Section F: The Arse-Kickers

Chapter One

"We got another one, sarge."

"Seriously?" Maia Kaur glanced up from the seemingly magical self-renewing pile of paperwork on her desk, downed the molasses-like dregs of her twice-reheated, alleged coffee, and gave the baby-faced constable the harshest glare she judged his tender rookie psyche capable of tolerating without inducing tears. "What is it this time? And don't tell me it's another bloody moehau sighting."

"Er...no, sarge." The constable consulted his notepad and swallowed. "Well, actually, we've had another three. But we've filed those ones in the, uh..."

"The low priority pile, constable?"

"Ah, in a manner of speaking..."

"Doesn't get much lower priority than the shredder, does it?" She dialled the glare back a couple of notches. "Don't sweat it, son. Prioritisation is a vital part of police work, especially at times like this, when sense and reason appear to have taken a leave of absence. That's something you'll come to appreciate over the course of your career. Now, what's this latest call about?"

"A spider, ma'am."

The sergeant absorbed this. Her glare-level drifted dangerously northwards. "A spider?" 

"Uh, yeah. Seems they've got a really big one at the Taylor place, out by the lake. Old man Taylor called it in not five minutes ago. Says his wife is a mess. Sounded pretty shook up himself, to tell you the truth."

Kaur ran a hand through her salt-and-pepper hair. "Well, I'm sorry to hear that, son. My heart really goes out to poor old Mr and Mrs Taylor. After all, who among us hasn't been traumatised by an untoward spider at an inappropriate time at some point in our lives? Please let them know our thoughts are with them."

"Uh...yes, sarge. Only—"

"Oh, and constable?"

"Ma'am?"

"There is one other thing I'd like you to pass on."

The young man swallowed again. "Wh-what's that, sarge?"

"Well, along with our best wishes, perhaps you could suggest to Mr Taylor that during a week like this, a week in which we've had reports of sheep snatched by curious creatures nobody seems able to identify, tales of strange shapes stalking the streets after dark, bizarre stories of phantasms and fantasies and things that go bump in the night, along with more sightings of New Zealand's answer to bigfoot than I've had in the previous twenty years"—the senior sergeant thumped her fist onto the desk, making the constable jump—"that instead of bloody well wasting police time with household bloody pests, maybe he'd like to head down to the corner store and buy himself a bloody can of bug spray. What does he think we are, bloody exterminators?"

"Yes, ma'am. No, ma'am. It's just, you see, I'm not sure bug spray is going to cut it."

"Really, constable? And why's that?"

"Well, see, he says he's already tried a shotgun."

"A shotgun?"

"Yeah. Turns out it's a big spider. Like, really, really big."

****

"This is a private jet."

"You know, Fields, your powers of deduction continue to astound. I'm beginning to see why they let you into the Agency in the first place. This is indeed, as you so perspicaciously point out, a private jet."

Fields had long since learned to let Peregrine's ribbing slide. Reacting only encouraged her. "Yeah, but why?"

"Why what?"