A Murder, Inc.: Volume 1 Read online

  Schlin sends dead glares at her, but she just stares calmly. Deciding to be smart, the woman complies. “Yes. Good girl. Now here’s some water to wash it down.” Vira hands her a glass of turbid water. At this point, Schlin would do just about anything. The moment the liquid touch her lips, though, she begins coughing in a fit.

  “Ups, sorry. It seems like I gave you a corpse’ juice instead. But it should do, should it? You are, after all, a hija de puta.”

  She is too tired to clean up her utensils. Considering where they have just been, she thinks she would just have to replace them altogether. Tomorrow night, she will just use the same disinfect tools on them.

  Turning off the lights, she turns to them one last time. “Buenas noches, abominaciones.”

  Uninvited

  03:16 pm

  Cynfael Mansion, Manhattan, New York

  “Your Lady, a visitor named Mr. Auberon Hildegard is here to see you,” her butler, Jason, announces in a monotone voice one evening. If Vira is not trained, she would have choked on her Thai Milk Tea.

  “Send him in,” she tells him. The butler strides back out and comes back in five minutes, Auberon tailing behind him this time.

  Now that the lighting is better, she can see why her cousin hangs out with him. His looks are obviously above standard, making him the perfect new conquest. The person standing in front of her is even more exquisite that the photo. He has short dark hair, deep blue eyes and pink lips. She wonders how long Aramis is planning to play friend before he ends the guy.

  “Hello, I don’t believe we’ve met,” Vira greets him with a smile, putting her friendly mask on. That is code for: I don’t know if he knows who I am or not, so let’s just play it cool. She extends a hand and he gladly takes it. “Vira Cynfael.”

  “Hi, m’name’s Auberon, but you can call me Beron. I’m a friend of Aramis, who I believe is your cousin. He is, isn’t he?” She nods. “I’m a little bit concern about him. Been skipping school for a couple of days now without any words. I tried to contact him, but the call always went straight to voicemail. I was wondering if you know what might have happened to him.”

  “Aramis is missing? My, I have no idea. Please take a sit. Would you like something to drink, though?”

  He seems to be surprised by my carefree reaction. “A-are you sure?” he asks as he places himself on the couch across from mine. “Whatever you’re having is fine.”

  I signal for Jason. He nods and makes his exit towards the kitchen.

  “Yes. But you see, I am not really that close to him, so this is news to me. What do you know of his disappearance, though? Have you even check his place, yet?”

  “I did, but there was no sign of him anywhere. If I had known, I would be here in the first place. I thought you might have some ideas of where he might be, but I guess I am wrong.” Is that sadness she detects coming from him?

  “Don’t worry. I’m sure that he’ll be fine.”

  “How can you know? It’s not like him to just disappear without a trace. I…. I suspect that he might be missing.”

  “If you really think that he’s missing, then why did you come to me? You could have made a report to the police by yourself.”

  “I did want to do it, but I think that there’s something bigger out there. Two days ago, someone asked about him at school.”

  “And what did you tell him?”

  “It’s a she, and I only told her what she wanted to know. When was the last time I saw him, what did we do before he disappeared. You know? Stuff like that.” Vira notices how the boy is fighting the blush that is creeping on his cheeks.

  With a knock, Jason walks in carrying a tray of Thai Milk Tea. He pours some for Beron, and the boy thanks him. He takes a sip, and his eyes widen in surprised delight.

  “Never tasted it before?”

  He shakes his head. “It’s really good. What is it?”

  “Thailand Milk Tea,” she replies, taking a sip as well. “Anyway, do you know who she is?”

  “Who?”

  “The person you asked you about Aramis. Do you know her?”

  “Never seen her before. No, actually, I wasn’t sure who it was. It was quite dark, so I didn’t get a good look at her. All I know is that she wore white shirt that day.”

  “Day? Not night? Why was it dark enough that you couldn’t get a good look at her?” Vira sounds curious, as if she didn’t know the answer to that question.

  “S-she,” Beron is trying really hard to control the blush on his face.“She brought me into the janitor’s closet. To interrogate me discreetly, I guess.”

  “Interrogate? Discreetly? Is that so? Nothing else happened?” Now she’s just teasing him.

  “That’s not the point here!” he snaps, causing Jason to tsk disapprovingly.

  “So, what else did you notice about her?” When Beron throws her a confused look, she elaborates, “Like her accent? Or scent? There shouldn’t be a lot of room to move around in there, should it? I’m sure’d at least notice it.”

  “Accent? I don’t think so. But her scent…. Now that you mention it, she doesn’t smell like anything at all. It’s strange, don’t you think?”

  “Yes, very strange,” she mumbles. It appears to be that her secret will remain safe. The question now is, what will she do with him? He seems to be infuriated with her after her ‘questioning’. Maybe she should fix this. Won’t want to get in her cousin’s way, after all. “You know what, I think I have something that we can use to find Aramis.”

  “Really?” Beron’s eyes lid up by that.

  “Yeah. Come with me. It’s in the basement.” That’s code for Jason to lock all exit.

  Victims

  03:45 pm

  Murder, Inc. Headquarter, underneath Cynfael Mansion

  Auberon is curious to see what type of device that will help them find his friend. That is, if it is even a device at all. Perhaps Vira has some sort of information of where he can possibly be?

  They have an elevator that is big enough to fit in beds. Button ‘B5’ is pressed. A blue projector comes to life and starts scanning Vira from head to toe. A beeping sound is head once it’s confirm her presents. But when it tries to scan him, the machine suddenly goes haywire. Uh-oh.

  ‘Intruder detected,’ it says robotically. Followed by that is small door sliding open, unfolding a gun aiming at the boy. Auberon jumps in panic, but Vira steps in to block the shooting range before the trigger is pulled.

  “Override as a guess,” she orders it quickly. And just like that, the gun and alarm sound disperse.

  “Sorry about that,” she apologies, sounding very sincere. “I forgot that we have that in our system. We don’t usually bring outsiders here.”

  When they arrive there the basement is dark, but the light has auto switch on. What Beron sees next, however, makes him collapse in shock.

  “Civilian,” Vira mumbles disapprovingly, dropping her ‘friendly’ act altogether. She steps over his body and walks towards her victims. “Good evening, ugly and uglier. How’s your day so far? Hungry? Sorry, but I’m afraid I don’t bring any food with me. I guess you two just have to revert to eating each other. Whichever part I choose to cut out today, I bet it can’t be any worse than the last time.”

  She proceeds on trying Auberon to a chair, which is placed right across from her victims. Then, she moves on to the changing room and walks out wearing a new set of operating uniform. She grabs on the kitchen knife from yesterday and approaches one of the operating tables.

  “Let’s see. Today we’re going to make a fillet o’ Schlin and brows de Hecate. Sounds good, don’t you think?” They reply by muffling some curses back at her. And to think that after yesterday, they poor weak souls would have been ripped apart already.

  Vira starts by making diagonal cuts at the side of Schlin’s body, starting from the start of her breast and down to her waistline. Then she does the same thing to her other side. The whore screams all the way.

  For the old man
, she cuts off his 24/7 angry eyebrows off of his face and forces him to eat every single bits of it, just like the last time. When she’s done, she has them with more blood pouring out.

  She sets down her knife just in time for Auberon to gain his consciousness. He appears disorientated at first, but after a couple of blinking it all comes back to him like a rapid nightmare.

  His breathing starts to build up. Sweat is forming on his forehead. His eyes locked at the scenery in horror. Then, when she thinks that he is about to pass out again, he screams.

  “Aaaahhhh!!! W-what the hell! D-did you do all of this? What is wrong with you?!”

  Vira leans in the table, her friendly smile turns into a dark one. “These two appears to be involved in Aramis missing. I thought that if you really want to help find him, you would want to ask them yourself.” Then she circles around the operating tables to walk towards Beron. “I mean, I would do it myself. But you see, the down fall is that they aren’t capable of talk to me without cursing in every single word they utter. They are quite delusional and illogical even before they got to this stage, you see. So, how about it? Do you want to try your luck?”

  “Hell… I think I’m gonna be sick.” He is fighting from bile to rise up.

  “I take that as a ‘no’, then.”

  “J-just who the hell do you think you are? How could you do this? Don’t you think you’ve gone a bit overboard?” There’s something building up in that eyes of his, and she doesn’t like the way it looks.

  “Close your eyes before you regret it, boy,” she commands in a dangerous tone. “And no, I don’t think so. I am Vira Cynfael, and these are my enemies. Have been so in the last ten years. They’ve gone under radar for a while, but now I got a chance to inflict my vengeance. Torturing answers out of them is just a plus. I don’t expect them to talk so soon, though. They are, after all, ex members of the mob.”

  He flinches at her, but then he realizes something. “That voice…. You’re her, aren’t you? The one who dragged me in the closet.”

  “Bingo. Ten points to Gryffindor.”

  “This is so sick! Why did you do this?” he asks in a frantic. Yes, she can see the fear in his eyes. He knows that she’s extremely dangerous and will do just about anything to get what she wants.

  “You seem like a good boy, Auberon. Why don’t you help me find my cousin? I happen to have new leads on Aramis. You want to save him, don’t you?”

  “I’m not gonna help you!”

  Vira sits herself on his lap. “No? That’s too bad. Then I guess I’ll just have to kill you.” As quick as lightning, her hand grabs on the front of his jean, staining it with blood everywhere. Auberon wails, disgusted and excited at the same time. Even in this condition, his body is still out of control.

  Just like in the janitor’s closet, she handjobs his hard on. Starts form the head, and then towards his length. The longer she touches him, the more the front of his jeans feels constricted. No, he can’t do this. Not when they are watching them. He won’t let it happen—

  Her hand stops moving. Auberon looks down and realizes why. He has come in his pants. And while his brain tells him no, his body finds her very appealing. Even with all that blood presence.

  Clues

  07:21 pm

  Vira’s bedroom, Manhattan

  She has been keeping ugly and uglier long enough in her headquarter. It is about time that she takes out those trash.

  Today also marks the third day that Aramis has been missing, and she still hasn’t come up with a better lead ever since she found Hecate and Schlin.

  Her victims usually would have pilled anything she wants to hear at this point. But they are different. She has to think of this case in a new perspective. What if they really don’t know anything about Aramis’ disappearance? What if they were trapped? After all, Vira must admit that it’s quite surprising why the two came up under the radar again after having gone for so long.

  If her new suspicion is correct, then that means the real culprit must have intentionally misled her to them. And for what purpose? Finding them again has come to her advantage. She has been itching to slice them to pieces ever since the moment they opened their disgusting mouths….

  Perhaps that is why. The real culprit knows that she hates them. Knows that she will take her sweet time in torturing them. And while she is busy with them, he or she has enough time with Aramis, with whatever they want to do to him.

  “Sin kopile!” she curses in Serbian. She’s been careless and underestimating the kidnapper. And look how much time has lose.

  Okay, get it together, Vira. You have to finish this chase soon. Who knows what kind of hell Aramis’ been through.

  And to get things really done, she knows that her ability in computing will not suffice. She has to ask for help.

  So she picks up her phone and dial her contact. She tries to call, but the tone keeps on ringing. She tries the second time, but the result is still the same. Finally, her call goes through when she calls for the third time.

  “….annyeonghaseyo,” the male voice from the other line says sleepily.

  “It’s me. I need your help, Ileong,” she says urgently.

  There is a pause. Then, “Do you have any idea what time it is here?”

  “Eight in the morning. It’s not that early.”

  “Well, it is, for some of us. Now what do you want?” he asks, sounding pissed.

  “Aramis is missing. I need you to hack into an email account and get me anything you can find from it. I will also send you a map with possible locations on where he was gone from,” Vira begins typing furiously before pressing the send button. “Check your inbox.”

  “I’m looking through it right now,” he replies absentmindedly, though sounding more awake right now. “The owner of the email account is located in Seattle, oh wait! Oh no….”

  “What it is?” she asks.

  “It’s from our old school. It was registered from the library.”

  St. Magoc?

  “What else can you find?”

  “Other than the fact that someone created a whole new domain just to make this one mailing account? The person could either be a school staff or a student—”

  “Or ex-staff or alumni,” she quickly added.

  “—that has a grudge on him. But considering how low profile Aramis is, I don’t think he is really targeting your cousin.”

  “He? He? How can you cross out half of our suspect list by using that referral?” Vira reacts hotly.

  “Hold your horses. Let’s not jump to any conclusions. I’m just being practical here. Yes, it can be a female, but let’s just think about this throughly. Who in their right mind would want to cross you when they entire school knows you destroyed it just because you were pissed at its system?”

  There is only one name that can come up to their mind, and it’s—

  “Xenos,” they say at the same time.

  But he’s dead. She killed him, along with the rest of the student body who stood in her way of collapsing St. Magoc. There shouldn’t even be a school left on that ground for that email account to be created. And yet there it was, the proof. So what’s exactly going on?

  “Yep, I double-checked it. The source was St. Magoc, alright,” Ileong confirms. “And guess what? Check the school website.” Vira does as he says, and finds a surprising from the search engine.

  It’s up. The school website is up. It shouldn’t be there, though, since the school closed years ago. The website would have expired, considering that no one else alive was around to pay for the annual bills. Then why it is there? Vira clicks the link and it directs her to a brand new page. In there, it says that the school has been reopened since a year ago.

  “W-who….” she finds herself shuttering.

  “It’s him. He owns the school now,” Ileong explains. “And look, he brought back the caste system to the school. I can’t believe parents are signing their children up to this place.”

  The caste
system used be to an unspoken rule for the school. This time, the school advertises its regulation openly.

  Reunion

  11:06 am

  Seattle Airport

  “You’re so, so, so…. like a girl!” Vira exclaims in widen eyes. How can she not? The small Korean boy that she knew is now standing in front of her at her height. His natural black hair is now bleached in a strawberry blond color, grown to the length of his shoulders. Strangers passing by would have thought that he’s a she!

  “Hello to you too, Vira. I see that you’re still as blunt as ever.” The way he talks is still very formal, which is probably the only thing that’s still not change about him. His tone of voice is much more masculine compared to five years ago. The moment he opens his mouth, though, passersby begin to throw strange looks at his direction.

  They have agreed to meet in Seattle the morning before. Vira took her time in packaging her private jet with her new Porche and various other weapons as Ileong took his time flying from East to West. And here they are.

  She opens her mouth to say something, but the worse lost the moment she chooses to speak. She tries again, but she so sure that she can’t speak to him without making an unintentional insult, that she just has to give up.

  “I am at a lost of words. Really, really lost.” She also tries not to stare when its possible, but the moment she decides on doing just that, she knows that he’ll know what she’s thinking.

  Unaffected by her reaction, Ileong just smiles and throws his hand open. “How about a hug?”

  Vira closes the distance between them with two short stride. He smells like roses. That’s the first thing she realizes when he wraps his arms around her, pulling her into a hug. His body has also become slightly firmer, though not even close to Aramis’.

  Aramis. The name makes her mind jumble between a panic attack and headache. She just hope that he is still alive. Not even God will know what malice she will do if he’s not.

  “Ileong, I do hope that it’s just wallet poking against my tight, instead of what I think it is,” Vira breaks the silence between them.