By midday, Detective Laith Alazraq was dead.

His car, the comfortable yet bulky Camino Forest which he had loved so much, had unexpectedly malfunctioned in the A-lane while he was traveling to meet up with his wife at her family home. The ensuing explosion created a fiery ball of fire in the tunnels, and the homicide detective, who was stuck inside the vehicle, could not escape. He burned to death within seconds, and unfortunately emergency personnel could not arrive in time to save him.

Earlier that morning, that very detective had successfully closed his first homicide case. "The murder of Cassia Grove, Novus Atlantis-born entrepreneuress and owner of the recreational club Nymphaeales, located in The Floats, was found to be the doing of deranged PATET Specialist Grot Antrum, who had apparently held an obsession with the successful Grove since their days in Novus Atlantis," the news anchor said. "There is currently speculation about a possible criminal connection between Cassia Grove and Grot Antrum. Antrum was found dead in his apartment only days after Grove’s death. It is theorized that his guilt at having killed Grove had finally overwhelmed him.

“Detective Laith Alazraq, who perished in an unfortunate freak accident at around midday, was responsible for solving the case of Cassia Grove’s murder, closing the case just moments before his own tragic demise,” the anchor finished.

Pheonix Zamarad watched the news report intently, gripping the leather arms of his chair anxiously as his eyes scoured the organic interface panel on the wall. There were photographs of the scene – the scorched interior of the part of the tunnel where the car had exploded, the melted frame of the vehicle, upside down, and various bits and pieces of debris that had been blown apart by the explosion, now littering the ground. There were even interviews with the emergency personnel that had responded to the call. According to the news anchor, the charred remains of Detective Laith Alazraq had already been transported to a morgue, and his funeral was already being prepared in accordance with Islamic funerary rites.

The whole ordeal put a bad taste in Pheonix Zamarad’s mouth. What nonsense, he thought. They let Antrum take the fall and found a way to kill off the detective when he’d gotten too close to the truth. And he had all my evidence, too. Damn it!

Laith Alazraq was dead, Pheonix was back to square one, and worse than all of that, he was being hunted. Earlier that morning – had it even been morning yet? – he had awoken to hear the tell-tale beep of his locked hospital room door being unlocked. All the time he’d been there, in that room, he’d been on edge. Last night, however, his nerves had shot through the roof at that small sound. He’d thought, perhaps, that it was simply the detective or some other member of the Heliopolis PD coming in for an impromptu interview. Highly unlikely, at that time of night, but…

He’d waited. Ten seconds. Twenty. And then he’d slipped out of his bed and padded over to the door, pulling it open to peek out into the hall. His blood had run cold.

Nobody.

He’d closed the door and backed away, taking in his surroundings frantically. Nobody. No guards. Guards were supposed to be stationed at his door. So long as they knew he was a criminal – and they knew – those guards would be posted there until he was well enough to be taken into custody. In all the days that he had been confined to that small hospital room, not a single guard had left him unsupervised.

Every fiber in his body had screamed at him to run. Something was wrong. Something was very, very wrong.

And so he had. He’d grabbed whatever clothing he could find – they’d been kind enough to bring him an outfit from his closet back home – and booked it out of the hospital room, right down the hall and around the corner. He’d found his way to the stairwell and began his descent – better to escape than stay in that hospital room like a sitting duck, even if he didn’t have anywhere to go – and froze.

Just a quick glance over the railing had given him everything he needed to know. Suddenly, everything had falling into place with alarming clarity.

Aster Lockwood – the real Aster Lockwood – the monster – was climbing the stairs, two or three at a time, his darkly clothed panther-like figure making its way up towards him. In that moment, Pheonix knew without a doubt that everything – the missing guards, the unlocked door, the unguarded criminal supposedly sleeping in his hospital room – all of it was part of Lockwood’s plan.

Pheonix had reeled back, turning desperately towards the door and once again entering the hall where his hospital room was located. What could he do? What was there to do? If he’d decided to take the elevators – if he’d passed by the nurse’s station – there was a chance that he might have been recognized, and he hadn’t wanted anyone to stop him. On the other hand, there was nothing else for it now; he needed to escape.

He’d run down the hall, past his hospital room – and then he’d stopped and run back to close the hospital room door. Better for him is Aster thought he was inside, snoring away in blissful ignorance. Any moment now, Aster would come out of the stairwell and through those doors, and Pheonix hadn’t wanted to be there when it happened. So, he turned right back around and kept running.

It had been a narrow escape. He’d just about turned the corner into the elevator landing and pressed the button in a frightened frenzy, when he’d peeked around the corner to see Lockwood exiting the stairwell. Pheonix had watched with dread as Lockwood pulled a blade out from inside his black jacket and made straight for his room.

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He hadn’t stuck around to watch much more than that.

The natural agar air sterilizer beside him hissed quietly, whispering him back from the nerve-wracking ordeal. The thought that he had been so close – so close – to becoming another one of Lockwood’s victims made him feel sick. He had hoped that the Heliopolis PD might be of help, but now… If the detective on Cassia’s homicide case was dead, it was no coincidence. And within mere hours of Lockwood’s visit to my hospital room… If that didn’t sent a message to Pheonix, nothing else would. He gulped and rubbed his forehead, where beads of sweat were beginning to form. Remembering the events that had transpired just a handful of hours prior was only contributing to his constant sense of anxiety.

The receptionist sitting off to the side seemed to notice his discomfort. She stared at him from where she sat, tilting her head curiously. His hands trembled, and he took a deep breath, trying to steady himself – but in truth he was incensed. As if any vehicle would malfunction so badly as to kill a man in this day and age. How many times would Lockwood and his network of affluent city-dwellers kill? Would they never be satisfied? Would they never cease their senseless violence? How could they keep going, completely unchecked? And, most infuriatingly, how was it that they always won?

He couldn’t let them keep winning. He couldn’t let Lockwood get away with it. He couldn’t live with himself if he didn’t at least try to stop these monsters.

Cassia’s death was on him. He should have made sure Aster Lockwood was dead that night. He should have had the courage to turn back and finish what he’d started. He should have made sure there was no way on earth that Aster Lockwood could come back to hunt them.

He couldn’t even imagine the fear that Cassia must have felt, opening the door of their house and seeing him standing there, waiting for her. Just when she’d started to truly leave that nightmarish episode in her life behind, it came back to drag her into the darkness. He couldn’t imagine the terror that went through her in her final moments. He’d promised her a better life – and they had had a better life, for a while. Sure, they bickered and quarreled like most friends did – in those times, they only communicated grudgingly through their Slates, until they made up – but he’d never been as close to anyone in his life as he had been to Cassia. He couldn’t let her murder go unpunished.

In order to do that, however, he needed to secure his own protection. With Lockwood on the loose in Heliopolis, there was no place that was safe for Pheonix. There wasn’t a single place he could hide – not a single place he could feel safe spending the night.

He rubbed his temples and glanced at the receptionist, whose concentrated stare was now completely fixed to her screen. She had asked him to wait here, in the lobby, which was to be expected. It wasn’t just anybody who could get an impromptu meeting with the chief executive officer and president of Emerald Farm. But he had already been waiting for almost half an hour, and he didn’t have time to waste. Who knew if Lockwood was already moving against him? Who knew if he was hunting him down that very moment, now that the detective was dead and out of the way?

The man had already gotten his hands on him once – had almost killed him, and would have, if he hadn’t wanted to play with his prey like the sick monster he was – but Pheonix had somehow escaped. Not that he remembered much about how. But that only served to underline his point: Aster Lockwood had it out for him, and that meant he’d come looking for him soon. Every moment was of the essence.

A pounding headache had made its home in his head, and Pheonix absentmindedly bounced his right leg anxiously. When was the last time he’d actually slept – not including the drug-induced slumber at the hospital? It had been a long week. A harrowing week. A terrifying week. His nerves were shot. If this worked, he might just have a moment to rest. He reached over to the air sterilizer and quickly configured it to release a calming lavander aroma, which he inhaled deeply in hopes that it might help him calm his nerves.

“Pheonix.”

He looked up from his seat. The old man was different from the last time Pheonix had seen him. There were more wrinkles, more gray hairs. But despite all of that, he looked good. Healthy. He just didn’t look particularly happy to see his son.

Pheonix pushed aside these thoughts and ran a hand through his hair. Now was the time to pull himself together and turn the tides in his favour. “Well,” he said, standing up. “It’s good to see you again.”

“What do you want, Pheonix?” Fraser Zamarad asked, his hand resting on the silver-headed cane.

“I’ve been fine, thanks for asking,” Pheonix replied sarcastically. His father didn’t respond. With a sigh, he said, “I need your help. I need your protection.”

“Did you kill her?”

Pheonix froze, staring at his father in shock. “Who?” he asked, but he already knew the answer.

“Your wife,” his father said.

“No,” Pheonix replied, squashing down the flash of irritation that came with the almost-accusation. His father had somehow always believed him to be a lowly character; no doubt, to him, murder seemed a reasonable thing to expect from his illegitimate son. But Pheonix’s anger would not serve him now, and besides, this man would never understand his relationship with Cassia.

“I didn’t kill my wife," he continued steadily, and already he could tell that his father did not believe him. "That’s why I’m here. The person who killed her… He’s going to come after me. I need your help.”

“Why should I help you?” Fraser Zamarad asked, tapping the marble-tiled floor of his lobby with his cane. “You think because half your genes come from me that I'm somehow responsible for you? Why should I even bother? You’re nothing more than a criminal.”

“I held up my end of the deal, didn’t I?” Pheonix countered, biting back a string of poisonous responses begging to be unleashed. “I gave you a run for your money, old man. I would have run you to the ground if Lockwood hadn't showed up – you know it's true. And that's not forgetting the added benefits I've been spoon-feeding your farm. Farm Hands Machines was the treasure chest that just didn't stop giving, wasn't it? The least you could do is hold up your end of the bargain. Or don’t you want to admit that your bastard son accomplished more than those silver-spoon idiots ever could? And let’s not kid ourselves here – they had a big starting advantage.”

Fraser Zamarad bristled at the accusation, but there was nothing he could say in retaliation. It was all true, after all. There was nothing those boys of his could do that Pheonix couldn’t do a hundred times better. Now, his father knew it, too.

“Allow me to explain the situation,” he said, crossing his arms. “Starting from now, Greenland Farm is going to come under control of a new leadership. But I’m the one who built it from the ground up. I’m the brains behind the whole thing. I know more about my company than every employee there put together. Things they know, things they don’t know… It’s all in here,” he said, tapping the side of his head.

“And so?”

“And so, I’m telling you that I’m ready to share all of that information and knowledge with Emerald Farms,” Pheonix pressed impatiently. “New products, new approaches, new resource pools – I’m offering you the chance to completely decimate Greenland Farm, and maybe even the rest of your competitors, too.”

“In exchange for my protection,” the old man said, stroking his white beard thoughtfully, eyes narrowed. “What exactly does that entail?”

Now he’s interested. How predictable. The old man never cared about anything more than business.

But that suits me just fine. This isn't personal, anyway. I'm just out of options – and I have one card left to play. Even for him, this is a business proposition worth grabbing onto with both hands. And, in the meantime, I'll regroup. Start again.

Take that killer down.

“We’ll get into the details in your office,” Pheonix told his father, looking around. He pushed his hands into his tailored pants pockets and leaned back. “Or were you planning on keeping me in the lobby?”