Fallout Equestria: Silver Nocturne

The darkness in my mind was a cruel mistress, tempting me to bask in her serenity for all eternity. But, like all the mares in my life, the darkness moved faster than my mind could keep up with. With all the tenacious ferocity of a tumble in the midnight sheets, Shady Pines pulled me back into its festering grasp once more.

The pleasant numbing of a painkiller kept me higher than one of Luscious’ regular junkies, and the warm hooves around my side were a gift from the heavens. With a groan that I normally reserved for bad hangovers, I decided that I’d had enough of my dark mistress for one evening.

I couldn’t recall anything from when I’d blacked out, and I never got a look at who’d jumped me. Best guess, was that Jerry had sent somepony to make sure I’d taken his threat seriously. I couldn’t prove it, but that wouldn’t stop me from trying my damnest to pin him for attempted murder. The evidence against him had to be out there somewhere, and I’d be damned if I didn’t find it.

The rank smell of the clinic greeted me like an old friend, and the fluorescent lighting was less of a comfort than when I’d still been boozed up. The lumpy medical cot that I’d been laid in groaned out even more than I did as I tried my damndest to sit up. The meds took their toll and reminded me forcefully that I wasn’t exactly hitting on all eight at the moment. I resigned myself to laying my head back down, instead focusing on the warmth of the hooves tenderly grasped around me.

“Sunsoft, yah okay!” Caltrop gasped and hugged me as if I was the only thing he had left in the world. His voice carried a sweet sorrow through the air like a sad song, and his warm tears doused my neck. In truth, waking up in his hooves was more a blessing than ever, one that I wished I could return in kind.

“He's been here since dawn.” The voice of Doc Chips was as jarring to me as a lone gunshot on a calm night. “Sat outside like a wet blanket until I let him in. Never seen a stallion bawl for anypony as much as he did over you.” She walked closer, and I could feel as she worked her magic across the top of my head. As she did, a spike of pain hit me like a bolt of lightning. “However, what I have seen before, is injuries like this.”

“So,” With as much coordination as I could muster, I attempted to pry Caltrop’s hooves from around me. As much as I loved how he held me, I had questions I needed answered. “Three questions. What hit me? What's wrong with my head? And how long will I be down for?”

Doc Chips sighed and did her best to pry Caltrop from me, finally getting him to relent. The release of his grasp left me feeling cold and naked, and his whimper felt like a needle in my already fragile heart.

“Well, far as I can tell, and from the description that Last Call gave when he brought you in, you got clocked pretty good by a powerhoof.” The way she spoke as she gave me the lay made it sound like she were bored with me already. “Saw plenty of wounds like it during my short stay with the Steel Rangers. But hell, at least you pay me for my work, even if it isn’t nearly enough.”

“Yah used ta live with those toasters?” Caltrop spoke up out of turn, drawing a look from Chips that could have dropped him dead were her eyes a pair of lethal weapons.

“She doesn’t talk about it.” I owed Doc Chips for saving my keister plenty of times before this, so the least I could do was take some of the heat off a question as loaded as that one. “Moving on, Doc. What’s wrong with my head?” I blinked a few times as the room became hazier than after a fifth of scotch.

“Well, one day you picked up a bottle and never put it down.” She spat with all the ire that a stallion like me could have ever deserved. “But the fifth you nearly drowned yourself in last night is neither here nor there. To be honest, it's not as bad as it could have been. The damage is a gash across your skull and the light fracture that came with it.” With a grumble, she lifted her hoof up. As delicately as a leaf on the wind, she used her magic to levitate a blue hoof covering over and stretch it over her raised hoof. As soon as it was on, she brought her hoof close to her chest with a wince, and favored it like she’d been doing for days. “I did what I could, but I'm not a miracle worker.” With a light touch, she got to inspecting the wound with her hoof. “You’ll need a week before it’s healed up well enough not to cause a problem.”

“Ya sure he’ll be alright?” Caltrop, the angel that we was, was like an inquizitive colt. Sure, the questions he always asked might’ve been harmless, but sooner or later they’d end up tooting the wrong ringer if somepony wasn’t there to stop him.

“So long as he doesn’t tear these stitches open and keep the bandages clean, it shouldn’t get infected.” Doc Chips turned her gaze down at me. The expression she wore felt like it held the anger of a thousand exploding suns. “And no alcohol. Period.”

“Not this again.” I groaned out and sought refuge again in Caltrop’s waiting hooves. Just having him here at my side did more for my pain than any drug ever would. I didn’t need this lecture now, not when there was still too much to be nailed down in this case. My demons could wait for another day, one where Jerry is safely locked up and this whole mess is behind us.

“Moron.” The Doc grumbled and pointed to my head. “Alcohol is a blood thinner. If you bleed anymore into your brain, there isn’t anything I can do for you but grab a shovel and start digging.” Her voice sent icy shivers through my coat, and chilled me to the core. “Got that?”

“Can’t ya just give him a healin’ potion?” Caltrop pinned, sounding even more the fragile stallion that I knew him to be than ever.

“Unless you have one lying around, the Clinic is out. I used the last one on Dutch.” With a snap, she used her magic to pull the blood splotched glove off her hoof and toss it toward the bin in the corner. At the same time, she wrapped a long cloth bandage around my head tightly. Turning away, she paused and held onto the silence in the room like it was more precious to her than caps. “Look, I know what Jerry said to you yesterday.” She looked back with a pleading look. It was less genuine than it appeared from behind her small glasses, but she only held it for a moment. “Maybe you should look into getting out of town early. Whoever did that probably won't stop until you're head is another smear on the dirt.”

“Thanks for the patch job and advice, Doc.” I groaned, forcing myself to sit up. My head spun more than a weather vane in a hurricane, but Caltrop’s steady hooves helped to keep me as straight as a door.

“I’m serious, Sunsoft.” She muttered again as she walked towards the door. “For the sake of both you and your Coltfriend there. You should save yourselves from this place before it swallows you whole.” With a sigh, she opened the door. “For now though, go home and get some rest. I don’t want to see you in here again this week, do you understand?”

“Sure thin’.” Caltrop answered for me, helping to prop me up as I found a way to get my tired hooves under me. “Come on, hun. Let’s get yah home.”

The heavy patter of rain drummed at the roof of my shack like a thousand hooves telling me to take Caltrop and run. Each wave of thunder that rolled above reminded me of the deafening crack of last night. Over and over again it played through my mind. Everything in my head was as hazy as the end of a long night at the bar, and I quickly found myself getting nowhere in the case from the comfort of my bed.

“Yah okay, Sunsoft?” Caltrop whispered into my ear. His voice was like silk, and I felt a shiver of pleasure run down my spine from his breath on my neck. I wanted to give him the answer he wanted, but I found the Doc’s words running through my mind.

“No.” I’d missed something in the case. I’d gotten sloppy and nearly ended up in a muddy hole as my reward. This case had become too dangerous to lose my focus again, not when I had everything left to lose. “I want you out of town before sundown.”

“What?!” Caltrop was understandably outraged. The fact that he shot up to his hooves as fast as he did only proved how much he’d grown to love me. Something I should have seen coming was the heavy slap that impacted against my muzzle. “I ain’t leavin’ yah, Sunsoft.”

My heart ached worse than it had in years as I watched his expression crumble. It hurt knowing what I was asking him to do, but it didn’t matter. I could take the pain so long as I knew he was safe, and the cruel reality of it was that out in the wastes was safer than Shady Pines was now.

He raised his forehoof again to slap me, but I stopped him short. “Look, I owe it to Silver and Wire to figure this mess out, but I can’t do that if I’m stuck worrying about you.”

“Is dat what yah think?” Caltrop spat at me like I’d just stabbed him in the heart. “Like I ain’t got feelins about this too? What happens when yah get jumped again?” The thump he made as he sat down next to me resonated with me far more than the thunder that crashed above. “What happens when I wake up a week from today and realize yah ain’t comin’ back ta me?”

“I’ll never leave you, you know that.” I reached my hoof up, caressing along his cheek for only a moment before he took my hoof into his own. With a whimper, he nuzzled against it and whined. “But I need to know that you’re safe.”

“Don’t ask me ta leave… I don’t want ta.” He whispered softly, each word boring into my very being like the nails to a coffin built just for me. “Promise me yah will come back to me?”

“I promise.” My own words slipped out of my lips more hollow than the ruins of the old world. I couldn’t make a promise like that, not when I’ve been always one hoofprint behind what’s been going down. However small that promise had been, my beautiful stallion collapsed onto me in a sobbing heap of needy warmth.

I didn’t deserve to spend my time simply holding him like I did, but this investigation wasn’t only about what I wanted anymore. If this was the last chance I ever got to hold him in my hooves, then not even Jerry would be able to stop me. Jerry had made this personal, and it was about time I got myself a new set of cards to play with. With Caltrop safely out of town, there wouldn’t be anything that stood in my way from getting dug in as deep as I could get in all this.

With a soft kiss on his lips, Caltrop melted into my hold, and for the next however long it was, I simply let time slip by. With as bad as things might get for him, he needed this more than me. He’d need to weather the storm of the wasteland alone until I was done here, and for that, he’d need all the time he could get to unwind. But for now, in my grasp, not a damn bit of that worry mattered to him, or me. Not even when I closed my eyes for a single moment, and drifted off into a warm nothingness.

As had become a bad custom in my life, an all too loud knocking came from my door and roused me back to the waking world. However, this time, I hadn’t even had the courtesy of a moment to get up before it opened. With heavily lidded eyes, I looked around me to find that Caltrop had gone, and that as had been my only companion for so many days, the emptiness around me was the only thing left in my life.

“Mister Sunsoft?” Luscious’ soft emerald eyes peered through the dim evening light that still hung outside. “I am sorry to wake you, however I have something here that you need to see.” In her delicate unicorn magic, she lofted a small cloth sack through the door toward me. “One of High Pillow’s associates attempted to pay me with that.”

My vision hazed as I attempted to get myself to my hooves, and my head stung like a thousand tiny needles were pushing into it. As soon as I’d found my hoofing, Luscious set the soft velvet sack down against my forehoof. The familiar clink of caps caught my attention, and my focus returned with the ferocity of an addict chasing their next hit. Carefully, I kicked the sack over with my hoof, watching as the bright silver disks inside spilled across my messy floor.

“I hope you understand that I have nothing to do with what’s been going on.” Luscious spoke up as I picked up one of the counterfeit caps in my hoof. Wether she said it as the truth or just to garner sympathy when this whole thing came crumbling down had yet to be seen. “If you come back to my office, I’ll allow you to speak with the girl who brought those to me.”

“I appreciate your help, Luscious.” As they once said in the old world, it wasn’t wise to look a gift horse in the mouth, and she knew I couldn’t afford to turn this away. She was too smart to try to buy me off with any favors or girls to try, but this was too nice, even for the likes of her. “I’ll swing by later this evening and take you up on that offer. You can count on that.”

“You won’t be returning with me now?” Her worried tone underscored the fact that there was more to this than she was letting on, but I couldn’t worry about it just yet.

“This isn’t the first I’ve seen of these pass through this town, and I’ve got myself a good idea where they’re coming from.” Carefully scooping the fake caps back into the bag, I looked up to find Luscious hiding behind her black mane like it were a veil. “But I will come see you as soon as I pay Rusty a visit.” With a soft nod, she turned and left, shutting the door and leaving me sitting alone in my shack.

Hoisting the small bag up to my muzzle, I stared at it as if waiting for it to reveal it’s secrets to me all on it’s own. I’d been right to suspect that High Pillow had something to do with the counterfeiting, and I could be damn sure that Jerry was in bed with her on it as well. But even a gift bag filled with guilt like the one in my hoof still wasn’t enough.

I wanted to nail Jerry to the wall for what he’d done so completely that they’d have to leave him up there as an example to the rest of the filth in this town as to what happens when you try to cheat the system. For that, I needed the source of the caps. Finding the mint would be that hammer I need, and I’d be hard pressed to find out that Rusty didn’t have anything to give me on where I could find it.

After searching my junk piles for my lead slinger for damn near on twenty minutes, I gave up. Maybe it was from the knock in the head, but I couldn’t for the life of me remember where I’d left it. With the heat I’ve been drawing in this shitty town, for once, I actually felt like I’d needed the damned thing to feel safe. Without it, I’d just have to be light on my hooves until I could work out how to get something to use in the little time I had left.

Then, for the second time today, a knocking at my door stirred my attentions. Whoever they were had been impatient that they didn’t even wait for me to greet them before opening it.

“Ah, Mr. Sunsoft.” High Pillow’s voice drifted into my ears like the hiss of a venomous snake. Turning to look, I found the vile mare all dolled up like the last time she was in town. Her mane was nearly sparkling, the teal locks all tied in a bun and secured with a string of white pearls more spotless than her soul would ever be. Instead of the emerald dress she’d come in before, she wore a puffy gold overcoat that was slung casually over a blue satin shirt. She smiled at me from behind the large sunglasses she wore, trying in vain to hide the disgust she felt from being in a dump like this place. “It is good to see that joo are doing vell after jor… accident, as I hear it?”

“Could be better.” I grunted. “To what do I owe the pleasure?” High Pillow never dealt in ‘private’ engagements outside of work, which meant the mare didn’t make this trip for biscuits. She wanted something.

“Maybe I just vanted to vish joo goodbye. Joo vere leaving tomorrow, yes?” She smiled, slipping inside and closing the door behind her. As she did, I could barely make out the two dumb bricks she’d brought along for protection standing outside. “Joo have protected dis place for so long vithout so much as a simple thanks. Ve have been very grateful for jor verk, and vish joo vell down ze road. It vould be a pitty should joo leave vithout something to show for it. Don’t joo agree?” With the care of a mother holding a newborn foal, she pulled a sack of caps out from her overcoat, holding them out to me.

“Yeah, well I ain’t finished with my work yet.” I snorted. She was most certainly trying to drum me up so she could play off something else. If I had to guess, it was something to do with the counterfeit caps running through town. “I’m on to something big. Pay me now and you might find you’ll be needing those caps in short order.”

That roused a soft chuckle from the mare, as well as a deep sigh. “Joo are certainly a stallion of conviction, Mr. Sunsoft.” She tossed the sack of caps at my hooves. “Keep zem as a thanks from ze Grifters for all jor hard verk over the years. Should be more zen enough zat joo could leave anytime.” Reaching back into her pocket, again she drew out the long cigarette holder she prized, pulling it up to her muzzle.

“Payoff’s won’t work, High Pillow.” I deadpanned, giving her the brunt of my thoughts in one go. “What are you trying to hide in this place that will make you hold up this little charade to get me to leave?” Even from behind those glasses, I could see the steam boiling in her veins. Nopony spoke to her like that and saw daylight again, but I didn’t have much light left to lose now that Caltrop was outta town. So, I took a shot in the dark. “Before you say anything, I know it isn’t you who’s been knocking off guards in this town. I’m sure it’s Jerry, and with the investment you have in this town, I know you have an interest in seeing it survive.”

High Pillow looked stiffer than most of my drinks after a long shift. I’d put her on the spot and she didn’t like the pressure. Her expression had cracked, and she knew it. Reaching up to her glasses, she pulled them down so I could see her Maroon eyes fill with a sort of uncertainty that painted her in a light of unease that I don’t think anypony has ever lived to see.

“Joo certainly are as perceptive as Dutch makes joo out to be. Had I believed it, zere would have been no charade.” Carefully, she hoofed a cigarette into her holder and lit it up. After a long drag, she relaxed a bit as I simply sat and waited for a response to my question. “Jerry iz up to zomething,” She nodded, peering over at me with a steeled look. “Zis town iz stagnant. Yet, it continues to thrive. Vhy, I must ask? He haz become difficult to control, gone rogue in fact.” She poured more mirth into that word than I could care to accept, but for once the two of us found ourselves in agreement. “He thinks zat he can just take zis place from us? Ha! Ve vill take hiz life for zat mistake.”

“No.” As much as I wanted to see him fall, there were rules for a reason. If Jerry was up to something, then leaving it to High Pillow and her cronies was just as bad as turning a blind eye. I didn’t need her ‘gift’ to come around and bite me in the ass later as something to hold over my head. I’m not so dense as to miss the fact that keeping this money at all was just as much of a payoff to the other guards if she happened to bring it up. If somepony doesn’t keep the rules intact, then none of what us guards do even matters. “Keep your lousy money.” I picked the heavy sack of caps up and held them out to her. “You get the hell out of my home and let me do my job. Jerry is my investigation, and he’ll be dealt with properly when I find the evidence that condemns him. Not by your goons, not by your rules.”

High Pillow smirked at that, pulling her glasses out and slipping them back over her muzzle. Again, she was hidden behind her gaudy glass mask, but now I could still make out the cracks behind it. Both our ear’s perked as a heavy hooffalls came down the alleyway outside. The labored breath of a pony outside made me tense up. Today had already been one hell of a doozy, and about the only thing I hadn’t been looking for was more bad news.

With more force than was probably necessary, Dutch nearly threw himself through the doorway and down at High Pillows hooves.

“Love, I just came from…” The scared up lug of an earth pony nearly groveled at the mare’s hooves before he looked up at me. He fell silent, and a scowl that fit him to a T fell across his no good muzzle.

“Vat are joo doing here, Dutch?” She snapped when he just left us all in a quiet suspense. Like an old world lapdog told to heel, he tore his gaze from me and went back to paying attention to his master.

“It’s Jerry. He’s dead.” Dutch spoke with an unnatural conviction for somepony of his character.

“What?” I snapped, immediately pointing my hoof up to High Pillow. “Tell me what’s going on. Now.” Had she only come here to keep me from interfering with what went down? No, she wasn’t the type to be that lousy with a setup. I don’t think that was the way she would have it go down at all.

“He was at the brothel, like you’d...” Dutch spoke up sharply, being silenced when High Pillow daintily pressed her hoof to his muzzle. It was amazing to watch such a violent and untamable beast like Dutch put into his place with so little effort. In fact, High Pillow’s remarkable control over those in her gang was probably the only thing I could truly respect about the mare.

“No stories, zis must be seen.” She spoke softly to him. “Joo must get ze doktor. Tell her to come immediately.” He was puddy under her hoof, softly nodding before getting up off the ground. High Pillow only turned her head to me slightly with a smile. “Please, accompany me, Mr. Sunsoft. I’m sure joo vill vant to see ze crime scene, yes?”

“You should leave.” I gave her the only thing I had to say and tried to beat it into her as best I could. But it’s hard for somepony’s words to stick to something so poisonous that one touch could get you killed. “There’s no reason for you to even set one hoof in there, and I’ll have you escorted out of town for trespassing if you or any of your cronies do.” Something must have been funny about the way I said it, because she wore a smile like I’d just given her the world. “I’m still the head guard of this town, and I say scram.”

“Joo said it Jorself. I have a big investment in zis town.” She laughed in a way that both made my blood boil and freeze at the same time. “If Joo think I don’t already own it, Joo may be less perceptive zan I once thought. Now, Joo will accompany us, Mr. Sunsoft, or it is Joo who will be escorted avay.”

“Fine.” Even if I wanted to try to hold up against her, she had the leg up on me in every scenario. For now, I had to fold under her. She’d get her way, sure, but only if she played by the rules. My rules. “Nopony touches anything around there, and only you will escort me to the body. Got it?”

“Mmmm,” She smiled her devilish smile again, sucking on her lower lip as she nodded. Satisfied that she’d at least play fair for the time being, I held my hoof out to the door. She gave out a sly giggle as she cupped her hoof around Dutch’s face, trailing around it as she walked past him. “Good. Now, ve go!”

The scene in the luxurious brothel suite was just about as depraved and green-lable as a stallion like Jerry could have ever sunk into. Velvet curtains, gold wrap ropes, and all sorts of ornate chests and dressers filled to the brim with any manner of toys to pleasure a pony for a whole week. Those made this place Lady Luscious’s most expensive and highest demanded room in the whole damn brothel. And Jerry always had his fun in it.

Thick leather ties held his body to the ornately carved wooden bedposts, and the lavender bedsheets around him were soaked in what I could only assume was half the afternoon’s worth of pleasure. The leather blinder and gag in his face probably would have suited him more had he worn them around town, but I couldn’t revel in the fact that the pervert was dead. This was another murder, and I had to do my job.

“Where’s the mare he was with?” I asked, stepping lightly around the various whips and paddles around the bed as I looked around the room.

“In my office. She’s one of my new girls, just a month new infact. This was her first appointment with Jerry, and you know he loves the new hires.” Lady Luscious spoke up softly from the doorway. “I could retrieve her if you’d like to question her.” She did her best to keep her eyes averted from the deceased, but I knew she couldn’t resist. That bastard soaked up quite a few of her caps as part of his ‘arrangement’ with keeping Luscious’s dash pushers out of the town’s jail. Really what it meant was that she’d have every want to see him dead as the rest of us.

“No, leave her be.” I sighed as I stepped close to one of the heavy knots tying Jerry’s forehooves up. “The poor girl needs some time to collect herself, and I have even more pressing questions to answer right now.” Looking around it, I took a closer look along Jerry’s neck and side. Nothing was out of place. No signs of trauma, or even injection sites for poison.

“Vat do joo think happened?” High Pillow put her mouth in with as much recklessness as the elephant in the room she was.

“I won’t know for sure until I get Doc Chips on this, but from here I can’t find a damn reason he’d be dead.” I took a step back, trying to get a bigger picture on all this. “Did the mare with him explain anything to you, Luscious? What he was doing, anything she may have done?”

“Not anything too specific, mind you.” Luscious glowed like a joy-girl before her first roll in the hay. I knew it wasn’t usual to discuss particular goings-ons in the business, but she was willing to stick her neck out to talk earlier, and she was the only angle I had on Jerry right now. ”She said that she had just gotten done whipping him before he started to shake and groan. Then she said he went quiet.”

“Vat if his heart couldn’t take ze strain?” High offered in what looked to be one of the only viable explanations from on the surface of this mess. “Joo have seen his poor physical health. Vas it not something zat could be possible?”

“No, I don’t think it would be.” I simply replied, casting my gaze over to the half glass of water sitting on the dresser across the room. From all my nights in this joint, no girl ever brought me water. “Half of this town wanting to see Jerry dead isn’t exactly front page news. However…” I paused as I moved over to it, finding that it indeed sat alone over on the top of the dresses. Diluted poison perhaps? Only Doc Chips would be able to tell me for sure. “Three ponies are dead in as many days, so I’m telling you that I’m sure that this was foul play.”

“Okay.” Doc Chips sighed as she pushed her way past Lady Luscious with an agitated look across her muzzle. From behind her, Dutch tried to push his way in, but Luscious moved to stop him and shot him a scowl that could freeze a stallion’s heart. “Looks like I have another long night ahead of me I guess. Just like last time, Sunsoft, I’ll have some results in the morning for you.” With another long sigh, she turned her attention back to Luscious as her magic began to untie the bindings from around Jerry. “Let him in, Luscious. I’m not going to carry Jerry back all by myself.”

Luscious threw me an expectant look, but for once, Dutch looked to make himself useful to our little town. I hated to refuse the mare I owed so many of my older nights too, however, this was bigger than either of us. Whoever had set this all up was about to make their move, and with all of us focused on Jerry, I was sure it would be tonight. Three deaths in three days makes a pattern, and whoever had strung this out would be getting desperate to finish it off quick.

“I’ve got to stop by Rusty’s for a while.” I spoke up, hoofing at my old suit barding and buttoning it up. “I’ll stop by in a bit to see if you’ve found anything, Doc.” Hoofing my hat forward, I wiggled it down firmly against my head. Intimidation was my next play, I was done playing the soft game, and now it was time for hardball. I was left with nothing to go off of with Jerry dead, and I need answers quick. I had no idea how Rusty fit into this crazy puzzle, if at all. But even if he wasn’t a major player, he might just be next on the list to find himself in a shallow grave.

“Rusty?” The Doc spun around in an instant. “You think he had something do with this?” She giggled in her feigned amusement. “Why, that hermit hardly even comes out of his shack. Even when he does, that simpleton’s never been the most mentally stable of ponies. Probably the only one to ignore more advice from me than you do.” With a cocked eyebrow, she shifted her stance and looked back over to Jerry. “I know I told you I was no head doc, but I don’t think he has the forethought to put something like this together.” The cockyness she put forth was as sharp as ever.

“I don’t know, but I’m going to find out what he knows, because he know’s something. That, I’m sure of.” I shrugged off her doubt and pushed on. Still, her words sat with me as I left the room. She was right. In the last few years I’d seen him out, he was more liable to use angry yelling and profanities to get you to leave him be before resorting to any sort of rational discussion. He’d seemingly destabilized to the point of near madness, and so long as he never actually hurt anypony, even the town's guards left him to himself.

As I stood in the hallway outside Jerry’s room, I hoofed out the small piece of metal taken from Silver’s hoof. Unfortunately, Rusty had at least one of the answers I’d needed. Between the deaths, the caps, and those left to look at, I was close to having all the pieces of this puzzle. I just hoped that when I found the last piece, I wasn’t too late to stop whatever insanity that was about to start in this town…