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7
Tessie and I are in the office, hungover the way you are when you’ve been through some shit. Even Obigor has more of a thousand-yard cataract stare than usual.
We drove back from the shipping container complex in silence, both staring ahead of ourselves at the road, saying nothing. What do you say to your partner when you accidentally signed her up for a night of suspension bondage? I tried saying sorry, but she just sort of brushed me off before I could ask any real questions.
We’ve retreated to our office which now provides us with some insulation from everything going on in the station. There was a buzz when we came in, so we avoided eye contact, spoke to no one, and made a bee-line for our desks.
Now we’re attempting to make ourselves presentable. Tessie has a bit of webbing in her hair. I almost reach out to take it off her, but then I remember how sticky that shit is. Last thing I need is to end up stuck to her head.
“You’ve got spider cum in your hair,” I tell her.
“Wha?” She blushes. “No, I don’t. What are you… no!”
“The web shit. It’s in your hair.”
“Oh,” she says. “Oh, fuck.”
At that moment, the chief bangs on the door in the closed fist way some men do because they forget that glass, and basically everything is more fragile than they are. He throws the door open and gives us a look I don’t like. It’s not his usual grump. It’s something that makes him less angry, more sad.
“Officer Peterson from the 96th was murdered last night,” he says bluntly. “Same MO as your perpetrator. Nothing was taken but his keys.”
I have never felt the intensity of crushing guilt that I do in this moment. An officer is dead. This is my fault. Instead of chasing Rage down, we let him go. He found a way to get his cuffs off.
“I am so sorry, sir.”
“Don’t be sorry. Find the asshole.”
“Yes. Sir.”
He shuts the door. That’s it.
I am furious. Furious at myself, but almost equally as angry with Justice. We curled up and slept while a brave man was slaughtered. One of our own.
Tessie looks at me, wide-eyed. “We should have done something.”
“Yes. We should have. And we’re going to.”
I get up and stride toward the door. I hear Tessie say something, but I’m not listening. Blood is rushing in my ears. I know exactly what I’m going to do.
I am going to kill Rage.
It’s the only way to ensure that he doesn’t end up in the justice system and reveal Justice’s secret to the world. It also ensures nobody else dies. This is the sort of thing we are very much trained not to do. We are not supposed to take the law into our own hands. But I do not see what other choice I have. Rage is happy to murder and destroy, and Justice seems unable to reason with him, let alone contain him. That webbing was nothing, or maybe there wasn’t enough. I don’t know. What I do know is that there’s one bug about to get swatted.
I have several hours of daylight and a pretty fucking good idea where he is. The body of Officer Peterson was found not far from a Red Light Discount store. There’s a chance Rage changed his habits after I caught him the first time, but given how badly that went for me, I doubt he feels actually compelled to make any adjustments. He thinks he’s untouchable, and that is precisely the arrogance that is going to let me take him out.
I tell myself it’s not really murder, what I’m about to do. It’s more like extermination. Nope. That doesn’t make it feel any better. Feels worse. Feels bad because I know what I am about to do is wrong, against everything I stand for, and against the moral of the law I signed up for, if not precisely the letter of that law. Nobody says you can’t kill monsters. You’re supposed to slay them.
I reach the store without too much trouble, mostly because I took Tessie’s car. Huh. Didn’t even notice I’d done that. Oh well.
I get out of the car and head right to the inevitable alley. Brooklyn loves itself an alley. It’s like hives of scum and villainy built right into almost every block. Rage is surrounded by filth, addicts, criminals. He blends in with all of them, but I see him. I know the shape of him. That dangerous V pressed against the alley wall, those two antennae twitching ever so slightly with the breeze.
I’m plainclothes, as usual. Nobody has any reason to suspect I’m here to take a life, but I feel as though I’m giving out a very specific energy, one that makes most of the inhabitants of the alley scatter out of it.
I walk slowly toward the sleeping monster. I wonder what he’s dreaming of. Perhaps disemboweling another officer of the law, or perhaps a father of two. The heinous thoughts of a creature like him cannot be fathomed. I suppose now I am learning what it is like to be on the verge of taking life, to savor that moment of complete power over another being, to know that by my action, I will end one complete universe. Something unique is before me, and I will end it because it is evil.
Standing behind him, I lift my weapon. It is best I do this quickly, before someone sees a woman in an alley pointing a gun at a bit of wall. There is life all around us, busyness that will not allow anyone to notice what is happening here.
I push the gun against his head. I thought it would be easier to pull the trigger.Just pull the fucking trigger.But I don’t. Or I can’t. I don’t know why. He deserves to die. He has to die.
