Ramello Staten

“It’s got to be here somewhere,” Ramello Staten panted as he pried open another crate with a crowbar, chips of wood flying off. Before beginning his search, he pulled up the lower half of the balaclava mask he wore to wipe away beads of sweat dangerously close to his eyes.

Another crate full of canned foods. Same as the last six. He clicked his tongue, annoyed at the lack of progress. Should he just search elsewhere? But this time, it could be different. There might be something covered by all of these cans. He dug through them, anxiously trying to find—

“What are we even looking for?” cried out the robust man calling himself Devyn, a devoted worshipper of the High Overseer Devylosian as was apparent from his chosen alias. The hockey mask hiding his identity muffled his voice. “Baked beans, corned beef, chowder,” he said, shaking cans after reading their labels. “And what the hell is this? Asparagus.”

“I-I’m not sure,” Ramello replied, embarrassed with his answer. “Anything…anything suspicious. We’ll know when we see it.”

“Look for anything suspicious?” snorted the stocky woman rummaging the shelves beside him. “That’s not very helpful.”

“Is this can of extra-long asparagus spears suspicious?” Devyn asked sarcastically.

“Chemicals, vials, canisters, anything weird,” said Mercator, the one who accompanied Reginus in their earlier meeting. The well-dressed man had tied his coat around his waist and loosened his tie, his dress shirt drenched in sweat, the amulets around his neck swinging wildly as he pushed down a stack of boxes so he could begin searching them. “I know it’s quite a tall order to look for something we don’t know, but Ram’s right. It should look suspicious, whatever it is.”

“Yeah, just hunker down and continue searching, guys,” Reginus huffed. “Cent said the trucks that go to the hospital get their packages from this warehouse.”

“That’s what shows up in their database,” Cent, the resident computer-expert replied. He was still in the stolen company uniform he used to sneak in the office of this compound. “Sorry guys, I didn’t find any other details.”

Devyn shook his head. “This is hopeless, dammit.”

He’s right, this is going nowhere. Ramello kicked over the crate in front of him, frustrated at the seemingly dead-end. Cans rolled across the floor. “It’s got to be here,” he murmured. He jammed the crowbar beneath the lid of the next crate in line and pushed it down.

It’s got to be here.

It should be. Something had to be here!

The face of the Adumbrae called ‘Red Hood’.

Salty smell of the air.

And ‘Dawson’.

Those were the only three things Ramello recalled. Nothing else. From the last memory of accompanying Erind on the train to when he woke up at the hospital, everything in between was a huge blackhole—except for those three tiny pieces of memory.

At first, he thought he only imagined the face with the scary snout-like mask, some kind of bizarre dream. But after seeing Reginus’ video of the incident at Serenade Bazaar, he realized he had met an actual Adumbrae. She was there when he was beaten up. As a friend or foe, he didn’t know. He did tell Reginus that Red Hood saved him, but he only said that to gain their trust; he wasn’t so sure if that was what actually happened. Red Hood attacked Uncle Jerry and Castan…she might be an enemy after all.

The distinct salty smell told him he was brought somewhere near the ocean. He hadn’t been to the beach for some time, so there was no other explanation for the memory of the strong scent of saltwater suddenly popping up in his head.

And lastly, the word ‘Dawson’. He didn’t personally know any Dawson. Could it be the name of one of his attackers? A clue as to their identity?

He told the police about the name, but they ignored him, obviously stalling the investigation. His uncle couldn’t easily step in because it was the jurisdiction of another precinct. Just looking for a person with such a relatively common name was going nowhere. For all he knew, it could be just a nickname, or he could’ve even misheard it.

A sheer stroke of luck struck him. While watching the live news broadcast of the protests at EFU Medical Center, a truck with a logo containing the word ‘Dawson’ passed by the camera.

One glance at the logo on the side of the truck and it jogged a small part of his memory.

That was it! He had seen this logo before. ‘Dawson’ wasn’t the name of a person. It was a company—Dawson Stevedoring and Logistics, LLC was its full name, as he found out after some research.

This company had to be connected to the Mark and Marc organization. He must’ve seen it somewhere when he was kidnapped and beaten. Why else did his brain desperately remember the name even if he could barely recall anything else the day he was attacked?

Ramello’s theory was confirmed by his uncle…indirectly.

Uncle Jerry, or Lt. Jeremiah Hall, as the seasoned detective insisted to be called if they were in front of other cops, was still in a coma at the hospital. Using the pretext of cleaning his uncle’s house—checking the mail, the fridge for any rotting leftovers, any unplugged appliances—he took the opportunity to search for information related to the Dawson company.

Although he couldn’t get into his uncle’s computer, there were plenty of notes strewn on his uncle’s work desk that outlined possible front companies of Mark and Marc—one of which was the Dawson company. The smell of saltwater made sense. Stevedoring being one of the services offered by the Dawson company, it was bound to have warehouses by the docks. He must've been brought to the docks, and thus near the ocean, when he was taken.

He also read his uncle’s suspicion about the mayor possibly protecting the criminals in the city.

It wasn’t hard to put two-and-two together.

The mayor ordered the patients of the two major Adumbrae attacks transferred to EFU Medical Center. Then delivery trucks from a company related to the Mark and Marc brothers showed up at the hospital? No fucking way it was a mere coincidence.

There had to be something sinister going on!

And Reginus and the rest of the SVS agreed with him when he shared the results of his investigation. They trooped to the hospital after their meeting to stake it out.

They didn’t have to wait for long for a Dawson truck to arrive. It was escorted by the police to be able to get through the lines of protesters. Everything reeked of a conspiracy. That was when they decided to follow the truck to the Dawson warehouses to find out what was being delivered to the hospital. For sure nothing good. And they were going to expose it to the public.

“This is hopeless,” complained one of the SVS members after another half an hour of fruitless searching.

Others agreed with him.

“It’s going to take ages to search this whole place.”

“What if it’s in another warehouse?”

“Or what if it’s inside these cans?” Devyn said. He placed the can on the floor and jammed his crowbar down on it. Red liquid spurted out, splashing on them.

“Watch it!” exclaimed Reginus.

Ramello wiped off some of the liquid off his arm and brought it up to his nose. Tomatoey. It was just meatball sauce. But Devyn was right. Whatever they were looking for could be hidden in cans…or in toasters, books, basketball balls, the possibilities were endless. Uncle Jerry had shared with him the disingenuous ways smugglers hid drugs to get them through customs. If dangerous chemicals were brought to the hospital, it wouldn’t be in obvious containers.

“Stop playing around,” Reginus snapped. “We’re not going to find it if we waste time like this.”

“We don’t know what we’re looking for. We don’t know if it’s even here!”

“Obviously, it’s not going to be hidden in plain sight.”

“We can’t spend hours searching this warehouse,” countered Devyn. “This place is huge. And we got those PCM bastards on our tail. We still don’t know why they decided to go after us now.”

“I can think of plenty of reasons,” Mercator said.

“Everyone, just shut up,” Reginus yelled. “Continue search—Devyn, where are you going?”

“I’m going to ask the guys at the back if they know anything,” he replied, referring to the guard and three Dawson employees they tied up in a small office room.

“They already said they don’t kno—”

“Bullshit! They should know if something fishy’s up. They work here.”

“Don’t bother,” Mercator said, sighing. “Even if they know anything illegal going on, why would they tell us?”

Devyn patted his palm with the curved end of his crowbar. “This is why.” Then he sprinted away.

Stressed, anxious, and tired, they all stared at each other for several seconds, processing what Devyn meant by that. Reginus interrupted the concerning silence. “Uh…is he?” she said, with a brow raised.

Ramello exclaimed with a start, “We need to stop him!” He rushed after Devyn, beckoning the others to follow him.

He didn’t need to be a law student to know he had broken, and was still breaking, many laws. It was his plan to break into the Dawson compound and tie up the employees, and now they were ransacking private property.

But what could he do?

Go to the police?

The police would just ignore him if he reported this. And he didn’t have enough evidence. More likely, he’d get beaten up again, or worse, killed, once those bastard criminals knew how close he was to uncovering their plot—which he still didn’t have a complete picture of. Taking the law into one’s own hands was illegal; that was why there were laws in place to stop society from descending into chaos if everyone just did what they think was right.

But I am right… If he stood aside, another incident like the one that happened to Erind’s condo was going to happen again. It’d be on his conscience if a lot of people died because he let it happen. And while he was sure he was right, he also knew lines had to be drawn.

What Devyn was going to do was certainly crossing it.

“Devyn!” Ramello called out. A yelp of pain and a crash. He spotted Devyn through the windows of the small office at the end of the warehouse. The man with the hockey mask used the crowbar to hit someone on the ground, out of his view.

“Where is it?!” Devyn roared. “I’m going to break your bones if you don’t answer me.”

“Are you out of your mind? Stop that!”

“Ple-please…it hurts…I don’t know.”

“The hell you don’t!” Devyn raised his crowbar, but Ramello barged into the office just in time to grab it. “Let go! This whole gig was your idea.”

“Yes, but we never agreed to do this,” Ramello spat out as he wrestled the crowbar away from the unhinged SVS member. “Wha-what have you done here?” he said as he looked around.

The bound security guard was lying on the floor, unconscious with a gash on his forehead. The male warehouse worker was twitching beside the guard, his leg injured by Devyn. The last two female employees tried to hide behind the desk, squiggling their best across the floor despite the ropes tying their hands and feet.

What the hell am I doing here? Ramello thought in horror as a moment of clarity grazed his mind.

“Dev! Ram!” Reginus shouted. She and Mercator entered the office, stopping in their tracks upon seeing Devyn's handiwork. The other SVS members also followed them, standing outside the window. “Wha—! We have to get them to the hospital. Someone call an ambulance!”

“But then we have to stop searching,” Mercator said.

“I know! But look, they’re hurt bad.” She knelt beside the bleeding security guard, taking out her cellphone and dialing numbers. “We can’t just leave them like that.”

“The police will arrest us.” Mercator grabbed Reginus’ phone, then glanced at Ramello, hoping he would step in.

“I…I…” Ramello stammered. What do we do? Should they just give up now? If they stopped now, Mark and Marc would know for sure they were on to them and hide their operations. “I think we—"

“Reg! Reg!” The three members tasked with searching the front part of the warehouse, and also to guard the entrance, came running towards them. “Reg, here you are. We were looking for you. We’ve got a problem. The PCM—”

“They found us?”

“Yeah. They’re gathering outside! There’s a lot of them!”

“I don’t know how they found us here.”

“Why did you leave your post?” Reginus demanded, her hands on her hips. “You’re supposed to guard—”

“Do you want us to die? Those PCM assholes are out for our blood!”

“And it’s not like we just left,” replied another. “We secured the doors with heavy chains and padlocks. Then we stacked as many crates as we could to block it.”

“But they’ll soon break through!”

“Can you hear it?” one said, holding a finger to keep everyone quiet. “There! The buzzing. They’re cutting through the chains and forcing their way in!”

“Shit, we got to run,” Devyn said, pulling his arm out of Ramello’s grip. “This place got a backdoor or something? Hey, you!” He pointed at the Dawson employee he hit with a crowbar. “Where can we escape?”

“I…ye-yes, we have a backdoor! Don’t hurt me!” He told them how to get to it.

“Go! Go!” Devyn yelled, leading the SVS members to the back exit.

Reginus looked down at the injured Dawson employees. “What about these—”

“Just leave them!” Mercator said, pushing her to follow the others. “Come, Ram. We can’t stay here. We don’t know what the PCM will do to us.”

Ramello balled his fist, digging his nails into his palm. Damn it! Did he really have no choice but to give up?

His jaws were clenched, seething in anger, as he brought up the tail of their fleeing group. He lagged behind, still thinking whether he could hide in the warehouse and then continue searching after the PCM members had left. They would go after the SVS while he’d be free to continue his search.

This was his only opportunity to find evidence. After this, they’d—

“Ah! They’re here!”

“They have the place surrounded!”

“Run, run back inside! Find a place to hide!”

“What’s going on?” Ramello blurted out. He turned to his left just in time to see a two-by-four heading straight for his face.

And everything went black.

“Ugh…whut?” Ramello groggily asked after a splash of cold water hit him.

He shook his face to dry himself and found his mouth was stiff with something. He hissed in pain as he scrunched his nose to try to dislodge it. He couldn’t. And he just made his entire face hurt.

He reached for it with his tongue, and from the taste found out it was dried blood caking his mouth. His arms were tied behind his back so he couldn’t wipe it off.

“And another one wakes up!” someone with a megaphone said.

“What’s going on?” he mumbled. Even speaking was painful.

All the SVS members were bound and thrown in the middle of a large circle of people.

There must’ve been more than fifty people surrounding them. Not just PCM members, but also those from other organizations based on the symbols they wore. Ramello was aware of these more radical groups because he encountered them recruiting members from the more problematic communities of the city where his foundation was having advocacy programs. Back then, he thought it was funny how fast gangs were being replaced by these groups over the past couple of months.

It wasn’t funny now that they were here.

The crowd…no, the mob, was armed with bats, spiked pieces of wood, clubs, chains. They only lacked pitchforks and they’d be a proper lynching mob. And instead of torches, they had cellphones to light up the night.

He shook his head. I’m fucked. We’re all fucked.

“As you can see, we’re fucked,” Devyn said, echoing his thoughts. Ramello finally got to see the man’s face as his hockey mask was removed but he couldn’t get a good look because it was swollen and also covered with blood.

“How did they find us?” Reginus said. “Aw…my wrists hurt.”

“A traitor,” Devyn said, spitting blood on the ground. “What else?”

“There’s no traitor among us,” Reginus fiercely said. “I’m sure of it. My rituals made sure of—”

“Fuck your rituals!”

“Now is not the time to fight amongst yourselves.” The man with the megaphone stepped out of the crowd. “Now is the time for your trial…judgment…and execution.” The crowd cheered, waving their lit phones, clanging their crude weapons.

Ramello’s heart raced as he faced impending death.

A way out! There has to be a way out!

He scanned the vicious throng, looking for an opening. And then he met someone’s eyes.

Those eyes.

He knew those eyes.

He could never forget it for it was one of the memories he recalled from the day he was attacked.

Red Hood was among the crowd, staring right at him.