Magie Noire

By Rurouni Star

Chapter Twelve

"Who are you really?"

I blinked slowly. My head was spinning. I knew there was a good reason I shouldn't answer the question, but the connection between my thoughts and my mouth seemed to have been temporarily severed.

"I'm Detective Karrin Murphy, with the Chicago P.D."

Bianca smiled pleasantly at me, but I could see the black eyes and rubbery skin beneath her skin-suit. She took another sip of her port. My stomach rebelled at the sight of the dark red stuff disappearing past her lips. "Why are you here, Detective Murphy?"

"I…" I struggled against the question harder, trying to regain control of my mouth, my sanity, my life. But those black eyes bore into me, tugging at the strings of my mind. I didn't know how to stop them. "I'm investigating the murder of Jennifer Stanton."

"Fascinating," Bianca said. She leaned forward in her chair. That deep red port glistened on her lips. "You must know quite a lot about the case, then. Please, tell me everything you've discovered so far."

The walls sighed with ecstasy. A woman's voice screamed in horror. I saw shades of the creature in front of me, feeding from a human being's wrist.

"Detective. I won't ask again."

I swallowed down bile. "She died along with Tommy Tomm — one of Johnny Marcone's enforcers. The two of them were intimate at the time. Their hearts exploded from their chests. I don't understand how."

Bianca tapped long, wicked fingernails against her port glass. I saw them as claws.

"You wouldn't understand, of course," Bianca observed. "But you don't need to. I have far better people than you tracking down the murderer." Her black eyes widened upon me, dragging me in like sticky tar. "Who knows that you're here, Detective?" She purred the words consideringly, and some part of me realized she was gauging whether anyone would miss me.

"My partner Ron. The Lieutenant." I paused. "Johnny Marcone. He all but dared me to come here."

The last name made Bianca twist her mouth in distaste. She stood up from her chair. "What a bother," she said. "Did he send you here so I would kill you for him?"

"I don't know," I said honestly.

"Well." Her lips pursed. Claws scraped against glass. A shade whimpered, begging on its knees in front of her. "I have no interest in doing Johnny Marcone's dirty work for him. If he expects he can send every little bit of inconvenient trash my way, he is going to be sorely disappointed."

She set down her glass, and beckoned me forward. I staggered to my feet, and got down on my knees.

Sharp fingernails gripped my wrist delicately. Pain pierced my skin. Then… ecstasy.

I'd never felt anything nearly so pleasurable. I doubted I ever would again. I watched the spiritual essence of my blood disappear between her lips, strengthening her body.

I slumped in disappointment as she let me go, though another part of me was aghast, horrified at the sight of her true form.

"Forget this conversation," Bianca told me, licking at her lips. "Go home and sleep. When you think of this place from now on, it will be with fear. You know that you should not return."

Someone helped me outside the gate. The mansion passed me by with threads of passion, fear, bloodlust, need. I had to go home. I had to sleep. I shouldn't come back.

The city was overwhelming, though. I couldn't figure out the way, through all the shadows that surrounded me. Instead, I saw a distant light, and remembered the image of a white temple, a merciful angel, a guaranteed comfort.

I turned my steps toward the light in the distance, and started walking.

0-0-0-0

I woke up to Waldo's hand on my shoulder.

"Hey. Sorry, um. I got a call from work. I have to go in." I blinked blearily, trying to figure out where and when I was.

Waldo looked down at me, concerned. The faint light coming in from outside lit up his face. I guessed it was maybe an hour or so after sunrise. I forced myself up, rubbing at my eyes.

After the shortest magical crash course in history, Bob had run me through some mental exercises to strengthen my control over what I was beginning to call my leaky brainpan. I'd fallen asleep halfway though one of them. No wonder my dreams had gone wonky — the exercises had shaken something loose.

"Everything okay?" I asked dimly.

Waldo looked uncertain. I was tired — but not so tired that I didn't notice his evasiveness. Waldo Butters just didn't have a very good poker face.

"You called in time off," I said. "If they're calling you back in, it's for a good reason."

Waldo sighed. "We've got another body related to one of my previous autopsies," he admitted.

My blood ran cold. He wouldn't say it out loud, but I knew. "It's a body on my case," I said. "Someone else died."

"That's not your responsibility," Waldo told me. "Really, it's not." He gave me a worried look. "I wanted to give you a quick checkup before I left. You can go right back to sleep after that."

I tried to press him for more information as he checked me over, but Waldo rebuffed my attempts with a polite, gentle firmness that made me feel a little bit like a child for even trying.

"Take it easy today," Waldo told me, as he finished up. "You should technically be getting out of the hospital right around now. Please consider acting like it?" He gave me a wan sort of smile. "I'll have my phone if you really need something." He paused. "Something other than work."

I might be stubborn, but I know when an angle isn't working. Waldo wasn't going to give me anything directly just because I kept asking. I sighed. "Fine, sorry," I said. "Force of habit. I'll try to get some more rest."

Waldo beamed at me, and I felt a bit guilty. Naturally, I had zero intention of staying in bed. "Oh!" he said. "I left something on the table for you. I hope you and your skull enjoy it."

I raised an eyebrow, but he didn't stick around to explain. Instead, he headed out of the bedroom, and I heard him gather up his things and close the front door behind him.

Bob's eye sockets lit up sleepily. "Lazybones," he mumbled accusingly. "You said you were just gonna practice meditating. Meditation doesn't involve snoring."

I snorted. "I meant to meditate. Cut me a break, I got poisoned." I considered him, though. "I think I got something out of it anyway. I remembered some stuff from the Velvet Room. Maybe Bianca's not as good at hypnotism as she thinks."

Bob's little eye lights rolled. "You're not that good either, grasshopper," he told me. "You said your Sight cracked open that night. No one is powerful enough to erase things you've Seen with your Third Eye. She might have buried those memories some, but they were bound to spring back eventually. You caught a lucky break."

I grimaced. For a second, I'd felt a little proud of my achievement, but Uncle Bob sure was quick to cut me back down to size. "Fine," I said. "I caught a lucky break. Either way, now I'm sure Bianca isn't involved in the murders, even peripherally. She said she had other people looking into it for her. I doubt she lied about that, given she was about to erase all my memories."

"Ooh boy," Bob said. "Goodie. That means you get to watch out for a warlock and some vampire's lackeys." He paused. "I mean, I'm assuming you're about to go do exactly what you just said you weren't going to do. Am I right?"

"You're right," I sighed. "I feel a little bad about it, but I don't think there's a great way to sum up the situation right now. I'll come up with some way to ease Waldo into it all later."

The golden glow in Bob's eye sockets wavered some at that. "What, you mean you're gonna tell him the truth?" He sounded a little upset, which surprised me. "Just how many people are you planning on letting in on the supernatural, kid?"

I frowned. "As many as I have to in order to stay in one piece," I said. "Why? Is there a problem with that?"

"The supernatural doesn't like having its cover blown, kid," Bob told me. "Sure, there's an in-the-know community, but it's mostly people who've got someone powerful behind them who'd care if they went missing or forgot a bunch of stuff overnight. Let's just say, for example, if some unnamed vampire found out your memory wasn't as foggy as she thought it was… maybe she'd decide she was better off with you dead after all. And, you know. Anyone else you told."

I let that sink in slowly. Damn. It made sense now that I thought about it, but it meant I really was going to have to reassess my approach to… well, everything. Not just this case, but all the stuff beyond it, too.

I chewed on the inside of my cheek. "...yeah," I admitted. "I'm gonna have to think on that."

Bob let out a little sigh of relief. "A little more thinking never did anyone any harm," he said. "I mean. I'm biased, obviously."

I cracked a smile. "Yeah," I said. "You're kind of a bonehead."

Bob snickered obligingly. "Actually," he said, "I'm an airhead."

I had the weirdest sense like I ought to be high-fiving the skull in front of me, but that was a tough call when one of the two of us had no hands. I settled for patting him on the top of his crown instead. "I'll put you in the living room before I go. You want to watch TV while I'm gone?"

"Oh, please," Bob said eagerly. "Do you get PBS?"

I blinked. Right. Bob had gone into storage when I was still a kid. He didn't even know about cable television.

"I've got plenty more than that," I told him.

0-0-0-0

I left Bob the skull nestled between two couch cushions, watching the Discovery channel on my grandmother's old TV. In the process, I discovered that Waldo had left his cd walkman and headphones on the table, along with a handful of polka albums. I snorted, and tugged the headphones over my neck. I had promised to brush up on my polka, after all, and I owed the M.E. more than ever, now.

My department car was presumably still parked out front at the Varsity, and my motorcycle was at the station, so I had to call a cab to get me where I was going. I probably could have managed with public transit, but I knew I was pushing my physical limits already, and taking the long way with a bunch of people pressed into my personal space made me miserable just thinking about it.

As I slunk into the precinct, feeling distinctly haggard around the edges, I immediately realized I wasn't going to be sneaking anywhere. A half-dozen faces turned my way within the first ten seconds of my entrance, with an equal number of raised eyebrows. I stuffed my hands into my jeans pockets and ducked my head, heading for my desk.

Damn it. My case files were already missing. I'd hoped I might be able to make a few copies, maybe check to see if something else about the new victim had landed on my desk — but Carmichael had clearly already moved everything.

"What the hell, Murph?" Two minutes flat, and someone had already ratted me out to my partner. I took a deep breath, praying for patience, and turned to look at Carmichael. He'd stumbled out of the break room, probably disturbed from a much-needed nap. "You're supposed to be in bed."

"Just picking up my stuff," I said warily. "You didn't have to come say hello."

Carmichael narrowed his eyes. "Must be some important stuff," he said, not bothering to hide his skepticism.

I held up my motorcycle keys. "I'm not leaving my ride here indefinitely," I said. "God knows what you donut-munchers will do to it."

"Uh-huh." His skepticism didn't vanish. "You good enough to drive a bike right now?"

I shrugged. "No one said I couldn't." I eyed him consideringly. "But while I'm here, maybe I ought to fill you in on the Varsity."

Carmichael groaned. "See, this? This is why I hung up on you. Jesus, Murph, I like your hard head most of the time, but you're gonna get the union involved if you keep acting like this—"

"You're gonna have to hunt me down and ask eventually anyway," I replied. "I'm just trying to make your job easier while I'm here."

Carmichael sighed and shook his head. "Fine. Conference room. You've got five minutes to give me the details. And you better go get me a coffee. You interrupted my beauty sleep for this shit."

I grinned. "I'd say you should give it a rest already, but I guess you just woke up."

Carmichael blinked. He rubbed at his eyes. "Am I still dreaming, or did you just pun, Murph?"

I winced. Ugh. He was right. "Damn it, Bob," I muttered. "You've turned me into a monster." Carmichael raised his eyebrows, and I dodged the question. "I'll go grab us some coffees," I said.

0-0-0-0

Carmichael's grumpy face barely lightened, even after he drained his first full cup of coffee. I lingered over mine; even the crappy precinct coffee tasted divine right now, but the caffeine just wasn't sitting well in my stomach.

"Well?" he asked. "Give me the short version."

I hesitated. Great. I'd offered to debrief with Carmichael on the spot as a way of stalling for time, but I hadn't entirely thought through what I was actually going to say to him. The reality of what had happened, giant scorpions and all, didn't strike me as something on the table.

"I got to the bar on time. Marcone had me patted down for wires, but he didn't take my gun. There was a dead scorpion on the table; he said someone left it on his desk at the Varsity as a warning." I chewed carefully on my next words. "I thought I was about to get something out of him, but… things get weird and fuzzy after that. Someone went for Marcone. I think they stabbed me. I started hallucinating big-time."

Carmichael frowned. "Dead scorpion still sounds like something," he said. "You think it might be some symbolic thing? You ever heard of that before in organized crime?"

I shook my head. "Marcone seemed to think it was like… a talisman. Like someone really was trying to put a spell on him." I searched Carmichael's face for any small sign of credulity, but — predictably — I was disappointed. He rolled his eyes dramatically.

"Great," he said. "So we've got voodoo drug-dealing gangsters now. I guess that still narrows things down some."

I pressed my lips together. "Okay," I said. "I spilled. Your turn. You gonna tell me who the other victim was, Ron?"

Carmichael hissed out a curse. "God damnit," he said. "I knew it. I knew you couldn't keep your nose out of it. Who told you?"

"No one told me," I said. "I figured it out. I'm a detective like that."

Carmichael shook his head. "No. No dice. Go home, Murph."

I narrowed my eyes at him. "What are you, my mother or my partner? Don't tell me you wouldn't be doing the same in my position, Ron. I just want to know who died."

"Why?" he demanded. "No, don't answer that, I know why. You want to blame yourself for not solving it quicker, for being in a hospital. You want to blow the rest of your health hoping you can stop it from happening again. Well, I'm not interested in helping you do that, Murph. The whole world isn't your responsibility. Sometimes, you're your responsibility. If you can't learn that, you're gonna end up with a gun in your—"

He cut himself off abruptly. But I knew the rest of what he'd been about to say.

"A gun in my mouth," I said. There was a cold, hard anger in my gut. "Yeah, Ron. I happen to know a thing or two about that."

Carmichael swallowed, and looked away. "I wasn't thinking," he said quietly. "Could've phrased it better. But I meant it. You're circling burnout, Murph. You gotta do everything so right, you won't even cut yourself some slack, let alone anyone else."

I clenched my jaw. "Oh, hell," I said. "I guess you've got me all figured out." I leaned in toward him. "Here I thought my problem was that everyone else was cutting themselves too much slack, passing dud cases off to S.I. and making backroom deals with fucking mobsters. I thought my problem was that I kept having to pick up everyone else's slack, Ron. But you've opened up my eyes."

Carmichael recognized the danger in my voice. He held up a hand. "Murph," he started. But I was tired and angry and scared, and I was entirely too far gone to recognize how far he'd pushed me.

"Shut up, Ron," I said. "You started this. You're right, okay? I'm too uptight. I wouldn't sell drugs. I wouldn't even look the other way. That's what got me doped up and killed my career. My fault entirely." My chewed-down fingernails were digging into my palms now. "I'm sneaking back into my own precinct on sick leave because I'm a workaholic, not because I think my Lieutenant is corrupt enough to pin my case on the first convenient target he finds, and certainly not because I gotta wonder which of my asshole coworkers is gonna leak all the case details to a mobster who likes to get into shootouts in the middle of the street. That's me, burning out, Ron."

"That is not what I meant," Carmichael shot back. He was on his feet now. "That is not what I meant and you damn well know it, Murph. You need to step back. I am normally the last person to say that to anyone, but you are not all right, and you haven't been since you got here. I am asking you to trust me to handle your stuff while you figure your shit out, because that's my job as your partner."

I shoved to my feet to match him. "I don't have shit I need to figure out," I hissed. "I've got it figured out. I'm trying to do the right thing, and the more I do, the more miserable I am. That's not me being neurotic, Ron. That's me realizing how fucking lonely it is to think there even is a right thing, let alone bother chasing after it. Sitting at home alone isn't going to make everyone else magically face down what two-faced, hypocritical sons-of-bitches they are. No one's gonna start doing their damn job just because I get some more shut-eye. And my partner isn't going to promise not to call in the mob, because he thinks having standards looks too much like a deathwish."

I was going too far, I knew I was going too far, but I couldn't stop. I felt like someone else had started running my mouth for me, and I was some audience member sitting at the back of my head, watching in mute horror.

I knew Carmichael had a point. I knew he was a decent guy trying his goddamned best to thread the needle between corruption and suicidal morality. I even knew, deep down, that he had a point about my deathwish, and that was something I was going to have to face down someday soon.

But I also knew I was telling some version of the truth. I was tired, broken, and desperate for validation in the face of death for purely rational reasons. Every time I'd tried to grasp at some faith in humanity, I'd been let down hard, and had my nose bloodied to boot.

I had to believe there was a point to doing the right thing. I had to. Otherwise, why the hell had my father gone through all that misery and endured so much, only to break from the strain at the very end? If there wasn't a right thing, then why the hell had he died chasing after it?

My last shred of faith in even that tiny ideal was finally starting to unravel.

Carmichael was still staring at me. And I was still going off on him, with that strange autopilot running the show.

"Maybe," I said, "just maybe, if I had half an inch of faith that I could leave you to do the job without copping out, I'd be perfectly happy sitting in bed recovering. Then we'd both be happier, because you wouldn't have to worry about another poor, neurotic Murphy eating their gun, Ron."

Carmichael swallowed. I knew I'd hit him hard. I couldn't help but know. My chest was tight with anger, guilt, shame, misery. My stomach was twisting, and I knew I might heave up that little bit of coffee any minute now.

I knew I'd fucked up, even before I felt my conscious mind take back the driver's seat. I knew there were things wrong with what I'd said, but I couldn't figure out which parts were wrong, and I was too dizzy and scared to face the things we'd said. The idea of trying to figure out how to fix things was so suddenly overwhelming that I staggered back from the table, breathing hard.

"...your case," I said hoarsely. "It's your case. Just fucking take it." I backed away for the door.

We were both equal cowards. Carmichael didn't try to stop me as I left.