Chương 33: 10 An Inquisitive Tower

Jeremiah Hall Sgt. Jeremiah Hall of the La Esperanza City Police Department scratched his graying stubble as Capt. Ward hollered at him over the phone. Hall mumbled 'Yes, sir' a few times, adding grunts of agreement to appease the irate captain without particularly listening to what the latter was saying. Hall kept his eyes on the road, wondering when the van would pass by.

"Hall? Are you still there?" Ward barked.

"Were you listening to what I just said?"

"Here, sir. Let's see. The BID is sending a high-ranking goldeye. No more searching the files of the Adumbrae attack. Focus on the Martinez case for this week because the mayor wants something good to announce to the press. That time-wasting seminar is next Wednesday. Have I already said not to search the Adumbrae attack files?"

"You did," Ward said. Then he sighed, continuing with a softer tone.

"Look, Hall, I know why you're doing this. That was a long time ago, okay?" Hall took a deep breath. The captain was wrong—this wasn't connected to that incident—but he didn't want to argue about it. He sat there, clearing his mind of his mistake years ago. There was no repaying that. He had learned a valuable lesson about investigating thoroughly before accusing.

"Don't make this your penance," Ward continued.

"Enough of your… solo jaunts, like the one you're doing now. I didn't back your promotion for you to ruin your career. Castan told me that you left him behind. Anyway, the BID is taking over. There's something more to this case, is what I've heard. We're going to give them the files, and that's that." The incomplete files, Hall thought, deciding not to say it out loud. It wouldn't do him any good arguing with Ward. The captain was a good man trapped by circumstances.

Near retirement, the captain wouldn't risk stirring the nest. Instead, Hall said, "Copy, sir. No more solo jaunts." They both knew that he wasn't going to stop. There were times when he had to trust his instincts and do what needed to be done. This was such a time.

"Tell you what, Hall," Ward said.

"How about you join the team liaising with the goldeye? In some way, you're still on the case. That's the most I can offer you."

"Are you serious?" Hall wondered what the catch was, but couldn't think of any at present. This might be a sort of appeasement from the captain. They did go way back. Or maybe, the captain wanted to push him to annoy the BID instead.

"You've worked with goldeyes, right? Back when they had golden eyes. Buddy-buddy with them. Anyway, wrap up what you're doing where you are. I want none of that starting tomorrow. The BID agent comes Monday." The call ended with a beep.

"Goldeyes…" Hall smiled, recalling his younger years. Years ago, the eyes of BID agents glinted gold—a special material in their bionic eyes made it so. He first met them around the time of the McHunter scandal. BID agents swarmed the city, getting up in everyone's business. It might happen again. What if I report the missing videos to the BID? Hall was sure several pieces of evidence of the Adumbrae attack had gone missing in the past few days. They were there before. He had reviewed them. Now, they were gone.

The reasons he'd been getting ranged from they had already been transferred to the BID to that he was hallucinating about them. If something criminally irregular was happening, he wasn't that recklessly brave to rattle the cage and paint a target on his back so needlessly. He had Ramello to think of. Enemies knew where to hit him back. He'd restrict himself to these 'solo jaunts', as Ward put it, until he'd gather something concrete.

Then he had to discreetly contact the BID, making sure that whoever he'd approach wasn't connected to the anomalies going on. He hoped the goldeye would be spotlessly clean. Hall took out his trusty notebook. He lost count of how many notebooks he had filled with clues and thoughts over his career. He flipped to the page headed with the name 'Erind Hartwell.'

"Officer Knowles," Hall read the first line. Knowles was one of the police officers who died during the Adumbrae attack. She had the distinction of ramming one of the abominations with her cruiser to save a civilian—Erind Hartwell. The cruiser's dashcam might not have provided the clearest of videos, but Hall's instincts prodded him when he saw Erind Hartwell. That was her, no doubt. Hall could think of several reasons why Hartwell lied that she wasn't present during the Adumbrae attack.

She might be afraid of being interrogated by the police. She might think she'd get tested or monitored. Or she might've heard that survivors of Adumbrae encounters were shunned by their communities, due to the stigma of having been near such a monster—some people believe, though not backed by conclusive research, that being near an Adumbrae carries the risk of turning into one. It was probably the increased stress after an attack, more than anything else. Reasonable reactions.

But Hall couldn't force himself to let this be. This Hartwell girl knew something about the mysterious woman who might be the fourth Adumbrae. There was something in Hartwell's reaction that tripped off Hall's police instincts honed over the years. And I was right. A few hours ago, Hall went to Eloyce University to question Hartwell and settle the matter once and for all. If Hartwell continued to deny things, he would've dropped it.

If she'd admit she was there and explain why she didn't come forward, he would've accepted it. If there was truly nothing amiss, then his instincts had probably dulled with age. But they didn't. His instincts were as sharp as ever. Waiting in his car outside Cresthorne College of Law, Hall saw Hartwell and the younger daughter of the Leska family—she was present at the memorial service, but he forgot her first name—get into an old van. Why would they do that?

The most reasonable explanation was that they were buying illegal substances. Nothing too surprising from a socialite. But with Erind there, Hall wanted to see if there was something more to this. Their destination appeared to be New Hope, the McHunters' derelict 'Mega City of the Future'. What could they be doing there? Drugs? Something more sinister? Hall couldn't follow them into the abandoned development because they'd pass an empty road; he'd be spotted.

He chose to wait by the corner, leading to the only path to New Hope. He tucked his unmarked car in the slot between a boarded-up shop and a three-story building home to dust and spiders. He also draped a wide cloth made of rugged material over the hood of his car to make it look old, blending in with its surroundings. The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings. From where he sat, he had a view of the skeletons of buildings in the distance.

"Mega Cities of the Future," Hall muttered, remembering the platform of President Maynard after the BID was organized.

"That was a crazy time…" Fresh off the police academy, Hall started his duty in a world with three active Purple Blooms. The nearest was off the coast of Brazil, a real concern to Americans. Because of the stress, seeding rates rose, and Adumbrae popped off all over the US. There were fears that another Adumbrae war was brewing, as the Hive began to awaken its Overseers from hibernation. President Maynard had an idea, thought by many to be brilliant at that time, that Americans should live in clustered cities.

Fit a lot of people in a small space by expanding upwards. Concentrating the population in specific areas meant an easier time for the brand-new super agents of the BID to watch over them. Fewer chances for an Adumbrae eating its fill of a town in the rural areas, gradually mutating into something more powerful, unnoticed, and unknown to the authorities. Hall recalled that his father was adamant about staying in their farmhouse.

His mother, on the other hand, was deathly afraid of Adumbrae and wanted the family to move near a BID hub. Fortunately, the Corebrings got everything under control, and a second Adumbrae War didn't engulf the world. The Mega Cities program became mostly forgotten, though some states tried to continue it, like California, given its history with Adumbrae Titans during the Adumbrae War. It didn't last long when the head of the McHunter family, the big man himself, Raphael McHunter, was executed for being an Adumbrae.

Hall didn't follow the news after that. Last he heard, McHunters sitting in jail for aiding and abetting an Adumbrae were still appealing their convicted asses up to the Supreme Court. Those traitors to humanity were lucky they didn't get the death sentence—that was the extent they could twist the law with money. No amount could save a confirmed Adumbrae from execution.

The McHunters outside of jail fought amongst themselves for a cut in the tasty pie, which was the estate of their grandfather, hastening the downfall of their crumbling empire. He looked up at the peeling sign of the building to his right. It was hard to read it from this angle, but it should say 'McHunters Charity Shelter', one of their PR tactics at that time to influence public opinion in their favor.

If he remembered the layout of this area right, there was a food bank here, a free clinic on the other side— A van was leaving New Hope! Hall pulled himself out of his memories and scooted down his seat to hide from view. It was the same van that picked up Hartwell and Leska from Eloyce.

"Blue hair," he muttered, peering over the dashboard to observe the van's driver. He didn't get a good look at her earlier. Erind and Leska were also inside. He checked his notes to confirm he had jotted down the correct plate number. Whatever they did at New Hope was over. They were safe. He didn't need to follow them as they returned to the city proper. Fletcher. That was the surname of the driver. A student of Eloyce University.

Ramello had pointed her out to him during the memorial service, saying that she lost her sister during the Adumbrae attack. There was a page in Hall's notebook with the heading 'Kelsey Fletcher'. Ramello didn't ask him to look for this Fletcher girl, a Cresthorne law student. 1L too, like his nephew. Hall took it upon himself to find out anything about Ramello's friend. Her body was yet to be identified.

Arranging the data on the casualties and the left-behind belongings scattered all over the trains and the station would take time to be comprehensible. However, seeing the missing Fletcher girl's sister with Hartwell was a definite alarm. Hall straightened on his seat as the puzzle pieces inside his head tried fitting together. Could Kelsey Fletcher be… Red Hood, the fourth Adumbrae? He flipped to the page on 'Red Hood', the mysterious Marsh Row killer.

Last Wednesday, a couple of dead bodies were fished out of the river running around Marsh Row. They had ropes around them. Someone must've tied them to something heavy to stop them from floating. But the perpetrator was an amateur. The river's current snapped the ropes, and the bodies were loose, floating down the river. Both bodies had snapped necks. An odd cause of death. No gunshots. No stab wounds. Not even regular strangulation. Why did the murderer choose to violently snap their necks?

Hall checked the pictures of the bodies on his phone. One guy had his neck bones completely detached, his head flopping about like a rubber chicken. Ankles shattered. The second victim's fatal injury was also inexplicable, his head forced to turn more than a hundred eighty degrees, as if someone forced him to mimic an owl. Spinal cord severed, causing instant death. No torture, other than the blow to the legs, but the methods of killing weren't normal.

This was done either with the use of tools or by several men or… by someone with superstrength. An augmented human? Illegally augmented people frequented Marsh Row. Or an Adumbrae? The latter explanation wouldn't have made sense before the Adumbrae attack, the least likely possibility. However, it was now forefront of Hall's mind. The victims might've had the worst of luck running into an Adumbrae. An Unripe Manifestation would've left behind a messy crime scene.

Bad news if a Complete Manifestation was running around. Even if the police couldn't trace where the bodies were dropped, they managed to find people who recognized the victims. They stated that their friend followed a woman wearing a Red Hood. They hadn't seen her since then. A woman with superstrength. Fourth Adumbrae. Missing Kelsey Fletcher. Were these puzzle pieces connected to other unsolved cases, like the spate of homeless people disappearing across La Esperanza?

It was difficult to track them, but word on the street was that people suddenly disappear without a trace. Many of the disappearances had happened at Marsh Row, connecting them to Red Hood. What about the PCM? Some of the newer members said that their friends had started to disappear, too. Five cases so far—two of these people had last been seen in Marsh Row. There was something to that place. He'd go there tomorrow.

It wouldn't be a 'solo jaunt' because he'd be investigating the Marsh Row murders; he wouldn't ditch Castan this time to keep Captain Ward happy.

"There's something to… huh?" Hall ducked again as a clunky Mayfair Galleon with tinted windows came out of New Hope, following the route of the van. After that came a vintage motorcycle ridden by a thin man wearing a leather vest. He jotted down details about the car and the motorcycle, as well as the jacket design of the rider. It was clear that Hartwell, Leska, and the blue-haired Fletcher had met with these people. After they were out of sight, Hall started his car.

He decided to follow the guy on the motorcycle. Either these young ones just wanted to take illicit substances in secret, or there was something more sinister going on. Only a few hours had passed, and they seemed to have their mental faculties intact. Their business inside New Hope was unlikely to be a drug session. They were on the main road to the city, so he was confident he wouldn't lose his target. Once they got into a populated area, Hall sped up to find the motorcycle.

The guy he was tailing eventually pulled up in a Phoenix Wings parking area. Hall stayed across the road, took out a small pair of binoculars, and watched the guy remove his helmet. Asian features. Korean? Japanese, maybe? He had a long ponytail. Taking off his jacket, the man revealed that he wasn't there to eat. He was an employee, wearing the signature Phoenix Wings orange uniform with a red flames design. The ponytailed man walked a few steps to the restaurant, stopped, and returned to his motorcycle.

It was probably parked too close to the next motorcycle. Hall's eyes widened as the ponytailed man lifted his motorcycle, wheels off the ground, and set it back down, aligned with the others. Did I see that correctly, or was I hallucinating?