Phantoms Among Justice

X - Enterprise, As Always/Nomenclature for Murder

Segregatio I

Donny Masters owned a cozy little restaurant, named Anthony's Pizza. It made very little revenue, but it didn't need to. He didn't care what it made, because it wasn't his chief source of income. He was the proprietor of a garage that specialized in repairing and reselling stolen vehicles. He was going over his invoices, when he heard his phone ring. He was famous in Amandah for his massive inferiority complex.

He was screaming obscenities as he heard it ring. "Mother- Who has the Goddamned balls to call here on a Wednesday afternoon!" He picked up the phone. "Hello! Anthony's fucking Pizzeria!?" Donny demanded.

The man on the other line laughed. "Still got them anger issues? Ah, to hell with 'em, right?"

"Who the fuck is this?!" Donny demanded. "You still lookin' for two guys for your operation? Y'know, your real one? Not Anthony's fuckin' pizza." With this sly inquiry, Donny sat back in his seat and nodded. "Davie-boy! Nice t'hear from ya, how do, son?"

"Pretty damn bad, seeing how I'm callin' you about a job" Santiago ridiculed. "Hey, what's this... Anthony's Pizza? Your name isn't even Tony for Chrissakes!" Donny was amused at this. "Anthony Phillip Bordelli, age? 47. Proprietor of Anthony's Pizzeria. I got all the credentials layin' right in front of me. You know that guy? What's his name? Pete Wendell. Yeah, he helped me. I thought it good to get me some good advertisement, but I just can't say 'Donny's hot car lot! You steal it? We'll wheel it' in the yellow books. I gave that name to all of my constituents, and the number. And about Tony Bordelli? Figment of my delirium. He's perfectly alive and well on paper. So, yes. In other words? Enterprise, as always. And yes, I'm always lookin' for good, broad shouldered guys to help. You get here? I'll put you on the books. Hell, I'm lookin' at somethin' for you right now."

Santiago stopped listening halfway into Donny's soliloquy and his head shot up when Donny mentioned his unique strengths. "Hey, what about Vic?"

"Vic? Oh! Vic... um... I guess I got a job for him. Think I met him once, real mean-lookin' motherfucker? Got that ponytail?"

Santiago laughed. "That's Vickie." Santiago heard flipping of papers on the other line. "Yeah, he can bust some heads around here. Got some people, they want to be a member of the Union. I keep reminding them, we ain't legal, let alone Union! But they don't understand it. So he can help around here, hell. All I care he can walk with me, be my muscle." Donny said. Santiago laughed yet again. "How much does it pay?"

"100$ a guy. 50 if he breaks somethin'." Donny said. Santiago, among other things, was an intelligent and unfair negotiator. He was disgusted. "Hey, he needs some of that mean green. That's why I called. 250. No more, no less. You conjure up some Chinamen figure like that again and I'll hang up, understand?!"

The phone seemed to squeal, for Donny was yelling. "200! Anything more and I don't give a good holy Goddamn!" Santiago chuckled. "Oh, I would've settled for 175, sweetheart. We're about 45 minutes away, be there? Or be square." Santiago said smoothly. The phone squealed again, then it was thrown. Santiago hung up, and came out of the phone booth with his thumb up and an accomplished look upon his face.

Segregatio II

Spade was in a pine box, six feet under the ground. He thought it respectful, however, for Dior and Terro to follow regulations for proper burial. He was breathing, very shallow. Not because this was all that his body would allow him to, but because when One is in a predicament similar to his, it is very hard to find and breathe air. He was thinking. How very fair of my fellow David, not to shoot me in the head. But rather to shoot into Jezabelle's floor. He was fumbling around in his pocket, for he had kept a lighter in there. He would set the box ablaze with whatever oxygen he had left. As painful as it may be, it would still get him out of the ground.