Aztlan: The Last Sun (8 page)

“Just,” I confirmed.

He took a look at the victim and made a face. “Gods of Death. It makes you want to lose your dinner.” He turned to the police officers. “Identification?”

“Not a thing,” said one of them.

Just like Patli. “But not because he’s homeless,” I noted. “Not with
those
clothes.”

Necalli nodded. “I doubt we’ll have as much trouble identifying this one.” He knelt beside the body. “Smells from
octli
. The other one did too, right?”

“Right,” I said.

“So they had that in common.” He looked up at me, no doubt meaning to add something—and winced. “Say, you really
did
get beat up.”

“I told you I wasn’t joking.”

His whole face seemed to furrow. “You’ll file a report when we’re done here. It’s bad for people to think they can beat up police officers and get away with it. It makes other people think they can get away with it too.”

The officers from the Twelfth nodded. Obviously, they approved of the sentiment.

“Well,” said Necalli, glancing at the corpse again, “I’ve seen enough. How about you, Colhua?”

“More than enough,” I said.

As we walked back to the pyramid, Necalli shivered. “I’ve eyeballed my share of corpses, but none like that one. Whoever did that had to be a real sicko.” A pause. “You think anyone in Ancient Light is that sick?”

“No,” I said.

“Even after those guys in the masks said what they said?”

“Even then.”

He shrugged. “We’ll haul them in anyway. I mean, we’ve got to do
something
.”

In accordance with Necalli’s orders, we rounded up the cultists again. This time we had files on forty-three of them, including the seven who had come in the last time of their volition.

Eren was one of those arrested, of course. She didn’t talk to me. She wouldn’t even
look
at me.

We questioned her people as we had previously, and got pretty much the same answers. If they were covering something up, they were doing a remarkably fine job of it.

Eventually we let them go, but I wasn’t there to see it. Because I looked like I had one foot in the Lands of the Dead, Necalli sent me home halfway through the night.

It wasn’t so much because he felt bad for me. It was more because having me around was bad for morale.

I didn’t care. I was just happy to drag myself back to my place, drink enough
octli
to dull the pain, and put my beat-up bones to bed.

I
n the morning, I was hung over. That was bad. But I was able
to bend a little here and there, which was good.

When I arrived at work, Necalli told me that he’d set up a surveillance detail after I left the night before. After all, both murders had taken place on properties slated to open during the Fire Renewal. It made sense to monitor all the other properties in that category.

There were three of them. Two, as the gods would have it, were Molpilia projects.

Cycles earlier, the Emperor had ordered every city in the Empire to set up a network of high-powered surveillance cameras on the roofs of strategically selected buildings. At the time, it was believed he was anticipating another Rebellion.

The rebellion never happened, but the network came in handy sometimes. This was one of those times.

The Emperor’s cameras afforded us a level of scrutiny far beyond what the pyramids’ security systems provided. But someone had to monitor the camera feeds. Hence, the detail.

I went upstairs to see how it was doing.

When I entered the surveillance center, which was a big room but seemed small because of all the monitors packed into it, I saw that Necalli had Takun, Quetzalli, and Izel on vigil.

Takun made a face when he saw me. “Necalli wasn’t kidding. You really
do
look like shit.”

“What did you do,” said Quetzalli, “try to stop a rail carriage with your face?”

“Thanks for the sympathy,” I said. “See anything?”

“Tons,” said Takun, “if the killer’s a squirrel. Otherwise, no.”

Izel laughed softly. “If we were lucky, Necalli told us, the murderer would show up. If we were
really
lucky, he would show up before we lost a night’s sleep. Guess what? We weren’t lucky.”

Of the three of them, Izel looked the worst for wear. But then, he had never been the sturdiest looking guy around.

He was tall, even a little taller than I was, but skinny to the point where you had to wonder if he ate at all. He looked like he might blow away in a strong wind.

A nice guy, though. Izel was the one Investigator in the office who always remembered everybody’s birth-gods. Some people said he was too motherly to be an Investigator. Obviously, at least one chief along the line had thought otherwise.

Whatever the remarks, Izel didn’t seem to mind. In fact, he often made fun of his frailty. He started working for the police, he once told me, because he was tired of getting beaten up.

Quetzalli, on the other hand, was small and tough. No one in the department wanted to mess with her, me included.

Looking over her shoulder, I saw that Necalli had given her Tepeyollotl in District Nine, the Molpilia project that Eren’s people had been marching around lately. But they hadn’t shown up yet. One thing I had learned about them was that they liked their sleep.

I thought about Eren lying in her bed, her long, dark hair fanned across the pillow. Then I thought about me running my fingers through that hair.

Then I remembered where I was.

I cleared my throat and said, “Tepeyollotl looks further along than Centeotl.”

“It is,” said Quetzalli. “All four of its sides were illuminated last night, and its security system is active—a good thing in that neighborhood. All that’s left is some cosmetic work inside.”

Takun was watching Mayahuel, Molpilia’s other pyramid, in District Eleven. Before I asked, he told me it was in pretty much the same shape as Tepeyollotl.

“By the way,” he added, “you should try some surveillance work yourself. It will keep you out of trouble.”

I turned to Izel, who had responsibility for Mixcoatl in District Nineteen. “What about your place?”

“Well,” he said, “the rent is a little high.”

“I meant
Mixcoatl
,” I said.

He shrugged. “It’s lagging behind the others. Even if we don’t find a corpse there, it probably won’t open on time.”

“Maybe because Molpilia’s not the developer,” Quetzalli suggested. “His projects always seem to be right on schedule.”

“Which is why he’s so pissed off about those murders,” Izel noted.

Takun sat back in his chair and stretched. “When I was a rookie, I used to think standing vigil would be a vacation. It sounded so easy.”

“Little did you know,” said Izel.

“Did you see see Coyotl last night?” Quetzalli asked me.

“No,” I said, “I missed him. I was playing in my mens’ league.”

When I first left the ball court, I watched every game presented on the Mirror, even the bad ones between teams like Zempoala and Oxtlipa. Now I missed one here and there.

“Was he good?” I asked, sitting down on an empty counter.

Quetzalli chuckled appreciatively. “He was
great
. In
one
play he took out two attackers, just laid them out on the ground. They had to be taken off on litters.”

“He’s a beast,” said Izel.

“A
demon
,” said Quetzalli. “Malinalco didn’t score a goal in the first half. They wouldn’t have scored at all except for that idiot Chipaua. I don’t know why they keep him on the team.”

“Who else are they going to get?” asked Izel. “You think defenders grow out of the ground like sweet potatoes?”

“Coyotl played well against Xoconochco too,” I said.

“You mean last week?” asked Quetzalli. “How would you know that? It was blacked out.”

“I didn’t see it on the Mirror,” I explained. “I saw it in the Arena.”

Quetzalli looked at me as if I had sprouted eagle-wings. “You got a
pass
? How in the name of—”

“Colhua was a
star
,” Takun reminded her with a twisted grin. “He can get a pass any time he wants.”

I ignored the remark. “An old teammate helped me out. He’s still with the organization.” Not so high up in the organization that he could get me passes on a regular basis, unfortunately, but high enough to slip me a cloud seat once in a while.

“Nice,” said Quetzalli.

In a way, it was. People killed for passes to the games—sometimes literally. But in another way, it hurt. After all, I wasn’t that old. If I hadn’t torn up my knee, I would still have been playing instead of just watching.

“It’s inspiring to work with Colhua,” said Takun. “Like drinking chocolate with the Emperor.”

“Be inspired to find something on those monitors,” I told him, “and I’ll forget to report your abuse of a fellow Investigator.”

“You’re too generous,” said Takun.

It felt good to banter with them. I should have gone downstairs and gotten to work reviewing the cultists’ interviews. But after what I had been through the night before, after what I had seen at Centeotl and Atlaua. . .I relished the distraction.

“Speaking of abuse,” said Izel, “is it possible to get a better grade of tea in here?” He held up his chocolate-colored ceramic mug. “This stuff is terrible.”

“No kidding,” said Takun. “A dog wouldn’t drink it.”

They all laughed. I would have joined them if my face hadn’t felt so stiff.

“By the way,” Izel asked me, “did you hear about the armistice?”

“No,” I said. “What armistice?”

“Among the Euros,” said Quetzalli. “We talked about it all night, I think.” She turned to Izel. “Who was it again? France and Germany? Or France and Spain?”

“France and Germany,” said Izel.

“You know how it is with those idiots across the water,” said Takun. “They love to make alliances, and then to go to war over them. It’s their passion.”

“And no sign of their stopping, is there?” asked Quetzalli, turning back to her monitor.

“No sign,” Izel echoed. “Not like us, eh? One empire, one people, all the same from north to south. Not a bunch of warrior ants trying to rip each other’s heads off.”

“It wasn’t always that way,” Quetzalli reminded him.

“Of course not,” said Izel. “When we were savages, we fought. We killed each other, we took each other’s women. But that was before Cortez.”

“Ah, yes,” said Takun, “Cortez. The great conqueror.”

“He tried to divide us,” said Izel, “but in the end he unified us. He gave us a common enemy.”

“That’s how the story goes,” said Takun.

Izel glanced at him. “What do you mean? You don’t believe it?”

“How do
I
know?” Takun asked. “I wasn’t there.”

“Speaking of Euro alliances,” said Izel, “I saw a funny story on the Mirror. In the first Euro War, Italy got itself screwed up. How did it go again?”

“I don’t know,” said Takun. “You’re the one telling the story.”

“Oh yeah,” said Izel. “I remember now. After the war started, Italy geared up to fight. It got all its planes and boats and armored carriages together, all its soldiers, preparing an offensive that would have knocked out its enemy in no time and carried the day for its allies—until it realized it had allies on
both
sides. Imagine—in order for the Italians to honor their agreements, they would have to go to war with
themselves
!”

“I never heard that one,” said Quetzalli.

“It’s true,” Izel said earnestly. “You can look it up.”

I had a feeling that I wouldn’t find that story anywhere, no matter
how
hard I looked. But I didn’t tell Izel that. Takun was giving him a hard enough time as it was.

“And this armistice between France and Germany,” I said, “how long will it last?”

“How long does it
ever
last?” asked Quetzalli.

They laughed again. I almost laughed too.

I could have stayed and listened to them all morning. As I said, I liked the banter. But I had a couple of murders to solve.

When I got downstairs, I stuck my head into Necalli’s office. “Nothing from surveillance,” I reported.

“I know.” He gestured for me to come in. “I want to introduce you to somebody.”

“Who’s that?” I asked.

“Our victim.”

I came round his desk and read the file on his monitor. The guy’s name was Zuma Mazatl. As we had guessed, he was far from homeless. In fact, he had a very
nice
home in a pyramid overlooking a canal in District Fifteen.

“A slave broker,” I said, reading further.

I had never had much use for slave brokers. Not that they were doing anything illegal, in most cases. The idea of buying and selling people just rubbed me the wrong way.

“No mate,” I continued. “No children on record. No living siblings. Looks like the Empire’s going to get a windfall.”

That was how it worked when somebody died without family. The Emperor got all his worldly goods.

“Looks that way,” said Necalli. “Get out to District Fifteen and talk with the guy’s neighbors. See if they know anybody who would want to murder him and pluck out his heart.”