The whole apartment was in a disarray: dirty clothes piled in the corner, everything was either packed or dumped, as if the owner of the house was preparing to leave in a hurry; there was a sign of fierce struggle also, leaving overthrown and broken furniture everywhere.

And the smell of a stiff came from a body lied in blood pool on the ground, face up, looking like being stabbed repeatedly to death with knife in bowels.

"This is Paul." Nines confirmed, frowning because of the unbearable stink.

Compared to zombie epidemic or being brutally tortured to death by a serial killer, Paul's way to go wasn't that terrifying, but that was exactly the weirdest thing here: he didn't fit in for both the victim of the Southland Slasher or the target of the plague-bearer: looking at his body, there were all the symptoms of the infection, but he was stabbed before he was fully turned, and the Sabbat would have wanted their specimens to be taken alive; but if he was killed by the Southland Slasher, why all of a sudden just no mutilation?

It was fairly common for serial killers to change their methods, but that's usually an escalation…a degradation so drastic like this? Simply impossible. In fact, based on the condition of the body, Leona could say that the killer of Paul was sloppy and in a panic—he was unable to subdue Paul immediately, and after quite a struggle he still didn't manage to strike in precision: the depths of stab wounds were inconsistent, and none of them was deadly. Paul died of excessive bleeding.

"We've always been working under the assumption that the Southland Slasher is the plague-bearer, simply using his vampiric power for personal vendetta…" Then Leona changed her perspective, "But maybe it's possible that there are two different people involved."

"You mean like…partners in crime? One is spreading the epidemic and the other is looking for bloody payback?"

Leona brooded over her own theory and shook her head in doubts: "I don't know…that still doesn't explain the sudden change in killing methods and the recent disappearance of the Slasher. But still for Damsel's sake, it's safer to assume this and track in two directions."

"Makes sense." Nines nodded. Doing this could prevent something like Damsel followed one of them and they tracked the other from happening.

To figure what Paul's role was in all this, they skimmed through his recent contacts on phone and computer, and though there wasn't anything directly connected to what they were looking into, an odd name that kept appearing in his call and chatting history did catch their attention: Muddy.

Just around the time the third victim of the Southland Slasher was found, this Muddy guy contacted Paul, who was a quite resourceful dealer on the street that knew lots of people, asking Paul to help him escape because someone was after them, and Paul told him to come to his place first. Seemed like Muddy and Paul were the next targets of the Slasher, or at least them thought themselves to be.

"Come to think of it, don't you find it strange?" While going through their conversation about a plan to escape, Nines couldn't help but suspecting, "The police hasn't made any progress in the killings. This is not some usual case—one of the victims is actually a judge, I can't imagine they are putting in so little effort."

Indeed. Right now the official investigation was baffled by the connection of the victims, because usually in cases like this there is always something personal between the killer and the dead, and they just couldn't find it in records of any kind. But it was not the only problem. "And I don't understand how did Paul get infected." Leona was confused, "He didn't live on street and never hanged out alone at night, not really the type for the plague-bearer."

But fortunately for them, at least one of the two leads didn't drop dead. Jack called Nines, saying that he just got this info from one of the Anarch boys: before Paul got the epidemic, he paid for one of the street girls on the street, who turned out to be sick and disappeared afterwards, too.

"That shit forced himself on the girl, actually." Jack scoffed, "She was already not feeling well and didn't want to do it at first, but he hit her, our boy said he saw it. Loser. Tell Damsel to pick a better ghoul next time, Nines."

"Will do." Nines hanged up, totally disgusted, too, and asked Leona, "So what do we do, now? Spilt up?"

Jack's call was put on speaker so Leona heard everything. She thought for a while and answered: "Yeah, like I said, two directions. I will ask Regent Strauss to send out a team to follow up that street girl, maybe someone around her saw something, and we get on with Muddy."

"Frankly I don't trust Strauss with this. No offence, but…"

"I know what you mean: they probably won't put Damsel on priority. The thing is, however, that lead goes straight to the plague-bearer, and right now only Tremeres are safe to confront it." Leona reassured him not to worry, "Trust me, they will put in all resources. This is the best lead we have on the whole epidemic thing right now, and they will value that, even if they don't care about the life of one Anarch—no offence, I won't be surprised if we don't care about our own people."

"Ugh…you cold-blooded Cammys."

Leona shrugged. They both knew it was merely a self-deprecating-ish joke to smooth the "political tension" between them. If they were both too serious and absolute about supporting their sides all the time, there would be no cooperation feasible, and Nines was also smart enough to play along—one of the reasons he was qualified to be "the leader".

Getting all they needed in this apartment, Leona and Nines took off and went back to their own places. Just like Leona predicted, Regent Strauss was more than glad to know she made a breakthrough on the case, immediately assigned people on the search and had the ghouls take Paul's body back to the Chantry: even though he was just a human who was dead before the whole process was finished, it could still offer insights on what Tzimisces were up to.

And though Leona was part of the task force, Strauss asked her to stay out of this and focus on tracking the Muddy lead, firstly because she was merely half way to master the blood armor skill, and he also doubted they could catch the plague-bearer himself through this seemingly more direct clue—he had always been prudent with the epidemic mission, whereas could be more careless about the business of his Slasher partner. "If it's like you have inferred, that he knows the Slasher intimately, then the Slasher could be a greater weakness of his", so Strauss explained.

But all she got nothing useful on her hands at this moment: both Muddy and Paul were not their real names, and even though Paul was a ghoul connected to the Kindred society, the one who knew him the most—Damsel—was missing, and everyone else hardly noticed him. Who gave a damn about ghouls…except for Mercurio, perhaps, who legendarily made it to "the head of security of CNA".

Ah, yes, Mercurio. He might have some ideas. Leona just thought of him. Mercurio was busy acquiring "special hardware" to get the Camarilla Kindred better equipped due to the rising Sabbat movements, so they haven't been in contact much. Hopefully he had some time just for quick info.

So Leona made a phone call. Turned out he was actually out of the country, in Iraq.

"OK, so it's a ghoul called Paul and a guy goes by the name Muddy, right?" While Mercurio was saying, Leona could literally here the outdoor wind roaring by, "Paul and Muddy…why do I feel like I have heard of them somewhere…I think I know them a long time ago, like 2000s back in big apple…"

"How?"

"I remember two ghouls with these names who were working for the Camarilla back there. By then Camarilla's power center was still in D.C., so we had lots of people on East Coast, but soon afterwards Prince moved his base to LA to 'increase Camarilla's presence on the west', and I went with him. Didn't know much about what happened there ever since, I think LaCroix appointed a Venture to handle the New York stuff…"

"Alright, send me his contacts. Thanks a million."

"No problem. By the way, I found a kind of herbal oil here and the locals said it's the best for aroma sex…"

Again. Leona rolled her eyes and rang off without hearing him out. She felt like he was making it a hobby, "harassing" her like this, despite that she never cared enough to listen and respond. If it wasn't for the fact he was all around a very nice guy and never did anything more than…"teasing" her, Leona definitely would have reported him to Boss LaCroix. This was "a hostile working environment", as them consultants put it.

Receiving the phone number from the Venture baron of New York, Leona immediately made a call, and to be honest, it wasn't a pleasant experience—the one who picked it up was some very arrogant young woman who said she was the secretary, and immediately interrogated Leona about how she got the direct number of the Baron, reminding Leona of some bad memories when she was still working in her old firm. And even after she explained everything patiently, Miss Secretary still harbored suspicions about "how a Tremere fledgling could know Mercurio".

Finally, the Baron himself came and asked about it, and fortunately for Leona, he had heard about her, so she wouldn't need to stand this any longer. This Venture Baron sounded much less annoying—at least in front of Leona—and was very open to offer Leona any assistance…that was, however, before Leona told him what she exactly needed to know.

Leona could instantly sense he was covering something. The Baron simply said Muddy and Paul were "laid off" because of "the redundancy in personnel", and ended the phone call in a rush, saying he was occupied with something else.

Hmmm. This is dirty in capital letters. After a few thoughts, Leona knew she had to find someone who was good at finding the skeletons people kept in the closet…and who would be better at that than a Nossie? Thus she phoned Bertram with no hesitation.

"Hey cupcake, what's up?"

"I need you to dig up something about a Venture Baron of New York. Possible dirt."

"Oh…" Bertram chuckled in excitement on hearing the imposing title of his newest victim, "That should be great fun."