Xaviers!

"Yeah, I get that," he nodded. "But tell me if your power starts telling you to run or something. Alright?"

"That's not really how it works, but I'll keep an eye out for trouble." she nods.

He nodded back and tested the door. If locked, he'd pick it. Once through, he'd take point and descend to the top floor.

The door is in fact locked and with a deceptively sturdy one too, though Chase manages to open it after a little while. Inside the stairwell is empty and all he can hear is vague sounds from the butcher shop below. The hallway is dirty and smells faintly of, well, a meat. Looking down it seems the first floor is a little bit better taken care of and probably where the shop's owner and their family lives. The second story Chase is on right now seems empty.

He took a moment to orient himself before exploring the side the symbol was on, wary of booby traps especially when opening doors.

Chase finds what is basically an empty apartment. There's some furniture, the lights work and the refrigerator is running with a low hum, but otherwise the place seems to be empty. Searching around a bit more thoroughly he finds signs of the place having been used not too long ago. There's no dust, dirty dishes are sitting in the sink with food stains dried out. Maybe a couple days ago, a week at most, someone was here. There's still take-out bags and frozen meal wrappers on top of the trash and a notepad sits on the kitchen table.

Chase drew upon his training and sought out likely hiding places used to stash supplies: under furniture, loose floorboards, or behind picture frames. He'd even check the notepad in case someone got sloppy.

There's nothing on the notepad and a couple of pages have been torn off. He does find numerous hiding spots in exactly the places he would expect them to be. Most of them are empty, although he finds a couple stray bullets, some pieces of civilian clothing, just in general stuff that got left behind while someone was grabbing things in a hurry. Seems like whatever she was doing, she was doing it fast and getting the hell out of there.

"So she cleared out fast... maybe she made a mistake then," he said to himself. His eyes resettled on the notepad and he added, "That... would be too easy." Nevertheless, he located a pencil and rubbed it on the top page.

It's feint, because apparently more than the top page has been torn off, but he can still make out bits and pieces of Chinese characters.

Code: Select all

n-w --sig---nt
--et R--h--kov i- Seva-to--l
h--b-r st-tu- -7t- -t --on

Chase tore out the sheet and headed back to the roof as he tried to puzzle out the incomplete characters.