Martin zoomed onto the site of the incident on
the map. Then he marked all the Avanu selling outlets around the street. There
were 13 exclusive outlets and 32 others that also sold Avanu in the radius of 2
miles around the street. That was quite a number, but manageable, Martin
thought. Now he took a print out of the map and slowly started joining outlet
locations to each other with a sketch pen. The figure of an irregular shaped
circle formed on the map with its centre roughly being the street where the
incident happened. Martin now had the haystack. All he needed to do was find
the needle.
It was four days since he met Anita, and
Martin had spent a lot of his time following the leads. He was moving from
outlet to outlet which was selling Avanu and showing Joseph's photo and asking
the employees if they had seen him. Most of the times, he received a
"No". He had covered a lot of ground in ticking out the outlets from
his list. He was concerned that if none of the employees replied in the
affirmative, he had to find another lead.
But at the same time, Martin was positive that
he was on Joseph’s trail. It wasn’t only because Anita confirmed he was the one
who saved her, but also because of how Joseph had saved Anita. But it made him
wonder why Joseph bothered to save Anita in the first place. Martin felt a wave
of unease move through him. There was something he was missing, and he should
have realized by now but had not.
He noticed it first in his Director’s office
when he was given the case. Facts about Joseph weren’t making sense. Joseph
wasn’t matching up to the typical terrorist profile. Nothing in the case was
adding up. Though he couldn’t place his finger on it, what he was leaning
towards, in the end, was that the case was fabricated. Probably not something
so drastic, like the whole thing being an elaborate lie, but maybe just
important aspects of it, such as Joseph’s identity. It wouldn’t have been the
first time where the truth was hidden in order to forward some agenda.
Every single case he’d worked on in the past
had a pattern, and using that pattern he could find the next piece of the
puzzle. Getting one step ahead of his target made it easier to bring the case
to its end. But in this case, he was sure that wasn’t going to be how things
worked. Of course Martin thought that he might have made a mistake, but after
going over all of the information he was given about Joseph from his Director,
there was no other way. Either there was something off about the case itself,
or he was experiencing something completely new.
Martin walked into the next Avanu outlet on
his list. It was a small building with the typical glass showcase, with dressed
mannequins. As he opened the shop doors a chime rang, the door touched a bell
placed at its upper edge. "Yes? What can I do for you?" An old man
asked Martin. Martin introduced himself and showed him the picture of Joseph.
There was a gleam of recognition in the old man's eyes. And he smiled at
Martin.
BINGO!
[The complete Book ‘MAN FROM TOMORROW’ can be downloaded at amzn.to/2MSf1ng ]
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