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This is a work of fiction copyright Radical Gopher and may not be duplicated in whole or part without the author's permission. This story contains adult situations and should not be views by anyone under the age of 18.

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THIS WAY MADNESS LIES - part 1

Jake rarely closed down his ice cream cart until after nine during the spring and summer, even on the weekdays. Business was just too good. He had found himself a sweet spot, only a block down from Rockefeller Center and right across from a subway entrance. Because of this, he almost never went home with leftover merchandise. He was busy wiping down his cart when he first heard the girl's voice.

"Two almond crunches, please."

He looked up into a pair of green eyes framed by thick, red hair and a smile. She was one of the prettiest customers he'd served that day, and if there was anything that Jake knew how to appreciate, it was beauty. The girl... No, he corrected himself; the young woman. carried herself with an air of confidence and poise that would have made many a Broadway actress jealous. She was above average height and had a clean, simple line to her features. She had on blue jeans, a white tee shirt, a lightweight black windbreaker and a pair of soft, brown suede boots. She wore no make-up, but then she didn't need any, not even to hide the light sprinkling of freckles that dotted her face..

Reaching into the icebox, he pulled out two ice cream bars and passed them over to

her. "Sure thing, lady... That'll be five even." He watched as she opened a small pocket book and pulled out a ten spot. As she did Jake suddenly became aware that a couple of men had stepped up behind him. One of them addressed him in a low, menacing voice.

"Hey, man... cough up the cashbox and don't give us no trouble, if you know what's good for you." To emphasize the point, the speaker jabbed Jake in the back with the rounded end of a crowbar.

Nervously, the ice cream vendor did as instructed. Mr. Crowbar's partner then relieved the woman of her pocket book, the ten dollars and the two ice cream bars.

"Count ten before you do anything man... we're packing." The two thugs moved quickly down the sidewalk and ducked into a nearby alley. It had all happened so quickly no one else on the street had seen anything.

"Ah FUCK!" Jake swore... "GODDAMMIT! Where's a cop when you need one?" He looked over at his customer intending to apologize to her, but stopped before he uttered even a single word. Instead of being angry or frightened or even annoyed, the expression on her face was one of calm expectation. She gazed at him and gave him a strange smile.

"Poor bastards," she chuckled. "They just ran down the wrong alley."

"Are you nuts, lady?"

She shook her head. "Wait for it."

There was a pause, then a crash and a pair of startled yells coming from the alley; a single gunshot and a flash of blue light followed. There were more metallic crashing sounds. A trashcan rolled noisily onto the sidewalk. This was followed by scattered pieces of what looked like a gun. One of the thugs scrambled out of the alley way on hands and knees, trying desperately to escape. Jake watched as a massive hand reached out from the shadows, grabbed the mugger's foot and yanked him back into the darkness. The curbside vendor could hardly believe his eyes. The hand appeared to have only four digits and was covered in white fur.. There was a little more crashing, then silence. Both the woman's pocket book and Jake's cashbox floated out of the alley and up to the ice cream cart, each was surrounded by a bluish glow. They came to rest on the edge of the cart.

Mystified, Jake picked up the pocketbook and handed it back to her He then reached into the freezer and handed her another two ice cream bars. When she tried paying for them he refused to accept her money. "I don't know how, but in some strange way I know you were partly responsible for saving my day's take."

She chuckled softly. "You have no idea." She accepted the ice cream, thanked him and strolled off, turning down the same alley the thugs had used.

"Hey Lady! Wait! Don't go in there!" Jake moved to follow her, but when he came to the alley's entrance she had vanished. He found the two thugs hanging upside down from a fire escape, suspended by the crowbar, which was now wrapped firmly around their ankles. He flagged the next police officer he saw, and then after a moment's reflection, took out his cell phone and took a picture before calling the newspaper. There might be some cash in a story like this.

A large, bipedal equine looked down on the scene from a nearby rooftop, nibbling on the ice cream bar the woman had just handed him. "You were right. First thing he did was call the... What's that word he's thinking? The Post."

"Its the name of a local paper," Jillian replied.

"Does your news media often pay for stories like this?"

She shrugged. "Sometimes, if it's a slow news day and they think the story's interesting enough."

The alien nickered softly. "You think I left them an interesting enough story?"

"Well, you did leave them a bit of a mystery, but in a city like New York, who's to say?"

* * * *

Colonel Faulkner, U. S. Army, retired, was not use to waiting. Every moment he was away from his job grated on him. There was so much data to evaluate, analyze and forward to the appropriate action group. If he didn't ensure it was done, who would. He stood and walked over to the window for the third time. The view hadn't changed. Manhattan was still there, as was the traffic, clouds and the people thirty stories below.

There was a buzz and the secretary picked up the phone. She listened quietly for a moment before responding.

"Yes sir, he's still here... Right away sir." She looked over at the Colonel. "The Director will see you now."

As Faulkner entered the office the director gave him a cursory once over. The business suit he wore was well tailored and quiet expensive. His frame was lean and tone and his hair black as pitch, despite the fact he was already well into his mid-forties. Steel gray eyes took in the room without his moving his head even an inch, left or right. In some ways he was jealous of the ex-Colonel. He had the looks, manner and intelligence to rise quickly within any organization to which he belonged. The Secretary for Homeland Security had been a fool to let him go. But then, his loss was the Director's gain.

"What's the latest word on our Boy Scout?"

Faulkner placed a file folder on the desk. "He seems to have gone to ground," the Colonel replied. "There has been no trace of any activity we can connect to him since the incident in Buenos Aires four weeks ago."

"None?"

"I have a third of my staff scanning the media for any possible hint, but so far the Outlander has been pretty much a non-entity. Current intelligence indicates his involvement in South America was accidental. He happened to be in the right place at the wrong time, for us I mean."

"I understand that before he broke up our South American project he effectively shut down one of our African funding sources. Is it possible he knows of our connections with Inkuba?"

"We don't know," Faulkner replied. "Our association with Inkuba was tentative at best. Most of our contact with him was through a third party who made the necessary financial arrangements. When Inkuba was arrested the banker severed those ties completely."

"You said most," the Director intoned. "What other contact have we had with him?"

"Charlie Rose," the Colonel said. "He made the initial contact that put Inkuba in our pocket."

"Dammit! How much do you think he told the bastard when he recruited his services?"

Faulkner shrugged. "We don't know. Charlie wasn't much for keeping records. He put everything in his head. He felt committing anything to paper was a guarantee some unauthorized bureaucrat would see it. He did have two, maybe three follow-up liaison visits with Inkuba before being killed in the plane crash."

"Well, thank God for small favors. With Charlie dead and no paper record, we should be relatively clean."

"One can hope. The problem remains that our friend the Boy Scout can, at least to some degree, read minds. If he somehow came into contact with our middleman, or if Inkuba knew something he shouldn't have, then we might have a problem. The key is how much he understands of our thoughts. Being an alien has to present all kinds of problems for him. My biggest fear is that Dr. Strathern is helping him understand more about us than we would like."

"That makes her a traitor, doesn't it?"

"It would if he were perceived as a genuine threat. So far, everything he's done has had a positive spin in the media. They like him... They think he's a cross between the Lone Ranger, Superman and Klatu, with a little bit of Trigger thrown in."

The Director chuckled despairingly. "Well, the Lone Ranger has managed to wipe out approximately five percent of our working capital and foil an operation we spent three years setting up. Worse, if your intelligence is to be believed, he did it unintentionally. What happens if he targets us specifically?"

"If he does," the colonel replied calmly, "he'll find out about the probe. There will be no way to hide it from him or disconnect ourselves from our association with it."

"If that happens..." the director said fearfully.

"If that happens... It's war!"

* * * *

Bob and Jillian stood on the floating disk twenty-three stories above Park Avenue. The Kerachaw had dampened down the blue glow associated with his powers sufficiently that they could not be seen from street level.

"There," she said pointing. "Third window from the end."

"Are you sure it's still unlocked?"

"I unlocked it myself while being given the grand tour," she replied. "I don't know of any reason they'd notice and lock it again, especially since I was the last ‘interested buyer' to be shown the apartment before the sales office closed today."

Bob nodded and directed the disc to drift slowly over to the window. He hooked a powerful arm around Jillian, steadying her as she leaned forward and pushed up on the glass pane. It slid up effortlessly. They quietly stepped from the disc into a large sprawling living room complete with fireplace.

"Rather ornate, isn't it?" the equine commented.

"It's the kind of home one associates with a seven figure annual salary; especially in New York City."

"And yet, there are hungry people sleeping in alleys less than four blocks from here. How can such disparity be allowed?"

"I know... our system isn't perfect," Jillian sighed. "Maybe if we could feel each others thoughts and emotions as the Kerachaw do, it would be a better world."

"It might help..." Bob looked at the young woman, his eyes sympathetic. "Perhaps as you did not evolve with such abilities, I should, as your people say, ‘cut you a little slack?'"

"Perhaps..." she replied, "but not too much." She walked silently over to the apartment door and pressed her ear up against it, listening. "I don't hear anyone."

"I took the precaution of scanning the immediate area. There are only seven people on this floor, including us. Twenty on the floor above, twelve below."

"Are you ready?" Jillian asked. In response the alien took a deep breath. For an instant his eyes glowed blue, then his visage seemed to shimmer. An instant later he was replaced by a middle-aged man of average height, wearing a gray trench coat, a double-breasted pinstripe suit and a matching fedora.

"How do I look?" he asked.

"Fine," she sighed, "providing our target isn't suspicious about seeing Humphrey Bogart ringing his doorbell."

"Oh... too readily identifiable?"

"Just a bit."

Bob focused once more. The eyes floated apart slightly, the shape of the nose changed and the hair turned blonde. The suit also changed into a one a bit more modern.

"Good... just ditch the hat and it will be perfect."

"But I like the hat," the equine said. Jillian simply looked at him. The hat disappeared. "Okay, I'm ready. Just don't forget you have to do the talking. It takes a lot of concentration to hold this illusion in someone else's mind... and don't let more than four people in the room at once."

"Got it," she replied, leaning over and giving him a kiss on his illusionary lips. From Bob's perspective she had just kissed him on the chest, but the sentiment was still understood and he nickered appreciatively.

* * * *

Stanton F. Archbury was a somewhat corpulent, middle-aged investment banker who was use to dealing with routine, and not so routine, visits from various banking investigators. He did not fear such calls, not because he was honest. Far from it. He was as dirty and as conniving as they come. What made him feel invulnerable was the skill with which he could manipulate and interchange numbers, accounts and balance books. He'd been doing it for nearly thirty years and he was good. Thus when he opened the door of his apartment and found himself confronted with a pair of investigators, reputedly from Interpol, he was calm and collected. He was unaware of the fact that the convincing ID the two "agents" had flashed was the result of a strong suggestion placed in his mind.

Archbury invited them in and brought each a cup of coffee, then sat down to discuss ‘business.' The young woman was, he thought, quite attractive with her bright red hair, slim figure and smattering of freckles. The older man seemed vaguely familiar, though he could not quite place where he might have seen him before.

"And how may I be of service?" the banker asked smoothly.

"Well," Jillian replied, "we've been investigating the investment and finance records of one Colonel Inkuba, late of Africa. He was recently arrested for drug trafficking and we have been asked to make inquiries regarding his cash flow."

"Really?" Archbury responded. "I can't say I've ever heard of, let alone had dealing with... Colonel... Inkuba before. What exactly brought you to my doorstep?"

He thought it interesting that the younger of the two investigators, and she was young, perhaps 22, maybe 23 years old at most, was the one asking the questions. Perhaps they were setting up the old, good cop/bad cop routine on him.

"The Colonel," Jillian explained, "had a cache of banking records, separate from his normal books, that indicated he had deposited large quantities of money with a client firm of yours called International Imports and Exchange."

Outwardly, Archbury remained cool and collected. Inwardly however, his mind began to race. No one should know a thing about either Inkuba or I.I.& E., let alone realize there was a connection there. For that matter, no one should have been able to see any ‘books' with that name because there were none, or there shouldn't have been. He remembered telling Inkuba's bookkeeper to commit the name to memory and simply use the word foreign deposits when recording any account information, though it was entirely possible Inkuba might have known the name. Fortunately, I.I.& E. was a front... a false trail that led nowhere. Money from the company was shunted through several different dummy corporations before finally coming to rest in the accounts of the Directory. Archbury knew this because he was the one who, for a tidy sum, did the shunting.

"I'm sorry to admit that I don't know much about this International Imports and Exchange," the banker replied smoothly. "They may well be a client, but we serve so many clients it would be nearly impossible to look them up without accessing company records. Perhaps if you were to stop in at my office tomorrow I could more thoroughly access my records and provide you with the information you're seeking? There might even be something there about this Inkuba fellow."

The name, Inkuba, had the desired effect. It brought to Archbury's mind a long chain of associated thoughts, many of them having to do with a series of dummy companies, all intended to support a much larger, secret corporation. Unfortunately the information was random and didn't follow any one specific chain of thought. This made sorting through Archbury's a chore, requiring more concentration than Bob wanted to expend, especially while maintaining the psychic illusion. He quietly projected some of this information into Jillian's thoughts, hoping she could use it to pump Archbury for more info.

"All right," Jillian said, "Perhaps you could tell us something about British Overseas Exports?"

The banker smiled and shook his head. "Sorry... no."

"Okay... what about Western European Alliance Shipping or Iberia International?"

He shook his head once more.

"I guess that means you don't know anything about the Directory either?"

Archbury's whole body and mind went ice cold. He looked at Jillian, then at Bob. "How... Where..."

Thoughts unspooled themselves, one after another as his mind raced uncontrollably towards panic. Bob sat quietly scanning through the information that was coming to the surface of the banker's mind. The subtly he'd been trying to employ in reading Archbury's mind became more and more difficult as emotions collided together.

"Who the HELL are you people?"

* * * *

The systems operator noticed the blinking red alert light on her panel. Flipping open the operations planner, she skimmed down the column of numbers and codes until she found the one that matched. Her finger traced the action line across the page as she read the instructions. Picking up a phone, she quickly dialed a five-digit number. The phone on the other end rang twice.

"Hello?" came the decidedly masculine voice.

"Colonel Faulkner?" she asked, "this is Sysop 028. We have an alert page from Solomon..."

TO BE CONTINUED.....