August 14, 2004 – 20:00
"They got informants everywhere!" said Louis.
"I'll go with you," said Sebastian.
"No," said Coralis, looking at him while glancing at the others. "I trust my contact, but I don't trust the people she talks to. If this is a trap, they'll expect you to come with me. I'll get a scent of what this is all about and will let you know, but for now, I prefer if you stay here to keep an eye on things."
Before taking off to Brazil, she gathered supplies and stopped at a store to buy a disposable camera. On her way there, she received a call from a hologram code she didn't recognize. She wasn't anywhere near her home, so she answered it.
"Agent Alejandro! What's up?"
"Do not refer to me as Agent anymore. Have you heard from Andrew lately?"
"No. The last time I talked to him was when we cleared my name for the Massina murder. Why?"
"He hasn't reported to any EBEE summon since December. I've heard through branches that he was spotted and ambushed last week, but he didn't get caught. I've tried calling him, but he is not answering."
Coralis didn't know if Andrew had told Alejandro about his plans, so she decided against mentioning what she knew and wondered if Andrew was planning on acting on his plans.
"If I may ask, why not refer to you as Agent anymore?"
"You? You can ask me anything, but I won' answer over hologram. Where are you heading?"
"I received a tip about a cell of naughty witches potentially summoning demons in a small town in Brazil called Rollaz. I'm on my way to check it out."
"Send me the coordinates, I'll meet you there."
Coralis didn't know Alejandro that well, but enough to know that if he ranked as high as she on the lists and was no longer an EBEE agent, then he must be standing on the same side of the fence as she. She sent him the coordinates of her destinations and arrived there well past midnight.
Alejandro arrived while she was almost done talking to the residents who were still awake. Brazil wasn't following the global lists, but they were burning witches, so she decided to introduce herself as CG: her initials for a name she was no longer using. She didn't want to burn before she even got started with her investigation. Alejandro introduced himself as Al.
"Are you sure we're dealing with a demon here?" said Alejandro.
"I don't think we're dealing with a demon. There is something I need to check to confirm," said Coralis, walking to where the city water was coming from. "I think the town has been plagued by a nasty coven of witches and I think this is the handy work of … 12."
"12?" said Alejandro, before understanding what she meant. "Oh wow, what makes you think that?"
"I'll tell you after testing the city water supply. Too many ears."
The mayor met her there. His skin was a lot paler than it should be and his eyes were glossy. He struggled to stay up.
"I'm telling you, these women are witches. You know what witches do," said the mayor.
"If they are witches up to nefarious activities, I'll behead and burn them for you, I promise you that, but I do need to find out exactly what's going on first," said Coralis.
Coralis took out her universal liquid testing kit in the suitcase she created out from her supplies bag when landing and tested the water. She didn't like when local humans hovered above her shoulders. She wasn't a real cop, so she had to be very cautious of her movements to make it look like she was a human cop or detective.
"That's what I thought. The water supply has been contaminated and it is what made everyone sick. Do you have a pharmacy in this town?"
"Yes. It is across the street from the inn. If you need to, I can call the pharmacist to open it up for you and I will leave this key here so you can come back without needing me to unlock the door. Workers are off on sick leave," said the mayor.
"Perfect, and yes, that would be appreciated if you could do that. I will get what I need to decontaminate the water supply and heal your citizens, and I will rent a room at the inn to prepare everything. In the morning, I will decontaminate your water, give your doctor what he'll need to heal your citizens and I will hunt down those responsible for this. Give me a call if there is anything."
"Thank you so much, Agent CG," said the mayor.
What Coralis needed couldn't be found in a pharmacy, but she could extract what was needed out of supplements sold there and use her magic for the rest.
"Thank you for meeting me here. I will need to update Sebastian and my mate, but with you here, they won't lecture me on working without backups," said Coralis as soon as the door closed and she activated a mute-ball."
"I'm glad to see you're not hiding. You're talking about your flyball teammate Sebastian Larameer, right?" said Alejandro, chuckling.
"I can't hide, even if I wanted to. Technically, Sebastian is my former teammate, because we both retired from flyball, but we still see each other a lot. He's an apprentice at the CMMA," said Coralis as she emptied the shopping bag onto the desk to start working on the elixir to drain the plague out of the city water supplies.
"Right, sorry, I haven't followed the last flyball season. I know Spain lost in the finals, but that's about it. Now tell me, what is going on here?"
"There is a small coven of five witches living on the outskirts of the town, in a remote cabin. One of their younger witches, Naria Lamitez, has been accused of killing the husband of a town villager with an evil spell out of jealousy. I've seen the body. The man had a very gruesome death, he definitively was killed with a hex. Some town folks threatened to denounce Naria's coven to the authorities."
"With reasons, I must say. We're in the middle of a damn witch hunt, how can they be so dumb?"
"Beat me. This coven is led by Rosita Laka and I suspect she contaminated the water with a plague, as her way to deter the folks from following through with their threats. 'Keep it up and I will kill you all' kind of logic."
"Plaguing water to make people sick… that does sound like what Critilla Manana would do."
"Yup. You know how there is no such thing as coincidence, right? Critilla Manana's coven disappeared from Portugal the day this coven appeared in this town."