Date: Sun, 16 Jul 1995 23:05:31 -0400 Reply-To: JillMari@AOL.COM Sender: Highlander TV show stories From: Jill Spetoskey Subject: Crosscheck in D-Minor (2 of 3) Comments are always welcome at jillmari@aol.com or jilkey@grfn.org Crosscheck in D-Minor-Part 2 Toronto-Two Weeks Later Many athletes ave very superstitous. They have a specific pre-game warm-up that they never deviate from, or specific pieces or brands of equipment that they always use. In Kyle's case, he never let anyone else touch his skates or stick, even carrying his bag with him back to his hotel room so that he knew his skates and sticks weren't being contaminated by the quipment manager. It was his superstitions that probably saved his life. Kyle walked through the hotel lobby, tired to the bone after a bad night at Maple Leaf Gardens. They had lost, and in frustration, he had been goaded onto a major penalty when the score was obvious late in the game. He nodded to his roommate as Kevin headed to the soda machine, and he went to the elevator. The elevator carried him to the third floor, and as he was getting out of the elevator, he was hit with a wave of nausea. Bananas. Must remember to eat a lot of fruit in the morning because I'm dehydrated as hell, and probably missing every vitamin and mineral known to man in my body right now, he thought as he fumbled for the card key. He opened up the door, and was suddenly pulled into the room. Keeping ahold of his equipment bag, he brought it up instinctively into the intruder's face. The other person pushed him away, and he saw that the man had a sword? in one hand. The sword came hurling toward his shoulder, and Kyle twisted his bag around barely in time to catch the flat of the sword with it. He heard the crack of wood breaking. Damn, probably the stick I got the game winner against Jersey with. The good ones always come apart so soon. The other made another stab at him. This time, he heard the ripping of canvas as the sword cut through fabric. He used his momentum to send the intruder back onto the bed. He released the bag, which landed on the man's stomach, and made a grab for the other's sword arm, catching his hand in both hands. Then, Kevin came through the door. "Kyle, what's going on here?" He said, dropping his soda. "He tried to kill me. Don't analyze, just give me a hand here." Kevin grabbed at the man's sword arm, and twisted. With a sickening pop, the man's hand let go, and the sword flew under the other bed. "Got 'em! Let's get the cops down here now." Kyle grabbed the man's other wrist, and held him still while Kevin dialed through to the Toronto Police on the phone. "Yeah, I'd like to report an assault. If you could get someone over here soon I'd appreciate it. My friend tackled him, and I think he's getting tired of keeping the thug restrained.....Yeah, room 313, at the Hotel..." "No, no police." The man spoke for the first time since he had grabbed Kyle through the door. "Our game is not for outsiders." "Outsiders? I don't know what you mean, but I make my living because a large number of outsiders find what I do amusing, and paying for the priviledge of watching me play." Kyle replied, puzzled. "We will talk later then, and when you are aware of your your potential, I will hunt you down, and take your head." "Kevin, did you hear that? He threatened to kill me. Why?" "Doesn't like your style, I guess." Kevin shrugged as he hung up the phone. "Cops are on the way. " "You'll regret this meddling, boy." The voice didn't seem to meet the threatening words. Kyle loked down at his catch, and saw that his assailant looked like a fifteen year old street punk. Black eyes stared behind a crop of dark spiked hair, and a body coverev in black leather. His face was almost white. "What meddling?" At that moment, a few of Kyle's teammates, roused by the commotion, made their appearance, and the kid refused to talk anymore. The police came, and started to ask questions. In the retelling, the sword became a long knife. After all, a knife was the weapon of a gang member. When the police searched the room, they couldn't find the punk's weapon. Instead, they took Kyle's battered duffel as evidence that some sort of bladed weapon had been used. "Looks like someone's got to mess with your stuff now." Kevin joked. "Yeah, I'm going to have to buy a whole new pair of skates and everything." Kyle looked over to where a cop was finishing dabbing at the spilled Coke. Suddenly, that cop rose respectfully, and admitted a curly-haired man flashing a detective's badge into the room. "Mr. Johnson, I'm Detective Knight, and I have just one or two questions before we pack up and leave here. You said that our suspect threatened to behead you?" "Yes." Kyle replied, wondering why the new guy had come onto the scene. "One of the homicide cases I'm working on invovled a beheading. We've got a report from an eyewitness describing a suspect leaving the crime scene, and I just wanted to see if we had a match." The detective opened a portfolio he had carried in, and passed Kyle a few sketches. "Normally, we'd ask you to come down to the station to look at these, but my captain wants to minimize the media circus, so I came out here." The man paused to give Kyle time to look at the sketches. In the background, he heard Kevin packing his things for a move to a new room. "Yeah, that's the guy that jumped me." "Thanks for your time with me. I assume that you will be traveling with the team so that we can get back ahold of you later on?" "Yeah, they told me that I'll be up for the rest of the season, at least." "Okay then, let's get you packed up and moved out of here. Officer Dickenson here will be keeping an eye on you tonight, and we'll get you safely on the team charter to Winnipeg in the morning." With that, the cops withdrew from the room, leaving only an earnest-looking Officer Dickenson waiting outside the door. Kyle went through the room, ramming clothing and toothbrush alike into the suitcase. Kyle was not an overly neat person by nature, and what he hadn't left tossed on the groung to begin with, the police had rumpled through in search for the punk's weapon. He was bending down to look under the bed for a missing loafer when his foot caught on something underneath the box spring. Feeling the object against his toe, he reached under the bed, and pulled the glistening object out. "Come to papa." He called as drew the sword out from under the bed. "It's like you didn't want to be found by the cops or something." He knew that he should turn it over to the police, and that it was probably a murder weapon of some sort, but there was something stopping him from doing that. He'd never been a gun person, and he had a feeling that the punk would come after him again. With a sigh, and a sense that he might be doing something stupid, he crammed the sword diagonally into his suitcase, and tossed a couple of sweatshirts around the hilt to cammoflage the end sticking out. He must have looked as frazzled as he felt. As he left room 313, the crime scene, he corrected wryly, the officer looked at him with concern in his eyes. "You okay, Mr. Johnson?" "Yeah, I guess I just hate not knowing the rules of the game. On the ice, it's simple, a neatly printed rule book with a zillion case studies on what you should and shouldn't do when. Life's never like that. Just when you think you have things figured out, someone comes along and tries to change all the rules without even telling you that there are any modifications to things up the pipeline." They reached the new room, and Kevin cautiously opened the door. "C'mon in. For our troubles his evening, themanagement has rewarded us with the presidential suite. It even has two phones so that you can gush on the phone all you want to Amy and I can still call out for pizza." "Thanks, Kevin. Are you sure that you still want to room with me even though it might be dangerous?" "You kidding? With these digs, I'd put up with Manson as long as he promised not to snore." This drew a wan smile from Kyle. "Now go call your wife, and tell her you're okay, and that you love her." Kyle reached for the phone, glad that he had friends that knew him well, and family that loved him. End Part Two =========================================================================