His disability card got him a bus ride to VC University. He tacked up the flyers on various bulletin boards across campus, then took advantage of the area’s many wifi hotspots to do some research on his netbook. He found some shade in a small park and began working.
From the flyer, her name is Alana Favors. She is nineteen years old. Last seen five days before. He knew that it was probably too late and that she was dead, but he was going to operate under the assumption she was alive. Her loved ones were surely doing the same.
He started with social networking sites. One of the pages had been taken over by a parent or friend, and directed her friends toward the efforts to find her. A website was put up, and several of her friends and family had posted what information they had. He learned she was a student at the community college, and that she was last seen after leaving an anime club get together on campus. Her roommate said she never made it home. Dean scanned old comments and posts, looking for a love interest. A couple of mildly creepy comments proved to be a cousin, but Alana did not appear to be in a relationship, occasionally lamenting the fact in her posts. Her last post was “I guess I’ll give it one more try. Wish me luck!”
If she had left town voluntarily, she did so without a goodbye or change of clothes. Without a relationship or known stalker, the abductor was either a stranger or had a low profile. Aside from the odd movie, the only regular social event Alana attended was the anime club at VC Community College. The next meeting was in two days, a week after her disappearance.
Dean spent the rest of the afternoon over the various social networks, learning everything he could about anyone associated with Alana Favors or the anime club. Some of the members had restrictive privacy settings. Dean had a series of false profiles on many networks and message boards, many of them with pictures of sociable young women, which usually helped him gain access. He found pictures of events and studied the faces.
He looked up a satellite view of the VC Community College campus. Between the hall that housed the meeting and her dorm there were no public streets. The meeting adjourned at 9 PM, early enough for some light foot traffic around campus. A snatch off the streets was looking unlikely. But who could say she went straight home.