Zeke's POV
"Yeah, we just entered Peoria," I say to Bea.
Shuffling comes through the phone followed by a sigh. "How far are you guys with that lead?" I look up through the windsheild where Four is asking a local questions.
"It's coming along. Four's asking around about Grey before we approach her. How about on your end?"
"I would answer that question but Dexstin gives me a look when I curse too consecutively." I chuckle a little and tell her to hang in there before hanging up.
"She's seems to be a legit person," my partner says as he gets into the passenger seat. "Everyone I talked to describes her as kind and intelligent, just traumatized. Apparently when she was sixteen her foster parents were murdered in front of her while she was restrained. The investigation brought up the weapons and the evidence, paired with a full confession, put the killers in prison. She however has continued to claim that it was demons that killed them. She's calmed down over the years, but still believes it." I nod and pull up the directions to the small shop located just outside Peoria, IL. On the way there I thought over how true her claims could be. From what I knew so far there was no way to be completely sure.
We pull up to Sword and Shield and walk up to the door. A bell rings over our heads as we enter and the red headed Vampire waiting at the cash register turns to us. She gives us a closed mouth smile and resumes looking at the door in the back, fingers tapping at the counter anxiously. Poor girl, she must be having a problem with her fangs. As if she could feel her anxiety raising a woman, who I assume is Phiera, comes out with three small vials of a pale pink liquid. She quickly puts them in a pouch and gives them to the relieved Vamp. She leaves the shop and Phiera looks up to fully acknowledge us. She's a little on the taller side, nearly my height, with box braids, glasses, and a complexion just a few shades darker than mine. She'd probably get by as "normal" if it weren't for the scar running down her neck and the aura of pure wisdom and knowledge floating off her. It was something that ran down deep that just couldn't be picked up by humans that told you she had been through so much. It was at that moment that I knew for certain that everything she had said was the truth. Now if only I could convince Four.
"Good afternoon ", he says as we walk up. "I'm detective Eaton and this is detective Pendrad. We would like to ask you a few questions concerning a case of ours." Phiera looks the both of us up and down, her eyes staying on me a second longer.
"Alright then. What would you like to know detectives?"
"Well, for starters, would you mind telling us what you gave that woman?" I give him a side ways glance, trying to figure out what the hell he was doing.
"I don't see how that has to do with anything, but fine. It was a tooth ache remedy. Tylanol just wasn't doing it and her dentist apointment wasn't for another week, so she came to me for a temporary fix. There's nothing illegal in it in case that's what you are implying. It's just a simple mix of different herbs and nuts. I could show you how to make it if you'd like." Phiera looked him in the eye and dared Four to accuse her of anything. The staring match would have gone on forever if I hadn't butted in.
"Thank you Miss Grey. We're here because of the proximity of Peoria and Chicago, and we hoped you'd know something about one of these symbols." I lay a binder full of the pictures out infront of her and let her look through them. It wasn't until she got to the second to last symbol, the one that gave Bea the vision, that she stopped and really gave it a good look.
"Miss Grey?", I ask.
Phiera shakes her head a little and looks at us again. "I don't know about the authenticity of the rest, but this one almost looks like an extremely old pattern. I remember seeing it briefly in a book before, but it's not talked about much anymore. If it's somehow involved in your case I'd worry about who ever was able to get there hands on it if I were you." My heart rate picks up and it takes everything in me to not show my worry on the outside.
"I see. You haven't by any chance had anyone come in about this or any other symbol like it within the past six months have you? Possibly the past year?"
She tries to think back, but eventually says that she honestly hasn't.
"Ok. Thank you so much for your help." I look back at Four who's settled a few steps away, his emotionless mask on his face. "Call Tris and tell her to have Lyn cross reference #10012. Tell her to focus on everything before...1980?" I look to Phiera for confirmation.
She thinks it over. "Try 1970."
"Everything before 1970." He nods then doesn't hesitate to go out to the car.
The second he was out of ear shot she turned to me with her arms crossed.
"Why do you have a human who doesn't know anything about the Supernatural involved with a case like this?" My hand went to the back of my kneck and I couldn't look her in the eye. She reminded me of my mom when she scolds me like that.
"Is it that obvious?"
"Is it that obvious? He just barely held back eye rolls and the disgust in his voice. Plus you can practically smell it on him. If I can sense it, and I'm just a Sensitive, I can only imagine what a Gifted feels when they first meet him." That makes me think. Is it really that bad when I bring him around Gifteds? I know he doesn't believe, but does he really show it that much? Am I just that distracted with everything, or have I just been denying to myself what I already knew...
"Look," Phiera says to bring me out of my thoughts. "I'm bringing this up because with symbols that old, sometimes there's a reason why they get barried away by history. I just want you to be sure that you want to let him go into this without knowing what he's dealing with."
I sigh. "Yeah, I know. Trust me when I say I'm working on it. I've been working on it. I just don't know how to prove it to him without losing my best friend."
Tris's POV
"Grrrrrr." The growl slips out as I let myself fall back on the floor. Uriah, Lyn, Dexstin, and I have spent hours looking through every book we have, every article. But. We. Found. Nothing.
"Breathe Beatrice," Dexstin mutters as he writes in a notepad.
"Dex is right Tris", Lyn says as she closes her book. "Besides, we all knew we weren't going to find something in these anyways. No one even writes about the Seventh Wall anymore, isn't that what you told me? We might have to go out searching and I don't just mean three hours out to Peoria." I rub my hand over my face. "I know, I know." A phone starts to ring and Uriah has to nudge my foot for me to know it's mine.
"Yes," I answer without checking the caller ID.
"Somebody sounds stressed." For the first time ever I actually grimace at the sound of Four's voice and try my hardest to hold back a sigh. I hold a finger up to everyone else and step out of the attic.
"Yeah, sorry about that. Just...alot of research and no results."
"Well lucky you, I might just have something to help you guys out." I immediately perk up.
"Please. Anything would be great at this point."
He tells me about what Phiera said and I practically tackle Lyn.
"I need you and Dex to drop everything and dig up anything you guys can on #10012 that's from the 70's and older." Once they are out the door I put him on speaker and help Uriah clean up.
"What about Grey? What did she say?" He didn't answer for a minute and I looked at Uri confused.
"Four?" I asked, not wanting him to stop now that we finally have something.
"Dude!" Uriah barked, trying to reign in his frustration.
"Huh? Oh, sorry. I uh...zoned out for a bit." He sighed. I couldn't help but feel he wasn't telling the whole truth. "She's turning out to be legit. No record and the locals say that she doesn't start trouble. She herself claims that no one has come in asking about this type of stuff."
I make a mental note to talk to him later.
"Ok. At least we didn't come out of this empty handed. You and Zeke get back to Dauntless as soon as you guys can. Uriah and I will fill Max in on what we have so far.
About five hours later finds us all back in the conference room on a video call with Max going over everything from the beginning. We picked apart every little detail for the billionth time as Max followed along on a notepad.
"And you've already got your people researching for what they can find I resume?" He asks once we've recounted everything.
"They are still at their computers as we speak." He cracks a tired smile at me. "Of course. I don't even know why I bothered asking. This is good. It's something. Our next step should be to know what and where. What is it exactly and where would you begin to get this. Our you gonna need anymore officers?"
I shake my head. "No. Not yet at least. We probably won't need them until we have more ground we need to cover." I run Lyn's idea of expanding our search past Illinoise by him. "There aren't that many places related to the supernatural or that have the knowledge we need around Chicago in the first place. We can probably reach all of them in a day and it'll probably be just like Peoria. A dead end. We don't know where our suspect began their trail, but I can tell you it's not here. We can get word to our connections in other states around the US and they could get word to their associates in even more states. This can buy us time until we can actually get to these places and it would be a faster way to eliminate some of our options so we're not wasting time."
He thinks it over for a long time but eventually, thank God, agrees. "Alright then. If there's nothing else then I think we're good to call it a night. Great work guys. I knew I was right to trust you all with this." We wish him a goodnight as he signs off and practically collaspe in our chairs.
"Well," Zeke says while rubbing a hand down his face. "I have a wife and daughter to get home to. Plus I already know Bea is going to have us working nearly everyday till the crack of dawn to get this off the ground as soon as possible so I need all the sleep I can get."
I growl at him jokingly, being careful not to let it sound too much like a real wolf with Four next to me, but he just chuckles.
"Seriously though, we all need sleep. I mean Uri looks like he's gonna drop any second now." Uriah snaps to attention at the sound of his name.
"Huh? What?" The rest of us bust out laughing and I smile. It felt good to laugh.
"Your right," I say as I get up from my seat. Time for everyone to hit the hay." I push everyone out the room, not even caring about all the papers left out because we were going to have them out all over the place tomorrow anyway, and gesture for a drowsy Lyn and Dexin to get up.
"Come on guys, you too. Home time." Somehow we all manage to get to our respective homes without crashing and sleep good for the first time in a while, running on the hope that we were finally getting somewhere.