Circuit City

Chapter 9

"Is that all?" the heavily set man asked me and clasped his fingers together over the table.

I stifled a yawn and threw a glance at Ehren, or rather his back, as he wrote the last bit of information I'd given them down on the screen below him. The black cord stuck out like a reversed oxygen mask from the back of his helmet as he leaned over the dark table in front of him. On the table was the tray with patches with scrolls where fingerprints, hair strands and other material that had been discovered through blue light were being stored.

"Y-yes," I mumbled, my teeth chattering with the shivers that shook my entire body. I hadn't been allowed to take off any the damp clothes during the interrogation in order to preserve any possible DNA-traces that had been left from the perpetrators.

With a large huff, the masked man rose from his seat and adjusted his helmet, which appeared to be a size too small, judging from the way the he crooked his neck and drew a large breath as he clasped the lock.

"Well shit."

 Ehren glanced over his shoulder. "Hm?" 

"I need to order a new one," the chubby officer commented while knocking on the hard surface of his headgear, confirming my thoughts.

"I told you before old man, you could've taken mine."

"Yeah, no can do," the old officer shook his head and adjusted the duty belt on his round waist. "I'm not letting them hang up a helmet with your digits when I go into retirement."

"I was going to carve my digits onto your helmet once you were gone anyway," the younger cop shrugged and then chuckled as his senior punched him lightly on the shoulder.

"I'll just come back again," he threatened, "and putting you on desk duty would be the first thing I'd do in my return. Introducing you to donuts would be the second thing."

"Yeah, no."

After a couple of minutes of silent reading, they pushed the flatscreen into the wall and turned to me. "Miss Tesseth," the old man began, "in a couple of minutes we'll send you home. We just have to go through the paperwork and make sure that nothing is missing."

How much paperwork could there possibly be?

"Of course, no problem," I mumbled and mentally cringed when I saw my reflexion on the  table in front of me. I wasn't fooling anyone, my frown told them exactly how I felt about being trapped inside the metallic box that was the interrogation room.

"Excuse us then," he continued politely before opening the door and exiting, with the younger mapper on his tail. Awkwardly, I nodded back but none of them took notice as they continued down the dimly lit hallway. Shortly after, the metallic door shut close, trapping me in a tired solitude.

After a small eternity, the door finally opened to reveal another masked man in a uniform jacket instead of the previous two in armour. With two long strides, he was at my table and gestured wordlessly with two fingers for me to get up. When I did, he walked slowly around me, quietly observing me with his hand under his chin. If I wasn't on the verge of freezing to death I'd probably laugh at the way he stroked the chin of his helmet as if it were his own face but now I simply frowned.

After another couple of minutes, I had enough of being examined. "Is there a problem, officer?"

The cop stopped in his tracks and faced me quietly with a tilted head. After a couple of minutes, he finally replied, "Not that I'm aware of."

"Okay...?"

"I was checking if you had any marks or bruises that we'd failed to register," he explained after a moment of silence and swung the door open. "It doesn't appear to be that way,  so you are free to go home."

"Oh." So that's what he was doing.

"Alright. Goodbye, and thank you for everything..." I nodded and began my march towards freedom. However, my escape was rapidly put to an end by the leg of the table that made contact with my big toe. "Ow!"

A loud thud echoed in the sparsely furnished room as I tumbled to the ground. A small hiss escaped my lips for the second time in the night as I rubbed the front part of my boot. "Of course I couldn't have a smooth exit..."

The muffled sound of air being squished was heard a few meters away from me and I turned my gaze up to find him stare at me, with his arms crossed, in front of a now closed door. "You okay, ma'm?"

"M-hm. " I nodded while I scrambled up again, brushing the dust of my knees. "I'm just clum-" My sentence was cut short when he suddenly threw a black cloth at me and I almost lost my balance again in my effort to catch it. After looking down at my arms I realized that the black cloth I'd received was, in fact, a fur lined hoodie in the color navy.

My gaze snapped up to the black helmet again and the man in front of me nodded towards the hoodie. "Wear it."

After taking off my soaked jacket and sliding my arms through the thick coatee, I quickly shuffled over to the cop, who had now opened the door again and was waiting for me. 

"Where are we going?"

"I'm taking you home," he replied curtly before lazily turning around to walk out of the room. 

"You are? How do you know where I li..." My eyes flew open and a surprised gasp escaped my lips. "Ehren?"

The officer froze, shut the door and then spun around to face me, making me crash right into his chest. With burning cheeks, I quickly stepped back to look at him.

"Remember," he spoke quietly. "You can't call me that."

My quizzical frown turned into a sheepish smile. "Right. Sorry  Mr ... uh, officer."

Wordlessly nodding, he opened the door for the third time and led me down the marbled hallway, ignoring me and my curious glances at the maroon walls along with the black lines on the cream colored floor.

"Can I ask you something?" I asked after having passed numerous black doors and identical-looking hallways. "Are you the only one who has been keeping an eye on me?"

My question was answered with silence as he proceeded to open a glass door that led to the street. Outside were three identical motorcycles waiting for us, neatly parked with their round tip towards the building wall.

Just like previously tonight, he fished out a black helmet from the compartment and tossed it to me before straddling the bike and gesturing for me to follow. However, my feet were glued to the ground as I let the realization of what was about to happen sink in.

"We're going on the bike," I finally commented.

"No, on a broomstick actually," he muttered as he put the key in the ignition hole. "I just mounted this bike to see if I could feel a difference."

My frown grew deeper but I put on my helmet anyway. However, the feeling of having swallowed a brick of lead grew stronger the closer I got to the death trap in black chrome. The memories from the last ride were still vividly playing in front of my eyes like an action movie. A very bad and nauseating action movie.

"Are there no cars available?" I squeaked out and scanned the snow-covered parking lot in front of the building. The mapper shook his head and turned on the engine, not sparing me a second glance in my desperate state.

"How can there not be any cars in a municipal parking lot at 7 am in the morning?" I grumbled to myself while I climbed on top of the passenger seat. "I thought all crimes occured around midnight."

 After making sure that my grip around his waist was secure enough, he turned on the bike's handle a couple of times rolled us out of the entrance. Then, without notice, the engine roared to life and we sailed past the gates in front of the parking lot and down the street towards Humport. 

Outside of the gates stood two police cars neatly parked with no officers in sight. 

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So after a very, very long time I've finally managed to write the next chapter and hopefully the story can move on quicker. As always, comments are appreciated along with feedback on my writing style and the characters. If you liked it, vote and HAVE A NICE DAY!