Dirge in C4(Ekaterina)
Date: 2025-09-28 06:02
(Dirge in C4(Ekaterina):Ekaterina)
[Sun Sep 28 2025]
On Colonial Avenue
It is night, about 65F(18C) degrees, and the sky is covered by dark grey stormclouds. The mist is heaviest At Church and Sidney
There is a waxing crescent moon.
Tenzin can’t stop his horse fast enough. A small accident off to the side later, he’s hopping down with a grunt and limping to the group. “Director, Liaison, Tamar,” he greets.
Lykaia makes a firm nod to Ekaterina “They’re trying to plant one or the other odd artifact to do what we do not want to see. Or sabotage possessions thereof across Europe. Hence the report about drones on the news. Been tiring.” Her gaze slowly sweeps back to Tamar “You have my number. Just text, Tamar. Can’t promise I’ll be available that moment, but if I am, I will respond.”
Next follows a brief nod to Tenzin.
Tamar nods at Lykaia then looks down at her hand, or rather around it. “I am trying to be good, and not make my aura worse,” she says, looking over at Ekaterina as if for approval before her attention falls on Tenzin, a faint smile at his mishap with the mustang. “Hello, Tenzin,” she replies quietly.
As the morning continues its inevitable crawl towards day, the hour strikes six.
It finds Ekaterina, Lykaia, Tenzin and Tamar outside the Bayview apartments. The objective, to resolve amurder case that the New Haven police department were unable to handle involving a series of missing persons and finally, today’s target, a located body in one of the apartments.
OOC If you could all follow for when we move, please.
Tenzin is silent with a neutral face, having no comment on the conversation going on with Tamar and Lykaia. The monk casts a brief appraisal over everyone, with all their gemstone auras and then some. He remains plain and bare of such influences, folding his hands over the front of his robes. He listens to Ekaterina, should she begin.
Standing beside a vehicle parked a little along the road from the others, Ekaterina rallies Tenzin, Lykaia and Tamar, explaining the situation to them in full.
“I am sure that you have heared about the frequency in mist abductions from the twenty-second.” the Russian begins. “This began then. Three victims to date, A Mister Channing, who’s car this is. And A Mister Hawkins.”
For now, Ekaterina allows Tamar and Lykaia to talk, this is long standing and it is good when allies can break the ice.
Motioning to the Pontiac Solstice she stands beside- A 2009 plate, Ekaterina explains. “This is the vehicle of Mister Michael Channing.” Curiously, there is no police corden around it, which suggests that special dispensations were made for the group– Or there is more to the situation.
“We will begin here and move in, where we will take over from the police. They are doing a poor job and I want no more deaths. I only heard of the last because of my connections in the force.”
“Yes, I am not sure what else to do,” Tamar replies in agreement with Lykaia before turning to look at the other two. She seems to sense Tenzin’s appraising gaze and glances down at her hand, quietly removing the ring and tucking it away into her pocket so that the wings of light disappear from behind her. Listening then to Ekaterina, the youngest of the group, and the odd one out not being in the Temple, gives the Director her full attention. “You said three victims. Hanning, Hawkins, and who is the other one?”
“The third is Miss Annabeth Jackson, who vanished soon after her leg was regrown.”
Thanks to the make of the vehicle and the door design, it’s clear to Tamar, Ekaterina Tenzin and Lykaia that the Pontiac isn’t locked.
“Michael was the first of the victims.” Ekaterina explains. “Cameras show him leaving the hospital, but he does not live in Bayview- His parents do however. Of specific note, his body washed up on the beach. So we’ll begin here. If we can find some evidence in the vehicle, we might be able to resolve this all the faster.”
“We are going in now?” Tenzin asks, surprised to learn. He eyes up the rifle Ekaterina is toting, and rushes off to find his horse. It is peeing beside someone’s car.
Weapons are retrieved as he scolds it, taking a light suit of armor and buckling it up in his lopsided walk back to the group.
Ekaterina shakes her head. “I think we will have no need for weapons, and this should not demand combat, but the weaponry is the look of the thing- Temple Security were called in by a third party.”
Tamar nods thoughtfully, asking, “Her leg regrew?” before she starts to wander her way over to the car. She doesn’t know much about cars at all, but she peeks inside through the windows anyway and tries to see if there are any strange or unexpected scents. Of course, the police may well have trampled all over though long ago.
“Blunt melee weaponry should suffice unless shit goes bad.” Lykaia agrees with Ekaterina, making another nod. “Car’s looking unlocked. Cleared to search around? Will check inside and the engine, too.”
“We will treat this like team building as we are here.” Ekaterina suggests to Tenzin and Lykaia.
She steps to one side as Tamar moves over, gesturing to Lykaia’s suggestion to check the vehicle, allowing Tamar the space to scent.
“Very well,” Tenzin nods his affirmation, revisiting his horse and leaving the gun stowed there. The morning star is kept at his hip. He gives a nod when Lykaia decides to check the car, and Tamar appears to look through windows. As for him, he looks at the tires, in case there may be some telling clue stuck between the rubber patterns.
Tamar makes her way around the car, pausing at one point with a small frown and doubling back to check something. She’s uncertain and tilts her head to one side. “Do we know if the man had any lovers?” the girl wonders before looking toward the building. Her mind ticks away. “You said his parents live here in Bayview?”
Lykaia retrieves a business car from the front, her expression grows a note pensive and she closes the door, moves to the front and opens the hood, taking a look at the engine. Specifically at the battery. She withdraws a few tools to tinker around and tamper, too.
Ekaterina nods to Tamar. “Da. His parents lived here. I am not sure of lovers. This was not information shared.”
Tenzin brushes his hand over the dirty tire, peering at the granules on his palm. “It does not seem like he went anywhere else besides the beach,” he posits, standing up from the inspection. “Just sand on the wheels, same as what the police said.” He checks from here if he can see the lobby of the apartments through the doors, if they might have a reception desk being in the fancy side of the city.
Tenzin says “Parents lived here? Not anymore?“
Producing a torch, Ekaterina follows Tamar and Lykaia around the car, the light shone in through the windows, allowing Lykaia to shift things before she touches anything.
“Hmm…” Ekaterina muses, the pen-light aimed on to the backrest of the passenger seat. “A hair.”
Turning to Tamar, Ekaterina asks, “Are you smelling anything?”
Lykaia exhales slowly. She unplugs a cable somewhere and then closes the hood. “Battery’s empty. Found a business card. Engine’s modified, non standard issue. Disconnected a cable so it’s forced to go through regulation.” She says, holding it out to everyone else.
Looking over to Tenzin, Ekaterina answers, words clipped, likely in mild annoyance. “They live here, but are away for the week.”
Tamar glances over at Tenzin when he mentions the beach. “I can smell traces of it. Salt in the air but almost maybe perfume?” She doesn’t seem entirely certain but it is clear that something is forumulating in her head. “You said that the woman’s leg regrew. What did you mean? I heard that this man walked out of the hospital after being badly injured. Is someone healing people and then kidnapping them?”
The business card that Lykaia holds out reads ‘Harmony Black’
For those who may happen to have interest in the theatre, they might recall that Harmony Black is a director who lives in– and works from Fairefield.
Tamar may be on to somethingwith the lover suggestion.
“The clinic regrew Miss Jackson’s leg– Apparently, she had enough favor for a fleshforming of that level.” Ekaterina explains.
“You know. I think I got it down. Sixty-third pick up. Harmony is a fleshformer. Regrown leg? Treated? Probably related to both the case and that. Still investigating the case.” Lykaia says, her lips thin into a line. “They usually only pickup in Aurora Heights. This is a bit farther then the usual.”
Tenzin rubs at his face, haggard and slow on a Sunday morning. “Ah,” he says, nodding at Ekaterina. The others seem to be picking up far more than he is, so he just keeps watch on the sidelines in case anyone might be watching their investigation. Seawinds blow through the street. He takes another glance at the apartment doors, and wordlessly strides there with his gaze slightly lower than middle distance.
“That is Harmony Michaels, not Harmony Black though,” Tamar tells Lykaia, clearly the thought had crossed her mind too. “I think maybe we are dealing with a mermaid. Why else would everything lead to the beach?”
Shaking her head, Ekaterina suggests, “I am not sure things line up for the Sixty-Third. A good theory though. We should consider it.”
“Similar names.” Lykaia says, giving a distant stare at Tamar. She sighs. “Well, that cancels that. They may still be related, perhaps an alias… but…” She shrugs. And then starts to move towards the apartment building. “Gonna take a look around inside. See where fate and chance leads me.”
OOC follow again, please. Copyover sillyness.
There’s a moment of pause from Ekaterina, then she nods slowly to Tamar. “Let’s head up to the apartment and see what we can find. A beach fetish plus what you smell suggests that, but why…” So saying, she begins to move with Lykaia for the building.
Two NHPD officers stand at the door, though they do not stop Lykaia, Ekaterina, Tamar and Tenzin as they enter. There’s an obvious sense of awareness here, and they do both reach for their radios as the group pass.
“The apartment we are looking for is up stairs.” Ekaterina explains. “This is the location of the final victim’s corpse– The one they found.” And once more, she moves, this time for the lobby bank of elevators
the pod ascends the apartment building without issue, though once Tamar, Tenzin, Lykaia and Ekaterina arrive on the fifth floor, they find an active crime scene underway. Two officers stand at the door as if waiting for the group, and though they do not obstruct, they do inspect the group with suspition.
Tamar passes by the officers outside without looking at them, keeping close in the wake of Ekaterina’s shadow as she ponders the question that was asked of her. “For fun?” she eventually posits.
As the party and Lykaia reach the fifth floor with the other two officers standing at the door, she reaches along her belt and withdraws a badge. “Special Liasion Officer Nachtlied. Forensics status?”
Tamar tilts her head to one side, glancing about before she asks Ekaterina. “Did he have any siblings?”
Tenzin follows along as a supporting presence. Unlike Ekaterina and Lykaia, he does not seem to have police connections. He relies on a show of good faith, offering polite bows of his head to the officers they pass as he takes stock of the situation at hand.
One officer steps forward to look at Lykaia’s badge and nods to her before glancing over Ekaterina, Tamar and Tenzin.
The Director steps forward, already with her work face on, and speaking with a no nonsense cadence. “Temple Security.” -That’s the only introduction they get as she bounces a finger between the members of the group.
“There are no siblings.” Ekaterina shares with Tamar, “But a good thought. It was one of the first things I looked at.”
“Mister Hawkins, Miss Jackson and Mister Channing’s parents all lived on this floor.” Ekaterina shares with the group. “Suspicious, da?”
The detective leading the investigation steps out from the northern apartment next, hand out-stretched and Ekaterina takes it.
“Director Perunova.” he greets. “You and your team have the scene. I admit, we’re stumped. There are no marks on this one. It looks like a suicide.”
Lykaia turns towards the northern door. Her lips parted as if about to say something before growing distracted with a thought. Then her lips close and she moves to the door, trying to open the one that leads into the northern apartment.
Tamar nods, both to Ekaterina and then to the officers on the scene. She falls back to when Tenzin is, murmuring. “The perfume is stronger here, in the elevator also. She must have been here.”
The detective steps to one side, brows raised. He seems to be as unaware as it’s possible to be in New Haven, considering Tamar’s claim with a blink, stone-faced.
Ekaterina nods to the angel however, considering that statement before she moves with Lykaia to the northern door. “Simple then.” the Russian quips dryly.
“‘Parents’, ah?” Tenzin wryly smiles at Ekaterina, moving for the northern apartment to get a peek since the detective had just left it. However, he stops short, frozen in a moment of thought. Quickly, he glances around, hand reaching for his morning star.
“Hmm?” Ekaterina asks of Tenzin as he reaches for his weapon. “You hear something?”
Tamar heads towards the northern room after Lykaia but stops at the doorway, looking further down the hall. Ekaterina’s question has her looking then at Tenzin. “You can hear it also? The singing?” she asks the monk when he goes for his morning star.
Lykaia opens the door and steps inside. Her exposes, pale green eyes glance tiredly around the scene. If there is bodies she pays them little immediate attention and threat assesses, considering flight routes, cover and what else, for the worst case situation first.
Tenzin is stood silent and stone-faced, with a knuckle-white grip on his weapon’s haft. Ekaterina gets what would almost be a wary shake of the head, but Tamar earns the shift of his dark eyes. “… Someone is singing?”
Through the door way the first thing the group can see is a bed, and upon it, the expected corpse.
There are no signs of struggle– It appears perfectly normal save the pile of bottles and spilled pills on the pillow.
A hand moves for her hidden sheath, and Ekaterina nods to Tenzin. “Lykaia?” she asks the woman who stepped in ahead, “What do you see?”
“Yes,” Tamar says quietly to Tenzin, ticking her chin down further along the hallway. “It is really soft, but it is pretty.” It is only then that she turns her attention to the corpse.
“Corpse on bed. Pills on night-table besides it. Ghost is talking shit.” She states, giving a glance back. “Would order forensics to blood test and check whatever the fuck the pills are containing, opposed to what it’s only saying. Someone might want to banish the fucking ghost bullshit.” Lykaia suggests, her eyes finally settling on the corpse, looking to the pills first. “Tamar. Singing. What do you hear, tell us while we’re searching. Ghost. Why would someone need to die? State while I can hear you. If I can’t. Try again. Let’s cooperate and figure out the fuck you are needing for your… vengeance?”
Tenzin glances over Lykaia with some surprise, not expecting all this from her. He does not rebut her observations, instead providing a confirming nod to Ekaterina. Tamar has him studying her for a moment, especially one of her ears as if an answer lay there. Silly of him. He speaks in the direction of something unseen, asking more gently a simple question, “Who must die?”
“You hear ghosts?” Ekaterina asks. She steps in to the room.
The air is indeed cold, as if there were spirit activity, but not enough to create a full manifestation.
Now the door is open and with the thin walls of the apartment building, Lykaia, Ekaterina and Tenzin can hear a soft hum, as if from a singer in another apartment along the line, the sound drifting through the walls.
On the bed, the corpse lays as if it just began to sleep. No name has been given, yet. She wears sandals and an onepiece, seeming to have been on the beach. Salt is beginning to crystalize, which suggests that she was in the ocean itself.
There’s a buzzing that sounds almost rhythmic, and if Lykaia, Tenzin and Tamar look, she can see ear pods that have fallen from the woman’s ears.
A shuddering of the air, and Tamar and Ekaterina, as well as Lykaia and Tenzin hear the responce; It’s a whisper on the wind, nothing more.
“Ghost?” Tamar blinks at Lykaia, her hand immediately sliding to curl around the pommel of her sword. Fat lot of good that would do to a ghost but it makes her feel better. “It is a sort of humming, I guess, but to a song or a tune? They sounds happy.”
“Ekat. You’re the forensics gal. Take a look at the corpse, determine cause of death?” Lykaia suggest-says, keeping her words short before she gives the room a second look, and checks if there is a bathroom she can go on to investigate and search through.
“I must die.” the whispered voice calls. “I have to die. I am a mist monster and I must.”
OOC We’ll keep to this room to save moving around more, but there is a bathroom that Lykaia can see just off of the open plan. A shower, cabinet, a sink and toilet.
“Is it one of the victims?” Ekaterina asks Tenzin and Lykaia, ignoring the ghost– Likely foolish.
“Michael Channing, Harmony Black, Annabeth Jackson, Bart Hawkins?” Another name added to the list with the location of the business card.
Even as she speaks however, Ekaterina is moving for the bed. Ekaterina leans over the corpse, gaze upon everything. Then, she snaps her fingers, drawing everyone’s attention. “Another of those red-gold hairs.”
Lykaia says “How do I exterminate you?“
Lykaia asks into the room, turning back after giving the bathroom a once over.
“You.. are not a mist monster,” Tenzin whispers, audibly enough for those in the room to hear. “Too far from the mists here. Who is telling you these things, what you are?” Always compassionate despite himself, the monk rolls prayer beads between the fingers of his free hand.
“It may be so. It is hard to say, but ah, they are moaning of strange things,” he murmurs to Ekaterina, shooting looks between Tamar and Lykaia. The latter gets a frown.
“Channing’s car.” Ekaterina muses, “Then Hawkins going missing. His dog was found. Jackson’s leg, Black’s business card… Now this one…”
Ekaterina shakes her head, though the spirit continues to whisper.
Tamar is drawn to the ear pods. She is only vaguely familiar with them, generally interacting with the other young people in the city in a very limited capacity. But she knows they are for playing music from phones. She picks one up, bringing it closer to her ear to try and listen, always with curiosity.
Tenzin says, just to check, “We have run the names Michael Channing, Harmony Black, Annabeth Jackson, and ah, Bart Hawkins for patterns relating to the Bayview situation, no?“
Tamar cant bring the pod that close to her ear
(fix) Tamar cant bring the pod that close to her ear; If she does, she will deafen herself. The music is too loud, enough to cause someone to startle perhapse.
Lykaia’s investigation of the bathroom proves that there is no pill bottles left there. They appear to all be beside the bed.
The voice continues that droning, its mantra causing the room’s chill to grow. “Must kill myself. The mist cant harm her again, and so everything that comes out of it has to die. The song said so…”
“Suspicion: Death by suicide in every instance. Likely cause? Psychic influence from an outside factor.” Lykaia shares with Tamar, Ekaterina and Tenzin. Then, looking at neither of them, she asks into the room: “Who are you?”
“Is the music normally this loud?” Tamar asks the others in the room, at least they are more familiar with things on this side of the gate. “Was she trying not to hear anything else?”
“Negative. But the likely source is music.” Lykaia says, giving Tamar a brief look. “Player inside the car below ran long enough to drain the car’s battery.”
Holding his finger over his earpiece, Tenzin stares away for a while, nodding subtly. When his awareness expands once more, it is to consider of the group, “You say you found red-gold hair, no? Annabeth Jackson lives in the unit 502. Suspected Fae.”
He darts a narrowed gaze at Tamar, the ear pods she’s holding. “That would be the main reason I would turn the music up loud,” he accepts the possibility. “You say you were hearing singing, no? From across the hall, maybe.”
“I am a mist monster.” The whisper answers, and it begins to finally manifest now, sitting upon the corpse that the phantom resembles. “I have to die so she cant be harmed by the mists again.”
It appears as though this spirit cant answer more than that– Even in death she has the glazed look of someone hypnotised.
Now Tamar, Tenzin, Ekaterina and Lykaia can see her, they notice the stutter in her manifestation when Annabeth Jackson’s name is braught up.
Tamar nods at Tenzin, in the midst of pondering something before suddenly blinking when the ghost manifests. “Wait…” she murmurs, “So… the woman with red hair, perhaps a mermaid, she is killing off people who escape from the mists? That is why you think you are a mist monster?”
“Okay. Connects to Jackson. She lives next door.” Lykaia notices, looking the ghostly silhouette over. “Ask your questions while you can, people.”
Pausing in its litany of madness, the spirit’s eyes clear for a moment. It’s not much, though it’s long enough to utter, “Anna has a beautiful singing voice.”
Tenzin wrings his hands together and approaches the ghost one more step. As perceptive as he is, it’s hard not to notice the stutter when the apparition manifests more visibly. What he assumes is spoken quietly. “People have lost their limbs to the mist before,” he says. “This woman, she was able to pay for hers back. How? Perhaps a bargain.”
He sweeps a hand towards the ghost. “And what payment does one such bargain require?”
Directly addressing the ghost, he attempts to hold onto that sliver of clarity. “How do you know Anna?”
“No bargain. Favor within the city.” Lykaia answers, giving Tenzin a blank look.
Tamar is confused for a little bit. “But Jackson is missing, yes?” she asks the others. Then she turns, backtracking out into the hallway. She’s searching for the sea-salt-perfume scent that was in the car and the elevator.
There are the sounds of a door opening, closing, then being locked from down the hall.
Gentle foot falls, and then Lykaia, Ekaterina and Tenzin hear it. A beautiful singing– Not for attention, but for the enjoyment.
It licks at the awareness of everyone close enough to hear it but none more than the ghost.
“She’s coming. I need to die so that I cant hurt her.” Naturally, its hands pass through the pill bottles. It resorts for the only thing it has left. Standing, she looks paniced- She charges for the balcony, throwing herself over the edge with a suddenness that speaks of triggered instruction, the building chill in the air dissipating as abruptly as the manifestation itself.
From down the hall, a figure begins to step in to view; A young looking woman, possibly early to mid twenties. She has red-gold hair, green eyes and is dressed for a summer at the beach– It’s past prime summer weather.
The singing is coming from this woman.
“Sometimes, things are complicated, Liaison,” Tenzin shrugs at Lykaia. He turns to Tamar with a pensive frown. “If she is missing, then who is singing right now?”
He watches in slack-jawed horror as the ghost rushes to the balcony and disperses over the edge. It may have been dead already, but it still shakes him. For some people, these things are hard to get used to.
The sounds from out in the hall get him alerted. He meets eyes with Ekaterina and the others, before pacing quietly to the exit. If the others do not stop him, he goes for it. “Anna?” he attempts to call to her with this name, to see if she’d turn.
Lykaia exhales when the ghost topples over the balcony. “Well, it was that or banishing.” There is no emotion that reaches her eyes before she looks to the woman from whom the singing is coming from and makes to approach her. “Ma’am. NHPD. Hold where you are, I have questions for you.” She briskly paces out of the apartment towards the woman, looking about ready to spring into action.
The woman advances to the elevators, though as she pushes the button to call the carriage, one of the police officers radios squalks- It’s loud. Louder than it should be, and she startles.
Tenzin’s voice calls out, and- she looks over. That song pauses, her eyes darting as if she were a trapped animal, obviously and dangerously unsettled.
She trembles on the edge of abject terror, hands rising to clamp over her ears and she curls in to a ball, sobbing.
Tamar is, thankfully, busy trying to figure out smells when the ghost decides to end itself a second time, so she is saved from that horror. Instead her focus turns onto the red-head, studying her for a few moments before Tenzin is calling her name and Lykaia is issuing commands.
“Tenzin, grab the radio from the officer. Turn it off.” Lykaia barks, looking down at the woman that seems to have stilled and curls into herself to spend time crying. “Might be a curse, not going to pay for it.” She picks up handcuffs from a pouch along her belt and makes to subdue the woman. It is more a case of, if she lets herself be dragged around, she can keep her hands over her ears, but if she’s struggling, she will have to suffer the handcuffs. “Think this might be better left to arcanists. Smells too much like curse bullshit right now but who the fuck knows.”
It’s one thing after another. Something about the way the redhead buckles makes Tenzin seethe. “Answer,” the man snaps, even his own voice punchier than it normally is. “You are Annabeth Jackson?” He thrusts a glare in Lykaia’s direction, but doesn’t question the demand. Locking eyes briefly with the officer, his hackles up, he snags that radio and switches it off; subsequently, he flings it at the wall with all the strength in his right arm. “Make her talk or more may die,” he tells Tamar and Ekaterina, really ticked off.
There’s no way that Lykaia’s questions get an answer, but the police officers take her motion– and that of Tenzin as instruction to move. They advance on the woman, one reading her her rights, the other cuffing her- none too gently.
The group follow, and over the next few days, the story comes out.
as to what happened, Annabeth Jackson lost her leg in the storm that caused masses of Havenite citizens to get captured within the mists. Anna as an influential member of the community was able to petition for her leg to be restored, her favor expended to allow this fleshforming. It left her understandably traumatised however.
Annabeth Jackson had herself admitted to the clinic, though mass negligence on the part of the psychologists there dismissed her in a day. She went home, where she found that loud noises caused her to receive flashbacks.
First Michael Channing’s car radio startled her. Reflexively she compelled the beach-goer to kill himself so he couldn’t harm her like the wyvern that took her leg. He resisted, drove to the apartments, then a noise report was made against him– Annabeth was in his car when this happened. He drove her back, offering to take her back to her apartment. The moment the car pulled up however, the radio’s volume flared, and this set her off again. She compelled him and Channing ran off to finally kill himself.
Next came Harmony Black, who had her music playing too loudly over her phone. She was emerging from the ocean where she’d taken a swim. Black, like Channing was compelled to drown herself.
When it came to Bart Hawkins, she couldn’t remember, though she recalled the sound of a barking– Like a hell hound, and the next thing she knew, she was six miles out of the bay.
Finally, the last victim, Charity Blake. Annabeth’s best friend. She confessed what she had done to Charity. She fell to sleep crying in her best friend’s arms. The alarm clock woke Annabeth. She paniced and the corpse was the outcome.
The mystery is swept under the rug, the NHPD -solve the crime-
As for Annabeth Jackson? She vanished from the public eye. It is suspected that a clandestine group– the same anonimous benifactor who hired Temple Security– took the siren, experimenting on her.
OOC Sorry for the wall of text and abrupt conclusion, small family emergency the SR needs to handle in a timely manner. Stand by to plot finish for your briefcases.