Chapter 3; Annoyingly Justified
Zonner wakes up to the sun blinding him. He groans as he shifts in his chair, moving his feet sending some books clattering off of his messy desk.
"Damn", he says, annoyance clear in his tone. He gets up and stretches, searching for a few satisfying pops.
Exhaling a sigh of release, he glances towards the window from where the sunlight bleeds into his office.
"Oh?" He comments as he notices a paper nestled into the nook between the pane and its border.
"There was that bird last night…" he recalled the raven he saw before he fell asleep as he walked towards the window.
He opens the window with little resistance and retrieves the letter, unfurling it with one hand with impressive dexterity.
"Don't be a threat don't be a threat don't be a threat", he repeats anxiously. This wouldn't be the first time he had gotten threatened. Zonner had gotten a threat before from some secret society earlier in his career when he was trying to expose the supernatural. Turns out people want the secretive world to be kept a secret.
Then there was another time when he was hunting a malicious transcendent and had been forced to back off due to the group backing him.
"Protection contract for a… Miss Lena?" Zonner read out loud confused. Why would he get a bodyguard contract? Important people in the supernatural community more often than not had groups backing them, and outside help would be unnecessary, especially since getting a transcendant's aid was expensive.
"Whoever's hiring me is definitely looking to use me as fodder or a meat shield…" Zonner concluded.
"But that would mean…" Zonner said to himself, "Something's gonna happen around this Lena person…"
Zonner read further down the letter. "Time and place; The Gala tomorrow…"
Reading that instantly dampened Zonner's mood. If something was bound to happen around Lena, that means something was going to happen at the gala.
"And Harrow's attending isn't he?" He says to himself rhetorically. Harrow was a capable person, the most capable person Zonner knew but he wasn't prepared to go against supernatural threats, especially since he didn't believe in them. Shooting a vampire in the skull wouldn't put it away.
Zonner turns the letter around and inspects the stamped sigil on the back. "Looks like this is a test…"
The sigil, or more accurately the coat of arms, told him that this was a request by an organization.
The coat of arms depicted a warped clock split in two with four arms, pointing at each number on the right except for four. The empty space on the left where the other half of the clock should be was instead filled by a coiling thorny vine on the top left and a ceramic simplified eye on the bottom left.
"I don't know about these guys", Zonner says as he studies the coat of arms with increased intensity.
Four was considered an unlucky number in most eastern cultures, so maybe the avoidance of it was to honor said culture, so maybe the origin of the organization this represents is also from the east. The clock obviously represents time, so the warping of it may represent control over it or belief that it's been twisted. The thorny coiling vine was interesting, it could be signifying a warning to not mess with time, but when seen with the eye which commonly represents wisdom, it could mean that knowledge of time could be harmful to the person. There was the dichotomy of the warped, unnatural time and the natural vine as well. The eye could represent intelligent life, the vine unthinking life, and time an unthinking unalive element.
There were many interpretations that could be derived from the symbol.
Zonner's eyes moved back to the warped clock.
The clock itself definitely pointed towards an affinity towards time, that was a certain fact.
"... That doesn't tell me much…" Zonner says with an annoyed quirk of his lips. "But, these guys are a newer organization since they used a modern clock instead of an hourglass or a sundial", Zonner deduces.
There isn't any text on the backside of the letter, so he turns it around again. There is a lot of unused space, and the request is written on the top, the middle area is left clear and the time and place is written at the bottom.
"More text will probably appear after I accept it…" he says before pocketing the letter.
"Like hell I'm just gonna take the job without getting a clearer picture", he says as he leaves his office.
He pauses just outside "... On second thought". He says as he heads back to use the restroom.
After finishing up his business he heads out. Almost instantly the crackle of city life fills his ears, "The gala's a high profile event so the people attending it are gonna be influential. Miss Lena, Miss means she's unmarried, which means she's gonna be young, hopefully" Zonner concluded as he walked through the street, ignoring the bustle of the lively city.
He walks shoulder to shoulder with a lot of people, the talking place packed, when suddenly
"THUMP!"
Zonner bumps into an older looking gentleman. "Apologies Mister", he says quickly, hoping for the man to move on.
With a closer look, he sees a frown forming on the man's bearded face. Before the older man can berate him, Zonner speaks first. "Could I have the time please?" He asks politely.
The man pauses, closing his slightly open mouth as he looks at his wrist. "It's a quarter past seven", the man answers, his voice sounding posh.
"Much obliged", Zonner says, patting him on the shoulder as he moves past him.
Since politeness was ingrained in society, asking for the time caused people to instinctively give it. It was a pretty neat trick to stop people from talking.
Zonner had needed the time anyway, he had to see if the library was open. He could go there and check public records or peerage books. He didn't have a last name but he did have her marital status.
Zonner slows his pace, "Actually, I'll ask around the newspaper office first". Asking reporters would be quicker, the invitation list for the ball could've leaked by now.
Zonner switches direction and starts going left towards the paper office.
He enjoys the view of the city, noting the good mood the people are in. The cause of that would most definitely be creation of more jobs, manning the new locomotives, assembling the new machines and operating new equipment.
"Here we are…" Zonner says as he looks upon the building he was headed towards. It's a four story building with three arched windows presumably on each side. The front door has a sign posted above it, "The Daily Post", it reads.
Zonner enters through the already open door. He hears screaming from the upper floors, arguing and cursing flying about.
He walks to the front desk, "lively place", he comments, his face already curled into a charming smirk.
"Too lively for my liking, feels like someone's been throwing rocks at my damn head", the fat man at the desk comments, rubbing his forehead. He looks up at Zonner, "What can I do you for?" The man questions with an accent.
"You from the west?" Zonner questions, noticing the man's curious way of speaking.
"Yeah, my pops decided I wasn't gonna waste my time shoveling pig shit, so he sent me here", the man says, a perpetual annoyance present on his face.
"Sounds like a right man", Zonner says, leaning on the desk now. "Alright guy", the fat man responds, scratching the side of his face.
"What's your name by the way?" Zonner questions. It was always good to form a personal connection before asking for anything.
"Mitch, what 'bout you?" Mitch answers, moving slightly in his chair causing it to groan.
"Zonner, at your service", Zonner says with a bit of flair.
"Pleasure", Mitch says simply as he reaches his hand out for a shake.
Zonner accepts and reciprocates with a firm grip.
"Now Mitch, did you guys do any publications about the gala that's happening the day after tomorrow?" Zonner questions, retracting his hand.
"Yeah, we did release an announcement about it. It's to celebrate the duke's daughter getting married", Mitch explains, a bored expression on his face.
"Any clue who's going?" Zonner probes. It was better to build up to the main request rather than to just ask straight up.
"Basically everyone, no one wants to get on the duke's bad side, no point to", Mitch answers honestly.
"Anyone named Lena?" Zonner inquires.
"Lena…" The tubby man says out loud thoughtfully. "That's… the Duke's younger daughter"
The paranormal investigator makes a choked noise, "How old would she be?" He questions, a bead of sweat falling from his forehead.
"She'd be… around twenty - twenty two" Mitch answers. A sly grin forms on his face, "Why? Looking to get lucky?" He says suggestively.
Zonner palms his face, "if anything my lucks on the down…" he grumbles. He wipes away the sweat forming on his forehead and asks the next big question. "Anyone else influential named Lena?" The now disgruntled man questions further. He would've asked if she was unmarried, but Mitch's comment already cemented that.
"Shared names in the aristocracy are rare, the only Lena I know of is Lena Whittaker, younger daughter of Duke Whittaker", Mitchell says flippantly, leaning back in his chair.
Zonner lets out an acknowledging hum. He tries recalling everything he knows about the Duke.
Duke Leon Whittaker is the Duke of Norsted and is around forty years of age. The Whittaker family has been around a long time, long enough to have a grasp on the supernatural. That fact only made the decision of hiring him more strange, and cemented Zonner's theory about this being some sort of recruitment test for him.
Maybe the young Miss Lena was trying to establish a new order to strengthen the position of the Whittaker Dukedom in the transcendent community. He would have to meet the young noble before he could come to a solid conclusion about her involvement.
Zonner reaches into his pocket, retrieving a few bills, "Thanks Mitch, good talk".
Mitch pockets the bills with a satisfied look, "Nice chat indeed, swing by again if yer bored!" He calls out as Zonner walks away.
The man with the fair complexion just waves his hand as he heads out the already open door.
Zonner looks to the side, before lamenting his situation. His situation wasn't exactly normal, which is why the interest of the party that sent the contract was annoyingly enough, justified.
Most transcendents are born into old and powerful orders, and most of their knowledge is focused around one or more adjacent paths. This made resource management very harsh since almost everyone needed the same stuff. They could have either quality or quantity in the form of transcendents.
Transcendent descendants are always more aligned with the path of their parents, so going for a different path would often be dangerous.
So someone like Zonner, who not only had potential to become a transcendent which was also a factor, not everybody could become a transcendent, but also had a trace of a divine bloodline was fresh and very delicious meat for these orders.
Zonner sighs and gets to walking. All of that was currently beside the point, he had to investigate any incidents which were related to the Whittaker family in recent and old times, so that he could get some sort of idea what he would be dealing with at the gala.
"About that actually–", Zonner says as he pulls out the letter. "I accept!" He says out loud.