by Dick Denny
Abandon
All
Hope
__________________
DICK DENNY
The road to Hell is paved with good intentions...
Foundations Book Publishing
Brandon, MS 39047
www.foundationsbooks.net
Abandon All Hope
By: Dick Denny
Cover by: Dawné Dominique
Edited by: Steve Soderquist
Copyright 2021© Dick Denny
Published in the United States of America
Worldwide Electronic & Digital Rights
Worldwide English Language Print Rights
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned or distributed in any form, including digital and electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the prior written consent of the Publisher, except for brief quotes for use in reviews.
Acknowledgements
To the fellas of Bravo Company 1/505 PIR, but especially Mike Piscopo… I would have been a good paratrooper. To Brendan Hoffman… Bro what don’t I owe you? And Phil the Destroyer… For practicing like me.
Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
About the Author
More from Foundations Books Publishing
Prologue: My Way
…the end is here…
It is without any hint of hyperbole or irony when I say Frank Sinatra had one of the greatest voices of all time. Even through the small speakers of my iPhone there was no mistaking the tone and timbre of Ole Blue Eyes himself. I had asked Gretchen to pick a song, a song for the End.
When I say the End, again, it is without hyperbole or irony. The grass was soft and well manicured under my sneakered feet. The wind was enough to tug at the edges of my jacket, exposing the pearl grips of the 1911 under my right arm and the wooden grips of the 1911 under my left. Even with the wind it was a pleasant evening, and probably the last.
Frank sang about living a full life and all.
Gretchen stood next to me, and even here at the End, she was a comfort. I wished she’d go but I knew she wouldn’t. I was certain dying was easy. Dying was easy and dying fighting was blood simple. It would be so much easier if she weren’t there.
But dang it, Frank did it his way.
Then again, it wasn’t like she was safe elsewhere. This wasn’t just a climax, it was the Climax. She would be no safer up on the International Space Station than she was right next to me. And at least here, she could die swinging. We could die together.
Frank may have had regrets, but doesn’t everyone?
I wished Jammer and Switch were here. Switch was gone because I had sent him away, but he definitely would have had I called him. That’s the damnation of having Brothers. Jammer was still dead.
Frank sang about doing what he had to do; preaching to the choir brother.
How many people had I killed since the entire shit show had been dumped on my lap? How many bodies had I stacked like cordwood in the name of putting off exactly what I found myself surrounded by?
Frank had a plan and did it his way.
Well, unlike Frank, I couldn’t say that about planning. Planning was never my strong suit. Maybe if it was we wouldn’t have found ourselves here at the End of All Things.
Frank sang about being in over his head but sucking it up like a man.
Gretchen had to know.
Frank Sinatra sang of standing and bearing it.
That I had, though I’m not sure it was a virtue. I’m not sure anything was better. I wasn’t sure anything could be worse. Hell on one side, Heaven on the other, and neither pleased to see us.
Frank sang about loving, laughing, crying.
I kind of wish I’d cried but I hadn’t. I hadn’t cried sober since I was eleven. I looked at Gretchen. The five-foot shaft topped with the Spear of Destiny clutched in her fists, more like a warrior goddess worthy of all the world's riches. She had to know. She had to know all the things I’d thought but never said. She had to know all the things I’d said that came out wrong. She had to know all the dreams I had about her, for us.
Frank had his share of losing.
Almost Switch… Jammer… Faith in Humanity… Faith in Heaven…Fear of Hell…
And yet, as he admits in the song, Frank was amused by it all.
To be honest, I was struggling to find the humor.
Frank said screw being humble.
I smiled at Gretchen. She smiled back. Shy was never the style of either of us.
Ole Blue Eyes did it his way.
For good or ill, goddamned right we did.
Frank sang about the defining characteristics of a man, and what does a man possess.
Gretchen…
Frank sang about laying it all out on the table.
I looked to my left and saw Lucifer in all the glory of his Divine Birth, armored and decked out for war, a brace of three spears in his left hand and a spiked Morningstar in his right. He stood surrounded by his Infernal Host in their dread damnation.
I looked to my right and there stood Michael, probably Rafael and Gabrielle bedecked as you’d imagine warriors of the Throne; Michael with sword and shield, probably Rafael with a sword and ax, Gabrielle with a bow and arrows of light. The angelic armies arrayed in good order, prepared and ready for the Day that had come.
Like Rocky, Frank sang about taking the hits but moving through.
I looked at Gretchen. Our eyes touched for what might be the last time. She knew, she had to…
For the time had finally come upon us. Hell to the left, Heaven to the right. Gretchen and I in the center, standing at the End of All Things—upon the field of Armageddon.
Frank sang about doing it his way. My Way ended like the world was probably about to.
Goddamn, my girl has great taste in music
“Dying man couldn’t make up his mind which
place to go to – both have their advantages,
Heaven for the climate, hell for the company!”
-Mark Twain’s Notebooks and Journals, vol 3
Chapter One
Songs for the Non-Existent Foot Chase Mix
“Magnum PI Theme” Mike Post
Ever have one of those thoughts that are just completely random and inappropriate to the situation you might find yourself at that moment? Like What’s Kathy Ireland up to right now? While you’re sitting at a funeral? Or What serial killer name would make the best name for a pet? Probably depends on the pet, right? While you’re sitting in a tax audit? Or the ever disturbing I bet she’s been fucki
ng her work friend Glenn for years while a should-be adorable four-year-old tells you a story about dreams of purple skies and rainbow milk.
In a totally inappropriate moment, I found myself wondering: I wish someone would be nice to Adele. I mean listen to her music, even her upbeat songs are fucking sad if you pay attention to the lyrics. Shit, someone just give her a hug and say, “You’re talented, sweet, lovely, and freaking valued.” And why would she want Someone Like You? It obviously didn’t work the first time, so why would you want to try the same thing again? Maybe Adele’s crazy… All that running through my shallow kiddie pool of a brain as Gretchen and I tore down the sidewalk as fast as our feet would carry us.
Were this a movie, it would have all been in slow motion. Gretchen would definitely look better running in slow motion than me,. but to be fair, she looks better doing anything than I do. At that moment, her Doc Martens were basically soundless as she sprinted down the cracked sidewalk with a collapsed ASP club in each hand. Her raven hair was tied back in a ponytail and her bangs bounced with each step. She had a gray tanktop that read Duct Tape, Mmmmm. I don’t know where she got it. Her pouch belt was wrapped around her slender waist above her short shorts that had at one point been acid-washed jeans. The rips in her fishnets were more alluring than they were a sign of our not quite living in poverty but definitely not making it big lifestyle.
In contrast to her full-speed gliding down the sidewalk, my black-and-white Chucks slapped the pavement with such a volume and form that any decent track coach or kinesiology professor would bust an aneurysm as opposed to finding the vocabulary to describe all the things I was doing wrong. I held my hands out straight like I was about to karate chop something and managed to pump my arms in relative time with my legs. I did manage to jump a stroller without knocking it or the baby in it over, all the while wondering, What’s up with Adele?’
At that moment, I knew life would be better then if The Beastie Boy’s Sabotage was blasting in the background, but life doesn’t have a running soundtrack and I don’t have a Foot Chase Mix. The simple reason being is I never really wanted to get in foot chases for the equally simple reasoning that foot chases are work…exhausting fucking work.
Normally P.I. work was just sitting around watching stuff and trying to not die of boredom while waiting to get pictures of people doing things they shouldn’t be doing in the first place. Problem is, you gotta have clients. So when there was a lack of those annoying commodities, Gretchen cooked up a plan. We referred to it as ‘The Plan’ because we’re not professional writers or acronym authors. It was simple; the cops are always putting out “reward for information leading to the arrest of” bullshit releases, so the first time Gretchen and I did their job for them, handed them their case, they stiffed us. “Sorry, your information wasn’t pertinent to our arrest.” It was bullshit, but not like we could really argue it.
So this time, we were going to catch the assholes, drag them to the station, hand them all the evidence we gathered and the assholes in question and then like pimps, get our fucking money.
That’s why we found ourselves sprinting down the street at eleven twenty-three a.m., past the moms heading to the park to meet with their Mommy Groups, homeless people, and the occasional person who has a job just trying to get lunch from Larry Wilcox’s hotdog cart, chasing Toshiro Some-Japanese-Surname-I-Can’t-Fucking-Pronounce and the two guys who decided to run with him.
Toshiro went by the nickname—I refuse to say street name or street tag or whatever nomenclature dip shits are using nowadays—“Baby-Powder.” He got the name because he likes selling to kids and getting kids to sell for him. He’d started selling dimebags in high school, coke in college, and now mainly sold designer shit like Molly but dabbled in a bit of everything. He dressed like an asshole who heard the term cyber-punk, but dressed as if they didn’t look up what cyber-punk actually meant. He looked like a shithead in an Asian Sex Pistols cover band, but pushing forty as opposed to being an age appropriate for that kind of thing.
The two guys running with him were a little bit of an unknown. I was figuring the tall, bald, tubby one was his Mook Muscle, the skinny cracked-out looking bastard was either some kind of sycophant, or more likely a buyer, just caught up in shit that was falling on Toshiro.
I was really getting tired of running. I reached in and brushed the fire in my gut, the fire that was always there and felt the Wrath start flowing through me. I got faster, pulling ahead of Gretchen and starting to close on the trio of shitheads.
“Cheater!” Gretchen spat as I started pulling away. There was no venom to it and I could feel the laugh behind it.
The crack-skinny dude turned his head to glance behind him. He had a real pimple problem for a guy somewhere between the age of thirty and sixty. With his head facing the wrong way, he clipped a fire hydrant. The other two made no more to help that dude as he tumbled, in the words of Alanis Morrisette, Head Over Feet.
“I got him,” I heard Gretchen call, so I passed the pile of crackhead without even pausing.
Coming up to the cross street I glanced and instantly leapt, doing my best Bo Duke across the hood of a screeching stopping car as opposed to the alternative of getting fucking creamed. No matter how cool a hood slide looks, it slows you down.
I pumped my legs and my light-gray suit jacket fanned out behind me, exposing my underarm pistol rig to anyone paying attention. The sprinting made it easy to keep the Wrath stoked.
I saw Baby-Powder look back and gasp to the surprisingly quick tubby bastard. “Get him!” Not the most thought-out or articulated plan I’ve ever heard but to his credit, that’s what the mook tried to do. He turned and raised his fists in a manner that orated his intentions with aplomb.
What he didn’t see coming was me just running around him, knowing he couldn’t catch up without the previously established forward momentum. Plus, I knew Gretchen would be on him in a moment or two. She seemed to like going after big guys’ knees.
As she’d told me more than once, “A knee’s the great leveler.”
I kept pumping my arms and legs and started to quickly gain ground on Toshiro. He kept glancing back and that kept costing him speed. I was only about twenty-five feet behind him when he turned into an alley. I was moving fast enough I half-jumped and planted a foot on the wall to angle myself into the alley.
About the time Toshiro got in the alley, he pulled out an honest-to-God butterfly knife and started flipping it open, then threw it at me.
The good news was two-fold. Buffed with the Wrath, I was fast enough to dodge it. On top of that, the dipshit did a bad job flipping it open and it had shut itself as it twirled through the air at me. So even if I hadn’t gotten out of the way, worst I would have had to deal with would have been a bruise.
The ineptitude made me even more angry. I felt the Sword wanting to be unleashed.
I kept running at him and he raised his hands defensively. I have never understood why everyone expected me to fight via the Marquis of Queensbury rules.
With the Wrath buffing my strength, I kicked Toshiro Some-Japanese-Surname-I-Can’t-Fucking-Pronounce right in his goddamned balls hard enough to lift both his feet off the ground. I stepped out of the way and watched as he fell to the ground, his body hitting perfectly flat.
“What the fuck were you thinking?” I half-laughed half-yelled at his prone form. He rolled onto his side and clutched at his crotch as he wept.
“I mean,” I lectured as I paced slowly pack and forth before him as I tried to catch my breath. “I mean, I had to chase you three fucking blocks. What the shit, man? What was the plan?”
I bent down and started going through his pockets as he cried. I found a thick roll of twenties in one pocket and a short stack of hundreds in another. I figured that even if the cops stiffed us again this wasn’t a total loss. I pocketed the dough. I also found bags of pills in the ‘90s-style fanny pack that ruined his wannabe Sex Pistols look. I left the pills there for the cops.
&nbs
p; Slowly, he started getting his shit together enough to yell in an attempt to be intimidating. “Let go of me, you son of a bitch!”
I chuckled as I tried to count the money I was blatantly stealing. “Yeah, she was kind of a bitch.”
Baby-Powder pushed himself up and started to try to run even as he was still bent in half. I grabbed him by the neck and pushed him head-first into the nearby dumpster. The impact sounded like the clang of the world’s shittiest bell.
“Seriously, dude, what’s the plan?” I repeated, still laughing. “Look, get up and stand with your hands on the wall. You’ve seen enough police procedural shows to know how this fucking works.”
I watched him slowly get to his feet and lean with his hands against the wall. He was still crying, and I was as genuinely as sympathetic as the Death Valley is wet. I glanced back at the end of the alley, but Gretchen hadn’t appeared yet. I knew three incontrovertible facts. Number one, Toshiro was an asshole. Number two, I could still feel the Wrath pulling at me. Number three, I wasn’t a cop.
I kicked Baby-Powder in the crotch from behind and watched his knees buckle and give out from under him. After the second kick to the junk, I was positive that if Toshiro didn’t already have kids, he wasn’t having kids.
Score one for the gene pool’s skim filter.
I grabbed him by the back of the neck and twisted an arm behind him, cranking it as I pulled him up and started walking him out of the alley. Near the end, I saw Gretchen standing with the other two on their knees before her, hands cuffed behind their backs.
She smiled sweetly then gestured at the closed butterfly knife on the ground. “What’s up with that?”
I shrugged, then jerked Toshiro a little. “Fuck-nut here threw a closed butterfly knife at me.”
