The bunker door grinds shut behind Thadeus, and Marla swivels from the monitors. Blue light washes over Victor Hale's face in frozen CCTV stills, then jumps to a receipt scan and a list of club check-ins.
Marla Brewer
I found the trail. Victor paid, but the card he used points to a shell, and the shell points to Knight's End.
Elias stops wringing his hands long enough to stare at the screen. A repeated symbol, neat and geometric, appears beside Victor's name, then beside the security man's alias.
Elias
That mark keeps coming back. Same pattern on the invoices, the messages, all of it.
Marla Brewer
Not random. It is a chain. Victor is the link they used to reach you, and the security guy is the hand feeding it.
Marla clicks again, and a map blooms on the center monitor, dotted with the club, a parking structure, and one storefront after another, all tied together by the same pattern.
Marla Brewer
If Knight's End is the meeting, this is the footprint. Whoever is inside that circle already knows him, and probably knows we're coming.
Thadeus stands with Peacebringer at his side while the room goes still, the next move suddenly clear, find the face behind the pattern before the meeting does.
✓ Quest Accepted
Identify the leadership of the Knight's End club
✓ Quest Accepted
Gather evidence of criminal activity at Knight's End
“Thadeus studies the computer monitors. He questions Elias, "You mentioned seeing a mark or symbol on these invoices. What is the symbol?"”
SUCCESS (Good Perception, rolled -2)
Thadeus leans in at the monitors, scanning the invoices Marla pulled up. Elias lifts a hand, then points with two fingers at the same geometric stamp stamped in gray ink across the paper trail.
Thadeus Jovanović
You mentioned seeing a mark or symbol on these invoices. What is the symbol?
Elias
It is a ring made of three short lines, like a broken star. I saw it on the receipts, and on the messages Victor kept deleting.
Marla zooms in, and the same mark resolves on the screen beside a tiny header line, Knight's End, management. Her cursor pauses there a beat too long.
Marla Brewer
That is not just a customer stamp. It is tied to whoever handles the club accounts.
Elias exhales, but the relief is thin. The fan in the room ticks louder than it should, and the printout in Thadeus's hand creases at the edge where his grip tightens.
Elias
If that mark is their sign, then Knight's End is not just a meeting place. It is where the people at the top leave their fingerprints.
On the wall map, Marla draws a quick circle around the club and taps the symbol twice. The room settles into a hard, useful silence, with the club's front door, back office, and unseen management all suddenly in play.
“Thadeus makes a mental note, "A broken star, I should keep an eye for that symbol moving forward." Marla interrupts his thinking, "Thadeus, I'm pretty sure I found the owner of the club." She points to the main monitor, to a rather imposing male figure. He has long, white hair with sharp facial features. The figure is wearing an all-white three piece suit and blue tie. Below the image, the name Donnie Ramirez appears. Marla gasps, "That's the owner's name".”
Thadeus files the symbol away as Marla clicks to a new record. She freezes on a white-suited man in the club profile, then sharply taps the name beneath it.
Marla Brewer
Thadeus, I think I found the owner of the club.
Marla Brewer
That is him. Donnie Ramirez.
Quest Complete
Identify the leadership of the Knight's End club