Terminate

by Natasha Deen

  The coroner came into the room, introduced herself and explained that she would have her assistant pull back the curtains. We’d see the body, identify it.

  That’s when I spoke up. “I’m not identifying anyone from here. I want in there.”

  The coroner’s gaze flicked to Clem, then came back to me. “It’s not policy—”

  “I don’t care what your policy is.” I strode toward her. “You said there’s a bunch of Jane and John Does, right?” Before she could answer, I continued my rant. “They’re homeless. Invisible. Untouched. Unloved. Barely acknowledged in life. They deserve more in death.” The coroner still wasn’t sure. I flashed her a withering smile and said, “If you’re worried my mommy and daddy might be upset, let me make it easy for you. I don’t have either.” I walked toward the door that separated the viewing room from where the bodies would be wheeled in.

  She turned to Clem, clearly hoping he would step in.

  “He can’t help,” I said. “The man’s ancient—and he was in the war. He’s so old, he was probably in all of them. Most days he can’t remember to put on his pants. You want to trust an ID to him?”

  Clem glared at me. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “You see what I mean? We gonna do this, or you just want to validate my parking?” I straightened my back and glared at her.

  The coroner sighed and knocked on the window.

  A young guy came into view.

  The coroner pointed at the door, then pointed again when he looked puzzled.

  The guy shrugged, then walked over and unlocked the door.

  I didn’t look at Clem as I walked inside. Didn’t think about why death had seen fit to visit me—again—to take someone I knew and leave me behind. Didn’t think about the truth of why I wanted to be in the room: that I had to touch them, to make sure the bodies were real and not some twisted trick or prank.

  I stared at the white sheet in front of me. Cataloged the dips and peaks as it draped over the body. Concentrated on lines and color, turned it all into an art exercise so I wouldn’t have to think about the lost kid lying underneath. The forgotten one who would never find home.

  I stepped out of the way as the assistant coroner moved in. His long brown fingers gripped the white sheet, and he pulled it back with a grace and gentleness that hit me hard.

  The punch to the gut became a one-two blow when I saw Ian’s lifeless face.

  I forgot about the smell of disinfectant and formaldehyde, the squeak of the coroner’s sneakers, the shriek of the thoughts in my head. Only one thing filled my vision and my awareness: Ian needed justice, and I was going to get it for him.

  FIVE

  Ian’s face was barely a face anymore. Someone had beaten him to a pulp. I moved closer to him. Reached out my hand and touched his cold forehead. “Where was he found?” I asked.

  “Across the water on Mitchell Island,” replied the lady coroner.

  Bentley had said Amanda’s phone had last pinged at North Lagoon Drive and Tatlow Walk. But Ian’s body had been found at the opposite end of the city. That meant either her disappearance wasn’t connected to Ian’s or the two were connected and someone was trying real hard to hide the fact.

  “Cause of death?” asked Clem.

  “Massive internal bleeding,” said the coroner.

  I appreciated that she wasn’t using a bunch of medical jargon. “How long did it take for him—”

  “Not long,” she said softly.

  Let the answer stay at that, I thought. Don’t torture yourself with how many minutes it would have taken for him to die. Don’t ask if he was conscious to the last moment.

  “What else can you tell us?” asked Clem.

  “I shouldn’t—” She shifted backward. “There’s a police investigation—”

  “Right.” I couldn’t keep the sarcasm out of my voice. “And homeless deaths are such a high priority. Wouldn’t want to risk messing with a high conviction rate or anything.”

  “Easy, kid,” said Clem. “She didn’t do this to Ian.”

  “Ian. That was his name?” Coroner Guy held up a clipboard.

  I nodded, my anger starting to subside. “Yeah. I didn’t catch his last name.”

  “Nothing else?” He sounded disappointed. “Nothing about his home life?”

  “He was a homeless kid,” I said. “We all have the same story—violence, neglect and abuse. What else is there to know?”

  “Sorry,” he mumbled. “Just thought you might have more for us to go on.”

  “Can’t you run his prints? Maybe he was in the system—” I saw the look that passed between the doctors. “What?”

  “Whoever did this—” the lady coroner’s mouth moved, but no sound came out as she considered her words “—made sure there were no prints left behind.”

  My mind ran straight to all the ways this could have been done. “Before or after he died?”

  “Postmortem. After he died,” she said.

  “Small mercy,” murmured Clem.

  Too small. “You said there was a police investigation?” I was like a dog with a bone. A growly, hungry dog with a too-small bone.

  “He’s not the first body to be brought in like this,” said Coroner Guy. “We figure—” He stopped and bent his head over the clipboard.

  “Logic says you take off fingers to prevent identification,” I said. “But whoever did this didn’t go through Ian’s pockets, or else he would have taken Clem’s business card. Which means whoever did this just did it for kicks.”

  The lady coroner’s face went white. “I’m sorry,” she said gently, “that his last minutes were with someone who had such little regard for him.”

  “Me too,” I told her. “How many have there been?”

  “Eight. Five boys, three girls. The girls weren’t beaten to death, but they had been beaten in the recent past. ODS, the lot of them. But all the bodies have defensive wounds, old bruises and burns.” The coroners both frowned. “The weird thing is what we found in their stomachs. These kids were eating better than most North Americans. Plus, tox screens indicate they were taking high-quality vitamins and supplements. It doesn’t make sense.”

  Maybe not to her, but I knew what had ended these kids. And proving it was not going to be easy. Bentley was about to get his wish. I needed his brain to help me navigate the hidden underbelly of the Darknet.

  SIX

  “You’re quiet tonight.” Raven jumped from the bottom rung of the building’s fire escape ladder, and landed beside me.

  “Thought you liked the strong, silent type,” I shot back.

  “No, hermana,” said Raven. “That’s your brand.”

  “I don’t know what’s more disturbing,” I said. “Your hacking the Spanish language or that you’re calling me ‘sister.”’

  “Sarcasm, I assure you.”

  I put my hand to my heart and gave her a wounded look. “I know, and that’s what hurts most.”

  She snorted and punched me on the arm.

  “Come on, let’s grab a drink.”

  “I get the whole coming out from under the sewers is big-time awesome for you,” Raven said, “but do we have to hit every coffee shop in the downtown core?”

  “I did two years of eating from garbage cans—”

  “And now you have a chance to eat something more than day-old bread.”

  I faced her. “The words are right. But my voice isn’t that high or breathy.”

  “It is when Jace’s around—”

  “Shut it.”

  We grabbed a couple of smoothies and croissants from one of the shops on Robson—my treat—then went our separate ways.

  I headed home. Raven may have razzed me about my living it up after my days on the street but my current life wasn’t perfect. Sure, I had a new identity. Plus, with the haircut and the weight I’d gained, I didn’t look like a coatrack anymore. But I wasn’t stupid. It was still dangerous out in the open and living in the real world still me
ant hiding from most people.

  Most people didn't include Vincent. He had known me before my family died and he had been the one who’d recognized my talent. Thanks to him, I had learned how to forge masters like Leonardo da Vinci and Francisco Goya. And double thanks to Vincent, I had used that talent to make a little cash.

  Now that I had found justice for my family, it was time to get off the streets. I used my art funds to get some clothes, food, and a comfortable place to sleep. Home was a cushy doublewide trailer that sat in a park full of Vincent’s old ex-con buddies. Men and women who’d had enough of the life and had no desire to be tracked by the authorities. One of the forgers who had struck it rich by doing a Monet better than the master himself had also been smart enough to get out before she got caught.

  She’d set up a series of dummy corporations, and ran all the park’s bills through them. I paid my share for the electricity, water, and heat, but there was no record of my name or my existence. And I’d made sure to set up my bank funds via the Swiss. Those guys were good for more than just chocolate and cuckoo clocks.

  And that cash was going to come in handy. Before I could get Bentley’s help, I needed to get some bitcoin, the currency of choice for the Darknet. But the Darknet was a warped network, full of crazies and psychos, and they were all paranoid. I wanted to give him as much cover as I could.

  After I showered, I played it safe. Went for a boy disguise: long black jacket, short black wig, make-up to darken my skin, and a light covering of facial hair.

  Jace didn’t know it, but Bentley had lent me one of their family cars. I’d asked him for something low-key. Apparently in that family, low-key was a silver Porsche Spyder.

  I headed back into town. The seller of the bitcoins wanted to meet at the waterfront near Bella Gelateria, an ice-cream parlor. I left the car in a public parking lot, then made my way to the location.

  In the email, the seller had said they’d be wearing a red jacket. I got to the location, expecting some twenty-or thirty-something guy with a scraggly beard, death metal T-shirt, and a chronic case of bad breath. Instead, I found a country club senior citizen standing by the open hood of her Mercedes, the scent of her über-expensive perfume reaching me before I even got close. I hesitated, figuring it must be a coincidence.

  “Don’t be a moron,” she said. “Get over here and let’s make the exchange.”

  Surprise kept my feet glued to the ground.

  She gave me an amused smile. “You think you punks invented the outlaw society? I was breaking laws before your mother was even born.”

  “You’re here to sell me digital money,” I said, making my way over to her. “Digital. You could have transferred it electronically.”

  She snorted. “You idiots are exactly why the crime rates are dropping. No sense of showmanship. There was a time when these things were about the experience, the contact…”

  I opted not to get into a fight with a crazy seventy-year-old who thought she was a gangster. “Whatever.” I dug in my pocket and pulled out the money.

  The old bat gave me the information for the digital transfer of the bitcoins, dropped the hood of her car, wished me a nice day and took off. I texted Bentley and let him know I had what he needed.

  He phoned and told me to wait for the next move. I headed to the ice-cream parlor and got a double scoop. Snagging a spot on a rusting bike rack that had seen better days, I bit into the sugary snack and took a moment to enjoy the feel of the sun on my skin, the wind in my hair. I hadn’t even eaten half of the cone when I got the text alert.

  Shielding the screen from the sun, I scanned the message and smiled. That kid was something else. Not just fast, but careful. To anyone else who saw the text, it would look like someone had left their phone unlocked, stuck it in their back pocket, sat down and accidently activated the keyboard. The message was a random set of numbers and letters. But Bentley was a hacker genius. He’d designed one algorithm that put his info into code and another that translated the message.

  I opened the app, translated the information and got what I needed. The location of the next fight. Then, as always, I deleted the texts. My ice cream was melting, and so was my latest lead. I scarfed the rest of the cone and made my way back to the car. Time to get back to work. Top down, catching air and rubber, I headed for the nearest lonely alley with no cameras.

  After tucking the car behind a set of garbage bins, I got rid of the dude get-up. I stowed the clothes in the back of the car. After another ten minutes to stash the vehicle in another public lot, I headed to the subway. Bentley had done his part. Now it was up to me. First rule of any fight: know your opponent. Time to hit the streets and find out who was the head guy behind the club. It was all happy-scrappy to know where the fight was, but if I couldn’t get the head guy, it was a waste of time. He would just reorganize. More kids would go missing or die. No way was I going to let anyone else plunge into the darkness that had consumed Amanda and Ian.

  SEVEN

  People always tell you who they are in the things they say and the things they don’t say. Instinct told me that Coroner Guy had been raised middle class, hadn’t ever been a rebel and had respectable friends. And he was new enough to his job that he hadn’t yet seen the dark side of humanity.

  His theory was that the kids had gotten into some street beefs with other kids and had tried to fight off their attacker. He wasn’t all wrong. They’d fought, all right, but it wasn’t an attacker. It was an opponent. Those kids had been part of an illegal fighting ring. They’d been beaten and then beaten again over the course of a few weeks. If they had really died after one fight, there wouldn’t have been fading bruises. And the reason the girls didn’t have any fresh injuries was probably because the gang had them working the guys in the crowd. Flip their hair, flirt. Nothing like a bunch of hot girls to add atmosphere and sizzle and get spectators to open their wallets and bet.

  How was I so sure? I knew all about the fight club. Every street kid did, but not because we talked about it. We feared it. Stayed silent about it. Just like scientists can detect black holes because of their effect on the matter around them, street kids recognize the shadow the club casts on all of us.

  Kids showing up at the shelters with bruises and cuts they wouldn’t talk about.

  Kids showing up at the shelters with wads of cash spattered with blood.

  Kids not showing up at the shelters.

  Kids disappearing altogether.

  If a kid found an adoptive home or went back home, word spread. The hope burned bright and clean and kept us warm while we slept in our cardboard boxes. But kids lost to the club? They became the ultimate black hole. No light. No air. And you didn’t ask questions, because asking questions sucked you into a place that would crush you.

  Ian had died because of the fight club. And if he had been there, chances were Amanda was there too. Anyone with half a brain would have walked away. Fight club was the only place rival gangs seemed to get along. If “getting along” could ever describe the way they behaved with each other. But they had a system, and it had worked for a long time.

  Each gang brought a roster of fighters.

  Each gang brought a crowd of spectators.

  One gang hosted—provided a venue, protection for the organizers and security for the audience.

  Then it was all about collecting the bets and forcing kids to bash each other’s heads in. The host gang collected the winnings, took a cut, distributed the cash.

  The next time there was a fight, another gang would play host by providing a location and protection.

  There were all kinds of side businesses to the fights—drugs, money laundering—but it worked for the gangs, kept the police off their trail and provided entertainment for people who’d lost their souls a long time ago.

  Logic, common sense and survival told me to run. To listen to Clem, bid sayonara to Amanda, light a candle for Ian and Dwayne and get on with my life. But I wouldn’t have had a life without Amanda, and I coul
dn’t—wouldn’t—let her fall.

  I took the subway to the Stadium-Chinatown station. Then I spent too many hours walking around Gastown, strolling the tree-lined streets, searching for any of my kin—fellow homeless—to get information. Clean stucco and brick buildings gave way to trash, iron-barred windows and the smell of despair as I headed east to Nanaimo Street. The clientele on the pavement changed too. From middle and upper class, well dressed and well fed, to those who used the ether of alcohol to pretend they wore more than rags, and the burn of meth to quiet the ache in their bellies.

  Some people might have been scared by the rotting smiles and grizzled hair, but I’d lived on the streets. I knew the inner workings of this jungle the way most people knew the creaks and groans of their homes. I pounded a relentless rhythm on the pavement, checking the doorways and alleys, tapping into every source and contact I knew.

  They smiled when they saw me, didn’t mind when I got up close and personal and climbed into their boxes with them. But their goodwill vanished when I asked about the club, the gangs and the leader. Some turned back to the bottle in their hand. Most turned from me. A few warned me away. Under a setting sun I took my questions to the other side of the street and, working my way back, got the same answers.

  Sort of.

  I still didn’t have a name for the head guy, but I had a description. He had a gym body without being overly muscled, fair skin, a deep voice and a commanding attitude. It wasn’t much, but at least I knew I wasn’t looking for an old man with a gut.

  By the time I returned to the Porsche, my head hurt, my feet ached, and my brain was focused on one idea. Thanks to the crazy old lady, bitcoins, the Darknet and Bentley’s genius, I knew the location of the next fight. My idea? Head to the fight and see if I could pick out the head honcho.

  It wouldn’t be that hard. Power is like a high-watt lightbulb. The guy’s underlings would flock to it like moths. Find the man everyone’s trying hard to please, you find the leader behind the club.