14 Chapter 14

"I see," Attorney Pence said, "now I understand. So you extended my clients detention so he would be out of the way of your investigation?"

"I guess you could say that." Chief Ahrest stated, then whipped around, "Come, Karma, let's get back to work."

As they went out. Chief Ahrest closed the door behind them and turned to Karma.

"So, Karma." He said, "I'll head back to my office to think about what to do next. Detective Rodney is probably already at court for the trial. Why don't you go and check up on Mr. Starvald, if he's still there? After that, you can go take your lunch break."

With that, Chief Ahrest left Karma and proceeded to go to his own room.

Karma walked down the hallway as he walked into the room with Mr. Starvald.

"Er, Mr. Starvald?" Officer Karma called to Mr. Starvald. Mr. Starvald turned around.

"Yes, what do you want, chap?" He asked Karma politely.

"Chief Ahrest told me to check up on you."

"Ah," said Mr. Starvald, "That's considerate of him. He was always a true gentleman, much like myself. Well," Said Mr. Starvald, standing up and fixing his tie. "I need to go now, Officer."

"Oh, of course." Karma said as Mr. Starvald left the room. Now alone, as Detective Karma was walking to his own department, He ran into Officer Byron, who was eating a donut.

"Ah, Karma." Byron greeted Karma, "Fancy seeing you here. I heard that you got involved in a hostage taking at Newfund Bank. What happened there?"

"Oh, nothing we couldn't handle." Karma told Byron, "Hey, Byron, are you also on break?"

"Hm, oh, yeah." Said Byron to Karma, grinning, "I was just about to see you to see if we could go have lunch together."

"That sounds like a good idea." said Karma as he and Byron headed off towards the parking lot and they got in Byron's car.

Byron got into the driver's seat and Karma got into the passenger seat. When they put on their seatbelts, Byron started the car and they drove off.

"So, where are we going?" Karma asked Byron.

"Well, my dad opened a new branch just a bit further down the road," Byron replied, "We'll be eating there."

"Well, Donut Land serves other thing than just donuts, right?" Karma asked.

"Of course they do." He replied, and added, "So, Karma, why don't you tell me about what happened?" Byron asked Karma while he drove.

"Well, this morning, we went and investigated Paradox Industries. We tried to find something that would keep them detained longer, and we did."

"Oh?" Byron said, intrigued, "And what did you find?"

"Well," Karma explained, "We found a piece of paper that links Mr. Paradox with the illegal hemlock trade. As you know, Deyd Krimeenall sells hemlock, so there's gotta be some connection there, right?"

"I believe that's highly likely, like a ninety nine percent chance." Byron agreed, "I think the Chief will investigate Paradox Industries again."

They came to a halt as the stoplight in front of them turned red. Byron turned to Karma to continue their conversation.

"I hope we find something to implicate Mr. Eclaire also." Karma told Byron, "We haven't found anything about him, so he's free to go after he posts bail."

"Tough luck." Byron replied, "Well, I'm sure you'll find something."

"Byron, the light's green." Karma told Byron, pointing at the stoplight.

"Oh, sorry about that." Byron said as he continued to drive, "Let's go."

He and Karma talked for a while before they arrived at Donut Land. They decided to get drive thru since it would be more practical if they needed to go to the police station quickly.

"Hello, welcome to Donut Land," the speaker said, "may I take your order please?"

"Karma, what you want?" Byron asked Karma.

Karma looked over the menu and looked for something other than donuts. Then he saw that meal number nine was, a burger, while number seven was fries and a coke.

"Well," Karma said, handing Byron ten mohns to pay for his order, "I'll have a number seven with extra ketchup, and two number nines, one with cheese."

"Okay," Byron replied, taking the ten mohns. "We'll have two number nines, one with cheese, a jumbo number nine, a number six, a number seven with extra dip,a number twelve, and a large donut."

"Okay sir, we got your order." The person talking through the speaker said, "Please proceed to the next area to claim your meal."

"Did you just order everything donuts?" Karma asked Byron.

"What do you take me for? One of those fat, unhealthy, donut loving cops?" Byron replied, "Only number twelve and the last order were donuts, number six was a tuna sandwich."

"Wait, why does donut land sell so much more non donut meals than donut meals?" Karma asked.

"Well," Byron said, "Dad knew that the he would've gotten more customers if he didn't just sell donuts, so he diversified a bit."

"I think he diversified a little bit too much." Karma replied. Byron continued driving until they reached the next area.

"Here you go, sir." Said the lady behind the desk, handing over a bag. Byron took the bag.

"How much?" He asked, pulling out his wallet.

"It'll be one hundred mohns, sir."

"That's not that expensive." Byron said to himself, looking through his wallet. He saw he was twenty mohns short. "Er, Karma." Byron asked Karma, "Could you lend me 20 mohns? I'll pay you back later."

"Fine," Karma sighed, taking out twenty mohns from his wallet and handing it over to Byron.

"Thanks." Byron said, handing the money to the cashier. "Here you go."

"Have a nice day, sir." The cashier said as they drove off to the parking of the restaurant.

"Okay, now give me my food." Karma told Byron as Byron handed him his order.

"There we go." Byron said, "Now, let's eat!"

They ate their meal in silence, but Karma broke it by asking Byron, "So, what about you? Any cases recently?"

Byron took the time to swallow his food, "Well, there was this one case we had to solve that involved a 1 million mohns counterfeit bill."

"Wait, does that even exist?" Karma asked.

"No, which is precisely why it's counterfeit." Byron replied, "Some foreigner complained about not knowing it was a counterfeit bill and made a scene at the airport when he was going to convert it to his country's currency of Nistrian Nacurs. We had to go to the airport and fix the issue."

"Well, did you?" Karma asked Byron.

"We had sufficient evidence to think that he actually knew it was a fake. In fact, we think he was the one that forged it."

"He didn't bother checking our bills to see if something like that existed." Karma said, laughing.

"Yeah, it's weird." Byron agreed, "I guess he didn't know a one million mohn bill didn't exist. Why, if it did, we could by a house with that."

They continued discussing what they did while eating. When they finished, Karma looked at his watch.

"Look at the time." Karma told Byron, "Our break's almost over. We have to get back."

"Agreed." Byron said, and he turned the car on and drove.

"I wonder what the Chief's next course of action will be, though." Karma said, "We don't have that many clues to work on, at the moment. We might investigate Luminescence Corporation again."

"We didn't really find anything else other than note at Deyd Krimeenall's house, right?" Byron said, "Other than that bottle of cyanide. That's not really much evidence to work on."

"We'll find a way." Karma said, "We can't fail our first job."

They arrived at the station and got out. They went in and parted ways.

"See you later, Karma." Byron waved to Karma as he headed to his own department.

"You too, Byron." Karma said, going back to his department.

As Karma walked towards his department, he bumped into Officer Grand. Officer Grand dropped what he was holding, and Karma picked it up and gave it back.

"Sorry about that, officer." Karma apologized, "Where were you going anyway?"

"Well, I was going to go see the Chief." Officer Grand replied, taking the envelope from Karma. "I'll be seeing you."

"Okay," Karma replied, "See you."

Karma walked away while Officer Grand walked towards the Chief's office. He knocked on the door.

"Come in."

Officer Grand opened the door and went in. He slowly closed it behind him.

"Ah, Officer Grand." Chief Ahrest greeted him, "You have the autopsy report ready?"

"Yes, sir." Officer Grand said, placing the envelope on the table. Chief Ahrest opened it and read the report.

"So," Chief Ahrest said, looking up after he finished reading the report, "the cyanide was not used to kill Deyd Krimeenall?"

"That's right, Chief." Officer Grand said, "That is what we initially thought since the cyanide bottle was found next to the dead body, but now that we performed the autopsy, we found traces of conium maculatum, in other words, hemlock, and its poisonous chemicals in the victim's body. The killer must've left the bottle to mislead us."

"Hmm, I see." Chief Ahrest said, "And the cup? What does Doctor Brown say about it?"

"In the cup, we also found traces of hemlock." Officer Grand continued, "Doctor Brown thought it was strange at first, but now that we found this out, the killer must have put the cyanide after Deyd Krimeenall died."

"Okay." Chief Ahrest nodded, "I might have to send another team to investigate. You can go now, officer."

"Yes, sir."

When Officer Grand left, Chief Ahrest was left alone, thinking about what this meant for the case. If Krimeenall was not killed by the cyanide, but rather hemlock, then that broadens the wide range of possibilities for the case. As of the moment, it seemed that Mr. Paradox was more of a prime suspect than Mr. Lusserson was. But he'd also have to look into that. Maybe he would need to send a team to investigate Luminescence Corporation and Paradox Industries.

He would have to ask Detective Rodney to investigate Luminescence Corporation if he came back. As for Paradox Industries, they would need to find hemlock in order to arrest Mr. Paradox for possession of drugs, if not murder. He picked up his phone that was on the desk and dialed for the Drugs and Organized Crime Department.

"Sergeant McKild? It's the Chief." Chief Ahrest said, "I need you to come down to my office."

A while later, there was knocking at the door, and Sergeant McKild came in. He closed the door behind him quietly.

"So, uh, Chief." McKild said, "What do you need me for?"

"We may have found enough evidence to assume that Paradox Industries is in possession of hemlock." Chief Ahrest told him, "I want you to go there and investigate."

"Yes, sir." Sergeant McKild responded, "I'll go inform my men." He said before he left.

Chief Ahrest sighed at the unexpected turns this case was taking. He thought about how the former Chief Karma had handled situations like this. He had and uncanny ability of finding evidence and tracing criminals. This would just be a simple case had he still been the chief.But no matter how complex, he was sure they would be able to find the killer.