The Forecast of Dallas Raines

"How can I help you?" asked the officer. His nametag read: 'Huxtable'.

"Well," I said, "We need you to raid a house being used as a brothel. Tonight."

"Huh?" said Officer Huxtable.

"Several women are being held against their will. They're being moved tomorrow. We don't know where to. It has to be tonight."

"Who's she?"

"I'm from the house," said Mya. "You need to get us out."

"Well now," said Officer Huxtable, "Y'all had better talk to Captain Kramer. If you'll follow me..."

Officer Huxtable opened a door for us and led us past cubicles and into a small room, windowless and barren except for a metal table and three chairs. He ushered us in, then shut the door. Mya stood still and silent. I paced.

The door banged open and in strode Captain Kramer. He was short and beefy, with a thick neck and a bright red face. His uniform was rolled to the shirtsleeves and he banged his fists unnecessarily on the table and thundered, "So! You say there's an illegal brothel right here in my town and we need to storm it tonight, huh?"

I nodded. We sat down, opposite Captain Kramer, who stood, hunching over the table.

"And you're a girl escaped from this brothel?" He jutted his crew-cut head at Mya.

Mya nodded.

"And who the fuck are you?" He jutted his head at me.

"I was visiting."

"Why?"

"A man in a wheelchair asked if I wanted a massage."

"And you said yes?" He pounded on the table for emphasis.

"Yes."

"Where did you encounter this...man in a wheel-chair?" Captain Kramer splintered the word like a twig between his teeth.

"On a walk." I told him the street name.

"And he met you there?" He jutted again at Mya.

"Yes," she replied.

"And you were being held against your will?" Captain Kramer demanded.

"Yes."

"You and how many others?"

"Three others."

"Held by whom?"

"Two men."

"Including this man in a wheel-chair?" Captain Kramer spat.

"Yes."

"Are these men armed?"

"Yes."

"Well now," Officer Kramer bellowed, smacking his fist on the table yet again, "That is one fucked-up kettle of fish."

"Yes," Mya and I said.

Captain Kramer glared at us. "These are extra-ordinary circumstances," he intoned. "I am therefore entitled to con-script you into this police venture."

These were certainly extraordinary circumstances, but I had never been conscripted into a police venture before. "What does that mean?" I asked.

"It means that you will be on-hand to identify the criminal elements." Captain Kramer stood and rapped on the door. "Huxtable!" he roared as Officer Huxtable opened the door. "Get these civilians dressed for combat. I'll gas up the Reaper."

"Yes, sir," said Officer Huxtable. "If you'll follow me..."

My ears were still ringing from Captain Kramer's punctuated inquiries as Officer Huxtable led us past the cubicles and through another door, but this door was striped black and yellow, and inside was like a locker room, except the lockers were teeming with guns. Rifles, shotguns, and pistols of every ilk and creed were crammed into the lockers. I was only dimly aware of being handed a blue jumpsuit and a very heavy black vest.

"What's this for?" I asked.

"Captain Kramer asked for me to get you dressed for combat," said Officer Huxtable. "This is protective gear."

"For protection against what?"

"Criminal elements," said Officer Huxtable.

Mya gave me a small, encouraging smile. She was already halfway into her jumpsuit. I had come this far, so I donned the protective gear and Mya helped me tighten my vest. Officer Huxtable handed us helmets with clear plastic face shields. The protective gear was too big for both me and Mya and I was reminded of when I tried to play hockey goalie in gym. Officer Huxtable suited up as well, then produced an enormous ring of keys and began opening lockers.

"What sort of weaponry do y'all like?" Officer Huxtable asked us.

I was speechless.

"I've never fired a gun," said Mya.

"Never fired a gun?" Officer Huxtable stopped his fiddling with the keys as he thought that one through. "Captain Kramer didn't mention that...Well, what sort of weaponry would y'all like?"

This seemed like an inappropriate question, but given the peculiar circumstances, it made perfect sense. We were, after all, headed into combat, according to Captain Kramer, and I would rather go in armed than unarmed.

"I'll try a machine gun," I offered.

Officer Huxtable pondered, then selected a gun and handed it to me. "This one's good for beginners," he said. "What about you, ma'am?"

"I'd like a shotgun, please," said Mya. Officer Huxtable handed her one. She appraised it and nodded, satisfied.

"Right," said Officer Huxtable, as he handed out extra ammunition. "Gun safety one-oh-one. This is the business end." He indicated the muzzles of our weapons. "Point the business end at the criminal elements, pull the trigger—that's that doohickey there—and that'll send 'em off to holy hell." He looked at us blandly. "Any questions?"

I had plenty of questions—such as, why had I just been given a loaded weapon—but I had already answered that one myself, with going into combat and all.

"Very well," Officer Huxtable continued. "If you'll follow me..."

We followed Officer Huxtable back out of the armory, past the cubicles, and through the lobby.

"How's your gun?" I asked Mya.

"Heavy," she said. "How's yours?"

"Same." I hesitated. "I'm glad I met you today," I said.

"I'm glad I met you," Mya said. And there, on the threshold of the village police station, wearing protective gear and toting deadly weaponry, about to go into combat against the criminal elements, Mya kissed me, going up on her tiptoes and tilting back our riot helmets so that she could reach my face. I kissed her, stooping a little, wrapping my free hand around her heavy vest. Her lips and cheeks were soft and warm. Her vest was coarse and rugged. I much preferred her face.

This latest peculiar circumstance was, sadly, soon interrupted by the screech of metal, the roar of an engine, and the whooping of Captain Kramer, whose bright red face poked out the top hatch of a six-wheeled gunmetal-gray smoke-belching behemoth of a machine. It looked like one of those early Great War tanks, or a militarized Jawa sandcrawler. On its side, a cartoon Grim Reaper bisected the stenciled "Village Police" with his scythe.

"All aboard, love-birds!" Captain Kramer roared. "This train is leaving the station!" The Reaper's doors yawned open like a hungry maw and Mya, Officer Huxtable, and I were swallowed up. It was quite roomy in the belly of the beast, if a little loud. Mya and I sat next to each other on one bench, holding hands. Officer Huxtable sat across from us and was soon joined by Captain Kramer, who banged on the wall of the Reaper, indicating to some unseen driver to take us away.

There were no windows in the Reaper so we couldn't see the elderly folks and park-going families who gawked as the steel juggernaut lurched and screamed past the town square, and I could only imagine their utter shock of any onlookers, and the even more incomprehensible terror that would soon be visited upon Aso and the wheelchair man. Mya squeezed my hand and smiled. She was thinking the same thing.

Before long I felt us climbing the hill on the way to the subdivision with the cornflower and russet-trimmed house of ill repute. The Reaper shuddered and coughed and squealed. The unseen driver had missed a gear change. Captain Kramer pounded on the wall and howled in unrepentant fury. Soon he turned his rage toward the keepers of the house. "They'll get what's coming," he thundered over the roar of the engine. "We will utterly annihilate them."

The Reaper slowed. We were on the last block.

"Showtime!" hollered Captain Kramer. "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down that wall!"

Mya looked at me quizzically and I pondered what Captain Kramer meant by that statement until the Reaper's engine revved and we hurtled forward and there was an immense crash of thunderous proportions and we were jolted from our seats and blind and deafened we lurched through the crumbling masonry and clapboard and studs and I could picture the Reaper, swathed in dust, spluttering in the debris and wreckage of the crimson and mahogany living room of the house itself and my only question was why Captain Kramer referred to our driver as Mr. Gorbachev and not Officer Gorbachev.

"Neutralize the criminal elements!" bellowed Captain Kramer, kicking open the back doors of the Reaper, and with that war-cry ringing in my ears, machine gun in hand, I charged after Captain Kramer with Mya right behind me.

Now I could see the debris and wreckage of the crimson and mahogany living room and Aso the hulking Hollywood bouncer, his black clothes ruined by the dust, was leering at us from behind a velvet couch, a shiny silver revolver in his hand. I recalled the lesson from Officer Huxtable and aimed the business end at the criminal element before me and pulled the trigger and held it down. The gun jerked and I fell backward as bullets raked the wall and ceiling. I let go and it was silent. Mya gave me a hand up. We looked at Aso, who was slumped over the couch, his gun on the floor.

"Was that a criminal element?" asked Officer Huxtable, peering around us at the corpse. I nodded. "Good neutralization," he murmured.

"Where's the one in the wheel-chair?" barked Captain Kramer. "I need you two to identify him."

We looked around. "I don't see him," said Mya. "Piece of shit. He's probably hiding."

"Split up," shouted Captain Kramer. "Identify and neutralize."

Mya headed toward the kitchen. She peeked around the archway, then charged in, brandishing her shotgun. God damn, she was hot. I followed her inside.

The wheelchair man had fallen out of his wheelchair and dragged himself into the corner, where he now sat propped up behind some leather-topped stools and a classic British pub table. Behind the stools' legs, it looked like he was already behind bars. He was still smiling. Fucking creep.

"Where are they?" demanded Mya.

"They're in the basement. But you'll never get to them." He grinned his savage yellow-toothed grin.

"You bastard," said Mya, coldly. She coaxed a metallic noise from her shotgun.

"You don't scare me," said the wheelchair man.

The shotgun blared and the man's leg exploded into a mangled miasma of blood and bits of bone. He barely flinched.

"Dumb bitch," he said, holding his arms out, taunting. "I can't even feel that."

"Good point," said Mya, adjusting her aim. The shotgun blared again and this time the wheelchair man made no reply, his grin frozen bizarrely on his pallid face. Mya lowered the smoking shotgun.

"Nice shot," I said.

"Thanks," she said. "Let's get to the basement."

She strode past Officer Huxtable, who was widemouthed, and Captain Kramer, who was purple-faced and bellowing. Ignoring them, I followed her to the basement door. She tried the knob. Locked. She stepped back and blasted it away like the wheelchair man's face. The door swung open.

"Lily?" Mya called. "Chaiya? Kitty?"

Nothing. Past the doorway was blackness. Mya thumbed the light switch to no effect. The darkness seemed to swallow life itself. Mya looked back at me. I shrugged. I had come this far.

One step at a time we descended the carpeted stairs. Lush shag carpet. I thought this strange, as the basement walls were raw cinderblocks. I almost wanted to take my shoes off and feel the sensational carpet on my bare feet, but we were on a mission to rescue Mya's friends and fellow captives from a darkness that seemed to swallow life itself and on top of that there could be exposed nails.

At the bottom of the stairs was nothing but further blackness. I couldn't even see Mya but I held her hand and slowly we stepped forward. A single lightbulb flickered to life above a closed door in front of us. Our weapons dropped from our hands.

Laughter filled the dark room: ominous, supernatural laughter, and then a disembodied voice, resonant and eerie:

"So you wish to rescue your friends. You have made it this far, but your quest is not yet close to over. Before you is the entrance to a dungeon. You must fight your way through, without your weapons, against enemies aplenty. At first you may find it easy, but soon you shall think otherwise. At the end of the dungeon await your friends, but between you and them is only death."

The voice faded into the shadows and the door before us slowly swung ajar.

Just kidding. That's only what I imagined happening. Instead we opened the door in the basement and Lily and Chaiya and Kitty were inside, hungry and cold and bruised but very much alive, and they hugged Mya and then me and they even hugged Captain Kramer and Officer Huxtable. They all got in the Reaper to go to the hospital but Mya talked her way out of it and came home with me.

Later that night, the forecast of Dallas Raines proved unequivocal and the rain came in torrents all night and on through to morning, but we had come this far, and Mya and I stayed inside, fucking our brains out in utter contentment.