Midnight Gun

And I don't own the clothes I'm wearing,
And the road goes on forever,
And I've got one more silver dollar,
But I'm not gonna let them catch me, no
Not gonna let 'em catch the midnight rider
                             - "Midnight Rider" by The Allman Brothers

The party was in full swing inside the ranch style home. The innocuous-looking abode was one of many of the exact same style in the neighborhood. It was like a menagerie of upper-middle class monotony. The man in the black leather trench coat and wide brimmed duster hat looked strangely out of place in this neighborhood of SUVs and over-embellished lawns. He quietly slipped his tools of the trade from their holsters on his hips, pressed the button on the grip, and checked the clips to make sure they were full. He slid them back in quietly-the only sound was the “snkt” that assured him that they’d been securely inserted.

Jimmy Torres, Bill Dryer, and Jack Hogan were the big fish in the room. The rest of the flunkies were only there to watch out for their respective employer. When it came to a “Who’s who” list of bad guys, these three dirtballs were in a class of their own. These weren’t only the nastiest guys who ever made a name for themselves in the business of illicit deeds, but they were also the experts in their respective fields of illegal activities.

Jimmy Torres was a master of human trafficking. He had contacts in all the major ports in Paragon and owned the smaller ports by either monetary influence or pure muscle. He never got his hands dirtier than he needed to and left a lot of the work up to his right-hand-man, Marcus. The missing persons catalog, that part that showed young and supple girls who'd vanished, were mostly the handy work of Jimmy and his group. The rotund man had gone mostly bald, but held onto the remaining hair like a drowning man clinging to a fast-deflating raft. He was an obese, foul-mouthed, greasy and many other reviling adjectives that mostly escape the mind when you laid eyes on this human meatball. However, never underestimate Jimmy. He may be a fat slob of a mook, but he was as cunning as a fox.

Bill Dryer realized early on in the 90s that to make money in drugs you needed to peddle your wares to higher bidders than the common street rat. He moved the high priced cocaine business into the suburbs. After the crack down on the Columbians Bill realized that he needed to change his product and service. He hired a couple of doctors and convinced a few more that their life was more important than the law and built his own pharmaceutical drop business. He had the needy buyer contact one of his men, who got the prescription and then returned the much needed reality-alleviating drugs to the respective buyers. He provided more housewives with “mother’s little helper” than any crooked doctor alone ever could. Unlike Jimmy, Bill liked to keep himself trim and fit. He weighed in at a nice 175 lbs. He worked out daily and for all the illegal narcotics and pills he pushed he rarely partook of any of it himself. He’s not as smart as Jimmy, but he’s just as conniving.

The third individual in this disgusting trio was Jack Hogan. The Irish man, and make no mistake about that…he even sported the accent and has bright orange-red hair, was not only as dull witted as they come, but he was dangerously crazy. He would shoot whomever he felt like at any time of day and where ever he damn well chose. He had a thing for guns, always had. He had roots back to the IRA and when they needed guns Jack was right there for them, the loving patriot. He squeezed the IRA for every damn dime he could and when they went dry he sold to the other side. He made a nice penny for himself and as things settled down he turned his eyes back to the USA. He brought his ability to be the biggest bully in the room and with that crazy temper he soon had one of his guns in the hands of nearly every thug on the street. On top of that he was peddling arms to the Third World countries that could drop the high price for the quality stuff he was selling. The bad part about Jack was that he was dangerous, mean tempered and hds never been caught. That cocktail gave him a god complex.

Those three were the first link in the chain.




And I’ve gone by the point of caring,
Some old bed I'll soon be sharing,
And I’ve got one more silver dollar,
                      - “Midnight Rider” by The Allman Brothers


“Hey Jimmy, thanks for the girls!” The grinning, jovial voice of Bill cried out over the music in the room.
“Hey Bill, thanks for da blow!” The thick New York accent of Jimmy Torres shouted back.
“Yah ken both go fook yarselves!” The Irish man called out and then snorted a line off the belly of a girl who could be no older than 16.

The music poured out of the house and flowed around the man in black, he frowned behind the bandana he was wearing and reached into his coat pocket. He produced two small tubes and screwed one onto the end of each of his guns. He adjusted the goggles on his face and knocked politely on the door.

“Would one’a you guys get da door?” Jimmy shouted. The nearest goombah turned the music down a touch and headed towards the door. Jimmy shot him a quick and insincere thanks and went back to fondling the girl’s tits who lay across his lap.

The mook who opened the door didn’t even check the peephole, he swung the door open and then collapsed into the hallway as two almost imperceptible “pffts” signaled his demise. The silencers worked like a charm.

The man in black rolled the dead man over and quietly shut the door. The party in the back room went on unabated. He placed the deceased man’s hands across his chest and closed the lusterless eyes. The black gloves reached into the pocket of the trench coat and laid two perfect silver dollars on the corpse’s eyelids.

He strode into the room as though he belonged there. The men who were there to protect their bosses didn’t have a clue and had no time to draw their guns. He surveyed the room and said in a calm and pleasant voice, “Everyone put their guns on the ground and slide them to me.”

One of the men went to draw his gun but the air around him was suddenly filled with his own blood, tissue and bone as the round from the .45 caliber tore through his forearm from the elbow down to his hand. He gripped the useless arm in his other hand and started to scream.

“I can’t have this sort of an interruption,” the pleasant voice said and then emptied another round into the head of the screaming lackey. “Now, anyone else want to see if I can beat the clock? No? Good. Then slide the guns over to me.” The boys with guns did as he asked and slid their guns over to him.

No matter what state of drug-induced stupor the girls had been in they were all suddenly very alert and very aware of what was happening. He leveled his guns at the lackeys and underlings and spoke softly, “I want you girls to get up, get dressed and get out of here. You can go to the police if you like, you can go home, but I need you out of here…now.” All the girls, the youngest one had to have been around 14, all nodded and gathered their clothes.

Jimmy Torres growled through clenched teeth, “I’ll have your fuckin’ head!”

The man in black didn’t start as the girls found the first dead man and let out a scream. He shouted to them down the hallway, “Don’t mind him. He’s not going to hurt anyone ever again.”

Jimmy growled again and the man in black leveled his gaze at him, “Jimmy, you’re not going to do anything except make a very ugly corpse soon.”

“What do you want?” This time it was Bill Dryer, hoping for a chance to reason with the apparent gun-wielding maniac.

“I want you all to repent for the crimes you’ve committed. I want you to bare your souls before whatever god you may have. Then as the realization that you’re all very evil men finally dawns on your brain and soul, I want you all to realize you're about to spend in eternity in Hell.”

Jack stood up, his hot, Irish temper in full flare, “I’ll tell yah what, yah little maggot, how about I ventilate yer fookin’ body and leave yah fer the rats to feed on!” And with the last word Jack produced a sawed off shotgun that he’d had tucked in the seat next to him and hid behind his back. It would be the last move that Jack ever made on this planet; too bad it was a poor choice in moves.

The room seemed to slow down a moment as the man in black dropped into a crouch and swung an arm out in Jack's direction. Two bullets exploded from the gun, one hitting Jack in the chest and the other in his forehead. Jimmy had taken that moment to stand up and rush towards the man in black, also a poor choice in actions to take. The man in black didn’t even turn his head and he squeezed the trigger twice, dropping the slovenly dough boy to the ground in a pool of his own blood. Bill Dryer was on his knees in front of the man in black, the lackeys were staring around in a stupor. None of them could believe how incredibly fast and accurate the man in black had been.

“I’ll do whatever you want. Whatever you need, I swear to it. Just please don’t kill me.”

“Bill Dryer. Born William Timothy Dryer. Mother, Margaret Lynn Dryer, nee Scosins. Father, Benjamin David Dryer. You have two younger sisters and a slew of nieces and nephews and have no children of your own. Your ex-wife was Marlayna. You divorced her in 1993 after a 10 year marriage. You have a MBA from Paragon City University.” The man in black quoted all of this with the ease and pleasantness of an information booth, “Listen, Bill, I could let you go with all the empty promises that you could pile into a cargo van-” His speech was interrupted by Bill’s plaintive promises that he would go straight. Still crouching, he smacked Bill in the forehead with the end of one his gun’s grips.

“It’s my turn to talk, Bill. Don’t be rude. As I was saying, you could make empty promises, but eventually you’d be right back out there going at it as though this little visit never happened.”

Out of the corner of his eye he saw one of the flunkies reach for a heavy candelabra, he crossed the pistol over his chest and shot the man through the heart.

“So, I’m going to finish what I came here to do.” With that, he stood up to his full height. The leather pants creaked slightly as his knees straightened out. He put the cold metal tube of the silencer to Bill’s forehead and squeezed the trigger. The couch behind Bill was suddenly covered in bloody gore. The remaining gangsters in the room all stood stock still.

“You fellows will pay witness to what just occurred. Know that these men paid for their crimes. Don’t make your crimes be the cause of your demise. Do you understand?” The mobsters all nodded slowly.

“Good, now put these lovely handcuffs on and one of you phone the police. You’re all going to jail for a long time, but it’s better than being dead.”

The man in black turned the dead bad guys over and on each of them he left two silver dollars on each closed, dead eye. When he was done he held the phone up to one of the mooks and told him to tell the police everything.

“If they ask for my name, tell them that The Midnight Gun is back.”

Well, I've got to run to keep from hiding,
And I'm bound to keep on riding.
And I've got one more silver dollar,
But I'm not gonna let them catch me, no,
Not gonna let em catch the midnight rider.
              - “Midnight Rider” by The Allman Brothers.