The Iron Swamp

By J V Wordsworth

***Warning*** This book contains strong themes and damaged characters.

Abandoned by the world, he waited.
Bitter and angry he returned.
The Iron Swamp would not forget him again.

For
Anyone looking for a battle for survival between dangerous people. If you love Stephen Donaldson, Dan Simmons, Peter Hamilton or George Martin, The Iron Swamp is for you.

• Language: English
• Publisher: J V Wordsworth
• Release date: Nov 22, 2015
• ISBN: 9781311013132

J V Wordsworth

I am the author of the world of Cos, an expanding series telling stories of war, spies, and despots and the people fighting to survive them. Set several thousands of years in the future, humanity has settled on a new planet already filled with life. The resulting war for dominance created a military state that lasted too long spreading corruption and fear everywhere from the ocean floors to the mountain peaks. Unfortunates of all kinds must fight against those seeking to continue their oppression, but when failure greets at every turn only the most resolute have the strength to continue the eternal battle.

Book preview

THE IRON SWAMP

J. V. Wordsworth

Copyright

The Iron Swamp

J. V. Wordsworth

The Iron Swamp. Copyright 2015 J.V. Wordsworth

All rights reserved.

This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, businesses, events, or locales is purely coincidental. Reproduction in whole or part of this publication without express written consent is strictly prohibited.

Dedication

For mum, who always put her children first even when life was difficult.

Thanks

I would like to thank all my friends and family for their support in the construction of this novel, particularly David Moss, Lance Karr, and Glyn Nelson who read the book at its various stages of completion, and offered many incredible insights. Very special thanks to Sadia Ahmed and my father Robert Wordsworth who went above and beyond the call of duty by not only reading it but sending me printed copies with their suggested edits. No doubt both individuals would make fantastic editors should they ever decide to take up the calling. Lastly, to Amy Bowman who helped me with Photoshop and read the book before anyone else.

Prolegomenon

Every individual described within these manuscripts played an important role in the sequence of events that brought Cos to calamity, often thought to begin with the barmaid Arianne Lickneis on 13/06/2259 FC. Even among these individuals, there are few who polarized the histories as did Simon Nidess.

In the words of the historian, Vander Mylis, He made The Kaerosh bleed, but he also played a role in its recovery. There are those who say his mind was blacker than the despots who preceded him, while others claim his weeping showed his remorse. You must decide for yourself as to the character of the man who was both scourge and savior to a nation that had long since lost all hope of redress. Consider what you might have done in his place, and do not judge too harshly the man who is already the subject of such reckless hate, his effigy will burn as long as Cos remembers fire.

Perhaps the histories judge him harshly; perhaps they do not. All histories have their own agenda, distorting facts with interpretation if not lies. This is the truth, from the minds of those who were there, and you can make of it what you will.

Prologue

14/6/2237 FC

You don't have to do this. Shia cupped the side of my face in her palm, forcing me to look into her dark eyes. She was a beautiful woman, elegantly tall with red hair that made the squalor of our living room fade into the background. It was hard to believe those same genes were in our son.

"No one has to do anything," I said, trying to look away.

Her grip tightened, anger inflecting her voice. Now isn't the time for one of your lectures, Sammy. I know my duty as well as you, but we've already given so much.

Not enough. There is a pounding in my head that won't cease until Granian resigns the Presidency and we re-join the Sodalis.

Long ago when the Sodalis was emerging as an independent nation, The Kaerosh had been their test site for communism. Men, women, and children of all races had rebelled, and the Federation, Cos' dominant power at the time, had forced the newly formed Sodalis to allow the Kaeroshi people their independence. The people celebrated for weeks on end with parades and fireworks as if they had been saved, but there had never been a more hollow victory. If they had truly known for what they fought, they would have burned every swamp, house, and living creature to a cinder before firing a shot for independence.

Shia smiled sadly. It's a dream, Sammy. He'll kill every citizen of The Kaerosh before he gives up his power.

She'd heard it all before, but that didn't make it any less true. Some dreams are worth fighting for.

And our son?

Simon.

If I'm killed, you'll look after him.

My little son. The only person for whom I might have reconsidered. But I did this as much for him as anyone. I wanted him to grow up in a Cos where he didn't have to fear waking in the middle of the night by hooded killers; where people had a right to protest, and the government existed not to look after itself, but its people.

Simon deserved that. We all deserved that.

He won't understand you know, Shia said, if you die, I mean. Simon is smart, but he doesn't think like you and me.

I nodded. Our son is weak. I knew that. He was one of the many people who simply accepted things for what they were.

Her mouth flickered as she bore the insult to our child. Not weak, Sammy, just young. You can't expect a boy of ten cycles to understand why we leave him alone so often, and that we may never come back. Children need to be loved. They need to come first, and we've never put him first.

Who do you think I'm doing this for if not him?

She shook her head, smiling sadly. You can fool yourself, but you can't fool me. You were a trouble maker before Simon was even born.

I braced against the deep green irises of Shia Nidess, but I couldn't hold her gaze. Reasons change. People change. I've changed.

She caressed my arm with fingers of silk, pulling me back to her. Someone needs to fight for the people husband and that is no shame. You have a moral fortitude greater than most. But do not pretend that our son will be better off when you're buried in the great swamps.

Shia always had a way of stripping through my armor and planting the blade firmly in my heart. I love our son. I would do anything for him.

A single fat tear made its way down her cheek. Anything except watch him grow up.

I pressed her head against my chest. I have no intention of dying tonight. I will come back, and together we will watch Simon grow up, you have my word.

Shia's tears wetted my shirt, and I held her as tightly as I could without hurting her. Growing up had been a poor use of words. Our son had ten cycles, and he still didn't reach a met high. The doctors claimed he would never reach 1.2.

Pituitary dwarfism they called it, or proportionate dwarfism. Supposedly, it was once quite common back on Old Earth before medical advancements cured the vast majority. But there was some genetic anomaly in my son, a frailty that prevented him from receiving the same treatment.

He was such a tiny little thing, more like a doll than a person, and there was part of me that knew without my protection little Simon Nidess would never survive the fetid swamp of The Kaerosh. He was scared of everything; crowds, adults, even other children. He needed a strong father figure to show him what it was to be a man. But in this, I would fail him.

If I came back this time, then it would be the next, or the one after that. The mission would claim my life, just as it claimed everyone. The Kaerosh wasn't ready to expel Granian. Perhaps it never would be. Perhaps he would live a long life solidifying his power base, only to be replaced by someone just as bad, then the pattern would repeat for cycle upon time until the twin suns went out and Cos was finally sucked into Cythuria. It didn't matter. Some fights simply had to be fought, because what would Cos be if no one stood up for its people? What would existence entail if there was no one to stand against the designs of evil men?

Our sacrifice, our deaths, gave everyone else's life meaning; the right and reason to continue. We were the counterweight to Granian's evil, the knowledge that for every despot murdering and oppressing his way through life, there were ten people willing to do anything to stop him.

I have to go, I said, releasing Shia from my embrace.

Will you say goodbye to him?

I looked at the door to his room. Like every human, quilla, cou or rathjarin, I had my flaws. Cowardice was not one of them. I did not fear pain nor death, poverty nor failure, but in this one thing I was a coward. I feared that if I went into that room, kissed my son and told him I would be back soon, I would not be able to leave.

He's asleep, I said. Best not wake him.

Shia nodded, though I could see the lie hurt her deeply. She hugged me and kissed me on the cheek. Come back, Sammy. Watch our son grow up as you promised.

Chapter 1

17/08/2256 FC

How many principles can a good man betray before he loses the title?

Those were the words of wisdom Sam shared with me before he sent me to bed the last time I ever saw him. No hug or scruff of the hair, no words of love, just a code that I was expected to live by. The naivety of children, I drunk it down like the indisputable truth of the Gods, and destroyed myself in a gesture of futility rivaling his own.

When it came to my rebellion, they didn't drive me out of The Kaerosh like they did him. There was no glorious end for Simon Nidess like there was for Shia and Sam. My crime did not rate so high. The police department stuffed me away in Las Hek PD basement with the old, the sick, the useless, and the embarrassing. Where the air stuck to your throat as if you were breathing through a gym sock, and the ancient light tubes bathed everything in the sickly yellow hue of a Hubuan refugee shelter.

Except for the sergeant's tank at the back, no one merited an office. Just line after line of desks filled with people like Edgar Holson who didn't realize we could all see his lunchtime porn break reflecting in the glass cabinet behind him, and George Buston who began his day by stocking the mini fridge hidden in his desk drawer, and finished it once his last beer emptied – bored old men, not the worst things littering the floor.

Philip Rake picked up my mint condition Sally cio Rathjarin figure, bashing its head against the table. Don't you think you're weird enough without bringing these to work? He smiled as a friend joking about my eccentricities, his thick stubble giving his face a rugged, trustworthy look. Only the malevolence in his eyes betrayed his true character.

A few desks away, Kevin Lisbold stood, the scent of blood in his nostrils. In nature the two were like clones, but Lisbold could not have looked more different. His flat cheeks and wide nostrils looked as if someone had smacked him in the face with a spade. Where Rake had full dark hair that made him appear mysterious and intelligent, Lisbold possessed only thin wisps of blond that aged him prematurely.

Since my demotion, the daily pleasure of dealing with Rake and Lisbold was second only to using the toilet at the end of the men's bathroom with half the bowl missing. They were fascinated by me, like dogs harrying at a bone until they ripped it to shreds.

Lisbold grinned. What you need these for? It's like you want us to come over and chat to you about them. Rake dropped the figure onto the desk before I could get my hand under it.

As much as I enjoy your company, they're just here because I like them.

Lisbold put his arm over Rake's shoulder. I think he's mocking us, Phil.

Rake nodded. I don't like being mocked by a man with a cock the size of my thumb.

I didn't like being mocked by men with brains smaller than my fists, but expressing this sentiment wouldn't do me any good. If you'd stop watching me in the shower you could live in happy ignorance of the size of my cock.

Rake picked up my carded Pida Whey special edition with coin and ripped the corner back, his jaw protruding in faux-horror. It would have hurt if I hadn't brought the figures in especially for these idiots to destroy. All I needed to do was get Lisbold to break one as well, and if they ever bothered me again, I would send them both a video of the act with an ultimatum to either pay up or never talk to me again. It was not my proudest moment, sacrificing two of my most valuable possessions to rid myself of a couple of turds, but when a man was too short to reach the flush he had to find other ways. Even the basement, where new lights started flickering the instant the janitor fixed the previous one, would feel like bliss if I didn't have to talk to Rake and Lisbold.

Why either of them ended up in this cupboard for the dispossessed I didn't know. They were young men at the start of their careers, surrounded by people so old or so obviously incompetent that their productivity wouldn't decline greatly if they died. Neither Rake nor Lisbold seemed sufficiently stupid to have merited the basement, which meant their actions were criminal, and the bosses put them down here to hide them from the press. If the broken action figures didn't successfully segregate us, I would investigate further.

I gave no response to the damaged card, so Rake threw it at me. Hope it wasn't worth much, he said, as the two of them walked away. I felt the prick of victory, but putting my ruined figure back on the desk was sufficiently sobering.

At the front of the room, the elevator dinged triggering a sea of gray hair and bald heads rising from the desks like wader birds evacuating a lake. As the doors slid open, a tall man I didn't recognize stepped out. He was older than me, though still young enough to drop the average basement age considerably. Mist goggles sat atop his forehead like horns sheared at the base. His boots rose almost to his knees, covered in mud fresh enough to entrench the sewage smell clinging to the air, wet prints slopping behind him. His black trousers were bath mat rubber, and his coat full of insulating zeolate that inflated his upper body like the head of a hammer. This man, whoever he was, had come straight from trudging through a swamp, and in The Kaerosh that never meant anything good.

He stopped at my desk. I need to talk to you.

I eyed the empty desks either side of me. Me or just anyone?

We can use that room at the back. He pointed to the sergeant's office, then walked off before I could object.

I followed him to the plywood door which fit into the metal tank like a varyball rammed through a bottle top. When turning the knob failed to open it, I suggested it might be locked, but he gave no indication of having heard. He lifted the door by the knob as he turned again, blasting me with the smell of microwaved noodles as he entered. Sitting in the sergeant's chair without removing his coat, he gestured to the other seat.

The sergeant was off on one of his snack breaks, so would probably be gone for some time. In fact, calling them breaks was a misnomer as he spent long enough leaning against the ground floor vending machine to leave a person print in the side. Even so, I sat uneasily, aware that he would not take kindly to our uninvited presence, and his nose-to-nose brand of shouting was worse than a face full of steam from a boiling ham.

The man glared for a few clicks, assessing me in the quiet. Bishon Kenrey was murdered in his bedroom last night.

His words hung between us like a rotting noodle draped over the ceiling light. I lacked strong feelings towards the clergyman, only the faint recollection he was one of Clazran's high-ups, and therefore most likely a piece of dis. I had no idea why a man I had never met would come all the way to the basement, drag me in to my superior's office, and relay this information.

Perhaps, he continued, you are wondering what relevance this has to you?

I looked through the window at the sea of incompetence from which I was especially selected. Either I'm a suspect, in which case I should inform you I didn't know the man, or you want me to investigate the murder, in which case I would ask why?

His pointed grin made his face look like a demonic triangle. "The why should be less important than the chance for you to redeem yourself."

I nodded. But I would still like to know.

He leaned back in the sergeant's chair, scratching a set of long fingers across his chest. I'll break it down for you so we don't waste hours arguing over it. We want you because we have leverage. You frak up, or don't do what we want, and you're back down here again.

I nodded. As self-confessed candor went, it was believable. And what do you want?

We want you to solve the case obviously. He took a deep breath of noodle-filled air. While partnered with Philip Rake.

I see, I said. It didn't seem appropriate to tell him to frak himself immediately. And what do I get in return?

If you solve it, you'll be reinstated upstairs, but I doubt you'll need it. Clazran will want you for his special police.

A lie. Given my background, the SP would sooner kill me than ask me to join them. I'm not sure Rake will work with me.

My interviewer turned to regard the sergeant's poster on The Top Ten Tips to Stay Fit in an Office Job. What do you want from me, Nidess? He frowned, his eyes flickering from tip to tip. Because you can cram it up your ass along with every other request you're thinking of making. This is the deal: You solve the case with Rake, and you can go upstairs again until your next frak up. And if anyone asks, you picked Rake for your partner. Clear?

As crystal. The only question was whether I wanted to improve my life by playing their game or seize the infinitely more satisfying opportunity of telling the bosses to frak themselves. It wasn't me that decided I was better use to the police department picking my teeth amid their storage bin for the mentally infirm. I was a good detective once, until I crossed them.

I knew the consequences. Innocent or not, the SP wanted Sariah to go down so she was going down. All I achieved was to follow her onto the scrap heap. But that was five cycles ago, and the experience had changed me. I wasn't sure I wanted back out. Sam's voice rang loud in the back of my mind that there was danger in my reappearance. Apathy clouded my will, but I knew that whoever emerged from the basement would not be the same man who went in. I would not remain the disciple of my parents' religion. It was safer to stay, better to stay. I could give them that one last sacrifice.

I said, Well, at least you're not here to frak me, pretty much as each word registered as a thought.

At that moment, the sergeant tried to return to his office. He actually felt the need to knock at his own door. Excuse me–

Get out! the dark haired man shouted without looking at him.

As the door shut again, every reject close enough to hear glowered at the fat man like a pack of aged volks, assessing whether they had the strength to bring him down.

He knocked again, opened the door slightly, but made no attempt to shift his mass across the threshold.

The dark haired man jumped to his feet like a trebuchet releasing its load. If you don't stop bashing those sausages on this door, I will barbecue you in the incinerator and save the cafeteria the daily food mountain it takes to keep you alive. Get out!

The door shut again, the sergeant now redder than after a climb to the vending machine. His grovelling had unmanned me. Suddenly, my rudeness seemed premature. Perhaps I should apologize for my ignorance, I said, but I'm not sure who you are.

My name is Lisidia Vins; now do you know?

I nodded. Everyone in Las Hek PD knew the name, fewer the face. He was Figuel's connection to the SP and rumored to be his brother.

And now you know who I am, perhaps you wish to consider my offer?

I'll do it. Not being buried in the Gargantua was incentive enough. Men like Vins were untouchable, and men like me had everything to fear from them.

Sure you don't want me to frak you first? He flashed me a set of radiant teeth.

I'd rather get to work.

Very good. He got out of his chair and walked round the desk. I'll let you break the good news to Rake before you head off to inspect the crime scene.

Chapter 2

Rake didn't take to the assignment with my degree of resignation. Perhaps he was excited by the revelation that he was the least useless person I knew, which I said mainly to piss off Lisbold, or more likely it was the chance of escaping the basement. He slapped me on the arm hard enough to bruise the skin beneath my dry-top, but his apology seemed sincere. I damaged easily.

The two of us joined the troop of policemen and CSIs outside as the police buses arrived. Two metal noses appeared out of the mist so quietly that a man in the road would have been crushed before he noticed them. Wheels dropped from the base and they floated to the ground, the supports sagging beneath their weight.

As people moved around me, I could see flashes of color and the occasional face, but the mist was strong enough to swallow Las Hek in a singular gray. I took out my mist goggles and pinned them to my face, the buses and people reappearing as if pasted onto my retinas. The fog wasn't as bad in Las Hek as in the West, but in the early hours clouds descended upon the entire nation.

A quick check on my tablet showed Kenrey was even more connected than I thought. Not just a bishon of the Felycian church, but the Archbishon. He was also a Guardian, which meant that Clazran would want blood.

Not even Granian would have dared give Guardianship to a Felycian bishon. The Guardians were supposed to be irreligious, unbiased representatives of the people as a whole. At least that's what they were in the Sodalis. The Kaeroshi fakes had always made a mockery of the title, but Clazran had not even bothered with the pretense. Combining all the positions of power amongst the few individuals he could trust not to overthrow him had created leaders of the faiths with no faith, and Guardians that should have been scraped off the bottom of a boot.

Enough people were moving around to fill three buses and several vans – a gaggle of untrained, inexperienced peons that would be enough to ruin any crime scene. Like most institutions, the station held to the fallacy that throwing more people at an operation gave it a better chance of success. The moment we arrived, out of reach of Lisidia Vins and the Commissioner, I would order nearly all of them to stay off the scene unless requested.

As the lead investigators, Rake and I were entitled to the front seats of the first bus, but two women, not long past 20 cycles already sat chatting to each other, entirely oblivious to my opening the door. Standing at the bottom of the steps, my head barely reaching their feet, I felt my ability to talk diminish. I was about to shut the door again when Rake stepped up behind me. Get out, he said, with a similar ferocity to Vins in the sergeant's office.

The two women exited the vehicle as if it were on fire, two pairs of breasts dancing above my head. It was a slight clamber onto the high step, but no one gaped at me as I took my seat. We were separated from the people in the back by a layer of sound proof glass, so the two ladies saw Rake stick his middle finger up at them, but didn't hear him call them, fracking dykes.

He grinned at me, so I smiled back despite feeling no amusement at all. Watching his brutish behavior directed at individuals besides me suggested I might be able to use him, if he could be controlled.

Philip, that sounded weird. We can benefit from each other's skills here, solving this case together. If we screw up, we might spend the rest of our lives in the basement. Or in the back of Vins' van.

Rake brushed his jet-black hair back with the flick of a hand. You might, but if you can't solve this, my dad will find another way to get me out.

"If we can't solve this, I said, but my eyes were already closing with resignation. That was it then. Rake's daddy was someone important, and they gave me the case to get him out the basement without it looking like special treatment. Rake had no interest in this case. Who's your father?" I asked, not sure I wanted to know.

Rake's widening grin was so reminiscent of Vins' that when he said, The Commissioner, I was almost relieved.

And you think if you frak this up he's just going to keep throwing chances at you? I laughed. "Well maybe he will for a while, but Cythuria knows how long you'll sit in the basement flicking coins through holes in your desk before the next one. Not even a father's patience is endless."

Rake's grin vanished. What do you want me to do?

Do what I tell you to do, and don't fight me around anyone else.

What if I don't agree with what you're doing?

We talk in private. If I disagree with you, I will do the same.

He nodded.

But the first thing I need is for you to keep everyone useless off the crime scene until we want them.

Now that I can do. He shook my hand so enthusiastically I thought my arm might come out of its socket.

Kenrey obviously disliked people because I hadn't seen so much as a building for 100 kims. Instead, once the fog lifted, I watched tree after tree rush at us on either side, blurring as they passed. Not swamp either, but actual forests that people could walk through without sinking up to their waist in bog. The trees grew tall, and the canopy was filled by healthy looking leaves untainted by rot. Such forests were not normally found south of the Line of Knives, the desolate mountain range that split The Kaerosh in half. The trees were not as beautiful as the volcanic forests of Gys, constantly aflame as the cinder trees competed for space, or as magnificent as the jungles of the middle islands that supported entire cities within the tree tops, but somehow, despite being in the jurisdiction of Las Hek, Kenrey had escaped the fetid swamps of the southern Kaerosh.

We pulled up outside a colossal gate that made me question what deity the bishon worshiped. The two connecting pillars took the shape of quilla in full battle armor, huge snake-like creatures arching away from the spiked lattice as if watching for intruders climbing the walls. The spikes themselves were decorated with skulls of all seven extant races. Not even in The Kaerosh did I expect to see something so morbid from the faithful, but at the same time I could not help but reflect how similar they all looked once flesh and body were stripped away. The quillan skull was a bit longer, the myuki skull a bit smaller with bigger eye holes, and the mabian skull was covered in crystal growths as if a human had been inflicted with some terrible bone disease, but the overall structure was always the same. Perhaps this was to be expected from the six races of Cos, but the two most similar skulls were that of houthar and human – two species which evolved independently at opposite ends of the galaxy.

It was well known that although evolution in Cos had been faster and produced greater diversity than on Old Earth, the similarities were not limited to the sentient races. With a few exceptions, most of the species in Cos had counterparts on the human home world. All in a row staring at me through their eyeless sockets, like shriveled peas in a pod, they demonstrated perfectly the limited imagination of evolution. For the Felycians, I supposed this reflected their creator's love of similar shapes.

Notably, the Rathjarin skull, which was the most unique, was not present. Whether this was because the gate's architect assumed there were none of them left, or because he hated them as so many did, was uncertain, but I was always interested in the attitudes of people to the race that had once ruled Cos.

Either side of the gates the stone walls stopped low enough to be surmountable, but a layer of spikes offered death to anyone who tried and slipped. Crossed bone blades sharp enough to draw blood with a touch continued hypnotically into the distance. My map suggested that beyond them were not just religious structures and tools of worship, but also living quarters and amusement facilities that allowed the inhabitants total segregation from the pollution of civilization.

I looked up at Rake. You and me should go in first with a messenger we can send back to get more people as we need them. Solving this case was my ticket out of the basement, and I didn't want to think about what would happen if I failed. As surely as Kenrey would prove to be a demon in human skin, my future hinged on finding his killer.

Rake pushed open the vehicle door as if throwing off an attacker. Gather round. He waved his hands and repeated the command until slowly the masses obeyed. The sky was the same dull gray as the road, and as I stepped down from the bus, the wind penetrated every layer, stiffening my skin like frost. In the absence of the mist, clouds filled the sky like a silver veil, darkening to the point of rupture as they flowed over the compound. Ships, arcing across the sky like rusted comets, ducked in and out of visibility, carrying cargo, refugees or even bounty hunters.

It took a few minutes for everyone to gather into a collage of browns, many wearing the same russet uniforms and thick police boots. Except for the silver buckle that clamped the belt in place as firmly as any ski wear, the officers would have been perfectly camouflaged on a pile of dug-up earth. Designed to hide mud and give the police force the semblance of tidiness, the uniforms fulfilled this role perfectly. What they did not do was distinguish the officers from the rest of the nation who had chosen various shades of brown for much the same reason. I was wearing a beige coat and chestnut trousers simply because it was impossible to buy anything else.

Little red lights flashed from person to person as heating elements turned on in their coats, gloves, and boots. I brought up the settings on my tablet and felt the warmth circulate round my body like a hot bath.

Right, Rake looked over the crowd as a general assessing his forces. We don't need any of you for the moment except Jackson. The rest of you can wait here until we call for you. He hadn't even finished speaking before the throng moved a step closer almost in unison, the volume of their questions making them incomprehensible. I hated crowds. People behaved differently in groups; something flicked in their heads, and suddenly violence became acceptable problem solving.

Rake smiled at them, ignoring the people closest to him by turning his head as they tried to speak to him. Finally, a red-headed man with more freckles than blank skin started walking towards the gate. Rake was already on top of him. Silence fell as the group watched him slip his arm around the man's neck and yank him to the ground before kneeling on his chest. Where do you think you're going?

The man winced, struggling to thrust his thorax up enough to breathe. I just needed the toilet is all.

There's forest all around you.

Yes detective.

Rake stared at the crowd as their last murmurs retreated down their throats, and the two of us walked through the parting gates with Jackson trailing as far behind as he dared.

Rake set a pace which fit Jackson's desires perfectly, but forced me to march alongside like a child with an angry parent.

He'll probably report me for that, Rake said.

I looked back at the mass of horrified CSIs. If he does, I'll back you up. It was necessary to maintain order.

Rake slowed slightly. That's not what I thought you'd say.

I shrugged, grateful for the change in pace. If the others had followed, he would have jeopardized the investigation.

Rake nodded. Guess you're alright, Nidess.

I said nothing. I wasn't going to bond with this thug over his violent outbursts. It made me feel like a piece of dis. Pressing on a man's chest hard enough to stop him breathing was only necessary if he was trying to kill you.

Just inside the gate, a man was leaning against a thin strip of metal bent at the top. It was clearly one of those poles used to construct temporary fences, yet the man had mistaken it for a cane. As if this wasn't enough, he was dressed little better than a hobo. His coat was an expensive knee length garb, worn mainly by the upper classes who could keep it clean, but this one was frayed and dirty, tossed by its wealthy owner and found by the man in front of me. Beneath that, he wore nothing but a rib suit molded round his body, leaving little of his thin frame to the imagination. Only a pair of shorts over his crotch protected his modesty, while everywhere else the zeolate strips that kept moisture and bacteria from rotting his skin were on full display.

Detective Nidess? He was not an old man, but the wrinkles in his furrowed brow carried cycle upon time. I am Master Sol Benrick.

Master was a misleading word. Benrick was the lowliest of his order, though it still did not explain his attire.

Where's Kenrey? I said, forgetting my manners as I contemplated his clothing.

His