Protagonists#

• Short, Lance - Foreign Service Officer (Γιάννης)
• Miller, Liam (Agent Dave / Jocko) - Naval Special Warfare Group One (SEALs) (Παναγιώτης)
• Lensing, Emma - Professor of Philology (Τάσος)
• Bennet, Wendy - Criminal Intelligence Analyst / Assistant Professor of Criminology (Κωνσταντίνα)

Denver County Jail, Monday, 9 OCT 2017, 4:30 p.m.#

Agent Jocko and Nikita continue questioning Sgt. Pelaez. They ask for the names of the other guards who assaulted Reznik. He complies and tells them to wait while he retrieves something.

Jocko enters the adjacent cell. When a prisoner is rude to Nikita, Jocko steps in to intimidate him. The scent from the prisoner drives Jocko mad, and he beats the man to death while Nikita stands outside. A security camera captures the act.

Lindsey-Flanigan Courthouse#

Agent Myra arrives at the courthouse posing as Agent Derek Long. After signing a few documents, she persuades an office clerk to accept a box labeled Case 17CR1182, which contains the following:

• Three expended Avalon Gardens brand marijuana vape cartridges, flavored Guine-verve Cherry
• One half-full Avalon Gardens brand marijuana vape cartridge, flavored Guine-verve Cherry
• One DC5V .05G vape pen and charger
• One receipt from Denver Greens, a recreational marijuana dispensary, for the above; the memo line is made out to “Suzie”
• The handbag, wallet, credit cards, and ID of Suzanna Carmichael, age 36, resident of Missouri
• A burned DVD labeled “Security Cam 6/Snowmelt/10-8-17”
• Radomir Reznik’s CDOC-issued photo ID
• A business card for Renewed Potential Housing Group (RPHG), a Denver-based charity that provides housing to released convicts
• A form memo announces the closing of the Reznik case and cancellation of the arraignment, with reference to a body transported to the medical examiner at 9:30 p.m. Sunday.

Denver City Coroner’s Office#

Agent Locke carefully performs the autopsy of Radomir Reznik.

• The body is severely mutilated and burned, with the skull shattered and torso torn open. The corpse is charred and partially melted due to the victim’s acrylic sweatshirt igniting.
• Burns suggest an alcohol accelerant started the fire.
• Skull and chest damage (12-gauge buckshot from above) occurred post-mortem.
• Canine teeth and nails in the body match a dog seen on video.
• No smoke in the lungs indicates Reznik died before the fire.
• Lung pathology is bizarre: fluid buildup suggests extreme lipoid pneumonia, and rapid, impossible cancer growth (stage-four carcinoma) occurred in hours, not months.
• The lower torso is obliterated (destroyed or ripped away) leaving only a mass of unidentifiable flesh.

She retains the mass of unidentifiable flesh and a portion of Reznik’s body for further examination, arranging for the incineration of the remainder.

Denver County Jail#

An alarm snaps Jocko out of his red mist. He and Nikita attempt to leave, but at the Block 2 security station, they discover that Sgt. Pelaez has hanged himself. Additional security personnel have gathered around.

The agents find the Security Monitoring Room locked and are unable to enter. Jocko shoots the lock and forces his way in. Agent Locke provides instructions over the phone on how to erase the murder footage, but Jocko is unable to follow them. Frustrated, he trashes the room and destroys all the equipment inside.

Jocko then helps the prison guards subdue another riot, while Emma detects the Scent coming from the restaurant/kitchen area. She discovers that its source is the food. Every package lists additives from GAP Inc.

Escaping the Police#

Police officers, SWAT teams, and ambulances arrive at the scene. The agents are interrogated about their presence at the facility. They are informed that Sgt. Pelaez killed a prisoner, destroyed the Security Monitoring Room, and then committed suicide. The agents are ordered to hand over their credentials and remain within city limits until their account is verified.

Agent Jocko befriends a guard named Jimmy, who leads them toward the server room. Nikita, however, senses that the guard is highly suspicious of them and will likely report them.

The agents decide to leave the premises and successfully slip away undetected.

Dinner at Crazy Brocolli#

Agent Nikita reports their findings to Pitzerelli. He sounds surprised to hear about GAP and sends over a set of mugshots featuring Southeast Asian men and women, along with an image of a human skull tattoo surrounded by strange symbols. He asks if they’ve seen any of them before.

After taking a seat at the Crazy Broccoli restaurant, the agents realize that the food they’re served carries the Scent. They opt instead to grab hotdogs from a nearby food cart.

Renewed Potential Housing Group#

Agents Myra and Jocko pay a visit to Renewed Potential Housing Group. They’re fortunate to meet Shoshanna Banks, who tells them the following:

• A taxi dropped Reznik off, on the Friday the 7th of October 2017.
• She checked him in and then he and walked out the front door, muttering that he “wouldn’t be staying long”
• He didn’t leave anything behind or mentioned where he went.

Meanwhile, Jocko investigates Avalon Gardens and uncovers the following:

• Established in 2015.
• Operated by Dakota and Bill Knight.
• The company specializes in post-process marijuana products: extracts, shatter, distillate, crystals, and a variety of THC food additives.
• It has a reputation for exceptionally strong product at competitive prices.
• It sells from a single physical location: the Round Table Dispensary at the company’s Valley Dirtlands Cultivation Site, just outside Greeley, Colorado
• Their products are wholesaled to dispensaries in Colorado and other states.
• The 99% THCA potency claimed by the company is impossible. The mixes that add flavor to cartridges dilute the solution more than 1%. Probably a marketing tactic.

Lab Work#

Agents Locke and Nikita return to the Coroner’s Office Lab to conduct additional chemical and biological analyses:

• Dead mass of indistinguishable flesh: Contains human DNA intermixed with an unidentified substance. Possibly related to the creature seen on the video footage.
• Body part: Abnormally high concentration of nerve endings.
• Avalon Gardens vape cartridge: Requires a fully equipped chemical lab to reverse-engineer the fluid
  • The sample is scheduled to be sent to Harvard University contacts involved in the Cornucopia House investigation.

Agent Locke fills in the autopsy report:

• Cause of Death: Exsanguination due to dog bites.
• Additional Findings: Reznik was suffering from tuberculosis.
• Recommendation: Immediate incineration of remains.

Agent Nikita contacts Pitzerelli, forwarding the lab test results and photographs from the autopsy.