Gabriel hated the heat and bustle of the city, but most of all, he hated how cramped the island was. Every subway station was a mall and a food center and probably three other things.
Orchard Towers was the embodiment of this. It housed embassies, churches, apartments, bars, nightclubs, shops, offices, and brothels. The complex was built directly on Orchard Road, the main shopping street and busiest street in the city, and where he was standing now.
The police officer he was assigned to work with had returned from the pushcart, offering a piece of bread wrapped around a bar of light yellow ice cream.
“It’s sweet corn flavor. My favorite as a boy.” The officer, Sim, was a Malay man in his mid-thirties with chunky black-framed glasses and an overgrown buzzcut. He was a quiet man, kind and mild-tempered. And so boring. Sim was so inoffensive that Gabriel could hardly believe that he was a real person, and not a children’s show character come to life. Gabriel gave a resigning sigh and took the sandwich from the smiling Sim. I wonder if Hollywell has it this bad.
…
When Gabriel sat in front of Costello and Koh and told him that he had chucked his Dalet, he was prepared for broom-duty as a punishment. Koh, in his perpetual haughtiness, advocated for expelling him from the force.
“He’s a mediocre officer with an insignificant record who has been here for less than a year. We can replace him easily, and we would be better off for it. He handed over a weapon to an Atziluth entity– a threat he engaged without properly reporting, putting his partner and countless civilians in danger.”
“Like you’d know, Koh. That’s not what happened at all.” Gabriel was irate, and began to shout. He turned to Costello. “Do I get the chance to defend myself against this shit?”
“Careful Rossi. You will address your superior officers properly.” Costello took a long drag from his cigarette. “Your report corroborates what Koh is saying now. Do you deny that you threw your Dalet?”
“No.” Gabriel was staring at the corner of the ceiling. When he thought himself wronged, it felt impossible to look someone in the eyes and respond to commands. I’m not some dog.
“Then do you deny that it was your idea to engage with the being without calling it in?” Costello’s tone was different now– before, his question was rhetorical, but now, Gabriel felt that he was being tested. Gabriel glanced towards him. He was staring through his brow now, and seemed to be slightly smiling. Gabriel’s eyes darted back to the ceiling.
“It was my idea.”
“Sir.” Koh sneered, correcting him.
“Sir.” It took everything in Gabriel to force the word out through his indignation. It felt hollow when he said it.
Costello did not respond. Koh was standing to his right, face obfuscated by the long shadows cast by the overhead light. The cigarette in Costello’s hand was burning, but he did not draw from it. When it burned close to his fingers, he snuffed it out.
“Koh, you asked that I transfer the handling of this incident to the November Taskforce.” Koh hesitantly shifted his weight.
“Yes, sir, but… this is not something that should be discussed in front of him.” he flicked his chin towards Gabriel. Gabriel noticed the way his voice wavered when he spoke, and he relished in it.
“If this incident is yours to handle, then Rossi seems indispensable to your investigation.” Costello let his voice trail off, flashing a smile. Koh shifted again. That’s right, asshole. I’m indispensable.
“Sir… we have already taken his account down–”
Costello cut him off. “Your team’s investigation into the November Disaster is highly confidential. If the appearance of this entity is, in fact, significant to your investigation, Rossi would be more of a liability if he was on his own.” Fuck you, Koh. You can’t get rid of me. I’m a liability.
“What are you suggesting is done with him then, sir?” Koh said curtly.
“For all of his stupidity, Rossi’s headstrong nature allowed him to take charge and confront this demon on his own. Reckless as it was, it may have disappeared without anyone seeing him, had he not taken such decisive action. Isn’t that right, Rossi?” Costello was grinning towards him.
“Um… yeah, I guess that’s true.”
“Underneath his rashness, Rossi seems to embody the qualities that we strive for in this agency. It would be a shame to put that to waste.” Koh opened his mouth to speak, but Costello put his hand up. “Moreover, even if we were to abdicate him of his duty, he would still owe us restitution for the Dalet he lost.”
“I don’t think I would be able to afford that,” Gabriel hesitantly interjected. “Sir.”
“No, of course not. And you would not be able to recover it either, so long as this investigation is left solely under Koh’s command.” Costello was thoroughly enjoying himself. “As such, it’s only proper that you are placed under his command until you recover the device. We can discuss your future with the Initiative after that.”
“WHAT?” Koh and Gabriel both jumped up. Gabriel was not sure who had been louder, as they had yelled at the same time. Costello was smiling up at the two flustered agents, both red in the face.
“Sir, the taskforce has been carefully selected and vetted. There’s nothing that he could add, he’s a liability.” That’s right, Gabriel thought. I’m a liability. Just put me on broom duty for a month.
“Koh, you have full autonomy to direct Rossi as you see fit, aside from dismissing him. Let him join your taskforce, or don’t. That’s your choice. He will report directly to you to make up for his recklessness with his Dalet. You can discipline for that as you see fit.” Why the hell did I cover for Hollywell? That’s what my kindness gets me?
The next morning, when Gabriel had gone to report to Koh, a member of the November Taskforce stopped him outside of their office and relayed Koh’s instructions. Gabriel was still puzzling over what Koh meant by calling him “the brave Officer CB” or saying he would “be protecting his ilk” when the SPF car pulled up outside of the headquarters building with a cheerful Officer Sim inside. Based on the way that the November agent had laughed when he read it, he knew it wasn’t anything good, but when he asked Sim what it meant, his smile had quickly faded and he became bright red.
…
Gabriel nibbled on the edge of the ice cream sandwich, wrinkling his nose in anticipation of a foul taste. Instead, it was sweet and mellow. He took a larger bite now that he had tested the flavor. Sim watched on, smiling, waiting for a verdict from Gabriel.
“The ice cream is really cold– it's hurting my teeth.” Sim blinked, waiting for more. “It’s not bad though. Thanks.” Now Sim seemed satisfied with this answer, and they finished their sandwiches in silence.
On Gabriel’s first day working under Koh, he quickly figured out how petty the man could be. Although Pung was the head of the force focused on stopping goetic terror, it was Koh’s connections to the SID and military intelligence that was used to create the intelligence network the Goetic Taskforce relied upon. Even now, Koh heard whispers from them, and it was one such tip about a black-market summoning in some part of Orchard Towers that he found appropriate for Gabriel to focus on.
Sim was a long time member of the police force, but from what Gabriel had surmised, he had spent most of his time behind a desk. His most serious contribution seemed to be the time that he had helped to investigate some low-stakes gambling ring. The message had been clear to Gabriel; just like Sim, he was a totally unimpressive officer, and if Koh had it his way, he would be a middling desk jockey for life after being fired.
Gabriel and Sim were to scour all of the building and interview hundreds of residents and workers in the hope of finding and stopping the supposed ritual summoning. Emphasis on supposed. Rumors of summonings came to the DMI by the truckload, but of those, only the smallest fraction of those were reliable. Koh wanted Gabriel to waste his time following a lead that would end up going nowhere. In the event the tip was real, he would be woefully unprepared. With only two officers, it was unlikely that they would be able to find the summoner, let alone stop them. In the best case scenario, Gabriel was wasting time; in the worst, another failure would be attributed to him, allowing Koh to make a stronger case for his expulsion from the DMI.
To avoid drawing suspicion from the potentially fictitious summoner, the pair told the residents that they were looking into a suspected pornographic production ring. Gabriel was dressed in an Singaporean Police uniform to match Sim’s, with a Dalet hidden in a vest pouch, secured to it by a thick elastic cord to prevent its separation from his person. Who knew Koh had such a dry wit.
When they were finished eating, they re-entered the building, wandering aimlessly. Sim repeatedly suggested that they interview the residents again, but Gabriel ignored him each time. He pulled on the elastic cord, freeing the Dalet from its pocket. Gabriel had quickly discovered that it was nearly useless for readings in the tower with the close proximity of the church and the brothels. The energy peaked during midday during church service, and well into the evening when patronage at the brothels would meet their peak. A brothel producing divine energy. Who would have guessed. Sim peered over his shoulder at the Dalet, watching the energy level on the screen climb during the three o’clock service at the church.
“The energy raises when the demon is summoned as well, right?” Sim looked to Gabriel to confirm a fact that he had already explained four separate times. Gabriel nodded. Sim continued. “If I were to summon the demon, I would do it now, when the energy is growing. It would blend in then, wouldn’t it?”
“That depends on how powerful the demon is. But yeah, it would be easier to hide.” Sim bobbed his head in response, upbeat as ever. “Even if they timed it that well, there would be no way to differentiate it from anything else that could cause it to spike. Besides, you would have to be able to pinpoint the exact location. And given the congestion of this building, it would be pretty difficult.” Gabriel had come to the same conclusion as Sim days ago; if a goetic terrorist was this well prepared, they would be able to seamlessly cover their tracks by hiding a heightened reading among the divine “noise” of the building.
“It’s very similar to the time my division discovered a gambling ring.”
“The glory days, right?” Gabriel interjected. Sim laughed in response, not catching on to his sarcasm.
“Yes, I suppose they were. We knew that it was organized by office workers, so we theorized that they met sometime soon after working hours ended. While we had figured a reliable time that they would meet, we did not know where. Knowing when they met was not of much use on its own.”
“Mhm.” Gabriel blinked.
“Instead of looking at the time they gathered, I thought we could try looking for the time that they would leave. Maybe, if we saw a large group of suspicious men leaving a single location at one time, we could find where the ring had met for the week.”
“Did that help you find them?” Gabriel sighed. Sim shifted his weight.
“No… it was not a useful theory either. We only discovered where they met when one of the gambler’s wives caught on to what he was doing and called in a tip.”
“That’s very nice, Sim.”
“But, Officer Rossi, does the energy stay elevated after a demon is summoned?”
He thought for a second. “I’ve only seen a summoning once or twice during my training. It stays elevated after a demon appears, but the energy is at its highest when a summoner creates an entrance to the Atziluth Realm and tries to make contact with a demon. After the demon materializes, I guess there would be a dip.” He was furrowing his brow. “But that’s not going to be useful here either. There’s no way to know if a sudden drop in energy can be attributed to a connection with the spiritual world.” Sim’s glasses were sitting near the edge of his nose, but he was deep enough in thought that he didn’t notice.
“It might still help us. Church services are held on a schedule, and the, ahh, girls work on a timed basis as well.” Sim, suddenly aware of himself, blushed and fixed his glasses. “We would look for a sudden dip in the middle of their respective… services, and trace the location of it. It's easy enough for the church, but for the night workers…” Sim fell silent.
“We would have to know how much time their clients are paying for.” Sim nodded silently. Gabriel snorted. “Sounds like a good plan, Sim. I’ll let you find that information out.” He seemed to shrink with each mocking word.
“I… if a demon was summoned here…” his voice grew thin. “Okay. I can try to talk to the girls.”
“But then what? Even if we know that the demon was summoned, how do we trace it to a specific location?” Gabriel began to rack his brain.
“Ah… a Dalet can track the source of an energy surge, right?” Sim offered.
“I’ve already told you, a spike is going to get lost in the noise of the church or the brothel.” Gabriel was chewing on his lip. “...but if they’re careful enough to wait for the rise in energy, they’d probably be just as paranoid about where they do it.” Sim stared at Gabriel blankly. “They’d do the ritual close to the source of the noise. It would happen near the church or the brothels.” Gabriel glanced at his watch– it had only been a few minutes since church service started. “Let’s give it a shot.”
They sat near the back of the church, watching the readings on the Dalet closely, but the energy did not wane at any point. With the conclusion of the service, they quickly left their seats and made their way back out to the hallway.
By now, the sun was setting, and they hurriedly made their way to a long hallway lined on both sides with massage parlors, strip clubs, and nightclubs with racy posters lining the windows. Sim was uncomfortably fidgeting with the wedding ring on his finger as women in short dresses stood on either side.
“Does your wife know how much time you’ve been spending around here?” Gabriel was hoping to get some kind of rise out of Sim, but he was ignored. He was too busy cowering. After a minute, Sim mustered all of the confidence that he could, straightened his back, and marched over to a girl that was standing outside of a massage parlor decorated with pictures of flower petals.
Sim’s confidence faded near-instantly, and he seemed smaller every second he spent trying to talk with the girl. Eventually, a greasy, pudgy Chinese man rounded the corner from the far end of the hall, hurrying towards Sim. When he reached him, he stuck a fat finger close to his face, gesticulating wildly. Sim began to shake like a leaf, but pointed towards the massage parlor. The two disappeared inside, and Gabriel backtracked towards the elevator to find a vending machine and take a seat outside. After waiting forty-five minutes, the police radio on Gabriel’s chest crackled.
“Officer Rossi, it’s Officer Sim. You can respond by pressing the large button on the left side–” Gabriel snatched the radio off of his chest in annoyance, cutting Sim off.
“I know how to work a police radio Sim. How did it go? Where are you?”
“Let’s meet back in front of the church, we can talk there. It went well.”
Sim was already outside of the church when Gabriel approached, which was now closed and locked tight. He looked like he had finished running a marathon, suit crumpled and face sweaty, but he was smiling.
“You didn’t call me here to tell me that you had a go with that fatass, right?” Gabriel pointed to a sweat stain on Sim’s shirt. He quickly shook his head.
“No, that man was their, ahh, boss. We didn’t- no. We came to an understanding. This is not an official red light district. Most of the girls are licensed to work here, and the businesses aren’t supposed to employ them for that kind of work.”
“I get fined for jaywalking, but some dumpy pimp is allowed to break the law?” Sim shrugged in response.
“I told them that we were looking into a pornographic production ring, and that we were worried that his girls might end up being approached to audition for it. He was very upset at this– at them being poached.”
“And so he agreed to tell you their booking times?”
“Yes. I said that we needed to know the times the girls were scheduling clients so we could catch them.”
“He jumped for that?”
“Well,” Sim smiled meekly. “I also promised him that I would personally make sure his business will continue to be overlooked.” Gabriel laughed in response.
“So you didn’t tell him you’re normally stuck pushing pencils behind a desk in Yishun?”
Sim laughed. “No, he has no idea.”
A silence fell over the two. Gabriel walked towards a window overlooking the street below. It was now well into the night, and clubbers were trickling into the building. The offices had long-since emptied, and Gabriel watched as a small group of office workers with their ties hanging loose walked in a huddle towards a bar across the street. Gabriel and Sim were the only desk jockeys that remained in Orchard Towers.