Madison Mosby and the Moonmilk Wars

by Jason Winn

  “All right,” said Madison. “Sit tight for a sec. Do you have the address?”

  “Yeah, Chester sent it to me.”

  Madison dialed Sean and Jane.

  “Sup, Maddy?” asked Sean in his normal surly tone. He always sounded bothered for some reason.

  “Hey,” said Madison. “Is Jane there?”

  “Yeah.”

  Madison breathed a mini sigh of relief. Jane was an ex-cop. She would know something, hopefully.

  “Good, put me on speaker phone.”

  “You’re on the air,” said Sean.

  “Get ready to write this down. It’s an address.”

  Madison looked over to Rey. “Got the address?” She held up her phone.

  Rey called it out.

  Madison went back to her phone.

  “You get that?”

  “Hold on,” replied Sean. There was a pause while he tapped at a keyboard.

  “Oh, shit,” said Jane. “Who got taken there? Tell me it’s not Sarah or Dana.”

  “No. Husband of a friend of mine. What is it? Police station? Impound yard?”

  There was another long silence on the other end. Madison looked over at Rey, who was wringing her hands with a look of half terror and half curiosity.

  “Madison, that’s Hampton Corner in Annandale. It’s a black-site.”

  “The fuck is that?”

  “What is it?” whispered Rey.

  Sean piped up, “It’s where they take you, when they want to beat a confession out of you.”

  “What?” asked Madison. “They don’t do that anymore.”

  “Yeah,” said Jane. “They do. One got busted in Chicago a while back. I thought they closed this one down. But, if you’re right about the address, they didn’t.”

  “Holy shit.” Madison looked away from Rey, not wanting to upset her any more.

  “I knew about it when I was on the force in DC,” said Jane. “I know cops that took people there. It’s bad, Madison.”

  “How is this thing operating?”

  “There’s a lot of money in the crooked cop business,” said Sean.

  “How do we get him out?” asked Madison.

  “You don’t,” said Jane.

  Madison felt her blood boiling. Nobody fucked with her people, whether they were lawyers or the woman who put smiley frosting faces on the cookies no one bought. Plus, she had a sneaking suspicion that the redheaded asshole, Crate, was there as well. A score needed to be settled.

  “Oh, yes we fucking well do,” she shouted. Her pulse was so hard and so fast her vision was strobing like a rave party. “Get everything you can on this place and be at my house in two hours with your field kits.” She ended the call and turned to Rey. “Call Chester and tell him to assemble his crew.”

  Chapter 22

  Madison, Jane, Sarah, and Sean stood in an alley several blocks away from Hampton Corner, in Annandale. The group was shielded from the street by an old industrial park. It was the part of town where the local thugs made sport of shooting out the streetlights and security cameras. Clouds blotted out the moon and the only lights were from the group’s flashlights.

  Madison wore dark jeans and a black hoodie over a bullet-proof vest. In her pockets, she carried a vial of Predator’s Cloak and the Scout Munk drone.

  “This is ill advised,” said Jane as she looked up and down the alleyway, securing her own bullet-proof vest. “If anyone comes down the alleyway, we’ll be pinned in. This isn’t like when we snuck into your courier friend’s house last month. You prepared to shoot your way out?” Jane was referring to the last sneak job, when Madison had suspected a courier of stealing Moonmilk.

  “The bikers are handling that,” replied Madison. She nodded toward a pair of motorcycles at each end of the alleyway. Another group waited down the street, ready to scoop up their friends and bug out. “They’ll keep anyone out. How many people are usually in there?”

  “Could be none. But, if they’ve got prisoners in there, it could be as many as half a dozen.” She sucked on a lollipop.

  “What kind of weapons do they have?” asked Madison as she racked the slide of her pistol and shoved it into the holster strapped to her thigh. A pair of spare magazines went into her belt.

  “Pistols. Maybe a shotgun or two.”

  Sean placed a heavy black case on the ground, clicked open the locked latches, and opened it.

  “That a drone?” asked Sarah.

  “Yeah,” said Sean, grinning. “Latest and greatest.”

  Sarah eyeballed the black quad copter and couldn’t help but say, “Not really.”

  Sean ignored her and removed a pair of goggles and slung them around his neck.

  “Let me guess,” said Madison. “I paid for that.”

  “Yes, you did,” replied Sean as he pulled the thing out and placed it on the ground.

  “What about that old phone?” asked Madison. She knelt to inspect an old cordless telephone with a thick antenna protruding from it.

  “Jammer,” said Sean. “Don’t want any calls for help going out. I made that, in case you’re wondering. All right, where am I going, here?”

  “Due west,” said Jane, “down the road at the end of the block, then go two more blocks. You can’t miss it. Three-story brick building with an iron fence around it.”

  “No problem,” said Sean as he powered up the drone and sent it aloft. The quadcopter drone was completely silent save for a faint whirling sound from the rotors. He pulled the goggles up to his eyes and worked the remote control.

  “Watch out for all the utility lines,” said Jane.

  Sean gave a dismissive “pssht.” His mouth was frozen in a perma-grin.

  “What?” asked Madison, “so he can see where he’s going with the goggles?” As if Sean was now deaf.

  “Yup,” said Sarah. “But that’s illegal now.”

  “Legality is in the eye of the beholder,” said Sean. “Almost there.”

  “And how are you going to get inside?” Jane asked Madison.

  “Bring your lock picks?”

  Jane patted her pocket.

  “You open the door. I’ll go in.”

  “This where you turn invisible?” asked Sean.

  “Did you tell them?” Madison asked Sarah.

  “They had to find out sometime,” said Sarah.

  “I’ll believe that when I see it,” said Jane.

  “No, you won’t,” said Sarah.

  “Okay, everyone shut up,” said Sean. “There’s a tablet in the case there. Power it up and hit the camera icon.”

  Jane grabbed the tablet, punched in the pass code and opened the app. The three women were treated to an infrared shot of Hampton Corner, coming from Sean’s drone about 200 feet above.

  “Looks like there’s two unmarked cruisers inside the gate,” said Jane. “I’ll take out the tires after you pull your disappearing act. That will buy us some time, if they try to come after us. Sean, swing around to the back. I bet there’s a way in there.”

  “Coming down,” said Sean. “Hold on.”

  The camera view changed as the drone descended and hovered in front of a rusty, but sturdy-looking steel door. Pallets and metal drums surrounded the door.

  “There you go,” said Sean.

  “There any alarms in this place?” asked Madison.

  “No idea,” said Jane. “Remember, I’ve never been in here, just heard about it.”

  “Don’t see anything that indicates an alarm,” said Sean. “No cellular antennas or wires coming off the doors or windows.”

  “All that could be inside,” said Sarah.

  “I’ve seen enough,” said Madison. “Let’s go.”

  “And how are you going to see what’s inside?” asked Jane.

  “I’ve got my own little drone,” she replied, patting the stiff chipmunk in her pocket.

  ***

  Madison and Jane crouched behind to a broken-down tow truck on a side street, next to the prison. A crumbli
ng brick wall seven feet high surrounded the building.

  “Sean,” said Jane into her earpiece. “We’re in position. What do you see?”

  Madison was patched in on the same call.

  “All quiet.”

  Jane put her phone on mute. “Listen, if we run into any cops, it’s best to get this over with without killing anyone. These guys aren’t on the books yet, if they’re in here. Remember, low profile.”

  “Got it,” said Madison, although she wouldn’t mind capping a few dirty cops. But she needed to listen to Jane. She knew better than her.

  Madison dug into her pocket and pulled out the Scout Munk. It lay still wrapped in the parchment paper, which somehow knocked the little guy out when he touched it. She took a firm grip around his body, remembering that he ran off the last time she pulled him off the paper, and handed the knockout wrapper to Jane. “Hold this.”

  Jane stared, mouth open. “No way.”

  “Way. He’s going to check things out inside. Then we go in.”

  The chipmunk kicked and squirmed in Madison’s hands. She could feel his little claws struggling to find purchase against her skin.

  Madison looked the chipmunk in the eye. He went still, as if waiting for orders. “Go inside the building and look for people. Then come back.”

  With that, she crept over to the wall, found a small hole at ground level and let the little guy go. He scurried through the crevasse.

  “Let me guess,” said Jane. “He’s going to come back and whisper in your ear what he sees?”

  Jane had been shockingly accepting of the magical world. It made Madison’s relationship with her easy. Not like Dana, who freaked the fuck out when Madison showed her how she could disappear right in front of her by drinking the Predator’s Cloak potion. A vial of which was nestled in her pocket. The few things Madison had shown Jane, the customer totems, the Winter Roses, warning her not to touch them with her bare skin, had intrigued Jane more than frightened her. Madison reasoned it was her time on the force, before she was booted off, that made her so even-keeled.

  “How we doing?” asked Sean.

  “Almost ready,” replied Madison. “Everything still quiet?”

  “Yup.”

  Madison looked up to see if she could spot the drone hovering over the block. The thing might as well have been invisible. There was nothing but dark sky above.

  About twenty minutes later the chipmunk returned. Madison snatched him up and brought him close to her face. The smell of cinnamon was strong and as she was about to take a big inhale, she stopped.

  “Come here, close,” she said to Jane.

  Jane brought her head close in to Madison’s, so close their cheeks were almost touching.

  “Now take a deep breath, like you’re smelling a flower.”

  “What’s going to happen?”

  “Some cool magic shit. Just do it.”

  The two inhaled the cinnamon scent coming off of the chipmunk and were transported to the edge of the building’s courtyard. They scrambled over and around trash, circling the brick walls. Their hands felt wet as the chipmunk’s path took him through silky puddles where rainwater had mixed with old motor oil. A second later, they saw a little opening under a loading dock door.

  The space was dark and cool, with nothing but fast-food trash and beer cans. The refuse was as big as tractor trailers to the chipmunk, but he darted past all of it with effortless grace. Past an assortment of propane tanks and gasoline containers, he reached the far end of the loading dock and came upon an office door, hanging open.

  They buzzed through it and out into a space that looked like a garage. The smell of mold mixed with grease and standing water. Old Annandale police cruisers sat rusting, missing doors and tires. Some had been tagged with graffiti.

  The chipmunk exited the garage and headed down a hallway, lined with closed doors. Country music could be heard—Hank Williams. A door at the end of the hallway led into a stairwell and the women were taken downstairs, where the hallway glowed with white fluorescent light. Dogs barked.

  Stopping to look into an open door, they could see four beaten men chained to radiators, stripped to their underwear. Their T-shirts were caked with blood and all of them had swollen faces. The dog barking grew louder.

  There were three other doors, and each room held two to four men, all in the same shape. All looked resigned to their situation—the fight had clearly been beaten from them.

  A thread of fear ran through Madison. She plucked it out and threw it aside. Her muscles tightened.

  The music was louder down here as the hallway opened into a large dreary room, with a few overturned chairs, and a pile of chains and handcuffs. A row of cages was off to the left. Inside, two mangy Dobermans locked eyes with the chipmunk and went from sporadic barking to a frenzy, seeing the tiny invader. On the far side of the room was a workbench. The chipmunk couldn’t see what was on the workbench, but rusty tools hung from a pegboard over the bench.

  He made a sweeping arc around the room, before returning to the stairs. He went up to the second floor, which was comprised of a bunch of abandoned offices and a large meeting room. There was one floor left. Madison felt a sense of dread as the chipmunk reached the top step. She could hear a man shouting, accompanied by screaming and something being beaten. She prayed silently it was a punching bag.

  Jane let out an audible shriek at seeing the next room. Bare walls save for a spray-painted smiley face, with x’s in place of eyes. A mattress lay on the floor under the smiley face.

  “That’s it,” she said. “That’s where they took me.”

  Madison was jarred out of the vision. She quickly put the chipmunk back in its paper. It went still immediately.

  “I never thought I’d see it again,” Jane said. Her eyes watered.

  “What are you talking about?” asked Madison.

  Jane produced a huge pistol and pulled back the slide, racking a round. “I’ll tell you after I kill everyone in there.”

  “Whoa, we’re here to get people out, not kill them. What happened to a low profile?”

  Jane’s eyes turned into two green suns. “Drink your shit. Let’s go. Get the bikers out.”

  ***

  Madison, shaking with adrenaline and a touch of fear, did as she was told. The Predator’s Cloak went down hard, like cheap moonshine. She forced it down with a cough. It had never tasted this bad before.

  “Jesus,” she muttered under her breath.

  “You okay?”

  “Fine, let’s get this over with.”

  Within a minute, Madison could see her hands disappearing.

  “You should grab the bolt cutters over that workbench in the basement,” Jane said as they crossed the street.

  Jane knelt by the brick fence and made a step for Madison with her hands and knee. A second later the two were bolting for the nearest door. Jane whipped out her lock picks and Madison slid through the opening.

  “Hey,” said Jane. “Watch yourself in there and move quick.”

  “I will.”

  “See you back by Sean.”

  Madison ran to the basement. It felt weird going through the same steps as the Scout Munk, but being normal size, like going back to your elementary school as an adult. Everything seemed so much smaller.

  Bolt cutters in hand, she raced to the rooms with the beaten men. She clipped the chains connecting them to the radiators. The bolt cutters made a satisfying crunch against the shackles.

  “The fuck?” one of them asked. He was a tall skinny kid, no more than twenty. He rubbed his eyes.

  “I’m the fucking ghost of Christmas freedom,” said Madison. “On your feet. Let’s get you out of here.”

  “The bolt cutters are flying,” one of them grumbled.

  “It’s magic,” said Madison. “Let’s move it, people.”

  A pot-bellied man covered in tattoos stood up. “I don’t need to be told twice. Come on y’all, let’s go.”

  Madison went from ro
om to room, cutting the men free. “You can stay here and be beaten to death or fed to the hounds, or we can just go. I’m a real person. Let’s go. Come on. Come on.” She was shouting now as she tried her best to pull some of the smaller men, but their bodies were heavy with exhaustion.

  “Good. Good. Follow the dancing bolt cutters. ”

  Madison led the men back upstairs. Jane’s boots could be seen charging to the second floor. There was a strong smell of gasoline and propane in the air. Wasting no time to see what Jane was up to, Madison stepped into the garage.

  The main door controls were off to the right. Madison punched them one after the other, and the dim light from the street crept in.

  The bikers, needing no more coaxing from the flying bolt cutters, bolted through the open garage door, leading out to the gated courtyard. Jane’s handiwork showed cars resting on flat tires.

  Madison went over to the only functional-looking car in the garage and planted the bolt cutters right through the windshield. The glass turned opaque with a million cracks. No one would be trailing them in that thing.

  Gunshots popped off somewhere in the building. Madison and several of the bikers ducked, thinking the bullets were aimed at them.

  Engines revved outside as the bikers, who had been waiting outside, raced into the courtyard. Their battered friends jumped on to the back of their buddies’ bikes and thundered away. Madison stood in the doorway watching friends greet friends. In a way she was envious. She didn’t have friends like that - the instant smile and hug.

  Gunshots rang out again, followed by shouting. There was still work to be done, and one of her only friends was potentially in a gun battle right now. The bikers were safe. Rey would be with her man tonight. Madison pulled her pistol from the holster and turned back toward the staircase.