I Have a Disease
"Shall we get started too?"
"Sure."
In the basement level-two shooting range of Hell's Kitchen, Leo and I squeezed the triggers at the targets. The men watched with faces like they'd just chewed something foul.
Bang!
Bang!
"Fuck, I forgot there was a range down here."
"Should've known the second the Boss stopped shooting. We got played good."
After the rounds were spent we climbed back up to the first basement, looking thoroughly pleased with ourselves. Maddox was out cold on the cot beside the workbench, curled into a shrimp like he was bait on a hook—the kind of pose that begged for a fishing line.
I took my time walking the workshop. Even after Gunsmith died the underground shop hadn't changed much. Shelves still groaned under every kind of part and scrap, and that same dank, brooding air hung heavy. I finally understood why Hazel had left this place behind.
Scanning one end of a shelf, a few odd pieces caught my eye. Not firearms, not the usual rigged devices for a gambling table either. While I was examining the machines a cold prickle ran across the back of my neck. Maddox had woken and was staring straight at me.
"First one's night-vision goggles. Let you see things even in the dark."
Night-vision? Looking like that?
"Coat the inner lenses with a certain chemical, amplify whatever little light there is so you pick up outlines and movement."
"So you can actually see at night?"
"Not yet."
"······."
Next came something he called Whisper Cloth—fabric that soaked up sound or scattered and bounced it in chosen directions.
"Lay it under shoe soles and you don't make a sound. To keep the shape I layered specially treated fibers with thin metal sheets in a particular pattern."
"Sounds pretty advanced."
Pure admiration made me press my palm hard into the broad sheet of Whisper Cloth. The soft squelching noises rolled through the basement workshop.
"...It's making noise."
"Yeah. Gotta remake it."
Better to fix this stuff and turn it into a bulletproof vest. Huh. Not a bad idea, actually.
Watching him, Maddox looked less inventor and more dreamer—burying himself down here, burning his life on useless gadgets.
"Why aren't you looking at the last one?"
"Do I have to?"
"That's a listening device."
This? Up close it was a microphone married to a phonograph, meant to cut sound onto a wax cylinder. That one actually interested me.
"Does it work?"
"Three seconds, maybe. Just too much noise—quality's pure garbage."
Tapping phone lines was already possible, but electrically amplifying outside sound was still in the cradle. If my knowledge held, real wiretapping only kicked off after the FBI was born. Proper gear like this wouldn't show up until Prohibition ended, and decent versions far later still. The finished products were trash, but the ideas weren't. Looked at kindly, he was a prophet a little early for the age.
Suddenly his scattershot curiosity and knowledge started to intrigue me. Remembering Gunsmith's last talks, Maddox had a strategist's eye for reading the board—how the gangs circled and competed.
"What's your main field of interest?"
"When I was a kid."
"······?"
As if he'd been waiting for the question, Maddox opened up. He scratched the itch in his mouth with words, sliding naturally back through the years. Short version: young Maddox ate violence at home and on the street—father, mother, brothers, neighborhood kids all took turns. He never had the guts to fight bare-handed, so he started craving tools. The first time he held a gun, electricity ran through his whole body. A gun was pure power all by itself. But a tool was only a tool for power. The real prize was being a gang boss.
"Just like that?"
"I have a disease."
"Not a dream?"
"Yeah. A disease the world doesn't have a name for."
Blood terrified him. Laying hands on someone himself brought disgust and terror at the same time. So instead of finishing the bastards who hurt him with his own fists, he wanted the tools he built to let "his men" do the stomping.
"That's why I'm hooked on tools, and why gangs interest me."
"Ever space out? Hear things that aren't there?"
Maddox blinked, then toyed with a nail on the workbench and muttered,
"Sometimes I hear Mom. Saying I ruined her life. Die, she says. Fuck, what the hell did I do so wrong?"
Screee.
He dragged the nail tip across the bench.
"Dad shows up too. Says my little brother's death is on me. Kid wasted away from sickness, clear as day. Fuck, am I the Spanish Flu? A germ? Fucking······."
Screee.
Screee.
Endless repeated violence, extreme avoidance, the black self-image that came with it, and the dissociation that flickered in and out. Maddox was drowning in complex PTSD. I knew the flavor; I'd worn it myself. Under pressure and tension he feared blanking out, so he clung to tools and other people's hands. Where my past life had sharpened me under violence and stress, he went the opposite way.
One more hunch: autistic-spectrum leanings. When he locked onto a subject he outstripped ordinary people, which fit.
I caught his hand.
Scree—
"Stop. I'm about to lose it. Better take that nail and stab me or scratch me till I bleed."
"!?"
Maddox froze, then dropped the nail like it burned. He stared at the bench, then slowly rubbed the metal filings the nail had left.
"Well look at that—you carved a star into the iron. North Star?"
"······."
In the last life I'd sat across from psychiatrists more times than I could count. Knowledge seeps in whether you want it or not; I had enough of that field to counsel him. Right now the job was to pull him out before he sank too deep.
"Why testify at Gugu Knox's trial? No need to make an enemy."
"Couldn't look the other way. He robbed my house."
"Wow."
"And Gugu Knox was one of the little shits who beat on me when I was a kid."
Fair enough.
Midnight had already passed. Maddox, still buzzing from spilling his past, drifted off again. Being down in this workshop always made me feel like the PTSD I'd buried might crawl back out. No air moved, the dim light set your nerves on edge.
I swung the iron door open and stuck my head up the half-sunk stairs. At the far end of the dark alley a streetlamp threw a thin glow. Rank sewer stink rode the air and stung the nose; somewhere down the narrow filthy street drunks were yelling.
When I shut the door again the men from the range had already come up into the shop.
"Boss, past midnight. Ready to roll?"
"Everyone to your spots."
"Okay."
Brian and I stayed; the rest filed out through the iron door and melted into the streets around the building, ready to box in Gugu Knox's crew at dawn. We left Maddox sleeping.
Brian and I moved into the old workroom Hazel used to use and sat against the wall. He toyed with his gun; I fished a small brown bottle from inside my coat.
"Boss, going with that instead of a gun today?"
"Need to know who's behind him."
The liquid in the bottle was Mickey Finn—the same cocktail that had turned loan-shark Archie Roselli into a "suicide." Chicago waiters used it too. Mickey Finn wasn't one single drug; it was slang for any poison cocktail, so the recipe changed with the job. This batch mixed scopolamine for hard hallucinations, barbiturates to lock mind and body down, and alcohol—George Walcott the pharmacist's strongest brew.
I drew a full syringe from the bottle. Brian watched and tossed out a random thought.
"Boss, people really do adapt, huh?"
"Missing the Flea Market office already?"
"First days were hell. Sitting at a desk made me want to die. Then after a while it got doable."
"So you're office material?"
Brian snorted and shook his head.
"Hell no. Adapt my ass—I just got lazy. Right now my whole body's humming. This is what fits me. And the day you talked about finally got here."
Oliver, Cale, Brian—once upon a time the three of them had been gunning to take Tanner Smith's place as next boss of the Marginals. Oliver ran labor-slugger work, Cale handled a unit and the rough stuff; Brian had been buried in the office fighting type. Bottom line: he was itching to get back outside and cut loose.
"Appreciate the hard work growing the Flea Market."
"...Thanks."
Bang bang bang.
The iron door hammering yanked my eyes open. Five in the morning. I checked my watch and rose quietly; Brian was already on his feet, though I never saw him wake. Maddox stood stock-still in the workroom, staring at the door.
We slipped down to basement two. Brian stepped into the lit, wide-open shooting range; I melted into the dark under the stairs by the entrance. I settled into a crouch just as the iron door creaked open.
"Fuck, Mad Dox. Why you only opening up now—did you pass out?"
"Just get in. Why only three of you? Kidding me? I ain't got the juice to haul crates."
"Aw, that worry you? Ain't gonna make a weakling like you do the lifting, so relax."
Giggling voices outside thickened into echoes. Then rough boots hammered down into the basement in a messy scramble.
"Fuck, everybody said you'd run so I told 'em—our Mad Dox, even as a kid, took a beating till he crawled and still never ran. Had the stones to look me dead in the eye in court and testify! Fuck, Gunsmith croaked and now the only one who really gets you is me, right? Huh? Ain't that right?"
"Hearing you yammer, you must've come high. Use that mouth to pick dust off the floor instead. Coo, coo!"
"Hahaha. Mad Dox. My old buddy never changes. Always begging for a beating."
Gugu Knox's easy laugh iced over on the last word. Then—
Crack.
Thud.
A body hit the floor. Had to be Maddox.
"Where's the goods?"
"Ptoo—down in the range."
"What kind of game is that? You knew I was coming, should've stacked 'em right here."
"Did that, every customer through the door would ask if pistols were on sale."
Thud!
"Shut your hole, get up, and show the way, you bastard."
Footsteps drifted toward the door that led deeper underground. Just as it was about to open—
"Why you freeze all of a sudden? Hey—what the fuck's wrong with this guy? Why's he shaking like that?"
"Hey, Mad Dox."
Slap.
"Move, you bastard."
"Nox, look at those legs jittering. What the hell's eating him? Scared enough to piss himself?"
Mockery, sneers, and disbelieving laughs all tangled together.
"Takes a second for the fear to hit—reaction's fucking slow. Lead the way already, you piece of shit!"
Slap.
"Gu-Gugu Knox... you're the... coward. You're the one hanging back 'cause you're scared..."
Even shaking with terror, Maddox still pointed out exactly where Gugu Knox stood.
"Retard, shut up and go down."
The door into the lower level swung open; a thin bar of light spilled through. Then mixed thudding footsteps rolled down the stairs.
At first Maddox had needled Gugu Knox about pigeons and kept his voice steady even while taking hits. Now he was trembling. PTSD. Blood flying, a body turning corpse—he must have pictured Gugu Knox dying right in front of him. Watching someone else die scared him worse than anything that could happen to himself.
Thud. Thud.
Boots sounded right above my head. I eased my head out and caught Maddox's back disappearing into the range, the men behind him carrying guns. Last of all Gugu Knox stepped down. The moment I came out from under the stairs and rose—
Pssh. Pssh.
Brian's rounds dropped two of them.
"What the—!"
The instant a panicked Gugu Knox went for his piece I locked an arm around his throat from behind and drove the syringe home into his arm. Straight into the vein, the mix hit fast. His struggling strength bled away while his body jerked like it was seizing. Less than a minute and he went limp.
"Not dead, right?"
"No idea. Can't exactly test it. Anyway, go up and leave the iron door open."
Brian took the stairs at a run. I laid Gugu Knox out on the floor and stepped into the range. Maddox was quaking in a corner.
"Maddox."
"Not looking. Not looking. Absolutely not looking. Fuck—the smell... I'm not smelling it either."
"Got it. Eyes shut, pinch your nose."
He squeezed his eyes tight and plugged his nostrils with his fingers. When I tugged his shoulder he stood, still shaking, and followed.
"I am not opening my eyes...!"
"Fuck, I heard you."
I took his arm and steered him past the bodies at the range doorway. The soft give underfoot made him shriek.
"Keep that up and I'll smear blood on your face."
"Hweeeek! No!"
"Then shut up and walk."
I got him clear of the range and onto the stairs.
"Just keep walking up. You can open your eyes a little when you—"
Before I finished he was already bounding up the steps. I turned back into the range just as more feet came down: Brian returning with Leo, Declan, and Pierce behind him.
"Boss, it's done. Outside's cleaned too. Two more in the truck."
"Good. Load every body into the truck and head for Pier 35. Captain River's waiting."
"Finally we get a truck of our own. Not handing it over to SCL, right?"
Leo's words gave me a strange flash of recognition—happier about the truck than the corpses. The old shoe-shine boy was long gone.
"Bodies first. Declan, that one's still breathing."
"Shit—alive?"
Declan, halfway to shouldering Gugu Knox, jerked upright in a flurry.
"Park him on that chair and tie the arms and legs."
"This bastard ain't gonna jump up and stick a knife in me, is he?"
Slap. Slap.
Only after a couple of open-handed cracks did Declan haul Gugu Knox over. The man kept sliding sideways when they tried to seat him; I braced the body while Declan lashed him to the chair with rope.
Gugu Knox came around when the sun was high and noon had settled in. He blinked a few times, then thrashed against the chair like he was having a fit.
"Start."
At my word Declan sprang up, hefting the big hammer he'd brought from the workroom, and walked toward Gugu Knox.
"Who you working with? Where'd you stash the stolen liquor? What were the thirty pistols for?"
"Fuck you!"
"Yeah. Figured you'd say that, you bastard."
Crack.
Gugu Knox's raw scream filled the shooting range.