B U G M A N

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Archival Stamp: Primus 3/5, 807a
Archivist: Irucior 1st, surname n/a
Document: Serial, 340958473n; Case #4329
Declassification: No longer admissible as evidence


THE CASE OF MAREK SING


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TRANSCRIPT 1:
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Gen’l Leery: “Marek Sing—please confirm your presence for the record.”

Marek: Grunts.

Gen’l Leery: “Right. Today is Fearican 6/4, 796a. Mr. Marek Sing, former soldier now serving the role of detective, is being audited for a lack of progress in a case he was assigned to 4 months ago. If Mr. Sing cannot justify or explain his lack of progress, this transcript will be sent back to the imperial parole board for review and potential incarceration. You are aware of this, Mr. Sing?”

Marek: Slurring. “You mean to tell me that poor kid’s gonna write all this down?”

Gen’l Leery: “In shorthand, then it’s transcripted ‘er whatever. Just speak slowly and start from the beginning. I need to know why you’ve failed to make relevant investigatory progress.”

Marek: Exhales. “Do you want the very beginning, or you want me to start with me?”

Gen’l Leary: Shuffling papers, looking. “From the start of your role in the case, please.”

Marek: Chuckles. “I shoulda picked prison up front, woulda saved a lotta trouble.” Looks around at the interrogation cell. “3 Imperial tours and you drag me into this dump.”

Gen’l Leary: “Let’s not reminisce, it’s—”

Marek: Interrupts Gen’l Leary. “It’s poison—this place. Maybe it’s the rain or the food or the dirt—but wherever it starts—it’s in every man, woman and child here. Poison in you and you. Now it’s in me too. Wanna know why I haven’t made any progress? It starts with the poison. Before I was even—”

Gen’l Leary: Interrupts Marek. “Alright, enough of that. Come on. How did you get assigned to this case?”

Marek: “I picked it up from the last guy. He walked. Went right back to prison. If that’s the truth. Why was the case given to the man I got it from, General?”

Gen’l Leary: Shuffles papers. “He also opted to finish his sentence for war crimes. And before you ask, the man prior to him was apprehended at the harbor. The first man outright disappeared. You are the 4th probate detective we’ve assigned.”

Marek: Leans forward. “They all walked save for me. You remember that, General. You remember that when you’re planning to lock me up Or when you’re passin’ this on to be analyzed. You remember I didn’t end up like the rest.”

Gen’l Leary: “The record cannot forget, your testimony is safe here. Cut the drama, Mr. Sing.”

Marek: Leans back and gets comfortable. “As ya’ like General…”

Gen’l Leary: “Try and focus on the case details. This is technically a hearing.”

Marek: Grunts. “Magistrate had about a dozen guards on retainer, all taken from the Northfall pool. It was only a matter of getting on those jobs, getting in the room where he was operating. That was the easy part.”

Gen’l Leary: “Let the record show the magistrate was under investigation for trying to access the imperial vault in Northfall. He is not allowed in such a place and knows it.”

Marek: “Yeah, somethin’ like that.He kept a close guard but enough rotated out and eventually he grew to trust me. I was a soldier. I can tell when a man trusts me with his life, and for someone as middling as a magistrate, well, it took a whole lot longer than I ever expected. That’s how you can tell a fella’s up to somethin’. He don’t trust nobody anymore. But anyways, getting in was a whole lotta work for nothin’. I spent a lotta sleepless nights on the edge. But he only ever trusted me with his life. You got a smoke?”

Gen’l Leary: “You can’t smoke in here, I’m sorry.”

Marek: “If you don’t let me smoke in here you might as well take me back to prison. I’m telling you that right now, General. The rest is up to you.”

Gen’l Leary: Reluctantly produces some rolled pipeweed and a matchbook. “Fine. Smoke ‘em all if ya’ like.”

Marek: Lights a roll. “So guard duty drags on a few months. I forget how long. One day I can’t take it anymore. One day, I ask why it took him so long to trust me. Why does he do that when we all came from the same pool of guards? Why did he prefer some to others? Ha. He said he’d seen too many of us fail and that he took a long time to judge a man’s salt. Good response. I was relieved of my duties the next day, the magistrate reported me for misconduct. The only genuine talk I ever had with him and he reported me for it. It was inhumane. It was like nothing I’d ever seen. I’d guarded his life for months and he couldn’t even talk to me.”

Gen’l Leary: Clears throat. “And when was that?”

Marek: “I forget. Two months into the case. Does it matter?”

Gen’l Leary: “I’ll check your file.”

Marek: Grunts. “I was dealing with a real creep. Some men, they sit behind a desk and they ruin the world. I layed low after that. I couldn’t let him see me, not after all that time we’d spent together. Sure I could change my face, but my body, my hands and my mannerisms—some things you can’t change and he knew those things. I knew he knew those things because I freaked him out. He memorized me. He’d be a fool not to.”

Gen’l Leary: “And how did you ‘lay low’?”

Marek: “The way I was taught. Head down. Nondescript place nearby the magistrate’s office. Follow him home. Learn about his wife and kids. His favorite taverns and his associates. What time he wakes up and the routes he takes to work. What he does in the rain. What he does on a nice day. What outhouses he prefers and where he likes to recreate. The problem was, there was none of that. He had no family. He did nothing. He visited his home once or twice a week and did nothing else in between. It gave me the chills.”

Gen’l Leary: Shakes head.

Marek: “I mean who lives like that? It was supernatural. I’ve seen the goblins and ghouls of this world enough to know that the magistrate ain’t human.”

Gen’l Leary: “That’s quite an accusation. I would say that’s even outlandish. How do you know he’s not tricking you?”

Marek: “How could he be tricking me? I followed him home from the office twice—him and his guards. But they never leave. As a guard we rotated shifts, nobody was ever watching him all the time, but now that I’ve seen it—watched him all the time—there’s no way he’s a human being. He disappears into his house and he comes back in a few hours, surrounded by guards who were waiting inside, I guess? I think he’s got a sigil in there.”

Gen’l Leary: “And you know where this house is?”

Marek: Nods.

Gen’l Leery: “And it’s not a body double, or anything?”

Marek: “No. He only leaves the office sparingly. If he’s using an actor or something that means he never leaves.”

Gen’l Leery: “Or he’s sneaking out in a way you don’t know.”

Marek: “I guarded that place for 2 months. He says 1 way in, 1 way out.”

Gen’l Leery: “That’s what he says, but…”

Marek: “I can’t argue with you about secret entrances. They usually get disclosed to the guards because a secret entrance isn’t foolproof. Based on my personal experience, it would be uncharacteristically foolish of the magistrate not to let the guard staff know. Maybe he excluded me, but that’s unlikely. Nobody likes surprises in that line of work. Get some of your goons to search his office.”

Gen’l Leery: “You know it’s not that simple… The magistrate is a city official—not Imperial. We’d risk our reputation if we were to hassle a man like that for no reason. Northfall is technically a city-state and…”

Marek: “Get whatever papers you need. Or take my word for it. But he’s not human.”

Gen’l Leery: “Sadly, Mr. Sing, I cannot adjourn this meeting with inconclusive evidence or next steps. Do you have any evidence to present at this time?”

Marek: “Just me word. But feel free to give me direction.” Laughs. “Next steps. I’ve been watching a ghost for the last 4 months.”

Gen’l Leery: “We can handle that on our end. Despite the circumstances of your employment, I do believe you are a good enough hunter of humanoids and trust your judgment. Learn what you can about the other detectives—the ones who dropped the case. There are 2 in the prison here. They didn’t share anything with us, but they might go easier on you.”

Marek: “I think they’ll just make fun of me. And it is kinda funny—going back to prison to avoid going back to prison.”

Gen’l Leery: “I’m only recommending this because I think they got further than you in the investigation. Those are hard men, Mr. Sing, harder than you know, and they all saw something that made prison better than being a probate detective. Learn what you can. Report that back to me and we will consider the next step taken, maintaining your parole.”

Marek: “Okay.”

Gen’l Leery: “You have 1 week. Plese continue with the regular conditions of your parole.”

Marek: “Thanks for the smokes.”

//stop



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TRANSCRIPT 2:
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[From the investigative journal of probate detective Marek Sing]

I saw a woman laying in shit on the way to the prison. Main street, market day, rainy as all fuck and she’s just laying there in shit. Mud. Refuse. Runoff. She didn’t even care, she held an emaciated dog in her arms. I guess that’s better than laying in shit alone.

Northfall Prison. Who were they to tell me I can’t kill in a war? That I can’t take what I need to survive. Yeah they fought back—no choice—but same here bud and I kill for a living. You’re a farmer. It ended as we knew it would. And nobody complains until the new regime. Only when the land is cleared for settlement do they question what it took. Who it took and what that did to them. So they call survival a war crime, and it was, and they put me in prison for it. But is there such a thing as a war crime when the war itself was a crime? I’m not a philosopher. If I was they might have given me a lighter sentence. But being here makes me sick because this is a sick place.

The first man is jittery. He was caught in the harbor trying to skip town. Why? I ask him. I was following a lead, he says. Bullshit, I say, trying to level with him. He takes that in and sits. I say nothing, hoping he’ll have a nervous breakthrough and start talking to me. Singing. He doesn’t. He says, I’m serious. He’s using a sigil and I was going South to speak with a wizard about how that could exist in a nondescript house in Northfall—it’s a big teleportation rock for fuck’s sake—you can’t drag that in overnight. You can’t use other sigils to get it there because they’re monitored. The Magistrate’s secret sigil existed before the town or he smuggled it in. I needed to ask a wizard which was more likely.

There are wizards in Northfall, I suggested, hoping to lead him closer to confessing. He answered, they might be in cahoots with the Magistrate. I’d put my own ass out to dry and then I’m gone. Can’t even hide in a jail and I’m pretty sure that’s better than being whacked. Even if you don’t know it’s coming. I don’t want to go out that way. Couldn’t bear it. I asked him why not. He says, dishonorable. I want to die standing up. Die aware. Die on my own terms even when that means suffering. Shit. I came close enough. I know it. And I believed him, there was a fire in his eyes. Me too. Yeah?

So really? Really, he tells me, he was really going to talk to a wizard in Raylon Harbor about sigils. There’s a teleportation specialist there. VERIFY THIS. I nod. He trusts me, he continues, but I was going to skip town after writing about my discovery. Or rather, sending General Leery what the wizard told me. That was enough of a contribution anyways. He’d be lucky to have that much. I agreed, he would. I think there’s a sigil in there too. I don’t think the magistrate is human. We understand each other. We’re on the same page.

The second man needed to be brought out in irons. He was reluctant. Taciturn. Why should I help you? Because, dipshit, I can put in a good word with the general who locked you up. Maybe knock 5 years off your sentence. He tells me he doesn’t want to leave. He tells me that’s it’s safer here and he’ll see me when I learn that. I tell him I’d kill myself before coming back here and he says, good. You don’t let go of this and you just might.

I just might.

//stop



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TRANSCRIPT 3:
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to be continued...