MAX & CARLOS:

Max and Carlos ride away from the scene of the two bloody murders commited earlier, the only real witness to the first, sitting in the backseat of the car. A blonde, long haired, robe wearing, hippie named Roy. Roy is blood soaked and is now close to being calm, he adjusts his glasses looking at the two men in the front seats.

"You know, you didn't have to take my Kuruma. I like fast cars."

"You must like layin' in the trunk too, cuz' if we'd taken Max's Stinger that's where you'd be stayin'."

"So are you guys taking me to the cops?" Roy asks them looking at himself.

"No." Max says lighting a cigarette, "We need to talk to you about somethin... but first, It'd be nice to know why exactly I just blew that guy away in there."

Roy becomes very uneasy shifting around in his seat, staying quiet, "I don't really wanna' talk about that right now."

"Look," Max says, "I just killed somebody, and though I do know why, I'd like to know MORE about it, you're the only one that was there, so just tell us your story."

"I got a question for you..." Roy says reaching in his pockets, "do you mind if I smoke some weed?"

Max contemplates it, after some serious thought he realizes that the man didn't ask if he could shoot V in the car. "Sure. But you got to tell me what happened."

Roy lights it up moving the flame back and forth across the blunt savoring every minute of it. "What can I say..." he lets out a huge cough, "he was fuckin' crazy, him and Kory both man, those two..." he shutters.

Max turns to Carlos, "Who the fuck is Kory?"

"Kory-Kory-Kory-Kory... never heard of em' before."

"Kory was the name of the guy that Jeff bought all his knives from. You know all that shit in the papers about the 'New Harwood Butcher'?"

"The guy who skins people alive?" Max says momentarily turning around.

"Yeah... - Not guy; guys." a very unsettling look passes Roy's face, "Those two freaks were killin' women in Kory's apartment in Shoreside Vale, and I never knew nothin' about it. They were my friends the full three years that this shit was goin' down. Doin' it right under my nose."

"Man..." Carlos says with a slight note of sarcasm, "That's fucked up... let me ask you somethin' buddy. How long could one person not know about this shit? I mean, friends for three years murdering young women. The two of them had an obvious affinity for knives, - they never mentioned anything to you - they never said anything huh? They just killed people behind your back, they did it with each other - but not with you 'No! That would be loco!'! You didn't even come out of the house 'til we fired a shot. - Now why don't you just stop fucking around, and tell us? How many have you gone through? Ten? Twenty, maybe?

"I told you, they never told me what they were doing!" he says screaming, "The names of the women in the paper were all people they didn't know... why would I suspect them? They were my fucking friends! Then he just fucking flipped out and killed his girlfriend right in front of me. I guess he couldn't resist the urge or something, scared me half to fucking death man... I didn't know what to do." Roy's eyes are swelled with tears and his face red, he's not bauling but he's obviously upset.

"Pretend I believe you." Max says pulling the car to a stop, "Where does Kory live?"
"I-I-I-I-I don't know... I mean, I used to know but... now..."

"This is bullshit. Roy... if your friend's a murderer, he ain't your friend. Now I'm gonna' finish up my day; regular style. But tommorrow we're going over to the motherfucker's house." Carlos says getting out of the car.

Hunt For The New Harwood Butcher:

The next day the three men drive down Shoreside Vale looking for Kory 'The New Harwood Butcher's' apartment. Carlos is driving this time, and Max is in the passenger seat. Roy sits in the back of his own car, with a brand new robe on.

Max turns to Carlos, "After this you want to get somethin' to eat?"

"Yeah, I'm starving... Hey, You ever notice somethin' funny about restaurants?"

"What?"

"Every restaurant that's name is the 'product' plus the word 'time' never does well."

"What are you talking about?"

"Ok well check this out," Carlos says smiling, "What's your favorite pizza place?"

"Pizza Hut. Yours?"

"Well Stacked. --You ever been to Pizza Time?"

"Yeah."
"Sucked didn't it?"

"It didn't suck it blew but who can tell the difference."

"That's the thing man, you walk into a Pizza Time and everything looks like shit, roaches on the fuckin' floor, the food is so greasy that orange shit leaks onto your hand, the employees probably don't even wash their fuckin' hands."

"I know what you're talking about now. So like if I walked into Taco Time it'd be ten times worse then walking into Taco Bell right?"

"Exactly! When's the last time you saw an add on T.V. for Taco Bell. -"

"Yesterday."

"Taco Time. -"

"...Maybe five years ago."

" See that's what I'm talkin about... Now I've never even heard of Burger Time, but I gaurantee that if it existed the shit wouldn't succeed in mass marketing."

"You are a very strange man. You know that Carlos?"

"But I'm right aren't I? I mean some gringo sitting at his chair in and office somewhere says to himself we'll call it Pizza Time, because people can say 'What time is it? Pizza Time!' It's fuckin' career suicide man."

"You ever been in marketing Carlos?"

"Don't even start with that shit, 'cuz if I was; they'd be havin' condoms and prostitutes at Taco Bell, FREE WITH EVERY TACO!"

Max can't help it, he bursts out laughing. Roy behind them completely unflinching.

"Goddamn, aren't you going to lighten up Roy?" Carlos asks him, he doesn't answer his question. "This is his apartment building right here."

"Okay... let's go."

The three of them get out of the car moving towards the large apartment complex with big metal double doors that looks like the entrance to an elevator and not really a whole building.

"Max." Roy runs up shaking Max's hand as he walks through the doors, "I'm sorry I had to do this to you man. But..."

"What?"

'click' The metal ring wraps around Max's hand, the other one smoothly attached to the handle of the apartment building. Roy runs in the other direction. "I'm sorry Max, but I don't wanna' fuckin' die. - Survival of the fittest."

Carlos approaches Max as Roy gets into the Kuruma. "What the fuck's going on."

"Goddamn it! Roy's getting away!"

The Kuruma starts up and all of a sudden a weird looking man dressed in all leather, with jet-black spiked hair comes running out of the building. The man is extremely pale, he runs up to Roy's Kuruma holding a gun in his left hand.

"Get out of the car motherfucker!"

'BLAM!' A bullet hole explode in front of him bashing the side of the car. He turns around to see Payne and Carlos holding guns at him. He pauses...

"Wait a fuckin' minute! You're the motherfucker that killed my best friend!" he points his gun at Max's face.

'BLAM!' another shot goes off, hitting the leather-clad goth in the shoulder. Blood sprays across his face, but is quickly dissolved by falling rain.

He fires seven shots, then gets into a blue van and drives away.

"Who the fuck was that?"

"My guess is that that was Kory."

"He didn't seem to happy about us bein' here did he?" Max asks.

"He sure didn't."

"How do you think he knew about Jeff? Roy told em'?"

"It's possible, but Roy ain't fuckin' stupid either I doubt he'd try to get us killed. Police might have questioned him, gave him a discription, maybe he was there I don't know. But somethin' happened and he's fuckin' pissed off."

"We killed his fellow murderer."

"What the fuck're we gonna' do now."

"Well first, you've got to get me out of this." He says yanking on the handcuffs, "And second, we ain't stayin' here, his ass isn't comin' back we need some kind of new lead or something, Roy just ain't workin'."

Carlos pulls Max's hand stretching the chain on the handcuffs, he fires directly on the chain seven times and it doesn't work. "Fuck man! This just ain't right homes!"

"Here let me try?"

"No, I can do it." Carlos says cutting him off, "Watch this!" he closes his eyes takes a deep breath and pulls the trigger. 'BLAM!' the chain snaps and Max Payne falls to the ground. He rises to his feet.

"That was a good shot." Max says complementing him.

"Eight times a charm... So where're we goin' now."

"Now? Now we go to see a magic man."