FSE

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Start of a new story - I've had this one floating around in my head for a while.

Part of this story's plot bases itself in the genocide in Bosnia during the 90s. I think it goes without saying that I've take liberties with the subject matter (most obviously, well, the fact that this story includes anthros); I have done my best to at least line up with the basic structure of the events, or at least the spirit of them, but if you feel I've not succeeded in that regard, please feel free to say so.

On the subject of which, as usual, any sort of critique is enormously appreciated.

Incidentally, I do hope this isn't seen as exploitative. I write stuff that draws from historical events (in the loosest sense of the word) because I personally find them fascinating; any liberties I take with them are not intended to demean the actual events, or the people involved in them.

Edited by Tlapa - whose stuff, incidentally, you should check out.

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Late evening had set in; and the little side road, too narrow for street lamps, was half-engulfed by dimness, the building before them throwing out a feeble yellow glow that barely reached the pavement. Elbowing the car door shut behind her, Hester inhaled slightly, then fought back a dry gag. It had been several months now, but the smell of the sea had not grown on her at all; if anything, it had somehow become more unbearably overpowering, especially in the crisp, biting, mercilessly clear chill of the evening air.

She glanced up at Aseem. The tall, stout, brown-scaled monitor lizard smiled down at her warmly; and she followed his gaze as he turned back toward the building just opposite them, across the narrow side-road.

"I suppose it's a matter of...well, I don't know, but I always thought it was beautiful." the lizard hummed absently.

The building before them had the body of a geometric blockhouse smeared with grimy white plaster. The roof was flat, with a portly brick chimney peeking awkwardly over the edge, little more than a black lump against the stormy grey evening sky; the smeared windows were uncased diamond-lattice, and a pair of distinctly plastic Victorian lamps hung from either side of the door.

Still smiling, the lizard pointed to the building's darkened far corner, where the scrawny, blackened remnants of a long-dead vine clung to the plaster, just barely visible amidst the shadow. 'My friends and I used to have climbing races up that thing.' he murmured cheerily. 'Until it came down, of course. Poor Davey. I've never heard a bone snap that loudly, it was awful.'

Hester gave a smiling nod, blinking slightly as the silently flashing lights of the two police cars pulled up before the entrance flitted in her eyes.

"Anyway..." the lizard went on jovially. "Anyway...I tried that new mushroom pie recipe - the one your mother wrote...with the, eh, bacon bits...I loved it!" His voice trilled with enthusiasm. "And then I had Lila try it, and...bless her, of course she had to complain...first there was still too much milk...then the bacon was undercooked...then she insisted...oh, dear, bless her...that the whole recipe was clearly meant for humans anyway, and I was trying to..."

His words faded as Hester found her attention wandering toward an earthy patch of gravel by the front of the pub, a few yards right of the front door, lit by the aggressive glow of a forensic lamp. A figure, clad in dark trousers and a pale blue shirt, lay sprawled upon the ground, its stomach to the ground, arms tucked awkwardly beneath it. The face, turned outward, was that of a young human male, his hair short and dark, his countenance squat, wide and chinless, his dark and beady eyes staring glassily.

A brief gust swept down, and a rustling tangle of dead leaves and loose plastic danced down the tarmac. Aseem, still smiling, pulled his coat about his broad torso."I don't care what they say...I never lost all that cold blood." he said, shivers burring his voice slightly."Inside, yes?"

Briskly, they crossed the road, and made their way up the brief stretch of cracked and mossy brick leading up to the doorway, where an uniformed officer stood with his hat under his arm, half-visible in the dusty yellow glow of the plastic lamps. The officer - one of the many Hester had not yet met - was a short, scrawny young dhole, his uniform clean and crisp, his rusty red fur neatly brushed.

"Anything new?" she asked curtly as they reached the doorway. For a brief moment, the dhole fixed her with a wide, bright, distinctly canid stare; then, turning to Aseem, he jabbered something in rapid, high-pitched Hindi. Smirking, and tittering slightly, Aseem brought his broad and scaly hand heavily down upon the dhole's shoulder. "The academy needs a few extra etiquette classes, eh?" he said cheerily; and, smiling, he elbowed his way past the dhole and through the front door; Hester stepped in after him.

The pub's interior, bathed in the smoky yellow glow of a pair of electric chandeliers, and warm with the dark, swirled wooden textures of the panelling, the tables, and the lengthy bartop, seemed somewhat better kept than its exterior, though the tables were haphazard and at awkward angles, and tobacco stained the walls. The bartender, a slight, middle-aged, aproned grey cat, stood with an uneasy look behind the bar, while a handful of patrons milled impatiently among the tables.

Aseem turned back to her, smiling."I...really am very sorry about Mehta, really." he said, a hint of sheepishness underpinning his jovial tone."He's a good lad, he really is, but...well, he fancied himself a scholar before he came to us. That's what a few months at university does to a young mind - he fancies he understands the world."

Hester raised her eyebrows. 'He doesn't like humans, then?' she asked quietly. Aseem, still smiling, drew his scaly lips tightly. 'Eh...he'll grow out of it, I promise.' he muttered with an awkward titter; and drawing the split tip of his dull grey tongue over his lips, he went on 'Anyway, the boy says it's nothing interesting - cause of death was a gunshot wound. There were a few, apparently, quite sporadic; most of them are in the wall. Still no identification. Shall we...?' He jerked his head toward the pub's interior.

The cat stood behind the bar, ears folded down, his fluffy, long-fingered paws clasped apprehensively over his chest as his teeth sunk into the fur of his lower lip.

"Well...like I said, a Russian lad." he burbled on distractedly. "Started coming in about a week ago. The first two nights he was with a few other young fellows...you know, real hair oil and big shoes sort. They weren't too bad, actually, for their type - had a bit of vomiting, nothing too off. Anyway, they must've shaken him off, or something, anyway, he started coming in alone after that." Exhaling, and relaxing his tense frame somewhat, he snapped his tongue disapprovingly. "He got really awful after that. Drank himself onto the floor, did a whole lot of foreign screaming, ran around with his shirt off a few times - you humans can get hideously pale, if you'll forgive me. Last night he toddled up to the bar, alright, and took a great handful of poor old Mrs Shirley's bottom. Damn lucky the poor thing was too full of vodka to notice, bless her."

Hester, nodding silently, leaned forward onto the bar, and at once felt her hand slide into a damp, sticky patch. The cat idly ran his tongue down his long, slender left canine.

"Anyway...I thought I'd give him the boot the moment he turned up tonight, but...he actually behaved himself to day. He spent the whole evening with Professor Pendrick."

Hester raised her eyebrows, and the cat nodded at the opposite end of the pub. Turning about, Hester saw a human man, bespectacled, perhaps 60, seated at a table by the wall, wearing a white shirt and dark tank top, a baggy brown overcoat half-hanging from his chair. He held a neat whiskey in his hand, with a half-depleted bottle on the table before him, and he swayed in his seat ever so slightly; but there was nonetheless a proud, haughty air to his bearing and to the firm-jawed expression of his lined, leathery face. Aseem stood talking to him, smiling his most politely discomfited smile; the old man looked up at him in steely, unsmiling silence.

'And, uh...what did they talk about?' Hester asked coolly, turning back to the bartender.

He widened his eyes and shrugged. 'They spoke Rusky all night. The professor does Russian history or something. I think. I don't really know him - he's at Oxford, I believe. His daughter lives here - schoolteacher, a lovely woman - my boy was in her class last year. The professor only comes down here occasionally, though. I've not seen him for a few years, come to think - he arrived a few days ago.'

Hester looked behind her again; the old man was still staring coldly up at Aseem, who was now biting awkwardly down upon his thumb as he spoke.

"Look, will you folks be around here a lot longer?" Hester heard the cat ask from behind her; but already, she was nudging her way through the poky maze of tables toward the other side of the pub.

Reaching Aseem, she stood on her toes and murmured"Shall I?" into his ear. Aseem, looking down at her with a smile, gave her shoulder a firm, grateful squeeze, and hastened light-footedly away.Hester turned down to the elderly man, who, at once, cast her a wide, thin smile. His teeth were rust-coloured, and strangely thin; and though his sharp, educated bearing was still evident, his watery blue eyes were misty with intoxication, his lids fluttering slightly.

"Evening, sir, I'm Detective Sergeant Bloom." she said, raising her voice slightly. "Can I ask you a few questions?"

The old man extended his smile slightly. "Now, that...that friend of yours..." - he gauchely tilted his head in the direction in which Aseem had hurried away - "...we talked for about three minutes and he managed to mention being a lizard twice." Despite the slight, damp slur to his tone, he spoke with a smooth, refined accent.

Hester drew her tongue across her upper lip."Did you know the victim at all?"

"One of...those sort of...that sort." the old man gurgled quietly, distractedly, half to himself; then, forcing his eyelids up, he raised his voice slightly. "You mean Oleg? Not at all. Just met him tonight. The great lout was so happy to hear some Russian he actually managed to sit his arse down for a while." The old man paused, tensed his shoulders slightly, and lurched forward in his seat slightly as he let out a violent hiccup.

Hester nodded rigidly. "What can you tell me about him?" she asked.

The old man's rusty smile returned. 'I...don't expect you've heard of the Zakharovs, but...well, they're big names in Russian steel.' He paused, tensed his shoulders again, and let out a light, delicate burp. 'Not that...not that the boy seemed to know that. I mean, I never expected him to have seen the inside of a factory, or anything, but...he barely seemed to know who his family was.' He shook his head stiffly. 'They were signing his cheques, that was what was important.' He paused again, and almost a minute passed as he very slowly took a delicate sip of whiskey. 'That was why I talked to him in the first place, in fact - I'd wanted to grill him a bit about his family's history - how they'd had to run off to Switzerland after the Bolshies got a leg up and all.' He took another slow sip of whiskey, dramatically grimacing as he did so. 'Of course, the boy had no idea about any of that. I ended up having to lecture him. Honestly. You know his great-grandfather met the Nabokovs? He'd no idea. Didn't care, either, he was just too sloshed to leave the table.' He leaned back, his rickety chair letting out a piercing squeal. 'And that's the generation they're leaving the major industries to.'

Hester nodded, drawing her tongue over her lips. 'I understand you're a professor of Russian history?'

The old man looked up at her, smiling again, and let out a prim, throaty guffaw.

"Research fellow. And it's Eastern European history. Not that..." - he tilted his head toward the bar - "...not that I'd expect poor Timothy to be able to wrap his head around the difference."

Hester exhaled, and leaned her thigh against the table."So...do you have any idea what Mr, eh, Zakharov was doing here?"

The old man paused yet again. He glanced down at the last dregs of whiskey sliding about the bottom of his glass; then, putting it down and nudging it across the table, he snatched up the half-full bottle, and, his chair letting out another squeal as he leaned back again, curling his lip and squinting, took a long, enthusiastic gulp.

Then, turning back to Hester, his smile now pulled all the way back over his rusty teeth and up to his dark gums, he went on. 'You mean in this particular sandbank of yours?' He gestured flailingly at a far window. 'Well...seems dad's plans for Ollie to go to Cambridge turned into a nationwide pub crawl. But the other louts he was with gave him the boot - there was, eh, and a girl with them, and...' He paused again, glanced back down the nose of the bottle, which he still held hovering a few inches from his face, and took another swig. 'Anyway...he was...just thrilled about being stuck here...' His voice, though still prim, had begun to audibly grow ever damper and more garbled. 'Most...most people can find something to occupy themselves with, even in a pit like this, as long as it's got a pretty promenade and an...well...an internet...but...if there's two sorts of people who simply aren't suited to a dull environment like this...' - he paused, turned his head aside, and let out another delicate burp - '...it's the intellectuals and...the...the restless louts. Always needing fresh stimulation is...is tiresome, I tell you.' He paused another moment before gracelessly slamming the bottle back onto the table.

Hester nodded again, absently groping for a chair behind her, and tottering slightly as she found none. 'So...are you staying here with family at the moment, sir?'

The old man's smile slid back down his dark teeth slightly. 'At my daughter's. The hubby dragged her over here when they married, because apparently his prosperous career of prancing around the house in an apron just couldn't flourish anywhere else the way it does here.' Amidst the slurring, Hester detected a sharp, spitting edge seep into the old man's tone. 'He's a...bloody...dog, you know? I mean...bless her, it's her choice...' He paused again; and with an exaggerated flail of his arm, he brought the bottle back up to his lips and took another gulp. 'I...mmph...I'm an open-minded man, detective. I've written papers on the pogroms; I know what hatred does, I do. But...' - looking back up at her, he leaned forward, and, his voice shifting to a throaty, melodramatic half-whisper - '...they tried to conceive, you know? Know what I mean? There's some folks who've made it work, too, aren't there? Interspecies...conception?'

Hester nodded, once again inclining her weight against the table. 'It's always the species of the mother, right?'

The old man licked his lips again, and pushed out a heavy exhalation. 'Mostly, but...there was the young woman in America...' - he intensified the rasping of his tone - '...gave birth to a bloody lizard thing. Just...a lizard thing. Nothing human about it, either, just...mmph...I tell you, they don't put up with that in...' - inclining sideways, he rested his elbow against the back of his chair, propping his head heavily against it - '...or...I mean to say...they didn't used to.' He took another gulp of whiskey, his eyes drifting outward. 'You know, in the war, there was this village in Poland...lot of wolf-types and whatnot living there...and they...' He let out a spacey guffaw. 'Well...anyway...my daughter and...that dog of hers didn't manage to...you know. They adopted...another dog, but I suppose that's not the poor child's fault.' He fought back another dramatic hiccup; his arms slid limply to his sides, and his head lolled over the chair's back, his spectacles askew. 'Mind you, I'd...I'd have objected if he'd been older than two when they got him. Damn...damn lucky he wasn't in the system long enough to...mmph...become a psychopath.'

Nodding again, Hester slid her hands absently into her pockets. 'Sir, would you like me to have an officer...?'

'But...but, eh...' the old man stammered thickly, his grin slowly broadening again. '...but...Sarah thinks I'm just here to see her, but...God bless her, I wouldn't be putting up with this jetsam pile of yours just for the privilege of staying in the same house as that great pooch of hers...watching him scurry about the kitchen...' Sluggishly raising his arm, the old man flailed it gauchely at the far end of the pub; and as Hester glanced over toward a table by the door, she saw Aseem speaking - far more animatedly now, and with a far less strained smile - with a squat, portly, middle-aged human man with a glisteningly bare scalp and a thin brown beard, smiling, nodding, and occasionally managing to direct a few words up at the jabbering lizard, and absently dabbing with a napkin at a blotch of spilled beer, still gently foaming, as it dribbled down the front of his mossy green jumper.

'That fellow...' the old man drawled, '...that fellow...he's going to be helping me...with my last paper. He'll be an asset, he shall. But, eh...' And as his smile broadened further, and he seemed to choke back another graceless snigger, he lifted his forefinger to his lips. '...but...sssh...he'll want to be anonymous...he's got some secrets, that one...'

From across the room, Hester heard Aseem loudly throw out one of his high-pitched, merry chuckles.

'So...detective...' the old man went on, his head now dangling like a ragdoll's over the chair's back, '...you...forgive me, but you don't sound local. Got a husband who dragged you out of the civilised world too, maybe?' Licking her lips again, Hester pulled her arm out of her pocket and slid her card across the table toward the old man.

"Please call me if you think of anything else, sir.' she said coolly, turning about as he began to open his mouth again."I'll have an officer drive you home."

His car boot falling heavily shut, Danny, standing on the pavement, took a long, deep exhalation of the early morning breeze as it swept in over the sea, the sharp, sparkling briskness.

The young Husky wrapped his arms tighter about the pair of cardboard boxes he held; and, grunting as he strained beneath their weight, he cautiously made his way across the road. The semi-detached houses, bright and bedecked with frilly awnings and thickly curtained windows, their little yards alight with colour, ran down to the end of the narrow little street, which opened up onto the broad, windswept brick promenade that ran alongside the beach, the ocean sparkling just beyond the railing.

Reaching the cream-coloured house, with its muslin-curtained bay windows stretching out over the little bed of delicately flushing roses in its cramped front garden, he clamped his arms tighter about the boxes and warily ascended the steps - apprehensively playing, as he did so, the day that he smashed a new monitor all over a customer's threshold over and over in his mind - and, finding himself before the front door, peered helplessly around the boxes at the buzzer for a moment before, ever so carefully, tapping his foot against the bottom of the door.

Several minutes passed as the breeze gently whistled, the buzz of distant traffic rose and fell, the ocean lapped the nearby shore, and the tugging weight of the boxes steadily wore Danny down; but as his knees had begun to quaver, the door clacked, rattled, and swung ajar, and Danny found himself smiling awkwardly around the boxes at a tall, middle-aged Alsatian in a brown dressing-gown, his jet-black fur bearing the scruffy, dishevelled look of early morning, a toothbrush in his paw, his muzzle rimmed with frothy white toothpaste, staring back at him with red, bleary, heavy-lidded eyes. 'Uh...hi, sir!' the Husky bleated cheerily. 'Uh...here about the computer.'

The Alsatian stared; his eyelids fluttered, and his eyes seemed to sink deeper into his fur.

'The, eh, new computer.' Danny said, accustomed to such reactions at early hours, and tapped at a box with his paw. 'Delivery and assembly.' The Alsatian stared. 'Eh?' he burbled thickly, frothy white flecks of toothpaste flying forth from his lips and spattering over the boxes. Danny stared back, not sparing an inch of his usual practiced smile.

The Alsatian glanced down at the boxes in Danny's arms. A thick globule of toothpaste dripped from the end of his muzzle. He blinked heavily, once, twice; then, ever so slowly, his red-stained eyes slid open, and he drew his dripping lips tightly. 'Oh, God...' he murmured, and glanced back into the house's interior. 'Alan!' he bellowed, his voice ragged with weariness, a long, frothy string of toothpaste flying forth from his muzzle.

As she gauchely shoved her car door closed with her knee, Hester felt a bony hand come down heavily upon her shoulder, and the tip of a frigid and scaly finger brush playfully against her cheek. Her head still heavy with the earliness of the hour, she turned slowly about. Aseem stood over her, smiling his usual, effortlessly merry smile.

'Morning!' he cried jovially. His voice jarringly pierced her sleep-muffled ears.

She blinked hazily up at him. 'Were you...waiting for me?' she slurred thickly.

The towering monitor lizard cheerily held forward a small, opaque square Tupperware. 'Look, that mushroom pie was so damn good, I just had to have Lila make you lunch.' He lifted the lid of the tub, and Hester attempted to make out its contents through the fog of her bleary eyes. 'Here, it's biryani. Nobody makes it like Lila does.' Hester felt him shove the tub into her midsection, and she weakly grasped it with both hands.

The bony hand came down upon her shoulder again. 'Promise me you'll eat it, alright?' the lizard chirped buoyantly. 'I can smell the fryer from here. That crap will kill you. Okay?'

Hester gave a lurching nod, and burbled something formless; and half-consciously, she began to stumble forward across the crowded parking lot, the lizard walking on springing heels beside her. The chilled, salty morning breeze picked up again, and a colourful assortment of loose wrappers and discarded papers danced about their feet.

'So...anyway, seems your old man was correct.' the lizard went on from above Hester's head. 'Our dead boy's dad is Yulian Zakharov...you know the sort, those unbearable oligarch types...' - he grunted out a juvenile guffaw - '...look, I pulled this off his Facebook page.'

A piece of paper was shoved under Hester's nose. She blinked heavily, and made out a printed picture of a human man well into middle age, shaven-headed and with a thick black moustache; wearing only a floor-length golden bathrobe and a pair of bright red briefs, he sat upon an enormously outsized, oddly-angled pink armchair, his stout, hairy legs splayed, clutching a champagne glass in one hand.

'...anyway...this'll turn to a lot of crap, no doubt, if dad's got anything to say...' Aseem went on. 'It'll get kicked the hell upstairs in not too long, I dare say. Let's not let 'em say we gave them nothing to start with, though.'

Hester nodded wearily; then, as a freshly damp gust loosened her hazy focus somewhat, she looked up at the lizard. 'That, uh...that fat guy you were talking to...with the beard...'

Aseem smiled down at her. 'Mr Markovic? Oh, aye, nice fellow. Came here a few years ago...he's from Russia too, I think. Keeps a hardware store. I got him to help me fix up my veranda once, extend the deck a bit. Lila was delighted, of course, got an excuse to spend a week hammering on about all the things I ought to be able to...'

'Do you think you could take a look at him?' Hester asked, weariness still gurgling in the pit of her throat.

Aseem raised his eyebrows. 'Who...Mr Markovic? You mean...background? But...everyone knows him...I mean...he was in the pub when...' 'Please.' Hester said, bringing the word down heavily.

The lizard blew out his scaly cheeks, and shrugged. 'Um...alright, I suppose. I'll see what I can do.'

Reaching the parking lot gate, they strode across the quiet road, and mounted grimy concrete steps leading up to the police station.

Hester opened the Tupperware lid again, and blinked stupidly down at the pale white rice sprinkled with dull brown vegetable fragments and lumps of shredded meat. 'Eh...this isn't the kind with cockroaches, is it?' she mumbled absently.

Beside her, she heard the lizard burst into chuckling, and merrily bring, this time, both hands down upon her shoulders. 'No, no, that was just for the wedding, honestly. Those mad aunts of hers liked it. This one's safe for you, Lila made sure. C'mon.' And, still chortling, his hands still on her shoulders, he lead her cheerily up to the door of the station.