Fic: Skip Muck, PI - Chapter Nine

[skew_whiff]

Title: Skip Muck, PI - Chapter Nine
Summary: AU. Pittsburgh. 1988. Skip's a private detective who got involved in a murder case, and now he's in way above his head.
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 3901
Disclaimer: Not my property, not for profit. All characters based on depictions in the miniseries, and no disrespect intended to anyone real. (Given the content of this chapter especially, I can't stress the AU nature of this enough.)
Notes: Crossposted to camp_toccoa.


Despite the heat, a nauseous shiver ran through me. Now, it's not like I've ever sat down and pondered on what my response to hearing of the kidnapping of a new partner would be, but I still would have thought I'd feel something - fear, rage, grief, anything other than the numb disbelief that washed over me. I swallowed, as if I could physically push it down into me, and reached out to pick the video cassette from the table.

"What's this?" I said.

"We'd better go find a VCR," More said.

That in itself took a fair amount of detective work, but we eventually tracked down a television set with a tape player in the lost property room, and pulled up some chairs for the afternoon's viewing. The tape hadn't been rewound; we were definitely dealing with some grade-A assholes here, if stealing Don hadn't been enough of a hint.

I pressed Play. The picture skipped and jumped, we got a few seconds of the opening titles to Dallas, and then it fizzed away into static, to be replaced with a shot of someone's apartment. Not Don's. Don was sat on a couch, bound at wrists and ankles with duct tape, another strip of it over his mouth. He didn't look scared so much as peeved, as far as I could tell. That was kind of reassuring. Next to him sat a guy wearing a ski mask, holding a gun to Don's head. Some banging noises were coming from off-camera.

"Okay, that's it," came a muffled voice. Another man emerged from behind the camera and sat down on the other side of Don - he was taller and skinnier than Ski Mask Guy, hiding his identity with one of those novelty rubber Ron Reagan masks. He cleared his throat, and started to make a speech he'd obviously been rehearsing.

"Well done, detectives."

He paused, steepling his fingers. If he'd had a white cat, he'd have been stroking it.

"Who's he think he's kidding?" Penk said.

"No shit," I said, with a nervous laugh. The Blofeld act was silly rather than intimidating, but Don was still sitting there tied up with a gun held to his head, and there was no way I could relax. Reagan continued -

"This can't be allowed to go any further. I can't say much, for obvious reasons, but you would be doing yourselves a great favour by dropping the Julian case. It's a shame that it came to having to kidnap your colleague here, but we have to look after the city's stability."

He hesitated.

"There's a Holiday Inn on the Pennsylvania turnpike. If you want to see your friend again, meet us there in 48 hours' time - starting from now, I make that half seven, next Tuesday. Do not bring weapons. Do not bring backup. We don't want to have to hurt him, but if circumstances merit it, we will."

To emphasise the point, Ski Mask poked Don's cheek with the gun. Don scowled.

"See you soon," said Reagan, and leaned in to switch off the camera. There was another burst of static, and then we were back to JR and Sue Ellen.

"Christ," I said, under my voice, feeling somewhat shaky. I turned to look at the others, and to my surprise, More looked happy as a fat kid in Chuck E Cheese. "What are you so pleased for?"

"These guys don't have a clue," he said, laughing. "They're a pair of complete amateurs. This should be easy."

"They might be idiots, but they're armed idiots," I said.

"What are we going to do?" Penk said.

"We're going to track them down," More said.

"Won't they hurt Don if we come after them?" I said.

More raised an eyebrow.

"Look, who sets the rules here? Us, or the crooks?" he said. "Let's go." He led us to the reception desk, and showed the receptionist the paper packet the note and tape had come in.

"Who delivered this package?" he asked. The receptionist made a little clicking noise with her tongue.

"Some courier, I think," she said. "Didn't give a name. And he was wearing a ski mask, which I thought was kind of odd in this weather..."

She didn't have a chance to finish her sentence. No sooner had More heard 'ski mask' than he was haring off down the corridor again, Penk and I struggling to keep up.

"Where the hell are we going now?" I said, out of breath as I tried to match his fast walking pace.

"Video room," More said. "There's a camera over the entrance to the station."

"What'll that tell us?" Penk said, from just behind us. "We won't be able to see his face."

"It's not his face we're looking for," More said, and kicked open the door to the video room.
Without explanation, he shoved aside the cop on duty, and began spooling through the recording on particular screen.

"Hey, what the hell do ya -" The cop spluttered with rage.

"Can't talk. Murder to solve," More said. I shrugged apologetically. Penk reached over and stole a handful of Cheetos from the open bag on the cop's lap.

"Here we are," More said, stopping the tape. Penk and I leaned in to see what he was pointing at. Ski Mask had only gone and parked right outside the station, the numberplate of his car clearly visible. I whipped out my notebook and took it down.

"Okay, let's go!" I said, and raced out of the video room, before skidding to a halt halfway down the corridor, having remembered that I didn't know where they kept the car registration database. Luckily, More did, and we headed off there directly. None of us were quite familiar with how to work the computer, but with a bit of help from our colleagues we had exactly what we needed: the details for an apartment in Bloomfield and, what was more, a name. A name we recognised, too.

Edward Shames. The goon of a security guard at Nixon Industries. Well, that explained why he'd been getting all antsy around us. It didn't go any way to explaining why he'd killed Julian, but then, he could tell all that to a judge. What mattered now was going to find him.

"Which car are we gonna take?" I asked, as we went out to the parking lot.

"The Camaro's faster," Penk said.

"Oh, hang on now," More said. "My baby's still got plenty of juice in her. Not as fast as my motorbike, maybe, but just as good as that oversized piece of junk."

"You kidding me?" Penk said. "The Camaro's a muscle car. It's built for power. Yours is just for dropping kids off at school."

"That thing's all style and no substance," More replied. "Now, if you want something you can -"

"Guys!" I snapped. "This is not the time. We're taking the damn Camaro."

Another fine sunny afternoon, driving through the city - but no singing along to the radio this time, no laidback joking around. We were packing heat and ready to kick some asses, the boys at the station ready to come to our aid at a moment's notice. We were men on a mission. Mostly. Penk was bitching about how he got dizzy if he didn't get regular meals. Luckily, there was a gummed-up roll of Life Savers in the glove compartment; I tossed them back to him, which shut him up for a while.

The car's tires screeched as I pulled to a clumsy halt, stopping halfway up the sidewalk. No time for neatness; we leapt out and charged into the apartment building, scrambling up flights of stairs, with me leading the way. I skid to a stop outside the door of Shames' apartment, and paused to take a deep breath.

As the other two arrived, I slid one hand into my jacket, ready to draw my gun, and hammered on the door with the other.

"Open up!" I yelled. More pushed me aside and kicked the door down; I think he just has a fondness for kicking stuff.

The effect was wasted, though - the apartment was completely empty. We'd got the right place, at least, the interior exactly as it had appeared on the video, but there wasn't a sign of life. I slowly entered, hand resting on my gun. Maybe they were waiting to ambush us. The other two covered my back, equally wary.

As I ventured into the apartment, I noticed the window at the back was open. Leaning out, I could just see the back of a fleeing figure in the alleyway below; they'd climbed out down the fire escape.

"Get back to the car!" I shouted, turning around. "We can still get them!"

I ran back down the stairs two steps at a time and flung myself into the Camaro. As I did, a red Chevrolet roared past. A red Chevrolet driven by a man wearing a ski mask.

I didn't even wait for More and Penk to shut the car doors before revving up the engine and setting off in pursuit. It was definitely not the right time of day for a car chase; it was just past five and the streets were beginning to fill with rush hour traffic.

I'll give the kidnappers some credit for trying to find ways around it. The red Chevy went twisting and turning through residential backstreets, avoiding traffic as much as possible, dodging down alleyways barely wide enough for the Camaro to fit down. The sight of sparks flying as the sides scraped down the brickwork was enough to make me weep. If I had my way, I'd make sure part of their sentence included paying for the repainting job we'd need.

They kept making sharp twists and turns, but we managed to keep on their tail. They seemed to be heading for the city limits, trying to escape the traffic; we ended up following them all the way to the highway.

"Christ, this could take hours," More grumbled. "You'd better have enough gas."

"Well, do something to slow them down, then," I said.

"Like what?"

"You've got a gun, dammit! Take them out!"

More wound down the window and peeked his head out, judging his shot. He licked his lips and slowly leaned further out, aiming his gun... and they spotted us. The guy in the Ron Reagan mask leaned out of the window of the Chevy, aiming his gun back at us.

More ducked back inside, just as the first bullet glanced off our bonnet and ricocheted past where his head had been a moment before.

"Shit," he muttered. "Penkala, get down, stay covered. Skip, take evasive action."

"I'm already down!" Penk yelled, cowering in the footwell, practically underneath where I was sitting. I began to jink back and forth between lanes, weaving in and out, earning myself a fair few honks on horns. Hadn't those morons heard the gunfire? We'd be giving them reason to hoot soon enough.

Reagan fired again, missing us by miles. I just hoped he didn't hit anyone behind us. I sped up, weaved faster; a third shot blasted away the wing mirror. This was getting hairy.

"More, Penk, one of you, do something for god's sake!" I said.

"Just wait," More said, infuriatingly calm. The Chevy was slowing down. We'd run into a traffic jam, queue stretching off for as far as the eye could see. Quick as anything, More leaned out of the window and fired off a perfect shot into the Chevy's back left tire.

The door of the Chevy burst open and Reagan ran out, opened the back door and picked up Don, slinging him over his shoulder and running for the verge.

"Let's go!" I yelled, getting out of the car and setting off in pursuit. "More, go after Shames. Penk, you're with me." The hooting of other vehicles had escalated into a horn symphony, some people getting out of their cars to try and see what was going on.

"Everything's fine," Penk yelled, attempting a bit of on-the-move crowd control. "Nothing to see here, folks!" Unfortunately, while his attentions were good, words like that don't have much affect coming from a running man holding a gun. Still, we could handle them later.

Reagan was trying to scramble his way up the scrubby verge at the edge of the road, but having a hard time of it. Don wasn't as light as he looked, and Reagan wasn't much of a climber by the looks of things. Still, he'd made it to the top by the time Penk and I caught up with him.

"You get back!" he yelled, pointing the gun at us. He kneeled down a little to put Don on the ground, standing in front of him protectively. "Don't make me use this!"

I moved forward slowly.

"Don't do anything stupid," I said, well aware that he was unlikely to break the habit of a lifetime now. "Let's talk this over."

"It's too late for that!" Reagan shouted, voice almost a squeak. "Get back! I'm warning you."

"Just put the gun down," Penkala said.

Reagan was shaking violently, but standing his ground. He made a funny little whimpering noise and turned to me, gun only a couple of feet from my nose. And he pulled the trigger.

Nothing happened. He tried again.

"Fuck," he muttered. Out of ammo.

"Now!" I yelled. Penk and I landed as one, tackling him to the ground. Penk got up and went over to check Don was alright; I put my foot on Reagan's back, reaching for the handcuffs hanging from my belt.

"Game over, Ronnie."

"Tell us everything," I said, leaning back in my chair. It was still light, though evening was drawing in, and all of us were sticky and irritable. The office was getting foggy with cigarette smoke; no amount of nicotine was enough to settle our collective nerves.

The man in the mask turned out to be Tom Peacock, of all people, the twitchy guy I'd briefly met in the council offices. For all his attempts at cool, calculating class on the video they'd sent us, he'd cracked pretty fast, thanks to stress from the chase, lingering nausea from wearing a cheap rubber mask on a hot summer's day, and the fact that as far as I could tell, he was the kind of guy who'd have a nervous breakdown if he burned the toast, let alone got arrested.

"I didn't mean to kill him!" he wailed, head in hands. Shames, who had kept his composure far better, gave him a contemptuous look.

"Y'know, Tom, you could have at least tried to offer a bit of resistance," he said.

"There'd have been no point," More said. "We know you're guilty. Just tell us what happened so we can all go home and have our dinner."

Peacock looked up, his whole face an ugly shade of red, and let out a long, juddering sigh.

"Okay, here's what happened."

And so unfolded the whole sorry story.

John Julian, as me and Don had guessed a few days ago, was a smart kid who was eager to impress. A little bit too eager to impress. Keen to get on the fast track to the Investigations Bureau, he'd conducted some private investigation, picking up on some rather dodgy tax records and deciding to look into them further. Doing so had brought him into contact with Peacock, who hadn't liked the way things were turning and so had offered to make a deal.

This 'deal' turned out to be a half-assed attempt to threaten Julian into submission. Now, that's almost a rite of passage for rookie cops; young guys get their fingers burned going too far on early cases, and end up meeting mobsters who tell them what's what. But Peacock was no Godfather - just a man with a horrible tendency to overreact.

Now, this in itself wouldn't have turned out so badly if it weren't for Peacock having an old drinking buddy - Shames. Shames had suggested they meet Julian at the old Nixon Industries building; as it was scheduled to be demolished in a matter of days, it'd be a perfect way to hide their tracks.

So Julian went to meet them, sitting down with them in the janitors' office. And, bless the kid, he stuck to his principles. He refused to back down. And Peacock got jumpy. He grabbed Shames' gun - the one he carried as part of his job as a security guard - and pulled it on Julian, aiming to scare him off. However, he was so damn jittery, he pulled the trigger and ended up shooting Julian.

Peacock and Shames weren't professional killers. Quite the opposite. If they were, they wouldn't have panicked so much and felt that they needed to finish the poor kid off. If they were, Peacock wouldn't have been such a bad shot that Shames had had to grab the first heavy object to hand and knock Julian out with it - that heavy object being the silver carriage clock Cobb had stolen the month before.

Having reached that horrible conclusion, they disposed of the body in the first way that came to mind: throwing him in the river, without even thinking to weigh him down.

"And that's what happened," Peacock finished, looking like he was about to be sick. He wasn't the only one.

"Hang on," Penk said. "How did the clock end up being sent to Grant?"

"That was my idea," Shames said. "There was a Filofax lying in the dumpster. I just cleaned up the clock and sent it off to a random address from it."

"Why didn't you just throw the clock in the river as well?" More said.

Shames frowned hard, looking surprised by the very idea of it.

"Shit," he said. "That would've been a much better idea."

Peacock elbowed him.

"See. I'm not the only person who fucked up here," he said.

"Well, y'know, I was a bit shook up from having just killed somebody," Shames said irritably. "I'm not the moron who shot him in the first place."

Don held up his hands.

"Hey, let's just say you're both morons."

"Wait," I said. "In your video, you said something about the stability of the city. Peacock, you're hardly someone high up in the council - who are you protecting? Who put you up to this?"

Peacock took a deep breath.

"I - I shouldn't say this, really, but - fuck it. What's it matter now? We're both going to prison," he said, and grabbed a tissue from the box on the desk. "Look, neither of us ever intended to murder Julian, we really didn't. It was just really important that he didn't squeal."

"On who?" I said, bringing my hand down on the desk.

Peacock blew his nose loudly.

"Dike," he said. "Norman Dike."

Three kicked-down doors in one afternoon is pretty good going. More was happy as a clam. Dike's little bachelor pad was far fancier than he could possibly have afforded on his wages; no wonder he was stealing tax money, given how much this place probably cost to rent. We're talking the works here, the leather sofa, the fancy lighting, some kind of weird-ass water feature in the middle of the big open-plan room. Kind of spoiled by the fact that Dike himself was sitting in his underwear eating dinner off a tray on his lap and watching The Price Is Right.

More and Don pulled out their badges. I'd have done the same if I had one.

"Norman Dike," Don said, "You're under arrest on suspicion of fraud and incitement to murder."
He just gaped at us, mouth opening and shutting without making a sound, offering no resistance as we cuffed him and dragged him back to the station.

The interview was a shambles, all of us tired and fed up. Dike tried his best to blame somebody, anybody but himself, but he'd got nowhere to run. I almost felt sorry for him, sitting there in his undershirt and shorts, unable to handle the fact that his luck had ran out. Almost.

Don checked his watch.

"Guys, we've all had a long day. Me especially, I'd like to point out," he said. "Let's wrap this up."

"Agreed," I said, "But one last thing." I turned and looked Dike square in the eyes. "Why?"

Dike shrugged.

"Because I could."

Hard to know what to say to that. Penk, Don and I watched as More escorted him to the cells, Bill and Babe flanking him. Boy, those two were not going to let any of the culprits have an easy night. Don sighed, wiping his forehead.

"I ought to feel glad we've caught the people who killed Julian, but y'know, I kind of don't," he said. Penk nodded.

"It's all a bit depressing," he said.

"So, I'm guessing celebratory drinks are out of the question?" I said. Penk shook his head.

"Not tonight, Skip. I need my beauty sleep."

"How about you, Don?" I said. Don shrugged. Good enough for me.

So we ended up nursing beers in a corner at the usual dive, but neither of us really felt up to it.

"God, it's like a graveyard in here tonight," I said, picking idly at a bowl of peanuts. Don sighed.

"At least it's all over now," he said.

"How are you?" I asked. "I should have checked earlier, but y'know, baddies to get confessions out of and all that."

Don smiled sadly.

"I'm okay," he said. "More shook up than hurt. I've got a few bruises but that's about it."

"Need someone to kiss it better?" I said. He grinned at me, bringing back that spark of warmth I'd been so badly in need of today.

"Something like that," he said. He looked at his half-empty bottle of beer. "You know what, screw this place. Let's get out of here."

We left the bar, walking out into the night. The air was humid and I could feel the first spots of an oncoming rainstorm; give it a couple of minutes and we'd probably be soaked to the skin.
"Want to get a taxi?" I asked. Don shook his head.

"Nah, it's not far from here to mine," he said. "Anyway, I like summer rain." It was already beginning to pick up; I could tell my hair was going to end up ruined. Somehow, though, I didn't think Don would mind.

I glanced around, checking nobody was around, and slid an arm around his waist. He leaned into me a little.

"Suppose that's one upside of all this," he said. I grinned.

"Yeah, Don, I think this could be the beginning of a beautiful relationship." He laughed.
"Hey, you say that, I think I've got a video of Casablanca which I've never got round to watching. How about that?" he said.

"I honestly wouldn't want to be anywhere else."

Now, in a perfect world, there's where I'd have stood and kissed him passionately, there in the pouring rain, underneath a streetlamp, as the soundtrack built to a crescendo and The End scrawled itself across the screen in big curly letters.

But it wasn't a perfect world, so we just staggered on home, leaning on each other to stay upright. And that's good enough for me.