Author's Note: Well, it's been awhile since I've been to this site. Ahh well.

Behold! The detective story is written! I'm planning this to be part one of a series of short stories based around this character. If you like this, you'll definately like the rest I have planned.

First person narrative... wow. I usually hate it, but when it comes to the noir genre of writing... I can't live without it. What can I say? It's fun!

Alright, now on with the show...

It was a dark and stormy night—you know, the kind they show in horror movies or detective stories; the kind that chill men’s souls to the core. The rain was a freezing, biting attack of merciless ice-crystals; blown from every direction which seemed physically possible. It poured and battered over windows and rooftops, it bounced off pavement and got under pedestrian’s coats and umbrellas, and it assaulted faces of those unfortunate few who were stranded without those—like me.

It was the perfect night for murder.

I can’t remember how it happened—just that it did. They came out of nowhere, four of them—no, maybe it was fifteen, I can’t remember—and they had guns—knives—missiles—torpedoes! They shot one man—massacred a whole block! A few guys went to the hospital, and about fifty were sent straight to the morgue! There was a gigantic explosion, or maybe it was just a cigarette lighter, and I don’t think anyone was killed.

The witness reports were unbearable. It was like trying to collect information from a dyslexic paraplegic with Alzheimer’s disease. A murder in the dead of night on one of the most popular street corners—and fifty witnesses saw fifty different scenarios. Maybe none of them were right, maybe all of them were right—I couldn’t tell. It didn’t matter, in truth. Witness reports were only taken as part of some antique guideline; everyone and their mother knew that they were the most unreliable source of information. You’d be better off sifting through cigarette buts in a storm drain looking for a lipstick container than trying to determine a situation from a slew of disgruntled witnesses.

All I determined from the witnesses was this: someone had been shot. But it didn’t take a cop to figure that much out—it only took one glance at the hole through the sap’s forehead and the brains splattered across the wall to realize that the guy had offed it. The guy was shot, and he had been shot dead.

It had been a long night as it was—two separate cases with plenty of leads ended up turning out zip on the street; but the number of suspects had gone from thirty to twenty, so I really couldn’t complain. A month of paperwork and six weeks of undercover had gotten me—and the rest of the force—closer to the target. I was exhausted to the point of my conclusions border lining delirium, and here the chief goes and dumps this random-occurrence crime on my hands like I didn’t have enough to handle.

I started with the facts, leaving my other cases on the shelf for a couple hours. There was a dead guy, enough witnesses to guarantee that no one saw anything, a wad of twenties and a Rolex off the deceased’s body, a bruise on the portion of head that hadn’t been blasted apart, and the crime scene—a clearly visible alleyway just off Main Street. Witness reports revealed nothing, and the rain had washed away everything but the scraps of skull and grey matter that were too big to be carried off in the storm.

The first thing I realized was that it wasn’t the random-occurrence crime as I had predicted. This guy was shot for a valid reason, not just because some hobo with a .380 blunt-nose wanted some drinking money. The shot was also too precise for some rich-kid joy riders who decided to have fun with their new Christmas toys. No, this was an execution, not a drive by or self-defense. This was deliberate and precise; not too far away either. The coroner detected powder on the dead guy, and one of the crime scene chaps went through a summarized course of Physics 101 with me when he explained the trajectory the bullet had to take to get the blood pattern on the wall. The summarization spelled one thing out, at least: it was a point-blank execution.

Someone wanted this guy dead.

I closed my eyes in thought, leaning back in my chair as I examined the possibilities. I’d get nowhere without a background investigation report on the sap, that much I knew. Without that, the murderer could have been anyone from a begrudged roommate or coworker to an angry mob-boss with a low tolerance for debt takers.

When I opened my eyes again, the sun was shining through the office window right onto my face. The clock claimed that I had been out cold for about three hours, though my internal chronometer begged to differ. A pot of coffee and a few slices of charitably given cold pizza later, I was back to the case. As much as I wanted to get back to the other two, they could wait—the killer wasn’t going anywhere, since they were both mob jobs. Mob cases always had at least the scantest luxury of time. This one however, since I couldn’t determine the whether the mob’s involvement was crucial or not, had to be put on first-class priority for me. I was solo on this one, and I wanted it done quick.

Judging from the way the dead guy was dressed, and the numerous forms of identification found in his wallet, I determined that electronic background checks wouldn’t turn up much. I’d have to go street side this time, and I’d start my search down at the Eastport Docks.

At first glance, the docks looked like the rest of this rundown, semi-forgotten side of oblivion; rotting structures of once-grand buildings and hotels, decaying shells of burned out apartment buildings, illegible graffiti sprayed sloppily on every visible surface. Trashcans and metal drums provided flames to the numerous homeless people who occupied the macadam, broken down gas stations and convenience stores past their prime providing headquarters to drug dealers, pimps, and other creatures of the unsavory sort.

I think it was Sherlock Homes’ character which said something along the lines of the simplest answer being the correct one. In this case, at least, that proved true; the first assumption of this neighborhood was the right one—this place was a forgotten dump whose era had long since past. It was sad, really; seeing such a place which gives off an air of an antique golden age, only to see the harsh reality that is, rather than the standing, decaying memories what use-to-be.

I didn’t take a cruiser in here—hell, I didn’t even take my car in here. Streets like these, you’d be dead or close to it from the muggings. Only a suicide would take something valuable into these neighborhoods.

The docks were just across the way. The trek had me wondering though; how could someone who lived here—worked, at least—have gotten to Main Street, nearly four districts away? Main Street was on the Upside of town; where the rich folks lived and the Mob operated. This place was ruled by the gangs, not the bureaucratic and businesslike Mafia. Not even they could control these gangs.

I shook my head as my destination approached. It was at one point a gatehouse, used to monitor the shipments going in and out of the docks—a checkpoint, essentially. Now it was little more than a broken down, single room dump; home to rats and druggies. The checkpoints themselves hadn’t been used in decades, at least—not since business moved uptown, anyhow. These docks were the last semblance of civilization around these parts, considering they were the only front for the city’s imports and exports. This place had to be somewhat civil—the city feds couldn’t risk letting their precious economy go through the tubes just because a bit more corruption leaked into the area.

I only got past the gatehouse because I kept my forty-five in open view. There were two types of people down here—the gutsy and the dead. Oftentimes, they were one in the same, but every once in a while the gutsy mugs would actually have the stuff their bluffing with—a boom-stick to back up the big-talk, for instance. The smarter ones try not to put themselves in situations that warrant that sort of action. But hey, I never said I was one of those smart ones. I just happened to be one of those gutsy fellows that had the boom-stick to back me up.

It wasn’t until I was staring at the chaotic waves of the harbor did I actually start to think back to the victim. If he worked in a place like this, he normally wouldn’t have had the amount of twenties he had on him the night he was shot, never mind the Rolex. Perhaps he had been shot out of revenge for something—robbing some rich chap’s apartment for instance. That would explain the cash and the ticker, sure; but that wouldn’t explain why they were left on the body. If someone robbed a guy’s place, and the other guy took the time to hunt him down and off him, he sure as hell would take back what was stolen, right?

I sighed. The case was becoming more convoluted by the passing minute, the more I thought about it. I needed more information—more pieces of the overall jigsaw puzzle. All I had right now was a body, a wad of cash and a Rolex, an ID that confirmed the deceased worked here, and a hell of a lot of speculation.

“Excuse me!” The roar of the waves and the grinding of the cranes nearby made it difficult to speak. I tagged the first man I came across with a flash of brass and a stern face. If they weren’t afraid of my intimidating posterior, they damn well better fear the somewhat faded ‘P.D.’ written across the badge.

“Hey, what’s the big idea here, bub?” He forced my hand off the shoulder I used to wrench him around. “Ya got a problem with—” His eyes flashed across my badge, and immediately his tone changed from anger to malice. “Whatta you want down heah?”

My reply was succinct. “Information.”

“Yeah, I bet. Today it’s infamation, tomorrah it’ll be an arrest warrant.” He shook his head and stepped back. “I don’t know nothin’, an’ no amount a’ badgerin’ is gonna get anythin’ outta me. Go git ya ‘infamation’ someplace else.”

I shook my head as he left. Conceited jerk—that was the problem with people nowadays. No one trusted the damn Department, so they’d withhold evidence and information. But the more they withheld all that stuff, the more crooks got off the hook for crimes—and in turn, the more the people distrusted us. It was disgusting.

“Tell me this,” I called after him. At least he had the respect to turn around. “Where’s the supervisor of the docks?”

He gestured vaguely over to one of the warehouses, several blocks away. I’m surprised he heard me over the cacophony of everything else in the area—but I stopped caring immediately after he left. I had a job to do, and he wasn’t part of it.

After I questioned two more like-minded individuals, I had found myself staring at the door to the office of the Eastport Docks Warden; Denis Stockholm. He was a relatively short man, but his eyes bored holes through anyone who even looked at him. Most of his employees claimed he was always busy doing anything and everything—not to mention crazy as hell. At first glance, that impression seemed to be right.

“Mr. Stockholm,” I started—may as well get straight to the point. “Did this man ever work for you?”

He barely needed to take one glance over it. “No. I’ve never seen the man in my life.” His gaze quickly returned to his quaint desk.

“You’re positive?”

“Of course. I know all of my employees by a first-name basis. I know their faces, their temperaments, and their phone numbers. I can tell you for a fact that that man has never worked here.” He nodded to the photograph taken off of the dead guy’s license.

“So a man named Micheal Schmitt never worked here?” I didn’t think he knew all four hundred some employees of these particular docks, so I decided I’d pry a bit.

Stockholm scrunched his eyebrows. “Mike?” He asked. “Of course he works here, but that isn’t him.” He leaned back in his chair. “In fact, he’s here today.”

“Get him.”

He shrugged. “Whatever. I have work to do, and so does he. So whatever you’ll be saying, make sure you say it quick.”

Scant minutes later, I was standing with my back to the harbor, staring into the face of one Micheal Schmitt. I got straight to the point.

“Do you know this man?” The identification photograph was in my hand.

He shook his head, stuttering his English as he did so. “N-no, I don’t.” His speech was halting; timid at best. His accent was a thick, Ukrainian one for sure, and it was quite possible he had just started learning good ol’ American English.

“You’ve never seen him before?”

He shook his head again. He was sweating—probably from the manual labor around here.

“I’ll keep in touch, Mister Schmitt.” I didn’t have anything else to say to the guy. I had no evidence, no motive—hell, the guy didn’t even have a reason.

So now where did this leave me? I was on the wrong side of town, with all the wrong information. The guy I thought was dead is someone different, and the Mr. Micheal Schmitt I did find is some Ukrainian immigrant that barely even speaks English. This was a dead end, as far as I was concerned.

As I started back towards the gatehouse, I reviewed the facts in my brain. There was a dead guy—false Micheal Schmitt ID, cash, Rolex and all; executed point blank. The real Micheal Schmitt worked down at the Eastport Docks; immigrant, laborer, possibly part of a union. His boss: one Denis Stockholm; sharp photographic memory, looks out for the big Number One—the perfect specimen of dockside capitalism.

The ID led me down a dead-end road, but maybe the card itself didn’t. Sure, the name was wrong, but perhaps the physical piece of plastic wasn’t. That led me to the next question in my mind: Where are the most popular fake ID distributors in the city?

Answer: Chinatown. Sure, there were a few here and there on the street corners, but quality fakes were usually made and sold down in the heavily mob-run district of the Chinese. Fortunately for me, there weren’t many mob guys who knew my face as a cop. Most of the saps knew me as their friend and ally, due in full to the other two cases sitting on the shelf of my desk back at the precinct. Infiltration was my best game, and I played like the best of them.

Unfortunately for me, a few too many guys saw me flash my badge down at the docks, and as I’ve said before—Eastport doesn’t like the feds. I had about twelve mean looking guys with various weaponry on all sides at this point, and I only had two clips—one in my forty-five, the other buried in my pocket. I probably should have left the precinct with a bit more.

I only had time to ask a simple question before hell broke loose.

“Do you guys really want to start something with an officer of the law?”

When I regained consciousness, I was tied to a chair and had one hell of a headache. The single-bulb light which dangled above my head cast dull shadows on the ground in all directions, like something out of a cheap horror movie. There was a quiet roar which filled the room; my aching brain somehow deciding that it was probably a furnace or incinerator. That led me to believe I was in some sort of basement someplace.

“Looks like we’re awake over here.” A voice called to me from out of the sharply defined darkness. The light above me only provided so much illumination.

I didn’t really feel like answering anything, rhetorical or not.

“So tell me,” the voice continued. “What can we do for you?” Russians. Had to be. They’re the only ones on this planet with that accent. It seemed like good ol’ Schmitty had friends.

I took a breath, trying to steady my blurry sight. That whack to the back of my head sure did a number. “I’m trying to find the identity of someone.”

“Really?” I couldn’t see the speaker’s face. I was so completely out of it I barely distinguished the voice as masculine. “And whose identity would that be?”

I could only sigh in painful defeat. “If I knew who it was, I wouldn’t be trying to figure out their identity now, would I?” I couldn’t help but spice it with sarcasm.

“No need to be upset,” the voice was closer now, almost like it was behind me. “We didn’t bring you here to hurt you.”

“What are you talking about?”

The accent continued, “We have no beef with the badge, you see. We just had to be sure you really were part of the precinct before we could be sure you weren’t a threat.”

“I don’t understand.” This wasn’t making sense at all.

Somehow, through my convoluted, pain-filled mind, I sensed that the owner of the disembodied voice was smiling. “Do you know, Detective,” it started, “how many people have false forms of identification in this city?”

My response was immediate and laced with annoyance. “Plenty.”

“Nearly everyone on these streets, Detective.” The voice replied. I guessed his question was rhetoric. “We know what you’re looking for. You’re looking for the killer of this man—” he flashed the photo ID I had been using of the dead guy, “—and we know who it is.”

If I could have turned my head, I would have. “Then why bring me here?”

“Because the answer is more than you can handle.” The said smoothly. “We can’t spell it out for you—that’d be too easy for you, wouldn’t it?” The Russian chuckled. “We can’t spell it out for you, but we can point you in the right direction. You wouldn’t believe it if we spelled out the murderer anyhow.”

I sighed. “What is it that you want, then?”

“A friend with the badge, is all we ask.”

“So you want an insider who’s on the force?” This guy was vaguer than a fortune teller.

“No,” he said. “We simply want someone who will help us when we need help. You’ll know what that means when the time is right.”

I didn’t look as though I had a choice. With reluctance, I agreed, and they pointed me in the direction I could only assume was the direction they wanted me to face. Unfortunately, it was the same direction I had already assumed before I was knocked unconscious.

I was drugged this time, apparently taking pity on the already gruesome headache that threatened to split apart my skull. When my senses returned and the blackness faded, I was sitting in a corner booth of a semi-forgotten bar. After it was decided I had been conscious for twenty minutes, I did what any stupid alcoholic would—I went to the bar and ordered a Scotch; on the rocks. One couldn’t hurt, right?

Four drinks and a half hour later, I stepped out of the bar. I needed the air. Night had fallen, and it was raining again. Judging from the amount of people in the bar, I could only assume that it was sometime around eleven—and my headache wasn’t getting any better. But headache regardless, the case pushed on.

It was getting foggy, the case. Now I was stuck with a set of Russians who claimed to know everything about the murder, but refused to divulge any information. The only clue they had chosen to give me was the clue I had already suspected—the Chinatown ID manufacturers. That was the next place I had to stop at, and I happened to know a few guys who were in with the Chinatown mob boss. Getting the information wouldn’t be difficult, provided I had what they wanted to barter.

The taxi ride wasn’t that eventful, but the fare certainly was—twenty bucks to go some twenty four blocks! That was just a reminder of how out-of-touch I had gotten with the more ‘civilized’ center of this god-forsaken city.

“I didn’t expect to be seeing you for some time, Detective.” The calm voice of my informant greeted me after I stepped out of the vehicle. He was a Japanese fellow, a one-time cop-turned-private-eye like many others. He had been a loose friend of mine since the days he was on the force, but those times were gone. Now he runs tight with the Chinatown mafia—he claims it’s only business, but sometimes I can’t help but suspect otherwise.

“Hello, Jin.” I said, nodding to him. “I need information on the ID business around here.”

He raised an eyebrow. “And why would you need that?” He asked. “Rather, what is it worth?”

I shrugged. The information I was after may or may not be as crucial as I hoped. I had no idea of the price to put on it. “Name it.” I said.

“Well,” he started, “Just getting the books for that sort of thing is going to cost something. And then there’s the infiltration fee…” he did the math on his fingers. “How’s five Benjamins sound?”

“I’ll pay you back later. I need to see the books now.”

He took my word for it. It wasn’t long until I was standing in the basement library of a seemingly abandoned apartment building. Jin explained that the books were organized by the client’s last name, and they were divided into two lists per page; one column listing the client name, the opposite column listing the corresponding fake ID provided.

If I could give the mob credit for anything, it was their efficient records. The only catch was, I didn’t know the client’s initial name—only the ID he was provided with. That meant I’d have to go through all forty-some volumes the hard way. I accepted the help that Jin offered, even though I knew it would add another Benjamin or so onto my tab.

Whether it was stroke of luck or just simple fate, I was just thankful that we found the name pretty quickly. It turns out that the “Micheal Schmitt” name had been given out to four different people. Two of them had been dead for years—one was thanks to a car crash, the other due to colon cancer. It was the last two who I had to investigate.

It wasn’t until the sun was rising that I got back to the precinct. The chief wanted to know exactly where I’d been for the last twelve hours or so, but I didn’t have time to talk to him. I simply waved him off and quickly explained that I had a new lead.

The internet is a wonderful thing. In seconds, the first Micheal Schmitt I had dug up from the records—Vladimir Roscov—popped up on my screen. He happened to be an illegal Ukrainian immigrant who had come to the city in hopes of avoiding his own financial problems back home. The picture that the database provided was a tad out-of-date, but it did its job. He was the guy down at the docks.

As for the other Micheal Schmitt—his real name was Alexi Rokov, another Ukrainian immigrant. The database didn’t say much about him, just that he had come to the States trying to flee financial problems as well—not surprising, given the economic stability of the Ukrainian market. The last place of employment listed on the page was Eastport Docks.

This guy, this Alexi Rokov; he was our dead guy. When you’ve been in this business for long enough, you stop believing in coincidences. Both Alexi and Vladimir were illegal immigrants, and both worked at the docks. I wouldn’t have been at all surprised if they had gotten over here by good old Denis Stockholm—the venture capitalist who probably saw illegal immigrants as cheap labor. Everyone knows that’s what the corporate world is about nowadays.

I ran a hand through my hair and sat back in my seat. I knew now the who, but not the why. Judging from the fact that Alexi had been loaded when he was killed, and the fact that he had been executed point blank, I wouldn’t have been at all surprised if he had dug something ugly up on his boss, and blackmailed him.

It was then that I saw the man in question walk out of the chief’s office. Stockholm walked past my door just as I looked up—pausing long enough to give me one hell of a look. Then I was called in to the chief’s office.

It was official. Two days into the case and I was off of it. The whole thing was pigeonholed into one of those dusty legal boxes and placed in the storage vaults downstairs before I even knew what happened. I had been right after all—the last minute epiphany had simply come too late. The chief had probably been bribed to drop the whole thing, and I had been threatened with the loss of my career if I kept it up.

What was I going to do? Lose my job over some dead immigrant’s ass? No. I dropped it, just like they told me to. As ashamed as I am to admit it, corruption runs through even the Precinct’s ranks. The chief was bought by greenbacks, and I was bought by my job. In the end, the bad guy got away.

I stepped back out onto the street, rain cascading off the shoulders of my trench coat as I did so. That case wasn’t just closed; it was as though it never happened. It was back to business as usual—back to my previous two mob jobs I had sitting on my shelf.

I sighed as I looked up into the pouring, overcast sky. The business tycoon had screwed over a laborer, and given the justice system the middle finger—and all I could do was sit back and accept it. What ever happened to ‘protect and serve’?

Even though I was back on my other two cases, I couldn’t help but reflect. Who were the Russians, and what would they need me for? They knew what I knew—probably more than I knew, since they probably had the facts of why Alexi was blackmailing Stockholm. Were they planning on ripping Stockholm from his seat of power?

The can of worms had been opened for a bigger investigation, but that could only be handled by a private eye. The cops were silenced by cash, and I was silenced by threats. But no matter how many worms Stockholm will try to stuff back into the can, there will always be a few that escape his thick-fingered grasp.

The Russians wanted a friend to uproot Stockholm. Well, they got themselves a friend, alright.