Dead Birmingham by Timothy C. Phillips Page B

a second, then he shrugged.  
    â€œListen, Chance, I’ve got a problem. I’ve got something . . . something big maybe, but I don’t know how to move it. Thing is, I don’t even know what it is. I just know that whatever it is, I’ve got to go see someone before I can get it to you . . . and I may not be coming back.”
    Chance listened to all of this dispassionately. “Uh-huh. That’s great, Scott. Now, would you like to slow down and tell me just what in hell you’re talking about?”
    Scott smiled, laughed, and relaxed a bit. “Sure, Chance. Sorry. I guess that probably didn’t make a lot of sense . . . it’s just that, well, I can’t give you a lot of details right now. Suffice to that I may have gotten in over my head this time. I might just end up with something to make it all worthwhile, but first I have to take a big risk. I’m going to do that this evening. If everything works out, I’ll be back with a big score. If not . . . well, I think I might have crossed someone who . . . who might not overlook it.”
    â€œAw come on. You make it sound like life and death.”
    â€œI think it is. See, something happened to Mule. I sent him to . . . to check on a matter connected with this thing. Two weeks ago. He’s disappeared. None of us know where he is now.”
    â€œChrist, kid.” Chance Ponder looked around as if suddenly worried Scott had been followed.
    â€œDon’t worry,” Scott said with a grim smile. “I made sure that no one knew I was coming here. Besides, whoever this thing belonged to, they don’t even know who I am . . . yet.”
    â€œAnd your friends?”
    â€œThey don’t know about any of this. I’m taking care of this myself. It’s sort of all my fault anyway.”
    Scott put out his hand. “Anyway, I wanted to say so long and thanks for everything, if we don’t see each other again.”
    Chance took the younger man’s hand and shook it slowly. “Be careful out there, kid.”
    Scott nodded, and turned to go. But he wasn’t going back to Malvagio’s little shop, just yet. He still had one place left to go before he returned there. And he dreaded that visit . . . more than jail, or even death.

 
    Â 
    BOOK TWO

 
    He was a pale man, a slender man.  
    To the few who knew of him, he was The Foreigner.
    He moved like a cat.  
    His face, to those few who ever saw it, was a white expressionless mask.  
    His soul was as blank as his face.  
    It had grown that way, because of his work.  
    He had done his bloody work for over twenty years.
    It was special work, and few could perform it well. To do so, one must exist on the fringes of society, never being close to anyone. It was brutal, evil work, and he was perfectly suited to his trade. He had begun life as an orphan in Cold War Europe, and he had entered his teens as a refugee, a lost soul in a lost time. He had found his way into the Intelligence field from a prison cell. He had been chosen for his skill. He had made his living the best way that presented itself to him.  
    He had become a killer.  
    In the beginning, it had put food in his mouth, but in the end, he did it because it was all that he understood. He possessed no ideology. The strong killed the weak. It was the way of the world, and nothing would ever change that. He did not consider those he destroyed. He neither admired nor despised them. He would live and they would die. No other calculus was necessary.
    In the end, however, he had found art in it. He had discovered things about himself, also. He was fast, and he was stealthy. These things came naturally to him. He had worked long years at honing these traits. Now, his hands moved so fast they were all but invisible. When he walked or ran, he moved with ghostly silence. If he boasted—and he did not—he could boast that he had spent weeks in densely populated