It took five minutes for the police car to pull up. Frat row had a better response time than a lot of VC. It was a University PD unit. Not as competent as VCPD, Dean thought, but this was their jurisdiction and would have the quickest response.
Two officers got out of the car, lazily walked to the front door, and knocked. Dean was not liking this. No ambulance, no waiting for back up, just a casual knock and talk. They weren't taking it as seriously as he was hoping.
Someone answered the door. They talked for just two minutes before the officers casually walked back to their cruiser. Dean waited, watching the cruiser. They could be waiting outside for back-up, or maybe they were going to wait for a detective or a search warrant.
The cruiser's engine started up. "You're fucking kidding me," he said out loud. Bleeding Skull slipped his mask back on and sprinted to the cruiser as it started to pull away. He grabbed a stone from the landscaping outside the Mu Theta Pi house and chucked it. It landed squarely on the VCUPD unit's back window, marking a web of cracks. The cruiser pulled into park and one of the officer's stepped out. Bleeding Skull flipped him off with both hands, and waited until the cop started running after him before he ran into the frat house.
"What the fuck is with the mask?" Bleeding Skull let the fraternity brother put a hand on his shoulder. He trapped the hand with his own and spun it into an arm lock.
"Where is she?" he ordered. He applied pressure, stretching tendons. Other brothers stepped into the foyer from side rooms.
"Don't say nothing, bro! Keep your mouth shut!" said a particularly built one.
Bleeding Skull stared this one in the eyes. "You know something, big guy?"
Eyes went to a set of downwards stairs. Bleeding Skull relaxed his hold, stepped on the frat's foot, and dumped him to the ground, twisting his ankle in the descent. He darted to the stairs, the other brothers in pursuit. He tried sliding down with a foot on each railing but there was too much friction, so he flew down four steps at a time.
The stairs let out into a study area. Three students sat sleepily over books at the tail end of an all-nighter. Bleeding Skull dumped one out of his chair and scattered papers.
"What the fuck, dude!"
Bleeding Skull picked a smaller frat and pulled him up by a handful of hair. "The girl! Where is she!"
The frats from upstairs made their way down. Built frat yelled, "Don't nobody say shit to this asshole."
"What are we going to do, Quinn?" a smaller frat asked anxiously.
The frats kept a respectful distance as Bleeding Skull prowled from the study area to a rec room. A foosball table, a pool table, and a big screen TV.
Quinn, the built frat, took point. "What, some crazy asshole comes in a starts breaking our shit. Pure self-defense."
"He knows something, what if he talks," another asked.
"Then let's leave him so he can't talk." Two of the studiers rushed upstairs, books and papers in arms. The rest were fair game as far as Bleeding Skull was concerned.
"You going to show me where she is or do I fuck some more shit up?" Bleeding Skull taunted.
"Fuck you, freak!" Bleeding Skull sized Quinn up. He had on a t-shirt, boxers, and sandals. Maybe woken up by the police. Broad chest and pumped up arms. His legs matched in size, so he lifted for athletics, not for looks. There was a faint tan line in a wide band over his left knee. A knee brace he recently stopped wearing, or took off at night. Quinn stood sideways, his hands out, palms open and facing down. A half-assed MMA stance that he probably copied from TV.
Bleeding Skull feinted with a jab, then snapped a quick kick to the side of the suspect knee.
"Fuck, not the knee, bitch!" Quinn confirmed.
Bleeding Skull took several steps back, hands out to his side. "Last chance, Quinn. Take me to Alana Favors or you walk with a cane."
"Is that what that fat slut's name was?"
Bleeding Skull grabbed a pool ball, reared back, and threw. Quinn ducked. The ball landed in another frat's teeth, sending him to his knees. He grabbed another ball. Everyone reared back. That ball went in the dead center of the large screen TV.
"Mother fucker!" Quinn roared, dropping the stance and charging Bleeding Skull in a football tackle. Bleeding Skull met the charge with a drop kick with both feet against Quinn's knee. He missed slightly, hitting his shin, but enough to send Quinn sprawling face down. Bleeding Skull grabbed Quinn's left foot, pulled it up, and straddled it. Locking the ankle, he sat down hard on the back of his leg, smashing the knee against the tile. Quinn screamed.
Two more frats ran up the stairs. Bleeding Skull thought he heard arguing from the foyer. He counted five circling cautiously around him as he kept Quinn in the hold.
"Fuck, she's not here, let go, shit!"
Bleeding Skull stared into the eyes of the rest. "You had your chance, Quinn. Say hello to crutches." He spun the lock into a kneebar, grabbed the foot, and twisted his lower leg until it almost popped out of his knee joint. Quinn wailed and slammed his fists into the tile.
Another frat grabbed a pool cue. Bleeding Skull let go of his hold and rolled under the pool table as the cue was swung at him. He popped up on the other side and grabbed his own cue from a rack on the wall. The frat swung his cue like a baseball bat. Bleeding Skull had one hand at the thick base, the other a foot apart to swivel against. He parried another swing, sending the cue to the ground. Bleeding Skull lunged, stabbing the frat in the throat with the tip. He brought it down hard, slapping the cue out of the frat's hand. He knocked him back with a front kick to the stomach, and flung the cue at the remaining frats.
More yelling from upstairs. He wasn't sure, but it sounded like the crackly static of a stun gun. Bleeding Skull backed up out of the rec room down a hallway. He passed a small laundry room. An exit door to exterior stairs ended the hall.
"I think the cops are here, let them..."
"No! We have to take him out! We can't let him talk!" shouted one desperately. Bleeding Skull locked eyes with his next target. He lunged forward and grabbed his nose in his fist.
"Where is she!"
"Let go, mother fucker!" The rest were beginning to charge. Bleeding Skull brought his free fist down against the other. Blood sprayed from the frat's nose. He left him on the ground and pushed through the rest back to the rec room. He counted four left. Bleeding Skull grabbed a pool ball with each hand from the table.
"The police are upstairs. This is your last chance to turn yourself in and let the girl go. You stay down here with me and I'll make your dentist rich."
"Dude, is he talking about that fat girl?"
"Shut the fuck up!"
"What the fuck are we worried about?"
"He's a fucking loose end."
"He knows something. We can't let him talk."
Bleeding Skull sneered. "None of you like your teeth, then." He feinted with an overhead swing with one of the pool balls. The frat lifted his arms in defense, leaving his crotch open for a soccer kick that lifted him off his feet.
Another grabbed Bleeding Skull by both biceps. Bleeding Skull wrapped his forearms around his opponents, locking his arms before head butting him on the bridge of his nose.
The next connected a fist to Bleeding Skull's temple. He spun around and landed a back fist, smashing a pool ball against his eye, cracking the frat's orbital socket.
The last had grabbed one of his arms from behind in a half nelson. Bleeding Skull dropped to his knees, slipping out of the hold. He swung both fists behind him, striking the frat in the face with both pool balls. He heard cracking. He spun around for another blow, but stopped himself when the frat held his hand out in surrender.
Bleeding Skull dropped the pool balls and turned his attention back to the frat with the broken nose. He picked him up by the hair and dragged him down the hall. There was only one door left before the rear exit.
It was a small boiler room. The light switch didn't work. Bleeding Skull opened the door wide to let light from the hallway in. Some bloodstains over a drain. Something yellowish green. The stench of bleach not covering the stink of shit and piss. A chain padlocked to a pipe. The chain ending in an empty shackle.
Nobody was there.
Three of the frats in the rec room were coming to their senses. Bleeding Skull pulled his captive into the boiler room, slammed the door, and kept his weight against it.
"The girl. Where is she now?"
"Fug you!" the frat managed through his broken nose.
Bleeding Skull slammed his face into the grating on the floor. The stench overtook him, and he wretched into the metal grate. He patted down the frat's pockets and pulled out his cell phone. He turned it on, lighting up his grinning mask. "I will send you to the hell you created for her!"
While the frat coughed up mucous and bile, the Bleeding Skull noticed that the frat had an unread text message from a Cathy. He opened it.
"Crzy bitch jumped. Ur on ur own."
"Where did Cathy take her?" Bleeding Skull demanded, pressing his face harder into the grate. Both jumped at the sound of a gunshot.
Bleeding Skull let up and stepped back out into the hall. A couple of bleeding frats rushed past him to the back stair case. Bleeding Skull ran the other way, through to the front stairs to the foyer. As he reached the stairs he heard a familiar voice.
"That's how you deal with your enemies! God, you frat fucks are such faggots!"
"Daaaaw-leeeey!" Bleeding Skull taunted from the foot of the stairs. Dawley rushed to the top and looked down. Bleeding Skull made a gun shape out of his hand, two fingers as the barrel against his own forehead.
"Who are you?" Dawley yelled. Bleeding Skull had ducked back into the study room before Dawley fired a round from his revolver into the wall.
Bleeding Skull ran to the back stairs, keeping sight behind him. He counted on running around corners before Dawley could catch up and draw a bead, but wanted to lead him away from whoever he had shot in case he was wounded and Dawley wanted to finish the job.
Dawley made it to the rec room just as Bleeding Skull pushed through the back door, but he was around the corner to the stairs before he had his gun up. The stairs let out next to a car port and the back yard. Police sirens were closing in. Bleeding Skull sprinted across the grass and did a side vault over the back fence. A bullet splintered the wood behind him as he landed.
Bleeding Skull changed direction and darted to the other side of a pair of hinges along the fence. Dawley kicked against the wood from the other side, cursed, then fumbled to open the latch. Bleeding Skull was poised behind the gate as it swung up, and rushed Dawley from behind as he passed through.
He trapped Dawley's gun arm at the shoulder in a half nelson, but he had too much range of motion and tried firing at Bleeding Skull's feet. Bleeding Skull dropped the hold and slapped a hand over the revolver's cylinder, preventing it from firing. A free elbow stuck Dawley behind the ear before grabbing his wrist. Bleeding Skull ducked under his arm and spun, twisting the handle of the revolver out of Dawley's hand. It stayed connected by his trigger finger, which was dislocated if not broken.
Bleeding Skull leaned in and made eye contact. Small pupils. Meth, maybe another amphetamine like Adderall. Bleeding Skull popped open the revolver's cylinder and slapped it, knocking out the remaining bullets. He released his hold on the pistol and struck the side of Dawley's chin with a palm. Dawley kept a tight grip on the pistol and missed wide with a left hook.
"VCPD! Drop your weapon!"
Bleeding Skull didn't turn to the voice before running in the opposite direction. He ignored more orders to freeze and vaulted over that yard's fence to a side yard. There were no flashing lights from the street in that direction. He ran across the street and made his way through four more yards before ditching the mask and hoodie.
The police saw Dawley holding the gun, and Dawley wouldn't be as good at getting away. He could only get in the way now. Bleeding Skull left him to VCPD.
Alana jumped. Suicide? Jumped from a car? Dean caught his breath while doubling back in a wide circle to where he had stashed his bag. Bailey's jeep was gone. The University had a clinic, but if there was trauma involved she would be taken to Blassingame General hospital. Dean half jogged the mile to the hospital. He was covered in sweat and splattered a little with other people's blood. He went to the emergency room entrance and sat down among the dozens of people waiting.
If he needed to, Dean could admit himself on a pretense and listen to the chatter from interior waiting rooms. Among the people waiting in the outside area he saw a middle aged woman and young girl crying and talking to a VCPD officer. Dean took out his netbook and checked Alana Favors on the social networks. A picture of her and the little girl with the caption, "Me and little sissy!" confirmed they were family, and confirmed that Alana Favors was in the hospital with police aware of her presence.
A doctor came out of the back and approached the Favors. Dean shut his netbook and left the emergency room.
Dean took a bus back to his apartment, soaked in a bath for a few minutes, then went to sleep. He didn't dream.