Anton Strout - Dead Waters

Connor shook his head at me. “And this is why we don’t go jumping over high-rise railings after strange women,” he said. His chiding was probably the closest I was going to get to hearing him say that he was glad I was okay.

“Well, I thought it was heroic,” Jane said, smiling. “Stupid, but heroic.”

“Thanks,” I said. I brushed her wet hair out of the way and kissed her forehead. “Next time, you get to jump first.”

She hugged me and I hissed as pain flared up my side.

“Careful,” I said.

Jane stepped back quickly, concern on her face. “Are you hurt?”

I pressed along my bruised ribs gently, testing them. “Not too badly,” I said. “More my pride than anything. Drowning in someone’s pool isn’t the way I really pictured myself dying. A vampire, werewolves, maybe, but not this.”

Connor tsk-tsked me.

“What?”

“Let’s get out of here,” he said, heading back toward the door, “before I nominate you for the Departmental Medal of Stupidity.”

I wasn’t sure if that was a real thing or not. I wouldn’t put it past the Department to issue something like that, maybe a dunce cap to make an object lesson out of foolhardy agents. Connor walked off before I had a chance to ask him. All I could do was let Jane help me hobble my way off the patio. Given all our cuts recently, I wondered whose paycheck was going to cover the damage the falling gargoyle had made. I doubted we could expense it.

I wasn’t normally one to strip in the partially walled office cube that comprised the space Connor and I shared, but by the time we got back to the Department of Extraordinary Affairs, I hadn’t dried off at all and was shivering from my jump into the pool. Jane left me with Connor and ran off to report to Director Wesker over in Greater & Lesser Arcana as I hung up my satchel to dry out, and then peeled off my suede leather jacket before dropping it into a plastic-lined bin I now kept next to my desk.

Connor looked down at it. “Nice idea, kid. When did you put that there?”

I leaned against our partners desk as I struggled out of my wet Doc Martens, which were now clinging to my feet like they were glued on. “After that ectoplasm in the popcorn-machine incident in that off-Broadway theater,” I said. “My cleaning bills are through the roof, and even before these cuts, the Inspectre stopped letting me expense them. You’d think damage done in the line of duty would be covered . . .”

“I wouldn’t press him, kid.”

“No?” My Docs didn’t want to come off. I undid the laces even more and wiggled off the first one, tossing it in the bin.

“No,” Connor said. “It could be worse.”

“Worse than bagging my clothes up here on a weekly basis and then dragging them to the cleaners on my own dime? How could it be worse?”

“You press the Inspectre on it, and they might start issuing us uniforms. You want to wear a tan jumpsuit with your name stitched over the pocket?”

“Depends,” I said. “Do I get to be Egon? Do I get a Proton Pack?” My other boot came free and I put it with the other one.

“I don’t think so.” Connor pointed to the mountains of files and paperwork piled on both of our desks. It had grown several inches in the few hours we had been gone. “Think of what it takes to even get ballpoint pens from supply. You rip a field-issued jumpsuit and try to requisition a new one? You’ll be roaming the halls in your boxers at least a week waiting.”

“Speaking of which, can you watch our cubicle door? I need to finish getting out of the rest of this stuff.”

Connor turned away. “Gladly. Although why you need to do it here . . .”

“It’s just easier,” I said. I walked around to the work side of my desk, slid the lower-left-hand drawer open, and fished out a dry T-shirt. I pulled off the wet one, threw it on top of my boots, and slid the new one over my head. The front of it read: I BRAKE FOR IMAGINARY CREATURES. “I’m living out of my drawer here.”

Connor laughed. “Now you know how Jane feels at your place.”

His comment stung. I tried to ignore it, but another flare of the tattooist’s way over-the-top emotions hit me. I bit my lip and fought the urge to say something, instead focusing on putting on a dry pair of jeans that were also sitting in the drawer. I slid them on, thankful to be dry once again and forcing the emotions down. “Okay,” I said. “Done.”

Connor turned and gave me a skeptical look.

“What?” I asked.

“Your face, kid. What’s the matter? Did I strike a raw nerve with my Jane comment?”

I sighed. “Yeah, I guess,” I admitted. “That tattooist emotional-baggage thing flared up again.”

I sat down at my desk and Connor walked over to his.

“Look at the bright side,” he said, sitting down. “You probably won’t have to worry about Jane getting the itch to marry you.”

“I won’t?”

“You jumping to conclusions that Jane wanting more drawer space means she wants to move in should land you in a padded room long before that.”

“Comforting,” I said. I set to work writing out the details of the events of the past few hours, almost enjoying the silence while doing it. At least Connor wasn’t jabbing me about my newfound domestic issues with Jane. When my eyes started to blur from all the paperwork, I stopped and gathered my papers. I stood up. “I’m going to run this up to the Inspectre.”

“Go crazy, kid,” Connor said, looking up from his own chaos of paper across from me, “but aren’t you forgetting something?”

I thought for a moment, and then shrugged.

Connor pointed at my bare feet. “No socks, no shoes,” he said. “No service.”

I opened my lower-left-hand drawer once more. “Thanks for the reminder,” I said. “I don’t know where my head’s at. Maybe that water woman squeezed some of my brains out when she was trying to drown me.” Fresh socks and dry boots, and under that, nothing more. I pulled them out and put them on. “Time to restock my wardrobe. Looks like this is all that’s left.”

“Then you better hope you don’t run into anything heading up to the Inspectre’s office,” Connor said.

I stood up, feeling almost human again, the leather of the new boots stiff against my feet. “A wandering monster encounter is highly unlikely. I think I can manage.”

I turned and headed away from our desks, walking off toward the stairs that led to the Inspectre’s office up on the second floor.

“Oh, you say that now,” Connor shouted after me, “but don’t forget where we work.”

I slowed my pace as I walked. Connor had a point. A healthy amount of paranoia about danger lurking around every corner had kept my older partner alive so far, and if there was ever a place full of potentially menacing corners, it was the Department of Extraordinary Affairs.

I found the Inspectre buried in a paperwork mountain all his own when I got to his office. The usually neat and orderly British gentleman’s office was littered with more casework and files than I had ever seen, little piles of manila folders dotting the rich cherrywood finish of the room.

“Sir?” I called out as I stepped into his office. He finished what he was writing before looking up at me, a bit agitated. “I’ve prepared a file on Mason Redfield . . .”

“Dammit, boy,” the Inspectre blustered, standing up. He came out from behind his desk, crossed over to me, and snatched the folder from my hand. “You mean to tell me you’ve been back long enough to write out a case file and didn’t think to come see me first?”

I stepped back, a little surprised by the anger in the Inspectre’s voice. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I just thought . . .”