"For how long has she?.."

"Quater of an hour, give or take."

Hernandez quietly informed his partner detective Roberts, a blue-eyed giant with a very brutal look, aggressively pointed beard and British accent while peering at the screen as if trying to find something he had missed. A whisper prompted helpfully,

"It's students, partner."

Roberts was a bright man, but he had manners of a port worker with a long record and an ill sense of humor he used to deal with stress. Hernandez tiredly massaged his eyes.

Click, click. Emilia Branson opened another file on a computer borrowed together with a room from the security of Forline University and started to watch it with her fingers crossed under the chin. Silently. Calmly, without ever changing the expression of unyielding determination.

"God bless modern smartphones with high-resolution cameras," Roberts muttered, his eyes also following the footage. Hernandez made a signature 'you cannot shut up, really?' face and glared back at him.

All clips provided different angles on the same scene. The earliest was featuring a woman, professor Lauster as university's stuff identified her, and words:

"...fucking kidding me!"

Here was when first phones would turn at and some others would start from a big white teenager with long hair and a skull-like piercing in his left ear.

"Interesting." That was professor Lauster.

"Who are these 'we'..."

A weak voice. Not every smartphone registered it and only this one turned onto a small girl just two desks away from its owner. The girl, Alice Branson, looked confused and a bit annoyed, but scared she was not.

"She looks out of her place there, isn't she?"

Emilia, the girl's mother, murmured to no one in particular. Two detectives nodded automatically. Alice had narrow eyes and an overall slightly Asian face, unlike her mother sitting right before them. Must be from the other side of the family. She was younger than the other students. Much shorter than any. Like a schooler attending an adults' meeting... as if any of them where adults.

“If you don’t understand, be patient. I will clarify soon," the video meantime continued showing as Lauster calmed down the students. Unfortunately, she never clarified enough.

It went on and on. Until – puff! – with a clap sound, seven students and professor Lauster disappeared, leaving behind their clothes with all and every item they had on them. Emilia clicked on 'stop' a second later and pointed at the lost things on the floor.

"How much did you identify?"

'Khm', Roberts cleared the throat before answering,

"Well, most of it is inorganic. Clothing, as we can see, including underwear. Piercing, combs and so on, a few dental fillings, one artificial tooth and what out team pre-identified as a titanium bone plate with a few bone fragments. I called the parents," he flinched, but today required from even him to talk patiently with a non-suspect type of civilians. "One of the kidnapped, ehm... Robert Macek broke his leg a year ago. Had a difficult operation, got an implant from a donor and a metal patch."

"She knew something."

"Chief?.." Roberts hadn't worked directly under Emilia back then, so he didn't get to call her Sarg.

"Alice."

The clerk-like woman tapped the screen thoughtfully and continued,

"I know of your running nonsense, abduction by aliens. When Alice was eleven, Bob... her father got really worried about the possibility of her being kidnapped. He always was overprotective... but, there were a few loud cases that year and his family line is sufficiently rich. I humored him. Alice wanted to be a cop back then, too...

I and she decided on a few code phrases. First, 'leaving something', say school or cafe means she is not in immediate danger. Mentioning Max, our dog, in any capacity meant something is up and she cannot talk about it. 'Will be fine' is when she has a problem that doesn't require assistance, only time. Simple, short codes for places, descriptions, you got the idea."

Click, click.

"Of course, over the years she lost interest in this little game, but some habits had already formed. She remembered. And when to use them if not..."

Emilia paused a clip from one of the phones.

"Now."

"This is what most witnesses referred to as either supernatural phenomena or supernatural powers," Hernandez mentioned.

"Excluding god punishment and the act of the devil," added Roberts. Both focused on the screen.

Alice was on it, shot from the side. Her face suddenly showed a mix of surprise, anger, panic or similar feelings. Literally two seconds later, her image split apart. They collectively had taken some time, but computer magic of stop, slow and go back had helped them to get ahold of this. One Alice on the footage was moving forward in time, and one backward until they merged together and disappeared in a few frames.

"She sent a message."

"Yes. Just a few words, but definitely longer than 'I m k' which came through. Her phone fell down and broke, right?"

"Unfortunately. Bad luck in everything. Our lab has it as a first priority, but their hands were full even before we got here. But why would you..."

"I know my daughter, Fredo. Parents tend to overpraise their children, and God knows Bob is worse than many at that. But Alice went through hell and she knows what is important down there.

She sent two messages to me, and the second one is meaningful."