Reflections Of Angels

Caught on Camera

A pile of large, printed photographs in hand, Declan spread them out over the table to examine under the lamp light. Even blown up to the size they were and cleaned up significantly, the quality was grainy, the colours mostly black and white.

Travis approached him from behind. "What are you doing?"

"Footage stills." Dec responded. "CCTV, speed cameras, the like. But there's only so much you can do on the computer."

Travis wondered briefly how he'd gotten ahold of half those things, but decided not to question it as of yet. It was fairly par for the course with Declan's line of business. "So what have you found?"

"Luci's number plate." He replied, holding up an image of a familiar car for Travis to see. "But from the looks of things, I doubt that's her in the driver's seat." He pointed to a semi-familiar blurr of pale blond hair in the front of the car. "So either they traded cars, or it was stolen. Someone else might be in there, but it's too bad quality to properly tell."

"You're going to follow it, right?"

"Yeah, but it's not really seen again on camera. I've got a couple of shots, but no clue where it goes."

"We'll find it." Katherine said, coming in from the doorway. "It won't have gone far if it disappears in the area."

"Learnt that from your stint at the Mundane police station, did you?" Travis teased lightly; Katherine just smiled.

"Car theft was one of my things, yes. What you do is you get a pocket knife with a good blade-"

"- There was also something else." Declan interrupted; reaching across the table for another photograph he'd separated off from the rest. "A couple of escapees who haven't figured out how to hide from the cameras yet."

The shot was one taken in the early hours of the morning, along a street of usually-busy shops that themselves seemed to become a ghost town once deserted. On the far side of the road, two figures in hospital gowns stood out like phantoms in the night. Both were women, the first of which was unusually tall and lithe, wrapped in a sheet of fabric she'd taken from somewhere to shield against the night air. Though made dark by the camera, it was easy to imagine the red in her wild, flowing hair and the tinge to her full lips, and the golden hue of the eyes that knowingly looked up at them.
The second was unearthly pale, to a level so on camera she appeared almost translucent; worn down to nothing but skin and bones that jutted harshly from her form. Her face was deathly gaunt, framed by thin, light-coloured hair; but there was a madness in her expression, which seemed to be the source of animation for her wispy form.

"Salome." Katherine said, in reference to the first.

"Is that-". Travis started, pointing to the second.

Declan nodded. "That's what Salome does- she draws people to her. It's part of what makes her so dangerous- that, and she has no qualms about not being discreet. She's one of those who would elect to reveal us all to the whole world in a moment if she could- another reason she's a risk.
But I think that this time, I might know where they were headed. And once we find Salome, we can find some answers."

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