Between Shifts

by W. R. Gingell

  He waited patiently for me to think things through for a moment or two longer, a smile lingering on his lips, before he explained, “I have a responsibility to Zero. The burdens balance out, I find; and I’m willing to expend myself somewhat in his service.”

  Since I’d just come to that conclusion myself, I only sighed and said, “It was that detective. Me and JinYeong found the body, so—”

  “Did you really?” murmured Athelas, his voice mildly surprised.

  I knew what that surprise meant. I said, “Well, I found it; JinYeong was trying not to find it. I called the detective to tell him about it. Told him he should call you for help with it, too.”

  “Ah,” said Athelas. “I see. I do wonder how it is that you made such a misjudgement, however.”

  “Yeah,” I muttered. “I’m beginning to wonder that, too.”

  The house had a different feel to it when I woke up the next morning. Dunno what it was—don’t even know if it was a safer feeling or a more perilous feeling—but there was definitely something different about it. If I hadn’t already known my psychos were home, I would have got the idea anyway.

  The dryad looked a bit perkier, too; if a little tree with a stranglehold on a pebble can look perky. It had been glowing a bit less every night they were away, I was pretty sure. Like it had been missing out on sunshine or something.

  I took it downstairs with me when I got up to make the morning tea and coffee, wondering if a proactive spirit when it came to the dryad would mean brownie points for me. I could use them before I spoke to Zero about the body.

  At the scene it had seemed natural that they would all help find the murderer for Detective Tuatu. They’d pushed themselves into the police force here, after all; and they were planning on staying in my house for a while, by the looks of things. And there had been bits of Between around the scene, too, so it wasn’t like they could claim Behind had nothing to do with it, either.

  I frowned to myself worriedly. After Athelas’ reaction, I hadn’t been able to nerve myself to bring up the subject of helping Detective Tuatu, though; Zero was already back at his studying, and he only lifted his head when I started setting the table around him for breakfast.

  Maybe I’d be able to do it this morning, I thought, throwing a covert look toward the three psychos in the living room as I passed them. We hadn’t gone out last night after all—I had the feeling our dead body had put a damper on things.

  As I made the morning tea and coffee, I looked up dryads on the search engine of my phone. Zero had given it to me a couple of weeks ago, and it was a smart phone, but it didn’t have a lot of data on the plan he’d bought so I didn’t like to do too much web browsing. Pity I hadn’t remembered when I was at the library yesterday.

  Pity my three psychos didn’t see fit to buy themselves a computer and home internet.

  I mean, it wasn’t like I found anything but weird Wikipedia pages and World of Warcraft references anyway, but it would have been nice to have found them in the comfort of my own home, sitting down in front of a computer, instead of at the library, or squinting at a tiny smartphone screen while the steam from the kettle misted it over.

  Rats. I was gunna have to ask Athelas, which meant he would probably want to ask a few questions of his own.

  A shadow fell, dark and cool, over the kitchen island.

  I jumped, narrowly avoiding a nasty steam burn, and saw Zero’s huge bulk in the doorway.

  “Scared ten months’ growth outta me!” I said indignantly.

  Those cool blue eyes looked at me for a moment longer before he said, “I don’t think so.”

  “What’s that s’posed to mean?” I complained, but Zero was looking at the dryad now.

  “What’s that doing out here?”

  “Getting some sunshine,” I said. “Think it’s feeling a bit cold lately.”

  “Dryads don’t feel the cold.”

  “Oh. How do you know?”

  “The same way I know you won’t grow any taller.”

  I looked at him suspiciously. “You joking with me?”

  “Don’t move the dryad around the house,” Zero said, and took his coffee.

  “Hang on,” I said, following him as he went back down into the living room with the tray. “What am I supposed to do with it, then? You said to look after it by the end of the month, but does that mean I’m supposed to plant it out in the yard, or what?”

  “Don’t plant it in the yard.”

  “Okay, but why?”

  “Zero doesn’t appreciate his territory being impinged upon,” said Athelas.

  Zero threw him an unreadable look, and said, “Exactly.”

  I could have been wrong, but I was pretty sure that made Athelas look surprised; like he’d been teasing Zero in his own sharp, unkind way, and hadn’t expected to find himself agreed with.

  “Ah, I see,” he responded. “You object to anything else being given the task of protecting those things you claim as your own?”

  “The dryad is protection?” I looked down at the little tree doubtfully. I mean, I’d thought myself it was helping to keep off the worst of the nightmare, but I wouldn’t have thought of it as protection, exactly. More like a good luck charm, or a nightlight.

  “Goodness, are you still there, Pet?” asked Athelas, sipping his tea.

  Was he really surprised, or had he been trying to tell me something in his sneaky-as-all-heck way again? Not that I was complaining; it was a question I’d wanted to ask him earlier, and I was getting the answer for free, in a manner of speaking.

  Zero said, “It’s protection of a sort. Protection, and wisdom.”

  “Yeah,” I said doubtfully, like it made sense. Maybe I’d still have to ask Athelas about it, after all.

  “I want it gone by the end of the month,” Zero reminded me.

  “Yeah, I remember,” I said. And then, because I didn’t have anything to bargain with but had promised the detective, I plunged ahead with, “Oi.”

  “What is it, Pet?”

  “We gunna do something about that body?”

  “No,” said Zero, without vacillating. “It’s a human body. It’s no concern of ours.”

  “Yeah, but—”

  “We don’t involve ourselves in human affairs. When fae involve themselves in human affairs, things become complicated.”

  “Not to mention very messy,” Athelas mentioned, tranquilly pouring himself another cup of tea. “Some time ago there was a self-appointed protector of the human race—”

  “Made a bit of a mess over here, did he?” I asked; though I wasn’t sure whether Athelas meant the fae himself had caused deaths, or that there had been deaths because of him.

  “No,” said Zero. “Someone made a mess of him. Go and make breakfast, Pet.”

  “But the dead bloke—”

  “There’s no connection to us,” Zero said coldly. “Why should we investigate?”

  “Yeah, but the detective said that there’s been more than one death, and that someone’s covering things up. And you can’t tell me there’s an animal big enough to tear someone’s hand off here in Tasmania, and there was a bit of Between open right through to Behind next to the body, so you can’t say it’s not something from Be—”

  “We don’t investigate human deaths,” Zero said; and if his voice had been cold before, now it was absolutely icy. “Pet. Make breakfast.”

  I bolted for it. There are times when I feel like I can push things a bit, and then there are times when I know I’m about to get my nose bitten off.

  This was one of the nose-biting times.

  Chapter Three

  I made breakfast like the good little pet I was, but when I set the table and went to call my three psychos in to breakfast, Zero was gone and JinYeong was scowling.

  “Flamin’ rude,” I said under my breath, but not so low that the other two wouldn’t hear me. “Tells me to make breakfast and then doesn’t even come to eat it.”

  “Believe it or not, Pet
, JinYeong and I are more than willing to do full justice to the meal you’ve made.”

  JinYeong rose and swept through to the kitchen, still scowling, and brushed past me with enough force to knock me sideways.

  “Oi!” I swivelled to stare at his back, and asked Athelas, “What’s biting him?”

  “JinYeong was expecting to join Zero in scouting for a suitable place to recharge, but Zero left alone.”

  “I don’t blame him!” I said, loudly enough for JinYeong to hear if he chose to hear. “Why would he want to wander around Hobart with JinYeong?”

  JinYeong didn’t reply, but there was a pretty deadly silence from the direction of the kitchen table that spoke for him instead.

  “Anyway,” I said to Athelas, “it’s not like that’s my fault, so why’s he pushing me around?”

  “JinYeong seems to feel,” said Athelas, and he didn’t trouble to keep his voice quiet, either; “that Zero was in a reasonable frame of mind before you spoke with him, and that by the time he left, he was not.”

  “Correlation isn’t causation!” I yelled into the kitchen, and this time there was the metallic rattle of a knife and fork being put back down on the table with a bit too much force. “Didn’t you go to school?”

  “I see that you’re not in the most reasonable frame of mind yourself, Pet,” Athelas said. “But do you suppose we could sit down to breakfast before it becomes quite cold? Zero doesn’t care about such things, but I confess to a certain preference for eating my breakfast warm.”

  “I’m not stopping you,” I said, but I started walking again.

  JinYeong was still glaring at me when I walked into the dining room, but his plate was half empty and the edge had been taken off the glare. He must have been hungry. I sat in my usual spot closest to the kitchen side of the room, glad to avoid the worst of his dark, angry eyes, and gazed over the table with some dissatisfaction.

  Athelas said, buttering toast, “Between the two of you, I’m surprised the butter hasn’t curdled.”

  I looked at him in surprise, and JinYeong had the gall to do the same.

  “Me? What did I do?”

  “Naega wae?”

  Athelas sighed. “I see I’ve upset the delicate balance of the morning. Pet, perhaps you could explain exactly what it is you expect Zero—or any of us—to do about a dead body?”

  I eyed him warily, a forkful of pancake halfway to my mouth. Was this a balance question, or just a question?

  Athelas saw my hesitation, and his eyes lit with laughter. “Are you becoming cautious at last? That’s somewhat disappointing!”

  “Dunno,” I said, answering his first question and leaving the second alone. “But I thought you’d ask a few more questions and stuff, at least.”

  “It’s a human.”

  “Some of the ones from your cases are human, too.”

  Athelas inclined his head. “That is correct. However, the majority of the victims are fae; moreover, the case has fae connections. We’re certain the murderer is fae, and although we haven’t ever been able to solidify a motive, we’re certain that involves Behind, as well.”

  “And humans aren’t important enough to worry about,” I said resentfully.

  “That is correct,” agreed Athelas. “More than one hundred thousand humans die each day. Should we avenge each one?”

  “You don’t have to avenge each one,” I argued. “Just the ones that Behindkind hurt!”

  “Why should we? Did we hurt them?”

  “No, but you can stop it.”

  “Power doesn’t obligate responsibility, Pet.”

  JinYeong, very precisely, put his knife and fork in the middle of his syrupy plate, and said just as precisely, “Neb.”

  I turned my shoulder on him and said to Athelas, “But you said there was someone—”

  “Ah, jjincha!” said JinYeong, and abruptly left the table.

  Athelas smiled into his tea. “Ah, I was curious to know if you would come back to that!”

  “You said something about that person before you fixed up the problem at the house over the road,” I began, ignoring for a moment the fact that my three psychos had actually, very recently, taken on the responsibility of righting the wrongs caused by Behindkind. Was it too much to ask them to keep doing so? I didn’t think so. “And you said—well, not said, but it seemed like Zero had something to do with him.”

  “Did I so? I wonder if I remember?”

  Right. So this was one of the balance-keeping questions. I was never quite sure which ones were and which ones weren’t, because things that seemed important to me quite often didn’t seem important to Athelas. Vice versa, too, if it came to that.

  “Got nothing to trade,” I told him.

  “Do you not?” said Athelas, in a lingering kind of way, and went back to his toast.

  Since I didn’t understand what he meant—or even if he meant me to understand it—I shrugged and cleared the table. When Athelas was alone at the table, he asked, “What is the hurry, Pet?”

  “No hurry,” I said. “Thought I’d go for a walk, that’s all.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “Zero said to get rid of the dryad,” I said. “I’m figuring out how to get rid of it.”

  Athelas’ grey eyes seemed to dance. “Are you sulking, Pet?”

  “I’m just a human,” I said, grinning. “I’m not important enough for you to worry about whether or not I’m sulking.”

  “I wonder if Zero wants you walking around town on your own?”

  “You can come too, if you think I’m gunna go talking to someone.”

  “Oh, I think not. Keep to well-peopled streets.”

  “If I’m not important enough for you to worry about me sulking, how come you’re telling me about me keeping to busy streets?” I protested.

  “Zero doesn’t like it when things under his protection are damaged,” Athelas replied. “I believe I told you that yesterday. Run along, Pet. Be back in time to make an early dinner, won’t you?”

  I would have taken the dryad back upstairs, but I wanted to be out of the house before either he could change his mind or Zero could come back, so I skipped out with it in the front pocket of my hoodie, my fingers laced around it so it didn’t get squashed.

  I went to the police station first. I could have gone to the library and done a bit more internet searching, but I didn’t think it would help much. There was a lot of stuff these days that just wasn’t on the normal internet. Maybe there was a version of Between for that, too. I’d have to keep my ears open a bit more around the house and sort of ninja questions in when they weren’t expecting it.

  I was across the road at Maccas when the sliding security door of the copshop opened and a plain-clothed bloke walked out, his close-cut afro almost shiny in the afternoon sunshine.

  Hang on. That was Detective Tuatu. He was leaving?

  Under my breath, I said, “Pft. Detectives working half days? That’s a bit cheeky.”

  He didn’t get into a car, either, so I followed him. It wasn’t that I thought he was suspicious or anything; you could call it nosiness, maybe. Instinct sounds better, though.

  What was he doing leaving half way through the day when he’d just been attending a murder scene yesterday, anyway? Shouldn’t he be busy doing murder investigation stuff and working late days?

  I stayed on my side of the road and trailed along with my hands still carefully cupped around the dryad in my pocket, wondering if I was imagining the faint tendrils of Between I thought I could see lingering in the detective’s wake.

  “What’s that about?” I muttered to myself. I already knew Tuatu was completely unfamiliar with Between, so it couldn’t be him making the trails—if they were even real. They faded as I followed him, too; but I was pretty sure that the bloke in the bright green pants I’d caught sight of crossing the Maccas parking lot behind me was still there behind me.

  That was more worrying than tattered bits of Between showing up around the
place.

  “What a pain in the neck,” I grumbled, bringing out my phone from my back pocket and pretending to text with it.

  Yep. The bits of Between were gone, but the bloke in the green pants wasn’t. I could see him reflected in my screen. Was he following me, or Detective Tuatu?

  I pretended to text for a bit longer. For a minute or two I even thought about texting for real; Zero might come to see what was going on, if I did that. On the other hand, he might just leave me to old green daks and tell me to come home over the phone in that commanding voice of his.

  I still dunno whether that voice is a fae thing, or just a Zero thing. Whichever one it is, I’m not about to disobey him when he uses it. Maybe it’s the pet in me.

  No good texting Zero, then. I hadn’t started out to follow Detective Tuatu, but now I was curious to know who was following who—and it wasn’t like the bloke was a murderer, after all. Not in trousers as bright as that, anyway.

  I started moving again and slid my phone into my pocket. There was a flutter of green across from me as green daks continued on his way, raising another question. Exactly how did someone with pants as bright as his, stay unnoticed? And who, I wondered, following the detective around a patch of partitioned roadwork, was so casual about following someone that they didn’t bother changing into something less noticeable?

  Did he want to be noticed? Or, I thought, my hand instinctively going for my phone again, was the bloke Behindkind? That would explain why Detective Tuatu didn’t seem to have seen him.

  I didn’t call Zero, but only because while I was busy keeping an eye out for old green daks, I lost the detective. Green daks must have lost him at the same time, because after a bit of covert looking around, he mizzled off back toward the city centre, leaving me annoyed at having my trailing hijacked.

  What was I supposed to do now? Just go home?

  “What d’you reckon?” I asked the dryad, wandering down into a park for the heck of it, and kicking leaves as I walked. “Wanna go home? No? Me either.”

  I walked the length of the park along the old wall that ran down the middle, trying to decide whether to go to the library before I went home, and heard the bingle of someone’s phone just beyond the gateway that led out.