Violent Shadows [SPECTREs Plot]

[Die]

The darkness of the surrounding waters went largely ignored by the lights of the nightlife of the large island and the city known for being the Marine stronghold in the East Blue. Some ships arrived as others left many times throughout the day and night. So it would suffice to think that a decently-sized, ordinary-looking ship with white sails arriving close to midnight was just any other ship. The coming morning would say otherwise, however, as indicated by several growing crowds outside of a weapons shop and a food store several streets away. Windows were broken, shelves were knocked over with their items, and a few bodies lied on the ground or were draped over the wreckage like rag dolls.

It did not take long for the local police to show up and disperse the crowd, sectioning off both areas for further investigation. However, the police simply stood around, waiting for a Marine investigative unit to show up. The location of both crime scenes in a lower middle-class area of the city coupled with the fact that was in relatively “out of the way” locations in far removed from the main streets and such highly delayed Marine response. For the next hour or so, cops would merely be standing outside of the crime scenes, keeping the crowds at bay. Their patience would soon be rewarded as this case would be taken up soon enough.

Commodore Dietrich von Koenig had been out of the Marine base for some time upon hearing rumors of two mysterious store break-ins and murders. It was terrible something like this would go largely ignored by the same people who called themselves the protectors of justice. But the Commodore was used to such occurrences as they were unsurprisingly commonplace. He arrived at the first crime scene at the blacksmith and gunsmith store. Several cops had moved out of the way, allowing Dietrich to pass and enter the crime scene. It appeared as though a storm had occurred just inside the building. The damage was extensive as shelves and items were either knocked over, broken, or both. The damage was also inconsistent, some things appeared to be cut cleanly with a blade, and others were just smashed into pieces. There were also numerous bullet holes in parts of the shop. He then focused his attention on the bodies, which also had some rather inconsistent wounds. Cuts of variable size were mixed with blunt force trauma and broken bones. One of the bodies suffered several bullet wounds to the head. From the looks of the damage and the gunpowder residue left on the entry wound, it was at point blank. Dietrich squatted down in front of one of them, eyeing the blood on the floor that had long since dried up. It was then he noticed the multiple footprints left by the assailants. There were at least four or five of them present. Many items had also gone missing, mostly blades, guns, and ammunition. He combed through the crime scene once more time, using his eidetic memory to remember every detail of the crime scene. He would have to wait for an official report from the medical examiner. “Walker,” he summoned as she was the only member of the team tagging along with him.

This was especially disconcerting considering the nature of the attacks. Pirates have been around before in the past several months as they always have been, but an attack like this had never been done by any of them. The Commodore would have to investigate the other murder scene first before heading over to the docks to check out any ships that had docked within the past week or so. For now, he left for the other crime scene, with Jasmine Walker in tow.

[Kurosaki]

Entering upon the crime scene there were many things to take note of. Trying to do her best to notice even the finest detail, the young Seaman Recruit bent down and examined some of the damage done up close. The entire place was trashed; in some places worse than in others. Shelves had been overturned, broken, etc. Weapons were clearly missing from their allotted spaces. The damage was sometimes caused by blunt force, hence the smashed areas. In other places clean cuts told the story of a separate individual.

By the looks of it all, considering the various footprints and damage, Jasmine Walker estimated that there were at least four assailants; probably more. Of course, footprints alone were not accurate to base that decision on since so many policeman had entered upon the scene since the murder had been discovered.

This was all deducted in a matter of a brief visit before the Seaman Recruit was summoned by her superior, Commodore Dietrich von Koenig.

"Yes, sir!" she said, straightening up and saluting before following behind him. For a moment she walked quietly and then ran up to follow him in stride as best as she could.

"Sir, permission to speak freely?" she questioned with a sincere look, hoping that he would take her seriously despite her rather low rank. She couldn't be sure that the things that she had realized from the first crime scene would also be noticed by the Commodore or not either. But the look of fire and stubbornness on her face told the story that she wasn't going to probably back down easily even if she was told, respectfully, to shut the heck up.

[Deleted]

Ritu had a smug grin on his face, he’d been able to distinguish himself in the marine recruitment, his prior training had given him the advantage over other men but his progress was in no small part due to his ability to suck up. Now he was on his first day under a distinguished Commodore known as Dietrich Von Koenig, the next man he had to impress. He had met him of course, before, in order to secure his place in the newly formed Spectres. He’d been a hard man to read, something Ritu figured was intentional, a learned behaviour to keep his intentions to himself, it made it hard to know who to be in front of him. So, safely, he’d opted for the ‘loyal marine’, obedient and dedicated and yet, by Spectre philosophy it’s safe to assume that the Commodore was a follower of moral justice, something at least him and the real Ritu have in common. 'Though all morals are subjective, the only absolute morality is my own, whoever’s at the top projects their beliefs onto everyone else below.' There was a long way yet to climb, but Ritu was nothing if not a climber and today he could see the first rung in the ladder.

He was on his way to meet up with the others, the Commodore and his new peer, Seaman Recruit, Jasmine Walker. He didn’t know anything about her yet, accept she was going to be both a teammate and the competition. He’d use his own skill set to keep distinguishing himself and his greatest asset was talking, talking and acting.

He’d been informed of the situation via the headset den-den mushi he’d been issued, a perk of Spectre life, one of many he hoped to be gifted. The rest of the team had dispatched to the crime scene immediately but Ritu had hung back to see if the locals could tell him anything, giving him a leg up in his superiors books. However so far it’d been fruitless and it’d be best that he caught up to see the second crime scene, having to be filled in on the first. He’d get back to investigating the public later, if he was permitted, but it’d be bad not to show and that’d be a point in Walkers favour.

Quickly Ritu arrived at the second murder scene, the local police were on sight and so the Seaman Recruit thought it best he got the rundown. “What’s the situation here, officer?” he asked politely enough, but with a certain level of command that was not reflected in his rank, only in his ambitions.

“The place has been trashed, both scenes are vastly similar. Both clean cuts and bludgeoned damage to store and victims alike.”

‘Odd..’ Ritu thought, but he didn’t have time to muse much as the Spectres arrived, he offered Dietrich a firm salute. “Sir, sorry for my lateness I came as fast as I could,” mentioning fruitless questioning would gain him no favour, so he didn’t. “Assuming the first scene was much like the second, the fact there shops would naturally lead one to assume robbery was the primary motive. Yet with the shops being attacked too, perhaps it could have been some rival to the business, a struggling shopkeeper who hired some muscle.”

Pausing for a moment Ritu reflected on another potentiality, normally he’d perhaps keep it to himself, but he best give all he could on the chance he was right, he was here to impress after all.

“Or perhaps there’s something else at work, not a lot seems to be missing at a brief glance, perhaps some important object or information has been taken instead, and the shops have been destroyed to leave no evidence and well... no witnesses were left either.”

He’d wait and here the others out, Dietrich would have risen to his rank for a reason, his experience would probably give him some valuable insight that Ritu would have perhaps missed, he’d never investigated a murder scene before and although sharp, he wasn’t yet familiar enough to draw any other conclusions from the evidence. Although one thing he had heard in training stuck with him, “Were the windows smashed inwards or from the inside?”

[Die]

"Unbelievable..." spoke the gruff, slightly hoarse-sounding voice. "I send you guys out to gather weapons and supplies and explicitly mention to not cause a scene, and what did you do?"

"Uh..." grunted one of them. "Gathered them?"

"YOU WRECKED THOSE PLACES!" shouted the man as he slammed his fist down on the table, who was clearly leader of this disguised pirate crew. He sighed and facepalmed. The two pirates looked at each other and shrugged. In a single, quick motion, the captain drew out his pistol and fired two shots. The two pirates fell dead as another pirate leaped back in surprise. The captain put away the pistol and facepalmed again, before directing his attention to the other pirate"Sed, weigh them down and dump them overboard."

"Uh...uh...Yessir!" squeaked Sed as he summoned two more crew members to dispose of the ones that were just killed. They were tied together by heavy chains, with several weights added in case. The three pirates, huffing and puffing from the effort of having to drag off dead weight with more dead weight added on, opened up a hatch at the stern of the ship, and dumped the bodies into the harbor, where they would sink quickly to the bottom.

"I was hoping we could keep a low profile while we were here. Looks like that possibility's gone out the window already...though this presents an opportunity. If we fight the Marines and escape intact, we'll be even more famous around here. Hehe...that does sound good...I'll send out more men to round up more supplies, maybe we'll run into a few patrols." the captain mused to himself.

---

As the two headed over to the second crime scene, Jasmine Walker made a request to the Commodore, "Sir, permission to speak freely?"

"Permission granted," replied Dietrich. The recruit had a reputation for being quite the spitfire. Surprisingly enough, out of the recruits who had graduated in the same class as her, she had demonstrated the highest aptitude for deductive reasoning. That combined with the aforementioned spitfire personality made for a strange combination in one person.

Although it was already reported that both crime scenes were awfully similar, Dietrich found it useful to at least know what each one looked like. As they approached the second crime scene, the other new member of the SPECTREs showed up, fashionably late at that. This one was also an interesting character. A man whose ambition rivaled that of his own. The two of them sought the position of Fleet Admiral for similar reasons. Dietrich would have to keep an eye on this one, which was not too hard given his history with the Marines and his honed ability to read people quite well.
"Sir, sorry for my lateness I came as fast as I could. Assuming the first scene was much like the second, the fact there shops would naturally lead one to assume robbery was the primary motive. Yet with the shops being attacked too, perhaps it could have been some rival to the business, a struggling shopkeeper who hired some muscle."

He seemed to pause a bit, as though he was searching his mind for more information to try and impress him. "Or perhaps there’s something else at work, not a lot seems to be missing at a brief glance, perhaps some important object or information has been taken instead, and the shops have been destroyed to leave no evidence and well... no witnesses were left either."

"A good hypothesis. However, seeing as how these two specific stores were targeted and the fact a sizable portion of stock had been taken from them both, it seems more likely that someone is procuring weapons and supplies, though the wanton nature of the destruction may indicate either an ulterior motive as you've suggested, or perhaps our assailants are simpletons. That much remains to be seen. As for the windows, they were broken in from the outside, indicating the assailants forced their way into the shops."

[/b] the Commodore hypothesized. "I suggest we pay a visit to the docks and search the records for all ships that had arrived in the past week. We won't be able to find anything else here for now." said Dietrich as he turned to head for the docks. Searching the docks was the next best thing they could do. After all, up until last night, crimes of this magnitude had not been seen for a long time. The Commodore surmised that it had to have come from a pirate vessel that had docked within the past week or so, possibly a disguised pirate vessel.[/blockquote][/size]

[Kurosaki]

Just as Jasmine had gotten permission to speak freely, another member of their Marine crew reported into Dietrich. The Marine officer was named Rita. But as far as what he was like other than the fact that he was competition, Jasmine didn't know. She planned to learn everything about him as quickly as she possibly could, however. It seemed that robbery was the most likely motive though it could have also been a cover up to erase evidence of another crime.

About to place her two cents in about how the first one was more likely and how the second had a very low probability when the Commodore spoke up first and said that; suggesting that they search at the docks for signs of the robbers.

"So, we should keep our eyes out for a group of at least four probably, correct, Commodore?" Jasmine questioned, still believing that she was given permission to speak more freely with her superior at this point in time. She knew she was taking a bit of a risk speaking up about her deductions but that was a risk she was willing to take.

"If my deductions are correct at least two of them were heavier set," Jasmine said, swallowing hard and preparing to take a verbal lashing if she was seen as being wrong or presumptuous.

Images of her childhood rival flashed into her mind. She knew that if it was him, he would be doing the same thing. Even if she was slightly sharper witted than he was, they both were struggling to rise through the ranks as fast as possible.

"One was approximately 5'4", another 4"11, 5'8" and 6'3..." Jasmine said as she pulled out her notebook that she had briefly, and quickly, scribbled notes down on a moment prior before they had started heading toward the docks.

(Hope the descriptions were okay! Sort of winging it here...)

[Deleted]

“However, seeing as how these two specific stores were targeted and the fact a sizable portion of stock had been taken from them both, it seems more likely that someone is procuring weapons and supplies, though the wanton nature of the destruction may indicate either an ulterior motive as you've suggested, or perhaps our assailants are simpletons.”

Ritu nodded, slightly disappointed in his own reasoning, staying quite was better than appearing stupid, despite what anyone else says. “Ockham’s Razor” he muttered, only amateurs speculate plots where in reality there isn’t one.

“I suggest we pay a visit to the docks and search the records for all ships that had arrived in the past week. We won't be able to find anything else here for now.”

“One was approximately 5'4", another 4"11, 5'8" and 6'3...” as Ritu had been mentally scolding himself, his peer had taken the jump on him, proposing not only that the assailants were heavy set but also what heights they were. ‘How could she possibly have come to that conclusion, some form of inductive reasoning? Shoes prints? She’s sharp, sharper than me, but we all use the tools we’re given and lest not forget, results beat all else.’

As they strolled towards the dock, Ritu remained quiet and reflected on his situation. His posture reflected his life as a monk, he already looked very militant in the way he held himself but his youthfulness detracted from that image somewhat. ‘Ok, so... the current theory is piracy? Simple theft... there builds and heights don’t really matter, I need more information. Best do the grunt work then. As for little miss knows so much, she seems kind of passionate, maybe I can use that at some point.’

As the trio approached the pier, Ritu turned to some fishermen unloading from their boat. Instantly the boys demeanour changed, his shoulders hung looser and adopted his best smile and then when his mouth opened there was something subtle that had changed in his voice, he’d lost the hard considered edge, the professional, serious him and replaced it with something more casual, more colloquial.

“Heya, looks like a good haul, eh? Wahoah, that Sea Bass is almost as big as I am!”

“Haha, tell me about it, almost ripped my arm off getting that outta the ocean, should be worth it though, she should fetch a good price.”

'Get him talking, never underestimate local knowledge.'

“I’d say, so tell me, you haven’t seen anything unusual around here have you, not like that giant fish, I mean... something suspicious?”

“Oh, uhm... let me see, not really, I mean, saw some drunks around here earlier and there are a few boats I don’t recognise, but often are, this is Roguetown after all. Trouble is it, looking into those break-ins? With what those Hard-Hats managed to get away with, I guess that other people are trying their luck. Sorry I couldn’t be more help.”

“Not at all, thanks very much. Just one last thing, which boats are the one you don’t recognise?”

“Uhm, theirs at least a half dozen. Those three Carracks, there, there and there. That galley and those two smaller ones.”

“That’s brilliant, thank you.”

Readopting his disciplined stature, the monk jogged lightly to catch up with the rest of the Spectres. “Sir, I believe it best we start with these ships,” he relayed, pointing out the boats that had been unfamiliar to the fisherman. “It’s more likely that they hide our assailants, as a local noted these as unfamiliar, that is, if you follow the assumption the perpetrator arrived recently. Additionally, although speculative, it is possible this was inspired by the Hard-Hat’s disobedience. Maybe they spotted this as an opportunity.” Hoping he’d redeemed himself, at least a little, Ritu reverted to being quiet and waiting for another opportunity to prove useful.

[Die]

((Let's inject some much needed life into this...and keep it that way...and put it into overdrive to catch up for Kuro. I apologize for the hefty wait...))

Dietrich merely nodded at Jasmine's observations. As of now things were purely speculative. Pulling body dimensions based on foot size was not the most thorough of methods, though if Jasmine saw something outside of Dietrich's usual scope of vision, he would keep an open mind. These latest events bore an ominous fruit for Dietrich. One he had not fully realized and one he could not see.

A group of four yes. However, we shouldn't be so quick as to take them down. If you do encounter people who match the description, and you are absolutely sure that they are the ones, you are to tail them. Remain hidden, and they will lead you back to the others, Dietrich said softly. He reached under his uniform jacket, producing a small case. He handed over to Jasmine, ”Here, Walker. Inside of this case is a headset Den Den Mushi. It is a small, portable variant of your standard Den Den Mushi that can be concealed and used at the same time. Take this with you, and keep in contact. Notify me if you find the people matching their description, and do not make yourself seen.”

There was a high chance that the guys in question were still out roaming the city. Under their captain’s orders they were not supposed to cause a scene. So instead, they were out together, wandering around during the day time, searching for the next place to hit once night rolled around. They had no disguises and they were confident that no one would be able to find out that it was them who caused the deaths of the shop owners and ran off with a decent amount of loot. “I am confident that you will find our men. Dismissed.”

[/b] Dietrich said as he finished giving Jasmine her mission.

He then turned his attention back to Ritu. It was up to the two of them to search the ships for anything suspicious. After having looked through the records of ships arriving within the past week, he cross-referenced with the word from Ritu of the ships that the fisherman had pointed out as unfamiliar. It seemed as though the aftermath of the Hard-Hats escapades had slowed down traffic for a bit. The galley with white sails stuck out as the most likely target, while the smaller ships were merely merchant ships that had stopped by to set up shop in the marketplace. That left the galley as the most likely ship and two of the carrack-class ships. ”Shogefel, search the two carrack-class ships. I will search the galley.”[/color] Dietrich said as he indicated which carrack-class ships were the ones to be searched. He produced a similar looking case from under his jacket and tossed it over to Ritu, ”If you find anything worth noting, contact me.”

Dietrich walked down the docks to the unfamiliar galley-class ship. From the outside, it looked plain and quite unsuspecting, but as the old adage goes, “Appearances can be deceiving.” The ship appeared empty from the outside. No deckhands were present and there were no signs of activity. The Commodore walked the gangplank onto the deck. There was no one up top, and there were no signs that could have linked this ship to the murders that occurred the night before. Moving from the deck, the Commodore walked over to one of the doors leading down below. It was odd to have a ship that required many oarmen to run to be completely abandoned. Even down below, and after having searched every room save for the cargo hold, there was nary a soul on board.

The only place left was indeed the cargo hold. There were two doors leading, one on either side of the ship. Dietrich took the right entrance, gingerly working the doorknob and slowly cracking the door open. Upon doing so, he immediately stopped, having caught a glimpse of a very thin tripwire tying the door to a very dangerous-looking set of powder kegs at the center. Had he pulled the door open, the wire would have tugged the simple pin holding everything together and tripped the explosives. Dietrich swung his forearm at the tripwire, producing a knife from his sleeve and severing it without any incident, or so he had hoped. Cutting the first wire tripped another mechanism that slowly pushed the other door open, which had a second tripwire tied to it. The Commodore quickly flung the knife at it, severing it and preventing the powder keg from detonating yet again. After a quick, yet thorough examination, he found that there were no more tripwires leading to the powder keg and that it was safe to enter the cargo hold.

If this did not scream of the group of murderers’ doing, then what else could? Dietrich slowly and gingerly searched the entirety of the cargo hold. It was clear that whoever occupied this ship had cleaned up shop and vacated the vessel. Supplies were missing, as well as furniture and even cannons and munitions. There seemed to be nothing of importance other than the improvised trap that had clearly been set up in anticipation for something like this. Any lesser Marine or would-be investigator would have tripped the trap one way or another, and would have had themselves blown to smithereens along with the ship. Something on the floor had caught the Commodore’s eyes. He kneeled down on the floor and took a closer look. A section of the floor had been cleaned quite a bit, as was evidenced by the lack of dust in relation to the rest of the cargo hold. A closer inspection of the surrounding floor revealed that the job was certainly half-baked. Minute dark red specks still remained on the floor, and in two specific spots. A closer inspection revealed the specks to be blood. So it would seem that two people had been murdered here. The telltale smear patterns indicated that they had been dragged towards the back, and that was where the Commodore would investigate next.

He scanned the back area of the cargo hold for anything that struck him as out of the ordinary, combing every nook and cranny for specific clues as to what might have happened. This led him to discover a hidden panel containing a lever. Cautious as to what it might do, he pulled it, ready to deal with anything that might be triggered by its activation. The creaking of wood sounded off as two doors at the rear of the cargo hold swung inwards, revealing a hatch that led to the waters below. If things were what Dietrich had ascertained up until now, it was clear that two people had been tossed through this hatch. It was entirely possible that their bodies were still there. The Commodore stripped off his uniform jacket, revealing the combat suit he wore under it. His combat helmet slid around his head and sealed off at the front. His breathing became metallic as the filters activated. Dietrich leaped through the hatch and down into the waters below. Being that they were right at the docks, the waters were relatively shallow, and it was a short amount of time before Dietrich found the two bodies still floating at the bottom, held down by some hefty weights. A quick glance revealed that they had been killed by gunshot and stripped of any identifiable clothing, perhaps as to not link them to any pirate crew currently on the island. This would make things harder, but ultimately Dietrich could see all of this information linking the murders to whatever crew used this ship, despite the seemingly plain appearance.

Having enough information, Dietrich swam up through the hatch and clambered onto the cargo hold. ”Shogefel,” Dietrich contacted through the headset Den Den Mushi. ”I may have very well found what we have been looking for, or at least traces of it. Meet me in the cargo hold of the galley.”[/b] And with that, the Commodore waited.

---

Near the Marine base on Loguetown stood a rather large World Government building. It was perhaps one of the most important buildings in the entirety of the East Blue, as it served as a central administrative building in the region of the globe, and as such directed most, if not all of the WG and Marine activity in the East Blue. A rather elderly, yet stout-statured man marched down the long hallway, carrying a large briefcase filled with important documents. He turned down a corner and unlocked his door, bringing him to a rather large office. It was clear that whoever this man was, he was quite a ways up in the echelons of the World Government. In addition to the briefcase sat a rather tall stack of papers on his desk. As he sat down and sighed, he looked back up and gasped. ”Whu-huh-huh. Who are you? How did you get in here?” he asked.

The unknown figure of a pirate walked forward from the darkness of the corner of the office. ”I’m shocked, good sir. Don’t tell me you and your friends have forgotten about the deal we made all of those years ago, because I’ve come to collect,“[/b] he said with a mock gentlemanly tone.

”You? said the man. ”I mean…of course I haven’t. What is it that you want?”[/b]
[/size][/blockquote]

[Kurosaki]

This had been her opportunity to impress her superior officer and while she knew she was also taking a chance that he wouldn't be receptive to her ideas, Jasmine was still a bit disappointed when when she received a mere nod. Well, she had based most of her deductions on the fact that the shoe impressions that were there also sometimes linked up with smashed in areas of wall and glass. Judging from where the impacts had been she had estimated where they had punched from height-wise giving her an estimate of their heights.

The weights had come out of the foot size itself and the height but had been a rougher estimate. Jasmine scribbled something into her notepad again and stuck it in her back pocket. She would probably need it later but for now there were no more small details that she needed to write down to remember.

In a soft voice, her commander spoke; agreeing that a group of four were the culprits but adding that they needed to not be quick to take them down. Jasmine questioned him with a, "sir?" but he obviously wasn't finished with his explanation. He wanted them to tail any suspicious people so that they would lead them to the others. Jasmine had to admit that the idea was a good one. After all, the four of them might not all be grouped together still after such a gruesome crime that they had committed. They might split up and regroup later to avoid suspicion.

Jasmine nodded her head and then corrected herself and saluted him and added a, "yes, sir" to it. She changed her position, however, when Dietrich handed her a small case. Extending a hand she took the case gently and listened to the explanation of its contents. Inside was a small headset Den Den Mushi. As Dietrich went over this, Jasmine opened the case to look at the small little snail. He explained that it could be concealed and used at the same time. He gave her the order to take it and keep in contact by contacting them if and when she found people matching the descriptions of the thieves and killers but to stay unseen.

"Yes, sir! I will do so! Thank you for your confidence in me!" she responded with another salute after she was dismissed. She then turned and left the store. She was actually carrying something she had taken from the scene though. It was a small scrap of material she had found on the ground. At first it looked to have no significance and she probably should have left it alone since she was technically tampering with a crime scene. But when she got outside, she knelt down to her trusty companion, Pachi, and rubbed the Labrador Retriever's head gently.

"Hey, Pachi, think you could give me a paw with this case? I'd appreciate it a lot. Hey, look at me," she said, pointing with one finger at him and then at her eyes with two fingers. Pachi looked up, excited and with his tail wagging rheumatically.

"Good boy, Pachi!" said Jasmine before rubbing the dog's head and back more, causing him to scratch his side with one of his back legs as though that had felt good and he wanted to also help massage himself. The Seaman Recruit extended the hand with the scrap of material and Pachi smelled it over. Slowly at first and then faster before he bolted forward, stopped a moment and smelled the ground in a circle before heading off in a singular direction.

Jasmine stood up and quickly followed. She had taken the leash off of him and it was now looped around her hand and dangling a bit uselessly. There was no point in keeping Pachi chained up. He was a good boy and he wouldn't bolt off for no reason. Besides, Pachi often whined and just looked up at Jasmine with sad soul searching eyes whenever she tried to put a leash on him and actually walk him like a normal dog.

For a while the two of them walked in the same direction. Jasmine wasn't sure if the scent was actually working. She could have accidently picked up the fabric from an outfit a customer had tried on, etc so there was no guarantee that they were following a lead on their men. Still, she couldn't help be anxious, nervous, and excited about the prospects.

(Sorry I didn't know how much room I'm allowed to make up these bad guys so I didn't involve Jasmine finding any of them.)

[Deleted]

The sprightly stepped young marine approached the gangplank leading to the first Carrack-class ship. His keen-green eyes adopted a look of focus, as with one tactical drawn out sigh he relinquished himself from some excess enthusiasm. Trying to maintain an air of authority, or at least, as much authority as a seventeen year old could muster; he stepped aboard the clearly inhabited ship.

“Ah hello young-master recruit, how can I be helpin’ ye?” The questioner was an aged, tough and weather worn gentlemen and it became immediately apparent by both his demeanour and his words that he was in charge here. It was also already clear that this wasn’t what Ritu was looking for.

More irksome though, was the assumption made immediately by his questioner, the baseless but correct assumption that he was a recruit of the marines and not of a higher office. Sure he donned the uniform, in part – and that he was young by all accounts, but still. Alas he had a job to do and as he saw it, no time to waste. “A routine inspection, or at least well an inspection – did you hear about the recent murders?”

“Yes, break-ins weren’t it? Got naught to do with us though young sir, this is a fisher vessel, see?” Ritu’s eyes glanced across the deck, the faint smell of fish was evident but the nets that looked clearly designed for fishing were all empty. As if in response to his hesitant gaze the senior fisherman continued, “change ‘f season lad, on our ways to greener, or err, bluer pastures one may say. Just a brief stock and rest here at Roguetown and on our way we’ll be.”

Nodding the new SPECTRE initiate turned his gaze to the other Carrack, “And of that vessel?” So far the story held well, the ship wasn’t a regular at the docks, hence why it wasn’t recognised by the local. Likewise this seemed a lot of effort to go to guise something illegal. Inconsistent with the level of care taken in the crime scenes he had witnessed only a few moments before.

“Ah that be our sister, both mine. But feel free to search either if ye’ see it necessary.” A bold bluff, if it was a bluff but Ritu was fairly convinced it wasn’t. There was nothing in this man’s manners which suggested anything other than a rough life at sea, no worry, and no malice reflected in any twitch or betrayal of facial expression. Each second wasted here was one Jasmine the clue-wonder got the edge on him. So he decided upon one last question instead.

“What of that galley, what can you tell me of that?”

“Not much... tisn’t ours that’s for certain, much as I wish it were. She had crew men aboard earlier though, ten or so I saw. As I recall they were emptying the ship as opposed to stocking it, but that ain’t so unusual. Haven’t seen anyone aboard her for a while now though--”

“Did you happen to see which way these men left with all this stock?” The question was met with a contemplative glance, and then after a quick glance around he pointed westerly across the rest of the dock and toward town.

“Thanks very much, good luck on your voyage Captain.” Turning his attention to the direction prior indicated the red-haired martial artist prepared to begin his own hunt when he was brought back into the present with an unfamiliar sensation in his ear.

"I may have very well found what we have been looking for, or at least traces of it. Meet me in the cargo hold of the galley.”

That all but confirmed what he himself had gathered, it also somewhat diminished the importance of anything he’d managed to gather. Still, he shouldn’t make a habit of keeping the Commodore waiting, if he couldn’t be perceptive, he’d at least by obedient. Rushing towards the side of the ship the nimble-footed, once-a-time monk leapt from the ship, flourishing his bo-staff. With a practiced hand he spun it, manipulating it around a rope tethering the Carrack-style, fisher boat to the dock he zipped back to dock level. Landing with a neat roll he was already in mid-run as he reattached his staff to his back.

Not long after that he’d appear in the location to which he was summoned. Panting lightly, his eyes flicked to Dietrich, then to the scene around him, the open hatch, cut wire and surrounding explosives. Fighting an urge to question an officer out of turn, he regained his professionalism and did as he figured he should.

“Both Carrack’s were fishing vessels, however I was informed that a gaggle of ten or so men were aboard this vessel earlier and were seen emptying it. Combined with this” he gestured around vaguely, “the question seems to me to be, where are they hiding all the stock? Last he saw, the fisher Captain said they were heading in a Westerly direction, although other than that I have little to offer. As to these traces sir, what’s the new orders?”