“The medics have him in surgery already,” MacMurphy offered. “They can maybe save one of his eyes.”
Kane grimaced in sympathy, but it wasn’t as if the man had a family to support. Magistrates were allowed to marry and produce legitimate offspring only when they held an administrative post. For Carthew, even if he made a full recovery, such a transfer was at least two decades away.
Becoming an administrator in the division wasn’t a promotion exactly, nor was it completely based on age, though that was certainly a factor. The quality of service was the most important considerationsupposedly.
However, in the past fourteen years of his active duty, Kane had seen a number of men, admittedly only a few, with less experience and younger than he, assume administrative posts. He wasn’t annoyed by it, only vaguely curious.
While the other men were busy dressing themselves, Kane quickly removed the compact disk from his belt and slipped it inside the pocket of his black, ankle-length, Kevlar-weave overcoat. He shouldered into it, a little uncomfortable as always with its weight. The right sleeve was just a bit larger than the left to accommodate the Sin Eater and holster he strapped to his forearm. After attaching his red badge to the coat’s lapel, tugging the fingerless black glove over his right hand and slipping on the prerequisite dark glasses, he was ready to go off duty, though he didn’t look like it. Even without the body armor and visored helmet, the Magistrate mystique, foreboding and not a little sinister, had to be maintained, especially during his downtime.
It wasn’t all for show. The lenses of the glasses allowed him to see clearly in deep shadow, and the overcoat could turn anything from a knife to a .38-caliber round. The glove allowed a secure grip on the butt of the Sin Eater.
A shrill whistle cut through the ready room. Salvo’s voice, filtered over the com, said, “Kane. Report to my office.”
“My, don’t he sound happy,” commented Pollard. “I expect he wants to discuss that comment you made back in the zone.”
“What comment?” Kane asked.
“You remember, when you made a passing reference to his canine lineage?”
Kane sighed. “Oh. That.”
Grant said, “No matter what he says, keep your fuse unsparked.”
That was Grant’s way of warning Kane to watch his temper. Kane appreciated the sentiment behind it, though he didn’t need the reminder. He walked past the rows of lockers, through a swing set of double doors and into the communal day room. People hustled around him, most of them wearing the gray bodysuits. They were arguing about duty rosters, scanning hard copies of daily reports, forcing down steaming cups of coffee sub. There were no women, not even filling support positions. He stayed only long enough to swallow a cup of straight sub. He desperately wished something stronger was available.
Out in the corridor, he strode quickly toward the office suites. Taking disciplinary action against a ville enforcer was a rare occurrence, since a man had to be supremely disciplined to be awarded a duty badge. Generally the worst penalty for an infraction was to be assigned a guard station at the bottom level of an Enclave tower, in the Pits.
The most severe punishment, outside of termination, was to be stripped of citizenship, barred from all the villes, reclassified as an outlander. It had never happened in Kane’s lifetime, and even before he was born, barely a handful of citizens were reclassified. It only required a few examples to make everyone else tread the ace on the line.
Salvo’s office was shaped like a small oval with one end chopped off. He sat behind a desk, likewise an oval. At his back was a broad window framing the moonlit towers of the Enclaves. He was thumbing through a sheaf of papers and didn’t bother to look up when Kane entered.
“You may sit, Kane.”
He gestured to a chair on the opposite side of his desk. “Take off the shades.”
Kane restrained a sneer. Salvo wanted to assess his every eye flick. Doing as he was told, he sat down in the hard wooden chair, crossing one leg over the other, resting his left ankle on his right knee.