Ekaterina’s Monday afternoon odd encounter(Lykaia)
Date: 2025-08-18 15:58
(Ekaterina’s Monday afternoon odd encounter(Lykaia):Lykaia)
[Mon Aug 18 2025]
On Madison Avenue
It is afternoon, about 72F(22C) degrees, and there are clear skies. The mist is heaviest At High and Woodcrest/span
(Your target discovers a ghost bound to an old music box in an antique shop. The spirit desperately needs someone to deliver a final message to their still-living descendant before midnight, when they’ll be dragged to whatever fate awaits them in the afterlife.)
Having just returned from the gym, Ekaterina makes her way back home on her disgustingly yellow motorbike; Freshly changed and showered, she’s making her way along Madison Avenue, headed for home.
On the sidewalk, Ekaterina can see Lykaia standing in front of an antiques shop somewhere along Madison Avenue. She is, as often, fully armed, looking at the establishment with one hand on her hip and the other on her phone. And it is only a couple of seconds later before Ekaterina’s phone vibrates with a new text from her: “Heard this Antiques shop got some weird shit going on. Bayview. Join me, Ekat? Can do it as the patrol we said we’d do earlier.”
Pulling up to check her phone, Ekaterina walks her bike the last few feet closer to Lykaia outside the antique shop.
Kicking down the stand, Ekaterina removes the keys, slips them away and shoulders her rifle. She checks her boot knife is in place, then steps from beside her bike to beside Lykaia. The phone is retrieved, unlocked, the device waved around because the facial recognition is imperfect, the thumb print doesn’t want to work, and finally she reads the text.
“Da.” she decides. Stepping closer, Ekaterina raises a hand to shield her eyes from the sun, then looks through the window of the store. “What are we suspecting?” she asks Lykaia.
Looking through the windows, it really just does summarize down to what one would expect from an antiques shop. The window has several small items on display and the ship has its rows of old antiques lines shelf by shelf, with some item just standing around at the center.
Lykaia exhales slowly, drawing her eyes away from looking inside, that’s probably been going on for a while and she answers Ekaterina “Unsure. File said something about a music box that doesn’t stop playing and tourists refuse to touch. And people hearing something about it. Not touching weird items on my own. Thanks for coming, Ekat.”
Looking through the window, an older music box stands among the antiques on display at the center.
“There is one over there.” Ekaterina notes, pointing to let Lykaia see the one she means. “But going in will likely help, da.”
So saying, Ekaterina steps through the door, leading the way, and begins to -browse- B-lining for the music box.
With Ekaterina taking the lead, Lykaia is happy to follow on in after Ekaterina. What greets inside the shop itself is the slight decrease of temperature thanks to the in-built AC. The air is dry, some dust covers some of the shelves. The music box at the center plays an eerie song, ‘In the Hall of the Mountain King’ by Edvard Grieg. It starts with itt slow pace, and then speeds up, then slows and resets to the start again and slowly crawls its away its eerie once more. The counter is on the far end, and a few sparse cameras keep an eye on the antiques from several corners.
Behind it is an old man. As Ekaterina comes closer to the music box, the air begins to feel colder.
Entering, that instinctive shiver from the humid air outside into the cooler atmosphere within the store with its active AC, Ekaterina raises a hand to the old man behind the counter by way of greeting. She doesn’t stop, yet, moving closer to the box. She spends time then, a hand raised, forward to test for that shift of temperature, where she circles the music box, trying to work out a viable perimeter of which to make an inspection from a safe distance from the object.
“Is colder around this.” Ekaterina shares with Lykaia as she attempts to idealise the distance from which the coolness reaches, Russian accent thick.
The air is for sure colder around of the music box, Lykaia comes to a stop as it begins to play its eerie melody once more. Her phone slides into a pocket and she keeps her distance, ready but more ready to support to escalate worst case. “Usually could be meaning…”
It happens before she says the word, as the silhouette of a woman suddenly stands over the box in a flash that lasts for a single blink of the eye and then vanishes once more. The cold extends.
“…Ghosts.” Lykaia finishes saying, shivering.
“Blyet.” Ekaterina curses.
Stepping back, the music box eyed with suspicion, there’s the sense that Ekaterina would be all too happy to smash this music box. Never the less, Lykaia dnd Ekaterina are here for a reason, and the objective is the box.
“Is strong ghost.” the brunette reasons. “I am told there are always ghosts, but without skill to see them, they are rare to manifest.” A pause, then Ekaterina considers.
Turning to gather more information before doing something irrepairable, Ekaterina calls out to the old man to gather context. “What can you tell us about box?” she asks him, gesturing to said object in question. “Do you know of what it does?”
The figure behind the counter takes their time looking up from a ledger they were working on. “Good evening. The music box?” They look to the box “Oh dear, it is an old box. It was discovered in an abandoned basement in downtown, under the hotel a few years ago. It plays music, and it never stops.” They give that kind of look that it’s been a persisting issue before continuing: “It used to be in possession of a cousin to the Fairchild family. It’s been dug out from a collection sale and is now on offer for sale here. Would you be interested in an acquisition, miss?”
“All good to know.” Ekaterina nods to the elderly shop keep, “But if this is all, it is a lot not being said, da?” Ekaterina smiles; the expressin twisted by scarring into a grimace at one side. “Tell me what you are not saying.” the Russian asks the shopkeep.
It’s innocent enough, but Ekaterina does expect an answer, the square-shouldered body language of an authority figure, the ramrod straight posture, the chin up, eye contact from Ekaterina’s days both within the military and the police. “It has caused you issues. Tell me of those.”
So said, and waiting for the man’s answer, Ekaterina steps that slight bit closer, seeing if she can repeat the manifestation to get a better look at the spirit, the age as judged from the clothing, the period it may have died, signs of death and indeed, any of the various forensic elements that might be useful for such an investigation.
Ekaterina takes another look at the music box, as it speeds up its repeating song. The antiquarian does provide with an answer after a couple more seconds “The music box does not play. It also appears to serve as an AC, it is colder around it. Some of the interested customers mentioned that they saw some white figure…”
Speaking of it, she appears again, right inside the box, a hand grasps out, she looks desperate, far as her ghastly eyes can form such an emotion.
“… standing inside it. Others reported they saw it beckoning, and another said that when they touched the box, that they heard a voice speak to them, begging them to deliver something.”
Lykaia gives the box another box, she clearly does not see it but does suggest “Not a fan of touching it. Moving it would need touching it. How’d you wanting to go on this, Ekat?”
purses her lips. That’s at once what Ekaterina wanted to hear and not at the same time; This is Ekaterina’s first true haunting, and there’s a period of culture shock before she makes a choice.
Reaching up to her subdermal, Ekaterina reaches out tothe Temple ritualists, the instruction, to stand bye with a purging ritual if required.
“Is not going to resolve itself, and sooner we can handle, sooner we can remove from streets.
Reaching into her fanny pack, the brunette retrieves a pair of latex gloves. Slipping them on, so as to preventcontamination of evidence, she then turns the crank on the music box, explaining to Lykaia, “If we can find what it want, we can end haunting or have item locked in vault.” A grimace as Ekaterina reached into that chill, but she does it, and so done, she waits to hear the potential voice and its request, but also ready to withdraw at a moment’s notice.
The silhouette of the ghost’s face shows just in the reflection of the light on the wood, staring at Ekaterina with ghastly, big eyes, locked in a horrified stare. The lips move, too quiet at first, the expression grows more desperate and then, the voice breaks through to Ekaterina as a whisper. “Please… I… don’t have… much time…. You must… tell… my daughter… that she can’t… trust him… he… is responsible… To look…. beneath… the shelf… in the…. rooof…. please…”
The whisper repeats, growing more and more desperate and louder the longer Ekaterina keeps her hand on the box.
In the background, Lykaia has made the call-in to the temple ritualists, along with drawing a neutralizer just in case Ekaterina needs that assist.
All new today. This is a curious experience and the goose flesh on Ekaterina’s exposed arms make that very clear. She’s unsettled. She lets it continue though, asking the spirit, “What is daughter’s name? Who is he? I need answers who and where to look to help.”
“It’s it’s…” The ghostly visage actually looks hopeful, far as such a horrifying visage could be called such. “She’s… Jasmine… He’s… Jack… Look… for her… I’ve… I’ve only till midnight…” She tells the address, it is an apartment here in Bayview. And when she’s finished speaking, this time, she draws to silence and the music box stops playing its eerie song. Her face remains visible to Ekaterina, but her expression has settled to something more peaceful.
That was rather simple; Ekaterina has names, locations and a description to match up.
Still, Ekaterina is not Order. She’s Temple, and that means that in spite of that willingness to aid in order toend this haunting and preserve that righteous ideology, Ekaterina is obligated to put humanity first.
She turns on a heel, nods to Lykaia, and motions to the door. The old man gets a nod and she leaves the box where it is.
once out of the antique shop, Ekaterina closes the door, presses that subdermal implant again and speaks quietly into coms.
It’s two simple requests. 1- Researchers to identify the spirit, the family, the daughter and the man, the names given and the message the spirit wanted to be passed on, just as the spirit asked for it.
The second is the more pragmatic- Wheels up immediately. Team of ritualists with containment to this address to requisition the box. It must be removed from the public eye and into Temple vaults for study before it can harm anyone.
It takes a couple of minutes before a guy in a labcoat shows up with two people to purchase and collect the box from the antiques shop. The research and the identity of the person traces back to humans that are tourists. Jasmine and Jack are visiting New Haven to get married, the ghost tracks back to being Jasmine’s mother who was here for the wedding. Something must have happened that lead to the death, with the now ghostly parent wanting to warn the daughter.
The date for the wedding is set exactly today at midnight.
And this reflects back to the box, it is cold throughout, as the report would later say, up until midnight upon which the music box lost all its supernatural properties and returns to just being a simple antique music box once more.
The message passed on, the box handled and not having the authority to do more than warn Jasmine of her mother’s cryptic words, Ekaterina is forced to wipe her hands of it. She leaves it be from then on out, and Ekaterina and Lykaia are able to return to their normal (for Haven) lives until the next issue rises its head.