It had taken Timmy and Wally until lunchtime to find Corporal Charlie. The station was in complete disarray and no one had any idea where anybody was. Thankfully, Wally had managed to wrangle him and Timmy a posting cleaning armour and hammering out dents. It was hot, smelly work, but it meant that they met every officer who came back in. After three hours of hammering dents out of helmets, crimping together split breastplates, and condemning blood, and less desirable fluid, covered uniforms to burn piles, they finally spotted Charlie’s unit coming back in. They were easy to spot, every one of them was built like oxen and carried themselves like fighting roosters. They had seen some of the most furious fighting but their spirits were still high. They walked through the precinct, nodding their heads, and clapping others on the backs. As they drew close, Wally nudged Timmy and motioned with his eyebrows.

“Can you see him?” Timmy whispered back, trying to peer around the burly officers for a sight of Charlie.

“No,” Wally whispered back, his head darting and ducking like an excited hen.

“Here you are lads, ‘fraid I’ve split me club though,” the lead officer said, holding up his truncheon which had an enormous crack running through the middle of it.

He had one of the most prodigious moustaches Timmy had ever seen. It was bright red and extended almost past his ears. The other officers gave a hearty laugh as they began dumping their considerably larger than average breastplates and helmets in a pile.

“Umm… excuse me,” Timmy said, never feeling more like a prepubescent twerp as he did right now standing in front of these half naked giants.

“Yes lad?” the one with the red moustache barked.

“Umm… are… do you… umm…”

“Where’s Charlie?” Wally said, rescuing his floundering partner.

“Nelson? ‘Fraid he caught a nasty one off some Goblin back at the barricades. Bastard knocked him off the top level and sent him down at least fifteen feet.”

“Is he okay?” Timmy gasped.

“Corse he is! Nelson’s made of iron and lard! O’ course he took a pretty bad bang on the barnet and they reckon he’s broken his arm or something.”

“Serves him right for going hand to hand with a massive bloody Goblin!” A blonde haired officer said behind them.

“I keep telling Chaz, he ain’t a young man no more,” a dark haired giant said. “Just whack ‘em with your club and move on. No need for all this fair fighting talks. Save that for the young ‘uns.”

“What can you do?” The red moustached one said. “Ain’t no telling Nelson when his mind’s made up.”

“Where is ‘e?” Wally asked.

“They took him to the infirmary tent they set up out back. He’s probably still there now. Queue was a mile long!”

“Ok thank you!” Timmy said.

They waited a couple of minutes for the officers to saunter off before they slunk away from the piles of armour. On light feet, they scuttled down to the back of the headquarters where a makeshift tent was hurriedly thrown up to care for the dozens and dozens of injured policemen. Some were badly injured, laid out on gurneys, covered in blood and whimpering. Others were just a bit banged up. They stood around in huddles, smoking and retelling their night’s adventures. In the daylight, the events of the previous night no longer seemed as horrific, and in front of each other, every officer had enough bravado to make it sound like it was just another night.

Timmy and Wally flitted about, trying to look for Charlie without looking like they were looking for anyone. Problem was, coppers have a sixth sense for the furtive and soon they were attracting looks from the other officers.

“Quick, pretend to be ‘urt,” Wally said out of the side of his mouth.

He grabbed his leg and began limping and groaning. Timmy, who had also wanted to pretend he hurt his leg, panicked and grab hold of the side of his face.

“What you doin’?” Wally hissed at him.

“I’ve hurt my head.”

“Looks like you’ve got an earache.”

“I was hit… by a big rock.”

“In the ear?”

“No… never mind,” Timmy dropped his hand in frustration.

“Wait, is that ‘im?” Wally pointed to the far side of the tent where a towering figure was sharing a smoke with a group of officers.

“That’s him!”

Timmy and Wally hurried across the tent dodging wounded policemen and exhausted nurses. They pulled up behind Charlie so quickly that Wally bumped into the back of Timmy, almost sending him into the giant back of Corporal Nelson. Up close, Charlie was a mountain of a man, his arm was in a sling and his head was heavily bandaged. The officers Charlie was talking to nodded at the pair curiously and Charlie turned around.

“Hullo boys,” Charlie said in his friendly way. One of his eyes was badly swollen but the other still twinkled.

“Oh hi… umm… are you umm… sorry to bother you…” Timmy felt himself sweating again.

He looked at Wally who avoided eye contact with him. The first and last time they had met Charlie was at Zimeon De Woolf’s home when they had sent out all those emergency comms. They had looked like fools and Charlie had had a hearty laugh at their expenses. Despite this, they both looked up to Charlie. Everyone across the city’s police force knew Corporal Nelson. He was a legend. Strong as two oxen and friendly as a pet puppy. He had served on the force longer than they had even been alive and had grappled with some of the most heinous villains the city had ever seen. It was rumoured that he had once punched a Troll so hard he turned him into shingle. Despite his venerable reputation, Charlie had never risen above the rank of Corporal, this served to make him more of a legend in the force. He had turned down every promotion ever offered to him in favour of staying on the streets and not having to boss anybody about. Despite this, Charlie was treated with more deference than any Sargeant, because he was a real copper and a good bloke to boot.

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“Aren’t you Washbottom and Edgewater?” Charlie asked after a few awkward moments of stuttering and shuffling.

“Yes sir, I am.” Timmy said. “I mean I’m Edgewater and he’s Washbottom.”

“Right, from that suspected homicide,” Charlie’s good eye crinkled in mirth as he remembered them.

“Yes sir… that’s us.” Timmy shuffled and looked down at his feet while his face turned pink.

“None of that sir stuff lad, I’m just Charlie,” he stuck out his hand. “And you are?”

“Oh… I’m Timmy.” He shook Timmy’s hand warmly.

“Wally,” Wally squeaked and gave Charlie’s hand a quick pump up and down.

“Pleasure. You two boys keeping yer heads down out there?”

“Yes s… Charlie.”

“Good. It’s as bad as I’ve ever seen it and I don’t know about it getting much better any time soon.”

They nodded and then stood there looking down at their feet.

“Is there something I can help you boys with?” Charlie asked.

“Yes!” Timmy said abruptly. “I mean yes, please, we need your help.”

“What can I do for you?”

“Umm, can we talk somewhere more private?”

Charlie looked at them curiously for a second before nodding at the men he had been talking to.

“Come on,” he said to Timmy and Wally, leading them out of the tent and around towards the river. The rain had slowed to a drizzle now. “Smoke?” Charlie asked them, offering the pack.

“No I don’t…”

“Yes please!” Wally took a smoke and then fished around for a lighter. He lit his cigarette and then held the lighter up for Charlie who grunted his thank you.

“So what’s wrong?” Charlie asked them, settling down on a stack of sandbags.

Again they exchanged looks like two schoolboys dragged into the headmaster’s office without a chance to confer first.

“Go on, ask him,” Wally muttered to Timmy.

“You ask him,” Timmy muttered back. “Why do I always have to do the talking?”

“Coz you’re smart with words and stuff.”

“No I’m not…”

“Boys, would one of you tell me what you’re chewing on, coz I’m only getting wetter and older waiting.”

Timmy cleared his throat and tried to meet Charlie’s calm gaze.

“We need to know who to talk to-to umm… find out who might… who did… ummm the murder.”

“What? What murder?”

“The Goblin family.”

“Couple nights ago? The tailor’s shop fire?”

“Yes, that one.”

“If I knew who did it lad, I would be dragging ‘em in here by their earlobes,” Charlie said, his eyes narrowed.

“No. Yes. Of course, but we want to find out and we know you know a lot of the Human First lot from out West, because you grew up there, so we wanted… we hoped you would be able to tell us… like… who could have done it.”

Charlie looked at the pair of them curiously.

“Even if I did, why do you two want to know? You’re not detectives. You’re barely Corporals.”

“I know. But…”

“We were there,” Wally said quietly. “We were the first ones on the scene. We saw it. We watched ‘em burn to death.” His eyes clouded over.

“Oh… I’m sorry you lads had to see that. But you can’t go running off trying to fight crime by yourselves. That’s not how this works. You have to leave it to the detectives, that’s what they’re here for. You’ll only get yourselves hurt or worse. Leave it to them what knows what they’re doing.”

“And who’s investigating?” Wally asked hotly. “‘As anyone even been put on the case? ‘Coz we woz there and no one ‘as come to talk to us. No one’s taken a statement! No one cares.”

Charlie rolled his tongue around his mouth and took a deep drag of his smoke.

“You’re not wrong there, lad.” he said after some quiet thought. “With everything else that’s happened since, I guess a family of dead Goblins ain’t top priority.”

“It should be!” Wally said. “Wot did they do wrong? They wasn’t villains. They wasn’t no one important. Just a family livin’ in their own ‘ouse wot got burned to death just ‘coz of bad luck and hate. They didn’t do nuffin to noone!”

Charlie nodded sympathetically.

“I know…”

“There was a baby,” Timmy’s voice was barely above a whisper. “In the fire.”

Charlie’s jaw clenched and he looked away from them.

“Please Charlie,” Timmy said. “We know you think we’re a pair of jokes and we probably are. But we’re coppers. We signed up, we took the oath, and we can’t just stand here knowing there’s some murdering scum out there right now walking free while that family…” he couldn’t finish the sentence.

“Weren’t even much of ‘em to bury,” Wally said, feeling the hot sting of tears in his eyes again.

“Scum,” Charlie growled and spat into the mud. “How do you know it was the Human First mob?”

“We saw them,” Timmy said. “Well, we caught sight of them. We were… patrolling, when they rode into the Goblin Quarter. I didn’t get a good look but I definitely saw a Human and he was young, couldn’t have been older than us, with a shaved head.”

“And we know it wasn’t the Landlord’s mob, coz the Landlord don’t go round killin’ civvies, right?” Wally added hopefully.

Charlie nodded thoughtfully.

“Good deduction there,” he said. “Bill wouldn’t kill a family of innocents like that, it’s not how this city works. And I doubt he would sanction it either. I think you boys are onto something. That little Human First mob has been growing in popularity across the bridge. Every day there seems to be more of ‘em with there stupid shaved heads and their bloody idiotic slogans.”

“Do you know who it could have been?” Timmy asked and Charlie shook his head.

“I don’t know that young mob too well. Could probably point a few of ‘em out by name from when they was running around being nuisances as kids, but to finger which one of ‘em could commit such a foul murder? I couldn’t say.”

Timmy looked down, crestfallen.

“But, I definitely know who might be able to tell you.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, I’ve got a snitch out in the West, he likes to think of himself as a bit of a Face. He’s always up to it in street politics. Knowing the West, it’ll be all over the place who done it. Talk to him and he’ll point you in the right direction. His name’s Tommy Plumb, a nasty little wannabe pimp, peddles smut out of the old water works down on Albany Lane. Has a little firm with him but they’re all wannabes like him.”

“Albany Lane… Tommy Plumb…” Timmy quickly noted down every detail. “Thank you so much, Charlie!”

“You really are a legend!” Wally said, beaming brightly.

“Listen, I’d love to come with you, but I don’t think I’d be much good on the street at the minute,” Charlie said, pointing to his bandaged head. “If I’m honest, for the last couple of minutes I’ve been seeing four of youse. But use my name, that should pull him in line if he tries anything.”

“Yes, thank you!”

“Now, help me back to the tent, I don’t fancy ending up face down in the mud.”

Wally and Timmy scampered under one arm each and helped Charlie to limp back to the tent. Once they were there, they eased Charlie down onto a makeshift gurney.

“Good luck boys,” Charlie said, sighing deeply. “I wish I could have been more help.”

“No, you’ve already done more than we could have hoped for,” Timmy gushed.

“Listen, be careful. That Human First mob are dangerous. They’re bloodthirsty and they want to prove themselves. Even worse, none of ‘em have ever really seen real violence, so they ain’t realised the reality of it. It’s always them without blood on ‘em that think they’re up for it the most. This could get very sticky lads. Are you sure about this?”

Timmy looked at Wally who gave him a hard, determined look in return.

“We’re sure.”

“Then good luck and watch each other’s backs.”

They nodded at him, their chests puffed up.

“Give ‘em hell boys and drag that scum back here to face the long arm o’ the law!”

“Yes sir!”