Nightside 03 - Nightingales Lament

only wore black because no-one had come up with a darker colour yet. He wore a snazzy black beret to hide his bald patch and designer shades to tone down the perpetual glare with which he regarded the world.
    He's a friend of mine. Sometimes.
    Music was playing from a portable CD player, rising easily over the bare murmur of conversation from the few regulars nursing their drinks in the back booths. Most of the bar's usual crowd were probably out and about in the Nightside, taking advantage of the blackouts to do unto others and run off with the takings. It would be a busy time for the Nightside's fences, before the lights went on again. Alex's pet vulture was perched over the till, cackling to itself and giving the evil eye to anyone who looked like getting too close. The bar's muscular bouncers, Betty and Lucy Coltrane, were occupying themselves with a flex-off at the end of the bar, frowning seriously as muscles distended and veins popped up all over their sculpted bodies. Pale Michael was running a book as to which one would pass out first.
    And my teenage secretary, Cathy Barrett, was dancing wildly on a tabletop, to the music of Voice of the Beehive's "Honey Lingers." Blonde, bubbly, and full of more energy than she knew what to do with, Cathy ran the business side of my life. I'd rescued her from a house that tried to eat her, and she adopted me. I didn't get a say in the matter. Dancing opposite her on the tabletop, in a leather outfit, cape, mask, and six-inch stiletto heels, was Ms. Fate, the Nightside's very own transvestite superhero, a man who dressed up as a superheroine to fight crime and avenge injustice. He was actually pretty good at it, in her own way. Cathy and Ms. Fate danced their hearts out, pounding their heels on the table to "Monsters and Angels," and I had to smile. They were the brightest things in the whole bar.
    I topped up my glass with the murky purple liquor and drank to the memory of Melinda Dusk and Quinn. It was good to know they were finally at rest, together, their murders avenged. I don't have that many friends. Either my enemies kill them, or I do. Morality can be a shifting, treacherous thing in the Nightside, and both love and loyalty have a way of getting drowned in the bigger issues. My few longtime friends have all tended to be dangerous as hell in their own right, and more than a little crazy. People like Razor Eddie and Shotgun Suzie . . . both of whom have tried to kill me in the past. I don't hold it against them. Much. It's a hard life in the Nightside, and a harder death, usually. I sipped my drink and listened to the music. I wasn't in any hurry. I had the rest of the bottle to get through.
    I've never found it easy to mourn, though God knows I've had enough practice.
    I looked around the bar, searching for something to distract myself with. A sailor had passed out at the main bar, and the tattoos on his back were quietly arguing matters philosophical over the low rumble of his snores. A mummy at the other end of the long wooden bar was drinking gin and tonics while performing necessary running repairs on his yellowed bandages. Roughly midway between the two, an amiable drunk in a blood-stained lab coat was endeavouring to explain the principles of retro-phrenology to a frankly disinterested Alex Morrisey.
    "See, phrenology is this old Victorian science, which claimed you could determine the dominant traits of a man's personality by studying the bumps on his head. The size and position of these bumps indicated different personality traits. See? Now, retro-phrenology says, why not change a man's personality by hitting him on the head with a hammer, till you raise just the right bumps in the right places!"
    "One of us needs a lot more drinks," said Alex. "That's starting to make sense."
    Cathy suddenly slammed down into the chair opposite me, breathing harshly and radiating happy sweat. She flashed me a cheerful grin. She'd picked up a fresh flute of champagne from somewhere and drank from it thirstily. Cathy always drank "champers," and nearly always found a way to stick me with the bill.
    "I love to dance!" she said cheerfully. "Sometimes I think the whole world should be put to music and choreographed!"
    "This being the Nightside, someone somewhere is undoubtedly working on that very thing, right now," I said. "Where's your partner, the Dancing Queen?"
    "Oh, he's nipped off to the loo, to freshen her makeup. You know, John, I could see you brooding from right