It was a fine Ankh-Morpork summer day. The flies buzzed, the river limped, and the sun sat in the sky like a sticky butterscotch disc freshly dropped from a child’s mouth. From time to time, a breeze dared to disturb the oppressive heat before being clubbed down again. It was the sort of day a copper treasured and despised: hot enough to keep any would-be troublemakers skulking indoors, leaving the city’s lawful protectors to dutifully and honourably swelter in their breastplates where they stood.

Captain Angua was not currently sweltering, although it was a near thing. She was stood in the corner of Commander Vimes’ office, staring carefully at the opposite wall while she listened to Inspector A.E. Pessimal’s weekly report. It was... a thing of beauty, really, if only in the eye of a very particular beholder.

“...whereupon, Mister Vimes, I pulled out my copy of Tax Regulatory Document Three Cee Aye, and asked him if he could point out the differences from his copy! Which, of course, he could, on account of having moved a decimal two places over!! He thereupon attempted to fox me, Mister Vimes, by pulling out a crossbow, whereupon I…” 

It was remarkable. The man was full of coppering; in fact he was overfull. You simply had to wonder where it all fit: the sheer civic pride and dogged determination of at least 0.6 Carrots, compressed down into a man only a few inches taller and a few feet thinner than a dwarf. His reputation preceded him all through the halls of finance unsanctioned by the law, and more pressingly, through the ones that were for now but very well might not be if A.E. Pessimal were to set one size-six-boot-clad foot inside. His persistence had even earned him a nickname: the Terrier’s terrier. Or, if people were feeling particularly brave, two drinks down in the neat grey bars frequented by the neat grey men of the Accountant’s Guild: the second bitch in the Watch.

Solidarity, Angua thought, came sometimes from the strangest places.

“...Thereupon which I wrote him a receipt for his crossbow, fragments A through Q, and his teeth, items A through E, and Constable Detritus escorted him to the Cable Street watch house, sir!” Inspector Pessimal came to a neat stop, nearly vibrating with enthusiasm, like a knife thrown hard at a wall.

His Grace, The Duke of Ankh, Commander Sir Samuel Vimes sat behind his desk, solid composure ever so slightly cracked like a wall with a knife thrown hard at it. For a brief moment his mouth opened, soundless, and then just as A.E. leaned forward to begin again Vimes clapped a hand down on the desk sharply.

“Right! Well. Thank you for the report, Special Inspector. Very good stuff, er -- this was… Boggis’ man? Mr. Lipwig’s?”

“No, sir. Mr. Lipwig is always very honest with his accounts.” Vimes’ lip twitched at that, and Captain Angua recalled one of his little maxims, that some men were too honest to trust -- but A.E. Pessimal shook his head. “He was employed indirectly by Lord Rust, Mister Vimes.”

A glint came to the commander’s eye. “Ah. Ah, yes. One of Ronnie’s? Well, then. Leave me the written report, Special Inspector, there’s a good chap…” 

Special Inspector Pessimal slid the report across the desk (with some difficulty, as it was about four inches high) and then stood, firing off a salute so smart it had creases. Commander Vimes nodded in response, and A.E. turned on his heel and strode out of the office.

Vimes left it about half a minute for the special inspector’s footsteps to recede down the stairs before slumping into his chair with a deep sigh. Angua held her gaze steady on the opposite wall, face intentionally left blank. There was another half-minute or so of silence, and then Vimes leaned forward, resting his elbows on the scarred and pitted desk.

“Eager little fellow, isn’t he?” 

Angua coughed. “You hired him for a reason, right, sir?”

“Hm.” Vimes grinned. “Damn right, Captain.” He sat up, and slapped the stack of papers. “One of Lord Rust’s boys, eh? The little bastards have been running rings around us. And then in walks Mister Pessimal -” He snorted. “Vetinari told me his clerks had nothing on the man. Vetinari! And his clerks keep their books so tight you couldn’t slip a wasp’s pri-- whisker inside! Our Mister Pessimal’s a valuable one, isn’t he?” 

“If you say so, Commander.”

Vimes’ gaze fell on Angua. “Something wrong, Captain?”

“Not at all, Commander.” Angua’s eyes held steady, examining the wall behind Vimes as if it were being held suspect for murder. “Just wondering why you called me in to talk.”

And, in her head: I didn’t slip the garlic into Um’s locker, if that’s what this is about. I’m not a sergeant anymore, and even when I was I didn’t go in for that sort of thing. Not to mention Sally would have some serious words with me if I did, and I’m not stupid, commander; I’m not looking for a fight with a vampire, who also happens to be a close friend!

A smaller, quieter, and… hairier voice added: Even though I would win.

“Am I getting old, Angua?” Vimes asked thoughtfully.

Angua’s calm cracked slightly, but decisively. An eyebrow snapped up. Vimes thoughtfully declined to notice.

“...Old, sir?” 

Vimes’ eyes stayed fixed on the door as he stepped around his desk, and Angua’s nose twitched. It was an embarrassing habit, but, well, the instincts never really left you. In this case, she hardly needed it. She’d known Commander Vimes for years now. It was quite easy to see when he was embarrassed.

“If I may, Mister Vimes… why are you asking me?” Angua paused. “I mean, I haven’t -- there are some who’ve been here longer --”

“Like who?” Vimes asked. “Fred? Nobby? Carrot?” 

Angua considered the list. Fred Colon had, a short few months ago, received the penultimate promotion, as it were: from deskbody to homebody. He still came round the station almost every day -- but less often now than when he’d first retired; in fact, he’d slept at his old desk the first few nights, and right now she couldn’t recall seeing him in a day and a half. After decades of marriage he and Mrs. Colon were getting to know one another, which by all accounts was proceeding better than expected. But… no, probably not Fred. If anything, he’d have been asking Mister Vimes for tips on how to acquaint oneself with civilian life. At least Sybil made sure Vimes took a day off every month or two.

And Nobby… well, the thing about Nobby was… well, he… he just…

No. Not Nobby.

And that left…

“You could talk to Carrot, Mister Vimes,” Angua suggested.

Vimes shook his head slowly. “No. Not him. Captain Carrot’s a good man- er, dwarf- er, copper. But you know what he’d say, don’t you?”

Angua considered this. Bit by bit, she came to the realization that she did. Vimes could ask Carrot what he thought, and he’d get an answer -- well-considered, gently phrased, encouraging and pleasant. A classic Carrot. It would be just what he wanted to hear. To a man like Sam Vimes, that was always the last thing he wanted to hear.

“So… you’d like my honest opinion, sir?”

“Well, I don’t want you lying to your commander, Captain.”

Angua considered it. She gave refusal a moment’s thought, but… but this was Sam Vimes. The same Sam Vimes who hated undead, everyone knew, but had chanced on her as the first in the Watch. The Sam Vimes who had followed her to Klatch with Carrot (although technically all three of them had simply been following the same suspect at wildly varying distances). The same Sam Vimes who had faced down a werewolf -- her brother -- and made it his… 

Well. It was Sam Vimes.

Angua looked at her commanding officer, Sam Vimes, and for a moment peered past the armor, the helmet, the face like granite - like thunder - like a really disgruntled face. She narrowed her eyes and looked clear through to the greying hair which had, in point of fact, largely greyed almost to white, and to the muscles which weren’t… smaller, no, but a good deal wirier, and to the granite face, which seemed, if you looked at it just right, like there might be the inklings of a crack…

And, oh, hell, nothing for it. Angua closed her eyes and sniffed.

Almost immediately, her muscles tensed to spring.

She restrained them, hardly registering more than a twitch. But… damn! It had been months since she’d even had a thought like that. It was embarrassing. Honestly, it was worse than that, because this was Sam, but the wolf didn’t care; the wolf didn’t think much of a reasonable explanation for why its behavior was unreasonable, or even think much at all. The wolf just smelled (Angua mentally cursed herself for even thinking it) weakness.

With only a mild effort, Angua opened her eyes and smiled with a mostly appropriate amount of tooth. Vimes was leaning against his desk. He met her gaze evenly, and Angua suddenly was doubly glad for her restraint. Vimes wouldn’t raise a hand to one of his men, everyone knew. There was a respect that ran two ways, and that was the foundation of the Watch. 

It was only that the wolf hardly had any respect at all, and Angua had personally seen what remained of the last werewolf who jumped Sam Vimes.

Vimes’ eyes softened, and he stepped forward. “There, er…” He trailed off, and Angua saw him searching for what passed between coppers as tact. “There aren’t many old wolves, are there?”

Angua shrugged. “Wolves? Yes. They take care of their own. For the most part, when the leader starts to… slow down, one of the younger ones will step up and face him. It’s a sort of test, you see. If the old one wins, the challenger isn’t ready. If he loses, the young one becomes the leader. Werewolves are different.” 

“How so?”

“Well, sir, I suppose in a way you could say the leader becomes the young one.”

“Gods!”

“Sorry, sir.” Angua inclined her head deferentially. “No one said werewolves were nice.”

“No,” Vimes agreed. “But no one said coppers were either.”

“Oh?” said Angua. You eat each other when you start getting up in years? She didn’t say.

“Nothing like what you said, only… Well. Used to be you didn’t retire. Maybe you run out your luck on patrol. If you don’t… you get a little older, you slow down, and one day the lads come round with a gold watch and say good job sir, you made it!” Vimes’ brow knitted itself closer. “And then the next day… the next day you come in, just to keep an eye on things, and the day after that, and the day after that too, and then one day you don’t come in at all, and if you’re lucky one of the lads notices and they have you in the ground before too long.

Vimes paused. Then his eyes focused on Angua. He shook his head, as if to dislodge the dark and sticky waters of memory, and cleared his throat. “‘Course, it’s not like that nowadays. I mean, look at Fred. If he can retire, anyone can, right?”

Angua nodded. “Makes sense to me, sir.”

After a moment, when it became clear Vimes was offering no response, she stepped forward. “Something else on your mind, Mister Vimes?”

He sighed. He stepped around his desk again to the window, leaning on the windowsill to look out over the yard. “Yes. I suppose so. It’s, well… Fred, of course, was irreplaceable, but there are other sergeants. Me, though… Someone’s going to have to step up, and, well, I’ve been thinking, and I suppose it’s about time I told my successor they’re succeeding, isn’t it? I’ve just been looking for the right way.”

And internally Angua thought, I see. He’s going to ask me to tell him, isn’t he? Well, I think I can deal with that… I’ll have to get him away from the watch house, but if I ask him to take the night off for dinner he’ll probably say yes. I wonder if Cheery would…

Vimes coughed. “So,” he asked, “how about it?”

Angua blinked, train of thought suddenly interrupted. “How about what, sir?”

A moment passed. They stared cautiously at each other. Vimes broke first.

“Oh, hell,” he said. “About the job. Will you accept?”

Angua stared at him.

“What?”

Vimes cleared his throat. “Ah… I thought I made it obvious.” He paused. Angua was still staring. “Er… is something the matter, Angua?”

Still staring, Angua shook her head. At last, pulling her jaw back up, she asked “Why?”

Vimes’ head tilted in surprise. “Why? You’re a damn good captain, that’s why. Isn’t that enough?”

“But… but…” Angua searched for the right way to phrase the protest and failed. “But I’m not Carrot, sir!” 

“Ah.” Understanding dawned on Vimes’ face. “That’s it, is it? You assumed he’d be the one?”

“Well… I think everyone did, commander!” Angua gestured helplessly. “I mean, no one in the city’s a more enthusiastic copper than him. He knows every law by heart! He asks people if they’re up to anything they shouldn’t be and they tell him! I mean, for gods’ sakes, he’s… he’s…”

The words died on her lips under Vimes’ gaze.

“Go on,” he said. “I know. He’s the king. Right?”

Angua made another vague gesture. “Well. He could be, sir. If he wanted to.” And then, feeling a sudden need to defend him, “Not that he does.”

Vimes sighed. “Angua, can you think of any possible reason I would want the one man everyone agrees is the rightful king in charge of the City Watch?” 

“Well… I suppose you might--”

“There isn’t one,” Vimes said firmly. “Carrot is a good captain and a good watchman. People like him. They want to talk to him, even though he’s a copper. They trust him. Even the nobs think he’s all right. And what do people say about me when I’m not around?”

Angua again weighed honesty and kindness.

“Well, sir… they do occasionally say something to the effect of ‘That Vimes, what a complete and utter bastard.’”

“And you know what they say about you?”

Angua pursed her lips.

“Well.” Sam Vimes sighed. “For what it’s worth, Captain…”

“Yes?”

“I think you’re just as much of a bastard as I am.”

“Sir!”

“What?” Vimes raised an eyebrow. “It’s not a bad thing to know, Angua. It’s not a bad thing to be, coming to that. You work a bit different from other people, yes? Nothing wrong with that.” He leaned forward, staring at her intently. “Let me tell you, Captain. The world needs its Carrots, right? That’s what you’re thinking. But it doesn’t only need Carrots. Honest men, good men… smart men and good coppers, yes, but sometimes you need a right bastard. 

“It’s like… Like… Like, say someone walks in and reports a stolen cow, right? What do you do first? Look for hoof marks? Start interviewing known cow thieves? Work your way through every farm animal in the city?”

Angua thought about it for a moment.

“Well, Mister Vimes, I think what I’d do is walk down the complainant’s street and see whose house smelled of  steak.”

Vimes smiled. “And that’s a commander talking-- Oh, damn.” Vimes jerked back from the window, ducking against the wall.

“Sir?”

“It’s Rust! Damn fool! He hasn’t even hired Slant yet! He can’t have! What the hell’s he doing here?”

“Probably asking about items A through E, Mister Vimes.”

“Not now,” moaned Vimes. “I haven’t even read the damn report yet! Why the hell’s he coming in all half-cocked?”

“Tactically speaking, Mister Vimes? Coming from a position of mutual ill preparation, ignorance always has the advantage.”

That earned a smirk, even as Vimes hazarded a peek out the window into the yard. “Oh, gods, he’s inside…” A moment later, the beginning of a ruckus from below proved him right. Vimes froze.

Then, slowly, he turned to Angua. There was a dangerous glint in his eye.

“Captain,” he said evenly, portioning the syllables out in an almost Vetinarian drawl, “how do you feel about a little test?”

Moments later, Lord Rust burst into the room, accompanied by two burly suited thugs and a badly bruised accountant.

“Vimes!” he hollered. It took until the sound echoed back from the stairwell beyond the open door for him to realize he was incorrect.

“Lord Rust,” Angua said, leaning forward in the commander’s chair. “Can I help you?”

The man’s eyes narrowed, searching his memory for Angua’s identity. He must have come up empty, because there is simply no other way to explain the utterly stupid thing he was about fifteen seconds away from saying.

“Yes,” Lord Rust said in what he probably thought was a snarl, “you can. Stop sitting there and go fetch your commander.”

Angua shrugged. “Can’t help you there, sir.”

Lord Rust stepped forward. The stress of the day was written in his face. “Did you hear me?” He asked in a slightly trembling voice.

“I think so, sir. Can’t help you. Sorry.” 

One refusal was bad enough. Two was too much. Something, some small important tenet of good breeding and nobility, snapped behind Lord Rust’s eyes.

“Listen to me! Listen to me right now! Get out of that chair and go get your master or else you won’t work another day in this city, you bitch!” 

The key to a really good snarl is not the set of your jaw, or the way you hold your throat, or the positioning of your lips. It isn’t in the vocal quality or in the breathing. It is definitely not (as Lord Rust seemed to think) about communicating just how long the stick up your bottom is. A really good snarl is genetic.

Angua snarled, and the four men standing before her went white.

“Now then,” she said, once they stopped trembling too hard to hear, “let’s try this again, shouldn’t we? You said you wanted to talk to Mister Vimes, right? Now, would you talk to the commander, Lord Rust? Would you?”

Lord Rust’s jaw snapped shut. “N-n-- well, no--”

“Then why did you, you little rat?”

Now Rust froze. The strain showed on his face as mental gears clashed with information that simply did not fit. At last in a halting voice he managed “No… have to speak with Vimes. He’s… he’s the commander.” And, gaining steam: “And I will tell him about that little insult, you --”

“Insult?”

Rust turned slowly. Sam Vimes was standing in the door… unarmored.

“Sorry, Angua. Was just on my way out, realized I almost forgot this.” All eyes followed Vimes as his hand dipped to his belt and removed the truncheon of office. They stayed on the truncheon as he hefted it and tossed it lightly to Angua, who caught it deftly out of the air in one hand. Lord Rust and his accomplices watched as she held it thoughtfully, then placed it on the official stand.

Then she smiled wide.

The door shut with a soft and definite click.

As one, the four men turned to look. Sam Vimes was gone.

Angua was not.

“Now, gentlemen…” She leaned forward. “Shall we talk?”

Down in the kitchen, Sam Vimes fixed himself a cup of tea. He drank it down, nodding genially to the officers passing through, and fixed himself another. Sitting in just the right corner, he could faintly hear voices from upstairs. It was going alright, he thought. It probably would be fine, so long as neither of those hulking suited muscles got stupid enough to put a hand on Angua…

Just as he thought it, he heard a muffled crash.

Well. That was all right, then. The other one would at least know better now…

Crash.

Oh, well. Disappointments are everywhere.

As he sipped his third cup, Vimes listened to Rust vacating the building, complaining reedily all the while, and to the two enforcers being dragged downstairs to the cells for some first aid, and to the twitchy accountant being gently but firmly apprehended by a few of the constables who had read Inspector Pessimal’s report, who were very curious about some things and wondered if he could just come this way, just a few questions…

The paper would be coming soon, Vimes knew. Probably a photographer as well. Rust would already be complaining, and by the time he got home the gossip would have raced around to Sybil, who would have questions of her own, and he knew Vetinari would have something to say as well. It was probably about time he put his armor back on, picked the truncheon back up, and got to smoothing things over…

And then from the main office he heard Angua speaking loudly, clearly, and authoritatively:
“...threatened him? I’m very sorry to hear that, Miss Cripslock. No, I’m not sure why. Wolf? No, Miss Cripslock, we don’t keep wolves in the watch houses. No, none of them. I believe there’s a regulation against it. No, no thank you. No photographs, please. Um is very particular about his hair, aren’t you, Um? And Sally considers it very undignified, having to be swept up… Yes, thank you for understanding…”

Or maybe, Vimes thought, he’d go for a walk.