Ch. 62 – This Had Better Work

Tony gripped his head, and cracked his neck a few times. The cracking sound sounded deeper and more satisfying the older he got, and really loosened himself up, but it had to be bad for his spine. Eh, the doc said he had big cholesterol and blood sugar problems to worry about anyways, so a little spine-cracking was small potatoes in the long run.

Derrick darted to and fro across the shop, like a dog searching for a bone. It was hard to keep up with the boy nowadays. It wasn’t all the beer, though . . . . Tony reached around his back to scratch at an itch that’d been taunting him since Derrick woke up him. His shirt bunched up, and rubbed against his round back as his fingers grasped for the spot. Almost . . . almost . . . . ACK. His shoulder cramped up, like an overfed toddler at the beach, and his shirt tickled against the itchy spot, as if taunting him.

Fine. Tony snorted. He backed up towards the back of the shop and rubbed against the textured wall. “Ahhh, yea, that’s the spot.” He’d rubbed directly on the itch, but—before the rubbing sensation had gone away—it was always hard to tell if the itch had been scratched away, or if it would stick around like a drifter at an event with free food.

Either way, it was time to get working; he couldn’t let the boy show him up too badly. Tony crouched down, gripping his knees for support, and came level with one of the shelves in the back of the shop. Hidden cameras, huh? He’d set up a few of his own back in school, trying to catch girls in the bathroom. Course, the only thing he’d caught was a slap to the face when a girl walked in on him taping the camera into place.

He’d been a dumbass back then, but if he’d learned anything about hidden cameras since high school, it was that they liked to hide in plain sight. This shelf was actually neat and tidy, and it looked the same as it always did.

The table to the left of it was a different story. There were papers, clear plastic boxes, and mugs strewn across the surface. Some of the mugs had spiderwebs in them, they’d be left out for so long. And given the general chaos of the table, it was hard to remember how its surface looked the day before.

Tony squatted down and squinted at the clear plastic boxes more closely. They all had some dust on them, but one of them looked cleaner than the rest. He streaked a finger across the box’s surface and rubbed the dust. The dust was fine, and had no grit to it, while the other boxes were covered with a coating of all sorts of detritus. Hmm. The box was suspicious. And there was only one way to find out.

Tony opened the box and dumped the contents onto the table. Various gadgets, parts, and old pens tumbled out, and Tony used his gut to keep them from falling off the edge of the table. Most of the contents was stuff he had meant to clean up maybe 5 years ago, but one gadget stood out as relatively new and untarnished.

And sure enough, on the side of the object, there was a miniature lens. “Found one,” Tony said. Derrick’s head swiveled around and he rushed over to Tony, as fast and jittery as a cocaine addict. “See here, it looks like a small camera,” Tony whispered, turning it over in his palm so Derrick could see.

“Quick, cover up the camera,” Derrick whispered. The boy reached out and snatched the camera up. “We don’t know if it’s transmitting through a different data connection or not.

“Mm. Right you are, my boy,” Tony said. “Mrmm. It just crossed my mind that I could’ve had this from a while back. It looks like the sort of wacky gizmo I’d get on bargain bin sales in the New Shore City tech markets.

“But you must’ve spotted something suspicious about it right?” Derrick asked.

“Yeah, the box it was in stuck out like a sore thumb. Well, anyways, we can keep the darn thing in time out until we search the rest of the shop.

The two of them took a few more hours searching the rest of the shop. It was easier work with two people, to help lift and move things around. But mountains of boxes would take them forever to go through. They ended up snapping pictures of the shop before touching anything else, and only investigating the outer layer of boxes, where cameras could be hidden and monitoring the shop. They were cutting corners, but that’s what you did when you were in a rush.

But, even after all that trouble, they found nothing else besides the small camera that Tony had spotted.

“Let’s call that the first sweep,” Tony said. His shirt was soaked through: kneeling and standing up had really gotten him sweating.

“Agreed,” Derrick said. He stood up and cracked his back, almost as loudly as Tony could crack his.

“You sound as old as I am! BAHAHAHAHA.” Laughing felt good, especially after the stress of finding out that they had a stalker problem.

“Well, I learn from the best,” Derrick said, with a slight grin.

The two of them dusted themselves off as best they could and had a drink of water. Derrick brought the cup over to Tony and set it on the table. Tony bent over and above his own belly to reach it, and then settled back, wobbling the chair. “So what’re your plans for today?” Tony asked.

“I’m going to try and contact my expert as fast as possible,” Derrick said. “They haven’t responded to my messages yet, so I’ll go ahead and try to find them.”

“Alright, then,” Tony said. “Say, could you stop by the hospital while you’re out, and get some implements autoclaved? Here, I’ll show you which ones.”

“I wasn’t planning to, but I can go if we need it,” Derrick said, lifting a hand up as Tony gripped his knees and prepared to get up. “Wait, you can stay there. Just let me know where the tools are.” Ahhh, he was a good boy. And Tony was lucky to have him.

Tony put his hands up. “I know, I know. I’m not lifting anything heavy. I have my big strong man to do that for me.” He fluttered his non-existent lashes. “The implements should be sitting out in the operation room.”

“Ha ha. Very funny. Maybe I will start building muscle some day,” Derrick said, as he jogged over to the operating room.

“No time like the present,” Tony called after him. Derrick was a bit of a skinny lad. He’d lost a lot of weight after the surgery all those years ago. He no doubt had some self-esteem problems, and Tony himself was to blame— “Fuck,” Tony muttered. He needed another drink.

“Alright, Tony. I’ll be off to go find the expert and get the implements autoclaved,” Derrick said. He gathered things up and moved quickly so fast he was almost halfway out the door before Tony swallowed the urge to reach for a bottle.

“Stay safe!” Tony called out after Derrick.

“You too, Tony!” Derrick called back. “Careful with that Xian guy, I feel like this whole boycott thing is going to drag us into a lot of trouble.”

Tony raised a hand, but couldn’t get a response out before the shop door had shut. Derrick was a wise lad. Wise beyond his years, even. He had a knack for keeping Hack Alley out of trouble during those dark, dark times that came like clockwork, where the only thing that seemed to matter was the beer stocked in their fridge . . . Even though the boy had been ready to die for killing a Leopard back when they’d been forced to save Ah Jun, his cooler mind prevailed. It’d be nice to think that Tony had something to do with that, but Derrick was a survivor; when it came down to it, he’d never be dumb enough to seriously threaten the Leopards.

That’s why Tony had to step up. It was his shop, so the buck stopped at him. And life had been better recently. Sally was here, and it was like her very touch poured strength—and dignity—into Tony’s chest. Change felt like it was at his fingertips. All he had to do was reach out and grab it.

Tony unlocked his phone, and scrolled through the sent messages to his old suppliers. The messages were short, professional, and very forward with Tony’s intent to rekindle his old partnerships with the suppliers. He hadn’t gotten a single darned response, but he’d keep working through his call list while they took their sweet time. If they decided to blow him off, well . . . he’d start driving to their headquarters once his body was back to normal. If he could get chummy with the suppliers again, Hack Alley could finally stop buying parts from scalpers, which would mean massive savings.

It could be just like the good old days . . .

His phone vibrated, and Can Can music started blaring out of its tiny speakers. It was Li Xian. Tony shook his head, and then answered the call.

Derrick was out, but Tony could make it over to the mahjong parlor on his own.

But with this stalker that Derrick had discovered, starting a big ole riot was dicey business. With all the commotion, the stalker could get the jump on him and the boy.

Tony said. Xian was a smart guy, but Tony wasn’t going to tell hi about the stalker. Not yet, at least. Besides, slowing down to find some more backers would give him and Derrick enough time to sus out the stalker, too.

Xian snorted.

Tony said.

Li Xian cooed.

Tony scratched his chin. At first just tickling it, but the more he thought, the deeper and harder his nails dug, raking along his stubble.

The good old days: was that just a nice dream? What was the point of faffing about with suppliers, when the Leopards were going to bleed all of Hack Alley’s earnings away?

Tony tsked and unthinkingly bit his lip so hard that he wiped a finger along it to make sure it wasn’t bleeding.

Li Xian continued.

Tony closed his eyes, and that night flashed before his eyes again. People were crawling along the street, blood pouring out of their bullet wounds. He had scooped up as many as he could, treating them in the shop, clutching onto their souls with his blood-soaked hands, until they inevitably slipped away. All as the smell of roasting bodies drifted in through the gaps in the windows.

Something was very, very wrong with this town, and the Leopards were most of it. And someone had to tell them that their time was up.

Li Xian yelled, clapping once, like the knife salesman that used to come around his parent’s house back when Tony was a kid. Man, I’ve gotten old. Those were some pretty good knives though. We kept them for almost a decade . . . I think. Unless pops had them replaced and I just couldn’t tell the difference. But anyways, this wasn’t about knives. This was about Chinatown’s future.

Fuck. This had better work.