Logan's Tale pt. III
"Asking Nicely"
I love hitmen. No matter what you to them, you don't feel bad. Fact is, the worse you do, the better it gets.
The two thugs escort me through Kadie's at gunpoint. Everybody in the joint can see the gun, but nobody seems to notice it. At Kadie's, there's a standing policy of mindin' your own business.
We make it to the door without incident, 'cept for the thug shoving the gun into my back. Blob still isn't back at the door. Probably still sittin' in the back tryin' to clear his head.
"Your killin' days are over, you over –the-hill, do-gooder, son of a bitch," said the hitman in gray as they pushed me out the door.
"Come on Dominic, can't I torch him?" asked the blonde, twitchy one.
"Chill out, John. It's my turn," Dominic answered.
Their names ring a bell. Dominic Petros AKA Avalanche was a rising hitman in the city with a thing for dropping rocks on people. St. John Allerdyce AKA Pyro was an old face in the game. He once made a lot of headlines a while back: has a thing for settin' people on fire. And the fact that he liked burnin' up dames the most was going to make this even more fun.
Before the two men knew what hit them, I attacked. A quick back fist took care of the flamer walkin' behind me. He goes down. Hard.
Avalanche levels his gun at me, ready to plug me full of lead. Doesn't know that would only make me mad. I grab his arm before he could fire and spin him around. I aim the gun at his rising partner. A shot rings out followed by Pyro's screams as the bullet burrowed into his stomach. Avalanche had a look of horror on his face when he realized his buddy had just been shot. I didn't leave him much time to think about it. With my right hand, I punch him hard in the gut. He doubles over, wheezing in pain. His gun clattered to the ground. I throw him upright against the alley wall.
Snikt!
I pop the two outside claws on my right hand and put them through his eyes. Blood and eyeball squirts out onto my arm while he twitches like a fish out of water.
Snakt!
I pull my claws back and he drops to the floor in a heap. I shake the wet blood off my hand as I turn back towards Pyro. He's sitting against a wall, holding a Bic Lighter, trying to spark a flame, but his hand was too wet from his own blood. His other hand is clutching the bullet wound in his stomach.
I pick up Avalanche's discard gun and hunch down next to Pyro. I smack the lighter out of his hand.
"Take it off," I tell him.
"What?" He looks at me like I have three heads or something.
"A fine coat like that and you're bleeding all over it," I specify.
"Alright it's yours," he whimpered out in pain as he slowly takes off the coat. I can see the gas tank on his back and the fuel lines to his arms now.
"Take that off too," I order.
"Oh, God!" he cries in pain as he removes the tank and fuel lines. Must hurt.
"It wasn't you losers who killed Red," I say, taking off my own tattered coat. "The guy who did that smelled to high heaven, and he knew what he was doin'." I crouch down until I'm lookin' Pyro dead in the eye. "So tell me, ma. Who sent you?"
He just stares at me for a moment, grinning and glaring at me. So I took Avalanche's gun and pistol-whipped the little shit.
CRACK!
He cries out again as blood runs from his mouth and belly now. I duck the gun into my belt and reach out to steady him with my right hand. I pop the outside claws on my left hand, bracketing his throat right below the chin. He froze. Any movement, even a twitch and my claws would tear through skin and flesh, and bone. My middle claw slowly slid out of its housing until its tip was just touching Pyro's neck. A drop of blood formed at its razor point. Pyro turned a pale green as he tried not to breathe or swallow.
"I don't hear you givin' me any names," I growl. Pyro's mouth opens and closes as he gasps for air. More blood pools at his neck as my claws graze against his throat. He's going to slit his own throat. That sounds all well and good to me, but I need information first. I pull the pistol out of my belt and aim it at Pyro. "So I guess when I shot you in the belly I aimed just a little too high."
Snakt! I retract my claws a second before I pull the trigger.
BAM!
Pyro screams soprano. Tears mix with blood as they run down his face.
"You keep holdin' out on me like this, and I'm gonna have to get really nasty," I warn. He looks up at me, terrified. I know what he's thinkin'. He's thinking, 'what could be nastier that this?' I glare down at him, my eyes promising a world of pain.
"It was Tyler…Tyler Dayspring passed me the order," he confessed with a quivering lower lip. "He runs the tables over to the Triple Ace Club." He's spillin' his guts. Another second goes by and I got all the info I need.
"Thanks again," I mutter. I raise the gun to his face.
BAM!
I stand up and put Pyro's coat on with a smile on his face. I brush some dirt off its leather sleeves, admiring it. It really was a nice coat.
Then the damnedest thing happens.
I'm walking out the alley, lighting up a cigar. And for a second, I smell the angel smell that belonged to my Red. For a second, I forget about my cigar and getting over to the Tripe Ace Club before dawn. I sniff the air again. My nose has never been wrong before. But my mind's not what it used to be. Just means I need my medicine, is all. I shake the smell out of my head and head out towards the end of the alley.
-X-
As Logan's shadow disappears into the darkness, a slim, striking figure steps out from behind a corner. Her flaming red hair hides her features, except for her sparkling, almost glowing green eyes. She raises a small revolver and thumbs back the hammer.
"Bastard," she whispers to the darkness. "You're gonna pay for what you did to me."
-X-
The sun came up as I was about halfway to the Triple Ace Club. I needed to find someplace to hole up during the day.
And here I was just getting warmed up.
-X-
I tossed and turned all day. No good trying to sleep. And it's not the street noise or the stench of this nine-dollar flophouse either, although the smell didn't help any. I'm just too excited. I can't ever sleep when I'm excited. No game on TV. Nothing to do but sit and wait for the damn sun to set and all the pryin' eyes to get out of the way.
I hate the sun. And the eyes.
-X-
The air cools as the hours pass. The sounds change. The suits and briefcases scurry to their fortresses and bolt their doors and balance their checkbooks and ignore the screams and try not to think about who really owns Sin City.
My hands are shaking like a kid's at Christmas by the time I hit the streets. There's blood in my hands, in my arms, pounding between my ears and pushing me forward and telling me I'll never be tired again…
And there's no thinking and no need for it. The instincts take over, white hot. The animal in me, the feral berserker in me, that I tried to drown in booze and bloody brawls, he's back. He's back and he's howling, he's laughing out loud, he's crazy with the pure sweet hate of it all.
It was easy findin' the Triple Ace Club; its gaudy neon lights were burnin' my eyes from blocks away. Tyler Dayspring tried to make the place look like something off the Vegas strip, but all the paint and lights just drew more attention to the cheap imitation the club was.
The bouncers at the door didn't say a word as I entered. I walk through the crowd of losers and degenerate gamblers towards the back. These guys are scum; they'd sell their children to the Devil for another lousy stack of chips.
There was a "No Admittance" sign on a door at the back of the club, with two guys in black suits and sunglasses standing in front of it. They told me to go back to the tables. I told 'em no, but with my fists. Both of 'em went down with no more than a whimper. Good help is so hard to find these days. Takes all the fun out of it.
Tyler Dayspring was takin' a shit in his private bathroom when I kicked in the door to his office. I could smell it from the doorway. It's one of those times when having enhanced senses sucks.
I busted down the bathroom door as Tyler was pullin' up his boxers. He tried to run for the window, but I caught him by the back of the neck and spun him around.
"Didn't your mom teach you that you should always flush when you're done," I growled, as I got right in his face. "Who gave the order?" I asked.
"I ain't saying shit," Tyler said as strongly as he could. I shake my head in disappointment.
"Now that's a real shame," I tell him before I pick him up like a rag doll. I carry him back to the toilet and shove his head into the bowl.
"Feel like talkin' now, Tyler?" I shout as gurgling noises come out of the bowl. "You don't want to say shit? Now you can eat it!" I shout shoving Tyler's head deeper into his own shit. "How many got paid off for the frame, Tyler? Huh?" I don't let up. This arrogant little snot pissed me off. "How many for the kill?"
He gurgles something inaudible and I pull his head out. His head is soaking wet and his long hair is caked with his own crap.
"It was Longshot. He set me up." I push his head back into the bowl, even deeper this time. I slammed the toilet seat down hard across Tyler's chest before pulling him back up.
"He'll never talk," spat Tyler.
-X-
Finding Longshot took longer than finding Tyler. I jumped him while he was getting into his car. Gave him a few hard shots to the kidneys to make him a bit less feisty. I stepped into his car, leaving the door open and started her up. The car was a piece of junk, it rattled like a tin can.
"You know for such a hotshot, would've thought you'd have a nicer car," I mutter to him. He grumbles something under his breath that I choose to ignore. With my right hand, I put the car in gear and with the left I grabbed the back of Longshot's leather jacket. I start to drive away. Longshot tries to get away, but I hold on tight. He was able to run beside the car for a few feet, until I gunned the engine and his feet flew out from under him. I pushed down on the back of his head, shoving his face into the pavement. Longshot's face scraped against the road, tearing his face to ribbons. His arms and legs flail wildly, but I hold on and keep grinding his face into the rough road as I push the car faster and faster. I could just make out his screams over the wind and the engine.
"I don't know about you," I called down to him. "But I'm havin' a ball."
Longshot talks. They always talk.
-X-
Then I go to church. But not to pray.
It's early morning, still dark out, nobody but me is there. I walk in and take a seat inside the confessional booth. A moment later I hear the priest enter the other side of the partition. I can't see him, its too dark in the confessional.
"Bless me Father, for I have sinned. It has been many years since my last confession." I say the words without even thinking. Some unknown memory rushed to the surface uncontrollably. I shake away the memory. Now's not the time to relive the past.
"And vhat have been your sins, my son?" the priest kindly asks in a thick German accent.
"Well, Padre, I don't want to keep you up all night. So I'll just fill you in on the latest batch." I lift up my hands and flick some of Longshot's dried blood off. "These hands of mine, they got blood all over 'em."
The partition slides open, leaving only a layer of thin, cross-hatching wood between the Padre and me. Now I've seen a lot in my day, more than I can even remember. But I was still shocked by the priest's appearance. He had deep Indigo skin and hair, glowing yellow eyes, and I think I saw a spade-tipped tail twitching back and forth in the air.
"You're speaking figuratively," he said in a comical tone. He didn't believe me, so I just keep goin'.
"When I need to find something out, I just go out and look for somebody that know more than me, and I go and I ask them. Sometimes," I chuckle, "I ask pretty hard. By way of a "for instance," I killed three men between tonight and last night. Tortured 'em first," I said calmly. "You might say I've been working my way up the food chain. The first two were minnows – small time hitmen. But it was Longshot, the money man, who fingered you Padre." I could see the priest's yellow eyes go wide in fear. He tried to duck out of the confessional.
Chk-Clank!
I raise the gun I stole from Avalanche last night and held it against the partition. The clicking noise made as I cocked it echoed in the confided space of the confessional.
"You know what that sound means. Sit down," I order.
"Dear Lord, man. Zhis is a house of God," he whispers at me, almost like he's pleading with me.
"Just give me a damn name," I growl menacingly. The priest hesitates for a moment before dropping a bombshell.
"Xavier."
"Ya know, you really are pushin' your luck, Padre, feeding me garbage like that," I say darkly, my patience wearing thin. "It can't be that big."
"There's a farm off North Cross and Lennox. It's all there," he tells me. "See for yourself." His attitude changes drastically. His eyes narrow and his voice drops to a frightening undertone. "And while your at it, ask yourself if that corpse of a slut is worth dying for," he spits at me with pure hatred.
BAM!
Worth dyin' for.
BAM!
Worth killin' for.
BAM!
Worth goin' to hell for.
The priest slumps down in the confessional a bloody, dead mess. He stinks like sulfur and brimstone.
"Amen," I mutter as I blow away the smoke from my gun's barrel.
-X-
I light up a cigar as I walk down the church's front steps. There isn't much better in life than a smoke when you haven't had one for a while. Like after a movie. Or after church. His keys say the Padre drove a Mercedes, or at least what that's what they're pawning off as a Mercedes these days. Modern cars – they all look like electric shavers.
I'm about to open the car door when I hear tires screeching behind me. I spin around to see a convertible peeling down the street at me; it's high beams blinding me. I squint through the glare and level my gun at the speeding car. I catch a glimpse of the driver as the car bears down on me. It's a beautiful woman with flaming red hair and dazzling green eyes.
"Red?" I mutter in disbelief as the cigar falls out of my mouth. I lower the gun.
The car hits me dead on like a wrecking ball, sending me flipping into the air. I land hard on the pavement. I rise to one knee, clutching my bleeding side.
"Red!" I shout at the driver as she wheels around. The car speeds into my face, knocking me back into air. That one hurt. A lot. I watched from the ground as the car spun around. The driver pulled out a small revolver and started blasting at me, even as her car plows into my chest again. I flip through the air like some kid's toy doll and land in a puddle of water. I look up in time to see the car peel away and disappear down some dark street.
I lay there for a moment, letting my healing factor catch up. Adamantium bones don't break so I was up and on my feet again in just a few seconds. I spit some blood out of my mouth before walking slowly back towards the Padre's Mercedes. I don't know where my gun went. Don't really care anyway. My claws will do nicely from now on.
I get into the car and start her up. This one's not as bad as Longshot's. Sounds almost like a decent engine. I pull out and head in the opposite way of Red's car.
No. Not Red. It couldn't be Red.
Sin City falls away behind me, noisy and ugly as all hell, as I head for this farm. My head starts to clear. Things start to make sense. It's my own fault and nobody else's that I got confused. With all the jumbled and mixed up memories in my head, it's hard not to. I would've been all right if I took my medicine like I should have. I've been having so much fun; I forgot to take my medicine. I swallow a handful of pills, spilling some onto the floor of the Mercedes.
"That wasn't Red back there," I say to myself over and over like a mantra. "Red is dead and that's the whole reason I've been doin' what I've been doin'." I keep tellin' myself that all the way to the farm.
Author's Notes: Here ya go, hope ya all enjoy. My thanks to everyone who's reviewed this fic and for your Jackie Boy suggestions. Keep those reviews comin'. The more I get: the faster the next chapter will be written and posted.
Nataku's Wrath