The newspaper he held out in front of his body had bold headlines of the great revelation of Plasmids. The word is mentioned fifty three times on the front page. Buried on page four is the story of the corrupt Rapture Security Police Officer Dean who was found to be corroborating with smugglers of contraband.
The headline was of hope that half of Rapture would have access to Plasmids within the next three months with more to follow.
"Now, we are all sons of bitches." Jack said.
He folded the paper neatly and tucked it under his armpit.
"I didn't like the guy." Howard said. Jack looked at him sideways. "Shit I hated the bastard. Still. The look on his family's face. Hearing your dead hero father is now being painted as a traitor."
"Just add it to the list." Jack turned on his heel toward the nearest bathysphere. "We gotta get down to Olympus Heights on that murder."
"Murder?" Howard said. "We ain't murder."
"That's what they'll say."
…..
"What the hell are you two doing here?" Gautreaux said. "Y'all ain't murder."
"Just missed your smell Cajun." Jack said. "Plus Contraband does have a say in this matter. The murderer talking yet?"
"Dat sonuvabitch still shaking in the guest room." Gautreaux said. "Coulda made less of a mess for the boys and me."
"Shit you ain't lyin." Howard said.
The in one corner of the room, in a circle made by all the furniture being pushed out around it, there was splatter of blood and tissue on the floor, wall, and ceiling. The blood then dragged into the kitchen area.
"That's brain matter." Jack said. "And hair. Well, with blood too. Obviously. She was dead in that corner."
"Yea dat's head gumbo." Gautreaux said. His index finger followed the path of blood. "Damdest thang. He keeps at it in the kitchen. Woman ain't got a face left. Barely got a skull."
"She was dead in the corner. Why keep beating her?" Howard said.
"I heard on the horn." Jack said. "Some excited, young sounding Officer yammering on about our suspect having bright red eyes and shaking uncontrollably."
"Yea. The guy is one helluva a freak show." Gautreaux said.
"Remember when Suchong ran that anger test and we had to clean up the mess?" Jack said.
Gautreaux rubbed his face looking at the corner then he came back around with his finger pointed at Jack.
"That's why Contraband is here." Jack said. "Red eyes from the plasmids and the shaking is cause his body is poisoning itself on adrenaline."
"Sheeeeet. Damn obvious when you think about it." Gautreaux said. He craned his neck a bit to look around the corner. "Watch your mouth though. The other boys in here are all Ryan all the way."
"Really obvious if you know about the break in at Futuristics last night." Howard said. "Damn, I didn't even think about that."
"It's really obvious when you know who lives here." Jack said. "One a Ryan's cronies."
"Him?" Gautreaux said. "He's a bookie that date's a stripper."
"Naw. She just playing at stripper." Jack said. "Gumbo girl got Ryan one a our associates that is actually singing Fontaine's name."
"So Frank got to her?" Gautreaux said.
"Hay-ell no. Bout the last thing Frank want to do is kill one of the few people that are saying his name." Jack said. "That just makes him look guilty. This blood covered mess makes Frank look outstandingly guilty right now. Whoever pulled this off is killing people to make it look like Frank's the man."
"How'd they get someone to say Frank's name?" Gautreaux said.
"Hooked his nuts up to a car battery."
"Shit." Howard said.
"Shit is right." Jack said. "And now we gotta make sure to stay really tight on the up and up. Don't worry about the witness, he's gunna commit suicide in a couple nights and that'll take care of that nice and quiet."
"Shit, how do I never hear about all this?" Gautreaux said.
"Cause you ain't in Contraband Cajun." Jack said. "Can't do any big help in Homicide."
"Well I can show you something. Kinda the icing on this here cake of fucked up." Gautreaux said. He gave the come this way sign with his hand. The kitchen was more blood across the counter and table. The icebox was not covered in blood. It had the smears of being swiped.
Jack stopped in front of the Icebox and opened his mouth wide.
On the outside of the door was a capital B and K with a wasp nailed in between them.
"What is that written in?" Howard said.
"That would be honey." Gautreaux said. He looked back at Jack. "What's wrong with you?"
"That's a weird looking bee." Howard leaned in. "Or is it some sorta red wasp?"
"Seriously, Alabama." Gautreaux said. "What's with the stare?"
Jack stepped forward and held his finger forward right in front of the red and yellowish bee.
"Now I know," Jack said, "that I gotta be one of the few people that know what that is."
…
"I wanna go home." George said. He was crying and curled into the fetal position in the corner of his cell. His eyes were squeezed shut and his hands were tightly squeezed between his thighs. Gripping at his crotch. "Oh god. I wanna go home."
This was the fourteenth hour he'd been in this position since they had left him. When they had brought him in blood had been dripping down from the crotch of his pants, which had still been steaming. The bleeding had stopped twelve hours ago. He had run out of tears nine hours ago.
When he urinated six hours ago he had passed out for forty-five minutes before waking up and dry heaving into another session of sobbing and repeating the same thing over and over.
"Momma please." George said. "I wanna go home."
For the first time since he had been dropped in his cell the slit in the door opened in the middle. George's eyes went wide.
"Fontaine!" George said. "Fontaine! Fontaine! That's what you want! Fontaine! It's Fontaine!" His voice was hoarse and weak.
He stopped yelling when the bare arm came through the slit. He stared at it silently as it just stayed there, not dropping or signaling anything. It just stayed there for a minute.
Then the arm turned yellowish green, like a wave of color spread over it. Next was a red that bubbled across the skin like blisters.
George started to hyperventilate.
The blisters on the arm were beginning to boil. They then boiled into forms of green and red life that burst out of the arm and started crawling and flying. The insects flew outward into the cell and more blisters formed behind them making more flying blurs of red and green.
The flying pieces of flesh found George and as he screamed, "Momma! Momma! Momma!" the bees of flesh flew down his throat and stung there along with stinging him over his eyes and around his neck.
Even as George was being stung to death he never moved and only stopped screaming for his mother when his throat swelled shut.