The Imaginary Corpse, page 12
Cold’s lip twitches in time with his eyebrows.
“Then, when I was done with that chess game, I decided to think straight back to my co-conspirator’s very public, very easy to find place of business, without making any effort to shake a tail.”
Officer Cold’s lower lip is doing its best to swallow the rest of his face, and his eyes are about ready to climb down and punch me.
“We both want to catch this guy, Cold. We both hate what happened to Officer Hot.”
“You knew we were going to check the Freedom Motel,” he spits, making up for incoherence with velocity.
“How did I know that?”
“Because you knew that was–” He stops, claps his hand over his mouth. “You knew. You knew that would be where we’d go to follow up on the Spindleman murder.”
There’s my opening. “You think that because you know Spindleman wasn’t the first victim. But I didn’t.”
Officer Cold takes a step back, and breaks eye contact with me. “You knew,” he insists, with the ragged rage of someone who has just discovered how wrong they are.
“I didn’t know,” I say, face pressed up to the bars.
He turns and stalks back toward the stairs. “Yell when you’re ready to stop lying, you damn liar!”
I slump back from the bars, shaking my head to clear the curse-burn in my horns. I guess ‘Christ’ isn’t the only swear word he knows. Upstairs, I hear something big slam into something bigger, then the shuffle of papers falling to the floor. I do not envy whoever has to clean up that mess.
I take a few seconds for my heart to start working properly, then I turn to the Snipe, and ask the most obvious question.
“What do you mean, ‘not a nightmare’?”
The Snipe looks me in the eye. Then looks me in the eye some more. Then, for variety, he looks me in the eye.
“The Man in the Coat,” he finally says. “Not a nightmare.”
“He’s not?”
“A friend.”
“We’re all Friends.”
“A real friend,” the Snitch insists, some of the first emoting he’s ever bothered to do.
“What?”
“Friend,” he says. “Companion. Not tormentor.”
Well that’s the next step after unsettling. “What exactly do you mean?”
The Snitch shrugs. “Just repeating what I hear.”
“From the ground?”
He gives me another silent stare that takes me just to the edge of my patience.
The word ‘creators’ fundamentally doesn’t make sense. Ideas don’t belong to more than one person. Even collaborators who both love an Idea Real are going to have their own spins on the Friend that results. It’s possible the Snipe is wrong, or is being misleading by accident. But then again, I’ve seen three different versions of the Man in the Coat already; multiple creators would fit with that. It doesn’t explain why two of them seem to have warped to fit the Idea they’re living in, and it doesn’t explain all the broken dishes, but it’s a start.
The Snitching Snipe has gone back to picking at whatever’s bothering him under his wing. I guess it’s up to me to carry this conversation.
“How do you know he’s a ‘real Friend’? Who said that?”
“Big Business,” the Snipe says.
And thus did the Snipe get my undivided attention. “You’ve talked to Big Business?”
“Heard,” he chirps. “Not talked. Only last few months, though. Mostly can’t hear him.”
A whole maze of possibilities opens up in my mind. “Why can’t you hear him?”
“Only hear people when they talk about crime,” the Snipe replies.
He hears about crimes in other Ideas? Why am I not strip-mining this bird for data already? I have to reconsider my entire approach to… everything. For now, though, I have questions to ask. “What crime was Big Business doing?”
“Lying to police.”
“Hot and Cold already talked to Big Business about the murders?”
“Three months, three weeks, two days, eight hours, fifty-five minutes ago.”
And drop goes the jaw. “Three months?”
“Three weeks, two days, eight–”
“Right,” I say, before he can get going. “But, the big story. This has been going on for three months?”
The Snipe blinks. “Four.”
“Four?!”
“Four months, one week–”
“Snipe, that is not useful data right now.” I try to hide my frustration. “But thank you for providing it,” I add hastily. “Do you know who the first victim was?”
The Snipe shakes his head. “No name. Person didn’t have a chance to give them one.”
That is one of the worst sentences I have ever heard. “Where?” I ask, barely a whisper.
“New place. Doesn’t have a name.”
That’s another one.
“Where else?” I ask, wondering if Worst Sentence Number Three is coming.
The Snitching Snipe shakes his head, flaps his wings a little. “Mostly new Ideas. New Friends. The Freedom Motel. A few less populated places.” His eyes scan me up and down. “Until now.”
I sit there with my jaw frozen in place. This is the kind of case you talk about at the Rootbeerium afterwards. Really, this is the kind of case where you hope that you even get to the Rootbeerium afterwards. While I let it swirl around in my head, I twig back to something he said before Officer Cold buttonholed me. “You said I didn’t kill Hot.”
“You didn’t.”
“Then who did?”
“The Man in the Coat.”
This is infuriating. I try to picture something calming, like being out of this cell. “Right, but, can you – can you sense peoples’ motives or something?”
He nods, pecks at a wing. I didn’t want to ask this next question, but…
“What’s the Man in the Coat’s motive?”
“Anger,” the Snipe says. “The Man in the Coat is angry.”
“Angry about?”
“The Stillreal.” He says it with finality.
I swallow the ostrich-egg-sized lump in my throat, and ask the obvious question. “What about the Stillreal makes him angry?”
For the second time today, the Snipe blinks. “It exists.”
I’m steeling myself for the next question, but again, I’m interrupted by footsteps coming down the stairs.
“You ready to talk?” Officer Cold asks. He’s shakier than he was last time, teeth set tighter, more fear on his face.
“I’m always ready to talk to you, my friend,” I purr.
Officer Cold winces, grips the bars of my cell. “I know you had something to do with this.”
I sit back down in the same place I sat when he came down the first time. “You’re right,” I say.
Cold’s eyes flutter. He’s surprised to hear me say it so plainly.
“I’m trying to keep it from happening again.”
Officer Cold takes a death-grip on the bars. “It can’t happen again with you in here.”
“It can and in all likelihood it’s going to.” I limp closer to the bars, hoping the lights in the hallway will let him see the sincerity on my face. “Officer Cold, your partner died at the hands of someone’s Friend. Someone’s incredibly powerful, totally unique, ludicrously dangerous Friend. And that Friend is going to keep doing what they are doing until we stop them.”
Officer Cold growls. “There is no ‘we,’ here, Tippy. Playtime Town PD doesn’t ally itself with malcontents like you.”
“Does it ally itself with malcontents like the Snitching Snipe?”
For one spare second, Officer Cold’s eyes flick over to the cell next to mine. He looks back at me, but too fast. We’re on the home stretch.
“You got those Friends killed,” Officer Cold says.
“He didn’t,” says the Snipe.
Officer Cold doesn’t look at him again, but his glare my way does get sharper. I answer him with a shrug.
“The Snitching Snipe always speaks the truth,” I say. “If selectively. If you want to know more, you can–”
Officer Cold pulls the freeze ray out of its holster so fast he can barely control its trajectory. The barrel bangs against the bars of my cell and he stumbles backwards, shaking his jarred hand.
“You did it!” he says, shaking the glowing gun at me. “You did it and I am going to prove you did it.”
“He didn’t do it,” the Snipe squawks.
Officer Cold turns the ray on him, and the Snipe jets backward into the shadows, invisible except for his bloodshot eyes.
“You did it,” Cold says to me. “I’m going to get you in front of Judge Stoneface, and we are going to put you in prison, and this is going to stop.”
“The Man in the Coat did it,” I say.
“You hired the Man in the Coat.”
“With what?” I ask. “A favor from the Stillreal’s new ultimate pariah?”
He rattles the freeze ray again. “Don’t test me, Tippy.”
“Why, because you’ll fail?”
And then he tries to shoot me.
The freeze ray whines, fires an electric blue beam into my cell. I flatten out just in time, and the beam hits the back wall, leaving behind a hockey-ready shell of ice. Officer Cold drops the ray and steps back, goggling at the winter wonderland he’s just created. For a second there’s a glint of regret in his big blue eyes, but it’s quickly replaced by the same brittle rage he’s been throwing down all day.
“Go talk to the Sadness Penguins,” I say. “Go talk to Farmer Nick Nefarious. I intervened because Spindleman was in danger. I–”
Cold scoops up the freeze ray, opens the door to my cell, and marches right for me. I won’t lie, I just about charge him right there, but something in his eye keeps me standing still. At least I’ll die thinking the best of people?
Officer Cold grabs my forelegs, yanks the cuffs free, and points to the stairs, all without looking up from the floor.
“Um,” I say. I edge closer to the door. “Um.”
“Just go, damn it!” He shouts it into my face, then realizes that this requires looking at me and retreats to the wall, face once more aimed at the ground.
The idea that pops into my head is absolutely ridiculous. Fortunately, I’m no stranger to that, so I ask, “Do you need a hug?”
First he looks like he’s going to shoot at me again. Then he looks like he’s going to throw me back in the cell. And then he hugs me.
It’s not a great hug, all things considered. Not only is he literally at the freezing point, it’s pretty obvious Cold has no idea what physical affection looks like or how it works. But I grit my teeth through the plummeting temperature and the apparently endless elbows, and I give him the hug he needs.
“No one is going to miss him like you do,” I whisper, right before we detach.
His expression is as flat as ever, but there’s a smile in his eyes, at least.
This isn’t what I’m supposed to do. I’m supposed to be a rough and tough detective. But it feels… right? Like everything else in my heart right now, I file it away for later. There will be time enough in the dryer. If I survive.
Before I leave, I turn back to the Snitching Snipe’s cell. “Hey, Snipe?”
Bloodshot eyes open in the darkness. I nod to make sure we see each other.
“Can you help Officer Cold out? He’s going to need help running down criminals. You could make a real difference.”
The Snipe looks at me, looks at Cold. “Much as I can.”
Officer Cold gazes into the cell. “Getting info out of the Snitching Snipe was Officer Hot’s job.”
“And now it’s yours,” I say.
Cold looks at me, and for a second he’s ready to lock me up again. My sympathy only goes so far when it comes to cops, but I feel like extending myself right now is a good idea.
“He’d be proud of you for handling it.” I pay him the courtesy of looking away, and turn again to the eyes in the dark. “And hey, Snipe? Thank you. You might have saved a lot of people.”
“That’s my job,” the bird declares from the darkness.
I think to myself that I’ll never disregard a background character ever again. And then I think to myself that if I had thought that a couple days ago, Spindleman might still be alive.
I walk upstairs, out the door, and into the moonlight, trying to stay ahead of my feels.
Even at night, Playtime Town is bright. The moon is never new here, and the city is always lit up with lollipop-shaped street lamps, cozy windows where pies cool and kittens snooze, signs advertising candy shops and ball pits and naptime parlors. Normally, the bright is welcoming, but right now it feels gaudy. All the illumination just means it’s easier to see the worry on everyone’s faces as I pass them by on the street. It’s gotten worse since I got arrested. Or maybe since the Friend who helped most of us find a home got driven here by unspeakable evil. I head back toward my apartment, pause at the intersection of Grin Street and Harmony Avenue, and look up at the moon as I consider my options.
I could chug root beer until an idea comes to me. I could listen to Spiderhand play piano. I could spin in the dryer six or seven times. Ultimately, though, none of that will help me feel right again, or fix the looks on the passersby. What will help is solving this case. I need to know who caused the crayon warping in the motel room, and why the Man in the Coat leaves behind the broken dishes, and why Big Business thought sending me into an ambush was a good idea.
With the day I’ve had so far, getting angry at Big Business seems like a reasonable next step. So away I go, against my better judgment.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
I surf the moon over to Chrometown, then ride that moon to its buddy in the Heart of Business. It’s still almost closing time here, which means everyone in the office buildings is in a frenzy to finish their work before the end of day that never comes. (Have I mentioned that I hate this place?)
I have trouble staying angry – I’m more of a ‘justice’ Friend than a ‘vengeance’ one – but focusing on the part where I almost actually died keeps the militant spring in my step as I march into Big Business’ tower and straight up to Front Desk. She looks at me with a blank, dazed expression.
“Name?” she asks, but you can tell her heart’s not in it.
“The guy Big Business tried to have killed.”
Whatever emotion she was mustering slacks right off her face.
“Detective Tippy,” I say. “I need to talk to Big Business about a matter of great import–”
“Mr Big is very busy today,” she insists.
“Great. Import.”
She turns to her computer, starts blazing away at her keyboard. “I’m sure he’ll fit you in if he can. Let me see when his next appointment is.”
“Tell him Detective Tippy is here. He’s going to want to see me.”
“Mr Big is very busy.” She’s avoiding eye contact almost as much as Officer Cold.
“It’s about the Man in the Coat.”
Front Desk’s eyes widen in time with her mouth, but she keeps her neck rigid, still avoiding looking at me. What’s she hiding?
“I’ll see if I can reach him,” she says. She presses a few buttons on a phone I can’t see, and waits through seven rings for someone to pick up. Detective stuff catches that the voice on the other end isn’t Big Business. He’s a warm, confident tiger purr; this person sounds like iced-over ashes.
“Detective Tippy is here to see Mr Big,” Front Desk says. “He says it’s about the thing.”
‘The thing.’ The idea that they have a code word for the Man in the Coat doesn’t fill me with happy thoughts.
The person on the other end responds, half-doubting, half-interrogating. The voice is raspy, so quiet that no sense I have can pick up their exact words.
“Yes, the thing.” Front Desk sounds annoyed and defensive. “Yes, Detective Tippy.” She’s being yelled at, and she’s not sure the yeller is allowed to do that.
“What?” She stands up out of her chair. I wasn’t sure Front Desk was physically capable of that.
“No. No, he can’t–” She’s shaking her head furiously. “He can’t – can’t do that. He can’t – he can’t‒”
The phone clicks over to dead air. Front Desk looks at me, and it’s not quite the blank look I got when I derailed our last conversation. That was shock. This is despair.
“That was… one of the fact-finders,” she says. Her voice is stilted and stony, gliding up and down in pitch. She’s off-script in a big way. “It… hung up on me.”
I’m guessing I know the answer, but, “Is Big Business up there?”
She leans on the desk for support, keeping her eyes on her computer like it might tell her what to think next.
“Is Big Business up there?” I repeat.
Front Desk struggles to find words. “The fact-finder said… Big Business is… on vacation?”
On vacation. Right after I find out he knew about the murders. Right. Not suspicious at all. Not infuriating. Or cowardly.
Front Desk sits back down, and stares at her monitor like it’s suddenly written in another language. I step out to a non-threatening distance from her, and clear my throat.
“Front Desk?”
She turns to me without a shift in expression.
“Do you keep Mr Big’s appointment book for him?”
Her mouth opens an inch or so, but otherwise, no response.
“Appointment book?” I ask. “Or like… a calendar on the computer? The Internet?” I shake my head, clearing out the desire to charge as a memory of an airbag balloons in my head. “Do you have a list of where he goes and when?”
She turns back to her monitor, and looks even more devastated.
“Look,” I snap, “I want to help find your boss, and–”
Front Desk flinches, and I stop. What am I doing? Her boss is on vacation. Her world has been turned upside-down almost as badly as Officer Cold’s. I take a deep breath, and a new approach.
“How are you doing?”
