|
Post by Zuyuri on Apr 11, 2016 2:05:11 GMT
Mosquitoes were buzzing, the dampness was getting lighter - but not by much, and the lichen was starting to sprout more patches of green. Green was growing on the moss in the trees, and even some of the water plants were beginning get greener...that is until something sped through it like an alligator or, well, moving feet, which revealed the brown green murk that was bayou water.
All units were being called to the bayou, with a meeting place near the 'yellow dock'. Shadow skidded to a stop at the meeting place where other police cars were waiting, their lights spinning. Behind him was Sunshine, who was giving Anna a lift to examine the body that was what was bringing the police over. Yellow tape was marked on the dock, with the words POLICE LINE DO NOT CROSS printed in bold. A few Other cops were mumbling protection spells to keep out any unwanted people coming in and messing with the crime; when death or potential homicides were involved, there couldn't be any chances.
"So," Shadow asked as he and Sunshine approached, "what are...." He cut off when they got closer to the body, his red eyes widening in shock. "...oh my God."
They were expecting a body mauled by alligators and/or weres, or a careless fisher. They weren't expecting this. It was a little boy, maybe eight or nine. His eyes were glazed over, and the skin color was no where near healthy, not counting the flecks of swamp muck stuck to the skin. Most importantly,he was floating, the only thing keeping him from going far away from the dock was the string of his hoodie having been snagged on a half-sunken log.
|
|
|
Post by neverlandlostgirl on Apr 11, 2016 2:34:46 GMT
A shadow beneath one of the trees that lined the shore seemed to quiver and vibrate even though there was no breeze to move the branches of the tree. Instead, the shadow consolidated into a tall, thin man who moved forward at a slow and measured pace over to where Shadow stood looking at the body. Even though his yellow eyes and dark air marked him out as demonic, there was no mistaking the golden badge of the BPD that he flashed at the other officers as he passed them.
He stopped beside Shadow and turned his own eyes upon the child that floated only several feet away and yet was beyond anyone's help now.
"I only just received the call a few minutes ago. Have we found the other bodies yet?" _____________________
"Thanks, Sunshine!"
Anna dipped beneath the yellow police tape and rose back up, pushing a strand of hair out of her face while also trying to ward off the swarms of mosquitos that clogged the crime scene. A large medical bag was clutched in her hand, a bright green covered in vine and flower prints, and she quickly switched it to her other hand before moving towards where Shadow and Pitch were standing.
"Sorry it took me so long to get here. I was getting my 7th cup of "Anna's special" coffee when the call came in and didn't hear the initial dispatch."
It was at this point that Anna came to a stop at the very edge of the water, her blue eyes looking down at the slightly swollen corpse that bobbed in the brackish water. She didn't say anything for a moment but instead seemed to become completely engrossed with the body, her eyes darting to every visible part of it and also to the surrounding areas.
Suddenly, she turned around, put a finger to her mouth and gave a sharp whistle to some of the nearby officers. Once their attention was focused on her, she snapped her fingers and pointed to the body.
"Oh boys, let's bring him in. And lets do it quick please, the gators are already far too interested."
As if to prove the point, on the other side of the bank something large and reptilian slid into the water and began to slowly close the gap between itself and the body.
|
|
|
Post by skyeknight on Apr 11, 2016 15:54:31 GMT
Aqua arrived on scene as they were bringing the small boy out of the water. After a moment to mask the shock that made itself apparent on her features, she slowly climbed out of the car. She could feel her heart sink as she did. Bodies were an unfortunate occurrence in the field. Being unable to stop the crime from happening and naturally the loss of life was always hard to deal with but... Children.
Cases with children were always the hardest. No matter how many cases she worked, the ones that involved children were always the toughest. Especially ones that ended like this. It felt like something had struck her physically and she was walking through glue as she joined the first responding officers at the side of the water where the boy was brought out. Her eyes became hard when she saw the state of the poor child. She was afraid to know how much he had suffered in his last moments.
Whoever did this was criminally inclined. Water was a strong forensic counter measure. It washed away trace evidence. Despite their coroner being quite gifted (if a little eccentric), Anna was going to have a tough time with this and her work was cut out for her. Whoever did this was awful. Aqua was driven now more than ever to catch the person who thought they could get away with something like this. Her hands clenched at her side. It didn't matter who caught the person as long as they were stopped.
"I can do an aerial sweep." Aqua volunteered.
Even if it was hope against hope, she wanted more than anything, not to find anymore victims (because she didn't want there to be anymore). Either that, or that if there was a victim, they had survived (against all odds). It was hard enough telling one family why their child was not coming home, let alone telling multiple families. And no one wanted to start throwing around the term serial killer because that would only insure panic in the community. But she knew all too well the look of heartbreak when the police had to come knocking to tell families bad news.
|
|
|
Post by Zuyuri on Apr 13, 2016 5:24:23 GMT
A loud splash and an angry hiss followed Anna's suggestion of getting the floating body out. Sunshine, wo was walking in the scene, had just come by. She stifled her mouth to cover her gasp. A kid. Why did it have to be a kid? She hiked up her skirt, pulled on a pair of rubber gloves that she carried, well Shadow had gloves constantly but that left her out of helping with bodies. and leapt into the bayou, wincing as she felt everything under the water come into contact with her skin. But she had to stay strong, making them see she wasn't just a girl who got lucky and escaped with a detective from vampires.
'Lower the gurney here," she told the officers, who were wheeling in a bed to pick up the child.
The device came down, and Sunshine very gently scooted the body onto the slab, the other officers helping by. As she was exiting, she grabbed her phone and began dialing. "I'm calling Pearl," she reported to her officers. "Yes, we have Anna here, but Pearl can help identify what else happened." _____________________ The body pickup was always the worst when in the bayou, Every time Shadow watched it go in, scoop up a body, it was like watching a twisted version of those fishing shows on the discovery networks. Pitch asked if other bodies had been found. While the golden eyed demon still gave him goosebumps, he maintained his aloof attitude. But since the Others Unit were a team, it was only fair to supply an answer.
"This is the first one we found. And if Anna's right, we should start looking fast before the gators find a buffet."
The Seelie recruit, Aqua, volunteered to do an aerial sweep. In perspective, that would be useful. A bird's eye view saved time and money on getting the swamp patrol and renting a helicopter. Sometimes having a Fae was a good thing, and she was definitely more eager to help than the Unseelie that was fired a few days earlier. Shadow adjusted his inhibitor rings, looking out at the rippling water.
'I'll go with Aqua to patrol the area," he volunteered, She'll take the air, I'll take the ground. If we find anything, we'll page you."
"Oh no you don't." Sunshine waded over. "I'm coming, too. We're a team, Shadow. Besides...I think we've got the analyzing of the body covered."
|
|
|
Post by neverlandlostgirl on Apr 14, 2016 3:24:11 GMT
Pitch watched from the shoreline as Sunshine and a group of officers set about the task of removing the body from the water and placing it inside a body bag on a gurney. However, he didn't move from where he stood and waited for Shadow's response. After several moments of watching the sad scene before them, he finally answered that this was the first body located.
Pitch nodded and finally turned his attention away from the child's body to Aqua when she offered to do an aerial sweep. Shadow quickly agreed to join her on the ground.
"I will take the shadows. If our assumption is correct, there are at least two more bodies in the area."
Despite the fact that he had said it was an assumption, Pitch's tone made it clear that he knew otherwise. Sunshine quickly stepped in to argue with Shadow about coming with him to search and the demon quickly took the opportunity to once more disappear into the shadows and begin examining the banks of the bayou.
______
"Thanks, Sunshine. I'll need Pearl's assist on this if we're ever gonna find anything. Also, let me know if you guys find any other bodies."
The thanks was for both helping to lift the body from the water and for making the call to her counterpart in forensics. She herself focused her attention on the remains of the boy, pulling on a pair of gloves and moving forward to examine the body more closely. After several minutes of looking at the body and lightly turning it as needed, she spoke to the group over her shoulder.
"Based on rigor mortis and lividity, I would place the time of death at roughly 14 hours ago. That would be around 1 A.M. last night."
She then gently pulled down the hoodie to reveal the boy's neck and examined his hands closely for several more moments.
"No bruising or scraping on the knuckles or face to indicate the victim fought back. Also, no signs of manual strangulation."
She suddenly opened the palm on the right hand. Her eyes widened before falling into a frown as she turned her blue gaze up to her coworkers.
"He's been marked, just like the others that we could find."
With that said, she turned the hand outward so that it could clearly be seen by everyone present. The pale skin of the palm was marred by a bloody indentation in the shape of a cross. The mark was unique in that at the end of each of the cross' points, what appeared to be small imprints in the shape of flowers were present. It was a mark that Anna had already examined on several other corpses.
"This is the La Llorona Killer's work."
|
|
|
Post by skyeknight on Apr 14, 2016 14:38:40 GMT
Aqua's heart sank over what Pitch said. Two bodies. Two more kids who would be reported. She closed her eyes. There was no point in focusing on that. Not right now. She had to find them first. So she took a few steps back, releasing the magic that kept up her more humanistic appearance. Once her wings formed, she took a running start and was in the air, wings beating fast to keep her up. She hated her appearance without the magic to make her look human. It always made people stare. Her features became far more delicate, her eyes had gone completely black not to mention the large blue wings on her back resembling something akin to that of a butterfly. None of that mattered right now. She was in the air and already scanning the ground for signs of the other children.
So much for her hope that there would be at least one survivor or no other victims. She let out a shaky breath as she began to fly over the bayou, trying to find any trace of a struggle or anything that shouldn't have been where it was. The tall grass was something difficult to see through, so she pushed it out of the side if it came down to it. She bit her lip when she saw a toy, floating in the water - a stuffed bear that hadn't become too waterlogged yet to sink beneath the surface of the water. She removed a pair of gloves from her back pocket and slipped them on before bringing the toy out of the water. If there was a toy nearby, there was most likely a child too.
"Let's try over here," Aqua called out to anyone who could have heard her.
She slowly started to fly again, still holding the soggy bear in her gloved hands, despite the fact it was dripping wet she did not move to wring it out. This time much slower in case this second victim left a trail or any other indication they were nearby. For all she knew, the bear belonged to the first victim. But she wasn't going to take any chances.
|
|
|
Post by Zuyuri on Apr 15, 2016 5:21:08 GMT
The only noises through the bayou were the buzzing noises of more than just mosquitoes. Aqua was flying up ahead while Shadow glided along the ground. The familar feeling of his jet skates pushing in and out with the slow rhythm of brushing noises was almost soothing. But he couldn't be too relaxed. Pitch had said there were two bodies. If the inspection of the bodies showed a mark Shadow didn't want to see again - he closed his eyes, trying to the shake the image out It had been a case that was supposedly closed after finding no leads. Yet the gruesome image of the victims...
[] The BPD cops had arrived in the Bayou to answer an Amber Alert. For an agonizing hour, there was nothing. But as Shadow had been speeding, a solo cop at the time, he had paused at seeing a pink coated hand in the bushes. He had parted them aside, gasping at the bloated body. Her left palm had been opened, and a hideous scorch mark uncannily resembling a cross on a chain stayed. The only name uttered was the frightened whisper of a Latino cop, 'La Llorona."[/i]
Aqua's call snapped Shadow out of the fog. She was holding a sodden teddy bear, which from the standpoint didn't appear to be holding anything heavy, it was just the swamp water soaking through the stuffing. "Good idea," he answered her suggestion.
Sunshine, who had been following the group on land, had just gotten there. She couldn't run as fast as Shadow, and although he had slowed down his basic speed, it was still quite the hike. She overheard Aqua suggest they search the area, and she nodded in agreement, grabbing her holster and keeping low and her hands on her gun. She had only taken one step when a bush behind her cracked. She whipped around, aiming for the bush but not firing.
"...Bellerouge Police!" she uttered shakily, her hands not moving. The rustling had stopped, and that was suspicious. It was probably a critter or something else. But as she turned away, the sun glinted at something which made her squint. And it was coming from the bush. She took a breath, shaking all negativity out. It was probab;y just a fog trick, but it couldn't hurt to look. She pated the branches and gasped. Sure enough, a little boy was floating nearby. His hand was up, revealing a very interesting shaped scar. Sunshine gasped shrilly, quickly swiping her com. "Guys, you may want to come by this fallen birch. I found another kid..."
|
|
|
Post by neverlandlostgirl on Apr 16, 2016 5:20:08 GMT
Suddenly the radio crackled into life once more and Pitch's calm but unhappy voice spoke.
"I've also just located a third set of remains by the Alma shack."
Pitch had been searching along the shoreline in the opposite direction that Shadow and Aqua had taken, using the shadows to jump from spot to spot along the water's edge. He hadn't seen anything until he saw several alligators thrashing near the shore, fighting over something small and pale and wearing what had once been pink pajamas.
He had gathered the shadows to his right hand before striking out at the large reptiles with a whip, causing them to lurch away from the body and quickly disappear into the murky waters of the bayou. Despite his quick actions, the gators had already managed to eat a fair portion of the body but not enough for him to see that this victim was a little girl.
"The victim appears to be female."
He spoke into his radio as he looked down at the floating pieces that had once been a child, his yellow eyes seeming to darken but his face remaining as impassive as always.
________
Anna had only just zipped up the body bag on the first victim and was watching the gurney being loaded into the back of an ambulance when Sunshine's voice quickly came across the radio, stating she had found another boy's body. A second later Pitch had also confirmed finding other remains, these of a girl. Anna quickly picked up the radio, mentally checking off the list that proved this was another triple homicide courtesy of the La Llorona killer.
Three children killed. Check. Two boys and one girl. Check. All bodies dumped into the river. Check. She wouldn't know if all of the victims had been drown until she got them back to the morgue and opened them up, but she was certain the results would be the same. And the markings.....
"Thanks. Just sit tight for the mo and make sure no one disturbs the crime scenes until we can get there."
|
|
|
Post by skyeknight on Apr 17, 2016 0:07:55 GMT
Aqua landed nearby Sunshine and Shadow. She sighed softly. She checked the area over for predators first. Then for anything that could have given any indication who could have done this to those poor children. There were no predators on this half which was rather lucky on their part. This was why she hated cases with children.
She knelt down, pressing two gloved fingers to the boy's rewrist. After a moment she shook her head. No survivors. Three sets of parents who would be getting a call from their office. Three sets of parents to visit the morgue to claim children who had gone too soon.
"Should we check for more children?" She asked, "Isn't the pattern three?"
|
|
|
Post by Zuyuri on Apr 17, 2016 6:16:45 GMT
((Skye, Rapunzel is not named Rapunzel, her name is Sunshine)) "Pitch just said he found one," Sunshine reported to Aqua. "Which means...yeah, we've got three." Her voice was quaking. Kids found all dead in a bayou. What a terrible place to die in. Or at least, all she hoped for was that the kids weren't dumped in here to just be alligator food. Heck, they were lucky to find kinds that didn't have chunks bitten out of them.
"And that means the pattern's been set." Shadow was looking hard at the mark on the hand Sunshine found. The La Llorona Killer; it was case he had been on, and when it shut down, it was a...mixed bag of emotions. "I'll explain it once we get back to the offices, but let's just say this is reopening a case we got long ago."
"You mean..." Sunshine's green eyes met Shadow's red, "this has happened before."
Shadow had to look away. It was so much to think about. He looked back at the rosary embedded in the hand of a little girl. For just the briefest of moments, the body wasn't that of a seven year old child. In its place was a blonde haired girl, about twelve or so. Her hair had been held back in a ponytail, and her eyes opened, wide and blue and filled with fear. He stepped back...and landed into the water. When he glanced back after getting algae enduced water on his face, the blonde girl was gone, and the pigtailed individual was back. The only blonde was Sunshine, looking at him with concern. To answer her question, he just curtly nodded. "We closed the case after running a few dead ends. But it looks like we're back in the game."
"Right," Sunshine mused. It wasn't like Shadow to suddenly get tense about a dead body. But for the briefest of moments, he had looked like he had seen a ghost. She'd ask him about it later, especially given that he didn't like to talk about the past - a past he vaguely remembered. "Aqua," Sunshine looked at the Seelie, "does that teddy bear have a name written on the tag? Maybe it can ID an victim."
|
|
|
Post by neverlandlostgirl on Apr 20, 2016 1:39:32 GMT
The shadows once again stirred as Pitch appeared only a few feet away from where the rest of his colleges had gathered around the second boy's body. A set of officers had already reached the third crime scene and were securing it as he shadow-jumped the short distance to join the others. His eyes instantly traced to the last victim as he listened to Shadow, Sunshine and Aqua speak. At the mention of the teddy-bear, Pitch nodded his head.
"The water may have damaged anything written on it, but forensics might be able to pull something off of it if we can't decipher a name."
His yellow eyes had remained on the body during that whole time but suddenly switched to Shadow when he mentioned something like this happening before.
"Perhaps you can better inform us more at the station."
He doubted any of them wanted to discuss the situation in more detail at the moment when one of the victims literally lay right before their feet.
_______
Anna had sent several other officers with basic forensic training to locate the other bodies and get them ready for transport to the BPD forensic labs.
"Ok everybody. Lets bag em, tag em and get em back to the morgue."
She spoke into the radio so that everyone could hear her as the first ambulance carrying the first victim kicked into gear and began to drive away, the silence of the sirens far worse than any blaring noise they could produce.
"I've got some bodies to examine. And we've got a La Llorona Killer to catch."
(End Thread?)
|
|