Steadfast, Part One: Dead on Arrival

Naomi removed her helmet before dismounting the motorcycle which had carried her west from New York, over old inter-province highways, rivers, and mountains, to a village in the Allegheny Mountains east of Pittsburgh so new that its residents had not yet chosen a name for the place. To avoid unnecessary delay, she had been given a set of latitude and longitude coordinates along with her orders. Well-tended farms in which cattle and swine grazed freely within white fences marking property lines, and the gravel covering the road once she turned from the highway yielded to cobblestones. A couple dozen buildings had already sprung up along either side of the main street, their roofs covered in solar panels, and a paved lot waited just outside the village proper for residents and visitors to park their vehicles. Tall trees formed a slightly jagged line down the center of the street, their leaves red and gold from the autumn chill; their age indicated the resettlement of a village which had existed before Nationfall by new inhabitants.

She walked her cycle to the Park & Charge lot, and paid the owner to rent a space for three days. She then paid a bit more for her cycle to be washed and polished, and for the batteries to be recharged. Homesteaders passing the local physician’s office stared at her. Being a pale woman with frost-white hair and scarlet eyes, in addition to having congenital pseudofeline morphological disorder, gave Naomi plenty of opportunities to grow used to people staring at her. However, she told herself, the residents might only be curious at the sight of a visitor with saddlebags slung over her shoulder and a sword on her hip. She waved to them, and a boy across the narrow cobblestoned main street pulled his mother’s hand while using his left to point at her. “Mommylookit! Who’s the pretty samurai lady?”

The mother stopped, glanced at Naomi with an apologetic smile, and turned back to her child. “She’s an Adversary. We don’t have any policemen yet, so she came to help us for a little while.”

To Naomi’s surprise, the mother led her son across the street and approached her and extended her hand. “Adversary Bradleigh? I’m Gail Shippens. The Phoenix Society arranged for you to lodge at my house for the duration of your visit.”

Naomi accepted Ms. Shippens’ hand. “Thank you, Ms. Shippens. I understand you run a bed and breakfast. Can you recommend a place for dinner?”

“My husband runs a pub next to our house called The Lonely Mountain. If business is slow inside, you’ll find him with his face in a book. He’ll probably ask you to turn over your sword, though.”

Naomi doubted she’d need the katana on her hip at dinner, unless the proprietor served her a preternaturally tough steak. “I appreciate the tip. May I check in later? I’d like to meet Doctor Petersen first.”

“Any time before eight is fine.”

The emptiness of the waiting room of Doctor Petersen’s office seemed cheery to Naomi, and suggested nobody needed the doctor or his skills that afternoon. A pleasant shade of soft glossy yellow covered the walls, and the floor was well-polished hardwood. Sunlight streamed through the windows. One wall displayed framed educational posters, but another displayed landscapes in oil. Naomi recognized one from her approach to the village, but not the signature. She turned to the nurse, who doubled as the receptionist, and asked him if he knew the artist. “Doc Petersen did those. The forest landscape in the top right is his first, but check out the detail on it while I tell the doc you’re here.”

Naomi did as advised, and squinted at an incongruous detail. The artist had depicted a battered sign with still-legible text amid the undergrowth. ‘Commonwealth Army’ stood at the top, as if the sign pointed to a base once held by the North American Commonwealth before Nationfall. Next came ‘Fort Clarion’ and ‘Authorized Personnel Only’.

“So, you’re not just an Adversary, but a young lady with a taste for art.” A tall man of late middle age, Doctor Petersen walked with a slight limp and a martial bearing. His close-cropped blonde hair faded to gray at the edges, but his blue eyes remained bright. “You took a bit longer to arrive than I expected.”

Naomi nodded. “Sorry, but I had leave scheduled, and wanted to ride into the mountains to see the autumn foliage. I didn’t think I’d do any harm by riding directly here instead of taking a maglev to Pittsburgh, renting a vehicle, and doubling back. Doing so would save a couple of hours at most for additional expense and trouble.”

“True, true.” Dr. Petersen extended a hand inside. “I must lead you down into the basement, Adversary Bradleigh, but are you sure you want to see what’s down there? I can explain my findings up here, if you prefer.”

“I’d be remiss if I did not inspect the bodies myself. Do you have spare scrubs?”

Dr. Petersen found a set for her, and waited outside his office while she changed. Once she was ready, she washed her hands before following him down. Dr. Petersen turned on the lights, revealing two bodies hidden by sheets. “This might upset you, Adversary. The victims were young.”

“I understand the victims were recently killed. Decomposition should not be sufficiently advanced to upset me.”

Dr. Petersen raised an eyebrow before nodding and turning over one of the sheets. “Our first victim is a young man in his late teens.”

Naomi nodded, and used her gloved hands to pull the sheet further down. “He appears to have bled out, most likely by the wound at his throat.”

“I think some sort of animal savaged him, but I can’t identify the species by the teeth marks.” Dr. Petersen paused a moment. “At least, I want to believe an animal is responsible. I know everybody in this village, Adversary, and I don’t want to think that we’d turn on each other so soon.”

“I don’t blame you. This is a charming little village, but you all should get together and choose a name for it.” Naomi probed the wound, gently working her fingers into it. Surprised by the ease with which her fingers slid into the corpse’s neck, she pulled the flesh apart to reveal a fatal incision. “The neck might have been chewed post-mortem. There’s also bruising, as if the killer had been sucking and chewing the flesh at the same time.”

An incision stretching from ear to ear was now visible. Naomi sympathized with Dr. Petersen, who might have missed it by focusing on the flesh of the young man’s throat which had been gouged by teeth which she had no choice but to assume were human. “Doctor, I think this man was killed with a knife. The killer then chewed upon his neck and sucked at the flesh for reasons currently unknown, which explains the marks and the bruising. If I had to guess, I’d say he either wanted to throw us off, he thinks he’s a vampire, or he wants you to think he’s a vampire.”

“Why the last?”

Naomi lifted the corpse by the shoulders and indicated the skin, which was slightly reddened, but not as much as she expected. “There should be more lividity, shouldn’t there? Where’s the rest of his blood? Is it where the body was found?”

Dr. Petersen shook his head. “No.”

“Then where is it?” Naomi’s fingers stopped at a blemish on the shoulder. “And what’s this? A puncture wound?”

“Exactly.” Dr. Petersen peered at it. “Wait. I treated wounds like this before back when I worked for the City of Pittsburgh, checking prisoners to ensure they were healthy enough to stand trial. This looks like the sort of puncture wound a tranquilizer dart leaves.”

“Would any trace of the drug linger around the wound site?”

“I’ll run some tests, but let’s have a look at the other victim.” Dr. Petersen covered the freshest corpse before uncovering the other. He would have been similar in appearance to the first victim in life, both tall, strong young men with short brown hair. This one had begun to ripen a bit, the belly which had once been flat and muscular in the manner fashion and advertising prescribed as a masculine ideal was now slightly swollen from gas buildup inside, causing Naomi to scrunch her nose behind her mask in distaste. She put on a fresh pair of gloves before starting with the throat. “Another incision, then chewing and sucking to throw us off.”

Petersen lifted the man this time. “There’s a puncture wound on this one as well.”

“I was afraid you’d say that. It looks like our killer used the same method for both killings: trank first, then slit the throat with an extremely sharp knife, and finally chew and suck at the flesh to discourage us from looking deeper.” Naomi left the rest unsaid to avoid belaboring the obvious fact that a serial murderer had sprung up in this as yet unnamed village. “Do the victims have anything in common?”

“They’re friends, and they work with their parents on the farms outside of town. They’re friends of another young man named Michael Brubaker. You’ll have to go through town to get to his family’s farm.”

Naomi nodded, and covered the dead man once Petersen lowered him back to the slab. She stripped off her gloves and mask, and threw them away before leaving the basement. “I’ll speak to Mr. Brubaker first, and avoid disturbing the victim’s families. If they’re all friends, he might be able to tell me something of value.”