Back in the truck and out on the highway on our return journey, it was a while before either Bract or I spoke. Finally Bract asked, “was that Ulug?
“I don’t know,” I sighed. “If I had just managed to see his face.”
But I had seen that emblem on the truck door at least, that was something.
“You fought well against that man,” Bract commented.
“I think I got lucky. That guy had some training, he wasn’t just your average thug.”
“What sort of training?”
“Military, if I had to guess. Or it could have been law enforcement I suppose. That fight almost felt like a spar on a mat. I don’t know any other groups that formally train men in combat.”
Bract was silent for a time. I handed him a box of Oak’s favorite biscuits to occupy himself with. As he crunched away on them, I considered all that had just happened. It hadn’t gone particularly well. I had hardly learned anything. I hadn’t even managed to snap a photo of the emblem on the truck. All I had to go off of was my memory. And from our brief and largely unhelpful piecemeal conversation with the men, all I had learned was that they were involved in something violent and dangerous, which could be just about anything. None of this was particularly useful or helpful to our investigation. Perhaps instead of angling directly for Ulug, we would have done better to ask about those who had encountered him within the camp. Or if other children were missing. I sighed deeply.
“The way that man moves when you are fighting,” Bract said abruptly, popping another biscuit into his mouth. “It is almost familiar.”
“What do you mean?”
Bract chewed the biscuit thoughtfully. “I see this sort of moves before. Back in my home land. The Kivich soldiers punch like this. Very fast, very many punches.”
“You think that man is from Kivich?”
Bract shrugged. “I do not know. Perhaps your military has similar training.” He ate a few more biscuits. “What do you do now?”
“Hope that my boss will have had a change of heart by tomorrow,” I said dejectedly.
“By today you mean,” Bract said, indicating the digital clock on the dash with a new biscuit.
“Right,” I said grimly.
I dropped Bract off at the usual spot near the edge of the woods. “You need a light?” I asked, peering into the dark trees. I handed him an old flashlight I kept in my truck for emergencies. It flickered on.
“Thank you,” Bract said. Though I couldn’t see much of his face, he seemed to be deliberating something. “What about the job tomorrow with them?”
I had been thinking about this as well. “It sounds dangerous. Unless I get some more backup, I don’t think we will be going. But if I do go, would you join me?”
Bract nodded slowly. I clapped him on the shoulder.
“Listen Bract, thanks for your help. I wouldn’t have gotten very far without you.”
I held out my hand and Bract shook it. “I’ll be here by the road tomorrow if you are going on the job. That was a very good sandwich.”
I smirked and headed back home. It was only when I got inside and flipped on the lights, in my bathroom that I observed I was still wearing Bract’s clothes. I would have to launder and return them. I pulled the clothes off, showered, and then fell into bed, for once too tired to think about the past evening or what was to come in the morning.
~~~~~
The first thing that happened when I drug myself into work the next morning was Oak descending on me before I could even take a sip of the coffee that Ashley had mercifully handed me.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
“Meryl wants to see you,” she informed me. Then she did a double take. “You look like shit Senel.”
I supposed the days of rigorous work in combination with only patches of decent sleep and having brawled with a potential drug dealer last night were making themselves apparent. At least Rifle Guy hadn’t given me a black eye. That might have been harder to explain.
“Good morning to you too,” I chirped, scooping up my coffee and heading into Meryl’s office without knocking.
Meryl observed me critically as I plopped down in the chair in front of his desk. “I see you took my advice,” he said.
I shrugged, slurping at the coffee so that I could avoid looking directly at him.
“I got an interesting call this morning from DI Roose over in Tersol County who wanted to follow up about the inquiry our made yesterday about one Kasorsh Ulug.”
My fist tightened around the coffee.
“He wanted to let me know that he searched the name Kasorsh in the county records and came up with a traffic violation a few weeks ago. Someone by the name of Limuel Kasorsh was pulled over by a highway patrol officer for speeding. They might have gotten off with the simple ticket, but Kasorsh had out of date registration on the vehicle. He was fined around $300 for the double offense.”
“Did Roose send the report? What kind of vehicle was it?” I asked before I could stop myself.
Meryl’s eyebrows flew upwards and I quickly returned to staring at my coffee.
“He did send the report,” Meryl said after a moment. “I haven’t had time to look at it. I’ve been busy going over the files you left for me yesterday.”
I glanced up at him, surprised. In my mind’s eye, I had seen him swiping the whole pile of them into his wastebin after I left.
“This guy Ulug has a history of enslaving children, as well as adults,” Meryl stated. “Women and young girls in particular. I assume because they are easier to control and intimidate into doing his bidding.”
I nodded. This was obvious from reading the files.
“You know Senel, when I was in Cannon during the crank epidemic, we were busting down the doors of ordinary citizens, factory workers, restaurant owners, you name it. Anyone who was desperate enough to make a little dough on the side. It was utter chaos, you never knew whether you were talking to a drug dealer or an innocent bystander. I once had to arrest a pregnant woman pushing a baby stroller down the street because she was dealing six months into her pregnancy while she took her ten month old daughter for a walk.”
I didn’t know what to say. I was listening, but I couldn’t see where this was going.
“The point I’m trying to make here, is that back then, when crank first came to this country, it was a total free for all, there was no consistency, it was just bedlam for the major cities. After control measures were finally instigated and recovery facilities were put into place a decade ago, it all went through the floor and you hardly could find a single user in the street. But someone is still buying, because high power guys like Borsk and Ulug turned up on the scene and systematized everything. They kept their distance from it too, so they couldn’t have anything properly pinned on them. Smart.”
Meryl sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. “I never worked those cases Senel, it was after my time. What you and the boys have been dealing with in the Capital is above and beyond anything that we dealt with a decade ago. To be honest, here in Melspol it felt like that whole world of depravity didn’t even exist. But if it’s resurfacing here of all places in rural communities, we need to get a handle on it. I don’t like the idea of these good country folk being subjected to what happened in Cannon or what’s happening now in the capital.”
I stared at him, still unsure of what to say.
“I spoke to the County Commissioner this morning after reviewing your files on Ulug and suggested we put some man power into investigating this potential situation. Commissioner Dowe is a smart woman, Senel, and she knows as well as I do that a creeping crisis can become a wave of instability real quick. She was born in the Capital, she knows a rougher landscape than this. She hasn’t been willing to delve into the nomad issue for the same reason as the other rural counties. It’s a damn mess and its more or less staying separate from our communities. These folks aren’t our citizens, and they aren’t asylum seekers, no one knows what category to put them in or how to handle them. But if you’re suspicion is correct and they’re being used as a labor force in a crank ring, that is something worth checking out.”
Now I found myself incapable of speech. I had been so sure that I was being kicked off the case or at the very least being put on probation this morning, that I had practically packed my bags before I left home.
“You-you really think this is worth investigating?” I asked hoarsely.
“I do. Commissioner is going get the ball rolling this week with the other four counties in the area that are seeing a rise in the nomad population where labor harvesting might be occurring. I’m not sure what form it’s going to be taking, but she’s authorized me to gather intelligence to build a case if we’re seeing suspicious activity here in Melspol.”
“That-that’s great,” I said, an unexpected wave of relief hitting me.
“That being said, our primary case is still Luna Lampour’s kidnapping. Before you go running off to investigate this crank ring, I need you focused on this case.”
“Of course,” I said slowly, my mouth rather dry. I still didn’t have the pieces I needed to bridge the two situations. “Sir, let me pursue the possible connections between the crank ring and Luna’s kidnapping. There’s no other leads in the case. What will it hurt at this point? If something else comes up, I promise I will drop that line of investigation immediately.”
Meryl fingered his beard for a moment. “I’ll give you until lunch break to come up with something substantial. And it better be substantial, Senel, or else we are dropping this.”