Case of the Claw

by Keith DeCandido

  Turning the car on, he tapped the button to put down the driver's side window all the way, then undid the plastic wrap of the pack. Cool sticky air wafted into the car, but it would also vent his puffs.

  Next to him, Milewski sat in the passenger seat, listlessly putting on her seatbelt and staring straight ahead.

  Lighting up, MacAvoy took a long, wonderful drag on the cigarette, immediately calming down from the annoyance of Spectacular Douche and his merry band of tights-wearing loonies.

  Then he pulled out into traffic, making a quick U-turn, driving down to Kanigher, and making a left.

  That last action got Milewski's attention. "Where the hell are you going?"

  "We're heading to Monty's. Best diner in town. We're gonna have breakfast—my treat."

  Milewski blinked and stared at MacAvoy. "Who are you, and what have you done with Peter MacAvoy?"

  Grinning, MacAvoy said, "C'mon, we're celebrating."

  Now she looked away. "What the hell do we have to celebrate?"

  "You kidding me?" He shook his head. "What happened Sunday night when we caught the call for the Claw case?"

  "My life as I know it came to an end?"

  MacAvoy chuckled. "Besides that."

  "Four open cases got shoved under our names."

  "Actually, it was fifteen, since the eleven open cases got lumped in with it."

  Squirming in her seat, Milewski said, "Right, and then we got three more added."

  "Yeah, but those last two were literally open-and-shut. And that's my poi—"

  "Oh, for Christ's sake!" Milewski threw up her hands as she shouted. "They are not literally open-and-shut! In order for that to be true, you'd have had to actually taken the physical case files and opened them and then immediately shut them. When you use the adverb 'literally,' it is not a term of fucking emphasis!"

  "Jesus, who died and made you William Safire?"

  Milewski rubbed her temples. "Just get to the fucking diner already. I haven't eaten all day."

  Given how conscientious his partner had been about keeping her blood sugars up, it was a statement as to how messed up Milewski was that she'd let it go this far. She wasn't even rummaging for a protein bar in the glove, something she'd done with the motor-pool cars with even more obsessiveness than the smokers had with the spare pack.

  "My point is—"

  "You have a point? That's a first."

  MacAvoy ignored that. "—that we now have eighteen closed cases, eleven of which were colder than a well-digger's ass. And by closing one of those eleven, we've finally cured the department of its biggest black eye."

  That got Milewski's attention. "Huh?"

  "Mulroney." MacAvoy stopped for a red light at 64th. "Up until six years ago, there'd never been an unsolved murder of a police in this town. Thanks to us, that's true again."

  Letting out a snort, Milewski said, "Please. We didn't do anything. Only reason this case is solved is because the Claw made the mistake of choosing a victim with leaky floorboards. We were lousy cops on this one."

  "And yet, we closed the case—one of the biggest cases in the city's history—which means we're great ones."

  Milewski shook her head. "I guess that's supposed to make sense now, huh?"

  "Hey, listen, if it makes you feel better, you solved the case way back when you found that file on Dimension X—which I still can't believe I'm saying with a straight face." The light turned green and MacAvoy accelerated. "And see, this is why you still got a shitload to learn, rook—we don't solve cases, we close cases. Solving cases is what they do in books. You wanna solve a case, read Agatha Christie. Us, we close cases. Maybe it's 'cause somebody ran a light with a murder weapon in his back seat. Maybe it's 'cause he bragged about it to somebody who got popped that night for a B&E and wants to plead out. And maybe it's 'cause he kills again and this time gets caught and shot by a uni. The point is, it's closed, and we got eighteen cases down, which is gonna put our shift's clearance rate through the roof, and that is cause for celebration."

  "I guess," Milewski muttered.

  "Oh, and did I call it? That fed profile was less than useless. Starling's in his early twenties, he was raised by both his parents, and we don't know what the biannual—or biennial, whatever—occurrence was that turned him back into the Claw." MacAvoy grinned. "But hey, at least they got the 'white male' part right."

  "Whatever." Milewski stared out the window, her elbow resting on the door and her fingers rubbing her forehead.

  MacAvoy sighed. Schooling rookies was always slow work. Obviously, he was going to need the entire three months he had left…

  9.47am

  "—I cannot begin to express how much SuperCity appreciates the continued presence and good work of these costumed heroes. On Monday morning, a parade will be held on Nantier Boulevard between 3rd and 29th Streets to honor all the heroes who helped save our planet tonight. Furthermore—"

  "Turn that shit off!" Captain Garcia snapped as he entered the kitchen from HQ's rear entrance.

  Therese Zimmerman was standing with a cup of coffee watching the battered old television set that sat atop the refrigerator in the kitchen, which was currently on CNN's Headline News, which was doing a story on the events of SuperCity. So was MSNBC, C-SPAN, Fox News, and pretty much every local channel in the state, as well as the main CNN station. Headline News was the first one she'd found that was running the entirety of Sittler's press conference from the night before.

  She grabbed the remote from one of the Formica tables and hit the power button. Sittler's face winked out.

  Turning, she saw that Garcia was dressed in an actual suit instead of a shirt-tie-slacks combination that more-or-less matched. It was charcoal, with a white shirt and dark blue patterned tie.

  Remembering why he was wearing the suit, she asked quietly, "How was the wake?"

  "Anybody who has a problem with freedom of the press shoulda bombed the funeral home. Never seen so many journalists in one place." Garcia went to the coffeemaker.

  "Charlie was good people." Therese personally had very little use for the elderly reporter. He was old-fashioned in all the worst ways, his articles were sensationalist garbage, and he always smelled of cheap cigarettes, cheaper booze, and bad coffee. But she knew that he and the captain had been friends, and besides, he hardly deserved to die.

  "Yeah." Garcia poured himself some coffee into one of the Styrofoam cups. "Makes you wonder what tomorrow'll be like. And the funeral oughtta be a zoo." He swallowed some coffee.

  "I stopped by Kane Memorial on my way in this morning," Therese said. "They've moved O'Malley from critical to serious."

  "Really? That's great!" Garcia's eyes widened like he wanted to smile, but couldn't bring himself to do it. "I never got there last night thanks to aliens and dead cops," he added bitterly.

  Sergeant Paula Taylor entered, her glasses dangling over her chest. "Javier, Zim—we just got official word. Mara's funeral will have the full honor guard, and both she and Trevor'll get medals of honor."

  "You call Baptiste and tell him?" Garcia asked.

  Paula shook her head. "I figured you'd wanna."

  "Thanks." Garcia guzzled the rest of his coffee, then crumpled the cup and tossed it in the garbage can. "I'll be in my office."

  After nodding to Garcia as he departed, Paula said to Therese: "Oh, Zim, we got a coupla dead bodies on Jaffee and 19th. Mac and Kristin aren't back yet, so who do I send? King and Bart are up next, right?"

  Therese shook her head. "I gave them City Hall." Fischer and Billinghurst needed a dunker after dealing with another one of the Clone Master's wild goose chases, so she gave them the City Hall roundup. They'd all be ruled accidental in any event, but the mindless paperwork needed to be handled. "And I wouldn't give Mac and Milewski a double after the Claw. CC are in court—" Cordova and Cacciatore were generally referred to by the abbreviation. "—so give it to Olivares and Pavlack."

  "Okee dokee."

  Once the sergeant left, T
herese turned the TV back on. She was curious.

  However, Sittler was no longer on the screen. The chyron said live and it was now the mayor's press officer. "—oint out that, in addition to their public heroics, one member of the Superior Six gave his life to stop the Claw's reign of terror."

  Oh hey, don't mention the cop that died, too. Therese almost turned it back off, but decided she wanted to hear more.

  The perky press officer went on: "SuperCity no longer needs to live in fear of the Claw thanks to that sacrifice. This proves what the mayor has always said—we need costumed heroes to keep our city safe."

  Disgusted, Therese did finally turn it back off. Fontaine dead, the Six covering up more than a dozen murders, but the guy who actually committed those murders winds up the big hero, at the expense of poor Baptiste, who was the one who deserved having the mayor's office singing his praises, not that costumed maniac.

  But it would get votes, and probably strike a huge nail into Congressman Wert's bill. Therese was no fan of Wert—and the bill was, at best, completely impractical and impossible to enforce—but that two cops were being cast aside like this…

  Therese sighed. It was politics as usual, and she knew it. It was how she made rank so young, after all.

  But she didn't have to like it.

  Maybe she and Marc could argue about it at lunch today. He'd decided to make up for all the busted dates by taking her to Simon Says, a theme restaurant run by a reformed super-villain called Simple Simon. She was supposed to meet him there at one-thirty.

  And then a thought occurred to her that made the coffee taste bitter—well, more bitter—in her mouth.

  What did Marc know about the cover-up?

  Leaving the kitchen, she headed for the wide staircase that would take her to the second floor. Intellectually, she knew that Marc probably knew nothing about it. He was the Six's financier, after all. There was no reason for him to know that the Claw was actually Starling.

  But what if he did?

  As she hit the landing and entered the detectives' bullpen, she glanced over at Homicide's section. Milewski and MacAvoy's desks were still empty—which tracked with what Paula had said. Their meeting at the Superior Six should've been done by now. Elsewhere, Bannon and Schiazza were screaming at each other about something—it was either the Lashmar case or that stupid argument about whether or not costumes should be allowed to play professional sports. Nobody else was around.

  Looking over at the door to the interrogation rooms, she saw that one door was closed—which meant either someone was being questioned or Dickerson wanted a quiet place to have breakfast again.

  Nearer by, Billinghurst and Fischer both sitting at their laptops, doing the very mindless paperwork she'd mentioned to Paula.

  Rather, Billinghurst was doing it. Fischer was on the phone.

  "Oh, hold on," he said when he saw Therese enter. Removing the phone from his ear, he said, "Mr. Clean's secretary for you, boss."

  Billinghurst stared at his partner. "Now now, King, it's not nice to call Zim's boyfriend Mr. Marc McLean by such a silly, frivolous nickname. His proper nickname, after all, is 'sweetness.'"

  "Right, of course," Fischer said with a solemn nod. "Sweetness's secretary is on line three, boss."

  Rolling her eyes, Therese said, "There are times when you two are really funny. And then there's now."

  She went into her office and closed the door, not wanting any of her conversation with Marc to be overheard. Billinghurst's hearing "sweetness" the other day was going to continually bite her on the ass as it was.

  Grabbing her phone and stabbing at the "3" button, she said, "Hi, Beth."

  "Hello, Therese. Hold for Mr. McLean."

  A moment later: "Hello, sweetness. Just wanted to make sure we're still on for lunch. It's just been an awful day so far, and I could really use your company."

  Therese had been expecting to have to protest his cancelling lunch, which she quickly swallowed. Having been denied her conversational opener, she just went straight for the throat. "Marc, there's something I need to ask you."

  "Of course, sweetness. You can ask me anything, you know that."

  Somehow, that didn't make her feel better. "I need to know—" She took a deep breath. "I need to know if you knew about Starling being the Claw."

  "I'm sorry? The Starling helped defeat—"

  "Marc, I know the truth. I was standing there in Joan Ankhmeni's apartment when we decided on the story. And I know that the Superior Six have been covering this up for years. So I need to know, for my own peace of mind, whether or not you knew about this."

  "The McLean Foundation handles the Superior Six's finances and trademarks. That's it. We're not involved in the day-to-day of the team."

  Therese frowned. She couldn't help but notice that he provided a canned, corporate answer to what should have been a simple yes-or-no question.

  More to the point, the answer wasn't "no."

  "I'm sorry, Marc, but I'm afraid I can't do lunch today. Way too much paperwork piling up. Maybe next week?"

  "Sweetness, I—"

  "Gotta go. I'll set something up with Beth." She slammed the phone down.

  Then it startled her by ringing right away. Once she got her heart rate down a bit, she snatched it back and said, "Zimmerman."

  "It's me," Paula Taylor said. "Just got a call. There's a dead body in a Dumpster on 29th."

  She hesitated, needing a moment to reboot her brain back to work. The only Homicide cops around had cases. She was going to have to give it to either Bannon and Schiazza, or to Billinghurst and Fischer.

  Then Paula added: "It's yet another Clone Master."

  Therese let out a very long breath. It would be cruel and unusual punishment to do that to Billinghurst and Fischer again.

  Grinning, she said, "Give it to Bart and King."

  Trevor Baptiste was sitting on an uncomfortable chair in a drab waiting room when his cell phone rang. The display indicated that it was HQ's trunk line.

  "This is Officer Baptiste," he said, flipping open the phone.

  "Trevor, this is Captain Garcia."

  Baptiste found himself sitting up straight at the sound of Javier Garcia's voice. "Yes, sir!"

  "Calm down, Trevor, I'm just checking in to see if you're okay."

  "I'm fine, sir," Baptiste said automatically.

  Skeptically, Garcia asked, "Really?"

  Baptiste blew out a breath. "No, sir, not really, but I do not know what else to say."

  "I can understand that. You're going to talk to Dr. Feldhusen, right?"

  "Yes. In fact, I'm in her waiting room right now."

  "She's a good counselor. Trust me, I know from shitty shrinks, but she's a good one."

  "Yes, sir, I know, she—" Baptiste hesitated. "She was who I spoke to after—after Sylvia."

  There was a bit of a pause before Garcia said quietly, "Of course. Look, Sergeant Taylor just told me that the commissioner's office has officially stated that Mara's gonna get an honor guard at her funeral Tuesday."

  "Good," Baptiste said emphatically. If anyone ever deserved it…

  "And," Garcia added, "you're both getting medals. The ceremony'll be Monday morning—right before the parade they're giving the costumes."

  Baptiste didn't feel like he deserved a medal, but knew better than to say that out loud. Besides, the brass liked it when unis got medals. It made good copy—and God knew the department liked good copy. Why else was the spokesperson at the crime scene last night?

  So he simply said, "Thank you, sir."

  "I'm just sorry that Mara's has to be posthumous. You take care, okay, Trevor? You need anything, call me—or call Merkle, and he'll find me."

  "I will, sir." Again, the words were automatic, though he doubted he would take the captain up on his offer. What would he be able to do?

  "Take care, Trevor."

  "Thank you, sir."

  After the captain disconnected, Baptiste closed the phone and put it back
in his pocket.

  The waiting room had three doors. One led to the hallway, one to the counselor's office, and one to a restroom. Baptiste was considering getting up to use the third door when the second one opened to reveal a short, elderly woman with curly white hair, wearing a white blouse and plaid skirt. "Officer Baptiste? Please, come in."

  Nodding, Baptiste got to his feet and followed Dr. Feldhusen into a room that was just as drab as the waiting room, but bigger, with a dull painting over a couch on one wall, two chairs in the center of the room, and file cabinets and an old-fashioned roll-top desk on the facing wall. A coffee table was situated between the two chairs.

  Feldhusen indicated one chair while sitting in the other. "Have a seat, please, Officer Baptiste. I'm sorry to have to see you again."

  As he sat, Baptiste's eyes widened in mild surprise. "You remember me?"

  "I didn't at first, but when I read your file…" She straightened her plaid skirt. "How are you doing?"

  "The lawsuit is still pending, though they have been moving to try to settle things. I spoke with my lawyer on the way here, and she suspects that after—after what happened last night, they might be more amenable to a settlement. We shall see."

  "Okay, but what I actually was asking about was what happened last night."

  Baptiste put his head in his hands. "What about it?"

  "How does it make you feel?"

  At that, Baptiste shook his head, and chuckled mirthlessly. "It is funny, I've been asking myself that same question since it happened, and throughout a very sleepless night. And honestly, I feel nothing. Empty. Mara's dead, Sylvia's dead, the Claw is dead, Starling is dead…"

  "And you're alive," Feldhusen said after Baptiste trailed off.

  "Yes." He shook his head again. "And I have no idea how that happened. The Superior Six and the rest of them—they fight monsters and aliens and powerful creatures and people with incredible technology. And I shot and killed one of them with a Beretta nine-millimeter pistol. That makes no sense to me. It—it shouldn't have been that easy. And now I'm going to get a medal for this."