“I assure you, Miss Sharp, that I did everything by the book. If there was anything wrong with our response, the problem didn’t come from me.”

  The pen of inspector auditor Chloe Sharp traced a series of swift cursive lines into her notepad, spelling “by the book, not his problem.” And she resisted the urge to throw the notebook across the table at the facetious brat sitting across from her, wearing a mocking mask of earnestness. They both knew damn well the words he had spoken and she had dutifully recorded were worthless. There had absolutely been something wrong with the Specials’ response – the gaping crater at the edge of the Central District was still-smoldering proof of that. Chloe’s job, as a bookend to her investigations into Eingopher, was to find what had gone wrong. And opposite her, Erwin Alcatraz, Specials Emergency Responder, didn’t seem to care what Chloe’s job was. His only intent seemed to be proving he’d done nothing wrong. An understandable reaction, especially given his youth and relative inexperience – most kids his age were in university, not responding to demonic catastrophes. It might have been easy to empathize with his worry about being blamed for the whole mess, except for the transparently artificial sincerity he liberally drizzled his words with. He wasn’t worried about blame or fault – when it came to the Specials, any reprimand was little more than stern words and a slap on the wrist. No, when he said it wasn’t his fault, he was playing a game with Chloe.

  The only question was, what kind of game? Was it keep-away – did he know something and was just being needlessly obstructive? Or did he not have any worthwhile information and his game was to annoy Chloe as much as possible before she threw him out of the interview room? Because if it was the later, Chloe admitted he’d racked up quite a lot of points already. “We’ll set aside fault for now, and just stick to the facts. Can you run through exactly what happened on the day of the Eingopher incident?”

  “All the facts? For the whole day?” He tilted his head to the side innocently.

  “Anything you can think of that’s relevant.” Chloe replied neutrally, keeping the sinking feeling in her stomach out of her tone. She could guess where this was going.

  “Well, I woke up at 8:30 AM. My alarm’s the theme from Super Galaxy Rangers – it’s quite catchy. I never stop it until it cycles through the first loop of the song…”

  And there he went. Keeping her mouth a thin, expressionless line, Chloe just nodded and wrote, and by the time he had started describing his breakfast in meticulous detail, her self-control paid off, “… I fried the egg for 7 minutes exactly. I use an egg timer, you see, so I can be quite confident of the timing… Really, Miss Sharp, is all this really necessary?”

  ‘Miss Sharp’ set off an involuntary twinge of annoyance – she wasn’t his damn school teacher – but she was careful to keep her voice steady and level. “I don’t think these details are particularly important, no. I’m more interested in your actions on the scene - you know, containment procedure, munitions and equipment, and so on. But anything you think is relevant is important.”

  Erwin sulked for a good minute, but when he resumed talking, he skipped straight to the point. “We arrived at… I dunno, the afternoon. It’s in the combat logs. They’d already tracked down the target and had drones and a few androids keeping tabs on him, so we were just disposal. Given your notes on his research focus, we followed standard demon disposal protocols: a long range attack with entropic rounds. Attack was about 1 kilometer out, delivery was an HSP-0039 railgun. The first shot hit, but was negligible, and the second evaporated before impact.”

  “Entropic rounds are kept at -273 C – they’re designed specifically as a conceptual toxin for demons. They’re not supposed to evaporate on contact with a bit of heat.”

  Erwin shrugged. “I’m telling you what happened. I don’t know why it didn’t work. It could be because the crazy geezer implanted himself with a near-complete demon, or…” he paused to make sure his silence was sufficiently implicating, before continuing, “All I’m saying is, it’s not my fault.”

  Chloe could fill in the blanks well enough – either there was something abnormal about the target, or there was something off with the weapon. And rounds cooled to within a rounding error of absolute zero had appropriately meticulous standards for handling them. Either someone made a substantial mistake, or someone had made sure there was a substantial mistake. Even the possibility of deliberate sabotage in a situation that potentially catastrophic was... concerning, to say the least. “Thank you, Erwin, that’s all I need for now.”

  “Hey, your handwriting’s really pretty, you know. The curve in your ‘s’ is really~ feminine.”

  Instead of leaving the room, he had leaned forward, his face mere inches away from hers, his expression innocent, his posture anything but. She stood up forcefully, her chair clattering, glaring sharply enough to cut steel. Hoping every drop of her disgust was plainly visible on her face, she forced her words out in an even tone. “We’re done here, Alcatraz.”

  He leaned back and laughed, and it occurred to her that whatever game he’d been playing, her reaction may have been his win condition. Mercifully, after getting the reaction he’d been digging for he stood and left the room, letting out a parting shot as he stepped through the door, “You’re cute when you’re angry.”

  And he was gone. Chloe took several minutes of deep breathing before she felt confident enough to move on the next interview. Erwin was a terrible brat, and somehow Chloe was certain he’d be an even more terrible adult.

  ****

  “Our written report was… exhaustive. I’m afraid there’s likely not anything more I can add.”

  Exhaustive certainly seemed a fitting word for William Stocks, level 3 Records Clerk. Or exhausted, at least – the shadows under his eyes certainly spoke to the amount of time that had gone into his reports. Chloe decided a more considerate approach was called for, “I don’t much want to have to talk to you either, but you were in Eingopher’s lab shortly before the rogue Alpha broke out, and you were active coordinating the evacuation during the Eingopher incident. Your perspective is an important one.”

  “I understand, just let me know where you’d like me to start,” he replied, straightening his tie.

  He really was a consummate professional office lackey - from the neat but subtly faded suit to the inevitable android assistant just a step behind. Chloe resisted the urge to scowl – why did people insist on dragging their office machinery around with them at all times? Still, he was at least professional, unlike the Specials brat she’d interviewed just before. It made for a refreshing change of pace. Ask a question, receive a thorough, detailed response. What a wonderful concept! The interview was quick but comfortable, and the results detailed but concise. And also quite thoroughly useless. Chloe leaned back in her chair, giving her pen a quick spin through her fingers. “You really weren’t joking about your report being exhaustive.”

  If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

  She meant it as an honest compliment; she could admire good work. If everyone was as thorough with their reports, her job would be a lot easier, yet even with androids to literally write the reports for them, somehow there was still no shortage of people who couldn’t decently fill out routine paperwork to save their life. Her respect dipped slightly as he turned to his android, asking, “Was there anything you can think of that didn’t make its way into our report?”

  Can’t office drones have a single thought of their own without consulting their robots? If said robot noticed the hint of a scowl crossing into Chloe’s expression, it didn’t react, instead responding levelly, “All I can think of was our brief discussion with Mr. Davis Cooper-Bullet regarding possible ways Eingopher managed to procure an Alpha project. It was conjecture, so it wasn’t worth including in the report, but if Miss Sharp is investigating the case, they may be useful considerations to, ah… consider?”

  “Ah yes, thank you Four. Yes, Davis, Four and myself had speculated on how Eingopher had got his hands on an Alpha project. It was either leaked by an internal saboteur, or…” Chloe had stopped listening. She had all but frozen at the mention of Davis’s name. Him of all people! How was he always involved? Why always him? Her thought spiraled, until she realized the office drone in front of her had stopped talking. She irritably spun the pen in her hand, fumbled it, and dropped it, sending it clattering onto the floor. She stood up brusquely, running through a familiar refrain in a tone somehow more robotic than the android had been. “Yes, thank you for your time. The interview has been most helpful, and if there are any further questions, I’ll be in touch.”

  Mr. Stocks seemed just as pleased to be done the interview as Chloe was, and promptly left the room, leaving Chloe with her thoughts as she picked up her pen from the floor. Davis Cooper-Bullet… Could she just pretend she hadn’t heard his name and close her investigation without him?

  ****

  “Always a wonderful day when the esteemed Inspector Auditor Sharp gives me a call!”

  Davis was smiling, but his sarcasm was impossible to ignore. He didn’t dwell on it, though, instead turning to the pool table beside him, lining up a shot, and sinking one of the solid balls into a nearby basket. Nodding his satisfaction, he stepped aside to let one of the nearby androids wearing a frilled apron and little else line up a shot. Chloe couldn’t help but notice that despite the exposed mechanical joints betraying the cheapness of the blue-skinned android model, there seemed to be exceptional attention to detail in its chest area. “Did you accidentally leave your camera in wide-angle? I’m pretty sure having all that on your screen during a work meeting is grounds for sexual harassment.”

  Chloe was confident there was nothing accidental about the camera view. Davis only shrugged, “Audio-only is fine too.”

  Chloe resisted the urge to grind her teeth. Her dentist had warned her against it. “That’s not… Forget it. I’m just calling because your name came up over the course of the Eingopher investigation. I’m sure you don’t have much to contribute, so if you could kindly say that for the record, we can both move on with our lives.”

  “Hey, I never said I didn’t have anything. In fact… oh, that’s a tricky one.” Davis’s attention was distracted by a loud *clack* from the pool table. As Chloe clicked her pen in growing impatience, he leaned over the pool table, lined up his next shot, slowly drew back the cue, released, and cursed quietly. “What a mess. Anyway, it just so happens I do have something that might be useful. I heard a conceptual toxin was deployed, to.. mixed results. So a question for you: why do we know about the conceptual toxins for demons specifically?”

  “Because demon fragments are the most common binding agent for the immortality project, and as such are one of the consciousness types most thoroughly studied. And since they’re used so often in research, there’s also the need to have a safety valve in case things go wrong – the same reason we install fire extinguishers in the labs.” Chloe had enunciated each syllable with as much frost as she could muster, and dearly hoped her phone’s speakers weren’t muffling any of it.

  Davis blinked. “That’s an impressively academic answer. I was just going to say it was because Alfred Niirisu figured it out.”

  Chloe hoped her meagre 1080p phone camera was able to convey just how frustrating an experience she found talking to Davis. “And how is Alfred Niirisu relevant?”

  “Well, he’s…” Another *clack*, and Davis again turned his attention to the pool table. An agonizingly slow set up, a shot followed by more muted grumbling, and the blue-skinned android was back leaning over the table and Davis was looking back into the camera lens. “He’s an expert on conceptual toxins and demon countermeasures. He also was one of Eingopher’s professors, back in his university days, and it just so happens he was also one of the major stakeholders of Eingopher’s research lab.”

  “That could easily be a coincidence,” Chloe retorted, but as much as she hated to admit it, Davis had a point. It was enough of a coincidence it was worth looking into.

  “Also, this is just an anecdote from our university days, but he was very knowledgeable about demons, especially theories about complete demons. I’m not sure if you were paying attention in that class, but what we saw in the Eingopher incident seemed like a pretty good fit for some of those theories. Might want to ask him about that as well.”

  Chloe didn’t welcome the reference to the time she and Davis had been in university together – if anything she wished their time together back then would fade from reality entirely. It had not ended well – for either of them. She pushed the unpleasant memories aside, and tried to make sure she, at least, was able to close the meeting in a professional manner. “This was less useless than I’d expected. Thank you for your time today.”

  Another *clack*, but Davis didn’t bother turning around. “Ah, I’ve lost, huh?”

  Chloe closed her screen and realized from the ache in her jaw she’d been grinding her teeth after all. If only Davis was consistently useless, he’d be a lot easier to deal with. Dammit, Niirisu was a good lead.

  ****

  Chloe drove her fist into the punching bag in front of her. Step back, step forward, punch, punch. Step back, step forward, punch. Davis’s dumb grinning face came into her mind, uninvited. Instead of consciously pushing it away, she held it there, then punched again – the bag swung violently. She reached out to steady the bag, then drove her fist in again. Each punch she could feel her irritation fading, a little at a time, in pace with her building fatigue. Her arms were aching as she left the gym.

  Chloe’s foot drove into the ground, before pushing off and propelling her forward. Through the park, there was the cool evening air across her skin, and the scent of leaves and cut grass. The evening came on quickly at this time of year, and the park’s lampposts were already glowing, keeping the lengthening shadows at bay for just long enough for Chloe to finish her evening jogging circuit. She pushed onwards, each step leaving her work just a little further behind.

  Fatigue had set in by the time she returned home. A warm bath, and it was as if all the stress of the day had left her. Her living room was a treasure trove of antique furniture, from the three bookshelves made of different shades of thick, solid wood, to the red plush couch she settled into for the rest of her evening. She’d left A Tale of Two Cities on the side table, and as she flipped through to where her bookmark indicated she had left off, she quietly appreciated the sensation of the yellowed pages turning through her fingers. She reached for a familiar pair of glasses, their ornate, graceful frame a precious, centuries-old antique, and adjusted them slightly before immersing herself in the book’s story. She didn’t need them, of course – her vision had been corrected by laser surgery years ago, and the lenses were fake regardless.