Back to Main Page

“The laws of perspective have been repealed!….All spatial relationships have been lost! It’s impossible to judge where anything is!”

“A dame?” Hargrove’s mind raced with the speed and precision of a formula one auto. The barrel of the pistol swung towards him, a hole seemingly bigger than an oil drum. Pit stop. “A dame, ah, hee....” Raising his hands before him in a futile attempt to delay the inevitable (why not? It had worked in the past) he spotted the stained manila envelope crinkling in his white knuckled grip. At the sight, Graves’ lips thinned even further.

“Might this be what you are looking for?” the Marxist Detective inquired, saccharin dripping from his tone. Suddenly the pose of Hollywood producer seemed likely to come in handy. “Maybe we can make a deal...babe.”

“Babes,” muttered Graves, his eyes unfocusing as he drew deeply on his cigarette. “I count those things too. That envelope, though....”

“Straight from the hand of BFG himself, babe,” Hargrove warbled, settling on using the word for punctuation. It seemed to have an effect on the cadaverous man. Around them, tourists had begun to gather, obviously assuming this was some kind of publicity stunt. Marty slipped backward nervously behind Shirley, who was patting her hair and giving the tourists her best winning smile, complete with tiny fleurets of broccoli stuck between her teeth. Felix grinned maniacally, his hands dropping into his pockets in a way that sent alarm bells ringing in Hargrove’s mind. A sharp kick to the FX engineer’s shins drew a grunt of pain and, more importantly, his hands into view, keeping them away from his toys.

“I’ve been waiting for a package for the last three days,” mused Graves. Felix’s hands slipped back into his pockets. Hargrove gave up. “You know how hard three days can be on nothing but coffee and cigarettes?” Looking at the drawn, haggard face, Hargrove wisely kept his mouth shut about the two weeks in Burma. “Why did he send it with you?”

“On the contrary, I believe he wanted us to have the package, Mr., ah, Graves.” Hargrove, sensing freedom in the presence of so many witnesses, felt his spine stiffen. It was a rare occurrence, and he was determined to ride it as long as possible. “But we might be willing to negotiate a sharing, in return for some information?”

The dead eyes focussed. “No deal.” Lenin’s beard. I forgot the magic word. The pistol rose again, drawing excited cries from the tourists. “So hand over the envelope, see? Otherwise things could get messy.”

A shrill whistle cut the air, freezing everyone in place. Hargrove glanced at Shirley; for once, though he could see she was innocent of the noisome interruption. For beside her, Felix grinned triumphantly, one hand cradling a massive, tubular device, with some kind of thin wire leading to the back end. The wire was connected to a small box, grasped in a white-knuckled grip by his other hand. “Amazing what you can do with a length of pipe, enough detonation squibs, and a gallon of thumbtacks! One wrong move, pal, and you’re geography!”

“So, what now? Mexican standoff?” Felix, completely in his element (showing off), fairly danced for joy. “I push the button on this puppy, and you, those Wisconsonites behind you, and all the first floor windows of the building across the road are gone! What do you say to that, man?”

Lechat staggered back into Shirley, dropping them both to the ground with a thud that squeezed a rank puff of wind from the woman’s perfectly shaped fundament. The massive cannon fell from his hand to hit the ground beside his reclining body, supported by Shirley’s ample chest. “Owie.” His hand came up from under his coat, this time drenched in scarlet.

Graves merely shook his head. “Pity all it takes to kill a man is a bullet.”

Marty applauded. “That one’s even better than the last one, Felix! Your timing’s perfect!”

“Oh, jeez,” Felix gasped. “That wasn’t...I...” Then the light faded from his eyes, and his hand, still holding the detonation box, fell to the ground as the tourists joined in on the clapping.

The boiling eruption of flame, smoke, and hundreds of hypervelocity thumbtacks scythed through the area like a lumberjack on speed. Screams filled the air as Hargrove took to his heels, one hand gripping the manila envelope like a lifeline, the other lashing out to latch onto Shirley’s sleeve. Despite his smaller size, he barely slowed while yanking her out from under Felix’s corpse. Fear, he had found in the past, was always better than steroids, though the Marxist detective had discovered both had roughly the same effect on his sex life. A form loomed out of the cloud of cordite smoke beside him, and he almost screamed before realizing it was Marty, sprinting for dear life on two legs and five times that many tentacles.

A bullet smashed the window of the “Hollywood Boulevard Tripe” they were passing.

Marty’s tentacles fumbled their insane sprint for an instant, falling out of sync as one slipped in through the shattered pane to grip a mass of juicy goodness. “Mmmm… tripe…” he muttered.

As they ran, fragments of memory spun through the mind of the Marxist Detective. World leaders...Candace Appel....BFG…Cheetos in Bombay...Wapkaplet Junior....the envelope....

“Forget the envelope!” Shirley screamed, grabbing him by the shoulders, Felix’s jacket hanging from one hand, her eyes wide in adorable fear. “We are going to DIE!”

Hargrove wiped away the spittle soaking his face. Another bullet smashed into the brick beside his head, but he hardly flinched. Contempt born of familiarity flickered in his eyes for an instant. I can’t believe I was afraid of a single man with a gun. This is nothing compared to the tribe of Borneo pigmies with the testicle tongs. Quickly he reached into Felix’s jacket and jerked out a single cylinder, hurling it to the ground. “Smoke canister-“ was all he had time to say before the flash-bang grenade went off with an eardrum-shattering concussion and an unearthly glare of light.

Blindly the detective gripped another cylinder, this time being rewarded with a dull hissing as it hit the ground. Bullets whining around them, the trio staggered into the nearest alley, blood streaming from their noses and ears. “Next time,” gasped Marty, “read the shoggoth-cursed label!”

A shoggoth….been a while since I’ve seen one of those, Hargrove considered, recalling the Temple of the Black Goat in Lemuria. “Maytheirnameneverbespoken,” he intoned, just to make sure, “and please don’t say that again.” Quickly he glanced back around the corner. Smoke filled the street, irritating his abused eyes, and he could see no movement. “Quick,” the detective muttered, running past his allies down the alley. Hopefully it wasn’t one of those famous Hollywood blind alleys….

Moments later all three were walking down the somewhat less famous “street running parallel to Hollywood Boulevard”, trying to look inconspicuous. Trying, despite Hargrove’s sadly damaged white suit, Shirley’s flight uniform (covering less square inches with every disaster), and the tattered remanents of Marty’s shirt (though his more attention-grabbing limbs had, again, vanished).

They succeeded; even for the Street Running Parallel to Hollywood Boulevard, aka Yucca St., this was par for the course.

Hargrove stalked back to the table, coffee in hand. Shirley and Marty both gazed up at him inquiringly. “One dollar ninety-five a cup? Profit, profit, profit, and no care at all for the people slaving away….how much does that poor puerto rican and his donkey get? Pennies a day, no doubt.”
“Yoll’syu, nyartho-“ Hargrove clamped his hand over the other man’s mouth.

“I’ve no interest in having to deal with an enraged Elder God, notthatsuchathingasdivinityexists,” he rattled off as a sop to his furious socialist senses, “so please try to keep the commentary in English.” That time in Ry’leh….ugh. He hadn’t been able to eat octopus for years. Not that he ever wanted to do so. “In any case, why don’t we examine the contents of this envelope, while discussing possibilities?”

Shirley smiled sweetly. “I think Mr. Offant might be interested in those contents,” she noted. Hargrove merely sneered faintly.

“And I think Mr. Offant can wait. Another lackey of the entertainment business – one no better than the other. Perhaps not, Captain Will.” With an effort, he put her hourglass figure and sculpted face from his mind. The effort so required was not all that great. It took very little to recall the fetid stench she could produce under pressure. How much worse could that be in the throes of…. With a shudder, he put the thought aside, and opened the envelope.

Inside was a sheaf of papers, a small handwritten note on a post-it, and a tiny envelope. Within it was the unmistakable outline of a key. Hargrove quickly pocketed the key, much to Marty’s amusement at Shirley’s disappointment, and read over the note.

Graves – I’ll get this to you any way I can. Keep it away from my son, and get it to Candace.

Hargrove’s thoughts spun in confusion. The sinister plot had just dropped to a new, unwholesome level of complexity. Secret messages being delivered to a mysterious man? BFG without trust of his son, perhaps under his control?? Candace, not actually an enemy of Wapkaplet, but somehow in cahoots with the man, despite her association with Ultimate Pictures??? Dramatic chords played in his mind at each successive question.

Numbers in columns…with a start, the detective realized he was looking at accountant information, printed off from some kind of spreadsheet. Quattro, by the vaguely unfinished look. Squinting, he was able to make out the names and numbers. Most of them were payouts of what he assumed were the standard sort for Hollywood movie moguls; $16 000 for dinner with clients, $25 000 for a tuxedo for the Oscars,

$32 000 for Mr. C. Sheen’s private entertainment, but amidst the horrifying expenses and ridiculous luxuries, one entry, repeated again and again, caught his eye.

There were more, different papers under the spreadsheet, but that name cut through his confusion like a laser through macaroni.

“Mao’s shriveled organ!” he cried, bolting up from the table. Nobody noticed; Hollywood, you know. “Le Scorpion! The French aristo-turned-assasin! I, and I alone, have survived an encounter with him.” His mind flew back to the desperate chase through the ancient sewers of Constantinople, the muzzle-flashes in the darkness, the stink of offal and cordite, the dark silhouette behind the strobing gun barrel, the squelching sounds at every step that still haunted his dreams…. “I never saw him, or her, clearly. Nobody has, not even his or her employers….Employers!” Quickly he checked the headings again. “Wapkaplet Junior. I should have known.”

“Hello? Unenlightened,” muttered Marty, waving one hand to get Hargrove’s attention.

“Wapkaplet Junior’s been using a mysterious assassin to kill people,” supplied Shirley. “But kill who? That’s a lot of entries. And how does it fit in?”

“I am still ironing out the details on the who,” Hargrove said loftily, the good communist atheist’s version of ‘the Lord works in mysterious ways’. “However, I have deduced, with my immense powers of, ah, deduction, that BFG has gotten wind of this. Furthermore, despite his position, BFG has found himself in the situation where he does not have the power to move against his son; in fact, he may find himself at his son’s mercy. Thus, he keeps the pretense of approving of his son, while building power against his plots with outside help. This envelope was a cry for assistance, meant for us to bring out where Graves could intercept it and deliver it to my mysterious employer, Candace Appel.”

“The woman who hired you to find her sister,” Marty threw in helpfully for the audience. “Doesn’t she work for Ultimate, like me and Will? And how does Ida fit in?”

“The sister? Think, er, man! Ida ostensibly works for BFG, but she is engaged to Sync Offant. No doubt she has been kidnapped by Junior, to give him power over Sync, and the whole ‘employed by BFG’ is just a convenient excuse to explain her constant presence! If only we had known this to begin with!” With this, he glared at Shirley, who turned away from the table, whistling nonchalantly and prospecting for nasel nuggets. Quickly, Hargrove turned back to Marty. “Where was I….Ah! Obviously Candace wishes to find her sister in order to free her from BFG Junior, who is holding her against his brother’s wishes. Either BFG is actually in cahoots[2] with Sync in some sort of unholy alliance against his own brother, or more likely Offant pursues his own game to free his fiancee, with Candace playing both sides in a desperate attempt to free Ida. Candace Appel must have the ability to stop Junior, with the proper information. Thus, BFG wishes to deliver the information to her secretly to foil his brother’s plots, and Junior wishes to capture her for leverage in his own nefarious schemes, thus having both sisters and full control over his brother and Sync Offant!” He glared at Marty now; the man raised both hands (and a forest of tentacles) above his shoulders.

Hargrove turned his glare back on Shirley, Marty joining for good measure. And to keep on the side of righteousness, no doubt. The woman wilted under their combined withering stares, finger motionless, interrupted in its spelunking deep within her cranium.

“I’m just a section five agent,” she whispered somewhat nasally. “I don’t know anything about that.”

“Would you be interested to know that there is a .455 caliber barrel pointed at you under the table?” inquired Hargrove. The woman froze in the act of reaching with her other hand behind her back. Marty slowly looked under the table, gripped the barrel of the Webley, and tilted it upward slightly.

“In the name of the crawling chaos, don’t shoot her in the guts!” Shirley smiled thankfully at him. Ignoring her, he continued. “At least put it in her chest. Avoid those damn intestines!”

All around them people chatted, oblivious to the tableau of tension in their midst. Finally Shirley seemed to cave in slightly, a loud paaarrrp accompanying the motion. Hargrove felt his chair vibrate slightly, but ignored it.

“All right. You have me there.” She sighed. “We sent Candace to hire you, in the hopes you would find Ida for us. It went down like this - we originally got wind that Junior was involved in something big, something BFG himself was unsure of – soon after we started investigating, Ida, our boss’s fiancee, was kidnapped, and a note left, telling us to mind our own business. In desperation, we decided to go through an unknown party, one who came....highly recommended: you. After contacting you, Candace never reported in. We suspected a man named Graves – she had been seen with him just before entering your building. Then, to our surprise, we discovered that BFG was trying to get in touch with Candace. Evidently she was still alive, and since we found out Graves is BFG’s personal hatchetman, we figured she had gone undercover, to try to find her sister with BFG’s help. We quickly sent the plane to get you through the airport and to here in one piece.” The beautiful woman smiled bitterly. “That didn’t work out so well.”

“When you wanted to get into the building, I figured you were on to something. As well, I thought it might be a good opportunity to see what I could inside. To my surprise, we find out that BFG not only isn’t with his son on this one, but they have lots of important world figures in there, and the father actively wants to sabotage his son’s work. Which seems to involve assassins.” She grimaced. “This is turning into quite the Waterworld.”

“What about Link?”
Shirely shook her head. “I don’t know anything about that whole situation. Really.”

“I have no idea.” Shirley looked worried. “Maybe he’s been turned. Maybe it’s BFG who’s playing his own game. I hope Candace is all right.”

And Moxie? Hargrove wanted to ask, but left it out. It seemed the man had been forgotten by his associates, but Hargrove still recalled the writer being beaten by the guards, and dragged away. He could become an ace in the whole. Yes…a beaten, psychologically disturbed scriptwriter. Just what I needed in the enemy camp.

Unsatisfied, but realizing she had obviously been honest up to this point, Hargrove leaned back and drummed his fingers on the table, lost in thought.

“Too back about Felix,” muttered Marty, tears forming in his eyes. “A real artist, that one….”
“Felix!” Hargrove sat bolt upright. “Give me the jacket!”

“Why?” Shirley handed the garment over. Hargrove almost dislocated his wrist taking it.

“Heavy,” he whimpered. “He left the Insect2001 robots in the building!” Fumbling through the coat he let out a shrill scream as his hand somehow activated a small blowtorch. “Arrrgh….Ah! Here it is! I think….” Quickly he pulled the compact remote control device from the voluminous pockets of the heavy jacket. The other two gathered around him as Hargrove flipped the power switch, and fought his way past the main menu.

“All right. Here’s number one.” The remote showed a long, metal hallway. “Some kind of duct. Good show, number one!” Out of sight, out of danger. “Number two….” Another duct, but this time the small insect was peering into what amounted to a cell. Inside, Moxie lay, bruised but whole, on a small cot.

“Shut up, Marty.” Hargrove fiddled with the controls further. “And here’s….” His face went green. Shirley turned away, gagging. Marty stared with interest. “Well,” continued the Marxist Detective thickly, “at least we know part of what Petunia plans for you, Shirley.” He studied the horrifying scene; the dubiously female security guard was in the women’s bathroom with one of the secretaries. Part, yes…but I still recall the card that mammoth passed you, Captain Will.

“Interesting,” Marty noted clinically. “I didn’t know you could get your legs into that position.”

“Marty!” gasped Shirley. “How can you even stand to look?” Indeed, Hargrove had discovered the motion control, and was desperately maneuvering the small insectoid robot from the nightmarish scene.

“Between riding with you in the limo two weeks ago, and the ‘field trip’ with my…country club, I’ve seen worse.”

The third bug had discovered the conference room. The Marxist Detective had slipped it in under the robes of one of the Saudi prince’s bodyguards; though the royalty wore Armani, the rank and file had to make do with more traditional dress. Hargrove ground his teeth at the elitism. But now the bug had reached the table, and the famous detective ran it up one of the legs and left it upside down at the bottom. Quickly he turned up the volume.

“Not so,” Marty put it. “I’ve studied it; there’s a particular text I need to read that was originally written in Arabic; since the author was mad, it loses something in translation.” He coughed delicately. “I catch a word or two here and there. They’re wondering when the meeting will start.”

“Fabulous!” Hargrove rubbed his hands together with glee. “Now, all we have to do is sit here, wait, and glean information!” He was ecstatic – all of his cases should go so well!

“Or, better yet, you could just hand over that envelope and everything in it.”

The trio slowly raised their heads to meet a pair of narrowed eyes staring out of the thin face.

“Not bad,” Graves admitted. “You actually lost me there, for a bit.” Hargrove cursed his luck. In order to manipulate the controls, he had put his Webley away. Now, with Graves in front of him, hands in pockets, it might as well be on the moon. The exhausted Detective wondered briefly if the man was referring to his explanation or the chase. “But I’m tired of games. So do yourself a favor; toss me the envelope.”

Marty let out a gutteral roar, and the table flew up into the cadaverous man’s face, propelled by a dozen less two tentacles. Papers flew in every direction; Hargrove cursed, and made a random grab, snatching several out of the air. At least I still have the key. Fumbling, he managed to pull the Webley left-handed. Graves was on his feet, though, pistol in hand. Suddenly Shirley hit the man from the side, driving a vicious right chisel fist into his throat, collapsing the strike to an elbow into the killer’s temple. The epitome of beauty and grace, she followed up with a left forearm to the bridge of his nose, and slid her other arm up under his armpit. A shift of weight, a grunt of effort (oddly stereo, echoed from her hip region), and the tall man became a tangle of arms, legs, and flapping coattails flying through the air. There was a boom, and something hot and fast passed close enough to wither the hair on Hargrove’s right ear. And a pistol. Can’t forget the pistol. Hargrove’s Webley thundered in reply, sending a slow, heavy bullet out to intersect with Graves’ trajectory; in mid-air it passed another round, and both struck home.

The Marxist Detective felt a surge of grim satisfaction at the sight of his foe, hate in his eyes, rolling away through the crowd of screaming coffeehouse patrons and leaving smears of crimson on the ground. Then the ground leaped up and kicked him in the back of the head.

When he came to, he was staring down at someone’s bobbing rear; obviously the Marxist Detective was held in a fireman’s carry. Tensing, he prepared for the worst.

“Relax! It’s me!” Marty cried. “Shirley has the electronics, the jacket, and whatever papers she managed to grab!”

“Put me down,” croaked Hargrove. The feeling of…things…squirming under Marty’s shirt was disturbing, to say the least. When the man obediently set him on his feet, Hargrove collapse immediately. Head spinning, he catalogued the particulars: throbbing head, shooting pain in left shoulder of approximately 3.5 on the HAS[3], cold feeling in left forearm, lack of response in left hand, crepitus at movement registering about 7.4 on the HFSS[4], and panic level of brain settled in at Charging Rabid Doberman[5]. I’d say .45 ACP round, shattering the humurus. A glance told him he was correct. Well, he assumed his cataloging of the round was also correct; it had FELT like a .45 ACP.

“Graves?” he gasped. They were standing on a street corner, Yucca and Argyle, one block from Hollywood Boulevard. Sirens could be heard in the distance.

“Rabbitted when you put the bullet into him,” Shirley wheezed. Her perfect skin had achieved an admirable shade of red. Of course, she’s carrying Felix’s jacket; Marty only had to carry me.

A screech of tires alerted the trio to the arrival of an apparition from the past. Huge flowers of every colour imaginable decorated the sides of the lime green Volkswagon van that pulled up to the curb. The side door slid open to the sound of bizarre guitar music and a cheap porn backbeat, and Hargrove shakily aimed his pistol.

“Forget that, man.” came the surprisingly deep voice. From inside, through a haze of sweet smelling smoke, they could make out a slouching figure, leaning against the other side of the van. Only one distinctive feature could be seen through the thick, medicated mist; a giant ‘fro, haloing the figure’s head. “You better jump on in, Hargrove. I’m here from Candace.”

Who is the mysterious figure from the disco age? Does he work for Candace Appel, or is this some clever (?) trap? And what of the world leaders, and Moxie? Can Hargrove solve the mystery and earn a red star, or perhaps a gold one on a sidewalk?

Side note – Rejected Chapter Title – The Annotated Marxist Detective. I couldn’t figure out a good quote. And if Eric can have the female lead throw perfect Dragon Palms, I feel no guilt at Shirley’s brief leopard flurry.

Side note 2 – my favourite sentence in the rewrite – “Either BFG is actually in cahoots[6] with Sync in some sort of unholy alliance against his own brother, or more likely Offant pursues his own game to free his fiancee, with Candace playing both sides in a desperate attempt to free Ida.”

Gah. That’s the last time I try to keep the basic integrity of the writing while making sweeping changes....

[1] While opinions vary on the exact size of Frieda Engel’s Derringer, witnesses have invariably noted its size as “bloody huge”.

[2] A good detective novel must use the word cahoots at least twice. This chapter fills the quota.

[3] HAS – Hargrove Agony Scale

[4] HFSS – Hargrove Fracture Sounding Scale

[5] A far more subjective scale than the HAS or HFSS, but more eaily comprehended by others. It ranged from ‘Insurance Salesman at Door’, through other levels (eg – ‘Cornered by Poet at Party’, ‘Hung Over and Caught by Father in Daughter’s Bed’, ‘Thrown by Villain into Shark Pit’, ‘Hung Over and Caught by Husband in Wife’s Bed’, ‘The Baby Might be Mine?’, ‘Hung Over and Caught by Daughter in Father’s Bed’) all the way up to ‘Discovered Inherent Flaw in Communist logic’.

[6] A good detective novel must use the word cahoots at least twice. This chapter fills the quota.