Existence Oblivion

by Kai Ellory Viola

  Glass Block

  By

  D Kai Wilson-Viola

  Glass Block Copyright © D Kai Wilson-Viola

  Cover art by Renée Barratt

  http://thecovercounts.com

  Formatting by D Kai Wilson-Viola

  http://indieminions.com/formatting

  With the exception of quotes used in reviews, this book may not be reproduced or used in whole or in part by any means existing without written permission from author.

  Warning: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded or distributed via the Internet or any other means, electronic or print, without the publisher's permission. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000. (http://www.fbi.gov/ipr/). Please purchase only authorized electronic or print editions and do not participate in or encourage the electronic piracy of copyrighted material. Your support of the author's rights is appreciated.

  This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events or locales is purely coincidental. The characters are productions of the author's imagination and used fictitiously.

  DEDICATIONS

  Dear reader. Most of these names won't mean a thing to you, unless you're one of the people listed. You are welcome to skip them, but if you know me, online or off, you might not wanna ;)

  First up though.

  I want to put a special dedication into the book for the Nanowrimo. Without it, the book, the series, the universe would never have been written. So, if you're at a bit of a loose end in November (or April/July for Camp Nanowrimo), wanna meet some people just as crazy about writing as you or want to support up and coming writers, then head on over to http://nanowrimo.org.

  A portion of every sale of EVERY book I've written or will later publish goes to Nanowrimo.

  First and foremost.

  To my beloved, David - without your unwavering belief, clever ideas, encouragement and comfort when it all went pear-shaped, this book would be gathering digital dust. Without your love, I'd be a completely different person, and I hope every day coming is as good as the last - together.

  xxx

  To my children - there's two of you right now, though there may be more in the future. Love you loads. Thanks for putting up with your mom's crazy need to write *everything* down and take photos of stupid stuff ;)

  To Keith - People are lucky to have one best friend. I've got four, and you're one of em. Thank you so much for sending the notes and the part I thought I'd lost. Thanks for talking to me about forensics, and not dying laughing when I said the dumb stuff (tm). Get your book written sunshine ;)

  To Katie-Anne - love you big sis. Thanks for being my unwavering cheerleader - even when I was being an angsty dumbass.

  To Mary Ann - founder of #chartermemberofteamkai, patient, intelligent and funny. I think you, of all people on this list, have been waiting the longest for this book. Tada!

  To Rae and your other half Ben - thanks for listening to the crazies, cheering on the crazies, and encouraging the laughter over said crazies.

  To Valerie - newer to the list of important people, we seem to be one another's shadows for lots of things. Thank you for being either a step in front, a step behind or right beside me - to get your advice, your support and to be one of the first people to get to cheer YOU on.

  To my mother - I dunno what to say, other than thanks. Without everything you did for me as a child, I'd never have loved books enough to want to write one, and without your patient tutelage, I wouldn’t have nearly as much fun with learning, nor be so obsessed with continuing as an adult.

  To my family and my family-in-law - thank you for your unwavering patience, support and funny conversations. And thank you for not looking at me as if I am completely insane when I went hunting for a pen and paper, or said completely random things that made you stop and think that I was mad.

  To all my Nanowrimo participants - thank you for letting me ML, and thank you for cheering me on when I hit crazy word-counts. Here's to many more years of that. And to Nanowrimo HQ itself. Office of Letters and Light will receive 5% of all sales, of all books from now on.

  To Troy, Simon, Zoe, Jack, Sara, KJ, the lecturers at Gloucester University and all of my classmates - Thank you. You know what for, but thank you. My voice only got louder once I did that degree - best four years of my life!

  To all my friends and fans online - Facebook is a blast, sure, but it really does get in the way of writing. Thank you for being the distraction I needed to get the story straight in my head ;).

  Love you loads - thanks for your support, crazy about you all!

  D Kai Wilson-Viola

  April 2015 - Gloucestershire.

  PROLOGUE

  Running. There's plastic grabbing at her – there's too much pulling her back. Her breath burns – she can't feel anything but the dull ache of her hip where she shuddered into the corner of the wall at speed, scraping and scouring her skin as she ran past, the stinging burn mirroring the gulps in her throat. She’d looked at those roughly plastered walls, mimicking bricks, and made a joke that they looked so delicate she’d fall through them. She hadn’t.

  She’d hit one at speed, when she felt a whisper of air on her neck. This was her third solo run through, and she knew that the others were watching. She thought they were. She’d come out of her room reluctantly this time, the klaxon startling her awake. Five minutes from klaxon to leaving, or she forfeited any of the profits she’d been promised this would create.

  Just one crazy night. She’d been told it would be only one night of jovial fear – the type that isn’t real, that you can fake. But this was getting too real, too scary. She was sure the intervals were shortening too.

  So, she’d left her room reluctantly, and as she did, the pass wall behind her formed red. As soon as she’d run, it had switched to the other side of the rudimentary maze, creating no option but to push on. She’d shot through band one – down the stairs, end of the corridor, the first room easy to key open and easier still to cross. There were some pieces of furniture in there, misshapen and hidden under the plastic coverings. And then…the lights went out.

  She heard him laughing, and she looked back over her shoulder. Something slapped against her face, the edge making a slurping, licking sound and she screamed again, her raw throat letting out a squeaking hiss. She swallowed, turning to see what was caressing her face before her feet slid out from under her. She fell under the ribbons of plastic, landing in a pool of coppery, viscous material. Small lumps squished and squeaked under her hands, splattering away from her in a corona of filth. It was dark down here, a slight dip in the floor. And in that dip was a puddle of sticky, stinking fluid.

  A rustle behind her made her yelp and scoot back into a lumpy, damp pile of rags and other detritus. And then she felt a bulge, like a nose. She screamed, and the room echoed. There was a laugh from somewhere off to the other side of her, from the opposite direction she’d come from. She froze, listening for any more noises, gulping breaths while wiping her hands. Her breathing sounded like a chainsaw in the echo chamber room. Carefully she backed away from the tendrils of plastic, crawling cautiously backwards, expecting something to drop any minute.

  Nothing happened.

  Slowly, she regained her feet, backing away from the room that she’d nearly entered, back into the bigger open plan area between the rooms. She felt exposed; her skin crawled as she slowly moved away, looking for another open room. The doors were on a timer, and the two either side were lined in red. She couldn’t see any green at all. Slowing her
breathing, she looked around slowly, unable to see much in the gloom

  She screamed, her breath whistling out of her throat almost as fast as she sucked it in. Eyes adjusting to the dark, she could see a shape moving towards her, accompanied by a rhythmic snapping...

  Above her, in the dark, a camera whirred...

  CHAPTER ONE

  The room held hushed portents. Kinetic potential that expressed itself in rape, murder, the restraint offered to criminals and police officers. There was a musty, sharp, almost acrid smell of over-brewed coffee and overused coffee grinds. Overlaid was sweat–it was high summer and the air conditioning had stopped working again. While the heat shimmered down the street outside, inside the ghosts of unsolved cases flickered across every detective's mind.

  'Death Wall A' was Elliot's desk, and he shared with no one. The sloppy slurry of paperwork that moved, scum-like across the surface, appeared to be still but only because whenever he cleared a portion, more miraculously appeared. Other policemen managed to file their work – Elliot was lucky that they were still in the right files. But when push came to flutter, he could grab anything out of the slurried mass and it would, invariably be right. The tingle wasn't completely tech either - he had this instinct that told him where something was. Like picking 'death' from a tarot deck.

  Elliot had often worked out that the paperwork he needed was always right within fingertip's reach, and so, his desk stayed the way it was. And as it was against the main wall, the piles were at least propped.

  He only moved - vacated the room entirely - when the ‘Death Wall’ above it was being used. Then, his desk and his space was used as a projection area - the images flashing across the murder wall for a once a month presentation on *the* case that everyone needed to pay attention to. There was only so much deference afforded to each detective - at some point they had to bow to their masters, the cases. So those days, Elliot would slink away, and keep working on his stuff, in a quietly cordoned off area with more old guard. Boxes would appear and carefully file his work in crime-scene accurate piles, before returning it when they were done.

  It was never his cases on the CORETEX presentations. He'd stopped caring years ago; his cases didn't rank that kind of attention. After a while, he'd deliberately started taking the ones that didn't get as much air time, or weren't as important.

  CORETEX - the core system that ran the city - was a data bank, first and foremost. As with everyone else's ideals and ideas, the system was used to support the tracking and monitoring of criminals, which was added much later, with much ceremony. Crimes could be analyzed, tied to areas, to gangs, to patterns with ease - saving the police for the never-ending job of prosecution, and lately, not getting to the criminals because their tech wasn’t against the law. And the law lagged so far behind now that it seemed like it would never catch up. Newer police officers were indoctrinated to CORETEX - not as an external interface, but as an ever watching, ever on-camera that documented, recorded and fed back information via their COREPORTS. Older officers who resisted fitting COREPORTS were sharply and subtly punished.

  As it stood, Elliot was one of the last few without an active COREPORT. He had the hardware, but refused to let them switch him to always on. He - like most of the senior officers - could disconnect. But they were the last set that could. The officers with less seniority than him were left with no option and had to log on and acquiesce, or leave the job. Which left the younger officers as always on duty, in some ways. An ever vigilant police force. But, as CORE was rolling out all over, they weren't as conspicuous as they once were. It used to be that off duty policemen, if discovered, were attacked, or worse. Now, CORE was everywhere – even tied into the CCTV.

  "Detective Peters?" A low, silken voice carried across the bullpen and as it traveled, silence followed in its wake. He jerked, guilty, bumped out of his reverie. The room had stilled, all eyes on him and he could feel the sullen blush of annoyance rising. He turned to meet the gaze of Cassidy Marques - shift Captain and Elliot's direct superior. He affixed a half smile to his face and rose smoothly, as if his chair didn't squeak and creak like old bones holding a rickety bridge. That always ruined the effect of course, but Elliot didn't care. He lowered his head slightly, the half-smile on his face sardonic and annoyed. It wasn't as if he minded, but...He needed a change of pace. Between mandatory psych appointments and desk duty, he was really beginning to feel his love for the force bundle itself away like a perp chucked into the back of a police van.

  Captain Marques wasn't smiling. She rarely did. Today she seemed rendered in a wax mask of annoyance – skin pale and tight. Even across the bullpen, Elliot could see that she was fighting hard against something. He crossed, passing in front of the cubicle doors, behind which Tark and the others sat, eyeing him with elements of guilt, annoyance and in Tark’s case, delight. It was like being called to the Headmaster’s room. Finally, he crossed the whole of the floor - he could feel each set of eyes lock onto his back, the tingle moving through his skin as he passed them and settling under his shoulder blades in a tight tingle.

  "Yes, ma'am?" Elliot said, as he reached her, putting his hands in his pockets.

  "My office please," she said, voice slightly softer. She relaxed a little bit - her arms were at her side, instead of crossed across her stomach, and the tone was matriarchal and slightly smoother. She tilted her body towards her office, moving towards the door, but Elliot moved faster, holding the door above her head with one hand, waiting for her to enter.

  All around the Maypole, hold a hand for shelter, he thought, Harper’s odd rhymes slinking in, unbidden. He’d recited them often when he talked of home. He paused – the last time he’d done this, he’d been briefed on the attack that had pensioned his younger friend off Precinct 1. It was an odd, disjointed thought, and felt like it had been pushed when he touched the door. He blinked a couple of times, then moved his weight slightly, as Captain Marques passed under his arm with a brief, almost annoyed glance.

  “Gallant as ever, Senior Peters,” she said. He entered after, pulling the door shut, before standing, respectfully before her desk. Not quite to attention, but not exactly slouching either. It was just a touch indolent though.

  With a sigh and a shake of her head, she traveled around the side of her desk, then gestured, almost sardonically to the seat, and he sat down, straightening his rumpled shirt and picking his tie out of his belt, then tried to straighten himself. One shoulder protested, and he realized he'd been sitting hunched and hog-tied with his tie in his trousers and he hadn't even noticed.

  As he fussed and rearranged himself, and she sank into her seat, relaxing just slightly for a second. Elliot smiled slightly, one corner of his mouth turning up in a soft tick.

  "How are you Detective Peters?" she said. Her neutral, soft voice held a hint of annoyance – the buzz of a mosquito under the edge of her pleasantries. Elliot frowned, eyes drawing together. The tone was definitely at odds with what he’d expected when she’d greeted him by the door. He looked up into her eyes – they seemed to be clouded and bloodshot, as if she were tired. He noted her makeup wasn’t quite right – the skin beneath too pale. Marques had always been wired tight, but with all of the issues and changes in the department, he wondered if she was under more stress than she was letting on.

  "I'm fine...ma'am is there..." he said, finally, voice trailing off as she looked him over. Elliot winced, knowing what she saw.

  The unkempt suit was rumpled, which wasn't unusual for a detective - though the stains were a bit difficult to ignore. The tie was sky blue, unstained, pristine, and definitely at odds with the practically threadbare suit which had seen better days, two bodies before Elliot had acquired it. He'd really slipped in the last six months – understandably on some levels, but he could see her wondering if he was just limping along and there would be another crime scene at his house – policeman down, self-inflicted wounds. She drew a shuddering breath, clearing that image from her mind and shook her head.

&n
bsp; "No problem Elliot. Tell me, honestly, how are you?" she said.

  He shrugged. "Same old, same old."

  He could see the ‘not true’ pass across her face, but she had the good grace to cover it and said, "If you wanna play it that way, why aren't you attending..."

  He knew what she was going to say. He knew it before she continued. Mandatory Psych. He wasn’t attending, and though that was technically against the rules, he had a reason. It didn’t help that his reason was ‘I don’t need it’. And when it came to Elliot, it might not be his choice, but he still defended his right to make it stubbornly.

  “Don’t Cassidy,” he said, and she blinked.

  “I am Captain Marques, Elliot. And I ordered you to attend nine psych appointments over the course of the last month and you managed,” she flicked the paperwork in front of her, turning to the fourth page, “once.”

  “That’s right,” he said. She raised her eyes, looking at him impassively, and he continued, “I didn’t feel I’d gelled with the psychiatrist.”

  “Bullshit,” Cassidy said. There was high colour on her cheeks, the confrontation inevitable, and in a flash of shame, Elliot knew he’d pushed too hard.

  "Right hang on," Elliot said, anger crossing his face in a flicker, a train shattering through a crossing. "I did the ONE mandatory psych evaluation, which decided I was duty fit. I was recommend counseling. I turned it down. I do not need to tell people how I feel, nor work out which the 'deep-seated' reason is that I feel it, now do I?" he asked.

  “Nine Elliot, is a bit far from single,” she said. His face coloured the brick red flush rising as he stared her down. The silence between them sizzled with unspoken words – recriminations and duty firing the air like shattering clay pots.

  Finally, she broke the stare and reached down, picking up a folder, before looking at it reflectively for a minute. “Let’s table that for now,” she said, handing the folder – blue, banded in black, with some sort of logo on it, across the table.