#Justice Read online

  #Justice

  (Hashtag Justice)

  By

  Mike Leon

  Copyright 2018 by Mike Leon

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, and retrieval system, without the written permission of the Author, except where permitted by law.

  Cover art by J Caleb Clark

  PLEASE SEND ALL COMMENTS, QUESTIONS AND DEATH THREATS TO:

  [email protected]

  It’s Literally The Most Chilling Thing.

  “You really should stay away from the windows, Ms. Saito.” The coldly professional suggestion comes from the stockier of the two well-dressed men in Izumi’s living room. She lets go of the thick vinyl vertical blind between her fingers and it swings back into place with the others.

  “Do you think they could be watching?” Izumi asks, her tone falling somewhere between worry and disgust. “Through the windows?”

  “I doubt it,” the bodyguard replies. He is bald and black skinned, with a roguishly handsome scar on his left temple—a real mandingo, and one that would piss off her traditional Japanese parents for an added bonus. She wishes she could remember his name. She’ll have to look at his business card again later. “It’s just a standard precaution.”

  “Right.” Izumi moves away from the floor-to-ceiling window and sits down on the white sectional that occupies most of the room. On the opposite end of the couch, the other bodyguard sits with his legs crossed, scrolling through some social networking site or another on his cell phone. He’s older, flabbier, white, and eerily quiet. His presence makes Izumi more nervous than she was already. She reaches for the TV remote and turns on the big flat panel television across the room just to have some kind of noise to cover the awkward silence. “So do you do this kind of thing a lot?” Izumi asks, directing her attention at the friendlier, better looking man.

  “Exactly like this? We’re usually out in public more, concert details for pop stars, politicians. But we do our share of stakeouts. Me and Bill have seen just about everything. Isn’t that right, Bill?”

  Bill nods without looking away from his cell phone. “Yup,” he confirms.

  “Shouldn’t you be more . . . alert?” Izumi frowns at him, and he barely registers her concern.

  “Nothing is gonna happen in here,” Bill says. His tone is a little more gruff than Izumi can appreciate.

  “What my partner means is it’s the streets you have to worry about,” his hunky colleague says. “Out there, danger can come at you from any direction any time. Some psycho might pull a gun, a knife, weirder stuff, for no reason at all. Just last month I stopped a guy from injecting Brittany Perkins with a syringe full of his own blood. He said she was a demon or something. But this is a different story. We’re ten floors up. The only way in or out is that restricted elevator. Even if somebody got a key for it then they have to go through me and Bill as soon as they come through the door.”

  “I’d put thirteen in ’em without asking any questions,” Bill grumbles lazily.

  “And he will,” the handsome guard says. “Bill was a contractor in Afghanistan. He’s seen his share.”

  “What if they find another way?” Izumi asks.

  “There’s no other way. Not unless your creepy stalker can order a drone strike.”

  “Does that happen often?”

  “No. That never happens. It’s just a joke.”

  “Oh. Okay.”

  Izumi turns her attention to the TV and flips through Netflix for a bit before finally settling on an old episode of Smallville, a show she watched when she was a kid. The familiarity of it is somehow comforting now. Midway through the opening credits, she gets a call that she wants to ignore, but decides to take anyway, just to keep up appearances.

  “Hey, bitch,” Izumi says, answering the phone with her usual playful invective.

  “Hi,” Leslie responds with slightly drawn out uncertainty. The junior editor never seems to know quite how to deal with Izumi’s wholly empowered attitude. “You okay?”

  “Hells yeah. Why wouldn’t I be?”

  “It’s just, I heard you hired bodyguards?”

  “What? That’s crazy. Why would I do that?” Izumi shifts her eyes instinctively to the bodyguards in her living room.

  “Because of what happened to all those freelance writers. I don’t know. It’s just what I heard.”

  “None of that stuff is true. Those were accidents. It’s just a spooky coincidence.”

  “I hope so. Some of us can’t afford hired gunslingers.”

  “Girl, you know I got your back. If anything happens, I’ll get you the A-Team, and the other staff too. But nothing happened. Nobody is out to get us. That’s crazy talk.”

  “You’re probably right.”

  “You know I am. Now tell me that dolphin poaching story is live.”

  “Yeah. It turned out it wasn’t a dolphin, it was a thresher shark.”

  “Ew.”

  “Yeah. I used a stock photo of a bottlenose dolphin and we can publish an update later if someone complains.”

  “That’s my girl. Awesome.”

  “George from Slacktivision called. He wants Gamestiq to give Call of Honor: Incalculable Warfare 2 at least a nine out of ten score.”

  “How desperate did he sound?”

  “Desperate enough to buy us all Caribbean cruises again.”

  “Awesome. I could use some sun.”

  “There’s a video charting on YouTube. Two pre-op transsexuals can’t get dates with straight men.”

  “They have dicks?”

  “Yeah.”

  “We can still swing that. Headline: These Ladies Show Bigotry is Still Alive and Well.”

  “Tomorrow’s listicles are Five Things Only Sociopaths Watch on TV, Fifteen Celebrities Who Just Can’t Even, and Eight Times We Fell in Love with Pie.”

  “Didn’t we do that one already?”

  “No. We did Eleven Times We Fell in Love with Pie.”

  “Okay good. Run it.”

  “Is everything okay?”

  “What would be wrong?”

  “You just seem a little off tonight.”

  “I can’t remember every listicle we ever post . . .” Smallville suddenly turns to a tidal wave of crunched colors and the home theater speaker bar mounted on the wall below the TV emits an oscillating womp womp. The lights fizzle and the living room darkens. Izumi squeals with fright, and Bill pulls a gun from the holster under his arm, but everything in the room is back to normal as quickly as it began.

  “Izumi?” Leslie calls out from the phone now lowered away from Izumi’s ear.

  “What was that?” Bill says. “A power surge? That happen a lot in here?”

  “No.” Izumi shakes her head, glancing back at the familiar face of Tom Welling now back in focus on the TV screen.

  “Maybe the people downstairs decided to run all the appliances at the same time. Who knows . . .”

  “But that’s never happened before . . .”

  “Well it doesn’t make any difference,” the handsome one says, grinning back at her from his place in front of the elevator doors. “The—” he stops suddenly, his smirk shifting to an expression of astonishment at something beyond Izumi, behind her. “What the?” He goes for his gun.

  Izumi turns and sees something more outlandish than she could ever have imagined.

  “Drop it!” Bill shouts. “Drop the knife!” Izumi didn’t even see the weapon. She was too focused on the empty black eyes of the evil figure in her living room. “Drop it! Drop it!”

  Then the shots ring out like needles in her ears. Bam! Bam! Bam! Izumi dives from the sofa, covering her head and closing her eyes. She makes it to th
e corner near the elevator to cower behind her gunmen in the brief lull between the shots in which Bill says “What the hell?” Then the men are shooting more. Then something warm and wet sprays across her face. Izumi wipes it away and opens her eyes to the sight of deep red muck smeared on her fingers. The penthouse is silent.

  Izumi turns up and screams at the horrifying figure leaning over her body. She screams at the dead men with their empty guns. She screams as she goes through the huge window and the glass shards cut into her flesh. She screams all the way to the pavement ten stories below.

  INT. THE BLACK OMEN - NIGHT

  The thumping beat and synthesized industrial clatter of a musician called Perturbator rattles through Sid’s head as he lies back against the black leather of the sectional sofa that spans the rear wall of the VIP room at the Black Omen. Pink fog refracts the UV light from the purple bulbs overhead. Ahead of him, Lily Hoffman allows a microns-thick slip of fabric she calls a dress to fall to the floor and reveal her luscious naked figure.

  Lily is a small woman, short and pale like copy paper. Her skin glows a bright shade of violet under the lights, and her many gothic black tattoos are voids in the purple haze. She runs her black fingernails through her raven hair as she turns for him. Some women are described as top heavy. Lily is the reverse. Her narrow shoulders and itty-bitty waist give way to battle-axe hips and a big bubble butt that draws Sid’s eyes in a pendulum motion as she drops her black g-string panties down around the 7-inch platform stiletto stilts she calls shoes. A colored back light silhouettes the gap between her thighs and causes Sid’s pulse to pound with furious anticipation.

  She turns and stilt-walks toward him, stepping up to a riser with a golden pole at the foot of the couch. She leans over him, hanging one-armed from the pole, her lengthy hair swinging above his lap like a bobbing string to tease a cat.

  “I knew you couldn’t stay away from me for long,” Lily says, licking her deathly black lips.

  “I was just in town on business,” Sid says. “Don’t let it go to your head.”

  “No?” Lily chirps. “Don’t you want it to go to my head?” She steps down from the riser, planting her dagger heels on the sofa cushion on either side of him. She swipes her middle finger through her waxy smooth labia only inches from his nose, trailing wetness up to the Wasteland tattoo that rides her pubic bone. “Or would you rather put it somewhere else?”

  Sid doesn’t know what to say to that. He doesn’t want to say anything. He just wants to be inside her. He plants his hands on her butt and draws her in. She moans as he slips his tongue into her salty wetness and closes his eyes.

  “Mmmm. Deeper,” she whispers. Sid presses into her even harder and she squeaks reflexively. “Deeper,” she still insists.

  He hugs her thighs, pulling her in with his considerable strength and tearing at her flesh like a hungry wolf.

  “Harder. Deeper!” she exclaims.

  Sid pulls away and glares doubtfully up into Lily’s gleaming blue eyes. She smiles back at him.

  “Like this,” she says, reaching down to spread herself open with both hands. Her vagina stretches to the absolute physical limit, until he can see all the way to the fleshy pink end of it, then beyond. Her inner lips open wider than his head and sprout dozens of crocodile fangs that snap shut around Sid’s neck.

  He roars and punches at Lily’s soft flesh, battering her legs and belly with a rain of blows that would shatter men’s bones.

  “Don’t fight it,” Lily squeals, throwing her head back and howling with pleasure. “I want you inside me forever . . . and ever . . . and ever . . .” Sid feels her lips sliding past his shoulders as she swallows him in. Her cervix slurps loudly as he passes through it into the swampy darkness beyond. Her womb seals around him like a pool cover drowning a child who has fallen in.

  Sid’s eyes snap open and he is awake in the neon glow of his bedroom. His sweaty skin is illuminated through his closed blinds by the giant Jesus Saves sign directly across the street.

  He turns and observes the gentle breathing of the woman in his bed. Sapphire. That’s what she calls herself anyway. She’s blond and wispy. Tall and busty. Her face is gaunt with age she won’t be able to lie about much longer. She says she’s twenty-five and working on her thesis at the university a few miles away, that she likes to party, always with an emphasis on party meant to convey something Sid does not understand. This is her story anyway. In truth, she is thirty-eight, divorced twice, and spends her days sharing custody of three children who are almost Sid’s age. She is not in school, and appears to generate income solely from sex work. Her real name is Jennifer. He learned all of this by surveilling her for two weeks, though that was hardly necessary. Her cover was paper thin. He can’t understand how a call girl, who does exactly what call girls do, procured from a call girl service no less, could then claim she is not a call girl and think no one would poke holes in that story.

  Normally Sid leers at pretty women the way he looks at juicy steak, but after that nightmare he can’t help looking at Sapphire like the meat’s gone bad. He slips from the bed as a silent shadow, leaving the call girl undisturbed. He picks up his discarded shorts and heads out into the hall, closing the door behind him. He could watch some TV in the den downstairs. TV is stupid, but not completely without merit, and he’s been watching a lot of it lately in an effort to catch up with the seemingly constant stream of pithy little quotes and references people make around him. A few days ago someone said “No soup for you!” in a mimicked Arabian accent, and Sid knew what that was. Still, he tends toward the grittier visual entertainment. Robocop and The Road Warrior were among some recent viewings, but the best one so far was a movie called Demolition Man, which Sid found particularly relatable.

  The firehouse in which he currently resides is a three floor brick building, but as tall as some five floor buildings when accounting for the high ceilings. It dates back to the early 1900s, and hasn’t been used by actual firefighters for two decades. Player procured it for them at auction. Sid heads down the hallway from his room on the third floor toward the steel fire pole near the rear of the building, which he snatches and glides down toward the bottom floor, a wide open garage with space enough for two fire trucks-or a black utility van loaded with more munitions, a bunch more munitions locked in a steel cage, a computer terminal, and a rug with a sofa and television.

  Sid silently lowers through the hole in the ceiling and spots Mary Sue’s bright pink hair at the far end of the garage, her attention swiveling back and forth between computer LCD displays on the desk in front of her. Sid clamps his hands on the pole and halts his slide. She hasn’t noticed him yet, which is good. Something about her excessive femininity seems especially off-putting after that creepy dream. In fact, just dealing with Mary Sue in general is a little off-putting all the time.

  Mary Sue Jadefire Sakura Ravencaller is a strange enigma. The plucky little girl is a lot of things, both descriptively and vocationally. Despite only being sixteen years old, she has a plethora of advanced degrees, is a doctor, is an Olympic gold medalist, hacks computers like a pro, and has a body hotter than the sun. Where did she come from? Sid has not even the slightest idea. He only knows she doesn’t put out, and that’s enough to keep his interest limited.

  Sid climbs back up the pole to the third floor and hops off, trying to decide what else he could do to clear his head. That’s when he notices the bright orange electrical extension cord which is dangling down the red ladder leading up to the open roof access hatch at the top of the steps. He traces it to an outlet in the corner, then back up the ladder. He raises an eyebrow to the peculiarity, then begins climbing.

  On top of the building Sid finds Bruce Freeman sitting on a collapsible nylon chair, bathed in the blood red glow of the sign across the way. The other end of the extension cord lies at his feet with a portable radio and another cable running to something in Bruce’s hands. Bruce leans over the arm of the chair and plucks up a longneck bottle of beer from
a cardboard six-pack carton on the other side of the chair and pops the cap with a little bottle opener. The radio crackles with a fuzzy conversation.

  Well, Bart, they didn’t probe me or nothing like that. But they did take me to the rings of Saturn where their secret base is. See, it’s invisible to our telescopes. And they had a message for me. They said they’ve been watching us for a long time and Jesus, he was one of them in disguise, and we shoulda listened to him when he tried to warn us, because this problem with the wheat gluten is because of that.

  Wheat gluten?

  That’s right. Wheat gluten is the first seal, Bart. Of the apocalypse. Think about it. You ever hear of a gluten intolerance 200 years ago?

  “What are you doing up here?” Sid says, startling Bruce.

  “Yeh,” Bruce chokes as he whips his head around to make eye contact. “Shit. Make noise or something will ya? God damn. Gonna get a bell to hang on you like a cat.” Bruce is a former CIA agent, former contract commando for Graveyard, and the former manager of the GameStop where Sid used to work. They met when Sid single handedly annihilated Graveyard’s headquarters last year to finally stop them from sending kill teams, commandos, and assassins to kill him everywhere he went. Bruce was the only operator Sid encountered in the building who didn’t try to fight him, opting to throw down his gun and give up instead. They’ve had several adventures together since.

  “What are you doing on the roof?” Sid says.

  “Chrono Trigger, booze, and Conspiratalk.” Walking around the chair, Sid can see that the object of Bruce’s attention is a handheld video game system. “It’s on all night. This guy Bart Gong takes calls from people that’ve seen Bigfoot and been abducted by aliens and shit like that.”

  In 1986 while I was a janitor at IBM I had a sexual encounter with an artificial intelligence-an android to be exact.

  “Sometimes they talk about regular shit like serial killers or end-of-the-world asteroid collisions or some shit.” Bruce continues, smirking as though he knows some secret to it all. “But it’s a lot more entertaining if you got insider info, cause you know for sure which callers are actually on to something and which callers are just crazy. Here’s a hint. None of them are onto something.”