Chapter 15

Setting up a meeting with Hardcase Delaney on the sly required some logistical acrobatics but I was once again in his cushy office. This time it was turn to pace the floor like a man whose wife is having a baby. “Did you see the latest crime scene?” I asked him.

“Yeah,” he said, glancing over a batch of hi-res glossy photos spread on his desk like poker cards. “They were handed over to me thirty minutes ago.”

“What do you notice about this scene compared to the others?”

“I noticed the poor sap had his neck screwed around instead of his whole body.”

I nodded, “Hmm mmm what else?”

“A box cutter.”

“Yep. You see that green goop around it?”

“Yeah, my lab boys and girls are working on analyzing it.”

I faced him now and dropped my bombshell. “No need to trouble them. I already know what it is.”

He leaned back in his chair and cocked his head. “Oh you do, do you? Well what is it?”

“Warden, have you ever seen that old movie Predator?”

His entire mood changed. He stood erect and pointed at me like I was Scrooge in a cemetery. “MacGaven You interrupted my weekend for this affair so you better have something better for me than muscle men and space aliens!”

“Allright if you want something better I'll give it to you. I will give you the scenario the way I believe it played out.”

Hardcase Delaney returned to his chair but the thunder cloud still hovered over his countenance. “I'm listening.”

“The victim was leaving his store for the night, most likely trying to beat the curfew. He had no reason to suspect he'd die last night because none of us have a reason to suspect we'd die on any given night.

“The Shadow Killer struck suddenly as they always do but this time the victim fought back before he was murdered. He used a box cutter he most likely kept in his pocket for self defense since citizens aren't allowed weapons & in doing so left us a clue about the killer namely that the killer bleeds some form of green blood like the Predator.”

I paused for both a breath and for emphasis. “Do you know what that tells me, Warden?”

“No, why don't you clue me in?”

“Our perp isn't entirely human! I have information from a medical professional who will remain anonymous that one year before these killings began those Abe Lincoln worshiping nutballs asked him for med supplies under the table.

“He refused but I believe that they got what they needed eventually and conducted a twisted experiment on someone thus birthing our serial killer.”

Hardcase folded his arms and gave the look a farther reserves for catching his son watching a porno.

“Seriously, MacGaven? The only evidence you've brought me is that you've been in a circle jerk with Fox Maulder! I told you before to leave the cultists alone, don't poke the hornet nest!”

I leaned over the warden's desk, it was my turn to be angry! “Delaney I don't know why you're being a stubborn ox about this but let me tell you something: I'm an investigator with a federal body therefore I technically outrank you here.

“I have no idea why you've become hostile toward me all of a sudden but I don't give a heck how many hornets are in that nest. if they're guilty I will bring the whole thing down off the branch it's hanging from because that's the job you dropped I'm my lap and this is where the evidence points!”

“You feds all have to stick your noses where they don't belong and make life more miserable than it already is! I asked to solve a series of murders.”

“Blast it Delaney, that's what I'm doing!”

“No! You're violating the civil rights of a religious group because they're beliefs are strange to you.”

The blood in my veins was heated, my muscles tense with frustration. “I couldn't care less if they worshipped Cthulhu. I'm targeting them because they're guilty as sin of something. Warden Delaney, don't stand in my way of doing the very job you asked me to do.”

I walked away before I punched the man. He yelled behind me, ’If you're wrong,MacGaven we are both in deep horse pucky! They could sue us. It could cost me my position. What would happen to this Colony? “

“Warden, if we don't stop this just because we don't want ruffle some feathers you won't have a Colony!”

I left him to stew over that. It was the weekend and I'd wasted too much time butting heads with Hardcase Delaney. Man, did he ever live up to his name. Of course a boogeyman bleeding out green ooze would be hard for anybody to accept but after facing killer AI drones during the war I could believe anything.

No, what bothered me was that the Warden had become uncooperative out of fear for his job. Didn't he realize that his refusal to cooperate could cost him just as much as a “civil rights” lawsuit?

I was so ticked off that I began to walk unconsciously, not really paying attention to where I was going. My footfalls carried me to Nellie's restaurant. I took my usual seat and browsed the menu. I settled on something that matched my mood, chipped beef on toast.

The ravishing blond flitted over to the table like a fairy queen. She wore a revealing red dress that almost blended into the table cloth accepted for exposed patches of smooth, feminine flesh. “You look troubled, Tom. What's going on?”

Crap. How was I supposed to answer that without blowing my cover? Ever in the role of a con artist I told her a half truth. “Oh, I'm not seeing eye to eye with someone I know here.”

She didn't press the issue and I was not going to volunteer any more information. She replied, “Well, that sucks.”

I took a sip of ice water and sat the glass back down with an emphatic thunk onto the table. I gazed at her for a long moment wanting to caress the parts of her not covered by her dress. “Nellie, about what happened last night…”

“The kiss?”

“Yes, that's the one!”

“What about it, Mr.MacGaven?”

“I thought I couldn't afford you.”

She leaned in and the fragrance of her perfume climbed into my nostrils. “You didn't have to, Darling. You earned me instead.”

I didn't know just what to say so I said nothing. “Tell you what,” she purred. “Why don’t we go out tonight and get you unwound.”

“Sure.”

That's what we did. We went to the cineplex. During the walk I felt like eyes, human eyes were boring into the back of our skull. I kept looking over my shoulder but never caught sight of anybody. The woman noticed. “Is everything alright?”

“Yeah, I suppose it is.”

Even as we took in the 2036 remake of the Maltese Falcon, The one with a fifty year old Scarlett Johansson playing Spade, I still felt like we were specimens under a microscope. Were we being watched or was I being paranoid?

I liked Scarlett's acting but I would have rather watched the original film from The 1940's. I made it through the remake because Nellie seemed to enjoy seeing the lead reimagined as Samantha “Sam” Spade. When the credits began rolling I escorted my date from the building.

There was someone watching us. In the dimness of the evening I couldn't make them out. I bolted across the road with angry drivers honking like agitated geese. The figure hauled butt as well and I lost them in an alley. Nellie's shoes behind me then, “Tom MacGaven what was that about?”

“I wish I knew.”