She looked at my stick and my leg, then back to me. “Yes, I’m fully confident that Commander Hicks will come to the correct decision. I’d still like us to be friends, Thursday. Together we have much to offer the service. Youth, vitality, vigor . . . and experience. See you around.”

And she left me there in an empty pause in which I was thinking up a pithy rejoinder. I did think of one, but her back had already turned and it was too late to be anything but a lame attempt to get the final word.

“Detective Smalls is the gold standard in law enforcement,” said the officer at the main desk as he watched her walk elegantly to the exit. “Can I help?”

I told him I was here for a psychiatric evaluation and showed him my ID. He recognized the name and raised an eyebrow.

“Welcome back, Detective Next. When I said Smalls was the gold standard, my comment may have been taken out of context. I really meant that she met the high standard set by your reputation.”

“You’re a terrible creep, Sergeant.”

“Thank you, ma’am.”

“Is the shrink in his usual room?”

“They moved him to the first floor,” said the officer. “Room 101. Another high-ranker is with him at the moment. We had Officer Stoker in this morning—before dawn for some reason.”

This was better news. Spike was a good friend, and like me, had also lost his job during the SpecOps disbandment.

“He’s up for the SO-17 divisional chief’s job?”

“Apparently, although as he himself says, ‘Who else would be dumb-arsed enough to take it?’”

“There might be some truth in that,” I mused. Spike’s work with the semidead, ethereal horrors, demons, bogies and vampires wasn’t everyone’s cup of tea. In fact, aside from Spike himself with my occasional assistance, it wasn’t anyone’s cup of tea. His old division of SO-17 was known colloquially as the “Suckers and Biters,” but they dealt with anything of a nominally undead or horrific nature. Despite the cuts, Officer Spike Stoker had managed to keep the phantasm-containment facilities and deep refrigeration units going in the subbasements, but only after he demonstrated precisely why there was a good reason. The councilor who was eager to make the cuts rashly took up Spike’s offer of a tour. She was struck dumb for six months. Only a fool looked into anything below the fifth subbasement.

“May I ask a question, Detective?” said the sergeant.

“Go on.”

“Why are they resurrecting SpecOps?”

“I have no idea. First floor, did you say?”

“Room 101. Don’t be too harsh with Dr. Chumley. He’s our third shrink in as many years. The last one was taken away in an ambulance. They don’t make them like they used to. Let me give you a visitor’s pass.”

3.

Monday: SpecOps

The recent smitings undertaken around the globe have caught many theological analysts by surprise, as this level of apparent interest in mankind’s affairs by the Almighty had not been seen since biblical times. The reason and purpose for the sudden reversion to Old Testamentism have spawned a thousand debates on late-night chat shows, none of which have so far provided a coherent answer. Traditionalists state that it was simply vengeance for sinful behavior, but of the eight confirmed smitings around the planet, only two locations could be described as “sinful,” leading scholars to muse on what being sinful might actually mean in the twenty-first century.