Episode Nine — Carved Truths
1048 Words
The trace came back at 4:42 a.m.
Ava sat at her desk in the precinct, eyes rimmed red from lack of sleep, coffee gone cold in front of her. Elias paced behind her, silent, the call still ringing in his head.
Do you know what he was?
That voice hadn’t come from any known number. But the Bureau’s systems weren’t entirely useless — Ava had a favor owed, and she’d cashed it in.
The result pinged through like a ghost.
SOURCE: Public Access Terminal, Hollow Creek Public Library — North Annex. Logged 2:08 a.m.
Ava frowned. “The same library we were in.”
Elias stopped pacing.
“They were there,” she said, turning. “Watching us. Probably waiting until we left.”
Elias nodded slowly. “They wanted us to know.”
Ava stared at the screen. “How long have they been following you?”
“I don’t think they ever stopped.”
The library was dark when they arrived. No footprints in the frost out front. No lights inside. But someone had clearly been there.
Ava pushed open the annex door with her foot — it hadn’t even been locked.
They moved carefully.
Nothing looked out of place at first. Same dust, same dim stacks. But then Elias spotted it.
“Back room,” he said.
The tech terminal — the one used for public searches — had been dragged half an inch out of line. The chair was still warm. And on the screen:
A single open file.
ARCHIVE: 1824.pdf
Access Time: 2:06 a.m.
Viewed: 2 minutes, 22 seconds
Ava leaned closer. “Someone pulled the digital record. But why? They already left the ribbon. They knew we’d find the paper file.”
Elias didn’t answer. He opened the file.
It was the same one they’d held physically — Amelia’s intake record. But this version had something extra. At the bottom, barely visible in the footnotes, was a hyperlink.
PROJECT RED ECHO — SUBSECTION 17
Ava tapped the link.
Nothing.
“Dead,” she muttered. “Probably scrubbed years ago.”
But Elias reached into his coat and pulled out a slim black drive.
Ava raised an eyebrow. “You’ve been holding out.”
He connected it to the terminal.
“Every Weller-linked digital archive had a redundancy server,” he said. “Offline. Isolated. Mercer gave me this ten years ago. Said I’d know when to use it.”
“And you’re sure it’ll work?”
“No,” Elias said. “But I’m sure it was never meant to fall into the wrong hands.”
He ran the decryption software.
After twenty seconds, the screen flickered. The link turned green.
ACCESS GRANTED — SUBSECTION 17: FIELD CASES
Dozens of case files appeared. Redacted. Coded. Labeled only by number.
But one glowed at the top:
FIELD OBSERVATION — 1824.9.E
Subject: CREED, A.G.
Cross-Reference: CREED, E.J.
Note: “Initiating post-separation control test. Observational pairing initiated.”
Ava stared at the screen.
“What the hell is a control test?”
Elias scrolled down.
Then he stopped.
“Read this,” he said, voice tight.
At the bottom of the file:
Subject pairing observed during unscheduled contact (Age 11). Emotional cross-interference recorded. Subject E showed reactive protection behaviors, including risk displacement and violence inhibition override. Behavioral designation updated: Echo Primary.
Begin secondary detachment protocol. Monitor for future triggering events.
Ava looked at Elias.
“Echo Primary,” she repeated. “You were the control.”
Elias closed the file.
“I was the leash.”
They were walking back to the car when the call came in.
Dispatch. Local PD. Another body. This time on the other side of Hollow Creek — near the old bridge where the river split.
Ava answered on speaker.
“Who found the scene?”
“Jogger,” came the voice. “Said it looked like a mannequin. They got closer. It wasn’t.”
Elias climbed into the passenger seat. “Victim’s identity?”
“Female, mid-thirties. Still processing prints. But the pose—” the dispatcher hesitated, “it’s the same.”
They didn’t ask for more.
They already knew.
The riverbank was choked in fog, the bridge looming above like a half-collapsed skeleton. Crime scene tape flapped weakly in the breeze. Ava ducked under it, Elias right behind her.
The techs had set up floodlights.
The body was laid out in the grass, just past the tree line. Arms folded. Head tilted. Ribbon tied around the neck — crimson this time, not black. The detail was deliberate. Staged. Ritualistic.
But there was one difference.
A carving.
Across the woman’s stomach, shallow but clear, cut into the skin with cruel precision:
EJ.C-1824
Ava stared. “That’s your code.”
Elias didn’t blink.
“They know I accessed the file,” he said. “They’re not hiding anymore.”
The coroner stepped up beside them. “We’ll have an ID soon. No defensive wounds. No signs of a struggle. Looks like she knew her attacker — or was drugged before staging.”
Ava looked around the scene. “There’s no blood trail.”
“No,” the coroner agreed. “Which means she wasn’t killed here.”
They both turned to Elias.
But he was already walking.
Toward the trees.
Ava followed.
“What are you seeing?” she asked.
He didn’t answer at first.
Then he pointed to the left.
A second ribbon — this one white, tied to a low branch.
A trail.
They followed it.
Three more ribbons, spaced evenly through the woods.
And at the end of the trail:
A small, burned-out building.
Ava blinked. “Is this—?”
“Yes,” Elias said. “It used to be Weller’s auxiliary observation cabin. They moved kids here when they became… uncooperative.”
They stepped inside.
The room was scorched, the walls caved in, but on the far side — untouched — was a table.
On it, an envelope.
Ava opened it slowly.
Inside was a single sheet of paper. Typed. Plain.
You looked back.
Now we look forward.
Turn the mirror.
Show the real subject.
Ava’s throat went dry.
Elias looked at her.
“They’re not done with me,” he said.
She shook her head. “No. They’re just getting started.”
- Writer
