Forums
1
Pursuit In Death - Chapter 1
Posted by
miche405
,
03 September 2012
·
405 views
Lieutenant Eve Dallas had a tactical team assembled in an alleyway in Spanish Harlem. She also had a team covering the front of the building and a third in position on the roof. Stevens was penned in. All his exit routes were covered; unless he could fly he was hers. She just needed word from the cyber-geeks in the EDD division that he was actually inside. As soon as she had that sheʼd give her teams the go signal.
The problem was that Eve had never been a patient woman, especially as she waited in that alley. She could barely breathe; the stench was overpowering and she was almost ankle-deep in some kind of swill. The question was: why? It was the mid-21st century and there were recyclers everywhere. Why was she standing in food waste?
“Dammit Feeney,” Eve whispered over her comm-link. “Is the rabbit in the hole or not?” Seconds later, a frustrated Captain Ryan Feeney replied, “Dallas, give us a minute, weʼre peeling through all his privacy screens as quickly as we can. You want to risk setting off an alarm? Iʼll let you know as soon as weʼve got something!” Eve couldnʼt afford to push the tech squad any more so she fell silent and glowered.
Eve was just about to stride over to her partner, Detective Delia Peabody, when a door to her left burst open. “What the ̶̶ ?” was all Eve got out. Bent in the doorway was a restaurant cook or kitchen worker and his attentions were on a bucket that sat at his feet. He scooped up the bucket and let the contents fly in a single practiced motion. A second later the door slammed shut.
To her shock and horror, Eve was covered from head to foot in the same type of food waste that she had been standing in for the past fifteen minutes. As she scraped soy chips and congealed gravy from her face, she heard Peabody choke back a laugh. The other cops in the alley had the good sense to be very engrossed in a weapons check. Dallasʼ temper was legendary and no one really wanted to test her.
“We got a solid image, Dallas,” Feeney said through the comm-link. “A mixed-race female in an upstairs room. Weʼve got her heart-rate and respiratory data. Itʼs solid data, Dallas, there is only one person in that walk-up. Weʼve got no legal recourse to crack that door.”
Dammit, where was Stevens? This was definitely his type of hidey-hole. But with the EDD confirmation there was nothing more Dallas could do. The teams had to stand down and return to Cop Central.
Dallas had taken only a few steps towards her partner when the same restaurant door burst open again. She saw the kitchen worker crouched over another bucket of filth.
Stevens had given Dallas the slip but she would not end the day empty-handed.
Dallas kicked out hard and fast and the door slammed inwards even faster than it had popped open. There was a sickening thud caused by heavy steel door meeting cranium.
When the door slowly swung open again, everyone could see that the unfortunate kitchen worker was out cold. His head dipped dangerously low into the bucket of waste.
“Peabody!!!” Dallas shouted to her partner. “Get dispatch to send over a couple of beat droids to pick up this piece of crap. I want him handed over to the Green Cops but I also want him charged with Assault on an Officer.”
Peabody already had her link out and had almost completed the call to Central. She raised an eyebrow at her superior officer. “Assault, Dallas? Really?”
Eve took one menacing step towards Peabody and she wisely caved. “Right.... Assault.... Iʼm on it, Lieutenant.”
The drive back to Cop Central was markedly unpleasant. Eve Dallas was cold, she was wet and some sort of food slime had oozed into her underwear.
To stop the Lieutenant’s teeth from chattering, Peabody reached for the vehicle’s climate controls. “No!” Eve cried out ̶̶ but it was too late. A thin wisp of steam and a metallic crunch emanated from somewhere behind the dash. Eve tried desperately to override the heat request. But to her horror the vehicle calmly announced that the interior temperature had been raised to 101.6º F.
Dallas pounded on the vehicle’s dash. Her favourite method of dealing with unresponsive technology was a well-placed punch or a flurry of kicks. A disembodied voice announced that she was currently assaulting an official NYSPD vehicle. She was warned to cease and desist the destructive behaviour or face charges.
When the Lieutenant was sure she wouldn’t scream in frustration, she informed her partner that the climate controls were broken. Something was always broken or malfunctioning on Eve’s police issue. Peabody just rolled her eyes and peeled off a few layers of clothing.
It was now difficult to ignore the odour that was inside the car. The food waste that had been dumped on Eve had started to ferment, no doubt due to the sauna-like temperatures within the vehicle. Given the day that Eve had been having, she really wasn’t too surprised to discover that the windows refused to respond to voice- or keyboard-command.
Normally Dallas and Peabody would discuss the finer points of the case on the way back to the house. But today they unanimously decided to remain silent and breathe sparingly.
Eve found herself standing before Commander Whitney.
Clearly this day was not going to get better any time soon. She had barely walked through the doors at Central before she was called into her boss’s office. She knew that she was going to have a strip torn off her for failing to recover Stevens.
As Eve stood, ramrod straight, ready to give her report, she desperately hoped that she was upwind of the commander. Whitney’s nose twitched as he stared intently at her and Eve knew her desire to keep the stench to herself was futile.
“So let me get this straight,” Whitney said. “You had me sign off on an operation that required an EDD team and three field units in full tactical gear. And instead of bringing me Stevens, the mongrel who has been terrorizing our city with his death-dealing designer drug, you bring me...” He glanced at the report on his screen. “A goddamned litter bug! Dallas, the Chief of Police wants answers! Every media hound in the city wants answers! People are dying! Children are dying! Dallas, I need more from you.”
“Another one, sir?” Eve had to know, the cop in her needed to know.
Whitney nodded. “We got word about a half an hour ago. That is the eighteenth kid to die from that poison. Dallas, I want Stevens and I want his ‘product’ off my streets. Do I make myself clear?”
Eve’s day was rapidly heading down the recycler and it appeared there would be no improvements in the foreseeable future. She wasn’t angry at Whitney: she knew she deserved everything he had said and more. It was her operation and its failure was on her. Stevens was out there in the wind and now that was on her too.
But she wasn’t the type to just roll over and die. There were reasons she was the top cop in New York. She took her lumps when she erred and offered no excuses. But what made her so damn good? She never made the same mistake twice.
Right now, Eve needed to do two things: she needed to take a shower and she needed to update her case files. She wanted to go over everything again and she would keep at it until she figured out where that rat Stevens was hiding himself.
Eve was down but she was not out.
The problem was that Eve had never been a patient woman, especially as she waited in that alley. She could barely breathe; the stench was overpowering and she was almost ankle-deep in some kind of swill. The question was: why? It was the mid-21st century and there were recyclers everywhere. Why was she standing in food waste?
“Dammit Feeney,” Eve whispered over her comm-link. “Is the rabbit in the hole or not?” Seconds later, a frustrated Captain Ryan Feeney replied, “Dallas, give us a minute, weʼre peeling through all his privacy screens as quickly as we can. You want to risk setting off an alarm? Iʼll let you know as soon as weʼve got something!” Eve couldnʼt afford to push the tech squad any more so she fell silent and glowered.
Eve was just about to stride over to her partner, Detective Delia Peabody, when a door to her left burst open. “What the ̶̶ ?” was all Eve got out. Bent in the doorway was a restaurant cook or kitchen worker and his attentions were on a bucket that sat at his feet. He scooped up the bucket and let the contents fly in a single practiced motion. A second later the door slammed shut.
To her shock and horror, Eve was covered from head to foot in the same type of food waste that she had been standing in for the past fifteen minutes. As she scraped soy chips and congealed gravy from her face, she heard Peabody choke back a laugh. The other cops in the alley had the good sense to be very engrossed in a weapons check. Dallasʼ temper was legendary and no one really wanted to test her.
“We got a solid image, Dallas,” Feeney said through the comm-link. “A mixed-race female in an upstairs room. Weʼve got her heart-rate and respiratory data. Itʼs solid data, Dallas, there is only one person in that walk-up. Weʼve got no legal recourse to crack that door.”
Dammit, where was Stevens? This was definitely his type of hidey-hole. But with the EDD confirmation there was nothing more Dallas could do. The teams had to stand down and return to Cop Central.
Dallas had taken only a few steps towards her partner when the same restaurant door burst open again. She saw the kitchen worker crouched over another bucket of filth.
Stevens had given Dallas the slip but she would not end the day empty-handed.
Dallas kicked out hard and fast and the door slammed inwards even faster than it had popped open. There was a sickening thud caused by heavy steel door meeting cranium.
When the door slowly swung open again, everyone could see that the unfortunate kitchen worker was out cold. His head dipped dangerously low into the bucket of waste.
“Peabody!!!” Dallas shouted to her partner. “Get dispatch to send over a couple of beat droids to pick up this piece of crap. I want him handed over to the Green Cops but I also want him charged with Assault on an Officer.”
Peabody already had her link out and had almost completed the call to Central. She raised an eyebrow at her superior officer. “Assault, Dallas? Really?”
Eve took one menacing step towards Peabody and she wisely caved. “Right.... Assault.... Iʼm on it, Lieutenant.”
*****
The drive back to Cop Central was markedly unpleasant. Eve Dallas was cold, she was wet and some sort of food slime had oozed into her underwear.
To stop the Lieutenant’s teeth from chattering, Peabody reached for the vehicle’s climate controls. “No!” Eve cried out ̶̶ but it was too late. A thin wisp of steam and a metallic crunch emanated from somewhere behind the dash. Eve tried desperately to override the heat request. But to her horror the vehicle calmly announced that the interior temperature had been raised to 101.6º F.
Dallas pounded on the vehicle’s dash. Her favourite method of dealing with unresponsive technology was a well-placed punch or a flurry of kicks. A disembodied voice announced that she was currently assaulting an official NYSPD vehicle. She was warned to cease and desist the destructive behaviour or face charges.
When the Lieutenant was sure she wouldn’t scream in frustration, she informed her partner that the climate controls were broken. Something was always broken or malfunctioning on Eve’s police issue. Peabody just rolled her eyes and peeled off a few layers of clothing.
It was now difficult to ignore the odour that was inside the car. The food waste that had been dumped on Eve had started to ferment, no doubt due to the sauna-like temperatures within the vehicle. Given the day that Eve had been having, she really wasn’t too surprised to discover that the windows refused to respond to voice- or keyboard-command.
Normally Dallas and Peabody would discuss the finer points of the case on the way back to the house. But today they unanimously decided to remain silent and breathe sparingly.
*****
Eve found herself standing before Commander Whitney.
Clearly this day was not going to get better any time soon. She had barely walked through the doors at Central before she was called into her boss’s office. She knew that she was going to have a strip torn off her for failing to recover Stevens.
As Eve stood, ramrod straight, ready to give her report, she desperately hoped that she was upwind of the commander. Whitney’s nose twitched as he stared intently at her and Eve knew her desire to keep the stench to herself was futile.
“So let me get this straight,” Whitney said. “You had me sign off on an operation that required an EDD team and three field units in full tactical gear. And instead of bringing me Stevens, the mongrel who has been terrorizing our city with his death-dealing designer drug, you bring me...” He glanced at the report on his screen. “A goddamned litter bug! Dallas, the Chief of Police wants answers! Every media hound in the city wants answers! People are dying! Children are dying! Dallas, I need more from you.”
“Another one, sir?” Eve had to know, the cop in her needed to know.
Whitney nodded. “We got word about a half an hour ago. That is the eighteenth kid to die from that poison. Dallas, I want Stevens and I want his ‘product’ off my streets. Do I make myself clear?”
Eve’s day was rapidly heading down the recycler and it appeared there would be no improvements in the foreseeable future. She wasn’t angry at Whitney: she knew she deserved everything he had said and more. It was her operation and its failure was on her. Stevens was out there in the wind and now that was on her too.
But she wasn’t the type to just roll over and die. There were reasons she was the top cop in New York. She took her lumps when she erred and offered no excuses. But what made her so damn good? She never made the same mistake twice.
Right now, Eve needed to do two things: she needed to take a shower and she needed to update her case files. She wanted to go over everything again and she would keep at it until she figured out where that rat Stevens was hiding himself.
Eve was down but she was not out.
