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CHAPTER SEVENTEEN NED

The files concerning San Fernando's recent rise in organised crime were as unorganised as they were extensive. Apparently, whoever had originally compiled all of this information and evidence had had a system of organisation that had made sense only to its creator, because articles about gang-shootings from thirty years ago were thrown together with profiles on top members of the Decimators and with reports on counterfeiting busts from just last year. Ned and Scarlett had dumped two boxes worth of assorted files out onto the conference room table, just trying to get a feel for what they were working with, creating piles based on the time period of the material or on which particular gang or mafia group the information concerned.

There was simply just so much material to go over. Some of the gang violence was minor stuff - spats between two gangs each consisting of just once species, such as the lions vs hyenas stuff that seemed to be found in almost any major American city. The Black Panthers were the one big gang that were all the same species, black felines, although they were known to work with contract killers of different species from time to time as well. The Panthers had been on a rise recently too, involved in drugs, ivory, artefacts, and sex trafficking, which made them a particular target for SF Metro.

There were several Mexican based gangs, along with a small branch of Russian mafia and the Decimators, who were a loosely-allied group of mobsters who had a nasty habit of bribing politicians to do their will. And that didn't count the independent crime lords who weren't associated with a certain gang. All of these were enemies of SF Metro and the city, and had been for a while, but there was one group which Captain Williston had particularly specified he wanted taken down, and because of the police chief's close friendship with Mayor Wong, that group had been placed at the top of the city's anti-organised crime agenda: The Chinese Mafia, or, as it was more commonly known, the Chinese Triad.

"I've got direct orders from the mayor himself to take those bastards out as soon as we possibly can" the Captain had stated. "They've got a new leader; their 'Dragon Master,' as they call it. A woman named Xang Lan, although we don't know much else about her, even her species to be sure."

Williston had gone on to say that the police force knew of a couple places at which the Triad was known to operate, but that because Xang Lan had been elusive and slippery, they did not dare raid any of the locations, because unless they caught the new "Dragon Master," the Triad would continue to operate. "Cut off the head of the dragon, and the body will die," he had said.

Unfortunately, news concerning Xang Lan was extremely limited. Some said she was a tiger, as a lot of the Triad leaders tended to be; others suggested a wolf or perhaps a fox, or even a panda. Without any confirmed sightings, it was impossible to know. "She's got a slug of aliases" Scarlett whistled, reading off a list. "Tang Mei, Po Su, Lissette Fratelli, Miranda Ryswell - and that's only half of them."

Ned did not think that determining Xang Lan's true identity or species was as important as finding the identity of the Prophet, but he did not say so. "A career criminal like this woman is bound to have at least a dozen escape holes" he said instead. "We just have to catch her at one of them."

Scarlett set down the notes she'd been reading and glanced over at the Triad pile next to Ned. "What exactly are these people in for?"

Ned read a list of the Triad's various crimes. "Contract killing - a lot of them are assassins. They 'own' a slug of businesses, in Chinatown and the Underworld and elsewhere. People who they force to pay them in trade for 'protection,' you know the line. Besides that, counterfeiting and forgery, smuggling, stolen cars - a whole list of offenses. Typical mafia stuff." He glanced at another note. "Javon Kabuli hates them with a passion, and he basically owns the Black Panthers right now, so the Panthers are their highest rival in this city."

"Until now" Scarlett mused, holding up a different article, which concerned Medea, the enigma villain, of whom reports had just begun within the last 6 months.

If Xang Lan was a mystery, Medea was a ghost.

No one could remember exactly when the villain had first appeared. It had begun with a bank robbery in a small suburb at the east of town, but since then, four other burglaries had been blamed on Medea, albeit without proof. Some members of the police force believed that the figure was an invention of one or more of the other crime organisations, invented to attract attention away from their own dealings, but as the mafias and gangs had not reacted to Medea's appearance any happier than the police, it was generally believed she worked on her own.

Medea herself was apparently the leader, although whether it was her real name was doubtful. Her name had come up in mention with some crime snitches, apparently, and also because at each of her crime scenes - which were usually small banks or money transfer vans, and which were usually left with all guards dead - she had left a small calling card, printed with the name MEDEA and nothing more. She worked with several assistants, who from survivor reports, were mostly female, an oddity among criminals. Some believed that Medea was a leopardess named Kathleen Southwick, a career criminal who'd been caught on camera during one of the robberies, but the fact that Southwick had been involved in the Underworld long before Medea's appearance suggested that she had probably merely allied herself with the new villain, rather than being her herself.

Snitch reports stated that in the Underworld, Medea was reported to have two main partners, called Hermes and Circe. "They all took names from Greek mythology" Scarlett mused. "Medea was a witch, Circe an enchantress, and Hermes was the god of thieves."

"Probably symbolic" Ned observed, putting Medea's paperwork back into a folder. The new villain was frightening, but it was not SF Metro Homicide's main focus to catch thieves. He did keep out the contact information for a few of the snitches; perhaps one of them would have something new to contribute about Medea, or more helpfully, Xang Lan. Either way though, with any luck, this wouldn't be his or Scarlett's issue to worry about anyway.

Garrett called later that afternoon.

At first Ned thought he'd just called to talk about the previous evening, but the coyote had other ideas. "Why don't you come up to our place this evening?" he suggested. "I think it's time we start seeing where each other live."

So Ned did.

He drove easily through the busy downtown, passing sidewalk cafes and tourist traps and malls and credit unions and chain clothing retailers and fast food joints. The ever erratic weather had changed yet again, so that the sun was burning down, but the meteorologist on the 5 o clock radio said that they could expect rain later in the week. Looking out the window of his car, with the skies blue and cloudless and the sun fiery and unrelenting, Ned found it hard to believe they were in for anything but heat - but that was San Fernando for you. The streets were crowded with tourists and judging by the number of cars in the parking lots of every bar and nightclub and restaurant he passed, they were giving the city good business. As they always did this time of year.

Remembering Olympia's address came easy; Garrett had texted it to him after their first date. Most of the students at Bay State University lived on campus in the dorm rooms or apartment halls provided there, or in the off-campus apartment complexes that lay just beyond the campus borders, but rather than choose a home located conveniently close to the university, as most people would do, Olympia had picked a house that was located on the hill above San Fernando's Chinatown, a good 15 minute drive from Bay State, and that only if traffic wasn't too heavy. Ned skirted around Chinatown itself to avoid the tourist traffic that blocks the narrow streets between oriental buildings, driving through several blocks of dirty streets cluttered with broken-down motels and seedy used-car dealerships. The hill itself still had a lot of trees, and the houses were well-kept. Not a Sullivan Heights by any means, but definitely an upper-middle class neighbourhood. Not the sort of place you'd expect to find a wolf like Olympia Rogan, but then again, her parents were wealthy, or so Garrett had said, and her father was involved with the British government in some way, enough to afford to send his daughter to a pristine American university and house her in a trendy community.

Olympia's house was a moderately-sized, oriental-style place, with the curved, pottery-roofed style of architecture common in Chinatown itself and in the neighbourhoods surrounding it. Several tall trees towered over the house, and the yard was filled with an array of leafy bushes and flowers, over a very healthy green lawn. Well kept, certainly. Ned parked his car against the sidewalk, opened the black iron gate; entered. The walkway up to Olympia's porch was made of fitted grey stones, and felt damp under his paws. The scent of columbines, snapdragons, and rhododendrons permeated the air as he stepped onto the small porch, crowded with several exotic-looking potted plants.

Here goes, he thought. Another piece of Garrett's world; another chance to see who this coyote really was. Strange the way he was feeling about coming here. He'd never laid eyes on this home before, yet somehow it felt like coming home. Ned had never experienced the familiarity of coming home from a tough day at work to a loving mate who'd give you a kiss and make you forget about all the day's trials, but now, he reflected, he realised how he missed having something like that, even if he hadn't known what he was missing. It reminded him of the days of his boyhood, when he'd run to the door every evening shouting to his mother "Dad's home!," waiting for his father to say something like "how's my favourite son?" and for their evening conversations over dinner, and afterward, around a movie, or while playing ball in the backyard.

Enough, already. His father was dead, and even if he hadn't been, the relationship was dead. He was something of the past, and Garrett, Ned hoped, was something of the future. Which meant, considering that this was far from being their first date, there was no reason for Ned to keep standing there like some dumb hound waiting for a prom date.

He took a deep breath, breathing in the scent of the various tropical greenery, and as there wasn't a doorbell, knocked.

Olympia looked just as exceptional as she had the first time Ned had met her, except that she now lacked the black jacket and jeans. Instead, the wolf was wearing some kind of Hawaiian kimono type garment, wrapped loosely around her slender form, and exposing a lot more of her body than the tight-fitting leather had - which revealed another of her peculiarities.

She was covered in one of the most distinctive dye jobs he'd ever seen. It was done in the same two colours as the beads in her mane, red and black; a twisting array of roses and vines and thorns, curling over her shoulders and down her arms, across what was visible of her back, and on what of her legs the kimono didn't cover. The thorny vines curved into intricate patterns, the crimson of the roses and the black thorns in contrast to Olympia's white fur. The three colours seemed to be her solo embellishment; she'd painted the claws on her fingers the same shade of crimson, and a glistening red ruby hung from each of her ears.

"Are you going to come in or just gawk like a fool?" Olympia asked at length, regarding him with her strange dark eyes.

"Sure" Ned said shortly, stepping into the foyer, which had a tiled floor and smelled of tropical plants and salt. A large saltwater aquarium bubbled beyond the doorway, in which a variety of colourful fish darted here and there. In the background, a stereo was playing music, some kind of electronic new age music, accented with violin and flutes.

Olympia waved a dyed paw - he hadn't noticed the rose on the top of each paw the first time - at a little closet to the side of the door. "Stick your jacket in there and come along" she told him, going back into the main part of the house. "Garrett's out in the backyard - I'm not done with dinner yet, so we can relax out there for a time first."

"Sounds great" he said, following the other wolf into an opener area that led to a kitchen-dining area and a larger living room, beyond which glass doors opened into what was apparently a very large backyard.

Olympia had gone into the kitchen, so he glanced around briefly, taking in the smooth hardwood floors, the Persian rugs decorating them; the art prints on the walls, and the overwhelming presence of potted plants - Olympia must have had an obsession with them. The furniture was foreign-looking and probably expensive, dark woods and silky fabrics, and the living room tables were decorated with ivory carvings and blue-painted Chinese vases. Above the fireplace mantle a very large model of an 18th century sailing ship reposed on a shelf; while the space above the sofa, which was upholstered in an oriental print with gold dragons, was devoted to a case containing two ceremonial Chinese swords. The room smelled strongly of both Garrett and Olympia but not of anyone else; they must not have had visitors frequently. Next to the door, a small fountain bubbled incessantly, so that the sound of trickling water rose to mix with that of the music.

"Do you always scrutinize the homes of your acquaintances as if they were a crime scene, inspector?"

Ned flattened his ears reflectively and spun to face the other wolf. She was holding a little wooden tray, on which she'd placed three wine glasses filled with red liquid, peering at him with that unreadable expression which she seemed to pull off so flawlessly. "Not usually" he replied uneasily, finding her steely gaze somewhat unnerving. "I guess it's mostly just that this is the first time I'm seeing where Garrett lives, so I'm trying to be observant. You can learn so much about someone from a decent look at their living space."

Olympia considered that. "You're a perspective man, Inspector. But Garrett's waiting, and I imagine you'd rather not keep him so." She turned towards the glass doors.

"That's true" Ned agreed, moving to open the door for her. Together they stepped onto a tiled patio, which opened down into grass. The backyard was enormous, stretching away at an angle from the house, spotted here and there by islands of trees and shrubbery, most of it of varieties of plants which, with Ned's limited knowledge of botany, did not appear native to California. Many of them seemed to be flowering trees of the type such as are seen in decorative Japanese gardens. Some distance from the house, a pool surrounded by marshy plants glistened in the sunlight, and the borders of the yard were lined with stands of bamboo, providing a natural barrier. It was like entering a miniature oasis hidden inside the city. The scent was tropical, and from somewhere in the trees above, birds chattered incessantly.

Garrett was lounging in a chair below one of the islands of trees, and he looked up as the two wolves approached. "Ned! You made it!" The coyote jumped up from his chair and Ned found himself hugging the canine as his tail wagged joyfully. He too lacked the leather, dressed instead in a short-sleeved shirt that was unbuttoned, his eyes hidden by green Calvin Feline aviator sunglasses.

"Just barely" Ned told him, taking the wine glass that Olympia offered as all three of them laid down lazily. "Killer day at the station." He relaxed back into the chair, eyes closing.

Garrett grinned guiltily. "Did they find out about last night?"

"Actually, they did, and I've been temporarily suspended from the Prophet case because of it." He wondered for a millisecond if talking about such things in front of Olympia was inappropriate.

The coyote looked mortified. "You lost the case because of me? Damn..." His tail ceased the eager wagging.

"No," Ned insisted, not wanting his boyfriend to blame himself for what had happened....even if in a sense, it was he....well, Garrett had started their foreplay, but Ned had finished it, and he wasn't about to put the blame on Garrett. "They were bound to find out I was gay sooner or later. Lennox says she will try to get me back on the case tomorrow."

"That soon? She must not be too mad at you then?" Garrett said hopefully. The wine was good, so much better than the cheap red stuff Salty Sebastian sold. This would take some getting used to, Ned thought, hanging out with people like Garrett and Olympia for whom cost was not a concern.

"No, not at all" he answered, biting back the annoyance that surfaced as he remembered Jason's self-satisfied smile when Ned had been called into the office. "A fellow rookie who dislikes me saw or heard us last night, apparently, and he tattled. If it had been merely Lennox, I would have been fine, but he also told Captain Williston, who apparently has it out for gays."

"I shouldn't have put you in that situation" Garrett muttered, frowning. "If-"

Ned shook his head. "Don't say it. No reason to go over it further. I made a mistake, I took responsibility for it, so I spent the day sorting files instead of looking at corpses. I'll live with that."

Garrett nodded shortly. "Filing?"

"Organising evidence of organised crime, as part of the mayor's new campaign against it."

Olympia looked up from her own lounge chair. "Oh? So that isn't all merely talk?"

"Captain Williston is adamant" Ned told her. He didn't really feel like talking about work right now, not when they had this beautiful, sweet-smelling place to relax in, but Garrett and Olympia did seem genuinely interested, so he explained. "The Captain and the Mayor are best-buds, right now, so they're both aligned for this same goal. Probably some kind of mutual back-scratching going on." He took a long swallow of his wine, and laid back in to the chair, sighing. This was the life.

"You can assure yourself that it is going on" Olympia remarked confidently. "That is the way of politics; the way it is done everywhere."

"You sound like you know that from experience" Ned commented.

The bizarrely-coloured wolf was regarding him with that same piercing gaze again. "You don't know who I am, do you?" she asked pointedly.

"I didn't mention it" Garrett said. Above them, a plane droned by, heading in to land.

"Who are you, then?" Ned asked uncertainly. He knew Olympia's father was someone of note in the UK, but that was all their original probe into her past had revealed.

"My father is Nigel Rogan, the former Member of Parliament and Ambassador to Thailand" Olympia stated calmly, her gaze turned away towards the far distance, where beyond the backyard the shadowy image of a neighbouring house was remotely visible through the trees.

That got Ned's attention. "Nigel Rogan, the multi-millionaire? But he's a fox...." Unless Olympia was adopted...

"I was adopted at one month of age" Olympia explained emotionlessly, her expression stony. "Mother was told she could not have children, so my parents had decided to adopt. You can imagine their shock and joy when my brother was born two years later."

All Ned could do was shake his head. He didn't know an awfully great deal about Nigel Rogan, but the name was undoubtedly familiar. Rogan was one of the richest men in the UK; a personal friend of the Queen, a very powerful fox, indeed. No wonder Olympia always acted with such confidence. Considering that studies had proven that adopted pups often assumed the mannerisms and habits of the species which had adopted them, it also explained Olympia's fox-like intensity and the way she seemed to view every battle as won before it had begun.

"Well" he said finally, "You're right. I had no idea my boyfriend was rooming with a millionaire heiress."

"I don't always want the publicity" Olympia flicked her ears, pulling her own sunglasses over her eyes. "It can be a relief to occasionally be thought of as an ordinary person."

"Isn't your father considering running for Prime Minister next election?" Ned asked, curious.

"He is" Olympia confirmed, and not without a touch of pride, Ned noticed.

"So why did you choose to come here, then?" Garrett was watching their conversation with interest, and Ned remembered how happy he'd felt when Garrett had gotten along so brilliantly with Scarlett. Perhaps the coyote felt equally pleased seeing Ned conversing with his best friend, and learning interesting details in the progress.

Olympia had finished her wine, and she set the tray on the grass behind her chair. "I wanted to see America" she explained. "I spent much of my childhood in Thailand while father was ambassador. Then several years at Oxford, and now, America. Jeremy - my brother - is studying in New York, actually, so being in the same country I get to see him more often, as it is."

Ned whistled. "When we first met you, Scarlett thought you were an actress, but I guess she wasn't too far off, thinking you were someone important."

Olympia smiled. "I could have been an actress, I suppose. My career just didn't go that way."

Ned was about to reply when he felt a paw on his shoulder and saw that Garrett had moved his chair closer, so they could hold paws. "You know what I love about wolves," the coyote whispered, "is that you smell so splendid just naturally. No need for cologne or for that artificial musk they sell in men's stores. Just perfect wolf scent." He pressed his nose into the fur of Ned's shoulder.

Garrett had smelled pretty marvellous too, the previous evening when he was bent over Ned's desk - but perhaps this wasn't the time to mention that. "And it's all for you" he said instead, leaning over to kiss the coyote in what by now was beginning to feel like a familiar gesture, the kiss that made his mind shut off as heart and cock, not always in that order, took control.

Relaxing with Garrett and Olympia, Ned could forget the drama at SF Metro; could forget the Prophet and the faces of his victims, could forget the ever-present concern that somewhere out there, the killer himself was waiting and plotting, preparing for the next person on his list; the fifth commandment. Even when he did discuss the case, or the gangs and mafia after which the police would be going (because Garrett and Olympia were both curious about the cases), it was from a position of pride, enjoying that his boyfriend and the girl wolf found his life interesting, especially considering that they were an actor and an aristocrat's daughter, people who might not be easily impressed.

The conversation flowed onwards far longer than Ned had thought it would, so that he learned from Garrett the ins and outs of life as a cast member on a TV show, as the coyote related stories of his travels to Africa and South America for filming, or explained that he did all his own stunts. And then Olympia told of her own adventures growing up in Thailand, so that by the time it was finally time for them to sit on the back patio and eat (a delicious Thai curry which Olympia had learned to make while living there), Ned felt he'd known this pair all his life.

Ned and Garrett were cuddling together on the sofa, trying to focus on occasional kisses and caresses and less on the hard-ons that each was sporting, when Olympia came back into the living room. "There's something on the television you might find interesting, Ned." She'd finally stopped calling him "inspector," he noted.

"What's that?"

"Just come see" the girl said, and she went back down the hall.

Olympia kept her television, an enormous flatscreen, in a smallish room off of the bedrooms, which contained several large chairs, each matted with white or brown fur and smelling remotely of popcorn. On the screen, the announcer, a white rat, was saying something about - what?

"Among other news, the Traditional Marriage Foundation, the organisation which has emerged as the premiere front of opposition to Amendment 28, is scheduled to air a broadcast tonight, but not everyone is happy about it. In just a moment, we'll be airing a message from Carlos Sanchez of the San Fernando Daily Press, whose husband, Conrad Fincher, was recently murdered by the serial killer who police are now calling 'the Prophet.'"

Ned took a seat in one of the chairs, moving to the side a little so Garrett could join him, although cuddling was far from his mind. Senator Johnson was due to arrive in California in less than a week, and there'd been speculation at SF Metro and elsewhere as to how the senator would be received. There had been talk of boycotting him; protesting against even letting the badger into the city, so perhaps that was what Sanchez intended to talk about.

After a moment the screen showed the fennec himself, a shorter fox in a navy-blue blazer. He'd already started talking before the camera was turned on, apparently. "Let me ask you this" he was saying. "If someone killed your lover, or your child, or your brother. Would you rest until you had found their killer? Could you sleep at night, knowing that the person, who out of pure hate, took your loved one from you - knowing that somewhere out there, that person is free, living, while your loved one is dead?"

Garrett had put an arm around Ned's shoulders, and as the fennec pleaded to an unseen audience, Ned pulled the coyote close to him impulsively, as if protecting him from an unseen assailant. Feeling Garrett's warm body against his, his scent filling Ned's nose - he felt safe.

"....This is why I will never rest, until Conrad's killer has been made to answer for his crimes" Sanchez stated ardently. "Not only for the murder of my husband, but for the murders of Hugo Sota, Claudia Wittmore, and, as I am now told, of Marvin Feeley. Four people have been killed by this pathetic excuse of an intelligent being, and" his voice rose "I learn that a man whose ideology has encouraged, even endorsed such violence, is planning to visit our city?"

The fox was quiet, looking from side to side. "How could this be? How could a city which is known worldwide for its acceptance let such a man come here with his hate? But he will not come. I urge you, citizens of San Fernando, not to let this happen. Write your representatives, write to your newspapers, write to the mayor. Let's not let this happen. Keep Adam out!"

There was some more after that, but Olympia shut off the television, muttering something about Johnson being an absolute fool to even plan a trip to San Fernando in the first place. Afterwards Garrett and Ned had held each other on the couch for a while, talking quietly, until Ned admitted that if he wanted to perform well at work the following day he had better get some sleep, so they'd kissed goodnight and Ned had left the strange but beautiful home with the memory of Garrett standing in the yard, watching him leave. After he'd returned to his own tiny house, staring out his bedroom at the tiny backyard, crawling into the squeaky, unstable bed with the sheets that needed washed and were still covered with black fur from the previous month's shedding, Ned remembered the feeling of Garrett's body next to his, hearing another's heartbeat, the oneness of lovers, something he'd not experienced with any previous boyfriend, honestly.

It was a good feeling.