“Look, it’s not fair, but the fact is, Colby, for all his faults and aromas, has great contacts. He’s very experienced with this sort of thing, it’s not like his background is in—” She stopped herself.
“In what, Sarah?” My eyebrows went up, questioning. “Writing science fiction novels? His background’s a little more respectable? Is that what you were going to say?”
She deflated. “No, that’s not what I was going to say. I was going to say city hall, and photography. That’s what most of your newspaper experience has been about.”
I stood there another five seconds, then turned and walked out. “Zack,” Sarah called out. “Zack, please.”
I put my notes about the Wickens story and all relevant phone numbers into the computer and e-mailed everything to Cheese Dick. Then I grabbed my jacket, slipped it on, and started making my way out of the newsroom.
“Hey,” Dick said as I passed within shouting distance of his desk. I kept on walking. “Hey, Walker!” I stopped, looked over at him. “I need to talk to you for a sec.”
I took my time walking over to him. “I sent you the stuff,” I said.
“Yeah, I see that. Thanks. So Sarah, she explained it to you?”
I nodded.
“It’s not personal,” Colby said smugly, enjoying immensely just how personal it actually was. “I’m just more suited to this sort of assignment. When you stumble into something, like you did, it’s okay to write the first-person story, you know, what happened to you, but after that, it’s really my area, you know? I mean, you don’t see me trying to cover a Star Trek convention, do you?”
I found myself thinking about what constituted justifiable homicide. My definition of “justifiable” might, I feared, differ from the justice system’s, so I decided not to act on an impulse to grab Colby’s keyboard and beat him to death with it.
“Anything else?” I asked.
“Actually, yeah,” Colby said, looking for a piece of paper on his cluttered desk. “Where is it…where the fuck is it?…Okay, here it is. Since I’m doing you a favor, taking this story off your hands, maybe you could do this one for me. You’d have to get moving, though. It’s in an hour.”
“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”
“Good story, man, could really use your touch. And if you don’t want it, it just means I’m going to have to go over to Assignment and tell them you didn’t want it and they’ll have to pull somebody off somethin’ else to do it and then they’ll figure you’re some kind of fucking prima donna or something.”
“Give it to me,” I said. It was in Colby’s own handwriting, some notes he’d taken. I could make out “police union” and “stun gun” and a time and location. “What is this?”
“It’s a demo. Some new kind of stun gun. The cops would like to have them; the police board’s been saying no fucking way. So this guy who sells them is putting on a performance, just for some members of the police union. Some cops, they might decide to buy one, even though stun guns haven’t been approved for use. They figure it’s better to take heat for using one of those, blasting a guy with a few thousand volts and seeing him get up again, than face Internal Affairs after pulling their regular guns and killing a guy. Photo desk already knows about it.”
“All right,” I said. “I’ll do it.” I was pissed, and felt like walking out of the building and not coming back, but I didn’t want to get a reputation as an asshole, either. Or for those who already thought I was one, a bigger asshole.
“Great,” Colby said, handing me his notes. “Feel your way carefully, though. I heard about this on the Q.T. from a cop. The union may not be crazy about you being there. The board won’t like it when they hear the cops have been looking at these things.”
The demo was scheduled for 11 a.m. I was still planning to meet Trixie Snelling at 1 p.m., at a coffee shop only a few blocks from police headquarters. She was making a trip in from Oakwood to see me, and I didn’t want to have to cancel on her. I didn’t think there’d be a problem.
On my way out of the building, I passed Magnuson’s office. The door was open partway, and I could see the miserable bastard sitting at his desk, no doubt plotting ways to ruin other people’s lives as much as he seemed intent on ruining mine.
“What makes this stun gun different from previous models, and what makes it the perfect tool for any properly equipped law enforcement body today, is its simplicity,” said the man who had been introduced as Mr. Merker. “Other stun gun models use two wires that are propelled from the weapon to the target. Once the gun has been fired, you must rewind the wires and replace the gas cartridge within the weapon that, basically, exploded when you pulled the trigger. So, you get one shot, then you have to reload. It’s a bit like being a Minuteman with his musket.”