4338.219 · August 7, 2018 AD
The Call She Couldn't Make Earlier
Sienna has been holding something since before dawn. She gave Stout everything she could in their first call — the Taylor file, the photograph, the confirmation he needed. But there was something else she couldn't share until the authorisation came through. Now it has. And the lab results that survived the Berriedale fire have just rearranged every answer Sarah Lahey gave across two hours in Interview Room 2 into a shape that looks nothing like cooperation.
The lab results are in. The blood samples that survived the Berriedale fire — the only physical evidence Sienna's team salvaged before someone burned the house to the ground — have returned a match on the first pass. A confirmed match, run twice, against a DNA profile already in the system from a serving officer's service record. The match places that officer inside a house where a man died, in contact close enough to leave blood on his clothing, at a time she never disclosed and in circumstances she never described across two hours of careful, choreographed answers.
But that's only the first fracture. The arrest records Sarah described in her interview — the evidence that would corroborate her account of being at the property on the first of August — don't exist. No custody log, no processing record, no interview transcript. Either Sarah described events that never happened, or someone has reached into the system and removed every trace that they did. And the sergeant who could verify either version was placed on administrative leave the night Karl vanished — not by his own hand, but by a duty inspector filing paperwork he never requested.
Sienna has already moved. Surveillance application submitted. Professional Standards signed off within the hour. Two officers seconded from Victoria — no connections to Tasmania, no connections to anyone in the building. They're en route.
