Vignette: An Executive

Muralis » Zone II » Vignette: An Executive http://www.muralis.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=gz2&action=display&thread=99

Vignette: An Executive Post by Saint-Just on Oct 6, 2011, 10:58pm

"Dead?"

"Very much so, ma'am."

"The cause?"

"A pistol shot delivered between the agent's eyes, at point-blank range. No projectile could be retrieved but the entry hole suggests a dueling pistol. Atypical, judging by the curious scarring radiating from the entry point. Additional damage at the abdomen, presumably from a knife or similar sharp item of such length."

"The contents of his bag?"

"Absent."

"Right then."

The purposeful scratching of a pen against fine paper filled the cramped chamber for a time, two women absorbed in their separate affairs. The fresher of the two, lanky and unnaturally pale in a fashion denoting illness in the weak lamplight, her mind wholly fixed upon the corpse she had retrieved. It was her first such experience, as may be expected in these comparatively civilized times. Corpses are not common in the frigid streets of Ghalea, after all. Across a neat desk, plainly designed, perched a slightly older woman peering intently through miniscule silver spectacles at the convoluted forms arrayed imposingly before her. This was a common practice relegated to the lower rung of Kurtz executives, intended to create some semblance of order even when an agent of the company is found in a frozen pool of his own fluids. The bespectacled scribe was fully aware that such a task should rightly have fallen upon her less experienced associate, yet the trauma of her macabre discovery seemed to have addled her senses a touch, prompting the assistance of her senior.

This was not Marisa Ronove's first Unscheduled Personnel Termination, referred to as a UPT. She had been with the Kurtz Corporation for nigh on fifteen years, in which she had witnessed the highly unfortunate Monte Cristo affair which had claimed the lives of no less than ninety-three registered employees. A third of the requisite UPT's had fallen upon her, giving Marisa the gruesome task of inspecting each body and describing their condition in detail. The bulk had succumbed to the pressure caused by an external breach, resulting in a bevy of ruptured organs and capillaries. More interesting were the handful of terribly disfigured scientists discovered in a pile in a shaded corner of a storage room, each gnawed and lacerated in a manner that troubled Marisa to this day. Not that it was legitimately a matter meriting her concern. The expeditious and discrete manner in which she had gone about her duties had secured an enviable promotion, with another soon to follow.

Regrettably, Marisa had also been rendered the resident authority on the subject of UPT's as a result of the circumstances of her ascendancy. She did not mind; Kurtz was ever eager to reward executives able to provide answers where none could reasonably be expected. Having ready access to a host of questions, this had become Marisa's forte. Even now her mind furiously assaulted the quickly forming mystery. The employment file of the deceased agent identified him as one T. Finch, a gentleman Marisa recalled meeting at a corporate function perhaps a year prior. Was his name Teddy? Timothy seemed more fitting. Poor Timothy... such is life, she mused. He had been assigned to "identify potential areas of loss and reduce potency of risks." Marisa had seen this before, the remembrance acute. A G. Redmore, deceased in her fifth year, had the same job description. From a confidant of the higher-ups she had learned that this was a particularly misleading way of stating "assassin." Such individuals were routinely employed in the interest of removing selected targets that posed a threat to the Kurtz corporate machine. These actions were generally overlooked by law-enforcement agencies by way generous grants in the interest of "enforcing an orderly society."

In short, someone had assassinated their assassin, and this did not amuse the company. This was abnormal, to say the least. Redmore had been mauled by canopy tigers while investigating an unregistered logging camp. Yet Finch, a more able individual in most respects, had been deftly overcome at close range. This made it clear that Finch had either blown his cover and been ambushed or, most uncharacteristically, he had elected to speak with his mark instead of terminating the individual from a distance as protocol surely demanded. Finch's record showed him to be a consummate professional, casting a great deal of doubt upon the latter. Who, then, had he been hunting? To prevent legal ramifications, no physical records were kept of such assignments; agents were briefed directly by the administrative board. Was she to travel to Durant in order to interrogate ill-tempered bureaucrats, then? Too much suspicion would aroused.

Passing the completed UPT impatiently to the jittery creature opposite her, Marisa curtly gestured for the girl to leave as she gathered a collection of writing supplies from the drawings. Scrawling a quick note enquiring into the identities of the residents of the neighborhood in which the shooting took place, she subtly tossed it into an engraved iron basin adjacent to her seat, hidden from visitors by the desk. This device, though mundane in appearance, was a moderately recent development in the field of integrative technologies. By inserting a small runed pearl into a node in the basin's rim, the contents would be swiftly incinerated and reassembled in the basin corresponding to said pearl, regardless of distance. Naturally, the cost was something of a setback in expansion of the system, as well as the troublesome matter of keeping track of one's pearls. Marisa, being of the upper class and possessing an extraordinarily organized nature, had no such difficulties. Placing the golden pearl in the node with a satisfying click, she ignored the ensuing blaze as she hastily scribbled out two more copies of the note, repeating the transmission accordingly.

Even as the sparks died away and the third paper faded, a new note had materialized in the ashes to the accompaniment of a warm breeze. Eagerly seizing it, Marisa sighed in irritation at the contents.

"The information you have requested is a matter of public record. For a list of residents, please apply to the department of private holdings."

This was unsigned, though Marisa was well-aware that it was a response to her second letter. She was not particularly surprised; this was a typical corporate dismissal of which the higher-ups were so fond. Consigning it to the rubbish bin, she calmly sipped her coffee. Though tea had become the fashionable beverage, taking after the ever-fashionable Durantians, Marisa and a handful of similarly beleaguered workers had remained loyal to the invigorating graces of Kelsmic coffee. She would sometimes deviate from her norm, sampling the spiced black teas of the Grantz clansmen, which served as a tolerable compromise.

Considering fetching said tea, Marisa's attention returned to the basin in which fluttered a note housed by a plain white envelope. Recognizing it as belonging to Archivist Guillame of the previously mentioned department of private holdings, her cold eyes, large and curved, narrowed in concentration. Unlike many of Carmagh's children, Marisa had inherited the green eyes of her Ghalean father, creating a fine contrast with her mother's golden skin. Her father had also passed along his curious hair, a species of blonde verging on white, light permitting. Practicality and vanity clashed playfully in the character of the executive, her hair worn in a loose bun at the base of her neck yet forming artfully arranged bangs over her smooth forehead. It was difficult to classify her as "pretty" or "handsome," for she possessed both qualities yet seemed intent upon emphasizing neither. Her jaw was perhaps too prominent, as is often the case in Ghaleans, though it was offset by high, delicate cheekbones. In spite of this, she left an impression of rounded symmetry, a sort of perfection tempered in fierce defiance.

Guillame's correspondence was a great deal more informative than that of the unnamed executive. He listed, in some detail, every individual known to be residing in the area identified as Calham Court. It was part of the upper class section of town, though the entire Ghalean capital was, in fact, a uniformly affluent area. Calham Court was admittedly on the lower end of the spectrum where the so-called Noble Cloister, a collection of housing clusters on the northward extremity of the city, was concerned. While still excessively large and ornate, the seven houses of Calham were less so. Marisa was familiar with two of the households, one consisting of a Kurtz researcher named Hydeman and his servant, the other being that of the Grayson family. The patriarch, Jin, was an old friend of Marisa's from her Monte Cristo days. He had retired after losing an arm in the ordeal, working from time to time as a private consultant. His wife had left him some years prior, though he had retained custody of the two daughters. The other five households were unremarkable, three being typical Kurtz families, one an empty property owned by a Godrite gentleman, and the last owned and utilized collectively by a handful of university scholars.. None of these stood out as likely investigation targets or, for that matter, capable killers. The former seemed to Marisa to be a greater issue by far. The foreigner was a clear red flag, of course, but it was quickly recollected that the party in question had only been present in the capital for the purchase of the property, returning home immediately after. To her knowledge, the structure was intended to be an investment. A note at the letter's bottom indicated that squatters helped themselves to the shelter provided at several points in the past, but this had ceased to be a problem with the introduction of a security array.

Considering Guillame's knowledge a dead end, Marisa rested her elbows upon the desk. The third letter had not been returned... she had, perhaps, been given unrealistic expectations by the promptitude of the company men, a label in no way applicable to the recipient of the third. Perhaps he was busy. Perhaps she wouldn't hear back for months. Sighing in frustration, she gently massaged her temples. There was nothing else for it... she needed to take to the streets. That was what driven people did when, having exhausted all generic avenues, information was still lacking, right? Nodding sharply to herself, she stood. She nodded again. And she left.