Gift Exchange for EvilZmi
Character: Raiel
Word Count: 3700
Raiel sat at her desk, frowning down at the papers spread out in front of her. Sleep tugged at her mind even as the sun shone bright and high in the sky. Almost two weeks she’d been working this case, and day after day it felt like another wall was rising up in the investigation. The witness who’d come forward to offer a contradicting statement to the supposed crimes of Mr. Hennigan had suddenly retracted their words, saying they must have remembered the details wrong. The papers confirming when Mr. Hennigan had clocked in at his office the day he’d supposedly visited the murder victim’s home, the evidence of his alibi, had vanished like he’d never clocked in at all.
Poor Mr. Hennigan. Raiel had interviewed him three days ago, when he’d been officially arrested on charges of murder, embezzlement, and even possible cult activity based on evidence supposedly uncovered in his private quarters. The town was reeling. He’d always been a kind, hardworking, honest businessman, entrusted with the safekeeping of many of the townsfolk’s goods as they awaited shipment. Mr. Hennigan’s courier business had been around for decades without a single black mark; past issues had been resolved as best he could, discounts or refunds provided when necessary, and almost all incidents were accompanied by a personal apology from the man himself. Of course, smiles and kind words weren’t always a sound business structure, especially in the face of competition. Courier business was serious business, according to Raiel’s investigations. In the last few years, at least three separate companies had popped up in and around town offering competitive rates and delivery timelines almost impossible to guarantee. So far, the townsfolk had been fairly loyal to Mr. Hennigan’s company.
That was, until these allegations surfaced. Two weeks ago, one of his competitors had been found dead in one of their warehouses, knife in his chest and a document clutched in his hand that was apparently a letter from Mr. Hennigan threatening him to shut down business or else. Naturally, she’d jumped on the case the moment the murder crossed her desk. It was almost too convenient. The letter in the competitor’s hand, the knife branded with Mr. Hennigan’s company logo, the body found right near the entrance for the morning shift to find immediately.
One of the loudest voices pushing for Mr. Hennigan’s immediate arrest and liquidation of assets was from one Mr. Lorican Reeves - another competitor in the courier business, and a man who sat on a seemingly bottomless mountain of money. Mr. Reeves had been out every day, almost within the hour of the body’s discovery, calling for investigations and arrests and claiming he’d always known Mr. Hennigan’s friendliness was too good to be true. The speed at which he’d jumped on the case, promising the townsfolk none of their goods were under threat, that he’d take care of them until everything was resolved, they didn’t have to worry about their lives being disrupted by such heinous activities occurring right under their poor unsuspecting noses.
Raiel’s own nose curled as she stared down at the flyer, one of many distributed by Mr. Reeves’ lackeys. Advertising discounted services for anyone impacted by Mr. Hennigan’s crimes - short term, of course. So far, Mr. Reeves had ducked her attempts at an interview. Being one of the major competitors, she knew he also had reasons for wanting both Mr. Hennigan and the dead man out of business - enough motivation to warrant the possibility of involvement.
Yet, despite her best efforts, solid evidence linking Mr. Reeves to the crime had yet to manifest while too-convenient evidence turned up right where it needed to be to implicate Mr. Hennigan. She fiddled with the letter opener on her desk, the one she kept nice and sharp in case she needed to open a particularly difficult piece of evidence. Then, she decided that official channels would only continue to be stonewalled until they had no choice but to make Mr. Hennigan’s charges permanent - and that deadline was fast approaching. Two days, if the rumors from the courthouse were to be believed. She had to move fast. Grabbing her coat off the back of the chair, she strode out of the precinct and out into the bright afternoon, squinting in the light and blinking several times until her eyes adjusted.
Mr. Reeves’ office was on the other side of town. Raiel’s boots clicked on the cobblestones as she power-walked through the streets, occasionally giving someone a nod when their eyes met. Most of the people here knew not to get in her way when she was on a mission, so no one tried to stop her or catch her in conversation.
When she arrived, she pushed open the door and strode past the secretary without pausing, ignoring the flustered woman’s attempts to call out to her and tell her Mr. Reeves wasn’t seeing any visitors without an appointment. Reaching the door to his office, Raiel pushed it open and stepped in without preamble. Mr. Reeves sat behind his desk, a somewhat heavyset man accustomed to a more than comfortable lifestyle. Stacks of paperwork sat on the desk, not unlike hers, but he was leaning back and sipping on a glass of expensive-smelling booze instead of working - though at her abrupt entrance, he startled and half the glass splashed down his front.
“I - you - Detective Weissberg!” Mr. Reeves sputtered, dabbing at his shirt with a silk handkerchief. “I wasn’t expecting… you don’t have an appointment.”
“I’ve tried, but your secretary keeps telling me you’re booked solid,” she replied, keeping her face neutral. Drinking on the job? So unprofessional. She stepped forward, ignoring the plush armchairs where his guests would usually sit while discussing business, and stood over him. “I have some questions I’d like to ask regarding your relationship with Mr. Hennigan and his business, and your whereabouts over the last few weeks.”
“My whereabouts? Detective, that almost makes it sound like I’m a suspect! Surely the investigation must almost be over by now. The evidence against my competitor is -”
“There are still some loose ends I am attempting to wrap up,” she cut in. “Evidence can be planted or even faked, Mr. Reeves. I’m ensuring that we don’t put an innocent man behind bars unless we’re completely certain he wasn’t falsely accused.”
Mr. Reeves’ expression darkened - only for the briefest of moments, but it was there. His hand tensed around the now empty glass and he sat up straighter. As he did, Raiel’s attention was drawn away from his defensive body language as something flickered in the air above his head. Goosebumps prickled down the back of her neck as the color seemed to wash out of the office, shades of blue overtaking the warm interior. A blue and black butterfly fluttered around Mr. Reeves’ head, and the wall shifted as several snake-like creatures with glinting white eyes running all along their sides slithered across the wood paneling. A bulbous spider with too many legs wove a web in the corner, several more butterflies trapped in the threads. The vision lasted barely longer than Mr. Reeves’ shift in demeanor, but it was impossible to dismiss.
Nightmares. His office was crawling with Nightmares, so pungent and powerful she was glimpsing them in the waking world. That meant Mr. Reeves had something eating away at his subconscious. Something plaguing his thoughts outside of his dreams. Something guilty.
“I can assure you, Detective, while all business is a competition of sorts, I wish no ill will upon my professional colleagues. And if you’re here to accuse me of some heinous, criminal act, I assure you that I had nothing to do with this whole unfortunate circumstance. Why, the very night the body was found, I was here, working late on some important paperwork. My secretary can verify this for you.” Mr. Reeves had recovered nicely, an almost smug smile growing on his face. “It’s unfortunate no one could verify Mr. Hennigan’s whereabouts. Perhaps he should have hired better workers. More reliable, trustworthy people. Like mine. I vet my employees personally. We value integrity here.”
“I’m sure you do.” Raiel’s jaw tightened. He was good. Of course he’d have a solid alibi in place. People on his payroll, ensuring lips stayed sealed and paperwork checked out. “Please have her send over the schedules and verification paperwork as soon as possible. I will also be requesting copies of manifests and shipping logs from the past two months, so please have that prepared as quickly as you can.”
She wanted to question him more. Knock that desk aside and demand answers. That smug smile, his too-relaxed posture after the mask had slipped for just a moment. Like he had all the power, knew exactly what she was there for, and was reveling in how her hands were tied by legal restrictions. Her fingers itched towards her belt, but she tamped down the instinct. Again, her eyes flickered to the spots just above his head, to the corner of the room, the slight distortions rippling in the air where the Nightmares lurked.
“I’ll have her get right on that,” he said. “You look tired, Detective. Perhaps you should sleep on this case. Make sure you’re thinking clearly before you wrap up the details. Last thing anyone wants is for you to make a mistake about who’s guilty and who’s innocent.”
She bit back the snarky response and gave a small, professional nod. “A good night’s sleep can be incredibly… insightful. Thank you for your time. My apologies for the interruption.”
With that, she turned on her heel and walked out of the office, out of the building, away from the suffocating shackles of laws and corruption and secrets. There was something else to try. One last ditch effort. There were other ways to get a confession.
**
Night took too long to fall. Raiel fought the exhaustion for as long as she could. The dream world was easier to traverse during the nighttime, and she needed things to be as clear as possible.
When the sun was long past the horizon and the sky itself was dark, a heavy cloud cover blocking the moon and stars, she laid down in bed and closed her eyes to let sleep take her. The transition from wakefulness to sleep was hard to track, but the transition into the dream world was always noticeable. The darkness behind her closed eyes took on a blue tint, and a soft breeze chilled her arms. Opening her eyes, she saw everything had become shades of blue and black. Outside the window, butterflies flitted between leafless, twisted trees. She rose, feet making no noise as she slipped out of her room and into the ominous dark of her dreams.
Strange, malformed shadows darted between the roots and trunks of the trees. Things that could’ve been teeth or claws or eyes glinted in the sourceless light that illuminated her surroundings, but she ignored them for now. Her destination was the decrepit castle looming in the distance, its windows dark as usual but the rusted iron gates open and waiting. She moved towards it, pace steady, alert for any stray shapes that wandered too close. Sometimes, a Nightmare tried to be a person. They never got it right, though. Fingers too long, tipped with wickedly curved claws that were more appropriate on a bird of prey. Eyes too wide and filled with pupils in an otherwise featureless face. Limbs with too many joints, arms so long the knuckles dragged on the ground. Those were the worst. The most dangerous. She always did her best to avoid them. Thankfully, none were lurking about this particular evening. Not yet, anyway. She had to make her visit brief.
Reaching the doors to the castle, she hesitated for only a moment before stepping inside. Each time she visited, the interior changed. Doors appeared in different places, rooms led to different spaces. And sometimes, they had answers to questions she couldn’t ask in the waking world. The air was filled with horrible scratching, skittering, whispering noises. Nightmares of all shapes and sizes crept through the shadows inside the castle, pausing to watch her walk by.
Please, please let something be here. As she walked, she chewed her lip, eyes darting about. She didn’t want to have to search the whole castle. That could take hours she didn’t have.
Something must’ve been listening, because where normally there were blacks and blues and sometimes whites, she spotted a distant hint of red. Up the winding stairs, down a hallway filled with too many doors that seemed to stretch into eternity until it ended abruptly at a T-junction. The red was coming from the left, and she kept following it, pace slowly increasing with excitement and anxiety. Behind her, she heard the Nightmares following her. Maybe they were curious. Maybe they were hunting.
The red glow intensified. She was getting close. Rounding the last corner, she spotted the glow emitting from a half-open door. Feeling the sweat beading on her brow, she jogged towards it and pushed it fully open.
Inside, the room was bathed in red and white. It was an ostentatious bedroom, much of the center taken up by a massive four poster bed. Sleeping in it was Mr. Reeves, though calling it ‘sleeping’ was generous. He was tossing and turning, face scrunched up in discomfort, breathing fast and heavy. The room was seething with Nightmares. Spiders with too many legs, bats whose wings looked too much like hands, snakes with no eyes or too many eyes; each one of them sluggish, bloated, feeding on his own nightmares. As she watched, a snake slithered up onto his chest, mouth opening so wide it almost turned inside out, and a thin red mist drifted from Mr. Reeves’ mouth and was drawn into the snake’s.
“No - no please. They can’t know. I worked too hard -” Mr. Reeves was muttering, his fears and subconscious thoughts being verbalized in his sleep. “Pay them more if I have to. Pay her… no, too uptight. Accidents can happen on the job. Keep her quiet. Keep her busy. Hennigan will be gone, too. All mine. My money. My business.”
That was it. Even if he hadn’t been the one holding the knife, he’d planned the murder. He’d paid the secretary to lie, paid the witness to retract her statement, paid off someone in the precinct to plant or remove evidence… who knows how many people he had in his pocket? But the sleeptalking confession would mean nothing in the waking world. Somehow, she had to get him to admit this when he was awake. In front of an audience.
A particularly fat spider the size of a small dog suddenly fell from the ceiling, its red thread snapping from its weight. It slammed into the ground barely two feet in front of Raiel, and she sucked in a breath. Glossy white eyes dotted its head and abdomen, blank and lidless, but two massive black fangs curved from its mandibles. When it flipped back over, legs scrabbling to support its weight, she knew it was looking at her when it froze. The din of the Nightmares fell silent. She’d interrupted their feast. The spider’s front legs lifted, fangs on full display, and it sank low to the ground.
It’s going to jump, it’s going to jump, run run run run - she spun and made a break for it. Just as something heavy slammed against her back, she drew a knife from her belt and jammed it into her palm -
She jolted awake, heart hammering, feeling a dull ache between her shoulders and a stinging in her palm. Looking down, a thin red line stood out against her pale skin, though dark veins were already spreading from the mark. The room was dark, but blessedly free of blue or red. The dream was over.
But her work wasn’t.
It took very little time at all to make her way across town. The streets were all but empty, aside from some night patrols of the town guard. No one noticed her as she darted from shadow to shadow until she found herself outside Mr. Reeves’ house. It was large, ostentatious just like the bedroom she’d seen in the dream world, fitting for a man who wanted his wealth on full display. It was also laughably easy to get into. Picking the lock was no problem at all. Clearly, he thought he was important enough that no one would dare bother him.
Once inside, she tiptoed through the rooms until a heavy thud somewhere above her head caught her attention. A muffled curse followed, more footsteps, a drawer or cabinet shutting. Mr. Reeves was awake and clearly frazzled about something. Following the noises, she found herself standing in an office. Mr. Reeves had a housecoat over his pajamas, but he was frantically searching through his desk, the cabinets, throwing scrolls and papers into an open traveling bag on the floor.
“Going somewhere?” She couldn’t help but ask. At the sound of her voice, he froze. His face was pale, sweaty, gaunt.
“You -” He pointed a shaky finger at her. “Why were you - no. Get out. You’re breaking and entering. Illegal trespass. I can bury you.”
“Bury me? Is that a threat?”
His face darkened, and he grabbed something from under the desk. A sleek crossbow, already loaded, was now pointed at her. “This is.”
“You’re threatening an officer of the law, Mr. Reeves.”
“You’re meddling. All of you. Asking too many questions. Can’t leave well enough alone. And you. Looming over me in my dreams like some kind of nightmare. I can make it so you never work in this town again. I can make these people believe anything. They’ll never trust you. They’ll be begging for you to rot in a cell just like Hennigan. Unless you drop this case. I can make your life a living nightmare”
Oh, you did not just do that. She slowly raised her hands, but her gaze didn’t leave his. Her calm, cold attitude almost perfectly opposed his manic energy, and that seemed to make him even more panicked. “Then maybe I should threaten you in return. Because whatever you think a living nightmare looks like… I promise you, you have no idea.”
She twitched her fingers. The tips began to darken, nailbeds turning black, dark veins winding her way up her palms, knuckles, past her wrists. The shadows in the office darkened, the few candles illuminating the walls doing little to fight the encroaching darkness.
“Last chance. Turn yourself in, confess to framing Mr. Hennigan and the murder.”
He was beyond reason. He raised the crossbow, aimed it at her. “No!”
Before he could fire, she flicked her fingers again. A blue-tinged bolt of energy fired from her hand, knocking the crossbow from his grip. He yelped, leaping back, looking around for anything else to use as a weapon as she slowly advanced. The candle flames began to turn from red to blue, burning more intensely. The shadows stretched and crawled along the walls, the floor, the ceiling, undulating and writhing. Her fingertips were growing numb, and one of her nails cracked. The Nightmares chittered and clicked, clawing at the barrier between dreams and the waking world.
One of them screeched. A claw of ebony and black mist tore through the air, catching Mr. Reeves’ sleeve. He screamed, leapt to the side, only for a long tendril like a rat’s tail to loop around his ankle and try to pull him to the ground. The veins were crawling up Raiel’s forearms, almost to her elbows. All her fingers were numb, and another nail cracked. She had to end the spell. Cutting off the magic was like sticking a finger in a leaking dam, the Nightmares fighting against her, but with one final effort she closed her fists and the shadows retreated.
Mr. Reeves collapsed in a sobbing, broken mess on the floor of his office. The candles burned low and red, barely giving off enough light to see.
“I believe I’ve made my point, Mr. Reeves. You have until tomorrow evening. Unless you want what plagues your sleep to follow you every hour, not just at night.”
All he did was nod, any response choked by his pathetic cries. She turned on her heel, fighting the satisfied grin. She would have to wait to see if it worked.
**
All things considered, she didn’t have to wait too long. The sun had barely risen, the precinct open for not even an hour, when the door crashed open. She sat up at her desk, hand reaching for the blade at her belt, as several other colleagues leapt to their feet and similarly drew weapons.
Mr. Reeves stumbled into the front entryway, face beet red and hair plastered to his head from sweat. He was still in his pajamas, though he’d thrown on a traveling coat instead of his housecoat. Even before he was fully through the door, he was rambling about making payments, blackmail, planting the letter in the warehouse, everything that would implicate him instead of Mr. Hennigan.
The precinct was in an uproar. Of course, Raiel couldn’t let anyone know about her coercion in getting him to confess. But it was enough to buy Mr. Hennigan more time as Mr. Reeves’ confession had to be investigated. The night terrors would continue to plague him, that she knew, as she saw the darkest corners of the precinct squirm and ripple even now with Nightmares. He would find no peace even after the trials were done. Even after a conviction.
She sat back, propping her boots on the desk, watching the scene unfold. One of her colleagues was clasping shackles around Mr. Reeves’ wrists. Soon enough, as the lead detective on the case, she’d be asked to get his formal confession. She finally let the smile creep across her face. Just a tiny one. A tiny Nightmare, a beetle with a dark blue carapace, briefly flickered into existence as it crawled across her desk; it paused for a moment, turning to face her, wings buzzing, before it took off and circled around her. As she watched, the beetle morphed into a butterfly before flickering out of existence once more.