Shade City

by Domino Finn

  I eyed Bedros lying unconscious on the floor and wanted to make sure he woke up a different man. This was my chance, and I didn't even have any matches. And then I saw it.

  I paced a few yards away and picked up the cigarette that Greg had thrown at me. It was still lit. I held it against my clove and pulled the smoke inside me. Then I flicked the used stub back at Greg.

  "I won't let you banish him," he asserted. "He is too important to me."

  "What, are you going to get your hands dirty?"

  "You don't think I can, Mr. Butcher? You don't think I can beat you until you have nothing left to break?"

  I narrowed my eyes as he stepped up to the top of the mezzanine. Greg was a scrawny guy. Like me, but he didn't work out. He looked like a stoner all the way. But I knew he would have some inner strength that came from Ambrose. From another world.

  There were heavier footsteps that concerned me, however. A pair of them. Behind Ambrose, stomping up the carpeted stairs, was Emilio. I spun around and saw Eladio at the other end of the balcony, rising in unison with his twin. They must have followed me. Neither said anything, but Ambrose knew he was in trouble.

  "You fools," said Greg, facing one strongman, then the other. "What do you intend to do here? I can release myself from this body and rejoin Soren."

  Marquis casually strolled up behind Emilio. "Please do. Soren is with my people outside."

  Greg's face was filled with horror as he laid eyes on his old nemesis. "You can't hold on to Soren forever," he proclaimed, but I'm not sure he believed it.

  "You were supposed to give me time," I scolded. "I had things under control."

  "No worries, Dante. It appears that you did. But after your struggles last night, you can hardly blame me." The man tugged at his vest and stood as tall as his short frame allowed as he examined Greg. "Is that really you, Alexander?"

  Greg stepped back and inched along the top railing. "You are a hypocrite, Mr. Butcher. You condemn me for my actions yet use possession for your own benefit. My own daughter, against me. Then you consort with the enemy for your own gain. How much of your noble mission is built upon guilty compromises?" He was trying to keep away from Marquis and Emilio but that brought him closer to me. Eladio was lumbering behind me but was keeping his distance as well. That was good. He made me nervous.

  "What of you, Ambrose?" I asked coldly. "You claim to be the ultimate victim of circumstance. You say that morality has never given you justice, but you were never a just man. You were cornered by your own corrupt dealings in the Southern Pacific. You ran from the blame. From justice. You killed yourself and your daughter. Still running. You tried to cheat death, but you only cheated yourself and your daughter out of proper lives."

  I'm back.

  Good, I thought. I clutched the watch in my left hand and the alabaster rose in my right. Things were getting a little messy, but I had the two things I wanted.

  Greg laughed maniacally. "We did what needed to be done. For the city. For our families." He raised his voice in rage, as if to convince himself of its merit. "I am a great man!" he boomed.

  I shook my head slowly. "Men are remembered by their worst actions, not their best." I turned away from him and walked back to the sleeping Armenian.

  "Don't do that," said Marquis. "I could use a soldier like him."

  "That wasn't the deal. One for one. I'm giving you Ambrose."

  "Like hell," said Greg. As soon as he had reached a middle set of stairs, he bolted down to the lower balconies. I planted my foot on the metal railing and leapt over. Suspended in the air, I snapped the walking stick on the top of Greg's head. It was an immediate knockout. Ambrose melted into the carpet. I landed on my feet.

  I tilted my head to each side to crack my neck as I strode back up the steps. Eladio was standing over Bedros now. I stared hard at him and shoved by. Then I kneeled beside the sleeping bodyguard and blew the smoke into his lungs. Marquis put his hand up to hold off the strongmen and watched me with interest. After a few moments, I rested my hand on the big man's chest and saw that his soul was clean.

  "It's done."

  Marquis nodded and Emilio stepped down to the front of the balcony and approached Greg.

  He's here.

  I smiled. "No," I directed. "Not him."

  "Dante," said Marquis, "one for one. You said so yourself."

  "I'm giving you Ambrose, not Greg. Not an innocent." I plucked the horseshoe ring from my pocket and let the watch dangle from the same hand. I tried to slip the ring over the end of the walking stick, but the metal tip was too wide.

  Hurry. Before he realizes.

  I started to panic. My whole plan was about to crumble because the ring was too small. I had thought it was large enough. It was, but the metal tip was preventing the fit. Then I realized. I gripped the alabaster rose in one hand and the tip in the other and brought Alexander's walking stick down hard. It splintered in half on my knee. Then I slid the cold iron over the wood. It caught several inches up as the base widened. I made sure it was tight.

  "Are we good?" I asked.

  Yes. He's still down here. He's going crazy.

  Marquis didn't realize I wasn't talking to him and answered. "I suppose we are, Dante. You've certainly gone to a lot of trouble to minimize the collateral damage." He held out his hand and I gave him the broken stick. He examined it with interest. "A man who has the power to jump into a multitude of men is now stuck, attached to a single piece of wood. I have seen something like this before. Clever. But how do I know that he is really tied to this?"

  I shook my head. "If you can't see it like I can, I'm sure you have ways of confirming it. You have agents on the Dead Side, don't you?"

  "More than I have here, Dante. It will upset me if this was all an elaborate deception."

  "We are men, not savages," I said calmly. "We must do right by each other." He smiled as he recognized his words.

  Emilio glanced around, trying to appear useful, then shrugged and returned to our level, leaving Greg in peace.

  "There's one more thing," I said, "before you go. Ambrose also buys Soren. If your people are holding him outside, they need to let him go. Soren will never agree to join your crew now, anyway. He'll never kill himself. He's a newly rich man. Just married. His future is bright without you. Let him go."

  Marquis signaled for the strongmen to head down the stairs and they wordlessly led the way. After they passed, the Royal nodded. "Reneging on agreements is distasteful."

  He was a wicked man, and undoubtedly my next enemy, but I knew he was telling the truth. He turned halfway and hefted the walking stick in his hand, then paused and looked back at me. "You have proven reliable and resourceful, Dante. My offer to you is still extended. Come with me. Join my employ."

  I looked at the man without blinking. "Not a chance."

  He started down the steps. "Well, I'll keep my eye on you anyhow. Consider it, at the very least. You have my number."

  It was some time after he was gone before I recovered myself. I focused on the Hamilton 940. "One down," I said.

  Many more to go.

  I nodded with determination, made sure Bedros and Greg were okay, then turned to go. On the way out, at the last second, I retrieved the bottom half of the broken walking stick.

  Dream

  Violet sat on a large husk of concrete, its purpose and usefulness long since past. Her small frame rested easy atop the slab, black combat boots swinging in the air. She sat just at eye level but was out of my reach, not in form but in thought. We were in a large open span of ground next to the LA River. Train tracks skirted us on either side. Behind us, a block away, was the vague vestige of old Downtown, but that's not what held Violet's attention. A large structure that looked like a Moorish castle served as a terminal for absent train cars. In the forever gloom of the Dead Side, it looked especially uninviting.

  "I've never seen this place," I said. I was trying to shake Violet out of her reverie, but in a careful way that showed considerat
ion. She was probably mad at me. She should have been, at any rate.

  "This depot is La Grande Station. I don't think it exists in your world anymore, but it was instrumental in mine. It was a bustling terminal that was the heart of the Southern Pacific in Los Angeles. Before Union Station was built." Violet continued her silent vigil of the building. It had large, empty windows on the bottom floor, rounded parapets, with a large, central dome and spire being its iconic contribution to the skyline. It looked small from a distance, yet somehow magnificent.

  "You father worked here." Her focused silence gave me the confirmation I didn't need. After everything that had happened, as evil as Alexander Ambrose was, he was still her father.

  "My memories," she said, "they're all jumbled now. When you live a hundred and twelve years, if 'lived' is the right word, things get mixed up. I've had different lives. Different names. At least for a time. My real life is so far away that it's hard to identify with it anymore."

  "The present is what matters. It's who we are now that counts."

  She turned to me. "Who are you, Dante?"

  I kicked at some gravel with my shoe. "Why is it that everybody asks me that?"

  "Do you think you're special? Do you think you have a purpose?" She looked away again, not expecting me to answer. "Do any of us matter?"

  I scratched the back of my head, already uncomfortable. I wasn't good at this sort of thing. I didn't know what she wanted. What to say.

  "Some of my favorite memories are of riding the Southern Pacific with my father. He was a busy man. Always so concerned with making a living and becoming respectable. I guess, for a while, he succeeded at both." Violet fumbled with her dad's pocket watch. "I never understood it back then. For a little girl, it just came across as harsh. Strict. But when he let me ride the train with him, all of that disappeared. We stood side by side and watched as we passed by the lives of so many other people trying to make it in this town. The wind felt good. Sometimes I want to feel that wind again." She turned to me with watery eyes. "Those were the few moments we could be together without feeling the weight of the world. I loved those precious experiences, of course, but he did too. I like to think he found joy in my happiness. I like to believe that... at one time... he really loved me."

  I wanted to tell her he did. That he was just a man who tried to make hard sacrifices for his family. That he eventually succumbed to his destructive tendencies, but for a time, at least, he tried to do good by her. But I didn't say any of those things. I didn't know what they would sound like out loud. And at this point, after everything we had been through, I didn't want to lie to her.

  "He's in there," she said. "Right now. He's mad as hell."

  "Has he tried any—"

  "It's not me he's concerned with. You've locked him out of any other connections with your world for as long as that ring circles his walking stick. The man of great power is now nothing more than me, a shade with a window to the living."

  "But both of you are down here now, together. Aren't you worried about crossing paths?"

  "He'll leave me alone. He's let me take care of myself for decades. It was a blessing that he left me behind, really. The more twisted he became, the more corrupt, the easier it was to shake free. After Finlay, Livia and Aster, and especially after all of this, I don't know if my father will ever seek me out again. In a way, he knows that's the best thing he can do for me."

  I nodded. She was right, as usual. Violet had managed to avoid her father for many years down here. Hiding wasn't even necessary. How could a twelve-year-old girl draw the ire of a father? If anyone, it was me that Ambrose resented.

  Her face showed relief. Having someone to talk to, to really divulge inner thoughts to, was something the girl hadn't had in a long time. Maybe not since the days of riding the Southern Pacific with her dad. Giving her that much was the least I could do.

  But the cuteness of her childlike cheeks couldn't hide the vast atrocities that would forever stain her eyes. The black eyeliner, the purple hair and lipstick, it was all a mask. For better or worse, it was who she was now. Viola Ambrose was a jumbled memory. A fantasy. She was dead.

  "I heard what he said," she started. "My dad. About us being hypocrites. Obviously, I know our intentions were noble. We're not the same as him. But can we excuse ourselves for our actions? Should we just pat ourselves on the back and move on?"

  "Violet..."

  "I can't jump into people anymore. I break them when I do that. It breaks me." She looked down again, holding back the tears that would surely come later, when she was alone.

  "You were only inside Pam for five minutes," I said.

  "She still didn't handle it well. She's having nightmares tonight. I guarantee you that much."

  "Violet, Pam was a little shaken up by your intrusion, but she would have voluntarily done it to save Soren. I believe that. And that's what makes it okay."

  "No. Nothing makes it okay. That's why we do what we do. That's our purpose. Now that my father is stopped, I'm done."

  I nodded softly. It was her right and I wouldn't tell her otherwise. Violet had a long history of troubled possession. It wasn't in her to control it as well as her father. Maybe that's why she could be saved.

  But what did she mean about being done and having a purpose? "What about you?" I asked. "You've taken care of Ambrose. You've made your decision about the living. Isn't it time for you to move on?"

  Violet wiped the water from her eyes and looked at me earnestly. Determined. "I'm not finished. I've still caused way more harm than I've helped. I think I'll stick around a little while, see how much further I can tip the scales." There was something about her purple lips. Was it a smile? "You know, Dante, I feel better already. I don't think you're a half-bad friend. A bit of a dick, though."

  I laughed. I didn't know what I had said, but if this troubled girl could see a bright side, then so could I. I paced in the depot for several moments. Smiling. Thinking of the sun even though it was absent here. I realized I would have missed her, if she had left. It felt good knowing she'd still be at my side. In my pocket.

  "Red Hat is still out there," I offered. "They're a whole other can of worms we don't fully understand yet."

  She hopped down from her perch and landed with a thud. Her boot kicked up dirt and she brushed at the red and black stripes of her dress. "No more little fish, then? No more finding marks at clubs?"

  "If you think I'm gonna stop going out, you're crazy. I can do my thing at clubs and still investigate the big boys. They're both worthy causes."

  "Well maybe you can cut back on the drinking at least."

  "Not a chance."

  "Oh well," she said, smiling. "Worth a shot."

  We stood there, blinking at each other, satisfied without words. It felt like a new beginning. We all needed those sometimes.

  "They're watching us now. Marquis knows your tricks."

  I tilted my head in a playful shrug. "Then we'll just need to come up with new ones."

  "We can't go in blind."

  "I never do," I said.

  "You always do."

  I scoffed. "I've got it under control."

  She chuckled and ran at me with open arms. I kneeled and grabbed her in a big hug. The cockiness was contagious. After all, we couldn't do what we did without it.

  Like all things, the innocence of the moment had to end. By our very nature, we could only experience highs if they were riddled with lows.

  "You never gave me an answer," she said, breaking away from the embrace. "Did we compromise our principles? Are we bad in our own way?"

  I stood up again and looked into her wise face. "I've heard that not everything in the world is either black or white."

  Her light purple eyes were piercing. "You don't believe that."

  Epilogue

  It was a bittersweet day.

  I was in lighter spirits after the chapter on Ambrose closed out. I didn't allow the tasks ahead to consume me yet. Instead, I'd found time to
hang with Trent. Watch Netflix. Do the little things. I especially liked my moments with Eva. It was nice being happy.

  We spent the whole day together doing mundane things. Going to the mall. Dinner. We went to Lock & Key for some drinks. Then we capped things off at her place in K-town. This time I'd remembered to stock up on beer first.

  We smoked out a little and had sex. Watched some TV and had sex again. By then, even though it was still dark out, Eva had passed out. It was a satisfying conclusion to the kind of day we all wish upon ourselves. But these moments don't come so easily or intentionally. We all live our lives and try to get our way and hope we cross paths with the most complementary people. But it's all dumb luck. Something like this couldn't be manufactured. It just happened. And when it did, it was magical. It was like a one night stand, except both of us had wanted more. That providence in a sea of possibilities was what made it so special.

  I didn't nod off so easily. I lay in bed and watched her sleep. Alone with my thoughts again, my mind became burdened with the words of Alexander Ambrose. I couldn't find peace. Even as his shade could no longer visit the living, he haunted me. And Violet, who had told me that I only believed in absolutes, by measuring degrees in black and white, seemed determined to deny me a little bit of gray.

  I thought about the girl's cursed life and the sacrifices she had made since. Compared to her, I was lucky with family. Girls were another story. It's not that I didn't meet any. The party scene had some perks. Cute girls were the biggest one. Still, I kept them at a distance. I'd always thought that was what I wanted. Now, I wasn't so sure.

  "That was amazing," whispered Eva. If her voice wasn't so sweet she would have startled me. She was talking as if she hadn't been asleep at all, as if our bodies were locked together just seconds before. In truth, I couldn't say how long I'd been wrapped in thought. I smiled at her sadly. It had been amazing. At that moment, I felt more guilty than ever.

  Her arm brushed against my chest and she turned her head slightly. Half of her face was buried in her pillow. A mane of platinum hair obscured much of the rest. I could see a lazy eye blinking slowly, straining to keep me in its gaze. I put my hand on her back. Eva looked so small under it. I rubbed her spine and she flinched as the touch gave her a chill.