What a huge mess the office was. There were so many things just everywhere. Cicely needed something that could help her concentrate. No such things around. Barring that, she needed something to help her feel familiar and relaxed, give her a chance to think. Use flask with Cicely. Cicely screwed the cap back on.
Now, then, out of every drab grey and brown, something stood out among the room. A fancy desk had mostly been left untouched. A bunch of the personal belongings had been thrown to the ground, including a bowl of fruit. Something had been conspicuously left there, and it was circled in bright red. It was obvious someone wanted that to be found.
Cicely made her way through the wreckage, throwing her arms out in balance as she went over a beam of wood that had fallen from the ceiling. From where the fancy desk had been placed, it must have belonged to someone high up. They could keep track of the entire Conexus office. On the desk was a newspaper.
Look at newspaper. It was about the people that stood up against the Astra Non Obligant! There were even photos of certain events, such as the ursa major attack on the university and something else that Cicely was not apart of.
Use newspaper with Zephyrus. Cicely waved to the Conexus official. "Hey, someone left this sitting out. Whomever it was wanted it to be found. Look, there's me!" Cicely pointed to her photograph that had been taken while she was getting medical attention. The velen, Phorcys, as was another person there on the ursa major attack. His name was Urias Medardo according to the article.
There were two other people she didn't know: Keydis Lysistrata and Annora Caestrum.
Zephyrus had preoccupied herself with a minor amount of cleaning up whilst her new companions did whatever Leidan had assuredly known they were capable of. The Lieutenant's ability to read others... how long had he been hiding it? He'd worked in Domestic Affairs for almost half a decade, since he were a fresh-faced recruit. Had the young boy been hiding a devious mind? Or had he simply developed those skills through experience?
Everything became muddled when it concerned Astra Non Obligant. Allies were called into question, enemies were not what they seemed. She only hoped her trust in Leidan wouldn't be misplaced.
Dragged from her thoughts by Cicely's call, she was beside the laicar woman in but a moment. Gingerly handling the newsprint in her talons, Zephyrus gave a low click of her tongue.
"A good find," She remarked, "I don't think this was left by Leidan. Is this a threat from Obligant?"
Humming thoughtfully, she finished her thought, "You should hold onto that. It may prove useful later. Could you help check up on Phorcys? He may have found something about where the pursuers took off to."
Offering a thankful smile to the barkeep, Zephyrus swallowed her anxiety and went to check on Perseus.
“‘Do not mistake underfoot for underneath,’” recited Perseus the moment Zephyrus appeared in Leidan’s doorway. “‘Find the first jewel.’”
Looking up from the papers he’d spread across Leidan’s desktop, he fixed Zephyrus with his usual wide-eyed stare, clearly expecting something from her.
“It’s a message,” he explained, perhaps unnecessarily. “Translated from a string of numbers on one of the pages in Leidan Halbert’s notepad. Possibly referencing the Three Jewels? There were also two papers. One with a list of...names?” Perseus glanced down at the slip of paper to confirm. “Yes. Names. Probably names.”
His head tilted to one side, he picked up the business card he’d taken from the stack within Leidan Halbert’s desk drawer and drew the one Leidan Halbert had given him from his coat pocket. He held them up, side by side, comparing them, as he continued. “...The other paper had more letters. They may decode into the word ‘darkest.’ If they do, the significance is...beyond me. At the moment.” He shifted from one foot to the other with the admission.
"On it!" Cicely said. She was, oddly enough, having fun, and it showed on her face. Might as well enjoy what she could of the day before things escalated into being horrible again. So where had Phorcys gone off to?
Oddly enough, she remembered the basilisk more, and she knew that it had gone out through the side. There was a trail of glass on the ground in the direction she was heading to. It led to parts unknown. Time to make it known.
"Hey, Phorcys," Cicely said in a forceful whisper. She didn't want to spook the basilisk, but she wanted to get the velen's attention.
There was an audible click of teeth from further ahead from the velen. Despite his headstart, the priest had not made much headway in following the trail. Instead he seemed to scan every fragment of glass for something.
“They were careful. Not a drop of blood, a piece of tissue, a scrap of cloth.” The velen said mournfully as Cirely came into view. “Whoever they were they were professionals not a trace of scent for my friend here to follow. Was your search any more fruitful?”
A poignant silence followed Perseus' impromptu report. Zephyrus seemed to lapse into thought, before shaking her head, "I can't make heads or tails of it, unfortunately. I was made Auspex as a public leader, I've never dealt with subterfuge on this level."
It was odd to be admitting so much so casually, but there was a certain... intuition, that drove her to do so. The young man could be trusted. She wasn't sure how she knew, but she did. A gut feeling that she would follow for now.
"It's not unlikely that it refers to the Three Jewels," She said. "Leidan was based here, in the Ruby Jewel, and often had to work in the Diamond and Emerald Jewels as well. I'm not sure what he means by 'underfoot' or 'underneath' though. Maybe we should consult with the others?"
Perseus had observation, there had to be a reason for the other two. Hopefully one or both of them had better lateral thinking skills than she. Nodding once at her train of thought, she continued, "I'll fetch them. This seems like the right trail to follow."
Leaving Leidan's office, Zephyrus' talons clacked loudly against the hardwood flooring of the Conexus office. She'd managed to sweep away a good portion of the broken glass and shredded files in her searching, but most of the corners and edges of the walls seemed occupied.
As she neared the entrance, the Auspex noted with some satisfaction that the perimeter was clear. The Corporal had taken her words to heart, and hopefully Phorcys and Cicely found something of use or meaning nearby.
Talk to Phorcys. Cirely shook her head. "Nope, they smashed all the fruit. It's really wasteful. I did find a newspaper article about us, though. See?" She held out the newspaper that was on the previous year's events. "Someone went to the trouble to circle it, and I doubt it was the owner." The newspaper itself wasn't that old, though, just a few days. The company had wanted to do a piece about last year's disaster, apparently.
Look at basilisk. "So, how dangerous is this guy? Girl? What's his or her name?" Cicely stood with any part of her body well away from it.
Perseus stared after Zephyrus’s retreating figure for a moment. His gaze ticked down to the assortment of items strewn before him.
He began to turn Leidan Halbert’s office upside-down.
Pers checked through the desk once more, idly pulling drawers off their tracks and depositing them on the floor. No more hidden bottoms, no new messages or notes strapped to their underneaths. Then he wandered over and did the same to Leidan Halbert’s filing cabinets: the folders within them were dumped on the floor, the drawers poked and prodded and checked for secrets.
After a moment, Perseus tipped the cabinets over – they crashed to the ground rather loudly. But nothing was hidden beneath them, either.
What else? What…else…?
On one knee, kneeling beside the upset cabinets, Pers’ attention tracked down to the floor.
Zephyrus found the velen and laicar conversing not far from the office. They'd been looking for a trail to follow, to no avail it seemed. Nodding to both, she beckoned the pair back with her to the office. As she walked with them, she explained, "Perseus found some code from Halbert. Something about 'underfoot is not underneath' and finding a jewel."
They made it two steps in before hearing sounds of raucous destruction from Leidan's office. Almost sprinting into the room, Zephyrus couldn't help the befuddled look that crossed her face as she took in the newly-dismantled office. Perseus was on one knee, knocking against the floor boards one at a time and occasionally shoving whatever piece of furniture was in the way to the opposite side of the room.
"What," the Auspex managed, "are you doing?"
For not the first time this morning, Zephyrus was completely at a loss. Her mind went back to the stupid riddle the Lieutenant had left in his wake, and tried to follow whatever backflips Perseus' mind went through to reach the conclusion.
By the time she spoke, Perseus had inspected another handful of floorboards and Zephyrus could feel the presence of Phorcys and Cicely behind her. "Underfoot… you think he meant under the floorboards? Underfoot but not underneath… maybe?"
Scratching at the spiny ridges on her head, the spurii turned to the others and shrugged. "I guess we could start searching in the rest of the office? They might've been trying to hide whatever this 'jewel' was by throwing the files onto the floor."
"Okay, then," Cicely mumbled to Phorcys. "No wonder you shoot people in the leg. You have no social skills." She tilted her head and looked around the outside. Whatever had made the trail vanished once the glass ran out.
Heading back inside at the request of Zephyrus, Cicely pondered upon the new revelation of things being underfoot. There was certainly a lot of things on the ground. She went back into the main area where she remembered something. It was near the entrance to the office.
Pick up pile of papers. Cicely reached down. She came back up hugging a huge pile of old files. As expected, it was too hard to read when they were all torn up. She started kicking them away.
When she got closer to the wall, something felt strange. Kick floor. The floorboards moved instead of creaked. Cicely tapped it some more. She brushed away any remaining paper in the area. It had to be a secret compartment! Cicely had read enough mystery novels. If only her thick, mittened hands could get in there to dig it up. Curse her desire of wanting to maintain feeling in her fingers.
"Hellooo," Cicely called out. "Does anyone have something long and narrow? I need to pry something up.
Perseus appeared at Cicely’s side a moment later, standing at least a foot too close and wielding a screwdriver pulled from one of the four tool belts strapped to his hips.
“What is it?” he asked – a rhetorical question, as he was already dropping to one knee on the floor and Cicely’s existence seemed to be a peripheral concern, at best. The craftsman pressed his fingers to the floorboards Cicely had exposed, ear angled to catch the way the wood gave, creaking beneath his weight. He made a fist, rapped at the spot a few times, then nodded to himself. As he wedged the screwdriver into the space between two floorboards, he muttered to himself in his soft voice. “Yes, this is...It’s likely...”
Pers leaned on the screwdriver and the floorboard came loose with the loud, grating squeal of nails dragging on wood.
The space beneath the floorboard had been hollowed out, creating the perfect compartment to stash something – or, in this case, three things. The first Perseus hefted out, his interest piqued.
“An occuli,” he reported thoughtfully. He turned it over in his hands, and ran his gloved fingertips over it. “It’s missing pieces. Two. Two pieces.”
His eyes trailed back down to Leidan Halbert’s secret compartment, where a bundle of diode-like tubes and yet another sheet of paper remained, nestled in the space between floorboards. “Or maybe just…” he added quietly, placing the unpowered oculus on the floor next to him and reaching back into the compartment, “…just one piece.”
He took the bundle of diode-like tubes in one hand, the piece of paper in his other, and his eyes looked from the first to the second.
Almost absently, he passed the diode-bundle over to Cicely, eyes on the mess of letters on this newest cipher. LMVQVDVOULFMWGDLBVGWRHXLEVIVW.
Perseus stared at it, not sure if he was content or disappointed. A moment of reorganizing letters in his head, and then he read it out loud. “One jewel found, two yet discovered.”
She knelt down to the ground with the bundle of tubes in her arms. There were four of them, and they weren't exactly light. She set the four down next to her in a way that they wouldn't roll away. The tube-like things were tapes that could be played, assuming the right device was around. And wouldn't it be known that was perfect, the device for doing so was right next to her. It was a brass box filled with ports. The entire front side was an opaque and curved glass sheet where the images were displayed. There was an open slot that fit the tapes, but Cicely left it alone until.
"And it's an oculus. Oculi is plural. Anyway, if we can get some terra regia volantis, we can power this device and maybe play what's on the tapes!" Cicely exclaimed. "Though I can't imagine too much what's on here. This technology has really only been used in three places. The kinchaa games, the store competition and last year's speech during the Nocte Nils."
Zephyrus' head began to spin. What on earth had Halbert gotten himself into? How in the world did Cicely know how an oculus worked? In the silence that followed, she noted the absence of Phorcys. The velen had seemingly slipped off to pursue the trail elsewhere.
"Three jewels," The Auspex mumbled. "I guess that means he hid something at the Diamond and Emerald Jewel as well? I don't know why he left an oculus here, though. I don't suppose either of you has some volantis to spare?"
The liquid ore was oft used for magical purposes, drawing visae from various sources and places for enchantments and potions. Unfortunately, neither of those were Zephyrus' forte. As the situation became steadily more complicated, her once-prominent skillset seemed all the more redundant. It was a bitter pill, and she tried to put it out of mind.
"Either way, we should get moving as soon as possible. If you want to look at what's on that, we'll have to do it somewhere safe. Do either of you have somewhere we could regroup and secure this evidence before we move on? Obligant has made it very clear that our offices aren't as secure as we'd like."
"As a high-ranking Conexus official, can't you just requisition terra regia volantis, Zephyrus?" Cicely asked. "Or maybe walk into a store, show your credentials and just take some." That was how it worked, right?
She shrugged the heavy brass box onto the floor along with the tapes. All four were kept nearby so they wouldn't have a chance to roll away. "If you want to keep these somewhere, I do have a bar in the Ruby Jewel. Though it's not locked. Or secure. Really, people go in and out all the time, and no one will keep track of it. So not that great of a place at all, really."
Still staring at the oculus with wide eyes and a distant expression, Perseus spoke. “I also have a place that is nearby. It has the...capacity...to be secure.” The young man paused before adding, “Dahlitium. I have a, reasonable, though not substantial, amount of volantis, at my...shop. But it...is...dahlitium,” he explained.
In several sharp, stilted movements, Perseus straightened to his feet and set his gaze on Cicely. Then Zephyrus. Then a window. He buried his hands in his coat pockets...but quickly took them out again.
Perseus's head turned slowly, returning his gaze to Cicely in increments.
"Not good?" he parroted, no particular expression of note in his face or voice. "No. No, that isn't what I meant. It's just." His hands returned to his pockets after all. A moment of mental searching, and he offered, "Common. Low-grade. Weak, speaking in terms of potency."
Pers' mismatched eyes tracked, once more, down to the oculus and its accoutrements. "Dahlitium volantis may power an oculus of this size just...fine. Or it may not."
"It could be worth a shot," Zephyrus interrupted. "In the meantime, we should get all this secured at your... shop, you called it?"
She pointed at Perseus, and at his nod, replied in kind. "We should probably move on as soon as you both feel ready, there's a good chance that this wreckage was an attempt to make finding Halbert's trail harder. We'll likely face more direct obstructions going forward."
Clutching her coat tighter around herself, the Auspex dared a peek outside, seeing the sun begin to crest more fully above the rooftops of the buildings in the Ruby Jewel. Without the cover of darkness, their movements would be easy to follow. The Astra Non Obligant would more than likely speed up their attempts at catching her Lieutenant the moment they made their next move.
All that was left now was a race to Leidan Halbert, to uncover whatever grim truths he held.
