CHAPTER 12
So now we get to one of the most important episodes in my life as a Hunter. The reason I sued MCB. And won. It was a rainy Tuesday. Calls had been slow. There hadn’t been a kifo eruption in the weeks since we lost Glenn. So we were hanging around the team shack when lo and behold two of my favorite people in the world showed up: Myers and Franks.
I’d been helping Franklin with paperwork when I got called back to the team room.
“Agent Myers,” I said, nodding in greeting. Being former MHI, the junior agent wasn’t very popular around here. “Traitor” was one of the nicer things my coworkers called him. He may have been a duplicitous jackass, but he had been a good Hunter, and he’d stepped up at Mardi Gras when the MCB had lost all their senior leadership. I just nodded at Franks and wondered why these two were back in town. “Good afternoon.”
“We need to ask you some questions, Gardenier,” Myers said. “You’re coming with us.”
“I won’t be interrogated without the presence of counsel.”
“You don’t have the right to counsel in supernatural investigations.”
“I do if such counsel is read in on the supernatural,” I said, as calmly as I could. “And in this town, throw a rock and you find a lawyer who knows about the supernatural.”
“Franks,” Myers said. “Bring him.”
Now, Franks just did not care. He would drag me by the hair if he felt like it.
“What’s this about?” Franklin asked. Half the team was up and ready to pounce. The new guys didn’t know Franks. Bad move. Franks would fight the whole office and probably enjoy it.
“Down, boys. I’m going peacefully. You want to cuff me?” I turned around and put my hands behind my back. “I’ll be fine, guys. Let it go.”
“Hell I will,” Sam growled.
“None of your concern, Haven.” Myers said. “Just stay out of this.”
“Last time I heard those same exact words out of an MCB agent’s cock holster, you cowards massacred a cruise ship full of civilians.”
“Get the hell out of our way if you know what’s good for you. Franks, cuff him.”
“Call Mr. Lambert, will you, Franklin?” I asked as Franks put on the cuffs. I won’t say Franks and I were friends but we had fought side by side. I think I even saved his life at Mardi Gras, but that did not matter with Franks. Those cuffs bit to the bone. I’m not sure he even knew how to put them on lightly.
“You call anyone, the MCB will throw you in prison,” Myers snapped on the way out.
I hoped Franklin would call his bluff.
They took me outside and Franks put me in the back of the car with a shove. Myers dropped a bag over my head.
“Is that strictly necessary?” I knew the sound was muffled but it was a reasonable question. The answer was a hard blow on the side of my head. Okay, they were playing by those rules. This would be interesting.
I probably should have been scared. The classic black helicopter boys were whisking me away to places unknown to interrogate me. I was probably going to be beaten up. There was a fair chance I’d get shot in the head. Also a fair chance I’d see the inside of a federal prison. I wasn’t sure what they were pissed about, could be any number of things, but I wasn’t going to let it get to me.
Prison would suck, but I really don’t fear the one thing most people fear most: Death. It’s not that I’m suicidal, but I long to die. I’ve been to heaven. It was a nice place. I’m looking forward to going back. Duty really is heavier than mountains and death really is lighter than a feather for me. I was sent back for one unknown mission. One moment when I have to achieve perfection as a Monster Hunter. Then I die. At a guess, painfully. I don’t know when that will be but I’m okay with it whenever it comes. I simply don’t fear it.
So all this was just another frustrating episode in a world full of frustration. I’d said I was an addict about Monster Hunting. But, frankly, if it wasn’t for the whole mission-from-God thing, I’d probably find some way to give it up. This sort of shit was just getting on my nerves. I was halfway tempted to try to get them to kill me. Franks wouldn’t mind. Franks really did not have the emotional parts to mind.
I had been expecting them to take me to some out-of-the-way spot to interrogate. But instead they took me straight to the Franklin Federal Building at Lafayette Square. I could tell even through the bag over my head. Church Street to Girod and into the underground parking lot. I recognized the bumps on Church which seriously needed resurfacing. God knows, I’d been there enough meeting with MCB back in the good ole days when Castro was in charge. I missed him.
When the car stopped I was as helpful getting out as I could be. It didn’t matter. Franks just manhandled me out of the car and nobody can manhandle someone like Franks. Then it was more or less being carried by one arm through a series of corridors. Elevator down. One, two, three levels. The MCB interrogation and holding area. Turn left, turn right, one…two…three…ten paces. Interrogation room four.
Hard steel seat. If the bag was off, the room would be a light salmon. Facing one of the de rigueur reflecting windows. Table, bolted to the ground. Two chairs, both steel. Not so heavy as to be a useful weapon.
And sure enough, the hood came off.
“Given my current relationship with the committee, you’d better have some serious probable cause for this, Dwayne.”
Only Myers and Franks had been joined by Special Agent Campbell. Of course, Myers was still a junior agent. Grabbing a Hunter off the street was over his pay grade.
“Nice try. This has been cleared,” Campbell said, sitting down across from me. “I know you’re involved with the Dark Masters and I know you killed your brother just to shut him up so he couldn’t implicate you in the ring. I requested assistance to clear this up once and for all, so Washington dispatched Agent Franks. And believe me, when Agent Franks assists in an interrogation, the truth always comes out. And now you’re going to answer some questions.”
“Gardenier, Oliver,” I said. “156-25-7819. Monster Hunter.”
“That’s the way it’s going to be?” Myers asked.
“Absent counsel, yes.”
“You know you don’t get counsel here,” Campbell said. “We’re the only ones who know where you are.”
“We’re in the federal building. MCB detention and interrogation. Room Four.”
“Nice guess. Where’s the rest of the cells?”
“Ten paces that way.” I gestured with my chin. “Turn left. Five paces. Three cells on the right, two on the left.”
“You know what I mean!” Campbell nodded at Franks.
I’d been hit quite a few times. I’d been shot a couple more. Getting hit by Franks was more like being shot. I ended up on the floor, shaking my head. I’d lost at least one tooth. And I can safely say he’d pulled his punch.
“That was an honest answer. You asked where the cells were. They’re around the fucking corner!”
“He’s correct,” Franks stated helpfully.
“The Dark Masters’ cells,” Campbell snarled. “Where are the rest of the Dark Master cells, Gardenier?”
“I have no clue. I’m not part of the ring and never have been.”
“Really, Chad?” Myers said. “We get the reading that you’re involved, you go snooping about it around the world. Then you conveniently find your brother’s cell and take out the only lead we had. Nice way to tie up loose ends. Just stopping the kidnappings is not going to save you from prison.”
“That was months ago!”
“Government may move like a glacier,” Campbell said. “But whatever ends up in front of a glacier is crushed eventually. Because of your relationship with some committee members, the director was hesitant to take extreme measures, but now your time has come.”
“That wasn’t my fault. I’m innocent! I was never part of the ring! But you’re never going to believe that, are you? So now we’re definitely on the only-in-the-presence-of-counsel thing. Time to break out the pliers, Franks.”
“Won’t need them,” he said simply.
“It’s good to be in the hands of a pro—” And then Franks hit me again.
It took a long time and it wasn’t pleasant. Since you’re reading this, I didn’t die and I’m not writing these memoirs from prison. I did end up in the hospital, however. The chart was fairly extensive.
Dislocated shoulder. Broken left wrist. Broken right forearm. Contusions over eighty percent of my torso. Two broken ribs. Internal bleeding. Skull fractures. Broken right occiput. Broken nose. Four missing teeth. Six broken fingers. Seven fingernails ripped off. It was more painful than it sounds.
The problem with interrogating someone under the assumption that they know something they don’t is that they cannot tell you what you want to hear. Campbell—who hated me anyway—was convinced I knew about more cells. If I even hinted I agreed, I was going to a secret prison forever. There would be no trial or anything like that. It would simply happen.
Later I found out that Campbell had been really close with Agent Robinson, mentor and protégé, and he blamed me personally for Robinson getting eaten by the mava. There hadn’t been any more Dark Masters kidnappings after Thornton’s death, so the MCB director had been ready to believe my testimony before the committee. At least until Campbell used Robinson’s death to sell the story that I was still a menace, hence his insistence of bringing in Franks for a special interrogation.
I didn’t crack. After the beating started I didn’t even wisecrack, believe it or not. I just took it and kept reciting my name and social. Oh, and I didn’t hesitate to scream. A lot.
I don’t know when they actually stopped. I was drifting in and out. Something about a subdural cerebral hematoma. Give Franks his due, he knew how to not quite kill someone.
I do remember it was actually Franks who called it.
“All we want is the truth.”
“Truth,” I muttered through busted lips. I’d spent most of the time on the floor and was starting to like it there. “Truth. Gardenier, Oliver…”
“Franks…” Myers sounded tired and unhappy. As the unfortunate bastard picked to be Franks partner, he’d been sent all the way from Washington for this, and he’d come to the realization that I was telling the truth.
“He knows nothing,” Franks finally declared.
“I’ll be the judge of that!” Campbell replied. “But I think we’ll give Gardenier some time to contemplate—”
“I’m bored,” Franks said. “We’re done.”
I passed out. Wasn’t the first time, but this time they didn’t wake me up again.
* * *
The rest of it was hazy. I’d been in the Marine bombing in Beirut and it was like that. Light and dark. Voices…
“…too extensive to treat here…!”
Muttered something, sharp…
“…probably have thought of that before you beat someone to death…”
Good. I was going to die. Sorry, God, tried to do the right thing…
I didn’t die. I wanted to die. Especially when I woke up in the hospital room with Franks staring at me.
I could only open one eye. I just looked at him. He looked back.
I’m not sure what Franks is. I’m pretty certain he’s not entirely human. He has none of the emotions of charity or mercy or conscience that make us human and I’ve seen him take a fatal head wound and just keep fighting like it was nothing. But what he does have is an absolute sense of duty. He wouldn’t be upset killing a building full of orphans if there was a real need to do so. Say they were all vampires or had been bitten by loup-garou or zombies or pick a reason to wipe out a nest of orphans. He’d shoot every little tot in the head, wring their necks like chickens, whatever, and go have dinner. Wouldn’t bother him.
But he knew, and I knew, that this mission had been flawed from the outset. He was sure now that I had nothing to do with the Dark Masters. He knew that Campbell had acted unprofessionally, emotionally, so wound up in his anger that he’d lost all objectivity. And that he, Franks, had wasted his valuable time beating me half to death for no good reason.
So I just looked at him and he looked back. I would say it was a staring contest but I actually passed back out after a while. So I guess he won.
* * *
“Mr. Gardenier?” a voice said.
This time there was no Franks. There was a Myers.
“Gardenier, Oliver…” I said. I tried to remember my social and couldn’t. Damn, I’d been hit hard.
“Mr. Gardenier?” the voice said again. “I am Samuel Koltts, your legal counsel.”
I turned my head, wincing in pain. There was another person in the room. Short, spare, very nice suit. Not MCB. Not with that suit. That was a three-thousand-dollar suit. Nice tie.
Myers was really there and just as clearly unhappy which suited me fine. Ugly suit.
“Lambert?” I asked.
“Yes,” Koltts said. “Mr. Lambert sent me to represent you in this matter.”
Albert Aristide Lambert was the senior named partner of Lambert, Klein, Masson and Kempf, one of New Orleans’ most prestigious law firms. The Lamberts were old ooold money and power. My gentleman, Remi, had worked for them previously and I’d retained them shortly after joining Hoodoo Squad. There were always minor legal matters to clear up with Monster Hunting and most of Lambert, Klein, Masson and Kempf’s better attorneys were read in on hoodoo. In New Orleans they had to be. Koltts was a new one, though. Him I didn’t know.
“No questions ’til fully recovered,” I muttered.
“That is not going to fly,” Myers said.
“Agent Myers,” Koltts said, smiling thinly. “I am aware of the broad brief given to Monster Control Bureau as well as the rationale thereof. And I also have a read-in federal judge who thinks your bureau should be shut down. You may feel free to continue to dig the very deep hole you are currently in. Or you can accept that no questions will be presented to my client until such time as he has recovered, by my definition, and I have had time to fully counsel him on this matter. As you were just informed by federal injunction. Is there some part of injunction you don’t understand, Agent, or should I write it down in very small words for you?”
* * *
It took six weeks for me to recover to a physical condition where I could do much. It took a week for me to get discharged, go home, and have a long coherent conversation with my attorney. It took three weeks for Lambert, Klein, Masson and Kempf to open up a can of whoop ass on the MCB like they’d rarely known.
Despite what Special Agent Campbell thought, despite what Agent Myers thought, it turned out it was possible to sue the ever-living crap out of the MCB. And all of them. Personally. Mr. Lambert was puzzled that I did not want to include Franks. My rationale was that Franks was essentially a non-self-directing weapon. It would be like suing my Uzi.
The judge did require Franks to give a top-secret deposition to my attorneys at one point. I was pretty sure Franks wouldn’t kill them. He was used to asking questions, not being forced to answer them. I wasn’t present, but it was recorded and I watched the tape several times, with the sound off, just to watch his expression. And, yes, Franks does have facial expressions. They range from slightly annoyed to very annoyed.
It was a basic necessity that there were a few federal judges read in on the supernatural. I had no idea what most of their cases involved. Many of these judges, while recognizing the importance of the First Reason, were also fairly uncomfortable with the MCB’s often draconian actions. Torturing a suspect and justifying it by a reading crossed several lines. MCB was basically just another government agency, which meant they could get in trouble for breaking the law, same as everybody else. It was just that they were so shrouded in mystery and lies that it seldom happened. Normally, suits against the MCB were tossed for national security reasons, but this time they wound up with an angry judge.
About the time my lawyers opened up the can of whoop-ass, MCB tried to retaliate. They turned up all sorts of nasty stuff about the law firm, the Lamberts, my attorney. The fact that Mr. Lambert had a mistress was trotted out to Mrs. Lambert who apparently replied that of course he had a mistress, so did she! Mr. Koltts turned out to be gay. This is New Orleans. Your point? They tried bribery, but the lawsuit was pure gold from the law firm’s end, so that just led to another federal suit.
What MCB mostly learned was that trying to corrupt a New Orleans legal firm was like trying to fight a rainstorm with a fire hose. Had Agent Castro still been alive he could have told them that. Because of the secretive nature of their job, the MCB wasn’t used to being sued, and screwed up every step of the way. Accountability was an indecipherable mystery to them. The Lamberts could smell a very juicy suit. It was like panning for gold in a virgin stream. Every overturned rock was pure litigation gold.
Here’s how we calculated damages. I was earning huge PUFF fighting monsters. MCB had beaten me practically to death, was trying to get me canned as an MHI employee, and was generally interfering in my ability to earn income. And, oh yeah, violated the shit out of my rights. I couldn’t get them arrested for that but I could make them pay through the nose. How much was I out? Not just for the six weeks of recuperation. Their harassment was liable to cost me my income in perpetuity. I should last until I’m eighty with any normal job. Figure out how much the lost income was over that time. Then multiply that times some number, maybe five, for pain and emotional suffering.
One hundred million dollars was less than the total but it was a nice round number. And I don’t care how big your secret black ops budget is, that’s real money. Then there were legal fees, which were legally permissible to be tripled. Good lawyers cost a lot of money.
As long as the suit was ongoing, by order of our judge, I could not be deposed, questioned or otherwise contacted or harassed by Monster Control Bureau regarding pretty much anything. Oh, and MCB had, naturally, had all my permits revoked. Which led to another lawsuit thrown on the pile. Unfortunately that made it impossible to do my job.
The suit could potentially take years, absent MCB offering a settlement I would accept. And MCB had no clue how to negotiate a settlement. Their invariable MO was demonize, vilify, destroy. Negotiate was not in that list.
The Shacklefords loved that I was causing the government discomfort, but my presence was making life complicated for them. I couldn’t work, so I took a leave of absence. I packed up and went to England to attend Oxford. And, yes, it took a year before the MCB settled. An interesting year and fruitful in many ways, but I still missed hunting.