“Girl went missing a few days ago,” Don said, raising his hand again.
“It’s a runaway,” Drake almost whined, lolling his head dramatically.
“She’s not a runaway,” Don said again, his tone the same. “Same grid of the city that the killer likes to strike in.”
“How do you know where she was taken from if she’s a runaway?”
“We know where she was last seen.”
“Yea, well those two things are often very different. Either way, she’s a runaway. Killer hasn’t been takin’ many prisoners, in case you ain’t noticed.”
“Just because it’s not related to the killer, doesn’t mean it--”
“No body, no ransom: runaway.”
“The crimes could be sexually - -”
“Enough,” John barked, stopping the both of them. He turned to Don, smacking his lips together thoughtfully as his fiddled the Rolaids wrapper between his fingers. “You don’t have enough to run with it as a feature, but do it up. If nothing else, it might help get the girl found, and if the paper helps with that, then we’ve got a story.”
“Done and done.”
“Anything else?”
“I hear the Mayor farted last week,” Drake scoffed under his breath. “Maybe you’d like to do a story on that, too.”
Don dropped his pad, waving his hand before him as though to open the field for him. “I suppose you’ve got better?”
“Abuse charges against Xander Drew,” he said smugly, tossing his open pad onto the Editor’s desk and leaning back.
“What?” Don said, leaning forward to read the notes even as John did. “Where are you getting this from?”
“Personal experience,” Drake smiled, tapping himself on the head. “Little bastard clocked me so hard I bled almost ten minutes. Had to go get it checked out and everything. That cute nurse at CBG thought I had a concussion. Riley.”
“This is good stuff, Tom,” John said, almost drooling from the mouth as he looked over Drake’s story notes.
“Please,” Don sneered, rubbing his head for a moment before sitting back down. “Its bloody Wow journalism and you know it, John. If I’d known we were working for a tabloid I would’ve brought in a few more stories about Elvis’ new love child.”
John stopped reading and looked up, his mouth open as he lay the pad back down.
“I think you’ve stepped out, boyo,” Drake chuckled a little, swirling finger around his head once before giving Don a hearty slap on the back.
“Get off me,” Don snapped, pulling away at the moment of contact. “And how’d him hitting you give you a lump on the back of your head, anyway? But go ahead, go after the kid that Tim White found broken and bruised up where they caught Genblade. A kid not even the Feds will go near for God-only-knows what reason, because if I were them, I think I would’ve asked what went on up there by now, wouldn’t you? So try it, see what happens. When you go missing, I’ll be sure and tell the cops you’re a runaway.”
Drake paused, opening his mouth to retort. After a moment he closed it again, turning away from Don and back to the desk.
“He’s... right, Tom,” John frowned, handing back the folder sadly. “It’s sensationalism. We all know it’s sensationalism. As much as I’d love to, we can’t print it.”
“Sure,” Drake nodded, picking the pad back up and closing it.
“All right, you guys know what to do. Get to it,” he said, waving them both toward the door as he unrolled another white capsule and shoved it into his mouth.
Both men got up and headed for the door, Don’s eyes cast downward and his free hand rubbing his temple again.
“Everything okay, Don?” John asked, leaning forward onto the desk just as Drake left the room.
“Hmm?” Don groaned, almost not even hearing it at first. “Oh, yes sir. Sorry, sir. I didn’t mean to go off like that.”
“It’s okay. You were right.”
“Shouldn’t have gone off.”
“Even so,” he shrugged. “Have you been feeling all right? We’re a little busy now, but you could go on leave after the trial if its - -”
“Not that,” Don sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose. “Got no sleep last night. Pipes kept me up at all hours.”
“Pipes?”
“Yeah, they thump and crack and make all kinds of weird shit noises. Happens every fall.”
“Hmm. Well, get it looked after,” John nodded, turning back to his computer and visibly having been tuned out for at least half of the sentence Don had said. “Sleeps important.”
“Yes, sir,” Don heaved again, turning to walk away as he started to yawn.
“Neocitran. Does it for me every time.”
“Yes, sir.”
Garfield Samson smiled softly to himself, the smirk spreading tenuously over his aged, angular face as he spotted a small patch of tulips growing just outside the Peterson’s fence. They were colored a milky white and were just starting to shrivel back from their summer bloom as the cold of fall got to them. He bent over to pick one, pausing only slightly when his right hip didn’t seem to move with the rest of his body. He clutched the stem tightly, sawing the nail of his thumb back and forth on it until it snapped loose of the rest of the bush. Grinning like a gargoyle, he turned toward his companion and presented it to her theatrically. “For you, my love.”
Linda Samson turned away for a moment, blushing. She took the flower from him without meeting his gaze, knowing that she would start to laugh the moment she saw the sun caught in his large ears, making them glow like candles in the night. “Flatterer,” she chided him, holding out her arm for him as they started to
