Dim Sum Asylum(58)
“If ever I walk away because a case got too bad, it’s because I’ll need a breath before going back in,” I growled. “Now let’s get in there and do the job. Gaines is already watching me to see if he needs to pull the cord. I don’t need your eyes burning a hole between my shoulders.”
“Look, if it were me in there—even in the short time I’ve known you—I’d want you to track down who put me on that slab.” He glanced over his shoulder when one of the beat cops said something under their breath and the pack of blue uniforms around him burst out laughing. With his contacts back in, it was harder to read his emotions, especially since I’d seen the storm of blues in them. “Just remember, I’m right here with you.”
“Got it.” I searched for the pair of latex gloves I’d shoved in my leather jacket’s pockets before we’d come into the hall. Pulling them on, I winced at the squeak my pants were making when I walked. “These needed like ten more minutes. I sound like a cheese curd.”
My jeans were still a little bit damp from coming out of the dryer nearly as soon as they’d been put in, despite Trent having tossed my clothes into the washer when I’d gone for a shower. My underwear’s elastic felt gummy, and I’d chosen to keep Trent’s T-shirt, a good call considering mine was probably going to have a second life as a dust rag after I’d gotten sick on it. Trent’s puke-abused sneakers hadn’t fared much better, and his left shoe was missing in action, more than likely a victim of the vulture pigeons living under the eaves of his apartment building, so it was only fair I’d lost a shirt in the deal.
“Okay, ready,” my partner said, snapping his gloves on. “You?”
“Yeah, let’s do this.” I made sure all the air was out from between my fingers, because I didn’t like the way latex rubbed my skin raw if there was too much room between the sticky material and my hands. “You said there’s a Forensics guy already in there?”
“Someone named Jaan. Know him?”
“Yeah, good guy. Was he in there when it went sideways?”
Trent nodded, and I winced, hoping Jann hadn’t taken too much damage. Ken Jaan was a good tech, one of the best the Asylum had on staff. Central spent a few weeks trying to coax him away every once in a while, but he always refused, preferring Chinatown’s insane challenges over the cookie-cutter animated-broomstick-gone-rogue crimes committed in the larger district.
As if Trent read my worry, he said, “He’s fine. Said he was in another part of the lab, so he didn’t see all of it, but the night tech came rushing in and took a few pieces of bone to the face. But other than that, they’re okay. The medics gave him a full clear, and he went right back in.”
“Okay, good to know.” I took a deep breath, squared my shoulders, and stared at the morgue’s entrance. Exhaling slowly, I sent my apologies to Jie’s soul for treading over what remained of her and pushed my way into the lab’s heavy double doors.
And walked into Hell.
I did need a moment, and I took it. Trent paused behind me, holding the door partially open, probably just in case I needed it. I might have. I was trying not to, but there was an enormous slice of my being screaming to turn around and go drink until I forgot what it felt like seeing the remains of a childhood friend splattered over nearly every surface of the Asylum’s arcane lab.
The number I heard tossed around for how many cups of blood in a body averaged between twenty-five and thirty, depending on weight. Looking at the nearly dried ruddy film covering the walls and counters, I’d have guessed at least seventy. There was no mistaking the flash point of the explosion. The outward ripple pattern was clear, and based on the tiny flecks of grayish white riddled through the bloody shock wave, whatever caused the incident was powerful enough to turn bone into powder and shear dead skin clean off, rolling bits of it into stiffening twisted strips and tossing them as far as the doors….
I could only take someone’s word that the remains I was staring at were Jie’s. There was no hint of her in the carnage. Hell, I couldn’t even tell if the body’d been human or faerie. There simply wasn’t anything there to recognize, and if anything saddened me, it was that Jie was once again an invisible shadow on the edges of the world she’d longed to be a part of.
“Jesus and Odin’s birds, this is….” Trent exhaled, his breath hot on my neck. “What the Hell happened?”
I didn’t get to answer. I didn’t have anything to say other than admit my ignorance, but as I turned to speak, shouting came from the hall behind us. The words were in a slang only found in the gōngyù, a filthy knit of words and sounds meant to communicate mostly desperation, anger, and violence. The man outside in the hall was beyond rage, caught up in a tornado of grief and injustice I could understand in the marrow of my bones. The cops trying to console him were failing miserably, and I caught the tail end of a curse ordering a ginger-haired patrol office to not only suck his own dick but to find a were-lamprey to do it for him.
The one word everyone could understand in the stream of red-hot shouts was Jie’s name, but only the most ruthless and cruel could ignore the pain under the rage.
“Should I go out and see who that is?” Trent asked when I finally spotted Jaan, a slender, bony man with skin the color of ancient parchment and a thick head of black hair with a white streak at each temple.