Any sort of setup takes time, unfortunately. Even when you're rushing it.
It took a full day and a half to get everything together, which was both incredibly quick and unbearably slow. I couldn't exactly afford to take a lot of time to prep, what with the possibility of someone coming into town to kill me and all. Or, for that matter, the rather sobering possibility of someone who was already in town and preparing to kill me. Generally speaking, when confronted with either possibility, my first instinct is to be somewhere else... preferably someplace far, far away. After all, given enough time and planning, anyone can be assassinated.
Anyone.
Assassins are no exception. In fact, it's something of an occupational hazard, since there aren't too many people in my line of work who aren't eventually taken out by one of our own.
Everyone in the industry knows that's the way things are, of course. Most know before they even get started in this business. The ones who don't, well... they find out eventually.
So needless to say the additional time required to put this setup together was making me the teensiest bit tense, and I'm prone to want to do some rather silly things when I'm worried. I'd actually considered paging agent Moss yesterday in order to have a quick sit-down and discuss exactly how he found out about me, precisely what he'd learned while investigating me, and who else could potentially know that information. I didn't, of course, because if the Hand had learned about me through him, and they hadn't pinned down my exact location yet, they might keep an eye on him to see if he would lead them to me. At least, keeping an eye on him is the sort of thing I would do under the circumstances if I'd been hired to take me out.
Funny, the thought 'How would I go about killing myself?' is usually a sign of someone contemplating suicide. For me, in this particular situation, it was just the opposite.
Getting both Shoe and the funeral home prepped for tonight's 'event' was understandably exhausting, considering all the work that had been put into it. I'd received some help on the first day from a few of Diavolo's guys, none of whom were on what I was now referring to as the 'short list' of Stevie's remaining targets. As Shoe had mentioned that night on the rooftop, he had called back all of the guys with targets on their heads, against Diavolo's wishes. Now, after a reportedly brief and unpleasant conversation with their boss, they were all back in the air, or on a train, or otherwise out of town, as per my request.
All of them, that was, save for one particularly nervous fellow, who was probably still smoking like a chimney atop the funeral home roof somewhere above me.
He probably had several good reasons to be nervous, honestly. He'd been dressed down earlier that day by a rather annoyed Angelo Diavolo for one, an activity that I presume usually results in someone's head being turned into a fine pink mist. His co-worker Shoe had been murdered, for another, and was currently lying in a large faux-oak casket somewhere in the building beneath the roof he was currently perched upon. And now he was sitting all by himself, with no protection to speak of, sitting on still and playing the role of what Diavolo had both specifically and explicitly referred to as 'bait' during the whole dressing-down process. I would imagine discovering that your boss considers you the very least important employee among those targeted for death, or at least the most expendable among those who remain, is not a very pleasant thing to become aware of. Then again, maybe Diavolo just felt like being blunt. After all, 'bait' was exactly what this guy was.
I didn't have a ready explanation for how Stevie was tracking down his former co-workers, nor had I gained any real insight from the multiple accounts of encounters with revenants I'd read in Atticus's papers. Stevie had pinpointed Shoe's rather unlikely position atop the building roof down near the docks with relative ease, despite the fact that I myself didn't know I was going to be ending up on that particular rooftop a couple of nights ago. He'd also said during one of our encounters that I wasn't one of 'them', and that he couldn't 'feel it', which I later realized could mean that he somehow had a palpable sense of his intended victims, which could perhaps include things like where they were, or how far away. For the moment, I was working off the assumption that this ability to track down the fellows on his short list was due to 'other'.
Which could work in my favor, I realized.
Putting together a hasty memorial service for a high-ish ranking mobster attended solely by myself and someone on Stevie's short list was a reasonable enough plan. With everyone else Stevie wanted to kill currently out of town, I figured if he felt like scratching another name off his list tonight, he'd be coming here.
Of course, there was also still the possibility that Stevie was getting the information some other way. And so in addition to this particular setup, the remainder of Diavolo's men had been told of the memorial service, and had all been informed that the attendance of this event would be mandatory for all employees. Word of the gathering made its way to the street, and had even been picked up by one television station who ran it as a bit piece for the evening news. Then, a couple of hours ago, all of Diavolo's men had been ordered to meet at the same warehouse, their cellphones were confiscated, and they were all told to simply relax and wait for a while. If Stevie did have a friend on the inside who was handing off information to him, they wouldn't have a chance to alert him that something was up.
My thinking was this - if Stevie had been told about the memorial service, especially one that everyone in Diavolo's organization was required to attend, he would probably figure that meant his remaining targets on the 'short list' would be here too. Even if he suspected the whole thing was a trap, he might not necessarily care, what with him shrugging off multiple gunshot wounds the way he did. According to several well documented accounts I'd read, he'd already marched into worse situations.
So with any luck he'd come running, regardless of whether or not he relied on some sort of mystical mojo to track down his targets.
The choice of funeral home was a bit lucky, actually. It was situated fairly close to the docks, and the proprietor of the place already owed Diavolo some pretty serious coin. I'd been told by Miss Calvino that while Diavolo would prefer it if the place was still standing once I was done doing what had to be done, it wasn't absolutely necessary. I did retain the impression that blowing the entire place up would likely result in a few expense-related deductions when it came to the second half of my fee, however.
In other words, the shoulder-mounted missile sitting a few feet away from me would be my last resort, rather than my first. Which was okay, actually. While scoping out the funeral parlour and making all of the necessary preparations, I happened upon another idea that had definite potential... one that seemed tailor-made for both my situation and that particular location.
Fire.
My working theory regarding everything Stevie was able to do, as well as some of those things he wasn't able to do, involved the fact that he depended on physical locomotion. At the very least, he appeared to depend on his ability to keep himself together enough to run, jump, climb, and kill. And yes, while fire did have some fairly mixed reviews in Atticus's papers when it came to taking down revenants, it was the sort of thing that was used quite effectively by those in the funerary community to reduce dead bodies to their most basic chemical compounds, vis a vis cremation. You know the drill; ashes to ashes, dust to dust. That, and a whole lot of ground-up dry bone fragments. The pastors overseeing funerals always tended to avoid mentioning that bit, for some reason.
Of course, if Stevie could still manage to hold thousands of tiny bits of himself together after being incinerated for hours and then pulverized into a bunch of scrabble-tiles, well, there really wasn't much else I was going to be able to do to the guy. But hey, at the very least he'd probably end up being much, much lighter.
My left leg was falling asleep, I realized. I shifted how I was sitting slightly, then leaned my head over the balcony railing in order to inspect the scene below me for what might have been the hundredth time.
The rows upon rows of chairs that faced the front were still empty. Shoe's body was still lying in the casket that had been prepared for him - an extra-large, if I had to guess - which was resting atop an equally large fabric-covered metal structure. Shoe's suit looked like it didn't quite fit him properly, and even in death his face had somehow managed to maintain an expression of both annoyance and constipation. There were a couple of bundles of flowers resting in holders in front of the casket, along with a large-ish portrait of Shuggy 'Shoe' Wellzotti. In the photo he was bearing an expression that was almost identical to the one he wore now, save for the fact that his eyes were open slightly in the photo. There were the usual decorations and trim you'd expect to see in a funeral home, a couple of large ornamental vases, a small organ sitting off in the corner, and that was pretty much it. Just me and a clear line of sight from my position on the second floor balcony to the area around Shoe's casket. If this were a normal job, and I'd had my rifle with me, I would have considered the whole setup far too easy.
With this particular job, and what I'd be attempting to pull off tonight, not so much.
I glanced over at the grenade launcher that was lying nearby, near my feet. Then I turned my head and looked down and across the room at Shoe's casket. Then I licked my lips, realizing I was just a tad nervous.
I'd never fired this particular model of grenade before, and I'd definitely never fired any shoulder-mounted grenade launcher at a target as close to me as Shoe was, which was where I figured Stevie was going to be. That was the sort of craziness I actively avoided, as a rule. Even though I had a reasonable amount of cover and an elevated position, just being in the same room as a payload like that once it detonated would probably suck balls.
Staring down at Shoe's lifeless corpse, it occurred to me to wonder what had ended up happening to Alaric.
The incident on the rooftops from two nights ago, including the rather noisy and attention-grabbing explosions that had happened nearby, appeared to have been hushed up. That was likely Diavolo's doing, since news involving the dead bodies of mafia enforcers and mysterious hit men didn't seem like it would help his business any. Still, I knew where Shoe's body was - it was right there, below me. What had been done with Alaric's body?
It was a fairly strange thing to consider, probably because I didn't actually care what the answer was, or where that crazy frenchman's final resting place ended up being. But it did cause me to wonder what sort of preparations he'd made for his eventual demise, and how many loose threads he'd left lying around, never to be tied up. Someone's death, no matter whose, always seems to end up reminding me of the fact that I would die, someday.
How many loose threads did I have in my life, for that matter? How many things would remain unresolved when it came to my own holdings should I suddenly end up dead somewhere?Perhaps the only reason I was wondering about Alaric in the first place was because it reminded me of my own dangerously precarious situation, and how close I could be to becoming dead myself.
Moss knew who I really was, which meant there was a good chance the Hand knew as well. So exactly what, pray tell, was I even still doing here in Baltimore?
I sighed. This was no time to worry about something like that, or to panic. That could come later. Focus, Joe.
Taking a deep breath, I focused my attention on the casket and corpse below me.
Thoughts wander in situations like that. Before long I found myself wondering who it was the Hand would send after me...
It had been eight years since I'd left, after all, and a lot of things can happen to an organization in eight years. Oh sure, there were those I had a feeling were still around; Anna, Loshi, Bravden, and Misha for a start. If any of those four had been tasked with coming after me, it would likely mean I was in for some hard times. But then again, if the Hand was actually coming after me, sending someone who I'd recognize probably wasn't going to be their first play. None of those four had any particular dislike for me that I knew of, and each may have actually possessed some measure of fondness towards me when it comes right down to it. Generally speaking you never sent an assassin to go after someone they might be on friendly terms with. The Hand had options when it came to taking someone out, and didn't necessarily need to go with one of their top four when it came to taking out an ex-employee.
Then again, it wasn't exactly like I was an easy target. And I had found a way to leave their organization, which was kind of unprecedented. Who knew? Maybe they'd bring their A-game. Faking your death just so you can leave an organization like theirs was the sort of thing they might take personally.
Briefly, I wondered who they'd given my spot to. They would have had to fill it once I'd left, right? Western Europe wasn't just going to take care of itself, was it? Weird that I hadn't thought of that before....
There had been a few young, steely-eyed up and comers waiting in the wings back then, and I didn't doubt that any one of them would have gleefully hacked out their own spleen just for the opportunity to take the spot I'd held at the time. Sending one of them to take me out wasn't out of the question, when it came right down to it. Killing me might even be seen as a rite of passage, if they played it right... some way for a young buck to demonstrate their worth, and put the punctuation-mark on the whole idea of 'out with the old, in with the new'. All they had to do was blow my brains out and they'd be set for life, like-
Wow, why the hell was I thinking thoughts like these? I was working at the moment, dammit. Thinking about stuff that wasn't strictly job-related was as stupid as it was unhelpful. If I was going to pull this thing off properly, or at all, I needed to concentrate. And wait, of course. As annoying as it was, waiting was simply part of the job.
At that moment, as though attempting to answer my silent prayers, I heard the sound of a large door handle turning. This was immediately followed by the whine of door hinges that probably hadn't been oiled in the past decade or so. I instantly became more alert, and shifted how I was sitting so I could catch a quick glimpse of the front entrance.
It was him... Stevie had arrived. About an hour before Shoe's service was scheduled to start, which was pretty much exactly as I'd hoped.
Showtime.
He walked in, displaying no fear or trepidation whatsoever, allowing the heavy wooden door to slowly shut itself behind him. After about five or so paces he stopped, glanced around furtively, and appeared to consider something. I quickly ducked my head and went still, choosing a moment when his head was turned away from me to do so. As a result, I couldn't see what he'd probably ended up doing, which I figured involved glaring at his surroundings a bit, spying the open casket resting near the back wall, and then loudly walking down the middle aisle towards it.
After a few seconds spent listening to him walking from one end of the building to the other, I figured it was safe to raise my head up and sneak a look.
Stevie was standing a few feet away from Shoe's casket, and even though I was currently viewing him from behind, every bit of body language I could pick up from him suggested he was spoiling for a fight. His arms hung at his sides, but his shoulders looked to be bunched up, despite being mostly concealed by his now-familiar leather jacket. I noted his tightly clenched fists, as well as how absolutely still he was standing as he regarded the corpse of the man he'd knifed to death two short nights ago.
For a few moments I could do nothing but stare. Rage on that level of magnitude is palpable, and there aren't too many people who don't recognize that sort of thing while in the presence of it. Call it a survival instinct. Whatever had existed between these two, it hadn't been pretty.
I wondered if that rage had been a part of what had caused Stevie to hang around, post-mortem.
He stayed where he was for a good, long time before taking the last few steps necessary to put him within arms reach of the casket before him. Once there, he stopped, and began grumbling something I couldn't precisely make out... words that were obviously being directed at Shoe, or what remained of him. Perhaps it was a final 'fuck you', or something of that nature. All told, it seemed like the perfect moment for something like that, despite the fact that Shoe wasn't actually there to hear it. Then again, with all of the new things I was suddenly discovering lately about the way the world worked, who was I to say Shoe couldn't hear him? I was just a hit-man, after all... what did I know about death?
Far, far less than the guy I was looking down upon, I figured.
Once Stevie was done saying whatever it was he'd just said he simply stood there a few moments, regarding Shoe's earthly remains quietly. Then, he swivelled his head to the right and looked at the portrait of Shoe sitting upon the nearby stand. Then he snorted softly, and began looking around the empty room once more.
Once more, I ducked my head down so that I was hidden by the balcony railing, noting as I did that my pulse had quickened slightly. Not alarmingly so, just enough to let me know that my body thought something exciting was probably going to be happening shortly.
I glanced down at the grenade launcher, sitting not three feet away.
Not the time. I was tempted to, but there was no need to pull that sort of panic move just yet....
He wasn't scouting around for other people, I knew - all the chairs were empty, and it was quite obvious nobody else was in the building. What he was looking around for was a place to hide.
Get there early, hide away somewhere inconspicuous, wait until everyone you want to kill has shown up to pay their respects, jump out of your hiding spot with a 'Raaawrrrggh!' and then lay waste to everyone and everything you see. Good, solid plan if you happened to be indestructible, and possessed superhuman strength. Simple, straightforward, uncomplicated. After all, even in a pack, jackals beware the lion....
I retrieved a small rectangular mirror from the left side-breast pocket of the tactical shirt I was wearing, wriggled myself into a slightly better position than the one I was in, then raised it up angled so I could get a view of what was happening near the casket without poking my head up above the balcony railing. It took a few seconds to adjust it so I could see, and my hand was a little bit shaky, but I could make out Stevie's position eventually. It appeared as though he'd just finished inspecting the large, ornamental vases located near the front, and was now focusing his attention on the corner of the room where the portable organ was located. Yup, definitely looking for a hiding spot.
I'd gone over this room twice already, and had informed the owner to have several things removed prior to this. There was only one hiding spot available in the entire room, I knew, but it was a really, really good one. I just had to wait for him to find it.
Though it was an activity made much harder by the fact that I was using a mirror to do so, I did manage to observe most of Stevie's progress when it came to inspecting his surroundings. He scratched his head a few times while wearing a look of consternation from time to time, which caused me to wonder if scratching was an automatic gesture in this case, or if walking corpses got itchy scalps from time to time. The latter didn't really make any sense - the guy shrugs off bullet wounds, broken bones, and all manner of other brutally painful stuff without much of a reaction whatsoever, and yet something as simple as an itch gets his attention?
Eventually, I knew that Stevie had found the hiding spot I'd left for him.
He was standing on the other side of the open casket from me, mostly hidden from view. Doubtless he was currently inspecting what it sat upon, lifting the dark, maroon cloth that had been draped over it in order to see what was underneath. I heard a short laugh, which was followed by an ominous and unsettling chuckle.
Yup, he'd found it.
The casket was laying atop a large, box-like metal frame that hadn't even existed a mere twelve hours ago. It had well-reinforced metal plates welded in place on the top, bottom, and all of its sides save for the one where Stevie had been standing, all set upon a sturdy set of gurney wheels and draped with enough cloth to say "We'd actually prefer it if people didn't actually see what was going on under here, really." I'd made certain that there were a couple of funeral-related things stored in it as well, to make the whole contraption look like some sort of serviceable stand that was always used to display caskets in these sorts of situations. The fact that this was nowhere even remotely close to what was actually used wasn't at all important, since ninety-nine point nine percent of people out there had no idea. After all, if you've been to a funeral, you've likely never spent any amount of time sitting there thinking to yourself, "Okay, so that's the sort of thing they use to prop caskets up. Good to know."
If you have found yourself thinking about things like that while attending a funeral, then you're probably even more jaded than I am....
I heard some scuffling and other assorted sounds that I assumed could be attributed to Stevie crouching down in order to further inspect his new hiding spot, coming to the conclusion that it was large enough, and then crawling inside as best he could. It only took about twenty seconds or so before the sounds of his movement tapered off and stopped completely, which I took as a sign that he'd gotten himself comfortable inside of the box and was now settling himself in for a fairly lengthy wait.
After a few minutes listening to the sound of nothing, I lifted myself up to a crouch and risked peeking over the balcony rail for an actual look.
Casket, Shoe, chairs, and everything else that was here. No Stevie anywhere in sight. Perfect.
I spent a fair amount of time on the balcony staring down at the casket, considering. That wasn't part of the plan, but I found myself doing it anyway, suddenly plagued by indecision.
Right at that moment I really, really wanted to simply pick up the grenade launcher and simply fire it in the general direction of both Shoe and Stevie, just so I could obliterate both of them be done with everything. It'd make a hell of a mess, and even with the nearby support column to provide me with partial cover, being so close to the blast wave would be absolutely fun at all. But still, it was easy, quick, and didn't involve me having to get any closer to Stevie than I was already. That seemed like a very good idea.
But that wasn't part of the new plan. Something like that would be messy, attract attention, and neither was something I wanted. Especially if the Hand was looking for me.
Still, I knew that this next part of the plan was going to be very, very stressful.
I sighed, took a deep breath and then sighed a second time. Standing up fully, I stretched a little, gave my grenade launcher one last longing glance, and then quietly made my way to the stairs that led down to the main floor. Once I arrived at the bottom I quietly cleared my throat, composed myself, dusted off my seldom-used Irish accent and put it to work.
It was extremely unlikely that Stevie knew that the funeral director who ran this place was originally an immigrant from Ireland, but talking was going to be part of the next bit, and since Stevie had already heard me speak on several different occasions and might be able to recognize my voice, I figured using an accent was something I'd end up doing anyways.
I took another deep breath, strode into the room and towards the area where the casket lay, not bothering to be particularly quiet or disguise my footfalls, and began conversing out loud as though on the phone.
"Aye, but the lilies are priced a bit high, no?" I asked, maintaining as unhurried and casual a gait as I could. "I mean, yes, he probably knows he's got us over a barrel, because lilies have always been our thing. But this hike seems like a bit much, yeah? Especially when you consider the sort of quantities we're dealing with here."
I fabricated a brief pause in faux phone conversation, took a few more steps towards the area Stevie was, breathed a little bit, and resumed talking.
"But what I'm saying is do we need to keep them for lilies? Not changing suppliers or that, but just getting our lilies elsewhere, maybe? Might change their tune a little. They're not the only game in town, after all."
Another pause, another few steps forward. I was now perhaps twenty feet away from Shoe's casket.
I licked my lips, and privately acknowledged that my stomach was beginning to do a few interesting flips and flops the closer I got. Tightness in chest, shallow breaths. Mounting nervousness, and lots of it.
Focus. Maintain composure. Really, there was nothing to worry about. Stevie was now hiding, and was probably going to do his absolute best not to be discovered, which meant he wouldn't be leaping out from his hidey-hole just to confront someone who was providing him with audible context clues that they were some sort of employee at a funeral home. Hell, he might even be more worried about being discovered than I was about him discovering me.
I realized that this last pause in the 'conversation' I was maintaining had lasted longer than the other ones.
"Ha-ha, right you are. Silly bastard. No, I'm sure he'll come around... just need to get him roaring drunk again. Remember that last time, at Pete's?" I chuckled into my palm, which I was holding up to my face as though it were a phone for some reason. The casket was now about ten feet away, I noted. "Yeah, maybe we invite him out for a few beers next weekend, renegotiate then. Guy could never keep up with us, but he always seems to want to try, hey?" Pause. "Heheh. True 'dat."
I had very little left in my repertoire when it came to completely ad-libbed spontaneous business-like phone conversations, but I was almost standing in front of Shoe's body at that point, which meant that I didn't need to maintain the whole 'talking on the phone' facade for much longer.
"Yeah-yeah, we'll figure something out. Anyhow, I've got to get back to work." Pause. "Yeah, I know. Strange as fuck, too - some last-minute sort of thing put together for this guy who weighs a metric fuck-ton. Paid in cash though, so there's that. I'll call you tomorrow, aye?" Another pause. "Ha! No doubt. You be sure to say hi to Carol for me, okay?" Yet another pause. "Oh, I will. Take care. Mmm-bye."
And there I was, standing over Shoe's body, staring down at his peaceful-yet-constipated-expression, ever-mindful of the fact that Stevie was mere feet away from where I stood, hiding somewhere below the casket before me. It was a weird sort of feeling, all told.
"Comfortable, Mister Cucinotta?" I asked in a respectful whisper that I figured was still loud enough to be heard by anyone within earshot. "Your friends will be here soon to pay their respects and see you on your way to The Lord almighty, praised be His name. Not much left to take care of, although... hang on. Hmmm. This might need a bit of fixing, to be honest. Oh, and this."
I began to make as though I were fussing around with this and that, adjusting various things for the sake of appearance, and other things I figured morticians and funeral directors cared about when it came to displaying the dead in a solemn and proper fashion.
Have I mentioned how much I hate playacting?
As I was doing all of this, I began slowly making my way around the casket and behind it, closer to where Stevie was currently hidden away. My brain did its best to convince the rest of my body that the prospect of doing so wasn't particularly terrifying, or worthy of getting all worked up about. To my brain's credit, the attempt was partially successful.
Deep breaths. Focus.
"And this, well, that simply won't do," I said, brushing my hand against some portion of the casket lid that looked immaculately clean. "No, no, and no! You're shaking hands with your maker tonight, after all. Here... let me take care of that for you. Let's just-... uh..."
Now. I was where I needed to be, and this was the moment everything had been leading up to. 'The' moment, as it were.
Fortune favors the brave....
I grabbed the two barely visible bits of metal that were protruding from just underneath Shoe's casket and pulled for all I was worth. The topmost portion of the heavy steel plate they were attached to became visible almost immediately, which encouraged me to continue pulling hard at what my fingers were grasping in an attempt to expose the rest of whatever was attached to it.
My white-knuckle grip on the coarsely cut metal tabs held for a few seconds, and the metal plate grudgingly inched forward, bit by bit, until-
There was a sound kind of like a 'squit' as the fingers of my right hand lost their hold on the metal tab completely, and I could immediately tell that I'd sliced my index and middle fingers on the rough edge of the metal I'd been gripping. Sharp pain shot up my knuckles and through my wrist, and I pulled my injured hand to my chest.
Fuck.
It took a fair measure of self-control to keep from hissing in pain, but I clenched my teeth and watched as blood began to ooze out of the two slightly ragged wounds. A small part of my brain briefly wondered if Stevie could smell blood, and I quickly dismissed the thought. After all, Stevie wasn't some blood-slurping vampire.
But then again, what the fuck did I know?
"Ouch," I announced in a carefully neutral irish accent. "Bloody thing."
No trace of movement from under the casket. Good.
Changing how I was standing slightly, I reached around the casket lid and carefully plucked Shoe's clip-on tie from his neck. After wrapping it tightly around both of my abused fingers, I grabbed the two protruding metal tabs and tried again, although much more carefully this time.
The metal slab, already partially pulled out, was much easier to slide back this time. It resisted my efforts for the first inch or so, got noticeably easier the next one, and then practically began to glide out. Breathing a quiet sigh of relief, I carefully took a step backward and worked the heavy metal plate until it was free, adjusting to the sudden weight with a slight groan. The thing weighted about fifty pounds or so, but was more awkward to lift than it was heavy.
I lifted the plate up so the bottom was around waist-level, then shuffled forward a bit while attempting to line the bottom up with the metal brackets on either side of the metal contraption before me. Thankfully, I was able to do so without too much trouble, and had the plate in position in hardly any time at all.
Here went nothing....
My hands released their hold on the metal plate, allowing gravity to do its thing. The slab of metal slammed into place with a loud thump. Immediately following that I quickly flipped two sturdy metal latches down over the metal rings attached to the top of the metal slab, then quickly grabbed one of the open steel padlocks from my shirt pocket and locked the first latch in place. A mere second or so later, I used my second padlock to secure the second latch.
And just like that, Stevie was imprisoned inside of a sturdy metal box.
There was a moment of what I'm tempted to call confused silence.
"Hey there," I said, dropping the accent and speaking down at the metal box. "So glad you could make it, Stevie - it wouldn't be a party without you here. Don't you worry a bit... I'll be taking real good care of you."
The confused silence gave way to a rather surprised grunt, followed by sounds of shuffling from inside of Stevie's makeshift prison. Although, I suppose 'coffin' would soon be more accurate than 'prison'.
"You did a real number on me, you know that? Philosophically speaking," I remarked cheerfully, removing some of the fabric and other decorative whatnot that had been draped over the metal box, clearing it away so that I might be able to access the pedal-locks that were currently holding the gurney wheels in a fixed position. "Thought I had a handle on things... figured I knew what was what. I'm seeing the world in a whole new light now, thanks to you, and the things I've seen you do." I smiled, stomping down on the small metal lever next to the gurney wheel, unlocking it.
I could make out a few muffled shout from inside the metal box. This was followed by a loud 'bang', which caused the container to twitch suddenly, then wobble fractionally back and forth.
"Hey now, just relax Stevie... it'll all be over soon." I smiled, stepping the second lock pedal into the unlocked position and heaving against the box in roughly the direction I wanted it to go. It was heavy, and it only rolled a few inches, but it did move. "You've got a date with a retrofitted crematorium, and it's all warmed up and ready to go. In a few short hours, you're not going to be bothering anyone anymore."
There weren't any muffled shouts by way of response, but given that I couldn't make out anything Stevie had yelled at me, I really doubted he'd been able to hear what I was saying to him. I heaved against the metal box again, causing it to move fractionally. It was then that I realized that I'd probably have a much easier time moving Stevie's new prison if Shoe's casket wasn't still sitting atop of it. Dumb thing not to notice, but I was a little keyed up just then. The whole plan had pretty much gone off without a hitch, which, considering how some of my other plans had ended up working out, was a refreshing change. All I really needed to do at this point was find a way to slide Shoe's coffin off of where it currently sat, move Stevie to the back room, and-
There was another sudden 'bang', one that was much louder than the first one. It was also accompanied by Shoe's coffin bouncing in place slightly, say about half an inch. Then, seconds later there was a shout of furious effort, followed shortly by another loud 'bang!'
Shoe's casket shot up a good three inches off the top of the metal box, and came back down with a loud thump. The casket sat a little oddly, which caused me to realize that the half-inch steel plate that served as Stevie's ceiling had been buckled slightly outward.
Okay... not good.
"Hey, c'mon!" I shouted. "Just calm the fuck down! You're just going to make things more difficult for yourself."
In response, I heard a sound that started off as a low growl and then became a furious roar, and there was a truly deafening 'bang!' that caused me to back up a half-step. The source of the noise also practically launched Shoe's casket upwards, with the large dead man still inside of it, a full foot into the air. When it came crashing back down it teetered awkwardly for a moment and then slowly slid to one side and fell to the floor.
The reason why the casket slid off, I could see, was due to the now visibly warped half-inch steel plate that was currently serving as the roof of Stevie's metal prison. It was clearly in bad shape all of a sudden, resembling a shallow pyramid with a bunch of knuckle-marks at its apex.
There was another furious growl, followed by yet another 'bang!' that caused the metal plate to warp further. New knuckle-marks now adorned the apex of the shallow pyramid of steel.
Okay, hadn't really considered this. He appeared to be in the process of successfully punching his way out of his metal prison... which, well, holy shit. The welds that attached the sides and corners seemed to be holding up fairly well, but this had only just started. If he could do this sort of damage from inside the metal box in this short a time, what might he accomplish in an hour or so?
Not good. At all.
Another growl, and another loud noise shortly after. This one not only warped the metal further, but actually lifted the entire metal box up off the gurney about a half-inch.
"Fuck!" I announced, throwing all of my weight against the box in an effort to start moving it in the direction I wanted. The wheels of the gurney squeaked in protest at first, then behaved themselves and began transporting themselves and the load they were supporting towards the side doors, which led to the crematorium. After I'd pushed it about four feet or so I heard a familiar growl, followed by a new dent appearing in the already significantly damaged plate metal of the box. Stevie was determined to free himself, and to his credit, it appeared that he might just be capable of pulling it off. Bare-handed, no less.
This, I have to say, wasn't part of the plan....
I heaved against the box, propelling it forward. As I did so, I began to realize that a part of my brain was already convinced Stevie's prison wasn't going to hold up to more than four or five minutes of this shit. Something was going to give, and it appeared that particular something wasn't going to be Stevie.
Not unless I got him somewhere really warm, really quickly.
We entered the main hallway, and I corrected our course and pushed for everything I was worth, occasionally flinching from the semi-regular 'bang!' noises erupting from the mass of metal before me. There were many, many knuckle-shaped imprints in the steel lid now.
Shit.
This was going to be a close one....