The Wolf in Red

City of Dreams

The phone rang before my alarm that morning, which was impressive considering it went off at 6 am. Still half asleep I answered it, sitting up in bed. 

"OK, who's been killed this time?"

Whoever was on the other end was silent for a minute. 

"We don't know yet. A young boy by the look of it, at the east end of Queen street. But this one is different. You might want to come quickly."

"I'll be there as soon as I can."

I put the phone down and lay back. Maybe I could get 5 minutes sleep before my alarm-

The alarm went off.

Or not.

*****

By the time I had driven halfway across the city to get to Queen street, the sun was peeking out from between the skyscrapers. A small group of people and their cars blocked the end of the street. Parking the car, I headed over, slipping through the group to the crime scene. 

Well this was definitely different, I decided. The last sudden death I'd had to investigate was just the result of a gang fight. The victim had been shot in the head. This one... well lets just say most of this boy's body was on my side of the street and the boy's head was in the alley opposite. The body was so mangled it was tricky to distinguish any of the boy's features but I guessed he was about 13 from his height. 

Right then someone from the small crowd stepped forward and crouched by the boy's head. Curious, I started over as the man placed his hand on the boy's forehead before recognising my friend Luke Flakker and stopping. I knew it wasn't a good idea to interrupt this part.  

Although getting half strangled again would be just the thing to top off this morning.

Luke knelt there for about a minute, not moving a muscle. As usual he was dressed like a walking greyscale. A light grey shirt, dark grey trench coat and even darker grey jeans.  His prematurely white hair and black shoes completed the grey spectrum. In one movement his eyes flicked open and he stood, stumbling back from the body. I watched as he rubbed the back of his neck, blinking like he was just coming back to reality. 

"That didn't look fun." I said.

Finally Luke noticed me. 

"Oh Hi Jacob."

He sounded slightly distracted, like his mind wasn't quite his own yet.

"Yeah that one was particularly painful," Luke went on, "but I did find something. Just before he died he heard some sort of animal."

Okay I should probably explain this. My friend Luke was a form of a seer, but a very rare one. Most seers have dreams or visions of the past or present. (Never the future though. There was some sort of complicated explanation for that I had never fully understood.) Anyway Luke could only see how people had died and only if he was touching their body. It wasn't always clear as he only saw their last few seconds of consciousness and always from the victim's perspective. And yes before you ask he felt everything they did as well. 

"-heard something howl." Luke was saying.

Oops he was still talking. I tried to look like I'd heard everything he had said.

"So what do you think it was?" He asked me. "Obviously an animal but I don't know much else."

"Could it have been a wild dog?" I asked.

He frowned. "I suppose so."

"Some sort of animal has killed him, you can tell." I said."And then he heard a dog howl just before he died. There are wild dogs in Lordanshire city right?"

"Yes." Luke still sounded uncertain.

"So it's sorted. We can go now and leave the rest of this to the police." 

After that it was easy. We let the rest of the group know there was nothing mystical about this death and when the police finally got there Luke explained what we had concluded and we were free to go.

The drive seemed shorter this time, maybe because I was a bit more awake. I had an odd feeling I had missed something important. We had taken photos of the scene, right? And recorded what Luke had seen down to the last detail? But then, I thought, soon none of this would be my problem. So It didn't really matter.  

I pulled up outside the mystical affairs department (MAD) just as the boss's car arrived. Had I remembered the letter? I checked and double checked it was still in my pocket as I got out of the car. The MAD building looked just as grey and uninteresting as every company building in Lordanshire, the only difference was it was much older. The company itself had nothing in common with the building except maybe its age. It was the MAD's job to look into events and crimes that the police couldn't make sense of and find who or what had caused it. 

"Hey Jacob!"

My boss had cornered me. He was wearing his immaculate suit and tie, his hair slicked back. Everything about his appearance was designed to make others feel inadequate in comparison. His dark eyes studied my face. 

"Have you made your decision yet?" He asked.

"Yes." I said and handed him the letter. My resignation.