After arriving at Carber’s Carpentry and calling the other Rangers and Mr. Moon to inform them of recent interesting developments, Braxton and Jerry stood outside near the back of the building's small parking lot. Jerry produced one of his unfiltered cigarettes from their metal case and lit it. He started smoking without much enthusiasm until he finished the cigarette moments later.

  Jerry sighed in relief as the cold rush of nicotine filled his system. Now was the time to hurry up and wait to have another long, miserable night of work, he guessed.

  A large, tattered awning hung above the two men and a handful of gendarmes who had helped to secure the crime scene. The tattered awning provided minimal cover from the elements, but Jerry didn’t mind. He had been through tougher, more unsavory weather dozens of times before. But despite this fact, he failed to be a fan of the brutal wind that still blew and the freezing rain that came down just as hard as it did hours earlier.

  To help them tolerate the punishing weather, Jerry and Braxton wore wool fedoras, thick leather gloves, and heavy, NorbatonTech trench coats emblazoned with three reflective Is on the back. All black clothing of course. Because of this, the gendarmes gave them plenty of space and bothered them little. Triple I Division special agents on the field often had this effect on gendarmes, who considered them to be a contradictory mix of harrowing boogeymen and reliable allies.

  “I've been wondering about something for a real long time,” Jerry said.

  “Yeah?” Braxton asked.

  “While we drove out here, I couldn’t stop thinking about how some people think that raw milk is a thing worth drinking.”

  “We just survived a gunfight a few hours ago and you’re thinking about people drinking raw milk? That is really your top priority right now?”

  “We survived and the bastard who started what he couldn’t finish with us caught himself a bad case of acute lead poisoning.” Jerry tucked his chin into his chest and gave Braxton one of his wolfish grins. “Am I not free to ponder what is on my mind during the rare moments of relative peace we find with each other?”

  Braxton snickered and shrugged. “I never said you couldn’t do that. I just find it strange is what I’m saying. But continue complaining about people drinking raw milk. I’m listening and want to see where you go with this.”

  “Thank you,” Jerry said. “So like I was saying, drinking raw milk is downright absurd and disgusting to me. Out of all of the things people steal from animals, milk is the grossest of them all to steal. Milk isn’t something humans were meant to drink in the first place, so now you’re gonna tell me people want to not just drink it, but drink it without the added safety benefits of boiling the stuff first? Un-fucking-real stuff, man.”

  “Sometimes some people get funny ideas in their heads about what’s good for them and what’s bad for them, but cross the wires,” Braxton said. “I’m certain this is a phenomenon you could relate to.”

  “Are you insinuating that my choice of veganism is silly?”

  “I never said that and will never do so. I think your veganism is actually an admirable trait of yours, so there’s no need for you to accuse me of calling it silly, dear. I’m talking about the other nonsense you tend to get into.”

  “Good to know,” Jerry said. “I once read an article from the New Chemeketa Source where dozens of so-called ‘raw milk activists’ gathered in the city hall to protest some new regulation. They drank a bunch of the stuff and poured it on the floor before they got arrested for disturbing the peace. Do you know what happened to these activist types a few days later?”

  “Everybody forgot about them and their little stunt?”

  “Reality caught up with ideology, my man. They got sick as stray dogs. A handful of them actually died from dysentery in the Twelveforsaken year of 2375. And all for what? To prove some bullshit point most people didn’t care about?”

  “Some problems tend to solve themselves given enough time,” Braxton said. “A big shame some people died, though. I believe the prize for playing stupid games should be hard lessons, rarely death.”

  Jerry scoffed and rolled his eyes. “If you say so, big man. I think if you’re trying to prove a stupid point and the potential risks involve shitting your pants so hard you die, you deserve what you get in the end.”

  “Harsh. But I suppose that’s one way to see things.”

  “Indeed. Now, I gotta light up real quick again. Bitching and moaning about dumbasses doing dumb things makes me hungrier for nicotine than usual.”

  Jerry placed another cigarette between his lips. He attempted to use his own personal lighter to ignite it, but the stiff winds kept blowing the flame out. Following a few, frustrating non-starts, a nearby gendarme took pity on Jerry. She produced a wind-resistant lighter and helped him out.

  “Thank you, dear.”

  “No problem, handsome,” she said before ambling elsewhere.

  Jerry and Braxton stood side by side for a few silent moments, taking in the nocturnal atmosphere while still waiting for the other Rangers to arrive. The weather was as treacherous as it was tedious to move through, he guessed. After Jerry finished his cigarette and threw it on the ground to crush the butt, he glanced at Braxton, stopped, then glanced at him again.

  “May I help you?” Braxton asked. “You have a lot of tells for when you want to say something, but are biting your tongue.”

  “Alright! This might sound very deranged of me to say,” Jerry started, “but I think more people could be put off by accurately labeling milk as rape juice.”

  Braxton regarded Jerry with wide, shocked eyes. “Excuse me?”

  “You and I are both clever enough men who know that cows are mammals that lactate only when they are pregnant, right? So to maintain a steady flow of milk to be consumed by humans, cows must constantly be impregnated, willingly or not.”

  “Was that cigarette you just smoked laced with something?”

  Jerry pointed an accusatory finger at Braxton. “Hey, you’re not addressing the point I’m making here.”

  “Because it’s an insane point I’m not going to address. Do not make me regret entertaining the thoughts you know damn well you should write in a journal or keep in that crazy head of yours.”

  “Excuse me for daring to think outside the anthropocentric box we call reality.”

  “Consider yourself deeply excused,” Braxton said. He pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. “The Twelve help me. I love you, and I really mean that, but I feel like you love driving me insane more than I love you.”

  “Don’t say that to me,” Jerry said, frowning dramatically. “That hurts my feelings.”

  “Then how about we agree to politely say nothing else to each other until the other Rangers and Mr. Moon get here?” Braxton asked. “Can we do that, please?”

  “Can do,” Jerry said. “Can do.”

  Around thirty five or so minutes later, the rest of Rustio’s Rangers and Mr. Moon arrived in a fleet of sleek, black cars. They maneuvered themselves into parking spaces, then exited the warmth of their cars into the freezing rain and cold, biting wind of the night. Nobody looked happy to be dragged out of their warm, comfortable homes to look at the mutilated corpses related to the scene of the crime within Carber’s Carpentry, but work was work, especially when it was stipulated to be on-call.

  Mr. Moon, the handler of Rustio’s Rangers, was the first to approach Jerry and Braxton. Like most Hissians, he was well over one hundred and eighty centimeters tall, covered in head to foot in fur, and had piercing yellow eyes most Non-Hissians struggled to sustain eye contact with for more than a few seconds. In short, he was a bipedal tuxedo cat. His real name wasn’t actually Mr. Moon, but a “nom-de-furry” he gave himself based on two facts. Hissians who emigrated from clowder cities gave each other names other sapients couldn’t physically pronounce, and that he had a large, white spot on his chest while most of his fur was pitch black.

  Like Jerry and Braxton, Mr. Moon wore the usual uniform of a Triple I Division field agent underneath a NorbatonTech trench coat with three reflective Is on the back. The only unique thing about his uniform was his fedora. It had been tailored to allow his ears to fit into it with minimal discomfort. Mr. Moon’s ears flicked every so often when freezing rain hit them. Like most things about Mr. Moon, Jerry found the ear flickering to be more annoying than endearing.

  Next to approach Jerry and Braxton was Anthony Rustio, the eponymous leader of Rustio’s Rangers. He was much shorter than either of the two towering men before him, but carried himself with the poise and confidence of somebody twice their heights combined. Underneath his fedora, he had strong facial features, focused brown eyes, and a smooth, youthful face that failed to betray his true age of thirty-something. Whenever they were in front of the other Rangers in less professional settings, Jerry loved to tease Anthony by calling him Ant. Anthony was not a big fan of this treatment, giving Jerry all the more reason to continue teasing him until he got genuinely upset.

  Next was Rosa Rodriguez. She was a short Native Zapotekan woman with all the physical sturdiness, facial expressions, and emotional presence of a brick wall. She wore her thick, black hair in twin braids that draped her shoulders. Rosa opted for a long, black, custom-made NorbatonTech skirt on the grounds of cultural dress exceptions. The skirt had taken a large chunk out of her paycheck, but she said it was worth it and just as protective as normal NorbatonTech pants.

  Next was the second official couple of Rustio’s Rangers—Hirohito “Howard” Kamikan and Mallory Xao. They were similar to Jerry and Braxton in that despite their clashing appearances, mannerisms, and personalities, they somehow managed to make things work for quite a long time.

  While Howard was a tall, lanky young man who had the angular body and sharp, gaunt facial features of an underfed dreamsauce addict who could use a few hundred more daily calories, Mallory was the complete opposite. She was an older woman who was just as, if not more sturdy than somebody like Rosa, with a thick body sculpted by exercise and a healthy appetite. Jerry often found their relationship amusing, but ultimately touching and adorable.

  The last Ranger to approach Jerry and Braxton was Noura Askersin, a youthful Ashokan woman with dusky skin, expressive brown eyes, and silky, black hair she kept in a thick ponytail. She possessed the ability to make the stiff, professional uniform of the Triple I Division look like something out of a high class fashion magazine. She was such a beautiful woman to Jerry, he often found himself bashful to be in the presence of somebody of her beauty. It was not uncommon for Jerry to ask how Noura failed to end up in the Neighborhood Watch Division, but she wasn’t the type of woman to expound on her past very much. This was fine by Jerry’s standards. All of Rustio’s Rangers had long, troubled pasts they weren’t fans of casually sharing.

  Once everybody exchanged the proper greetings, handshakes, and other short pleasantries, Jerry and Braxton got to the real, long-winded business of recounting tonight’s wild events to Mr. Moon and his PTALP. He closed it and regarded Jerry and Braxton without his usual suspicious eyes and minimal cross-examination—a curious rarity for the Hissian that Jerry noticed. Mr. Moon had the obnoxious habit of treating even non-professional engagements like legally binding interrogations. Then again, he was probably just tired and not interested in doing more work than was needed at the unholy hour.

  “I swear the suspects we deal with are getting crazier and crazier the closer we get to the end of our employment next year,” Anthony said. “This has to be the fifth time this year one of us has had to use deadly force.”

  “Sixth,” Mr. Moon said.

  “Thank you for the correction,” Anthony said.

  This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  Jerry shrugged. “Such are the confounding times we found ourselves in. I’ve personally stopped counting the amount of times somebody or something has come at me with a knife, a gun, or something even more nefarious.”

  “Bragging, are we?” Rosa asked.

  “No,” Jerry said. “Just stating pure facts. I’m real certain fixating on the amount of times somebody has tried to end your life does bad things to your head.”

  “I agree with that wholeheartedly,” Howard said. “My head is already awash in plentiful nightmares. No need to jumble up the pink toybox within my skull anymore than needed.”

  “Right on, Crazy Kamikan,” said Jerry. “Right on.”

  “I think we should get to looking at the plentiful nightmares inside this workshop instead of doing an impromptu vent session,” Anthony said. “We have Dr. Moenstaggers to give us real therapy later, and it's colder than a touched’s tit out here.”

  “Hey, my tits are plenty warm and welcoming,” Jerry said. “Don’t you agree, Brax?”

  Braxton sighed deeply instead of replying.

  After confirming with one of the crime scene technicians if the crime scene was clear to enter and examine, Rustio’s Rangers and Mr. Moon were given the go ahead. A crime scene technician gave them latex gloves, masks, and protective suits so as to not contaminate the scene further than it already was. As expected, Braxton had a Vullen of a time putting his protective suit on, but barely managed.

  The Rangers, Mr. Moon, and a small army of crime scene technicians entered the workshop. They broke into smaller groups to cover more ground. All around them was the evidence of a party cut short. Upturned wooden chairs. Crushed, empty plastic cups. Plates of hastily abandoned, half-eaten food. Empty cans and bottles of soda. In the center of the workshop, there was even a rainbow disco ball that spun around, casting multicolored light on everything.

  “Look at that.” Jerry pointed at the disco ball above. “Dance till you're dead, huh?”

  “Be a little professional," Braxton muttered. “People got murdered here tonight.”

  Jerry, Braxton, Rosa, and several crime scene technicians approached Bradley’s body—or at least what looked like it. Bradley’s corpse was so drenched in blood, Jerry almost failed to realize it belonged to Bradley were it not for his shock of signature white hair. Jerry sighed. He was no stranger to seeing or even making corpses of his own, but he had a strong feeling the more time he spent looking at Bradley's body, the more it was going to make him feel bad about being human for a few hours.

  Jerry kneeled close to Bradley’s body and was proved correct. The deceased man was literally blown apart by the Exorcist Division operators who had the duty of responding to whatever insane, drug-fueled antics he was attempting to pull off. Since Exorcist Division operators were meant to deal with all threats, supernatural, mundane, and otherwise, they were given access to exotic weapons, tools, and ammunition such as explosive, silver, or expanding bullets. It looked like Bradley had the misfortune of facing off against many Exorcist Division Operators’ explosive bullets. And losing.

  Badly.

  Bradley’s lower jaw remained barely attached to face and was split horizontally, leaving his thick, slug-like tongue free to loll about in a pool of congealed blood and devastated flesh. Bullet fragments, shards of his own teeth, and pieces of his own shattered jawbone had spalled across the flesh of his already mutilated face, resulting in dozens of deep grooves that obliterated what was left of his visage.

  His right arm was damn near blown off at the elbow, exposing a complicated series of tendons, raw, splintered bone, and broken arteries. The glistening reds, purples, pinks, and otherwise viscera colored contents of his torso and abdomen were exposed, smelling just as bad as it looked. One of the crime scene technicians lost their will and excused themselves to expose the contents of their own stomach outside.

  Bradley remained untouched by bullets below the waist. This wasn't a surprising sight to Jerry . Exorcist Division operators were quite the bloodthirsty, thuggish bunch, but a well-trained bloodthirsty, thuggish bunch. They typically went for the center mass and head, hitting them with lethal accuracy.

  “Alright, enough of this,” Jerry said, returning to his full height. He felt a little queasy. “If I look at that for a second longer, I'm gonna join that one tech outside.”

  “I heard that,” Braxton added, looking visibly queasy as well. “He brought it hard and bad, but very quickly, I think.”

  “What a shame this one is,” Rosa said. “I bet that little lock of white hair he had made him popular with the ladies.”

  “Not in particular,” Jerry said. “His girlfriend was an angry alcoholic that wanted to claw out his roommates eyes. I wish I hadn’t needed to stop her. I’m certain if you met Shatter Moon, that fucking bum, you would’ve wanted shattered his head.”

  “I see.” Rosa looked at the decapitated head of a man not too far from Bradley’s ruined corpse. “I also see what appears to be a head without its extra baggage.”

  “That it is,” Braxton said.

  Jerry looked at the head and sucked his teeth. “We oughta petition the Exorcists to burn this place down once all of this is done. This place is gonna get so fucking haunted by all this violence.”

  “Agreed,” Braxton and Rosa said at the same time.

  Jerry, Braxton, and Rosa approached the decapitated head and frowned at it together. They kneeled as one to get a closer, all the more stomach turning eyeful of the head.

  “Look at those cuts on the neck,” Rosa said. “That’s nasty, non-professional work. I’m going to guess he felt a few good whacks before the lights went out for him.”

  “What do you think would possess Bradley to do something like this?” Braxton asked.

  “Or give him the strength and insanity for something like this?” Jerry asked. “People cutting other people’s heads off while high on drugs is not unknown to our splendid line of work, but decapitation is usually a personal, domination-oriented act. Sometimes a spiteful act.”

  “Are you implying our beheaded friend might’ve done something to deserve this?” Braxton asked.

  “Not exactly,” Jerry said. “But we both know Bradley was running around with some real unsavory characters after getting caught by you and I. Or maybe Bradley was just a fucking crazy person who got too high on crazy drugs and decided to hack up some random guy like crazy people tend to do.”

  “But if that is true,” Rosa said, “wouldn’t somebody have tried to stop Bradley? Decapitating somebody in the middle of a party has to be a very time consuming, attention grabbing act somebody would’ve prevented.”

  “Bystander effect?” Braxton suggested.

  “Maybe,” Jerry said. “I have a feeling something was messed up about this workshop long before people started dying and getting chopped up in this weird bastard of a building. Could it be a demonic haunting messing with people’s heads or something?”

  “I doubt that,” Rosa said. “This workshop isn’t that old of a building and I bet it doesn’t have much of a history of the kind of activities that invite demonic hauntings. However, I could be wrong.”

  “You always doubt my theories,” Jerry said. “And I bet you are wrong about this place not being haunted.”

  Rosa laughed. “I said what I said, and I’m not willing to argue with you while we’re standing by the head of a dead man and the mutilated body of another dead man.”

  “Good idea,” Braxton said. “But I think we should ask an old friend of ours if our newer, deader friend has a record on him.”

  “Agreed,” said Rosa. “Let me do the honors since I’m the best at drawing up her sigil.”

  “Make way everybody!” Jerry said to everybody that could hear him. “And don’t get too scared now because some real spooky Triple I Division shit is about to go down.”

  The crime scene technicians obeyed him as Rosa produced her PTALP and a lancet pen. She pricked her finger with the pen, held it there for a few moments to allow it to drink her blood, then started drawing up the sigil on the PTALP. She finished it a few moments later, gently placed the PTALP on the ground, then backed away.

  Jerry suddenly felt a chill draping his neck and shoulders while a large plume of smoke reeked of sulfur, copper, and hot iron emitted from the PTALP’s yellow writing surface. The foul smelling smoke detached itself from the PTALP. It then condensed into the towering, hovering shape of a buxom demoness wearing a black corset stapled to her skin that was made of blue lined, yellow paper splattered with blood. She was taller than even Braxton, and wore a tight secretarial uniform with black high heels. She folded her hands over her impossibly thin waist then looked at Rosa with her wide eyes made of black ink. Even though the crime scene technicians were being ignored by the demoness, they rushed elsewhere away from it.

  Rosa returned the look at the demoness, wholly unimpressed. “Good afternoon and better blessings from the Twelve, Paddington, even though I’m certain you reject the Twelve and anything They have to offer you. We need your help with something, demon.”

  “Greetings, Miss Rodriguez, Mr. Genovesi, and Mr. Oulumana,” Paddington said. As always, she tried to sound seductive, but her dry, whispery voice sounded like hordes of rats and roaches crawling across decaying paper. “I love to serve my many masters in the Triple I Division at any time, but especially when they call on me during the night.”

  Jerry scoffed and rolled his eyes, equally unimpressed as Rosa. His own homosexuality aside, Jerry often wondered if any man could find this demoness attractive despite her grotesque parody of physically appealing traits. He hoped like Vullen not.

  Paddington was easily one of the most useful supernatural beings in the entire Mendakian Union’s arsenal. One just needed to look past the feeding of fresh human blood she needed for operation, a thing the Mendakian Union was not only willing, but equally able to fulfill. Paddington was a living database of criminals and other ne'er-do-wells that could be updated at any time by any authorized sapient, and could be called upon in most places at just about any time by different, uninvolved parties.

  Paddington was also such massive pervert, Jerry hated calling upon her and wondered if it was possible to lodge a sexual harassment against an ancient being of incomprehensible usefulness, age, and utter perversion. And whenever she touched anybody else or Jerry, a thing he already hated most people doing to him, it didn’t just feel mildly uncomfortable. It felt viscerally terrible. Her touch was like starved spiders crawling across his skin.

  “Let’s get on with this already,” Jerry said to Rosa. “The longer I have to tolerate looking at this abominable creature, the longer the shower I’m gonna need afterwards.”

  “Why do you treat me so roughly?” Paddington asked. “Is that how you always treat people who want to love you? I can get used to that.”

  “Fuck off,” Jerry barked. “Demons can’t love anybody but themselves.”

  “That much is very true,” Paddington said. “But I can pretend to love you as much as I love myself.”

  Rosa dipped a gloved finger into the blood on the decapitated head, then held it towards Paddington. Paddington wrapped both of her large, papery hands around Rosa’s entire hand. A long, slippery tongue of blood and ink emerged from her thin lips, tasting the blood on Rosa’s finger tip. Rosa, despite being the eternally blank faced trooper of the Rangers, winced and grimaced as Paddington’s tongue analyzed the blood. Paddington’s tongue then slipped back into her mouth like a snake returning to its den.

  “That was very tasty,” she cooed. “Now…what would you like to know?”

  “Is the blood of the person you tasted known to you?” Rosa asked while she recovered from her abject episode of disgust. “What was his name, and does he have a criminal record of any sort?”

  “Rentoir Augsaux,” Paddington said. “Age thirty-two and of Lascauxian descent. Never married. But I’m guessing what you and friends would like to know was that he was a very naughty boy of the more white collar variety.”

  “Such as?” Braxton asked.

  “He received a five year sentence for embezzlement and money laundering while he was formerly employed by the Pertapin Mutual company based in the Mendakian Union,” Paddington said. She smiled at Braxton. “It seems our poor, freshly departed Augsaux had a bad habit of putting his hands in sweet pots where they weren't supposed to be, an admirable trait to me.”

  “And look where that trait you’re calling admirable rewarded him with,” Jerry said. “Do you have any idea who he was laundering these ill gotten funds for, Paddington?”

  “During his tribunal, he was suspected to be working for the Grey Men chapter of New Chemeketa, but this wasn’t fully proven.”

  Jerry’s ears perked up at the mention of the Triple I Division’s primary antagonists—the Grey Men. They were pesky, but still dangerous terrorist bastards known for their advocacy of Eurisian supremacy, holding odder, more esoteric beliefs, and killing each other as much as they often killed civilians over personal conflicts, territory disputes, and psychological operations created by the Triple I or Information Warfare Division. Jerry felt a bit more secure in his theory that Bradley Birdshit and Rentoir Augsaux had some bad history before it came to this final, bloody conclusion.

  “Any last fun facts about Augsaux?” Jerry asked Paddington.

  “No,” she said. “But how about a few fun facts about me? We demons cannot lie, and I’m an open book, just begging to have a few fingers touching me.”

  “I’d rather staple my hand to my testicles like that corset you’re wearing is stapled to your body, then salute the Mendakian Union flag instead of interacting with you in any non-professional capacity.”

  “I love that acerbic wit of yours,” Paddington said. “You must be a riot at post-coitus pillow talk.”

  “Yeah, enough of this shit,” Jerry said. “Bye bye now, Paddington.”

  “And here I thought we were making a genuine connection like a plug and a socket.”

  Jerry walked over to Rosa’s PTALP and picked it up. He removed the page with the blood sigil attached to it. Paddington chuckled as she vanished into a cloud of reeking smoke that drifted towards the ceiling. The page disintegrated in Jerry’s hand.

  “I hate her so much,” Rosa said to Jerry.

  “Not as much as I do,” he said.

  “It’s not a contest, you tedious knuckleheads,” Braxton said to both of them. “Now let’s see what else we can find out.”

  “Agreed,” Jerry said.

  Before they moved to go elsewhere, a crime scene technician approached Jerry.

  “How may I help you?”

  “That’s really how a PTALP works?” the technician asked.

  “More or less,” Jerry said. “Put blood in, get interesting things out, but I legally cannot tell you the finer details.”

  “That’s fine by me,” the technician said. “It was neat seeing that demoness in action.”

  Jerry frowned at the man. “What do you mean by that?”

  “That demoness? The one you called Paddington?” he asked. “Don’t judge me now, but she was very damned attractive, and you get to work with her every day? Sometimes I’m so jealous of you Triple I Division types.”

  Jerry, Braxton, Rosa, and a few other crime scene technicians with concerned faces silently judged the man. They said nothing else as they turned away to find Noura, Mallory, and Howard.

  “I hate it here so much, man,” Jerry said to Braxton.

  “I do as well,” he said. “I do as well.”