On Duty Contact, Chapter 26



“If an officer makes the wrong call, it not only affects citizens of this city, but also affects the officers themselves in ways that only someone who has walked in their shoes can fully understand. Cops are held to a higher standard of accountability than the rest of the population, as it should be. But never forget that they are people too; men and women who are subject to the same doubts and regrets that all of us are. I’m not asking for anyone to cut us slack, not at all. But a little recognition for the conditions under which our men and women operate, that’d go a long way.”

-Frank Regan, Blue Bloods.



It wasn’t a place that he had expected to find himself in, but Damien had history with the church on the corner Cleophus Avenue in Downtown Southfort. The near century old brown brick church with a light grey tiled roof was a three storeys high triangular shaped building with two spires on its front corners, the left being slightly taller with a large cross at its peak. The church had stood the test of time, the better and the worse parts of it. It had been vandalised and firebombed during the civil rights movement due to the pastor ignoring segregation laws and allowing people of all races, black, white, human and Anthromorph, to attend services there. As a result, it was considered a cultural landmark for the city, a celebration of the diversity that was so characteristic of the Centaur Valley.

Sitting alone in the middle of the fifth row from the front, Damien’s left fist was clenched with his right hand closed over it, close to his face though he was not praying. The church was deserted except for the lone priest who had merely exchanged a friendly nod with him before returning to his study. The colourful stain glassed windows that ran along the sides of the building, depicting various figures of the Christian faith were his only company. The large window behind the alter depicted an orange glowing cross with streaks of light across a blue sky, made up of hundreds of individual pieces of various shades of blue and orange. There was a low ambiance vibrating through the church, which one could interpret as the low hum of God’s breathing as he listened to those who came to worship him and seek guidance from him. He didn’t know any religious hymns apart from Amazing Grace, but he curiously found himself whispering the words of Let It Be, by the Beatles to himself, perhaps his surroundings influencing the choice of song to something somewhat related to it.


When I find myself in times of trouble
Mother Mary comes to me
Speaking words of wisdom, let it be.


Guidance and wisdom was something that many had offered Damien, but it had done little to distract him from the looming judgement that awaited him, past on him by figures of the mortal world rather than that of the divine.

Another two weeks had past, and the city had finally set a date for the Grand Jury. Today was Saturday and the jury would be held on Tuesday. Damien was to appear to give his testimony about the shooting of Tuma Caymen. His account would be only one piece of evidence that would be presented to the jury, along with crime scene reports, procedural documents, other testimonies and forensic evidence. The Grand Jury’s role was not to judge if a defendant was guilty or not, but to examine the evidence and decide if there was enough of a case to press criminal charges, whatever those charges may be. He was assured by his lawyer that there was a good chance he would escape with no charges being laid, but even if that were the case, there was always the threat of a lawsuit.
His relationship with Renamon had been somewhat interrupted during these two weeks as he had been visited several times by Internal Affairs Officers and had been to meetings with department and legal officials regarding the shooting. The conditions of his administrative leave required him to be home between 8am and 5am to be available for questioning during the week, so he and Renamon would usually not meet until after 5am so they would not be caught together and give something else to used against him. They both knew the risk, but Damien would not dare ask her to back away from him, nor would she anyway. The weekends they normally spent together, but always with a level of discretion. Damien always worse sunglasses and even dyed his hair black to reduce the chance of him being recognised while they were out in public. Renamon has suggested blonde, but he replied that doing that would make him look too much like Albert Wesker.

One thing he had particularly feared was the inevitable questions about his colleagues Bryan, Eugene and the ambush. They had of course not told anyone about it being he and Renamon who had saved their lives that night and when asked what he knew about it, Damien told them that the first he knew about it was when it was broadcast on the news the next morning. Bryan and Eugene would now be on administrative leave too due to that shooting that took place during the ambush, though so far a body had not been recovered. Few people in the neighbourhood had been willing to talk to the police for fear of being implicated in the riot or feared being targeted for speaking out. Those in the latter were appalled by the brazen attack on two of the city’s police officers and indeed praised the ‘anonymous’ good Samaritans who intervened. The Mayor had gone on television to speak about the mob that attacked two police officers and the Samaritans who had not come forward to be recognised,

“It really demonstrates the sad times we live in, when good citizens who stand up to assist our police officers in times of need, are so fearful of reprisal from their fellow citizens that they choose to remain anonymous rather than receiver the recognition they deserve”.

Renamon’s quick action with the fire hydrant had also washed away the shell casings from Damien’s weapon, which could potentially have placed him at the scene. The description of a “man with brown hair and a yellow fox girl” was mercifully vague. Nobody had recognised him in spite of the media using his photo regularly and it was not uncommon for Anthromorphs to dye their fur different colours, therefore not specifically implicating Renamon.

The thought of that reminded him of Ayana, the Zebra mare and ex stripper he had befriended. She often coloured her stripes differently before she performed, sometimes one colour, sometimes various colours. She had a rather teasing habit of using brighter colours the closer the stripes moved down her legs, where a barely visible black g-string was the only things she wore as she danced...
You’re in a church, remember?! He mentally reminded himself. Damien shuffled in his seat as he forced the dirty thoughts from his mind. He sighed apologetically as he looked up the cross in the window, though he wasn’t entirely sure why as he didn’t consider himself to be devout, owing to such escapades like the one he was trying to eject from his mind.

Other police related news had diverted some attention away from him; an early morning SWAT raid on a house connected with the kidnappings happening across the state had yielded some hope that a break in the case may be made. But aside from an officer being wounded and a suspect being killed, all that was learnt from it was that at least some of the victims had been held there and that the criminal syndicate responsible was well organised and planned ahead. The dead suspect had worked as a bouncer for a nightclub on the outskirts of town, but there was no evidence that the club was involved in any way.

More disturbing news though came from outside of town in Centaur County, where another kidnapping had occurred, this time an Anthromoprh Puma couple had been taken from their home late in the evening. A passerby reported two men showing police badges and talking to the woman of the house before being let in. The couple were gone the next morning and the local sheriff’s department stated that no officers had been sent to the address, further adding to the fear that was already unsettling the Anthromorph residents of Centaur Valley and Centaur County. Residents were now being advised to ask to see full identification of anyone who claimed to be an undercover officer and not just take them one their word for showing a badge.

Damien heard the doors behind him open and someone begin to walk up the aisle, he didn’t think to look to see who it was. More to look the part more than anything, he leaned his head foreword into his clenched hands as the soft footsteps came nearer.

“So here you are,” Renamon said sombrely as she placed a hand on the end of the row. Damien looked up in surprise as he heard her voice, seeing her standing at the end of the row, dressed in a blue shirt and her usual black vest but with more modest shorts that extended to just over her knees. She slowly walked down towards him, her hand running along the bench as she did. She took a seat beside him, curling her tail up beside herself. Damien pulled his hands down onto his lap keeping the left hand clenched.

“How did you find me?” he asked softly. She reached into her pocket and withdrew her Smartphone , which showed an active tracking app that showed a satellite map of the city, a glowing red dot blinking over the church.

“You put a tracking app on my phone?” he asked incredulously, though still quieted as he fumbled into his pocket to look at his own phone.
“So I can find where you are without having to call you,” she replied with a sly smile, “Don’t worry, it’s not because I’m paranoid,”
Damien unlocked his phone and began to scroll through the apps he had installed, trying to find the tracker she had installed. He eventually found a foreign app called Eyespy that gave his position to her. He eyed her queerly when he found it, but she only kept up her sly appearance. Damien chuckled mirthlessly,

“It’s bad enough that the government spies on me, let alone crazy girlfriends,” he said as he pocketed his phone.
“You know, that’s the first time I’ve heard you call me that,” she said casually, eyeing him with what seemed like a sense of pompous.
“Really?” he asked.

“Yes,”

“Well, why should I stop there? Maybe I should start calling you honey bunch, or snookums or maybe, I don’t know, Foxy?”
“I’m the only one gets to decide when I’m ‘foxy’,” she responded with a touch of sensuality.

“Renamon, we’re in a church,” he protested lightly. She only smiled as she sat back and stared ahead at the cross that rose overtop of them, the blue sky that it lifted up into reflecting in her eyes. There was a pause between them as the low, ambient hum settled on the church again.
“But why are we?” she asked softly, leaning forward and interlocking her fingers. Damien rested his arm on the back of the bench, stretching it behind Renamon. He pursed his lips before he spoke, “When I was a kid, Father Dewitt used to come visit all the kids who were in foster homes. Some of them were given up at birth and never knew their parents, and he would try to see if he could find them, maybe get an explanation. Some people were just in a bad place at the time and knew they couldn’t look after them, so they gave them up. Some of them took their kids back when they were found. But others... they just threw them away like they were nothing.”

“But you weren’t either of those, you told me,” Renamon said curiously. Damien nodded,

“I was one of the rare exceptions who never knew their parents because they died in a car crash when I was young, not because they didn’t want me. Somehow I think that was worst scenario; if you were abandoned but found your parents again, at least you would get to meet them and know what kind of people they were. Know if they did what was best for you or just couldn’t stomach the sight of you. You would have an answer, not just questions,”

Damien glanced up at Renamon and then down again to his clenched hand. He slowly uncurled his fingers as he bought it closer to her, revealing a silver medallion and chain that had been hidden in his palm. She leaned closer as she examined the engraving on it. On the medallion was a saint spearing a serpent with the words, “Saint Michael pray for us,” engraved around the ring of the medallion. He gently scooped it into her hands, Renamon picking it up and holding it with her index finger and thumb, turning it over and seeing the other side which depicted the same saint with a child, with the words around the outer ring saying “My guardian angel be my guide.” She rubbed it gingerly with her thumb, looking to Damien with wistful curiousness.

“Father Dewitt was like an uncle to me. I used to do errands for him around here, but he could never convince me to really get behind any of his sermons. He gave that to me when I graduated from the academy. Saint Michael is the patron saint of police officers, the protectors. He believed it would keep me safe, just as he believed God kept him safe.” Damien held his hand out for the medallion, which Renamon carefully returned to him. It sat in his open palm, the chain attached to it falling and dangling from the edge of his hand. He scooped it back up and laid it on top of the medallion.

“Two weeks on the job, Father Dewitt had a knife stuck between his ribs by some guy who wanted the church collection plate. He died on the floor of this church before anyone could help him. I can only imagine that he was thinking the same thing that I was when word reached me; why didn’t God save him? Why would he let someone like that enter a church and kill someone who devoted his life to his beliefs?”
Renamon looked solemn as Damien gloomily recounted the tragedy. She looked down at the floor as her hands pressed against each other, her tail twitching thoughtfully.

“You believe that the evil that happened here proves God’s nonexistence?” she asked.

“No,” he replied shortly, “It proves that he is fallible. They talk about intelligent design, but what kind of person would create life, a universe, people, give them guidelines to live by but tell them that they can live however they want to? Put good people like Dewitt on the same earth as bad people like the man who killed him? Only someone who is naive, misguided or cruel enough to think it’s a good idea. If we are made in his image, then he must make mistakes just like we do. Like us he has to make decisions that we would rather not make.” Damien suddenly grinned and began to chuckle lightly, shaking his head dismissively, “When did I suddenly get up on the soapbox? I’m talking like some bleeding heart,”

“No, Damien, you are talking like a human being,” Renamon interjected. Damien glanced back at her and saw the seriousness in her face, tempered by the soulful eyes that shone back at him. Her words punched a hole in his cynicism, but doubt hung over him like a black sky. Renamon reached over and put her hand over the medallion, clenching it in both of their palms. She gave him an encouraging smile which he returned in kind, but it faded all too quickly.

“I wore this every day after I graduated, but I stopped after he died. I figured if his faith couldn’t save him, how could it help someone with less faith like me? And now here I am, not even sure why, acting like maybe it will help me with the grand jury.”

“Are you really that afraid?”

Damien sighed gloomily, “I’m afraid about the choices I’ve made, Renamon,” he replied earnestly, “The choices that all lead to this; where I am now. To be with Dahlia in high school was a choice I made, a choice that might have caused her death. Becoming a cop because I wanted to stop what happened to her from happening to other people, that was my choice. And because of that, I had to choose to end somebody’s life who made the decision to do whatever he could to help his brother. I’ve killed two people in my life, Rena, and now it’s not my choice what will happen to me when the grand jury comes together to decide if I acted wrongly. I just keep thinking, were any of the choices I made wrong?” he asked, looking up at the cross as if to ask it rather than Renamon.

She watched where his eyes went and followed their trajectory until she too was looking up at the stain glassed window. In her peripheral vision she saw Damien’s fingers kneading the medallion in his palm, the metal making a soft jingling sound as he continued to stare ahead. She looked at the symbol before her that caused confliction in the mind of her partner and caused her too to reflect on the matter of religion in her own mind. Her right hand reached down and tapped the Taijitu tattoo beneath her clothing, which was supposed to have more significance to her than she knew she had. For Damien the cross was the symbol of the religion that he knew but did not understand. He acknowledged it but had not enough devotion to accept. Renamon’s homeland and her culture were heavily steeped in the Taoist religion that her tattoo’s represented and not merely the Kitsune heritage that she shared. It occurred to her that she was doing the same as him; his kneading of the medallion was no different than her placing a hand on the Taijitu of her right leg. Both appeared to have been done unconsciously, both as a result of a likeminded focus on the double edged sword that was freewill and choice.

When she had left home, Renamon had also left much of the traditions associated with her kind as well. She retained the aspects of it that suited her personality and lifestyle, namely keeping her body fit and healthy and the Taoist principals that guided her moral compass. She saw this in Damien, who had admitted to her that although he at times put on the show of being a playboy, he had never had relations with any woman who he did not care for, hence why the number of women he’d had in his life could be counted on one hand. It was those aspects of the Christian faith that had rubbed off on him, but never compelled him to truly align himself as a believer. She saw that in herself, too, perhaps it was the ingrained new age approach that came with them being of a younger generation eager to make its own path than the one that was already worn before it.

Renamon stood up slowly, her attention turned back to Damien. He turned his head slightly as she rose above him, steeping over in front of him and taking up his view. The blue background of the window took up the space around her, the cross blocked from view. The blue of her eyes was far more receptive that the glass he had been looking up to. She reached down and placed her right hand over top of the medallion.

“The choices that you’ve made, Damien,” she began sincerely, “They have done more than just lead you to your current predicament, to this place. They lead you down a path that few would want to take, to face challenges that few can conquer and makes decisions that no one else has to make. Some forced on you, but you had the courage to make them. Your choice of becoming a policeman saved the life of a young boy who else would have died. You chose to give Desta Cayman a chance to become what his brother wanted rather than hand him over. If it weren’t for that first choice you made, then you and I may never have met and I.... I may have made a very different choice than if I had met you,” she said dolefully, her thoughts turning back to when she stood on the edge of the roof of Caruthers Private Hospital, contemplating the end of her life, only the thought of the warm friendless and care shown to her by Damien the day after she was assaulted kept her from making the fatal plunge. The reopened emotional wounds of that low point of her life made her breath deep, clutching both of Damien’s hands fiercely.

“Don’t doubt yourself, Damien. Don’t think you made a wrong decision in choosing your path in life. There is no one better suited to it than you. No one seems to appreciate the good you have done for this city, but I do. You have given me a new lease on life; you gave me a reason to keep going. You have done so much for me and I know you would do the same for others because you are a good person. You’ve shown me that you are stronger than this; you showed me that I was stronger than the men who assaulted me. You saved me, Damien,” she said in her effusive yet reserved tone, her eyes being the main display of emotion. Damien lifted himself carefully, keeping hold of her hands as he stood on his feet. They both stood between the benches, standing side on to the cross overlooking them. It quickly dawned on both of them how they looked, standing like this, hand in hand inside a church, only not in the aisle.

“Is this really you, Renamon? Or has a heavenly angel taken up your form?” he grinned with a hint of playful allure, “After all I know just how heavenly it is,”

“Damien, we are in a church,” she jested, mimicking his earlier remark.

“And you know just what to say to make a man feel better about himself,” he replied. Renamon smiled warmly, “I suppose I cannot chastise you too much. We have both sinned by taking a lover to bed without being married to them,”

“Who was he?” Damien asked in feigned betrayal. Renamon rolled her eyes before she gave him a quick peck on the nose. She dropped her left hand and pulled him out with her right.

“Come on, I didn’t just come here to find out where you were,”

“Okay, what are you thinking?” Damien asked as they walked down towards the door.

“I thought you’d like for us to spend some time together before the grand jury next week,” she explained.
“Well, I guess I can’t just hide in here waiting for a miracle,” he said, “Unless that miracle is you,” he added warmly.

“Flattery will only get you so far,” she said as they walked out onto the street, turning left out of the door and walking down towards Damien’s car.
“And how far is that?” he jeered.

“A candlelit dinner at my home,” she responded brightly, “A homemade oriental dinner.”

“Sounds good,” Damien answered, “What time?”

“Oh, nine I suppose,” said Renamon as they stood beside the car.

“Does this meal include the full compliments of the house?” he asked as he opened the driver’s door. Renamon stood by the half open passenger door, giving him a sly smile and a suggestive twitch of her tail.

“We’ll have to see how the evening goes,” she replied before stepping into the car, Damien chuckling to himself as he sat down in the driver’s seat.


End of Chapter 26