The Quimby Hotel

━ 03: Bittersweet Reunion

Cairo pushed through the door to the security camera room, where he knew his sister Havana would be waiting—although none of them called her that.

"HQ," he said, and she turned idly in her chair, no care in the world. She pulled off the headphones corded to her portable radio player, sliding them around her neck.

She appeared curious but not surprised at his presence. She saw everything—HQ rarely left this room, her eyes never deviating from their pattern of darting back and forth between the monitors. It was highly likely she had watched him come in and perhaps even anticipated this very visit. "Welcome home," she told him in removed greeting, like this was simply another day and he was returning from an errand, like he'd never left. It was a breath of fresh air compared to Tokyo's reaction, at least.

"I need to see the security footage from three days ago."

She gestured to the unused chair across the room and allowed him to drag it over beside her. She watched him sit before nodding to his new eye patch.

"Does this mean you're a regular plebe like me now?"

Cairo laughed humorlessly. "You act like it was the only quirk I had."

"As good as," she replied with nothing insulting in her tone, though he still felt the sting. "I barely recall you using the others."

He elected to switch the subject as she pulled up the playback of Sunday morning on one of the screens directly in front of them. "Did you see anyone suspicious coming in that day?"

"People tend to come here when they don't want to be found, Cairo. Suspicious figures are hardly an uncommon occurrence."

"I know, I know." That would serve to make his job harder. He had to weed out the spy the guardsmen had spoken of, as it was likely he hadn't yet left. Father had mentioned the captain but no one else, and it made Cairo wonder whether he was actually aware of the informant planted in the hotel, or if he was keeping talk of the Unlawful to a minimum on suspicions alone. He imagined the latter was likely. Mr. Quimby wasn't fond of admitting he didn't know things.

Cairo skimmed the feed as HQ sped through it, sighing when he realized he couldn't differentiate one shady scrub from another. "Just show me the new check-ins," he conceded finally.

HQ lifted an eyebrow. "All of them?"

"I don't have a better idea," he admitted sourly.

She zoomed in on an overlarge bearded man in a long leather coat. "This one checked in with what Tokyo said was almost certainly false identification," she said. "And he paid all in cash, but it was real."

Cairo squinted at the fuzzy image. "Yeah, what else is new?" Everything was so pixelated it was difficult to determine specific facial features, only articles of clothing and those distinct traits that were prominent enough to stand out. Either way, this man was almost certainly not the spy. A guardsman posing as a customer would be too stupid to think to present himself like a gang member; it was more likely that he would be among their better-dressed clientele. Besides, as far as Cairo knew, guardsmen tended to be thin and lean.

"If you're looking for someone specific, we might need Vienna's snapshot memory," HQ suggested, and Cairo looked at her sharply.

"What makes you think she would want to help me?"

She shrugged. "Vienna will do anything for a good bribe. Come up with something."

He grunted. "Only if I have no other choice."

They went through the footage for the day, HQ's fingers sliding smoothly across the controls as Cairo did his best to memorize every grayish, blurry face. There seemed to be so many more customers than Cairo remembered; magic and non-magic users alike had flowed in through the front doors on Sunday as if this was a churchhouse, a safe haven. Many hid their identities or cloaked themselves in shadow, shooting Tokyo elusive smiles at the front desk as they silently paid for their rooms, and with the sheer influx of them Cairo hadn't the slightest clue how he would pinpoint just one as a Court spy.