. 11-14

Welcome to another episode of A Pearl Before Swine! Act One is beginning to take shape, so let the debauchery commence. Part 4 is a staging ground for the massive finale. I plan on writing Act Two soon, but I might detour to a side story or two.

Table of Contents

ACT ONE: Rising Tides

Prologue: Moonlit Jellies on a Restful Night

Chapter 1: A Ray of Sunshine

Chapter 2: It Stirs

Chapter 3: A Day of Confusion

Chapter 4: Tracks Revealed on a Peaceful Evening

Chapter 5: It Beckons

Chapter 6: A Search for Meaning

Chapter 7: Hypnotic Dances on a Hidden Stage

Chapter 8: A Descent to Despair

Chapter 9: It Searches

Chapter 10: Hazy Dreams on a Lucid Tide

Part 4: (You are here)

Chapter 11: It Speaks

Chapter 12: A Rite of Passage

Chapter 13: It Plots

Chapter 14: Dark Secrets on a Twisted Path

Part 5: (Coming up)

Chapter 15: A Day of Revelation

Chapter 16: It Stirs

Chapter 17: It Rises

Chapter 18: A City Before Swine (Act One Finale)

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Chapter 11: It Speaks

The room was shrouded in more than just darkness. Fear and paranoia hung on the still atmosphere like an oppressive weight. There were no conversations, no arguments, no breaths taken. Nothing but fearful anticipation filled the seats. At last the lady on the high desk spoke.

"We know you all are aware of the incident. Tonight you will learn what we know and what we will do about it." The room was silent, and even in the darkness, every pair of eyes could be seen riveted on the dark speaker. She continued, "at one-thirty yesterday afternoon, there was a breach. One of our ... facilities was compromised momentarily, and an experimental subject escaped. It has since been contained after causing some small amount of damage."

"Small?? That thing leveled a building!" a voice cried out from the crowd. Another chimed in "We've been exposed!" The pent up anxiety unleashed itself as arguments broke out around the meeting.

Angler 3 smiled softly at the misguided chaos. Angler Leader was loathe to leave her prisoners, but the meeting was certainly important enough to warrant it. Angler 2 had been left behind to keep guard while 1 and 3 tried to get some semblance of direction from the higher ups. The Leader was spitting something about "under control, my ass" to several attending businessmen who were clearly out of the loop.

The lady on the desk clapped, and her voice silenced all conversation. "We are not exposed. The authorities suspect nothing. Our contacts in the police department have smoothed out all the remaining questions while the correct story gets woven. IT IS BEING HANDLED."

"What about the prisoners?" yelled out Angler Leader. "I have one-hundred and forty-five pairs of eyes that have seen too much. We should have killed them at the scene if they needed to be silenced. Now we can't hide the fact that there was more involved than some isolated disaster!" Several voices murmured their agreement.

"The prisoners are an issue" the lady answered. "Perhaps it would be best if we had a scapegoat. Maybe some terrorist cell acting independently. They could be arrested for association with the chemical explosion in the fashion sector, and for kidnapping and imprisoning several dozen citizens." The silhouette of her head tilted knowingly at the audience.

Angler Leader stood frozen for a second before her voice returned with an almost desperate fury. "The Anglers have served this organization faithfully for years" she seethed. "We are you eyes and ears."

"One of many" the lady replied unemotionally.

"You ... you cant do this" Angler Leader sputtered. "I won't let you" she muttered unconvincingly. It was perhaps only in this very room that she would not have the guts to spit her usual venomous berations. For the first time, Angler 3 saw his superior as something other than the biggest fish on the food chain. Her legendary arrogance and command had dominated all other facets of her life. She sat back down in a furious silence, and Angler 3 noted her staring longingly at the desk. She was SO CLOSE to sitting there. One more successful operation and her promotion seemed guaranteed. It all fell crashing down upon her ears in a second.

"You will continue to monitor the prisoners, and in due time, the police will be led to you. You will stick to the story VERY EXPLICITY, and do your part for the organization." The lady on the dias continued to expand on their newfound plan. "If you are truly faithful, you will do what you are told, and will be rewarded accordingly in the glorious future to come." The silhouette leaned in threateningly. "And if you betray us, you will become useful to us in other ways."

The threat hung loomingly in the already crowded air. Angler 3 could feel the ropes encircling his ambitions, and in a spur of inspiration, he broke the status quo to speak.

"If I may offer a proposition" he yelled. All eyes turned to him, and the room hung in a delicate balance. If the next words out of his mouth did not impress them, he would have turned a dire situation into a disaster for speaking out of line with his status. "Let us unleash the beast again. The chaos will cause even greater pressures, but it will also muddy the waters for those who sense a greater game at play. Give us the resources to ensure our story is good. It will take significant efforts in infiltration, espionage, and petty crime to ensure that the paper and electronic trail of our new terrorist organization looks convincing."

"And who would lead these efforts. You?" the voice from the desk spoke.

Angler 3 smiled a merciless grin. "Who better? Who has the resume and the motivation?" He glanced at Angler Leader still sitting shocked in her chair. He knew he was burning bridges, but he saw one last treacherous path to saving himself from the situation.

After some silent conference, the lady raised her voice again. "Very well. Your reputation is more well-known than even you realize. Your recent endeavors have been quite impressive to us. You are now named Angler Leader. Do not fail us." The unspoken "or else" rang louder than the morning temple bells.

The new Angler Leader turned to see realization had dawned on his former superior. The new Angler 3 looked mutinously back at his smiling eyes. She abruptly stood and stormed out of the room. Across the room the snarky sneer still etched in Karl Killcreek's face seemed almost approving. His eyes appraised this new player to the game.

The buzz of recent developments did not last long. The lady once again launched into a speech -- no, orders -- for the rest of the organization. The room began to grumble then prickle at the instructions. No illicit activities? No communication of any kind. The sudden halt of all their operations? The forfeiture of all their current assets to the central figures of power to hide properly? Their businesses and ambitions would be crushed in a single stroke. They were to remain underground until called upon again.

"Its too far! We can survive this!" cried one voice in the crowd. Nearly unanimously, the attendants began to rise to their feet to voice their displeasure or bicker amongst each other. Even the lady on the desk could not quell the rising tide of anger.

The man in a Business Suit moved to the center of the stage to corral support. "This is unacceptable! We will hide, but hide OUR way. This blatant attempt to use a crisis for the purposes of exploiting us will go NO FURTHER!" The crowd began to yell their approval, and the mob began to advance to center stage in a frenzy.

Then the voice spoke.

It was not a special voice, but when he spoke the room fell silent. His voice was soft and peaceful. Angler 3 had no idea how anyone had heard it above the violent din. It was an ordinary voice all things considered. It didn't sound very old or deep, and it would have been hard to pick out of a crowd. But it was the WAY it was spoken that captivated all attention. The voice was rather slow with many pauses. The strange phrasings sounded poetic, and the rhythm and inflections seemed to create a hypnotic melody.

"You all -- it seems ... have left your faith behind you."

"You are -- I think ... forgetting where you stand."

"For here -- entombed ... our purpose grows ever greater"

"Lest you and I ... see what is nigh ... and set the world asunder."

Chills broke out, and the entire room stood frozen in subjugation. The voice came from the throne. The crowd slowly melted, and not one voice rose in opposition. The least powerful or intimidating voice Angler Leader had ever heard, set a presence that dwarfed the entire room. Even Killcreek filed out of the room without so much as a peep. His planned display of a broken heroine left the room quietly along with his contingent.

The meeting was over. The least compliant grouping of powerful independent figures in the city fell into complete compliance without one further word. Several officers received briefings on their next steps, but Angler Leader could barely manage more than a nod at his instructions.

Back at the abandoned apartment complex, Angler Leader saw his new number 2 commanding his forces. He may have been granted command, but he was not in command he realized. Even with the change in leadership, they were only afraid of her. "A problem for tomorrow" he said to himself.

He walked towards the lone prisoner. Approaching the window, his eyes were finally met. Alina's expression told him all he needed to know. Her hand moved subconsciously to her left jacket pocket and what was contained within it. He smiled. He was lucky he had gotten to her first.

When the time came, she would be the key.

Chapter 12: A Rite of Passage

Three more days with the police. At least this time, they didn't give up on the case. Dozens dead and dozens more missing from the attack. Evan and Markus sat in vigil at the police bulletin along with a small crowd of sobbing friends and families of the victims. Every time the list of deceased was updated, the entire crowd gathered in terrified anticipation, and many walked away in tears.

The updates began to slow down, and Evan clung onto hope that Leena was still alive. They were still finding bodies in the rubble, but so many were missing that a search was arranged.

It was a week since Evan had more than an hour of sleep at a time. He wanted answers. They all wanted answers. Finally, they got some. Sort of.

"Three suspects are in custody" the police chief began. "A security camera found buried in the rubble gave some insight into the attack. The details will remain confidential until the investigation is concluded, but for the sake of public safety we must warn you that it appears to be the work of a rogue Powered."

The crowd began to murmur and fret at the news. Memories of the last time the Powered had gone rogue were fading but still potent. In the peace, almost all of them had died out, right? The vestiges of fears long buried reemerged from the depths of peoples' minds.

The chief continued, "The Powered seems to be the enslaved weapon of several unknown operatives that were seen releasing and resecuring the attacker. We believe this to be the first attack by a terrorist cell that has been brewing for several years. The three suspects in custody were also tied with several petty crimes over the past year. Their goals are unknown, and they could strike again at any moment, but rest assured, this IS our top priority, we WILL protect the people of this city, and this city will be made SAFE AGAIN."

The video of that speech quickly spread panic around the city, but Evan couldn't care less. He was lost for the second time in a week. The world around him was a blur, and not even Marcus could shake him from his stupor. Exhausted, he laid down in a nearby park and fell asleep.

He was awoken by a tug on his shoulder. A young woman was sitting next to him. She was wearing a blue blazer with tight jeans, and she stood about 5-6 with brown hair tied back in a bun. She wore large round glasses and carried a paper notebook and pen in her hand. "Weird" thought Evan drowsily. "Who uses paper in this day and age?"

"Hi! I'm Kaitlyn Mercer. You're Evan Ray correct? I was the private investigator you didn't meet a couple days ago."

Evan remembered he was supposed to meet with her, but now was the first time that crossed his mind since the big incident. "Oh, sorry. I've been ... busy" he said without much sincerity. He really didn't want to be bothered right now.

She saw his reaction and softened up. "Hey, I'm so sorry about what happened. First your mother and now your friend. I'm doing what I can to find them."

"How did you know my friend was missing?" he asked. "I don't remember telling you much about any friends."

She had the decency to look mildly guilty. "I'm a PI. I've been looking into your mother's disappearance, and all the details that go with it. Speaking of which, I have something I need to discuss with you. I found something." Evan sat up straight at that. "Your mother was digging around in some classified documents. Three days before she disappeared someone was following her." She laid out a series of separate still frame images of various security cameras showing the time Diana walked past and the time a mysterious man followed.

"She's always dealing with classified stuff" Evan responded. "Nothing about this seems abnormal."

"My guess is, this time she found something that someone wanted hidden. There are plenty of shady businesses with dirty secrets they would rather not be revealed. I need to know what she was looking at. When I broke into the Records Office there was no way to figure out what she looked at or what she took."

"Wait" Evan asked confused. "You broke into somewhere? How? Is that allowed?"

"What do you think?" she responded sardonically. "Listen, my methods are different, but I get results, and I am willing to bet that you are ok with that right now. Now do you have any idea what she was looking at? Did she leave her work somewhere in the house that I couldn't find?"

"Wait" Evan repeated. "You broke into my house?"

She rolled her eyes. "Please. It's an apartment with standard security. You might as well have left the door open and invited me in."

"Umm." Evan tried to recall what papers were on the kitchen table the morning she left for her business trip. "She said that her associate Henry was doing some math stuff that he wanted my friend Marcus to help with, but that wouldn't be it. Umm... I didn't really look at what she was working on. I just assumed that it had to do with her trip to Suros Energies."

"Any place where she might keep something hidden?"

"Not that I know of. At least not in any of the places that I didn't already check."

Kaitlyn chewed the end of her pen for a minute. "Depths, I really could use a clue right now." Evan then remembered his mysterious note. It seemed like ages since he had figured anything out. He decided to show her the note. Apparently she hadn't broken into the police files for this case, because she hadn't seen it before. He explained what he and Leena had figured out, but she wasn't listening.

Her face turned pale as she read it. "Oh man... you should have shown me this sooner. I've got to go." She turned around and started to briskly walk away.

"Hey!" he yelled after her. "What's going on. Did you figure something out?" She merely responded that she had a lead to follow and that she would talk to him soon. "What in the depths was that" he muttered to himself.

At the very least, the interaction had given him the energy to ponder again. He decided to head to the abandoned church in Sector 31 that Sierra had told him about. Arriving at the street, he found it to be located in a small park that had been converted into a graveyard. It looked mostly run down, and inside the perimeter hedges, no one could be seen. He read the note again.

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In the light where you were found, but mightier than steel.

From the nest upon the ground. Ten spins before the crash.

In the dark of Neptune's gaze. The names spell out the seal.

The soft cover through the haze, shall vanish in a flash.

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He began to work out the clues out loud. "Natural lighting, check. Mightier than steel, um.. I guess. From the nest upon the ground ten spins before the crash. Umm..." He thought back to the broken clock that Leena had pointed out matched the description. "Ten spins, so eleven minutes and forty seconds ... or eleven hours and forty minutes? It depends on which hand needs ten spins. Before the crash? Well at least I think it's a time. I guess I could just stay here all day. In the dark of Neptune's gaze. So it needs to be away from the water."

There was a large octopus fountain away from the front of the dilapidated church building, and several aqueducts could be seen around the distant surrounding buildings. There were many rooms that didn't have any water in sight, and a large central courtyard that was overgrown with plants.

"The names spell out the seal." As hard as he looked, there were no names anywhere near the building. If there ever were names religious or otherwise on the structure they had long since been eroded. Undeterred, he went home to gather supplies for a stakeout. He hoped that something would reveal itself at the unknown time specified in the note. Walking into his room, he remised on all the times his mother made fun of him for falling out of his good ole water chamber in the morning. Then it hit him.

A crash. She always called it his morning crash when the chamber dumped him out onto the floor to wake him up. He did some mental arithmetic. Eleven hours or eleven minutes before 7:30 AM. It could either mean 7:50 PM or 7:18 and 20 seconds AM. He assumed it would be the former. He hurried back to the church.

He spent the next several hours pacing around the building looking for any last clues. At about 7:20 PM he heard a noise. Someone else was sneaking around the mossy cobblestone paths. He followed the noise up a flight of stairs to the ramparts. The figure was slim and carrying a bag. They placed the bag underneath an old antique cabinet and stretched while listening to music on headphones. Evan snuck closer. Could this be a clue? He suddenly made the final dash, twirled the figure around to see the face, and ...

"Sierra?"

"AAAAIGGHHHH" she screamed hitting him with a forearm that knocked him to the ground.

"Wait! Its me Evan, Evan Ray!" he yelled from his back.

"Oh my Neptune. What are you doing here?" she asked, breathing hard from the scare.

"You told me about this place for my clue right? What are you doing here?"

She hesitated before responding. "I just come here to relax. Like you were looking for, its pretty secluded with natural lighting or whatever your clue said."

"Oh" he sighed. "Hey I think I've figured something out." He explained the rest of the clue to her and she excitedly agreed to help him figure out the final pieces. They circled the compound again, but she had no more insight than he did.

"The names spell out the seal" she kept repeating. Every room they checked had no distinguishing characteristics let alone names. Finally there were only seconds until time. "Hey, we've just got to pick somewhere and look. Our best bet is something distinctive. I'll head up to the roof, and you scour the courtyard. Maybe someone carved a name into the elm tree in the center. It could be under the dirt layer or something."

Evan desperately dug around the base of the tree in the seconds before the time was up. At 7:50 he was still searching to no avail. Another minute past before he gave up the dig with a sigh of despair. He sat on the lowest branches of the elm and distraughtly scoured the courtyard for any signs. The elm tree. He thought back to his pet named ELM. It was an acronym for his friends' names. Evan, Leena and Marcus. Just then Sierra appeared at his side.