I expected the terminal to be locked, but Mr. Keratás had just left it on sleep mode. It booted right up to the desktop. The symbol of ASCorp, a pristine Aetherium shield, rotated in the background.
My eyes tracked the room excitedly, making sure the door sat closed and there were no cameras. Then I started to snoop around his computer. I started with the email, running through most of the messages. The guy had an oddly high amount of ‘singles in your area’ spam emails, and about a quarter as much related to boring paperwork and requisitions dating a month back- nothing of interest.
I didn’t stop there and searched the rest of his computer, passing through the downloads, trash, and assorted files. A few were locked behind high-end encryptions, probably related to company secrets. I didn’t even try to look into them. For all I knew, even an attempted access could alert somebody.
Some of the files proved to be revealing of a different kind of issue. The guy seemed to have a serious problem pirating movies. There were all kinds kept in there, from D-rate action flicks to ages-old romance dramas.
Fortunately, I found something else of interest after a bit longer searching. The guy had a remote desktop app downloaded onto his computer, which allowed full access from his phone. After messing around with it for a moment, I got onto the guy’s phone app and glanced through it.
The call log revealed a lot of calls between him and unmarked numbers, and even more between him and a company phone. Interestingly, about a couple months back he started to get calls from a particular ASCorp phone. Consistent calls. Unfortunately, the log only showed the calls happened, and not the actual contents. Still, it was suspicious timing so I noted the number down on my own phone.
I found something even more interesting in his messages. Most of them were boring number crunches related to work or the occasional short small talk between him and his ‘friends’. Based on what I read Mr. Keratás really seemed like a boring kind of guy. A boring guy who was blackmailing my client...
The thing of note was the same number from earlier sending messages almost every day starting from about the same time Mr. Abernathy received the first letter. The contents thereof were… not something I could ever talk about with a straight face. They were full of over-the-top lovey-dovey shit. And it all looked one-sided like Mr. Keratá carried the entire relationship on his back like some messed up stalker. I couldn’t get past the first dozen before I had to start skipping through them from cringe alone.
I skipped all the way back to the first message from the unknown company phone. ‘Is it done?’ Suspicious. Unfortunately, there wasn’t a name associated with the number, just a letter: J.
I looked through everything I could get my grubby little hands on one last time before shutting down the laptop. What was my next step now?
I left the office, not spotting my culprit anywhere. Which was fine, he couldn’t escape from ASCorp operatives or other mercs once I told Mr. Abernathy. After I got around to finishing this gig, that is. See, I wasn’t quite done yet. From the messages I read, this ‘J’ set Mr. Keratás up to the task of sending the letters to Mr. Abernathy. They seemed to be the true mastermind, and I couldn’t in good conscience say I solved this when they could just prop up another dummy to go after Mr. Abernathy. Or maybe a more direct route...
Worse yet, I had absolutely no clue who this J was. I did, however, have a plan. And a pretty solid one at that. It was simple; call the number. It was so stupidly simple and direct a toddler could’ve come up with the idea.
I worked my way out into the maze-like aisle, putting distance between myself and anyone who might want to overhear. Then, I simply pulled out my phone, typed in the number, and hit dial.
A few moments later, the other line picked up. “Hello?” A woman’s voice came across, one that sounded as if she was in the prime of her life. And it was refined too, as if whoever spoke was a ‘proper’ lady.
“Ah yes… ahem, I’ve been trying to reach you. Just to clarify, this is?” I asked, dropping my voice down a pitch.
“Oh great.” The line went quiet for a moment. In the background of the call, I could hear a man’s voice, sounding faintly familiar. Then, the woman spoke again, though it wasn’t directed at me. “I’ll be right there, dear! It's just another spam caller.”
“I assure you, ma’am, I’m not a spammer. I just want to confirm your identity before-”
Just like that, ‘J’ hung up. Yeah, not my brightest disguise all things considered… Seriously?! Gah! The more I think about it, the stupider I feel... Why did I have to go for such an obvious spammer start? Stupid, Shiro.
I stared at an empty shelf for a moment, slowly going over the entire interaction as I tried to search for some kind of clue. Nothing. Other than the person sounding posh and high up, which I already suspected, there wasn’t much else of note. ‘Course, other than the rather helpful tidbit that Honest Face wasn’t actually all that helpful in the case where the other party can’t see said face.
Leaving the area, and dodging by a bot as it spewed oil everywhere like a nightmarish facade of a fountain, I returned back to the entrance. The same guy as earlier sat next to a robot, tinkering on it as I passed by. He shot me a glance but otherwise pretended not to notice me. Fair.
On my way out, Mr. Cheer, the artificial greeter, waved at me. His smile, so inhumanely large there was no way it wasn’t artificial, seemed to gleam with a malicious light. “Goodbye now, and please come back in the future!”
Returning to my bike, I straddled it as I tried to think about what to do next for the investigation. My best bet was returning to Mr. Abernathy with what I’ve found in the hopes that he’ll be able to remember someone in particular who had it out for him.
I could worry about the investigation later though. I noticed this in the last couple of months, but I’ve got a real problem locking into only one thing at a time. Like, I have to finish what I’m doing before doing anything else. For instance, working on an investigation and only focusing on the investigation even if it cripples my social life.
Today, however, I had a place to be. I keyed Ichiban into my Mapp™ and pulled up the best route to reach there.
I stared at my reflection in a puddle. The dark patch over my eye combined with my clothing and long black hair gave me a moody look, and yet it didn’t detract from my looks in the slightest. This may just be some faulty pride speaking, but damn did I look good.
My skin had a healthy glow to it and my thick hair shone with life. The puddle warped my form slightly, twisting it. Yet even that couldn’t hide the fact that I was starting to fill out. And! And! AND! I seemed to have gained a quarter of an inch of height. It was hardly noticeable, but I felt it.
A drop hit the puddle and scattered my reflection around as it twisted and turned into a gnarled building of marbled faces. As it started to settle back down, another stray drop smacked it, ruining my distraction.
I brushed a hand across my cheek, brushing several loose strands of hair back under my hat. I looked up, the gray sky crying sorrowfully as lightning occasionally screamed in the distance. The cool water felt nice, refreshing almost. It almost managed to take me away from this place.
Unfortunately, a particularly bright flash caused me to look away from the storm-clad sky- to look right where I had been avoiding in the first place. The Jade Columbarium sat in all its bleak glory, the almost marbled gray stone seeming to hide several twisting and turning dragons. A squad of Jade Fang Enforcers stood around the entrance, watching each and every person approaching like hawks.
I took a deep breath and stepped under the cover of the building, immediately feeling a chill down my spine as the solemn air met the icy ocean gale. My eyes closed almost on their own, trying to subconsciously hide from the place even as I stepped forward.
A map wasn’t needed as my feet automatically carried me into the place. Muscle memory, rusty from misuse, shook itself awake as I stepped one foot after another into the Jade Columbarium. Unlike in the past, my footsteps were entirely quiet as I passed by the mourners, just another ghost haunting this place.
Little alcoves sat everywhere, each holding an urn. Unlike Grayhill Depository, all the vases here were basically the same. Other than the names and personalized writing on each one, they were all little, barely-lit jade urns. They looked almost like a capped-off trophy with two curling dragons acting as handles. Personal items sat scattered around the alcoves.
A ceremony was being held off to the side of one of the rooms I passed through. Rather, several ceremonies by the looks of things. There were easily dozens of people gathered around the area as a man spoke. Did something happen recently?
He wore what I could only describe as clerical robes, and looked as though someone had plucked him right out of Saint’s Cathedral. His voice was smooth and relaxing as if he was offering a healing prayer. “... their souls to our heavenly father, that we might see them again one day. Rejoice, for today is not one of reckoning, but-”
I tuned him out as I passed through the area and moved on by. Still, I had mad respect for a priest willing to come out and do a service in the middle of Jade Fang territory. Not only in Jade Fang territory but at the heart of the Jade Fang’s burial building. Practicing what he preached of love all, eh?
I stepped into a specific room, the dragons hiding in the gray marble seeming to come alive and animate at my approach. The walls twisted and twirled as I gazed around. A lump sat in my throat as I saw the room sitting entirely empty. No grievers were back here, leaving me feeling a strange sort of isolation as I walked to the middle of the room.
One step after another I headed in till my feet froze in front of a specific alcove. Two urns sat together, the dragon ‘handles’ intertwined with each other in one last eternal embrace. Names were etched into the synthetic jade: Ryouma Tsukuyomi and Akiri Tsukuyomi.
My hand trembled slightly as I ran a finger across the meeting point of the two urns. The color in the spot I touched had long since faded, rubbed away by a foolish girl hoping to get one last hug from her lost parents. That was back when my eye was still flesh though, back long before I went to see my-
I took a deep breath and rocked back onto my feet, forcing the thought away. Compartmentalize. The less I had to think of his vile face, the better.
I gazed at the two items in the alcove. Unlike some of the other alcoves around here overflowing, only two items sat in this one. A baseball, the seams cracked from years of use, and a small silver flute. It's funny, even after all this time I could faintly hear the flute’s hauntingly beautiful swills playing in the background of my mind, accentuated by the laughing glee of a child.
My eyes clouded up, some of the rain from earlier must’ve dropped in, blurring my vision. I rubbed at it, chuckling slightly to myself. It had been so long, yet I still missed them so dearly. With a shaky breath, I knelt down on the ground in front of their alcove, too scared to lift my head.
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Thanks for the emotionally charged chapter. There seem to be some ninjas around with some onions and knives.