At five o'clock, Barton Mayor Anthony slumped in his car, and his beautiful female secretary Gina bent over and massaged her heels with a bitter look on her face. Anthony's eyes unconsciously looked down at a part of Gina that was exposed due to bending over. The fatigue of the day seems to have diminished a lot...
"Keep your eyes forward! Pay attention to the road!" Anthony found that the eyes of the driver in the front seat were looking at the same place as him in the rearview mirror. He reminded the restless driver sternly, and at the same time reached out to block Gina's body. .
Gina realized her gesture, straightened up shyly, covered her chest, and at the same time gave the mayor a grateful smile.
The mayor of Barton City shook his head coldly, but he was happy in his heart, 'One step at a time, build up a good impression first, don't be in a hurry, don't be in a hurry...'
Let us not judge Mr. Mayor’s philosophy on conquering women for the time being, and simply describe Mr. Mayor’s busy day.
The city government has taken back cemeteries and privatized the funeral industry. As of Barton City (Barton is located in the easternmost part of Massachusetts), it has been implemented throughout the entire state of Massachusetts. But for the entire federation, this is just a trial. Therefore, the governor and the two Massachusetts senators attach great importance to it. All day today, what Anthony did was drag the two governors to inspect various cemeteries and explain what projects would be carried out after the land was taken back.
Of course, in the process, the two senators who were destined to become rivals showed completely different concerns. One was more concerned about the development direction of the funeral industry, so Anthony had to use the South District Cemetery in charge of Zach as an example to explain that Barton City had not given up on tradition... while the other was more concerned about the planning and commercial value of the land...
With Anthony caught in the middle, there was an illusion that the gubernatorial race had already begun.
Anyway, Anthony is now relieved, he saw off these two politicians, and now he can finally go back to the city hall and rest for a while before he goes to attend his niece's birthday party in Cologne!
"Gina, what's the name of Cologne's niece?" Anthony asked his secretary, rubbing his temples.
Gina replied: "Lisa, sir, is the daughter of Director Cologne's sister."
"How old?"
"Ten years old. Sir."
Anthony sighed. If it weren't for his good personal relationship with Cologne, why would the mayor need to 'attend' a ten-year-old girl's birthday party! Anthony looked out the window, and the city hall building appeared in front of him.
The driver opened the door and after Anthony got out of the car, Gina followed him. Anthony decided to go back to the office quickly and get himself drunk so that he could spend a ten-year-old's birthday party in a daze of consciousness.
Anthony walked past the reception desk of the city hall and walked straight in. No, Anthony turned back and looked at the two people sitting in the hall, Zach and Benjamin!
Anthony helplessly made a 'go to the office' gesture to the two of them, and then directly gave Gina a day off.
Back at the mayor's office, as soon as Anthony opened the bottle of whiskey, three people pushed open the door of his office.
three people
Zach smiled and put the cap of the whiskey bottle on the mouth of the bottle, "Anthony, what we want to do next requires you to stay awake."
Anthony frowned, and Zach took the bottle away and put it back in the wine cabinet, looking at the third person: "Who is this? Wait." Anthony rubbed his temples: "You are James Lance! Lance The general’s son! Why are you with these two people?!”
"Look, I'm sorry, you need to stay awake." Zach moved two stools as if he was very familiar with this place, and all three of them sat down.
"Uh." Anthony stared at Zach: "What's going on? He's James, right! It's not some messy thing!"
James now fully believes that Anthony and Zach have a deep friendship. James doesn't know whether to be happy or sad now...
"Benjamin! You, you are the good side, why are you here?" Anthony knew that vampires like to play with words. In comparison, werewolves are much more honest and straightforward, and Anthony prefers to talk to werewolves.
Benjamin raised his eyebrows at Zach, and Anthony's 'praise' was appreciated by him: "This is James Lance, but in the past week, there have been two 'James's in Barton City. Specifically, please Let the person involved explain it."
James looked at the ghosts and wolves on his left and right, and then at the mayor with a serious face. He never thought that he would meet the Mayor of Patton in this way, and the mayor's actions and words just expressed one thing. He believed in the other two people more than General Lance's son. personal'.
Barton City is composed of these three people, James is just an outsider.
James took a few deep breaths, put aside this feeling, and told the whole incident: the shapechanger, the disappearance, the corpse, his encounter with Zack Benjamin, David, the communications, the rumors... it all came out.
Anthony's expression changed several times during James' narration. Finally, he put his face on his hands and leaned on the desk: "Zach, go get my whiskey, I need a drink now."
"No." Zach shook his head: "I need you to stay awake and think like a mayor."
"Hey." Anthony touched his face with both hands, and his expression was really not good. Anthony extended his right hand to James: "Sorry, I doubted your identity before."
James stretched out his right hand and shook it vigorously with normal human body temperature. James had read Anthony's information and knew that he was born a soldier.
"The other skinchanger, uh, Jin, where is he?" Anthony began to think.
"He's in the trunk of my car," Benjamin replied. "We don't want him walking around."
"The 'rumor' he said is somewhat credible." Anthony frowned: "I mean, can we trust this guy?"
James breathed a sigh of relief. From this sentence, he felt that the mayor did not want foreigners to enter Barton City!
"Full marks." Zach replied helplessly: "He was the first to come to Barton. He is seriously picky about his diet, and his sense of goal is very weak." Zach glanced at James, meaning , he actually let James survive, "These weirdnesses mean that he is the one who is ostracized even in his own ethnic group. There is not much difference between the alien ethnic groups and ordinary people, and people will not abandon themselves just because of a rumor." home, but he did."
"That is, he can no longer stay in his original place of residence. And you, you are a vampire who can walk in the sun, and his loyalty has been transferred." Anthony nodded, sighed again, and then asked: " Do you have any plans? I don’t want my city to be invaded by low-level aliens!”
James noticed the words Anthony used to describe Zach. It seems that the 'noble' Zach mentioned in Coulson's studio has a special meaning!
"The first step is that I need to get in touch with the corpse that was discovered before. I want to lock in the scent of the rumored shapeshifter." Benjamin: "Although the rumor has been released, we must at least end the source first."
"Then why do you come to me?" Anthony asked in confusion: "James, you have taken back your identity, you can take Benjamin by yourself..." Anthony suddenly thought of something, and frowned: "Damn it! Cemetery recycling, funeral privatization!”
Benjamin shrugged, and it seemed the mayor realized it too.
After the Barton Police Department receives the victim's body, it must first undergo a forensic examination and document storage, and then it will be sent to the funeral owner who once belonged to the city's public resources. If it is not claimed for a long time, it will be disposed of casually.
This process has not changed today, but there are two things to note in this case. First, when the body was discovered, it had been exposed to the outside world for too long and was severely decomposed. It was sent to the forensic doctor for examination before being sent to the funeral owner.
Second, the funeral industry has been privatized. Facilities that were once public resources have been privately owned. No economically minded owner will keep these severely damaged corpses that are destined to be unclaimed for too long.
Benjamin has already visited various funeral homes in Barton City this morning because of the purchase of stones. Everyone has received the privatization notice from the city government, which means that the unowned items currently stored there have become off their private property, and if a warrant needs to be called, a formal search warrant must be obtained.
Moreover, if funeral owners act quickly enough, these resource-hogging corpses will probably be the first to be cremated!
Before coming here, Benjamin had already gone to David's house and memorized David's smell. Now he still needed the smell of the previous corpse for comparison to isolate the smell that could truly identify the skinchanger.
If you don't understand, let me explain. The smell of a shapechanger is composed of two parts, one is the smell of the shapechanger's external image, and the other is the fixed smell of the shapechanger itself. This is a special phenomenon produced by the shapechanger's two sets of digestive systems.
What Benjamin now gets is a mixture of the smell of David and the skin-changer itself. Even the real David is mixed with the mixed smell because of the skin-changer's gnawing. So what Benjamin needs is another different mixed smell to confirm the unchanged part of the smell in a contrasting way.
A werewolf's nose, magical, right? I think so.
"I need to call Cologne!" Anthony picked up the phone. Even though the mayor was very anxious, the dial of the phone was still turning slowly. Anthony only hopes that the shapechanger is not manipulating the phone line now, or he is hoping that the other party is manipulating it!
After the number was broadcast, a busy tone came from the receiver. Yes, it was a busy tone. This kind of sound was only heard frequently ten years ago, but it often sounded in Barton City this week. The busy signal means that the other party is talking to someone else and cannot be connected. In fact, after the popularization of answering machines, this sound has long been replaced by "Please beep again and leave a message."
Now that there is a busy signal instead of the answering machine message, it means that 'David' is controlling the communication!
"Busy signal, he is in the Barton Telecommunications Bureau now!" Anthony looked at Benjamin.
"Very good." Benjamin stood up, "Saved a lot of trouble, I'll go first."
"Be safe~" Zach said to Benjamin who stood up and moved his arms, and at the same time pulled James who was about to leave together: "What are you doing? There are still important things to finish!"