A Hard Rain Part 2

"Everyone out!" Dix shouted to his people as he and Bev reached the ground floor, followed by Mr. Data.

The body closest to them was moving, the blood running along the cold, hard concrete and back into the man. It was like watching a movie in reverse.

Redblock's men were coming back to life.

"Mr. Stanley, Mr. Carter, get out!" Dix shouted as he and Bev and Mr. Data ran across the large warehouse toward the open door.

Carter did as he was told, followed a moment later by Stanley.

"Not so fast!" a voice said from behind them.

"Freeze!" another voice shouted.

They were thirty paces from the door across the open concrete.

Thirty paces of cold, hard death.

Dix yanked Bev to a stop and turned to face the man who had shouted.

Mr. Data stopped beside him.

Five of Redblock's men were on their feet, with no signs of the bullet holes that had riddled them a few moments before. All had guns leveled on them.

"Reach for the heavens," one of the goons ordered, waving his gun at the ceiling.

Another of the walking dead climbed to his feet and picked up his gun and joined his friends.

"What do we do now?" Bev whispered to Dix.

Mr. Data gave her an answer. "As Henry Gamadge said, 'Always act as if there was going to be a murder.' "

"What?" Bev asked.

Mr. Data shrugged. "These men were killed. They cannot be happy with the situation."

Dix could not have agreed more. This was not a situation normally faced by a streetwise detective.

"Just great," Bev said as yet another dead goon came back to life and joined the party.

"So," Dixon Hill said, putting his hands in the air, "we do as they say. Unlike them, if we die, we stay dead. Remember?"

The Luscious Bev had nothing else to say.

And Mr. Data had no more quotes.

She and Mr. Data raised their hands in the air and the three of them stood there like a picket fence, facing the walking dead.

Outside the open door, so close and yet so far away, it started to rain again.

Clues from Dixon Hill's notebook in "The Case of the Missing Heart"

Cyrus Redblock has been s.n.a.t.c.hed by an unknown party.

Benny the Banger wants to rule the city.

Reality has changed and death is only temporary to those who live in the city.

Chapter Two.

Mobsters, Gangsters, and Thugs, Oh My!

Section One: Dealing with the Devil's a.s.sistant T HE RAIN POUNDED on the metal roof of Cyrus Redblock's warehouse like a hundred drummers, making it almost impossible to hear any distinctive beat. It was a constant thunder, gaining in intensity, then fading back, only to come on strong again.

Dixon Hill ignored the noise and worked at the binds that dug into his wrists. The rope was coa.r.s.e, rough, and pulled tight, locking his arms behind his back. The goon that tied them had also wrapped the rope once around his chest and around the back of the wooden chair. Dix could stand with the chair, but at the moment that would serve no purpose.

Two other walking dead had given the same treatment to the Luscious Bev and Mr. Data, leaving them all in the main area of the warehouse against the wall facing the large door.

Dix knew that Mr. Data could break free at a moment's notice, but the members of Cyrus Redblock's gang standing guard prevented that. Both their guns stared at him like dark, round cat's eyes, never blinking or turning away.

Dix also worried that Mr. Riker and the others would stage an attack on the warehouse to rescue them. Too many good people might get hurt trying that. With luck, Riker and the rest would hold off and give him time to solve this.

So they sat and waited, the rain pounding on the roof as Dix carefully, without being seen, worked to free his ties.

The man who must have been Cyrus Redblock's second in command appeared from down the stairs that led to Redblock's office. He was followed by four others, all with guns drawn, as if someone might try to ambush them in the narrow staircase. After being killed once so far today, these guys were taking no chances.

The thug in charge wore a dapper pinstriped suit and a brown fedora. His jaw was square and his nose looked like it needed punching. He held his hands behind him, as if starting a lecture to a room full of students. There were no signs in the suit of the bullet holes from earlier. Dix figured the guy was lucky at that. The suit must have set him back a pretty penny.

The pounding of the rain faded to a constant background noise as the man approached his prisoners.

"My name is Danny Shoe," the guy said, stopping directly in front of Dix. His eyes were a deep blue and very intense. "So what'd ya do with da boss?"

"We did nothing with him," Dix said. "And you know that. Were we the ones who attacked you?"

"Might have been your men," Shoe said, brushing aside Dix's answer like he was swatting at a fly.

The other goons nodded like puppets all having the same string pulled from above.

"Me and my men came here to offer to join forces with your boss," Dix said, playing the hand that looked like it had the best chance of success. "Seems we was a little late."

He didn't add the detail about all of them being dead just a short time before. No point in rubbing salt in old wounds, even if they were healed.

"And why would da boss want ta join you?" Shoe asked. "He didn't much like bein' partners."

"To stop what you couldn't stop," Dix said, smiling at the blue-eyed guy standing in front of him. "Your boss getting s.n.a.t.c.hed. Like I said, we was too late."

"You knew it was gonna happen?"

Dix stared at the man, giving him his best how-stupid-are-you look. "Of course. The entire city knew. Where were you? Nappin'?"

Dix glanced at Mr. Data and the Luscious Bev and winked.

"More than likely they was out havin' lunch when the word got pa.s.sed," Mr. Data said.

"My mother even knew about it," Bev said.

Dix just shrugged at Shoe and kept staring at him.

Now the guys with the guns seemed confused. Two of them actually turned and looked at their leader, clearly starting to think it was his fault Redblock had been s.n.a.t.c.hed.

Shoe snorted, again waving away Dix's word with the back of his hand. "So who put the s.n.a.t.c.h on the boss?"

"I don't know," Dix said. "Don't you? You was here, wasn't ya?"

"Didn't see much of anything," the guy said. "Happened fast."

"Like an inside job?" Dix asked, smiling at the guy.

Now the men standing around with the guns looked even more uncomfortable. One of them said, "Don't be pointin' no finger at us. We took lead for the boss."

"Yeah," the others said like a boys' chorus. .h.i.tting the perfect note all at the same time. A couple of them even absently touched places they had been shot.

"Didn't say it was any of you," Dix said, smiling at the guy with the blue eyes. "But which one of ya isn't here?"

Shoe kept looking at Dix while all the goons looked at each other like they had never seen the other guy before, their guns waving back and forth like dead flashlights, searching for the person who wasn't there.

Finally one of them said, "Lenny."

The others murmured and nodded, letting Dix know he had hit on the right idea. Now if he could just turn it into a way out of here.

"Lenny," one man said again. "He was guardin' the back door."

"Where the attack came from?" Dix asked.

Everyone in the place knew it was from the back. The guy named Lenny was now doomed, no matter if he had helped or not. Dix didn't much care.

Cyrus Redblock's second in command nodded, then stared at Dix. "So just because ya know dis, what makes ya think we can trust ya? You coulda been the one settin' it up. Workin' with Lenny."

"Because I'm here and your boss isn't," Dix said.

For a moment the only sound in the big s.p.a.ce was the last of the rain beating on the roof as the storm pa.s.sed.

Then from the back a door slammed, echoing like a shot, and half the men turned, guns ready to fire. This was one jumpy bunch of thugs. Of course, they had the right to be jumpy, considering everything.

A guy came in, walking fast. He was short, with black hair and a long nose. His suit was wet and his hair plastered on his head. He came straight up to the guy in charge. "Word on the street is that Joe Morgan did the s.n.a.t.c.h."

"The Undertaker?" Shoe asked, turning and ignoring Dix for the moment.

"Yeah," the wet messenger said. "I heard it from a good source, who heard it from a good source, that the boss is stashed alive in a casket in Morgan's headquarters."

"So we go in and get him out," Shoe said.

The other thugs shouted their agreement.

"I wouldn't move so fast," Dix said. "You could get your boss killed permanently. And he wouldn't much like that, any more than he liked the fact that you let him be s.n.a.t.c.hed in the first place."

Shoe turned and stared at Dix. "We was caught by surprise. We'll be da ones doing da surprising dis time."

"My point exactly," Dix said. "Let me and my gang work with you."

"And what's in it for you?" Shoe asked.

Dix decided to level with the guy as much as he needed leveling with. "I'm lookin' for a gizmo people call the Heart of the Adjuster. It's about the size of a small ball, shines like it's made out of gold, but it's not. I help you get your boss back, I get his and your help finding my gizmo."

Shoe stared at him, as if he were a man who couldn't read faced with a page of fine print. Finally he nodded. "Deal. Cut 'em loose."

Dix said nothing until the ropes were cut from all three of them, then he stood and faced Shoe.

"You double-cross me," Shoe said, his blue eyes slitted, "you'll be swimmin' with da fishes."

"No double-cross," Dix said, staring right back. "If your boss is being held by this Joe 'the Undertaker' Morgan, we'll get him back."

"A piece of cake," Mr. Data said, doing his tough-guy stance. "Easy as pie. Slicker than a-"

"Whatever," Shoe said, waving away what Mr. Data was saying. "Get your people and meet us a block south of da Undertaker's headquarters. Be ready ta fight."

With that he turned and strode toward the cars, his men scattering to follow.

It took Dixon Hill, Mr. Data, and the Luscious Bev only a moment to beat a hasty retreat out into the light rain and the dark night of the street.

Twenty hours before the Heart of the Adjuster is taken Captain's Log.

The Enterprise is still drifting in s.p.a.ce toward an area we have called the Blackness. We have continued to maintain most internal systems and environmental controls, although with each pa.s.sing hour it seems to take more and more effort. Engineer La Forge offers little hope of getting either the warp core or the impulse drives back on-line until we discover what exactly is causing the problem.

On that front, Mr. Data has an amazing theory. He believes-and I tend to agree considering the information we have at the moment-that the Blackness is framed by not just one quantum singularity, but by four, all staying equidistant from the other. Our instruments can see only one from our present location.

Such a formation, up to this point unheard of in the known universe, would have the effect of not allowing any light to escape from an area of s.p.a.ce between the black holes, thus the Blackness. It would also cause untold rifts in the s.p.a.ce-time continuum. If Mr. Data's theory is correct, this ship would not survive entering the Blackness.

I have instructed Mr. Data to continue his research to find proof that this is what we are facing, and I have ordered Engineer La Forge and all of engineering to find a way to slow the ship down. We must not get close to the edge of the Blackness, let alone enter it.

Section Two: An Alley of Blood The perpetual night of this city by the bay had turned cold, the dampness biting at fingers and cheeks like an invisible animal, not hard enough to draw blood, but with enough force to leave the skin red and angry.

Dixon Hill had the collar of his tan raincoat up around his neck and the belt of his coat pulled tight. His hands were in his pockets, but his ears and nose were still exposed to the cold. At that moment what he wanted more than anything else was for this case to be over, the Heart of the Adjuster safely back in his hands, and to be downing a hot toddy.