Fantasy Whatever Gets You through the Night by TMaskedWriter

[Ramesh_Rocky]

Luc gave a tiny smile as Ramirez offered his thoughts, looking over at the trap that would have awaited whoever stepped into it if they hadn't spotted the slightly differently colored step.

"The dog chain only goes to the bottom of the stairs." He observed. "If you're unwilling to shoot a dog, your only option is to retreat back up the stairs. In your struggles to get away, you're thinking about the vicious animal in front of you rather than the trap you passed a moment ago and are backing into."

Luc's main interest seemed to be Scott's choice of wall decorations. He stood at the base of the stairs, where he could see down the hallway, and studied it.

"I presume the gun room is behind that red door?" Luc asked. LeGrasse nodded and he turned his attention back to the hall. "Scott fancied himself something of a decorator. A telling motif, don't you think?"

Ramirez stood next to him and tried to see what Luc was seeing. He looked down the hall at the posters lining it.

"Nazis tend to regard him as the Second Coming of Hitler." Hernando mused.

"Oui." Luc answered. "A deliberate aesthetic choice." He gestured to the WWII images on the wall in front of them. "Here is the past." He then gestured into the posters along the hallway. "And down this hallway is the present, leading us to..."

"A big dog?" Hernando asked. The three men chuckled before he answered seriously. "Safeguarding the future behind the red door."

"Oui." Luc replied. "Most of this room doesn't tell us much right as we enter. We know Scott worked in maintenance; a full workshop in the basement is to be expected. We know he was, as you said upstairs, 'sufficiently vicious and paranoid' to plant traps in his home and do such things to an animal. We know that he built things in his home. He was probably the one who retooled the van. Or they borrowed his workshop. He'd have been too busy at work to show them how to hide their compartments better." He turned to one of the technicians and asked, "Has a safe been found?"

"Yes, Detective Inspector." The Bomb Squad tech replied. "In that room." He pointed down the hall.

"I see. Has it been checked for traps and opened?"

The man nodded his head affirmatively.

"It was wired, sir." The technician replied. "With a kilo of C-4. We took care of it. We found more in it. It's clear for your inspection."

"Rule of three?" Hernando asked. Luc nodded. He turned to LeGrasse to explain. "He had the false step trap in this room and the dog in the hall. There was almost certainly a third trap on the safe. There may be more in the bedroom, but likely not. That door trap on the bedroom would only get the first person who tried to enter; give him enough warning to pull out a gun kept at hand. These are people to whom guns matter more than lives, you will at least find a large pistol or shotgun in the bedroom. Probably more hidden around the house."

The three proceeded to the red door.

* * *

Beyond the door, they found what Luc was anticipating. More valuable Nazi memorabilia than was kept in the workroom sat in display cases along three walls. Luc frowned at an empty container of Zyklon-B on one of the shelves.

On the fourth wall was what all of them anticipated. Guns of various ages and models dating back to the War. Organized like the tools in the other room to show where they're to be put back. LeGrasse noticed that half the outlines were missing.

"No other guns have been found yet?" Luc asked as he studied the outlines of the missing weapons. LeGrassse confirmed Hernando's statement that other guns were being found stashed around the house. When Luc got down to the pistols, he laughed and pointed at it.

"Browning HP." LeGrasse smiled in agreement. He explained to Ramirez. "When the Nazis invaded France, they graciously allowed the workers at the Browning factory to keep their jobs, but now make guns for Germany. La Resistance sabotaged so much of their own work that a War-era Browning with German markings; especially Nazi ones, is more likely to kill the shooter than whomever they're shooting at. Someone took one. It probably had a neat Swastika on it. There's at least one whom we won't have to worry about if it comes down to a shootout."

"Someone?" Ramirez asked. "Scott didn't take them himself?"

Luc faced him.

"If Scott had taken any these guns off the rack for himself, our encounter at the studio would have gone differently. His first reaction upon seeing you was to run. If he'd had the ability to take a hostage or make a stand, he'd have done so. Cyanide is one thing; going down guns blazing, heiling Hitler is another. No, recall what I said earlier. Dietz was a hero in his eyes." He gestured over to a photo of Dietz printed from the internet. "His hero's come to town with some killing to be done, and it was hard enough for Dietz to smuggle himself and his team into San Finzione, let alone bring weapons. He'd HAVE to acquire them here!"

[Ramesh_Rocky]

"So, he turns to loyal fan Jerry Scott. Who's only happy to donate some to The Cause." LeGrasse concluded.

Ramirez looked at the outlines to try and see if he could recognize the guns that had been removed from the walls.

"Sturmgewehr 44." He told them. "Considered the first real assault rifle. They were only issued to SS officers in the paratroops. An old widow turned one in at a gun buyback. A collector spotted it for what it was, returned it to her, and told her that the only way her husband could have brought one home would have been if he'd killed an officer and taken it off the body himself. And that it was worth at least thirty-thousand American dollars."

"Yes, some historic pieces." Luc agreed. "But if Dietz came here to arm himself and his men, he only took a few of the vintage weapons and went for the more modern." Luc pointed out the outline of a Luger Parabellum P08. "The murder weapon was a Luger, no?" LeGrasse confirmed Forensics' findings. "And note the distinctive shape of an Uzi also missing."

"That's where Scott's sense of irony ended." LeGrasse offered, pointing at it. "Israeli weapon; Uziel Gai was Jewish."

Luc nodded agreement, then turned his attention to the large floor safe that had been left ajar for him.

"We now know that Dietz is not just armed, he's as well-equipped as he could get. And then there's this." He bent down and opened the safe the rest of the way. His eyes widened at what he saw. He dragged the large wooden box with American military markings out by one of the two ropes that flanked either side and opened it.

"That is what the bomb tech said would be there, correct?" LeGrasse asked.

"Oui." Luc replied. "It says so on the box. He neglected to tell us that most of the contents were missing."

"Those come in boxes of twenty-seven," Ramirez informed the two. "The bottom layer is full, that's nine. Three on top of the nine for a total of twelve. One on the safe leaves fourteen unaccounted for!"

"He HAS to have had it smuggled!" Luc said as he stood. "The box may not have been full when he acquired it. We know he used one on the safe itself. Maybe traded a block or two for something like the Sturmgewehr. Whether he gave Dietz any or not; and we have no reason to assume he didn't part with at least some of his, what's left is enough to destroy a good portion of the block. We've only found the one detonator, but Scott could easily have made more!"

The three of them stared down at the wooden crate.

"Non." LeGrasse agreed. "San Finzione has not experienced a bombing campaign since the War. And then it was our own, against Schell. Now, we are a Tourist Nation. Except for the Nessuno Family, almost everyone is an innocent victim waiting to happen!"

"And now Dietz may have enough to start one." Ramirez said, taking out his phone and getting no signal in the underground room. "I must alert La Contessa at once!"

Luc closed the box and they followed him to find a signal. Because they knew what they'd find, but the label on the box meant that all three men had important calls to make. Leaving the room with the partial box that read "C-4, 27 Kilos."

[Ramesh_Rocky]

Whatever Gets You through the Night Pt. 14

"Whoa, thought it was a nightmare.

Lord, it's all so true.

They told me 'Don't go walkin' slow.

The Devil's on the loose.'"

-John Fogerty, "Run Through the Jungle"

"DIETZ HAS BOMBS!" Contessa Helena de San Finzione shouted to the walls of her study. Mander was with her and had been looking at the photos when she got the call from Generalissimo Hernando Ramirez that she'd just ended. "Most likely, anyway. Scott had a crate of C-4 in his Nazi Loony Room, little over a third of it left! He also armed Dietz's crew, but that first one seemed more important. How's YOUR day going, Mander?"

"S'alright. Hanging out, lookin' at Twitter while Your Countessness were on the phone." Mander replied casually, sitting on the couch in front of the television that took up most of the facing wall. "Seeing if Joffrey the Orange's had anything to say yet."

Although the United States was considered an Ally of San Finzione, their 45th President was most certainly not. Before Helen had been born, back when he was famous for simply being a "businessman" as opposed to "a serial failure of a businessman," he came to San Finzione to meet with Count Vincenzo Ramon de San Finzione the First to discuss expanding his hotel and casino chain into the country. Because Vincenzo welcomed and encouraged healthy competition in San Finzione's primary industry, the Count met with him personally.

Vincenzo the First had been described by those who knew him as an excellent judge of character. Their meeting lasted less than five minutes and ended with the future President's limo leaving Castle Finzione with a security officer escort straight back to his plane and him being the first person since Count Ernesto did the same to Benito Mussolini to be formally and publicly banned from San Finzione. This only applied at first to his business interests as well, but after a few tries, Vincenzo extended it to any venture that he was reasonably sure the "businessman" had interests in.

Although he was, by no means, a spiteful man, hotels, casinos, and wines were synonymous with San Finzione long before the future President had chosen to enter those fields. Vincenzo took amusement when the future President announced that he was branching into some new product line. He'd then take some spare venture capital he had lying around and dip Società Finzione's toes into the same waters. San Finzione already had a Calcio team and Vincenzo didn't feel the need to push the joke all the way and create a new league; but apart from that, profiting where the businessman failed and ended up declaring bankruptcy each time.

"Let's see," Helen said, calculating time zones. "Midnight in Seattle is 10 AM in San Finzione, so DC would be 3 AM. It's 18:25 Tuesday evening here, so it's 11:25 the same morning. If he decided to extend the usual weekend golfing trip a day, he got back last night, so we've got another thirty-five minutes before he even wakes up and turns on what he calls 'news.' We've still got until 10 AM before he'll go on Twitter. Apart from specific people, neither of America's political parties have any particular issues with San Finzione except that Americans like to spend money here instead of sticking it in the politicians' pockets, so there's the occasional movement for 'Don't go somewhere foreign to spend your money. Stay here and give it all back to our corporate masters. You shouldn't be able to afford a vacation anyway.'"

Mander thought on this.

"So how do ya win people back?"

"Their friends who don't listen come anyway, go back with stories, and they start to realize just how badly 'Why don't we just FORCE the public to Buy American' always fucks up. Troy's doctoral thesis is something about the Hawley-Smoot Tariff and what a fucking bad idea it was and how it screwed the entire world and its long-term effects; he can give you the details. You probably don't want them, though. The short form is 'it was short-sighted and stupid and one of the major factors in the Stock Market Crash and the Great Depression.' Americans get tired of driving through the same hole in the same giant redwood every vacation and remember that we have everything but winter sports here. And that's only because we don't have a winter to speak of." She remembered the current crisis. "Fuck, Mander, we have THEME PARKS! People bring their kids!"

Mander nodded his understanding. He tried to keep her from worrying by steering the conversation back toward Troy.

"Jacking up import duties to the point of cutting yourself out of the Global Market and kicking all them countries depending on ya for trade right in the bollocks has consequences." He then looked around suspiciously before turning back to Helen. "Please do NOT tell him that I know anything about it!"

Helen agreed.

"Ok, I got one more story about this, though."

She took a drag and began.

* * *

[Ramesh_Rocky]

They remained exactly where they were. Helen continued her story.

"Ok, so the three of us were in History class and the teacher was playing a game with the class to explain Margin Trading; another culprit. Essentially, getting loans from the bookie to keep playing the ponies. You'll just settle with him out of your winnings at the end of the day. Guess how that day tends to end."

Mander understood. Helen continued.

"So, Julie and I and everyone else are highly interested in all this on-paper 1920s play money we're making when Julie looks over and sees the look on Troy's face. She asks what's wrong because we've been glancing over at him and doing what he does and now he's worried. Troy tells us he knows what's coming because Papa Emay lived through the Great Depression. And he encouraged Troy's interest in money and finance, so he told Troy stories about those days. That meant that Troy knew what the three of us need to do to win.

"A game-week before it all comes tumbling down, Troy raises his hand for the teacher. She walks over; Troy tells her 'The three of us settle our margin loans while we're ahead and invest the profits in Oil because demand for it will only increase throughout the economic disaster you're about to hit us with. We'll weather the Great Depression. And the only thing that fixes an economy that far gone is a war. Which is horrible, but inevitable in the global climate you'll create, so when it happens, we back the Allies and make the REAL money!'"

The big Englishman laughed.

"I'm guessing the game didn't factor in someone like him playing."

"No, it didn't. Totally beyond the rules but she agreed that it would've worked and gave us all the A and Troy got extra credit anyway."

Mander smiled. Helen smiled too as she realized what he'd just done: Taken a load off her by letting her tell a story about the best friends who shared the secret of mind control with her. She gave a tiny nod of thanks before they got back to business.

"We have to hope he's got a plan for it; that he's not just going to start randomly bombing night clubs and casinos." Helena told Mander. "I mean, we train for that. Being a global tourist destination means if you do something stupid in San Finzione, the world sits up and takes notice. Some prick makes a bomb or takes some hostages every couple months. I come and use The Thing and defuse the situation quickly and quietly. Tourists also have money, so muggings happen; and about one in ten tourists is some kind of potential kidnap target. The reason you've never SEEN anyone from our Anti-Terror Unit is because they're even busier than Ultimados and work MORE discreetly! The Ministry of Intelligence has gotten good at spotting the patterns; and because I don't allow incompetents to run my government for me, Caldwell-Pierce, LeGrasse, and Ortega cooperate like grown-ups. For every incident you see on the news, there are twenty that we take care of before they happen, and everyone just enjoys our country none the wiser."

"You never caught Whyte's bomber, did ya? The one who blew up the Ministry of Science. That line about Morgan doing it was obviously bullshit for the media. He was a knife man, not a bomber. He was keeping his head down, being mild-mannered farmer Gareth Finnegan and hoping the world would forget there'd ever been a Frank Morgan. He wouldn't've up and joined the IRA and learned bombs while he was trying to be a good husband and father."

"No, we didn't." Helen agreed, lighting a cigarette and moving over to the couch to sit next to him in front of the photos. "That bomb predates the studio by several months, though. Scott probably didn't even know what a San Finzione was back then." Helen took a drag and pondered. "Might've come from the same crate, though. Long as you're up front about 'There's only 13 in it,' and don't try to pull a burn by putting those on top and filling the rest of the box with Play-Doh, you'd still make something. It's unlikely that Scott wouldn't be so starstruck as to part with some of it as well."

"Maybe it's cursed, like in those shows where there's a cursed gun and we follow the gun as it passes from person to person, destroying lives and always somehow getting lost after so's it can be 'found' by the next doomed soul."

"Or," Helen sighed. "Maybe because Dietz's plan is something to do with the movie, we're all thinking about movies a bit more than we usually do. Don Nessuno knows what I'd do to him for arms-trading or people-smuggling in San Finzione. I can think of a half-dozen small-timers connected, ballsy, or stupid enough to go for it. There are other criminals in the country besides us; they get who's in charge and what happens if they don't play ball too, so it'd have to be worth that risk." She shook her head to clear it. "That still won't lead us to Dietz; project for another time. The people who know how to find and deal with bombs are out looking for bombs now, so let's focus on what WE can do." She turned her attention back to the photos. "Even if all we can do is 'learn what Eliot was thinking about before the end,' it's something."

Mander went back to studying them as well. Because San Finzione Studios was still an "up-and-comer" in the industry, Helen had taken a Hollywood of Yesteryear approach; giving fresh, young talent their first big break. It had also been a boon to the tourism trade as people added "you might get discovered and become a movie star" to their lists of reasons to go to San Finzione. Because of these things, the cast were mostly unknown first timers, and he didn't recognize any of them.

"Dietz has to be well-funded, too." Mander offered. "As gaga as Scott was for the guy, there's no way you let a buncha guys walk off with half your guns and however many bombs without a deposit or something."

[Ramesh_Rocky]

"Hmm." Helen hmmed. "We know Scott wasn't an idiot. He had to know Dietz wasn't going to return them when he's done. Hero worship or not, you don't give away all that hardware in exchange for an autograph. And you don't dump that kind of money in your bank account, where the bank and the government ask where you got all that from. You keep it hidden in liquid or easy-to-liquefy form." She took out her phone and sent a text to the three men at the crime scene to look for a bunch of cash. "He wouldn't have had time to blow it all on more Hitler bobbleheads or whatever. A nut like him wouldn't trust banks, so that rules out a safe deposit box. If it's not under the bed or in the closet, it's in a wall somewhere. Knowing how much Dietz gave Scott for the guns might give us an idea of Dietz's bankroll."

"If Dietz goes anywhere he can withdraw money," Mander thought aloud. "He gets picked up on camera and he's fucked. He'd know that, so he either brought a briefcase of euros or someone's going to the bank for him."

"Yeah, I'm not going to be able to ask Troy to follow the money this time. Dietz wouldn't be stupid enough to go around using credit cards and making money transfers we could track. Your briefcase full of cash theory feels right." She gave a thought to that, then pounded the coffee table, causing some of the pictures to fall off.

"He's sacrificed five of his own people already. If he's as smart as everyone's saying, he didn't blow all his pawns on the second move. Scott was key to the plan; four guys you send to steal a tank are expendable. So, he's gotta have more guys. Because if it was down to Dietz and he's as cunning as all that, someone pulling his strings or not, he'd already realize he couldn't win, get the fuck out of San Finzione, and save his own ass."

"You need four guys on a Panzer crew." Mander followed along. "One to drive, one to load the shells, one to fire them, and one for the MG on top. Whyte sent half his forces at a time. Dietz would know better than putting everything on all-or-nothing rolls of the dice like that. We got maybe a third of his crew."

"Factoring in that Jerry Scott was, hopefully, his only man in San Finzione, that leaves him with maybe eight guys and himself holed up somewhere. Dick or not, he still has to feed them." She took a last drag as she made the connection. "Which means he needs to send one of them to market for supplies! And he's spending enough cash to feed nine men."

Mander caught on and offered his thoughts.

"They must've visited Scott's house at least once for the tools and guns. Unless they ran into a second sympathizer who'd hide them just out of the evilness of his heart, he's paying for a room or rooms, too; probably also, in cash. We've only seen the one and I didn't get a good look at his hair before he didn't have a head anymore." Helen gave a little smile at that. "Course, you're making a war picture, so a bunch of probably Aryan guys like Dietz would blend into the crowd these days. Presuming his crew's mostly blond, blue-eyed white guys like himself, a big group of 'em could claim to be starving actors throwing their money together to get a place while they wait for stardom to happen."

Helen thought on that.

"That might make a good cover story. Luc said at the meeting that he thought a trick like 'put on an SS uniform and walk around the studio freely' was too pedestrian for him, so that's out. And it wouldn't just be food he's got to send them out for. Troy and I estimated they've been here under a week. He's a prick, but if he knows anything about keeping up morale for a dozen guys holed up that long, fear and mockery's not enough. He's got to be providing basic essentials for guys like them: beer, cigarettes, playing cards, some porn; stuff for boredom." Helen lit another cigarette while she was on the subject. "But he still can't risk someone noticing a bunch of guys who probably resemble him coming and going with all those grocery bags and cases of beer... he'd have to stock up."

"Well, we got a rough shopping list: smokes, beer, food enough for about a dozen." Mander stated. "Dietz is probably big on German food, so he's likely to buy a bunch of sausages and sauerkraut and such. So, one of them's going to the shops; paying a ton of cash for all of it. I know it don't work like on TV where cashiers remember every customer and every sale, but a thing like a guy paying for a small Oktoberfest with a big stack of bills sticks with you. And you can use your Thing to find out for sure. I still got no clue how ya do it and know better than to ask, but it's one at a time instead of a whole movie, right? Gotta be easier."

"Yeah much easier. I could mutter the command like I did with Compton." Her mood brightened. "That sounds non-dangerous and 'something La Contessa can do that someone lower down in her government can't' enough for Troy's tastes. Something we can do while the law guys do their law stuff!" Helen stood up and grabbed her purse from the open safe. "Let's go shopping. To the Contessamobile!!" She thought another second. "Ok, that's TWO things I've gotta come up with better names for now."

* * *

[Ramesh_Rocky]

Mander entered the market and held the door open for Helen.

"It doesn't do it automatically?" She puzzled to him as she stepped through the door.

"Not always. They ain't all like in the States." Mander told her. He then got a look of realization. "Has Your Countessness really not been in a market since then?"

"I can burn water." Helen replied. "I lived off Spaghetti-Os and ramen until my friends taught me how to eat at any restaurant for free. Then I married a man who had servants to take care of those things. I know there's a thing about twelve items or fewer. Does a six-pack count as one item or six? That's a question I'd legitimately like to know the answer to, Mander. Because of The Thing and being me, paying for alcohol hasn't been a thing I've even had to think about since Wade got locked away. What's in the drink? Of course, I ask that. But not the price. Liquor is something that people who want to fuck me spend money on, then give to me."

People were getting their phones out at seeing La Contessa enter the store. Like Dietz, Mander was wanted in enough parts of the world to have an aversion to cameras. Helen's blanket pardon meant that he was less concerned about it in San Finzione than elsewhere, but it was still a safety concern. He simply kept a safe distance and all cameras got pointed at La Contessa rather than him. Some were shocked by her casual profanity. The locals who'd encountered their Contessa before were well-accustomed to it.

She felt almost as uncomfortable as she imagined Mander was feeling at being "seen out and about with La Contessa" and the oohing and ahhing that accompanied her when walking into a shop in the marketplace "like it was nothing." Vincenzo I liked to go out in public occasionally to hear what The People had to say to and about him. Helen had decided to wait until she had better poll numbers to listen to what the public thought of her a second time, which was another reason for the Citizens' Grievance Office.

She knew that a European market would differ enough from an American supermarket to not expect the same experience. They didn't have greeters like many big American stores to welcome the customers and thank them for shopping while making sure they didn't steal anything before they leave.

La Contessa walked up to a blonde cashier who smiled silently, afraid to say a word.

"There's no need to be afraid." Helen told her. "I hate to be one of those women who comes into a store and demands to speak to the manager. So, are they around? Nobody's done anything wrong. I've just got a question that you'll have to ask them about anyway."

She called the manager, then pointed toward his office at the end of an aisle.

Helen looked at all the prices of items as she walked, marveling. Since one way or another, not paying for things had been Her Way her entire life, prices for everyday essentials weren't a thing she'd ever had to look at and consider. Prices in US dollars would have confused her as much as prices in euros were doing now. Everywhere she went shopping these days, she had unlimited credit and many of the things they sold could not be described as "essential" or "every day." Some people were still following her with their phones out, recording or taking pictures. Halfway down the aisle, Helen stopped and turned to them.

"Stop recording." She commanded them. They did so. "Put your phones away, go about your shopping experience, and welcome to San Finzione."

The people returned to their business as she and Mander approached a brown-haired man.

"C... Contessa," he stammered. He then dropped to one knee. "It's an honor to have you in our store. How may I help you?"

She looked down at him, then back up to Mander with a "yeah, this happens sometimes" look. Although he was in Bodyguard Mode, Mander cracked a smile.

"Nobody has to kneel for me unless I tell them to or they're being really nice to me, Sal." La Contessa responded, motioning for him to get up while reading his nametag.

[Ramesh_Rocky]

"Of course, Contessa." Sal said, rising to his feet.

"Good." Helen replied. "We need to have a word in your office. Nothing bad, just, you'll probably have to look up stuff."

"Si." Sal said, looking questioningly at Mander.

"Oh, don't worry about him." Helen answered his unasked question. "That's just my big, bald, scary Englishman; he's cool."

Sal escorted them to the office.

* * *

There were only two chairs in the office. Sal offered one to La Contessa and went to the other behind the desk. Mander simply stood behind Helen.

"Now, Sal." La Contessa said, taking out a cigarette. Sal looked around for an ashtray, couldn't find one, and reached for a coffee cup that still had a few centimeters of coffee in the bottle. She nodded her thanks and lit it. "Again, nobody's in trouble here, I might have to ask you to remove something from the videotape I did outside, but just that, because it's the tapes and books we're interested in. And since we don't have time for a lot of questions, you're going to cooperate and tell the truth."

The last had been a command. Sal nodded his understanding.

"Si, I'll be happy to remove what you wish from the tapes." He turned to do so when Helen commanded him again.

"Not yet." She took a drag. "There's something I want to see first. Let's start at the beginning. I'm looking for someone who bought a lot of stuff and paid cash. Any of those stand out in your mind?"

Sal thought.

"It happens often. People come to buy supplies for parties, fishing and sailing trips..."

He trailed off. Helen took in the new information.

"True, someone might buy as much beer and cigarettes as they could if they were going on a sailing trip." She thought some more. "But you can usually that tell by how they're dressed, right? Like, someone shopping for a party would be dressed for a party and someone dressed to go sailing would have on boating clothes. We're looking for a special case that would be neither. His clothing may have been normal or non-descript. Possibly dressed as a tourist. He'll have bought a lot of beer, though." She thought another second. "Probably a lot of German food as well. You have a meat counter in the store, right?"

"Si," Sal told her, taking out this week's books. "Many people buy lots of beer, but I know that a few days ago, someone bought all of the sausages and they needed to order more."

Helen turned and looked up at Mander. Mander looked back down at her. She turned back to Sal.

"That sounds to me like the kind of transaction you could find in the books, note the time, then show us on the tape."

Sal found the transaction in the records and brought up the surveillance tape for that time. A man in a longcoat with red hair that Helen could tell from here was a bad rug had two carts. One contained food and the other, as she suspected, was full of cases of beer. Mander leaned forward to whisper in Helen's ear.

"That looks like enough to keep a dozen idiots from going stir crazy; long as there's beer."

She agreed.

"Sal, we're going to need a copy of that. La Policia will be by to collect it within the hour. Now, delete the part from today where I stopped and talked to the customers and that should be all I need, La Policia may want the receipts and such. You've done a good job today, Sal. Forget the part about erasing my footage and hey, have a nice day."

Sal smiled as Mander held the door for La Contessa and they left him to copy the footage. Once they were walking down the stairs, Mander spoke.

"I don't know how many markets you've got in the City, but it seems we lucked into the right one on the first try."

"We lucked into a lot more than that." Helen said with a smile as they made their way back to the entrance. She waved goodbye and thanked everyone for visiting before they left to go back to the car. Helen took out her phone as she looked around her, then turned to Mander.

"Eliot was shot in the Suburbs. We don't needlessly surveil The People, so there aren't many cameras there. But now, we're in the City Center! Where we DO have cameras! NOW, we can track Bad Red Rug to... well, wherever Dietz has probably already cleared out, but it's fucking something!"

[Ramesh_Rocky]

Whatever Gets You through the Night Pt. 15


"Blue canary in the outlet by the light switch

who watches over you.

Make a little birdhouse in your soul.

Not to put too fine a point on it,

say I'm the only bee in your bonnet.

Make a little birdhouse in your soul."

-They Might Be Giants, "Birdhouse In Your Soul"

Helen, Maria, Mander, Ramirez, and Luc were gathered in her study. Tape from the market had been given to LeGrasse, who was overseeing CCTV tracking of the man that La Contessa had named "Bad Red Rug." Night had fallen some time ago, and it was agreed that everyone should relax, have a drink, and try to sort out what they'd gotten on Dietz today.

"If he's left the place," Mander said, taking a sip of his pint. "There's a chance he left some of the C-4 behind as a Fuck You for us." He turned to Ramirez, who was smoking. "Might want to tell LeGrasse's chaps to check the door before bashing it in." He then turned to Luc. "I live on an island and I regrettably worked for David Igazi. I have an idea of how much beer it takes to keep a dozen morons' loyalty. Red Rug's his guy."

Ramirez sipped his brandy and hmmed. He, Luc, and Maria accepted La Contessa's offer of some Napoleon Brandy. And because she wasn't planning to have any more and trusted everyone in the room, Helen had a splash of it in her cocoa as well. Everyone was aware of her personal feelings about alcoholics, so they were limiting themselves to the one social drink. Helen sat at her computer. Mander and Maria sat on a couch and Luc and Ramirez were in a pair of Louis XIV armchairs facing everyone. Hernando leaned over and took another look at the photos.

"Stalin's one effort at morale at Stalingrad was making certain the vodka rations always got through." Ramirez was forced to agree, despite his personal misgivings about the mercenary. Most of which concerned the fact that he WAS a mercenary and if the chips were down, would save himself over La Contessa. He was a friend of La Contessa's, though; so Ramirez accepted that, until then, he was here for the duration.

"I heard a story about that!" Mander interjected. "There was this Russian Commander, right? And he figured out 'Every time I report casualties, Stalin cuts our vodka rations accordingly. So, I'll just stop reporting casualties!'"

Helen set down her cocoa and leaned forward. She'd heard the story before, but she appreciated the good scam involved. Mander continued.

"Sure enough, when he stops reporting them, he still gets their vodka to split amongst his remaining guys. So, months go by, right? It's Stalingrad, course they're taking casualties; but now the number of guys splitting the dead's vodka gets smaller; Stalin keeps 'em coming. Eventually, someone at the Kremlin notices 'Hey, we got this commander ain't lost a single man in months! He must be some kind of tactical genius like that Ortega bloke; wasted on the Front Lines. Let's go out there and find out his secret!'"

Everyone leaned closer as Mander lowered his voice for the good part. He stopped to sip his pint for emphasis.

"So, they send some officers out there and they find him and somethin' like twenty guys blitzed out on a hundred guys' worth of vodka!"

Everyone laughed. Luc was the first to speak.

"I'd imagine they were all shot the same day." He mused.

"That's the best bit!" Mander added. "They were GONNA shoot him, but they COULDN'T! Because that very morning, back in Moscow, Stalin had declared him a Hero of the Soviet Union for not losing a single man in months! So now he was propaganda, and they had to give him the medal or go back to Moscow, tell Stalin he fucked up, and get shot themselves. They gave him the medal!"

The laughter re-erupted. When La Contessa's phone rang, the laughter died down. As she picked it up, the Generalissimo's phone also rang. They both quietly had a similar conversation. Helen hung up a few moments before Ramirez's conversation was over. She remained quiet until his call was done to tell the others.

"The old man in the hospital didn't make it." Helen said flatly to them. "Arturo Lopez, age 81, has become the first Citizen of San Finzione to be killed by the Nazis since 1945."

Silence fell. No one could think of what to say. Lady Maria was the first to make the attempt.

"That means that he was here when Great-"

She stopped herself. A round of "Forever does he reign in our hearts" right now would be more than she, and she suspected Great-Grandmama and the Generalissimo would be able to handle.

Helen took another sip of her cocoa before putting out the cigarette she'd lit during Mander's story.

"I'm sorry, everyone." La Contessa said at last. For the second time in as many days, Helen felt the hollow feeling of losing someone. She didn't know Arturo Lopez personally. Just that he'd been one of The People she'd sworn a lifelong oath to protect and defend. And since that one had been made on behalf of Vincenzo, Maria, and the Country overall; it was one of the ones she took as seriously as the vows she'd made to Vincenzo in St. Francis de Sales Cathedral years before. She thought how Arturo Lopez probably watched her Royal Wedding on television that day. And how, whatever his opinion of his Contessa's job of carrying on his Count's work, she'd have to hear it from the rest of the Lopez family when she visited.

Helen noticed that everyone had been remaining still and watching her while all these thoughts ran through her head. She spoke again.

"I'm sorry, everyone, I..." She started walking slowly toward the panel that activated the secret passage to her bedroom. Maria already knew about it, and the others, she was ok with them learning about it. Only Luc didn't seem surprised that she'd just reveal something like that to them all without caring. "I think we should pick this up in the morning. Or whenever LeGrasse has something to tell us. Luc, I heard you've already got Scott's computer. Maria, would you call Nunzio or someone to bring Eliot's computer out to Hernando's car? La Policia brought it up to the castle, and I thought he might..."

[Ramesh_Rocky]

She nodded. Luc did the same. Maria picked up her phone to do so as Helen opened the secret passage and stepped through.

"I need to... I dunno." She said plainly as they all stood to leave. "Close my eyes for a bit and... hope Dietz doesn't... kill any more of The People before then, I guess. Maria, please show the Generalissimo and Luc out. Mander, you know where your room is. I'm..."

Lady Maria and Mander understood. She couldn't think of anything to say but what she'd said twice already.

"I'm sorry, everyone." Contessa Helena de San Finzione told her friends before closing the door and making her way up to her bedroom.

* * *

Helen emerged from the hidden door in the pillar next to the fireplace in La Contessa's bedroom. The room was as empty as she felt. And as silent as she was slipping out of her clothes and sitting on the bed. She'd left her pack down in the study and needed a little before bed. She opened the drawer in her nightstand that contained nothing but packs of her brand and opened a new one. She lit up and took a couple of drags before putting it out and turning to lie in bed.

"Seems like you've had a bad day." The naked woman suddenly lying on the bed next to her said. Helen had grown accustomed to her appearing out of nowhere in various costumes and states of dress. The momentary look of surprise on Helen's face turned to love at the sight of the woman who looked and sounded exactly like Susan Bailey and had just spontaneously existed next to her.

"Really fucking bad!" Helen replied, embracing Suzy-Q with a passionate kiss.

Susan had more than one unique perspective, and one of them was lying with Helen now.

Susan had emotional and physical scars from the only relationship she'd ever known before being rescued from it by Troy and Julie and being taught the secret of mind control herself. She didn't have true Multiple Personality Disorder; but there were three other versions of herself in Susan's head that she'd imagined into existence to deal with her difficulties in life and now resided in it with her. They'd turned out to be benevolent and Susan had been able to make peace with the three representations of herself in certain situations. Suzy-Q was one of them, and after much debate, they'd determined that she represented Susan's desire to help others.

Helen had stated that Susan seemed to have the ability to do anything if she was aiding someone else. Susan's learning mind control and her new family's love for Helen caused her to be important to Susan as well before they'd really developed their own relationship. They were still working out how it happened, however, they theorized that when Helen was stabbed and undergoing a near-death experience during surgery, Susan's need to help her and some connection between them meant that Suzy-Q had been able to enter Helen's mind and help her through the crisis. Suzy-Q had limited control over the ability. At first, it seemed she could only do it when one of them was in danger. Now, it seemed that one of them simply needing the other was enough to do it; and Susan was just the person that Helen needed to see, so it was no surprise that she'd appear in Helen's mind at some point in the day.

Because Suzy-Q was in Helen's mind, she was limited to Helen's range of perception and couldn't interact with her surroundings. Only Helen could sense her in any way. Helen was also able to "think her words" at Suzy-Q so that she didn't have to look like she was talking to an invisible person. When Suzy-Q returned to Susan's mind, she'd then relay all she'd experienced. Tonight, though, Helen didn't feel like the mental effort, so she spoke aloud to one of the women she intimately loved. When they broke the kiss, Suzy-Q spoke again.

"Figured that. They've been watching the news in Federal Way, you know. They figured they'd call but once they saw you and Maria and Mander were ok, also figured you'd be busy Contessaing. Susan's been texting with Maria since your meeting got out. When she told us the news about the old man in the hospital, I guess Susan thought you might need help badly enough for me to come to you. Maria also said you'd gone to bed, so figured it was a good time."

"It's always a good time for Susan or figments thereof." Helen replied, slowly running her hand down Suzy-Q's back. Suzy-Q rubbed Helen's neck and stroked her cheek, her thumb resting lightly behind Helen's ear.

"I wouldn't go that far." Suzy-Q said with a smile. "If Suzy-Ho was here, this would already be porn."

"Not a bad idea." Helen said with a dance of tongues. Suzy-Q eventually ended it.

"We're already dressed for it. If there's time, sure. But let's get to the important thing, Helen: How are you doing?" She looked Helen in the eye seriously. "Remember, all this goes back to Susan, so don't brush it off with a joke about how 'everything's fine,' I want the Susan answer."

[Ramesh_Rocky]

Helen smirked at that. One of the things she loved about Susan was that she fearlessly called Helen on her shit when no one else would dare stand up to La Contessa like that. Susan was as much her family as Troy & Julie; therefore, like them, could say whatever she wanted to Helen. She tried to come up with a joke anyway before deciding it was also too much effort after everything today, so she just told Suzy-Q the truth.

"Not good," she exhaled. "In the past few days, I've lost someone I cared about personally, almost lost Maria, and ended up losing someone I didn't know personally but was still one of My People. And all of these things can be pinned on one man whom we now know has an arsenal and bombs. LeGrasse is having La Policia go over the CCTV cameras and get a trace on the guy we caught on video. Nothing I can really do until then besides be sad for the two of the seven dead people who did nothing to deserve it. The others were all Nazis. Fuck them."

"And now you know that Dietz has all the stuff he needs to make a lot more people dead." Suzy-Q said knowingly. Because she was existing in Helen's mind, she had some access to her thoughts. It was how Susan was able to learn Italian instantly. Suzy-Q hadn't meant to do it and didn't know how it happened to repeat the process. Since information in La Contessa's mind could find its way to Susan whether either woman wanted it to or not, Susan, like the rest of her family, had Top Secret clearance with San Finzione's government.

"There are days where I feel totally up to this job." Helen told her, sliding her hand to stroke her breast because the sex idea was still something she could also use about now. "Then there are days like this. Where I DO want to hand it all over to Maria and either go live with everyone there or across the street with the Greens! But I can't, because it'd be a really shitty thing to do to her, Vincenzo, and the country."

"I'm sure Vincenzo didn't wake up knowing what he was doing each and every day either." She advised Helen. "I mean, he was The Count, so he had to act like he always knew what to do; especially when he didn't. You know all about that part of the job, though. He can't have faced everything he did with complete confidence."

"There's also the fact that, for Troy and the Boys' sakes, I'm doing my best to not get TOO involved. Because he's fucking right a-fucking-gain; they DO need a Mommy to come home to after this. And I need them, too. So, Ramirez, LeGrasse, and Luc are all handling the Law & Order side of things. Mander and I are taking it from the perspective of those for whom The Law is a natural enemy."

"That's one of the things that Troy and Susan have in common." Suzy-Q replied, not at all objecting to Helen's plan. "Not the hunters vs wabbits thing. Both their parents went out for a drive one day and never came home. And Julie experienced that loss right alongside you two. You spent most of that time with Propappou, though. And he needed his Petalouda Mikro, too. It has to have eased his loss that he had you and Troy there to think about and keep going for." Helen nodded agreement. "They wouldn't be them if they weren't over-protective of the twins. You too, but they know you can handle some stuff; they're more concerned about Vincenzo and Byroni."

"I'm still baffled by how two perfect little beings managed to come out of me!" She answered. "I could call up the Ministry of Science and have Dr. Rocco give me a 2-hour presentation with charts, graphs, and other visual aids on the physical details if I wanted to really embarrass my Minister but that's all it would accomplish and I like Miguel." Helen remembered something just then. "Oh yeah, he sent over something I asked for." She thought another moment and wrapped her arm around Suzy-Q's waist. "It'll wait until morning."

Suzy-Q put her hand on Helen's arm. She didn't move it; she simply placed her hand there.

"Helen, the thing that the world tries to make you think and that you try to forget is really your biggest strength. Troy knows it, but he can't say it. Ramirez and everyone else know it but WON'T say it. Susan would want me to. Because she gets it better than anyone."

Suzy-Q kissed her deeply before continuing.

"You are Contessa Helena de San Finzione." She punctuated it with a smooch. "You are ALSO Helena Medina." Another smooch. "And Helen Parker." One more. "Three very special women, each of whom has loved and been loved by three more great men than most of us except maybe Julie can say. You are in literal command of most situations. And when you aren't; what do you do? When running's not an option, I mean."

Helen returned the passionate kiss and they replied together.

"Cheat."

"That's right." Suzy-Q continued. "You cheat. And that's how you win, Helen. What you call yourself out of deflected shame, Susan calls you with all admiration." She pulled Helen closer for emphasis.

[Ramesh_Rocky]

"You are a criminal, Helen Parker. That's how you've always thought of yourself, so that's what you've learned how to be. You're not going to beat this Nazi fuck by trying to be Troy or Vincenzo! You're going to do it by being the Fucking Cunt you become when someone tries to touch your real family! By being the woman who removed David Igazi, Armando Santori, and Leonard Whyte from all mortal affairs. And is going to take down Heinrich Dietz before he kills anyone else! Except maybe his own guys. He seems like that sort of prick; nothing you can really do about that."

"Heh," Helen hehed. "Ramirez and I were talking about those guys earlier. He didn't actually say the words 'you think you're a criminal, you need to stop acting like one' but he got his point across. You're making it sound like I need to act like MORE of one!"

"Good," said Suzy-Q as she moved her hand to Helen's breast like Helen had been doing to hers whenever possible. "I was hoping my message wasn't being lost on you. You and Mander ARE Robbers, but you're trying to play Cops and that's why you plan to let Luc take Dietz to prison. I got from your thoughts that you don't plan to kill him. Let me know if Stavro gets that 'private time' with this asshole. Susan might fly there to watch it happen. Maybe Troy, probably Julie."

"If they don't, they'll have to wait until the studio releases volume I of our new video series, 'San Finzione's Wackiest Nazi Beatings!'"

"Plus, just think of Mander a moment." Suzy-Q paused to say. "You promised that man he'd get to kill Nazis. Plural! He's been in your country a whole day now and only gotten to kill one! I think Maria should get credit for the tank. I mean, you had it right at the end there, but until then, it was all Maria."

"You're right." Helen agreed. "Vincenzo banned fox hunts years ago, but I just plain wouldn't be a good hostess if I promised my guest a Nazi hunt and didn't deliver."

"And he's not going to bag any more with you holding back and trying to be a good, responsible mother and ruler for Troy and the Twins' sakes. Helen Parker is many things. 'Good' and 'responsible' are not two of them. You try, and some days, the world lets you. Other days, you have fuckers like this, and like Michael Corleone, every time you think you're out, they suck you back in. You don't have to be Helen Parker all the time, but she's the one who rids the world of shit like this, so she's the one you need to be right now. That's who you have to tap into."

She slid her hand between Helen's legs.

"Here." Suzy-Q said with a grin as Helen reveled in the sensation. "Let me help by tapping some of that for you."

Helen laughed as she went to work.

* * *

Mander walked a few steps behind Luc and Ramirez as they walked to the Generalissimo's car. It hadn't occurred to any of them to ask Lady Maria if there was a passage to Mander's guest room before saying good night to her, so he decided to take the long way with them anyway. The two men found it slightly uncomfortable having the large, dangerous East Ender behind them. They dealt with it, though, because they only wished they'd beaten him to the idea first.

"I have two micros to look at when we return to your home." Luc told Ramirez. "It will be tricky."

"Why?" Ramirez asked. "Will two be harder for you to crack?"

"Non." Luc answered. "Simply that I'll have to type with both hands."

That got a laugh from Mander that almost caused the two of them to jump. Mander saw their reaction.

"You guys act like you expect me to take out my gun and start shooting any second." He said to the two of them at last.

All three stopped walking and silence fell. They turned around to face him. Mander looked at Luc first.

"You're a cop; I get that you and me are always gonna be bears and park rangers. So, I know why you don't like me." He turned to Ramirez. "When you kill people, it's for San Finzione and because they're bastards. You're rightly thanked for that service. When I do it, it's for money. I don't put on a uniform and swear an oath to kill bastards. I didn't often get much say in what degree of bastard I killed until Her Countessness gave me one. I'm sorry that I just skip all the honor and duty stuff and get right to the bastard-killing and paid-getting. It's not hard to imagine what your problem is with me, either, Generalissimo."

[Ramesh_Rocky]

They had no response. The fact that he hadn't raised his voice at all to tell them these things had caught them off guard.

"Good. Don't say anything. You've both said it all with your actions and the looks you been giving me all day and still are now. That's all right. Liking me isn't required. But I just saw the coolest lady I know fight everything inside her to not break down in tears in front of you, you, Lady Maria, and me over someone she never met and didn't know existed before today. Whatever you think of me and my motives, Detective Inspector, she's always done right by me. And whatever you think of them, Generalissimo, Her Countessness needs all of us right now. I'm sorry that she sometimes needs someone who might've shared a common experience or two in their lives to talk to. Ever wonder why, when she had that problem after the boys were born, she didn't run to my island? Cause I asked her that. She told me she knew I'd talk her into coming back, same as Troy, but he'd be nicer about it. And it'd be the second place you looked after his house."

Mander shook his head and walked toward the intersection of the halls to the way out and the one to his room. Before he rounded the corner, he stopped to look at them.

"I'd thought about asking you two if you'd like to have one more and talk about what else we can do for her. I think I'll go see if that Nunzio kid's off the clock yet instead. He's all right."

He turned and left the two of them. After anther few seconds of silence, they resumed walking toward the entrance.

"It has been a day of unexpected things." Hernando told his old friend as they carried on. "I'm not sure if I'm more irritated that he'd say such things to me or that he's completely correct."

"You watched the footage of the attack on Lady Maria as well." Luc told him. "We both saw him face down that tank and take a foolhardy gamble to kill one of them. The one on the machine gun; which could have ended her chase quite suddenly. He couldn't have known for certain that the gun would explode. He didn't do all that just to kill a Nazi."

"No." The Generalissimo replied. "He drew fire away from La Contessa and Lady Maria. So that we wouldn't have to wait for it to be fired at one of them to find out."

"That's what I saw as well. Perhaps we should be men, admit that he's right, and see if he's still up for that drink."

Ramirez nodded. They followed after him.

[Ramesh_Rocky]

Whatever Gets You through the Night Pt. 16

"I was staying at the Westin; I was playing to a draw.

When in walked Charlton Heston with the Tablets of the Law.

He said, 'It's still the greatest story.' I said 'Man, I'd like to stay.

But I'm bound for glory; I'm on my way!

My ride's here.'"

-Warren Zevon, "My Ride's Here

"You would kill me."

The village elder scowled as David Igazi's men loaded their tribute onto his vehicles. Igazi looked the man over. He looked into the elder's eyes and spoke again.

"And if you were younger and faster, you might stand a chance."

The elder said nothing. He continued to glare at Igazi. He wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of telling him that he was right about the only thing preventing the old man from ending the brutal warlord on the spot. Igazi's response was to give the big, boisterous laugh he was known for before backhanding the old man and knocking him to the ground. He took one last look at the gathered villagers.

"Get some more attractive women by next tribute!" Igazi said, spitting on the man and getting into the back of his jeep. Nigel Mander watched the scene from the front passenger's seat, his AK-47 strapped to his back. Mander turned to the men and gave the signal to move out.

One of the men grabbed a woman by the wrist. Mander gave him a look that told the man exactly what he'd do to the prick if he tried to bring that woman back to base for "fun." He let go and got into the vehicle with the others. Mander turned back to the driver and nodded for him to drive off.

As they left, Mander thought he heard something hit the vehicle. He turned around and saw a boy who'd made it through the human wall the adults had made to protect the children. He looked like he'd just thrown a rock. Mander noticed that Igazi also seemed to have perceived the sound but didn't turn to look as they left the village.

Ten kilometers away from the village, Igazi stopped their caravan.

"Did that boy throw a rock at my jeep?" Igazi asked him and the driver who hadn't noticed.

"Didn't see, sir." Mander lied. "Probably not, though. Kids play sometimes."

Igazi thought a moment.

"Send half the men back to bang the entire village." He ordered Mander. "Just in case he did. Tell them not to kill anyone who doesn't make them but leave none unviolated!"

Mander thought for a moment. Igazi had given orders like this before. And Mander had worked hard to become his indispensable right-hand man for the express purpose of not being sent on "missions" like the one he'd just been ordered to tell others to carry out. Prior to that, whenever Mander could, he'd scare the children into running off onto the savannah, then rejoin the men; lying about all the banging he'd been up to while they were busy looking for the children. More than once, he'd had to whisper to a woman "If ya don't scream, they'll know I'm not doing anything to ya." And that night, when they got back to the compound and told stories of what they'd done that day, Mander would sit and laugh along with suppressed disgust at the knowledge that he was the only one lying.

He knew how the conversation would play out if he tried to convince Igazi to countermand an order he'd just given. Assuming he didn't decide to draw his pistol and shoot Mander for trying to change his mind, he'd answer that it would let every village in the region know to teach their children to show David Igazi proper respect and better than to throw rocks at his vehicle. Then Igazi would probably say something like "Kony fears David Igazi! Uongo fears David Igazi! AFRICA fears David Igazi! The WORLD must fear David Igazi! THIS is how they will LEARN!"

For what wasn't the first time today or even in the past hour, Mander thought of how easy it would be to shoot Igazi. He trusted Mander enough to let him walk around with a .44 revolver near him all day. Igazi MIGHT not see him draw and turn in time. The driver MIGHT be startled enough to do nothing before Mander shot him too, simply out of not having time to find out the driver's loyalty to the warlord the hard way. Mander then MIGHT shove him out of the seat, drive off before any of the others grasp what they just saw, collect the loot he'd been skimming and stashing for himself, and beat them to the first plane out of Africa he could find.

Then he thought of the thirty men behind them in armed Humvees and other vehicles that could outrun the jeep. And far too many guns for the four bullets he'd have left in the gun after those two or before he could ready his AK. Maybe the other rotten tossers would accept the surprise change in management or maybe they'd all open fire. Most of them whispered around the campfire that Igazi couldn't be killed by bullets and he knew they believed it. He'd prove them wrong at the cost of his own life.

That many things having to go exactly right meant that they wouldn't. Nigel Mander wasn't the sort of person who could make that exchange. He was the sort of person who took a job because he got word some nutter in the Heart of Africa wanted his own army badly enough to pay too well to care exactly WHICH African nutter it was until he was already in. Mander wanted to get out of that army alive with enough to buy an island and never have to work for fuckers like Igazi again. If he found an opportunity to stop and kill the fuck without getting killed himself on the way out the door, even better.

But this wasn't his moment to find out. The plan had too many moving parts. And if he continued to hesitate, Igazi would shoot him, then tell the driver to give the order. He thought of the woman he'd tried to save earlier from coming back with them. She was going to get far worse than if Mander had just let the prick take her back to the compound and pass her around until he could try to help her escape. And his finding the will to sacrifice himself over principle wouldn't change a bit of it.

Mander got on the radio and gave the order.

* * *

[Ramesh_Rocky]

"It weren't the first time he did a thing like that." Mander told Luc, Ramirez, and Nunzio as they had another pint in his room. Being a guest room at Castle Finzione, it was large enough and had enough comfortable seats for all of them around a table. "Weren't the last either. It were the first time I thought it might just be worth my life to take the fucker with me, though."

Hernando and Luc smoked and sipped their own pints. Nunzio didn't smoke but sipped along.

"Then you weren't 'only following orders.'" The Generalissimo said over his pint. "If you hadn't, he'd have killed you as an example to the others. You did these things under duress. That is a different matter."

"Oui." Luc agreed. "If Igazi didn't kill you, the others would have. You MIGHT have saved that village that day by sacrificing yourself or Igazi might have killed them all and burned it to the ground as an additional 'fuck you' for your insubordination. The man was a sociopath; there's no depth to which he wouldn't have sunk." Everyone looked at Luc. He looked at Ramirez. "Did you not think I'd been trying to build any case I could against David Igazi before your Contessa settled the matter?"

Everyone laughed.

"Si." Nunzio spoke up, having been listening to the story as well. "I cannot imagine doing the kind of things you have done, Mander."

"You were born in San Finzione, mate." Mander answered. "We got a monarch too; she doesn't take as much of a hand in taking care of the people as Her Countessness does. You don't have to go looking for work from psychos, then find out who the boss is and what he'll have ya doing. That maiming-the-dog trick Scott did? Yeah, I've seen it before, too."

Nunzio lifted his beer into the air to toast his Contessa. The others clinked theirs with him.

"If any of ya don't believe my role in things, you can ask Her Countessness. Think she were gonna hand me an island without using her Thing to make sure I wasn't a fuckin' rapist first?"

They all nodded as they drank. They didn't need to bother her with the question. They knew her and that it was something she certainly would have done. Ramirez looked at the clock.

"It is getting late." Ramirez said. "Let's not keep our driver waiting any longer, Luc."

"Yeah," Mander agreed. "I imagine Her Countessness is gonna want to talk to us all in the morning."

They said their goodbyes. Luc and Ramirez returned home and Nunzio went back to the Servants' Quarters. Mander went to bed.

* * *

The Sun shone through the open balcony doors into the bedroom of the castle. It cast it's beam across the marbled floor, onto the Persian rug, across the king-sized bed, and onto the face of Contessa Helena de San Finzione. She opened one eye slightly and the light entered it as well.

She was alone. Suzy-Q had left at some point in the night. Helen checked her phone and found two messages. The first was from LeGrasse, saying that they'd tracked down the motel that Dietz evacuated and were questioning the manager. The second was from Susan, who had apparently gotten everything back from Suzy-Q and told Helen what a lovely night she'd had. She smiled and went to get ready for the day.

As she sat in the bath, missing Jeanne's usual "assistance" with bath time, Helen had a thought about how she wanted to address the people she now thought of as "her crew." How she needed to tell them to get themselves unfucked and accept that Mander was part of the team and wasn't going anywhere. She wasn't yet aware that after she'd went to bed, Luc and Ramirez stayed and settled some differences with Mander over a second drink. She still thought something needed to be said to everyone. When she emerged, she sent a text calling everyone who'd been at the meeting on Monday to the castle. She was so scattered that she'd thought it was Tuesday yesterday. The kind of day that George Carlin described when he said "All day Wednesday, you keep thinking it's Thursday; and it happens all day. Then Thursday comes and you're all right again." A little thing, but another reminder of what she and Suzy-Q talked about.

Helen got dressed. Then called for a couple of pages to bring her some things as she left her bedroom and sent another text to the others, telling them where this meeting would be held. She went to prepare.

* * *

[Ramesh_Rocky]

Lady Maria and Mander sat outside the large pair of Mahogany doors with Howard Caldwell-Pierce while awaiting the others. They saw LeGrasse, Ramirez, Luc, and Ortega walking toward them. If the two military men had been in ordinary suits rather than their dress uniforms, the four of them approaching in mid-conversation wouldn't be out of place in the introduction to a crime/legal drama where the cops take down the scum of the city in the first half and the lawyers put 'em away in the second.

"We found the rental car abandoned at a car wash in Wine Country last night." LeGrasse was saying to the others as they approached. Maria noticed that Mander's wave to them and Luc and Ramirez's waves back weren't as perfunctory as the other two's. "The driver paid for a full wash and detail, said he had to take care of something, and never returned. We have him on camera and are checking databases. Forensics is going over the vehicle to see if they missed anything."

"You don't rent an automobile without a credit card." Luc replied. "A stolen one, if nothing else. A less likely and hopefully incorrect explanation would be another plant. Or they could have bribed someone like they did the manager at the motel."

They were close enough that it wouldn't be rude for Mander to try and enter the conversation, so he did.

"So that's how they stayed hidden, then?" Mander asked. "Find a cheap motel and slip the desk clerk a few bills to look the other way?"

"Si." Ramirez told him as Mander and Maria stood, now that everyone was gathered. "They gave the manager an extra five-hundred Euros for two rooms for a week with no paperwork and no questions."

"Oui," LeGrasse said, a little uncomfortable talking to Mander like a peer. However, Luc and Ramirez seemed to be doing so, therefore, he'd make the effort as well. "The owner said five-hundred; which probably means five-thousand, but he didn't want us to seize it all. As long as the bills came out of it, we've got something. He figured 'if a dozen guys want to pay that much to use a couple of rooms for a few days, let them film all the gay porn they want in there.'"

That got a laugh from everyone. Then Mander had a thought.

"Dietz probably didn't bother to sterilize the scene if he planned to blow it up when he left. The car thing was a nice move but pulling up stakes like that had to be hurried. I'm sure he took anything he thought we could use with him and left the rest of the cleanup job to his goons. They wouldn't have the discipline to pack up all their empties and cigarette butts and take 'em with. They dumped it all in the nearest bin or the first they came across. Your people with the dust and brushes should be able to get something there, Prefect."

Luc agreed.

"Oui, their garbage will be full of empty beer cans that your fingerprinting people should love. Have the bomb squad check any large trash containers at the motel at once, Martin." He took the microphone of his security officer radio and relayed the instruction to his people still at the scene. "if they find nothing, note the direction they left and check containers to see if they dumped it nearby. Your people caught his C-4 surprise on the door; there's every possibility Dietz would leave another for you to find with the garbage. Someone could toss their own out and set it off! Taking an innocent life for no other reason than slowing our pursuit is not beyond him!"

LeGrasse gave the order greater urgency. When they told him they were on it, the thick Mahogany doors opened enough for Nunzio to step through, smiling.

"La Contessa will see you now." He said cheerfully. The three who'd stayed up late with him were surprised because he'd seemed so buzzed off two pints last night and showed no signs of hangover this morning. Mander had a suspicion why as they entered the Throne Room of Castle Finzione.

The entire room was Mahogany and Marble. And the scent of the room was best described as "History, but not the worst parts of it." No scents from the era of the Black Plague remained.

Gold trim lined the columns and an Emerald Green carpet led toward the center of the room, where their eyes were drawn from the famous artworks on the walls to the Throne and its occupant.

Contessa Helena de San Finzione sat on the Throne of the Reigning Monarch, also Mahogany with inlaid gold and emeralds. The throne to her right, where once she sat and if she'd ever had any intention of marrying another man, her second husband would sit; was next to her. She used the two armrests side-by-side to hold her ash tray and cocoa. A small, hard leather case also sat on the armrests. She wore her emerald-green robes of office and Tiara. In her left hand, she held the Royal Scepter. Music was playing from somewhere; most of the room, by now, recognized Warren Zevon's "Desperadoes Under the Eaves." A meeting table like the one in the War Room had been set up in front of the throne.

"This one's about Warren struggles with drinking." She listened to Warren sing a line and looked up at the speakers. "Oh, Warren! I've ALWAYS been the girl who understands you!" She turned back to them.

"Do you know why I don't like being in this room?" Helena said to the others as they approached. Mander and Luc were still awestruck by the décor. Maria had been in this room many times in her life and the others had been here before. "It's because I have to sit in THIS chair." She gestured to the throne where she sat. "Vincenzo's chair!"

She didn't join in the chorus of "forever does he reign in our hearts" because she was his widow, so it wasn't required of her. When it was finished, she continued.

"Same deal with my offices here and in the Business Wing. Although these chairs and rooms have been mine for seven years, I still think of myself as occupying HIS seat here." She looked down and back up, then to a side door. "And he'll be back any minute and I'll move back to my seat for him. I still get that feeling in these places. I think he took his time coming back so I could get used to the seat; didn't work."

"And yet, you're wearing your robes and the tiara and scepter." Maria said. "And you've asked us to meet here. Why, Great-Grandmama?"

"Making a point." Helen said, looking at Ramirez with a small smile. "Just a second."

The assembled waited while La Contessa hummed along with the fifty-eight seconds of the song where Warren Zevon just hums.

"Ok," she said when it ended. "TWO points. The new first is that all this stuff I'm wearing and this thing I'm sitting on are the only reasons I get to do things like that. The second, well, I did The Thing with Nunzio and he told me you guys talked a bit about that last night." Helen realized how badly that came out. "Oh, I don't mean I used The Thing to make him tell me; hell no! He was hungover, I took the hangover away, and he was so grateful, he told me why he was hungover. Kid's a lightweight, guys. One pint and he's good for the evening."

Those who'd stayed up drinking with Nunzio nodded. They'd learned this.

"Now, Mander is here because, like Vincenzo, I wouldn't have entrusted him with all that I have if I weren't certain he was someone whom I could. I know the kind of shit Igazi forced him to do and I know his heart wasn't in it and he was planning a burn long before I gave him a better offer. Maria gets it; she's one of those things I trust him with. That's why I will always give him the better offer. Because there's nothing more valuable in this world than a man who will stay bought."

Mander remained in Bodyguard Mode as she concluded.

"It sounds like some of you got it a bit last night. Does everyone get that I respect him as much as all of you now? Can you do the same? Or do I have to appoint him the leader of Mander Force; San Finzione's top secret special mission team of highly trained reformed ex-cons who go beyond the law to take down the crooks who operate above it? I can tell by the look on his face that Mander likes the idea and I've already got the codename 'La Fucking Contessa' locked in."

Everyone acknowledged their Contessa's instructions.

"Good. Sorry, take a seat, everyone. I wasn't trying to do THAT kind of power move to you. I've had my morning croissants, but it's early and I can have something brought up."

No one requested it. Helen stepped down from the throne and joined them at the head of the table.

"Arturo Lopez will be remembered as the LAST Citizen of San Finzione to be killed by the Nazis. We all understand this, right?" They did. "Luc, I can no longer promise you a live capture of Dietz. I will do whatever I am able to make this possible. However, if it comes to it, I will hear his case myself; posthumously if need-be, For the Good of The People, and I will sit in Vincenzo's Chair and convict him and carry out his death sentence myself for the crime of Being A Dick In San Finzione! And anything else you tell me he's done. Got a few unsolved cases you'd like to pin on him, go right ahead. You can just make shit up and I'll find him guilty of it."

Luc nodded. She turned to Ramirez.

"I've been trying to do everything right and be the woman Vincenzo married. The problem with that is that he KNEW he was marrying a woman who DOESN'T do everything right! He KNEW that the world would force San Finzione's NEXT ruler to go to the lengths he was too good a man to go to!" She turned to Ortega. "That's why he created La Squadra de Ultimados; to do the things that HAD to be done! Because sometimes, a trigger needs to be pulled and he believed in San Finzione enough to do it himself! But he wouldn't have been the man he was if he were capable; whatever good cause he had."

[Ramesh_Rocky]

"You have been ruling correctly, Contessa." Ramirez told Helen. She smiled a little at that.

"I thought that myself." She jerked a thumb back to the Throne. "I thought I could just sit in that chair and wait for Dietz to try to make his way through all of you to me, like a Video Game Boss. The problem with THAT idea is that by the time that final confrontation happens, everyone who stood between me and him is already dead. That's not going to work for anyone, Hernando. And if I'm going to stop it, I need to get out of my boss lair and get my hands dirty."

Helena removed the tiara. She placed it and the scepter in front of Maria and held out her hand, palm up.

"I need you to take care of The People the right way, Dearest One. And tell all these others how to do so the right way. They all know how to do the right things. Mander and I know how to do the WRONG things, and THOSE are what we need to go do!"

Lady Maria looked at her Great-Grandmother, made the tag, and became Contessa-In-Reggenza Maria.

Contessa Helena de San Finzione stood and removed her Robes of Office, revealing the black leather jacket and skirt she'd been wearing the night she killed Leonard Whyte. She folded her robes and set them on her old chair, now that the big one was, until she was ready to tag back, Maria's. She also looked at her Great-Granddaughter sadly because they wouldn't be seeing much of each other once she left. For security reasons, outside Castle Finzione, the two Contessas could not be within one city block of each other. She then turned back to the others.

"But that's for after the meeting. I'm told LeGrasse found some things overnight and want to hear more. If Luc's gotten anything from the computers yet, I want to hear about that, too. Let's give Nunzio a break, call someone else, and let's DO have a little something and look at what we've got before heading out."

Everyone agreed. Helen picked up her phone and the object that had been sitting between the two thrones. She texted for someone from the kitchen, put them both in her purse, and sat down.

"Also, Mander. When we leave, let's talk some more about Mander Force. The studio's got an animation department and I'm already getting toy ideas."

They began to talk.

* * *

"What did you tell this one?" Dietz asked Dummkopf as he unlocked the door to their new hideout.

"That we were musicians." He replied as the others brought the two white panel vans around to the rear of the closed storefront. "That we have a gig this weekend and need a place to lay down sleeping bags and practice undisturbed."

He moved into the store and saw the others unloading gear from the vans in the back alley.

"Your cover-ups are improving at least, Dummkopf. This is a step up from 'We want to film gay pornography in your establishment.'

"I have another set up, sir." Dummkopf told him. "A fallback closer to the escape route."

Dietz went behind the counter and plugged in his laptop.

"Then you've done two right things today, Dummkopf. You may be up for a name change soon. I promise nothing."

He smiled slightly as Dietz brought up the file.

"Scott got at least one more vital piece of information for us before the end. We have two ways to proceed now: my first idea or a bombing campaign." He looked at the crate carefully being hauled in that contained the five bombs he had remaining. "If we are able to pull this off, I am going to have to give Scott far more credit than I care to."

He walked over to the items now being hauled in. A box containing the old guns from Scott's house and a rack of six SS uniforms still in plastic from the Wardrobe department's drycleaners. He looked through the MP-40s and took out the Sturmgewehr.

"I am keeping this one." He told Dummkopf. "Now, go fetch Good One and the others." He admired the studio's fine work on the lapels of one of the uniforms through the plastic. It looked almost like something Opa would wear.

"Tell them to..." Dietz thought for a moment. He looked into the sockets of the skull on the cap that went with the uniform. He then smiled and turned to Dummkopf.

"Tell them to get ready for stardom!"

[Ramesh_Rocky]

Whatever Gets You through the Night Pt. 17

"My jacket's gonna be cut slim and checked.

Maybe a touch of seersucker with an open neck.

I ride a GS Scooter with my hair cut neat.

Wear my war-time coat in the wind and sleet."

-The Who, "I've Had Enough"

"Marco Santori!" Contessa Helena de San Finzione's shadow called from the doorway of the Taverna. The bartender turned off the music and everyone faced her. "Your Contessa summons you."

At the bar, a man dropped his beer and ran for the side exit. He opened the door and ran straight into a wall of Englishman that knocked him to the floor.

"You must be Marco." The wall said as he bent down and picked Marco up by the collar. "I'm Mander. Some say I'm a likable guy. YOU won't."

Helen walked toward the bar. Mander took the man's wallet and keys. He tossed the wallet to Helen and the keys onto the bar. She walked up to the bar, took all the money out of his wallet, and set it on top of Marco's keys. She slid the pile over to the bartender, indicating for him to take all the money.

"He's had enough for today." She said to the barman. "He can come back for his car when he's better. Whenever that'll be."

"What are you talking about?" Marco yelled as he tried to escape Mander's grip. "It's not even noon!"

"Yeah, but I still expect you to be in no condition to drive after this. Now, let's allow these people to enjoy their drinks and take it outside."

Mander maintained his grip on Marco and shook him until he walked through the doorway, then held it for Helen.

"That's 'Er Countessness there, that is." Mander told him. "Stand up straight an' show respect proper!"

Helen graciously nodded to Mander as she stepped through the door, into the alley where they'd parked the Aston-Martin.

"You were absolutely right, Countessness." Mander said as he shoved Marco toward the front of the car. "You come in the front, this tosser runs fer the side exit."

"Hey, if there's one thing I know, it's thinking like other criminals. I have tracked down Carmen Sandiego's ass SO many times!"

Marco began to reach into his inside jacket pocket when Mander slammed him onto the hood of the vehicle. He drew the Desert Eagle and shoved it under Marco's chin to minimize damage to the lovely car.

"If that 'and enters that jacket, it ain't comin' out." Mander told him. That was enough to stop him from going for whatever he had planned to pull.

"My Englishman's a bit on edge today." Helen explained to Marco as she lit a cigarette. "You might've heard Word on the Street that San Finzione is having a tiny Nazi problem right now. Some of them even tried to kill YOUR Princess with a tank yesterday!" Helen turned around, appearing to calm herself. "And my Englishman likes three things: money, the soulful yet aggressively rebellious rhythms of Misters Roger Daltrey, Peter Townshend, John Entwistle, and Keith Moon; and Lady Maria."

"That girl's a dear, sweet angel, she is!" Mander added, then let Helen continue.

"Everybody loves Maria, Mander. So does a friend we were talking to at the castle earlier. REALLY good at thinking of stuff others wouldn't. HE pointed out that we know where they got their guns and such from, but finding belts of machine gun ammo and shells for a Panzer? That's something special. You have to go to a guy who knows how to GET that kind of thing. You need someone who's maybe got some old family military connections and knows where they can be acquired in a hurry. Maybe he knows some old Supply Sargeant with whom daddy's name still carries weight who just might have some of that old surplus ammo forgotten in a dusty back corner that could safely go missing. Interpol and La Policia are the at the base assisting the MPs in tracking him down now. Shouldn't take them long; they found their last guy pretty quick. He's dead, by the way. So, I decided we should come talk to a turd and son of a turd I know who could arrange that deal with a couple phone calls, let Mander try a pint of one of our fine local brews and get some information."

"An' I suspect I'm about to work up a thirst. So I want 'Er Countessness to have that information quick-like so's we can go back inside and I can 'ave that pint an' tell the pigs to get fucked when they show up! Her Countessness lets me do that. She lets me do a LOT of things."

[Ramesh_Rocky]

"Yes I do. For example, I COULD just use that 'magic' everyone says I've got and make you talk. But until this man can get hold of some more Nazis to kill? A fuck who'd do business with them? Yeah, I'd let him do a lot of things to that guy."

Helen turned to Mander.

"Before I let you do a lot of things to this guy, can I tell him about your jacket? It's really cool! I'm gonna."

She turned back to Marco.

"This is Mander's jacket from his Nazi-Stomping youth back in London. He's handy with a needle and thread, so it's still in great condition and it still fits! What makes it so cool is that it's a loving re-creation of Vyvyan Bastard's jacket from 'The Young Ones'. Even has 'Very Metal' written on the back. But there's a very special difference, you see. It's these."

Helen gestured to what looked to be a string of many red tassels hanging from Mander's left shoulder. Because of the height difference between them and the way they were leaning over Marco, they were at Helen's eye level. She played with them a little like a kitten.

"You know what these are? Tell him, Mander."

"Laces. Taken off Nazis I fucked up or worse."

"You see," Helen explained with a long drag, "A Nazi can be a Skinhead, but a Skinhead is not always a Nazi. Mander was one of the non-Nazi kind, shaving his head back before Nature took care of it for him. He's got... what, fifty of these?"

"I stopped counting round thirty, so maybe."

"So, Marco, NAZI Skinheads wear red laces on their boots. That's a good first thing to look for. REAL Skinheads like Mander here, enjoy beating the shit out of Nazi ones for appropriating their culture and getting them lumped in with fucking Nazis. So, if you send a Nazi to the hospital or the morgue, you take his laces and hang one from your jacket as a trophy. He's got the others in a shoebox at home in case one breaks." Helen looked down at Marco's feet. "You'd have to ask him the policy on piss-covered loafers; but that's for after. Who'd you sell the ammo to, Marco? Let's go ahead and skip the part where you say 'I dunno, some guy!' like I'll accept that and go straight to Mander roughing you up a bit for giving me that shit."

Mander took his cue, hoisted Marco off the hood of the car, and body-slammed him into the wall before slamming him into Questioning Position on his knees, pressing the side of Marco's face against the not-burning-but-still-uncomfortably-hot metal bonnet of a car in the San Finzione sun.

"Now that the 'try and play me for a fool' part is out of the way," Helen replied, blowing smoke into Marco's face. "Let's get to it. Tell me everything about the man you sold them to."

Marco told her everything he remembered about the racist gun nut he sold the odd old piece to and the blond man he vouched for who wanted the merchandise overnight and gave him enough money to make it happen. He didn't know anything about any explosives. NOBODY would traffic in bombs in San Finzione! It'd be like trafficking in women; even San Finzione's creeps worse than him knew better than to try that in La Contessa's country!

When he was finished, Helen lit another cigarette and leaned in closely.

"You know what, Marco? I believe you." She said as she keened in closer and blew another stream of smoke in Marco's face.

"I want to really, REALLY believe you."

She stepped back and let Mander do a lot of things to Marco.

* * *

[Ramesh_Rocky]

The two of them sat at a table in the Taverna afterwards. Mander got his pint and to tell La Policia to go fuck themselves. Helen didn't come here often, so she didn't expect the bartender to keep cocoa on hand just for her. She settled for "Screwdriver, hold the vodka."

"Well," Mander said now that the cops had gone about fucking off and joining the paramedics in hauling Marco away. "We now know that Dietz bought his ammo from Marco and that he's spending the bankroll like water, so either it's massive or nearly gone. In short, everything we knew back when Marco still had teeth."

"Oh, we accomplished something." Helen said with a drink of her own. The rest of the Taverna gave them their privacy. "Marco Santori will be Word on the Street by the time we finish our drinks. And that word is 'La Contessa is looking for a Nazi named Heinrich Dietz. And if you know something and don't come to her with it right away, she'll make you into even BIGGER Word on the Street than Marco!' Our Universal Health Care will replace Marco's teeth. Getting that message out there and seeing you doing a bit of the old ultraviolence? Priceless! Do you channel Michael Caine in those moments?"

"Maybe a little. 'Get Carter, at least. Your Countessness absolutely knows more about mass communication than me. So, why not go to the top and shake down Don Nessuno?"

"I kinda OWED Marco's dad that one. I wish I'd thought to put 'The Thieving Magpie' on my phone before we set out this morning. The Don wouldn't deal with fascists. Ramirez is right on that one. He plays by my rules, shows me respect, and gets that if he doesn't, I'll make him eat Spaghetti and His-Balls. With store-bought sauce and no garlic bread. White wine only; no red."

Mander agreed, not thinking she was getting mean about it until she got to the no garlic bread and wine-pairing part. He contributed his own thoughts to the de-beating; a word La Contessa made up earlier in the conversation to describe "this little post-beating de-briefing. Hey,' de-beating!'"

"Guess we learned how Scott got some of his hardware and knew who to send 'em to. With everything he was doing for Dietz, he wouldn't have time to make a proper intro; just 'Go to the Taverna, ask for Marco, tell him I sent ya.'"

Helen lit a cigarette. It was allowed in the Taverna, but if it hadn't been, that wasn't going to affect her decision just now.

"Dietz wouldn't have met Marco himself. His face had just been seen and he's still worried about that; he would've sent a flunky. Probably Bad Red Rug but he didn't bother wearing the rug that time. They might only have brought the one wig and they're passing it around. We're still a step behind him, but we're catching up."

Mander finished his pint.

"So, where to next? Got someone else ya want me to do that to?"

"Not just yet. And by the way, thanks for bringing the Cockney, that was some Guy Ritchie stuff out there." Mander accepted the compliment. "Next, we take the Aston-Martin back up to the castle; probably get Bessie while someone washes the blood off and beats Marco's face-dents out of the hood before Troy sees it. The President should've had a reaction by now, so I should go see what it is and... probably, knowing me, start a flame war with the President to keep him too distracted to do any real damage on top of everything else right now. After that, we should go check out the set. LeGrasse has some people on the director, but I can't help thinking that there's something there that we're not seeing and want to take another look with you because you give me good ideas. THEN, if no one's tried to get word to me; I know a couple other small fry like Marco who could ALSO use a reputation upgrade!"

"I KNEW there was a reason everyone comes here for holiday!" Mander said, overturning his glass. Helen downed her orange juice and did the same. They began to walk out.

"Aren't you worried some of them'll tell someone about all this?" The tall man asked the woman who was just at the low-end of average height.

"Tourists don't find the Taverna until nightfall. Who're THESE people gonna tell? Batman? Let 'em. HE might wanna beat some Nazis too."

"I don't need that kind of competition." Mander replied as they left.

* * *

Prefect of security officer Martin LeGrasse sat at his desk with printouts of the information that Luc had been able to pull from Silverman and Scott's computers. He read Luc's findings at the top of the stack. The report of La Contessa and her giant's altercation with Marco Santori went into a basket on his desk labeled with the abbreviation N.S.L.C.F.; for the French phrase that meant "We Already Know La Contessa Did It."

There was little unexpected on Silverman's computer. Nothing particularly shocking in the way of pornography or dirty private online chats. His browser history was primarily devoted to social media, research on the film, other items of interest to film students, and eBay searches for Indiana Jones action figures and playsets. He'd spent a good amount of time on the Simon Wiesenthal Center's website, which raised LeGrasse's eyebrow. A call to them got someone checking their records, but no one he could reach on the phone was able to confirm or deny whether an Eliot Silverman, from Los Angeles or San Finzione, had contacted them or requested information. He made a note to have someone check Eliot's mail in case he'd reached out by post.

But it was an itch LeGrasse couldn't scratch. Meeting Luc via the Generalissimo and working with him in the past through Ramirez meant that he didn't feel any professional jealousy toward the man. He admired Luc's ability to consider the perspectives of others and was trying to apply it himself as he went over what they had and considered the "why" of the crimes that Heinrich Dietz's gang was committing. Thinking of them as "another gang causing trouble in his city" rather than "The Third Reich returned to San Finzione" was helping Martin approach the case objectively.

The motive seemed obvious: Stop the film from being made. And with the arsenal they had, there were many more bloody and violent ways that they could have and still might go about it than a carefully planned hit like Silverman, followed by a hasty plan to steal a tank, trash the set, and kill Lady Maria. Thinking about things from that angle, trashing the set may have been, if not their objective, an opportunity that arose in the process.

Or was it vice versa? Had the goal been to destroy the set and Lady Maria was the target of opportunity? If stopping the movie was the objective, her loss would be more likely to cause La Contessa to abandon the project than wrecking a set that can be rebuilt with money and a couple of days. The possibility also existed that they'd seen Contessa-In-Reggenza Maria's portrait and presumed that she was Contessa, but that stupidity seemed beyond even them.

He'd quit smoking long ago but spending so much time around La Contessa and the others lately and thinking this over made him miss them. He picked up a pen, twirled it, and stuck it in his mouth as he stared at a wall kept blank for this express purpose.

The "why" of it all was what weighed on his brain. Luc seemed to have the understanding of human nature covered, but what could Nazis gain from sabotaging a movie about the late Count? After "because the director was a Jew," there was no clear motive and that hardly seemed enough. Or why continue once you've made that point? The new director was not Jewish; if the motive had been Racism As Its Own Reward, that mission was accomplished. No, the motive needed its own motive, and that was the one he pondered.

[Ramesh_Rocky]

Again, he wondered, to what end? Something in the film that they "don't want the world to see?" What, then? The movie was still being made and LeGrasse already knew how the story ended. You could open a history book to find that out! He hadn't had time to read through Juliessa Skankeko's script but imagined that La Contessa wouldn't have chosen it if it weren't historically accurate and well-written.

LeGrasse looked over at Luc's findings from Scott's computer. More significantly brutal and disturbing pornography than on Eliot's. And, as suspected, a great deal of activity on white supremacist websites, chat groups, and forums. The man seemed to have little time to pursue other hobbies than hatred or means to that end.

His email provided more information. A number of them within the past two weeks had been to an anonymous email server and painted the timeline of Scott's being reached out to by Dietz or his representative for assistance with an upcoming project in San Finzione. So, he had at least that long to get things ready for their arrival as best he could without drawing suspicion. And whatever the motive was, it had been in play long before Silverman's murder. Apart from a few gaps filled in, the timeline of events was essentially the one they'd put together already.

The last item that Scott had been able to send from home before going in to work on the last day of his life had been the revised shooting schedule. He'd given Dietz the previous schedule prior to Silverman's murder. The second had been the one made after, now that the other directors had moved up a step on the pyramid. La Contessa's statements that they'd resume shooting the day after a murder had been hasty, made over the dead body of someone she considered a friend. She hadn't thought at the time that some of the crew might want to take a day of mourning. They were resuming filming today with the battle in the caverns. LeGrasse had people protecting Larry Compton, so he was safe. The actors and the rest of the crew, on the other hand...

That thought led him to more. The director had been killed, a set ruined, a tank destroyed, an old man accidentally killed. With all those guns and bombs they now knew Dietz and his gang had, they could have just attacked the production directly and gotten it over with. Slaughtering the cast would definitely end the whole thing. So, if Dietz had the motive, opportunity, and means to do so prior to now, why not go straight to mass bloodshed? Moves like murdering the director when and where you know he'll be alone or stealing a tank and going on a rampage over an empty set were less effective methods of terror than the C-4 and vintage guns would allow.

"Vintage" resonated with him. Scott had more modern firearms in his collection, but apart from someone taking the Uzi, the guns they'd selected had mostly been MP-40s, Lugers, a couple of Gewehr rifles. He imagined that whomever had picked the Uzi had done so merely because he'd seen it in the movies and thought it looked cool.

Period guns and the fact that they were filming a battle in the caverns today. It gnawed on the part of his gut that made him a cop. Most of the force was busy looking for Dietz or helping find the ammo supplier on the base. He picked up the phone.

"Have any available units within ten kilometers of the caverns meet me there." He thought a second. "Send SWAT as well. No lights or sirens. Not just yet."

He left the office for his car, informing his receptionist that he'd need to speak with La Contessa and the others as soon as possible.

When he was told that La Contessa was en route to the caverns as well, he decided it was time for the lights and sirens.

* * *

The driver parked the van in front of the Tourist Center that served as the entrance to the caverns. Signs out front advised that the Caverns were closed today for filming.

Good One opened the back door and he and the other four men dressed as Nazis checked their weapons one last time before emerging. He looked at the strange old yellow-and-black antique car someone had driven to the set. It was old enough to be a movie prop, but far too bright and cheery, and it wasn't on the set, which was inside the caverns themselves. When the van drove away, he led them toward their destination.

A man with a clipboard stood in a doorway with a sawhorse propping it open. The last obstacle between them and being on the set. Good One knew that this was likely a one-way trip. That van wouldn't be back to collect them and report their success to Dietz. He patted the pocket containing the cyanide capsule that would be his only alternative to life in prison if they succeeded and approached the man.