Warhead On Legs

Title: The Twisted Thread
Fandom: Original
Word Count: ~23,000
Rating: R
Summary: Randi wanted to be a trauma nurse because the strange things in the world just rolled off her back. The Hellhounds, the magic users, the necromancers. But one look from a biker across a library circulation line throws everything in her life out of balance. She won't believe in true love, can't believe she's doing this, but it keeps happening to her anyway. And that's just the beginning.
Contains: Descriptions of violence, character death, unconventional non-/dub-con
Author's Notes: Many thanks, as always, to my incredible Beta Brute Squad for cheerleading and editing work. Thanks to dragon_gypsy, who found what one of my editors has dubbed "could damn near be the theme song for Black Ice in general."

Mix
Part 1 || Part 2 || Part 3 || Part 4

( The Treaty )




Coda: 
"You lied to me."

She didn't argue. She didn't even try to explain, just stared at me with her arms folded like I was in the wrong, here.

"You lied, and you used me. How long have you been lying to me? The whole time we've been working together, or was that just the part where you're a faerie? And then you needed a patsy and I just happened to ..."

"You weren't a patsy."

The way her voice shook I kind of thought she was upset that I was upset. Except in order to care about my feelings she'd have to care about me at all, and I wasn't feeling that. "Then what was I? Your stooge? Stalking horse, that's what they call it, right? I was bait?"

Considering I actually was bait for this contingent of rogue pixies, and I couldn't believe I was even thinking that, she had no room to argue.  "You were..." Her lower lip caught in her teeth. "You were the best person I could think of to investigate. You don't stop. You don't stop to think that maybe this might be a little bit crazy, you just... go where the case takes you."

"Right into the Hellhounds' mouth." I ground my teeth some more. "You orchestrated this whole thing. Right from the..."

"NO."

I stopped because she yelled. Not because her eyes were going watery or because she sounded like she was about to crack, or because her glamour was finally slipping. I hadn't seen it slip before ever, had I? No, because if I had, I would have realized what she was. "No?"

"No. The necromancer wasn't me. You brought me in on that, I didn't start you on this, I just... helped you along."

"I... don't even know what to say to that. You didn't help anything. You used me, you and that damned dog both pushed me around like a toy, and..."

Her arms unfolded. "And what? Huh? What exactly would you like to yell at me about? Yes, we used you. Because the last thing this city needs is more bodies on the ground, and you know what would have happened if we hadn't? Civil war. Real war. Do you know how many people die in wars, you little shit? Have you seen the bodies?"

My turn to stand there with my lips pressed shut and too upset to say anything. "Obviously, you still know a lot of things I don't." Okay, maybe not too upset to say anything.

"The gum on the bottom of my shoes knows things you don't."

We both recoiled from that one.

"Fine."

"Good."

"Get out."

Cherry gaped. Her lower lip wobbled, her eyes went wide and watery. I couldn't tell if it was on purpose or if she really was hurt, and I didn't care anymore. "You w--"

"I don't care. Shut up. Get out. You used me, and you haven't even said you're sorry for it. We're not friends. So give me a case, ask for my help, and pay my retainer, or get out."

She narrowed her eyes at me on that last part. "And if I have a case for you?"

"I'll recommend someone." Because she was still an attorney at the DA's office, that part I'd checked out and it turned out to be true. I still had no idea how. "Now get out of my office. And don't come back without a federal warrant."

She closed the door. Waited almost a full minute in the hall, her black silhouette against the bubbled glass, maybe for me to call her back. I wasn't going to call her back in. She hadn't even said she was sorry.

Her heels clacked down the hall and faded away. And I sank back into my chair, giving myself a whole five minutes to feel shitty about what had happened before moving on to my next case.

"Hey, Mr. Chou? About your daughter..."  

I.

( The Case )



  
Interlude:
The rain glimmering off the streets did nothing for the smell. The pavement still smelled like a sewer; the whole damn city did. No amount of rain or street cleaning machines or scented bags of potpourri dumped down the grates could clear the air of that smell of human waste and human garbage. It colored everything underneath the sharp scents of the city's inhabitants, like sepia undertone in a painting.

Fists clenched, shoulders hunched, he walked. The rain dripped down the collar of his worn leather work coat.

This time of night, everyone was indoors or on a job. Heads bowed down and making their way through the rain, no one looked around to see what was going on. Hell, these days people did that seldom enough even in the daylight. Too many bad things happened because someone looked when they shouldn't have, because someone got involved. Safer for everyone if you kept your head down till you got where you were going. Kept yourself to yourself.

Of course, it helped if you knew where you were going. That was how you could tell a native from a foreigner. Natives had a shield of fear and uncaring around them, they didn't have to look up. They had their set paths, knew where they wanted to go, didn't deviate. Unless they were smart. Then they were unpredictable.

He liked to think he was smart. Unpredictable. After what happened the past few weeks, he had to be unpredictable. He was still alive.

"Fucking pixie bastards," the Hellhound muttered.

The rain eased off even from the drizzle it had become, giving up a little bit of moonlight through grudging clouds. Just in time for him to go indoors, but at least there was a little less cold in the air.

He walked into the laundromat. The sole occupant was offloading damp clothes from a washer and draping them over every tall rolling basket he could fit around him. He held up a hand for the other man's inspection that was covered in what was best described as a black woolen octopus.

"Socks."

With a look of disgust, the washerman shook excess water from the mess on his hand back into the unit and then draped each sock individually over the edge of the wire basket. The first man did not take his hands from his pockets.

"Did you check the traps?"

The Hellhound snorted. "Of course I checked the traps. There was nothing. Same as there's been nothing for the past three days, same as there was nothing before Chauncy bit it. Same as there was nothing before that."

His friend reached an arm into the washing machine and swirled it around, grimacing at the cold and the conversation and every other damn thing currently giving him fits of perturbation. "I still don't believe it."

The first man's eyebrows shot up into his bushy forelock. "Which part of it? The dead bodies? The blood on the wall? The..."

"Don't believe it's the pixies." 

He snorted. Hoisted himself up onto a washing unit and drew one knee up to his chest, leaving the other leg to dangle. "Not saying you're right, what do you think it is?"

The other man wrung his hands out over the open washing machine, spattering drops of icy cold soap-laden water everywhere. "Don't know. Necromancer, maybe, looking for the really good quality spare parts?"

"We hired a necromancer, she didn't find anything."

One by one, the carts creaked over to the dryer, followed by the muffled thump of clothes hitting the inner wall. "Maybe it's a Sidhe."

He shrugged. "Maybe, but when was the last time you knew one of them to come out of their little holes and take an interest in anything that happened topside? We don't even know who'd kick who's ass in a fight because no one's seen one in a hundred years. Hell, for all we know they're all dead down there."

His friend banged the door on the first dryer shut. "Shades. Water lilies. The government. Hell, I don't know." The next pile started disappearing into the other dryer. "Maybe it is pixies."

"As likely as water lilies. Those half-drowned whores couldn't stand up to anything, and half of them are human."

"No shit?"

He shrugged. "Had one, myself. It turned out she was a human with a real talent for holding her breath and a faerie fetish. Didn't mean much in the end."

Quarters clinked as they fell through the slots, and the dryers commenced to rocking. The two men looked at each other for a long moment, tension drawing out between them in sticky, tight-bound cords. The Hellhound flexed the fingers of his right hand, taking a breath and then letting it out again as he opened his fist. No point in satisfying a tawdry urge, or in thinking about it any further. Poor dumb bastard wouldn't know what hit him and he didn't want to tangle himself up with the guy any more than he already was.

"Shades?"

He blinked. Of course the other man didn't know anything about what he'd been thinking, but it was still strange to have his thoughts broken in on like that. "Shades. Um. Chauncy was seeing a Shade."

Now it was the other man's turn to blink. "He was seeing someone?"

"Don't look at me, I wasn't sleeping with him. She must have liked something she saw." He shrugged, not offering an opinion on the wisdom of taking up with a Shade. There were a lot of reasons any of them did stupid shit, and a lot of reasons not to take up with a Shade in particular. Listing them all would keep them there all night.

"So why do you think it's pixies? And don't say it's because Illyan thinks it's pixies."

"I won't. And it isn't. Think about it, we can't see the threat, can't hear or smell it until it's right there. It's tricking a lot of people somehow. It's in and out without leaving a trace. It's something with a huge axe to grind..."

The Hound leaning against the dryer snorted. "Pixies can't even lift a normal sized axe."

"Fuck you. You know what I'm talking about." 

He grinned. Teeth flashed. For a second, the lights in the laundromat seemed to wash the color out of everything a little bit more than usual, sharpen the focus. The air cooled. And then in the next instant everything was back to normal. Or would have been, if there was anything in the building other than them.

"So, nothing in the traps."

The other Hellhound shrugged. "Nothing in the traps. Just watching and waiting. Less you want to hire another player to try and shake something loose."

"Wouldn't be worth it. This is our business, not theirs."

"We don't even know whose business it is," he shook his head in disgust. "We're fucking blind, here, okay? We've got nothing. And we're being slaughtered in the streets like fucking humans."

"There's always a bigger predator, Gerard. We've been on top a long time. Maybe it's just ... maybe it's our time coming around."

The Hound shook his head slow and easy, rolling it side to side on his neck. "No, this is someone. Damned if I'm going to lay down and die for them."

Hadn't looked like either of the other two had laid down and died, either. At least, not on their own will. But that didn't matter too much, either way.