The Law of Averages

Book 2: Chapter 185: Apathy and Incompetence

The DCPD station was an uninspiring piece of architecture. It was square and flat, sharp-edged without a curve in sight. It looked like nothing less than a series of cargo containers stacked on top of and beside each other, then covered in dull brown bricks. The surrounding area was safe enough—there weren't shady figures hovering on each corner hawking aftermarket mods—but the entire sector seemed dirtier than it should be. Literally, there was a fine layer of muck and litter coating just about everything. The whole place was a relic in dire need of an upgrade.

Dan pushed open the front doors, noting they were manual rather than automatic. There wasn't even a handicapped option. The front desk was not occupied by a uniformed officer, but rather a bored looking young woman who was occupied painting her nails. Dan glanced around the small foyer, noting two doors on opposite sides of the room. The upper half of each was made of frosted glass, but he could see uniformed shapes moving back and forth beyond them. There were a few couches in the lobby, but they were moth-eaten and empty.

Dan approached the front desk and coughed into his fist. The young woman glanced up at him from behind two-inch safety glass, looking thoroughly unimpressed. Dan smiled his best customer service smile, and offered her a greeting.

The woman didn't even bother smiling back. She put aside her little nail brush and bottle kit, sat up in her seat, and said, "Did you need something?"

Dan's smile strained a bit. "I'm here to report a criminal."

"Ok." Her eyes glanced over him, clearly assuming he was turning himself in for some imagined crime. She turned in her seat, shaking the mouse of her computer to wake up the screen.

"Name," she droned.

Dan frowned.

"I'm not the criminal in question," he clarified.

"Name," the woman repeated, in the same bored tone.

Dan's frown turned into a scowl. "Daniel Newman. Listen: I saw someone who I know has a warrant out for him. He's a dangerous guy, and I'd like to speak to someone about it."

The receptionist tapped at her keyboard for a few moments. There was a quiet humming noise, and she ducked down below the desk. Dan's veil followed the motion, and found a printer spitting out paper. The woman came back up, paper in hand, and passed it through the window slot.

Dan looked at it incredulously. It was an incident report form. He grumbled under his breath, but committed himself to filling it out. This wasn't Austin, he wasn't a known figure. There were procedures in place, he assumed, and he would follow them. He snagged an empty clipboard hanging off the desk and stomped over to a seat to fill out his paperwork.

Fifteen minutes later, he decided he was being given the runaround.

"Your report will be processed. We'll contact you if we need more information," the receptionist stated with bland disinterest. She took his papers without even glancing at them, and tossed them in a nearby pile, atop about two dozen others. Dan glanced at the tray they were sitting in, and noticed a fine layer of dust.

"That's it?" he asked, having gone from annoyed to furious.

"That's it," the receptionist confirmed. She gestured to the door with one hand, while the other reached for her makeup kit. She didn't even bother to make eye contact. "You can go."

"I don't think so," Dan said. He rapped his knuckles against the wooden desk, just loud enough to garner attention. When the receptionist looked up, he stated, very slowly and enunciating every word, "I witnessed a dangerous fugitive entering a populated area. I would like to speak to someone about this."

The woman finally expressed something other than vacant boredom, even if it was only a pursing of the lips.

"Someone will contact you if we need more information," she insisted.

Dan swept the room with his veil out of sheer paranoia. This couldn't be real. Was he being Punk'd? But no, there were no hidden cameras, no film crews, no watchers of any kind.

He briefly considered going to a different station. This one was the closest to the Evo Church, and thus the obvious option, but it seemed both run down and uninterested. The area itself was safe enough that the officers probably didn't have much to do, and liked it that way. Dan figured his paperwork would be shuffled off to a more active district, but that could take weeks. He decided to give it one more shot.

Dan leaned forward and smiled at the receptionist. He channeled every frustrating customer he'd ever encountered in retail, all at once, and said, "I would like to speak to someone in charge. I won't be leaving until I do. I'm going to make things as difficult and annoying as possible for you in the meantime. The faster you pass me upwards, the faster I'm out of your hair. Do we have an understanding?"

Five minutes later, Dan was in a cramped corner cubicle, speaking to a pair of detectives. They hadn't bothered introducing themselves, and both wore plainclothes. No nameplates, no visible badges. They'd only flashed their detective shields, and lead him inside. Dan decided to call them Beard and Mustache.

"What seems to be the problem?" asked Beard. He was the shorter of the two, and the rounder. He was about Dan's height, but had probably sixty pounds on him, and none of it was muscle.

"I recognized a wanted, dangerous criminal here in the city, and I'm here to report his location," Dan repeated for what felt like the tenth time.

Officer Mustache frowned. He was a lanky fellow, a good head taller than Dan, but built like one of those really skinny trees you see on beaches. The man was a palm tree, Dan thought. With long, gangly arms that looked like fronds.

"You should really go to the precinct closest to the sighting," Mustache said, as if he were being perfectly sensible.

"It was at the Church of Infinite Evolution," Dan said. He pulled out his phone and brought up his map app. He tapped at the station's location, holding out the screen for the two detectives to see. "You guys are the closest."

Mustache and Beard shared a look. It wasn't something worried, or conspiratorial, or anything particularly dangerous. Dan's brain was very attuned to those kinds of expressions by now. Instead, it seemed more... skeptical. They turned to him, hilariously in sync, and with near identical expressions of doubt.

"The Evo Church, huh?" Beard repeated. "And, uh, who was it you saw going in there? Don't tell me it was Bastion? Or maybe the Cannibal."

Mustache sniggered to his partner. "No, I bet it was Champion himself. That guy sure seems to get around."

Dan stared at the two in dismay. Part of him wanted to believe these two were on the Evo Church's payroll. The greater part of him thought they were both morons.

"I saw Eddie Charleston entering the Church of Infinite Evolution, dressed as one of their priests," Dan said, trying very hard to not infantilize his voice.

Beard and Mustache frowned, glancing at each other again.

"Who's Eddie Charleston?" Beard asked, while Mustache spun over to the nearest computer and started a search on the name.

"He's a kidnapping, mind-controlling asshole," Dan said.

"Low-level muscle for hire," Mustache summarized after scrolling through the files. "He's got warrants out in Austin, Pittsburgh, and Santa Monica."

"Sounds like a real peach," Beard drawled. He looked at Dan. "You're telling me you saw this guy inside the Evo Church? You sure it was him?"

"Dressed as a priest, yeah." Dan nodded, feeling like he was finally making progress. "I'm sure it was him. I ran into that asshole on a police ride-along some time ago. He slapped me with his roofie powers and kidnapped the officer I was with. So, yeah, he made an impression."

"Kidnapped a cop?" Beard repeated, looking to Mustache. His partner was frowning at the computer screen, slowly scrolling through an incident report.

Mustache nodded, and said, "Says here he grabbed a senior officer and a recruit, but they got away. Gregoir Pierre-Louise. Huh." Mustache scratched his namesake. "I recognize that name from somewhere."

"He's very popular on the internet," Dan said blandly.

"That's the lunatic who was brawling with Coldeyes in Austin!" Beard exclaimed to his partner. "Remember? There was that shaky cam video!"

"That's the guy your Eddie Charleston took down?" Mustache asked, eyes wide in alarm. "He's here? At the Evo Church?"

Dan frowned. This was quickly going in the wrong direction. "He didn't take down Gregoir, really. He just, I dunno, drugged him up a bit. Gregoir broke out pretty much immediately, is my understanding. But yeah, he's at the Evo Church."

"Are you sure?" Mustache insisted. "I mean—" He stuttered, clearly looking for some other explanation to make this not his problem. "Why were you there, anyway? You a member?"

"No?" Dan shook his head. "I was passing by. Just lucky I guess. Why's it matter?"

"Lotta crank calls about the Evo Church," Beard said, jumping on the denial bandwagon. "Lotta kids think its funny to bring trouble to their door."

"I'm literally here, in person, making a statement," Dan pointed out. "I'm not some anonymous teenager having fun with a burner phone."

There was a pause in the conversation as the two stooges processed this information. Beard asked again, almost plaintively, "Are you sure it was this Charleston fellow?"

Right. Fuck this.

Dan pulled out the printed schedule that he'd pilfered from the church. He passed it over to the two officers, tapping on the name 'Brother Charleston'. Dan leaned forward, putting his elbows on his knees, and resting his chin on his knuckles. "Gentleman, I'm telling you that there's a dangerous fugitive hiding out right down the street, giving sermons at the local cult. Can you please explain to me why I'm not being taken seriously."

The two detectives shared another look. Beard said, "Look, it's just... It's tricky with the Church, y'know? It's a political organization, and has a lot of local pull. We could get in real trouble if you're yanking our chain. And this guy, Charleston, seems a bit out of character for him to be giving sermons, you know?"

"Yeah," Mustache agreed. He was glancing over Charleston's file, and the upgrade description therein. "I think it would be pretty obvious if an entire group of parishioners were getting roofied every day." He laughed, part nervous, part hysterical. "There'd be a hundred accidents in the parking lot after morning service alone!"

"I guess we're saying, if you really saw this individual, maybe you should be talking to the feds?" Beard posited, as if struck by divine inspiration. "They're really more equipped to handle something of this, uh, magnitude."

"And they'd survive the fallout," Mustache muttered under his breath.

Dan looked between the two detectives. First, he considered doing exactly what they'd suggested. This was, strictly speaking, a federal matter, but most police departments in Dimension A were used to being sovereign authorities within their own cities. It was generally a terrible idea to circumvent them, even in cases like this. But now that he'd raised the issue, and been dismissed, he should be free to go the feds without causing a territorial snit.

He really didn't want to.

What Dan really wanted to do, was make these two idiots do it. And solve the problem, of course, but if he could do it in a way that made Beard and Mustache miserable, he was gonna pick that path. The only thing that pissed Dan off more than apathy, was deliberate incompetence. These men were treating a serious, dangerous issue like it was some sort inconvenience, and he couldn't wait to absolutely ruin their day.

Dan was petty, and he was comfortable with that.

"I've submitted an official statement to your receptionist," Dan said. "I filled out the paperwork and everything. Its been filed. Now, I've let you two know the situation. You've been apprised, and are officially in the loop. That's a documented fact."

Dan sat up straight, folding his hands in his lap, and smiling sympathetically.

"What I'm saying, gentleman, is that this is now your problem."

Mustache and Beard glanced at each other for the final time. They looked a little green at the prospect of work, or danger, or some combination of both. A silent conversation passed between them, then Mustache wearily rose to his feet.

"I'll call it in," the detective grumbled, and finally went off to do his job.