Chapter One

hen Nick Wergild regained consciousness, he was hanging from the third story window of a whorehouse in Beaver Creek, Montana. Forty feet below him was an ornate, concrete fountain that looked like a rather uncomfortable place to land. The only thing keeping him from the waiting embrace of gravity was a pair of handcuffs, a heavy, silver chain connecting his wrist to that of Quentin Fairbanks, former politician and current lunatic. Realizing where he was, Nick decided that opening his eyes had been a horrible mistake.

Quentin Fairbanks was a sizeable man, both in height and in girth, with all the charm and sex appeal of a young Joseph Stalin. He was seventy-three but appeared to be around forty. His wealth gave him access to advanced anti-aging medical treatments that most people only knew through rumors and urban legends. He had an odor like old milk, which he concealed with cologne that smelled like old fish. On this particular day, he was wearing a rumpled tuxedo, a black cashmere overcoat, and a smile like a crack in the surface of a frozen lake.

“So, the brilliant manhunter is finally awake! As much as I’ve enjoyed our little time together, I really must cut things short.” Fairbanks reached into his jacket with his free hand, producing a rusty, chrome hacksaw.

“The only thing worse than being murdered,” Nick thought, “is being murdered by someone making bad puns.” Calling up to Fairbanks, he said, “The handcuffs are spider steel. Impossible to cut. Why don’t you saw through your arm instead?” He regretted the words as soon as they left his mouth. He had forgotten the most important rule of manhunting: Don’t taunt the crazies. Fairbanks removed his belt and jammed it in his mouth, scowling determinedly. He pressed the saw to his wrist and let its teeth eat away at his flesh.

“Oh, holy hell,” Nick thought. “I’m finally going to die. I wonder if my life will flash before my eyes. – No, I’ll be dead too soon. Maybe just the highlights: birth, first day of school, losing my virginity on a tugboat…” His reminiscing gave way to horror as Fairbanks’ blood began to fall. “I can’t keep living this way. No amount of reward money is worth this!”

Fairbanks was the one remaining evil from the Old Days, the last of the politicians. He had worked in the capital for years, right until the end. He would have kept working after that, but once the government collapsed, he stopped getting paid. It was hard for the government to pay for much of anything, once IRS headquarters was burned to the ground. He had been in hiding since the day of the Washington Riots, using various aliases, forged documents, and fake mustaches. Apparently, he still had a lot of enemies. Even after all those years, they would still give a lot of money to see him behind bars. Or beaten with a tire iron. Either one, really. They weren’t picky.

With no government to collect taxes, there were no police. The criminal justice system and protection services were now the domain of insurance companies, private security firms, and manhunters. Manhunters like Nick were a special breed of private detective, experts in solving crimes, tracking down fugitives, and hand-to-gun combat. (It was easier than hand-to-hand combat, especially if you were the one with the gun.)

If criminals couldn’t be found by the security patrols, the victims offered a reward to the first manhunter who could. The reward for Fairbanks’ capture was the highest Nick had ever seen. After several weeks of searching, Fairbanks remained elusive. Finally, Nick had a stroke of inspiration. (For Nick, inspiration always felt like a stroke.) He found a way to get Fairbanks to come to him: he would marry his daughter.

Melinda Fairbanks came from a wealthy family, but her father’s years in hiding had left her nearly penniless, forcing her to take a job transcribing audio books for the deaf. Her mother had given birth rather late in life, making her not too much older than Nick. Still, this did not make him feel any better about what he had to do. Melinda was a thin, nervous sort of woman whose prominent nose and bizarre hairstyle made her resemble a malnourished Shetland sheepdog. However, if you had a few drinks, took off your glasses, turned off the lights, and gouged out your eyes with a spoon, she could be almost pretty.

Nick met Melinda at a charity auction in Seattle. A security firm was auctioning off the estate of a serial killer and donating the proceeds to his victims’ families. Unfortunately, most of the killer’s possessions were vending machine toys, old romance novels, and eerily realistic ceramic clowns. To encourage bidding, the auctioneer offered to personally deliver each item, either to the winner’s home or to the local dump.

Nick arrived at the auction, lit a cigarette, and cornered a waiter. “Excuse me. Do you see that woman sitting by herself, at the table in the corner? I would like to buy her a drink.”

“It’s an open bar, sir,” the waiter replied. “Drinks are free.”

“In that case, send her twelve.” He waited for the drinks to be delivered and then strolled over to Melinda’s table. “So, are you drunk enough to think I’m cute, or should I come back in an hour?”

“What?”

“Nothing. My name is Nick Wergild, and I’m a billionaire with a heart condition.”

They were soon engaged. Mr. Fairbanks sent a video mail, saying that he would pay for the wedding. It would be an expensive ceremony, with limo service for all the guests, a live orchestra and, at Nick’s request, an ice sculpture of a grizzly bear playing the banjo. Melinda insisted that the wedding be held in Billings, Montana, where she had been raised. Her entire family would be attending, save for her sister, who was out of the country, and an uncle who thought there might be something good on TV that day.

Nick was in the men’s room, changing into his tuxedo, when Fairbanks arrived. As Nick had requested, the limo driver announced his arrival with two sharp blasts of his horn. Hurriedly, Nick pulled on his jacket and rushed outside, meeting Fairbanks in the church’s small, gravel parking lot.

“So, Fairbanks, we meet at last.”

“Nicholas, my boy, we’re about to be family! Please, call me ‘Sir.’”

“Actually, that’s the problem. I’m not getting married at all. This was just a ploy to bring you out of hiding.” Nick reached into his jacket and drew his laser stunner, aiming the black, metal tube at Fairbanks’ head. “A lot of people are dead because of you, people whose families have waited a long time for justice. Also, there’s a reward and I could really use the cash. Turn around and put your hands on your head. You’re coming with me.”

“My god,” Fairbanks moaned. “You’re leaving my daughter at the altar? She’ll be heartbroken! Or she would have been, if she weren’t marrying you for your money. Of course, if you’re really a manhunter, you don’t have any… But still, I imagine she’ll be disappointed. Probably. I suppose.”

“Forget about her,” Nick said, locking Fairbanks in handcuffs. “Get in the car. I have to take you back to Vancouver to get my reward.”

“Canada?” Fairbanks gasped. “Can’t you just shoot me?”

“Oh, god, no. The good Vancouver, in Washington.” Nick shoved his prisoner into the rental car and hopped into the driver’s seat. “Get comfortable. It’s going to be one hell of a long drive.”

“Can I listen to the radio?”

“No. Be quiet or I’ll make you ride in the trunk.”

Nick took a moment to punch in an address into his navigation system before continuing on his way. After taxes were eliminated, the roads became privately owned. No one wanted to drive roads full of toll booths so, instead, most roads were funded by advertising. The ad companies soon lined the nation’s highways with twelve-foot-high, flashing billboards. If you didn’t know exactly where you were headed, you had to have a navigation system. Billboards didn’t make very good landmarks. In just a few hours, what was once a billboard for “Cannabliss Cigarettes” could become a billboard for “Holy Spirit Church, Inc.”

After an hour of driving, Nick found himself in Beaver Creek. He pulled into a rest stop, parking in the grass next to the restrooms. “Come on,” he said, “I have to pollute the groundwater.”

“I don’t,” Fairbanks snapped. “Sorry about that. I know how you girls like to go to the bathroom in groups.”

“Well, that was hurtful. However, I can’t leave you sitting in here alone. This isn’t a security patrol car; you can open the back doors from the inside. That’s why I’ve been driving ninety miles an hour all this time, to keep you from opening the door and jumping. And it’s fun. If you drive fast enough, the blood rushes to the back of your brain and you see the strangest things…”

Nick dragged his prisoner into the restroom, handcuffing him to a pipe hanging from the ceiling. He stepped into a stall and sighed, exhausted. The restroom hadn’t been cleaned since the early Mesozoic Era. Thousands of travelers had passed through, leaving behind various smells, stains, and bodily fluids. Just above the toilet paper dispenser, someone with a red marker and shaky handwriting had written “Are you paranoid, or is that just what they want you to think?”

He read graffiti for awhile, chuckling at the dirty limericks. Suddenly, filthy, brown water seeped under the stall. Opening the door, he found that the water pipe was broken and Fairbanks was gone.

“Oh, holy hell.”

He rushed outside just in time to see Fairbanks dash across the highway, artfully dodging speeding cars. Nick chased after him, holding traffic at bay with his badge and laser stunner. Horns blaring, motorists greeted him with obscene gestures and hurled fast food containers.

Fairbanks ducked into a large, Victorian house. The building had crimson lights hanging from the porch and a flashing neon sign identifying it as “Aphrodite’s Temple,” a brothel. By the time Nick made it inside, Fairbanks had vanished.

The walls of Aphrodite’s Temple were dark wood engraved with scenes from the Kama Sutra. The floors were marble tile covered with shaggy, burgundy rugs. An ornate chandelier swayed gently; apparently some guests upstairs were shaking the floor. Near the door, a video screen on the wall was playing a documentary on the history of the brothel.

“…since the days of government, when prostitution was illegal. However, the women of Aphrodite’s Temple were able to get around the law. Customers were given sex for free, but charged three hundred dollars to leave without cuddling.”

The front hall was an immense, two-story passageway with a desk at the far end manned by an AutoGreeter. The Schlock Products™ AutoGreeter was a low-end variety of mechanical receptionist. The top half of the machine looked like a well-dressed, young woman, but the bottom half resembled an abstract sculpture thrown together from surgical tubing, transistors, and old air conditioner parts. An AutoGreeter was supposed to be capable of the same variety of facial expressions as a real human, but this one could only manage two: “smiling” and “mild stroke.”

“Hello,” the android chirped, “and welcome to Aphrodite’s Temple! May I show you our menu? We have very pretty girls!”

“No thanks,” he said, scanning the room. “I’m just looking for someone. I’ll only be a minute.”

“Welcome to Aphrodite’s Temple!” the android repeated. “May I show you our menu? We have very handsome boys!”

“I’m looking for a man in handcuffs,” Nick explained, annoyed. “Did you see which way he went?”

“Handcuffs are on sale in our gift shop! Welcome to Aphrodite’s Temple! Would you like to see our menu? We have boys that look like pretty girls!”

Nick stormed past the malfunctioning machine. The hallway ended in double doors. Pushing his way through, he found himself in a small kitchen. A large, steaming roast was sitting atop a doily-covered counter. A plump, white-haired woman in a floral print apron was pulling a pie from an oven. Needless to say, he was stunned. It was like finding a Norman Rockwell painting hanging in an outhouse.

“Yes?” the woman asked, placing the pie on a windowsill. It smelled like blueberry. “Can I help you with something, son?”

“Did you see a fat man in handcuffs run through here?”

“Oh no,” she laughed, wiping her hands on a tattered dishtowel. “Did your playmate get away?”

“It’s not like that. See, I was engaged to his daughter, but only so I could get to him. – Wait, that doesn’t sound right. …Just forget it.” He turned for the doors, but stopped suddenly. “I have to ask you something, or it will bug me for the rest of the day. Why does a brothel need a kitchen?”

“It’s for the messy lovers, mostly,” the woman said. “Some of the boys like to cover the girls in pudding or whipped cream. Back in my younger days, I knew a nice man who loved to pour hollandaise sauce all over my body. I would have preferred bearnaise, but I wasn’t ready to share such a personal secret with him…”

“I’d really better go,” Nick said, suddenly feeling very uncomfortable. He left the woman to her reminiscing and headed upstairs.

The second story held endless rows of “guest rooms.” Most of them were identical, with a hot tub, waterbed, and a mirror on the ceiling. Other rooms were built around a particular theme: medieval dungeon, Roman bathhouse, dog kennel. Most of the guest rooms were occupied and, of course, locked. Nick searched the vacant rooms, gradually working his way down the hall. He accidentally walked in on a few couples but, fortunately, none of them were doing anything strange. At least, nothing stranger than what he did at home.

Opening a door, he saw that there was no bed in the room, just a stack of mops and cleaning supplies. It was either a storage closet or another theme room. Plastic shelves in the back were filled with cases of “Liquid Codpiece,” a spray-on prophylactic. The spray formed a protective layer that was thinner than a traditional condom and transferred heat better. The only downside was pulling it off.

A soft squeak from down the hall. Nick poked his head out of the closet just in time to see Fairbanks duck into an empty guest room. Nick sprinted down the hall and threw himself at the door. The door slammed open, knocking Fairbanks to the floor, his head bouncing painfully off the marble tile.

“Get up!” Nick yelled. “Slowly.” Grabbing a nearby bedpost, Fairbanks pulled himself to his feet. He was still wearing Nick’s handcuffs. “I can’t risk you getting away again. You’ve forced me to chain myself to you. I hope you’re happy.” Nick unlocked one of the cuffs and snapped it on his own wrist and then pushed Fairbanks down the hall to the stairs. He seemed almost eager to go, taking two steps at a time. “Slow it down, Fairbanks.” Fairbanks leapt down four stairs at a time, dragging Nick behind him. Suddenly, Nick lost his footing. He slid down the stairs, crashing into a wall.

Darkness.

When Nick regained consciousness, he was hanging from the third story window of a whorehouse in Beaver Creek, Montana. Forty feet below him was an ornate, concrete fountain that looked a rather uncomfortable place to land. At the window above him, Quentin Fairbanks was busy sawing off his own arm.

“Wait a minute!” Nick yelled. “I have a question for you.”

Fairbanks pulled the belt from his mouth, his face clenched in pain. “Do you mind? I’m rather busy at the moment.”

“Why didn’t you just take the handcuff key?”

“Whatever do you mean?” Fairbanks asked, bewildered.

“I was unconscious. Why didn’t you take the handcuff key from my pocket before you threw me out the window?”

“I… ah… the…Well, this is embarrassing. I don’t suppose you would toss the key up here? No? Are you sure? Last chance! – Alright, fine. If that’s the way you want it, I’ll just get back to the amputation!” Fairbanks sighed, frustrated. Biting down on his belt once more, he returned to sawing at his arm. He struck an artery, his blood spraying onto the window and dripping down onto Nick’s face.

Wiping the blood from his eyes, Nick reached for the windowsill. Try as he might, the handcuff chain was simply too long; he couldn’t quite reach. Staring at the ground, he imagined his body broken on the cement fountain. Soon, the water would be tainted by his blood.

“Looks like I’ve run out of options.” He reached into his pocket, his fingertips brushing a familiar object: his laser stunner. “This is going to hurt.” He aimed at Fairbanks’ forehead and fired. A white bolt of electricity arced through the air, knocking Fairbanks to the floor. The electricity flashed down his arm, through the metal handcuffs and into Nick.

Once more, darkness.

Painfully, Nick opened his eyes. His wrist was free, and Fairbanks was gone. He found himself looking up at a group of scantily-clad women holding bullwhips, riding crops, and leather paddles. One of the women, a redhead in a lace teddy so thin it was practically imaginary, helped Nick to his feet. “I knew that was dangerous,” he said, “but I didn’t think it would kill me. Oh, well. At least I went to heaven!”

“Heaven? No, you’re still in the Temple.” The wall of women parted, revealing Quentin Fairbanks collapsed on the floor. Three of the women were sitting on him, while a fourth threatened him with a cattle prod. “Who are you guys, anyway?”

Nick explained the events of the past few days, omitting the part about leaving a woman at the altar. His version of the story also had a car chase, gratuitous nudity, and a song and dance number. Other than that, though, it was strictly the truth.

“That’s quite a tale, Mr. Werguild,” the redhead said at last. “But one you left something out. You said this guy was a politician, but not what position he held.”

“I’m not positive, but I think he was Secretary of Agriculture.”

“Oh. Do you think he’ll be in the work camps for awhile?”

“After the arbitrator hears about him trying to saw off his arm, he’ll probably end up in an insane asylum.” Nick gazed down at Fairbanks and sighed. “Listen, this guy is very dangerous, and my handcuffs obviously aren’t enough to keep him under control. Do you have anything I could use to restrain him?”

The women cackled uproariously. “He wants to know if we have any restraints!” the redhead laughed. “Can you believe this guy?”

As Nick drove back to Vancouver, Quentin Fairbanks was sprawled face-down in the backseat. His arms were encased in a tight, black restraint called a “monoglove,” a solid sheath of leather enclosing everything from his fingers to his elbows. Leather straps around the shoulders further reduced his movements. He was also wearing six pairs of leg irons, a ball gag, and a tight, vinyl hobble skirt.

The drive to Vancouver took nearly sixteen hours. Nick passed the time smoking a pack of Cannabliss cigarettes and tailgating slow drivers. He dropped off Fairbanks at a security patrol office, where the desk sergeant reminded him that it was illegal to humiliate a captive.

“Don’t blame me,” Nick replied. “He was like this when I found him.”

“Oh… Well, everybody needs a hobby!”

Finally, Nick arrived at his building. He trudged across the parking lot to his office and collapsed at his desk, exhausted. He pulled a bottle of pills from a drawer and, smiling dimly, took a much-needed break from reality.