Glitch in the God Complex (AmpCore #1)

14 - Jurisdiction by Decree

It would have to happen on my watch.

Detective Chloe Delgado sank bank into her chair with all the energy of a sloth, her eyes bleary from lack of sleep. A half-smoked cigar jutted from the corner of her mouth, smouldering moodily, just like her. She glared at her computer as the evidence scrolled along the shimmering curve of the flatscreen.

At least it wasn't a total loss, she decided. As much as the situation out in the docks was a complete shitshow, the Evi-Techs had managed to scrape up a decent amount of physical evidence from the scene, on top of the two dead bodies.

Barson Jennings for one. She'd been holding out a faint hope that the kid – Kirk – had been mistaken, but the DNA confirmed it. Not that she'd needed it. The dead ganger fit his dad's description to a tee, so that was a whole other dumpster fire she knew she would need to put out sometime soon. The dock rackets didn't cause too much trouble day-to-day, but somebody, or some thing had just kicked the proverbial hornets nest out there.

A single blow – neck snapped like a breadstick. It certainly seemed like he'd had a run in with the wraith. The shards of metal debris and river residue the techs had rescued also confirmed the insanity of it all.

An actual wraith, on the loose in Hadrian North.

On my fucking watch.

Right now it was a waiting game; waiting for techs to sift through it all and hopefully give some clue to how in the boiling hell a wraith ended up on the rampage less than a kilometre from where she was sitting. She pinched the bridge of her nose with one hand and puffed on the cigar, letting the burning, bitter smoke swirl around her mouth before she exhaled, adding to the ever-present cloud above the bullpen.

Through that cloud, Doser came trundling, carrying two snap-foam beakers of steaming coffee. It didn't taste much like the real thing – not like the police budget would spring for actual coffee beans – but the caffeine was real enough.

"How we doing?" he grated, dumping one cup down beside her before sinking into his chair, one hand pawing at the keyboard.

"Big fat nothing so far." She raised the cup to him in thanks, removing the cigar long enough to take a gulp of the scorching liquid. "What'd the techs say?"

"Naismith said they'll need a few more hours to give us the preliminaries." Doser shook his head bleakly. "What a bloody mess."

"No shit."

"Cutter Jennings' crew are already out on the docks in force," he continued. "My contacts out there are clamming up tight till this us done. Cutter's gonna gut whoever did this."

"If we ever find them." Delgado shook her head grimly. "Every witness says the same damn thing. A codewraith, cutting right through the district."

"So?"

"So where the hell is it?" She threw her hands up in exasperation. "It can't have just vanished into thin air."

"We should be so lucky."

"I'm serious."

He smirked. "So am I."

She gave him a withering look. "If we can't find that thing, we can't find how it got across the river. If we can't find how it got over, then we can't stop it happening again."

"I know, I know. But-," His computer chimed, cutting off whatever he was about to say. He started at the screen for a moment. "Now what?"

"What is it?"

"Just got a ping from Naismith," Doser grunted, straightening in his seat, his visor shining into life across his beady eyes. "Huh."

"What?"