Chapter Forty-eight
Museum/ Omens
Thursday, March 22. 5AM. 125 S.A.
Lemac Lake, Noville. Switzerland
"Time to wake up."
Lizbeth frowned and slowly opened her eyes.
She had felt a shiver first and then it was replaced by a gentle caress on her cheek. She could detect a faint smell of tobacco from that hand so she could tell it was Shin. However the coldness was coming from outside as Shin was the one who had just opened the door and woken her up. At some point he had gotten out of the car and she hadn't detected it.
"Good morning," she said, yawning and then looked at him. Lizbeth finished waking up and looked at him worriedly. "What happened to you?"
"What are you talking about?"
"You look worse than yesterday. You face is pale, look like a piece of paper! Are you okay?" Lizbeth got out of the car and touched his forehead. She didn't know Shin had ever been sick from anything, but that look wasn't good, he was still pale as the previous day.
"I don't feel anything. Also I'm pale." Shin frowned with two cups in his hand. "Coffee?"
No was time for coffee. That didn't look good at all. She tried to protest but she knew he wouldn't pay attention to her if he didn't feel anything. "You really don't feel anything? You're not cold? Dizzy?"
"Nope," Shin said. He reached over and gave her a kiss on the forehead and then on the lips. "Really, I'm fine."
Lizbeth looked serious, but received the cup of coffee he extended. The warmth contrasted with the gray cold weather of the day. She had just realized that everything was still cloudy. She looked over to the museum but it was still closed, surely the owner should be arriving soon.
She looked at him with an arched eyebrow. "Did I tell you the code to the trunk?"
"No."
"Where did you make the coffee?"
"With the coffee pot in the trunk. You didn't tell me the code but, you use the same password every time."
She took a few sips and looked around, she thought she saw a public restroom near where she had parked. "I'll be right back, I have to pee," she excused herself.
"I'll keep watch…"
As he said those words she looked at him. It brought back memories of the past when they were on the road, or when they had used the ley tunnels to teleport to other countries instantly.
"...We're not in those times anymore where we went to the trees. Do you really want me to pee in here?" Lizbeth asked pointing to a military craft that was flying near the waters a couple hundred yards from where they were.
"I was kidding," Shin said stroking her head. She pouted and walked away.
Shin watched her walking away and, although he couldn't express it, on his face his features were even more hardened than usual.
I'm sorry. He thought. He didn't want to lie to her but the truth was that he didn't feel well. His back and chest hurt and he felt slightly dizzy. He had checked his face and had to admit that he had used her makeup stored in the luggage rack to cover the dark circles around his eyes. Seriously, what the hell is wrong with me?
Lizbeth didn't know, but there had been a few occasions where he had felt slightly sick in the past, but nothing like that. From the symptoms it could be like a bad flu, but there was no coughing or sneezing, no fever either. Just a general tiredness. And that was not the only thing. He felt light.
He didn't want to remove the symbiont nanoparticle armor from inside his body, because he would have to take off his clothes, but he was sure that the weight had shifted again.
Beyond that, he didn't want to worry anyone, least of all Lizbeth. He knew perfectly well how she had suffered and how she had searched for him when he disappeared in 1974 in a plane crash whose turbine pulverized him and took ten years for his body to regenerate. Then, through Rein and Noki, he had learned how she had searched for him when he disappeared in 1999.
He had made that woman worry too much about him, even when he had tried to keep her away, so that she wouldn't suffer any accidents when she was near him. Even if that had changed now, he still felt guilty about it. And, given the conversation during the night, she had made it clear to him that both, she and Mai, were willing to risk a lot in that relationship. Even when there were parts that neither could share, for fear that something might happen. He wasn't sure because of his fragmented memories, but he knew that Mai and Lizbeth had their memories a little more orderly. Still they could not share them. At least, not yet
He saw her coming again and leaned against the car, lighting a cigarette, trying to look distracted. She simply took it from him and stubbed it out. "No cigarettes until you have a good breakfast. There's fruit, croissants, even bacon and boiled eggs preserved in the trunk."
"Fruit? Croissants? In compressed or printable form? When are those eggs and bacon from?"
"Don't be picky, Mr. Professional Cook, we ate worse in our time. Food is different now, more practical."
"All right, I'm going to eat something." He wasn't going to get into an argument with Lizbeth over something like that. Even he was pretty hard-headed with Mai when she forgot a meal because of work.
He ate some croissants and had some orange juice just like Lizbeth, although she did snack on some nuts and some bacon as well. As he smoked outside after breakfast, he saw a vehicle coming down the street and parked on the corner of the museum. A older man got out of the car and the first thing he did was to look at him and then head towards the entrance of the museum.
That must be the owner.
Shin knocked on the car window to let Lizbeth know. She had gone inside the car to take care of some personal things and he would stay behind to make sure no one came near. This was the same problem that Mai had but, unlike her, Lizbeth had suffered from it before. Specifically every time they had met during the twentieth century of the Ancient Era.
Finally she got out of the car contentedly and obliged Shin with an extra breakfast, which he didn't argue too much about either, and they both headed for the museum.
"Fresh is always better, right? Didn't you miss the taste?"
"A little. You've always had a good diet."
"Just a little?"
"Quite a bit," Shin admitted.
Lizbeth nodded in satisfaction as she climbed the stairs leading to the museum entrance. Shin knocked on the door and within a few seconds the man he'd seen step inside appeared.
The door creaked open, revealing a hallway with dim lights. The owner of the museum, a tired looking man, greeted them with a bow as they introduced themselves.
"Welcome, agents. Please come in and follow me. I guess you're in a hurry."
Soft lights illuminated labyrinthine corridors filled with artifacts from the war, forgotten relics and oddities from the place's past. Shin and Lizbeth stepped into a world where time seemed to blur, each object whispering unknown stories. There were pictures with clippings that told of all sorts of oddities about the lake. Shin guessed that much of it could also be hoaxes to attract tourism, in his time it was normal for places like this to use mystery or haunted places to attract tourism. Although, considering the Dark Events, nowadays every such story had to be investigated before it was completely dismissed.
The museum owner, in a solemn voice, began to guide them through the galleries, revealing relics that defied logic and defied human comprehension. From artifacts from ancient civilizations to curiosities from outer space, every corner of the museum was a portal to the unexplored. Of course, to Lizbeth's dangerous smile, the man then clarified that these were objects that had been analyzed by the local OOParts control office and none of it was really dangerous.
"And the one we are looking for?"
"It's over here, follow me."
"Can you tell us some of the story?"
"When I got the call at night I was surprised. At first I didn't remember well, until the girl who called specified that they were those seats."
"Aren't they the only ones?"
"Yes, they are the only ones. But we have some seats that were removed about forty years ago from a nearby gazebo. And others from a family restaurant, which were also removed because of a rumor that they were cursed. It's nothing more than hearsay, but it's something that attracts attention. A little morbidity to attract tourism is not a bad thing, right?"
"Well, that sort of thing has always attracted people, both for good and bad, and in all eras" Lizbeth admitted.
"Anyway, these are the ones you're looking for," the owner said, stopping in front of a display case containing two old seats with blue tattered upholstery. There was a gold-colored marker attached to the side of the base of the display case that indicated a story about strange lights having been seen over the lake on the same day it was found.
Lizbeth frowned and Shin looked at them more closely.
"They're the same," she said to Shin, and then looked at the owner. "What's the story? The real story, not this one here that says they might be UFO seats."
"Let me see," said the man consulting his Neurowire and then waved his hand and sent the file. Lizbeth received it and read it to Shin.
"Found in the year 111 by some fishermen, that part I already knew. Let's see... they were discovered in August near Veyteux?"
"Yes, it's a couple of kilometers north, along route nine," the man explained. "May I ask what it is about?"
"Sorry, we can't say. It's part of our investigation. Can you open the display case? I want to make sure of something."
"Yes, of course."
The man did so and Lizbeth set about examining the armrests and the underside. It was as if they had slipped out of the locks that held them to the floor. The irons of the locks and braces were bent, the leg rests were missing. But what she was looking for were the serial numbers. In her mind she had displayed the 3D rendered model of the plane with all its parts. She no longer had any doubts, those seats belonged to the front of economy class. It was part of the plane they were investigating.
Lizbeth looked at Shin and she nodded. Then she looked at the owner. "We're sorry but we're going to have to take them. They are part of an active investigation. I can make a certificate right now, but later you'll have to take it to the local Nevermore review office or the Commission for Objects of Sensitive Treatment."
"I see." The man looked like he was expecting something like that, but rather than looking worried his face almost seemed relieved. Lizbeth guessed that this might be because an object seized on suspicion of a Dark Event might be good publicity for a museum of oddities.
"Will you take it with you?"
"We can't, it's a piece in an active investigation, so it can't be put in a compressed space. We'll call in a team of people who are working on the lake to do it."
"I see."
Lizbeth looked to the side and frowned somewhat quizzically. "Excuse me I have to take a call. I'll be right back." She stood up and walked away a little, but then turned to Shin. "I think you'd better come. Excuse us, we'll be right back. It's something important."
"Shall I accompany you?" asked the museum owner.
"It's not necessary, we know the way out."
They both walked quickly to the exit and Lizbeth instructed him to activate the shared call function of the device in his ear.
The museum owner turned to look at the seats and examined them curiously, while scratching his jaw.
The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.
"Hmm... I think there was something else," he said quizzically and went inside the museum, heading to the basement where he kept other objects.
Meanwhile Lizbeth and Shin came out of the museum and a light drizzle had started to fall and a thick mist was beginning to rise on the surface of the lake.
[Are you alone?] Mai's voice sounded a little strange.
"Yeah, what's going on?"
[That's what we're trying to find out. Oxy and Professor Reubens have disappeared from the base camp.]
Shin frowned. "Did they leave the perimeter?"
[No. At least from what we're seeing from security they both disappeared from where they were working at the same time.]
"How is it possible that security didn't see them?" Lizbeth asked.
[There is a mismatch in the security system and surveillance, just at the time they disappeared. But I don't think that's the most serious thing.]
"What are you talking about?" Shin asked.
[We're talking about Oxy, we know what she's like sometimes. But I think this isn't a prank. Her Neurowire signal just went out and we have something else that doesn't add up. Anderson, that woman from the council, has been affected by the same substance as Van.]
"That hypnite thing? How?"
[The doctor who checked her out says it's been in her system for days, but it activated last night just before Oxy disappeared.]
"Where is she now?"
[Unconscious, she's in the medical tent. That thing activated and left some traces in the Neurowire's record, but now it's just like it happened to Van, disappearing from her brain.] Shin and Lizbeth looked at each other with confused looks. [How are you guys doing?]
"You were right," Lizbeth said, "the seats are the same as on the plane. I'm already going to ask someone from one of the teams to take it to Evidence."
[I was really hoping I was wrong… Call Carissia, she can take them.]
They could both imagine what that was about. While it was a weak lead at first, now it had just added a new problem to the whole thing. If those seats had been discovered in 111, why had the plane shown up on Tuesday and not fourteen years earlier? It was something they would have to solve later, if that really had a resolution and didn't end up in the pile of unsolved Dark Events cases.
[Either way, good job, are you going to do some more research on that side or are you heading back?]
"Have any more bodies arrived?" Shin asked.
[About ten. I think the forensic team is already doing autopsies.]
"Lizbeth nodded. We'll try to find out some more around here for a couple of hours and if nothing new comes up we'll head back. Anything else we'll let you know."
"Mai?" Shin asked.
[Yes? What's going on?]
"How's the weather there?"
[Cloudy. It's drizzling a little.]
Lizbeth wondered at the question, but looked up at the dark gray sky that was already turning a little lighter gray with the mist. She consulted her weather app. The whole area between Switzerland and France was cloudy and it was predicted that it would probably stay that way all day. There was no severe thunderstorm warning, but there was some wind and possibly more drizzle around noon. The cold wind had stopped and the leaves on the nearby trees were barely swaying. Everything had been replaced by mist.
[Why do you ask?]
"No reason. I don't like it very much. It's going to make the search more difficult if we get heavy rains." Shin's face was a little strange.
[Anyway, be careful. We're going to continue to see what's going on here.]
"Okay, see you later," Lizbeth said cutting the call and looking at Shin. "Where could Oxy have gotten to? It's weird."
"Yeah, more so considering there was that woman as the Council's viewer. I don't think she'd dare do anything foolish." Shin slowly walked down the short stairs of the museum and looked up at the sky. At that moment he wished he had brought his old trench coat. But that was not what worried him most.
He found the sky unsettling and had a strange feeling about it. A feeling he did not like at all.
"Oh! Here you are!" The museum man had come out and was smiling. "Come, I think this will interest you."
They both went back inside and the man showed them an old transparent waterproof bag, with a lot of dust in it that he had left in the foyer.
"What is this?" Lizbeth asked.
"This was also found that day near the seats, by the same fishermen, I had to go downstairs to look for it because I didn't remember it," explained the museum owner, offering the waterproof bag.
Shin took the bag and they both put on latex gloves to handle it. When he opened it, he realized that inside it was a small black backpack with an old design.
"What does this remind you of?" Shin asked, showing it to Lizbeth.
She took it and looked it over. "It's an old backpack. I haven't seen one of these in ages. They don't make them like this anymore. But it's in perfect condition."
She proceeded to open it and inside were a couple of comic books and a language learning book with Greek legends. Shin picked up a Man of Steel comic book dated 2011 of the Ancient Era. The pages were glued together and faded. Surely if they had been fishermen, then that had been found in the water. He picked up the book of Greek legends and there was a bookmark on a page almost as faded as the others. It was the legend of the River of Oblivion in Spanish. After checking the year of publication, 2008, he put it back in the backpack. There was nothing else.
"I think it must be from the plane," Lizbeth said somewhat seriously. That was a child's backpack, probably a teenager's, because of the size and there were no childish markings or designs.
Shin nodded, the issue dates of those comics and the book seemed to match as well. Then he looked at the museum owner. "Wasn't anything else inside?"
"I think there was a red jacket, but it was ruined from being in the water. I think I remember the people who found it threw it away."
"Ruined?"
"Yes."
Lizbeth raised an eyebrow. Then it's likely that the seats had been in the water for a long time, too? She thought.
The upholstery was ruined. That could well have been the action of water rather than time. Who knew if they hadn't been in the lake for years and were found by fishermen just by chance. But given the state of the seats and that backpack, it couldn't have been long. Maybe the jacket had been ruined by being in the water, but the backpack, being made of better material, had held up better.
"Is there any chance we can talk to whoever found it?"
"I don't think so, they died about five years ago if I'm not mistaken, you can check with the local registry."
After the museum owner gave her the names Lizbeth connected to the registry of people to find out but they had indeed died of natural causes. Nothing unusual. They had hoped that if they had been alive they would have been able to talk to them but they had no luck with that.
Shin closed the backpack and returned it to the waterproof bag. "We'll take this one too," he sighed.
***
Siren Island
The morning was still dark in that lonely part of the island, but the sky was clear showing the brightness of the stars. On the horizon could barely be distinguished a distant clarity that drew in the distance the silhouettes of the archipelago of the Canary Islands. It was still more than an hour and a half before sunrise.
Rein, a fey drath of short stature, looked to the northeast with a worried expression on the rooftop of her house, surrounded by plants and flowers native to the island.
Her blonde hair did little to hide the small two horns peeking out of her bangs. The hair also hid one of her blue eyes, which had a vertical elliptical pupil like that of a reptile or cat. Her thin tail, ending in a slightly more solid tip with three prongs protruding like thorns, waved under the white nightgown she had just woken up in.
The connection the dragonys shared with nature and magic allowed them to sense disturbances in the air, and Rein was no exception. In particular she, a drath type, with her ability to manipulate the weather was especially sensitive to changes in the atmosphere. Although she had been checking the weather report there was something that didn't feel right.
"Relax already," said a violet-haired fey girl hugging Rein from behind.
"Something's not right. I don't like it."
Her younger sister, Noki, hugged her tighter, sharing an uneasy gaze to the northeast. Noki, despite being the younger sister, was a head taller than Rein and had the body that could easily pass for that of a young human. But despite what they looked like, both were well over two hundred years old.
Noki had dark green eyes, hair down to the waist and a short, somewhat tousled, fringe. She wore a long T-shirt whose wrinkles revealed that she had worn it to sleep. The T-shirt did little to hide her athletic legs and toned muscles.
Although the two were not blood sisters, and in fact were different types of feys, both had been raised as if they were sisters. A small family that was formed in the nineties of the twentieth century of the Ancient Era. With a foolish adoptive father who had been absent for over two hundred years, till last year, when he finally appeared again. An adoptive father who, along with his two girlfriends, at that moment was in the direction they were looking.
"I really don't think it's anything," Noki said and turned away. "Are we going to have breakfast up here?"
"Yeah, sure," Rein said, still staring blankly.
"Hey!" A sharp call made them jump and they poked their heads down. Standing in the doorway of the house was a girl with short black hair, with a few red locks sticking out, and wearing a short techwear dark dress, with high-soled black boots which made her look a little taller. Her pale skin contrasted with the black earrings and red of her eyes and the slightly thicker and scaly red tail. Although her hair was short, she had two longer strands at her back which almost made them look like thin ponytails.
"Are you two awake?"
"Mii! What's wrong?" Noki asked.
Mii looked up at them both and sighed. She looked very serious. Then her tail stopped looking scaly and instead had transformed into a kind of flesh-colored tentacle, although it didn't have suction cups like an octopus. Instead of suction cups, a large toothed mouth and other smaller ones accompanied the tentacle.. The tentacle grabbed onto the trunk of a nearby plant and Mii, jumping twice on two other nearby plants, climbed up the two floors of Rein's house.
Mii landed nearby and the tentacle retracted again, the mouth disappearing and leaving only the red scaly tail. Both girls looked at her. Mii, like Rein also had vertical pupil eyes.
"You could have used the door," Rein complained.
"Yeah, sorry. But I didn't want to delay this any longer. I sent a drone and saw that there was light so, I decided to come."
"What's wrong?"
Rein and Noki exchanged worried glances, waiting for the revelation of what was to come. Mobi, whom those closest to her called Mii, was the head of the Intelligence branch of the SID. Her showing up so early could not be good. Even though the three of them had been friends for decades, something told them she wasn't there for breakfast.
Silence fell over the small group.
She handed Rein a display, which she took and began to read. It was a forensic analysis.
"This was sent by Van before she traveled to the lake where the others are."
Rein frowned as she read. She wasn't quite sure what it was. She knew about what happened in Rome but didn't understand it.
"What is this?" Noki rested her chin on Rein's shoulder and began to read as well.
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"I'm sorry I didn't say it before, but this required some extra analysis. We didn't want to raise a stink and Rome Station did a more thorough examination to be sure."
"There was a body in the tunnels where that box that was stolen was?"
"That's right, but it's the final part that's important."
Rein skipped to the final part of the report and read what Mii indicated. Then she opened her eyes in surprise. "Wow, I didn't expect this."
"You see why we didn't want to draw attention to ourselves."
"Now we'll have to call the RIA."
"Did you tell Tony?" Noki asked, raising her eyes from the display and looking at Mii.
"I thought Rein would like to know first. This is an enigma from your era, right?"
"Well, not so much. But it's part of the island's history. All those families are connected to the story of how it was discovered... or rather conquered."
"What do you say, we tell Raven later?" Mii asked.
"Well it's part of her family history." Rein nodded.
"Family is a relative term for Raven, she considers Gehirn her father because he was the one who found her when he arrived on the island," Noki interjected.
"The world gets small when you have a few centuries on top of you," Rein whispered wearily.
"I just wanted to tell you. I have to go now," Mii said.
"Don't you want some breakfast?"
"No. I'm going to eat someone alive this morning."
The two sisters looked worriedly at Mii. Mii was a mimic and was known for her ferocity. They didn't know if that was a joke or if she could be serious.
"I'm joking... at least partly."
"Why?"
"I guess you don't know because of the information fence. My cute kouhai was attacked."
My cute kouhai could only refer to one person coming from Mii. "Something happened to Van?"
"Phil sent me a message yesterday that someone had messed with her brain, but it looks like she's going to wake up now, or at least that was the prognosis last night. I'm going to go to the lake now to get some explanations."
"Don't cause any fights. From what Mai said there's someone from the council," Noki alerted her.
Mii smiled with her lips, but her eyes looked like they weren't smiling at all. "I just want to see her and some explanations. You can't blame me for worrying about the boys in my division."
Mii raised a hand in greeting and jumped off the rooftop into the garden.
Rein leaned out and called out to her. "Wait! You're going now?"
Mii stopped in mid-step. "Do you want me to say something to that fool?"
Rein and Noki looked at each other. "How much longer before you leave?" they both asked almost in unison.
Mii grimaced worriedly. "Why? Do you want to tag along?"
Rein looked to the northwest. "There's something I don't like."
"What are you talking about?"
"The air feels funny today just in the direction that they're in. Or at least that's what she says," Noki pointed out.
"That's it? The air is bad?" Mii asked.
"It's not that... it made me remember something." Rein looked doubtful. "Maybe I'm overreacting but, the leylines are shaky today."
"Do you think there might be an earthquake or something? The pressure needles are working normally."
"It's not that. The ley lines are just like they were that day."
Mii looked at her and pursed her lips. "What are you talking about?"
"Maybe it's just me being silly. But it reminds me of that day."
"What day?"
"The day the war against the fractus began."