Fly Little Bird
What is a life? For some, the answer shimmers in the presence of the sacred—a gift bestowed by hands unseen, shaped by the ineffable presence of how one envisions their chosen deity. Life, in this vision, is a thread woven into the vast tapestry of existence, luminous and fragile, carrying the weight of intention and purpose. Others, seeking grounding in the tangible, look instead to the language of science: life as the intricate unfolding of chemical interactions, endlessly shaped by the environment that holds them. Each breath, each heartbeat, an echo of reactions between elements, guided only by the laws of nature and chance.
Yet whether we see life as divinely gifted or chemically constructed, its significance often hinges on our personal experience and the choices we make. Is a life precious? Perhaps only to the one who inhabits it—the vessel that contains these surges of impulse and reaction. Consider the human form: a carbon-bound vessel, vulnerable as any leaf that spirals away from a silent, wintering tree. In nature’s endless cycle, an ant’s memory persists only through the pulse of the collective, the nest’s knowledge carried forward without sentiment or self. The leaf, drifting earthward, feels neither fear nor hope; the tree remains silent, its rings holding stories we may never hear.
Imagine, then, the vividness of a moment in your own garden: the afternoon light filters through unfolding leaves, the scent of damp soil rises after rain, and a delicate breeze traces your skin. You are surrounded by the ceaseless dance of chemical reactions—petals opening, insects humming, the gentle warmth settling across your shoulders. In this fragile harmony, a small bird, perhaps a blue tit or a sparrow, approaches. Trusting, it lands upon your denim-clad knee, its claws barely pressing, yet keen enough to remind you of your own physicality. It’s clear, watchful eyes meet yours, and as you extend your hand—slow, deliberate, open—this luminous creature hops into your waiting palm, the pulse of its heart a trembling thrum against your skin.
In that instant, something wordless passes between you—a connection beyond language, shaped by trust and the quiet awareness of another sentient being. Here, the meaning of life crystallizes, not as a distant abstraction, but as a living choice before you. The bird’s presence offers a silent question: what will you do with the life in your hands? The urge to control, to act, to define—these all stir within, their origins as much chemical as spiritual. You could close your fist, snuffing out that delicate life, ending those miraculous reactions in a rush of finality. But instead, you listen to something deeper—perhaps divine, perhaps biological, perhaps both—and choose mercy. You lift your hand softly toward the sunlight filtering through emerald leaves, feel the soft brush of feathers, and whisper, “Fly, little bird.”
In the end, whether shaped by faith or reason, the essence of life is not solely in its origin but in the choices we make and the reverence we feel for the lives—our own and others’—that intersect with ours. Life is sacred when we choose to treat it as such, luminous in the moments we hold it gently and let it go.
*****
A rather unexpected lunch date
It felt like there was a certain intangible fug in the air, one that hinted at rampant a uncertainty, one that had been hanging around Alice Riggs for a long while now. It was not in the bad smell, body odour type, but sometimes, particularly at times like these Alice could almost taste it. It was making her doubt herself, making her wonder if she could cut the mustard any more, or shake the salt or pass the pepper. This was something that, despite her absolute lack of culinary skills, was making a scratch in the veneer of her being the best undercover officer she knew.
Admittedly this was quite a shallow, nepotistic and incestuous pool of experience, as by the very nature of living in the shadows meant you shouldn’t be seen, acknowledged or known. She had a new and unwelcome feeling that she was now living by the light of a fading star. In fact, she wondered if she was indeed that fading star, and that was why she was here now. Not in the sense of absolute existence but standing looking at a very remote farmhouse at the top end of somewhere only vaguely pronounceable that equated to who knows where.
To dollop cream all over this culinary introspection, it was raining and ergo she was now getting wet. Not that the rain was surprising to her as, she wanted to and indeed would use the word ‘friend’, even though that was still a relatively fresh, unknown and uncomfortable concept for Alice, but it would do for now - Tina Rawson. Who was now so firmly ensconced in the neighbourhood and environs, sort of, in a general sort of way, and as such would pontificate on the local weather at the drop of a hat, or shake of a welly. Alice envied the way Tina had entrenched herself in to the area and in spite of the various, occasionally dangerous, adventures they had been on together in the course of their occupations, had managed to step away from it all. Now on a journey in becoming a mother and internet warrior, a cardboard soldier as someone had once said to her. Although as she recalled this thought, Alice was now doubting it, as in her own mind she was unsure if she had not said it to herself.
On top of all these new worries and personal doubts about her skillset and the perpetual state of edginess she was currently in, she also knew that some people sometimes looked at her as if she was not quite right. Admittedly she played up on this as it made being undercover slightly easier if those she was infiltrating thought she was as crazy as a lemming. There were only a few people who had either seen or been allowed to see the real Alice, not even the final set of foster parents had seen the real one, which was a state of affairs she was quite content with. In fact, she wondered whether she herself would recognise the real Alice.
She blew out a breath and wiped her hand across her eyes, trying to clear some of the Yorkshire rain from them and her brow. Had there been anyone watching they would already be wondering why she hadn’t just driven all the way up to the farm, like any normal visitor. What that watcher wouldn’t have known was that Alice was being careful, not that she was expecting anything to jump out at her, no she was being entirely professional, which in this case meant eschewing personal comfort. Her bosses’ words ringing in her head, that this was a long shot visit first of all, but if the odds suddenly changed, as they were wont to do, that she shouldn’t destroy any clues if she could help it. Also, as far as surprises went she was packing her regulation Glock, so the one doing the surprising would be in for a bigger one back, if Alice was forced to confront them with the shouty end of a firearm.
She took one more look down the distinctly soggy farm track, sighed again and set off, head down scanning the grass verges and tracks for evidence. Of what had not been made clear at the briefing, but she had assumed that footprints, recent tyre tracks, or even a big foam pointy finger saying evidence here, might have counted. Walking slowly with your head down, did not increase any awareness of what might be happening ten feet in front of you, so instinctively she had loosened her fast release clip and tightened her grip on her sidearm During all of this she was silently Alice cursing in an Alice style at the way the rain had a found new path to get to ground, mainly down the back of Alices exposed neck. Trudging on, she wondered if she should just go back to the car and tell an untruth to her boss about the fact that the address had seen no signs of life recently and was another literal and figurative dead end.
There was a dawning realisation that she was not going to get any wetter by continuing and certainly no drier by returning to her warm, oh so warm, Volvo, she applied the mantra of what would. Not in this instance, of what would Jesus do, as he would not have made it out of the car until he had a quick word upstairs. No this was more along the lines of what would Tina Rawson do? The answer was simple, Tina would have stomped angrily onwards, swearing like a sailor with Tourette’s, and threatening to shoot something for all the trouble that said something had caused in the world of Tina. As a strategy went it was fairly simple, but it did make Alice smile, which was not something she had much cause to do recently. So. she stomped, splashed, cursed, Alice style, silently and tried to list who was in for an accident, and as the rain had now made it to her previously dry pants, making the list was an easier task than she thought, to construct on the hoof.
Two damp minutes passed and the chafing at the top of her legs had begun when she made it to the comparative shelter of the stone-built porch that was tacked onto the front of the gray stone farmhouse, the lintel above the door declaring it was from ‘1742’. Alice assumed that this meant the house and not just the stone, or someone was taking the mick and declaring it was perpetually just before quarter to six. Momentarily relieved of her new relationship with Yorkshire water, she took stock of her what was in front of her. There had been no clues immediately apparent on her stompy walk here, and there were no lights visible in the windows, in fact there was the sum of badger all indicating any sign of life.
The feeling, though, about the building had not faded, that queer unsettling sense that she had been somewhere very similar, if not the same, before. Which was possible, as she had been to lots of places, but she could not recall one that fitted this particular mindful playbook.
Keeping up the ruse that she was looking for signs of life, when patently there did not seem to be any, she did what normal people would do in such circumstances. She knocked on the door. Then she knocked again, this time with a little more force, enough force that she could hear the echoes reverberating from inside the property. It would appear that her routine task was in fact just that, and that she had got herself wet and into a Tina sized strop for no reason at all. The little annoying voice she had in her head, the one that she had to only let out occasionally unless she wanted to give people the affirmation that she was a complete barmpot, was doing its little ahem thing that usually preceded some advice that would usually be worth ignoring.
She knew she could walk away now, as her role in this was complete, but if she was later questioned about what she had done, which was a distinct possibility, then could she in all honesty say she had done everything she could? The voice was telling her to go and check around the back, after all she was already wet, so what did it matter. Unused to sage advice from her internal monologue as she was, Alice did a mental shrug, and set off to do a perimeter walk, like a sailor going out to sea, to see what she could see, see, see. She whistled this little ditty to herself as she walked around, with slightly less stomp than she had arrived, finally going around the side of the building.
Hindsight is not something that was welcomed in her role as a sometimes-undercover Higher Executive Officer in the National Crime Agency. The higher-ups tended to frown on their officers who said I knew that would happen, or who voiced a prescient opinion on what should have been done in the first place. As Alice slipped around to the rear of the building, her nose involuntarily wrinkling at the smell of farmyard effluent that appeared to be surrounding her, she had a sudden rush of the unease that had been lurking around unseen from the moment she had first spotted the house.
The state of the back door as she approached, had her reaching for her Glock, as it was looking decidedly unfit for its designated purpose and distinctly second hand. The splintering around the lock and hinges gave weight to the argument that something other than normal ingress and egress had taken place here.
For a brief moment the little voice peeped up with go back to the car and call this in Alice, but Alice was inherently a very good copper and as such was nosey and until she knew what had happened then she would take comfort that she was armed, she was alert and she would not hesitate to run away if something came at her. She wouldn’t shoot it, as she had never done that. She could draw pretty pictures in the targets at the range, but sticking a bullet in a living thing, was a bridge she didn’t want to cross. She knew Tina had done it, although they had never discussed it, mainly as Tina didn’t really do that sort of thing, and as far as she was aware there was not a casual conversation scenario where the subject could come up. She wished she had her trusty Taser with her and hadn’t left it in the car, as she had no problem discharging that at anyone or anything who might like to taste a few thousand volts followed by doing the twitching dance in the dirt. If pushed she would admit that she actually took a vicarious thrill from Tasering bad guys. Something else she could not admit to the bosses as they had a certain squeamishness around those sorts of admissions. They would have her whipped into a session with some sort of HR or psychologist sort faster than she could blink. Not that she would mind that, but she wouldn’t wish her mental processes on anyone, no matter how highly trained they were. Tina would attest to that, on oath probably. The back door was hanging from its top hinge and gave Alice a very clear view of a country kitchen, but this was not one for a catalogue or glossy, overpriced, pretentious magazine.
A quarried stone floor, led to a cream-coloured range which was flanked by an impressive and clearly antique Welsh dresser, Alice wondering at whether this would be a Yorkshire dresser as it was in Yorkshire, and they tended to be somewhat parochial about such things. Along the lines of quiche, not in any lifetime, it was egg and bacon pie. There was a large kitchen table that came into view as Alice shifted slightly to her left. This was the cause of the future emission from lifestyle choices magazines as the table was decorated not with scones and garden flowers, but with a large human being. One that had either had an unfortunate and highly unlikely accident involving a knife, or there was foul play at large.
Alice was on full alert now, and the tension must have swept across the intervening space to the body as the flies that were dancing on the wounds, suddenly took to the air and gave Alice a view of the man’s face and his new orifice. If Alice had been in possession of any doubt as to the cause of death, the knife sticking out of the man’s chest having given her a clue, the fact that the flies had revealed a slit throat as well, just added weight to the foul play theory.
“Aw fudge.” Alice murmured, not so much at the thought of the dead body, no this was now a problem as the man on the table was the one they had been hunting for a few weeks now. There was no doubt this was the last resting place of Calvin Duffey, late of the parish of Westminster and aide to the MP, Esther Patterson, who had started the whole NCA investigation process in the first place.
Alice watched, her senses still on alert for danger, her little voice telling her that there was nobody there, as they would be on their heels, rather than sitting smelling what was in the kitchen. Alice also knew she was now stuck, although she did ponder going back to her car, and reporting that there was no sign of life, which was technically true, apart from the flies that is. She knew that once she called it in then she would be made to sit at the end of the track, blocking anyone who happened along, then she would be required to assist the cavalry when it arrived, followed by death through paperwork and all the while having a damp and chafed crotch. All because the balloon Duffey had decided to get his escape to the country spectacularly wrong on so many levels.
*****
