The Marvel Knights Group presents: Sleepwalker #2

I try her number, again. I lost count after the fifth time, I'm not sure if this is the sixth or sixteenth message I'm leaving. I spend what seems to be fifteen minutes waiting on the annoying message she left on her machine, but at least I'm spending it doing my favorite thing in my pitiful existing: counting cold, hard cash. The fat man came for his daughter pretty quick, dropped a healthy load of cash in my hand and a few extra hundreds just to keep my mouth shut. This is the day where I love my job.

My work isn't hard, not mentally; though if I could afford medical insurance I'd probably have to pay out of the nose for it. With my records in emergency rooms, I'm surprised they still set the bones I break, with as little as I pay my bills. I set aside a third of the money and it's actually a lot more than I was told to expect, the third of the cash would do nicely to pay my landlord for the next six months... which will put me three months ahead.

Fuck. Money comes in. Money goes right out.

I surrender and take the trip downstairs one-step at a time. This bastard scares the living shit out of me, I swear he had to be KGB at some point, or maybe he's just Russian and I've read too many Clancy books. Knowing my chances, he might actually be KGB, you never know in this town.

I knock three times and he comes running. I can hear him run with the grace of an overweight ape as he comes to the door. Sifting through the fifteen or so locks nailed into his door -- yeah my neighborhood is wonderful -- and I'm looking up at more grey hair than I ever want to acknowledge. Pushing its way through the wife-beater like a forest that needed a bad culling. The stench around this guy is mixed with old spice, and I suddenly wonder who he was expecting, but whatever was going to come here he's not exactly happy to see me.

"You have rent?"

"Hiya, Ivan, how's life?"

"My name is Dmitri, do you have rent, or not?"

He's not interested in joking, I'm not interested in giving away all this money, but he's bigger than me so I just hand him the roll of cash. "This takes care of what I owe you and plus some more."

"Good. Very good." He starts counting and nodding his head. Slowing down around the bigger numbers, probably to make sure it's all there...or he needs to remind himself how to count. Either way he's nodding in approval when he finishes. "Very good. You need to stop being so late, I might lose patience."

"Ah, c'mon, I'm your favorite tenant."

"You never give trouble, I do like you. But I only like you when you pay."

He slams the door in my face and I take the hint. The guy hates me. Who can blame him?

The door opens pretty quickly for the fat man, and white papers come flying at my face and smacking me in the nose. "Those are yours." His thick accent sounds and the door slams again. Two months worth of mail, I wonder if he knows how illegal that is?
Scattered all in front of his door, the cheap bastard could've let me keep the rubber band, at least now I know where all my mail has been going. I sift through the bills, the past due notices, the credit card offers, the lawyer notice...and wait, lawyer?

Shit, I'm being sued and Dmitri couldn't have at least let me know?

I take my time opening it, climbing the stairs as I go honestly more interested in settling the wrongs I did to make Amy run off again and I stop dead in my tracks. I read it three times before I realize my eyes aren't playing tricks on me, "What the fuck, man. You're kidding me."

The address reads Philly and I don't need any more information than that, my Uncle Jake lives -- well I should say lived -- there. The letter from his estate lawyer is dated a week ago, and I'm at least thankful that it wasn't mailed months ago, or Dmitri might've lost it. "Fucking… You've gotta be kidding me."

Stumbling into the apartment, I make a grab for the phone and dial the estate lawyer's office number. It rings twice, "Yeah, hi, my name is Rick Sheridan, I'm calling for, and yeah, I guess I'll hold."

I can't hear myself in my voice. I hate the sad sack sound my voice makes when I'm depressed. I wait for five minutes and a woman's voice takes over the phone, "Mister Sheridan?"

"Yeah, that's me."

"We've been waiting for your call. What in the world has taken you so long?"

I cleared my throat, "Landlord issues, he...well he withheld my mail."

"Doesn't he know that's illegal?"

"Guess not, I think he's KGB."

"Not all Russians are spies, Mister Sheridan."

I can count on two fingers how many Russians I've met and so far, I'm batting 50% on the spy theory. One out of two, my odds are still pretty good, though I guess the lady spies are made from sexier stock. "Yeah, I don't think he cares too much."

"We need you to come down to Philadelphia immediately."

"I'm not sure if that's good for me."

"Mister Sheridan, you're the only living person named in your uncle's will. If you don't claim the estate the state will auction it off."

Well that puts a brighter shine on my shit storm of a day. I guess that means I should forget trying to talk to Amy ever again; damn she was really fun when she wasn't pissed off at me. "How quick is immediately?"

"Now that I have you on the phone I can get the state to wait a few more days, but as far as immediately is concerned, you have until Monday to make your claim."

"Shit," I sigh realizing that finding this out on a Friday makes the day a lot less likely that it'll get any better. "I just got paid; I can catch the next bus out of the city."

"Very good, very good. I'll draw up the paper work and call me in the morning; we'll set up a place to meet."

"Than..." She hung up the phone. Damn lawyers suck.

Out of the shower and it’s on to the next order of business. I’m on the phone before I can find a clean shirt to wear and I try to make note not to pack all of them, as I still need to find one to wear. At the rate I’m going with throwing clothes into the only bag I have without holes burrowed through the whole thing, I’m going to need a post-it to remind me.

Shit, too late, I’m out of clean laundry.

The phone takes a minute or so to stop ringing, the fucker doesn’t even say hello when he picks up the phone. “Screening my call, JT?”

“Don’t call me that, Sheridan. It’s unprofessional.”

I can’t hold back the smile, “Those are your rules, man, not mine. I’m just letting you know I’m not going to be in town for a while. I need to head to Philly.”

“Actually, that plays in well with a job I had in mind.”

Shit. “C’mon man, my uncle died, I need to get to Philly.”

He laughs a little, he’s not much of a caring bastard. “It’s works, man. Just hear me out, and I’ll even buy the ticket.”

“You or the department?”

“Don’t be ridiculous, the department is paying for you, this is work not a personal favor.” He stops and I hear some papers shuffling around. “You heard about the shooting at the national building?”

“Yeah, couple days ago, why?”

“Write this down, I need your talents to get by a telepath mutie.”

I stand there for all three seconds with my notepad in hand and the ADD Cop gets distracted. JT mumbles something I can hardly hear to some other cop in the background and I just go back to finishing my hasty packing, really I’m just throwing balled up articles of clothing into my bag without any rhyme or reason. Waiting, it’s about the only part about my job I hate, it seems like I waste so much time just waiting for something to happen, but like my mother said it’s the story of my life.

It’s a full few minutes before he gets back to the business at hand, the son of a bitch almost scares me when he gets back to the phone.

“What do I need to do?”

“Yeah, that. Let’s talk at the bus station; we have to move fast.

“All right, I’m out the door right now.” I hang up, drop the cell in my pocket, and lock the door. I usually try not to work weekends, but who can argue with a quick payday, under the table at that? If this is as high profile as I think it might be, I might even make up the money I lost paying rent.

“Have you ever just had one of those days? Wake up in the morning and the sky is pissing down on the world, your world, from its giant pitch-black abyss? The phone rings and the machine relay your girlfriends’ voice to say – no confess it wasn’t her mothers’ house she’s spent the last week and a half and she hopes you can still be friends.”

I’m trying to stay interested in what this guy has to say, but he’s been at it for twenty minutes already, pessimism isn’t usually enough to bring me down, but this guy is something else. “Yeah man, one of those days, I hear ya.”

“It’s life man. Fucking life, the world will just piss on you all your life and then when you kick it, little shit no one can see just eats you. Literally man it’s the little shit that eats you away, nothing is left after that.”

Why is it when I have to take the bus I always seem to find the seats next to these kinds of people? “That’s a pretty dark outlook toward life, man.”

“That’s what my shrink said, are you one of those blood sucking parasites?”

“Nah, man,” he’s not convinced until I show him my license in my wallet, “I’m just cannon fodder the NYPD likes to kick bullshit they don’t have time for. You know, the kinda shit like, ‘hey Rick, some old woman hasn’t seen her kid in two days, you wanna look into it for us?’ I always get the same kind of shit.”

“No shit? You’re a dick?”

“I like to think I’m a pretty nice guy when you get to know me.”

He laughs and starts to explain the joke I’ve already heard about a million times this week, “I bet you know every one of Bogart’s lines!”

Jesus Christ, I wish Eight Ball would come out of retirement, or jail, what is he doing? Whatever, dying by cue-stick would be more gratifying than living through listening to this asshole imitate – poorly – Humphrey Bogart lines. I just nod and try to find something else to listen to besides some overweight movie buff reciting Casablanca one screwed-up line at a time. But everyone else had the good sense to listen to their iPods or sleep through this trip. I’m left going up shit creek and my paddle is in the fucker’s hands. I just had to be idiot enough to say hello to this chump, the job didn’t say I had to speak to him. If the bus ride wasn’t bad enough, listening to this guy vent all his inadequacies is enough to drive me insane.

Days like today, man I should take up smoking. All the real PIs do it; maybe that’s why Bogart always got all the ladies. Then again, maybe Bogart got all those women because he was fucking Humphrey Bogart. Bogart, what a fucker, the guy makes a career out of making this job seem glamorous, if he wasn’t dead already I’d…nah, I wouldn’t do anything, he’s Bogart man, and I’m mostly a pussy around movie stars anyway.

Fuck you, Hollywood.

The son of a bitch keeps talking and I think my silence eggs him on even more. “So my friend Lenny tells me I should tell my supervisor to fuck right off and boy I sure am glad I did!”

“Find a new lease on life?” I try my best not to sound bored out of my mind, I’m not sure if he’s paying attention or those acting lessons actually paid off.

“Fuck no; I used to work at the National Building.”

“Holy shit, no kidding?” Now, we start to get into some interesting topics.

“Yeah man, I told my boss to take that job and shove his keyboard up his ass. Two hours later, Lenny walks in and blows the place away. The son of a bitch took out almost all the middle management!”

“Damn, looks like your buddy solved all your problems. Too bad he had to do it with an auto-glock.”

“Yeah, great guy. That Lenny…hey, what the fuck…”

It’s all I needed to hear. The sedative quiets him a lot faster than I thought it might and I signal to my associate watching me at the front of the bus. He steps over and shows his badge to the hardly conscious pain in my ass. I do the right thing, help the cop get Lenny’s accomplice to his feet and relieve him of the two pistols tucked away in his jacket.

“Ronnie Lauren, you’re under arrest for the murder of seventeen people at the national building…”

The cop goes on and on and I’ve heard it about a million times this month. Don’t get me wrong, cops are great and all – they do pay my bills after all – but you’d think they’d pick up on some of that TV dialogue to spice up their lives, and by extension my life too. Hell, it might even earn them some street creditability if a few of them would walk that Shield sort of walk, instead of imitating the hard asses around their buddies. I dunno, put it into action, live your life according to TV, what could go wrong? But they take offense when you mention it to them so I’m going to keep my mouth shut this time around.

The sedative keeps the mutie asleep until we get to our scheduled pit stop. We escort him off the bus and into the waiting cruiser where a doctor shoves another needle into his neck. It’s all pretty impressive and the other passengers on the bus are completely oblivious to the entire thing. One of these days, I’m going to ask one of the cops how they keep the civilians from taking pictures and getting in the way most of the time. I mean it’s scary to think just how there is such a handle on these people, all these muties running around and even the beat cops shrug their shoulders at the idea of it all, until you mention one of the big names.

NYPD doesn’t make it public, and they’d come down on me pretty hard if I ever spoke a word about it. People like to think cops are stupid, and sure, they might do stupid things sometimes – they are mostly human – but no one ever stops to wonder how New York still has a rising population. With all the assholes, the public is afraid of, the kind of guys that Jameson prints about in that shitty tabloid everyday. If the cops didn’t have their kind of control, none of us would be breathing.

I nod to the Lieutenant that handed me this gig, nice guy, and I watch the convoy take off. Telepaths, man they freak me the fuck out, even thanks to the tolerance to most of it I receive from Sleepy taking up residence in my little corner of the mindscape. I miss out on a lot of the lower level suggestion stuff, and it’s probably why the cops would rather have me on their side than questioning everything they do, I’m not really all that great of an investigator or else I would have put two and two together and figured out how they do this by now.

Some of the other capes, though, they make me laugh. They think masks keep secrets. And yet little Ricky Sheridan is the naive kid, but really there are times I think about it and shit they're all pretty stupid, the amount of stuff the cops know about us would give Spidey some choice nightmares. If he only knew.

God damn, the bus is ready to pull off and I didn’t get my drink. Damn cops, they’re always taking too long. To hell with it, I just settle back down in my seat and enjoy the silence for a few minutes and stuff a pair of headphones into my ear after a couple of minutes. The music will keep me awake, but at least I’ll be able to relax, can’t be falling asleep this early in the day. Sleepy is still a recovering addict after all, if I don’t keep him on the wagon I’m pretty much fucked. It’s a vicious circle, but he appreciates it, even if he can’t tell me.

The motel six smells bad. There’s an odd mixture of cigarettes and…something else I can’t quite place. With all the hookers running around, I’m not sure I want to place it. At this rate, it might have been safer to sleep at the Greyhound station, at least for my health.

I’m not remotely tired, fucking wonderful. Spent the last four hours on a bus, listening to music and now I’m wired. There are a few bars just outside the hotel, but I’m new to town, I don’t know what is where and who is safe. I don’t like being in new places, I’ve spent my entire life in NYC and I don’t plan on moving at any point in my life…the odd part being that I haven’t seen my uncle since he moved to Philly.

Twelve years is a long time not to change your will.

To hell with it, I check the time. It’s just after ten and maybe, there will be some decent movies playing on HBO, though I’m not holding my breath. Well not for the movies, the stale smoke in the air has me breathing sparingly; I’ll be light headed enough in a few minutes; that should make whatever drivel I find on TV that much more interesting.

I let loose a long sigh, set the alarm for noon, and hope the Sleepwalker lets me get some sleep tonight. I’m really not looking forward to waking up in a strange place let alone on a rooftop somewhere in the middle of this strange place.