The Plane’s Children – Chapter Eight – Emersli1

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Tony opened his eyes and squinted against the light, unaccustomed to his new level of sensitivity.

“You know what to do Tony.  Picture a dial, or a lever.  Whatever works for you.  And dial down sight.”  Ellison giving instructions in that crisp way he had.

Following his instructions, Tony pictured the dial in his mind.  Slowly he turned it to the left, and as he did, he felt his eyesight stabilize.  Letting out a breath of relief he realized Jim wasn’t actually in the room with them.

Oops.

Carefully dialing his hearing down, Tony gave an experimental sniff.  Nothing seemed overly pungent, so either he didn’t have much in the way of enhanced scenting or the iso-rooms were just that good.  Something to explore later he supposed.

Knowing Blair, there was a lot of testing and training in his future.  But not until they caught their perp.  That definitely took priority over Blair’s curiosity.  Though Tony could probably benefit from some quick and dirty practice time to get a handle on things before going into the field.

Sitting up,  he looked around the bare room wondering where Alone was.  The thought had barely crossed his mind, when he felt his partner.  They materialized next to him on the bed and Tony wondered if they’d always been there or had just popped in when he missed them.

Alone laughed.  “I am always with you Tony, but it takes a great deal of psionic energy to be visible to anyone but you.  That means sometimes you may feel me more than see me.  But I have had a lot of time to practice manipulating psionics, so I can usually be visible whenever you wish.  At least to you.”

The intercom came to life, startling both of them.

“Jim says you’re not hearing him anymore, so you must have gotten your senses at least somewhat under control.  I’m sorry we can’t just let you stare at each other in wonder, but we do have a murder to solve.”  Blair’s voice came wryly through the tinny sound system.

Sighing, Tony threw a hand sign in the direction of the camera and began to climb out of bed.

“Oh, before we go out there … do you have a gender preference?  I know the sentinels and guides I’ve interacted with definitely refer to their spiritmates as male or female.”  Tony looked at his partner.

Alone thought about it.  “I think maybe their idea of their partners’ genders comes from the gender of their otherself.  In our natural state we are not dimorphic.  So no.  I do not feel a strong leaning towards any gender, though if it would be easier for you, you may choose one and I will accept it.”

Tony drew up in offense.  “This is the twenty-first century.  We call people by the pronouns they prefer.  It’s a matter of respect.”

Alone looked remorseful.  “I’m sorry Tony.  I wasn’t meaning to make light of it.  It’s just that I honestly don’t care.  And I thought you might not want to stand out from your friends.”

“Actually.”  Oops.  They’d forgotten Blair was on the intercom.  “It sounds as though I need to put more in my paper than I realized.  Once this is all cleared up, I would love to actually have the time to talk to you about your people and culture.  I think we’d all love to know our spiritmates better.  But right now, we just don’t have time.”

“We’re coming Blair.”  Tony suited actions to words as he pulled on his shoes and opened the door to the iso-room.  “What’ve I missed?”

What he’d missed apparently was the forensic evidence from the silo.

Not that there was much of it.  It looked as though once they’d been put in their rooms, Amalda and Matthew had been left alone.  At least until Amalda died.  Her body had probably been removed a few hours after death, which had occurred between three and five o’clock.  Matthew didn’t remember hearing the door being welded shut, so that had probably been done just after he was placed in the room.

Matthew’s tox panel had come back with evidence of a large dose of phenobarbitol sometime within the past week.  So he had probably been dosed during the brief time he was out.  Since he remembered an injection, they were going with ketamine for their presumptive knock-out drug.

The addition of the box of vanilla wafers to Amalda’s room and the welding of Matthew’s door were the only differences in the spaces.  And either they’d scared him off, or he’d truly just walked off and left Caulfield to die in that room and rot there.

Tissue samples from Amalda were mostly inconclusive, but did indicate the possibility of a small dose of phenobarbitol.  Probably to keep her asleep during transport.  The blood panels bore more fruit.  Amalda’s blood was flooded with cortisol, adrenaline, and noradrenaline.  These hormones showed an intense fear response.  So Dr. Saxon’s thought about her being scared literally to death was looking more and more promising.

Unfortunately, that’s where the progress ended.  Forensics on the apartment had confirmed Tony’s sequence of events, but not produced any new useful evidence.  No one could find a trace of this guy.  Mick Brandon had suggested looking into the property records for the silo, and was currently trolling through the state’s landholding records trying to track the parcel.

Parker and Jackson had gone to Amalda’s school to talk to some of her coworkers.  They all responded to the news of her death with appropriate levels of shock and loss.  No one knew anything.  Amalda hadn’t mentioned meeting any new friends.  She hadn’t been afraid of anybody.  If she had a stalker, she didn’t know it … and neither did anybody else.

Matthew’s parents were flying in from San Francisco, and would get in some time this evening, but Tony didn’t hold out much hope that they could add anything to their knowledge for the case.  They had reportedly been on good terms with their son’s partner, and had been supportive of the move, though disappointed for them to be so far away.

All in all, it was a whole frustrating lot of nothing.

In the five days since Amalda Vernon’s death, they’d learned everything they could about the woman.  There just wasn’t a lot there.  She was a nice, normal woman who’d lived a small, quiet life.

And then Alone asked a small, simple question.  And everything changed.

“Which happened first?  Flicker’s unbecoming or Amalda’s death?”  

The question fell into the room   Blair looked quickly towards Dr. Saxon, there reporting on the latest round of tissue samples.  The doctor appeared to give it some thought.

“I don’t even know if there’s a way to tell.  But speaking hypothetically … the attack was directed against Flicker, so I would assume they unbecame first.”  Dr. Saxon’s voice sounded as professional as ever, but she reached up for her egret spiritmate either offering protection or seeking comfort.   Maybe both.

“So someone attacked the guide rather than the woman.”  Alone mused.  “I wonder…”

After a moment of silence, Tony ventured, “You wonder what mia stella?”

“I suppose I wonder what a guide could do to make someone so angry with that part of them that they tried to kill it.”

Tony’s mind spun.  He couldn’t think of anything.  Some parents romanticized the idea of having a sentinel child and were disappointed to have a child test as a latent guide, but he’d never heard of anybody killing someone because of that.

“Maybe we need to go further back.”  Mick Brandon suggested.  “You had us look at just the last six months.  Maybe someone was angry with her in San Francisco, and it just took this long for them to find her.”

Tony considered the idea.  “It’s not a bad idea to look further back.  I’ll talk to Matthew’s parents tomorrow and see what they can tell me.  It’s better than just waiting.”

Unspoken was the fear shared by everyone in the room.  That another body would drop before they could get a line on their perp.

Matthew’s parents couldn’t tell him much.

They had only known Amalda for not quite four years.  His mother described a cheerful girl who loved children and was eager to start her own family.  His father talked about a girl who couldn’t cook to save her life, until she met him.  Their times together in the kitchen while he taught her everything he knew were clearly very cherished memories.

Both parents had taken Mallie into their hearts, and now those hearts were breaking.

Mason Caulfield wiped his eyes.  “What about Tom and Carter?  I’m sure you’ve told them.  Are they here?  Mallie loved those boys so much, and she was so proud of them.”

Tony didn’t have much experience with positive parental attention, but remembering two young men with empty, haunted eyes he thought that maybe that’s what they needed.  And the Caulfield’s seemed ready to stand beside them, Jennie Caulfield nodding along with her husband.

“They’re actually in guest rooms here at the Center.  If you’d like, I could let them know you’re here.”  Tony wasn’t going to force a meeting on two traumatized boys, but …

“Yes, please.  They’ve shared every major holiday with us for the last three years, and Mallie was … well, they’re family.  They need to know that they’re still family.”  Jennie was very firm, and Tony wondered what it might have been like to have such a family.

A nudge to his knee from Blair’s spiritmate and the feeling of Alone giving him a psionic hug surprised him.  But what really shocked him was Dr. Saxon’s egret, flying over and giving him an admonishing (but gentle) peck on the cheek.  

Right.  He had a family now too.

Picking up the phone, he called the room the Vernon boys were sharing and passed along the message that the Caulfields were here and would like to see them.  A brief response had Tony relaxing, confident now that this was the way to go.  Hanging up he turned to the grieving couple.

“They’re on their way down.”  In fact, Tony could feel them getting closer, their grief brushing against the edge of his shield.  Soon he heard rapid footsteps, and then the door opened.  Mason and Jennie stood as one, and each caught a twin as they practically dived into their open arms.

With a nod to the others, Tony shepherded them all out the door to leave the family to mourn and comfort each other.