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CHAPTER 1
The wind didn’t just blow in Griffintown; it hunted. It funneled off the Lachine Canal, sharp as a glass shard, carrying the scent of frozen iron and old secrets.
Chloe Tremblay pulled her collar higher. The wool scratched her neck. She was twenty-four, a coder for a gaming startup on Rue Peel, and she was late. The city was a study in grayscale. The sky was lead. The snow was ash. The canal was a jagged vein of black ice cutting through the ribs of the industrial district.
Then she saw it.
Near the edge of the water, a lone willow tree stood like a skeleton. Its branches were brittle, clicking together in the breeze. From the lowest limb, something defied the wind.
A beanie.
It was slate grey. Cashmere, by the look of the weave. It didn't flutter. It swung with a heavy, rhythmic weight. A pendulum. Left to right. Tick. Tock.
"Someone lost their luck," Chloe muttered. Her breath hitched in the air, a white ghost that vanished instantly.
She stepped off the plowed path. The crust of the snow broke under her boots with the sound of snapping bone. She reached out. The beanie felt oddly stiff. New. It hadn't been lost for weeks; it had been placed there this morning.
She tugged.
The branch didn't let go. It had been whittled to a lethal, needle-like point, threaded through the tight knit of the wool. Chloe pulled harder, her gloved fingers slipping. With a sudden pop, the branch released its captive.
Something heavy hit the frozen slush at her feet.
Chloe looked down. It wasn't a coin. It wasn't a stone.
It was a human molar. Attached to it was a tiny, rectangular sliver of black plastic—a micro-SD card, taped to the root of the tooth with surgical precision.
The beanie in her hand felt suddenly, impossibly hot. She dropped it. It lay on the snow like a discarded scalp.
The wind screamed louder. Chloe didn't wait for the echo. She ran.
CHAPTER 2
Detective Émile Bouchard sat in the examination room of the McGill University Health Centre. The air was sterile. Too warm.
"Take off the shirt, Émile," Dr. Aris said.
Émile complied. His skin was a map of war. Across his chest and arms, angry red welts rose in jagged islands. They itched with the intensity of a thousand stings.
"Cold urticaria," Aris sighed, tapping his tablet. "Your body treats the Montreal winter like a parasitic infection. Your mast cells are dumping histamine because the temperature dropped five degrees."
"I’m a cop in Quebec, Doc," Émile rasped. His voice was a low growl, sanded down by years of cigarettes and shouting over sirens. "Telling me to stay warm is like telling a fish to stay dry."
"It’s getting worse," Aris countered. "One of these days, your throat will close up. Anaphylaxis. You’ll choke on the very air you breathe."
Émile reached for his shirt. His hands shook—not from the cold, but from the suppressed urge to claw at his own skin. He hated his body's betrayal. He came from a line of Bouchard men who were made of granite and ice. His father had walked beats in Griffintown when the snow reached the second floor. Now, Émile was a man allergic to his own heritage.
His phone buzzed on the metal tray. A text from the precinct.
Griffintown. Lachine Canal. We have a 'gift' on a tree. And a tooth.
Émile stood up. He didn't wait for the doctor's parting warning. He threw on his heavy, thermal-lined parka—a tactical shroud designed to keep the world out.
He stepped out of the hospital. The air hit him.
-15C.
Immediately, the itching began. A slow crawl behind his ears. A tightening in his lungs. He ignored it. He climbed into his unmarked sedan, cranked the heat until the plastic smelled of melting dust, and headed toward the water.
CHAPTER 3
The crime scene was a circle of yellow tape flapping violently against the backdrop of the Farine Five Roses sign. The giant red neon letters loomed over Griffintown like a dying sun.
Émile crossed the line. He moved slowly, his movements stiff to avoid sweating beneath his layers. Sweat meant moisture. Moisture meant a drop in skin temperature. A drop meant a flare-up.
"Bouchard. You look like hell," a voice called out.
It was Sloane Rahal. She wasn't a cop. She was a consultant—a forensic textile expert with a PhD in material science and a wardrobe that cost more than Émile’s car. She was kneeling by the willow tree, staring at the grey beanie through a magnifying lens.
"It’s the season for it," Émile said, stopping five feet away. "What are we looking at?"
"A work of art," Sloane said. She didn't look up. "This isn't mass-produced. Look at the tension in the purl stitch. This was hand-knitted on circular needles, probably gauge US 4. The wool is a blend: 70% Mongolian cashmere, 30% vicuña."
"In English, Sloane."
She looked up then. Her eyes were sharp, scanning him. "It’s a five-hundred-dollar hat, Detective. And look at the branch."
Émile leaned in. The tip of the willow limb was shaved clean. A perfect, sharp spike. "Someone wanted it to stay put. He didn't want it to blow away. He wanted it to be found."
"There's more," Sloane said. She pointed to a small Evidence bag. Inside sat the molar and the SD card. "The tooth didn't fall out. It was extracted. Post-mortem, I think. No blood on the root. It’s clean. Too clean."
Émile looked at the beanie. It was a dull, flat grey. The exact color of the ice on the canal.
"The girl who found it," Émile asked. "Where is she?"
"In the back of the cruiser. Shaking like a leaf," Sloane said. "She tried to look at the card. She has a laptop in her bag. She's a coder."
Émile turned toward the cruiser. His skin was screaming now. The welts were forming under his thermal leggings. He needed to get inside. He needed the heat. But he stayed. He looked at the "Farine Five Roses" sign flickering in the distance.
The red light hit the grey wool of the beanie. For a second, it looked like it was bleeding.
"Check the card, Sloane," Émile said. "I want to know who that tooth belonged to before the sun goes down."
CHAPTER 4
Ten minutes later, inside the cramped, sweltering mobile command unit, the SD card flickered to life on a monitor.
It was a video. High definition. No sound.
A man was sitting at a mahogany desk. He was tanned, smiling, wearing a linen shirt. Behind him, a window looked out over a turquoise ocean. Palms swayed. A cocktail sat on a coaster next to a silver laptop.
"That’s Marc-Andre Vance," Émile said. "The venture capitalist. He’s been 'off the grid' for three days. His PR firm said he was on a digital detox in Tulum."
"He looks happy," Sloane remarked.
"He looks dead," Émile corrected.
"What?"
"Look at his eyes, Sloane. He’s not looking at the camera. He’s looking at something just off-screen. And his hand—the one holding the drink. It’s not moving. Not even a tremor."
Émile leaned closer to the screen. He ignored the fire spreading across his back.
"Zoom in on the reflection," he ordered the tech officer. "The sunglasses."
The image pixelated, then smoothed. In the dark curve of Vance’s designer shades, the tropical paradise disappeared. There were no palms. There was no ocean.
In the reflection, framed by the luxury of the "Tulum" office, was a faint, red, neon glow. Five blocky letters, reversed and blurred.
S-E-S-O-R.
"Five Roses," Sloane whispered. "The sign. He’s not in Mexico. He’s within a mile of where we’re standing."
"The video was posted to his Instagram an hour ago," the tech officer added. "Thousands of likes. Comments saying how jealous they are of his vacation."
Émile looked out the window of the van at the darkening Griffintown skyline. The "Tailor" wasn't just killing people. He was keeping their digital souls alive while their bodies turned to ice. He was creating ghosts in the machine.
"He’s still here," Émile said, his voice dropping to a whisper. "And if that's his tooth on the tree... he’s not smiling anymore."
CHAPTER 5
The heat in the mobile command unit was suffocating, yet Émile’s skin felt like it was being flayed by invisible razors. He stepped back out into the Griffintown wind. The transition from +28C to -15C was a physical blow. His lungs spasmed. He leaned against his sedan, waiting for the antihistamines to do the impossible.
"The reflection in the glasses," Sloane said, following him out. She was wrapped in a slate-colored trench coat that mimicked the sky. "It wasn't just the sign. It was the angle. To see the Five Roses sign like that, you’d have to be elevated. High up. One of the old silos or the new condos."
"The new condos have security. Doormen. Cameras," Émile rasped. He pointed toward the Peel Basin, where the canal widened into a wasteland of rusted cranes and concrete skeletons. "The old silos have shadows."
They drove in silence. The tires of the sedan crunched over frozen road salt. Griffintown was a neighborhood of ghosts—old Irish laborers buried under layers of glass and steel.
They reached the edge of the basin. A massive, rusted crane from the 1940s loomed over the water like a predatory bird.
"Look," Sloane whispered.
Pinned to a heavy steel hook dangling from the crane’s cable was the second marker. Another grey beanie.
This one wasn't just hanging; it was pinned through the center by a long, rusted industrial bolt. The wind made the hook groan—a metallic shriek that echoed off the water.
CHAPTER 6
Émile didn't wait for the forensics team. He climbed the base of the crane, his boots slipping on the rime ice. Every movement sent a fresh wave of hives across his joints. He reached the hook and pulled the beanie free.
Inside the fold, there was no tooth this time.
There was a fragment of bone. Greyish-white. A distal phalanx—the tip of a finger. And nestled next to it, a small, blinking LED. A GPS chip.
"It’s active," Émile said, jumping back down. He showed the blinking light to Sloane.
She didn't look at the chip. She was staring at the beanie. She took it from his hand with tweezers, bringing it close to her eyes.
"This is different," she said. Her voice had lost its professional chill. "The first one was cashmere. This is coarser. It’s a blend of wool and... something mineral."
She rubbed a stray fiber between her gloved fingers. It didn't snap. It shimmered.
"Magnetite," she muttered. "This isn't just clothing. It’s been treated with a magnetic iron ore. And look at the salt spray on the brim."
She pointed to a crust of white crystals.
"It’s not road salt, Émile. It’s industrial brine. The kind they used in the old flour mills to prevent the machinery from seizing in the humidity. This hat hasn't been outside long. It’s been sitting in a basement that hasn't been cleaned since the Great Depression."
CHAPTER 7
"Detective!" the tech officer shouted from the van, his arm waving frantically.
Émile and Sloane hurried back. The monitor was glowing with a fresh update. Marc-Andre Vance’s Instagram account had just posted a "Live Story."
The video showed a beach. Golden sand. The sound of waves crashing. A pair of tan legs stretched out on a lounge chair. A caption appeared in a bubbly font: Living my best life. No reception. Don't call.
"We just tracked the GPS chip you found on the crane," the officer said. His face was pale in the blue light of the screen.
"And?" Émile prompted.
"It’s moving, sir. But it’s not in a car. It’s not on a person."
He pulled up a map of the Lachine Canal. A red dot was pulsing. It was moving in a slow, perfect circle, exactly thirty feet below the surface of the frozen water.
"It’s in the current?" Sloane asked.
"No," the officer replied. "The circle is too perfect. It’s a machine. Something is rotating under the ice at a constant speed."
Émile looked at the "Live Story" on the screen. The waves on the "beach" were rhythmic. The sound was looping every six seconds.
"It’s a loop," Émile realized. "The 'Digital Ghost' is a script. It’s automated. The killer doesn't even need to be at a computer. He’s set the victims’ lives to autopilot while he finishes the weave."
Suddenly, the red dot on the map stopped. It sat stationary for three seconds, then began to move rapidly toward the shore. Toward them.
CHAPTER 8
"Movement on the bank!" a patrolman yelled.
A figure emerged from the shadows of an abandoned horse stable near the water. He was wearing a heavy, tattered coat and carrying a bundle of grey fabric. He ran with a limp, heading toward the labyrinth of the Cité du Multimédia.
"Police! Arretez!" Émile shouted.
He gave chase. The cold air felt like swallowing needles. His throat began to itch—the warning sign he feared most. He pushed through it, his heart hammering against his ribs.
He tackled the figure into a snowbank. They rolled into the frozen muck.
"I didn't do nothing! I was just paid!" the man screamed.
Émile flipped him over. It was a local squatter known as "Stitch." His fingers were stained with ink and grease. In his bundle were six more grey beanies, all identical.
"Who paid you?" Émile roared, pinning him against a rusted fence.
"A man in a uniform!" Stitch blubbered. "He gave me a hundred bucks to hang the hats. Said it was for a 'guerrilla marketing' campaign for a new clothing line. He told me to start at the canal and work my way to the police station."
"What uniform?"
"Security! Or a cop! I don't know! It was dark, and he had a mask on because of the cold!"
Émile searched the man's pockets. He found a crumpled receipt from a high-end yarn shop in Westmount.
"Is this it?" Émile asked.
"No! He gave me that too! Said if anyone asked, I should say I bought the wool there!"
Émile let him go, his breath coming in ragged gasps. He looked at the beanies in the snow. They were decoys. A trail of breadcrumbs designed to keep the police looking at the surface while the real horror happened beneath their feet.
His phone buzzed. It was Sloane.
"Émile, get back to the crane. I just analyzed the GPS chip again."
"What is it?"
"It’s not just a tracker, Émile. It’s a trigger. And it just reached the 'Zero' coordinate."
At the edge of the canal, a low, mechanical groan rumbled through the earth. The ice in the center of the Peel Basin began to spiderweb. A massive, iron lock gate—unused for fifty years—began to grind open.
CHAPTER 9
The grinding of the iron lock gate sounded like a giant’s teeth gnashing together. The ice shattered in jagged plates, sucked down into the churning black water of the canal. As the gate retreated into the limestone wall, a hidden alcove was revealed—a dry-dock chamber built during the Victorian era and long since forgotten by the city’s blueprints.
"Get the lights over here!" Émile barked.
The police floodlights cut through the swirling snow, illuminating the interior of the stone chamber. It was a cavern of weeping masonry and frozen moss. In the center sat a single, modern ergonomic chair. It was bolted to a wooden platform.
On the chair sat a laptop, its screen glowing a ghostly blue. Beside it, a high-end ring light—the kind used by influencers—cast a sterile, circular glow on an empty space.
"The Studio," Sloane whispered, her voice trembling.
Émile climbed down the rusted rungs of the access ladder. The air in the chamber was stagnant, smelling of wet rock and ozone. He reached the laptop. A script was running on the screen—lines of code rapidly generating social media captions.
Tequila at sunrise. #Blessed.
Missing the MTL cold? Not even a little bit. #TulumVibes.
Émile looked at the floor. Beneath the chair, the "brine" Sloane had mentioned was pooled in thick, oily puddles.
"He’s not just faking their lives," Émile said, his voice echoing. "He’s doing it right here. He brings them into the dark, puts them in the light, and makes the world believe they're a thousand miles away."
He turned to leave, but something caught his eye. On the back of the ring light, taped to the plastic, was a small, grey envelope.
His name was written on it in precise, calligraphic ink: Detective Bouchard.
He opened it. Inside was a Polaroid photo. It was a picture of the willow tree from the morning, but taken from a different angle. In the background of the shot, leaning against a distant lamp post, was Émile himself.
The killer had been watching him find the first beanie.
The first stitch is always the hardest, Émile, the note read. But the pattern is already set. Check your locker. You’re missing something.
CHAPTER 10
The drive back to the precinct was a blur of sirens and the frantic scratching of Émile’s skin. The "Digital Ghost" was no longer just a clever hack; it was a taunt.
He burst through the heavy doors of the station, ignoring the stares of his colleagues. He reached his locker and tore it open.
Empty.
No, not empty. Tucked into the very back, behind his spare uniform, was a third grey beanie. It was folded neatly. When he picked it up, a heavy, cold object fell from the wool.
A brass skeleton key.
"That’s not a modern key," Sloane said, appearing behind him. She had followed him from the canal, her eyes wide with a mix of fear and professional curiosity. "That looks like it belongs to the old Lachine Canal maintenance tunnels."
"It’s my father's," Émile whispered. He recognized the notched edge. His father, Captain Jacques Bouchard, had kept a set of master keys to the city’s old infrastructure.
He flipped the beanie over. Stitched into the interior brim in red thread—the only bit of color he’d seen—were coordinates.
"These aren't GPS coordinates," Sloane noted, leaning in. "They’re depth and pressure readings. Like a diver’s log."
"He’s using my father’s history against me," Émile growled. "My father was the one who closed the 'Flour Mill Murders' in '96. He found the bodies in the tunnels. He always said he missed one."
CHAPTER 11
The precinct’s televisions all switched simultaneously to the emergency broadcast system. A shrill, rhythmic tone filled the room.
"Attention Montreal residents," the announcer’s voice crackled. "Environment Canada has issued a Flash Freeze Warning. A polar vortex will collide with a moisture front over the St. Lawrence in exactly three hours. Temperatures will drop from -15C to -40C in less than sixty minutes. All non-essential travel is prohibited."
"-40," Sloane whispered. "At that temperature, exposed skin freezes in less than five minutes. If the victims are in unheated spaces..."
"They aren't just in unheated spaces," Émile said, grabbing his gear. "The Tailor is using the city’s own geography as a freezer. If he’s holding them in the dry-docks or the vents, they’ll be blocks of ice before the sun goes down."
"We have three hours to find them," the tech officer shouted. "But the 'Digital Ghost' just went haywire. It’s posting hundreds of photos a minute. It’s a DDOS attack on our own tracking system. We can't filter the real signals from the fakes!"
"We don't need the signals," Émile said, heading for the door. "We have the key. And I know exactly which lock it fits."
CHAPTER 12
They reached the St-Gabriel Locks just as the first flakes of the vortex began to fall. The wind was no longer hunting; it was killing. The air was a white wall of ice crystals.
Émile led Sloane to a small, nondescript stone hut near the water’s edge. He shoved the brass key into the lock. It turned with a heavy, satisfying thunk.
The door swung open to reveal a spiral staircase leading deep into the earth.
"Wait," Sloane said, holding her tablet up. "I just got a ping from the lab. The DNA from the tooth in the first beanie? It came back."
"And? It’s Vance, right?"
"No," Sloane said, her face turning ashen in the dim light of the hut. "The DNA matches a John Doe from 1996. One of the victims from your father’s old case."
Émile froze. "That’s impossible. My father identified all the bodies. He saw them buried."
"Then he lied," a voice came from the darkness of the stairs.
A figure stepped into the light. It wasn't the Tailor. It was the Police Captain, Émile’s commanding officer, holding a service weapon pointed directly at Émile’s chest.
"Your father didn't close that case, Émile," the Captain said, his breath hitching in the cold. "He settled it. And now, the debt is due."
CHAPTER 13
The Captain’s gun was steady, but his eyes were rimmed with the red exhaustion of a man who hadn't slept since the first beanie appeared. The wind howled through the open door of the stone hut, and Émile’s skin erupted in a fresh wave of fire. The "Cold Allergy" was no longer a nuisance; it was a countdown.
"Drop the key, Émile," the Captain ordered. "And Sloane, put the tablet on the floor. Slowly."
"You were his partner," Émile rasped, his throat beginning to constrict. "In ’96. You and my father. The Flour Mill Murders."
"We were heroes," the Captain said, a bitter smile twisting his face. "But heroes don't pay the mortgage. Vance and his tech buddies—back when they were just kids with a server—they wanted that land. The old mills. We 'cleaned' the site of the squatters. Your father took the lead. He moved the bodies, but he didn't bury them all. He kept one. A contingency plan. A ghost in the closet."
"The tooth," Sloane whispered. "The John Doe. You’ve been using the Tailor to finish what they started."
"The Tailor is the boy who lived," the Captain snapped. "The son of the man your father killed. He grew up in the walls of this city, learning the code, learning the tunnels. He didn't want money. He wanted the world to see the people who 'erased' his life. He’s the one who built the Digital Ghost. I just provided the list of targets."
Suddenly, a muffled, rhythmic thudding echoed from the stairs below. It sounded like a heartbeat, but mechanical.
"The pumps," Émile realized.
He lunged.
Not at the Captain, but at the heavy iron door of the hut. He slammed it shut, the latch catching just as the Captain fired. The bullet sparked off the stone. The narrow space was plunged into the dim, emergency red of the tunnel lights.
"Go!" Émile yelled at Sloane.
They scrambled down the spiral stairs, the air growing colder and damper with every step. At the bottom, they emerged into a massive vaulted chamber—the junction where the canal met the city’s underground intake system.
The sight was a nightmare rendered in ice.
Three massive, transparent blocks of ice stood in the center of the chamber. They were the bases for the sculptures intended for the Place des Festivals. Inside each block, a human figure was visible—Vance and two other missing developers. They were upright, their eyes open, their skin the color of blue marble.
They weren't dead. Not yet.
A series of tubes ran into the ice, pumping in oxygen and a saline solution to keep their hearts beating while the "Digital Ghost" script continued to post their happy, sunny updates to the world.
CHAPTER 14
"The pressure," Sloane cried out, looking at a gauge on the side of the ice blocks. "The Flash Freeze is starting outside. The intake valves are opening to prevent the pipes from bursting. If that water hits these blocks, it will encase them completely. They’ll be part of the city’s foundation by morning."
"I have to get to the master control," Émile said. His vision was blurring. Red splotches were blooming across his face and neck. He was entering anaphylactic shock.
He pulled a small auto-injector of epinephrine from his pocket and jammed it into his thigh through his parka. The rush of adrenaline cleared his head for a moment, but it was a borrowed minute.
"The control isn't here," Sloane said, her fingers flying across her tablet. "It’s being bypassed from an external server. The signal is coming from the top of the Farine Five Roses building. The Tailor is at the source."
Émile didn't wait. He knew the maintenance elevator in the back of the tunnel led directly to the sub-basement of the mill.
He emerged onto the roof of the Five Roses building twenty minutes later. The blizzard was a white-out. The giant red letters of the sign hummed with electricity, vibrating against his back.
In the center of the roof stood a man draped in a heavy, hand-knitted grey shroud. He was sitting at a ruggedized laptop, his fingers moving like spiders across the keys.
"The pattern is almost finished, Detective," the Tailor said. He didn't turn around. His voice was a dry rasp, barely audible over the wind.
"The Captain told me everything," Émile shouted. "My father was a coward. But this—this isn't justice. It’s just more ghosts."
The Tailor turned. His face was a map of scars—frostbite from a lifetime spent in the cold. He held a long, sharpened knitting needle made of surgical steel.
"Your father took my name," the Tailor said. "I am taking the city's future. When the sun rises, Montreal will realize it’s been led by ghosts for thirty years. The Digital Ghost will release every document, every bribe, every lie your father and the Captain ever told."
"Do it then," Émile said, taking a step forward. His throat felt like it was closing. "Release the truth. But let them out of the ice. Don't be the man my father was."
The Tailor looked at the laptop. One key-press would release the valves. Another would purge the servers.
"The grey thread," the Tailor whispered, looking at the beanie Émile was still clutching. "My mother made that for your father. A peace offering he never accepted. He threw it in the slush. I found it. I’ve been holding onto that cold ever since."
CHAPTER 15
The Tailor lunged.
He was faster than the cold should have allowed. The steel needle whistled through the air, slicing the arm of Émile’s parka. Émile swung a heavy industrial flashlight, catching the Tailor in the ribs, but the man didn't flinch. He was numb to pain, a creature of the frost.
They grappled on the edge of the roof, five hundred feet above the canal. The wind shrieked, threatening to peel them off the concrete.
Émile’s body was failing. The hives were so thick his skin felt like it was boiling. He couldn't breathe. His heart was a frantic bird trapped in a cage of ice.
"End it!" the Tailor screamed, pressing the needle toward Émile’s throat.
Émile didn't fight the needle. He reached out and grabbed the Tailor’s laptop.
"If I go," Émile gasped, his voice a wet rattle, "the truth goes with me."
He threw the laptop toward the edge of the roof.
For a split second, the Tailor’s "predator" instinct was overwritten by his obsession. He lunged for the computer—his life’s work, his revenge, his only identity.
His boots slipped on the rime ice.
Émile grabbed the Tailor’s shroud, anchoring him. They teetered on the brink. The laptop slid into the abyss, vanishing into the white-out.
"Save it!" the Tailor cried.
"I’m saving you," Émile wheezed, pulling him back from the ledge with the last of his strength.
They collapsed onto the roof. The Tailor stared at the empty space where his digital empire had been. He began to howl—a sound that was lost in the roar of the blizzard.
Below them, in the chamber, the rhythmic thudding of the pumps stopped. Sloane had used the distraction to bypass the local lock. The ice began to drain.
CHAPTER 16
Three Months Later.
The ice on the Lachine Canal had turned to grey slush, then to running water. The first green buds were appearing on the willow tree in Griffintown.
Émile Bouchard sat on a bench near the water. He was wearing a light jacket. No parka. No thermals. The urticaria was still there, a lingering shadow, but it was manageable. The heat of the truth had a way of warming the blood.
The Captain was in a cell in Sorel. The Tailor was in a psychiatric facility, silent as the stone he’d lived in. Marc-Andre Vance had survived, though he’d lost three fingers to the frost—a permanent reminder of the price of his "digital" life.
Sloane Rahal walked up and sat beside him. She handed him a coffee.
"The servers were recovered," she said. "Most of the data was encrypted, but we found enough. Your father’s legacy... it’s not what you thought it was. But you saved the people he didn't."
Émile looked at the water. "He always hated the grey. He said it was the color of indecision."
Sloane reached into her bag and pulled out a small package. "I made you something. For next winter."
He opened it. It was a beanie. But it wasn't slate grey. It was a vibrant, defiant safety-orange.
"So I can see you coming," she smiled.
Émile felt the wool. It was soft. Warm. He looked up at the willow tree. The branch where the first beanie had hung was growing new leaves, covering the scar where the wood had been sharpened.
The Digital Ghosts were gone. The city was real again. And for the first time in a long time, Émile Bouchard took a breath of cold air, and his throat stayed open.
The digital photograph, starting point of this fiction, captured in Montreal in 2025 is available in limited editions (100) on a Manifold
Title: Relic #2 / The grey beanie Photographer: Mehdi Maciej Benembarek Year: 2025 Image Size: 6720 x 4480 pixels License: Primary NFT holder is free to use in advertising, display privately and in hgroups, including virtual galleries, metaverse, social media, documentaries and essays by holder of the NFT, as long as creator is credited.
AI Conductor: Mehdi Benembarek
Text: Gemini (2025)
CHAPTER 1
The wind didn’t just blow in Griffintown; it hunted. It funneled off the Lachine Canal, sharp as a glass shard, carrying the scent of frozen iron and old secrets.
Chloe Tremblay pulled her collar higher. The wool scratched her neck. She was twenty-four, a coder for a gaming startup on Rue Peel, and she was late. The city was a study in grayscale. The sky was lead. The snow was ash. The canal was a jagged vein of black ice cutting through the ribs of the industrial district.
Then she saw it.
Near the edge of the water, a lone willow tree stood like a skeleton. Its branches were brittle, clicking together in the breeze. From the lowest limb, something defied the wind.
A beanie.
It was slate grey. Cashmere, by the look of the weave. It didn't flutter. It swung with a heavy, rhythmic weight. A pendulum. Left to right. Tick. Tock.
"Someone lost their luck," Chloe muttered. Her breath hitched in the air, a white ghost that vanished instantly.
She stepped off the plowed path. The crust of the snow broke under her boots with the sound of snapping bone. She reached out. The beanie felt oddly stiff. New. It hadn't been lost for weeks; it had been placed there this morning.
She tugged.
The branch didn't let go. It had been whittled to a lethal, needle-like point, threaded through the tight knit of the wool. Chloe pulled harder, her gloved fingers slipping. With a sudden pop, the branch released its captive.
Something heavy hit the frozen slush at her feet.
Chloe looked down. It wasn't a coin. It wasn't a stone.
It was a human molar. Attached to it was a tiny, rectangular sliver of black plastic—a micro-SD card, taped to the root of the tooth with surgical precision.
The beanie in her hand felt suddenly, impossibly hot. She dropped it. It lay on the snow like a discarded scalp.
The wind screamed louder. Chloe didn't wait for the echo. She ran.
CHAPTER 2
Detective Émile Bouchard sat in the examination room of the McGill University Health Centre. The air was sterile. Too warm.
"Take off the shirt, Émile," Dr. Aris said.
Émile complied. His skin was a map of war. Across his chest and arms, angry red welts rose in jagged islands. They itched with the intensity of a thousand stings.
"Cold urticaria," Aris sighed, tapping his tablet. "Your body treats the Montreal winter like a parasitic infection. Your mast cells are dumping histamine because the temperature dropped five degrees."
"I’m a cop in Quebec, Doc," Émile rasped. His voice was a low growl, sanded down by years of cigarettes and shouting over sirens. "Telling me to stay warm is like telling a fish to stay dry."
"It’s getting worse," Aris countered. "One of these days, your throat will close up. Anaphylaxis. You’ll choke on the very air you breathe."
Émile reached for his shirt. His hands shook—not from the cold, but from the suppressed urge to claw at his own skin. He hated his body's betrayal. He came from a line of Bouchard men who were made of granite and ice. His father had walked beats in Griffintown when the snow reached the second floor. Now, Émile was a man allergic to his own heritage.
His phone buzzed on the metal tray. A text from the precinct.
Griffintown. Lachine Canal. We have a 'gift' on a tree. And a tooth.
Émile stood up. He didn't wait for the doctor's parting warning. He threw on his heavy, thermal-lined parka—a tactical shroud designed to keep the world out.
He stepped out of the hospital. The air hit him.
-15C.
Immediately, the itching began. A slow crawl behind his ears. A tightening in his lungs. He ignored it. He climbed into his unmarked sedan, cranked the heat until the plastic smelled of melting dust, and headed toward the water.
CHAPTER 3
The crime scene was a circle of yellow tape flapping violently against the backdrop of the Farine Five Roses sign. The giant red neon letters loomed over Griffintown like a dying sun.
Émile crossed the line. He moved slowly, his movements stiff to avoid sweating beneath his layers. Sweat meant moisture. Moisture meant a drop in skin temperature. A drop meant a flare-up.
"Bouchard. You look like hell," a voice called out.
It was Sloane Rahal. She wasn't a cop. She was a consultant—a forensic textile expert with a PhD in material science and a wardrobe that cost more than Émile’s car. She was kneeling by the willow tree, staring at the grey beanie through a magnifying lens.
"It’s the season for it," Émile said, stopping five feet away. "What are we looking at?"
"A work of art," Sloane said. She didn't look up. "This isn't mass-produced. Look at the tension in the purl stitch. This was hand-knitted on circular needles, probably gauge US 4. The wool is a blend: 70% Mongolian cashmere, 30% vicuña."
"In English, Sloane."
She looked up then. Her eyes were sharp, scanning him. "It’s a five-hundred-dollar hat, Detective. And look at the branch."
Émile leaned in. The tip of the willow limb was shaved clean. A perfect, sharp spike. "Someone wanted it to stay put. He didn't want it to blow away. He wanted it to be found."
"There's more," Sloane said. She pointed to a small Evidence bag. Inside sat the molar and the SD card. "The tooth didn't fall out. It was extracted. Post-mortem, I think. No blood on the root. It’s clean. Too clean."
Émile looked at the beanie. It was a dull, flat grey. The exact color of the ice on the canal.
"The girl who found it," Émile asked. "Where is she?"
"In the back of the cruiser. Shaking like a leaf," Sloane said. "She tried to look at the card. She has a laptop in her bag. She's a coder."
Émile turned toward the cruiser. His skin was screaming now. The welts were forming under his thermal leggings. He needed to get inside. He needed the heat. But he stayed. He looked at the "Farine Five Roses" sign flickering in the distance.
The red light hit the grey wool of the beanie. For a second, it looked like it was bleeding.
"Check the card, Sloane," Émile said. "I want to know who that tooth belonged to before the sun goes down."
CHAPTER 4
Ten minutes later, inside the cramped, sweltering mobile command unit, the SD card flickered to life on a monitor.
It was a video. High definition. No sound.
A man was sitting at a mahogany desk. He was tanned, smiling, wearing a linen shirt. Behind him, a window looked out over a turquoise ocean. Palms swayed. A cocktail sat on a coaster next to a silver laptop.
"That’s Marc-Andre Vance," Émile said. "The venture capitalist. He’s been 'off the grid' for three days. His PR firm said he was on a digital detox in Tulum."
"He looks happy," Sloane remarked.
"He looks dead," Émile corrected.
"What?"
"Look at his eyes, Sloane. He’s not looking at the camera. He’s looking at something just off-screen. And his hand—the one holding the drink. It’s not moving. Not even a tremor."
Émile leaned closer to the screen. He ignored the fire spreading across his back.
"Zoom in on the reflection," he ordered the tech officer. "The sunglasses."
The image pixelated, then smoothed. In the dark curve of Vance’s designer shades, the tropical paradise disappeared. There were no palms. There was no ocean.
In the reflection, framed by the luxury of the "Tulum" office, was a faint, red, neon glow. Five blocky letters, reversed and blurred.
S-E-S-O-R.
"Five Roses," Sloane whispered. "The sign. He’s not in Mexico. He’s within a mile of where we’re standing."
"The video was posted to his Instagram an hour ago," the tech officer added. "Thousands of likes. Comments saying how jealous they are of his vacation."
Émile looked out the window of the van at the darkening Griffintown skyline. The "Tailor" wasn't just killing people. He was keeping their digital souls alive while their bodies turned to ice. He was creating ghosts in the machine.
"He’s still here," Émile said, his voice dropping to a whisper. "And if that's his tooth on the tree... he’s not smiling anymore."
CHAPTER 5
The heat in the mobile command unit was suffocating, yet Émile’s skin felt like it was being flayed by invisible razors. He stepped back out into the Griffintown wind. The transition from +28C to -15C was a physical blow. His lungs spasmed. He leaned against his sedan, waiting for the antihistamines to do the impossible.
"The reflection in the glasses," Sloane said, following him out. She was wrapped in a slate-colored trench coat that mimicked the sky. "It wasn't just the sign. It was the angle. To see the Five Roses sign like that, you’d have to be elevated. High up. One of the old silos or the new condos."
"The new condos have security. Doormen. Cameras," Émile rasped. He pointed toward the Peel Basin, where the canal widened into a wasteland of rusted cranes and concrete skeletons. "The old silos have shadows."
They drove in silence. The tires of the sedan crunched over frozen road salt. Griffintown was a neighborhood of ghosts—old Irish laborers buried under layers of glass and steel.
They reached the edge of the basin. A massive, rusted crane from the 1940s loomed over the water like a predatory bird.
"Look," Sloane whispered.
Pinned to a heavy steel hook dangling from the crane’s cable was the second marker. Another grey beanie.
This one wasn't just hanging; it was pinned through the center by a long, rusted industrial bolt. The wind made the hook groan—a metallic shriek that echoed off the water.
CHAPTER 6
Émile didn't wait for the forensics team. He climbed the base of the crane, his boots slipping on the rime ice. Every movement sent a fresh wave of hives across his joints. He reached the hook and pulled the beanie free.
Inside the fold, there was no tooth this time.
There was a fragment of bone. Greyish-white. A distal phalanx—the tip of a finger. And nestled next to it, a small, blinking LED. A GPS chip.
"It’s active," Émile said, jumping back down. He showed the blinking light to Sloane.
She didn't look at the chip. She was staring at the beanie. She took it from his hand with tweezers, bringing it close to her eyes.
"This is different," she said. Her voice had lost its professional chill. "The first one was cashmere. This is coarser. It’s a blend of wool and... something mineral."
She rubbed a stray fiber between her gloved fingers. It didn't snap. It shimmered.
"Magnetite," she muttered. "This isn't just clothing. It’s been treated with a magnetic iron ore. And look at the salt spray on the brim."
She pointed to a crust of white crystals.
"It’s not road salt, Émile. It’s industrial brine. The kind they used in the old flour mills to prevent the machinery from seizing in the humidity. This hat hasn't been outside long. It’s been sitting in a basement that hasn't been cleaned since the Great Depression."
CHAPTER 7
"Detective!" the tech officer shouted from the van, his arm waving frantically.
Émile and Sloane hurried back. The monitor was glowing with a fresh update. Marc-Andre Vance’s Instagram account had just posted a "Live Story."
The video showed a beach. Golden sand. The sound of waves crashing. A pair of tan legs stretched out on a lounge chair. A caption appeared in a bubbly font: Living my best life. No reception. Don't call.
"We just tracked the GPS chip you found on the crane," the officer said. His face was pale in the blue light of the screen.
"And?" Émile prompted.
"It’s moving, sir. But it’s not in a car. It’s not on a person."
He pulled up a map of the Lachine Canal. A red dot was pulsing. It was moving in a slow, perfect circle, exactly thirty feet below the surface of the frozen water.
"It’s in the current?" Sloane asked.
"No," the officer replied. "The circle is too perfect. It’s a machine. Something is rotating under the ice at a constant speed."
Émile looked at the "Live Story" on the screen. The waves on the "beach" were rhythmic. The sound was looping every six seconds.
"It’s a loop," Émile realized. "The 'Digital Ghost' is a script. It’s automated. The killer doesn't even need to be at a computer. He’s set the victims’ lives to autopilot while he finishes the weave."
Suddenly, the red dot on the map stopped. It sat stationary for three seconds, then began to move rapidly toward the shore. Toward them.
CHAPTER 8
"Movement on the bank!" a patrolman yelled.
A figure emerged from the shadows of an abandoned horse stable near the water. He was wearing a heavy, tattered coat and carrying a bundle of grey fabric. He ran with a limp, heading toward the labyrinth of the Cité du Multimédia.
"Police! Arretez!" Émile shouted.
He gave chase. The cold air felt like swallowing needles. His throat began to itch—the warning sign he feared most. He pushed through it, his heart hammering against his ribs.
He tackled the figure into a snowbank. They rolled into the frozen muck.
"I didn't do nothing! I was just paid!" the man screamed.
Émile flipped him over. It was a local squatter known as "Stitch." His fingers were stained with ink and grease. In his bundle were six more grey beanies, all identical.
"Who paid you?" Émile roared, pinning him against a rusted fence.
"A man in a uniform!" Stitch blubbered. "He gave me a hundred bucks to hang the hats. Said it was for a 'guerrilla marketing' campaign for a new clothing line. He told me to start at the canal and work my way to the police station."
"What uniform?"
"Security! Or a cop! I don't know! It was dark, and he had a mask on because of the cold!"
Émile searched the man's pockets. He found a crumpled receipt from a high-end yarn shop in Westmount.
"Is this it?" Émile asked.
"No! He gave me that too! Said if anyone asked, I should say I bought the wool there!"
Émile let him go, his breath coming in ragged gasps. He looked at the beanies in the snow. They were decoys. A trail of breadcrumbs designed to keep the police looking at the surface while the real horror happened beneath their feet.
His phone buzzed. It was Sloane.
"Émile, get back to the crane. I just analyzed the GPS chip again."
"What is it?"
"It’s not just a tracker, Émile. It’s a trigger. And it just reached the 'Zero' coordinate."
At the edge of the canal, a low, mechanical groan rumbled through the earth. The ice in the center of the Peel Basin began to spiderweb. A massive, iron lock gate—unused for fifty years—began to grind open.
CHAPTER 9
The grinding of the iron lock gate sounded like a giant’s teeth gnashing together. The ice shattered in jagged plates, sucked down into the churning black water of the canal. As the gate retreated into the limestone wall, a hidden alcove was revealed—a dry-dock chamber built during the Victorian era and long since forgotten by the city’s blueprints.
"Get the lights over here!" Émile barked.
The police floodlights cut through the swirling snow, illuminating the interior of the stone chamber. It was a cavern of weeping masonry and frozen moss. In the center sat a single, modern ergonomic chair. It was bolted to a wooden platform.
On the chair sat a laptop, its screen glowing a ghostly blue. Beside it, a high-end ring light—the kind used by influencers—cast a sterile, circular glow on an empty space.
"The Studio," Sloane whispered, her voice trembling.
Émile climbed down the rusted rungs of the access ladder. The air in the chamber was stagnant, smelling of wet rock and ozone. He reached the laptop. A script was running on the screen—lines of code rapidly generating social media captions.
Tequila at sunrise. #Blessed.
Missing the MTL cold? Not even a little bit. #TulumVibes.
Émile looked at the floor. Beneath the chair, the "brine" Sloane had mentioned was pooled in thick, oily puddles.
"He’s not just faking their lives," Émile said, his voice echoing. "He’s doing it right here. He brings them into the dark, puts them in the light, and makes the world believe they're a thousand miles away."
He turned to leave, but something caught his eye. On the back of the ring light, taped to the plastic, was a small, grey envelope.
His name was written on it in precise, calligraphic ink: Detective Bouchard.
He opened it. Inside was a Polaroid photo. It was a picture of the willow tree from the morning, but taken from a different angle. In the background of the shot, leaning against a distant lamp post, was Émile himself.
The killer had been watching him find the first beanie.
The first stitch is always the hardest, Émile, the note read. But the pattern is already set. Check your locker. You’re missing something.
CHAPTER 10
The drive back to the precinct was a blur of sirens and the frantic scratching of Émile’s skin. The "Digital Ghost" was no longer just a clever hack; it was a taunt.
He burst through the heavy doors of the station, ignoring the stares of his colleagues. He reached his locker and tore it open.
Empty.
No, not empty. Tucked into the very back, behind his spare uniform, was a third grey beanie. It was folded neatly. When he picked it up, a heavy, cold object fell from the wool.
A brass skeleton key.
"That’s not a modern key," Sloane said, appearing behind him. She had followed him from the canal, her eyes wide with a mix of fear and professional curiosity. "That looks like it belongs to the old Lachine Canal maintenance tunnels."
"It’s my father's," Émile whispered. He recognized the notched edge. His father, Captain Jacques Bouchard, had kept a set of master keys to the city’s old infrastructure.
He flipped the beanie over. Stitched into the interior brim in red thread—the only bit of color he’d seen—were coordinates.
"These aren't GPS coordinates," Sloane noted, leaning in. "They’re depth and pressure readings. Like a diver’s log."
"He’s using my father’s history against me," Émile growled. "My father was the one who closed the 'Flour Mill Murders' in '96. He found the bodies in the tunnels. He always said he missed one."
CHAPTER 11
The precinct’s televisions all switched simultaneously to the emergency broadcast system. A shrill, rhythmic tone filled the room.
"Attention Montreal residents," the announcer’s voice crackled. "Environment Canada has issued a Flash Freeze Warning. A polar vortex will collide with a moisture front over the St. Lawrence in exactly three hours. Temperatures will drop from -15C to -40C in less than sixty minutes. All non-essential travel is prohibited."
"-40," Sloane whispered. "At that temperature, exposed skin freezes in less than five minutes. If the victims are in unheated spaces..."
"They aren't just in unheated spaces," Émile said, grabbing his gear. "The Tailor is using the city’s own geography as a freezer. If he’s holding them in the dry-docks or the vents, they’ll be blocks of ice before the sun goes down."
"We have three hours to find them," the tech officer shouted. "But the 'Digital Ghost' just went haywire. It’s posting hundreds of photos a minute. It’s a DDOS attack on our own tracking system. We can't filter the real signals from the fakes!"
"We don't need the signals," Émile said, heading for the door. "We have the key. And I know exactly which lock it fits."
CHAPTER 12
They reached the St-Gabriel Locks just as the first flakes of the vortex began to fall. The wind was no longer hunting; it was killing. The air was a white wall of ice crystals.
Émile led Sloane to a small, nondescript stone hut near the water’s edge. He shoved the brass key into the lock. It turned with a heavy, satisfying thunk.
The door swung open to reveal a spiral staircase leading deep into the earth.
"Wait," Sloane said, holding her tablet up. "I just got a ping from the lab. The DNA from the tooth in the first beanie? It came back."
"And? It’s Vance, right?"
"No," Sloane said, her face turning ashen in the dim light of the hut. "The DNA matches a John Doe from 1996. One of the victims from your father’s old case."
Émile froze. "That’s impossible. My father identified all the bodies. He saw them buried."
"Then he lied," a voice came from the darkness of the stairs.
A figure stepped into the light. It wasn't the Tailor. It was the Police Captain, Émile’s commanding officer, holding a service weapon pointed directly at Émile’s chest.
"Your father didn't close that case, Émile," the Captain said, his breath hitching in the cold. "He settled it. And now, the debt is due."
CHAPTER 13
The Captain’s gun was steady, but his eyes were rimmed with the red exhaustion of a man who hadn't slept since the first beanie appeared. The wind howled through the open door of the stone hut, and Émile’s skin erupted in a fresh wave of fire. The "Cold Allergy" was no longer a nuisance; it was a countdown.
"Drop the key, Émile," the Captain ordered. "And Sloane, put the tablet on the floor. Slowly."
"You were his partner," Émile rasped, his throat beginning to constrict. "In ’96. You and my father. The Flour Mill Murders."
"We were heroes," the Captain said, a bitter smile twisting his face. "But heroes don't pay the mortgage. Vance and his tech buddies—back when they were just kids with a server—they wanted that land. The old mills. We 'cleaned' the site of the squatters. Your father took the lead. He moved the bodies, but he didn't bury them all. He kept one. A contingency plan. A ghost in the closet."
"The tooth," Sloane whispered. "The John Doe. You’ve been using the Tailor to finish what they started."
"The Tailor is the boy who lived," the Captain snapped. "The son of the man your father killed. He grew up in the walls of this city, learning the code, learning the tunnels. He didn't want money. He wanted the world to see the people who 'erased' his life. He’s the one who built the Digital Ghost. I just provided the list of targets."
Suddenly, a muffled, rhythmic thudding echoed from the stairs below. It sounded like a heartbeat, but mechanical.
"The pumps," Émile realized.
He lunged.
Not at the Captain, but at the heavy iron door of the hut. He slammed it shut, the latch catching just as the Captain fired. The bullet sparked off the stone. The narrow space was plunged into the dim, emergency red of the tunnel lights.
"Go!" Émile yelled at Sloane.
They scrambled down the spiral stairs, the air growing colder and damper with every step. At the bottom, they emerged into a massive vaulted chamber—the junction where the canal met the city’s underground intake system.
The sight was a nightmare rendered in ice.
Three massive, transparent blocks of ice stood in the center of the chamber. They were the bases for the sculptures intended for the Place des Festivals. Inside each block, a human figure was visible—Vance and two other missing developers. They were upright, their eyes open, their skin the color of blue marble.
They weren't dead. Not yet.
A series of tubes ran into the ice, pumping in oxygen and a saline solution to keep their hearts beating while the "Digital Ghost" script continued to post their happy, sunny updates to the world.
CHAPTER 14
"The pressure," Sloane cried out, looking at a gauge on the side of the ice blocks. "The Flash Freeze is starting outside. The intake valves are opening to prevent the pipes from bursting. If that water hits these blocks, it will encase them completely. They’ll be part of the city’s foundation by morning."
"I have to get to the master control," Émile said. His vision was blurring. Red splotches were blooming across his face and neck. He was entering anaphylactic shock.
He pulled a small auto-injector of epinephrine from his pocket and jammed it into his thigh through his parka. The rush of adrenaline cleared his head for a moment, but it was a borrowed minute.
"The control isn't here," Sloane said, her fingers flying across her tablet. "It’s being bypassed from an external server. The signal is coming from the top of the Farine Five Roses building. The Tailor is at the source."
Émile didn't wait. He knew the maintenance elevator in the back of the tunnel led directly to the sub-basement of the mill.
He emerged onto the roof of the Five Roses building twenty minutes later. The blizzard was a white-out. The giant red letters of the sign hummed with electricity, vibrating against his back.
In the center of the roof stood a man draped in a heavy, hand-knitted grey shroud. He was sitting at a ruggedized laptop, his fingers moving like spiders across the keys.
"The pattern is almost finished, Detective," the Tailor said. He didn't turn around. His voice was a dry rasp, barely audible over the wind.
"The Captain told me everything," Émile shouted. "My father was a coward. But this—this isn't justice. It’s just more ghosts."
The Tailor turned. His face was a map of scars—frostbite from a lifetime spent in the cold. He held a long, sharpened knitting needle made of surgical steel.
"Your father took my name," the Tailor said. "I am taking the city's future. When the sun rises, Montreal will realize it’s been led by ghosts for thirty years. The Digital Ghost will release every document, every bribe, every lie your father and the Captain ever told."
"Do it then," Émile said, taking a step forward. His throat felt like it was closing. "Release the truth. But let them out of the ice. Don't be the man my father was."
The Tailor looked at the laptop. One key-press would release the valves. Another would purge the servers.
"The grey thread," the Tailor whispered, looking at the beanie Émile was still clutching. "My mother made that for your father. A peace offering he never accepted. He threw it in the slush. I found it. I’ve been holding onto that cold ever since."
CHAPTER 15
The Tailor lunged.
He was faster than the cold should have allowed. The steel needle whistled through the air, slicing the arm of Émile’s parka. Émile swung a heavy industrial flashlight, catching the Tailor in the ribs, but the man didn't flinch. He was numb to pain, a creature of the frost.
They grappled on the edge of the roof, five hundred feet above the canal. The wind shrieked, threatening to peel them off the concrete.
Émile’s body was failing. The hives were so thick his skin felt like it was boiling. He couldn't breathe. His heart was a frantic bird trapped in a cage of ice.
"End it!" the Tailor screamed, pressing the needle toward Émile’s throat.
Émile didn't fight the needle. He reached out and grabbed the Tailor’s laptop.
"If I go," Émile gasped, his voice a wet rattle, "the truth goes with me."
He threw the laptop toward the edge of the roof.
For a split second, the Tailor’s "predator" instinct was overwritten by his obsession. He lunged for the computer—his life’s work, his revenge, his only identity.
His boots slipped on the rime ice.
Émile grabbed the Tailor’s shroud, anchoring him. They teetered on the brink. The laptop slid into the abyss, vanishing into the white-out.
"Save it!" the Tailor cried.
"I’m saving you," Émile wheezed, pulling him back from the ledge with the last of his strength.
They collapsed onto the roof. The Tailor stared at the empty space where his digital empire had been. He began to howl—a sound that was lost in the roar of the blizzard.
Below them, in the chamber, the rhythmic thudding of the pumps stopped. Sloane had used the distraction to bypass the local lock. The ice began to drain.
CHAPTER 16
Three Months Later.
The ice on the Lachine Canal had turned to grey slush, then to running water. The first green buds were appearing on the willow tree in Griffintown.
Émile Bouchard sat on a bench near the water. He was wearing a light jacket. No parka. No thermals. The urticaria was still there, a lingering shadow, but it was manageable. The heat of the truth had a way of warming the blood.
The Captain was in a cell in Sorel. The Tailor was in a psychiatric facility, silent as the stone he’d lived in. Marc-Andre Vance had survived, though he’d lost three fingers to the frost—a permanent reminder of the price of his "digital" life.
Sloane Rahal walked up and sat beside him. She handed him a coffee.
"The servers were recovered," she said. "Most of the data was encrypted, but we found enough. Your father’s legacy... it’s not what you thought it was. But you saved the people he didn't."
Émile looked at the water. "He always hated the grey. He said it was the color of indecision."
Sloane reached into her bag and pulled out a small package. "I made you something. For next winter."
He opened it. It was a beanie. But it wasn't slate grey. It was a vibrant, defiant safety-orange.
"So I can see you coming," she smiled.
Émile felt the wool. It was soft. Warm. He looked up at the willow tree. The branch where the first beanie had hung was growing new leaves, covering the scar where the wood had been sharpened.
The Digital Ghosts were gone. The city was real again. And for the first time in a long time, Émile Bouchard took a breath of cold air, and his throat stayed open.
The digital photograph, starting point of this fiction, captured in Montreal in 2025 is available in limited editions (100) on a Manifold
Title: Relic #2 / The grey beanie Photographer: Mehdi Maciej Benembarek Year: 2025 Image Size: 6720 x 4480 pixels License: Primary NFT holder is free to use in advertising, display privately and in hgroups, including virtual galleries, metaverse, social media, documentaries and essays by holder of the NFT, as long as creator is credited.
AI Conductor: Mehdi Benembarek
Text: Gemini (2025)
1 comment
🚨New drop | Relics of the Unseen Metropolis #2🚨 From a real photograph to an AI thrilling novel, Opus 2 … The grey beanie In Montreal, the cold doesn’t just bite. It remembers. A discarded grey beanie hanging from a frozen branch in Griffintown. A GPS tracker. A human tooth. Step into the world of "The grey beanie," a noir thriller where the Lachine Canal hides secrets deeper than the ice, and a "Digital Ghost" is erasing the living. Follow Detective Émile Bouchard—a man literally allergic to the Montreal winter—as he races against a "Flash Freeze" to stop a killer who knits vengeance into every stitch. Witness this mystery novel built beat-by-beat with AI, blending gritty Montreal atmosphere with high-tech suspense. https://paragraph.com/@relics-of-the-unseen-metropolis/relic-2-the-grey-beanie