Part Three

Rebecca came out of the trance like state she had entered, lulled into by the man’s story and his strangely soothing voice. She started, and then caught herself.

“What is this nonsense?” She demanded angrily. “You think to beguile me with some child’s story, to lull me into letting you go free? I will tell you right now, you’d better think of a better excuse or you’ll find yourself behind cold bars for a long, long time. So, what will it be? Try another story, or accept your fate?”

The man’s frightened expression had returned. He seemed to stare at something behind her, but she wasn’t ignorant enough to turn and look. The next thing she knew would be waking up hours later, after this drug addict had knocked her out and made a run for it. She wouldn’t risk the injury it could cause. Besides, this one looked nasty. They’d probably find him guilty of multiple charges of possession with intent to supply.

She suddenly came back to herself. She had been daydreaming, lost in her thoughts. It was a wonder her charge had not made a break for it already, while she was not thinking straight.

There was a loud buzz, and she felt an intense heat go past her. She turned just in time to see a flash of red and nothing in the darkness behind her. Turning swiftly back, she gasped at the sight.

The man had stiffened. His eyes were wide, and as she watched they glazed over. The man went limp, and crumpled to the floor in a shapeless heap. She gingerly touched the body, rolling it over with her foot. There was a large burn on his body.

Just like the other victims of the Blaze Case.

She swiftly made her way into an alley, where it was darker. She reasoned that no killer would be able to see her here.

She hoped that her reasoning was correct.

*****

The Metaldroid Project was a success in all ways but one – the user of it slowly had his or her mind warped. It was nothing serious, no psychopaths were created, but it would make them less emotional, and more inclined to use order in their personal day to day lives. They also gained an excellent memory.

This was true until one year after the Metaldroid prototype was first activated. At this time, tests had confirmed how brilliantly it worked. Then, one day, control was lost.

The man in control of the prototype, one Jonathan Vivaldi, who had been the first to ever use it in a full mind-body transferral, disappeared. It is believed he was out on a scouting mission in America, sent to locate the country’s nuclear weapons, and was attacked. What is strange is that there are no records of him ever leaving the country, and no records of anything or anyone remotely like him ever entering America.

It is a rumour among ranking British military and scientists that something was wrong with the Metaldroid mission and that America had been in the know from the beginning. They were then able to sabotage the prototype before it could leave the country.

This rumour has never been confirmed, and Vivaldi’s family received only the dreaded envelope containing those grim words ‘Missing in Action’.

*****

Detective Inspector Rebecca Hunt was feeling more than a little afraid. She had been crouched in these shadows for hours now, and terror swept through her like a wave crashes upon the sea. She was overwhelmed, yet somehow managing to keep herself from a primal whimpering that she very much would have liked to let out. What she would have liked even more would to be back at home now, or even her office, not here in the cold, dark night, being stalked by an unknown killer, one who had possibly killed fifty already and showed no signs of repentance.

She hated to admit it, but she was terrified.

As dawn sent its first tendrils of cold morning light through the cloudy sky, Rebecca judged it safe to walk back home. Shakily she opened her front door, stepped inside, closed the door, and then proceeded to lock it. She went about the house, finding every chain and padlock she had. Only then did she allow herself to sink into an armchair and ring up the police. She phoned in to say that she was ill, and would not be coming in to work today. She did not have to put on any voice; she was shaking and trembling already. It was not faked.

She put down the phone and tried in vain to relax. She thought back to the time last night when the fog had cleared and for just an instant she had thought she had seen a figure, standing by the pavement. It had been tall, at least two metres high, and well over the normal height of a human being. Then it had gone, and she had shaken herself, trying to force herself to realise it was just a trick of the light. Unfortunately for her currently brittle mental state, the body had been proof that something very dangerous and very capable was truly out there.

In the safety of her house, she began to research. Although she had called in sick, she still had remote access to all the files of the case. She looked at these now.

There were three new files, and she ignored them all except one which caught her eye. It read ‘Software Recovery Information’. She opened this and found a mass of jumbled text. It read:

Ht … w … for … u … o.

“Th ….. stal shines … ght

………………………………..ght

This … me the ………………………

Three t …. f the ………. wait with me.”

She snorted. This was what had been recovered from the latest murder in the Blaze Case. The computer had been reduced almost to ruins, a smoking, melted lump. Still, the technicians working for the police department had managed to retrieve something, which was always a good sign of their quality and know-how. Even if that know-how had only managed to pull up a jumble of words.

She stopped short of thinking when she idly looked at her browser. There, in the URL bar, was the URL, as usual. It read “http://www.police.uk/”; like it normally did. What shocked her was that nobody had made the simple connection she had just made.

She immediately set to work, searching all the possible combinations. She knew it was impossible, that there were millions of sites out there with URLs like that, but in her feverish activity, she did not have to think about how close she had come to death last night.

Her thought chilled even her own fevered body.

What if the recovered words “Htt … ww … for … u … o” was an URL?