The Adventures of Lazarus Gray (20 page)

Mr. Skull patted Malone on
the shoulder. "Good answer. But not quite quick enough on your
feet." The flames around his head grew much brighter, dancing about
like living things. He gripped Malone by the throat, lifting him
off his feet with one hand. To the others, who were now watching
with horror, he said, "Tell everyone. Make it clear so that they
understand. Mr. Skull doesn’t wear a mask. This. Is. My.
Face!"

Malone whimpered as Mr.
Face slammed him onto his back on the desktop.

Mr. Skull used his free
hand to pull out a small silver vial. His thumb easily pushed off
the top of the vial and a reddish powder began to spill out,
falling onto Malone’s face. Malone began thrashing wildly,
recognizing the mixture dubbed Bone Dust.

The powder transformed into
a corrosive liquid as soon as it touched Malone’s skin. The
chemical reaction left an almond odor in the air and Malone’s
screams were so awful that even the hardened criminals in the room
looked away, with some of them retching.

When Malone ceased his
fighting, his face was a ruined mess and his labored breathing
slowly came to an end. Mr. Skull released his hold on him and
turned to face the others. "Anybody else got anything smart to
say?" he demanded. When no one said anything, he shoved Malone’s
corpse to the floor and took his seat behind the desk. "Get that
mess out of here."

Two of the men jumped to
the task and Mr. Skull turned his chair so he could look out the
window. "Boys," he said to those who remained. "I think it’s time
to speed up my plans a little."

One of the men cleared his
throat. "Whatcha wanna do, boss?"

Mr. Skull watched the rain
that spattered against the window. In a very low voice, he said, "I
want to kill some people, boys. A lot of them."

***

The former hotel that
served as headquarters for Assistance Unlimited was a three-story
affair. The first floor was for visitors and also contained several
small apartments used by Gray’s aides. Lazarus Gray lived alone on
the third. The second floor had been gutted, leaving a massive
meeting area for the group. It was here that Morgan Watts, Samantha
Grace and Eun Jiwon had gathered.

Morgan stared at what
they’d dubbed ‘The Monster Board’ and let out a whistle. It was an
accounting of all the known crimes attributed to the city’s most
notorious criminal over the past six months, with pins stuck on a
map of Sovereign. The crimes were numerous and spread out
haphazardly all over the map. It seemed that The Monster had his
evil fingers in virtually every criminal enterprise imaginable.
"It’s unbelievable. How can one man be involved in so many
things?"

Samantha, a gorgeous blonde
who was dressed today in khaki pants and a button-up white shirt,
sat atop a nearby desk. Her knees were crossed in front of her and
Morgan found himself admiring her calf-length boots and long legs.
"Well, it’s not like he’d personally be handling all these crimes.
He has a network of goons to do the dirty work for him."

"Still. You’d always think
there was more than one of him." Morgan played with his moustache
as he stared at the board. The oldest member of Assistance
Unlimited, Morgan was very fastidious about his appearance. His
hair was always slicked down and he was never seen without a coat
and tie.

Eun stepped forward and
tapped one of the photographs attached to the side of the display
board. "Why don’t we ask for permission to question some of his men
who’ve been busted?"

"Because too many of them
are on the turnstile system. They get processed and are back on the
street within 24 hours." Morgan shook his head. "The Monster’s got
way too many judges and lawyers on his payroll. He’s virtually
untouchable. Our best hope is to actually catch him in the act and
take him down ourselves."

Samantha was about to
suggest that one or more of them should go undercover when Gray’s
voice sounded over the building’s intercom system. "All hands to
the medical lab, please. We have a new case."

The three of them jumped to
action. Morgan pushed the display board into a small closet while
Eun summoned the building’s elevator car. He held it open for his
associates and pressed the button for the basement sub-level. It
was there that Lazarus Gray did autopsies, as well as experiments
that would be too dangerous for the upper levels.

"I didn’t even realize the
Chief was back," Eun said.

"He’s like a cat," Samantha
said with a smile. "Comes and goes as he pleases."

Morgan cleared his throat
as the elevator came to a rest. "I figured he’d still be on his
date."

"Date?" Samantha asked,
arching an eyebrow.

"Didn’t you know?" Morgan
asked, knowing quite well that Samantha had been unaware of Gray’s
evening plans. Morgan had a growing attraction to Samantha but
she’d put a halt to any romantic notions. Though she’d claimed it
was simply because she didn’t believe in workplace relationships,
he suspected that she was actually harboring a crush on Lazarus
Gray. "Lazarus and that Miya girl went out for dinner tonight.
Given how crazy she seemed to be about him, I didn’t expect him
back so soon."

"Well, just because one
person likes another, it doesn’t mean that feeling is
reciprocated," Samantha answered frostily.

"Don’t I know it," Morgan
muttered under his breath. He noticed that Eun was trying
unsuccessfully to hide a smirk and he playfully swatted the younger
man on the arm.

The three of them entered
the medical lab and were immediately hit by the antiseptic smells
that they associated with the room. Lazarus stood next to a body
covered by a thin white sheet, wearing a medical smock and gloves.
Without any preamble, Gray said, "This man was killed by a toxic
formula that ate the skin off his face. It’s a unique compound and
I’ve already been in touch with the various chemists in the area.
The ingredients that would be needed to make this were bought in
bulk less than two weeks ago, with instructions to deliver them to
an address on Ferguson Street."

Samantha looked down at the
covered corpse and felt a sense of relief that Gray had not left it
exposed. "Do you think Doc Pemberley might be involved?"

Gray nodded. "I believe he
might be. We know he’s been on the run for the past month or
so
¹
and this seems like the sort of thing we’d
associate with his work. Eun, if you don’t mind, please call the
authorities and ask them to pick up this body. Samantha, I’d like
you to visit the victim’s office. He was a private investigator and
I’d like to know what cases he was working on before he met his
demise."

Gray began stripping off
his medical gear, tossing the gloves into a trashcan located
nearby. "Morgan, you’re with me. We’re going to drop in and pay a
visit to our old friend, Doctor Pemberley."

Morgan grinned broadly.
"With pleasure, Chief. I owe that kooky old bird a good
thrashing."

Chapter III

Deadly Clues

Melvin Pemberley was fifty
years old, though he could pass for a man in his mid-thirties. He
was handsome, with short-cut blond hair, blue eyes that resembled
chipped polar ice and a coolly efficient manner of conducting
himself. He tended to wear white lab coats and was rarely found
without a pair of surgical gloves. It was a bit of irony that a man
who so often dabbled in blood and guts was uncomfortable getting
his hands dirty.

Doc Pemberley was
completely amoral. Where the average person would cringe, Pemberley
stared unabashed. When a normal man would rush in to save those in
need, Pemberley was more apt to pick up a sheet of paper and begin
recording the events occurring before him. He had run afoul of the
law on numerous occasions since losing his license to practice
medicine. Selling his services to anyone who could meet his fee
meant that Pemberley not only stitched up gangsters, he also worked
on creating chemical weapons. He had fled Sovereign more than once
but always ended up returning home. Mr. Skull had come along at the
perfect time for Pemberley, giving him steady employment after
Assistance Unlimited had smashed his latest scheme.

Ferguson Street was far
from being the sort of area where Pemberley preferred to reside.
Violence was so routine in this part of the city that no one even
looked out the window when screaming or shooting began. Before
being discredited, Pemberley had lived in relative luxury but those
days were long gone. Now his lab consisted of a converted kitchen
and the experimental surgeries he carried out on neighborhood stray
animals were far from hygienic in nature.

Pemberley was wiping bloody
hands on a filthy smock when a pounding came at his front door. He
froze in place, a frown settling on his handsome features. Mr.
Skull’s men were the only ones who knew about this hideout and all
of them knocked with a special code: two hard and fast beats,
followed by three shorter ones. The vile doctor threw a sheet over
the suffering creature stretched across the dining room table. He
was continuing his experiments related to the grafting of one dog’s
head onto a second one’s body and had experienced limited success,
with the grafted head living for up to three hours.

After grabbing a small
pistol from under a counter, Pemberley cautiously approached the
front door. He stepped over to a nearby window and pulled the shade
slightly aside, peering outside. To his surprise, he didn’t see
anyone there. He was just about to turn back to the kitchen when he
felt the cold barrel of a gun press against the back of his
head.

"Put the gun down now,"
Morgan hissed. "Or I’m going to put a new hole in your
head."

"Morgan Watts," Pemberley
said. "I wish I could say it was a pleasure." The doctor held the
gun out from his body and let it dangle from one finger before it
fell to the floor. "How did you get inside? I paid for some very
expensive locks."

"There’s not a lock in the
world that I can’t break," Lazarus Gray said, entering the room.
Morgan glanced at him and saw that his employer looked even more
grave than usual. "I put down that poor animal in your kitchen,
Pemberley. If there’s such a thing as Hell, you’ve confirmed your
place in it."

Pemberley quickly spun
around, knocking Morgan’s arm aside. He tried to follow it up with
a quick punch to the man’s stomach but Pemberley found his arm in
Gray’s iron grip. Lazarus applied enough pressure that Pemberley
cried out like a child, falling to his knees. Gray maintained his
hold on him.

"A man died tonight, the
victim of an acid attack. The skin on his face was burned off. Do
you know anything about that?"

Gritting his teeth,
Pemberley nodded. He was enough of a realist to know when he was
licked and in the face of more abuse, he was quite willing to
betray anyone and everyone if it might help his own cause. "Mr.
Skull paid me to make it for him. He calls it Bone
Dust."

Morgan whistled. "I’ve
heard of this Mr. Skull guy, Chief, but I figured he was just a
story, a kind of urban bogeyman. They say he doesn’t have any face
at all – from the neck up, he’s just bones."

"Is that true?" Gray asked,
directing the question to Pemberley.

"Yes. Don’t ask me how but
it’s the truth. He’s a sadist. He didn’t just want something that
would kill, he wanted something horrible."

Most people who met Lazarus
Gray thought that he was relatively emotionless but his closest
friends knew the truth: Gray felt disgust and remorse just as
strongly as they did, perhaps more so. At the moment, Morgan could
see in his employer’s eyes that he hated Pemberley with every fiber
of his being. Gray raised his free hand and brought it crashing
down on the doctor’s head. The blow was enough to knock him out and
Gray dropped his hold on him, allowing the villain to fall onto the
floor.

"I’ll truss him up," Morgan
offered, taking out some extra-strength cord from his pocket.
"Should we call Samantha and Eun – tell them to be on the lookout
for this Mr. Skull character?"

"Yes. You take of that, if
you don’t mind. I’d like to look around this house and make sure
that there aren’t any more monstrosities lurking about."

"Did Miya tell you about
your past?"

Gray paused, somewhat
surprised by the question. But then he knew that his aides were
also more than that – they were friends and they were concerned for
his wellbeing. "She told me some things but not enough. I know that
I was a part of an occult organization with Walther Lunt and that
they did some terrible things. I also know that some memories I’d
had about an event in Mexico were slightly misleading – which was a
good thing. But I still don’t know my name or how much blood might
be on my hands. I’d like to think that my participation in the
group might have been attributed to some naïveté on my part and
that I left their number when I realized what they were up to… but
that might not be the case."

"Well, whatever you did in
the past, Chief, it doesn’t define you now. You’ve been given a
whole new life and you’ve done so much good since coming to
Sovereign that I bet it balances the scales against anything you
might have done before."