Hana yawned, covering her
mouth in embarrassment as she stepped back from the large corkboard she had
been rearranging. She looked over her shoulder at Detective Daniels, afraid the
small young woman would judge her for getting tired working on such a high
priority case, but the detective only gave out a larger yawn of her own.
“Sorry,” Dae Daniels said to Hana, taking a swig of her hours old coffee. The look on her face implied it mustn’t have been very warm. “I’ve been up since one AM,” she explained not for the first time after begrudgingly swallowing her gulp, and dumping her cup in the trash. A look at the clock told Hana it was now a little after five pm.
Detective Daniels seemed more than capable at her job, a stark contrast to the number of other officers Hana had met during her time spent at Oakville’s precinct that day. Daniels had worked under cover for teenage gangs, often helped by her incredibly youthful appearance. She described the experience as being a little 21 Jumpstreet, but Hana had no idea what she was talking about.
Still, she’d worked multiple cases with missing children, and dealing with children who ran away, or were otherwise trouble. “Every other cop in this damned precinct only knows how to write a parking ticket,” Dae had told Hana.
Hana had never been tall, but even compared to her this woman was short, and tiny. She had an adorable little face, and the prettiest eyes. It was no wonder she was so good at undercover work, she looked no older than fourteen. The only hint at an older age was a lip ring on her lip, something Hana hoped no mom would allow a fourteen year old to get. Also when she spoke it was with a wisdom no fourteen year old could possess. When other officers came by, it was often with coffee and donuts, older men and women showing nothing but respect and support to the case even though they all had nothing useful to add.
It wasn’t just the officers that were inadequate for the job. Spending the whole afternoon there had been enough for Hana to realize the entire Oakville precinct was impractical. Like the city hall, the walls were all glass and built to the design of an open concept that was more focused on looking good than it was at being practical. Work space was hard to come by, computers were all set up at standing desks with no chairs, and the meeting room they were using to spread out the evidence of their case was built with state of the art tech like projectors and holograms, but none of it worked so Detective Daniels had wheeled in an old corkboard from storage.
“So we’re sure she’s the first?” Hana asked pointing to a sweet young brown skinned girl she’d placed at the top of the pyramid. For all of Dae Daniel’s wisdom and experience, she didn’t seem to have much in the way of organizational skills and that was something Hana had no problem bringing to the table. Anything to be helpful.
Detective Daniels nodded, sitting up on the desk she was leaning against. Her legs dangled off the edge. “Twenty four months prior from her disappearance,” Dae told Hana, “There were three missing child cases in Oakville. They were all resolved.” She lifted a stapler off the table near her and passed the folder underneath towards Hana.
Hana grabbed it, and looked inside. It was detailed notes on the three children, kept likely just in case they were somehow connected. The one girl had been reported with her sister by the mother, found later that night to have been out with a large group of boys found in a van by the Bronte Harbour.
“And that was the last kid,” Dae said, looking at the kid at the very bottom of the pyramid. “Billy. Reported missing a little over a day ago.” All the pictures of the kids filled the corkboard, there were so many, and the disappearances weren’t showing any sign of slowing down.
“Went to the same school as my son,” Hana said, reading the boy’s portfolio. “You know I think I remember Jacob mentioning something about a Billy in his class.” This was starting to get a little too close to her family.
Dae yawned again. She’d been woken up that morning to a disturbance downtown. Some sort of fight had broken out in an abandoned building. Dae had been called down by the officer on duty that night when a child’s footprint had been found in the ash and rubble of the now burnt down building. She’d told Hana that there was little more she could get from the rubble besides that kids had been there. Possibly the missing ones, possibly any children.
“More kids will go missing,” Dae told Hana. “And then we’re going to need more corkboard.”
Hana shook her head. “We should have people out there.”
“Where?” Dae asked. “Covering the entire town? Oakville is large, sprawled out. We don’t have the resources and we don’t even know where to start.”
“Well then,” Hana said, having a sudden idea, “perhaps our next goal should be marking the locations of each disappearance on a map and see if we can narrow down our search parameters.” It was something the detective should have thought about long ago, but seeing as she was the only person on the case, how could Hana blame her? She was in way over her head.
Dae nodded an agreement with her. “I’ll get us a map,” she said, raising a finger quickly. “Tomorrow. I’ve had four hours sleep in three days. I’m gonna catch a few more hours before the sun goes down and everything goes all Stranger Things around here again.”
“Right,” Hana said to the detective as she slid off the desk to leave. “I’ll just stay here a little longer and go home as well. You’ll wake me if you have to go out tonight?”
“Best to sleep by the phone then, Mrs. Lin,” She said heading to the door. “It was a pleasure meeting you. And your help is more than welcome. Damned needed even.”
“Well the mayor’s office wants to show you that we have our full support behind you,” Hana lied to her, unable to say the words with any enthusiasm.
The detective stopped at the door, and Hana turned from the corkboard to see a third woman blocking Dae’s way. This woman was tall with long black hair tied up in an untidy bun. She was pale with slightly Asian features, almost looked like an older version of Hana’s own daughter.
“Can I quote you on that?” the woman said in a deep voice, leaning against the doorway, and looking past Dae’s shoulder at Hana. “Isobel Teung, Voice news.” Her accent had the hint of British but it wasn’t overwhelming. Hana could tell this woman was very well travelled.
“Damn. I hate reporters,” Detective Dae Daniels muttered, trying to slide herself past the young lady, but Isobel refused to move.
“I haven’t heard of you guys,” Hana admitted sheepishly.
“We get that a lot,” Isobel told the both of them. “But we’re not like the others. We’re a largely liberal news outlet trying to bring people unbiased journalism.”
“Unbiased liberal journalism?” Hana asked, as Dae slipped under Isobel’s arm and gave her a triumphant look from outside the room. “Isn’t that an oxymoron.”
“We’d like to think conservatism is an oxymoron,” Isobel said sharply. Hana pursed her lips.
“You sure you’re not my daughter from the future?” she asked, that defiant tone sounding awfully familiar.
“Pretty sure,” Isobel said quickly. “I’m here about all the missing children. I’ve already been by the protests outside city hall. I wanted to report on the efforts being done to find these children and return them safely to their families.”
“You have to understand Oakville has never dealt with any sort of tragedy on this scale before,” Hana told the reporter, looking back at the corkboard. Every one of those faces that she tried to look in the eyes only gave her a sinking feeling in her stomach.
“Is that on the record?” Isobel asked, joining Hana at the corkboard. “My god, this many kids? Who’s taking them all?”
“We don’t even know they are getting taken,” Dae said from the doorway, having still not left yet. “They could all be running away.”
“All these kids?” Isobel said in disbelief, looking at the corkboard.
“There might be a ring leader, someone with the power to motivate these other kids to leave their families and join him,” Dae explained.
“Some pervert?” Isobel asked with disgust.
“Maybe,” Dae said. “But for this many kids I feel it would have to be someone like them. He or she makes them feel like they are the same somehow. Provides for them some bond of family that’s stronger than the bond they have to their actual families.”
“Some of the families have been found dead,” Isobel said, leafing through pages of her note pad.
“Yes,” Dae said, nodding her head. “But not all.”
“Some brutally,” Isobel continued. “Most with all the blood drained from their bodies.”
“But yet in almost all cases of bodies being bled dry, I could find no signs of them being strung up in anyway.” Dae said. “I examined many of the bodies personally. The fact I don’t have time to sleep much anymore is more a blessing now than a curse.”
“But she has to go out tonight on patrol,” Hana said, nodding at Dae to finally take her leave. “She was hoping to catch a little sleep before then.”
“Seems fair to me,” Isobel said, crossing her arms, still exploring the cork board with her eyes, and taking pictures of it with her phone. “Seems like you guys could use more hands.”
“As I said,” Hana repeated, “Oakville has never dealt with anything like this. It’s a small rich town that’s never had to worry about any serious crimes. What we need to do is start looking outside our police force for someone with strong investigation and deduction skills.”
“Where are you going to find someone like that outside the police force?” Isobel asked, and Hana looked at her with a raised eyebrow. The mayor’s assistant had someone in mind.
* * *
That was just one of many scenes from the new chapter about to release on my Patreon at my site 99geek.ca or at patreon.com/99geek
You can subscribe for as low as a dollar. Though if you comment here, or send me an email at aldonn_clone@hotmail.com I'd be willing to send you some of my stuff from patreon with the hope that you will spread the word about me to others on the internet and social media, or even just if you'll get back to me and tell me what you think. I'm desperate right now to build an audience. More than I am for money, which I'm pretty tight on that too. The life of a penniless writer. If you, like me, have no money to give, and no time to spend on spreading word of my site and patreon, the least you could do is follow me on twitter @AndrewGeczy
I appreciate any help. The chapter will be up today or tomorrow, and next week there should be a new podcast. Both the podcast and the next chapter on Patreon in September are going to be for Adrift Homeless.
