15

It was always hard dealing with the regular police and the Arcane Commission at the same time. Technically, the Reds were just a special division of the regular force, the way Cryptobiological Containment and Rescue Service was a subdivision of Animal Control. There were liaisons between the departments meant to keep things running smoothly between the cognizants and incogs. But it complicated things when both were involved. Reports had to be filed for both offices, doubling the paperwork. All the magical details only confused the Blues, who were eventually happy to pass Monster off to the Reds, where he gave his statement again to a commission detective.

Detective York had an angular body and a face that was mostly beard and eyebrows. He looked over Monster’s statement from across a desk.

“And what’s your relationship with Miss Hines, again?” asked the detective.

“Friends,” said Monster.

“And why were you visiting at her sister’s house?”

“Because of the gaborchends,” said Monster.

“Yes, the gaborchends,” said the cop. “The gaborchends Judy Hines was somehow responsible for.”

“Somehow,” agreed Monster. “I know that it doesn’t make sense, but I’ve got a bag full of transmogrified goat cryptos to prove that I’m not making that up.”

“Mmm-hmm,” said York.

“I’ve got witnesses. Those two people at the Oak Pines apartments. One’s an angel, so she should be trustworthy. And my assistant, Chester.”

“Yes, we’ll look into that,” said the detective noncommitally. “By the way, the clerks in Otherworld Immigration tell me they’re having trouble locating the gnome’s nonresident work permit.”

“I have a copy at home. In my sock drawer.”

“Not my department,” said York. “You’ll have to take it up with them. Have you ever seen the persons who abducted Judy Hines before?”

“No.”

“And they said their names were Ed and Ferdinand.”

“Yes.”

“Did Miss Hines seem to know them?”

“No.”

Detective York clicked his tongue against his teeth as he read the report again.

“Okay, Mr. Dionysus. I’m going to need you to look at some mug shots, maybe get with a sketch artist.”

“Whatever. Can we just hurry this up? I’d really like to get home.”

York fixed him with a quiet stare. “I take it you aren’t worried about Miss Hines then.”

Monster said, “It’s not like we were close friends. More like casual acquaintances. Honestly, I didn’t even like her.”

York took out his pen and wrote something on the report.

“What are you writing?” said Monster.

“Oh, nothing important.”

York clicked his pen several times, then scribbled something else. He pushed his chair away from the table and exited.

When he was halfway out the door, Monster blurted, “I never said I wanted her hurt. She’s not a bad person. We just don’t get along.”

“It won’t be much longer, Mr. Dionysus.” York closed the door, and Monster heard his clicking pen all the way down the hall.

Monster glanced around the small room. The cheap table and uncomfortable chairs, the bars on the tiny windows, the large mirror along one wall. This was an interrogation room.

“Oh, hell.”

He closed his eyes and wished he could just stay invisible permanently.

The door opened. It wasn’t Detective York coming to arrest him, much to Monster’s surprise. It was another cop with a couple of thick mug shot books. She dropped them on the table and they landed with a thud.

“All these?” he asked.

“That’s what the detective said.”

“Can I at least get some coffee or something?” he asked. “I’m not used to being awake right now. I work nights.”

She passed an indifferent glance over him, not bothering to look him in the eye. “I’ll check back in about an hour.”

As she was leaving, Chester stepped inside the room. “They wanted me to take a look at some mug shots.”

She jerked her thumb toward the table and exited. There was an extra click when she shut the door, as if maybe she’d locked it. He slid one of the books across the table as Chester took a seat.

“How’s it going, boss?” he asked.

“Not too good,” said Monster. “I think I just incriminated myself.” He imagined Detective York sitting behind the glass. Monster tried not to look at the mirror. “Even though I’m completely innocent. It’s not against the law to not get along with someone, is it?”

They passed the next twenty minutes flipping through the books. Monster closed his with a slam.

“Well, that was a waste of time. Did you spot them in your book?”

“Sorry.”

Monster slumped forward, putting his head on the table. “Now they’ll definitely think I had something to do with it.”

“You can’t blame them for being suspicious,” said Chester.

“Sure, I can.” Monster stood and put his hands up to the glass. “Are we done here? Can I go home yet?”

“It might not be a great idea to antagonize the cops,” said Chester.

Monster was too tired to care.

“Why do you think those women abducted her?” asked Chester.

“I really don’t know. Doesn’t your spider-sense tell you anything?”

“I’m out of my depth,” admitted Chester. “I got nothing.”

“This is probably all just a coincidence,” said Monster, though even he was beginning to doubt that. He only told himself that because he was trying to stay out of this mess, whatever it was.

“You don’t think they’d hurt her, do you?”

“How should I know?”

Monster sat and drummed his fingers on the desk.

“Okay, let’s assume there is something going on,” he said. “It doesn’t really have anything to do with me anymore.”

“This isn’t just about you.”

Monster sighed. “Okay. Point taken. But I can’t really do anything about Judy. I’m not a cop or anything.”

The door opened and Detective York entered the room. He slid a form in front of Monster and Chester. “Sign these.”

Before putting his signature on his, Monster read it just to be sure it wasn’t a confession.

“You’re free to go, Mr. Dionysus,” said York. “I’m afraid they impounded your… car.”

Monster forced a smile. “Of course.”

“And, Mr. Dionysus”—York paused very deliberately as he glanced over the statement with a frown—“please don’t leave town. We might have further… questions.”

Monster’s smile dropped. “Yes, sir.”

He walked very briskly out of the police station with Chester perched on his shoulder. He found a bus stop bench and sat there, staring at his phone doll, trying to decide if he should call Liz or a cab.

He brushed away the blackened flakes, pieces of Chester’s scorched body, clinging to his shirt.

“Excuse me,” said a vaguely familiar voice. “Are you Monster?”

He glanced up at Greta. “No, I think you’ve gotten me confused with someone else.”

“Another golden man?” she asked.

“There are more of us out there than most people realize.”

A confused look crossed her face. The origami parrot on his shoulder should’ve been a dead giveaway, but it wasn’t hard to throw light cognizants.

“I’m sorry to bother you, sir,” she said softly.

“No problem. Happens all the time.”

She walked away.

“That’s not right,” said Chester.

“I don’t pay you to be my conscience, Jiminy,” said Monster.

“Just consider it a free service. This can’t be easy on her. She knows something has happened to her sister, but she doesn’t really get it. You know how the Reds are. They don’t bother explaining things to incogs. They just give them a plausible cover story and send them on their way.”

“Yeah, I know, but I don’t see how it’s my problem.”

“That kind of self-serving attitude is at least partially responsible for getting you into trouble. Who knows? If you’d handled Judy with more delicacy…”

“Karma, huh.”

“Karma is just a philosophical construct, a rather simplistic punishment/reward theory that satisfies your egocentric perception of your universe.”

“I was just about to say that.”

“You can dismiss my observation with levity—”

“I just did.”

“—or you can show some basic consideration and human compassion. Notice I join the terms human and compassion without irony, which isn’t always easy.”

Greta stood on the corner, waiting for the crosswalk light to change. Monster told himself the best thing he could do was stay away from her, allowing her to settle back into her comfortable obliviousness, but that wasn’t really an option. Just like her sister, Greta was obviously a light cognizant. If she’d been a full incog, then she’d be able to rationalize the magic she couldn’t accept. And if she’d been a cog, she could’ve dealt with it at face value. But, being light cog, she was stuck in a rough middle ground.

“Oh, hell.”

Monster reluctantly ran after her. He reached her just before the light changed.

“I know your sister. I was there when they took her, and I guess I kind of blew up your house.”

“My house,” she said distantly. “Oh my God, my house.”

“Now, that really wasn’t my fault…”

Greta looked through her purse. “I need to call my husband and daughter, let them know about the, uh, the thing.”

“Exploding hydra,” said Monster.

She paused and tried to absorb the idea.

“Crap. I don’t have my cell.”

“Here. You can use mine.” Monster offered his phone doll but pulled it back just as she reached for it. “It’s a local call, right?”

Chester cleared his throat.

“What? The out-of-state charges on this thing are ridiculous.”

“Monster—”

“Fine.” He handed her the doll. “But I don’t see how inflating my phone bill is going to make up for her house. Two wrongs don’t make a right.”

“Thank you,” said Greta.

She stared at the doll a moment.

“I have no idea how to use this.”

They found a coffee shop around the corner, and after Greta reluctantly accepted a clarity rune Post-it on her forehead, Monster gave her a rundown of the past two days.

“Wow,” said Greta. “It’s true, then. All of it.”

“Yes, magic is real,” said Monster.

“Not that,” said Greta. “That’s a little odd, but I can deal with it. No, I meant all the weird things in Judy’s past.”

“What weird things?” asked Chester.

“Just… weirdness in general. She always had strange things happen to her, things that didn’t quite make sense, that she couldn’t explain. No one in the family talks about it much. We just assumed she was hiding the truth. Turns out all this time, the truth was hiding from her.”

“Something like that,” said Monster.

“You’re telling us this has happened a lot in the past?” asked Chester.

“I don’t know,” said Greta. “I’m still trying to adjust to the idea, but yes, I think so. Judy has always been the screwup in the family. When she was younger, she was arrested a handful of times. Mostly vandalism, destruction of private property, some minor arson, things like that. Once, the cops were pretty sure she’d smashed a car that belonged to her ex-boyfriend. They couldn’t really prove it, though.”

“How long have these incidents been happening?” asked Chester.

“They came and went. She’d be fine for a few years, then suddenly there’d be a new round of them for a few months. We were sure she was bipolar or something. Even sent her to a few psychiatrists, but all the doctors agreed that she didn’t exhibit any symptoms. Eventually we gave up and tried to ride out the rough times.”

Greta sipped her coffee. “Damn. I always gave her a hard time about all her screwups. I never believed her when she said it wasn’t her fault.”

“You can’t blame yourself,” said Monster. “It’s just how it is. Even if she had been able to explain, you wouldn’t have been able to understand.”

“But I still feel bad about it. She must have been having a rough time. One time, we thought she’d dug up the backyard. I mean, dug it all up. There was a hole at least twenty feet wide and fifteen feet deep. And she’s standing there, covered head to toe in dirt, and Dad starts yelling at her for doing it. But she couldn’t have done it, could she? Not in less than an hour. Not without a backhoe. How could we think she was responsible for that?”

“Because it was easier to believe than the alternative,” said Monster.

“I guess.” She pressed the Post-it to her forehead. “I think this is giving me a headache. Is that normal?”

“Perfectly,” said Monster. “Nothing to worry about.”

Greta rubbed her fingers along her temple to soothe the ache. “Does this happen a lot? If magic is real and most of us can’t see it, wouldn’t this be happening to people all the time?”

“Not really,” said Monster. “There’s not that much magic around. Not anymore. It’s not uncommon for people to run across it once or twice a day, but it usually falls under the category of ignorable incidents. Incogs don’t talk about it, don’t deal with it, and just work around it when they have no other choice. It’s not often a conflict, just a few minutes a day that they conveniently push to the back of their minds and don’t think about, writing incidents off as daydreams or something they read in a book or saw in a movie. That’s the haze. That’s how it works.”

“Why does this keep happening to Judy?” asked Greta. “Is she some kind of monster magnet?”

“We don’t really know,” said Chester. “If there is such a thing, we’ve never heard of it.”

“What do we do?” asked Greta.

Monster shrugged. “We don’t do anything. There’s nothing to do. We let the Reds handle it.”

“That’s it?”

“Yep, that’s it.”

“You don’t think they wanted to hurt her, do you?”

“How would I—”

Chester kicked Monster under the table.

Monster offered his most reassuring smile. “I mean, I’m sure it’ll be fine. Your sister can take pretty good care of herself. Trust me.”

Greta politely smiled back. “Do you know what I find most disturbing about this? It’s how unreal it seems, even now. I still can’t wrap my head around it. I know I should be really worried about Judy, but it’s all too unbelievable.”

“I’m afraid the rune can only help you recognize magic,” said Chester. “It can’t make it more acceptable to your underdeveloped brain. There’s really not a way around that.”

“What if they never find Judy? What if I never see her again? How will I even remember what happened to her without this stuck to my head?”

Monster and Chester hesitated.

“What will happen?” she asked more insistently.

“You aren’t going to like the answer,” said Monster.

“Tell me, damn it!”

“Those incidents that are harder to ignore usually result in a sort of autopilot response. At its most extreme, it’s called a complete incognizant fugue, and it allows incogs to forget days, years, family, friends. They’ll overlook anything that they can’t understand and anything related to it as well.”

“You’re saying I’ll forget about her. I’ll forget about my own sister.”

“It’ll be easier for your mind to do that than accept magic,” said Chester. “Sorry, miss.”

“But I’m sure it won’t come down to that,” added Monster. “I’m sure everything will be fine. The Reds are pretty good at handling this kind of thing. It’s what they’re paid for, right?”

“Yes, of course. Thank you, Mr. Dionysus. You’ve been very kind to take the time to explain this to me.”

“No problem.” Monster made a show of looking at his watch, tapping it loudly with his fingers. “Is that the time? I really have to get going. There’s this… uh… thing I’ve got to do. Real important, uh, thing. Magic stuff, y’know. You wouldn’t understand.”

Greta frowned. “No, I guess I wouldn’t.”

Monster reached over and pulled the posted rune off her forehead before she could react. Almost immediately, the haze fell over Greta. The effect wasn’t normally so fast. There were different levels of light cogs, and Greta was more susceptible than her sister. The stressful nature of the memories also made it easier to shuffle them into her subconscious. The irony was that by explaining things to her, Monster had made it even easier for her to forget. Now they were no longer merely mysteries she didn’t comprehend. They were secrets she couldn’t absorb.

She looked Monster over with a vague recognition. “Don’t I know you?”

“I don’t think so.” Monster pushed away from the table and left before she could think about it.

“You induced a full fugue,” said Chester. “And you did it on purpose.”

“What else could I do?” said Monster. “It was the only merciful thing. She couldn’t help her sister. Now she can move on at least. She would’ve forgotten anyway. I just helped her forget faster so she could get on with her life. I don’t feel good about it either, but I don’t hear you coming up with a better idea. It’s easy to criticize.”

“You’re right,” said Chester. “I guess it was the only option.”

“It’ll all work out. I’m sure Judy will show up in a few days and it won’t make a damn bit of difference whether her sister worries an extra few hours about her then.”

“I said you’re right. What more do you want?”

“I just like hearing it. You don’t say it nearly enough.”

“Be right more often and I would.”

“Do you think I’m happy about it? But I’m not a cop. And every time Judy and I meet, one or both of us is almost killed. Greta was just going to forget eventually. From a practical perspective, it might as well be sooner than later. Save her some unnecessary stress. And when Judy shows up again, her sister probably won’t even remember any of it.”

They crossed the street and watched Greta finish her coffee. She paid the bill, then quietly got up and walked away.

“You could’ve at least paid for the coffee,” said Chester.

“And I could’ve bought her a new house while I’m at it. Get off my back.” Monster brushed Chester aside. “And get off my shoulder. You’re shedding all over me.”

Chester landed on the sidewalk and tried to fold himself into his gnomish shape. One of his arms snapped off and fluttered to the ground.

“I think this body has had it,” he said. “Might be time to get a new one. I have to get going anyway. The wife isn’t too happy as it is. Says I spend too much time in this dimension already.”

“Get going. I can handle things now.”

“Are you sure?”

“This may come as a surprise to you, but I did get along just fine without you for many years.”

“Sure, boss, sure.” Chester sounded skeptical, though. “Catch you later.”

He left his borrowed body. A stiff breeze kicked up and carried it away like the lifeless paper it now was.

“Good riddance,” muttered Monster.