"There's nothing here. No trace at all." Illiana had taken us back to the mayors office to see if we could find anything to help locate the missing mayor. "I can't even pick up his scent."
"He burns candles, so maybe that's messing with your nose." We had searched the office for an hour, the only thing we found was a schedule book, but every day after yesterday was empty.
"Have you guys checked his house." I closed the book and gave it to Yukino to put in her bag.
"We went there, but since he didn't answer we figured he wasn't there. No one wanted to go in."
"Well than, that's where we should go." She walked us down the street, only about three houses down from his office, and we stopped in front of a two story house with large wooden doors. The second we walked inside we were shocked.
"What happened here?" The living room was trashed and it looked like his dining room was too. "Oh no.. he must've been kidnapped!" Illiana was freaking out, frantically looking around the room. Sting and I shared a look and began searching the house. Nothing seemed to be missing and everything looked to have only tipped over, not dropped or pushed because of a struggle.
"What do you think?" I asked sting and he looked around once more.
"I don't know what's going on, but this guy wasn't kidnapped. It's too neat." He scratched his head and went to Illiana. "Listen, I don't know exactly happened but we have a feeling he wasn't kidnapped. I can't explain it, just trust me." She stared at Stng, wanting to know what we knew, but she wouldn't be happy if she knew we thought he just walked out. "We won't give up on this, we'll keep looking for him. So don't worry." She nodded and headed back to her house. We needed her to leave so we can do a better investigation and so she could get some well needed rest.
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"Everything down here is clear. Nothing suspicious at least." Rufus had just finished searching the down stairs rooms with Orga. Yukino decided to search the basement and Sting and I were up stairs.
"I'll check his room, Rogue can you get that one?" He pointed to the door at the end of the hall and I walked towards it. When I opened it up both walls were covered in bookshelves and the far wall was nothing but window. There was a desk at the end of the room so I headed towards that.
"Rogue, what's this?" I looked at Frosch who had a black book in his hands. I opened it up and saw it was another schedule book, although this one was filled out more.
"Good work Frosch." I gave him a pat on the head and searched more. The books were all about politics and town history, with a few fiction mixed in. I met everyone in the living room and went over what we had. I stated Frosch's find of the schedule and the one I found earlier, Rufus, Sting, and Orga all said they found small memos hidden somewhere in the rooms, and Yukino found a small pile of magic books.
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"We've gone through every book five times, there's nothing here." Yukino dropped the book and stared at it. It was just after ten and we were currently sitting in the mayors office going through the books Yukino found. So far they were only on general types of magic. For example, they had a book on celestial wizards, simply going over how the magic users go about making contracts and how to improve the relationship with the spirts. None of the books ever went over how to use the magic though.
"What about the agenda? Is there anything in that?" I pulled out the books and went over them. The one found in the office was full of meetings and appearances up until yesterday, than it went blank. I sighed tossing that one aside. I opened up the one found in his house and looked it over. This one seemed to be full general notes, such as grocery shopping and when to pay bills.
I was about to give up when I saw a blank spot. Looking at it further I saw that it was about a month ago, and then everything goes back to normal. Skipping through I reached yesterdays date with the words Sabertooth kills monster- 12:30 PM written on it. The next page contained more notes, Sabertooth searches office- 3:00 AM, Sabertooth searches house- 5:00 AM, Rogue and cat find book- 5:30 AM, Rogue goes through book- 10:15 AM. I looked up at the clock on the wall and saw that it was 10:20. I dropped the book and everyone stared at me with shock. It's only natural, I've never freaked out like that before.
"Rogue, are you alright?" Orga picked up the book and looked like I'm guessing I did. Rufus grabbed the book and handed it to Sting.
"You guys are acting weird. What's this about?" His eyes met the page and he stared at me. "Did you do this?" I shook my head and he gave it back to me so I put it in the bag and kicked it behind me.
"Well, as weird as that was, it doesn't give us anything." Rufus sighed and rubbed his head. "I'm starting to think he wanted to disappear."
"Maybe, but we promised we'd find him so that's what we have to do." We agreed with Yukino and continued looking through the books.
"Hey, this book is about lacrima. It says 'There are several different ways lacrima can be use. Communication, image saving and viewing, and magic.' Than it gives a brief description of each." We gathered around Sting as he continued. "Communication lacrimas allow one person to talk to another from any distance. Image saving lacrimas allow the user to save an image of what they are doing and view it as they please. Image viewing lacrimas allow one main lacrima to observe one object or event and it can be transfered to any sharing lacrima. Lacrima used for magical purposes enhance the users magic power and energy reserve. So the user can not only use more powerful attacks, but also use them for a longer period of time.'"
"Why have a book in this? This is basic stuff." Rufus asked, obviously annoyed.
"It also says that sometimes a person can transfer magic into a lacrima to give to someone else so they can use that magic. It's weird, this page is marked up the most, like they were studying this." Sting pondered for a minute and gave up. "We should keep this, who knows what else we'll find."
"Guys!" Everyone looked over to Yukino who had the first agenda book in her hands. "I was going over this again and I found that the same city is used over and over. And it's also written in the small notes we found around his house." She was moving stuff around on his desk so she could show us what she was talking about. "The town he has written everywhere is some place called Pateo Village." She narrowed her eyes, trying to figure out where it was. Sting looked down and then his head snapped to me.
"Didn't you and Ashe live there?" Everyone turned towards me and gave me hopeful eyes.
"Well, technically I didn't, I just passed by a lot. But Ashe lived there until about two years ago."
"We should go. We'll take her since she knows the area." Yukino looked so excited to finally have a clue but I looked down, knowing she'd hate my response.
"Ashe isn't going to want to go back. She doesn't have the fondest memories there."
"Rogue, we need her. She needs to realize that she can help us find a missing man. I'm sure she'll put everything aside to help out." Sting put a reassuring hand on my shoulder and smiled. I sighed, knowing convincing her was going to be hard.
Just as I was going to say something, there was an odd glowing coming from the bag. Orga picked up the book and looked at what I'm guessing to be the newest memo. He was going to show me the book when the office doors slammed opened and Ashe came running in.
"Ashe? What's wrong, where's Lexi?" She looked at us with tear stained cheeks and fell to her knees.
"She's gone." Everyone in the room stopped and looked at the girl now bawling on the floor. "I went to get her out of bed after my bath and she was gone. I searched the whole resort and asked everyone if they saw her. No one knew a thing." She hid her face and cried even harder. Yukino dropped down beside her and hugged her trying to calm her down.
"I'll go make some tea." Rufus whispered before leaving the room. Sting and I helped Ashe up onto the couch so she'd be off the floor and Yukino went back to comforting. When she was situated Orga grabbed my arm and showed me the book. My fists clenched as I read what was now written on the page, Little girl 'disappears'- 10:45 AM.
Hey guys! Hope you enjoyed chapter 9! Im really trying to get things kicked off here and into some major awesome... stuff. So thanks for reading (and over 200 reads) and I hope you're enjoying! <(^-^)>
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Alone No More (Rogue Cheney)
Fanfiction"I-I just hate being alone." I watched as she cried, dying at the sound of her whimpers. "Who said you were alone?" I asked. The tears slowed and she looked at me with those eyes I loved. "You have me." I hugged her tight as she cried onto my robe...
