The Hitman’s Tale – 1.02 A Long Way to Fall

Joe left Drago’s hive of scum (and villainy) and walked towards the docks. It was still early morning but smugglers worked around the clock and, occasionally, sometimes through it. The dock was actually the city’s sky port for flying craft, but had been branded as ‘the docks’ because, quite frankly, it was still used for docking ships. Some things never changed.

Joe clambered up on to a dumpster and hopped over the wall that ran around the front of the sky port. Security had never been brilliant at the docks, and Joe had found himself sneaking along the edge of the sky port before. He always resisted the urge to look down over the edge of the docking bays at the long drop to the ground. The sky port itself hung over the edge of the City of Light’s foundation plate and seemed to be holding on by the lip of its own plate. Many an unlucky gangster had been given the gift of concrete shoes and thrown over the edge. On a quiet day you could hear them scream all the way to the bottom.

***

The docks had an air terminal and generic sky port centre connecting the docks to the city plate. Large aircrafts usually docked around the edge of the plate, hovering thousands of feet above the ground, while the smaller privateer crafts properly parked on the plate itself in the limited space available amongst the stacked cargo containers and fuel tanks. The visitors to this plate were predominantly tourists boarding or leaving the various cruise ships that visited the City of Light, the rest of the plate’s population being the understaffed maintenance crews. Occasionally gangs would sneak in to the docks to conduct whatever business they had, the docks being a sort of neutral turf where no one group claimed the area as their own as part of some unwritten arrangement. It was the only way in and out of the city after all, so keeping rival groups out would be too much hassle. However, every once in a while a fresh-faced new upstart would come along wanting to claim the area as their own, something Joe suspected was happening now.

The would-be assassin weaved his way between the gaps in the vast steel cargo containers, searching for his prey and occasionally doubling-back into the maze whenever he found the gaps in the containers becoming too thin. He could clearly hear a rhythm and blues beat drifting over from the centre of the structure, and he relied on his ears to guide himself through the maze of cargo towards it. Eventually the maze opened out into a section of hangars and bays, and the music filtered through the air clearly, no longer obstructed by cargo.

Peeking his head around a crate, he could see a low-rider car parked haphazardly against a hangar. The music was pumping out from its radio and masked the voices of the two Yardies stood talking to each other, unaware of Joe’s presence. Joe really wasn’t fond of criminals like Yardies, who favoured vice achieved the unorganised way; organised crime was just more efficient, and wearing a suit was nice too. To add an extra layer of distaste, these Yardies were wearing dreadlocks of various colours, grungewear in assorted denim tatters and chains and piercings dotted around the empty inches of exposed flesh. A right bunch of ‘typers¹, clearly.

Spotting the Uzis² in the Yardies’ hands quelled Joe’s urge to just step out and plug them both with a few quick shots. Instead he slunk around the containers to get a better view of the hangar. Sure enough, poking his head around from a new vantage point, there was the group of Yardies loitering outside the hangar. As far as they were concerned, it was perfect – renting out a hangar and intercepting the shipments of every smuggler in the city was a no-brainer. Joe was surprised that they had lasted this long. He span the chambers on his revolver to check it was loaded and clicked them into place with a swift flick of his wrist. He’d already decided on how he was going to approach the hit, and wedged the gun between his belt and his back into his trousers just as the hangar doors opened to reveal Mr. Blonde Dreadlocks sitting in his own lowrider. Joe moved.

“Excuse me?”

The Yardies raised their guns reflexively towards the suited man advancing towards them. Their poised guns didn’t stop his advance.

“Oh, do beg my pardon, I’m new around here.”

The man approached with a beaming smile on his face and a look of complete innocence, which could quite easily be exchanged for complete idiocy in the City of Light. The Yardies lowered their guns as the man neared closer. He obviously wasn’t intending any harm. No one would get that close if they were looking to shoot someone.

“Who be you?” one of the Yardies questioned gruffly.

“I’m the new hangar inspector around here,” the suited man announced. “Who’s the boss around here?”

Another Yardie pointed at Blondie as he pulled his car forward out of the hangar. Blondie frowned at the suited man, sunglasses gleaming in the early morning sun.

“What do ya want?” Blondie growled through the bulging spliff drooping from his mouth.

“Well, you’re due for payment on your hangar rental.”

“What you talkin’ about, mon? We paid last Friday!” Blondie snarled, lying through his gold-plated teeth. He had in fact paid nothing, and had been expecting a skyport official to come snooping around for a while.

“Really? Damn. I don’t suppose you could check something for me, then?” the suit asked. “Just an item I need checked before I go back to my boss and tell him he’s fucking cocked up again.”

“Okay?” Blondie replied, trying to work out the man’s accent.

“Excellent, Mister…?”

“Lundi. Lundi Dreade.”

“Right, Mr. Dreade. Can we take this inside?”

Lundi stepped out of the car and shuffled back inside the hangar with the suited man, nodding at the Yardie inside the hangar to indicate that this was private business. As the Yardie left the hangar, Lundi grabbed the suited man and pressed him against the hangar door.

“Let me straighten you out, man,” the Yardie boss rumbled, “we got a gud ting goin’ here.”

“That’s the problem,” the suit calmly replied, “but it’s not my problem.”

He slid the revolver out and into Lundi’s chest, where a quick squeeze of the trigger promptly put an end to all of the Yardie boss’s concerns, as well as his lungs. Unfortunately it also made a loud bang that echoed around the hangar, disturbing some nested pigeons up in the rafters.

Shit. Forgot to attach the godsdamn silencer.

Joe ran out of the hangar, hiding the revolver by his leg. The four Yardies outside were advancing forward, completely aware that there had been a gunshot and that the suited man was now running sideways with an awful lot of what looked like blood splattered across his jacket. The suit pointed hesitantly at the hangar door, shock on his face.

“He was so upset that he couldn’t make the payment! He just shot himself! I-I couldn’t-” Joe realised that they weren’t buying it and that they were going for their guns, “-fuckit.”

He brought his revolver up and shot one Yardie through the shoulder, spinning him around and tossing him to the ground. Joe’s smile was cut short as he stumbled in his backwards run, rolling as he landed to avoid the stream of Uzi bullets that tore through the floor where he’d been a second later. Sitting up he ultimately disarmed the Uzi-toting Yardie with a shot to the head, brain matter decorating the floor as the body landed heavily. The two unarmed Yardies hesitated, ready and prepared to let Joe go. Joe smiled.

The sudden roar of engines signalled the arrival of Yardie backup, as two low-riders pulled up next to the hangar from around the corner. Joe stopped smiling.

“Aw shit,” Joe muttered as he clambered to his feet and started to run. He could hear the Yardies briefly ordering a pursuit, along the lines of ‘kill that muthafucker’, and the revving of high-powered engines poised to strike. The squeal of hover thrusters signalled that finely-tuned vehicles were going to run over and burn his arse into the concrete³. The concept of concrete shoes suddenly sounded far more appealing to Joe by comparison.

Joe allowed himself to turn briefly to see what was chasing him, which only made things worse. He then concentrated on sprinting forward, forcing the fact that there was a dead end in the form of a wall in front of him to the back of his mind. He’d worry about it once he got there. If he got there. It seemed a mile away. Joe shook his head. He wasn’t about to let time slow down and fool him into thinking things were dramatic. It was only metres away, he could make it. Just force some extra push into your strides. The roar of the engines breathed down his neck, their sound grating through his ears. It didn’t matter, he’d just worked out what he was going to do once he’d reached the wall.

At the wall he stepped on to it, pushing off of it with one leg and wheeling around mid-air. Raising his revolver he fired, luckily catching one driver in the neck. Landing, he rolled sideways as the now out-of-control car smashed into the wall where he’d been a second before. Joe grunted as he leapt on to his feet, charging forwards towards the buckled car. Spinning the gun around back-to-front with a deft flick of his fingers, he brought the butt of the gun down across the face of the stunned passenger, who groaned and slumped forward.

The other car swerved to a stop, passengers raising their guns and firing carelessly at the wrecked car in an attempt to kill the suited attacker. Joe reluctantly took cover, fully aware that what he was using as a shield was liable to explode with just one well-placed bullet. He carefully opened the passenger door of the car while hunched down, pausing to squeal as several bullets missed his arm and perforated the dashboard. He flicked the switch for the hydraulics and clung on as the body of the car began to raise up away from the hover thrusters. Waiting for the Yardies to pause for a second, he changed his foothold and pulled himself up, stamping down upon the crumpled bonnet of the car and leaping over the wall-

-realising a second too late that the floor below was miles below, the wall being a perimeter boundary skirting the dock plate. Joe’s hand reflexively grabbed the wall, and his legs kicked into automatic mode, scrabbling to run up the brickwork. Through sheer desperation, one of his legs managed to hook itself around the top of the wall, leaving him dangling from the plate by a hand and a foot. Joe’s vision swirled, far far below he could see the town of Undercit, which looked like a small network of cardboard boxes crafted by ants from this height. The wind lapped at him and threatened to rip him from the wall. Using all his effort, he hauled his face up on to the wall, his arm screaming to let go with the effort.

With chin gaining purchase on the ledge, a chunk of brickwork splashing up into his face as a bullet tore into the brickwork next to his head caught him by surprise. He remembered the car full of angry Yardies, and forgot to keep holding on.

Joe fell. Joe screamed.

Joe realised he wasn’t dead when he was thinking how much his chest hurt, and how the ground felt suspiciously like cold metal. He opened his eyes and felt dizzy as the world blurred past. He rubbed his eyes, but realised that, coupled with the air rushing past, the blurring wasn’t his eyes. He was on top of a truck. He laughed, almost hysterically.

Carefully rolling on to his back, he could see the wall up above some distance where he’d fell from. As luck had it, he’d fell from the one part of the dock plate where the freeway passed underneath. He had marvellously chosen one of the only two sections of wall surrounding the skyport that overlooked the motorway. The freeway was a long stretch of eight lanes which weaved and twisted between the various plates that formed the City of Light. From up there, he’d been too confused and panicked to even notice the stretch of concrete passing by just underneath. He could just about make out two round lumps bobbing above the wall he’d fell from, presumably two angry Yardies. Even with the truck saving his life, it had still been quite a distance to fall. Joe had heard about people falling out of buildings into bushes unharmed, and put his continuing life down to sheer dumb luck, which sounded about right.

“Only in the City of Light,” Joe muttered to himself, lying flat against the roof of the truck and enjoying the ride. He would get off when the truck stopped.

Joe watched as the city passed by. He loved this city, and knew almost every street, every building, every nook and every cranny. The city hospital loomed among the buildings on one side, and the view on the other side of the truck overlooked the rim of the plate out across the distant horizon, towards the vast desert.

The truck eventually pulled into a delivery bay behind a supermarket, and Joe calmly stepped down on to the cab of the truck, leaping to the ground and dusting himself off, provoking bemusement and double-takes from the truck’s driver and the delivery bay attendants. Joe knew exactly where he was – he was downtown, the north side of the second plate. He could have ordered a taxi, but figured that he could allow himself the luxury of walking. Besides, Drago wouldn’t be expecting him to be back so soon. He smiled, checking that his revolvers were well hidden in their holsters before joining the hustle and bustle of the streets.

***

The two monks stood in the doorway of the office. The thin one who had introduced himself as Acheron stepped forward to allow his huge partner, who he had introduced as Tartarus, to block the entire doorway with his bulk.

“Gentlemen,” Acheron simpered, “as we explained outside we can do this the easy way or the hard way. Oh do please come out from behind your desks, it’s so discouraging when I have to talk to thin air.”

The door lay in splinters on the floor behind Tartarus. The monks had lost the trail of their quarry, but had picked up a lead with two travel agents. Approaching the travel agent’s office, they had been locked out by swift manoeuvres from Mr. Swill of Swill & Jones Travel Agents, as had been painted on the door before Tartarus had tried opening it. Acheron had found explaining the situation to the whimpering businessmen through the door before Tartarus had opened it quite refreshing. It was a perk of the job.

Swill and Jones stood up behind their respective desks, now wielding small pistols. Acheron sighed, and stepped behind his wall-like associate.

“Oh please. You can try if you want, but you’ll only make Tartarus angry. Isn’t that right, Tartarus?” Acheron stated, poking the huge thug as a prompt. Tartarus grinned and cracked his knuckles. It sounded like tree branches snapping in half. Acheron smiled as he heard the sound of two guns being thrown to the floor, and stepped out from behind Tartarus to see the two terrified businessmen with their hands in the air. He waved their hands down dismissively.

“You know what we want. Just tell us.”

“W-we c-c-can’t. C-c-c-client confidentiality,” Mr. Jones blathered nervously.

“Don’t worry. It’ll be between you, me, Tartarus and anyone else we tell.”

“We could be arrested for breach of trust. You don’t scare us,” stated Mr. Swill, obviously the more resilient of the two. Mr. Jones whimpered as Acheron shook his head.

“Tartarus…it seems these gentlemen don’t want to be co-operative. How about you persuade them until they tell us where the doctor has gone?” Acheron asked his cohort smarmily. Tartarus stood with a blank look on his expression. Acheron remembered who he was talking to and sighed. “Keep hitting them until I tell you to stop,” he rephrased. Tartarus smiled as he understood, lumbering forward and grabbing Mr. Swill by the head in one of his huge palms. Acheron shut his eyes as Tartarus did what he did best. It sounded like a heavy slab of meat hitting a wall repeatedly, only this slab of meat produced additional grunts, whimpers and cries of pain. When he opened his eyes again Mr. Swill certainly looked like his namesake, and Mr. Jones had wet himself.

“Well?” Acheron asked. Jones nodded.

“W-we d-did h-have a g-guy d-dressed as a d-d-doctor come here. He bought a t-t-ticket to S-Samprini, west of here.”

“How far away is Samprini?”

“F-four hours b-by l-light aircraft.”

“That’s a shame. That answer just got you killed. Although to be fair we would have had to kill you anyway. You know too much.”

“N-no! W-waait! I-I can do you a d-deal!” Jones cried, but Acheron had already turned to leave and had elbowed Tartarus into action. Acheron stepped outside and waited for the screams and fleshy thwumping sounds to die down. Tartarus stepped out of the office as Acheron summoned up a small fireball in his palm. He flicked it on to the paperwork scattered across the desks, and after a minute the office began to burn. Tartarus stood watching him, and grunted as Acheron nodded at him with a smile.

“So what are we gonna do now, Acheron?” rumbled the thick-headed thug.

“Take a drive down to Samprini, Tartarus. We’ll catch up with the good doctor eventually,” Acheron replied, elbowing the fire alarm next to the office door. The two monks swiftly moved on, and were driving away in their van as the contents of the office incinerated, shortly before the building was evacuated and the fire department arrived to douse the flames.

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Post by Sean Patrick Payne | July 27, 2022 at 10:02 am | The Hitman's Tale | No comment

Tags: Acheron, Gifelle Arms & Weapons, guns and weaponry, Joe Vekowski, Lundi Dreade, Tartarus, The City of Light, the Galactic Finders of the Tserulian Monastery, Yardies

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