Defective - A Psychopath's Tale

Chapter 32

Back at Shangri-Holland, Holland was going through the video I'd recorded at Wanda's home; Randi watched with him while I spun up a couple joints.

"Does she always speak of herself in the third person?" Randi asked.

Holland was stepping through a portion of the video frame by frame, zooming in and out at times. He was looking at something when Randi asked her question, thus the delay in his response.

"Hmm, yeah, as long as we've known her, she's always done that. Part of why we call her the crazy chemist." He answered.

Randi considered his answer. "So... what's the rest of the reason for calling her the crazy chemist?" She further queried.

Holland clicked on a couple menu items on the screen with his mouse, hit a few keys then looked back at me; I was lighting a joint and purposely didn't make eye contact. He looked back in the direction of the computer he was using, but not at it.

"She's been know to... turn on her friends, lash out and attack them. No actual reason, just the toys in her attic making noise." He reset the video and started it playing again. "Damn near killed someone who was nothing but nice to her." He ended.

As he watched the video, some parts over and over again, Holland muttered to himself. Not only was I trying to catch anything I could from what he was saying to himself, so was Randi. And like me, she knew asking would be pointless. I knew he'd found something of interest. You just had to wait Holland Fuzzy out; once he had all his duckies in a row, he'd talk. Until then, you were best just to leave him alone. Interfering would only make the process take longer. If you interrupted, he'd go back to make sure he hadn't missed anything.

A good 45 minutes passed. Randi was glued to Holland's side. She even refused to go with Zandie when she told her she had something to work on involving clothes. She was watching everything Holland did; probably making a mental list of things to ask him once he was done. Sure, she had a love affair with clothing, but the technical stuff Holland was doing was where she lived.

"This... this is interesting." Holland commented clearly, he was talking to the rest of the people in the room now.

He had several frames he'd grabbed from the video up and was working on them; the printer started making noise. From what I could see, he was blowing up sections of the frame and printing them. Randi watched the first couple he did, then she whipped out her tablet and started tapping away. Holland hadn't asked her for any help, however, she knew he was onto something and would do her best to provide what she could. Initiative, a rare quality in kids her age.

"This mark, this logo. It belongs to the Imperial government." Holland said as he waited for the printer to finish the rest of the pages, he was holding the first one he'd printed and moving towards me.

"It's apparently linked to the I.S.R.D. chemistry branch. The other mark belongs to them also, but isn't linked to any branch. The Imperial Government website doesn't say squat about it and the Imperial Science and Research Division site only lists it as a generic division icon. It doesn't appear on anything at their site." Randi explained from what she'd pulled up on her tablet.

Holland had the other pictures he'd printed now, he held one up facing Randi. "You're talking about this one right?" He asked.

"Yeah." She set her tablet down and walked to where Holland was and took the picture from him. "That doesn't make sense." She commented eyeballing the picture.

"What doesn't make sense?" I asked not understanding what not making sense she was talking about.

"Another generic icon for the I.S.R.D." She stated.