by Dan Stout
“I think I made you miss your party.”
She considered that.
“It was still worth it to see your parlor trick.” She smiled. “And Carter, if you find out more about this ability, you’ll tell me, won’t you?”
A muscle in my jaw twinged, and I thought back to my distrust, my fear of her connection to Paulus and the powers that be. Then I put all that aside.
“Sure,” I said. “Any excuse to see that couch.”
26
TRUE TO MY WORD, THE next day was the Responders’ Remembrance, and I was there onstage in my dress reds, standing alongside the brass who oversaw the city’s police, firefighters, and emergency services. It was early evening and the sky was pitch black, the shimmering moon obscured by clouds. All around us the stage was bedecked with Titan’s Day decorations, silver and blue the traditional colors of celebration and mourning, respectively. Scarlet streamers streaked through the decorations, representing the police, firefighters, and EMTs who’d lost their lives or been injured in the line of duty.
The mayor took his place at the stage front, standing tall and somber in a blue suit. Paulus was in the front row of the audience, a few seats away from Gellica, whose eyes stayed on me throughout the service. Jax stood to my left, a bit of sanity in a sea of surreal symbolism. I’d never felt more out of place, a cop who’d lost a couple fingers standing at attention to remember those who’d given so much more.
The mayor’s speech washed over me and my mind drifted. At one point Jax’s elbow dug into my side, and I realized everyone was looking at us and clapping. I didn’t know what to do, so I smiled and nodded, simple motions that had no meaning on their own, and that let everyone read their own meaning into them.
Next, the newly engraved names were read from the memorial, a monolith of granite shaped like the Mount, with the silhouette of an arm hidden in its profile representing the Titan, who sacrificed himself so that we’d have warmth and life. Punished by his peers, cast underground and pinned below the Mount, he was condemned to eternal torture by the imps, his screams of agony fueling the geo-vents that gave us warmth. In Titanshade that’s considered a good bedtime tale for kids.
The band struck up the anthem, and I found myself remembering the last time I’d seen my mother, before she went in to work and never came back. Long before she was a captain, Bryyh had been at my mom’s funeral, another young cop telling me how brave my mom had been. Telling me that cops were heroes, and we were all a family, and a hundred other lies that I’ll never stop believing.
The truth is, there are no heroes. Only occasional acts of foolishness from people who should know better.
After the ceremony the press and politicians moved to an area with better lighting for photo ops. What remained were sons and daughters, families and friends, spouses and partners. A crowd composed of those left behind. I slipped through the press of bodies, drawing closer to the stone, close enough to scan the names until I found my mother’s. I stared at the engraved letters, tiny cuts chiseled into stone. It didn’t even come close to capturing who she was and what she sacrificed for the city. I multiplied that difference by all the many names on the monument, and for the briefest moment I felt on the verge of some great truth. Then it was gone. Like all truths it was just mist in the morning, evaporating in the harsh reality of daylight.
A touch on my shoulder and Gellica was beside me, decked out in muted blue. Her eyes scanned my face, circling my features as if she could see something that others had missed.
“Sorry about your friend,” she said, indicating the new names added this year. So many names between my mother and Myris, representing years, decades, and so many deaths.
“Me, too.”
Beyond the memorial, under a light designed to shed favorable shadows for photo ops, the brass mixed and mingled. Paulus and the mayor, the chief of police and the fire chief. Angus was on the edges, hoping to get a little face time and expand his network. I turned my back on them and faced Gellica.
“And I’m sorry about the last time we talked. I didn’t mean to dump all that on you.”
Her lips raised in the smallest of smiles. “Yeah, you did.”
“Maybe we can try again. Talking, I mean.”
“I’d like that,” she said.
Closer to us, and far from the photographers’ scrum, Hemingway stood in dress reds. She stared at the newly added names on the memorial. Her eyes held no tears, only a fierce look of commitment. Behind her, Jax and Hemingway’s new partner were talking quietly, giving her a little space. All around us were cops and medics, firefighters and their families. They were mourning, laughing, and remembering.
“Me too,” I said. “But right now, I need to be with my family.”
* * *
Hammer Head’s was a traditional off-duty watering hole, and it was always busy. But on Responders’ Remembrance we packed it to the rafters. From beat cops in scarlet shirts to the brass in dress maroon, there’s a bond that ties us together. Brothers and sisters who might fight like rabid wolves when they’re alone, but are quick to close ranks against any outside threat.
Of course, every family needs a black sheep. I walked in to a mixture of polite nods and indirect stares. I did my best to seem oblivious to all of it while I scanned the sea of faces. It was all cops and a smattering of family members. The fire department had their own gathering spot. The stresses they faced were similar, but not quite the same. When firefighters arrive at a disaster they’re always the heroes. Nobody cheers when the cops show up.
I found Captain Bryyh standing next to Captain Quinlin by the dart boards. Bryyh was large, but next to her OCU counterpart she seemed downright insubstantial. I walked over to join them.
“There’s no reason to continue this mess,” Bryyh was saying. “Pissing on each other’s territory doesn’t do anyone any good.”
“Except that it’s already in motion.” Quinlin swung his beer at the front door of Hammer Head’s, and foam slopped over the side of his glass. “It’ll continue one way or the other. Why not capitalize on it.” Quinlin’s shaved head was pocked with a scattering of moles that took regular nicks from the morning razor. He stopped talking as I approached.
Quinlin eyed me as if I’d stumbled into his home covered in tibron dung. In a way, I couldn’t blame him. He’d made his reputation on absorbing smaller cases and using them to crack mobsters. Having the recent killings taken back out of his department’s portfolio was bad precedent.
“Captains,” I said, before turning to Quinlin specifically. “I was wondering if I can come to OCU and pick up the St. Beisht file directly. Save Dungan the hassle of packing it up.”
Quinlin grumbled, a deep and intimidating sound. “I shoulda figured you’d pull something like this. You really are the next politician, aren’t you?”
“What?” I’d been called a lot of things in my career, but politician was a new one.
Quinlin snorted. “You get cases moved from department to department, you’re onstage with the mayor, you’re front-page news, and you’ve been getting favorite status for as long as anyone can remember. Rules get bent for you, Carter, and everyone knows it.”
I shook my head, forcing a half-smile to show I was in on the joke. I was nothing like Angus, or even Dungan—cops who lived and breathed the red tape and backslapping that was part of every public servant’s life.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” I said. “And I’ll be by tomorrow. Thanks for your cooperation.”
For all of Quinlin’s griping, Bryyh didn’t seem disturbed. She was different at the bar. More relaxed than I was accustomed to seeing. It reminded me of when she used to visit me and my old man after my mom died. It was a side of her I sometimes forgot.
Quinlin’s eyes flashed. He clearly would rather I wasn’t there. Too damn bad.
“Imp’s blade,” muttered Bryyh. “Relax, Carter. Have a
drink. Remember your friends.”
It seemed everyone in the place was drinking a toast, whether with beer, whiskey, or soda. Everyone loved the departed. After all, the dead couldn’t disappoint us. I stalked away and headed toward the bar.
Across the room Guyer was talking to a few guys from Vice. She wore dress reds like the majority of cops in the place, but I guessed she’d had hers tailored to fit a little better. When she dressed up, she liked to do it right.
She and the others laughed, and Guyer held her hands up, then headed to the bar, as if she’d lost a bet and was now on the hook for the next round. I intercepted her path.
“Got a minute?”
“Sure,” she said. “I’m not on the clock.”
I leaned closer. “It’s about the interview we had yesterday. What I was trying to show you.”
“Hey,” Guyer squeezed my shoulder. “Don’t worry. I took bad notes.”
“What?”
“I simply noted that we discussed the victim’s deformity. No point in recording the conversation about my school days and that baton trick, right?”
I blinked. She thought she was covering for my delusion.
“Don’t mention it,” she said. “You looked good up on the stage. Like a real pro.” She leaned away from me, hopping up on the foot rail and waving an arm overhead. “Hey, Artie!” The bartender spotted her and moved in our direction. Guyer glanced over her shoulder at me. “C’mon and have a drink. I’m buying this round.”
But the room was already spinning for me, and I stepped away. I wandered the bar, feeling like I was on the other side of the looking glass. I stood on the fringe of a circle, physically present but mentally calculating how many beers it would take to wash all this from my memory. I doubted I could count that high. No one spoke to me as I left, so I had no excuses to make as I slipped away, gliding through the crowd like a ghost heading home.
* * *
I didn’t go straight home, of course. Since I was already in the neighborhood I stopped by the Bunker. My mailbox there held a pleasant surprise, the results on the search for the second alleyway body’s identity. Apparently Paulus’s political pull worked even faster than expected. I tucked it under my arm and headed to my apartment. Once there, I fed Rumple and kicked off my shoes, put on a record, and then flopped on my couch to see what I could learn about the man who’d died in my arms.
Turned out he’d been identified by his tattoos. That’s never a conclusive identification—anyone can get a tattoo—but it was enough to make a high-probability ID. Our latest victim was Dale Turner, a former member of the Titanshade Fire Department whose arrest records indicated a life that had spiraled downward in recent years. Turner had collected a few run-ins with the law as a kid but straightened himself out, at least long enough to pass a background check and serve on the TFD.
I flipped to his city personnel record. He’d been hurt in a fire, and took a disability retirement. The arrests started a few years after that, mostly for possession, then later for intent to distribute. It was a tragically common pattern, especially among first responders: an injured person moving from prescriptions to street drugs to help ease chronic pain.
Rumple leapt onto the couch, patrolling the cushions and purring as he selected which piece of paper to sit on. While he situated himself, I considered Turner’s connection to the TFD. He wasn’t active six weeks ago, but chances were good he still had friends in the department. Friends who might have been at the manna strike. And if one of them felt bad for a comrade in pain, or simply wanted to earn some extra cash, might they have bottled a bit of manna?
If so, Dale Turner might have been the source for the manna that fueled snake oil.
But would he have the connections to do anything with it? Arrests for possession weren’t the same thing as being able to set up processing or distribution operations. I paged back to the documents covering Turner’s earliest brushes with the law. The details were sketchy, simply a list of dates and offenses, as well as the names of any other offenders arrested in the incident. But I found what I needed. Because back in his youth, Dale Turner had run with a group that included the man who now went by the name Donnie Starshine.
I set the paperwork down. We needed to find people who knew Turner, maybe even search his home. I needed to talk my way through things, and Rumple seemed uninterested. I paged Ajax, leaving my home number.
When he called back the booming sound of bar music was in the background. Hammer Head’s was having a banner night, and my partner seemed to be planning on closing it out.
“Are you drunk?” I had to ask twice before he heard me over the noise of the crowd.
“No,” he said. “Nope. Not at all . . .” A pause. “Maybe.”
“Wish I was,” I said, then gave him a quick lowdown on Dale Turner’s criminal history. “What did we learn from Lillian Moller?”
“She likes redheads.”
“What else?”
“Well,” Jax considered, “somebody sold Jane snake oil.”
I paced back and forth, holding the body of the phone as I spoke into the receiver. “And who do we know with ties to snake oil in that neighborhood?”
He paused. “Is this . . . Are you quizzing me?”
“No. It’s the woman we—”
“Because I’m good at tests, but I need to prepare a little.”
“No, dammit!” I shifted the receiver. “Think. When we found Jane we interviewed the neighbors.”
“The woman!” he shouted. “With the kid.”
“The kid who knew the dealer at the corner, the kid whose mother was using.”
“I remember her,” he said. “Susan.”
“Sherri.”
“Sherri, right.” He sucked in a breath as though holding back a hiccup. “You’re right.”
“So tomorrow let’s go talk to our friend Sherri and her son.”
He gave an agreeable grunt, and I ended the call with second thoughts already brewing like storm clouds on the horizon. I wasn’t comfortable thinking about my connection to the cobwebs and manna threads, let alone going back to a location where I’d first encountered them. But Jane’s case was more important than my discomfort, and I could only hope that things would turn out okay.
27
I WOKE FRIDAY MORNING FEELING delighted that I could skip NICI training, though my elation drained away when I remembered why I was excused: everyone’s least favorite doctor was going to get her chance to prod and examine us.
By the time I got to the Bunker and made my way to the examination station I figured I’d be one of the last through the door. But once again I was an early arrival. DO Guyer was right behind me.
“Why is it so bright in here?” she croaked. “And can someone get me a water?”
It seemed my colleagues were slightly the worse for wear from the evening at Hammer Head’s. A good portion of my days had been spent hungover, but for once I was the one with an advantage of clarity.
Dr. Baelen walked briskly from station to station, pushing the attendants to move through the standard exams, so that she could get to the real stars of her show: me and Jax.
We only had a few minutes, so I leaned over to where Jax sat on his chair, back reclined, one arm draped over his eyes.
“How’s it going, partner?”
He replied with a grunt, and an irritated wave of his fingers. I decided to take that as an invitation to continue.
“You remember our phone call last night?”
“Yes.” His normally musical voice was a husky monotone.
“So we’re still on for visiting the lady from Ringsridge Road. Make sure you’re awake by then.”
He answered with another grunt, and this time I let him rest. Baelen and her boys were headed over to begin draining our blood.
She started with an interview, asking us to rehash
every detail of the encounter in the alley. I complied, covering for my exhausted partner. But I also noticed that Baelen was far more effusive in her responses and follow-up questions than at our previous exam. Some of that frantic excitement we’d seen the other day at the Bunker must have carried over. And that made me wonder if she’d be open to some questioning of my own.
I waited until she had a slight pause in her interrogation, before volunteering, “I think the guy may have said something about cobwebs. That mean anything to you?”
She jotted notes madly. “Cobwebs? Cobwebs, no . . . but I’ll look into it.”
“Yeah, I think he said he was tingling, like there was something all over him, clinging to his skin. Or under his skin, maybe?”
“Really?” She considered this. “Detective Ajax, do you remember the man’s exact words?”
Oh, Hells . . . I didn’t need to put Jax in the awkward position of defending my lie.
“So tell me, Doc,” I said a little louder, “what are you trying to learn with all the poking and prodding?”
“I doubt you’d be interested in abstract concepts.”
“It relaxes me,” I said.
The doctor directed one of her assistants to begin drawing my blood.
“There is a theory,” she said, “that the word manna is descended from the phrase animus manda, a Barekusean term used to describe a vital world force that connects all things. The words got shortened over time, resulting in ‘manna.’ It may have come from an older phrase in turn.” She let out a burbling sigh. “The Barekusu are extraordinary linguists.”
“But you’re not concerned with language, are you?”
She looked from the syringe and into my eyes. “No.”
“So why do you care about this?”
Baelen turned her attention back to the assistant. “Two more, Charles.” As he moved to comply, she answered my question. “Because this is the first manna discovered outside of a whale.”