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Fan Fiction: Short Stories
Chapter 6:
Getting a Lead PROF. THEODORE WHITE was crossing the campus of New York University when a
voice called his name. He stoppd and turned to see a man, wearing a homburg and
dark wool overcoat, approaching him. "Yes?" White asked. "Okay, now it's starting to sound like a bad horror movie," Margo Lane said. She was in the back of the taxi with Lamont, who had been picked up from the university and had just told her what he had learned from his talk with Prof. White. "So whoever these 'zombies' are, they were poisoned with this tet . . . tetro . . . ?" "Tetrodotoxin," Lamont said. "That appears to be the case. After a while, the poison begins to wear off. In this case, it started wearing off while the one was at the coroner's office." From the front seat, Shrevy looked at them in the rearview mirror and said, "Boss, you said more of these zombie-like guys were spotted. You think maybe somebody might be using this tetro-whats-it to create an army of slaves to do crimes?" Lamont nodded. "If that's the case, whoever's responsible may be planning to create more." "So what do we do?" Margo asked. "See if this fugu fish is sold anywhere in the city. It's popular in the Orient, so see if any of the restaurants over in Chinatown serve it." Miguel Gustavo stood in the ceremonial room, shirtless, having just finished his daily exercises. In his hands he held the morning edition of the New York Times, looking at the front page headline in big letters: SHADOW INTERRUPTS THIRD ROBBERY. The article told how witnesses, the store employees, were being robbed by the strange "zombie-like" criminals when The Shadow arrived to break up the act. Though the employees said they never actually saw The Shadow, they did hear his laugh. "He is a strong one," Gustavo said, folding the paper. "A worthy opponent. I had anticipated his inevitable presence. The final battle will ultimately come, but not before I complete my mission." With that he tossed the paper onto the table and walked away. It was evening when Margo Lane entered the mansion's main living room, where Lamont had just finished lighting a fire. The past couple of days had begun to grow colder, and forecasters were now predicting rain within twenty-four hours. Lamont stood. "Did you find anything?" "Fugu fish is extremely rare here in New York," she said, "even in Chinatown. The restaurants over there stopped serving it a couple years ago after there was a reported outbreak of deadly fugu. But, I did manage to track down a place in Chinatown that's been known to sell fugu from time to time, shipped in fresh right from the Orient." "What's the place?" "Wu's. They don't have any right now, but they get their orders from a guy named David Hong. And they're expecting another shipment later tonight." Lamont looked up from the paper. "Where's this David Hong?" She handed him a slip of paper. "He stays at a warehouse down on the waterfront. That's the address. The man I talked to at Wu's said he was expected to return around ten o'clock." Lamont nodded, moving toward one of the window's. Outside, the last signs of light had disappeared. Clouds were in the sky and wind was rustling the trees, a sure sign that a storm was coming. "So what happens now?" Margo asked behind him. "Mister Hong is going to receive a little visit," he said. "From The Shadow." David Hong went about loading boxes into the trunk of his car, humming to himself a song his mother used to sing him to sleep with when he was little. The warehouse was cold, impossible to completely heat, and the portable heater was over by the desk, a few yards away. He was putting the third box into the trunk when he suddenly heard laughter. He nearly dropped the box, struggling to hold onto it as he looked around. "Who's there?" he called. "Who is that?" "David Hong," a peculiar voice said from the darkness. Frightened at the mentioning of his name by a stranger he couldn't even see, Hong seemed to stand upright, letting go of the box and dropping it to the ground. "How do you know my name?" he asked, turning in circles, looking everywhere. "I know everything," the voice said. "I've come to pay you a little visit." "Wha--what do you want?" "Answers. Who are you supplying the fugu to?" "Fugu?" "I know you acquire it for Wu's in Chinatown. But someone else is getting it from you, aren't they? Someone who's using the poison for his dirty deeds. Who is it?" The last three words came sharply, loud, giving Hong a start. "I--I don't know his name." "Don't lie to me, David Hong," the voice said sinisterly. "I'm not lying. I swear. I don't know his name." "Tell me what you know." "He comes by. About every three or four days. Picks up some of the, the fugu." "When will he be back for more?" Hong, is body full of fright, tried to think. "Um . . . t-tonight. Around eleven. He always shows up late at night." "Do you know you're aiding a criminal, David?" "I don't know what he's doing, honestly. He just takes it and pays me, and that's it. I don't know his name, I don't know where he lives, what he's doing. I don't know anything. Please don't hurt me. Please." Another moment of laughter, then: "I'm not going to hurt you, David Hong. You're going to leave. Right now. You'll walk out of this warehouse, keep walking, and never ever come back. This is your only chance." Hong swallowed hard, still wondering who the unseen man was, but grateful that letting him go was the man's idea. Hong grabbed his pack of cigarettes from atop one of the boxes and hightailed it toward the door, throwing it open and disappearing into the night as the laughter trailed behind him. A lone car drove down the pier, its headlights paving the way before it. It came to a stop outside warehouse five and shut off, and the driver climbed out. Miguel Gustavo shut the door and walked toward the warehouse. The wind was beginning to pick up, flapping his trench coat. The storm was close. Annoyed that David Hong wasn't already waiting for him, he knocked on the door. No reply. He knocked a few more times, harder, clearly growing angrier with each second. There was nothing he hated more than having to wait. A moment later, the door swung to reveal a man who was not David Hong. "Who are you? Where is the other man?" The Chinese man before him introduced himself. "My name is Wu LoPan," a disguised, accented Lamont Cranston. "Mister Hong went home sick. Stomach flu or something. He asked me to come down and help you. He knew you would be coming. So I came down to help you." Gustavo looked at him suspiciously, as if suspecting something, then said, "Okay, let's get this over with." He stepped inside, and Lamont closed the door behind him. As soon as the door shut, Margo Lane emerged from where she had been hiding, a small utility shed near the stairs leading down to the docks, and hurried toward the car nearby. She crouched on the passenger side and opened the front door. She searched the glove compartment, sifting through papers and pulling them out to look at them, hoping to find something that would tell them the man's name. She found the registration card and quickly scribbled down the name and address on it, then replaced everything and shut the door. She moved back to the shed and stepped inside, closing the door just as the door to the warehouse opened. Gustavo came out first, leading Lamont, who was wheeling out three boxes on a dolly. Gustavo opened the trunk and stood by watching, not offering to help as Lamont loaded the boxes inside. When he was done, the man shut the lid and moved toward the front of the car without a word. "Hey," Lamont said. "David said I'd get paid for doing this." Gustavo turned just long enough to say, "Let him pay you. I don't pay strangers," then climbed into the car. Lamont pulled the dolly out of the way as the car backed up, turning around and heading down the pier toward the entrance. It passed through the gate and turned onto the street, heading right. Seconds later, a taxi cab pulled away from the curb and fell into place behind it. Back at the warehouse, Margo came out from the shed and walked over to where Lamont was standing. "That's a pretty good disguise," she said, looking at his face closely. "I can't even tell it's you." "Did you get anything?" the familiar voice of Lamont asked. "A name and an address." She handed him the paper. "Whether one or the either belongs to him, or neither, I don't know. But that's all I found." "Good girl." He tucked the paper into his pocket. When she looked back, Wu LoPan was gone, and standing in his place beside her was a suited Lamont Cranston. "Let's get out of here," he said, and started walking, leaving her to stand there looking on in amazement. |
The Shadow: Master of Darkness
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