The Word | Sic Transit | Credits
[Begin 10/1/99]
Reziphel and Shilom drive to Janet's office, and spend all afternoon searching for the gang member called Bingo in the Department of Justice's criminal records files.
At about 6 pm, they finally have something:
Gerald Patterson, aka "Bingo", tall, skinny, black, brown eyes, black hair, missing two front teeth. Born 5/16/74.Twice arrested for possession of crack cocaine, wanted in connection with two homicides (both committed in Chinatown), also wanted for assault (carved "Bingo" on the arm of a prostitute), considered armed and extremely dangerous.
Janet then pulls up the arrest records on the prostitute: Wei-lin Chang, aka Scarlet. One of the arresting officers listed is Patrolman Tom Smith of Precinct 5, which handles parts of Chinatown, the Lower East Side, and Little Italy. Smith is in when she calls, and he agrees to talk to her before he goes out on patrol. Janet drives over to see him.
Smith tells Janet that Scarlet has been working Chinatown for 4 or 5 years now. She can usually be found on Division Street, sharing her space with one or two other prostitutes. Most of her customers are Chinese, but she has a few other regulars. Smith thinks she might be owned by one of the Triads currently operating in Chinatown. He's has never had any trouble with her; she's only been brought in a couple of times, and when told to move along, she never puts up a fuss.
Bingo had been a customer of Scarlet's before, and often paid her in drugs. The last time she saw him, about six months ago, he couldn't perform -- Smith guesses that was because of the drugs he'd been using and abusing. Bingo got angry, and took it out on Scarlet. Fortunately for her, he let her go after he'd "signed" his name. She had come to the precinct house to report the incident that night.
Janet thanks Smith for his help, and as she is leaving, he warns her that Wei-lin doesn't speak much English; they needed an interpreter for her the night she was cut. Janet says that won't be a problem, and heads towards Chinatown.
Once there, Janet cruises clowly down Division Street. This section of Chinatown is mostly office buildings and warehouses; not much is open at night. Several small groups of prostitutes are out, as well as a few single Chinese men. Janet spots Wei-lin standing with two other hookers, and continues driving down the street to find a parking spot. She sits in her car for several minutes, singing a Song of Tongues softly to herself, and then gets out and walks back to the trio.
As she approaches, she hears the women laughingly discussing her in Chinese: "What's she doing here?" "Look at those clothes. She'll never score with that outfit." Janet, who is currently dressed in jeans, sweater, and overcoat, greets them in perfect Cantonese.
Surprised and somewhat ill at ease, the women fall silent, giving Janet a chance to look them over. Scarlet is very thin, close to 40, with dark circles under her eyes that her makeup can't completely hide. Her hair is black and tangled. Her trademark red dress is stained and has long, off-the-shoulder sleeves ending in loops that go around her middle fingers. It shows a substantial amount of cleavage. She carries a small red handbag that almost matches the dress, and wears a long coat, pulled open in front.
The other two women are considerably younger, both in their late 20's. The first is called Mai; she has a mass of frizzy peroxide blond hair piled up on top of her head. She's dressed in a leather skirt and tight black top, and has a leather jacket draped over her chubby shoulders. She is somewhat cross-eyed. The second, Blossom, has short black hair, and is more stereotypically dressed in fishnets, shorts, and a lot of jewelry; she looks more than a little drunk and is obviously cold, even with her long coat.
Janet introduces herself and shows them her badge. She tells Wei-lin she'd like to talk to her, and gives her two companions a $20 bill to go and get something to drink at the convenience store a block or two away. When they hesitate, Wei-lin assures them she will be all right, and the two walk off, arm in arm.
Janet waves away Wei-lin's apologies for the comments she and her companions had been making about Janet. Wei-lin then compliments her on her command of Cantonese. Her breath is foul, and she has unsuccessfully tried to mask the smell with some kind of breath mint. The combination is unappetizing.
Janet tells her that she's come about Gerald Parker, the man that assaulted her a few months back. Would she like to see him punished for what he did? Scarlet shrugs and says sure. She's heard that he still comes down to Chinatown occasionally during the day, but never any more at night. He'd been getting into fights and generally causing trouble for quite a while before he cut her; she thinks he may have killed somebody. Scarlet has "friends" who would take care of him if he was stupid enough to show his face around here at night.
Scarlet's version of what happened six months ago pretty much matches Patrolman Smith's. She and Bingo had been in one of the nearby alleys, and when he started yelling at her and pulled out a knife, she was afraid he was going to kill her. She shows Janet the scars on her left arm: it takes some imagination to see the word "Bingo", both because of the hurried execution and because some of the marks are not longer visible.
Janet again asks her what she would like to see happen to Bingo; she urges her to "be honest". Scarlet considers this for a minute, and says she would like to see him dead. But she doesn't think she will have to worry about that. Her "friends" will take care of him if he isn't careful. He's made himself very visible around here.
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| Dave Choat |
As she reaches her car, she notices that there is now a light on in the Equality Corporation building across the street. A man is watching her from the second story window. His figure is backlit, so she cannot see his face. Very deliberately, she opens her car door and lets the interior light spill over her features as she looks up at him. After a minute or so, she gets into her car and drives away. She calls Reziphel on his cellphone soon afterwards.
Meanwhile, Reziphel heads off to the last known address of Gerald Patterson: an old run-down apartment building in Harlem. There are trash bags piled up outside, but the lobby is relatively clean, though it smells like unwashed people. The mailbox for apartment 512 has no name attached to it, but then again, neither do almost half of the other mailboxes.
Rez climbs the stairs to the fifth floor, and sneaks down the dimly-lit hall to apartment 512. He listens at the door, and hears a TV blaring a basketball game. After knocking loudly on the door, he quickly hides behind a corner where he can observe the door without being seen. A minute or so goes by, and then a fat middle-aged black man answers the door, wheezing and cursing. The light from the TV spills out into the hall briefly before he slams the door again. Definitely not Bingo.
Thinking that he needs to be discreet, Rez decides to investigate the apartment in celestial form. His first attempt to ditch his vessel fails, but a few minutes later the hall is empty as the Wheel rolls through the apartment door.
The small, dingy living room holds little more than a faded couch and an overstuffed chair, which is placed squarely in front of the television set. Beer cans and potato chip bags litter the floor. As Rez moves past the chair's occupant, the man stiffens. His eyes bulge, his mouth drops open, and inarticulate noises emerge from it. Reziphel realizes that the man can actually see him!
Being new to this sort of thing, Rez is momentarily at a loss for what to do. Finally, he speaks: "Um. Behold!" The man's eyes bug out even further, if possible. "I have come to rid your city of a great evil!"
The man swallows, and stammers, "You mean -- the anti-Christ?"
"No. This man is not at that level of evil. But I must find him." In a booming voice, Reziphel continues. "His name is the same as a dog's."
"You mean, like, Spot?"
"No. Think back to the songs of your childhood."
The man, clearly confused, falls silent, thinking hard as the sweat drips down his face.
"His name," and here Reziphel pauses for effect, "is Gerald Patterson."
"Who?"
"You know him as... Bingo."
"Bingo?" The man's face clears. "I threw him out a few months ago. He wasn't paying his rent!"
"Where is he now?"
"I don't know, I haven't seen him since. Is he -- Bingo is the anti-Christ? I never woulda thought." He shakes his head, muttering to himself.
Reziphel is somewhat distracted, remembering a Song he once heard about that he might be able to use to track Bingo. He decides he'll need something that Bingo once owned. "I need to find him. Do you have anything of his here?"
The man shakes his head. "I don't think so. He took his TV and stereo, left me with this piece of shit." He gestures at the TV, then remembers who he is talking to. "Uh, sorry. I threw away most of his other stuff, it wasn't worth anything."
Reziphel considers. "What did he like to do?"
"He liked drinking beer, but I drank all the cans he left in the fridge." He brightens. "He liked basketball -- he was a big fan. Used to play with some of the guys in the neighborhood."
"Did he have a basketball?" Reziphel asks hopefully.
Looking nervous again, the man replies, "Yeah, but the landlord threw it out the window after he left."
Realizing he will need to get back into his vessel soon, Reziphel intones, "You have been helpful. I must go."
"Yeah, uh ok." He watches as Reziphel rolls out through the ceiling.
Soon afterwards, Reziphel gets the phone call from Janet. Since Reziphel's usual telephone style is to hang up if the person on the other end pauses for more than half a second, Janet is forced to call him back several times before she gets her message across: Sam will have to figure out what he wants to do with Bingo without Wei-Lin's help. She simply wants him dead; her ideas about punishment don't go any farther than that.
After the last call, Janet heads back to her apartment.
Sam spends the next hour or so checking out all the local YMCA's, gyms, and any place else that has a basketball court, on the theory that Bingo might be there. He is considering going to search the crowd at the game at Madison Square Gardens when he realizes that this is taking too long. He needs help.
Sam calls Janet again, and asks her if she knows anyone who might be able to track Bingo. Janet says she doesn't, but that Gil might. She tells Sam to stay on the line while she calls Gil.
Gil recommends a Cherub friend of his. Reziphel returns to the apartment, and convinces the man to give him something of Gerald's, which turns out to be a pair of underwear. Much later, the man in the apartment reminisces on what happened that day.
Reziphel meets up with Oscar Parker, a Cherub friend of Gil's, who calls in another Cherub with a Song of Affinity. Using this Song, he manages to get a fix on Gerald. Reziphel, Shilom, and the Cherub, Naphali, follow the trail to Times Square, into one of the last remaining peep shows. Reziphel gets quite an eyeful. The others leave him to follow his prey.
Around 10 pm, Janet arrives at the Gold Rush, where Gil is working the door. She smiles sweetly at him, hands him her coat, and pays her $5 cover charge. All heads turn to look at her, and several men start to approach, but when she drapes herself over Gil, they back away.
The Gold Rush is decorated in a Valentine's Day motif: hearts and cupids with Stetsons are everywhere. Many of the drink specials are of the pink variety, and there are pink carnations at every table. The mechanical bull has a necklace of plastic hearts, and even Gil is wearing a pink shirt.
Janet insists that she be introduced to Pat, so Gil takes her to the bar. Gil tells Pat that this is his apartment mate, and then adds, "We do not have intercourse." Pat, who is used to Gil by now, takes this all in stride. By way of polite conversation, she asks Janet if it was her dress that Gil wore to the bar several weeks ago.
"Ah yes," says Gil. "The humor experiment. But no one laughed."
Janet winces. "It was an Oscar de la Renta original!"
Pat assures Janet that it did indeed look original on Gil. Janet says that she never got to see it, and Pat pulls out a photo from under the cash register. After perusing it, Janet looks somewhat pained, but recovers.
Pat serves her a Lone Star beer ("Gil's favorite!" Janet sqeals), and Gil excuses himself to go back to work.
Janet spends the rest of the evening dancing and flirting, but all the men she talks to are very polite; no one seems eager to mess with Gil's "girlfriend". Janet ends up getting to know the three policemen who are there. She hits it off very well with the last, Ted, and by the time the bar closes at 1:00 a.m. they have made arrangements to go back to her apartment.
Ted waits by the door while Janet goes to talk to Gil, who is now helping Pat clean up. Janet asks Gil to give her his key to her apartment, saying that she needs some privacy tonight. Gil looks over at Ted, then turns back to Janet.
"I don't like him," he says.
"Unless he's Hellsworn, I'm leaving with him," Janet replies, and is out the door. She and Ted drive separately to her apartment, where they spend the night.
As they clean up, Pat tells Gil that she finds her friend "interesting", and asks him if he isn't somewhat upset at her behavior. Gil says that whatever Janet does is fine with him, adding that "she knew what she wanted when she came in here tonight, and she got it."
Gil spends the rest of the night out on the street, talking with Oscar
Parker at his newsstand.
Bingo and his Jamaican pal finally leave Times Square around 2 am. Reziphel follows them back to Bingo's apartment, and waits an hour until the two are likely to be asleep. He goes celestial, and gets into Bingo's bedroom. Here he has a dilemma over what to do to punish Bingo properly. He finally settles for setting himself on fire, then jumping on Bingo, burning him, cutting "Bingo" in one arm and "Scarlet" in the other, and throwing him against the wall. Next he goes into the living room and smashes the stereo with the TV. Finally he goes back and throws the burning mattress out the window, and then throws Bingo out behind it. Bingo misses the mattress, and is dead when Reziphel jumps out after him.
Reziphel beats a hasty retreat and spends what's left of the night and early morning in an incinerator.
[End 10/1/99]