Cold Bones: A Beginning

The headset crashed forcefully against the floor.

It was the third one this week.

Agent Vice was getting less and less pleased. The sweating man dragged and twisted the tie that choked at his throat, creasing the skin above his nose in frustration. Agent Vice had bolted to his feet mere seconds before he threw down his communications equipment. After his head and the roof of the van traded details, amid swearing, the mustachioed agent resigned himself to stooping. Buzzing and static broke out into muffled speech and he snathed the secondary communications line transmitter up to his red face.

"Are you there, Pickled Toes?"

Agent Vice had to suppress a growl. Why on earth was he even on this assignment? This was a tedious, boring task, and he was a man of action. Surely the records spoke for themselves? The fluorescent lights and screens in the surveillance van glared annoyingly. It was cramped and stuffy. He was on his own. All the chinese takeaway had been eaten. The agent was but one mission away from his retirement. What burned him the most wasn't the role he had to play in this hunt they'd been put on. The worst part was who he'd been assigned to do it with.

"Loud and clear, Cold Bones"

Cold Bones physically jerked away from his walkie talkie. Each word felt like some hellhound snapping it's jaws. He let a sigh pass between his teeth. Sometimes he just didn't understand his partners attitude. Was it something he'd said?

"I'm here in the warehouse, near the supposed meeting point. So far I've seen barely anyone here. No guards, no crooks and none of those whaddya-call-'ems.."

"The targets, you mean?" Inquired Agent Vice as his eyebrows slowly edged closer to his moustache.

"Yeah, them things. What're we here for again?" Cold Bones looked around, edging from huge nondescript crate to huge nondescript crate.

"We're here," rumbled his partner, "to stop a meeting that could endanger the entire human race. We are here to stop the mafia meeting up with the Veribrax"

"The what now?"

"The Vertibrax, weren't you listening?!"

"Alright alright, keep your 'tache on, geez..." The agent shook his head in dismay. Was it something he did?

Suddenly, a rapid tapping. Cold Bones drew his six shooter and pused his spine to the crate. It was coming from above him. Cautiously the agent leaned out and looked up between the dull, hazy, unshaded bulbs that swug gently. The tapping had stopped but it had definately come from one of those girders...
Training his sidearm on where he'd heard the noise coming from, Cold Bones resumed his slinking between crates.

"Hey, Pickled Toes, you hear me?"

An old hand wiped down a furrowed brow in exasperation. "What now"

"Can I just call you Pickle?"

"...Are you being serious?" Pickled Toes forced the words from between clenched teeth.

"Well, we need to get a good, what's the word...rappee? Rapper?"

"Rapport?"

"Yeah!" Cold Bones clicked his fingers, "Didn't know you were so well educated, Pickle"

"Don't call me that!" Shouted Agent Vice. A large vein pulsed repulsively on his temple.

"You call me Bones all the time..." The agent did have a simple mind, in some ways.

Before his irritated partner could break yet another piece of equipment, Cold Bones froze. A metallic slam announced new arrivals. Sunlight flooded the dusty warehouse, casting deep shadows behind the stored goods. Cold Bones dived into the welcoming darkness, stashing his walkie-talkie away. Footsteps clacked and echoed throughout the square hall. The agents skillfull hearing picked out five...no, six sets of footsteps. They drew closer and voices began to filter through.

"I don't get it boss, why're we dealin' with these freaks? They ain't even American" said the first. The voice was hasty and weazley

"Who else is gonna buy this thing, you mook?" came the second. Aggressive in tone, his words felt like a cudgel.

"But we made so much money in the heist, why'd we wanna risk ourselves?" This third voice was slithery, ambiguous. Cold Bones instincts made him very wary of the owner. It was a gut feeling.

"Because," stormed the fourth voice, "These guys had the balls t'contact me personally. They wants this bad so we're gonna get it for all it's worth. Capice?" The commanding tone and likenes to a poor Marlon Brando impression suggested to Cold Bones that the owner was their boss. The ringleader as it were.

So far there were no signs of any Vertibrax. Only one half of the party had arrived. The agent wasn't sure if he could start until they all got here. At that moment the tapping began overhead again. It didn't last long. The air was perferated by a number of bullets from various models of handguns, one after the other. The shots were poor and innaccurate but in large enough numbers anything moving would stop. And it did. Silence crept back into the storage warehouse as the body of a rat fell from the girders above. Seven men watched it fall. One of those tracked it all the way down as it landed directly on his face. Cusses pushed the silence back and six guns were reloaded and primed.

"Whoever you are, come out now, with your hands up"

Cold Bones sighed. There was no way out of this, really. He tightened his belt, pulling up his dark sand-coloured trousers. Dust was brushed from his blood-red tie and white shirt. After straightening his suit jacket and peroxide blonde hair Cold Bones tilted his matching trilby down and stepped out into the path of six barrels of potential death.

Six jaws dropped to the floor as their owners eyes bore holes into the walking, animated skeleton that stood before them.

Agent Cold Bones knew no other name. He had amnesia. He also had no skin. Bleached white teeth permanently grinned outwards. Somehow the deep black holes that were his eye sockets had an even darker part to them. This darker part was what darted around and seemed to exist as his eyes; peoples brains took some time recognising this. Somehow his cow-licked peroxide-blonde hair remained upon his creamy smooth cranium.

"So, uh...can you put the guns down?" Queried Cold Bones

"...A-are you a freakin' skeleton?!"

"No, I just drink a lot of milk" if it was possible, Bones grinned more.

"He's like a zombie or somethin', I seen this in movies!" shrieked the first gangster to talk, his gun quivering.

"Hey!" objected Bones, frowning. At least, it looked as though he was frowning. In analysis it was odd...his clothes hung to him as normal. The light seemed to distort upon his deathly visage when the agent showed expression. It was as if he was invisible except for his hair and bones. "I'm not a zombie!"

"Then what are you?!" rumbled the second.

Cold Bones didn't know. Cold Bones couldn't remember his actual name or where he came from. He only knew he worked for The Company and that was his codename. It was his whole name as far as he was concerned.

"A skin-challenged business man"

The mafia members were so fixated on Agent Cold Bones to notice his partner Agent Pickled Toes had managed to run behind them, panting and wheezing, with a pump action shotgun. His temper had got the better of him and upon a loss of communications the Agent had run out to go and make sure that Bones hadn't screwed up.

"The jig is up" announced Agent Vice, punctuating his words with the solid snap of a pump action shotgun being readied

"The jig is up?" grinned Cold Bones, "Pickles, you need to lay off the cheese"