Chapter 3 — Chasing Ghosts

Getting lectured by his boss wasn't exactly new, but Jeremy sure seemed to be making a habit of it lately.

"You diverted another task force to investigate a fucking Rallsburg lead?" Aderholt asked, holding up his requisition paperwork.

Jeremy shrugged. Only doing my job, Mr. Station Chief sir. "Thought we had something."

"The entire thing's a dead end, Ashe. Drop the case and let the locals chalk it up to their own stats. If those dumb fucks even keep stats. We've got more important work on our plates than a freak accident."

"Sir, it was never ruled as an accident," Lani put in.

"Do you want to get promoted out of this pit someday, Makaio?"

"Yes, sir, but Jeremy's right." Thanks, Lani. Doesn't really accomplish much, but thanks. "We had several tips called in from Redmond that matched the description of one of the unconfirmed deceased."

"Who?"

"Ryan Walker, the prep kid from Walla Walla," Jeremy replied.

Aderholt shook his head. "A blonde haired blue eyed white college kid shows up in tech town. Go fucking figure. Was there anything legitimate in those reports?"

"No, sir," Jeremy answered, before Lani could speak up.

"Look," Aderholt started, calming down. "I get it. This shit's still weird as fuck and no one's come up with an answer. Fire's stumped, staties are stumped, God Almighty himself is stumped. We all feel like we've lost this one. But there's nothing new. We haven't stepped in a single turd of evidence since May. So unless you've got something actionable, you've got to stop diverting resources. We don't get enough funding for what we can put away. I can't have you spending it on crap that's never going anywhere."

"Yes, sir." He's not exactly wrong. I might be taking this personally. But fuck him, I'm not givin' up on her yet.

He glanced down at the form again. "What about this kid required a full ten man tac squad to bring him in, anyway? You can't take out a single twenty two year old guy on your own?"

Jeremy shrugged. "Like you said, sir. We've had no leads in months. I wasn't going to let it get away."

He sighed. "Kid's dead, Ashe. They all are."

"Haven't been declared that way yet, sir."

"Don't remind me," Aderholt groaned. "I've got a shit-ton of pressure to declare that Price kid dead so the state can reclaim their assets." He sighed. "It's just a formality though Ashe. Drop it. Time to move on to something else."

As soon as they'd returned to their office and closed the door, Lani spoke up. "Why didn't you mention it?"

"Because it could still be nothing." Jeremy sat down and pulled up his email. The IT guys had finally sent him access to the rest of the video dumps and he was looking forward to a lazy, dull afternoon watching them all and listening to some music. It's better than paperwork or heading out into the heat, anyway.

"But the report in Redmond said the guy's wallet had an ID with Ryan Walker stamped right on it. She even had the matching number from the DMV."

"And when we checked the footage, he looked nothing like the social media pictures," Jeremy pointed out. "We couldn't track him down. The barista could have been wrong. Or just an attention seeker. Or someone stole Walker's ID before this went down. Plenty of reasons."

Lani frowned. "You're the one that wanted to sprint down there at a moment's notice to check it out."

He shrugged. "And I was wrong. It's not like it's the first time."

Lani sighed and went back to his desk. "At least we got out of the office for a while. It's been so nice out this week."

"Didn't you live on Maui 'til you were twenty one?" Jeremy loaded up the next video on his list and leaned back in his chair, settling into his practiced surveillance stupor. "It's just been 'less cloudy than usual'."

"I've been up here five years now, I can still appreciate the change."

With just one earbud, Jeremy queued up his playlist where he'd left off. He wished he could listen to his music properly, but Aderholt would tear him a new asshole if he missed a call. He flicked the switch to mono sound and grated at the flattened sound. He was just starting to find a groove when Lani interrupted.

"What are you doing now?"

"Workin'."

Lani frowned. "I get that you're happy out here, but I've got a career too. They partnered us so I'd learn the ropes from you. Everyone says you're actually really good at this, but it's been six months now."

"So why'd they put me in the least important station of the NSB?" he murmured, not taking his eyes off the screen.

"That was your handiwork, wasn't it?"

Jeremy paused the video, glancing up. "Hmm?"

"I dug up your old files. You requested this station."

"Huh, so I did." Jeremy's hand hovered over the play button, but he didn't click it quite yet. He was curious to see where Lani was going with this.

"No one at this level just gets the station they want like that, no questions asked. Either you're really good at what you do or you've got something on the higher ups."

"Both good guesses."

"So which is it?"

"You forgot the normal answer. Maybe I just pissed off the wrong director, but he didn't have the clout or the balls to fire me so he threw me to the ass-end of nowhere, at 'my request'." He added air quotes around the last two words with his fingers.

Lani winced. "...Okay, that's definitely possible."

Jeremy cracked a smile. "You want to get somewhere in this business? Treat your boss like the fuckin' king, and make sure you find all the dirt on him you possibly can." He resumed the video, leaving Lani to stew over his words for a bit.

Lani, of course, wouldn't give up that easily. Right as Jeremy was getting into the music again, he stood up and walked over to his desk. "The traffic camera videos?"

"Yes."

"We had two full teams go over every inch of those. What are you supposed to find that they didn't?"

"I'll know it when I see it."

Lani sighed. "This isn't just another way to kill time, is it?"

No, it really isn't. "Everything's a way to kill time."

"Do you mind if I work on the Chancer case then? I've got calls to make."

"Go for it, won't bother me."

Lani made his phone calls and did his paperwork, while Jeremy just sat and watched footage. In truth, he thought he was probably wasting time just like Lani said. He wasn't about to find anything in the endless clips of highway and intersection recordings from the nights around May 16th. Nothing related happened anywhere, according to the neatly collated reports from the tech team.

There were two collisions they'd spotted from civilian cameras, plus a burglary in progress and one assault captured on corporate security footage, but they weren't allowed to disclose any of that. Their jurisdiction was strictly the potential of a terrorist attack or other foreign operation on the small town of Rallsburg. Any crimes outside that window would go unreported, since the files were only handed over under that specific court order.

Jeremy felt a pang of guilt at the couple of assaults he witnessed, and mentally filed away the perpetrators for later pursuit. He'd make sure they were picked up one day on another charge. In the meantime, he'd crawl through every second of recorded video he could stomach. Whether it was the crisp, clean corporate feeds or the barely-usable intersection cameras, Jeremy wasn't giving up on her yet.

Days dragged by. Lani handled the caseload for the both of them without a single complaint. His young partner was indefatigable, while all Jeremy wanted to do was stay rooted in the comfortable chairs provided by the taxpayers and handle everything from his nice, air-conditioned office. Lani was in and out frequently, and while he did occasionally ask Jeremy for help on protocol or procedure, they rarely spoke otherwise. It was all business, exactly how Jeremy preferred it.

They'd sent him every single piece of camera footage they could find in every direction exiting Rallsburg, both the few days before and after the fifteenth. In the month immediately following the discovery, a dedicated team had gone through every inch of the recordings practically frame by frame, looking for anything that might be of use. The only overhead camera they could find was a snapshot of a satellite mapping the area for NASA, but it had been taking wide shots and didn't produce anything useful. Nor did the many cameras they'd lifted from the ground—as far as anyone could tell, the entire region had been totally, painfully normal for those five days in May.

So what the hell happened?

Jeremy leaned back in his chair on a sunny Monday morning in September, staring at a still frame of St. Peter Hospital in Olympia. The night before on May 14th, two ambulance helicopters had been dispatched to Rallsburg. One had returned with two patients and two passengers. The first patient died on the flight from a gunshot wound, with his name listed as John Doe and whose remains were never identified. The second patient was reportedly missing the lower third of her leg, and was treated on site before getting lifted to the hospital. She was expected to recover given time. Those two were accompanied by a young woman and a man, all of whom refused to give their names.

The other helicopter had borne a single passenger. William Carbonell, age twenty-two, former student of Rallsburg University and current resident of the town. His medical records read like an anatomy inventory with the sheer number of broken or heavily bruised areas. Given the twisted state of some of the corpses they'd found in Rallsburg, Jeremy suspected he was the best link they had to whatever actually occurred—but before anyone had even noticed what had happened to the town, William Carbonell had vanished without a trace along with the other three.

Hospital security showed no one exiting their floor. The girl who had accompanied the amputee had entered both rooms in the middle of the night, but other than that… nothing. They successfully identified her as Nicole Parsons, age twenty and a native resident of Rallsburg, but nothing else useful. When the nurse had gone to check on Will at five the next morning, they found his bed empty and the equipment disconnected without tripping a single alarm.

William Carbonell and Nicole Parsons were the only two residents of Rallsburg currently presumed alive, but despite making every major watchlist across the country, neither had shown their faces since that night.

The hospital had to have the answer. It was the only real lead. Jeremy had personally interviewed every single member of staff on shift that night, but none of them witnessed anything. The helicopter teams had reported smoke from the northern fire, but it was extinguished before they touched down. One of the EMTs also reported seeing a wolf at the scene where they picked up the gunshot victim. Jeremy wasn't sure what to make of that, but he'd kept it in mind all the same. Wolf markings weren't on any of the victims in town, so it didn't seem to connect to anything else.

What am I missing?

Their office phone rang. Jeremy was still staring at the hospital, lost in thought, and Lani picked it up for him. "Jeremy."

"Huh?"

"Someone on the line for you."

"Tell 'em I'll call back."

"...It's your sister."

Jeremy looked up, surprised. He picked up the phone on his desk. "Thanks, Lani." Lani gave him a thumbs up before returning to his own work. Jeremy put the phone to his ear. "Maddie?"

"Hey, little bro," said Madelaine Ashe. "How's it going?"

"I'm fine. Just bored. What's up?"

"I'm in town, thought you might want to get lunch."

He glanced at the clock. Sure enough, it was already one thirty. He suddenly realized how hungry he was. "Same place as always?"

"Last one there is buyin'."