surrender to the city ( narrative )
Who: Manx, Queen, various Kritiker scientists Where: Kritiker HQ, Paris When: a week after the Project Noir strike What: Odd news.
Manx wasn't sure why she had been called to Paris to talk about poison. Poisoning happened. She assumed that Pawn would be fine, and with Project Noir gone, there were other targets she had to focus on. They had gotten a lot of information from the strike, and she still needed to figure out more about this Adal woman and the Greek magical papyrus Bishop and Knight had translated ages ago.
But the analysts had said that it was important to discuss in person, and so Manx made it to Paris as soon as she could.
They had three samples out, one from Martine, one from the horses who were killed, and one that was not labelled. When prompted to explain themselves, they said that the poisons were all identical. Manx knew not to believe in coincidences when Esset were involved: they had a way of popping up in the most unlikely places. Moreover, she wasn't surprised by this news as much as the fact that Esset was now interested in killing horses. But that didn't explain the third sample, and she tapped the table impatiently.
"Where is this one from?"
The scientists look at each other and then nodded. "This is why we thought we should call you, ma'am. It's from Kritiker."
"What?" She tensed, and neither doctor really wanted to look at her.
"It's a particularly fast-acting agent developed by Emily Smith--Toyger."
Manx looked stunned, narrowing her eyes in thought. "Were any of our samples missing?"
"No."
"Then someone else must have developed it." Emily was dead. She had been for years. Manx could tell by their expressions that they didn't believe her, but that was the most logical thing. She was vaguely aware that it was extremely unlikely for two parties to develop the exact same compound, and she didn't believe in coincidences, but if their insinuation were true, that would mean something very bad was happening indeed. "Run through your tests again."
She turned and left the room, calling Queen as she walked. They needed to figure this out soon.