Trigger: Day 13

Word Count: 78,015

Summary of Events:

Spencer ended up thwarting three crooks who'd been trying to break into a car to steal the laptop the car's owner had left in plain sight while heading downtown for another night of seeking the Billionaire Queen. Despite getting close to her twice, he failed to get close enough to her to confront at all as he pursued her from nightclub to nightclub. The following afternoon he decided to check out the online edition of Kynaston's main daily paper, the Kynaston Times-Tribune, to see what'd made news lately . . .

Excerpt of the Day:

The top headline made his eyes go wide: CROOK CONFESSES EVERYTHING TO ESCAPE OWL-MAN. Immediately he clicked on the link to read what the article had to say.

Shortly after 6:30pm police report that a frantic man entered their downtown headquarters and confessed to a laundry list of crimes including petty theft, assault — aggravated and with a weapon — drug possession, illegal weapons possession, and other charges.

Astonished and sceptical, police had no intentions of taking the man into custody until they could verify his confession, but he begged them to lock him up so that he didn’t have to see the terrifying owl-man again.

“He described a man, over six feet tall, with a strong and athletic build, in a dark-coloured suit with tall boots, long gloves, and a cape that can change between stiff like a kite and soft like capes usually hang,” Inspector Rice told media in a press conference late last night. “The man’s face was covered by a horned helmet with big, round, yellow owl-eyes and a beak over the nose. All that could be seen of the man was his lower cheeks, lips, and jaw, which he described as caucasian.”

The man informed police his two friends who’d been with him robbing a car had heard a strange sound before they’d spied the man gliding with his stiffened cape. He landed on the car hood, knocked the man’s two friends unconscious, and then proceeded to chase the man down with alarming speed and tell him to leave and to never be caught doing anything illegal ever again or the owl-man threatened to personally put him in jail and throw away they key.

Officers, based on the man’s reports, found his two friends in one of the downtown parkades, bound together at the wrists, as well as bound at the ankles, with a coat hanger and gloves among other evidences suggesting they’d been out to steal from a parked car.

The man’s friends corroborated his report to the best they could remember and were arrested for attempted break and enter of a vehicle. Police also collected the shoe prints of the owl-man from the hood of the car the three men — now all in police custody — had been intent to rob.

Police have declined to say if there’s anything unique about the boot prints they discovered at this time, but they are intrigued by this strange report and would like to know more about this strange owl-man if there is more to be had.

Prompted by the article, he went and checked his boot treads. To him they certainly seemed to be generally nondescript, like most shoe treads, but he was sure the fact that they were a little on the stickier side compared to most boot treads and that they wouldn’t likely match any other boot tread the police could find for sale in all of Kynaston would leave them wondering.