I can shr[/smaller]ink down and hide in a jacket poc He considers for a moment and offers, "Or I could transform into a cane or a bra
"That sounds great! Good idea. If you can do it, I'd be down to wear a cool black bracelet." Zach holds out his arm toward Dr. Goo.
"How would you want to split us up, Aegis?" Hotaru asks, "Who to where, and why?"
"Guess it doesn't matter, everybody on the bus." Aegis starts to load up.
"I mean, I know we're calling this a mission but it's really probably just talking to a kid who stayed out late on a night that got colder than we thought--or passed out drunk in a walk-in freezer or something."
Exactly.
When Aegis gets in the bus she takes another quick drink before settling down, if she's not driving she'll keep working on her drink as they travel.
Violet looks at Rocket and Goo as she moves toward the bus.
"If I've learned anything, it's that it's never just 'that simple'."
To Pulse:
"I'm not able to link our minds just yet. Ace has that one up on me... but I'll give you a signal, trust me."
"Why doesn't it matter? If you have an idea, you should share it." Hotaru said, responding to Aegis as she slides onto a bench near the front.
"You heard the boss, we're not splitting up."
"If that's how you feel." Hotaru shrugs slightly, "I don't think you'll get very far unless you speak up, though."
Whippoorwill pulls herself in the bus, her braided leather bullwhip coiled and over her shoulder. "Oh, no no no," she says. "I am nobody's boss." She looks serious and direct at Aegis, hoping to disabuse her and everyone else of that notion.
"At most, I'll be a sort of field commander, but I'm as new to this super powered game as anybody here. Actually, quite a bit newer than most of you."
Despite her protests, she ends up directing the bus on a slight detour to pick up the drop off from her contact at the police department. Her cheeks color quite a bit as the irony is not lost upon her. But she sends Rocket out to grab the package, since if there was a camera or someone waiting to see who picked it up, the best they'd get was a blur.
As the bus resumes its trek to the hospital where Richie is, Briana dumps the contents of the large manila envelope out and goes over it. "Hmm. Looks like there's a serial killer with an unusual M.O.," she shares aloud. "Killings every three months over the last two years. Remains of the bodies are partially eaten by wild animals; bite marks match to a puma or cougar, but big, nearly twice normal size. Ooh, here's where it gets, well, more weird, outside the strangely regular pattern. Human bite marks too. But with pronounced canines, like vampire fangs."
She skims a few of the medical forensic reports. "Seems like they think whoever's doing this is using modified dentures or prosthetics." She shrugs as she consults the most recent case with today's date. "Well, looks like we've got two more months before there's another expected killing."
"No swipe marks? That's... strange. I would think there'd be signs of claw-style injuries. Guess if they've done it eight times... they haven't figured out a pattern." Hotaru says with a grimace. "And it sounds kind of ritualistic..." she pulls her feet into the seat with her. "Gormogon?"
"Gorma-who?" Whippoorwill asks, completely not getting the reference.
"Television. Serial Killer thing. Ritual murder... chewed on bones and built a skeleton from them. It was really weird and creepy. Do the files say anything was missing from the bodies?"
Whippoorwill nods understanding, then starts rifling through the papers. "Not seeing that, but there's quite a bit here. Maybe. We'll want to study all this closely. I'm sure they've also looked at all the victims to see if there's a connection there, too. Maybe a fresh set of eyes will help. Or, just the willingness to accept the impossible. So I guess it wouldn't be outlandish to suggest someone's got werewolf powers."
"Mmmm... but every three months?" Hotaru asks. "I wonder if there's some sort of pattern besides every three months. Like new moon, or full moon." She says, thinking out loud. "If we know the established patterns, we can research it online."
"Marvel's got Catseye. Like Mystique but only a cat or a panther hybrid. Faster, heals, claws and teeth. Basically all the 'cat' things. Hellsing's got Schrodinger. He's got Solopsism on his side. But I don't think that one really applies." she says with a shrug.
She-Ra's Catra (before Hotaru's time)
An alt-world Catwoman
Rinko from a (to me) very obscure manga from 30 years ago
Finally, just not in Hotaru's lineup, there are a -ton- of video game werecats.
Creepy, Goo thinks as he listens about the serial killer.
"Regardless, we need to remember. The group we work with is close to 'No-kill'. We need to come up with a way to incapacitate and capture, possibly even hold violent metas. Any ideas for that, besides 'pinball til unconscious'?"
"Can I see the report?" She says, holding her hand out for it. While she reads, she tries to piece together several questions. "Wanna help me read this, Goo? Aegis? More perspectives will mean a better shot of coming up with something."
As always, take your time. :)
Who is being targeted?
What are they being targeted for? (Seems to be food), if that is the case, either the person is very efficient or has other hunting grounds the police haven't found.
When are they being targeted? (Both times, especially celestial convergences, and time of day the victims go missing.)
Where are the bodies being found? Where were they most likely to be before their disappearance?
Why are these specific people targeted, and why is his MO seasonal?
How are his victims being killed, how is it moving them from point A to point B, how does it choose their victims?
Zach nods as they discuss these strange killings. Most of the images in Rockets head come from B-movie werewolves, but as they talk it hits him that these are real murdered people they're discussing.
After a minute of quiet he says, "I know it's what we've signed up for but...well, I'd never actually even seen a dead person until the day I came across Siren trying to rob that Museum. Bolt was there too--lucky for me--and she was the one that confirmed that two of the cops died in the blast.
"...I could kind of tell from where I was though. Their images, their blood arcing in slow motion, it's all kind of still etched into my brain."
Aegis gave Whip a glance of disbelief when she claimed she wasn't the boss but didn't comment on it further. "We may need to contact Cat and have her teleport some if we can't store them safely." She shrugged when Pulse offer the report. "Worth a shot." and looks over it with her for a while. "Are the bite marks from just one animal? It could be a shift or maybe someone controlling animals."
Whippoorwill's jaw gets tight and her movements become slow and deliberate when Rocket talks about seeing the officers die. She forces away the images his words conjures, grabbing a forensic report and studying it closely.
When Aegis mentions someone controlling animals, she looks up from the report, eyebrows raised. "That's a possibility. Well, I'm going to assume anything's a possibility."
"I... don't really have anything like that." Hotaru says, shaking her head to rocket. "Desensitized by TV's all I've got, and I don't think It'll quite be the same when I do see it. I'm still sorry you had to." she offers, looking up from the report, before digging back in.
Rocket smiles at his fellow comics fan. "Thanks. I guess from what Ace and Kitty were saying...well, we'll all have to deal with death sooner or later."
The murders, if they continue on schedule, should result in the next death being sometime between 4 and 7 weeks from today. There are 3 sets of bite marks total on the corpses, according to the bite casts taken from the bodies.
The exact animals seem to have changed at some point, as one of the bite castings changed between the 4th and 5th victims. So the perpetrator seems to have access to large felines readily. There are 8 victims total, thus far.
-----------------------
When Rocket gets tot he hospital, he meets up with his friend, who shows him to the room the boy is in. He's been in and out of consciousness, an incoherent when conscious. He keeps talking about snow men and icicles when he's conscious.
Rocket finds out from his friend's family that the boy has been like this since he woke up, the doctors had to amputate his fingers due to frostbite, as well as his toes. They managed to keep everything else, although they suspect his eyesight may have been permanently damaged.
The doctor's say he may be suffering from PTSD from the cold and the amputations.
They find out that he was found down town, near the Arch. He's 18, but he had a fake ID, and the group of friends were bar crawling down town. The temperature was only 20 degrees that night, and the doctors can't explain why he had such advanced frost bite. The cops think he might have gotten drunk and gotten into a freezer, and then been found and dumped outside, rather than taken to the hospital.
"Ano.." Hotaru says as she passes off another sheet that she's already finished with. "They're not... exactly three months, just similar. We're a little over halfway to the next one, probably. And... the types of bites changed halfway through. Still a big cat, though. So... maybe the 'talks to lions' is a better guess." Hotaru says as she hands off the last page.
Back in the bus, Rocket explains what he's heard. "Snow men and icicles...it still could totally be a hallucenation after passing out in a walk-in freezer...but it seems worth investigating just in case.
"Violet, would you be able to find out more, probing inside his head?
"We could go sniff around down near the Arch...but it's so big, so public, I doubt we'll easily find anything incriminating."
"If we're going to head to the arc first it might be easier recreating the attacking, send you or Pulse in at night with a few drinks in you and see if he shows up."
"Uh, I don't..." she stops, "Oh. Yeah, I get it..." she frowns slightly, "Not sure we'd be able to get Rocket drunk, given his metabolism." she says with a frown, she doesn't really seem up for 'drunk'.
"That's a good idea, Rocket. If Richie's too out of it to be coherent, maybe Vi can sift through his thoughts." She looks at her expectantly.
Violet shrugs. "I can try, but I'm not sure how much information we can get out of someone so heavily sedated. Yeah, let's try it. I'm sure I can convince the people at the desk I'm family or something."
Violet pulls on her shades and coat, smiling at Rocket. "Going my way?"
Goo asks, " Were there any other crimes committed close to the arch that evening. The boy may have stumbled into another meta abo
"You know... I was kind of curious. When I fire off pulses of electromagnetic energy... I can feel them. I know they're there, and can watch them move out. I was wondering if folks like Vi and Ace also see like that. If they see what they're making and what they're doing." she says, legs still tucked into the seat with her, but not really looking up, as if distracted by something. "Kinda makes me wonder how bad it would be to see things that way."
"Sure thing. I can tell the lady at the front desk that my girlfriend was outside, and she thought we should come say some prayers over him. She'll remember me since I was just in there."
Whippoorwill gives them a nod as they leave the bus, then occupies her time waiting by going back through the information on the killings.
"Sure thing. I can tell the lady at the front desk that my girlfriend was outside, and she thought we should come say some prayers over him. She'll remember me since I was just in there."
Violet smiles. "I was gonna go with the 'family' angle, but yeah, maybe they'll let the girlfriend in. I can do 'girlfriend' pretty well. Where'd we meet?"
Violet stands at the observation window, one arm around Rocket - ostensibly, it's because she is there for emotional support, but really, it's to help keep herself upright if something happens to rock her while she's working on the poor wounded lad's mind.
She reaches out to his sleeping mind and gently attempts to insert herself into his thoughts. She remains an observer for several cycles of his dream state, watching and waiting, to see what goes on in his mind.
After a few cycles, she introduces herself.
"Hello, (name). I'm Violet, and I'd like you to take a walk with me."
Violet will then proceed, ever so cautiously, to walk him along his path from that night, making sure to keep him calm, even as the events of the evening unfold. When (if) she gets to the point where the bad things start to unfold, she will remove him from the focal point of the situation - showing it to him from a detached observer standpoint, so that it is happening as if in a game or a movie, without emotion, without harm to him.
If necessary, she will convince him that this is all simply a bad dream, and when he wakes up - and he will eventually wake up - he will find himself motivated to double-down on his education, go for all the scholarships and grants he can find, and focus on working to help those with amputations or missing limbs, like himself. He'll become a great force for good, if he will let himself.
Eventually, she pulls herself out of the glassy-eyed trance she seems to have gone into, leans heavily against Rocket, and whispers "Food?"
Zach finds himself liking standing there with Violet's arm around him. Then--Wait, she's a psychic, she can totally tell if I'm liking her right?--tenses slightly.
When Vi pulls back, leans into him, and asks for food, Zach grins. "PBJ?" he asks, pulling two from his jacket pocket.
Violet looks at Zach, concern on her face. "What's wrong? Everything okay?"
When Vi pulls back, leans into him, and asks for food, Zach grins. "PBJ?" he asks, pulling two from his jacket pocket.
"I was thinking somewhere quiet, where I can gather my thoughts about what I just saw. Italian?"
She gives his arm a squeeze and nods out toward the outside world, beyond the walls of the hospital.
Briana tossed the last investigative report down onto the stack and pinched her brow in thought. She said a silent prayer that whoever was behind this was really a vampire wannabe with a trained lion like the police surmised. If it was a meta, though, they'd have to work together to find it and take it down.
And then what? she wondered. If we stop it, what do we do with it? She didn't like their options. Turning it over to the St. Louis police would be a good way to put more lives at risk if they tried to stick it in the local prison. Furthermore, it would likely get turned over to one these government groups that Ace and company were worried about. In the alternative, they didn't have the means to keep it contained at their own place.
Briana clenched her teeth reflexively, feeling a distant throb of remembered pain through her jaw. She did not want to give it over to Ace and Sanction for them to pronounce judgment. She felt a current of traumatic stress arc through her when she thought of Sanction and the beating she received from her. She hadn't been beaten like that since -- An image of her father flashes, superimposed upon Sanction's form as she towers over her broken form.
Briana nearly convulses as she forces the image away, suppressing a shudder that runs through her entire being. She tries to cover with a stretch and a yawn for the others in the bus, and she secretly hopes Violet's attention was elsewhere since she'd likely have felt that.
Acknowledge it. Accept it, but don't let it define you. It happened. But it won't control you, she recites. She rubs her eyes and tries to keep her hands from shaking.
The next serial killing should be in 8 to 12 weeks time frame.
The boy's brain is jumbled up, chaotic, unconscious. Pain slams into Violet, her fingers and toes aching from the frost bite. Flashes of family, school, fear of the cops, fear of other teenagers. It takes some effort of will to get through the chaos and into his memories. The unconscious mind having no direction, just random flashes and discharges.
Finally though, she manages to force her way into the boys memories. He may have some brain damage from the cold he was exposed to.
Memories flash by, a cute girl, blonde, with an accent, flirting with him. Words are distorted, probably the damage. The background is fuzzy, but she thinks it's some place on the college campus. The accent can't be made out due to the distortion.
Drinking, bar hopping, flashes of friends, the blonde, then the blonde leaves. Glancing at a clock, over and over, then leaving the friends in a bar.
Flashes of walking down to the arch, and the blonde again, waiting on a bench. A small expensive bottle in a paper bag, shared under the arch while watching the city lights. Kissing... The flavor of peaches...
Then pain, looking up... a flash of icy form. Someone else, indistinct feminine screaming... then the world goes white and there's pain... so much pain... so cold...
"I hate peaches," Violet mutters, rubbing her jaw. "I feel like someone just kicked me in the teeth."
On their way out of the Hospital, Violet pulls her phone out and sends a text to Whippoorwill's phone:
Hey, BB. What was that blonde girl's name we met at . Pretty sure she's in my Criminology class. Has she been sick? Haven't seen her in 4EVR. Like, at least since . Wasn't she from Europe? Did she go home 4 holidays? C U L8er, ILU! <3
Once they're out of the hospital and on their way to somewhere that serves a decent mushroom sauce, Violet will huddle up under Zach's arm in full Girlfriend Is Cold Because It Is Winter mode and start relaying to him via her Telepathy the things she saw and experienced during the Brain Hack. She parses it out a bit at a time until she knows he can handle the rush.
Those down by the arch looking up police records don't find any other criminal acts that night nearby. That is, nothing unusual, just the usual petty larceny, pick pocketing, etc that one finds in a city.
The cryptic text puzzles Whippoorwill for a bit while she tries to suss out what Violet meant.
"Okay, I think we're supposed to look for a blonde, from 'Europe' -- like that narrows it down much -- and we've got this bar where we should probably start our search," she announces.
After thinking a bit, she types a response to Violet:
IDK, u hung out w/ hr more. Europe's a big place, u kno--"
Rolling her eyes, she stows the phone and starts giving suggestions to Pulse and Aegis. "Check with the bar, blonde plus accent. I can only guess Violet saw her in Ritchie's mind, so match her description with his. Then we'll trace their steps to the Arch."
"There should also probably be a record somewhere of people here on holiday, maybe? I don't know... airport security probably keeps that sort of list. If she came here, killed someone with her powers, then headed back to Sweden, or whatever.." she shrugs. "There's a very obvious window of 'when they arrived', I think, if that's the case."
She sits for a moment, "We could also try and check CCTV. I can't really understand the feeds yet, but if we check around here for them, they might have seen something, if Vi found out what we should be looking for."
It occurs to Violet that her text might not have been as cleverly clear as it could be, as she reads Whip's text. She hastily replies:
IDK, u hung out w/ hr more. Europe's a big place, u kno--"
IKR? I couldn't figure her accent out & she nvr told me where she was from. I know she liked peachy booze. The expensive kind.
After sending the text, Violet looks at Rocket and asks:
"How quickly could you get to the bus, tell them everything I told you, and then get back here? Or should we just forget about refueling and get back to the group?"