by Logan Jacobs
This morning, however, the building that was fifty feet wide by what looked to be two hundred feet long had an entranceway that was covered by crime scene tape. Or, the futuristic equivalent anyway. Bright yellow strips of light crisscrossed the doorway to the shop seeming to hover in the air all on their own.
There was a squad CSI hover-van parked out front with two white contamination suit clad aliens packing their gear up into the back.
Grizz and I watched and waited until the CSI team was done, and the van hovered off into the morning. Then we waited ten more minutes before leaving the side of the building that we had been watching from just to be safe.
Instead of walking up to the front, Grizz lead us down an alleyway that ran the entire length of Darry’s building until we got to a fenced-in backyard. There was a tall fence topped with laser wire. A roughly person sized gate with a bio-scanner set in the frame seemed to be the only way in.
“Am I parkouring it over the fence?” I asked Grizz as he inspected the gate and fence.
“Maybe if I was not here, yes,” he said and grinned wickedly at me. “Or if I was in the mood to make you train for no reason this morning. But, I know the password.”
Grizz waved his hand over the bio-scanner which blazed to life.
“Champion Grizz, voice recognition required for entry,” a pleasantly robotic female voice said from the scanner.
“Grizz the Mighty,” Grizz replied with confidence.
“Access denied,” the scanner voice said.
“Wait, what?” Grizz mumbled, highly confused. “That’s the password. Grizz the Mighty, Greatest Champion.”
“Access denied.”
“Sure you don’t want me to hop the fence?” I asked hesitantly.
“You keep your puny human feet planted on the ground,” Grizz grumbled at me and scratched his head. “Grizz the Fearsome.”
“Access denied.”
“Fine, Darry, you win,” Grizz said as he suddenly remembered something. “Grizz the Meathead.”
“Access granted, welcome Grizz the Meathead,” the voice said almost cheerfully. The scanner turned from red to green, the gate slid open, and we walked into the back yard.
“Grizz the Meathead?” I asked with a smirk.
“Don’t you start with me, Havak,” Grizz groused but then chuckled. “Darry had a wicked sense of humor and loved nothing more than, how do you humans say it, to fondle my balls.”
“Break your balls, Grizz, break,” I corrected him.
“Indeed,” he nodded as we walked up to the open garage door that made up the back wall of the shop.
Before we entered Grizz stood and looked out around the yard. It was full of scrap metal, cannibalized machinery, an old laser lathe, and tons of other industrial workshop brik-a-brak. Nothing seemed ominous or obviously out of place.
“Anything seem funny to you yet?” I asked as Grizz’s eyes slowly took everything in.
“No, the yard is a mess as usual,” Grizz replied. “Like many gifted with great, creative talent, Darry was a mess. Come on, let’s go inside.”
“We should be extra careful not to disturb anything, right?” I half asked half suggested.
“Yes,” Grizz agreed. “We should try not to disturb anything. I just wanted to get a look as soon as possible. Follow me.”
Grizz walked into the dark interior of the workshop. The second we crossed the threshold banks of bright, soft white, LED lights came to life above us to illuminate the floor.
It was like being inside the playroom of some mad, maniacal, inventor whose milieu was death and destruction. Imagine if Doc Brown had worked for The Punisher.
Every type of gun ever made lined one whole wall of the shop from back to front. The other wall held all kinds of strange, futuristic machinery for gunsmithing and armor making. In the middle were tables full of body armor, bolts of fabric woven with a kevlar like material that could withstand both ballistic and energy rounds, and sheets of molded plastic for making more traditional heavy armor.
The shop was quiet except for the sounds of a TV show that played on a small holo-vid screen set up near what I assumed was Darry’s main work bench. It had pictures of dozens of younger praying mantis looking aliens, blueprints, ledgers, candy bar wrappers and tons of other office clutter. One picture caught my attention right away. It was larger than the rest and held the central position that all the other photos were arranged around. In it were an older looking praying mantis with his arms around an adolescent male praying mantis. Darry’s father. Next to them stood a younger version of Grizz. He had his hand on young Darry’s shoulder, and the three of them smiled exuberantly into the camera lens. A big, hand printed sign behind them read: Happy Molting Day Darry.
“That was a great day,” Grizz smiled nostalgically.
“It looks like it,” I said quietly.
“What is this nonsense on the holo-vid?” Grizz asked at the very loud, yet somewhat familiar sounding voices coming from it. “Havak, is that you?”
I turned my attention to the screen and was surprised to see that, yes, it was me.
“Yup.” I replied with a sigh. It was an old video of during one of my appearances on the Trillium Vou show. Like most of my visits to her god awful tabloid talk show about all things Crucible of Carnage, it was a mess. Trillium had tried to embarrass the President and I, but we were in the middle of putting a verbal smackdown on her. “One of my greatest Trillium Vou hits. Didn’t know Darry was a fan.”
“He wasn’t,” Grizz said, slightly confused. “He despised Trilium Vou and all she stands for with a red hot fiery passion. She had him on the show early in his career, when he was making a name for himself outside of his father’s shadow On it, she tried to insinuate Tarry was somehow involved in an illegal betting scam. Darry called her a few not so nice names and stormed off the show. She spent the next decade trying to discredit him, but his work stood on its own merits, and she eventually found bigger fish to fry. Like you.”
“Yay, me,” I sighed. “Why do you think he was watching this?”
“I have no idea,” Grizz said and shook his head. “Come on, let’s look around some more.”
Towards the front was a modified shooting range and then a strange looking, circular, glassed in “cage” for lack of a better word. It reminded me of the thing Nick Fury stuck Loki in during the first Avengers movie.
Grizz walked slowly toward the circular cage. When he peered inside he had to put his hand against the glass wall to steady himself.
“Oh, Darry,” he muttered and put his head in his other hand.
I walked up behind him and peered through the glass. The inside seemed innocuous enough. It was brightly lit by more LED lights and had smooth, white plastic walls and a smooth white floor. Well, white except for a very large bright green stain. I turned and looked over at Grizz who was struggling to keep his emotions in check. I could feel the turmoil coming off his holographic form in waves of sadness. I wanted more than anything at that moment to be able to put my hand on his shoulder, just to let him know that I was here and that I understood. Grizz wasn’t the only part of this duo who had suffered loss and pain in his life.
“What is this thing?” I finally asked. If I couldn't comfort my trainer, at least I could distract him. Get him back to the task at hand. Which was finding out who had killed our friend.
“It… um…” Grizz stammered as he pulled himself together. “It is a blast chamber. Darry used it to test munitions and firepower too destructive for the firing range. Darry may have been messy, but he was meticulous about safety. He would have never gone inside the chamber. And certainly not while it was loaded with any ordinance.”
“Come on,” I suggested. “Let’s keep looking around, okay?”
“Yes, I will take the right side, you take the left, Havak,” Grizz replied as he started to take charge again.
“On it,” I replied and walked over to the left side of the workshop.
Nothing seemed ter
ribly out of place except maybe that everything was out of place. Darry was really a mess, but like Grizz had said, those gifted with genius often were. I could just imagine the big mantis moving from one station to the next as inspiration guided him. I wished I’d had a chance to get to know him as more than just our awesome weapons master.
I was so concerned with looking at things on the many workbenches that lined the wall that I didn’t pay attention to where I was walking and tripped over the barrel of a massive machine gun.
My cat like reflexes kicked in and kept me from falling flat on my face but I did end up sprawled on the ground with my face at floor level.
“Oof!” I groaned out.
“Watch your step, Havak,” Grizz shouted from the other side of the workshop.
“Thanks!” I called back, then under by breath, “captain obvious.”
I was about to push myself up off the ground when I saw a small, blinking blue light from far under the nearest workbench. I crawled over to the edge of the bench and reached my hand back to see if I could get a hold of whatever was blinking. My face was flat on the floor, and it looked like it was some kind of tiny thumb drive device only a quarter of the size. My fingers scrambled around it as I tried to get a grip on it, but it was pushed all the way up against the wall and practically wedged into the little gap between the wall and the floor. My shoulder started to cramp up from the strain so I relaxed for a second.
“Use the Force, Havak,” I said quietly to myself in my best Alec Guiness voice, closed my eyes and reached out again. This time my fingers got a hold of the edge of the little device, and I was able to flick it toward me. I flicked a little too hard because it whacked me right between the eyes. “Too much Force.”
I pushed myself up onto my feet and held the little device in my fingers to examine it a little closer. Yup, looked just like a mini-thumb drive.
“Hey Grizz? I think I--” I started to yell but was cut off.
“What fuck are you doing here?” A menacing voice came from the back of the workshop near the garage door.
I slid the mini-drive into the front pocket of my jeans as I felt a little surge of adrenaline spike my bloodstream, and then I turned to see four imposing aliens backlit in the doorway.
“We could ask the same of you, brigands!” Grizz shot back
The aliens walked into the shop and in the bright light I could make them out better. Bruisers would have been a better word for them. All four of them were the same race, some kind of bipedal, humanoid with mottled gray skin, and dark, muddy, heavy browed eyes that made them look dull and menacing. They were all roughly six feet tall and built like gorillas with thick, muscled necks and arms that stretched the fabric of their track-suit like outfits.
“But, uh, we asked youse first,” the lead Bruiser mumbled out in a voice that was part Sylvester Stallone and part trash compactor.
“This is my friends shop,” Grizz growled and began to walk toward the Bruisers with bravado. “I have every right to be here. You, do not.”
“We can go wherever we want,” another of the Bruisers chimed in with the same accent and voice.
“Boss said we was to secure the place,” the third Bruiser let slip.
“Shut up, Rupert, you idiot, boss said not to say anything about him being boss,” the fourth Bruiser said and whacked Rupert on the arm.
“Both of you stupes quit talking period,” the main Bruiser commanded. “Boss don’t pay us to talk.”
“Really, cause you guys have been chattier than a gaggle of middle schoolers at an assembly,” I taunted.
The guns were all over on the other side of the garage which sucked. Although, I doubted Har’Gitay would be thrilled if I ended up killing a couple of goons at a recent crime scene while I had her personal holo-pad in my back pocket. I’d slowly started to move closer to them instead of farther away and quietly picked up a familiar looking eight inch black metal cylinder from the nearest workbench. It was an extendable baton, kind of like the ones Earth cops would use, and I palmed it so that it was hidden behind my forearm as I walked toward the Bruisers.
“Well, how about we bust your heads up instead?” Rupert asked as he cracked his knuckles.
“I mean, I guess you could try,” I prodded. I wanted them to get upset and make a mistake. To attack before they were ready. My combat mods had started to fire up the second they walked in, and there was a voice screaming in my head to not let them get enough room to attack at once. They also clearly didn’t know Grizz was a hologram yet which I very much wanted to use to my advantage. “But I think I’d actually be more scared if you were a bunch of middle schoolers. Tween girls are terrifying. They can make you cry over something you weren’t even aware you were self-conscious of. So, if you want to go and get some tween girls, we’ll wait.”
“Um, uh, what is a tween girl?” Rupert asked, confused.
“Human female child between eleven and thirteen,” I explained as I got slowly closer and closer to Rupert who had started to take my bait. He had shuffled into the corridor between two long work benches, which would act as a perfect choke point for me. “Way scarier than you, dude.”
“My companion is most correct,” Grizz chimed in from the other side. He was doing the same thing I was by trying to get them to enter into the clutter of Darry’s workshop. It would prevent them from being able to coordinate a group attack, which would easily overwhelm me at the moment. Two of the four had started to make their way through all the workbenches and machinery toward Grizz which would hopefully give me time to take the two that were headed toward me out first. “Pubescent females are much tougher than you louts could ever be.”
“Is that so?” the lead Bruiser asked and moved closer to Grizz.
“Indeed,” Grizz replied simply. He glanced over at me, and I gave him a very small nod to let him know that it was time. “Now, let’s fight!”
Grizz bellowed so loud it almost scared the shit out of me and made to hit the main bruiser with a massive overhead hammer blow.
The Bruisers jumped from the sudden loud noise, and I sprang into action before seeing how they reacted to the fact that Grizz was a hologram.
I let the cylinder slip out into my hand and pressed the small button that extended the rest of it out into a foot and a half long baton as Rupert tried to charge me. My right foot slid back until I was almost in classic batting stance, and then I grabbed hold of the baton with both hands and swung for the fences.
The tip of the baton hit Rupert on the side of his well-muscled neck which prevented it from snapping but he still went sprawling over the workbench next to him. Gun parts and tools flew everywhere. I shoved him the rest of the way over the bench so that he was out of my way as I continued my forward movement toward the other Bruiser.
“Marc, they are coming!” Grizz shouted over to me. I glanced over and saw the lead Bruiser walk right through him.
“It’s a fracking holo! Get the human!” The lead bruiser yelled. Grizz attempted in vain to grab the Bruiser but his arms passed through the Bruiser like a ghost.
The Bruiser in front of me was ready for a frontal attack from the baton which is why I threw myself into a slide across the floor so that I passed between his wide open legs. At just the right moment I jammed the baton upward right into his groin.
Thankfully my momentum carried me past him, because he doubled over and puked up his breakfast. I got to my feet quickly and lashed out with the baton again, slamming into his right knee. There was a loud pop as it came out of joint, and the Bruiser fell to the ground trying to scream through a mouthful of vomit.
A crash to my right drew my attention, and I saw the lead Bruiser fling a workbench out of the way as if it were a toddler’s toy.
“Havak! Stop playing around and dispatch these miscreants!” Grizz called over to me. “Smash them so that we can get on with our day.”
“Working on it, Grizz!” I yelled back, then mumbled under my breath, “Nice back seat driving you lug.”
The two remaining Bruisers were trying to get me in a pincer move. They weren’t as completely stupid as they looked because they’d also managed to find weapons. The lead Bruiser held a double bladed battle axe while the other was trying to figure out how to take the safety off an energy pistol he’d pulled from the wall.
“I’d take out the one with the firearm before he figures out how to use it, Havak!” Grizz suggested as he vigorously pointed at the goon. “He’s right here.”
“Thanks, Grizz,” I said through gritted teeth.
The Bruiser with the gun now fumbled the weapon in his hands with greater purpose. I heard a click as the safety snapped off, and he pointed it right at me. The barrel glowed bright as the gun warmed up. Just as he pulled the trigger I vaulted the workbench and flung the baton at him in a badass Matt Murdoch move. The baton hit him square between the eyes which sent the energy blast wide. I still felt the heat of the plasma as it singed the air an inch from my face. It slammed into a bank of equipment behind me. I didn’t have time to check on the damage because I was now face to face with the lead Bruiser.
“Nice job with the baton, Havak!” Grizz complimented me. “But you should probably punch the one in front of you before he--”
The Bruiser clocked me right in the face.
“--hits you in the face.” Grizz finished. “See, I tried to tell you.”
I rolled with the force of the blow which hit me so hard I saw stars for a second, but luckily I was pretty used to fighting at this point. I shook my head to clear the stars and dodged another of the Bruisers blows. We were cramped between a tool locker and a big lathe of some kind. The distance was very close, and I felt the Krav Maga scream in my brain. My left arm came up just in time to block a punch, and I whipped my right elbow up into the Bruisers chin.
His head snapped back and he stumbled into the lathe which roared to life with a high pitched metal whirring noise. The jagged peice of metal that Darry had been working on spun like some kind of demented drill bit on the lathe.
