Word Weld

The parking garage was largely empty when I stole inside on foot. My car was concealed in an alley downtown. This was not Orchard Square. At the Square I had met the Shadowman again and received my instructions. They made my heart sink. But I said nothing, lest I should get another sermon about my “debt” and struggle with my lack of gratitude.

And thus I found myself, once more nervous, though considerably less nervous than the last two times.  I made my way carefully along the second floor of the parking garage, until I got to the skywalk. It was a bridge of sorts, a walkway that spanned a busy downtown street and gave access to the parking garage from a large multistory building that was home to the offices of the University of Maryland, a college whose primary income was from online courses. It was also the brainchild of millionaire George Thomas Castle, and currently owned by Sarah Castle, his eldest daughter.

I stared down the empty corridor. The walkway was covered but open to the atmosphere via the sides. It was about a hundred feet long. It being so late at night, there was no one around except (I knew) janitors and security. I waited for a few minutes, until in the building on the far side of the bridge I saw the security guard walk by, stopping for a moment to check the door. Satisfied that it was securely locked, he moved on, and I stole across the bridge, trying to keep low.

One of the things the Shade had done when I met him was give me a change of clothes. My outfit consisted of everything black, and not just black, but a deep, intense black that made me blend into the darkness. I had my flashlight with me, and my gun, and he had given me boots that made no noise. I don’t know how or where he obtained these items in my size, but they fit perfectly.

I reached the glass doors of the building and pulled out another small item. It was a glass cutter. I had only used one once before for a shop class years ago, but I had seen enough movies to know how it was used. After attaching a suction cup to a part of the glass door just below the handle, I cut a hole around it and quietly pulled the severed piece out. Reaching in, I unlocked the door and entered. While proud of myself, I was starting to feel nervous again. I squelched my feelings with thoughts of the young woman I now loved, and bringing justice to her wicked half-sister. I felt like I was in a fairytale.

Next came the tricky part. I had to get up to the 10^th floor without being seen. Security was modestly heavy. Basically it was what you would expect from a big building. There was a lot of it, but there was far more building than security. My ears were listening for the slightest sound, my eyes sensitive to every light that might be a security flashlight. The hallways were fairly wide most of the time, and there were plenty of places to hide. I could not use an elevator, since they were monitored by cameras. In fact, a lot of the building was monitored by cameras, but the Shade said he was taking care of that. I could only trust that he was doing so. Even so, the elevators were a bad idea. So I located a stair tower via signs and entered one cautiously. The 10^th floor was eight flights of stairs up from where I was, and I flew up those stairs, my heart pounding.

It was around the 7^th floor, as I turned a corner, that I heard a door open above me. At once my mind filled with panicked thoughts. Frantically I looked for a place to hide as footsteps descended from above. The stairs were open and empty, providing no hiding place. The only thing even remotely useful was a window at the edge of the building.

It was merely a slit in the wall, really, about two feet wide, that looked out on a building beyond, a dark building. There was the slim chance that in my black attire I could go unnoticed, though the window itself was in a conspicuous place, being in the wall over the stairs themselves, and not the landing. I would have to climb up to it. Hurriedly I did so, having no other viable option. If I tried to open a door I would have been heard. I scrambled up to the window, faced the outside so my face was not visible, and pulled my jacket up over my head to hide the back of my neck. I had gloves on so my hands were hidden.

As I stood, my nerves declaring war on my senses, I heard the guard reach the landing and descend the stairs below where I stood. I heard the beep of his walkie-talkie.

“You clear on the eighth floor?” came a voice on his radio.

“Eight floor clear,” he responded, and stopped, I could tell, right where I was. There was no way he would not see me, but I was in no position to attack him! He went on, “Wow, it’s dark out there. Seemed lighter out when I was upstairs.”

I realized he must have stared right between my legs and outside! How he did not see me was beyond my knowledge. As my astonishment continued to render me stupid, the man resumed his downward journey. Strange. There was no way he could have missed me…

The man went down to the seventh floor and when the door closed behind him I hopped down. However he had missed me, I was still at large. Up the stairs I continued, until I reached the 10^th floor door. Easing the door open as quietly as I could, I listened. Hearing nothing, and convinced that the aforementioned guard was the only one up this far at least within earshot, I entered the hallway. This floor contained the staff offices, including Sarah’s.

I was beginning to wonder, in the back of my mind, if I was actually going to make it out of this building. It was dark as I made my way past the locked rooms where administrators did their work for the university. Sarah’s office was in the back, down a thin corridor, and after a waiting room. I made down the corridor and as I did, I noticed a light up ahead. I almost swore, but caught myself. Who could be up here at this hour?

I knelt down and now stealthily advanced toward the open waiting room. It was not only the reception for Sarah’s office, but the President’s and several others’. As I glanced up, I heard some papers rustling and then the tapping of keys on a computer. Then I moved a little closer and saw that it was the receptionist, a woman who looked at this distance older than me, probably in her late thirties, and she looked to be working late. Rats.

My thoughts filled with ideas. Could I somehow sneak past her? I might be able to reach her desk unseen, as the only light was the one at her desk and her computer monitor. Or perhaps I could distract her into going down another hallway while I made past her. Then again, I could just threaten her with my gun and lock her in a closet, or knock her out and tie her up, or…

I had to do something.  I knew myself well enough that I couldn’t bring myself to knock her out. It just felt too much like hitting a woman… and in fact was. If there had been no other way I might have done so, but as it was, I declined that option. Tricking her into going down another hallway was far too idealistic and with my normal fortune was probably a bad idea. I decided to lock her in a closet.

Making my way over to the desk, I was able to hide unseen. Then I sneaked around the side and stared up at her. She was looking at her computer screen, reading something she had typed. I rose slowly, directly behind her, and coughed deliberately.

She jumped a little, startled, and turned around, staring into the barrel of my gun, the second woman to do so since I had started using it in earnest. She was a well-dressed, executive secretary and was much younger than I thought; she was perhaps only twenty-two. Rats. For some reason doing this to an older woman made it easier. Now I felt like a real criminal.

Holding her breath, her eyes wide with fear, she looked from the gun to me. I should have been wearing a ski mask, but the Shade didn’t know I was going to have to do this. And come to think of it, I was taking too long again.

“On your feet,” I demanded, though not angrily. It would have been far harder if she had known I was not going to shoot her under any circumstance.

Slowly she obeyed, instinctively putting up her hands.

“Don’t shoot, please,” she said.

I then looked for a closet, and kicked myself mentally. There was no closet. I should have considered that before I put my lack of a plan into action. As the poor girl stared at me blankly, wondering if I was going to kill her, I realized there was almost nothing I could do with her. There was a restroom, but that didn’t sound like a convincing prison. The only thing I could do was to tie her up somewhere. Maybe there was a coat closet in Sarah’s office. I gestured to her,

“You have keys?”

“Yes,” she replied.

“Open Ms. Castle’s office.”

“Ms. Castle’s?” the girl sounded dismayed. “You can’t, I’ll lose my job!”

Rats. The girl must have been desperate to plead with a man in my position, which meant that the threat to her from helping me (even involuntarily) was pretty severe. It also meant I was being a real lout. At the same time, if she was an honest girl she had no business working for Sarah Castle.

“Please!” she went on, tears coming to her eyes. “I’ve already messed up! That’s why I’m working late! If I help you now, I’ll be fired for sure!”

“How can you be fired for something you had no control over?” I asked, though I wasn’t sure why. “Never mind, just open the door.”

Utterly distressed, she obtained her keys from her desk and then went to the door in question. I felt wretched, but I didn’t have time to worry about it.

“Nobody could expect you to die for some stupid company,” I told her as we entered the office.

“You don’t understand!” she sobbed. “I’m Ms. Castle’s personal secretary! You don’t know what she’s like! I know it sounds strange, but she would expect me to die for the company! If I don’t try to stop you, I’ll be fired, and I can’t be fired now! My family needs the money… My father is on disability and isn’t old enough to retire, and…”

“Listen, go find honest work,” I interrupted, being a jerk again, “you don’t need to be working for someone who would fire you for getting held up.”

“Ms. Castle will give me a bad record if she fires me!” she ignored my interruption, for she was now truly hysterical. “I’ll never be hired anywhere! That’s what happened to her last secretary! Please, I don’t know why you’re here, but you can’t do this, you just can’t!”

That was when the hysterical young woman did the only thing she knew to do at that moment. Flying in the face of death (not really), she flung herself at me, trying to get the gun away from me. She was much smaller than me, however. She grabbed my wrist and twisted the gun away from her, but with my other hand I tore one of her hands off my wrist and squeezed quite hard until she let go and, in pain, sank to the floor. Looking around, saw a coat closet… however, it had no door on it. Rats.

With no other option, I dragged her over to the desk and ripped the phone receiver cord out of the phone and receiver. It was not that long, but since it was coiled many, many times, when stretched it was far longer than it looked. As she sobbed, I bound her hands together behind her and tied them to the leg of the desk.

“Help, please!” she cried, and I was obliged to gag her using what I had available, namely a large wad of Kleenexes, and part of the telephone cord to hold it steady. Tears fell liberally from her eyes as I did so, and the only thing I hated worse than doing this was the fact that I had to. It was ironic to me that on my first adventure I freed some girl from her captors, and here I was, making some girl a captive.

But I had a job to do. I went over to the computer and turned it on. It just needed to wake up, and displayed a login screen needing a password. I pulled out a little slip of paper and typed what was written on it. To my relief, the computer booted up. The Shade wanted a very specific thing, a single file that existed only on the hard drive of this computer, in a ghost drive. The computer booted up slowly, but when it was finally where I could use it I began my hunt through the directories. This was expedited by the use of a special flash drive the Shade had given me, one that disabled security systems and tunneled through hidden places in search of its programmed file. And it found it! Finally, a job well done.

Before I even had time to savor the thought, I saw a flash of light and the door opened. A security guard stood in the doorway. I heard the secretary’s frantic muffled screams grow louder.

For a second the guard and I looked at one another. It seemed almost slow motion to me, his mouth opening, his hand going to the gun on his hip. Mine was on Sarah’s desk. I reached down, strangely calm, and fired the instant it was pointed. My aim was true, I shot and killed him.

I had done it before, so I was not as shocked. Perhaps I should have been. After all, he was someone’s son, someone’s Kyle. This girl was someone’s Candice. As I stared over my gun at the prone form just beyond the doorway, I realized something very important. Every man’s time may come any day, from an evil source, or from a good. Every man has a chance to escape Hell before that time comes. Those who delay do not believe. You can’t believe later, for that time may not come. The verse came to my mind: “…behold, now is the accepted time; behold, now is the day of Salvation.” My soul reconciled what I had done, before and now, with my heart, and while I was no less sorry I had to kill that man… I was not sorry I had killed him.

My hands went to the flash drive plugged into the computer. It was done almost immediately, so I removed it and stuck it in my pocket again and leaving the computer as it was, made for the door. It was then that the lights came on. I heard voices over the dead guard’s walkie-talkie. I was out of time!

As I rounded the desk and was nearly at the door, I heard a muffled cry. The young secretary, her face tear-soaked and streaked with demolished makeup, stared at me with the most piteous look I could imagine. For some reason she looked like the typical damsel in distress, like Andromeda or Guinevere. I felt like such a horrible villain.

“Time to go, Shay,” I heard the voice, and spinning, saw the Man of Darkness standing in the receptionist’s waiting room. Quickly I followed him down the hallway I had come from. When we reached the wider hallway it connected to, however, we heard shouts and saw a group of security guards pounding towards us. The Shadowman took out a pair of magazine-pistols and opened up, forcing the oncoming men to take cover in nearby hallways, behind couches, columns, or whatever else they could find. Meanwhile, we retreated. I avoided using my gun, since my ammunition was considerably more limited than his. I went all the way down the hall as the Shade covered me, and found, to my dismay, that it was a dead end, leading only to bathrooms on the one hand, and a conference room on the other.

“No way out!” I called, and running over to me, he shoved me into the conference room, firing a few parting shots as he entered himself. The entire far wall of the conference room was made of glass, and was in fact an exterior wall of the building, looking out over the street and across at another, even taller building beyond.

The Shade dragged me over to the window and fired a shot, shattering it. Cold night air, laced with a bit of drizzling rain, swept into the conference room, and along with it came the sounds of the city at night. Airplanes and a few cars made the most noise. The shouting of the guards as they came after us, however, was what we concerned ourselves most with.

“Lock that door!” he pointed.

I returned to the door and shut it, locking it. I then shoved the heavy conference table up against the door, making it secure in my opinion, at least. When I looked back, the Shadowman was gone! I ran to the edge and looked down, wondering if he had jumped! To my shock, he was hanging by one hand.

“You have to trust me, Shade,” he ordered. “When I let go, you must jump, understand?”

For a moment I faltered.  We were ten stories up.

“Shay!” the Shade’s voice came again.

“I understand,” I said, thinking about Kyle and Candice. What would happen to them I if I didn’t make it?

The black blob that was hanging onto the edge then suddenly began plummeting down into the abyss that was the descent to the street below. I leapt, having no idea how far to jump from the building. I saw sheets of glass rushing by as we free-fell down toward what seemed so much like our imminent deaths. Lights, and darkness, rushed by, and the cold wind chilled me as down I plunged.

I was almost enjoying my last moments on earth when I felt myself jerk to a stop! I found myself hanging, somewhere around the third floor, with the Shade gripping my shirt sleeve. His other hand had smashed through a window and gripped the fourth floor slab. There must have been glass, but he did not seem injured. I could barely even see him for the darkness above as I looked up.

“Shade!” he shouted loudly. “Get your gun!”

I grabbed his arm with one hand to make myself feel safer and with the other fetched my gun from my pocket.

“You know what to do!”

I was very close to the glass, even touching it. Even so, I knew there was no choice. I placed my feet against the glass to push myself out from the wall and then fired a shot right into the glass. My body swung into the opening now created as my feet no longer were pushing against the glass. Then I felt my lifeline, the Shade’s hand, suddenly pull away, and I tumbled ingloriously into the room. I did not even have time to contemplate any of this, however, as I was at once grabbed and lifted. It was my shadowy friend, dragging me through an empty office and out the door.

“The back way will be fastest,” he told me.

“What about my car?” I suddenly remembered.

“I’ll take care of the car; just get yourself out of here!”

The back way was into the alleys. While he disappeared around a corner I made my way out. Sirens were beginning to echo through the streets of the city as I made it to a stair tower and raced down the steps as fast as I could. The exit at the bottom was a fire exit, but I didn’t care, since our cover was already blown. I smashed into the door and into the alley beyond. A police car pulled up at the far end of the alley as more raced past it. I was already running the other way as I heard the officer jumping out of his car and yell for me to stop. I heard a gunshot and a sharp ping! as he gave chase. I raced into the shadows with the public servant in hot pursuit. If he only knew what I was trying to do.

I turned a corner and wondered where I was going. Then I suddenly became very certain of myself. I doubled back and stood just before the corner I had turned. I could hear the officer pounding down the way toward me. For a moment everything seemed to freeze, and I could see his face just rounding the bend.

My fist shot out and the policeman’s face plowed into it. The force, with his running, combined with the blow, rendered him totally unconscious. I turned and began to run again, wondering now what had come over me to do that. My heart was beating quickly, but I was not sweating. I ran down the alley and came out at a back street. There I found a car waiting with a door open. A man leapt out and I skidded to a halt just before the sidewalk. A big man had emerged. It was Willard, my nemesis, and to my great interest, his wounds were completely healed.

“You!” Willard clenched his teeth. His hand went for his coat and he pulled out a gun. Mine was staring at him just as his came to bear. We stared down our weapons at one another. I wondered what he was doing here. “You’re finished here, ‘Mr. Shade!”

Mr. Shade? I was wearing black, so he must have mistaken me for my accomplice. And what was Willard doing here at this hour? Did they know we were coming?

“You want to die together?” I snarled at him.

I saw in his eyes a glimmer of wavering.

“Kill him, you fool!” came a voice from inside the car. I could tell by the voice it was Sarah!

“He has a gun!”

“And you don’t?”

Gaining courage from the prospect of finishing this right here, I fired, hitting Willard in the arm. He let out a scream and fell onto the car, slumping down. I came up and kicked him in the head, much harder than I thought I could, for it knocked him unconscious! I knelt down by the door and looked inside. Sarah sat in the backseat, staring at me in disbelief.

“This ends right here,” I declared angrily, thinking of what she had done to her half sister, to the woman I loved.

Then I felt myself jerked back hard by my jacket collar.

“No!” I heard.

The Shade had stopped me! He dragged me into another alley and threw me up against the wall, then flattened himself against me! I thought he was insane until I saw policemen run past, unable to see a man hidden by the Shade.

It seemed like forever that we were there, up against the wall, as police everywhere combed the alleys. I even saw Sarah as I was peeking over the Shade’s head. She had a cigarette and stood with an angry expression at the opening of the alley. Then a policeman walked up to question her and she at once assumed a most distressed look.

It took a long time but finally the police moved on. Then we checked the street and when we saw it was clear, the Shade told me to stay hidden, and that he would be back shortly. In about twenty minutes he returned with my car. He drove up and let me drive once more.

“You have the drive?” he asked as we got on the road.

“Right here,” I took the drive out of my pocket and handed it to him.

“Good, this is our first bit of evidence.”

“Willard thought I was you,” I told him.

“Did he?” the Shade added the drive to the contents of his inner pocket, though it was so black I couldn’t see if he put it in his shirt or his coat. “Maybe I am beginning to have an influence on you, Shade.”

“An influence?” I repeated, chuckling. “Yeah. I had to abuse that poor secretary, not to mention ruin her life, and I had to kill a security guard, and punch a cop. I’d say all that was pretty much your doing.”

“It is good that you are becoming more capable.”

“Didn’t you hear me?” I reiterated. “I killed and man and ruined some girl’s life! Doesn’t that mean anything to you?”

“If it means something to you, then it means something to me,” he answered cryptically.

“And what does that mean?”

“Don’t worry, Shay,” he rubbed his arms, as if the physical activity of the night had been too much for him. “If you had not killed the security guard, something much worse could have happened. And it may not be so ill with the young secretary, my friend.”

“Do you care at all about the people you use?” I asked. “Do they mean anything to you? Or is the only thing that matters your crusade?”

“Shade,” he put a dark hand on my shoulder, “there was a time when the crusade was everything to mea, but not anymore. Even so, you must trust me.”

“I hope nothing really bad happens to that girl,” I shook my head.

“All will be well with her. Right now you need to get some sleep.”