On
one hand Vi was scared, but on the other hand relieved about how much
information could be accessed.
About herself she found school
grades, old class photos and newspaper articles. Of these she only
read the headlines:
"14-year-old girl disappeared."
"Where is Violet P.?"
"Still no progress in the case of Violet P."
On the photo she wore
a hair-band and smiled into the camera.
That was creepy. Violet
got a very strange feeling.
Rain began to crackle against the
large windows of the library and a muffled rumbling thunder was
heard.
She typed in a different search term: Tony Rydinger.
It took a while before she found the right one. He was now 47 and
manager of an airport. On a photo he posed in collar and tie.
Wow
... that was even creepier.
Violet bit her fingernails.
He
was soo old. He still looked nice, but not as good as before ...
She shook her head. Actually she was here for a completely
different reason.
She gave in the date of her disappearance.
A
lot of newspaper articles appeared. Violet refined the search to
Metroville.
Nothing ... at least nothing about a gigantic laser
cannon or a destroyed building.
Only a power outage ... and a
mysterious plane crash.
Violet opened this article, not because
she thought it had something to do with her case, but just out of
interest ... It didn't happen too often that three jet fighter
crashed in Metroville.
"... The reason for this tragic accident can't be determined yet. After investigations of the black box of all three jets, a failure of the electronics can not be excluded... "
"Sure, with all three at the same time ..." said Vi, and closed the article again.
Then
she remembered something important.
The large yellow "C"
of the building ... Cobra.
She gave in
this name, and of course millions of articles about snakes appeared
first.
Jack had said that after this incident nobody would have
ever heard about him again...
"... At least not with that name ..." Violet whispered. She felt that she was on a track of a mystery.
"Ladies and gentlemen, the library
closes in half an hour..." came an announcement over
loudspeakers.
It was already half past five? Then she had sat
here for hours! Hopefully Dash didn't worry.
No matter. She had
still half an hour for today...
Hectically she started a search
for company names from the former city, which began with C. Of which
there were a lot, and Violet couldn't refine the search because she
didn't know what actually had been fabricated "officially"
in this building.
So she looked at the company logos for a big
yellow C. But without success. This cost her about 15 minutes. She
already wanted to give up and go home when she had an idea.
Vi pressed the blue button.
"How can I help you?"
"I
need a satellite image of this area from 2005 ..."
The desired material appeared on the screen.
"And what about Einstein?"
"Not so important ..." murmured
Violet. She pressed a finger on what she considered as the industrial
park of Metroville. It was immediately enlarged.
Violet closed
her eyes and put her hand on the forehead.
"... I moved off with the bike at the Parkers..." she whispered in thought, and followed the route with her finger on the touchscreen.
"Then it flashed ...." Violet stayed with her finger at the place where she first had stopped too look up in the sky.
"The library closes in five minutes." The voice droned from the loudspeakers.
No! She was so close!
"Can I help?"
"Sssh!"
She had to concentrate. She followed the road through the industrial park. Then she smacked her forehead.
"I'm so stupid! Timothy, is there a satellite image from this area shortly after this date?"
A new satellite image appeared and after a short time Vi found what she was looking for.
She pressed her finger on a terrain on which
only a pile of rubble was visible.
A small newspaper article
appeared, with a photo, on which some onlookers and photographers
stood in front of the ruins. The date showed that the report was in
the newspaper three days after her disappearance, so she hadn't
seen it before.
"... The mysterious circumstances that resulted in the breakdown of the main building of Robac Industries on Wednesday night are still unknown..."
Robac Industries?
Violet got doubts ...
"Do you want me to find more about this topic?"
"If you could show me everything about Robac Industries." Violet responded quickly.
Many articles appeared, including a picture with the company logo ...
"That's it ..." Violet whispered and stared fascinated at the screen. Her heart beat faster.
The logo had a white lettering, only the C at the end of Robac was bigger and highlighted in yellow.
"Ladies and gentlemen, the library closes now. Please proceed to the exits."
Violet
cursed and grabbed her stuff.
But she had made progress.
She would find out what had happened to the responsible persons on this evening...
When she arrived home, she was tormented with the
thought of whether she should tell Dash about her researches... Vi
didn't believe that she could lie to his face when he asked what
she had done all day.
But Dash didn't ask.
Finally Flame
had told him that Violet had been catching up about the recent
historical events. Why should he think something else?
She wasn't totally happy with it, but for now she kept her secret.
