NURSERY CRIMES

It's been a long night. The rain has somehow managed to get down the back of my neck even through my deathsuit, and I'm so tired that I could about go to sleep standing right here in the street - if I wanted to wake up with most of my more valuable major organs missing, obviously. I turn down the alley that cuts between the two roads; somehow, the shadows seem to press a little closer tonight.

"Goosey goosey gander, whither will you wander?"

What the..? Reflexes flying on fatigue poisons have the Ofanite in my hand almost before I realise it.

"Upstairs, downstairs, in my lady's chamber..."

The voices - they sound almost like children. Not that that's any comfort, not here, not Downtown.

"There I met an old man, who wouldn't say his prayers..."

It sounds like a nursery rhyme, but not one I've ever heard. I scan around the alley, trying to see where the voices are coming from. They have a strange quality, echoing almost.

"So I took him by the left leg, and threw him down the stairs."

Yeah, that sounds like a Mort nursery rhyme. Violence towards those who won't play the game. But I won't perpetuate the stereotype; not here, certainly not against children. Suddenly I feel sick of the whole thing. Ramming my pistol back into its holster, I walk purposefully out of the alley, leaving the echoing voices behind.

--As the ebon walks away, the young/old woman watches with a playful smile. Behind her, the man says "You see? That one won't serve your master. He loves good order too much."
"Perhaps," the woman says. "But he won't serve your master either. He thinks for himself."
"Something new, then," the man says.
"Or maybe something old," the woman counters.
"But either way..."
"...something to watch."
They settle into the companionable silence of people who have been enemies so long that they have become friends. And they watch.--

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