, made specifically with a built in suppressor, fiber-optic sights, and tactical lights by some of the more unsavory 'blacksmiths' in China. In most cases, the gun is impractical because of all the accessories on it, but in this particular case, it is a light gun that is incredibly quiet, light, and useful.
The lobby is dead silent, and I allow myself to fade into the shadows before making my way up to the stairs, crouching in the darkness, listening for any sound that is not the fierce thunderstorm outside.
I make a stop on the second floor, which appears to be more of a typists room, what with desks and typewriters and bits and pieces of newspaper scrap laying around. It is even darker on this floor, and I am starting to have trouble seeing, but it appears there is no one here either and I begin to wonder if there is anyone or anything here at all.
Until, of course, I hear it.
It is the sound of someone being hit, and the sound of someone's breath literally being taken away. And suddenly, my faith in my, admittedly shoddy, detective work is restored. I crouch lower to blend in with the shadows and take up less space as I move up the stairs two at a time. Finally, I come to the highest floor where the office of the editor likely would have been and flatten myself back-to-wall and peer through the open door way. There are two men in this room. One, who is strapped to a chair, looks to be quite unconscious, and I recognize that face from hundreds if not thousands of campaign commercials: Timothy Gibson. The Mayor.
The second is a tall man wearing a jacket and hood that is similar to mine, and with it, I cannot identify who it might be, though I have a sneaking suspicion I know who it is. But I am not given time to think about it as the man raises something that hung limply in his right hand, and I realize it is a gun that looks very similar to an M16 with a compacted barrel. He takes aim right where I am standing and immediately swivel back behind the wall as I hear and impressive bang and a shattering of wood and dry wall around me.
I assess the damage and realize that I am dealing with a shotgun based off the M16 platform, rather than an Assault Rifle itself. Suddenly, I don't feel so safe carrying the Ruger around, but creep closer the doorframe and take aim while trying to stay out of sight, managing to fire and catch the man, who I can only assume is Heisenberg, in the shoulder.
However, the man only seems to be slightly fazed by it, and turns to the unconscious mayor and speaks:
"He won't feel a thing," he steps back and takes aim at the mayor's prone back, and I am frozen into immobility. I have heard that voice before. But where? I can't tell if his eyes are truly on me, but I know that Heisenberg is looking at me, "Which is more than I can say for the ones you take."
A second burst of shotgun spray rips through the afternoon rain, and I have no choice but to stay behind:
"Lesson, Dexter, learn it well," Heisenberg says, "next time, don't miss."
He takes aim at me, and I realize it is best for me to stay behind the wall, because even though I got a lucky shot in on the man, a Ruger is still no match for shotgun in close quarters combat situations such as this one.
But Heisenberg does not come closer, he moves back towards a window and clambers out it, presumably onto the fire escape I saw earlier. I eventually rush to the window and see him clutching his shoulder as he walks away into the rain, shotgun at his side.
I walked away from this one unscathed, and he was injured. But who knows what will happen next time?
Turning back to the Mayor, I realize there's no use in checking for a pulse. Blood everywhere, his back is torn to shreds. He's definitely dead. And that is not good for me. I won't get fired, but I am as good as off this case now. Quickly, I head back to the wall where I had been standing and search for the bullet casing from my gun somewhere on the ground. I eventually find it by a stack of wooden shrapnel strewn on the stair landing. I refrain from going out the way I had come, and instead take the Fire Escape back into the rain.
The streets are very soaked, rain floods the drainage pipes and every step I take is a wet slosh with water spraying up my pant legs and accumulating in large droplets atop my jacket, hood, and gloves. I find a pay phone a few minutes away and dial 9-1-1, putting on my very best scared hick accent:
"9-1-1, what's your problem?
"They done there that ol' Printworks by the Port," I reply, sounding very much like I live on a farm and my name is Jebediah, "Heard me some gunfire. Sounded like one o'them shotguns. Saw a guy leavin' there, too, somethin' about newspapers."
They then ask me if I could stay by the payphone, at which point I tell them 'Hell, nah', citing that I'm already about to stain my britches and I just wanna get the hell outta the rain and I won't be there when the rozzers come.
At which point, I hang up the phone and return to the Mercedes parked a few blocks away and head home rather quickly.
Once there, I return the guns and my gloves to their normal hiding place before I dry myself off a little bit with a towel, make a sandwich and wait for Harry to call me. That call comes exactly as I am into my fifth bite of the sandwich:
"Dexter, where are you?" Harry asks.
"Somewhere in Coconut Grove. It's a little hard to tell in all this rain." I reply, looking out the window at the hurricane-like conditions outside.
Harry grunts in acknowledgement, "Well, I need you to get to the abandoned Printworks by the Port of Miami. We found the Mayor."
I pretend to get excited for good news, "Is he ali-"
"No," Harry responds quickly. I stop for a moment and force my breath to hitch, like a real human's would, and then let out a long groan.
"Now what?"
"Now you come down here and we'll find out what to do, but the FBI takes over from here."
"Alright. I'll be there in twenty," I say, before ending the call.
A sudden rogue thought hits me as I am about to open the door. 'In a game of geniuses, the mediocre are merely playthings,' is what Guerrero said. If we are to look it at that way, both Heisenberg and I are the Kings of our little chess board. We need our pawns, our rooks, and bishops and horses. And Queens.
We need our very own Queens.
We are playing the game, and right now, we've got each other trapped in a move that harms us when I'd rather not move at all. He knows about me, so I have to hunt him down and kill him before the MMPD can find him themselves. But that also brings me the risk of being fired, the risk of being killed, and worse than all that: the risk of being caught.
So I will need to build a few bridges, make a few contacts to keep myself out of harm's way. And I know exactly who I should call first. Reaching down into the inside pocket of my jacket, next to picture of Liza and I, I pull out a small, rectangular card with a name and a number on it. In the other hand, I dial the number on the card into my phone and put it up to my ear. There is a silence for a moment, then I start hearing the ringing noise, until someone picks it up and a familiar Cuban-accented male voice answers:
"Carlos Guerrero."
"Mr. Guerrero, this is Detective Moser from Miami Metro," I reply.
"Ah, Detective! What can I do for you?"
"I could use some help," I say, stepping out from the comfort of my home and back into the cold rain.
Notes: This was a bit of a tough chapter to write because of all the exposition, but I hope it satisfies and was worth the long wait! Thanks for reading, and drop me a few reviews while you're at it (After all, reviews are like money, the more you give me the better I feel about writing).
Hope you guys stay on for the next chapter,
Geist.