by K. C. Finn
Kendra turns to face Cae in a feeble attempt to mask her disgust. “Sure,” she says quietly. “This is real fun. Makes me think I ought to get out more.”
A flag rushes up behind where Cae is standing, and suddenly a crowd comes out of nowhere to gather round them. The pair are rotated in the throng, forced to the front of a baby blue stall where a woman with no hair beckons them.
“Acids my dears!” The woman speaks with an off-putting serenity in her dreamlike voice. “Sulphuric, Demi-Sulphuric, Vitreous and Aqueous varieties. Phosphoric 100% Strength. Nitric special price, today only!” The strange woman’s hazel eyes fall on Caecilius. “And you my dear? What’s your poison?”
“Just looking,” he answers, but his usually deep voice is broken. Cae’s eyes are hard focused on a bright green jar bubbling at the front of the stall.
“There must be something I can tempt you with,” says the woman eagerly, pushing back the fistfuls of money from her other potential clients. She follows Cae’s gaze to the simmering substance, and Kendra feels her own blood rising at the woman’s particular interest in the detective.
“What is that?” Cae asks shakily. “That one there?” He points a gloved finger at the glowing jar.
“That’s HCX, my lamb,” says the woman, her grisly mouth widening into a smile. “Very expensive taste you’ve got there. But its effects are quite something to witness.”
Kendra doesn’t like the way the woman’s closing in, and she can see Cae’s bright blue eyes watering. In a sudden movement she grabs him by the shoulder and pulls him away. The creepy bald woman stares at her, aghast.
“He can’t afford it,” she explains, pushing him out of the crowd.
They move into a section full of guns and grenades where there is a lull in the shouting calls of sellers. Cae shakes himself and lets a heavy breath out into his mask that fills the mouthpiece with condensation. He wrestles himself out of Kendra’s grip.
“What was that?” She asks. “So much for staying cool.”
“I was being interested,” Cae answers all too quickly.
“Why?” Kendra bites back.
“I’ve seen that green stuff before,” he replies. “In a crime I didn’t solve.”
“One crime at a time, Cae, for pity’s sake,” Kendra says, and Cae suddenly notices the stress in her brow. He realises, perhaps for the first time ever since he’s known her, that she is worried.
But at that moment a bugle sounds from the furthest end of the market, and a huge yellow banner bearing the words CHEMICAL TRADERS is lifted. The masses of criminals rush toward it. A voice booms out of a microphone when the bugle echo has died.
“Chemical Traders open! Chemical Traders open! Today’s specials are FORGET, REMORSE, HOPE, PAIN and DEATH!”
14.
“Death?” Kendra says under her breath. “Oh sure, I feel like taking a little drop of DEATH today, don’t you?”
She and Cae are at the back of a very large crowd, waiting to reach the traders at the front.
“I would suggest,” answers Cae as he is shoved further forward by the increasingly large mass behind him. “That DEATH is a substance one would give to other people.”
“What do you do, put a spoonful in their coffee?” She replies.
“That works,” says a suited man behind her. “But it’s getting them to stay dead afterwards that’s the trick.”
Cae is heavily disturbed by the pleasant and calm tone of the man, but he doesn’t have time to judge. “This stuff wears off pretty fast, then?” He asks.
“An hour for every five grams,” answers the man, “it takes about sixty grams to make sure they’re actually dead.”
“Thanks for the tip,” says Cae.
“Any time,” the cheerful murderer replies with a smile.
As they near the front of the stall the effects of the various powders on sale become more and more apparent. A very short man barges past Kendra forcefully, clutching a bottle of POWERFUL. Two young women float past absently after him, sharing out powder-bags full of FORGET. Rather worryingly, several people pass by with dark looks and copious handfuls of FEAR, PAIN and DEATH. Cae makes a silent note to himself to review the mysterious poisonings of last September with Damian when he gets back to work.
“It’s not all bad, you know,” says a young girl dressed in rags when she passes Kendra. “Some things in life are good.” Kendra gives her a sad look, catching sight of a carton of HOPE big enough for a whole family.
Cae suddenly sees how easy it might have been for Brooks to get hooked into this place. If these drugs really do what they say, then one taste of BLISS or JOY would never be enough. The detective observes the pricings and quantities when he gets close enough to the front. The happiest emotions are extortionately priced, as are the opposite extremes. DEATH is the most expensive, closely followed by LOVE, which is apparently sold out until February.
A moment later he and Kendra reach the front. A young girl in a lab coat and a brilliant white gasmask looks them up and down.
“What can I get you?” Asks the girl, holding what looks like a scoop for confectionary.
“We’re looking for LIFT,” Cae says loudly over the other customers.
“LIFT?” She repeats, and Cae and Kendra both nod. “You need Physical Traders; they’re at the building.”
“Then where can I find the building?” Cae asks, an eagerness consuming him.
“You’ve got serious money right? The Physical stuff’s much dearer than this.” The girl’s eyes travel between them, and they are not as unkind as one would imagine for a dealer.
“We’ve got money alright,” Cae says.
The girl leans over the counter of the huge stall, pointing down through a gap in the row. “You see that green light?” She questions. Cae and Kendra follow her pointing finger to a faint green ball of light about a five minute walk away.
“Uh-huh?” Kendra says.
“Follow it,” the girl replies. “There should be four altogether. They’ll lead you to the building. Ask for Leroy.”
Cae thanks the girl, and then realises he probably shouldn’t have been so polite. He and Kendra skulk away from the Chemical Traders quickly, out into the deserted sand path leading to the first green light. When they are out of earshot of the throng of criminal customers, Kendra checks herself carefully.
“How many guns are you packing?” She asks, hands reaching to her ankles, cuffs and chest as she walks.
“Two,” Cae replies, “and a knife. But I think everyone here is going to be loaded up. It might not be much use to us.”
“Right,” Kendra agrees sadly. “Who needs a gun when they can just fill you up with instant DEATH in its handy power format?”
“That’s really thrown you, hasn’t it?” Cae questions, starting to feel a little sad that he has dragged Kendra into his dangerous life.
But then Kendra laughs her deep laugh. “Let’s just say I won’t be letting anyone else prepare my coffee from now on,” she says.
The four green lights lead to the building, and a man stands outside shovelling a plastic tube of powder into his mouth. When Cae is close enough to speak to him, he sees the tube is labelled RESISTANCE.
“We’re looking for Leroy,” he says, “Physical Traders?”
The man just nods and stands aside. He offers no directions, so the detective and the soldier step cautiously into the dark space beyond the doorway. It is not a building, in fact, but the concrete shell of one that is yet to be finished. There is no clean air and no fan in operation inside, so the usual thick smog permeates the large, cavernous spaces, and now and then a concrete pillar comes out of nowhere as they walk around.
A sign for Physical Traders is lit in neon yellow in one corner of the place. As they near the sign a man with a dark beard and no hair on his head comes to stand behind the desk.
“You must be Leroy,” Cae says with a curt nod.
Leroy looks down at his nails casually.
“And you
must be Detective Rex.”
15.
Of course, by the time you realise that something is a trap, you’re usually already in it. This occasion is no exception to that rule. But one of the perks of working in a hazardous profession, such as the Special Brigade, is the propensity to always be ready for the unexpected.
Before Caecilius can unholster his first gun, Kendra has floored an assailant that came out of the smog behind him. She kicks Leroy in the face and they run from the sound of distant gunshots with no visible source. Tearing away blindly in the toxic smoke, Caecilius runs shin-first into a concrete staircase, which they then proceed to climb.
At the top is a corridor that is brightly lit, fluorescent bulbs cutting through the smog enough to tell them that it’s empty. They hurry along it, Kendra at the back, pointing pistols in both directions.
“Somebody rumbled us,” Cae says with hardly any breath.
“You’re really unfit for twenty five,” is Kendra’s answer.
At the terminus of the corridor is another hall with a series of doors. At one end an opening in the shell-like wall lets in a blast of sunlight.
“Jump and run,” Kendra orders, heading for the gap. “The sand’ll break our fall.”
Cae follows, but as they reach the end of the hall the sound of crying catches his ear. He casts a look into an open doorway, where a teenage boy is lying on the floor.
“Help me,” the boy sobs. “Oh God somebody please help me…”
Cae stops in his tracks, and Kendra rushes back to him.
“We don’t have time for this!” Kendra says in a strained voice.
“They’ve haven’t found us yet,” Cae answers, listening hard for the sound of footsteps. There is only the sobbing of the boy, muted by his ill-fitting mask.
“Carrying a casualty will slow us down!” Kendra cries.
“Please,” says the boy, louder this time. He looks to the source of their voices, his eyes large and blue and tearful. “Please don’t leave me here.”
Cae dives into the room at that. “I can’t abandon him,” he says.
Kendra follows swiftly and they stand at the boy’s head and feet. They take a hold of him together and pull, but nothing happens. He is impossible to lift, inexplicably heavy.
“Please, please,” he begs, “find a way. Please oh please, oh God, oh please.”
It’s then that Caecilius looks down to a horribly familiar little bottle next to the boy’s stomach. He picks it up in his gloved fingers and reveres the label. The boy is chock full of GRAVITY.
Cae struggles for a moment with his conscience, because he knows of no way to fix the poor boy. But a second more and it doesn’t matter, because the huge man from the front of the building steps into the doorway.
Kendra races for him at once with a flying kick, but when her powerful steel boot smashes into his chest, the man doesn’t even flinch. Kendra flies backwards at the reversal of her own strength, giving out a cry of pain. Her guns fly loose and are swiftly scooped up by three men who enter from another unseen door.
They point Kendra’s pistols and their own guns at Cae, who drops his weapon with a terrified reluctance. One of the men, who Cae now realises is Leroy, comes forward and grabs him around the chest, fishing out his other gun. He pats down his legs quickly for more weapons, but finds nothing. The same thing happens to Kendra at the other side of the room, but she has a gun straight to her temple the whole time. These men are smart; they know she is a far more dangerous foe.
Leroy throws Cae across the room until he is on the floor with Kendra. He catches the blue eyes of the young boy, who is crying silently, watching the scene with fear. The shortest of the three men holds out two powder-packets to Cae and Kendra. The scrawled label reads KNOCKOUT.
“If you’d oblige us, detective,” says Leroy, “You’ll be less trouble to transport this way.”
Cae mirrors Kendra’s movements as they reach out slowly for the packets. When they have taken them, the short man rips off Kendra’s gasmask sharply, followed by Cae’s own. He gasps in the acrid air, the smell of it filling him to the brim with bile and toxicity.
“Only one way to get these back,” Leroy taunts.
Cae and Kendra look to one another, knowing that every one of these aching, sickly breaths will poison them more. They share an important look, and hear the cocking of six or seven guns around them. The same thought passes through both their minds. There is no choice. They can only wait and see what happens after.
Cae tips the powder into his mouth, tasting a bitter edge of salt and heat, and a moment later there is nothing.
16.
The detective wakes to the sight of Kendra opposite him, unmasked and tied to a chair. Her face is badly bruised but she is awake, and the relief in her brown eyes is clear enough when she sees that he is too. He tries to move, but he too is tied down to his little wooden seat. Cae inhales a suspicious breath of clean air, and takes a moment to look around.
It looks like a casino, albeit not a glamorous one. There are card tables that look well used, a large spinning wheel emblazoned with various cash prizes, some electronic bandit machines that have seen better days. And there are the three men from before emerging from a private room at the back.
They say nothing as they come to stand beside Kendra, and Cae watches them fearfully. Kendra’s face is level and calculated - the epitome of a prisoner of war. This is his fault. She should never have been here.
“Caecilius Rex,” says a voice from behind him. “Well it sure is nice to meet you, detective.”
The voice belongs to the man who rounds Cae’s chair. He wears a tailored suit and has a small, black beard in a triangular shape. Cae recognises him at once as Jack Lacroix, a drug dealer from years gone by, well before his time with the police had ever started.
“Wish I could say the same,” Cae answers calmly.
One of the three men punches Kendra soundly in the gut. Cae looks on in horror, but Kendra bites her lip, hardly reacting, steeling herself.
“None of your cheek,” says Jack. “Or, as you can see, your associate will suffer in your place.”
Cae speaks again in a smaller voice. “What do you want, Jack?”
The dealer chuckles. “The big fat payoff for ending you,” he says viciously. “There’s a big price on your head, Rex. Someone wants you gone real bad. And they tipped me off that you’d be here.”
Kendra stirs with a deep breath.
“You were right,” she whispers calmly. “It is about money.”
“So what about Brooks?” Cae asks, his steely eyes turning to Jack again. “Did you kill him too?”
Jack gives a happy little nod.
“Sprat to catch a mackerel,” he explains with a tidy wave of his hand. “And didn’t it work like a charm?”
The pieces come together slowly, and Cae knows now that the whole thing is a set up. A set up that ends with him dying.
“You don’t need the girl,” he says to Jack sharply. “If I’m going to die, then she’s not important. Let her go.”
But Jack shakes his pointy face with a grin. “That’s not any fun,” he says. “And I’m on strict instructions to enjoy myself.”
Cae suddenly realises that Leroy is missing, only to see him re-emerge a moment later. He is holding a small video camera; he points it into Cae’s face with gusto.
“It doesn’t make for a good show otherwise,” Jack continues gleefully.
Another of the men approaches Cae with a silver teaspoon, upon which a few grams of shining powder sits.
“First, a little PAIN,” says Jack, and the man forces the powder into Cae’s mouth, contorting his face violently to make him swallow it.
In the seconds that follow the sensation is unreal. A searing, burning agony shoots through Cae’s veins, entering him at his fingertips and rocketing into his heart. He cries out uncontrollably, thrashing against his chair, the drug robbing him of dignity as the tears explode from his eyes. Through the blur a
nd the ache and the stabbing sensations, he sees Kendra watching, her brown eyes wide with fear.
He wants it to end for a moment, by any means necessary, and then he wonders if this is what they intended. For him to beg for his death. As he foams at the mouth he catches a glimpse of the camera again, forcing its way right up into his eyes. The drug hurts him deep, like a thousand knives cutting into every organ, but something stirs inside him. He has felt like this once before. He was weak then.
But not now.
“That’s all you’ve got?” He asks in a splutter. “Pathetic,” he spits.
The camera falls away. A minute of hell and agony passes, but Cae forces his mouth shut, not daring to look up at Kendra. His body spasms at the impact of the chemical, rocking against the hard chair. But he will endure it, if it’s the last thing he ever does.
But then it is fading, and the pain is still there, but considerably less.
“I quite agree,” says Jack. “A gram and a half is hardly worth spending on you. But it was fun while it lasted.”
Cae shakes the tears of pain from his blue eyes, only to refocus on a huge bucket of powder being carried over. As you might expect, the label on this one reads DEATH. Leroy and the short man are hauling it in from the private room. The other man now has the camera.
“Now for some real suffering!” Jack exclaims like an excited schoolboy.
Cae feels his heart slamming through his chest.
“Do your worst,” he says bravely as the bucket comes nearer.
Jack smiles at him. “As you wish.”
But the bucket stops short of where Cae is bound, landing instead at Kendra’s chair. She looks across to the powder, and back at Cae, but her eyes are not wide or tearful.
“No!” He shouts suddenly, and the camera comes closer to him again. “NO!”
Kendra gives him a lopsided wink, and his heart feels like it has stopped altogether. He watches the scene in silent horror, as though all the sound has drained out of the world. The way they force the powder down her throat, loading her mouth as she struggles. They keep going long after she has slumped in the chair, until her corpse is drooling a white paste as it hangs against the chair-back.