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Payne and Punishment
Chapter 2: New kid on the block
It's been thirty years now. Thirty years since the horror of watching my wife and kids die in my arms, but I still remember it so perfectly. A bright sunny day in the summer of 1976, and the Castles had gone for a family picnic in central park.
These were in the days long passed, before Uzis and Berettas ruled the streets. It was a Thompson, like the ones or fathers carried. And I knew that unmistakable rattle as it's man stopping .45s drove blood and breath from my body. I dropped to the ground, my daughter laying next to me. She had taken it in the gut. She turned to her towards me, a look of horror on her face, as if asking me why this was happening.
But I had no response.
My wife bled out later in the OR. Her life had drained through an open gaping hole in her heart. Anytime I let my guard down, the look in her eyes creeps up on me, and brings me to my knees.
My son dropped wordlessly to the ground, and I thought, for just a moment, that he was ok.
I got to my knees, taking a breath that cut like glass and searched his body in vain for an entry wound. By sure bad luck, a round had found it's way through his open mouth, killing him instantly.
We hadn't been the ones who where supposed to die that day. No, we were just innocents caught in the crossfire of a mob war.
They're all long dead now, the old man who they shot through my family to kill. The shooter, the old man's soldiers, all of them, dead, by my hand.
That might be enough for some people, to avenge the deaths of there loved ones, but this was never about revenge. No, what I do is not about revenge, it's Punishment.
Soap stared down at the table. He often didn't make eye contact with me, but this was strange even for him. He hadn't spoken two words, just stared at the table.
After I started taking out the Gnucci family, Ma Gnucci demanded that the NYPD do something about me. She wanted a crack team of specialist, men that wouldn't rest until they had caught me.
Instead, what she got, was Martin Soap.
Soap wasn't a bad cop, in fact he was probably one of the few good cops left around. One of those other good cops was Molly Von Richthofen, Soap's one time partner. She had been given a task just as impossible as Soap's was. Her job had been to take down Ma Gnucci. She had figured that the best way to get to Ma, was to follow me, and she had been right.
They had been there when I torched the Gnucci estate. And with a little help from me, Soap had been able to black mail his way into the commissioner's office. He had some big changes in mind for the department. But he never gotten to make those changes, the old commissioner black mailed him right back out.
That's when he became my informant. He got me the info I needed to do my job.
"I've been reassigned Frank, I'm no longer working the Punisher Task Force."
"Soap, what are you talking about, you are The Punisher Task Force."
He looked up at me, a look of despair in those deep set eyes, "Well they've put someone else on, and he won't be as easy to get along with as I am."
"Who is he?"
He let out a heavy sigh, "Frank, have you ever heard of Max Payne?"
I had heard the name before. Max Payne had carved a trail of blood and bullets through one of New York's worst snow storms ever. Leaving behind the bodies of some of the cities biggest low lives. Jack Lapino, the Fineto Brothers, and at the end of it all, Nicole Horn. She as it turns out, Horn had been running the Valkire ring around the city.
It had been all over the papers the next day. A few years ago he went on another killing spree, this time, it ended in the death of senator Alfred Woden, and landed Payne in Rikers.
"I thought he was serving a life sentence."
"Someone cut a plea bargain with him. I don't know what kind of agreement it was, but he's got his badge back."
I leaned forward, picking up the glass in front of me, "Woden was connected the Vladimir Lem and Lem was connected to Slobodan Draculic. Payne Killed Lem and Woden. I'm starting to see a pattern of bodies here."
"And for once, you're not the one leaving the trail."
I let the comment slide, "Soap, there are a few more things I need you to do for me. First, try and find out who made this deal with Payne, and second see if there are any more common acceptances between Lem, Woden, and Draculic."
"Frank, what are you gonna do if Payne comes at you wanting blood, I mean, you don't kill cops, right Frank?"
I slid my way out of the small booth, "This time, I might make an exception."
A hand firmly grasped my forearm as I reached for the door.
"Galina says hello Frank."
I didn't need to turn around, I knew the voice, and could picture the wrinkled one eyed face of the man it belonged to.
"What do you want Fury?"
Nick Fury, the original black ops hard case. Long before I had ever set foot in Da Nang Fury and his teams had set fire to half of Asia. We had crossed paths many times over the last thirty years. S.H.I.E.L.D. had come after me numerous times, I consider the fact that I was able to get away pure luck.
He was without a doubt the one man I could say I was afraid of.
"You're getting sloppy Frank, I all I had to do was follow your little snitch and he lead me right to you."
That was the second time Soap had lead someone I didn't want to me. Last time was a reporter, can't remember his name to save my life. Hand cuffed himself to me, said he wanted the story, I never understood what story there was to want. He ended up on the business end of a wood chipper.
"I didn't ask how you found me Fury, I asked what you want."
I didn't need to worry about him trying to arrest me, he owed me one and said he'd do his best to keep S.H.I.E.L.D. off my back.
"Seems you been pissing off some Russians lately Frank" he said walking over to door, "damn, why the hell can't you smoke anywhere in this fucking city."
He pushed open the door. A fresh blast of late winter air greeted me as Fury stepped out into the night, I was right behind him.
"Remember the Barbarossa incident Frank?"
How could I forget. HALO dropped into Siberia, 700 miles inside the arctic circle, and twelve miles from butt fuck nowhere. Fury had dragged me in to try and retrieve some bio weapon the Russians had been working on code named Barbarossa. It was a suicide mission into a soviet missile silo, the only sample was in the body of the creators daughter, a six year old girl.
Galina had been the same age then as my daughter Lisa had been when she died. In spite of all the things I've done in my life, I couldn't let that little girl see the horrors that silo, the piles of bodies we had racked up. And there was no chance on earth I was going to let anyone harm her.
By the time we got her back on U.S. soil her body had broken down the virus, destroying the only sample, and that made some people very unhappy with me.
"What does that have to do with anything?"
Fury struck a stick match and brought it to the cigar hanging out of his mouth. Taking several quick puffs off it before dropping the match to the ground, "S.H.I.E.L.D. had been monitoring Slobodan Draculic for some time now, and we where able to link him to a man named Ivanov, big time Russian mobster who had ties to Vladimir Lem."
"That name is coming up too many times tonight for my taste."
A cloud of smoke escaped his lips as his reached into his coat, "Somehow Ivanov got his hands on Barbarosa, we're not sure what he's going to do with it" he handed me a manilla folder.
"So you government wants you to deal with it again?"
The old cold warrior chuckled, "No Frank, they have nothing to do with it this time, I figured since you'd have to deal with Ivanov, I'd just give you a little hand." he turned and began to walk off down the street, "I'm staying at the Plaza, come on by tommrow, I got some new toys for you"
With that he was gone.
All I could do was stand there.
Ivanov, Lem, Payne.
I really hate it when things get complicated.