Chapter 19: Interlude Bailey

Chapter 19: Interlude Bailey

Adam Bailey was not having a good evening.

The last few days had been great. Utterly exhausting, but great, amazing, awesome, and every other synonym for good he couldn’t currently think of.

Becoming a professor, gaining his own research team, getting to investigate the scientific mystery of the century, if not the millennium ... all amazing. He’d even written a paper in what felt like record time, a paper that would almost certainly become very impactful when it came to making plans surrounding summoning in the future.

He’d been tired, but it had been the good kind of tired, the kind that let you know you’d been working hard and achieved something. At least that was how it had been right up until this moment.

Now, however ... blech. He hadn’t become a member of academia because he liked fielding late night emergency calls.

But some utter dumbass had decided to summon a powerful monster right next to campus, in the middle of a frat party no less, and both the police and university higher ups had decided that the situation needed the attention of the closest thing to an expert the world had produced thus far. Hence, he was driving towards a frat house at three in the morning, a stomachache forming from downing the monster energy drink he always kept in his fridge for emergencies such as this.

It would have been rather obvious where the problem had occurred even if he hadn’t had the address. The blue lights were flashing atop police cars while barriers and tape were blocking off a large area surrounding the frat house. A large fire engine was also present for some reason, making Bailey wince. Had there been a fire too, or had the summoned monster been some kind of fire spirit? He certainly didn’t know, he hadn’t been told anything beyond ‘get your ass over there right this instant’.

There were also a pair of ambulances there, their own lights not flashing. Given that they weren’t driving off, there clearly weren’t any emergencies still happening.

“Excuse me, Sir, this is an active crime scene.” someone stepped up to Bailey’s car window and rapped on it.

He just rolled it down carefully, not making any hurried motions, stuck his head out.

“I’m Professor Adam Bailey from the local university, I was asked to come here.”

Instead of answering him, the cop just reached up for his radio and asked for confirmation, then finally turned to Bailey “Can I see some ID?”

“Here you go.” Bailey handed over his basic ID card.

“This just has your name on it, can I see something official from the university?” the cop asked.

“I don’t carry my letter of accreditation in my wallet, sorry. But you could always just look me up on the university website?” Bailey suggested, sighing internally. Yes, being cautious and bureaucracy were both important, but that didn’t mean he liked having either shoved in his face.

“... checks out. I’ll just call someone over real quick.” the officer told him, voice a little smaller than it had been.

As the young man scampered off, Bailey shut off his car and got out, looking around. A faint scent of smoke and burnt steak. Something had clearly happened to require the fire brigade, though it didn’t seem like whatever had caught fire had been a person. At least that’s what decades of hearing burning human flesh described as ‘burning pork’ led him to believe. God, he hoped that no one had gotten burned.

“Professor Bailey?” an older woman was walking towards him, wearing a wrinkled uniform that spoke of something being put on in a hurry “Polizeirätin Eisenberg, currently in charge of this ... situation.”

“Yes, nice to meet you, though I wish it had been under better circumstances.” Bailey nodded, then shook her hand. He wasn’t entirely sure just how highly ranked she was, but given that her title roughly translated to ‘police council member’, he guessed pretty high.

“Likewise. How much do you know of the current situation?” she asked.

“Not much. All anyone told me was that a monster had gotten summoned during a frat party and that I was wanted there, then the university called me like two minutes later and told me basically the same thing.” he explained.

“Alright, that is basically correct, but we’ve actually found out some more information. The summoner appears to have been a highly inebriated individual who overheard one of the more influential members of the fraternity talking about how stupid summoning drunk was and decided to take that as a personal challenge. When he actually saw the circle glow after he finished charging it, he got scared and decided to pretend nothing had happened, but then someone else noticed and warned everyone. He was, according to his statement, willing to just let it lie there until it went away but then one of the people who showed up looked like he knew what he was doing, so the summoner decided to go through with things.” she explained.

“Wait, you caught the guy? That’s great! How?” Bailey exclaimed. Getting someone this criminally stupid off away from anywhere he might inflict significant damage could only be a good thing.Ñøv€l-B1n was the first platform to present this chapter.

“It was pointed out to us that monsters are able to locate their summoner, always. Apparently, that was also announced before the monster actually appeared so people had already thought about that by the time we asked about it. This being said, a bunch of drunk university students aren’t the best source of information and there were a lot of false accusations, but one of my patrol officers has a [Skill] to check mana levels and there was only one person with basically no mana who hadn’t also been involved in the fighting.” she explained.

“SEK, the Sonder Einsatz Komando. But did anything else happen?” Isaac asked.

“Nope. And feel free to come in tomorrow morning, but only if you want to. Also, be really fucking careful.” Bailey implored.

“Will do, Professor. Aye aye. Have a good night and see you tomorrow. Bye.” Isaac said.

Bailey bade him goodbye in turn and hung up.

“I’m sorry about that, a friend of mine ended up in the hospital.” Bailey apologized to Eisenberg.

“It’s fine, no one could ever fault you for being worried after a mess like that.” she told him.

“Thank yo-“ Bailey’s phone rang “Sorry about that. Professor Bailey here.”

“Hey Professor Bailey, its Professor Bishop. I heard about the incident and I’d like to assist with the necropsy, do you need any help?” the familiar voice of his colleague greeted him.

“I’d like that. I’ll call you once I know when and where.” Bailey said.

“Actually, I’m at the incident, outside the police tape. Can you see me waving?”

Only a couple of minutes later, the other professor met him at the body. It lay there like a block of charcoal, stinking fluids dripping from cracks in its surface.

“So, either of you know what that is?” Eisenberg asked.

“No, but I doubt many people do. This was a Tier 4 creature, something well beyond the power level of most people to handle. Anyone who’s summoned one in the last couple of days probably didn’t survive.” Bailey said “And the sheer damage the fire inflicted makes telling anything from its looks pretty difficult. If possible, I’d like to do a necropsy as soon as possible, for several reasons. We can find out how tough these things are and the internal organs might help identify just what this is.”

“Necropsy?” Eisenberg asked.

“Autopsy for animals.”

“Actually, that’s part of why I asked for your help. We’ll have this body transported to the nearest police morgue in a few minutes.” Eisenberg told him.

“Excellent. I’ll need a few things. A monster that came from a Tier 4 circle is likely to be quite tough, so I might need a lot of cutting power to get through, well, anything. Someone with [Piercing Strike] or an equivalent [Skill] would be great. I’d also like a proper circular saw and a bunch of extra scalpel blades wouldn’t go amiss. Lastly, I’d like Professor Bishop to assist. Is any of that going to be a problem?” Bailey asked.

“No.” Eisenberg said, then called over a younger police officer “Wachtmeister Klebs will help you get everything you need.”

Then she hurried off to yell at two people who were currently arguing about ... something, Bailey wasn’t entirely sure what.

“So, this is what happens when a monster gets summoned by someone who can’t handle it?” Bishop commented, looking everything over “By the way, do those dents in the concrete steps look fresh to you?”

Bailey stepped over to them and frowned, seeing there was still concrete dust in the small impressions.

“If those were old, they‘d be clean, washed out, not filled with dust. These are clearly fresh.“ he said, casting a look back at the charred body.

“Well, shit.”

“Well shit indeed.”