1 Ymiden 723 (yes, still)
continued from here
Oram stepped out into the soot-filled corridor outside his office and immediately noted the bloody footprints that hadn’t been there before. He immediately knew who must have left them. ”Dammit, Refed,” he muttered, feeling more disgust than anger. The eidisi must have left them when he came back to return the keys. After locking up his office, the hunter took a few moments to examine the prints. They were the only ones, he noted.
When he had arrived, he had noticed the blood pool and avoided it. So, apparently, had whichever Rangers had discovered and removed the Secretary’s body, which was no a trivial feat. Oram guessed that was Hop’s handiwork. The killer, too, had apparently avoided stepping in the blood and leaving any footprints, which only strengthened the hunter’s suspicion that the culprit was a veteran at this sort of work. That left poor, hapless, preoccupied Refed with the dubious honor of sole bloody-bootprint-leaver.
The lower floor was empty and quiet at the moment. The Rangers were apparently all outside eating. Oram followed them outside and went to the dining fly. Rangers generally liked eating outdoors when the weather was nice, so the fly and its adjoining field kitchen had already existed prior to the fire, although these were both considerably busier today than they would otherwise be. Among the throng of eaters Oram found Hop, who was sitting with some Rangers he guessed were the ones sent earlier to track and investigate. He also found Refed, and returned the secretary’s keys before rejoining Hop. Rosser Hopkin’s specialty was debriefing patrols, so Oram would want to sit in on that. For now, though, everyone was eating, so Oram grabbed some food as well. He found that he was quite hungry -not surprisingly, considering how busy the morning had been.
When he had finally eaten his fill, Hop and the trackers were already filing out for their debrief. A large pavilion for meetings had been staked out, but not yet erected, so Hop instead led the Rangers to a shaded, quiet spot next to the Headquarters, on the opposite side from the burnt stables. Oram trusted that Hop knew what he was doing, and as the older Ranger was the one who would have briefed the patrols before those had headed out, the Chief Ranger elected to observe rather than insert himself into the process, sitting in a spot where Hop could see him but the other Rangers would be unlikely to notice him.
Hop did his debriefs by the numbers, so there would be some preliminaries that Oram wasn’t necessarily interested in. While he waited these out, he noticed somebody approaching. Looking up, the Chief Ranger recognized Jim, who sidled up to Oram and took a seat. The hunter guessed, although he did not actually know, that Jim knew Common Sign, and so he signed: ”Hop told me you were in town,”
With a smirk, Jim signed back: ”Unable to confirm.”
Smartass the Chief Ranger thought. Instead, he signed: ”What have you been up to? And what have you found so far?” He tried to keep his expression and body language neutral, not wishing the questions to come across as accusations.
Whether he noticed the tone or not, Jim chose to take the questions at face value. ”Trying to find out what happened to Elliott” he responded. After a brief pause he added: ”No luck.” There was yet another pause. ”Body’s been moved. Doctor. Sawbones Shack.”
The two men exchanged a look letting them both realize that neither welcomed the news. Oram pondered their options. After a few moments, and a sigh, he signed unhappily: ”We wait and see. No other responsible options for now.”
Jim nodded his agreement. As unsavory a character as the Doctor was, it seemed unlikely that he would do anything untoward with the body, or lie about it in any way. With nothing else to be done on that issue, Oram turned his attention to the debrief, which was just starting in earnest.
