Cairn wastes no time in traveling to El Hat Study, where he’s already known. His cover story is the same as always. He’s a contract duelist hired by the study to perform an investigation that requires months of fieldwork that would detract from the teaching duties of the fulltime Masters. The story is plausible on the surface and he’s scary enough that nobody will challenge it.
He learns the three top Defenders have been missing for two weeks and the headmaster will be gone for another two months with his family in Gateland. It didn’t take long to discover the identity of one of the other disciple’s agents, she’s a low-level asset named Luscin, also going by her fake fighting identity, Fighter-Fox.
Cairn tosses each master’s personal rooms for further information and finds an old notebook of Master Elora Remon. Inside is a sketch of a youthful looking man with a crooked nose. On the back are two words, possibly his name, Teum Fox, and instructions to keep him away from Luscin. Knowing his master may find his flawed nose interesting enough to bring in, he pockets the picture.
If this young man is the other agent from the first report, he must have been successful in contacting Luscin. That contact could explain her sudden change in loyalty. Elora’s sloppy notes reveal Luscin was attached to another handler, calling himself Dorson Milnor. When that man disappeared, she attached to the bent-nosed-man and lingered here for more than a year.
These notebooks should never have been written but shortened his investigation by weeks. The bent-nosed man is indeed named Teum Fox and he too has a fighting persona called the Dragon Hunter.
This Teum agent has been covertly meeting with Horatio Nguyen for months prior to his sudden vacation.
The missing defenders are likely dead, the chance of a disciple turning one agent is slim, turning four would be impossible. Someone would sell the others out for a chance of promotion.
It wouldn’t take much to defeat Elora or Damien, they are both highly skilled. But the gift is about wielding power and neither of them had much. Defeating Gideon on the other hand would take a tremendous amount of skill and power. These two agents must have worked together to defeat Master Ta Raha. It will be rewarding to defeat the pair.
Cairn destroys the incriminating notebooks before leaving the study to begin tracking his targets.
It’s late afternoon and the West-East-Transcontinental Railway Company station is quiet for now. All the outbound trains are long gone and the inbound traffic won’t start arriving for another hour. The only activity is a man using his meager gift to blow loose debris off the train platform and a merchant organizing his newsstand. There’s a small group of four professional pan handlers lounging on and around a bench at the end of the platform.
One of the men or women present, is likely an informant. All Cairn needs to do is make himself approachable. He plasters his best smile on his face and heads towards the newsstand to but a few broadsheets.
The merchant, dressed in the same denim overalls as the railway station employees turns and nervously smiles as Cairn approaches.
“News or entertainment for your ride?”
Approachable, trying to smile invitingly, “I’ll have something of both. I’ll be stopping in Thuma, do you have a recent paper from Thuma?”
Seeing Cairn for the first time often causes people to gasp, “Y-yes, sir. I do, these were delivered last night and are only two days old.”
The merchant’s hand is visibly shaking as he holds out the Thuma Broadsheet.
Cairn tries to put the man at ease by not blinking, blinking draws attention to his eyes after all, “Do you have anything from last week?”
The merchant is relieved to have a reason to turn away from the off-putting customer, “Of course, I keep papers as old a month,” while walking to the rear of the densely packed stand. After rummaging around he pulls three separate broadsheets and presents them to the intimidating man with the unforgettable purple eyes and scary crooked smile.
Cairn takes the sheets and holds out a handful of silver coins for the merchant to take as payment.
“You can have the out-outdated sheets. I should have thrown them away days ago, I only sell current news. One broadsheet and your choice of a fu-funny paper or puzzle book off the middle shelf will cost you a full silver.”
Using his thumb, Cairn flips a silver towards the merchant who nearly fumbles the catch.
Cairn tries hard to calm the man with small talk, “I’m always pleasantly surprised at how inexpensive things are in the deep south.”
The merchant knows he looks nervous and tries to compensate, “Inexpensive yes, but far too hot to be considered the d-deep south. The snow gets so deep that a man leaves thr- three tracks when he walks through it, you know… the snow, in the south?”
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Trying to end the exchange on that terrible attempt at being funny, “S-safe travels and come b-back and see me when you need something else to read.”
Cairn smiles broader trying to show more teeth and flips the merchant another silver which is caught with the same lack of precision as the first.
The first step to being approachable is to transact with someone publicly, buying the broadsheets accomplished that while letting him flash his coins as well as provide an excuse to sit somewhere and not look suspicious. Soon the platform will be filled with people waiting for the train to arrive and disembark its passengers and he’ll look like he’s waiting patiently for a friend, family, or colleague. He will blend in perfectly.
Picking an empty bench, second from the end but furthest from the pan handlers Cairn sits halfway between the middle and left edge of the polished wood slotted bench.
Cairn starts with the oldest paper dated nine days ago and skims the headlines before flaring a low burst of energy. Half the people here will feel it, the panhandlers and sweeper glance in his direction.
There was nothing conspicuous going on in Thuma that day so he folds that sheet up and sets it on the bench, giving anyone a reason to approach and engage.
Two headlines catch his eye immediately.
Chemical Leak Delays at W-E TCNTL Rail St
Fair Explosion forces early closure
A dual between these unknown agents and a Defender could explain the explosion and a chemical leak is the kind of distraction favored by Damien.
“Have you finished this one?” says a voice interrupting his thoughts.
Looking over the top of his sheet he sees the sweeper gesturing to the paper on the bench.
“By all means help yourself.”
“May I join you? If I sit alone the pan handlers like to harass me. I’ll be gone in a quarter hour as the train will be here and I have work to do.”
Cairn says nothing, knowing his silence will be taken as consent to an informant whereas a chatty stranger will be put off and sit somewhere else.
When the sweeper takes the paper and sits, Cairn is confident he’s made contact. Next, he slips a hand in his pocket and fishes out a heavy coin and holds it between his thumb and the broadsheet he’s now pretending to read.
The sweeper now holding a half-unfolded broadsheet is also pretending to read, “Not much is going on this time of year. Nobody important has arrived or departed in almost two weeks.”
Cairn takes the bait, “What kind of important people would that have been?”
“A pair of local celebrities, both duelists were seen leaving on Locomotive #3 recently.”
Cairn comments, “Important is a relative term. What’s important to one man is trivial to the next. For example, most people don’t care much for scholars, where I’m fascinated by them. I was planning to visit the Study here but I couldn't get an appointment with their headmaster.”
“That’s terrible luck for you. Headmaster Nguyen and his family left on vacation two weeks ago. In fact, they left on the same locomotive as the two duelists. His return tickets won’t get them back here for another two and a half months.
“But I don’t think they’re planning on returning.”
Cairn was looking for confirmation they boarded a train and which one, not this man’s opinions. When an informant starts to opine it’s only to inflate the value of the meager information they provide.
“Why would you think that? Did he announce that he will retire?”
“The day he left one of his masters, a woman I can’t recall for sure which one, was here.
“After they departed… she was seen returning to the study, then was again spotted by myself chasing after the train. She did not return.
“Furthermore, two other masters’ from El Hat left and have not returned. There have been excuses made about emergency deployments to stop an insurgency to the north. Nobody believes it, this is one of the laziest studies in South Cenoka. They never leave the city for more than a day.
“If that trio of Defender’s left the study and didn’t return something big is happening, I doubt the headmaster wants to, or could return.
Cairn folds the paper he was reading and places it on the bench with the coin inside, “It’s occurred to me that I have time to eat before the train arrives, can you recommend a food stall?”
Seeing Cairns face fully for the first time, “…Surrrre, um my brother in-law makes the best kabob outside Missacon. His stall is east of-of the station about 100-yards-standing, I mean a 100-yards from where you are standing.”
Cairn gives up on smiling and flips the sweeper a silver coin to augment the heavier coin on the bench, “Thank you for the food tip.”
Regaining his wits, “The West-East Transcontinental Railway Company El Hat Station strives to give excellent service,” reels off the sweeper to the retreating man with the strange eyes.
Cairn, with no intention of eating kabobs, walks to the station exit. Once out of sight he cloaks himself from sight, sound, heat, and electromagnetic detection before taking to the air at a leisurely 300-miles-an-hour following the tracks.
He figures Elora could not have caught up for at least twenty miles, so he slows upon passing that marker.
Now he brings his speed down to a little over 60-miles-per-hour. That’s a little faster than the train would have been traveling.
The gravel bed that supports the rails is perfect and undisturbed. Scanning side to side he looks for anything out of place.
A disturbed area to the right of the tracks shows signs of violence.
It appears that one or more packs of ravtors fought over the same kill. Might be something, probably nothing.
Alighting away from the darkened disturbed ground, Cairn is mildly surprised to find what is undoubtably a woman’s skeletal remains scattered around the blood-soaked dirt. Crushed stained bones are all that remains, he had to piece together the pelvis like a jig-saw-puzzle, to be sure of the victim’s sex. His master, Rätsel would be displeased at how long it took to do so.
A positive identification was made when the two-week-old undisturbed head was found a quarter mile further along the tracks.
Elora never looked better than right now. Her eyes were shriveled but fixed wide open and her mouth was stuck in a rigorous grimace.
Remembering the fun times they had together, he places a gentle kiss on her wrinkled crusty forehead before tossing her head onto the tracks and resuming his stealthy flight.