[MISSION] IN THE SHADOW OF THE DRAGON

[khuimods]

Characters: All! Those signed up to teams will have comment headers; there will be opportunities for non-teamed characters.
Date: Feb 15-28, running into the first week of March
Location: Around Aifaran
Situation: The Sentry has called on outside help from the Dreamfolk to deal with a challenging situation
Warnings/Rating: None yet, will be added as needed.


In the early morning hours of February 15th, a fire starts at city hall. The blaze burns hot and quick, but fire teams are able to put it out by the time the sun comes up. The Sentry holds a press conference that afternoon, sharing that the fire is determined to be arson. Witnesses describe someone wearing an ill-fitting Sentry uniform hurrying away from the scene.

The Sentry will announce that, due to the strain on their resources dealing with storm recovery, they are commissioning outside assistance to deal with a number of incidents similar to this one. Dreamfolk in particular are being called upon to once again use their unique abilities to aid the archipelago.

Those who report to the Verdant Sentry Headquarters are briefed on the situation: a contingent of the Sentry is departing Aifaran for the Zoech Lowlands to search for the people missing from Cape Averi. The outpost was found empty after the storm; at first this was presumed to be the fault of the Dreaming, but now they aren't so sure.

Those who choose to assist the Verdant Sentry will be given a small stipend and extended a certain degree of authority to act on the Sentry's behalf. The 'deputized' Dreamfolk will be responsible for investigating discrete incidents to help make up for the reduction in Sentry forces in Aifaran. They are being entrusted not only with these cases, but with the reputation of the Sentry itself.

Although they are requesting this assistance, the Sentry remain tight-lipped about Cape Averi beyond the bare-bones logistics. Their suspicions are not made public, and nor will they be shared with the assembled volunteers unless these investigations intersect. Abuse of this power will not be tolerated.

---

OOC Notes: Characters will be provided with tools needed to conduct the investigation, such as gloves and basic forensics gear (fingerprint dust, evidence collection bags, etc). They will also be handed paperwork

If you did not sign your character(s) up for a team, you can submit a summary of what the character will look into and we will provide a reply as to the findings and effects. This will be a one-time thing for these characters in order to maximize the time for the main mission logistics.

Comments

[wrathfulkhan]

Gene's taken a little time off from the dojo, leaving it in the capable hands of one of his instructors for the day. There's a lot to investigate here, and he's relishing the opportunity to give his mind the workout. Not like this is a good thing, but if it had to happen, he might as well take advantage of his skills to help.

"Hm." He's scribbling on a pad of paper, taking down his initial impressions of the scene.

[redlightgreenlight]

When her SO had told her she was being assigned to an investigation, Valdis had not expected this. She followed Gene around, using her senses to find what he couldn't see. Her sense of smell might be the most helpful, so she took deep breaths, letting the air drift over her tongue and through her nose.

"Look for anything that might give off a scent of the person responsible," she said, "I will recognize it if we run into said person later."

Though scent might not be admissible in court.

[zohvin]

"You can follow a scent? That's useful."

Zohvin peered a bit doubtfully at Valdis for a moment before stepping away from the other two, intent on getting a closer look at the destroyed machinery of the control station itself. That seemed like one of the best places to dust for fingerprints (dust! Did they not even have basic scanning equipment here?), and he was also quite interested to see if these vandals had done a clean job of it or not.

[wrathfulkhan]

"I'm sure we can use fingerprints to corroborate, if need be," Gene said. Then: "Valdis, do you recognize this scent?"

He directed her to a few droplets of dried blood and a scrap of fabric caught on some of the destroyed metal. "There might be prints here, too." His own attention was caught by a phrase painted on the wall. "Do either of you recognize this? I think it looks like something from the Sabonile."

During his investigation - where Gene hasn't gotten to yet - Zohvin might notice that the automated railway signaling controls had been cut, while everything else seems to have been destroyed at random in an attempt to cover the saboteur's tracks.

[redlightgreenlight]

"I'm as human as you are, Zohvin," came her only reply.

Valdis eyed the blood and scrap of cloth that Gene pointed out, her eyes sparkling. Someone was going to regret leaving that behind. She took a deep breath, memorizing the scent, picking it apart to try to see everything that it was. Did the perpetrator live near the sea? Did they smoke? What was their last meal? Did they wear perfume? Scent could tell so much.

She turned her head to look at what Gene saw, "I don't really may much attention to the religious things," she commented, "Unless I'm trying to implicate them in something against the law."

[zohvin]

Zohvin's reply to her comment was a laughed "Hah! That's a good one." And it answered his question quite well, too. No one could possibly mistake him for a human, even among these people that knew nothing about his species in the first place.

It's as he's eying the cut lines with a critical eye that Gene mentions the Sabonile, and that makes Zohvin pause, turning to regard him and the graffiti there on the wall. "Don't they worship an energy crystal?" he asked, his tone kept carefully neutral. It wasn't so long ago that Zohvin had stolen a few pieces of art from one of their churches - though of course he hadn't lingered to read any of their pamphlets.

[wrathfulkhan]

Gene snorted at the joke before turning his attention to his co-investigators. "They do, sort of - if I recall correctly, they see it as a living being, not just a power source."

The scent Valdis was picking up definitely indicated frequent proximity to the sea, but also the scent of the city, as though the perpetrator spent approximately the same amount of time in both.

[redlightgreenlight]

The consistency of scent from the cloth indicated an even split of time between the city and seaside, though what that meant she couldn't tell yet. She turned back to the symbols.

"Do you think this has to do with that?" she asked, "Like a rebellion against using it as a power source?"

She walked closer, trying to figure out what the phrase had been written in, touching her fingers gently to the words.

"What about the destruction? Was this all random, or was there a specific target?"

[zohvin]

"I can tell you that the damage isn't as rage-fueled as it might look," Zohvin chimed in. "There's a neatly cut cord over here that doesn't match the graffiti and the dents in the slightest. Whoever did this knows how these controls work."

He takes the small fingerprinting kit out of his pocket, but spends a moment longer looking at the graffiti, not very happy about the ideas this is starting to give him. "If the Sabonile are truly behind this, it'd make more sense for them to target where their precious crystals are being stored. This could be the work of a more militant sect that doesn't have the manpower yet... or it's a clumsy attempt at misdirection."

[wrathfulkhan]

"I'm not sure," Gene said to Valdis. "Though they've always seemed to be the pacifistic type. While they're not beyond passive-aggression, I should think that actual vandalism would be a little bit outside their scope."

At Zohvin's revelation, though, he looked thoughtful. "Chaos to cover tracks. Though not very well-covered, it seems." Gene's familiar with misdirection to further his own ends, but coming at it from an investigator's perspective is uniquely interesting, and potentially uniquely vexing.

"If it's misdirection, then, we ought to consider who might have motive."

[redlightgreenlight]

Valdis shrugged, carefully pulling the bit of cloth off there it had stuck, taking another deep breath.

"So someone knew exactly what they were doing," she reiterated, "It's an odd target, the control station."

She tried to think about who might gain from such deliberate sabotage. Gene was probably right about the Sabonile, much as she disliked any form of religion, those who followed them tended to stick with the values.

"We should take a sample of the blood."

[zohvin]

Zohvin nods to them as he opens the bottle of fingerprinting powder, sprinkling it out over the control panel on the areas he thought it likely the perpetrator would have been touching it. While he's attending to taking the fingerprint samples, he comments,

"Do we know enough from the scene to establish a motive? Perhaps the Sentry could, but I doubt they're going to share the details of their other investigations with us - excluding Valdis, of course." He offers her a polite nod before turning his attention back to the panel. "It'd be more prudent to find their train-knowledgeable collaborator and make him squeal like a shriek-hawk."

[wrathfulkhan]

"No motive I can ascertain aside from the graffiti," Gene said. "Or just a desire to cause trouble for trouble's sake."

Something occurred to him then. "Perhaps they were paid. What could one of the gangs stand to gain from this, do we think? Unless something has changed, they don't have an alternative transportation system."

[redlightgreenlight]

"Maybe it isn't about them," Valdis replied, walking over to take a swab of the blood and put it in a small forensic tube. "Maybe it's about stopping another party from getting somewhere."

With the fire at the Records Hall, by a person dressed as a Sentry member, it could be an attempt to sabotage a response to something that hadn't happened yet. She tucked the vial into her pocket and glanced at Zohvin.

"The sentry is pretty tight lipped with me too," she replied, "If you mean what I think you mean, there's no need to make their contact squeal, my current position is in interrogation without pain, and I'm pretty good at it."

[zohvin]

"Whatever gets the job done," he tells Valdis with a ghost of a smile tugging at his lips.

It doesn't matter how many fingerprints Zohvin finds, he focuses on taking samples of as many of them as possible. That process involves using the clear tape provided in the kit, pressed down against the shapes outlined in the dust, which is then placed against a piece of paper for easy review later. He can't help but think about how much faster the process could have gone with a handheld scanner.

"I can't claim much familiarity with the gangs here. Are they organized enough for focused attacks like these?"