96.
“Enter!”
The gruff voice on the other side of the door barked.
DI Woodley sighed and rubbed his tired eyes before downing the remainder of his stone-cold coffee. It had only been three hours since he received that phone call tipping them off about Brick, and his life had been a chaotic whirlwind ever since. And now here he was, being summoned to the commissioner's office first thing in the morning, that’s a breakfast that nobody wants. DI Woodley sighed, pushed open the door, dumped his empty coffee cup in the bin, and with a thick manila file tucked under his arm, walked across the office and stood in front of Commissioner Stephenly.
Commissioner Stephenly was rake-thin and tall. As he rose up the ranks, people nicknamed him "The Reaper" for his hollow cheeks and sunken eyes. The man was as vicious as they came, but in his defense, he was as vicious to criminals as he was to police, journalists, and any other fool who got in his way. Woodley had known him long before he became commissioner, and had worked on several task forces with him. But a bit of shared history offered very little reprieve from the commissioner's acidic words and infamous lack of patience for anything less than excellence.
"We have him in custody, sir," DI Woodley said, his voice husky from a night of barking orders. "He's currently at St. Thomas' in intensive care under guard.”
"St. Thomas'?" the commissioner said.
"Yes, sir. When we found him, he was..." Woodley stopped and swallowed dryly, thinking about the mangled mess they'd found. Brick was ziptied, his mouth flapping like a bloody piece of lunch meat. His distended jaw reminded DI Woodley of that famous bald-headed screaming picture. Woodley suppressed a shudder. “He was found with some rather nasty injuries.”
"From us?" the commissioner asked.
"No, sir. He was already like that when we found him," Woodley replied.
"Good. Chalk it up as internal beef. Make sure you take plenty of pictures, lest the scumbag tries to sue for police brutality," the commissioner said nonchalantly, shuffling some papers on his desk.
"Yes, sir. Already done," Woodley said.
"Good man," the commissioner responded. “Anyone else caught in the net?”
“We found maybe a dozen or so other known criminals, most in violation of their license conditions, a few with active warrants out for them. All battered and beaten.” Woodley replied.
"Sounds like you had a fun night," the commissioner said offhandedly while he looked through a manila file.
"Place was a war zone," Woodley said flatly. "There were bodies everywhere, but we found no evidence of who did it. All the victims were known associates of Brick and the Syndicate.”
“I would say we have to assume it was some rival gang violence," the commissioner replied before looking up at DI Woodley. "Wasn't it?” the Commissioner looked up at him with a curious look, as if prompting him to go on.
DI Woodley looked down, then cleared his throat before fixing his steady gaze on the commissioner.
"I don't believe so, sir, no.”
“Oh really?” The commissioner said and closed the manila file he had been rifling through, and sat back in his chair, meeting Woodley's gaze. He then motioned with his hand for Woodley to continue.
"The chat is already on the street, sir. This seems to be the work of the vigilante we discussed previo…”
“Ahh, the one that has been targeting low level Syndicate drug dealers?”
"Yes sir. Please, have a look for yourself," Woodley replied, handing over the thick file under his arm.
The commissioner took the file, flipped it open, and began flicking through the reams of notes and pictures. As he read, his brows began creasing and his eyes narrowed.
"What is this, Woodley?" he asked. "Have you been carrying out an investigation independently and without authorisation?”
"No, sir," DI Woodley said, his spine stiffening, his eyes looking just above the commissioner's head. "It's just that every single time I have a call about anything to do with the Syndicate, it seems to lead back to this vigilante. He seems to have been targeting their South London operations. The chaos we had 48 hours ago in the Mulberry Estate…" DI Woodley began, and the commissioner gave a single solitary nod for him to go on. "Informants have told us that was because the criminal known as Brick put a bounty on the vigilante's head: ￡100,000 dead and a quarter of a million alive. Those shootouts, the car chase, the accidents, the pub brawl, they were all in commission of said bounty."
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"And you're telling me all of those villains couldn't kill this one vigilante of yours?" the commissioner asked.
"That's correct, sir," Woodley replied smartly. "It seemed the vigilante managed to escape after that pile-up and the subsequent shootout down near the New Cross roundabout. Also sir, we believe the vigilante was responsible for the warehouse fire down by the Greenwich Docks.”
“We do?” The commissioner replied.
“Yes sir. The criminal, John Mcken, who we arrested unconscious at the scene, carried remarkably similar wounds to those men in building 4 and informants…”
The commissioner raised his hand and silenced him.
"DI Woodley, while I appreciate you have a virulent network of snitches, I need more than the word of junkies and some familiar looking bruises," the commissioner said.
DI Woodley nodded.
"We found a balaclava, sir, near the scene of the incident. It was drenched in blood.”
"Did we get a match?" the commissioner asked.
"No, sir," Woodley replied. "However, it did match the blood that we found in the alleyway the night of the shooting down Glover's Alley and blood recovered from John McKen."
The commissioner paused and ran his tongue around his mouth, and again he gave a small flick of his hand, indicating for Woodley to continue.
"We have DNA evidence to put him at the scene of at least 3 crime scenes in which Syndicate members and affiliates have been arrested, usually found beaten unconscious. We also have a picture now.”
The commissioner sat forward.
"A picture?" he said.
"That's correct, sir. It was taken somewhere around New Cross." DI Woodley fished around in his inside pocket and revealed a printout of a still image taken from a security drone. It was a grainy picture but it showed a hooded figure, bloodied and battered, stumbling through the back alleys of South London, his face barely visible.
The commissioner stared at the grainy picture and then looked up at DI Woodley. "You're saying this is our man?”
"Yes, sir," Woodley replied. "His clothes match other CCTV images we have of the vigilante, as well as videos taken on phones, etcetera."
The commissioner stared at the image again.
"This is the best picture we have of him," the commissioner asked, tapping his long index finger on the desk. "Can hardly see a bloody thing.”
"Yes, sir," DI Woodley replied. "Unfortunately, the drone camera wouldn't go any lower than that in those areas. That image is a 68-times zoom, and of course, it was dark and he was hooded.”
"And facial recognition?" the commissioner asked.
"Nothing, sir. The image is too low-res for the system to pick up anything. However, it was able to establish a few facts that we did not have previously.”
"Such as?" the commissioner asked.
"Well, he's a white male. We believe he's young, somewhere between the ages of 16 and 25, and between 5 foot 9 and 6 foot," DI Woodley said.
"So, nothing particularly useful," the commissioner sighed.
"No, sir, not really. However," Woodley continued. "I have been able to narrow the lists of suspects down quite drastically.”
The commissioner raised a thick eyebrow in surprise.
"You see, sir," DI Woodley said. "Whoever called last night, and we are assuming that it was this vigilante that called, he called me on a number for a specific crime that I had been investigating: the arson attack at the florists.”
The commissioner raised his eyebrows.
"And how many people had that number, Detective Inspector?" he asked.
"A few dozen, sir, but I can narrow him down as a resident of the Mulberry Estate. With your permission, I could investigate further…” DI Woodley let his voice trail off, his gaze still just above the commissioner’s head and his face was carefully composed in a mask of indifference.
The commissioner furrowed his brows and looked at the picture in his hand.
“Do it,” he said. “We can’t have citizens running around taking the law into their own hands, especially causing this much mayhem. But keep it silent, Woodley, if the media get a whiff that we’re taking these vigilante rumours seriously it’ll be all over the next news cycle.”
“Yes sir.”
“Our official stance is that he does not exist,” the commisioner continued. “I want the web boys on this. Any videos, images, mentions of this vigilante scrubbed. We make him disappear, understood?”
“Yes sir,” DI Woodley replied stiffly.
“Good. Bring him in, Detective Inspector, and do it quietly. I don’t need to remind you that Brick killed one of ours. Adding this vigilante into the mix could easily muddy our case and I will not have that animal walking on a technicality. Understood?”
“Yes sir.” DI Woodley bent down to collect his folder and the Commissioner placed his hand down on it.
“You have copies?” he asked.
DI Woodley nodded and straightened up before turning to the door. As he turned the handle the Commissioner said:
“What did you say they call him?”
“The… the Gutter Mage, sir.” DI Woodley replied and he heard the commissioner snort derisively from behind him.
“Honestly, these Borough people live in the stone ages. That’ll be all.”
DI Woodley walked out of the door and sighed. He closed his eyes and then opened them a few seconds later. He was back on the hunt and this time it was for The Gutter Mage.
Once Woodley had left, the Commissioner pulled an old analogue phone from a box within the bottom drawer of his desk and dialled while reading through the file.
