SECRETS (5)

Weeks passed as Lucy continued looking for Snake. It was almost painful, she and Amy had put so much time into their search, and the feds wasted it! Two years of hard investigation down the drain!

It wasn't a complete loss however. Lucy was very familiar with the Pit Vipers and their turf, and she knew some of Snake's connections who mostly consisted of businessmen, celebreties, and even a few her work was over, Lucy would spy on the vipers and talk to the contacts.

Lucy had even set up microphones and cameras. Those things weren't cheap, but Lucy didn't care about the bill. Occasionally something would happen to her equipment. It was either stolen or destroyed. Thankfully Lucy had contingencies in place so no one would trace them back to her.

Her problems didn't stop there, Snake's friends were just as slimey as he was. They had a lot to lose, and they obviously weren't going to spill any secrets. Lucy had to pull some pretty sneaky shit in order to get the information that she needed, and almost got caught a couple times, but it was still worth it. Even if they did find out, they would be easy to deal with. The evidence was incriminating enough to put them away for ten to fifteen years, and she was more than capable of defending herself.

The only real problem she had was Anderson and the feds. If they found out, Lucy was in a world of shit. Fortunately though, Lucy knew better than to leave a trail.

After compiling all of her findings, she discovered something. Given his affiliations, Snake was on the move all the time, but there was one area he often visited which was located in the Lefferts district. This was probably a meeting point where the Pit Vipers did some of their more important deals, or it was where they did initiations. Lucy didn't know, but it peaked her interest.

Lucy's attention was arrested when a 10-1000 came over on her radio. She'd been taking her usual patrol route when it happened. Lucy responded, saying she'd be there. Lucy gave an impatient sigh, she wasn't looking forward to this. Somebody had been murdered.

/

Downtown Brooklyn was always busy, but even for the normal rush hour traffic, this was absurd. Lucy had to drive along the shoulder of the road just to get through. She was trying to make it to the Tiller Hotel, but because of the police had the area road blocked, there was little else she could do.

It got to the point where Lucy had to park in a car lot, and run the rest of the way. The hotel was only a couple blocks down though, and she hadn't done her daily exercises yet anyway.

"Have a good run, Ishikawa?" One of the officers ,Douglas, joked as Lucy trotted into the parking lot. "What've we got, Doug?" Lucy asked.

"Don't know, haven't went in yet." Douglas told her.

"Why not?" Lucy snapped.

"Anderson told us not to go in."

"Why not?" Lucy questioned.

"Feds have a handle on this one, Ishikawa. We're just suppose to keep the crowds back and no one is allowed inside until the feds get here."

"Screw the damn feds." Lucy growled.

Douglas knew better than to try and stop her. "You're funeral, not mine," He threw his hands in the air.

Lucy noticed it was hot inside as she came in ,the A/C must have gone out or something. Most of the lights were off in the lobby, but there was still enough ambient light coming in for her to see everything around her. The lobby was very spacious ,not huge, but spacious. Lucy also noticed a very strong smell as she came in, one that smelled like copper and smoke. She cautiously drew her Beretta as she began scanning her surroundings. To the right was the reception area. Nothing unusual there. To the left however was the breakfast area. That's where the real carnage was.

There were four large pillars squared around four black leather couches that had been torn to shreds. In the center of the room between the couches and the pillars was a large coffee table that had been smashed to splinters. There was a body lying on top of it. She found seven more bodies in the room, two were spralled out on the couches, while the other five were lying on the floor. Lucy noticed that some of them had carry weapons on them. At the far end of the room, Lucy found three more figures lying next to the breakfast counters.

Lucy noticed that some of them had been shot. One of them had a huge hole blown through their chest while another one was missing part of her face. Whatever they'd been shot at with, the projectiles were so hot they cauterized the wounds. Lucy noticed that the shooters had been firing in all directions, and that there were larger marks in the walls and floor. She looked around and noticed several small bullet cartridges from the pistols, scattered across the ground, but nothing that looked like it could hold whatever made those large holes.

As Lucy examined the other bodies, she determined they'd been killed by an edged weapon, but there was something else too. Most of them that had been mangled were missing some of their limbs, but almost all of them were missing their heads and spines. Lucy's blood went cold when she saw it, despite how warm it was. The image reminded of her of...

She felt something fall on the the back of her neck. Something wet. She felt at it and saw red on her hand. In a moment of horrified realization she looked up, and then she wished she hadn't. There were three more floors above the room off to the upper right. They were hall ways that led to the other rooms on those floors. Seven more bodies were hanging off the guard rails. They were missing their skins. Some of them looked like they'd been half eaten. Lucy had seen the banisters when she came in! How could she have not have seen the bodies?

"Oh my God!" Lucy blurted, as she stared at them. The horrific images reminded her of the dream. They reminded her of what happened to her parents twenty-eight years ago.

M-M-Mom... D-D-Da-ad...

Lucy stood there for what felt like hours before the sound of heavy footsteps caught her attention. She was met by the beam of a flashlight as she turned around.

"Ah, fuck'n a!" Walker's voice said. "Who the fuck let her in?" He asked.

Douglas was about to fess up, until he saw the skinned bodies and began losing his lunch.

"Shit!" Walker cussed. "How long have you been in here, and have you told anybody about this?" He asked her aggressively.

"Wha-?" She asked stupidly.

"Answer the fucking question, Ishikawa! Did you tell anyone?" Walker snapped.

"No!" Lucy answered. Walker calmed down after she answered.

"Good. Keep it that way." Walker told her menacingly. He looked around at the carnage in the room before walking away. "You can stay as long as you like, Ishikawa, but don't tell anyone about this."

Lucy didn't know who Walker was, but she knew he wasn't DEA. He began giving out instructions to his men when Lucy approached.

"Care to explain what the hell is going on?" Lucy asked in a brash tone sensing he knew more than she did.

"I'm not at liberty to discuss it." Walker responded coldly.

"Can you tell me what you're doing here?"

"Negative."

"Can you tell me anything at all?"

"No."

"Hey," Lucy said as she came up behind him. "Hey," Lucy said as she grabbed him by the shoulder, "What the hell did that, and what the hell is going on?" Lucy interrogated.

Walker paused before putting Lucy in an armlock and forced her to her knees. Lucy tried to break free, but she couldn't. "Don't bother." Walker told her as she fought back. Lucy was an exceptionally strong woman, but no matter how hard she tried the federal agent's grip held firm. Finally he let her go. "Don't bother going after Snake, Ishikawa. He's probably already dead." Walker told her. He stood there long enough to see the look on her face.

"How do-?" Lucy asked as he walked away.

"You ask a lot of questions," Walker stopped her. "Take my advice, kid, and let this one go. It's not worth it. Just stay as far away from it as you can. Trust me, it'll all be over in a couple weeks." Walker adviced. Lucy glared at him. It was a little to late for that.

"Who the hell are you, Walker?" Lucy asked.

He simply stared back at her. Their staring was broken when Walker began hearing his men shouting at something. Reporters probably.

"Just stay out of this," Walker repeated, "Like I said, you can stay and look if you want to, but don't tell anyone about this."

Lucy thought about leaving, but she stayed anyway. There were some things she may have missed. That and she didn't come all the way out here just to look at the graffiti. Especially in this traffic.

/

Lucy thought to herself as she jogged back to the car lot. She recognized two of the bodies. One of the was Rico Kingi ,the Colombians' leader, and the other was Ruben Pueblo ,Serviteurs. Another six were Kingi and Pueblo's men. The rest of them were regular visitors.

Both of them must have had a meeting or something when it all went down. Lucy knew what had happened to them, but she tried to draw up other conclussions. It was too crazy to believe, but the answer was always the same. They'd been hunted by Nightmare. The evidence was too conclusive. It obviously wasn't the Pit Vipers or the Jamaicans, the feds clearly weren't DEA, and her parents had been killed in a similar fashion. It had to be the monster, she knew it had to be. Lucy was just trying to figure out why...

What did it have to gain from all of this? Why did it go after Kingi and Pueblo? What did it want with them?

Lucy wasn't sure why, but either way she knew it was connected to Walker. Walker had mentioned something about Snake. Maybe it was after Snake just like she was. Again she couldn't understand why. But maybe Walker did...

Lucy's mind continued to wander until she made it to the lot. As she approached her car she saw four men trying to break into it. Pit Vipers. She could tell by the get up they were wearing and scaly tattoos.

She recognized the one with cobra hoody as he tried to break into her car with a coat hanger. He saw her as she came.

"Ay, yo iz tha bitch!" The one in the cobra hoody called out to his budies. Two of them had rusty pipes, and another had a crowbar while cobra hoody had a semi-automatic tucked in his coat pocket.

"Oh, ssshe's hot. Looksss, like we havin' usss sssome fun tonight." Another said, deliberately sounding like a snake as he lightly jumped up and down on his feet in anticipation.

Oh, for the love of it. Lucy thought; she really wasn't in the mood for this.

"Ay yo, we remembered wha youz waz tryin' to pull on da boss, a coupla weeks ago. We came ta send ya hiz regardz." Cobra guy told her.

Before he could pull the trigger, Lucy shot him in the arm. He screamed in anguish as he held at his wrist. She'd had her pistol drawn from her coat holster the second she saw them.

"Bitch, you gonna die." The other one told her, before charging for a swing.

Lucy threw herself under the guy, grabbed him by the leg and threw him over her. The other tried to grab her, but she grabbed him instead, spun around and threw him over her shoulder. The last one went to ram the claw end of his crowbar into her. Lucy caught the weapon, spun her foot around, sweeping him off his feet. As he fell he let go of his crowbar. The guy in the cobra hoody tried to grab his gun, but Lucy kicked it away from him before punching him in the face.

One of them tried to hit her from behind but smacked him in the gut with her crowbar. The other one she'd thrown over her shoulder tried to do the same as his budy before him. Lucy anticipated the attack and blocked with the crowbar before sending her knee into his crotch. She smirked as she saw him begin to cry in pain, before kicking him away.

Cobra hoody took out a switchblade from his pocket, and began swaying back and forth, looking like he was going to attack her. She knew he wasn't going to. Without looking away she sent her elbow into the guy she'd taken the crowbar from, before slamming him to the ground. By that point cobra hoody decided he'd had enough and booked it.

After that Lucy nonchalantly walked to her car, stepping over the one she'd slammed to the ground in the process, before driving away.

/

Mei-ab'we watched as the ooman males attacked the female. Mei-ab'we had been following her for quite some time. There was something strange about her. Mei-ab'we didn't know what it was, but he could sense it. She had stumbled upon the rogue's latest kills. He had smelled recognition in her terror. Perhaps she'd seen the bad-blood before. Perhaps she'd been his prey and got lucky.

Mei-ab'we had managed to find the rogue weeks prior. At the time they were out in the open, and he could not risk attacking. Had he moved swiftly and stealthily maybe he could have finished it quickly, but it was too risky. If he had made a mistake he would have attracted the oomans' attention. That and there was no sport in it. He wanted to relish in the hunt.

While he could not engage his prey, Mei-ab'we took the time to watch him carefully. He saw that the rogue was watching an ooman female. This was that same ooman female. Since then he hadn't crossed paths with the rogue, although he did follow the ooman. Given what he'd seen, his presumptions about her relation to the rogue were correct. If this was the case he would continue to follow. The rogue would come for her again...

At first, Mei-ab'we thought the female was outmatched by the males. He didn't know why they wanted to attack her. Mei-ab'we had been to this planet once before, but he knew very little about the oomans. He remembered stories about them. They were a barbaric, yet civilized species who were weaker than his kind, but what they lacked in strength many of them made up for with intelligence and craftiness.

Mei-ab'we could clearly tell the males weren't very intelligent. The female ,however...

She fought her attackers back with surprising grace and dexterity. Her flawless display captivated him. He was even more impressed that she relied on skill rather than her weapon. She had fired one shot during the whole engagement, but even then it wasn't to kill. He didn't know why she didn't kill the males.

She had every right to defend herself. It wouldn't have been wrong to slay them, yet she didn't. He thought about it curiously as he watched. At the end, she'd scared one of the males away, and left the other three. Such skill was proof of a strong warrior. Such would have made excellent sport, but he had no time for that. Besides he needed her alive if he was to find the rogue.

Mei-ab'we stayed behind and watched the three males recover.

"Ey, man thiz shit fuckin' sucked yo." One of them said. He couldn't understand what they said, but he recorded it anyway. Perhaps it would come in handy later.

"Truth, bro. Truth." Another said.

"Ay, man, da bosssss wantsss thisss bitch dead. How we gonna ev'n get close ta 'er?" The third one said.

"I dunno man."

"Ey man, I hear' da boss say'n som'thin da otha day. He got som'thin fun planned fo 'at little bitch." They all began to laughed, making this hissing sound that reminded him of a serpent.

He noticed two other oomans appear. They were females.

"Yo, man, look at t'em hot asses ov'a der!" One of them said ecstatically.

"Ey, we havin' ussss som' fun tonight!" One of them hissed. "C'mere lill girlsss."

Mei-ab'we saw the males attack the females. They weren't as independent as the female before, allowing the three males to assault the females. They could not defend themselves like the other could, it was an unfair advantage. Such behavior disgusted him.

Mei-ab'we was not allowed to engage. He could not jeprodize his hunt for this. If the oomans found out, or ,worse yet, the rogue... But they wouldn't find out... Mei-ab'we checked his surroundings, before flexing his wrist, causing the blades on his gauntlet to extend outward. He would have fun with his prey before they died.