disorganised crime, 2

 

Chapter 2

 

I realised that we were dealing with more than a few bent cops when the sergeant taking the complaint asked for a registry fee to see that the complaint was filed.

“The registry fee for seeing this complaint filed is five credits,” he said. “Ten, if you want it expedited.”

“You’re asking for a bribe,” I said, flatly. “A bribe not to lose or delay my paperwork.”

He shrugged.

“Call it what you will; I call it a registry fee.”

“You’re fired,” I said. “And I’ll be prosecuting you.”

He goggled.

“And who the hell do you think you are?” he demanded.

“I know I’m your ultimate boss on this planet,” I said.

He didn’t want to leave, but I managed to persuade him.

It wasn’t that far to the ground; only the second floor, and there were flowerbeds to break his fall. Not to mention an ornamental lake. He made a good splash; I wonder if he could swim?  But then, I found myself indifferent to that conundrum.

I called my father-in-law, who was the best person I could think of.

“Dad?” I said. “I need a dozen squads of marines.”

“Whatever for, Gunny?” demanded Major-General Kerufin.

“I’m declaring martial law in the city until I find out how many police are corrupt,” I said.

“Oh, like that, is it?” said the major. “You’ll have them.”

He was as good as his word.

A troop ship arrived in the park within fifteen minutes, and disgorged a couple of hundred men, most of whom drew up to attention as the ship took off; and the officers came in to find me. We shook hands, and I briefed them.

Now I had to page every cop on this shift and bring them into the squad room, preferably after the marines had arrived, and tell them they were on administrative leave whilst I had their integrity investigated.

The babble was almost deafening.

I dodged out of the room, and threw in a flash-bang-crash grenate, known in the trade as a ‘peacemaker.’

It knocks anyone in the room half silly, overwhelms their optic nerves, half deafens them, and subdues almost everyone.

I went back in when they were subdued. I should maybe have

 

 

This would be a job for Phwedulp, bullying… er, coercing.,. other civil service Tsshst. Phwedulp would be in the Prime Pool as Tsshst designate what solcentrics refer to as seventh heaven.

And as if on cue, Phwedulp came in, followed by the rest of my squad.

“The Big Man is some aristocrat, the other criminals of the city believe,” said Phwedulp, in his precise tones.  “We should get some information from this precinct house if that fat man was allowed to call him, or if the captain alerted him, as I have had all outgoing signals tapped, and ingoing signals to the office of the captain. So far he has alerted three other high-ranking police officers that the new count is going to be difficult.”

“Bwurrf and I shook down a few Wargrini heavies,” said Arffrur, barking a laugh. “Thought they were tough, they did. Well, they weren’t.  We have the names of the chiefs of gambling, prostitution, protection, and theft.”

“What did you do with the less than tough heavies?” I asked.

“Gave them to a recruiting sergeant from the marches,” said Bwurff, and they both gave another bark of laughter.

Well, that disposed of them neatly. No testimony, but then, fewer to fight.

“We discouraged a few in the protection racket business,” said Antti. “Keaanurr and I found some of their heavies shaking down some mom and pop store, so we shook back, and harder.”

I winced. Keanurr is a mobile army on his own, and with Antti’s strength and resilience, the pair of them move from ‘army’ to ‘natural disaster.’ They’re an odd pair of friends, Kea is almost twice as tall as Antti, but they get on well.

“And how far did you shake?” I asked.

“We might have found the rest of the heavies?” said Antti. “And the head of that branch. We might have accidentally broken him beyond repair. Sorry.”

“Witnesses… I do need witnesses,” I said.

They both beamed very feral smiles at me.

“So, what was our fat man?” I asked.

“A branch of the protection racket, I think,” said Kea. “Some kind of ‘police force’ to discourage other hard types from operating.”

“They were on to us very quickly,” I said. “That either places the Big Man centrally, or your damaged protection racketeer, or good communications.”

“I’m guessing good communications,” said Serenaa. “We need to get to the Big Man before he moves, casually, and escapes to set it up again.  So, we need a volunteer to be a prisoner, and spring Arseface from jail, and go to him.”

“Why is everyone looking at me?” asked Antti, plaintively.

“Because he hasn’t seen you other than in uniform, briefly,” I said. “And because we can dress you up to look fat rather than stocky, so he sees you as a good sort of greasy grafter like him.”

Antti sighed, dramatically.

Serenaa giggled.

“It’s fun, you know, playing a part,” she said.

“You really did pick well for yourself, Gunny,” said Antti.

I tried not to look smug, I really did.

I don’t think I succeeded.

 

I heard all about it via the bug we put on Antti.

 

He was thrown roughly in a holding cell next to Arseface, whose name was Telemaan Kuraashi.

“You’re all a bunch of piddling amateurs and you’ll never amount to anything!” shouted Antti.

“It’s this new count,” said Kuraashi. “What’s your beef?”

“It was a beautiful racket,” mourned Antti. “I cooked it up with… well, let’s just say a senior police officer. Go round places with a dodgy record, and have those cops in on it stop people for minor traffic violations, and suggest they can get round any hassle by taking out a subscription to ‘Police times’ and buying an advert in it. So, you know, they know it’s a bribe, so they can’t complain about it, but you tell them to erase any citation they are messaged, and ignore them, and their subscription will make it right. O’course, the suckers will get arrested for failure to pay fines or turn up in court, sooner or later, but by then, there are other suckers.”

“I haven’t heard of that one,” said Kuraashi, interested. “You work for the Big Man, I suppose?”

Antti sneered.

“I work for myself,” he said. “There’s a big man? Maybe I should contact him; we could expand this no end. Who is he?”

“That’s none of your business,” said Kuraashi. “But maybe I can put in a word for you some time.”

 

Antti settled down. The next phase was up to me.

And it involved Antti and Kuraashi being cuffed together and taken out to a small military establishment.

They were put in a cell, still cuffed, with a guard outside.

“This is preposterous!” said Kuraashi.

“Shut it, number sixty-three,” said the guard. “You and sixty-four are going to get a trial without any prejudice or interference. And be pleased not to be number sixty-nine; so many jokes, so little time.”

Kuraashi had run out of swear words when a Wargrin in marine uniform came into the office, and put his briefcase on the table of the guard.

“Hullo,” he said, and shot the guard.

It was a tranq dart, obviously; and the Wargrin involved was Arffrur, who is about as ordinary looking Wargrin as you can get, being a brindled brown all over.

He attached a device to the lock of the cell, and walked out. A fuse hissed.

Antti pulled the bed over and got behind it.

Not a moment too soon; the explosive device went off, hurling bits of prison bars about.

“Is this a rescue attempt or is someone trying to kill us?” asked Kuraashi, nervously.

“I bought some help, but you know how Wargrin are,” said Antti. “Straightforward. And that’s the limit of what he’ll do. Come along. We’re about to have company.”

 

Antti knew the layout of the joint, but could act well enough to be sufficiently hesitant over leading Kuraashi – still cuffed to him – out. There was a ground vehicle parked, and Antti chuckled like a casino floor man when he meets a man with a system. He felt in the wheel arch and found a key.

“I wasn’t banking on being cuffed to you, you know, so just co-operate,” said Antti. “And you’d better direct me to this Mr. Big of yours, so he can separate us, see us taken care of, and expand on my scheme.”

“He’d have bailed us both out, if you’d have let me explain about you, you know, no need for this uncomfortable escape,” huffed Kuraashi.

“In a pig’s eye,” said Antti. “Did he have any way of knowing we were going to be transferred? Does he have informants in the military?  I do. It’s how my man got the tipoff and was able to get us out, but he doesn’t dare do more. I can pay for my own face and fingerprint makeover, all your big man has to do is arrange it. And tell me where I’m going at the cross-junction ahead.”

“Straight; head back for the city,” said Kuraashi. “He has a villa in the suburbs.”

This was pretty much what we wanted to know. The car was stiff with trackers, as was Antti himself, and we were a couple of streets over and five minutes behind, so as not to alert Kuraashi, who was watching every vehicle behind in the mirror.

It’s amazing how many planetary governments actually prefer ground vehicles over anti-gravity ones, since the advent of tiny fusion engines rendered fossil fuel and the even more polluting battery cars totally obsolete; I suspect it’s because it’s easier – read, cheaper – to register the number of miles travelled with pressure sensors on the roads and scanners to the car’s unique registration number for the purposes of taxing them.

Anyway, to cut a long drive short, Antti returned to the city, following instructions.

“I… I need to contact Mr. Big to let him know we’re coming,” said Kuraashi.

“There’s a public terminal here,” said Antti, pulling over, to the screech of breaks and horns sounding as he crossed three lanes. Most people communicate by their own pocket box, but there are still public terminals with higher power than the cheaper boxes, and with contacts to various helplines hardwired in for emergencies, from the fire service to youth chatline. And in a way, that was one of the main reasons for the public terminals; kids at risk whose own pocket boxes had been taken away or were monitored. That alone justified the cost of maintaining the little domes with their terminal.

Kuraashi hid the number, of course. Not that it would do him much good, Antti had crossed three lanes of traffic to pull in at this terminal for a reason; it was one we were monitoring.

“Hello? Can you tell Mr. Big this is Kuraashi?” said Kuraashi, when the signal was answered. “I’m bringing in someone who needs taking care of.”

He called off.

Antti smiled, cynically.

Taking care of was a phrase which could be taken several ways.

This would likely be an ambush, and his idea taken up without involving his participation. It was a brilliant scam, and one I had run to earth when we were involved in martial law on some one-spaceship dump of a planet, and the local bad boys had been impersonating cops.

Antti was fairly certain that the ambush should be on, as you might say, the other foot by the time they got there.

He groaned.

“I haven’t eaten since this morning, those bastards haven’t fed us; let’s pick up a meal so we can at least be coherent when we get there.”

“How the hell are we going to pick up a meal with our hands linked together like this?” demanded Kuraashi.

“There’s a drive-thru Spice-u-Like over there,” said Antti. “And we hold hands and make like it’s our anniversary.”

Kuraashi shuddered, but Antti was the one behind the wheel, buying time for our people to get in place.

Antti drove over to the take-out, and ordered two hagga birry-yummy and a lentil soup. Hagga are the local meat beast, able to process the local mineral cocktail which comes up in the vegetation, and I believe they process the dung for some of them. It was something I needed to learn more about if I was to make a good job of being count, as it was part of the local economy. Hagga-house is a widely spread eatery where you can eat hagga meat in various incarnations, from steaks to sausages, and they advertise by hagga wandering freely on the blue-green roofs where their favourite herbs have been planted. They make plenty good guard beasts too; that single, lethal horn and armoured head are formidable. Oh, did I hear some one say, ‘Oh, the Hamilcar Unicorn?’ full marks for getting there eventually.  Anyone would think they weren’t widely exported to hear some of you being so long recognising them.

So, Antti parks up to eat his meal, with Kuraashi picking at his, while we do our thing.