The paramedic tried to touch the gash on Eris Scorn's forehead. She slapped his hand away.
"I said I'm fine," Scorn rasped. She spat on the subway platform. The saliva was pink. "Wrap it or leave it. I have a crime scene to process."
The station was a circus of flashing blue lights and yellow tape. The air smelled of burnt powder and that specific, copper scent of spilled blood. SWAT teams were sweeping the tunnels, their boots heavy on the tile, but Scorn knew they wouldn't find him.
The man in the grey suit was gone. He hadn't run; he had evaporated.
"Detective," a voice barked.
Captain Velez stepped under the caution tape. He looked tired. His tie was loose, and he was holding a Styrofoam cup of coffee like it was a grenade.
"You want to tell me why I have three injured civilians, a shattered subway car, and a report about a 'firefight' in a tunnel with no bodies?"
"It wasn't a firefight, Cap," Scorn said, letting the paramedic finally tape a gauze pad over her brow. "It was an execution attempt."
"Who was the target?"
"Arvin Nyles."
Velez frowned. He knew the name. Everyone in the precinct knew the name. The mousy office worker Scorn had been shadowing for months because she thought he was the 'Shadow Killer'.
"The accountant?" Velez scoffed. "Someone sent a hit squad after an accountant?"
"Not a squad. One man." Scorn walked over to the edge of the platform, looking down at the dark tracks where Arvin and the girl had jumped. "He moved like smoke. Tactical precision. He fired four rounds. Three hit the support pillars exactly at head height. The fourth grazing me was a warning shot."
She pointed to the bullet hole in the metal stanchion next to her head.
"He missed on purpose," Scorn said quietly. "If he wanted me dead, I'd be on a slab."
"Ballistics came back on the casings," Velez said, sipping his coffee.
"And?"
"They didn't."
Scorn looked at him.
"No match," Velez clarified. "No serial numbers. The alloy isn't standard brass. Lab boys say it looks like some kind of polymer-coated composite. Military grade, but not our military."
Scorn felt a chill that had nothing to do with the drafty tunnel. "He called it 'Project Acheron'."
Velez stiffened. "What?"
"The shooter. He asked me if I knew what Project Acheron was."
Velez stared at her for a long moment. Then he crushed the coffee cup in his hand.
"Drop it, Eris."
"Excuse me?"
"Write the report," Velez said, his voice dropping an octave. "Gang violence. Two suspects fled into the tunnels. We are conducting a manhunt for the shooter."
"Captain, this wasn't a gang. This guy was—"
"Drop. It." Velez stepped closer, invading her space. "You mention 'Acheron' in an official report, and you won't just lose your badge. You'll lose your pension and your freedom. That is a flag you do not want to wave."
He turned and walked away, shouting orders at a uniformed officer to clear the press from the entrance.
Scorn stood alone on the platform. The noise of the station faded into a dull roar.
Cover up, she thought. Fast and dirty.
She climbed down onto the tracks.
"Detective!" a uniform yelled. "You can't go down there! The power is—"
"Power's off, rookie!" Scorn yelled back, not looking up. "Focus on the perimeter."
She walked to the spot where Arvin had jumped. The gravel was disturbed. She saw the skid mark where Nova had landed.
Scorn crouched. She clicked on her flashlight.
She needed to understand. Arvin Hale was a nervous wreck. She had watched him spill coffee on himself three times last week. He apologized to automatic doors when they didn't open fast enough.
And yet, tonight, he had moved with purpose. He had broken a hydraulic door seal.
Who are you really, Arvin?
Her light swept over the muck between the sleepers.
Something glinted.
It wasn't a shell casing. It was orange plastic.
Scorn reached down with a gloved hand and picked it up.
It was a prescription pill bottle. The cap had popped off in the fall, scattering the pills into the sewage water. Only one remained inside.
Scorn held the bottle up to the light. The label was wet, the ink smearing.
PATIENT: A. NYLES
DOSAGE: 100MG
INSTITUTE USE ONLY
WARNING: PSYCHO-VOLTAIC SUPPRESSANT. DO NOT DISCONTINUE.
"Psycho-voltaic?" Scorn whispered. She had been a cop for fifteen years. She had worked narcotics, homicide, and vice. She had never heard of a drug class called 'Psycho-voltaic.'
She looked at the single pill left in the bottle. It wasn't a normal tablet. It was dual-colored: one half stark white, the other a deep, bruising purple.
Scorn didn't bag it. She didn't call the CSI tech over.
She slipped the bottle into her trench coat pocket.
"Detective Scorn?"
She looked up. A SWAT leader was standing at the edge of the platform. "We've cleared the first two hundred yards of the tunnel. No sign of them. But we found something... weird."
Scorn climbed back up, her joints aching. "Define weird."
"Blood," the SWAT officer said. "About fifty yards in. A lot of it. Looks like someone smashed their hand against the concrete repeatedly."
"Self-inflicted?"
"Looks like it. But that's not the weird part."
The officer hesitated. He looked disturbed.
"There's a service door ripped off its hinges further down. Steel reinforced. Someone bent the locking bar like it was aluminum foil."
Scorn touched the pill bottle in her pocket. The plastic felt cold against her hip.
"It wasn't the shooter," Scorn said, more to herself than the officer.
"Ma'am?"
"Nothing," Scorn said. She turned toward the exit stairs. "Call off the tunnel search. They're gone. If they went into the old drainage system, they could pop out anywhere in Queens."
"Where are you going?"
"To the library," Scorn lied. "I need to look up a word."
She walked away, leaving the chaos behind her. She had a name now. Project Acheron. And she had a bottle of pills that didn't exist.
The Sheep was gone. She had a feeling she was about to meet the Wolf.