"We'll be takin' care of business, everyday
                Takin' care of business, everyway..."
                -- B.T.O.

               "I look inside myself, and see my heart
                is black..."
                -- The Rolling Stones

               "Dirty deeds, done dirt cheap..."
                -- AC/DC
                

1.


                                 3:02 PM
                                 
     "Look,  Silva,  you  either come up with the money today or you  can 
  
kiss your ass goodbye.  Maybe your wife's too, if I'm feeling bitchy."

     Dan  Silva's voice trembled as he spoke,  fading in and out  like  a 
  
mistuned radio station:  "I... I don't have it.  Please...  You've got to 
  
give me more time." he pleaded.

     "I'm afraid that's impossible,  Mr.  Silva, you've had one extention 
  
too  many.  My men will be there at the stroke of midnight to close  your 
  
account... permanently!"

     Robert Morrow slammed the phone back into the cradle with one  quick 
  
motion.  He  took  a  drag of the Camel dangling from  his  lips,  as  he 
  
reached  for  Mr.  Silva's folder.  Tardiness was one thing  he  couldn't 
  
tolerate.  Silva  said he would pay up,  and by God,  he  better.  If  he 
  
doesn't have the money, why he'll just have to use another currency.

     Blood.

     Robert chuckled heartily as he pictured Mr. Silva lying in a  gutter 
  
somewhere  with his throat slit.  The rats would munch on his  flesh  and 
  
bones... and the maggots on his tasty marrow.  Dan Silva would pay, oh my 
  
yes.  In nines.

	The  intercom  buzzed,  jarring  Morrow  out  of  his  absent-minded 
  
reverie.  He leaned forward,  cleared his throat,  and depressed the talk 
  
button:

     "Yes, Charlene, what is it?" he asked.

     "Sir, there's a man by the name of Mike Bower here to see you.  Says 
  
its urgent."

     "Urgent,  my  ass.  He  probably  just  screwed  up  again."  Robert 
  
mumbled to himself with no small amount of disdain. 

     He sighed, and told his secretary to send Bower in.

     The scent of dimestore cologne wafted towards Rob's nostrils,  as  a 
  
man in an equally cheap suit strolled in.  He sat in one of the  leather-
  
decked  chairs  and  began  to  fidget  with  his  tie.  He  seemed  very 
  
embarrassed  by something,  acting like a kid about to be scolded  by  his 
  
parents.
  
     "Do  you  have something to tell me,  or would you rather  just  sit 
  
there and play with yourself?"  Morrow asked.

     "I... I messed up, sir."

     Bower's eyes fell to the floor as he spoke, as if he were addressing 
  
the  Persian  rug  which graced  it.  Half-moons  of  sleeplessness  hung 
  
beneath  his eyes.  His face looked like a worn leather jacket which  had 
  
spent too much time in the rain.  With a cynical smile,  Morrow waved him 
  
away... smirking as Bower twitched like a schoolboy on his first date. 

  

     Dan  Silva was doing some twitching of his own,  though not  of  the 
  
nervous variety.  He was much too dead for that.

     His  muscles  were just beginning to seize  up.  That  slow,  steady 
  
process known to all body-baggers as rigor mortis.  The paramedic plugged
 
his  nose  as he zipped up the rubber death-shell,  shaking his  head  in 
  
disgust.  It  turns  out Mr.  Silva had died by  drowning.  No  lifeguard 
  
could  save him,  for he was nowhere near a swimming pool.  

     The murder weapon, to put it simply, was a toilet.  They didn't even 
  
bother flushing it first.  Dan died with such an unpleasant taste in  his 
  
mouth.  It  would  make  quite a little joke  around  the  office,  along 
  
with  what they had done to Silva's tasty little wife.  Oh  well,  she'll 
  
recover.  And, if not, why not sew it shut?  I'm sure the doctor wouldn't 
  
mind performing that little "service", now would he?



     The  ambulance  door slammed shut,  and the  "stiff  mobile"  roared 
  
away.  Lightning pierced the pale grey sky, and thunder bellowed like the 
  
growling  of God's stomach.  The first few sprinkles of  rain  splattered 
  
down,   forming   abstract   art  which  the  wipers  spread   over   the 
  
windshield.  The  driver clicked the radio on,  but was greeted  only  by 
  
silence.  Not  even an obnoxious D.J.  to grumble at,  nothing to do  but 
  
drive.  And, if that rookie was up for it, maybe yap a little.

     "So... Ah, this your first job?" he asked.

     "Yeah.  It may be my last, too."

     "What's that supposed to mean?"

     "I  don't  know...  something  just doesn't  feel  right.  And  this 
  
goddamn storm isn't helping much, either."
  
     "Yeah.  I know what you mean.  As a kid,  storms scared the hell out 
  
of me.  To tell you the truth, they still do."   

     The  ambulance suddenly swerved to the right,  sending  their  cargo 
  
tumbling  off the stretcher.  It landed on the floor with a  loud  splat, 
  
the wet rubber making sounds like fingernails down a chalkboard.

	The body-bagger winced at the sound,  his flesh clumping together to 
  
form goose-bumps.  He picked the body up,  struggling to place it back on 
  
the  stretcher.  Finally,  he  strapped the  cold  corpse  down,  cursing 
  
himself  for  not  doing  it  earlier.  The  last  buckle  proved   quite 
  
difficult,  and his hand slipped,  grazing off the slick rubber.  It felt 
  
like it was encased in slime.  

     The  zipper wasn't quite up all the way,  and a small hole  provided 
  
air  for the cadaver.  The body-bagger quickly realized dead people  have 
  
little need for oxygen.  The bag should be zipped up all the way,  or the 
  
corpse wouldn't be very fresh.  And that simply wouldn't do.  The bag-boy 
  
remedied the situation by grasping the silver tag, or at least trying to.

     The bagger yelped in pain,  a look of utter confusion planted on his 
  
face.  He  stared at his throbbing thumb,  where a perfect imprint of the 
  
YKK  zipper had replaced several layers of skin.  It had  burnt  him.  He 
  
had been crisped.  

     The  bagger stared in disbelief at his new tattoo,  yelling  at  the 
  
driver to "for God's sake stop!!"  A perfectly-timed thunder clap drowned 
  
out the bagger's pleas...  making them as insignificant as a rain drop in 
  
an ocean.
  
     The ambulance roared on,  the thick raindrops splatting against  the 
  
windshield like bugs.  The water ran down the window in streams,  mocking 
  
the  sweat  which flowed down the driver's head  in  rivulets.  He  drove 
  
through a particularly large puddle,  and the rain found its way into the 
  
wheel-wells with a loud splash.
  
     The driver glanced in the rear view mirror, and a slow scream caught 
  
halfway  up his throat.  As he opened his mouth wide,  to let the  shrill 
  
sound escape, something terrible happened.  It began to rain blood.

     It  coagulated on the wipers,  and they spread it across the  window 
  
like strawberry jam.  Left.  Right.  Left.  Right.  Left...

     The  body-bagger  moaned  as something in the rubber  bag  began  to 
  
growl.  It sounded just like a mass murderer dragging a mutilated  corpse 
  
down  a  gravel road.  A low bass roar that was  steadily  increasing  in 
  
volume.

     The zipper slowly snaked down... unveiling the creature within...

     One eye peeked out of the rubber, eyeing the body-bagger like a side 
  
of  beef.  It scanned his  ID  tag,  and  then began to laugh.  It was  a 
  
laugh like no other,  sounding like knuckles being sliced and diced by  a 
  
cheese grater...

     "Dan Silva, Royal Alexandra Hospital." it read.

     Warm blood is so tasty on a cold night...  it refreshes the body and 
  
soothes  the pain.  The pain.  The pain of watching yourself  slowly  rot 
  
from the inside out...
     

                                 5:09 PM
                                 
     The screams reverberated through the dark caverns of Silva's mind as 
  
he started awake...  floating in a slick sea of sweat...  and blood.  His 
  
mind  simply  refused to belief what it  saw.  His  sheets,  pillow,  and 
  
mattress  were drenched in blood.  His entire body was covered  as  well, 
  
from  head  to toe clots glued him to the bed.  He tried  desperately  to 
  
break free... but the congealed blood held fast.  He tried to scream, but 
  
his lips wouldn't budge.  

     A  few more droplets splattered down,  and began coagulating on  his 
  
eye  lids.  His senses were now nonexistent,  eradicated as  easily  as 
  
chalk  wiped from a chalkboard.  His mind jibbered endlessly  "I'M  GONNA 

DIE I'M GONNA DIE I'M GONNA DIE I'M GONNA..."

     Two perfectly-placed drops sealed his nostrils shut, and as he began 
  
to black out,  a maddening itch ran through his body...  he was paralyzed 
  
to  do  anything  but listen to its  never-ending  screams:  "SCRATCH  ME 
  
SCRATCH ME SCRATCH ME SCRATCH..." 



     Dan's  first thought when he woke was that he had died and  gone  to 
  
hell.  No such luck.  He was still at home, and still on the run.

     The  first  few threads of a plan began to weave themselves  into  a 
  
tapestry that would,  God and other deities willing,  get him out of this 
  
mess.  It was so simple... so fucking simple.  The question was, could he 
  
pull it off?


  	
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