Not A White Knight
Spike stepped down from the monorail car obilivious to the ebb and flow of other passengers using mass transit to part around him like the arms of a river. He quite enjoyed the water metaphor because it suited his present of self assurance in his mission and himself. Glancing down for a few seconds at the metal briefcase chained to his wrist by a chain, Spike continued on his way. Every footstep causing the chain to jangle like the loud jewelry of the matronly woman who had been his companion on the journey to this part of town.
Far away from that crowd, a dark pair of eyes peered out from the shadow of an overhanging arch that formed the back wall of an elegant cafe. The owner of this pair of dark eyes seemed to be trying in vain to keep out of the direct downward slanting rays of the noontime sun. Had any passerbys taken more than a passing glancing at the man, they would probably remark on his more than passing resemblance to a stock villan from a B-class vampire movie.
Somehow that never bothered him 'Better to be feared than loved," he grimly smiled.
He was tall and slender and wore dark wrap around sunglass. He wrapped his tan, ragged from bullet holes, trenchcoat closely around his slender body. Peering at the face of the diamond faced watch on his wrist, he addressed someone who had not yet arrived.
"Cutting it pretty close, aren't we?" On the heels of that thought, he wondered what momentary lapse of reason made him agree to meeting at this horrendous hour of the day. Something clandestine deserved an equally clandenstive time of day, suitably dark and mysterious.
"Not everything that moves and breathes in shadows is bad, Spike, my boy"
At that instant, just when Vicious had just about decided to bolt and renege on his side of the arrangement, Spike appeared around the corner of the near building.
"You are late."
Spike started, his eyes widening in mingled rage and surprise, quickly giving way to disarming grin. While he enjoyed pushing the envelop, seeing just how far he could stretch his luck., and the danger. He knew that there were limits, and from all apperances he just about reached them with his boss. Spike glanced up at the centuries old clock mounted high on the roof of the city hall building, and realized maybe that that wasn't an entirely unjust conclusion; he had cut it a sliver too fine. He began an apology but that the older man would not take it well.
"I'm here now." Spike said instead.
"Indeed," Vicious replied. "I hope for your sake that you have not managed to lose the package."
"Got it right here,jefe," Spike replied elevating his arm with the briefcase attached to it.
The older man ignored the attitude and shuffled in one of the pockets of his trenchcoat for the keys. He came up with it, inserted into the locking mechanism and carefully lay the briefcase down on the ground, then turned up the lid. A fortune in silver ingots stacked three rows across and three rows deep. A small fortune. "Well done. Everything is order."
"That's not what the boys at the Mint will say."
"How long have we known each other, Spike?"
"A long time."
"And in that time have you ever known me to exhibit an altruistic bone in my body?"
"Can't say that I have, Sir."
Vicious nodded. "I am not, and I suspect I ever will be, a white knight."
"I'll remember that," Spike nodded.
"See that you do." Vicious replied. "Thanks to your intervention, I now have everything I need to beat certain factions in the Syndicate at their own game. He closed his eyes, and when he opened them again, snapped the lid of the briefcase shut and picked it up. "You may go now."
"This aint' gonna come back to bite me, is it?" Spike addressed his boss's turned back but either he did not hear him or chose not to answer. "Just what the hell did I get myself into this time?"