It has been three days since Casper had disappeared. Since the day that Vick had arrived at his apartment and did not see him, she was in a restless search.
It was the morning of the third day that he was gone, and she woke up with her back all achy. Her eyes were a bit dried and she did not feel so energetic after just two hours of sleep.
Her father had gone mad because of Casper's disappearance and encharged her to take care of it. In this case, he did not need to say anything to her; she would do it of her own will.
She felt like her heart had stopped and cracked when she realized that Casper was nowhere to be seen inside the house and in no place near the residential zone.
Before she went to talk to her dad, Vick had already started a hunt group to search all over the floor that Casper lived in, and other groups in floors nearby.
She ordered Raul to talk with people of the corporation responsible for the Teleporting pads and ask for the registers of the last night.
The military had access to the cameras of all floors, and so were the Jarls, so she designed more subordinates to make a report of what they could see in the records.
Just after all these measures, she went to talk with her father, which lasted for nearly an hour of discussion before she could calm him down and convince him that everything would go well.
"I will take care of the mess that your mother did outside, and you will take care of the mess that is emerging inside this district, understood? And do it right!" He yelled as the final sentence of that argument.
When Vick was younger, she always got resentful because of her father's tantrums. However, she got used to it after some time.
Better than sweat that matter all day, she would be doing something worth it if she just ignored him and took action.
This way, she left the throne room with her head raised and right after headed to her office to start doing something more to raise her chances to find Casper as fast as possible.
All the Ridire who were acting on the night of Casper's disappearance were interrogated.
The Princess at first thought that they could have killed him, and then hid that matter to not be caught and executed to didn't have accomplished her order: not kill anyone.
Nonetheless, the hours passed and anyone was found lying in their Interrogations. Vick called her two particular Aesir, Canute and Ari, to help to interrogate all the Ridire involved in that mission. Even so, they could find nothing wrong with them.
All the Ridires had the same testimony about the events of the previous night: a man wearing black clothes, who nobody could really notice whether if had a mask or not, could lose them. They said that the persecution got started on the 18th floor until the 40th, where Uppsala was. It ended after the man took a Teleporting pad to somewhere they could not know where, since it was very bustling that day.
Due to all the witnesses and events that had happened, it was not difficult to associate that man wearing black with Casper.
However, that was just a smidge amount of information. The crucial things, like where he went that night, his objectives with those crazy actions, and where he was now, were still to be found out.
The Princess could not afford herself to sleep well those days. In fact, she just got to take a nap the night after the third day of search.
The thing was that she could not focus entirely on that issue. Casper was not the only thing she had to deal with every day. And although Vick could delegate the major part of the search for her numerous subordinates, it was frustrating to not be aware of what was going on.
Because of these points, the Princess needed to struggle to get everything on her day done, since her mind was lost in problems other than work.
Her worst time was at the General Court. It was twice as hard to attend to judicial cases with so many things going on. Vick must have had taken control of things because lost her concentration there could mean affect the Castle's economy overall.
If she could not bear an argumentation with every person who stepped on that carpet in front of the throne, the Real family and the Jarls would pay the bill for it.
And if someone with ulterior motivations could make some way to foolish her in that state she was in, it would cost more than money…
"If I don't stop to overwork myself and focus on one thing at a time, I will make a mess even bigger than it…" Vick wiped her eyes, yawning and stretching her arms.
She was still feeling sleepy and was about to fall asleep still sat at her desktop again when someone put a mug in front of her with a loud thud, a piece of bread and cheese.
She opened her eyes again, adjusting her posture on the chair.
Vick looked up and spotted Raul looking with his empty, grey eyes at her.
"I know that you did not sleep too much, Your Highness, but unfortunately you need to wake up now if you want to get everything done." He bowed before Vick, kneeling on the ground.
"Yes. Thank you, Raul." She said, trying to maintain her cold and insensitive tone. However, it was difficult not to show some fondness towards the butler.
Raul was like her grandfather. He was there for her since she was born.
At first, she did not like Raul that much, but the time came when she was mature enough to understand why the butler said and made everything he did in the past.
Sometimes he could seem more frivolous and cruel than Vick, but he was trying to protect her.
In a District filled with ideals geared to war and battles, where the strongest must live and the weakest bow their heads, Vick was an easy target.
"Please, Your Highness, eat your breakfast, then follow me to the General Court. An extremely urgent case was reported." He requested, politely.
"Who had the petulance to bother me and everyone who works there with such selfish report?"
She took a sip of the contempt in the mug, savoring it, and sorting out that it was tea. She was so uninterested in that matter, that even her breakfast had her more entertained.
"Those three Jarls that requested to take action in the 16th floor of the Castle with their pharmaceutical business. They reported that they had an emergency going on and that they needed a meeting as soon as possible."
The Princess sighed, losing her appetite after just some small bites on the bread. She got stressed out, she had enough of those three idiots.
"Forget the breakfast for now, Raul. Since it is so urgent, I will go now take the morning reports of the search and then head to the general court."
She got up from the chair after organizing some papers and close her notebook.
"As you wish, My Princess." He bowed deeply again.
With hasty steps, Vick opened the Office's door and shut it with anger.
…
Casper was sitting on the cold floor made of concrete. His back was leaning against the wall, and he was trying to find the will to sleep.
The place he was in was had about 3 square meters. The walls were 2 meters tall. It was a pretty small place. A claustrophobic would be driven crazy for sure if he remained for just half an hour there.
To make it worse, the room was completely empty and dark, and had no air intakes, except for the breaches in the front metal door.
Casper had not anything against small and compact places. He did not care about loneliness as well. Empty places never bothered him, not even the stuffy ones.
After the Ridire had taken the bodies to the nursery, they dragged Casper for some corridors and brought him there.
They threw cold water at him before put him into that lockdown. He was cold and wet for a whole day, but after some time all his clothes could dry somehow.
Nevertheless, his opened wounds were still without the proper treatment. He was still bleeding slightly, and achy.
"I never thought I would be put into solitary confinement in my very first day in this prison… I hope that, at least, the other prisoners got their own punishment as well…"
Casper closed his eyes, still not willing to go to sleep at all. He was one day and a half in that lockdown, totalizing three days that he was disappeared from the outside world. However, he could not fall asleep.
Inside his mind, a storm was happening.
"Well then… how will I get out of this prison…" He gave a faint and tired smile. "This will be interesting, I need to admit."