Special Agent Glenn Millhart was an intimidating sight to behold.

A former NFL linesman of Samoan and Caucasian descent as well as a war veteran who stands at an astonishing six-foot-six with a robust body, Agent Millhart was not someone you want to mess with despite the fact hat he was in his late forties. There have been rumours that during the end days of World War Three, Millhart was part of a USMC assault team that helped recapture Okinawa from Chinese forces, during which he was said to have killed the commander of the Chinese forces with a single punch to the chest-

“Actually, I punched him in the face before shooting him three times with a pistol,” the FBI agent admitted to Roderick and Amirah as he scratched his head in embarrassment, the two officers sitting on a couch with him on the second floor corridor leading to the evidence room.

“What about the one where you threw an entire crate of explosives into a Chinese bunker?” Roderick asked.

“It was actually a misfired allied air strike.”

“And taking a building full of enemy soldiers on your own during the Battle of Shanghai?”

“I’m not a kamikaze, we turned that building into Swiss cheese before we entered.”

“Wait, you mean all those stories about you going Rambo on the Chinese were exaggerated? Even the one where your threw a grenade into a Chinese tank’s barrel from twenty feet away?” Amirah asked.

“Actually, that one was real, and even I thought the tank imploded due to some mechanical failure or something until we found the remains of an American grenade inside the wreck, so that one can be written off as a once-in-a-lifetime event. But in the end, the UK split from us because our leaders decided to invade your country, and Russia and the EU’s unexpected alliance ended up with both America and China getting a boot up the asses. War never benefits anyone except the politicians.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right… Both Amirah and I were born during the war, had to deal with a lot of shit growing up…”

“Let’s just hope we do not have any more wars, at least during our lifetimes. Speaking of which, what’s taking them so long?” Millhart asked.

“No idea,” Amirah replied when the door of the evidence room suddenly opened up and a man whose head and hands were completely wrapped in bandages emerged, wearing a fedora, a black trenchcoat and a pair of dark brown trousers along with a pair of shades.

“Are you supposed to be the Invisible Man?” Roderick asked.

In response, the bandaged man made several hand signs, including a middle finger directed at Roderick, before beckoning for them to enter.

“He’s saying ‘I’m a revenant, you dumb fuck’, and he’s saying that everything’s prepared,” Amirah translated.

“Argh, let’s just go in. I’m already having a bad day…”

The whole of Grey Team, including Lucas and Ajibade who have been relieved of guard duty by their colleagues, were in the meeting area of the evidence room, staring at several pictures, files and videos being played on the holo display, not to mention the captured pelesit. The bandaged man simply sat down on a couch and literally went lifeless, his body slightly deflating as his head flopped backwards limply like a fruit hanging from a branch.

“Yeah, don’t mind Hats, it’s suppose to be his Stay Dead Day today,” Weijin said to Roderick and Amirah, while Millhart appears to already be aware of what Hats was since he never bothered to give a second glance.

“That’s the undead guy you all call Hats?” Amirah asked.

“Yup, because he’s always wearing a hat. He’s from our Counter-Magic Arm. We normally summon him when a crime involves ghosts and undead because revenants like him can create a psychic imprint through ectoplasmic residue left by them,” Ajibade explained.

“Polongs are familiars, artificial spirits created from the blood of dead people. Since the dead has been disturbed, part of their unhappiness will be transferred into the polongs, which in turn causes them to emit some ectoplasmic residue. In our case, some of our killer polong’s ectoplasm were left on this pelesit,” Lucas added.

“And that was how Hats, with the help of our tech duo in the Investigations Arm, were able to obtain this,” Jason said as he showed Agent Millhart the picture of the face Hats obtained through a psychic imprint with the ectoplasmic residue found on the captured pelesit.

“Ah, shit, it really is him. The Woke Hunter,” Millhart confirmed as he took a look at the picture of what looked like a Caucasian male in his thirties or early forties.

“You know his name, Glenn?” Xiaoye asked.

“Yes. His name’s Arthur Bray. Not exactly someone you’ll expect to become a serial killer: He was a history teacher at a high school in Portland, but ten years ago, he was fired for, well, misgendering a new student.”

“Seriously?” Xiaoye asked.

“Well, he didn’t do it on purpose, he even apologized on the spot, but, well, the school decided that their reputation was more important than his expertise, so they publicly fired him, just as his wife passed away from cancer. It didn’t end there, though. The church he goes to is a progressive one, so they booted him out, he was publicly called a bigot and his house was vandalized. When his wife’s grave was broken into, however, something snapped in him, and he disappeared for six years.”

“What the hell is wrong with your country, Agent Millhart? This Arthur Bray character, he didn’t mean to insult, he made an honest mistake and apologized for it, and this is what he gets?” Ajibade asked.

“Hey, I’m not a big supporter of this toxic woke culture thing myself. But you can’t fight a mob mentality. If we knew how to handle it, there won’t be so many anti-vaxxers in America. Anyways, he became our number one suspect after several of his former students were found murdered four years ago. But for some reason, no matter how many ambushes we set up, no matter how many stalkers we sent to tail him, he always slips through our grasp. One day, he could be in Ohio, but then he’ll be in South Dakota the next.”

“I take it he has a list of false names?” Farhan asked.

“Yeah. Sixteen, in fact, but the ones that comes up the most whenever there’s a victim are Eli Krasthill, Joe Custin and Lance St.Geneva. He’s also become a master of disguise, and the one time we got him, we ended up having to let him go due to lack of evidence, and by the time we finally had proof that he was behind the serial killings, he was gone… Until now.”

“When did he flee the United States?” Jason inquired.

“Last month. Our mistake was assuming he fled to Malaysia. After his disappearance, it turned out he had been living in different parts of Malaysia for six years, and always in small towns and villages, so we spent the whole of last month combing that country for him. Then the serial killings started happening here, in Singapore, but it was only when your team sent us that picture were we able to confirm that it was the same person we’ve been hunting for,” Millhart replied as he gestured at the picture of Arthur Bray.

“I’m guessing he spent those six years learning how to create and control a polong, and used it to wreck havoc in his home country. He then came here to avoid the authorities, but by this time, he’s already become addicted to killing, and when he realized there are woke people in Singapore-”

“He started murdering again, even though he was supposed to lay low,” Xiaoye finished Jason’s words.

“What happened to him was wrong, but thirty-two lives is way over the line. He’s so consumed by his anger that everyone’s fair game to him,” Ajibade muttered.

“Doesn’t matter. We have a face and a name. Now we just need to find him,” Lucas said.

“We Americans have been trying to get our hands on this fellow for a long time. We’ll appreciate it if you let me and my team go with you to make the arrest,” Millhart requested.

“No problems, Agent Millhart. Our colleagues are assisting us in tracking him down- Hold on a moment, they’re calling me now.”

“Weird ass ringtone he’s got there,” Ajibade said to Xiaoye, who nodded as Jason spoke through the phone when the inspector’s eyes lit up.

“Agent Millhart, how many agents are with you right now?” Jason asked Millhart.

“Whole team is here, actually. We don’t split unless necessary.”

“The techs found where your serial killer is staying. A rented condo unit in Woodlands. All right, Grey Team, we’re working overtime tonight. Let’s move!”

“Finally, some action!” Ajibade commented as everyone headed out the office.

“Don’t jinx us, Ajibade,” Lucas bluntly cautioned.

As the incoming night shift had taken most of the vehicles out for patrol, Grey Team commandeered one of the vans used for emergency missions instead, with the FBI attaché team, numbering about eight members, boarding it as well. As for Xiaoye and Roderick, the two took one of the remaining hatchbacks with Weijin and Amirah.

“I’ve just confirmed that the division in charge of Woodlands are going to provide reinforcements,” Weijin said as Xiaoye followed the two vans out the garage.

“Shit, he’s going to be there,” Roderick muttered.

“Who, your old man?” Xiaoye asked.

“Yeah… Look, about what I said earlier-”

“Forgiven. I know you’re pissed with your pa, though that word stings, you know? There’s a number of officers in the Shades like me, having parents not from two different races but from two different species. Half-elves, half-orcs, dhampirs, faeblood, morphlings, nephelims and cambions. The word ‘half-breed’ to us is like you, a white man, calling Ajibade, a black man, the n-word, see?”

“I kind of had that feeling it was a really bad choice of word.”

Xiaoye sighed.

“Your pa’s really eating into your brain, is it?”

“Yeah.”

“Look, because of who my pa is, I have the ability to read auras of other people, thus I know when someone is lying, or is in fear of their life, or they’re putting on a brave front. Of course, I’ll still need to use one of my Black Arts to be able to read someone’s mind properly, but your father’s got a very lonely, confused aura around him.”

“He brought it on himself when he tried to force me and my siblings to follow his way of life. Ben walked out first because his wife, then his girlfriend, was a Buddhist which did not sit well with my father. After that, we all began to leave. I was the last one to go. He didn’t even blink when I stepped out the front gate for the last time.”

“And none of you have tried to re-connect with him?” Weijin asked.

“No. We just felt that he didn’t care anymore. Religion became his life, we were just his puppets, his subjects in a dictatorship.”

“Roderick,” Xiaoye spoke as she began to slow down the vehicle now that they were nearing their destination, “He’s forgotten how to be a father, how to separate family from faith. He’s alone, unsure of how he’s going to continue his life. He’s trying to reconcile, even though he’s clearly still a discriminating roaster, but the more you don’t talk to him, the more he’s going to force himself into your life, and the more he’s going to try and control you because he thinks that’s the only way he can re-connect with you, and one day, you’re going to snap and do something stupid to him. You want that to happen?”

Xiaoye’s words struck a nerve in Roderick, who stared out the window for a while before shaking his head.

“No. I don’t want to know.”

“When you have time, talk to him. Don’t be nice, though, but don’t be nasty either. You need to be stern, confident, make yourself the bigger man. Superintendent Harper’s not as unreasonable as most people claim him to be. Once he realize he needs to start treating you like a grown man, that’s when you can start healing him. Hell, I almost regretted my last words to my ma. Luckily for me, I was able to reconcile with her before I went off to fight in the Third World War.”

“We all have family problems, Roderick. My brother hasn’t come home for six years after my dad kicked him out for taking drugs. Police recruiter’s eyes nearly popped out when I told him my family disowned my brother for his crime… The commissioner gave the okay anyways,” Amirah admitted.

“All right, enough reminiscing, we’re here, time to get to work,” Weijin said as Xiaoye brought the vehicle to a halt beside the van.

As Roderick suspected, Supt Harper was there on the scene with several of his officers, but apart from exchanging glares with his son, he did not do anything else. Jason, meanwhile, leads Grey Team and the FBI to the condominium unit that Arthur Bray had rented, the owner already there with three other officers, one of whom passed them the key.

“He’s not inside, and when we found out what he was, Supt Harper ordered us not to go in and to wait for the Shades,” the officer said.

“Good decision. Who knows what kind of traps may have been laid in there,” Jason replied before unlocking the door and opening it just the slightest.

“Xiaoye, any passive Black Arts that allows you to survey an area?” he asked.

“Aye, I’ve got one. Everyone shift away from me for a moment,” Xiaoye replied before nicking her thumb with one of her fangs and rubbing a thin line of blood across both her eyes.

“ꓘɔɒlꓭ ƧɈɿA: ИoiƨiV - ЯǝɈnυH ƎγƎ”

Xiaoye’s eyes turned completely violet with a mild glow emitting from them, yet Roderick noticed that she could see clearly as she pushed the door open and walked around the apartment, looking left and right before her eyes turned back to normal.

“No traps, it’s safe. There’s a ritual circle under the couch, a stained knife hidden under the bed in the master bedroom, a broken flask of blood in the wardrobe… And a paper stashed away behind the desk in that room, but we’ll need to rip the thing off the wall to get it,” Xiaoye said, but then Lucas wordlessly entered the very room she had pointed out, approached the desk inside and bent down, removing the tactical glove from one of his hands and placing it against the back panel of the desk.

Within minutes, the back panel was encased in ice, and Lucas removed his hand from it before kicking the frozen panel into pieces, causing the paper Xiaoye saw using her Black Arts to drop out.

“Look, it’s a map,” Lucas commented as he showed everyone present what was on the piece of paper.

“I know that building. It’s an abandoned asylum. View Road Hospital,” Farhan said as he glanced at the map.

“You think he might be there?” Millhart asked.

“Only way we’ll know is if we go there. Update Supt Harper on the situation, we’re heading to View Road Hospital. Hopefully, we’ll finally capture our target,” Jason replied as he gesture for everyone to leave for their next destination…