Chapter Text
"I didn't catch your name." Colter said, trying to ease the transition from being grilled by the lady in charge to investigating a missing person. The woman who had approached him on deck stole a quick glance over her shoulder, her surprise clear enough for him to realize she hadn't thought he'd care to ask.
"Natalie," she answered dutifully. Colter hadn't immediately caught it up top with the roaring wind and the whine of the jet's engines, but her voice had the rising lilt of an European that learned English very early on in her education. "I or Gregory will escort you for your remaining time on the Vatt."
Colter gave a courteous nod to the remaining man in the original detail. The other two men had veered off rather quickly for reasons Colter was sure never to know. Gregory, just an inch shorter than himself, but built much like Carl, returned the gesture with a bland expression.
"Here is Dr. Grace's accommodations," Natalie intoned, stopping in front of one of dozens of identical doors scattered throughout the carrier's endless hallways. She removed a master key from the pocket of her slacks and unlocked it. Pushing it open, she gestured inside.
Once Colter stepped over the lip into the room, he understood why Natalie hadn't led him in. The place was small, barely bigger than the width of his own Airstream. At least the length of his trailer made up for the lack of space. Dr. Grace's room was a precise square, each piece inside selected specifically for its economic size and storability. Diagonally from the door, Grace's desk space was still set out, like he'd been forced from the carrier at a trot by the demanding Stratt. His rolling chair, moved by the waves, had rolled away and stopped against a small cabinet crafted from the bulkhead. Each individual cubby had a door that was firmly closed. A single porthole let in light to supplement the desk lamp clipped above his desk and a single bulb in the middle of the ceiling. Colter flicked the switch by the door.
There were pens scattered in random corners of the room. They, like the chair, had been victims of Grace's hasty exit and the ocean's will. The only thing that seemed to have been consciously put away was the bunk, flipped up and strapped into place against the wall opposite Grace's desk. Colter stopped in the middle of the small space and turned in a slow circle.
Based on the state of the room, Colter could guess that Grace's participation in the summit had not been told to him ahead of time. That narrowed the abduction down from possible 'premeditation' to 'moment of opportunity.' If Grace hadn't known he was going, how could his kidnappers have?
Saving that thought for later, Colter approached the desk. Most of the papers left out were pinned in place by magnets or caught under random objects. Journals were stashed in an apple crate by the desk leg. Colter crouched down and, using the tip of his pen, pushed one of the notebooks resting on its spine open. Grace's handwriting inside was legible but shockingly inconsistent. Cursive, block letters, print: it was like three different people had written at once. The information inside lent him nothing except that a few formulas looked vaguely familiar. He filed that away for later too.
Standing back up, Colter next took a cursory glance through the cabinet. Clothes mostly, though he found the earth hacky-sack from the school photo tossed haphazardly amongst his socks. A door was recessed into the wall next to the bunk and he pulled it open expecting a linen closet or other personal effects stored away from prying eyes. Instead it was a small shower stall, smaller even than Colter's. There wasn't an option for hot or cold water. Generic hair product bottles and a bar of soap had pooled against the drain--more evidence of the rocking ship and Grace's lack of forethought to put everything away in the little containers built into the shower walls.
"Dr. Grace is a shy man," a voice said from the doorway.
Colter leaned out of the stall, closing the door behind him. The bearded man from the hanger was standing in the hall, looking vaguely uncomfortable. His hands were buried in the pockets of his lab coat, shoulders up to his ears. "Dr. Narender," the man introduced himself, fumbling to release his hand to shake Colter's. "I thought I would come down to help."
Fighting the urge to make a face--mostly out of irritation--Colter reassured, "That's not necessary. I think I've gotten everything I can from this place."
"Oh, yes, of course, but I meant...." Narender trailed off, before huffing a sigh of exasperation at his lack of clarity. "I can't speak about the project. But I can tell you about Dr. Grace."
Attention raised, Colter relaxed his stance, fingers itching for his notebook. "Shy, you said?"
"Yes, and humble. He's a very smart man, though he'll be the last to admit it." Narender gave a solemn look over the room, the few possessions packed away in a single box, a drawing taped beside the porthole that had to have come from one of his students back at the middle school. Colter wondered suddenly if they knew what it was their former teacher was doing. "You have to understand, Mr. Shaw, Dr. Grace doesn't truly understand his purpose here."
"And you do?"
"Oh, everyone does," he said with a shrug, like it was obvious. He took pity on Colter's blank look. "He's Stratt's right-hand man."
Colter blinked, genuinely surprised by that revelation. "That wasn't mentioned earlier." Sure, he could tell that Stratt was under pressure to get Grace back--but it felt more like she was needing a scientist, not a lynchpin of her own operation.
Narender rolled his eyes. "She won't admit it out loud, but there isn't anyone else she drags into every meeting, summit, and training exercise as often as she does Dr. Grace. For having been on this project for only a few months, he knows just as much as she does."
The reason for Grace's abduction was becoming clearer in Colter's mind. Even if Grace himself wasn't aware of it, someone knew of his importance to this project and they wanted leverage--either over Stratt or the number of government entities supporting this diverse crew of scientists.
The 'why' less of a mystery, Colter was ready for the 'who' and 'how.'
From the carrier to the jet to a private plane, Colter felt a little wrung out by the time he settled into one of plane's luxury bucket seats. A flight attendant offered him a drink and he greedily accepted the bottle of water over any alcohol. By the time they left the tarmac; Colter, having been running on too-little caffeine and an unsatisfying nap in the last 30+ hours, was out. He didn't stir until the same attendant palpated his shoulder. By then, the plane had already landed.
Gathering his duffle from the crew on the tarmac, Colter spotted Carl by yet another black SUV close to the private airport. Daylight was barely breaking over the horizon by the time he rejoined the bodyguard. "Carl. Good to see you again."
"Likewise," Carl answered without thought. He opened the door for Colter and like in Denver the day before, slid in after him.
"You know anything about this project?" Colter asked once they were in drive and pulling away from the runway.
Carl didn't outwardly react. "How much were you told?"
Nothing at all. "Enough."
"Then you understand why it's important that we get Dr. Grace back."
Colter nodded like he had been expecting that answer. In reality, the importance of Dr. Ryland Grace kept expanding. From what little he could tell, Grace wasn't a very large figure in his own life. The fact that so many people held him in such high esteem kept catching him by surprise.
No pressure, right?
Any job Colter took on was important to him--especially when a person was involved. But he had enough confidence in his own skills and experience to never really be worried about completing a job. Even if the outcome was less than ideal, Colter could always lean back on the knowledge that he had done his best.
For some reason, he didn't think 'his best' was going to cut it this time.
Whatever Dr. Grace was wrapped up in, it felt like more than just a passing science experiment on the verge of collapse. This felt end-of-the-world levels of important. Much like Colter himself, his jobs tended to stick close to Earth. Personal, intimate. Dr. Ryland Grace's disappearance was larger than just the people that knew him. Colter suspected that to the rest of the world, he represented something bigger.
He sent a text to Randy. He needed more information.
Dr. Grace's hotel room, much like his room on the carrier, was bare.
A duffle bag was shoved in the alcove serving as a closet, none of its contents hung up. A t-shirt with the words 'Ah! The Element of Surprise!' and a pair of blue-striped pajama bottoms had been tossed carelessly on the unmade bed. Other than those small human touches, the rest of the room probably looked the same as the day Grace checked in. Even his toiletry bag was packed away and resting on top of his duffle.
Colter wasn't sure if that was how Grace lived, or if he had been preemptively packing for the trip back to the carrier. He suspected the former due to how little Grace had had on the ship, but it was never smart to jump to conclusions until one had all the facts. Standing in the doorway to the room, Carl hovering at his shoulder; Colter confirmed no one had entered before him by checking the 'do not disturb' doorhanger was fully visible. Satisfied, he crossed the threshold.
With very little to see, Colter wandered the one-bed room. He pulled open drawers (all empty save the expected Gideon Bible in the nightstand), checked the safe (unlocked and open) and the trash can (a few dirty napkins from meals, local pizza menu, a scrape of paper with a phone number on it). Curious, Colter extracted the paper and pulled his own phone out to dial it.
The number's owner answered after the third ring, clearly only half-awake. "Helloooo?" a woman drawled.
"Hi. My friend had this number, but he couldn't remember where he got it," he lied smoothly, not ready to tip her off just yet. Before he could say much else, the woman--now completely awake--gasped so hard Colter feared she sucked her own vocal chords down to her stomach.
"Ohhhhh--EEEeeeee! You're friends with the cute blond?! Please I need to talk to him!"
Wide-eyed, Colter shot a startled look in Carl's direction. The other man just frowned, not able to hear whatever was going on on the other line despite the woman's volume. "Uh, no, I'm sorry, he's a little indisposed at the moment."
"Oh, boooo!" she practically screeched. Colter jerked the phone from his ear. Carl definitely heard her that time, eyebrows jolting. "I've seen him all over this hotel and not once has he had the guts to talk to me. I gave him my number on Saturday."
Colter recalled Narender's statement on the carrier. "He's...shy," he got out. He scrunched his face, oddly embarrassed that he was wing-manning for a guy he was currently looking for and had never met. "Uh, but when was the last time you actually saw him?"
"I don't know," she replied flippantly. He could imagine the shrug of her shoulders, "Couple days ago? He was with that scary lady. You know the one, right? Since you're friends."
Pursing his lips, Colter squinted at the painting hanging above the bed. Some abstract piece only hotels would buy. "Uh, yeah. His boss. Bit of a strict schedule."
"Aw, poor guy. He looked like he needed a break, y'know," she giggled.
The conversation having gone on longer than Colter had wanted, he nodded though she couldn't see him. "Mm, yeah, you're right. I'll see what I can do about him calling you back." He hung up before she could say anything further.
He held the scrap up between two fingers, number visible. "Your friend get a lot of company?"
A genuine smile split Carl's face--the façade of professionalism cracking so cleanly that Colter could see the boyish charm the man hid so carefully. Grace probably saw that side of him often if the possibility of a liaison had him grinning that wide. "No, he really doesn't," he replied with a barely swallowed laugh. "Plenty of offers though," he tipped his head down, eyebrow raised suggestively.
His own smile pulling at the side of his mouth, Colter gave a silent "Ah-haaa." He turned away, looking for anything he may have missed; but there wasn't even a lamp twitched out of place. Colter sat down on the bed, facing the window.
"Everything all right?" Carl asked after a too long pause. Colter tilted his head like he was listening but didn't face the other man.
"Just thinking," he clarified.
When investigating the spot where a missing person had been taken or last seen, Colter tended not to speak. He observed his surroundings, mentally documented his findings to mull over later, and parsed out what was helpful and what was a red herring. Having to narrate that to someone was...annoying; but out of professional courtesy, he indulged any officer, parent, or volunteer willing to listen.
"Stop me if I'm wrong," Colter hummed, keeping stationary. The sun was ticking to the apex of its orbit; outside the window was a shadow-less burst of color. They were too high up to see, but he guessed there was a reasonable amount of traffic for noontime in Amsterdam as bikes and taxis zoomed about town. "But Dr. Grace. Introvert, right? Unless he's around people he knows and trusts?"
There was the slightest squeak of Carl's shoes as he shuffled in place. "Yeah."
"So he wouldn't approach a stranger. Or be too chatty if a stranger approached him?"
"No."
"He wouldn't have fought them, would he?"
The quietest of sighs breathed from behind him. "No. But he would run." Another squeak of Carl's shoes. "He's always running," he mumbled under his breath, probably thinking Colter wouldn't hear him.
Colter nodded. "Okay." Standing up, he turned and left the room. As expected Carl followed and didn't ask questions, closing the door behind them. It took almost ten minutes to get back down to the lobby and approach the front desk. A young woman stood behind the desk, clacking away on her keyboard, eyes firmly fixed on the monitor. With the wide variety of guests Colter could see scattered about the lobby and adjoining bar area, Colter assumed she could speak English. He approached the marble-topped counter, pressing the heels of his palms against the edge. One hand held his mobile.
"Hello," he grabbed her attention politely, "I was hoping you could help me?"
She paused in her task, looking up with a practiced flick of her bangs. "What can I do for you?" she asked crisply, lips pursing around the words. She gave him a professional once-over as he did the same. Her nametag read Tabit.
Colter could feel Carl stop close behind him. Ignoring him for now--there was no need to throw authority around just yet--Colter extended his cellphone to her. He had already pulled the photo from Grace's middle school up to display. "Have you seen this man?"
Tabit frowned, "Why are you asking?" Her tone was professional, but Colter could tell her mood had already shifted against him. Interesting.
"He's missing," he replied bluntly. If she was immediately distrustful of him, there had to be a reason. Honesty would be the best way to get her back on his side. "I've been hired to look for him."
Her eyebrows raised, hands slipping from the keyboard. "Really? H-how long?"
"A few days, but I'm trying to pinpoint an exact time. Do you remember seeing him at all recently?"
Already nodding her head, Tabit shifted over so they were more eye-to-eye over the counter. "Yes. I saw him, mmm, two days ago? He's been very nice; one of the nicest guests we've had stay with us. So I remember him very well."
Carl stepped up to Colter's side so their arms were pressed close together. He leaned over the counter, "Two days ago? You're sure?" he asked, tone aggressive.
Colter immediately raised his arm across Carl's chest, holding him back. Tabit had leaned away in surprise, eyes wide. The last thing he needed was Carl spooking her. "If it's all right," he said more calmly, "you can answer his question."
After some hesitation, she replied, "Yes, I'm sure." She met Colter's eyes rather than speak to Carl. "He is here attending a world summit meeting. The manager has been on all of us to make the list of attendees happy. He was one of them--and the only polite one. Even his boss was a little mean," she wrinkled her nose like Stratt's bad behavior was a lingering smell she couldn't get out of her fabrics. Colter saw the smallest flash of amusement chase across Carl's face before he schooled it into a look of deep concentration.
"And when you saw him, was it here? In the lobby?" he pointed down with his cellphone hand to emphasize his point.
"Yes." She nodded her head in the direction of a sweeping staircase leading to a first floor balcony overlooking the entire ground floor. There were people up there now milling about. It didn't appear to be connected to the first floor of guest rooms. Colter assumed it was a lounging area for more private conversations. "It was late, after the meetings. I was about to swap with the night shift."
Colter and Carl shared a look. According to the timeline, Grace couldn't be found after the second-to-last meeting. So if he was in the lobby from that time to when he was seen by Tabit close to midnight, how had Carl not seen him?
"Was he with anyone?"
"Two men," she answered succinctly. "I don't know who they were with, but they were familiar. Not a member of the summit, but their...their detail," she got out, like it took her a second to remember the word in English. "They all bleed together after a while, but these men had these...pins," she pointed to her own lapel of her uniform blazer.
"Do you remember what that looked like?" Colter asked.
She hummed, like she doubted her own memory, "They were red. A circle pattern, but like little stars."
Mouth twisting, Colter decided to ask Randy about that later. "Did," he pointed to his phone to remind her who he was talking about despite his screen having gone dark, "he look okay?"
"He looked more than okay," she almost laughed. "I haven't seen him at the bar since he checked in, but he had a few that night. I guessed the meetings had gone well."
Colter stole a glance at Carl. The other man immediately shook his head. Grace wasn't a drinker.
Tabit's brows pinched. "He wasn't drunk, was he?"
Sighing in sympathy, Colter relaxed his shoulders, "I don't believe so, but please don't feel bad about that. It's not your fault."
Looking down, Tabit shook her head. "I'm sorry. I wish I had more to give you."
Colter grinned. With his eyes, he gave an emphasized look above Tabit. She turned, confused until she landed on what he was seeing. A CCTV camera. "Can I take a look?" he asked mischievously, like they were in on a secret.
Tabit nervously bit her lip. After a second of thought, she leaned forward, "My manager clocks out an hour before me. Come back then and I'll let you in."
"Thank you," he replied, appreciative. Carl was opening his mouth in possible protest, but Colter wasn't going to risk losing Tabit's trust. He grabbed the man by the elbow. "We'll be back soon."
"I have the power of several governments behind me, Mr. Shaw. We don't need to wait from some two-bit manager to leave."
"Oo, back to last names. You must be angry," Colter teased. Despite his clear disproval, Carl still followed Colter to the bar area, "And that's not how I work, Mr. Carl." He put extra emphasis on the man's name as he still didn't know his full name. Carl scoffed.
Colter stopped at the bar and leaned up against it, resting one arm on top and gripping the wrist with his other hand. "Look," he started, being sure to make direct eye contact with Carl. "You people hired me for a reason. I get my work done--but only when I can do it my way. The last thing we want to do is tip off whoever has Dr. Grace. That gets exponentially harder when you introduce world governments to the equation."
Colter saw the moment Carl understood his logic. Didn't stop the man from frowning though. He looked longingly at the bottles lined up behind the bar. Colter gave him a sympathetic pat.
Turning to the bar, he grabbed a nearby bowl of complimentary snacks. Unlike most of the bars Colter frequented when looking for a missing person, this bar's snacks were a variety of nuts he didn't think he had ever seen before. He dragged the bowl over, situating it between the two of them. "So, tell me your story. How'd you meet Dr. Grace?"
Carl finally--finally--relaxed, crossing his arms on the bar top and leaning all his weight on it. "I can't really talk about it," he grumbled.
"You met because of this project then."
A flicker of indecision before he nodded. "Yeah. Ryland's a weird dude, y'know? Real...quirky. But, man, if I didn't have the best time watching over him." He looked down between his arms and chest, head hanging despondently. "Makes me feel like the worse kind of crap to have lost him."
Colter picked out a nut since Carl was too upset to accept the offer. It crunched loudly between his teeth. "How did you lose him?" he asked.
Sighing gustily, Carl stood back up. His knuckles bleached pink where he squeezed the rounded edge of the bar's wooded top. "There was a break between the last two meetings. And, really, the last one was just a round of applause for all the windbag talking they'd been doing, so," His throat closed and Carl took a moment to swallow. "So, Ryland told me don't bother coming with him, y'know? It was going to be especially boring after a week of especially boring meetings. I mean, I don't get half of the stuff they're talking about--and, really, there's only so much Ryland can explain before he's just completely lost me." He laughed a little at the end.
Colter leaned over the bar like Carl had, head turned so he can continue to watch the other man and keeping an arm out so he could scoop nuts out of the bowl. They weren't not half bad and satiate a hunger he had forgotten about until then.
"So, I--y'know--I took him up on the offer. Went to the spa--they've got a nice one here." Colter raised his eyebrows, face open like he was impressed. He'd never had a spa treatment personally, but Reenie always raved about them. "Relaxed for a bit. Started an audiobook I'd heard about. But, y'know, I couldn't really relax. Ryland is such a strange dude. And despite his name, he's just about the clumsiest guy I've ever met. Felt weird, just, leaving him out there all alone. He's always safe on the Vatt, but here? In the real world?" He blows a raspberry.
Covering a grin with his hand, Colter dropped another couple nuts in his mouth. Carl talked like a concerned father more than a hired bodyguard. "So, you went back to the summit?"
He nodded. "That's when the receptionist lady told me he hadn't signed in for the last meeting. I went back to his hotel room, but it was locked--had to use my copy of his keycard. It was empty. Colter, man," he faced him, hands out like he was measuring the distance of a shoebox, "I swear, I checked every inch of this place I had access to and most of the places I didn't. The only place I didn't check was the roof."
Colter stood up straight, brushed imaginary peanut dust off his shirt. "From what Tabit said, that isn't where he would have been anyway."
Carl turned his face away with a shake of his head. When he brought his hand up to bite at a hangnail on his thumb, it was trembling. His eyes scoured over from the bar area out to what they could see of the front lobby. The view of the lounge area wasn't visible from where they stood.
Dropping his aloof act, Colter tapped the taller man's chest with the back of his hand. "Hey."
Attention recaptured, Carl lowered his hand. His thumb was bleeding the tiniest amount. He met Colter's gaze.
"I will do everything in my power to find your friend. I promise."
It took Carl a moment--a moment long enough that Colter thought he would start tearing up--before he relaxed his posture. "Yeah. Okay."
Ryland surfaced to the sound of waves in his ears. He hummed, nuzzling his face into the softest blanket he'd ever felt before. Curling up, he leaned into the soothing back and forth of the water, the distinct texture of sound that was saltwater over sand and shells. It was different from what he heard on the Vatt. This was the sound of home--San Francisco--and an early morning on the beach close to the Bridge, when the fog rolled in like an old comfort blanket one clutched as a child.
Ryland's eyes shot open.
Because, he hadn't been home in several months. Not since the day Stratt waded him up in a hazmat suit and stuffed him into a room full of argon. Sure, at some point, it wasn't just her command keeping him there, but still it was all her fault he hadn't been home long enough to see the early fog in months. So there was no way he was there now.
Sitting up, Ryland looked quickly over his shoulder to his right. The sound of waves were being pumped from a small noise machine on a stout dresser. A mirror was attached above it, and Ryland could see himself bundled up under a soft, fur blanket. His hair was mussed and his glasses were missing. He was still wearing the dress shirt from the last summit meeting.
Scrambling to his feet, his legs were hopelessly tangled in the blanket. Before he could slow himself down, Ryland pitched over the side of the bed. He landed hard on his face.
With a groan, he rolled over onto his back. He felt sluggish and heavy; his legs were still propped up on the bed. He shoved at the blanket--which he feared wasn't as fake as he hoped it was--until he could finally get his legs free. He struggled but got to his hands and knees, then his feet. Swaying slightly, he took in the rest of the room.
Other than the bed and dresser, there was also a wardrobe, nightstand, and a bookshelf with no books. A bland blue rug took up most of the concert floor. Two doors were on opposite sides of the room, and it took his brain a moment to realize there were no corners to the wall, just smooth curves of a perfect circle. Everything was painted a similar shade of eggshell or cream. Ryland wrinkled his nose distastefully.
"You're awake!" a voice suddenly said. Ryland jumped, emitting a yelp that could probably be heard from space. The waves had stopped. The voice continued, "I'll be over in just a moment!"
Blinking owlishly, not completely back in his own body, Ryland wobbled away from the intrusive speaker and to the closest door. When he successfully twisted the knob and pushed the it open, he stepped into an ensuite with a sink, toilet and claw-footed tub. It was fully stocked and clean.
"Am I dreaming?" he mumbled, confused. He'd hadn't been in anything this spacious since his childhood home. Even his little studio was smaller than all this.
He reversed out of the room, leaving the door ajar. He followed the shape of the room to the other door. Unlike the bathroom, this one didn't open. "Huh?"
"Oh, just a moment!" the overly-enthusiastic voice said from both the speaker and, Ryland thought, the other side of the door. There was a soft beep before the door swung inward, almost hitting Ryland in the chest.
Finally revealed, the voice's owner was a tall, thin man in a smart gray suit and blue dress shirt. He was young, younger than Ryland, surely, with woodsy brown hair and eyes. He was much more polished than Ryland was in that moment. He grinned at him, before something that was just close enough to be concern, took over his expression. "What have you done? You're bleeding!"
Even more perplexed, Ryland reached up to his face. He patted around it, not really feeling anything, before pulling away. As the man had said, red stood out against his fingers. "Huh? Uh, what?"
The man approached him, pulling out a honest-to-God handkerchief from his pants pocket. Without permission from Ryland, he pressed it against his nose, tutting as he went. "Was that what the bang was? I didn't include cameras in your room--y'know, for privacy's sake--" he chuckled like he'd told a particularly clever joke--"but now I wish I had. Are you always this clumsy?"
Deflecting the man's question--and his touch--Ryland pushed away. "Where am I?"
The man folded up the soiled hankie and dropped it directly into a wastebasket by the wardrobe. "They told me there would be memory loss when he came to. I'm so sorry about that, but I had to have my men seize the opportunity." He jerked his hand up, closing it into a tight fist that trembled slightly. For a brief second, Ryland thought he recognized the action. "You are a very difficult man to get a hold of, Dr. Grace. But it's to be expected, I suppose."
Haltingly turning his head to and fro, trying--and failing--to understand what in the world this man was going on about, he choked out, "Did you reach out to the project?"
The man scoffed playfully, flinging his hand the way he'd tossed the hankie. "Please! I didn't have time for all that! The hoops! It was easier just to have you come to me!"
This man was both over-exuberant and loud. Ryland squinted at him. "And you are?"
The man froze--face, body, attitude. Ryland felt like he'd stepped on a landmine. He suddenly missed how loud he was before. "You...don't remember who I am?"
"Uhh," Ryland dragged out, and because he wouldn't be Grace if he didn't make just about every situation worse, continued to grumble, "No. I don't believe we've met."
His grin more that of a rictus corpse than a person, the man reached out. Before Ryland could stop him, again, he twisted his hand in the material of his shirt. Slowly, he dragged Ryland into his space until his breath was blowing right into Ryland's shocked, opened mouth. "You don't get to forget me."
Oh, this couldn't be good.