It was raining. Not much, just the steady Washington drizzle that kept the Pacific Northwest green almost year round. The summer night had cooled off already, the rain and the clouds and the wind cooling everything quickly. Lightning snarled in the clouds, thunder rumbling and booming at random.

The place was your typical auto-body shop on the edge of town. Near a junkyard, but not too close, away from the typical Yuppie businesses but close enough to downtown that cars could get brought there quickly and easily. Three tow-trucks that sat in the back parking lot.

As I watched, three cars were brought in and the drivers and their friends left, usually looking happy.

Those cars were someone's. I saw a Baby On Board sticker, a Lacey High School Honor Student sticker, and a Vietnam Vet sticker. All three were months or years worth the payments, probably not even paid off. Now they were gone and the person had to replace it once the insurance company got done telling them that the car they paid five grand for was worth only seven hundred dollars blue book and after their fifteen hundred dollar deductable the insurance company wasn't going to pay shit, leaving  them with a year or two worth the payments to go.

It can just be replaced! was something I heard in college from people who had barely graduated high school. Sure, it could, but the hundreds of hours at a low paying job couldn't be replaced. I'd tried explaining it and only blank looks in return.

Moving around it, walking around the block across the street, then once through the alley, hands in my pocket, sportsball cap pulled low, cigarette in my mouth, I got a quick layout. Once the door was open and I was able to make a quick estimate of roughly a dozen or so people working inside to tear the cars apart.

The guy at the side door was a big guy, taller than my six foot, well muscled, bald, with a permanent angry scowl. Leather jacket and jeans, sneakers, and a gaudy gold watch on one wrist to match the heavy gold chain around his neck.

Russian.

From the shitty tattoos on his neck and hands, Russian mob without a doubt.

Well, Hollister admitted he was working with them by trying to threaten me with them.

I knew Russians.

They understood two things. A gun in their ear and a boot on their neck. Anything else was a waste of time.

I walked down the alley, that shambling walk I'd perfected over the years, shoulders relaxed, spine relaxed, knees flexed slightly. It made me look about four inches shoulder and the slump hid my size, making people mistake me for fat.

I pulled out the cigarette pack, pulling one out, then made a show of slapping my pockets as I walked up.

"Got a light?" I asked the guy.

"Fucking American junkies," the guy snarled in Russian. "No, fuck off," he finished in English.

"Oh," I said, sounding sad.

The guy was already watching the mouth of the alley again, dismissing me.

"Too bad for you," I said.

He started to look at me as I took two quick steps forward. He tried to reach into his pocket and hold his hands out at the same time.

I grabbed his face, my hand almost covering his face, took the half step so I was beside him.

And drove his head into the cinderblock wall as hard as I could.

I felt something pop and he slid down, one arm twitching and a foot tic making the tip of his sneaker bob back and forth. He was halfway down when I drove my knee into his face, slamming his head against the wall.

His eyes were open, his face blue, his nose smashed and only leaking blood.

Putting my hands in my pockets I found what I was looking for and patted it. Happy with where I was at, I opened the door and walked in.

Grinders and welders were going, hoods were being pulled off, tires being removed.

The guy who was supposed to be watching the door was over helping move two tires and I looked around quickly. The racks of tools, body sections, and parts had a large enough gap for me to walk behind them, along the wall. I counted how many were in the room quickly, letting the lizard watch them.

Most of them were armed with pistols.

I walked along the side, pausing now and then to let people move across the openings, ghosting along with my hands in my pockets and the hat pulled low. At the back of the room I looked around and saw stairs leading up to a hanging office. Nobody guarding it, just metal stairs.

Keeping slumped down and my face down I walked over and went up the stairs. The door wasn't locked as I opened it and stepped in.

There were two tough guys standing there. One sitting by the far door. One sitting on my right. One behind the desk.

The one behind the desk I recognized. The scars on his face were still thick, puckered, disfiguring his mouth and his eyelid on the left side of his face from where he'd gotten his face cut up on the 1K Zone during the Cold War.

"Sergeant Kuznetsov," I said, staring at him.

The Russian dropped the glass he was drinking, reaching for the pistol on his desk. The one next to me grabbed my arm and the one at the far side stood up. The two standing up moved toward me, one grabbing my arm, the other pulling out a pistol.

"Chernobog," the Russian spit.

"You're working with the drug dealers in Lacey and Centralia," I said in Russian.

The Russian just stared at me as his men manhandled me up to the desk.

"Do you want me to shoot this idiot?" the one with the pistol asked.

"I want my father's jewelry back," I said. "Car thieves, pulled a stereo and men's jewelry, billfold, wallet, and watch from a wreck," I felt the lizard snarl. "They had blood on them."

The Russian behind the desk got a cruel look on his face.

"We are far from Germany, Chernobo," he said.

"You know this American?" the one holding my right arm asked. His grip loosened.

"From a long time ago," the Russian said. "It doesn't matter."

"Your fucked up face says otherwise, you little Russian rat," I grinned.

Kuznetsov jumped to his feet, hefting the pistol he'd pulled from the desk. The one holding my right arm let go to grab at his waist.

The lizard slapped the button.

Now

Everything slowed down as I pulled the Gerber free and stabbed the one on my right in the neck, yanking the blade free in a spray of blood that hadn't even hit my by the time I was turning, stepping in front of the one holding my left arm who was frowning. The blade went in under his sternum and I twisted before yanking it out and headbutting him. The one with the pistol that had been behind me was lifting the pistol up when I took control of his wrist with my left hand, shoving his hand straight up.

I stabbed him in the armpit, blade angled down, and shoved him away after twisting the pistol, the gun falling from his hand with the snapping of fingers.

The one by the door was stepping forward, the gun clear of his belt.

Kuznetsov was stock still, his eyes wide, his face white, his lips bloodless as he watched me move in on the last one.

The guy from the door's eyes widened as I reached out, grabbed his hand, and yanked him into me. He had time to scream once before I buried the knife in his throat and yanked it out.

I turned around and faced Kuznetsov, flicking the blood off the knife.

"You thought those idiots could stop me?" I asked. I reached out and took the pistol from his numb fingers. "I want information at least, the jewelry at best."

Kuznetsov swallowed and collapsed into his chair, staring at me.

"Chernobog," he whispered.

"In the flesh," I smiled.

"What will make you go away?" he asked.

"I told you. Junkies robbed my father as he lay dying in the street. They took his jewelry, stole the stereo from the car, took his wallet and money clip," I told him.

One of the dying shit themselves and the room filled with the stench of raw sewage.

"I want it. All of it," I said.

"What makes you think that I have it?" Kuznetsov asked.

"Hollister in Lacey, thinks he's a big time drug dealer?" I asked.

Kuznetsov nodded.

"He gave up that the Russians give him protection after I shot his wife in the mouth," I told him.

Kuznetsov's eyes widened even further and the lizard wondered if they were going to pop out of the sockets.

"This is the part where you threaten my family and Ms. Pointy Thing and I have a discussion with you about how if I so much as hear a Russian accent on the TV I come back and kill everyone you know, everyone the Russian dogs in this building know, and torture whoever I want until you get the fucking point," I snarled. I leaned forward. "Look into my eye and tell me I'm lying."

Kuznetsov shook his head.

"So, are you going to tell me, or am I going to rip you apart with my bare fucking hands?" I asked. "I want my father's personal effects."

He shook his head again. "I do not have any such thing."

"Two days ago. Car wreck. High end stereo. Expensive male's jewelry. Watch. Gold money clip with the First Cavalry Division logo on it," I said.

"I do not have it," he said again.

I growled low in my throat.

He was starting to sweat.

"Who does?" I asked.

"I do not know."

"Your little pals put a bounty on my head. They took me in the grocery store with my daughter present. They threatened my family. My wife," I said.

"The Beast," he said softly.

"My children. My mother," I snarled. I slapped my hand on the table with a crack. "I WANT MY FATHER'S STUFF!" I roared in his face.

The grinders shut off and I stood up, grinning. I drew the .45 out of the holster at the small of my back.

"This is gonna be fun," I said. I smiled wider. "I'm going to kill everyone in here. I'm going to take their ID's and go to their houses. I'm going to kill their families. Burn down their houses," I knew the lizard was smiling. "You started it. You put families on the target list."

Sliding the knife back in the sheath, I checked the chamber on the .45 and looked up at him.

"We didn't do it in Europe, I guess we'll do it here," I said.

The grinders started back up.

"Give me a name. Give me a name of someone who fences men's jewelry, and I'll go away," I said.

Kuznetsov shook his head, sweat running down his face.

"I know, I know, they'll kill you if you do," I said, my voice full of mocking sympathy.

He nodded.

"Except they're not here with you," I said. I grabbed his hair and yanked his head back. He opened his mouth to protest and I shoved the barrel of the pistol into his mouth.

"I am."

His eyes were wild as he gagged. I slid the pistol back and forth, staring into his eyes.

"Suck on it like a good little bitch," I growled, pushing deep enough to gag him, pulling it back, then pushing it forward again. "Your wife will suck it just like this right before I blow her brains out in front of your fucking ratlike kids."

His hands slapped at me and I shoved the barrel past his gag reflex, making him choke.

"You think you could get away with targeting my family, you vodka swilling garbage eating potato hoarding slavic garbage golem?" I snarled. I yanked the pistol free and he took a whooping gasp, tears running down his face.

"You have thirty seconds to give me a name and an address of that fence, Ivan," I snapped. "Thirty."

"I DON'T KNOW!" he shouted.

The grinders stopped.

"Give me a fucking name of someone above you then," I snapped. "Twenty-nine."

"I can't!" he said.

I walked to the door and opened it, stepping out, switching hands with the pistol and drawing the knife.

The guys on the floor were in a group of about a dozen, standing at the base of the stairs.

"TWENTY-EIGHT!" I shouted.

They all looked up as I jumped down, landing in front of them.

Jam the pistol into the gut of the one in front of me. Pull the trigger. The heavy .45 rounds blew through him and hit the man behind him. Stab the one on the right through the neck. Step slightly to the left, shoot the guy on my left, step forward, shoot twice, half done with the magazine, stab twice, two throat shots. Trigger pull. Stab. Stab. Trigger pull. Stab. Trigger pull. Trigger pull.

Empty.

Kneeling down in the pile of bodies, drop the knife and empty pistol. Scoop up a shitty street pistol. 9mm by the weight.

Four were coming toward me, one with a wrench, the other with pistols.

Four shots.

Two came around a car.

Two shots.

One ran for the door.

Two shots in the back.

"I'M LOOKING FOR A WATCH! IT TELLS TIME!" I yelled as I walked into the work area.

One Russian was kneeling down, a pistol in his hand. He looked up at me.

I shot him in the face as I walked by without looking at him.

The lizard said there was three left.

"I'M LOOKING FOR A WALLET! IT HOLDS MONEY!" I yelled.

A Russian came out from behind the tires, yelling, lifting the pistol. I could tell in his head he figured I'd duck or he'd hit me.

I shot him through the open mouth before his back leg cleared from behind the tires.

"I'M LOOKING FOR A STEREO! IT PLAYS MUSIC!" I bellowed out.

One ducked down behind the rolling tool case. I could see his feet.

I shot him in the foot, when he fell forward I shot him in the side of the head.

Pistol was low, I could tell by the weight.

The last one rushed me, lifting up the pistol, starting to yell.

I shot him between the eyes.

There was silence and I closed my eyes.

The lizard couldn't hear anyone shifting or breathing in the silence.

The thunder cracked three times, shaking the building.

I walked back, dropping the cheap shit pistol and grabbing my .45 and blade. I reloaded the .45, putting it back in the holster, and walking up the steps.

"If you have a gun and aim it at me, I will cut off your fucking fingers and make you eat them, Ivan," I snarled.

When I went into the office, he was scribbling on an index card.

He tossed it on the desk.

"Here. My boss. Ask him," he snarled.

I picked up the card. "Why would he know?"

"He was here when what you want was brought in by some guys sent by Hollister," Kuznetsov said. "I didn't want it. Too hot. I told them to throw it away, but my boss, he seemed to want it."

"Too bad for you," I said.

"Wha..." he started.

I shot him in the face.