Grave

The police come, take some photos, accept the “tripped breaker” excuse from Samantha for why there wasn't any video from the last hour, and haul off the very confused man who has trouble talking. No, he probably won't get much of an official sentence, simply because there's very little hard evidence… but Samantha certainly gave him an unofficial one with that cracked skull and the ensuing brain damage.

It's otherwise a dull day of business, and after working her full shift, Jasmine heads to the bus stop, phone out, GPS set to the relevant coordinates, and a fitted titanium ring in her back pocket. The bus ride is an hour long, not counting three exchanges where the duo waits for about ten minutes. With the distance involved, it's not until they're walking the last mile to the grave that Jasmine realizes what's up.

“There's nothing out here,” Jasmine frowns once they reach the spot, a half-mile down a logging road, and ten feet into the freshly planted woods.

“Well… given what your mother mentioned,” the symbiote considers, “an unmarked grave makes a certain amount of sense. If you want to give me a minute or two I can check.”

“Sure…” the host agrees.

The man in the ring takes a deep breath, and sticks her hand into the soil… speaking a green word of the earth. The soil parts, dirt, rocks, and trees sliding out of the way, forming a hole in the ground and a small hill nearby, both growing until the truth is revealed: The corpse of a VERY dark-skinned old man matching the sketch, his brown eyes open, a look of terror frozen on his face.

“That's not right…” the ring mutters aloud, handing back control to the body's owner and continuing on in her mind, “eyes tend to decay very quickly, his aren't very far gone. He can't have been dead for very long… a day or two at most… and without a proper funeral… do you want to talk to him? I probably can retrieve his soul at the moment.”

“No…” the young woman closes her father's eyes, “...not after what Mom said.” She shakes her head as she stands, “I will report the body, though.”

Jasmine pulls out her phone, and dials.

A cheery woman picks up, “911, what is your emergency?”

“I was getting some fresh air, and found a dead body in the woods,” the semi-possessed woman gives a partial truth, “So I'm reporting it.”

“Hold a moment…” the woman on the other end of the line clicks on a keyboard, very loudly, “...looks like we can have a car there in twenty minutes. Am I speaking with Jasmine Smith?”

“Yes ma'am,” the younger Smith agrees.

“Thank you Jasmine. Please do not disturb the scene. It will make the forensics team's job harder.” The woman on the other end of the line takes a breath, “and please remain on the line until you have confirmation from the officer.”

“Yes ma'am,” the young woman waits.

Eighteen minutes later, a sheriff's truck parks at the edge of the logging road, lights and sirens blaring. The sheriff turns off the siren, but leaves the lights on, as she gets out of the vehicle in full uniform, carrying a roll of yellow police line tape. Jasmine heads over to her, and the officer speaks first, “Are you Jasmine Smith?” she begins.

“Yes ma'am,” the host replies easily, lets the 911 operator know, and hangs up.

“Show me the body, please…” Jasmine leads the officer to the hole in the ground.

On seeing it, the officer grabs her sidearm, and does a slow, full circle turn before frowning and bolstering it.

“Ah, officer, what…?” The host asks, confused.

“This ground is very recently disturbed,” the officer explains as she takes the tape and starts marking off a good hundred foot radius around the hole, “you don't have a spade, and nobody's going to dig a hole that deep, toss a body in, and then NOT fill it back up… unless they're interrupted. You probably had a REALLY close call there, ma'am.”

“Not that close,” the ring chuckles in the back of his host's mind.

“Ah,” Jasmine nods, “well… the twenty minute wait would have given anyone time to take off, so….”

“True enough,” the officer admits as she finishes taping off the area, “So… I need to take your statement. Come with me, please….”

They go back to the officer's car, where Jasmine spends half an hour filling out a form with her name, address, phone number, email, driver's license number, and oh yes, her slightly-falsified account of what happened: As far as the cops know, she was just out getting some exercise in the woods, and stumbled across the open grave.

“Whoever ends up investigating is going to wonder what you're doing exercising this far from home, you realize,” the guest speaks into his host's mind.

“Yeah, well,” the host whispers back, “can't exactly hide where I live without drawing even more suspicion… but hey, no car, and there's going to be video of my bus ride here, so they won't think I dumped the body at least. I'll think of something if they ask.”

“All right then…” the ring accedes as the woman hands the completed forms over to the officer who gave them to her, one of many now that an actual investigator and a forensic team have shown up in the interim….