Richard sat in Karen’s living room across from Rob. For the first time in years the married couple seemed happy with each other. Richard was so pleased about the changes in Rob that even if he gave up the superhero plans, Richard would still be happy about this outcome.

  He felt no resentment at being politely asked to leave before they would both need sleep. Richard even winked at Rob. He might not have been attracted to Karen, she was Rob’s wife, but she was still a beautiful woman and he could still congratulate his best friend.

  Richard walked home again that night. This time he watched for bowler hat clad ruffians and silver uniform wearing agents alike. None of those appeared. He let go of his vigilance piece by piece until his thoughts were consumed by the beautiful woman he found himself attracted to. Alethia.

  He whispered her name to himself, trusting that no one else would be able to hear his voice.

  “Alethia.”

  She went along with the super powers plan right from the start. Richard suspected that she would also be along for the hero-ing part of his plan. That would make this whole situation and everything that happened to him so far a-okay.

  Tomorrow was an SCA banquet with some light fighting and maybe some archery contests. Richard was still considering entering one of those in complete disguise. That would be better than the animated Robin Hood even, because he would not need to use stilts or a big floppy hat to pull it off. He just needed super powers.

  Richard reached his own house. As expected, Rachel was not home either. He had texted her when the calls to Alethia did not elicit a response. She had gone over to another friend’s house and all three fell asleep before remembering that tonight was game night. They had ended up skipping war-gaming, even though Richard wanted to try his new brain against Karen enough that he had challenged her anyway. She refused, which was a pretty reasonable response.

  Tomorrow was also his first day back to work since he “got sick”. A morning shift was exactly what Doctor “Return to Normal” had ordered. That would be a nice break and a chance to work out some frustration on kids running the labyrinth in the morning.

  Richard woke two hours after he fell asleep. Still almost five hours before he had to be awake, he cursed his fate, but found himself unable to return to sleep. After tossing and turning for half an hour, Richard got out of bed and wandered the house for a while. He checked out his assortment of wargaming armies and found that the same unpainted army sat waiting for his attention on his desk that was there last year.

  He studied the miniatures for several minutes. In his mind’s eye, he could animate them and review each with a slightly different color scheme. Soon, Richard sat at his desk and took up paints to make his figurines table worthy.

  Two hours later, Richard emerged like he was taking a breath of air after holding it for a long, long time. But his entire army had a base coat and he was starting to apply a new coat for detail. His test mini looked fantastic. He might showcase this army the next game night at the Taylor home.

  When he could delay no longer, Richard donned his Phaser Tag shirt and black pants. The drive to work was faster than he remembered. He was the first person in the building. As an assistant manager, he held more responsibility than he was comfortable with. But at the same time, he was basically free here. His nominal supervisor was the store manager: Joseph.

  Joseph did not care about anything except never, ever having to face the regional manager with something his team did wrong. To that end, Joseph towed the company line, but only enough to keep his people ignored by the higher ups. Richard believe that all good managers worked that way.

  Saturday mornings would be rough, but that was the cost of skipping work for the better part of a week. The first few customers arrived, several of them were regulars. They probably considered themselves weekend warriors. But Richard knew they were all forty-somethings fighting their mid-life crises by engaging in the most juvenile “sport” they could find. He knew this because all of them seemed to resent the kids who normally frequented the place. Like their presence was a reflection of the mens’ refusal to grow up.

  Richard chuckled at those thoughts while he dragged out the armor — aka light sensors — and guns the players would need to run the course. This was early enough that Richard could join the group if anyone else in the store showed up. Five minutes before he scheduled the first run, one of the new people, Tammy, arrived. She was young, maybe in her early twenties or late teens. Richard thought she was pretty enough, but she was too young for him and he had his heart set on Alethia.

  “Tammy, you’ve held down the cash register and floor alone before, right?”

  Tammy had just set her bag down when Richard fired the question at her. She blinked in confusion and said,

  “Yeah, I guess so? Why?”

  Richard grinned and said,

  “Because I want to take in a game before the rush starts in earnest. You okay until Terry or Zachary arrive?”

  “I think so, sir.”

  Richard winked and said,

  “Please don’t call me sir. Richard or even hey you works fine.”

  His words appeared to make her uncomfortable. Dang. Richard was not flirting with or coming onto her, he just hated being called sir. And he wanted to make Tammy more comfortable here.

  He was already pulling his armor on. The gun he kept behind the counter was still in place. He examined it before plugging in and registering his rig with the store computer system. He was going to be red team today since they were a little on the thin side. Most of the hardcores ended up on the blue team anyway.

  While waiting in the red staging area, Richard helped pump the group up,

  “Are we ready to go kick the teeth of some scummy blue guys in?”

  The assorted adults and early rising kids shouted “Yes” in response. Richard loved this part of his job, he felt like a dungeon master or awesome party host. Basically he was the cool kid here who knew all of the people and had all of the best toys, and he just wanted to share them with everyone.

  The buzzer sounded and the door to the staging area shot open with a pneumatic hiss.

  Richard had been at the front of the door, pushing with the rest of his team. An eye blink after the door opened, he was no longer with them. He was stalking to where he knew the Blue team guys would be setting up ambushes or overlook spots.

  Richard massacred them. To a man.

  By the end of the twenty minute match, Richard’s avatar, KainKat had ascended the top position and almost set a record. His score fell short by a handful of points, which made him glad he chose restraint.

  Tammy was drowning under the press of heavy nerds asking her questions and generally harassing her. Richard recalled his own days of idiotic social awkwardness and still felt disgust at their behavior. Tammy handled herself really well despite it all, but she met his gaze with her own and the look in her eyes screamed for help.

  “Soldiers of Phaserton! Assemble!”

  This was the other part of his job he enjoyed. Now that more people were here, he spent time distracting them from the female members of the staff by getting them pumped up to wage invisible ray wars against the warriors of the “wrong” color. Richard and Kenneth took sides opposite each other for this activity. The day flew by as they sent rotating teams into the maze to rack up points for their team. None of the players the rest of his shift even hit the top thirty all time scores.

  The one dark spot in the day so far was when Richard had to sidle up next to one of the older weekend warriors who would not leave Tammy alone.

  Joseph and management had no official policy on harassment, but Richard did not plan to put up with any. The first time he saw the older man standing over the counter, practically oozing into Tammy’s personal space, he watched from across the room. If the man moved wrong or tried to touch Tammy, Richard planned to feed the man the offending appendage. But he kept his creepy behavior to just tolerable levels. Or maybe he crossed the line, but was so nonchalant about it that even Tammy shook her head when she caught Richard watching. Some part of her gaze alerted Richard that Tammy might be suffering from a different issue entirely. But he did not catch any further indication of a problem from her the rest of the day.

  Two hours later, the same old man sat in the cafe eating cheap hot dogs and staring right at Tammy. The man’s bald head held thin locks that covered his ears like a beaded curtain. He wore a white stained button up shirt and slacks that should not have required the suspenders the man wore. Tammy avoided his gaze her whole shift at the registers. Richard took a break from his own labors to watch Mr Creepy.

  When he finally got up to leave, the old man patted Tammy on the hand and paid his bill. Richard could not hear what he said over the cacophony of the arcade and announcers. But he had already decided to walk Tammy to her car when her shift was up, right after his own.

  Several hours later, Richard’s shift was about to end and he could not find Tammy anywhere. He asked Kenneth,

  “Hey, have you seen the new girl, Tammy?”

  Kenneth said,

  “Oh yeah man. She’s got a smoking hot ass. Damn, I would hit that in a second.”

  Richard shook his head,

  “No you ass, I am worried that one of our creepy patrons was stalking her earlier and I wanted to make sure she reached her car okay.”

  Richard had already discussed this with Joseph, but the employee parking lot was out back. The main lot was never full so employees should have been allowed to park there so more people could see them if they were attacked. Joseph blew off his request, one of few the downsides to having a minimal effort boss.

  Richard sprinted out of the building with a quick word to Kenneth,

  “Watch things, I will be back in a sec.”

  Something about Tammy’s demeanor bothered Richard all day. She had seemed worried about something and Richard could not shake the feeling he should be involved. He hit the employee section of the back where they kept their lockers. No one else was in the room, so Richard tried changing his face. His power seemed to fail him, he could not change into “a random guy”. He successfully turned into Doctor Price the other day, so he tried him again. That worked.

  Without trying to refine his outfit, Richard stepped outside and looked around. Tammy’s car was still in the lot, which made Richard really nervous. He started searching in earnest now and found a collection of discarded boxes in front of an unused service door. At the base of the boxes, Richard spotted a hand.

  He quietly bent down and saw that this hand belonged to an arm that wore a dirty old button up shirt. He moved the boxes out of the way and recognized Mr Creepy. Richard checked his pulse, the man still lived.

  From the door behind the boxes, Richard could hear some odd noises. He tried to move more of the boxes out of the way and found they were bound up by something. Further investigation showed a thin piece of wire connecting the mass of boxes. They were held up near the top of the mystery door.

  Without knocking, Richard pulled the door open with a metallic grating sound. He realized too late that he had shattered the lock on the door with his tug. Inside he saw three people, two men and one woman: Tammy.

  The two young men held pistols in their hands and had them pointed at Richard. Tiny bells rang in the room that were themselves connected to the wire of the door. In a flash, Richard saw that they had rigged a way to conceal their activities while also warning them if their camouflage failed.

  The guns gave Richard pause for less than a heartbeat. Too bad for those hooligans, but the threat they represented narrowed Richard’s focus to that of a laser. All three people had disguised themselves, the two men wore ski masks and Tammy wore nylons on her head. Those disguises did not help them, Richard could have picked all three out of a lineup with his nose alone. He spotted the necessary details before his heart hit the second beat after opening the door.

  Time slowed down to the point where Richard’s assailants appeared to freeze from his perspective. That was fine for his purposes. He knew that he could not move fast enough to beat their trigger fingers. But he could also see that the one furthest from the hanging wire held that same wire in hand. For the boxes to hang the way they did, some of them needed to be reinforced. Probably with the little round roofing discs used in construction. That is what Richard would have used anyway.

  Motion. That was all the three probably saw as Richard threw his entire body not at the gunmen, but at the door and the handing mass of boxes suspended on it. A gun’s report told him that one of them fired, but the shot missed Richard entirely. His weight jerked the wire out of the man’s hands and made him sway into his friend. That collision was the opening Richard wanted. He darted toward them and Tammy screamed.

  Another shot rang out and this time Richard paused. Something had smacked right into his chest, hard. It did not hurt at first. It did not really feel like anything for a few seconds, like his body now moved in slower motion than the three had when Richard was watching them. He took his hand away from his chest — when did that get there — and it came away dark and bloody. Richard swore as the three people ran from the utility room. At least they did not shoot him again.

  The internal CPU in his head he had finally managed to suppress went insane as he listened to squealing tires. Red warnings flashed across Richard’s vision, but he was having trouble focusing his eyes on them. As he fell unconscious, he was pretty sure what the messages said:

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  “Blood belongs on the inside.”

  He woke on a gurney. Like a scene from a hospital drama, he was being wheeled into a stark white hallway while serious-sounding people shouted at each other.

  “White male, forty to fifty, GSW chest. Vitals are stable.”

  “Prep an OR. Did you say his vitals are stable?”

  They continued to run while a man in a white coat looked over Richard. He shined a bright light in his eyes and felt his pulse.

  “Jesus, you are lucky buddy.”

  Richard could not speak through the pain in his chest. He was more surprised that he was shot than anything else.

  The doctor examining him seemed to recognize Richard and said,

  “Holy God. Scott? Scott Price?”

  Richard wanted to say, “No” and maybe also, “please just let me go” but his word failed to work.

  He was still alert and conscious when they rolled him into an operating room.

  Two of the people who pushed his cart left after they locked the gurney in place. Richard could hear three people in the room. One spoke to another, issuing medical requests that Richard tuned out. The pain in his chest had faded to a dull ache. That surprised him more than any other part of his circumstances. I am still in Doctor Price’s form. Huh. That thought made Richard believe he might have a chance to escape this place before they performed surgery on him and discovered his real identity.

  Maybe that would be okay.

  A ridiculous thought. He had no idea what was in his blood, but the FBI or NSA would probably be very interested in someone who could shapechange into other people.

  In the midst of these thoughts, Richard heard the two doctors turn and ‘scrub in’. Their backs were turned while the nurse prepared something on the table. It smelled like metal with some sort of astringent liquid.

  He looked around now and saw that he was on a flat table with the shirt he wore the other day as Doctor Price still on. How did I make clothing and could I make armor or something? Richard held that thought as he rolled onto his side and slowly stood. The leads and other probes stayed in for now. They would emit alarms when he pulled them off, which could wait until the last minute.

  Richard focused on the nurse preparing syringes and tools on a small cloth. She did not see him yet, none of them did with their intense focus on their various tasks. He hoped he had the woman’s form sufficiently in mind because he was about to try to escape.

  One last pause to consider the nurse, and Richard ripped the monitors off of him along with the IV in his arm. To their credit, all three looked back as Richard hightailed it out of the operating theatre. None of them could match his speed, so he was out the door before they turned. The hallway looked clear so Richard focused on the nurse. This time, he felt his body change, presumably because the differences were so extreme. In a second he looked like the nurse who had been treating him. Not just looked like, he was the nurse. His body actually changed when he assumed a new form.

  The pain in his chest was gone now too. Richard looked down at his chest, pulling his shirt forward and trying to look past his new breasts.

  Yup, not only am I not injured, but I have boobs.

  Richard’s face burned and he stumbled a moment as his concentration wavered. Walking around as woman proved to be a little harder than he expected. Thank goodness she wore flats, Richard would have face planted otherwise.

  Something rattled around in the front of his shirt for a moment. Like a button came loose from his clothes. It felt into his pants and down his pants leg. Richard glanced back to see a tiny piece of metal on the floor. At the same time, the door to the OR flew open as the nurse and doctors ran outside to find their patient.

  Richard turned his face away, but the nurse was already running toward him,

  “Excuse me! Miss! Excuse me!”

  Oh crap.

  Richard had no plan for this, so he walked even faster away from the woman, she shouted again,

  “Miss, stop, please! Miss!”

  Screw this.

  Richard turned his full speed on and ran from all three as fast as he could. He cleared the hallway in seconds, probably setting a human land speed record, if not for Alethia. When he rounded the corner he changed back into Doctor Price. His clothes were whole as well as his chest.

  I have a freakin’ healing factor.

  He was definitely going to tell the gang about this.

  Richard had no phone or wallet, a problem he knew would come back to haunt him. He wondered how that worked exactly. Maybe he did not change his ID or maybe the wallet and phone were too complex for him to create. Whatever the reason, the EMTs, hospital, or worse, the police, had his cellphone and wallet now.

  He did have a way to contact his friends when he thought about it. The curtesy phone or one of the pay phones was out. That would be traced back to whoever he called and create a potential problem for them. Maybe Richard was being paranoid. He knew it was possible. But at the same time, careless was not working out for him.

  Richard found what he was looking for down a second hallway. Someone left themselves logged into one of the computer stations he passed. With a look around him, he sat down and hurriedly bashed out an email to Rob and Karen. Since no one appeared, he also sent them an SOS message. That would go direct to their phone. Richard logged out of his various accounts and was out of the chair in less than two minutes. Right before the owner of the logged in system returned.

  In a bathroom, Richard tried turning into one of the doctors from the OR he had been in. That worked too. This guy was older with a paunch to him like Richard used to have. He had a thick mat of disheveled white hair and he looked like he was prepared for surgery. Richard did not know how to change his clothes without taking them off.

  He tried it and laid the apron and gloves on the counter along with the head cover. They sat there like normal clothes.

  Maybe he could become a clothing counterfeiter if the hero thing failed.

  When he walked about 3 meters away, the clothes dissolved into smoke.

  “Huh. That’s interesting. And shuts down that career path.”

  Richard chuckled as he walked out of the restroom looking less conspicuous. Once he was out of the hallways where he did not belong, he stepped back into a restroom and changed back into himself. He tried to put his big cowboy hat on, but that did not work this time.

  He intended to figure out how this worked, maybe not right now though.

  Cameras dotted the ceilings and corners like little pockmarks. Blech. Richard avoided them as much as he could, but acknowledged that he was probably caught by several of the irises.

  Outside, Karen and Rob waited for him. Once inside the car, Karen turned to him,

  “What in the hell was it this time, Richard?”

  “I swear I didn’t do anything wrong this time!”

  He told them what happened, omitting his shape changing. For some reason, Richard felt compelled to withhold that detail, even from Rob and Alethia.

  “God Richard, they are going to come looking for you.”

  “Oh yeah. Don’t I know it.”

  Rob said,

  “From the way it sounds, the cops should not think you were involved with Tammy and her two friends. That’s good.”

  Well… It would be. Richard thought in response to his friend. The problem, of course, was that the EMTs would not know Richard was on the gurney. Except that his ID and phone were on the “victim” who has disappeared.

  “Except that I am not currently bleeding nor do I have a bullet wound in me.”

  “Do you think we all have healing factors?”

  Richard shrugged. He had started healing before he transformed. He did not know how fast Alethia or Rob would heal.

  “Maybe. I don’t really want to test it. Do you guys?”

  Rob shook his head.

  “Not particularly. Especially if it varies like the speed thing.”

  “Have you figured out your super power yet?”

  Karen spoke up,

  “Robert is very, very strong.”

  Rob smiled and rubbed his hand down the back of his head. He looked a little embarrassed while Karen looked impressed.

  “I don’t know if that is my super power though.”

  Richard said,

  “It would be cool to find a way to test it, right?”

  Karen interrupted them,

  “You boys are supposed to be super geniuses now. Maybe stick to working out the problem of Richard’s impending incarceration?”

  Rob nodded and grinned. Karen’s tone was milder than it would have been a few days ago. She sounded more amused than frustrated with them.

  Rob said,

  “I think we can go with some version of ‘I hit my head’. The police are going to have a heck of a hard time building a case here. Especially with a missing victim. You said Mr Creepy was fine when you checked on him?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I wonder who called the cops in the first place. They should have witnesses and stuff. We should should call Kimmie.”

  Karen narrowed her eyes,

  “You are feeling good enough to see your sister right now?”

  Rob shrugged,

  “It’s weird, right? I can remember all of the mean stuff she’s said over the years, but I just don’t really care that much. It’s like I have distance from what she’s done. What all of them do constantly.”

  Karen patted Rob on the shoulder. Richard tried not to pay too much attention, but something in Rob’s voice sounded wrong to him. Not like he could hear truth or anything. More like he could hear pain in Rob’s voice that he tried to hide and failed. Or a place where pain was supposed to be but wasn’t.

  The former thought worried Richard where the latter terrified him.

  They pulled into the Taylor driveway and no cops were there to greet them.

  “Do you need to call work or anything?”

  Karen handed Richard her phone.

  “Yeah, I should call Joseph and let him know more or less what happened.”

  He dialed the number for his boss,

  “Hello, who is this?”

  “It’s Richard, Richard Kain.”

  “Holy Shit, Richard, what the hell happened?”

  Richard told him the story Karen and Rob had concocted. He had been hit on the head and crawled under a car to hide after the masked people and Tammy stole his wallet. He heard a gun shot and passed out. When he woke, he wandered into a store and asked a stranger to text his friends for him. Richard and Karen picked him up.

  He hung up the phone, hoping that what he said would match whatever Kenneth or whichever employee who stumbled on the scene reported. The bump on the noggin was important because it established that he was unreliable.

  Next he called his credit card company and his bank. He didn’t want to do it, but it would buttress his story to replace his credit cards and order a new ID and phone. So he performed those tasks, pleased that his newfound memory supplied the answer to every identity challenge and password for every account he needed to accomplish these goals.

  Rob called his older sister, Kimmie. She was a lawyer in Houston. He was not friends with anyone in his family, but Rob told Richard that he still kept in touch with them. As sad as Richard’s parents dying was, at least he had been able to rely on and trust them when they were alive. Rachel lived in their old house with him and he considered her a friend.

  Kimmie insisted on speaking to Richard,

  “Hello Richard. Despite what my idiot brother thinks, I am not going to dispense legal advice to one of his friends over the phone. I do have some non-official advice for you: get a real fucking lawyer and don’t waste my time again.”

  She hung up before Richard could. He sighed into the phone and said,

  “I suppose her advice is still good. Who should we call?”

  As if summoned by their discussion, the doorbell rang. Rob went to check while Richard waited near the stairs. He checked the peephole and shook his head,

  “Richard, go upstairs and only come down if Karen comes to get you, okay?”

  Richard quietly walked upstairs and stayed out of sight. Rob walked outside. As he closed the door behind him, he said,

  “Good afternoon detective, how can I help you today?”

  Richard held his breath and listened to their discussion. The detective was a woman, based on her voice,

  “Mr Robert Taylor?”

  “Yes ma’am. May I ask your name?”

  “I am Detective Riveria. Do you know the whereabouts of one Richard James Kaine? I believe he is a friend of yours.”

  “Why do you ask, detective, has he done something wrong?”

  “We just want to speak to him and please answer the question Mr Taylor.”

  “Which question, detective? Is he a friend or do I know where he is?”

  Richard held in a laugh at the detective’s expense. Robert was a slamming good role-player and he was currently playing “dumb villager Schmidt.” The absolute worst character anyone wanted to run into during a D&D investigation. Schmidt was bored and dumb. He would never give you information but would try to keep you talking for as long as possible. Most players could recognize Schmidt after two questions, unless Rob was playing him.

  He spoke like an Eliza bot.

  “Do you know where Richard Kain is, Mr Taylor?”

  “Why do you think I would know where he is?”

  Richard could hear the detective’s sigh through the door and up the stairs.

  “Sir, are you trying to conceal the whereabouts of Mr Kaine?”

  “Why do you think that, detective?”

  Another voice said, this one male,

  “Because you haven’t answered a single one of her questions, Mr Taylor.”

  This man’s voice was gravely, like he smoked too many cigarettes. His tone held enough contempt and impatience to account for him and his partner.

  “Well, none of you has asked me a question I know the answer to or that I care to answer.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I don’t really like repeating myself.”

  Jesus Rob. Richard wondered what his game was. It sounded like he was deliberately trying to piss these cops off now.

  The man’s voice dropped as he said,

  “Listen joker. If you know where Richard Kain is, you need to tell us unless you want to be an accessory.”

  In a loud voice, Rob said,

  “An accessory to what exactly officer? Look. I have an engagement I need to prepare for this afternoon. Unless you are investigating a crime or you have a warrant, I do not care to give you any more of my time.”

  The woman muttered,

  “You haven’t given us anything anyway.”

  The door opened and Rob stepped back inside.

  “You folks have a nice day now! Bye bye!”

  He closed the door slowly. Richard heard the female detective whisper,

  “Easy Steve. Stand down.”

  Rob waited until the cops drove off to go back downstairs.

  “Jesus Rob, what were you doing?”

  Karen nodded along with Richard’s question. They both looked at him with the same bewildered expression.

  “I was trying to get the guy to hit me at the end there.”

  Karen spoke for both of them this time,

  “Seriously? Why?”

  Rob grinned and said,

  “I wanted to make this problem go away and I wanted to see if I had a healing factor too.”

  Richard was pretty sure they all did. He did not really want his friend testing it out.

  Still, he laughed his ass off.

  Once he was calm, Richard said,

  “Man, you could have gotten shot. Be careful.”

  Rob nodded and said,

  “Do yall still want to go to the banquet tonight?”

  They argued about it for about ten minutes before Richard decided he did not want to hide. If the cops showed up at the banquet, maybe he could just talk to them. Or he would go in disguise… no that would be impossible with Rob and Karen as his ride.

  Most of his garb was at his house anyway. So they had to take him by his house on the way. He was not far from the Taylor’s house, so none of them noticed the car following them the short way.

  When he got out of the car, two people approached him. A woman with short red hair, cut close to her scalp in a pixie cut and a man wearing aviator sunglasses with buzzed dark brown hair. They were both tall and well built and both clad in cheap blue suits. Her’s ended in a skirt and hose where his ended in trousers legs. The colors of their outfits did not match. Her suit was just a bit darker than his.

  “Mr Kain? Richard Kain?”

  “Who is asking?”

  They both pulled out badges and identification cards. Richard checked them both. Their names were Caroline Riveria and Henry Thorsgud, both detectives.

  “How can I help you two detectives?”

  “Where were you this afternoon after work?”

  “Hiding under a car after someone hit me over the head.”

  The man said,

  “Excuse me?”

  Richard nodded,

  “Right, it was not ‘someone’ I think it was one of the men with Tammy. One of the employees at Phaser Tag where I work. They hit me over the head and stole my wallet and cellphone.”

  “I can see you cancelled your credit cards.’

  “Yeah. Karen and Rob are my friends. Have you met them?”

  The woman, Detective Riveria, leaned toward Richard. He was doing his best ‘slightly drunk’ impression.

  “Have you had yourself checked out at a hospital, Mr Kain?”

  “No, do you think I should?”

  “People who are hit in the head can have serious complications even hours after the event. Have you been to the hospital today Mr Kain?”

  Oh shoot. She definitely saw him on camera today.

  “Maybe, I can’t really be sure, officer.”

  The man, Henry, said,

  “You mean detective, son.”

  Richard suspected he was a Hank. He looked like a Hank. The kind of Hank who threatened to give the debate kids swirlies in high school. Richard thought becoming a detective would have been too hard for Hank here.

  “What do you mean, you can’t really be sure?”

  “The whole day is really foggy to me. I am really sorry I can’t be more help.”

  “You remember Tammy and two men though? What about a third?”

  Richard nodded,

  “Right. I went out to check up on Tammy in case Mr Creepy tried to hurt her.”

  “What?”

  Richard explained Mr Creepy’s interactions with Tammy inside during her shift. He left out the part about finding Mr Creepy on the ground under the boxes. Richard left the whole part about the boxes out. When he walked outside, he was knocked on the head right away. He saw the people who did it because they were in front of him and they hit him more or less on the top of the head.

  Richard did not think either detective fully bought his story. Thank goodness for Rob,

  “Detectives, we’re going to be late. Can we head out?”

  “Yeah, am I in trouble officers?”

  Richard kept the grin off of his face when Hank ground his teeth. Detective Riveria said,

  “Not right now, Mr Kain. We may have some more questions for you later. Are you planning on going out of town in the next few days?”

  “No ma’am.”

  “If that changes or you remember anything else, please give me a call.”

  She handed him her card, when she did, Richard got a strong whiff of her perfume. It smelled expensive, high quality. Though Richard could not say what gave him that impression.

  The two walked back to their car, a Toyota with black cloth seats and dark tinted windows.

  Richard ran inside. The main reason he wanted to be sure to attend tonight was that Alethia would be there. No threat of incarceration would keep him from seeing her tonight if he could help it.