Verdun Chronicles, Case 3 Part I

The Sinister, Sneaky, Solidly-Locked Chest of the Late Abernathy Jeminsk

I am so so sleepy and will be taking a nap after this. THAT SAID! I will spend a precious moment of my consciousness reminding you that these cases are split in half, with the setup (including all necessary clues) in this first part, and then next Monday you will get the second half, including the solution to the puzzle! Comments about your speculation of the solution are not just welcome but ENCOURAGED (please please please please please please please). In fact, they are so encouraged that the first one (regardless of being correct or not) gets a free month of the paid tier!

Also, I am working my way toward 300 paid subscribers (current count: 16! THANK YOU GUYS!!!!) If you want to contribute:

and now, onto the chapter!

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Abernathy Jeminsk was a locksmith nearly as famous for the problem’s he’d solved as Anastasia Verdun. Though they’d never crossed paths, she and Jolene had heard of him. Any lock, he could pick; any key, he could find the lock for it; anything that needed to be sealed up, he could construct a lock so complex that only the matching key, made by him, would have even the slightest chance of opening it. He had been called upon by a Yaletian queen once, to construct a lock for the royal treasure room. Other than compensation, his only request was that he could bring his family along on the trip, which was easily granted. People are willing to accommodate much for those with skill.

Abernathy Jeminsk died two weeks ago.

The Jeminsk’s family car comes to collect them on a drizzly day.

The driver is a cyborg, dark skin overlaid with wiring before sinking beneath the hard shell of at least one prosthetic arm. He moves stiffly about, implying at least one prosthetic leg and maybe even some metalwork in his torso or spine. Still, he’s polite when he offers to help Jolene from the chair to the backseat of the car, and he doesn’t toss the chair around as Jolene has said the public bus drivers do. Acceptable. Anastasia follows her wife into the car.

The Jeminsk’s live further outside Elsyx’s city limits, where the farm forests are hardly managed and just drip off their excess in pools that change color with the seasons. This season, it’s dandyfruit, big and yellow and shining, and Jolene whispers that they should ask the driver to stop on the way home so they can steal a few. Technically, it’s illegal to steal, but a lot of the farmers in the area follow an old religious principle of not reaping the edges and corners of fields, so that those who need food can have it. Christianity is a small, fringe belief set, but little things like that make religions seem like such a kind thing.

When they arrive at Jeminsk House, they are told to wait in the car while their driver pulls the wheelchair out of the back and sets it just outside Jolene’s car door, so that when she gets out, he transfer is seamless, and they’re able to get inside and out of the rain in a flash. The Jeminsks have an elderly housekeeper with a few analog cybernetics, and she asks Jolene if she needs help being pushed over the thick pile of the runner carpets that insulate the hallways. It used to be that Jolene kept knitting supplies in a pocket of her chair so that if anyone other than Anastasia touched it, she could grab one of the needles and stab at their hand. The way Jolene winces, she’s wishing she’d brought her knitting needles.