People are moving around the Labyrinth of Tigers. The small detective that brands herself as the Inescapable Professor goes effortlessly to the Fourth Coil. She has spent lots of time there. She inspects the seal she is training. The animal is ready. “Sorry, big guy” she whispers “I wish there was another way.”
The breeding process is messy as always, but the Bishop is pleased at the results. He doesn’t talk with her as much since they had that conversation in the Embankment, and she is not one to press for conversation. Today, though, she coughes.
“Your Excellency, I hate to take your time, but there is something you should know.”
He frowns at her. “Oh, so now you care?”
“Just because I do not approve your plan to invade Hell, it does not mean that I love the Soul Trade, Your Excellency. You know that. Do not pretend that you did not know me when you invited me to breed animals to you.” She gets a file from her case, as he doesn’t answer. “And here is what I want you to know. It is a case I am working on for almost a year now.” She shows him pictures, numbers, contacts… “There is a ring of spirifers acting on Flowerdene, in Spite, for quite a while. From time to time, a big one, like Sour Elizabeth, is sent to jail, but soon another one replace the old. Not even the Flowerdene Initiative could do much to stop it from happening. Look at those numbers. So many soulless people. And I can bet that the Brass Embassy is not refusing those souls on moral grounds.”
The Bishop look at the frankly alarming number of soulless people the document shows. “Why are you showing me that?”
“The case is not closed.” She says, pointing at some lines in the paper. “I need more proof. It has been a long and difficult investigation, but I am working with other detectives and we are getting closer and closer to dismantle this ring for good… Until this whole Insurgence business started.”
He starts to make a protest, but the woman is quicker. "Your Excellency, do not insult me by denying it. I know that the Church wants to ensure stability and order, that you are against the insurgents and all. Good for you. But do you remember the Flowerdene Massacre? And how quickly things can become an even worse massacre if the spirits are too high? If the desperate people of Flowerdene that may rise in the insurgence are treated as the enemy and ‘dealt with’, we will never be able to show the world how many soulless people it really has. We will never have a case against those spirifers.
Now, if people start to pay attention to Flowerdene, they might notice that there is something amiss… It might turn into a full blown scandal. It did not become a scandal when it began because people pretty much ignore Flowerdene. But what if they did not? What if they actually cared about what happens there? The soul trade is highly controversial, despite what the Bazaar tries to make people believe in. A scandal of those proportions could make them start discussing it again. Something that people such as you could use against devils, to limit their grip on London, for instance.
What I ask is not that you embrace the insurgents’ side. Just that the Church works to tone down the violence against them and that you remember the church-goers that the poor people of Flowerdene are not blood-thirsty enemies, they are vulnerable, scared and lots of them are soulless on top of that - lots of them do not even know what that means. There is a fundraiser going on to help the people there, I have heard. If the Church can make that an astounding success, who knows? We might be able to get things finally done there."
The Bishop looks at the small woman doubtfully. “…You talk a lot.”
“Guilty as charged.” She shrugs.
“I will think about it. I still want to wrestle you to the ground for your defection.”
She smiles. She didn’t expect him to commit to anything, but the idea to screw with devils would eventually grow on him. It was a pity that she had to use that kind of rethoric instead of simply remind Church officials of what the Gospel was all about, Jesus Christ in a velocipede! One day.
The small meeting happened in a rich lady’s drawing room. To anyone from outside, it would look like a common salon. Outsiders didn’t know that everyone there had special pocket watches hidden in their coats.
After the traditional offerings of souls and contracts, the Professor asked for a word.
“My friends, there is a chance that our investigations are compromised.” Murmurs explode everywhere. She gets on firmly. “Flowerdene will be soon the epicenter of a conflict. It will be a ripe ground for spirifers hiding the evidence for their crimes, disguising it as deaths due to the fight. While we cannot prevent that from happening, if the worst comes to the worst, there may be a last desperate chance of at least making sure the spirifers don’t get completely away with their deeds.”
Someone asks for clarification. She gives it: “We are going to press. Secrecy at this point will not aid the investigations anymore. We might not catch the spirifage ring, but we will at least thwart them for now. If they abandon spirifage as a result, great. God will take care of their punishment, if that is the case. But if they go back to it afterwards… We start it all over again.”
There is a silence. Then, ideas start to storm. About when it was the best time to start printing the news, about how to protect the soulless identities, about what else could be done… At least, there was a consensus that the citizens of Flowerdene should be spared as much as possible (even if just as living evidence against the criminals, is some people’s views).
The Professor smiled without humour in her mind. Waging a secret war was an easy way to resort to violence. People would only know that something was amiss after the fact, when it would be too late. If she could time the scandal in the presses just right, she could probably force the powers in play to be more subtle and the toll on lives, less heavy. The respectable factions did not fear the law, but the public opinion was another matter.
[[OOC: That was my move. As of now, the Professor only planted seeds to make Flowerdene the centre of press attention during the war, giving the Pact something else to loose, besides a bit of money and some lives of lesser pawns (I think it makes for a best story, in all honesty). Anyone wishing to work with it, from all sides, message me and we will see what we can do from that.]]