Okay, again, I own Kancho, the Constable, and any anonymous mentioned-in-passings. I own nobody else.
Hawking stood outside the burn ward, looking in on his grandson. Tears filled his eyes as he watched the child struggle to breathe. Even with the life support, nobody could tell him if Spectre would live.
"I'm sorry," Hawking whispered, though he knew Spectre could not hear him. "I'm so sorry; I couldn't get there in time."
He felt a hand on his shoulder. Hawking turned, hoping to see Tobor. But it was the Constable; Hawking growled and turned away.
"It's not your fault," the Constable said. "What happened—you could never have expected it."
Hawking sighed. He did not want to hear yet another well-wisher trying to talk him out of a guilt trip.
The Constable looked around. "I thought Tobor would be staying out here."
"No," Hawking snarled. He slapped the Constable's hand away, resisting the urge to hit something. "I don't understand. It's been three days! Tobor checked out just fine; why hasn't he come to see his son?" He shook, anger warring with grief. "He's been...so angry..."
"So were you, six years ago," the Constable replied. "But you didn't lose your wife, and Spectre's fate is nowhere near as certain as Tobor's had been." He frowned. "And maybe he heard..." He shook his head.
"Maybe what? Heard what?"
The Constable bit his lip. "Can I talk to you, Guardian? In private?"
Hawking nodded, and the two went off, neither one aware that they were followed.
Kancho crept behind them, memorizing every word to report back to the Bride.
"Set?" Hawking said.
"I don't know for sure," the Constable replied. "If there was any evidence, it's been wiped clean by the fire. But I'd spoken to the firefighters, and not one of them believes that a natural fire could spread like that."
"Do you have any leads?"
The Constable shook his head. "Like I said, there's no evidence. Just a nagging feeling that something isn't quite right. But I was thinking, if the Guardian Tobor had gotten wind of the idea—"
Hawking nodded. "He might be in quite the vengeful mood. Perhaps it is better that he has not visited."
"Guardian?" The Constable looked at him, puzzled.
Hawking hesitated. "I—I didn't want to tell anyone about this, not until I could be sure what it meant. But if there are others with that suspicion, and it gets out that I've held this information back..."
The Constable waited. And finally, Hawking told him what he'd seen. About Spectre's command of the Chaos Force, and the lives that were lost because of it.
The Constable stood, silently, thinking over this piece of information. He frowned, and finally spoke. "We can't say what happened until your grandson recovers, but I don't believe for a second that boy set those flames. Not on purpose, at least. But if he had anything to do with it..." He shook his head. "No. Nobody can know about this. Not until we know what happened."
"You would withhold possible evidence?" Hawking asked, trying to hide his relief.
"What evidence?" the Constable replied. "In legal terms, what you've told me is barely more than idle speculation. It bears considering, but it isn't a theory we can rely on."
"Thank you," Hawking said.
The Constable left, and Kancho followed Hawking back to the burn ward.
The Shinobi agreed with the Constable's assessment; as far as she was concerned, what the Guardian had revealed was pure hearsay. Only Vahti would know the truth of it, and he had died before he could deliver his report.
—
Kancho paced the hallway outside the burn ward. Her orders had finally come in, leaving her with mixed feelings.
She had begun watching the child since Vahti's death. She was not as experienced as most of the Shinobi present, and she had, technically, broken the rules a number of times in the last week.
So it was with a little anxiety, and no small amount of surprise, that she received the message from the Bride of Constant Vigil. A message instructing her to continue that watch, and to guard the child as she saw fit.
The message left Kancho more nervous than before. The Bride had not said it outright, but the tone implied that she agreed with the Constable's suspicions. The Bride believed the fires had been set.
And the Bride expected Kancho, not to watch the child as was customary, but to protect him as needed.
The clans were a suspicious lot, but did the Bride really expect danger?
Kancho's musing was interrupted by the arrival of a female echidna. A very familiar one.
She frowned, memorizing the echidna's features. She been out with the ambulance during the fire. Not surprising, that, since the woman had lived in the apartment below Tobor's. So why was she sneaking around, like she was afraid of being seen?
Kancho tried to remember other details. Yes. She was a nurse here, and her husband was a firefighter—
One of the firefighters who'd died...
Kancho's eyes widened.
It could be nothing...
Then why was she sneaking around?
Kancho followed the woman into the burn ward.
And waited, and watched.
The woman took one more glance around, to be sure no one was watching, and tiptoed up to Spectre's bed. She reached for the IV and pulled a syringe from her pocket—
Kancho launched herself at the woman.
—
The head doctor tried to jump out of his chair, nearly knocking himself over, at the sound of the alarm.
"That's from the burn ward!" he shouted.
Hawking and the Constable looked up in alarm, and raced after the doctor.
Great Aurora, Hawking pleaded, let my grandson be all right.
The doctor rushed into the burn ward, tripping over the nurse as he went. The Constable reached out in time to stop Hawking from doing the same.
Spectre was awake, whimpering, and gasping for air. Hawking rushed to him, hoping to soothe him before he had a chance to tap into the Chaos Force again.
The doctor went to his bed and found the tubes that had been pulled out. "Here we are," he said, putting them back into place. "This must be what triggered the alarm. But how—"
He looked over to see the Constable crouching over the unconscious nurse.
"Looks like someone attacked her," the Constable said. "Recently. Probably when the alarms went off."
"But we didn't pass anyone," Hawking protested. "And there isn't anyone else here—"
"I'll need to check the security cameras," the Constable said. He frowned. "Why was she in here?"
"I ordered her to give the boy another painkiller," the doctor replied. "Wh—"
"This?" the Constable asked, holding up the syringe he'd found under the woman's arm. He handed it to the doctor.
"Yeah, probably."
"Probably?" The Constable lifted an eyebrow. "Probably."
"I don't recognize the medicines on sight," the doctor snapped, "but she wouldn't have had another syringe."
"Maybe," the Constable said. "Maybe not."
"What is it?" Hawking asked.
"Remember that thing we were talking about?" the Constable muttered. "That thing we agreed not to talk to anyone else about, not until we had more information?" Hawking nodded, and the Constable gestured at the woman. "Her husband was one of the firefighters. One of the ones who'd died in that...particular blast."
"Ah, whatever happened, we can't give this one to him," the doctor said. "Give me a moment, I'll send the tech for another one."
"When you do," the Constable said, "get that one analyzed."
The doctor froze. "Analyzed, sir?" He gave the Constable a puzzled look.
"To verify what's in it." The doctor opened his mouth, then snapped it shut at the Constable's expression. "Let us err on the side of caution, shall we, doctor? Ease my mind; prove to me that I'm being overcautious."
"There's no such thing as 'overcautious' in this business," the doctor muttered, nodding. "Mine or yours." He handed the syringe to the tech with the Constable's instructions.
A moment after the tech left, Spectre began to shake and whimper again. Hawking turned back to try to soothe him, unaware that the woman had regained her feet.
She stared at Spectre, her rage blinding her to the others in the room. "You freak!" she snarled, lunging for the child.
The Constable whipped around and grabbed her before she could take more than two steps.
"Let me go!" She kicked at the Constable, tried to bite and scratch him. "Let me go! That demon killed my husband! He—"
The doctor's eyes widened at her words. He glanced over at the child, shivering in Hawking's arms, then his eyes narrowed. "Excuse me, Constable." He walked over and punched the woman on the jaw, knocking her out again.
The Constable released his arms, letting her fall to the floor. "Oops." He looked at the doctor and lifted one eyebrow.
"If you wish to take her in for questioning and let her scream herself hoarse," the doctor said, "by all means, take her. But not here. That bile she was spitting out is hardly conducive to the healing process, don't you think?"
The Constable nodded and dragged her out, almost running into the tech on the way.
The tech watched them leave. His face paled and he turned to the doctor with fear in his eyes. "The syringe you gave me—it's poison."
Hawking stared. "Poison? But—"
The tech nodded. "A very effective one. And once it's in the bloodstream, we'd never detect it. Not with all the medicines he's on. We'd be lucky to—" He swallowed. "Lucky to find it...in an autopsy."
The doctor dismissed the shaken tech.
Hawking held Spectre until his trembling subsided and he fell back asleep. "He's safe now, though. At least we know to expect—"
"No, Guardian, he's not," the doctor replied. Hawking glanced up at him, and the doctor sighed. "I don't know what you and the Constable were discussing that nobody should know about, but I have to wonder if she knew it, anyway. And with how much she'd been shrieking, how long do you think it will be before the rest of the city knows it?"
"She was angry," Hawking whispered. "Confused. He's a child. Most people will understand—"
"All it takes is one, Guardian," the doctor replied. "There were many lives lost in that fire. Many families lost their friends and loved ones, and such a mere child as he survived?" He shook his head. "I would like to think that most will know him for another victim, but the Guardians are different; you are something that most people simply do not understand. And there are those who will only want someone to blame. Who better than your grandson?" He sighed. "And all it takes is one," he repeated.
"And you?"
"I will continue to treat him as I must," the doctor replied. "But I do have other patients. Others who may be caught in the cross fire should this happen again." He sighed agaiin. "Guardian, saying this goes against everything I have learned, but if you have any way to take care of him, any way that you can take him away from here, I must ask you to consider it. For him and for my other patients."
Hawking stared at the floor.
"I'm sorry, Guardian. It is not a good option, but there may be none better."
Hawking nodded. "Deo..."
The fire ant appeared, Hawking gathered up his grandson, and the three of them disappeared.
—
Kancho started swearing under her breath. Of course they'd have to leave after that! Even she couldn't protect the boy very well if them like that woman started coming after him.
But she couldn't protect him at all if she couldn't follow.
At least she knew where they were going. Haven. The "secret" place where the Brotherhood kept their own vigil.
She left the hospital and went to the edge of the city. There, she pressed a button on her watch, activating a device that opened a portal between zones.
She left the city and went to her "home" in Rainbow Valley, found her map of the island, and made her way to the Forbidden Zone.
And Haven.
I do have some ideas rattling inside my brain where Spectre actually reveals to the Brotherhood what he remembers. In one of those ideas, Espio is authorized to provide what information the clan has on the subject; in that particular version, Vahti had collapsed partway through delivering his report, so the clan does know some of what had happened inside the building...just not that "Tobor" was responsible.
In the "history" version, however, I figured it would work better to say he hadn't delivered a report...just because I wasn't sure how I wanted to do that scene.
I might change it later.
Oh, that one line where Kancho is thinking "she been out" et cetera. That wasn't a typo. I mean, it was sort of an accident, but I like it, and I'm trying to work out what her speech patterns might be from there.