Chapter 4

The Ethel Estate

4th of Thraous 7:00 AM

       Rick tossed and turned in his twin sized bed, every time he closed his eyes he didn’t know if he would dream his own dreams or his wife’s and often, he couldn’t tell the difference. When dawn began to peak into his room illuminating the dusty green and gray prayer rug laid haphazardly in the corner, sleep would not return to him so with a groan he decided to roll over and get up. He went through his normal routine while looking at the people that resided currently at the Ethel house.

       There was Martha Ethel, she was the cousin of the governor and the mother of Mike. She had decided to return to her maiden name from Latheil after her husband Matt died. Then there was the governor and his wife, Allan and Elaine, Allan had been governor close to twenty-six years since his father Arthur had died. Rick had met them before at a get together, they seemed nice enough and not the type to commit any major crime.

He tried to comb his goatee while reading with one eye, but all he accomplished was getting the brush all tangled in his hair. With a bit of cursing and a hurried insincere prayer to Nexan the brush came loose with a few stray hairs. He finished combing and braiding before getting back into reading.

Rick saw that Allan and Elaine also had three kids, Bryson, who was twenty, loved music, and was the next in line to be governor. The last two were twins, one was Barney and the other Brandon who was currently going by Bree (They apparently had a thing for names that began with “B”) They were both 17.

       Rick downed the rest of his flask, then filled it back up with alcohol he had bought the previous evening. He decided to walk to the Ethel house, mostly because he was running low on money, and because he was up early so figured a good morning walk could help him get his thoughts in order. The streets were busy with people moving back and forth, ignoring the world. He slowly made his way down the street; he picked up fried fish on a stick from a street vendor and stopped to enjoy some music. Passing a park, he saw kids on the equipment and on the side-lines, teens hanging out gossiping and showing off their skating skills. On the skates they would use Inchemy to push or pull themselves along, easily reaching crazy speeds, they would also do jumps and then use an inchemical rod that shoots out of their hand to shove them to greater heights.

Further up on his left there sat his old police department Bronson stood outside in the shade eating, he waved at Rick as he passed, he checked the time, Bronson should definitely be on patrol at the moment, but he had never been known as the most industrious in the department. After taking the left fork in the road he could see a looming tower in the distance, one hundred and sixty stories of pure metal. That was where Lord Governor Serkin ruled from. That building was the tallest structure in Nexus city, it is claimed by the Nextian Church that the Nexus itself was under the tower.

       After about an hour of walking along the streets and buying a chocolate covered apple Rick stood in front of the gates to the Ethel estate. The gates were twice his height and wide enough to let two vehicles pass through comfortably. The gates were painted black except for the golden ‘E’ in the middle. He pushed a small, worn, white button underneath a keypad beside the gate. He stood waiting for a couple minutes before the gates swung silently open. As he passed through, he noticed a camera following his movement. Once he was near the door it opened with a slight creak to reveal the butler. He had black hair with a dusting of white on the sides, he was of average height, and he had piercing blue eyes. The butler gave a slight bow and said his name was Robert. He then informed Rick that he was to wait a moment in the foyer.

       Rick followed Robert into the foyer, there were hangars and coat closets on the walls and an old yellow couch with white embroidery. On both sides of the room stood double white doors with gold trim surrounding them. “Your coat sir?” Robert asked.

       Rick looked down at his trench coat that contained his flask. “No, I think I’ll hold on to it.”

       Robert nodded, “Well if you change your mind the hangars are right there.” With a nod of his head, he left through the right set of doors.

       Rick had just sat down and turned on his camera when from the other room a yell of “CLEAN YOUR SSSSSSSSTTTTTTUUUUFFFFFF!” came to his ears. Suddenly the door burst open and a tall lanky young man with bushy brown hair came into the room. “BARNEY! WHEN YOUR DONE BAKING CLEAN THE KITCHEN!” just then the young man Rick assumed to be Bree seemed to notice him. “Ah, sorry about that. You don’t happen to have seen a kid with red hair?”

       Rick grinned, “No I haven’t, sorry.”

       Bree waved his hand, “Nothing to be sorry about, though if you see a kid with red hair come and tell me. Also if you hear racket upstairs that’s Bryson, he’s trying to play the drums.”

Rick nodded. “Thanks, I’ll remember that.”

Bree nodded then turned and left the room muttering “how many places can a dude hide?” under his breath.

       Just as Rick was getting back settled, he heard rustling from the skirt of the couch under him. Getting up he put his hand on his gun to see a slightly overweight red head pop out beside his feet. “Hello detective! Names Barney!”

       He smiled, “names Rick.”

       “Well, that’s a boring name,” Barney got fully out from under the couch. “I mean that respectfully of course.

       “Well of course.” Rick shook his head.

 “I baked some nice muffins, and I was going to clean it up, but I had to go to the bathroom. but apparently, if I leave the kitchen for any reason, I am obligated to leave it spotless for Bree.” Barney shook his head.

“Then why are you hiding?”

“Eh, boredom. Can’t leave the estate without an armed babysitter not even to cross the road to the cinema so, I might as well make my own fun.”

“Well, have as much fun as you can muster.” Rick grinned.

 “Why of course! Well, it was good meeting you.”

       The yell of, “BBBBBAAAAAARRRRRRNNNNEEEEYYYYYYY” came to their ears.

       “Well, if I keep this up Bree will lose his voice for sure” Barney grinned as he heard Bree yell again. “Well, I suppose that is my cue to exit stage right, I may bring you a muffin. So, see ya!” With that he turned and left through the door Bree had entered through.

       Rick chuckled and sat back down. It was only a short couple of minutes before the doors opened again and Allan and Elain came through the door. Allan was short and a bit round with a bald head and a nice fitting blue suit with a silver tie, while his wife was barely taller with long brown hair and a matching dress.

       “I see you met the twins.” Elain grinned.

       “They are the welcoming party.” Allan laughed. “They’re either arguing or conspiring.”

       Rick stood back up, “It’s been a while, last time I saw them they were probably 8.”

       “After you found our lost pendant, right?” Elain asked.

       “Yeah, it would have not been good to lose one of the few amulets in private hands.”

       “Well, no one knew how to use it so it wouldn’t have caused too much damage.” Allan shrugged.

       Elain nodded “The government can’t make an excuse to take it if no one can use it.”

         Allan Turned to Rick his expression going sober, “So are you here about my nephew?”

       “Yes sir.” Rick said nodding slightly. “Do you have any insight into what happened? Or why he ran away?”

       “I have no idea.” Elaine looked down, “He seemed to like it here, he never showed signs that he was discontent. He was just always busy studyin-.” 

       “Well,” Allan interrupted, “he did seem distracted, aloof, and disturbed by something the few days before he left.”

       Rick started at the Governors abruptness, “Any idea why he was like that?”

       Both Allan and Elain just shook their heads.

       Rick looked around, “could it have had to do with his father’s death?”

       Allan and Elain began nodding slowly, “Everyone has their own way of grieving” Allan said, “so you could be right…”

       “Is Martha here?”

       Allan continued as though Rick had not spoken, “…I have not been able to have time to grieve over the death of my brother-in-law, this district requires my undivided attention nearly all the time.”

       “She is out of town for the day,” Elaine replied to Rick’s query. “She left early, left a note saying she would be back soon. It said she was going to be visiting a childhood friend in the Tielens district She specifically said she would come back tomorrow morning, she said she hoped she would not miss when you would decide to come by.”

       “Well, I want to work fast when a missing person is involved.”

Allan spoke softly, “We really appreciate that.”

       “Well,” Rick clapped his hands. “Can I see Mike’s room?”

       “Oh yes, right this way.” Elaine motioned with her hand before taking the lead. She brought him up a flight of stairs and down a hallway. They heard the banging of drums floating from one of the rooms they passed.

“Bryson?” Rick asked.

Elaine smiled, “yes! He just loves music.” As soon as she finished speaking, they came to a white door that looked like all the others they had passed. “This was Mikes room.” She opened the door. “Call if you need anything.”

Allan chimed in, “We would love to help with anything you need.”

       Rick nodded and thanked them both. He began going over the room being careful not to touch anything. The bed was messy, the sheet and comforter were all tangled together and there were papers and notebooks stacked on the bed. The desk was covered in loose leaf paper that appeared to have old Nextian and the translation scribbled on it. it said:

See beyond the veil of flesh.

Understand the thoughts of many.

The Nexus hears what flesh cannot.

       Rick picked up the paper, the Ethel family amulet is one that allows people to read minds, a rare item, most all amulets were controlled by the government, though a select few houses in the Lord Governor’s favor were allowed to keep theirs, though with strict orders not to use them. He tucked the paper away before he picked up the 0shin, a fancier version of the Nexitech device he was wearing, and put it on, the layout was like his Nexitech device though instead of doors it simply used keyholes. Rick went into history hoping that finding a clue would be this easy. Under histories he found searches for historical pamphlets and searches for bikini shots of Marie M’rander a popular new actress. But finally, Rick found reference to a club in the River District that he knew was used as a front to allegedly traffic magic goods.

       Rick took the device off and moved into the hallway, he went down to the master bedroom to begin poking around while Allan and Elaine weren’t looking over his shoulder.

At least half of the missing person cases he had taken on had been perpetrated by a family member, while it always felt awkward poking around someone’s room without explicit permission he felt he could make a probable cause case.

He found various official papers, and some apparent attempts at poetry by Elaine. In the closet he found many shoes and clothes like expected, but he also found the slightly less expected like an unlocked folder cabinet that after a quick search yielded boring tax and legislation information. Nearly despairing, Rick tried jumping to see if there was anything on the shelves hidden away. On Allan’s side of the closet, on a shelf, Rick spotted a faded white box. He grabbed a suitcase and precariously balanced himself atop it reaching up to grab the box, barely he managed to hook a finger in the hand hold to pull it close enough to get a solid grip and bring it down. Slowing his breathing he grabbed the lid and slid it up off the box, inside it was full of detailed paperwork, scanning the contents Ricks palms grew sweaty. The contents were essentially receipts of who the Governor had taken money from as well as a small piece of paper with no name on it that stated:

It will be done, right before the curve on Oron St. Matt will no longer be a problem.

Rick put everything back where he found it and left with a quick thanks to Allan and Elaine for cooperating before going to catch an Electro-bus. While waiting he cut the footage to just the search of the bedroom, wrote a brief explanation as to why he had been there and sent it to the force.

       As he stood waiting, he had the realization that no electro-strips were near the club in the River District so with a sigh he messaged Brick.