The Tragedy of Ronald

I sat in my office, reading through the code I had just written. On my desk was a watch that was connected to the computer through various wires and connectors. The tranquilizer watch had a major bug where it shot out over one dart with one press. Its cartridge only holds 6 tranquilizer darts, that meant every dart was valuable.

The idea came to me to create this watch when I saw the Moderator killer, if I could knock him out before he got away. Then he wouldn’t be still out there, waiting to take another life.

My phone came to life on my desk. It was Kalina. I tapped the side of my glasses to answer the call. Kalina hates being on speaker, but I didn’t have any hands to pick up my phone. “Hey Kalina,” I said, still scrolling through my source code.

“Tommy Boy, what are you busy doing?” Kalina said. It sounded as if she were in a car. I could hear her the sound of wind coming through the window.

“I’m working with the engineering department to create a tranquilizer watch.” I said. I made a block of code into a comment. It was at the point I needed to go line by line to find the bug.

“Oooh, that sounds like fun, but all that tech is unnecessary. With just a keen eye for detail, you’ll find the one truth that prevails.” Kalina said, even though I couldn’t see her she I imagined she had the same little smirk whenever she quotes that tv line.

“That’s true, but with technology advancing at such a fast pace, we can afford to have some fancy gadgets to make our jobs easier.” I said, compiling my code only to receive an error. Okay, it wasn’t that line. On a notepad, I wrote some notes. “Besides, could work with the engineering department to make these glasses. Now I can answer your calls without having put you on speaker.”

“Oh god please never put me on speaker.” Kalina said. It sounded like she put her car in park. Then there was the sound of a car door opening. “You never know who is listening and what they are going to do with the information they overhear.”

“I guess you don’t get to as high as your position without being a little paranoid.” I said.

“Paranoid? Thomas, what is it I tell you all the time?”

I rolled my eyes. “In this line of work, complacency will get you killed”

“That’s right, so a bit of paranoia will serve you well. Anyway, I’m going to my office to check my email and then we are heading out for a recent case. The city is short on detectives, so from time to time they ask us to lend a helping hand.”

“Alright, sounds great, because this watch is getting on my nerves. I’ll finish up and walk over.”

“Sounds great,” Kalina said, and then we both hung up.

I saved my documents so I could pick up where I left off later. My phone buzzed to life again: it was Syd.

“Hey there Detective! Want to order takeout and watch movies?” Syd’s message said.

“Sounds amazing! I have a case today, so when that’s over, I can head over.” I texted back. Syd texted a thumbs up and I put my phone in my pocket, then walked over to Kalina’s office.

Her office was a on the other side of the building. I walked past Emily Dickinson’s office. I vaguely remember during boot camp. Since we went through training together, it only made sense we should at least be friendly with each other. I stopped at her office and knocked.

It was too dark to see through the office window, but then I heard from the other side of the door, “It’s open.”

When I opened the door, it appeared I opened a portal to the underworld. There was a skull of a stag hanging on the wall behind where Emily was sitting. It sat in the middle of a pentagram. The office lights weren’t on rather, there were lit candles of all shapes, sizes and colors around the office. Hanging all over the walls were demonic illustrations of various cartoon charters and gods from mythology. Infront of her double monitors was a cute pink and purple unicorn doll, which felt out of place, but I was in no place to judge.

Emily looked at me under her hood with her dark eyeliner and massacre covered eyes. Around her neck was a pentagram. Her pale skin contrasted with the black lipstick she was wearing. As I looked at her, it felt like I was staring at Lady Death herself.

“Oh, hey Tom, what brings you here?” Emily said.

“Uh, nothing really, I just wanted to say great job on the mission last time. I didn’t know it was you.”

“Thank you. They usually call me out for undercover missions. Very few people can recognize me when I am pretending to be a civilian.”

“I wonder why,” I said, looking at the little black bat stuffed animals on her office table. “Anyway, that’s all we should grab lunch later,” I said, slowly closing the door.

Emily waved weakly, “Toodeloo, just let me know and we can go” I shut the door and went toward Kalina’s office. What a strange woman. I’m kind of hoping we don’t get paired up on any cases.

Reaching Kalina’s office, I knocked, and from the glass window in the door I saw her wave for me to come into the office.

“Perfect timing. I just finished my last email. Let’s head over, we’re losing daylight.” Kalina said, standing up from her desk.