Juliette was sitting at the dining table when her eyes came into focus. She was back in her former home. It was wrong for her to be there but she didn't care. It felt good to be in a familiar environment. When she looked around she saw who she assumed to be Nick standing and peering out a nearby window with his back to her. She called his name and hoped he would turn to look at her but he remained motionless.
She called out a second time a bit louder than before, but, again, no response. She chose to go to him instead. To force him to acknowledge she was there but when she attempted to rise from her seat it felt as though she was being held down. Her limbs felt incredibly heavy. She could barely lift herself up. She clenched her teeth and pulled on the sides of the table with her hands to bring herself to a standing position.
Each step she took towards Nick was equally as taxing, if not even more so. It felt as though the room itself was trying to prevent her from reaching him. She attempted to call out again, hoping that he would just turn around and she could stop trying to force her way across the room with such difficulty, but, if anything, it appeared as though he turned his head further into the window pane if he reacted to her words at all.
She could feel her heart pounding in her chest. She finally made it within reach and extended her arm to grab his shoulder or his shirt or any part of him that her fingers could grasp. Before she could connect her grasp to him, she felt hands grab the back of her head and her neck and pull her forcibly back.
Adalind.
Juliette didn't know how she knew, but she knew it was Adalind that was pulling her backwards. She reached back with both of her hands and attempted to free herself but instead was pushed down onto her knees. She called out for help and none came. She couldn't even see Nick anymore, the pressure to her head and neck was bending her body forward more than what came naturally to her. She bent her arm and swung back with her elbow and felt it connect with Adalind's shoulder and neck. She attempted to twist her body around to face her attacker. Struggling with their tangled limbs, her hair fell into her eyes. She tried to swing out with her fists and instead felt blows against her own face in return.
Using the crook of her elbow, she swiped her arm up from her chin to remove the obstruction from her view and when she could see clearly she reflexively reached out with both hands to grab Adalind by her throat.
But it wasn't Adalind.
It was Kelly. Nick's mother.
Juliette stopped what she was doing, unsure of how to proceed.
Kelly's face was contorted with rage. As she spoke, bits of spittle flew from her mouth, "You're not getting anywhere near my son!"
Before Juliette could react to the harsh words, Kelly reached back and with incredible force, slapped Juliette in the face so hard that she fell over onto her side.
There was a loud banging at the door and Juliette shook awake. Through the door Nikki shouted, "I don't know what you're doing in there, but knock it off. We're trying to sleep!"
Juliette looked around. It was dark. The window glowed a bit from an outside street lamp. She reached out for her phone and realized her fists were clenched so tightly that it was painful to release the tension that had built up in them. She shook her hands to bring back feeling to her fingers, then checked the time on her phone and saw that it was just after three in the morning.
She wiped her hand across her forehead and wasn't surprised to find some perspiration on the non-Woged part of her face.
As she was about to roll over and try to get back to sleep she reached up and felt her cheek. She knew it was just a dream, but nonetheless, her face stung where she'd been struck. Perhaps she'd somehow hit herself? She closed her eyes, but the visions of the nightmare she'd just had kept replaying over and over in her mind. She lay awake until dawn when, finally, she got up and dressed herself for the day.
In the late afternoon, Sergeant Drew Wu was squinting as though a bright light was shining on his face. But there was no bright light. He was in the police precinct, standing in the archway entrance struggling to decide how best to react to a statement that had been made to him by a woman who'd come into the precinct to speak with Detective Nick Burkhardt. A request not unusual by itself. It was more the reason why she wanted to speak with Nick that was leaving Wu at a loss for words.
After an extremely pregnant pause that the woman seemed to be expecting, Wu decided to simply repeat the request back to her, "So, you would like to speak with Detective Burkhardt to report the whereabouts of the missing person... Juliette Silverton."
It was difficult to know how to respond to such a request, as Juliette had never been officially reported missing. Wu only knew this because he was in Nick's inner circle and was aware that Juliette had been going by the name Eve for quite a while. Wu had never fully understood how Juliette had been transformed into Eve and as curious as he was about it, had never found the time or the appropriate way to ask about it.
The woman, who'd dodged the question of her identity, appeared to be the victim of either an accident or had recent surgery, as she was wearing a patch of gauze on the center of her face. She seemed to be taking pleasure in watching Wu react as she didn't respond to his non-question. She allowed the query to hang in the air unanswered. She was going to wait to speak with Burkhardt and not much more needed to be said.
Wu, on the other hand, couldn't outright admit that Juliette wasn't actually missing, since, as far as he knew, she was still identifying as Eve and he hadn't actually seen her in at least a couple of months. To other people, she may very well be considered missing. But to acknowledge she was missing also felt like a mistake. He felt as though he'd been lured into a verbal trap with one simple sentence and felt he shouldn't give anything away if he could avoid it.
He pointed at a nearby chair, "Wait there. I'll try to track down Detective Burkhardt."
Nick was pulling into the station parking garage when he received Wu's phone call. Rather than rush to meet this strange woman, he advised Wu to put her into an interrogation room.
Nick made his way through the station, rather than go directly into the interrogation room, he instead stepped into the room on the opposite side of the two-way mirror that separated them from the interrogation area. Wu was already there waiting for him, standing with his arms crossed at his chest, staring at the woman who refused to identify herself.
Nick closed the door behind him and asked Wu, "What kinda vibe did you get from her? Hostile? Helpful?"
Wu shook his head, "Amused? Like she was enjoying putting me on the spot like that. What is going on with Eve? Do you know where she is?"
Nick took a minute to briefly explain to Wu that Eve is once again Juliette and that she's trying to exact some sort of revenge on Adalind, "But I still have more questions than answers about it all, so hopefully, this woman will get me some. Do me a favor and text Hank and get him here as soon as he can."
Nick stepped back out and placed a phone call to Samantha. He felt that someone from the Council should be in the loop in case things went sideways. He left her a voicemail and then entered the room to begin his interrogation while Wu watched from behind the mirror.
As he closed the door behind him, the woman turned to look at him and wasted no time in changing her face to a Woge. He assumed it was so that she could verify that he's a Grimm. He knew it wouldn't take her more than a second or two to verify but he held his eye contact with her an extra moment so that she could see that he felt completely at ease with her being a Hexenbiest. She stared back for an uncomfortable few seconds then removed her Woge.
Nick nodded and walked around to the opposite side of the table but didn't sit. He crossed his arms and continued to say nothing as he stared at her.
At first, she didn't know what to do. She waited to be asked a question, but when none came, worry lines began to form on her forehead.
Nick uncrossed his arms, put his hands on the table and leaned in to an uncomfortably close distance to her. She pulled her face away from his, attempting to put some space between them, but he just leaned in even closer. The impassiveness of his facial expression combined with the openly hostile and angry tone in his voice sent a shiver up her spine as he said, "You attacked my wife."
She closed her eyes in shame and embarrassment, not just for having attacked Adalind, but for underestimating the Grimm. She hadn't said a word and he immediately knew what she'd done. She mentally admonished herself for not planning on what to say regarding the attack on Adalind that she had participated in.
She opened her eyes to see Nick was still staring at her, waiting for her to confirm or deny what she'd done. In attempt to make herself feel better she told herself there was no way she could have anticipated him putting two and two together so quickly.
When at last she spoke, she couldn't hide the panic in her voice, made worse by speaking in a language that wasn't her native tongue, "Yes..."
She had intended on trying to find words that would somehow ease the tension in the room, but even the single word she had spoken had achieved a reaction from Nick she wasn't ready for. His impassive facial expression vanished, replacing itself with rage. He grabbed the side of the table with one hand and, with what appeared to take very little effort, pushed it out of his way. It collided so hard with the wall that the two farthest legs from the wall lifted up into the air and for the briefest of a second they paused as gravity reasserted its grasp. For that second, the silence in the room was deafening before the legs crashed back down onto the floor causing her to flinch.
She'd had so many plans. Things she was going to say. She came here for his help and thought that by offering her help to him that he would be glad. Perhaps even grateful. Instead, it seemed as though she was minutes, if not seconds, away from being killed by a Grimm. She had to think fast, but her panic stricken mind could only think to begin rambling out apologies as quickly as her mouth would let her. She repeated the phrase, "I'm sorry." so many times she wasn't sure if they were all in English or if she'd reverted to French a few times or maybe even every time.
Nick stepped over to the table and pulled it back to the center of the room., By separating the two of them with the table the woman calmed down quite a bit. The rage on his face still visibly apparent, as he sat down and pulled his chair into the table, the legs gave off angry scraping sounds against the floor.
Nick, doing his best to stay 'in-character,' said, "Every instinct I have is telling me to rip you to pieces, so I'm going to need you to tell me, very quickly, why it is I shouldn't do that."
"I -"
"Stop."
She stammered for a moment before Nick interrupted again, "I need to step outside and calm down before I do something we both regret." He stood up so fast his chair fell over and banged on the floor loud enough for the her to flinch again.
Without looking back at her, he strode over, opened the door and walked out closing the door loudly behind him.
He intended to go back to the room on the other side of the mirror and talk to Wu, but before he could turn the corner, Wu came at him so fast that he had to come to a sliding stop. He was excited but didn't want to be overheard by the woman in the interrogation room so he spoke in a whispered shout, "That was awesome!"
Nick smiled, "I didn't over do it?"
Wu smiled back, "I think you nailed it. Why the aggressive approach though?"
Nick dropped his smile and began walking back towards the room behind the mirror as Wu walked with him, "You said she seemed amused. I wanted to change the tone of the conversation. Take control."
They stepped into the side room and looked through the mirror. She was still sitting at the table, though she must have gotten up at some point and picked up the chair he had knocked over. Nick nodded his head at her, "She seem amused now?"
Wu stepped up the mirror, his breath fogging up the glass, "No, she looks pretty worried now, I'd say."
"You get to speak to Hank?"
"He's on his way."
Nick took out his cell phone and checked his notifications. He saw a text message from Samantha saying that Alexander is on his way. He took a moment to describe Alexander to Wu so that he could keep an eye out for him.
Nick checked the time, "Okay, I think I let her stew long enough. It's time to go play good cop."
Wu was too curious to not ask, "How'd you do that thing with the table?"
Nick smirked, "You know a magician never reveals his tricks."
Wu pursed his lips in skepticism and said, "It was an accident wasn't it?"
Nick feigned innocence, "I have no idea what you're talking about."
Nick opened the door to the interrogation room and stepped in. He sat a cup of water on the table next to the woman's hand and then closed the door behind him. He walked around the table and sat down without saying anything.
She glanced at the cup of water, then looked at him and then glanced back at the water again. He could see in her eyes that she was contemplating the possibility that the water had been tampered with. Matter-of-factly, he said, "The water is clean, came directly from the cooler."
She reached out, picked up the cup and took a sip before sitting it back down again. Nick wasn't sure if she was actually thirsty or simply took a sip in an attempt to gain a small amount of trust between them.
He let the silence hang in the air for an extra moment, then said, "Tell me what it is we're doing here today."
She had rehearsed what she wanted to say countless times in her mind but due to the tension in the air and the pressure she felt, she shortened it to four words, "I want to defect."
Nick didn't bother to hide his skepticism as he scoffed, "I'm sorry?"
"I wasn't really sure I wanted this to begin with and now that I am so invested... I just can't live like this."
Nick reached forward and quickly yanked the bandage off her face. She yelped from the sudden removal of the tape from her skin. Nick was able to confirm his suspicions with the fraction of a second that he could glimpse the near perfect triangle of Woged flesh where her nose should have been before she rushed to cover it with her hands both from the discomfort of the tape removal and mostly the embarrassment.
"Is that the investment you're referring to?"
With her hands still covering her face she nodded and then pleaded to him to have the bandage back.
Nick tossed it so that it landed on the table in front of her. She snatched it up and quickly attached it to her face again as best as she could manage, however she struggled to keep the tape in place and continued to fuss with it throughout the rest of their conversation.
Nick questioned her motives, "Vanity? You want to defect because of vanity?"
She shrugged, "You're married to a Hexenbiest so you probably know that we are generally attracted to power. When I was offered the opportunity to become stronger, of course I'm going to consider it. But..." she paused for a moment, "It's embarrassing to admit, but I want what you and your wife have. I want to have kids one day. A family." She gestured to her face, "But who would want kids with me looking like this? And who would want to be with someone who was willing to hurt others the way I did to your wife. I really am very sorry that I participated in that. In the beginning, I thought I could be that person. I believed that part of strength is taking what you want when you want it. But the cost..." Her eyes welled up with tears, "I still want a normal life. I'm not as cold-hearted as I thought I was... I guess."
Nick was skeptical, but willing to accept the information provided at face value for now. So he decided to take back control of the conversation, "What's your name?"
"Manon Pomeroy."
"Explain to me how the power thefts are being done. How is Juliette and the rest of your gang stealing the power from other Hexenbiests?"
Manon went through the process with him, doing her best to emphatically explain how incredibly painful and scarring, she held up the palm of her hand for him to see, the whole process was.
"How did you even know how to use it?"
Manon wiped at her eyes to clear out the tears and snorted out a brief laugh, "Witch trials if you can believe it. Witch trials have happened at one point or another all over the globe by one country or another. France was no exception. Most of the trials were nonsense. Countless Kehrseite lost their lives. But every so often, they'd actually catch a Hexenbiest. Apparently, one time they caught a group of Hexenbiests using the Siphon and they put them on trial for practicing witchcraft. The Witchfinder testified what he saw them doing and it was all documented and the Hexenbiests were found guilty and executed. But the Wesen Council couldn't just leave devices like that in the hands of Kehrseite, so they sent a Hexenbiest to obtain the Siphon and the trial records. Witch trial records in general are mostly all gone, lost to time. But the important ones were obtained by the Council and stored."
This all sounded to Nick like something the Wesen Council would have done back then, "So how did you get it?"
"The Council would contract out the retrieval of artifacts and the dangerous ones had to be stored somewhere. Select Hexenbiest Covens would be tasked to collect and store them. We had been sitting on that Siphon for centuries, not knowing what it was. We had received a request for assistance in helping with your accidental power theft and found the Siphon and the trial records essentially by accident."
Nick understood everything being said but something puzzled him, "There are Hexenbiests all over the world, right? Why come to Portland? I know Juliette's motivation. But how could she convince your Coven to come here just to attack Adalind?"
As though the answer couldn't be more obvious, Manon replied, "We weren't after her. We just wanted her out of our way so we could get your Staff."
The Staff is a powerful weapon, true, but Nick still didn't understand why a group would want to risk coming after him for the Staff when it would make more sense to simply avoid any part of the world where he and the Staff would be. If anything, he would expect them to give him a wide berth.
When he explained as much to Manon, the confusion that Nick felt a moment before had transferred over to her, "We wanted it so we could try to duplicate your accidental power theft. That way we could stop using the painful method we already had."
Nick sat thoughtful for a moment, running over the facts in his mind and what Manon had told him when the realization struck him, "She told you the Staff caused the power theft?"
Manon nodded her head slowly. She had spent several days and nights with Juliette and while she knew that there was a lot of animosity between Juliette and Adalind, she had been convinced that Juliette was going to help them get the Staff for the purposes of more power thefts. Now, she was also running over all the facts in her mind. Everything Juliette had said and done, "It didn't?"
Nick let out a small chuckle, "No. She lied to you to get you to go after Adalind."
"So then, what does the Staff actually do?"
Nick knew she was asking out of a reaction to learning the truth, but felt she should know better than to ask something like that. He refrained from using sarcasm and simply replied, "That's not something I feel comfortable divulging to you or pretty much anyone."
There was a knock at the door and it opened a crack to allow Hank to peek inside. The two looked at him and Nick gestured for Hank to come inside. Nick took a moment to introduce Hank to Manon and bring him up to speed.
As Nick reached the part about Juliette lying regarding the Staff causing the power theft, Manon began tapping the table with her finger as she had an epiphany, "That's why she didn't want me to come here!"
Nick furrowed his brow, "What do you mean? She knew you were coming here?"
She waived her hand in front of her dismissing his concern, "I told them I was coming here to lure you into a trap. But don't worry, I never intended to do that." She smiled, trying to alleviate the doubt that crossed Nick's face, though his brow found a way to furrow even more. Manon continued, "But Juliette said it was a bad idea. That you wouldn't fall for it. The others said it was worth a shot since we didn't have any other ideas. Even though she said it wouldn't work, she gave me a location she said you would know and she even took me there this morning so I could see the layout. It's a tunnel. She said you'd had to rescue her from a Dämonfeuer there and would know what I'm talking about. But my plan was to take you to our house and retrieve the Siphon and hope that somehow we can reverse what we've done."
Hank took a notebook out of his shirt pocket, flipped to a blank page, sat it on the table and slid it over to her. He pulled out a pen, held it out to her and said, "Write down the address."
Manon shook her head, "It doesn't work that way. The house is untrackable. I can write it down, but within a few moments the page will read as nonsense. It's why we chose the house. We just had to reactivate what the previous owner had set up."
There was a knock at the door and Wu opened it just wide enough to poke his head through, "Nick, there's some people here to see you."
Nick left Hank to keep Manon company. He walked down the hall to find Alexander standing next to a man of small stature. No more than five feet in height, wearing what appeared to be a well tailored suit. His face clean shaven, his hair parted on the side. The man obviously took great pride in his appearance. Nick took a guess that he was in his forties.
Alexander extended his hand which Nick thought was odd. Rather than make it an issue, he went ahead and accepted the handshake. Alexander used the motion to step closer to Nick so he could speak more quietly, "I heard you have one of the power thieves here."
Nick nodded. Alexander let go of Nick's hand and gestured at the man who had accompanied him, "This is Malcolm Tomasi. He's been guarding the Spice Shop for the past few days, allowing Rosalee and Monroe to run their day to day operations and feel safe."
At this, Nick immediately reached out his hand to shake Malcolm's, "Thank you so much for helping them like that. I really appreciate it."
Malcolm shook his head and in an Ukrainian accent replied, "No thanks are necessary. I'm being well compensated and power theft is a deplorable crime. How will we be dealing with the thief you've captured?"
Nick explained that he didn't capture the thief, she turned herself in and claims to want to defect. Malcolm was skeptical to say the least. He angrily let out a stream of sentences in Ukrainian. Nick nodded his head in understanding at the skepticism but pointed out, "It doesn't matter whether she's being truthful or not. It's the only lead we have. So here's what we're going to do..."
