6
1082 Words
The morning fog at the docks tasted like diesel and salt.
Sarah ducked under the yellow police tape, her boots crunching on the gravel. Her head was still pounding from the wine last night, or maybe it was just the sight waiting for her.
"Detective! You can't be back here."
It wasn't a police officer who shouted.
A wall of men in matte-black body armor stood between the GCPD squad cars and the shipping containers. They held assault rifles across their chests, not aimed, but ready. No badge numbers. No faces. Just the silver shield logo on their shoulders.
Black Shield.
Sarah marched up to the lead mercenary. He was a head taller than her, his face obscured by a tactical visor.
"This is a crime scene," Sarah said, flashing her badge. "State jurisdiction."
"Private property," the merc rumbled. His voice was digitized by a modulator. "Client invoked Article 4. Internal security matter."
"Article 4 covers shoplifting," Sarah snapped. "We have reports of automatic gunfire and an unconscious man found tied to a railing. That’s aggravated assault."
"The employee slipped," the merc said. "Go home, Detective."
Sarah grit her teeth. She looked past the wall of black armor.
Fifty yards away, a sleek black limousine sat idling next to a rusted shipping container. The window rolled down just an inch.
Darius Krell.
He was watching her. He raised a hand in a mock salute, the diamond on his pinky catching the gray morning light.
"Captain," Sarah yelled, turning to Thorne, who was standing by his cruiser, looking defeated. "Are we really letting rent-a-cops push us out?"
Thorne took a drag of his cigarette and flicked it into a puddle. HISS.
"Stand down, Vance. The paperwork is already filed. Vane pulled strings."
"They're scrubbing the scene!" Sarah pointed. Behind the mercs, a crew was power-washing the pavement. "They're destroying evidence."
"I said stand down."
Sarah turned back to the blockade. She couldn't fight them. Not physically.
But she was smaller than them. And she knew this shipyard better than they did.
"Fine," Sarah said, throwing her hands up. "Have it your way."
She turned and walked toward her car.
As soon as the lead merc looked away, she cut left, diving behind a stack of pallets.
She moved low and fast, crawling through the gap between two rusted hull fragments. The smell of rotting fish was overpowering, but it masked her approach.
She emerged ten feet from the target container—Number 409.
The lock was melted slag.
Sarah pulled out her phone, snapping photos rapidly.
CLICK. CLICK.
Then she saw it.
On the latch of the container door, snagged on a jagged piece of metal, was a tiny tuft of fabric.
She crept closer.
It wasn't black tactical nylon. It wasn't denim.
It was beige wool.
Sarah frowned. She pulled an evidence bag from her pocket and tweezed the scrap into it.
"Wool?" she whispered. "Who robs a shipyard in a sweater?"
She looked down at the mud below the door. The power-washers hadn't reached this spot yet.
A single, clear footprint was pressed into the oil-stained dirt.
She placed her ruler next to it and snapped a photo.
Size 11. Sneaker. Waffle tread pattern.
It was a generic brand. The kind you buy at a discount superstore for twenty bucks. No grip. No tactical advantage.
"Found something, Detective?"
The voice came from directly behind her.
Sarah spun around, hand on her holster.
Darius Krell stood there. He wasn't wearing his usual flashy suit. He was in a long leather coat, looking like a shark in human skin. Two Black Shield mercs flanked him.
"You're trespassing," Krell said, smiling. His teeth were too white.
"I'm investigating," Sarah said, standing her ground. "What's in the box, Krell? Drugs? Guns?"
"Textiles," Krell lied smoothly. "Very boring stuff. But my security team tells me you found a thread."
He looked at the evidence bag in her hand.
"Doesn't look like much," Krell laughed. "Looks like something a grandpa would wear."
"It belongs to the man who kicked your ass last night," Sarah said.
Krell’s smile vanished. His eyes went cold.
"That man isn't a ghost, Detective. He's a nuisance. And he made a mistake coming here."
Krell stepped closer. He smelled of expensive cologne and fear.
"You tell your 'Ronin' something for me. Tell him the Council is watching. Tell him he's a dead man walking."
"I'll be sure to pass that along," Sarah said, "right after I put you in cuffs."
"Get her out of here," Krell barked to the mercs.
The guards stepped forward, grabbing Sarah’s arms.
"Hey!" Sarah twisted free, shoving one of them back. "Don't touch me!"
"Let her go!" Thorne’s voice boomed.
The Captain was walking over, hand on his gun. The standoff was back on.
Sarah backed away, clutching the evidence bag. She had what she needed.
The apartment was quiet when Sarah got home.
She was exhausted. Her boots felt like lead weights. She dropped her keys in the bowl.
CLINK.
"Noah?" she called out.
No answer. Probably at the library, pretending to work.
Sarah looked down at the entryway mat.
Noah’s shoes were there. His "running errands" sneakers. Cheap, comfortable, bought from the discount bin three months ago.
Sarah froze.
She looked at the shoes. Then she pulled her phone out and opened the photo of the footprint from the docks.
Size 11.
Waffle tread.
Generic brand.
She looked back at Noah's shoes.
They were identical.
"Don't be stupid," she whispered to herself. "Half the men in the city own these shoes. They cost nineteen dollars."
She knelt down. She picked up the left sneaker.
She turned it over.
Embedded in the tread, right in the center of the heel, was a smear of black, oily sludge.
The same black sludge she had just stepped in at the shipyard.
Sarah stared at the shoe. Her breath caught in her throat.
The beige wool. The clumsiness. The unexplained bruises.
And now, the mud.
A floorboard creaked behind her.
Sarah dropped the shoe. She spun around, hand flying to her hip.
Noah was standing in the hallway. He was wearing an oversized hoodie, his hair messy, blinking sleepily behind his glasses.
"Sarah?" he yawned, rubbing his eyes. "You're home early. Did you catch the bad guys?"
Sarah looked at his face. The soft, confused eyes. The slouch.
She looked back at the shoe.
It's circumstantial, her brain screamed. It's just mud.
But her gut was screaming something else entirely.
- Writer
