VESSEL - Extinction Countdown 992: Azure Trace

Man - a being in search of meaning.—Plato (Πλάτων, ca. 427–347 B.C.)

An anonymous tip turned the Linqing Winding Road crash from accident to murder.

Spearheading the investigation was Yi Qing, a detective captain at 067 Precinct for just over six months. Her single eye, masked by a black eyepatch, made her an outcast among the brass. But that was only surface bias.

Yi Qing’s true obstacle lay in her mysteriously blank resume. Thrust into the precinct by some higher-up, she occupied a coveted insider’s slot worth hundreds of thousands. With her looks, she could have coasted as a desk clerk or played the trophy cop for promotions. But Yi Qing refused.

At 067, her name sparked chatter. Beauty? Unmatched in the precinct, marred only by the missing eye, giving her a modern pirate look. Skills? Her record was empty, yet she topped grappling, combat, and fitness tests, outmatching three or four male cops in their twenties or thirties. Only a few long-dead legends in the precinct’s history could’ve rivaled her detective work.

Her file listed thirty-two, but she looked twenty-three. A captain blending beauty, skill, and connections—she was shunned. Junior cops kept their distance; seniors had no leverage. The precinct let her be, as long as she caused no trouble and they could keep the higher-ups satisfied.

Lately, Yi Qing was stumped, staring at piles of photos and traffic cam footage. She’d volunteered for the Linqing Winding Road case, convinced it was no accident but a deliberate act.

Traffic police should’ve closed it, but after the tip, Yi Qing was first on scene. After inspecting the site, she declared it murder, shifting it to 067’s criminal division.

She had three reasons. First, the coroner found Guo Huaian, sharing the car with Lin Changrong, died of a heart attack, not the crash. No proof if it was before or after. If before, Lin Changrong was a prime suspect.

Second, the crash came from a collision at the taxi’s rear door. Odd, since the taxi’s doors auto-locked when the engine ran, impossible to open mid-drive unless the engine stopped. Why the rear door? Did the driver swing the car sideways for the hit?

Third, the strangest clue: the mangled door showed signs of being sliced with precision. Yi Qing tested fragments—the cuts aligned seamlessly with the car body, suggesting tampering beforehand.

By her logic, this wasn’t one murder but a potential chain. If Guo died pre-crash, Lin was suspect. If the door was sabotaged, someone targeted Lin or Guo. Even if the driver or passenger, Ye Shisan, wasn’t the killer, another culprit loomed.

Her bold theory turned a crash into a serial murder case. The precinct chief, overwhelmed, handed it to Yi Qing.

She knew the precinct was watching her fail, but her reasoning held. Errors, if any, lay in evidence or witness statements. Without a full proof chain, she was on her own.

After months hounding Lin Changrong, she got a fine and a warning to stop disrupting his life. She drove the taxi driver to flee to his uncle in Nigeria. Now, only Ye Shisan remained—the least likely suspect.

Why? First, he was a passenger, fresh from a mental hospital after twenty years, cut off from society, barely able to use a phone, with no chance to know others. Second, he saved Lin Changrong post-crash. Why would a suspect do that instead of letting him bleed out?

The case was too bizarre, even for Yi Qing. She hated bothering the innocent, but she had no options left.

Snapping back, she found her motorcycle parked outside Shisan Bakery. “Closed at two p.m.?”

Peering through the locked glass door, she heard a sour-toned child’s voice from above. “Hey, you’re not Uncle Shisan’s phone girlfriend, are you?”

Yi Qing looked up. On the second-floor balcony stood a stunning girl with silvery-white hair and a doll-like face, her voice sweetly clear.

“What girlfriend? I’m here for Ye Shisan. Is he in?”

“Nope! He’s done with you! Forget it!”

Yi Qing stifled a laugh. She flashed her badge. “Kid, I’m a police officer. I need to see Ye Shisan.”

Vanilla’s face turned icy, fearless. “I’m no kid—I’m a fairy!”