Page 95 of Violent Possession

I believe in digital footprints, in traces, in the idea that every existence, no matter how careful, leaves an echo in the system, but not this man.

So I try to follow the tracks Idohave: to understand how he knew Griffin’s exact whereabouts, in a convenience store at a random time.

The apartment—which I myself selected in the middle of that transitional zone between the old city and the cynical cluster of newly built luxury—is surrounded by silence and a rotten ecosystem: expensive boutiques side-by-side with corner bars, Korean waxing salons, 24-hour pharmacies, and a floating population of beggars, credit card promoters, and prostitutes.A perfect mix to hide someone like Seraphim. I created the opportunity myself.

In my office, the screens are already lit. I start with the most obvious flaw: the camera of the warehouse nearest to the alley that failed the exact instant Griffin entered. The system report cites “scheduled maintenance”. Except no one schedules maintenance in the middle of the night in a city where cameras are worth more than the police. I ignore the report and directly access the security company’s server—a labyrinth of proxies, but only up to a point.

The digital work order exists. Serial numbers, protocols, the supervisor’s electronic signature. Except the signature was cloned, and I figure this out because the on-duty technician, according to HR’s biometric records, was on the other side of the city, fixing a hotel elevator on the waterfront. Seraphim anticipated I would look for the error, and he planted it to divert my attention. Elegant. In a way, I admire it.

Swallowing my frustration, I change tactics.

My first scan is with facial recognition software—a gift from the FSB, with some improvements of my own. It checks if anyone, anyone at all, followed Griffin between the cameras.

But nothing. No repeated faces. No suspicious figures. Nothing that lingers for more than thirty seconds. Too clean.

I discard the algorithms and trust a superior processor: my own. I go back to zero. The point of origin: Griffin leaves the building, alone. Turns right, walks two blocks, enters the store. What did I miss on this route that neither my men nor Griffin himself would have seen, if he really wasn’t involved?

I replay the seconds. Griffin passes a prostitute, a thin brunette under a synthetic coat. For five seconds, her eyes follow Griffin. People always look at him, at the prosthesis, but it doesn’t seem like flirting or curiosity. When he turns the corner, she instantly pulls a phone from her bra, types for eight seconds,then puts it away again. She doesn’t look back. It seems like a habit.

I fast-forward the timeline: Griffin crosses the street. A bar, still open. Inside, the bartender pours a glass, but his eyes don’t stray from the window pane. Twenty seconds after the prostitute sends the message, he tilts his head toward the back of the bar and gestures—a double tap on the counter—to someone in the shadows. Whoever receives the signal doesn’t appear on camera, but the language is clear.

It’s a human chain. A circuit of transmitters, with no visible loose ends.

I move on. The convenience store. The facade camera is low-resolution, but it’s enough.

Griffin approaches. The clerk is behind the counter. A cell phone in his hand lights up. He looks down. No change in his expression. But his right hand moves. He reaches for a small plastic sign hanging from the window by a chain. The sign says “We’re Hiring”. He flips it to the blank side.

I pause the recording. I rewind one, two, three days to this same time. The clerk, with the same boredom on his face, never flips the “We’re Hiring” sign in any other recording. Only at that hour, on that day, in that minute.

I return to the moment Griffin arrives, frame by frame, until I capture the exact instant the clerk turns the sign.

I need a name.

The convenience store is part of a national franchise. A corporation. And corporations have a weakness I know well: HR and payroll systems with pathetic security.

It doesn’t take long to bypass their firewall and access their servers. It’s child’s play. I locate the employee file for the specific branch. I pull the time clock records for the night in question. And there he is.

Arthur Penhaligon. 46 years old. Single father. Minimum wage.

I use his name to dig deeper, to find financial data with public records. The story that unfolds is so predictable it’s sad. Denied bank loans. A growing credit card debt. And then, the why.

Recurring and substantial past payments to a pediatric oncology clinic, which are now spaced out between months.

I leave my office, crossing the dark hallway of my apartment. It’s not a complete answer, not by a long shot. But, for the first time with Seraphim, I havesomething.

The actof softening the meat, of breaking the spirit before the first question is even asked, always comes first. The method never varies: a theater of pain and panic amplified by the desolate echo of the surroundings. I watch from the shadows, listening to the impact of fists and kicks on the fragile bones of the bound man, the squeals muffled by the makeshift gag. His face is already a map of purple and cuts, and yet, each new blow tears away another shred of resistance.

I let it last for another thirty seconds, enough for the fear to settle in his bones, for the taste of blood in his mouth to become the only reality he knows.

“Enough,” I say.

My men pause in the same instant. The larger one steps back, wiping blood from his hand on his shirt hem; the other releases Penhaligon’s shoulders, who collapses against the back of the chair with an asthmatic sob. This is the secret to control: not toscream, not to foam at the mouth, not to lose your composure. Perfect order is silent order.

I cross the space with a didactic slowness. I stop three meters from the target, hands in my suit pockets. I give the victim the right to see me clearly.

“Leave,” I order, without taking my eyes off the tied-up man.

The two guards hesitate. A fraction of a second, nothing more—enough to register that they don’t want to leave me alone, not even with a harmless human rag. But they don’t question it. “Yes, sir.”