The Riddle

Chapter 10

Maria, slunk into her favorite armchair. While finally back home, mentally she was still in the mailroom, walking through various positions, materials, and claims. She closed her eyes, snuggling further into the soft chair, the various vials of samples jingling in her pocket.

“Another rough day?” came a voice from behind.

“Mh,” she responded.

Mario pat her on the head, which she ignored. “That bad?”

“Yes.”

“Do I dare ask?”

“Not before martinis.”

“Oof!”

A half an hour later, they were seated at the dining room table. Dinner had consisted of a quick sandwich and soup from a carton, plus, of course, martinis. About halfway through, Maria began to describe the day’s events and the fire in more detail. At the mention of the fire, Mario’s jam dropped and a bite of sandwich fell from there and back onto the plate. Maria had continued undeterred, wolfing down her own sandwiches in the process. By this time, she had gotten to the part about the state of the burnt mailroom. Mario’s plate remained largely still full of sandwich.

Maria noticed the plate and made a detour from her story. “Aren’t you going to finish that?”

“Later,” Mario responded. He started rubbing his temples in dismay. “What on earth are you doing for stuff like this to happen?”

Maria paused. “Well, a lot of different things can happen in an interdisciplinary department.”

“Not like this it doesn’t!”

Maria bit her lip. Was she becoming numb? Well, not completely numb, but still…

“Hokay, so you were talking about getting into the mailroom after the fire, right? Just hold on a moment, while I go get another martini.”

“Another one?”

“For me!”

He returned shortly after, sat down and opened his arms. “Please continue.”

“It took a while before I was allowed into the mailroom. The officer wasn’t about to just anyone in, but I was able to get a look at some of their notes. Eventually, I was able to get in and take my own samples.”

“You took samples?”

“Of course! I have them in my pocket right now…Honey?”

Mario’s jaw had dropped again. “You were able to think of doing that? And you brought the samples home? That was allowed? What if there was a dangerous substance still in there?”

“Oh, I didn’t think of that.”

Mario face-palmed.

“Anyway, no matter how I look at it, the fire started approximately right where Brandi had left her package. If her package somehow started the fire, well, that leaves a lot of concerning questions.”

“How would an open package start a fire.”

“Brandi would know more about how this works, but if some substances are exposed to air, the substance could ignite.”

Mario made a series of contorted facial expressions. “But that would require sealing the thing from air during transport. The package could have ignited before ever reaching the mailroom.”

“Yeah, whoever did this probably knew exactly what they were doing.” She chewed her lip. “What’s even more worrisome is that when I looked at the stack, there appeared to be something that looked like a fashion magazine.”

“What? Wait, you could tell?”

“It was a thick stack of paper. Even if the fire hadn’t been put out as quickly as it did, it still would have taken some time to burn through the whole stack. Peeling away the top layer of ashes showed some writing about haircuts and facial shapes.”

Mario took a sip of the second martini.

“If that was a magazine, then whoever sent the package had no intention of sending the actual documents to Brandi and even worse, was blatantly unwilling to let her see them.”

“This seems shortsighted.”

“Because not sending the documents immediately casts suspicion on whoever sent them?”

He nodded.

“That will be something to check tomorrow: who sent the package?” She tilted her head from side to side. “Brandi’s case was looking to be… problematic before this happened.”

“How so?”

“I’ve run into this with all of my reports at some point. Their work hints at uncovering something unsavory. Usually, this means developing an action plan for the client to find and correct the problem if things turn out to be, well, delicate."

“Is this another thing where I should be afraid to ask?”

“No, I’m referring to a client getting scammed or making sure they don’t get scammed.”

“Oh!”

“Well, mostly. In two other instances, the scammer had gotten deep into the client’s situation and the report was threatened. It wasn’t blatant like this, though. It was document and communication forgery, not a ticking fire bomb.”

“Was this Zach?”

Maria flashed a sarcastic grin. “How did you guess?” The grin faded. “Whoever did this was either confident or in a hurry.” “Or didn’t think things through.”

“Hm?”

“You’re assuming that this person is a pro. What if the scammer is new at this?”

Maria mulled over that bit. “The compound thing does make me think a pro, but you have a point. What if the scammer is a pro at corrosive substances but not scamming?”

“Regardless, is Brandi in any danger? Are you in any danger?”

“I’m thinking that the package’s purpose was to destroy evidence in Brandi’s office, not physically harm anyone.”

He glared at her.

“You know that my office has security!”

Mario huffed.

Maria crossed her arms. “I’ll need to check with Brandi to see what could count as ‘evidence to destroy’ in her office,” she muttered to herself.

“I’m still driving you to work tomorrow.”

“Mario!”

“No buts!”

“I can’t have you driving me to work! Do you realize how that would look?!”

He frowned.

“I’ll text you, okay?!”

“When you get into your office, at lunch and when you leave and no less!”

Maria’s nose twitched in exasperation. “Okay! Okay!”

They changed topics, attempting to lighten the mood. The new exergame Mario had brought home the previous week proved sufficiently goofy to this end. Maria conked out on the couch after several rounds, images of low polygon objects and burning paper dancing in her head.

The next day, Maria was down in the spectroscopy lab in the basement. The collection of rooms appeared as they normally did, cluttered and filled with the white noise of various fans. A single light flickered in the ceiling. The floor looked dull and dusty. A lone cabinet door was left open. All appeared as she had come to expect, except for one thing.

“Hello!” she called out. “Is anyone here?”

Only the whirl of the various gizmos could be heard in response.

Maria pursed her lips. Turning round and round she just about gave up until her ears discerned a faint sound that was not fans.

“Oh, someone is here,” came an unfamiliar voice.

Maria turned around to spy the person she was looking for, the current lab technician. “Uh, hi,” she stammered before adding, “you’re not Al.”

“Who’s Al?”

“Never mind.” She pulled out a fistful of vials from her pocket. “I need these analyzed.”

The technician held out both hands to catch all of the contents. “All of these?”

“Yes.”

He looked around back and forth, unsure of what to do next. “And here I was hoping to get to the backlog.” He shook his head. “Wait a minute! Who are you? Most of the building is closed. Should you even be here?”

“Right.” She then proceeded clarify the situation, including why she was an exception to the building closure rule.

The light of realization flashed across his face. “Oh, so you were at the fiasco yesterday?”

“Yes. Now do you think that you could get these analyzed? Finding out what caused the fire is going to be a higher priority than probably anything else you have.”

The technician paused, as if not sure if he would agree.

She glared at him.

“I’ll get started then.” He spun around and darted away into the next room.

Maria heaved a sigh, rolling her eyes. Heading back upstairs she mentally reviewed her to-do list, or at least what could be done that day. First priority would be to contact Brandi, see how she was doing and discuss her case. Next would be all of her own paperwork for all of these upcoming committees. There would be extra now due to the fire. After that, if she managed to finish, would be a brief check in with her other reports. Hopefully nothing too traumatic has happened to the others.

Plopping into her chair, she turned to her screen to set up a chat with Brandi. After a few minutes, her newest report answered, camera off.

Some of her reports liked to have the camera on, while others preferred to keep the camera off. Maria didn’t have a preference either way, so she simply followed what her reports did.

“How are you feeling?” Maria greeted as she turned off her screen.

“Better than yesterday. How’s the office?”

“Most of the building is unaffected, thankfully. Only a few heads were allowed to reenter the building for today, though. Ah, correction: a few heads and one technician.”

Brandi chuckled a bit.

Good. She can still laugh. “If it’s okay, I would like to address the elephant in the room right away: the package.”

“Ah, yeah, okay.”

“Do you recall who sent it to you?”

“Hm…it was supposed to be from the supplier.”

“Is that what was written on the return address?”

“Nnno. No. I think it was from an associated office, though.”

“Okay, do you recall the address at all?”

“Only that it was from another city. But I do recall some communication being from that city in the past.” She thought it over a bit more. “There was some connection between the two, but for the life of me, I can’t recall what that connection was.”

“Do you remember anything about the other place?”

There was a long pause. “Let me check my notes.”

Maria agreed and the meeting soon ended there.

Before tackling the growing mound of paperwork, she wandered down to the lobby and to the espresso machine. The ground floor lay empty, untouched. It was so quiet that she felt as though she could hear her own footsteps on the carpet.

The rumble of the brewing coffee echoed throughout the floor. The edges around the lobby were carpeted on shadows. Sure, the building was officially closed, so turning on all the lights seemed unnecessary and tedious. But the sheer change in atmosphere was enough to trigger a heightened awareness of her environment.

The machine hissed its finale and Maria began to head upstairs again. So little of the building had been damaged, not that much of the lack of damage could be seen. The hum of the HVAC filled the stairwell. As she approached the next floor, the sound of shuffling papers whispered through the doorway.

Probably just one of the other heads.

Maria turned to go up the next flight then stayed on the landing.

It’s probably just paranoia, she told herself as she turned around. Probably just the background noise of the building. She turned left, heading down a darkened hall. The shuffling sound became more discernable. Probably just one of the other heads. After all, the…

She froze.

The mailroom was just up ahead. She could still see the tape barring entry in the dimness.

Crap.

She tiptoed up to the edge of the entry. From her vantage point she could estimate the position of the light switch. She peered in, no moment. Keeping her eyes to the interior, she reached across the doorway. After some fumbling and leaning into the doorway, she found the switch and flicked it on.

A thud of papers could be heard from the back room.

Maria ducked out of view of the entrance and waited in the dark. Clattering and banging could now be heard from the back. Then a skid and now the pounding of heavy feet. A figure slid out of the doorway, arms full, and right before Maria.

The figure way about average and either large or wearing baggy clothes. And most distracting of all, the figure’s face was green with a mud mask.