“I am already too old for such a spell to work well,” she said. “I had you too late in life and I am already an old woman and my health wanes with my power. It has to be you.”
I dared her then to set the spell on me. She said it would be bad magic to use such a spell against an unwilling witch—especially her own daughter.
Exchange of posts on
“General” GRIMNIR channel
DAY 1959 (9 DECEMBER, YEAR 5)
Post from Frank Oda, 11:17:
Has anyone seen or heard from Julie? She went off on her bike two hours ago to pick up some parts and should have been back a while ago. It’s not like her to not report in.
Reply from Tristan Lyons, 11:20:
Good catch, Frank, we have been a little distracted by the sudden disappearance of the DOSECOPS SUVs from the street. They all took a powder about forty-five minutes ago.
From Rebecca East-Oda, 11:25:
Good riddance. The neighbors will be pleased too.
From Julie Lee, 14:30:
Sorry for the mysterious absence, everyone. I’m fine and I’m hanging out in a top-floor hotel room at the waterfront Westin with none other than Major Isobel Sloane.
From Tristan Lyons, 14:31:
WHAT!? Glad you are okay but please explain.
From Julie Lee, 14:45:
I was on my way back to the house with the delivery, just a couple of blocks out, when I noticed that all three of the DOSECOPS SUVs were blasting down the street, headed for the main drag. So, on the spur of the moment, I decided to follow them. Couldn’t have kept up with them on the highway but of course they were in Boston traffic and so it was pretty easy to keep pace. I had to make a few illegal sidewalk runs and cut through some parking lots but was able to track them across the Mass Ave Bridge and across the South End into Southie where they ended up passing through a guarded gate into the container terminal. There’s a big slip there lined with cranes where they load and unload the container ships. Thousands of containers stacked all over the place, trains, trucks, etc.
I couldn’t get through the gate, so I was kind of stymied at that point. I looked around for a tall building and noticed the Westin a few blocks away—it’s like twenty stories high and I could see its top floors, so I knew it had a view of the area. So I gunned it over there. The neighborhood is kinda forbidding, lots of big industrial-type buildings but no place to come in off the street. I left my motorcycle with the parking attendants and went into the lobby and asked the lady at the front desk whether there was a bar or coffee shop on the top floor where I could have a drink and look out over the harbor and she was like no, all of our dining establishments are down low and the top floors are all rooms and suites for our guests. I asked if any of those was available and she said she could get me one with a view of the harbor so I plunked down my credit card and said I would take it.
While I’m there filling out the paperwork, I see a woman approaching in my peripheral vision. She’s coming from the direction of the coffee shop in the lobby, holding a latte cup. I figured she wanted to talk to the front-desk lady but instead she approached me and said, “Excuse me, this might sound very weird and I’m sorry if this makes you uncomfortable but I have the strongest feeling that I know you from somewhere and I was wondering if I could chat with you for a minute.” So I look up at her and holy shit it’s Isobel Sloane from DOSECOPS! She’s dressed in a sweatshirt and sweatpants and some Crocs that I’m going to take a wild guess were looted from Walmart and she basically looks fine, but a little spacey and disoriented. As evidenced by the fact that she didn’t know my name. We’ve had coffee together lots of times at the DODO cafeteria and she totally knows me.
Obviously something weird was going on so I said, “Sure, I would totally love to chat with you, hang on a sec and we can go up to my suite and get some room service and just chill out for a little bit.” Which she was fine with.
So, ten minutes later we’re up in this fancy suite. Pricey, but the only room I could get with a view of the harbor. I was super nervous that we’d be followed, but nothing of the sort happened, and as soon as we got inside I locked and security-bolted the door. I got Isobel settled down on a comfy chair in the living room area of the suite and then looked out the window and down into the container port area.
DOSECOPS has a fleet of half a dozen black SUVs, as you know, and all six of them were down there, clustered together like cockroaches along the side of the big slip where the container ships tie up to be loaded and unloaded. I could see people standing around them but it was too far away to make out faces. Some of them were looking out into the harbor. And right there, just a mile or two out, south of the airport, was a big container ship steaming away. Piled with hundreds of containers, of course. And everything about the body language of the people around the SUVs was “goddamn it we just literally missed the boat.”
More in a few minutes but I’m gonna hit “send” on this so you get the update.
From Mortimer Shore, 14:59:
I checked the shipping records. That’s the Alexandre Dumas. She’s owned by a French shipping company. They name all of their ships after writers, I guess.
From Tristan Lyons, 15:03:
Where’s she headed?
From Mortimer Shore, 15:06:
Le Havre apparently.
From Julie Lee, 15:12:
CONTINUED
So when I saw how it was down along the waterfront I turned to Isobel who was just chilling, sipping her latte and looking out the window, and I said, “So, Isobel, it’s good to see you!”
“Isobel. Right. That’s me,” she said. Like she’d forgotten her own name.
“We have been worried,” I said.
“Who has been worried?” she asked.
“People who work with you and who knew you had gone missing,” I told her. “You have been missing for over a week.”
“Oh, I wasn’t missing,” she said, and kind of nodded down toward the harborfront area below us. She seemed completely unconcerned.
“You were down there?” I prompted her.
“Yes, there’s a shipping company, with an office, and a lot of shipping containers that they look after.”
“Might one of those containers be green, with some rust spots and some equipment inside?” I asked.
“You mean the ATTO?” she asked without skipping a beat.
“Yeah, the ATTO.”
“That’s mostly where I was. It was in the warehouse. It’s not green anymore, though. We painted it red.”
“We? So, you were involved in this painting project?”
“Yeah, I didn’t have anything else to do, so I helped out a little. It was fun.”
“Where is the ATTO now with its shiny new coat of red paint?”
“They just loaded it onto the ship a little while ago. Then I found myself out on the street and so I decided to go get some coffee. That’s when I saw you.”
“Were you being held prisoner?” I asked.
“No.”
“Was there another woman in the ATTO part of the time?”
“Yes. She was always there.”
“Was it Gráinne?” I asked. “Irish accent?”