Grilled Cheese and Goblins

by Nicole Kimberling

  “See, I’d say when you’re a person who gets in trouble a lot you know your only defense is honesty. Otherwise you get blamed for everything instead of just the stuff you really did.” Keith decided that he definitely needed to take a look at his own personnel file when this was all over.

  “Well-spoken,” said Johanna, “but naive.”

  “Maybe that’s what I should have them put on my gravestone,” Keith joked. “Anyway, this bad blood—”

  “I received it four times here,” Damien said. “Over the course of the last six months or so. Sanguine Service of America.”

  “As I’ve said, we’ve only received one contaminated bag here,” Johanna said. “Then we banned imports from the US. We use a German facility now.”

  “The German blood is too expensive,” Damien said. “Nobody can afford it.” The paper bag on his desk fell sideways and a long, hairy spider leg came out.

  “I think that thing’s escaping,” Keith said.

  “Yeah, don’t worry. I got it under control.” Damien scooted slightly back. “Do you think it would be possible to inspect the SSA facility? Because this seems to be a pattern, and the state of Colorado is within your jurisdiction, isn’t it?”

  “Sure, but I’ll just get denied permission,” Keith said. “They don’t want a shutdown. Ever.”

  “I can’t see how that would keep a dedicated investigator from going in anyway,” Damien said.

  “It’s not that. If I could get in there I would.”

  “What about paying off an employee to leave the back door open?” Damien kept a close eye on the spider as it approached the open pudding cup. Slowly it stretched one leg out to prod the plastic exterior. Then the pudding itself rose up out of the cup in a glistening tendril that crashed out, engulfing the spider in an instant. The hapless arachnid thrashed and kicked but couldn’t keep itself from being dragged back into the cup. Damien carefully replaced the foil seal on top and glanced back up into the camera. “Or you could try reminding them who you are the old-fashioned way. Maybe revoke a license or two to give some motivation to comply.”

  “I’m not into applying that kind of force.” Keith kept his eye on Damien’s pudding cup. What the hell was that thing? “And as for paying someone off—I’m a government employee. I don’t have that kind of cash.”

  “You’re not regular government. You’re NIAD,” Damien scoffed. “Appropriate some cash.”

  “Shadow government is still government,” Keith countered. “It would take so much paperwork.”

  “What about approaching SSA’s parent company? Do you not have a contact at Blissco?” Johanna asked. “I have one called Eija. She’s very efficient.”

  “Well, I do have one acquaintance, but she’s very low-level.” Keith didn’t know why, but he felt like he didn’t want to sully his relationship with Susan with business complaints.

  “Please, you must try. Even though it might be awkward.” She shuddered as she spoke the word, as if there could be no greater fate than potential for mild social discomfort.

  “I have a little bit of a random question for you, Johanna. On your file it says that you’re married to a NIAD dentist who works with the military?”

  “I am, yes.”

  “Has he ever worked with any trans-goblin soldiers?” Keith asked.

  “I couldn’t say for sure. He mostly works with navy forces—näkki.”

  “I just wondered if he’d heard anything about extra-human soldiers being discharged.”

  “Not here. Do you think it has to do with the case?”

  “I don’t think so, but . . . the SSA facility is located near Peterson Air Force Base, and recently I’ve heard some stories about trans-goblins being removed from the elite fighting forces. I just think it’s strange that these two things are happening at the same time and so close together.”

  “It’s possible, but . . .” Damien paused to light his cigarette. “To me it seems like every eight years or so somebody has a xenophobic panic and calls for a purge. And your country is due for one.”

  “Do you think that the tainted blood is part of a targeted attack against extra-humans—a deliberate poisoning?” Johanna’s brow wrinkled in concern.

  “Like I said, I don’t know,” Keith said. “Have there been planned attacks on the food supply in either of your countries?”

  “Nothing of the kind here.” Johanna shook her head.

  “Nor here,” Damien said. “But your country is a shit show right now, so anything could happen. If it does, you should come work for me here. I could use a man with a huge set of balls and no interest in women. So many witches here—you would not believe the number of witches.”

  “Whatever size your genitals are, you and your partner would always be welcome here in Finland as well,” Johanna said with a warm smile. “Our extra-human community is the happiest in the world . . . there was a survey. Human citizens too.”

  “And yet you still come to stay at my condo in Cancun every January.” Damien smirked. “Because your country is too fucking dark.”

  “My generous paid vacation is part of why I’m so happy.”

  Chapter Six

  Five minutes after logging off his conference call, Keith dialed Susan’s direct line.

  “Thank you for calling Blissco, the largest purveyor of commercial goods in the known universe: if we can’t get it, it never existed. This is Susan speaking.”

  “Hi Susan, it’s Keith Curry from NIAD. You’re working late.”

  “Agent Curry! I’m so glad you’re all right. I heard about your coliseum fight.”

  “Really?” Was there anyone who did not know he’d essentially gotten his ass kicked? “Who told you that?”

  “Oh, a little bird,” Susan said sweetly. “How can I help you today?”

  “Tell me about expandinol.”

  “Expandinol is a spell-synthesized molecule that generates alertness and strength. Licensed and bonded wizards manufacture it right here in our laboratories in the bazaar. We use it only in our Mage Technica drinks and do not sell it to second parties.”

  “Then it has to have originated at Blissco’s labs?” Keith concluded.

  “Well, yes and no. Obviously, there’s such a thing as counterfeiting, but it would be unlikely to find that product outside of the Blissco lab. Why are you asking?”

  “Because it’s been found in a prescription meal from SSA.”

  “Keith, I’m shocked! SSA prescription meals are subject to strict protocols. They’re sustainably sourced from an all-volunteer pool that has been screened for thirty-seven dangerous blood-borne diseases and twenty intoxicating substances. And besides that, products containing expandinol cannot be sold or shipped to the earthly realm.”

  “And yet I’ve got this prescription food from—SSA’s Rich Red metabolic line that is plainly contaminated,” Keith said. “And this isn’t the first time I’ve handled an SSA complaint either.”

  “No! Why haven’t you called me sooner?”

  “I assumed you knew.”

  “If I’d known there were complaints filed with NIAD you would have been the first person I reached out to. Were any of our extra-human clients hurt?” Worry sounded through Susan’s tone.

  “Several were affected. More than that, no replacement meals were sent. I ended up donating my own blood to feed a client.” Keith tried to throw this in casually, but it still ended up sounding like a whine followed by a humblebrag.

  “This is very serious. I’m going to put in a request for compensation for you right now,” Susan said. “Please hold while I consult my operations manual.”

  Keith spent a few minutes listening to light jazz before Susan finally returned.

  “First, I want to extend my sympathy for any problems this may have caused. We are now conducting inquiries into the security of our lab.” Susan’s voice went a little flat, like it did whenever she was reading straight from the Blissco script. “But I also want to find out where in the supply chain the
expandinol was introduced. Do you think the packaging could have been tampered with?”

  “If it has been then I can’t see where.”

  “Would it be possible to take the packaging to our facility in Colorado Springs for authentication? For our sake and yours?”

  “I would love to do that,” Keith said.

  “I can make an appointment for you tomorrow at nine a.m. Mountain Standard Time with Abby Wheeler. She is currently in charge of the facility there.”

  “Thank you very much, Susan.” Keith took a deep breath, preparing to wind up the conversation.

  “One more thing, Keith—we at Blissco would like to thank you for alerting us to this problem and for finding an immediate solution for our customer Ms. Balderas. We are offering you our Technetium Elite membership card.” Susan sounded surprised and excited as she read this—as if she’d just been handed the information scribbled on a sticky note.

  “Uh . . . it’s not necessary. I don’t need another credit card.”

  “Please, Agent Curry, do reconsider,” Susan’s voice took on a strange urgency. “Membership unlocks special advantages.”

  He wondered if she hadn’t met her sales quota.

  Well, she’d definitely done him a solid, so why not?

  “Okay, sure, I’d be happy to accept.”

  “Wonderful! A drone has been dispatched through a targeted portal and should be arriving outside your window just about . . . now.”

  Keith heard a whirr outside and saw a drone floating there. He opened up the window, popped out the screen and stepped back while the drone whirred inside. It hovered over Keith’s desk, then dropped what looked like a regular black credit card.

  “That was fast.”

  “Instant delivery is one of the perks of the card,” Susan said. “Now all I need to activate it is the security code printed on the back of the card to get started.”

  Keith sighed. “Okay, give me a second.” The hologram embedded in the card showed the constellation of Orion. The three stars of its belt glowed especially bright. “Okay the numbers are . . . 777. What are the odds?”

  “Good! With Technetium Elite the odds are always in your favor.” Susan gave a girlish giggle.

  “Oh yeah? What happens if you’ve got two cardholders going head to head?” Keith was only half joking.

  “Then advantage dispensed depends on the individual cardholder’s credit limit, and yours is very, very generous.” A note of undisguised glee sounded through Susan’s voice, then her tone cooled to seriousness and went back on script. “Please download our app to start using your Technetium card today.”

  Chapter Seven

  The next morning saw Keith entering the Denver NIAD office to find Nash hard at work reading the paper. On his initial visit he’d been dismayed by the clean desk, but now its pristine surface aroused definite suspicion. What were the odds that absolutely nothing worth noting had occurred in the entire Rocky Mountain region since his last visit? Zero? Less than that?

  And yet apparently Nash could find nothing to disturb his morning confab with the funny pages. Keith glanced from Nash to the receptionist. She’d decided to go for a heavy smoky-eye look even though it was barely past eight in the morning.

  “Anything new in the Balderas case?” he asked, mostly to avoid wishing Nash a good morning.

  “Don’t know. Not my case. So you tell me?” Nash asked.

  “I’ve been exploring several promising avenues. Industrial espionage, counterfeiting of magical substances with possible tampering that might lead to prosecution as domestic terrorism under the hate crimes act. You know, just regular food-inspection-related stuff. How about you?”

  “Same old same old.”

  “Yeah, I can see that you’re overwhelmed with work here.” Keith could not keep this remark to himself.

  “This is what efficiency looks like,” Nash said.

  “So no more reports of tainted meal products from anyone else?” Keith directed this at the receptionist, who’d decided to wear a low-cut mint-green jumpsuit to work because apparently the Denver branch had no dress code.

  Noticing his attention, the receptionist shook her head slightly. Again, Keith couldn’t figure out her gesture. Was she answering him or disgusted by his question?

  “We got one report from the police in Fort Collins,” Nash said. “Some nut there thinks drinking human blood cures his constipation. He had a transformation episode.”

  “But this victim was a human?”

  “He’s certainly not a vampire.”

  “Was he drinking from an SSA pack?” Keith hoped not. He’d issued a recall, but there was no way to tell if SSA had actually complied or not.

  “From a guy’s arm at a party.”

  “Where’s the donor now?”

  “Nobody knows. The bloodsucker didn’t know his name and Fort Collins police haven’t found him either.”

  “If he was at a party where something as unusual as blood drinking was occurring, somebody must know who he was. Do you have an agent assigned to tracking the donor down?”

  “Why should I? What whackadoodles do to themselves isn’t my department.” Nash gave a yawn.

  Keith’s grip on his temper faltered.

  “You know,” he said, “I thought before that you were a racist, but really you’re just the laziest sack of shit on Earth, aren’t you?”

  Nash looked up and smirked. “Maybe... but I also don’t have goblin-dick breath, so I feel like I’m doing better than you. There’s a car waiting for you outside.”

  Keith spent the ride from Denver to Colorado Springs reading. First he looked at his own personnel file and discovered that he had way more complaints lodged against him than he’d previously realized—ninety-nine percent of them dealing with “failure to inform appropriate authority” or “circumventing proper procedural channels.” The words “lacking in decorum” also featured prominently throughout.

  These, he felt, weren’t criticisms so much as basic statements about his personality.

  His file listed Gunther as his “de facto” spouse, which is what NIAD called shacking up. But it went on to list his estrangement from his biological family, the name and location of his old restaurant, his known associates in the extra-human community, vegetarianism and firing range score.

  Under magical powers it listed: “none detected, though luck quotient scores may indicate underlying, unconscious sensitivities to magical fields.”

  Why hadn’t anybody told him that? And what did that even mean? That he should continue to trust his gut? He’d have done that anyway. But he did have to wonder about what Jerry had said. What if he really did have access to magic, but just didn’t know how to use it? Or didn’t know that he was already using it? Was magic like intuition? Something that happened without conscious effort?

  Certainly with goblin magic that was the case.

  Out of sheer curiosity he clicked on Gunther and learned absolutely nothing new for the first seven pages. Then right at the bottom was a note that said three months before Gunther had requested permission to marry a fully human citizen and that the status of his application was pending.

  Keith fell back in the seat, stunned.

  Not that Gunther had applied for permission to marry—he’d been dropping unsubtle hints about how Keith might propose to him for almost a year. But it hadn’t occurred to him that if Gunther had to ask for governmental approval then it followed that permission might be refused.

  The barely healed old rage of being denied the freedom to marry, which Keith had carried his entire adult life, ripped open like an ugly ulcer in the center of his heart.

  The fear of exposing himself to the vulnerability of asking a man to stay with him forever burned away under an onslaught of abject fury at the thought that some pencil-pushing assholes would try and insinuate themselves into his life like this—demanding whatever bullshit promise or oath they would demand Keith and Gunther take or otherwise block them from having what shou
ld be rightfully theirs.

  This was how being bound by the Secrecy Act felt, Keith realized. And it didn’t just affect Gunther, or Jerry, or Lupe. It affected everyone who cared for them, including Keith and countless other people... it affected them all.

  Who, he wondered, was he going to have to pay to get that application approved? And would it be the same if he went to another country? Another realm of existence?

  How big of a ticket to a new life could his new Technetium card buy?

  No, he wouldn’t think about possible barriers to recognition of his now-certain marriage at this time. Not from the Heartman Clan and not from NIAD. He couldn’t experience that blinding, frenzied battle of hope and hatred and still think logically. He had a case to close.

  And he also wondered about the limit on his new card.

  Immediately, he downloaded the app and set up his account. This action soothed him somewhat. More so when he realized the card didn’t extend monetary credit in any specific currency so much as it was loaded with credits—Keith did not know how much. Under the Limit tab the app just said, “one hundred percent available for use.”

  What did that mean? He supposed he’d have to call Susan and get more details later. He needed to focus completely on solving the SSA problem. Lupe and hundreds of others needed their dinner. He could make that safe, if nothing else.

  “Agent Curry! Thank you for waiting! You had a complaint about one of our products?” Abby Wheeler, the SSA rep who met him, had perfect hair. She also had perfect lip gloss and a perfect pantsuit. She was thin, fortyish and had the whiff of ex-cheerleader about her that Keith found common in the pharmaceutical sales force.

  “Susan from the head office called.” Keith could see sweat beading beneath Abby’s makeup and wondered exactly why. Was she under duress or hiding something? Or was she just that scared of the head office? He supposed the fear could be considered legit. Most employees feared being reprimanded much more than he did.

  “So were you in charge of this facility at the time of the contamination?”

  “No, that was Marshall Cramer, but he’s been called back to headquarters.” Abby’s voice trembled slightly. “I’m the person in charge here temporarily. Since yesterday.”