The Imperials

Anonymous

Harun POV:

In the tiny search window, cursor blinking on and off, my fingers hesitated above the keyboard. Closing my eyes, I took a brave, deep breath before continuing. Then I typed missing people, and immediately the glowing screen came to life. Pages and pages of new sites, small town papers, social media pages, and many, many stories shuffled up. There was endless cases to solve. 

Before long, I'd fallen down a rabbit hole of missing persons cases from all over the kingdom. I skimmed message board after message board, and so far, I noticed there was no luck. According to Daniel, he was giving his best shot in solving these cases, but for my point of view, he was a mighty failure. 

The number of missing sites was rocketing up to the sky now. Each day a someone was gone missing, someone was raped. Someone was in dire need of help, and here I was just sitting helplessly in my new car unable to do anything for them. 

I had to do something.

So, I started my own podcast directed towards the missing people. I kept myself anonymous, my voice disguised with filters. The LDA, short for Laptop Detective Agency that Daniel introduced me to does most of the work though, bringing me clues and tips and self-organizing into an online community. I compile the research, sift through the clues and choose the cases to focus on, and record, edit, and upload the podcast. 

Some victims started reaching out, but so far, we've only uncovered a few things; this particular group of high-tier masked criminals were alarmingly dangerous and anonymous. They always wore black whatsoever wherever they went. If someone exposed the slightest information about them, they were taken away or simply murdered.

With a deep breath, I start recording after locking my car doors and pulling down the blinds. 

Host: A seventeen-year-old vanished into thin air. His family and friends have no idea where he might have disappeared. He leaves behind no traces, no clues. Or does he? 

Almost a hundred people are reported missing this month. If we pay attention, if we work together, maybe we can bring some of them home. Is there something you can do to help? Listen up. Let's try. 

I am the seeker, and this is RadioRecovery.

When I'm finished, I click upload, and no sooner it's live. 

I immediately got a call from Daniel. He was the guy who suggested this after I had endlessly complained to him about my helpless status to the world. 

"Hey Harun," Daniel ordered hastily, his voice quick and busy from the other end. "I saw what you posted. Erase your browsing history, use a private browser, and I repeat do not use your real name. Never slip up--"

He has been saying the same thing again and again ever since I started this thing. "I thought you already told me this--"

"I know. You don't understand the severity, on the other end is a murderous mob we're a dealing with. They have a leader, and he's sadistic. Just like us, they're are tracking my men down, especially detectives. I feel like they have their own mob of detectives doing research on us, on our detective who are aware of them. As soon as one of my detective uncover something, they are gone missing before their investigation comes to our hands. They never come home. Listen, if you sense something suspicious, drop everything, don't bother going back to this job. It's one of dangerous cases I'm dealing with. I feel like it's gonna be a great fall for our kingdom!"

"Hey don't say that?" I interfered. "We'll get through this victoriously, once and for all."

"Yeah," He sighed depressingly, "Hey, I can't talk anymore, middle of my brother's engagement right now. Seriously, I don't even understand why I should even be here in the first place. Not like I'm the main focus here!"