I am sorry to hear about your migraine, and glad that it only delayed the Valentine's celebrations by a day :) I am also very disappointed that you don't want more details about the Ents [*screws up several pages of gorily descriptive writing*]. And I shall keep Falko nearby in case I have more days where I don't have time to fit things properly into the Inspectral tale :)
Speaking of whom.... Swap The records office main room had three rows of white, formica-topped desks with hard wooden schoolroom chairs, a bank of microfiche readers along the side-wall, small bookcases at the side of each desk and microfiche station, and a small hatch at which the old man appeared. Each desk had a laptop chained to it, showing a catalogue screen. Collins sat down and tapped William Fulton into the catalogue search box, and several seconds later got a screenful of reference numbers back. He looked around and found that the desks each had a drawer in which was a single slab of notepaper and some cheap blue biros the length of his index finger. He tried not to sigh, carefully copied the reference numbers down, and went to the hatch to hand them to the old man and swap them for actual information. When the man returned, some twenty-five minutes later, Collins had figured out how to swap the catalogue screen for Minesweeper. He got up and took the box of carefully hand-labelled microfilms, and two registers of deaths and births and decided to start with the microfiche reader. Forty-five minutes later he was writing much more detailed notes in his personal notebook as he read through newspaper articles from twenty-five years ago; part of him was marvelling at how much seemed to be going on in the world, and the occasional population figures made him pause and re-read them as they seemed far too high. Had the world really managed to support so many people all at the same time? He checked the births and death register as an afterthought, and more because it was there and needed to be given back to the old man than because he thought it had relevance. Then he double-checked it. The William Fulton of interest, on whom he had now had seven pages of notes, had neither his birth nor his death recorded.
“So,” said the Inspectral. They were sat in the staff canteen, where Collins had bought coffee for himself and Ghost-aid for the Inspectral. Ghost-aid was a sparkling blue drink that ghosts somehow absorbed through touch and tasted like mushrooms to the living. “What have you found?” “William Fulton was born in Tanham,” said Collins. “Which, and I haven’t found anything written down about this which is partly why I think it’s true, is the sixth blasted town. Most of the stories about him mention him as a petty criminal, someone like Michael Batts who would key cars, mug pedestrians and get arrested for drunkness, loitering and on one occasion for riding a pig through the town library. But then there’s a break in the stories, like he’s doing something that no-one knows about—” “Or has turned over a new leaf and gone straight,” said the Inspectral. He maintained his straight face for long enough that Collins started to doubt himself, then chuckled. “But that’s unlikely. Go on.” “He goes quiet,” said Collins, feeling himself blush with the embarrassment of missing the joke. “And then he gets reported as a member of the Radiant Dawn.” “Not just any member,” said the Inspectral. “The files are in my office; pick them up when we return. William Fulton was determined to be clergy-level in the society. The undercover officers think he may have been their equivalent of a Deacon, maybe even a Bishop.” “Ok,” said Collins, trying to keep surprise out of his voice. “Ok, that makes sense actually as he’s mentioned by people in the blasted towns after the event as having been seen there, and some even report having heard sermons by him.” “Good,” said the Inspectral. “Anything else?” “Two things,” said Collins. “One is that there’s passenger lists that mention a William Fulton for aeroplane flights, so he must have been rich.” “No,” said the Inspectral. “Flights were a lot more common back then. And cheap, too, not like today. Why is that interesting though?” “He seems to have gone to the Caribbean for three weeks a year for several years,” said Collins. “Specfically Haiti. And the second thing is that his death was reported in the newspapers, but the registers of births and deaths doesn’t list it. Nor his birth either.” The Inspectral sat silent for a few minutes, soaking his hand in his Ghost-aid. “Well done,” he said at last. “That’s a lot more to think about it, isn’t it? But something you mentioned I didn’t expect: how did you guess Tanham was a blasted town?”
3 comments:
I am sorry to hear about your migraine, and glad that it only delayed the Valentine's celebrations by a day :) I am also very disappointed that you don't want more details about the Ents [*screws up several pages of gorily descriptive writing*]. And I shall keep Falko nearby in case I have more days where I don't have time to fit things properly into the Inspectral tale :)
Speaking of whom....
Swap
The records office main room had three rows of white, formica-topped desks with hard wooden schoolroom chairs, a bank of microfiche readers along the side-wall, small bookcases at the side of each desk and microfiche station, and a small hatch at which the old man appeared. Each desk had a laptop chained to it, showing a catalogue screen.
Collins sat down and tapped William Fulton into the catalogue search box, and several seconds later got a screenful of reference numbers back. He looked around and found that the desks each had a drawer in which was a single slab of notepaper and some cheap blue biros the length of his index finger. He tried not to sigh, carefully copied the reference numbers down, and went to the hatch to hand them to the old man and swap them for actual information.
When the man returned, some twenty-five minutes later, Collins had figured out how to swap the catalogue screen for Minesweeper. He got up and took the box of carefully hand-labelled microfilms, and two registers of deaths and births and decided to start with the microfiche reader.
Forty-five minutes later he was writing much more detailed notes in his personal notebook as he read through newspaper articles from twenty-five years ago; part of him was marvelling at how much seemed to be going on in the world, and the occasional population figures made him pause and re-read them as they seemed far too high. Had the world really managed to support so many people all at the same time?
He checked the births and death register as an afterthought, and more because it was there and needed to be given back to the old man than because he thought it had relevance. Then he double-checked it. The William Fulton of interest, on whom he had now had seven pages of notes, had neither his birth nor his death recorded.
“So,” said the Inspectral. They were sat in the staff canteen, where Collins had bought coffee for himself and Ghost-aid for the Inspectral. Ghost-aid was a sparkling blue drink that ghosts somehow absorbed through touch and tasted like mushrooms to the living. “What have you found?”
“William Fulton was born in Tanham,” said Collins. “Which, and I haven’t found anything written down about this which is partly why I think it’s true, is the sixth blasted town. Most of the stories about him mention him as a petty criminal, someone like Michael Batts who would key cars, mug pedestrians and get arrested for drunkness, loitering and on one occasion for riding a pig through the town library. But then there’s a break in the stories, like he’s doing something that no-one knows about—”
“Or has turned over a new leaf and gone straight,” said the Inspectral. He maintained his straight face for long enough that Collins started to doubt himself, then chuckled. “But that’s unlikely. Go on.”
“He goes quiet,” said Collins, feeling himself blush with the embarrassment of missing the joke. “And then he gets reported as a member of the Radiant Dawn.”
“Not just any member,” said the Inspectral. “The files are in my office; pick them up when we return. William Fulton was determined to be clergy-level in the society. The undercover officers think he may have been their equivalent of a Deacon, maybe even a Bishop.”
“Ok,” said Collins, trying to keep surprise out of his voice. “Ok, that makes sense actually as he’s mentioned by people in the blasted towns after the event as having been seen there, and some even report having heard sermons by him.”
“Good,” said the Inspectral. “Anything else?”
“Two things,” said Collins. “One is that there’s passenger lists that mention a William Fulton for aeroplane flights, so he must have been rich.”
“No,” said the Inspectral. “Flights were a lot more common back then. And cheap, too, not like today. Why is that interesting though?”
“He seems to have gone to the Caribbean for three weeks a year for several years,” said Collins. “Specfically Haiti. And the second thing is that his death was reported in the newspapers, but the registers of births and deaths doesn’t list it. Nor his birth either.”
The Inspectral sat silent for a few minutes, soaking his hand in his Ghost-aid.
“Well done,” he said at last. “That’s a lot more to think about it, isn’t it? But something you mentioned I didn’t expect: how did you guess Tanham was a blasted town?”
Greg - hah, well, I appreciate that. Both things.
And speaking of things to be appreciated, there's this entry. Fascinating and carries the story forward a few, I think, important steps. If not more!
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