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Tuesday: Eleven Days Before the First Wave

Chapter 3

The Faded Flotsam

of Absent Lives

The heat was unbelievable.

Conan had landed in Ord City on the Monday afternoon and gone to the Kimberley Grand Hotel where he had a room on the 11th floor.

The next morning, he opened the door onto his small balcony and was assailed by the crushing heat and humidity. Within seconds the sweat began to bead on his brow and under his arms, but he stayed outside to acclimatise and get a feel for the city, which looked and smelled like Hong Kong or Bangkok. Buildings were clustered together in a riot of town planning and the hot breeze brought him wafts of car fumes, blocked drains and alien cooking. The streets below were choked with traffic and people, and Conan was momentarily shocked that a modern first world country like Australia could allow so much haphazard progress with so little order. Once the doors were open to the teeming desperate hordes the planning and order would always be in catch-up mode.

The city was mostly characterised by apartment blocks and bamboo scaffolding, but there was a CBD of some taller towers, the football stadium further south, and the Army of God cathedral with its huge red and yellow neon cross – that always reminded Conan of hamburgers.

Allowing his eyes to wander, Conan beheld the sun sparkling on Lake Argyle. To the far north there was maybe a glimpse of the Timor Sea. To the far south, the Ord River disappeared into the dim red distance, but in the middle, Ord City seethed and bubbled – two and a half million getting rich or getting by, as they always had at home.

For many of them – the First Wave as they were known – full citizenship was only days away.

And the city was getting nervous.

• • •

Edward Loong was the Head of Mission at the AFP headquarters in Ord City and was not overjoyed to make Conan’s acquaintance.

‘You must be Tooley,’ he said, ignoring Conan’s hand.

‘Call me Tools,’ said Conan. ‘Everyone else does.’

‘Call me Loongy,’ said Edward, ‘Very few call me that.’

‘Doesn’t really roll off the tongue,’ said Conan, unsure of whether Loongy was being friendly, or not.

‘You’d think it would by now,’ said Edward. ‘I’m sixth generation Australian after all … what about you, Buddy?’

‘Dunno … third or fourth … not that it matters.’

‘Oh, it matters,’ insisted Edward, ‘… more than ever.’

Conan laughed, still uncertain whether ‘Loongy’ was having a laugh or oddly paranoid about his ethnic heritage.

‘What’s so funny?’ demanded the head of the AFP mission.

‘Oh, nothing. Anyway, what’ve you got for me?’

Edward’s eyes narrowed. He suspected Conan was taking the piss somehow.

‘I don’t know why Sydney thought they had to send someone up here,’ he complained. ‘This case is already designated overflow … a straightforward gang execution … dime a dozen. You should go back and look after Sydney crime.’

‘I will,’ said Conan, ‘… as soon as I can. But in the meantime, I’ve been sent up to fly the flag.’

‘Politics,’ spat Edward.

‘Politics,’ agreed Conan and shrugged. He was already irritated by the distance, the crowds, the weird smells and the heat – now he had Edward’s chip to deal with.

Edward muttered something to himself then slid a couple of plastex files across the desk. There was a code on the covers that he could use to access the record bank – the files contained a small number of personal effects found on the bodies. Both men had been Malay Chinese and, apparently, close friends. They had not been known to police as gang members, but everything about their deaths suggested gangland execution. The location, the butchered throats, but most importantly, the DR carved into both of their foreheads. And both had had their left eyes removed.

‘Didn’t that strike you as odd?’ asked Conan, trying to conceal a shudder as he placed the forensic photographs face down on the file.

‘What?’

‘The DR brandings … but also the eyes removed? Bit of a mixed message, wouldn’t you say?’

Edward laughed.

‘Thank God for Sydney,’ he sneered, ‘sending us their finest officer to shine a torch through the darkness!’

‘You don’t think it strange that the bodies bear the marks of two different groups?’

‘Just part of the usual fun and games up here … Tools.’

‘Left eye missing suggests Habal Tong radicals,’ continued Conan, determined to understand the local customs. ‘It means the victims saw something they shouldn’t have?’

‘Their tongues were cut out also,’ reminded Edward, with a grim smile.

‘But they had DR carved on their foreheads. That’s the mark Dedd Reffo leave … but Dedd Reffo and Habal Tong are mortal enemies.’

‘Habal Tong are enemies of no one,’ insisted Edward, ‘… except to those who betray their secrets.’

‘The point is,’ said Conan, ‘presuming these blokes weren’t killed by a coalition of two opposing groups … why would both marks be inflicted on the bodies?’

‘As a warning,’ said Edward, as though the answer was too obvious for words.

‘A warning to whom?’

‘To everyone.’

• • •

‘Here are the extra files you wanted.’

Conan sat in a spare office grudgingly provided by the AFP who mostly worked in an open plan environment. Hovering in the doorway was Loongy’s deputy – Agent Ping – who placed a couple of plastex boxes on the desk.

Agent Ping was tall and slim with dark eyes endlessly amused.

‘What’s it like having Loongy for a boss?’ asked Conan, carelessly allowing his irritation to show.

‘Loong’s not so bad,’ shrugged Agent Ping, ‘… as long as you know your place.’

‘My place seems to be the bottom of his shoe,’ said Conan, ‘and he’s trying to scrape me off.’

‘Very funny,’ said Agent Ping, and left without laughing.

The plastex files lay open on the desk in front of him – the two murdered men had not carried much on their persons. Both had wallets with plastic and paper cards. One had a number of sticky notes covered in tiny Asian characters and the other (written in English) had a folded list of names, dates and numbers, which was described in the file as a barter record.

He sent the sticky notes to be translated and considered the next item – a business card of one of the murdered men (Michael Wing Ho, importer) with blurred handwriting on the back. The thing that interested him about the card was where it had been found – in his shoe, according to the file. Clearly it was important to the victim if he had taken the trouble to hide it and, as it was his own business card, the importance could only lie in the illegible handwriting.

He placed the card back in its forensics bag and sent it off with the sticky notes to be hyperlit, magnified and translated – to the extent that was possible after the sweat from Wing Ho’s feet had caused the ink to run.

The toxicology report listed nothing unusual with the exception of alcohol and traces of Crimson – the latest designer drug – in their blood.

The last thing in the file was a list of phone records for the month. The two men had called each other frequently but it was the last calls that interested Conan. Bruce Fong’s last three calls had been to Wing Ho, but Wing Ho’s last call had been to an unidentified number.

Just for the shits and giggles, Tools tried the number and was unsurprised when the recorded voice informed the number was no longer in use. He dialled another number and found himself talking to Lucia back in Sydney.

‘Hey Conan?’

‘Hey Lucia.’

‘What can I do for you?’

There was a hint of suggestion in her voice, despite the risk, and Tools grinned, genuinely fond of her.

‘I need a trace on a number.’

He read the number out and heard her groan.

‘What’s wrong?’

‘That’s a cryp.’

‘Is that a problem?’

‘No … just a hassle.’

Cryp numbers were unhackable quantum generated numbers – constantly changing. If you dialled the number and were accepted by the owner, then a regular ping would be sent by the owner’s phone to your phone to update and thus allow you to go on calling.

‘Do you have the phone from which the number was called?’ asked Lucia.

‘No.’

Another groan.

‘Okay,’ she sighed, ‘I’ll do my best, but you owe me.’

‘I already owe you.’

‘Well, at some point I’ll be calling in your tab, Conan Daniel Tooley. And I hope you’ll be man enough to honour your debt.’

There was a supercharged silence of several seconds as Conan wondered how to respond in a way that would continue the subtle flirting without putting their jobs in jeopardy. Calls into the Sydney office were routinely monitored for security purposes.

‘You know me, Lucia Francesca Baresi,’ he eventually replied. ‘I’m a man of my word and will stand ready to serve you when I return.’

‘Truly?’

Conan winced at her change of tone and said, ‘Gotta go. Let me know if you trace the number.’

He hung up and reviewed the meagre contents of the files. Not much to go on without the translations he’d requested. He drummed his fingers against the desktop for a few moments, then jumped up and walked back to Loongy’s office.

‘Hey, Tools is back! What you want, Sydney investigator?’

‘I need to have a look at their flat.’

‘Whose flat?’

‘Fong and Wing Ho … the dead blokes.’

‘What for?’

Conan just stared at Loongy for a few moments, then shook his head to clear it of the Through the Looking Glass imagery he was getting.

‘It’s standard procedure, Loongy … check out the victim’s home … try to get some insight. Who knows what we’ll find.’

‘It’s already been checked. There was nothing … just Habal Tong crap.’

‘You’ve been?’

‘It’s standard procedure … like you said.’

Conan leaned against Loongy’s door, trying to imply that he was comfortable – with no intention of going away.

‘There was nothing in the files from the flat.’

‘So?’

‘So … I’d like to see for myself.’

Loongy shrugged, as though indulging a madman, and said: ‘Not today, I’m busy. Maybe tomorrow.’

‘You don’t need to come. I have checked out dead men’s flats before.’

‘Oh, but I do need to come,’ smiled Loongy, unpleasantly.

‘Politics?’

‘Politics.’

• • •

There being little else he could usefully do, Conan decided to go and have a look at the derelict house where the bodies had been found.

Walking the streets of Ord City was like walking the streets of any oversize Asian city – hot, smelly and teeming with people. Initially a series of camps around Kununurra and Wyndham, Ord City had exploded since 2023 as refugees flooded in from the north and dollars poured in from all over the world – keen to invest in the infrastructure needed to house, feed, clothe and entertain a major new city on the northern edge of Australia.

‘Incredible,’ muttered Conan to himself as he pushed through the hordes of happy, pissed off, impatient, tolerant, temporary citizens – some of them less than two weeks from full citizenship.

There was graffiti everywhere, like any other city, but it was simply impossible to make out meaning in a multitude of scrawls and styles. Only occasionally did he see English, and that was usually just initials. AINANIA was everywhere – whatever that meant – but it was frequently crossed out or overscored with DEDD REFFO or just DR.

Conan had always taken an interest in graffiti. From his earliest days as a police detective (before transferring to the feds) he had picked up on gang information which the members had happily advertised on walls, assuming no one in authority would understand. Conan understood, which had led to a number of successful arrests and a fast-tracked career.

For a while.

But he was still naturally interested in how the people of the streets communicated and took his time getting to the back-lane address which had been scribbled on Michael Wing Ho’s card.

AINANIA he saw again and again, and suddenly twigged its meaning – ‘all is nothing and nothing is all’ – the most fundamental principle of Habal Tong.

Perhaps the most interesting thing about Ord City was the way so many different races and cultures had blended in such a short time, despite so many ancient conflicts. The reason for the new harmony was mostly attributed to Habal Tong, according to numerous documentaries on religious integration and tolerance, but there was a darker side. Having combined all the best features of its component faiths, HT devotees were confident that they had synthesised the perfect philosophy, free from the trademark doubt that fluttered in the hearts of other believers. This confidence sometimes bred an unpleasantly arrogant fanaticism which was unsettling for the mainstream Australian population, already getting nervous about the imminent First Wave being released into wider society. There were mutterings about embracing Australian values before being let loose and any number of powerful voices were raised in protest. Not least the far right radical group – Dedd Reffo – who were dedicated to keeping refugees out of Australia. They had purchased a submarine from Somalian pirates (renamed the HMAS Eureka) and since 2024 had been sinking refugee boats in international waters, polarising the mainstream community. Most condemned them for cold-blooded mass murder, but others encouraged them and dinner party conversations in Sydney and Melbourne were getting increasingly heated.

The other polarising issue was the number of disaffected Australian youth who were converting to Habal Tong, spouting its tenets like counter-cultural axioms to rock the establishment. The biggest surprise of the 2025 census was the decline in those who regarded themselves as atheist or agnostic.

And clearly, all of those same battles were playing out in graffiti daubed on the walls of Ord City.

‘And the murder statistics,’ thought Conan as he arrived at the house in Ruddock Lane where the two men had been found, bearing the marks of two violently opposed groups.

It was an evil looking place – burned out and abandoned – and Conan forced himself to ignore the irrational tremors as he walked up the short path, littered with bottles, cigarette butts, syringes, hundreds of little Crimson vials and the faded flotsam of absent lives. The house, of course, was covered in graffiti, with AINANIA and DR the only writing he could make out amid the many alien daubings.

There was blue police tape across the entrance but it was unguarded, meaning the police were no longer interested in the place. That also was odd, reflected Conan, who was beginning to wonder why he’d been sent up when no one seemed to have any interest in the case.

Inside, the house stank of charred wood, damp and urine. There were scores of discarded needles, vials and a carpet of broken glass. Rubbish was piled in every corner and two mildewed mattresses were red-brown with old blood. Conan knew from the file that the bodies had been found face down on the mattresses – which should have been removed. He was also aware that the disfigurement of the victims’ faces had occurred while they were still alive – including the removal of eyes and tongues.

Considering the overwhelmingly pacifist philosophy of Habal Tong, its more radical adherents were breathtakingly violent, but the violence was easily integrated within HT philosophy by the aphorisms of Ah Li Wu – the reclusive leader. ‘To love is to kill and to kill is to love,’ he said, simultaneously defining the relationships of HT couples and empowering his goons.

Mind you, there were mainstream academics who doubted the existence of Ah Li Wu. No photograph had ever been produced but there were paintings of his image everywhere – a Chinese face with a long beard. Indeed, there was a fairly skilled example of his image done with spray cans on the wall in the room in which Conan stood, his nose twitching at the stench.

Conan stared at the picture of Ah Li Wu – appreciating the technique that had produced it and pondering the secret semiotic messages that such street art always carried. It was rumoured that Ah Li Wu would make a first ever public appearance at Illumination – a major Habal Tong festival to be held the night before the First Wave, culminating at midnight as the First Wavers became full citizens.

What a night that was likely to be – and possibly it was the reason for Loongy’s strange attitude. Obviously he had his work cut out preparing for the big night – such a huge gathering, of such symbolic importance, was a perfect target for Dedd Reffo and after just one morning at AFP headquarters Conan was in no doubt as to their main focus.

Gangland murders were unimportant.

‘But not to me,’ thought Conan, breathing through his mouth as he hurried from the house and made his way back to the hotel.