The Worthy Enemy

Turning into the exit hallway of the Chapter 484 Meeting Center, Pickers was briefly alarmed to see a lanky well-dressed figure standing beside the personnel door that was his destination. Instantly he recognized him as Letchken, a CAS senator and one of the bigwigs on the nominally legal policlub side of Humanis.

Pickers had met him a dozen times in the last ten years, but only this time did something about Letchken come off as unsettling. His too-wide, too-friendly smile made Pickers want to reach for the new gun at his hip. It would be ironic if the gun Humanis had paid for claimed one of its heads as its first victim.

But as reprehensible as he found Letchken, shooting him would cause more problems than it might solve. Pickers strode towards the door understanding that a conversation was unavoidable.

When he was within five feet of the door, the senator spoke. "Mister Pickers. How many times have we met?"

Far too many, Pickers thought. "Not nearly enough," he said. But he didn't smile. He'd lost his will to smile within the first year of street coordination. And he could dispense with the ass-kissing; he had no desire to advance, and he was too important for them to kick out.

"With as long as the two of us have been members of Humanis, it seems like we ought to have more cause to talk. Men in your position, they don't tend to last all that long do they? Yet here you are, about to celebrate a decade of service to the cause. You're not dead, you're not in prison, and you haven't lost faith."

"Tell me Mister Pickers, how do you do it?"

"How is the wrong question," Pickers said. "How is easy. Why is the right question."

The intention of his statement was to make Letchken feel offended and express Pickers' dislike in talking to him, but the senatorial freak simply kept smiling as if everything were on script. "Alright then," he said, "Why do you do it? Why do you keep doing the things you do?"

The reason was simple: Pickers just wanted an excuse to kill non-human gangsters. He didn't believe in the doctrine, he had no interest in extending the violence to any level beyond the street and he felt no hatred for anyone beyond a specific description of metahumanity that the world seemed to have in too great a quantity. He had joined Humanis because they offered an avenue for him to express that desire with almost no oversight. Did it make him happy? No. Did it make the world safer? Probably not.

Would a river of blood and gunpowder make him clean? It most definitely wouldn't. But it was what they all deserved. This world was Hell and they were its demons. None any better than the other. But once he had known a kind soul and demons had killed him. That couldn't go unanswered. The policlub was just a weapon to Pickers, no different from the gun on his hip.

But of course he couldn't tell that to Letchken, someone who had probably never had a real friend in his life. So all Pickers said was, "To protect good people. Somebody has to." Someone did. She was out there somewhere, doing it the right way.

"Of course," Letchken concurred. He reached into the front pocket of his suit and produced a small strip of paper. Uncharacteristically low-tech for policlub operators.

"Tomorrow night some associates of mine are liberating some materials for the cause. We could use some more man power, some more... meat, so to speak. We want to make this as quick and as painless as possible."

He hadn't mentioned this at the meeting when he'd spoken about the state of affairs in the CAS. And it was unusual for Humanis heads to keep operations secret from each other. Pickers took the paper and opened it to find an address printed on it.

"I hope we can count on you and yours showing up," Letchken said suggestively.

Pickers' expression didn't change. "I'll round up the crews."

Letchken reached out and patted Pickers on the shoulder for the first time, ever. "You have a bright future ahead of you, Mister Pickers. And it begins tomorrow night, ten o'clock sharp."

Between the touch and the words, it felt like a threat and once more Pickers felt a desire to draw his gun.

The senator brushed past him and walked back towards the meeting hall. With only one glance over his shoulder, Pickers pushed open the personnel door and escaped into the late evening air. His mind was occupied with the prospect of the next evening's activities, not in anticipation of some successful operation but in an effort to contrive some way to avoid participating. He feared there was no plausible excuse; that he would have to have a hand in it, or spit in Letchken's face.

He unlocked the driver's side door of the Pinto he had come in and piled into the seat. He didn't start the car right away, instead simply resting his hands on the steering wheel and staring at the street in front of the lightless chapter parking lot. Pickers let out a slow breath and tried to clear his head.

That was when he realized that the dome light hadn't come on when he opened the door. His eyes went up to the rear view mirror and he saw a broad silhouette of someone's head blocking the view of the rear windshield. His left eyebrow twitched, turning on his low-light vision and showing him the lines of a face he had seen both too little and too much of in the last decade.

"Dawson?"

His hand went for his gun but she was already prepared. Her right fist closed tightly over his wrist and pressed it to his side while her left came around the driver's seat to hold a deployed butterfly blade to his throat, edge right at his jugular.

"Jason Pickers," she hissed. "Number eight on the California Free State's Most Wanted list. Suspected of burglary, arson, extortion and at least fourty-four counts of murder. And that's just since you joined Humanis."

Pickers swallowed hard, even that simple motion causing the blade at his throat to draw a thin stream of blood that trickled down his neck and into his vest. Responding would be unwise.

"Do you remember," Dawson said conversationally, "That day you and Vic walked in on me watching one of those old films I'm so fond of and I said for the first time that I wanted to be a detective?"

He did but he elected not to nod. She continued, "You said to me, 'Imp you'll make a lot more money committing crimes than you ever will solving them.' And do you recall what Vic said?"

"You can do anything," Pickers mumbled, careful to keep his throat as still as possible.

"That you set your mind to," Dawson finished. "And he meant it. When you looked at Vic, looked in his eyes and saw his smile and heard his words, you knew he meant what he said."

It was true. Pickers squeezed his eyes shut as hard as he could, but all the same a tear escaped out of his right eye.

"Don't you dare fucking cry over him now," Dawson seethed, hand trembling against his neck. The knife scraped perilously at his artery.

"You who out of all of us has shamed his memory the most," she said. A note of anguish had entered her voice, and Pickers knew it was genuine because it was anguish he felt himself.

"You, who has broken laws and ended lives in some fucked up desire to pay the world back for taking away someone good. What do you think he'd make of the things you've done in his name? Of what you've helped build, of who you've hurt? Do you know what the law will do to you when you get caught?"

She bared her teeth and in the wan moonlight he saw their points gleaming dangerously, every bit as sharp as the knife at his throat.

"They're going to give you the CHAIR, JASON!"

That too was true. Humanis would throw him to the wolves in a heartbeat. That's what men like him were for.

Dawson's next words came out slow, her voice on the verge of breaking under the weight of her emotion. "Bringing you in would be like killing you," she whispered. "It would be better... if I did it. If you have to die, it should be by someone who loved you once. Someone you called a friend. That's what we were, weren't we Jason?"

"Yeah," Jason breathed. "So what are you waiting for?"

The moment stretched long and Pickers shut his eyes. This would be it. Finally, after all the gun fights and street brawls and jobs gone sideways, this would be it. Imp would kill him. He could accept that.

But instead the blade fell away from his throat. "I don't kill people anymore," Dawson said matter-of-factly. She let go of his right hand but gripped the gun holstered on his side and pulled it free.

"A Taurus Omni-6," she noted. "Tasteful. Your affluent friends in Humanis buy you this? If you had a decent bone in your body you'd have used it to kneecap them and left them for the cops." The rear driver's side door opened up and Dawson began to get out.

Pickers wanted to say something, wanted to ask her not to leave, but he had nothing to offer. She was right, and they both knew it. Only later would he recall that Dawson had been shirtless, a fact that seemed unimportant next to the bizarre display of ferocity he'd seen in the rear-view mirror.

The door shut and she disappeared into the night. When she'd been gone for several minutes, Jason Pickers planted his head on the steering wheel and for the first time in over ten years, began to weep.

= = =

T.Gaines-KE: How's the new suit fitting?

Det.Dawson: Like it was made to order.

T.Gaines-KE: Won't fit anyone else. Not too busy with nights out to come to the department head meeting tomorrow I hope.

Det.Dawson: Can I come wearing the suit?

T.Gaines-KE: Entertaining as that might be I fear it would give you away.

= = =

I.Mendoza: Senorita we must meet. Someone has approached me in regards to the gangs.

Det.Dawson: Any idea who?

I.Mendoza: She is a member of the bloody tusks. I can say no more on record.

Det.Dawson: I understand. I'll visit you tonight, at sundown.

I.Mendoza: Are you feeling better senorita?

Det.Dawson: What do you mean?

I.Mendoza: Dios mío

I.Mendoza: We must meet. Tonight.

= = =

Candles.McG: Almost died last night

Candles.McG: And not just on the job

Det.Dawson: Run into something you couldn't burn?

Candles.McG: Almost

Det.Dawson: What am I looking at?

Candles.McG: No idea but it tried to cut my head off

Det.Dawson: Seems like you should be accustomed to that by now.

Candles.McG: Pack some phosphorous if you go out for a walk, Dawson

= = =

Max.S-LS: I want you in my office. Now.

Det.Dawson: What's this about?

Max.S-LS: A lot. Get here, as fast as you can.

= = =

Alenia was experiencing an odd kind of terror, odd because it was inspired by the sight of Dawson shirtless with only a jacket on her upper body and a pair of worn-down pants with holes showing her meaty leg muscles. Such a sight should have had the elf drooling and humping the human's leg.

But it was evoking terror in her because she'd just thirty minutes prior kissed goodbye a lamentably fully-dressed and well-groomed Dawson and watched from the window as the Firebird pulled out of the parking lot and sped down the road.

Now, out in the hallway of the apartment building at the end of the hall, there she was. Rough, like she'd been out somewhere all night and not with the suit. Ratty, like she'd been robbed and scavenged clothes from a dumpster, or a corpse. That level gray gaze was aimed right at Alenia who was standing next to the soykaf machine and looking in her direction. Forty-five feet stood between them.

Dawson started walking towards him. Alenia's trembling hand dropped the cup onto the floor and she sprinted towards the still-open apartment door.

With all her energy she shut it behind her and started yelling. "Someone! Someone wake up! Something's wrong!"

She spared a moment to make sure the door was locked and then scrambled down the hallway around the corner shouting.

Rierra stood at the top of the stairs, rubbing her eyes and wearing only one of Dawson's nicer shirts. "What's the matter?"

"Someone's in the hallway!" Alenia stammered.

"So?"

"They... They look like Dawson!"

Rierra frowned. "What do you mean?"

"They look just fragging like her!!"

Rierra started descending the stairs, arriving at the bottom and taking Alenia's hand to walk her back to the hallway. "Well what are they doing?"

"Um... getting soykaf I think."

"Did you get a good look at them?"

"I know what she fragging looks like!" Alenia said shrilly.

"Are you sure that's not just her coming back for soykaf?"

"What?! No it's not her! This person's in some kind of torn-up jacket, and she's filthy! What are you doing, get back from the door!"

Rierra waved her concern away and turned on the hallway camera. The hallway was empty except for the spilled cup of soykaf Alenia had dropped on the ground. Before Alenia's mental state could be called into question, the object of her terror came into focus.

It did indeed look like Dawson, but in a state of half-dress completely at odds with what she'd looked like when she left a half hour before. She had a new cup in her left hand and bent over at the hip easily to pick up the one Alenia had dropped. Then she knocked on the door, twice in rapid succession with a brief pause before a third. The let me in signal.

"Oh drek," Rierra whispered. They began to back away from the door and the signal came again.

"If she's knocking," Alenia said, "That means she doesn't know the door code, right?"

Before Rierra could answer, the Dawson in the hallway visibly sighed, set down the empty cup and began to interface with the number panel beside the door.

"What do we do?" Alenia whispered. Rierra responded, "Hide! Upstairs!"

The door was opening just as they were reaching the top of the stairs and they dove into bed, Rierra right behind Alenia. They began frantically waking up Nyana, Shelara and Jastira.

"Whatsh the matter," Nyana mumbled in complaint. She hated being woken up before noon, unless it was to have her ears cleaned.

"There's someone downstairs!" Rierra hissed. "Someone who looks like Dawson!"

"Did she come back to to fuck ush?" Jastira wondered hopefully.

"No you idiots, it's not her! It's someone else! And she's inside!!!"

Alenia slapped Avalanche in the face. "Hey! Wake up! Wake up, dummy, we're in trouble!" When the snoring troll failed to respond to anything anyone did to her head, Shelara reached between the fomor's legs and pressed firmly at the space between her cocks. They twitched in response and Avalanche's eyes cracked open at once.

"Ahh! Ahh, please! Please! Mershy... I'm shorry for knockin' you up mommy!"

"You're not fucking right now," Rierra whispred harshly, putting her hand over Avalanche's mouth. The troll licked at her fingers indulgently, hopeful that might change immediately.

"There's someone downstairs who looks just like Dawson but isn't her," Alenia said in warning. Avalanche's eyes went wide.

"D... double Dawshon pusshy?"

The troll rose out of bed, flinging the blankets off around them and exposing the mostly-naked elves.

Alenia tried to grab the troll's midsection but lacked the strength to hold her back. "No! Stop! She'll know where we are!" But Avalanche's newly acquired fantasy was too alluring and she gracelessly stumbled towards the stairs.

"Frag!" Rierra whispered. "Well... if anyone is going to take her..."

Avalanche stood at the top of the stairs for a moment stretching and rubbing her eyes, then began descending the steps. Alenia and the other elves crawled across the carpet to peek at the lower area between the bars of the guard rail.

The Dawson look-alike had taken off her ratty coat and dumped it on the ground beside the couch. She'd removed from the pockets and set on the table a folded-up knife and an unfamiliar gun.

Nyana blinked. "Um... that body... It looks... Um... correct."

"Really correct," Jastira agreed.

"Should we test it for flaws?" Shelara whispered, licking her lips.

The impostor stood up as Avalanche approached her, spreading her arms and speaking at a low volume. Smiling slightly, in that familiar way. The troll wrapped her arms around the brawny woman and began to smell and lick her throat and the side of her head affectionately, picking her up and turning her around.

"Notice something missing?" Alenia said severely.

"Yeah," Rierra replied, "No tattoo."

"Then that's really not her??" Nyana said with appropriate anxiety.

"Avalanche seems to think it is."

"Hey," the troll called out in their direction, "She smells normal! And good... like sex!"

Rierra stood up and made herself known at the top of the stairs, attracting the look-alike's attention.

"What's wrong?" It was Dawson's voice. Alenia had just heard it tell her to be good, and this was the same voice.

"Who are you?" Rierra asked.

It was Dawson's smile. "What kind of question is that?"

Rierra went down the stairs and the other elves followed behind her sheepishly. At the bottom she crossed her arms in front of her bare chest and asked again.

"A serious one. Who are you?"

It was Dawson's laugh. "Have you lived with me so long that it's your apartment now and I'm the guest?"

She picked up the gun and knife from the table, causing the elves to momentarily flinch. She turned to face them.

It was Dawson's genuine concern. "I realize I was out later than usual. Something happened and I lost a little bit of the night."

"No," Rierra said, "You didn't."

It was Dawson's penetrating stare. "What do you mean?"

Rierra's brow drew lower. "Who. Are. You?"

Rather than display credentials she clearly didn't have, the impostor went to the wall safe and pressed her hand to the scanner. It went from a dull black to a bright green and the door popped open in recognition of her biologically confirmed identity.

Inside, the safe was empty. Of course it was; Dawson had just taken her effects out of it this morning before leaving in the Firebird.

"This safe only opens for one person," she explained.

"Someone else opened it up earlier," Alenia said, unable to keep her voice from wavering.

The dark-haired woman looked inside of it. None of the items were inside, not the badge or the gun or the knife. Everything she'd left in it before going out the night before to wear the suit.

"Vayger was the last person I was with," she said. "I need to talk to her and figure out where the suit is. Where's my commpad?"

"It's with the person it belongs to!" Rierra shouted. Avalanche rubbed the back of her head in confusion and tried to move towards what she was certain was Dawson. Shelara leapt to grab her by the wrist.

"Stay away from her, Avalanche! That's not who you think it is!"

"What are you talking about?" It was Dawson's analytical mind, her skepticism. "Was someone else here before me?"

"Yeah," Nyana said. "You... Well... Dawson was."

"I am Dawson."

Alenia asked, "Then... where's your back tattoo?"

The woman's right hand went up to her bare back, her fingers tracing over the spot where it was supposed to be. "It's not there?"

The elves shook their heads no.

Then she looked at them in the same way she looked at people she considered suspects of something. "Who was here before me? She looked just like me?"

"You," Rierra corrected, "Look just like her."

"That should be impossible... But..." Her head turned to one side. It was Dawson's personal experiences, her open mind. "But... Stranger things have happened." She looked back at Rierra.

"Where is she now?"

"She left in the Firebird, half an hour ago. To go see Sokoth."

Not-Dawson ran her left hand through her hair in a too-familiar manner.

"I'm going to leave. I need to figure out what's going on." She waited a moment and then spoke more slowly, "Will one of you get me some clothes?"

Jastira came back a few moments later with a shirt and pants, the more official variants that made Dawson look more presentable though no less fuckable. They fit Not-Dawson perfectly.