A Pillow Of Winds
11 November 2006
To Sgt. Amber Sandles there was nothing more important than justice. Which was why she had left her main suspect Fern alone in a dark interrogation room for the past sixteen hours. From Amber's perspective Fern was the girl, she had no need to investigate the other evidence, no need to interview anyone else, once she got Fern to crack, she'll have her case. And a fat bonus from the mayor.
Isolation was a proven effective method of information extraction. It was one of Amber's favourites.
Being left alone for the past 18 hours hadn't done Fern any favours. Normally, she was a little high-strung, working for one of the most powerful men in the town of Cable was a stressful job. And she had lousy parking.
But now she had just gone fucking nuts. At the moment she was talking to the monkey in the corner. His name was Ralph. He was enjoying a cup of tea and spoke with a posh English accent. Fern had taken issue with him.
"So Mr. Ralph, you see you're killing the planet by not recycling."
Ralph, the monkey, was confused.
"But all I said was that contrary to popular belief - monkeys don't really like bananas. Then you started this recycling shit."
"But you're killing the planet Mr. Ralph. Why would you do that?"
"Hey, as a monkey I'm responsible for a minuscule amount of damage to the earth compared to you humans."
"You piece of shit. You speciesist. You can't not do your part because you're a monkey!"
"In fact, since I'm just a figment of your imagination. I'm not responsible for any damage to the earth. I don't believe I'm even capable of performing the act of recycling. So fuck you.
With that Ralph disappeared in a puff of smoke. Fern was all alone. She missed that little monkey. He was a complete grandiloquent wanker but he was so lovable, anything with a tail was lovable in Fern's eyes. She remembered back to her childhood - her wonderful childhood where she danced all day with the flying antelopes and the singing giraffes. They were wonderful, she wanted her mermaid mother back. She never called her - the poor woman was stuck in a nursing home in Joy. Fern went there once, the walls were drab and dull, the carpet was sticky and everyone was unpleasant. Fern wanted her childhood back so much, it was so colourful, full of colours that no longer existed.
Now she was stuck all alone in a dark room with nothing but three mysterious hooded heads staring at her.
"Hey, you weren't here before."
Fern, known for her incisive observations had just made another brilliant one. The three heads, whose hoods shrouded their faces moved slowly towards Fern. She started to bite her fingers and one accidentally came off (in her imagination... her fingers were fine in reality).They swooped onto her and started to chant.
"You hated him!"
"You killed him!"
"He's dead because of you!"
"You're evil!"
"You fucking bitch!"
It was the standard emotionally crippling hallucinations. It was what Amber was waiting for. She watched in from the observation room as Fern gradually went crazy - screaming to herself, ripping out her hair, all sorts of enjoyable stuff. Amber looked towards her partner Zeverin and gave him the nod. The nod that meant they were going in - the suspect was ready for intense police interrogation (Amber and Zeverin had developed a comprehensive nodding system as they found talking too inefficient at times. However, even a subtle misinterpretation could prove the difference between "Let's go in for the kill" and "I left my washing on the line").
They moved into the room. From Fern's perspective two figures had just come in and scared away the floating heads. She came to the quick conclusion that only something that the heads were truly frightened of would have the power to drive them away - which just made her all the more terrified. Amber and Zeverin approached her and adopted the classic cop position. They had decided on what they called a "two pronged" approach, where Amber would ask a question and then Zeverin would ask another before the suspect got a chance to answer. The goal was just to confuse the suspect into submission. Amber had decided to take the leading position.
"Why'd you do it Fern?"
"What was in it for you?"
Fern didn't answer - she just stared back. Amber and Zeverin decided to go in for another attack.
"You're finished Fern. You might as well admit it. Why did you do it?"
"The evidence is piling up Fern. You're dead, just like Mr. Fishbait"
In Fern's world she said "I didn't kill him!". But in reality she could only come up with
"The purple monkey stole my aardvark".
Amber took Zeverin aside, they needed to get their game plan straight, Amber saw an opportunity for good police work.
"Sounds like a confession to me. Let's get more intense."
Amber and Zeverin turned back towards Fern. Who in her mind was summoning the fire demon to destroy all her enemies, she screamed out in an evil screech.
"I fucking did it! I killed the fucker! That piece of FUCK! Now where's my FUCKING cup of tea?"
Fern just collapsed on the ground, apparently from using up all her energy to summon the fire demon. On the other side of the room and looking very satisfied with themselves, Amber and Zeverin just nodded towards each other. They had done good work here. Good, solid police work had gathered them the confession that would stand up in any court of law. The citizens of the world can rest easy knowing that dedicated police officers like Amber and Zeverin are tirelessly pursuing justice using efficient and ethical means to do so.
At that moment though, Jenny the clerk came crashing into the interrogation room. She was as white as a ghost and looking terrified. She had news for Amber and Zeverin that will most definitely throw a tiny wee spanner into their brilliant work.
Like Charles Manson, Joe had taken inspiration for his criminal actions from The Beatle's White Album. But while Charles Manson had gotten his inspiration from "Piggies" and "Helter Skelter" to kill people, Joe had taken inspiration from "Why Don't We Do It In The Road?", while the Beatles song included the lyrics "no one will be watching us", someone was watching Joe and his partner perform the act. Which was why he was sitting a jail cell at the moment. Along with Fern he was the only person being held by the Cable police force. Jenny the clerk was making small talk with him, and by that we mean that Joe now knew everything about her. Poor Joe.
The Cable Police Force didn't hear much from their undercover operative. He spent most of his time getting drunk in Suckles. So Jenny the clerk was very surprised when he suddenly showed up. Showing up at the police station wasn't normally a good way to retain undercover status.
"You're undercover! You're not supposed to be here!"
"It's the vampires!"
The vampires never did anything. Which is what made this statement so alarming. When the Cable Police Force discovered that there was a huge collection of vampires living in the underground of Cable, they were quite concerned that this could have a negative effect on the living part of the population. In fact, the Vampires were very peaceful, they just hanged out in their musty little bar all the time talking about intellectual shit. The police never worked out how they managed to feed themselves with blood that all the myths and legends suggested they needed, but maybe they were simply urban legends that had been perpetuated by the hegemonic media whose means of production were controlled by the dominant class of society that disapproved of vampires' liberal stance on abortion and gay marriage.
So, the police just left the vampires alone. There was no need to do anything, they didn't cause the citizens any grief, and, hell, the police probably didn't have the resources to properly deal with them even if they wanted to. It was just better that way, but to stay on the safe side they put someone undercover there to keep an eye on things. You never know with mythical beings.
And now it seemed, the many hours that the undercover guy had billed drinking with the vampires were all worth it as he screamed out to poor Jenny the clerk:
"They killed Jeffrey Fishbait! They're going to attack! We're going to die!"
And with that he fled.
Posted byBren at 4:19 pm
Labels: Cable
