//------------------------------//
// 8. Irrefutability 
// Story: That Maverick With The Dog 
// by Dan The Man 
//------------------------------//


8 - Irrefutability


The naturalist with the grey stubble beard bowed over the hair sample, resting on a petri dish under a portable microscope.
With a giddy look, he mumbled some thoughts to himself as he analysed the piece of fibre.

Helen stood behind him, slowly swaying from side to side, awaiting his judgement with her arms still crossed.

"Now... the first thing I have to say about this hair is... get ready for this."

"Well, Mr Derry?"

He tapped on his thighs with his hands as he leaned back a bit oin the sofa he was sitting on.
"I personally cannot believe this, but this hair is a hundred percent real. It's mammalian, the follicles have perfectly naturally raspberry - the colour, mind you, not the fruit - pigmentation, it's apparently curly by nature as well, and it's from an equine."

Helen couldn't believe what she heard.
"Are... are yo absolutely sure?"

"Missy. 64's the diploid number of chromosomes in this strand of hair. So it stems either from a horse... or from a chinchilla, a fennec fox, an echidna or a spotted skunk - the former three of which do not exist on this continent, and the latter of which does not live in these latitudes."
He shrugged.
"In other words, it must be from a horse."

The government agent curiously stepped closer to the microscope, and looked into the rose thread in the petri dish.
"But is there even such a thing as raspberry horse hair?"

"Damned if I knew. Not anything I'm familiar with, however. It's awfully interesting though, isn't it? One explanation is that it's mutated -  a product of multi-generational breeding and genetic manipulation. And even that isn't sure!" he explained, exhaled, and put his sunglasses back on.
"And if I were you, I'd think about sending this to the Institute of Biological Studies, or maybe the Department of Environmental Affairs. The choice is yours. Both'd be hard pressed to find out more about this... specimen."

"No, but thanks. I think I can handle this." Helen said immediately. Who was she kidding?
"Thank you for your professional opinion."

As the pudgy next-door naturalist in the shorts and the polo shirt was escorted back out of the house, Helen took one last, in-depth look at the hair before turning away.
So it was all true. That what she had suspected, seemingly out of nowhere... it was true.
Strange, that she didn't seem any more 'flipped out' by this. She felt underwhelming.

Did this mean that there had in fact been creatures in this house that had never been seen before on this planet earth?
Maybe her colleague wasn't bullshitting as much as she had thought. Maybe Brian wasn't beeing as metaphorical as she had thought.

It may not have made sense, but the proof was there.

Where were Fisher and her colleague, anyway? Were they still in the kitchen? How long were they in there.
As she thought about it, she moved absent-mindedly, like in a trance, to the door of the makeshift interrogation room. Determined to tell everyone of this newest breakthrough, no matter how absurd it was, she knocked and opened.
"Fitz? I... uhm..."

She saw her colleague standing at the window, slightly bent forward, head drooping, leaning with both arms on the windowsill. Brian still sat at the kitchen table, looking at Helen with the surprise of the moment.

On one hand, Helen still wanted to avert her eyes from the suspect, but on the other hand, she wanted to return his gaze. After all he had been through... she now was all the more interested in seeing who he was, and how he was...

"What?" her colleague confronted her roughly, ripping her out of her thought.

"Can you step out for a moment? I want to show you something."

"Yeah."
At first, Fitzgerald hesitated, but then he swiftly let go of the windowsill and moved to his colleague in the doorway, combing his hair back nervously as he went. He ignored Brian as he swept past him energically, abandoning him at the kitchen table without as much as a glance. 

Helen held the door open for him. She looked Brian one last time in the eyes. He looked back at her, his eyes inquisitive, somewhat forlorn, seemingly having forgotten how mad he should be at her. 
Then she gently closed the door to the kitchen.

Fitzgerald paced back and forth in the living room, as if he tried to digest something as it slipped down his food tract with agonising slowness.

"Fitz?"

"Yes?" he replied as he jerked his head towards her, like he had been snapped out of light sleep.

"I think we may have something here."

"Yeah. I also think that."

"Really?" Helen asked, her eyed widening in surprise. 
She pointed at the mobile laboratory on the desk behind her.
"I had the-"

"We have something, alright." he repeated, interrupting her, pacing down again near her.

She felt his tension. The unease heightened with each of his steps.
"What is wrong, Fitz?"

He gave the closed kitchen door a disgusted aside glance.
"Fisher. That son of a bitch." he hissed.
"He has been blowing us hot and cold. Blowing me hot an cold!"

"Why? What did he say?"

He ignored her question.
"Look here. This is what happed. This is what actually happened in Pleasance.
This guy is a loser, a wreck. He sits in his shithole of a hometown, with an illegitimate daughter, and no future prospects. He is a loner, antisocial. His parents died away from him years earlier. He is obsessed with this show you're so obsessed with, My Little Pony.

"Now hold your horses, Fitz." Helen tried to stop him.

"Let me finish. Right now, in there, he has given me a five minute lecture about the symbolism of the sonic rainboom in the show. It's about... uh... coming of age, it's about maturity, about times changing, changing for the better. Bear with me here. He also very apparently has a complex with his late parents. An obsession because his mother was a dreamer, an idealist, just like him. She drew pictures of rainbows. One of them is hanging right there, on that wall over there. He cried me a river about how his life reeled out of controlled after she died. And he is think it's only the rest of the world that has spiralled out of control. Do you follow?"

"No. Not one bit." Helen said strictly.
"What are you talking about? How does this pertain to anything?"

Fitzgerald took a step closer.
"He wanted his old life back. His mother's rainbows. He somehow acquired this daughter I told you about, named her Rainbow. But not after his mother's work, but after the one in the show. He wanted to his world to change for the better, to be a happier place. So what does he need? A sonic rainboom, that's what!"

"Fitzgerald!" his partner barked fretfully and glared at him.
"What is this?"

"It's the motive." he remarked, with a strangely hyped smile.
"The motive to all of this. The orchestrated explosion, his lost, estranged daughter. He just had to build up this... this mythology in his life based on that of the show, so that he could experience what the characters in the show have experienced. It all makes sense. The rainboom!"

"Bullshit." Helen said slowly.
"Th... think about what you're saying. You're saying this all isn't real!"

"It's real to none other than him, Helen. Yes, this is exactly what I'm saying."

"Then how did he make the bomb? Where did he get the materials from? The knowledge? Think about it!"

"I have." Fitz simply said.
"We will get this little shit. We're so close I can smell the explosives."

"Well, there are no explosives." Helen said exasperatedly.
"Matheson searched everything; the cupboards, the floor, and the walls. There were no explosives, and no detonators. We don't have anything on him. Not even a goddamn pistol!"

For a split second, Fitz was put off.
But not put off for long, as she stumbled to continue his thought.
"Then we dig up his garden, his acres! Yes, I'm sure he planted more things there than just baby trees! He is guilty, and I know it!"

"Jesus, let it slide!" she reprimanded him, like she was restraining a snappy dog.
"He is clean." 
She turned and pointed to the microscope.
"He is afflicted, yes, but not in the same way. Let me show you this instead."

Fitzgerald followed her pointing hand indignantly, staring at the assembled lab for a long moment.

"This is real, Fitz." she assured him, a tad gentler.
"Just like you said earlier. And I didn't believe you then. But this... I had the hair under the refrigerator examined."

For a moment, it seemed like Fitz had stopped in his tracks. One moment he still seemed jumpy, furious even, but now he seemed to have little more left in his hands to rave about.
"This... is not real, Helen." he persisted, although silently and hoarsly.
"Don't tell me I ever told you something different."

"I had the hair samples tested. They're equine, and naturally coloured."

He looked at her blankly.

"Here's the proof. Right under that microscope."

"Proof..." he huffed.
"Spare me."
Then he simply turned around, and walked out the door. 

"Fitz."

Before she could stop him, he was in the garden in front of the house, beckoning several policemen to him.

Helen didn't know what had happened that her colleague could have snapped so violently. But she had to find out more about this truth somehow. She had to see Brian, before the colleague decided to haul him behind the house to continue with the interrogation.

Brian was still in the kitchen, slumped over the kitchen table, holding his head in his arms. He was at the end of his wits.
Carefully, Helen crossed into the kitchen, and pulled up Fitzgerald's chair across from him.

"Mr Fisher..." she spoke as she sat down.

He didn't respond. His face was still buried in his hands.

"Brian..."

"What do you want?" he hissed.

"We... we found bodily material under the fridge, which... which indicated that there really were creatures here that... do not seem to exist in this world."

"Oh?" the suspect remarked scornfully.
"So tell me. Was the letter and and the photo album not enough of a dead giveaway already?!"

"With that, Brian, I mean that we believe you. I believe you..."

"Oh, good."

She shuffled her legs. It must have all seemed so blatantly obvious to him, no matter how new it appeared to her.
"I know there were no... explosive devices involved."

He shook his head slowly, his eyes popping up from behind his fingers.
"So what now? I know that I'm screwed either way. You don't need to come and tell me in which way."

"How come? Why do you think that?" Helen inquired.

"Either, that psycho boyfriend of your's is going to have me thrown in jail for fucking terrorism, or... everyone will know about Dashie. Everyone..."

"But didn't you... didn't you tell me your Dashie was 'safe'? Where is she now?"

"Somewhere where you can't hurt her!" he answered spitefully.

"But if she is safe, why do you worry?"
She bowed in closer, trying for a more emotional approach.
"Brian, let me assure you. I doubt that anything is going to happen to you. You are not a terrorist. We cannot incarcerate you for something you didn't do."

"Oh, Agent Fitzgerald begs to differ though."

"That isn't a problem. Agent Fitzgerald is... somewhat under pressure right now. In any case, he want just the same thing as me. To keep this country safe from danger. Of course, if there is no danger, there is no reason for you to be worried."

Brian finally put his hands down on the table. His tired eyes looked down as well.

"Officially, Brian, the only thing that connects you to any of this is that you were there at the time. Nothing more."

"I think we both know there's more to that than that."

"Yes. And yet, we can't fault you for that in court. As far as the law is concerned... Dashie does not exist."

"I got it." he slurred.

Brian looked out the kitchen window. He noticed someone scurrying around the garden, carrying a spade on his shoulder. He directed some of the constables roughly with his hands ordering them to spread out on the premises.

Helen followed his stare, then returned to him.
"I think Agent Fitzgerald didn't believe you. I think he didn't want to believe your story."

Brian nodded slightly.

"Tell me. How did it all come to be? Dashie, I mean? Where did she come from?"

He stifled a smile.
"I found her sleeping in a cardboard box on 7th street. She was about..." he raised his hand a foot over the table top, "...this high? The box had a message, that whoever finds this, should good take of her."

"In a box?" Helen said, and smiled a bit herself.
"How do you think she got there?"

"Would you believe me if I told you it was because of a botched experiment conducted by Twilight?"

Helen giggled.
"Yes. Yes, I would. And when you said she was at 'a better place' now, what did you mean? She didn't... pass away, did she?" she asked and looked at him with an awkward expression.

"No no. I meant Equestria. She went back there. She was... well... rescued, per se."

"And by whom?" Helen inquired, thinking back to the pink hair under the fridge.
"Pinkie Pie?"

"Pinkie Pie... Fluttershy... Rarity... Twilight... and Applejack. And Princess Celestia."

"Wow... even Applejack." she sniggered, a bit overwhelmed by all the presences.

Brian raised his arms a bit.
"I know, if I told  something like this to anyone else, they'd have me committed straight away!"

"No, please." Helen insisted.
"Tell me more."

He glanced through the opened dor to the living room.
"One day, they stood in front of my door. All six of them. After only, what, fifteen years of waiting?"

"Waiting?"

"I looked forward to that happening. In a way, I expected little less to happen."

"But why did they take fifteen years?"

"Well..." 
Contemplatively, he rested his chin on his arm.
"I know it's definitely not true... but in a way, maybe they wanted to grant me some time with her. Well, maybe not they themselves, but... the universe. Call it poetic justice." he added with a smile.
"I didn't need more time with her, no matter how often I tell myself how much I wanted more."

Helen nodded.
"I think i know what you mean. Do you think it had some kind of... purpose that she was here?"

"I don't know. But I have learned so damn much while she was around... about family, friendship, authority, responsibility, protection, faith, pride, love, determination, happiness,... it does almost seem like it, doesn't it? Not to mention, reality. I see the world from an altogether different angle now. I see it... from third person view, if you know what I mean."

"I dare almost say, there is little that could still surprise you, now."

He shook his head.
"No, no. I think it taught me to never stop being surprised, and always to expect the totally unexpected. Because exactly that can fuel a life." 
He hesitated. Helen noticed ow his lip quivered for a short moment.
"I should have gotten out sooner. Damn it, what was I doing?"

Helen looked at him quizzically, trying to determine an answer.

"After Dashie left, I... I guess I just stopped living. Coping with the new life it took in about all my time. So much for the lesson I was taught. The change shouldn't have come too quickly or early for me. But I wasn't used to much else but Dashie. A life with her was all I knew to do right."

"Brian. Nobody's perfect. Not even you. You did a good job doing what you did. Expertise in anything needs time. And what you need now, is help, that's all. You can start a new living... as soon as all this has blown over, of course."

"Help..."
Brian hesitated for a moment with an answer. Then he looked at her with a disbelieveing raised eyebrow.
"Wait a minute. When you were in town and you old me you were a psychologist, you weren't just bullshitting me, were you?"

She simply smiled, and swayed her head thoughtfully from side to side while looking for a suitable reply.
"Yes, and no. Though I do have an adress in Bayneck, just in case. So not everything I told you was bullshit. In my line of work... you pick up a lot of psychological know-how the more you interact with other people. You understand."

"You mean poor arseholes... like me?" Brian snarked.

"Yeah... more or less. Though they aren't exclusively poor."

He replied with another stifled grin.
"So you still want to help me... once this 'blows over'?" he attempted to clarify.
"Why?"

"Because, while some things will blow over... like most of the suspicions against you... others, won't." She nodded at the open kitchen door.
"I cannot guarantee how we would continue with the evidence we found here. You may be out of the woods, but I know how much it still concerns you."
She pointed at him with a finger.
"She is your little Dashie."

Brian looked back down at the kitchen table.
"I... thanks."

"Don't mention it."

Heavy shoes vibrated on the ground as they moved towards the room. In a matter of seconds, Fitzgerald's form stood in the doorway. In his hand, he still held the spade, even though now it was plastered with earth. He held the same sore, bitter glare as when he left. So he still didn't find what he was looking for.

Helen nodded at him slightly, then looked back to Brian.
"I mean it though. Don't mention it." she said quietly. Then she reached into a pocker under her blazer, and pulled out something metallic.
She laid the pair of hinged handcuffs onto the table, between her and her suspect.

Brian froze, with a scared expression on his face.

"Brian..."
She motioned discretely at her partner.
"I'm afraid you must still come with us, for one or the other formality."

"And why the cuffs?" Brian inquired nervously.

"Well..." Again, she discretely directed him to her colleague.
"It would save us all some some work, if you could just... slip those on for the way."

'Let them believe what they have to believe.' came back to his mind, flashing across his inner eye.
Brian turned to look at the expecting, nearly hungry eyes of the other government agent knifing him in his back. 
'Grab him!' they shouted. 'Grab that bastard and don't let him go!'

Then he slowly reached out for the cuffs.
"Alright. I get it."

"Thank you." 'Helen answered nearly voicelessly. Despite that, there was legitimate gratefulness and humility in her thanks.
Slowly, she got up, and walked behind him, cuffing his hands behind his back under the watchful eyes of her partner.

+++

Brian closed his eyes and breathed heavily as he was led out of the kitchen by two very different hands. One, meek and small, held on to his right shoulder, and the other one, forceful and cramped, grabbed on to his left. In the living room, the policemen were looking at im with sneering faces, the same way one would smile at a mighty tiger that was trapped in zoo cage, as he was paraded past them. 
The merciful afternoon sunlight descended on his face as they reached the doorstep of his house. From the corner of his eye, he noticed a man in a uniform jacket drawing his camera and framing him the side - shortly before the camera was jerked away by the exasperated agent Fitzgerald's other hand with a short curse.

Brian and the two government agents reached a green limousine that parked several meters down the driveway. Helen opened the door for him, and Fitzgerald seized his head and pushed him into the seat, before roughly gurting him to it.

A last time, Brian looked out of the car's dyed windows, and let the spring blossoms of the oaks and acorns above him sink into his psyche. Celestia's beaming sun was still reaching inside the car, breaking through the dark-brown windows and touching his skin like a soothing, warming hand. Slowly, he relaxed his muscles and sunk back into his seat with an almost apathetic content. It was all goind to be okay. 
All would be just right.

He mumbled an almost inaudible 'Thanks...' before the car door flew shut with a forceful thud.

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