16(S2E3)-The Librarian

16

(Season 2 Episode 3)

The Librarian

Vince sat on the park bench waiting for his contact.  It was 4:00 am and he was armed with his trusty .38 caliber revolver.  The sun hadn’t yet started to rise, but it was just barely light enough to see.

The perfect night for a killing.

That is what Vince did, after all.  He killed people for money, or at least he attempted to. He had been quite worried that he was out of a job after the last one.  He had botched it when, during a long range kill, a dog had walked into the shot.  As brutal as he could be with humans, he had not yet been able to kill a dog.

Fucking dogs.

After that it had been a couple of weeks before he had gotten a call for anything and he was worried.  When you screw up in the business of death you usually end up getting killed.

Nevertheless, the call for work had come.  He was contracted to run back-up for another hitter.

Vince had never been a fan of being back-up, but in the long run, it was easy money and he knew he had to build up his reputation again with his booker.

Vince was an average sized guy, and he tended to dress like a rock star.  His hair was disheveled and he sported a five ‘o-clock shadow.  He wore jeans and a tee-shirt with a faded logo on the front.  He also wore an old blazer over that to conceal the shoulder holster where his gun sat.

He’d been sitting on the bench for an hour now and was fighting off sleep.  He didn’t exactly like the early morning shit, after all, he had a life.  As much as he loved movies like The Professional and Hit Man, about the brooding super loner hitter that doesn’t let anyone in, this was not the kind of killer he was.  Vince had a vibrant night life and a good amount of friends who all thought he did ‘something with the internet’.

Vince also had three different girlfriends; Cindy, an eighteen year old Asian grad student who fucked like she was getting back at her dad, Monica, who was good at taking care of him, and Rhonda, a punk rocker bitch with pink hair who liked to think she was the best lay on the planet but was in fact not quite as good as Cindy.

His life was good.

Vince heard the sound of someone clearing their throat, and turned.  Standing in front of him was a woman.  She had blonde hair in curly locks that were a little longer than shoulder length.  She wore a long sun dress, stretching to her ankles.  The thing was white with big red dots all over it.  On her feet were sandals strapped in the back.  She held a duffle bag in front of her and looked at Vince with bright green eyes from behind a pair of wispy glasses.  She looked twenty but was probably more like thirty or so.

 Like out of a fucking fairy tale.

“Can I help you, babe?” Vince asked the woman.

Her face was stone cold with the exception of a slight eyebrow twitch on the word ‘babe’.  “I believe you are waiting for someone?”

Vince looked confused, this couldn’t possibly be the hitter.  “Yeah, I am.  How did you know that?”

She just stared at him waiting for him to get it.

“You’re my contact?” he asked, confused.

“Bright one, aren’t you?” She said, plopping the duffle bag on the bench next to him.

Vince frowned.  “Hey, hey.  At least I was on time!  I have been waiting here, literally all day!”

“Metaphorically.”  The woman said, without turning toward him, pulling a Kevlar vest out of the bag and strapping it to herself.

Vince looked confused.  “What?”

She stopped what she was doing and took a deep breath.  “Metaphorically.  You have metaphorically been waiting all day, because you haven’t actually been here all day.”

Vince became confused.  “What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about English.  The language you speak, or at least attempt to.”  She answered as she pulled a Tech-9 sub-machine gun out of the bag.

“Jesus, that’s a little much, isn’t it?”  He said as he watched her drag a clip out of the bag and rammed into the gun expertly.

“No, it’s not.”  She continued.  “The word literally means actually; without exaggeration or inaccuracy.  When you say ‘literally’ in that sentence, it means you are saying you have actually been here for a full day.  I know you have only been here for an hour.”

“Well I-”  Vince sputtered and the woman interrupted.

“Whereas, ‘metaphorically’ means something used, or regarded as being used, to represent something else; an emblem; a symbol.  As in, to say that, while you haven’t actually been here a day, you, in fact, have been waiting long enough to feel as though you have been here a day.  Do you understand?”

Vince stared at the puzzling woman, then finally decided how to respond.  “You have been watching me for an hour?”

She shook her head and pulled one more clip from the bag, slipping it into the pockets of her vest.  “Of course.  I had to be certain of your identity.”

“Okay, whatever.  Let’s just do this job and get out of here.” Vince said, frustrated with her.

She nodded.  “I agree.  The location of the hit is in this direction.”

She slid the bag under the bench and began to walk into the more wooded area.

Vince shook his head and began to walk next to her.

Time ticked by as they moved through shrubs and Vince became anxious.  Something about this whole job felt wrong.  She felt wrong.

“So, how long you been in the business?” Vince asked, trying to start up a conversation.

She took a deep breath.  “Have you.”

“What?”  He said, regretting it as soon as he did.

“That sentence is wrong.  It should be, ‘how long have you been in the business?’ and to answer your question, I prefer this to stay as impersonal as possible.”  She said in response.

“Jesus,” he said, the irritation showing in his voice.  “Impersonal it is, then.”

“Thank you.” She said without emotion.

There was another moment of silence.  “So this mark likes early morning jogs, right? That’s why we are out here?”

She remained silent.

“Perfect time to hit him if you ask me,” Vince continued.  “So, is it a man or a woman?”

“The target is male.”  She answered.

Vince was happy about that.  He hated killing women.  At the end of the day, he could pull the trigger no problem, he just always felt bad about it.  He had considered the reasons for this and thought it was probably some latent ‘man protects woman’ instinct, or possibly that men were usually less attractive.

“Okay, well, impersonal as this is,” Vince began again, “I need to call you something.  You can call me Vince.”

“You may call me the Librarian.”  She said in response and Vince was surprised she didn’t argue it.

Vince made a grunt of interest.  “The Librarian?  I know you.”

The Librarian stopped and turned, feeling they were sufficiently removed from the main path.

Vince stopped moving, but not talking.  “Yeah, I heard the Librarian was good, but I thought she specialized on taking out other killers, like a private cleaner or something?”

She racked the slide on the sleek killing weapon, waiting for him to figure it out.

“So the guy we are here to kill is a hit man, himself, huh?” Vince asked.

She stared back at him and raised her eyebrow.

Vince figured it out. “Fucking dogs.”

The Librarian emptied the entire clip of ammunition into Vince’s chest and head.  The entirety of the weapon’s 9mm, 32 round clip, finding their marks in his body somewhere.

Vince’s lifeless body hit the ground.

The Librarian removed the spent clip and slid it into one of her pockets before taking out the new one and placing it into the gun.  She then watched the body for a second. When it didn’t move, she walked over to it and squatted down next to the bloody mess. She took a single latex glove out of a vest pocket and slid it over her right hand, snapping it in place.

She pressed two fingers to Vince’s throat, looking for a pulse.

There was none.

She pulled the latex glove off her hand and pulled out a small zip lock bag.  Placing the glove into the bag, she then sealed the bag and replaced it in her pocket before walking back through the shrubs to the bench.

She removed the vest and broke down the gun, putting them back into the bag before zipping it up.

She suddenly heard Johann Sebastian Bach’s, Fugue in G Minor.  She recognized it as the ringtone of her business phone.  She pulled out the phone and recognized the number.

She answered.  “How may I service your request?”

“Are you near Cleveland?”  The voice on the other end was that of Elmo Kincaid, a man she had worked with before.

“Perhaps.  I have just completed an endeavor and would be available.”  She answered.

“It’s a big job, a cleaner type job,” he said and she could hear the desperation in his voice even though he tried to conceal it.  “It’s serious wet work.”

“Will we have to rendezvous?” She asked.

“Defiantly.  I can give you the details then.”

“Understood.  I will contact you with a confirmed rendezvous schedule.”  She said, and then hung up.

She was happy about this offer.

She had been in dire need of a challenge.

15(S2E2)- The Devil Wears a Dress

15

(Season 2 Episode 2)

The Devil Wears a Dress

Hovered.

It would probably have been the best word to use when describing his situation.

He hovered.

Between life and death.

Between awake and asleep.

He fucking hovered.

He was asleep now.

Felt her hair as he ran his hands through it, felt her lips on his mouth as they kissed.  It was an embrace that had gotten him every time.  A kiss with her kept him up some nights, wanting.

He lost track of the world around him when she kissed him.

Bam.

Fucking, bitch.

He was awake now.

He could feel the muddy ground and wet grass as the rain came down hard.  He felt the pain in his chest like a vice squeezing the life out of him.

Broken heart or a bullet in the chest, same difference.

He saw the red head limping toward him.  Her face had been beaten and bruised and blood leaked from her nose.  The water drenched her hair and the whole thing coupled together, made him think of the old legends of Irish banshees.

Fucking, banshees.

He was asleep.

He was on the top of his game, about to nab another one hundred yards rushing in a single game.  This was the season of his life and his senior year.  The college scouts were here and he was blowing it out of the water.  She sat in the bleachers cheering for the team.  They were happy.  She sat next to his father who was very proud.

The quarterback yelled.  “Hike!”

The play started, he got the ball.

They all said it was a bad hit.

He only remembered the internal pop he had heard in his head on the impact.

Fucking knees.

He was awake now.

A weird looking old guy was standing over him working on his chest.  There was a lot of bleeding.  He couldn’t breathe.

The guy working on him seemed to hunch over, looking over his big dopey looking glasses like a grandfather would.  He had wispy grey hair and had to be in his fifties.

“This isn’t looking good, Patty.  Jesus, this bullet is in there.”  The man was talking to the banshee who was sitting on a stool with an ice pack on her face.

The swelling had gone down and he could swear he remembered her from somewhere. She responded to the man working on him, but her accent and the damage to her face made her indiscernible.

“Fourth cupboard on the right,” He said to her.  “And for Christ’s sake, use a coaster.”

“What… are… you doing…” He managed in a very hushed and weak tone.

The old man turned toward him, peering over the glasses.  “Probably killing you, but the jury is not in on that one, yet.”

“She shot me… I loved her and she shot me…” He managed, barely clinging to the real world.

The old man went back to his work.  “Well, that’s what they do when you love them, kid.  At least, in my experience.”

He fell back into the darkness and was silent.

****

Jim Creegan was awake.

His eyes exploded open and he tried to jerk upright.

The pain that followed this very ill-conceived, panic ridden idea, kept him from accomplishing this.

The movement made his chest burn and with a scream, he fell back, breathing hard.  He hurt everywhere.  Soreness crept through his being like a plague.  To make matters worse, his head was throbbing and he was starving.

Then came the urge.

“Bet you got to take a wicked piss.”  Patty said as she entered the room to find Creegan awake.

Creegan looked over at her and raised an eyebrow, positive she said something about a woman named Tish.  “What?”

Patty realized her Irish accent had gotten the better of her again, she slowed down and attempted to annunciate better.  “You have to pee?”

Jim began to remember now.  “You’re the one I fought in the hospital.  You tried to kill me.”

Patty shrugged.  “So did your girlfriend.  Seems like a thing with you.”

Creegan frowned, and Patty continued.  “You need help getting to the pisser or not?”

Creegan had to succumb to his bladder and he nodded.  Patty came over and slowly helped him out of the bed.  He tried not to groan, but did anyway.  Slowly, Patty helped him down the hall.

“I don’t get it.”  Creegan muttered through the pain.  “You tried to kill me in the hospital only to save my life later?”

“I need your help.”  Patty replied.

“My help?  With what?” Creegan asked, confused.

They made it to the bathroom.  “I want to take down The Muppet.”

Creegan looked at her, shocked.  She then walked outside the door and let him do his business.  The stream began to hit the water when Creegan responded.  “Why the hell would you think I would help you do that.”

“You want more reason then the fact that I just saved your life?” Patty asked, loud enough to get back into the bathroom.

“Alright,” Creegan responded.  “What makes you think we can do it?”

Patty smiled.  “Your girl still has the flash drive.  He just made a public spectacle of himself and those cleaners were sent by the Rodriguez brothers.  He’s weak.”

Creegan seemed to consider what she had said.  “Okay, well in that case, I only have one last question.  Why?”

Patty sighed and thought back to all the conversations she and Elmo had had.  The times they had been together.  The time when he had pulled her out of the grime and made her strong.  These memories used to give her joy.

Now, they brought only anger.

“He double booked me.”  She said with a low voice, dripping with intent.  “He hired Rockwell and Stone and almost got me killed.”

Creegan hobbled to the door, finished with relieving himself.  “In other words, hell hath no fury like a woman scorned?”

Patty worked her jaw and narrowed her eyes at Creegan.  “You would know.  Your girl shot you for $250,000.00.  That’s pretty sad.”

Creegan shook his head and looked away.  “Twenty.”

Patty raised an eyebrow. “What?”

“Twenty grand.”  Creegan said as patty threw his arm over her shoulder and began to help him back.  “My cut was only twenty grand.”

Patty laughed out loud.  “She shot you over twenty grand?  Wow, you know how to pick them.”

“Fuck you, red.”  Creegan said as they entered the main room with the bed.

Patty helped him back into bed.  “At the end of the day, if we don’t do something we’re gonna be dead anyway.  Elmo’s going to clean house, and we are the dirty dishes.”

Creegan nodded.  “I’m in.”

Patty looked confused, expecting to have to convince him further.  “You are?  Just like that?”

Creegan shrugged his shoulders.  “You saved my life.  All you had to say.”

****

Elmo stood there in the parking garage in downtown Cleveland waiting for her to show up.

How ridiculous.

Elmo thought to himself as he became impatient.  Since when does Elmo Kincaid wait on anyone?

Elmo did wait, however.  He had no choice.  The Rodriguez brothers were still convinced he had lost the flash drive that he kept to hold them in check and they were seconds from bearing down on him.  He had lost half a million dollars, despite his best efforts not to.  Then, finally, there was the matter that fourteen days ago a bunch of people had an apocalyptic shoot out in a hospital which was all connected to him. Thankfully, he owned the cops but how long would that last with the kind of weakness he was showing?

“Waiting for someone?”  The sultry voice cut the air and Elmo knew who it was.

It was the same woman who had demanded the ransom for the flash drive.  It was the female bane of his existence.  Elmo turned to see a woman standing there.  She was wearing a business skirt, slightly too short, and a pinstripe blazer.  Short, dark red, almost black hair, came down to her chin.  She swayed when she walked, moving mostly with her hips.

“You look like a whore.”  Elmo stated, unimpressed.

She frowned.  “You look old.”

That really struck a nerve in Elmo and her wicked smile returned.  “I still have it.”

Elmo reached behind him and drew the small automatic pistol he had stashed there for this occasion.  “Not for long.”

She mocked fear.  “Oh, dear me.  A gun.  I never would have thought you would bring a gun.”

Elmo continued undaunted.  “The flash drive.  I want it now.  Then, you get the hell out of Cleveland.”

She shook her head.  “Come now, I expected the Muppet to be smarter.  You are disappointing me.”

Elmo shook his head.  “No one calls me that!  Enough games.  The flash drive!”

Elmo extended his hand with the gun and took aim at her head.

She shook her head.  “It’s been fourteen days.  Fourteen days since I personally turned your world upside down with nothing but a bat of an eye.  So, after I out-smarted the smartest criminal in Cleveland, I called him up fourteen days later and came to a parking garage to meet with him alone?”

Elmo’s confidence was wavered and he started to use his peripherals to scan the garage around him.

She smiled knowingly.  “Oh, now you’re getting it, aren’t you?  Let me tell you what I did for fourteen days.  I searched.  Searched for the right price, the right skill set, the best bang for my buck.  Do you know who I found?”

Elmo heard the tell tale click of a hammer being cocked into position.

“I found Clay.”  She said with a smile.

Elmo was beside himself.  The man was right behind him, a gun pressed to the side of Elmo’s head.  How had he gotten so close so fast?  Where had he been?  They were in the middle of a parking garage!  Elmo slowly lowered then dropped his weapon.  He had no choice.

“Clay presented the best references and skill sets for the right price.  Sure, I could have gotten six killers for the cost of Clay here, but I have always been a firm believer in quality over quantity.”  She said as she moved in closer to Elmo.

“What do you want?”  Elmo asked, just plain exhausted now.  “You got your money and the flash drive.”

She shook her head and laughed once.  “Half a million dollars?  If you think I was ever in this for half a million dollars, you’re insane.  I used that money to set up my plan and to get Clay, here.”

“Your plan?” Elmo asked confused

“Oh Elmo,” She said.  “I don’t want half a million dollars.  I want it all.”

Clay eased the gun away behind from Elmo’s head and a deep thunderous voice boomed.  “Don’t turn around.”

The woman continued.  “From now on, I get twenty percent of your profits.  In exchange, I keep the flash drive safe from the cartel.”

Elmo scowled.  “Twenty percent is ridiculous.”

She shook her head and chuckled playfully.  “No.  Basing the safety of your multi-million dollar drug empire on a flash drive is ridiculous.”

She turned and began to walk away.  “I’ll call you with further instructions on how and when you will pay me.”

Elmo shook his head.  “You are the fucking devil.”

She stopped and turned.  “Most people just call me Maggie.”

14(S2E1)-Patience

A ZVS Webisode

Written by Zachariah Van Sluyters

Edited by Melissa Blazek Van Sluyters

The MoFos

Season 2

Kill the Muppet

14

(Season 2 Episode 1)

Patience

Mike Paisley squirmed in his chair for what had to be the twentieth time in the last hour.

 There were lots of reasons why Mike should be squirming.  Of course, probably anyone who knew what Mike did for a living would have expected him to be rather uncomfortable.  After all, Mike Paisley was a guard at Ohio’s premiere mental institution, a place that took the worst of the worst, or as Mike and his partner Karl called them, the craziest of the crazy.  They kept the term between the two of them for the most part, because this statement would be frowned upon by the staff.

Mike however, was not squirming about what he did for a living.  He had in the beginning, but after three years on the job he had gotten used to it.  Lunch did tend to have a riot or incident once a week or so.  Mike wasn’t worried, though.  He and Karl sat behind two-inch thick safety glass with their fingers on a button which would flood guards with Tasers into the room to quell whatever insurrection the patients had planned.

Mike was squirming for a very different reason.

His ass was on fire.

Mike had chronic internal hemorrhoids.  Very itchy red bumps inside the anus that one contracted through stress (Mike’s wife and two kids) and repeated hard or acidic bowel movements (his wife’s cooking and the Swenson’s Galley Boy burger, which he just couldn’t resist).

 “You okay?” Karl asked as he watched Mike squirm again.

Mike’s face was contorted in pain.  “Yeah, I’m fine.”

Karl shook his head.  “Seriously man, you look messed up,”

Mike wanted to change the subject.  Looking into the mess hall which was pleasantly quiet today, he saw the door open and two guards walk the famous Patient 1314 into the hall.

“Is that him?” Mike nodded as they brought the tall thin man in scrubs and a white robe into the room.

Karl nodded following Mike’s gaze.  “That’s him alright, 1314.”

They called him 1314 because his name was still, for the most part, unknown.  It was a  phenomena that had only just occurred.

1314 had been found in an abandoned hospital, surrounded by dead people, talking to himself.

The details hadn’t been released to anyone yet, but from the rumors, all the dead people had big red X’s on the international criminal list, and had all been holding guns themselves.  On top of that, 1314 had been holding some military super gun that no private owner should have.

As the story goes, the only name they could get out of the guy was that he called himself Rockwell.  No one could find his prints on record and no one could track him.  It was like he didn’t exist.

They had transferred him here two weeks ago and he had spent the better part of it by himself.

This was his first day released into the general patient populace.  The doctors said he was ready for social interactions.  Mike had lost track of the times the doctors were wrong.

“Can’t believe they haven’t charged him criminally yet,” Mike said as they watched the infamous patient get into the food line.

“Hard to charge anyone when the victim’s don’t have names,” Karl said, also enthralled with the patient.

Mike shook his head.  “Man, is that a mystery or what, dead nameless people just dropping out of the sky, you think it was some spy shit?”

Mike had always enjoyed working with Karl.  He was a good guy.

“It was fucking aliens.”  Karl said.

Then again, Karl could be an asshole.

Mike blinked twice.  “Just to be clear, you aren’t talking about people from other countries that enter the country illegally, are you?”

Karl got serious.  “Think about it man.  Why can’t the government find info on these people?  They know fucking everything.  I’m telling you, the dead guys are aliens, and so is 1314, and they came here to fight over our resources!”

Mike pinched his nose and felt the pain in his ass again.  “So let me get this straight, you think aliens came to earth, put on our clothes, and then used our guns to kill each other over a planet that we control?”

Karl scuffed at that.  “Of course not,”

Mike breathed a sigh of relief.

Karl finished.  “They already control our governments.  Why do you think we attacked Iraq?”

“Sweet, merciful God!”  Mike said and squirmed in his chair.  The hemorrhoids in his ass suddenly throbbed and flared like napalm.

Karl’s eyes narrowed at Mike.  “Jesus man, what the hell is bothering you?”

Mike grit his teeth.  “Besides your system of deduction? Honestly, I have hemorrhoids and they are bad today”

Karl was a taken back, shocked by this revelation.  “You have Hemorrhoids?”

Mike became confused with the look of disgust on Karl face.  “Yes, I have internal hemorrhoids and they are driving me crazy.”

Karl proceeded with caution.  “You’ve been fucking dirty chicks?  I didn’t know you cheat on your wife, man.”

Mike literally groaned.  “Oh my God!  No, you jackass.  Hemorrhoids are in your ass!”

Karl looked even more confused.  “You’ve been getting fucked in the ass by dirty chicks?”

Mike lost it.  “What?!  How is that even fucking possible?”

Karl shrugged.  “I don’t know.  How else you get that shit in your ass?”

Mike screamed.  “I DON’T HAVE HERPES!  I HAVE HEMORRHOIDS!  They are two completely different things!”

Mike suddenly heard a lot of yelling from inside the mess hall and then realized that between his hemorrhoids and Karl’s stupidity, they had both become oblivious to what was happening on the other side of the glass.

It was at this time they both noted the shadow in front of the window.

They turned.

It was 1314.  He had an ear to ear grin.  The patients behind him were all screaming and jumping on tables like apes in the zoo that had just witnessed violence.

Mike then noticed the patient on the floor, patient 137.  He was twisting in the fetal position covered in his own vomit.

Mike and Karl’s pale white shocked faces looked back to 1314 who was staring into the glass back at them.

“Hey, motherfuckers.  That guy on the floor ate a piece of my fruit.  But it’s okay…”  1314 said, before raising his hand, covered in the other man’s vomit, to the glass placing an unrecognizable piece of fruit against the window with a slap, “…I got it back.”

Mike hit the button.

Karl puked.

****

The guards looked at the mess hall door behind Rockwell.  All of the patients turned from the line or looked up from their food to see the new blood.  The second passed and they all went back to eating.  Rockwell had a quick memory of the NVA P.O.W camp he and Stone had been in.

He smiled.

Good times.

Stone appeared next to him.  “Don’t fuck this up.  We finally got out of the padded room.”

Rockwell sighed.  “I liked the padded room.  It was like an adult sized bouncy house.”

“Well I need personal interaction with someone other than you.  If I have to hear one more of your fucking stories, I’m going to kill myself.”  Stone said, frustrated.

Rockwell spun toward him.  “First off, asshole, that is fucking psychically impossible.  You’re already dead.  Second, as previously mentioned, you’re fucking dead.  Who the fuck are you going to talk to?!”

Stone shrugged at that.  “I can listen.”

“You can listen?  You know what?  Fuck you!  When you were alive you never listened to anything I said and I said shit all the time!  I’m a fucking non-stop one way communication generator!  You can listen.  Fuck you.”  Rockwell’s rant came to a close and he realized the entire room had just watched him scream at nothing for a couple of minutes or so.

“Great start.”  Stone said, sarcastically.

Rockwell sighed.  “I want my hat back.”

Rockwell walked to the food line and grabbed a tray, getting in behind a man about a foot taller than him, and ripped.

The man’s face constantly twitched.  Rockwell saw his number patch on his shirt.

Patient 137.

They began to move through the line and the big man kept staring at Rockwell, who was becoming uneasy.  They began to take food and Rockwell finally became annoyed with the staring.  “What?”

They were both given some stew

The big man twitched so much it made him hard to understand.  “You…You…Think your tck tck… Famous.”

They were both given a carrot.

“I don’t think, Sasquatch.  I know.”  Rockwell responded by jabbing his thumb at himself.

“Easy, think of the straight jacket.”  Stone whispered in Rockwell’s ear from behind him.

They were both handed fruit.

The big man suddenly grabbed the fruit and put it on his own tray.  “I get… tck tck… the fruit!”

“Put the fruit cup back.”  Rockwell said as his eyes narrowed.

“Relax.  We don’t want to go back to the padded room.”  Stone said getting worried.

The big man pulled an apple slice out of Rockwell’s fruit cup and plopped it into his mouth.

Rockwell’s jaw worked.  “I’m gonna take my fruit back.  All of it.”

Stone’s imaginary head went into his hand.  “Crap.”

The big man chewed twice and swallowed.

Rockwell calmly put his tray of food down.

Rockwell cracked his knuckles.

Rockwell then took his fruit back.

Season 2 Preview

Season 2

Preview

Fifty-Fifty

The gnarled voice of Tom Waits played on the small counter-top stereo in the large kitchen.  Patty had a hard time making out what he was saying but she knew it had to do with cold water. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GNqRqF1E0fc) The music was painful but gave the pain a voice.  Patty slowly leaned forward in the kitchen table chair where she was sitting.  As she did this, she pulled the ice pack off her swollen and bruised face.  In the last hour she had been sitting here it had grown to be room temperature and had ceased to serve its purpose.

She slowly leaned over the kitchen table dropping the bag and picking up the half empty bottle of Don’s good whiskey.  She poured herself another glass.  She should be drunk after all that she had consumed in the last hour but her aching head and body kept her grounded in soberness.

“Do you know how much that cost me?”  Patty slowly turned to see Donald Carter entering the room from the basement stairs.

He was a short man standing five feet, seven inches, tops.  Don was in his fifties at least and always seemed to walk hunched.  He had white hair and a big, super thick set of glasses which he always seemed to be looking over the top of like a grandfather would.

“You owe me, Doc.” Patty’s accent was heavy but her speech was slow and garbled because of the damage to her face.

Don nodded as he continued to towel his hands off.  “Yeah, I owe you and that’s why I took the bullet out of your friend’s chest.  The bottle of liquor is not included.”

Patty gave Don a hard look as he sat down across from her.  “He ain’t no friend of mine.”

Don leaned back in the chair and crossed his arms.  “So you dragged this guy all the way here in your condition and he’s not your friend?”

Patty hit the drink hard.  She groaned with the burn and felt her pain dull with the effects.  “He’s the one that put me in this condition.”

“Well that’s the dumbest thing I have ever heard,” Don said as waved a hand in the air. Don did that… talked with his hands a lot.

“Is he going to make it?” Patty asked, ignoring the insult.

Don shrugged.  “Fifty-fifty.  I pulled the bullet out, stopped the bleeding and sewed up what I could.  But since I was doing it in my basement, I was limited with the equipment, so I can’t be sure I got it all.  He lost a lot of blood.”

Patty nodded.  “He’ll wake up.  You don’t take me down and not wake up.”

Don shook his head, curiosity getting the better of him.  “What the fuck are you doing Patty?  You look like a truck rolled over you and you tell me the guy I just saved, the guy you saved, is the one that did it to you?”

Patty locked eyes with Don.  “Elmo and I are done.”

Don had had his own run in with The Muppet and it had cost him his livelihood. “You crossed the Muppet?”

Patty shook her head.  “No, he crossed me.”

“Will you stop with the crazy talk?  You can’t go against Elmo Kincaid alone!”  Don pleaded to Patty’s sense of reason.

She didn’t have one.

“You’re right, I brought my backup.  He’s downstairs on the operating table.”  Patty responded.

Don scoffed.  “You two?  To half-dead toughs are going to bring down Elmo Kincaid?”

Patty slammed the glass onto the table creating a loud bang which made Don jump a little in his seat.

“We ain’t going to bring him down.  It’s well past that now.”  Patty looked Don right in the eye as she finished.

“We are going to kill the Muppet.”

The Mofos

Season 2

Kill the Muppet

The Mofos return

10-2011

13-Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda...

13

Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda

“Well this is a conundrum.” Barbie said, as she stared at the waiting room.

In the center was what used to be the scrappy, red head with the bag from earlier.  She was now a beaten mess, lying on the floor with a coffee table wrapped around her.  The room told a story of a brutal fight.  She lost, but she had put up one hell of a fight.

“She’s still breathing,” one of Barbie’s soldiers said, squatting over her.

Barbie didn’t look at him, instead her attention was drawn to the trail of blood moving through the door into the back office.  “The flash drive?”

The soldier shook his head.  “No, she’s clean.”

“Then finish her and be done with it.”  Barbie said.

The soldier stood and leveled the machine gun at Patty’s head and…

Suddenly a loud crash came from the direction of the doctor’s rooms.

“With me.  Let’s move.”  Barbie’s commands were concise and without doubt.

She and her soldiers moved out of the room and Patty’s life had been spared.

****

Creegan stumbled through room after room without direction or purpose.  He moved out of instinct and the belief that if he stopped, he wouldn’t be able to start again.  His sight was slightly blurred and every inch of his body hurt.  All he could think about was getting back to Maggie and escaping with her and the money.  It had to work out this time.  It just…

Creegan’s thought process stopped as he crashed into a rolling supply table that was sitting in the hallway.  The thing tumbled, making a huge crashing noise and he barely managed to not fall with it.  Somewhere toward the back end of the hospital, a burst of desperate gunfire sounded.

There were killers in the building.

Armed with guns.

Maggie.

Damn it, pull it together.

Creegan checked himself.  The arm wound had begun to stop bleeding, thanks to clotting and the soaked bandage Maggie had made the night before.  None the less, he had lost enough blood to feel light headed.  His left eye had swollen shut and was probably a deep purple by now.  Most of his knuckles were broken and his right wrist and hand where broken and swelling up.

This, coupled with the other bruises and scratches were a sure sign that Creegan was in bad shape.

He took a deep breath.

He couldn’t give up.

He moved down the hallway with a purpose.  Find Maggie.  Find an exit.

****

Rockwell could hear the gunshots behind him in the hospital.  “Hold on buddy, I’m coming!”

He was talking to himself and attempting to sprint, but with his foot, it looked more like a desperate hobble.  Either way, he had still made the exit and could see the car five feet away.

He didn’t have the keys, so as he moved to the back end, he put the gun to the lock and fired the large .357 round into the mechanism, popping the trunk.

As the trunk came open, he pulled away the material covering the place where the spare tire should be.

There was no tire.

There was only Bess.

As Rockwell laid eyes on his prize possession, a madness came over him that could be seen on his face.

****

Barbie looked down at the cart, knowing instantly what had caused the crashing noise. The winner of the fight behind them was just up ahead.  She gave her men hand signals, and they moved with her down the hall like a cloud of killers.

The blood trail was getting thinner.  The bleeding was stopping.  Barbie could tell from the distance between drops.  They would have to catch him or her, soon.

Gunfire.  Another series of shots and none of them from the MP-5’s they were carrying, but a semi-automatic pistol of some sort.  This led Barbie to become confused.  Was there more to this than they had observed?  Had Kenneth and his team been dropped? Maybe they should have done more recon…

Doesn’t matter.

She reassured herself, realizing that everyone’s destination was the same.  Whoever they were tracking was trying to find the gunfight.  She could tell, because those shots sounded closer.

Suddenly, the blood trial stopped and Barbie put up a fist.  Her men all stopped in their tracks.  She looked around for some trace of the target, but didn’t see him.  The six of them were standing in the hallway about fifteen feet from the stairwell in front of them. They were surrounded by open doors to different rooms.

He has to be right around here.

As soon as she had this though, one last small caliber gunshot broke the silence.  It had come from the room to their immediate right.  Barbie gave a quick series of hand gestures and the six men took flanking positions in the doorway to the room where the shot originated…

****

Maggie stared as Stone twitched as the small caliber bullet hit him.  He then stopped moving and Maggie watched for a half second to make sure he wasn’t going to come back to life and jump her from behind like some monster at the end of a Wes Craven movie.

He didn’t move.

No surprise resurrection today.

Maggie turned to the bag lying on the floor and opened the zipper to make sure.

Maggie heard the climax of Beethoven’s Ode to Joy in her head as she saw the crisp stacks of money inside.

She smiled and pulled the strap over her shoulder.  She dropped the small hand gun into her pocket.  All she had to do was walk out the door.

She walked out the door.

She found herself surrounded by men in suits with machine guns.  One beautiful blonde woman was standing in front of her, smiling.

“You must be Maggie,” She said as she smiled.

Maggie frowned, frustration running through her.  “This is getting fucking ridiculous!”

Barbie ignored the random comment.  “Now I want you to reach into your pocket, very slowly, and pull out the flash drive.”

Maggie’s face dropped, deflated.  She had come so far, only to fail when she was so…

That’s when she saw him.  He was hiding in the doorway across the hallway behind the six mercenaries.  She should have known.  After all, that’s why she picked him.

Jim Creegan.  She wondered if anything could kill the man.

He shook his head at her as he moved into position to make a move.  Maggie grabbed the bag and pulled it to her chest, clutching it like a mother would a child.  “No.”

“No?”  Barbie was confused.

“No, you’re going to kill me anyway.  Just get it over with.”  Maggie said, squeezing the heavy bag.

Barbie smiled.  “Well you are right about that, have it your way.”

They all steadied themselves to execute her via firing squad.

Creegan readied himself to make his move.

The door to the stairwell kicked open.

Everyone turned in surprise.

****

Bess

 To call Bess a gun would be a gross understatement of the facts.

Bess was an AA-12.

She resembled an M-16 assault rifle, but shorter and thicker. Instead a banana clip, she bore a large drum (like the Tommy gun) and a big scary barrel.

The AA-12 is a fully automatic shotgun.  The drum of ammo holds twenty shells of scatter-shot, and it can empty its clip in less than five seconds.

Bess haunts the nightmares of any who lay their eyes on her destructive power.

She is the scariest fucking gun ever invented.

****

Creegan remembered the gun from the RTA incident.  He remembered the sounds of thunder and the absolute damage it inflicted on everyone in Rockwell’s path of destruction.  He knew everyone in that hallway was going to die.

****

Barbie turned her head toward the idiot at the end of the hall.  He wore Hawaiian print button-up shirt and a cheap Wal-mart fedora on his head.  In his arm, he held some kind of strange-looking gun.

There was smile on his face from ear to ear.

“What the fuck are you?”  She asked, genuinely curious.

****

Rockwell smiled at them.  All eyes were on him.  “Honey, I’m the mother fucking end of your world.”

Rockwell snapped Bess up and pulled the trigger.

In his head, he could hear the climax of Beethoven's Ode to Joy.

****

Creegan saw Rockwell’s gun come up and move.  Putting all of his remaining energy into his actions right here and now, he sprinted across the hallway as the thunder began to sound from the mouth of Bess.

He lowered his shoulders and hit Maggie, colliding with the bag of money she clutched to her chest.  The force lifted her off the ground.  Creegan leaped and the two of them flew through the doorway behind Maggie.  They crashed to the ground and Creegan wrapped Maggie in his arms, clutching her to his chest, shielding her with his body as the seemingly endless booms sounded in the hallway.

As suddenly as it had begun, it ended.  There was a clang of shells hitting the ground and then silence.

Creegan breathed hard, staring at the door, waiting to see if anything happened.

“You think they’re all dead?”  Maggie asked.

Creegan shook his head.  “Don’t know.”

“Jim Creegan.  You still fucking alive?”  Rockwell’s voice called from the hallway.

Maggie sighed and Creegan muttered a curse word.

“Yeah,” Creegan answered finally.

“Maggie with you?” Rockwell asked.

Creegan stared at the empty doorway considering his response.  “Yeah.”

“For fuck’s sake, do you two ever die?!”  Rockwell said, frustrated.

Creegan didn’t respond to that, instead he waited.  Rockwell was seemingly thinking about something.

“Okay.”  Rockwell yelled, “I’m calling it.”

Creegan looked at Maggie, confused and Maggie shrugged.  “You’re calling it?”

 “I’m done, Creegan.”  Rockwell sighed.  “I’m all done.”

Creegan looked at Maggie and they decided not to look a gift horse in the mouth.  They stood and moved out through the opposite entrance, to the room and down the hallways to the exit.

****

Rockwell heard them go.  He then carefully moved through the field of dead bodies.  The shotgun had literally dismembered them; the hallway was covered in gore.  A stray shot had caught Rockwell in the stomach and he was bleeding a decent amount.  He could hear sirens in the distance and knew all that gunfire would bring the cops.  Either that or Elmo had called them.

He moved into the room where he had left Stone.  His eye caught Stone, lying on the floor.

“Told you I’d be back for you.” Rockwell said.

Stone grinned.  “That you did, brother.  I guess we are finally even for that time in Baghdad.”

Rockwell grinned.  “It was about time I got you back for that.”

Rockwell limped over and took a seat on the floor, back against the wall.  Stone was lying across from him.  “What’s with this laying on the ground shit?  We have to get out of here before the cops arrive.”

“Don’t think that’s going to happen, Rockwell.  I think you have lost it.”

Rockwell raised his eyebrow.  “I am a crazy mother fucker, but what are you getting at?”

“Well, for starters, I’m fucking dead.”  Stone responded.

Rockwell frowned.  “I know.”

Rockwell saw Stone for real now.  He wasn’t talking or lying down to take a break.  His eyes were open and staring without perception at the ceiling.  Stone had a small hole in his head and was lying in a pool of his own blood.

Stone was dead.

Rockwell had been too late.

Rockwell lit a cigarette and leaned back.  He decided to wait for the cops.

He was done.

****

Maggie and Creegan moved down a hill into someone’s backyard.  The house was empty and they decided to take a breather.  They could hear the sirens in the distance and knew the cops were all over the hospital.

They had done it.  Gotten in and out with everything.

They needed a bus ride to the airport and then, the sky was the limit.

“I can’t believe we did it.”  Creegan said, catching his breath.

Maggie turned and looked at him, smiling.  “You did it, not me.”

She rose and caught her breath walking over to him.  He smiled as she did and took her into his arms and they kissed.  It was a long and deep kiss.  A kiss for a winner.  Creegan had finally won something.  He felt accomplished.  He had come out of this situation with the spoils and the woman.

Things were looking up.

The kiss broke and Maggie looked up into Creegan’s eyes.  “Creegan, I’ve always liked you…”

Creegan’s smile turned to a frown as he heard the single small caliber gunshot.

“But I love money.”  Maggie finished her statement.

Creegan now felt the bullet deep in his abdomen and the strength seeped out of him.

He staggered and fell backward, landing in the grass as his breathing became ragged.  His head dropped to his right and he watched her hoist the bag over her shoulder, pocket the small gun and turn.

She walked away.

She didn’t look back.

(Season 1 ends here)

12-Stone Cold

12

Stone Cold

Maggie wasn’t waiting around to see if Creegan could put Patty down or not.  As far as she was concerned, it was over and with better results than she could have hoped for. Both the flash drive and the money were in her position.  She just had to get out of this building and she was set.  She could finally move on with her…

Her train of though and her smile vanished into thin air as she turned the corner at the end of the hallway and found herself staring down the barrel of a gigantic revolver.  On the passive end of the gun was the grinning face of madness staring at her from under his fedora.

Rockwell.

“The bag bitch,” Rockwell said, pulling the hammer back on the large gun.

Stone seemed to materialize behind her, a Glock in his right hand.  “Hands in the air!”

Maggie frowned as she slowly raised her hands.  Her brain went into overdrive as she tried to figure a way out of this.  “Just hold on guys.  I know we don’t have good history…”

“Good history?” Rockwell scuffed.  “Bitch, I got a limp.”

Stone grabbed the heavy bag with his left hand and pulled it off her shoulder and put it on his own.  Maggie felt emptiness, as he did so.

“You don’t have anything left to offer,” Stone said from behind her.

Rockwell wiggled his eyebrows in excitement.  “And that means I get to make a canoe out of your head… then your boyfriend’s.  Finally!” Rockwell said as he pressed the cold barrel to her head.

Maggie’s brain settled on a long shot. “The flash drive!”

Rockwell raised his eyebrow.  “The what?”

“The flash drive, I have the flash drive!”  she said, probably louder than she need to.

Stone moved around to Rockwell’s right side.  “Bullshit, you traded it for the money.”

Maggie shook her head.  “There are Cleaners headed into the building.  Patty saw them while we were making the exchange, so I grabbed the money and bolted.  I still have the flash drive.”

Stone and Rockwell seemed to consider this.  Maggie began to get her confidence back.  “And who said Creegan was my partner?  I don’t see him around anywhere.  Maybe your duo needs a woman’s touch?”

Stone shrugged.  “We need to get the flash drive back for The Muppet anyway.”

Maggie shook her head.  “You're going to give it to him?  You boys think too small.”

Rockwell lowered the gun.  “Explain.”

Maggie smiled.  “My pleasure.  Whoever owns the drive, owns The Muppet.”

Rockwell and Stone realized what she was saying and seemed to consider this.  It was going to work.  Maggie was going to get out of this alive, and with two brand new soldiers who, most likely, could get her out of here alive.

Stone and Rockwell turned back to her.  T hey both raised their guns.

“No deal.” Stone said, calmly.

Maggie’s face dropped.  “What?!  Why?!”

Rockwell grinned, “Well that’s simple.  You’re a lying bitch and we don’t trust you. Unlike Creegan, we have no love for your lady parts.”

“We also prefer the field work.”  Stone said, calmly.

Maggie shook her head accepting it.  “You have just got to be kidding me.”

That was when Rockwell caught the movement out of his right eye.  He spun toward the hallway junction to their right, seeing the big guy in the suit with the MP-5, just in time.  He spun and fired the giant gun twice in rapid succession.  Both bullets caught the guy in the chest and he staggered backwards, his figure depressing the trigger in a last, desperate effort to kill the thing which was killing him.  The gun fired, one deadly burst sweeping through the hallway.

Stone yelled in pain as a bullet found its way into the right side of his pelvis just above the thigh.  The bullet shattered his hip bone.  Stone’s source of balance and stability failed and he tumbled backwards, bringing his gun up as he fell.

Maggie turned and ran, disappearing back down the hallway.

The man who Rockwell shot, hit the ground.  Dead.  Another suit peeked around the corner and Stone began pulling the trigger.  Chunks of the wall were dislodged by the shots.  The suit ducked back around the corner and Rockwell grabbed Stone by the hand, bringing him back to his feet and supporting him with his shoulder.

Rockwell began to help Stone stumble back the way they came in the opposite direction of Maggie.  The suit wild fired the MP-5 around the corner but the bullets hit the wall and roof meaninglessly.  The action was only to give him cover to get to his downed partner.

****

Kenneth ducked back around the corner just in time to avoid the cover fire from the two down the hall.  He had gotten only a glimpse of the situation, but it was all he needed. His man was down and probably dead.  The two had a giant hockey bag, which was probably the money.  They found the secondary target.

He put the gun around the corner and blind fired in order to give himself cover to peek around the corner again.  The two were gone.  They would be retreating.  One of them was wounded.  His other four men stood behind him with guns at the ready.  He gave a hand gesture to move with him around the corner and they did.

Kenneth stepped over the body of his man.  One of the suits behind him asked quietly, “Sir, what about Burt?”

Burt was the one on the ground.  “Make sure he’s dead, more for the guys who don’t fuck up.”

The man shrugged then popped a single shot into Burt’s forehead

Kenneth led his team around the corner.  The hunt was on.

****

Maggie was a lot of things, most of them very bad.  She was not stupid, however.  While Creegan had slept, she had walked through the hospital and mentally mapped it out in her head.  She knew how to move and where everything was, which gave her a leg up on everyone else in the building.

Everyone who was trying to kill her.

She was not ready to give up on her money.  She had come too far to just walk away. Instead, she kept low and moved, room by room, alongside Rockwell and Stone without them knowing.  It wasn’t hard since Stone’s leg seemed useless and it took everything Rockwell had to keep him standing while carrying the bag and watching for the team of Cleaners who followed behind.

The duo zigged and zagged a couple of times and she had to make a risky crossing of the main hallway.  She did it, just in time, as she watched the five man team come around the far corner.  All were moving at a crouch, guns at the ready.

Rockwell and Stone were out of their league.

Maggie had to watch and wait.

She would get an opportunity.

She would take it.

****

“Alirght, head through those doors!”  Stone yelled at Rockwell, through gritted teeth.

Rockwell shook his head, “Can’t stop, we won’t make it!”

Stone shook his head. “We aren’t going to make it!  Now, go into that room!”

Rockwell frowned and veered through the doors.

“Alright, now put me against that wall.”  Stone gave the order.

Rockwell frowned.  “Stone, we have to-”

Stone cut him off.  “Just do it!”

Rockwell did what he was told.  Stone adjusted, leaning his back against the wall.  “Now kick over all these beds and make them face the door we came through.  And hurry.”

Stone said this as he pulled the Walther out of his back holster and set it in his lap.  He then did the same with the Derringer, and then checked his ammo in the Glock. Seven shots till empty.  Rockwell shoved over the beds one by one, each making a crashing noise.

“We are taking a stand, huh?  I like that.”  Rockwell said and smiled.

“No,” Stone replied.  “I am.  You’re going to go to the car and get Bess.”

Rockwell’s frown turned to a smile.  “You said I couldn’t use her no more.”

Stone nodded and smiled.  “I let you keep her, didn’t I?”

Rockwell nodded, “Alright, I’ll be right back.”

Stone shook his head.  “Take the money with you, moron!”

Rockwell shook his head as he sprinted out the back entrance to the room.  “No way, there would be no reason to come back then.

“Asshole.” Stone said, now only talking to himself.

****

Maggie had already crawled in the front entrance to the large curtained examining room.  None of the curtains were drawn, but after Rockwell had overturned all the beds, it was easy to find a corner and become unseen.  Not to mention, the lights were off and, although it was still daylight, the room was toward the center of the hospital.  This cast shadows everywhere.

She had heard the end of Rockwell and Stone conversation and shivered.  If there was anything in the world she would rather not see again it was Bess.  She sincerely hoped this was all over by then and she was out of here with her money, or at least her life.

As it was, she was rooting for Stone.  In his condition, he would be the easier one to take the money away from, as long as she could do it before Rockwell returned…

…with Bess.

****

Kenneth and his men arrived at the room and stopped at the sliding door, peeking in.  He saw all of the beds knocked over and knew that Rockwell and Stone were set up in the room for a showdown.  They were expecting the Kenneth and team to move in through the front and sweep the room.  At which point, they would attack Kenneth’s team from behind the beds or out of the shadows.

Amateurs.

Kenneth motioned to his four subordinates, to have them move in through the front and sweep forward, two to each side of the room.  He decided to move around to the back and would take Rockwell and Stone from the flank when they sprung the trap.

Kenneth would kill both the marks and get the money.  Most likely, a couple more of his men would die, making his take even bigger than he had anticipated.

It was a good day.

****

Stone heard them come through the sliding glass door.  It made a swishing noise as the air adjusted.  Stone had pulled himself directly behind one of the tables and was lying on his back.  The Glock was in his right hand and he held the Walther in his left.

He remembered Baghdad and his Army days; hiding behind a dinner table so he could get close enough to his mark to cut his throat.  Knowing then, that he had a talent and that talent was the planning and execution of the murder of other human beings.

If only he could have been an artist.

He peeked around the table, lying completely motionless as The Cleaners moved through the room, two on either side, cautiously checking behind each bed, guns at the ready.  They were professionals.

Stone would have to be fast.

Stone would have to be faster than he had ever been before.

The two on his side moved over the bed in front of him, and he knew it was time.

Stone took a big breath then exhaled, clearing his mind and steadying his hand.

He then sat up, fluidly bringing the Glock up on his targets, deciding which one of them would be faster.  He saw recognition in the one man’s eyes in the millisecond that it took him to pull the trigger.

Stone fired three quick shots into his center mass and the man went limp.

The other went to bring his gun up but Stone swept his arm to the right, making the pinpoint adjustment, emptying the clip into the man’s chest.  The second reared back and stumbled over the bed, crashing to the floor.  His MP-5 made a short burst into the ceiling.  The slide on the Glock locked into the reload position and Stone swept his body around.

He had to be faster than ever before…

Stone brought up the Walther with his left and aimed down the sights, firing twice at the first man.  He immediately corrected his arm to point at his final target.  No time to make sure that he even dropped the first, he pulled the trigger desperately as the tension had built in his chest.  He had to make sure.

The gun went empty.

Both men were dead.

Stone sighed in relief.

He dropped the pistols and he grabbed the bed and pulled himself to his one good foot, gripping only the Derringer in his hand.  He had just killed four men in half a second, while wounded.

Damn, he was good.

He heard three shots from behind him.

The bullets hit Stone in the back and he crashed to the floor, stumbling over the bed that had been his lifeline.  The Derringer dropped from his hand and hit the floor, sliding into the shadows.

Stone hurt everywhere.  Blood was free-flowing out of his body.  He had just painted his masterpiece, only to die directly after.  He frowned at the realization and became frustrated.

He heard his unseen attacker laugh as the suit walked around the bed, standing taller, machine gun clutched loosely in one hand.  He looked down at Stone and smiled, “Damn, man.  That was some shooting.  I don’t even think I could shoot that well.  Too bad I had to shoot you.”

Kenneth looked down and brought the gun up.  “I should thank you.  You just made me a lot of money.”

Stone closed his eyes and waited for the inevitable.

It never came.

Inside, he heard his Derringer go off three times and opened his eyes to watch the surprised look on Kenneth’s face as he staggered backward, blood coloring his white undershirt.

Finally, he fell to the ground.  Dead.

This made Stone happy.

It also worried him.

He heard the foot steps behind him and Maggie walked past.  His Derringer was in her hand.  She walked to the bag of money and picked it up, slinging it over her shoulder.

She then looked at Stone and cocked her head to one side, curiously.

Maggie then walked over to Stone and pointed the gun at his head.

“Like I said, Stone, you think too small.”

One final shot rang out.