Chapter 17

Chapter 17: Q&A

They ate dinner late that night and everybody retired to their respective areas. Skinner was still slightly apprehensive about ‘interrogating’ a fellow police officer but the Viper had assured him that he wouldn’t have to be bothered with it. He’d noticed a transformation in the man over the last several days. He was certainly less jovial about things, if that was what you could call his demeanor before. Perhaps he was always like this when it came time for a job but Skinner had no way of knowing. He had noticed that the man smiled less and tended to pore over various files most hours that he wasn’t doing legwork for the job. Perhaps this kind of dedication and attention to detail was why he was so good at his job and even more likely why he was still alive today.

Skinner awoke in the morning to the muted sounds of someone screaming and knew that their captive was awake and slightly aware of his situation. The gunfire in the mornings didn’t bother him anymore as he’d become accustomed to it. He walked into the range with a cup of coffee as the Viper was reloading. He stood quietly as he watched the man score killing shots on all three targets in all three stalls. The man seemed to prepare for all circumstances which was a good thing in his line of work. The Viper holstered his pistols and turned around, not really seeming to be surprised that Skinner had snuck in behind him. “Morning detective.” He said flatly. “Morning. Your patient is awake.” “Yeah I heard. I was gonna let him stew for a bit before I turned on the lights for him.” The Viper walked past him into the main part of the house and grabbed himself another cup of coffee. “I’m going down to talk with him. You can come if you like.” “I’ll pass thanks. I should probably squeeze a few rounds off before we have to shoot for real.” The Viper nodded and grabbed his overcoat and sunglasses as he headed for the door.

The yells from Officer Jackson in the pit grew louder as the Viper crossed the yard. As he removed the thick steel bars that secured the bulkhead the man’s screams turned more frantic and rose in both volume and pitch. These were the screams of a desperate man much as the hit man had hoped. He would be much easier to squeeze information out of if he was under the impression he was going to be tortured. What the man didn’t realize was that the hardest part of his interrogation was already over with. The Viper left the light off as he stepped into the stairway and closed the bulkhead behind him. He knew the layout by heart and walked silently through the long black hallway, his footsteps muffled by the man’s frantic screams.

He sat quietly in a chair across from where he knew the cell was and simply listened. The man continued to scream for several more minutes alternating between pleading and profanities. The Viper simply continued to sit and listen silently until the man began to quiet down. He then lit a cigarette, the light from his lighter casting the room in a dim light momentarily, blinding his prisoner briefly until the flare died. All that remained was the bright yellow end of his cigarette in the total blackness of the pit.

“I have some questions for you Officer Jackson. If you cooperate I’ll let you live. If not…well let’s just say that there are some very hungry rats down here.” Fuck you, you bastard killer. Fuck you and your offers. You’re a piece of shit!” The Viper took a drag off of his cigarette causing the end to glow brightly for a moment, casting his face into a brief light. “I’d have hoped that you would have been more forthcoming officer. “Piss off you fucker. I’m not saying shit!” “Well that is certainly your prerogative officer, but you see there’s a small problem that I have with you at this point in our lives. The problem simply put is this. You tried to kill me. Not only that but you took money to try to kill me. Now, you see I already know who sent you. I’ve got all of the paperwork I need to prove anything I want to. But your cooperation will dictate who I actually hand this information to.”

“Fuck off. There’s nothing you can do to me.” “Well that’s where you’re wrong officer. There’s plenty that I can do to you, all of which at varying levels of pain but I think being eaten alive by rats would be by far the worst of them. I also don’t like people who don’t keep their promises officer. Now when I walked down here you were saying something about giving me whatever I wanted if I’d just let you go. You’ve apparently not kept your end of this promise so I think that I’m gonna have to leave. We’ll see if you’re more forthcoming with the information in a couple of hours. Look out for those rats. You’ve got a couple of open wounds and as I said, I imagine they’re pretty hungry at the moment.” The Viper noisily stood up and turned to walk down the hall, his hard soled shoes making loud clicking noises as he walked towards the stairs. “I’ll tell you anything, just get me out of this friggin pit!” The man sounded frantic again as he opened the bulkhead and shut it noisily. He slid the steel bars back through the slots and walked to the house. He laid his overcoat across his desk and walked into his small sparring area.

He practiced several forms of martial arts in here. You couldn’t always rely on your pistols. Sometimes they jammed, or worse ran out of ammo. In these cases he didn’t want to be left defenseless and studied here just as hard as he did with his pistols. He walked up to one of the training dummies and assumed the defensive stance he’d learned years ago. He delivered a flurry of straight punches, crouched into a low sweep then suddenly rose into a spinning back kick. The dummy flew to the side with the power of his strikes and he seemed satisfied. He circled the dummy as he’d been taught, delivering furious jabs to the head and torso areas and finished with a round kick, sending the dummy flying again.

The clapping from behind him broke his concentration and he turned around quickly and found Shin Lao standing in the doorway watching him. He’d shied away from her over the last day or so but it was something that she was accustomed to as a job grew closer. He tended to go into a business mode as he steeled himself up for a job, but this one was going to be the biggest of his life, and perhaps his last for more than one possible reason. She knew this but it didn’t mean that she had to like the possibility. “You know that dummies don’t fight back. Perhaps you should train against something that’ll hit you back.” Shin Lao smiled and took several steps onto the large matt that occupied the majority of the room. “You know you’ll kick my ass all day long. I think you enjoy these little sparring matches.” The Viper said with a smile. He may be proficient in several forms of combat, but Shin Lao had him beat in hand to hand combat even on her worst day. “It’s true. I do.” She said with a grin. It was true, the man could hit the sharp end of a needle from two blocks away but he wasn’t nearly the melee fighter that she was.

She took an offensive stance, her arms spread slightly, he hands flattened and hard as steel. The Viper slipped his shoes off and took his defensive stance and began to circle around her. His teacher long ago had taught him that more fights were fought along the same axis in a back and forth manner. He learned that by circling he could often get the upper hand. But this only seemed to work with someone who wasn’t incredibly proficient in such arts. Shin Lao was one who was incredibly skilled so these matches often came down to his reflexes and speed trying to fend her off.

They circled each other like some sort of mating dance seen in the animal kingdom. The comparison wasn’t altogether untrue as their forms of combat were created using motions taken from animals. The Viper had learned several forms of Kung Fu in his travels, all of which he was proficient with, but he had taken many motions from each and turned them into a style that he could use in most of his situations. Shin Lao however had learned one form and had mastered it well. Enough of this dance he thought to himself as he quickly closed the distance between them and thrust out his hand in a tiger claw strike. He arm swiftly rose up to block the strike while her other swung smoothly through the air and almost caught him in the stomach had he not blocked. He crouched down and twisted his body to bring around a quick sweep but she quickly rose to one foot leaving his foot hitting nothing but empty air. She straightened her leg out into a quick snap kick but he brought his arms up across his face to block her foot. He caught he foot and twisted with his body pulling her off balance, but she simply brought her body around with it landing on her remaining foot with ease. She kicked her foot out from under her and extended her body, sending her pointed toe into the Viper’s chest. He released her foot and rolled backwards, on his feet in a second.

Shin Lao was already pressing her advantage and launched herself into the air with both feet extended towards her target. The Viper saw her mistake and rolled to the side just as her feet pushed deep into the matt, he swung his leg around again to sweep but her feet had barely touched the ground before she was in the air again, avoiding his sweep again. He hopped to his feet and took his defensive stance again as she came down, her arm swinging around to strike. He blocked her strike and she launched into a flurry of quick strikes. He blocked all of these and retaliated with a barrage of jabs of his own. She quickly caught his arms and cut him short. He struggled for a moment and she simply smiled. Though she was worried momentarily when he simply grinned and twisted his body upwards. He brought his feet up into her chest and pushed backwards launching himself back as well as her. He rolled out of the landing and pushed his attack as she was just getting up off of the matt. He leapt into the air while she was still rising and brought his fist back to land the blow. She caught his arm inches from her face and rolled backwards, sending him flying behind her. She rolled with him and pinned him to the ground.

She smiled down at him as he struggled briefly to get loose but realized he was trapped underneath her, her hands like iron on his forearms and her weight bearing down on his thighs making it impossible to move. “You’ve gotten better Elias, but you’d better keep practicing.” He smiled at her and sighed “I know. But I’ve just got to be good enough to finish one last job.” Her face had gotten closer to his as he spoke and he could feel her breath on her face. “Just so long as it’s your last job for the wrong reason. If you get yourself killed I’ll never forgive you.” Her voice had gotten low and Elias looked up into her eyes. “I won’t. They’ve already tried and failed.” Her body flattened against his and she was more laying on him now than pinning him. “You’d better not. I hate to wound your ego, but there are people out there that are better than you.” She lowered her head and kissed him, removing her hands from his arms and touching his face. He kissed her back hard wrapping his arms around her shoulders pulling her harder to him. With a move that elicited a slight groan from the Viper she sat up and looked down at him. She smiled coyly and tucked her hair back into a bun. “Just keep that in mind when you ask yourself whether you feel like getting killed or not. There are other things to concern yourself with than vengeance.” She stood up and walked to the edge of the mat and slipped her shoes back on.

“Dammit” the Viper cursed under his breath and rose from the mat to retrieve his shoes. He slipped them on and left the dojo, turning the light off as he walked to his office and grabbed his coat and glasses. He looked at Skinner who was sitting at the security monitors with a sly smile on his face. “Not a word.” Was all the Viper said as he walked out to the garage. It was time for round two with his prisoner.

He turned the light on in the pit this time when he entered; the loud grunt from his prisoner brought a smile to his face. He liked to keep his guests guessing and walked the hallway into the small area. “Okay officer, time to come clean. Who were you working for, how much did he pay you and what am I walking into.” “Fuck off bastard.” The Viper turned his attention to the shelves causing the man to follow his eyes. The shelves held perhaps twenty Plexiglas cages. “The brown rat is one of the few species of rats which are omnivorous. They’re also the largest of the true rat species. They’re the ones that were responsible for carrying the plague and typhoid fever in the dark ages. These particular rats are also very hungry as I haven’t fed them since we went to retrieve you.” The Viper pulled one of the cages off of the shelf and opened one end of it. Five rats quickly spilled out with one rat being much larger than the others. He saw his prisoner eyeing them fearfully. “That one there is named Tanaka and is the alpha in this particular plague. Aptly named don’t you think?” The Viper pulled another cage off of the shelf and opened it, releasing five more rats into the area. The officer started trying to scoot back to the farther end of his cell but didn’t have far that he could go. “I’ll let you guys get acquainted. Just ring the bell if you need anything.”

The Viper turned the light off and walked back towards the bulkhead. The horrified yips and snorts of his prisoner filled the dark hallway as the rats began to investigate the man. He didn’t leave the pit however and closed the bulkhead noisily from the inside. He then sat on the stairs and listened, lighting another cigarette as he waited. It didn’t take long before the man started gibbering for someone to help him and the Viper took that as his cue to return. He walked quietly down the hall listening to the man scream once again for someone to help him. He turned the light on when he reached the other end of the hallway and sat again in the chair noting the man huddling in the corner trying futilely to get the rats off of himself. “So again I ask. Who were you working for, how much did he pay you, and what is he planning?” “All right I’ll tell you. Just get these fucking rats off of me.” “I will, but afterwards. You seem to be more forthcoming when you’re under the gun, so to speak.” “Tanaka. Tanaka paid me to take you out. He said that you were trying to kill him and wanted to take you out first. He paid me five hundred grand to take you down.”

The Viper smiled at this new information. He’d never been paid that much for a single hit. Apparently Tanaka was very worried about him. “Wow, that’s quite a bit of money officer. How were you planning to explain that to the powers that be, along with the money you received from the online auction?” The police officer looked shocked at the revelation of this information. “Yes we know it was you that sold them. How do I know this?” The Viper pulled the two guns from their holsters hidden under his jacket. “Because a friend of mine returned them to me. So, you earned twice from my supposed death. However you tried to sell something that belonged to someone else. Stolen goods if you will. Now I have one more question for you. What is Tanaka up to? Why did he suddenly have so much interest in seeing me dead?” “I don’t know. I was just someone to pay to get rid of a problem. He never told me anything I swear!” “I don’t believe you Luke but I’ll have to take your word for it now won’t I.” The Viper stood and turned to leave “What about these fucking rats. I told you everything I know.” “You’re right, you did. No need to torture you any longer I guess.” The Viper reached into his pocket and withdrew a small whistle. He blew into it and the rats scurried away from the man. He reached down and scooped the rats up and into their cages.

“Because you told me that much I’ll leave the light on for you while I’m away. I’ll decide what to do with you later.” The man started screaming profanities again as the Viper walked down the hallway and out through the bulkhead. The steel bars back in place he entered the house and sat down in his office now with more questions than he had answers.