Tales of the Wide Spaces/003

"I do no bad!" the Çer wailed. "You catch for nothing!"

Anton Velasquez, who had traveled to this - a police station in Gramercy - on behalf of the Interior Ministry, just watched.

"I yam, what is word, clean! Innocent! Like baby!"

A baby who was the size of a Shetland pony, covered in dark brown scales, and who, by all accounts, had put up an impressive struggle when he'd been caught trying to drive away in a stolen car. Not only had he managed to hotwire it, but had nearly twisted himself into a pretzel trying to fit into the human-designed driver's seat.

"Find mother, mother tell! I am innocent since child!"

It was only a blessing he'd hit a street lamp across the street at 5 km/h before hitting anything or anyone else.

"City-spirits, they know I good! Make offerings, they will tell!"

Velasquez sighed, feeling it necessarily to make a token defense of reality. "I understand that you were in the car when the officers arrived. Why was that?"

The Çer barely hesitated. "I try to catch thief."

"Who was, in fact, not in the car?"

"He very sneaky."

"And you tried to escape the officers because...?"

"Because thief get away! They ignore! Bad po-leese!"

Velasquez fought the urge to put his face in his hands. While the Çer's inability to keep his mouth shut very closely fit what he'd been expecting to find, it was painful to hear it in action. "I hate to tell you this, Mister...?"

Now the Çer hesitated. At last, he supplied, "Goodperson."

"...Mr. Goodperson?"

"Is me, yes."

"...right. Fine. I hate to tell you this, Mr. Goodperson, but the good officers here tell me that they saw no one else near the car, and that, in fact, they saw you from the point that the car started to move. What do you say to that?" He held up a hand. "I should add that supplying yet further false information here will only worsen the trouble you're in."

The Çer, mercifully, went silent, looking uncertain.

Velasquez added, in a quieter voice, "Is this the kind of situation that the followers of Tweeter's own 'MiteyCer' would expect him to be in?"

The Çer's head jerked upright, the antennae going stiff with anger. "What? Who say?"

Velasquez held up a smartphone. It was clearly an old one, and even more clearly had been through a lot. It was battered and chipped and worn; parts of the screen were cracked, parts of the case abraded by windborne sand, the color faded by harsh sun. "You were still signed in on this."

The Çer deflated, his head sinking to the level of the desk. "Is my square," he muttered.

"Look," Velasquez said, placing the phone on the desk quite deliberately out of its owner's reach, "can we start again? As things stand, you're going to be locked up for a while based on the evidence against you. But I might be able to get you a deal... provided you're honest with me. Now: what is your proper name?"

The brown Çer looked away, silent. For a time, Velasquez thought he might be refusing to answer, but in a small voice the creature finally said: "I yam Savod, son of Keçli."

"And you are the owner of the phone and of the MiteyCer account on Tweeter?"

Savod continued to avoid Velasquez' gaze. "...yes."

"And why did you go for the car?"

Savod finally looked up, staring into his eyes, and twisted his head to one side in what Velasquez understood to be a kind of shrug. "I get bringed to Grammer-see after leaving desert. They split up pack, put into many rooms. Cannot roam in city. Cannot hunt in park. Want food, must buy. To buy, must have money. Guvmint give some, but not much. Many ovareshid no hire Çer with no reading, no writing, no schooling. I go for car because I want no hunger."

Velasquez nodded. It wasn't as if it were a new story - poverty was a trap of lots of people, and it was all the worse when, like the Çerid, you didn't know the rules.

"Would it help those in your position, then," he asked, "to start somewhere else? Maybe somewhere where you would be dealing mostly with other Çerid?"

Savod eyed him coldly. "If you send back to Çeridgul-"

"No, no," Velasquez intrerrupted. "Relations with Antakia are still very strained, and we understand that Çeridgul is a bit crowded these days. No, we didn't take you in just to try to send you back. But you aren't doing well where you are."

Savod worked his jaw, peering closely at the Interior agent. "Awto Nomous State?"

Velasquez smiled faintly, and leaned back in his chair. Savod might have a bit of a run-on mouth, but he apparently wasn't stupid. "The Çerid Autonomous State, yes."

The Çer gave him a look that he interpreted as profoundly skeptical. "Is no such ting. Fairy tale, dream-smoke."

"It doesn't exist yet. That doesn't mean it won't." He leaned forward again. "Once the current bunch of bills makes it through the Cortes, in fact, it'll become official. It's only a matter of time."

Savod eyed him shrewdly, and then sat down on the floor across the desk from him, like a cat. "You want MiteyCer to tell Çerid: go to this place, is good, everyone happy-happy. Yes?"

Velasquez smiled more broadly. "It would be helpful, yes. We would be willing to consider compensation for your efforts. The Interior Ministry would advise law enforcement here to consider it a kind of community service in lieu of jail time. You get paid, we get the assistance of a popular well-known voice in the Çer community, the Çerid get a head start on a piece of territory under their own control and due for some federal funds, and the locals here don't get their cars stolen. So: happy-happy, as you put it."

The brown Çer looked thoughtful. Finally, his antennae lifted and curled, and while Velasquez was not familiar with the expression, he would not have been surprised to find that it was the equivalent of a mischievous grin.

"Must see before I buy, of course," he replied at last. "Not want to add-ver-tize bad product."