I don't have to show Crimson the way to my room, as he used to spend a lot of time in this house with Cinnamon when we were younger. Even though I can not ever remember him spending any time in my bedroom, which I shared with Fudge, he knew which door to open.
I follow Crimson into my room. I am staring at my books underneath the television that are not in their normal place, and can already tell that Forrest has been in here cleaning and tidying up. As I am not paying attention, I crash into Crimson, unceremoniously, when he suddenly stops dead in front of me.
"Wow!!" he laughs as he stands staring around the room
"This is my kind of room ... " he laughs "You have an office in your bedroom. ... I love it!!"
"Really!" I laugh "It generally annoys most people!! Parsley used to hate it!!"
"It is probably just me. I'm an ambitious workaholic, who doesn't know how to clock off. I am well known for falling asleep at my desk or in the squad car. I wake up and am straight back on the job. Half the time I don't find my bed for days." he grins at me "With this set up, you can just roll out of bed and get straight to work, or visa versa, roll into it when you can't keep your eyes open any longer!!"
"Oh I do that quite often!" I laugh
"So what do you do, constantly work from home?"
"Pretty much!" I smile at him "Journalism is not really a nine to five job. News can break at any time, day or night. It is more about the articles I produce not about the hours I spend doing it. So my office hours are flexible, and I do tend to do most of my work from home."
"It's pretty cool!" he smirks then suddenly frowns "You are off duty right? I'm not going to be reading my life story in print any time soon am I?
"Hell no!!" I laugh "I always ask before I start creating news articles."
"Really!" he raises his eyebrows "What about the naked woman in the divebar!"
"Oh don't!!" I start laughing "I'm sorry, the rules don't apply to Strawberry, when I can get a pound of her flesh!! Both me and Tap have many scores to settle with your Sister, so we jumped on the opportunity to dish the dirt!! Don't think we didn't have both Sunny and Mango tearing strips off the both of us because of it!"
"I still don't understand where her head was at! She wasn't even drunk enough to have her dancing naked in a public bar .. for Berry's sake!!" he starts really laughing "I am just glad that Tapestry had the sense to warn them not to send me, when the force went in to arrest her!! I was on duty that night ... I would have had nightmares forever if I had seen her dancing naked!!" he chuckles
"I'll tell you where her head was at. Even hating Tap's guts, trying to get her claws into a rich and famous rock star, that was her game. When he knocked her back, she obviously must have thought he would not be able to resist her naked slut dance." I laugh "Tapestry walking away was the best part!! I doubt many men would have."
"I'm glad he did, or I would have had to knock him out for hurting Crystal." he chuckles quietly.
"Do you mind if I have a nose?" he points over towards my notice board.
"No I don't mind, knock yourself out!"
"What is the fascination with the deserted warehouse in the middle of town?" he mumbles as he glances through the papers pinned to the board "It is almost like you have an investigation going on here!"
"I have pretty much! It has become my obsession." I laugh "Not that I am getting very far with it, or that there is really much point to it now that I am moving to Berry Shores."
"So what are you looking for?" he glances over his shoulder at me
"Basically, that place really bugs me!! It is one big abandoned suspicious mystery ..."
"As well as one hell of an eyesore sat smack bang in the middle of town!!" he laughs
"Exactly!! Someone needs to do something with it. That building or the land it sits on, could be put to some use to benefit the town. Instead it is just sitting there empty, littering up the skyline, making this town look like a dump. If I had my way, it would be demolished!!"
"I have always been led to believe it is a protected listed building."
"It is registered as a listed building. Although, I don't understand why. It is not like it is anything special that I can see or find. It doesn't have any historical significance and it isn't an architectural wander ... it is just a plain and simple quick build concrete block, no different to any other warehouse." I frown at him "Has your job ever taken you inside the grounds?"
"No. That place is a red taped nightmare for us!! Especially at times like this, with Alpine missing, we have to get permission to enter the grounds to search them. Then we will have a security presence escorting us around, so I've been told, it is ridiculous." he smiles "It is all very cloak and dagger if you ask me. Not even the force has any clout as far as that place goes!! I've always presumed because they are trying to protect the listed building."
"The place is as suspicious as hell with it's eight foot walls and all that barbed wire making it impossible for anyone to get over the wall and into the grounds. Then there is the multi padlocked gates, that are also spiked and barbedwired to hell. Twenty padlocks I've counted on that gate!! You can see from the rusted gates, chains and padlocks and the overgrown jungle inside the grounds that nobody has opened or been through those gates in a very very long time!!"
"Yeah that is why we didn't bother to get permission when Tapestry and Honey were missing and now with Alpine. You can see clearly nobody has entered the grounds from the gates, which is the only way to actually get in without fading yourself trying!" he chuckles
"Do you know who owns it?" he frowns at me
"That is just the thing. Some woman who faded over six hundred years ago."
"What?!" he starts to really laugh "Don't you mean sixty years ago."
"No, six hundred!!" I smile at him "If she was alive today she would be over 700 years old!"
"That can not be right Mint!" he laughs "There is no way that warehouse building has been there for over six hundred years!!"
"No it hasn't. That warehouse was only built one hundred and twenty-one years old. It replaced a warehouse that was demolished the year before. In fact, there has been seven different warehouses on that piece of land over the last seven hundred years. As soon as one comes down, a replacement springs up in it's place."
"So I take it, this six hundred year old woman owns the land rather than the building."
"Yes on paper she owns the land. If she owns the land, she also owns what's on it, including the buildings." I smile at him "Something is very suspicious about that piece of land and especially the warehouses that have been built on it."
"What do you mean?" he frowns at me
"Besides the mystery of who is actually controlling and responsible for that land today, seeing as the registered owner faded over six hundred years ago. A woman who as far as I can see had no living relatives even before she faded. Her story alone is pretty fascinating, if you want to believe that white berries existed until they were persecuted out of existence!!" I laugh and he grins at me. "Only one of the seven warehouses has ever been a working warehouse as far as I can see. The first warehouse was a textile factory, until it was burnt to the ground in an unexplained fire. All the other warehouses that have followed were built and never put to use. As far as I can see they have all sat empty. just like this one does now." I roll my eyes "There seems to be a very strange reoccurring pattern happening, approximately every one hundred years, almost like it is being done on purpose. ALL seven of the warehouses have been suspiciously registered as listed buildings the year they were built. They sit empty and heavily guarded by all the security measures, then all of them have burnt to the ground in unexplained fires. All except for the one that is standing there now. If this warehouse goes like all the others, time wise, we are about due for an unexplained fire."
"You are right, this does all seem very suspicious!!" he smiles at me "Would you mind if I helped you with this in my spare time?"
"That would be great!!" I smile at him "Another head on the case might breath some new life into it. You might be able to find something I am missing, I just keep hitting brick walls with it now."
We leave the warehouse notice board, realising we have been distracted away from what we came up here to do. We make our way over to the computer and laptop, getting our head into the mission of trying to find Ruby's family.
Crimson, logs both the lap top and computer onto the network of birth, death and marriage data bases, using his police logins. I am quite fascinated with it, as they are usually not accessible to the general public as a mass. Now I can access any town I want and have the whole world open in front of me. For me it is quite exciting.
We work quietly for a while, me on the lap top and Crimson on the computer.
"You know this town is crap!!" he mumbles after only a short time. "Nothing is ever done properly in this dump of a town." he points at the screen and laughs
"What am I looking at?"
"Mom and Dad's marriage entry, and all the bloody blanks that should be filled in, that aren't!! All that tells me is their names, dates of birth and the date they got married, which I already know!!" he tuts "It is ridiculous, you know at work we struggle all the time, it's like nobody gives a shit about administration in this place!! As long as there is a record of them getting married - the rest doesn't matter to them."
"Yeah I know, I have the same sort of problems with work sometimes. Think about it, why should they bother. It is not like the rest of the world gives a flying shit about what goes on in this town. It is not like we have to answer to anyone!! They just leave us here to rot and do our own thing ... which I guess we do."
"I know, but still it's wrong!! Its our history that they can't be bothered to preserve!!" he tuts "Take Dad for instance ... I now have to search the Amber data base to fill in his blanks - because I know where he comes from, so I can. However, it is Mom's blanks that I need filling in and I don't know where she comes from and this marriage entry should tell me, but it doesn't because some mixed berry idiot has only done half a job!!"
"Chill!! We will find her ... "
"Seriously Mint, just punch in the name Ruby Red, and just see how many there are. Like all actually colour surnames, Red, Blue, Green ect, there are millions of them!! Finding my mom is going to be like trying to find a needle in a hay stack!!" he laughs "We have to find her to find her parents ... by the time I bloody find them, she will just be bones!!"
"Crimson are you sure you should be doing this?" I frown at him "It can't be easy for you, your Mom has only just faded, and I think you know you are probably setting yourself up for a slap in the face when you do find them. The chances of their opinion of colour mixing and mixed berries changing is very slim, otherwise they would be in your life already.
"Yeah I know. I have already thought that myself." he mumbles "But I HAVE to find them, and do the decent thing, even if it is only for my own peace of mind!!"
"I can see that you are getting yourself worked up already. You should be grieving not putting this pressure on yourself."
"What choice do I have! They have a right to know and I wouldn't live with myself if I didn't at least tell them." he mumbles "Besides, if I don't do it, who will."
"I could do it for you, and I'm sure if River isn't busy, he would help me. You know this sort of thing is right up his street."
"Oh I don't know ..." he frowns at me "Anyway Mint, you can't talk to me about not grieving. Shouldn't you be getting yourself worked up into a state over Alpine right now like Fudge is. Even getting upset over your break up with Parsley or getting angry over the only thing left of Cinnamon, his baby, has been tainted by my Mother and the evil phyco?"
"I'm not made that way ... I'm better shutting myself off and doing something. It's not often you will see me openly showing my emotions or crying, but it doesn't mean I am not feeling it or don't care!"
"Exactly, the same way that I am ... so me doing this is what I need to do, because if it isn't this I would only be doing something else, like going to work." he smirks at me as he wags his finger "You are more like Leafy than you realise ... Mini Leaf!" he laughs at me "That guy never shows any emotion either!"
I laugh at him as I hit the return key, I had already put the name Ruby Red into the search bar ... I sit and watch as thousands of them flash up onto the screen, there are not millions like Crimson said, but close to 40,000, I can see when the search is complete. Working through every one of them is going to take us MONTHS and we have less than a week. Needle in a haystack is right ... at least if we knew which area she came from, it would give us a better chance.
I sit thinking for a moment, then I get an idea. I pull up the news data base that I use everyday for work, and log in. Just as I start to type in her name, Crimson starts swearing loudly.
"WHAT THE HELL!!" Crimson roars suddenly, making me jump.
"What's wrong?"
"I thought I would be able to find Mom via Dad seeing as his records should be and are complete the Amber end. I just searched for his marriage records, and according to this he is not married to Mom at all." he is really frowning at me as he points at the screen.
"Are you sure you have the right Sunny Shine?"
"Yes, positive, Sunny Sun Shine ... there is only actually one recorded in Amber .... his date of birth, place of birth, parents names ... everything is perfect and correct, except for the marriage records." he flips a page "Look there is his twin brother, Saffron, exactly the same date of birth, place and parents names ... registered as deceased." he flips the page back "According to the Amber register, Dad was married to someone call Mustard Maize ... " he frowns for a moment "... exactly two weeks before the Sugar Valley register says he married Mom."
"That has got to be a clerical error."
"Even though I highly doubt it, I hope it is just a clerical error, because if this Amber entry is true ... he was committing bigamy from the moment he married Mom!! His marriage to Mom would not have been legal or even real."
"It's got to be a mistake ... otherwise wouldn't you have seen or had wind of this other wife. How could anyone juggle two marriages without it being noticeable!"
"Oh this gets worse ... it is a Husband not a Wife!! Mustard Maize is male!!" he chokes "That definitely has got to be a mistake!!"
I was thinking that the name Mustard Maize belongs to a woman. Crimson repeating the name Mustard Maize again, and saying he is male, sets alarm bells ringing in my head ... I know a man with that name!!
"Mustard Maize .... Oh sugar ... I know a man with that name!!" I laugh nervously, which causes him to really frown at me "It is probably just a wacky coincidence, but I have seen a guy with that name, here in Sugar. He is friends with Mace and Tapestry ... Jasmine is always talking about her Uncle Mustard."
"I've never come across him." he frowns at me again
"I have seen him at Forrest's house a few times, when I've been there hanging out with Bay ... actually he is yellow and gay. I've even seen him taking Jasmine out."
"This seems all a bit odd!!" he frowns "Where does he come from, because he doesn't live in this town."
"Apple I think ... I'm sure Bay said he was a friend of Maces from Apple. He was best friends with Mace and his wife, before he did his disappearing act."
"Hill or Valley?"
"Apple Hill." Crimson turns back to the computer screen "Like I said, it is probably just a wacky coincidence, there has to be more than just one Mustard Maize on this planet. I presume the Amber lot have got his records mixed up and the Mustard Maize you are looking at comes from Amber .. I bet it is just a clerical error ..." I start laughing "Sunny was fiercely homophobic ... him married to a man ... that is just down right nonsense."
"Yeah just like we would have thought Leafy being straight would be nonsense." he laughs for a minute "I don't know .... I am SERIOUSLY beginning to think something funny is going on here ..." he mumbles as he turns to look at me "This Mustard guy was also born in Amber. He is the same age as Dad all but a few months ... and get this ... the marriage ... it took place in Apple Hill." he starts to choke as he stares at me wide eyed "I am getting a really nasty feeling about this ... they were both born in Amber ... married in Apple, why would they both come from Amber and get married in this neck of the woods? Why would they live in neighbouring towns now? That has to be more than a coincidence ... Dad worked in Apple, I always thought he spent way too much time there, he virtually lived in the place ... " he starts to choke again, but he doesn't tell me what he is thinking.
"Where did he work?"
"The name of the company he worked for was Maize Engineering." his eyebrows almost launch off his face "Oh fudge!!" he snaps as he turns back to the computer.
I watch him typing something frantically into a search engine.
"What are you doing?"
"Checking out the place where Dad worked. Most places have a web page these days." he mumbles as he starts to look over the page that he has just pulled up. "Oh Fudge!!" he chokes
"What?!"
"I bet you can't guess the name of the guy who owns the place."
"Mustard Maize?"
"Yep!!" he snaps "Dad started working there not long after he left school and moved to this town. He was working there for over twenty years ... you know I found it VERY strange that not one single person that he worked with turned up for his funeral!!!" he stares away thoughtfully for a moment "Oh berry ... why am I not thinking!! I am so stupid!! Mustard Maize, I also know that name!!" he jumps up out of the chair, almost like he is having a panic attack. "Fudge Mint ... why didn't I piece this together before now!!"
"What?!"
"The guy who showed the Amber police, the tree which Crystals twin sisters remains were buried under. He was an old school friend of my Dad's from Amber Meadow, as well as an old boyfriend of Dad's gay twin brother Saffron. He remembered which tree Saffy faded falling out of ... that guy who just so happens to also be yellow, gay and living in Apple Hill now ... for berry sake I've even spoken to the guy myself .. " his eyes are virtually popping out
"His name wasn't Mustard Maize by any chance?"
"Yeah it was ...." he mumbles "Oh shit!! He also showed Tapestry and River where Saffron's grave is, when they went out to Amber with Dad's body."
"Why did Sunny want to be buried in Amber?"
"To be with his brother Saffron." he laughs sarcastically "Now I am beginning to wander!! The guy on the marriage certificate. The guy who owns the place where Dad worked. The guy who helped Amber police with their enquiries. The guy from Apple who is Maces mate .... the chances of them being four different people is virtually impossible in my book!! There are too many Apple Hill coincidences for them to not be the same person!!" he snaps "I feel like I'm doing a damn jigsaw and all the pieces are falling into place!! The finished picture is not pretty!!"
"I think you might be right, because that is him!!" I mumble as I point to a picture on the web page. "That is Maces friend. That is the guy I've seen at Forrest's house."
"Are you sure?"
"Yeah. I'm sure! No girl forgets a cute face, especially when it is wasted on a gay guy!!"
Crimson is chuckling at me when he pulls out his phone. While he is calling someone I turn my attention back to the news archives that I had been glancing through. While I've been talking to Crimson I've scanned quite a lot of articles, but I notice that Ruby Red as a complete name have started to peter out. So I punch in Strawberry Fields boarding school and quite a few articles pop up.
"Mace is not answering his phone." I hear Crimson mumble from behind me
"Try Granite, Shale even El, chances are he will be with one of them." I mumble "Or Tapestry, he seems to be really good friends with that Mustard guy too."
I click on an article that attracts my attention, and what looks like a very familiar face jumps out at me. I sit staring at it for a second, wandering if I am imagining things. I start to read the article.
"MINT STOP!!"
"What?!"
"Look at that picture ...."
"Yeah I'm just looking at it ... she looks like Ruby."
"That is my Mom!!" he squints at the picture "That is how she looked at school, surely you've seen their old school photographs."
"Yeah that's what I thought ... I've actually pulled up a news article from the boarding school in Strawberry Fields that they went to ... but look at her name"
"Ruby Blaze ..." he frowns at me
"Ruby Red Blaze. Red being her middle name not her surname." I point to her full name lower down in the article "And according to this news article, she has been a missing person since she was expelled from school, because of being responsible for starting a fire that caused a lot of damage. They actually made a play of her surname Blaze, with her setting a fire!!" we stare at each other for a moment.
"That is definitely, my Mom. Mom did get expelled ... I'm sure you've heard the story. It was set up, Ice burnt down the music room, so that they could get Mom expelled and brought here because she was pregnant with us. Before the pregnancy started to show and she got into trouble for colour mixing. There being no red boys at the school." he chuckles
"Yeah ..." I mumble as I point at the date of the article
"Yeah, that's the year me and Cherry were born." he pulls a face, then frowns
"She has had contact with her family since then, I'm sure she has. She must have done, she told us they washed their hands of her because of me and Cherry being mixed berries." he laughs "I guess she did a runner from the boarding school and didn't tell them where she was straight away.."
"You are a police officer, can't you check to see if she is still listed as a missing person ... because doesn't it seem strange that you thought her last name was Red when according to this it is Blaze."
"Yeah I was just thinking that myself ..." he mumbles as he jumps back on the computer "I'll have to pop into work and check the missing persons database."
I open another news article that the search has thrown up relating to Ruby and the school. I blink a few times when I see the date on the top of the news article.
"Crimson look!" I point at the screen. Crimson was just about to make a phone call, but he stops and drops his phone on the desk.
"Oh Fudge!" he frowns "I was six, nearly seven then!" he continues to frown at me "She told us she went to see her parents just after we were born ..."
"Another lie?" I mumble "You don't think she is STILL missing do you"
"The way my Mother sneaks and lies .... seriously I wouldn't be surprised at all!!"
"Well at least we know where she came from now."
"Where?" he looks over his shoulder
"Red County." I laugh at him as I point to it in the text.
"Huh! That figures ... being red!" he starts laughing "Yeah on Mom and Dad's marriage entry here she is definitely down as Ruby Red ... not Blaze ... which is making her look as dodgy as Dad right now!! Why would she NOT tell us her surname is Blaze? Why hide it and tell us it is Red?"
"Maybe because she was trying to hide something, her pregnancy and the colour mixing. So she would want to hide her identity and whereabouts possibly .... what about if she lied to all of you and has never contacted her family since she left the boarding school ... what about if they STILL don't know where she is."
"She wouldn't would she?" he frowns at me then pulls a face
"She lied about Saffron, Scarlet and all the affairs she's been having, her name, and I can think of half a dozen lies she has been called on over the years, so yeah ... I guess she could have."
"I don't know, but I doubt she would have got away with hiding for long, she was a teenager and she might have covered her name up here by marrying Dad. However, her medical records, she couldn't have covered them up or her true identity without getting a fake identification like Mace did, or having them fraudulently fabricated ...." he trails off and starts to look thoughtful
"Gravel got Mace the fake ID didn't he." I smile at him "Gravel who is Scarlets Dad ... think about it!"
"Yeah I just did as I said fake ID... Gravel popped up in my head too." he pulls a face at me "Scarlet did come pretty quickly after me and Cherry ... and Mom was in this town over a year before everyone else left school, so I guess it could be possible that Gravel helped her, for a price of course .. which was probably payment in kind, knowing my Mother, and the unexpected prize was Scarlet!!" he chokes but I can't help but snigger at what he has just said. "I think I need to pop into work and check the missing persons database ... we could just be getting carried away here, and it's more likely she contacted them later, like she told us and her family really did not want anything to do with us because of being mixed berries."
"Have you tried to search for her on the Red County data base?"
"That is exactly what I am doing right now!" he mumbles then smirks at me "You need to quit journalism and join the force. You would make a good detective, you've definitely got the brain for it ... and I think we would make a good team!"
"Partners in crime!" I laugh at him "Not a bad idea, I've always had a thing for handcuff!!"
"You kinky minx!!" he starts howling "Next time I see you, I'll have to remember to bring my handcuffs!!"
"Only if I can wear your hat, PC Shine!" I laugh at him
"That can definitely be arranged ..." he starts laughing
I know he's only joking ... but I wish!!
I continue reading another article dated four years after the last one we just looked at. The photo on the articles is all too familiar ... because I have seen it before. I jump up out of my chair, and run down the stairs after I've told Crimson I will be straight back. I run into Dad's room and grab his photo album and leg it back up the stairs.
"What you got?" Crimson frowns at me
"Alpine's photographs from school." I mumble
I flip the pages until I find what I am looking for. An end of year photograph of the whole gang together.
"Look .. it is exactly the same picture." I show it to him as I point to the one on the screen.
"Oh shit yeah!" he laughs then frowns "How did they get that photograph? Dad has got that one."
"They all have one don't they ... "
"Oh yeah, its an end of year photo." he points at the date "I've never noticed that before because Dad has his in a frame and the date is hidden." he smiles at me "As they are all on the photo, I guess a teacher or photographer would have taken the picture."
"I don't get it ... if she was still missing, when you was six, surely they would have questioned her school friends after she went missing, as they would have been the last one's to see her."
"They should have done at one point." he frowns at me "If I was at work I could tell you, but I don't have access to the data base or case files from here." he goes quiet for a moment as he thinks "As they were still at school for a year after she went missing - I would say they questioned them during that year ... and at the time, I guess they would have been covering for her. As they helped to smuggle her here, they would have kept quiet because of the colour mixing, they could all have got into serious trouble for it." he smiles at me "If they all said she was expelled and they haven't heard from them since, and don't know where she is ... they might not have bothered to ask them again." he shrugs "We are just guessing at the moment and could be way off!!"
"I've found another one ... she was still missing when you was errr ... ten."
"Why am I not surprised!!" he mumbles
"Woohoo, I think I have found her!! Oh Berry ... her parent's names ... Crimson and Scarlet ... her Mother's maiden name is Tart, which is Straw's middle name. I would say I have found her!!"
"Yeah Crimson is the name of her Dad in this article." I burst up laughing "Oh Berry!!"
"What?" he frowns at me
"Seriously ... you need to look at this ... you need to see what your Grand-FATHER does for a living!!"
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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