Liquid Cool: The Cyberpunk Detective Series (15 page)

The trio returned almost an hour later. I was boiling mad, but kept it to myself. I had to be nice because I hadn't been paid yet. I was going to ask (demand) a bonus.

I stood from the table and now I really felt sorry for the punk--but only for a couple of seconds. GW had a serious black eye, the father also looked like he had been through a major fist fight, and the mother was scratched up too.

They were all grinning at me. I hoped I wasn't an accessory to murder.

"You're going to get a good bonus, Mr. Cruz," she said.

"And I want a good business review too," I said as I handed GW the key to the handcuffs.

Then it began again. The girl was standing and cursing again and the mother, as if by levitation, moved back across to her and was screaming at her with full intensity. I was paying attention but I still had no idea what they were saying--kind of like Dot and her mother, but they were yelling in another language. This was English, but it wasn't. My brain wasn't comprehending a word of their yelling. Then I saw it. The girl punched her mother in the face KO-style. The mother fell to the floor like a rock. GW and father rushed at her like the dogs.

"I'm out of here," I said to myself and exited the Cafe.

"Hey you!"

I turned to see the Cafe's owner glaring at me.

"Why did you bring these crazy people into my business?" He barely finished his sentence when he spit at me.

I was out of range but I gave him a dismissive gesture as he ran back into the Cafe. I turned to walk away again.

"Hey you!"

I turned and reflexively ducked as a bowl of rice barely missed my face. The owner ran back into the Cafe.

I wasn't about to wait to see what else he had planned.

"Hey you!"

I was quarter way across the street, but turned. The owner was preparing a winding throw like those silly cricket players and this time he threw an egg at me. It barely missed as I lurched forward. Were we little children in kindergarten? A grown man was throwing eggs at me.

He prepared another of his winding up throws for me. Since we were in kindergarten, I stood on my tippy toes as if it was dodge ball--I was ready for him. He threw, but it went wrong. The egg went high up in the air and smashed on the windshield of a passing hover-car that was descending to park. It slammed on its air-brakes, hanging twelve feet in the air. Its passenger door lifted up and some kid crawled from the driver's side to the passenger seat.

"I'm going to kill you!" the kid yelled at him.

I didn't know if it was a full moon or not, but the hover-car driver jumped! I expected he had bionic legs and would land with effortlessly, but all I heard was a sickening crack and the expression on the kid's face was that of someone who been hit in the face with a sledgehammer. The kid was laying on the ground, screaming and crying, while the Cafe owner was laughing and pointing at him.

Then there was a spark from the kid's hover-car hanging in the air as something disengaged the air-brake. The hover-car descended diagonally straight for the cafe owner. The man ran through the doors as the hover-car crashed through the doors after him! All I heard was things breaking, people screaming, and smashing sounds. Then a crash that seemed to shake the ground.

That was it. It was way too much excitement for me. I ran away as fast as I could.

Chapter 19: The Guy Who Got Shot In My Office

There was something satisfying about going into the office. I always hated the prospect of being chained to a cubicle or tiny office at some government or corporate job like ninety-percent of the people. I knew even as a kid I wouldn't do that, but I didn't have much to show for it with my high principles. And with virtually every last human in the city in legacy housing, it meant that people were devolving to the lowest possible denominator. Not having to worry about housing meant I could subsist on very little per month. But that meant all you were doing was existing. That's not really living, but that's what most people were doing. That's why so many people got themselves in trouble on the crime scene. But it was also why this detective thing was so exhilarating for me.

I stood in my office with my mobile computer on my sole office desk marveling at the screen. I had reviews!

Trusted Reviews was the bible in customer service. Businesses did everything and anything for solid (good) reviews about their products and services. I think some little old lady started it years ago and every average Joe and Jane went to it first when deciding what service or item to buy. There were all kinds of rackets and scams involved with companies trying to rig the system, but they were always found out, which was worse, because then companies could get banned. Major players in an industry could brag about having thousands or even millions of reviews. Bottom line was if you didn't have any reviews, then your company didn't exist, no matter how impressive your physical or virtual storefront on the Net.

I now had three. I couldn't believe it. GW gave me such a glowing review that I couldn't believe it was the same person. Then there were those from his mother and the father. All were lengthy (very good), detailed about finding the sister/daughter (even better), and mentioned me solving the case in a day, when local authorities couldn't close the case in many months (the best).

I couldn't stop reading it and smiling. Maybe I could make this detective thing work. I liked that it gave me purpose. Human beings needed purpose and it was fun too.

There was some big commotion going on outside the front door of the reception-waiting area.

Did I forget to lock it again?

I got up and walked to check, but just as I approached, the door swung open and a punk, with his back to me, stood there with a gun. My body jumped as the man was shot once. He yelled out, was a shot a second time, and then his gun dropped from his hand as he began to fall. A third shot rang out, and he crashed to the ground. I had frozen in place, but now my brain engaged and I dove back into my office.

I heard one or more people running away.

I lay on the ground watching the dead man on the ground. My eyes were beginning to tear up. My new career was about to be taken away from me before it could even get started.

Chapter 20: Phishy

There was no possible way I could wait there. My office was a red-and-blue siren party. I couldn't bare it. Now I had a police jacket. Anyone involved with any kind of crime, even as a victim, got a file. People could do a Net search on my business address and see that someone was killed in my office. Would you go to a detective who had someone killed in his office? I was ruined. No one would care about any good reviews.

I came back to my place after giving the same statement to police three different times to two different sets of officers. They always did that. Lying people rarely were good enough to keep to the same lie multiple times and to different people, though the professional criminals and psychopaths did so with ease. They let me go my way as they plastered their crime scene tape across the door of my office. I suspected I'd be seeing that Realtor very soon.

Well, I parked my Pony and then just had to take a walk, clear my head, and calm down. I was out for about thirty minutes when I started back to the main entrance of the Concrete Mama.

"Hey, can you help me with directions?"

Someone called out to me as I was just walking up the mega-stairs. I turned to look back and blinked when I heard the first shot. I dove to the hard, wet ground as whoever the man was took two more shots at me before running away.

I lay there on the ground, gritting my teeth. I was so enraged that if I had the jaw strength I would have crushed my own teeth.

As GW said, I was a psycho when I got mad. You didn't want to go there with me.

I was indirectly shot at once and a man was killed. Now, I was shot at--me--in front of my own place.

It was the fourth place I checked to find him. There was Phishy, chatting it up with his sidewalk johnny friends. I tapped my horn to get his attention. All of them looked up at me, as I slowly landed my Pony down on the ground. I lifted up my hover-car door as Phishy was already running to me with a big smile, but he saw my face and he stopped, and his smile disappeared.

"What's wrong, Cruz?"

I was standing and slammed my door shut. I never slammed my car door. I could feel my own fumes of anger radiating from my body. I gestured to him to approach and Phishy did so cautiously.

"What happened?"

"What happened is that some stranger got shot to death in my new office. The police yellow-taped the whole thing so I'm out of business before even starting. Then to top off the day and make it even more exciting, someone tried to gun me down right in front of my place."

"In front of the Concrete Mama?"

"Yeah."

"Oh, wow."

"Oh wow, Phishy? I've never been involved with anything like this before. You know that."

"I know. I know."

"I don't do violence. You know that."

"But you're a detective now, Cruz. You have to expect that sort of thing now."

"Well there is no now. I'm out of business."

"No, you're not."

"What do you mean?"

"If the cops yellow-tag you, as long as they don't contact you again in 48 hours, then you're in the free and clear."

"What are you talking about, Phishy?"

"That's how it works. The cops got 48 hours to escalate the case. If they don't or can't, then you go and rip that yellow tape down and act like nothing happened."

"The police can prosecute you and send you to jail, Phishy, for ripping it down."

"But only before the 48 hours."

"Are you sure, Phishy?"

"I'm positive, Cruz. I know this stuff. You know that I know this stuff."

I watched him for a bit, thinking. Yeah, Phishy would know these things.

"But I'll get a reputation--"

"Reputation?" Phishy interrupted me. "There are hundreds of shootings in this city every day, Cruz. You won't get no reputation. But...was it a client who got shot in your office?"

"No, some punk stumbled into my office door and he was armed, too."

"See what I mean. A street shoot-out that spilled into your office. You won't get no rep for that. But what about the other thing?"

"Yeah, the other thing. Someone trying to kill me in front of my own place."

"You know what you need to do."

"What's that?"

"Come on, Cruz. You know."

I did know.

"There's no way around it, Cruz," Phishy said. "You can be a good detective, but you have to have the tools of the trade. You're not a laborer anymore."

"Yeah, everyone seems to know that, thanks to a certain person."

Phishy flashed a smile.

"Who do I talk to you then?"

"Leave it to me, Cruz." Phishy's smile was really back.

"I'm not going to let you rip me off, Phishy."

"Oh no. I'll take care of you."

"Where at? I don't want any of this near my place."

"Your favorite coffee place."

"The Wet Cabeza?"

"They have the rental offices on the top floor."

"Yeah. Okay. How do you know that? Never mind. And no scamming, Phishy. I don't like them, but I know guns."

"Yeah, I know. You even killed someone when you were five with one."

I gave him a look.

"I didn't tell anyone."

"Like you didn't tell anyone that I was a detective?"

When I dumped on the cafe that I found GW's sister in, it wasn't that I didn't like cafes. I did, but I liked high-end ones but without the high-end prices. The Wet Cabeza was my favorite and it was one those places that I went to so often that I knew everyone who worked there and the owners. Now that I thought about it, it was ironic that an establishment with such a name had always been my favorite place.

I arrived and was greeted by the staff, each who I knew on a first name basis. I had a craving for some humble pie, but I resisted. I just had a cup of silk coffee and left it at that while I waited for Phishy.

Inside, the layout of the place was that of a large open cafe, all booths and barstools at the kitchen counter, with college-kid waiters and waitresses on hover-roller skates.

Upstairs they had tiny conference rooms for rent. The Wet Cabeza attracted a business clientele, and offering the meeting rooms was a stroke of genius--why should hotels get all that business alone? It meant that there was another reason to keep butts in the seats and the food and drink orders coming all the time.

It was two days later and it seemed that he was in the same shirt with fishes, but Phishy was never unkempt or smelly. Technically, he wasn't a sidewalk johnny. He just hung with them. He was an operator. My girlfriend called him a slider, but he wasn't sliding through life, he was only sliding from one scheme or scam to the next. But with Phishy it was never too criminal--always small time so if he were caught there never was any real chance of jail time.