His Last Steps

Adam was not religious. He was when he was a child, but his father's familicide made the part of him who believes disappeared. At first, it was a mild disappointment towards Aster and the Goddesses, then it was a hard disappointment, and as time went by, he was more comfortable to think that there were no Goddesses whatsoever. This line of thinking somewhat made him content. The realization that there was no life after death, there was no possibility that he would meet his family again, and this life is all that he had, made him a man of purpose. If this was all there was to life, he might as well do what was best in his life, study, and work.

Until last night. The death of Marco forced him to reevaluate his perspective on life. He questioned the possibilities that probably there were such things as 'fate' or 'destiny', that life was not a collection of random happenings, that there was some pattern to life. Why the fathers of his life both must end their life in such horrible circumstances. Under his dose of BE last night, he tried to recollect some memories about his biological and foster father, in hopes of finding some threads, but the memories collided into one blob of blackness, to the point that he muttered, "Aster if you're really there, help me."

Even after he was soberer, back to the crime scenes with Hagar and Y-0, inside his protective armor, he kept wishing that Aster would lead his way. It felt right, to ask for metaphysical support, even if his more logical part of his mind kept telling him that it was for naught. They were back at DomArt, slowly retraced the great hall of the gallery, to find some new evidence. Adam let his suit scanned everything in the direction of his helmet, while he tried to picture Marco's movements, how did he come in, how did he run. Did Marco nervous, or confident.

Y-0 snatched his inner attention, "there were reports of people falling sick, especially from the press people who reported last's night incident without their protective armors." Its voice could be heard digitally from inside Adam's armor.

"Really?" Hagar's voice also came in through his speaker from inside her helmet, "what does the report say?"

"They were having breathing difficulties, and fatigues."

"Could it be the gas?"

"I'm afraid so. It's still too early to tell." Y-0 concluded.

"Well, that's another thing to think about," Hagar was quiet for a moment, then asked, "what if last night's gas was not … never mind."

Nobody was trying to push Hagar to follow through with her hypothesis. They already got too many on their plate right now. The incident might just be a coincidence.

"We can look into that after we concluded today's investigation," Adam felt that he had to respond, "there probably some connections."

No response from Hagar or Y-0, they were probably agreeing.

They came into the ante-chamber of the gallery, the one which painted red with the explosion of blood. There were people in a simpler protective suit who tried to clean the mess from the walls. If it was up to him, he probably just ordered them to demolish the building altogether and build a new one. He wished that his life could be treated that way too.

His suit detected traces of footsteps, and apparently Y-0 and Hagar's did too since the three of them looked at the point it started. It was different because of the tension it put on the floor, the pressure of someone running away.

"That could be Marco's," Hagar commented.

"It is the same shoeprint," said Y-0

They followed the print. He humored himself by thinking that he could never imagine that 'following your father's footsteps' could be so macabre. He smiled, but he felt pain inside his chest. He tried to grab the middle of his chest, but the structure of his suit stopped him. Every time the suit found a match from the initial shoeprint, the interior display of their helmet beeped and showed another one before it, so they just followed along, while positioned themselves at the general peripherals of the track, in an effort not to disturb the track. They followed it into a narrow corridor at the back of the building, which seemed undisturbed.

"Backstage," Adam commented, "do galleries need backstages?"

"This was from before the building repurposed into a gallery. This is probably art handlers and the gallery people comes and goes," said Hagar

"This is nice," Y-0 muttered.

"What is?" asked Adam.

"The corridor. It is … aesthetically pleasing," it concluded.

Adam tried to see what Y-0 see. It is nice. Soft carpet, Yellow-gold finish of its walls with a subtle geometric pattern which repeated, and responded to the triangular wall lamps, also shined yellowed light. It was a short corridor, though, since they found themselves at an emergency door, which could only be opened from their side out, but not from the outside in. Their suit detected a slight dent at its rectangular knob, which put horizontally from side to side.

"It was forced open," Hagar said, she pushed the knob slightly with her pointer finger, and the door clicked open, "but for what? It wasn't locked."

"He panicked," Adam concluded. He pushed the door wide open, "so, should we walk to where he's going?"

"His footprint would be already mixed with other footprints and the rain," Y-0 answered.

For a couple of seconds, Adam was saddened by the fact that following his father's footsteps only brought him this far.

"We already knew where he was going," Hagar said, "to my crime scene."

"For what?" Adam tried to imagine why Marco became a mass murderer, "is that his 'safe place'?"

"Maybe," it was hard to read Hagar to her darkened helmet glass, but Adam knew she was thinking hard.

"If Marco was a part of this, and he ran back to the place where he thought was safe, why then he died there, in the same manner as these victims?" Adam wondered aloud.

"Processing…" Y-0 muttered.

Hagar ignored it, "suicide? From guilt?"

"He could've just run back to the room and huffing the gas," Adam said, looking at the empty wet alley where the emergency door opened into, picturing the repeating image of Marco ran through the darkness, over and over, panicking, "well… the door can only be opened from the inside, though. He couldn't come back even if he wanted. But he could end his life less spectacularly. He could just shoot himself."

"Maybe he wanted to protect you," Hagar theorized, "if his corpse found dead near the crime scene, you would be tied to it immediately, putting your career in jeopardy."

Adam couldn't comment on that. The thought that Marco, whose connection with him had been severed years ago, still cared about his wellbeing, made his heart ached even more. He dismissed it.

"He was murdered. There was another person with him in your crime scene," Adam said.

"Processing…" Y-0 muttered.

"Do you want us to go there? To make sure?" Hagar offered, "as you know, we found no trace of another person with… Marco," she almost said that the late Marco was just a 'corpse'.

"We have to go back to APD," Y-0 finally said.

"Something happened?" Hagar asked.

"Yes, with Y-14. There is complication between him, George, and the press conference." Y-0 insisted to call its fellow androids with gendered pronouns despite how morally incorrect it might be for humans.

"Press conference?" Adam asked, ignoring the weird way Y-0 called its fellow machine with a 'he'.

"Yes," Y-0 said, "about this case. George insisted on giving it."

"That asshole," Hagar muttered, then asked, "is Y-14 okay?"

"No," Y-0 answered. A hint of concern could be heard, "George shot him."