CHAPTER FIFTEEN

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Streetlamps were turned on in the twilight outside, light-sensing panels telling the inner machinery that the sun had lowered. Coconino sulked under their glow like a lost child.

Lost child. Damn it. When Creed returned to where he’d left the girl, he found Coconino alone.

Now, they returned to headquarters through Pinel’s Hostelry. Creed found Johann. After removing his mask, he embraced his steed around the neck. Coconino whined by his feet, so he patted the animal on the head. "It's not your fault, Coco. You stayed."

Creed keyed the hidden lock and it opened on the backyard. He slammed it shut after he and Coconino entered.

"Why so angry?" called a voice.

Creed looked past a couple of trees to the back porch where Moreno and three others sat at the table, all members of The Brotherhood of the Golden Cog. There sat O'Leary, a ruddy-skinned man Creed assumed was Hiram Pinel, and a lovely woman with glowing brown skin and a pretty, roundish face, undoubtedly Moreno's wife. The night’s fog had brought with it a salty tang.

"The police are in on it, and I lost a kid."

As Coconino ran to a far-off tree and urinated against the trunk, Creed strode through the yard and up the porch stairs.

"James, this is Hiram Pinel—"

"Enchanté," said the Frenchman, who extended a hand. They shook, but under his mask, Creed frowned. Pinel's eyebrows were lowered, his irises tiny.

"And, this is my wife—" said Moreno.

"Beautiful wife," said Hiram.

"Aye, cabron," the woman scolded but smiled.

"Si." Moreno chuckled. "Mi hermosa esposa, Selena."

She stepped around the table and kissed Creed on the forehead while standing on her tiptoes. She grasped his shoulder and Creed felt warmth fill his cheeks.

"You're upset," Selena said.

"Guillermo, can we talk?"

The leader of the Brotherhood of the Golden Cog nodded. "Certainly. Let's retire to the dining room." They went into the building, a yip coming from Coconino as Creed entered, though the coyote didn't follow.

A minute later, they sat at the dining room table, the Tesla bulbs in the chandelier giving the room a pleasant glow.

"Were you aware of the death rooms where they take Chinese prostitutes?"

Moreno tilted his head. "Death rooms?"

"When an enslaved Chinese woman is too beat down and sick to work any longer, she's taken to a place to die. I suppose there must be dozens around Chinatown. They call them hospitals." Creed described exactly what he saw that evening.

"Madre de Dios." Moreno clenched his fists. "I had no clue. The police are crooked, of course. Too much crime goes unpunished to deny this. They've been escorting these girls to the brothels and carting away their bodies? I knew these girls are slaves, of course, but there's only so much a group like us can do—"

"I wouldn't expect you to solve all the city's problems. I just wanted to tell you what I discovered," said Creed. "And, there was the girl who showed me."

"She wouldn't tell you her name?" Moreno said. "What did she say when you got back to her?"

"She’d already fled."

Moreno shook his head. "Poor child. Do you think she really lives with her parents?"

"I want to help her. At least I learned something. That hospital must be where Madam Chang sent Sun Jing. But, how did she wind up in Santa Cruz with machinery grafted to her? Who has that technology, and where did they get it? What do they plan to do with it?”

Moreno frowned.

"And, who was the woman who attacked me?” Creed continued. “Because she had enhancements, too. Who's trying to stop me from finding out? What else are they doing in that hospital?"

"That's a lot of questions," said Moreno. "What's your next move?"

"I don't know," Creed answered, crossing his arms. Still, an idea came to him that soon worked itself into a plan.

Around one in the morning, Creed knelt on the same roof where he’d observed the hospital earlier. He watched the men two stories down. The bay fog filled the spaces between the buildings and chilled him through his duster.

Two new men, both Chinese, wore clothes reminiscent of the guards from Blossoms, a tie, vest, and white shirt with jeans and black boots. These men also sported bowler hats. Why did criminals always seem to wear black? Creed realized he couldn’t judge. It provided camouflage at night, of course. Creed himself wore dark blues and black.

He’d come prepared, and he patted the bottle in his inside coat pocket that would help him deal with these men without crippling them for life. Moreno had reluctantly provided it.

One guard sat on a barrel beside the door, arms crossed, and leaned against the wall. Another stood with arms dangling. A third sat on his own barrel on the other side of the door. He looked one way, then the other, then closing his eyes and crossing his arms. They seemed used to this routine, sitting outside at night and nothing ever happening.

Creed hoped to find the answers to his questions inside that building. He wanted to believe no other guards lurked nearby, but he didn’t dare chance it. Earlier, he’d eaten a light supper and then spent an hour sitting quietly in his room, breathing to remain calm and to help him focus on his mission. Now, he took the small bottle and a cloth square from his breast pocket, poured about a quarter of the contents on the rag, then recapped the bottle and put it away.

Bodacious Creed, known by some as the zombie lawman, stood, took a breath, and jumped.

He fell two stories and landed in front of the men, hitting the ground with a satisfying thump. Only a bit of pain touched the soles of his feet. Under the streetlights, the shock on their faces appeared ghastly.

Creed didn't plan to let them recover.

He grabbed the first by the collar while holding the rag between two fingers and his palm. Creed lifted the hefty stranger off his barrel and swung his steel-hard fist into the man's jaw with a crack. The man spun and flew to Creed's left. The other pulled a club from his hip and swung it at Creed. It hit his shoulder. Creed lifted this man with both hands, turned, and threw him at the third.

Legs apart and fists raised in a fighting stance, Creed waited for the men to get up. Through grunts of pain, the first pushed the second, who rolled away.

The door slammed open, banging against the left barrel.

Turning, Creed came face to chest with a massive steely. It reminded him of Anna’s seven-foot-tall automaton, Zero. Because Zero’s functions included lifting and lab work, it possessed incredible strength. As this new steely's massive fist swung toward Creed's head, he realized its skills included fighting.

Creed ducked as the metal fist whooshed over his head, hitting his hat and knocking it down into the road.

The guards stood. One slammed his club into Creed's back. He stumbled forward, a sharp pain in his kidneys. He spun, grabbed the man around the waist, and plowed him into the steely. Breath rushed from the guard's abdomen. The steely stepped back, keeping its balance, grasped Creed’s shoulders, and lifted him.

The other guard came at him, billy raised. Creed kicked his face and the man’s nose crunched. A second later, he kicked the steely in the neck. It squeezed his shoulders, and it might have crushed the bones of an ordinary man. Instead, the steely's arms creaked. Creed kicked its head again, this time with both feet, and the automaton let go. Creed hit the ground on his back but felt little pain.

Sparks came from the steely’s neck. Creed leaped and wrapped his legs around the automaton’s torso, grabbed its head, and twisted with all of his might.

The exoskeletons of mechanical beings created by Morgan's Automatons were constructed of steel and hickory, the latter being an extremely strong wood. Still, Creed's enhanced strength prevailed. Wood in the neck cracked and split. Bolts popped. As sparks flared through the broken spine, the steely fell backward, Creed on top.

Rage filling him, Creed snatched up the rag he’d dropped in the scuffle, stood, and glared at the two men. They turned and ran.

Creed dashed after them through the fog and easily caught up. He grabbed the first, pulled him close, and held the chloroform-soaked cloth to his mouth. When that one collapsed, he covered the next block in moments and did the same to the second and then, finally, the last.

He checked each. Their pulses beat hard in their necks. They should be out for a time and give him no more trouble. He rushed back to the building, wondering what other surprises the hospital held. Above, a young woman watched him from the window.

Creed gazed at her for a moment, at her pleading gaze and her hands pressed against the glass, at her breath fogging it. She stepped away.

Through the open door and down the hall he caught movement.

There stood an older man leveling a shotgun.

Creed drew his left pistol. The speed must have shocked the stranger, for he dropped the rifle and held his hands up. Creed strode in, reached the end of the hall in moments, held the back of the man's head, and pressed the rag to his face. In seconds, the elder went limp and Creed let him down.

Back outside, Creed hauled the steely into the building. He wondered if he should drag the guards in, too, but that would only take more time. He planned to gather evidence and get out. So, Creed shut the entrance and looked at the doors on either side.

The hallway reminded him of the brothel alleyways from earlier. Slave girls started there and wound up here. Is this where someone operated on Sun Jing? Time to find out.

He opened the first door on the left. A young woman scuttled back in her bed and began a coughing fit. The room smelled of human waste. Otherwise, the room, only about eight feet square, was empty.

"I'm not here to hurt you," said Creed. The situation repeated itself in the course of the next several rooms. Some women lay still in their beds, sleeping or feigning sleep. One or two women occupied each small room.

In the first room upstairs, he found one empty bed, and on the table beside it, an uneven lump covered with a sheet. Creed pulled it aside. Tubes looped from one side of a box-shaped contraption to the top. Buttons went across the device and a crank extended from one side. Creed pulled at one tube. With a click, it slipped out.

An injection needle protruded from the end. Perhaps they had used these to sedate Sun Jing before her operation.

Creed stepped to a dresser. The components they used in the necklaces, bracelets, and head units had to be in here. He pulled open the doors and his mechanical heart sped up once he saw what sat on shelves inside: vials of a liquid.

More sedative? It filled every shelf in the armoire. Where did they keep the implants? Five doors remained, all of which he checked. He found two women and four empty beds before opening the last door. In the last room, a former slave girl pulled her lone sheet to her chin as she watched him. A wardrobe occupied the far corner. The other women on the floor looked spent, one thin and frail, the other breathing in sickly gurgles. The girl here was the one who stared at him through the window, and she might have been all of seventeen years old. Creed saw no obvious signs of illness. Would that make her a fit candidate for alteration?

He gazed at her and said, "It's all right."

He opened the wardrobe. Nothing but linen clothes. He patted the piles on all of the shelves. All soft. Nothing hard or metal hidden here.

Those injections didn’t contain a sedative. They put the girls to sleep. Permanently.

If they didn't die on their own, the men at the hospital killed them.

Creed stormed out of the girl's room and back to the one with the machine. He lifted it from the table and slammed it against the floor. The wood cracked and liquid spilled into the carpet. He grabbed tubes two at a time and ripped them out. He snatched a sealed vial from the dresser and shoved it into his right coat pocket.

Fuming, he stamped back to the last room on the floor. He couldn't save all of the women here, but he could save one.

She must have seen his anger. She looked dismayed Creed took several slow breaths, allowed his shoulders to relax, and softened his posture.

"Do you speak English?" he asked.

She must have at least known what this meant because she shook her head.

"You and me." He pointed to her, to himself, and then toward the street. "We're getting out of here. I can get you somewhere safe."

She gazed at him with brows lowered as though parsing what he meant. With eyes flashing wide, she nodded.

Creed held out his hand to her, but she got out of bed herself. She coughed for a long moment, then said something in Chinese. Creed guessed the meaning. She was ready to go with him.

They stepped out of the room, Creed making sure she moved all right on her own. As he strode down the hall, she followed. They descended the stairs. She gasped at the man knocked out at the end of the lower hallway and the massive steely out front.

Down the street, Creed spotted his hat. He picked it up and shoved it on his head.

The young woman stumbled, and Creed decided to carry her. He lifted her with both arms, holding her like a groom about to walk his bride across the threshold of their first home. She instinctively put her arms around his shoulders.

When Creed ran, she gave a scream that may have been joy or fear, but as he carried her through the streets of Chinatown, the young lady went quiet and held on.