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Chapter Twenty-One

It had taken several hours for Obsidian to explain what had happened when he had discovered Janus at the Phoenix Grace facility and his subsequent death.

By now, darkness had fallen on Crystal City and the Lower City bar that Janice had taken him to had begun to become decidedly more quiet with only a few people left, people who had nowhere else to be or had become dependent on the alcohol or solace that the bar provided.

Obsidian had explained to Janice how he had pulled Janus from the Phoenix Grace facility in Everonth, only to have him pass away when he reached the only place he could go for help, the hotel that Janus and him had stayed the night before.

Janice had been finding it hard to disguise her shock and disbelief at Janus's demise. At first, she did not want to believe it was true. He had been her friend for many years and she desperately needed Obsidian to be lying about this however the deadly earnestness of his eyes had convinced her otherwise.

In her heart, she knew he was speaking the truth. She was unable to describe it and she had never met Obsidian before but there was something about the way that Obsidian had described Janus's death.

That and the TerraNet videos that he showed her on his phone of the news report that Obsidian had seen on the television just a few hours earlier. She had been working at her desk job and nobody had thought to inform her about the news.

Her emotions had spiralled from despair to the depths of an abyss. Janus and her had been close friends for many years but that was all it had ever been. She had never had the courage to push any further and now;

She would never get that chance again...

She wanted to cry but her duty stopped her. She wanted to go outside and scream but she had to remain professional. She wanted to walk into Phoenix Grace headquarters, find Ivan Grace himself and demand answers but she knew that security would deal with her before she even got close.

For the moment, all she could do was question this rather acerbic horse about what had happened.

Obsidian had been trying make sense of it all himself, the vixen was shooting questions at him left, right and center and all he could do was wonder if he was going to end up getting arrested and charged with Janus's murder? What if she did not believe him? What if she thought that he had something to do with it? The thought of spending a night in a cold, noisy police cell terrified him considering it was something he had never had to face before.

Janice could sense his fear, his selfish concern for his own wellbeing. She could work that to her advantage.

She could use that...

He told her about what he had discovered about Janus's wife, Cassata and how he had no idea that she had been in the employ of Phoenix Grace. Janus carefully sipped her orange juice, being careful not to give anything away as he talked, her large brown eyes at the base of her muzzle fixed on the horse in front of her.

It was so obvious to her. She had seen it in thousands of other criminal investigations over many years. Phoenix Grace had Cassata killed because she had discovered something or knew something that could have jeopardised the company. She knew about the seedy backhand bribes that Phoenix Grace had been paying towards Barrus Sturgeon and other powerful figures because she had filed his tax returns.

Dirty money...

Janus had walked into a conspiracy which took him close to the center of corruption that festered at heart of Crystal Lake and had paid the ultimate price for it.

She owed it to her friend, somebody that she never would have passed the entrance exam to the force without, to discover what that was and expose this conspiracy.

She told Obsidian that he was going to help her break into the Phoenix Grace computer files in their central headquarters. She knew that HQ was going to be furious but she did not care. Obsidian was reluctant to help but the slight nudge that he could possibly be implicated in Janus's murder soon convinced him otherwise.

She was going to finish what he started...

***

It was almost half past three in the morning when Obsidian used his employee pass to open the office door. The central headquarters for Phoenix Grace was deadly quiet, with only a few security guards left inside the building.

The automatic lights on the twenty third floor of the massive tower flickered to life as soon as Janice and Obsidian entered the Historical Research Department of the building. It was a large room, dominated by rows of workstations and office cubicles and historical artifacts encased in glass littered throughout the room. There was an usual skeleton of some extinct species on a wall with the rest of the walls being open glass windows that looked out over the city lights of Crystal Lake.

Obsidian had managed to convince the guard at the front desk in the lobby that he was there to collect some research files.Janice however was not an employee and this forced her to get creative, making up a story about being a new employee that had lost her pass and wearing a low cut top with her physique had been enough to convince the guard to let her pass.

Janice had always wanted to consider herself an actress, as a young cub, she had convinced herself that she was going to be a glorious actress and the star many plays and films. It was a dream that had long since been suffocated in this god forsaken city.

Obsidian quickly logged onto his computer. Janice could tell that he was not used to sneaking about as he was moving with such a degree of suspicion, she was surprised that they had not been caught already.

His computer wallpaper caught her eye, it was a rather interesting pornographic display of two very muscular Leodis, lion-like men who originated from Fesalis. She raised an eyebrow at it and remarked if it was really appropriate to have that kind of material on a work computer.

Obsidian, already embarrassed enough, chose to ignore her as he accessed his email, his hands gliding across the holographic keyboard that came online as soon as the computer was booted up, scrolling down the email that had first caught his attention and mentioned Janus's wife.

"Here it is..." he said, looking over at the rather scantily dressed vixen who sat on the table beside him. He looked her over from head to toe, she had really dressed for the part but he supposed that this was part of some official police operation and she had to look the part. She had told him that back up was nearby if they needed it, ready to storm the building.

It was a lie, but it was a successful one.

"Fuck..." replied Janice under her breath, causing Obsidian to look over at her in surprise. "It says here that Cassata was responsible for documenting "Yiff" exposure within the city."

Obsidian grimaced at her. "Wait... did you not know that Phoenix Grace was interested in documenting drugs in the city?"

"I knew they had several drug rehabs set up but..." muttered Janice as she read on, her voice trailing off. "But this is nothing to do with treatment programs, this is distribution research!"

"Wait... " said Obsidian, who had never really had that much of a knowledge of drugs in the first place. He knew that Phoenix Grace had been avidly committed to helping the war on drugs as a pharmaceutical and biotechnology company but he had never really looked into that side of the company that closely before. "Does that mean that Phoenix Grace has producing Yiff?" he asked her in shock.

"It sure looks that way..." replied Janice. "Look here, there are requisition orders for chemicals from Everonth, where you worked... they were sent to a refinement facility in the Lower City and it looks like Cassata was responsible for paying off the Import Officials to look the other way."

Obsidian felt somewhat overwhelmed by all this information. He found it increasingly difficult to believe that Phoenix Grace, a respectable company, one that he had worked with continually for the last decade, could be responsible for creating and distributing one of the most dangerous designer drugs in Crystal Lake.

"That's... impossible" he said, finally.

"No... look here... there are shipping receipts for an "undisclosed chemical", signed for by a Doctor Aaron Naga, who is the Head of Research and Development for the company..."

"Former head..." corrected Obsidian. "Doctor Naga left the company last year to spend more time with his family."

"Oh... seriously?" replied Janice, looking over and wondering how somebody so big, could be so dense. "Corporations say that when they have to fire an employee... It's a way to keep the press from knowing too much about the circumstances"

Obsidian sat back in the chair and rolled his eyes. He was tired of everyone always assuming that he was stupid but maybe had been just too trusting of this company. He had known nothing but Phoenix Grace since he was a child and he found it incredibly hard to believe that the thousands of people that worked for the company were all bad. They were just like him in so many respects.

Janice looked away from the computer and thought for a moment. There was only so much one unsecure email could tell her but it certainly raised questions about Phoenix Grace's company image. Maybe this, Doctor Aaron Naga could help shine some light on what exactly was going on and exactly why her friend had to pay with his life, to keep it secret?

"We need to find this Doctor Aaron Naga..." she said.

"I'm afraid that the former head of Research and Development killed his wife and children and then shot himself." replied a feminine voice from the other side of the room that made both of them jump. "Unfortunately he was a deeply disturbed man"

Obsidian's blood froze. He knew that voice. He kept silent and looked over the figure standing in the room, the same one that had confronted Janus and himself inside the tent and that Janus had rendered unconscious.

"You!" replied Janice, almost immediately pulling out her gun, from its concealed position behind her. She had put it in between her belt and her trousers so she could easily conceal it and she felt safer knowing that it was there.

"Hello Janice..." replied Cassandra Equinox, who was stood in the doorway, eating an apple as she spoke, seeing the gun and smirking gently.

"Oh dear... is that any way to greet your sister after such a long time?"