Into The Fire

4-3

“HELLO, LOUISA,” APRIL greeted the journalist. “Nate’s in the living room. You might need to give him a nudge, I think he’s on the verge of falling asleep.”

“Thanks.” Louisa slipped her laptop bag off her shoulder on her way down the passage. “Hi, Nate,” she said as she stepped into the living room. She had to smile, Nathan was on the verge of falling asleep, as April had said, and he jerked awake with a start when she spoke, splashing coffee from the mug he was holding.

“Dammit!” Nathan swore when the coffee soaked through the leg of his trousers. The profanity was prompted more by annoyance than injury for the coffee had cooled significantly while he dozed. Sitting forward he set the mug down on the coffee table and brushed uselessly at the damp stain. “Hi, Louisa,” he said once he had recovered.

Still smiling, Louisa joined Nathan on the sofa. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to make you jump like that.” Though the words were apologetic, her tone was one of amusement. “How are you? Aside from damp.”

“Knackered, it was a busy night, but I’ll live,” Nathan told her. “You?”

“You know me, always busy,” Louisa said. “The website’s doing...”

“Sorry to interrupt,” April apologised from the doorway. “Can I get you a drink or anything, Louisa?”

Louisa nodded appreciatively. “Thanks, a coffee would be great. I haven’t long got up and my brain’s not functioning at full capacity yet.”

While April left to provide the offered drink, Louisa turned her attention back to Nathan so she could finish what she had been saying. “The website’s going great, I’m getting more and more visitors every day, and the ad revenue is climbing. I’m making a reasonable living now, not great, but definitely reasonable, and I’ve got people from all over sending me stuff to put up as well. If things keep going like this I’m going to have to hire an assistant to keep up with everything.”

“Congrats.” Nathan was genuinely pleased that his friend was doing well, even if she did work in a profession he had never been keen on – journalism. He was especially pleased because the news website she had started had come about as a result of her being sacked from the Branton Herald for refusing to interview him in the aftermath of his family’s murder. “I’m glad the gamble’s paying off so well. So, tell me about this email that’s keeping me from the sleep I need.”

Louisa answered by taking out her laptop and booting it up. “Obviously the person who sent me this is the person who vandalised the Larsson Studio last night – I take it the studio was vandalised, and this isn’t some kind of weird hoax.” Why anyone would want to perpetrate such a hoax she couldn’t imagine, but she had reported on people who had done stranger things so she knew not to rule it out.

“It was, and this looks to be genuine pictures of the damage and the graffiti.” Nathan scrolled through the photographs attached to the email, comparing them to his memories of what he had seen when he attended the studio. “You’re right, these must have been sent by the person who vandalised the studio. Thanks.” He accepted the fresh mug of coffee his sister had brought him and lifted it straight to his lips. He then began reading the lengthy block of text that made up the email.

While Nathan read, Louisa sipped slowly at her coffee. “Nuts, right,” she said when he pushed the laptop away, signalling that he had finished. “That is not the work of someone who’s firing on all cylinders.”

That comment made Nathan snort with suppressed laughter. “You could say that. I can think of a few other ways of putting it that aren’t as polite.” His eyes returned to the signature at the bottom of the email. “Where does the link take you?” He didn’t want to click on it in case it caused a problem; given his lack of proficiency with computers, he could just imagine it doing something horrific, like rendering the laptop unusable.

“YouTube video,” Louisa answered. “There isn’t much to it, just those pictures in rotation, mixed with some pictures of the studio’s models, the most provocative ones he could find I suspect, with a male voice over the top, basically reading off what it said in the email. If the text wasn’t enough to convince you the guy’s nuts, the video definitely will.”

Curious, and hesitant, Nathan clicked on the link. It took a few moments for the video to start and then he was treated to an image of a teenage girl, who might or might not have been over sixteen, in a skirt and blouse that were reminiscent of a school uniform. The blouse was unbuttoned and opened enough to make it clear that she wasn’t wearing a bra, while the way she sat on the floor, with a leg c****d to one side, exposed the merest hint of underwear.

There was nothing illegal about the image, though Nathan was sure it came as close to the edge as it was safe to do.

There was no doubt that the person who had made the video wanted to grab attention, that was made clear by the ‘PERVERTED’ that had been written across the image in a font that resembled handwriting. A few seconds after the video started the voice began speaking.

**