Night Claw is seeking revenge of her sister who was murdered by a shrouded government official. She haunted the FBI by day, waiting for a break in the case. All she had learned was that the official was working to deconstruct conservation regulations that would destroy the habitat of the local wolf population. By night, Lucy, aka Night Claw, was a waitress, you know, to pay the rent.
One Thursday, Night Claw decided to visit the area where the official was focused. She was hoping to glean some clues. Wandering around the forest with a compass and her phone, she didn’t see any reason that anyone in power would care about this place. There was no construction planned in the area. It was remote and there were not even any mines or speculation about mineable areas. What was the point?
When she got home, she went through her sister’s stuff again. Mia had some sort of weird wolf obsession because she had sketches of wolves scribbled all over her notebooks. That’s where Lucy had gotten the nickname Night Claw, from Mia when they were little. She came to a page that was folded over and stuck a little. She peeled it up, careful not to tear whatever was inside. There was a scribble: wolfboards.org, canalupa, $g7kk90<. That was all, but it was new info, not seen by her or the detectives.
Lucy didn’t know whether to follow the lead herself, or to bring it to the detectives. It was late now, so no harm in going to the site then bringing it to the detectives in the morning. She went to wolfboards.org on her laptop. The site was old; it looked like it was running message board software from the late nineties and hadn’t been updated since. Yet the conversation was active.
The user canalupa hadn’t posted in almost two months, but looking through their post history, they had been very active previously. There was also a thread about their absence that started about 3 weeks ago and was basically people sending best wishes. No one knew that Mia had died.
Mia had started a number of threads in her account, all conservation based, but a few targeting government regulators. The most common name in her criticism was John Maynard. A quick google search showed that he was a representative who was lobbied by several corporations to loosen local conservation efforts. Some of his legislation did reduce the protections on the land Lucy had visited earlier. She had seen some of this stuff already in Mia’s personal stuff, newspaper clippings along with lots of rants against him.
Along with these, she posted lots of pictures from the remote forest. In some of these photos, you could see wolves were near the photographer. Had Mia taken these close ups of wolves herself? Was anyone considering a wolf attack? No, they said she had a bullet to the head, which is why she was not allowed to see the body, her face was too mangled? Was it a cover up? Because she would have hated to see further actions against the wolves because of her death?
She needed to see the body! But how? First thing the next morning, she went to the FBI officer and spoke to the the usual family liaison officer, Marge Haverford. She told Marge she needed to see the body, or atleast whatever pictures they had of it. She stated as a direct relative she had that right and that they wouldn’t be talking her out of it.
“All right, I understand. What are you looking for, asking to see the pictures? Are you hoping for closure, because I can refer you to a great grief counselor.”
“No, I have questions about the condition and I’m not sure I believe the lines I’ve been fed.”
“Ok, well I can answer your questions without putting you through the trauma of seeing your sister in such a condition.”
“Fine, you might think I’m crazy, but I need to know if there were wolves involved in this incident.”
Marge gasped. “Oh, child, how did you know!? Wait, let me pull up the pictures. You should see this.” Marge typed a few things into her console and then Mia’s folder was pulled up.”You see, when authorities arrived on the scene, there were wolves everywhere. They suspected a wolf attack right away but no one reported that because they were afraid of backlash against the wolves. Then as they approached your sister, there was not a scratch or bite mark on her. There was a bullet wound to the head as we told you, and a dead wolf nearby, also shot. The wolves didn’t hurt your sister. They were protecting her.”
Lucy was dumbstruck. She quickly recomposed herself and asked Marge about the suspected motive. Marge was vague, obtuse even. She said they thought it had to do with land conservation, but that was all she knew. She said that due to recent regulation changes, shooting the wolf as well did not escalate the seriousness of the crime. Investigators are looking into corruption but they don’t have enough evidence to take anyone to court for the murder alone. Corruption charges would be even harder to prosecute.
“Ok, can I get a copy of these pictures of her body, for my own peace of mind” Mia asked Marge.
“Unfortunately, no, not while it is an active investigation. When the case is closed you can though, and you can come to me anytime to look at them.”
“Ok, thanks, one more thing, I found Mia had an account on wolfboards.org, a wolf message forum. Her username was canalupa. I can write that down for you.” Lucy did not want to also give them the password. It just didn’t feel right.
“Ok, thanks hun, please do write it down.” So she did.
Lucy had a lot of mixed emotions from the encounter. On one hand, she was elated to learn about the bond Mia had with the wolves. On the other, she was no closer to understanding who killed her sister and why.
A couple nights later, she was no closer to any revelations. She was waitressing down at the Surf and Turf Manor when two businessmen with suits came in and were seated in her section. Her first thought was that she hoped they tipped well. Local business men sometimes did, and sometimes were stingy. Her second thought was that one looked familiar. Could it be that John Maynard walked right into her section of her restaurant. She stepped outside really quickly and googled him, just to be sure, and alas, it was him! Now what? She had to act cool, not rash. She couldn’t let him know who she was or that she suspected he might be involved in Lucy’s murder.
She had no plan, but she had better go and get their drink orders. “What can I get you two to drink?” She asked when she got to their table.
John smiled brightly at her, “I’ll have a beer, whatever you have on tap.” She noticed he was handsome, mid thirties or maybe early forties, and had a polished, politician-like smile.
His associate concurred, “Yes, a beer for me as well, do you have Heineken?”
“Yes, we sure do. With a glass?”
“Yes, please.” He smiled as well, but not with the same polish, more sincere than John’s.
“Alright, I’ll be right back with those.” That was totally unfruitful, except that she did not give them her name, on purpose in case John was following the investigation.
“So now, no criticism.” John was saying to his associate when Lucy returned to the table with their drinks. They had been talking quietly while she was gone, so she had no idea what they were on about.
She had no reason to be too curious so she just asked, “Are you ready to order appetizers or your meal yet or would you like another minute?”
The mystery man asked John, “Do you want to split a pizza?”
John laughed, “That’s what I was going to say! I like everything on my pizza, even anchovies.”
“Ew, just cheese for me.” He turned to me, “Can we have a half and half pizza, half everything and half cheese, but make sure the half cheese isn’t contaminated by a single anchovie?”
I laughed, “I can put that in as a special request. Any appetizers to hold you over while that’s cooking?”