Type K
The ceiling fan swished lazily, a low thrumming beat. The fluorescent lights dimly illuminated the morgue’s dingy gray-blue tile and refracted harshly off the rows of steel boxes that housed the corpses of twenty-four of the city’s dead. The mortician, a young man with brown hair and deep green eyes, shuffled quietly into the room and shut the door of his cramped office behind him. The man was thin and rather short, about five feet and six inches in height, covered only in an orderly’s uniform and a regular white doctor’s coat. A few pins were tucked in his breast pocket, along with an ID tagged at his coat’s collar. The name read Trowa Barton.
He went to the white counter that lined one side of the morgue, picking among a shelf of manila folders labeled with the names of the morgue’s occupants. He leafed through the minimal information that his assistants had provided for the most recent body brought in.
“Five feet, four inches tall, one hundred and twenty-two pounds, brown hair, blue eyes, approximate age twenty years,” he muttered to himself, reaching out and opening the drawer that held the male whose file he was reading. What the drawer revealed was a starkly attractive young male that was nude except for a surgical sheet covering his privates. Smiling in the dim light, Dr. Barton rested a hand on the corpse’s chest and said softly, “Hello, John Doe.”
Dr. Barton’s perusal of the corpse was interrupted by a curt knock on the door. He turned to the door, ready to thoroughly scold the nurse or orderly that’d dare disturb him at this late an hour. He had marked a sign on the door to his offices which clearly stated the hours when he could be reached and—
The mortician’s line of thought was abruptly interrupted when a blonde man stepped into the morgue. He was wearing a slickly-cut black suit and his hair was slicked back, his almost angelic features marred by a thin scar that ran down the side of his left cheek. He said in a cool voice, “Are you Dr. Barton?”
“Yes, sir, I am,” said the doctor, straightening himself and stepping forward. “And who, exactly, are you? My office hours are clearly posted on the door outside and—”
“Save it for the nurses, Doc,” the blonde replied, lifting a hand to silence the mortician and stepping forward to glance at the corpse’s body. “I need some information, and I need it fast.”
“All right,” Dr. Barton said, trying to maintain his calm. He nonchalantly turned to shut John Doe #23’s door, but the blonde reached out to stop him.
“Look, Doc, I work for a very powerful man. This John Doe here in your ice box used to work for him, too. Now I need to know how this guy died and when, so we can figure out who killed him. Don’t start off with your whole rigmarole about confidentiality and police business. My boss’s man is sliced open like a can of sardines, and you’re gonna tell me what kind of weapon did that to him.
Then you can play mad scientist with his organs and whatever, but not until you perform an autopsy and provide me with a full report.”
Dr. Barton sucked in a quick breath, trying not to choke. Then his face hardened. “Why should I do anything for you and your boss, young man?”
The blonde’s face twisted into what looked like an amused smile. He smoothed back his gold hair with one tan, slender hand, and then grabbed the mortician’s collar and easily lifted him up to his toes, despite being a full inch shorter than the doctor himself. “Because if you don’t I can make your life living hell, Doc. That’s why.”
Eyes wide, Dr. Barton struggled to get free of the blonde’s grip and replied quickly, “All right! I’ll perform the autopsy, but you’ll have to wait outside.”
The blonde shook his head. “No way, Doc. I’ll just wait right here and let you do your thing. Then you write me up a little piece of paper saying what happened, I can take it back to my boss, and we can all get on with our lives. All right?”
Dr. Barton figured he had no way out anyway, so he reluctantly scrubbed up and rolled John Doe #23 onto an operating table, then rolled it into the operating room. The blonde, looking faintly curious, followed a few paces behind and leaned against the wall. Dr. Barton carefully performed the autopsy, taking photographs of the incision on John Doe’s neck, the bruises marking his stomach, and his lower right arm. Taking a couple of blood samples, the mortician looked at the blonde and said, “You realize the blood testing will take at least twenty-four hours, don’t you?”
“I can wait,” the blonde replied with a smooth smile, making the mortician sigh in exasperation.
Things weren’t going well tonight for Dr. Barton. First, his activities had been interrupted by this stranger, and now he was performing an autopsy on a John Doe whose name he should know. He cursed softly down at the corpse lying on the operating table. Why couldn’t he have just stayed in his little ice box, instead of causing the doctor all this trouble? Still, the young man he was incising with his scalpel was fairly beautiful.
Must have been quite a looker when he was alive, thought the doctor.
Three hours later, Dr. Barton stitched up John Doe #23’s chest, signed the autopsy report, and handed it to the blonde. The blonde looked over the report for a few minutes, then nodded and said, “Thanks, Doc. I appreciate this. Remember, I wasn’t here tonight and you were doing whatever you do this late in a morgue on a Friday night, playing hanky-panky with your buddies or whatnot. My boss’ll reward you for this, too, Doc. Might even come to you for business in the future.”
Dr. Barton’s face burned with humiliation at the blonde’s insults. He choked out a goodbye and ushered the blonde out of his office, only breathing a sigh of relief when the sound of the man’s steps receded down the hall. Returning to the lab, he found a scribbled note left on the counter.
Dear Doc,
In case you wanted to know what my buddy’s name was, it was Heero Yuy. Easier than calling him John Doe, don’t you think? Thanks for the work tonight, and take care of yourself.
He snorted at the note’s cordial tone, then remember with faint alarm the blonde’s words.
Might come back for business in the future… Business with a man like the blonde’s boss was the last thing Dr. Barton wanted. He had too much at risk as it was and was already walking a very thin, delicate line.
Double-checking that the outer door was locked, the mortician retreated into the back supply room he kept locked and out-of-bounds from his assistants, citing that he kept strong chemicals and delicate equipment in there he couldn’t afford to risk damaged. The small shoebox of a room smelled acrid, a Bunsen burner brewing an orangish substance in a beaker. Shutting the door behind him, the mortician carefully checked the beaker’s contents. The next batch was nearly ready.
Leaning against the door and wiping his forehead, Dr. Barton reflected that he’d come very close to being exposed tonight. He couldn’t let it happen again.
*~*~*
The blonde was whistling a cheerful little tune as he stepped out into the street. A nondescript black car pulled up and he stepped inside, shutting the door as the sedan rolled off into the night like a coasting leviathan.
The driver, a man with black hair slicked back into a ponytail, glanced at the blonde. “Get the report, Quatre?”
“Yes, I did. The good doc was downright cooperative, even. Too cooperative, like he had something to hide. He sure didn’t like me being there,” said Quatre reflectively, stroking his chin.
The black-haired man nodded. “Probably doing things that wouldn’t bear close inspection. Think he’s gonna pamper Yuy after he’s sure we’re gone?”
Quatre chortled, then said, “Wufei, you know Yuy always liked an older man. For an older man, though, the Doc was cute. Real pretty green eyes and—”
“You better shut your mouth with talk like that, Quat! You’ll get the boss up in arms doing another inquisition to rid his men of ‘the disease.’ Remember what happened to Maxwell?”
Quatre’s face sobered and he nodded, replying softly, “Yea, I remember.”
Both of the men fell silent as the car came to a halt in front of a warehouse in the industrial section. Wufei cut the engine and they both stepped out, casually entering the building with discreet glances to see if anyone was watching. With a subtle hand gesture, Quatre deflected one of the camouflaged guards. He and Wufei were the boss’s top men, easily recognized.
When they entered the warehouse they were escorted up a long flight of winding steel stairs, down a catwalk, and into the loft that served as their boss’s temporary private office. Below them, techno music pounded and colored lights flashed as young people gathered from local neighborhoods danced the night away at what they thought was just another rave. Quatre knocked briskly on the door and stepped inside. “Mr. Khushrenada, I’ve got the autopsy report from Dr. Barton.”
A ginger-haired man turned around in his big swivel chair to face the blonde, folding his hands in a steeple and smiling. “Good, Winner. May I see it?”
“Yes, sir.” Quatre obligingly laid the folder on the desk for Khushrenada.
He picked it up, opened it, and read over the contents of the file slowly and carefully. Standing near the doorway, Wufei and Quatre waited at a silent attention. The only sound in the room was the stirring of a young woman seated opposite of Treize’s desk in an armchair. Her blonde hair had been pinned into a French knot, and she wore a flimsy looking evening gown the color of mulberry wine. The look on her face was one of contempt and hatred, and she remained icily silent. Wufei, glancing out of the corner of his eye, felt pity for her but didn’t let his features betray it.
“Where’s the results for the blood testing, Winner?” Mr. Khushrenada asked tersely, glancing up at the blonde.
“Sir, the doctor said they’d be back in twenty-four hours.”
“All right. I want them here by eleven o’clock tomorrow. A minute later and both you and the Doctor will be dancing together in Hell.” Quatre swallowed nervously, wondering if Mr. Khushrenada knew exactly what he’d been thinking about while Dr. Barton operated on Yuy’s body. His boss’s cerulean eyes sparkled knowingly. How could he know?
“Go down and enjoy the party, boys. I’m sure you want the rest of the evening off,” he said at last, waving his hand in a gesture of dismissal. Wufei and Quatre nodded briefly, then departed, shutting the door behind them.
~TBC~
Kira Maxwell
KiraxMaxwell@msn.com_________________
On to Part 2!