Snakes & Ladders (24 page)

When he reached the west side of the road, at the top of the hill, the Adder moved inside the nearest apartment complex. Hermon Heights was a standard project slum – a dilapidated building, screaming of neglect and falling down all around him. But it was no doubt cheap on rent and, even better, Hermon Heights had no onsite manager.

Inside the slum, the air was just as cold as out. The halls were dim and the walls felt uneven, giving the corridor a slanted feel. In fact, everything felt off-kilter, warped.

Or was that just him?

The Adder walked down the eastern hall of the main floor and opened the door to the last room. Unit 109 was unoccupied, and the residents of the other units were smart enough to leave each other alone.

One of the unwritten rules of the projects.

Once inside, he closed the door behind him, then turned to face the room. Straight ahead was his collection of electronic equipment, already set up and ready to go.

The computer with external drive and signal receptor.

The monitor all hooked up with a colour feed of the target suite.

And, of course, his
supplies
.

He grabbed the cans of varnish. Four for the job; one for the police. Then he snatched the can of Coke from the table, popped the cap and chugged some down. The sweet caustic liquid burned his throat wonderfully. Outside, the sky was so big and so clear and so icy pale blue. It made the sounds of laughter invade his head once more, and the Adder could feel tears welling in the corners of his eyes. He picked up the screw gun. Gave the trigger a squeeze. And listened to the soft steady
whirr
of the motor.

He closed his eyes and listened to it for a long moment. Until the laughter faded and he could think again.

It was time to get to work.

They were halfway to Sarah Rose’s address when Felicia gave him a jab.

‘We need to make a pit stop first,’ she said.

‘Where?’

‘Ladies room. Any place.’

Striker was concerned about getting there. ‘Can you hold it?’

‘I wouldn’t ask if I could.’

Striker just nodded. A few blocks later, at the corner of First Avenue and Rupert, he pulled into the Chevron lot. The owners of the gas station were police friendly and gave cops free coffee. More importantly, the bathrooms were normal – clean, tended, and free of black lighting and discarded needles.

Felicia hopped out and ran inside.

As Striker watched her go, he felt his cell buzz against his side. Hoping he was receiving another text or email from Larisa, he immediately pulled out the iPhone and read the screen.

It was an email:

Striker frowned on reading it. More riddles, more gibberish. Though when compared to the last, more stable message, the sender seemed to be spiralling out of control.

He got on the phone and tried to trace the message. Within seconds, the tech provider told him exactly what he expected to hear – the email was untraceable, most likely sent through an offshore proxy server. Striker nodded absently as he listened to the man. He hung up, called Ich, and the VPD tech said he would look further into it.

Moments later, Felicia returned to the car. She brought with her a pair of gas station sandwiches – egg salad – and a couple of chocolate milks. She dropped a sandwich in Striker’s lap, gave him a quick look and knew something was up.

‘What now?’ she asked.

Striker showed her the message, and she read it through slowly as she tore the wrapper from the sandwich. Striker did the same.

‘Friggin’ creep . . . How did he get your number?’ she asked.

Striker shrugged. ‘Who knows? Probably through the work directory.’

‘But this is your
personal
phone.’

‘My work phone forwards to my personal one, and the work phone is listed.’

Felicia thought this over, then swore. ‘I don’t like this.’

‘The sooner we get Mercury, the sooner this entire nightmare can end,’ Striker said. ‘But first we have to make sure Sarah Rose is safe.’

He tore a bite out of his sandwich, put the car into Drive and hit the gas. He wanted to get to Sarah Rose’s place. Suddenly, it seemed like they were running out of time.

The address for Sarah Rose – the one Striker got from Dr Ostermann – was in the two hundred block of Princess Avenue, and the building was aptly named Princess Place. It was essentially a social assistance-funded, outpatient programme for the drug addicted and mentally ill, with assisted living and onsite medical staff. The exterior was made from faded pink stucco that was now reinforced with white smears of spackle that looked like scars on skin. Dark iron bars lined every window.

Princess Place.

Where no princesses lived.

Felicia got out of the car first. She looked for a long moment at the building in front of them, then met Striker’s stare. ‘Last time we were here, Thunderchild tried to stab you with a sword.’

Striker smiled. ‘Ah, the memories. We could reminisce forever, but hey, duty calls.’ He headed across the road to Princess Place. Before he reached the sidewalk, the front door of the facility flew open and crashed into the wall with such force that all the windows rattled. A small woman, terribly thin with red-dyed spiky hair, came stomping out, turned south and then marched on towards East Hastings Street.

‘Stole my fuckin’ ROCK!’ she screamed, and gave the building the finger.

Striker barely gave her a glance; this kind of behaviour was all par for the course in the Oppenheimer area. Before partnering up with Felicia, he had spent three long years here, during his time in Patrol, dealing with everything from the never-ending clumps of passed-out drunks to the cocaine-psychosis stabbings that were commonplace in any one of these slums.

He gestured to the building ahead. ‘You ready for a walk down memory lane?’

‘I’m still trying to forget my last time here.’

Striker smiled at that. He pulled open the front door and walked through the opening into Princess Place. He took in a deep breath, and winced. As always, the place smelled of body odour and piss.

The foyer around them was busy with crackheads and crazies – all of whom were one step from life on the street. Princess Place was the end of the housing line for most. It was cluttered and dirty and never seemed to hold a moment’s peace. And the angry screams from the floor above were a testament to that.

‘Fight up there,’ Felicia said.

Striker didn’t hesitate. He bounded up the stairs to the second level, then found his way down the hall to unit 212. Sarah Rose’s room. When he reached the unit, the door was wide open and the room was empty. Completely. Not even a chair was left inside. The place smelled of bleach, like it had just been cleaned.

‘Another dead end,’ Felicia said.

‘Let’s talk to the staff,’ Striker said. ‘Maybe she’s changed rooms.’

They headed down the stairs again. By the time they reached the bottom, the sounds of another fight had erupted – this time, sounding much higher. Maybe third floor. Striker stopped and listened to the yells.

‘Too much self-medication,’ Felicia said.

‘What do you expect? We’re in Crack Central.’

Striker was still concentrating on the noise up above when the wiry redhead returned from Hastings Street, still yelling about someone stealing her rock. Striker turned to keep an eye on her. As he did, he caught a glimpse of the old brick building across the road, on the other side of East Cordova, a half-block down.

The Social Assistance office.

He nodded to Felicia. ‘You still got your contact at the welfare office over there?’

She nodded. ‘It’s been a few years, but, yeah, he might still work there.’

‘Well, if Sarah Rose has ever lived here, then she’s definitely picked up her cheques from that office before. You go over there while I talk to the staff here. See if you can work some magic on your man. Find out where they’re sending her welfare cheques.’

‘You mean, if they’re going anywhere at all – Sarah’s records indicate she was in Riverglen for quite some time. So she might not even have an outside address yet.’

‘Hey, it’s worth a try. Zero plus zero still equals zero.’

Felicia thought this over, then nodded. She headed for the door, stopped and looked back.

‘You sure you’re gonna be okay here all by yourself?’

Striker looked through the safety glass of the onsite nurse’s office and spotted a tall blonde woman. She was over six foot and large. Striker knew her, and he smiled. ‘I’m not by myself.’ He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder. ‘I got Nurse Ratchet here to protect me.’

Felicia gave the nurse’s office a long look, apparently still uncomfortable with leaving him. ‘Be careful,’ she finally said, and left the building.

Striker watched her cross the road and walk through the tinted front doors of the Social Assistance office. Once she was gone from view, he blinked, snapped from his thoughts, and turned towards the nursing station.

Inside the protected area, behind the locked door and safety glass, was the nurse. Striker couldn’t recall her name, but upon seeing him, she smiled, got up from her desk and opened the office door. She leaned against the door frame and crossed her arms, and Striker noted that they looked strong across her chest.

‘Constable Striker,’ she said. ‘Or is it Corporal by now?’

‘Detective.’

‘
Detective?
Well la-dee-daa,’ the woman said. She extended her hand to him, and he took it. ‘Janice, in case you forgot. I’m the onsite nurse here. You helped me out a few years back when one of our patients was delusional – Johnny Thunderchild.’

‘Thunderchild.’ Striker nodded. ‘How could I forget?’ He looked around the foyer and all its connecting halls. Already, many of the live-ins were gawking at him. ‘Maybe we should take this into the office,’ he suggested.

Nurse Janice agreed.

They went inside.

‘Coffee?’ she asked right away.

Striker declined. ‘No time. I’m here to speak to one of your patients,’ he explained. ‘A woman named Sarah Rose. I thought she was up in 212, but apparently not.’

The nurse immediately shook her head. ‘Sarah? God, she hasn’t lived here full-time for close to a year now, I bet. Nine months, at least. And that was probably before her stint in Riverglen. She did come by here for a few days – on a part-time temporary basis just a few weeks back. Stayed a half week or so, then was gone again.’

‘You know where she went this last time around?’

The woman made a
who knows
face and approached the coffee maker. The brew looked thick and it smelled burned. Striker watched her pour herself a cup, then add a healthy dose of cream to it.

‘We have no idea where Sarah went,’ she finally said, then sipped and tested her drink. ‘The woman just took off on us one day. Which is too bad because who knows where she ended up. We tried to get her into Belkin House, but she said no to that. And then we tried the Lost Ladies shelter on Marine. But Sarah refused that, too. She was very . . . particular about where she would go. In the end, she left of her own accord and, to be honest, we were thankful for it. We just wanted to get her out of here. And
quick
.’

Striker frowned. ‘Out of here? Why?’

Her response was telling: ‘Because of Billy.’

‘Billy
Mercury
?’

The nurse nodded. ‘That guy had a strange thing for Sarah. Just wouldn’t leave her alone. He was delusional. Psychotic, really. And not just about her. He was paranoid about the doctors, too – kept telling everyone who would listen to him that they were giving him experimental medication. Stuff the army had used overseas during the war. That they were all in bed with the pharmaceutical companies and using patients as test subjects –
guinea pigs
, were the words he used.’

Striker took out his notebook. ‘Billy has a history of paranoia. Delusions, too.’

Janice sipped her coffee. ‘You don’t gotta tell me that. He was always in here, talking about demons and the devil and evil ghosts. And he was always off his meds. One day, for no reason at all, he punched right through the window over there. Tore his hand up really bad. Needed over seventy stitches to close the wounds.’

‘Bad cut. Was he high?’

She shook her head. ‘That’s the scary thing – he wasn’t. We’d just had his blood work done as a favour to Triage. And he was absolutely clean . . . You should’ve seen the blood; it just
poured
from his hand. I thought we had an arterial bleed for sure. And Billy, he just stood there and stared at it. Like it was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen . . .’

Striker wrote this down, then looked up. ‘Any other strange stuff?’

‘With Billy? Lots, sure, always. He seemed to get even worse after that. Really
obsessive
with Sarah. Kept saying he knew she was whispering to him at night. Creepy stuff like that. Said he heard noises.’

‘What kind of noises?’

The nurse shrugged. ‘I dunno. He never really said and I never really asked. I just wanted Sarah to move out of here because of him. For her own safety. And to be honest, Billy scared the hell out of me and the rest of the staff, too. When they committed him to Riverglen, we all breathed a sigh of relief. He’s gonna kill someone one day. Her, or one of us.’

Striker stopped writing and met her stare. ‘Well, watch yourself, Janice, because he’s out.’

Her face tightened. ‘Are you fucking kidding me? They let him out again?’