Ch. 55 – Humpty Dumpty

The wind whipped through Derrick’s hair, as he tossed another brick at the concrete wall. It cracked in half, the pieces clattering onto the building’s roof where Derrick was hiding from the world. He had to break something before he could work up the courage to tell Tony that the Leopards had fucking robbed their shop.

Fucking gangs. Fucking White Leopards. Maybe—no, almost certainly—if they weren’t around, some other gang would have moved in and started terrorizing Chinatown instead. But since it was the Leopards who were here, Derrick hated them especially.

Derrick needed to talk to Theo. When Raymond came in with that busted lip of his, he mentioned that he was acting on a ‘Boss’s’ orders. That boss was probably higher up than Theo, since Raymond didn’t seem to give a fuck about Theo’s orders, but Theo could still be held accountable for what his fellow gangster had done. Derrick had to at least try to hold him accountable, anyways.

Derrick would make that call to Theo after the fiery pain in his chest had subsided. He needed to break things first.

A shout came from below, in between the cracking noises of brick on concrete.

This area of Chinatown was usually quiet and deserted, which was why Derrick came to the rooftop here to throw bricks in the first place. The shouting was faint, muffled, as if it was trapped between layers of stone and struggling to get out. Derrick picked a brick up and crouched, stepping around chunks of other broken bricks as he made his way to the edge. He popped his head past the edge, looking down upon the stone walls, which stretched downwards until they converged on the small line of asphalt that formed the alleyway, deep in between his building and the next. He was just in time to see a man in a white cap and jacket kick another man who was collapsed on the asphalt.

A Leopard. The man on the ground being kicked seemed like yet another drifter wandering through Chinatown in search of a dry place to sleep. Or was he someone familiar? Derrick felt like he had seen that set of dusty rags before, although when that had been, he couldn’t remember. The drifter kept his hands over his head, curling into a ball to avoid the worst of the kicks. It wasn’t enough, apparently, as his head snapped back when the Leopard’s foot connected.

Another yell. A separate man at the mouth of the alleyway ran into the alley’s shade, and up to the White Leopard, shouting something so fast that the sounds all blurred together. Derrick was high up on the roof, so it was hard to make out what any one of them was yelling. Wait, was that man—

It was Mister Kim. The man with a death wish, staring down the White Leopard, was the friendly, hardworking Mister Kim. The man who’d always thanked Derrick profusely when he got his leg fixed at the shop. The man who’d given Derrick a necklace meant for his own dead nephew. Mister Kim was holding a stack of air filters with his trademark red gloves, gesturing wildly with them at the Leopard. From the way he stuck his neck forward and tapped his leg prosthesis on the ground as he spoke, it could only be Mister Kim. Shit! Why had he gotten involved?

The White Leopard gave the drifter on the ground one last kick, and turned to face Mister Kim. The alleyway was narrow, and the Leopard, although not a huge man, blocked the whole span of it as he swaggered back and forth. Mister Kim craned his head, trying to look past the Leopard, who had already closed half the distance between him and Mister Kim. Mister Kim waved his arms, and threw one of the air filters he was holding at the White Leopard. But the Leopard stepped to the side, and the filter clattered harmlessly to the ground behind his feet.

The White Leopard stopped within a foot of Mister Kim, who also stood his ground and kept shouting as the Leopard started jabbing him in the chest. The poor handyman might have been too scared to move away; or maybe he stayed out of a sense of altruistic obligation to the drifter who was getting beat up?

Mister Kim and the White Leopard were right underneath were Derrick was. The White Leopard kept yelling, almost loud enough that Derrick could understand the words. He was going to get more and more violent, now that he had locked onto his next target. If he was nasty enough to be a Leopard, he’d probably bash Mister Kim on the head, and split up the man’s belongings and business with his gangster friends the very same day.

Mister Kim was just an old man. Despite the toughness he’d built over his many years as a handyman, his bones were weaker now, as he’d often told Derrick when he’d complain of the aches and pains that came with age. It was a miracle how he kept working and smiling everyday despite living in gang-infested Chinatown.

The White Leopard pushed Mister Kim back, making the handyman stumble and fall backwards. His head bounced against the pavement as he hit the ground. Derrick bit back a yell.

The Leopard took another step forward, but then, instead of rushing to kick Mister Kim in the head, like he’d done to the drifter, he turned around and took a step into the alley, towards Derrick. Derrick ducked his head back behind the edge. Had the Leopard seen him? Wait, no. If the Leopard was going for Derrick, he would’ve been walking towards the ladder that led up the rooftop. Derrick moved over a few meters on the roof just in case, and peeked over the edge again. The Leopard hadn’t moved any farther, still within striking distance of Mister Kim, only he was crouched over something up against the wall of the alley. It looked like a bag, of some sort.

After rummaging through the bag for a few seconds, the Leopard pulled his phone out of his pocket and whipped it towards Mister Kim, who was still writhing on the ground. He stayed in place, pointing the phone at Mister Kim, and then at the drifter who had already fallen still. The Leopard was crouched so close to the wall, that if Derrick just reached out his hand, it would be right above the Leopard’s head.

There was only one reason the Leopard would be recording Mister Kim: to mark him for death later on if the gang so chose to kill him. Then, the Leopard reached out and punched Mister Kim in the head. The handyman’s head jerked, as if he’d been shocked awake, and then he curled up into a ball, like the drifter had.

Derrick gripped the edge of the wall he’d been hiding behind. Back when he was a kid, there was a series of murders that had made the news; the victims never knew what hit them, and had died bleeding out on the streets. It had turned out that the killers were just a group of kids, who’d decided it would be fun to drop bricks on people from tall buildings. They had used common red bricks you could find at any construction site: just like the brick that Derrick was holding in his hand.

Derrick held the brick over the edge of the building, lining it up with the Leopard’s head.

And then Derrick dropped the brick.

The solid red blur fell, growing smaller and darker as it sped toward the small line of asphalt between the two stone walls that stretched down to earth. It fell straight and true as if drawn to the Leopard’s white cap.

And when it hit the White Leopard’s head, both of them dropped to the ground: the brick broken in half, and the Leopard crumpled to the floor. A small patch of red appeared near the Leopard’s neck, staining his white cap and jacket.

Mister Kim crawled backwards on the ground, whipping his head left and right, as if searching for some ghost or sniper that had struck the Leopard down.

“도망치다,” Derrick screamed at the top of his lungs. It meant ‘run away’ in Korean, something that Derrick picked up quick from hearing the Korean punks who hid out in Chinatown to avoid their loan sharks. He ducked back behind the lip of the building, in case someone had noticed where the scream had come from.

After a few seconds, during which Derrick couldn’t help but count his breaths, the noise of Mister Kim’s grunting bubbled up to the top of the building where Derrick lay, flat against the surface of the roof to avoid detection.

Derrick stuck his head out again. Mister Kim was supporting the Drifter on his shoulder, and the both of them walked off towards the other side of the alleyway, away from the main road. Something the drifter was carrying kept banging against the his side as he limped along with Mister Kim. The two of them had a surprising amount of energy after having the shit beaten out of them, and they rushed down the length of the alleyway in just a few seconds; thankfully no passers-by had seen Mister Kim at the scene of the crime.

The only one left in the alley was the White Leopard, who was oozing blood, lying still on the ground.

Derrick was on the roof, so there was no way to go but down. He swung one foot over the edge and rested his weight firmly on the ladder. Ignoring the vertigo, he looked down towards the small strip of asphalt down below, to make sure the Leopard wasn’t waking up. The Leopard was still, although the small puddle of blood near his head slowly grew.

As Derrick let go of the edge of the rooftop, reaching for the ladder with his left hand, he saw the smear of blood on his palm. Shit. Derrick had been throwing bricks for almost half an hour. If someone came by the alley later and saw fresh bloodstains on the ladder it would be another lead for them to track him down. His cut and cracked skin, chapped from the cold, dry air outside, was going to keep bleeding, but he could at least wrap it in his sleeve while going down the ladder.

And down he went, shaking the ladder as he went down so fast that his left hand was almost slipping from rung to rung, until his foot got stuck on a rung, and the ladder escaped through his fingertips. Derrick slipped, and reached out for something solid—anything solid—and found the ladder’s side with his prosthetic hand, its attachment creaking at the interface with his stump.

It was hard to breathe. The cold metal of the ladder chilled his body as he clung to it. Slow down, Derrick. One step at a time. He readjusted his grip, and continued down.

The ladder clattered as he went, stepping down one rung at a time, until he reached the ground and settled back onto his soles. Then, reality hit.

Life outside the alley went on like normal. It was the quiet part of Chinatown, so the hum and vroom of a single passing car was all that penetrated into the alleyway.

But a dozen or so yards past where the alley entrance cut off the sunlight, laid the bloody brick, and a White Leopard lying still on the ground, stained red. His white cap had fallen off, and blood oozed from his buzzed head. His face came into view. It was Raymond: the Leopard who had come looking for protection money. The one who’d left an open wound on Derrick’s cheek from slapping him with rings on. And the one who kept pushing to know about Derrick’s past. Raymond had been wearing his gang’s signature white cap and jacket, so he hadn’t been recognizable from the rooftop, but now that Derrick was right in front of him, it was unmistakable.

Raymond’s chest had seemed still from a distance, but as Derrick came closer and held his breath, the slight up-and-down movement of Raymond’s chest became obvious. He was still alive. Derrick glanced back and forth. Both ends of the alley were empty. There weren’t any surveillance cameras pointing into the alley, either. Derrick could probably leave, and Raymond would wake up later, having no idea that Derrick had ever been in this alley. If luck would have it, he might also have some short-term memory loss, and forget that Mister Kim had interfered with Raymond’s shake-down of the drifter as well.

But if Raymond woke up and remembered everything . . . he’d tell his gang about how Mister Kim had gotten in his way. And maybe he’d even assume that Mister Kim had knocked him out somehow, since he had never looked up and saw Derrick on the roof. The Korean man and his wife would be dead or dying within the week.

And what would Raymond do after he’d gotten his revenge? He’d asked so many questions about Derrick’s past: dangerous questions, that would tear apart the whole facade that kept Derrick safe. If Raymond woke up and went about his business like usual, well . . . the Leopard had said it himself: he’d come visit Hack Alley, and drag Derrick back to the Leopard’s HQ for questioning.

Why did this Leopard need to investigate, and dig up Hack Alley’s secrets, anyway?? What had Derrick done wrong? Was a quiet, shitty life, with an ugly-ass face too much to ask for?! Having to clean up after his own boss while the man chased bar girls, and never having a chance to find love for himself . . . Derrick had never tried flying too close to the sun. He was fine with wriggling around like a worm, deep within the dirt: small and ugly, but safe at least. But the White Leopards wouldn’t even let him have that.

Maybe it had been bound to happen some day: someone digging through his past, and peeling away the lies he and Tony had taped together to protect him.

If Derrick was a worm, well . . . worms always surfaced after the rain, didn’t they? Were they driven upwards by fear of drowning? Or was there something about a rainy day that enticed them to risk tasting the fresh air on the surface? Either way, the worms were snatched up by birds’ beaks, and stomped underfoot by both the uncaring and sadistic alike.

Tears welled up in Derrick’s eyes, and his throat ached with each shallow breath.

He took one last glance up at both ends of the alley. No one was watching. No cameras were recording.

Derrick grit his teeth, and picked up half of the broken brick.

He rolled Raymond onto his back, and knelt at his head. The Leopard was still wearing the gold chain around his neck, and the designer watch around his wrist. All of the man’s prizes were doubtless taken through other people’s suffering. Derrick planted his prosthetic hand down on the asphalt, and raised the soiled brick high above the Leopard’s exposed temple. His heart raged in his chest . . . and looking down upon the Leopard, Derrick didn’t feel like a worm anymore.

Raymond’s eyes twitched—

And then his head bounced against the ground as Derrick brought the brick down: once, twice, three times, and more. His eyeball burst when Derrick’s arm grew tired and missed the temple. His nose caved in when Derrick gripped the brick in both hands, and brought it straight down. And his face lost feature after feature, until Raymond was unrecognizable through the blood, bruising, and torn flesh.

Derrick got up, back slick with sweat, and gazed down at Raymond’s head, which looked almost like a mutilated fruit. But it wasn’t enough to be sure he was dead; a lucky man could be beaten worse and live to tell the tale.

A discarded beer bottle, with its label just barely sticking on, stood near the wall. Derrick snatched it up by the handle with his prosthesis and smashed it against the ground, shattering the bottle, and gripping what remained: a long, wicked sharp blade of glass. And then, bearing down on Raymond’s neck, he stabbed up into it. Blood coated the glass, spurting and trickling down Raymond’s neck. It was red: the color of death. It kept coming, and coming. That much blood meant that a patient on the operating table was sliding out of your grasp. It was startling. But in this alley, Derrick wasn’t a mod-doc. Just a killer, who’d stabbed another man to death.

Derrick released the breath he’d been holding and pulled the glass out, wiping the blood on the Leopard’s jacket.

And then the world seemed to come back into motion. Another passing car, and the sputtering of a delivery bike’s engine pierced through the frenzied veil of his own heavy breathing. Derrick froze as another drifter shambled past the entrance of the alleyway, thankfully not curious enough to peer into the darkness, where Derrick stood over the remains of a monster.

Fuck, he had to leave. First things first, Raymond’s cell phone; it had the footage of Mister Kim on. If the Leopards found a phone at the crime scene, it would be one of the first things they checked. Derrick smashed it three times with a piece of the broken brick, and then picked it up with his prosthesis, shoving it into his hoodie pocket. Alright time go—Wait. THE MONEY. The money Raymond had taken, it might still be on him! Derrick got lower, almost sprawling on the asphalt to hopefully avoid being seen from the main street, and reached inside the pocket of the man’s hoodie with his prosthesis. There was nothing. Maybe his actual pockets then?

Just then, a group of punks walked by the alleyway, scuffing their shoes on the pavement. Fuck, he didn’t have any time. He had to GO.

Derrick pushed himself up off the ground, put his hood up, and depressed his heaving shoulders. Running out of the alleyway all out of breath would draw attention. He tried to slow his breathing, but his pounding heart ached for fresh air. He tore his gaze away from the Leopard’s cooling body, and walked away from the main street, one step at a time—

Shit, the brick! It had Derrick’s blood on it too. Even if the White Leopards didn’t officially have a DNA database to identify blood samples with, they could probably bribe a cop to grant them access. The bottle—and shards of glass—wasn’t a problem since he’d picked it up with his prosthesis, but Derrick snatched up both broken pieces of the brick and stuffed them inside his shirt. Hunching over to hide it, he turned away from the main street and left the alleyway, head down, feeling the bloodied brick pieces beat against his belly.

After he’d crossed a few streets, he dropped Raymond’s broken cell phone into a trash can, and kept walking, heart thundering as if he was still swinging that brick, over and over and over.

#

Derrick closed the door to Hack Alley behind him, and tossed his clothes in the washing machine, dumping a load of detergent into the hatch. You were supposed to soak bloody clothes, but if a White Leopard had found the body, dropped by Hack Alley to investigate, and saw a bucket with a bloody shirt in it, it was game over.

He started a cold laundry cycle. The washing machine shook the ground; its cyclic swirling beat like the banging of a drum throughout the shop.

The brick pieces, he brought over to the sink and scrubbed clean with bleach. He picked out the scraps of skin, and tossed them into a plastic burn bag. He would have to drop the brick pieces off somewhere random after he removed as many traces of his blood and the Leopard’s flesh from them as possible. He dropped the stained rags he’d been scrubbing with into the plastic bag, dropped that into another plastic bag, and dropped the whole package into his backpack. He then saw the blood stains on his own arm. He would have to get rid of them.

Derrick jumped into the shower and scrubbed small circles on his blood-stained skin. He soon sat down and held his arm close to the drain, to minimize the bloody water that flecked onto the shower curtain and walls. Filling a bucket with water, he splashed a bit on the walls to wash the bloody droplets down into the sink.

It was late afternoon, just about the right time to go dumpster diving again. He put on his regular dumpster diving gear and left, as if he was going on yet another routine trip to look for usable parts. The bus was as full as usual. The snoozing, overweight woman, who had become a common sight on the bus to his dumpster diving circuit, kept on snoring right next to Derrick. Nothing was wrong. No one could see the plastic bags with the shreds of Raymond’s face inside his back pack.

It was just a normal dumpster diving trip. But this time, he dropped a few extra plastic bags off at the landfill deep within a pile of garbage, and far away from the landfill’s entrance.

It was dark when he came back and started the washing machine again for the third time that day. His clothes were still pink. God, what if someone made the connection . . . The machine cycled endlessly all throughout the evening, and he awoke at the table to the sound of the washing machine’s churning. His limbs were lead, and his eyelids drooped, so he just sat.

He had just killed a man. For the first time since he’d killed dozens of them, years ago, when he’d grilled a leap of Leopards like they were no more than cubes of meat on the barbecue. The memory of that smell drove fire into his veins. He got up, pacing, back and forth throughout the shop. What else should he do to keep the murder under wraps? To protect himself and Tony? Surely, it’d be more suspicious if he left town right away? The thoughts swirled around his head until his growling stomach told him it was finally time to cook dinner.

He had marinated some meat yesterday, in preparation for a stir fry meal. He pulled the small plastic container out of the fridge, opened the cap, and—

The smell of blood and soy sauce wafted up through the air. Derrick’s stomach heaved. The metallic tang reached down into the back of his mouth, and his neck dripped with blood—or was it sweat? Derrick threw the container at the counter-top, and reached up toward his neck, feeling around it. It was dry, it was dry—unlike Raymond’s. And his shaking hands were clean—just slick with sweat. He downed a glass of water, and then another, but his stomach still growled with hunger.

And so he pulled out the meat that he had marinated the night before and started stir-frying it, but the smell of cooked meat made him gag. Cooked meat with a smell like fifty bodies in a burning building.

Derrick ran to the bathroom, leaving the meat frying on the stove, and threw up in the toilet. Teary-eyed and weak, he stumbled back to the kitchen and tossed the charred meat in the trash, and tossed the trash out.

He settled for a dinner of microwaved white rice instead, to settle his stomach. Rice didn’t fill his stomach completely, as it kept growling the rest of the night, but at least the dizziness got a bit better.

What was he going to tell Tony? That he had killed a White Leopard? Would it make sense to tell Tony? Would the knowledge only put him in danger? If Derrick kept it to himself, he could truthfully say that Tony wasn’t involved . . . .

Maybe he needed to get Tony out of town.

Something clanged, and Derrick jumped in his seat—the shop was empty, there was no one there but him—and then the sound of running water came. Ah, it was just the washing machine . . .

He didn’t dare check the clock as midnight came and went, but it felt like he had been awake for a week before he finally drifted off into the next day.

The next day came. He went back to the landfill multiple times, searching for the plastic bags he’d thrown away, and was satisfied when he was no longer able to find them amid all the new trash that had been dumped. Derrick came back to the shop, and ran more laundry cycles on the clothes—still pink—that he had worn the day before, before finally cutting them into little pieces and scattering them throughout the city.

Before he knew it, three days had passed since Raymond showed up.

And no one had come to Hack Alley to collect the rest of the protection money.