November 1, 2015 

Police response times were under four minutes in this city, and Detective Alafogiannis was close to SFPD's headquarters.

Crouched over Paul Aniston, her senses alert to the return of his killer, she glanced back up every few seconds, always listening for a change in the warehouse's rhythmic buzz, drip, echo, and low creak. She had verified that he was dead. A kind of delirium left nothing for the detective to do but wait for backup, stoke herself up to go after the killer, or try to put the brains and blood back into the cadaver.

A sense of uselessness came over her. She formed her fist into a little boat and dragged it along the concrete through the deepest pooling, maybe a quarter of an inch deep, collecting a few millimeters on her palm and fingers, and gave in to the urge to tip the dirty plasma back into the hole in his head. It was a futile dribble. His eye socket was a hole big enough for her little fist to fit in. She didn't know where the flesh, bone, ocular tissue, and bits of encephalon from his head had flown to attempt a retrieval.

Her blood slick left hand kept finding its way back to the ring on her right, twisting and twisting. Sending blast doors flying was one thing, restoring the dead . . . that kind of magic she had sworn she would use only once more, then never again. Breaking the laws of San Francisco county was one thing, the laws of nature quite another.

Sirens brought her back to sanity, or at least back from the lowest point of madness to a much milder crazy. Detective Fog wiped her hands on Paul's jacket. She had disturbed the crime scene by playing with his splattered gore. Bringing her Smith and Wesson back up, she stood and examined the machinery, crates, and shadows ahead for movement, but everything was still and silent.

One step at a time, she made it across the room, to the corner of a large machine that she didn't know what it did but around which the killer had fled. There was no door to the outside, so she had the perp cornered unless they got a window open. From where she stood, she couldn't tell if the windows opened. The killer could still smash one, but there hadn't been any kind of explosion of glass to indicate that.

On a whim, she spoke out loud to the shadows, "Nick?" She waited in a silent moment and said again, "Nick Manardos?"

Her fear was ebbing. Maybe talking would distract or unnerve him. If he was Nick Minardos.

The killer was cornered, but that didn't make her the cat to his mouse. The mobster knew where she was, and she didn't know his precise whereabouts, and he had very dangerous claws. Turning that corner was a terrifying prospect. She was comfortable where she stood. "With the mafia, it's always the best friend they send to kill you, right? Which makes you, Nick."

A shuffle of feet echoed in answer to that question. At least it sounded like feet. A few seconds of that noise created an auditory picture in her mind; if it was accurate, it was Nick moving away from her. Of course, it could have been a decoy. All the same, the time had come to dart around that corner and see what was there.

She didn't think, just acted, eyes and gun ready as she moved into the open. Took in the rest of the room, the shapes she could make out with only the dusty light coming through the windows. The row of windows was higher than head height with nothing up against them to facilitate climbing, all of them closed; there was no killer, no movement. Only a few more machines and crates, nothing for her to take cover behind but seconds passed, and no one shot at her.

More shuffling. The auditory picture changed shape; if it was Nick, he was limping or dragging himself. He must be injured, or he would have killed her and left the way she came in. The sirens outside had stopped, and officers would be rushing in any second. It wouldn't do to get shot or to let him get away, but other than that, it looked like Paul's killer was about to be apprehended.

The murderer would be questioned, would give answers. All would be well.

There were windows on the far wall as well. Some of the machinery and crates blocked Detective Fog's view of whether there was anything a shuffling, possibly limping young mafioso could climb up to exit on that side. It was the side the cops would be coming in anyway, an eight-foot drop to the ground. The shuffling continued. Detective Fog put one foot in front of the other, gliding to the wall to her left to put her back against it even if there was no one behind her, eyes peeled for movement. She slid down the wall toward the next row of obstructions around which she could clear the room or find the cornered suspect and keep 'em cornered, blocking any last chance at escape.

The shuffling ruffled again, and with some confidence, she moved toward the corner where it was coming from. Some shadows and odd bits of obscure pipes and mechanisms flanking her also could have hidden a crouched murderer, so she kept an eye on it as she moved.

A flicker of light and shade preceded the blast a millisecond soon enough for Detective Fog to throw herself forward, roll over her shoulder, and come up with her revolver pointing. She turned to aim toward where the gunshot had come from. The concrete wall where her heart had been was cratered. The shots kept coming, she counted six in equal succession, but Detective Fog fired back at a target she couldn't see behind its cover. Her trigger finger pulled back hard three times before the incoming fire fell silent.

Continuing to move, she fell back to the unknown corner with its protection of steel containers, finding it clear except for some kind of press that someone had left on. She watched over a matter of some thirty seconds of safety — ready to shoot if Nick appeared around the corner. The press shot out a sheet of newspaper pages printed with today's headline, "IN-N-OUT BURGER SUES PALO ALTO STARTUP," in a ruffle that in the blind factory darkness had sounded like the shuffle of shoes dragging on concrete but now didn't at all.

A flash of movement to her right made her turn her head. A pair of uniformed cops had come around the corner from Paul's body. They were so silent she hadn't heard them coming. Now that they saw her, one of them said, "Put your hands up." The two were out of the line of fire from wherever Nick was hiding.

Malyssa put her gun down and obliged. Then she tilted her head towards the left, where the gunfire had come from. The cops were smart, and it was as if they could read each other's minds; one kept her eyes on Detective Fog, and one looked where she indicated. Both had weapons drawn. The one watching Malyssa took a second to glance at the crater of gunshots in the wall there.

"Slide your weapon over here," said the other. Malyssa bent down again and slid her revolver all the way to the officer, coming to a stop at the toe of a shiny black boot. The officer took the weapon. "Get up against the wall behind you, turn around, and place your hands on the wall." Detective Fog complied. Then with a hand signal, the first officer communicated her next move to her partner. The two moved into the middle part of the room, yelling to the person who had fired shots a minute ago, "Come out with your hands up!" In the distance, more sirens wailed, then stopped outside the warehouse.

Absolute silence followed. The two cops tensed, ready for anything, including a shot to the chest or head, and waited. Sixty seconds went by. A hundred and thirty. It was quiet. There was no breath. No gunfire. Every thirty seconds, the printing press churned out another newspaper, but that was it. Adrenaline and patience warred with each other.

The lights came on. The two cops were still ready for anything, but that didn't mean they weren't baffled by what they saw. Attached to what could have been a coffee roaster or maybe a smelter was an upright gun with a tripwire mechanism attached to the trigger and an elaborate series of cogs and machinery. Sci-fi-looking robot arms had fallen still, motionless, having completed their purpose. Whatever that was.

Behind that was the similarly motionless, slack body of Nick Minardos. Malyssa's somewhat haphazard three revolver shots had neutralized him: one to the head, not a bullseye but through the brain anyways, and one to each arm.

Minardos was tied up with rope to what looked like a giant hot water tank. His mouth was gagged, but that wouldn't have been enough to keep him as silent as he had been. Mute utterings should have been audible, the deep-throated cries of a man screaming for survival, ninety percent of the sound lost behind the gag but some perceptible murmur escaping from the other side. There was blood around his mouth and dried all down the front of his shirt.

"You can turn around," said the first cop.

Detective Fog turned around and came out from behind the row of containers without asking for permission to do so. She had a lot to take in and process. Nick Minardos was dead. Detective Fog had killed him. Someone, perhaps even a fellow mobster, had wanted Detective Fog to kill him. Why was that? Had there been a third Mafioso present? Maybe the strangest mystery of the lot was how the third Mafioso — after cracking Paul Aniston in the head and leaving Nick Minardos to be shot in retaliation for the rigged gunfire — had gotten away.

Thank you for reading Detective Fog. More chapters will be out soon! This book updates often, so tune back in to see what happens next, and please leave a star if it has entertained you entertained so far.