Disclaimer: Rights to The Pretender world and all its characters belong to creators Craig Van Sickle and Steven Mitchell. NBC owns a share, as do Twentieth Century Fox and MGM.
Due South was created by Paul Haggis and produced by Alliance Atlantis, BBC, CTV television and Pro Sieben Media. It's a wonderful show, mixing action and humor together into a delightfully quirky detective drama. If you've never seen it, I highly recommend the DVDs. The point is I'm borrowing someone else's creations. No profit is being made and no copyright infringement is intended.
Defining Connection 5
By Phenyx
05/21/2006
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Jarod tried not to flinch as Constable Fraser held the door open for him. Jarod didn't like having people behind him, felt too much like he was being escorted through the Centre's corridors. He stepped aside and, taking his cues from the Mountie, Jarod gestured toward Miss Parker.
"After you Miss Parker," Jarod smiled.
The group trooped through the door, the Mountie coming up the rear. Jarod looked around and found that they were in a small morgue. Jarod had seen far larger, had in fact worked in one. Evidently, this was a temporary holding location for corpses prior to transportation to the central morgue downtown.
The room contained only one examination table, which was currently occupied by the pale form of a naked young man. Over the young man's body leaned an ancient-looking fellow with thick glasses. The old man was singing opera, Verdi's Falstaff.
"Tutto nel mondo é burla," the old man sang. "L'uom é nato burlone." The rich deep tones of his voice broke off abruptly and the man began to talk. "Ah, Constable. I've been expecting you."
"Good afternoon," the Mountie said. "Mort, these are Detectives Parker and Malloy, come to liaise with us from the capital. Detective Parker, Detective Malloy, this is our coroner Dr. Mort Gustafson."
"Please call me Jarod," Jarod said.
"Yeah, yeah, enough with the niceties, Frase. Get to the point so we can get out of here." Jarod glanced over at Kowalski when he spoke. The blond man was sitting on a stool with his back to them. He was staring resolutely at the door.
"It only takes an extra moment to be courteous, Ray," the Mountie replied.
Jarod caught Miss Parker's attention with a questioning look. As the doctor began to talk about times of death and a crushed larynx, Jarod noticed that Kowalski was shrugging out of his shoulder holster. Once removed, he hung the leather straps over one knee and peeled the damp shirt over his blond head. The cotton t-shirt hit the floor with a splat.
"Ray!" Fraser sounded positively horrified. "You can't disrobe here, there is a lady present!"
"I'm not lady," Miss Parker said in a bored tone. "I'm a cop."
Ray snorted at her response. "See, Frase? She don't care," he said. "Go on Mort. Tell us about the specks of white stuff we found."
"I've tested it for every drug I could think of," the doctor said. "But it turns out that it isn't chemical but biological."
Jarod kept his attention on the doctor as he eyed the detective through his peripheral vision. Ray Kowalski was very lean, skinny to the point of being nearly concave. But his shoulders and biceps were rounded with muscle. He was the definition of wiry and would no doubt, be far stronger than many would assume. Jarod sized up the smaller man, knowing he could take him if the need arose. But Ray Kowalski would not be easily subdued. Jarod could see the quickness in him. It would not be safe to under-estimate him.
Force of habit made Jarod examine the Mountie with the same clinical eye. Dark, chiseled good looks made Benton Fraser the more noticeable of the two men. The bright red uniformed helped too. The broad shoulders and tight straps of the tunic forced perfect posture, Jarod knew from experience. But somehow he felt that the Mountie's rigid spine had little to do with his attire. Benton Fraser was as tightly pressed and stiffly starched as his uniform. There was little of the man underneath that was permitted to shine through.
"Look here," the doctor was saying. He guided them to a microscope where Fraser looked through the lenses first.
"Ray," he said with a frown. "You should look at this."
"S'okay, Frase," Ray said with his back still to them. "You look enough for both of us."
Fraser shrugged and said in explanation, "Ray doesn't like the morgue."
"Why on earth not?" Miss Parker said, her voice dripping with sarcasm. "It's just like being at the amusement park."
Jarod grinned. Miss Parker was blending into her role with an ease that made Jarod a little uncomfortable. He didn't like being reminded that she had the same pretender marker in her blood that he did. But he couldn't suppress the flash of pride that he felt at her abilities.
Mentally shaking himself, Jarod turned to Kowalski and said. "I would think that an aversion to death would have kept you from pursuing a career in law enforcement."
Ray frowned and looked up at Jarod from his stool. "An aversion?" he asked. "Are you from Canada?"
Jarod blinked at the abrupt change in topic. "No. Delaware, why?"
"Nothin'," Ray said with a shake of the head. "I have no aversion," he stressed the word. "To death. Dead guy splatted on the sidewalk, no prob. Knifed pirate tossed on the hood of a car, so what? Bullet-riddled d.b sprawled in the gutter, I've seen it all. No sweat." Ray reached over his shoulder and pointed at the examination table. "But you put a human being on a metal slab, slice him up like a damn Thanksgiving turkey so that you can lay his guts out for display… that's just unnatural."
"What do you make of this, Detective Malloy?" Constable Fraser guided Jarod toward the microscope.
"Please call me Jarod," he said automatically. Jarod peered at the sample and tried to identify what he was looking at.
"When we saw the white powder on the guy's shirt," Ray was saying. "We thought cocaine, right? Heroin maybe."
Constable Fraser spoke the next sentence. "But the texture was wrong. And the taste reminds me of caribou."
"Rhino," Jarod recognized what he was looking at. "Black Rhino. Poachers kill them for their horns. Powdered rhino horn can sell for as much as 54 grand per kilo."
Ray whistled.
"Rhino horn is highly valued in certain parts of the world for medicinal and cultural reasons," Jarod explained. "In the Far East, especially China, people believe the powdered horn can be used as medicine to reduce fever."
"I suggest we go to Chinatown and ask a few questions," Fraser said.
Ray nodded as he bent to retrieve his wet shirt. "Yeah. It's a plan." He stood. "It will take some legwork to canvas the entire neighborhood. But Frase speaks the language so we usually have better luck down there than most cops."
"I speak a couple of the dialects," Jarod offered.
"You speak Chinese?" Ray asked.
"Doesn't everyone?" Miss Parker chipped in.
Ray frowned and looked from Jarod to Miss Parker and back again. "How did you know what powdered rhino looks like under a microscope? And why do you both speak Chinese? That's just weird."
Jarod smiled his most disarming smile. "I worked for the WWF a few years back."
Ray's frown grew. "What does wrestling have to do with anything?"
"The World Wildlife Foundation, Ray," Fraser said. "The black rhino is an endangered species."
The blond detective went very still for a moment. "That's no coincidence, Frase. Endangered turtles this morning, and rhinos this afternoon, this is connected somehow."
"That would seem to be likely, Ray," the Mountie agreed.
"Right." Ray tossed his holster over one shoulder and headed for the doors. "Let's go. Hey, while we're in Chinatown we can grab lunch at that place with the noodles. You know the place, Frase. The one by the thing."
"Yes, Ray. Mr. Woo's does have very good noodles."
"Greatness," Ray said. "I'm starved." The detective swung into the corridor with only a moment's glance at his partner.
Jarod saw the non-verbal exchange between the two men. A quick look at Miss Parker told him that she had seen it too. It made Jarod more than a bit anxious.
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Ray opened his locker and tossed in his wet shirt. He hauled out the gym bag that carried his change of clothes. Working with a crazy mountie for more than two years had taught Ray the wisdom of having extra clothing around.
Ray was unbuttoning his jeans and toeing off his shoes simultaneously when Fraser walked up behind him. "Where are they?" Ray asked without preamble.
"I left them with Francesca to properly equip them with a pass for parking privileges."
"Greatness," Ray snorted. "We'll rescue them as soon as I'm changed."
Fraser rubbed one knuckle over his brow. "Yes well," the Mountie began. "Francesca did seem quite enamored with Detective Malloy."
"Whatever," Ray said. He was wearing only boxer shorts as he sat down to peel off his soggy socks. "I want you to keep an eye on these two, Frase. Something's queer about them."
"In what way?"
"Dunno." The wet socks joined the wet shirt in the bottom of Ray's locker. "Just something. That guy weirds me out. Watch him and you'll see. When he's still, he's completely still, doesn't move at all. Like one of those bugs."
Fraser made a mental note to clean Ray's locker out as soon as possible. "Bugs?"
Ray pulled on a dry pair of jeans as he spoke. "One of those stick bugs. When it walks, you can see it easy as you please. But when it stops moving, it blends right into the background."
"I did notice that both of the detectives are very light on their feet," Fraser admitted.
"See?" Ray said. "Something's queer. Why would two detectives from Springfield both be able to speak Chinese?" Ray yanked a white cotton t-shirt over his head and began to tuck the ends into his waistband. "And did you hear him call her Miss Parker? What's up with that?"
"Their credentials checked out," Fraser argued. "And both seem to be competent investigators."
Ray slipped his arms into his shoulder holster and jerked the straps into place around his chest. "That may be Frase," Ray said. "But I've got to go with my gut on this one. We should be careful."
"Understood," Fraser nodded in agreement.
Ray pulled a jacket from the hook inside his locker and slammed the door closed with a clang. "Okay then," he said with a grin. "Let's go catch bad guys."
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End part 5