The Paladin Short Stories

The Nightingale Chapter 4

There weren't a lot of places that Vinders avoided more enthusiastically than the tech division of their station. The mancers that operated the servers were some of the more obnoxious characters that he'd ever worked with. He assumed it was due to the amount of study required to reach their level of expertise. The low pay that came from the job didn't help.

Considering that all of them thought themselves to be overqualified and overlooked, they were usually bad at cleaning up after themselves, making the whole section of the building smell like old elf food that somehow never went bad, and yet still stopped smelling good after a couple of months.

Still, they looked a little more tame than usual, keeping their snarky comments that were meant to show how ignorant their fellow police officers were about technology to themselves. That was one thing that Vinders was going to thank Jormund for.

The paladin never did need to say much. Just his presence was enough to unsettle everyone in the room, and Vinders found that he was getting a little more used to having the man around. He was quiet, unassuming, and always seemed to be smiling politely. Like a habit. Sure, it was unnerving, but Vinders learned that looking away from the man helped, even if it kept him in his peripheral vision.

There were a lot of cameras and pictures in the area of the shop, giving them a lot of perspectives on the location.

Almost none of them showed a hulking monstrosity of magic and metal marching through the streets, although a handful of vehicles were caught that could have been transporting something that large.

Only one did.

"This is from the store across the street," one of the mancers noted, bringing one of the videos up. "Across the street from the back, anyway."

The video played, and sure enough, a massive bulk of a creature moved out through the back gate of the technomancer shop, stepping out and climbing into a van with surprising dexterity.

"Well, there's our murder weapon," Wolmark commented. "We know that's our man. Now we just need to find him."

Vinders moved to the door to get to searching for the technomancer in question, but the fact that Jormund hadn't moved from where he was standing, his eyes looking like they were somehow digging into the footage more than actually watching it.

"Something to add, paladin?" the mancer asked, watching the man carefully.

"Something off with the image," he muttered, leaning in a little closer, his neck craning in a way that made Vinders’ rub his own. "Pixels are off."

"I..." The mancer was about to berate Jormund for his technical ignorance, but quickly thought better of it, turning his attention back to the footage instead, hoping that he was right instead.

"Can you give me a higher resolution of the footage?" the paladin asked, and the mancer did as he was told, bringing the resolution up and pulling it in closer to the mechagolem in the footage.

Vinders couldn't see what Jormund was talking about, but after a few seconds, the mancer in question stiffened up in his seat and leaned in closer too, reworking the image.

"Son of a pixie," the specialist finally said. "Look at that. Displacement in the pixels around the golem. It's good work, but not perfect. A little rushed, but you'd have to be a technomancer with a lot of skill and talent to pull off a job this good."

"So he faked the mechagolem footage?" Wolmark asked, leaning in closer. "I'm not... what are you fuckers talking about?"

"It looked like a vibration to me," Jormund admitted. "But it does look good. Fake, but good work. I doubt we would have seen it if he hadn't been in a rush."

"I mean..." The mancer started to say, likely to assure them that he would have caught it, but again looking up at Jormund before rethinking his position. "I doubt that we would have seen it too."

Jormund nodded, looking at the man oddly before turning his attention back to the video in question. "I think we're going to need to dig a little deeper into the video footage, see if we can't track down who might have altered it."

"You don't think that it's our technomancer?" Vinders asked.

The paladin shrugged. "We can't know. But someone's trying to play us a narrative that involves that mechagolem trashing that place for some reason, and I want to know why someone is trying to tell us that story."

Wolmark nodded, tugging gently at his beard. "I've got to wonder how the f**k this helps us find our missing singer."

"They're trying to tell us something that drives us away from our singer," Jormund replied. He looked calm, and yet Vinders could only compare him to one thing: a bow drawn, just waiting for the string to be released.

Another officer stepped into the room. "Detective Vinders? They made contact. The kidnappers are calling."

Jormund patted the mancer on his shoulder. "You keep digging into the footage."

"Yes... yes sir."

He turned around to Wolmark and Vinders. "After you, detectives."

They nodded. Vinders half-expected the man to be taking control of the situation, but so far, he was holding to his promise that he was only going to be consulting. They pulled out to the bullpen, where the captain was standing next to a bunch of techies.

"They called up the manager," one of them explained, pulling up the audio.

"We just want her back," a woman stated very clearly. "And we need to know that she's still... with us."

"She won't be speaking," the kidnapper asserted, his voice heavily warbled. "We won't be letting that siren use her voice, but we will be providing proof of life after this call. But she is alive and well. If you want her to continue that way, we're going to need five million Gereas in coin to be delivered to a spot of our choosing. Confirm that you understand this."

"We... we understand."

"Await our next call."

The line clicked dead, and after another second, the connection to the manager's phone buzzed again, showing a picture of the siren. She looked disheveled, her long brown hair tangled and tears streaking her makeup down her cheeks. Her mouth was covered by a gag that looked to have a few runes inscribed in it to keep her from using her voice.

"What do you think of that picture, paladin?" Wolmark asked, tilting his head.

Jormund leaned in closer, eyes narrowing. Vinders was sure that he could see something quivering in his eyes. The movement made Vinders' own eyes hurt just looking at it, and he turned his gaze away.

"That looks like her, no alteration to the picture," Cal finally asserted. "It looks recent enough too from the shadows in the background. More importantly, it looks like they want us to know where it was that the picture was taken. That or they were careless, and so far, there is no sign of them having been careless."

"So... more to the narrative?" Vinders asked. "Is that what you're thinking? How do you mean that they might have been sharing her location?"

"They've been trying to direct our eyes. We just need to look where they don't want us looking. As for the location..."

"They took the picture right in front of the window," Wolmark said. "They want us to know where she is?"

"Can you work out a location from that?" Jormund asked.

The techie nodded. "Sure, within a couple of blocks, maybe. Give me a minute."

Vinders scowled. "Is that even where they are keeping her? I mean, if it's not, why bother?"

"Because they're trying to misdirect us," Jormund grumbled. "One part of misdirecting them in turn is to let them think that they've got us playing their game. That's what they've been doing so far. In the meantime, I think we have a situation developing outside."