I frowned, wondering what my chief was up to. “What sort of next door are we talking about?”
“Your building, but on a different floor. He has a studio, as he’s ranked as a cadet, so a lot of his stuff is in storage, but he’s in the queue for a good apartment if he shakes out. We’ll see in a few months. And don’t feel sorry about the studio; it’s the equivalent of a two-bedroom in floor space, it just doesn’t have enclosed rooms except for the bathroom, which is a good one.”
“Do you know how much these apartments cost if we were to rent them normally?” I complained.
“Yes, I do. I also know why cops are getting them at the rate they do,” he replied with a chuckle.
Hm. As he’d cultivated me to push my luck, I asked, “Why do we get them at the rate we do?”
“Lucifer’s daughter and her husband own the building, and the rent rates pissed her off. When she made the acquisition, she had an anxiety attack because apparently she can’t handle making too much money. She ended up asking Bailey for help. Bailey’s form of help involved the suggestion she renovate the entire building to be spacious apartments and rent them out to the police. We also house some folks in witness protection there until we can get them moved to somewhere safer.”
Well, that explained a few things. While I hadn’t met Lucifer’s daughter yet, I heard about her exploits often.
She meant to change the world for the better, and at the rate she was going, she would take over the world before reforming the damned thing. “Ah, okay. That makes sense. Please thank her for me.”
“I’ll do that. Is there an actual problem beyond the itching?”
“Yeah. Were you aware our victim had goldfish attached to his genitalia and there were a pair of still-living, endangered sturgeon attached to his nipples?”
My chief made a sound suspiciously like a giggle. “I had not heard about his genitalia, but I was aware of the sturgeon. They went to hell for some tender loving care from Lucifer’s wife, who has become an undisputed master of caring for fish. They were in rough shape. They’ll be fine, although there is currently a dispute over who will get the fish and what their fate will be. One is male, the other is female. I expect they will be bred, and the babies will be released into the wild once they’re old enough to have a decent chance of survival.”
Well, at least someone would get a happy ending from my hell day. “I would appreciate some warning about why we’re in scrubs, Samuel.”
My chief sighed. “Items in his bathroom, which were registered as evidence, were covered in some form of caustic slime. The gloves you checked out are impervious to it, and the scrubs will make sure it is neutralized if it gets on you. It self-replicates, and we haven’t identified what is causing the replication. Your room on the floor is already treated in preparation for the crap, and there are special boots inside for when you open those containers. It will get on the floor, and the practitioner magic we have going in that room only cleanses it every minute.”
“You mean it’s like hagfish slime?” I asked. Only a few weeks ago, someone had decided it had been a good idea to transport a bucket of hagfish in his car, resulting in a slimy mess and the shutdown of an entire street. “I don’t think we have had sufficient time to recover from the hagfish incident, sir.”
“There will never be sufficient time to recover from the hagfish incident, McMarin. Bailey cried for a week because she couldn’t get it all out of her coat even with the help of fire. She only stopped crying when I informed her I would have to sacrifice myself and brush it out of her fur.”
The pregnant cindercorn kept the precinct topped up on amusing incidents, which helped me deal with the insanity my life had become. “We’ll be careful, sir. Thank you for the warning regarding the replicating caustic slime.”
“You’re welcome. If you need help, give me a call. Do not ask for Bailey. Her solution to all problems today involves fire. The commissioner isn’t letting her up the budget for public relations and working with shelters. She wants more budget.”
When didn’t she want more budget? “Good luck with that, sir.”
“Thanks. I’ll need it. I’ll give her credit, though. She goosed the commissioner out of a budget upgrade for cases involving kids, so she might even let this go for a change.”
Nothing riled up the precinct more than the cops wanting to help needy kids and not having the budget to work with. “How did she pull that miracle off?”
“Don’t ask. It involves statistics you won’t appreciate.”
I read behind the lines: she’d done research into domestic violence issues and in-need families. “The budget is for making sure kids get into the foster system and are properly monitored?”
“Bingo. We’ll have more resources to be able to make sure we can work with the social workers—and we are going to be able to better evaluate if children actuallyshouldbe removed from a household. We’re getting an on-call angel for these cases for minimum wage, around the clock. Our angel is also going to be staging interviews with all parents who have lost their children into the system. If it is determined there was not just cause, they will be reunited.”
Damn. “Think the angel would be willing to answer questions outside of the custody cases?”
“As a matter of fact, yes. The angels are being paid to be available around the clock, and you know how they hate being paid for work they’re not actually doing.”
I snickered. “Congratulate Bailey for her masterful acquisition of an angel.”
“I’ll do that. Be careful with that evidence. I’ve already sent one person to the hospital today for acid burns, and I’d rather not have to send someone else. We hadn’t realized it replicates, and we hadn’t upgraded the danger rating yet.”
“Nobody really expects self-replicating acid,” I replied.
“Precisely. So, if you can figure out what’s going on with that slime and why they’re trying to erase evidence, let me know.”
ChapterTwelve
