Book 3 Chapter 4 - Dead Ends and a Deadbeat

Guilt is for the poor and the powerless.
A Category Red is guilty the moment they are accused.

But a violet? A blue, even?
There is no evidence worth taking their power from them.
Authority protects authority, even if they hate each other.
There is a sick solidarity among the strong.
Because the moment they undermine each other, they undermine themselves.

Maybe that’s an exaggeration. There is certainly a line that not even the strongest
can safely cross. Not without some kind of consequence.

But it’s a line most of us would be killed for even approaching.

If there is a killer on the loose, there is only one thing we can do about it.

Pray to God they aren’t too rich to prosecute.
—Unknown

Lyle Lupin took another drink. The whiskey burned, and he didn’t even like the taste. He didn’t much like how it made him feel, either. He’d barely drunk before this at all, in fact. But sometimes, feeling like shit in one way was better than the alternative. That was quickly becoming every day.

“Maybe instead of drinking, you should spend some time finding the fucking serial killer terrorizing the city?” The voice was gruff and communicated more than vitriol. It was an accusation, but there was fear behind it as well. Lyle looked up and met the angry eyes of the bartender. The fear wasn’t for his own safety, Lyle could tell that much. Not in the cyan district, where there hadn’t been a single victim. But plenty of people had friends and family who lived in lower districts. 

It wasn’t a pleasant admonition, but Lyle didn’t blame the man for giving it. Lyle wouldn’t have wanted to serve him, either, if their roles were reversed. Still. It wasn’t his damn fault.

“I’m doing everything I can,” Lyle whispered. It was a pathetic defense, but it was what he had. 

“Really? Because this is the third night in a row I’ve had to cut you off,” the man practically spat. “Meanwhile, the Cruel Ivy Killer is tying living people to trains and watching them die as they’re dragged away. Seems like he’s trying a lot fucking harder than you are.”

Lyle gripped the empty glass in one hand and stared at the bottom. “Yeah, well, he has a lot more support than I do,” he grumbled. He knew he shouldn’t share details about the case, but it was hardly a secret at this point. At least, the situation which led Lyle to that conclusion was public knowledge. Despite all the evidence pointing to Chromatic Academy in some way, he couldn’t investigate it. Even if the police department hadn’t announced as much, it would have been obvious. The single place in the city with more combat and violence-oriented callings than the rest of Prism combined. Anyone would have started there. Even without evidence to suggest the killer lived on campus. 

The fact that no one involved in the investigation went anywhere near the campus was pretty damn telling. And the publicity was helping to put pressure on Bouvier to open the campus up to the police. That meant more than a few people had made the same deduction as Lyle himself. That the killer wasn’t working alone. Bouvier was obviously involved in some way. There was no denying that. Although Lyle couldn’t be certain whether he was a willing collaborator or if it was blackmail. 

He was stuck investigating only the sites of each murder, and floundering when every promising lead was out of reach.

“You talking about that Bouvier asshole who runs the academy? ‘Cause it seems pretty cut and dry to me. You have an asshole killer based out of the academy, and you have an asshole doing everything he can to stop anyone from investigating the very same place. Now, I don’t have a calling for this shit, but that sounds an awful lot like two and two adding up to goddamn four,” the bartender mocked. 

Lyle sighed. “If only it were so cut and dry, but it’s definitely not him. Or, not him alone. And even if it were, we can’t get fucking proof until we get on campus somehow,” he explained.

“How the hell do you know it’s not him if you can’t investigate him? Shouldn’t you at least bring him in for questioning, or whatever you morons do? Why the hell can one man stop you when bodies turn up every damn week?” the bartender replied, slamming his palm onto the counter. It was an act born more of excitability than anger, but it still came off as overly aggressive to Lyle.

He couldn’t answer that entirely honestly. As much as he might’ve wanted to. Not the second bit, anyway. Even he couldn’t quite stomach the politics involved, and the bartender wouldn’t like them any better. But that didn’t matter, because Bouvier’s “Dream Eater” calling was a state secret, only shared with Lyle recently. The fact was, Chromatic Academy needed Abel Bouvier. More specifically, it needed his “Void of Sloth” talent. And what Chromatic needed, Prism protected. Without Chromatic Academy, there would be no Prism City. No cities at all, actually. 

The world barely had enough lancers to survive as it was, and they were already falling behind. Even with fucking quotas for yearly drafts. There were probably alternatives. Chromatic would survive, even if students suddenly regained their motivation to try and escape. But it would require at least three times the current staff. And that meant many of the world's most powerful lancers would be acting as guards instead of subjugating nests.

Lyle didn’t want to think about any of that. He didn’t want to consider any moral implications or try to sleep with the knowledge of it in his head. He hadn’t known how fragile everything had been a few months ago, and he’d been happy that way. But they’d told him, because they needed their next order to be crystal clear and supported by context.

Find the Cruel Ivy Killer. It will not be Abel Bouvier, do you understand?

So he would not be taking the headmaster in for questioning, and he did not have the leverage to force the investigation onto campus. Not when compared to Bouvier. Not yet. 

He could answer the first question at least, if only partially.

“I know he’s not the killer for at least two public reasons,” Lyle answered. “For one, he has an alibi. He was attending high-profile functions during multiple notable kills attributed to the Cruel Ivy Killer. In fact, he was with the president herself for one of them. That's about as credible an alibi as a man can get.”

“Couldn’t a talent of some kind do that? How can you really trust an alibi so completely? For that matter, how can you be certain every crime attributed to the Cruel Ivy Killer is actually them and not some copycat?” the bartender insisted.

Lyle knew all of Bouvier’s talents, but he couldn’t share that with the man on the other side of the counter, so he focused on the second question. “I can’t be completely certain, you’re right. But I have a talent of my own. “Red Threads of Fate.” It draws a line for me between things with a particularly strong connection. The more significant the link, the more vibrant the thread. I have to intentionally compare them, of course. But when I do, it draws a pretty clear line between bodies. They were all killed by the same person. Or they all had some other remarkable connection that makes them related anyway,” Lyle explained.

“So why the hell don’t you just call in every possible suspect and use that talent to find out who else is connected to the deaths?” the bartender asked. Interestingly, the frustration and fear seemed to be fading from the man’s voice. Each question now had more genuine investment and curiosity lacing it. Lyle decided to capitalize on that. He really needed another drink.

He ran his finger across the rim of the glass and looked up at the server before answering. “I don’t suppose I could get a double?” he asked. 

The bartender narrowed his eyes, but grunted and grabbed the bottle to pour. It was uncommon to get anything out of the man after he’d been cut off. Still, his lips were particularly loose tonight, so it wasn’t terribly surprising. Lyle waited for the drink to be ready, then took another sip before responding.

“Like you said,” Lyle answered. “Talents can make up for a lot. Which means just about everyone in Prism City is a possible suspect, even if not all of them are likely. It wouldn’t matter if they weren’t, though. That would still fail. My talent works best on nonliving things. Otherwise, the resistance attribute gets in the way and either nullifies my ability or makes the results unreliable. That won’t work, unless the killer is remarkably weak.”

The bartender grunted and leaned up against the counter. “Fine, then. How else do you know that headmaster shithead isn’t the killer, aside from his alibi? I still question whether that can be trusted,” he pushed.

Lyle shrugged, then took another sip. He wiped his mouth on his sleeve, then rested his head in one hand. “Whoever the killer is, he struggled against a teenage girl in Category Orange. Bouvier is blue, and a formidable combatant at that. It’s possible he was poisoned during the fight, I suppose. But it’s not the only time the Cruel Ivy Killer’s middle-to-low category has been evident. Kills happen in the green district at the highest, for one. And several deaths were clearly preceded by a struggle of some kind. Bouvier is simply too strong to be a realistic suspect.”

The bartender furrowed his brow in thought. “I guess. So he’s protecting a student, then?” he asked. 

Lyle rolled his glass on its edge in idle thought, then shrugged. “I don’t know. Could be an employee. Or a relative. Or anything else. Bouvier is protecting them, though. Whether he means to or not. I need to get on that fucking campus if I am going to stop all this death,” Lyle said.

That really was all it would take. A day on campus. A week, maybe. Once he could access the files on students and staff, as well as the logs for the trains leaving the academy, it would almost be too easy. 

They didn’t have any DNA to test or prints to check. The killer was somehow meticulous and quick with cleanup at the same time. Like he had a talent that could touch every surface in the room at once and pick up even the tiniest of hairs. Lyle didn’t know what talent that might’ve been, but he’d almost certainly be able to figure it out. If only he could see what registered talents the students had.

He had solid leads. More than he usually even wished for in the average case. And he couldn’t investigate a single one of them.

“How the fuck is that legal?” the bartender asked.

Lyle groaned. He knew he needed to shut up. He’d been lectured on how important Bouvier was. On all the reasons he couldn’t simply spread rumors. But people were angry, and they had every right to be. Hell, he was angry as absolute sin himself.

“The bodies are getting bloodier,” Lyle murmured. “Not all of them. Or maybe ‘bloodier’ isn’t the right word. 'More gruesome' might be better. He does seem to enjoy strangling them as often as he can. With rope or with ivy, whichever works better. Those are bloodless, at least. But he displays them. He leaves the corpses in public places, and he poses them like he specifically wants people to be afraid. That’s what’s getting to me. The fear. It’s like he cares more about that than who he kills. Not to say he doesn’t care about who his targets are. He obviously picks victims that would be harder to reach than others. But he wants us afraid. He wants us angry. He wants us thinking about him, and how terrible our deaths might be when we find him.”

The bartender was silent for a long moment. The words changed the energy of the conversation, and not only because Lyle was finally drunk enough to hint at confidential details. Rather, it was because he’d shared some level of that growing dread with the other man. For the bartender, the Cruel Ivy Killer was news to be afraid of. To make him worry about someone in some lower district he cared about. It probably hadn’t felt entirely real. Like knowing cancer exists, but assuming only other people would ever have it. But Lyle spoke like a dark cloud, and he sapped the light from the room. 

“He’s getting more bold, you know. More brash. The first killings we know about were covered up entirely. But I doubt they were actually his first. There were too many at once and in one place. Those were murders committed by a killer with confidence. By someone who had...” Lyle trailed off. Partly because that voice in the back of his head telling him to shut up was getting louder. But also because he’d suddenly had an idea. 

If he was right, he’d thought of a new angle to force his way onto campus.