Human (part 2)

About forty minutes later, the four (which should have been five) investigators and the captain were in the small conference room of the plant. The head office did have a meeting room, it was just past the training room at the end of the hall with the large window on the left. It was a narrow, stuffy room with a few chairs arranged around it and a slide projector pointed at a white wall of atomic brush-writable material.

Sarah, or rather: the infamous Sarah Harmon, honored three times for performing the most complicated deeds on cases of special nature, the one who had previously worked as a guest on North K Hill, Wheasfield and St Hermburg; this famous investigator was our captain. She was the one leading that conference. From the outside she looked like a little girl about fifteen or sixteen years old. This was because she wasn't human either, she aged differently.

In our line of work it wasn't very common for us to tell each other about our finesses, racesor quirks just because we worked in the same place. Usually only those who worked as partners knew about each other's details. This policy was helpful because if it ever happened that there was an undercover agents or traitor among us, we could count on all the tricks we had up our sleeves. Additionally if an agent were captured and tortured, he wouldn't be able to reveal everything about the others while not knowing them completely.

Of course, these secrets faded over time as people worked together for a long time. I know everything about Joey, for instance. It's just that there's no section in the contract requiring that we need to reveal all our attributes when we join SAD.

That's why we didn't know exactly the nature of Sarah. I always assumed she was an alien. But one thing was certain: with that face and body she wasn't an altered human like me.

The team of five investigators was completed after the late entry of Cole Chapman, who broke into the room with his stink and his presence, crossing in front of me.

"Sorry, Mr. Lieutenant," he said wryly as he bumped my arm.

"At last you come."

"Yee, always here for you."

"Listen..." Sarah interrupted as Chapman searched for a seat to settle down, "I'm here to talk about the Johnson's case... and Arthur Cooper's."

"Who the hell is Arthur Cooper?" I asked.

"Was it the name of the unidentified old man?" Ventured Joey.

"We'll reach there," she said impatiently, "as you already know, the suspect was first sighted at dawn between Wednesday and yesterday by citizen Gelson Hernandez, and then he was seen for the second time by your own eyes during the conflict yesterday morning. Everything indicates he is an alien. I gathered you here because I wanted to discuss with you how we will distribute the tasks... Considering this we have several pending cases." She was referring to the envelope dropped by the alien in her hand. It was open.

"What was in that envelope anyway?"

"I will read a passage: It is with great honor the Arena entertainment committee comes to inform you that Mr. Arthur Cooper has been chosen to participate in the Uahmyr tournament, it is up to each participant to choose a main organic material for the registration that will be completed by March 25th this year. Then there are a few more rules." Sarah showed us the paper quickly, swinging it toward us. It was completely different from an ordinary paper. It was all covered in official detail, with a strange ink color and several stamps underneath, near the signatures.

"What is this about?" Joey asked, "a tournament? What kind of, exactly?"

"Organic material? Uahmiur? So that must be..." Lowe began.

"...An illegal tournament of paranormal beings. Cockfight. Except with larger roosters," completed Sarahc "and it's pronounced Uahmyr."

"Woah!" Exclaimed Joey.

"This exists?"

"Everything in Arena exists." I said.

"Although it is an illegal practice, the Uahmyr tournament is not under Sproustown's jurisdiction." Sarah threw the paper into an empty chair. "What intrigues me is that they called someone from here... You know, this competition is no small thing. There are many more paranormal beings roaming around the world than you think, not to mention in Arena, which is their home. Calling someone from here indicates there's some very valuable 'organic material' on the loose. And by valuable I mean threatening."

Sarah made a pause, looking at each other in the room separately, then continued:

"They would never choose any of you, for example."

"Now wait... You mean to say there's someone this strong in Sproustown?" I asked, "could it be... That alien from yesterday?"

"Not necessarily. Our flying cloak suspect may have stolen an invitation from someone named Arthur Cooper, in fact I'd say that's the most likely hypothesis."

We waited for further elaboration. Sarah met the expectation:

"As I said, Uahmyr's tournament is no small feat, it is an opportunity that is given to only a few underworld leaders present on Earth, Arena and other planets which can reach their destination in time. Since it has so many competitors for so much places, such a small role can be worth more than millions. But still, I believe no one would sell the right to participate. Just competing in the tournament would greatly enhance the reputation of anyone who only inscribes a brawler..."

" ...'And what does this have to do with the alien?' You ask. Listen, if this paper is so valuable, there would be no reason to flap it in your pockets around dawn. If I belonged to the top rank of a mafia organization I would have locked it tightly inside a box with some padlocks and put guards around it. That means... The invitation was stolen.

"Which means either Arthur Cooper was the old man living with Miss. Johnson or it had previously left the invitation at her house under the old man's care." I concluded.

Sarah just stared at me reflexively for a moment.

"Yeah... It could be... Reasonable... Yes... You might think it must be one of these two alternatives."

"That would explain why it had the invitation in its pocket, because it had just forcibly taken it from someone else using some method we don't know how." I completed.

"That is another problem. We know it wasn't ductu. So it must have been some finesse of his..." Lowe speculated.

"The method used for murder is something to consider. It would be easier to analyze if I could know exactly where the envelope was taken from; after all he managed to get in and out of the residence not only without leaving fingerprints, but leaving no trace there was even a break-in. If he took the envelope from there, there must be something. I'm going to ask Agent Chapman..." Sarah looked at Chapman sitting between Lowe and Crane, who was sitting quietçy throughout the meeting "...to do the inquire, now with that goal in mind."

"What about us?" I asked.

"You have the Monday off, don't you?"

I had forgotten. It was already Friday.

"It leaves us only the other four. I have to go to Silverbay and take some more action on that." Sarah nodded at the envelope on the chair. "Joey's duo: I'll ask you to investigate the whereabouts of this Arthur Cooper guy. Looking through the records and making some phone calls we should be able to find something out."

"My duo partner is the Lieutenant, Captain..." Joey objected.

"Then form partners with Lowe."

They looked at each other strangely. Sarah went on:

"There is still one point that has not been considered: if the alien stole the invitation he had a reason. Is he a mafia boss? A leader of a Sproustown criminal organization? Hardly, because a leader would not have taken the invitation with his own hands, but would have sent an aide... Which leads me to conclude the alien is just an aide and there is someone else behind this." Sarah turned back to Chapman: "You said there were what? Three remaining Deluxe groups?"

"Not exactly three groups, Madam Captain... I said there were three Deluxe retail outlets here in town. One is in the lower part of town, which is infested with doped people. Another one almost here in the enter, near that alley where they ate that Gerald dude in broad daylight and a third related to a vendor in the northeastern bands, near that big mall there, you know, Captain? He's shows up there only from time to time, from what I've heard.

"Humph. And the DEA does nothing about this?" I muttered.

"It's hard to do something, Mr. Lieutenant... It's hard something because all this sales talk I hear from my contacts is just a rumor. The DEA inspects and inspects, but even if they find the doped under the effect of the candy. The candy itself... No one ever sees. They only seized two samples together with some teenagers this year. Wanna know what's interesting about it?

Chapman looked around:

"The samples were from different manufacturers. One was found in the north, another was found here in the center."

Sarah considered it for a moment.

"This indicates that despite DEA's prominent efforts in recent years, there still appear to be some illegal Deluxe's trade in Sproustown." She shrugged. "With the effort of the police the sales decrease a lot, but it's hard to believe it's going to stop overnight. What's most worrying is having an alien involved. Leave the drugs for the DEA. We have to put the investigation of the flying cloak man's involvement with trafficking on our list, but we won't do that on Monday because someone has to stay here in case of an emergency. And the one left is you, Crane.

"Yes, captain!" Crane nodded.

"Thus we are settled." Sarah finished and the people started to get up. She addressed me and also made a signal to Chapman with her hand.

"You two, have a minute?"

As soon as the others left, there was just me, Chapman and Sarah in the room. She pulled the door.

"It's about Jeffrey Sprohic... As expected Silverbay's officials said they'll be taking the case since it's their jurisdiction... I won't be able get a word from him."

"And taht's bad?" Chapman asked.

"I was hoping we could get some information on who hired him to steal Club Jewel. As Lieutenant Dotson reported two days ago," she turned to me, "it's hard for Jeffrey Sprohic to think of the entire escape plan on his own, so he might be working under someone in charge of the trafficking. And if that's true... Since the two incidents occurred in the same week, it is to think they are related to each other, as their motivation is similar."

"Sheeshs, I think I get it, Mrs. Captain. If the zombie opens the mouth... We capture the alien?"

"Might be even better. Maybe we'll reach the hirer."

"But as you said... Now we can't interview Sprohic."

"Certainly not, Lieutenant Dotson. The blow you struck on his spinal cord has immobilized him for too long thus we missed our chance." She gave me a disapproving look.

"C'mon... He was a giant and was making victims. How would I know what degree of strength to apply in order to immobilize him for the rest of the trip without exaggerating?"

When the functioning of the spine is locked the whole body becomes paralyzed. Since zombies cannot be knocked out it's the only way to capture them. Even if Sprohic's sane doesn't allow it to restore the broken bone alone, it can be recovered via surgery, and surgery can be applied directly to the zombie without anesthesia, as it feels no pain. Therefore you don't have to hold on when fighting one of them.

"So be it. Now what we have is what we have. That's why Chapman, I wanted to ask you to check your contacts to find out anything about Jeffrey Sprohic. It is not possible that anyone involved with the Deluxes would not have seen a giant over six feet around during the week if he was really working on this line.

"Understood, Mrs Captain." Chapman saluted and left the room.

C'mon? Was she really going to leave this job for Chapman?

When Chapman opened the living room door I went out into the hall at the same time. Sarah turned to pick up the paper she had left on the chair. I whispered to Chapman:

"That stink... I smoke and even I am bothered from it by afar."

"Heeey there, Mr. Lieutenant... Give me some credit. This is not mine. You know a lot of people use these things around where I walk, y'know? An agent trying to infiltrate among the night people and trying to get a trust bond... I have to put up with a lot around there."

"Yeah... Who knows who's infiltrating among who... Find out who Sprohic is. I won't tolerate you screwing with the case."

"That's what I'm aiming for, Mr. Lieutenant. 'later." Chapman saluted sarcastically and headed for the courtyard.

Friday ended faster than ever. We have the weekend free and I, additionally, have the monday. Just now that the investigation was getting interesting

I went back to my house on foot, which is no big deal. It only takes about thirty-five minutes to walk. As I made the journey I wondered about the situation we had until then: we had an invitation to an illegal tournament in our name on behalf of someone probably important in the underworld. On the other hand, we were unaware of who this someone was. We had a murder case whose preliminary analysis was natural death, although we saw the culprit, we had no clue about it. It was still necessary to investigate the house again for clues, which is what Chapman was going to do; and to check if anyone knew about Sprohic's action before it happened to form a link between the two cases, which Chapman was also going to take care of.

Chapman and Chapman.

As the undercover agent, he kept in touch with people of dubious reputation, but who provided him with interesting information about Sproustown's various cases, often giving us hints of things that may be the work of beings of interest to SAD. Clearly, in this case, any information about Deluxes trafficking was valuable information.

But it turns out that by being so close to these contacts, there was a possibility that Chapman had become too close and decided not to pass information on because it would report some acquaintance of his that he liked.

A righteous agent wouldn't do that, but I don't attribute that quality to Cole Chapman.

'Maybe I should confirm either of these things for myself over the weekend. I don't exactly have contact with anyone remotely connected with drugs, nor do I walk around the bars listening to conversations. I think my appearance would scare people like that rather than encourage them to tell me anything, but I think I could at least go back to the Johnson's house and see if I find out anything about the envelope and the alien.'

It's what I thought along the way.

When I got to the stairs outside the house it was almost six in the afternoon. My boots make a little noise so Jane knows when I'm coming. Before opening the door I could hear her annoying voice:

"Henry? Henry? Is that you?"

I heard the voice getting closer and closer to the door.

"I called you and you..."

She continued the sentence on the other side of the door but I didn't hear anymore. I thought to myself at that time: 'if I have to listen to Jane and her bullshit for three days straight, it will probably be the end of my life. I do not want to go back.'

On the other day I told myself I was going to start drinking for real to live up to her stupid paranoia. Today I passed in front of the bar and didn't enter.

I was still five for six.

Instead of keying the door in like every day, I used the indarra to jump over the stairs and fall to the other side, so I ran quickly to the grass, making it invisible to anyone who opened the door since it opened to the end side of the stairs.

Jane opened the door and searched for a few seconds.

"Henry?"

Her voice was a mixture of monotony and irritation.

She looked around and then closed the door behind her after entering the house again, must have thought it was her impression.

Walking on the grass to make no noise I headed for the bar and escaped that night.